The Coordinate

Chapter 15: A Small-Scale Confrontation

            The café was crowded with investigators and police officers, and it seemed like they haven’t found her, or that person yet. The New World Government had a lot of methods they usually employ in cases like these. There was the ID tracker embedded within the drive connection inside their wrists. Bugs were monitoring every corner and crevice everywhere. Satellites provided live feedback every second. Print shadowers. Case simulators—all kinds of things, but the look in their faces seemed like they had no clue.

            Investigators like these were usually either smug, relaxed, or both. But this time, they were tense and worked up, based on their faces and mannerisms alone.

            Jordan withdrew from the café’s block and walked along the gold-bathed sidewalks, thoughts adrift and lost in the background noises.

            He flicked his wrist. Time read 5:20. His wrist suddenly vibrated. A projection appeared on his backhand—an incoming call.

            He accepted.

            “Jordan!? Where the hell are you!? I told you to stay in your room!” Mrs. Finch’s voice boomed out of it.

            “I’m looking for Rori.” He said calmly, plainly, expecting none of them to accept or understand it.

            “Jordan, what you’re doing now is a violation of-“

            “I know!” he shouted. He then took a deep breath, “You know what kind of person I am, Mrs. Finch. I have no regard for authority.”

            He turned off the call and issued a silent mode.

            He kept walking, as he thunk, trying to get inside the mind of a presumed mastermind. Where would he someone hostage and force them for answers?

            Somewhere where tools are available to dig the drive connection and ID chip from someone’s wrist… Somewhere that not even the satellites and hidden cams can’t find them… Somewhere where nobody would hear them.

            Where would a place like that be?

            Eventually, he found himself walking to the rural parts of town. He checked the time again, reading 5:38.

            He stopped and sat on a bench, tired. There was nobody around, except for one person walking across him.

            That brief and sudden determination was perhaps nothing but stupid stubbornness after all. He talked to himself andro his advisor all mighty and proud and determined, but with nothing to show for it.

            What the hell was he thinking? He was just a human, an engineering student at that. He wasn’t Batman, or Sherlock Holmes, or Hercule Poirot.

            Stupid youth, he thought.

            Guess that one time I shot down that spacer ship made me think I was some sort of hero…

            “Hey there,” a male voice said, with an accent he couldn’t recognize. He looked up, seeing a man six centimeters taller than him. He wore a trilby hat, and a frock coat over white inners and black pants—something like what an investigator or a typical ‘mysterious stranger’ would wear. He was a novasapien, based on the little protrusion on his back, but his horns were hidden inside the hat. He also looked young, like what a human would look like in his early 20’s or late teens.

            He didn’t seem like the novasapien he was looking for, Jordan thought.

            “Mind if I sit next to you?” he asked again.

            Jordan scooched over and nodded.

            “Why’s someone like you over at the surface city? You don’t particularly smell like the rest of the people living here. You a student?”

            “Yeah, but I’m not from here. We’re over here for a scholarship capability test.”

            “Oh, you and your peers are geniuses?”

            “I wouldn’t say we’re geniuses,” said Jordan.

            The man took a deep breath, “So, why are you here? Heard there was a hostile novasapien running about and had kidnapped or possibly murdered someone on the news. Someone like you shouldn’t be around here.”

            Jordan fell silent, casting his gaze over the skyscraper-filled horizon, looking at a blurry orb half-sunken into the green, gaseous sky.

            “You’re here to find the victim, aren’t you?”

            Jordan’s eyes widened and turned to him, surprised.

            “How’d you know?”  Jordan asked.

            “I have a talent of sniffing someone’s intentions.” The man then looked at Jordan and smiled, “Name’s Swallow.”

            Jordan greeted him with a nod but chose not to divulge his name.

            “I have a question for you,” continued the mysterious man, “It’s about what this whole conspiracy and sudden a*******n are all about.”

            “What is it?”

            “Where do you think the captor would put her in? It’s strange, isn’t it? Someone suddenly abducted in the middle of the day, and not even the New World Government has the slightest idea where they could be.”

            “Why are you asking me this?” Jordan asked.

            “I was hoping to know how an underground-dweller, and even more so a genius would think.”

            “As I said, we’re not geniuses. I don’t know why and how people think everyone in the Collegium Initiative program got the impression that we were some kind of super intelligent collective.” He sighed, “But… if I were to answer your question…

            “Hm?” The mysterious man said, looking at him with great interest.

            “I was told that the victim was suddenly lost her blip, so she can’t be tracked. The bugs and the satellites can’t seem to find any sort of traces of where she went after the café, so…

            “So…?”

            “I’d assume the abductor has some kind of tool to remove her drive connection from her wrist, then have some sort of cloaking device, or something. As for where the victim would be kept… I’d think she’s either murdered, or was left somewhere where the police wouldn’t find her. I think the latter would be most probable though.”

            “Interesting train of thought.  Why do you think the abductor would kidnap that girl in the first place?”

             “I don’t know. Ransom, maybe? I’ve heard the suspected abductor was a hostile novasapien that didn’t come from here, and I heard he was trying to find something. But one thing I’m sure of is that this particular novasapien is way beyond the New World Government or the Zionous can handle…“

            “I see. Is that what you think?”

            “It is, why?”

            “Because, Jordan Heron, you’re very much far from the truth.”

            An unpleasant wave ran up Jordan’s spine. His eyes widened, his heart thumped in his chest fast and hard. He looked at the mysterious man with a scowl and suspicion.

I didn’t tell him my name.

            Swallow took off his hat, revealing dark, jagged, unfiled horns. The light of the sinking sun expressed his blue eyes.

            “It’s you…” Jordan gasped.

            “Yeah, it’s me.” He said casually, laying back on the bench.

            Jordan discreetly flicked her wrist, trying hard not to seem scared or desperate. He needed to keep this man distracted…

            The lack of response from his drive connection flared his panic. What’s going on? He thought.

            “I’ll tell you how I was never found, why your attempts to contact anyone or send a signal isn’t working, and where your friend Rori, is, but in return, you give me an underground visitation pass. Your friend’s drive connection isn’t permitted for that you see because she doesn’t have an Absolute Authority Module. You, however, do.”

            How did he-?

            “What are you planning? Why are you doing this?” Jordan spat.

            “Would you believe me if I said I want to save Winter? She’s probably being experimented on by now.”

            Jordan snapped a vein, he stood up and reached his hand out to grab Swallow, but somehow the sky rolled and the ground rose to meet his face. He coughed out the dirt in his mouth, trying to stand up.

            “I’m glad you think I’m someone the Zionous himself can’t handle because that’s true. But really, I’m not here to kill you, nor do I intend to beat you until you give me a visitation pass. However, Rori is going to be all lonely, and your government will have no chance of finding me unless we trade. It’s a win-win situation, you see?”

            Jordan stood up and swung his fist, but the novasapien before him disappeared. His eyes now looked at the sky, and his feet were swept from under him. He fell to the ground

            “Hey, you’re the one beating yourself up, not me,” Swallow said, squatting in front of him.

            Jordan took a pained, lungful of air before clawing to Swallow’s direction, but only struck the wind.

            “I’m not letting you hurt Winter, you bastard!” he spat in between breaths.

            “Stars, didn’t I say I was planning to save her? She is my partner now after all.” Swallow sighed again, “Look, you see me as your enemy, but you’re not mine. That’s why I don’t intend to hurt you humans. I’m not going to try and convince you that we’re on the same side. Just give me a visitation pass, alright?”

            Jordan stood up, “How do I know you’re not lying?”

            “I don’t know, you’re a smartass who was able to predict my train of thought and shoot me down, aren’t you? Find out for yourself.”

            Jordan glared at him, looking for any signs. A lying person usually refused eye contact, exaggerated expressions, reactions and wording, sweat, or covered their mouths, but the guy in front of him was more resolute than an old-world fanatic.

            Jordan flicked his wrist, and a virtual, rectangular tab popped out into the air. A visitation pass. It wasn’t that Jordan believed him. He just didn’t know what else to do.

            “First, tell me,” Jordan started, “How are you able to hide and h****k my drive connection?”

            Swallow put his hands inside his pockets, “I have a special kind of drive connection that lets me disable all chips around me for around 20 meters. As to why I’m able to hide from your bugs and satellites, your one guess was right. My drive connection also has a cloaking program that makes me and everyone around me invisible to any kind of camera feeds. That’s all.”

             “Where’s Rori?”

            “Give me the visitation pass first.”

            Jordan flexed his pointing finger, and a projection pulsed from his palm. It scanned Swallow’s hand before disappearing

            Swallow took his left hand out from his pocket and tossed him something. Jordan caught it. A grappling g*n.

            “Rori’s on the roof of a long-abandoned ‘motel’ building over there,” Swallow pointed deeper into the rural area, “Use that to propel yourself up. Use the southwest corner so people don’t see you. And don’t even think of using that for forensics analysis. I held a plastic wrap.”

            Swallow put on his hat again and started walking the opposite direction, back into the urban, more densely-populated part of the city. “Jordan Heron,“ he called out one more time. “When you do see Winter suffering, and you know that it isn’t stopping. Are you ready to fight everyone that cared for you—your advisor, this government, your school, and even your friends?”

            Jordan was silent, still scowling at him. “f**k off,” he said finally. “I’ll find you again someday, and when I do, it’s not going to be friendly.

            “Ah, well. I’ll know your answer in due time.” Swallow said, cynically smiling. He continued walking until eventually, he was gone.

            Too many things scratched on the surface of Jordan’s mind. He steeled himself, focusing on finding Rori first before losing himself in his thoughts.

            Swallow.

            He didn’t know if that was the novasapien’s real name or not, but he memorized his face and was now sure. The next time he sees him, he’ll make a call before the novasapien bastard can activate his that disabling feature, or he’s bringing a stun g*n.

            Diving deeper into the rural area, it was mostly remote, with very few buildings and establishments, and were mostly just residential houses. Novasapiens and humans alike walked around and conversed around lawns and fences, others walked their pets. He kept his gaze to the roofs of the buildings, looking for the building Swallow pointed to.

            One detail he noticed while walking around, was that this part of the city barely had any gas warding towers. The city had one every few miles, but this place only had like four that he could see.

            Finally, he found a tall abandoned building with the sign ‘Luckystar Motel’. People passed the place by, so he did as Swallow instructed. He went to around the building, finding its southwest corner and shot the grappling g*n, hoisting himself up.

            Upon arrival, he was met with a teary-eyed, short-haired woman, scared, and alone.

            Relief poured down on him like a gentle rain after a drought. He threw a laugh, “By the Zionous, Rori. You look like an abandoned puppy.”

            Rori suddenly cried and ran up to him, hugging him hard and repeatedly said, ‘I’m sorry’ over and over again.

            “You deserve this, you know. Should have called the goddamn cops.”

            “I know, I know! I’m sorry. You were right, I am an i***t!”

            Jordan exhaled and hugged her back. “What an eventful two days for us. Can’t wait to tell Winter about all of this… For now though, let’s go back.”