by Larry Niven
"I heard a sound, which I now presume was this door being opened and then shut. There is fresh scent in this tunnel of a human male. He must have fled when our container's lights entered the trackway." The kzin showed his fangs and licked his chops with a deep-throated mrrrowl. "There is much fear in his sweat."
I went to thumb the door open but the plate had been ripped open and bypassed. Not even an ARM ident would work now. Closer inspection revealed the locking mechanism. A hole had been cut in the door's plasteel surface and a simple lever and pivot engaged the securing bolts inside. A metal pin attached to a chain could be inserted to hold the lever in the locked position. With the pin in place the door was proof against anything short of heavy energy weapons. The holes rendered the door useless in a depressurization emergency, but the smugglers wouldn't be worried about that.
I tried the handle reflexively. It didn't budge.
"I have already attempted that," said Hunter mildly.
"It's clear we're not going to get through. Let's seal this bay off and get the crime scene team down here."
I grabbed the comm unit from my patrol pack and called Dispatch. I didn't get anything but static. No repeaters in this unfinished section. Our runner had made a clean getaway.
Merral noticed the problem. "There's a Port Authority comm on the control board in the container." Hunter snarled in acknowledgement and launched himself back down the corridor, eager to be on with the chase.
I let him go, turning to Merral. "You know about this place?"
"Of course." She gestured at the door and the pirated wiring the smugglers had used to power their floodlights. "Although evidently I didn't know everything I thought I did."
"Tell me about it." We turned back down the corridor.
"This bay was supposed to serve a whole new industrial subsector they were going to put in right after the liberation. Turns out they overestimated the requirements and they never needed the space, so they just sealed it off and left it."
Her explanation made sense but there were other problems. "The tranship net doesn't even know it exists."
We turned the accessway corner into the main bay. Hunter jumped down from the container. "The crime scene team and a detachment of Goldskins are on their way. They will open the pressure door from the other side. I will meet them there." He leapt off again without waiting for an answer.
"Of course it does," Merral continued.
"It doesn't." I paused, decided to trust her. The smugglers already knew we were on to them anyway. "Miranda Holtzman's internal organs were found in a shipping container on Wunderland, along with a cache of stolen UN weapons. The container's point of origin was 19J2, but when I tried to punch up the data on it the system drew a blank."
"You did a shipping trace to get that data, right?"
"Yah."
She nodded. "When you do a trace, the net uses the billing system data because normally you're interested in who owns the shipment and who's paying for it. This bay isn't in the billing system because no customers are registered to it so it would never show up. But the routing software knows about every node around Alpha Centauri and that's the data set that gets used when a shipment is set up and verified."
The picture became clearer. "Is there any way someone could swap the source and destination addresses without a Port Authority ident, or at least without logging it in the computer?"
"Too easy." She laughed and tapped a few keys on a board at the base of the container racks. Its display came up with a duplicate of the inspection container's shipping panel. Another press brought up SRC and DST. She hit a final key and the readout flashed REJECTED for a moment and then, magically, TMU19J234C and TMUCA147A switched places from origin to destination. "You just refuse delivery."
"What?"
"You refuse delivery. If you accept the shipment, you need a PA ident to accept the COD, clear customs control, verify the manifest and all that. If you refuse delivery, the tranship box just gets bounced back to point of origin still sealed so none of that matters, so you don't need the ident. The shipper's delivery bond is forfeited to pay for shipping the container back and the transaction is cleared out of the net. It's a user function."
"A user function?" I couldn't believe my ears. "What happens if a refused shipment gets re-refused by the shipper?"
"Why would anyone do that?"
"What would happen?" I tried to keep my voice level.
She shrugged. "I don't know . . ." She paused, thinking. "Grounded at the originating port, I suppose. At worst it would go back to the recipient again. It couldn't get lost or redirected, only a PA ident can change the source or destination. Nobody could claim it unless they signed off with us." She paused again. "Unless . . ."
"Unless it got shipped here."
She nodded, understanding the problem. The tranship system had a couple of assumptions built into it — that the Port Authority was physically present at all the system endpoints, and that no shipper would refuse its own refused container. With dynamic encryption and multilayered security measures, the system was considered fail-safe. But a couple of reasonable assumptions made a security hole big enough to shove a twenty-meter container box through that wasn't defined as a failure. There were no hackers, no high-level corruption. The system just worked the way it was designed to. It was a brilliant setup, a sort of digital jujitsu. The smugglers were only caught because of human error. I wondered if they considered their system fail-safe too.
It would be a while before the crime scene team arrived. Merral scrambled up the container rack to call in her findings to her team. I took the opportunity to look into the cargo box on the loading ramp. I got a shock. The white crates were all clearly labelled. They contained high-tech drugs, each molecule assembled atom by atom in zero gravity. I recognized some of the names—Polyhalazone, Quadrol and Ricaline. Every case here was worth fifty thousand crowns at a minimum, at least treble that on the black market, and there were hundreds of cases. There was more in the container, stacked parcels of brown quickwrap a half meter on a side. I ripped one open. Brand new fifty krona wafers spilled onto the floor. I couldn't begin to guess how much was in the package. The next package yielded twenties. I ripped open a third. Hundreds. I picked one up and looked it over carefully. It gave away nothing to the naked eye although I knew it had to be counterfeit. I would have heard of a theft this big—the whole system would have. I was willing to bet it was a very good counterfeit. The Isolationists never did anything with half measures.
The scale wasn't half-measured either. I counted packages and did some quick mental arithmetic, then did it again because I didn't believe the results the first time. This container held a billion crowns at a conservative estimate. The krona isn't the rock solid currency it used to be. Its value has been steadily eroded since the start of the occupation and the slide has only accelerated since the liberation. Even so, a billion crowns was a staggering sum. A fraction of a percent of counterfeits in the cash supply will upset a currency's stability. With the Provo Government's grip already shaky, there was enough here to undermine the entire system's economy. If this container got through to Wunderland, Alpha Centauri would be in chaos within a month.
It wouldn't, though, because we'd gotten here first. I felt suddenly shaky. This was a major haul. I was well aware of what the Provos knew and did not know about the Isolationists. The scale of their smuggling system, their expansion into medical facilities and organlegging and their counterfeiting operation were all new pieces of information. We were going to get positive DNA idents from this site, and the Goldskin interrogators would get the names we didn't have from the ones we caught. This investigation was going to break the back of the Isolationists in the Swarm before they even got going and shut down a huge smuggling ring as well. The information we gained would let the Provopolizei put a major crimp in their operations on Wunderland too.
It was a good feeling—it was the way I used to feel when Prakit and I started to unravel one of our big cas
es back on Earth. And why not? This was just as big—maybe bigger. Tiamat might well wind up crowning my career and I'd only been here a month.
My enthusiasm damped itself. The whole Wunderland half of the project depended on the Provopolizei. They might well be "convinced" to close the case down by some pro-Isolationist politician.
I shook off the negative images. I was doing my job and doing it well. Wunderland was out of my control, but I'd already scored a major victory just by catching this shipment. No politician could take that away from me.
Merral came in, gasping when she saw the cash.
"Impressive, eh?"
She just nodded.
"Don't get too excited, it's not real."
She looked at the stacked packages "There must be hundreds of millions of crowns here."
"A billion at the very least."
She whistled. "They could crash the market with this."
"I think that's the plan."
She tore her gaze away from the money and handed me a hardcopy. "Here, you're going to need this."
It was from the data terminal in the inspection container. It listed thirty-six tranship boxes that had passed through 19J2 at some point, along with their points of origin, shipper, receiver and supposed manifest. This bay was a hub for smuggling activities ranging from UN outposts at the edge of the system to remote monorail stations deep in the Jotuns on Wunderland. One container was even shuttling back and forth from Earth itself.
Hunter came in and reported. "The crime scene team has arrived and the access tunnel has been secured." He took in the container's contents and for the first time ever I saw him at a loss. "There is . . . considerable wealth here."
"Almost certainly counterfeit."
"Of course." He was back in control that quickly. "Shall I inform the UNF authorities that they can recover their pharmaceuticals as soon as the team has finished their sweep?"
"I'll do it; you take over here." His practicality reminded me that there was plenty of work to be done. The bay was secure and the sweepers would give me a report. I had to start coordinating the authorities whose jurisdictions were on Merral's destination list. It was a big criminal organization. Not everyone would get warned in time. A lot of crooks were about to get caught.
Johansen came in with First Tracker in tow. I took some time to fill them in on the findings and set them to tracing our runner. The sweepers were already at work in the bay by the time I left. I tubed back to the office and got the paperwork under way. I'd only been at my desk half an hour when the screen chimed. I punched the call through. It was Suze.
"Hi, am I interrupting anything?"
I smiled. "Big exciting things, but I'm glad you called anyway."
"Why don't you knock off early and tell me about them?" Her smile was rich in promises.
"I really shouldn't . . ." I looked at my long list of to-dos " . . . but what the hell." Any excuse to dodge paperwork. A twelve-hour delay wouldn't make much difference in the course of the investigation. I was just sending preliminary reports anyway. Most of the information I needed wouldn't be back from the field lab until tomorrow.
"Great, your apt, thirty minutes. I'll order dinner."
"Sold." She punched off and I stored my work in progress.
* * *
Suze was waiting at the door when I got to my apt. I thumbed the plate and kissed her. We went in and I unslung my patrol pack and hung it on a hook by the door. She looked at it with curiosity.
"You carry a gun?"
"It's just a stunner."
"Does that have anything to do with your big exciting happenings?"
"Not a whole lot as it turns out. We closed down an Isolationist smuggling operation in an abandoned container bay today. And we know who killed Miranda."
"Who?"
"The Isolationists." I paused, then shut up. I'd been about to tell her about their organlegging operation, but there was no need to upset her.
She didn't notice my hesitation. "Catch anyone?"
"Not yet, but we will. We got a big pile of stolen drugs and about a billion in counterfeit krona as well."
She whistled. "That is big and exciting."
I grinned, still very pleased with the success. "I have to convince the management that I'm earning my pay."
"You won't get fired this week anyway." She reached past me and took my pack off the wall. "What else do you carry?"
"Just what you'd expect. Comm unit, binders, medkit, beltcomp, shockrod, that sort of thing."
She opened the pouch and examined the medkit. It was ARM issue on Earth, more advanced than what was given out here. "You're ready for anything, aren't you?"
"As much as I can be."
She took out the binders, simple double circlets of stainless steel—very low tech. She locked one cuff to her right wrist.
"Anything at all?"
She held out her arms towards me, wrists together. Her eyes were high voltage arcs. She wore a look of invitation and defiance—"I dare you."
I walked over and gently took her hands. Her gaze didn't waver. Without breaking eye contact, I lifted the other cuff and closed it around her left wrist. The lock is usually inaudible. This time the click sounded like a gunshot.
She parted her lips. I pulled her arms over her head and kissed her fervently, pulling her pliant body hard against mine. Eventually, I picked her up and carried her to the bedroom. My apt is on the .8G level and she was as light as a feather in my arms.
* * ** * *
The screen chimed, though I had it set for privacy, dragging me out of a deep sleep. Priority call. I punched it through and got the Goldskin dispatcher. Emergency. Johansen had arrested a suspect and shots had been fired. She was hit—no word on her condition yet—and the suspect was fleeing. The Goldskins were in pursuit but weren't pressing their quarry. He had a strakakker and was moving along a pedestrian promenade. They didn't want to provoke a firefight.
I didn't blame them. I punched the dispatcher into audio only and patched in security surveillance. They'd be following him on the monitors. The screen showed a crowded arcade from halfway up one wall. A surging disturbance in the throng marked the escaper. He was a dark-haired Wunderlander, running awkwardly in the low G, brandishing his weapon and screaming. People were desperately scrambling out of his way. As I watched, a startled kzin leapt straight up and grabbed a light fixture on the ceiling fifty feet overhead. The fugitive jerked his gun up to cover the sudden motion but didn't fire. Between his panic and lack of coordination, it was a miracle he hadn't already emptied the strakakker into the crowd. One hint of pursuit and he'd do just that. The Goldskins had made the right choice. Let him run, exhaust himself and then hole up somewhere. Even if he took hostages and wound up killing them all it would be no worse than a shootout down on that floor. Hopefully, it would turn out much better.
Hopefully.
Suze came up behind me, rubbing sleep from her eyes and looking very fetching with her hair tousled into a fiery halo and wearing an oversized jump-shirt from my wardrobe.
"What's going on?"
I spoke quickly. "We've got a runner. Tammy tagged a suspect from the container bay bust and got shot."
The dispatcher was still waiting for instructions. I split the screen and punched up Control's map. I got a floating 3D planview of the arcade and the levels around it. The fugitive was a tiny red ball on the .3G level, heading down-axis. Gold spheres marked the cops positioned around his route, moving to get ahead of him but staying out of the way. As long as he didn't open fire they'd stay there. Clusters of blue-marked med teams held in readiness. Control had sealed the pressure doors behind him but not ahead. Any route he chose was fine with them as long as it was off that arcade. I zoomed the map out and punched up a history trace. A red line showed his path. He was panicked but he wasn't running blindly. He was going straight down-axis, moving in every time he had a chance. He was heading for the low-G industrial zone near Tigertown.
Heading for the down
-axis hub.
I told the dispatcher as much and blanked the screen. Suze was looking over my shoulder and I nearly knocked her over as I got up to grab my clothes. I threw them on in record time and grabbed my patrol pack. At the door I paused long enough to kiss her good-bye.
"Back soon."
She grabbed me with surprising strength, kissed me hard and whispered fiercely in my ear. "Don't let him live."
"What?" I said, taken aback, not understanding.
"Don't let him live. If he's caught, there'll be a trial. He's an Isolationist, they can buy the court or blackmail it or break him out. He'll get away. It's not right, after what they did to that girl." Her gaze was intense, burning blue. "If he's shot while escaping . . ." She let her voice trail off.
She didn't need to say more. I kissed her fiercely and left.
Control had a tube car ready and held on standby. I jumped in, thumbed the plate and the door slid shut. The route panel was already set for the down-axis hub. The dispatcher obligingly shunted everyone else out of my way and I made the thirty-kilometer trip in record time. On the way, I thought about Suze's plea. An armed and dangerous fugitive killed while fleeing arrest. There would be no questions if I ordered shoot to kill. We'd lose the chance to interrogate him of course, but he wouldn't evade justice—and it would be justice. Even if he wasn't an Isolationist with blood on his hands, he'd proved murderous intent by shooting Johansen.
Frontier justice. It wasn't the way the ARM did business on Earth, but this wasn't Earth. Maybe I should issue shoot to kill orders anyway. It was a reasonable response given the situation. I had to think of the danger to my troops as well. Stunners don't have a lot of range and if the runner got off a burst before going down it would be messy, even if we fired first. Pulse rifles would more than even the odds.