Aaron Conners - Tex Murphy 02

by Under a Killing Moon

has been effectively destroyed.”

  “What do you mean?”

  The waitress interrupted us. Dubois ordered another beer, and I asked for bourbon. I figured I could talk young man into buying my drink. When the waitress walked off, Dubois took a deep breath and continued in a quiet voice. “How much you know about CAPRICORN?”

  I shrugged. “Not much. From what I understand, you guys do what you can to put hate groups out of business.”

  Dubois nodded. “I joined CAPRICORN just over a year ago. I was a reader. My job was to read certain publications and find discriminatory references. Whenever I did, I’d pass the information up the ladder. If the top people felt like it was worth looking into, they’d send out agents to determine whether or not there was a major threat involved. If the discrimination was linked to a certain group or corporation, we’d send an agent to infiltrate. If there was a real problem, CAPRICORN’s goal was to bring down whoever it was, thereby limiting or eliminating their power and influence.”

  Dubois paused. I nodded to show I was following him, and he went on. “I was never an agent, but I did move up from my position as a reader. My new job was in resource allocation. It required a security clearance and dealt with prepping agents who’d been assigned to infiltrate organizations. Our department would fix up the agents with everything they’d need, and then we’d receive reports from the agents and pass them along to the higher ups. It was while I was in resource allocation that I first found out what was happening.”

  The waitress returned with our drinks. I didn’t even need to ask, as Dubois handed her a ten. I thanked my young friend and took a swallow of bourbon.

  “You were saying that something was happening.”

  Dubois took a quick sip of beer. “Our agents were being taken out, one by one.

  Overnight. Within the space of a month, practically all the reports had quit coming in.

  We sent out recons to find out what had happened, and then they started disappearing.

  After six weeks, 90 per cent of CAPRICORNs personneI was dead or missing.

  CAPRICORN just didn’t operate in the US… it was worldwide. We had thousands of agents, from Moscow to Santiago. Now, as far as we knew, only those of us in the home office were left. There was a meeting the day before the bombing, and everyone who attend was given final orders. I don’t know what kind of orders the others got, but mine were to meet Colonel O’Brien here and get a package from him.

  “How was the Colonel involved with CAPRICORN?”

  “I’m not sure. He could’ve been on the Supervising Committee. We never knew any of the committee members names.”

  “Any idea what was supposed to be in the package?”

  Dubois shook his head. “No. And he was going to tell me what to do with the package when he gave it to me.”

  I sat back and let Dubois take a drink. So, the Colonel had a package. That would explain what his killer had been looking for. But he hadn’t found it, at least not in the Colonel’s office. And the police hadn’t found anything. Where was it? A thought occurred to me. I pulled the blue index card from my coat and handed it to Dubois. “This mean anything to you?”

  DuBois looked the card over carefully, sounding out the letters and numbers silently.

  After a minute, he handed it back. “It doesn’t mean anything to me. What is it?”

  “Hell if I know. I got it anonymously in the mail. I think it might be related somehow to his disappearance. I figured it might be a code, like the one I broke to find you.”

  Dubois shook his head. “CAPRICORN usually kept communications direct. If that wasn’t possible, we’d use messages in newspaper personal ads.”

  I nodded and took another sip of bourbon. Another question popped into my head.

  “What do you know about something called the Winter Chip?”

  Dubois almost choked on his beer. He set the glass down and wiped his mouth. His voice fell to a hoarse whisper. “How do you know about the Winter Chip?”

  “The Colonel said something about it on the disc I recovered from his office. I think it was what his attacker was looking for. Maybe the Winter Chip was going to be in the package the Colonel was supposed to deliver.”

  Dubois was silent for some time. With some resolve, he turned back to me. “Look, I don’t know that much about all this, but, since you know about the Winter Chip, I’ll tell you what I do know.”

  I stuck an unlit cigarette between my lips and motioned for him to continue.

  “Some of the most accomplished computer scientists in the world were working on some top secret project for CAPRICORN. I only heard rumours, but apparently they were working on something they called the Winter Chip. I don’t know what it was, or what its purpose was. I can only tell you that it supposedly had something to do with our fight against the Crusade for Genetic Purity. Working in the Resource Allocation department, I knew that we’d sent dozens of agents to infiltrate the crusade. Word was, one of the agents had gotten in early and worked himself into a high position. I don’t know if he was rooted out with the other agents, but my job was to get the package from the Colonel and leave it some place where this undercover agent could pick it up. What he was going to do with it, I don’t know.”

  I looked at my cigarette. It had burned halfway down without me taking a single drag.

  “You have no idea who this agent is?”

  “I don’t. But I did find out something about the mole, as we called him. He’d been undercover for months before I got promoted. Just after I started work at my new position, the higher-ups requested that all of the mole’s reports be sent directly to them.

  But I did get a peek at one report before the order came down. It mentioned something about a plan being developed in the Crusade, some sort of eugenic cleansing that would be used to destroy the Mutants. I also remember reading something about Reverend Sheppard. The agents said that Sheppard wasn’t the real leader of the Crusade, that it was someone known as Phoenix. There was also a reference to a Chameleon. The only other name mentioned was a professor. Perriman. I think that was the name.”

  I pulled the Colonel’s small notebook out of my pocket and jotted down the names Phoenix, Chameleon, and Professor Perriman. When I finished, I glanced at Dubois.

  “So, what do you do now?”

  Dubois shook his head and looked into his beer. “I don’t know. I haven’t been able to sleep since the bombing. I want to go back to LA and see if any others survived, but I’m afraid if I do, someone’ll find me and I’ll disappear, just like the agents.“He looked up, hopefully. “What do you think I should do?”

  I’d been in some dangerous spots before, but had never run for my life, so I couldn’t really empathize with him. He was terrified, and probably with good reason.

  “Do you have any family?”

  “Yeah. Back in Des Moines. My mom and sister live there.”

  The mention of kinfolk seemed to calm Dubois. It seemed like a trip home would be just the thing.

  “Why don’t you fly home for few weeks? Or the rest of your life? You’ll probably never feel safe in LA again. And what do you have to go back to?”

  Dubois nodded, slowly at first, then emphatically. “You’re right. That’s what I’ll do.“He looked up at me. “Thanks a lot, Murphy.”

  He finished his beer and was starting to move out of the booth when he paused. “What are you going to do?”

  I thought about it. “Well, I guess I’ll see if I can find this package the Colonel was going to bring tonight. Then, I’ll see what I can do about finding the CAPRICORN mole.

  Maybe through his Professor Perriman.”

  Dubois slid out of the booth, stood up and extended his hand. “Good luck. It was good to meet you.”

  “Likewise.”

  He grabbed his coat and walked around the corner to the front door. With my arm on the back of the booth seat, I turned and looked out the window behind me. After a moment, I saw Dubois leave the club and cross the street.
I was just about to turn back to the few remaining drops of bourbon in my tumbler, when I saw three dark figures converge on him. The attackers weren’t street kids, they were professionals. As they grabbed him, a speeder landed nearby, and they forced him inside. At the same instant, two grim-faced men in suits with matching bulges under their left arms approached the front door of the club.

  I didn’t bother to finish the bourbon. I bolted from my seat, trying to remember if I’d seen a back door during my earlier reconnaissance. I couldn’t recall. A quick glance out the window told me that the men in suits had entered the club. They’d be on top of me in seconds.

  I looked desperately around the room and saw the full figured girl in black, sitting alone.

  I hurried over to her table and sat down. “Hello there.”

  She looked at me, surprised, but not unpleasantly. “High. I’m Teri.”

  I shook her hand, my eyes trained on the mirror behind her. The two men in suits had just stepped around the corner and were carefully surveying the area. Teri moved her head a little to make eye contact with me. “What’s your name?”

  I pried my eyes away from the mirror and looked into Teri’s lovely face. “Tex. Listen, I’m sorry to barge in on you like this, but I noticed you earlier, and I thought you might like to dance.”

  Teri smiled as I glanced back at the mirror. The men had started across the room. What the hell was I going to do?

  “I’m really not much of a dancer. Why don’t you just tell me about yourself? I think talking is much more fun than dancing.”

  The two men were twenty feet away and getting closer. I tensed up. They weren’t going to get me without a fight. Suddenly, they turned and moved quickly in the direction of the bar. As I breathed a sigh of relief, I heard the sound of shattering glass. I spun around to see one man with his gun to the throat of the waitress. The other man was holding off several employees, identification in one hand and a gun in the other. As the waitress struggled against her abductor, a shot rang out, and the sounds of screaming joined in with the pulsating music. I jumped up from the table and ran to the door, arriving just ahead of the panicking mob.

  Bursting out of the logjam at the front door, I raced to my speeder and lifted off. As I rose above the bedlam, I looked down and saw the doors of The Land Mine vomiting hordes of terrified bystanders.

  As I sped through the night, jumbled thoughts rattled around my head. Who had grabbed Dubois? Were the men in suits in league with the people who had abducted Dubois, or was it just a monumental coincidence of timing? I doubted it. From everything Dubois had told me, the people who’d suddenly shown up were probably affiliated with the nameless group that had destroyed CAPRICORN. Dubois was one of the last embers remaining from a nearly extinguished brush fire. These people had tracked him down and stamped him out. But why had they gone after the waitress? Maybe she’d been involved, too.

  Fifteen minutes later, I descended on Chandler Avenue. Several speeders were parked at the kerb in front of the Ritz, so I set down halfway between the Ritz and the Brew & Stew. I got out of the speeder, locked it up, and started walking towards my office. As I in passed one of the parked speeders, I heard the whirring sound of a window going down and then a female voice. “Excuse me.”

  I stopped and turned to find a beautiful woman looking up at me. Her skin was very fair, and her green eyes stood out, even in the dim light from the street lamps. Her red hair was bobbed and framed her face perfectly. But what really caught my eye was the gun pointed at my chest.

  “Get in.”

  UAKM - Chapter 15

  The speeder lifted off. I was in the front passenger seat, and the beautiful woman was in the back. I couldn’t see the gun, but I could feel it. I looked out of the corner of my eye at the man driving. I guessed he was about thirty five, clean cut, with a pleasant face and a larger than usual nose.

  When we cleared the roofline, the man turned the speeder and headed into the darkness, away from the city. My curiosity was piqued. “So, where are we going?”

  “Nowhere.” The beautiful woman spoke from the back seat. Her tone wasn’t particularly threatening, more businesslike than anything. “Just sit back and enjoy the ride.”

  “Sounds good to me. I love to fly.”

  The man at the wheel turned and smiled at me. “And it shows.”

  Unexpectedly, he extended his hand. “I’m Agent McCovey. My partner is Agent Andrews. We’re with Interpol. I hope you don’t mind… we need to ask you a few questions, and were a little pressed for time.”

  Even as I shook his hand, I wasn’t altogether certain whether I should be relieved or not.

  Agent Andrews’ gun was still pointed at my head.

  “If your partner’ll put her gun away, I promise I won’t jump out of the speeder.”

  I watched Agent McCovey as he smiled into the rearview mirror and nodded. The gun barrel disappeared from my peripheral vision. It made me feel better, but I was still nervous and had an almost uncontrollable urge to smoke. I dragged the pack of Lucky Strikes out of my pocket and held it up. “Do you mind?”

  Agent McCovey didn’t take his eyes from the airspace ahead. “I’d rather you didn’t.”

  “Regulations?”

  The agent shook his head. “No.”

  Agent Andrews smirked in the back seat. I put the pack away and looked out the side window. We left the occupied areas and were heading out over the no-man’s-land to the north. This part of the city had never been cleaned up after the war and, according to rumour, was now inhabited by orc-like creatures who only came out at night and fed on human flesh.

  Several tall buildings were still standing, and we descended toward one of them. There was no sign of electricity for miles. Agent McCovey skilfully navigated the speeder over the flat roof and landed. Agent Andrews tapped me on the shoulder. “Let’s get some air, shall we?”

  I opened the speeder door and stepped out. The only light source was the faintly pink half-moon, the evening had gotten as cold as it was dark. I adjusted my overcoat, tied the sash tightly, then lit up a much-needed cigarette. Agent Andrews had followed me out the door and was now leaning against the side of the speeder, arms folded across what was probably a lovely chest. Despite her having held a gun to my head only minutes before, I had quite a yearning to hug her. This wasn’t unusual-I’d always been attracted to women who’d just as soon kill me.

  Agent McCovey walked around from the driver’s side and stooped down to collect a handful of gravel. I eyed him warily, afraid that I was about to experience a strange, new form of Interpol interrogation/torture, but he wandered toward the edge of the roof and began throwing small rocks into the murky darkness. Satisfied that I wasn’t going to have information pelted out of me, I turned back and smiled disarmingly at Agent Andrews.

  “This is a lovely spot. It must be true what they say-people take the places where they live for granted. I’ve never made the time to visit as part of town before.”

  The agents wide green eyes gazed at me, unblinking and unamused. “We chose this place because we know it’s not bugged. There are things we need to talk about, sensitive things, that none of us want to be overheard. That includes you.”

  I was flattered that they’d include me in their spy games, but I was feeling the same sensation I felt in my recurring nightmare, of being a Jeopardy contestant and having the Final Jeopardy category turn out to be Famous Suffragettes. I took a deep drag and let the smoke slip out of my nose and mouth as I spoke.

  “Don’t get me wrong… I think we’re hitting it off really well, and I’m having a great time, but do you mind telling me what I’m doing here?”

  Agent McCovey meandered back into the conversation. “Don’t worry. You’re not in any kind of trouble. We just need to find out what you know.”

  Agent Andrews interrupted. “We know you found the video disc.”

  “Who told you that? Drysdale? He is such a liar.”

  McCovey smiled and looked out into t
he chilly night.

  “It’s no big deal, Murphy. The only reason we picked you up is to see if you found out anything else about Colonel O’Brien’s murder.”

  It sounded like Interpol was grasping at straws. Taking the time to round me up seemed like a last ditch effort, though I would never verbalize that. The upside was that they might let me in on something I didn’t know, in trade for me telling them everything I’d found out. Of course, I hadn’t learned much, but they didn’t know that.

  Agent Andrews seemed to be getting cold and tucked her hands under her arms. I noticed with mixed reactions that her right hand was fondling the loaded holster under her black jacket. She seemed to be the less accommodating of the two agents, so I spoke to the man.

  “Well, I’m assuming you both saw what was on the videodisc. I didn’t recognize the attacker.”

  McCovey stuck his hands into his pockets. “There’s no reason why you should have. But that’s irrelevant. We already know who he is.”

  Agent Andrews threw her partner a cautionary glance, but he disregarded it and went on.

  “The man goes by the name of the Chameleon. He’s been on our most-wanted lists for years. We believe his real name is Jacques Fou, but his fingerprints have been surgically removed, and he’s a genius with disguises. If you saw him again, you probably wouldn’t recognise him.”

  If Interpol knew who the killer was, then they already knew more than I did.

  “So how am I supposed to help you, seeing as how you’ve already solved the murder?”

  Agent Andrews jumped in. “The Chameleon isn’t some kind of psychopath who kills people for the hell of it. He’s a mercenary. Organizations and individuals hire him for specialized hits. We want to know who his employer was this time.”

  Agent McCovey began to pace casually as he picked up where the woman left off.

  “Even more importantly, we’re trying to find out more about the Winter Chip. On the videodisc, it looked like that was what the Chameleon was trying to find out from O’Brien.” He turned to face me. “Where were you earlier this evening?”

  I flicked my spent cigarette off to the side and buried my hands in the pockets of my overcoat. I considered how much I should tell the agents. Dubois had told me a little about the Winter Chip, and McCovey seemed open to sharing information, so I decided to tell them what I found out. In exchange, maybe they could tell me more about CAPRICORN.