Robert Charrette - Arthur 01 - A Prince Among Men

by Robert N. Charrette

  It stirred, and she thought her first impression was right. Then she saw the pale, curled fingers on the ground. Dead man's fingers. The dark lump rose up, resolving itself into the shape of a hulking Sumo refugee. She froze in place, chilled deeper than the cutting wind could account for.

  The killer held something in his hands, something soft and yielding in the grip, something that dripped. A dark-red watch cap. The killer pulled on the cap, drawing her attention to his face. That face would have been at home in a horror vid. He grinned crookedly at her, showing teeth out of a dentist's nightmare.

  "Good night it is. Two for Old Shaggs tonight."

  She screamed, but the wind tore away the sound.

  Turning, she immediately lurched off balance as one of her damned heels slid off a rock and snapped. She fell hard. Before she could scramble up, she felt a presence looming over her. The heat of his body washed over her, as did his fetid breath. The smells of decaying organic matter and fresh blood clogged her nose.

  A huge hand came down on her shoulder, half engulfing her neck. Sharp nails dug into her flesh. She screamed again and started her hopeless struggle.

  The bastard strangling her actually laughed.

  Holger saw the thing that had taken to living in the alley behind Rezcom 3 every night during the stakeout. He didn't know what it was, but he knew it for something from that other place, the place where the monsters came from. Out of habit he noted its patterns, the way it moved, its hunting grounds, and soon had it pegged as a scavenger living off the bountiful refuse of the rezcom. But he didn't do anything about it. Not even when it took the addict that stumbled into its territory. Scavengers kill live prey when they can get away with it; it was the way of nature. Watching with professional interest, he noted that nature's way applied to the unnatural as well. He didn't interfere. It wasn't his business.

  He knew about the other watchers too, but he stayed out of their way, especially once he spotted a familiar silhouette spending time parked next to one of the watchers' cars: Vadama. Staying out of his way was usually the safer course. Holger did his best to keep his own surveillance less visible.

  But two weeks of physical and electronic watch on the rezcom brought him nothing. Even tailing Marianne Reddy unearthed no sign of the missing John Reddy. Holger wasn't really surprised; the kid hadn't even shown up for his own funeral. Tailing the mother had seemed a good tack; since John wasn't dead, it seemed likely that he would try to contact his mother once things calmed down. It had been a bad guess.

  The trail was cold; he left it to the Mitsutomo boys.

  Abandoning his watch on the boy's mother, Holger retraced his steps, looking for something he had missed, anything that might be out of place. He looked again at the murder that had happened a few days before John's disappearance. The victim, one Emilio Winston, had been missing lor several days before turning up dead in a drug-related crime. Winston had been a student at John's university. A connection?

  Holger hacked his way into the university computer net.

  Winston, the victim, had been on the freshman basketball team with John. That was a connection, but what kind? Another kid, a freshman named Trahn, had disappeared from the university about the same time as Winston. Holger ran a few files and discovered that Trahn's psych profile didn't look like your typical runaway's. Trahn had been enrolled in one of John's classes. Holger set a couple of search routines loose on the files and waited for results. The expert systems didn't live up to their name; they turned up nothing.

  Maybe it was the fact that John himself had disappeared now that made Holger want to connect the two previous disappearances. Maybe he was just grasping at straws. In any case, he took a look through the university records for himself.

  He started with campus security, since they had checked into both disappearances. Trahn had last been seen on the day before Winston's last appearance. Close, but not close enough. Lots of witnesses, John included, had seen Trahn in an Enviro lab, but nobody after that. The kid had been there after most of them had left, but John's account said that Trahn left before he did. Sometime after Trahn left the lab, then; and before supper, since his roommate reported that Trahn had failed to show up for their supper date. A window of only an hour or so.

  Winston's disappearance was more problematic. In fact, he seemed to be almost nonexistent for most of the day before he was listed as missing; only his roommate had seen him that day. Odd, since the psych profile showed him to be a gregarious sort. But then, the profile didn't show him as a drug abuser, either.

  Why hadn't the police followed up on that? Even if they had, what would they have turned up? There didn't seem to be any connections between the two disappearances. But nearness of the timing still bothered Holger; that, and the fact that they were both too uncharacteristic for the people involved.

  He cast his net wider, using one of the Department's cover idents to put a general request into the police computer. Scanning the missing-persons list for a month on either side of the museum incident, he found another university connection in among the list of names. Four days after the museum incident one Harold Black, a custodian at the university, was listed as missing. Holger called up the report. Black had checked out of work on time the Friday before the incident and failed to report to work the following Monday. Coincidence? Maybe. The investigating officer noted that Black had checked out the previous Friday, citing illness, and had been absent from work for the first three days of the following week. No one had seen the guy during that period. Interesting time frame. Black's whereabouts were unknown for a period almost exactly matching Winston's period of being l he invisible man.

  Holger added Black into his mixing bowl and stirred, waiting for something to stick together. Black popped up as the source of Winston's reported connection with unsavory characters on the day before the boy disappeared. Very interesting. Holger called for Black's file. The datapic was unfamiliar, and Holger was sure he would have remembered such an ugly face; he had never seen the guy before. The file was sparse; the guy was a work-relief type and had been with the university for only a little over a year. The university computer didn't have anything but the basics on him before that I lolger ran down the references and learned they were fakes. Not unusual in itself, but suggestive in the current circumstances.

  Not expecting any results, he placed a call to the last address in Black's file. To his surprise, a gruff voice answered.

  "Hello?"

  "Am I speaking to Mr. Harold Black?" Holger asked in his best phone-solicitor voice.

  "Yeah," the voice responded suspiciously.

  "Mr. Black, you have been selected by our computer to receive a wonderful prize. All you have to do to receive this prize is to verily a few bits of information. Would you be willing to do that?"

  "Don't want no prize. Good-bye."

  The connection went dead, but Holger's console displayed confirmation that the phone line had connected to the address in Black's file. It was in the Providence district of the Northeast sprawl. Not a nice place by all accounts—but by implication, Mr. Harold Black was not a nice man.

  Holger had a few questions for Mr. Harold Black.

  Jessie didn't want to wake up, in fact she dreaded the idea, but the alarm across the room shrilled at her insistently. She'd made sure it was across the room when she'd crawled into bed—what? She squinted across at the clamoring clock—four hours ago. If she had left it within reach of the bed she would have destroyed the blasted thing.

  And her chance for making the deadline, as well.

  Summoning a gigantic effort of will, she flung back the covers and dragged herself up, crossing the room in quick, chilled strides.

  Silence, blessed silence.

  But not relief. For that she'd have to make the pour. Greyshelda Prototypes would be unhappy if she didn't deliver the model today, so unhappy that they'd invoke the failed-delivery clause in her contract. She knew they would; they'd always done so before. But this time she could
n't afford it; she needed every one of the dollars credited to her account. She tugged on her robe. If she made the pour right away, the model would be cured—barely—by the time she got to their offices.

  The light in her workroom was on. She didn't remember leaving it on, but then, she hadn't been thinking very straight when she'd collapsed last night. Two days without sleep did that for you. Waking up with her head on her worktable, next to the food she'd just fixed, had been a clue that she'd needed sleep more than sustenance. Now that she'd had some of the former, the latter sounded good, even if it was to be the Zapper Instameal™ she had 'waved before crashing.

  She was annoyed when she saw that the Paperform™ tray was empty, its compartments as clean as if they had been licked. The ultrasonic vermin guard had to be on the blink again if the rats had gotten in. Then she noticed the pyramidal pile of peas next to the tray. Rats didn't do that.

  Beyond the peas was something that made Jessie's knees weak. She sat down to avoid falling down, and stared. Sitting

  on the table next to the plate was the mold, open, and next to it a casting, all clean and polished.

  Rats didn't do that, either.

  Pamela swiveled the secondary monitor around to where McAlister could see the image.

  "Can you tell me what it is?"

  He gave the screen a quick glance. "One of Sorli's toys."

  "He built it under your nose and with Mitsutomo money, and you're telling me that you don't know what it is?"

  "No idea." He seemed undisturbed by his lack of understanding. "Technics isn't my specialty."

  "Can you get it to one of our research teams?"

  "Sure, but he'll know." The monitor registered agitation in McAlister. "He won't like it."

  "I don't care if he likes it."

  "He'll jump ship."

  Pamela didn't think so. "By his own admission, he can't afford to just now."

  "He won't like having his toy might taken away."

  "He hasn't got time for a temper tantrum."

  "You don't know him very well."

  Who did know Sorli? McAlister had worked with him more closely than anyone Pamela knew of. Had she pegged Sorli right on this one?

  Mike Powers clucked his tongue as he listened to the announcer. God above, what was the world coming to? Used to be that you only heard that sort of trash on the tabloid channels. Dragon men from outer space! Who believed that crap?

  He hit the remote and called up the Astrology Channel. Shelli Crystal was breezing and jiggling her way through Virgo, so he wouldn't have long to wait for his horoscope. Shelli didn't do the 'scopes herself, she had a staff for that; but Mike didn't mind, Shelli put on a good show.

  Something thumped on the balcony. With the windows bianked Mike couldn't see what it was, but he figured it was Ms. Colomo's cat knocking over his flowerpots again. Stirring himself, he hauled his mass out of the chair. If he caught the damned beast he'd pitch it off the balcony. That'd teach Ms. Colomo to let her animal intrude on people's God-given privacy.

  He slid open the door and saw the broken pot immediately. But he didn't see the cat. All he saw was the sharp, sharp teeth in the snout that thrust at him.

  "There's no one there," Spae said as they pulled up.

  Holger shut off the engine. He didn't like this car as much as the one they'd had in Worcester. That seemed appropriate; he didn't like being in the sprawl proper as much as he'd liked its exurb satellite—and he hadn't liked Mitsutomo's version of Worcester much at all.

  "Wait here anyway," he told her.

  "I thought you always wanted backup."

  "This is just reconnaissance."

  "Oh, that makes all the difference."

  But she folded her arms and stayed put.

  The area wasn't quiet, but Holger didn't see or hear anything that didn't fit. It looked and sounded—and smelled— like a run-down neighborhood full of run-down tenements. Nothing he hadn't seen before. His trench coat was out of place here; made him look like cops. Useful at the moment. The street people eased out of his way and watched him with wary eyes.

  The door to the building he sought was open. He entered the hallway and paused by the bottom of the staircase. A naked bulb halfway up the stairs to the next floor was the only light working to push back the gloom of the windowless hall. He went up the creaky stairs, headed for the third floor.

  Two teenagers squatted on the second landing. They wore gang colors but they didn't posture or threaten when Holger reached the landing. For all the attention they paid him, he might not have existed. Holger noted the syringe one of them held in her dirty, limp hand. The sudden, harsh smell of fresh urine and the puddle spreading from beneath her companion said that these two pieces of urban trash were the real thing.

  Holger passed them by and walked down the dark hall. Black's apartment was the next to last on the left. Holger slid a card into the frame and encountered a resistant bolt. 1 ,ocked. He listened but heard nothing from the other side. One of the junkies on the landing sniggered when he rapped on the door.

  There was no response.

  After a minute, Holger took his lock opener from one of his trench coat's inner pockets. Standing to one side, he inserted the opener's rod into the keyhole, triggering the enzyme that would expand the plastic of the rod to match the tumblers. When the expanding plastic had nowhere to go but back into the opener, a second enzyme was released to halt expansion and stiffen the rod's new shape into a custom-fit key. Holger turned the opener and felt the bolt retract. Firmly gripping the Glock concealed in his pocket, he entered.

  The room was empty.

  The debris suggested that more than one person had been living in the apartment, possibly as many as three or four. Nothing suggesting that any of them were female. No doubt there were things here that a good lab could tie the people who had lived here to anyone he found—once he found them—but right now a full scraping search of the place was a waste of time; a hair was anonymous unless you had other hairs or something else with the same DNA structure to compare it with.

  His search gained him one significant item to confirm that he was on the right track. Gummed to the inside of a trash can by some noxious black substance was an embroidered patch. Pried free and turned over, it revealed the likeness of a small dog in armor, a symbol of the Woodman Armory. Such patches were worn by the security guards at the museum. Examination of the patch showed that it had been carefully cut from a garment, probably by someone who had wanted to keep the shirt wearable. Someone who had left Worcester wearing only the clothes on his back might want to keep such a shirt wearable even if he wanted to rid himself of any visible association with the museum. Someone like John Reddy maybe?

  Circumstantial evidence, but suggestive.

  He heard familiar footfalls in the hall. He wasn't surprised when Spae spoke from the doorway.

  "I told you there was no one here."

  "And you were correct, Doctor. I've satisfied myself here for now. We may as well leave."

  He had seen enough. Black's return to this place showed him to be unimaginative and, frankly, fairly stupid. But the runaway custodian was not so stupid as to stay here once he had a hint—as Holger's call had been—that someone was onto him. Black and his companions had abandoned this place, but they were still out there somewhere, probably gone to ground. Their coming here in the first place suggested that Black was their leader, or at the least their native guide. That was fine by Holger, for Black had already demonstrated his skill level in hide-and-seek. Holger would find them. It was just going to be a matter of time.

  At least he and Spae were ahead of the Mitsutomo team. Those corporate slugs were still working Worcester.

  CHAPTER

  I2

  lt was the first truly sunny day in weeks, and John couldn't pass up the chance to take in some of the warm radiance. His tears of being recognized had been laid to rest long ago, so lounging on the porch of MaxMix Manor didn't seem dangerous in the least. This was his n
eighborhood now—more or less; he knew the people who lived here and could spot a stranger as far as he could see along twisty River Street.

  But for all that, he didn't really belong here.

  Still, the day was too fine to let old anxieties nag him into a foul mood. He sat down on the railing and swung up his feet; the balcony support at his back allowed him to maintain his balance on the narrow seat. The sun washed over him, warm and soothing, seeming even to mute the music blaring from the Ramirez house down the street. It was still weeks before the real spring weather would arrive, and the heat felt good. He felt calmer than he had in some time, mellowed.

  Was this how cats felt when they stretched out in a sunbeam?

  Like a cat, he slitted his eyes and watched the street without seeming to. River Street didn't get a lot of traffic, mostly just locals on foot or bicycle going about their business. Not too many cars; the road was full of untended potholes. It was a bad part of town, don't you know.

  Feeling relaxed, John just watched the kids playing in the street, racing between the old multistory houses and across yards, sidewalks, and street as if there were no distinction. Once in a while a car would negotiate the road, dodging pits and kids as necessary. Slick Dick put in an appearance in the lot by Rosamund's Haircuttery and set up shop early; Slick must have been touched by the fineness of the day as well, because John saw him actually accept trade goods for th£ junk he was pushing. The day was almost ruined when Mr. Talisano's thunderous old Chevy fumer rumbled past in blue clouds of foul-smelling exhaust. Mr. Talisano was a good mechanic, which was the only way he could keep that old antique running, but he wasn't a sensible guy; gas guzzlers like the Chevy were just too anti-green.

  A twin pair of black leather jackets turned the corner from Pickett, a guy and a girl with arms wrapped around each other. He recognized the male's silhouette at once; such a tall, rail-thin scarecrow had to be Hector. Since the guy was Hector, the girl had to be Carla, his woman. John didn't need to see the backs of their jackets to know they were painted with the flaming-rapier emblem of the Downtown Dons. Though the pair were both several years younger than John, their emblems were older and more worn than the one on the back of John's jacket.