Play 2 Wage: Linked

An alarm blasted through the apartment, waking me up at some ungodly hour in the middle of the night. I scrambled, fighting with my blanket as I rushed to my feet. My darkened room illuminated with dim red flashes from the warning system, high up on the wall near the door, that each room was required to have.

I threw the blanket off and grabbed my plasma knife as well as the section of steel pipe I kept in the corner of my room, and started towards the door. When I opened it and leaned out into the hallway, I heard a muffled banging on the front door. Both Tevin and Rin were poking their heads out of their doors as well. Rin, bleary eyed and wearing his usual outfit of loose sweatpants and a ragged yet clean undershirt, and Tevin in nothing but his underwear, holding his rifle up with his thumb on the safety.

An immediate and silent conversation went on between us with a quick series of looks, shrugs, and nods. We had come up with plans for this kind of thing. Rin ducked back into his room to work electronic counter measures and send for help, while Tev and I quickly moved to the living-room. I flipped the top from the coffee table, grunting with effort as I lifted the heavy steel plate that rested on cinder blocks. Unconcerned as old drinks, crumpled food wrappers, and scrap paper tumbled and spilled across the floor.

I braced the metal plate against the wall at the threshold to the hallway, then pressed myself against it to one side, leaving room for Tevin to take cover on the other with a clear view down the short hall.

The pounding on the door continued for a moment longer, and then paused, the alarm cutting out and changing from flashing red to dim solid green. A voice with a pre-recorded sound to it rang through the system.

“This is not an exercise. This is a police control”. The recording repeated itself again, before it cut with an audible click and a new voice came through the speakers, stern, male, and businesslike.

“Residents of apartment 12, prepare for entry and search, authorized under section 1050C of the ‘Great Nation’ Act. Do not resist or attempt to deter, and your statuses will be taken into account if we find evidence deemed prosecutable. I repeat…”

The voice repeated the warning, and Tevin and I both cursed and looked at each other. I dropped my length of pipe and knife, and he threw his rifle onto the couch before we both walked over and placed our hands against the wall on either side of the TV.

“This is bullshit. They should know this whole building is Gov’s,” Tev grumbled, using the slang term for government sponsored Link-workers.

I nodded and grunted in reply, too busy worrying to form a sentence.

After the second repetition, the door slid open and revealed a riot-shield identical to the ones my gauntlet guards used. Bright white lights flared on the shield and lit up the room, causing us both to squint and turn our heads away as they entered.

As usual, there was zero communication from the shepherds as they swept through the room, the one with the shield pushed over the makeshift steel-plate barrier I had set up and it crashed to the floor. It crushed one of the cinder blocks and some of the stuff that had been swept from the table.

Tevin growled something about his console controller, but the beating of my adrenaline and anxiety fueled heart pounded too hard in my ears for me to catch what he said. I kept my eyes on the floor, my hands on the wall, hyper focused on listening to what the soldiers were doing as they moved around behind me.

The businesslike voice that had spoken the warning from before sounded behind us, causing me to jump and Tevin to try to crane his head around and look at the speaker.

“Tevin Valejo, keep your cool and we’ll be out of your hair in a few moments. Mr. Spenser however, your presence is required at District Control. You are not under arrest or being detained, but you will be escorted there immediately. Will you comply with these orders voluntarily?” I finally turned my head around to look at the man about halfway through his little speech.

He was an older man, mostly bald with a heavily wrinkled forehead and eastern traits to his skin tone and to his dark eyes. He was unarmored, and wearing a rather plain dark gray business suit adorned only with a nondescript security badge pinned to his breast-pocket, his eyes tired looking as he stared back at me.

A rumpled and worried looking Katie stood silently beside him, her tablet clutched to her stomach, while a half-dozen armored shepherds moved around the apartment. I noticed one of them jamming a tether attached to a handheld device into the frame of Rins' now closed and locked door.

Neither of us moved, keeping our hands flat against the wall as we looked back at him. Tevin, ever the man of action, started to growl an angry reply, but I raised my voice to cut him off before he could piss the guy off.

“Listen here you litt-”

“Of course! Agent. We will comply willingly and have nothing to hide. Is there any more information you can give me? And would you let me get some actual clothes?” I asked politely, hoping to minimize hostility from whatever was to come next, and gesturing to myself. I was wearing only a pair of athletic shorts, and was suddenly glad I chose my plain blue pair, and not the novelty heart patterned shorts Tev had given me as a gag-gift the year before that I typically wore as pajamas.

“No. Mr. Spenser, follow us. Tevin, you stay put and ride this out. Ryan might get in a bit of trouble for installing his own locks, but given his assignment, his precautions will most likely be deemed acceptable.” With that said, he turned and walked towards the front door.

Katie gave a small shrug and a nervous smile before she turned to follow him, gesturing for me to follow.

It took me a moment to snap out of nervous inaction and start after them, along the way I gave Tev a pat on his shoulder, muttering, “I’ll be alright, man. Keep an eye on Rin while I’m gone, don’t do anything you’ll regret later on.”

I followed the two bureaucrats outside, quickly stepping into a pair of cheap sandals that were loose from the pile of footwear by the door. I passed another pair of shepherds who were milling around in the small courtyard, one of them poking at Rins motorcycle. When I stepped through the open gate, I found the street outside of our building was buzzing with activity as a whole company of armored soldiers were busy searching every building on the block.

They had a few dozen people laying on their stomachs in the street, nearby a growing pile of contraband and confiscated gear and equipment. Shepherds were hauling out more and more rough looking people and sketchy looking boxes, bags, and weapons from every building along the block for questioning, arrest, or seizure.

As I followed Katie and the agent over to a waiting drop-ship, I watched as flashes of light lit the windows of the 4th floor of the building across from ours, muffled gunshots echoing out a split second later.

The balding agent took no notice of the gunfight and led us up the ramp of the dropship through the massive open side door, before turning and walking through an automatic door towards the front of the craft. The door quickly opened as he stepped close and slammed shut immediately behind him, while the ramp retracted up behind us and the heavy side door started to crank closed as well.

Katie stepped across the bay and did something with her tablet that caused a pair harnesses to drop from the ceiling. As she worked to don one of the harnesses, she turned and gave me a look that I could not quite read, a mix of worry, anger, and impatience.

“I don’t think you’re in trouble, Nick, but you got the attention of someone with enough power to pull ropes, not strings.” She said, just loud enough to be heard over the spooling engines.

I grabbed at a second harness, and hurried to pull it on as well before the dropship took to the air while I replied. “I expected some kind of reaction, but nothing like this. I thought it would be you dragging me off into a room at the Link, not… whatever this is. If you don’t know what’s going on, why are you here anyways?”

She finished buckling into her own harness, the straps rumpling up her normally pristine outfit. She grabbed one of the handles on the nearby wall, just as the ship jolted underneath our feet as it lifted from the ground. “You better hurry with that. And I pulled some strings of my own to be here. You’re the first play-maker to come out of my Link and I’ll be damned if some big-wig is going to snatch you away with a godfather offer and steal all the credit for whatever it is that you're making happen.”

I widened my stance as the ship started to move under my feet, splaying my arms out to catch my balance, before starting to work on the buckles again. I grunted in reply as I strapped myself in for the ride, just in time for the ship to bank into a hard turn and pour on the acceleration, causing both of us to swing towards the back of the ship and lose our footing.

“Damn, are they trying to scramble us back here?” I called out over the rattling and shaking of the ship as it took off.

Katie laughed as we swung around again in a different direction as the ship turned once more, seeming to enjoy the experience. “All aircraft are under order to take evasive action over the city! After the fiasco yesterday with the hijackers the Director wants to make sure we don't lose another Goshawk.”

I grumbled under my breath about being literally jerked around for the higher-ups’ convenience, while clinging to the straps that held me to the ceiling. I pulled up my legs as we swung around again, worried my foot would catch on one of the long vertical handles that lined the walls.

I finished the ride in silence, clinging to the straps and holding my legs up to avoid kicking anything, while Katie continued to laugh in delight at the rollercoaster treatment we endured throughout our short ride across the city. All in all, we were in the air for maybe 5 minutes before I felt the ship braking hard, causing the straps to stretch taut, digging into my thighs, armpits, and ribs.

As we worked at unstrapping ourselves from the harnesses, the side door opened and wind blasted into the bay as the bald agent came out from the door he had retreated into. Without much more than a passing look at us, he strode past us and stepped onto the ramp as it deployed down to the landing pad.

I glanced out of the door as I worked on the buckles and was struck by the partial view. We were high up with a view that looked out over the city. A line of fresh, clean, and well-lit new construction along the arterial trade route stretching outwards and away from us into the distance, stark against the dark and sparsely illuminated sections of old-city.

I fumbled my way out of the harness quickly enough to not need help from Katie, and we followed the agent between a pair of sky-blue armored soldiers that snapped to attention as he strode between them at the end of the ramp. It felt like a massive parking lot, the edges ringed with search lights, missile batteries, and embedded cannons.

I rubbernecked and looked around as we started to walk, raising a hand to shield my eyes from the gritty wind. I realized we were on the top of the massive warehouse-like building that was connected to Travellers station on the far side of the Link. I could even make out the darkened spot along the western trade route from the attack the day before, still buzzing with flashing orange work lights and heavy equipment as they cleared the destruction from the hijackers.

We passed a dozen other dropships sitting on their own pads in neat rows, next to hundreds of smaller drones and fighter craft, as we moved towards a three-story armored tower that jutted from the asphalt coated roof. The two soldiers dropped in behind us, and I wondered if they were there for our protection, or to make sure I complied with whatever orders I was given. Probably both.

We entered a thick blast door at the base of the tower and stepped into a large freight elevator that waited for us. Another sky-blue armored soldier waited on the deck of the elevator, he operated an old school lever that had us quickly lowering down into the building.

Awkward silence hung over us as we slowly rode down into the depths of the building, so of course Max finally decided to speak up.

“This is pretty spooky. Are your people always so enigmatic and bossy? I might have misjudged your people a bit, it’s starting to remind me of home. You might feel a little tingle in your fingers in a min, but don’t worry about it.”

I tensed, glancing over at Katie who was in turn watching the agent, that little worried smile worn like a mask on her face again. I clenched my fists and waited out the ride.

The elevator eventually opened up, the wide doors only opening partially to reveal a sterile and hospital-like hallway painted in beige tones with stiff industrial carpeting. The agent led us down the hall, leaving the soldiers behind on the elevator as the doors closed and the hum of electric motors carried it away.

We walked past eight opposing pairs of plain and unmarked doors under the harsh white lighting, until the agent turned and tapped a single knuckle against the center of one. I noted it was on the left. The door instantly cracked open and we followed the man through.

Inside was another smaller room, 15 feet square to a side, with open grating flooring and a noticeable windflow rising from below to be whisked away by a silently spinning fan above us. Another two armored soldiers were inside the room, these wearing mirror-finished plating with a sleeker design I had not seen before. They kept their hands on small dangerous looking alien sidearms worn on their hips as one put up their hand, palm out and fingers splayed, to stop us for a moment.

The door closed behind us, and a sparse cloud of vapor was released into the room, washing over us before being whisked away by the fan in the ceiling. A small chime sounded, and the soldier lowered their hand and stepped out of the way to the second door. Again, we followed the agent into the next chamber.

Inside was a room with a view, tall panoramic windows looking out into the night over the city. There was some kind of overlay that pinned information boxes and brightly colored markers that slowly tracked down the streets, through the air, or held in place. The interior of the room was dominated by a long conference table that jutted from the base of a high-built desk surrounded with a cluster of screens at the narrow end near the windows.

A moment after we entered, the screens parted and swiveled to clear the top of the desk, pivoting on hinged arms to flatten out of the way against the sides of the dark stained wood. Behind them sat a middle aged man with close cropped brown hair wearing the blackest clothes I had ever seen, they seemed to drink up the light in the room. It almost looked like he was just a floating head against the backdrop of his high-backed leather chair. His hands were also visible, his fingers steepled together in front of his chest as he looked us over.

I was sure he thought he struck an imposing view, judging by the stern look that he gave us from atop his high desk, but I was forced to suppress a laugh at the ridiculousness of his outfit. Unable to dismiss the image of him as nothing but a floating head and hands. I struggled even harder after the intrusive thought of him playing the bongos up there popped into my mind.

“Guy. Nicholas. Spenser. You’ve caused quite the stir.” He addressed me, his eyes locked onto mine, he spoke in a slow and measured cadence. “I’m sure you are well aware of why you are here. Before I inform you of the Council's decision, is there anything you would like to say for yourself?”