buzzed my ear. My stump had to be bleeding again, must’ve bumped it without noticing. No other way to explain why the damn pests had been dogging me since the gay bar.
Already, the air felt cooler. The Cellars were designed to provide a constant temperature year-round, each meter of depth providing further protection against the scorching Lagartan summer. Perfect for brandy’s long-term aging process.
We descended one step at a time, our movements deliberate, careful, nervous, weapons aimed at the black shadows hiding ahead of the flashlight beam. My lungs protested the stale air; legs quivered from overuse; eyes stung with salty sweat.
The bottom was near, a tall, arched doorway emerging from the dark like a tombstone, the last two stairs submerged in floodwater. I stepped down, ankle-deep water filling my shoes, the spaces between my toes. We took the last stair, cold liquid soaking our calves. Deluski swept the beam from side to side. Brandy casks sat on rusted shelves, rows and rows of them bathing in still water. We entered a tunnel of tipped shelves. I had my eyes peeled, my ears dialed in. Shattered casks poked out of the water like shipwrecks.
We sloshed to the row’s end. The water was now above our knees, my already exhausted legs resisting the extra work. Up ahead, Deluski’s beam found a lift, one of many that were once used to lift casks to the surface, where they could be loaded onto a barge docked in the inlet overhead.
We about-faced and started up another row. Casks towered overhead, water dripping from cracks in the ceiling, plinks and plunks echoing all around. I tried to shut out the fear of the ceiling giving way, river water crashing down on our heads in a violent torrent.
Water crept up my thighs, every centimeter a shock to my never-cold Lagartan skin. We stopped at the foot of a metal monster, long arms reaching out, the robotic stock picker frozen with rust and crusty mold.
“This is going to take forever,” I said. “They could be anywhere down here.”
“They might not be down here at all. They could’ve gotten scared off. If we smelled a setup, they could’ve too.”
Deluski’s phone rang. My heart jumped at the sudden ringing. Shit! To free up a hand, he tucked the flashlight under his arm, making everything but a small, rippling circle of light on the water go dark.
“Fucking silence that shit.”
“Sorry. Forgot. Call’s coming from a blocked ID.”
I felt a twinge in my gut. Something was up. “Answer it.”
“It’s a vid.”
“Live feed?”
“Yeah.”
“Turn off the outgoing vid before you answer.”
“Got it. No holo-projection down here. We’ll have to watch it on my screen.”
I dragged my rubbery legs through the water until I stood shoulder to shoulder with him. “Go.”
Dim yellow light jittered across several racked casks of brandy. The camera was as dizzying as the lighting, bouncing, weaving, until finally it steadied on two men, my men. They were both on their knees, water up to their waists, faces sagging with resignation. A third man stood behind them, panama hat tilted down to keep his face in shadow. A lase-blade fired up, its red glow casting the scene in hellish fire.
No!
Panama took hold of Kripsen’s hair and sliced his throat. Flash-fried blood misted upward among puffs of curling smoke. Kripsen’s eyes rolled up in their sockets, blood streaming, life draining.
Blood pulsed in my temples, my face on fire. FUCK! FUCK! FUCK!
Panama shoved Kripsen forward. A splash of water kicked up at the camera, and the camera jumped. “Fucking watch it,” came a voice with a pissy attitude.
I knew that pretty-boy voice. Mota. With no conscious thought, my arms came to my face and started to knead, the butt of my weapon digging into one cheekbone, the butt of my right arm into the other.
The screen shook in Deluski’s quivering grasp.
Kripsen wasn’t moving. He was doing the dead man’s float.
Bile stewed in my gut. We were too late. Too damned late. Lumbela was about to die, and we were powerless to stop it. The Cellars were too big. They could be anywhere within this network of interconnected underground warehouses. We’d run out of time.
Lumbela’s hair was in Panama’s grip, head tilted back, Adam’s apple bulging, eyes pleading, begging. The blade scorched and charred its way through skin and muscle and windpipe. Panama let go of his hair, and Lumbela briefly splashed under the surface before slowly rising to the top.
Deluski didn’t speak. But I could hear him breathing fast through his nose, the sound raking in and out.
Panama wasn’t done. He turned the floaters over, their blank eyes staring, throat wounds gaping, mouths hanging open and filled with water. Panama pulled Kripsen close and reached a hand toward the wound. Kripsen’s still face went underwater as Panama worked his fingers inside his throat. He pulled his hand out, bringing Kripsen’s tongue with it. He left it like that, red flesh poking from a mouth that wasn’t a mouth. A Lagartan necktie.
I wanted to scream, but they were down here somewhere. Possibly near. Mota and Panama. They were going to pay.
Panama moved in to dress up Lumbela.
“Turn it off,” I said. “We’ll fry the fuckers on their way out.”
Deluski understood. He was already moving, heading back toward the staircase, his legs high-stepping through the water. I was right behind him, doing a sloppy imitation, bumbling and stumbling, my stride a splashy sort of scramble.
The water shallowed nearer to the stairs, my gait taking on a semblance of normalcy. Deluski used the flashlight to help me pick a spot behind a cask that had a good line of sight.
“You set?” he asked.
“Yeah. Don’t shoot until I do.”
“Got it.” He splashed away, light jouncing for a minute then extinguishing when he found his spot.
My feet and ankles were still in the grip of cold water, an aching numbness taking hold. Wet pants chilled my legs. A water-splashed shirt clung to goose-bumped flesh. Focus. I held my piece tight in my left, my eyes searching for a break, any break in the pitch black dark. They’d come this way. They had to.
Mota and Panama. I’d passed on my chances to kill each of them. Kripsen and Lumbela had paid the price for my stupidity, the ultimate price. My once-fearsome crew was now reduced to one.
I clenched my jaw to keep my teeth from chattering, wiggled my unfeeling toes. Mota had been asleep when I had him in my sights. Asleep. All I’d had to do was squeeze the trigger. But I was weak. Soft. Felt sorry for the piece of offworld ass spooning alongside him.
And Panama? I’d left him beaten and bruised but all too alive. Fuck.
I tried to take satisfaction from the fact that Panama’s YOP partner didn’t show on the vid. I’d clocked that bastard over the head good. That SOB probably still wasn’t seeing straight.
I let my piece hang by my side. Didn’t want a tired arm. I’d have plenty of time to take aim as they approached. The sound of dripping water pinged hollowly off the walls. I ignored the fly buzzing around my head. Focus.
Neckties. Panama gave my boys fucking neckties, the calling card of the jungle warlords. I couldn’t wait to fry the fuck out of him. Mota too. Despite the chilled bones in my shoes, this time there’d be no cold feet.
Yepala was General Z’s territory. The general was famous for employing an army of children. Decades of war had taken its toll on the adult population so now he drafted children.
But what was the connection between Mota and General Z? I remembered the picture: Mota, Froelich, and Wu standing around a pile of cash. Opium money? It was possible.
But would General Z order the murder of two Koba police? That was a risky move for the warlord. A move as ballsy as that could provoke a nasty backlash from the Lagartan army.
So perhaps Mota and Panama weren’t conspiring with the warlord at all. Yepala was on the edge of the general’s territory, a place where nonopium trade and commerce were freely permitted. Those two SOBs could be operating an independent business inside the general’s territory.
I saw a light ahead, and I put thoughts of drugs and warlords out of my mind. The light blinked in and out as they passed behind one obstruction or another. Then it split into two lights.
