Paid in Blood

"If you prick us, do we not bleed? If you tickle us, do we not laugh? If you poison us, do we not die? And if you wrong us, shall we not revenge?"

--William Shakespeare, The Merchant of Venice

Chapter 1

Standing before the bedroom window, I watched as rivulets of rain water cascaded down the glass. Somewhere out in the concrete jungle, a siren howled. A cold January night reigned over Atlanta, but still the city glowed. Streetlights, billboards, and neon signs combined to cast a multi-hued pall over the pride of the south. Ten stories below, the nocturnal traffic crawled through midtown like a luminous worm. The traffic situation hadn’t changed a bit, but the Atlanta of 2042 was a lot different than that of years past. All the flash and glitz made for pretty light, but it cast deep shadows. Predators lurked in those shadows—both men and beasts and things that were neither men nor beasts.

I sighed and reached up to run my right hand over my close-cut hair. The flesh along my skull prickled into goose bumps as my palm passed over, spurring a slight shiver that quivered down my spine. It had been ten years since I lost the original meat, but even now the vat-grown replacement felt foreign, like a part of myself that I didn’t want to acknowledge. In an age where stem cell replacements and organ transplants had become as common as a blood transfusion, most of civilized society had become used to it—that is, if they could afford the price. I had been lucky, but I still couldn’t get used to the feeling. It had been made from my own DNA, but it didn’t seem mine.

The rustle of bed sheets disturbed me from my reverie. I turned back toward the bed, looking to the prostrate form sprawled out across it. Her real name was Monica, but everyone we had ever known called her Brown Sugar—or Sugar for short. She must have been having a good dream because she smiled, biting her upper lip as she stretched in her sleep. Kinky shoulder length hair framed her round face like a dark curtain. She was a bit shorter than most, and her formerly lithe body had begun to put on a little weight as time went on, but then again, so had mine. The result of an interracial union, her skin had the color of creamed coffee, and her ire could rival that of any hood rat in the metro. Some men might have derided her for it, but for me it just endeared me to her that much more.

I turned back toward the window, studying my bare-chested reflection in the neon-lit glass. Even though I had begun to put on a little weight around the middle, I still counted myself to be in pretty good shape for a thirty year old man. My wide chest was covered in more scars than I could count, but more noticeable were the black paw prints of my nanotat, or nanite tattoo, that continuously strolled from one shoulder blade to another.

Nanite tattoos had become a staple of twenty-first century life. They fed off of the body’s electromagnetic fields, stimulating the ink within the skin to form into a certain pattern at certain times, much like a digital calculator or LCD screen. A long time ago I inked my body in a fit of youthful bravado, and now the invisible hound pressed on my chest like a constant weight.

Soon I sighed and tore my eyes away from the window. Standing around rehashing the past wouldn’t get me to sleep any faster, but maybe a full belly would. My stomach was growling anyway, so a midnight snack couldn’t hurt. I turned away and headed for the bedroom door, but as my hand touched upon the doorknob, the bedclothes rustled again.

“Rook?”

No matter how many times I heard that name, it still brought the hint of a smile to my lips. It had started as a joke back when I was a kid—a play off of my last name that one of the older guys thought was funny. But unlike most nicknames, it had stuck. That name followed me up from the streets, and stuck by me when just about every other aspect of my essence changed and molted away. For a while, it was the only name Sugar knew me by. She still slipped into it when she wasn’t thinking.

I turned back to the bed where Sugar lay propped up on one elbow. “I’m here, baby. Just go back to sleep.”

She mumbled something unintelligible and lay back down. I eased the door open and slipped out into the hallway, making my way through the apartment to the kitchen.

The place wasn’t overly huge, but it was big enough. Located on the eastern side Midtown, it didn’t have very tight security, but it boasted some of the best neighbors around—the kind that minded their own business. Even better was the fact that Apartment 1005 didn’t even exist—at least, not officially. In exchange for a favor or two, a friend in a rather high place arranged for a computer glitch to “lose” the location, rent, and ownership information on the apartment. In this digital age, it had become startlingly easy to lose property in the shuffle of corporate assets.

I passed into the den and switched on the television. The two dimensional image of a plastic-faced anchorman sprang up over the screen, bathing the room in a flickering blue glow. I dialed down the volume to a soft murmur as he continued.

“The entire city is still celebrating the Falcons’ play-off win over the Philadelphia Eagles last Sunday. Their victory gains them the NFC championship title and clinches their spot in Superbowl Seventy-Six to be held in San Diego later this month. Tempering that jubilation, however, is news of the death of Atlanta’s star linebacker, Alonzo Jaxon. Jaxon, or Ajax as he was popularly known, collapsed on the field during the weekend game from a massive heart attack. He was rushed into a waiting ambulance, but died on the way to the hospital. An autopsy is scheduled to determine his exact cause of death. In a related story—“

I keyed the volume down to a low murmur as the anchor droned on about some company being investigated by the North American Union and Corporate Council for “corrupt business practices.” I didn’t catch the corporation’s name, but it hardly mattered. In this day and age, all businesses were corrupt. I, of all people, should have known.

Turning away from the idiot box, I moved into the kitchen. The soft glow of the TV barely penetrated the darkness, but I still didn’t turn on the light. I crossed the kitchen and opened the fridge, spilling a wash of golden light over the kitchen floor. For a moment or two, I stood there like a fat woman trying to decide: cake, or ice cream? She would have chosen both, but I wasn’t in the mood for comfort foot. I just sighed and grabbed a beer.

I had turned back toward the den when I heard something. Even after retiring from the old business, the slightest noise could still put me on edge. Something about that sound—like a muffled bump against the living room wall—seemed different than the usual nighttime imaginings. I froze with beer in hand, peering curiously toward the flickering den.

“Sugar, is that you?” I called out.

Nothing answered my call. But instead of calming my fears, it twisted my gut like a cold hand. Suddenly every nerve in my body was on edge—a feeling I thought I had left behind three years ago.

As quietly as I could, I padded over to the doorway and pressed my wide shoulders against the wall. Old instincts suddenly took hold as the sturm and drang began to pulse within my chest. Concentrating on the sounds in the living room, I listened as barely audible footsteps tread upon the soft carpet, slowly moving closer to the kitchen. I held my breath as the footsteps stopped, and the glossy black barrel of a twelve gauge shotgun edged through the doorway.

Just as the attached arm started through, I darted forward, grabbing the weapon by the barrel and jerking it past my side. My left fist slammed into the ski-masked face I now had in front me. The most he got out was “fu—“ before the heel of my palm kissed his nose. His hand clenched reflexively, and the weapon roared, discharging a blast of shot right by my hip. The recoil kicked upward, and I trapped the barrel beneath my armpit. Grabbing the weapon with both hands, I planted my bare food into the man’s stomach and heaved. His grip on the weapon dissolved with an oof as the breath rushed from his lungs. I had my hand was around the trigger in an instant, ready to blast the bastard right where he lay on the floor. But then something moved to my right.

Instead of looking to see what it was, my instincts screamed at me to get the hell out of the way. And I listened, spinning away from the door pressing my back to the wall. Just as I cleared the threshold, a staccato chain of autofire sang out, tearing through the doorway and into the wall. I worked the action on shotgun, blindly reaching around the door frame to unleash a load of buckshot at where the little prick should have been. Despite my ringing ears, I heard someone shout, and then the sound of running feet. Finger poised over the trigger, I whirled around the corner just in time to see a second hitman dive behind the couch. I reacted quickly, but not quickly enough. My pursuing shot only gutted the stuffing out the back of the sofa.

Another flash of movement drew my aim as the first gunman scrambled for the door. The fight may have left him, but I wasn’t about to let him off that easy. The shotgun roared in my hands, unleashing a torrent of buckshot that turned the man’s hip into dog chow. He hit the ground with a satisfying scream, but I didn’t have time to savor the success. The one behind the couch opened fire again, forcing me to retreat beyond the doorway. Slugs slammed into the drywall, and I fell to a crouch as the bullets punched through, whizzing overhead. I growled and leaned into the doorway, the shotgun booming. Two new holes appeared in the back of my sofa before the first shell casing had even hit the ground, but as I tried to work the trigger again, all I got was a metallic click. The magazine was dry. My stomach suddenly lurched as I found myself standing in the open, half naked, without a bullet to my name.

That was when desperation took hold.

The shotgun fell from my grip as I dashed for the couch. My feet left the floor just as the second hitman rose from behind the furniture, trying to bring his weapon to bear. I slammed a meaty forearm into the weapon, sending his arm wheeling outward as the rest of my mass struck his body. His finger clamped down on the trigger as we tumbled to the floor, spraying slugs into the far wall.

Pinning his arm to the ground, I delivered a punch to his solar plexus that convinced him to give up the gun. I swatted the weapon away and drove my fist into the masked face beneath me, but instead of flesh and bone, I struck hard steel. A piercing howl escaped my lips as I pulled my bruised hand back into my gut.

My opponent capitalized on the moment, wriggling partly out from under me to free his arms and snatch an eight-inch blade from the sheath on his thigh. The serrated blade flashed upward, drawing a hot line across my temple even as I threw myself to the side. Freed from my bulk, he rose to his feet, looming over me as I struggled to get up. My face stung where the raw flesh met with open air, and something sticky began to seep into the corner of my eye. The hardwood beneath me was slick with blood—I couldn’t tell if it was my own, or someone else’s—and I slipped and crashed to the ground.

“Now you’re gonna die, fucker,” he growled, backlit by the light from the TV as he loomed above me. He took a step forward, ready to plunge the steel into my gut.

And then his neck exploded in a spray of crimson pulp as a single gunshot rang out. He hit the ground hard, gurgling softly as his limbs pawed at the carpet.

Behind him, Sugar stood with my old revolver held in both hands. The Ruger .357 glinted in the darkness, its inscribed chromed surface reflecting the muted light from the television. Sugar’s eyes were wide with terror, but her hands held the weapon unwaveringly as she pumped another shot into the man’s back. His feeble struggles ceased, and he finally lay still.

I picked myself up off the floor like a drunk, holding my hand against the wound on my head.

She looked up from the body almost as if noticing me for the first time. “Are you--“

“I’m fine. It’s nothing a little duct tape won’t fix,” I said, reaching out to take the pistol from her now-shaking hands. Despite my outward bravado, its weight was firm and reassuring. Feeling the familiar grip beneath my fingers seemed to calm the palsy of my limbs.

“My God, your face,” she whispered.

I turned away from her and hit the light switch, scanning the living room for anything else we had missed. After finding nothing, I moved over to the first intruder. A large pool of blood had spread around him, and he lay unmoving, his eyes staring blankly at the floor. From the state of his injury, he probably was probably alive, but not for much longer. I decided to let nature take its course and stepped over his dying form, padding over to the front foyer. The adrenaline was still surging through my system like a double shot of heroine as I peeked around the corner toward the front door. I half-way expected to find myself staring down the business end of a gun, but all I found was empty space. The unattended door yawned open, its electrolock a mess of exposed wires. I pushed it closed and turned the deadbolt to secure it for the time-being.

“Did you see anyone else?” I asked, returning to the living room.

She shook her head.

“At least that’s some good news. Come on, we have to go.”

“Sit down and let me clean you up.”

“No,” I said, a bit more sternly than I had intended. She gave me a hurt look, but I tried to ignore it. “Get your things packed. We need to be out of here in five minutes. They could have back-up on the way.” I didn’t tell her that the neighbors had probably called the cops by now. She already knew.

Sugar started to protest, but I gave her a slight push toward the bedroom to get her moving. As soon as we got there, she began rummaging through the closet.

“One bag,” I cautioned. “This ain’t gonna be a vacation.”

She gave me a slight scowl but set to work anyway, cramming clothes and computer equipment into her suitcase.

In the meantime I went into the bathroom, flipping on the light to look myself in the mirror. The bastard had gotten me pretty good, as evidenced by the deep gash along my temple and into the hairline. As with most head wounds, it looked worse than it really was. The bleeding had mostly stopped, but it had already drained down my neck and onto my wide chest. The black paw prints tread through the blood across my chest like a ghostly mongrel stalking from one shoulder to the other. It stung, but I managed to clean off most of the blood with some warm water. Using a few butterfly bandages from the emergency med kit, I sealed it closed until I could get some proper stitches.

That was when the shakes started. It had been a while since they paid me a visit. My hands began to tremble as the adrenaline faded from my system, replaced with a thousand unbidden memories that bubbled to the surface of my conscience like caskets after a low country flood. I thought I had kicked the shakes a long while back, but I had been out of the game for too long. The good life had made me soft. Now the only thing I could do was ride it out.

I staggered back toward the toilet and sat down, desperately willing it to stop as I trembled like a wind-blown leaf. I tucked my head between my knees, gripping my legs so hard that I swear I could feel the bruises welling up beneath my skin. Splashes of blood painted my mind’s eye as the tumult of memories sped by, but the over-arching theme to it all was a desperate hope that Sugar wouldn’t find me like that.

It was only a minute or two before the palsy began to fade, but it felt like much more. I took a moment to calm my labored breathing and wipe the wetness from my eyes before standing once again. I took a deep breath and steadied myself against the wall before returning to the bedroom.

By then Sugar had finished packing. She had tamed her hair into a short pony tail and was hurriedly pulling a sweater on over her tank top. “What took you so long?”

“I had to get cleaned up.”

She looked far from convinced, but neither did she press the issue. “Aren’t you going to pack?”

“Already have.” I reached into the closet and grabbed the sports duffle lying on the floor—an emergency bag in case I had to get out of Dodge in a hurry. It was an old habit from a life of running, and one that I would always be thankful for hanging on to. Tossing it onto the bed beside hers, I went to the closet again.

I pulled on an old pair of jeans and then snatched up a black T-shirt off the floor, putting it on as well. I donned my old shoulder holster and shoved the revolver into its accustomed spot before finally grabbing the Kevlar-lined jacket off the coat rack.

“Are you ready to go?” Sugar stood with luggage in hand, wearing a blue rain jacket.

“Yeah—no, wait.”

I turned back and snatched my digital assistant device off of the dresser.

“What the hell is that for?”

“Evidence,” I said as I breezed by her into the hall and out into the kitchen.

I approached the first one, cautiously stepping around the blood that had pooled on the floor around him. Gingerly, I reached down and peeled the mask off to reveal his face. It was a mess of blood from his busted nose, but I could make out youthful features beneath it all, brown eyes staring upward with mouth opened in a silent scream. The nub of a green mohawk on his scalp contrasted sharply with his black skin, but other than that there was nothing unusual about him. I switched my digital assistant to camera mode and took a quick snap shot of his face, then started rifling through his pockets. The only thing he had on him were a dozen shotgun shells, which I promptly stuffed into my bag before moving on to the next body.

This still lay face down on the sodden rug, limbs splayed out like a snow angel. I rolled him over onto his back and reached down, pulling off the mask to look the would-be-killer in the eyes. As the mask came off, a tangle of dirty-blonde hair spilled out from the hood, framing the steely visage beneath. To my surprise, the he wasn’t a he at all—it was a woman. More interestingly, the entire left side of her face was covered in pinkish scarring. Judging from the surprise I got when I punched her, I could guess that there was some kind of metal plate somewhere in there too.

Sugar wrinkled her nose in disgust. “God, what happened to her?”

“You shot her,” I quipped. “Or don’t you remember?”

“I mean her face,” she said with a scowl.

“Must have been an old injury. Maybe her body wouldn’t take to the stem cell therapy—that, or she couldn’t afford it. It doesn’t really matter now.”

“Do you know these guys?”

I shook my head, standing up once again. “No, but I’m sure someone does.” I snapped a photograph of the corpse and started rifling through her possessions.

I took a pair of clips for her submachine gun, four zip-tie handcuffs, and her knife. I also grabbed her gun from the floor, an HK MP-5. It was an older model common on the streets, but from what I’d been through that night, I could tell it was still plenty deadly. Stowing it all in my duffle bag along with the rest of the gear, I reclaimed the shotgun and used the shells I’d scavenged to reload the piece and slam a fresh round into the chamber. I looped the bag’s strap around my neck and shoulder so that I could grasp the shotgun with both hands, then headed back toward the door, gun first.

Sugar followed as I edged out into the hallway, twitching at the trigger. Luckily, no one else was in evidence and my neighbors had enough sense to stay inside. Closing the door behind us, we bypassed the elevator and headed for the stairs. We reached the bottom slightly out of breath, but wasted no time in heading out the adjoining door and into the street.

The rain was still coming down as we left the apartment building, which only made the January chill that much worse. The city’s neon lights lit up the night sky like a gaudy Christmas tree, but the street around us was strangely dark except for the streetlights hovering overhead. Despite the urgency of the situation, I paused, rainwater running down my face like cold tears, as we lingering just beyond the entrance to the building—the first real home I’d ever known.

Sugar seemed to sense my feelings and put a sympathetic hand on my shoulder. “Derek,” she said quietly, using my real name for the first time that night. “You said it yourself. We have to go.”

“Yeah, I know.” I turned away from the building, flashing a shadow of a smile. “Let’s blow.”