Second Contact

by Mike Resnick

  As he exited the plane he studied the waiting area, looking for anyone in a military or police uniform, but couldn't spot anything out of the ordinary. He quickly reached the door to the women's restroom, suddenly felt very nervous standing out in the open, and decided to spend a couple of minutes in the nearby men's restroom.

  He entered the empty room, walked up to a sink, and began rinsing his face off. As he was looking at his face in the mirror, wondering how it had come to look so haggard in just two days, he saw a tall man enter the restroom and approach the adjoining sink. He was about to reach for a towel when the man's overcoat fell open and he saw the handle of a pistol.

  His mind raced back to basic training, some fourteen years ago. Twenty-three ways to disarm a man. He couldn't remember any of them. Six blows guaranteed to kill or incapacitate. He didn't know where to deliver them.

  Time seemed to freeze as he studied the man, looking for a weakness in the man's approach, wondering what he would do if he found one. Bits and pieces began coming back to him. A heel in the groin. But to do that he'd have to turn around and put his enemy on the alert. All right, then. A blow to the nose, pushing up, driving the bone and cartilage into the brain. It would never do. He was bent over, with his back to his enemy; there was no way to sight his target as he spun around.

  The man was four steps away, then three, then two.

  Becker looked for a weapon—a loose soapdish, a glass, anything. He couldn't find one.

  Suddenly a large hand reached out and grabbed him by the shoulder.

  “Yes?” he said calmly, ignoring the hand and continuing to rinse his face.

  “Major Becker?”

  “You've made a mistake,” he said, still rinsing his face. “My name is Smith.”

  “Why don't you just come along quietly with me, Major Becker,” continued the man, “and we can avoid a scene.”

  “I told you—my name is Smith,” replied Becker. “Who are you and what do you want?”

  “You're Major Maxwell Becker,” said the man patiently. “Almost everyone else is waiting for you to show up in Washington, but I had a hunch that you might try to get home via Baltimore.”

  Suddenly Becker let his body go limp for an instant. The man instinctively leaned forward to support him with both hands, and Becker suddenly pivoted and caught him flush on the jaw with an elbow. The man grunted and staggered back and Becker, following up his advantage, pushed him as hard as he could. The man, already off balance, slammed against a wall and fell groggily to the floor.

  Becker pounced on him, quickly appropriated his gun, and then backed away, panting heavily.

  “All right,” he gasped. “Who are you?”

  The man stared up at him and said nothing.

  “They're already trying to kill me,” continued Becker. “If you don't tell me what I want to know, I might as well give them a reason.”

  “Go fuck yourself,” said the man sullenly.

  “I'm not kidding,” said Becker. “You were going to kill me. I'm certainly willing to do the same to you.”

  “Fire a shot and you'll have the airport security down here in ten seconds.”

  “What were you going to do about them?”

  “I'm just here to take you into custody.”

  “Who are you—police, military, who?”

  The man stared at him silently.

  “Fine by me,” said Becker, cocking the pistol and wondering if he would actually use it.

  “Just a minute,” said the man. He carefully withdrew a wallet from his lapel pocket and tossed it to Becker, who caught it with his free hand and flipped it open.”

  “Lieutenant William Donald Ramis, Space Service Security,” read Becker. He folded the wallet and placed it into his pocket. “Okay, Lieutenant Ramis, suppose you tell me just what the hell is going on?”

  “You're a wanted man,” said Ramis. “You could save yourself a lot of trouble by giving me back my gun and surrendering to me.”

  “That might save you a lot of trouble,” replied Becker. “I don't see that it would do a thing for me.” He paused. “Who are you working for?”

  “You saw my ID,” said Ramis.

  “Perhaps I should reword that. Who told you to kill me?”

  “My orders are to bring you in. You were to be killed only if there was no alternative.”

  “Why don't I believe that?”

  “Believe anything you want,” retorted Ramis. “Those are my orders.”

  “Bullshit. If the military wanted me alive, they would have tried to arrest me instead of kill me this afternoon in Lake Forest.”

  “I don't know anything about Lake Forest. I just know what my orders are.”

  “Who issued them?”

  “The space service.”

  “The space service didn't tell you to get me. An individual did. I need a name.”

  “Do your worst,” said Ramis adamantly. “I'm through talking.”

  “Look,” said Becker angrily. “I'm a loyal American citizen, and an officer in the United States military. I've never committed a subversive act in my life. Suddenly my own people want me dead. I just want to know why, and if you can't tell me, I want the name of someone who can.”

  “I can't tell you that,” said Ramis. “But I'll make a deal with you.”

  “What kind of deal?”

  “Give me back my gun and I'll give you a four-hour headstart before I report what happened.”

  “I don't believe you,” said Becker.

  Ramis merely shrugged and made no reply.

  “On your feet,” said Becker, casting a quick glance at the door and wondering how much longer he could count on being alone with Ramis in a public restroom. He decided that he'd settle for thirty seconds.

  Ramis stood up, hands slightly raised, and faced Becker.

  “Walk over to the toilet stall and face the door,” ordered Becker.

  Ramis did as he was told, and Becker, mustering all his strength, brought the pistol down on the back of the tall man's head. Ramis collapsed with a grunt, and began trying to stand. Becker hit him again, and he finally lost consciousness.

  Becker placed the gun in his pocket, then dragged Ramis’ body into the stall, placed him on the toilet seat, and then shut the door. He checked himself in the mirror, was surprised that he looked so calm and well-groomed, and then walked out the door into the long corridor leading from the arrival gate to the baggage claim area.

  “Where were you?” demanded Jaimie, who was standing outside the women's restroom.

  He related what had happened as they walked quickly toward an exit.

  “You should have killed him,” she said when Becker was through. “He could wake up at any minute.”

  “I can't kill an officer for following his orders.”

  “He only had one order,” she said firmly, “and it didn't have anything to do with arresting you.”

  “What makes you so sure?”

  “He came alone. If they wanted to take you into custody, they'd have sent at least two men, in case you put up a struggle. He was here to kill you, plain and simple.”

  “Then why didn't he do it the second he walked in?”

  “Airport security. Too much publicity.” She shook her head. “He would have walked you out of the airport, taken you to a nice quiet spot, and pulled the trigger.” She paused. “Did you remember to take his gun?”

  “Got it right here,” said Becker, patting his pants pocket.

  “Good. You're getting better at this all the time.”

  “Word from on high,” he said wryly. “Well, what's next? I don't suppose it can hurt to rent a car, since Ramis will let everyone know I was here anyway.”

  “And then you'll drive it all the way to Washington so they'll know for sure where you are?”

  “Well, a taxi's no good. They keep a record of every address they go to.”

  “How about a bus?” she said. “No ID and no addresses. We simply get off at the terminal and walk
out.”

  “They'll be watching the terminals.”

  “Well,” she said, “we're a little old for hitchhiking.”

  “What about a series of three or four cabs,” he suggested as they finally walked through the airport's exit door, “the same as we used to get from Chicago to Milwaukee?”

  “It's a lot harder to find cabs at night in the Maryland countryside.”

  “We could hotwire a car.”

  “I'm game if you are,” she replied. “But I have to warn you that I don't know how to do it.”

  “You can't hotwire a car?” he said. “What the hell kind of criminal are you?”

  “A sophisticated one. I can repair a computer; I just can't fix a car.”

  “Me neither,” he admitted. “All right, we'll take a bus and get off at the stop before Washington, and then take a cab to some generic downtown location.”

  They found the bus depot without difficulty, and were soon speaking in low tones in the back of the almost-empty vehicle as it sped through the moist night air toward Washington, D.C.

  “What do you plan to do when we get there?” asked Jaimie as the cab neared the city limits.

  “Ramis is probably awake by now, so I can't go to my apartment or my office, that's for sure,” he replied. “I suppose I'll rent a hotel room under a phony name and go from there. What about you? Can you get to your computers?”

  She nodded. “Nobody should be looking for me until morning. I ought to be able to get in and out by then.”

  “Then take this,” said Becker, handing her Ramis’ wallet, “and see if you can find out exactly who he works for.”

  “Right,” said Jaimie, taking it and putting it in her purse.

  “Where will you be after tomorrow morning?” asked Becker.

  “I don't know yet.”

  “How will I get in touch with you?”

  She lowered her head in thought for a moment. “Have you got a social security card?”

  “Of course.”

  “Give it to me.”

  He took it out of his wallet and handed it to her. “What's this all about?”

  “Can you remember the last eight numbers of it?”

  “Certainly.”

  “Give me until noon tomorrow to find a place. Then call that number.”

  “What number—you mean the last eight digits?”

  “Right. I'll have it rigged so that they connect you to my vidphone.”

  “Can you do that?” he asked. “I mean, what if someone else already has the number?”

  “Oh, ye of little faith,” she said with a smile. “You've been with me for two days now. Do you really think that I can't switch a couple of vidphone numbers?”

  “I take it back,” he said.

  The bus stopped for more passengers, and when a few of them sat down on nearby seats, Becker and Jaimie rode the rest of the way in silence. They got off just outside the city limits and phoned for a taxi.

  Becker had the cab drop Jaimie off a couple of blocks from her apartment, then directed the driver to a large hotel that catered to the tourist trade. He paid him off with the last of the money Jaimie had appropriated in Illinois, then walked up to the front desk and requested a single room for an indefinite stay.

  “Name?” asked the desk clerk.

  Aware that both Becker and Smith would probably light up security boards somewhere in the city, he repressed a smile and gave his name as William Ramis.

  “Where is your luggage, Major Ramis?” asked the clerk.

  “Somewhere in Oklahoma, I think,” he said with a grimace. “The airline says that it'll be delivered sometime tomorrow.”

  The clerk chuckled, and a few moments later Becker sat down, exhausted, in his 24th-floor room. It has been a long, grueling, occasionally terrifying couple of days, and he was glad to just take his shoes off and relax.

  He commanded the holovision to activate and turned to a round-the-clock news station to see if the incident at the Baltimore airport had been reported yet.

  He forgot all about them when he saw the headline story.

  Captain Wilbur H. Jennings had decided to enter a plea of temporary insanity in his much-anticipated trial for the murder of two crewmen aboard the starship Theodore Roosevelt. In a brief appearance before the press at Bethesda Hospital, he stated that he had no recollection of his actions, deeply regretted the grief he had caused his victims’ families, hoped he had not irreparably damaged the space program, and was anxious to pay his debt to society.

  12.

  It was four in the morning.

  Becker had been unable to sleep, and clutched for Ramis’ pistol every time he heard footsteps in the corridor outside his room. It was when he was pacing around the bed and literally jumped at his own shadow that he decided he simply wasn't cut out to be a fugitive. He dressed quickly, put the gun in his pocket, rode the elevator down to the lobby, walked across the street, found a properly nondescript and unidentifiable vidphone booth, and called Magnussen at his home.

  “Yeah?” said a sleepy voice a moment later.

  “Turn on your light,” said Becker. “I can't see you.”

  “Who is it?” asked Magnussen, staring blearily into his vidscreen.

  “The light,” repeated Becker.

  “I'll get to it, I'll get to it,” mumbled Magnussen. “What the hell time is it, anyway?”

  “Four o'clock.”

  “Christ! In the morning?” A soft light suddenly came to life, and Magnussen continued staring at his vidscreen. “My God, Max, it's you?”

  “Surprised I'm still alive?”

  “What are you talking about? Couldn't it wait until morning?”

  “Jim, take thirty seconds and try to get your brain functioning,” said Becker.

  Magnussen sat absolutely still at the edge of his bed for a moment, then rubbed his eyes and turned back to the screen.

  “All right, I'm awake,” he said. “What's up?”

  “Good. Now suppose you tell me what's going on?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Let's start with Jennings. When I left Washington two days ago, he—”

  “You've been out of town?” interrupted Magnussen, surprised.

  “When I left town,” repeated Becker, “he was quite willing to die in exchange for being allowed to tell his story on the witness stand. Now, suddenly, he's pleading temporary insanity. What kind of deal did you make with him?”

  “I haven't said a word to him, Max. He asked for a press conference and they gave it to him. I was as surprised as anyone.”

  “Okay, you didn't get to him. Who did?”

  “I don't know if anyone did,” answered Magnussen. “He sounded pretty sincere to me.”

  “And pretty sane?”

  “He's pleading temporary insanity, Max, not permanent.”

  “Bullshit. Someone is forcing him to do it.”

  Magnussen yawned. “Is that what you called about? We really could have discussed this in the morning.”

  “That's only part of what I called about,” said Becker. “The other part is that I may not be alive in the morning, and I want to know why.”

  “I don't understand you.”

  “The military has made two attempts on my life today.”

  “You're crazy! We don't kill our own people.”

  “Jim, it's not a matter of if they're trying to kill me, but why.”

  “I'd heard around the office that you'd gotten into some deep shit, but for our people to kill you? I just don't believe it.”

  “Did they say what kind of trouble I was in?”

  Magnussen shook his head. “I didn't even know you were out of town. I figured that maybe you'd been caught shacking up with a general's wife, or something like that.”

  “I went to Great Lakes to interview a witness in the Jennings case.”

  “Why should that get you into trouble?” asked Magnussen.

  “I don't know!” snapped Becker. “When I got there, th
ey'd put a double in his place, and—”

  “A physical double?”

  “No, just some guy pretending to be the man I wanted to interview. But the second they realized I didn't believe in their actor, someone put out a kill order, and I've been running for my life ever since. I want to know why.”

  “I swear to you, Max, I don't know anything about it.”

  “Who would?”

  “I honestly don't know.”

  “Have you ever heard of a hit man named Ramis?” continued Becker. “He works for us. Do you know who gives him his orders?”

  “The name's not familiar.”

  “Shit.”

  “I can try to hunt this Ramis down tomorrow.”

  “Don't bother. I know where he is.”

  “You didn't kill him, did you?”

  “No, I didn't kill him.”

  “Then I can still pull out a dossier on him once I get to the office.”

  “I may be dead by the time you find it,” said Becker, deciding not to mention that Jaimie was also working on extracting Ramis’ dossier. “I can't wait for tomorrow, Jim. I've got to do something now.”

  “Like what?”

  “I haven't done anything wrong ... and besides, the Jennings case is settled. I can't affect it no matter what I do.” Becker paused. “I want you to bring me in.”

  “Bring you in?”

  “Guarantee my safety and I'll surrender myself to the space service. I just want to talk to someone and straighten things out.”

  “Max, I'm just a lawyer. You sound like you want someone from our Covert Operations branch.”

  “I don't care who you get. I just want people—my own goddamned people—to stop trying to kill me.”

  “Do you want to come to my place?” asked Magnussen. “We can go in together in the morning. I guarantee no one will try to kill you while I'm a witness.”

  Becker shook his head. “Jim, if you're on their side, there'll be a killer waiting for me at your house ... and if you're not, I honestly don't think they'd flinch at killing the both of us.”

  “If you don't trust me, who can I get in touch with that you will trust?”

  Becker was silent for a moment as he considered his options.

  “The police,” he said at last.

  “The Washington police?”

  “I want them to put me in protective custody until you can arrange a meeting between me and whoever put out the kill order.”