On the High Frontier

5. Nothing Special (part 5/10)

Sayoko comes in through the Mall of A Thousand Dreams and stands quietly in the visitor's lobby of Grifter's Rift. She's not been here since her first visit, but she needs to show contrition if she's going to succeed. The mysterious shapes and shadows that had been exciting the first time now seem threatening and unnerving.

"What do we have here?" The area acquires an indigo hue as GenKen's sphere with its swirling pattern of blue and violet manifests in the centre of the hall. She'd expected to work her way through underlings to him, this mightn't be an improvement. All distractions vanish as they are transported to a private instance.

"GenKen, Dono." She bows deeply. Nothing for it but to seize the phoenix by the beak. "I owe you an apology, and an explanation."

The silence stretches out as the sphere floats before her, the swirling pattern is more angular than normal.It's unnerving, how annoyed is GenKen? "Agreed. A personal or professional matter?"

A trick? No, a personal favour, but this has to be public. "Professional."

"Good." The shapes in the globe soften and the area reconfigures to a small meeting room with chairs around a plain table. "Is this private?"

"James is monitoring, but the offence is mine alone. And you?" She can't demand privacy but they can't expect her not to ask.

"First rule of Grifter's: Do not research the Rift." She's not in a position to complain, so she nods her acquiescence. "Proceed."

"I failed to return in a timely manner to explain my actions against the individual Marcus." Acceptable actions  by the terms of the Rift code.

"Be aware that Marcus has lodged a complaint of unprovoked assault in the sanctuary of the Rift." Ouch, that's a potential banning offence. She has to disprove it.

"Untrue. He attempted to have one of my agents captured or ... "

"You." GenKen isn't fooled by her claims of a team then.

"Yes, Attempted to have me captured or killed during a job he instigated."

"Such actions are not against the code."

"Neither is retribution."

"No such job is registered to Marcus."

"It was an unknown agent so I planted a marker in the avatar. I tracked it to Marcus' shell, and when confronted he acknowledged his complicity. I demanded all his current volatiles as restitution, he agreed. Afterwards I ejected him through volatile scrambling HAIL. If he lost anything, he cheated me."

"He claims it was an unprovoked attack, and he has a witness."

What the ... "There was no one else present. Who claims otherwise?"

"The operator Ferris was monitoring his link."

That was the last straw. "That's bullshit. Ferris isn't independent."

The sphere's pattern swirls chaotically and brightens so much it hurts to look at. "Take care, you are already on a thin seal. You will respect this gathering." Kimiko is silent, but notices the tacit admittance of an audience, or court.

"I apologise, but Marcus is a sock-puppet of Ferris."

The sphere moves closer to her; it is dimmer and the pattern is more restful, but again angular. "That's a serious allegation. How could you know this?"

She's got to do this right, and hope they're unbiased. "The tracker I mentioned earlier was multi-functional, and included a hardware hack. I confirmed it was still in place when I talked to Marcus earlier. I commed Ferris a short time ago, and the same marker was on his console." They'll need proof. A telltale indicates that James is already transferring the evidence.