Crack in the Kill Code (AmpCore #2)

08 - A Little Bit of Trust

 "Oh, I'm listening, believe me. Are you?"

Senior Administrator Mattise was not a happy man.

Piper didn't need to be a psychiatrist to see the toll that the man's new responsibilities were taking on him. He paced grimly in his Spartan office, his immaculate white uniform open at the throat, the darkness of stubble shadowing the lower half of his face. She shifted awkwardly in her seat, lips pressed tight together as they waited. Arrow sat to her left, Odiye to her right, all three of them squirming in the silence.

The holographic visor across Mattise's eyes shimmered and flickered with data, and she could see him twitching as he composed and fired off communiques, fielding a staggering array of messages in a short space of time even as his call continued. His AmpCore implants allowed him to hurl his thoughts off into cyberspace faster than any corporate neural interface could match.

Even still, he looked stressed. Piper didn't really know what to make of Mattise anymore. On the one hand he was corporate spiv right down to his bones, but on the other, he seemed genuine in his desire to put an end to the constant infighting. Even for a career corp agent, the constant manoeuvring and counter-manoeuvring was wearing thin.

"No," he growled, stopping with his back to them. She could feel his frustration simmering in the air around them, his visor flaring crimson. "I've told you already. Until such time as I have guarantees over the security of the academy and the students, the board remains suspended."

She didn't hear the reply, but it didn't seem to calm matters.

"Then withdraw your funding," Mattise snarled. "And I'll ensure that your filthy subsidiaries never set foot inside AmpCore again. I can promise you that. No, you think about what you want to do and send me a formal proposal when you've finished swinging your dick around. Goodbye."

The visor flickered out of existence and Mattise's head rocked back. He stared at the ceiling for a moment as let out a long, bitter sigh.

"Is the job all you dreamed it would be?" Piper ventured after a moment, hoping she could lighten the atmosphere just a little.

"I'm not in the mood, Russell."

So much for that.

She cleared her throat awkwardly. "Sorry."

"Well, you wanted to speak to me." He turned to face them. "Here I am. What's so important that you couldn't put in a bloody message?"

She exchanged an uneasy look with her companions, neither of whom looked any more thrilled about the prospect of what they were about to ask.

"I can't stress enough how busy I am right now," Mattise said icily, "so either tell me what you want or get out."

"It's about the fighting in the city – at the dock districts," she blurted.

"That's got nothing to do with you. You're supposed to be keeping your head down and attending to your studies. Do you have any idea how close you are all skating to the edge right now?" He pointed to the door. "Chorla Sinette is dead. Do you have any idea what I had to go through in order not to have to hand them Toran Knox's head on a platter?!"

"That's not our fault-,"

"But you picked a bloody side didn't you?"

Odiye straightened up. "Toran's our friend, sir. We owe him our support."

"Maybe so, but now I have full-blown factional war going on under my nose." Mattise snorted in disgust, hands on his hips as he began to pace back and forth. "On top of that, half the dockside districts are getting ready to riot and I've got funders breathing down my god-damned neck to provide AmpCore support for their bloody security teams."