by Eric Brown
‘Where the hell did Kim meet this monster?’ Halliday asked.
‘He came into one of her restaurants after a fight,’ Casey said.
‘Wonder what the hell she sees in him ...’
Casey smiled to herself and squeezed his arm.
King disposed of his opponent a minute into the fourth round, laying the guy out with a lightning combination of punches to the head and a telling kick to the midriff.
Cue the clichéd victory celebrations, the hoisting of the champion from the ring. It struck Halliday, as did every sporting event he’d had the misfortune to find himself watching, as a microcosmic example of the overwhelming futility of human endeavour. But then what had Kim called him, more than once: something along the lines of a heartless cynic?
Halliday gave it five minutes, then turned to Casey. ‘Wait here, I’m going to talk to the champ.’
‘Can I come with you?’
He hesitated. ‘You met this guy before?’
‘A couple of times, with Kim.’
He nodded. There was a chance that Casey’s presence might have the effect of loosening his tongue. ‘Okay, follow me.’
They moved around the ring, towards a corridor thronged with jostling pressmen. Halliday fought his way through, pulling Casey after him. A big cop stood before the door to the dressing rooms.
Halliday flashed his old NYPD ID card and the cop stood aside. He passed down a half-lit corridor high with the odour of sweat and oil. Stewards in blue overalls moved back and forth. A bodyguard stood outside the door of a dressing room, legs spread, arms behind his back.
‘Jimmy King in there?’ Halliday asked.
‘Who wants to know?’
Halliday hung his ID.
‘A cop? What you want?’
‘Well, I’m not an autograph hound, buddy. Tell the champ I’m investigating the disappearance of Kim Long, okay?’
The bodyguard hesitated, then turned and ducked into the dressing room, pulling the door shut behind him.
‘What if he won’t let you in?’ Casey asked.
Halliday drew the neural incapacitator from his jacket pocket and held it up for Casey’s inspection. Before she could reply, the door opened and the guard appeared, bulking from the small opening like a genie from a lamp.
‘Jimmy says he’ll see you when he’s dressed.’
Halliday nodded. ‘That sounds reasonable.’
They waited in the corridor. Halliday said, ‘Some fight?’
The guy grunted. ‘Every bout fixed weeks back, so what the fuck?’
‘And I thought the great tradition of American sports was unsullied by such things.’
The guy just looked at him, expressionless.
Someone rapped on the other side of the door, and the bodyguard stood aside and pulled it open. Halliday stepped into the dressing room, followed by Casey.
Jimmy King was dressed in a black tracksuit, and he still wore his trademark headband. Out of the ring he looked reduced, much smaller than Halliday had imagined.
He had the sudden, involuntary vision of Kim and the champ in bed.
Someone, his coach or whoever, was jabbering to King in Vietnamese. Halliday displayed his ID to the coach and gestured to the door. ‘Get out.’
The coach glanced at Jimmy, who nodded. The guy quit the room.
Jimmy King shifted a quick glance from Halliday to the girl, who was standing by the door. ‘Hey, Casey, how’s things?’
She smiled shyly. ‘Fine, Jimmy.’
Halliday indicated a bench. ‘Sit down. Make yourself comfortable. You must be tired after all that running around?’
Watching Halliday with suspicion, Jimmy King sat down.
Halliday sat on a bench across from the boxer, rested his elbows on his knees and looked across at King. Casey remained by the door.
‘When was the last time you met Kim Long, Jimmy?’
King shrugged. ‘I don’t know. A month ago, maybe more.’ He looked from Halliday to Casey. ‘Why, what’s happened? You said Kim was missing.’ He picked up a towel and mopped the sweat from his face.
‘She’s been gone around a week.’ Halliday stared at the boxer. ‘What do you know about it?’
‘Me?’ King gave a fine imitation of pained incredulity. ‘Listen, friend, I haven’t seen Kim for weeks. We split up. She found someone else—’
Halliday digested this. ‘She did?’ He realised he was sweating. His fist clenched around the incapacitator in his pocket. ‘You didn’t like being dumped, so what did you do to Kim, champ?’
‘Me? I did nothing. Last time I saw her, we talked.’
‘Who’s she seeing?’
King shrugged. ‘I don’t know.’
‘You’d better tell me, champ.’ Halliday pulled the incapacitator from his pocket. The boxer watched him, his eyes wide. ‘Was it a silver-haired guy, old, in his sixties?’
‘I told you, I don’t—’
He surprised even himself, then. He leapt up and rammed the incapacitator into the guy’s midriff, squeezing out a small charge - just enough to have the champ squirming on the floor as the voltage scrambled his neural network.
Casey gave a small shriek and covered her mouth with her hand.
Halliday had heard that the pain inflicted by an NI was exquisite. He stood over the boxer, staring down at the tortured expression on his face.
He reached down, took hold of a handful of tracksuit, and pulled King to his feet. He dropped him onto the bench, grabbed him by the neck and lowered his mouth to the boxer’s mashed ear.
‘If you don’t tell me who the fuck she’s seeing, champ, and anything else you might know about what’s happened to her, I’ll make damned sure you never fight again. Got that?’
‘I. . .’ The guy worked his mouth, trying to speak. ‘I don’t know who’s she’s seeing. But—!’ he screamed, hands raised, as Halliday moved to make good his promise. ‘Kim ... she’s been strange. Acting strange. Secretive. She was involved in something. I don’t know what. I heard her talking on her com. Mentioned something about some Methuselah Project.’
Halliday raised the incapacitator. ‘What else you heard, champ?’
The boxer’s eyes widened in fright. ‘I ... she’s been seeing someone. A friend. They’re both involved.’
‘The friend’s name?’
The boxer was obviously struggling to recall the name. ‘She ... she’s called Anastasia.’
‘Surname?’
‘Dah. Anastasia Dah. She has an apartment in the Kennedy building, off Broadway.’
Halliday knelt and patted King’s sweat-soaked cheek. The champ flinched. ‘Anything else you think I might need to know?’
King shook his head. ‘That’s everything ... everything I know. Wish - wish I’d never met the bitch!’
Halliday smiled. ‘That makes two of us, champ.’
He dragged King from the bench and dumped him behind a row of lockers, so that he’d be hidden from view when the door opened.
He looked up and saw Casey, staring at him. ‘What? You wanted to come along, Casey. How do you think I conducted interrogations?’
She just looked away.
‘Come on, let’s see what this Anastasia has to say for herself.’
He took her hand and they hurried from the dressing room. Another bout was in progress in the diamond-bright glare of the ring. They left the roar of the crowd in their wake and emerged into the hot night.
As they walked to the car, Casey said, ‘I’m bushed, Hal. Is it okay if you drive me home?’
‘Sure. No worries.’
She was silent in the passenger seat as Halliday drove uptown towards El Barrio. He looked across at her. ‘Casey...’
She said in a small voice, ‘You didn’t need to have done that to him.’
‘Hey, Casey, he got off lightly—’
‘He would’ve talked without you using that thing on him.’
‘Like hell he would. He wouldn’t have said a damned thing. I had to f
ind out what he knew, and I found out. And now I have a lead or two. You want me to find Kim, yes?’
She avoided his glance, muttered, ‘What do you think?’
He fell silent. He wondered if Casey was right, if perhaps there might have been a more humane way of going about extracting the information he desired from King. How much had his actions been provoked by simple jealousy?
They turned onto East 106th Street and headed west. They passed Thai Joe’s VR Bar where, before he’d bought his own jellytank, Halliday had spent a lot of tank time. Fat Joe was waddling up and down the sidewalk, resplendent in a multicoloured Hawaiian shirt. Halliday wondered how trade was, now that citizens could afford their own jellytanks.
‘You’re not going to use that thing on the woman, are you? On Anastasia?’
Halliday looked at her. ‘I’d never—’
‘What?’ she said, meeting his gaze. ‘You’d never use it on a woman? Not even if you needed to know something real bad?’
He didn’t reply. He knew the answer to that one. He remembered one time back when he worked for the police...
‘I’m just going to talk to her. I won’t even mention I’m a detective. I’ll tell her I’m a friend of Kim’s, okay?’
She gave a small nod.
‘Casey, all I want is to make sure Kim’s safe. And I’m gonna do whatever I need to do to find out.’
She nodded again, not looking at him.
He drew up outside her apartment block.
‘Hey, if you want to go out sometime, Casey ... Just give me a call, okay?’
She smiled and touched his hand. ‘Yeah, okay. I’ll do that, Hal.’
She slipped from the car and hurried across the sidewalk.
He watched her go, then pulled out into the street.
The Methuselah Project, he thought, as he turned onto Fifth Avenue and headed downtown towards Broadway.
What the hell was the Methuselah Project?
* * * *
Six
The Kennedy building was a four-storey apartment block on East Houston Street. Built during the boom period twenty years ago, it was the residence of fifty or so seriously rich citizens. Halliday found all this out from the Net as he sat in the Ford across the street from the building. He also learned that Anastasia Dah was the director of a casting agency in the VR entertainment industry. Kim was certainly moving in elevated circles, these days.
He considered whether he should use his police identification and go in there in a supposedly official capacity, or play on Dah’s sympathies - if she were the type of woman who had such things. He could say he was a friend of Kim’s, concerned for her whereabouts.
He tapped her code into his com and waited.
The small screen flashed, and the head of a striking black woman stared out at him. ‘Anastasia Dah. Who is this?’
‘Halliday. You don’t know me. I’m a friend of Kim Long.’
He watched the woman, looking for the slightest reaction.
She merely nodded, non-committal. ‘I think Kim mentioned you, once. What do you want?’
‘I want to talk to you about Kim,’ he said.
‘Is she in trouble—?’
‘I’ll discuss that with you in person, Ms Dah. Now, if you don’t mind. I’m right outside. If you could spare a few minutes...’
‘I’m afraid that’s impossible. I’m extremely busy.’
He hung his police ID card before the screen. ‘We can do this one of two ways. Either you can give me a few minutes of your precious time, or I can take you down to the station. That might take a little longer.’
Anastasia Dah glanced off screen. ‘I can give you fifteen minutes, Mr Halliday. I’m on the fourth floor, apartment two.’
He cut the connection, pulled the case onto his lap and lifted the lid. If Dah was still in contact with Kim, then he’d be wise to plant a transceiver in her apartment. He slipped a cache of bugs into his jacket pocket, then considered the surgical gloves.
He slipped a hand into the transparent envelope and pulled on a glove. The membranous polymer material shrank around his right hand, visually indistinguishable from his flesh. He tried to detect any sign of the nano-devices that apparently coated the palm of the glove. All he saw were the lines that criss-crossed his skin - the life-line that Kim had once happily announced indicated a long and prosperous existence.
He locked the Ford and crossed to the building. A liveried concierge allowed him into the air-conditioned chill of a lobby full of artificial palms. He rode the elevator to the fourth floor, avoiding his reflection in the mirrored interior, and emerged into a sumptuous corridor of polished timber and thick carpeting.
He found Dah’s apartment and knocked. The door opened almost instantly, swinging back to reveal a vision of sybaritic excess. The carpet resembled thick white fur, and the furnishings, two huge sofas and three armchairs, were upholstered in similar fashion. The effect was as if a family of polar bears had been sacrificed at the whim of some crazed interior designer.
Halliday stepped into the room, his feet snagging on the thick pile. The door swung shut automatically behind him.
Anastasia Dah wore a scarlet wrap that contrasted strikingly with the ebony perfection of her skin. The electronic image of her as relayed by his com-screen had failed to do her beauty full justice: she was perhaps the most glamorous woman Halliday had ever met. He guessed that she was in her mid-twenties, with high cheekbones and lips that appeared constantly amused.
‘I appreciate you taking the time to talk to me, Ms Dah,’ Halliday said, holding out his hand.
Dah took it, and Halliday squeezed. ‘As long as we can conclude the interview within fifteen minutes, Mr Halliday.’
‘I don’t see why it should take any longer.’ He looked around the room. ‘Quite a place ...’ He noticed, through a door that stood ajar to the right of the entrance, the sleek shape of a Tidemann’s jellytank. The console at the head of the tank sequenced through a series of menus.
She was barefoot, and the wrap was drawn tight around her voluptuous form without a hint of any clothes beneath.
Halliday indicated the tank. ‘I’m sorry if I’ve delayed your immersion,’ he said.
‘Likewise,’ she said, her gaze taking him in from head to foot. ‘I’m sorry if I’ve dragged you away from your own.’
He shrugged, damned if he was going to let her see that her barb had found the target. ‘I use VR a lot in the line of duty, Ms Dah.’
‘Then that’s something we have in common.’ She smiled, gesturing to one of the furred sofas. As Halliday sank into the cushions, she went on, ‘I tank for an hour every day, Mr Halliday. It’s one of the perks of the job.’ She sat on the opposite sofa and crossed her long legs.
He noticed, with satisfaction, that she was absently scratching the palm of her right hand.
‘You’re the director of a VR casting agency?’ He looked around the walls of the apartment. Perhaps a dozen large pix showed Anastasia Dah in the company of holo-actors and VR stars. ‘I understand that the stars are computer-generated these days. So why the need for casting agencies?’
‘I cast the actors and models who provide the original templates for the computer-generations,’ she explained. ‘We’re always looking for new faces, as well as creating new personas from scratch, of course.’
‘Pity the poor actors who find themselves out of work,’ Halliday commented. ‘I know Vanessa Artois. She quit the business when all they wanted from her was her identity. She wanted to act.’
‘I hear she’s doing well in Hollywood,’ Dah said. ‘Isn’t she working in live theatre these days?’ There was something insufferably smug in the way Dah phrased the question.
‘So I believe,’ he said, ‘but I didn’t come here to drop names.’ He set his com to record and placed it on the glass-topped coffee-table between them.
‘How long have you known Kim Long?’ he asked.
‘We met at a party perhaps six months ago,’ she said. ‘C
an you tell me why you’re interested?’
He watched her. ‘Kim went missing some time last week,’ he said. ‘I’m questioning her friends and acquaintances. If you’ve any idea at all where she might be ... When did you last have contact with her?’