The street had a way of clearing of people as they walked along. Which didn’t mean Frannie and Rakesh weren’t followed, or word of outsiders’ presence didn’t spread along the streets and alleys. It was only a matter of time.
There was no electricity in this part of the city: only the occasional flicker of a candle or oil lamp behind a window throwing out faint puddles of light. It came as no surprise when a tall man with a large gun stepped into one of those puddles ahead of them.
“Welcome to my territory. Why should I let you live?”
Frannie sighed, not because of this threat, but over the fact that the people trapped in this slum had access to high-tech weapons but no way to make light bulbs work. Rakesh dropped her hand and stepped forward to confront the gunman. Frannie stayed in the shadows and watched his back. Further into the dark, others watched her.
Rakesh showed the gunman his leather courier bag. “I have a delivery to make. Can I take anything out for you?” he added.
Rakesh sounded so polite and helpful Frannie had to hide a smile. But it worked.
“The mail has to get through, eh?” the gunman asked. He thoughtfully scratched his bearded jaw.
“Heard about you lot.” All the bravado had left his voice.
“Just shoot him and take what he’s got,” a watcher in the dark called.
Frannie turned enough to make sure her gun was visible to the watchers. She caught the glitter of eyes.
“Kindly keep out of this,” she suggested softly.
“He’s a mailman,” the gunman called to the others. “Remember what happens when the mail doesn’t get through.”
The troublemaker took a step out of concealment. “Who’ll know, if he’s dead?”
“They’ll know,” Rakesh said. There wasn’t a hint of doubt in his voice. He didn’t bother to look at anyone but the gunman. “I’m on my way to Paddington. I’ll come back this way. Be waiting here if you have anything for me to deliver. Francine.” He gestured her forward.
“What the—!” The troublemaker lunged.
The gunman shot him before Frannie could. The man’s angry shout turned into a scream that nobody paid any attention to. The blood that flowed onto the ground was just one stain among many.
“I’ll be here,” the gunman said. “Watch out for the Zs,” he called out as Frannie walked away with Rakesh.
“So, you peace-loving ex-mercs retaliate when something happens to one of your own,” she said once they were away from the gang.
“I’ve heard that rumor,” was his cool answer.
When they reached the main entrance of the ruined rail station she asked, “How are we finding Mrs Bledsoe’s daughter?”
He took out a handheld puter and used the keypad. “Easy. Mrs Bledsoe had her daughter chipped when she was a kid.”
“Ah. Of course.” She kept her attention on the dark street and the shadows by the surrounding buildings while Rakesh used the primitive tracking function of his puter.
She supposed the old lady’s daughter would be in the age range for that particular endtimes app.
Identity/tracking chip implants had been all the rage for children back when civilization began seriously to fall apart. Even members of the Elect communities had used them. Frannie supposed the IT chips had been the first tech enhancements her ancestors had used.
After a minute or two he lifted his head and looked to the left. “This way.”
She accompanied him around a corner, into an area of tents and shacks set up on the street. They stopped in front of a tent, where they found a very surprised middle-aged woman who burst out crying when Rakesh gave her the letter. She said no when Rakesh asked her if she wanted him to bring an answer to her mother.
Duty over, Rakesh and Frannie headed back the way they had come. They exchanged a glance to acknowledge they knew they were being followed as they approached the spot where the gunman had said he’d meet him.
The gunman was there all right, a piece of mauled meat, with a pair of zombies kneeling on either side of him, munching away. The gangbanger had warned them to look out for the Zs, but had ended up a victim of the hunt himself.
“Because he was alone,” Rakesh said. “Waiting for me.”
The Zs sprang away from their kill, toward them.
“Two more coming up behind us,” Frannie answered.
“Aim for the head,” he said as she span around.
“I know!”
Her irritated shout was drowned by the roar of the Glock as she fired. The bullet went into the Z’s forehead with a horrible thud, blowing a much bigger hole in the attacker’s head than it should have.
Stinking brain fragments flew away into the dark.
Her next shot went through the second zombie’s shoulder. He slammed into Frannie without slowing at all. This one had enough intelligence left to grab her arms and wrench them so hard the Glock was forced from her grasp. She held the Z away from her while he snapped at her face. She brought up her knees from beneath him.
But a knife sank to the hilt into the zombie’s head before she could lever him off.
Rakesh flung the body away before it collapsed onto her. He pulled her to her feet. A quick glance told her Rakesh had taken out the other pair of zombies. No one else was around.
“I owe you one,” she informed the mailman.
He gave a curt nod. “I’ll hold you to it. Keeping promises and returning favors is the right way to live,” he added. He sounded like he expected her to argue.
“Well, yeah,” she answered.
They made their way back to the sentry post. Frannie had wondered if getting out would be as easy as getting in, but the guard was waiting there for them. She let them through and pressed a tiny bag into Rakesh’s hands. Mailmen had the run of the world, Frannie decided. What they did was just too useful to keep them from making their rounds.
She and Rakesh spent some more time in the sewer, but were met by a smuggler’s van at the spot where they came out. It was just after dawn. The van took them deep into the hangars beyond the collapsed terminal buildings of Gatwick Airport. A well-maintained private jet was parked inside the hangar. They were taken past it, up a flight of metal stairs to an office/living area. A tall, thin man came from behind his desk to greet Rakesh, arms held out for a hug.
He stopped inches away from the mailman and made a gagging noise. “Oh, God, you stink.” He went to a door in the back of the office and gestured them through. “Get cleaned up. There’ll be food waiting for you when you’re done.”
Not only was there running water in the bathroom shower, but it was hot! Frannie stripped off her clothes and plunged into the steaming stream of water with her face turned up and her eyes closed.
Heavenly!
It wasn’t long before her rapture was interrupted as a naked Rakesh squeezed in beside her. “To save time and energy,” was his comment. He began to rub her skin, leaving a trail of lather and tingling pleasure. “I brought soap.”
She gathered up soap bubbles and returned the favor, her hands gliding over his chest and hips and down his thighs.
“We both know how this is going to end,” he said.
“Uh-huh.” Frannie leaned her head against his shoulder, put a hand on his hip to steady herself and wrapped her leg around him, welcoming him inside.
“What is it you want from me?” Frannie asked Rakesh. She didn’t turn away from watching the clouds below the airplane window, but she was acutely aware of him in the seat beside her. They’d both slept on the flight. When she woke up she found his head resting on her shoulder. She watched him for a while, then turned toward the window when he woke up.
She held her wrist up, showing her implant. “I can’t offer you every bit of data I can access at the retrieval point. I certainly can’t download everything there is in the database into my one little brain. I’m letting you name what your help’s been worth. And it has to be something accessible at my security level.