New Technology Summit

The seabirds of Marina wheeled through the air above Goshi's flagship Mothra. The crew today was unusually tense. The Executor had returned from his summit with the Biomade Oversight Council visibly pleased. Seeing a man who never showed emotion, and whose whims could result in your death, being outwardly happy was a very unsettling thing. Every sailor and officer on that boat was making every effort to be invisible.

For one person aboard, being invisible required no effort. Her livid eyes materialized out of the shadows, followed by a bright pink bob. Her footsteps making no sound, she slipped down the corridor and out the hatch, stepping nimbly into a shore-boat and nodding to the man at the engine. Without a word he took her skipping across the waves toward the docks. No one on Mothra knew who this girl was, and no one wanted to know. The Executor kept his own council and it was safer that way.

Slipping through the streets of Marina she drew no attention. Despite her remarkable appearance, she had a gift for being inconspicuous. In a city like Marina - full of plazas and monuments where people congregate for long strolls and outdoor meals - it was even easier. No one noticed her slipping the lock on a wealthy townhouse door. She was forgotten before the door closed behind her.

Inside was a subtly lavish apartment. It had a furtive quality to it, as though it knew it was expensive, but didn't want you to know. No big show pieces, but here and there little touches peeked out, indicating someone with champagne taste. From upstairs the steamy sweet smell of a Thula pipe (a local opiate) drifted down. She made her way up the carpeted staircase and into the room from whence the perfume emanated.

A skinny Biomade man with more than a few broken veins in his cheeks failed to notice her until she was already seated in front of him. He jumped suddenly, disturbing the coals under his Thula pipe and burning his knee.

"Ow. Oooh. Hot!" He patted the spot with a cool silk pillow and made awkward faces. "How did you get in here?"

"Nevermind. You sent a message."

"What? No I didn't. I mean, not to you. How did you know?" He shook his head, trying to dispel the fog from his mind. Focus would be necessary and he could hardly see straight.

"You're slow today Sawaguchi. If an old friend of former director Yamoto..."

"Lord Tsuchinaga Yamoto," he corrected her.

"If an old friend of Lord Tsuchinaga Yamoto starts inquiring too much around this business I'm going to find out."

His eyes narrowed and he looked at her suspiciously for a few moments hoping desperately that she was not reading his mind at that very moment. It was a desperate ploy to stall for a moment to regain some sobriety.

"But, your story seems so unlikely," he protested. "I'm sure that his factor was a girl called Samara and he would have told me if he'd changed something that important before his death."

"Fine. Don't believe me, but then, how did I find you, Sawaguchi? How do I know so much about your relationship to him? Why do I keep intercepting your messages? You must have a better explanation." Despite herself, she was enjoying the game, a little.

Head swimming, he admitted he had no such explanation.

She leaned closer to him and put her index finger under his chin. Her smile was impish, and he had to admit, sexy, the kind of girl Yamoto would have liked. "Listen," she said, "Just tell me what you wanted to give to the Biomade Oversight Council today, before I intercepted the message."

The walls were sprouting lilacs. The drugs were taking effect.

"It's just a file. Lord Tsuchinaga Yamoto made me promise to deliver it to the Biomade Oversight Council when Executor Blade was making his proposal to them about some new technology. The Lord was convinced that this technology represented a terrible danger and he said the file would prove it." Sawaguchi paused and she blinked her big red eyes at him in anticipation. "He said if we delivered it too early, then Blade would have time to do damage control. Too late and the technology would already be approved. But if we did it at the Summit then the licenses would be revoked, the project sunk, and that would be that."

Sawaguchi couldn't tell if it was her touch, or her proximity, or the drugs, but something was making him very dizzy indeed.

The girl pulled her hand away and gave him a pitying expression. "Apparently you didn't hear then?" she said.

He stared blankly.

"They moved the time of the meeting up this morning. Blade got his technology approved hours ago. The demonstration was a huge success. Apparently he teleported a HeiShi soldier across the room before their very eyes."

Sawaguchi suddenly looked more alert - and very alarmed.

"But... no. But, my contact on the council said the meeting was this afternoon," he felt the floor crumbling out from beneath his feet.

"I'm afraid that I intercepted those messages too."

His face melted into tears, "He only asked me for one promise. For years he was doing me favors and he only asked me for one promise..."

She watched him sink to the floor and dig his fingers into the lush carpet. "The DisLocators are already in mass production. With this announcement, Goshi is ready to start deploying them. Soon Geneva Prime will have thousands of soldiers equipped with them - the most mobile army in the world."

Every word made him shrink. He sobbed feebly and grasped for the pipe, sucking white cloud through the bubbling tube.

In his incoherent state he babbled, "Maybe it's not too late. I can still give the file to the Council. They might review their decision."

He was still babbling when the psychic knife passed through his temple.

"The permission was just a formality in any case, but Blade would rather if you didn't hand that file in after all." She drained his life right out of him, and kept on draining long after he was unconscious until his body was a dried husk on the floor.

A clear acrylic disk sat on the top of a beautiful wooden chest of drawers nearby. She snapped it in half and strolled casually from the room.