Chapter 23: Tracking

Chapter 23: Tracking

A few hours later, I picked up Thorne and Claire and we drove off to one of the megabuildings in our district.

“Boss, plug this into the network for a bit and I’ll be able to get access to the cameras.” Claire handed me a small lipstick-shaped device.

“Got it. Remember, don’t leave the car.”

Having warned her, Thorne and I strode confidently into the building and went up to the elevator. There were a few people just hanging out on this floor we went to, but they didn’t seem to bother with us despite the stealth suit I was wearing.

Momentarily splitting off with Thorne, I went and plugged in the device Claire gave me when the opportunity presented itself.

“I’m in. I don’t see anything unusual on that level.” Claire’s voice resonated from my implants, thanks to the group call we were on.

“Rollo, I’ll go knock on the door. You hang out of sight in case anything goes wrong.”

“Okay, go ahead.” I agreed without hesitation, as Thorne was the one wearing proper armor while my suit’s defensive properties were questionable at best.

It had nothing to do with being happy that he was finally getting used to calling me by the name at all, though it was a welcome change.

I shadowed Thorne as he went toward the address we had found from the profile we had received from the QG, Oli. The hallway right in front of the place was narrow with no cover, so I engaged the camouflage function as soon as he knocked on the door.

After a brief moment, the door opened slightly, and a middle-aged woman peeked out behind the chain lock. “What do you want?”

Thorne visibly relaxed his grip on his weapon, “Hi, we’re looking for acquaintances of Mark Layton, we—”, the woman’s expression immediately changed at the mention of the name, “What do you want from my son? Are you one of those ‘friends’ of his? I want nothing to do with you people. Leave my son alone.”

“Um, no, we’re actually here for his friends, actually.”

Thankfully, Thorne was the one to speak with this lady. I don’t think I could talk to her face to face considering I was likely the one who killed her son, regardless of whether or not he deserved it.

“I don’t know anything about them. Go away!” The door slammed shut with a bang.

I tapped Thorne on the shoulder and signaled for us to retreat. It wasn’t likely the lady was lying and there wasn’t much for us to do.

We returned to the car and made our way back.

“So, what do we do now?” Thorne asked pensively, breaking the silence in the car.

“There isn’t much we can do but wait for Oli to turn up with some info. We don’t have a network comparable to QGs like her.”

“I could try to dig around as well. If I can’t handle it, I can ask Lana or Leo,” Claire noted.

“Don’t, you’re still new at this, let’s leave it to the professionals, and don’t bother Lana or Leo either, they do this for a living so we should pay them but I already paid Oli and her team to do the job.”

She looked like she wanted to say something back, but decided against it and started playing around with the terminal in her hand.

“Cheer up guys, learning to delegate is something you’ll have to do sooner or later. Shall we grab some desserts before we head back?”

Having worked in an office of one of the biggest companies in the previous world, it was common to wait around for the other departments to finish their part before you could start yours.

This will be a good experience for these two.

Late afternoon the next day, a call came from Oli, sooner than I expected.

“Oh, then I have no need for you.” I drew my weapon and aimed it at his head.

“WAIT WAIT! I’ve been in this group for a long time. I can tell you anything you want to know! Please, just let me go after.”

“I’m listening.” I steadied my gun and kept it pointed at him. He started spewing his entire history with the harvester group and went into the minute details.

“Stop, give me only the relevant information about your leader and why you attacked me.”

“...Sir, I—” His expression looked like he was coming up with an excuse so I interjected, “We’ll be asking this of your friends by the way, if yours doesn’t match I won’t mind pulling the trigger.”

“...Of course, I speak only the truth, I assure you! Sir, the reason we attacked should be obvious, shouldn’t it?” He stared up at me with disgusting puppy eyes. “Spit it out.” I slowly placed my finger on the trigger and ensured he saw it.

“Okay okay, it’s because someone’s been sacking all the other harvester groups, that made the higher-ups worry and wanted to end the threat so we can do our business with peace of mind.”

“...And why do you think it was me?” Though he didn’t explicitly say it, it was obvious he was referring to me.

“Someone noticed a lot of the chrome you have in stock matched what some groups were holding onto. Competitors keep a close eye on each other, after all.”

Well shit, with all the harvesters I had been hunting, I thought everything would be fine as long as there were no survivors. I needed to think things through more...

“So one of you guys saw what I was selling and came to that conclusion, you guys are a lot more aware than I had thought.”

“...Well, someone else noticed and approached us about it so we teamed up...”

Oli did mention there was some gang involved as well.

“You sure know a lot for someone who swore they had no idea about the attack on me.”

“...Haha, I learned a lot of things since we had nothing to do but gossip for the past while since the boss disappeared.”

“Disappeared?” I frowned. “Yeah, after the attack failed, our boss and a few others went out and haven’t come back.”

“Did they say where they were going?”

“Yea yea... They went to meet with the Scrapers to discuss the failed attack.” I gave him a questioning look. “They’re a large gang...so we didn’t dare to bother them. We’ve just been waiting here ever since.”

“Send me the location of where you usually meet them.”

“Of course, of course...Will you let me go, please? I swear I won’t bother you or anyone again. I’ll leave the city!”

“I’ll see what your friends have to say first.”

There was no way I was going to let him go. Harvesters like him were like cockroaches that always sprung back up, but even if he really quit doing any crimes, he had to pay for all the people they had brutalized until now. While personally, I would rather have him spend the rest of his days doing hard labor and creating profits for me, the value of experience points was hard to argue against.

Corroborating all the stories our prisoners provided, we got a clearer picture of what was happening. The location they provided was some bar they met at, so it wasn’t too useful, but still worth checking out.

Once I finished dealing with the harvesters, I received a group call that included me, Thorne, and Claire. Sharing a look with Thorne, it was immediately obvious who initiated the call.

“Guys, some people just came after me. I got away and I’m tracking them down right now. I’ll ping you my location.”