The Complete SF Collection

by Morgan, Richard

  CHAPTER FIFTY

  They caught a crack-of-dawn Cathay Pacific bounce to New York the following morning. Carl would have preferred not to wait, but he needed time to make a couple of calls and plan. Also, he wanted Tom Norton to sleep on his choices - if he could sleep at all - and face the whole thing in the cold light of a new day. All things considered, he was playing with better cards than he’d expected, but Norton was still an unknown quantity, all the more so for the way things had finally boiled down at the Human Cost Foundation.

  At the airport, Norton’s COLIN credentials got them fast-tracked through security and aboard before anyone else. Carl sat in a preferential window seat, waiting for the shuttle to fill, and stared out at an evercrete parking apron whipped by skirling curtains of wind-driven rain. Past the outlines of the terminal buildings, a pale, morose light was leaking across the sky between thick gunmetal cloud. The bad weather had blown in overnight, and looked set to stick around.

  Forecasts for New York said cold, dry and clear. The thoughts in his head were a match.

  The suborb shuttle shifted a little on its landing gear, then started to back out. Carl flexed his right hand, then held it cupped. Remembered the smooth glass weight of the ornament from the Human Cost director’s desk. He glanced across at Tom Norton in the seat next to him. The COLIN exec caught his eye - face haggard with the demons that had kept him from sleep.

  ‘What?’

  Carl shook his head. ‘Nothing. Just glad you’re along.’

  ‘Leave me the fuck alone, Marsalis. I made a promise. I’ll keep it. I don’t need your combat-bonding rituals.’

  ‘Not about bonding,’ Carl looked back at the window. ‘I’m glad you’re here because this would have been about a hundred times harder to do.’

  Brief quiet. In the window, the terminal building slid out of view as the shuttle turned to taxi. He could feel Norton hesitate.

  ‘That wouldn’t have stopped you, though,’ he said finally. ‘Would it.’

  Carl rolled his head to face front, pressed back into the seat’s cushioning. He hadn’t had a lot of sleep either. Elena Aguirre had sat in the darkened corners of his hotel room on and off all night, pretending to be Sevgi Ertekin, and not quite pulling it off.

  ‘Not in the end, no.’

  ‘Is that how you do it?’ Norton asked him.

  ‘Do what?’

  ‘Become a thirteen. Is that what it’s about, just not letting yourself be stopped?’

  Carl shot him a surprised look. ‘No. It’s about genetic wiring. Why, you feeling left out?’

  ‘No.’ Norton sank back in his seat as well. ‘Just trying to understand. ’

  The shuttle trundled steadily out towards the runway. Rain swept the window pane, smeared diagonal with the wind. Soft chime - the fasten-webbing sign lit on the LCLS panel above their heads, complete with animated instructions. They busied themselves with the thick, padded tongues of fabric. Like the siren song lull of v-format prep, Carl usually had a hard time with how it felt once the webbing had him in its grip - it triggered tiny escape impulses across his body that he had to consciously hold down with Osprey-trained calm. But this time he finished smoothing the cross-folds over each other, drew a deep breath and found, with a shock like trying to walk up a step that wasn’t there, that he felt nothing at all. Only the sense of anchored purpose, soaking coldly through him like the woken mesh.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ he said to the man at his side. ‘About your brother, I’m sorry it had to work out this way.’

  Norton said nothing.

  Across the aisle and back, a soft but urgent chiming signalled that some idiot had failed to web up correctly. An attendant appeared and hurried down past them to help out. The shuttle’s motors picked up their idling whine, began to build force. On the LCLS panel, soft purple lettering in Chinese, then English, then Spanish, then Arabic, swelling forward, fading out. On station.

  Carl glanced at the silent COLIN exec. ‘That’s part of the reason you’re here, right?’

  ‘Sevgi’s the reason I’m here.’ Norton’s voice came out tight.

  The engines outside reached shrieking pitch, the shuttle unstuck and hurled itself down the runway. Carl felt himself pressed back into the cushioning once more, this time with outside force beyond his own strength.

  He closed his eyes and gave himself up to it.

  They hit the sky on screaming turbines, the suborbital fuel lit and kicked them up around the curve of the world. The webbing hugged them tight and close.

  ‘Fucking Ortiz,’ said Norton loudly, beside him.

  In the judder and thrum of the trajectory, it wasn’t clear if he was talking to the man or just about him. And this time his tone was loose and hard to define, but somewhere at the bottom of it Carl thought he could hear something like despair.

  Norton wasn’t really surprised when Jeff spat the name out, but not because it wasn’t a shock. Simply, surprise wasn’t an option any more, the glandular wiring that would have supplied it was running surge-overloaded, had been since the previous evening when Marsalis played him Jeff’s phone conversation and told him about Ren. And it certainly shouldn’t have mattered to him more than his own brother’s betrayal.

  Somehow it did.

  He still remembered the change when Ortiz came fully aboard at Jefferson Park, when the slim, dynamic Rim politician’s post morphed from consultative policy adviser to actual Americas policy director. He remembered the sudden sense of stripping down as layers of bureaucracy were lashed into efficiency or simply fired down to skeleton staffing levels. He remembered the way the little-fiefdom people like Nicholson and Zikomo ran for cover. The new hires and promotions, Andrea Roth, Lena Oyeyemi, Samson Chang. Himself. The tide of change and the clean air it seemed to bring in with it, as if someone had suddenly opened all the windows facing the East River.

  On another day, some other time, he would have called the bringer of this news a liar to his face, would have refused to believe.

  But there was too much else now. The old landscape had burned down around him, Sevgi, Jeff, the aftermath of the Merrin case - it was all on fire, too hot to touch anywhere without getting hurt.

  ‘It was Tanaka’s fucking idea from the start.’ Jeff, laying it out. Bloodied nose staunched once more, this time with torn twists of tissue pushed up each nostril, a freshened tumbler of cognac and, now, slightly slurring tones. ‘He comes to me two, two and a half years ago with this stupid fucking scheme. We can take Ortiz for some serious extra cash, if we just threaten to go public on Scorpion Response.’

  ‘Why you?’ Marsalis asked.

  Jeff shrugged. ‘I was all he had. When we scattered back in ’94, there were no links, no looking back. I was the only one apart from Ortiz who kept my identity, the only one with any public profile. Tanaka - he was called Asano back then, Max Asano - sees me on the feeds, this conference in Bangkok on the Pacific Rim refugee problem. So he sneaks across the fenceline, tracks me to the house over in Marin and he lays it out for me. He’s got it all set up, the discreet clearing accounts in Hawaii, the back-sealed financial disconnect, the whole method. It’s all there for the taking.’

  ‘Ortiz?’ Norton still could not make it fit. ‘Joaquin Ortiz ran Scorpion Response? Why the hell would he get involved in something like that?’

  Jeff shot him a weary look. ‘Oh, grow up, Tom. Because he’s a fucking politician, a power-broker with an eye to the main chance. He always has been. Back then, just after secession kicked in, he was a junior Rim staffer looking for an edge. He got Scorpion Response handed to him and he worked it as far as it would carry him, which was pretty much up to policy level. When Jacobsen came in and the oversight protocols looked too stiff to risk any more, he folded Scorpion up ahead of time and moved on to getting elected to the assembly instead. That’s how you do it, Tom. Stay ahead of the game, know when to get out and keep your eyes open for the next opportunity.’

  ‘The next opportunity being COLIN.’

&
nbsp; ‘Yeah, that’s right, little brother.’ Jeff’s expression turned hooded and resentful. ‘Fucking Ortiz does seven years of elected office in the Rim, which he then bargains into a consultancy with the Colony Initiative. Another six years there, climbs to the top of that tree as well, and now they’re talking about the UN.’

  ‘Ripe for the plucking,’ said Marsalis.

  ‘Yeah, well, that’s what Tanaka thought.’ Jeff swallowed brandy, shivered. ‘See, he figures there are twenty or thirty ex-Scorpion personnel scattered about North America with their new identities, so Ortiz can’t know who the blackmail’s coming from, and he can’t very well set out to find and kill them all. Plus he’s got access to COLIN-level funds these days, he can skim a few million off here and there, make the payments easily. It’s the line of least resistance.’

  ‘But that’s not Ortiz,’ said Norton automatically, startled.

  ‘No. That’s what Tanaka missed.’

  ‘And so did you,’ Marsalis pointed out. ‘Why did Tanaka need you in the first place? Why not take his demands straight to Ortiz?’

  Another shrug. ‘He said he wanted a buffer. I don’t know, maybe he just wanted a friend, someone to work with. It’s got to be tough, right? Living a cover identity for the rest of your life. Covering for a past you can’t ever tell anyone about.’

  Marsalis stared at Jeff like something he wanted to smash. ‘Oh, you’re breaking my fucking heart. So how come it took this Asano-Tanaka-whatever guy fourteen years to get around to blackmail?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ Jeff said tiredly. ‘Scorpion personnel all got seed money for going away, all part of the deal. But not everyone knows how to handle that. Maybe fourteen years was what it took for Tanaka to piss his stake away. Or maybe he just got unlucky a couple of years back and lost what he’d made. You slip financially in the Republic, there’s not a lot of help out there to get you back on your feet.’

  ‘Right. So this washed-up ex-sneak ops petty crook comes to you with some wide-eyed scheme for putting pressure on one of the most powerful men in American corporate and political life. And you just go along with it?’

  Jeff drained his glass again, sat hunched forward over it. ‘Sure. Why not? It could have worked.’

  ‘This I’ve got to fucking hear. Worked how?’

  Jeff reached for the bottle. ‘Tanaka’s idea was, he sends the blackmail demands to me, and I take it to Ortiz as if I’m scared. I steer Ortiz towards paying up, point out the smart move and offer to act as a conduit so he stays clean.’

  Norton shook his head. ‘But that’s not Ortiz. He wouldn’t just . . . Christ, you should have known that, Jeff. Why didn’t you see it?’

  Jeff gave him a hunted look. He uncorked the cognac.

  ‘Why do you think, little brother? I wanted the fucking money.’

  ‘Yeah, but you must have-’

  ‘Just fucking don’t, Tom. All right?’ The bottle slammed down, the pale liquid slopped and splashed up through the open neck. Jeff’s voice scaled upward, defensive to bitter fury. ‘What do you know about my life anyway? It’s okay for you, with your fucking COLIN badge, your promotion that I set up for you, your fucking loft apartment on Canal Street and your no-ties, no-costs jet-set fucking life. You know what I make here at Human Cost? For fourteen hour days, six and sometimes seven days a week, you know what I fucking make? I’ve got two kids, Tom, a wife with expensive tastes, no pension scheme yet. What do you know about all this, Tom? You float, you fucking float through life. So don’t come to me telling me what I should or shouldn’t have known. I wanted the money, that’s it. I was in.’

  Norton stared at him, too numb to pick up pieces and make them fit. It was too much, too much of his world blown open.

  ‘I don’t live on Canal Street, Jeff,’ he said stupidly. ‘I never did. It’s Lispenard. You should know that.’

  ‘Don’t fucking tell me what I should know!’

  ‘Why don’t you tell us what went wrong?’ Marsalis suggested. ‘Ortiz wouldn’t roll over, right?’

  ‘No.’ Jeff reached for the bottle again. ‘At first, yes. He transferred some funds of his own, told me to make an interim payment and play for more time. Then, when Tanaka’s next demand came in, he just sat me down and told me what we were going to do.’

  Marsalis nodded. ‘Wipe out everyone who could be doing it.’

  ‘He - ’ A helpless gesture. ‘He’d kept tabs on them all. I didn’t know that, but he knew where every single one of them was. Or where they’d started out from, anyway. Some of them had moved about, he said, so it’d take a little time to track them down. But one way or another, they all had to go. I sat there, Tom, I couldn’t fucking believe what I was hearing. I mean - ’ Jeff’s voice turned almost plaintive. ‘We hadn’t asked for that much, you know.’

  ‘It wasn’t the money,’ Norton said distantly.

  Marsalis reached over and took the bottle out of Jeff’s trembling hands. He poured into the tumbler. ‘UN nomination. Just a step away. You fucked with the wrong patriarch just when he could least afford it.’

  ‘Yeah.’ Jeff sat and looked at the drink the thirteen had just made him. ‘That’s what he said. There’s too much at stake here, Jeff. We can’t be exposed now. We have to get tough. I tried to talk him down, tell him it wasn’t so much money. But he didn’t care. I told him he’d get caught, that nobody could get away with killing that many people, that many ex-sneak ops guys. You’d need a whole team of people to bring it off, and then they’d have the same goods on you as the original blackmailers.’

  ‘Or,’ said Marsalis, ‘you bring in the one member of the old team you can trust to get it done. The one person who also can’t afford the word to get out, and who won’t let nostalgia and camaraderie get in the way of doing the job. The one person who’s wired for it - a thirteen.’

  Jeff just nodded, let the black man talk. He was emptied out.

  ‘Everyone thinks Merrin’s gone to Mars.’ Marsalis went on, nodding what might have been approval. ‘A thirteen called Merrin did go to Mars. So that makes the other Merrin, Onbekend, pretty invisible back here on Earth. He’s pulled his own disappearing act, found a surrogate brother down on the altiplano, a safe haven. A sideline in playing pistaco for his brother now and then, when the local bad guys need scaring, but the rest of his time’s his own. Until suddenly here’s his old boss banging on the door, telling him it’s all about to end. Some ungrateful fuck from the old team is threatening to blow everything wide open, and the only way to ensure that doesn’t happen is to go back and wipe out every member of the old team left alive. Does Onbekend want the work?’ Marsalis spread his hands. ‘Probably not, but what choice does he have? If Ortiz isn’t going to pay, the blackmailers are going to get angry and the word on Scorpion Response is going to get out. And there’s just no telling how far that thread can unravel. Whatever Onbekend’s managed to swing for himself down on Manco Bambaren’s patch is under threat. There’s a good chance he’s going to the tracts, because if they do find him it’s that or a bullet. Feel free to contribute, Jeff, if I’m getting any of this wrong.’

  ‘No, you’re right.’ Jeff sipped at his drink, held it in both hands before him, staring into space. ‘When Ortiz went to Onbekend with it, he saw what had to happen right away.’

  Marsalis grinned. It wasn’t a pleasant sight. ‘Clean sweep, huh? Just like Wyoming all over again.’

  ‘It was the only way,’ said Jeff.

  ‘Okay, but Onbekend isn’t stupid. He knows he isn’t going to get away with murdering thirty-odd ex-sneak op soldiers and not leave some trace of himself at least at a couple of the crime scenes. And once that genetic trace gets into the system, he’s as fucked as if he’d let Ortiz’s blackmailers go ahead and blow the whistle. Because the only living thirteen who’s supposed to have that gene-print is on Mars. So if it shows up around a stack of murder victims in the Rim or the Republic, all hell is going to break loose. That’s what he confronts Ortiz with, that’s the sticking
point.’

  ‘And Ortiz is at COLIN,’ said Norton wonderingly.

  ‘Right. So he hatches the perfect alibi for Onbekend. Not only will they bring Merrin back from Mars to account for any genetic trace that crops up, they’ll set him up as the fall guy for the whole set of murders. Hold him in reserve while Onbekend gets the killing done, and then have him die in some plausible way and leave him for RimSec to find. With finesse, they could even set it up so RimSec get him pinned and kill him themselves. Medals all round, and no one looks too closely at the aftermath, because it’s so fucking neat. After all, you can’t argue with genetic trace, and there’s your monster, dead in the dirt.’

  Norton looked at his brother and could not name the feeling that seeped into him. He hoped it was pity.

  ‘No wonder Ortiz paid up at the start, Jeff,’ he told him. ‘He had to have time to put all this in place. He had to get Merrin back here, before Onbekend could go to work.’

  ‘And Onbekend came over the Texas border and started with Tanaka.’ Marsalis nodded. ‘He could have stopped right there, if he’d only known. But he doesn’t know, doesn’t get the chance to get it out of Tanaka, maybe wouldn’t even have been able to afford to trust him even if he did, so he’s committed. He kills his way across the Republic, because those are the easiest ones - underfunded police departments, low-grade data-tech, highest murder rate on the planet and a massive underclass to hide out in. He only heads on to the Rim when the easy work is done, moving slower now because he’s got RimSec to contend with. But still, Jasper Whitlock and Lola Montes, he’s getting through them, probably only a handful left and then . . .’

  They both turned to look at Jeff Norton.

  ‘What happened?’ Marsalis asked him softly. ‘You lose your nerve, playing both ends against the middle? Thought maybe Ortiz had worked you out, knew you were part of it after all ? You start to think maybe Onbekend’s last bullet was going to be for you?’

  ‘No!’