The Neo-Metropol Heist

31: Jaeger

"Scary guy," Stewart said acerbically, taking a sip of his coffee, "just screams 'action hero baddie'."
They were both sat at Jaeger's desk, looking at a picture on her terminal of Commander Garistag, the man that they were due to meet the following morning and who apparently led Sergei Castells' private mercenary force, MetSec.
His face definitely did scream action hero baddie, Jaeger thought. He had sunken, thin eyes like a snake. Over the left side, he had a nasty looking scar that lingered as the memory of what seemed to be a severe cut many years ago.
His hair was shaved but he had thick stubble that Jaeger was sure wouldn't fly if he'd been a real soldier.
"He's all kinds of stereotype," Jaeger agreed, "bodes well."
The OC floor was almost deathly quiet, as it usually was at this time of night. Jaeger had offered to take the night shift and Stewart, of course, had joined her.
She was a night owl, and Oscuro had always hated it when she'd signed them up for graveyard duty, but Stewart didn't seem to mind. In fact, he seemed to see the benefits of the peace and quiet.
"Coffee?" Stewart asked, tipping his mug to show it was empty. He was also quite happy to do the coffee run, which Jaeger liked.
Jaeger nodded and the rookie scooped up her mug and headed over to the kitchen area.
Glancing back at her terminal, Jaeger saw a notification pop up in the corner. It was a call from dispatch calling for support on a stakeout by uniformed officers over in Little Wuhan, the strip of the city that belonged to the Chinese triad groups.
It was low priority - Wuhan was notorious for EMBR smuggling groups, it was probably part of a uni op and they were looking to cover their ass. Jaeger checked the assigned officer name, Officer Ferenzi, she'd seen the young officer around, and as far as she knew she was professional and pleasant.
"Stewart," Jaeger said as he brought the mugs back across the room, "continuing the action hero tropes."
"Boss?" Stewart asked, putting the mugs down.
"We're going to Chinatown."
Stewart seemed to always be up for whatever Jaeger signed them up for - he hadn't even seemed fazed when she'd signed him up to the protection detail of the most important man in the RNS. Now, all he had to do was not shoot unarmed teenagers and he was the best partner she'd ever had.
They signed out a patrol car from the garage on the fifth floor and were soon on their way to Little Wuhan.
"So," Stewart said, "what's the deal with this place?"
Jaeger seemed surprised that Stewart didn't know about Wuhan, it was almost as notorious at the precinct as the Beach, the only reason it wasn't more notorious was because organised corruption was a bit more difficult to take on than petty crime amongst the poor so it was swept under the carpet.
"Wuhan?" Jaeger asked, "it's a hole of scum and crime lit up with pretty lights and called legitimate. Mostly east-Asian cast offs who are so deep in with City Hall that we can't do shit to root them out. You aren't from round here, are you?"
Stewart shook his head, grinning.
"I knew someone would rumble me," he chuckled, leaning back into the driver's seat. Jaeger didn't like being a passenger because she was usually a better driver than the driver, but Stewart seemed able enough and hadn't offended her so far.
"So how did you end up here?" Jaeger asked him, "if I could go anywhere, my first choice wouldn't be here. Where do you come from?"
Stewart grinned as he chose which question to answer first.
"I'm from a little town in the Rockies called Bailey," Stewart explained, "when the states reformed we sort of rejected... everything, put up a wall, took to drinking our own water and eating our own crops and pretty much told the government to stick it."
Jaeger listened to the rookie tell his story, his eyes glazing over with that look of reminiscence that people get when they talk about where they come from.
"Smalltown boy?" Jaeger asked, trying not to sound as interested as she was, "now answer the bit about how you got here."
"I started to feel like the wall was closing in on me and I though the recycled water tasted like copper coins," Stewart said, "I always liked buddy cop movies and I thought I would make a good cop, so I enlisted in the academy straight out of school. Three years later I was shipped out to the city and here I am now."
Jaeger nodded.
"Buddy cop movies, huh?" She said.
Stewart turned to her and smiled.
"Yup," he said, "you know, Tango and Cash, Starsky and Hutch, Turner and Hooch."
Jaeger raised an eyebrow.
"Wasn't Hooch the dog?" She asked.
Stewart nodded, giving her an amused glance.
"He was indeed, so you know the genre?"
Jaeger shrugged, "my dad used to have a collection, I always thought they were cheesy."
"You sound like you were a happy kid," Stewart said, remembering himself when Jaeger threw him a sharp look, "boss."
Jaeger looked out of the window and could suddenly remember her dad watching the old movies on a player that was antique even then, laughing uproariously and trying to explain the plot to her. She wished she'd given more of a shit, then.
"I quite liked the one with, er, shit, what were they called?" Jaeger said, racking her brains for the names of the faces she could see, "Danny Glover and Mel Gibson."
Stewart laughed.
"Lethal Weapon?" He said, "Riggs and Murtaugh."
"That was it," Jaeger nodded, "or maybe that's just the one I remember."
They both sat there for a moment as the car weaved gently in and out of the late evening traffic, consisting mostly of transport vehicles and maintenance droids, then, Jager had a thought.
"Am I Riggs or Murtaugh?" She asked, actually curious.
Stewart looked at her with a glint in his eye.
"No offence, boss," he said, "but you're definitely Murtaugh."
A few minutes later, Stewart took control of the car again and brought it down in the brightly-lit square in the middle of Little Wuhan, the car coming to a stop with a quiet thud.
Jaeger pulled on her field jacket, warm, flexible material with armour plating woven into it, she didn't think she'd need it but thought it was best to wear it anyway.
They stepped out of the car and walked across the square to an empty loading bay behind a closed shopping parade, where they found three waiting patrol cars. Stood next to one was a stocky woman in patrol armour, holding her helmet in her hands.
She had frizzy, deep black hair and dark skin with piercing eyes that glimmered in the blue light that existed everywhere in Little Wuhan.
"Ferenzi," Jaeger said, nodding at the officer.
Ferenzi nodded back at her and shook her hand, "Detective Jaeger, thanks for the back-up. You must be bored."
Jaeger shrugged.
"This is my partner, Detective Stewart," Jaeger said, remembering him. He shook Ferenzi's hand and then reverted to his rigid default pose that made him seem as though he had an iron rod up his ass, "pleasantries over," Jaeger said, "what's happening here?"
Ferenzi handed her a hand terminal and Jaeger began to flick through files with a quick gesture of her quickly freezing fingers.
"Our undercover here was in on an EMBR ring being run by a Mr Long, he heads up the Morning Guns," Ferenzi explained.
Jaeger knew the MG, in her time at organised crime their exploits had dropped into her in-tray a dozen times, and not once had she been allowed to make a move on them because of their generous anonymous contributions to the patrol ball.
Why they were suddenly making a movement on Long now, she couldn't say.
"A couple of hours ago we had a call in from our undercover, Officer Chen," Ferenzi explained, tapping the terminal and bringing up a picture of an officer in his mid-twenties, first in a patrol uniform and then switching to an image of him in tatty leathers with a Morning Guns tattoo on his neck, "it just said 'Hendrix is the best guitarist of all time'."
Jaeger gave Ferenzi a bemused expression and raised an eyebrow.
"It was our code phrase for the operation if things went FUBAR, we think Long rumbled him and now we need to pull him out."
An extraction, then. That made sense.
"Why do you need OC support?" Jaeger asked, flipping through the reports on Long and the Morning Guns, trying to cram in her usual three-hour research time into a few minutes.
Ferenzi cracked her knuckles in what appeared to be a habit, as she'd done it three times in the short time Jaeger had been stood with her, "Chen's last report had enough dirt on Long for us to put him away, at least for now. And to crack the MGs.
"If possible, we want to pull Chen out and bring Long in without having to make two trips."
Jaeger nodded - Ferenzi seemed straight enough but she couldn't shake the feeling that there was something that the officer wasn't mentioning.
"All right," Jaeger said, going with it, "what's the situation?"
Ferenzi gestured for Jaeger and Stewart to follow her to the edge of the loading bay and pointed at the tall building across the square.
"That's Long's Entertainment Parlour," Ferenzi explained, "lower floors are his casino, a shell front for the MGs but a nice little earner in its own right. The floors above it are where the Guns run their operations from.
"Long holes up in his office most of the time, and he has a force of about twenty guys in the building alone, most of his men are spread out across the city."
Ferenzi sighed and took the terminal back, cycling through the carousel of information and bringing up another image. A surveillance close-up of a hulking man in what seemed to be a cowboy hat and a flowing leather jacket.
"It's his bodyguard I'm worried about, though. Our latest reports say he's brought in outside help because his guys are flocking to the rival gangs faster than he can double their pay."
Jaeger narrowed her eyes - Long's new hired gun must have been a serious player if a hardened officer like Ferenzi was scared of him. Ferenzi handed her the terminal back and Jaeger recognised the face that looked back at her.
"Blackjack?" Jaeger asked.
Blackjack was a mercenary known to the NMPF, a free agent with a formidable and infamous reputation and a look to match. He wore an outfit like that of an Old West bounty-hunter. The image was blurred but Jaeger could make out the patches of metal across his face - his various mods - and his twin modified revolver pistols.
"What the hell is a low-grade gangbanger like Long doing with a guy like Blackjack?" Jaeger asked, handing the terminal back to Ferenzi, who shrugged.
"Don't question the morals of a man like Blackjack, detective," Ferenzi said, slipping the terminal away and readying her helmet, "he goes to whoever pays enough. For now I'd recommend we go around him, only through him if we have to. We don't want to lose men on this."
Jaeger nodded in agreement as Ferenzi pulled on her mask, "we have some gear for you in the truck, just in case you need more than that fancy kevlar," the officer's voice was synthesised as it played through the helmet speakers, "we move out in ten."
Jaeger acknowledged her with a casual salute as she turned to Stewart and then headed towards the closest patrol van.
"There's something we're missing here," Stewart said to her quietly, a quick glance over his shoulder to make sure none of the dozen or so officers around them could here, "am I right?"
"You're right," Jaeger replied as they reached the open patrol car, handing Stewart her terminal, "I think that's it."
Stewart studied the terminal.
"Long stopped making his anonymous contributions to the precinct last month," Jaeger said, "he must've had a good reason, but it looks like his position on the patrol's buddy list was severely weakened."
Stewart hadn't made the connection but Jaeger didn't blame him - the rookie hadn't yet gotten to the point where he immediately suspected everybody of everything, with or without good reason. She wondered how long it would take him.
"You should charge for these crash courses in how the world works, boss," Stewart said with a grin, "you know, provide a service."
Jaeger didn't reply but couldn't stop herself smiling.
"The plan is to get in and get out without getting shot," Jaeger told him, pulling on one of the mobile combat vests she'd pulled from the patrol car, handing one to Stewart, "stay behind the guys with the bigger guns."
She took two of the combat pistols from the cache inside the car and examined it. She had her own gun, as usual, but these were top-of-the-line and worth switching in.
She handed one to Stewart and holstered hers next to her own pistol.
"You know how to use that?" Jaeger teased.
Stewart raised an eyebrow and examined the handcannon.
"It's a little different to what was issued at the academy, but..." in a split second, the rookie thumbed the 'hibernation' trigger, clicked open the ammo chamber, cycled the magazine, reset it and raised it to his eyeline, "I think I can handle it."
Jaeger was impressed, but didn't let the rookie enjoy his moment too much, grasping his arm and stretching it out so the gun was further from his face.
"There's a little more kickback than you might be used to," she said, "I'd keep it a little further away from your face, unless you want a black eye."
"Aye-aye," Stewart mock-saluted, flicking the gun back into sleep mode and slipping it into his holster.
They kitted themselves out and then Ferenzi walked into the centre of the patrol vans to get the attention of all of the gathered officers.
"All right kids," she said, her voice flanged and harsh through the mask, "let's make it quick and clean. Beta, you move through the rear entrance and Alpha, we'll take the front. Detective Stewart, you will be with Beta and Jaeger, you're with me."
The officers formed two loose columns and Stewart gave Jaeger the look that partners give each other when there's a chance that they might soon be getting shot at, then they split up and joined their respective groups.
Jaeger stood next to Ferenzi, who was preparing her rifle. The gun was set to incapacitate, but Jaeger knew that Ferenzi's psych profile didn't give much indication of how long it would stay that way.
"Ready?" The officer asked, and Jaeger gave her a nod, "let's move out."