Chapter 1
1
Zima brought the glass to her scaly lips, gulping down the golden liquid within. It was common sense to not drink on the job, especially this one, but her stomach demanded a kick and she was more than happy to oblige.
The last drop of the wine passed through into her mouth, and she set down the glass, elbowing the counter in front of her. The barman noted her situation, and ducked beneath the bar for a new bottle.
This part of the club was quiet, but the silence she craved was drowned out by the cheers of both joy and frustration coming from every direction. To her left, humans and hybrids gathered around a table with a green mat on top of it, hitting ceramic balls with wooden sticks. Behind these tables were flashy slot machines that ate money and regurgitated it back if you fed it at least ten times. On her right, waiters passed through mazes of tables and served up dishes to hungry patrons. Upstairs was a mess of neon lights, though she hadn't been up there just yet.
She could feel dozens of sets of eyes on her back. She hated being watched. It made her too damn self-sensitive, too prone to the little comments people made about her when they thought she wasn't listening.
Worse now that I'm wearing this damn thing. She adjusted the shoulder strap of the very thing she was thinking about. There was no doubt that it was a source of all these stares. Not all, but most. She angled her inky, thinly-slit eyes over to the nearest observer.
He was a few seats down the bar, clutching a drink in both hands. The brute was a Muton, and he lacked the rebreathing gear most of his kind needed in order to survive in Earth's atmosphere. The alien grumbled some sort of word and shuffled away.
Mutie, she thought, and chuckled to herself. It was someone else's slur that she was remembering. Muton's were horrible, disgusting creatures that knew the only way through a problem was with a gun or a fist, sometimes both. Not to mention the stench they emitted. Animals who lived to kill, and killed to live. And they were allowed to roam in public, while hers was not?
She liked to think of herself as the Muties opposite. She was a collected, cunning creature, at least she thought of herself as so. Muties like this one had too much foreign DNA in their gene pool, made their faces look like something crossed between a frog and a human. Not that she didn't mind humans. Her... companion, if that was the right word, was human.
"You look horrible in red."
At first she thought this was her mind speaking, then a shadow fell over her side and she glanced over, slowly lowering an arm to her bag, sitting on the counter in front of her. It came with the costume.
The one who'd spoken plonked himself in the chrome stool beside her, and when she recognised the man's face her irises widened a little and she eased the tension that had grown in her tail. She gulped down the rest of her drink and set it down on the bar. She flicked her tongue out and eyed the barkeeper, silently asking for another refill.
"It's your kind's fault I've got to wear shit like this," Zima said, her long tail curling up against the cold steel of her seat. English sounded a little strange coming through her reptilian mouth. Her long tongue didn't make things much easier, especially any word with the letter 's'. Some words she couldn't even pronounce at all. Like Possession. All that came out was pisthissthis. Her companion had thought that was hilarious.
"It's my kind's fault for a lot of things, but you don't look half bad," the man replied with a smirk. Zima huffed. The barkeeper slowly refilled her glass. "Tempting, even - if you weren't in red, that is."
"And what colour would you recommend?" she asked. She put her snout into her palms and sighed, not really interested.
"Hm." She felt his eyes scan up and down her body. Him she didn't mind looking at her – she'd had her fair share of observations of his own features, most notably that odd but fascinating dark hair growing out of his scalp. She always had an excuse ready whenever he caught her staring.
"Let's see - slate-gray scales, ocean-blue eyes. Maybe... titanium white? Electric violet?"
"I wonder if your palette's starting to outgrow your ego."
"Oof," the man said, clutching his side like she'd stuck an imaginary knife there. Zima huffed again, but there was a little humor in this one. Daniel always had a way of making her do that. It was his prime directive most of the time when they were off duty.
"Is he here yet?" she asked, doting on her glass. Daniel shook his head, then waved the barkeep over.
"Should be around soon. Got a little time to kill, so I came over to chat."
"To get a drink, you mean?" she said, not hiding her annoyance. "You don't know me, remember? That was the plan we agreed on. What we always agree on."
"Right, right," Daniel said. He put on his most confident face, left eyebrow up, a little swagger in his shoulders. "I'm just a guy trying to chat up a snake-girl. And he already made her laugh once."
"Huff," she corrected. "Not a laugh, not a ha-ha, not even a tee-HEE. A huff."
He smiled at her. "Any way to make you 'tee-hee'? Like to see you do that one day."
"Buying me another round might help."
"Deal," he said, and then Zima was holding two glasses, with a third well on the way. "Dispatch won't be too happy about you drinking on the job, you know. I'd ask you to pace yourself, but, uh..."
"But my liver's better than yours," she said, tapping her nails on the rim of her glass. Ever since coming to earth she'd been hooked on the Blanc Sauvignon, or was it Sauvignon Blanc? Not as good as that fancy wine she'd tried back in France. What was its name? Chardonnay? What she wouldn't give for another sip of that swill.
"Also helps loosen the muscles," she said between gulps. She coiled her body a little tighter underneath and around her seat, a pleasant buzz going from her chest right down to the tip of her tail.
"We all know you've got no lack of those," Daniel said. One time he had seen her scrunch up an entire car chassis like it was a piece of paper. That mechanic never tried to inflate his prices again after that little argument.
They sat in companionable silence for a while, enough for other patrons at the bar to come and go twice over. Hybrids and aliens and humans alike, although the latter had the more dominant presence. She couldn't spy any of her own kind around, but then again why would they come to some flashy joint like this where people stared at numbers all day hoping the odds shifted in their favor? She couldn't even eat anything off the menu, but that didn't surprise her.
Apparently, her kind 'unsettled' the earthlings after one of her long-distant sisters demonstrated her wicked poisonous potential in front of a group of people. Two women had suffocated, almost died. Fear spread like a disease among humanity, and thus her kind's image was changed forever. It had been an honest mistake, but that changed little for Zima. Even her own species wasn't above her ridicule.
She opened her mouth to ask her companion something, but Daniel beat her to it. Just before sipping his drink with his eyes slightly angled upward, he said, "He's here. Second floor. Plump dude."
Daniel had some sharp eyes, but she had an advantage in terms of peripheral. Up and behind her on the balcony, the entry door there had opened and in walked two men. One plump, as Daniel so quaintly put it, wearing a vest that bulged a little just above the waistband of his jeans, and one impossibly skinny, who wore a black business suit like some old-world agent. The skinny one adjusted his spectacles, his eyes darting all around in suspicion of everything.
The large one wiped his brow with a little handkerchief before moving off to the right. His escort waited a few seconds before following.
The big man put a hand on the guard rail and walked towards the right, into a space dominated by game tables. It was the most popular part of the club. Some of the games involved little balls spinning on rotating dials, landing randomly on numbers. Others sported pairs of cards snipping onto tables as the hands were dealt. Chips, the alternate form of currency around here, clinked together as they passed from hand to hand in large clumps. No matter how many times she'd asked Daniel to explain the rules she never got why people took impossible risks. "For the thrill," he had said. Still, most of them looked happy enough. At least on the outside.
"Looks like the Chancellor's in the mood for some gambling," her companion said. Daniel finished his drink, smacked his lips, and stood up. "Shall we?"
"Let's," she agreed. She uncoiled herself out of her seat, stretching her back to numb the kinks in her joints. As she did a little bit of cloth from her dress rolled up itself just below her waist. She corrected it with a talon before picking up her bag. The damn dress was way too tight, but it did its job well, hugging her curvy body and defining her humanoid upper body. At first she had protested the idea. Dispatch was going way too far this time, making her look like some whore. The pricks told her to deal with it. It was only after Daniel had so bluntly put it that she'd eventually gave in.
"Everyone's gotta be looking at you when I make my move," her partner had said. "But if you really don't want to, we can think of something else."
She didn't want Dispatch hearing of any deviancy, and decide to suck it up and go ahead with it. And what very efficient eye-candy she made. Not two seconds after walking in she had to retreat to the bar to get a slice of privacy. Now it was time to put it to the real test.
She slithered up the stairs to the next floor, bag slung over her shoulder. When she came into the borders of the casino, even more eyes crawled over her, like tiny little bugs, and the Chancellor's was the most oppressive of them all. The plump man was in the middle of making a bet when his beady eyes locked onto her body. His lower jaw dropped and he stuttered as he made his bet, putting all his money on red, no doubt because of her choice of clothes. Maybe this was the right colour.
She positioned herself between the Chancellor and his escort, who had put his thin frame a few meters away by a set of stairs, where he could get some height. The escort seemed a little dissuaded by her presence, but kept his eyes alert and swiveling. Zima leant against a pillar and pretended to look bored, lazily looking around until her eyes set on the Chancellor's own. The moment she did, the man looked away, a flush in his cheeks.
"'Scuse me," Daniel said, sliding past her, grin on his face. It would have been difficult to listen in on Daniel as he moved into the noisy crowds, had she not been bred as a master of infiltration. She angled her head a little and zoned in her hearing, blocking out the clinking of chips, the buzz of the neon dollar-signs, and the woops and shouts of the winners and losers.
Daniel strode confidently towards the Chancellor's table, his breath cool and even. He could be serious when the situation called for it. For whatever reason he seemed rather lax when he was around her. She'd heard he was never that way around any of his previous partners.
He took a seat directly to the Chancellors left, and eyed the game with his brow raised. When the new round came up, he put a bet on the number eighteen. By some fortune the little ball landed on his number, and he was given a modest sum of chips by the dealer. Zima quickly checked on the thin man. He was busy looking at a group of hybrids over at another table. A few minutes went by, and Daniel began to hit a running streak that eventually caught the Chancellor's attention.
"You're doing well there, son." He eyed Daniel's pile of not-money with obvious envy.
"Yes sir," Daniel said. "Guess Lady Luck's smiling on me tonight."
"And she's spitting on me behind your back," the man said, chuckling a little. "At least I know the owner deserves our support. Did you know she's a hybrid? Came right out of an ADVENT prison camp, poor thing. But fortunately she had a powerful friend to help her out, if you know what I mean."
"Maybe I do. Maybe… Wait a tick," Daniel said, face brightening as if realising something suddenly. He squinted across at the man, who looked a few years older than him. "You're... You're not the Chancellor Ramos, are you? From the radio?"
"Last time I checked," Ramos confirmed. He beamed. "You a fan?"
"Ever since you got elected!" Daniel agreed. "I can't believe it! What are you doing in a crummy place like this?"
"What everyone else does," Ramos said, raising a plaintive hand. "Us politicians need some time off too, you know."
"But aren't you scared?" Daniel said, putting a little awe in his tone. "Everyone knows Advent's got a tight hold on this part of town."
"High risk, high reward," Ramos said. "A little like this damn game of roulette. Funny how that is, huh? Don't worry about me - Advent can't do nothing to me in public like this. Bad press is the last thing they need. And I've got an escort just in case. He'd probably want me to stop talking to you, but what the hell, right?"
"Geez, I couldn't imagine being in your shoes," Daniel said. Zima thought he was going a bit overboard with the whole charade, but Ramos looked to be the kind of guy who liked admirers recognising him, drinking in the fame as greedily as she herself drank wine. "All that running around, openly backing the resistance wherever you go, bringing down the Elder's grip on our world one peg at a time. You're practically a hero round these parts."
"Oh I wouldn't call myself that," Ramos said. "The real heroes are the men and women out there, fighting off Advent's tyranny directly. I'm just a mouthpiece who can't even hold a gun like it wasn't a piece of wood, but that doesn't bother me much."
"Better to be out of the fight than in, eh?"
"You bet. But the fight's going to come here soon, just have to hold on a little while longer. City's flipping and shuffling as we speak, and people like you are going to be finally free."
"Free to gamble in peace?"
"If that's what you want. Once we've rid this City of Advent's already weakened shadow-government, people's lives can start to go back to normal. No more assigned places in society, no more obsessive security, no more providing your ID to every lamppost you walk beneath. True freedom, like we had before the Invasion."
"This is all music to my ears, Chancellor."
"Call me Ramos."
They continued to game and chat, but not to the point where Zima became bored. Daniel made his move when his winning streak suddenly broke, and most of what he'd won tonight was taken away. Daniel frowned, threw up his hands and loosed a frustrated sigh.
"You were really going there, friend," Ramos said. He looked disappointed too.
"Guess all my luck's finally gone out," Daniel said. He made to stand. "And I think we should go out too."
"What?" Ramos stuttered, shocked and confused at the same time. "N-No, thank you. I'm going to stay for a bit and-"
"Back exit, now," Daniel insisted. "Don't even think about yelling." Zima could barely see from her angle, but Daniel lifted his coat a little, and the handle of a plasma pistol stuck out just a tad. The Chancellor looked from Daniel to the weapon, then back to Daniel again.
"You're making a big mistake!" Ramos said, his voice cracking on the last syllable. He slowly moved out of his seat. Daniel grabbed him casually by the sleeve.
"We've all made a lot of those, my friend. And one more's not gonna make me feel any worse. Let's go."
Daniel's free arm dropped to his coat. Only Zima could hear the little whir of the pistol warming up. A sudden movement to the side pulled her into action. The bodyguard was the only one that had noticed Daniel forcing the Chancellor out of his seat. He made a little gasping sound, almost like a hiss, and reached into his suit. He drew an old-world nine-millimeter. Zima was on him before he could switch the safety.
Like slapping a troublesome child, Zima knocked the pistol away with a quick backhand. It clunked onto the nearest roulette table and settled beside someone's pair of aces. The gamblers there continued to call their bets. The bodyguard tried to retrieve his weapon, but she pressed all her weight up against him and slammed him into the wall. He looked up at her and snarled, ready to fight, but when she slipped her wicked fangs from there sheaths, and let loose a very loud and intimidating hiss, the colour, and the fight, drained from his bony face.
Zima let a moment pass before retracting her body and teeth. The man's hands were shaking. She flicked her tongue and tasted his fear, just to be sure he would not follow. "Some bodyguard you made," she teased, and turned her back on him. She caught sight of Daniel's sleeve as he slipped quietly through the rear entrance. They had bribed the guard to take a good long break tonight. She let a few seconds go by before slithering over that way.
She clutched the handle and opened the door. Back on the casino floor the bodyguard was still in shock, and when some passing-by hybrid stole his weapon from where it lay he didn't even react. She chuckled at the sight before leaving the warm interior and out into the chilly night air.
The alley was dark and mostly empty. Far down into its depths a cat rummaged through a bin. It took one look at her and jumped up to a fire-escape stairwell, where it perched itself on the railing, staring down at her with its big green eyes. In the other direction a little bit of light from the main street spilled through the mouth of the alley. She watched a moment for any traffic, but none existed at this hour. Satisfied they were alone; she turned her attention to the alley's only other occupants.
"-is it you want?" the Chancellor was saying. Daniel had him pressed up against the brick wall of the club. The fluorescent lightbulb above the door was a dim source of illumination, and the two humans were standing just inside of its cone of light. Ramos' eyes were bulging in their sockets. "I have money in my front pocket. You can have it! Have it all!"
"This isn't about money," Daniel said. He was rummaging inside his coat for something. "It's about you, Ramos. We need your support."
"Support?" Ramos turned his head and noticed Zima, then proceeded to moan pathetically. She almost felt sorry for the poor fool. Almost. "I'll do whatever you say, just please... please don't-"
"Oh, not us," Daniel interrupted. "Our employers want your help. Went to a good bit of trouble to find out your schedule. And I didn't mean to imply a choice, by the way."
"Employers? Who are...?" She saw Ramos' face drop in sudden clarity. "Advent. You're Advent, aren't you?"
"Bingo," Zima said. Ramos looked at her stupidly, as if he'd never heard a Viper speak before.
Something up above them caught her eye. The cat was still up there, but something about it had changed. The eyes, they were too circular, and there were no irises either.
What happened next was the first time tonight that she felt a tiny boost of adrenaline course her veins. Whatever strength Ramos had been holding back until now he let loose with a shout, shoving all his weight right into Daniel's chest, who gave off an "Oof!" and fell to the pavement.
"Now! Shoot them!" The Chancellor started to bolt, but Daniel threw out an arm and knocked one of his ankles. Ramos lost his balance before and fell face-first to the ground. Zima would have been there to stop him, but she was busy discovering that the thing she presumed to be a cat was no longer the case. Up there was a man holding a rifle, the barrel aiming right at her head.
She reached into her bag for the weapon she carried, while at the same time throwing herself to the right. She would later tell Daniel that she had felt the air of the bullet brush over the scales of her hood, it was that close. Right before she hit the ground she produced her own weapon and pulled the trigger, a bright flash from the weapon momentarily lighting every surface of the alley a lime-green colour. She landed on her elbow and grunted.
A satisfying choking sound let her know her aim was true, and the man's rifle fell out of his limp hands. She watched it fall and clatter right next to Daniel's leg, who had dived and pinned the fleeing Ramos while she did the shooting. Her heart thumping, she put the weapon back in her bag.
Daniel folded Ramos' arms behind his back, and put his weight on top of him. The Chancellor struggled while her companion removed a little vial of blue liquid from his pocket. Ramos saw this and struggled much harder.
"No!" Ramos pleaded. "No no no no! Please don't do this! You don't know what it's like!"
Zima didn't know what Ramos referred to. The drug in Daniel's hand, the interrogation that would come soon, or the Elder's fury. All would be very unpleasant. Daniel undid the stopper and brought the vial down.
"Rule number one, Ramos," Daniel said. "Never turn your back on Advent. Deep breaths, now."
Daniel flipped the vial onto his hand and poured a small amount of liquid onto his finger. He brought his digit to Ramos' nostrils and smeared the stuff on his face. The drug had an almost immediate effect – droopy eyes, slurred voice. Yet the Chancellor managed one last drawled message before losing consciousness.
"You have to fight it! The Network doesn't have as strong a hold as you think! Don't let... Let it..."
The sound of a skull hitting the pavement. Ramos began to snore. "Shit," Daniel said, getting off his knees and dusting his pants off. He put the vial away and looked up at the sniper's body. "He had another bodyguard! They told us he only had the one." Daniel sighed, ran his hand through his hair. "Good shooting, by the way."
She shrugged, though inwardly she was trying to suppress her emotions. It had all nearly fell apart in two seconds, if she hadn't noticed the second guard... Maybe drinking wasn't such a good idea, now that she reflected on it. Though it had been a long time since anyone had ever got the drop on them during an operation.
"And what was that he said about the Network?" Daniel asked. "'As strong a hold as we think'? What does that mean?"
Zima had no idea. The Psionic Network felt as powerful as it had ever been. No one had ever weakened it, no one had ever broken free of it. And why would they? She was surrounded by such an open feeling, like a constant warm presence in the back of her consciousness. Daniel had described it well when he'd first been connected, like someone's opened up all the doors in my head.
When she didn't reply Daniel frowned, and changed the subject. "I'll move Ramos. You go get that guy up there."
He took the Chancellor by the armpits and started dragging him deeper into the alley. Ramos snored as he was taken, a frown on his face like his dreams were troubling him. Zima huffed an affirmative and moved so she stood directly beneath the sniper's position. She put her bag down, pressed up against the smooth bricks as hard as she could, and slithered up the wall. Her body made crooked 's'-shaped patterns as she ascended, her hands and muscular tail finding good purchase. She caught the railing of the fire escape before gravity could puller her back don, and slung herself onto the nest using her capable arms.
The sniper was human, male, and unremarkable. He wore military-grade night vision goggles, the source of the inhuman eyes that had been watching her for who knows how long. She would later berate herself for not noticing sooner. She pulled the goggles away with a claw, but didn't recognise the face underneath. There was nothing in his pockets, though she did notice he wore a Kevlar vest packing a few extra rifle bullets. It seemed a little overprotective for a lowly Chancellor who preached to the masses through a radio shack, safe and hidden somewhere in the slums.
She snorted in disgust as she awkwardly handled the corpse. The human was warm in her palms. Once she had it firmly over her shoulder she jumped fearlessly over the railing and into the air. She coiled her tail halfway down the fall, and landed with a heavy crunch on the concrete, the muscles in her tail seamlessly absorbing the impact.
She joined Daniel a little way down the alley. Two dumpsters stood against the next connected building behind the club, one was green, the other red. With one arm Daniel lifted the lid of the red one. Her companion carefully placed the Chancellor inside the bin. They were told not to harm him at any point. Once he was done, Daniel motioned for her to come closer.
He took the dead man by the legs while she had the arms. On the count of three they heaved him up and over the lip of the dumpster, a less graceful display compared to Ramos' placement. By some ill fortune Zima lost her grip on the assassins' sleeve and had to quickly clamp down on the arm to keep him from falling. She felt muscles and bones shift under her fingertips. She suppressed a shiver.
It took a few clumsy moments, but they managed to neatly fit both bodies inside. With a loud bang she shut the lid and wiped her grimy hands on her dress, giving it two little smears across her abdomen. It would have been a pain to clean if she were planning to keep it, which she wasn't. The Chancellor would wake up in a few hours, but he'd be out of there long before that happened.
Daniel lowered to a crouch and produced a pen. With it he drew a little symbol on the side of the dumpster. It looked like the letter A, but without the horizontal slash, and he added two short prongs flicking out from the bottom points of the letter. Not Advent's symbol, but similar enough for the right people to recognise.
"All right," Daniel said, looking at his watch. "A little late, but it's done. Let's grab the Chaser and get outta here."
The alley split off into two directions. Together they moved down the path on the left, and the darkness swallowed their forms.