"They call me the Angel. I have some dirt you might be interested in, but I need your help, meet me outside H+ Augmentation in Chrome City tomorrow"

~ Answerphone message, incoming connection blocked.

Perrault & Flint in...

The Angel of Cayambe

"Are we going to go?" Asked Tallie Perrault. Sharp and brilliant, Flint saw her obvious talents immediately.

"Of course we are." Replied Detective Raymond Flint, barely parting his cigarette gripping lips. He took one last drag and stubbed the spent stick out into his ash tray. "I've heard of The Angel. If the dirt exists, she can find it. Question is, what does she know that interests us?"

"Oh, I’ve heard of her. I just hate going to Chrome City though. The choppers freak me out." Said Tallie. "There's something about a person who willingly wants to handle eyeballs. What do they even do with them afterwards?"

Outside, the protests continued. It had been three weeks now; the first ever Bioroid to go against its directives. Reclamation orders were given, but Hass Bioroid had already taken a hit in the public eye. People wanted answers, and they wanted them now.

"I wonder if this is about Adam?" Said Tallie, as she slid her aging NotePAD into her case, ready to head out.

"It almost certainly is." said Flint as his eyes disappeared beneath the brim of his hat. "Let's go."

He lit another smoke and followed Tallie out the door.

It was raining, hot, and dirty. The chants of Human First echoed through the passages of Chrome City. The usually bustling city had ground to halt as Biotic labour had become untrustworthy and borderline dangerous.

“So, bets on what she knows?” Asked Flint, popping his collar and raising his shoulders in a poor attempt to stay dry.

“I wouldn’t even like to say. Where Adam is? Something about his victim? …Do we even want to know?”

“If she’s rung us, it because she wants the help of the NAPD. Just not the official help of the NAPD, if you catch my meaning.”

The bright facade of H+, drew near. The City’s best parlour, and the best place for the needs of body augmenters. If you needed a Brain Cage, visual interface devices or simply some discreet physical protection, you’d come here and the chopper would set you up. Be ready to rest up for a few days after though.

Flint opened the door. He was greeted by the sight of a woman, tall and confident. A satchel draped over one side of her body, and a PAD in one hand. Her hair up in a bun and wearing an impossibly white dress, which with her blue eye shadow only accentuated the tone of her brown skin. “Flint, Tallie? My name is Valencia. They call me the Angel of Cayambe. Thank you for coming.”

“Hi.” Said Tallie. Flint merely nodded.

“Let’s go into the back and talk.” Valencia suggested, already turning and heading into a back room.

“There’s always a back, isn’t there?” Flint mumbled cynically.

“Well, yeah, obviously. I mean there literally has to be a back. There can’t just be a front and then nothing.” Tallie rarely let Flint’s demeanour go unchallenged, and she found he often responded better to resistance than enabling his negativity.

They sat down in a room, dimly lit by the glow of a rudimentary Rig in the corner. “Forgive the bare state of things right now. Things have been…. rough for me of late.” Flint gave a cursory glance around the room. There was very little here, nowhere near enough for someone who relied on digging up dirt to do very much at all.

“I think I can stop these protests.” Valencia went right into it. “I think together, we can get the info we need from Haas, and bring this all to an end.”

“Carry on…” Flint had learned the hard way to not show his hand prematurely.

“I’ve got some info. It’s not a lot, but it’s enough. It’s enough to get a foot in the door, and we can take it from there. Well, you can take it from there.” The Angel took something out of her bag. A small data-fort. “The corp already has the bad-publicity… you’ve got me to thank for that.”

“Of course!” Tallie exclaimed. “You. You were the one who leaked the HB reclamation order. It looked like your work.”

Valencia simply smiled and continued “Using that bad-pub, and this new information, we can continue the pressure. These names, each one, guilty or not, will give the corp even more of a headache. The worse it gets, the more you, Flint, can get your warrants for searching the HQ.”

Flint leaned forward, his interest piqued “What is that list of names?”

“I pulled in some favours and I’ve got user data for some… questionable Adam fan sites.”

“People actually approve of that thing?” Asked Tallie. “That’s pretty gross.”

“And what am I supposed to do when I actually get into HQ?” Asked Flint.

“Just look, see what you can find. As the publicity gets worse and worse, sowill the protests. The corp’s focus will be narrowed. Only the most important info will be being acted on, and when it’s close to the surface, as everyone’s top priority, that’s when you can take it and finally get the truth out.” Valencia had clearly put a lot of thought into this, although her tone of voice belied the complexity of the task.

“Tallie,” She continued “your skills in drumming up information and resources are to be applauded. I must say, it’s actually a pleasure to meet you in person. If you could, I need you to bring that to the table today. You need to be out in the field, bringing things in when we need it the most.”

“Of course, Val.” Tallie knew it was less than becoming for a burgeoning professional to be embarrassed at praise.

“I’ll stay here and do what I can with the minimal resources I have. I’ve been lucky enough to use my influence to get some tools from our more, shall we say, criminally minded friends. Here, Flint. Take these.” She passed him some innocuous looking desk ornaments.

“…what on Earth?” He turned them around in his hands, trying to ascertain their usefulness.

“Put them down somewhere fitting when you’re inside. They look innocent enough, but they will relay the information to me faster than you can parse it with your more legitimate methods. I’ll let you know when we’ve found something of interest or something to sequester for evidence. Of course, you’ve still got to get in in the first place.”

“I don’t want to be the one to bring this up… but let’s talk credits.” This was Flint’s way of saying he was game, without coming over as enthusiastic about the score as he obviously was.

“You’ll get paid. You give me time, and I’ll give you money. Expenses for the job, and a nice pay off at the end... Should this all come together.”

The room fell silent. Valencia hoped her pitch had brought them on board. She was sick of having to be in hiding, she wanted to be out in the field, and she wanted her rig back. The one breaker she had managed to obtain while on the run, she owed a big debt for, and wasn’t sure how long she could go without paying it back.

Flint reached into his jacket. He removed his packet of smokes and placed one into his mouth. “Alright…” he said, drawing the lighter to his mouth and lighting the cigarette “I’m in.”

“That is, of course, if Miss Perrault is on board?” He knew Tallie would be. This was her bread and butter. Neither of them had the inclination to sit behind a rig, doing the grunt work. They wanted to be out there, in the never ending passages of New Angeles, soaking it all in.

“The Angel of Cayambe.” Tallie said, wistfully. “Let’s do this.”

TO BE CONTINUED