Penumbra

by Eric Brown

  Naz pointedly ignored her.

  ‘It seems as though we have another crucifix killing,’ Vishwanath continued as they descended. ‘The governor is getting impatient to have the crimes cleaned up. He says it “doesn’t reflect well on the image of the city”. Personally speaking, I am more concerned about catching the killer in order to save lives in future.’

  They stepped from the elevator and into the underground car-park. The transport situation was a far cry from what she had been used to in Child Welfare. Two new squad cars were waiting, engines running. Vishwanath signalled for herself and Naz to join him in the first car, while two forensic officers took the second.

  As the driver swept them up the ramp and on to the midnight streets of Calcutta, quieter at this time but still busy by the standards of most cities, Vishwanath turned in the passenger seat. ‘I hope your com-boards are loaded with the details of the previous crucifix killings?’

  Rana held up her board in reply.

  Something in Naz’s hesitation gave her an exquisite surge of cruel pleasure. ‘I . . . was in the process—’

  Vishwanath gave Naz a look that cut him dead. ‘I don’t want excuses, Lieutenant. Copy the details from Rana’s board. On second thoughts, I think Rana should do it for you.’

  Uncomfortable with her commanding officer’s overt favouritism, but at the same time enjoying Naz’s discomfort, Rana took his board and connected it to her own. Seconds later she had downloaded a copy of all the relevant data on the murders, plus a copy of her own report for good measure.

  ‘The killing occurred in Pathan,’ Vishwanath said, ‘north of here at the Hindustan Plaza hotel. We have yet to learn the identity of the victim.’

  Rana entered the details into her com-board, then sat back as the squad car carried them into the exclusive district of foreign embassies and consulates. They passed grand colonial buildings of white brickwork, like so many wedding cakes, set in lawns as vast as cricket pitches. There was so much unoccupied space in this suburb that Rana found it hard to believe they were in the same city; just two miles south of here was the teeming, chaotic heart of Calcutta. This place filled her with an uneasy feeling, like agoraphobia. She much preferred the familiar hurly-burly of the city centre and the surrounding slums, where she had spent so much of her life.

  The Hindustan Plaza was a fifty-storey obelisk of sheet obsidian reflecting the distant lights of central Calcutta and the occasional floating ad-screen. There was much frantic activity in the forecourt: local police cars, beacons pulsing, an ambulance, redundant in the event, all watched by a gaggle of curious guests and uniformed staff.

  Rana followed Vishwanath, aware that the little group of investigators and forensic scientists was the centre of attention. A local sergeant rushed up to Vishwanath, almost doubling himself up in obeisance, followed by the hotel manager who gabbled something about an ‘unfortunate incident’ and how ‘this had never happened under my managership before’.

  ‘I’m delighted to hear it,’ Vishwanath replied. ‘Now if you would show me and my team to the room in question . . .’

  They rode in the elevator to the fourth floor. Rana stepped out on to a plush red carpet and followed the dancing manager and the sergeant along the corridor. They came to an open doorway. A pulsing low-powered laser cordon barred the way.

  Vishwanath said, ‘Who discovered the body?’

  ‘The maid, sir,’ the sergeant replied. ‘She noticed that the door was slightly open. When she looked in . . . This was at eleven.’

  ‘No one else has entered the room since then?’

  ‘Only the hotel manager and my constable, sir. He confirmed that the victim was dead and contacted me immediately.’

  Vishwanath nodded and signalled to the two forensic officers. They knelt before the open doorway and removed two crawlers from silver sterile bags, then placed them on the carpet. The crawlers dashed off into the room like hyperactive turtles.

  ‘Do you have the name of the victim?’ Vishwanath asked the hotel manager.

  ‘Ah-cha. He was one Ali Bhakor. He was an eminent businessman of my very own acquaintance, sir.’

  Rana entered the dead man’s name into her com-board and peered through the doorway. She could see along the corridor into the lounge, and the chair upon which the late Ali Bhakor slouched. Only the man’s left arm could be seen, hanging limply over the side of the chair.

  ‘Have you accounted for Bhakor’s movements last night?’ Vishwanath asked the sergeant.

  ‘Ah-cha, sir. I’ve detailed his known actions since six. Also I’ve interviewed the maid and bell-boy.’ He proffered his com-board, and first Vishwanath, then Naz and Rana downloaded the relevant file.

  While the crawlers gathered forensic evidence, Rana took the opportunity to read the meagre file. Bhakor had arrived at the hotel at six the day before, had dined alone at seven and returned to his room at eight. He had spoken to no one during that time other than hotel staff.

  The crawlers scuttled back over the threshold and were retrieved by the forensic scientists. They examined the read-outs and then passed the crawlers to Vishwanath, Naz and Rana. Rana downloaded their findings into her com-board and cross-referenced the data with that compiled by the crawlers from the scenes of the other so-called ‘crucifix killings’. She detected a number of possible correlations. Identical cloth fibres had been discovered at three of the crime scenes.

  She reported her findings to Vishwanath.

  ‘It’s a slim connection, Lieutenant. The fibres might be of a cloth commonly worn. I want them checked and a full forensic report on type, origin, availability, et cetera.’ He killed the laser cordon. ‘Ah-cha, let’s take a closer look.’

  They passed into the room.

  The forensic officers filmed the scene and the murder victim and then examined the body, taking tissue samples and readings with instruments unfamiliar to Rana.

  Ali Bhakor sat slumped in the armchair, arms dangling over the side, legs outstretched, his fat chin resting on his chest. There was something pathetic and undignified about his posture that was even more grotesque than the wound that had killed him. The right side of his face was blackened with the impact of the laser charge, but the left side was unburned and wore a strange expression of startled surprise. Rana had expected to be repulsed by the sight, but the strange fact was that it seemed no more sickening than the cosmetic effects of a hundred sensational holodramas.

  Carved into the padded flesh of his left cheek was the bloody shape of a crucifix. Something about the mutilation, perhaps the sight of the blood or the fact that the crucifix was the killer’s cynical calling card, seemed to Rana more ghastly than the laser burn.

  She noticed the com-screen in the corner of the room. After receiving clearance from forensic, she accessed GlobaLink and typed in her commands. Ten minutes later she had compiled a file of news reports and court cases concerning the dead man. She downloaded the file into her com-board and returned to Vishwanath.

  ‘I’ve found out a little about Ali Bhakor, sir.’

  ‘Go ahead.’

  ‘Like all the other victims of the killer - if they do share a common killer - Bhakor had a criminal record.’ She passed her com-board to Vishwanath. ‘Two years ago he was implicated in the import of illegal substances from Burma - heroin-plus and slash. Ten years ago he was jailed for a year for smuggling precious gems from a colony world.’

  ‘Do you draw any inferences, Lieutenant?’

  ‘Well, obviously the branding of the corpse with the crucifix . . . Perhaps the killer sees himself or herself as taking part in some kind of moral crusade to clean up the city.’

  ‘That’s certainly a possibility.’

  ‘Or, perhaps these are vengeance killings. All the victims might have opposed the killer in some way in the past, perhaps with business deals.’

  ‘When you get back to HQ I want you to check all the business dealings conducted by all the victims over the past ten years - and if you find nothing,
go back twenty years. Also, if these are vengeance rather than morally motivated killings, reconsider the implications of the crucifix. It’ll be a complex, time-consuming task, but this is priority, Lieutenant. Drop everything else and concentrate on this case.’

  ‘Ah-cha, sir.’

  A forensic officer stood up after examining the corpse. ‘Standard 100 laser charge, sir. Might have been any one of a dozen types of weapon available over the counter. Just like all the charges used on the other victims. We estimate that he died between eight and eight-thirty yesterday evening.’

  Rana moved to the window and stared at the screen of her com-board, reading through her notes on the other killings. She knew that somewhere among the morass of data and evidence were the facts that would lead to the solution of the puzzle. They would not leap out at her, but had to be considered minutely from every angle.

  She looked up from the board. ‘Sir.’

  Vishwanath lowered his own board. ‘Lieutenant?’

  ‘It just occurred to me. The scenes of the crimes - there is a link.’

  Across the room, she noticed Naz look up with irritable curiosity.

  Vishwanath fingered the touch-pad of his com-board, frowned at the screen. ‘I don’t see . . .’

  Rana wondered whether she had been mistaken in mentioning this. ‘Well, the connection is tenuous, to say the least. There were three hotels, three parks, a public toilet, a nature reserve and a golf course.’

  ‘And the connection, Lieutenant?’

  ‘None of the victims was killed at home or at their offices. Maybe—’

  She stopped. She had just called up a street map of the city, and positioned the crime scenes on the map. She stared at the screen of her com-board.

  ‘What is it, Lieutenant?’

  Silently, Rana held out her com-board to Vishwanath, who considered the revealed pattern on the street map. The locations of the murders, joined like a dot-to-dot, formed a crucifix spanning the city limits of Calcutta.

  ‘So, it looks like they’re connected, Lieutenant.’ Vishwanath paused, staring at the screen. He handed it back to her. ‘What do you notice about the crucifix?’

  She stared at the cross, laid over the city on a roughly north-south axis. She shook her head. ‘I’m sorry . . .’

  ‘It isn’t complete. Look - the vertical bar is made up of six points. The lateral bar comprises two points to the left, but only one to the right. There is a point missing, to the right.’ He stabbed a forefinger at the place where the next point should logically follow. ‘A region of slums to the east of the city, Lieutenant. If our killer has a symmetrical mind, then perhaps this is where he will strike next.’

  ‘And if he isn’t symmetrical,’ Rana added, ‘then it might be anywhere at these three points, north, south or west.’

  ‘I’ll have patrols concentrate on those areas,’ Vishwanath said. He stared at the screen. ‘Also, for the killer to form this crucifix suggests that he arranged to meet his victims at the various locations. It’s hardly likely that he’d just happen upon people he considered evil-doers at these points. Which suggests that he must have known, or at the very least had contact with, the victims to arrange a meeting.’

  Rana nodded. ‘I’ll run checks and interviews with the victims’ contacts to see if they received calls from a common acquaintance.’

  ‘Excellent, Lieutenant.’ He gave a slight smile, and Rana felt as if she had received a medal of honour from the president himself.

  Ten minutes later Vishwanath decided that they had done all they could at the scene of the crime. The body was loaded on to a stretcher and taken away, the room sealed for a more thorough forensic examination later.

  As they left the room, Vishwanath said to Naz, ‘I want you to stay here, Lieutenant. Interview the staff. The usual routine. Download the file to my terminal by noon.’

  Naz saluted, trying not to let his disappointment show at being given the donkey work.

  Vishwanath and Rana descended in the elevator, moved through the crowd still gathered outside the entrance and climbed into the squad car.

  Rana’s shift was due to end shortly after she arrived back at headquarters. She spent a further hour making her report, downloaded it to Vishwanath, and asked if she could leave. She was tired after the long shift and the mental effort of collating her report. Seconds later the reply flashed on her com-screen: ‘Off you go, Lieutenant. Well done.’

  She took the elevator down to the ground floor and paused on the steps. She recalled her earlier resolution to visit Vandita and the other kids when her shift ended. But the sun was rising, burning up the grey mist of dawn, and the kids would be up and at work by now. She would call on them tomorrow.

  She left the police headquarters and began the short walk home through the rapidly increasing heat of another Calcutta day.

  * * * *

  9

  Bennett and Mackendrick were checking supplies and equipment in the cargo hold when the Cobra gave a sudden jolt. The sensation of riding an elevator indicated that the floor of the repair pit was rising to meet the deck of the spaceport. Bennett grabbed the tail-gate of the open-topped transporter, swaying with the motion.

  ‘If that’s it down here we’ll join Ten,’ Mackendrick said.

  They took the lift-plate to the upper deck, standing side by side in silence. Mackendrick was wearing a black flight-suit, so tight that it shrink-wrapped his thin frame, emphasising his prominent rib-cage and scooped pelvis. Since learning of the tycoon’s illness, Bennett had never been able to look at Mackendrick without thinking that soon, perhaps within a year, the man would be dead. He wondered how one could go on living with the knowledge that death was imminent. He thought of his father, and how he had coped with the fact of his approaching end. Then he realised that right at this minute, in Mojave Town, the remains of his father were being interred in the grave garden. He recalled his father’s eyes, as he died, accusing him, and he felt a sudden and painful stab of guilt.

  The flight-deck was finished in ubiquitous regulation black: jet carpet, couches and curving walls, the better for the pilots to apprehend the dozens of illuminated readouts and screens. Through the delta viewscreen Bennett watched a tug reverse towards the nose of the Cobra, engage grabs and take the weight of the ship. Slowly they trundled forward, past the terminal building, towards the vacant blast-pad and posse of waiting technicians and mechanics.

  Mackendrick lay on the engineer’s couch to the rear of the flight-deck, and carefully buckled his thin frame into the safety harness. Ten Lee was already strapped into her couch, the wraparound command console pulled close. Her face, surrounded by a bulging flight helmet with the visor screen down, was a study in emotionless concentration as she cycled through the pre-flight programs.

  Bennett took his helmet from the pilot’s couch and pulled it down over his head, feeling the familiar comfort of its snug fit. The irritating chatter of a flight controller played in his right ear; he modulated the noise below the threshold of audibility. They were still one hour from liftoff. He would rather be alone with his thoughts until then.

  He climbed into his couch, sinking into its padded depths. Everything about the Cobra, from major mechanical specifics right down to minor design features, was superior to anything else he’d flown over the years. Mackendrick had spared no expense when fitting and equipping the ship.

  He pulled the horseshoe console towards him, locking it in place. He flipped down his visor and went through the running program with Ten Lee. This was, he realised, more a routine process to soothe his pre-flight nerves. During his fifteen years in space he had never flown trans-c. In fact, the furthest he had ever travelled was to Mars on a short vacation ten years ago. He had every confidence in his own ability to fly the Cobra, especially when they arrived at Penumbra and he had to take them through the storm-riven atmosphere - and he knew that he could not hope for a better ship or operating system. But the fact remained that they were embarking on a faster-than-light voy
age through two thousand light years of unexplored space. He found it hard to grasp the enormity of what was about to happen. The fact of the flight alone was mind-numbing, without considering what they might find when they finally made landfall on Penumbra.

  He raised his visor and glanced across at Ten Lee. She was reading off a string of equations with the calm of someone to whom this reality was nothing more than a passing illusion.

  They reached the blast-pad and the tug disengaged. Hydraulic gantries took the weight of the ship and eased it to the vertical. Bennett tipped, staring up through the viewscreen at the bright blue sky.

  He opened communications with the control tower and for the next half hour went through the process of program checks and data monitoring. Through the side-screen he noticed the bowsers and trucks carrying the mechanics and technicians beetling away across the tarmac. The sight filled him with a feeling of isolation he recalled from ten years ago, when he regularly piloted shuttles from ground to orbit.