Specter Protocol Read online

  Specter Protocol

  Cyber Witch: 2082 Book 2

  Eddie R. Hicks

  Specter Protocol

  Cyber Witch: 2082 Book 2

  By Eddie R. Hicks

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  Copyright © 2020 Eddie R. Hicks

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

  This novel contains scenes of graphic violence, explicit language and sexuality and is intended for mature readers.

  Cover Art by: Ravven

  Contents

  Prologue

  1. Estrella

  2. Ray

  3. Miyuki

  4. Estrella

  5. Miyuki

  6. Estrella

  7. Ray

  8. Estrella

  9. Ray

  10. Miyuki

  11. Ray

  12. Estrella

  13. Ray

  14. Estrella

  15. Miyuki

  16. Estrella

  17. Miyuki

  18. Estrella

  19. Ray

  20. Estrella

  21. Ray

  22. Estrella

  23. Ray

  24. Miyuki

  25. Estrella

  26. Ray

  27. Estrella

  28. Ray

  29. Estrella

  30. Ray

  31. Miyuki

  32. Ray

  33. Miyuki

  34. Ray

  35. Estrella

  36. Ray

  37. Estrella

  38. Miyuki

  39. Ray

  40. Miyuki

  41. Estrella

  42. Ray

  43. Estrella

  44. Miyuki

  45. Estrella

  46. Miyuki

  47. Estrella

  48. Ray

  49. Miyuki

  50. Ray

  51. Estrella

  52. Ray

  53. Estrella

  54. Ray

  55. Miyuki

  56. Ray

  57. Estrella

  58. Miyuki

  59. Ray

  60. Estrella

  61. Miyuki

  62. Estrella

  63. Ray

  Epilogue

  Afterword

  Next time on Cyber Witch: 2082

  Keep in touch

  Also by Eddie R. Hicks

  About the Author

  Prologue

  Huang

  Huang had tremendous respect for the pilot of the stealth helicopter. Navigating a vehicle like that through the cluster fuck of high-rise structures and billboards seen in Kyoto was no easy feat. Doing it while not drawing the attention of the hundreds of city dwellers below was even more impressive.

  Darkness had shrouded the metropolis. Though with the rain falling and lack of snow, you couldn’t tell. It was another record-breaking high for the city for this time of the year. Huang wondered what the weather was like before climate change was a word commonly used in the news.

  The stealth helicopter touched down on the rooftop of a nightclub. Huang got the go-ahead to leap out and lead his men out. Multiple assault rifles, including his own, had their safeties switched off. The rain felt nice as it splashed over his thin black hair, where his tactical visor rested, waiting to be pulled down for action.

  He pointed at the emergency exit ahead. His men sprinted for it with their rifles leading the way. One of them reached for the door and yanked on the handle. It wouldn’t open. When Huang lowered his tactical visitor over his eyes, its scans revealed the door was locked electronically and tied to an alarm. The battering ram would have to remain aboard the helicopter.

  He spun around, facing a large member of his team, a big brutish Australian with muscles that put most of Huang’s team to shame. His name was Serge Smith, though Huang doubted that was real since most hackers had some alias and doctored profiles when they were run through a facial scanner.

  Serge had been silent during the helicopter ride, then again, the Australian man was the only one aboard that couldn’t speak any of the languages of the People’s Federation of Pacific Nations, other than English.

  Huang pointed at the locked door. “Can you work the door?” Huang paused. It was the first time he’d spoken English in eight months. He was surprised he could speak it so well.

  Serge nodded and stepped forward, leaving his RW partner behind, an Asian witch with long black hair shrouding half her face in mystery. The big Australian slung his rifle over his shoulder and reached into his pocket. Out came his tablet pad in hand. He scrolled through its touch screen, playing with several apps, displaying numbers and computer code. A green light brightened Serge’s tablet screen.

  Huang heard the door’s mechanized joints retreat. Serge stepped forward and opened it, and no alarms sounded. There were a few murmurs in Chinese, all coming from Huang’s men. He told them to ignore the fact that Serge had apps on his tablet that gained them access. Yes, they were illegal, and no, Huang didn’t care. They needed the assistance of hackers like Serge. Huang pointed at the opened door, and his men charged through. Their feet made very little noise. It left Huang, Serge, and his RW partner standing alone on the neon glowing and rain-drenched rooftop.

  Huang couldn’t take his eye off the witch. At first, it was because of a mild attraction. It’s not every day he saw a stunning Chinese witch like that standing in the rain with shiny black hair blowing. Then it was because of the odd appearance of her form. Since her hair covered half her left face, it created enough darkness for Huang to notice her synthetic eyes glowed ruby red. It wasn’t right at all.

  Serge moved to the stairwell that lay beyond the opened door. A firm grip from Huang’s hand grabbing his shoulder stopped him. Serge grinned, looking back at him. “She caught your attention, mate?”

  “Why the fuck are her eyes like that?” Huang asked. “Aren’t RWs supposed to have emerald eyes?”

  They watched the RW woman while she moved to join the two. “That’s Yanmei Feng. She wasn’t built using Yoshida parts.”

  “Fuck off. Really? I thought Yoshida had a monopoly on RW cyberware and their AIs?”

  Yanmei smiled as she neared them, half her face still covered by the parting of her hair. Her ruby irises were like a demon’s peering into Huang’s soul.

  “Things are changing,” Yanmei said to Huang in Chinese.

  Huang replied in the same language. “Zhang controls the RWs here, but they purchase Yoshida cyberware.” He grimaced. “Or… does this have to do with the news from the Alliance?”

  Yanmei’s head angled to the side. “What news?”

  “That Zhang can compete in the cyberware market, and we’ve been augmenting the imaginary witches and warlocks.”

  “Come now, Major, do you really believe fake Alliance news?”

  “I don’t know what the fuck to believe anymore.”

  “Oy!” Serge bellowed, adding English to the conversation. “I don’t speak Japanese.”

  Huang snorted. “We weren’t speaking that.”

  “Chinese either.”

  “Don’t worry, Serge,” Yanmei said in English. It was better than Huang’s English. “I was educating our Secret Police officer.”

  “I prefer the term Federation State Security,”
Huang said.

  Time was wasting. If they didn't hurry, they might miss the meeting. Huang, Serge, and Yanmei entered the stairwell and ran down to the dance club below, regrouping with the rest of Huang’s men. Another locked door halted them. Serge hacked it and they pushed forward silently. Surveillance cameras on the walls went into a video loop. Serge was like a wizard, and the tablet in his hands was his magic staff.

  “All righty, I’m in their security network,” Serge whispered to the group. “Huang, you and your men got about twenty minutes or so before I get kicked out.”

  They were on the upper decks of the club now, fanning out in the shadows and peering through the targeting screens of their rifles. Below lay a barren dance floor missing the usual activity, music, and drunken roars. The club wasn’t due to open for another five hours. That didn’t stop the person of interest from throwing their own personal party at the bar. Huang’s team was in position, aiming their weapons down. The black combat armor they wore blended with the low light area of the upper deck. Huang ordered everyone to dim the light from their rifle’s targeting screen and ammunition display counter. No need to make the men below wonder what those square-shaped lights up above were if they looked up.

  And who were the men below? The local Yakuza group, the only people at this end of Kyoto in possession of enough money to hit the clubs and titty bars. And the only people that had enough power to force the owners of this club to let them in before it was opened. Huang studied the Yakuza below via his tactical vision. He tapped a switch on it, forcing the images to zoom and enhance at the bar. The Yakuza were entertaining invited guests, foreign guests with shaved heads. Each shaved head had a large tattoo of a skull.

  The bald men with skull tattoos spoke a language no one from Huang’s team understood.

  “What language is that?” one team member asked.

  Huang listened when the foreigner spoke. “Spanish,” he whispered. “Same with their accents. They must be from the Alliance.”

  They watched as the talk between the Yakuza and the bald men continued. One bald man approached a Yakuza man with opened arms and a grin fueled by the drinks they had. They spoke English to the Yakuza.

  “Alliance gangsters?” A voice from Huang’s team asked. “What are they doing here in the Federation?”

  Huang shrugged, keeping his rifle steady. “I don’t fucking know,” he said, then told everyone to shut up as he listened to the meeting.

  “You like, huh?” The English-speaking Yakuza man spoke. The bald man nodded, and the Yakuza tapped his wristwatch. A holographic picture of a group of men and women hovered above it. “They good mind readers too. Best you can find.”

  The bald man smirked, eyeing the ghostly hologram with approval. “How much for all six?”

  “Six?!” The Yakuza finished his drink. He laughed. “You fucking crazy? Can you even afford that?”

  “My client’s got deep pockets.”

  The Yakuza faced his brothers, laughing. In Japanese, he shouted. “This fucking gaijin thinks they’re better than us. Ha!” Back in English, he said to the bald man. “Six hundred thousand.”

  The bald man’s arms crossed. “Federation Yuan or Alliance Dollars?”

  “Dollars.”

  “And these six telepaths, your Federation government don’t got trackers in them, right?”

  “We only sell unregistered IWs, so yes,” said the Yakuza. “Clients don’t like to fuck girls and boys that can be tracked, you know?”

  The bald man rubbed his hands together. “You got yourself a deal, hombre—”

  Everything went black. The power went out.

  “What the fuck?” Huang’s world turned green and black when his tactical visor activated night vision. “Shit. Guys stay calm!”

  Calm was what the people below on the dance floor weren’t. Guns blazed. Bodies dropped. Huang’s night vision flashed white every three seconds. Screaming wailed. The voices of those screaming were Japanese and Spanish. The bar and walls got nasty and wet with blood.

  “Fuck! I said to stay calm!” Huang roared to his men. “Hold your fucking fire!”

  “Don’t think any of us fired!”

  “Then who the fuck did?!”

  The screaming and shouting below continued. Huang heard bullets hitting the ceiling and walls next to him. They’d been spotted. His people were going to die unless they acted.

  “Ah, fuck it!” Huang said. He took aim with his assault rifle and made it join the chorus of gunfire.

  Bullets flew from guns below. Bullets flew from rifles above. Everyone was shooting.

  “Smith, what’s going on with the power?” Huang asked.

  There was no reply.

  Huang couldn’t see Serge with those fighting for survival on the upper decks. Yanmei wasn’t there either.

  The violence let up by the time Huang resumed shooting. There were four men left, all of them had bald heads. The Yakuza lay in a bloody mess on the floor. One man teetered suddenly. Yanmei stood behind his body, something that looked like daggers sprang from the tips of her fingers. She vanished. The second bald man fell, holding his neck, gushing red. Yanmei appeared once again, her hands were glowing white. The two remaining men pointed their pistols at her and fired. Their bullets hit the wall. Yanmei vanished again like she was never there to start with.

  Like Yanmei, the hands of one of the bald men began to glow white. That glow dimmed when his head rolled to the floor. Yanmei appeared behind, holding a katana dripping red fluid onto the grisly dance floor. The last bald man dropped almost in sync with the beheading of the man.

  The lights came back on. Yanmei stood alone in a growing pool of blood, lowering the katana. Her face held no emotion. With the fighting over, Huang and his men rappelled down from the upper decks and began examining the bodies, searching for survivors. They found none. Huang kicked the edge of the bar. He was here for answers, not to kill everyone.

  Huang faced Yanmei who remained standing, holding the katana. The white glow from her hands faded. She spun, faced him, and smiled with her ruby eyes glowing.

  “What the fuck are you?” Huang asked her.

  “She’s Yanmei Fang,” Serge said. Huang saw him emerge from the back-storage room, slowly putting his tablet in his pocket. “Didn’t we introduce her to you, mate?”

  “Search the rest of the place,” Huang ordered one of his men.

  He nodded and saluted Huang. “Roger.”

  Huang’s team vanished deeper into the club. He hoped there were other members of bald men or Yakuza still alive, and able to talk. Serge placed a laptop on the blood-drenched bar counter and waved to Yanmei. “I found this back there. Wanna find out what’s on this?”

  Yanmei glanced at the laptop, powered it on, and then reached for a network cable plugging into her head. “Jacking in now.”

  She jacked into the laptop and entered the zombie-like state most RWs do when they download data. It made Huang grimace. Was Yanmei an IW or an RW? He couldn’t tell. And Serge didn’t seem to care.

  Huang grabbed Serge.

  “Whoa, there mate—”

  He pulled and dragged the large Australian away from the bar, pointing a finger at Yanmei. “Who the fuck is she? What kind of RW has that kind of power?”

  “Hate to break to this you, mate, but she ain’t an RW.”

  Huang checked his tactical visor. It made no mention of registered IWs are in the area. “Serge… you brought a fucking unregistered IW with us?”

  “Where I go, she follows.”

  “The Federation is getting lambasted for recruiting IWs with cyberware into black op teams!”

  “Yep, read about that on the news my self—”

  “That’s fucking bullshit, and you know it. We don’t team with IWs. We follow the accords like everyone else.” The two men looked at Yanmei. “You just made us look like liars if anyone finds out.”

  “Look, mate, this is how I fucking get results.” Serge shoved Huang off. It wasn’t ha
rd giving the size of his massively built arms. “And you hired me to do that, get fucking results, and I am.”

  “My mission is getting to the truth and finding out who the fuck is training IWs, giving them cyberware, and sending them into the Alliance.” Huang gave a long glance at the dead Yakuza and bald men with their heads blown off, or their bleeding bodies gushing blood everywhere, stabbed by daggers that retracted inside Yanmei’s fingers as she faded in and out of existence. “Intel suggested we’d find that here, but with everyone fucking dead, I’m having second thoughts.”

  Another glance at Yanmei, her ruby synthetic eyes, and cyberware that wasn’t made by Yoshida.

  Huang got the answer.

  “It was Zhang wasn’t it?” he asked Serge. “Who else other than Yoshida is advanced enough to produce cyberware?”

  Yanmei jacked out, laughing at Huang.

  Serge joined her in laughter. “Zhang Industries? You got proof of that, mate?”

  Corporations always think they’re above the law. It had to have been them, or at least they’ve been funding a separatist group. “I’m going to report this.” Huang stepped away from the two, pointing a finger at them. “And you two as well. You’re part of the fucking problem.”