Sims (27 page)

“What a way to go.”

“Wasn't the fire that got him. A bullet saved him from that.”

“Really?” Patrick said. “You're sure?”

Yarger gave him a steely look.

“What he means,” Romy added quickly, “is how can you tell if he was, as you say, ‘very crisp'?”

The sergeant poked an index finger against the center of his forehead. “Ain't never seen no fire burn a little hole here and blow off the back of a skull, know what I'm saying?”

“I hear you,” Romy said. “But no, er, ‘crisp' sims?”

“Not yet anyways. Don't expect to find none either.”

“But Lieutenant Milancewich mentioned sims.”

“Right. We have a witness who saw armed men herding a bunch of sims and some humans into a couple of vans just before the place lit up.” He shook his head. “I don't know what sort of incendiary devices they used, but they musta been beauts. Place went up like it was made of paper.”

“But there
could
be dead sims in there,” Romy persisted.

Yarger crooked a finger and started moving away. “C'mere. I'll show you why there won't be.”

Patrick and Romy followed him to a taped-off area near the corner. Yarger stopped and pointed to the sidewalk.

“That's why.”

Red spray-painted letters spread across the pavement.

FREE THE SIMS!

DEATH TO SIM OPPRESSORS!

SLA

“SLA?” Patrick said with a glance at Romy.

Her face was troubled when she met his eyes. “I know what you're thinking,” she whispered. “But no. Impossible. He'd never.”

“The Symbionese Liberation Army?” Patrick raised his voice to cover hers. “Didn't they kidnap Patty Hearst?”

“Different group,” Yarger said. “These assholes are the ‘
Sim
Liberation Army.' Don't that beat all.”

“How do you know?” Romy said.

“That's what they called themselves in the note they left.”

“What else did it say?”

“Buncha sim-hugger garbage. The usual stuff. You know the rap.”

“May I see it?”

Yarger gave Romy a you-gotta-be-kidding look. “Forensics got it.” He turned as someone called his name. “Yeah. Be right there.” Then back to Romy. “Look, you wanna leave me your card, we'll call you if we think we need help. But don't wait up for it. And for the time being, stay on the other side of the tape, okay?”

Patrick expected Romy to press him further, but she simply nodded. Patrick lifted the tape for her and she ducked under. She pulled out a compact camera and began snapping pictures.

“For your scrapbook?”

“For Zero. He'll want to see.”

“Speaking of Zero,” he said, leaning close and whispering. “Did you call him about this?

“You don't call Zero. You leave a message.”

“Could he be behind this?”

She lowered her camera. Her look was fierce. “I told you—”

“Does he consult you on everything he does? Of course not. So how do you know?”

She started snapping pictures again. “I just do. He lets me take care of the brothels and places like this. That's
my
job.”

“Well just what sort of place is it—or I guess I should say,
was
it?”

“A globulin farm.”

“A what?”

“I thought I explained that when—wait. Did you see that Asian man?”

“No. Where?”

“He was in that knot of people over there. I just pointed the camera in his direction and he ducked away. Where did he go?”

She rose on tiptoe to scan the area, then quickly ducked back.

“Oh, hell!” She spun, turning her back to Patrick as she started moving toward the corner. “Don't look around, just follow me.”

“Why?”

“Just do it. I don't want to—”

“Well, well!” said a man's voice behind him. “If it isn't Ms. Romy Cadman of OPRR. Fancy meeting you here.”

“Shit!” Romy hissed; it sounded more like escaping steam than a word.

As she turned, so did Patrick. He saw a swarthy, broad-shouldered man in a gray overcoat swaggering toward them. Patrick took an instant dislike to his smug expression. But his cold, dark eyes were his most arresting feature. Patrick felt like a mouse being scrutinized by a rattlesnake. But then the man's gaze flicked away. Patrick had been demoted from lunch to background scenery.

“Mr. Portero,” Romy said in a deep-freeze voice. “What a surprise.”

“I don't see why it should be. Sims were reported on the scene, and SimGen has a vital interest in the welfare of all sims.”

“Sure it does,” Romy said, drawing out the first word. “But to send its chief of security?”

“ ‘Free the sims' is not a phrase SimGen takes lightly, especially when it involves murder. I decided to look into this myself.”

“You should introduce yourself to that sergeant over there,” Romy said. “His name's Yarger and he's anxious for all the help he can get.”

“I'm sure he is.” Portero jerked a thumb toward the smoking ruin. “What do you think? Globulin farm?”

“That's my guess.”

Patrick remembered now. “That's where they infect sims with viruses and such and then drain off and sell their immune globulins, right?”

The man turned his glittering stare on Patrick. “And you are . . . ?

“This is a friend,” Romy said. “Patrick Sullivan. Patrick, meet Mr. Portero, security chief at SimGen.”

“Oh, yes,” Portero said. “I believe I've heard of you. Some sort of lawyer, right?”

Patrick noticed that Portero had clasped his hands behind his back as he spoke. A handshake seemed out of the question.

“Some sort, yes,” Patrick said. “But about this globulin farm . . . ?”

“A small operation from what I can gather,” Portero said.

Patrick glanced at the blackened ruins. “Not any kind of operation now.”

“Thanks to this so-called SLA,” Portero said. He stared at Romy. “Ever hear of them, Romy?”

Patrick felt his insides clench at the sound of her first name on Portero's lizard lips, but said nothing.

Romy regarded him coolly. “Not till this morning.”

“I don't understand their methods,” Portero said, rubbing his jaw as he looked around. “I can see them making off with the sims, to free them later. But why fire the building? What if they'd missed a few sims in their raid? They'd have been cooked just like that corpse.” He turned to Romy. “Did your sergeant friend mention finding any sim bodies?”

“No, thank God.”

“Yes . . . Thank God.” Portero's eyes became distant; he seemed to recede for a moment, then gathered himself. “But why did these terrorists make off with the humans as well?”

“Your guess is as good as mine,” Romy said.

Portero smiled as he shook his head. “Oh, I doubt that, Romy. I doubt that very much.”

And then he swaggered away.

“Something about this has got him worried,” Romy said. “He's putting on a good show, but something's bothering him.”

“Is that why he never blinks?”

“He doesn't have to; he has nictitating membranes.”

“That figures. And his tiny reptile heart is set on you.”

Romy's lips twisted. “Yeah, I know.”

“But I'm taller.”

She smiled for the first time since he'd arrived. “You know, sometimes I'm glad you're around.”

“Only sometimes?”

She hooked her arm through his and started walking. “Let's go grab some breakfast and wait for Zero to get back to me.”

“Excellent idea, but in a better neighborhood, if you please.”

As they moved away he glanced back at Portero, intending to give him a look-what-I've-got wink, but thought better of it when he saw the fierce look in those icy dark eyes.

MANHATTAN

They were just finishing a leisurely breakfast at an East Seventies café when Romy's PCA went off. She checked the readout:

GARAGE 10AM

She was glad for the change from the Worth Street basement. Use one place too often and eventually the wrong person was going to make the right connection. She and Patrick hopped a cab to the West Side.

“I don't see a garage,” Patrick said as they stepped out onto Ninth Avenue in the Thirties.

He noticed the sidewalks were busy here, but nowhere near as crowded as the midtown madhouse a few blocks east.

“It's down the street, closer to Tenth. But let's stand here awhile. Just to be sure no one followed us.”

The sun had poked through the clouds but did little to moderate the chill wind whistling off the Hudson.

“Do you ever ask yourself if you're crazy?” Patrick said, looking around as if expecting to see trench-coated men lurking in doorways.

“All the time.”

“Good. That's a healthy sign. Because I think we're both crazy.”

“I think I know where this is going.”

“Do you? Great. Then maybe you can tell me why we're at the beck and call of this guy. Who is he? What's driving him? Why's he doing this? What's in it for him?”

“I can't answer all your questions,” she told Patrick, “but I can tell you why he's doing it: to stop the slave trade of sentient beings.”

“But what's in it for him?”

“Cessation of the slave trade of sentient beings.”

“Bull. Idealistic crap.”

The words stung Romy. “You don't believe people can be motivated by ideals?”

“Foot soldiers can be, and they often are. But not the generals, not the guys running the war. They've got something else driving them, whether it's a better place in history or a spot closer to their god or riches or fame or glory or power or revenge or guilt; there's always something in it for them.”

“What about Gandhi? Schindler? Father Damien? Mother Teresa?”

He shrugged. “Everyone in the world knows their names. Maybe that's what they were after.”

“I'm glad I'm not you,” she said. “What an awful way to view life.”

“Maybe I've seen too many so-called idealists caught with their hands in the till.”

“A corrupt individual doesn't corrupt the ideal.”

“No argument there, and I didn't bring this up to start one. But look at the situation. Here's a guy who has to have spent a fortune setting up this nameless organization to stop SimGen, and then he hides his identity from everyone who works for him. I can see him not trusting me, but what about you? You say you've worked with him for years. He's got to know you're in this for the long run. Why doesn't he let you see his face?”

“How do you know he hasn't?” she shot back.

Patrick's eyebrows jumped. “Has he?”

“No.”

“See what I mean?”

“Maybe he's someone we'd recognize.”

“Yeah, there's a thought. You know . . . he seems to be built a lot like David Letterman.”

Romy wasn't going to dignify that with a response.

“Let's walk,” she said, satisfied that no one was on their tail.

“Seriously, though, I'd feel a lot better about this Zero guy if I knew what makes his motor run.” Patrick seemed to be in summation mode as they
headed toward Tenth Avenue, walking sideways, the wind ruffling his blond hair as he gestured with his hands. “If it's because a SimGen truck ran over his mother when he was a kid, fine. Or if he's got huge short positions on SimGen stock, fine. Or even if it's because of something crazy like Mercer Sinclair stole his girlfriend in seventh grade, okay too. I just want to know so I can have a handle on how much he'll risk to get what he wants. Because so far we're the ones in the line of fire, not him. He wasn't in my car when it was run off the Saw Mill. He wasn't at Beacon Ridge when the sims offered to share their poisoned food with us.”

Romy hated to admit it, but Patrick was making sense. She'd been taken with Zero from their first meeting. She'd sensed the fire burning beneath all his layers of disguise, and had been warmed by its heat. But what fueled that fire? It was a question she'd never asked. She'd assumed it burned the same as her own, an all-consuming desire to right a wrong. Was that foolish? Perhaps. But she had to go with what she felt.

“All I can tell you,” she said, “is that I believe in his cause and he's never let me down. I don't intend to let him down.”

He sighed. “Fair enough. I'm trusting your judgment. For now.”

Down near Tenth, Romy stopped before a dirty white doorway next to an equally dirty white roll-up garage door and pressed a buzzer. She glanced up into the eye of an overhead security camera and nodded once, signaling that all was clear. The door buzzed open.

Inside, a single dusty bulb glowed in the ceiling. They found Zero, barely visible in the gloom, his tall lean figure swathed in sweater, jeans, ski mask, dark glasses, and gloves, pacing beside a beat-up Ford Econoline delivery van, once white, now soot gray.