Pet Noir Read online

  The grief comes as a howl, a cold snarling bitter scream against the universe, a hatred of her beloved’s death as flaming as the sword in the cards. Jerked to a mental halt Mulligan feels real tears pour down his physical face as her despair floods his mind. Nunks, however, is calm, radiating only his desire to comfort rather than a specific attempt at comfort. The mind hesitates on the edge of sending, then pulls back into loneliness. When Mulligan sobs aloud, he feels her respond, but with shock, a bitter wondering that someone has been touched by her pain.

  Sister, Nunks sends. Not savages all of us. We help >>please let us help.

  The mind hesitates again, then a cold hard sweep of bitterness makes both of them gasp aloud.

  Good beings? [disbelief, rage] >See this>see this!!!

  As vividly as if he hovered above in a skimmer, Mulligan sees the pit out in the Rat Yard, lit by maglev floaters in a macabre white glare. All around are the police vans and choppers; men with riot guns form a protective circle as the med techs drop a jointed ladder into the pit and clamber down to the grave.

  Let him rest now> let him rest>> oh by my Gods>let him rest. Why? why? why?/not let him rest?

  Sister: please listen nowstay now>listen. They try to help| find killers>get killers>>punish killers. Then: new grave, final rest.

  [doubt, hesitation]

  Please: >believe us>

  [rage] >make them stop> THEN >I believe> I know killers I describe killers>>>let him rest!

  Although Nunks can mask his feelings from Mrs. Bug, Mulligan can feel his despair, his helplessness faced with trying to change Chief Bates’ mind about this to him necessary exhumation and the autopsy to follow. In the vision Mulligan can see the chief, pacing near the skimmervan with a comm unit in one hand. All at once Bates begins listening intently, then tosses back his head, his face going ashy, and rushes over to the pit. Waving his arms like a madman himself, he yells something that Mulligan can’t quite hear. The riot squad, the med techs, the coroner, all stop to listen; then the sentients in the pit begin scrambling out, looks of horror on their faces. Those who’ve been above-ground shrink back, begin piling into the vans and slamming the doors while Bates gestures and shrieks and finally restores order. At last the chief sorts things out: the men who were in the pit go in one van; everyone else crams into the others. As the vans pull away, Mrs. Bug’s mind sweeps over theirs.

  [gratitude] [gratitude] [gratitude] Believe you now [gratitude]

  >Please let us help> Stay now sister. >Let us help>>

  But she is gone, her grief trailing after like a streak of sand in the summer sky once the main storm is passed.

  [frustration] Little brother, you send Bates away not send?

  Not send, big brother. [bewilderment]

  >Go to Buddy >ask Lacey >>Lacey need know> ask she understandnot understand.

  Yes, big brother. >I do that>

  Do it NOW little brother.

  [submission]

  Although it irks him that he’s afraid of an AI unit, only Nunks’ scorn drives Mulligan upstairs to Lacey’s office, where the comp unit is humming quietly to himself as he performs some elaborate function. On the screen Mulligan can see blocks of words flashing by, too fast to read.

  “Uh, say, Buddy? Can I ask you a favor?”

  “You may ask, Mulligan unit. I may or may not comply.”

  “Well, something’s come down, man, and Lacey got to know.”

  “I do not understand your dialect. Please rephrase.”

  With a groan Mulligan casts his mind back to his high school class in formal speaking.

  “Uh, I must talk to Lacey. Please get her on line for me.”

  “Why do you need to talk with the programmer?”

  “I got to lay something on her...uh, tell her something that has happened.”

  “To you?”

  “No, to Chief Bates out in the Rat Yard.”

  “She already knows of that event. Your input is unnecessary.”

  “Well, hey, man! I mean, I beg your pardon, Buddy. Please tell me why Bates left the Yard.”

  “I will not. My programmer has not authorized me to impart data to inferior units.”

  “Hey, listen up, you lousy hunk of plastosheet!”

  “You are incorrect. There are no vermin on my casing.”

  “Yeah? But there fucking well maybe’s going to be a lot of cold water poured in your vent slits, any sec now.”

  For all that he claimed not to understand Mulligan’s way of speaking, Buddy gives out a high electronic squeal, and his screen flashes four different colors.

  “Chief Bates was informed by Doctor Carol that the corpse in the Rat Yard carries a previously unknown bacterial infection. He withdrew his men to prevent further contamination. I am going to report your threat of violence to my programmer, and she will make you suffer accordingly.”

  “Yeah? Suck kilowatts!”

  As he walks away, Mulligan is smiling to himself. He’s amazed at how much easier it is to think of snappy things to say when he’s sober.

  oOo

  “How long is this thing going to take?” Lacey snaps.

  “Just coming up.” Carol glances at her chrono, then at the comp screen. “Dunt blame you for being impatient, mind.” She turns to her unit. “Display result of skin sample analysis number two.”

  The screen fills with diagrams of several different organic molecules.

  “Thank God and his madre! You’re clean, man. Nada but normal bacteria.”

  Lacey lets out her breath in a long sigh.

  “This could be important,” Carol goes on. “You touched a metal surface that Little Joe handled, right? That might mean this stuff no spreads from metal surfaces to organic ones, leastaways not easily. Where is this box thing?”

  “In my desk in a locked drawer.”

  “Hey, man, damn good thing.”

  “Yeah. I had a hunch it needed locking away.” At her belt the comp link beeps. She slips it free. “Que pasa, Buddy?”

  “Sam Bailey is on line.” Buddy sounds honestly pleased. “Does my programmer wish to speak to him?”

  “Sure do. Tie him in. Hey, Sam?”

  “I’m here, yeah.” His voice is fuzzy, and his video, worse: a squashed grid with a somewhat darker face-shaped smudge on top. “Damn the aurora! I no can hardly see you.”

  “Yeah, no can see you so good either. Where are you?”

  “Main Station. I’m bringing the launch down now. We went through Customs at Space Dock, so I can meet you in about three hours. How about Kelly’s?”

  “Sounds great, yeah. Out front?”

  “Oh man, at the bar. I’ve been in deep space for months, remember?”

  “Sure thing. At the bar, then.”

  When Lacey leaves the clinic, she heads straight into the Outworld Bazaar. All along Fourth Street the three-dee shop signs float in mid-air and spill colored light onto the sidewalks and move-belts as the advertisements run through their endless loops. Bottles of booze pour themselves into glasses, pretty women unzip their jumpsuits, cuts of real meat sizzle on grills, pretty boys in tight jeans unbutton their shirts, packs of cards spread themselves into winning poker hands, marble bathtubs fill with steaming water—all crackle by at top speed, as if they are desperately trying to compete with the endless light show in the sky. The double glitter from signs and sky cloaks even the most drably-dressed passers-by in a masquerade finery of ever-shifting color, and there is music, too, pouring out of clubs in a steady beat of drums and synthisound. Through it all strut the spacers, gaudy enough in their reflec jumpsuits without the dazzle of constant lights, arrogant in their sure knowledge that they are the only reason that this weed-choked garden of delights exists at all.

  The best licensed betting office in Polar City, Al’s, occupies a second floor suite in a bright blue plastocrete shop building down an alley between Third and Fourth, just a
cross from the twenty-five-hour-a-day rostratologist and just above a place that sells pornographic holopix and garments that consist mostly of black plastic straps. Lacey rides up on the grav platform with a lizzie who is working an elaborate series of calculations on a portable comp unit and muttering to himself about in-system ships and asteroid trajectories. Lacey thinks to herself that if she were ever going to bet on anything, it wouldn’t be the yacht races, where one fist-sized chunk of rock on the wrong course can upset the results of hours of careful mathematics.

  The public office is a long narrow room, painted green, with an enormous rose-pink data-screen on one wall and three cashiers’ windows, guarded by two security beings with stun guns, on the other. This particular night Al himself is crouched over a desk in the corner, working comp and changing some of the odds on the big board. As Lacey watches, the Polar City Bears go up a point to be favored, two to one, over the New Jerusalem Crusaders to take the division title. The lizzie gives the board a bare glance, then hurries, comp in hand, to the nearest window. He’s got either a hot tip or a system, she supposes.

  “Lacey, hey,” Al says. “You’re actually going to part with some of the old hard earned? My heart, my heart!”

  “I no could do that to you, Al. I only bet when I got a sure thing.”

  “Never make big bucks that way.”

  “Never lose big bucks either.”

  She strolls over and perches on a corner of the desk while he reads in the latest figures from dirty and much-creased bits of yellow paper. A Blanco with thin gray hair, Al is the palest of the pale, because he never goes out in the sun, not even for the safe hour just after sunrise. When he’s done with his comp work, he ritually shreds the papers into tiny pieces and dumps the handful into a recyler chute.

  “What do you want then, amiga? I got a hot tip on the coming election.”

  “Not my department, but I wouldn’t mind a word with you.”

  They go into Al’s private office, a tiny cubicle crammed with comp on the one hand and all the latest debugging devices on the other. Al offers her the red plastofoam chair, takes the brown one with the unsteady legs himself, then puts his feet up in comfort on the edge of the desk. Lacey can pick out a multitude of tiny whines and high-pitched hums, Al’s personally designed debugging system. Lacey is willing to bet that no one in the entire Mapped Sector has the skill or the tech to listen in on their conversation.

  “I want to buy some dope,” Lacey says. “Best Sarahian you got, a hecto.”

  “A whole hecto? You?”

  “No going to smoke it all, man. Going to spread it around.”

  “Ah, I get you.” For a moment Al chews on his lower lip. “Tell you the truth, man, I don’t know if I can get it for you.”

  “Jeez, that must be an historical first.”

  “Well, something’s wrong.” Again the lip chewing as he stares blankly at the far wall. “Hell, you maybe know something. Look, I’ll get you a good price if you help me out a little.”

  “Maybe. What do you need?”

  “You know Sally Pharis, don’t you?”

  “Sure do.” She suppresses a smile: Al’s taken the bait with a perfect gulp. “I hear los verdes are on the prowl for her ass.”

  “Yeah, so do I. Question is, why? And do they got her yet, and if they got her, do they got the dope she’s bringing me?”

  “They no got her yet. Don’t know anything about the dope. But the why, hey man, someone’s gunning for her, out to kill her. The greenies just want to keep her alive.”

  “Jeezchrist!” For a moment Al stares in mingled surprise and horror. “You know who it is?”

  “No can put a name on him, nah, but look, it’s some Outworlder. Sally saw something that’s related to a killing, and this dude wants to shut her up.”

  Al shudders and squirms.

  “This killer, then, he’s no one of us?”

  “No way. Like I say, some Outworlder, causing trouble.”

  Al’s surprise turns to a quiet fury.

  “Oh yeah?” he says. “Then if I find something out, I’ll tell you, and you go to the cops.”

  “Good. It’s a gonzo scene, man.”

  “Sure is. Jeez, I wish to God I knew where the hell she is!”

  And that answers her question, without her having to ask it. Sally was indeed supposed to make Al a big delivery, and there are very few things that would keep her from doing so. Although Sally has a good many faults, she’s the most reliable dealer in Porttown.

  “But about the dope, man,” Al says. “Want me to call round a couple places?”

  “Naw, I got one more contact. Tell you what, if he no come through, I’ll get back to you, oh say, by twenty-two hours.”

  “Okay, yeah. I understand. When you need it, you need it now.”

  “Yeah.” She gets up with a conciliatory smile. “But thanks, man. I appreciate it.”

  “Okay. I’m starting to get scared, thinking whathahell might’ve happened to Sally.”

  “You and me both, pal. You and me both.”

  Chapter Five

  The Public Bureau of Investigation takes up the top floor of the Republic’s auxiliary office building, a black monolith relieved by curls of molded plastocrete acanthus leaves around all the doors and windows—an architect’s whimsy loathed by every sentient in Polar City. By the time he’s gone through all the sonoscans, ID checks, and pat-downs necessary to get to the top, Bates is ready to be in a very bad mood. Commissioner Akeli has an air-conditioned suite, carpeted in pale beige and furnished with real leather chairs and a wet bar as well as his desk and built-in shelves. Prominently displayed in the outer office is an assemblage of distressed styrofoam, a late art form of Old Earth. When Bates arrives, Akeli is so solicitous, making him a drink, insisting he sit down and rest after his hard night’s work—that the chief is immediately suspicious.

  “Some kind of problem?”

  Akeli merely grins in patently false camaraderie and sits down at his desk, where the comp unit whirs and flashes pieces of a Polar City map on screen.

  “Bates, look. I know we’ve had our inevitable frictions and differences of thinking in the past. When you place a couple of strong-minded persons like us in the same jurisdiction, well, conflict becomes inevitable, wouldn’t you say?”

  “Yeah, guess so.” Bates has a cautious sip of his gin and tonic. “I can cop to it, we both like to run things our way.”

  “Yes, exactly that. But look, we’re faced with a major problem now. We must work together for the security of the Republic and interstellar amity. Am I correct?”

  “Sure.” If I understand your fancy words you are, you pompous asshole. “That serious, huh? Did you find out anything about the Lies’ role in all this?”

  “That, too.” Akeli frowns into his own glass and swirls it to make the ice cubes jingle. “But, ah, let us consider something. I know I can be perhaps shall we say overly legalistic about sharing information. I mean, the bureau does uncover data of a more than local import that at times it’s forced to classify beyond your clearance level. I realize that this has caused inconvenience in the past.”

  “Uh, well, yeah.”

  “So, look.” Akeli leans forward with a sudden shark-like smile that’s probably meant to be disarming. “Please, as one peace officer to another, tell me the truth. How did your men break into our comp banks?”

  “Your what?!”

  “Ah, c’mon, man to man.” Again the shark’s smile. “It’s unnecessary for you to pretend naivety. I’m forced to admit to a certain admiration for your staff. Even though our security experts have adjudged our system to be what they call hacker-proof, your office has been accessing us any time they want to, and all they leave is just one tripped alarm, the desperation back-up that doesn’t even record the intruder’s entry code.”

  Certain obscure memory banks, uh-huh, Buddy! Aloud, he says:

  “Then how do you know it’s us?”

  “Well, who else? It isn’t
the Allies or the Confederates, because their electronic ports are shall we say kept under a certain surveillance? Surely you don’t expect me to believe that it’s some amateur with a housecomp unit, hacking into the best security in the Republic?”

  Bates considers, sipping his drink to stall for time. If he thought that the PBI could actually trace Lacey and Buddy, he would lie to protect them, but he feels quite certain that they’ll know how to cover their tracks—especially once he tells them that they’ve left tracks to cover.

  “Akeli, you got a bigger problem than you think. I’ll swear to you, on my honor as a peace officer or anything else you want, that no one in my department’s been hacking into your system. I mean it, man, sincerely. You’d better get yourself some experts from Sarah, cause you got a real security breach.”

  For a minute Akeli considers him with narrowed eyes; then he nods.

  “Very well. I believe you. I’ll put qualified personnel on the job immediately.”

  “You’d better, yeah.”

  “If you’ll excuse me?”

  Grabbing his drink Akeli sweeps into his inner office, leaving Bates to his gin. When he returns he looks unusually grim. As far as Bates is concerned, it will do his colleague good to take something seriously for a change.

  “Now, about that possible contact between Ka Gren and an Alliance double agent or informant, I’ve given the case to my best officer, and she’s already managed to procure certain suggestive clusters of data, such as, for instance, that Ka Gren has been frequently seen on the premises of Kelly’s Bar and Grill in the recent past.”