Chapter Four—Bird’s Eye

The sun was almost down completely. It had sunken bellow the horizon, leaving only warm hues of yellow and orange. “Well,” Kyle said, “I don’t see a lot of movement.”

They were atop the Tower Suites, still under construction in East Lake, spying on Ben Yates through their monoculars. So far, Kyle had only spotted two guards on the roof. He and John, or Staxx as he was called in the public eye, could take them out without breaking a sweat.

“So we mess up the vid feeds and then get in there,” John said. “It’s not hard. You distract the desk guy and I’ll go into the camera booth.”

“Yeah,” Kyle said. “That sounds like a plan. Should be easy. But I’m not sure…”

“Not sure of what?” John asked.

Kyle breathed in deeply, the warm summer wind caressing him well enough to make his long black feathered hair tickle the side of his neck. It felt good.

A quiet moment like this once in a while is real nice, he thought. Though being in their line of business, they had plenty of quiet moments—and some really loud ones too. John seemed to really like the gunplay.

Max preferred blades, getting up close and personal with the overlords, those high-value douchebags who thought they were the real people of the world. How their arrogance irked him.

John was steadier than him. Kyle thought they were the perfect complement to one another.

“Kyle?”

“Yeah?”

“May’s calling.”

“Oh… she’s going to be mad we blew her off.”

“Yeah,” John said. “This isn’t revenge for her not showing up on that dubious date you set with her, is it?”

Kyle lowered the monocular. “What? ‘Course not.” He sighed, then pulled back his sleeve to reveal his wristlet. He touched the incoming call, which he had set to silent. A little holo-image of May was projected just above his wrist.

“Max,” she said. “Is this call secure?”

Her appearance was that of a high-tech babe with rose bud lips, and her image was in illustration. Definitely not what she really looked like.

She always asked if it was secure, like Kyle would forget.

“Yeah, it’s secure. You doing well?”

John watched the same display on his wristlet, as the call was linked between all three of them now.

“You blew me off.”

“Wouldn’t do that,” Kyle said. “Just have other business to attend to. We just finished a job less than a few hours ago anyway.”

“You know how things are, Max,” May said. “There’s always preliminaries that need taken care of far in advance. Now our time table’s off.”

“Sorry,” Kyle said as he peered through his monocular. May’s view of his screen must have been a sideways John since his wrist was angled wrong. “We’ll be through with this one tonight. Promise.”

“Can I trust him, Staxx?”

John shrugged, thinking about it as Kyle gave him a look.

“Yep,” John said. “Sure can.”

“That’s a lie.”

“How do you know?” John asked. “Because you sounded like Max just now. Only he clips his sentences so much.”

John chuckled. “We’ll do our best, May. I promise.”

“All right, fine. Call me when you’re free.”

“Will do,” Kyle said.

Then she ended the call.

Kyle lowered his monocular and sighed. He was dying to learn more about May. He didn’t know why, but he was extremely attracted to her.

Maybe it’s the allure, he thought. Not knowing who she is, only that she supports our cause…

So hot.

“You awake?”

“Huh?” Kyle said, distracted. “Yeah, totally.”

“Are we going in from the roof?”

“Hmm. I want to, but how do we get on it? It’s not like we brought the ship.”

John sighed heavily. “Then I guess it’s the vents.”

“Don’t be so glum,” Kyle said.

John looked at him. “You know I’m a big guy, right? Look at me.”

Kyle smirked.

“Asshole.”

Kyle laughed. “It’s gonna be fine. I already set up our getaway vehicles. I got a couple of bikes in the back alley and then a stolen car waiting for us in the entertainment district.”

“What are we stealing?”

Kyle looked at him. He didn’t want to say they were going to kill the guy. Not yet. “It’s a surprise, Staxx.”

John scoffed slightly from Kyle’s use of his alias “Staxx.”

“Yeah,” Kyle said. “’Take it to the Max’ and ‘Staxx of cash’! We’re gonna rock Yate’s world.”

“All right. So we go to the building now?”

“Yep. You go in like you own the place—I don’t know, pretend you gotta take a piss or something, and let me know when you reach the vid-booth. Look.”

Max projected an interior map of the first floor of Green Haven. There was a 3D diagram of the floor layout and the vid-booth was outlined in red.

“Easy enough,” John said.

“I’ll take the desk guy out and then you go in and hook up the electrical spike with the new video loop.” He handed John the package.

“Okay.”

It would be no problem. John was well acquainted with video booths and security systems.

“Now let’s go,” Kyle said, leading the way back down the building under construction. When they reached the street, they started making their way toward Green Haven.

The business suits from the previous jobs were great. Perfect disguise for this high-class area. The cops probably wouldn’t even bother them. Not here. Rich types—the overlords—could be a real pain in the ass if bothered or inconvenienced.

They had no problems walking around in East Lake while staying to the pedestrian walks. In fact, the roads tonight were pretty sparse. All the residents were out having a great time probably.

Too bad for Yates, Kyle thought, smiling.

Before they walked under the portico, they clicked on their holo-masks—the ones May had provided. These were the highest grade money could afford and supplied both fake irises, topographical evasion and of course, a new face to match.

We still need to find out who she is—who she works for.

They walked under the portico where a resident was leaving his comfortable looking car and chauffeur. The place was immaculate. The cement was perfect, the shrubbery was trimmed to perfection. The windows on the high rise residential apartments shined with a reflective sheen and the sea view was something to kill for.

Kyle glanced up at the building, craning his neck pretty far as he got a glimpse of the building’s name climbing up the side of the structure in a grey-green metallic finish.

“Very nice,” John said. “I wouldn’t mind living here myself.”

“Got that right.” He turned. “All right, Staxx, you ready for this?”

“Hell yeah, Max.”

“Then let’s take it to the max!”

John chuckled, not knowing how to introduce his line in a situation that, up to this point, had nothing to do with stealing cash.

Instead he just said, “Let’s kick some ass.”