Dark Angel: Skin Game (27 page)

Behind the counter, seated on a high stool, was a lumpy-faced sixtyish guy so white that Logan would have mistaken him for an albino Manticore experiment, if the man's eyes hadn't been so dark, like a couple of raisins adorning a dish of ice cream. The desk clerk was hunkered over a magazine—Barely Legal Teen—which, Logan realized as he drew close enough to get a look at the cover, was neither about the law nor aimed at a teenage audience.

The white-haired clerk made no effort to hide the porn mag when Logan got to the counter, nor did he look up.

"Excuse me," Logan said.

Finally tearing himself away from the photos of naked girls, the clerk glanced up at Logan with eyes that were deader than rap music.

"You have a guest here named Thomas Wisdom. Could I have his room number, please?"

"No."

"No?"

"We don't just hand that information out to anybody who asks. Don't you think our guests deserve their privacy?"

Logan glanced at the magazine. "How much is a subscription to that fine periodical?"

The clerk's eyes narrowed. "It's a monthly. Cover price is eight ninety-five."

"But you save money when you subscribe."

"Still... probably run fifty bucks."

"I see. And it'd come in a plain brown wrapper?"

The clerk got Logan's drift and nodded. "Sure. Nice and discreet."

From his billfold, Logan withdrew a crisp fifty dollar bill. "Which room did you say my friend Mr. Wisdom was in?"

"417, sir."

Logan placed the fifty-dollar bill over one of the nude photos. "Enjoy," he said.

A tiny yellow smile appeared in the lumpy white face.

Then Logan reached out and grabbed the clerk's wrist. "You know what I hate, though, when I subscribe to a magazine?"

The dark eyes were large now. "No—what?"

"When they call up and ask me to resubscribe. On the phone?"

"Why don't I hold all of Mr. Wisdom's calls for you?"

"Would you? You're a dear."

By way of contrast with the lobby stench, the elevator smelled like urine. As the floors dinged by, he wondered if he was walking into an Ames White trap. Though tracking Thompson had been tough, the computer techniques he'd used could easily be anticipated by White, who knew of Eyes Only's techno bent. If Otto Gottlieb was either lying, or a pawn, then....

As the doors slid open on the fourth floor, Logan decided the pistol snugged behind him should stay put—if he approached Thompson with gun in hand, the wrong signal would be sent, and things could go violently awry. Anyway, no point letting his paranoia get the best of him. On the other hand, paranoia had kept him alive more than once, in the Eyes Only game....

Every surface in the hall appeared to be some shade of gray, from the cheap carpeting to the peeling paint on the walls; even the wall-mounted lights, hung every six feet or so, seemed to be covered with a patina of age-old smoke. As

he walked down the corridor—the room he sought was down around the corner—the urine smell gave way to Lysol.

Logan approached the door marked 417 cautiously, then stood to one side and reached over to knock.

No response—and no noise within the hotel room, either... not a radio or TV, or someone getting up from a chair; nothing.

Logan really needed Thompson to be home—and his gut told him, despite the silence, the man was on the other side of that door. Thompson was hiding out, burrowed in; damnit, he was here—he had to be....

Stepping closer, Logan knocked again. Still nothing. A third knock was also answered with silence.

Or maybe his gut was wrong. Logan wondered if the porn-loving desk clerk had known Thompson was out when he sold him the information....

In frustration, Logan spoke to the door, loudly: "Mr. Wisdom—Mr. Wisdom! I need to talk to you." Then he leaned in and listened to nothing at all. Finally, he nearly shouted: "Mr. Thompson—"

The door snapped open, to a wide crack, and Logan found himself staring into the gray snout of a Glock barrel.

"Keep your voice down! Do you want to get me killed?"

Forcing himself to look past the barrel of the gun, Logan saw a skinny, pasty-faced white man only a few years younger than himself, with matted dark hair, an untrimmed beard, and eyes that looked both exhausted and terrified.

"No, Mr. Thompson—I want to help you stay alive."

The hand holding the gun was trembling; Logan realized the man with the weapon was seconds away from blasting him into eternity....

"Until about three months ago, Mr. Thompson," Logan said as calmly as he could manage, "you worked for the NSA, where your supervisor was a very bad egg named Ames White."

Thompson cocked the gun, and the barrel continued to tremble; but Logan knew he'd bought himself some time.

Thompson demanded, "Who are you?"

"My name's Logan Cale. I'm a journalist. I was sent by Eyes Only—I think you should recognize that—"

The barrel waved an invitation. "Get in here!"

Logan did as he was told, and as soon as they were both in the room, Thompson shut and locked and night-latched the door.

The room was a mess—bedclothes scattered, pizza boxes and fast food cartons littering the floor, the scent of stale sweat permeating everything. A portable TV

perched on a scratched-up dresser—news on, sound down—a worn-out armchair occupied a corner, and a nightstand next to the bed held a pitiful table lamp that at the moment supplied the only light in the room—even though it was mid-afternoon, the curtains were pulled tight and scant light made it in from outside.

The former NS A agent wore a sleeveless white undershirt, black suit pants, black socks, and no shoes. Logan wondered if the guy had been out of this room at all, since checking in.

Glock at the ready, Thompson peered quickly through the peephole into the hall.

Satisfied, he turned back to Logan.

"Clasp your hands behind your head."

"You will find a gun," Logan said, as he complied, and Thompson patted him down and found the pistol.

"Since when do reporters go packing?" Thompson asked, an eyebrow raised in the bearded, skeptical mask of his face.

"Since they linked up with Eyes Only," Logan said. "The authorities consider what we do to be cyber terrorism—you should know that... you were with the NSA."

Thompson slipped the clip out of Logan's pistol and ejected the shell in the chamber.

He stuffed the pistol in his belt; the ammo he slipped in a pants pocket.

Then he pressed the snout of the Glock to Logan's temple,

eyes wild as he said, "How do I know White didn't send you?"

"If White had sent me, you'd probably be dead right now."

"Or you would."

Logan—hands still clasped behind him, cold snout of the nine millimeter still kissing his temple—managed to shrug. "Or I would.... White does want you dead, right?"

Thompson's mouth dropped open. "Why the hell do you say that?"

"Pieces are falling together. Otto Gottlieb told me—"

The pistol pressed harder into Logan's flesh. "Otto's one of them."

"No. He's bolted the NSA too. And anyway, he was never on the inside of White's schemes—he was like you, just a good little NSA soldier.... Can I put my arms down?"

"No. But keep talking."

"Gottlieb thinks that what happened to you and your partner—and some other off-kilter things that have been going down—are somehow White's doing."

"A transgenic killed my partner."

"That's the party line, isn't it? Whatever the case, Gottlieb finally realizes White's gone rogue. And part of what White's up to has to do with some ... some friends of mine, who he's trying to hurt."

Thompson wasn't keeping up. "Rogue? Friends of yours?"

But the Glock had lowered; the bearded former agent had let it slip away from Logan's head....

"Yeah," Logan said. "Several of my friends, actually."

Eyes flashing with the abruptness of it, Thompson changed subjects. "How the fuck did you find me?"

"People hiding under an assumed name often do so under a variant of their real name—helps them fight the loss of identity that comes with going underground."

"Shit," the ex-agent said, knowing.

Logan went on: "I started with your mother's maiden name, names of people you went to school with, any name that you'd come in contact with, then I put every anagram of your name into the computer; after that, I listed synonyms for 'sage' and fed in Tom and Thomas, under various spellings, for Thompson ... and waited for the computer to spit something out."

Even hotels like the Armbruster had to list their guests with the government's database; the Travel Security Act dated back pre-Pulse, one of many repressive laws born out of a fear of terrorism.

"Shit," Thompson said again.

"Now," Logan said, hands still behind his head, "I have a question for you."

Thompson—gun in hand but not pointed at Logan—just looked at him, obviously still pissed at himself for picking a name that could be traced to him, a pro who should've known better.

"Why didn't you run?" Logan asked.

"I didn't know, at first."

"That you were set up, you mean."

"Yeah. I mean, I knew I was being railroaded out of the NSA; but I was healing up from a broken arm—"

"Your file says you took early retirement on full disability pay."

"That's right... which, frankly, made me even more suspicious. It was almost like—"

"You were being paid off."

"Yes! But finally I knew White and his people would be looking for me, and after I sent my family away, I knew they would think I ran too. So ... I didn't."

That made only vague sense to Logan, who said, "Look— could I put my hands down?"

"Yeah ... yeah ... sorry."

"Why don't we sit and talk about this?"

Logan took the chair and a dejected-looking Thompson sat on the bed, the Glock in his hands, draped between his legs. He looked like a man trying to decide whether or not to kill himself.

"Your arm looks like it healed fine," Logan said conversationally.

Flexing his left arm, Thompson said, "It's still sore sometimes." His face changed, curiosity overcoming fear. "Why are you here? Why come looking for me?"

"Surely you know about what's going on at Terminal City?"

Thompson nodded. "About all I do is watch the tube—I see the news. What about it?"

"Those people are the friends I was talking about—and I'm trying to help them.

White's putting the squeeze on, to get the federal government to invade and kill all the trans-genics. Total genocide."

Thompson shook his head. "Can't help you, then. After what one of those ... those freaks did to my partner, killing 'em all is fine by me."

"Are you sure that a transgenic killed your partner?"

Thompson nodded so vigorously he bounced on the edge of the bed. "Listen, Cale—

before the NSA, I did time in the Army and was a cop in Los Angeles. I've seen the evil shit that people can do to each other ... but I've never seen anything like what happened to Hankins."

"He wasn't the last, either."

"No—I mean, skinnedl No normal person could do that— only a monster bred to do atrocities, trained to kill—"

"Bred by the government. Trained to kill by men like Ames White."

"Even so, these transgenics need to be put down— whether it's out of getting even for victims like my partner, or just to put the bastards out of misery—I don't really give a damn. As long as those monsters are wiped out."

"And yet... you still believe you were set up by Ames White, right?"

The two men locked eyes, and Thompson said, "We were sent into combat with rubber bullets, Cale. Look—Hankins was a son of a bitch, but he was goddamn good at his job. We were using those new portable thermal imagers—"

Logan held up a hand. "Whoa—I don't know what a ... thermal imager?"

Thompson nodded.

"I don't know what a thermal imager is."

The agent explained the devices and how they worked; the new devices were under White's personal lock and key. "Anyway, that night last March, in that warehouse—the imager would have shown Cal something if it was working right. Mine too—only it showed nothing."

"Nothing?"

"That's how I got my arm broken! The thing at first gave me a hot reading, then farted out on me. It should have read hot for that homeless guy in that office—he just wouldn't have come up as hot as a transgenic. But it didn't show shitl The imagers don't lie, and yet this one told me that room was empty. And Hankins wasn't up against some homeless mook—he was facing a transgenic."

"I'm sorry about your partner," Logan said.

Thompson shrugged. "Thanks. Funny thing is, I never even liked the guy. He really was an asshole ... but nobody should have to die that way...."

Logan watched the man's face tighten in remembered horror as he relived the moment of discovering his mutilated dead partner.

"Nobody," Thompson repeated, "... 'cept maybe Ames White...."

"Do you still have the imager?"

Thompson shook his head. "Company property. Like my gun and my badge. Your buddy Agent Gottlieb took it all

when he hauled me to the hospital. Having my partner killed, being injured—plus I shot a civilian—I was put on immediate administrative leave. Last I saw my imager, it was in Otto's hands."

Logan made a mental note to ask Gottlieb about that. "What happened after that?"

"Agent White was livid that one of the imagers had been stolen by the transgenic. He said if the transgenics—and some of them are very smart—figured out the technology, they could also figure out a way to beat it. He expected us to guard those things with our lives. Anyway, after Agent Gottlieb took my gun, my badge, and the imager, I could see the writing on the wall. My career was over."

"How did they manage that? You don't go on full disability for a broken arm."

"They had me talk to an NSA shrink—that was the excuse. I shot that homeless guy, remember. Isn't any of that in the file? That my disability is mental?"

"Not what I saw. But it sounds like you had a free pass— why are you in hiding?"

"That first night, at the hospital—while I was waiting for them to cast my arm—I started thinking about those imagers, and how they couldn't possibly have been working right. Agent Gottlieb had already left—there was no reason for him to babysit me, so he was gone." Thompson sat forward, his eyes haunted. "But the more I thought about it, the more I thought these two imagers were defective and, so, were dangerous ... and someone else could run into the same fatal snag we did."