The Scorpion Game

by Daniel Jeffries

  Hoskin turned around and passed through the Farm’s internal energy barrier. Quinlin popped up on his innervision. He must have told the Farm to let him know if Hoskin got back.

  “Where the fuck you been?” flashed Quinlin.

  “Crashed out.”

  “Clarenza wants us upstairs now. She’s ready to go on a rampage and Chief’s up there too.”

  “All right. I’m on my way.”

  “Are you wearing the same damn clothes you had on yesterday? Why don’t you stop by my office and grab a Qwik-Bath spray? I can smell your ass from here.”

  ***

  Quinlin’s office was absurdly clean and organized, but Hoskin had no idea where the damn spray was, so he just started opening drawers. The bottom one was stuffed with light pens, old arrays, soaps, mem-cubes, a dress sock. Guess messes have to go somewhere, even for the organized. A movement caught his eye. It was a small amulet, with a holographic red sun rising in it, a Deos symbol. He picked it up.

  As far as he knew, Quinlin had never gone to a church in his life. And hadn’t he said he wasn’t sure what that symbol meant the other day? Hoskin put it back. He’d ask Quin about it later.

  He found the Qwik-Bath spore spray right where a woman would have put it, in a small medicine cabinet in the office bathroom, arranged with other sprays and bottles in perfect rows. Hoskin sprayed himself down and then cut over to his office to put on some fresh clothes.

  Azusa Newtype popped up on his office wall while he was still naked.

  “Niiiiiicce,” said the forensics tech, her head tilted to the side, watching him with her rapidly blinking bird eyes.

  “I know you’ve been waiting a long time for this,” said Hoskin with a smirk.

  He put on some underwear.

  “And my lifelong fantasies have now been fulfilled,” she said.

  “Did you just come to satisfy the inner voyeur or you actually got something to say?” he said, pulling on pants.

  “Hold on, I’m still overwhelmed by your magnificence. Let a girl catch her breath.”

  “Come on, whadda ya got?” he said and pulled on a t-shirt.

  “If you listened to your messages—”

  “Well I didn’t—”

  “Is that a new shirt? I better put out an alert, now I know you’re not Dante,” said Azusa.

  “Whadda ya got, girl? I gotta get upstairs.”

  “Those flecks you brought in the other day.”

  “Yeah.”

  “They’re pore projectors.”

  “What?”

  “Pore projectors. Not like I’d know this—but they’re popular with pornstars.” She smiled. “Expensive. Let’s the girls shift their appearance to look like whatever the guy or girl wants them to look like. Where’d you get ‘em?”

  “Pornstars? Who else would use ‘em? Hookers?”

  “Makes sense. Sure. I don’t know. I guess anyone who wanted to change their appearance often. They’re not cheap though and not easy to put in. You need ‘em everywhere and they still need to leave room for your pores to breathe.”

  “Thanks, woman. I’ll make sure not to let anyone know what you’re really doing up there, when they think you’re working.”

  He flashed the screen off before she could say anything back. She flicked it right back on and said “asshole” and then blinked away again.

  ***

  The Chief, Captain, Quinlin and Daniels were all in the situation room. A holodesk stood in the middle, playing the message Hoskin just saw outside. The massive pack of memories was downloading to the desk, but still had a ways to go. Hoskin stepped into the room.

  “Detective Hoskin, please tell me you have something here?” said the Chief.

  Daniels paced back and forth. Clarenza looked worried, her six hands fidgeting.

  The Chief seemed more tired than angry. No doubt his extensive network of Dynasty family donors were relentlessly calling for answers. Police Chiefs didn’t get into office without money.

  “I know how we can attack it next,” said Hoskin.

  “And how’s that?” said Daniels.

  “I looked at it again and again last night,” said Hoskin. “The killer is getting out of the buildings and he leaves no trace. The first murder of the Senator was sloppier, a trial run probably. He was still trying to figure out the perfect method. The girl was collateral damage. We think she was coerced into the murder. But maybe she screwed up. He wasn’t happy with the results so he did the next two himself. The second two were perfected techniques. He perfected his escape.”

  “All speculation,” said Daniels. “You still don’t know anything at this point. For all we know he’s someone who works for them. He never has to leave.”

  Hoskin ignored him.

  “And why do you think he’s getting away?” said the Chief.

  “We’ve heard the chatter on the Dynasty darknets. They’re still looking for someone from the Gilead murders who got away. We might as well add the Barrotes murders to that.”

  The Chief and Captain looked straight at him as he said that. The Captain frowned. Hoskin figured they realized it wasn’t completely legal to listen in on the darknets, but chose to pretend he hadn’t said it.

  “Do you deny it?” Hoskin said to Daniels. “I already dug into your files, just like you dug into mine. I know your background. You must hear the chatter on your family’s private darknet?”

  Daniels didn’t look happy, but he nodded.

  “So how’s he getting out of those mansions?” said the Chief. “I’ve been to a few of them for fundraising dinners. Their security is impregnable. Nothing’s getting in or out that they don’t want in or out.”

  “He’s right,” said Quinlin. “I always say nothing’s unhackable but those places are unhackable. You don’t just walk in or walk out. You need a code or auth from someone in the house.”

  Hoskin thought about it. “What about a personal Tangleport? Maybe he just took off from the one in Childress’ place?”

  “No,” said Daniels. “They scan everything that wants in or out with an atomic signature scan. Can’t fake that. If that place was on lockdown it wouldn’t let anyone leave.”

  “What about hacking the firmware on the thing?” said Hoskin.

  “Not happening,” said Daniels. “It’s incredibly simple firmware. Complexity makes things vulnerable.”

  “He’s right,” said Quinlin.

  “Even if he did, it wouldn’t matter,” said Daniels. “Especially when the mansion goes into lockdown. No way in or out. Overrides everything else. After the chaos broke out at the Gilead murder that Mansion Personality would have sealed that place tight.”

  Hoskin thought about it and then said, “We’re focused on the wrong thing. It doesn’t matter which door he got out. He had to get out somehow. I’m thinking he had to have help. We start with everyone that could have helped him. I’m thinking nannies, cooks, security personnel. He’s got inside people.”

  “You’re thinking maybe at the right moment he gets a security array turned off for him and slips away?” said the Chief.

  “Yeah. Someone with high level access. Someone who’s been around the family a long time. He has a cult-like following. Some people out there think he’s a hero. Maybe he’s charismatic. People get drawn to him. They hate their boss. They’re angry and wish someone would do something. And then he comes along and does. We need to get out and talk to everyone employed at the Gilead and Childress mansions.”

  “That’s not going to happen,” said Daniels. “The families won’t let it. And all the workers have NDAs. They talk, they lose their jobs.”

  “Unless the families waive the NDAs. Look we don’t have fucking time for this. They’ll have to choose between their secrecy and their lives,” said Hoskin. “Their memories are already all over the nets. What else is it gonna take?”

  Daniels stared at him but said nothing.

  “Link up with
your people and tell them they need to open up to us,” said the Chief to Daniels. “We need your connections now. They’ll go along. Just tell them they have people working there who want them dead. I’ll do the same with my donors.”

  “They’ll think they can handle it,” said Daniels. “They’ll run their own interviews.”

  “Then make them understand,” said Hoskin. “They don’t have all the pieces. We do. They’ll only have their own people’s interviews. The other families won’t share with them.”

  Daniels nodded. He didn’t look happy about it, but he didn’t have much choice. Unless the Shipwide government took over the case, Daniels was only there by invite. Hoskin wouldn’t be surprised to see Daniels make a play for the case soon. The Dynasties would want more control over it. Right now they had the Chief in their pockets, but they’d be counting on Daniels to keep whatever he found quiet. They had a lot of secrets they wouldn’t want some city cop knowing.

  “The memories are key,” said Hoskin. “Builds sympathy for his cause. He’s revealing the lives of these people. Showing us what goes on behind the curtain of their lives. Anyone can look like a monster if someone goes digging in your memories.”

  “But how is he getting those memories?” said Clarenza. “Backbrains are heavily encrypted.”

  “Not sure yet. We thought he might be taking them and then working on them, but at least one blackbox got dissolved at the scene and the memories still got released,” said Hoskin.

  “What’s that mean?” said the Captain.

  “It means,” said Quinlin, “he’s got some breakthrough tech. Best case is he’s got some zero-day exploits. That would be a simple explanation. But to have one for everyone? There’s no way he had zero-days for everyone. The backbrains of the powerful are well updated and secured. One or two of them are vulnerable maybe, but all of them?”

  “What do you mean, zero-day?” said the Chief.

  “Unknown, exploitable bugs,” said Daniels.

  “What else if not that?” said the Chief.

  “Maybe he’s got an insider, someone with access, who would have the encryption keys?” said Quinlin. “Or he’s been at this for a long, long time. It would take years to brute force through the encryption. We’re talking ten, twenty years. Maybe longer.”

  “Twenty by my estimates. That doesn’t seem too likely,” said Daniels.

  “If he’s brute forcing them, he’s very patient. And one other thing seems clear. He’s got forensics knowledge,” said Hoskin. “Which means he could be someone on the force.”

  “I’m hoping,” said the Chief, “you didn’t just say what I thought you said.”

  “Yeah, unfortunately I did. He’s probably law enforcement. An ME, spatter expert, cop, a former cop, a detective, whatever. Federal or district or city level, I just don’t know,” said Hoskin.

  “What makes you say that?” said the Chief.

  “He knows too much about crime scenes, about investigations. He’s left no trace. He’s effectively cleaned up every scene.”

  “He could have slotted that knowledge,” said Clarenza.

  “I don’t think so. Slotting someone else’s knowledge is not the same as someone else’s knowledge. He’s too good so far. Someone who had the knowledge burned in would make mistakes. He wouldn’t have mastered it. You can slot how to fly a fighter plane, but you won’t fly it as well as someone who’s been flying for twenty or thirty years in a real fight. You need your own instincts, your own muscle memory, your own quirks worked in to truly understand,” said Hoskin.

  “What about a doctor or a prosecutor?” said Daniels. “Anyone with forensics knowledge fits the profile you’ve made up.”

  “Sure. Could be either. But let’s start with what we got. We look over everyone in the department’s profiles. We won’t find anything if we start digging into doctors and prosecutors first. That will take more time. The lawyers’ll resist it across the board, slow us down with trips to court. But we can get our own records and go through them fast.”

  “Detective,” said the Chief. “If that’s right then we’ve got a disaster on our hands, and every day it’s getting worse, not better. I need something concrete fast. Looking into the lives of other cops and agents will not go over well.”

  “I’m not here to make friends,” said Hoskin. “I just follow the truth wherever it leads.”

  “All right. How do you want to do this?” said the Chief.

  “Quietly. We’ll need access to all law enforcement personnel files at all levels,” said Hoskin.

  The Chief stood for a moment and said nothing. The symbols on his face scrolled wildly and then disappeared. No one said anything.

  “All right, Detective,” he said. “But we need to see some breakthroughs pretty quick here. For all our sakes.”

  When Sirens Sing

  When everyone cleared out of the Situation Room, Hoskin talked to Quinlin.

  “Hey, let me ask you something. What’s this?” said Hoskin, as a holo of the Deos amulet he’d found flared over his hand.

  “Oh man, where did you find that?”

  “Your desk, when I was up in your office.”

  “I ain’t seen it in years. It was in the drawer? Which one?”

  “Bottom one.”

  “Been looking for that. It was my mom’s. She wore that thing every day. I got it when she died and then lost it. Felt bad. I thought about her a bunch recently, started looking for it.”

  Hoskin knew that Quinlin’s mom had killed herself. He remembered the first time Quinlin told him the story. It had come out of nowhere after drinks. They hadn’t talked about it since.

  “Sorry, didn’t mean to bring up—”

  “Nah, it’s fine. Like I said, been thinking about her a lot more recently. Why ask?”

  “Just ‘cause you said you didn’t know the symbol the other day. So I thought—”

  Quinlin laughed. “That all? I remembered not long after I said that. Couldn’t believe I forgot it actually. Probably just blocked it out. Mom made me go to that fuckin’ church every Saturday. Fuckin’ Saturday of all days. Why religions always got to pick the best days to give back to the man upstairs? I ever start a religion, God’s gettin’ Monday.”

  “Probably get a lot more people that way. Come on. We got shit to do.”

  Hoskin and Quinlin spent the day going over thousands and thousands of files. Even with smartcore analysis it was slow and tedious, old-fashioned police work.

  “Can’t trust all the work to the machines. Gotta look at everything ourselves,” said Hoskin, earlier that day.

  “Machine’ll probably do a better job,” said Quinlin.

  “Probably, but not always,” said Hoskin.

  Hoskin and Quinlin started with the most likely suspects delivered by the smartcore and worked their way down. They worked in Hoskin’s disheveled office for the next seven hours.

  “What are we looking for again?” said Quinlin.

  “I’ll know it when I see it,” said Hoskin.

  “Great. And how the fuck will I know it when I see it? And when are you gonna clean up this shit hole?”

  Quinlin jabbed a designer cigarette to his lips. It was Haji brand paper and genesculpted, chemical-free tobacco, laced with the boiled down chemical essence of “focus,” making boring work easy. Its smoke filled the room with a subtle cinnamon scent.

  “When I get around to it. Look for the obvious first and the not so obvious second. Find anyone with lots of complaints on his jacket, even if they were dismissed, anyone investigated for any reason,” said Hoskin.

  “That’s ninety percent of the department and includes us, in case you forgot. Unless you’re on desk duty, you’ve got complaints.”

  “Yeah, look for the guy with the most. Where there’s smoke, there’s fire.”

  “Once again, that includes us, and you make that up yourself?” said Quinlin with a grin, the smoke spilling from his li
ps slowly.

  “Then put us on the list. After that,” said Hoskin, “look for the not so obvious, like people with perfect records, who’ve been around a long time. No complaints. Promotions like clockwork.”

  “And that tells us what?” said Quinlin.

  “How do you find a fake diamond?” said Hoskin.

  “Are there any real ones anymore?”

  “Yeah, there are. And the fake ones are too perfect, no flaws. Even ones where they tried to introduce imperfections, those imperfections always have a strange regularity,” said Hoskin.

  “All right, I got it, you surly old bastard,” said Quinlin. “Why do I work with you again?”

  “You must have fucked up in another life. Now shut up and start digging.”

  Three hours later, they were still at it.

  “Fuck man, we’ve been here all day. Gonna roll me a ‘Cloud’,” said Quinlin.

  Hoskin looked at him.

  “You’ve been smoking a lot more than usual,” said Hoskin.

  “What? No I haven’t.”

  “Yeah, you have. You telling me I don’t know something when I see it? What’s up?”

  “Nothing, man. Same is it ever was.”

  “Nothing wrong?”

  “Just more stress. You know?”

  “Whadda ya mean?”

  “Look, I been dreaming of the murders. Hasn’t happened since I started out. Saw them every day when I was rookie. The eyes. The faces. The first one, that girl, the one on the street by the Willows club, it got to me. Now I’m seeing them every night. But I got it handled. All right?”

  “Yeah?”

  “Yeah.”

  “All right. You say so.”

  Quinlin took out his rolling kit.

  An hour later, the hardcopy looked like it had mated and multiplied. Images hung on the mediawall in a constellation that showed the most likely suspects closer to the center, as graded by the smartcore’s pattern recognition systems.

  By the time they’d finished it was just past 2 a.m., and they had more than a thousand potentials in their suspect array. The faces formed a chaotic mandala on the mediawall: cops, prosecutors, judges and former cops from all over the city.