Red Shadows

by Mitchel Scanlon

  "We'll need that," Weller said to him. "Along with everything you've got on HelixHealth, its policy holders, budgets, and anything else you may have in your records. A Tek-Judge will also be arriving in the next few minutes to analyse your computer system at source. This is an open Justice Department investigation. Until it is closed, we expect every assistance."

  "Of course, you do realise, that's potentially a lot of information." His hands returning to the keyboard, Mortimer pressed a button and checked something on the screen. "The latest figures at my disposal indicate HelixHealth has over forty-five thousand policy holders."

  "You said the victims all qualified for medical insurance because their parents worked for HelixCorp?" Anderson asked him. "But we know they were all forty years of age. Surely it's unusual to continue offering discount rates to employees' children long after they've grown up and become adults?"

  "Unusual?" Mortimer smiled broadly at her once more. Again, she had the sense that it was a smooth and polished façade. "At other companies perhaps, but not here at HelixCorp. Every time a new employee starts, we tell them that once they join HelixCorp they and their children are covered by our medical insurance for life. As I say, it's an additional perk that comes with the job. In the end, it's all about recruitment. Now most jobs are done by robots, recruiting the right calibre of people for the few human jobs that are left has become all the more vital. Schemes like HelixHealth help make us seem a more attractive employment prospect than our competitors. That in turn allows us to recruit only the most top-notch candidates to work for the company. Believe me, over the years it's been a policy that has paid more than its share of dividends. 'HelixCorp: recruiting the right people, with the right outlook.' It's one of our slogans."

  "Uh-huh." Rising from her chair, Anderson indicated to Weller that they should leave, and turned to head towards the door. "Okay. I'd say that about covers everything. Don't worry about those printouts, the Tek can access the data direct from your mainframe once he arrives. Thank you for your time. You've been a great deal of help."

  "Don't mention it," Mortimer called after them as they left the office. "To use another one of our slogans: 'Here at HelixCorp we like to make life easy'."

  "Are you out of your drokking mind?" Weller said to her a few minutes later, once they were out of earshot of Mortimer's office and moving towards the exit from the building. "What the hell were you doing ending the interview so early? There was no way that creep was on the up-and-up. Did you see the way he reacted when he saw you were a Psi-Judge? The drokker almost wet his pants."

  "I saw it," Anderson replied. "That's why I read his mind while we were talking. I couldn't do a deep probe without making him suspicious, so I just read his surface thoughts. He's nervous, all right, but it has nothing to do with our investigation. It seems Mortimer neglected to report some minor share dealings on his most recent income tax assessment. That's why he was so keen to see us personally when he heard two Judges had arrived on the scene, he was afraid we were here to investigate him for tax evasion. From what I could read in his thoughts, he needn't have worried. I'll forward what I've learnt to the Accounts Division, but given the sums involved I'm not even sure failing to report the share dealings was actually a crime. It looks like Mortimer is just another citizen who gets overly nervous around Judges. It's the uniform, I guess. It may be designed to put the fear of Grud into perps, but it does the same for innocent citizens as well."

  "What about the HelixHealth angle?" Weller asked her. They had reached the parking lot and were heading for their Lawmasters. "It's the first solid evidence we've come across of any kind of connection between the victims."

  "Yeah, I was wondering about that myself." Climbing onto her Lawmaster, Anderson hit the ignition switch. "Maybe the killer has hacked into the HelixHealth database and he's using it to choose his victims? I figure we contact Tek Division and ask them to make sure the Tek they send checks the HelixCorp security logs to see if anybody has tried to break into their system recently. On top of that, I'd say they should compile a list of all the people who had access to the HelixHealth database and see if any of them have previous criminal convictions or a history of mental health problems. It's a job for the Teks now. Rather than shuffling through paperwork or databases, I'd say you and me would be better off following other lines of investigation while the Tek Division sees what it can come up with."

  "Other lines?" Mounting his own Lawmaster, Weller turned on the engine. "Right now we seem drokk out of leads. You've got any new ideas, Anderson, I'm open to suggestions."

  "We could go back to the crime scene blocks," Anderson said to him. "You could re-canvass the neighbours while I perform a deep telepathic probe on the minds of the block supers. You remember I was saying maybe the killer had used his powers to influence the supers into taking the surveillance cameras off-line for maintenance? Maybe if we're lucky he hasn't covered his tracks as well as he thinks. Maybe, if I scan them, I'll be able to find some kind of remaining memory of the killer in one of the block supers' heads. You never know what we might be able to shake loose, either of us. Either way, it's got to be better than sitting around hoping that the Tek Division will do our job for us." She checked her watch. "I make it nearly midday. If our perp stays true to form, sometime after twenty-one hundred hours tonight he's going to kill a new victim. "That gives us about nine hours to find him and stop him before another innocent person dies."

  A Psi-Judge! They sent a Psi-Judge. Sitting alone in his office once the Judges had left, Douglas Mortimer felt an icy hand of dread clutching at his heart. By now, they must know everything! Any minute, they'll come back in through that door and tell me I'm under arrest.

  "So that's the famous Psi-Judge Anderson? I'd heard she was attractive, but, really, the holo-pictures I've seen hardly do her justice."

  Turning at the sound of an arrogant and sardonic voice behind him, Mortimer saw a thin, blond-haired man in an immaculately tailored grey suit emerge through a side door connecting to an ante-room adjoining his office.

  "Carlyle?" There was an edge of panic in Mortimer's voice. "You heard them? They wanted to know about HelixHealth. You said this wouldn't happen. You said-"

  "Of course I heard it." Turning away, Carlyle moved to a drinks cabinet lifted out a bottle of synthi-whiskey and filled two glasses. "If you remember, I did warn you that the Judges might well come to see you, and I told you that if it happened I would deal with it, which is exactly what I have done."

  "But they sent a Psi-Judge. They were here at least ten minutes. She could have-"

  "Read your mind?" Smiling, Carlyle took one of the drinks, brought it over to Mortimer and laid it on the desk before him. "Naturally, she tried it, but you needn't worry. I diverted the probe and made her think you were worried about some trivial and entirely fictitious misdemeanour." His lips rising in urbane amusement, the smile on Carlyle's face grew wider. Mortimer could not help noticing that the smile never seemed to reach his eyes. "Really, you should try to stay calm about these things, Douglas. You remember when we first met you asked me if I was good at dealing with problems? Well, I am. It's what you pay me for. Now, have a drink and stop worrying. Right now, everything is under control.

  "I promise you, the Judges don't have any idea what is going on."

  TWELVE

  NIGHTFALLS & SILENCE

  Nightfall: William Ganz's favourite part of the day.

  The colours of the city seemed more vivid, revealed in all their true glories after the light of the dreadful and deceitful sun had passed around the Earth. Awakening refreshed from sleep and with a renewed sense of purpose, William dressed and went about his business. There were fourteen more names on the list in his head. Fourteen names, fourteen reds. Fourteen more killings and his deal with the Grey Man would be done. Walking the streets of the city and seeing the colours of the myriad soulshadows of the people all around him, William felt a familiar sense of excitement. Granted, the sleepwalking souls around him might
not know it yet, but their city and their lives were his to do with as he willed. He was invisible. A ghost, he could come and go as he pleased. He would kill all the reds in Mega-City One, and then he would kill the reds in every other city of the world. And there was nothing the Judges could do to stop him.

  Nightfall. He loved the night. It made him feel more virile, more vital, more manly. It quickened his pulse, the sights and sounds of the city around him carrying with them the promise of many more nights in his future. He knew he would experience a thousand more nights like this: hunting reds. It hardly seemed enough, but it was a start. With that happy thought in mind, he checked the details of the next name on the list inside his head.

  Marjorie Kulack: Apartment 26-A, fifteenth floor, Sissy Spacek Block.

  "Marjorie Kulack," he said the name aloud, whispering it to himself, savouring the way it sounded on his tongue. He felt the anticipation rise within him. Soon, he told it. Soon. He picked up his pace, walking more swiftly towards his destination as he saw Sissy Spacek Block in the distance.

  A monster, eager to do his work.

  Nightfall. For Marjorie Kulack, it had all just become too much.

  It had started when the voices inside her head had suddenly grown louder. In place of a hundred voices, it now felt like she had a thousand or more people babbling in her mind at once. Her head was throbbing, pounding out a ruthless staccato beat of relentless torment. It was agony. She felt like her skull was about to split open, spilling her brains out onto the lime green carpet covering her apartment floor. The pain was unbearable. Pulling herself to her feet, she rose from the sofa and stumbled towards her door. If she could make it to the pharmacy in the block plaza, she could buy some painkillers to mix with the antidepressants the doctor had given her. Opening the door, she staggered outside and saw her neighbour Mitzi Coltrane walk past her in the hallway.

  Look at Marj Kulack, she suddenly heard a voice that sounded suspiciously like Mitzi's talking in her head. Barely nine o'clock at night and she's drunk already. Guess she's been hitting the bottle hard ever since Herv finally saw sense and left her.

  "Why don't you shut the drokk up!"

  Before she even knew what she was doing, Marjorie was screaming those words at Mitzi. She felt the pain inside her head ease by the smallest of fractions. It was as though by unleashing the pent-up frustrations inside her she had accidentally discovered a valve to relieve some of the pressure building in her head. It felt good. For the first time in weeks, Marjorie Kulack had finally found some relief.

  Then, she looked down at her neighbour and saw what she had done.

  Mitzi was lying like a broken rag doll at her feet. Her eyes were open and vacant and her slack mouth was drooling spittle. Spotting a wet and spreading puddle on the floor underneath Mitzi's body, Majorie realised that her neighbour had lost control of her bladder. Staring into Mitzi's eyes, she could see nothing of the spiteful and judgemental woman who had been her neighbour for close to twenty years. It was as though Mitzi was gone, replaced by a slobbering imbecile wearing her body like a suit of clothes.

  I did this, Marjorie thought. I did this to her. For a moment she was caught up in the whirling maelstrom of her own emotions. She felt astonishment, fear, disbelief. Then, as quickly as they had come to her, the emotions passed. She looked down at Mitzi and realised that she felt no pity for this piss-stinking idiot bag of meat and bone that lay before her. She felt no remorse. She felt no regret. Mitzi Coltrane had always been an evil, sharp-tongued shrew of a woman. In the end, Marjorie had done nothing more than given her exactly what she deserved.

  "You shouldn't have called me a drunk, Mitzi," Marjorie said, though it was plain enough that her neighbour could no longer hear her. "And you shouldn't have said those things about Herv."

  It suddenly occurred to her that Mitzi had not actually said anything. Yet Marjorie had heard her voice clearly, albeit inside her head. With that thought came a revelation. Marjorie realised she had been wrong before. It looked like she was psychic, after all. The voices she heard in her head were the thoughts of her neighbours, the thoughts of all the people who lived in the block around her. For weeks now, she had been hearing other people's thoughts. Now, it seemed she had been granted a second psychic power. Now, as well as hearing what people were thinking, it seemed she could wipe their minds. Otherwise, how else was she to explain the fact that Mitzi was currently lying drooling in a pool of her own urine?

  I did this, the thought flashed through her mind again. Where she had at first experienced astonishment, now she felt the growing smugness that comes with the sure knowledge of absolute power. I did this to her. I made Mitzi into a moron. Hell, the stupid bitch was already one to begin with. All I did was shut her up once and for all.

  For a moment she paused to listen to the voices. Inside her head it was the same old, same old. She heard people thinking about their weight, or their love lives, or the love lives of the characters on the programmes they were watching on Tri-D. She heard people complaining inwardly about their vid-phone bills, moaning about the block super, and whining about the weather. In their heads, the residents of Sissy Spacek Block lusted and gossiped about their neighbours, passed judgements and made hateful comments. She heard their secret and private thoughts, their perversions and desires, all the things they kept in their own heads where they were sure that no one else could hear them. But Marjorie could hear them. She could hear them and she decided she had had enough. Turning to look at Mitzi Mittlelmeyer once more, she tried to tune into her thoughts and encountered only blessed silence. Whatever thoughts Mitzi had once harboured, they were now well and truly wiped clean.

  Silence is golden, Marjorie thought to herself. Really, when you think about it, it would be so much better if the entire block was like Mitzi. Then, things would be quiet. Yeah. Silence is golden. I should wipe all of their minds: every person's in the block. Then, at last, I can get some rest.

  Silence is golden. As she set off down the hallway to visit each of her neighbours in turn, the words had become a comforting mantra in Marjorie's mind. Silence is golden. Silence is golden. Silence is golden.

  By the time anyone thought to call the Judges, Marjorie had brought silence to a dozen people, and she had barely even started.

  Nightfall. For Cass Anderson, it felt like time was her enemy.

  It had been a frustrating day. With Weller alongside her, she had visited four different blocks to perform a deep telepathic probe on the block supers in the hope that one of them might still maintain some shred of a memory of the killer. The results had been disappointing. If her theory was right and the killer had used his powers to persuade each super to take the cameras in their blocks offline, he had subsequently covered his tracks so well that Anderson had been unable to pick up his trail. Similarly, Weller's attempts to re-canvass the blocks in search of additional witnesses had turned up nothing.

  Tek Division's trawl through the HelixHealth database had as yet failed to produce anything to help them. In their continuing analysis of the physical evidence left at the crime scene and on the victims' bodies, Yoakim and Noland had not managed to find any new leads. Earlier, Anderson had said the investigation was batting zero on every front. Now, it seemed they were at less than zero. If the case grew any colder, she would have to start wearing thicker gloves.

  Grud, I feel like warmed-over three-day-old munce, she thought. Damn sleep machines. I don't care what the Teks say. Ten minutes in a machine is no replacement for a proper night's rest.

  She was sitting on her Lawmaster outside the imposing entrance of Sector House 34, waiting for Weller. A short while ago, both she and the Street Judge had returned to the Sector House to undergo treatment in a Total Relaxation Inducer, or "sleep machine" as it was known to most Judges. Through some miracle of modern technology that Anderson did not even pretend to understand, ten minutes' rest in the machine was supposed to be the equivalent of eight hours' sleep. Generally, sleep machines were only used as an em
ergency measure when some crisis blew up and Judges had to work triple shifts to cope with it. Tonight, the knowledge that the killer was still out there and probably about to strike at any moment had caused Anderson and Weller to book a session each on the machine, in the hope of being able to continue their investigation on into the night.

  Hearing the sound of an engine approaching, Anderson turned to see Weller emerge up the ramp from the Sector House's underground parking bay. As he pulled alongside her, one look at his face told her that he felt as tired and ill-rested as she did. They were both running on empty, in more ways than one.

  "Just finished talking to Control," Weller said. "Asked them to contact all the HelixHealth policy holders and tell them not to open their doors to any delivery men. Control said with forty-five thousand policy holders it would take too much manpower to contact them individually. They're sending them all automated vid-phone messages instead. Have to hope the next potential victim is somebody who checks their messages regularly."

  "It probably won't work anyway," Anderson told him. "The killer's a teledominant. It doesn't matter what we tell people. If he tells them to open their doors, they'll do it."

  "Had to try something," Weller grimaced. "I don't like thinking that creep's out there about to snuff some citizen and we can't do anything about it."

  "Yeah, I know what you mean. Right now it feels like we can't do much else but sit around and wait for the next victim. But the more I think about it, the more I think there has to be something we're missing. Something that could lead us right-"

  "Control to Anderson." Her thoughts were interrupted by the sudden blare of her Lawmaster radio, Anderson took the call, expecting to be told that they were too late and the killer had already struck again.