CHAPTER 11
“Mister Miller isn’t seeing guests,” the security dolls intoned when Nick and the Archangels approached.
Both dolls were new Sigma Chevaliers, which were updated versions of the Lancer and competed with the G7. These were the dolls that Kim had been worried about. Unlike the Lancers, they were closer to the size of an average woman, but with the curves of a supermodel. Sigma knew their target market.
Rie opened her mouth to object, but Nick raised his hand.
“I’ll send Lucas a message,” he said, pulling out his phone.
He tapped something out, hit send, and waited. A few seconds later, the dolls seized up. Then they stepped aside and gestured to the stairs up.
“Welcome back, Mister Waite,” they said.
Nick wondered if they genuinely knew that he’d been here before, or if that was a programmed greeting.
When he stepped forward, the Archangels followed. Immediately, the Chevaliers blocked them.
“For security reasons, only one of you may accompany Mister Waite,” one of them said. Disdain dripped from her tone as she said “you” to the police dolls.
The Mark 1s gripped their weapons tightly, but Rie turned and waved for them to calm down.
“Lucas is an old friend of Nicholas,” she said. “I believe things will be fine. And you will be right outside, regardless.”
The responsive flash of eyes made it clear that the dolls weren’t as sure. However, they backed down with a nod.
“We shall wait for you here, Detective,” Twelve told Nick.
For some reason, Chloe and the two Mark 3s didn’t join in. He found out why when he walked up the stairs and they followed. The Chevaliers didn’t stop them.
Before he could turn and question them, Rie looped her arm around his and led him upward. That told him everything he needed to know.
Nothing had changed about Lucas’s office. It had an old-timey feel to it. Lots of dark wood, black marble, and dark shadows in the high ceilings. Lights dangled from chains. Nick felt as if he had stepped inside a movie filmed many decades ago.
Which was the entire point. Lucas was new money. While Neo Westphalia had been built by a bunch of tech billionaires who minted their wealth at the turn of the millennium, a new generation was making their dough from new technologies. And their values differed somewhat.
Nick took in all the physical decorations and was reminded of how few of these existed in his life right now. There had been a few at the tailor. Lucas had always appreciated the physical over the virtual. With the money he had, he didn’t need to rely on cheap AR.
If Nick had that money, would he find Babylon less dreary? Would it be less of a cold mass of steel and glass?
Another pair of Chevaliers awaited them upstairs.
“Welcome, Mister Waite. Mister Miller is waiting for you in his office,” they said.
Nick knew the way, and the Archangels followed closely behind him. Rie didn’t have a weapon on her, he belatedly realized. Or at least, a visible weapon. Perhaps she had some sort of energy weapon or handgun concealed inside her armor.
Although that would introduce a structural weakness. He’d be genuinely surprised if she had any hidden compartments.
The office was small, which made sense given it was for a small business. Lucas probably used this place to entertain guests and for accounting.
A doll sat behind a large oak desk outside a closed door. No, not a doll, Nick realized. An interface. Her eyes were vacant.
Interfaces were humanoid shells that mainframes used to physically interact with the world. They had little functional purpose, but they had become a trend with the boom in emotion engines. Company executives liked the idea that the AI that ran their companies was a “person” they could talk to. Unlike dolls, interfaces even came in male versions.
“I see Lucas finally upgraded you, Lumen,” he said.
The woman’s eyes regained their life. Then she looked up at him.
Unlike dolls, she was almost impossible to tell apart from a human. Only the barcode and serial number engraved in blue ink beneath her left eye, plus the silver bands on her wrists, gave her away. Interfaces never left a factory without these distinguishing features.
She had bobbed white hair with blue highlights, vivid blue eyes, and wore a sleeveless black dress. The cobalt theme was hard to miss.
“Nick. It has been several years. We never had the opportunity to speak outside of a terminal,” Lumen said, her tone exceedingly professional. “It is good to see you. Lucas has missed you.”
“Has he?”
“I imagine so. The new Ciphers lack your efficiency.” She tilted her head. “Are you here to provide maintenance?”
Rie looked at him sidelong with a strange expression.
“I’ll talk to Lucas about it,” he said.
“Thank you. I hope your meeting is productive.” She turned away from him and her eyes became vacant again.
The doors to Lucas’s office opened. Lumen had presumably kept them closed to force him to talk to her.
“She’s an older mainframe, isn’t she?” Rie asked as they stepped over the threshold and turned the final corner.
“Lucas tinkers with her, but she’s a logic engine he bought about 15 years ago,” Nick said. “I played with her directives a lot when I used to work here.”
The time for small talk was over, however. Lucas finally came into sight.
Along with a bunch of his thugs.
Lucas leaned back on a massive leather throne, his arms behind his head. He wore a silver suit, which contrasted strongly with his dark skin, and a pair of mirrored glasses framed his face. Amethyst earrings dangled on either side, but were intentionally mismatched in length. His hair was dark, neatly combed, but substantially longer than it had been the last time Nick had seen him.
His thugs were a mixture of suited men and women, all packing bulky handguns on their hips. Most had visible cybernetics, usually replacement limbs, although one had some patchwork done to his face. Probably a burn victim.
“Nick, long time, no see. Not sure I approve of your new friends, though,” Lucas said, staring at Rie.
“I see you still wear those stupid AR glasses. Do they even do anything when you have an implant?” Nick asked.
A few of the thugs tensed, but Lucas laughed. Nick walked forward and leaned across the massive desk. The two men shook hands, and Nick tried not to wince as Lucas’s cybernetic hand tried to crush his.
“And you still haven’t fixed your damn hand,” Nick said, shaking the feeling back into his hand.
“I built this thing to crack skulls open, not hand out pansy-ass handshakes.” Lucas sat back down, then flipped a vape pen out from inside his arm. “Sit down. I hope this isn’t a shakedown.”
“Do the Archangels usually approach politely during shakedowns?” Nick asked.
Lucas glanced at Rie, then shrugged. “No. But then, the prototypes usually don’t walk around in public. You’re giving me shit about my AR glasses, but I’m wearing them for damn good reason. I can control what I see with these, unlike this.” The smuggler tapped the side of his head.
Rie smiled. “You don’t need to pretend that your implant isn’t modded, Lucas. It is considered a permissible implant.”
His face turned stony. “Permissible, huh? Can’t say I appreciate the idea that what I do with my implant is your business.”
“You do business in Babylon. You know how this works,” Nick said, trying to defuse the tension. “With that said, I think you’re overstating how effective your glasses are. Your mod shuts out the neural network, right? But your glasses still need a connection to work. Augmented reality only works if you receive the augmented part. Otherwise it’s just reality.”
Lucas snorted and fiddled with his glasses. “Sure. But these are locked off from the security bands and encrypted. I can’t see everything, but I still get access to assisted aiming and more Cipher shit than you get.”
Rie’s smile never wavered. Lucas had just admitted that his AR glasses were illegal, as they had been modded to prevent access over the security bands.
Nick sighed. “Lucas, don’t freak out. But how many Archangels walked into the room with me?”
Silence. Lucas looked around the room, his eyes hidden behind the mirrored lenses. Then he lowered the glasses and his expression tightened.
“Fuck me,” he breathed out. “Mark 3s. When the fuck did they get here? And how did they do that?”
“Maybe your glasses weren’t as encrypted as you thought, old man,” Chloe said with a smirk.
The thugs looked at Lucas in confusion. If they heard Chloe, they showed no signs of it.
“I think you might want to show yourself, Chloe,” Nick said, turning in his chair.
“Stay steady, boys,” Lucas said, raising his hands in a calming gesture.
Something happened, imperceptible to Nick. The thugs swore and reached for their guns.
“I said. Stay. Steady,” Lucas roared.
His thugs froze, then returned to their resting poses. The Archangels hadn’t even flinched. Even if a weapon had been drawn, they could have just shut down the nervous system of the gunman.
“Quite the show of force. Alright. I get it. You’re not here to put me out of business. Then why are you here? And what are you doing here, Nick?” Lucas grunted out between puffs of his vape pen.
“I’m a detective now. They made me a great offer.”
Lucas snorted. “A financially great offer, or the sort of great offer with an implied bullet point?”
“Both. First one, then the other,” Nick said.
The Archangels shot Nick a nasty look, while the smuggler laughed.
“Detective, huh. Hell of a step up from the kid I hired to keep Lumen running squeaky clean.” Lucas paused. “You should give her a check-up on the way out. Half the directives you gave her are still churning away, but they pop up some odd codes.”
“You didn’t reset her before the interface upgrade?”
“Nah. Too much history to lose. She’s a little odd, but that’s normal for logic engines in interfaces. Can’t give her any of the fancy modules, so she just runs the club and my finances. I have a new mainframe with all the bells and whistles for the imports side of things,” Lucas said.
Nick nodded and made a mental note to talk with Lumen again on the way out. Maybe he’d learn something interesting while poking through her logs.
“So, what do you want with a small-time smuggler like me?” Lucas looked between Rie and Nick as he spoke. “I’m assuming that you’re the boss, Nick.”
“We’re partners,” Rie insisted.
“Sounds cushy.”
Rie’s lips thinned. “A small-time smuggler wouldn’t be selling arms to anti-government groups. Perhaps you should choose your words more wisely.”
Nick winced while Lucas’s face hardened.
“This is about the bomb threats the other day, isn’t it?” Lucas took a long puff.
“Not quite.” Nick looked around. “We might need everybody to clear out. I’m free from my NDA, and you got off, but nobody else here is really cleared to know this stuff.”
The thugs started, then glared at the Mark 3s.
“Chloe, you might want to step outside as well,” Nick said. He gave her a meaningful look. “Actually step outside.”
Lucas waved a hand, and the thugs left. The Archangels followed. When the doors shut, only Rie, Nick, and Lucas remained inside.
“I have deactivated your recording devices, and am playing an electronic signal that will disrupt any disconnected media,” Rie said. “We are clear to speak about the topic.”
“Can’t say I expected anything less. So, this is about Tartarus and Neural Spike,” Lucas said.
Nick nodded, then briefly explained the events of the past few days. He left out the purpose of the task force, as telling a black-market smuggler that the police were corrupt was like saying that drugs were addictive. Also, it was probably classified info that Nick would get in trouble for talking about.
“I don’t need to be clued in to know you’re leaving something out,” Lucas said afterward. He fiddled with his vape, switching out the canister inside it for another one. “How did the NLF—or whoever took Helena—know that there’d be an opening before the police hit? I didn’t even know that the Archangels had hit anyone until a couple of Ciphers went dark over in Asgard hours later.”
Asgard was another of the cities in Neo Westphalia. All of them were named after ancient or mythological cities that had been considered bastions of greatness of their civilizations.
Like with Babel, nobody had been crazy enough to name a city Atlantis.
Rie shrugged. “Our investigations will uncover the truth.”
“Uh huh.” Lucas rolled his eyes, then looked at Nick. “So, where do I come in? The Archangels don’t usually knock to ask questions about this sort of thing.”
“The NLF pulled off a bunch of bomb threats the day that Tartarus got hit,” Nick explained. “It’s possible that was entirely to provide cover for Travis, as the elevators also malfunctioned that morning.”
Rie nodded in agreement. She had evidently connected the same dots that he had.
“But then they showed up at the docks, trying to steal data they shouldn’t need,” Nick continued. “If they were covering their tracks, they would have been far more destructive.”
“You think somebody else did the raid, and they might have been unrelated,” Lucas said. “Or an accessory.”
“Pretty much, yeah. But they’re getting these dolls, weapons, and fancy neural mods from somewhere. Travis has gone to ground. There’s a damn good chance the NLF is connected to what’s going on and can lead us to Helena. What are the odds that two separate groups with military equipment are operating at the same time, without being noticed by the Archangels?”
“Higher than you think,” Lucas said with a grin. “But fortunately, I do monitor the import market and you’re probably onto something.”
“He is?” Rie asked, clearly surprised.
“Wow. You brought ol’ Nick on as a detective and don’t even trust him. Should trade your doll in for one of those fancy Chevaliers I got out the front, Nick.” Lucas winked at him.
“Explain how he is onto something,” Rie said coldly.
Lucas wagged a finger. “Not so fast. I’m a businessman, and a good businessman doesn’t do anything for free.”
The expression on Rie’s face suggested she was about to prove otherwise. Even if Lucas’s neural implant was deactivated, he might be about to find out that Rie could physically switch it on. Or much worse.
Nick coughed. “What do you want, Lucas?”
“Info. These Mark 3s just appeared out of goddamned nowhere. We’ve been theorizing about them for ages, while Sigma sells the dumbed down Mark 2s to every tinpot dictator interested in their own doll army. Now they show up, and we haven’t even seen a scrap of a spec sheet.” Lucas pointed finger guns at Rie. “Give me the goss.”
A pause.
“The ‘goss,’ Lucas?” Nick asked.
“It’s a great word. You should make more diverse friends. You’ll enlarge your mind.”
Nick wasn’t sure he wanted to know what sort of friends Lucas had made that used the word “goss.” It sounded like the sort of thing he had picked up from some of the stranger patrons of his fine establishment.
“I don’t even know what the word means,” Nick said.
“Gossip. So, spill the beans.” Lucas’s finger guns remained unwavering.
Shaking his head, Nick said, “Fine. I can’t tell you anything classified, but I doubt Sigma will sit on their newest model for long now that they’re wandering the streets.”
He didn’t ask Rie for permission, mostly because showing weakness in front of Lucas would harm more than help. She nodded regardless.
“Fantastic.” Lucas clapped his hands. “Here’s what I got. The new NLF isn’t really connected to the old one, other than the whole ‘burn down the Spires and eat the rich’ shit. You know, dumb, young reactionaries. But somebody is backing them. I’ve been careful not to sell to them directly after last time.”
Rie glared at him, and the smuggler raised his hands in surrender.
“Hey. I didn’t think they were going to try to sneak bombs into cargo containers,” he said defensively. “Anyway, even if I don’t sell to them, there are a thousand small fries who will. So my stuff gets to them anyway. The great circle of capitalism.”
“But you think they’re buying from you,” Nick said.
“Indirectly, yeah. I moved a bunch of neural mods lately, plus a huge amount of G2s and weapons. It looked like an old black company expanding in Alcatraz, but then the owner abruptly shut up shop and vanished.” Lucas grimaced. “He ran an international smuggling business on the side. Last thing he brought in were a couple of small containers from the States. Then, poof. Gone, and all his warehouses were stripped bare.”
“We are aware of the abrupt closure of Lu Import Export,” Rie said, but she looked concerned.
“’course you are. Anyway, rumor was that he brought in something big for some hotshot in the Spires, got a huge payout to keep quiet, and got off this shithole of a planet.” Lucas shrugged. “It’s a nice story, at least. Most likely he got thrown into the ocean and whoever is backing the NLF stole everything.”
“So some mysterious foreign containers, a lot of G2s, weapons, and neural mods all vanished. Plus money,” Nick summarized. “What about the explosives?”
“I don’t trade in those anymore. In fact, it’s practically impossible to buy a lot of them without getting a visit from our lovely girls in cybernetic blue.” Lucas nodded at Rie. “They’re probably assembling their own explosives. The city is flooded with high-explosive and incendiary rounds for anti-doll purposes. My boys and girls use them. Anything less is like shooting foam darts at a doll.”
Nick clicked his tongue. That made too much sense. The Archangels could monitor explosives, dolls, and weapons, but ammunition? The stuff sloshed around Neo Westphalia like water. Although strictly illegal, the police let it slide so long as the black companies kept their fighting out of the public eye.
“They’d need a pretty sizable operation to be pulling apart bullets for explosives, though,” Nick said slowly. “Not to mention that they’d need to be sourcing them. If they’re screwing with neural networks and mods, that narrows the net even more. There can’t be that many operations in Alcatraz with suspicious network activity and a large trade in ammunition.”
“Front companies are more likely,” Lucas said. “But you’ve got the idea. You recall how Welk ran Neural Spike, don’t you?”
Nick nodded. “Even with the military’s blessing, he was still operating illegally. They’d just disown him if he attracted the wrong attention. So he had to be careful not to centralize everything and relied on friends like you. But he still had a few major operations. An explosive manufacturing plant must be the equivalent of one of those.”
Rie shifted uncomfortably. “The police can begin sweeping Alcatraz for—”
“Don’t bother,” Lucas said. “You already said they have those fancy neural mods to block you out. You Archangels are all brute force—just sucking up all the memories and data from everyone, then zapping anyone with the wrong thoughts. You’ll need a defter touch to find the NLF.”
Her expression turned cold. “We are more capable than you imagine, Lucas. With the city within the grasp of our neural net, it’s only a matter of time before we find them.”
Nick shifted uncomfortably. Rie’s thoughts on privacy were crystal clear.
“Quite the partner here, Nick.” Lucas eyed the prototype Archangel carefully. “But we’re buddies, so I’ll do you a solid anyway. While your dream eaters ransack the neural implants of half the city, I’ll round up some Ciphers and look for real leads in Alcatraz. The NLF doesn’t have many friends. Especially as a lot of them think the raids on Tartarus and friends were because of the bomb threats.”
They weren’t, naturally. But Nick knew it made for a great cover story.
Nick suddenly realized that recent events had become even more suspicious. If Tartarus was supposedly being raided because of the NLF—at least publicly—then that made the case against the police even stronger.
It also meant that whoever organized the raid was likely to be connected to the NLF. They could organize the bomb threats, which provided a useful cover story and helped Travis sabotage security. This gave them a valid excuse to move the raid forward, which was necessary to coincide with the anniversary party so that Tartarus HQ was empty. Then they seized Helena for…
Well, Nick still didn’t know why they wanted Helena.
The NLF’s latest actions were illogical, but he needed to dig these revolutionaries out of their trenches to solve this mystery. Their mysterious benefactor might be the ultimate target of the investigation.
And the one who had Helena.
“Thanks, Lucas,” Nick said.
“No problem. A shame your lovely ladies can’t do a proper Cipher sweep.” Lucas grinned toothily.
Rie scowled. “As I said earlier, we are more capable than you imagine. Perhaps you should be warier of what we can do.”
Lucas blinked several times in confusion, then looked at Nick. “Uh, what?”
“Time for the trade, I think.” Nick scratched the back of his neck. “I’m not just a detective. In fact, I’m about to explain the entire reason I approached you in person, before anyone realizes I’m a detective. I need to shore up contacts with Cipher networks if I want to be useful.”
“Fair. So long as you scratch my back, I’ll scratch yours. Just don’t forget your roots.” Lucas tapped his vape pen on his desk for effect. “Some circles will cut you off out of principle. But a bunch of us are realists. The world changed the instant Welk created the first Archangel prototype. I’ll work with you. A lot of others will as well, either because they like you or because it might be fun to work with the Archangels for once.”
Nick sighed in relief. This had been the part he’d been dreading. Although it would get worse shortly.
“But one piece of advice, Nick.” Lucas leaned forward. “You’re used to being a minion, but now you’re a dealmaker—cop or not. The moment the police raid one of your partners without the best fucking reason in the solar system, you’re done.”
Nick nodded solemnly. To him, that made perfect sense. Every major raid on a black company set Ciphers on edge. The Spires always danced around heavy regulations amid lip service to ideals of freedom.
“What counts as ‘the best fucking reason?’” Rie asked with a raised eyebrow.
“That will depend. I’m willing to accept a raid on terrorists. Jeremy was stupid to do what he did, and I learned my lesson the hard way.”
“You did?” she asked, incredulous.
“Your older sister made some very pointed threats,” Lucas said flatly. “My understanding is that people only get one warning from her, then—” he ran a finger across his neck.
Rie frowned. Was she aware of Kushiel’s activities?
“Anyway, Nick, what’s the deal with these Mark 3s? This is interesting, but a distraction.”
Taking a deep breath, Nick steeled himself for the explanation. “Like I said, I’m not just a detective. You saw what the Mark 3s did earlier. They don’t just use the security bands. Their hardware lets them emulate Ciphers.”
Lucas’s eyebrows shot up, vanishing beneath his dark bangs. “Emulate… Aw, shit, Nick, you’re training the fucking pigs?”
Rie snorted as Lucas let his true opinion of the police slip.
“Somebody has to,” Nick said.
“A lot of people would prefer somebody a lot dumber than you to do it,” Lucas said drily. “But, fuck.” He ran a hand through his hair. Several times. “Welk would love this. If he could choose any Cipher to train his babies, it would be you. Crazy bastard.”
A strange sensation filled Nick in response to Lucas’s words. But he ignored it. At his side, Rie smiled brightly.
“So?” Nick asked.
“This doesn’t change anything. Like I said, the world changed years ago. I’m no Luddite. It’s hard to even tell that I’m not talking to two humans.” Lucas rubbed his eyes, then fiddled with his glasses. His vape lay to the side. “You’re probably the weirdest person to be training dolls, though.”
“Really?”
“Yeah, really. They basically exist in the neural network and the Altnet. You’ve always been that guy on the outside staring in at everybody else enjoying the party,” Lucas said. “That might make some people nervous. You don’t feel the same existential dread that the Archangels invoke. The idea that every thought, action, and aspiration might be monitored and controlled.”
“We don’t have that level of power,” Rie said.
“Yet. You can manipulate our senses. How long before you can manipulate our emotions?”
Rie shifted uncomfortably. “I… do not understand. Nicholas—”
“I think this might be a conversation for later,” Nick said.
Inwardly, he was thankful to Lucas for making Rie uncomfortable enough to raise a topic like this. While he was interested in Chloe and the others, Rie piqued his interest to a far greater extent.
“Anyway, any other fun details you can tell me? Can they shoot laser beams from their eyes yet?” Lucas asked. “The dolls on the garbage my son watches can all do that.”
“We cannot. Yet,” Rie said, smiling.
Nick snorted. “They’re easier to understand in relation to the earlier models. The Mark 1s are basically military dolls condensed into a smaller form, with added neural and electronic warfare capabilities. But Sigma stripped out the emotion engines for the Mark 2s, then slapped in lots of new military tech, and sold them to armies all over the world.”
“Shit armies,” Lucas corrected. “Sigma has struggled to find a major buyer. The Mark 1s were too much for most militaries, and even many police forces. Most generals don’t want soldiers that think for themselves. But the Mark 2s weren’t enough of a paradigm shift to steal market share from RTM and military refitters.”
The international doll market was highly concentrated. RTM made the vast majority of dolls for civilian and military purposes, and many companies bought customized units from them, then sold their own. They were called refitters and were basically part of RTM’s market share. Sigma had been shaking things up lately, but they were the disruptor.
There was a major competitor in China, but tit-for-tat trade wars across the world made them a non-entity in many countries.
“Sigma’s mainframes were a huge hit, but they haven’t made the same inroads with dolls,” Nick said. “Too much volume is in large companies that make purchases for reasons that have nothing to do with merit.”
“You mean like the fact your commissioner is a goddamn RTM cheerleader?” Lucas barked out a laugh. “Everyone knows that the reason they haven’t replaced the Liberators yet is because they won’t accept Sigma’s offer.”
Rie didn’t move. If she had any loyalty to her manufacturer, she kept it hidden.
“Anyway, take all those fancy toys and armor upgrades in the Mark 2s, and put them in the small frame of a Mark 1. Then add in the enhanced neural and electronic warfare capability. Bam, a Mark 3.” Nick waved his hands at Rie. “Well, kind of.”
“She’s the prototype. Got it.”
“One of them,” Rie corrected, her expression stony. “You will meet the other soon enough.”
Chilling.
Lucas frowned. “So, the police are militarizing even more. That means the Mark 3s can handle energy weapons?”
“Yes. They have enough power draw from their batteries to run low-yield energy weapons,” Nick said. “There’s not much short of dedicated high caliber anti-armor rounds that will harm them, either.”
“Good thing I’m not starting a war, then.”
Nick got the impression that his catch-up with Lucas was nearing an end.
But he had one more question, and he’d been reminded of it by one of Lucas’s earlier comments.
“You called the Archangels dream eaters earlier,” Nick said. “I don’t see that slang much on the Altnet.”
His friend shifted uncomfortably, which was a new sight for Nick. Rie’s eyes narrowed.
“It’s physical slang only,” Lucas said, suddenly raising his hands at her expression. “Real popular with guests in the district. Uh, I don’t know if you want to know the reason.”
Nick immediately cottoned on, but Rie tilted her head to one side. She looked at both men in confusion.
Then her eyes flashed, and she scowled. A tinge of redness rose in her cheeks.
“We are not dream demons,” Rie said flatly. “When did we become popular in the red-light district?”
“I wouldn’t call you popular.” Lucas laughed, causing Rie to grimace. “But there’s a certain type of clientele that likes the idea of being paralyzed by dominant dolls. The expressions you put on when arresting folks gets some excited, you see?”
“Unfortunately, I do see.” She sighed and rubbed the bridge of her nose. “Nick, did you have a point with this line of questioning?”
“Yes, actually.” Nick pointed at Lucas. “It reminded me that the NLF called me Wraith. If you’re using the same slang as them, I figured you might know what the hell is up with the cringey nickname.”
Lucas roared with laughter, while Rie stared at Nick with an odd expression.
“Wraith! Holy shit, that almost sounds cool. Wonder what those dumbfucks call me.” Then he scowled. “Probably something insulting.”
“I believe you are known as the Proprietor,” Rie said, voice strained. “There aren’t many Ciphers with your wealth and influence in Alcatraz.”
“Huh.” Lucas drummed his fingers on the tabletop. “That’s not half-bad. Not that I’m using it on the Altnet. Maybe I’ll see if anyone else has heard these names. I’m guessing they came up as evidence?”
Nick frowned when Rie shrugged.
“They are recorded in the police database,” she said, clearly dodging the question. Then she frowned. “I am curious why you consider them… cringey.”
“Because we’re not in middle-school,” Nick said flatly. “Pretty much every Cipher is public record, including our employment histories. It’s how we get jobs. If Lucas goes around calling himself the Proprietor, then his customers would laugh him out of his own club.”
“I… see,” Rie said very slowly. “May I suggest that you are more careful with this subject around the Host?”
What?
Lucas covered his mouth as he snickered, but he avoided Nick’s gaze.
When Nick glared at his old friend, Lucas merely rose and held his hand out. Nick got the message.
“I’ll get to work on finding the NLF, Nick. We should do drinks soon. My shout,” Lucas said while they shook hands.
“Is it ever not your shout?”
“Not while my credit is still good.” Lucas waved them out. “And I imagine it’s only getting better with our partnership.”
Outside, the Mark 3s joined them, while the thugs wandered back inside. Presumably to be debriefed.
Nick didn’t make it far. Lumen stood opposite the office entrance, her hands behind her back as she rocked back and forth on blue heels.
“Is it time for my maintenance, Nick?” she asked.