Quaranteam Ch. 44

She grabbed him and kissed him almost like it was the first time all over again, wrapping both of her arms around his neck, holding him there for as long as she thought she could get away with, pulling back, giggling a little. "Thank you for that. That's sort of what I thought you might say, but there was always a chance you might've been angry."

"No, there wasn't."

"No, I guess you're right," she agreed. "There probably wasn't."

They walked into the living room where Phil was mixing himself what looked like a very stiff drink, more bourbon than anything else. He'd pulled on pants and a t-shirt, but hadn't bothered with shoes or socks, and his hair was still a little damp from the shower. "Okay Andy, you woke me up and I know you wouldn't do that without some serious reason, especially since I'm bringing the family over to your house in..." He glanced at his watch, checking the time. "Fifteen hours. What's so important that it couldn't wait a day?"

"I think maybe Gregor Vikovic is being held hostage," Andy said, and the whole room fell deathly quiet. "Maybe it's Covington and his people, maybe it's the Russians trying to get a foothold into New Eden, I don't know. But I do know that when I talked to Gregor less than an hour ago, he was clearly talking to me under duress."

"Are you sure, Andy?" Niko said. "I was there too, and he mostly just sounded tired. Maybe we did wake him up."

"Start from the beginning," Linda said, her tone all business.

"Earlier tonight, I got a text message from Gregor's phone saying, simply, 'HELP ME.' I texted back, 'Who is this?' because I didn't recognize the number and reply came back almost immediately saying 'GREGOR.' I texted back, asking what he needed help with and he started to type a reply but then stopped. I waited a little bit, and when I didn't get a response, I sent a follow up, only to get no response to that. Then I called the number, and got Gregor's voicemail, but when I went to leave a message, it told me the voicemail box was full."

"Odd, but hardly this level of concern, Andy," Phil said to him, moving over to a big lounge chair, slumping down into it.

"So we went over to Gregor's house."

"Did he look fine?" Linda asked.

"We never saw him," Andy replied. "They didn't let us past the gate. He claimed that he'd given that phone to his daughter Sonya, and that she must have been playing a game or something."

"You said the incoming message on the voicemail box was still him, though?"

"Yep," Andy said.

"If he gave the phone to his daughter, why wouldn't she change the outgoing message?" Niko said.

"And we're not even at the part that made me really nervous," Andy said. "And it's not something that anyone else would've caught. Right before he sent us on our way, he told us he 'takes too much joy in the game of poker.' But the night we were playing, he specifically told me 'fun has no place in poker.'"

The rest of the room paused for a second. Phil spoke first. "That feels a little flimsy, Andy."

"I know how it sounds, Phil," Andy said, "but trust me when I tell you this, the idea of Gregor Vikovic taking joy in poker goes against literally everything I saw of the man during the poker night. He was all business, all the time, and fun never entered the picture, not once."

"Anything else?" Linda asked.

"I was talking with Nathaniel Watkins not too long ago, and he mentioned that Gregor had canceled on their lunch meeting but that Gregor didn't call himself, and his wife Katrina called instead, which Nathaniel said had never happened before," Andy said. "It's a lot of little things, but I think it adds up to something."

"It is odd that both times, nobody's seen Gregor," Linda said. "I don't know if we're talking full Red Alert level of panic, but it's certainly something we should be keeping eyes on. Maybe we can talk to the mayor about doing a wellness check on him tomorrow?"

"You know," Niko said. "If it really was his daughter, why not just send us a message from that phone now saying everything is fine? That seems like a very easy way to solve the problem. The fact that they didn't do that does make all this feel just a little bit more off. What do we know about Gregor Vikovic?"

Linda grabbed a tablet from the table, tapping it to bring it to life, before making a handful more taps. Andy suspected she had a profile on everyone who lived in New Eden in there, just out of force of habit. "Let's see... Gregor Ulianich Vikovic, dual citizen of Russia and the United States. Gained US citizenship in 2005. Most of his money comes from shipping, as the owner of Vikovic Import/Exports, as well as the owner of a small fleet of cargo ships."

"Small?"

"It says here only, like, eight."

"Eight cargo ships is not a small fleet, Linda," Niko said with a laugh. "Those things are huge, so that means he's doing massive international business, moving things in and out of all sorts of countries. I imagine a lot of that got shut down what with the two viruses going around."

"So, remarkably no," Linda said, scrolling through the tablet. "At least that's not what it says here. He's been moving containers back and forth, and while a lot of them are sitting in ports around the world, automated loading and unloading systems have made most of it pretty painless, and the guys he's got working the ships just don't get off them at any point, so they've been running mostly without incident, although it says here there was one ship that was nearly lost at sea. One guy lived long enough to get it to throw anchor just offshore near the port of Los Angeles, and he sent a reclamation team in to remove the bodies and sanitize it down, to get it back to work, this time with paired up crew members and partners. There's even some press release he put out saying 'business never sleeps, so neither do we.' It sounds like he's even making inroads, trying to set up in-country shipping, with a team of truck drivers each of whom gets their own partner. The immunity numbers aren't great, but it's better than nothing, and they're mostly staying inside their trucks, so maybe it'll work. Nobody's really sure at this point."

"Wait," Violet said. "You said they're just leaving shipping containers in the ports?"

"Yeah," Linda said. "Customs is incredibly short-staffed, and so are truck drivers, so there's been a lot of trouble in getting goods moved around."

"Which means a bunch of those containers are going unchecked," Violet said. "So, say, you were smuggling in Russian hitmen or spies..."

"...it would be a great fucking way to do it," Linda finished for her. "Shit, that's a good thought." She tapped away at the screen more. "There's thousands of containers laying in ports all across the country right now. No way we would have time to check them all, even if we wanted to." Linda looked at Andy. "You've talked to Gregor more than anyone here. You think he's capable of smuggling in foreign operatives?"

Andy shrugged. "I certainly don't know him well enough to make that call. He certainly didn't strike me as the type of guy who wanted to go back to Russia again any time soon, though. I asked him about it over the poker game, and he said he wasn't sure if he went back that Putin wouldn't just have him killed on general principle. I thought maybe he was joking, but Gregor said he and Vlad were 'going in different directions,' so maybe it's not Russian military."

"Hey Phil," Niko said. "Did your Mrs. McCallister mention how she and her friends managed to get back into the country?"

"I didn't ask," he said. "I was hoping you might do that. Why?"

"Because containers like that are a good way to move people internationally discretely, assuming you plan for it properly," Niko replied. "Maybe Gregor wasn't in the human trafficking business before, but took it up once the pandemic hit. Remember that briefing we got last week?"

Linda nodded. "Right right."

"What briefing?" Phil asked. "I wasn't in any briefing."

"Phil. Honey. As hard as this may be for you to believe, you are not aware of everything that's going on with this damn virus right now. Last week, Niko, Violet and I were all in a briefing given by the General informing us there's something of a humanitarian crisis going on, with loads of people trying to flee the countries that aren't reacting to DuoHalo very quickly. No men, just containers of women, being managed by women, all trying to escape to a country where they can get some protection, and to get the Quaranteam serum."

"Oh fuck," Andy muttered.

"Fuck is right. Some of the less developed countries are looking at even higher fatality rates than it's being reported, and women are fucking scared," Linda said. "And it's not just the countries you would think it would be, either. Places like Saudi Arabia, France, Spain, Sweden... lots of people are convinced their governments are going to collapse. For the first time in a long time, the world is looking to us to lead them out of this mess."

"Even if all that's true," Andy said. "Why would Gregor want to draw attention to himself, then? The messages, the ducking out of regular get togethers..."

"Maybe one of his business partners turned on him," Violet suggested.

"Or maybe the house has been taken hostage," Niko countered.

"Or maybe, just maybe, we need a whole shitload more intel before we jump to any conclusions," Linda said. "But you're right, Andy. All of this does add up to something strange going on over at the House of Vikovic.

"Agreed, we definitely need to learn more," Andy said. "But I didn't want to let it go without bringing it up ASAP."

"Speaking of ASAP things, Andy," Phil said to him. "Since you're over here, maybe you can go and hit Evie McCallister's place tonight? I can give you the directions, and you can tell me what happens. She's been getting pretty anxious, which means I think it's been a while she dosed last from her husband. The sooner I have proof this rewiring sperm of Sergei's works, the better off I'll be."

Andy turned to look at Linda. "Is the place secure?"

The blonde Captain nodded. "I've got a couple of my best girls sitting on the house, making sure everything's copacetic. They don't know why, but they know nobody goes in or out without my say so."

"So how about I stop by tonight, pitch Watkins to her, explain how it's all going to work, then, as long as she agrees, I can bring Nathaniel by tomorrow before the party, so Niko will have all the samples to give you there, and everything looks like we're just going about our lives, being normal people," Andy said.

"You know, you fell into this spy business very easily, Andy," Phil said in admiration.

"I write about a Druid Gunslinger for a living. You know how complicated my plots get. People are just like that, only harder to read."

"Plan sounds good, although remember, Evie's going to be skittish, especially since she's nearing the break point for not having her fix."

"How far into the cycle is she?" Niko asked Linda.

Linda shrugged. "Seven, eight days maybe. She's not at the ten day make-or-break point, but she's not far from it. Getting her reassigned to Watkins sooner would be better."

"Fine fine," Andy said. "Tonight I prep her, tomorrow we get her reassigned to Nathaniel, and tomorrow night, you have your blood work so you can start seeing what this variant is like."

Everyone rose up from their seats, and there were hugs all around, something they'd been doing a lot more lately, as if they'd taken the privilege for granted before. "Stay safe, first and foremost, Andy," Phil told him. "If it's between the reassignment sperm and your life, you win that every day, got it? This shit is not worth risking your life over."

"Got it. I'll see you tomorrow, brother," Andy said. "You'll have your answers soon enough."

"And I'll have an update about Vikovic for you at the party tomorrow, Andy," Linda told him. "You scratch our back, we scratch yours."

The three of them moved to head towards the car, as Niko filled Alexis in on the whole reassignment sperm that the man Sergei was reported to have as Andy was a little lost in his own thought. He was certain he was missing some key detail when it came to Vikovic.

As it would soon turn out, he wasn't wrong...