“Just concentrate on the task at hand, Inspector.”
“So what have you got? A hacked passkey?” Cuskelly shook his head. “Fuck it, I don’t even want to know.”
“Don’t concern yourself, Inspector. One way or another, this is the last time you’ll see me.”
The elevator slowed as it reached its destination, and then the doors opened to reveal the interior of Level 122. Cuskelly stepped out and the others followed.
The ceilings here were low and there was a distinct lack of windows around the exterior. The only illumination came from lengthy stripes of green-tinged lights that led away like monorail tracks in the ceilings and floors of the corridors that led into the interior of the building. Cuskelly seemed to take a moment to count these off, as if remembering the steps in a maze, then set off toward the third one in line.
“Don’t say anything,” he told them. “Don’t stop to look at anything. Don’t touch anything. Don’t fall behind.”
“Sure thing, Dad,” Tucker said facetiously. “Are we there yet?”
Cuskelly ignored him, bustling on ahead, his thick girth taking up much of the corridor. They came to a juncture and the inspector indicated for them to move over into a recess where a few steel-framed chairs sat against the wall.
“Sit and wait,” he said.
Cuskelly proceeded to the room at the end of the corridor, opening the door and heading inside. After a brief exchange with someone inside, there were the sounds of footsteps again in the hallway.
“How long is this going to take?” a woman said.
“A half hour or so, that’s all,” Cuskelly said.
“You should be clearing this beforehand in future. I have work to do.”
They passed the recess and Alton and Tucker went unnoticed as the woman continued along.
“Sure, sure, Jannie. Sorry. Will do,” Cuskelly said. “See you soon.”
As the woman disappeared, Cuskelly poked his head into the recess.
“This way. Move it.”
He led them down into the room, a claustrophobic little office with frosted windows and a terminal screen perched on a cluttered desk. He turned a dimmer on the light switch and the room became painted in the fluorescent hues of the terminal screen and nothing else.
“Ooh, mood lighting,” Tucker said.
“Close the door,” Cuskelly said. He produced a gadget, a black rectangle not much larger than a matchbox, and proceeded to connect it up the terminal with a thin grey ribbon-like wire. Pulling the keyboard closer, he settled himself in the seat before the workstation and began to type.
“Come closer,” he instructed. “I need to scan your chips.”
Alton and Tucker did as he asked, holding out their hands expectantly. Cuskelly took Alton by the wrist and placed his fingers on the black rectangle.
“I can get you access up to the Atrium and most places in between for the next forty-eight hours, except for Enforcer-only levels and the Infirmary,” Cuskelly said. “Put your thumb on there as well,” he said to Alton, moving the gadget closer. Alton complied and waited until the scan had completed before removing it again. “Once that forty-eight hours is up…” Cuskelly shrugged. “If you try to use your ID at a checkpoint, you’ll set off every fuckin’ alarm between here and Fiji.”
Alton frowned. “The Republic of Fiji dissolved over fifty years ago. It no longer exists.”
Cuskelly rolled his eyes. “Whatever, man. Damn. Grow a sense of humour.” He took Tucker’s wrist and repeated the process. “There. I think we’re good.”
“Pretty lax security in this place,” Tucker noted. “We practically just walked in here.”
“Lax security?” Cuskelly said, incredulous. “First, keep in mind that you’re only on this level because of my clearance. Second, this isn’t the ID processing facility. That thing is like Fort Knox. This is just a data entry station. Housekeeping. I installed a backdoor into the ID facility half an hour ago so that we didn’t have to go there in person.”
Tucker grinned. “You’ve been a bad boy, Cuskelly.”
“Yeah, and now I’ve gotta go try to cover my tracks. Chances are they’ll find it anyway, and I’ll end up in a world of hurt.”
“Your help is appreciated, Inspector,” Alton said.
“Yeah, and now what about your end of the bargain?” Cuskelly said. “Where’s the footage?”
Tucker glanced at Alton, who nodded in return. Tucker reached into his pocket and brought out a data chip.
“That’s the only copy?” Cuskelly said, reaching out and snatching the chip away. “There’s no more?”
“There’s no more,” Alton said.
Cuskelly looked down cheerlessly at the chip in his palm. “I didn’t mean for anyone to get hurt,” he said, his expression pained. “Honestly. Those people… that wasn’t meant to happen.”
“I’m not here to judge you, Inspector,” Alton said. “You happened to be in one of my establishments when something terrible went down, and I had the footage. My interest in you extends no further than that.”
“Yeah,” Cuskelly said glumly. “Okay.”
“On the bright side, you now have the only evidence of the incident in your hand. No one else has to know about this.”
Cuskelly stared at the chip for a moment longer, his face clouded by conflicting emotions, and then he gathered himself together.
“And now we’re even,” Cuskelly said, placing the chip in his pocket.
Alton nodded. “Yes, I suppose so. But we may need to call on you again before we’re done.”
“What?” Cuskelly said, furious. “No fuckin’ way, man! This is it! I’ve more than paid you for–”
Alton reached out, his hand moving like a viper and crashing into Cuskelly’s pudgy neck, and the inspector was propelled backward, his head smacking loudly against the frosted glass behind him. The wall shuddered and rattled with the impact.
“We may need to call on you again before we’re done,” Alton said calmly, but his eyes were like hot coals as he leaned in toward Cuskelly. The inspector choked and clawed at Alton’s vice-like grip, trying his best to nod.
“Cck… yah… okay,” he croaked.
Alton let go and stepped back, and Cuskelly gasped and dropped down to one knee, left reeling from the struggle.
“Now we need to get out of here,” Alton said in a businesslike manner, not a hair out of place.
“What… whatever you say.” Cuskelly nodded. He lumbered to his feet, hand pressed gingerly to his neck, and gathered up his gear. “Where are you headed?”
Alton smiled at Tucker. “We have some new friends to see.”
14
The elevator doors opened and Alec Duran stepped out into Tech Seven, his face buried in a tablet as he flicked through screens of mugshots and rap sheets. He was so engrossed in his work that he collided with someone coming the other way, almost dropping the device.
“Whoa, sorry,” he said, reaching out a hand to steady the other person. It was Sergeant Tunks.
“Watch where you’re going, Duran,” Tunks grunted. “You could walk straight down an open elevator shaft doing that.”
“Tunks,” Duran said, surprised. “What are you doing here?”
“Getting my weekly pedicure.”
“No, really. What are you doing here?”
“What do you think? Dotting the i’s, crossing the t’s. Handing in paperwork.”
“About the Deimona case?”
“That, and some others. I’ve worked up a bit of a backlog. Had a lot of shit to wade through.” He pointed to the tablet. “What about you?”
“Following up some more leads on Deimona. I’m going after his associates, anyone who helped him while he was hiding out in the Reach.”
“That’s a real slippery slope, Duran. I doubt there’s a bottom to that particular rabbit hole.”
Duran shrugged. “I have to start somewhere.”
Tunks eyed him warily. “Riding the wave of euphoria from the Deimona takedown,
huh? It won’t last.”
Duran began to walk away. “Thanks for the vote of confidence.”
“Be real, Duran,” Tunks called after him. “A couple of weeks and you’ll agree with me. I’ve seen it all before. You put away one guy, and he just gets replaced by an even worse guy, and you end up going nowhere. You end up going backward.” Duran kept walking. “You’ll wish you listened to me.”
Duran didn’t bother to respond. Tunks had been lost in a quagmire of apathy for so long he’d forgotten what it meant to be an Enforcer, what it meant to uphold the law. There was no point arguing with him or trying to drag him out of his cocoon of pessimism. Duran had far more meaningful ways of spending his time, especially now that he was beginning to pick up some momentum.
He used his fingertip ID to progress through three separate security gates on his way to the surveillance room. Tech Seven, located on the 195th floor of the Reach, was one of the most heavily guarded instalments in the entire building. It housed many of the most important Enforcer security facilities, as well as a data centre. The floor had been off-limits to Duran while he had been demoted to constable, but now that he was back at his rightful rank his full privileges had been restored.
Curiously, some of the rooms that had been active the last time he had been here were now dark and silent, the windows coated in dust. The activity level in general seemed to have dropped as well – previously he had grown accustomed to staff hustling down corridors and in and out of offices, but now there were only a few solitary figures hunched before their workstations, eyeing him guardedly as he passed.
Duran made it to Room 217, an innocuous-looking place with a frosted glass door. Through the translucent entrance he could see LEDs flickering blue and green, like colourful stars hiding behind a thin layer of fog. He placed his fingers on the security panel and proceeded inside.
“Parnell, Riethmuller,” Duran said by way of greeting. “Good to see you again.”
As the two men turned to him he was taken aback. Parnell was there in his usual chair, but on the other end of the console was a man he had never seen before.
“Oh, my apologies,” Duran said.
“Duran,” Parnell said. “How’s it going? Long time no see.” He was a short man with thick black spectacles that had been glued together at the bridge. “Riethmuller isn’t here anymore. This here is Singh.”
Duran nodded in greeting to Singh, but the man simply took a slow bite from a greasy burger in his hand and turned back to the console to continue his work.
“So where’s Riethmuller?” Duran said, taking a few steps over to Parnell’s side.
“Gone,” Parnell said simply.
“Right.” Duran surveyed the console with dismay. His recollections of it were far different from what he observed now. In the past it had been tidy, neatly organised with data chips and portable storage arrays all maintained in their proper place. Now it was a mess. Gadgets were strewn around the place, and someone’s lunch was sitting half-eaten on one of the horizontal displays. There were also the telltale brown rings of coffee mugs scattered around, making the console appear like a poorly rendered piece of abstract art.
“Did you come in just for sightseeing, Inspector?” Parnell said, sitting patiently while Duran gave the room the once-over.
“Sorry. Things have changed a lot around here in the last few years.”
“Have they?” Parnell said. “Couldn’t be sure, myself.”
“What about all the other rooms back there?” Duran said. “Looks like a lot of people have moved out. Is the place is shutting down or something?” he joked.
Parnell offered no hint of mirth in return. “People get relocated, reassigned. You know how it is.”
“Yeah, I guess.” Duran placed his tablet down on the console in the area that had the fewest coffee rings. “So I need to pick your brain about a couple of things, if that’s okay?”
Parnell shrugged. “Shoot.”
“I’m looking to follow up on the known associates of a guy called Javier Deimona.”
“Deimona?” Parnell said thoughtfully, then clicked his fingers. “Oh yeah, I heard just about that this morning. You reeled that bastard in good and proper. Nice work, Inspector.”
“Thanks, but this is still a work in progress. I want the rest of his crew, the guys that were harbouring him while he was in the Reach.”
“So that was you who was making all of those requests for surveillance footage over the past few weeks? You’ve been keeping me and Singh busy.”
“Yeah, but I need more. A lot more. I need to trace every movement Deimona made since he entered the Reach a couple of months back.”
Parnell snorted derisively. “Okay Duran, just hold it a minute. I think you’re going to have to adjust your expectations here a bit.”
“Huh? Why?”
“Well, for a start, we only have about a quarter of the storage space we used to own. The arrays are all packing it in, hardware’s going toes up. We had to shut down more than half the cameras out there because there was nowhere left to write the data.”
“What?” Duran said, disbelieving. “Why aren’t we replacing the arrays?”
“Funding, what else? The creds aren’t coming through like they used to. The techs have had to cannibalise the old gear and make do where they can.”
“Shit. How are we supposed to do our job like this?”
“It ain’t easy,” Parnell admitted. “And it’s getting a little bit worse every day.”
“Okay, at the very least, I’ll need footage of Deimona’s entry through the gate. Who he was with and when it happened. Maybe I can at least start drawing some timelines from that.”
“Well, that’s going to take time, Duran. There’s a lot of garbage to sift through to find that.”
“Can’t you bring up an exception report?”
“Yeah, and it’s a mile long. The number of illegals coming through is skyrocketing.” Parnell looked at Duran doubtfully. “Didn’t they tell you any of this stuff when they brought you back?”
“I was aware there was a problem, but…”
Parnell reached for a chipped coffee mug and took a sip.
“I can tell you this,” Parnell said. “You can try plugging your fingers in the holes all you like, but whatever you do, you’re not going to get them all. The boat’s still going to sink.”
Duran slumped against the console. “How did it get this bad?”
“Well, there’s the whole funding thing making life more difficult, for a start. We don’t have the resources. But those people out there…” He leaned back in his chair and shook his head, staring at the door. “Bastards are getting more desperate. More creative. They’re coming at us in greater numbers and from angles we never thought about before.”
“And what are we doing to stop them?”
Parnell grimaced. “We’re shutting down our systems because we can’t get anything replaced, let alone upgraded. That’s what.” He swung back to the console and tapped on his keyboard, bringing up a graph displaying red and yellow curves. “This is the best guess we have at what we’re dealing with.”
Duran studied the graph for a moment. “Is there some kind of error in the report? It looks like the number of illegals has almost doubled in the last year. That can’t be right.”
“Don’t know, Inspector. Around here, we just pump through the numbers. It’s people like you further up the food chain who make the call on why.” He tapped the screen. “Personally, I think part of it is due to the gear going down. We’re not getting a complete picture of the facility anymore, and that’s leading to false positives and other anomalies.”
“Or maybe the guys who are stationed at the gate need a kick up the ass.”
“Hah, maybe. But there’s just weird stuff, too. Stuff that doesn’t make sense. It’s time-consuming going through it all to try to verify it.”
“Like what?”
Parnell flicked the graph away and began scrolling through mor
e menus.
“Well, take a look at this one from today, for example. We got a shipment through down at the gate, and all the visitor credentials checked out. No problem. Then, when they leave, they’re one short. So where the hell did the extra guy go? He can’t have just disappeared.”
“Why not? Maybe he cut loose.”
“Doesn’t seem likely. This guy has been a regular for years, hasn’t ever given us a problem, and his ID hasn’t shown up at any of the other checkpoints.” Parnell scratched his head. “Although, the weird thing is, this guy hasn’t checked in for over a month. For three years prior he made an appearance every week at least twice, and often as many as four times.”
“So why the change?”
“Who knows? And then, stranger still, when we went to the facial recognition from the entry, the system is reporting a ninety-three percent match to a dead guy.” Parnell laughed. “How do you like that? We’re getting zombies walking in now.”
“What?” Duran said, irate. “Why wasn’t the facial recognition flagged when the visitor checked in? Why weren’t we alerted in real time?”
“Geez, Duran, you’re really out of the loop, huh? The facial recognition process needs seven dedicated cores in order for it to run in real time. That’s one huge database it has to sift through, y’know? A lot of algorithms running in parallel.”
“Yeah, so?”
“So these days we’re down to one core, and it’s not even dedicated. All the others packed it in. We requested replacements from off-world, but…” He spread his hands. “You already know how that story ends.”
“For fuck’s sake!” Duran spat.
“Yeah. So now it takes almost an hour for the thing to crunch through the database, which is no good to anyone. Too little, too late. The only reason it’s still running is because no one has bothered to turn it off yet.”
“This is exactly why we’re seeing those numbers rise for the illegals. Reasons just like this.”
Parnell shrugged. “Hey, don’t complain to me, Inspector. I just work here.”
Duran rubbed his hand across his face. “So who was it, anyway?”
“Huh?”
“The dead guy?”
Earthbound (The Reach, Book 1) Page 12