The man codenamed Vector curled the pinkie of his left hand into his upper palm, applied gentle pressure to the implanted dermal pad hidden there to open a channel to his handler.

“Cisko, this is Vector,” he whispered, his words barely more than an exhale. Even after all these years and more than a few attempted explanations, he still didn’t know exactly how it worked; however, long experience had taught him that the nearly microscopic network tattooed on his larynx would transmit the words with crystal clarity, no matter how quietly he spoke.

He held still, keeping the two men across the courtyard in his peripheral, waited six seconds for the response. The bare hint of a click sounded in his ear, subtle confirmation that encryption had been established now on both ends of the conversation.

“Cisko copies, Vector,” a woman answered. Not the woman, but someone close to her. “I have you secure.”

The signal in his ear chirped once. “Vector confirms secure.”

“Go ahead.”

“Target is on site.”

“You have positive visual?”

“That’s affirmative. Looking at him right now.”

“Opportunity?” she asked.

Vector restrained the reflexive impulse to flick his eyes at the two men he’d identified as security officers.

“Security’s light. Cover’s good. Best chance we’ve had yet. I’d like to take it.”

“Your team is in place?”

“Of course.”

“Stand by.”

“Vector, standing by,” he said, and then relaxed his hand, releasing the pad. The two men across the courtyard moved to a table under the awning and sat down in low wicker chairs. One of them was heavyset, sweaty, sloppily dressed in cheap knock-off clothes patterned after the most expensive brands. Fairly typical low-rent thug pretending to be a respectable, important thug. The other man was almost the exact opposite: small-framed, quiet in his movements, easy to overlook. He was the dangerous one. And also Vector’s true target. For the moment, the Target was intent on whatever he was viewing on his holoscreen, temporarily oblivious to his surroundings. Surprisingly out of character, given what Vector knew about the man, but it was better for Vector that way. Better for the job, anyway.

Vector. He shook his head at the codename, sipped his room-temperature, weak coffee. Tomorrow he would be someone else. Warble, maybe, or something even more ridiculous. He was pretty sure the Woman picked names for him that she knew he would hate having to say over comms. Her way of reminding him who he worked for, or more likely of gently mocking who he used to work for. For all her intensity, she did have a playful side that she wasn’t afraid to let out once in a while. She had many names of her own, though he didn’t know if any of them were real. He and his team had just taken to calling her “the Woman” so they all knew who they were talking about.

He leaned back in his chair, scratched his belly, scoped out the immediate area for the thousandth time. Half a dry pastry sat on the chipped plate in front of him next to his cup of terrible coffee. Twenty-two days he’d been here in Elliston now. Martian days, anyway. Vector couldn’t remember the exact conversion to Earth time offhand. Not quite the same, but close enough that he didn’t mind the difference too much. Not after three weeks. Three weeks of integrating himself into the community; getting the lay of the land, establishing a routine, becoming part of the background. Three weeks of terrible coffee and dry pastries on chipped plates.

That wasn’t precisely true. He didn’t come here every day. But he’d started visiting the restaurant attached to the hotel every couple of days almost as soon as he arrived. Laying the groundwork. Not enough to become a regular, never at quite the same time each visit. But consistent enough to blend into the scenery. The packet had indicated this was one of the Target’s favored spots for meeting his various contacts. Vector just hoped he’d get the green light before anyone else showed up. This wasn’t the kind of thing he liked to do outnumbered. Not any more outnumbered than he already was, anyway.

The seconds ticked by as he waited for a response from the Woman. He surveyed the surroundings once more, trying not to let the delay get to him. If he didn’t look up, it didn’t take much effort to imagine himself in any number of cities back home on Earth. Or, back where he used to call home, at any rate. The architecture was familiar, if not exactly culturally distinct. Some mixture of Cuban and Mexican, maybe, translated across roughly two hundred and twenty-five million kilometers of open space. The hotel was squat; the outdoor seating for its restaurant was a square, walled courtyard with two exits to the busy streets that hemmed it in. Outdoor. The word didn’t mean quite the same thing here. It was a comfortable spot, sure, as long as you didn’t mind living in a bubble.

Down here, looking up, the vast membrane that kept the artificial atmosphere and temperature stable and the dust storms out was nearly transparent. Nearly. There was a silvery sheen to the sky that was obvious to Vector’s Terran eyes, like a thin skin of oil on the surface of a pond. From a couple of thousand meters up, it looked like a planetary blister. From orbit, the collection of settlements clustered together made it appear that Mars had developed some horrendously disfiguring skin disease. But the Martians seemed pretty pleased with it. All the estimates back home said it’d be another fifty years at least until they could take their chances with a completely unshielded settlement. Then again, back home they’d been underestimating the rate of Martian progress since Day One.

Vector could still remember sitting at the dinner table as a kid, listening to his parents talk about those colonists and wondering why they always sounded a little angry when they said it. It’d taken barely two generations to go from our brave brothers and sisters to those colonists. And these days, it was getting harder and harder to think of them as colonists at all. Mostly they were just Martians.

The general consensus had been that the great Martian Experiment would draw the nations of Earth together. And like most predictions by the people who should know best, that consensus had been dead wrong. While Earth was busy squabbling with itself, the colonies on Mars just kept plugging along, expanding, crystallizing. Making the world their home. And anyone who had studied history even casually shouldn’t have been surprised at the course things took. The colonists’ ties to Earth weakened, their Martian identity strengthened, and before anyone knew it, Earth had a whole new group of people to squabble with.

Not that the Martians had the peace and harmony thing all figured out either, though; a fact Vector was here to exploit. As far as he could tell, no matter how far out into space humanity got, it would never be far enough to escape its own nature.

“Vector, Cisko,” the voice finally spoke in his ear, as loud as if she’d been standing beside him instead of thirty thousand kilometers above. “You’re a go.”

“Copy that, Vector is go.” He set his coffee on the table and leaned back in his chair, stretching. Casually, slowly, he swept his eyes around the courtyard, careful not to let them rest on the Target’s security detail. They were locals, but he could tell by the way they held themselves, and from their level of focus, that they weren’t amateurs. The two of them were standing at opposite corners of the courtyard, each stationed by an entry point. Not bad for controlling the courtyard, but, in Vector’s opinion, that put them too far from the man they were supposed to be protecting. If he’d been running the detail, he would have had a third guard tasked solely with close protection. They probably had overwatch positioned somewhere in the surrounding buildings, keeping an eye on the general flow of the area, but that wasn’t going to help them. Vector and his team had already successfully infiltrated the target zone. Of course, it was easy for Vector to spot all the flaws in the protection plan, seeing it as he was through the eyes of the attacker. It was always easier for the party who got to choose the time, place, and method.

The Target was still busy reviewing his viz, looking over whatever information the cheap Thug had shared with him. Or maybe digesting the morning’s intelligence brief that his analysts had compiled for him while he slept. Vector couldn’t help but wonder how shocked those same analysts would be a few minutes from now.

He cracked a knuckle and in the same motion switched channels on his comms. He picked his coffee back up and mimed drinking it while he spoke again.

“Kev, we’re a go. You in place?”

“Roger that,” Kev answered. “Say when.”

“Hey, Kid,” Vector said. “You got me?”

“Yeah, I gotcha,” his long-time partner replied.

“What’s your angle?”

“Clear line to the big guy by the door,” she answered. “Heat signature’s good on the other fella, but I’d have to shoot through to get him.”

“Okay. Take the big guy. I’ll get the other.”

“You sure?”

“Yep.”

“Roger. On you.”

Vector replaced the coffee on the table in front of him, and rested his hands on his lap. This was the tricky part. As soon as he moved, he’d draw attention. Every space had its rhythm. It was his job to match it, to blend with it. Too fast, and security would perk up. Too slow, and they’d keep watching him until he’d left the zone. He allowed himself a few settling breaths.

“Doc,” Kid said a few moments later, “you got a spotter.”

“Yeah?” Vector answered.

“Just above you. Fourth floor, about the middle of the building.”

“Shooter?” Even with a couple of decades of practice, Vector had to restrain himself from glancing that direction.

“Can’t tell for sure. Better assume so.”

“Can you take him and the big guy?”

“Depends on the order. Whatcha think?”

“I think I’d like you to take whichever one’s most likely to kill me first.”

A pause, while Kid thought it over. One of the reasons Vector liked her. She never hurried with answers.

“Spotter then,” Kid said finally.

“Be sure.”

“I am.”

“All right. Let’s do it,” Vector said. He scratched his belly in an absentminded sort of way, let his fingertips brush the grip of the pistol he had tucked close against his ribs. It wasn’t a complicated plan. Walk over, kill the bad guys, leave. But for all his years of experience, no matter how simple, Vector had never once seen things go exactly according to plan.

Go time. He laid his napkin on the table, brushed the crumbs from his lap. Kept his eyes away from his Target and the security team. Slow breath. Vector stood.

And as he was rising to his feet, he felt a hitch in his gut. Some warning instinct firing off that he’d learned long ago to trust. But he was in motion now, he couldn’t stop or slow or change direction. He’d have to figure it out on the fly. He paused and drained the last of his terrible coffee, buying himself a few moments to scan the environment. In that cursory sweep, he saw the Thug was standing now, a few paces closer to the thin security officer. Bad timing; Vector and the man had just happened to start moving at nearly the same moment. Any security worth half its rate would take that as a potential concern. And if either of the two men were preparing to leave, that was problematic. Security was always a little tighter, a little more aware in transitions. He would have preferred to act while the guards were settled, when they’d gotten comfortable in the space and thus, hopefully, complacent.

There was still time to scrub the op. He could just walk out. Wait until another day. But no. The Woman’s timetable could absorb a few delays. She was too smart, too experienced to think anything would work out exactly according to her predictions. But she did have a timetable nonetheless. He needed to wrap this job, and get on to the next.

Vector changed the plan on the move.

“Kid, scratch that, scratch that. Take the shoot-through first.”

“You sure?”

“Roger, shoot-through, then spotter,” he said as he placed his empty cup on the table and started towards the exit guarded by the big guy. “On my action.”

“Shoot-through, then spotter, copy. On you.”

Vector kept his pace steady, casual. Just another morning. All part of the routine.

Twelve feet from the big security guy by the door, Vector made eye contact with the man, gave him a nod then looked away. A brief acknowledgment; I see you, you see me, nothing to be concerned about.

Six feet away, Vector glanced back over his shoulder as if he’d maybe forgotten something at his table, angled his body away from the security officer.

“Kev,” he whispered, “Come on around.”

“Copy, on the way.”

Three feet. When Vector turned back, the gun was in his hand, the grip pressed tight against his ribs as an index. Held that way, he didn’t have to look at the gun to know where it was aimed. At least not at this range. He angled the pistol low. The big security guard’s face changed, hands flared up in reaction. Too late. The suppressed pistol coughed twice, sending rounds through the man’s pelvic girdle, folding him into Vector.

“Help!” Vector cried, catching hold of the guard. The man struggled weakly, and Vector fired a third round point-blank into his solar plexus as he lowered him to the ground. “Help! This man needs help!”

Vector crouched over the man, his pistol still held close to his body, swiveled on his heel and did his best to look helpless. The crowd sat frozen, unsure of what had happened, or what was happening. One man was caught halfway between sitting and standing as if he knew he should do something, without having any idea what that would be.

“Gun! He’s got a gun!” another man shouted. Everyone looked, Vector included, and he saw the man pointing frantically at the thin security guard who was now moving towards the Thug. Vector fought back the urge to bring his own weapon up. Kid would handle it. After three steps, a puff of concrete burped off the exterior wall, and the security guard fell headlong into a table.

That’s when the screaming started. The panic. The remaining patrons scrambled and clambered over one another in every direction, some towards the exits, others just away. To them, everything was happening too fast for comprehension, some lightning strike of utterly random and unpredictable violence, taking the lives of anyone who happened to be in its path. Only someone familiar with Vector’s line of work would have noticed the precision, the fluidity, the careful unfolding of each step in its proper time and place. Vector left the big security guard and moved through the crowd towards the Target.

In the churning chaos, no one was looking four stories up, where Vector was certain the spotter was having just as bad a day as his two ground-level security companions. The Thug was by a table thirty feet away, in a partial crouch, with his hands splayed out to either side like he was trying to keep his balance. He was paralyzed by indecision, with his head turned such that he presented a perfect side profile to Vector. Only one person in the zone was paying any attention to Vector at all. That person was staring right at him.

The Target.

He too was standing now, but he was absolutely still, untouched by the confusion swirling around him. His body was tense and coiled, out of sync with the blank expression Vector saw on the man’s face. Recognition of what was happening, refusal to accept it. Powerlessness to stop it. He raised a hand, part shield, part supplication for mercy. Neither had any effect.

Vector fired two rounds in quick succession, pat pat, into the center of mass, and the small man grunted and winced with the impacts. To Vector’s surprise, the man didn’t cry out; he just seemed to deflate as he sank to the ground, with a strange and sad look in his eyes.

The Thug looked at Vector with horror, fell backwards in his haste to scramble away. He rolled to his side and writhed in an awkward attempt to simultaneously regain his feet and crawl away, all the while keeping his terrified eyes locked on Vector’s. Vector put a single round through the man’s head, and then another three rounds, haphazard, into his body as he flopped back and lay still. Couldn’t make it look too good.

Having handled the Thug, Vector calmly closed the remaining distance to the Target with an even pace. On his way out he passed by the man, who was now lying on his side breathing the ragged last breaths of a man as good as dead. Vector didn’t slow as he fired a final round through the Target’s neck and continued with the same stride to the eastern exit of the courtyard. That shot hadn’t been strictly necessary; the first two would have done the job. But it made the hit messier, and that was a carefully calculated component of the op.

He fired the remaining rounds from the stubby pistol into the walls and floor, and then dropped the empty weapon just before he exited the courtyard, leaving it behind. The Woman had insisted on that particular point too. He hadn’t asked why. Vector had learned well enough that she always had her reasons, and they were almost always good ones. And anyway, there was nothing on it that could be traced back to him, or to his team, or to anyone off-planet for that matter.

As he stepped out onto the street, the first shockwaves were just spilling out into the general populace. A few patrons had fled the courtyard in that direction, screaming. Several other citizens were standing around on the sidewalks, trying to get a read on what exactly was happening. No one took notice of the white vehicle that pulled to a stop and opened its door just as Vector emerged. Nor should they. It was identical to the thousand other autopiloted vehicles of various colors that moved around the streets at every hour of the day or night. He slid into the seat and closed the door. Kev was sitting in a forward-facing seat, a tablet in his lap and a mess of cables dangling out of the forward dash.

Before the door was fully sealed, the vehicle was already pulling smoothly away from the curb, under Kev’s illegally manual control. He kept it reined in, enough to look natural for the usual AI-managed behavior. But it was always reassuring to know he could punch it if he had to. Kev fiddled with the pad, kicked off an algorithm that would gradually transition the vehicle’s white exterior to grey and from grey to some other equally forgettable color. The process was slow enough that casual observers wouldn’t notice and the most perceptive ones might only think how interesting it was how different the light could be from street to Martian street.

It was a ten-minute drive to the drop off and then a twenty-minute walk to the shipyard where Vector’s not-strictly-legal off-world transport was waiting for him. He had a couple of days of hard work ahead of him, crewing the hauler to pay his fare, which wasn’t particularly appealing after three weeks of surveillance and planning. But it was all part of the plan. And it kept some truth in his cover; he’d claimed some local legal troubles to the ship’s first mate, all a misunderstanding, best if he disappeared for a while. That story and three hundred brin had been enough to earn a spot on Cortesia 3 as a loader, which meant a lot of manual work, not much sleep, and even less time for chit chat.

“We good?” Kev asked after a couple of minutes of careful driving.

“We’re good,” Vector answered. “You get the place buttoned up?”

“Clean as it can be without burning it to the ground.”

Vector nodded and then leaned his head back and closed his eyes. The adrenaline was burning off now, and the weight of the whole planet settled on him. They rode in silence for a few more minutes, during which time Vector’s mind replayed the entire takedown in pristine detail. Just over thirty seconds from tip to tail. And every second of it earned a review as he analyzed what he’d done and what he should have done. Good call to take the big guard first. But he could have acted sooner, gone with the original plan and been closer to the exit when he’d completed the task, rather than having to walk through the entire crowd to get there. More exposure than necessary. He was lucky there hadn’t been any heroes in the crowd. Though there almost never were. Almost.

“You all right, Doc?” Kev asked, interrupting Vector’s mental playback.

“Yeah,” he said glancing at his friend and then rubbing his eyes with the palms of his hands. “Just beat.”

“I hear ya. How long’s your trip back?”

“Three days to link up, Lord willing and the creek don’t rise.”

Kev nodded. “Should be showing up about the same time as you then. She going to give us a couple of days off?”

“I wouldn’t bet a beer on it.”

“Yeah.”

Kev wheeled the vehicle smoothly up to the drop off. “This is you,” he said.

“Yep. Thanks Kev.”

“Always, brother.”

“Safe travels.”

“See you soon.”

The two men shook hands and then Vector hopped out. He didn’t look back as Kev disappeared back into the flowing traffic. Kev had handled the hotel and surrounding area’s surveillance feeds, which meant any viz of the crime would have to be collected from any eyewitnesses who had the presence of mind to record the event. Worst case scenario figured about fifty minutes for Elliston Police to get all the details sorted out and start distributing descriptions. Vector always cut the worst case estimates in half, which meant he needed to make a twenty-minute walk in about fifteen, without looking like he was trying to run away from something.

He set off toward the shipyard. Seventeen minutes later, as he was lining up to board the Cortesia 3, he checked in one last time.

“All right, Kid, I’m clear,” Vector said.

“Copy that, Doc,” Kid answered. “EPD showed up about twenty minutes ago. I’ll sit tight for a couple of hours, see how it shakes out.”

“You good on exfil?”

“Yeah, flight’s out in two days.”

“Keep your head down, Kiddo.”

“Roger that. Catch you top-side.”

“See you there.”

Vector waved to Cortesia 3’s first mate and got a stony-faced single nod in response. Three days of hard labor. Three days of penance. And after that, a new name.

Vector boarded the ship, one job completed and another no doubt eagerly awaiting his return.