Ghost Spark - Essence Engine

Four

 "Wait, wha? Oh, right, you're already in there."

"Not completely here yet. Still more work to do."

"Let me know how things go in there. Anything I should know about?"

"You don't need to talk for me to hear you," said the whisper.

"Besides, talking to yourself in public, people might think you have issues."

"Fuck," Marcus sighed.

A greetbot detached from the wall in Marcus' room and rolled over to the bed.

"It is time to go Marcus. Your drop ship is prepped and ready." it said.

"Please follow the green line on the floor. It will guide you there."

"Where's my suit? "

"All your gear is in the airlock. John is waiting for you there."

Marcus opened the door from his room and followed the green line down the short hallway to the hangar bay. The walls glowed an iridescent pulsating blue as he walked by.

The hatch to the hangar bay opened as Marcus arrived. John was standing inside, waiting for him. The Escape pod was hanging from a gantry directly above the outer airlock in the floor.

"Ready to go eh? Excellent," John smiled.

"The contract is on the pad over on the wall. Just need your signature."

Marcus walked over to the curved wall of the hangar bay and pulled the pad out of the wall.

The text was standard mission contract. Payment, bonuses, riders, and premiums.

"Your lawyer signed off on it while you were under."

"There's nothing here about Maggie."

"That is a side contract between you and me. My word, your word. Let's keep the bloody lawyers out of that one, eh?"

Marcus glanced at the pad again and pressed accept. He put his thumb on the pad to be scanned and then his iris was scanned by the pad.

DNA scan complete - Iris scan complete - Signature accepted, the pad displayed.

Marcus placed the pad back into the wall.

"John, why bring me all the way here. It's a little much, all this. Don't you think. It must have cost a fortune to bring me here,"

"You are right of course. It is absurd to fly you up here just to send you back down. Accounting will never let me hear the end of this one, but that stick you had. There are corporations, sects, militias, governments all looking for it. There is nowhere on earth that this information is safe. And as you can see, this is nowhere on earth."

"Still makes no sense. At all. You could have retrieved it from me and then sent a drone up here," said Marcus.

"It was the only way to ensure the chain of custody. If you handed it off to a $50 an hour tech on the take from a rival corporation all I would get would be bad porn on a stick. This way, I am absolutely sure of what's on it," said John.

"How did you know that it was the USB drive you're looking for. Why would such a sensitive device be in the hands of a diplomatic crew stranded on the border in the first place?", asked Marcus.

"What's on it? It's encrypted. For all you know it could still be porn."

"Let me worry about all that. You have a drop ship to catch I believe. We will be in drop position in 15 minutes and you are still not in your suit. Everything you need for your cover is already in the jumpsuit.". Said John.