by Anthony Ryan
"You look like shit," Father Bob commented as I wandered into the chapel. He was placing hymn sheets on the pews for the late night mass. "Been drinking?"
"Only during working hours." I hesitated. We hadn't spoken much since Consuela died. "How's things?"
"Need new plumbing if you'd care to contribute to the collection box."
"Sure." I pushed some green through the slot. "Would've been round sooner…"
"Save it, Alex. You don't believe so why would you come back? It's OK, got my hands full with the sins of the faithful."
"There's a little girl, kidnap case…"
"Whatever you need."
"I need access to the copy. I assume you made one."
Father Bob gave me a sidelong glance, kept placing hymn sheets. "What makes you think that?"
"The soul resides in memory, memory resides in the soul. Preservation of human memory is therefore the holiest of acts." A quotation. Cardinal Eduardo Mendez, ex-communicant, apostate and founder of the Neo-Catholic Church.
"Didn't know you read scripture."
"Consuela did. She was the believer after all."
Father Bob sighed and put down his hymn sheets. "Come on, it's in the office."
"It won't be the same," he warned, spooling up the immersion couch. "It's just a construct, an interface for accessing memories, don't expect too much."
I nodded, swallowed, realised my hands were shaking.
"Do you really need to do this?" Father Bob asked.
I closed my eyes, exhaled slowly, refilled my lungs. Four repeats. An old pre-combat routine. "Let's get on with it."
I'd opted for the docks as a setting, the viewing platform overlooking the ore freighter bays. It was where I'd first seen her. She hadn't seen me that first time. I'd been hiding in the air ducts, on the run and waiting for an opportunity to stowaway on her father's tug. They ran it together, family operation, had since she was little. But she longed for the freighters, long hauling out to the Belt and back, and would come here to watch them berth or launch. She was watching now, older than the first time, the age she'd been when she died.
I tried to speak and faltered, coughed, forced the words out. "Hello Con."
She turned, there was a brief moment of blankness then a bright welcoming smile. "Alex." A pause. "You haven't been to see me in nine months and eight days."
I nearly jacked out then and there. Father Bob was right, it wasn't her. Perfect face, perfect voice, but all wrong. Just not her.
"I'm sorry," I stammered. "I'm here now, and I need your help."
Blankness again as the construct programme processed my response. "Of course I'll help."
"Choi," I said. "I need to know about Choi."
"Choi, Zyan Li. Real name Matsuke Hiroka. We served together during the war."
"What do you know about her life before the Slab?"
"Veteran of the Sino-Nippon War. No surviving family members. Served in Japanese Air Force Intelligence then covert ops. She was an entertainer before the war, part of the Tokyo Teen Pop revival, a singer, gave it up when she got married and had a daughter."
A daughter? All this time I had no idea. I'd always assumed Choi spent her entire life either killing people or dealing drugs. "What happened to her family?"
"Killed in the initial Sino assault wave." The construct's face became sombre. "That's very sad."
Looking at this perfect but grotesque facsimile of my wife I couldn't help but conclude Cardinal Mendez had got it wrong. There is no soul in memory, no ghost in the machine.
"Thank you." I couldn't bring myself to say her name. She wasn't there to hear it. "Jack me out please, Father."
I was hurrying back to the Pipe when Sherry called. She was using our private channel which didn't bode well. "Problems Alex. Tech just found a mobile bug latched on to the Department's main comms data feed. Looks like it's been lying dormant for months. Must've cut its way in when they did the last systems upgrade. Very high spec, bespoke engineering."
Mr Mac, he always hired the best. "How much did it get?"
"At least seven hours worth of comms data, all squirted out in a data-burst less than twenty minutes ago."
Seven hours ago, when I met the sonofabitch. Wind me up and let me go then track my progress a few hours later. Like I said, Mr Mac had no need of tracers.
I check-listed every call I'd made in the previous seven hours. Luckily I hadn't mentioned Choi at any point but I had called Sherry to arrange the SWAT team just after leaving her place. He knew of our association, he knew she dealt blues and he knew the intel she gave me was a blind. If he hadn't put it together by now he soon would.
"You need to get as many Demons as you can to Madame Choi's place," I told Sherry, now sprinting for the Pipe. "Give them Nina Laredo's ID specs. Advise to shoot on sight."
"Won't be easy. The bug uploaded a virus to the Departmental data core the instant the tech's found it, a really nasty one. Yang-Side police comms are seriously screwed for at least another hour."
"Do what you can." I sounded off, ran onto the axis-bound platform and scraped through the carriage doors a fraction before they closed.
I forced myself to take a seat, checked the Sig then exhaled slowly, refilled my lungs. Four repeats. Pre-combat routine.
Joe had secluded himself behind an over-flowing dumpster in the alley opposite the Heavenly Garden, crouched in the shadows, hooded against the sweat-rain, large hands resting on his knees. I wondered if he had any idea how threatening he looked.
"Anything?" I asked.
He rose, shaking his head, rain drops flying from the hood. "Nothing in or out since I got here. Place is closed up. Lights on upstairs though."
I glanced up at the slitted yellow rectangle over the door, knowing whatever awaited me there wasn't likely to be pretty.
"We're going to have company," I told Joe. "Plenty of it and not friendly. No back-up for at least a half hour. You don't have to stay."
Joe's only reaction was a slightly raised eyebrow, but he was the kind of guy who could say a lot with an eyebrow.
"Sorry," I said, drawing the Sig. "Stay close."
The door was locked so I got Joe to bust it open, went in gun raised, blinking in the gloom, finding Marco unmoving on the floor. I went to him, fingered his neck for a pulse. Slow, regular. The sweat dewed pallor of his skin told the tale. Drugged. Syteline maybe? He wouldn't leave so she put him out.
"Find a closet for him," I told Joe. "Then watch the door. I'll be upstairs."
I lingered at the foot of the stairs, peering up at the half-rectangle of light showing she'd left the door to her office open. Why didn't you run Choi? I sighed and started climbing.
I gave the door a gentle push, kept the Sig held low. Choi was kneeling before a large sheet of rice paper, dressed in an all-white kimono, guiding the hand of a little girl as she painted Japanese symbols with a bamboo brush.
"This means tree," she told the girl who smiled a little. "You try."
The girl took a firm hold of the brush and tried to copy the symbol, a frown of deep concentration on her small face.
"Very good," Choi complimented her. "Don't you think so, Inspector?" She looked up at me, face absent of any fear or concern. There was also no sign of a weapon within reach. Just a satsuma-ware tea set with a half-empty bowl.
"Yes," I said, putting the Sig away, coming in, forcing a grin at the girl. "You're very clever."
She gave a shy smile and burrowed into Choi's side, snuggling close.
"Choi," I said, keeping my voice as light as possible. "We don't have much time…"
"Will you sit Inspector?" Choi gestured at the couch opposite. "I'm afraid I have no more tea to offer."
It was clear she had no intention of going anywhere so I went to the couch and sat down. "What's her name?" I asked.
Choi smoothed the little girl's hair back from her forehead. "I doubt she has one. I've been calling her Satomi. She seems to like it."
I didn't need
to ask to know Satomi had been her daughter's name. "Let me see if I've read this right. You got wind of a major Blues exchange but didn't know what the package was. You surveilled the hand-over to see if it was worth stealing. Mr Spaghetti and Meatballs turns up with Satomi here. You kill him and the security, hack up the bodies and take her back here to play house."
Choi just smiled and tweaked Satomi's nose, drawing a strange rasping giggle. "She can't laugh," she explained. "Or talk. They made her without vocal chords. The courier had a data stick with all the details. They took a little girl and made her into a narcotics production facility."
I remembered Ricci's call. "Her blood."
"Yes. Her endocrine system has been altered to synthesise Blues. The perfect courier. She's worth billions. And she will never grow old, they took her ageing genes. But she will die, eventually. Blues is a carcinogen, even now she shows early signs of non-Hodgkins lymphoma. She has perhaps another two years."
"That why you didn't run?"
Choi looked at me squarely and I noted a faint sheen of sweat on her forehead. "Where would I run to? I knew who they would send after us." Her voice was a little strained and her hands trembled as they cradled the girl, who now seemed to be sliding into sleep. My eyes flicked to the half-empty tea bowl.
"Choi…"
"My name is Matsuke Hiroka," she said. "I know we have not exactly been friends Inspector, but I am glad you are here to witness my final act. I have lived a life of deceit, crime and violence. And now I have a chance to give it meaning." She held Satomi closer. "If they take her they might save her. Save her for the life they made her for."
An urgent whisper from Joe hissed in my ear. "Movement outside. Counting four so far."
"I can get you out of here," I told Choi. "Get treatment for her…"
"There is no treatment." Her eyelids were drooping but she forced them open, fixing me with an imploring glare. "Consuela worried for you during the war, did you know that? Not for your life but for your soul. The many lives you took, your fierceness. She worried that with the war over there would be no place for you, no path to redemption. But here you are, no less fierce but a force for good. You have your redemption, Alex. Let me have mine."
Joe again, "Getting pretty busy down here, Inspector."
Choi closed her eyes and began to sing, soft, melodious, that old Bob Marley tune again. Satomi shifted a little in her arms, rested her head against Choi's breast, her lips moved as she tried to sing along.
"I'll be right down," I told Joe.
Nina Laredo was waiting outside, alone in the middle of the street. The nightly sweat-rain was starting to ease off and the holo-lights reflected off the slick paving like scattered jewels. There were a few hirelings lurking in the corners and no doubt a few more I couldn't see.
"Wait for the signal," I instructed Joe. "Then lay down fire on the right flank. Concentrate on the rooftops."
"What is the signal?"
"It'll be hard to miss." I went outside.
"Inspector," Nina greeted me with the usual professional courtesy, keeping her H&K flechette carbine pointed at the ground. "I am instructed to permit you to vacate the vicinity peaceful-"
I quick-drew the Sig and shot her in the stomach. After that things are pretty hazy.
The Heavenly Garden Shoot Out (or Massacre depending on who's telling the story) has since become something of a Yang-Side legend, a story to scare infant crims at bedtime. All about how the big bad Demon gut-shot the most feared hired gun on the Slab, took a flechette burst in the face as she went down but that only seemed to piss him off. There are lurid and improbable tales of extraordinary marksmanship as he went on to pick off the snipers on the rootfops with single shots to the head then engage the survivors in hand to hand combat. The ending varies a little but most agree he had to be prevented from further abusing the corpse of Nina Laredo by a large fellow Demon who knocked him unconscious.
Whether or not any of this is true I can't tell you. I honestly don't remember anything after I shot Nina.
I woke up in the hospital finding Sherry Mordecai gazing down with an expression I'd never seen on her face before. Pity.
"Don't do that," I croaked, feeling like my oesophagus had been replaced with sand-paper. I blearily fumbled for the water jug next to the bed. Sherry gently pushed my hands away and poured a small amount into a cup, holding it to my lips.
"Thanks," I said, slumping back into the mattress. I met her gaze. "Choi?"
She shook her head. "And the girl. Ricci says sodium thiopental, fast acting and mostly painless."
"Joe?"
"He's fine. Feeling guilty. Thinks he may have hit you too hard. I told him where you're concerned there's no such thing as too hard."
She took something from her pocket and placed it on the bedside table. Mr Mac's smart. "He's been calling. Thought I'd leave it up to you."
She went to the door then hesitated. "Oh, it seems Choi made a will. She's left you the Heavenly Garden, and everything else. It's a shit-load of money and I'm not sure how much of it Professional Standards will let you keep, but for the moment, you're a rich man. Congratulations." With that, she left.
I stared at the Smart for a long time before picking it up and thumbing to the missed calls. He picked up immediately.
"Alex, are you OK?" Genuine concern. No anger or frustration.
"I killed Nina," I said. "Blew her guts out."
"I know. Nina had a professional awareness of the risks inherent in her occupation. I'll miss the contribution she made to my business. But employees are replaceable, friends are not."
"Try and get this you fucking nutcase, I am not your friend!"
"Of course you are, Alex. As I am your friend. Why else would I give you the opportunity to resolve this?"
A cold realisation gripped my chest. "You knew, you already knew Choi had taken her."
"No, I suspected it and you confirmed it. Being aware of your connection I thought it only fair to at least give you a chance of saving her. Pity how it turned out. I always liked Choi…"
A chance of saving her. "Her name was Matsuke Hiroka and she didn't need saving," I said. "She'd saved herself. Don't call me again. I see you I am going to kill you." I switched off the smart and tossed it into the water jug.
I suddenly became aware that there was an adhesive bandage on the right side of my face, a big one. The cause of Sherry's pity? I struggled out of bed and wobble walked to the mirror over the sink. A handsome man I barely knew stared back from the mirror. He'd clearly been through some bad times, tired red-tinged eyes set in a pale unshaven mask that was, nevertheless, still unfeasibly attractive.
I reached up and began to unpeel the bandage. Flechette wounds have a signature all their own, the way they score the flesh leaving straight line scars that might have been left by a scalpel. Nina's final shot had carved deep channels in the skin from my jawline to the top of my ear which had been partly sheared away. The medics would have treated the scars with re-growth enzymes but the damage was too severe for a full repair. Without surgery or a complete facial reconstruction I'd be wearing this disfigurement for the rest of my life.
"Now," the handsome man grinned in the mirror, "that's more like it."
THE END
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About the author
Anthony Ryan writes and illustrates fantasy and science fiction. He works full time as a researcher, has a degree in history, and lives in London.
For news and general wittering about stuff he likes, check out Anthony's blog at: http://anthonystuff.wordpress.com
Discover other titles by Anthony Ryan at Smashwords.com:
Blood Song - Raven's Shadow Book I
Slab City Blues
Slab City Blues: A Hymn to Gods Long Dead
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