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***
- Bestia...
- David...
Fixer nodded at me and decided to get straight to the point, as she always did in our interactions.
- There's an order...
- Go ahead.
- There is a guy, Dan, he has a gambling problem and not so long ago he lost his sports car. As they say, he lost and fuck it, he has a lot of these cars, although he himself in his life has not earned a quid....
I raised my eyebrow questioningly at such meaningless for me details, and Bestia understood me perfectly well.
- However, you don't need these details. The problem is that inside the car was an old disc with a rare recording of Samurai. You need to find that disc and return it, and if you can get the car back, the client will be very happy.
- The details are in the letter?
- Yeah... and you're not interested at all?
- Hmm?
- Well, who could afford to carry a rare record in their car?
- Nah...
I shook my head.
- It doesn't bother me at all. I don't care if it was the son of someone in the band, or if it was Silverhand himself who came back from the other side of the world, though....
I grinned.
- ...he didn't give a shit about his band, so he wouldn't be doing anything here, either on his own or commissioning work from a solo. So my money's on either a crazy collector or the son of someone in the band.
- You're right, it's Nancy's son.
- Whatever. Where do I start looking?
- I'll text you the details in an email... and you better hurry. The car's no big deal, but the tape--
I shrugged.
- Okay, give me more details in the message and we'll get started.
- Roger that...
She texted me the email and I opened it immediately.
- Seriously?
- What?
- A sewer entrance?
- What do you want? Sixth Street underground casino. If you make it official, you'd have to pay a hefty gambling tax, and here, you pay a kickback to the cops that's three times less than the tax--
- All right, let's go. Over and out.
- Yeah, if this casino goes bankrupt, I don't think anyone will be upset....
I got an understanding chuckle.
- Okay, over and out.
Bestia cut the connection, and I threw the letter to my girls and went to get dressed myself. We'll have to go to the city, or rather to the city itself we'll get there quickly, but to get to the destination point... Of course, we could use Delamain again, but it's not stipulated in the order, so no one will compensate for its use, as in the work with Regina. So it would be foolish to spend it out of your own pocket.
And the fact that we'll cover it by robbing this underground casino doesn't change the fact that it's all very expensive. And we're in no rush.
We got into our car, which Panam had recently named Cake2, so that her nickname Cherry would become not just cute, but also very relevant again. After all, she was nicknamed exactly as Cherry, which is on Tortik.....
- So, ladies, I hope I don't have to tell anyone how careful we have to be when working with underground casino systems?
- No... we'll be careful and we'll run all the withdrawals through dozens of offshore companies, a much longer way than we normally do, but we'll do it in such a way that the funds are untraceable.
- Great...
On the road we discussed the case, to the quiet muttering of Becky, who couldn't accept that the case needed quiet work again.
- And by the way, I've almost mastered the covert ops database! And Panam's almost finished her operative training, so she'll be able to take over the security duties for the Runners.
- And you're suggesting I take you with me?
- Mm-hmm...
She showed me the bracelet on her arm.
- What's that?
- Stealth technology for quiet operations. Makes the wearer invisible to others. I tested it in the clan.
- Um...
I scratched the back of my head in embarrassment.
- Is that when you were running around the clan in a swimming costume and making faces at everyone?
- Π?!
She stared at me dumbfounded.
- Did you see that?!
- Well... sort of... yeah... and I'm not the only one....
The girls nodded their heads.
- But after all... I ordered it through a trusted person.....
She looked at the bracelet with resentment.
- ...and why didn't you say anything to me?!
- Tell you what? That you're running around camp in a swimming costume and everyone's so used to some of your antics that they've decided to ignore you?
- But I'm--
- Becca...
Panam intervened.
- ...You're part of our family, but even so, we know what you're capable of when you're bored. Remember when half the camp woke up with stupid drawings on their faces... No, that was fun, just like when you gave Saul and a few other idiots laxatives and they sat in the toilet all day... But let's be honest... it gets boring.
- But I was running around in a swimming costume...didn't you feel bad about your girlfriend being looked at by others?
- Becca, you were being modest... you've seen some of the people in Knight City, do you really think a swimming costume would embarrass me after that? Especially...there's an expression, a girl in underwear is naked, a girl in a swimming costume is clothed.....
- Fuck.
- Well, don't feel bad, I'll have to get you a sandi and a suit, and then I'll start taking you on missions.
- Honestly?
- Yeah, honest.
- That's great!
Becca's excited.
- How's the access to the casino systems?
I looked at the girls and they shook their heads.
- Nah... there's no way in from the outside. If you put slivers in their computers then yeah.....
I left the car with a sigh and swung over the fence and slid down the sloping part of the stone embankment, then activated the sandi and in two steps I changed my direction of movement and found myself on a small horizontal section, where I walked along this narrow path to the collector.
There were no guards, but there was a camera, but it was not dangerous for me now, because the suit's cloaking system was switched on, and the sandi was working at a minimum, but still allowed me to slip past.
I walked down the manifold and reached the large metal door that had no electronic locks on it for a couple of minutes.
- Quiet?
- The retrogrades have suddenly turned retrograde.
- What do you mean?
- I mean, it's just a regular metal door. No electronic locks or anything like that.
- What are you gonna do?
- Well... I used to make energy blades on my tonfa for a reason, didn't I?
- Hmm?
- Just melt through the lock and the hinge points. You could just try to rip the door off, there should be enough muscle strength for that...
- You wait, visit a couple of neighbouring collectors before you do that, maybe there's another entrance there...
I shrugged.
- Okay, let's check it out...
And I did, except there was no other way out. So I had to go back to the door, except this time I got lucky and it opened, letting out a completely washed-up man dressed like a corporate man. And he looked like a completely lost mind.
Sandi's activation is at fifty per cent and I manage to slip inside the casino before the corporat leaves and the door closes behind him.
- I'm inside...
Once again, I lower the level of sandi work and calmly walk through the casino, looking around and slipping slivers into the sockets of the local Sixth Street guards who scurry around the casino keeping an eye on the players. Of course, if I only had a cloaking system, I'd have a much harder time, because with all the lights flashing around, it would have a hard time keeping up with my disguise. Oh, and with only one sandi, I'd have to work at a higher level of acceleration....
And so... I speed up as I pass between the rows and freeze in places where the cloaking system will easily hide me....
Having found a passage to the part of the casino for VIPs, I calmly bypassed the guard in a suit, who stood at the entrance, not forgetting to put a chip in him, and then looked around in this hall. There were no lower level corporates here, but someone in the middle... Kind of like Vee before she got kicked out of the corporation.
Naturally, I didn't want to make a mess of it here either, though I was itching to put a couple of slivers in the hands of these power-hungry minds by zeroing out their accounts and destroying their lives. Why did I feel the urge?
It was just that their faces were too arrogant....
But I held back and made my way to the part of the casino where the employees and security guards were located. The staff-only part, so to speak.
And that's where I went wild, putting splinters in everything. And when I went round these premises and made sure that there were only two entrances, I started to knock out the people around me and only after cleaning everything up I fell out of acceleration again.
- Work hard, ladies, just let me know if anyone decides to enter the staff quarters.
- Okay...
I spent about twenty minutes in the rooms while the girls plundered the casino and searched for the car and the disc with the Samurai's rare recording. And they found out that nobody knew about the record at all, at least while the car was in the care of the local part of Sixth Street, and after it was transferred to a special garage....
The girls also got the address of the garage, and then I went through the casino again, picking up the chips and waiting for the next loser to lose, I left the casino with him. I wish I could say that...
But it wasn't that easy, when I wanted to leave the casino, having collected all the chips except those responsible for the girls' work in the systems of this very casino, the girls warned me that several guards were heading for the staff rooms. I had to use the sandi to its fullest to get to those guards and knock them out by dragging them inside the rooms, and then at the same speed to get to the exit of the casino, through which some rich-looking intelligent man was entering.
It wasn't until I got to the boardwalk that I could relax.
- Ladies?
- All figured out... and yes, they didn't just set up a casino there, nobody wins there. There's not a single machine that's set up to win. So we're asking for permission to delete all the data completely. So that they can't rebuild their casino for as long as possible.
- Do it.
It was at this point that Tortic2 pulled up to where I was standing and I ducked inside activating the sandi, precisely through the open front seat window.
- So, off to the garage?
- Yes...
Panam nodded and pressed the accelerator pedal to the floor, increasing the speed of the car, though when I jumped in, it was going immediately.
- Are we in a hurry?
- Yeah, they want to get the car ready for resale quickly. It's already been in the garage for twenty-four hours, the record disc could have been found by now, so we need to get there as soon as possible.
- Oh, come on.
I shrugged.
- ...If anything, we'll go to a third location and steal it from the buyer. But I'd really like to get it all sorted out quickly and not make any unnecessary moves. By the way, how much did we make off that casino?
- We could pay for a trip to the moon and still have money left over.
That's what Kiwi told me.
- What about me?
- You're not involved, or have you forgotten about that?
Lucy's joined the conversation.
- I was just hoping that you'd cool down a bit and let me at least share the cost of the flight with you.
I got a very suspicious look.
- Splurge?
Becca also decided to join the conversation.
- Yeah. (chuckles)
- With us?
Becca didn't calm down, and the suspicion in her voice grew even more.
- Yeah.
- And you weren't planning on taking the bulk of the payment?
That's the question Panam asked.
- Well...
I looked away.
- I see...
Judy grinned.
- ...If you want, you can barter with us, but only on equal terms.
- Okay...
I sighed...pressuring them now wasn't the smartest thing to do, but a little later we could try to move their payment up a little more, leaving the bulk of the flight payment to me.