by Ian Hocking
On David’s left, another bike appeared. It was the man who had been in the shed when the laptop exploded. David watched him with envy. He seemed to ride the bike with his fingers and toes. The bike undulated and swerved yet the rider’s body kept a perfect, comfortable line. David, by contrast, was at risk of bouncing from his seat.
‘Computer, rear view.’
Another bleep. The display showed that the third bike was still behind, but not far. They had him in a pincer.
Movement to his left. A boot connected with his bike. David swore. He wobbled and slid, but managed to stay upright. Moments later he felt his palms go slick with sweat. That had been close. His stomach and fingertips tingled.
David searched the area for a way out. There was low ground on the other side of the hedge. To his left, the ground banked steeply upwards. That way led back to the equipment shed. He had to get over that hedge and into the next field. There was no way he could outrun his pursuers. On the flat, maybe. His bike was faster.
He dipped into a steep ditch and was forced to brake heavily. He slowed. The wheels slid, locked, and he walked the bike up the other side. He turned to see that the other bikers had gone high to ride around the top of the ditch. They were waiting for him. Abruptly, he heaved the front of the bike around, surprised at its sudden, dead weight, and headed back the way he had come.
He retraced his route along the hedge. He built up his straight-line speed. After a glance at the camera, he pulled on the back brake and spun the rear of the bike. He sat and panted. His breath clouded the visor so he flicked it up. There were lines of sweat on his temples.
He removed his gloves—they dangled by strips of Velcro—and looped the chin strap through its metal link and tugged. It held. He had maybe four seconds until the oncoming bikes reached him.
He slapped down his visor and raked the throttle. Once again he was riding, gathering speed.
Something in his expression, or his posture, gave pause to the incoming riders. They fell to the left and to the right and David shot through the middle with centimetres of clearance.
He rode on towards the large ditch. He did not bounce in the seat as he had done before. Now he rode with his fingers and toes. A glance at the rear-view camera confirmed that the other bikers were following. With some disappointment, he saw that they were moving as fast as he was.
The ditch approached.
Here it was.
Into the rapids.
He swerved left, hillward, then cut right, towards the ditch at a cruel diagonal. He spurred his heels and felt the answering sibilance of opening valves. Accelerant mixed with the fuel. The engine whistled and the bike found a new speed. He dropped low to its tank, willing himself to stay onboard.
He rode up the other side of the ditch, now pressed into the seat, and caught its lip as a ramp. He was airborne. The hedge was a brief glimmer of dark green below. He heard the wheels swipe its surface. He became weightless. Then the bike touched down. David watched as the steering column rose to meet his chin. His mouth slammed shut. The back wheel touched, bounced, and the front did the same. The bike became a bucking bronco. But the intervals shortened and, though the bike shook and swerved, the onboard computer was able to keep it upright. It came to a graceless halt some thirty metres from the hedge.
David tapped the petrol tank.
He opened his visor and risked a look over his shoulder. The other bikers had stopped to watch him. He wondered why they didn’t race on to the nearest gate. One biker removed his helmet and stabbed angrily at a phone. David managed a little wave and began to ride away.
When he reached the road, he turned south. The tyre spikes rattled uncomfortably until the bike retracted them. According to Easy Rider(TM), the present road led, via a tortuous pre-programmed route involving minor roads and country lanes, to London Heathrow. If he rode without a break, it would take one day, nine hours, twenty-eight minutes and twenty-seven seconds.
It was 8:00 am. He rode on.
Chapter Fourteen
The empty hotel lobby had twinned staircases that rose like the edges of a cobra’s hood. Saskia passed across dark and light tiles: milky veins in the brown, black cracks in the white. Her small heels made clacks. Deliberately, she lifted her gaze. The ceiling was shot through with lights.
A man hurried towards them.
‘No, no, fucking no,’ he said.
He had the countenance of a soldier who had learned to march in his youth and had never recovered his relaxation. He was beyond retirement age, but the tightness of the skin around his throat spoke to fitness. His eyes travelled up her legs, perched briefly on her breasts, and flitted to Jago. ‘You’re bloody persistent if nothing else.’
‘Thank you, Colonel McWhirter,’ replied Jago. He was motionless. They did not shake hands.
‘You have not met me yet,’ said Saskia. ‘Frau Kommissarin Saskia Brandt, Föderatives Investigationsbüro, or FIB.’
McWhirter stared at her hand as though he wished to break it, and a branching diagram of self-defence sprouted in her mind’s eye, discreet as a menu offered by a butler. It varied on dimensions of incapacity (light, moderate, severe), completion time (7 seconds, 30 seconds, a minute), and weapon type (unarmed, pencil, McWhirter’s sweater).
Saskia raised her fist to her mouth. She coughed lightly. The menu slid away.
‘The continental FIB hereby requests your full cooperation in the capture of Professor David Proctor, Colonel.’ Her face closed on his. She saw the blackheads and the bloodshot sleepiness of his eyes. She looked at his lips and tilted her head. ‘I will give you five minutes. Call the person who pays you. Ask them to confirm my identity with the Berlin section chief, Beckmann. Then return and, first of all, explain to me and my deputy your rationale for this…filibustering. Second, try to talk me out of arresting you for obstruction of a terrorist investigation.’
McWhirter frowned. His anger was imperfectly contained. Saskia imagined him as an actor who was dumbstruck by the improvisation of a fellow performer. He spun on his heel, crossed the foyer, and was gone.
Jago turned to her.
‘Deputy now, is it?’
‘Sorry.’
‘Don’t apologise. I’ve never been a sidekick. It’ll be a new experience.’
‘A sidekick?’
‘You know, a sidekick. He asks the hero dumb questions so the audience knows what’s going on.’
‘Ah, I understand.’ A memory—a precious jewel—glinted. ‘That happens on Enterprise, the 60s TV show. You beam down with the captain. If you are wearing a red shirt you will be subject to a fatal special effect.’
‘You’d better call me Scotty, then. He never gets killed.’
‘Do you think my speech worked?’
Jago found his smile, then lost it. ‘We’ll get the gen, or a bullet in the head. Either way, it’s progress.’
~
The rear lawn was pressed and smooth, sloped like a fairway, and tree islands put winter half-shadow across Saskia, Jago and McWhirter as they walked.
‘What about the woman on the motorbike?’ Saskia asked.
‘She’s aged between thirty-five and forty-five,’ said McWhirter. ‘We would have her in custody if it wasn’t for the local police.’
To Saskia, Jago said, ‘We like to be useful.’
At the peak of the garden, where one could look back across the shoulder of the hotel to the widening valley, a large, camouflaged tent flexed in the wind. A man in civilian clothing stood next to its porch. His hands rested on an assault rifle. He saluted McWhirter as the party entered. Inside, a dozen men and women were packing computer and office equipment into crates. Unlike the guard, they did not acknowledge the visitors.
‘It’s lucky you came today,’ said McWhirter. ‘We would have been gone by tomorrow.’
Saskia moved to the centre of the tent, where a huge shaft had been opened. Its mouth was large enough to admit a car. Four coloured ropes dangled into the hole from a pyramid scaffold.
‘Is this the only way?’ she asked. The inspiration from her body, filtering through her chip, was clear: she must go down. But it looked dangerous.
‘I’m sure the detective inspector and I wouldn’t feel any less of you if you satisfied yourself with the crime scene photos rather than a trip down there. Am I wrong, Jago?’
The DI peered into the hole. Then he looked at the rig. He seemed unimpressed. ‘Saskia, you should think twice about this.’
She removed her coat, handed it to Jago, and shrugged off her suit jacket. Both men stared at her. ‘I came to see the crime scene,’ she said.
‘There are airborne contaminants,’ said McWhirter. ‘I really -’
‘You let Proctor down.’ Saskia removed her earrings and put them in a trouser pocket.
‘Listen to me, Kommissarin.’ He moved close to her. ‘I need this hole capped by seven.’
‘Then we should proceed.’
McWhirter held her stare, then turned to open an equipment crate. ‘Splendid. Why not? We’ll call it “The Magical Mystery Tour” and invite coach parties.’
Jago draped Saskia’s jacket solemnly across one arm. As she reached to remove her holster, he gripped her knuckles. She read his expression and nodded. The gun stayed.
‘Take this,’ McWhirter said. He tossed her a helmet. Inside was a tangled bundle. Saskia shook it out to reveal a harness. She was relieved to see that it looked familiar. Rappeling, then, counted among her implanted skills. Her hands began to manipulate its straps with expertise. She fed her legs through and ensured the double-sprocket mechanism was attached to the karabiner.
McWhirter watched her complete the checks. He stepped over the fluorescent cordon and attached his harness to a rope. ‘Twenty metres. I’m on blue.’ He tapped his helmet and the lamp awoke. Then he jumped into the blackness. The rope whistled through his decelerator.
Saskia looked at Jago. Her thumbs itched. ‘You want to come too, Scotty?’
‘No, thanks. A friend was paralysed using one of those decelerators. Anyway,’ he said, hefting her coat and jacket, ‘I’m being useful.’
‘Right.’ Saskia clipped her harness to the rope. She chose the red one, unhinged the decelerator and fitted the line around the two sprockets. She closed it firmly and checked, with a tug, that the rope was gripped. There was a disc attached to the sprocket axle. She pulled it out and turned the dial to twenty metres. Then she snapped it back, checked it was locked, and jumped.
~
The blackness opened like a mouth. She heard Jago say, ‘A friend was paralysed by one of those,’ but he was no longer there. It was a memory. She blinked in the rushing, dry air. She was falling too fast. She would hit the ground fast enough to break into pieces, fragments of a looking glass.
She saw a circle of light. She began to slow. The decelerator squealed and the harness bit into her pelvis. Her weight returned with a thump and her head whipped forward. Gasping, her eyes opened on smoke and dust. She could see her shoes dangling centimetres from the ground. She pinched the decelerator. It sprang open and the rope was released.
She landed on the balls of her feet. A pat confirmed that her gun was still in its holster. She resettled her glasses and tensed as McWhirter stepped towards her. She felt the heat of his face and his spit-smelling breath.
‘Your helmet light has three levels of brightness. Just tap. Understood?’
Though her glasses had zero-light processors, she did not want McWhirter to know. She tapped the helmet three times. The beam became intense and localised. She had landed in the remains of a corridor. It was a long, grey space choked with debris. She could see furniture, computer equipment, filing cabinets and paper. The air tickled her throat.
‘What happened down here?’ she asked.
‘A fire. Don’t be surprised if we suffocate.’
‘Was this damage caused yesterday?’
‘Most of it by the first bomb, twenty years ago.’
‘And you say Proctor was responsible for both?’
‘The origin of the explosion was inside the locked workroom of Proctor’s laboratory. It should have destroyed the equipment in Proctor’s lab, and only that.’
‘But it didn’t.’
‘No. It started a fire, which soon spread. Ceilings collapsed. Eight people were killed. Proctor was evasive during his initial interrogation and evasive again to the inquiry. In their report, the investigators noted their suspicions, but there wasn’t enough evidence. He slipped through the net.’
‘Until now,’ said Saskia, probing. ‘When he slipped through the net again.’
McWhirter turned his light in her direction. ‘Be careful where you step, Detective. I don’t want to lose anyone else.’
He stepped through a rough gap that had once held a door. Puddles splashed as she followed. Inside the room, their torch-beams were thickened by the dust. A huge glass tank loomed. Its broken edges winked.
‘What was in there?’
‘A whole world. A world in a fish tank.’
‘I do not understand.’
‘Of course you don’t.’ He gestured to the right. ‘Proctor’s old office. That was where the 2003 bomb went off.’
Saskia removed her glasses and polished them on the hem of her blouse. As she rubbed, she felt his stare, and the revolver was close in her thoughts until the glasses were replaced and McWhirter turned away. She looked slowly over the scene to capture it. Later review of the video would reveal the shadowed corners. She stepped forward and something crunched underfoot. She glanced down and saw the eye of a flattened rat. She moved back and bumped into an overturned chair. Her heart seemed to grow large and hot in her chest.
McWhirter’s light blinded her again. ‘You know, we have a saying in Britain: “The murderer always returns to the scene of the crime.” Shimoda’s body was in that room along with the bomb. He still is. Pieces of him, anyway.’
‘“Thus conscience does make cowards of us all”.’
‘Sorry?’
‘Another British saying. Shakespeare. Do you feel guilty, Colonel, that this happened on your watch?’
‘Should I?’
‘It happened twice.’
‘Detective, few people finish the games they start with me.’
Saskia touched rat with the tip of her shoe. She remembered crying in the back of a taxi after the break up with Simon, the boyfriend who never was. The burn: a question mark. Question: What power did McWhirter have over the Angel of Death, the serial killer whose bottled geni could erupt from her brain in an instant?
‘Are you trying to scare me, Colonel?’
‘I’m making you aware of the facts.’
‘Facts I have. What I need is the feel. Where is the interface with the computer?’
‘See for yourself.’
He pointed towards a doorway in the far wall. She moved towards it. The plaintive cries of the rats became louder. The room was small. There was a power here: it was a room in a room in a room, buried deep in the earth. Saskia was struck by the thought that, after she and McWhirter completed their tour, and this place was capped, its silence would return and its power would grow again.
McWhirter breathed in her ear. ‘It has an unpleasant feel, don’t you agree?’
She turned to him. ‘It is certainly dusty.’
‘Got what you wanted?’
‘Please?’
‘You wanted to get into Proctor’s head. Are you close enough? You can almost smell him, can’t you? Smells like…an incinerator. A crematorium, even.’
‘I would like to leave now.’
‘It has atmosphere, doesn’t it? My little Magical Mystery Tour.’
‘I would like to leave.’ Her voice was firmer. Her hand rested on her gun. ‘Now.’
He laughed. ‘I’m only pulling your leg. Come on.’
They retraced their steps. When they reached the corridor, McWhirter was quick to attach his rope. He connected the decelerator and climbed upwards in a caterpillar
-like motion, alternately grasping the rope his hands and feet. ‘Are you coming?’
‘Directly. I want to check to something first.’
‘Well, don’t stay too long. I heard some noises just now.’
‘What kind of noises?’
‘Just noises.’
And he was gone. His breath echoed down the shaft and sounded close, but Saskia was alone. She touched the edge of her glasses and a Heads Up Display appeared, overlaying the dark scene with objecting-parsing halos, and a menu. A cross-hair was locked to her eye movements. She blinked at the cartoonish graphic of a filing cabinet and a preview of her recently recorded footage expanded.
What? she thought. Something nagged at her. What am I looking for?
Myself?
No. Concentrate.
She cued through the footage until she found the moment she had descended into the research centre. Fast forward some seconds. The dark corners were bright. No objects had thermal properties that the glasses identified as statistically warmer or cooler than the ambient. She stopped on the image of the corridor wall. Her breath stopped too. Her astonished eyes saccaded to the magnifier icon, blinked, and the image rushed out.
It showed the corridor—this corridor, right now—in almost perfect brilliance. There was the wreckage, the charcoaled furniture and loose paper. But on the wall immediately to the left of the doorway, someone had written a message.
The words blazed white on the grey surface. She lowered her glasses and looked sternly at the wall. Nothing. She raised the glasses. The graffiti re-appeared. She swallowed. The writer had used a paint that was reflective in the infra-red portion of the spectrum.
The message read:
Das Kribbeln in meinen Fingerspitzen lässt mich ahnen, es scheint ein Unglück sich anzubahnen.
The glasses were produced in America and their default language was English. Uncommanded, a subtitle ran across the base of her vision.
‘The pricking in my fingertips lets me say that bad luck is on the way,’ it read.
