433 Infiltration
Feather stepped out of his Raven, a small, personal hover tech vehicle reminiscent of a helicopter. Most of the capos owned sothing like this - an aerial mode of transportation that they could use to get around the world with more efficiency.
Ravens were not made by any official corporation but rather by underworld chanics and technos, designed solely for the purpose of evading governntal and AA airspace tracking. In a world where variant evolution was a constant threat, comrcial flying vehicles were incredibly rare, and what the black market could cough up they had to build small and stealthy to dodge watchful global security eyes.
He adjusted his grey suit jacket, smoothing out any wrinkles. It was fine Italian Altieri fabric, the kind of ware that would take the average wage slave half a year's worth of their salary to afford, but it did not make him feel any better about what he was doing. He glanced up, seeing the Evileye's trio of eyeballs staring down at him with an expressionless gaze.
'Fucking creepy,' he thought before he shook his head. The Evileye might have been disconcerting, but what was even worse was eting the other capos. Specifically the sword capos Nico and Adriana. They were both from the Aquaslums of Neo-Venice, and it showed in their tough-as-titanium attitude.
With extre weather events and environntal changes from the Altering, Venice sunk underwater. Neo-Venice was built atop the ruins of its old corpse. But over ti, variant corals known as Breathbones created large air bubbles throughout the sunken city.
There, the filth of society, the hunted, the wanted, the unforgiven - they all moved in. They started a dark society of their own, one that existed in a symbiotic relationship with Neo-Venice.
As it was, the sunken city grew another type of coral called Cryo-Coral. These produced cryogen, an ultra-rare energy source that made high-cooling technology viable, powering everything from freeze rays to cryogenic stasis.
The Aquaslums quickly assud a monopoly over cryogen and, over ti, organized and took upon the image of the mob of pre-Altering antiquity. That way, they salvaged together so culture. So refinent.
Escaped criminals beca soldiers and capos.
The Slumlord beca a Don.
Neo-Venice created an unofficial peace with the Aquaslums in exchange for doing business together.
That was how the Italian Prong actually started. But no matter how they liked to dress themselves up, the Aquaslums never changed in how dangerous they were.
Bubble-Zones could pop at a mont's notice, flooding and killing anyone within them. The main way to earn your keep down there was to be a cryogen miner, worming down into vast coral entanglents that acted like cave networks.
Being a miner was like taking extre caving to another level and then smashing it through the ceiling. You had to snake your way in through the tiniest of gaps on limited oxygen supply and zero visibility.
All the while, you ran the risk of aquatic variants gobbling you up for lunch, and energy signatures from the corals disrupted quite a bit of technology, making drones difficult to use.
Cryogen had to be hand-picked from the jaws of dark, murky, death-filled depths.
In the Aquaslum's lawless confines, child labor was the preferred thod of getting this precious resource.
Nico and Adriana had both grown up as miners and, when they grew too big to reliably squeeze through coral gaps, beca enforcers renowned for their strength and savagery.
Feather had personally killed maybe twenty people. He did not like getting his hands dirty. He was more a businessman than anything else, soone that could get almost anyone to open up to him over a round of drinks.
But Nico and Adriana were different. They probably had a kill count in the several hundreds. Hell, they had probably killed twenty people by the ti they were fifteen years old.
Feather got his capo position because his father was a prior shield capo and had grood Feather into the job. Feather had grown up in relative wealth and security.
In contrast, Nico and Adriana had clawed their way up to the top with every little ounce of strength they had, damned be whoever they stepped atop of to get there.
Feather and those two were cut from completely different cloths that did not sh at all. He related more with the third sword capo Orlando who, like Feather, had been raised into his job as the personal bodyguard of the Don.
At least Orlando knew so goddamn manners and how to crack a joke or laugh at one. Feather did not even know if Nico and Adriana could physically even smile anymore or whether those muscles had atrophied from disuse.
"Sir." Two power-armored soldiers stood at attention in front of Feather.
Feather nervously glanced up at the Evileye, but the soldiers did not notice it at all.
"What the hell, where's Nico and Adriana?" said Feather. "Did they forget I'm a capo? No offense to you guys, I'm sure you two are great company, but it's custom for a capo to greet another capo."
"Adriana is busy securing the periter of the base from variant threats," said a soldier. "Nico is expecting you."
"Expecting , huh? He doesn't want to greet here, but he wants to see ? At least let a man stretch his legs out." Feather looked ahead. His Raven had landed on a small runway carved through the forest, and that runway attached to a large warehouse where the Trident stored shipnts and supplies mostly for Blackwater.
Now, it was chock full of weaponry ready to hold Blackwater down to the end of ti and more.
What worried Feather was why Nico wanted to et him. Feather avoided Nico and Adriana and they tended to avoid him other than courtesy-based greetings, all of which had been curt.
The fact that Nico requested a direct eting with him was suspicious as high hell.
"Follow us, sir." The two soldiers waited for Feather to start moving, their high-powered guns nestled alertly in their hands. It was obvious that they wanted Feather to move first to make sure he did not run anywhere.
"Sure. There better be a hot al ready for at the base. A good vintage wine, too," said Feather as he took a step forward, towards the warehouse in the distance.
"No, sir." The soldiers blocked Feather's path. They waved their guns off the side, towards the thick, untad forest. "Nico has also been dealing with variants. He wants you to et him at his current location."
Feather paused for a mont, his heart rate rising. He could not have brought his rcenaries here as there was a no-weapons policy. Plus they were undead so they could not pass through any bio scan for regular body temperatures and bodily functions. It was why he was not undead - to pass any checks to infiltrate this place.
He felt as naked and defenseless as a newborn baby.
'Hey, you watching this shit? This stinks of a whacking' Feather said ntally, hoping Aldrich would hear him.
'I'm watching closely.' Aldrich's voice ca in a calm reply.
'Then what do you want to do!?' complained Feather. 'Nico's gonna put into the dirt! Shit, does he know sothing's off!?'
'He wouldn't. Unless you revealed anything, but Fler'Gan's ntal conditioning has ensured that isn't a possibility. Which leads to believe that, most likely, this is due to other reasons. Do you have a history of issues with Nico?'
'Well, maybe, I don't know. Never talked to the sword capos much. But I know they never liked .'
'In any case, we'll see what's up. Follow the soldiers.'
'But what about dying!?'
'We have a piece of you stored in Haven. If you get killed here, you'll just respawn back there anyway. As I said, you are the perfect suicide bomber. Just go. Otherwise, you'll draw too much attention.'
Feather groaned internally at the fate he had been reduced to. From high-standing capo who threw out credits by the thousands at fancy dinners and clubs to…a renewable suicide bomber.
Nevertheless, Feather had no choice but to follow.
"Take to Nico," said Feather, putting on an air of confidence.
"Yes sir. Follow us." The soldiers marched ahead, and Feather followed behind.
Reviews
All reviews (0)