Vigilantes (29 page)

Goudkins rolled the bottle against her skin, feeling it sooth a budding headache.

If Ostaka got sidetracked on this investigation, it would be his own damn fault. He was the one who had started the war with Goudkins.

She had just retaliated.

She brought the bottle down, then twisted the top and took a swig. The water was delicious. She had been thirsty and not even realized it.

She wished those thoughts had calmed her down. She was the one who had felt they needed to work together, and they hadn’t. But if he was actually double-checking the Frémont information as a way of conducting his investigation—smartly doing it from the Security Office’s system—then he was finding a way around the order.

She should have supported that.

If she had been thinking clearly.

If he hadn’t been such an asshole.

She wandered back to the consoles, feeling vaguely guilty.

Well, she couldn’t undo what she had done. She had to live with it now.

She took another drink of water, then looked at the screens. The screen on the right was still gathering and compiling data.

The screen on the left was done.

Mavis Zorn had died ten years before. She had passed out in her office at the Impossibles. If someone had found her, she might have survived. But no one had, and she died, alone, at her desk, of something the death certificate called “natural causes.”

Apparently there was no autopsy. Mavis Zorn had been older than she looked, employed at the Impossibles
after
she retired from teaching. She had worked at the Impossibles for forty years.

She left no family and very few (if any) friends.

Goudkins studied her biography.

Zorn had taught all over the sector, usually at one of those domed communities that arose near some kind of mining operation or agricultural development at the edge of the known universe. An entire cadre of traveling teachers went from short-lived community to short-lived community, educating young people, and moving on when the operation near the domed community shut down.

She was nearly seventy when she decided that teaching and traveling were too much for her. She went to law school, got her degree, and was one of the few people who got stuck permanently at the Impossibles.

Or so it seemed.

Goudkins frowned at the limited information. How had this Zorn woman ended up with enough power to not only mentor young lawyers like Uzvaan, but to prevent them from handling cases that would harm their delicate sensibilities?

She couldn’t tell with a simple glance, and she knew she would need to do more digging to find out.

So she turned her attention to the screen on her other side.

It had finished scrolling as well.

Jhena Andre had had a standard career in the prison system before moving into administration decades ago. Then her work became classified to anyone who looked it up.

The first thing Goudkins did as she opened the classified file was cross-reference Andre’s name with any existing investigations.

And what crossed Goudkins’ screen made her sit back in surprise.

The order that had given her the most trouble since she arrived on the Moon—the one that prevented Goudkins and Ostaka from doing any investigation of the Frémont clones—had originated from Andre’s desk.

And it hadn’t just gone to lower-level investigators like Goudkins and Ostaka. It had gone system-wide.

No one
was to investigate those clones without Andre’s permission.

Goudkins felt cold. Her heart started to race. She was onto something.

It was something big.

It was something that could cost her job.

She didn’t care.

Because, if she could track this all down, she might actually find out who ordered these attacks.

And she might be able to stop them.

THIRTY-EIGHT

NYQUIST ALREADY HAD his sandwich by the time the holographic security footage rose on the table top. The sandwich itself was a work of art—the pastrami the best he’d ever had, topped with crispy lettuce, a sweet tomato, and sharp Cheddar. The bread even had a bite to it. He had no idea what kind of sauce covered everything, but it made his eyes water.

Sevryn started up the footage twice, and each time, it collapsed. Nyquist knew this game: he’d express impatience, and Sevryn would tell him that the playback wasn’t working. He’d fix it and give it to Nyquist later.

Then, later, Sevryn would tell him that the footage got destroyed in the machine malfunction.

Nyquist enjoyed his sandwich, let Sevryn monkey with everything, and planned to charge the man with obstruction if anything got destroyed while Nyquist was sitting there.

Finally, when he had finished half the sandwich, he leaned back.

“You know,” he said, “I know a lot about security systems. I could get that working or we can just download the footage on one of my chips and I can look at it back at the precinct.”

He wiped off his mouth and stood.

“In fact,” he said, trying not to sound too dramatic. “Why don’t we do that? It’ll be easier.”

Sevryn gave him a panicked look, and Nyquist tried not to smile. Clearly Sevryn didn’t know much about security systems at all. He had been trying to make it appear like he couldn’t make it work, when he actually could.

Erasing something from the system was nearly impossible if you were new to it all.

“I got it,” Sevryn said. “Finish your sandwich.”

A hologram appeared on the table top, half over the remaining bits of sandwich. The entire front of the restaurant showed in the footage.

A line went out the door.

The four tables had well-dressed customers, cramming their mouths with sandwiches similar to the one that Nyquist was eating. The low hum of conversation almost sounded like it was live.

The line included several uniformed police officers. None were looking directly at any of the cameras that created this three-dimensional image.

Still, Nyquist’s stomach clenched, and he suddenly regretted eating the meal.

He recognized about six of the dozen cops in line. Most of them were detectives, even though they were wearing their uniforms. Many detectives had started wearing uniforms after the Peyti Crisis, partly because headquarters thought a uniformed presence made the streets seem safer and partly because uniforms were durable and almost impossible to mess up.

They also stored trace evidence as a matter of course. Most police officers thought that a good thing—it made sure their prosecutions were easier.

But if they were the perpetrators…

“Everything okay?” Sevryn asked.

“Great,” Nyquist said, and hoped his response sounded genuine.

“I still got some cheesecake,” Sevryn said.

“I—this sandwich will be more than enough, thank you,” Nyquist said, still staring at the images moving before him. He recorded everything, in case Sevryn decided to destroy it after all.

Nyquist swallowed hard. The sandwich was threatening to return. He still hadn’t seen any faces straight on—at least of the police—but he thought he could identify several of them.

He hoped he was wrong.

Then one of the cops turned, and Nyquist saw his entire face. Lucien Gaetjens. His flat nose and broad cheekbones made him readily identifiable. Nyquist had never worked with him, but had dealt with him a lot when Gaetjens was trying and failing to pass his detective exams. Gumiela had even suggested that Nyquist take him into the field and train him, and Nyquist had respectfully (he hoped) said no.

Not because of Gaetjens, but because Nyquist had enough trouble with partners. He didn’t need to mentor someone already having problems.

Beside him, another cop, whose face Nyquist recognized but name he didn’t know, leaned over and whispered something. Nyquist reluctantly turned on his department identification program. Pedro Federline. He was still a beat cop, who had been with the department nearly ten years.

Which meant he either had attitude problems or he didn’t have the patience (or the smarts) to move up in the ranks. Usually, failure to move meant someone was in the wrong job.

Although Nyquist had known several beat cops who were perfectly content where they were.

Zhu came through the door. His suit appeared to be silk, but Nyquist couldn’t tell. Several of the cops looked at Zhu, but he didn’t seem to notice.

A few of the cops whispered with each other, and one laughed.

Nyquist’s heart was pounding, as if he were seeing all of this in real time.

Zhu was staring at the menu, clearly oblivious to everything going on around him.

The female cop had just gotten two things from the counter, one a gigantic container of soup. She turned.

And Nyquist closed his eyes, just for a moment.

Exactly what he had been afraid of.

Savita Romey.

He thought he recognized her posture and her form. He had worked with her on more than one case, flirted with her more than he liked to think about, and had gotten angry with her the morning of the detectives meeting.

She had suggested that they torture the Peyti clones to find out what they knew. Or maybe just hurt them on general principles.

Nyquist had moved away from her then, feeling deeply disappointed.

Her gaze was on Zhu, and her lips thinned.

Nyquist had seen that look before. It was Romey’s version of disgust. She hated Zhu.

She usually used that hate to solve cases. She’d been one of the first responders to Mayor Soseki’s assassination site on Anniversary Day, and she’d done as good a job as could be expected.

Nyquist always kept her on his rotation, because he knew she could get the job done.

He pushed the sandwich away, watching as Zhu made his way up the line.

Romey handed off the soup to Gaetjens. He nodded and grinned. Then Romey took the lid off her coffee and walked directly into Zhu.

“Savita,” Nyquist whispered.

Zhu saw her at the last minute and moved out of the way as coffee, so hot that it steamed, splattered on the floor. A few other patrons moved back, alarmed, clearly burned. They said something that Nyquist couldn’t make out.

But he could make out what Romey said.

Sorry
, she said to Zhu in a tone that was equal parts sarcasm and intent.

Gaetjens bumped Zhu from behind and poured the soup on him. That had to burn.

Yeah,
Gaetjens said in the same tone that Romey had used.
I’m sorry, too
.

Then a third cop came in from the side and dumped some kind of liquid on Zhu.

Oh, my
, the cop said.
Lookie what a mess you made
.

Nyquist did a search for that cop’s face, and found it belonged to Omar Nettles. Nyquist had never seen him before, but that wasn’t as odd as it sounded. There were thousands of police officers in the Armstrong Police Department; he couldn’t be expected to know them all.

Zhu looked at Nettles in surprise. Nyquist was surprised as well. Nettles made it clear that this little interaction really
wasn’t
an accident.

Zhu held up his hands in protest.
Look, guys, I didn’t mean
—

Guys?
Romey asked, waving her coffee cup around and deliberately spilling more on the floor.
Do I look like a guy to you?

And that was when Sevryn stepped in, yelling at everyone. He threw the four police officers out first. Then Zhu thanked him, which also seemed like a mistake.

Sevryn snapped,
Don’t think I don’t know who you are. I didn’t lose nobody last week, but on Anniversary Day, I lost a son, two uncles, and my Aunt Marie. So I don’t need your kind here
.

Zhu actually seemed offended. Deeply offended. That caught Nyquist’s attention. Why would a man who represented the Peyti Clones be upset by a link to Anniversary Day?

I’m not doing anything connected with Anniversary Day
, Zhu said.
I’m—

The hell you’re not
. Sevryn had started yelling. Everyone in the deli was looking at Zhu, not just the cops. Zhu had taken a step backwards, as if distancing himself from Sevryn.

Sevryn continued, louder,
Those clones, they were working with them other clones, and they’re all trying to destroy us. Now you’re out there, recruiting soulless lawyers to save their asses. You have every right to conduct your business as you see fit, and so do I. And I don’t see fit to feed the likes of you. Now get out
.

Zhu looked at the people around him as if he expected a defense. The cops just stared at him. Everyone else looked down.

He sighed, and for a moment, Nyquist thought he was close to tears. That seemed odd.