“Hold on, I’m checking now. Not getting anything either. That’s not right.”
“Thanks for the brilliant fuckin’ insight.”
Hoskin cut the link. He rubbed the rough stubble on his face and gathered himself for a second. Instinct told him he didn’t have much time left to crack this thing. He needed to partition up his mind to look at more things at once. Now was the time for damn vSelves. Right tool for the right job. He had to work fast. He forked a ghost off his backbrain: vHoskin1. The ghost Hoskin went back to work on the timeline, while he kept looking at the Sakura angle.
His vSelf split the mediawall. On the left, the timeline dominated and started to flow. On the right stood a picture of Sakura surrounded by a mandala of light linked to info constellations about her. Already Hoskin could feel the back of his neck heating up as his virtual chewed through processing power.
On the left: Shootout in the Starship Graveyard. Two attackers, both IDed as enforcers with the Mountain Snake Triad.
Party massacre. Only known death from the massacre: Gabriel Gilead. Other deaths unknown.
First message from Multiface.
Hoskin’s ghost flicked the timeline forward again.
Childress’ son Barrotes came next.
More messages from Multiface.
Now he had Salazar and the hooker, IDed as Janessa Fairview, a shipborn orphan and registered prostitute. Not much else on her background.
vHoskin1 thought of something and forked another ghost to investigate: vHoskin2. The mediawall split into thirds. In the middle, vHoskin2 slid the files of the three women to the front. By running virtual instances of himself, Hoskin was eating up about quarter of his backbrain now, about 700 billion molecule sized cores in its array. The back of his neck burned as the cores pegged out and spewed waste heat through his pores.
The three images formed a triptych in the center of the screen. The second ghost set the 3D photos of the girls on a slow spin, so it could look the bodies over carefully from every angle. On instinct alone, vHoskin2 spawned a deep pattern match against all metainfo on the three girls which included physical attributes, their genomes, their atomic map and state vectors, where they died, a mass of unlinked data. Another 160 billion cores burst to life running the search. It linked up to his and Quinlin’s private arrays and turned over about half the job.
A half hour later an alert came back. The pattern match had found something. Hoskin was just about to pull it up when Captain Clarenza rang him on his innerphone. He blinked her up.
“I need you to come down to my office, asap.”
“Can it wait—”
“No.”
“All right. On my way.”
***
Hoskin knocked on her office door and she gestured him.
“Yeah, Cap,” he said. “What’s up?”
“How long you and I worked together, Officer?” she said.
“Long time,” said Hoskin.
“Twenty years or so, last I checked. You ever get tired of it all?” she said.
“Sometimes, Cap,” said Hoskin.
“Me, I’m tired all the time.”
Clarenza said nothing, and she sat quietly for a minute, four of her arms folded on her lap, one hanging at her side and one on the desk. She shifted her weight uncomfortably.
Hoskin felt a tiny window open in his mind. It was the Captain offering him a heavily encrypted innertalk link. Hoskin took the other end and locked in.
“Better this way, so I can say what I got to say,” she flashed.
“Got it.”
“Look, the CII Head called the Chief. They say they traced the news leak from the Salazar slay. Internal investigation. They say it came from here.”
“All right.”
“They say it came from you,” she flashed, slowly, looking up suddenly and directly at him.
Hoskin sat back and squinted.
“And whadda you say?” he flashed, folding his hands.
“I think it’s insane.”
Hoskin nodded. He stayed quiet for a minute.
“Appreciate that, Cap,” he said, out loud.
“Question is: why do they think that?” she flashed.
Hoskin thought for a minute. He’d sent the images from the last murder scene to the Farm’s smartcores, where overcomplex biosoft left them vulnerable to a series of timing-channel attacks and direct assaults. And sometimes it was much easier than that. Anyone with enough security clearance or compromised credentials could watch the incoming streams from the eyes of every cop in the field as they hit the expert systems for cataloguing and analysis.
Hoskin spawned a ghost of himself to dive the Farm’s cores and see who’d accessed his footage. Somebody had. Looked like at least three people. He took a deep breath and let it out slow.
“My fault probably. Left myself open. I streamed images to the department cores. They’re compromised. Quinlin and I knew that long ago, which is why we rigged our own systems,” he flashed.
“And there’s something else too,” she flashed.
She flicked an image to his innervision: Sakura and Hoskin outside the strip club, getting into a cab.
Hoskin frowned.
“You were seen with a witness of an ongoing case. How’s that going to look?”
“Not good.”
“I don’t like the timing of these things, but this one is all you. You set yourself up for this one, even if nothing’s going on.”
“No question.”
“Look, you know what’s got to happen right?” she said.
“Yeah.”
“I’m going to have to pull you from the case and put you on suspension until we work this out. Submit for weapons deactivation. Go get your stuff, head home.”
***
Hoskin left the Captain’s office. He found Quinlin and filled him in on what had gone down. Quinlin angrily unleashed a flurry of probes and assaults on the Farm’s cores. He found something interesting right away.
“Bad,” flashed Quinlin.
“What?” flashed Hoskin.
“Patches.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean someone or something did some custom patches to the Farm’s biosoft, plugged up some of its holes.”
“How long ago?”
“Dates are fake. Hard to tell. Can’t be more than a few weeks though, since I was digging around in them a few back and there was nothing like this.”
“So it means whoever was fucking around looking for something on me, got in and the closed the doors behind ‘em.”
“Yeah, that’s probably what it means. What are you going to do?”
“I fucked up. I’ll take what’s coming to me. Nothing else I can do.”
“This is too coincidental. Means we were on to something, getting close. Look we can’t have you off this right now. Just load up my hacked firmware. Get your damn weapons online. You know were the code is.”
“Maybe. I’ll head home, get some rest, figure something out. Don’t want to make things worse just yet. Just let me work it out.”
He grabbed his gear from the locker room. He walked out the back entrance and looked around. It was the first time he’d stepped out onto the streets in over a hundred years without a badge.
The Hot House
Two days later and Hoskin still hadn’t gotten the Captain to rescind his suspension, despite badgering her to the point where she hung up on him and wouldn’t take his calls for a day.
He was restless, bored, unsure of his next move. He paced the apartment.
Hints of depression slipped into his spirit. He fought it, but he could feel it creeping in slowly, getting to him. He couldn’t stop watching the damn newsstreams.
He thought of the girl. He wanted to see her again, even though it was stupid and might keep him from getting back to the case.
Two more riots had ripped through poor areas of the city. Hundreds were injured and a few peop
le died. The Senate pushed through a curfew, and that led to a third riot in the expensive Harijuji fashion district, with rioters pulling rich women from dressing rooms and beating them. Two women were in critical condition.
Two newsheads debated the meaning of the Harijuji riot.
“This is clearly just people looking for a scapegoat for their laziness,” said the first one, a darkly beautiful unisexual. “Get a job.”
“How dare you say that, with unemployment nearing 25%? And that’s just the fake number. We all know the real number is closer to 35 or 40. And who’s responsible? The Dynasties. The Senate is bought and paid for by the Dynasties. They just rubber stamp any new power grab—”
Hoskin blinked up another stream. A gunman had stormed into a crowded, upscale restaurant ranting about bloodsuckers and killed fifteen diners.
“Congress weighs emergency powers for the President.”
“This is just for the duration of the crisis,” said her spokesman.
Hoskin didn’t like the sound of that. Whenever a crisis boiled up governments tended to pass dangerously overreaching laws in the interest of “security.” He didn’t know if it was emotion, stupidity, or opportunism. Probably all of the above. Twelve hundred page laws that showed up suddenly during a crisis were not written the day before. They were sitting in a drawer waiting for the right opportunity.
Maybe it was best he wasn’t a cop right now. Enforcing laws he didn’t agree with disagreed with him.
He finally started to work out. He needed to do something. He pushed it as hard as he could on his archaic weight set, trying to get his mind clear.
The door rang, which muted the newsstreams. It was the girl. Of course. Her picture appeared on the mediawall. He banged out another set on the benchpress and dropped the weight on its hooks. He flicked off the mediawall, walked over and opened the door.
“Sorry I got you fired,” she said.
She wore a body hugging Cheongsam, bright red, with a soft white holographic dragon snaking around it. Tiny specks of light glittered on her eyelids and lips. She was leaning casually against the door frame. Her silver and pink streaked hair flowed down her shoulders. A large bag dangled at her feet.
“Suspended. Not fired. And you didn’t do anything. I did. It was my mistake.”
“So I’m a mistake now?” she said, pouting.
“I crossed a line.”
“I like crossing lines.”
“How’d you know I got suspended?”
“What, I don’t watch the news? Can I come in?”
Hoskin knew he should refuse but found himself saying “sure.”
There are mistakes we make once and never make again and then there are our favorite mistakes that we like to make over and over.
He turned his back on her and walked over to the weight set. Behind him, he could feel her like a fire in a cold room. He grabbed his towel and dried himself off. Just tell her to go. But he couldn’t.
When he turned around, she was standing incredibly close, looking up at him. He felt magnetized to her, but stood still. Her perfume drifted towards him. She dropped her bag.
“You ever wish you were somebody else?” she said.
“No.”
“I do. Every day.”
“Why are you here?”
“You wanted me to come.”
“I did?”
“Yes. I could feel it.”
She stepped a little closer.
“And why did I want that?”
“I don’t know. Why did you?” she said, running a finger down his forearm.
She was so close now and he could feel her body heat, electric, radiant. She pulled him in and kissed him and he let her. She pulled back and twisted away, laughing.
“Let’s have some fun,” she said.
“Not the best idea.”
“Of course it is. I always have good ideas. Come on.”
She took his hand and pulled him towards the door.
“Where are we going?”
“A secret place. Someplace we can forget everything. Just for a minute. You have something better to do?”
“Yeah, not make things worse.”
She let go of him, grabbed her bag and started sauntering towards the door.
“There’s nothing for you to chase right now, Officer. Don’t you want something to chase?” she said, looking back and laughing.
He followed her.
***
He’d offered to drive, but she’d insisted they take the light train well out beyond the edges of the city into the deep countryside, leaving the troubles of the city behind. She pressed against him the whole time and said nothing. They both knew not to talk, that even the slightest words would break the fragile balance between them. Her fingers gently caressed his inner thigh and he could feel her touch through his whole body. When the last stop came, there was nobody left on the train. They got out.
He knew this was beyond stupid, but he didn’t care. For once, he would be truly and completely irresponsible.
The platform was empty. Beyond it were trees, and Hoskin heard running water. There was a small automated town there, and they rented a hoverpod from an automat and it took them out further into the planes and the forest. The mountains in the distance looked brilliant, majestic, purple as they pressed against the darkening sky. She’d brought water and they sipped when they needed to, still saying nothing.
She waved a hand and the pod stopped and they got out. She pulled a glowglobe from her bag and let it loose. It hovered after them, throwing off soft light as the artificial sun melted into twilight. She took his hand, and Hoskin could see she was leading him towards a huge rock covered with trees. They wove their way into the woods and started to climb. It wasn’t hard going, but at times they had to be careful and find just the right spot to grab onto. It focused Hoskin even more on the intensity of the moment.
After a short climb, they stepped forward from a circle of trees, panting a little, their bodies slick with a light sweat. A small open space stood before them. Beyond it, he could see the black sand of the open plane stretching out endlessly. His feet crunched the leaves and the tall grass. In the center were three sculptures made of twigs and leaves and rocks, taller than three men standing on each other’s shoulders. They seemed to give off a faint light. She waved a hand at the glowglobe and it dimmed slightly.
She looked at him expectantly and Hoskin knew suddenly that she’d made them and that she’d never shown them to anyone. He didn’t know how he knew it, he just did. He touched her face and then walked towards them. The light came from soft, iridescent flowers, huge, bell-shaped that sprouted all over the sculptures. He touched one and brought it to his nose. It smelled of jasmine and honey.
He could feel her behind him.
“They’ll take this from me too,” she said, softly. “Like they do everything else.”
“Nobody can take this from you.”
She kissed him fiercely with a desperate intensity and he let himself go. He didn’t need drugs this time. His inhibitions burned away easily, effortlessly. They peeled off each other’s clothes, kissing, collapsing to the ground, their bodies tangled. He was ready for her already and she helped him in. He pressed up as far as he could inside her and her eyes and mouth burst open. Her breath echoed in his ear. Her eyes looked kaleidoscopic, brilliant, hypnotic and he wanted to fall into them. He kissed her neck and her body opened to him completely and he let all his stress and rage and desire pour into her, as the long grass tickled their skin.
***
He wasn’t out long but when he woke up later in the clearing, she was gone, as he knew she would be. A tiny egg lay next to him. It was studded with little cheap jewels. He picked it up. He could see it had a tiny seam in the middle of it and he broke it open. It was a matryoshka doll, filled with ever smaller dolls. She’d left him water and the glowglobe too.
He made it to the bottom of the rock a
nd called a car. On the way back he studied the matryoshka closely, taking it apart and putting it back together over and over.
***
When he got back to the apartment it was still early morning. He knew he’d fucked up. Twice. Not something he did often, but there was no denying it. The worst part was that he knew better. But when he was around that girl she invaded his mind. She was a like a fresh needle to an addict. His mistake had cost him and he didn’t have the one thing he cared about in life, his work.
He watched the newsstreams for a few minutes. It showed footage of one of the “rich” women who’d died in the Harijuji riot. She was just a poor nursing student who’d won a day trip to a spa. He watched the men kicking her. Women too. The footage froze on the face of a crazed women sneering as she stomped the poor girl.
He flipped it off in disgust. These were the people he was fighting for? He thought about calling the Captain again, but it was too early.
With nowhere to go and nothing to do, he suddenly felt sick, overwhelmed, broken and worst of all powerless.
He had to get out.
He got up and opened the odor-eater bag that held his running gear. He pulled on a sweat-top and climate adjustable running pants. He kicked off his shoes, grabbed a wad of gel from the bag and threw it down on the floor. The gel hit the ground with a splat then leapt up, spread out and formed a super-soft, nearly weightless shell around his feet.
Outside, Hoskin didn’t even stretch. He just knew he had to run, to feel the streets, to get the case and the horror out of his mind. He’d let the girl get to him, compromised the case. No point lying to himself. It was his fault and now the city was falling apart. But why did it always have to fall on him? Wasn’t there anyone else who could step up?
He thought of the way people cheered for the killer and of all the people out of work and the rich in their citadels in the sky and it all felt worthless and wrong, none of it worth fighting for, none of it worth saving. His entire city was sick and full of rot. Its reckoning was a long time coming.
The sadness and sickness slipped into him, overwhelmed him, breaking through the tissue-thin partitions in his mind that kept out the blood spatters and the knife wounds and the bodies, bloated and bleeding. This was the part of his brain where children went to die. This was the deep country of his mind, the place where God didn’t care and slashed down people for no reason or just for his own amusement. This was the dark.
The Scorpion Game Page 20
