Don Mares tried to sneer off the threat. He didn’t really succeed. Maggie thought it was because he’d realized the same thing she had. Paula Myo never smiled because she didn’t have a sense of humour.
*
Adam was finishing a rather splendid early breakfast at the Westpool Hotel when his e-butler informed him that an unsigned message had arrived in its hold file. It had come from a one-time unisphere address, and the text it contained was encrypted with a key code that identified the sender to him immediately: Bradley Johansson.
Outwardly, Adam drank his coffee quietly as the waiters fussed round the restaurant tending to the other guests. In his virtual vision, he prepared the message for decryption. His wrist array was worn on his left arm, a simple band of dull malmetal that flexed and expanded constantly to maintain full contact with his skin. Its inner surface contained an i-spot which connected to his OCtattoos which, in turn, were wetwired into his hand’s nerve fibres. The interface was represented in his virtual vision by a ghostly hand, which he’d customized to a pale blue, with sharp purple nails. For every tiny motion he made with his flesh and blood hand, the virtual one made a scaled-up movement, allowing him to select and manipulate icons. The system was standard across the Commonwealth, giving everyone who could afford an OCtattoo direct connection to the planetary cybersphere. He guessed that most of the business people having breakfast around him were quietly interfacing with their office arrays. They had that daydreaming look about them.
He pulled the appropriate key out of its store in his wrist array, represented by a Rubik’s cube icon, which he had to twist until he’d arranged the surface squares into the correct pattern. The cube opened up, and he dropped the message icon inside. A single line of black text slid across his virtual vision: Paula Myo is on Velaines.
Adam just managed to hold on to his coffee cup. ‘Shit!’
Several nearby guests glanced over to him. He twitched his lips in an apologetic smile. The array had already wiped the message, now it was going through an elaborate junction overwrite procedure in case it was ever examined by a forensic retrieval system.
Adam never did know where Bradley got half of his information from. But it had always been utterly reliable. He should abandon the mission right now.
Except . . . it had taken eighteen months to plan and organize. Dummy companies had been established on a dozen worlds to handle the disguised machinery exports to Far Away, routing and re-routing them so that there would be no suspicion and no trail. A lot of money had been spent on preparations. And the Guardians wouldn’t receive another shipment of arms until he could set one up. Before he did that, he needed to know what had gone wrong this time.
They had been so close, too. Rachael Lancier’s last call confirmed that she had put together about two thirds of the list. So close.
*
Maggie Lidsey’s car drove her into the headquarters building underground car park an hour before she was due on shift. She’d been working longer hours ever since the case started. It wasn’t just to curry favour with Paula Myo, she was learning a lot from the Chief Investigator. The woman’s attention to detail was incredible. Maggie was convinced she must have array inserts, along with supplementary memorycells. No aspect of the operation was too small for her to show an interest in. Urban myth certainly hadn’t exaggerated her dedication.
The elevator in the lobby scanned her to confirm her identity: only then did it descend to the fifth basement level where the operations centres were situated. The Elvin team had been codenamed Roundup, and assigned room 5A5. Maggie was scanned again before the metal slab door slid aside to admit her. The interior was gloomy, occupied by three rows of consoles with tall holographic portals curving round the operator. Each one was alive with a grid of images and data ribbons. Laser light spilled out from them in a pale iridescent haze. A quick glance at the one closest to the door showed Maggie the familiar pictures of the buildings which Rachael Lancier used to run her car dealership from; along with shots from the team’s two shadow cars showing Adam Elvin’s taxi as they followed him through midtown.
Maggie requested an update, and quickly assimilated the overnight data. The one item which stood out was the encrypted message delivered to Elvin’s e-butler through the Westpool Hotel node. She saw Paula Myo sitting at her desk at the far end of the room. The Chief Investigator seemed to get by on a maximum of two hours’ sleep per day. She’d had a cot moved into her office, and never used it until an hour after both main targets had retired for the night. And she was always up an hour before the time they usually got out of bed. The night shift had standing orders to wake her if anything out of the ordinary happened.
Maggie went over to ask about the message.
‘It came from a one-time address in the unisphere,’ Paula said. ‘The Directorate’s software forensics have traced its load point to a public node in Dampier’s cybersphere. Tarlo is talking to the local police about running a check, but I’m not expecting miracles.’
‘You can track a one-time address?’ Maggie asked. She’d always thought that was impossible.
‘To a limited degree. It doesn’t help. The message was sent on a delay. Whoever loaded it was well clear.’
‘Can the message encryption be cracked?’ Maggie asked.
‘Not really, the sender used folded-geometry encryption. I logged a request with the SI, but it said it doesn’t have the resources available to decrypt it for me.’
‘You talked with the SI?’ Maggie asked. That was impressive. The Sentient Intelligence didn’t normally interface with individuals.
‘Yes.’
There was nothing else forthcoming.
‘Oh,’ Maggie said. ‘Right.’
‘It was a short message,’ Paula said. ‘Which limits what it could contain. My guess is it was either a warning, a go authorization, or a stop.’
‘We haven’t leaked,’ Maggie said. ‘I’m sure of it. And they haven’t spotted us either.’
‘I know. The origin alone seems to rule out a mistake by any of your officers.’
‘The Socialist Party does have a number of quality cyberheads. They might have noticed our scrutineer programs shadowing Murphy’s e-butler.’
Paula Myo rubbed a hand over her forehead, pressing hard enough to furrow up the skin. ‘Possible,’ she conceded. ‘Although I have to take other factors into consideration.’
‘Yes?’ Maggie prompted.
‘Classified, sorry,’ Paula said. Even though she was tired, she wasn’t about to confide her concerns to anybody. Although if Maggie was any kind of detective she should be able to work it out.
As Mares had said, a hundred and thirty-four years without an arrest was an uncomfortably long time. In fact it was impossible given the resources Paula had to deploy against Bradley Johansson. Somebody had been providing Johansson and his associates with a great deal of assistance down the decades. Few people knew what she was doing on a day-today basis, so logically it was someone outside the Directorate. Yet the Executive administration had changed seventeen times since she had been assigned command of the case. They couldn’t all contain secret sympathizers of Johansson’s cause. That just left her with the altogether murkier field of Grand Families and Intersolar Dynasties, the kind of power dealers who were always around.
She’d done everything she could, of course, set traps, run identification ambushes, deliberately leaked disinformation, established unofficial communication channels, built herself an extensive network amid the political classes, gained allies at the heart of the Commonwealth government. So far the results had been minimal. That didn’t bother her so much, she had faith in her ability to work the case to its conclusion. What concerned her more than anything was the reason anyone, let alone someone with true wealth and power, would want to protect a terrorist like Johansson.
‘Makes sense,’ Maggie said, with a trace of reluctance. She knew there was a terrific story behind the Chief Investigator’s silence. ‘So what action do y
ou want to take about the message?’
‘Nothing immediate,’ Paula said. ‘We simply wait and see what Elvin does next.’
‘We can arrest all of them now. There are enough weapons stored at Lancier’s dealership to begin a war.’
‘No. I don’t have a reason to arrest Elvin yet. I want to wait until the operation has reached its active smuggling stage.’
‘He was part of Abadan. I checked the Directorate file, there are enough testimonies recorded to prove his involvement no matter how good a lawyer he has. What more do you need to arrest him?’
‘I need the weapons to be shipped. I need their route and destination. That will expose the whole Guardian network to me. Elvin is important primarily for his ability to lead me to Johansson.’
‘Arrest him and have his memories extracted. I’m sure a judge would grant the Directorate that order.’
‘I don’t expect to have that option. He knows what will happen the second I have him in custody. He’ll either suicide or an insert will wipe his memories clean.’
‘You can’t be sure of that.’
‘He’s a fanatic. He will not allow us access to his memories.’
‘Do you really believe that?’
‘It’s what I’d do,’ Paula said simply.
*
Paula briefed the watcher teams before the shift changeover, explaining her suspicions about the encrypted message. ‘It changes our priorities slightly,’ she said. ‘If it was a cancellation then Elvin will make a break for the CST station. I need a detail of officers on permanent duty there to arrest him if he tries to leave. Detective Mares, will you organize that, please.’
‘I’ll see the captain about more personnel, sure.’ During the week of the operation Don Mares had modified his attitude slightly. He didn’t contend anything, nor disagree with Paula; but neither did he put any extra effort into the operation. She could live with that, base-line competence was a depressing constant in law enforcement agencies throughout the Commonwelath.
‘Our second option,’ Paula said. ‘Is a go code. In which case we need to be ready to move. There will be no change in your assignments, but be prepared to implement immediately. The third option is not so good: he’s been warned about our observation.’
‘No way,’ Don Mares said. ‘We’re not that sloppy.’ There was a grumble of agreement from the team officers.
Tarlo gave Renne a fast grin. The boss always generated a high standard of professionalism with whatever police force she worked with. None of them wanted to be known as the one who failed her.
‘As unlikely as it sounds we have to take it into consideration,’ Paula insisted. ‘Be very careful not to risk exposure. He’s smart. He’s been doing this for forty years. If he sees one of you twice in a week he’s going to know you’re following him. Don’t let him see you. Don’t let him see the car you’re using. We’re going to get a larger vehicle pool so we can rotate them faster. We cannot afford mistakes.’ She nodded curtly at them. ‘I’ll join the lead team today. That’s all.’
Don Mares and Maggie Lidsey came over to her as the other officers filed out of the operations centre. ‘If he catches a glimpse of you, it really will be game over,’ Don Mares said.
‘I know,’ Paula said. ‘But I need to be close. There are some calls you can’t make sitting here. I’d like you to take over as general coordinator today.’
‘Me?’
‘Yes, you have the qualifications, you’ve taken command of raids before.’
‘Okay.’ He was trying not to smile.
‘Maggie, you’re with me.’
*
They caught up with Adam Elvin when he was taking a slow, seemingly random, walk through Burghal Park. He did some-thing similar most mornings, an amble through a wide open space where it was difficult for the team to follow unobtrusively on foot.
Paula and Maggie waited in the back of a ten-seater car which was parked at the north end of Burghal Park. The team had the rest of their vehicles spaced evenly round the perimeter, with three officers on foot using their retinal inserts to track his position, never getting closer than five hundred metres, boxing him the whole time. The Burghal was a huge area in the middle of the city, with small lakes, games pitches, tracks, and long greenways of trees brought in from over seventy different planets.
‘That’s twice he’s doubled back on his route,’ Maggie said. They were watching the images relayed from the retinal inserts on a small screen in the car.
‘Standard for him,’ Paula said. ‘He’s a creature of habit. They might be good habits, but any routine will betray you in the end.’
‘Is that how you tracked him?’
‘Uh huh. He never uses the same planet twice. And he nearly always uses the Intersolar Socialist Party to set up the first meeting with the local dealer.’
‘So you turned Sabbah into your informant and waited.’
‘Yes.’
‘For nine years. Bloody hell. How many informants do you have, on how many planets?’
‘Classified.’
‘The way you operate, though, always arresting them for their crime. That doesn’t make for cooperative informants. You’re taking a big risk on a case this important.’
‘They broke the law. They must go to court and take responsibility for their crime.’
‘Hell, you really believe that, don’t you?’
‘You’ve accessed my official file. Three times now since this case started.’
Maggie knew she was blushing.
*
That day Adam Elvin finished his walk in Burghal Park and caught a taxi to a little Italian restaurant on the east bank of the River Guhal which meandered through the eastern districts of the city. While eating a large and leisurely lunch he placed a call to Rachael Lancier, which the metropolitan police had no trouble intercepting.
Elvin: Something’s come up. I need to talk to you again.
Lancier: The vehicle you wanted is almost ready for collection, Mr North. I hope there’s no problem at your end.
Elvin: No, no problem about the vehicle. I just need to discuss its specification with you.
Lancier: The specification has been agreed. As has the price.
Elvin: This is not an alteration of either. I simply need to speak with you personally to clarify some details.
Lancier: I’m not sure that’s a good idea.
Elvin: It’s essential, I’m afraid.
Lancier: Very well. You know my favourite place. I’ll be there at the usual time today.
Elvin: Thank you.
Lancier: And it had better be as important as you say.
Paula shook her head. ‘Routine,’ she said disapprovingly.
*
Eighteen police officers converged on the Scarred Suit Club. Don Mares dispatched the first three within two minutes of the conversation. The club wasn’t open, of course, they simply had to find three observation points around it and dig in.
Two of Lancier’s people arrived at eight o’clock that night, and performed their own surveillance checks before calling back to their boss.
When Adam Elvin finally arrived at one o’clock in the morning, ten officers were already inside. As before, they had managed to blend in well enough to prevent him from identifying any of them for what they were. Some of them assumed the role of business types looking for some bad action after a long day in the office. Three of them hung around the stage, identical to the other losers frantically waving their grubby dollars at the glorious bodies of the Sunset Angels. One had even managed to get a job, trying out as a waiter for the night, and was making reasonable tips. Renne Kempasa was sitting in one of the booths, the hazy e-seal protecting her from view.
The remainder of the team were outside, ready for pursuit duties when the meeting was over. Paula, Maggie, and Tarlo were parked a street away in a battered old van, with the logo of a domestic service company on the side. The two screens they’d set up in the back showed images taken by the of
ficers inside the club. Rachael Lancier was already in her booth, a different one this time. Her skinny-looking bodyguard was with her. He’d been identified by headquarters as Simon Kavanagh, a man with a long list of petty convictions stretching back three decades, nearly all of them violence-related. When he arrived he’d swept the booth twice, scanning for any covert electronic or bioneural circuitry. The passive sensors carried by the officers nearby nearly went off the scale. He was using some very sophisticated equipment – as was to be expected from someone who worked for an arms dealer.
Paula watched Lancier and Elvin tentatively shake hands. The arms dealer gave her buyer an inhospitable look, then the e-seal around the booth was switched on. Its screening was immediately reinforced by the units which Kavanagh activated. One of them was an illegally strong janglepulse capable of frying the cerebral ganglia of any insect within a four-metre radius.
‘Okay,’ Paula said. ‘Let’s find out what’s so important to Mr Elvin.’
A metre above the booth’s table, a Bratation spindlefly was clinging to the furry plastic fabric of the wall matting. Amid the artificial purple and green fibres, its translucent, two-millimetre-long body was effectively invisible. As well as a chameleon-effect body, evolution on its planet had provided it with a unique neurone fibre that used a photo-luminescent molecule as the primary transmitter, making it immune to a standard janglepulse. It had only half the expected lifespan of a natural spindlefly because its genetic code had been altered by a small specialist company on a Directorate contract, replacing half of its digestive sac with a more complex organic structure of receptor cells. In its abdomen was an engorged secretion gland that threw out a superfine gossamer strand. When it had flown in from the neighbouring booth, it had trailed the gossamer behind it. Gentle lambent nerve impulses from the receptor cells now flowed along the strand to a more standard semiorganic processor which Renne carried in her jacket pocket.
In the middle of Paula’s screen a grainy grey and white image formed. She was looking down on the heads of three people sitting round the booth table.
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