Dead Dwarves Don't Dance

by Derek J. Canyon

  “Whoever hit the club probably got the last of the hijacker’s ordnance. No fixer’s going to hold on to that much gear longer than he has to.”

  “Yeah,” Noose agreed, shoving the printout into his pocket. “I guess it’s time I get out there and find out who’s been selling a lot of milspec equipment these past few weeks.”

  Cori again started to rise from the bed. “I better come with you.”

  “Not likely,” Noose said, pushing her down as before. “I’m the one who gets shot at in this partnership. You stay here and rest.”

  “Shot at?”

  “Well, it’ll happen sooner or later, and I don’t want you there when it does.”

  “And what if I don’t want you shot, either?”

  Noose smiled and squeezed her hand. “Hey, don’t worry. It’s me.”

  “That’s what I’m afraid of.”

  “Very funny. I shouldn’t be long. I have my car this time.”

  “Noose.”

  He stopped. “Yeah?”

  “The police called yesterday. They want…they want me to identify her.”

  Noose frowned. “I’ll handle it.”

  “You sure? I should go with you.” Her voice was not at all convincing.

  “You’re going to stay right here. Just call the cops and tell them I’ll be down there later today. Tell them I’m your cousin…Jack Oxbow.”

  “I really appreciate it, Noose. I don’t think I could handle seeing her…body, just now.”

  “I understand. I’ll see to everything.”

  “Thanks. The information’s on the kitchen counter.”

  “Right. See you later today.”

  “Be careful,” Cori said, but Noose had already left the room.

  25

  Noose hovered his Detonator skycar over the deserted streets between dilapidated skyscrapers. No pedestrians here, no police, no Peacekeepers. Only smoldering rubble and gutted cars, as well as a few organ grinders searching the ruins for any body they could salvage and sell for profit. Undocumented body parts sold quite well to various street docs, research labs, and cost-cutting transplanters. Here in Blackzone, the grinders didn’t have any problems from cops interfering in their collection routes. In fact, cops rarely interfered with anything in Blackzone.

  That served Noose’s professional purposes just fine. Blackzone held the majority of Atlanta’s criminal population. From smugglers, hackers, unregistered psykers, and other rogue neohumans, to pushers, gangers, and fixers. And Blackzone held another valuable resource: Websters and information dealers. Most were hackers who sailed the Internet’s data oceans, collecting every bit of info they could store, selling to whoever wanted it. Other dealers couldn’t tell a neuroport from a Kokastik, but still had valuable information.

  Just after nine o’clock, Noose descended into the small, empty parking lot outside Diablo’s. He stepped out of the Detonator and locked it. Dirt and grime clung to the exterior of the grungy little bar, its ancient walls pitted and cracked from decades of weather. A few meters from the bar’s door, a fat indigent slept in soiled rags, booze and vomit leaking from his slack mouth.

  Noose knocked loudly at the locked door, getting no answer. He stepped around the drunk and tried to peer through the grime-caked windows. He would have had a better chance seeing through a brick wall.

  “Get away from me, ya gobbler,” the drunk mumbled in a thick drawl, eyes barely open. He waved a hand as if he were fending off flies.

  “I ain’t a gobbler, old man.”

  “Who the hell cares?” the bum muttered. “All gonna end the same. Gonna get blown to bits and then have yer pieces eaten by rats.” He continued to mumble and rant incoherently.

  Noose walked around to the back of the bar. A vidcam watched the alley from just above a reinforced steel door. Beside it, a dusty, battered palm scanner hung from electrical wires.

  He pressed the call button on the dangling palm scanner. After several moments, he pushed it again. Finally, a soft voice drifted down from a hidden speaker above the door.

  “Who the hell is it?”

  “Down here, you one-eyed freak.” Noose said loudly.

  The vidcam above the door tilted downward. “Oh, Noose! What do you want? I don’t serve breakfast.”

  “I don’t want breakfast, Socket, I want in.”

  “You and every other stud this side of the Chattahoochee.”

  Noose shook his head in annoyance, and held up a cashcard. “It’s biz today and I’m paying.”

  After a pause, the door clicked. A furry hand appeared around the door and pulled it open, revealing the one-eyed, toothy face of an exotic neohuman. Tall pointed ears stood up from her furry head, sharp fangs lined her snout. “Magic words, Noose. Come on in. Where’s your hat?”

  “Lost it.”

  Noose stepped into the back room of the bar, and Socket locked the door behind him. The cat-human led the way past a faded movie poster of Anastasia Carpone. She sashayed to a stool and sat on it, pulling her long striped legs up beneath her. Her ringed tail twitched. Once she had been an acrobat in Atlanta’s club scene, dancing, gyrating, and leaping for the amusement of rich audiences. But when a club owner tried to trick her out, she escaped. But that was years ago, and now she quietly ran the little Blackzone bar.

  “Whatta you want, Noose?”

  “Info on fixings.”

  “What kind of fixings?” Socket pointed to a chair nearby. Noose sat down.

  “Milspec. Within the last three weeks.”

  “Whatta you want to know?”

  “Who’s been unloading heavy ordnance recently. Violator, Akbar, grenades, and high-explosive rounds.”

  “Oh, you’re talking about that convoy last month.”

  “I knew I could count on you, Socket.”

  “Eight hundred creds,” Socket offered, scratching her furry arm.

  “Five.”

  “Six-fifty.”

  “Six.”

  “Done,” Socket accepted. She reached into a pocket and held out a cashcard to Noose, who connected it to his card. He programmed the transfer, waited for the confirmation beep, and handed the card back to her.

  “Wiz biz, Noose.”

  “Ditto. Now, let’s hear it.”

  Socket tipped back the stool on two legs and leaned against the wall. She tapped the card against one of her large fangs. “Four Peacekeeper convoy trucks and two escort vehicles got hit on IR-75 in broad daylight as they were coming through Park Sector. Escorts taken out with gas bombs, truck drivers and guards with stunners. No casualties. They never fired a shot.”

  “Very efficient.”

  “Yeah. Wiz to know when you buy a Peacekeeper he stays bought. You ever that easy when you was in the ‘keepers, Noose?”

  “Nope.”

  “Anyhow, two of the trucks crashed off the road, but the other two slid to a stop nice and neat. Half a dozen jackers stole as much gear as they could. Two minutes later they flew away in a skyvan and no one ever saw them again.”

  “Regional Police?”

  Socket laughed. “It was a Peacekeeper convoy and Peacekeeper jurisdiction. They did ask for a Reggie investigation. But, they didn’t try too hard.”

  “Someone with connections pulled the hit, eh?”

  “Someone who can get Reggies and Global to do half-assed investigations.”

  “So, some bigwig wanted that arsenal on the streets.” Noose scowled.

  “Seems that way.”

  “Who pulled the smash and grab?”

  “Keznick and his gang.”

  “I figured as much. He won’t smear targets if he can help it.”

  “Clean blue lightning. No murder raps for him.”

  “And no casualties means the robbery doesn’t lead on the news. The theft is kept quiet. Very clean. Very neat.”

  “That’s Keznick.”

  “He’s freelance and wouldn’t need that much heat,” Noose guessed. “And he doesn’t have the resources or connectio
ns to bribe Reggies and Peacekeepers. He’s just the tool.”

  “You get an A in class, Noosey-boy.”

  “Yeah, yeah, yeah. Just keep talking. Who fixed it?”

  “Like you say,” Socket said, twitching her lynx-like ears. “Who’s got Regional and Global fingered? Who deals in big guns? Who’s used Keznick before?”

  Noose’s face darkened. “Ipplitz.”

  “Bazinga!”

  “Bastard,” Noose swore.

  “My, my. Got a little problem with the Tanned Man?”

  “I talked to him yesterday and he said he had nothing to do with it.”

  “You thought he’d tell you?” Socket laughed. “You getting senile in your old age, Noose?”

  “Who’s old, you relic?”

  “Ouch!” Socket frowned, then stretched her long legs and twisted her torso, showing off her feline curves. “This look like a relic to you, dwarfy boy?”

  Noose had to admit that Socket still had the goods. She’d escaped servitude years ago, and still showed no signs of genetic degradation. She claimed she didn’t have an expiration date, but Noose suspected she was rubbing some geneticist for booster injections.

  “Ain’t no tiger-babe tighter than you, Socket,” Noose nodded.

  “You always know how to sweet talk a lady, Noose,” she purred, walking over to stand behind him. She scratched her claws through his hair. “It’s been awhile. You got time?”

  Noose shook his head. “Sorry.”

  “That’s so sad,” she said with a frown, rubbing up against him from behind.

  “Come on, Socket. Business today. How’d the ordnance pan out?”

  “Let me check.” The catwoman walked back to the bar, bending over to search behind it. She gave Noose a good long look at the genetic perfection of her ass and swaying tail before turning around with a pad. She tapped it for a while.

  “According to my sources, some of it got smuggled into the Swan Lake Arcology up in the great plains. Wait! What the hell would they need this stuff for in Swan Lake Arcology? Ain’t that some artist colony?”

  “That won’t be the stuff I’m looking for.”

  “Definitely not. There might be a Caliplex shipment, not too sure on that one yet. At least two separate buyers in Europe, though.”

  “Still off target.”

  “Looks like the last cases got sold right here in Atlanta. Akbar, Violator, and Ares Thumper. With ammo, of course.”

  “That’s the load I’m looking for.”

  Socket’s ears perked up. “Trying to find the hitters that did Stiltzkin’s?”

  “What? Do I have it written across my forehead or something?”

  “Nope. But that’s what happened to that shipment. The buyer geared some hitters with the ordnance he bought from Ipplitz, and next thing: kablooey! Stiltzkin’s is gone.”

  “You know the buyer?”

  “Nope. Can’t get that data. Hitters probably got smeared at the payoff. If you want to talk to Ipplitz again, you better hurry. He’s the last loose end.”

  Noose hurried out of the front door.

  “Thanks, babe, I owe you one.”

  “How about you take me out for a nice dinner?” Socket called after the dwarf, but he was already jumping into his skycar.

  26

  Ipplitz’s door swung open easily and Noose cursed under his breath as he pulled out his Stormer. The guard goon lay sprawled across the crushed card table, his blood covering nearly the entire expanse of floor. It looked like he’d been hit a couple of dozen times with a 10 gauge. Flies floated around the room, landing on the goon’s gaping wounds. From the tackiness of the blood, Noose estimated the hit had gone down only a few hours before.

  Cautiously, Noose followed bloody boot prints down the long hallway leading to Ipplitz’s playroom. He reached the door and listened. Nothing.

  With his left hand he pushed the latch and slowly edged the door open, peering inside. The vidwall was still on. He stepped into the room and saw Ipplitz’s huddled body. A deep cut stretched beneath his chin, from one ear to the other. He hadn’t gone easily, though. Blood splattered his hands and forearms, and smears of it covered the wall. Ipplitz’s two Marilyns, dressed in bloody lingerie, lay in crumpled heaps nearby. Each had a single bullet wound to the temple.

  Noose straightened and relaxed. He holstered his Stormer and began searching the room, but found only liquor and sports memorabilia. There was no sign of a safe or computer terminal, nothing that might hold information on the fixer. Noose spent another ten minutes searching two other rooms, but came up empty-handed.

  Scowling, he returned to the entry room. He moved to the door and stopped. Something was different. Waving away flies, he turned and scanned the room. The goon’s body had moved. Noose knelt beside him, felt his thick throat, and detected a weak, stuttering pulse. The goon’s eyes opened.

  “Howdy.” Noose smiled despite himself. “Who did this?”

  Blood bubbled from the goon’s mouth as he answered. “D…don’t…know. Wore… masks.”

  “You’re shot up nice and good. I’ll call the paramedics if you tell me where Ipplitz kept his records.”

  The goon’s eyes glazed momentarily and he shook his head slightly.

  “Loyalty to a dead man may be honorable, but it ain’t smart in your condition. That’s right. Ipplitz is in his room with an extra grin just below his chin. So don’t worry about taking any heat from him for squealing.”

  The goon didn’t respond. He closed his eyes, then opened them with effort.

  “You don’t have long, big boy.”

  His mouth moving ever so slightly, the goon whispered. “Mirror.”

  “Which one?” Noose asked.

  “Ba…bar.”

  “Right.” Noose rose and walked back to the playroom. He strode around behind the bar to look at the mirror on the wall. He searched for a few minutes and found a concealed button and pushed. The mirror slid away to reveal a small compartment with a computer keyboard. He unplugged several wires, no doubt leading to surveillance or security equipment in the building. Only one cartridge was loaded in the keyboard, and Noose pulled it out and put it in his pocket.

  Holding the keyboard under his arm, just in case the onboard memory held any valuable information, he left the room to the three corpses. Back in the entry room, Noose bent down near the goon.

  “Okay, goon, you were right. I’ll call the medics.”

  The dwarf didn’t wait for a response, but strode to the inset vidphone on the wall and called emergency services, switching off the video as he did so. He told the computer operator to send an ambulance to the building, hit the disconnect, and walked out the door.

  27

  Doctor Salma-Scott-Scott looked down at the rather unkempt dwarf standing in front him. Standing more than a meter and a half tall, he was big for a dwarf. Despite the dark brown long coat hiding his body, the doctor could tell that he was bulky and strong, as were most of that genotype. Fresh injuries marred his face, and a cigar protruded from his mouth.

  “Yes, Mr. Oxbow,” Dr. Salma-Scott-Scott said, looking down at an electronic pad, “Ms. Kniginyzky called to inform us that you would be identifying the body of her sister.”

  “That’s right,” Mr. Oxbow replied.

  “Actually, I think it is better that you do this, Mr. Oxbow,” Dr. Salma-Scott-Scott said, as he led the dwarf down the white, antiseptic hallways of the hospital. “I’m sorry to say that most of the victims of the attack on the dwarf club were quite mutilated by the explosions. I’m sure someone of your…er…obvious experience, would handle seeing the body much better than the grieving sister. She seemed quite distraught, and the shock of seeing a beloved relative in such a state would not do her any good.”

  The dwarf grunted agreement. Dr. Salma-Scott-Scott didn’t think the dwarf looked very troubled by the death of his cousin, but he did not have much experience with dwarves. Perhaps they always looked like Mr. Oxbow: angry, intimidating, ready to exp
lode at a moment’s notice. Dr. Salma-Scott-Scott couldn’t be sure, of course, but thought he was probably taking some sort of emotional transference drug, perhaps a sadmad, or similar narcotic.

  “Here we are.” Dr. Salma-Scott-Scott led the dwarf into the morgue, where they were greeted by a white-robed attendant.

  “Hi, Dr. Salma-Scott-Scott. Ready to identify another one of the dwarves?” He looked down at the dwarf beside the doctor.

  “Not this time, Travis,” the doctor said, showing him the pad. “Human female.”

  Travis scowled at the pad. “Nignisky. Kiginsky? Kingsky?”

  “It’s pronounced Ka-nig-i-nisky, Travis,” the doctor said. “Now, if you please?”

  “Sure. Sorry, doc. Cubicle F-18.” Travis bent over his desk and punched in a few keystrokes. “Coming up.”

  The doctor led the dwarf behind Travis. Rows of gleaming metal doors lined the walls from floor to ceiling. A door on the top row opened and a drawer slid out into the grasp of a small crane that hung from the ceiling. The crane carried the drawer along runners and lowered it in front of the doctor and dwarf.

  A body bag rested ominously on the shining metal slab.

  “Shall I, Mr. Oxbow?”

  The dwarf nodded, and the doctor reached out to pull down the zipper. He paused and turned back. “I must warn you that there is extensive burn damage to the face.”

  “Open it,” the dwarf commanded.

  The doctor unzipped the top forty or so centimeters of the body bag. He stepped away to allow the dwarf a good look at the face inside. Most of the woman’s hair had been burned away, and a large piece of shrapnel had caused a great rent in her skull. The left side of her face was black and peeling, her jawbone revealed near her ear. The other side of her face was damaged as well, but remained recognizable enough to compare with her records. The police, however, required positive identification by an appointed representative of the family.

  Mr. Oxbow leaned over the slab and gripped the edges. His knuckles whitened.

  “That’s Pamela,” the dwarf said softly after a few moments of silence. Despite the nearly sub vocal statement, Dr. Salma-Scott-Scott jumped at the sheer menace in the dwarf’s voice.