Free Cog by K. Ceres Wright

Intelligence agencies were usually cautious when dealing with free agents. Provoking an agency into issuing a hit was just one mistake away.
    The shooter behind her was probably dead, but she’d have to check. She crawled backward, slowly, still listening for movement, until her foot felt something hard. A boot. She twisted around and fired. Burnt flesh. A large red hole that curled black at the edge filled the man’s chest. The nauseating smell of cooked bowels bloomed up.
    She kept crawling backward, training her gun on the unmoving form. Her toe tapped his plasma gun. She jerked her toe away, fearful of searing off her leg. She picked up his gun and checked the chamber. Enough energy for five more shots. Her own gun had seven. She crawled back farther, until the dead man’s face came into view.
    Kirill Genechko. A low-level mercenary. Ukrainian. The kind government agencies hired to do their dirty work. Or at least the agencies that hadn’t much experience in wetware, the agencies not involved in intel, like the Department of Agriculture.
    Thia crouched low and struggled to prop up the dead man. He had to weigh at least two-fifty and she had to strain not to grunt in exertion.
    Another shot scorched past, frying the man’s head, missing hers by inches. She let go and the man fell on her arm as she toppled over, face up. One more blast flew over her, burning her nose.
    I must be hot on someone’s ass for them to try this. She slid her arm out from under his lambskin coat. They must pay well, whoever they are.
    Deciding she couldn’t wait in the bushes forever, she readied the two guns and crouched. She stood and ran in a zigzag pattern back down the dirt path, toward the station. She had to get Neer to a safe location.
    Shards of blue pulsed past her, searing her coat. Four o’clock. She leveled her weapons and squeezed off several shots. Two shots answered back, one slicing her shoulder. She bit her lip through the pain and ran, firing behind her until she ran out of shots, then reached the edge of the woods. A vision of her car loomed up. She fell to the ground, shocked.
    Neer sat in the passenger’s seat, half his face gone. Burnt black, along with the door. Thia rolled left, behind a large garbage bin. More pulses fired. The station was deserted, patrons no doubt scared off by the gunfire. Footsteps. The gunman approached.
    There!
    A car sat idling, a beige Reno. One of the cheap imports from Kenya, but any port in a storm. She dashed for the open passenger-side door and slammed it shut behind her, keeping low as she slid in the driver’s seat. Hunching to the side, she engaged the reverse gear and screeched backward, then tore out of the parking lot as blue pulses slashed the air around her. She reached I-1994 and pushed the car to its 300 mph limit. Streetlights blurred past.
    She couldn’t even work out the identity of the second gunman, but he was definitely a pro. She had been stripped of her car and her source. A first. There had been more than one and they knew where she was going. The information Neer had access to must’ve posed a danger to someone. The question was, who? There was one place to start looking. Nicholle Ryder.

Chapter 6
    Nicholle snatched a bag out of the closet and headed for the transport tube.
    “Where are we going?” Chris said.
    “Away from here. I don’t have any plans written in stone at the moment. We’ll make it up as we go.”
    “As we go?”
    They stepped out of the tube and Nicholle jogged to the back of the parking lot. Chris kept up.
    “Look, unless you happen to have access to a safe house, I’d suggest you hush.”
    She stopped at a small black car and pressed her thumb on the lock. It glowed green and she yanked the door open.
    “Manual doors?” Chris said.
    “Get the fuck in.”
    Chris slid into the seat, his face drawn up in wariness. Nicholle started the car and eased out of the lot.
    “With tinted windows, no one should be able to see us. And the car