War Dance

THREE: Z9 - 2

Region 26 was positively humming with life three days later. An unexpected warm spell the weather programmers had added in just to keep people on their toes and add slight psychological catharsis from the abject misery of the constant rain had brought everyone out of the shelter of their apartments and into the streets. It wasn't pleasant enough to holiday in, but the dark blue sky was light by Celestrian standards, and everyone seemed in a good mood.

Z9 thanked the weather people for it. The crowds helped disguise her, and the need to be constantly on the watch for people bumping into her and setting her pain flaring off again helped distract her from that same pain. The ringing in her ears had turned itself down to a mild irritant which came back to her on occasion in the same way one suddenly tunes back into a clock that's been ticking in their room for the past few years. Things were just about manageable, as long as nothing got completely out of hand.

The entrance to the port was in a warehouse in the Great Complex area. The archway over the street which announced that one was entering this particular zone ran patronisingly cheerful graphics across its screen. Smiling faces beamed down at her. 'Great Complex: A World of Imagination!' it said. Well, Z9 thought, everyone has nightmares, after all.

Since she was an hour early, she dropped into a café done up in a garish combination of modern and traditional, seemingly in an attempt to create 'atmosphere'. Slumping a little in worn civilian clothes, she ordered a kofi and drank it slowly. Both killing a little time and an attempt to fool anyone watching the cameras, if she looked like she was trying to avoid being suspicious, they'd flag her up. Since the port was a place of illegal trade and transportation, this made her more likely to be trusted. The only ones straight barging in there were either well known, or police. Or both.

She took a bottle out of a small satchel and took one of the pain pills the doctors had prescribed her. It hit the spot, but only just. Chasing it down with the cheap muck she'd bought, she left the café and headed for the warehouse. The doors were open and vehicles loading up in the main loading bay. That was the true way in, and the false way - the way down to the port. Z9 needed a third way. Luckily for her, C.A.T intelligence had discovered a while ago a secret route in only used for Sarsonne, the Night Witch herself. It was, essentially, the VIP staff route.

There were cameras down that way in, but only rarely. Too many and you draw attention to there being a secret entrance to begin with. Nobody watches thin air or something that doesn't need guarding. And so Z9 dropped into a warehouse a block down. It wasn't as big as the main one but looked suitably abandoned to any passing eye. Nobody around. Made things easier.

Z9 kept her head down as she headed to the secret entrance. She stood by the crate with her body angled to the camera she knew was there. She took out a fake signet ring that Sarsonne's employees were known to wear and flashed it at the electric eye. She picked up the crate and touched the ring to the underside. A small electric beep and part of the wall peeled away. She stepped inside, put the ring to the slot on the inside, and the door closed again.

It was just the one camera until further down, when anyone in the security booth would really be watching intensely. Any squatter might accidentally find the entrance; that was no big deal. The camera would pick up an invading police force. Further down and the checks would be more stringent.

Z9 wasn't particularly interested in subjecting herself to a retinal scan, biodata extrapolation, and all of that top level security protocol shit. She just needed a way past the main guards to get into the port, and this was the best way to do it.

Along the wall were a series of doors leading down into various bowels of the port. Several had dust accumulating at the bottom of them. She wondered if the Night Witch regularly used this port herself. Rumour had it that she preferred her quarters deep in the port in Region 5, but the chances of proving that were slim to none. Obviously not many used these passages. The door she had been told in advance that she wanted (no Halo-Chip this time; any communications were automatically routed through port-specific wavelength frequencies, and were monitored with technology so advanced even the wizards at C.A.T hadn't found a way to get past them) was the only one that had any signs that it had been used in the past five years. Nicks and dints in the metalwork on the edge showed things had been brought through on occasion and whacked against the side. She put the ring to the slot on the wall, wondered how long this fake broom emblem would hold up against deeper checks in the system, and slipped through.

Down the corridor lit sporadically by occasional wall-mounted lights, she turned her clothes inside out. The new colour, material, and nametag, along with a second emblem under the tag, marked her out as a mechanic. She tapped a button on her bag and it changed its outward design. Her gun tucked itself into a flap on the side – still accessible - and a second flap fell to the base and allowed tools to clatter out into the main compartment. At a glance, she was one of the crew doing the checks that any pirate would expect of the service they were paying extortionate amounts for. Bring contraband in through my ports, please, no worries, we'll even check your starship engine over and give you a full tank of fuel, on the house.

Z9 had doubts that this disguise would pass. After all, the place was going to be monitored harder than a Region 2 casino. Carmen had tried to allay her fears. All they needed was to know what Leppis PPY was bringing through. Grab it if possible. If not, then find out where he was going. This was a fact-gathering mission first and foremost, a theft if the circumstances were right. She should be in and out again before any red alarms started blaring. Piece of cake for a Z agent. This was their bread and butter.

Bread and butter, maybe, but not when you still ache all over like you've been several rounds in the ring. Z9 took a pill from her bag and swallowed. Allowed herself a moment to breathe.

She took a cap from the bag, brought it low across her face, and went out into the hangar. Checked the time. Five minutes until Leppis's shuttle arrived.