by Lisa Smedman
“I’m not sure,” I said. “Maybe. I’ve got a meeting with one of the investigating officers tonight.”
“Yeah.” He glanced at the telecom. Its screen still held the frozen zoom of the mark on Gabriel’s arm.
“Ugly fragger, isn’t he?”
“The guy in the picture—Montoya?” The missionary wasn’t overly handsome, but I wouldn’t have called him ugly.
“Who? No, this guy—the sun god. The face at the center of the calendar stone. The Azzies sure worship some ugly-looking gods.”
I crossed the room and picked up the printout I’d made. “You know this design?” I asked Rafael.
He nodded. “Sure. Everyone does. It’s from an altar stone that was dug up in the seventeen hundreds in Tenochtitlán. It’s massive—the size of this living room. It’s carved with the ancient Azzie calendar. I had a gold pendant of it, once, back when I was interested in that sort of thing. But I sold it a couple of years ago, to buy parts for my bike.”
That was why the design was so familiar. I’d seen it on museum posters, embossed on leather purses imported from Aztlan, on T-shirts even. It was an almost universal symbol of the ancient Aztecs. I hit the reverse-zoom icon on the telecom to show Rafael the full picture. “So how come our dead missionary had the symbol on his arm? Was he some sort of Azzie patriot?” I asked.
“That’s on an arm?” Rafael peered at the telecom screen. “It look like a brand. That fragger must have been into some serious pain.”
“Do you know any more about it—about what it might symbolize?”
Rafael shook his head. “I just know what I was told by my buddy Alberto—the guy who sold me the pendant. He’s originally from Aztlan, but he’s lived in Seattle since he was just a kid. He runs a jewelry business now, and does pretty good for himself. Gold mostly—replicas of ancient Azzie stuff. Alberto doesn’t worship the old gods, but his parents are heavy into that drek and he knows about the country’s state religion. He could probably tell you all about the calendar stone.”
I glanced at the clock. “Would his shop still be open? Could we talk to him?”
“Guess so. I haven’t seen him in a couple of years, but we were pretty tight, once.”
I grabbed my jacket and headed for the door.
“What, now?” Rafael asked.
“You got anything better to do?”
“No.” He lumbered to his feet and picked up his helmet. Small and round, it was the type that bikers called a “lid.” Its sole purpose was to conform to the helmet laws—it didn’t offer any real protection. “Grab your helmet. I’ll give you a ride there.”
I looked out at the rain, thinking that my Americar would be a whole lot more comfortable. And the streets would be slick and slippery. But Rafael was careful when I was on the back of his bike. He rode recklessly and pulled incredibly risky stunts when he was alone, but when I rode with him he took it smooth—not slow, mind you, but smooth. He always insisted that I wear a full-face helmet and a heavy leather jacket. Although I was an ex-cop with a number of gun fights and high-speed chases under my belt, he was still protective of me. It was kind of sweet, really. Besides, driving me somewhere would keep him out of trouble. And so I said yes.
The ride took about forty minutes, and the rain-washed air did wonders to clear my head. I was thankful for my helmet’s visor; the rain must have been stinging Rafael’s face as we whipped along. He pulled the bike up in front of a gleaming new glass and cement building, one of the many new skyscrapers that formed Tacoma’s bustling downtown.
Rafael’s friend had a shop at street level. It appeared to be fronted by windows, behind which were display cases filled with gold bracelets, pendants, and rings, but scrolling message boards at the bottom of each “window” reminded would be smash-and-grab thieves that these were, in fact, huge monitors that fronted solid concrete walls.
As Rafael buzzed the intercom beside the front door, I paused to look at a display of what looked like large golden spools. I’d never seen anything like them. “What are these?” I asked.
“Ear plugs,” he answered. “The ancient Azzies pierced their earlobes and stretched them to make those fit. Alberto says they’re a fad among Azzie priests. And among gangers. You know how Seattle gangers go for gold chains and knuckle rings? It’s ear plugs in Aztlan. The bigger and flashier, the better.”
After a security camera scoped us out, the intercom came to life and a voice directed us to enter. We passed through the outer, barred door into a small space like an airlock and found our way blocked by a second door. It was heavy glass, probably bullet-proof. Through it we could see into the shop itself. A dwarf stood behind a counter filled with jewelry display cases. Gold sparkled alluringly on black velvet.
“Hola, Alberto.” Rafael waved at the dwarf. “Buzz us in.”
“I can’t, Rafael. Not unless your friend leaves her weapon outside.”
I was suddenly aware of the familiar bulge of the Beretta under my arm. The shop entrance must have been fitted with metal detectors or chem sniffers—or a combination of both.
As the outer door clicked shut behind us, I looked up and saw a small round opening beside the surveillance camera. I hoped it held a taser and not something more lethal—and illegal.
“Aw, Alberto. C’mon, chummer. She’s my best friend. I’ll vouch for her. She’s an ex-cop, for frag's sake.”
“Well, all right . . . But only if she unloads the weapon first.”
“That’s fine by me.” I was starting to feel claustrophobic in the confined space. I drew the Beretta from my shoulder holster and released the magazine, held it up so the dwarf could see that the chamber was clear, then placed the magazine in a pocket and reholstered my weapon. “Satisfied?”
The dwarf nodded and touched something under the counter. The glass door opened. We entered and took seats on stools at the counter like a couple sitting down to pick out wedding rings. The air was filled with soothing music—native pipes playing a gentle melody.
Rafael made small talk, asking after Alberto’s parents. I noticed that he didn’t mention Mama G. The two old friends had not seen each other in a couple of years, and so Alberto would never even have met her. The thought made me sad. A person was only alive as long as someone remembered her. To those who had never met Mama G, she might as well never have existed. As far as I knew, only Rafael and I mourned her.
Alberto had rigged a bench behind the counter so he was at eye level with his human customers. He had the dark, long-lashed eyes of a Spaniard and the high cheekbones of an Azzie native. He wore his hair short and his thick beard trimmed to a goatee. He dressed well, in a tailored suit that de-emphasized the boxiness of his broad shoulders.
“What can I do for you?” Alberto asked when the pleasantries were over. “Are you shopping for something specific?”
“I’m shopping for information, actually,” I explained. “I’m a private detective, working on a case.” I pulled out the printout I’d made of Montoya’s branded arm and slid it across the counter toward the dwarf. “Rafael said you might be able to tell me about the calendar stone—what it symbolizes. And why someone would want to brand it on their arm.”
Rafael joined in. “Remember the pendant you sold me, Alberto? What was that story your parents told about it? Something about the sun god, wasn’t it?”
“It’s the legend of the death and rebirth of the sun,” Alberto answered. He reached into the display case and pulled out a golden ear plug nearly as wide as his fist. The front was cast with the same face-and-sun design. Peering at it, I could make out more detail. To either side of the sun god’s face were two clawed hands, each holding something. Above and below each of the hands was a rectangular panel with a glyph inside it. Next came a circle filled with Aztlaner glyphs, and then another circle studded with the triangular flares that had reminded me of the sun’s rays.
Alberto took the ear plug back from me, gave it a quick polish with a cloth, and continued his description. “In th
e Aztec cosmology, the time period we’re living in is known as the Fifth Sun. The calendar stone records the dates on which each of the four previous suns was destroyed and the date when our current age began. The Fourth Sun, for example, was destroyed by water.
“Ties in nicely with the Biblical flood, doesn’t it?” he added. “Except that it was supposed to have happened around A.D. 761.”
He ran a finger around the circle that enclosed the sun god’s face. “These glyphs are the twenty day signs in the ancient calendar. The Aztecs had a calendar of eighteen months that were divided into—”
“I thought a new era started in 2011,” Rafael interjected. “With the Awakening. Isn’t it the Sixth World already?”
“That’s from the Mayan calendar,” Alberto said. “According to the Aztec calendar, the true ‘awakening’ hasn’t happened yet.”
“I see.” I nodded. “So the calendar stone predicts the date that the world will end?”
Alberto shook his head. “No. Even the ancient Aztecs didn’t know when the Fifth Sun would be destroyed. But they did know how the world would end—in a cataclysmic earthquake. And when it does, the tzitzimine—the ‘demons of twilight’—will swarm up out of the earth and devour humanity.”
He smiled. “My parents used to frighten me with that one.
The monsters under my bed were always tzitzimine, not bogey men.”
“Do people still believe this?” I asked. “Is it part of the Aztlaner religion?”
“Not really,” Alberto said. “At least, not within the faith my parents practice. There are fringe groups that take it seriously and are preparing for it—just like there are Christian faiths centered around preparing for the apocalypse.” He laughed to himself. “The Christians don’t know when their apocalypse is coming, either.”
We were interrupted, just then, by a customer. The fellow was typical of Tacoma’s nouveau riche—smartly dressed in an expensive suit and shoes. He dropped more than five thousand nuyen on a heavy gold ring for himself, and bought delicate gold earrings hung with brilliant turquoise quetzal feathers for his girlfriend.
While he was tending the customer, Alberto let me hold onto the gold ear plug with its calendar stone design. I noticed that he kept one eye on me all the time, though. Despite the fact that I was Rafael’s chummer, the dwarf still didn’t entirely trust me not to pocket the thing. Compared to the suit buying the ring and earrings, Rafael and I were terribly under-dressed, not at all like the store’s usual clientele, I supposed. No wonder Alberto was wary.
I nodded as I turned the ear plug over in my hands. Things were starting to fit together—even if they didn’t entirely make sense yet. The missionaries were part of some weird offshoot of the Azzie state religion. Maybe they had been involved in some sort of illegal cult practice that Mama G had witnessed at one point in time. Maybe all three had been killed to hush something up. But what?
Alberto finished with his customer and ushered the man out through the door.
“What’s the god holding in his hands?” I asked as he returned to the counter.
“Hearts,” the dwarf answered. He took the ear plug back from me, gave it another quick polish, and placed it gently back inside the velvet-lined display case.
“Human hearts,” Rafael prompted. “Go on, Alberto. Tell her the gory stuff.”
The dwarf looked somewhat embarrassed. “It’s not part of the state religion any more.”
“So?” Rafael laughed. “It was, once.”
“But not any more.” Alberto’s voice was tight.
“What isn’t it part of the religion any more?” But I could guess.
“Human sacrifice,” the dwarf said. “The Aztecs believed that the sun god needed blood to sustain him and keep him in motion. And to help the new sun be born. So they sacrificed at the beginning of every year, and at the beginning of every new age.”
“Human sacrifice,” I echoed. Had Mama G seen someone being sacrificed? Was that why she’d been forced to flee Aztlan? It wouldn’t be the first time a witness had been killed to hush up a homicide.
It was a good guess, nice and neat. But as it turned out, the truth was much messier. Human sacrifice wasn’t the only thing Mama G had seen.
6
I shook the rain from my umbrella and ducked through the mahogany and brass doors of Icarus Descending. The place specialized in seafood and was one of those restaurants where every other item on the menu had “market price” entered beside it. If you needed to ask, you couldn’t afford it. The restaurant catered primarily to elves—there were maybe two or three other humans there, besides myself. Many of the serving staff were Asian elves and were rumored to be part of a Chinese triad. That was a good one. Why wait tables when crime is so much more lucrative? It was more likely that the customers were triad members—they’d be the ones with the nuyen to eat here.
The restaurant didn’t have much of a view, but the decor made up for it. Everything was done in an ocean theme. The bases of the tables were crusted with mock barnacles and the walls and floor looked like seaweed-draped rock. The ceiling was a translucent field of pale blue that rippled and flowed like water. At its center was a single, large yellow glow meant to represent the sun. The effect was exactly like being underwater—the programmer even got the sparkles on the ocean’s surface right.
I wondered at Parminder’s choice of restaurant. According to myth, Icarus flew too close to the sun. His wax-and-feather wings melted, and he plunged into the sea. I wondered if my former partner was using the restaurant as a subtle metaphor that I was close to getting burned. It would be just like her—subtle to the point of being obtuse.
Or maybe she just liked seafood. The restaurant certainly smelled wonderful. Despite being irked at having to drive all the way downtown and being forced to lay out what was sure to be a day’s pay to eat here, I was already hooked—pun intended.
I saw Parminder sitting at a table on the lower level of the restaurant. As I started down the stairs, a brilliant purple squid swam past me at chest level, making me jerk back to avoid running into it. Then I realized that it was the result of a hidden holo-projection unit, as were the tiny silver fish that darted around the diners’ feet.
I slid into the seat opposite Parminder, trying to look as at ease in the posh environment as she did. We’d both come from working-class roots, but she’d deliberately honed an air of sophistication that I could never match. It helped, her being an elf. I wondered for the millionth time why she’d joined the Star and chosen homicide. Probably for the intellectual puzzle. She’d prod at a case until she cracked it, no matter how much skull sweat and overtime it took. And then, having satisfied her own curiosity, she’d let it be buried. Saving the world didn’t interest her the way it did me.
I ordered a vodka and seven—the real stuff—from the menu screen set into the table, Parminder a glass of Chardonnay. We made small talk as we studied the main menu, touch-keying items that looked interesting to call up a holographic projection and detailed description of the dish’s ingredients. I ordered grilled salmon and wild mushrooms, and Parminder chose spiced oysters, muscles, and clams served on bread molded to look like a gigantic clam shell.
“So?” I began after a waiter had brought our drinks and slipped away. “How goes the investigation? What have you got so far?” I tried to look chill, but the anxiety I felt was obvious in my voice. I took another sip of my drink.
Parminder looked around, assuring herself that there was no one within listening range. “Lone Star isn’t the only agency with an interest in those two missionaries,” she said. “The Aztlan security forces had them under observation.”
“Oh yeah?” I waited for more.
“They were members of an apocalyptic religious cult. The Aztlaners normally keep a tight lid on fringe groups, but they wanted to learn what this one was up to. And so the government—facilitated—their trip up north, pulling strings behind the scenes to make things as smooth as possible for our two dead frien
ds. They wanted to see who the pair were hooking up with here in Seattle. But Clement and Montoya were murdered before the Aztlaners had a chance to find out.”
“And the pair never guessed that Big Brother was watching them?” I found that hard to buy. “I’d be suspicious as hell if I were trying to leave Aztlan and the wheels all seemed pre-greased. Especially if I was part of a fringe group.”
Parminder took a sip of her wine. She continued as if I hadn’t interrupted. “The religious sect was legal—on the surface. But the Aztlaner security forces believed it to be secretly involved in illegal activities. There were rumors that its members practiced—”
“Human sacrifice,” I said, completing the sentence for her. “Cutting out hearts, and other unpleasantries.”
That surprised Parminder. “Ah . .. yes. I see you’ve been doing some digging on your own.” She seemed impressed. “We had to get that information from the consulate.”
I shared my theory that Mama G had witnessed a sacrifice, and that the cult members had forced her to re-live this experience so that they could lift some detail of it from her memory of the event. “That’s what the simsense chips really were,” I told Parminder. “A snuff film, dressed up in religious trappings.”
My former partner blinked. “Not at all.”
Now it was my turn to be puzzled. “What do you mean? How can you be certain what was on the chips?”
Parminder smiled smugly. Back when we were partners, she always looked that way whenever she’d thought of something that I hadn’t. The look still irritated me.
“I spoke to one of the customs officers at SeaTac Airport,” she said. “He inspected the simsense chips, and even slotted one or two and skipped through them in a random sample of their contents. According to him, they were little more than travelogues. A running narrative of religious dogma about the end of the world and the death of the sun, combined with a walk-through of various archaeological sites in the Yucatán. Hardly even worthy of simsense, unless you enjoy the discomfort of walking around in blistering heat and feeling the sweat trickle down someone else’s body.”