Freedom TM

car in gear, then eased out of the driver’s seat as he released the clutch and lowered the toolbox onto the gas pedal—the car roared off into the inlet and soon splashed through the water, eventually stalling and rolling away as it began to sink.
    The Major grabbed his shoes, tied them together and hung them over his neck, wrapped the guns inside of his jacket, and started swimming for the far bank, through bubbles still coming up from the car. The water was shockingly cold, but he didn’t think hypothermia would be an issue across this distance.
    The Major swam with calm determination toward the far shore. About halfway across he dumped both guns and kept going. A few minutes later he climbed over a low jetty of rocks on the far side. He lay resting on the rocks in the darkness, listening to the waves wash against the stones.
    He stared up at the starry night sky from his place in the shadows. Some of his contractors were dead. They would have to be replaced. Some generalized plans had fallen into the hands of the enemy, but it could have been worse. Yes, the enemy would now know they were up to something in the Midwest, but it couldn’t be news to them, could it?
    But he was alive. In fact, The Major hadn’t felt this alive in years. He thought back to nights spent in South American jungles. Theywere some of the most vivid memories he had. That was truly living.
    He stared up at the field of stars above him.
    And suddenly he saw a dark, wing-shaped object noiselessly gliding across the blue-black field.
They’ve got surveillance drones.
He snapped alert and grabbed his things. He ran barefoot across the beach toward a pier that jutted out over the water. The Major ran inland beneath it, the wood planks coming closer and closer overhead, until finally he was crawling up to the very beams themselves, pushing sand away to get deeper in, climbing under the boardwalk. He smelled the tar, discarded cigarettes, and dog shit, but he kept digging.
    He heard powerful motorcycle engines and diesel trucks approaching. The Major started to push sand back behind him with his feet, hiding his presence. He was sweating profusely, blocking himself in. Then heard steel-shod boots approaching on the boardwalk. Dozens of others were racing over the asphalt to either side. Motorcycle engines throbbed in the background.
    The footsteps stopped near The Major’s hiding place. He could see shadows nearby between the planks and the voices of men.
    “The car is in the water on the far side. He crossed here.”
    “Looks like the shortest swim.”
    “How did they find him?”
    “Fingerprint scanners on the room locks. Loki released the bio-metric database from Building Twenty-Nine to the darknet. People have been inserting software bots into all sorts of systems for months.”
    A chuckle.
    “We’ll get him. There’s nowhere in the world he can hide now.”
    ______________
    Loki walked through the shattered bungalow door wearing his black helmet and riding suit. He wasn’t too concerned about his safety. As a fifty-sixth-level darknet Sorcerer, he had the best gear credits could buy. His black riding suit resembled leather inlaid with titanium wire, but it was actually composed of flexible polymer fibers lined with sheer thickening liquid—a mixture of polyethylene glycol and particles of silica whose chemical structure stiffened instantly into a solid under rapid compression. In technical terms the gel displayed a highly nonlinear rate-dependent sheer resistance—which in layman’s terms meant it could stop a bullet or a knife while still being comfortable to wear. However, Loki also had pieces of ceramic composite trauma plate in critical areas, and on the backs of his gloves, as much for looks as protection. This was his faction battle armor, and he seldom moved about without it. Especially in these troubled times.
    His hands were clad in gel armor gloves as well, with fiber-optic lines running like veins along the backs of his hands and along his body, leading to a wearable computer on his belt at the small of his back. Two of the fiber lines also ran to lenses contained in engraved, titanium enclosures at the ends of his index fingers to accommodate his LIPC weaponry. His belt buckle bore the symbol of the Stormbringer faction—twin lightning bolts with skulls in each quadrant. Such was the culture of the darknet—manga come to life.
    Through the sensors in his outfit, Loki could “feel” the world immediately