The old man’s contact led Jordan to a warehouse complex near the waterfront on Ankara's outskirts. There were several buildings in the complex, and it was well guarded. Jordan counted more than two dozen guards on patrol consistently. Some of them were definitely Enhanced, though Jordan’s intelligence indicated they were mostly Zeta class. His personal assessment confirmed it. They’d have to be careful, but he was confident in his squad. He’d need to wait a few days for them to arrive, so Jordan rented out a hotel room near the complex and spent the next few days watching it, buying supplies, and formulating an attack plan.

  His father had more than a few friends in the military, and even some contacts with the Ankaran police. If things needed to get loud, he was confident they could make an investigation go away. So long as innocents didn’t get caught in the crossfire, the police wouldn’t be in a hurry to investigate the deaths of known criminals anyway. If they couldn’t snuff out organized crime, who were they to complain when someone else tried?

  Theoretically, their spy satellites and video cameras would allow them to rid themselves of the criminal underbelly almost entirely. Crime was tough when someone was always watching. However, in addition to corruption, they also faced significant human resource challenges. Most of the would-be policemen were swallowed up by the armed forces. A certain amount of the best talent was also taken up by the secret police, the force meant to find and quell rebellion before it began. What remained wasn’t enough to keep Akaadia safe. That was even with the recent law and order crackdown the Emperor was undertaking. His reforms were working their way through the system, but these types of things were always slow to be properly enacted. Other planets had similar problems, usually even worse.

  The longer Jordan watched the complex, the more convinced he was that combat would be necessary. This place was well guarded, and he didn’t know precisely where Lucy was. Sneaking in, finding her, and leaving stealthily would be difficult.

  Over time, the other guys showed up. Gon was the last to arrive, having come from the most remote planet with the fewest opportunities for transportation. The big guy arrived on the third day after Jordan had begun his stakeout. Now that everyone was here, they sat around a central table with a crude sketch of the facility on top, Jordan laying out his attack plan: “We’re going to have to mask up and go for a swim, boys. They’re watching the water, but not as much as they can watch the roads. We’ll make our incursion here.”

  He tapped the part of the map meant to represent the westernmost side of the facility, furthest from the shore. It was consistently the lightest guarded. Jordan continued: “We’ll do it at around 7:30, when the sun has mostly set, and their watch is at its weakest. Once we’re in, we’ll keep things as quiet as possible as we search the place. If we find Lucy and Marie quickly, we can retreat to the water with no one the wiser.”

  “And what happens when the shooting starts anyway?” O’Riley commented what everyone was thinking, and Jordan was quick with his answer: “We’ll beat a fighting retreat to the water after finding the girls. I bet they don’t have anyone who can match the five of us. Even though there are a lot of them, these guys are mostly lower-level mooks. My sources' reports say that the guards won’t go higher than Zeta. Maybe one or two low-grade Epsilon at worst. We may be outnumbered, but we have them outclassed.”

  Everyone nodded their assent. They were all low to mid-grade Epsilon, possessing powerful combat abilities. Suddenly, MacNeil piped up with a question: “Wait, five of us? There are six of us.”

  Jordan looked at him and shook his head: “MacNeil, you’re going to be our eyes in the sky. Stay in this hotel and monitor their movements. We’ll have comms, so you can help guide us on the guard’s movements.”

  MacNeil looked like he wanted to argue, and Jordan cut him off: “I know you can pull your own weight, but we need someone to do this. I trust you to handle it.”

  The red-haired young man remained frustrated, but he closed his mouth and didn’t raise any further objections. Jordan produced some helmets, steel gray with blue visors, saying, “We’ll use the built-in comms systems in these helmets to coordinate. Their systems will allow us to breathe underwater for a few hours.”

  They’d be able to breathe underwater indefinitely with Pneumonic Enhancement, which none of them had. That was fine. They’d only need a few hours at worst.

  Stolen story; please report.

  “We leave at noon.”

  …

  Four humans and one Dunid left the hotel as a group the next morning. They cruised the gritty streets and alleys of one of the poorer neighborhoods in Ankara, dodging security cameras and creating a zig-zagging trail that would be difficult to track. Most of the residents were at work or indoors, meaning there were few witnesses to track their movements. They eventually stopped in an alley near the waterfront and prepared to wait. Once things grew late enough, they would put on their helmets, slip into the water, then swim to their objective. For now, they had a few hours to kill, and everyone tried to get comfortable. However, before Jordan could even sit down, he got a call from MacNeil: “Boss, we have a problem.”

  “We’ve got plenty of problems, MacNeil. You’ll have to be more specific.”

  “Two unmarked vans just pulled into the complex. They stopped near one of the warehouses. I count eight armed men in total.”

  Jordan frowned. Activity in the complex was far from unusual. Trucks would often pull up, receiving or delivering shipments of illegal goods or stolen valuables. Vans, however, were new. Their presence spoke to one thing: “It looks like they might be here to smuggle some people.”

  MacNeil was sharp for a kid his age. It wasn’t a guarantee, but it was very possible that these vans were there for human cargo. Possibly even Lucy. If they waited too long, their target might slip through their fingers. Jordan responded with a simple statement: “Switch to helmet comms.”

  He hung up and donned his helmet. The others had already begun to do the same thing, with some realizing what was happening and others just mimicking their compatriots. They would need to start swimming early. It was far from the worst-case scenario. If it turned out that the vans weren’t for human cargo, they could always wait underwater for a few hours until the original designated time of attack. Jordan had already planned for this sort of contingency. MacNeil’s voice crackled over the helmet’s comms as they swam: “The leader of the new ops is a tall, heavyset white man. Black hair, green eyes. He’s talking with a short, fat man. Tan skin. Brown eyes and hair. Has a gold tooth.”

  Jordan’s contact had identified the short man as Julio Olajun, the mid-level crook who ran the complex. This whole middleman operation was under the aegis of the Sinachro cartel, a home-grown Imperial operation. Jordan didn’t recognize the big white guy, which wasn’t a surprise. He wasn’t an encyclopedia on Ankara’s criminal underworld. He radioed back: “Strength assessment?”

  “The smaller Hispanic man looks a bit weak. Mid-grade Zeta at best. The big guy might be trouble. It’s hard to get a reading on him.”

  “Alright. Keep me informed.”

  They swam for a bit, hearing MacNeil’s voice as they did: “The short guy’s going inside the warehouse. He’s taking eight of his guards with him. The big guy’s standing outside with his people. The other complex guards are spread out on the perimeter.”

  The squad reached the water outside the southern border of the complex, then stopped at Jordan’s signal. The cars would need to head east to leave. They then waited on tenterhooks for MacNeil’s subsequent transmission: “I see the fat man coming back with his guards. They’re holding four human-sized forms. Hooded. ID impossible.”

  Jordan took a deep breath. Any of those could be Lucy or Marie. And even if they weren’t, human beings were up for sale right before his eyes. He processed these new developments as MacNeil continued his narration: “The big man had his guard hand over some briefcases, contents unknown. The fat man’s guards placed the figures in the rearmost van. They’ve shut the doors. What’s the plan?”

  It was late afternoon—practically broad daylight. Still, Jordan’s course of action was obvious: “Keep up the overwatch. We’re going in.”

  A few strokes brought Jordan to the concrete barrier at the edge of the water. With the grace of a monkey, he clambered up the obstruction and over the wall’s edge. In a flash of light, twin sapphire daggers manifested in both of his hands. The two guards who’d happened to be watching this section cried out in alarm, raising their weapons to fire on the intruder. As they did, one spoke into the radio on his shoulder: “Intruder on the-“

  He didn’t even get to finish his thought before Jordan leapt within the soldier’s guard. In the blink of an eye, his knives pierced their throats, stabbing in and tearing out in a single smooth action. Both men collapsed, eyes wide as they felt their lifeblood pumping out. As he watched them fall, Jordan was surprised to feel a pang of emotion in his chest. These men were criminals, scum of the earth, and he’d been given no choice but to eliminate them. His father and the military had trained him to hunt and kill, but this was his first time taking human lives. Their vacant eyes stared back at him hauntingly, and an old memory he had with his father came to mind unbidden: “Killin’ a man’s always a tragedy, Jordan. A tragedy I hope you’ll be able to avoid. But if you do kill, you’ll be tempted to harden your heart. To push forward, unfeelin’. That’s what I did, anyway. That instinct might save your life, so I won’t tell you to ignore it. I will tell you not to be ruled by it. This world’s filled with enough cold-hearted killers as is. Don’t end up another one. The way you do that is simple.”

  The old man had taken another swig of his drink and pointed commandingly at Jordan: “Remember who you’re fighting for. Love’s the only thing that can keep a soldier’s heart from freezing over.”

  In that moment, Jordan remembered his family. Remembered Daniel. And thought of Lucy, whom he’d only met once. He thought of the sweet, happy girl at the Graduation dinner, stored away in some cold warehouse. About to be sold to the highest bidder. The fire in Jordan’s eyes winked back on.

  Behind him, the others had vaulted the barrier as well. As a unit, they moved out.