26 January 2106 by Pete III
As my eyes snapped open I could hear movement on the other side of the couch--footsteps by the door we came in through. I successfully fought the urge to move when I remembered Ken-san's Self-Programming Luminescence. The SPL had scanned the room before it began emitting light that would not reflect off of any objects in the room--including me. To these men, I was invisible.
Yes, there were three of them--as luck would have it, two of them passed on either side of the sofa without so much as brushing against it. As a distinct lack of luck would have it, the third gentleman bumped right up against it.
"What--" I heard him say. He looked right down at me--or through me--at the floor, I suppose. "I can't--"
He looked quite flustered--his face being the only part of him I could see clearly. His clothes were jet-black against the slightly less black walls of Ken's safehouse. He held a Sharone 360 in one hand and a palm light in the other. He panned it around trying to see what was blocking him.
"Condo! Keep up!" one of the other two said.
"I am--" my fellow said, still frustrated. "Something's weird, my light's not working."
"Shut, Condo. Collins, sitrep."
"Two rooms..." another voice said.
"Right--Condo, stay--Collins will check the rooms, I'll cover."
"Allbrecht--this light!"
"Use your Light-amps."
Uh-oh... I did not like the sound of that. If they amplified the light in the room digitally they still couldn't see me, but they could see shadows where objects really are... that's assuming I understood Ken's tech properly.
I grit my teeth as I watched him cover his eyes with nanoskin sensors. I was so close to him I could hear the skin powerup.
My guy glanced around the room. "Much better."
He then looked down, right at me.
"Hey! What's this!!"
He jumped back from my view and I froze, completely without any idea how I should react.
"Condo--what?" It was one of the others again. They were both aiming their Sharones at the doors to the two rooms. If Ken or Hu happened to get up to go to the toilet, they were sure to be dead. I had to make sure that didn't happen.
"There's something here." I watched as the man nearest me leaned over the edge of the sofa again, extending the barrel of his Sharone until it touched my ribs.
This was it.
I grabbed his hand with both of mine and yanked as hard as I was capable, pulling the very heavy man over the back of the sofa onto myself. I made sure to point his gun, with his hand still in it, toward the table as I rolled off onto the floor.
Instinctively, he pulled the trigger, obliterating the table in an instant. The loud racket from the Sharone was sure to wake Hu and Ken and alert them to the intruders. I squirmed my way out from under the man and stood up immediately, my hands in the air.
"PLEASE! I SURRENDER! TAKE WHATEVER YOU WANT!"
Of course, to them, thanks to the SPL, I was just a big black blob, waving it's blobby arms 'round in an all too threatening way, I'm sure.
"FREEZE!" one of them yelled.
I was still waving my hands showing that I was unarmed.
"Please! I don't have a weapon!" I said as loudly and as clearly as I could.
"FREEZE OR WE'LL SHOOT YOU!" yelled the one called Albrecht.
I held perfectly still. "I'M HOLDING PERFECTLY STILL! PLEASE DON'T SHOOT!"
"WHY IS HE BLACK?" Collins asked.
"DON'T MOVE!" Condo yelled.
"I'M NOT MOVING!"
"TURN OFF YOUR CLOAKING FIELD, NOW!"
"Hang on! It's not a field! One moment, please!" I yelled. "IF we could please stop yelling now!"
Finally, they stopped yelling.
"Here, let me turn on the proper lights," I said moving, still with my hands up, to the light control near the door to Ken's bedroom.
I pressed the slider upward and slowly white light brought everything into clear view. The three men pulled their light amp nanoskins from their eyes. I could see they were all Caucasoid. Judging by their accent they grew up inner-city kids from New Columbia.
"What the--?" Allbrecht said, clearly not having seen anything like SPL before.
"What kind of cloaking field is that?" Collins asked.
"Em, it's not, actually, a cloaking field, as they are illegal."
"Then what is it?" Condo pressed the barrel of his Sharone to my jaw.
This was getting difficult...
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