One of Us

by Michael Marshall Smith

  There was a pause. ‘What do you want?’

  ‘I need you do to something for me,’ I said.

  ‘I told Mr Stratten what you said already,’ she said, her voice dull. ‘He didn’t seem especially frightened. And no, he’s not back in the office, and no I don’t know where he is.’

  ‘I need REMtemps’ mail code,’ I said. ‘Plus the seed key.’

  ‘What are you going to do with it?’

  ‘Just give it to me.’

  Her voice sounded strained. ‘Are you going to hurt the company?’

  ‘No,’ I said, as gently as I could be bothered. For a split second I had a glimpse of her world, where the company was your family and you believed in its slogans and lies, and you had the energy to put up pantsy signs in the kitchen area ordering people to tidy up after themselves and not to steal other people’s milk.

  She told me. I wrote them on a piece of paper, and put the phone down. Vent was standing behind me, holding a computer disk. I handed him the piece of paper, and he sat down at a computer which was isolated from the others lying around. He stuck the disk in the machine, let it settle, and then typed in the information I’d given him. We watched the screen as the file on the disk absorbed the information, grew fat, and gave birth to another file. Within seconds this was big enough to eat the original, leaving just one crabdaddy again. A four-figure code appeared on the screen, and I scribbled it onto my hand.

  Vent stood up, gave me the disk. ‘Use it wisely and with wiseness,’ he said. ‘And here’s a present.’

  He reached into the folds of his gown and pulled out a gun. I took it, stared at him. ‘What’s that for?’

  He scratched his head. ‘Don’t know, to be honest. The fridge told me to be nice to you. Never happened before, in fact the fucking thing’s never even spoken to me until now, so…Jeez, it’s early and I can’t think straight and I don’t know why I’m doing it, okay?’

  ‘Thanks,’ I said, and clapped him on the shoulder. ‘I got to go. I’ll get you your money.’

  ‘Just take care,’ Vent said. ‘And remember my interest rate.’

  I tried to think of somewhere safe to park the car, and decided the basement of my building was as good a place as any. On the way I called Travis. He said that five of the people with blackmail sheets had received phone calls from a man called Quat, and that the whole lot of them were now under loose police guard. He also reminded me he wanted to see me at the station that evening—and that if I wasn’t there there’d be an APB out on me within seconds. But he at least gave me one piece of news that was positive, if a little weird. When the cops in Cresota Beach arrived at the school, they found no sign of any bodies. Three hours later two REMtemps security men were found in a car in a Jacksonville parking lot—having apparently shot each other.

  Another sign, I guess, of the man in the suit tweaking behind the scenes. At least it meant my position hadn’t gotten any worse. I tried to make a further call, but only got an answering machine. So I called Melk, got some information and noted it down for later.

  When I was parked and the doors were locked I took the disk out of my pocket and stuck it in the drive. Then I flicked over to the Net and drove, taking care not to glance in the rear-view mirror.

  The main gate to the adult area was snarled up; two Net Nannies were working over a car full of teenage boys, who looked terrified. The Nannies scare me too, to be honest—beetling old women, complete with thick, shapeless bodies, red faces and grey hair done up in buns—and so I backed up and went another way.

  As I approached Quat’s neighbourhood I slowed, not knowing if he might have put up any defences in case I tried to take revenge on him for stealing my money and screwing me over. I stopped at the end of the street, but I couldn’t see anything that looked like it was going to cause trouble. Which pissed me off a little, I’ve got to admit. What—he thought I didn’t have what it took to come cause him a little inconvenience?

  Mistake. What I had sitting in the back of the car would do a hell of a lot more than that. Crabdaddies are the ultimate meltdown on the Net, the acme of vindictive destructiveness. They make normal computer viruses look like stubbing your virtual toe. They’re designed by hackers to fuck up other hackers, and so you have to go the whole hacker mile and deliver them personally. I’d only ever used one once before, and I hadn’t expected to again.

  I took a deep breath, and got out of the car.

  Sitting in the back seat was something that looked like a desiccated skeleton, dressed in a mouldering black suit. A few fine, dry hairs stuck up out of its skull, but otherwise the bone looked like it had been licked clean in the grave by generations of creeping things. The remnants of bony hands poked out of cobweb-strewn cuffs, and a big hairy spider sat in the gaping mouth. It smelled of mustiness and shadows, yellow moonlight and rustling winds high up in the branches of old gnarled trees.

  I opened the back door. Nothing happened for a moment, and then the crabdaddy’s head turned slowly to look at me. There was nothing in its eye sockets, but the sound of the vertebrae grinding quietly against each other was enough to make my skin crawl. The thing is, something like this in the real world wouldn’t be frightening. Well, obviously, it would be if it was real, but not if it was a fake or an animatronic, and that’s the point. Crabdaddies are Net things: when you’re in there, they’re very real. There’s no use telling yourself they’re actually only a file on a disk. The real world stops being the benchmark, and Halloween comes true.

  ‘Okay,’ I said quietly. ‘Before I give you the code, I want you to understand something. You are only to enter that house over there.’ I pointed, and the head swivelled slowly to look at Quat’s site. ‘And the code’s only going to give you fifteen seconds, so make the most of it. Also, don’t hurt the dog. Understand? ’

  The head tilted slowly down, and then up.

  I took a couple of steps back, turned my hand so I could see the number I’d written there. ‘Eight. One. Seven,’ I said, and then took another pace back, just in case. ‘Six.’

  It didn’t even come out the door, just vaulted straight over the front seats and onto the hood. It had barely landed before it was hurtling towards Quat’s house, body morphing as it went. As it changed into the true crabdaddy shape—sort of like a decayed elephant turned inside out and painted with blood, but not as cute—it began to scream, the sound like a modem turned up to a billion decibels.

  Quat’s dog took one look at it, and then vanished. I jumped in the car, swung a quick turn and drove like hell.

  I heard the sound of it smashing through the front door, and an explosion as the first internal wall fell down. Then, as a fiery glow started to burn out my rear-view mirror, I flipped out of the Net.

  Soon as I could see the dashboard properly I pulled the disk from the machine and threw it out the window. I turned the ignition, put my foot down, and left at the speed of sound.

  They didn’t want to let me on the lot. No, they surely didn’t. At first they tried to deny the movie was even being shot there, but I trusted Melk’s information and stuck to my guns. Finally they admitted it, but said I still wasn’t allowed in. Three big security guys explained this to me in no uncertain terms, and our discourse took on a rather depressing circularity. In the end I just gave them the message again and wound the car windows up, making it clear I was going to sit there with my arms folded, blocking the way, until either the cops arrived or they did what I asked.

  One of the guys went into the booth and got on the phone. There was a hiatus while he had a conversation involving a good deal of gesticulating, during which the other two guards took the opportunity to stare malevolently at me through the windshield.

  Eventually the booth guy came out, and indicated for me to roll down my window.

  ‘So?’ I said.

  ‘Mr Jamison will see you, sir,’ he replied. You could see the pain in his eyes. ‘Just follow the road round there to the left and have a nice fucking day.’

 
; ‘Cool,’ I said. ‘Thanks for working with me on this. Oh, and if you ever want to get a reservation at E:Coli, just mention my name.’

  His face brightened. ‘They know you there?’

  ‘I should think so,’ I said. ‘I left without paying last time.’

  I pulled away and drove down the path at significantly higher than the requested speed, past little huts full of busy creatives, including the offices of Mary Jane, the current last word in virtual film stars. Melk once got a job escorting her to a party, which basically involves walking around carrying a workstation and monitor on which her face and responses are projected in real time, worked by a small team of animators and scriptwriters who hide in the john with remotes. His back still gives him grief every now and then, but I think he regards it as the highlight of his career.

  I saw Jamison walking down the path towards me, and pulled over into a space round the side of the Cafeteria, thus probably leap-frogging about seventy grades of hierarchy and starting a small status war. The outside seating area was empty. Jamison sat at a table and waited patiently until I joined him. His face was lightly made up, his hair gorgeously silver, and he was wearing a sober suit.

  ‘Good morning, Mr President,’ I said. ‘Sorry to yank you out like this.’

  ‘Hello, Mr Thompson. I thought I wasn’t going to be seeing you again.’

  I sat down. ‘Don’t worry. I haven’t come for your money.’

  ‘I assumed not. Is there going to be trouble of some kind?’

  ‘I’m afraid so. You haven’t heard anything more over the blackmail?’ He shook his head. ‘You’re going to. The guy who was running Hammond is picking up the reins, and this is a man who doesn’t give up. One of his sidekicks has already called some of the other victims. Can I ask you a question?’

  ‘You may.’

  ‘Did you ever make illegal use of an organization called REMtemps, for temporary memory dumps?’

  Jamison looked glum. ‘I assume that question is rhetorical. You seem to know a great deal about me, as usual.’

  ‘No,’ I said. ‘It was just guesswork, but it’s nice to have it confirmed. Now—the situation is this. The cops know about the blackmail scam, and have loose surveillance on all of the victims. This means that the blackmailers—who, incidentally, are working for Stratten, the guy who runs REMtemps—are going to have to step lightly until he works out a deal with some high brass so he can return to business as usual.’

  ‘I hadn’t noticed anyone keeping an eye on me.’

  ‘That’s because I didn’t let on to the cops that you were involved.’

  ‘Thank you,’ he said. ‘What can I do in return?’

  ‘I want to fuck Stratten over, for personal reasons and because the lives of two of my friends—including the woman who came with me to visit you—seem to depend on it. You know that unless this racket is killed dead, you’re always going to have to watch your back. So I’m going to ask for your help. I want to set up a meeting between you and Stratten’s right-hand guy.’

  ‘But how can you do that?’

  ‘I’ve got something on a bottom-feeder in Stratten’s operation, or at least he thinks I have. I can get him to call his boss and tell him two things: you’re not under surveillance, and you’re refusing to pay up. It’s very likely that Stratten will send a man called Quat around to work you over. I’m going to be there waiting for him, with another friend of mine, and we’re going to make this guy extremely unhappy. He’s going to be ready to turn anyway, because he’s a Net-head and I’ve just nuked his web site with a supervirus which will look like it was sent from REMtemps.’

  ‘What do you need me to do?’

  ‘I need you to be there. Quat may call ahead, and he needs to hear your voice. Once we know he’s on his way over, you can—and should—make yourself scarce.’

  Jamison nodded briskly. ‘Of course I’ll help. Call the studio at any time, and ask for extension 2231. My assistant will put you through to me immediately. When do you want this meeting to take place?’

  ‘It’s got to happen tonight.’

  We stood up together, and he shook my hand. ‘Thanks,’ I said. ‘And I hope I haven’t caused you any embarrassment on the set.’

  ‘Hardly.’ Jamison winked. ‘Hauled out by a youngish man of roughish mien, who wouldn’t tell Security his business? You’ve done me a favour.’

  I watched as he walked regally off down the path, back straight, head high. He looked like he had nothing in the world to worry about except saying his lines and not banging into the furniture. I hoped I’d get a chance to see his new movie, even if it was only on cable in a jail cell. He looked the part.

  Hell: he’d get my vote.

  I grabbed brunch at one of the sidewalk tables outside the Prose Café, then headed back to my apartment burping and replete. The Prose, as you’d expect, understands the importance of making sure there’s enough fat and cholesterol in your diet. You can actually get them as side orders, if you want. When I got home I called the number Romer had given me, and he picked it up first ring. It was nice to get the sense that someone was taking me seriously. It had been a while.

  I told him that I’d tried to shake down Jamison independently, implying that my master plan was to cream a little money off the Stratten gravy train. I did this to make myself sound stupid, which never does any harm, and also to get him confused as to what my motives actually were. I then gave him his instructions, and said I’d be waiting for his call.

  I sat by the phone and smoked a cigarette. Romer called back before it was even finished. He’d spoken to Quat, told him both that Jamison was unknown to the police and giving him problems, and asked for reinforcements. Quat had sounded distant and shaken, but said that he’d go lean on Jamison at nine that evening.

  ‘Good work, peanut face,’ I said. ‘What I want you to do now is stay out of the way, and remember two things. The first, as you know, is that your ass is mine.’

  He knew. ‘And the other is?’

  ‘Fuck with me, I’ll kill you.’ I put down the phone knowing that wasn’t true, but that he’d believe me.

  I looked around the apartment, trying to work out where to start. Had there been more to do I could have drawn up a schedule: as it was it hardly seemed worth doing at all. In the end I went to the bedroom first. Not much of interest had ever happened there, and it didn’t take long. I collected a few items of clothing which had sentimental value, and slung them in a suitcase. I left the rest in the closets, reasoning that by the time I got out of prison most of them wouldn’t fit, and chances were fashion would have changed anyhow. People might be wearing unisex dresses made out of eagle saliva, for all I knew.

  There was plenty of room left in the case, and I filled it with the few remaining objects in the apartment which seemed worth taking. Some books, and the manual to my organizer—which I’d never read but kept for superstitious reasons, in case I threw it away and suddenly the thing stopped working. A few bits and pieces from the drawer in my desk: matchbooks from places where I’d had a good time; a couple of postcards from Deck and my folks; a photo of Helena I’d happened to be carrying on the day of the job and never quite had the heart to throw away. At the back of the drawer was a paper diary I used to keep, noting the years of travelling, the motor lodges and Holiday Inns and then the Hiltons and Hyatts—plus accounts of many of the dreams and memories I’d carried. God knows why I wrote it all down like some inventory of my life. Just a guy thing, I guess. Men are collectors, earnestly accruing experience, possessions and time. And women too, as I realized from the names I’d noted down. Voices I’d listened to, hair I’d stroked, backs I’d seen curled in front of me in the morning. All gone now, butterflies pinned in a case in the back of some dusty museum, trophies collected out of boyish enthusiasm and never really understood. Male hormones are like viruses. They want to go out and conquer, explore new places to hang their hat, and they’re not always that good at discerning how much damage they’ll do to the
ir host.

  I flicked through a few pages, then changed my mind and put the notepad back in the drawer. The diary was like a collection of letters from a first love, or from an earlier Hap. If any of it meant anything, it had already become a part of me. I didn’t need to keep the envelopes to prove the letters had been sent.

  I left the answering machine in place, and asked it to redirect my calls to Deck’s. It said that it would, and was surprisingly polite. Then I locked the apartment up, and lugged the suitcase to the elevator. Down in the lobby I spied Tid, who was in the middle of helping a stallholder rip a couple of tourists off. When he was done, and they’d staggered off laden with charming pieces of driftwood and Kincaid-inspired daubings, I took him for a beer at the bar where I’d waited for Deck and Laura what seemed about a month ago. I gave him a spare set of my keys, and asked him to keep an eye on the place for six months. I was paid up that far: then it would be repossessed and wouldn’t be mine any more. Tid was cool, and promised he’d do what I asked. He’d heard from Vent, understood I was in some kind of jam. He didn’t think me maudlin for getting things sorted out, and you shouldn’t either. It’s not something you get a chance to do very often. I was going to take it.

  Then I got in the car, and drove. I spiralled out of Griffith, taking in the sights, then meandered out into Hollywood and Beverly Hills. Doubled back and hooked up with Sunset at La Cienega, and took it all the way to the coast.

  As I drove I felt calm and almost happy, as if life’s loose ends were tied up for once. I didn’t know what I was expecting to achieve in the evening. I might get as far as talking to Quat, if I was lucky, but I didn’t believe I had much chance of dealing with Stratten himself. The whole point of operating remotes like Romer and Quat is keeping yourself as far away from the action as possible, and Stratten had made himself remarkably elusive. The man in the suit had told me to focus on Stratten, however, and so that’s what I was going to do in the time I still had left. I thought about calling Travis, seeing if there wasn’t some way he could let me have a little more time. But it would have been pointless, so I didn’t. Travis didn’t believe that Helena had been abducted. He hadn’t believed in the alien theory, and I sure as hell wasn’t going to try him on the new information. If I told him I was on a mission from God it might get me a psychiatric ward rather than the main cell population, but that was all. Travis had his own agenda, and ticked items off it to keep himself sane. If you’re a cop in a city drowning in crime, you have to take your victories where you can. Tonight the tick was going to be next to the fiasco at Transvirtual, even though nobody but him, me and the victims’ families even cared about it any more.