Technomancer

by B. V. Larson

  I thought about that for a second, but knew he was still dodging my actual questions. “You still haven’t explained the blood and the book.”

  “Both are functional. The power I have, as I’m sure you have guessed by now, is to open pathways through space.”

  “Yes, I’ve run into quite a number of them lately.”

  “I require organic material to light these fires,” he said.

  “Fires?” I asked.

  “Do you know what flame truly is, Mr. Draith?”

  I thought about it and decided honesty was the best policy. I shook my head.

  “It’s a body of incandescent gas. It requires a source of intense heat to begin burning, and then a supply of fuel to continue the chemical reaction. These rips in space are similar in nature: they don’t last forever without some substance to keep them going. I am able to create the spark that starts the reaction, that’s all.”

  “And you use blood for fuel? Why not wood or tap water?”

  “I’m not exactly sure why, but most substances don’t work. Recall what I said about utilizing technology one does not fully understand—in this way, we are like most computer users. We can read our e-mail, but have no comprehension of the complex process by which it actually appears on the screen.”

  “All right,” I said. “So only blood fuels your power? That makes you some kind of vampire.”

  “We don’t use that term,” Gilling said stiffly.

  “I’m not surprised.”

  Gilling pursed his lips for a moment in irritation before continuing. “Once these openings in space start burning, only organic fuels seem to work. Blood happens to be a very convenient, efficient source of fuel. We tried store-bought meats, both cooked and raw. They couldn’t sustain the reaction. Freshly killed animals do marginally better, but only for short periods. A significant flow of warm blood, however, has moved us into a new realm of power!”

  His eyes lit up as he spoke. I found his manner disturbing. The pistol in my hand, which I’d let dangle while we talked, perked up seemingly of its own volition. Some part of my mind had decided the world might be a better place if this man were dead. But I didn’t shoot him. Instead, I asked him another question.

  “And the poetry?”

  “Oh, that. Again, functional. It helps me keep my mind focused as I maintain the opening. I have to think about where I want it to go while I set my fire, you see. If I’m distracted, I make mistakes—poor Hugo.”

  Indeed, I thought, staring at the table where a man had died earlier this eve, his torso merged with a sheet of glass. Poor Hugo. It was very different now, thinking of these people as individuals, as people who were caught up in a new kind of science humanity had never met up with before.

  I had a thought then…what if we had discovered these things before? At a previous point in history?

  “Gilling,” I said, “do you think the witches of the past—do you think they might have discovered something like this?”

  “Undoubtedly,” he said. “Keep thinking about it. You’ve just uncovered the source of little men from other worlds. The truth behind both ghosts and goblins. All the things we’ve sought to erase from our consciousness with the clear light of modern science.”

  “So, you’re saying our science simply isn’t sufficiently advanced to understand these things yet?”

  “Correct. And what a society doesn’t understand it rejects and labels as heresy. Welcome to the ranks of the heretics, Mr. Draith.”

  He smiled at me, but I didn’t smile back. He’d given me a lot to think about, and I didn’t like most of it. I tried to remember my immediate goals. I wanted to know who was killing people I came in contact with and why. I wouldn’t mind learning about my past life either—regaining my lost memories one way or another. Barring that, I’d settle for finding out how I’d lost them and who was responsible.

  “Is your cult—excuse me, coven, responsible for the mysterious murders around town?”

  Gilling licked those bright red lips. “There have been a few regrettable deaths,” he said. “Hugo is a case in point. Others have sought to steal our objects. We thought you were one of those, an attacker.”

  I told him of my persecution, of the inevitable demise of those who came near me. He listened closely and his frown grew as I went on.

  “We’ve been aware of the deaths. But our purpose has been experimentation and greater understanding. We’ve not engaged in any kind of assaults upon individuals.”

  For some reason, I thought he might be telling the truth. For one thing, the rift I’d stepped through before had led to the world of the Gray Men, not the basement of a ring of cultists. On my list of suspects, the Gray Men had moved up a notch, despite the shady nature of the cultists. I decided to proceed on another topic.

  Gilling raised a hand to stop me. “This conversation seems more like an interrogation, Mr. Draith,” he said. “Let me understand our relationship. Are you interested in joining us or not?”

  “You kidnapped my friend Holly and manacled her in your dungeon. You were going to kill her. Why would I want to join you?” Beginning to wonder if he was trying to delay me, I figured it was high time I checked up on Holly and Jenna.

  “She’s not as innocent as she seems, Draith.”

  “Really?” I asked, but his words didn’t really surprise me. I knew she was a thief and was quite capable of lying.

  “We had good reason to pursue her, let me leave it at that—but she was awaiting questioning, not murder. Think about it: why would we want to bleed humans when less problematic sources of fuel are so abundant? Now, I really must insist—” Gilling said, moving to rise.

  “One last question,” I said. “Do you know Robert Townsend?”

  Gilling opened his mouth, then paused. He sat down again. He tilted his head to one side, glancing around what had been Robert Townsend’s hotel room. I knew he had sent Hugo here, which indicated there was some connection to Jenna and her missing husband.

  Finally, he leaned forward conspiratorially. “Yes, I do. Have you seen him—lately?”

  I shook my head. “I’m looking for him too.”

  Gilling nodded slowly. “He’s a slippery fellow.”

  My eyes narrowed. Was he lying? I’d found Robert’s shoe in his dungeon. Had he killed him in that dungeon?

  “Are you telling me Robert was a member of your group?”

  “Yes,” Gilling said, turning around in his chair and closing his eyes.

  Had Robert Townsend really stepped out on his newlywed wife on purpose? It seemed odd, as he’d left behind his lucky ring. In support of the self-styled technomancer’s claims, however, I’d found a shoe, not a body. One other thing had been bothering me about Jenna’s story: these rips, when they appeared, had never consumed anyone. You could step into them, but they didn’t drag you in. That was further evidence that Robert had left purposefully.

  Suddenly, a wink of light blossomed around Gilling. I pointed my gun at Gilling and almost fired, but I realized that he was already a blur of flesh and clothing in a ripple of space. I stepped to the edge of the rip and his flaring outline. “Come back out of there!” I shouted.

  He lifted his hand one more time. Was he giving me the finger or waving at me? I wasn’t sure, but after a second, he stepped away and disappeared. I stood behind in the room, cursing. If I followed him, I had no idea what I was walking into. Damn.

  The rip closed and I examined the spot where it had been. There was a handy pool of blood on that exact spot, provided by the dead man named Hugo. I nodded to myself. He’d sat at the table, very close to the blood, on purpose. He was thus able to leave at will.

  Shaking my head, I left the room and the Lucky Seven. I needed to see Jenna, but first I had to find Holly. I had too many women in my life right now.

  I had given Holly my cell, so I didn’t have an easy way to call her. Pay phones had long ago been ripped out of the lobby of the Lucky Seven and other casinos. Anyone they wanted to do bu
siness with could use the hotel room phones or their own cells. Anyone who didn’t have a room or a cell, they figured, could get the hell out.

  So instead I walked down the Strip to another big casino hotel. I needed a shower and a bed, not to mention a way to call Holly. I had money to pay for a room, but I didn’t want anyone knowing my location. My eyes slid around the lobby in paranoia. Someone had made numerous attempts to find me and probably to kill me. Knowing a thing like that makes a paranoid person such as myself…even more paranoid. As for the Gray Men, I didn’t know how they were tracking me, but I didn’t want to make it any easier for them.

  Coming up with a plan, I walked to the front desk. The clerk was perky despite the time of night. The palm trees in the vibrantly lit atrium behind her were motionless. I wondered how they kept plants from dying in there—I couldn’t see an obvious source of sunlight.

  “Do you have any rooms available?” I asked the perky clerk.

  “We sure do! Weekend or not, the hotel is half-empty,” she said.

  I nodded. “I’ll find out what the rest of my party wants to do,” I said. “We just drove in.”

  “OK!”

  I left her and walked to the elevators. Hotel security ran their eyes over me. I didn’t look back, but instead walked with purpose. Security was supposed to make sure street people didn’t get into the hotel. I knew they would assume I had checked in and was now heading up to my room.

  I got off on the twenty-second floor and tapped on a door. A bleary-eyed man told me to piss off. I did as he requested, saying I’d forgotten the last digit of my room number. The second try resulted in a woman’s voice suggesting I ask at the front desk. She wisely didn’t open the door.

  At the third door my knock went unanswered. I tried it twice more, with long waits in between. With my heart pounding in my chest, I put on my sunglasses and forced the lock. I slipped inside, finding the king-sized bed neatly made and smelling of fresh sheets. I stretched out on the bed with a sigh and considered a shower, but reached for the phone instead. I was glad they didn’t have a computer system disconnecting the phones when not in use. Some hotels had such systems. I tapped in my cell number and Holly answered on the second purring ring.

  “Draith?”

  “Yeah,” I said. “Are you OK?”

  “Yes. How about you?”

  “I’m alive,” I said. “Where are you?”

  “I had a cab drop me off at my apartment complex, but I got into my car and left. I was too scared to go up there.”

  “Did you see someone?”

  “No, but the neighbors told me Sherri was dead.”

  “Who?”

  “My landlady.”

  “Oh, right. Sorry about that.”

  “She was a witch, you know, but I never wished her dead.”

  I was quiet for a few seconds. “You don’t mean—like an actual witch, do you?”

  Holly laughed. “No, not like that.”

  “So, you’re out driving around?” I asked.

  “Yeah.”

  “I’ve got a new room. You can come stay the night if you want.”

  It was her turn to pause. “Yes, I’d like that. Thanks, Quentin.”

  “No thanks necessary. I owe you several nights’ lodging.”

  She laughed, and after I gave her the room number, she promised to come right over.

  I heaved myself up and took a shower. By the time I came out rubbing a towel against my head, I heard a tapping at the door. I checked the peephole and let Holly in.

  She ran her eyes over me once, then frowned. “You’re pretty scarred up,” she said.

  I nodded. “Thanks for noticing. The cuts have healed, but they still turn red after an application of hot water.”

  Holly reached out and ran a finger over one ridged spot on my flat stomach. I recoiled slightly in pain. She pulled away.

  “Sorry,” she said, then she pushed past me.

  I followed her inside and finished drying my hair. When I came out of the bathroom, she had poured us two glasses of clear liquid.

  I smiled. “That’s not water, is it?”

  She walked close and gave me mine. She smiled up at me. I could see now why Tony had hired her. It wasn’t just for her dancer’s legs. Her smile was entrancing.

  “I raided the minibar,” she said. “Hope you don’t mind.”

  “Not at all.”

  “We need ice. I’ll go get it.”

  I sipped at my drink. It was straight vodka. I made a face, then rummaged until I found a vial of orange juice or something that would pass for the real thing.

  Holly took a long time coming back with that ice bucket. I muttered to myself about justifiable paranoia and I pulled on my jeans. I made sure my .32 automatic was in the front pocket.

  While I waited I wondered if she would come back with someone who wanted to kill me. Could this be a setup? Was Holly an innocent bystander I’d gotten into trouble—or was she part of the trouble disguised as an innocent?

  It was a disturbing thought that I tried to dislodge. I blamed Gilling. That guy was a crazy snake. He had put thoughts in my head, possibly seeking to pry me apart from one of the only living friends I had.

  I tried to look cool when the tap came at the door again. I looked through the peephole. No Gray Men. No cultists. There was no one there but Holly.

  I opened it and let her back inside. I checked the hallway after she came in. Empty.

  “Sorry,” she said, dropping cubes into our glasses. “I had to go down a floor to find ice.”

  “I see.” I took my automatic out of my pocket and put it on the dresser. When I turned around again, she was staring at it.

  “You didn’t trust me,” she said.

  “What? No,” I said, “I was getting ready to go look for you.”

  That made her beam again. It was a glib lie, but it had worked. She found the orange juice and put a dollop in her glass as well. We stirred our drinks and sipped them. She told me how scared she’d been in the cab, and how the cabbie had been eating her up with his eyes and asking her an annoying barrage of questions at the same time. I nodded and listened. I didn’t talk about Gilling and his accusations. I figured I could save that for later or try to figure out if there was any truth in it in some other fashion. He had called her a thief, and I knew from experience he had a point there. It indicated he did really know something about her.

  The second drink was gin and tonic water. For the third round, we moved on to a junior-sized bottle of merlot. I figured if we drank everything in the minibar, I was going to be sick in the morning, but I was beginning not to care.

  Holly jumped on me after the merlot. Honestly, I was surprised. She straddled me while I slouched back in an uncomfortable chair. I hadn’t even noticed she’d taken off her jeans at some point. Her legs were warm and strong. Her panties were silky against my thighs. When had I removed my own pants? I recalled us talking about comfort and now…

  The kissing and touching began in earnest. Soon I wasn’t thinking anymore. At one point, I pushed her off and held her up in the air for a moment with our faces inches apart. She didn’t weigh much and she didn’t squirm, so I kept holding her up. We studied each other’s faces.

  “Why the sudden interest?” I asked.

  “More paranoia? Have you forgotten I was chained in a cellar, and you came to get me? You risked everything.”

  I thought to myself that I’d really lucked into finding her, but there was no way I was going to tell her that. I stared at her for a few seconds longer, then finally relented. After all, a man has to make the most of his opportunities. We made love a time or two and fell asleep at dawn. By noon the next day, I had to work hard to shoo Holly out of the room.

  “What?” she asked, fooling with her hair. “Are you out of cash already? I can pay for the room if I have to.”

  I finally explained that no one had paid for the room and we had to get the hell out before someone figured out this detail.

&
nbsp; Holly looked around the room and giggled. “You crazy bastard. I’ve pulled a lot of moves in my life, but this is a new one. It’s exciting. You are exciting, Quentin.”

  I hustled her out of the room before she could tempt me back to the disheveled bed. Foreign maids were the only people we met in the hallways as we left. They glanced at us with blank expressions. Did they know? I decided it no longer mattered if they did.

  It was on the way down to the lobby that my phone rang. My cell was still in Holly’s purse. She pulled it out, and I reached for it. She ignored my hand with an impish grin and answered the call.

  “Hello?” she asked, then paused. Her grin faded. “Well, who’s this?” Another pause. The grin was gone now, replaced with a twist of her lips. “Yeah, he’s right here.” She handed me the phone.

  I took it, looking at Holly quizzically.

  “It’s Jenna somebody,” she told me.

  I felt a jolt of embarrassment. She looked at me with her eyes narrowed. I sighed. I supposed these two were bound to come into contact eventually.

  I took the phone. “Jenna?”

  “Mr. Draith?” she said. Her voice sounded cold.

  “Yeah, I…” I began. I made a small move to turn away from Holly. It was automatic, but it was also a mistake. In an elevator, privacy really isn’t possible.

  Jenna was telling me something in my ear, something about where she was and needing me to come by. I finally caught on.

  “You’re all right?” I asked. “I’m staying in a different hotel now. Yeah.”

  I noticed Holly’s expression had shifted from a smile to a glare by this point. It had happened amazingly fast.

  “Sorry,” Holly said. “Let me off, I’ll give you two some privacy.” She reached out and used both hands to push every button on the face of the elevator panel. The bell dinged and she got out on the sixth floor.