The Debt Collector (Season 1)

by Susan Kaye Quinn

  “You can use my help,” she cuts me off in that earnest way of hers. “Can you still get Candy to give you access to her files?”

  “I don’t know. It’s going to be more tricky now.” I swallow. I didn’t plan on Elena ever knowing this part. “Look, I had to threaten her. Convince her that I would kill her.” I don’t say that actually killing Candy was more tempting than I want to admit. “But now that I’ve made the threat, she’s going to be ready for me. I can’t just stroll back into her office and pick up where we left off.”

  “What if she’s not expecting you?”

  “She’ll definitely be expecting me. She’s probably already called Kolek to get one of his mob henchmen to guard her office. They would both rather see me dead. Even if she hasn’t called in reinforcements, I’m pretty sure Candy will shoot me before I have a chance to get a hand on her.” I wince after the words are out of my mouth. I'm basically saying I would attack her.

  But Elena just nods thoughtfully again. The poisoned darts of disapproval have been sheathed, at least for the moment. “Maybe I can help you with that, too.”

  “What do you mean, too?”

  “What if you had your psych officer’s home address? She wouldn’t expect you there, right?”

  “Maybe not, but—”

  “And once you’re there, you can get access to her files. But you’re not going to have much time to search if you’ve got her looking over your shoulder, right?”

  “Well… she might be unconscious.” More squirming.

  “Even so, what are you going to look for?”

  She has a point.

  “Okay, Miss I-falsify-my-own-birthdate. What should I do?”

  She digs into her pocket and pulls out a flexible film with a tiny black dot in the center. “You plant this on her computer. Once she’s logged into the secure server at the Department, it will give me ghost access to everything. I can datadump her files to a secure grid, then mine them for patterns and maybe even augur some events. Pinpoint a vector that can help us.”

  “Um… okay.” I only understand half of what she’s saying. A very small half. I point to the film she’s holding between her fingertips. “So, you’re saying if I plant this on Candy’s computer while she’s logged in, you can get access to her Department files?”

  “Yes,” she says, like that was completely obvious.

  “And then you’ll…” I trail off hoping she’ll put it into English for me.

  “Then I’ll find the evidence we need to put an end to this insanity.” She gestures around us to the beds filled with kids. Some work on their screens, while others stare at the ceiling because that’s all they have strength for.

  “That’s what I thought you said.”

  “So?” she asks.

  “So what?”

  “So, will you do it? Let me help?”

  I don’t like the idea of Elena coming within a mile of Candy. But I’m really way out of my depth here. “Okay. I mean, as long as you’re just doing stuff remotely, it shouldn’t be dangerous. And it would be a tremendous help.”

  She looks relieved.

  I frown. “You thought I would say no, didn’t you?”

  Her lips purse. She hesitates, then says, “I would be accessing your files as well as everyone else’s and… I guess, you’d have to trust me.”

  I’m too stunned to say anything at first. Then I say quietly, “I’m the untrustworthy one, remember?”

  She gives a small smile. “And I’m the one who’s really good at lying.”

  I grin.

  She holds the film up for me to take.

  It’s so thin I’m not sure how to grab hold of it. “Um, how do I make this thing work, exactly?”

  “You snap it to activate the adhesive.” She demonstrates by taking the two ends between her delicate fingers and pulling them quickly apart. The film makes a small pop sound and turns purple. “Snap it again and it deactivates.” She does so, and it clears. “Once it’s active, put it on your finger or your palm. It will automatically stick and become virtually invisible. Just don’t touch anything metal with it until you’re ready to transfer it to her screen. The bio-glue will preferentially lift off your finger and transfer through the film to the other side and adhere to the metal surface. After that, it will be practically undetectable.”

  “How do you know all this stuff?” I ask, carefully taking the film from her.

  “I read a lot.”

  I lift an eyebrow.

  “And I have a lot of time on my hands.”

  That reaches inside me and stirs things around. An aching curiosity wells up and wants to know what she does with her time, besides spending endless nights in the chair next to Tilly. But the more I know about Elena, the less I think she’ll want anything to do with me, outside of rescuing kids. Maybe my efforts in that regard offset the fact that I’m planning to beat up my psych officer to do it. Maybe, in her mind, that makes me not as much of a monster. But she’s smart and beautiful and good and brave… the extreme opposite of everything debt collector. Still, I’m thinking of excuses to just talk to her, learn something more personal, when Grace scurries up to our side.

  “Lirium,” she says, slightly breathless. “There’s a man at the front door. He’s asking for you.”

  “What?” Alarm trips through my body. I shove Elena’s tiny spy film into my pocket. “What does he want?”

  “He says he knows you,” she says quickly. “His name is Dr. Brodsky.”

  My shoulders drop. “It’s all right—I do know him. Let me talk to him.” I leave Elena with a smile that says we’re not done talking yet and follow Grace to the front. I gave Madam A’s address to Dr. Brodsky, just in case, but I didn’t expect him to show up so soon.

  That doesn’t bode well for his granddaughter.

  Dr. Brodsky’s granddaughter isn’t as young as I expected. I guess I pictured Tilly when he talked about her, but she seems closer to twenty than ten. Madam A has them stopped cold at the entranceway, like she’s planning on pulling her gun on the seventy-year-old inventor and his granddaughter. Tatiana appears half-dead already, slumped in the wheelchair that Dr. Brodsky is leaning on.

  Madam A gives me a look like she’d rather pull the gun on me. She’s already fingered me for bringing more people to her cloistered hospice. And she’s not exactly wrong.

  “Dr. Brodsky meet Madam Anastazja,” I say, eyeing her. She stands ramrod straight, but the gun stays tucked in her silk holster behind her back.

  “Please forgive me, madam, for intruding on your home,” Dr. Brodsky says. “But you were right, young debt collector,” he says to me. “They had stopped giving Tatiana her life hits.”

  “I told you, Opa, they’re just being prudent,” Tatiana says with a wheeze. “No sense in wasting life energy when it’s just putting off the inevitable.”

  She adjusts her position in the chair. Her withered arms and legs take too little space in the cushioned confines and don’t seem to have enough muscle to make the movement happen. I’m uncomfortable just watching her. She should be in a hospital bed.

  Dr. Brodsky pats her shoulder. “All of life is simply putting off the inevitable, Tatiana. There is no crime in that.”

  “But there is in what you’re doing now, Opa.”

  “Some crimes are worth committing, are they not, debt collector?”

  “Yes, sir.” I turn to Madam A. “Dr. Brodsky is working on a technology that might, one day, help patients like the ones you keep here. I warned him about kids being transferred out, just in case…” I gesture to Tatiana. “Well, in case it got personal.”

  Madam A’s cool, glittering eyes regard Dr. Brodsky, and he stands up to the scrutiny well, returning it with his mechanical eye dilating and measuring her. Finally, she gives a short nod. “Grace will take Tatiana in back and find her a place to rest. She needs attending.”

  Grace hurries to Tatiana and wheels her toward the back of the entranceway.

  Madam A watches th
em go, then returns her gaze to Dr. Brodsky. “Perhaps we can discuss this technology of yours. Did you bring it with you?”

  “No. I keep a few small prototypes in my laboratory, which is all that really exists of the concept now, other than what I keep in here.” He taps the side of his head. “But I would be happy to discuss it with you, madam.” I’m afraid he’s coming off more crazy-old-man than brilliant-inventor, but Madam A seems to take him at his word. She beckons him to follow her.

  Before they leave, she gives me a cold look. “I hope you are quite done bringing strays into my house, Lirium. We have reached our quota.”

  “Yes, Ma’am,” I say and hold my smile until she turns her back.

  I stroll toward the apartment building that is my psych officer’s home in a slow, canvasing walk around the block. The apartment complex is more upscale than I expected, sleek white-and-gray granite blocks interspersed with glinting chrome balconies. The neighborhood is respectable as well, filled with the kind of potted palms and lush greenery that only money can maintain.

  Candy must make a tidy sum selling out kids’ lives.

  Elena sits in a coffee shop two blocks away. I insisted that she arrive there on her own, so we wouldn’t be connected, in case things went bad. But in spite of the upscale neighborhood, I’m worried. I swung past the café earlier, and the coffee shop clientele looked less interested in coffee than skeet. Elena and I waited until evening, hoping to gain some cover for my breaking-and-entering activities, but now I suspect the night-life here supports a hidden drug den in the back of the café. I don’t like the idea of Elena there alone, but she has to be in range for the data-dot-thing to work.

  I flip open my palm phone to call her. I already checked in before I arrived, but I want to be sure everything’s still good.

  She answers in one ring. “Hello?”

  “Hey, it’s me.”

  “I didn’t expect to hear from you so soon.” Her words are measured, tempered for whoever in the café might be listening in, but there’s worry in her voice.

  “Sorry, I’m just checking on you.”

  “I’m fine.” Impatience.

  Okay, I’m being obvious, but I can’t help it. “Watch out for anyone trying to sell you a hit. You can just tell them you’re not interested. And keep your head down. Don’t make eye contact with anyone, just, you know, look busy. Work on your screen.”

  “It’s not my first time in a café.”

  “It’s the skeet den in back that I’m worried about.”

  “Not my first time there, either.”

  “Wait… what?” I ask.

  There’s a soft laugh on the other end.

  “You’re messing with me, aren’t you?”

  “Don’t you have somewhere to be?” she asks, but I can hear the laugh still playing in her voice.

  “Right. Sorry. I forgot how much of a badass you are. I’m hanging up now.” But I don’t. I wait to see what she says.

  “Good luck. I’ll be waiting.”

  I hang up, not sure if the smile on my face should be there or not. But thoughts of what I’m going to do next wipe the grin from my face.

  Getting into Candy’s apartment won’t be difficult—it would be harder if she lived somewhere lower rent. But the centralized security system in her building apparently has to register with the local law enforcement, fire department, and other public safety offices: all government agencies which share information with the Department of Life and Health. Elena’s ability to get hold of the passcode both makes my job easier and scares the shit out of me. And makes me worry for her again.

  She’s risking a lot to help me.

  I remind myself this isn’t for me. Or her. It’s for the kids who are having their lives stolen by Candy and whoever else is involved. Part of me wants to walk in and drain the life out of her until she tells me everything she knows. We’d get what we need, and it would be immensely satisfying in the process. And I’d give that life back to the kids she stole it from—justice all around.

  But that wouldn’t stop it from happening again.

  If I leave Candy dead in her apartment, whoever she works for is going to start covering their tracks. And if I don’t leave her dead, she’ll call them, and the result will be the same. So, keeping Candy unaware of my true intentions is still the only way to make this work.

  Really unfortunate.

  I arrive at the front door of Candy’s apartment complex and stride up like I’m supposed to be here. I swipe my palm to open the door. There’s a quarter-second beat when nothing happens, and I’m afraid the passcode doesn’t work, then the door tones and slides open. I take the elevator—all mirrored walls and shiny stainless—to the nineteenth floor. I guess blood money is one way to live above the smog.

  I hesitate in front of Candy’s door, one of only three on the floor. I’d like to keep this quiet if at all possible. It won’t help if the neighborhood watch decides to call the police.

  I switch the passcode on my palm to the one for her door and swipe my hand past the sensor. It slides open and I stride in, hoping to find Candy before she finds me. There’s no one in the living room off the entryway, but a light shines from down the hall to the left. I walk slowly to keep my boots silent on the polished wood floor of the hall and manage to steal up to the open door of her bedroom without a sound. She sits in bed, screen in her lap, legs buried in a satiny-white comforter.

  Unfortunately, she sees me at the edge of her door before I can make a move inside. My black trenchcoat and boots give me away even before she looks at my face. I sprint toward the bed, rushing at her, but she’s already rolled to the side and yanked open the drawer of her bedside table. Just as I scramble across the slippery comforter, I see the gun.

  I lunge, going for the bare skin exposed by the hiked-up back of her pajama shirt, but she swings the gun toward me, so I grab for that instead. My hand locks around hers and the gun. I could drain her, but her finger is on the trigger, and the tiny muzzle is uncomfortably close to my ribcage. Plus any gunshots will bring the police.

  I wrench her hand with the gun away from my body. She rakes her dagger-like nails across my face. I growl through the pain and slam her hand against the bedside table. The gun drops and tumbles across the carpet.

  I start to drain her, and her body tenses up. She’s stretched half off the bed, so we both slide to the carpeted floor. I keep a grip on one of her hands, while I bring the other to my face. Life energy pulses through the contact on my cheek, giving me a hit through the raw flesh where she carved lines in my face. The sting eases, and the flush of life energy helps to calm my breathing. I’m tempted to keep drawing her down, drain her completely, but I’ve got to stick to plan. I pick up her screen off the floor, where it was flung during our brief fight. Elena’s magic dot is adhered to my pinky, so I make sure to press that to the backside of the screen before setting it in front of Candy and letting her go.

  She gasps and recoils from me. While she fights to suck in oxygen and recover, I stand and scoop up her gun. It’s small, and it makes me wonder where her standard-issue weapon from the Agency is stashed. Hopefully, not nearby. Her bedside gun is probably the one she uses for her unofficial dirty business.

  I hunch down to peer at her. “That’s really no way to treat one of your debt collectors, Candy.”

  “Lirium.” She coughs. “I didn’t realize it was you—”

  “I understand,” I cut her off in my most patronizing voice. “You were too busy going for the gun.” I tap my chin with one hand while keeping the gun lazily pointed at her. “Let’s see, where were we? Before our discussion in your office was interrupted… right, you were going to submit that transfer request for me.”

  She stares at the screen I’ve left on the floor, then looks back to me. “The what?”

  “The… trans-fer… re-quest.” I say it slow, like she’s mentally impaired. “You know, the official document that says I never have to see you again. You would like that, wouldn’
t you?”

  “I… um…” She frowns, like she can’t believe I broke into her apartment just to get her to submit a form. And it is a fairly flimsy excuse. It makes more sense that I’m here to kill her.

  I stand up, take a step closer, and point the gun at her head. “Do you have a problem with that?” I figure logic doesn’t have much of a chance when you’re looking down the business end of a weapon, even if it is a tiny, snub-nosed one like Candy’s.

  “No!” She cringes, holding a hand out against the gun. “I just… okay! I’ll enter your request, just give me a second.” She picks up the screen and quickly swipes across it.

  I wave the gun at her. “Show me.” I bark the words and she jumps. I don’t want her calling the police or sending some kind of message. She scoots to the side, so I can see what she’s doing. She’s on the official Agency page, tapping in her login. When it brings up the internal screen, I try not to show my relief.

  Now I just need to buy some time for Elena to do her data snatching thing.

  I hunch down again to talk to her, cozy, like we’re friends. “I’m really going to miss you, Candy.” A little crazy talk should help keep her off balance. “We were just getting to know each other.”

  She flinches but doesn’t look at me, just keeps tapping on the screen. The transfer request form fills out in record time.

  “Which…” She falters. “Which division in Florida do you want?”

  “Pick one,” I say. “You know I’m not idiot enough to go there, right? So don’t bother sending any rental-thugs. I’d just like to keep collecting my government check for a while.”

  She taps in more information, her fingers shaking. When it’s complete, she submits it and looks up at me.

  “I did what you asked.” There’s a quiver in her voice. “Now you don’t need to… you can let me go.” She’s looking at me like she thinks I’m crazy, which will work as well as any explanation I can come up with.

  “Good girl.” I switch the gun to my left hand and hold out my right arm. “Now log in my tracker.”