I quickly showed the emergency alert to Luanda. Her eyes narrowed, and her nostrils flared as she read it. Intellectually, we both knew this was coming, but it felt like one more cut from a knife. From now on, anyone could burn us.

  The urge to act when there was nothing to do—and the relentless vibrations from BlueWhisper—ratcheted me tighter with every buzz.

  Even Griss was affected, but when Luanda relayed the details, he locked it down and adopted a crisp and measured cadence. “Luanda, Sophia, and I have run exfils like this dozens of times—trained for it our whole lives. We’ll make it happen, Minnow. Just stay sharp and let us do our job.”

  I grinned mischievously at Luanda and mouthed ‘Minnow’? She just flipped me off with a slight smile.

  “Why is Sophia here?” Luanda prodded, her tone more chiding than questioning.

  “Don’t be like that. We’re adults, Luanda, and she is the best driver I know. Soldier up. She’s got your back, so you should have hers, otherwise we can talk about that new gun of yours you think I don’t know about.”

  “Just remind her to keep it under 110 in school zones and that clothing is never optional.”

  “Minnow, stop distracting,” Griss demanded firmly. “I need you to stay frosty and let me run the op. And you—Sabot, Trey, whatever your name is—you're not off my shitlist yet. But we'll table that for now. Focus up. Let's start with the SITREP. Tell me everything.”

  We filled him in while simultaneously relaying updates from BlueWhisper’s nonstop encrypted Session messages.

  Griss asked, “Luanda, have you been keeping up your picking practice, and is there anything you can use as a set of makeshift lockpicks? We may need to raid a maintenance closet, and I need to know if you are up to it.”

  Luanda glanced around, but I cut in. “I have lockpicks with me. Just a credit card set, but it has most of what I use. Doors like that should be no problem.”

  “Nice, I can rake it or comb it open no problem,” Luanda added somewhat competitively, gesturing for me to hand them over.

  “Well, Sabot, at least your prep wasn’t total shit,” Griss acknowledged. “Just remember extra clothes next time you break someone out.”

  I shook my head, remembering the same complaint from Luanda as I handed over my emergency lock pick set. Formed from a single sheet of metal, it was the size of a credit card with the picks laser-cut into it.

  Griss put us on hold to make other calls and work out the details. Outside, we heard the sound of a drone fly by, and as we waited, Luanda flicked my lockpick card across the back of her fingers like a magician killing time between tricks.

  After a minute of waiting, things got worse.

  BlueWhisper: Bad news, mate. They have a photo they are describing as suspect 2. Photo ID with the name Travis Benson. Hoping it’s not you, but it doesn’t seem good. The picture was attached.

  Me: Yes, that’s me.

  BlueWhisper: That sucks. Keep the chin up, though. I’ll crack a couple more Red Bulls and stay with ya as long as it takes.

  Travis Benson was the name I had used for the rental car during the very first hack. They had taken it off Dave’s body, no doubt. It felt like getting doxxed by a dead man.

  The name didn’t matter, but the police having my photo did. They wouldn’t get that on their own in a million years, but Meridian got it in two days.

  Luanda’s face tightened when I shared the news, and the lockpick card flicked to the tip of her fingers and then disappeared into her palm. “Travis, too? Jesus. How many names do you even have, Sabot?”

  The plan Griss put together was elegant in its simplicity. He would buy some less conspicuous outfits and meet up with Sophia. She’d drive him into the parking garage and wait in the loading zone. Griss would slip in, get us changed into street clothes, and we’d all walk out together. “In and out,” he promised.

  I thought we were done, but he grilled us on details: things like clothing measurements, my level of fitness, the amount of sleep we had, and my experience with firearms. Then, he went into contingencies and alternatives. It was methodical, almost ritualistic—like a checklist they'd run a hundred times before. Some of it was downright impressive—like the mapped-out fallback routes in every direction.

  Some of it ate at me, like his dismissal of my compressed air bypass suggestion as ‘amateur hour.’ I hated playing his soldier, but he knew his shit, so I swallowed my pride.

  Luanda’s input impressed me. She remembered and described the layout of each hallway, including maintenance rooms and potential exits. I had noticed almost none of it.

  Unfortunately, our losing streak seemed to go on forever: the police found the prison clothes we had dumped in the trash, and they had a probable direction for our initial escape. We absolutely needed the plan to work. The one that felt like an ice pick to the heart was that the phone started warning us about battery life.

  Griss was pissed I had no charger, calling me a “fuck up.” Luanda just sighed in frustration. We decided to set up a group for coordination so Luanda and I could get our updates periodically and keep the phone from dying.

  The phone’s silence felt awkward: no buzz of updates and no flow of demands. In some ways, this was my first moment alone with Luanda since Stillpoint. Her wary glance said she felt the weight, too. Then, the corner of her mouth turned up, and her eyes widened. “I have a solution to the phone situation.”

  Stolen from its original source, this story is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.

  She had my attention.

  “Four doors down, near the back stairs, there’s an office with no lights and no lockbox. Somebody isn’t home. These locks are crap: five pins, mastered. We’ll rake in fast.” Her hand displayed my lockpicks out of nowhere.

  Griss would never go for this, but he wasn’t here, and we were. Her improvisational style and Griss' careful planning seemed at odds, for as close as they were. It was a risky move, but it had the potential to pay off. Checking messages every ten minutes meant ten minutes less notification if we had to move immediately. The phone was our lifeline.

  I offered a middle way. “I don’t want to get caught by a security guard after fifteen minutes of being 'almost done.’ We can try that private office,” pointing to a room next to the conference room. “If it rakes—fine. Single-pin picking is too slow.”

  "Alright, Sabot. Practice run it is," she conceded, as she popped a wave rake and tension wrench out of the credit card set and walked quickly to the inner office.

  ‘Sabot’ didn’t feel right from Luanda. Using Trey had been an accident; it was only a name my mom used. Going back to Sabot felt uncomfortable.

  The inner office was small, sterile, and empty—almost an ode to post-pandemic Seattle.

  She worked the lock for at least five minutes, having to reset it a few times, but eventually succeeded. I stuck out a hand and said, “Let me see how it feels.”

  She gave me the rake and tension wrench, and I had it cleared in less than a minute. The master keying or possibly a spool dropped me into a couple of false sets, but it was relatively easy. Hacking is mostly boredom. Waiting for scripts to find vulnerabilities or brute-force hashes. During these slow moments, I practiced lockpicking. It’s calming, almost meditative.

  “Well done, Sabot,” she said, her tone light, but with a hint of disappointment at the corner of her eyes. My feelings hovered between pride and sympathy.

  She started immediately towards the hallway, but I stopped her with a gentle hand on her forearm. “Are you sure we should try this? It’s not what Griss asked us to do.”

  She shook her head, eyes hard. “Those plans didn’t include a dead phone. Improvisation is for when the plan breaks, and every plan breaks.” She started to brush past me, but I had a sharp pain and a sense of foreboding, so I grabbed her hand, pulling her back into the empty inner office.

  “Wait,” I whispered, putting a finger to my lips. We stood silent in the bare, cramped room, and after a few seconds, we heard the door handle to the suite turn. The click of it stopping at the lock a couple of times was sharp and metallic.

  The door didn’t open.

  Inches apart, we stood still, listening for anything except our breathing. The sound of handles being tested echoed two more times before we heard a door open and a loud voice say, “Sorry to interrupt. There is an escaped prisoner near here, so they’re asking us to check for anything out of the ordinary. Has anyone seen anything?” The response was too soft to make out. Eventually, the original speaker said, “I don’t think it’s anything to worry about. I’ll be stationed at the front desk, and so far it’s all clear.” There were more inaudible words and a final, “thank you,” before the door closed. As they moved down the hall, the footsteps faded and disappeared.

  “Still want to try the move?” I asked, knowing the answer.

  “Absolutely. With a guard at the front, there is no way we can exfil through there. That means plan Bravo, so we ideally need tape. There is as much chance to get that from an office as a maintenance closet, and your picking speed means it won’t take any longer than the maintenance closet to get into.”

  Her points were all solid. “Let's do it fast,” I agreed.

  With that, she opened the door, we made a quick peek out, then walked down the hall at a brisk pace, but not fast enough to make extra noise. I had the picks out before we arrived at the office. Luanda stood close, concealing what I was doing from anyone entering the hallway. I was faster on this one than in the practice run, and we were in almost before I could read the placard naming it “Rainier Analytics.” It felt anticlimactic after the day so far.

  Luanda closed the door silently behind me, engaged the lock, and surveyed the office. Where the previous office had been larger with cubicles in an open arrangement, this consisted of a reception area, three private offices, a conference room, and a snack area. We immediately began checking the offices, and Luanda came back with the jackpot—a standard USB-C phone charger.

  We immediately crashed in the conference room and plugged the phone in. I opened the group chat and started scanning it. Most of it was mundane information from BlueWhisper about police locations. I was scrolling slowly, reading each message, when Luanda reached over and flicked it till we got to the end.

  At the bottom were these messages:

  Griss: You need to get back on comms. You are long overdue. If you do not respond, I’m heading straight over.

  I had to assume the next person was Sophia, our driver, since I didn’t recognize the handle.

  Koko: Chill. You don’t need to baby her. Luanda can take care of herself, and if Sabot broke her out of police custody, he can’t be a slouch. Whisper is tracking it, and the cops haven’t shown any indication they have them. Stick with the plan, honey.”

  Luanda grabbed the phone and joined the chat:

  Sabot: Situation is stable. Had to reposition because of building security and are now safe near the back exit on the same floor. We secured a phone charger and will likely have additional supplies in this location. We need to go with Plan Bravo due to the security presence in the lobby.

  Koko: See, I told you they were fine.

  Griss: I’m five minutes from Grenova to pick up your clothes. I’ll be in a position to execute in another five to ten minutes after that, so place me at twenty-five minutes to our initial rendezvous.

  Koko: I may need more time. Traffic is snarled for lunch, and apparently, somebody doesn’t want me going 110 in school zones. Give me maybe thirty minutes.

  I had a momentary panic as I saw her responses come back so quickly. If she was in traffic, either she was a texting while driving maniac or she was using a speech-to-text app, and many of those recorded every word, but I decided it wasn’t my place to say anything.

  The security guard in the front meant we were using our backup plan. Luanda and I would go down the back stairs and try to bypass the fire exit. It had risk, but was better than the certainty of being spotted going out the front.

  To make the bypass happen, we needed tape. Duct tape was the best, but all we could find was packaging tape, so we decided to make do.

  The expensive leather office chairs in the conference room were an upgrade from the hard floors we had been sitting on. The room smelled of coffee and had a solidity, like the last pillar holding up this dying building.

  Placing her head on the oak table, Luanda took advantage of the lull to close her eyes. I envied her—this wild woman I’d risked everything for, who’d saved me with one shot at Stillpoint. The drone of Helicopters, the distant sirens, and the steady flow of updates kept my nerves raw.

  After fifteen minutes, Griss was at the Rendezvous, and Koko was five minutes out. Go time was close. I leaned to wake Luanda when a notification sounded, ending my brief sense of safety.

  BlueWhisper: ALERT: They have a witness who gave positive IDs just two blocks from your location. They are moving the hard cordon. You need to move now.

  BlueWhisper: Right fucking now.

  Luanda snapped awake as I grabbed the phone and charger. "They're moving the cordon," I shouted. "We’ll be locked in."

  “Copy that,” is all she said as we rushed to the back stairway.