Xenopath (11 page)

MALLORY

Next morning
Vaughan was awoken by the chime of his handset. He dragged it from
the bedside cabinet and clamped it around his wrist. "Vaughan
here."

Kapinsky was
evidently an early riser. She was already in her office and it wasn't
yet eight. "Vaughan, what are your plans for today?"

He rubbed his
eyes and tried to order his thoughts. "This morning, going over
to the Scheering-Lassiter HQ, see what 1 can dig up there."

Kapinsky shook
her head. "I've tried it. No go. They don't like private
investigators."

"I'll work
out some way of getting in there."

"You're an
optimist, Vaughan," she said. "What about this afternoon?"

"I'll check
the surveillance cams in the area around the amusement park. You?"

"I'm
spending the day on the Mulraney case, questioning a few people,
seeing if I can dig up a witness or two. Meet you here first thing
tomorrow to collate what we've got, okay?"

"See you
then," he said, and cut the connection.

Beside him,
Sukara stirred. She rolled onto her back and blinked up at the
ceiling. Light—real
daylight
—slanted into the
bedroom.

"Like it
here, Jeff," she murmured.

He leaned over
and kissed her. "I've got to be going. I'm late already."

"Jeff, I
don't like what you told me about that killer last night." She
gripped his hand. "Take care," she said, reluctant to let
go of him.

"I'll do
that," he whispered.

He showered,
left the apartment, grabbed a couple of samosas from a kiosk beside
the upchute, and rode to Level One with a cage full of businessmen
and schoolchildren.

He took an
air-taxi the three kilometres to the centre of the Station. He would
normally have travelled by train, but as Kapinsky was picking up the
expenses he could afford to travel in comfort.

The
Scheering-Lassiter headquarters was situated in the high-rise
business sector, a tapering obelisk like extruded glass, which, until
last year and the construction of the central government tower, had
been the tallest building on the Station.

It looked,
Vaughan thought as he stood in the plaza outside the edifice,
suitably phallic and thrusting for a company whose aim it was to seed
the stars. He watched the comings and goings of business execs and
company workers, fingering the pass in his pocket and hoping its
validity had not been erased after its owner's death.

Everyone going
into the building through the single, sliding entrance proffered a
pass-card, which was scanned by an electronic eye. Security guards
were on hand to turn away
personae non gratae.
A small
proportion of the people entering the building made enquiries at
reception; far more simply walked through the lobby and made for the
elevators.

The thing to do
was to go in exuding confidence, an air of belonging, and once inside
take it from there. With luck he would get a bit further than
Kapinsky had yesterday.

He walked
towards the building and activated his implant. Instantly a hundred
minds flared in close proximity—a cacophony of hope and desire,
anger and joy—with a dull backing of the mind-noise of the rest
of Levels One and Two.

He felt his
pulse race as he approached the sliding glass door. As it opened to
admit him and a couple of suited Thai women, a curious thing
happened.

The mind-noise
that was a constant background hum remained in his head, but the
bright flares of individual minds cut out the instant he entered the
building. He was so surprised that he almost forgot to show the
staring camera eye his purloined pass. He fumbled with it, heart
hammering, and passed into the lobby without being apprehended.

He bypassed
reception and headed straight for the elevators, where a wall plaque
described the departments on various floors.

He bought
himself time by consulting the plaque, at the same time coming to
terms with the fact that everyone in the building—everyone
employed by Scheering-Lassiter—was mind-shielded.

There were
exceptions: a cleaner scouring the marble tiles was without a shield,
as were a couple of lowly office boys, along with casual visitors to
the building—but Vaughan estimated that more than ninety per
cent of everyone in the building was unreadable.

Which meant that
he wouldn't learn as much as he'd hoped this morning—but the
fact that the company kept its personnel shielded was interesting in
itself.

The first floor
was given over to individual offices and a list of executive's names.
The second through tenth floors housed various departments, corporate
strategy, research and development, and Terran administration among
others.

On the fifteenth
floor he found what he was looking for: colonial affairs. In offices
one to five were housed the Mallory Department.

Vaughan entered
the elevator and rose to the fifteenth floor.

He stepped out
into a spacious area of wide corridors and open-plan offices,
decorated with what he took to be specimens of Mallorian flora: blue
shrubs and startled-looking blood-red cacti, alien to eyes accustomed
to verdant Earthly horticulture. Men and women in smart business
suits moved back and forth, barely giving him a second glance. They,
too, were shielded. He killed his implant, and the distant mind-noise
from the rest of the Station fell blissfully silent.

Across the wide
corridor, facing the elevator, was a big head and shoulders
photograph of Gustave Scheering, the head of the organisation. He
appeared to be in his sixties, the beefy slab of his face staring out
at the world with all the self-confidence of a self-made millionaire.
Vaughan read a potted biography of the great man beside the
photograph: born in New York, he'd risen from obscurity to the status
of a major tycoon in his twenties, running a couple of Luna-Mars
shipping Lines before starting up in the colony business with his
business partner, Reb Lassiter. Scheering had assumed total control
of the company after Lassiter's death five years ago.

To the left of
the elevator was an exhibition area given over to educating the
visitor on the positive aspects of Mallory's human colonisation.

Vaughan browsed
the softscreens and holo-cubes, which gave condensed histories of the
planet's discovery, exploration, and colonisation. Documentary
footage was accompanied by a saccharine female voice-over, sotto voce
corporate hard sell.

It was, he had
to admit, a stunningly beautiful world.

Take
Switzerland, expand it, add a North African climate and gravity a
little less than Earth's, and the result was the exotic colony world
of Mallory. The fact that the grass and most growing things were a
shade of blue only added to the planet's allure.

There was very
little on Mallory's native fauna, and nothing about
Scheering-Lassiter's ecological policy. Not that he'd expected much
in that department.

He read
everything there was to read in the exhibit, listened to all the
anodyne commentaries, and came away knowing he'd been fed the party
line.

It was time to
find someone who might be able to answer a question or two.

He bypassed the
open-plan office area—the desks occupied by glorified
secretaries—and made for an enclosed office at the far end of
the chamber.

The door was
marked: Gita Singh, Co-Director.

He knocked and
opened the door without awaiting a reply.

A woman in her
thirties, power-dressed in a severe black suit more like a uniform,
looked up from a softscreen in surprise. "Can I help you?"

He'd decided to
be direct, rather than try to catch her out with dissimulation. "I
hope so. I'm Jeff Vaughan and I'm investigating the murder of one of
your colleagues."

Singh was
suspicious. "Have you cleared this with security?"

He flashed his
identity-pass. "How do you think I got this far?" he
smiled, disarmingly. "I know you won't be able to tell me
anything linked directly to the case itself, but I'd appreciate some
background information about the planet."

Singh's gaze was
professionally neutral. "Mr Vaughan, I really am very busy this
morning. By the elevator you will find an informative display, which
should tell you all you need to know."

He shook his
head, his smile sardonic now. "I think not. I've taken the tour,
and in fact I think it told me nothing about what I really want to
know about Mallory."

She held his
gaze. "And what might that be?"

Vaughan was
placatory. He spread his hands. "Look, I'm on your side. Someone
sliced one of your colleagues to bits and I want to solve the case.
I'm sure you appreciate my concern?"

"Of course,
Mr Vaughan. But I cannot see how anything I might tell you about
Mallory could have any bearing—"

"Perhaps I
should be the judge of that, Ms Singh? To begin with, I'd like some
information about Scheering-Lassiter's ecological policy regarding
Mallory, its relations with Eco-Col, and the management of indigenous
fauna."

Discreetly, but
not so discreetly that Vaughan missed it, Singh slipped a hand
beneath the desk and applied pressure.

The audience was
over.

Vaughan sighed.
"Well, I can see that I'm wasting my time here, Ms Singh. It's
been pleasant chatting."

She watched him
with an expression that indicated the sentiment was not mutual.

He rose and left
the room, quickly, before security arrived and quizzed him about the
pass-card. He took the elevator to the ground floor and stepped out
into the punitive noon sunlight, happy with the morning's work. At
least he'd got a lot further than Kapinsky, and he'd come away with
one or two interesting pieces of information.

As the air-taxi
powered down onto the landing shelf, Vaughan looked out at the sable
edifice of the Law Enforcement headquarters, rising from the deck of
the Station like an Aztec ziggurat. It brought back a slew of
unpleasant memories.

Two years ago
he'd found himself involved in an investigation with a cop called
Jimmy Chandra. Their enquiries had taken them off-planet, to the
colony world of Verkerk, where Chandra had died.

Chandra had been
an optimist, his Hindu cheer a foil to Vaughan's then cynicism.

Vaughan had
changed since then, however; now he could share Chandra's upbeat
world-view. The world had not changed one bit—but Vaughan had.

He showed his ID
at the entrance and dropped into the bowels of the building, making
his way through the dimly lit corridors to the surveillance room.

It was a long,
low chamber, badly lighted, and the ventilation system seemed to have
given up trying to cool the place. It was like a sauna in there, made
worse by three cops smoking cheap cigarettes as they stared at their
screens.

Vaughan found a
corner booth and powered up the com. It flared, showing a grid-map of
Level One, beside a rank of numerals should he require views of other
levels.

He found the
amusement park, entered its reference number and the day and
approximate time of the scene he wished to view, and waited.

As expected,
there were no surveillance cams in operation in the park itself. He
returned to the map, worked out where the killing took place, and
entered the reference of the nearest street which might be covered by
a cam.

This time he was
in luck.

There were three
cams covering the length of the deserted street, and one of them
showed a section of the area where Kormier had died.

He magnified the
view, enhanced the image: he made out the concourse between the ghost
train and the empty McDonald's kiosk.

He ran the tape
at three times the normal speed, and the only indication that time
was elapsing was the flicking digital display at the top right of the
screen: the scene itself remained static.

He glanced at
the timer: 23.40. According to the SoC's report, the killing had
taken place at some time twelve minutes either side of midnight.

He slowed the
image to real-tune and watched.

Two minutes
later he saw movement.

He leaned
forward, magnifying the image, and saw two small figures cross the
concourse, climb the steps of the ghost train and enter it through
the ghoul's open mouth. Children: a boy and a girl. From the way they
were dressed, in ragged shorts and T-shirts, he guessed they were
homeless street-kids taking refuge for the night in the park.

They appeared
again, minutes later, emerging from the exit of the ghost
train—another open mouth. Then they stopped suddenly, and one
of them pointed across the concourse before ducking back inside the
open mouth.

Vaughan made out
what the boy had pointed at.

Another figure
had appeared on the concourse.

Vaughan reached
out and stilled the image, his pulse racing. He stared at the figure.
It was a man, tall and dark, in his fifties: Robert Kormier.

He restarted the
footage, playing it real-time now. He glanced at the digital display:
it was nine minutes to midnight.

Kormier paced
back and forth, between the ghost train and the fast-food kiosk. From
time to time he glanced at his wristwatch. So he had clearly arrived
at the amusement park to meet someone.

Seconds later,
the boy jumped from the exit of the ghost train.

Vaughan stilled
the image and examined the ghost's gaping rictus. The girl was still
in the shadows, peeping out.

He restarted the
image. Kormier paced. Each time he reached the ghost train and
turned, Vaughan expected him to face his killer.

So far, however,
there was no sign of the laser slayer.

Then, at a
minute before midnight, Kormier came to a halt before the ghost
train. He turned, lifted his cuff again to glance at his watch. He
looked up, across the concourse, then lifted an arm as if in
greeting.