Dan had gone white. He was shaking his head. “No. They’ll kill me, Asa. I can’t tell—”
I stood up, grabbed his shirt, and hauled him halfway across the table for a nose-to-nose. “I’ll kill you, asshole, with my bare hands! But you won’t go quick. You’ll scream until your goddamn voice-box is in shreds. Tell me his name! Tell me! Tell me!” I shook him till his eyes rolled, then pushed him backward. He crashed into his chair. Spilled coffee spread over the table and dripped onto the floor. My brother crouched there, numb with fear. Then he began to weep.
First the Bad Cop, then the Good Cop.
I sat down again. “Danny, Danny. I know what happened. They took you from the Kenora fishing lodge and brought you here. Told you that you could go on living if you cooperated. They needed background material on me to make their demiclone masquerade work. Intensely detailed stuff. So their clone could fool Eve and Delegate Sontag as well as my associates.”
“They had me hooked to the machines for nearly three weeks,” he whispered, scrubbing at his face with the back of one hand. “I thought I was a goner. The pain, Asa! Like every nerve in my body was on fire. Like being wrapped in a burning net! They squeezed me dry. Then they fixed me up, let me rest and recover. I helped fine-tune the act of the first demiclone. They wanted me to do the same for the second one. And you would have helped with the coaching, too. Whether you wanted to or not.”
He was shuddering as fresh tears ran down his ravaged face. I leaned forward, stretching my blue lips in a non-Haluk smile, and laid an alien hand on his shoulder. “Danny, you know what they intend to do. Colonize our galaxy by force. Destroy humanity if that’s what it takes. How does my clone fit into their scheme? Are they using him politically, in the Assembly? Or did they wangle the fake back into Rampart upper management?”
“Both. You’re—he’s Rampart’s president and syndic. Eve and the others were so relieved when you reappeared after being presumed lost in the Sagittarius Whorl that they didn’t question your strange change of heart. Cousin Zed’s still Chief Operating Officer, but he’s permanently based on Seriphos now. You—I mean, the demiclone—and Eve are effectively calling the shots from Toronto, with Gunter Eckert and that Macrodur stooge Ellington and the rest of the board sitting back applauding.”
“Eve has no idea she’s dealing with a fake?”
“He’s very well prepared. A natural actor with compelling presence.” He flashed a twisted grin. “A lot like you, kid. It helps that you were always such a headstrong loner, not socializing with the rest of the family. And of course he knows the business inside out. The Rampart-Galapharma consolidation went through like gangbusters under his direction, and he’s got the Haluk Consortium following his lead like Mary’s little lamb. The fifty new Haluk colonies in the Spur are up and running, with settlers flooding in by the millions.”
“Did the Assembly approve the three hundred additional colonies?” I asked grimly.
“Not yet. The vote is expected very soon. Last I heard, maybe two weeks from now. Your demiclone has been guiding the strategy of the other Concern lobbyists, showing them where to exert pressure and how best to counter Delegate Sontag’s opposition. He and his Xenoaffairs Oversight Committee threw open their meetings to the media. Released a shitload of evidence detrimental to the Haluk and started a slam-bang row. The accusations of demiclone spying caused a furor.”
Atta boy, Ef! “That’s great. Are citizens pressuring the Assembly to revise the Haluk treaties?”
“Sure. But Concern lobbyists are fighting it hammer and tongs. Bringing in their own experts to demonstrate that Sontag’s ‘proof’ of a vast demiclone infiltration is nothing of the sort. Only Macrodur and some of the smaller Concerns are DNA-testing their top executives. The other big outfits are stalling. No demiclone spies have been uncovered yet.” Dan gave me a sour look. “It doesn’t help Sontag’s case that his chief witness has recanted his original testimony and now claims that false depositions were entered under his name.”
“Chief witness—”
“You.” Dan managed a weak chuckle.
“Who is he?” I asked in a low, encouraging voice. “Who’s the first Fake Helly demiclone?”
He shook his head. His eyes were darting wildly.
“I’ve got to know. To stop him.”
“They’ll kill me.”
“You’ll tell me in the end, Dan. I’ll hurt you if I have to. Save yourself pain—”
He screamed at me: “What do you know about pain? My whole life is pain!”
Return of Bad Cop.
I hit him a sharp backhanded blow to the face. “Bullshit! Bull! Fucking! Shit! The worst pain you’ve experienced is hurt pride and failed ambition. You’re an arrogant, self-centered fuckwad, Dan. A driven, calculating monster! You wanted Pop to make you head of Rampart. When he didn’t, you lost it completely. You hooked up with a madman who promised to give you what you wanted. You did everything you could to ensure that Alistair Drummond would take control of Rampart. It was your twisted idea to demiclone Eve. You dreamed up the scheme to sell Simon and me to that freakazoid pimp in Coventry Blue … And you poisoned our mother, Dan, because Alistair Drummond threatened to kill you if she didn’t turn over her Rampart quarterstake.”
“I didn’t,” he mumbled, fingering his bashed nose. It was bleeding a little.
“You did,” I said sadly. “And that’s your worst pain of all.”
I waited while he cursed and sobbed, denying it. Then I said, “It’s Alistair Drummond, isn’t it? He’s alive, and he’s wearing my face.”
Dan gave a violent start and stared at me open-mouthed. “No! It’s not him!”
But it was all the confirmation I needed. I’d never been able to believe Drummond was dead, and there was the tenuous bit of evidence that he’d been present at Dan’s abduction from the fishing lodge. When I was in the tank, the Haluk leaders had discussed an unstable human rogue with a scheme that fit the Grand Design. The Haluk had suspected that the man might be insane. I knew for a fact that Alistair Drummond was a charming, plausible, brilliant sociopath.
And now he was me.
I climbed to my feet, picked up the Ivanov, went around the table to where my brother cringed in his seat. “I can’t waste any more time on you. When the Haluk hook you up to the truth machines later, be sure you tell ’em I intend to fuck their shit. I’m going to rip my skin off Drummond and chop the rest of him into red-flannel hash.”
“Asa, they’ll torture me to death with the damned machine!”
“Maybe. But before you turn up your toes, be sure to tell the Servant of Servants I know about his invasion plan. Tell him he better give it up, cut his losses, and start begging the Assembly for mercy. If he doesn’t, humanity is going to chase his baby-blue ass back to the Haluk Cluster and make damned sure that he and his people rot there till the Big Crunch.”
“Asa, for the love of God—”
I shot Dan with two stun-darts. He’d be unconscious for at least half a day. I took off my uniform’s weapon belt, since I’d never get out of the building wearing it, divested it of its useful equipment, and put the stuff in the gym bag with the change of clothes.
Then I headed back to the elevator. Maybe my vitals would explode when I tried to pass the checkpoint at the 100th floor, and maybe they wouldn’t. There was only one way to find out.
Going down, I found that the gold-striped key-card did indeed give me a green light to the lowest Haluk floor. I was on my way to freedom.
Aliens joined me in the elevator car at lower stops, but there were no humanoid demiclones among them. I decided they must have private elevators. It would hardly be prudent for them to be seen entering or leaving those set aside for the building’s Haluk tenants.
Some xeno passengers wore native garments, others were dressed like humans, perhaps off for a night on the town. No one paid any attention to me. I kept a position near the doors in case of an emergency.
And an emergency happened.
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The door opened to admit another passenger, a Haluk male who wore a dull yellow smock and carried a technical magslate. When he saw me his pupils widened in the racial equivalent of surprise. He kept staring as we made other stops and the car became crowded. Then he was pushed to the rear, out of my sight.
But I knew him. Mustard Smock! He was the one called Archiator Something, who had shown me to the Servant of Servants and the VIP female Haluk when I was still in the tank. Then he’d acted like the demiclone project director or some other technical bigwig.
Was he alert enough to spot my anatomical anomalies?
Yep.
I felt someone grip my arm and speak in low Halukese. “Guard. Tell me your blah blah.” Mustard Smock was asking for my ID.
The door opened again to admit three more passengers to the nearly full car, meditechs in pale green human-style hospital garb with diagnostic devices hanging on cords around their necks. In his own language I told Mustard, “Sorry. No time.” Then I pulled away from him and slipped out just as the doors were sliding shut. He tried to squirm after me and didn’t make it.
My heart was pounding as I dashed out of the elevator alcove and flattened myself against the wall just out of sight, expecting to hear the chime as the door reopened. It didn’t happen. Perhaps Mustard couldn’t get to the control panel in time to stop the car. Perhaps he’d decided to brush off his suspicions and get on with his business.
Perhaps he’d alert security at the checkpoint.
There were no sculptures or pretty decorations on this floor, and no windows, either. The area had subdued lighting and there was a chill in the air. I rejected my first instinct, which was to catch the next elevator down to the checkpoint and try to escape before the flap and foofaraw started.
Easy does it, Helly, I told myself. Haluk guards do tend to look alike. I needed to change my clothes. Maybe find another elevator bank.
There was no one in the corridor. I went down a few doors before using my master key, slipped into a dark room, and locked myself in. Then I turned on the light and spit out an astonished expletive.
The place was full of golden mummy-cases, standing upright in narrow open-fronted booths. They lined the walls and were set up in close rows like library shelves, with space to walk between them. A medical monitoring device was attached to each elegant coffinlike chrysalis. I knew very well what they contained—Haluk testudomorphs, the dormant phase of the allomorphic alien race.
But Haluk who had undergone allomorph eradication therapy with PD32:C2 didn’t hibernate. And it was common knowledge that the Haluk did not send allomorphic members of their race to Earth. It wasn’t cost-efficient for their embassy staff and trade attachés to sleep for half a year, and the Haluk were ordinarily very cost-efficient.
So what were the testudos doing here?
I went back to the door, doused the light, and did a lowboy scan of the corridor. Empty. I opened the door opposite and found more ranks of testudos. Racing to another chamber several doors down, I found still more. This time I shut myself in the room and rapidly began to change into Dan’s athletic gear.
My mind was spinning and my overloaded stomach felt queasy. There seemed only one explanation: treated Haluk were somehow reverting to their original allomorphic state.
Had Emily Konigsberg done it deliberately with her mutant exon? Or was the odd bit of DNA some sort of necessary genetic stopgap that actually staved off a reversion process that was inevitable?
When these testudos completed their dormant cycle and hatched into graciles, could they be treated again? If so, what did the Haluk think about being obligated to humanity—and especially Rampart Concern—indefinitely?
Rampart … the pieces of the puzzle were coming together.
I fastened my shoes, put on the baseball cap, and pulled it low over my eyes. Took all of the hardware out of the gym bag except the spare Ivanov and sedative injector and stowed the stuff in the ample kangaroo pocket below my jacket’s half-mast zipper. Put the key-cards in my pants pocket. Considered leaving the guard’s uniform and boots behind, along with the bag, injector, and extra gun, then remembered it was damn near winter outside of Macherson Tower. So I stuffed the uniform into the gym bag in case I needed it for warmth, and kept the other things, too. I was still wearing the fire-opal ring.
When I opened the door I discovered I was not alone in the corridor. Fortunately, the Haluk lepidodermoid pushing the gurney that held a gold chrysalis was going the other way. In their asexual intermediate phase, the aliens are thick-skinned, ponderous, slow-witted, fit only for simple tasks. The lepido pushing the gurney stopped at a door beyond the lift alcove, used a key-card, and rolled its burden inside.
I dashed for the elevator and caught one going down almost immediately. It was only moderately crowded. But when we reached the bottom Haluk floor, the doors failed to open and the chime sounded its alarm. I felt my overloaded stomach contract with fear and almost disgraced myself.
One of the passengers said, “Blah blah [expletive] forgot to blah the gold key?”
The red light beside the card-slot was blinking. A sensor inside the car had counted us and counted the card insertions. One short.
There were disgusted mutters from the others, who glared at each other trying to spot the careless twit causing the delay.
I mumbled, “Sorry!” forced out a strangled-puppy Haluk laugh, and plugged my card. The light went green, the doors opened and we all emerged into a crowded lobby.
There were eight lines at the outbound checkpoint gates. Everyone held a blue key-card at the ready and quickly passed through. I fumbled in my pants pocket and sorted out my own. When I inserted it, would my heart explode? Would that hurt? How long would it take me to die?
Guards stood beside a second group of elevator banks, those leading down to freedom. Were they watching for a bold impostor? If I got through the gate without popping my pump, would they seize me and escort me back upstairs to the tank?
Inhaling and squaring my shoulders, I pushed in the card.
The gate’s indicator light glowed green.
My heart kept on beating and I went through. Keeping my head low, I shoehorned myself into a crowded elevator car. A few moments later the doors opened into the Path.
My first need was to get as far away from the vicinity of Macpherson Tower as possible. My second was to find a reasonably secluded public phone. Using it would be dangerous. Without money, and unable to eyeball my way into the iridoscopic ID system with my exotic irises, I would have to recite either my personal code or the Rampart general code, plus their authorization tags, to make a credit call. I didn’t doubt that the Haluk had access to both codes. If they’d penetrated the telecom databank as well, they’d not only know where I’d called from, but also whom I’d called.
It required some serious thinking. If I attempted to contact my relatives, friends, or close associates, I might immediately endanger their lives.
And even if I did reach someone, would the person believe the Halukoid geek with the rumbly voice was me? Not bloody likely. All public vidphones transmitted the image of the caller unless you physically blocked the video pickup, a move justly regarded as suspicious by those answering the phone. People in the upper echelons of society—and that included Eve, Simon, Karl, Ef Sontag, and Bea Mangan—screened their electronic communications carefully. They probably wouldn’t even accept a public phone call from someone who refused to show his face.
But I thought I knew someone who would.
Almost instinctively, I took the Path westward beneath Dundas Street, in the direction of the old Rampart Tower. (I’d only realize later that Rampart would have transferred its Toronto headquarters to the ithyphallic monolith on the waterfront that had once housed Galapharma.) At University Avenue, I rode the escalator to the upper level and found a suitable phone in a com bank at the St. Patrick subway station.
Using the Rampart code and ID tag, I called CCID Headquarters: Cop Central. I cover
ed the vid pickup with my hand. When the duty officer responded, I asked for Chief Superintendent Jacob Silver. He wouldn’t be working the night shift, but I was pretty sure they’d patch me through to his home if I stated a family emergency and gave my name and personal code. And the police link would be secure from Haluk snoops.
“I’m sorry,” said the deskman. “Chief Superintendent Silver is deceased. May I route your call elsewhere?”
“No—”
Stunned, I cut him off. Stood there paralyzed.
Jake. Jake was dead. Because of me? Because Alistair Drummond had slipped up imperceptibly during his public playacting, and only Jake, the wise old cop, had spotted it? And not-so-wisely confronted my demiclone?
Jake.
Rats …
I don’t know how long I stood there. My precariously stoked vitality was swiftly draining away. Several trains entered the station, discharged and took on passengers, glided off quietly, defying gravity. The crowds were moderate. A clock said it was 2002 hours.
I knew I had to get away from the public phones, so I moved to the nearest newsstand and pretended to watch the big-screen PNN posting of News on the Hour. Top Story: a tsunami on Hokusai causes heavy damage to a big Homerun Concern manufacturing facility. Oh, yeah—and five thousand people died.
I felt lightheaded and stupid. My belly was beginning to cramp. I could feel a hot throbbing beneath the improvised bandage at the back of my neck. Maybe the wound was infected with alien germs.
One thing was certain: my weakened body had been flogged enough. It now demanded to be horizontal. If I didn’t go down soon of my own free will, I was going to collapse.
Where the hell could a Haluk in a track suit catch some z’s?
I couldn’t rest on one of the inviting Path benches. The searchers would find me. I had no money to patronize a spa or theater.