The Dark Edge Chronicles - Hardwire

Penetration

It was the better part of three hours later that finally saw the two men make their way through the narrow, congested streets of the French capital. As he looked out his window at the distant Eiffel Tower, close to the center of the city, Mordecai spoke.

"Where exactly are we going, Seiji? Paris geography has never been one of my strong points."

"The Gare de Lyon, on Boulevard Diderot," Seiji answered with a nod. "It's the station with south-bound trains making for southern France and the coast." He looked over at the big man. "I've got you booked on a train directly to Lyon."

"The TGV, I hope," Mordecai said, referring to France's bullet train, which could travel at extremely high speeds across the landscape. If the lone gunman had to travel like a Normal, he wanted to go as fast as physically possible.  Seiji grinned.

"The Train a'Grande Vitesse? But of course! It isn't translocation, but the closest thing you're going to get while staying on the ground around here. Once you get to Lyon, you can catch the bus or a local train to the town you tracked the Brotherhood to, Neuville-sur-Saune, on the banks of the Saune River."

"Perfect." Mordecai grinned lopsidedly for the briefest of moments before becoming grimly serious once more. "The faster I get there, the better chance I have to intervene before the Alliance survivors are seriously harmed beyond what happened in Calgary."

A few more tight corners and crowded streets found Seiji and Mordecai finally pulling to a halt in front of the majestic old Lyon Train Station, built around the turn of the century and opened in 1901 for both commercial and passenger service. As they piled out of the car, Seiji spoke once more.

"I've got local currency, food and supplies waiting for us in a locker inside, on the main floor of the terminal. We'll collect those and get you on the train!"

"Right," Mordecai acknowledged and, after retrieving his shoulder bag from the Citroen's trunk, he followed the compact hardwire inside, pushing through the thronging crowds of midday travelers as he kept a careful eye peeled for any Brotherhood heavies.

A day later found the man in black stepping off a local train at Neuville-sur-Saune, a small town just north of the city of Lyon, in southern France. Pausing on the wooden, old style platform as people piled off the train behind him, he pulled a map out of a side pocket on his shoulder bag and opened it.

'According to the trace I did on Quick Poison's signatures, they dropped Tabitha off in Toronto where she was met by a special transport team of hard softwire movers. The movers then flew her to London's Heathrow and from there took the Chunnel train over to mainland Europe,' he thought as he tapped a small red circle marked on the map. 'The trace finally ended in this little town in the middle of southern France. I've a feeling that the Brotherhood is particularly strong around here. I wouldn't be surprised if this breeding facility is right in the heart of the enemy territory!'

Quickly marking out a route on the map with his finger, Mordecai tapped the red marked spot where the trace ended, a chunk of farmland west of town. It looked like he was going to do some walking, since it would be virtual suicide to attempt a translocation so deep in enemy territory. They would detect him as soon as he began to pull energy out of the air.

Shrugging, mostly to himself, Mordecai folded up the map and slipped it back into the bag. Walking into the middle of enemy territory; it was beginning to be quite the habit this time around. Not to mention, it was probably a trap. But how many traps had he walked into, in Calgary? And now the Brotherhood's western network was in a shambles. Of course he wanted to try and rescue Tabitha without bringing the whole place down, but if he had to, he would in a heartbeat.