[h2]”One Call…That’s All!"[/h2]

[img]https://i.imgur.com/qEZu58W.jpg[/img]

For Yuri, the act of reading the lawyer’s business card while standing in a Khao Yai sewer tunnel seemed highly appropriate.

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[img]https://i.imgur.com/2CQH9bU.jpg[/img]
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“Keep that safe,” Booth said as he sloshed back toward his newest client.  “Okay, I got my bearings now.  Follow me.”  The attorney didn’t seem to mind wading in the ankle deep filth, another box checked.   

Yuri found himself grateful for the calf length workboots as they progressed through the deepening shadows.  “Where are you taking me?”

Booth glanced over his shoulder.  “Got a safe spot up ahead.  A place where you can tell me everything I need to know without a wet work team kickin’ the door in.”

“Wet work?”  Now he was confused.

“The gorillas in the suits?” the lawyer replied.  “Ex military types, usually spec ops guys who just can’t settle down and grow a beer gut like Buddha intended.  Their job was to have you feedin’ the pythons by oh-dark-thirty tonight…conjure?”

“Conjure,” Yuri nodded dumbly, though he didn’t conjure at all.  “But why?” he asked.  “Was this my company’s doing?”

“Around this corner,” the little man directed him through a junction.  The tunnels beyond were much narrower, their uneven brickwork forming an overhead arch that barely allowed a man to pass without stooping.  “C’mon, baby, you knew something bad was gonna happen when you agreed tp meet your bosses,” he chuckled.  “We’re under the old part of the city now.  Don’t touch the walls…it doesn’t scrub off.”

A half dozen rats scurried past, moving as an organized unit in single file.  Booth didn’t see fit to comment.  “But…a wet work team?  To get rid of me?  Why?”

“I’m not a hundred percent on this, yet.” The tunnel’s confines gave the lawyer’s voice a hollow echo.  “But your ship’s all over the cortex.  ‘No survivors…went down with all hands,’ is the kinda [i]la shi[/i] Ogilvy-Norton’s pumping out in their press releases. Makes you an obstacle, my man!  Number One, their street cred dips if you go public.  But they can bounce back from that.  It’s Number Two that’s got their corporate panties in a twist.”

“What’s number two?”

“Money.   My girl’s not done crunching the numbers yet, but she was already North of a billion credits in the loss of the ship and cargo.  Right now, your bosses are scrambling to  grease the wheels for their insurance policy to pay out.  As Niska tells it, a sole survivor…a mechanic who can testify to shoddy maintenance?  You could put their whole bankroll on the skids.  Hell, even paying to have you offed is cheaper than the cost of your death benefit.”  He laughed.  “You’re worth less dead than alive…much less!”

“But…” Yuri cast a wary eye behind them.  “Then those guys…the spec ops.  What’s to stop them following our tracks?”

Booth snickered.  “Right now, they’re shadowing the truck.  It’ll head to my office…in another hour or so.  Gotta drop the band off first, capiche?  They’ll bust in after dark.  When we’re not there, they’ll scratch their [i]pi gu’s[/i] and search for clues on the truck.  So we’ve got a good three  hours before they find the bottom hatch and put two and two together.  After more time to backtrack manhole covers, if they’re stupid enough to drop into the sewers they’ll be up to their knees in the city’s dinner rush.” 

The thought of professional killers wandering aimlessly in knee deep effluent gave Yuri a chuckle of his own.  “Pretty clever,” he smiled as they approached an access ladder.  “I liked the Mariachis especially.  Nice touch.”

“Shiny!”  Leonard Booth, Attorney at Law, pulled a wrench from his suitcoat pocket.  He swung, banging the tool twice against the ladder.  Suddenly, the manhole cover above them was lifted, loosing a cone of light that forced Yuri to squint.  “Cuz you’re paying for them!”

“Huh?”

“C’mon,” the little man  climbed upward.  “I hope you like knish!”