“Me.”
Alexandra. He opened the door and let her in.
“I think we’ve got a way to do it,” she said. Then she cocked her head at him. “You growing a beard?”
“Only until I find the energy to shave it off.”
They went into the kitchen. Alexandra took a couple of beers from the refrigerator, opened them, handed one to Tanner, then they walked into the front room. Alexandra sat on the small sofa, Tanner in the easy chair.
“So there’s a way,” Tanner said.
Alexandra nodded. “Getting into those kinds of records is a bitch,” she said. “So many walls, so many alarms, and traps ready to suck you right in and bury you.” She shook her head, smiling. “But we got in.”
“Who’s ‘we’?”
“Me and Kaufman. You wouldn’t believe this guy, looks nothing like a computer demon, but man is he good. Mid-forties, bit of a potbelly, wears nice tailored suits, runs a very conservative business distributing toilet-seat liners to office buildings downtown. But sit him down at a keyboard and he just goes nuts. Sometimes I think maybe he’s a little schizoid. A functional schizoid.”
“So you and Kaufman got in.”
“We got in, but getting in’s not the same as doing anything. And there’s no way to change anything in there without blowing off a dozen alarms and leaving traces. But…” She shrugged, drank from her beer. “Kaufman thinks there’s a way to take care of your problem. It’s only good for one shot, but it should cover you. You only need one clearance and confirmation, right?”
“Far as I know. Just the boarding.”
“Well, here it is. What Kaufman does is create a mimic. Kind of a program overlay right at the access point of Rattan’s ID data. It’ll only work once, and it’ll only work with Rattan once he sets it up. Rattan will have to make arrangements for the shuttle trip, and get basic document ID for someone else who’s already in the data base. It’s got to be someone clean, of course, who will get approval for all the initial arrangements. But it’s also got to be someone no one at Hunter’s Point will know. You don’t want some freak coincidence of pulling a name at random and it turns out to be the upstairs neighbor of the guy running the confirmation check. Rattan’s got to choose the name, he’s going to be in the best position to know what’s safe.
“So what happens is this, without getting too damn technical. Actually, I can’t be too technical, because I don’t really understand it all myself, but Kaufman says it’ll go, and I trust him. So. Rattan goes through security at the launch field, they check the documents, then hook him up. All his fingerprint and retinal data go into the system and search for the matchup, right? Finds the match, and Rattan’s name and status come off and head back out. This is where the mimic kicks in. It rides piggyback on the confirmation all the way out to the Hunter’s Point field terminals. Just after it enters the system, before it comes up on the screens, it does a dump of Rattan’s name and status and substitutes this other guy’s info, which then comes up on their screens. Identity and status confirmed. Then it all does a self-destruct, program and data, and there’s not a trace anywhere. No traps, no alarms go off, Kaufman says, because nothing in the data base or programming is changed, nothing even touched, really. All basically passive until the final step.” She paused, drank the rest of the beer, and breathed deeply. “Anyway, Kaufman says it’ll work.”
“Can it be set up in two days?”
“Probably. Kaufman’s working on the mimic right now. He’ll just need a name from Rattan to complete it.”
Tanner slowly nodded, more to himself than to Alexandra. That’s what he needed from Rattan as well. A name.
“Why are you doing this for him?” Alexandra asked. “You must be getting something from Rattan.”
“Yes, I am.”
“What, then?”
Tell her or not? He knew she would do it without an answer, but that was not really the point. Tell her. “The name and whereabouts of the Chain Killer.”
“Jesus. Rattan knows?”
“If he doesn’t, I’m going to follow him up to New Hong Kong myself and cut off the one intact limb he’s still got.”
It was well after dark, nearly ten o’clock, by the time Tanner was finally done for the day, but he felt good. Things were falling into place, and in two days he should have what he wanted from Rattan.
Rattan had called back just a few minutes earlier. He had been in touch with the New Hong Kong doctors, and arrangements were set for Paul. Tanner had told him what he needed for Alexandra, and Rattan had said he would have it for Tanner by the next day. It was all moving forward. Tanner had done everything he could, and now he just had to wait.
He went into the bedroom and stood at the window, looking down at the street. Oscar, the blind cat, sat on the sidewalk, licking himself. The night was quiet. Tanner was back home, and things were done, and he could sleep now. He would need the sleep. Once he got the name from Rattan, he and Carlucci would probably get very little sleep until they had tracked the Chain Killer down and taken him in. If they could find him. There was no guarantee, no matter how good Rattan’s info was.
Then what? Once they had the guy, then what? What would it mean, anything?
Don’t think about it now, he told himself. He undressed, got into bed, and closed his eyes. He slept.
32
SOOKIE WAS FEELING pretty proud of herself. She’d been the one who spotted the ambulance. She could hardly sit still, she was so excited. Mixer sat beside her, and they were both smoking. Mixer seemed a lot more relaxed than she was. They were sitting outside a crasher shop, watching the ambulance.
She had lost Tanner for two or three days. Mixer had stuck with her a lot of the time. Worried about her, she guessed. She tried to tell him not to bother, she was fine, but he just grumbled a lot and stuck with her anyway. Sookie really liked Mixer. He was a good person.
They had wandered around the Tenderloin, but they’d hung out a lot near the tattoo parlor, since that was the last place they’d seen him. And it paid off.
Tanner had shown up with another man. Sookie thought maybe it was the man Tanner had been sitting with that day by the water, when she’d seen the bodies. They had met the woman again, in front of the tattoo parlor. Then they’d all gone inside. The tattoo parlor was still closed and locked.
Sookie and Mixer had waited around a while, and then they’d decided to check out the other streets, the back of the buildings, the alleys. That’s when she’d spotted the ambulance and pointed it out to Mixer. Mixer had grinned and said, “Good girl, Sookie. Good eyes.” And they’d set up outside the crasher shop to watch.
A real city ambulance was a rare sight inside the Tenderloin, and it meant money. Money to get in, money to get out. It might have nothing to do with Tanner, but Sookie had a good feeling about it. So did Mixer.
Hah! Sookie said to herself. She’d been right. Tanner came out of the building nearest the ambulance, waved at the attendants and guards. Ambulance doors were opened. Then the other man and the woman came out of the building, pushing a crazy-looking wheelchair with a chopped-up man in it. There was all kinds of stuff hanging all over the wheelchair.
“Man,” Mixer said, “will you scope out that thing. That guy’s a fuckin mess.”
Sookie was holding on to her legs to keep them from wiggling too much. “Who is he?”
Mixer shook his head. “No idea.”
The woman and the attendants were working with the wheelchair, loading it into the back of the ambulance. The man swore at them once. Tanner and his friend and the woman all got in the back with the wheelchair, along with an attendant. Guards closed up the doors, then got into the front with the driver.
“Let’s go,” Mixer said. He jumped up and pulled Sookie to her feet. “Follow me.”
They hurried along the streets, running hard whenever there was room. Sookie didn’t know where they were going, but she was sure Mixer knew what he was doing. They hitched a ride with an organ ru
nner for a few blocks, to the edge of the Tenderloin, then hopped off and hurried through a bunch of shops to an exit leading out of the Tenderloin. Once outside, they ran a couple of blocks to the end of an alley leading back into the Tenderloin.
“There’s only two places you can get in and out with something as big as an ambulance,” Mixer said. “This is the closest one, so I figure this is where they’ll show up. Man, it must have cost a lot to buy passage in and out.”
Mixer started moving around the street, looking into cars and trucks and carts, trying doors.
“What are you looking for?” Sookie asked.
“A free ride. How else we going to follow them when they come out?”
Sookie tried to keep an eye on the alley and stay with Mixer while he bounced around. All the doors were locked, he couldn’t get into anything. Somebody yelled at Mixer, told him to get the hell away from his cart. Mixer ran across the street, Sookie right behind him.
Suddenly Mixer stopped, and Sookie almost ran into him. “Hey,” he said.
“Hey what?”
Mixer was staring across the street at a parked brown car with a man sitting behind the wheel, drinking something out of a paper cup. The man in the car looked familiar. Sookie knew she’d seen him before. But where?
“That’s the same guy,” Mixer said.
“What same guy?” She still couldn’t remember where she’d seen him.
“That guy Tanner kept meeting outside the Tenderloin. I told you I’d check him out, see who he is.” He turned to Sookie and grinned. “He’s a cop.”
“A cop?”
“Yeah. His name’s Carlucci. Tanner used to be a cop. I checked him out, too. He quit a couple years ago after his partner got killed. He got shot pretty bad himself.”
Sookie was about to ask him more when the ambulance appeared, creeping out of the alley. There wasn’t more than a couple of inches of space on either side, and it couldn’t even turn, it had to come straight all the way out.
“Damn,” Mixer said, hitting the roof of the locked car beside him. “We’re going to lose them.”
The ambulance cleared the alley, turned south, and picked up speed. The brown car with Carlucci started up and pulled out into the street, following the ambulance.
“I’ll be damned,” Mixer said. “Wonder what the hell is going on here?” Within a minute both the ambulance and the brown car were out of sight. Mixer sat on the hood of the car, and Sookie hopped up beside him. “Carlucci’s Homicide.”
“What’s that mean?” Sookie asked.
“He investigates murders. He’s the top guy on the Chain Killer case.”
“Chain Killer?”
“Yeah, that guy who kills people and chains them together and dumps them in the water.”
Sookie got a funny feeling in her stomach, like something bouncing around inside.
“I’ve seen him,” she said.
“Who?”
“The Chain Killer.”
Mixer turned and stared at her, grabbed her shoulder. “You serious, Sookie? You’re not screwing around?”
“I saw him,” she repeated.
“Where?”
“In the Tundra.”
She told him about trying to get away from the thrasher pack, going down into the basement. How the hatch was locked. Seeing the door, going down the passage, into the room. All the machines, and the chains hanging on the wall, then the man with the metal skull and machine voice and something like wings coming after her.
“Shit,” Mixer said. “Sookie, you gotta show me where this is. You remember it? You can find it again?”
Sookie nodded, the funny feeling changing to fear inside her.
Mixer jumped off the hood. “Let’s find a car and go,” he said.
33
THEY ARRIVED AT the Hunter’s Point launch field more than two hours before liftoff. Night was falling quickly, the sky a strange deep purple headed toward black. Paul, Britta, and Tanner helped unload Rattan from the ambulance, and wheeled him into the processing station. Through the station’s huge view windows Tanner could see the shuttle, its form outlined by lights, cradled in the brightly lit gantry.
The processing teams were prepared for Rattan, though they thought he was someone else, of course. They informed him that he would be boarded first, a half hour early, so all the special physical arrangements could be made; formal processing and security checks would start in about forty minutes.
Rattan had dyed his hair, shaved his mustache, patched one eye and shimmered the other, and added a few ritual strips to his cheeks. Tanner would never have recognized him.
“It’s time to talk now,” Tanner said. “Or you don’t go any further.”
Rattan nodded. “We’ll go back outside. Britta, stay here with Dr. Robertson. Mr. Tanner and I have some things to discuss.”
Tanner and Rattan went back out the front entrance, Rattan expertly guiding the wheelchair out the doors and down the concrete ramp to the tarmac. Tanner followed as Rattan turned the corner of the building and wheeled to within a foot of the charged fencing. He positioned himself for a direct view of the lighted shuttle, and locked the wheels. Tanner stood beside him.
“Am I really going?” Rattan asked. He turned and looked at Tanner.
Tanner nodded. “You’ll get through. You’ll get aboard, and you’ll still be aboard at liftoff.” He paused. “I gave you my word.”
“I wonder if I’d be able to tell if you were lying.”
“I’m not.”
Rattan stared at him, then grunted. “What about Carlucci? You’re working with him on this.”
Tanner was not surprised that Rattan knew. “Carlucci doesn’t know. He knows I’m looking for you, he knows about your old message, but he doesn’t know I’ve talked to you. He doesn’t know we’re here.”
Rattan slowly nodded, but did not say anything.
“So who is it?” Tanner asked.
“The name won’t mean a damn thing. You won’t find him with it. But it’s Cromwell. Albert Cromwell. What a name. Least his parents didn’t name him Oliver.” Rattan emitted something like a chuckle. But it quickly faded, and he wiped sweat from his forehead with his hand.
“If I get my arm and legs back,” Rattan said, “I’m going to give up this business.” He sighed. “Hell, even if I don’t. I’m getting too old for it. I feel too old.” He shook his head. “You know how old I am?”
“No.”
“Thirty-nine. Forty next month. I know, it’s not really that old, but…I’ve been doing this a long time. What is that, younger than you, right?”
“A little,” Tanner said.
“Do you feel old?”
“Not really. I don’t think about it much.”
“I do. Getting your legs blown off’ll make you feel old, tell you that. I don’t know, I’ve been dealing drugs too many years now, and I like the odds less and less. My odds. I keep thinking they’re going to catch up with me, I’ve had it my way too long.” He wiggled his left arm stump, jiggling the overhead sacks. “I guess they did. And I don’t want to push it any further.”
He remained silent a long time, staring at the shuttle, and Tanner had the feeling Rattan was not going to say any more unless he prodded him. But, just as he was preparing to ask him for more about Albert Cromwell, Rattan began talking again.
“It cost me a fucking fortune to get onto this flight,” he said. “Damn thing was full, and I had to buy four people off of it, and they didn’t come cheap. Not much is cheap anymore. Shit, not much of any value ever was.” He shook his head, gazing out at the shuttle. “You ever been in love, Tanner? You must have been, sometime in your life.”
Tanner could not figure where Rattan was headed, but he could not think of anything to do except answer.
“Yes.”
Rattan nodded. “I never was, up until a year ago. Always thought it was too much a pain in the ass, too much trouble. I still feel the same, but I fell in love anyway. Another sign of getting
old, maybe. But of course I can’t do it right, I’ve gotta fuck it up, I’ve gotta fall in love with guess who?”
“Not me, I hope.”
Rattan laughed, so hard the chair shook. “Very good, Tanner. Don’t want to be getting too…what’s the word? Not morbid.”
“Maudlin?”
“Yeah, maudlin.” He shook his head, sighing heavily. “No, not you. Britta. Fucking crazy, yeah?”
“Why crazy?” Tanner asked.
“Because she’s young and she’s in love with a carnival stud who’s got an augmented cock and, according to Britta, the strongest, longest tongue in the city. Me, I say who gives a shit, you can get a fucking machine to do all of that, if you want. But see, that’s just it. We’ve got different priorities. Different interests. Different everything.”
“She’s going with you to New Hong Kong,” Tanner said.
“Purely business. Purely temporary.” He shrugged, then violently shook his head. “Why the fuck am I telling you all this, I must be going fucking senile.” He turned and grimaced at Tanner. “You don’t really care, either, do you? All you really want to hear about is Mr. Albert Cromwell, yes?”
Tanner shrugged. “That’s what all this is about.”
Rattan nodded, but did not resume speaking immediately. He spent a minute with the chair’s controls, making minute adjustments to his position. When he was finished, nothing looked any different to Tanner.
“He was a customer,” Rattan said. “A damn good customer. I mean, I didn’t know he was the Chain Killer. He was just some guy who bought a lot of expensive shit. Well, not just some guy. See, he’s fucking half machine. Maybe more than half.” He turned to look at Tanner. “Yeah, he’s the closest thing to a real cyborg I’ve ever seen. I mean, I don’t know what the technical definition of a cyborg is, but I got a feeling this guy is it. One human arm and hand is all the guy had. The other arm’s metal, and both legs. No flesh look-alikes. Fuckin’ high-tech state-of-the-art cyborged. For all I know, the guy’s got a metal dick, too. Metal plating up one side of his neck, and about half his skull’s been removed and replaced with all kinds of hot-shit micro-circuitry. And who knows what else? And here’s the fuckin’ kicker. This guy chose to have all this stuff done to him. He volunteered to have them cut off his arm and legs and turn him into a fucking machine.”
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