Necropath [Bengal Station 01]

by Eric Brown

  “I know what we experienced,” he said quietly. “Jimmy Chandra died because the Disciples didn’t want their plans known. Why else do you think they threw us into the pit?”

  Sinton sighed. “Vaughan,” he said, something like pity in his tone, “my guess is that they were a drug syndicate, refining and distributing this rhapsody stuff. It’s big business, big money. Of course they didn’t want their plans known.” He poked at something with the toe of his shoe. Vaughan watched him kick what appeared to be a piece of vertebra from the ghat. It turned over and over as it fell and splashed into the sea.

  “What are your plans now?” Sinton asked at last.

  “I don’t know.” Vaughan shook his head. He hadn’t thought of anything beyond returning to Earth and joining in the operation to eradicate the Vaith.

  “The Agency could always use a telepath,” Sinton said. “Good salary, police apartment...”

  Vaughan looked at him. “I thought you didn’t trust my judgement? Now you want to employ me.”

  “You’d come in useful at interrogations.”

  “Thanks, but no thanks.”

  Sinton nodded. “Well, if you should change your mind...” He set off, towards a waiting flier, paused, and turned to Vaughan. “Can I offer you a lift anywhere?”

  “I’ll make my own way, thanks.”

  He watched Commander Sinton walk towards the flier and climb carefully inside. The vehicle rose, turned on its axis, and climbed on a long diagonal towards the upper-deck.

  * * * *

  Vaughan sat on the edge of the ghat and watched the sun set beyond distant India. As the indigo twilight crept over the Station, and mourners began to gather for the next funeral, he climbed to his feet and made his way to the elevator.

  Back in his apartment he pulled the bag of rhapsody from where he’d concealed it down the back of the armchair. He held it in his palm, staring at the scintillating crimson dust and going over what Commander Sinton had told him. He clearly didn’t believe anything in Vaughan’s report, so he wondered how thorough Sinton had been in his search for the Vaith. If he had erred on the side of caution in the administration of the drug to his officers, then that might explain why they had discovered nothing.

  He looked up from the rhapsody, across the room to the graphic of the Chosen One. The likeness of Elly Jenson seemed to stare accusingly at him. He crossed the room and ripped down the pix, balling it and shoving it into the waste disposal chute. Trembling, he left the apartment.

  On the upper-deck he pushed through the crowds to the flier rank and climbed aboard the first vehicle. “Poplar Boulevard, New Mumbai.” He sat back and stared out through the window as the flier rose and the mind-hum of the evening crowds dropped away.

  He closed his eyes as the flier accelerated north.

  Only when the diminuendo of the engines indicated deceleration did he stir himself from the edge of sleep and look out. They were coming down in the lighted boulevard. Vaughan indicated the split-level domes of Villefranche’s dwelling and the flier edged along the street. He told the pilot to wait for him, climbed out and walked through the garden and up the curling ramp to the entrance of the dome.

  He paused before the door and peered inside. There was no sign of activity within. He knocked half-heartedly, waited ten seconds, and was about to return to the flier when he saw movement at the far end of the studio.

  Villefranche stepped out from behind the crystal sculpture of a rampant horse, saw him and hurried towards the entrance. As she approached, the vibrant music of her mind grew louder. He considered inserting his pin, but elected to spare himself the pain until he thought it absolutely necessary.

  She stared at him through the glass, her eyes red with crying, and pulled the door open. “Look who it is. And I thought I’d seen the last of you.” She ushered him inside.

  “I’m sorry... about Dolores,” he began.

  She stared at him, then said, “She’s in a better place now, Vaughan.”

  “I feared you’d joined her.”

  She stared at him. “I’ll get you a drink, Vaughan. What do you mean—you thought I was dead?”

  He sat down on the cushioned seat beneath the curve of the dome, examining the horse sculpture as she opened a beer. She carried it across to him, along with a bottle for herself.

  “Well?” Carmine said. “I do hate you mysterious, silent types. Why did you think I was dead?”

  He took a swallow of beer, watching her. She was wearing a capacious smock covered in crystal glitter, and her blonde hair was mussed where she’d pushed it back out of her eyes. He shrugged. “It’s a long story. Have you been to any more church services lately?”

  “Thanks to you, Tarzan, I was barred.”

  “Thanks to me?”

  “You got us raided, recall? I was the sucker who invited you, yes? Ergo: Carmine Villefranche persona non grata at the services. That’s what I mean. Oh, I tried to find out where they were being held—I needed a fix of the god-drug. But they were playing it close to their chest after that first raid, moving about, keeping their venues secret. Poor little Carmine was out in the cold, all alone, without her weekly fix. Thanks, Vaughan.” As ever, he found it hard to establish whether her censure was meant, or an act.

  “Your expulsion from the Church has probably saved your life. Have you kept in contact with any of the other members?”

  Carmine frowned. “No, I haven’t seen any of them around. At least, not for a few days.”

  “That makes sense. You were fed the rhapsody drug by the leaders of a cult who believed in salvation and union with the One through sacrifice to...” He paused there, wondering how best to phrase what he had to say next without it sounding melodramatic, “sacrifice to their god—a creature on Verkerk’s World that sustained itself through luring victims addicted to the drug. Three of the creatures, the Vaith, were brought to Earth, and one was secreted on the Station. The faithful were fed the drug and allowed to commune. The plan is that, when the ranks of the faithful has swelled, your God will consume its victims.”

  Carmine stared at him. “You don’t know how ridiculous all this sounds.”

  “I think I do. I had trouble believing it, too. Until I saw what was happening on Verkerk’s World.” He told her what he’d witnessed in the northern ranges.

  Carmine stared at him with wide eyes, slowly shaking her head.

  Vaughan went on: “The cycle repeats itself every two years. The creatures wake, secrete the drug into the water table, and give the call, and in doing so recruit more willing victims. One of the creatures is somewhere on the Station. I plan to eradicate the thing before it wakes again. That’s why I came here. I thought either you’d be Vaith meat by now, or still attending the services.”

  She looked at him, shaking her head.

  “I need your help. Can you tell me anything, anything at all, that might lead me to where it’s been kept? Did you hear rumour of a special venue, a secret Church building somewhere?”

  Carmine shrugged. “Nothing comes to mind. I can’t think...”

  “Maybe not consciously,” Vaughan said. “But if I scanned.”

  He didn’t wait for her to object. He pulled his pin from its case, tilted his head to one side and inserted the pin into his skull console. He closed his eyes.

  I don’t want him in my mind... Secrets. Don’t want him knowing I like him... Damn! Damn him! He’s like all men! All! Bastards!

  He read her craving for the drug, her desire to be united with the One.

  He dived past the superficial thoughts of the instant, into a sea of mental imagery, memories and emotions. Her grief for Dolores was complex: she missed the woman and wished that she had shown her more love, but at the same time felt betrayed that Dolores had left her, Carmine, by taking her own life.

  He sorted through her recollections of recent acquaintances, analysed her conversations with those who were members of the Church. He relived, vicariously, snatches of Carmine’s life since she’d
met Dolores Yandoah. He soon realised that Carmine knew very little of the secret workings of the Church—she was a mere follower, a unit to be manipulated, a lamb to the slaughter.

  He recalled his suspicion that it might have been Carmine, through her knowing that he was a telepath, who had alerted high-up Disciples to the fact that he was on to their case—which would explain Lars Jenson’s being equipped with a mind-shield when they had called on him that day. But he scanned for evidence of this, and found nothing. Carmine Villefranche had told no one of his telepathic abilities.

  He resurfaced, ascending through her involuntary sexual fantasies of him and her entwined, watched over by the ghost of Dolores—Carmine’s way, he supposed, of getting back at her dead lover for what she thought of as Dolores’s betrayal. In her fantasy, Carmine was biting Vaughan with teeth as sharp as razors. Her tangled psyche was a textbook example of the complexity of the human drives of love and hate, and every shade of attraction in between.

  When he opened his eyes and ejected the pin, Carmine was watching him, smiling with a kind of smug satisfaction.

  “I hope you liked what you saw in there, Tarzan.”

  “I read that you know nothing about any secret location.”

  “Oh...” She sounded put out. “Well, any time you feel like going through the contents of my brain, just knock.” She smiled, sweetly, but with venom.

  Vaughan nodded. “Thanks for your time. I’ll see myself out.”

  She watched him as he stepped from the dome, her expression neutral.

  * * * *

  He hurried down the ramp and down the garden to the waiting flier. He climbed into the back and leaned forward. “I want you to make a circuit of the Station, flying as low as you can go.”

  The pilot turned in his seat, stared at Vaughan. “That’ll cost you, bud.”

  “How much?”

  “Say... two hundred—baht. Plus the thirty you already owe.”

  Vaughan pulled out his wallet, peeled off two hundred and fifty baht. “A circuit, low, and go as slow as you can.”

  The pilot looked from Vaughan to the cash in his hand, shrugged. “Whatever you say.”

  “And another thing. If I tell you to land before the hour’s out, don’t land, okay? Fly ten kays out to sea—you do that and there’s five hundred baht in it for you.”

  The pilot stared. “You some kind of weirdo, mister?”

  “It’s an experiment, okay? Scientific.”

  The pilot shrugged again.

  The flier rose. Vaughan pulled the bag of rhapsody from his inside pocket, measured what he considered to be a safe amount onto the palm of his hand, then rolled a ten baht note and snorted the glittering crimson mound.

  The drug burned his adenoids, percolated into his system and left him sprawling across the back seat. He was aware of the pilot’s quick glance, the shake of his head. “Fucking junkies,” Vaughan heard him say, as if through a fathom of ocean.

  As the flier made its slow circuit of the Station, he waited for the rush of euphoria that never came. He even inserted his augmentation-pin, the better to pick up the signature of the Vaith—but he read nothing other than the fevered imaginings of the pilot and stray emanations from individuals down below.

  As the hour elapsed, and he came down from the high, he didn’t know whether to be grateful that he hadn’t experienced the call, or saddened at what that meant: that Elly Jenson, and who knows how many other faithful, had made the ultimate communion with the One.

  “The hour’s up, bud.”

  “Yeah. Take me to Nazruddin’s, Chandi Road, Himachal Sector.” The beer at Villefranche’s had whetted his appetite.

  He sat back and went through the events of the day, piecing together what he had found out so far, thinking through what had happened on Verkerk’s World. He considered Elly Jenson’s father, and how he had been waiting, his mind shielded, when he and Chandra had turned up to question him. Jenson had known that a telepath was on his way, and later he and the Disciples had done their best to eradicate him and Chandra.

  Who had known about their mission to Verkerk’s World?

  The flier came in low along Chandi Road and settled outside Nazruddin’s. Vaughan paid the driver and climbed out, fighting his way through a gaggle of street kids as he made his way into the restaurant.

  He settled himself into his booth and ordered a beer, considering his next move.

  Five minutes later he raised his handset and got through to Commander Sinton.

  The commander’s big, florid face filled the screen. “Ah, Mr. Vaughan. Have you changed your mind already and require work?”

  “No fear, commander. But I have come up with something I think you might find interesting.”

  “And that is?”

  “Not over the air,” Vaughan said. “When can we meet?”

  “I’m rather busy at the moment. How about tomorrow? Let me see... Around noon?”

  “Noon—by the gates of Himachal Park, okay?”

  “I’ll be there, Mr. Vaughan.” Sinton cut the connection.

  Vaughan finished his beer, then made a second call.

  “Dr. Rao. I’d like to do business again.”

  “I’d be delighted, Mr. Vaughan. What can I do for you?”

  Vaughan told him. He haggled over a price and arranged to meet Rao at Nazruddin’s at two tomorrow afternoon.

  “One more thing!” Dr. Rao said before Vaughan cut the connection. “I was paid a visit earlier today by Tiger’s older sister.”

  “Her sister... I didn’t know she had a sister.”

  “As you might imagine, the girl was distraught at the news of Tiger’s passing. She is staying at the Ashoka Hotel, if you’re interested in being charitable and consoling her.”

  Vaughan grunted something non-committal. He was tempted to tell Rao that he had more important things to do than console Tiger’s sister.

  Rao went on, “I mentioned your name and told her that you were close to Tiger. I think she might appreciate a few words.”

  “Yeah.” Vaughan nodded. “I’ll look in on her sometime. And I’ll see you tomorrow, Rao.” He cut the connection, forgot about Tiger’s sister and missions of consolation, and ordered another beer.

  * * * *

  TWENTY-THREE

  TRUST ME

  It was almost midday by the time Sukara emerged from sleep. She awoke suddenly, blinking at the dazzle of sunlight that fell into the bedroom. She heard Osborne moving around in the adjacent lounge, the vid-screen on and the volume turned low.

  Then, the recollections of the day before rushed to fill the vacuum in her mind. Pakara was dead; she would never again see her little sister, never again share the silly games, the sisterly intimacy, with the person on the Earth she had known for the longest time.

  Last night Osborne had held her until well past midnight, and then he had carried her to bed. His words had helped her, his sympathy easing the ache of her loss. Every confused and grief-stricken thought that entered her head, he had countered with gentle words of counsel—it seemed that he had gone to the very core of her being and soothed her pain with exactly the right response. She recalled the night they had met at the hotel in Bangkok, and how Osborne had held her, wanting only to look deep into her mind.

  Sukara wondered about his strange infatuation with her mind. She might have understood him had his obsession been with her body, if he craved sex with her like another customer. But why his obsession with her mind? She was a simple, uneducated working girl from the country, who knew nothing of the world around her, and even had difficulty making sense of her own day-to-day experiences.

  She climbed out of bed and padded into the bathroom. She saw herself in the full-length mirror beside the shower, and instead of averting her glance as she normally would, she confronted herself head on. She was ugly. Her facial injury, which she had not seen like this for a long, long time, was not just unsightly in itself—a raised ridge of purple scar-tissue running down the centre of her
forehead, down the right side of her nose, and through both lips to the point of her chin—it also turned her nose to one side, and gave her lips a mismatched twist, as if they had been cut in half and then imperfectly re-joined.

  As if this was not sufficient a burden to bear, she was short and squat, her skin a shade darker than what was considered the ideal. Fat Cheng had called her little Monkey—but little Ape would have been more appropriate.