The Mandel Files, Volume 1

by Peter F. Hamilton

  ‘But Wolf knew Kendric,’ Greg said. ‘Weird.’

  ‘Not really,’ said Gabriel. ‘The organizer is their link, a one-way databus who passes on all Kendric’s intelligence to Wolf. But there’s no return flow, Wolf has nothing Kendric needs to know. And Kendric would’ve told the organizer that you’d confronted him, that you knew about Wolf. So the organizer fixed for the sniper. Morgan here is right, Greg. We can’t get rid of Kendric, he’s your only hard lead left. In fact he ought to watch out, the organizer must realize that, too.’

  ‘Shit,’ Greg muttered in frustration. ‘Kendric won’t take us to the organizer, not now. He’s too smart. They’ll never contact each other again.’

  Gabriel opened her eyes. ‘Snatch him,’ she said flatly. ‘That’s your only option. Snatch Kendric. Interrogate him. Snuff him.’

  ‘Risky,’ said Walshaw. ‘A quick clean kill is one thing, snatches have a tendency to get messy no matter how good the hardliners you use. Lots of questions asked.’

  ‘My precognition would make sure there’s no mess.’

  ‘I’ll authorize it,’ Julia said firmly.

  Greg hadn’t seen her emerge from Walshaw’s office. But now she stood in the corridor, head held high, in complete control of herself, as if the bomb-blast of Katerina had never happened. No longer the ivory-tower habitué but very much the Princess Regent. Some small part of him mourned the passing of the timid, sweet girl he’d first met on a sunny March day. Innocence was the most appealing of human traits.

  Morgan Walshaw shifted uneasily as Julia’s chillingly bright gaze turned on him, demanding. ‘If that’s what it takes to sort this out, then that’s what’ll happen,’ she said. ‘It’s bad enough having Kendric coming at me like this, but unknown enemies as well, that’s totally out. I’m not having it. And the snatch is the way to unmask them. That bastard Kendric has been banking that we won’t fight him on his own level. Well, his credit has just run out.’

  ‘Julia—’ Walshaw said.

  ‘No arguments, just do it!’

  Greg could see how much effort it took Walshaw to retain control, no espersense needed for that.

  ‘It isn’t up to me, Miss Evans.’

  Julia realized she might’ve overstepped the limit. ‘I’m sorry, Morgan. It’s Kats, you see, she keeps asking for him. Doesn’t say anything else. Bastard. I think she’ll have to be sedated.’

  ‘OK.’ He raised a cybofax and muttered into it. ‘Doctor’s on her way.’

  ‘Who then?’ Julia asked. ‘Who is it up to?’

  Walshaw looked at Greg. ‘That’s you, Greg. If it’s to be done, it’s to be done properly. Would you interrogate him?’

  Greg had seen it coming, ever since Gabriel blurted the idea of a snatch. It’d given him a few seconds to chew the proposition. He spread his palms wide. ‘Preparations wouldn’t hurt. Mind you, I’d be physically incapable of interrogating anyone for a couple of days anyway. That might give us enough time to analyse the Crays’ data. See if we can’t find some leads in them. Ellis should’ve left one.’

  He noticed Julia’s face had gone blank, focusing inwards. Must be using her nodes, running their arguments through analysis, battling the pros and cons against each other, trying to reach the conclusions ahead of them. In a way it was a power similar to Gabriel’s.

  ‘We’re going through the Crays now,’ said Walshaw. ‘Although I don’t know what the hell you did to one of them, it crashed one of our lightware crunchers when we plugged it in, bloody thing is so much rubbish now. The other two Crays are clean, although it’ll take time to make sure there aren’t any concealed wipe instructions buried in them.’

  ‘What have you got so far?’ Greg asked.

  ‘Ellis had quite an extraordinary accumulation of data, everything from minutely detailed personal dossiers through to industrial templates. Trivia and ultra-hush all jumbled together. It’s going to take some sifting, even with the light-ware crunchers hooked in.’

  ‘What did you mean, Ellis should’ve left a lead?’ Julia asked.

  ‘Standard practice,’ Greg explained. ‘If you’re plugging into those kind of deals you cover your back. Benign blackmail, to make sure your partners don’t get any funny ideas afterwards. There’ll be a record of all the burns he arranged as Wolf; money, clients, the names of his hotrod team; data he bought and sold as Medeor, names, companies. Every damning byte. And it’ll be somewhere where it can be found after he’s dead. In the Crays, the Hitachi terminal’s memory core, his cybofax, public data core on a time delay, hell, even an envelope left with a lawyer.’

  ‘Nothing else?’ Julia asked.

  ‘Pardon?’

  ‘You don’t think there’s anything else important in the Crays?’

  For some reason her slightly querulous attitude made him aware of how immensely tired he was. He was travelling on buzz energy, had been for hours, and it was running out fast now they’d got Katerina back.

  ‘I wouldn’t know, I expect they’re a goldmine of illegal circuit activity.’

  ‘That’s all?’ Julia was leaning forward, studying his face intently. He had the uncomfortable impression he was being judged. Crime unknown. And, frankly, he didn’t give a shit.

  ‘All I can think of, yeah.’

  Dr Taylor stepped out of the lift, accompanied by Victor who was carrying her case. She was a young woman wearing a plain cerise trouser suit, her dark hair French pleated. She had a quick word with Morgan Walshaw and went into his office. Julia started to follow, but the security chief laid a light restraining hand on her arm. For a moment she looked like she’d rebel, then nodded meekly. Victor closed the door softly after he’d gone through.

  ‘Thank you for bringing Kats back to me, Greg,’ Julia said, abruptly all humble contrition.

  Greg gave up trying to find motives for her oscillating moods. She was on an emotional rollercoaster; depressed by Katerina, frightened by Kendric, trusting in him, Gabriel, and Walshaw to deliver her from evil. Poor kid.

  ‘It hurts so much just seeing her,’ Julia said. ‘Serves me right, I suppose.’ She reached round her neck with both hands and unhooked a slim gold chain. ‘For you. From me. And you don’t even have to give me a kiss for it.’ She favoured him with a sly weary smile.

  It was a St Christopher pendant, solid gold.

  ‘Well, put it on then,’ Julia said.

  He mimicked a grin, feeling itchy under Gabriel’s heartily bemused eye, and fastened it round his own neck. The little disk was warm on his skin as it slithered down beneath the open neck of his crisp dress shirt.

  ‘To keep the demons at bay,’ Julia said. ‘Even though you’re not a believer.’

  Greg pulled out of the finance division’s nearly deserted car park, turning the Duo west on to the artificial lava surface of the A47. There was a single car in front of them. It wasn’t quite dawn. The gross Event Horizon sign splashed the surrounding land with a guttering medley of coloured light.

  ‘I feel sorry for that girl, you know,’ Gabriel said. She was looking out of the window at the clumps of hermes oak scrub along the side of the road. Beyond the bushes was a near-vertical drop to the ruffled waters of the estuary. In the distance were the dark shapes of the hydro-turbine islands, moonglazed foam rumbling round them.

  ‘Katerina! Who wouldn’t?’ Greg said.

  ‘No, Katerina is pure survivor breed. I meant Julia; she has no real family, few friends her own age. And you’re on the borderline yourself, now, despite her token of esteem.’

  ‘How do you figure that?’

  ‘If Ellis hasn’t left anything in the Crays, or whatever, about Kendric or the organizer, how do you think she’ll feel about you? You’ve managed to be right all the way so far. She trusts you because of that. Implicitly. Screw up now and it’ll all end in tears.’

  ‘Not a chance. I know Ellis’s type down to his last chromosome. A hyper-worrier. He’s a little-man intermediary who’s lucked into a real super-rank underclass operation; elate
d and terrified all at once. He’ll have taken precautions. That means a way of pointing his finger from beyond the grave.’

  ‘Oh, yeah?’

  ‘Yep. Ellis’s major problem was that he never got round to telling his paymasters he was insured.’ Greg slowed as the car in front turned off on to the sliproad for the bridge ahead, then accelerated again as the cutting walls rose on either side.

  Gabriel said: ‘I still don’t think Ellis would take such—’

  The front nearside tyre blew out.

  The Duo veered violently to the left, straight towards the near-vertical slope of the cutting. Greg saw sturdy grey-white saplings, impaled in the headlight beams, lurching towards him. The steering-wheel twisted, wrenching at his hands, nearly breaking his grip. He jerked it back as hard as he could, with little or no effect. The Duo’s three remaining tyres fought for traction on the coarse cellulose surface. It was slewing sideways, screeching hard. A flamboyant fan of orange sparks unfolded across the offside window. That alpine-steep incline was sliding across the windscreen, rushing up on the side of the Duo. Horribly close. They’d spun nearly full circle and Greg could feel the tilt beginning as the car began to turn turtle. Then there was a boneshaker impact, a damp thud, and they were disorientatingly, motionless. Silence crashed down.

  Soon broken.

  ‘Shitfire,’ Gabriel yelped. She was staring wild-eyed out of the windscreen, drawing breath in juddering gulps. ‘I didn’t know!’ She whipped round to look at him, frantic, frightened, entreating. Which was something he’d never ever seen in her before. And that alarmed him more than the blow-out.

  ‘I didn’t know, Greg! There was nothing. Nothing, fuck it! Do you understand?’

  ‘Calm down.’

  ‘Nothing!’

  ‘So what! You’re tired, and I’m knackered. It’s only a bloody tyre gone pop, small wonder you didn’t see it. Non-event.’ Even as he spoke he could feel some submerged memory struggling for recognition. Something about the tyre-performance guarantee. Puncture proof? That bonded silicon rubber was tough stuff.

  Thankfully, Gabriel subsided into a feverish silence; eyelids tightly shuttered, mind roaming ahead. Did she suffer visions of her gland pumping furiously? He’d never asked.

  Greg concentrated on his hands, still clenching the wheel, white-knuckled. They wouldn’t let go.

  What appeared to be a eucalyptus branch was lying across the windscreen. Its purple and grey leaves shone dully in the waning rouge emissions from the office block’s sign.

  Looking out of his side window he could see the bridge nearly directly overhead. They’d only just missed crashing into the concrete support wall.

  ‘Greg—’ Gabriel said in a low frightened moan.

  Upright shapes were moving purposefully through the dusky shadows outside the sharp cone of light thrown by the Duo’s one remaining headlight.

  Greg stared disbelievingly at them for one terrible drawn-out second. ‘Out!’ he shouted. His door opened easily enough and he was diving out, racing for the back of the Duo. A mini-avalanche of loose earth and gravel had digested the rear of the car. His hands flapped across his dinner jacket, hitting every pocket. Panicking. Trying to remember where the fuck he’d left the Armscor stunshot.

  There were three of them approaching; two men, one woman. Walking down the middle of the road with a glacial panache, cool and unhurried. A confidence that’d tilted over into sublime arrogance.

  The Armscor had gone, swept away by the tide of pitiful sloppiness he was screwing his life with. Given it to Victor? Suzi? Left it in Walshaw’s office?

  He stuck his head above the Duo’s roof, ducking down quickly. The ambush team was closing in remorselessly, empty silhouettes against that idiotic phallic sign and its happy floating Disney projections. They were still carefully avoiding the headlight beam.

  Gabriel’s door was jammed up against the earth of the cutting; her frantic shoving couldn’t budge it more than halfway open. The gap wasn’t nearly large enough for her bulk.

  One of the men levelled a slender long-barrelled rifle at her. Greg squirrelled away his profile: leather trousers tucked into calf-high lace-up boots, last-century camouflage jacket, blind plastic band of a photon amp clinging to his face, designer stubble, small pony tail.

  ‘Mine,’ the man said.

  A narrow streak of liquid green flame spewing from the end of the rifle, and Gabriel was jerking about epileptically.

  Greg turned and ran for the slope of crumbling earth, clawing at the dense treacherous scrub lassoing his legs, keeping low. The eucalyptus saplings were neatly pruned, a bulbous flare of foliage on top and bare slim boles, providing a meagre cover. He grabbed hold of them in a steady swinging rhythm, hauling himself upwards, feet scrabbling for purchase. The embankment seemed to stretch out for ever.

  It was an animal flight. Blind instinct, equating the sliproad at the top of the embankment with the grail of sanctuary. Pathetic, some minute core of sanity mocked.

  ‘There,’ came the triumphant shout from below.

  The shot caught him three metres short of the summit, where the saplings and scrub had given way to a bald mat of grass which bordered the sliproad. The pain seared down his nerves like a lava flow. He saw his arms windmilling insanely, fingers extended like albino starfish.

  As he fell there was just one question looping through his brain. Why hadn’t Gabriel known?

  32

  Greg woke to find he couldn’t move. His toes and fingers were tingling, not so much pins and needles as pokers and knives; the aftermath of a stunshot charge. Arms and legs ached dully. Guts knotted tight, rumbling ominously. A livid collection of aggravated bruises and scrapes.

  His cortical node prevented the worst peaks of neural fire from stabbing into his brain, but the cumulative effect was atrocious.

  He opened his eyes, seeing greyness distorted by octagonal splash patterns. His whole body was quivering now, drumming against whatever hard surface he was lying on. The tingling bloomed into a sandpaper rasp which the cortical node hurriedly muted.

  Consciousness seemed like nothing but constant suffering. He instructed the node to disengage his nerves altogether. Sensation fell away, leaving him alone in grey nothingness. He closed his eyes and slept.

  At the second awakening his thoughts were clearer. He’d stopped bucking, still on his back and unable to move. Genuine tactile sensation had replaced the tingling. The surface he was lying on was vibrating faintly. Heavy machinery, somewhere not too far away. A stifled monotonous hum backed the supposition.

  He opened his eyes again, focusing slowly.

  Gabriel was lying beside him, shuddering, in the throes of stunshot backlash. Her mouth gaped, drooling beads of saliva.

  Greg tried to reach out to her, found his hands were immobilized under his back. There was a rigid bracelet about each wrist, bolted to the floor; it was the same for his ankles.

  Bloody uncomfortable.

  They were in a small empty compartment, metal walls, metal floor, metal ceiling. Painted grey. The only light was coming through a grille in the door.

  Greg blinked at that door, haunted by its familiarity. It was rectangular with curved corners, fastened by bulky latches. The last time he’d seen that particular arrangement was on board the Mirriam. ‘Oh, shit.’ And under way too, by the sound of it.

  Thinking logically, they’d have to be heading down the Nene. Or up? No, the river wasn’t deep enough to take the Mirriam west of Peterborough. The Wash and the open sea, then.

  Next question: Why?

  Not just to dump them overboard. There were far simpler ways to dispose of bodies. Besides Kendric had gone to a great deal of trouble snatching them alive.

  Nothing pleasant, hundred per cent cert.

  ‘Greg?’ Gabriel’s voice was tiny, fearful. ‘Greg, it’s gone.’

  ‘What has?’ His own voice wasn’t much better. ‘No, wait, think before you speak. Remember they’ll probably be listening.’

/>   ‘Bugger that. My precognition won’t work. I don’t know what’s going to happen to us.’

  ‘You really gave your gland a workout snatching Katerina, remember? We all have to throttle back occasionally, nature never intended our brains to take the psi strain.’

  ‘Shut up and listen, arsehole. There is absolutely nothing. I can’t see a second into the future. I don’t even know what you’re going to say!’ He could hear the fright bubbling through her voice. She was holding back a long, terrified scream.

  Hear it, but not sense it.

  The corrosive throb of overdriven synapses had faded, he must’ve been out for several hours. He’d recuperated enough to use the gland again. It began to discharge a murky cloud of neurohormones. But that secret gate into the psi universe remained firmly shut. He couldn’t even perceive the glow of Gabriel’s mind, not fifty centimetres from his own. Impossible. His skin crawled, goose bumps rising at the black sense of deprivation. Mortal again. After fifteen years it was hard.

  ‘Me too,’ Greg said. ‘Not a peep.’

  The breath came out of her in a woosh. She let her head rest on the decking, staring into a private purgatory. ‘What have they done to us, Greg?’

  ‘They haven’t done anything to us. You were using precognition right up until the Duo crashed. We didn’t eat anything dodgy, we certainly weren’t infused with anything.’

  ‘What then?’

  ‘Must be something which affects psi directly.’

  ‘What?’ she shouted.

  ‘I don’t fucking know. Ask Kendric, he’s the one into pilfering new discoveries before they even make it out of the laboratory.’

  Gabriel closed rheumy eyes in anguish. ‘Funny, I always thought I didn’t want to see the end coming. Now I’m sure it is coming I’d like to see it. Not knowing is too much like cold turkey.’

  ‘Silly girl. You just want to see which of our escape plans works the best.’

  ‘Escape plans,’ she snorted in a resigned amusement which nudged disapprobation. ‘Sure, Greg. Sure.’ After a while she asked, ‘What do you think they want us for?’