by Jeff Edwards
He reached toward the faceplate of the SCAPE deck. “Tell you what… This clip has got about ten minutes left to play. That’s four or five repetitions of the laser eye treatment you’ve just experienced. I’m going to let it run now. By the time it’s done, we’ll be long gone.”
I shook my head. “Just a second…”
“Too late,” he said. “Time to go…”
He hit the play tab.
The world dissolved into darkness and pain.
CHAPTER 13
I was still in Leanda’s chair when the SCAPE recording reached its end and my consciousness snapped back to reality. I huddled with my arms clasped around myself, shuddering and twitching as my brain gradually came to grips with the fact that my precious flesh was intact.
Nine-fingers and his arm-twisting buddy were gone. In other circumstances, on other nights, I would have wanted to chase them down—pay them back for what they had done to me. But not tonight. For now, it was simply enough to know that they were somewhere else.
It took a while to regain enough strength to get to my feet. The only marks on my body were the irregular cuffs of reddened skin around my wrists, where the second thug had gripped my arms.
The Blackhart was still in my shoulder holster. The assholes had been so confident in their ability to work me over that they hadn’t even bothered to disarm me. Like it or not, their arrogance had been justified. I’d never had a chance to go for my gun.
I made a careful circuit of the apartment, checking doors and windows. No signs of forced entry. They might have spoofed the front door lock, but somehow I didn’t think so. For no reason I could name, I was sure that they had a key chip, just like mine.
I made my way to the bathroom, where I spent several minutes in front of the mirror, peeling nano-pore tape out of my hair until I could finally get the SCAPE rig off of my head. I put the headset back on the shelf where I’d found it, and shoved the wad of tape into my pocket. I ejected the torture chip from the SCAPE deck, and slid the chip into a different pocket.
One last look around the place, and I headed home, turning the lights out as I went.
When I reached the lobby, I pulled out my phone and called Vivien Forsyth. She answered on the fourth ring, audio only.
Her voice was a muffled half-yawn. “Insomnia, Mr. Stalin? Or are you trying to impress me with your diligence?”
“Neither,” I said. “I need a little help.”
I could almost hear her mind ratchet up to full alert. “What can I do for you?”
I pushed through the outer doors and into the semi darkness of the pre-dawn morning.
“I’m leaving Leanda’s building. I need a pull from the lobby security cameras, from midnight until about ten minutes ago. I could try to go through Bruhn, but he’ll drag his feet if he can. And sooner is better.”
“I understand,” Vivien said. “I’ll get on it immediately.”
“Thanks. Because there’s a good chance that someone will try to delete the recordings, if they haven’t done it already.”
“What’s going on?”
“Later,” I said. “Get the security video first. Then we’ll talk.”
“Alright,” Vivien said. “I’ll call you when I’ve got something.”
She hung up just as I was reaching my parking spot.
My car emitted a bleep when I entered its sensor perimeter. I let the computer scan my key chip, and it bleeped again. There were no warning tones, so I was theoretically safe from car bombs, backseat intruders, and all the other wonderful things that can happen in vehicles. It appeared that Nine-fingers and Arm-twister hadn’t stopped to visit my car on their way out.
I climbed in and fired up the turbines. No explosions. No shadowy figures crouched in the rear floorboards. So far, so good.
I pulled out of the parking space.
I was walking in my front door when Vivien called back. The unexpected jangle of the ringtone made me flinch. My nerves were a bit skittish after my encounter with Thug 1 and Thug 2.
The audio bug was still in my ear, so I accepted the call, sound only. “Any luck?”
“Absolutely,” Vivien said. “I’m forwarding the vid to you now.”
An alert popped up on the screen of my phone, prompting me to accept or reject the incoming file. I accepted it, and waited a few seconds for the download to complete.
“Hang on,” I said. “It may take me a little while to find what I’m looking for.”
I hit the ‘play’ tab, and fast-forwarded through the security footage until I spotted two people entering the lobby of Leanda’s apartment building. I zoomed in on their faces. Not my thugs. I fast-forwarded again.
Nine-fingers showed up on the screen at a little after three a.m. He was with another man of similarly Asian appearance. The second man—probably Arm-twister—was about ten centimeters shorter, and at least twenty kilos heavier. From the way he carried himself, the extra weight was all muscle.
I fast-forwarded again, and caught sight of my two Asian buddies walking out of the elevator and leaving the lobby at a few minutes until four.
“Thanks,” I said to Vivien. “This is exactly what I was looking for.”
“Glad I could help,” she said. “Are you going to tell me what this is about?”
I checked the exact time index for the entry of the two men into the building. “Call up the video, and freeze-frame on three-oh-two a.m. and eighteen seconds. You should see two men crossing the lobby.”
After a brief pause, Vivien said, “Got it.”
“Zoom in on their faces. Does either man look familiar?”
A longer pause, as she searched her memory. “No,” she said finally. “I don’t remember ever seeing either one of them. Is there some reason I should know them?”
“Not really,” I said. “Just hoping for an easy answer.”
“Who are they?”
“Hired muscle,” I said. “At least one of them—the taller one—is a killer. They came to visit me when I was going through your daughter’s apartment. I’m fairly sure that they let themselves in with a key chip.”
“That’s impossible,” Vivien said. “How would they get a key to Leanda’s door?”
“The same way I did,” I said. “Somebody made them a copy.”
There was a short silence as we both thought about the potential implications of that thought.
Vivien spoke first. “What did they want?”
“They roughed me up a bit, to get my attention. Then, they offered me a bribe to walk away from this case.”
“How much?”
“A half a million marks.”
Vivien didn’t hesitate. “I’ll double it.”
I laughed. “Relax. This is not a shakedown. You know what my rates are, and you’re paying them. I’m not open to a counter offer from Muscle Boys Incorporated.”
“Are you sure?” she said. “A million marks is a lot of money. And I wouldn’t mind paying, if it’ll help you keep your head in the game.”
“My head’s already in the game,” I said. “But if it will make you feel better, I’ll let you buy me a steak sometime. About five centimeters thick, with all the trimmings.”
“So, you’ll definitely be turning down the bribe?”
“I don’t know about that,” I said. “They say they’re going to kill me if I turn it down. They’ll also kill me if I take their cash and then double-cross them. Either way, I’m dead, so I might as well enjoy the money while I can.”
Stunned silence from the other end of the phone. Then, “You’re kidding, right?”
“About keeping the money? Yeah, that was a joke.”
“No,” she said. “The other part… The part about killing you…”
“Oh. No, that part wasn’t a joke. They threatened to kill me if I don’t leave the case, and I’m pretty sure they weren’t bluffing.”
“What are you going to do?”
“Tell them to stick their money up their asses. Then, I guess I’l
l spend a while looking over my shoulder.”
“I’m serious,” Vivien said.
“So am I. There’s not a whole lot I can do. I’ll keep an eye out, and I’ll keep digging until I figure out what this is all about.”
“Why do they want to kill you?”
“Good question,” I said. “Here’s a better one… Why don’t they want to kill Bruhn, or any of the other cops on your daughter’s case?”
“What do you mean?”
“Think about it. You’ve seen the LAPD files. Those guys have not been sandbagging. They’ve been working hard on this investigation for the better part of two months. I’ve been nosing around for a few days. So why are Thug One and Thug Two focusing on me, and not the cops? Or to put it another way, what have I been doing that the police have not been doing. Whatever it is, it seems to be setting off alarms with some very nasty people.”
“You’re getting close to something.”
“Maybe,” I said. “Or, maybe I’m just moving in the right direction. Either way, I think things are about to get ugly.”
“I can help with that,” Vivien said. “I can provide guards, security services, and as much surveillance equipment as you need to protect yourself.”
“I appreciate the offer,” I said. “And I might want to take you up on it at some point. But I’m not sure I can work that way.”
“I understand. The offer stays open, if you change your mind.”
I yawned. “Thanks.”
The yawn must have been contagious. She echoed it softly. “Good night, David.”
“You mean good morning.”
Vivien yawned again. “Whatever…”
She hung up the phone.
The messenger showed up about an hour later. I’d been expecting a regular bonded courier, like the one Vivien had sent a few days earlier. This guy was definitely not from one of the commercial delivery services. He was hired muscle, punched out of the same mold as Nine-fingers and Arm-twister. His facial features had that same loosely-Asian fusion of cosmetic handsomeness and calculated brutality.
The fabric of the messenger’s dark clothing was suspiciously thick, with a striated weave pattern that suggested Kevlar, or one of the carbon-polymer armor analogs. Bulletproof, or at least highly bullet-resistant, and it would probably turn the blades of most knives.
His package—presumably a half-million Euro-marks—rode between his shoulder blades in a charcoal gray backpack of the same armored fabric. This left both of his hands free for action.
According to House’s hard object scanner, the man was armed with a semi-automatic hand gun, a shock rod, and three edged weapons—two with blades in the thirty-five centimeter range, and one with a blade length of about fifteen centimeters. House’s sniffers picked up traces of chemical propellant consistent with small arms ammunition, but no other evidence of explosives.
I didn’t bother to figure out where the weapons were concealed. I just took it for granted that the guy could get to them quickly, and use them proficiently.
I’d thought about handling the messenger by video, but I decided to meet with him in-person. I didn’t want Nine-fingers to think that his intimidation tactics had me too scared to show my face. So I instructed House to put his defensive systems at full readiness, and I met the guy at my front door.
The messenger didn’t bother with thumb prints or retina scans. He pulled out a trid and compared it to my features. When he was satisfied, he shoved the 3D photo back into his pocket and said, “Stalin, I’ve got a package for you.”
I yawned and shook my head. “No thanks. I’m not accepting any deliveries today.”
The man didn’t seem particularly surprised. “You sure you know what you’re doing?”
“Probably not,” I said. “But I’ll take my chances.”
He opened his mouth to reply, but I cut him off. “If you’re about to deliver the obligatory threat, you can save your breath. Biggest mistake of my life, and I won’t live to regret it. You’re going to spank me with a rusty cheese grater, and feed my testicles to a rabid mongoose. Yep. I got all that. You can go back and tell your bosses that you’ve delivered the message. I’ve been sufficiently threatened.”
There was a subtle realignment of the man’s posture. His left shoulder came down a fraction of a centimeter and his right hand began to move.
Suddenly, his body was covered in bright red dots. At least ten low-intensity targeting lasers were concentrated on his head, and another twenty were focused on strategic points of his anatomy. House had him covered from every angle. If the man blinked funny, House would cut him to ribbons.
“That’s the worst case of laser measles I’ve ever seen,” I said. “You should really have that looked at before it gets serious.”
The messenger looked down and saw that multiple targeting beams were focused on his heart, his groin, and both of his hands. There were other laser dots on his neck and cranium, but he couldn’t see those.
“This conversation is over,” I said. “Go back and tell your nine-fingered buddy that he’s starting to irritate me.”
The messenger started to respond, but I took a step backward, and let the door slide closed in his face.
CHAPTER 14
I left House on full defensive alert, and went to bed.
When I woke, the sun was going down again, and I had an idea. One of my dreams had been something about the messenger guy, running around LA, showing the trid of my face to everyone he encountered. Not exactly a practical method of tracking my whereabouts, but my subconscious had latched onto the concept, and transmuted it into a potentially more viable alternative.
One shower, one meal, and two cigarettes later, I left home by the side door, which I only use when my house is likely to be under surveillance. The door opens into an abandoned office complex, littered with broken furniture, the debris of fallen ceiling tiles, and collapsed interior walls. The teetering jumble of wreckage looks like an avalanche waiting to happen, and that’s exactly how it’s supposed to look.
Occasionally, a squatter will poke his nose inside, in search of a place to sleep, or any scrap that might be worth salvaging. House keeps an eye on such uninvited guests. If they behave themselves, he lets them stay for a while. If they get too obnoxious, or if they show signs of taking up residence, he uses his defensive weapons—at non-lethal levels—to encourage them to move on.
There were currently no visitors in-residence, so my exit was unimpeded. House kept my path illuminated with low-intensity lighting, to make sure that I didn’t trip over anything.
It took several minutes to follow House’s winding trail through the staggered heaps of junk. By the time I reached the glassless frame of the office complex’s street door, I was on a side street, about 80 meters from either of my public doors.
I had House run a final scan of the street. There was no one within the perimeter of his cameras or sensors.
I stepped out into the night, and took an alternate route to the barricade. After the usual onceover by the cops, I was passed through into Dome 12.
I loitered in the shadows at the end of the block long enough to be sure that no one had followed me out of the Zone. If Nine-fingers and his thugs were really going to come after me, they didn’t seem to be on my trail yet.
I walked to the 52nd Street Depot, and caught a westbound Lev to Dome 15: West Hollywood.
I found Jackal at her usual hangout, Nexus Dreams—a jacker bar on Santa Monica Boulevard that pandered to cyber criminals and techno-fetishists. The interior of the club was painted matte black; the walls, floor, and ceiling sectioned into grids by blue florescent lasers. The chairs and tables were molded from transparent acryliflex, edge-lit in painfully-vivid colors. The overall effect resembled a radically-simplified version of the DataNet, where some of the club’s patrons made their larcenous livings.
A stuttering racket of semi-melodic pulses came hammering out of the overhead speakers. Not slash-rock, but the latest strain of pseud
o-music to catch on at street level.
Jackal stood in a back corner, among a huddle of chip-heads. She was still keeping her eyebrows shaved and wearing her hair in that weird bowl cut—bare skin all the way up to the tops of her ears, and a thick black mop above that. She was rail-thin, and her sharp cheekbones stood out in almost skeletal prominence.
She spotted me edging through the crowd toward her, and nodded in my direction. She seemed to recognize me without having to load up any of her auxiliary chips. Apparently, she had decided to move me to her permanent memory for quicker access. That might have been a personal compliment. Or it might just mean that I was high enough on her trouble-scale to merit instant recognition and avoidance.
If it was the latter, I could hardly blame her. Our last bit of business together had fried most of the silicon implants in her brain, and had nearly left her dead. But she didn’t seem to be looking for an exit, so maybe I wasn’t on her instant-avoid list yet.
She gave another nod when I was close enough for conversation without actually yelling. “Mr. Bad News himself… What’s on your agenda tonight, Stalin? Chat? Or biz?”
I kept my voice about two notches below a shout. “Biz.”
Jackal took a final swig from her drink, handed the empty squeeze tube to one of the chip-heads, and started for the door.
I followed.
Her whipcord body moved through the crowd with an ease that seemed almost clairvoyant. She shifted and jinked with the rhythm of the not-quite-music, darting through holes that opened and closed in synchronicity with the jittering beat.
My own passage through the throng was not nearly so effortless. I was about two-thirds of the way to the door when it occurred to me that this would be an excellent place for the Nine-fingers gang to take a crack at me. In the semi-darkness, amid the pounding soundtrack and the crush of bodies, it would be child’s-play to get close enough to do me in. A blade between the ribs, or a laser shot through the back of the skull, and I’d never even see it coming. Goodbye to Grandma Stalin’s favorite grandson.
