Chapter Fifty-Two - A Cat's Strut

“A lot of the media aimed at younger audiences in the 70s-80s and into the 90s had conflicting messages about how violence isn’t a solution to actual problems, while also using violence as a primary source of entertainment.

Nowadays, however, that has changed significantly. Much of our media centres around samurai, who often use violence, fear, and intimidation as their first resort to solving even the smallest of inconveniences.”

--On Dystopian Child Rearing, Excerpt, 2035

***

The River Heights people, in a show of what I supposed was camaraderie, had all decided to bunk together.

Well, I said bunk together, it wasn’t quite that simple.

The River Heights group seems to lack any direct system of leadership and instead relies more or less on the voices of three important members to make decisions that the rest seem to follow.

“Alright,” I said as I stepped out of the mall. I didn’t have a technical waiting for me, unfortunately, and being that it was stupid o'clock in the morning, there weren’t any buses to take. “Hey, where’s my bike?”

Back in New Montreal.

“Right... can it drive itself over to here?” I asked.

Certainly. Though it will take at least half an hour to arrive.

Which meant that there was no point in splurging on a new ride. I’d just have to walk, like some sort of peasant. I laughed at myself, then took off with a bit of a strut. Myalis hadn’t filled me in entirely yet, but she did place a waypoint on the map stuck to the corner of my augs, so she must have known where I’d be heading in any case.

As I was saying. The group is led by three members, though they were not elected to any position of leadership. They seem to control the others by dint of being the richest and-slash-or because they are in positions of relative power outside of the community.

“Who are these guys?” I asked. “Bunch of old white men?”

That’s an accurate description of one of them. Stanley F. Johnson is the owner of a chain of mid-level housing accommodations across this city. You visited, and destroyed one, about ten hours ago. He has ties to several smaller real estate companies, and runs a few businesses on the side, mostly selling furniture, HVAC services, and security.

“Ah, alright,” I said. “And the other two?

Meredith Jones. She owns the state’s largest insurance company. Her portfolio is also diversified, but it mostly lies in intangible assets. And finally, Will P. Brown. He inherited his family’s assets, making him the fifth richest person in Burlington. He owns shares in nearly every large industrial complex in the state and many beyond.

“Only the fifth richest?” I asked.

As I said, while the de facto leaders are all influential, they’re not necessarily just the richest. They’re all well-connected socialites as well. Humanity tends to be one of those species that values more than just one form of wealth. Popularity, and fame, and connections, and the willingness to do violence, are their own form of capital.

I hummed to myself as I continued to walk. The city was pretty quiet. There was still some traffic on the roads, but the outer lanes had been closed to car traffic, leaving them open for people to get around on foot. Which was nice, since there weren’t many sidewalks to walk on.

“So, they’re all staying together?”

At a hotel one of them owns.

Ah, that made a lot more sense. Myalis fed me what data she had on the hotel and the River Heights folk within it. They’d taken over the penthouse, of course, as well as the four or so floors beneath. That had meant moving a lot of others out of rooms they’d bought, but they didn’t seem to care overly much.

They had their own security details who’d gotten to work securing the building for their bosses. The force was divided into three. One part was securing the ground floor and elevators, another was on the rooftop and on the hovercar-landing balconies and finally the largest group had taken over the corridors between the rooms. I could watch a live feed of armed men keeping the rooms safe.

Of course, being safe was nice and all, but it was all kind of a moot point when Myalis seemed to break into their comms and camera network as if they’d just invited her right in.

“So, I’m not an expert at intimidating people into not being huge dumbasses. What do you think the best way of going about all of this is?”

Ideally, I can see three approaches. The first is to negotiate. Approach them calmly and rationalise why their actions are likely to cause more harm than good, perhaps outlining the obvious consequences. All three seem to have average or above intelligence. They also have advisors and staff assisting them in their decision-making process who would profit from this method.

“Alright,” I said. “What’s the other options?”

The next is simple. Take all of their money. Unfortunately, with the state of things as they are, they might still be able to act on the perception that they have money, even if in fact they have none. The third option is the one I suspect you’ll enjoy the most.

“Go on.”

Sneak into their rooms and either intimidate them one at a time, or work to move them so that all three are in the same location so that you can intimidate all three at once. They are currently asleep.

“Oh, I like that one,” I said.

I started to plot and plan as I continued my walk over. Myalis was kind enough to highlight their rooms for me, which were all, fortunately, on the same floor. One of them had a particularly large living room, so that seemed like a good place to drag the three to.

“So you have any chloroform?” I asked.

I have some, of course. But I have better options as well.

“Yeah, that’s what I meant,” I said with a nod.

I got to the hotel, then slipped into an alley next to it and went invisible. It was almost unfair how much of an advantage that was.

Then I realized that they’d installed these little laser sensors across the lobby. I wasn’t sure if my suit’s invisibility would foil that. So I went around to the back of the hotel and through a service door that Myalis conveniently unlocked for me. One of the guards was around, and he heard the door opening, but I squeezed myself against a wall and left the door ajar.

He poked his head out, then pulled it back closed and made sure it was locked. And then he reported it over their internal comms. Smart guy.

I followed him out of the room, moving slowly so that I wouldn’t make any more noise than I had to.

I considered riding the elevator up, but that would have made it too easy to spot me.

Then I did it anyway because there was no way I was walking up forty flights of stairs. But I did it smartly. I climbed up two flights, avoiding motion sensors and a rather shitty laser grid as I went, then rode the elevator up from the third floor to the floor just below where the River Heights group was waiting.

I walked up from there. They had a guy sitting next to the door out of the staircase one floor up, but his head was knocking back and forth as he fought off sleep, so I just squeezed on past him without making a sound.

The penthouse floor was nice and swanky. Not as cool as the hotel we’d stayed at in New Montreal though. There was some nice carpeting and the walls were all done up in this faux-roman style, with marble all over and big arches over each doorway. A pair of guards were walking a patrol across the main corridor, but they seemed both tired and bored out of their minds.

I paused next to one to check out their gear. A small, compact gun, and a handgun on their leg, chest armour with a rig for ammo, and a visored helmet with all the bells and whistles.

Basically, the kind of shit I’d expect to see on a top-quality PMC. No markings or anything though.

We could probably use these guys over on the front line instead of wasting their time guarding some VIPs. What were the chances that someone would actually come all the way up here to mess these folk up anyway?

I shook my head and continued on my way to mess these folk up.

Myalis kindly provided me with an aerosolized sleeping agent in grenade form. Fortunately, it wasn’t noisy. I waited for the guards to be out of sight of any of the cameras mounted to the ceiling, then underhanded the grenade between them.

They were quick to act. The moment they spotted the grenade one jumped back and away and the other spun around aiming down the corridor from where I’d tossed it.

Then they both just flopped to the ground bonelessly.

“Anyone spot that?” I asked.

I have the cameras running on a loop. Though if you could be so kind as to move his foot back?

I walked over and did just that. “Alright, that worked pretty well. Let’s see if the locals can handle the same treatment.”

***