The fourth hacker in their group, Racehorse, groaned. “Geez, Africa. That’s practically cheating. And now he’s hiding in the damn Christmas trees? Every time I get a blip, it’s just somebody with half their face behind a garland or a tree.”
Luftwaffe said, “That last photo did it, Vlogger1. Good sniffing, there. That one has the distance between Max’s pupils to a tenth of a millimeter. With the other biometrics we have, the program should be able to identify him even if he’s wearing a mask.”
“But not if he’s behind a damn Christmas tree with his head draped in glass icicles,” Racehorse grumbled.
Arthur smiled and adjusted his legs, careful not to bobble his tablet too much. He didn’t like people surveilling him personally, of course, but it was quite handy when one wanted to find a missing person. Also speaking of which, “Racehorse, did you erase me from the footage yet?”
“Oh, yeah. Did that minutes ago. You’re gone.”
Excellent.Arthur didn’t bother to reply out loud. While his cohorts were scrubbing his voice from any security surveillance footage as he spoke, he didn’t need to chat out loud and give them more work to do.
Besides, someone in meatspace might hear him. The closed casino was preternaturally quiet.
Luftwaffe said, “We’ve got a hit.”
Already?
Nice.
Luftwaffe continued, “I don’t know the target that well. Take a look, Blackjack?”
That was Arthur’s cue. He angled his tablet away from the spots of light reflected from the lamps behind him to see the screen better.
The surveillance video feed was a little grainy and staccato in the way of surveillance footage everywhere. People walked through the frame a little more quickly than was natural, bobbing like an old-time movie. The swags of Christmas garland and conical trees flashed shards of light into the lenses, flaring into horizontal bars.
The room pictured on the footage looked to be one of the salons farther away from the lobby because Arthur didn’t particularly recognize the salon from his brief stroll into the casino with Casimir that evening. Slot machines filled most of the gambling areas near the front. The roulette and poker tables were farther back in the more exclusive areas.
Arthur was pretty sure they were looking at one of the public areas, though. The exclusive, private rooms for high rollers were more sparsely populated. A thick crowd eddied and streamed sluggishly through the salon.
Two wide-screen televisions occupied one side of the room, and a crowd was watching what appeared to be a soccer game.
On the right side of the screen, a yellow box flashed as a man stuck his head into view, looked around, and retreated.
Luftwaffe asked, “Was that him?”
Arthur moved the slider bar backward on his screen to rewind time.
The man had dark hair, and it was a little overgrown in curls around his face and the collar of his tux. He turned his head, and a strong cheekbone and jawline swiveled into view, sort of.
Arthur whispered, “I’m not sure.”
“The program says it’s a hit.”
“What percentage?”
“Seventy.”
Not enough. “Timestamp?”
“Nine-thirty.”
“Where does he go after that?”
Hums of indecision filled Arthur’s ears. “Looking.”
Arthur scrolled forward on the footage, looking for when the man left that little niche and came back into view. “What’s the room behind where he is? Through that doorway?”
Through his earbuds, Vlogger1 said, “On it.”
