Tek Power (18 page)

“I know who Mentosa is. Matter of fact, we encountered him in the lobby of our hotel only yesterday.”

“Professor Mentosa wants to meet me at nightfall,” she told him. “He has news about Dreamer and how we can reach him.”

“You trust Mentosa?”

“He's one of the few people in this country I do trust completely,” she answered. “Can you come with me?”

Gomez said, “I can.”

27

B
EFORE HE HIT
Cleve Shannon's office, Jake stopped at the Club 900 on the Carretera Sur. The late afternoon sky had clouded over and a misty haze was settling over the city. The club's facade stretched across nearly half a block and was a gaudy patchwork of litesigns and neon tubing.
The DIRTY TALK One-Stop!
blinked one huge sign in glaring scarlet.
Talk FILTH with the Most BEAUTIFUL Holomodels in the World! Cheer An ORGY! Have A Lusty DYKE Listen To Your CONFESSION! Talk As DIRTY As You Want!

The huge, goldplated robot doorman sneered down at Jake. “You ought to be able to do better than this,
pobrecito
.”

Jake feigned a rueful expression. “I know and it often gives me pause,” he admitted. “How much?”

“Fifteen hundred
córdobas
admission fee, which includes a generous tip for me.”

“Of course.” Jake handed him a packet of Nicaraguan money chits. “Where might I find Daphne Dynamite? She was recommended to me as being—”

“Geez, I wouldn't have pegged you as enjoying that sort of thing.” Grabbing the money, the big robot thrust it into a slot in his side. “I'd have guessed you were a straight wanker.”

“Are you this critical of all the Club 900 patrons?”

The mechanical doorman made a chuckling noise. “Sure, sap. It makes you doinks feel extra guilty.” He tapped the side of his golden skull with a golden forefinger, producing a rich echoing bong. “Psychology, you see, plays an important part in sex, even this paper moon kind.”

“You're absolutely right. Now where do I find Daphne?”

“They'll tell you inside, rube.” Behind him a wide black door slid silently out of the way. “Trot on in and enjoy yourself. And that's all you're really going to enjoy, chum, since everything else is fake.”

“Hiya,
guapo
,” greeted the naked Chinese hatcheck girl. “Check your lid, please.”

Jake moved across the blackwalled foyer. “Not wearing a hat, miss.”

“Makes no difference, still costs you a hundred
córdobas
.”

As he paid the android, Jake said, “It's been suggested I'd enjoy Daphne Dynamite.”

She looked him up and down. “You might at that,” she commented. “Though you looked more like a keyhole man when I first saw you.”

“Maybe later. Where do I find Daphne?”

“Use Door 14 over that way. Enjoy.”

He found another robot, goldplated and jewel-encrusted, guarding the door marked
DAPHNE DYNAMITE.
“How much time you want with this dominating little lady?”

“Oh, fifteen minutes ought to do.”

“That'll be a thousand
córdobas
, including gratuities.” He held out a golden hand, palm up.

Jake gave him the money.

“And one hundred more for the coins that activate her holostage.”

Jake paid that.

The room beyond the door was a shade over closet-size. There was an uncomfortable metal chair and a dirt-smeared holoplatform.

Squatting next to the coinbox, Jake took the special coin he'd brought with him out of an inner jacket pocket. He inserted it into the slot and stood back.

The room made a series of low, odd noises and the lights dimmed for roughly ten seconds.

Then a life-size projection of a plump middleaged woman arrived on the small circular stage. “I'm nowhere near as cute as Daphne Dynamite,” she said.

“Matter of opinion. Did Timecheck fill you in?”

“Yes. How is he?”

“Running about four seconds slow last time I saw him.” He sat on the chair. “This is completely secure?”

“Don't worry, Cardigan. I've had secret meetings here before. There's no danger of being overheard, although your reputation may suffer if you're seen coming out of here.”

“It's about as low as it can sink already. You're Santilla Soledad, huh?”

“I am,
sí
.”

“Timecheck recommends you as a good source for information about the doings of the US Embassy in town.”

“That's one of my specialties,” she acknowledged. “I worked there for nearly three years.”

“I'm interested in Dominic Hersh.”

“A real
hijo de puta
.”

“That I already know,” Jake said. “I'm interested in his recent activities. Particularly in relation to the late Arnold Maxfield, Jr.”

“Hersh is really with the Office of Clandestine Operations. They planted him in the embassy and everybody there's aware of the fact,” Santilla told him. “Hersh is more than that, though. He's also very thick with the Joaquim Tek Cartel.”

“That's not exactly news to me.” Jake leaned forward in the rickety chair. “Here's what I have to find out about, Santilla. First off, I want to know the names of all the people involved in the death of Eve Bascom. Then I need more information on Surrogate 13.”

“I don't have the names, but I can find them,” she said. “Surrogate 13 is an android dupe of the president of the United States. It was, very quietly, delivered to the embassy here about two weeks ago.”

“Why here?”

“This was the staging area, Cardigan. Hersh played an important part in the operation and the final testing of the simulacrum was done here under his supervision.”

“Is the andy still in town?”

She gave a negative shake of her head. “It was shipped out days ago.”

“To where?”

“I hear Florida.”

“Why there?”

“That's where it was to take over for the real Warren Brookmeyer.”

Jake frowned. “Whose idea was all this?”

“The president himself. He's a Tekhead, you know,” she continued. “The idea, as I understand it, was to use this very convincing Mechanix sim to carry on for him for a few weeks while he goes some place to try a cure for his addiction.”

Jake stood, shaking his head. “Nope, that's not what's going on,” he said toward the projection. “You don't kill people simply to keep them from revealing a con.”

Santilla smiled. “Ah, I forgot for a moment that you're an American,” she said. “To me covering up something like this with a few murders seems perfectly logical. They killed my father five years ago for something much less important.”

“Something's being covered up, Santilla, but I think it's more than just using an android double for Brookmeyer.”

She offered, “I can suggest someone else you ought to talk to. Keep in mind, however, that she's a civilian. That is, not a revolutionary or an informant.”

“Who we talking about?”

“Her name is Gabrielle Kastle. She works for the Nicaraguan office of MaxComm and until a week ago was romantically involved with Dominic Hersh.”

“He doesn't sound like a guy anybody'd want to get romantically tangled up with.”

“I said exactly that to Gabrielle more than once.”

“So she's a friend of yours?”

She nodded. “Do you want me to try to arrange a meeting?”

“Sure, but someplace other than here.”

“Don't worry. Gabrielle would never—even holographically—enter a place like this. I'll contact you soon as I can, Cardigan.”

As he said “
Gracias
,” she faded from the room.

28

J
AKE GOT THREE
separate views of the second killing. Three intensely sharp and bright monitor screens showed him the murder from assorted angles.

He was down in the basement Security Room of the office building that housed the Observación Discreto detective agency up on Level 3. Jake had used his breaking and entering skills to gain him admission to the area just three minutes ago.

He'd planned to use a stungun on the human guard who watched over the building's hundred-plus watchdog screens. Then he'd go up and try to persuade Shannon to share his files on Junior Maxfield and Eve Bascom with him. Jake didn't want anyone with the capability of calling in the law to witness that discussion.

A fair plan, except somebody else had been here first.

The guard, his right hand just inches from the alarm toggle, was slumped down in his chair. Nearly half of the top of his skull was gone, sliced away by the beam of a lazgun.

While Jake was standing there, a couple feet behind the dead man, he checked the trio of screens that provided a view of the inside of Cleve Shannon's office.

“Jesus!”

Two men wearing the now-familiar plastiglass face masks and crimson berets had come busting into the hefty operative's room.

Jake slapped the sound key.

“… the hell do you clowns think you're doing?”

Neither of the Red Angels said a word.

“Captain Dacobra and I are,” Shannon started to tell them.

But then the shimmering beam of the first lazgun hit him. It severed the hand that had been inching toward the lazgun sitting next to the vidphone.

Jake got to see that from three different points of view, heard the detective scream with pain.

The second lazgun crackled, then the first one again. Shannon roared once more before he was cut clean in two. Blood exploded, masking one of the security camera lenses.

Exhaling, Jake took a backward step.

Then he heard a woman cry out in pain. A third Red Angel appeared in the office doorway. He was holding a woman in front of him. He had her right arm twisted behind her back and his other hand clutching her throat.

It was a slender blonde woman of forty.

“Bev Kendricks,” said Jake, recognizing the private investigator.

Pivoting, he ran from the room.

T
HE LAKESIDE HOUSE
was called the Villa Flor and once, long ago, it had been surrounded by formal gardens. After the severe earthquakes of thirty years back, when the private chapel and one entire wing of the villa had collapsed, the plants and flowers had been left to grow wild. Now in the rainy twilight outside the living room you saw a sprawling tangle of yellow and scarlet blossoms, of twisty, thorny vines and giant shaggy shrubs with jagged mounds of smashed brick and stone rising up out of it.

Gomez, seated alone on a long low sofa, was scanning the sea of foliage out there in the gathering darkness. So far he'd spotted two armed guards. One, a hefty young woman with a lazrifle, was hunkered against the remains of the chapel's bell tower.

Gomez and Rita, who was occupying a rattan armchair, had arrived more than ten minutes ago for their meeting with Professor Mentosa.

But he hadn't as yet appeared and, except for a large bearded youth who stood with arms folded in the arched doorway, they were alone in the big vaulted living room.

“You seem,” observed Rita, “uneasy, Gomez.”

“I'm merely reflecting,
bonita
,” he told her. “Wondering if, despite the infinite wisdom stored in my capable
cabeza
, I've come toddling into a trap.”

“Do you think I'd set you up?”

“Might be the prof is the one who—”

“This isn't a trap, Señor Gomez.” The short greyhaired man he'd seen attacked in the hotel lobby came into the room now. Mentosa was in a robot wheelchair. “Allow me, by the way, to thank you. I've been told that you scared off my attackers after I was stungunned.”

Gomez held up a correcting finger. “Actually that was my partner, Jake Cardigan,” he said. “He's quicker on the trigger than I am.”

“Convey him my gratitude. I would have been killed if someone hadn't taken action quickly.” The chromed chair whirred him to the center of the room. “I've heard many good things about the both of you. An old and trusted friend of mine in Mexico, who's fighting a very successful battle against the oppressors, speaks very highly of you.”

“Would that be Warbride?”

“
Sí
.” He rolled over to Rita, held out both hands. “How are you,
paloma?
”

“I'm very worried about my brother, Professor,” she answered, taking hold of his hands. “You know something about what happened to him, don't you?”

Mentosa gave a sad shake of his head. “The news is not good,” he said. “Yet I feel there's hope.”

“Where is he?”

Looking out into the wild garden, the greyhaired professor answered, “They've taken him, along with several other suspected rebels, to the Isla Chanza Detention Station.”

“
Dios!
” She let go his hands and pressed hers to her heart. “How can you say there's any hope?”

“What's this Isla Chanza set up?” asked Gomez.

“Nobody comes back from there.” Rita started to cry softly. “Nobody, never.”

“That's not true, child.” The professor's chair took him nearer to Gomez. “There is a manmade island out there in Lake Managua.” He gestured at the rainy night. “Political prisoners are detained in a prison facility there, processed and—”

“Tortured,” said Rita quietly, sobbing. “Tortured, maimed. They'll do terrible things to Dreamer and then—”

“Easy, child,” said Professor Mentosa. “Many prisoners actually do leave the island, Señor Gomez. The problem, however, is that they leave there for much worse federal prisons or for the Termination Station on the outskirts of our city of Granada.”

“Where,” inquired the detective, “does the hope come in?”

“There are,” answered Professor Mentosa, “several people being held on the island that we want to see freed.”

Rita popped to her feet. “Wait—you're not going to try a raid? That's impossible,” she told him, voice rising. “Everybody'll get killed and so will Dreamer in the process.”