Defragmenting Daniel: The Complete Trilogy Box Set

by Jason Werbeloff

  Hooplah’s face hardened. “So you don’t know,” she muttered.

  “Don’t know what?”

  “You don’t know who he is.”

  “We know enough,” said Kage. “We know that he’s killed two people, and badly hurt another. We know that he’s going to hurt more if we don’t stop him.”

  Kage tapped his glasses. Pulled up the crime scene photo of Daggy Munch’s face, and projected it onto the wall. He switched to the image of Daggy’s skinless legs.

  Hooplah’s forehead hardened. She crossed her arms. Looked away.

  Kage pulled out his license. “I’m not with the police. I’m a private investigator.” Hooplah examined the badge out of the corner of her eye. “I can help him. I don’t have to report that you divulged this information. And if you help me, I can bring him in for questioning before he or anyone else gets hurt. Believe me, the police will find him eventually. And when they do …” Kage slid the license into his jacket pocket. “… they won’t take him quietly. In cases like these, they tend not to take chances. I’ve heard …” He lowered his voice. “… they shoot serial offenders on sight.”

  “He didn’t do anything,” she said.

  Kage nodded. “So you do know him.”

  Hooplah shifted in her seat.

  “What you did was illegal. One word to your supervisor, and you’ll lose this job. More than that, Bubble PD will want to interrogate you down at headquarters.”

  Hooplah’s head fell into her hands. She ran her fingers over the ridges of her bare skull.

  “He would never hurt someone if he didn’t have to.”

  “That might be true, Hooplah.” Kage placed a hand on her shoulder. “If it is, I’ll find out. And I’ll protect him.” Kage leaned back in his seat. “But I can only do that if you give me his name.”

  Tears spotted Hooplah’s face when she lifted it from her palms. She gazed at him through wet robotic eyes.

  “I can help him,” said Kage. “I’m one of you. A Gutter. I understand the lengths we have to go to. He must have his reasons.” Kage squeezed her shoulder again. “Let me help him. Let me help you. Your supervisor won’t know about any of this. I won’t mention a word of it.”

  “Daniel Mendez,” she blurted.

  “You’re doing the right thing,” said Kage. “Now, show me the information he asked for. Show me his records.”

  Hooplah stood. With a trembling hand, she opened the door. She stepped over to her workstation, and typed Daniel’s name.

  Kage eyed the list. There was Lincoln’s knee. Daggy’s tongue. But he didn’t recognize the other names. Margaret Evans – cornea. Ben and Bob Stanton – lungs. Autumn Beckett – liver.

  Kage’s heart stopped when he read the last line of the file.

  Kassandra Jackson. Right amygdala.

  Kage touched his temple. Traced the scar-less skin. That amygdala should have been his final ticket to masculinity. Had he changed? Maybe. He felt a little gruffer. A little more grumpy. Maybe more easily aroused. But he still didn’t feel that feeling. The feeling that he’d arrived. That now he was unequivocally a man.

  Kage snapped himself out of his thoughts. He was on Daniel’s list. He could be next.

  He tapped his glasses. “Call Una,” he whispered.

  “No signal,” said his glasses.

  He turned. Out the door. Second right. Third left. He ran past the receptionist. Narrowly avoided a sleepy operator dawdling through the front entrance.

  He was up the hill in under a minute. Past the delicatessen. At the border post.

  The call went through. “No time to explain.” He panted. “Issue a red alert for Daniel Mendez. Include border checks and face recognition on street cams. Yes, now. Don’t worry about authorization. I’ve got enough for the warrant. I’ll handle that later. And send me the locations of the people’s names I emailed you … Check your inbox … Please Una, just do it.”

  Kage’s glasses pinged. He opened his maps app. Four dots pulsed inside the Bubble. That was odd. All four of them were in the same location.

  What were the chances of four unrelated people in the Bubble all appearing in the same place at 1 a.m? Infinitesimal. Perhaps they were all dead. Bodies dumped in the same place. He would have heard something by now if they were dead. Bacchus Mall was a busy place. Four dead bodies wouldn’t remain undetected for long.

  Which left only one possibility. Daniel Mendez was with them right now.

  “Una, call Shoulders.” He flashed his identity card at the border guard. She waved him through. “Tell him to meet me at Bacchus Mall. I’ve found him. I’ve found the Organ Thief.”

  A Taste of Things to Come

  Mopane worms.

  Daniel couldn’t expunge the taste from his tongue. Mopane worms. They tasted like drywall smelt. Earthy. Paper left in glue too long. Salty.

  High in protein, the insects had been a staple at the Orphanage. Mopane porridge for breakfast. Smoked mopane for lunch. Mopane puree for dessert.

  He hadn’t eaten the ubiquitous foodstuff since he’d left the Gutter an eternal four days ago. But for some reason, while Daniel lay on the grassy knoll overlooking the Stantons’ trailer, the taste of Mopane worm pervaded the back of his mouth. And no matter how much he swallowed or spat or salivated, the flavor wouldn’t ease.

  He’d been lying on the hill for an hour at least. What were they doing in there? What was Margaret doing in there?

  The windows of the trailer were frosted over. But every so often, he’d see the silhouette of a woman’s head. Then another. And another. How many girls had followed the Stantons into the trailer with Margaret? Daniel wished he’d paid more attention to the stage when the Stantons’ performance had ended. But he’d been too busy watching Margaret. The way she’d ploughed through the crowd, ramming the audience aside. One young man, who’d been resolute in his attention to a certain lady’s breast, wouldn’t move aside. Margaret, with her slender arms, had lifted the two lovers over her head and tossed them to one side. As though they were made of Styrofoam.

  She’d made it to the stage well enough. And he’d bet anything she was in the trailer right now, with the rest of the Stantons’ groupies. Gods alone knew what Margaret would do in an orgy.

  Movement.

  The door of the hovering trailer faded to translucent, and a girl poked her head outside. She blinked at the stage lighting, and tossed the frizzy, blond hair from her face. Yawned. Shielded her eyes, and stepped onto the grass. Another followed behind her. A third, and a fourth. Seven of them. All bare-breasted.

  Margaret wasn’t among them.

  Daniel rested his hand on the satchel at his side.

  It was time.

  *

  “Faster!” yelled Kage.

  Bacchus Mall, in the northmost district of the Bubble, was about as far from where he needed to be as anywhere else in the Bubble. The cab might have been flying at its regulation 300 mph, but the city passed underneath him at a glacial pace. Right now, right this moment, Daniel could be chopping up his next victim. Or victims, he thought. There were still four of them in that mall, according to the tracking software Una had sent him.

  “Helios Taxis respects the speed limits imposed by regulation sixty-three point –”

  “On the authority of Bubble PD, I authorize you to exceed the speed limits encoded in your programming.”

  “Please enter your badge number.”

  Kage didn’t know whether his PI license number would suffice, but recited it anyway.

  “Please hold.”

  As the taxi flew north, toward the southern edge of Bubble Central, the towers grew ever taller. The rusted buildings closer to the Gutter border had transformed to a polished sheen in Bubble Central. Their metallic skins sloughed off the dust and decay of their marginalized cousins. They thrust their concrete chests into the crisp Bubble air.

  “Authorization verified. Increasing speed.”

  The acceleration shoved Kage into his seat. Buildi
ngs flashed by almost as fast as Kage’s thrashing heart.

  I have you now, Daniel Mendez.

  Kage checked the pistol in his waist holster. Loaded.

  I have you now.

  *

  Daniel climbed over the rock that had provided cover while he’d waited. Was about to descend the hill, when another girl spilled out onto the lawn, tripping over her colossal breasts.

  He froze in place.

  Had she seen him?

  She gathered herself, and shone a drunk, starry smile to nobody in particular. She stumbled away, breasts first.

  Gods, thought Daniel. Have Bubblers no shame?

  He continued his descent. Crept up behind the back of the trailer. Strained to peek through one of the frosted windows.

  He couldn’t see much through the blur. But he thought he made out three distinct figures. One crouched over. Another on the floor. The third paced.

  As he slunk round to the front of the trailer, he heard Margaret’s tinny voice.

  “… needs lips for Project Alpha. Daniel needs lungs. Daniel is Margaret’s Project Beta.”

  “Look, lady. We’re just here for the booze and the boobs. We play for our fans. They come back here to show their appreciation.”

  “Margaret wants what Margaret wants.”

  A scream pierced the air.

  Daniel unzipped the satchel, and swung his body into the trailer.

  *

  It didn’t taste right.

  Even as the taxi darted through traffic at hair-bending velocities, around high-rises, under bridges, narrowly avoiding hooting hovercars – Kage couldn’t help it. He couldn’t shake the feeling that he’d missed something.

  Even as the thrill of the chase took hold of him, the blood of the hunt thick in the air, Kage knew that the facts didn’t add up.

  Daniel had removed too many organs.

  Kage called up Daniel’s organ donation records on his glasses. Lincoln Russell had received Daniel’s knee. But that wasn’t all he’d retrieved from the older recipient. He’d taken the man’s fingers too. And Daggy Munch? The records indicated that she’d received Daniel’s tongue. But not his skin. Why had Daniel skinned her lower half?

  The sum of the parts, in this case at least, was greater than the whole.

  Dr. Hoevert, the aging Coroner, had picked up the discrepancy too. Differences in the way the attacker had cut off Lincoln’s fingers and knee. Daggy’s tongue and skin. Two organ thieves?

  Kage touched his waistband. The cold steel of the pistol was little comfort at the thought of confronting two killers in Bacchus Mall.

  But there’d been no supporting evidence for the Two Killer theory. Nobody else followed Lincoln Russell into Amputating Amy. There was only one person in the taxi cab that arrived at Daggy Munch’s apartment the night she was butchered.

  Could this be some sort of trap? He’d almost forgotten that he was the last person on Daniel’s list. He touched his right temple. Somewhere beneath that scar tissue, inside the vulnerable folds of his brain, was Daniel’s amygdala. He imagined Daniel standing above him. Taking a bone saw to his skull. Prying the folds of his brain apart.

  Kage didn’t know just what was going on. But he didn’t like it. Not at all.

  “You have arrived at your destination,” sang the taxi, as it juddered to a halt just outside the opulent gates of Bacchus Mall.

  *

  Daniel couldn’t quite credit what he saw when he stepped inside the Stantons’ trailer.

  Margaret had one of the Stantons in a choke hold – he guessed it was Bob, but it was difficult to tell with his face so swollen. The android’s free hand traced an outline of brown pus over the musician’s lips and cheek. The other Stanton, yes, that was Ben, negotiated with her.

  “Lady, we’ll give you whatever you want.” His voice lowered. “They said your Bubble was a little crazy, but this is hectic.”

  Daniel stood, mesmerized by the shape Margaret traced across Bob’s face. He recognized it now. It was the shape she’d drawn on the table at the ice cream bar. He hadn’t recognized it then, but he did now. It was an eight on its side. The infinity symbol.

  “Margaret wants lips,” she said, and illustrated by tugging on Bob’s mouth. He let out a thunderous yelp. It seemed ridiculous at first – attempting to pull off the man’s lips like that. But as Daniel watched, a crimson line appeared along the borders of Bob’s mouth. Something in Margaret’s hands click-click-clicked, like the notches of a locking wrench. The line above Bob Stanton’s top lip become a gash. Became a wound. Became a pit. Blood spilled down his chin. Pattered on the floor.

  Daniel cringed.

  “Who are you?” shouted Ben Stanton. Panicked, the lung on the man’s chest inflated-and-deflated rapidly.

  That’s when Daniel realized he was no longer just an observer. Ben’s eyes had locked onto him.

  Daniel reached into the satchel, and found the cold handle of the kitchen knife.

  Radio Silence

  Kage pulled up the locations of Daniel’s future victims on his overlay.

  Now that Kage was a step away from Bacchus Mall, the resolution of the map increased. Three of the dots clustered in one location, with the fourth separate from the others.

  Ben and Bob Stanton. Margaret Evans. They were all somewhere inside the entrance. Somewhere to his left. Autumn Beckett was still in the mall, but apart from the others.

  He checked his pistol for the third time. “Nice prop, man,” giggled a drunk teenager hobbling past. Kage tucked the gun into its holster.

  The curtains of Bacchus Mall yawned. The infamous wine fountains on either side glowed an opalescent black in the Bubble night. He pulled up the collar of his jacket. Was about to step forward, when a meaty hand grappled his arm.

  “This better be good,” said Shoulders.

  Kage caught his breath. “I’ve located his next victims.”

  “How could you possibly know that?”

  “Because they’re the other recipients of his organs.” Kage stepped forward again, but Shoulders held him back.

  “I saw that list,” said the Senior Detective. “That weird techie bitch sent it to me. I see you’re on it, Kass.”

  Kage’s body was afire. Kindled by the need to get into that mall and find Daniel Mendez before he hurt anyone else. By the need to remove Shoulders’ hand from his jacket. By the need to clock the Detective in the jaw.

  “I also see,” continued Shoulders in a measured tone, “that Thomsin Sparling isn’t on that list. Seems like a pretty large hole in your theory that this Daniel Sanchez is targeting his organ recipients.”

  “It’s Mendez,” said Kage. “And Sparling was an opportunistic kill. We haven’t worked out the details yet. But it’s just too great a coincidence to ignore that both Lincoln Russell and Daggy Munch are on his organ recipient list.”

  Shoulders yawned. “Do you know what time it is?”

  Kage’s skin itched under Shoulders’ hand. Tingled. Stung. He had to go. But … but he shouldn’t go alone. Not just because this could be a trap. Not just because Daniel might overpower him. But because Kage was only a PI. Sure, he could make a citizen’s arrest. But if something went wrong, Captain Weeks would have his head.

  Kage bit his lip. “It’s just past three in the morning.”

  “That’s right, Kass. You don’t have a solid theory, and you call me out here at this ungodly time to do your bidding. Hell, those ‘future victims’, as you call them, could all be out for a good time. It’s hardly a coincidence they’re all in the same place on a Saturday night. Bacchus Mall is the place to be.” He preempted Kage’s reply by squeezing his arm. “But …” Shoulders shone his signature smile. “… I’m being a good sport. I’m here.”

  “Can we go now?” asked Kage, shrugging off Shoulders’ hand.

  “We can.” Shoulders grew taller. Puffed out his hyena-chest – Kage knew hyena implants when he saw them. “But this is the last time. If this is another one of your false
alarms, if you brought me out here for nothing …” Shoulders’ smile widened to an obscene grin. “… you’ll be out on your ass. You’ll never set foot in Bubble PD again. I’ll make sure of it, Ka-ssa-ndra.” Shoulders enunciated his birth name in careful syllables.

  Kage ignored the adrenaline shunting through his veins. “Sure,” he said quietly. “But if we don’t move now, there’ll be nobody to catch.”

  “Yup,” said Shoulders. He turned around. Rummaged in the boot of his squad car. He’d parked it in the middle of the thoroughfare. The man could take up space.

  “Want one of these?” He tossed Kage an assault rifle like it was made of straw. Kage almost fell over when he caught the weapon. It was heavier than he was. He gave it back.

  Shoulders whistled to himself as he strapped on his vest. He checked each buckle, tightening and loosening it until the fit was perfect. When Shoulders progressed to untying his shoes with infinite care, Kage couldn’t help it any longer.

  “Detective Shoulders, we’re in a hurry.”

  “My mother always said, ‘Rush not, want not.’”

  Kage shook his head. “You mean, ‘Waste not, want not?’”

  “I know what I mean,” said Shoulders, sliding one foot into a combat boot. He tested the fit. Wiggled his toes under the leather.

  “By the time you’re done, the Organ Thief will be well gone. And we’ll be left with a trail of bodies.”

  Shoulders glanced up. “Protocol fourteen point two states that in an assault on a dangerous target, the officers involved will ensure that all Bubble PD safety gear is worn at all times.”

  Shoulders untied the other lace.

  Kage swallowed his rising rage.

  “That reminds me. I really should check in with Weeks.” Shoulders tapped his glasses. “Yes, I’m at the location, sir. We believe the perp is inside. Uhuh … Yes, my thoughts exactly.” He looked to Kage. “Weeks says to wait for backup.”

  “You’re the backup,” said Kage.

  Shoulders leaned back against the squad car, and returned to his whistling.

  *

  Twenty. Fucking. Minutes.

  Kage called Una. Called Weeks. Called in every favor he could think of. No, the SWAT team couldn’t get there any quicker. No, he couldn’t enter Bacchus Mall alone, given the danger presented by a serial attacker.