Chapter 37: Shadow Dance
In a tense mission, Omni and her team navigate the shadows of a corporate dungeon, discovering unsettling truths and rising danger.
Omni’s breath hitched, an uneasy prickle running down her spine, as the ghostly silhouette of the Company’s headquarters loomed over the Black River.
A glistening glass shard tearing at the dull grey clouds locking in the heat radiating off the concrete of the city. Omni couldn’t help but see it as a makeshift blade reflecting the distant lights of the new city.
The team’s shadows merged with the murky currents. As they moved closer, Murph’s words replayed in her mind, syncing with her heartbeat in an unsettling rhythm – “It’s a trap within a trap.”
Her stomach knotted, her heart raced and her breathing shallow, Omni felt on the edge of panic as she moved downstream closer to the building.
Calm down or you’ll drown Omni, she thought to herself.
As the wire cutter sliced through the fence with eerie ease, Omni couldn’t shake the feeling that this was a little too straightforward
Can they electrify in water? Omni glanced towards the west coast at the glowing neon hub of Century City. Rich eyes had line of sight to this tower. The Company had to greenwash everything they did here, for them. It didn’t matter for people living in the Stacks, the dark scar on the city’s face, the other point in the triangle between new city and the tower. They don’t have to worry about those people.
Only people with money mattered, she thought cursing, on this contested land and rehabilitated waterway. The old tribe paid off and the garbage-filled bird-killing waters cleaned and purified. They edged in closer to the shore. She felt the angry heat she stoked inside her thawing the ice gripping her heart. They’d all be sick tomorrow if it wasn’t for those rehabilitation efforts.
Zeke gestured as the team kept to the shadows of a embankment wall, out of line of sight of any cameras. Two gangers progressed up fearlessly, while he held a fist up. That fist became a five fingered count down, at one the tall flood light dropping them in shadow flicked off.
As the last teammate emerged from the water, Omni caught a quick, uneasy glance exchanged between two of the gangers – a momentary flicker of something she couldn’t read.
As the light flicked off, her attention snapped back to Zeke. Her father tapped her shoulder and pointed for her to follow. She could feel his tension, and the under current of frustration at be caught in this vice. But he kept his mouth shut and guided her up the hill toward the darkened corridor as torchlight on the far ends of the campus turned to investigate the faulty lights.
Those moving torches brought her out of her head and back to the growing fears that she’d been trying to overcome. In rush they flooded back and the pressure felt too much. She was rooted for a moment, she wanted to scream, “It’s a trap,” she gripped the rifle she’d been given her knuckles white and popping. A firm hand, her fathers. pushed her forward, and together they ran up the hill.
The team kept a close line to the tall glass building, avoiding any overhead cameras that were marked out on the map. Satya snuffed out the ones they couldn’t avoid, looping empty scenes for the seconds it took for the team to regroup. Omni looked down at her wet boot prints on the concrete. They’ll see these she thought.
She stared at them until her father dragged her forward, those torches were almost upon them. The lock picked the team melted inside, a few extra shadows disappeared, and the light returned. The approaching torches paused confused.
< Ok, let’s proceed, they’ve returned to their routes > Satya confirmed.
As they entered the bare emergency stairwell, Omni couldn’t help but notice how quiet it was, as if the building itself was holding its breath. The perimeter alarm no doubt suppressed by the elder djinn. Ada was intent on his every action and Omni left her for the moment to learn what she could. They moved in a bubble of digital darkness, a collection of human shadows under the wing of a watchful djinn.
< She’s two floors down, > Satya added and Omni nearly yelped with fright, her fathers hand on elbow directed her every step. She glanced up at him, how was he so calm? He winked at her. Was he having fun?
They turned and turned and turned descending into depths of the basement levels. They came out on an open space with parked construction vehicles. Mammoth earth movers and long articulated arms waiting for daylight to expand the Company’s grounds. Omni cast glances around at their team, the gangers felt preternaturally calm, grim smiles on tattooed faces. Although a few didn’t hold her gaze, maybe they were nervous too.
< I’ve redirected internal security drones, we’re clear to progress. > Satya whispered as a map appeared in Omni’s vision. She knew everyone saw it but her father. She squeezed his forearm, pointed at her eye and then across the way as the rest of the team changed direction. He nodded once and they moved.
Vin’s approximate location blinked on their shared map. How did they have so much intel, Omni wondered, her mind racing as her leaden feet plodded across the underground parking. Her body didn’t want to go forward. Her mind wanted to be anywhere else. But here she was like old litter on the Black river, caught in the current.
As they increased the shadows, turning off lights or blinding cameras, they zeroed in on where their intel told them Vin was being held. These levels weren’t meant to be seen by the public eye, they didn’t make the news, and the immediate the shift was apparent. Gone was the marble of the foyer, the fern-filled waterfall running down the inner wall and the illusory starscape. A wonder both day and night.
Down here it was different, as they progressed deeper down, Omni glanced around at the bare concrete, listened to the dripping water, as they moved underneath the harsh steel-caged lighting in confined pipelined corridors. Long lines of coloured paint directed knowing feet to important places. They ignored those lines and followed the neon line Satya etched in their minds. Their surroundings felt hard and imposing like bunker, a place to keep people out, or keep them within. Like the inside of a clenched fist.
Murph’s words crept back into Omni’s mind, “It’s a trap. It’s a trap within a trap.”
“Doors and corners,” Zeke whispered over their comms, “It may not stay this quiet.”
Omni looked up at him, leading from the front directing the team as they checked each corridor and room. But there was a tightness in his movements, a cautiousness that seemed more pronounced than usual.
Still, they walked deeper and deeper. Still, they hadn’t met with any real resistance yet. All they had actually had to do, was to subdue one or two underpaid security guards, walking around, older men, with minimum wage. Thankfully, they were subdued without killing them. Knocked out with chlorophyll, or some equivalent. Gagged and bound, these men were shoved into a cleaning closet, and kept out of sight. A temporary sensor placed on the inside of the door so Satya could monitor them.
But with every step Omni felt, this was too easy. She should have listened to Murph. He said it was a trap, and it’s feeling like a trap.
They wound deeper still, down, the further away they went from the sky, starlight, open freedom. The deeper they went into the bowels of the company, into this modern dungeon, away from surveillance, away from digital and human eyes, deeper and deeper, until they found a holding room.
That the intel told them Vin was in. Omni wondered how they found that intel to begin with, whether it had been given, supplied, or easily hacked. Whether it was wrapped up neatly with a bow and a little card saying “Nothing suspicious.”
She wondered at her thoughts as the door opened. But those thoughts disappeared when her eyes laid down on Vin, tied up.
Her father next to her tensed.
Vin looked up as soon as the door opened, a frail looking Indian girl. A headlamp lit her up, and she squinted and blinked at the light.
“Omni, what’s going on?” her father said, his voice tinged with confusion.
She frowned, her eyes locked on Vin’s bruises and blood covered face. Vin didn’t make a sound, but she nodded. She moved her head to signal there’s no one inside.
Omni’s mind raced, but a part of her stalled, struck by her father’s confusion.
And the team, Zeke and Ash and all the Numbers, crept in to the room. Her father’s hand gripped her elbow holding her back, he frowned at her but she pulled lose. Vin this person from Murph’s past, a legendary ghost of his broken memories sat there real and in the flesh.
They secured the room, the members of the Numbers taking up positions at every corner their guns at the ready. Safeties clicked off. Bodies tense.
< I’ve disabled the cameras, the room is secure, > Satya said across comms.
Zeke walked towards her, took off her gag, and started speaking to her. His words were lost to Omni because the moment his hand touched her face, Vin crumbled to digital dust.
A deep laughter filled their minds, creeping in through their implants overriding their custom protections. It continued as Vin’s form disintegrated revealing a bundle of sensors tied to a chair.
Electric realisation crackled across her skin, as fear and adrenalin dumped into her veins. Omni, spun around and looked at her father, he’d known.
Everyone stood dumbfounded, Zeke especially. Ash noticed the gangers arranged around them.
Zeke didn’t understand. He didn’t know what was going on. Ash tried to keep his eyes on all the gangers surrounding him. In the confusion, Farouk grabbed hold of Omni and pulled her from the room, as the shouting began.
“What the hell are you doing?” came Zeke’s voice.
Everything was happening too fast, Ada updated Omni’s minimap with red dots for the gangers and white dots for her team. The team had split, they were betrayed!
< It’s an ambush! > Ada’s voice thundered in Omni’s mind.
“Weapons down, now!” barked the lead ganger, authority cracking in his voice.
“This is my command!” Zeke bellowed, his voice a mix of anger and disbelief.
<Satya’s going to force a Bond with Ash now. Get out of here! >
Omni heard a scuffle as her father pulled her away, his finger to his lips. There was sickening meaty thud and a body fell to the ground.
Ash shouted something.
Her father pulled her behind him, and gestured towards the stairwell. He faced back toward the room his gun trained on the door. He was covering her, he’s done this before. Omni’s mind raced too many things were happening.
“There was no one in that room, Omni. What did you see?”
“A hologram of Vin, it’s a trap, Dad.”
“No shit,” he said, a rare break in his usual composure. Omni caught herself, more startled by his swearing than the chaos unfolding around them.
“Dad, Ada’s marking the way out for us, I can guide us.”
He looked hesitant, he didn’t trust machines, he didn’t have an implant. That absence had probably saved her life. But what about Ash and Zeke, she thought as bile filled her mouth.
As they reach the first stairwell, seconds later, someone radioed in, “Package received. We have them in the holding cell — Wait where’s the girl?”
And it was at this moment that the jaws of the trap slammed shut, and Omni knew how stupid they’d been to just walk right in here. Down all those stairs, into a dark and quiet room underground. A mouse through a maze and into the damp, warm, mouth of a waiting snake.
As her father dragged her out, leaving the others behind, she realised she should have trusted her instincts. She should have listened to her father. She should have listened to Murph, because now they were truly fucked.
< Satya’s bonded with Ash. Run. >
In seconds the gunfire started and Omni ran.