Xenoform (36 page)

‘Hey there, you cop-murdering piece of crap,’ somebody said in a voice so cold and unconcerned that he knew at once he was in trouble. The voice, as far as he could tell, seemed to come from the light, which was to say from everywhere at once.

Spider tried to speak, couldn’t do it. His mouth was too dry to work. Footsteps etched a steady path around him, unhurried in their pace. Maybe two sets – it was difficult to focus on the sound. He felt that he was being examined closely. ‘I...’ he managed to croak.

‘Where is your organisation based?’ asked the voice. It seemed to come from in front of him now, but there was some aural distortion going on, as if the speaker was still moving despite the fact that the footsteps had ceased. There was no emotion in the voice.

And then a second voice, a woman’s, said, ‘I say we turn him over to the Freak. Bastard killed Jamine. Fuck ’im.’

‘Hmm.’ The man seemed to consider this suggestion at some length.

Spider squinted and tried to see through the brilliance that flooded the room. Shapes were congealing out of the whiteness. The silhouettes of two people. Bizarrely, they seemed to be slowly turning over and over in the vertical plane with a regular motion. And then it became clear. Spider was strapped to some sort of rotating disc. Probably some technique used to disorientate the victim. It certainly seemed to be doing its job, in that case. He was now almost certain that he had also been drugged, possibly with some sort of truth serum.

‘I mean,’ said the woman, ‘we’re up to our necks in it on the streets. We don’t have time for this. We should get back out there.’

‘Spider,’ said the man, ignoring his partner. He had his arms crossed in front of him and appeared to be staring at Spider calmly and steadily. ‘That is what you call yourself, isn’t it? We scanned your DNI already. Don’t worry, we used an isolated terminal. We didn’t allow it to net-connect.’

‘How...’ Spider choked on the words and was almost sick before he could finish: ‘...Kind of you.’

‘Protect and serve, protect and serve,’ said the man conversationally. ‘You and your associates are wanted in connection with numerous outstanding crimes committed over the last five years. What’s your real name? Spider was all we got from your head.’

‘Your friend attacked us when we were trying to get home.’ The words were coming easier now, as his mouth began to generate some saliva. The figures of the two police officers were also becoming more defined. The man addressing him had a rosy light in place of his right eye, maybe a laser weapon, and two sharp horns on his head. He also had a huge and bushy brown beard. He looked like a Viking warrior, although he sounded like a customer service manager.

‘Your contract–’ he checked a small screen inlaid into one forearm, ‘–paid previously by Human Genetic Recycling, ended yesterday. All of the crimes committed within the period of that contract’s existence are now liable for pursuit under law. Where are you based?’

‘I thought you said you read my DNI. You tell me.’ His head was down at the man’s feet now and Spider noticed that he had a wickedly-curved energy blade sheathed on one shin. It looked more like the tool of a torturer than a police officer. Slowly the disc rotated until they were face to face again. The man watched his prisoner clinically.

Spider tried to move his head to see the woman but found it too tightly restrained. Then, removing the need, she stepped into view and said, ‘We don’t have time for this, Ramone. Just give him to the Freak.’

She was older than Spider, maybe fifty, and built with a short, compact frame more suited to a pit-fighter than an officer of the law. Her forehead was dotted with studs of some metal that could have been titanium. Her face was lined in the manner of one whose habitual expression was a scowl, and indeed she was scowling with revulsion at Spider now. Also, he didn’t know who or what the Freak was but he didn’t like the sound of it much.

‘The Freak?’

‘Where are you based? You and Whistler and the others of your team?’

‘Who’s Whistler?’ he managed to grunt. He certainly didn’t feel too conversational, so perhaps he hadn’t been injected with a truth drug after all. It was possible that his disorientation was due entirely to the rotating disc and the pain could have been from one of the post-arrest beatings that RPC were known for, in common with most of the commercial police forces.

‘Whistler? You know, your boss, the lifelong gang member turned corporate thug. You guys are body-snatchers for HGR, right?’ He turned to the woman and they shared a little laugh. ‘At least, you used to be.’

‘Used to be?’

‘They ended your contract. I guess your services weren’t worth paying for any more. I understand the bodymod industry is suffering something of a stock crash at the moment.’ And he laughed again – a rich sound seemingly borne of genuine amusement. It made Spider wonder if they were going to kill him.

‘Aren’t you people supposed to notify us of contract termination? Some fair period of grace? I want a lawyer.’ Spider could feel the gentle rumbling of the disc’s bearings beneath his back. He wondered how many victims of RPC had been strapped to it before.

‘Actually, we aren’t obliged to do any such thing. It’s a courtesy that we sometimes extend, but your team isn’t exactly easy to get hold of. And then our first contact with you is when you are apprehended kneeling beside the body of a murdered Resperi officer with an illegal weapon beside you. Was it you or your deceased friend who killed the officer in the pod?’

‘Pod?’ Spider said, wondering if he sounded as irritatingly stupid as he hoped.

‘He had a son, you know. Two years old.’

‘Yeah? And we had a contract. All things come to pass, man.’ Spider was down by Ramone’s feet again and when he saw one of those feet twitch he thought maybe Ramone would kick him in the head. He was sure it crossed the man’s mind, but it didn’t happen.

‘Where are your maggot friends, Spider?’ This was the woman, looking disdainfully down at him. ‘Long story short – tell us and we won’t give you to the Freak. You’ll even get a trial.’

‘The Freak?’

‘Mm-hm,’ said Ramone. ‘Tell him who the Freak is, Officer Blake.’

‘The Freak is a brain-diver.’

‘A what?’ Spider was up at the level of her piggy face now. She really was impressively ugly.

‘A machine-human symbiont, designed to read much deeper into your head than a simple DNI reader. She can actually scan the meat of your brain, divulge all your dirty secrets. Not strictly allowed under the terms of the Fair Legal Process Act but still used in extreme cases. Oh, and the process is very invasive, as you’d imagine. Often fatally so. And very unpleasant.’

‘I see,’ said Spider as nonchalantly as he could.

‘No,’ said Blake. ‘But you will if you don’t tell us what we want to know.’

‘You say you were going home, when you happened to murder two of our officers. Home is your group’s base, no doubt. Were you near to it? Maybe it’s in the industrial sector, some old warehouse. There are certainly enough of them lying empty there. It really is better if you just tell us.’

Ramone was surprisingly good, Spider grudgingly admitted to himself. The bastard was essentially right about everything so far, although there was no need to let him know that.

‘If you read my DNI like you say you did you’ll know that’s wrong,’ said Spider.

‘Thing is, we couldn’t get much from your DNI, Spider. It seems to be pretty well protected. Not unusual for a career criminal, but annoying. It just gave us name, rank and serial number stuff. But then, as you installed the protective firmware you already know that.’

It was true – Spider’s DNI, like those of all the harvesting team, was well-shielded from both remote and wired probing, for just this sort of scenario. The firmware had been very expensive but HGR had footed the bill. At least they hadn’t revoked that, if only because they couldn’t. Was it true that the contract had been terminated? Maybe, judging by the chaos that reigned in the city, it was a simple computer error. If so, though, there would be no convincing the RPC officers. They were pissed. Even if he suggested that they may wrong, they’d probably still take the opportunity to execute him illegally and then go on to raid the base if they had the resources to do so. With their force undoubtedly stretched to breaking point, how much time would they devote to him before just giving up and killing him? Or giving him to this Freak of theirs, which sounded like it might amount to the same thing? Not long, he thought. And when that happened, his butchered brain would give them Whistler and the others anyway. He could see no way out.

‘I’m not going to do your fucking job for you, officers. You’d better introduce me to this Freak, because frankly I’m getting bored.’

‘Oh,’ said Ramone with mock disappointment. ‘Oh never mind. We hadn’t expected you to help us, to be honest. But don’t worry – we’ll find your friends.’

‘In the end, we always get our way,’ confided Blake.

‘We’ll see,’ said Spider. ‘But you’d better make sure you keep me well-restrained.’

‘Really,’ said Blake disinterestedly.

‘Really.’ Spider tried to look her in the eye as he rotated towards upside-down again. ‘Because one slip, one momentary lapse in your guard, and I will kill
you
.’ He nodded at Blake, as much as his bonds would allow. ‘And
you
.’ He nodded also at Ramone. ‘And you can spend eternity in that great police retirement centre in the sky comparing notes on me and my team with your dead pig friends. One mistake is all I need.’

‘Don’t worry,’ said Ramone, cracking his knuckles loudly. ‘There won’t be one.’

‘Give me to this brain-diver, then,’ said Spider. ‘Your conversational skills amount to shit. I’ve had enough.’

‘First thing’s first,’ said Ramone softly as Spider rotated to face him again. He was holding a short police truncheon in one big hand. This wasn’t entirely unexpected, Spider reflected. ‘First thing’s first.’

‘Right,’ said Whistler emerging from her room with a small torch. ‘Do we have that old gennie still?’

‘Yeah,’ said Tec. ‘We have it, but its glory days are long gone. Also, I dunno how much fuel we have for it.’

‘Get on it. Get the power on – without it we’re in serious trouble. The base is defenceless until it’s sorted, not to mention that Debian’s attempts to find Spider and Roberts are on hold.’

‘I’m on it,’ answered Tec curtly, his head blazing a determined shade of amber. He rushed off down the corridor, illuminated only by the glow of his own skull.

‘Sofi,’ said Whistler pointing a clawed finger at her. ‘I want you on the roof with some heavy equipment. With the cameras and motion sensors off-line we need a lookout. Any problem – and I mean
any
problem – and you shout. I’ll help Tec with the gennie.’ She considered this briefly, concluding that any contribution she could make would probably be counter-productive to Tec’s efforts despite her best intentions. ‘Scratch that, actually. I’ll watch the car park.’

‘Okay, boss,’ said Sofi, her features sharp and shadowed in the torchlight. She turned and felt her way down the corridor.

Whistler pointed the torch at Debian, who shielded his eyes. ‘Maybe you had better help Tec.’

‘Look, I’m not really practical in that way. I mean, computers I can do, but engines...I assume this generator is a diesel or gas burner?’

‘I think you might still be more help than I would. Unless you’d rather guard the bottom door in my stead?’ Smiling, she held out her smartgun to him, grip first.

Debian recoiled from the weapon as if it were a live snake. ‘No,’ he said emphatically. ‘I’ll help with the generator, on second thoughts.’

‘Good man,’ said Whistler with a cheerfulness she didn’t really feel. Debian turned to go and she called him back. She dug a crumpled chocolate bar from one pocket and threw it to him. It was unpleasantly squishy and warm. Debian dropped it and picked it up again from the floor. ‘You said you were hungry,’ she said and pushed past him towards the empty hangar and the exit to the car park.

‘Thanks,’ he said to her retreating back.

Tec dug the battered generator out of crap alley by the application of back-breaking effort and heartfelt swearing in equal measures. Looking it over he concluded that the infernal machine had never seen any glory days at all. It had been here when the gang had moved in, but apart from testing it and changing the oil they had never had a use for it, despite Tec’s passing interest in it as a mechanical device.

Working by the dim glow of four tea lights he cleaned it up enough to actually see what he was doing and pulled the cord. The echoing volume of the big room reverberated to the sound of the clattering machine as it caught and ran, choppily at first. Tec bent over it with a screwdriver and tweaked the mixture by a tiny increment. The gennie began to run more steadily, although it stank to high heaven and began to fill the big room with choking clouds of smoke that looked eerily blue in the darkness. He shut it off and began to search for some ducting to use for the exhaust.

He hunted through the piles of junk, holding a tea light aloft in an ashtray, launching disappointingly useless items further into the depths of the heap. He reflected as he searched on how, in this world where you could get your cancer treated with nanotechnology (if you were rich enough) their power requirements had come down to four cylinders of exploding fuel vapour. How quickly things could devolve.