She blinked. “What kind of name is that?”
“My Dad was a galactic. But he’s dead now,” Jin added with hasty prudence. And half truth, for that matter. He tried not to think about the funeral.
“Does your mother let you come downtown alone? It’s school hours, you know.”
“Um, yes. She sent me on an errand for her.”
“Let’s call her, then.”
Jin held out his skinny wrists. His stomach felt cold and quivery. “I don’t have a wristcom, ma’am.”
“That’s all right. You can come along to the security booth, and we can call her from there.”
“No!” In a panic now, Jin tried to wrench away. Somehow, he found his arm cranked up behind his back, hurting. His shirt tail came loose, and the envelope dropped to the pavement with a loud slap. “No, wait!” He tried to dive for it. Without releasing his arm, the woman scooped it up first, staring at it with a deepening frown.
She murmured to her own wristcom, “Code Six, Dan. Level One.”
In moments, another policeman loomed. “What ho, Michiko? Catch us a little shoplifter?”
“I’m not sure. Truant, maybe. This young fellow needs to come to the booth and call his mother. And get ID’d, I think.”
“Right.”
Jin’s other arm was taken in an even stronger fist. Helplessly, he let himself be marched along. He was wild for a chance to break away, but neither grip slackened.
The security booth had big glass windows overlooking the rotunda. It was cool inside, and when the door shut a wonderful silence fell, which usually would be a relief to Jin, but not now. A lot of screens were running, and Jin realized that some of them were from vidcams that looked right into people’s faces as they went up or down on the escalators. He hadn’t noticed them among the noise and confusion and hurry of the place. The woman plunked him down in a swivel chair. His feet didn’t quite reach the floor.
The wide man, Dan, held up a light pen. “Let me see your eyes, child.”
Retina scan? A red flash. Jin squeezed his eyes shut as tightly as he could, and clapped his palms over his face for good measure. But it was already too late. He heard the man moving away to his comconsole.
“He’s scared, Dan,” said the woman. Jin peeked through his fingers to see her holding up the envelope, squeezing and rattling it like a birthday present. “Think the reason might be in here?”
A ping from the console. “Aha. I believe we have a match. That was quick.” Officer Dan looked up and asked, “Is your name Jin Sato?”
“No!”
“It says here he’s been missing for over a year.”
Without letting go of Jin’s arm, the woman edged around to look at the holoscreen. “Good heavens! I’ll bet his family will be relieved to get him back!”
“No, they won’t! Let me go!”
“Where have you been hiding for a whole year, son?” Officer Dan asked, not unkindly.
“And what is this?” Michiko asked, hefting the envelope and frowning.
“You can’t have that! Give it back!”
“So what’s in it?”
“It’s just a letter. A, a very personal letter. I’m supposed to deliver it. For, for some men.”
Both officers went rigid. “What sort of men?” asked Michiko.
“Just… men.”
“Friends? Relatives?”
Relatives were not a good thing, in Jin’s world. “No. I just met them today.”
“Where did you meet them?”
Jin’s mouth clamped shut.
“Not addressed. Not postal-sealed. No legal reason we can’t peek, is there?” said Dan.
The woman nodded and handed the envelope over. Dan popped a folding knife and slit it open from the bottom, holding it above the countertop. A thick wad of currency thumped out, followed by a fluttering note.
It was more money than Jin had seen in one place in his life. From their widening eyes, it was more money than the two security officers were used to seeing in one lump, too, certainly in the hands of a kid.
Dan riffled the wad and vented a long, amazed whistle.
Michiko said, “Drug ring, do you think? Feelie-dream smugglers?”
“It could be—gods, it could be anything. Congratulations, Michiko. Shouldn’t wonder if there’s a promotion in this.” Staring at the envelope with more respect, Dan belatedly pulled a pair of thin plastic gloves from his pocket and donned them before he picked up the note. It seemed to be printed on half a flimsy.
Dan read aloud, “We must trust that you know what you are doing. Please contact us in person as soon as possible.” He turned the note in the light. “No address, no date, no names, no signature. Nothing. Veery suspicious.”
Michiko bent to look Jin sternly in the eyes. “Where did you meet these bad men, child?”
“They weren’t bad men. They were just… men. Friends of a friend.”
“Where were you taking all this money?”
“I didn’t know it was money!”
Michiko’s eyebrows rose. “Do you believe that?” she asked her partner.
“Yah,” said Dan, “or he might have taken off with it.”
“Good point.”
“I wouldn’t have! Even if I had known!”
“No one can threaten you now, Jin,” Michiko said more gently. “You’re safe.”
“No one did threaten me!” Jin had never felt less safe in his life. And if he blabbed, Suze and Ako and Tenbury and everyone who had befriended him wouldn’t be safe, either. And Lucky and the ratties and the chickens, and big, beautiful Gyre… Lips tight as he could press them, Jin stared back at the officers.
“Call Youth Services to pick up the boy,” said Michiko. “The rest of the evidence had better go to Vice, at a guess.”
“Yah,” said Dan, his gloved hands sliding Jin’s precious envelope, the wad of cash, and the note into a transparent plastic bag.
“My animals,” Jin whispered. Such a simple task Miles-san had entrusted him with, and he’d screwed it all up. He’d screwed everything up. Between his scrunched eyelids, tears began to leak.
With a grating noise and a puff of powder, the bolt popped out of the concrete.
“Finally,” breathed Roic.
Chapter Five
Roic waited for dusk to deepen, and for the occasional echo of footsteps along the gallery to fall silent for a good long time, before venturing a cautious reconnoiter. The door lock yielded to force, or rather, the flimsy doorframe splintered and gave up the mechanism whole, more loudly than he would have liked, but no one called out or came to investigate. Crouching to slip beneath any view from the windows, bare feet silent on the boards but for an occasional tiny clink from the chain swathing his ankle, he discovered that the gallery wrapped the rectangular building on three sides, with stairs down on either end. About a dozen rooms like his lined this level. There was no third storey.
Another building, with faint yellow gleams leaking from its windows, lay down the slope to the right. Obscured in the trees behind it seemed to be a parking area, but a marked lack of security lighting made the details invisible—both to Roic and to anyone passing overhead in a lightflyer, he guessed. Right now he was grateful for the shadows. He slipped around to the far end. A third building, vaguely shedlike, sat low and black in the gloom down at the border of the level scrubland. Roic wondered if there’d been a fire, to so clear out the crowded conifers.
Roic’s heart nearly failed him when a voice above his head hissed, “Roic! Up here!”
He jerked his head back to see a pale smudge of a face peering over the edge of the roof. A long black braid swung forward over the figure’s shoulder, triggering recognition and relief. “Dr. Durona? Raven? So they got you, too!”
“Sh! Not so loud. We were in the same lift van. You were out cold. Come up, before someone comes back.” A pair of lean arms extended downward; Raven was apparently lying prone. “Careful of my hands…”