"Now what?" he asked.
"I need a few days to find out why and who. I can keep it out of the newsnets that long, but you better be prepared for it to hit. If I come up with answers, you could-" He stopped himself. He almost said, you could turn it to your advantage. It surprised him for a moment.
"That's Lio's job," Rega said, following his thoughts. He closed his eyes again. "Both of them now," he whispered. He sighed. "I have a campaign to win. Do what you have to do to find them. If it costs me the election, so be it." His eyes glistened now. He stood. "Thank you for…for coming by, Coren. I know this wasn't easy for you."
"For either of us."
"Do you have any ideas yet?"
"Possibilities. Do you want to know?"
"No. Not till you finish. Then I want to know everything."
"Yes, sir."
As Coren started for the door, Rega caught his arm.
"Everything, Coren."
Rega let go and walked away, toward the bedroom. Coren waited till the door snicked shut before he left. By the time Coren returned to his office, third shift was just ending. His stomach churned-the carrot had triggered his hunger-so he stopped by a small carry-out within walking distance of his building and bought a sandwich.
"Good morning," the Desk greeted him. "Please verify identity."
Coren sat down and went through the procedure, unwrapping his sandwich with his free hand.
"Welcome, Mr. Lanra. You have two messages. One from Myler Towne, one from Ambassador Burgess, Auroran Embassy."
Coren stopped chewing. "Burgess? Time."
"Six-ten."
Half an hour ago.
Coren finished chewing and swallowed. "The one from Myler Towne-is it a repeat of the first message?"
"Yes, sir."
"File it. "
"Yes, sir."
"No word from Jeta Fromm?"
"No, sir."
"Anything further on Yuri Pocivil?"
"No, sir."
"Ree Wenithal?"
"Yes, sir. Public records plus case logs, per parameters."
"Good, good. New search. I want to know who owns Improvo Shipping and Storage, and which freighter and passenger lines it does business with."
"Yes, sir."
Coren stretched lazily until his shoulder twinged. "Did you make that physician's appointment?"
"Yes, sir. Your physician has an opening six days from now, second shift."
Good thing it's not an emergency, Coren thought wryly. "Okay. What specifically do you have on Wenithal? Display."
The screen rose from the desk and file headers scrolled down. Coren caught the words "Nova Levis" and said "Stop. Case file number 82-791-AKB. Review."
"Infant abduction case involving several prominent families. Ree Wenithal primary investigator. Eighteen month investigation culminating in sixty-two percent recoveries and the closing of eight orphanages and four bioremedial research laboratories. "
"How does Nova Levis figure in?"
"R and D facility which came under investigation relative to Ree Wenithal's investigation. Laboratory cleared of any charges."
Cleared…but the name scared Wenithal just the same…
"Collate the particulars: names of families, the children involved, witness lists, and other sources."
"Yes, sir. Do you wish to audit Ambassador Burgess's message?"
"Not yet. Alert me two hours from now."
"Yes, sir."
He rubbed his face and eyes as if to massage away the fatigue.
He felt incompetent. Things had gotten away from him already. It had happened before, but he never got used to it. So much of police work relied on chance and luck-the rest was a question of tenacity. Coren had a good track record of wearing a case down until he solved it. But that took time, and right now he did not have that luxury. He needed to know now.
He had lost Jeta Fromm. That was his one chance of finding out about that strange robot quickly enough to find Nyom's killers before the murders went public. The more time passed, the less likely he could wrap this up before the news broke.
Going to Brun Damik had been a gamble. Not a bad one, Coren thought, considering the rearrangement of shipping schedules out of his office for Petrabor. And Damik did know something. But instead of the answer that would have made Coren's life easier, he led him to Ree Wenithal. In truth, despite the curious fact that Damik had called Wenithal first after Coren's visit, Coren would have walked away from Wenithal as a useless lead.
Except for Wenithal's reaction to the name Nova Levis. But now Coren knew that Nova Levis was the name of a research lab. How did that relate to the colony? And what did kidnapping have to do with it?
"Desk, display data package received from Sipha Palen."
The screen came up. A menu scrolled across it. Coren read through the choices-autopsy, crime scene, material forensics-and touched the icon over crime scene.
The screen showed the cargo bin. Coren hesitated, then accessed the internal view.
Bodies stacked in couches crowding the walls…
He reached for the screen and accesssed the image of the dead Brethe dealer, then gazed at it thoughtfully. "Desk, I want a search for all manufacturers of prosthetic devices. Find a match for the hand pattern found on the woman's shoulder, and the type of prosthetic capable of doing this kind of damage."
"Yes, sir."
"End," he said. The screen went blank. "I'll go over it later."
"Yes, sir."
He scooped up his sandwich and went into his private space. He was tired and hungry and the painblock had worn off sometime in the last hour. It would do no good to rush into anything as unexpected as this.
The images of Nyom still covered the table. He gathered them up and placed them back in the carton. He sat down then, and finished eating.
Eight
He woke up with a stiff neck on top of the bruises. He swallowed another painblock and went to his desk.
"Good morning, sir," the Desk said. "Analysis and collation on the provided data completed. Do you wish a summary?"
"In a moment. I need coffee right now." He switched his samovar on. The machine hummed gently to life. Dark, steaming liquid filled a cup below the spigot. Coren breathed in the steam. "Any more messages?"
"None. Do you wish to review those in the queue?"
"Play Ambassador Burgess's."
Coren heard the flatscreen scroll up from the desktop, but he stood by the samovar, eyes closed, sipping his coffee.
"Mr. Lanra, I would like to apologize for any abruptness I may have exhibited with you yesterday. It has come to my attention that our interests may intersect. I would appreciate another opportunity to talk about it. I'll be in my office the rest of the day. "
Coren opened his eyes. "Hm. I wonder what I disturbed. Connect to Ambassador Burgess."
"Yes, sir."
A few seconds later a crisp male voice said, "Ambassador Burgess's office, how may I help you?"
Coren went to the desk. On the flatscreen he saw the face of Burgess's aide, Hofton. "Coren Lanra. I'm returning the Ambassador's call."
"Of course. Wait one moment while I put you through."
The screen went pale gray, then Ariel Burgess appeared. Her eyes looked slightly puffy; perhaps she had gotten as little sleep as he.
"Ambassador Burgess."
"Mr. Lanra, thank you for returning my call so promptly."
"I admit I'm puzzled at this turnaround."
"No more than I am. Perhaps between the two of us we can make sense of some of it. Would you care to meet with us again?"
"When?"
"As soon as convenient for you."
"Right now, frankly, nothing is convenient. How about-" he glanced at the time chop "-ten. That'll give me a chance to clean up a little. "
"That would be excellent. Here?"
"Certainly. I know the way."
She almost smiled at that. "Till then, Mr. Lanra."
The screen blanked.<
br />
"Desk, give me a summary of the analysis on the data I gave you. "
"Specify order."
"Um…" He rubbed his eyes, remembering. "Update on Yuri Pocivil?"
"No further progress."
"Improvo Shipping. "
"Improvo Shipping and Storage is a subsidiary owned outright by the Hunter Group. It has been in operation for thirty-eight years with ninety-two facilities within Sol System and fifty-one facilities located on various Settler worlds. The Hunter Group itself is an offworld company, headquarters on Cassus Thole."
"Really. How many employees within this system?"
"Six hundred seventy-two thousand."
"How many of those are immigrant?"
"Two thousand seven hundred."
"How many of those are natives of Cassus Thole?"
"Eleven hundred twenty-two."
"Uh-huh. Interesting. No list of board members?"
"No such list available at this time."
"Continue search, see if you can find one. Also, I want a list of all Hunter Group holdings. Next, the data from Wenithal's case file."
"The last case he worked on was a major kidnapping ring. It developed from an investigation into a single instance which led him to uncover a global operation with offworld connections. Infants were being sold through various vendors-primarily orphanages and child hospice centers-to offworld buyers."
Coren's interest spiked. "Go on. That sounds familiar. What's in the case file?"
"The record obtained from the public police database contains categorized tables, names cross-referenced in hierarchical tabulations according to assigned probabilities."
"Sounds like his interview and suspect lists."
"Correct. Three hundred seventy-nine names listed, all time-indexed over an eleven-year period beginning twenty-nine years ago, ending eighteen years ago. Of those with current public record files available, two hundred and ninety are deceased-"
"Stop. Two hundred and ninety dead?"
"Correct. "
"Pattern analysis. Common factors?"
"One hundred thirty fatalities occurred within an eight month period. Ninety-seven died of age-related factors. Eighty-three died as the result of fatal accident. Sixty-eight died as the result of fatal interaction-"
"You mean homicide."
"That is a legal definition not applicable in all instances. "
"They were killed by other people. "
"With certain qualifications, yes. "
"Continue."
"Thirty-nine died of causes unverifiable due to inaccessibility of data."
"Explain."
"Deceased were offworld at the time of death. There were irregularities in subsequent reporting."
"Hard copy, names, places, dates, and cause of death." Coren watched while the Desk produced a disk for him. "Give me current disposition of surviving members of the list."
"Of the eighty-nine remaining names, forty-three are serving sentences in rehabilitation clinics, eighteen have emigrated to Settler colonies, and five are residents in hospice centers. Displaying list of remaining twenty-three."
Coren read down the rows until he came to a name he recognized. He whistled.
"Alda Mikels…interesting." He read on. "A few of these people are prominent public figures. I-" He stopped, startled. "Rega Looms."
Coren stared at the name for a long time. He retrieved his hemisphere then and set it into its niche on the desktop.
"Desk, download contents of last recorded exchange."
"Done."
"Play back." Coren listened to his conversation with Ree Wenithal again. When he reached the point where he told Wenithal that Nyom Looms was dead, he said, "Stop there. Subject said something below normal range of hearing. Amplify and enhance. "
From the desk speaker he heard Wenithal, in a raspy whisper, say "Both of them now."
"End playback." Coren looked at Rega's name on the screen. "'Both of them now.' What does that mean?"
"Unknown," the Desk said. Rega had said something very similar. Both of whom?
"Desk, give me a hard copy on these names, then file and return to standby. "
Coren went into his private room to clean up and change clothes. He wanted to go back to his apartment and stretch out for several hours' decent sleep, but he lacked the time.
He slipped the disks into his pocket and drummed his fingers on the edge of the desk. Several years ago, Coren remembered, Alda Mikels and a few others invited Rega Looms to join a business consortium which seemed to Looms at the margins of legality-gray market at least, if not black market. Some of those people were on Wenithal's list. Considering Looms' attitude toward most of them, Coren wondered why they would have approached him in the first place. Perhaps the association went back further than Rega had told him.
"Desk, I want a review of the last twenty-three names, those surviving and still on Earth. Initiate a records search and correlate common associations for the past twenty years. "
"Parameters?"
"Education, business, investments, public service, children." He hesitated. "If nothing turns up, expand search to thirty years. "
"Yes, sir."
Coren disliked investigating his own employer. Sometimes, though, protecting Rega Looms required that he know things Looms probably preferred he did not.
"Also, get me a thorough background on Ree Wenithal. Retired, law enforcement, currently runs his own import-export firm."
"Public file previously referenced-"
"I want a deeper background."
"Yes, sir."
"Also…also, display crime scene image from Sipha Palen's data."
The view spread across the screen. He stared at the bodies as the view rotated slowly through three-hundred-sixty degrees. Fifty-two people.
"Give me a copy of this, too, " he said. One more disk extruded from the slot.
He ran down the list of instructions just given and tried to think of anything overlooked. Nothing came to mind but he could never quite shake the feeling that he had missed something. Without Jeta Fromm or the dockworker Pocivil, all he had was Nyom's collapsed robot.
There's never enough time to do this right… The Spacer Embassy occupied a huge area on the eastern edge of D.C., in the heart of the government districts. Embassies, really, as the structure contained the missions for all the Spacer Worlds. Most had one set of offices, usually unoccupied. Of the Fifty Worlds, only a dozen maintained full-time staffs on Earth, Aurora and Solaria being the largest.
Just living on Earth marked these people as unique. Most Spacers disdained other worlds, especially the one that spawned them so long ago. But no group is completely homogeneous, and Spacers proved no exception. The total Spacer population on Earth never exceeded a few tens of thousands-a handful compared to populations in the many millions-but their presence made a powerful impression on Terrans.
Of them all, Coren reflected as he entered the main gallery of the Embassy, he preferred the Aurorans-they were the most approachable, the least defensive, compared to the xenophobic Solarians. To be sure, those Solarians living here did not share the degree of paranoia exhibited by most of their people in dealing with outsiders, but they still came across as standoffish and mistrustful.
Coren signed in at the reception desk and patiently received directions to the Auroran arm of the embassy building. He then retraced his path from the previous day.
Hofton met him in the reception lounge of Ambassador Burgess's offices. "The Ambassador is expecting you, Mr. Lanra. Mr. Avery is here as well. I trust this is acceptable."
"Completely."
Hofton escorted him into Burgess's office and closed the doors.
Ariel Burgess looked tired, with the beginnings of dark circles under her eyes. Derec Avery seemed much the same as he had yesterday.
"Mr. Lanra," Burgess said, rising from her seat and coming around the desk to clasp his hand. "Thank you for giving us a second opportunity to discuss your problem with u
s."
"Thank you, Ambassador. I have to tell you, I'm a little dismayed. "
"I'm a little surprised myself. It seems we have a parallel interest in your situation."
"Parallel interest…quid pro quo, then."
"If that's satisfactory."
"I don't have the luxury of time, Ambassador. What I need is a roboticist to see if anything can be salvaged from a collapsed positronic brain-the robot I told you about yesterday."
"It allegedly witnessed a mass murder," Derec Avery said. "Which would probably have precipitated the collapse."
"Possibly. "
"Let me guess," Burgess said. "You think the robot itself committed the crime. "
"A robot, certainly."
"Why?"
"We have no other viable suspect," he said. "Everyone who boarded the cargo bin used to shuttle the victims to Kopernik is accounted for-all dead. There was no way for a human to get out of it without breaking the internal seals in place inside the bin. So we're left with a suicide-murderer, or…" He pursed his lips. "I saw another robot board the bin with the victims. It was…unusual."
"A second robot," Ariel said. "You didn't mention this yesterday. "
"I didn't know if you'd be helping me or not."
"That might have changed our minds sooner." Coren held up his hands apologetically.
"You said it was unusual," Derec said. "How so?"
"It didn't register through my surveillance equipment. I could see it, as I see you, but through an optam it was invisible. Masked-what they used to call 'stealthed.' "
"We don't make robots like that," Ariel said. "That function is useless except for military or criminal purposes, and we don't-can't-use robots for either of those things."
"Nevertheless, I witnessed just such a robot."
"And when the bin was opened?" Derec asked. "Was it there?"
"No. Only Nyom Looms' robot was present. Here." He handed the disk containing Sipha's reports. "Go to the crime scene."
In a moment they huddled around Ariel's desk, gazing at a full holographic image of the interior of the cargo bin.
"This is what the security people on Kopernik found when they opened it up," Coren explained.
"What is that the robot is working on?" Derec asked.
"A rebreather unit. It contained a poison that caused neurological damage and paralysis."
Chimera (isaac asimov's robot mystery) Page 10