Marcos skimmed the kill order. Pretty standard stuff - psych bonus for the killer, team bonus if it could be made to look like enemy fire or accidental death. Nakagawa had been assigned as the trigger man. Order came directly from HQ, countersigned by Erickson two hours ago, and the cryptographic checksum was valid. Unless someone stole the Blackmountain private key, it was authentic.

"What am I supposed to do with this? Instead of killing me, you killed everyone else in the squad. Is that supposed to make me trust you?" Marcos's gun hadn't wavered.

"No, trust is earned with time. Now you know Blackmountain is your enemy. This should be enough for you and I to work together. You need my help."

"At least tell me why you did it. Why them and not me?"

"Ah, shall we negotiate then? Let us say that SumatoTek made me a more interesting offer. I need someone with credentials to the Resource Extraction system. You were flagged as a defection risk. What is your price Marcos?"

Marcos considered. "You helped murder my squad. I rather liked them. Ten million."

"I am authorized to pay half a million, plus safe passage to an airport of your choosing."

"I'm all that's left of RexOps, and you're looking down the barrel of a gun. You've overplayed your hand Nakagawa. Ten million, or I walk and you don't."

"You forget that your alternative to an agreement is dying here in the mud; my allies surround you. One million."

"Three million and passage, half the scrip up front, the rest when I deliver whatever it is you need."

"Done. I will record the terms on the ledger."

"No offense, but I prefer to use my own agent." Marcos first checked the trustworthiness rating of SumatoTek. Their contract compliance for covert work was 99.999. More than satisfactory - not many entities maintained five nines. Next he tasked an AI agent with writing an appropriate smart contract. The money disbursement part was standard stuff. Safe passage was trickier, but there were some existing contracts to draw from.

He stipulated a biometric check before boarding and after deplaning, and full identity verification by a notary at the destination. He ran it on the test net and threw a fuzzer at it to make sure the agent hadn't screwed up anything obvious. With more time he would have hired an auditor, but that would take hours. You go to war with the contract you have, not the contract you want.

"Alright, have a look." Marcos sent the signing request to Nakagawa, who reviewed it with the help of his own agent.

"Acceptable. Welcome to SumatoTek. Your first payment is delivering now. HR forms will have to wait." The last he deadpanned. Joking. Probably.

Marcos holstered the bike pistol. Another file transfer request popped up:

Zeroware.zpk

Accept | Reject

"Now that you work for us, I must ask that you execute this package. It will root your command system and disable Blackmountain spyware"

"And install SumatoTek spyware in its place?"

"A corporation must protect its assets."

Marcos waited a few beats for the money to settle, then accepted and ran the code. Nothing changed that he could see, but Nakagawa looked satisfied.

"Now we must return to the base immediately. Blackmountain will revoke your credentials once they realize what happened, but with luck the chaos will buy us at least an hour."

"Are you crazy? That base is crawling with gun rats. We can't get near it without getting our heads blown off. I've got remote access, let's just run your package here."

"Not possible. You do not have the right permissions to run the payload. I can fix that - I have a 0-day exploit for the Blackmountain terminal. But it relies on a buggy USB driver. We require physical access."

Marcos was impressed. Had to be something damned important to justify burning a 0-day. Should have held out for that ten million.

"As for the gun rats," Nakagawa continued, "those were a gift to our rebel compatriots from SumatoTek. We have included a few safety measures." Nakagawa flourished a small rectangular controller. "This transmitter will register our face-prints as friendly to any rat that comes within 100 feet. Now follow me." Nagakawa engaged his motorbike and headed off through a faint trail in the brush. Marcos twisted his own throttle and kept close.

It'd been years since Marcos had been on a recon bike. Fortunately it was like... well, like riding a bike. Easier really. Shock tech had come a long way - the 'trail' they followed was a root-twisted mess, but the ride felt smooth as pavement. Plus with traction control and pathfinding assist, the thing could almost drive itself. After the long march out, they were back to the perimeter fence in mere minutes.

Marcos pulled a sit-rep from his command glasses. Central was unresponsive, either destroyed or offline. Perimeter turrets were down, as were most security cameras. The ones that were still up just showed gun rats. They sat on their haunches, waiting for a target with mechanical patience. His squad was still mostly dead; Aaron had finished bleeding out, leaving Ignatz the loan survivor. He hadn't moved from the mess hall.

"You will lead from here," said Nakagawa. "Go slow and stay next to me. You must stay in the protection of the transmitter."

Marcos throttled down and coasted toward the edge of the gun rat infestation, alert for signs of activation. As a rule he didn't trust technology to behave as designed - there was always a subtle bug or incorrect assumption. He picked an isolated rat at the edge and rolled slowly toward it. No reaction.

"As I said, friendly." Marcos noticed Nakagawa had kept behind him on the approach. Maybe not as confident as he seemed.

Marcos gave the bike a little speed and headed toward the nearest building, one of the RexOps data analysis pods. A small irregular hole was blasted at the base of the door, a telltale of the sapperbots used for breaching fortifications. Thankfully the electronics and latch on the door were still functional, allowing for the entrance of authorized full-sized people.

Inside the building was a mess. Someone had made a desperate attempt to barricade the door, piling up reams of printer paper reinforced with office furniture. The invading bots had no problem going over, through, or around the junk, but Nakagawa and Marcos had to clear the shit out of the way to make any progress. The would-be defender had killed the lights at the breaker, an ill-conceived ploy to thwart the rats' targeting. Bots with IR don't care about visible light.

Marcos flicked on the floodlight built into his tactical hood. Strange low-angle shadows sprung to life across the walls. He turned down the first cubicle aisle and nearly tripped over the industrious barricader; a civilian lay sprawled on his back, one leg awkwardly folded under. A flicker of recognition tugged at Marcos. Albert? Alfred? Whoever he was, a neat hole on his forehead was still oozing partially congealed blood. In his arms were a pair of flat-panel monitors, no doubt bound for the makeshift fortification.

Marcos kicked the expended gun rat and watched it shatter against the far wall. He immediately regretted it as he felt the wound on his leg open back up.

"Alright, let's do this and go. I don't care for the work environment." Marcos pulled a chair away from the nearest terminal to make room for the both of them. Nakagawa beckoned Marcos to log in, then plugged a tiny nub into an available port. A terminal flicked open by itself. Marcos watched some SQL execute against a remote database, followed by a pair of file downloads. Nakagawa retrieved the nub.

"Done. Let me post it back to the office to verify." Nakagawa plugged the nub into a tablet he'd produced from a pocket. A few seconds later Marcos received the second payment. He smiled and logged out of the Blackmountain terminal.

"That concludes our business," stated Nakagawa, "I do not lightly break promises, but there is much at stake here, and I am afraid you cannot be trusted."

Marcos looked up. Nakagawa had unholstered a pistol and was turning to face him. The cold light from the headlamp cast Nakagawa as a grim specter. There was genuine sadness in his eyes. "Goodbye Marcos."

BANG.

Warm blood flowed down Marcos's face.