Alana asked, “What about his non-professional, social media?”
“He’s been completely inactive since February Sixth, except for two Internet sites, which are both online gaming forums—”
Brett leapt in, “He’s active in a virtual reality game guild, a high-end one that does raids and stuff. It’s the same kind of thing Wen Jing does, and that she has me learning to do in my spare time. It’s the same game, actually, Pangenre. The other site he’s active on is a fantasy baseball league.”
Rhys said, “He’s leading his fantasy league in their standings. I gather that when it comes to baseball, he knows whereof he speaks. In my estimation, he has the knowledge to pull off the baseball murder and a clear motive—”
Brett capped off the sentence, “Revenge for his sister’s rape.”
Alana asked, still skeptical, “All of which hinges on the idea that he’s learned how to hack a cyborg when Srinu says it’s impossible. Is there anything to connect it to our case yet, except for being that diplomat’s relative?”
Rhys raised his hands, “Isn’t that enough to open an investigation?”
Alana looked at the whiteboard again. Then she looked at Brett, who despite his travel lag, appeared ready to spring from his seat. She looked at Rhys, who placed his hands on his hips, waiting for a response, seemingly unprepared to accept anything short of action. She said, “Brett, the ‘baseball murders’ are your cases, but I can’t ignore the connection to the same man whose ‘lost’ limo ended up being used to abet our criminals. Ben, you help Brett dig for some actual evidence. I don’t care whose case it supports at this point. In the meantime, I’ll go see the DA and see what kind of warrant I can wrangle out of him based on this.”
Rhys said, “I did receive an extra note of caution a couple days ago from Security Division not to go near the Chinese officials. For what that’s worth.”
Alana’s chair rolled back against the wall after she stood, “Was it Agent Derringer?”
Rhys nodded, “Yes.”
“I didn’t see anything in Louis Chu’s records that qualified him as a Chinese official, so, for want of a better lead, we’ll investigate him.”
Wednesday, 12 July, 14:00
Owing to a busy week in the always over-worked criminal justice system, Alana had to deal with the Deputy District Attorney General instead of the DA, which proved fortuitous, in that the official was a recent cybernetic retiree. When presented with the evidence, backed by the theory that Louis Chu, perhaps even the Chinese government, had discovered a way to hack cyborgs, he signed an open surveillance order for the entire Chu family even before Alana had presented all the evidence. He made certain to remind her that it was not an arrest or detention warrant, and that the uncle would have diplomatic immunity from police scrutiny. He slipped her a business card with his direct Vira code on it, and told her to contact him if her investigation uncovered additional evidence that might give reason to expand the warrant.
Alana wasted no time in putting the warrant into use, organizing a stakeout of Louis Chu’s residence, a stand-alone, three-bedroom ranch house in Glendale, in western Los Angeles. Absent enough manpower to maintain a constant watch, she requisitioned several surveillance drones. Any cellular or wireless communications coming from the house would be intercepted and parsed electronically, with computer algorithms scrutinizing the data for keywords and suspicious data bits.
By the time she had everything in place and ready to go, it was already dinner time, and Brett and Rhys left the office together to visit a local pizza parlor, with Rhys going along so he could answer any lingering baseball questions Brett might have regarding his side of the case. Although they offered to bring her a sample, Alana declined. She could eat, and indeed, she did abuse her recently acquired food ingestion unit more often than not, but the more she pondered the background of Louis Chu, the more she became convinced that suspicion was justified. It was as if a bloodhound had picked up the scent of its quarry.
Alana’s Vira pinged, “You have an incoming call from Edward Jenkins.”
The momentum of her investigation had carried the memory of her dinner date with the reporter far downstream. For just a moment, she pondered everything she had to do, and whether she was really interested in going out with the handsome, well-spoken stranger. It still nagged at her that he, a living human, was even remotely interested in an asexual cyborg with no capability to have the kind of relations that living humans do. While it was possible that there really was some platonic interest, her life experiences whispered in her ear that those kinds of attractions were built from long-term interactions, and not from chance encounters. The question that hovered at the edge of her skepticism was whether Jenkins simply had a mechanophilic fetish. She first considered letting the call roll over to her in-box, but then thought better of it and decided not to simply leave the man hanging. “Vira, answer.”
Jenkins’ smooth voice spoke into her ears, “Hello, Inspector Graves?”
Alana decided not to say anything that might lead Jenkins on any further than she already had, “Speaking.”
The reporter said, “Please accept my apologies for not calling earlier, but I had to fill in for one of the anchors on an afternoon show. Are we still on for dinner tonight?”
Alana said, “I’m afraid I’m going to have to cancel. I’m just too busy.”
There was a short pause before Jenkins asked. Alana could detect a slight tinge of annoyance in his voice, “Fine. Can we reschedule for another night?”
“Mister Jenkins—”
“Ed.”
“Mister Jenkins, I’ve had more time to think about it, and I don’t think it’s a good idea.”
There was a short pause before Jenkins said, “Was it something I said? Something I didn’t say?”
Alana said, “It’s just not a good idea. I’m swamped with life and career, and I don’t see room for a relationship. I mean, what kind of relationship could we have? I’m just not wired for that sort of thing. The good news is that you’re no longer a prime suspect in our murder investigation.”
“If things... I mean, if we saw each other, and there was—”
Alana wasn’t certain of what Jenkins was trying to imply, but as she cut him off, she had the distinct feeling that he was about to offer to have her upgraded to a deluxe model, which reinforced her suspicion that he was what had come to be known in the media as a ‘technosexual.’ “Let me say it one more time. No. I appreciate the effort you went to, and the sentiment behind it, but it’s just not going to happen, so there’s no point in either of us pursuing what neither of us can have.”
Jenkins’ voice went flat, “I see.”
Alana asked, desirous of being rid of the distraction, even if fresh, farm-raised lobster would have been involved, “If there’s nothing else...?”
“No, I guess there isn’t. Thanks anyway,” Jenkins said before hanging up.
Alana sat down, and as she wondered whether or not she did the right thing, Brett and Rhys returned from their outing, Brett carrying a small, take-out box that he set on the opposite corner of his desk from where Rhys’ Fenway Park souvenir remained. When she saw Rhys, she decided that, yes, she had chosen wisely. That did not stop her from getting back to business, “I got the warrants and already put some robots on stake-out duty. Are you two lucid enough to put in some overtime tonight?”
Brett was surprised that Alana asked instead of just commanding it, “I slept in from my run to Boston, so I’m good for a few more hours.”
Rhys replied, “I’ve been up and on the case all day, but I’m not physically tired. I think I’m lucid enough to do something, but don’t make me think too hard.”
“Right, then. Ben, you begin monitoring the surveillance drones I set up. There should be a separate folder for them. Use the situation room monitor to tile them. Tweak their positioning if you need to. I’ll check up with you in a few hours for an update.”
Brett asked, “What do you think I s
hould do?”
“You’re still the DI in charge of your side of your case. If I were you, I’d start compiling a detailed profile of Louis Chu, anything you can find out about him. Just like with Phil Robertson’s college transcripts, there could be a minor detail that might crack things open.”
Brett nodded, sitting down at his desk, “Thanks for your advice. For the record, I decided to accept the promotion to DI, in case I forgot to mention it earlier.”
Rhys said, rather more nobly than Alana had been able to be whenever she had been passed over for promotion in the past, “Good. Maybe I’ll get to work under you in the future.”
Alana asked, “How are you getting along working with Maggie?”
Rhys frowned, remembering the incident where MacGruder took the drug-induced swipe at Alana, and indirectly, at all cyborgs, “DI MacGruder will be back on duty within a couple of weeks, just in time to have one of his cases once again solved by Chief Inspector Graves when he wasn’t looking.”
Alana declined to inquire any further, but she could sense that MacGruder’s animosity toward her had not been kept to himself while Rhys was working with him. She stood, “Then I’ll leave you to it. I’ve got a couple of errands to run.”
Rhys asked, “Are you going to dinner with that Reporter?”
Alana shook her head, her voice dropping off slightly, “No. I told him no. I need to drop in on Gabriel Stone. See whether his prognosis has changed. Make some decisions.”
Brett was already running his fingers across his desktop, “We should have plenty to keep us going until you return. Call if you need anything.”
Alana nodded and exited the room. She made a slight detour, stopping by the cyberforensics lab, to find it every bit as hectic as it had been during the day shift. Wen Jing, no longer a junior analyst, was directing traffic as her team continued to process the volume of rescued retiree brains prior to sending them to be reunited with their bodies. Alana waved to her from the doorway. She nodded in acknowledgement, but still had to perform a couple of minor tasks at her computer console, presumably updating records, before she transited the maze of crates and tables to reach Alana.
Wen Jing wiped some sweat from her forehead with her lab coat sleeve, “Please pardon our mess. We’re trying to clear everyone through as fast as we can, but we still need to check them for evidence, and there are just so many of them.” She looked around the room, and somehow the overwhelming amount of work that still lay ahead of both her and her team seemed to provoke a smile, as if she felt happy to be doing something important.
Alana said, “I remember you telling me about that online game you and Brett are playing—”
“Pangenre?”
Alana nodded, “I think that’s what it was called. I wanted to ask you about the way the social aspects work. Is this a good time?”
Wen Jing shrugged, “I know how important it is to get the victims identified and taken for care. These are people, just like you and Detective Rhys, and they’re in pain, just like that poor woman I helped you interview. Even after streamlining our process, I’ll probably be busy with this for a week or longer. But I can spare a couple minutes. What do you want to know?”
“I think we’ve identified a suspect, and according to his social media posts, he’s an active player in the same game you play. What I need to know is, if we have trouble finding him, whether or not you could look to see if he’s playing—without raising suspicion.”
Wen Jing scratched her nose and fidgeted, almost as if she was embarrassed, “I’m a pretty experienced role-player, so that might help. Pangenre is a single-server world, so if he’s online, I should be able to find him. There are a couple of hurdles. First, I’d need to know his main character’s name so I can put him on my friends list. Once I get that, I can hang out online until he logs in. Whether or not I can make contact is another issue. The game uses a lot of virtual instances so I might not be able to meet him.”
“Virtual instances?”
“Think of it as a private room where a small group of friends go to play the game. If he’s in one of those, I could only make indirect contact, which might be enough to tip him off that something’s wrong. You said he was active. The game community is huge—millions of players online at the same time—but it’s broken down into guilds. There’s a very small chance that I might know him, or at least know of his character or his guild.”
Alana nodded, “I still don’t get it, but I think I made enough out of that to get that it’s a viable option, if we need to use it. If we do, would you be willing to help us?”
Wen Jing asked, “Let me be clear on this. You’d want me to play a VR game during business hours to try and make contact with a criminal?”
Alana nodded, “Essentially. But we won’t need to worry about it unless he’s hard to find. I just wanted to ask you if it was feasible.”
“This is normally one of my days off, Wednesday and Thursday. But this is important, so we’re all running double shifts to get it done. Otherwise, I’d probably be home, playing the game if Brett was busy. Did you need anything else?”
Alana said, “That’s all I needed, but just one question. What’s the appeal of that game? Why put so many hours in it?”
“It’s fun. In this one, you get to play what’s basically a time-and-dimension-traveling cop, going around fixing the universe with your friends. It has a lot of different ideas and content, and some really good enemy AI and writing. It’s like living a movie where you can be anything or anyone you want to be.”
Alana said, “Maybe I’ll have to try it once just to see what it’s all about.”
Wen Jing said, “Oh. Well... You can’t. Retirees can’t play it. The virtual interface puts you right into the game, and it doesn’t work right unless you have a living body. It’s the way the game intercepts neural commands and translates them into virtual movements. So, when you’re playing, you run, jump, and talk and all kinds of stuff, but your body just lies mostly still. It doesn’t work with cyborgs, not yet anyway. The developer is trying to make it so it does, but they say there are some technical issues they haven’t solved yet. So, sorry, you can’t play. But there are plenty of in-game first person videos people have recorded and put up on the Internet if you want to see what it looks like from a player’s perspective.”
Alana was more than ready to leave well before Wen Jing had finished her soliloquy, but the young woman’s passion for the game was evident. She said, “I’ll be in touch if we need to do any of that. Thanks for putting so much effort into looking after cyborgs. A lot of people still don’t consider us to be human.”
Wen Jing nodded, “A lot of people feel that way about gamers too. People just need to learn to be nice to each other. As much as I love my job, the days I’m bored at it are the best ones.”
Alana took her leave of the lab, but she had one more stop to make before she left the building. She went to the detention block and paid a visit to Rémy Tremblay. She had the officer in charge let her into the cell. Tremblay sat on his cot with his back to the wall, lifting and lowering his left leg, his eyes focused upon his foot. He watched as Alana stepped inside, but did not utter a sound. Alana said, “Security Division wants you very, very, badly. I told them to go to hell because I made you a promise. But let me explain something to you. That priest you gunned down was my son. Security Division has a copy of his save file in their archives, but they won’t let me have it unless I rescind your plea bargain and hand you over to them. That means that he’s probably going to die, and he won’t be resurrectable.”
Tremblay remained silent, lifting his uncut leg up and down, up and down, letting the polymer heel of his athletic shoe strike the floor on its descent. Alana noticed that the shoe’s laces had been removed, a standard security procedure.
Alana continued, “Against my better judgment, I’m keeping my promise. I just want you to know what I gave up for you. As you spend the rest of your natural life in prison, remembering what it was lik
e to have freedom to choose your destiny, eating the same seven meals in rotation every day, wearing the same two sets of clothing week in and week out... I want you to know that the reason you weren’t disappeared was that a cyborg stood up for you and kept her word. I’m just like the thousands of people whose lives you interrupted—”
Tremblay spoke, softly, in his French-accented, broken English, “You Americans—so pompous. Unbearable. You learn a trick to keep alive, but it is not life. It is undeath. You are all zombies, like in movies. But many people—not Americans—want to be zombies too. All over le monde, people want to be zombies. But the American company holds the patent. Outside America, only rich people can afford to be a zombie. You have a war to get the right to be a zombie. How many thousands of you people died to have right to be zombie?”
Alana let Tremblay finish, which he did, his leg never ceasing to move. She asked, “Is that why you went along with this? To get enough money to become a zombie?”
Tremblay scratched the philtrum beneath his nose vigorously with his right index finger, and sniffed, “Rémy is grandest hypocrite of all, non?”
Alana left him with a warning, “The federal marshal will be around in the morning to transport you to a maximum security holding cell to await your trial. Be careful about what you eat and drink in prison,” before opening the door and leaving. She had entertained the possibility of getting Tremblay to confess to some deed, anything that might give her leverage with Derringer to obtain Gabriel Stone’s save profile. However, when she saw the man again, she instinctively knew that even if he did know something potentially incriminating, the odds that there was even a trace to connect it with Security Division were so low as to make a National Lottery jackpot win seem like a good bet in comparison.
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