"Hold on. I'll free you in a minute."
Completing his sweep, he found no sign of the attacker. There was only an exit door, wrenched off the hinges. Glancing through, he saw a set of stairs leading up to the street level. Some of the women had formed a line going up, holding on to one another. The ones left in the basement tried to free the ones still shackled. He waved them back and used a cutting laser on his g-span to burn through the chains in zigzag patterns, allowing the women to help their friends.
He spotted a computer center in the corner. Extracting a takeover drive from his belt, he plugged it into one of the ports, tapping his g-span to communicate with his auto-assistant.
"Proto, I need you to unlock the manacles on those chairs. After that, retrieve everything in the system that refers to illicit activity. Records, locations, names. Anything that can incriminate more of their operation."
"Right away, Vigil."
A series of clacking sounds followed as the manacles snapped off the captives. The women quickly ran to their companions, hugging one another and crying. While the info downloaded, he turned to a group of women who cowered away, clearly terrified. He held up his hands in a disarming gesture. "I'm not going to hurt you. Okay? What happened?"
One of them blinked tears from her eyes. "The Angel."
"Angel?"
She nodded. "Angel of Death." She pointed to the corner of the ceiling, where a sinister-looking device was implanted.
Vigil focused his visor, magnifying the view. "Incognito, you seeing this?"
"Looks like a C8 explosive, Vigil. Enough to level the building. Appears armed for remote detonation. You need to get out of there now."
"Activate the fire alarm, so everyone upstairs gets out. I'll take care of the women."
"Make it fast, Vigil. Whoever planted that can blow it up whenever they want to."
Vigil turned to the women. "Everyone up the stairs now. This place is going to explode!"
Proto's alert buzzed on his g-span monitor. "Your download is finished, Vigil."
He retrieved the data drive as the women streamed up the stairwell, assisting one another along the way. He scooped up a teenage girl who could barely walk, carrying her at the end of the line.
"Hurry. Move faster!"
They scrambled upward until they reached an access door in the alley beside the building. Hundreds of the former captives were packed together, staring around in paralyzed shock. Vigil activated his visor so that it flashed brightly, painting them in crimson light. His voice amplified, echoing off the walls.
"Move as far from the building as you can. Go, now!"
They scattered, running into the street, where they joined crowds of partygoers fleeing from the fire alarm in the nightclub. People stared in shock and confusion, cars screeched to a stop, passersby on the sidewalks stopped, removing holovisors to gape at the scene. Bodies collided, women screamed, cameras recorded the chaos.
Vigil ran through the crowds, still carrying the girl, who sobbed into his chest. His augmented voice thundered over the chaos. "Keep going. Clear the area. The building is about to—"
The explosive detonated behind him — shattering glass, scorching brick and steel, hurling burning debris across the entire city block. He ducked behind a taxi, clutching the girl tightly as the vehicle rocked from the impact and broken glass showered on his head and shoulders. Screams rang in the air, and thick clouds of smoke and ash rolled through like dirty fog. He stood and looked around.
The Moneta building was just a broken shell, gutted by flames that roared with intense heat. Smoke rose swiftly, blackening the night sky and smothering the light from nearby buildings and streetlamps. Bodies littered the ground — people who didn't get far enough from the building. Some of them dragged themselves away, too dazed to look after their wounds. Others sat in the debris, crying. Screaming, covered in soot and ash. Some didn't move at all. The bodies lay still, burning in the rubble.
Emergency lights flashed as RCE vehicles converged on the scene from the sky and ground. Responder androids emerged from buildings to assist the wounded. Vigil placed the crying girl in the arms of one of the automatons, scanning the nearby rooftops. His com buzzed.
"Vigil, you need to get out of there."
"I'm leaving." He glanced up when a movement caught his eyes. Directly above him, a silhouette on top of the building, some sort of light above its head. The figure looked down at him, then quickly turned and vanished.
Vigil ran into the alley, activated his boot thrusters, and propelled to the top of the building just in time to see the figure leap to the next rooftop. He followed quickly, thrusters pulsing to cover more ground. Sailing through the air, he landed within yards of the runner. Squeezing his fists triggered stun blasts from his g-span. The impact bowled the other man over. He fell, rolled, and leaped back to his feet, turning to face Vigil.
His face was covered by a scarlet helmet fashioned like a cyber-enhanced medieval knight, and his loose-fitting white tunic fluttered in the wind, adorned with a large glowing red cross that glowed on the chest. He looked like a combination of a ninja and a priest with his lightweight crimson armor and free-flowing outfit. Topping the religious look off was a golden halo that glowed just above his head.
"Nice outfit," Vigil said. "Points for looks, deductions for lack of stealth."
They circled one another, sizing each other up. Vigil's fist glowed with charged energy. "So, you have a name, or do I just call you Halo?"
The man's voice was deep in timbre, reverberating as if from canyon walls. "My name is Heretic. That doesn't matter, though. My actions do."
"Your actions." Vigil cocked his head. "You mean blowing up buildings full of innocent people."
"Those people weren't innocent. They used their business as a cover to enslave and traffic women and girls. Do you know what the ones in the chairs were there for? Virtual rape. You call that innocent? You're either terribly misguided or just a bad as they are."
"Those women and girls were still in the building after you left."
"Which is why I didn't blow it earlier. I was waiting for them to clear the area."
"They were terrified. If I didn't show up, some of them wouldn't have made it. And you never freed the ones in the Immersion chairs. You must be new at this."
Heretic said nothing, eyes dark from the visor of his helmet.
Vigil stepped closer. "A lot of the people in the nightclub were just there to dance and let off some steam. You would have killed them too."
"No one would have missed them. This place was well known as a center for drugs and prostitution. The people in there were sinners, insulting God with their flagrant incontinence and fleshly lusts."
"And you're supposed to be what — God's personal executioner?"
"I'm just a worker in the field, separating the weeds from the wheat. I would think you'd understand, but I see that you're blind like the rest of them, wasting your pity on carnal malefactors instead of protecting the lost sheep."
Vigil pointed a finger. "I want you to stop. I may have inspired your… work, but I won't allow you to go around slaughtering people."
"You flatter yourself." Heretic gestured, and a cross-shaped sword appeared in his hand, blazing like sunlight. "This is God's work, not that of any man. And certainly not you. Fall back, or I'll cut you down and beg for forgiveness later."
"That's not exactly virtuous," Vigil said, dropping to an offensive crouch.
Bright light flooded the rooftop, flaring from the RCE jet chopper that hovered above them, pushing back the hazy smoke and scattering trash. A commanding voice blared from the vehicle's loudspeakers.