The Big Sheep

by Robert Kroese

  “Strange how?” I asked.

  “On edge,” he said. “Even more than usual. And spacey, like she’s not all there. She forgets things. Like yesterday she asked if I wanted to try the new pizza place on Figueroa. I thought she was joking, because we had just eaten there three days ago, and she hated it. Said it was the worst pizza she’d ever had. So I laughed, but she was serious. She didn’t remember going there. She was so certain, I told her I must have remembered wrong, and we went there again. And she hated it again. Ordered the Hawaiian, just like last time. Said it was the worst pizza she’d ever had—again.”

  “And she never remembered she’d been there before?”

  “Not that I could tell. I didn’t push her, because she’s already so anxious. Paranoid, even. She keeps saying things like ‘You won’t let anything happen to me, will you, Roy?’ And I tell her, you know, that’s my job. I’ll do my best. And then she doesn’t say anything. Sometimes she just cries.”

  “You tell her you’ll do your best? Not exactly reassuring.”

  “I don’t lie to Priya,” Roy said. “Never. She’s surrounded all day by people who tell her what she wants to hear, or what they think will get her to do what they want her to do. That isn’t my job. My job is to protect her. And that means being straight with her. If she can’t trust me when it counts, then I’ve failed.”

  “And does she trust you?”

  He shrugged, and for a moment a pained expression showed on his face. “Obviously not completely, since she felt she had to sneak out to hire Keane. All I can do is be honest with her. It’s tough, though, when she starts talking all paranoid. How do you talk someone out of paranoia? The more I try to reassure her that there’s no vast conspiracy out to get her, the more I sound like part of the conspiracy. And to be honest, I don’t know that there isn’t a conspiracy. I haven’t seen any evidence of one, but that doesn’t mean it doesn’t exist.”

  “Is that what she tells you? That there’s a vast conspiracy out to get her?”

  “Not in so many words. But she’s on edge all the time. She doesn’t trust anybody. Freaks out when she sees one of her own commercials on TV. Says that people on the street are watching her. Well, what am I going to say to that? She’s Priya Mistry, for Pete’s sake. Of course people on the street are watching her. So tell me, Mr. Fowler, is there a conspiracy?”

  “If there is,” I started, “Erasmus Keane is the man—”

  I saw the blast a split second before I felt it: a hailstorm of broken glass propelled by a fireball, the promise that EVERYTHING MUST GO splintering into a million pieces. I instinctively shut my eyes and raised my hands before my face, and a hundredth of a second later the shock wave hit, knocking me to the ground. A rush of hot air and debris followed, and I lay there for a moment, waiting for a chunk of concrete to crack my skull open or a shard of glass to sever my jugular. It didn’t happen.

  I opened my eyes and looked around. My ears were ringing, and the air was thick with dust and debris. I pulled my shirt up over my nose so I could breathe. Roy, who was already getting to his feet, was doing the same. Glancing around, I took in the scene: chairs and folding tables lying scattered across the street, a dozen or so people sitting or lying, stunned, in the street. I didn’t observe any serious injuries, though; we’d been too far away from the blast for it to do much damage. There were some skinned knees and elbows, but everyone was conscious and I didn’t see any obvious broken limbs or profuse bleeding. Fortunately, we’d all been sitting down, so we hadn’t had far to fall to the pavement. The air was too thick with dust and debris for me to be able to see to the corner, but I wasn’t optimistic about the chances of the security guards manning the barrier to the set. Hopefully they had at least died quickly.

  Roy tugged on my shirt and pointed through the haze at a pile of rubble about halfway between us and the store. I realized after a moment that it was Brian, lying facedown in the street, covered with dust and glass shards. He wasn’t moving.

  I got to my feet and followed Roy to Brian. The fire was still raging inside the store, and I had to use my hands to shield my face from the heat as we got close. We turned Brian over carefully, checking for any lacerations or signs of broken bones. We didn’t find any.

  “Is he breathing?” I yelled over the buzzing in my ears.

  Roy felt Brian’s neck for a pulse and put his ear to his nose. “Yeah,” he said with a nod. “Probably just took a knock on the head when he fell. Let’s get him out of here.”

  Easier said than done. Brian was a big guy, and while Roy probably could have moved him in a fireman’s carry, we didn’t want to aggravate any internal injuries by lifting him. That meant dragging him. But while I didn’t particularly like Brian, I didn’t necessarily think he deserved to be sliced to ribbons by being dragged across a street littered with glass shards. Roy ended up grabbing him under his arms, clasping his hands in front of Brian’s chest, while I held his ankles. We moved fifty feet or so back the way we had come and sat him down up against the wall of a building across the street.

  “Brian,” I said, slapping his cheek lightly. He didn’t move. “Brian!” I said, louder this time. I slapped him a little harder. This time he stirred. His eyes fluttered open. It took him a moment to focus on me. “What … happened?” he murmured.

  I held his gun before his eyes. “Candy from a baby,” I said.

  He tried to grab the gun, but I pulled it away. He groaned.

  The actress he had been chatting up and a couple of the others had come over. “Is he okay?” the actress asked.

  “He’ll be fine,” I said. “Get him some water and an ice pack. Keep him conscious. And don’t let him have this.” I handed her the gun. “It’s real, and it’s loaded,” I told her, to prevent any misunderstandings. She held the gun in both hands, staring wide-eyed like I’d just handed her a live cobra.

  I got up and saw that Roy was gone. He was running into the dust cloud. I followed.

  NINE

  I saw her boots first, protruding from a pile of concrete, stucco, and twisted rebar. My heart sank. If that was Priya Mistry under all that, there was no way she was still alive. By the time I got there, Roy was already tearing away chunks of concrete with his bare hands. I moved in to help, but Roy was three hundred pounds of frantic energy and adrenaline, tossing hundred-pound slabs of concrete like they were pieces of Styrofoam. It was like watching Lou Ferrigno breaking through a wall on that old Incredible Hulk show from the 1970s. I had to keep reminding myself that those were real cinder blocks he was hurling. I decided it was best for everyone if I observed from a safe distance. The fire in the store had settled to a steady blaze, but it was still throwing off a hell of a lot of heat. I stood on the other side of Roy, waiting for him to finish or collapse from exhaustion. A camera drone buzzed nearby, and I wonder if it had caught anything of interest. I had a feeling that if it did, I’d never be allowed to see the footage. For a moment I considered attempting to shoot the thing down, but that was no good either: those things were programmed not to allow unauthorized access to their onboard memory.

  Eventually Roy stopped digging. He sank to his knees and held a bloody hand over his mouth. I couldn’t read the expression on his face.

  I approached, looking into the depression in the pile Roy had dug. She was dead, there was no doubt about that: black hair smudged with blood obscured her face. I moved the hair away and then pulled off my jacket. I wiped her face with my jacket, trying to clear enough blood and dirt away to get a good look at her face. It almost had to be Priya, but it was hard to tell.

  I became aware of sirens, and a man and a woman in paramedics’ uniforms pushed us aside. Well, they pushed me aside. They sort of shoved impotently at Roy, and eventually he got the idea and stepped away from the body. He was panting and dripping with sweat.

  More emergency personnel were moving in, and the Tortugas were escorting the uninjured away from the scene. Roy and I made our way through the rubble back to where the ot
her actors were waiting. We were covered in dust, and Roy’s hands were bleeding. He looked like he was on the verge of breaking down.

  Taki Soma, who played Priya’s mother on DiZzy Girl, ran up to us. “Is it true?” she asked. “Stacia Acardi was killed?”

  “Who?” I asked.

  “Priya’s stunt double,” Roy murmured. “They were doing an action scene today. She’d have been wearing the same clothes as Priya.”

  “Well, hell,” I said. But if the girl in the rubble had been the stunt double, then where was Priya?

  “We should check the shooting location,” Roy said.

  I nodded. We cut through an alley to skirt the bombing site.

  “Does this happen a lot?” I asked.

  “What?”

  “Explosions on the set.” I’d been struck by the lack of panic among the crew members, as if a corner store exploding was unexpected but not unheard of, like a freak thunderstorm.

  “Not on the set,” Roy said. “But we’re used to explosions. We hear them, usually a few blocks away. The DZ is basically a war zone. Gangs competing for territory. Mag-Lev is supposed to provide us a safe haven for shooting, but I guess one of the other gangs decided not to cooperate this time.”

  “What do they want? The bombers?”

  “Mag-Lev gets a lot of money from Flagship for letting them film here. If the other gangs can make it too dangerous to shoot, Flagship will pull out of the DZ. That hurts Mag-Lev. Anything that hurts Mag-Lev helps the other warlords.”

  Glancing down the street, I saw most of the other principal actors, but Priya was nowhere to be found. Some distance away stood Élan Durham, who was barking animatedly into his comm. While Roy quizzed crew members on Priya’s whereabouts, I sidled closer to Durham. Between the buzzing in my ears and the general commotion, I could only make out about half of what he was saying, but whatever he was yelling about, he was not happy.

  “We’re paying that son of a bitch … at least a week behind schedule … second fuckup in two days … made him, and we can sure as hell destroy him…” He was quiet for a moment, then let out a long sigh. “Yeah, I know … I won’t … know how hard you worked…” Then he saw me, muttered something into his comm, and ended the call.

  “What the hell are you doing here?” he demanded. “Where’s Brian?”

  “Resting comfortably,” I said. “He nearly got blown to pieces by the explosion. Roy and I dragged him to safety.”

  Durham nodded, registering the information as if I had told him craft services was out of capers.

  “Do you know where Priya is?” I asked.

  He shot me a puzzled look, as if he wasn’t quite sure what I was asking him.

  “Priya?” I said impatiently. “The star of your show?”

  He shrugged. “She’s around here somewhere. I can’t have you wandering around the set without Brian. If he’s out of commission, you’ll have to leave.”

  “Yeah,” I said. “I wouldn’t want to disturb the equanimity of your set.” I turned and walked back toward Roy, who was still questioning crew members. He shook his head as I approached.

  My comm chimed in my ear. It was April. Not great timing, but if she had information on Priya, I didn’t want to miss it.

  “April, what’s up?”

  “Hey, Fowler,” she said. “Your girl, Priya? She’s nuts, all right. My friend at Ballard and Greene says she’s got a contract to make ten commercials for Prima Facie. She’s made four of them already. No sims.”

  “Hmm,” I said, not sure how this new information fit with everything else that had happened recently.

  “You must know this, though, right?” she asked.

  “What do you mean?”

  “Aren’t you watching her?”

  “Sure, but we just started yesterday.”

  “Well, she’s down there right now,” April said. “At a set in Culver City. Where are you?”

  For a moment I couldn’t think of anything to say.

  “Fowler?”

  “You’re sure she’s there right now?”

  “Yes,” April said. “My friend is over there, getting some signatures from some Marcus and Shea people. He’s, like, the world’s biggest DiZzy Girl fan. Keeps gushing about how she’s even more gorgeous in person.”

  “Do you have an address?” I asked.

  “Fowler, you need to leave that girl alone.”

  “April, I need the address. I don’t have time to explain. Please.”

  She gave it to me.

  “Thanks, April,” I said. “I have to go.” I didn’t want to be rude, but I’d have to explain the situation to her some other time—preferably after I had a better grasp on it myself.

  What in the hell was going on? Priya disappears from the DiZzy Girl set, and then ten minutes later she’s filming a commercial across town? Even if she’d taken an aircar, she’d have been hard-pressed to get to Culver City from the DZ in ten minutes. Had I imagined seeing her a few minutes earlier? Had Roy and I both been taken in by her stunt double? It seemed impossible.

  “No one has seen her since the explosion,” Roy said worriedly. “A couple of people say they saw her walking this way just before, but Taki said she thinks it was Stacia.”

  For a moment, I considered telling Roy about Priya being spotted across town. But I figured it was better for him to stay on the set and try to find some answers here. Besides, telling him would just prompt a lot of questions I either couldn’t or didn’t want to answer, and I still wasn’t entirely sure I could trust him. His concern for Priya certainly seemed genuine, but he was an X factor I just didn’t have time for.

  “She’ll turn up,” I said. “Any word on who set the bomb?”

  “Nah,” he said. “We’ll never know unless one of the other gangs claims responsibility.”

  “Okay,” I said. “Hey, I’ve got to go. I’ve got another case to check on.” I wondered if that sounded as lame and ridiculous as I thought it did.

  “Another case?” Roy asked incredulously. “Aren’t you supposed to be looking into threats against Priya? She’s missing, for Christ’s sake. She could be buried under rubble! Durham clearly doesn’t give a shit, so I could really use your help.”

  “I’m sorry, Roy,” I said. “I would stay if I could, but I have to leave.” I tapped my comm and tossed my ID to him. “Call me if you hear anything.”

  Roy turned and walked away without a word. I sighed. Making friends and influencing people, that’s me. I hit up Keane on my comm.

  “Hey, Fowler,” said Keane cheerfully. “How goes the glamorous life?”

  “Not great,” I said. “There’s been an explosion on the set. Some kind of terrorist attack by a rival gang. And Priya is missing. Well, sort of.”

  “She’s sort of missing?”

  “That’s the weird part,” I said. “April says she’s making a commercial on the Flagship lot. But she was just here, like, ten minutes ago. Keane, I don’t know what the fuck is going on.”

  “All right,” he said. “I’m on my way.”

  TEN

  Keane picked me up at the DZ barrier. Not twenty minutes later we were at the address April had given me. The building wasn’t part of the main Flagship studios complex; it was one of the old warehouses they had acquired and converted during their rapid expansion of the past few years. Circling the building from a safe distance, we determined that our best bet was to wait for Priya to leave, and then follow her, assuming she was actually inside. Other than the shipping bays, which were all closed, there were only two entrances: one at the front of the building and one at the rear. Armed guards were posted at each. There was also a guard stationed at a gate on the side street that led around to the back of the building. The front entrance didn’t seem to be in use. While we watched, three people entered the building and two left, all through the rear door. The vehicles were stopped at the side gate, both coming and going.

  An amber light blinked on the dash, indicating that we had dropped belo
w the minimum altitude for this area. Ascent corridors were tightly regulated in most of the city, in part to prevent people from doing exactly what we were doing: flying at low altitudes to spy on someone. If we didn’t start climbing pretty quickly, the light would go red, indicating that the LAPD had been notified. They’d pinpoint our transponder and send a couple of cruisers to intercept us. Once that happened, there was nothing to do but land and hope the cops weren’t in the mood to strip-search us or impound the car.

  “Keane,” I said, as he made another circle around the building, and the frequency of the amber light increased.

  “I got it,” Keane said, craning his neck to keep an eye on the building. The amber light’s frequency continued to increase.

  “Seriously, Keane,” I said after a moment. “This is a very bad idea.”

  The light had gone from insistent to frantic. Ordinarily, the car’s safety override would have kicked in by now, telling the autopilot to climb to an acceptable altitude, but Keane had hacked the override. That was a felony. Another good reason not to let that little light go red.

  “There!” Keane exclaimed.

  “What?”

  “Limo. Headed toward the guard tower.”

  I looked where he was pointing. There was indeed a limo pulling up to the gate.

  “So?” I asked.

  “Could be our girl’s limo,” said Keane.

  “It could be anybody’s limo!” I snapped.

  “On an out-of-the-way set like this?” Keane said. “No. There aren’t going to be a lot of bigwigs here. I’m surprised they even make Priya come down here. Are you sure April’s intelligence is good?”

  The light went red.

  “Well, shit,” I said. “When they arrest us, do you mind telling them I’m a hostage you were holding at gunpoint? I’ll let you borrow my gun.” I was slightly more than half serious.

  Another warning flashed on the dash: ERROR! TRANSPONDER OFFLINE!