Zero Day Code by John Birmingham

Author:John Birmingham [Birmingham, John]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Gigantic Bombs Corporation
Published: 2021-08-09T00:00:00+00:00

20

Just Like The Crocodile Hunter

Somebody finally got smart and the ICE agents removed Sandino’s cuffs. The bitch who’d kidney-punched Ellie disappeared too, replaced by some black guy who was all tooled up and body-armoured like the rest of the agents, but he didn’t seem to have as much of a hard-on. He politely asked her to sit in the car.

“Because it’s cooler,” he explained.

And it was. They had the AC running at full arctic power and even sitting half-in half-out with the door open so she could keep an eye on this pig circus, Ellie had to admit it was more pleasant than standing out in the hot sun taking random kidney shots.

And random seemed to be the organising principle at work here.

The ICE guys put her people into the vehicles.

They took them out.

They put them back in again, but they never actually drove away. This went on for nearly two hours. There was no way they’d be open for lunch.

She saw the guy in charge, the one she’d spoken to inside, taking calls on a tactical radio and two mobile phones. Somebody was kicking his ass. She’d had enough of those conversations to recognise when things weren’t going well.

“Hey Sandino,” she said to her saucier when the agent threw one of the phones away. “You seeing this?”

Ellie half expected the new guy to tell her, or at least ask her, to shut up. But the agent seemed remarkably chill. Like he was more of an observer than a participant.

“Am I seeing what?” Sandino asked.

Ellie pointed at the dishpigs climbing out of the van they’d just been loaded into.

“Pah,” scoffed Sandino. “They don’t know what they’re doing. Or somebody is stopping them. Perhaps Damien’s lawyers, no?”

“Perhaps,” she said, frowning.

The ranking fed looked pissed.

“Agent?” she said to the black guy watching over them.

“Yes ma’am?” he answered, surprising her a little.

“Is something wrong? What’s happening?”

He snorted.

“Your guess is as good as mine, ma’am.”

He turned away from whatever was happening or not happening and looked at Sandino.

“Are you doing okay, sir? Can I get you some cold water?”

“You can let me get back to my work,” Sandino said. “My master stock, it will be ruined.”

“I’ll get you some water,” the man said. He waved another agent over and spoke to him. The second man nodded and ran back inside the restaurant.

None of this seemed right to Ellie.

Not just the raid itself. That was an obvious fuck up and she didn’t doubt that Damo’s lawyers had been firing off injunctions and restraining orders and all sorts of legal high explosives. But she didn’t imagine that it would make much difference either. La Migra were feared with good reason by everyone in the restaurant trade. These motherfuckers were true believers. And in their own way, Ellie would admit, they were utterly fearless. A lawyer’s letter or even some uppity judge telling them to stand down wouldn’t normally knock them off course.

But two hours after they’d stormed her kitchen, they still hadn’t taken anybody away. And their arrogance had given way to uncertainty and something approaching apologetic disquiet.

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