Odd Girl Out (2 page)

The last place I wanted to go was a little three-by-three holding cell at four in the morning, where all was quiet and private and where I had zero maneuvering room in case of trouble. In fact, I wanted to go there so little that if there’d been fewer cops on the scene I just might have tried to make a run for it.

But there
were
all those cops, and arriving in my three-by-three in a great deal of pain would leave me even more vulnerable if the Modhri decided to take a crack at me. In the end, I went quietly.

The police booking ritual hadn’t changed much in the last century, though the level of technology associated with it had certainly improved. They took my fingerprints, my biometrics, my DNA, several photos, and one of the new seven-layer physio scans that had done so much over the past few years to ruin the once-booming criminal plastic surgery industry

The arraignment judge was sympathetic, or else recognized the wobbliness of Kylowski’s case. Over the DA rep’s protests, she went ahead and set bail instead of remanding me to immediate custody.

Of course, the fact that she set the bail at half a million dollars might have implied not so much sympathy but a macabre sense of humor. She would have had my financials on the screen in front of her, and would have known I couldn’t possibly raise that kind of cash.

Fortunately for me, I had a friend in New York who could.

He was there within the hour, arriving by autocab and no doubt striding in like he owned the place. Dressed in a severe dark blue business suit, his currently long hair link-curled in a tight conservative knot at the back of his collar, and with a set of enhancement glasses perched on the bridge of his nose, he would have looked like just another defense attorney pulling the night beat.

He was anything but. Bruce McMicking, a human chameleon who changed his appearance like most people changed music providers, was ex-Marine, ex-bounty hunter, and currently the top troubleshooter for multitrillionaire industrialist Larry Cecil Hardin.

He wasn’t nearly as happy to see me as I was to see him. “I trust you realize how far I’ve stuck my neck out on this one,” he said coldly as we walked down the precinct steps. “If Mr. Hardin gets even a whiff of this, there will be six counties of hell to pay.”

“I know, and I’m sorry,” I apologized. “But I didn’t have anyone else to call.”

“You need to make friends with a few more trillionaires.”

“Oddly enough, I do know one besides Mr. Hardin,” I told him. “But he’s only a potential trillionaire at the moment. Probate’s likely to take a while.”

“Doesn’t it always.” He flagged down a passing autocab and ushered me inside. “This had better be good.”

I waited until we were rolling, and then gave him a rundown of my evening. “Interesting,” he commented thoughtfully when I’d finished. “What’s your read?”

“The male vic was a walker, with at least one other walker present,” I said. “They jumped Lorelei, but she got off the first shot and managed to plug one of them in the forehead. They got her with snoozers—”

“Which implies they wanted her alive,” he put in.

“Right,” I said. “After which—”

“So why did they then turn around and kill her?”

I frowned. With my brain still fatigue-fogged that question hadn’t even occurred to me. “Maybe the Modhri realized that one walker couldn’t get her away fast enough once her shot woke up the neighborhood,” I said. “So he went for the draw instead and killed her.”

McMicking shook his head. “I pulled the police report while they were processing you out. The witness said the incident started with a single shot—”

“Presumably Lorelei nailing the first walker.”

“—but then that shot was followed by only a few seconds of silence before the barrage started.”

I scratched my chin. A few seconds wasn’t nearly enough time for a pair of snoozer rounds, an attempt to pick her up, the realization that that wasn’t going to work, and settling for murder as Plan B. “How sure is the witness about the timing?”

“Very sure,” McMicking said. “He was getting something out of the micro when the first shot sounded, and hadn’t even gotten it to the table when he heard five or six more.”

“The walker getting his polyp colony shredded.”

“But again, the next gap wasn’t very long,” McMicking said. “No longer than it took him to set down his meal and hit the cop-call button on his comm. Another barrage, again consisting of five or six shots, and it was over.”

Just long enough, in other words, for the second walker to turn around and mutilate Lorelei the same way. But not enough time for much of anything else. “Okay, so there was no time for an interrogation,” I said. “But there might have been enough time for a quick theft.”

“That was my read,” McMicking said. “Only I’m guessing it was the walkers who shot first, with the snoozers, and that the woman then managed to get off her thudwumper round before she went under.”

“I don’t know,” I said. “A pair of snoozers are going to take down a woman of her size awfully fast. She’d have been lucky to even get the gun out, let alone aim and fire.”

“Unless she was like the man who died outside the New Pallas Towers eleven months ago when this whole thing started,” McMicking said. “He had three snoozers
and
three thudwumpers in him and still managed to follow you there.”

I gnawed at my lip. Earlier, I’d speculated that Lorelei might have been someone like me whom the Spiders had coopted into their war. It hadn’t occurred to me that she might have been an even rarer avis, someone like my partner Bayta.

Especially since neither Bayta nor the Chahwyn had ever mentioned there being any more like her roaming the galaxy. “If she was, she could have saved herself a lot of grief if she’d just identified herself to me,” I said.

“Maybe she wasn’t allowed to,” McMicking said. “Given all I don’t know about this game, I
do
know the Spiders like to play their cards really close.”

“No kidding,” I said sourly.

“Speaking of Spiders and playing cards close, where’s Bayta?”

“She’s off riding the Quadrails somewhere,” I told him. “On our last mission we ran into a large shipment of coral allegedly headed for Cimman space. She and the Spiders are trying to find out where it actually ended up.”

McMicking grunted. “Good luck to them.” He inclined his head microscopically toward the street behind our autocab. “So you think our tail is a friend of Lorelei’s? Or have we found our missing walker?”

Even dead tired, I knew better than to spin around and peer out the rear window. “How long has he been there?” I asked.

“Since we left the precinct house,” McMicking said. “Private car, Manhattan registry plate. There could be a second person in the car with him—hard to tell with the light and distance.” He cocked an eyebrow. “The other interesting question would be which one of us they’re following.”

“My guess is it’s you,” I said. “I’m pretty much a known quantity. You’re the mystery man.” I cocked an eyebrow. “I mean, they know about Bruce McMicking, but they don’t know about
you
, if you follow.”

“Those official photos of me do tend to go out of date pretty fast,” he agreed. “Of course, that assumes our friend is a walker and not some other unforgiving leftover from your past.”

“Could be,” I agreed. “Though I’m guessing you probably have as many of those leftovers as I do.”

“Someday we’ll sit down and compare notes,” he said. “Any preference as to how we work this?”

I watched the streetlights flowing past. “Let’s first try to find out which of us he’s interested in.”

Ten minutes later our autocab pulled to a halt by the curb in front of my apartment building. I hopped out, and as the vehicle pulled back into the sparse predawn traffic I strode quickly across the sidewalk and the thin sliver of open ground to my building’s outer door.

No one opened fire before I made it inside, nor was there anyone lurking in the foyer. I skipped the elevator in favor of the stairs and headed up.

Midway up the first flight my comm vibrated in my pocket, and I pulled it out. “Compton.”

“Looks like it’s me,” McMicking’s voice came back. “The car didn’t even slow down for you. Oh, and I got a clear look as we went around the corner. There are definitely two of them.”

“Just doubles the fun of it all,” I said. “Are they still following you?”

“Like the golden retriever I had as a kid.”

“Good,” I said, easing around the last corner of the final landing. There was no one lurking in the hall outside my apartment. “Give me ten minutes and then a two-buzz.”

The first thing I did once I was inside was to retrieve my Glock and make sure its clip was loaded with snoozers. I tucked it into my belt, and then added a clip of thudwumpers too, just in case. Feeling marginally safer now that I was armed, I went to the kitchen.

Eggs would have worked best, but I’d come straight home from Sutherlin Skyport and hadn’t had a chance yet to stock up on perishables. But I did have a pantry shelf full of canned soup. I decided New England clam chowder would work best, and emptied four cans into a plastic bag. Carefully gathering the top of the bag closed, I headed back out.

The street was momentarily deserted as I emerged again onto the sidewalk. I’d already settled on my spot: a somewhat overelaborate covered doorway a couple of doors down that stretched three meters closer to the street than my building’s doorway did. I hurried to it and stepped inside, doing my best to melt into the decorative wrought iron.

In my pocket, my comm vibrated twice and then went still. Peering around the doorway, I saw a pair of headlights turn the corner onto my street two blocks away. It had covered the first half block toward me when a second pair of lights appeared and turned onto the street behind it. The first vehicle—an autocab—passed by my position, and I caught a glimpse of McMicking sitting half turned in his seat, one hand on the door handle and the other holding his gun. He continued on, and the car behind him rolled toward my doorway.

And as it started to pass me, I took a long step out of concealment and lobbed my bag of soup squarely into the center of its windshield.

The car’s wipers went on instantly, of course. But they’d been designed for rain and sleet, not clam chowder. One sweep later the entire windshield was a solid layer of chunky white goo.

The occupants were up to the challenge. Even before the windshield was completely blocked, the man in the passenger seat slid down his window and leaned his head out, the wind whipping through his hair as he peered around the side of the car toward the autocab still rolling on ahead.

Unfortunately for them, with the distraction of the soup bomb neither set of eyes had spotted McMicking’s drop and roll out of the autocab door. He came up into a low crouch by the side of the street, and as the car passed he quick-fired a pair of snoozers into the passenger’s exposed cheek and neck.

The man reacted instantly, jerking his head back inside. But it was too late. As the car sped up, I saw his sideways movement continue on, sagging his head against the driver’s right shoulder.

With his partner’s eyes suddenly of no use to him, the driver now had no choice but to open his window as well. I was ready, and uncorked a couple of shots at the back of his head as he stuck it out into the night breeze.

But snoozers were by design a low-speed, low-impact round, and the car already had too much distance on me. A few seconds later the vehicle careened around a corner and vanished into the night.

Gun still in hand, McMicking crossed the street to my doorway. “That was interesting,” he said. “You reach any conclusions?”

“Did you hear the passenger calling any directions to the driver?” I asked.

McMicking shook his head. “I didn’t see any hand signals or gestures, either.”

“Neither did I,” I said. “In which case, I’d have to say they were definitely walkers.”

McMicking gazed down the street where the car had disappeared. “So what now?”

“We get you out of here before he can reacquire you,” I said, looking around. Aside from the cars parked along the far side of the street, there were no other vehicles present. “I don’t know whether it would be safer to get another autocab or call a friend to pick you up.”

He gave me a lopsided smile. “You really think I know anyone I trust that far?” he asked. “But don’t worry about me. I meant what about you?”

I thought about what Lorelei had said about her sister being in danger on New Tigris. I thought about the fact that her murder pretty well proved she hadn’t been just blowing smoke. I though about the Modhri, and his obvious interest in whatever the hell was going on here.

And I thought about the fact that the man standing in front of me had just put up half a million dollars of Larry Hardin’s money to guarantee I’d stay in New York until the legal system took its crack at me. “First thing I’m going to do is get some sleep,” I said. “After that, maybe I’ll poke around a little and see if I can backtrack Lorelei’s movements.”

“Sounds good,” McMicking said, gazing a little too intently at me. “I’ll keep tabs on the autopsy. I’ll also try to see if I can find anything on her from official sources.”

“I’d appreciate that,” I told him. “And thanks again for bailing me out. I know the kind of bind you’ve just put yourself into over this.”

“No problem,” he said, his eyes lingering on my face another second before he gave the street another sweep. “Get some sleep. I’ll call you later.” Giving me a quick nod, he turned and strode away down the sidewalk.

I watched him for a moment, wondering if I should offer to backstop him. But McMicking was a big boy, and quite capable of taking care of himself. More to the point, I was dead tired. Turning away, I headed back to my apartment.

It was just before two o’clock in the afternoon when I finally woke up again. I checked for messages—there weren’t any—and then heated up another of my repertoire of soup cans, washing down the meal with a glass of sweet iced tea. By the time I finished I felt more alive and refreshed than I had in days.

Time to get to work.

My first task was to write a brief message for transmission to the Tube station hanging out there in the outer system just past the orbit of Jupiter. Unless Lorelei had always been in Terra system, she had to have come here by Quadrail, which meant that the Spiders should have a record of her movements. I asked for that record to be put together for me, and threw in a request that Bayta be located and notified that I would shortly be on my way.

Encrypting the whole thing with one of the Spiders’ special codes, I uploaded it to the message center, noted it would be lasered to the transfer station within the hour, and got busy on a general computer search.

I’d been at it an hour, and was still sifting through all the unrelated information on all the unrelated Lorelei Beaches, when my door chimed.

I approached the door as one might approach a sleeping tiger: quietly, cautiously, and with Glock in hand. Standing well off to the side, I keyed the viewer.

The uniform was that of a package messenger, complete with book-sized package in hand. The hair was that of an aging new-drift klivner trying to relive the glory days of his youth.

The face was McMicking’s.

I unlocked the door, and he slipped inside. “Still alive, I see,” he said approvingly as I closed the door behind him. “Anything else happen last night?”

“Not to me,” I said. “You?”

He shook his head and handed me the package. “Here.”

“You get something already?” I asked, frowning as I pulled open the tab. There was nothing inside but a set of official-looking cards.

“Not on the woman, no,” he said. “I thought you might need these.”

I swallowed hard as I focused on the top card. It was an official Western Alliance ID card, complete with my face and fingerprints and other data.

Only it was made out to someone named Frank Abram Donaldson.

I looked up again to find McMicking gazing at me, an all too knowing look in his eyes. “This is…” I paused, searching for the right words.

McMicking, typically, didn’t have to search. “This is going to get my butt in serious trouble,” he said calmly “But this is war. And I owe you. You and Bayta both.”

“Mostly Bayta,” I said, rubbing my thumb across the ID. It even felt real. “She’s the one the Spiders listen to, and mostly obey.”

“But you’re the one
she
listens to,” McMicking pointed out. He smiled faintly. “And mostly obeys.”

“I’m not sure I’d go
that
far,” I demurred.

“I would,” McMicking said. “And one of these days I’m hoping you’ll be able to explain just how all of that works.”

“Definitely,” I promised, though I didn’t have the vaguest idea when that day would come. Bayta’s close relationship with the Chahwyn and Spiders was a closely guarded secret, but at least it was something I could vaguely understand. Bayta’s relationship with me, on the other hand, I was still trying to get a handle on. “Meanwhile, I’ll do whatever I can to get back before my court date,” I added. “If I do, hopefully you’ll be able to sneak the bail money back into your department account with no one the wiser.”

“You just focus on figuring out what the Modhri is up to and nail him,” McMicking said grimly. “Mr. Hardin can absorb the loss if he has to.”

“Mr. Hardin isn’t the one I’m worried about,” I said, sliding the ID to the back of the stack. Behind it was a torchliner ticket, with the shuttle from Sutherlin scheduled to leave that evening for its long voyage across the inner system to the Quadrail station. “I didn’t think I was nearly this easy to read,” I commented.

He shrugged. “It’s not like the Modhri is doing serious work down here,” he said. “At least, I hope not. Therefore, wherever you need to go for follow-up on Lorelei will probably be somewhere out-system. I hope the timing isn’t going to be too tight.”

“No, it’s perfect,” I assured him. “The sooner I get out of town, the better.”

I rotated the ticket to the back of the stack and thumbed through the rest of my brand-new credentials. There was a universal pilot’s license, an import/export license, a rare-collectables dealer’s certificate, and a notarized security bond. “No plumber’s certificate?” I asked.

“Never hurts to be prepared,” he said equably. “You may find the last one particularly useful.”

I flipped to it, and stopped cold, about as surprised as I’d been in many a day. It was a card identifying Frank Abram Donaldson as a member in good standing in the Hardin Industries security force.

I looked up at McMicking again. This time there was a puckish smile on his face. “And
that
one’s even legit,” he said. “I have standing authority to hire any security personnel I want.”

“Oh, he’s going to be pleased about this one,” I said. “What exactly is my salary, if you don’t mind my asking?”

“Don’t mind at all,” he said. “You’re on staff at a dollar a year. Don’t spend it all in one place.”

“Not a problem,” I assured him. “It’s the prestige of the thing that matters.”

“The hell with the prestige,” McMicking countered. “What matters is that that ID includes a carry permit.”

I frowned down at the card. He was right—the proper legal phrasing was there at the bottom. “The hell with the prestige, indeed,” I agreed. “That could come in
very
handy.”

“And unlike your residence permit, it doesn’t require you to load with snoozers, either,” he added, moving back toward the door. “I have to get going—Mr. Hardin’s briefing me on a new assignment this afternoon. If I get anything more on Ms. Beach before you hit the Quadrail, I’ll send it on ahead.”

“Thanks,” I said, sliding the stack of documents into my inside pocket. “For everything. I owe you.”

“Just let me know how it comes out,” McMicking said. He paused with his hand on the knob. “Or at least let me know as much as the Spiders will let you tell me.”

“You’ll get it all,” I promised. “I know how to push the boundaries, too.”

He gave me a lopsided smile, then opened the door and checked the hallway outside. With a final glance and nod, he was gone.

I double-locked the door behind him, feeling a not entirely pleasant warmth flowing through me. Sometimes it felt like Bayta and I were all alone in this war, with no one but the Spiders and the Chahwyn even cheering from the sidelines. It was nice to know that McMicking was treating the whole thing seriously, too.

On the other hand, the Modhri had a little trick called thought viruses that he could use to plant subtle suggestions into those who weren’t already under his control. And thought viruses transferred best between friends, allies, associates, and compatriots.

It was nice to have McMicking as an ally. It was also potentially very dangerous.

But in a few hours I would be aboard a torchliner, out of reach of him and anything the Modhri might be able to do to me through him. In this case, at least, having an ally had proved to be a worthwhile gamble.

Setting my Glock on the tea table, I headed to the bedroom to pack.