Hunter got his deck set up, and all the hitcher jacks set up, fanning out cables so that the rest of the team could connect up to his system and ride along as he entered the matrix. Most of the team got set up fairly quickly, with Aswon being the last as usual – struggling as always to get the sensors threaded through his dreadlocks. Eventually, though with a little help, he too was set up, and they could start their run.
Hunter funnelled his mind into the matrix through the ranch's connection, dragging along the rest of the team behind him as if they were kites trailing behind on a piece of string. He quickly dived through the local telecom grid and hopped up to the regional level, jumping across the ocean in a blink of an eye and descending into the North American grid, and then down into a seedy digital city, full of random bits of code blowing down narrow tunnels, littered with the wrappers of old programs and discarded hardware, before they arrived at a set of steps leading down to a basement. He fed in a long series of numbers from his invitation into the lock by the door, and it seemed to grudgingly accept them and let the door swing open, allowing them to enter. Hunter walked in first, followed by the floating icons of the rest of the team, all displayed with the default user motifs, a plain unanimated persona with minimal details.
The room was dark, but not black – in fact, the walls seemed to be trying to be black, but were instead a very dark grey, as if they were approximating black but with a strong backlight, giving the room a slightly surreal appearance. A door on the other side of the room was at an odd angle, higher on one side than on the other, and was made up of flat colours, two different shades of the dull brown giving it very primitive shading.
The door swung open, distorting as it swung towards them as the perspective changed but the display didn't, looking false and unreal, and a figure entered the room. Wearing a black suit and with a shock of styled blonde hair balanced atop his head, he looked as fake and artificial as the room did – in fact he looked worse. As he stopped moving, the team could see that his model or avatar was blocky and angular, made up of large triangles that were easy to distinguish. He flashed a smile at them, his lip pulling back in an equally angular smirk, revealing brilliantly white teeth, then shoved the door shut with his hand. As it closed, the walls rippled, and long lines of neon green, blue and purple started to track across them at crazy angles, scrolling from top to bottom or side to side. Each wall contained only one colour, but the lines met up at the intersections, tracking the movement of their neighbours as they moved about.
"Hello there. I'm Mr. Johnson."
"Of course you are. I am Marius, and this is the rest of my team. You asked for a meeting?"
"Indeed – straight down to business I see. Nice. Ok, then. I have an urgent mission, and according to my database, you're assets that have been used before, and you seem to be available."
"Marius – the scrolling lines are interference patterns, a rotating cypher. This room's pretty secure – about as secure as we're likely to get over the public network. We should be safe to talk." Hunter sent over his private channel. He continued to examine the room carefully, looking for any signs of trace ICE or bugs, or anything else that worried him.
"I see. Well, we are available." Marius replied after a moment. "But it depends on the nature of the job, of course."
"Well, I have need of a fast team, able to get to a location quickly, but then to perform a very stealthy insert to a facility. Tough facility, very tough. Going to need some skilled operators to get past the defences. You're likely to hit monitored airspace a good fifty klicks out, and secure airspace for the last ten. Once you manage to get on site though, you need to enter a very specific building, with its own layered defences – quietly. Once in there, that's where your decker goes to work – we've got a data plant we need sorting, also nice and quiet. It's going to be tough, like I said. Air-gapped systems, secure server room, red-rated host with a whole chunk of ICE on it. But we need you to ghost in there, drop the payload and then exfil – all nice and cool, and on the down-low. Can do?"
"Hah. That does not sound like us." Aswon snorted, then held up his hand in a subtle apology to Marius and took half a step back, ceding the conversation back to him. The Johnson turned to face the pilot, too, and cocked and eyebrow – or rather the two triangles that made up that part of his face changed shape a little.
"There is a certain element of truth to that statement. Though we have performed a number of stealth insertions before, and our transport is fairly subtle in flight, it is not small or easily overlooked on the ground."
"And I'd need a better deck than this, by the sounds of things!" Hunter added. "Unless that's on the table as part of the pay?"
"Subtlety is not always our strong point," Tads added, muddying the waters even more.
"Subtle-side aside, Hunter actually has the most important factor here. We could probably get in without being detected – we have done so before. A number of times. But while he is good with what he has to work with, he does not have a cyber-deck worthy of the name. He is an information retrieval specialist, or perhaps a top-flight researcher. He is not a decker. Not by the normal understanding of the word." Marius shrugged, and glanced over at Hunter, hoping that he hadn't caused offence with his assessment – but Hunter seemed to agree with him completely.
"Can you loan us equipment? If not included in the pay of the job, can you make something available to use on the mission, and be returned afterwards?" This time it was Kai raising the question, indicating that he was seriously contemplating the job offer. "Or can you get us a decker that we can ferry in to do that part of the mission?
"Ahh – unknown. I'm sure we have such things somewhere in the corporation, and we could get hold of them. But I don't know if we can do that in time… hmmm." The triangles of his face distorted and protruded, perhaps representing a frown. "I'm not sure we could get it to the location in the next two days, not quietly. And almost certainly not an operative with the right skills that cannot be traced back to us."
"Where is the site? In rough terms." Marius asked, then nodding thanks to Hunter as a Mercator projection map appeared to float in front of him.
"The…um…. Ah… The western Pacific coast."
"And we need to be there in two days to carry out the job?"
"Yes. Like I said, it's urgent. We need a fast team. Your name came up. You've got gamma clearance and everything…"
"I have no idea of the relevance of that. But it would take us longer than that to work our way around to the West Coast of the UCAS. I am assuming Seattle here, rather than the Tir or one of the Native American Nations?"
"And you don't have a computer expert on call then? A decker of your own? Really?" He glanced over at Hunter and fixed him with a look – probably. With the low resolution it was hard to work out if he was trying to stare Hunter down, or had gone slightly boss-eyed.
"We do not like to turn down paying jobs – but this sounds like it is too fast, too far, and too risky. We do not have a decker of the required quality to penetrate an offline secure host – not and do it leaving no trace."
"Would you if I was offering half a million?"
"No."
"Oh." The Johnson looked a little disappointed, perhaps hoping that the sight of a nice juicy carrot would have provoked a different reaction.
"We need to do our research on the target – our due diligence. We will not rush into a situation like this. Not for that little money." He sniffed a little, indicating that he wasn't so cheaply bought or so desperate that he would abandon caution just for a six figure payout. "Perhaps if you were able to supply some personnel, or a top-grade deck, we might reconsider. But I think our answer here will remain a no."
"Awww… crap. Well that just sucks ass. I had high hopes for you guys." His voice whined a little, but Marius remained firm.
"I wish you well in finding another team. But this is not for us."
"And you don't know anyone, do you? I could probably spring for a finder's fee, or an introduction bonus?"
"Hmm. Perhaps. We do know someone with the requisite decking skills – in Seattle, that is – but we have only worked with them once."
"Oh – just to clear up. When I said western Pacific coast, I was thinking more like… sorta around the Japan kind of area. Roughly. Not the UCAS or NAN."
"I see." Marius zoomed the map in, looking down at the area around Japan – focussing on the area from the edge of the Yakut nation, past Vladivostok, the Japanese home islands, and down towards Korea and Mongolia. "That does not help matters – we would definitely be short on time to try and collect him, then return. Excuse me." He swapped to their internal channel, then glanced over at Aswon. "Spook? Or someone she knows?"
"Not sure dragging the Triads into this is a good idea – especially if we don't actually know the target yet. Could get really messy."
"True enough. Perhaps Germaine?"
"Now there's a thought – at least they'd be local to us. We could try – but I think she'd want more time than this, too, and adding on the fee for a contractor, might really dent the pay packet – even one as big as this. What do you think, Kai?"
"I'm actually not liking the sound of this – it sounds too rushed, and too disorganised. No clear info, just telling us how hard it will be. I'm actually thinking we should pass. The money is nice, but I don't like the risks to get it."
"I'd have to agree. Even if we could find a contractor, and Germaine vouched for them – would we want to go on a mission this risky with untested blood? I'm with Kai – stick to your guns and tell him this isn't for us."
"Well, crap. I'm gonna have to scoot it seems." The Johnson's announcement forestalled any further discussion, and Marius turned back to face him. "You kids take care – but this isn't going to work. I need to bounce." He opened the door again in all defiance of 3D space and seemed to sidle sideways through it before disappearing into the darkness. A moment later the scrolling lines stopped, then faded away, leaving them in the slightly grey featureless room.
"Well, maybe we should take that as a compliment," Tads said brightly. "They sound like they think you're the absolute business with computers, Hunter!"
"It actually worries me that they think that – means their intel about us is off. Right – I'm heading out of here. Hang tight." He quickly retraced his steps, the grids passing by in a blur of light as he headed his consciousness back to the ranch, then jacked out of his deck. The rest of the team started to blink and sway a little as the real world intruded on their digital vision, before things steadied down a little and they started to peel off the 'trode nets from their heads.
"Ok, so that one's a bust. I'm going out for a hike." Hunter announced, shutting down his deck with a firm motion. "I'll be up in the hills." He headed out, snagging his assault rifle on the way to the rear of the ranch and the path that lead to the east, climbing slowly up into the bluffs. The rest of the team dispersed as well, each heading off to take care of their own business or tasks. As soon as Hunter was away from the others, he pulled out his commlink and composed a brief message to Julius, his friend at Ares, asking him to get in touch, then started to pick up the pace and push himself to a brisk run, eyes scanning the ground ahead as he started to pound out the distance.
It was about eleven thirty when Kai got a call – the prefix indicating it was coming from an Indian grid, through the actual number wasn't displayed. He made a mental bet with himself as to who it could be – then answered, and immediately lost, recognising the voice and sight of his friend Jahnu Sidana. He looked to be out in a street somewhere, a riot of colour and sound behind him.
"Hey Jahnu, how are you? Where are you?"
"Just wandering the streets, Kai, this is not a conversation for the office. I just wanted to check in with you, and see if you're available for work? And if you're still in the area?"
"We're not that close to you right now, but we can get there reasonably quickly. Well, within a couple of days, if need be. What's the problem?"
"I have some people, wanting to hire a team. To perform an extraction of someone – willing, I should add."
"Well, that answers the first question – and that's good. We don't generally touch kidnapping and the like… but rescues, yeah – we can look at that. Do you have any details on who, or where, or when – anything in fact? And how personal is this for you?"
"It's not anyone I know directly – more of a friend of a friend. But they could be…good friends, if I was to help them out. Very powerful, good friends. I don't think I would be their enemy if I was not able to help them, but I'd much prefer them to be my allies."
"I think I see. Ok, what else do you know?"
"Not a lot – I was asked if I knew someone that could help out, with an extraction. High value target, from a secure location. Needs a competent team who can work well together to overcome some security."
"Well, we can certainly have a look. Do you have any ideas on payment? Or the form of payment?"
"They mentioned a hundred thousand Nuyen."
"Ok… well, hmm." Kai considered for a moment, thinking about the costs they were likely to incur. Jahnu was based in New Delhi, so they were going to spend a good amount of money on fuel to get there and back, and that would probably put a good dent in even a hundred thousand paycheck. "I need to check with the rest of my team. We'd need a lot more details, but in principle – sure, we're interested. What I'd say is that maybe let your friends know that we move more than people, and we like moving exotic goods. And we don't necessarily have to take payment in Nuyen. Fuel and goods would be considered, too. Just throwing that out there!"
"Ok, I can let them know. What is the next step?"
"Give me a minute, just to shout out to the team. Just putting you on hold." He hit the right key to park the call, then fired up the team channel. "Everyone, got another possible job. If you can head to the kitchen, got a caller on the line…" He headed to the table and sat, taking Jahnu off hold and chatting to him about inconsequential stuff until at least a few of the team had arrived and found themselves a drink and a chair. "Right everyone, got my mate Jahnu on the line. He works for the border force in India, based out of New Delhi, but this isn't an official job. He's got some friends of friends needing a hand, doing a willing extraction of target from a secure location. Pay is hundred kay, base offer. That's as far as I've gotten."
"Where is Hunter?" Marius looked around, then scowled, and closed his eyes for a moment, mentally trying to work out the distances involved. "We are probably looking at 40% of the mission pay on fuel, just to make you aware."
"Ow – that's a good chunk. Unless that's just a starting bid of course." Aswon added.
"It is – but Jahnu is a good friend, so if we can help him out, that's a good thing. And he's been helpful to us too – he's clued us in on a fuel stop we needed. And it wasn't his fault those nutty elf wannabe's were there, and we avoided them, before anyone says anything… right, taking him off hold. Jahnu? Right, I've got most of the team here, and have told them what you told me."
"Right… um, hello friends of Kai. I do not know what else to mention?"
"Well, ok – is the job near you, for starters?"
"Oh, no – that much I know. It does involve crossing a border though, so that is part of the danger. But the distance is not much."
"Crossing a border? Ok, well, that much we are specialists in, so that shouldn't be a problem."
"That makes it either Pakistan, Bangladesh, Nepal or technically Kashmir, depending on who you believe." Marius theorised. "Pakistan is likely to be the hardest as the countries have a great deal of antipathy towards each other, Kashmir is a warzone so dangerous, but not as heavily patrolled, and both Nepal and Bangladesh should be relatively easy. At least I believe so anyway."
"As long as it's not Tibet!" Aswon retorted. "But I don't think anyone is crazy enough to pitch that as a job, and not mention it straight away."
"Ok, Jahnu. I think this is doable. The pay may need a little negotiation, but we'll have to see. But we need some more details."
"I will speak with my contact. Can you set up a meeting room to discuss this? And pass me the details?"
"We can. Our computer guy is out at the moment, so we need to get him back here." Kai glanced over to Aswon and made a gesture, tapping his mouth and ear, getting a nod in return. Aswon stood and headed out of the back and tried his commlink first, putting in a call to Hunter, before breaking into a run and heading up towards the hills. He might be out of cell range, but the team headsets had pretty good range, and he wouldn't have to go far to be able to call him directly and ask him to get back to the ranch as soon as possible. Kai meanwhile continued with the call – "We'll get a meeting room set up and the details over to you, and start preparing ourselves for the job."
"Very good, Kai, thank you. I will speak with my contact and let them know, and I will speak to you again. Soon, I hope." Jahnu ended the call, and Kai grabbed a quick drink and looked around.
"No idea who the target is, but a quick extraction shouldn't be too much trouble, right?"
"It depends. Let us hope we are not breaking a mass-murderer out of prison, or some kind of genocidal monster."
"Well, if it is, then we extract them, deliver them, get paid, and then I hit them with a lightning bolt and make them explode." Tads said offhandedly, getting a variety of looks from around the table. "Only if they deserve it." She shrugged a little. It wasn't as if she was going to go looking for an excuse to kill anyone, but they had to know by now that she wouldn't stand idly by and let people get away with some things.
"Ooooo kaaay…." Kai grinned at her, then continued. "Now – language wise, I think Hunter speaks a couple of languages from that way, and Aswon is bound to pick them up quickly. And I'm assuming, Tads, that you can do your mind linking thingy if we need it?" She nodded to him. "Good – so we should be able to communicate ok over there. And a lot of people are going to speak English too, so we can always fall back on that."
Aswon returned shortly thereafter, letting them know that Hunter was on the way back. A few minutes later the massive ork turned up, dripping with sweat from his fast run back to the ranch. They packed him off for a quick shower, then filled him in on the job offer. A few minutes later, he'd fired up his deck and created a meeting space on the Matrix, doing his best to secure it from intruders or any data intercepts, then passed over the details to Kai to forward on to Jahnu.
"Right – who wants to pick their avatar?"
"We can look different?"
"Of course, Tads. You just let me know what you want, and I can make you look like that – within reason. The deck doesn't have unlimited memory, but it should be enough…"
While they waited for the contact to come back to them, Hunter created some personalised avatars and icons for the team. Aswon went for something close to his actual appearance, but with a very large hat, while Shimazu chose an animated sword that floated through the air. Marius had a fighter jet, while Kai stuck with a fairly bland and generic representation of a Mongol horse rider. Tads agonised for a while, but eventually plumped for a tiny quoll, customised with even smaller elk-antlers growing out of the head.
They arrived in a meeting room, a bland corporate office with video screens adorning the walls showing profit and loss graphs, and work desks that seemed to stretch off into infinity behind them. Each of the team appeared near a large screen and a manager's desk, waiting for their guest to arrive. When the door opened from the 'corridor' leading to the local grid, an anonymous generic icon floated in. As soon as the door closed, securing the meeting room, the icon turned towards them.
"I am Singh."
"I'm Kai – I believe we have a mutual friend in Delhi, and he's outlined a job that you need some help with. This is my team – Hunter, Marius, Tads, Shimazu and Aswon."
"We have a target in need of extraction from a secure facility. The facility is heavily guarded with significant defences and firepower. You will need to be well equipped and highly skilled to complete this mission."
"I'm sure we have the skills required to accomplish the task. But, we do need to confirm that the target of the extraction is a willing one – we will not take the job otherwise."
"Yes – he wants out of there more than anything else. So – you are willing to take this job?"
"Based on what we've heard so far, yes. As we understand it then, it's a single target located in a secure facility. You need the target extracting or rescuing, and then carrying across an international border to safety?"
"Yes." Mr. Singh didn't elaborate, seeming to be a man of few words – or limiting what he said to avoid giving anything away.
"Then we'll take the job – though we may need to negotiate on price a little. But tell us more…"
"Good. We have a target in a maximum security prison, located in Pakistan. The prison is about fifty kilometres away from Karachi. Once the prisoner is extracted, they need to be returned to Hyderabad." As Mr. Singh started to give some details, Hunter added them into a map, throwing them up onto the huge screen at the front of the room. First was a range circle, centred on Karachi, then a glowing icon over Hyderabad. Next he added in the border between the two countries, zooming in a little until the screen displayed only the locations identified so far.
"Ahh, good. Ok, so the prison is here – just east of the Hub Dam." Hunter zoomed in a little more, watching as the map started to pixelate and distort, stopping before it got too bad. Clearly he needed to get some better maps of the area ahead of the mission. "This is the Hub Dam, about five kilometres long. It created this massive lake behind it, formed from the Hub River. On the eastern side, you can see this large peninsula sticking out – the prison is located on here. Surrounded on three sides by deep water, about two kilometres wide, it provides a natural barrier to escape. The only exit or entrance road is to the east, and goes over fairly barren and empty terrain, climbing up towards the hills here."
"What size is the prison? And do you know what kind of prisoners are there?"
"About a thousand inmates – and it's a maximum security facility. Mass murderers, terrorists, soldiers, some political prisoners and agitators, multiple sentence violent crimes and organised crime types."
"So, the defences are going to be…significant. Hmm." Kai studied the picture a little more. "Ok, what else?"
"There is an airbase just to the north of Karachi. Because of the tensions on the border, there is likely to be a combat patrol up, on the Pakistan side of the border, and potentially more fighters on alert status. So once you hit the prison, you will have only a very short amount of time until there is a response – a military response."
"Searching… ok, got it, I think." Hunter highlighted an area just to the north of Karachi, outlining a large airbase with a pair of runways, visible as squiggles on the map. The limited resolution didn't let him see details of hangers or buildings clearly, but he could see that there was something there. "That's… drek, that's only about thirty klicks south."
"Three minutes of flight time for us, at standard speed. Probably less than sixty seconds for an interceptor or patrol fighter on burners." Marius said quickly, working out the figures in his head. "They could launch from an alert pad, get airborne and be with us in ninety seconds using full power, and still have plenty of fuel. That complicates things."
"Are you in contact with the target? Do they know a rescue is coming?" Kai steered things back to the job.
"We have very limited communications. We can pass messages to them, very short messages. But it has a twenty-four-hour delay from wanting to send, to actual delivery. And there is the same delay, if not more getting anything back."
"Ok, figure it's a dead-drop, relaying messages via one of the prison staff to someone outside, who then does another relay to a neutral party, and back to you, and vice-versa. Good for security, bad for speed. So we need to plan at least a day in advance, and keep plans very general and high level… but we can warn them to be ready for a rescue, and they at least won't resist then. That's good." Aswon thought for a moment more. "We could probably warn them of a day, then, and make sure they were prepared to identify themselves. Do something like when they hear the sound of thunder, to sit down, or jog on the spot, or something distinctive like that – to make identification much easier. If time is going to be of the essence, we need to be in and out with maximum efficiency, so cutting down search time is really going to help."
"Yes."
"Well, I have a plan then – we should go with the KISS principle." Marius gestured to the map. "Assume for the moment that we come in from the sea, to the north of the target area. We fly in with full stealth on, and supported by magical cover. We head in at high speed but relatively low altitude, using whatever cover is available in the hills to that side. A final low level streak over the lake, to come in over the prison area. We slow to a hover, as quickly as I am able to, and then pop the doors. Hunter suppresses any defences one side. Aswon suppresses from the other. Tads provides magical support. Shimazu with Kai on the back ramp. If we can get a message to the target to be outside at a specific time, we arrange for that time. Tads then spots the target, and levitates him up into the air, where Kai and Shimazu grab him, I immediately vector upwards, then accelerate to the north – away from the airport, and the border. When the target is aboard, and we are closed up, we drop to nape of the earth, evade and disappear into the ground clutter, before bending a course east and heading to slip over the border and hook around to wherever in Hyderabad we need to go to deliver."
"Nice – has the advantage of simplicity. We need to check that whatever area he will be in is not warded, as otherwise that could stop Tads dead in her tracks. But it's a good starting plan."
"If they have warded the area, then we can always try the other direction – we tunnel under the prison, and bring him out that way. If we can get onto the outside area to the east, I can drop a tunnel down and just head west, and look to come up under an exercise area or something like that?"
"It worked out for us last time, Tads, so I don't see why not. I'd be concerned about the water to the sides – if the tunnel breached, we'd be in a lot of trouble. But I'm sure Hunter can guide us ok again." Aswon looked at the map and walked his hands over it, estimating distances. "I think the aerial snatch is a faster option, though much more likely to be spotted. The tunnel will be slower, but sneakier. Either way we need to do a bit of recon."
"Ok, so the team are obviously starting to look at how to do this, Mr. Singh. That leaves a question of why… to evaluate this properly, we need to know about the target. Will he have personal security? Trackers? If we swoop in and grab him, just how far will they pursue us? Are we freeing the last person who ran for president, or an international arms smuggler? We need to know something." He waited, the seconds stretching as out Singh stood there contemplating what to say.
"He is a fighter. A freedom fighter. He has performed direct action against the government of Pakistan. But he is an Indian national."
"I see. So from their side of things, a terrorist. But you will see him as a freedom fighter?"
"Yes."
"Well, they're no doubt not going to be happy that we spring him, but if he's just a run of the mill freedom fighter, then the resources they throw at him will have limits. Ok – let's talk costs. We're a fair way from Pakistan, so we're going to spend a bunch on fuel getting there and back, plus what we spend on the actual mission itself. Now… my team will no doubt glare at me for being too generous, but as we're going to use most of a tank of fuel getting down, if you can arrange for us to get refuelled, and the pay for the job as already discussed – I think we have a deal."
"I must discuss this with the council. Our funds are limited, but we can perhaps make arrangements."
"As I said to our mutual friend, as long as we can get fuel, then we're also happy to discuss goods or services, in at least part-payment. We're pretty good smugglers, so we can ship items for you, and take our pay that way, perhaps. Maybe something else you need to discuss with your council."
"Yes." Kai sighed a little, somewhat annoyed with the terse and brusque answers.
"Fine. Then perhaps send a message to your target that we would perhaps plan to be there in one week. We'll work on the details, but perhaps plan on them being out in the open, and able to display some kind of sign or wear something noticeable, and we'll see if we can get them out, nice and smooth. So tentatively, one week from today, we'll aim to be on site to do the actual pickup. We'll scout and confirm, and advise you, but so you have chance to get your initial messages sent. Ok?"
"Yes." Kai frowned, but realised he'd asked a very closed question.
"Right. Hunter – can we leave this location open? Is that a thing?"
"Yes, I can leave the room available, and hidden. Should be fine for a while… you can log back in here and leave messages for us, and we'll get them, or can arrange for another face to face meeting."
"Good. I will go then, and speak to my people." Mr. Singh's icon turned and headed to the door, disappearing into the corridor and then fading out of view. The team waited for Hunter to work his magic, and a few moments later they were 'back' at the kitchen table, blinking as the real world reasserted itself once more. Hunter pulled out his screen and displayed the map they'd been looking at on it.
"Ok, what have we got here… So – if we fly from here straight down to Karachi, it's about 2,450 kilometres. So we're not on fumes when we get there, but we don't have much to work with. And that's going to cost us about twelve and a half grand in fuel, probably."
"So pursuing the fuel option is definitely a good idea. Right." Kai gestured towards Delhi. "Jahnu is there, and could be helpful – but he's a fair distance away?"
"Yeah – thousand kilometres. Bit of a diversion."
"Not great. Ok, and Ganesh is even worse, he's over in Nepal – that's the exotic goods trader we've spoken with before. So probably not that helpful here, unless we can arrange to head over and drop off or pick up something."
"I have no contacts in India or Pakistan." Marius gestured to the north a little. "There is the warlord that we dealt with for the heroin deal up a little way – he had no fuel for us then, but perhaps may be able to arrange something. And there is the village where Tads had her friend – the gemstone smuggler."
"We don't know that for sure."
"The probable gemstone smuggler." Marius conceded. "But still off the least time path for us. As would be the place we picked up the painting. However, there is another option – if we head south towards Muscat, we can stop at the location in Oman – 'Keith', I believe was his name. The man in the old sandstone castle."
"Oh – yeah. The Brit guy and his wife… let's see… seventeen hundred klicks to there, so no problem at all, and that drops the distance after a refuel at Keith's to twelve hundred. Longer flight and higher costs overall, but we could go from Keith's stop, to the job, then to Hyderabad, then back to Keith's on one tank – just. Not much slack for combat though. But if we take some barrels with us, we can refuel in Hyderabad probably?"
"Do we want to get that close to the UAE?" Kai asked. "Just thinking about the trail of blood that we followed, chasing after Unsubtle."
"I don't think that's going to be linked to us, not now. And we're in a different aircraft too – completely different signature."
"Oh, there is that. Yeah – I'd forgotten that the…" Kai didn't finish the sentence, seeing Marius start to bristle up. "Well, that's not an issue then. So a distinct possibility, and it does help us come in from over the water, and not from the India side, which will help, yes?"
"They will have radar coverage of the coast, but the waterway is busy, and there will be many targets to track. And we are stealthy – so yes, it will probably help us."
"Give me a few minutes, I'm just going for a quick check…" Tads folded her arms in front of her and laid her head down on them, relaxing into the table. A moment later her, body seemed to settle or deflate slightly as her spirit shot out of the confines of her flesh and she disappeared at speed. The others continued to examine the terrain, establishing where the border was and looking for mountain passes or chasms, rough terrain such as 'badlands' that they could exploit to try and throw off pursuit.
It actually took Tads just under nineteen minutes to make the round trip, adding in a couple of dog-legs as she did to check for pursuit or to throw off any tails.
"Which way did you go?" Hunter asked, getting some directions from the shaman and plotting her course on his map.
"What are you looking for?" Marius asked with some evident confusion as Hunter marked up the rough flight plan, and then started to do some calculations.
"Just working something out. One sec… ok, done. Well, by a rough measure, and not factoring in the time you spent hovering, you broke Mach 12 on that journey – you're getting faster!" The ork turned towards Marius. "And you're still not the fastest."
"Speed is nothing without control. And that is not to say that Tads has no control – but speed by itself is not the aim. If I wanted to go fast, I would have been an astronaut. But they do not get to fly – they just program a computer." Marius sniffed as if such things were below him. "So – what did you see?"
"Well, the area is horrible. Despite the lake being there, the land around it is arid and fairly bleak. Not a lot of anything growing – I don't know if that was a factor in building the prison there, but if you broke out, then you're not living off the land, you've got to take some supplies with you. So the area isn't great for magic to start off with – and the prison?" She shuddered a little. "Well, it's not nice. Not as bad as the space launch facility, or the top of the tower in Kowloon was. But about as bad as it was maybe in the drug lab. It's going to limit the power of my spells, and I'm not going to be able to rely on things like a stun spell or a lightning attack. The spirits should be able to conceal the Broadsword just fine, but the weaker spells will be overcome by the area."
"Any idea of what caused it?"
"The whole prison area stinks of hopelessness, fear and pain. I think people get abused there on a regular basis, and badly hurt – it's seeped into the rocks, the bricks, the land… even the water felt unwelcoming. It's a horrible wretched place. But there are some magical spirits about. I saw a handful of air spirits, elementals, I'm sure, wandering around the place. Looked to be on patrol, so I'm guessing they've been summoned by a mage and told to guard the place. And I also saw watcher spirits zipping about the place, much lower down and closer, examining things.
"Watcher spirits? Interesting…"
"Why, Aswon? Spirits are spirits, right?"
"No, not exactly, Hunter. Elementals on patrol mean that it's a hermetic that summoned them – but in a Muslim region, that's not surprising. They're not keen on magic generally, but detest Shamanism – that definitely goes against all of their beliefs. So seeing elementals means they have a hermetic mage involved somewhere – but an elemental once summoned will last a year before it disappears, not like a shaman's spirits which are bound by sunrise and sunset. But watcher spirits are weaker, a lot weaker. They normally only last for hours… unless you expend magical materials to make them hang around."
"Is that why we don't use them?"
"Partly, Hunter. Watchers are not as clever as normal spirits, and they're harder to communicate with. They're…." Tads thought for a moment. "They're like an average dog. You can teach them some tricks, they can be useful, and there's nothing wrong with them – but they can't hold a conversation like a normal person."
"Ahh, ok. So if there's watchers there, that means they have someone on site to summon them every day? Like Tads would have to with her spirit?"
"Exactly. Either that or spend a constant stream of money on supplies to make them last longer – days or possibly weeks." Aswon tapped on the map, towards the front of the prison and what appeared to be the administration buildings. "Probably based in here, but it's likely they have onsite magical support, and that changes the equation slightly. If Tads tried to levitate up the prisoner, they could try to levitate them straight back down again, for instance."
"Oh… Oh no." Tads paled a little. "Given what we know of the place – they could do worse. They could just dispel my powers. And let them fall… given the feel for the place and how little they seem to care for life…" She swallowed obviously, as her mind went through a process of trying to understand such a mentality. "It means we need to be ready for destructive powers. People willing to throw fireballs even if there are innocent people nearby. To release destructive magic to enforce their will, regardless of the consequences.
Hunter felt his wrist buzz, then looked down to see the incoming call from Julius. He routed the call to his comm-set so he could speak semi-privately, and accepted the call. As soon as the connection was made he could hear a background chatter and buzz, and looking past the tiny image of Julius appeared to display a street scene with passing traffic – presumably he was calling from a public terminal somewhere. They exchanged the normal pleasantries, making sure each other was ok, and subtly looking for any issues with the other person, signs of coercion or discomfort. When both were happy that they were as free to talk as they were likely to get, Hunter got down to business.
"Julius mate, I've got two favours to ask. First is, can you get me a decent map of an area. Or something better than the janky crap I can get off the free-map hosts? Specifically I'm looking at the max-security prison next to the Hub Dam area and Hub Lake, just north of Karachi. Um, co-ordinates are about 25.26875, 67.14388 for the main gate, as best I can work out – but ideally we're looking for whatever we can get for the whole area. I'm sure you can work out what we're after there."
"My friend – be careful. I would be very surprised if your target is not protected by a number of security systems. But I can get something for you, I'm sure. I don't know how current it will be, but we should have…" he paused for a moment, thinking furiously… "I'm pretty sure I can get half-metre resolution scans of the area. We should have had scans go over to monitor border deployments in the area, and being close to a military base will probably help. Yes, let me see what I can get you. I'll send though a link to the map downloads when I have it."
"Great stuff mate, thanks – that might be a life-saver. Right, the other thing I want to know is – what's 'Gamma' clearance?"
"Can you give me some context?"
"We got called by an Ares Johnson, from a UCAS grid. Apparently we're on some kind of list of contractors, and he tried to hire us for a job. It wasn't going to work for us, so we had to turn it down, even when he offered half a mil. But he then turned around and told us we had gamma clearance as if that should have made a difference."
"Well, it's above alpha and beta?" Julius snorted as Hunter pulled a face. "No seriously… it is. I don't know the specifics, but I'd have thought it's an indication that you've done work before and not made a mess of things, and have a position of being considered reliable and efficient. Not trustworthy of course – you don't believe in the corporate line. But probably eligible for better work or less chance of being screwed over."
"Hmm. Well, at least we're not alpha then. But we're also not a later letter in the alphabet either."
"I have no idea how many letters they use – want to me to look into it?"
"No, that's not really that important, I just wanted to try and gauge how that would affect us. Don't stick your neck out for that, just in case. The maps are far more important to us."
"Ok, null sheen. What's the timeframe on the maps?"
"We're looking at being there in seven days. So the sooner we can get them the more planning time we have…"
Right, I hear you. Let me see what's on my desk on Monday and I'll try to get something over to you." Hunter acknowledge the message, and they said their goodbyes, chatting about a few innocuous things before Julius broke the connection.
"Right, Julius from the Ares recon office is going to get us some better maps – scans of the prison area, the lake and hopefully the ground around it. He knows the kind of job we're likely to be doing, so he's probably worked out we need some better info on the area as a whole as well. We'll have to wait until Monday probably for some detail, but that should still give us a day or two of planning time."
"Good stuff, Hunter. While you were on the call, Shimazu's been having a bit of a think about stuff – he was just telling us about his opinions, but why don't you just go over the basics, Shimazu?" Kai sat back and waved for the bodyguard to start over.
"As you wish. If this is a prison, then they are likely to have a slightly different mix of weapons and equipment in place than the offices or facilities we've visited before. Clearly they try to keep weapons out of the hands of prisoners as far as is possible, but overwhelmingly the ones they do get hold of tend to be somewhat improvised or makeshift, and almost entirely based on short and very concealable melee weapons. Despite everything that has changed over the last few decades, the shank made from a broken toothbrush remains a favourite means of attack, as does the bar of soap in the end of a sock." Shimazu shunted over some pictures that he'd found somewhere, showing a deep puncture wound and a massive bruise on the side of the face. "The shank is when you want to kill, the club or flail is when you want to hurt – but both are still widely prevalent inside. As a result, the guards tend to emphasise armour with considerable resistance and padding to such attack styles – relatively low speed but high force impacts. So the armour your standard prison guard will be wearing will absorb a punch from you, Hunter, and barely stagger them, while a shot from the pistol Marius uses will put them on their ass. You don't need a big gun to take them out, as they don't have to defend against guns – but a melee strike is likely to do nothing." He tapped the hilt of his ever-present sword. "Even this might struggle. A cut, unless I hit a weak spot, is going to slice into the top layers of armour and then start to bind up on the material and get wedged. We need to avoid melee combat with anyone inside the prison, as they will be armoured to defend against the assaults of several people at once. If you need to take them down, then shoot them. But do not engage in hand to hand combat."
"Ok, well, I wasn't planning on not taking my assault rifle, so that's not a problem."
"Still relevant though, Hunter – like don't bother with your grenade launcher. Those micro-frags are going to do nothing against that kind of armour."
"Alright, fair point, Aswon, I hadn't thought of that. And the stun rounds aren't going to do much either, are they. So it's avoid them, or shoot to kill. Gotcha."
"That is the defensive side. On the offensive side, you can expect the average guard to be wielding a club or cosh, probably with a taser built in. Again, their own armour is good at deflecting that kind of damage, so if they lose a weapon during a brawl or a riot, it's not terrible for them – but against an unarmed prisoner, that's enough. But as soon as there's any kind of trouble, expect to see full-auto shotguns, probably with cut-down barrels. Small, handy and with high blast damage, designed to stop a charging troll. If this was a facility in a more media-focussed country or with a corp that cared about their public relations, then they'd be firing bean-bag rounds, gel cartridges or some other less-lethal options. But chances are here that they're going to be packing flechette – big, nasty rounds packed to the brim with metal or ceramic darts. One of those shoots you somewhere without armour, and it's going to take you down with one shot. And they will have those things set to a wide choke, and will just hold the trigger down, filling a corridor or a doorway with a cloud of death."
"You make it sound fun."
"I have seen their effects on a crowd, during a riot. They disable a lot of people, very quickly. Good if you want to get a minister away from a public event where the speech has not gone well, very bad if you happen to be the angry crowd venting your frustration about a corrupt government." Shimazu's face worked a little, his jaw firming up for a moment and his normal inscrutable expression slipping just a touch. "Do not under-estimate their power. Even if you are armoured, the impact could well push you back or knock you over. Other than auto-shotguns, you're likely to say grenade launchers firing tear-gas rounds or maybe even knockout gas. And if you make it outside the secure area, then the guards are likely to have rifles like yours, Hunter – scoped, with decent barrel lengths. If a prison break happens, and someone is making a run into the area outside, they will have the range to keep them engaged for some considerable time."
"Ok, so unusual mix of weapons for us – got it."
"They will also make a lot of use of implanted tags most likely – doors that will only open if you have the correct pass, or you are the only person in range of the sensor with a pass. Choke-points and airlocks to funnel people into different areas or to limit the rate of movement. Weapons scanners at key junctions, especially near places like kitchens or laundries, or any work space that a prisoner has access to. Guards will have secure locations with camera systems able to monitor wide areas of the prison, and they will be well protected by bullet-proof one-way glass and reinforced doors, often in elevated positions – think like the control tower at an airport. Excellent lines of sight and secure entry and exit. As this appears to be a maximum security area, you can also expect to find that areas of the prison have separate air-filtration or distribution systems, so they can gas a corridor or entire wing, but leave other areas untouched. Guard areas will all be isolated with their own secure air system, and it's likely that the guards will have gas-masks available to them."
"That can be a good thing, though – if they're using masks and not fully sealed suits, it means the gas they use is likely to be airborne only, and relays on inhalation – not just skin contact. That makes it easier for us to defend against too." Aswon pointed out. "I can't imagine this place being cool for much of the year, and nobody is going to want to wear a full hazmat suit or sealed chemical assault gear."
"They are also likely to make use of drones in abundance. Though they are initially expensive, and require some maintenance, they are very cheap in the long run. I would be very surprised not to see a large number of surveillance drones similar to our own on deployment all around the prison facility. Equipped with large sun-cells over the top of the lifting bag, in a climate like this, that gives them unlimited power effectively. Apart from a rare storm, they will gather enough power during the day to last through the night, and they are easily enough equipped with night-cameras and sensors. They do not require days off, or shift changes, or fall sick. As long as they have appropriate maintenance, they will stay on station indefinitely, and provide an excellent perimeter watch. If I was guarding such a facility, I would also have some expert-systems tied to facial recognition to monitor the movement of individual prisoners and track their movement around the grounds, monitor associations and such like."
"So they'll need to be fairly low?" Kai asked.
"Relatively speaking – yes. But in this case that is likely to be between one hundred and two hundred metres high – more than enough to keep them safe from a thrown rock from all but the strongest person, but low enough to zoom in and get details on things like prisoners exchanging contraband. They are likely to have these surveying every part of the open ground in the prison, and a pattern of them guarding the perimeter, too. That implies the presence of at least a pair of security riggers – which then means they may also have access to mobile gun platforms as well. Or even systems like a tracked drone with a forward mounted riot-shield and foam dispensers, with room for half a dozen guards on the rear."
"Well, we knew it was going to be tough, right? But we can do this. We've got the skills, and we've cracked nuts like this before." Kai smiled at them, not the broad grin he used for outsiders, but a tight-lipped and more restrained smile that indicated confidence and trust. "We're going to have fun with the border too. The airbase is part of it, but Pakistan and India have been at each other's throats for decades. Remember, they had a nuclear exchange back in the 30s, and that left the northern end of the country a barren hell-hole. We plotted a course around that when we went to the far east. But since then Pakistan has been a bit of a problem-child in the area, as far as I know. We're likely to find that the border between them and India is hot and hostile, so we're potentially going to be seen as hostile by forces on both sides – and we should remember to take that into account!"
"It sounds to me that we need to be thinking more in terms of stealth rather than suppression then." Aswon gestured to the map. "It might be hard for you, Tads, given the nature of the area – but perhaps a nice big illusion of the prison with nothing going on, laid out over the top. Sort of like what we saw in the valley near Tashkent. The cameras aren't alive, so the magic will fool them utterly, so it doesn't even need to be that strong."
"I could try. It depends how widely spaced out the drones are. But it's a possibility."
"If you could – even just a nice wide vision centred over the top of us, to take out all the drones – that would be a great start. Rather than levitate the prisoner up, I'm wondering if we need to land in the yard to collect them. It looks big enough, and if we have an illusion over the top and a spirit to conceal us as well, then we might not get spotted at all?"
"Perhaps a modification to my earlier plan then – we attach a rope to Shimazu, and instead of levitate the prisoner up, we lower Shimazu down to grab him and retrieve him. I am not comfortable with landing in an area like that – it is too easy for guards on the perimeter to start firing down at us. Even though they are unlikely to get through the armour, a lucky shot on a turbine blade or some other vital spot could ground us in the worst possible location."
"Hmm, that might work just as well. If Hunter was on one side, and me on the other, we could suppress any guards if we needed to, if they detected something. And that still leaves Kai and Shimazu for the retrieval, with Tads providing magical support. That would seem to be a reasonable starting plan, at least."
"There is also the dam nearby. That is a piece of critical national infrastructure – holding back trillions of litres of water. It no doubt provides power for all of the local area too. This is a problem – and also a solution I think. It will be guarded, and probably guarded well, so there are additional forces in the area to take into consideration. But it's also potentially a very good distraction for something going wrong!"
"As long as we're not planning on actually blowing up the dam – things got close enough back in Irkutsk, thank you!" Aswon shook his head. "But I agree – the threat of a bomb or a breach is likely to draw a lot of attention there – though it's only two kilometres from where we will be, so that's not a lot of breathing space! But even if we can set off just some alarms there, then it would draw attention away, or split a reaction force."
"Once we get a bit closer, I can also do a slightly longer surveillance of the watcher spirits, and see if I can work out what they're doing. They might just go and alert someone if they see something magical. Or they might go hug someone hiding under an invisibility spell and start to scream, to give the guards something to aim at. We need to find out, before we go in, as best we can. And when we go to do the actual mission, I can look at summoning a flock of our own if we need, to even up the odds."
"I agree with Tads – ideally we should have a day for recon somewhere nearby if we can, work out if we can see the mage or any support elements, any guard rotations, just to get a feel for things. It could help us a lot. As long as we can do that, without being spotted ourselves, obviously.
"Another possibility would be a variation – we come in at a very high altitude. Ten thousand metres or so, high above any surveillance, as if we are a commercial jet. We get over the site, and then drop vertically, just using the engines to maintain attitude and position, and apply thrust as we approach the ground, aiming to come in to a hover at a hundred metres. Then we deploy Shimazu on a rope, and as soon as the target is secure, we go straight back up. That will minimise the time we are engaged with any ground forces to an absolute minimum, though any air threats will still be an issue."
"That could be interesting… normally the winch for a rope like that is pretty slow, lots of torque, not much speed." Aswon noted. "It'd leave Shimazu and the target somewhat vulnerable."
"Well, only if we use a vehicle winch. You're right, Aswon – the winches on the truck and rescue vehicles and things like that tend to be pretty slow. Designed for lots of pulling power, but not a great deal of zip. But we have a few days… just imagine if we got the motor from something like a building lift? Something designed to move a car with eight people, just a few hundred kilos – but to take them up or down a multi-story office block as quickly as possible? That might let us recover them quickly."
"Might cost us a chunk too. On the other hand, having a really rapid winch might be very handy in the future – up or down. Ok… this has other challenges, but I think we can work solutions for them. We could also probably find a blast blanket or something like that, for Shimazu to take down with him, and to wrap around the target. Something to help absorb impacts from any gunfire."
"And if it wraps around the target, it will obscure him from certain magical effects, too." Tads pointed out. "Not a lightning bolt or a fireball, or any of the spells like that – but any spell designed to affect the prisoner directly will fail if they can't see him clearly."
"I'm willing to do the jump. If I take my shield with me as well, that will make them much less likely to cause damage. I don't exactly need to go moving around much if I'm tied onto a line, so it won't slow me down at all. And with the bottom section folded out, it provides much more coverage."
"Ok, sounds like we have the beginnings of a bunch of plans. Let's split up for now, each of us do some research and work out what our possible options are, and we'll meet back up at dinner time to discuss?" Kai looked around the table and got a bunch of nods, then pushed himself off from the tabletop, his chair sliding back over the smooth floor. "Good job, team. Let's work out how to break this guy out of prison without landing ourselves in there in their place!"