For a moment, all Rodrigo does is stare at the badge she’s showing him. Then he looks at her, confused.
‘How would you feel if I tried to take a look at your memory of what happened? You can say no,’ she says, ‘you’re under no obligations here. Nothing will happen to you if you refuse.’
Rodrigo stares at her and Isabel can feel Voronov’s eyes burning a hole in the back of her head.
‘Would you be okay with that?’
Rodrigo’s eyes flick over her head to Voronov but the other man remains quiet. Isabel tries to block his presence from her mind. She doesn’t think any of his thoughts will make it past the blocks she has in place, both natural and reinforced by the pill, but just in case, she doesn’t want anything distracting her from the young man in front of her.
‘What would you do?’
Isabel gives him a small smile, surprised that the first thing she’s met with isn’t outright hostility. That’s becoming more and more of a rarity. It’s got to the point where she doesn’t show her badge or her classification apart from where her job dictates she has to.
‘I’d have to be touching you, just your hand would do, it helps the connection. Then I’d take a look at your thoughts. Sort of like peering in through someone else’s window, if that makes sense?’
His hands curl into fists and she waits for him to make his decision. ‘Does it hurt?’
‘No, it doesn’t. And it would only be for a moment.’
Rodrigo licks his lips. Then he nods. An aborted thing, like he wants to take it back after making the decision to agree.
Maybe Isabel should check that he’s sure, but she doesn’t. Voronov has seen the confirmation and that’s enough for her, enough for it to hold in court should accusations be made of non-consent.
She reaches for Rodrigo’s hand. Nothing too sudden, he’s spooked enough. His hand is cold and at her touch he lets out a shaky exhale. She leaves her fingers there, only the tips of her index and middle finger on the back of Rodrigo’s hand.
They’d explained in class once how touch could help a weak connection, strengthen it and anchor it, made easier by the transference of electric pulses.
‘All right?’ she asks, peering up into Rodrigo’s face.
Rodrigo swallows, Adam’s apple bobbing with it, and nods again.
It’s quick. Most people, when she tries something like this, think there’ll be pain but there’s nothing like that. They’d practised under the eye of their Guide, to show how seamless it should feel to the person on the receiving end of a connection. They’re supposed to feel nothing. Not even a tickle. Doesn’t matter if it’s done with or without touch, the receiver should never even register your presence. It’s something the PNP likes to throw around in their manifestos, how Gifted telepaths can sneak into your minds without you even knowing and invade your privacy.
Isabel closes her eyes, breathes in through her nose and out through her mouth as she reaches for the connection.
It’s harder opening a pathway to a person under the influence of the pill, but suddenly it snaps open through the block. Thoughts that aren’t her own spill into her head. She can’t hear Rodrigo’s voice in them, but they carry his essence. Isabel doesn’t even need to dig too deep; she latches on to his next horrified thought and follows it back to its source memory.
The train is packed.
That’s the first thing Isabel notices. The feeling of claustrophobia bleeds through the memory and she can feel everyone pressing around her from all sides.
It takes a moment for her to adjust. She’s sitting higher than she normally does and can’t look beyond the field of vision Rodrigo has from his point of view. It’s one of the most frustrating things about going into someone else’s memory. It’s their memory. You can only see what they saw, smell what they smelled, move how they moved, no matter how much you want to turn around and look for all the things you know will give you a clue about something.
The book blurs in front of her eyes and the next thing she knows someone is crashing into her.
It’s the deceased. He’s standing. Rodrigo’s own sense of déjà vu overlaps with hers. She thinks she recognises the man’s face too and for a moment, that distracts her.
His eyes are wide open, and she sees exactly what Rodrigo meant. The awareness is there, completely, his expression horrified. The sound of his face hitting the glass is sickening. Isabel hears a crunch and for a brief moment, the victim’s eyes roll back in his head. The smell of blood is quick to hit the air and Rodrigo is standing now too, Isabel with him. She feels the victim’s shoulders under her hands as she tries to pull him back but isn’t strong enough. The window breaks as he puts his head through it.
Screams, sharp and acute, threaten to deafen her and the carriage shakes with the number of people pushing past each other to get out. At least that’s what Isabel assumes is happening, because her eyes are still on the man who is smashing his head over and over again into the broken glass.
It isn’t a fit. This isn’t someone losing it. No way.
Then the smell is right there, familiar but stronger than the ghost traces of it that had been in the train when she’d done her walk-through earlier. Like burnt human hair.
Isabel withdraws from the connection. It’s disorientating and she doesn’t realise until she’s standing that Voronov has a hand at her elbow and has helped her up.
‘Thanks,’ she murmurs, brow puckering as she focuses on the new memory now inside her head, sealing it, compartmentalising it.
‘No problem,’ Voronov says. His hand lingers on her elbow and his eyes roam her face. Then he steps back, keeping any questions he might have to himself. Isabel appreciates that. Second-guessing her in front of a witness wouldn’t help. And it would piss her off.
Isabel ignores the shakiness in her fingers and knees and forces another smile onto her face.
‘Thank you, Rodrigo, you were a great help. Stay here a bit longer; get your feet under you. I’ll ask someone to bring you some tea to warm you up, and then they’ll have to take your details in case we have any further questions. Will that be okay?’
‘Yes’ – it comes out faint and shaky, so he clears his throat and then speaks again – ‘yes, Inspector Reis. Thank you.’
‘Thank you again for your help,’ she says with a touch to his shoulder. ‘Rodrigo, make sure you speak to someone if you have to.’
Rodrigo puts his head back in his hands.
The knock on the door comes as she turns back to Voronov. He’s staring right at her.
Well. I suppose this is where I find out if he’s a prejudiced prick, she thinks.
Voronov turns away and reaches to open the door. Jacinta is standing there, a small clear plastic bag in her hand with what looks like an ID badge inside.
‘Can you step outside for a quick second?’ Jacinta asks.
Isabel spares one last glance for their young witness before stepping outside with Voronov and pulling the door closed behind her. She eyes the bag in Jacinta’s hand.
‘Is this what I think it is?’ Isabel asks.
Jacinta nods but she doesn’t look happy. ‘Take a look for yourself,’ she says, handing the bag over.
Isabel turns it around in her hand, smoothing the plastic over the front of the victim’s ID card inside. The lanyard is green, the bloodstained spots darker. She sees the name next to the ID’s picture and understands why Jacinta is looking so grim.
‘Merda,’ Isabel bites off.
Jacinta sighs beside her. ‘My thoughts exactly.’
It’s the head of Portugal’s National Testing Institute.
Gil dos Santos.
Chapter 5
Isabel slides her thumb over the plastic bag, smoothing it and scrunching it over the ID card, as she chews on another energy bar.
The title and name are printed on a white background. On the right-hand corner, along the top of the card, is the university’s name and logo, on the left is the deceased doctor’s photo.
A man in his early sixties, full head of dark hair and square-rimmed glasses on an angular face. No smile.
The NTI was set up by the government as the main body dedicated to the study and the acclimation of Gifted people in Portugal. It’s responsible for all the testing centres and the setting up of the Gifted Registry, as well as the monitoring, which keeps tabs on higher-level Gifted. They coordinate the testing seasons and although they’re mostly funded by the government there is private investor money going in too. They have their fingers in a lot of pies when it comes to Gifted study and research.
And now one of its figureheads is dead – and he hasn’t passed away quietly in the night.
The media is going to have a field day.
Isabel tosses it back in the evidence box, trying not to fixate on how empty it is right now and leans back in her chair. She finishes the bar and drops the wrapper into the bin. She needs a proper meal. The headache is settled square between her eyes and after reading three witnesses that morning she really needs to replenish her energy.
The light in the case room is bright and feels like it’s stabbing her in the eyes despite the aspirin she’d taken on the way back to the station from Gare do Oriente.
Isabel and Voronov had made the trip back to the station separately, which Isabel had been grateful for. The familiarity of her own space had been soothing in the wake of the pain building steadily behind her eyes through the two hours or so of witness interviews.
Her head throbs with it now and she fights to keep from wincing, muttering under her breath. The problem with the aspirin is that once the headache is in place then nothing dislodges it.
The pill’s job is to tamp down her Gift, forcing it under. It’s what causes the headaches. Gifts aren’t meant to be suppressed; though when she first started medicating Isabel had been assured that the pills don’t cause permanent damage. Isabel has always wondered if anyone in power would care if they did. Sometimes she thinks she doesn’t want to know the answer to that.
Isabel is still staring at the ID when the Chief sticks her head out of her office.
‘Reis, come in here please.’
Isabel stands, trying to work the crick out of her neck as she does so. She nods hello to a few colleagues arriving for their shift.
They’re on the second floor of the building. The station is a ratty thing that has seen better days. It needs a new coat of paint and some central heating. Isabel walks into her boss’s office with her scarf still wrapped around her neck, wishing for another coffee and a sandwich.
Voronov is already seated in one of the chairs across from the Chief. Isabel takes the other one and folds her arms across her chest; trying to keep what warmth she can cling to in this icicle of a room.
‘Okay. What’s the situation?’ Chief Bautista’s got a voice that sounds like paper rasping over bumpy concrete. It’s the voice of someone who has spent their entire life drinking and smoking too much but it carries across a room like crazy. The Chief is in her late fifties. Her salt and pepper hair is down; loose staticky curls that come down to her chin, cut with borderline OCD precision. Isabel always wonders if they used a ruler when they gave her that haircut.
‘What did the witnesses have to say?’
‘There was a young man who tried to stop the vic from bashing his head in. Obviously it didn’t work, but he was pretty up close and personal during the whole thing,’ Isabel says.
The Chief narrows her eyes at Isabel. ‘And what did you get from him?’
‘From the conversation he had with Inspector Reis,’ Voronov says, ‘it seems that he’s not sure exactly what happened. It could have been a fit but he doesn’t think it was.’
‘And?’
‘And,’ Isabel says, sighing because she knows what look she’s about to get, ‘I asked for his permission to see the memory. And two other witnesses as well.’
‘Reis. You know the situation we’re in. You can’t just peep into people’s memories; we have protocols—’
Isabel puts her hands up to hold her off. ‘Chief, the kid was in shock and I needed to get the most accurate possible view of the whole thing. I asked for his consent and Inspector Voronov served as a witness. No foul play. Same with the other two. I followed protocol, I promise.’
That takes the wind out of the Chief’s sails but she still harrumphs as she eases back in her chair. ‘In the current climate, we have to be careful with these things. Voronov,’ she says, sounding like a barking drill sergeant, ‘you’ll need to fill out a statement detailing Inspector Reis’s use of her Gift during the interviews. I want it on my desk by tomorrow morning. I want yours too, Isabel.’
‘Yes, Chief,’ he says.
Isabel nods.
‘Carry on,’ the Chief says.
Isabel thinks back on what she saw. ‘A lot of the other passengers claimed he was just a crazy guy who lost it, some say he was trying to go for his bag and that’s what set everyone off. Others are saying that he was having a fit and everyone panicked.’ Isabel sits up in her seat and drags a hand through her hair, pulling it back from her face. ‘We can’t rule out the breakdown or medical condition theory yet. But from what I saw, I think we should be worried. There’s a strong possibility that there was more at play here.’
‘You think that maybe this was a result of someone using their Gift on him. As in someone used their Gift to physically move him? Can that even be done?’
Isabel nods. ‘I don’t know what kind of level a Gifted person would have to be to be able to actually influence a person’s whole body like this. I’m guessing it would have to be a monitored level. To be honest, after what happened in Colombo, would it really be such a shock? I think we need to make sure we’ve ruled out health issues and anything else of that nature before going down that avenue. The autopsy results will be useful.’
‘Okay,’ the Chief says, ‘you do what you need to do. Anything else I should know?’
Isabel catches the look Voronov throws her way. ‘We found ID on the deceased,’ she says, ‘it’s Gil dos Santos.’
The Chief curses under her breath. ‘One of the heads of NTI?’
‘Unfortunately,’ Isabel says. ‘He has a wife. We’re going to go and see her.’
‘So you’re telling me we’re going to have a media circus with the press circling our investigation like vultures.’
Neither Isabel nor Voronov say anything. They don’t have to.
‘Fine, try and keep as tight a lid on this as possible. Isabel, make sure you do everything by the book. I know you’re good and you follow the rules, so don’t give me that look. I’m saying this because this is going to be high-profile, and you know as well as I do that the public is in the mood for more Gifted blood. I don’t want to give them anything to hang you by, understand?’
‘Maybe it won’t come to that,’ Isabel says. ‘For all we know, it really was an unfortunate incident and we’ll have an open-and-shut on this one.’
The Chief sighs and rubs her eyes. ‘I hope so, Reis. What about the rest of the team?’
‘We’ve been assigned a room in case this blows up. Carla’s in there setting up with Daniel. I think Jacinta’s on her way. We’re heading over now for a quick briefing, see where we’re at.’
‘Keep me posted. You can go.’
As they walk to the case room, Voronov keeps step with her.
‘Today has been the first time I’ve seen telepathy used like that,’ he says.
Isabel gives him the side-eye. ‘Oh? And? Is it going to be a problem?’
Voronov stops in the middle of the corridor and Isabel does too. No one notices; they keep going about their day, immersed in their heavy caseloads.
‘Should it be?’ he asks.
‘No. It shouldn’t. Not to be an arsehole but I think as your new partner, it’d put my mind at ease if I knew that it really wasn’t going to be a problem.’
‘It won’t be a problem.’
‘Good to know,’ Isabel says and carries on to t
he room. ‘I just wanted us to be clear.’
‘We’re clear.’
Chapter 6
The case room is halfway to set up when they all gather to go over preliminaries.
‘Right, so most of our witnesses either haven’t seen anything or they don’t understand what happened,’ Daniel says.
Isabel and Voronov are at the end of the table; Jacinta and Daniel are sitting across from them. Carla is at the desks that line the wall, setting up the binders, carefully labelling them as she goes. Voronov’s rolled up his sleeves past his elbows and is leaning back in his chair, rocking back and forth in it. Everyone’s got rid of their coats and the coffee pot has made the rounds.
Isabel needs that proper meal soon. She’s relieved she didn’t have to access too many memories. People don’t usually want someone in their head and despite what most Regular people think, Isabel would rather stay in her own mind. Less energy expended; fewer horrors seen.
‘Yes,’ Isabel says, tapping the ID absently, ‘but we have this. Gil dos Santos.’ She sits up and resettles in her seat so she’s facing the rest of the team. ‘As we know, he was one of the heads of Portugal’s National Testing Institute, so that’s a big deal. They run a pretty tight ship, they’re heavily involved in the organisation of the Gifted testing and they work closely with the government and the Registry. I’m sure they do more than that.’
The NTI work too closely with the government for Isabel’s liking, and there are many things about them that aren’t shared with the public. There are even rumours of experimentation and militarisation, but nothing like that has ever been confirmed.
‘In any case,’ she says, ‘he’s a big name. Not the best of starts for us. The press will be on us the moment they catch wind of it.’
The case room they’ve been assigned is too airy for Isabel’s taste but they’re lucky to have one, so she hasn’t complained about it. Also, if she complained, Chief would tell her to fuck off. It’s not the best idea to irritate the Chief before lunch has even taken place.
‘Until we get news back from the autopsy, we won’t be able to rule out the health issues angle. Ideally, that’s what I would’ve liked it to be but after seeing those memories we need to make sure.’
The Colours of Death Page 3