Cheapdog (part three)

Dec was a few beers deep at the Vets table in Meatspace, across town. He suddenly got a message on his comms. Given the hour, and his present company, there was only maybe one person it could be. He checked it.

Dec, it’s 15. Res is in big trouble. She needs your help, now. I’ve sent her coordinates. Hurry.

What followed were GPS coordinates that were extremely specific. Dec hesitated for a second. Genesis 15 was wild, but he wasn’t a liar. “Gotta go play the hero, boys,” Dec said as he stood up and patted his hip. Nothing was there. Either he went to Res’ place unarmed or he left his weapon at her place. He didn’t like those odds; he didn’t know anything about the situation. “Sharp, you armed?”, he asked one of the other vets. “No sir, at least not in here. You know my temper,” Sharp replied, turning back to his beer. “Guess I’m going to have to improvise, if I’m not too late,” Dec thought, as he made a quick visit to some friends before he sprinted to his quadcopter in the rain, which was blowing slightly sideways as it fell.

He jumped in, got strapped in, and tapped his communicator against the dash to transfer the coordinates to the quad’s navigation. Multiple routes were available, and with a few more taps, an emergency beeline route was chosen and he lifted off. He enabled race/crisis mode. “This is stupid,” Dec muttered as the copter flew about 10% beyond its design parameters, heavy raindrops battering the windshield canopy.

The banging at the door continued. “Sheepdog! Open up! You’re only making this worse for everyone. You open the door now, we can talk!”, said the outsider. Res, still peeking from behind the couch, slowly shook her head no. Sheepdog looked like the kind of guy that would fold under this kind of pressure. He was a no-friction kind of guy, and this was textbook friction. Sheep turned his head and stared at the door with his mouth beginning to open. “No Sheep, don’t!”, Res hissed, just as Sheepdog uttered a single, loud word at the door. “Stop!”. “Stop? Is he fucking crazy? When has that ever worked?”, she thought. The banging stopped, and the doorknob quit moving. From the hall, the voice said, “What did you say?”.

Dec was pushing the quad hard. He could feel a rolling vibration traveling through the quad from the front to the rear, suggesting the airframe was getting fatigued. One of the drawbacks of choosing the hot rod version instead of the luxury model, but right then, he needed more speed. The problem with batteries was always weight. You could run a gasoline engine low and the vehicle got lighter as you approached empty. A near-empty battery weighed the exact same as a fully-charged one; heavy. Looking around the interior, the heaviest thing he could jettison was the passenger seat. “Oh well,” Dec sighed, “guess I never used it anyway.” He jammed his hand under the seat and pulled up until the seat started tearing away from the carbon fiber floorpan. He wrenched it loose, and after pulling the emergency canopy open lever, chucked it out and overboard. He was gaining on the location, 2 minutes out.

Res was panicked. Whoever was outside, they were definitely coming in now. Sheepdog just sealed their fate. He stood up and tiptoed to the door. “I said stop. There are lots of bombs in here, and I’m holding a dead-man’s switch. If I drop it, this whole block goes up in flames.” Sheep sounded dead serious; it was one hell of a bluff.

There was some muffled discussion outside. The strangers were discussing their options. “They didn’t say anything about bombs,” one said. “They don’t pay me enough for this kind of shit”, another said. A gruffer voice added, “ahh he’s bluffing. There’s no intel on this guy that suggests he’s anything more than a garden-variety nerd.” Finally, the leader spoke up. “Bull-fuckin-shit, Sheepdog. We’re calling your bluff. Open this door and show us the device. We don’t want to hurt you, so don’t make us hurt you.” They were dressed head to toe in level 3 soft body armor, so anything out of a handgun would thump, but none of them would die. They could afford to play this out.

Back in the quad, Dec was still en route. Less than a minute to target, and he still didn’t know what he was rushing into. It could just as easily have been a prank by 15. He knew 15 talked to Res though, and that was the only proof he needed to justify this high effort rescue. The quad’s vibration had turned into a violent cowl shake and it wasn’t going away. As Dec surveyed the interior, a glowing red chunk of metal caught his attention. Blade number 4, on the right rear, was overheating. He had been meaning to fix that. Too late now. The quad was doomed. “At least it isn’t smoking,” he thought, before it started smoking. Bearing seizure was imminent, and though the quad was safe enough on 3 engines to land, it sure as hell wouldn’t do anything fast. 30 seconds to target…at the current, unsustainable velocity.