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The mountains and hills just outside Camrose were still burning enough that licks of flame pierced the haze of dingy yellow smoke, and two moms with yoga pants, and doublewide strollers were striding down the street, chattering away.

Down at the other end of the neighborhood, a mom was getting her kid out of the van.  It looked like he wanted to play on his trampoline.  At least the mom had the sense to say no and send him inside.

Mia leaned over the railing of her house, mask on her lower face, eyes stinging a bit from the smoke, watching.

If you want to hide, do it in plain sight, in the middle of large enough numbers.  If you’re anything like me, you’ll find people acting like this is a blessing and a curse.  Because I worry about those children, enough it gnaws at me. 

Chews at me.

But I’m strange.  I know that.  You’ll find it easier to be strange around people like this.  It’s a good thing Camrose went this direction.

Both of the stroller moms turned to look at Mia as they passed her.  Fizzy and Eva.  Their mouths were hidden by facemasks to protect against the haze, their eyes dark blurs, obscured by smoke, that Mia had to search for meaning in.  It didn’t look like those eyes were smiling.

Mia raised a hand in acknowledgement, a small wave.

Neither mom acknowledged her, and they carried on their ways, fast-walking away.  The fact they waited until they were further down the street to resume their conversation gave Mia the distinct impression they were talking about her.  They almost certainly were.

You have to ask, what do they know, who might they be?  If you aren’t asking, and if your guard isn’t up, that’s a problem.

Mia had seen them at least twice a day for two years now, she’d looked them up on social media.  Mia’s work at the hospital wasn’t in the same part of the building they worked in, but she saw them there too.  Both were nurses, and nurses tended to fit into groups or types.  The cliques were one, Mia found.  The girls who’d never grown out of a high school mentality.

Anxieties still did their work on Mia’s nerves, adding onto worries that were already there.  Her children were due home from school, and they were nowhere to be seen.

Her head felt filled with noise, and the noise diffused out into a general full-brain headache.  Tears rolled down her cheeks as she closed her eyes.  The smoke.

Her eyes checked the coast was clear.  It wasn’t, but only in a manner of speaking.  The smoke obscured everything past a block and a half.

Her phone dinged.

Carson:
Coming home early.  Want to see if the babysitter is up for watching our two?  Six to eleven.  We can eat, go for a hike.

Code.

She didn’t reply.  No point.  She knew him.  He’d send it just before cranking the car into motion, and he wouldn’t acknowledge his phone between that moment and the time he got to his destination- or any store he stopped at on the way.  It’d chew at her, not getting that response.  Even if she knew him and his habits.

She didn’t like making plans when she didn’t know what was up with the kids.

Mia watched as the little boy from down the street went outside to the trampoline, his mom going out with him to watch.  He was wearing a mask for the smoke, but still…

Mia felt that anxiety chewing at her gut, especially when his mask fell to hang from his neck during one of his bounces.  He was trying to get a soccer ball to bounce up with him and kick it in mid-air.

Exercising hard, no doubt.  Panting.  Hauling in lungfuls of smoke.  Mia winced.

She double checked nobody was going to want to walk inside in the next few minutes, then slipped inside, going straight to the television in the living room.  There was a game console there, little used, slightly modified.  The case had a lot of extra room inside it, and by popping it open, she could remove a bit of hardware.  A small computer.

She disconnected the HDMI cable from the console and attached to the computer instead.  The other end was already in the television.

This was meant to be for emergencies only, but really, if Camrose was blanketed in smoke…

You have to work out the risks and dangers.  What stirs suspicion or makes people act the wrong ways?  Calling the babysitter to ask when she’s six minutes later than usual might get her guard up, make her defensive.  Isn’t it better to do things this way?

It was fast to boot up.  She input the password using the buttons on the top of the bit of custom hardware.  The screen lit up with an overhead view of their little district.

Three dots appeared on the map, labeled T, R, and J.  They were near the entrance to the park, T a bit inside with ‘J’, the babysitter a short distance away.  R stood off to the side.  Further away, ‘C’ was driving in.

T had her focus.  Was he hurt?  Sick?  Coughing his little lungs out?  Had something else happened?

The babysitter would have called.  Ripley would have.

She stared at the dots.

Her phone dinged.  New text.

Ripley:
User wants to share RF_412.vid with you.
[Play]

Ripley:
can I post???

Not an emergency.  Probably.  Mia opened the video.

Tyr, at the park, by a bush near the gated entrance.  There was a grouping of birds under a shrub, and half the time when Tyr jumped, they jumped too.  Maybe one of those was an instance of them being startled by sudden movement.

That was the delay then.

Me:
Nope.

Ripley:
its smokey!

Me:
We’ll talk about it when you get home.

The three dots started moving toward home.

She checked the box was working, because she had it out, switching between the overhead map, satellite image, water lines and drainage, electrical grid, and a few collected projects that included a heatmap by a local cycling club on what roads were most bike friendly, a traffic map that wasn’t working, and a map with dots showing recent crimes the police had responded to.  Half of those were unreliable, outdated, or broken, but she hadn’t had a day clear to address that in a while.

Camrose had once been a suburb of same-y houses built to be mortgage fodder and investment properties, but due to various political factors and a bit of luck, it had undergone enough of a change that there were stark differences between a computer generated map from four months ago and the satellite image from this week.  The neighboring city had swelled, its borders expanding.  It was already grazing Camrose.  It wouldn’t be long before Camrose was absorbed by it.

The images went dark as she removed the cable, packed up the computer into the console, and put things away.

One anxiety being quelled helped with the rest, the same way a short delay by her kids could stir them, and one weird look from neighbors she’d seen nearly every day could intensify them.

You have to recognize your emotions and what they’re for.  If you’re afraid or anxious, your body is changing how it functions.  Anxiety becomes energy.  That energy should be put to productive use.  Fear is your body responding to cues, even ones you’re not aware of on a conscious level.  You can put the two together, address fears.  Plan against future fears and problems.

The various maps and satellite images were one such project, but needed a few straight hours to be free and clear.

She focused on smaller things.  Bug-out measures were in place.  A bag in the main bedroom.  Another bag in the garage.  House security.  Shotgun in the closet panel, firmly secured.  Handgun in the bedframe.  There were traps that had been set, but those weren’t the sort of thing she test-deployed if her kids were due home in six minutes.

The headache built on itself.  The smoke hadn’t helped.  The anxiety- the headache felt worse as the anxiety faded away with the knowledge the kids were okay, not better.  As if it had more room.

The door burst open, and Tyr shrieked his excitement.  Just what a headache needed.

A ball of terror and excitement in a colorful sweater, hair short, black, flat on one side and spiky on the other, face covered from forehead to chin with a clear mask with a filter at the bottom.

“Look!  Mom!  Lookatit!”

Josie was trying to close the front door, but Tyr wanted it open, because the smoke pouring in the door was catching the light and, he seemed to think, looked very cool.  And, because of that scene with the birds only minutes ago, caught on video, he was in the mood to stomp, jumping as high as he could before slamming his feet onto the ground.

“Look, mom!  Super smoker!”

“Super smoker!”  Mia swept him up into her arms, so Josie could shut the door.  She forced her roaring headache into the background as he excitedly tried to convey the smoke and the birds and other stuff that she wasn’t prepared to string together or make sense of.  Especially when he was struggling with removing the mask he was wearing for the smoke.  He was all wide, smoke-red eyes, excitement, dust, smoke, and dirt.  Unable to get a word in edgewise, she smiled, nodded, made it clear that yes, she did see the smoke coming through the door, she’d seen the video.  She got his mask off and handed it to Josie, who hung it up by the door.

He squirmed, wanting out of her arms, and managed to wriggle free before he was halfway to the ground, landed on all fours, then sprinted off, as only a kindergarten-age kid could, stomping every time he brought a foot down.  Straight for where his toys were, at the other end of the house.

“You sure you don’t need the washroom after a long day at school!?” she called out after him.

There was a pause in the stomping footsteps, then stomp-running in a new direction.

“Wash your face and hands while you’re there!”

The response was an affirmative non-word.

Mia turned to look at Josie and Ripley, huffing out a breath, smiling a bit.

“I’m so sorry, Mrs. Hurst,” Josie said, at the same time Ripley asked, “Why can’t I post the video?”

Then, “I should be able to post it because there’s no way anyone could see-” and, “Traffic was ignoring the signs and lights at every intersection and Tyr saw the birds-”

Both continued for a couple seconds past that.

Mia put her hands up and out, getting each to pause, so she could address them in turn.

“I know it’s bad with the smoke and everything-” at the same time as “you’re not even enforcing that rule after I turn twelve, right?”

Both started talking again, same time, and Mia reinforced the hands, waiting until they stopped.

The peace lasted all of two seconds before Tyr upended a bin of toys in the other room.

Not moving or saying anything, Mia pointed at Ripley.  Eleven, skinny, hair straight, chin-length and parted at the side, wearing coveralls that would’ve been a comfortable fit for a child a few inches taller and thirty pounds heavier.  It wasn’t, as far as Mia could tell, dissatisfaction with her body.  Ripley liked the garage mechanic aesthetic.  The fanciest she got was overalls and a tee.

Maybe, down the road, they’d say this was a sign of this or that, or something else.  Maybe it’d be something that made a teenage or adult Rip wince when she looked at old class photos.  Mia had enough of those, for sure.

For now, all that mattered was that Ripley had friends, she wasn’t getting bullied, and she was comfortable and happy in the now.

“I don’t see why I can’t post it.”

“You’re not usually interested in social media.”

“Social media isn’t that interesting,” Ripley countered.

“Fair point,” Mia said, looking at Josie.  The teenager looked like she didn’t think so, but was polite enough not to say so.

“But this is a cool video,” Ripley said, more insistent.

“I get veto rights on anything you’re putting online.  Maybe you get more freedom and phone privileges at twelve, if you’re showing you understand the rules.”

Ripley looked dissatisfied.

“Go rewatch the video, tell me why I said no.  If you can, that will really help your case.  But first, go wash your face, and rinse the smoke out of your eyes.  They’re so red, honey.”

Ripley picked up her bag, and started to walk up the stairs.  She paused.  “The gates of the park were there.  Someone could watch, realize we probably just ended school, and figure out what direction and route we walk home?”

“That’s most of it,” Mia answered, “Very good.  But also…”

She trailed off, and tilted her head slightly toward Josie.  With every passing second, she tilted it more.

“Josie…” Ripley said.  “…that she walks home with us.”

“Is Josie safe online?”

Ripley snorted.  Mia smiled.

“Hey,” Josie protested.  “I follow your rules.”

“Some,” Mia said.

If you’re doing what we do, you can’t have a presence that people can track.

“Can we work on the bay window later?” Ripley asked, from the stairwell.

Ripley wasn’t someone who liked being online, or video games, or technology in general.  She had joked her daughter was an old man in a toddler’s body, and that hadn’t changed with age.  Rip did like books, though, always had, and for her birthday, she’d wanted a window with a seat that she could curl up in, with bookshelves on either side.  So that was a current project and had been for a few months now.  Being involved in the building and learning things along the way was as much a present for Ripley as the end product.

“This weekend, okay?  Your dad is getting off work early and he might want a date night.  I haven’t been upstairs in a minute, do you want to check the seal around the window?  See if it smells like smoke, touch around the edges if the hot air is coming in?”

Ripley nodded, started to go upstairs with a note of enthusiasm, like she really wanted to do the checks, then she paused.

“It’s a cool video, though.  It’s cute, people will love it.”

“Maybe we sit down later to edit it?  Cut out segments?”

“That won’t be as popular.”

“I know.  Sorry.  Maybe this weekend we tackle the special project?”

Ripley lit up at that.  She nodded, and headed upstairs doubletime.

“Special project?” Josie asked.

“Secret!” Ripley called down.

The special project was making one of the connected bookshelves a secret hatch, that could swing out.  Not an easy project, but figuring it out would be fun.

She turned her attention to Josie.  “Sorry.”

“I really am sorry about being late.  If you need me to babysit, I can give you a discount, as an apology.”

“It’s fine,” Mia said.  She offered a bit of a smile, which Josie returned.  Uneasily returned?  “Thank you for bringing them home.  We’ll pay you in full.”

Josie nodded, shifting her weight.

“Can you look after Tyr for now?  While I get ready?”

Josie did.

Was she was conveying the wrong signals in moments like these?

Negativity in general had a way of diffusing out.  Badness came easily and when they were addressed, they turned into something else, still there.  Doubts, the weird looks from passing neighbors, Josie’s unease… it became self doubt.

Every social interaction felt like she was doing something wrong, walking away with things to overanalyze.  Every aspect of her own appearance and presentation felt fraudulent.  She was taller than average, broad across the shoulders, broad across the hips.  Her hair, light brown like Ripley’s, had never felt like it looked right.  No good cuts.  It fell too flat, or framed her face and head wrong.

We have work tonight.

The thought centered her.  She washed her face, cleaning up after the sudsy mess left behind by her children’s rushed face-washes, then changed clothes.  Something cool to wear, because the heat radiated off the hills.  But durable, easy to clean.

Tyr was preoccupied with a show.  Ripley was reading, unwinding from the day.  She wanted to be a mom in the time window before Carson got back, but they were fine as they were.

She already had a sense of what the job might look like, and she spent a few minutes searching online, looking at articles.

‘Heist’ kidnapping of a court justice.  Wrong demographics.  Wrong dynamics.  The thread from that to people reaching out to her or Carson didn’t make sense.

Workplace shooter on the run.  Wrong dynamics again.  Too messy.

Some mundane crimes- shootings, murder, kidnappings.  No dynamics, still.

Military sergeant steals gun drones, hunted colleagues.

More mundane others.  Robbery, murder.  Back to a lack of dynamics.

Leader of police strike sought for questioning over riot incitement.

“Mom?”

She looked up and over her computer.  Ripley, at the door to Mia’s office.

“Can I have a slice of carrot cake?”

“Absolutely.”

“Also, I think Dad’s home.”

“Got it.  Thanks.  Can you close the door?  Opening the safe.”

Ripley shut the door.

True to her word, she opened the safe to get things, and then packed in the process, getting her ‘work’ laptop and other things together in her messenger bag.  Her eyes skimmed the page as she did.

Car chase across the city, multiple civilians injured.  No.  Already resolved.

Neighboring city, more “civil warrior” attacks had shut down the power grid.  They’d done enough damage it would be potential months before the power was on.  Between the secondhand smoke from the outskirts of the city here, close to Camrose, and the power problems, people were leaving in droves.

Carson came in while she worked.  She didn’t lift her eyes off the screen, sliding a screwdriver set into a slot in her bag.

He put his phone on the desk and slid it across, until it was in front of her, then came to stand behind her, hand at her back, running up to the back of her neck.

Unknown Number
I can pick your son up from paintball at the park and feed them
but they’ll be alone at my place from eight to twelve
that okay with you?

She reached over and started typing out the reply.

“Your neck’s so tense it’s like stone.  The usual headache?” he asked, at the same volume.

“About usual,” she replied.  “I think this is an easy yes.  We’ll at least go in for more details.”

“Yeah.”

She sent the reply back.

Me:
You have the wrong number.

Carson started to massage her neck, but she touched his arms and moved them, so he was hugging her from behind.  He squeezed.

She took a moment like that, closing her eyes, letting the noise melt away.  The headache receded some.

Noise downstairs made her eyes open.  Tyr.

She reached over to the laptop, Carson still hugging her, and turned it slightly their way, before clicking a tab.  The sergeant who stole and used military weapons on civilians.

“You think?” Carson asked.

She turned, moving within his embrace.

She’d never fit well into her own skin.  Carson did.  He was tall, athletic in a way that didn’t easily lend itself to a particular sport – maybe rugby or a martial art, but there weren’t any good outlets for that around here.  He had wavy black hair that looked good whether he styled it or ran fingers through it right after getting out of bed.  Sharp chin, easy smile, eyelashes so thick it looked like he wore makeup.  He wore patterned tees or black tees and jeans, ninety percent of the time, but a lot of his shirts had a way of looking worn out.

Anyone who saw them together would wonder why he was with her.  She never felt like more of a fraud than when he was there, being her partner, smiling at her.

Maybe he sensed that, because in these quiet moments, he didn’t smile.  She hadn’t told him to drop the smile, but he’d done it naturally.  He was that kind of person.  He made easy friends, knew people, and put himself out there easily.

She was the only person he showed that expression to.  She hoped.

“Let’s go see,” he told her.  “Who’s getting their second lease on life?”

⬥

The trick to dealing with the law is to realize that they’re human.  Cop, lawyer, judge, administration.  Ninety percent want to do their work, feel reasonably fulfilled, go home, and live the rest of their lives.  They’ll work long hours; for some, that means taking shortcuts, or falling into routines. 

So much of the system we live in is built to avoid the worst unforced errors, but even like that, people get lazy.  People are stupid.  Ninety percent of people are idiots, and out of the remaining ten percent, ninety percent are mediocre.

Play into that, use that system against them, but don’t get complacent.  Do everything as if someone very talented, driven, and lucky is after you.

Layers of obfuscation.  Spacing out uses of different codes.  The ‘wrong number’ code was one of four they used.  Within that, there were other layers.  Time was money, so when the text came in from their contact, the numbers that appeared in the text were the amount.

The contact had said eight to twelve.  Add eight to twelve, get twenty.  Twenty thousand for tonight’s work.

Carson had altered it a step further by using the time the text was sent.

You can’t have throughlines.  You can’t let them have easy connections.

Even the fact Carson had used a text after receiving a communication by text was too much, as connections went.  She’d talked to him about it on the way over.

Even the best detective in the world had only so many resources.  Past a point, they had to rely on others.  If they were forced to rely on people who weren’t the best detectives, and were maybe even sub-par, then that introduced key weaknesses.

Bases of operations were the same.  They rotated, going between a handful, regularly abandoning them or picking up new ones.  Carson did a lot of the scouting.  She did final verification.  They needed a place with good view of anyone incoming, and where they could be reasonably sure nobody was present.

Far enough out of the way there wouldn’t be passing cars or passersby.  Close enough that they could run damage control if they needed.  The car had to be easy to keep out of easy view.

Give them no reason to think you even exist in the first place.  If they might have an inkling, then give them no reason to look at you.  If they do look, make it cumbersome, every step a chore.

How many eyes would it take to watch every single location?

To check every call from a burner phone to a burner phone?

Their destination was a gas station that had closed down instead of rebuilding after a fire.  Not one of the recent forest fires, or the current one.

Carson’s driving was slow, through the smoke.  The smell and the smoke only leaked in when the vehicle was stopped.  He pulled around the back, then brought bags out with him.

Teenagers had used the place to party, at some point since their last use of the spot.  She’d watched them come on trail cameras they’d installed, watched them go.  It was a place she’d consider going if they were on the run.

They used the back, where it was dark.

Carson used a box, long emptied of its beer cans, to sweep a surface clear.  Bottles, cans, and a few stray articles of clothing fell to the floor in the corner.

She set her bag down, and got her equipment out.

“Ten minutes,” she noted.

“Comfortable,” Carson replied.

Computer on, everything booted up.  Thumb-drives in a case she’d set aside.  Twenty thousand didn’t buy anything overly fancy, but she’d included one of her better kits in case someone or something called for an upgrade.

Carson was on point, and she was background, but background was everything here.  This was her domain.

Two years ago, she’d driven through a neighborhood, laptop on the passenger seat, set to look for open connections.  One woman had pointed cameras at bird nests.  The birds were long gone, but the cameras were there.  A feed, low-ish resolution, of a not-very-resided residential area.  They’d had their contact send people there.

She’d driven through a lot of neighborhoods like that.  Collected locations like that.  Carson wasn’t the only one to do any scouting.

She showed Carson.

“You were right.”

“Nathaniel Abate.  Sergeant,” she reported.  “Served seven years, became a warrant officer.  Ordnance.”

“Coast isn’t clear.”

She glanced over at the low-resolution feed.  Nathaniel was on two cameras.  There were people on the street.  “No.”

“I’ll ring him as soon as those people are gone.”

The area was normally pretty empty.  A part of the neighboring city where things were a bit run down.

“Looks nervous,” Carson added.

She studied the feed.  “Wanted for two murders.  It doesn’t look like he has the weapon he stole and used.”

“Sold it?  To get the money to pay us?”

“And other cash, I assume.  We’ll see.”

She began searching Nathaniel’s social media.  He didn’t have a lot, but he did have friends.  One was mentioned in a news article.  From there, she could track down the friend on Hoot, do some skimming, and find that they played a lot of Ares Aria together.  Once she had the usernames those people used, she could find them, with variations, elsewhere.  One streamed, and there were conversations there.

“Calling,” Carson said.

She glanced at the feed.  The area had mostly cleared out.  The fact Nathaniel was an agitated, muscular guy in a dark jacket helped to discourage anyone who might’ve caused trouble.

On the feed, with a time delay, Nathaniel reacted.  He walked over to a bench and, after a brief examination, pulled the phone out from below.

Knowing Nathaniel’s web of contacts gave her a sense of his digital footprint- it let her find the sites he’d been on and quit.  It let her track his mood.

“No names,” Carson said, over the phone.  “Across the street, a dark blue Ion.  There’s a key inside the gas cap.  Head past the record store, and pull onto rural road six.”

This was an angry man.  Even with the volume on mute, she could see him raging online.  Well, the fact he’d gone after colleagues using stolen weapons was a whole other thing.

She could hear him on the phone, as Carson pulled it away from one ear.  “Are you jerking me around?”

“No,” Carson replied, calm and even.

“Go here, go there, do this.”

“There will be more steps,” Carson replied.  He didn’t sound like himself.  “All of these steps are for our mutual benefit.”

“I’m fucking tired, man.”

“You don’t have far to go.  Do you want me to repeat the instructions?”

“You’d better not be scamming me.”

“Do you want me to repeat-”

“No.  I fucking remember.”

Mia opened a text document.  She typed:  Cooling off period.

Carson nodded.

Slight change to their procedures and process.

The anger had touched his relationships.  He’d broken it off with an ex.  Not that long ago.

She made a note of that in the same text document.

In pictures on Hoot, he’d had a car, and then it had disappeared.  That suggested a DUI, other driving incidents, or financial problems.

DUIs or other things that would lose him his license were unlikely if he was working in the army- she couldn’t imagine he’d hold his position long enough to get his hands on the weapon.

He’d made comments about his sister in law’s vacation, though.

And there it was.  He’d driven recently, on base, going by a photo of him and two others in a warehouse.

Money problems, it seemed.

As Nathaniel left the area, she closed the window with the feed and turned things to their feeds from two of the trail cameras they’d put along the highway.

She motioned, and Carson muted the phone.

“If he didn’t have the cash to buy or keep his car, he’d have trouble scraping up twenty thousand.  He sold the weapon.”

“To our contact?’

Mia shrugged.  “I’d believe it.”

“He’s traveling light.  Half-full backpack.”

“Weapon?” she asked.

“Of course.”

There was no way to get too granular.  Law enforcement was something to be wary of, but the clients were their own sort of danger.  Their mistakes were Mia and Carson’s mistakes.  Mistakes that their contact, who sent them clients, had to deal with.

Nathaniel’s trip down a dark road was a chance for them to look out for tails.  In this part of the city, after hours, and on the outskirts, in this direction, there weren’t many cars.  She watched them all, wary of any moving in response, trying to stay close enough to help.

“Okay, Nathaniel,” Carson said.  “I’m going to ask you some questions.  Part of the reason is to keep you awake.  You’re tired, it’s the evening, you’re on a straight road in the dark.”

“I can stay awake.”

“I believe you.  I still want to know.  Do you have any identifying marks?  Birthmark, tattoos?”

“Tattoos.”

“Army?”

“Yeah.”

“You have the option of getting that covered up.  We can handle that, but it’s a process.  We’d need you to follow very strict instructions.”

“No.  I can wear a jacket.”

“Have you ever bitten anyone in the commission of a crime?”

“No.  Who do you think I am?”

Confrontational.  Mia took a note, aware Carson was watching her type.

Carson ran down the checklist, while Nathaniel drove.  Here and there, he gave directions.  In other circumstances, if something needed to be handled, then they’d have Nathaniel come here and restrain himself.  Tattoo removal or cover-up was one example of that.  They had a process, to stay out of the way and keep some layers of distance.

Nathaniel was directed to another of their stops- an old base of operations they’d abandoned for the most part.  Carson had left a camera secreted away.  He gave directions and had Nathaniel set it up, change his shirt and hair, and take a photo.

It came straight to Mia.

So, let’s dive into this.  How do you build a new identity for someone?

For twenty thousand, we’re not talking maximum effort.

Still, a better way?  It wasn’t to perfect a passport, invent a person from whole cloth, or hack a government database.

It started with her work.  Bodies came to the hospital.  Medical examiners or coroners would investigate the cause of death.  From there, it could go to a pathologist for further investigation, autopsy, and more.  Or it could go to the families, who would usually use a funeral director.

A number of bodies came through the system that didn’t get claimed, and didn’t warrant any deeper investigation.  There, that ninety percent rule came in.  People fell into routines, took shortcuts.

Mia had worked at five hospitals, and had left something behind at four of them.  A RAT.  Remote access terminal.  A program at the root level that watched everything, let her operate it from a distance.

Three of those were still live, undetected.  The fourth had been lost in an overhaul of the hospital systems.  If they were traced, the timing of their installation would line up better with a colleague who’d moved to the same hospitals as her – he hadn’t been at one hospital, so she hadn’t installed anything.  A man who deserved it.

When a body came through the system, people would use the hospital system to record the data, it would look like it had worked as intended.  But behind the scenes, it wouldn’t process the way it had seemed to process.

If a fitting body came through, she researched it, the same way she was researching Nathaniel now.  Making sure there weren’t any problems, or people from the past who’d crop up.

An unclaimed dead man with a name became a John Doe, and got cremated after thirty days.  The name lived on.

But that’s not enough, is it?

From the time the name was in her custody, she kept it alive.  Fed it an income, often meager, but some.  Paid taxes.  Posted on social media as them.  Often, that was another filter, seeing who popped up.  Old friends, enemies, law enforcement.

From there, it was sold to a client, who was prepared to pick up where their predecessor’s life had ended.

The second best identity to give someone was a real one.  The level of screening and the quality of that life varied with the price tag.  She wouldn’t fabricate a passport.  She’d give them the things they needed to apply for one, go through the system regularly.  References.

The best identity- that was a whole other process.  Those fruits had yet to ripen.

She put the photo in a folder on her computer.  She’d make a driver’s license tomorrow.  With ID, they could get more ID.

Again, the full package came with more.

Twenty thousand bought Nathaniel a new life with a driver’s license and a sketchy history for which the statute of limitations had passed.

Carson was walking Nathaniel through the process now.

“If you move that part of the counter-?  Yes.  I heard the bag rustle.  There are a few things in there, we’ll talk more about them later.  Blue paper is a list of accommodations.  Ones that you can apply for and pay with the card there.  Pick something midrange, outside the city core.  Go, hole up, get sleep, eat.  Do not call anyone.  From this point on, your old name and life are in the rearview mirror.  Any questions?”

The reply was curt.  Mia didn’t catch it.  It sounded negative.

She wrinkled her nose at the smoke.

“The phone you have now?  Toss it into the PVC pipe by where you found the bag.  We’ll be in touch.”

There was silence after the call ended.  Carson put the phone away.

“He needs a reminder not to talk,” she said.  “If he leaves that tattoo uncovered and they find him, I don’t want him mentioning us.”

“He knows,” Carson replied.  He rubbed the back of her neck with one hand.  “If he crosses that line, he burns a lot of bridges.  Including with our contact.”

“Mmm.”

They’d provided a phone, presented as a burner, and he was using the crummy web browser on that phone to look up the places they’d provided.

All curated.

The place he ended up picking was a cabin, further out.  Nice for the cost, out of the way, stocked up with food.  They’d bought it after one of their biggest jobs.

Control for everything you can control. 

There, they had the phone lines.  They had cameras inside, out, and around, watching roads.

She did her research, and Carson quietly waited, as their client went to the destination.  She set things up.  She used a proxy to dial Nathaniel’s ex, recorded the message, then quickly set some things up.

“What are you thinking?” Carson asked, as they watched him walk inside.

“Do you want the long answer, the short answer, or the funny answer?”

It was Carson’s line that she’d used, playful.  He’d used it a lot with Tyr, when Tyr asked endless questions, barely seeming to care about the answer before firing off the next.

“Weird.”

“I fantasize sometimes about making up a language.  Something specific to what we do.  Some words in English are too long, it’s inefficient.  Wouldn’t it be useful to have it be a series of short syllables?  Something we can use rapid-fire.  Maximum meaning in the shortest amount of time, keyed to our needs.  Doubles as a code if we end up in a pinch.”

“I’m down to work it out.  Project for the two of us?”

“Shoot holes in it,” she told him.

“That fast?  You don’t even want to play around with the idea?”

She shook her head, craning around to look up at him.

Her neck was stiff.

He rubbed it, thumbs at work.

She’d had boyfriends over the years.  Less than she’d have liked, since she’d been a young, single mom and that sent most potential partners running.  A lot of the guys she’d attracted hadn’t cared at all about Ripley.  They’d seemed to care about her age, as if it was some victory to have someone young when they were older men.

Of the ones who hadn’t run, or hadn’t stayed for reasons that were too obvious, only one had ever given her a massage without wanting it to lead into something else.

What did it say about them, that this was their chemistry?  In a dark, dirty gas station, stalking a man, watching every road around that man, around them, Carson had his hand at Mia’s neck, working out the stiffness, and Mia felt a kind of tranquility in the fact her husband didn’t smile.

So often, they were pieces of different puzzle sets, jammed together.  The exceptions were moments like this, when they operated well together, and when they were with the kids, away from the rest of the world.

“I think the code-switch to an unfamiliar language costs us more time than the efficient phrasing would save,” Carson said.  “We already learned English, it’s automatic.  Your idea saves time in saying, but in listening?”

I learned English twice.  The second time, after The Fall.

She didn’t say her thought out loud.  It changed how Carson treated her.

She contemplated what he’d said.

“Okay.  Thank you.”

“Want to try anyway?”

“No.  I’m not that attached to the idea.  I’m glad to have a good rationale to kill it.  It kept circling around my head.”

“Mmmm,” he grunted.

“We need a new code, if we’re not using texts for a while.”

“Let’s each come up with something in the next few days.  It’ll annoy our contact.”

“It’ll be more annoying to anyone after us.  He’s paying us for that.”

“Touché.”

“Have we hit the quiet patch?” Carson asked.

“Maybe.”

Nathaniel looked agitated, still.  Pacing.

Her heart sank when she saw him pick up the phone built into the cabin and dial.

“Fuck,” Carson muttered.

“You asked me what I was thinking, before.”

“I was going to ask what you were really thinking, but we got distracted.”

“I was hoping this would work out for him,” she said.  She made sure things were square.

Nathaniel’s call went to a recording of his ex’s answering machine message.

A beep sounded.

“Kadie.  I’m in trouble, you already know.  You have to.  It’s everywhere.  I wanted to explain why, before I go.  They didn’t listen.  I found issues and nobody cared.  Do you know what that does to someone?  To have your work not matter?  To know the harm being done down the line?  There aren’t any consequences anymore.  People keep topping themselves, doing worse shit.  And I guess… might as well stop the worst of them and then…”

There was a long pause.  He was breathing hard.

Maybe, with a real answering machine, it would have detected the silence and logged the message.  Maybe not, with the emotional breathing.

“…I guess I’m a part of it now.  I’m doing the thing I’m complaining about, that lack of consequences.  I think I’m free and clear, soon.  Unless they fucking screw me.  But hey, listen.  I know what your situation is.  I’m going to be in touch, in my own way.  I can get you out too.  Give me time to get the money together.  But don’t tell anyone I called.  Delete this message, um.  Don’t tell anyone.  If you do, I’ll know.  If you don’t, I can get you out.  I promise.  Let me do one last good thing, if it’s that.”

He was choking up with emotions.

“They’re going to lock me up for fucking forever if this doesn’t work.  But it can’t work without you.”

The call ended.

“Idiot,” Carson said.

“Contact the contact?” Mia asked.  “Too many red flags, now.”

“Yeah.”

“Do you think the contact brought him in as a favor?  Maybe an old friend?  It wouldn’t surprise me.”

“I know as much as you do.  Probably less, since you did your digging,” Carson said.  “That fucking idiot.”

Angry, defensive, righteous, and he’d called when he’d been told not to call.  She didn’t believe in the slightest that he’d back off, now.  He was emotionally invested.

While Carson called, Mia dug.  A deeper look at Kadie, the ex.

She had a kid.  There was no telling if the kid was Nathaniel’s or the ex’s new partner’s, but that partner was a gambler.  Online poker, by his Hoot feed.  Probably the situation Nathaniel had talked about.

“Message sent, using the library.  If he asks for more of an explanation, I might need you to take over,” Carson said.  “I barely remember this code.”

“Yeah.”

There were a few minutes.  The call seemed to have calmed Nathaniel down, because he was making food now.

Some gangs and groups used email drafts with shared email accounts to convey covert messages.  The idea was that if the message wasn’t sent, nobody would intercept it.  But there were agencies watching for that.

The idea with the library was simple.  Books placed in a ‘interested’ custom list in a shared library account were a signal.  Specific books with specific topics for certain situations.

This wasn’t the rarest situation ever, but it was a complicated one, always.

If they were offering someone a new life, leaving the old one behind… but they decided they didn’t want to let go one hundred percent.

Most of the time, some leeway was given.  The contact would make things clear, would stop being so nice, and they’d be hurried on their way.  Sometimes there would be a penalty fee.

Mia refreshed the page and saw the book selection.  All shelved, except for one.

This wasn’t one of those times.

Killing people they were supposed to be giving a new life to had a massive potential to backfire, if there was even a whiff of it.

Mia watched for a while.

“Did I understand the code worse than I thought?” Carson asked.

“No.”

“We’re killing him.”

“Yeah.”

“Except…?”

“Timing.”

“Okay,” he said.  He began picking some things up.  Hardware, the tattoo equipment, the stuff for quickly putting together IDs.  Weapons.  “Tell me when.”

Mia’s eyes roved over the thumb drives.  Each with an identity living within it, waiting for someone to start living it.

Second chances.

Their ex-client finished eating, fished around until he found a toothbrush and disposable razor under the bathroom sink, and groomed.  She could see him through the camera in the bathroom lights, watching him every step of the way.

Then he sat down to take a shit.

“Okay.  When.”

“Doing it like that?” Carson asked.

“Yeah.  It’s efficient.”

“It’s a hell of a way to go.  Are you mad at him?”

She considered for a second.  Then she nodded.

“I’m not saying no.”

The door was closed.

The cabin was thoroughly theirs.

At the foot of the door, a clear bag would expand, filling the gap. In the ventilation, a capsule would fall into a container.

The bathroom would fill with odorless gas before he finished his business there.  The lock would keep him sealed in, just in case.

It was meant to be silent.  But something must have tipped Nathaniel off.  Mia felt a kinship for him in that moment.  Whatever instincts he’d honed or fear he’d lived with, he’d taken something out of it.

Whatever it was, he leaped to his feet, ass unwiped, pants partially pulled up, and rushed the door, awkwardly drawing the weapon from his waistband.

He nearly fell when the door didn’t open.

Hand over nose and mouth, he aimed near the door handle.

Three shots.

None got the lock open.  The door wasn’t built that way.

He went for the toilet paper.

It took two tries, but he pulled the cardboard core out.  Crumpling it slightly, he thrust it through one of the bullet holes in the door.  His hand, flat, blocked the others.

Maybe some light was visible through the gap between fingers.

Mouth at one end of the tube, he breathed through the hole in the door, crouching awkwardly.  One hand blocked the holes.  The other held the gun, pointed at the door.  Ready to shoot it- and theoretically, someone on the far side.

Carson and Mia watched for a bit, neither commenting.

Mia was hoping the gas from the vent would get him, regardless.  The cardboard tube couldn’t be perfect.  Even if it was, some trace gas could leak past his hands, and get sucked back in by the tube.  Maybe?  It was heavier than air.

It didn’t get him.  He didn’t budge.

He waited.

“How long does it take the gas to dissipate?” Carson asked.

“It doesn’t dissipate.  But there’s a timer.  After two hours, the ventilation fan kicks on.  By my calculations, made when I set up the room, I decided an hour after that, it’d be safe to open the door and go in to clean up.”

“Hmm.”

“People might be dumb, mostly, but they’re survivors.”

“Life on this planet has been working on that survival thing for millions of years.”

Nathaniel was using the toilet paper he’d pulled the cardboard tube out of to block holes and gaps, freeing a hand.

“Then we have to get involved,” Carson said.

Mia watched the man get into a better position, his focus apparently forward, gun barrel pressed against the wood.

She nodded, and with a few snappy motions, put things way, tucked her laptop under one arm, and carried it in the direction of the car, pulling her mask up to protect her face as she stepped out into the smoke.  Carson brought the other bags.

In the late evening, at the outskirts of Camrose, fire was working its way across the mountains, and uneven, windswept plumes of black-grey smoke looked like mountains themselves.  If the day had been dirty yellow, the night was orange-red.  It whipped up fierce winds.

She felt most like herself in moments like this.  The rest of the world dark and pushed out to the margins.  A job to do, and a voice running through her head.

The fact they were killing a man didn’t really factor in.

She settled in the passenger seat, belting in before opening her laptop to see what their ex-client was doing.

You have to forgive me.  I fell out of the habit of walking you through the steps.  It helps me keep everything in line, outlining and explaining it all.  It’s so we can bring you in, Ripley, Tyr, later on, when you’re eighteen or so, if it seems like a good fit and you want to be a part of it.  The practice I’ve been doing in my head will help me help you understand.

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