by Eric Brown
She was Indian, flat chested and stooped, with a hawk-like beak of a nose and pockmarked cheeks.
The impression she gave, Vaughan thought, was that of the Grim Reaper customised for the late twenty-first century, scythe replaced by a laser strapped to her anorexic waist.
Javinder... Vaughan knew, then, where he’d heard the name before.
“Kulpa?” the woman said, ignoring both Kapinsky and Vaughan.
“Javinder... My boss told me you were on your way.” The big Sikh seemed deferential, as if overawed in the presence of the telepath. He indicated the corpse and escorted Javinder across the patio.
Vaughan turned to Kapinsky. “Javinder. Ring a bell?”
She shook her head. “Should it?”
“Think back to the interview with Shelenkov. She said she was questioned by a private investigator.”
“Javinder,” Kapinsky said.
“So Javinder’s linked Mulraney’s killing and this one.”
“Not necessarily. It might just be coincidence.” Kapinsky stopped, then said, “What the hell’s she doing?”
As Vaughan watched, the Indian telepath stood beside the lounger containing the corpse, then knelt. She reached out with long, black-nailed fingers and laid her hand across the dead man’s brow.
The she closed her eyes as if in concentration.
Something turned cold within Vaughan’s stomach.
“What the fuck’s she doing?” Kapinsky hissed at him.
He knew very well what she was doing—and at the same time he knew that what she was doing was impossible, this long after the subject’s death.
Not looking at Kapinsky, but staring at the attenuated Indian as she bowed her head as if in pain, he said, “She’s a necropath.”
“Come again?”
“A necropath. She can read the minds of the dead.”
Kapinsky stared at him. “How the hell do you know that?”
“Seen them on the movies,” he wisecracked. He almost told her that, years ago, back in Canada, he’d been implanted with the hardware to read dead minds, and had done so for the Toronto homicide division before he’d burned out.
She said, “I’ve read about them, of course. Knew they were around. Never thought I’d see one in action.”
You’re not, Vaughan thought. He knew that what they were witnessing here was nothing more than an elaborate charade.
He looked at Kapinsky. “How long’s Nordquist been dead?”
She glanced at her handset. “Nearly three hours.”
Indira was putting on an act. He knew he was right, knew that he was onto something.
The woman was genuflecting before the corpse, her fingers spanning its head like some psychic healer. She let out a low moan, then a sob, and broke the connection.
She remained kneeling, motionless, her head hanging, for perhaps a minute.
Around her, Kulpa and the SoC team watched in silence like the chorus in a Greek tragedy.
At length, Javinder rose to her feet, towering over Kulpa, and took a long, deep breath. The two conferred for a while, the sergeant nodding from time to time. The expression on his face comprised awe with supreme gratitude.
“Wonder what the hell she read,” Kapinsky murmured.
“I wonder,” Vaughan echoed, sarcastic.
A minute later the tall Indian turned on her heel and strode off towards the air-car, something imperious in her disregard of the onlookers.
Kulpa joined them. “I thought you might like to see that,” he said, as if he had personally stage-managed the private performance of a world-famous diva.
Kapinsky said, “She was a necropath, right?” Across the patio, the air-car fired up and rose into the air, banking away over the ocean
Kulpa nodded. “Right. Quite something, ah-cha?”
Aware of his pulse, Vaughan said, “What did she tell you?”
“She said she accessed his dying thoughts. They were weak, but readable. As we knew, Nordquist was in financial difficulties. He owed a lot of people a lot of money. He was the guy who killed Kormier and Travers—but his other debtors were queuing up... he couldn’t think of another way out, except for...” He gestured towards the suicide and fell silent.
Vaughan chose his next question carefully. “And do you know who she was working for, sergeant?”
Kulpa nodded. “She was hired by the multicolonial, Scheering-Lassiter. The murder victims Kormier and Travers were employed by S-L. They wanted it cleared up.”
And they’ve got it cleared up, very neatly, Vaughan thought. But they’d staged this little display of duplicity without reckoning that one of the audience might know something about how necropaths worked.
He walked away from Kulpa and Kapinsky, around the pool, and came to the balcony rail. He gripped it, leaning over and staring at the scintillating expanse of the Bay of Bengal.
He felt good, secure in the knowledge that he was right, that he knew now, for sure, who was responsible for the deaths of Kormier, Travers, Nordquist, and before them Dana Mulraney.
Kapinsky joined him. “Vaughan? What is it?”
His answering smile turned to laughter.
Kapinsky said, “You okay?”
“I’m fine. Never felt better.”
“You going to explain yourself?”
He nodded. “Sure. She, Javinder, was faking it.”
“What?”
“She didn’t read Nordquist’s dead mind.”
She looked dubious. “And you’d know, would you?”
He held her gaze. “Too damned right I’d know, Kapinsky.”
She sneered. “The holo-movies, right? You’ve seen necros work on the movies?”
He ignored the jibe. “She didn’t read Nordquist,” he said. “What she told Kulpa was bullshit. She’s working for Scheering, right? So of course she’d tell him that Nordquist was in deep shit financially.”
“Vaughan, for Chrissake.” She shook her head, exasperated. “What makes you think—”
He interrupted, reaching out suddenly and gripped her upper arm. She winced as he pulled her to him and hissed, “She was bullshitting. That performance, kneeling and pretending to read Nordquist, it was a fake—”
“How the hell do you know, Vaughan?”
“Because you can’t read dead minds after three fucking hours, Kapinsky. One hour, maybe you can pick up weak signals, the odd deep memory, but even then you’d be lucky. Three hours... forget it. The brain’s so much dead meat. Stone cold. There’s nothing firing in there, the synapses have long since given up the ghost.”
“Like I said, Vaughan. How the hell do you know this?”
He hesitated, looking at her. Even if he told her, she wouldn’t believe him. There was only one way to prove that Javinder had faked the reading.
“Okay, listen.” He looked around. Kulpa and the SoC team were clearing up around the corpse. “Years ago, before I came to the Station, I worked for the Toronto Homicide Department. I was a necropath.”
She stared at him, her expression combining revulsion and respect. “Straight up?”
“We got to the scene an hour after the crime, and we might be lucky. Any later and we were chasing shadows. Two hours and the investigating officer wouldn’t even call us in.”
Kapinsky was watching him, doubt in her eyes.
Vaughan said, “There’s one way I can prove it,” he said.
He lifted his handset. “I’ll switch my shield off, okay? You can go in, access my memories. You can read for yourself that necropaths are fucked if the corpse is two hours cold.”
She held his gaze. “I think I believe you,” she said, her expression indicating that she’d rather not access his memories of reading dead minds.
“Like hell you do,” he said, and swiftly tapped in the code to kill his shield.
He thought back to his Toronto days, to the last corpse he’d scanned, then opened up to her his knowledge of a working necropath.
Seconds later she reeled away, holdi
ng her temple. “Christ, Vaughan,” she said, gripping the rail for support.
He activated his shield, staring at her.
She took a breath and straightened up. “Okay, okay... So Scheering is hiding something.”
He smiled. “It isn’t just a hunch any more. Now we know. Javinder was hired to put us off the trail.”
He paused, then said, “We’ve got to scan Denning, Kapinsky. We’ve got to find out what the bastards are up to on Mallory.”
* * * *
FIFTEEN
I AM HORTAVAN
Pham sat in the gnarled root system of an old banyan tree on the edge of Gandhi Park, Level Three, and stared out across the flat lawns and paths. It was a smaller park than Ketsuwan, and not so busy—the perfect place for Pham to hide from the killer. She had spent the past two nights not on a bench, which was too open and obvious, but in the cover of the banyan.
Yesterday, Khar had helped her win more money. A card sharp in a nearby corridor had set up a small table, taking money from gullible passers-by who thought they could guess which card came next in a certain sequence. Pham, guided by Khar, had guessed right three times running, and won over two hundred baht, before the angry card sharp had refused to allow her to play anymore.
She had celebrated with a big Thai meal in a proper restaurant overlooking the park. Afterwards, in the shade of the banyan, she had tried to question Khar, but the thing in her head had remained stubbornly silent.
This morning, she tried again.
“Khar,” she said. “Please talk to me.”
She waited. There was no answering voice in her head.
She said, “Do you realise that it’s rude not to reply when you’re spoken to, Khar? There you are, living in my head, enjoying yourself thanks to me, and you don’t even have the good manners to be polite. What would your mother say, if you had a mother?”
Silence. Pham grew angry. “Khar! Why won’t you talk to me?”
Just when she thought Khar was not going to reply, the voice sounded in her head. Because it’s safer if I don’t, it said.
“Safer?” she asked, glad that it had spoken, but puzzled by what it said.
The less you know, the less there is for the killer to read.
She thought about that. “The killer’s a telepath?”
Correct.
The silence stretched. That was bad. It was bad enough that the killer was trying to find her, but even worse that the killer was a mind-reader too.
“Khar,” she asked at last, knowing that the thing in her head would not answer her question. “Just what are you?”
Evidently Khar was considering whether to tell her. At last it said, As the telepath knows this already, there is no danger in telling you. I am a Hortavan, a being from another world.
Pham shook her head in wonder. “Am I going mad, or do I have an alien in my head?”
You are quite sane, Pham.
She laughed, but it was a nervous laugh. “Why did the telepath kill the man in the park?”
Because he, the telepath, wanted me dead.
Pham thought about that. “Which is why the killer is trying to find me, ah-cha? He read my mind when you got into my head, and now he wants to kill me—and you.”
That is correct. I am sorry.
Pham shrugged. “I don’t know what to say. I’ve never had an alien in my head before—and I’ve never been chased by a killer. You said that soon you’ll move on?”
That is correct. In time, I will leave you. You will be safe, then.
She thought about her next question, then said, “Why does the telepath want to kill you, Khar?”
Silence. “Khar? Please answer me.”
At last the voice came again.Because I am opposed to what the telepath’s employers are doing on my planet.
Pham frowned, thinking through Khar’s words. “What are they doing?” she asked at last.
It will be best, and safer for you, if you do not know that.
“Ah-cha,” she said, nodding. “But can you tell me what you are doing on Earth?”
I... I am trying to locate someone , Khar said.
“Who?” she asked.
Again, it would be dangerous to tell you that.
“But it could only be dangerous,” she said, frowning in concentration, “if a telepath read what I know.”
Correct.
“Well—” she made a spread-fingered gesture of frustration. “Why wouldn’t it be dangerous if a telepath read your thoughts?”
That is impossible. My thoughts cannot be read by humans. My mind is too alien.
Pham shrugged. “So how come I can communicate with you?”
She felt, then, what might have been a smile in her head. Because I have studied your mind, Khar replied, and I am communicating with you in your own language. I am reading your thoughts—you are not reading mine.
That made a kind of sense. She asked, “How long will you stay in my head, Khar?”
Until I have found who I am looking for.
“Any idea how long that might be?”
No, Khar responded, and then fell silent.
Pham sat in the roots of the banyan tree and watched life go on around her. All these people were leading their own very important lives, going about their business, and not one of them knew about her and the alien in her head. It made her feel proud and important... and also a little scared.
She was about to ask Khar which planet it came from, when its voice sounded in her head. It was the first time that Khar had asked her something.
Pham, do you trust me?
It was odd, but she had never thought about that before. She felt no fear of the thing in her head— never had—and Khar had helped her win money, after all.
She shrugged. “Ah-cha. I think so, yes.”
Will you help me find who I am looking for?
She thought about that. “Will it be dangerous?”
A few seconds elapsed, and then Khar replied, I will attempt to make it as safe as possible.
“So it will be dangerous.”
It might be.
Pham thought about it. “Thing is, you can control me, right? So even if I said I didn’t want to help me, you could make me do it.”
I would not force you to do anything, Pham. If you refuse, which is entirely reasonable, then I will move on, find someone else.
It was Pham’s turn to be silent for a time, now. She considered what Khar had said. How would she feel, not having the special alien in her head? She would miss him, his conversation and his help. Khar had become a kind of friend.
Of course, if she agreed to help him, then she would be in danger, no matter what Khar said.
She smiled to herself. Until now, she had always thought of Khar as an “it”. Now she realised that she thought of Khar as “him”.
She said, “This person you’re looking for... I know you can’t tell me who it is, but can you tell me if he’s bad?”
Khar replied, Yes, he is bad.
She considered this, then said, “Then I’ll help you, Khar.” She paused. “I bet you knew that—I bet you read my thoughts—even before I answered, an-cha?”
Pham felt the smile in her head again.
She said, “So... how do we find this person you’re looking for?”
* * * *
She took a ‘chute up to Level One, then walked to a train station and caught a northbound express to Kandalay. At first, leaving the safety of Gandhi Park, she felt afraid, vulnerable. She thought that everyone was looking at her, that everyone knew she had an alien riding in her head. She also thought that at any minute the telepathic killer would find her again, and this time he wouldn’t just call out her name, but shoot her dead.
But as the train carried her rapidly north, and no one in the carriage paid her the slightest attention, she realised that she was safe. She was one small girl among millions of people, and even if the killer could read her mind, he would have to find her first.
When the tr
ain pulled into Kandalay station, she left the carriage with the rest of the passengers and found herself on a wide, quiet street lined with grand houses and flashy air-cars. Pham had never seen such a quiet, unpopulated area before—it was even quieter than Gandhi Park. She tried to imagine living in one of the big houses along this street— they were bigger even than Mr Prakesh’s factory. Twenty people could live in one of these houses quite comfortably. She thought of her bunk on Level Twenty. In these houses she would have a room to herself.
