For the next three days, from Sunday to Tuesday, Emz prepared and performed for the benefit of his watchers. On Sunday evening, he carried the trackable clip in the pocket of his dark winter coat. Leaving through his building’s entrance, he travelled to the Gemini Building by Metro, arriving exactly at 9 p.m. Taking his time, he casually walked past the tall apartment building, where projected snowflakes were falling, stealthily taking photos and making notes on his mobile screen. Now that he knew what he was looking for, he easily spotted the cream vehicle the twins were driving, partially hidden behind a corner of another building on the opposite side of the intersection. He pretended not to see it and instead made a bit more of a show of casing the Gemini Building. He then hailed a taxi and rode to Nico Sanna’s apartment building, the greasy tech guy working for Drexler. He didn’t approach the door but made some more notes, covertly noticing the cream vehicle tailing him once again. Emz then took the Metro home for the night.
On Monday, he once again travelled to the Gemini Building with the tracker, this time by taxi, arriving precisely at 9 p.m. He made a show of walking past the elegant front entrance, then slowly walked around the building, once again taking notes on his wrist screen. The cream car was nearby once again. Emz then suddenly walked east and took the Metro from a station in the Theatre Mile, heading once more to Sanna’s apartment. He surfaced at a Metro stop a block away and headed to Sanna’s building. He reached the entrance and then hailed a taxi to take him to Poyz Midton International Station, hurriedly heading towards the platform gates but not passing through. Emz made an effort to pretend to note some additional information, in case he was being watched, and then headed home again by Metro.
On Tuesday morning, Emz secretly left in different clothing via his neighbouring building. This time, he had left the tracker in his loft and headed down to a nondescript area in Sutton to meet up with Luki, whose van rolled up on time as usual. They exchanged information, and Luki gave Emz a sturdy storage tube containing a decent copy of the Money Happens painting and a few pieces of equipment for the heist. Emz then stealthily made his way back to his loft in reverse. That evening, he once again donned his winter coat with the tracker and took the Metro, using a few different lines before exiting at a stop several blocks southeast of the Gemini Building.
He walked at a steady pace until he reached the entrance to the Gemini Building at 9 p.m. and took another slow walk around. He didn’t see the cream car but felt as though he was being watched—unless that was just paranoia. Whether they were there or not didn’t matter; they would be analysing the tracker data and, hopefully, conditioning them appropriately. Emz then hailed a taxi all the way to Poyz Midton International Station and hurried inside to the platform gates, though, again, he did not pass through, instead turning around and taking the Metro home.
Wednesday was the heist night, the real one. In the evening, Emz once again secretly departed via his neighbouring building, without the tracker, wearing a very long and thick dark luxury fur overcoat that reached his ankles, with a matching dark fur trapper hat, earflaps down and tied under his chin. At his waist, under the overcoat, he carried a strong ballistic nylon bag with several items for the heist, and hanging across his back was the storage tube containing the fake painting.
He hailed a taxi and rode to the InterContinental Baltic City Norton, a grand hotel that spanned across three blocks on Joplin street. Before getting out of the taxi, he repositioned the storage tube inside his overcoat and slung the strap over his left shoulder so the length of the storage unit would fall down his left side. When he climbed out of the taxi, the thickness of the fur coat and the way his left elbow held out, with his left hand gripping the coat lapel, hid the tubular shape well enough to avoid attracting the attention of any casual observer.
Emz looked the part of a wealthy individual, and the doorman rushed to open the gilded door for him, touching the brim of his tophat as a welcome gesture. Emz smiled back and waltzed inside, heading over to the bank of elevators, taking one all the way to the roof. He was already pre-checked in under a false ID, and so his mobile had the digital key that allowed him access. The booked room was pricey and unused, but it did grant him use of the helipad.
Waiting for him, precisely at the booked time, was an airtaxi— not just the same company as the one booked by Bogdan Petrovi?, but the very one programmed to travel to the Gemini Building after Emz's booking, thanks to Luki’s hacking skills. The roof was empty, with no cameras activated, due to Emz requesting a privacy option for his travel with the hotel.
Instead of boarding the airtaxi straight away, Emz skirted around the boxy aircraft to its rear. The automated vehicle had four doors and six great encased rotors hanging from thick arms on either side of the roof, three in a row on each side. Essentially, it was a scaled-up six-rotor drone, capable of carrying four adults and some luggage. From his position, Emz could see eastward over the sprawling Norton Park, which the expensive hotel backed onto. This park was narrower and longer than its cousin in Sutton and far more manicured. At its eastern edge was the illuminated Norton Arena, which would play a part in the second fake heist the next day. Ignoring that for now, Emz took two coils of rubberised cables from his nylon bag and, with some effort on the cold, breezy roof, looped one over each of the arms holding the rearmost rotors, then down around the back struts for the landing skids. He fastened them tautly together in the rear middle of the aircraft with a harness attachment and safety latch, checking and rechecking it to make sure it didn’t come loose accidentally.
Once satisfied, he climbed into the airtaxi, and after closing the door with a well-engineered thud and locking sound, the six rotors began to engage, and the craft swiftly lifted into the air. The journey was quick, taking Emz past the Gemini Building to a nearby hotel slightly north of his final destination, the Poyz Marriott.
Once he touched down on the empty hotel roof, Emz took a moment to take out a harness from his nylon bag and wrestle his arms into the straps, which was a little hard to do while sitting down with such a thick fur coat on, but he had practised over the last few days and managed to get it done. He put on a pair of gloves and then slipped out of the airtaxi. After slamming the door shut, he quickly rushed around to the rear and attached his harness to the attachment on the pre-fitted rubberised cables.
The airtaxi, oblivious to its exterior passenger hanging on, soon took off and flew a very short distance to the Gemini Building. The air viciously whipped around him, and the loud rotor noise overwhelmed even the noise reduction in his buds, while his hands tightly gripped the cables and he buried his fur-hatted head into the cold rear of the aircraft. At precisely 11 p.m., it descended onto the helipad with smooth precision. The rotors slowed as the craft settled, and the building’s roof access door swung open just as the vehicle powered down.
Emz’s heart was beating like a steel drum, threatening to burst from his chest. The ride had been scarier than he had expected, and although he was unbelievably glad to have landed, he was still fearful of being discovered, especially as he overheard men talking in Serbian, which was translated by his buds. They appeared to be discussing an issue with the “fucking Kalboys”—a street term for the Kalininskaya Bratva, a Russian gang that had nearly killed Emz a couple times during the trouble with the old crypto wallet a few months back. Three doors slammed shut, and the rotors began to spin up again.
You could be reading stolen content. Head to Royal Road for the genuine story.
Emz pulled the safety latch, and the two coils unravelled and slipped away from the airtaxi as it began to lift off. The downforce from the rotors was intense, but Emz managed to scoop up the loose cables, scurry away, and slide behind a small shed with a robotic arm that would reach over to a smaller pad to retrieve any packages dropped off by a delivery drone and keep them sheltered until collection. The airtaxi flew off at an angle away from his hiding place, and Emz felt sure he hadn’t been seen.
Emz slipped out from behind the shed, shoved the cables and harness back into the bag, and went to the roof access. As expected, it was locked shut, but Luki’s hacking soon provided the solution, as a yellow-and-blue-accented humanoid robot opened the door and headed over to the shed to collect a package that Luki’s programming had instructed it to fetch—even though there was no package waiting.
Emz dashed through the door and descended a few steps into a corridor, where guest elevators stood at one end and two service elevators at the other, one of which was accompanied by a trolley the robot had brought along. The four-wheeled service trolley had a crisp white sheet draped over its two-tiered shelves. Emz took off his gloves, fur coat, hat, and storage tube, stowing them all under the sheet on the lowest shelf. Under his coat, Emz was wearing the building’s porter uniform: a saffron waistcoat, white shirt, pinstripe navy trousers, and patent brogue shoes.
Before stowing his nylon bag, Emz retrieved a small bulbous black device, which he placed on the trolley’s top shelf, and a clear inner bag containing more items for his disguise: thick black glasses, a wig, and a gold name badge. He concealed the bags alongside his coat on the bottom shelf, then began his transformation. The wig gave him a crown of textured curls, the big glasses mostly hid his features, and the name badge, reading ‘Malcolm’, completed the look.
As he adjusted the badge, Emz couldn’t help but think of Michael, the first porter he had met when dropping off the painting. The disguise was tailored to resemble him closely, though not perfectly. Emz briefly worried about potential blowback for the man but pushed the thought aside. Needs must, he reminded himself.
The robot came walking down the steps from the roof without any package and headed towards the trolley. As soon as Emz put his hands on it, the robot pivoted away and moved towards an elevator. One must have been waiting, as the doors immediately slid open. Emz pushed the trolley in after the robot. Thanks to Luki busying himself inside the building's systems, the elevator stopped on the penthouse floor, and Emz pushed the trolley out, checking his wrist screen for the time.
The elevator doors closed while the robot remained inside, and Emz rolled the trolley along the corridor, keeping his head bent down.
Further up the corridor an old man turned out of the south penthouse alcove, wearing a long loose-fitting white robe with matching headscarf. The elderly sheikh caught a glimpse of Emz and waved, before heading down the corridor and into a guest elevator.
Feeling super anxious, Emz patiently waited until the elevator doors closed before rounding into the north alcove for Bogdan Petrovi?'s penthouse apartment. As hoped, the thug guard wasn’t there, and was hopefully riding in the airtaxi with Petrovi?. Emz moved to the doors and, with an elbow, pushed down a handle. The door swung open. Thank you, Luki, Emz reflected with relief.
During the planning phase, they had discussed directing the robot to collect the painting, but Luki had made a strong case that it was one thing to activate a robot to follow typical service routines, but another to instruct it to go to locations and undertake tasks it wasn’t meant to.
For nearly two decades, the United Nations Data, Robotics and AI (DRAI) Protocols had been in place, which meant that any data created or generative decisions made by artificial intelligence were recorded directly into decentralised ledgers in the cloud using blockchain technology. This made it almost impossible to fake data and ensured everything was auditable, traceable to its source. The international legislation also enforced that commercial hardware and software were crafted with layers of redundancy to prevent AI and robots from engaging in illegal and lethal activities.
There were always exceptions, black-market efforts to circumvent the legislation, but vigilant UN watchdogs and severe criminal punishments had curbed all but the most determined people from exploiting the technology, which is why Emz was undertaking the heist himself.
Emz activated the small bulbous black device designed to detect hidden camera lenses by emitting infrared light in a wide direction. He placed it at the farthest end of the trolley top and pushed the wheeled unit into the apartment first. Emz had expected that a very private individual like Petrovi? would be unlikely to have surveillance equipment, in case it could be used against him, and the logic seemed sound as the emitter didn’t alert him to the presence of any cameras in the room. The space looked identical to how Emz had last seen it, with its mishmash of art and furniture.
He glanced at the Money Happens painting, but resisted the urge to rip it off the wall and simply run. Instead, Emz quickly opened all the interior doors one after another to ensure no one was still in the apartment. He found multiple bedrooms, a bathroom, kitchen, and study, all horribly eclectic in their design, but no people. Relieved, he dashed over to the painting. From under the trolley sheet, he retrieved the storage tube, a second device from his nylon bag, and some latex gloves, which he slipped on. He carefully removed the fake painting from the tube and rolled it out on the table, using candlesticks to weigh down the corners and help it flatten.
Next, Emz took down the real painting and used the second device, which had a powered staple gun on one end and extraction jaws on the other. He worked swiftly, removing all the staples and detaching the canvas from the stretcher bars. Carefully, he rolled up the real painting and slid it into the storage tube. He then stapled the fake painting onto the stretcher bars and re-hung it on the wall. The replica was a good likeness, but even to Emz’s untrained eye, it was not perfect—though passable at a glance. Ensuring no loose staples were left behind, Emz placed everything back under the trolley sheet, exited the apartment, and closed the door behind him.
He checked the time and noted it down. Then, taking a small folding knife from his pocket, he levered a corner of the unit housing the electronic door lock, leaving the tiniest of marks on the plastic casing. It was subtle, but noticeable to anyone who scrutinised closely. Good enough, he thought, before heading to the guest elevators.
Emz messaged Luki to signal he was ready, and one of the elevator doors slid open almost immediately. He rolled the trolley in. As the elevator descended rapidly, Emz quickly removed his wig, glasses, gloves, and name badge, placing them into the nylon bag along with the camera detector and staple gun. He attached the bag to his waist, slung the storage tube over his left shoulder, and donned his fur overcoat and trapper hat once more.
Just as he finished, the elevator doors opened onto the restaurant and spa level. Emz wiped down the metal handle and with his foot pushed the trolley out into the corridor. A robot passed by and, as planned, pivoted over to take the trolley and wheeled it away. Thank you, Luki, Emz thought with a grin. The elevator doors closed, then opened again on the ground floor lobby.
With as much swagger as he could muster, Emz strolled calmly through the lobby, his left hand poised on his lapel while his right swung gently at his side. Guests moved about, some assisted by porters with their luggage, while others stood at the concierge desk in conversation with staff tapping away on tablets. A woman lounged on a sofa, absorbed in a book, very retro. No one spared Emz a second glance. People rarely notice those who leave—only the ones who arrive, he reflected with satisfaction.
The doorman opened the gilded door for him, and Emz stepped out into the cold night air, kept warm by the thick fur covering him from head to toe. He walked a block west to Armstrong street and paused to look out over Baltic Bay. Past the fancy yachts gently bobbing in the Norton Marina, his gaze fell on the twinkling lights of Baltic City Centre. He took a deep breath of the crisp, icy air before hailing a taxi to take him home—via the neighbouring building rooftop. The big moves had started.
