Chapter Thirty-Two - Basse Couture

“Car culture is strange.

They tend to be at least mildly competitive, which means that we occasionally get to observe two Samurai trying to one-up each other with increasingly wild rides. These cars don’t tend to stay cars for very long, not when walking mecha, flying tanks, literal airships and space-capable craft are some of the easier ways to escalate.”

--J. P. Kafka on the evolution of car culture, Jan 2038

***

I leaned back into the molded seat and tapped my fingers on the armrests as I thought. Fun and games aside, we were on a mission. We had to run over and save Katallina. It felt as if we were getting close. Deus Ex had dumped the mission on my lap that morning, and now we were nearing the afternoon. About noon now.

What was Katallina thinking? Stuck, captured, and no doubt far from comfortable for well over a day now. I’d be losing my mind in her place.

The problem was, Samurai needed points to solve all their ills, and she couldn’t have more than a few dozen from what I’d seen.

“You’re quiet,” Gomorrah said as she let go of the controls. “We’re cruising. I set us on a circular path until we figure out our next step.”

“Mmm,” I agreed. “That’s fine. I was just thinking. Myalis, can you gather up everything we’ve learned so far in like, a packet or something? Send it to Deus Ex and Longbow. The nerds too.”

“Nerds?” Gomorrah asked.

“Lag and Dial-Up,” I said. “They’re a pair of Samurai that basically live in the Mesh.”

“You know a lot of Samurai,” Gomorrah said.

“Just the five,” I said.

“That’s more than I know,” she said.

“I guess I get around,” I replied with a grin.

Gomorrah crossed her arms. “Disgusting,” she muttered.

Incoming call. One moment.

The car’s dashboard, already covered in displays and analogue switches and all sorts of buttons and screens, lit up as a hologram appeared standing above it. A foot-tall Deus-Ex wearing a frankly adorable pout as she sat on one of her huge floating guns. “Stray Cat, I saw your package.”

I stared. “You going to rephrase that?”

“What?” the girl asked. “No? I got the information packet your AI compiled. Just finished looking through it, in fact. Sunrise Weapons look like the likely culprit for the kidnapping. I set my AI to digging into them as soon as I got to that part and we’ve found some interesting stuff about them.”

“I sent that like, a minute ago,” I said.

She rolled her eyes. “You’re still thinking at meat-speed. You’ll catch up eventually.” A few screens flicked to life around her, most of them maps. “Pin-pointed a few likely spots of their corp to place the girl, so I sent a few drones out to scan the buildings.”

“Um... why didn’t you do that from the very start?” I asked.

“I only have so many drones, and their scanning process gives people cancer. Anyway, point is I found her here.” One of the maps grew bigger but I wasn’t paying attention to that.

“Wait, back the fuck up. Did you just give cancer to a few hundred people? What the fuck?”

“A higher chance to develop cancer. Probably lower than just breathing the air outside,” Deus Ex said. “I don't actually have anything that can directly give people cancer. That would be a useless weapon.”

“That’s really fucked up, Little D, and I don’t think it would be anything approaching a useless weapon.”

“I have quantum-tunneling plasma guns that could fry people a lightyear away. I don’t need a cancer gun. And besides, those scans worked despite the shielding they have up.”

“Still fucky,” I said. “I know some of them are dicks, but others don’t deserve that kind of crap.”

“Fine, I’ll pay into their life insurance or whatever,” Deus Ex said. “They’re not important, the girl is.”

“You need therapy,” I said. “But that can wait until after we’ve saved the kid. And her dog. Do you have a plan or do we just barge in and take her back?”

“I’ll send you the scans to look at them yourself,” Deus Ex said. “But looking at the place... I don’t think we’ll need much preparation. They’re scientists. The only security in place isn’t on the floor where the girl is kept, and those are rent-a-cops. The cheap kind. The moment they learn a Samurai is on the scene they’ll clock out and leave.”

“Good security, that,” I said.

The hologram shrugged. “I’m up north right now. About an hour’s flight away if I take my time. I have a couple of things to finish up here. Try to get her out before then, and I can take care of things once she’s safe.”

“You don’t want to help?” I asked. “It’s your mission after all.”

“Stray Cat, there are literally only a dozen people in place, and they’re all normies. My drones could probably take care of them all with their cancer scanners and a few hours. But you’re closer. Just make sure she’s safe in the end. Collateral doesn’t matter. See you in a few hours. Deus Ex out.”

The hologram winked away.

“Friendly one,” Gomorrah said. “Not too sure how pleased I am with her taking on god’s name that way.”

“She’s a right little brat,” I said. I didn’t comment on her disregard for human life, but I was certainly thinking about it. “I’m not as... is the word bloodthirsty?”

“You mean the way she didn’t seem to care about casualties? No. Bloodthirst would mean she wants more dead. I think she’s just callous.”

“Right. She really does need therapy. Anyway, I say we fly on over there and I’ll see about sneaking in. Can you keep close, just in case?”

“I’ll park God’s Righteous Fury near them. I can always just launch a few rockets at the building and drive in if I want.”

“Now who’s bloodthirsty.”

Gomorrah sniffed. “I paid for the rocket launchers, I intend to use them.”

I raised both hands in surrender. “Fine, whatever. Just don’t blow me up, alright.”

The twin joysticks slid out from the dash before her and Gomorrah grabbed on. Soon, we were dropping out of traffic and shooting across the city. I was almost used to her insane driving. Almost. I winced as Gomorrah cut a corner so close that the side of the car clipped through a holographic ad hovering next to a building.

“Right, I need a distraction. Myalis, can you bring up the blueprints that Deus Ex got?”

Certainly. I’ve colour-coded it for ease of understanding. And I’ve replaced all the big words with little ones.

I chose to take the high-ground and not comment on any of that as I took in the map hovering before me. It wasn’t an actual projection, just a display on my augs that moved as if I was looking at a fixed object.

The base... lab... thing, was a small-ish complex set on a single level that took up the majority of a building’s floor plan. It had a few office-like spaces near the entrance, then was divided into sections. One looked like a set of labs, the next had break rooms and washrooms as well as a few conference areas and smaller offices, and then a second lab area, this one less of an open-concept area and more a series of small rooms connected by a t-shaped corridor.

Katallina was in one of those rooms, in one that was divided in half with a cell at one end and the entrance at the other.

There were cameras here and there, but they had blindspots, and the only place with any sort of security was the main entrance.

“Yeah, that looks easy to break into,” I said. “Not very secure. Could it be a trap?”

It seems as though someone embezzled some of the funds originally intended to keep the complex secure. It has recently been used mostly to test a few non-lethal light-deterrent weapons. Nothing that would excite the competition too much. I think the main thing keeping the complex safe so far is the lack of interesting things to steal from it.

“That’s one way to keep safe,” I muttered. “But now they have a kid Samurai. What the hell are they planning?”

According to the files of the project lead, they want to indoctrinate her, then use her to purchase low-tier weapons and blueprints only slightly above the company’s current manufacturing capabilities. He wishes to make these inventions seem as if they’re innovations from Sunrise Weapons R&D.

“That’s... it?” I asked. “It’s not a company-wide thing?”

It seems as if few members of the upper echelons in the company are in on the plan.

“They’re moronic,” I said. “Wait, how do you know?”

The complex’s networks are connected to the internet. The lead researcher’s password is his cat’s birthday.

“You mean this entire thing was started by a bunch of fuckwits?”

Was there any doubt?

***