Ocular gritted his teeth as the bottled shattered under his foot. But he kept running.
The echo of his dress shoes, slapping against the battered tile floor, reverberated off the walls, guiding his ears down the hallway. His hand brushed against the wall, and when it caught the doorknob, he bolted out into the courtyard.
Immediately the soundscape opened up: traffic, voices, wind, his footsteps now muffled in the struggling grass. He was almost to the street when he heard the spattering of a submachine-gun behind him, and dove across the bus-stop bench. Bullets whined pat and around him, some striking the bench, as he rolled up and let off a burst from his silenced Mac-10.
Not that he expected to hit them, seeing as he could only fire in the general direction of his attacker. He dashed up the sidewalked, straining for details, barely dodging a few bystanders, who protested, and then screamed as the gunfire picked up again from behind. He bolted across the intersection, vaulting the hood of a sedan whose tires were already screeching on the pavement.
Ocular found his heart pounding, the blood-pressure screaming in his ears as he pushed hard down the pavement. Suddenly, his earpiece crackled to life...
"Left, now!" He could feel the air tighten around him as he ducked into the narrow alley. Almost forgot about Mica... He found his Operator's skills re-assuring, started to relax just a little, just as he ran smack into a trashcan. An involuntary barrel roll, and he was back on his feet in time to hear Mica say "Right." before he burst out into the street.
Ocular cursed out loud as he stumbled against a parking meter. FOCUS! Adrenaline surging, feet pounding, ears and skin searching for data. Data... Suddenly he felt his eyes, felt the data stream. Glimmering green characters resolved themselves vaguely, startling at first, but then augmenting his other senses. This time, when Mica shouted "Right, subway!" he could make out the opening, and managed a nice legslide down the banister into the tunnel. The vision faded, but not before Ocular resolved his objective. He vaulted the ticket stalls, to the dismay of the collectors, and scrambled towards the tracks. The vision gone, he hesitated a moment, till he heard a hydrolic hiss, and slipped through the doors just as they were closing.
The inside of the car felt like a tomb, stifling in its lack of echo space. The cars slowly rumbled to life, and Ocular grabbed hold of the ceiling rail. He felt a little trapped. Can't tell ANYTHING over this racket. A static muffled voice announced "Crenshaw Ave" as the next stop. Crenshaw... Blue line, that must have been Hampton station. He strained to pick up details: a newspaper ruffled from the front of the car, someone pressed the buttons on a cell-phone across from him. But the train noise masked the usual heartbeats and breathing that informed him of people. He didn't even know whether his pursuer had missed the train. He tapped his earpiece.
"It's clean, Oc, you beat him. Nice railslide by the way *chuckles*. Get off at Crenshaw, the Red line is right across from it. We've got a new drop set-up."
Ocular relaxed, and reviewed the mission. It had been a bust from the start, he had smelled the fear, the distrust, from the contact. He had feigned confusion to get out of the apartment, found the elevator blocked by the ambusher. The stairs had been the only choice. Good thing he didn't figure on me going up! Nonetheless, it had been close, and he still had the package in his possesion.
He got off at Crenshaw, made his way cautiously to the surface. His pursuer hadn't arrived here, perhaps guessed he would go further. He crossed the street, went up a block, ducked down into the Red line entrance. This time, he took out a faked subway pass, and showed it to the clerk, got casually on board.
"Take the Villa stop. Blackballer will be waiting there with a car. Make the delivery with him, and he'll drop you off at a hardline." Easy enough. To bad it hadn't been in the first place...
