The Courier (San Angeles) by Gerald Brandt Read Free Book Online Page B

dug in. By the time I left, with extra food in a takeaway container and a promise to not stay away so long next time, my mood had lifted. The night air had cooled, a byproduct of the Ambients being turned down. I shivered in the sudden change of temperature and zipped my jacket up right to my neck. Kai’s place was always warm. The package, still shoved down the front of my jacket, crinkled as I walked to my bike.
    I unlocked the bike and started the motor. The ride home was short. The pedestrian traffic had slowed down, and I made a clean merge onto the street. Most of the bums and druggies had already found their little cubbyholes for the night, and those that weren’t able to just lay on the sidewalk in front of the local businesses. A young boy was just settling down for the night, pulling garbage over his legs to keep warm. I stopped and gave him my leftovers before continuing home.
    I pulled the bike up to the Lee Fish Market, just outside the alley the trucks used to deliver fish, and chained it up for the nightagainst the steel barriers guarding the front windows and doors. The bike’s own locking mechanism was great for quick stops to complete deliveries, but for overnight, nothing beat a titanium and nanotube composite chain and lock. I plugged it into the socket hidden below the window ledge, the only one that actually worked. A small concession from the Lees.
    The food in my stomach was making me sleepy, and I rubbed my eyes before slipping the helmet over my arm. I walked to the side service entrance in the alley, thinking of my warm bed. The sound of tires chirping on the street made me stop and look over my shoulder. A white van pulled up and stopped across from the Fish Market entrance.

LEVEL 2—TUESDAY, AUGUST 9, 2140 11:00 P.M.
    Two men vaulted out of the van and ran toward the closed front doors of the Fish Market. I ducked into the darker shadows near the wall, breathing hard against the cold, wet concrete. Even the persistent neon glow of Chinatown didn’t reach here. They hadn’t seen me, they hadn’t seen me, they . . . I repeated the words, a constant litany trying to convince myself, trying to make them true. I recognized one of the men as the butcher from the delivery site.
    I felt my hands start shaking again, and the food in my gut had turned into rock. It was a face I wasn’t ever going to forget. His complexion was lighter than I remembered, and he had cleaned off the spattered blood, but the narrow face matched, with its well-groomed mustache, the nose that looked like it had been broken once too often. And the eyes. Dark as Level 1 during a blackout. They glittered with an intensity that scared the bejesus out of me. I could still feel them boring into me.
    His name popped into my head—Quincy.
    I crept backward through the shadows to the side entrance.
    Christ, once they found the front door locked, they were bound to try and come around the back way. There weren’t too many places to hide. Two soft voices came from just around the corner.
    “Hey, let’s see that image. This looks like her bike. She’s here.”
    “You head down that way, I’ll wait here and check if the other guys have seen her.”
    I crouched lower in the shadows and slid behind two green dumpsters used to hold the Fish Market’s cast off garbage. A huge rat ran between my feet into the alley, dragging its fleshy tail through years of built up fish guts, scales, and oil, scared by the intruder into its domain.
    I understood it.
    The dumpsters were standard issue refuse containers, pretty much like any others you find around the city. Their huge metal lids squealed in anger every time they were opened or closed. I moved deeper behind the bins until I came to the gap between two of them. I slid between the bins, jumping to catch the top edge, and maneuvered my feet onto a small ledge. Another rat scurried out from under the dumpster.
    Light flashed into the alley, moving quickly from the entrance to the bins