Is That a Pisty in your Pocket?
Johnson nestled the starter-charge into the canister mounted to the thermite puck; careful, because one wrong move meant molten spray and a bad day. Sweat pearled and slid into his eye. He clamped it shut and kept the other on the charge. When it clicked home, he finally breathed—stepping back to wipe the sting from his eye.
One down, three to go.
When he finished preparing the charges, he pulled on dark goggles and lifted the tray. He turned and Hormel covered the corridor with his coilgun; Charleston gave a thumbs-up. Johnson stepped up to the fugitive’s door, and placed the first charge gently over the top hinge—it snapped magnetically in place.
This door wasn’t normal. The fugitive had modified it somehow, and they’d spent hours trying to break in. They had operational authorization for torches, but those barely scorched the paint. He’d requested incendiaries an hour ago. Only when Ms. Aggy pinged the fugitive inside did approval finally come.
Johnson looked forward to a little sizzle, as long as he didn’t lose a hand. So, slow, slow, slow, he laid the second charge—click—against the door.
Three. Four. Blow that door.
Stepping back, Johnson lifted the remote trigger and—
“I have the fugitive in custody!” The speaker by the door squelched. “Do not, I repeat, do not set those charges! I’m coming out.”
Johnson’s shoulders sagged and he groaned. “Oh, who the fuck is that?”
“No idea, boss.” Hormel rubbed his bald, olive-oil colored head.
“Did you see any of ours go in?” Charleston asked, pulling the smartcomm from his vest.
“No, I had the charges, you two had the door,” Johnson barked.
“Oh, we got a perp-alert. HQ just got an arrest claim from... Officer Gallagher?” Charleston said, cinching his dark brow.
“Let me see that.” Johnson yanked the smartcomm from Charleston’s hand and glared at it. “The rookie?”
Hormel huddled up with the other two, stretching on tip-toes to see the screen. “He was babysitting the slips down on Corp B; how’d he get inside?”
“Easy, I chased the fugitive inside when you weren’t looking,” said a voice from the now-open door. “Didn’t you see me? Y’all looked mighty distracted.”
Hormel spun, coilgun aimed. “Hands up, don’t move!”
Charleston followed suit. Johnson just pointed a finger. “Gallagher! How in the mother-loving hell did you get in there?”
Gallagher raised his gun over his head. “I told you, I followed her here.” With his free hand he hauled out a slim young woman. Her wrists were bound behind her back. “See, here she is, all wrapped up and ready for Christmas.”
Johnson looked at the smartcomm, then up at the girl. It was her—she looked so much smaller in person. “Come on Gallagher, cut the shit. You just lost me a four figure bonus for getting that door open, so I’m not in the mood for pranks. There’s no way you got in there without us seeing you.”
Gallagher grinned. “Are you sure about that? Because I’m kinda standing here, in the open doorway.”
“The little wank is gaslighting us,” Charleston grunted.
“No, no!” Gallagher shook his head. “That’s crazy, I’m not gaslighting anybody.”
“Now you’re gaslighting us about gaslighting us.” Hormel barked, marching forward and jabbing his muzzle at Gallaher’s side.
Gallagher shrunk back. “Okay, okay! You explain it then; if you guys were watching this door so closely, how did I get in there?”
Charleston frowned. “He does got a point.”
“What point?” Johnson shouted at Charleston and then pointed at Gallagher again. “Do you think we’re morons?”
Gallagher shrugged. “I mean, I did sort of chase a criminal into an apartment you were supposed to be guarding. So maybe not moronic so much as… inattentive?”
“Drop it mate,” Charleston said. “We’re all in agreement this door never opened in the four hours we’ve been here. So you need a better tactic.”
Gallagher’s brow dipped. “What do you want me to say? That I walked through the wall?”
“For all we know you’ve been in there all day,” Johnson said. “Hanging out with our fugitive. You might even be in on it.”
“Whoa, fine. Check my duty logs.” Gallagher jutted his chin. “Go ahead. I checked in from Corp-Ring B at least three times after the alert went out.”
Charleston grabbed his smartcomm back from Johnson, and tapped away.
Gallagher continued. “My shift was supposed to end over an hour ago but I saw Ms. Saran here running through the corridors and clocked in some overtime.”
“He’s right, even checked in right after we gave up on the torches.” Charleston mumbled.
Gallagher nodded excitedly, “See, there, I can’t falsify those records. So, try again, how else did I get in there?”
Hormel had set his coilgun to his side at some point and was scratching his chin. “Maybe he did walk through the walls.”
“What?” Johnson, and Gallagher blurted at the same time.
“Well, we know he didn’t use the door,” Hormel said.
Charleston pinched the bridge of his nose, and shook his head. “We know you’ve got one of your theories, Hormel, so just spit it out.”
Hormel pointed at Gallagher with a nod. “I bet he’s gotta pisty in his pocket.”
Gallagher’s brow pinched. “Excuse me?”
Hormel shook his head and sighed. “A Personal Space Time Interferometer, you know, a pisty.”
“Seriously? That’s your theory?” Gallagher chuckled as he rubbed the back of his neck. “I got in through a wormhole?”
Charleston snapped his fingers. “Now that you mention it, I did smell ozone a bit ago.”
Johnson glanced between Hormel and Charleston. “Well, what does that have to do with anything?”
“Okay, so...” Charleston modeled a sphere with his hands. “You’ve created yourself a wormhole, but you got to stabilize it or it’ll evaporate. So you fluff the event horizon with a little exotic matter. But all that energy tears apart molecular oxygen, and it comes back together as ozone.”
Charleston’s shoulders hopped as he crossed his arms. “Pretty basic really.”
Johnson frowned. “What do you read at night, Charleston?”
Hormel lunged at Gallagher’s pants. “Let’s search him.”
Gallagher stumbled backwards. “Hey, hey! Hands to yourself! If I had a… pisty, why the hell would I come out the door? I would’ve wormholed back out and avoided this whole conversation. Not to mention, how does a guy like me get banned technology anyway?”
“I bet he had an accomplice,” Hormel blurted.
“Someone rich?” Johnson asked.
“Ah!” Charleston’s eyes lit up. “A criminal.”
Hormel snapped his fingers and pointed at Charleston. “Who double crossed him and left him hanging.”
Gallagher aired out his collar. “Man, you guys really are nuts.”
He grabbed the prisoner, who’d been quiet this whole time. “Really, this has been fun, but I’ve gotta get this girl to detainment.”
He took a step but Hormel blocked him and Johnson took up his flank.
Charleston looked at his partners. “Your average criminal couldn’t get their hand on a PSTI. It’d have to be a super criminal, one crazy enough to use unstable wormhole technology.”
Johnson narrowed his eyes. “Are you thinking what I’m thinking?”
“You don’t think...” Hormel blurted.
Gallagher’s lips pulled tight against his teeth. “Now, guys, really there is no accomp—”
“Mason!” Johnson shouted. “Nobody’s figured out how he gets around undetected.”
Hormel eyes light up and he grins. “Right, one minute he’s cornered and then poof like a wizard. And then there’s a funny smell afterward.”
“Ozone!” Charleston laughs.
“Okay—okay—so wait,” Gallagher sputters. “So, I teamed up with the station’s most notorious gangster?”
He shook his head. “Are you boys hearing yourselves?”
They all ignored him, and the fugitive looked up, darting glances at each of the three guards.
“But why Mason?” Hormel asked.
Gallagher raised a finger. “Yes, precisely, why Mason? Huh?”
Charleston whistled. “I bet he was in on the whole thing. I’m looking at Ms. Saran’s dossier, and she’s never been in for anything other than low-level data theft and falsified credentials. A high-profile job like this is totally outside her wheelhouse… buuuut, she’s gotten special dispensation seeing as she is the official security advisor for none other than Dalia Ledas herself.
“Oh. Shit…” Hormel gasped. “There are rumors the Ice Princess has been shacking up with someone on the lower decks.”
“Don’t call her that!” Ms. Saran growled.
Hormel and Charleston stared at the fugitive, mouths open. Johnson opened and closed his mouth at her glare.
Ms. Saran softened her eyes and looked down. “That’s not who she is. It’s... unkind.”
Hormel cowed his head, Charleston’s eyes fell, and Johnson nodded. Gallagher’s jaw just opened and closed.
“I’m sorry miss,” Hormel said. “I didn’t mean anything by it. It’s what everyone calls her you know.”
“Is it true then?” Johnson asked. “You two are lovers aren’t you? It all makes sense now.”
Ms. Saran nodded, but Gallagher shook his head. “Seriously, nothing right now is making any sense whatsoever.”
The trio wasn’t talking to Gallagher anymore.
Charleston stepped forward and put a hand on Ms. Saran’s shoulder. “Mason hired you because you were close to Dalia. What did he do? Threaten you?”
Johnson gasped. “No, he threatened her didn’t he?”
Ms. Saran nodded at the ground.
Johnson’s eyes glistened and he stared at the ceiling. “Oh my, you poor thing.”
Charleston put a hand over his heart. “She betrayed Dalia in order to protect her.”
“Whoa, you just like deduced all that huh?” Gallagher asked, picking at the corner of his eye. “That’s hooey; why would Mason bring her back here then?”
Hormel nodded at Ms. Saran. “You tell us miss, what really happened?”
Charleston squeezed her shoulder, “Come on now, we’re all friends here.”
Gallagher squeezed his eyes shut. “Are we though?”
But Ms. Saran looked up between them. “I… I don’t know how much I should say.”
Hormel, Johnson and Charleston exchanged glances and nodded; each clicked a button on the front of their vests.
“Cameras off, whatever you say stays between us.” Charleston said.
Ms. Saran nodded at the floor again and spread her feet before looking up. “Mason did hire me, like you said, and he did threaten to kill Dalia, like you said, but I didn’t give him what I stole—some sort of keycard. When I got to the dropoff, there was someone else…”
The three guards stood there beaming. Gallagher rolled his eyes.
Ms. Saran shook her head. “You won’t believe me.”
“No, no, we trust you,” Hormel blurted.
She glanced sideways. “Well, when I got to the Storage ring, the person who took the card from me was... Ragana Ledas.”
Johnson exchanged glances with Hormel and Charleston. Gallagher glances at the ceiling.
“No way,” Hormel said.
Charleston shook his head. “That changes everything.”
He scrunched his brow. “But why come all the way back here, with Mason?”
“I don’t know if I should say right now, you might take it from me…” The girl muttered, eyes to her boots.
Charleston stepped back. “Oh, I see, you’ve got evidence.”
Hormel snapped his fingers. “An air-gap recorder! That’s smart.”
Johnson shook his head. “Evidence of what? Your deal with Mason? Why would Mason help you with that?”
Gallagher sighed. “For leverage over Ragana, obviously. Well, really he just wanted her eye.”
Charleston nodded at Gallagher. “Oh hey, look who’s contributing... wait…” He raised an eyebrow. “Her eye?”
“So he’s taking you to detainment to deliver evidence?” Johnson asked Ms. Saran.
She looked up, eyes wide, “Oh, no! I need to show it to Dalia—warn her about Ragana.” She pouted. “Then maybe she’ll forgive me.”
Hormel gasped. “Well, yeah! You need to go like right now!”
Johnson narrowed his eyes and pointed at Gallagher. “What the hell’s wrong with you, taking her to detainment. Bonus or no bonus, this is bigger than all of us now. You get her up to the Ledas suites right now. That’s an order.”
Gallagher’s mouth dropped open. “But… we’re both privates… and I was… oh forget it.” He saluted. “Yes sir, you’re right, I’m such an ass, what was I thinking?”
Johnson put his meaty paws on Simonee’s shoulders and squeezed. “I have to say Ms. Saran, your story just warms my heart, godspeed!” He choked. “Godspeed indeed.”
Ms. Saran’s eyes glistened and she nodded. “Thank you.”
Gallagher groaned, and Johnson stepped up to him. “What the hell happened to your nose? Mason take a swing at you?”
Gallagher touched the bandage over his nose and chuckled. “Oh, that? No. Funny story actually. I ran into a couple of boobs on Corp-Ring B this morning who wanted to tussle a trained security officer. They got in a lucky punch and ran.”
Johnson squinted. “You file a report?”
Gallagher grinned. “Not yet, when this is all done, maybe I’ll see those two later—take care of them properly.”
A hiss broke the silence of the open doorway.
“What was that?” Johnson asked.
Gallagher looked around. “What was what?”
Johnson shook his head. “Thought I... well, Gallagher, you’d better get going. As soon as Ms. Aggy realizes you aren’t heading to detainment, they’ll send the big guns. Fried’s already on the board.”
“The goon squad?” Gallagher looked pale.
“Yeah, Ledas ain’t fucking around. God speed, brother.” Johnson grabbed his hand and pulled him in. Gallagher fumbled the exchange and patted him on the shoulder instead, then marched Ms. Saran off down the corridor.
Johnson turned to the mess of equipment around them and sighed. “Hey Chili, get those charges put away and tape up the door. I’ll get the torches.”
Hormel saluted. “You got it boss. Charleston, bring the case behind me so I don’t drop these things.”
After the cameras showed the trio of guards clear the corridor, Mariem and Carlos re-opened the door and broke the tape. Mariem bolted down the corridor.
Carlos hollered after her, “Hey! Where are you going?”
“To follow them, obviously. They might need my help.”
Carlos grinned and waggled his eyebrows. “It’s because he likes you isn’t it?”
Mariem glared lasers through Carlos’s skull.
He cleared his throat. “Entiendo, well, I’m going to get out of this costume and take a nap. Call me if you need me.”
He slung Juicy-Lucy over his shoulder and headed the opposite direction.
Mariem took off after Simonee.