Living in the Fray

Chapter Thirteen

'RONSON! GET ME A TRACE ON THE LAST MOTHER FUCKER RIGHT NOW!'

Krieger was haring her way down the streets of the Port at breakneck speed with an ungodly sound coming out of her. Even the Chase drones were having a hard time trying to keep their cameras trained on her erratic movements, she genuinely looked like an escaped mental institution inmate being chased by a swarm of angry bees; arms flailing and random screaming. At the rate she was shifting, if anybody got in her way they were getting a random smack in the face and shoved aside with the force that only a tiny, steroid strength emulating, capricious cyborg woman could provide. At next years Chase, you could bet that there would be people wearing "I Got Mown Down By Krieger at the Con Chase!" T-Shirts. Krieger had this knack for having memes and weird merchandise made about her. She thought it was ultimately funny. And it brought in money which she thought was even better.

Ronson was trying his best in an attempt to locate the final con, Tobias Clement. He'd listened in on local CB and Police radio chatter which while it was still used; was a bit of a bust as most communications were via neural mod and weren't easy to hack in to. The CCTV cameras he had accessed weren't showing up much either and all on the streets of New Edo was relatively calm.

It wasn't until Ronson heard Erik who was sat at the station beside him, talking to himself in his native Swedish. Thankfully Ronson had upgraded his neural mod before the Chase had begun and his auto translate software was running quite nicely. He heard Erik mention something about the manufacturing district and a derelict building. He also spoke of a potential hostage, which was not good. Ronson then had the idea of bringing up recorded CCTV footage of the outskirts of the manufacturing district. The way Erik was talking made it sound fairly recent, so Ronson brought up the last hours worth of CCTV footage from the five cameras that were available and played them back at five times the normal speed. Nothing happened in the first forty three minutes of the footage but rolling in to the forty fourth minute; Ronson noticed a bit of a scuffle happening on camera number three which was indeed near the derelict Shimizu metal works which had closed down after a huge fire engulfed the building about a year and a half ago.

Ronson rewound the footage all of about ten seconds of it and played it at a slightly slower speed. Sure enough, Clement hurriedly walked in to the cameras view and aggressively yanked a young looking woman behind him by her arm. She had blood running from her nose and was screwing her face up in pain, blinded by tears. Clement soon yanked her arm behind her back and drew what looked to be a large knife to her neck before dragging her in to the loading bay of the derelict building.

'Cas, you need to get your arse down to the Shimizu building right now. Clement's taken a hostage and going by the time stamp it was barely ten minutes ago. I don't know why the Chase directors haven't blown his fucking head off by now.'

Krieger had instantly set off at full speed down the street in the direction of the Shimizu metal works factory, sparing nobody who got in her way after hearing Ronson in her head.

'They won't decapitate Clement, he's the last con you know what they're like. A bit of potential collateral adds to the drama.'

'Yeah well hurry up, it looks like Frank's got the drop on you.'

'AGH FUCK!' Krieger screamed.

The Chase drones were now working over time trying to keep up with Krieger who barely seemed to be hitting the ground with her boots, practically sailing through the air. She made the decision to go down main street unfortunately during the lunch time rush. The street was backed up with cars and people blocking up the pavements which made Krieger frustrated and filled with even more rage. She was now screaming and cursing, yelling at people to "get out of the fucking way." Trying to get past the people who were too busy literally getting in her way and gawping, Krieger launched her self on to the roofs of the cars in the bumper to bumper traffic. It made her journey easier now, jumping from car to car earning herself exasperated shouts from the drivers.

It took Krieger just a few minutes to get to the Shimizu building. Ronson gave her directions on what side to enter but she had already noticed one of the fire exit doors was wide open. She could hear the faint sound of sobbing and a voice talking calmly. Krieger crept quietly along the outside wall, stopping at a large window covered in cobwebs and dust and peeked in through a clear gap. Bionic sight and hearing had their advantages and while the incident in what made Krieger and her brother from another mother Ronson what they are today was disgusting and traumatising; she had to admit it was pretty cool. Like a human getting an upgrade that made you stronger, faster and a lot more indestructible. The only problem was the odd malfunction and the occasional crippling seizures that left you a dribbling, foaming mess.

A quick peek in to the building showed that it was quite empty save a few large, dusty machines, some random old furniture and loads of random stuff that look like it had been dumped there. In amongst all the crap and junk; Krieger could see Frank with his gaudy, heavily customised Beretta up and pointing at Clement who was stood clutching a partially clothed blonde haired woman in front of him. His body position clearly showed he was holding a knife against her neck.

Krieger had figured out what she should do. Frank was obviously trying to talk Clement down and convince him to let the woman go so that would buy her some time. If she went in through the open fire exit door and went in to stealth mode she could probably sneak up behind Clement and kill him quickly enough so he wouldn't harm the girl. She looked again through the cleanish gap in the window. Krieger had noticed that Clement was actually quite a bit taller than Frank and he was aiming his gun up towards Clement's head. And after another look, she saw that the girl was being held in an angle so Clement could hold his knife horizontally across her neck. The girl was also stood shivering in her underwear and had quite a few bloody cuts and grazes across her skin. Clement had probably started stripping and cutting her with his knife in order to do what ever sick thing he was planning before Frank interrupted him. It made Krieger's stomach turn.

'I could probably sneak in and use that machine as cover, creep up behind Clement then blast him right through the head. Frank's a fucking idiot he should've just shot him as soon as, but then again Frank's an idiot and would want to look like the hero so.' Krieger sounded out in her head for Ronson to hear.

'Do it.'

'First things first.'

Krieger sat down on the concrete outside the building and quickly took off her boots revealing her feet donning a pair of odd socks, one black and one purple. She quietly placed them beside the wall then quickly checked both her guns, deciding to swap the magazine in her left holstered gun she called Jake, with some really nasty hollow points. Letting out a bit of a sigh, she kept as low as possible and sneaked her way through the open fire exit door and behind some kind of massive industrial metal work lathe that was caked in dust. There were bits of broken glass and small shards of scrap metal littering the floor which were sharply making their way in to Krieger's feet no matter where she stepped but that didn't bother her in the slightest. She had to be silent and wearing her clumpy boots would not allow that. She could hear the sobs of the girl, the grunting of Clement and Frank's sympathetic toned voice as she shimmied along the lathe, but tuned all that out. At this angle she had a clear shot at Clements head as soon as she stood up and at this angle, Frank wouldn't get hit by any bullet leaving Clement. That was Krieger being considerate.

Krieger had however heard a few of the Chase drones whirring on their way to the building to film what was happening. She had seconds to make her move before anybody else heard them, or if Erik saw footage of Krieger literally yards away from Frank or Clement and warned Frank. One drone hovered and situated itself in one of the higher up side windows of the building that had been knocked out. Frank had noticed it focusing on him but hopefully Krieger wasn't in its field of view.

'Cas that camera can't see you but there's more incoming from your side. Do it no...'

Ronson never even got to finish his sentence. Krieger had already bounced up and fired the gun Jake drawn from her left holster. The single bullet entered the back of Clements head and pretty much took most of his head with it on exit. The hollow point bullet had done its job and shredded Clements head, splattering the now wide eyed and shocked girl with bits of brain and skull but more importantly; splattering the bloody mess all over Frank's designer ensemble and confused looking face. Both the girl and Frank had instantly shut up their sobbing and calm chatter respectively. Krieger just stood there watching them both, smirking as she lit a cigarette.