F Paul Wilson - Sims 04 (9 page)

 
          
You’ve
got to love modern technology, Luca
Portero
thought,
smiling as he spotted Ellis Sinclair’s silver Lexus SUV half a dozen car
lengths ahead on the
George
Washington
Bridge
.

 
          
Luca
had equipped the Lexus with a transponder that let him know its location no
matter where it went. He glanced at the locator screen, glowing in the dark on
the passenger seat. Luca’s car was a fixed dot in the center of the green LCD
monitor; the Lexus was a blip floating directly above it. A GPS program laid
out a map of the city around them, showing both cars crossing the
Hudson River
toward the city.

 
          
All
was well.

 
          
Well?
he
thought. Who am I kidding?

 
          
He
shook his head. He’d almost forgotten what well meant. Nothing was anywhere
near
well .

 
          
Darryl
Lister had become a raw, twitching nerve after he learned of the fateful
question at the stockholders’ meeting, a nonstop question box: Who asked it?
How could he know?

 
          
Well,
Luca had soon found out that it wasn’t a ‘he’ at all. The meeting had been
recorded—a matter of routine—and who did he
spot
while
reviewing the video files: Cadman.
Romy
fucking Cadman.

 
          
Initially
Lister had been sure that Palmer had talked under his own
Totuus
,
but then they’d tracked the operative to some
Long Island
hospital where he was spending his days
sitting around babbling gibberish. Obviously the MTW had worked.

 
          
Luca
shuddered at the thought of such a fate, even if the effect only lasted for
ninety days. Ninety days of hell. If you weren’t loony before, you damn sure
might be after.

 
          
But
the success of the MTW had sent Luca back to the leak problem.

 
          
He
already knew it was Ellis Sinclair. But who was he was leaking to? That was
what mattered. Tonight Luca would find out. Once he learned Sinclair’s contact,
the rest would fall into place. Then he’d make his move. And take no prisoners.

 
          
He
followed Sinclair down the West Side Highway to
Fifty-fourth
Street
, crawled across Midtown—traffic in the city
would be murder until after Christmas—to a parking garage across the street
from the Warwick Hotel. Shit! He couldn’t very well pull in right behind him.
He should have brought backup.

 
          
He
left the car double-parked and running while he trotted to the ramp that led
down to the parking area. Crouching, he spotted Sinclair accepting a ticket
from the attendant. But instead of walking back this way, he started up the
ramp on the other side.

 
          
Fuck!
He was heading out to Fifty-third!

 
          
Luca
ducked back into his car. He folded up the locator unit and grabbed the keys.
As he slammed and locked the door he heard a voice behind him.

 
          
“Can’t leave that here.”

 
          
He
turned to see an NYPD uniform.
Black, big face, big gut
stretching his blue shirt, big black belt laden with police paraphernalia.

 
          
“Officer,
this is an emergency.”

 
          
“I
don’t care if your hair is on fire, you can’t leave that car here. There’s a
garage right there. Pull it in and—”

 
          
“I
don’t have time. I’ll be right back.”

 
          
“You
leave that car there, I promise you, it’ll be long gone and far away when you
come back.”

 
          
“Fine,”
Luca said, moving off. He tossed the keys to the cop. “Take it.
Merry Christmas.”

 
          
The
cop opened his mouth,
then
closed it. Luca doubted
he’d ever had anyone tell him to go ahead and tow his car.

 
          
Luca
dashed straight through the garage—down, across, and up onto Fifty-third. He
stopped when he reached the sidewalk, frantically peering east and west through
the lights, the shadows,
the
people hurrying to escape
the chill.

 
          
Which
way, damn it?

 
          
He
glanced longingly at the locator unit, dangling from his hand like a small
valise. If only there had been some way to affix a transponder to Sinclair
himself.

 
          
Never
mind the wishing. What now?

 
          
He
couldn’t see Sinclair on Fifty-third. Maybe he’d headed downtown on
Sixth Avenue
. Luca’s instincts urged him in that
direction. He started off at a run but the crowds on the avenue slowed him to a
crawl. The Radio City Music Hall Christmas Show was in full swing, jamming the
Sixth Avenue
sidewalks with parents and their screaming
kiddies. But that meant Sinclair couldn’t move fast either.

 
          
Luca
bullied and bulled his way through the throng as fast as he could, earning angry
looks and comments.
Yeah, merry Christmas to you too,
fuckers.
He kept rising on tiptoes to check the other side of the
street—he saw oversized Venus de
Milos
framing the
Credit
Lyonnaise
Building, and a line of fifteen-foot
nutcrackers standing guard against the columns of the Paine-Webber, but no
Ellis Sinclair.

 
          
An
Art Deco marquee directly ahead now,
Radio
City
blazing in red neon, and the damned charter
busses vomiting tourists onto the sidewalk blocked his view of the opposite
side. No sign of Sinclair here, so he stepped between two buses to check the
other side—just in time to spot Sinclair starting down a subway entrance by the
Time
& Life
Building
.

 
          
Luca
congratulated his instincts.
And his luck.
But it
occurred to him that Sinclair was moving pretty quick for a guy who was
supposedly dosed to the eyeballs on antidepressants.

 
          
No
time to wonder about that now.

 
          
He
sprang forward to follow but a horn
blared
him back.
The light was against him and traffic was moving just fast enough to make crossing
impossible. Cursing, he edged to the corner. As soon as the light changed Luca
lunged forward, damn near knocking down a few slow movers on his way to the
subway. He flew down the steps and raced along the longest, fanciest goddamn
subway ramp he’d ever seen—marble tile, brass trim, all part of the Rockefeller
Center complex.

 
          
When
he reached the token booth, Sinclair was nowhere in sight.

 
          
Uptown or down?

 
          
He
saw the ALL TRAINS sign and ducked under the turnstile—no time for a token—and
followed the sound of a train pulling in. He reached the platform just in time
to see the doors of an F train pincer closed behind Sinclair.

 
          
Luca
pelted after the train as it began to move, intending to grab a handle and jump
onto the landing between the cars, but it picked up speed too quickly and he
was left standing on the platform.

 
          
The
lighted sign on the rear car said its last stop was
179th Street
in
Jamaica
. That meant Sinclair could be going across
town or to the far side of
Queens
, or
anywhere between.

 
          
He
let out a roar and kicked the nearest tiled pillar.

 
          
“Hey,
don’t worry, buddy,” said a shabby guy a few feet away. “There’ll be another
along soon.”

 
          
Luca
wanted to kill him.

 
          
SUFFOLK COUNTY
,
NY

 
          
Zero
stepped into the small, two-story farmhouse in the middle of a fallow potato
field, one of many that dotted eastern
Long Island
.

 
          
Good
to be home, even if he had no one to share the place.

 
          
He
unwrapped
the scarf from his lower face and removed
the hat with the pulled-down brim. Masking his features was relatively easy in
the colder weather, especially at night. Summer was a problem, forcing him into
a wig, a fake beard and nose, oversized sunglasses, and a floppy
boonie
cap.

 
          
He
shrugged out of his coat and turned on the three computers arranged around the
sparsely furnished living room.
A couch, a recliner, a TV,
three folding chairs before the card tables holding the computers.
Not
exactly the lap of luxury, but it served his purposes.

 
          
As the computers booted up he stepped to the mantle of the cold
fireplace where an eight-by-ten black-and-white photo of
Romy
Cadman leaned against the wall.
He loved this close-up, taken with a
telefoto
lens shortly after a letter to the editor of the Times
had brought her to his attention. He felt a familiar ache as he stared at her
face.

 
          
Romy
…were there other women in the world like her? If so,
he’d never met one. But then, really, how many women had he met?
Nowhere near enough for a fair comparison.

 
          
He
ran a fingertip along her cheek, wishing he could do so in the flesh.

 
          
And
what did others matter, anyway?
Romy
was
Romy
, his
Romy
. He knew he
shouldn’t think of her as his, for she never would be, never could be. That
would require removing his mask for her, letting her see his face. And then
she’d reject him, turn away in loathing.

 
          
Well…he
didn’t actually know that, but he couldn’t risk it. Better this way. At least
he could see her often, be near her, talk to her,
hear
her voice. But once she rejected him, all that would be lost. And even if by
some miracle she, superior woman though she might be, didn’t reject him, the
whole relationship would change, and not for the better.

 
          
Tonight’s
Romy
ritual ended with a knock on the front door.
Even though he was expecting it, Zero jumped at the sound. A visitor here was
an occasion. Only one person knew where he lived, and his visits were rare.

 
          
He
laid the photo face down on the mantle and went to the door. When he opened it
he embraced his oldest and dearest friend, the man who was like a father to
him.

 
          
“How
are you?”

 
          
“Good,
Ellis.
Very good.
How are you?”

 
          
“Getting
better every day, thanks to what you and your group have been doing.”

 
          
Ellis
Sinclair did look better.
Maybe a little grayer, but less
gaunt.
Perhaps he was eating better.

 
          
“Come
in,” Zero said, shutting the door and taking Ellis’s coat.

 
          
He
felt a little awkward. He was unpracticed at being a host.

 
          
Ellis
did a slow turn, taking in the small living room. “Are you comfortable here?”

 
          
“Yes,
thanks to you.”

 
          
He
pulled a bottle of Scotch from the cabinet under the TV. He’d never developed a
taste for liquor himself, but he knew his guest was something of a hard
drinker. But Ellis surprised him by waving it off.

 
          
“Thanks,
but I’m taking a breather from the booze.”

 
          
Zero
almost said, Glad to hear it, but reconsidered.
Wouldn’t be
appropriate.

 
          
“Coffee, then?”

 
          
Ellis
shook his head. “I can’t stay long. As I told you, the reason I’m here is
because I didn’t want to discuss this over the phone. May I sit?”

 
          
“Of course.”

 
          
How
strange to acquiesce to a request for a seat from the owner of the house. Since
the purchase of real estate would be—to put it mildly—awkward for Zero, Ellis
Sinclair had bought the place for him years ago.

 
          
“I
gather this is fairly important then,” Zero said as they seated themselves,
Ellis on the couch, and Zero in the recliner.

 
          
A
vague anxiety had been nibbling at him since Ellis’s call late this afternoon.
What was too sensitive to discuss over an encrypted phone?

 
          
“More than fairly.
In fact I was followed tonight—by
Portero
himself, I believe.”

 
          
“But
you lost him.” It was a statement. He knew Ellis would have aborted his visit
if he thought he was being followed.

 
          
“Yes.
Took a subway to
Forest
Hills
and rented a
car there.” He shifted in his chair. “But let me cut to the chase here: Someone
asked a very disturbing question at the stockholders’ meeting today.”

 
          
Zero
nodded. “You mean about ‘surge’?”

 
          
“Exactly.
One of your people, I presume?”

 
          
“Yes.
Ms. Cadman. It was her idea. We heard the word from a man who tried to assault
her, and she thought that would be a way to see if it meant anything.”

 
          
“Just the word?”
Ellis said, his eyebrows lifting. “That’s
all you have?”

 
          
Too much had been happening lately to allow Zero time to give Ellis
one of his irregular briefings, so he filled him in now on the invasion of
Romy’s
apartment, the
Totuus
, and
Palmer’s resultant aphasia.

 
          
“So
you have no idea what this Palmer fellow was referring to,” Ellis said.

 
          
“Not
yet. But we know it means something. And I figure you’re the man who can tell
us just what.”

 
          
Ellis
tapped his fingers on the armrest of the recliner. This went on for an
agonizing minute. Then, “No, I’m not.”

 
          
“What?”
Zero couldn’t hide his shock. “You’re a founder of
SimGen
!
This goes back to Manassas Ventures. They gave you start-up capital. You’ve got
to know!”

 
          
“I
do know,” Ellis said. “But I can’t tell you.”

 
          
“Another
thing you can’t tell me?” He could feel his blood rising. “When I found
Kek
you said you couldn’t tell me anything about him or
about what was going on in Idaho. ‘Too sensitive,’ you said. Now two men
attempt a chemical rape on the minds of
Romy
Cadman
and Patrick Sullivan; we ask one of them who sent him and he tells us ‘surge.’
You know who that is and won’t tell me? Why on earth not?
‘Too
sensitive’ again?”

 
          
“No,”
Ellis said, his gaze boring into Zero.
“Too dangerous.”

 
          
“It’s
already dangerous.”

 
          
“But
you’ve sampled only a taste of what’s waiting for you if you push this
further.”

 
          
“You’re
telling me to back off?”

 
          
“I’m
begging you to back off.”

 
          
Zero
couldn’t believe what he was hearing. But the emotion in Ellis’s voice—fear,
desperation—were real.

 
          
“Isn’t
this what you set me up to do?”

 
          
“No,
it’s not. Your goal—our goal—is to turn the public against
SimGen
and the idea of
sims
as
laborers. Stop further cloning of
sims
—that was the goal, remember?”

 
          
“Of course.
And how better to turn the
public against
SimGen
than to find its dirty laundry
and wave it in the air for all to see?”

 
          
“You
have no idea what you’re getting into, the forces you’ll be setting in
motion…they’ll crush you.”

 
          
“They
have to find us first.”

 
          
“Zero,
leave it alone, I beg you. You’re making progress on so many other fronts. You
don’t need—”

 
          
“Progress?
What progress?
SimGen
is opening more natal centers all the time!”

 
          
“We
may soon have to rethink that with the tide of public opinion turning.
Manufacturers, one or two of them major, are starting to advertise their
products, their clothes, toys, appliances, and so on, as ‘
sim
-free.’
Mutual funds specializing in
sim
-free companies are
springing up. The Beacon Ridge poisoning—it’s awful to look at it as anything
but an atrocity, but something good did come out of it because it’s accelerated
the process.” Ellis leaned forward, his expression intense, alive with hope.
“We’re
winning ,
Zero. Leave Manassas Ventures and the
rest alone.”

 
          
We’renot
winning, damn it, Zero
thought,
his frustration a fire in his gut.

 
          
“What
we’ve been doing until now is like trying to tame a killer carnivore by
removing its food supply.
Can’t be done.
Or if it can,
it’ll take a lifetime. But that was all we had, the only way we knew to deal
with it.
Until now.
Now we may have found a weapon,
one that can strike at the heart of the beast. And that changes everything.”

 
          
“But
you’re forgetting that there’s a pregnant
sim
somewhere out there. Find her and prove that the father of her child is human
and our war is won!”

 
          
“If we find her.
That’s a very, very big ‘if,’ Ellis. And if
we don’t, and if we neglect this ‘surge’ lead while we hunt for her, then we
may miss a crucial opportunity.”

 
          
“I
know you’re chafing to end this crusade, but you have no idea what you’re
getting into.”

 
          
“They’ve
already tried to kill
Romy
and Patrick. What can be
worse?

 
          
“They
can
succeed .
And they will. Keep pushing this and
some of your people will die.”

 
          
The
words jolted Zero. He’d realized that when
Romy
and
Patrick had been run off the highway, but hearing it said aloud…

 
          
Ellis
leaned back and closed his eyes. “You want to strike at the beast. I understand
that. But I’ve been living in the belly of that beast for decades and believe
me, Zero, it’s dark in there. It’s full of things that should never see the
light of day.”