The Armor Heist

By D. Clarence Snyder

The Shipping Wars completely reformed the business of carrying things from one point to another. Competition grew so fierce that it finally burst into armed conflict. The old companies were destroyed, and Parcel Service rose out of their combined ashes. Obtaining nation-status, Parcel Service exercised its power to make certain that those dark days of competition are gone. Every truck is armored, every package defended, every step taken to ensure that the mail must flow – through Parcel Service.

When an unscrupulous employee stole a valuable console and sold it to the competition, it was only natural that he used Parcel Service to move the device. He didn’t plan on getting caught or being forced to reveal the tracking number of the package. Now, the rightful owners want their console back, and they’ve offered a ridiculous bounty for its safe return.

Armed with the knowledge of the console’s route, a smuggler, a sniper, and a shape-shifting thief concoct a risky plan to claim the bounty: taking on Parcel Service and hitting their armored car – with another armored car.

Set in "The Bright Future", this short story takes place before book 1 in the series: "The Cookie Caper".

• Language: English
• Publisher: D. Clarence Snyder
• Release date: Jan 27, 2018
• ISBN: 9781370137893

D. Clarence Snyder

D. Clarence Snyder is a retired Master Sergeant and unabashed nerd. His previous work includes uncredited technical articles; several issues of the comic book series The Tick; and an infrequently updated blog and web comic.

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The Armor Heist

A Short Story in the Bright Future

by D. Clarence Snyder

Copyright 2015 by D. Snyder

Smashwords Edition

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Table of Contents

The Armor Heist

About the Author

Also by D. Clarence Snyder

The supreme art of war is to subdue the enemy without fighting. -Sun Tzu

The Armor Heist

Have you ever killed anyone before? a voice in the darkness asked. Given the circumstances, it seemed like a rookie question. Anyone who answered ‘yes’ would be confessing to a crime. No one ever would.

You know who I am? Ægis responded. He was doing his best to remain calm and professional. He was not sure where he was, or who had him, but the list of possibilities was short. He had been snatched from his apartment by large men wearing body armor. He was sure that he had not been read any sort of official statement advising him that he was in custody. That meant it was unlikely he had been arrested by municipal police. Government forces had a long history of using official statements. They might have seen him as dangerous enough to use overwhelming force, but traditional police would have delivered their statements after he was chained down with a bag over his head.

I do, the voice admitted. Let me get that for you.

The bag was lifted away and Ægis’s eyes were flooded with information. He blinked rapidly as his irises expanded to constrict his pupils. Sudden immersion into light was disorienting, but that was the point.

The room did not look like a government facility. Municipal police interview rooms tended to be light in color; crèmes, blues, or industrial grays. In his experience, they were dominated by observation windows. One-way glass gave the impression that the rooms were decorated with large mirrors, but it didn’t fool anyone. Government interview rooms smelled as if they had been washed. They had a damp, chalky odor, covered by hints of floor wax and cleaning products.

This room had black walls textured with uniform pyramids of charcoal foam. The floor wasn’t tiled; it was carpeted. Despite the dark color, the space was well lit by a polymer lighting panel. It was too well lit. There was no table, no pretext of alternate use. It was a soundproofed interrogation chamber. It didn’t smell like anything. It was definitely corporate.

Ægis could think of four nation-status corporations that might want to interrogate him at that moment. All of them had the means, the motivation, and the time to get whatever information they wanted from him.

The interrogator neatly folded the bag into a triangle. He seemed irritated, but he casually put the triangle into his pocket. They were supposed to remove that before I came in.

The interrogator was Dr. Matthew Redds. He was not a rookie. In fact, he was one of the most experienced interrogators in the geographic nation. He taught classes on interview technique and held a PhD in psychology. His thesis on human reactive behavior was required reading at a certain federal police academy. He didn’t ask interviewees about their past crimes in the hopes of getting confessions. He used such questions to learn what sort of person he was dealing with. How the subject answered could tell Dr. Redds a lot about who was in the chair.

In one exchange, Dr. Redds knew Ægis had been interrogated before.

A casual, pleasant conversation would set the subject at ease. It would make getting good information from him easier. If