by M. H. Mead
The Yavorit felt suddenly perfect in Andre’s swollen hand. Part of him—perhaps a larger part than he cared to admit—wanted to end this here and now, wanted to end Topher.
No. If Topher dropped his weapons, both gun and pad, Andre would arrest him, cuff him, and lead him away to trial. He wasn’t like Talic, choosing amputation over pain. “Don’t give me an excuse, Topher.” He didn’t shout, but the words carried. “Drop the datapad.”
Topher turned his head to look sidelong at Andre. “I think you’d better drop your gun. I’m close enough. I’m in. You shoot me and they all die.”
It started with a chuckle at the back of Andre’s throat that swelled into laughter.
“I mean it!” Topher’s voice, so sure, so controlled, was now shrill with anger.
“All who?” Andre mocked. “Take a look, Topher. Did you notice how few cars were on the road with us? Check out the on-ramp down there.” He didn’t take his eyes off Topher, but nodded his head to the north.
Topher turned toward the highway. His eyes widened “They . . . they . . .”
“You and Madison,” Andre said, “you both have the same idea about what Detroit is. To you it’s all just a big mechanical construct. The gears mesh together and those in power turn them. Turn one cog wrong, it all falls apart. Take a good look, Topher. Detroit isn’t a machine. When things stop working, people start.”
Andre shook his head in mock sadness. “You’ve been a pain in the ass, but after I arrest you, the spinners will cover your trial on a flash-pad. You and your little organization will be yesterday’s news.”
Topher’s nostrils flared under burning eyes. “You can’t arrest me.” He held up his datapad and looked over his shoulder at the tower. “I’ll do it! I will!”
Andre laughed again, low and long. “If you were close enough to release the virus, you would have done it already.”
Topher swung the gun in a flat arc, but Andre was ready for the movement. The Yavorit’s sight laid a perfect crosshatch on Topher’s furrowed brow and his squeezing finger was already at the trigger’s breakpoint. Topher’s head snapped backward, whiplashed forward and then back again as the second bullet scored. His arms flung wide and part of Andre’s attention tracked the gun as it dropped from Topher’s hand. He would need to mark that for retrieval. Sofia would want it back.
Topher spun halfway around as if still trying to flee, but instead thudded to the earth and lay there. He twitched once and was still.
Andre climbed the few remaining meters to the top of the hill and stood where he could see the highways laid out in complicated spirals below him. He activated his phone implant and placed a call to Captain Evans. He gave her GPS coordinates and called for an investigative team.
The glow of artificial streetlights had taken the place of fading sunlight, and Andre could clearly see the on-ramp to the north where a dapper row of fourths stood arm in linked arm, preventing the line of cars from entering the on-ramp. He could see more in his imagination, fourths up and down the highway, standing between the cars and danger—making a line and then putting themselves on it. He wondered if Bob was down there. He wondered if he should help them.
Andre smiled and shook his head. He wouldn’t go to the on-ramp. He didn’t have to. This was bigger than him. Bigger than any one of them. The fourths were on the job and would do what they always did. They would take care of their city.
ANDRE EASED OPEN THE door and moved around the corner, raising his hands to elbow level. He wondered about the wisdom of surprising a guy like Talic. Wondered even more as Talic held a large and unfamiliar handgun—probably military issue—on him.
“Gun,” Talic said.
“I thought that’s what it was.” Andre strolled forward, still holding his hands at that negligent height. He glanced around at the spartan lack of decoration in Talic’s apartment. There were a few lonely nails on the walls and two empty shelves. Had they once held trophies, medals, maybe a photo of his unit?
Two wine glasses sat on the spotless expanse of kitchen counter next to a recently-opened bottle. “Expecting someone?”
“Saw you sneaking into the building.” In a single fluid movement, Talic safed the gun and placed it on the counter, still within reach. He poured the wine, rolling his wrist with a connoisseur’s ease over each glass. He offered one to Andre. “Did you come here alone, or should I pour another?”
“Alone,” Andre said. “This isn’t department business.”
Talic grunted. “Meaning it’s personal.”
Andre regarded the wine in his glass—nearly as dark as the night sky beyond. The City Center lights below were the only stars available and more easily navigated. “Not the way you mean. You saved Sofia’s life. Maybe mine too. I’m here to thank you. Mostly.” He sniffed the glass and sipped. Smooth. Oaky. He glanced at the label. “I didn’t know Leelenau Cellars made Pinot Noir.”
“They don’t anymore. Been saving this one for a special occasion.” Talic took a generous sip. “Mostly?”
Andre raised his glass. “I’d say the summit is off to a successful start. The city,” he said with dramatic irony, “is saved.”
A laugh from Talic, only a tinge of bitterness. “For now.”
“I’m serious. Don’t come back.” He regretted having to say it out loud. Talic wasn’t a man to bear threats, but Andre had to be sure there was no room for misunderstanding. It was only a matter of time before the newly appointed investigative committee got around to interviewing Jae Geoffrey Talic. Better for the city—better for everyone—if he just disappeared. Unavailable in the permanent sense.
Another part of Andre’s conscience nagged at him. He wasn’t the only one who owed Talic a debt. Thanks for killing those who needed it, was something no one was ever going to put on a cityscape holo banner. He glanced around Talic’s sad, empty apartment, and something told him that it always looked like this, that Talic was always ready to leave.
Andre gestured with his glass. “How’s the leg?”
Another man would have showed off his bandaged ankle with bravura. Talic just took another mouthful of wine. “Hurts.”
He nodded. Hospitalization was out of the question under the circumstances. Andre had to be content with the fact that Talic could walk and stand without apparent agony. He continued to tell himself that his conscience didn’t bother him about that either.
“Where will you go?”
Talic leveled a gaze at him. “I have some contacts in other countries. Don’t worry, LaCroix. It won’t be anywhere nearby.”
He’ll be in Canada. Andre had already looked into the cross-border exercises Talic led. He had a considerable network of relationships among the Mounties as well as the Provincial police forces. He wouldn’t go far, just far enough.
Talic drained his glass and set it on the counter. He waited for Andre to do the same. And waited, eyebrows raised in question.
“That glaze dealer in the zone. Sufek Reem.”
“That always stuck sideways with you, didn’t it?”
“Was it you? Did you take the shot?”
Talic blew out a breath through his nose. “No. I don’t even know exactly who did. I was just closing ranks, LaCroix. Protecting my team.”
Like I’m doing now. Andre drained his glass and set it on the counter next to Talic’s. “I can live with that.” He made for the door.
“Can I ask you something?”
“Sure.”
“Have you decided what you are, yet?”
“You mean, cop or fourth?”
“You’ve pretty much proven you can’t be both.”
Andre rested his hand on the apartment door and thought about the media, how they were tripping over themselves to pour the love on fourths. Video clips of Bob and his friends linking arms to close the on-ramps were still in heavy circulation on national and even international news. He thought about the hard work ahead to clean up the mayor’s office now that Mother Mad had been arrested, and the just plain grun
t work that the police patrol would have to do as the public slowly regained its trust in Overdrive.
He thought about the city as a whole and how much he needed to be a part of it. Sure, he could be both cop and fourth. He was for three years. But fourthing had made him a shitty cop, and the last thing Detroit needed was more shitty cops. He looked back at Talic. “I’ve decided.”
“And?”
He lifted a corner of his mouth and tilted his head to the side. “I love this town.”
Talic pushed his glass away, parking it next to the gun. “Love can be a bitch.”
Andre smiled ruefully, thinking about the events of the last two weeks. “Only if you do it right.”
He walked out of the apartment and down to Sofia’s waiting car.
THREE WEEKS LATER, ANDRE found a parking spot in the cemetery and wheeled the Raven into it just as his datapad vibrated for attention. He routed the call through the car’s companel and commanded it to answer. Danny Cariatti’s face filled the screen. “Your implant is down.”
“I’m not on the clock.”
“You turned it off?”
Andre leaned into the screen and whispered, “We’re allowed to do that, you know.”
“Shit, man. I don’t even turn mine off when I’m in bed.”
“Julie must love that.”
“She hates it. Says she feels like she’s fucking the whole department.”
“Did you call for a reason, or just to put disturbing images in my head?”
“The prelim for that other kid . . . what was her name?” Danny leaned away from the screen to consult some notes. “Wilma Riley.”
“The one on Friday?”
“Moved to Thursday.”
“Still ten o’clock?”
“Yeah.”
“Tell the captain I’ll be there.” Andre shut off the car’s engine and reached for the door handle. “And Danny?”
“What?”
“Try it without the implant. Not just sex. Try it for other stuff too.”
“Yeah, sure. We’re cops.” Danny knocked knuckles against his forehead. “Mind and body and all the hours of your days belong to the city.”
“And my soul?”
Danny reached for the cutoff button. “You get to keep that.”
Fallen leaves blew over his feet as Andre walked toward Jordan Elway’s grave. He put his hands in his pockets against the chill. Every second or third grave spotted fresh flowers, reminding him that he’d forgotten to buy some on the way. Next time. For now, he picked up three loose stones and held them until he got to the site.
It was a nice marker. Elway would certainly have appreciated the holocarving of his name, the way the letters seemed to hover a few centimeters above the surface of the granite. Andre knelt, feeling the dampness of the grass beneath his knees and not caring. He pushed aside the modest pile of stones he’d left earlier and dug a hand’s-breadth into the loose soil. He fished inside his coat pocket, bumping his hand against the familiar presence of the Challenger key. He reached deeper and pulled out two things—his police credentials and his fourthing badge. He looked from one to the other, then put the police shield back in his pocket. He set the fourthing badge into the hole, smoothing the dirt back over it, then rebuilt the stones into a miniature cairn marking the spot.
The cemetery was set on gently sloping land and he climbed the hill at the center of it. From here, he could just glimpse the edge of the rolling skyline of Detroit. He couldn’t see the corruption of the government or the poverty of the oh-zone. He couldn’t see the endless traffic on the highways or hear the non-stop droning of the spinners. From here, he could only see the sun glinting off the tops of the buildings. From right here, he couldn’t see anything but the glow.
ABOUT THE AUTHORS
M.H. Mead is the shared pen name of Margaret Yang and Harry R. Campion. They have been friends and co-authors for many years. The authors live in the Detroit area, where they are hard at work on their newest novel.
Catch up with Margaret and Harry on their website where you can read their short stories, learn about their novels series, visit their blog, and find links to all social media sites.
www.yangandcampion.com
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OTHER WORKS BY M.H. MEAD
Good Fences
The Caline Conspiracy
Fate’s Mirror
Riding Fourth
TABLE OF CONTENTS
Title Page
Dedication
Dramatis Personae
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
Chapter 36
Chapter 37
Chapter 38
Chapter 39
About the Authors