by K. W. Jeter
Lois Allen, the department’s top forensics specialist, had done the autopsy herself. It had been over two months ago that the medical examiner had come to this station and delivered the results and analysis, complete with the stack of photos, that alone indicated how high a priority the clinic-bombing case had. The ME had wrung out every scrap of data possible from the fragmentary—very fragmentary—remains of Dr. Quinn. Science had confirmed the obvious: Quinn had died instantly, torn apart by the force of the bomb. When he had gone back into the clinic after rushing Cathy and Matt outside, he had apparently searched and found where the bomb had been hidden in a service closet. Perhaps he’d had some notion of being able to defuse it, keep it from going off. Movies gave people ideas like that, as if there would be some big red wire that one could pull loose from a cluster of red dynamite sticks, and everything would be fine. Quinn had discovered otherwise.
Identification had been positive. The doctor had played football as an undergraduate, right up to his senior year when a cheap shot had taken out his left knee, the intricate bones splintered beyond repair. A replacement joint, surgical steel coated with Teflon, had been installed. Under a microscope, the serial number from the Swedish prosthetics manufacturer would be visible. One of the photos that Lois had taken was a blow-up of the battered metal that had been found in the clinic rubble; the number etched upon it matched the info that had been faxed to the station from the factory in Malmo. George had wondered if the artificial knee would be buried along with the rest of the bits and pieces of the late Dr. Quinn. Would that be the human way of handling the situation?
He slid the photos back into the envelope in which they had come from the coroner’s office. There was something that bothered him about them, but he hadn’t been able to figure out what it was yet. Perhaps the sheer clinical gruesomeness of them, the way the numbered tags on each scrap matched up with the paragraphs in the ME’s report. In a just universe, a sentient creature shouldn’t wind up reduced to charred tissue and bone fragments. If nothing else, it proved the murderous nature of the Purists; they didn’t just seek to kill the Newcomers, they had now turned against their own species, against anyone who didn’t agree with them. The Purists had enough hatred in their bowels for everybody on this planet.
They’ll never go away, thought George gloomily. The wicked were always among us, to paraphrase one of the humans’ holy texts. One didn’t have to be a saint, human or Tenctonese, to realize that truth.
His eyes and the brain behind them ached. He knew he ought to follow Matt’s example and go home, to his own wife and family, and try to get some rest. How much good was he accomplishing here, burning himself out this way? Every lead on the Purists and whatever they might be planning had come to a dead end. The only thing he and the rest of the Bureau of Newcomer Affairs security team could do now was wait and see what Darlene Bryant’s thugs did next. Most of what a police detective did was wait, trapped in a little pool of light while evil circled closer in the darkness beyond . . .
He pushed away the autopsy file on Dr. Quinn, as though it contained—for a moment—all the cruel things in the world, that he wanted to forget. His hand reached toward the other corner of the desk for the phone; he’d already decided to call and let Susan know he’d be home soon. Maybe he could spend some time with their baby Vessna before Susan put her down for the night. And with Emily, though she’d probably be deep into her homework by now. He could find out if she’d had any more communication with her brother. He knew she was sworn to secrecy about going to see Buck, but she had ways of letting her parents know that things were going all right with him. And that’d been a big help, George admitted to himself, in smoothing things out between himself and Susan. They had talked it over, more than once, and Susan had agreed that their son needed the chance to take care of himself for a while—at least, until things got less hectic. Maybe after Matt and Cathy’s baby was born; then he’d be able to get himself transferred from this security assignment, and they could concentrate on putting all the pieces of their own family back together.
A fraction of an inch away from the phone, his hand stopped. A mental circuit had sparked complete, as his eye had caught sight of something else on his desk that he had shoved beneath the stack of paperwork that filled his In basket. Another folder, thinner than the one with Dr. Quinn’s autopsy report and photos; a corner of the single sheet of paper that this folder held peeked out, just enough to remind him of what it was.
One minute passed, then another, before George drew his hand away from the phone. Slowly, he pulled out the folder from where he had hidden it at the bottom of the pile. His hearts trembled in his chest as he flipped open the folder, and looked at the sheet of paper inside.
Perhaps I’m dreaming again. He closed his eyes, trying to will that explanation into reality. Yes . . . I went home and had dinner, and played with my kids. I’m at home, not at the station. And I went upstairs to bed, and I’m really lying beside my wife. And I’m dreaming all this.
He knew he wasn’t dreaming. With his eyes still closed, he had picked up the sheet of paper; he could feel it in his hands. He didn’t have to see it to know what was printed on it, the words framing the image at the center. A piece of his dreaming, even though this was real, and the other . . .
Was what? He no longer knew.
He folded the piece of paper where it had been creased before, then again, so it was small enough to slip into his shirt pocket.
From the hook behind his desk, he pulled his jacket off the hanger where he had carefully placed it before, brushing the lapels smooth from force of habit. He one-handed the buttons as he headed for the door.
I should have called Susan anyway, he thought as he switched off the room’s overhead lights. He knew it was going to be a while before he reached home.
A long while.
He ran into his old friend in the hallway of the station.
Literally ran into him; George was preoccupied, his thoughts a million miles away. Albert had to grab onto George’s arm to keep him from falling.
“Sorry; my apologies . . .” George mumbled the words in a distracted manner. “Very clumsy of me . . .”
“That’s okay.” Albert stepped back, then reached out to brush a speck of lint from the shoulder of George’s suit jacket. Glancing down, he saw with a pang of guilt how scuffed and in need of a shine George’s shoes were; that was the kind of thing he used to take care of, back when he had still been the station’s janitor. Not because it had been part of his official duties, but because he’d been so proud of George and what an important person he was—certainly the most important Newcomer that Albert was acquainted with. People had gone from the LAPD to the mayor’s office; Albert was sure that would happen to his friend George someday. But not with shoes in that condition. He wished he had brought his shine kit with him this evening.
“George, it’s me.” Albert had suddenly realized that George hadn’t recognized him at all. George stepped to one side of the corridor and continued on his way. “It’s Albert!”
Frowning, George looked over his shoulder at him, then blinked as though he had just woken up. “Albert . . . yes, of course.” He shook his head, an embarrassed half-smile appearing on his face. “Now I really am sorry. I just don’t know where my mind’s at these days.” He turned back and shook Albert’s hand in both of his. “It’s good to see you, Albert. How have you been?” George took a step backward, spreading his hands out as though in amazement. “You look great!”
“Yeah . . . uh, thanks.” He had to look down at himself to make sure. “I guess I do.” He poked with one finger at his own double-breasted suit, then glanced back up at George. “May bought me this.” The suit’s fabric was of a perfect dove gray, soft as air against his fingertips. May and Mr. Vogel’s incredibly thin personal assistant, a human named Brian, had dragged him to a shop on Rodeo Drive, where they had been the only customers for a whole hour of having his measurements taken and trying things on. That’d
been fun enough, until he and May had gone home and he’d seen the sales slip for the one suit the shop’s tailor had gotten ready for him, and he’d realized that the amount was bigger than any paycheck he’d ever brought home from the station. He’d nearly fainted, like back at the fancy restaurant where Vogel and Dierdorf had hired him. Now there were six more suits like this one, hanging up in his closet. “May said I needed it. Because of, uh . . .” Now he felt embarrassed. “Because of me being important and stuff. That’s what she said.”
“Nonsense.” George laid a hand on his shoulder. “You were always important, Albert. Remember that.”
“Maybe . . . maybe we could get together sometime.” Albert looked with more concern than hope at his friend. Truth was, George didn’t look so good; he looked all run-down, as though whatever he was thinking about so hard was an invisible ton of lead pressing upon him. “Maybe you and Susan could come over for dinner. May and I have a bigger place now. It wouldn’t be so cramped, like before. And, and May’s been taking these gourmet food preparation lessons over at the Tenctonese Cultural Center—you should see what she can do with buffalo spleen—”
“That’s a good idea, Albert.” The faint smile on George’s face was still there, like the flag of a defeated army. “Susan and I would love to come over.” He gave Albert’s shoulder a squeeze. “We’ll do that sometime. I promise.”
“No, no—I mean like soon.” His worry over the state of George’s health had grown. “Like . . . maybe tomorrow night.” He wondered if George just wasn’t eating right these days; maybe that was it.
“Sorry.” George shook his head. “I’m pretty busy right now. Work and all. Perhaps—”
“Or the night after that,” Albert said anxiously. “Anytime this week would be great.”
Another shake of the head. “I don’t think so. But soon.” His hand fell away from Albert’s shoulder. “Good seeing you again.” The last remnants of the smile faded as the preoccupied look settled behind George’s eyes like a dark cloud.
Albert watched in dismay as his friend, head down and shoulders hunched, headed toward the station’s exit. I should’ve been able to help, he thought glumly. Since I’m supposed to be so smart.
“There you are!” Another voice called out to him. “Been looking all over for you.”
He turned and saw Captain Grazer, hand outstretched and with a big smile on his face, striding from the opposite end of the corridor. The smile was bigger than any Albert could remember seeing when he had still been mopping the station’s floors.
Grazer seized Albert’s hand and pumped it. “How you been? I was starting to think that maybe you’d forgotten how to find the place.” Grazer rolled Albert’s lapel between his fingers. “Hey, nice suit. Come on, let’s go back to my office.”
“I was wondering . . .” Albert resisted the captain’s tug at his arm. “Do you know . . . is there something wrong with George?”
“Huh?” Grazer looked past him, to where George could be seen going out of the station. “Ah, that’s just how you get when you’re a workaholic like him. He likes it that way. Come on.”
In the captain’s office, Albert sat in the big chair pulled around in front of the desk and watched as Grazer pulled a bottle of sour milk from the bottom drawer. Albert recognized the brand. He’d recommended it to one of Precognosis’s clients.
“Care for a nip? Supposed to be the good stuff.” Grazer held the bottle up. “At least, I hear that’s what you told the folks. Me, I wouldn’t know.” His smile widened, becoming even more ingratiating. “I’ll just stick to the single malts for now.”
“Thanks . . . but no.” Albert shook his head. “I drove over here.”
“No more riding the bus for you, huh? That’s great. I sure hope you passed your driver’s test—” Grazer laughed as he stowed the bottle away. “I’d hate to have to arrest an old pal!”
“I got my license. I studied.”
“I’m sure you did; just kidding.” Grazer picked up the cigar from the ashtray on his desk. “What kind of car you got?”
He shrugged. “I don’t know. They gave it to me. The people I work for did.” He searched his memory but couldn’t come up with anything. “It’s a new one,” he said helpfully.
“Yeah, well, you make sure they gave you a nice one. Don’t let those bastards cheap out on you. You deserve the best.” Grazer leaned back in his chair, eyes narrowing as he meditated on the cloud of smoke he had just exhaled. He pointed with the cigar toward Albert. “You know why I asked you to come here tonight?”
He didn’t, but he hadn’t let it bother him. Nowadays, people were always asking him to go someplace or another. It was one of the pleasant parts of the job—he got to see a lot of different places and meet people who acted happy to see him. “No, you didn’t tell—”
Grazer interrupted him. “It’s the future,” he said, his voice going deep and mysterious-sounding. “That’s what it is. That’s what you deal in, don’t you, Albert?”
“I guess so . . .”
“Well, Albert, so do I. That’s one of the great things about police work, isn’t it?” Grazer didn’t wait for an answer. “Detective work, like some of those little things you did for us. It’s all basically the same principle that’s involved. We analyze the past—a crime—so we can create the future: the arrest of the criminal. And thus we go from a state of potentiality to one of actuality.”
“Gosh.” Albert wasn’t sure he knew exactly what Captain Grazer meant, though a lot of it sounded like stuff that Vogel had talked about. The future and everything.
“Tell me, Albert—” Grazer leaned across the desk, bringing the glowing tip of the cigar closer to Albert’s face. “Did you get that package I sent you?”
He nodded. The smoke from the captain’s cigar made his eyes water.
“Did you look through all that stuff in there?”
“Well . . .” He felt even more uncomfortable. It was always interesting getting a package delivered to you, and one from an old friend—he had thought that maybe it was some kind of present from everybody at the station, or maybe something of his that he had forgotten to pack up and take with him when he quit. But instead the box had held a book, a big fat one with a glossy cover and Captain Grazer’s photo on the back, and a dozen audio cassettes. He had tried reading the book, but hadn’t been able to get through even the first couple of pages; it was full of that same kind of language, stuff about the future and making possible things real. The cassettes were even more disappointing. He had hoped they would have music on them—he had gotten to like human music nearly as much as an old Tenctonese visahooli—or maybe a good mystery novel read aloud, like some of the tapes May had gotten him for when he was driving around in the car. But instead, they had all been full of Grazer reading stuff from his book in a carefully intense voice. Albert had fast-forwarded through a couple of the tapes, and there had been some even weirder stuff, all about closing his eyes and ‘visualizing’ the future, like it was some place you could go visit. He had tried doing what Grazer’s voice on the tapes told him to do, but had wound up falling asleep.
“That’s okay,” said Grazer. He tapped the ash from his cigar. “I know you probably haven’t had a chance to get through more than, say, the first ten or twelve chapters. Rome wasn’t built in a day, Albert. GIT is a big concept; it’s understandable that it takes a while to get a grasp of it. Especially for somebody of your . . . well, your particular talents, that is. That’s why I put in the set of tapes for you. Great, huh? Technology in the service of actualizing the future. So easily assimilated, you hardly have to pay attention at all. Like having your head turbo-charged. I knew you’d like those.”
“Um . . . yeah.” Albert nodded slowly. “They were . . . really great.”
“Thanks. A lot of thought went into them. A lot of work went into the whole package, Albert. I’ve been working on GIT for a long time. Years, Albert, years. I like to think of it as my contribution to humanity—and Newcomer
s, too, of course. A breakthrough in conceptual dynamics, a whole new system of organizing the processes of sentient effort.”
Albert nodded. He recognized some of those phrases from the little bit of the book he had been able to read. He didn’t want the captain to think he wasn’t paying attention to all these ideas. They probably really are good ideas, he thought. Since Captain Grazer had them and all.
“But it’s hard, Albert. It’s hard.” Grazer had swivelled his chair around so he could gaze out the window behind him. The streetlights had come on and the tall downtown buildings glowed in the distance. “Now I know how Napoleon must have felt. Or Oppenheimer. Any of those genius-type guys who were so tragically misunderstood in their time.” The expression on Grazer’s face turned dark and brooding as he puffed at the cigar. “The world doesn’t appreciate real breakthrough ideas like this, Albert. Not at first, anyway.” He swung the chair back around. “But that’s why I asked you to come here tonight. Why I wanted to talk to you. I think . . .” He punctuated his words with jabbing motions of the cigar. “I think there’s a way we can help each other, Albert . . .”
“Oh.” He had started to get a suspicion of what else the captain was talking about.
“Yes, indeed . . .” Grazer nodded, his gaze turning inward to some glorious vista that—for the moment at least—only he could see. “That’s part of what GIT is all about. People helping other people. To evolve, to grow . . . to bring the future into reality. The way you can help me, Albert . . .”
He hoped he was wrong. He hoped the captain wasn’t going to ask him what he was afraid would be the case.
“Yes . . . the future . . .” Grazer leaned back in his chair, filling the air above himself with blue-gray smoke. “You and me . . . it’ll be great . . .”
Albert felt his hearts sinking inside himself. He wished his friend George were here, or just somewhere around in the station. He could talk to him, and George would tell him what he should do.
But George was gone. He felt like he was all alone in Captain Grazer’s office, like he was drowning here inside his expensive suit. The captain was still talking but he couldn’t really hear anything that was being said, as though all those grand words were a transmission from another planet, too distant to make out.
