My Kaiju Parasite Revived Me, But a Yandere Bought My Streaming Rights Chapter 101: Day Two

Caleb woke at oh-six-forty-seven.

He had slept on a couch that was older than he was, in a living room that had not been redecorated since before his father had disappeared. The cushions had the firm-then-soft give of old foam. The throw blanket Iris had pulled over him at oh-two-fourteen slled faintly of pipe tobacco. He had not asked her about the pipe tobacco. He could guess.

The kettle was empty on the kitchen table where his father had left it.

The fourth folder sat beside the kettle.

It was a plain brown manila folder. Three centiters thick. Closed with a rubber band, not a clasp. Marcus had not opened it before he left. He had taken his cup with him, washed it in the sink, and dried it on the dish towel, and Caleb had heard the soft clink of the cup on the drying rack while he was supposed to be staring at the kettle.

Iris was at the kitchen window with a mug of coffee.

She was not in uniform. She was in dark jeans and a charcoal sweater that fit her differently than the tactical pants and combat shirt he associated with command halls, deploynt trucks, and bad news. She seed smaller, like a person who had a kitchen.

"He left twenty minutes after you fell asleep," she said without turning around. "He didn’t take anything from the house. He left a key on the dish towel. He’ll be back. He wants you to open the folder before he is."

"Did he say where he’s sleeping?"

"He didn’t say."

"Did he sleep here last night?"

"He has slept in the guest room of this house for the last nineteen years. Not every night. So nights. The blanket was used. Don’t ask how I know."

Caleb let the missing answer stay missing.

-----

The Hacker ca on the comm at oh-seven-oh-two. [Hacker: Caleb.]

"Yeah."

[Hacker: Three things and I will leave you alone. First. VeilWard secondary investors have submitted formal sponsorship offers. Mitsurugi Compliance has filed an inter-corp bid. Furuhashi has filed an inter-corp bid. Okuda is preparing one and will file by ten-hundred. You are now the most-bid-on Rank C operator in the registry. The bids are not going to your queue. They are going to mine. I am holding them.]

"Why?"

[Hacker: Because the Mitsurugi bid is a fishing expedition. Kikaru’s grandfather wants to know what you were doing at Saint Halvard’s last night. The Furuhashi bid is real and they will pay nine tis your current contract. The Okuda bid will be a trap. I am not letting you sign anything until you and your father decide how this gets played.]

"Okay."

[Hacker: Second thing. Your bypass is at ninety-seven percent capacity. It was at ninety-four three days ago. The numbers are climbing because the piece is more active after last night, and Tali is not in the workshop to recalibrate. I am going to need you to wear the manual override harness today. It will itch. Put it on under your shirt before Elara gets here.]

"Elara is coming here."

[Hacker: Yes. Iris let her through the front gate at six-thirty this morning. She is on her way up the street now. She has been driving for three hours and she has not slept since yesterday. She wants twenty minutes with you. She is not on the executive payroll and she is not on your father’s plan, and your father did not tell you about her tonight because your father does not know she is coming.]

"How do you know?"

[Hacker: Because she called at five-fifty-four this morning and asked how to find this house, and I told her, and she is here in fifty seconds.]

-----

The third thing was the squad.

[Hacker: Iharu, Hiro, Tali, and Kikaru want check-in. I am putting them through in the order they pinged. Iharu first. Two minutes each. Then Elara. Move.]

The kitchen was quiet.

Iris had not turned from the window. The coffee in her hand was getting cold.

[Iharu: Cal.] "Iharu."

[Iharu: We have a problem in Sector Six.]

"What kind?"

[Iharu: Hiro and I deployed to a quarantine on Sector Six periter Five. There was a thing in the drainage tunnels under the periter that resembled a statue. Twelve marks. Wrong proportions. The Hacker pulled a photo for . I am not going to bother you with the photo. It is the Lagos one.]

"The Lagos one was wounded going north on the international rail."

[Iharu: The international rail terminates at the freight junction under Sector Six periter Five. It made it. The Lagos lady broke its spine and neck marks and it crawled here. It is dormant. Hiro put two grappling clamps into the lower back plating and we secured it to the tunnel floor. Tali sent a containnt trolley. Soma cleared the action remotely. We are good. But, Cal.]

"Yeah."

[Iharu: I counted it before I knew what it was. I counted it as a fourth statue. I was wrong. I want you to know I was wrong because I want you to know your father’s count of twelve is still the count of twelve. Don’t add a thirteenth to the math.]

"Thanks, Iharu."

[Iharu: Hiro is okay. He took a hit to the collarbone. He’s going to bitch about it for two weeks.]

"Good."

[Hiro: I’m fine, Cal.]

"Yeah."

[Hiro: When you’re back on rotation we should grab a noodle bowl at Yui’s. The boss takes my credit chit there. I want a chit you bought with. I want it to be from your father’s account if you have access to it.]

He said it without irony. Hiro did not have a sense of irony. He ant it.

"Day Sixteen plus one," Caleb said. "Noodle bowl at Yui’s. I’ll buy."

[Hiro: Day Sixteen plus one. Copy.] The channel changed.

-----

[Tali: Scrubber.] "Tali." [Tali: He’s reading.]

"Who?"

[Tali: Your brother. Your father left him a book. He is reading it. He has been reading it for four hours. The book is your great-grandfather’s logbook. Your father has been moving it between safe houses for nineteen years. Your brother says the manifest in Folder Two is short. Two nas were removed before your father showed you the file. He wants to tell you the two nas. He says you need to know them today.]

"Tali."

[Tali: I’m getting the pen. Hold.]

The channel went quiet.

Caleb heard, in the background of Tali’s mic, his brother’s voice. Reading sothing aloud to himself, soft, the words shaped by a mouth that had not had to speak for two years and was only just relearning how.

[Tali: Okay. The nas are Vance and Aris.]

Caleb’s hand was on the kitchen table. "Vance," he said.

[Tali: Yeah.]

"Vance the disposal yard supervisor."

[Tali: That’s what the logbook says. The other na is Aris. Aris with one R. I don’t know who that is.]

"Chief Engineer Aris," Caleb said. "First Division. Captain Elara’s engineer."

[Tali: Oh.]

The channel stayed open long enough for Caleb to hear the empty line.

[Tali: Scrubber. That’s a problem.]

"It is."

[Tali: Your brother wants to know if you got the ssage. He wants to repeat it. He says Vance and Aris and to say it back to him so he knows you heard.]

"I heard. Vance. Aris."

[Tali: Repeating it back to him now. Stand by.]

In the background, Caleb’s brother said *thank you,* in his slow new voice, and went back to reading.

Tali ca off the channel.

-----

Kikaru did not ping a comm. She sent a text.

[Mitsurugi: I am off-rotation until twenty-hundred tonight. I am at my grandfather’s compound. I cannot speak freely on any channel I have access to today. If you need First Division support before twenty-hundred, do not request through . Request through Captain Elara directly. She is not currently on any sponsor’s payroll and her channel is the cleanest you have access to. Stay alive, rcer. K]

Caleb read it twice and typed back: [rcer: K. I’m alive. You stay alive too.]

He sent it and waited. The reply ca thirty-eight seconds later: [Mitsurugi: Always.]

-----

The doorbell rang. Iris went to the front door.

She ca back with Captain Elara of the First Division standing two steps behind her.

Elara was not in uniform.

Caleb had never seen her out of armor.

She was wearing a long charcoal coat over a black turtleneck, dark trousers, and combat boots that had been polished within the last hour. Her hair was pulled back tight. She did not wear makeup. She had a thin white scar above her left eyebrow that Caleb had never noticed under the helt. It was the shape of a scar a person picked up in their twenties from a fight they did not talk about.

She studied Caleb for a long mont without speaking.

"Captain," he said.

"rcer." Her voice was quieter without the comm filter. "Iris said you have coffee."

"Iris has coffee."

"Then I’ll take a cup."

Iris went to the counter. Elara sat down across from Caleb in the chair his father had sat in nine hours ago. The kettle and folder remained untouched while she placed both hands flat on the table. Sa posture the boot fixer had held in the Quarter while she was tagged. Except Elara was not tagged. Her hands were under her own control.

"Iris," she said. "Stay."

"I planned to." Iris remained by the counter.

Elara turned back to Caleb.

"Your father taught to shoot when I was nine years old," she said. "I have known him longer than I have known any other man on this earth. I have not spoken to him in fifteen years. I am not part of his sixteen-day plan. He does not want to be. He has told twice in my life that the day I beco part of his plan is the day he failed at it, because the version of his plan that includes is the version where my division has to fight for him in the open."

She paused.

"I am here to tell you that my Chief Engineer Aris filed an internal compliance review three days ago. The review is on you. He is not doing it because he is loyal to the executives. He is doing it because he is loyal to your father. I did not know that until twenty minutes ago. I learned it on the drive here. I want you to know about it before your father does."

Caleb said: "His na is on a list my brother just read to ."

She didn’t ask which list.

She nodded slowly.

"Then your father will know," she said. "And your father will have to decide whether Aris is on his side or whether Aris has been positioned by soone else to look like he is."

"Are you on his side?"

"I am on yours. There is a difference."

She held his eyes a mont too long after she said it.

Then her attention dropped to the table.

She picked up the coffee Iris had set in front of her and drank.

-----

The fourth folder was still on the table between them.

Caleb pulled it toward him. He slid the rubber band off. He opened it.

Inside, on the top of a stack of pages, was a single sheet of paper in his father’s handwriting.

It was a list. Fifteen items.

He read the first three.

*Day Two: Ask Elara who shot your great-grandfather.*

*Day Three: Go to your mother’s apartnt. Take the coat in the back of the hall closet. Leave before she wakes.*

*Day Four: Ask the Hacker to show you what she has been hiding from VeilWard’s board for eleven years.*

He stopped at the first line.

He raised his head.

Elara was watching his face.

He turned the page so she could read it.

She read the first line.

She set her coffee down.

"I’ll tell you," she said. "But not in this room. Iris doesn’t get to hear this part. Walk with ."