The Blood Tax

Chapter 4: The Bitter Reunion

​"You told me I was the only ghost in this city, Keller, so why is Zuan's personal cleanup crew currently dragging my woman into the dark?"

​Bisma squeezed the small transmitter against his jaw, his fingers pressing so hard into the plastic casing that his reconstructed joints throbbed beneath the surface. The heavy steel doors of the service elevator had already closed completely, sealing Meira inside with the three syndicate operatives. On his portable monitor, the elevator indicator lights flickered as the cabin rapidly descended toward the subterranean parking levels of the Dolder Grand Hotel.

​The earpiece crackled with static before Keller’s voice came through, cold, smooth, and completely unbothered by the sudden panic. "Your primary objective is completed, Hans. Markus Vance is dead, and the city council is satisfied. What the syndicate does with hotel staff is outside our jurisdiction. Evacuate the premises immediately."

​"She is not just hotel staff," Bisma growled, his voice a low vibration of pure rage. He turned away from the maintenance closet and walked toward the concrete service stairs, taking them three steps at a time. "Zuan is involved. He is extracting information about the very data your council wants buried. If they break her, your precious politicians are exposed anyway."

​"You are compromised by emotion," Keller replied coldly. "If you compromise this operation, the antidote for your weekly stimulant will not be waiting at the safehouse. Think carefully about where your loyalties lie."

​Bisma pulled the earpiece out of his ear, cutting off the transmission completely. He did not care about the threat, nor did he care about the chemical leash Keller used to control him. The image of Meira on her knees, staring at the barrel of a silenced pistol, had shattered the calculated numbness in his brain. His heart hammered violently against his ribs, sending a sudden spike of adrenaline through his veins that bypassed the artificial pain blockers.

​As he swung around the final landing of the concrete staircase, a sharp, searing heat flared across his chest and down into his right thigh. The sudden physical exertion was pushing his heart rate past the safe threshold. The deep tissue wounds from Zuan’s hunting knife, barely held together by surgical thread and advanced cellular glue, began to protest. He could feel a warm, sticky moisture spreading beneath his dress shirt, soaking into the white fabric. His stitches were tearing, but he refused to slow down.

​He burst through the heavy fire door leading into the lowest level of the underground parking garage. The air down here smelled of damp concrete, gasoline, and exhaust fumes. The rows of luxury sedans and security vehicles were bathed in the sickly yellow glow of overhead sodium lamps.

​A sharp screech of tires echoed from the far eastern sector of the garage. Bisma sprinted between the concrete pillars, keeping his body low to avoid detection. He arrived just in time to see a black, armored utility van reversing out of a private parking bay. Through the heavily tinted windows, he caught a brief silhouette of an operative forcing a blindfolded woman into the rear passenger seat. It was Meira.

​"Check the perimeter one last time," the syndicate lieutenant commanded, stepping out of the front passenger seat to scan the garage. He adjusted his leather jacket, his hand resting openly on the grip of an automatic submachine gun strapped to his chest. "Zuan wants no digital tracks left behind. If anyone saw us take the girl, erase them."

​"The cameras in this sector are already looped, sir," a driver called out from inside the idling van. "We have a straight path through the southern utility exit. Faksi Zuan is waiting at the abandoned industrial docks."

​Bisma pressed his back against a massive concrete support pillar, his breath coming in shallow, ragged gasps. The pain in his leg was intensifying, making his right knee tremble slightly whenever he shifted his weight. He reached into his jacket, his fingers wrapping around the handle of his tactical weapon. He had no firearm, only the silent tools of a cleaner, while the operatives ahead were fully armed and highly alert. A direct assault in the open garage would be suicide, especially in his current physical state.

​He watched the van slowly accelerate toward the heavy metal exit gates at the far end of the facility. If the vehicle cleared those gates, tracking them through the snowy streets of Zurich without Keller's satellite grid would be virtually impossible. He needed a tracker, something to bridge the gap between his forced retreat and his upcoming hunt.

​Bisma looked down at his own left wrist. Embedded just beneath his skin was the silver tracking chip Keller's medics had installed during his facial reconstruction. It was a military-grade locator tied directly to an encrypted civilian frequency he could intercept with his portable receiver.

​He didn't hesitate. Pulling his tactical knife from his pocket, he pressed the blade against the outer edge of his left forearm. With a swift, brutal stroke, he sliced through the top layer of skin, ignoring the sudden rush of crimson blood. He dug the tip of the blade into the wound, catching the edge of the small silver cylinder, and flicked it out into his palm. The agony was sharp and bright, but it was nothing compared to the burning rage inside his chest.

​He stepped out from behind the pillar just as the van drove past his position. Using the last ounce of his physical coordination, Bisma lunged forward, pressing the bloody tracking chip firmly against the magnetic underside of the van’s rear bumper. The metal component clicked into place securely just before the vehicle sped through the opening gates, disappearing into the swirling white chaos of the Zurich blizzard.

​Bisma collapsed against the wall, clutching his bleeding forearm as his breath raggedly tore through his throat. The wound on his chest was bleeding freely now, a dark stain spreading across his suit jacket. He pulled out his portable receiver, watching the tiny red dot blink steadily on the digital grid. The van was heading toward an old industrial warehouse district along the Limmat River.

​"I am coming for you, Meira," Bisma whispered into the empty, freezing garage.

​He spent the next hour stealing a nondescript civilian sedan from the lower deck, using his cleaner tools to bypass the ignition system within seconds. He drove through the snow-choked streets of Zurich, his vision occasionally blurring as the blood loss from his reopening wounds began to take its toll. He kept his teeth clamped together, using the pain to maintain focus, refusing to let the shadows consume him before he reached his destination.

​By the time he tracked the signal to the industrial district, the storm had worsened. The warehouse was a massive, rusted structure surrounded by chain-link fences and decaying shipping containers. Two guards patrolled the perimeter, their rifles held close to their chests to protect the mechanisms from the freezing sleet.

​Bisma parked the stolen vehicle two blocks away, approaching the building on foot through the blind spots created by the snowdrifts. He slipped through a broken window panel near the rear loading docks, dropping silently onto a stack of wooden pallets inside. The interior of the warehouse was dark, lit only by a few hanging work lights near the center of the main floor.

​From his vantage point behind a row of rusted iron machinery, Bisma saw her. Meira was tied to a heavy metal chair directly beneath a flickering light bulb. Her face was bruised, a thin trickle of blood running from her lip, but her eyes remained fierce and defiant despite her terror.

​Standing directly in front of her was the syndicate lieutenant, holding a thick folder of translated political documents. Two other operatives stood guard near the only visible entrance, their weapons at the ready.

​"Let us try this one more time, sweet girl," the lieutenant said, his voice echoing off the corrugated iron walls of the warehouse. He leaned in close, slapping the folder against her cheek. "You were cleaning the luxury suites for three days. We know the auditor Vance hid a backup drive somewhere in the room service carts before he died. Where did you put it?"

​Meira spat blood onto the concrete floor, her head shaking defiantly. "I told you, I don't know anything about a drive. I just clean the rooms. Please, let me go."

​The lieutenant sighed heavily, turning around to face his men. "She is lying. Zuan's instructions were very clear. If she doesn't give up the location of the backup data within the next five minutes, break her fingers one by one."

​Bisma’s fingers tightened around his knife until his knuckles turned white, his body preparing for a lethal plunge into the light. The psychological tension of seeing her suffer under the hands of the faksi that destroyed his life was tearing his internal stitches completely apart. He could feel the cold fluid of his own blood running down his leg, pooling inside his boot. He was operating on pure survival instinct now, a ghost fighting to reclaim the only fragment of humanity he had left.

​Before he could make his move, the lieutenant's satellite phone began to ring loudly. The man answered it immediately, his posture instantly straightening into a rigid display of respect.

​"Yes, Boss Zuan," the lieutenant spoke into the receiver, his voice amplified by the quiet acoustics of the empty warehouse. "We have the girl here. She is resisting, but we will have the location of the backup data shortly."

​Bisma froze, his eyes widening as he listened to the voice on the other end of the line, which was loud enough to leak through the phone speaker.

​"Do not waste too much time, you fool," Zuan’s voice hissed from the receiver, sharp and dripping with malice. "The city council thinks their new Ghost Cleaner solved the problem, but they don't know I already have their entire political network compromised from the inside."

​The lieutenant nodded quickly. "Understood, Boss. What should we do with the girl once she talks?"

​"Kill her and leave her in the river," Zuan commanded coldly. "And make sure the explosive traps around the facility are armed before you leave. If anyone from the council tries to investigate this location, I want them blown to pieces."

​The call ended with a sharp click. The lieutenant shoved the phone back into his pocket, turning his gaze back toward Meira with a brutal, uncompromising smile.

​Bisma stepped out from the shadows of the machinery, his knife raised, his face pale as death itself as he prepared to cross the threshold into the abyss.

​"If you touch her again, I will personally tear your throat out of your neck," Bisma said, his voice cutting through the silence of the warehouse like a death sentence.