Shit with that. He took a little jig step on his way back from the Assay office, and on helldeck nobody took exception to a little exuberance—if a guy was happy, that guy must have reason: in a society that lived on luck you wanted to brush close to whoever looked to have it, because that guy might lead you to it.
What he had was a card in his pocket that said they had a couple of nice pieces, and that money was going into the bank, dead certain. You tagged things and you didn’t know how long it was going to be til the ‘driver got there, but what you had in your sling was money—and in this case, a good chunk of it.
Yeah!
“Meg or Sal in?” he asked Mike at the bar when he got to The Hole—he knew where Bird probably was, where Bird had been this time of day for the last week.
Mike said, “They aren’t, but the cops were.”
He looked at Mike a moment. It was hard to change feet that fast. “Cops.”
“They weren’t in uniform. But they had badges. Anything I should know?”
He sighed, said, because, hell, you needed the local witness on your side if it came to trouble: “All right, Mike. The guy we rescued—out in the Belt. We got a claim in on the ship. He owned it. Sole survivor. The guy’s crazy. God only knows what he’s said. Police are probably checking us out to be sure we’re on the straight.”
Mike looked a shade friendlier at that. And interested. “Claim on the ship, is it?”
He tapped his key on the bar. “More of a long, long story. But that part’s blackholed. You, we trust. Let me go check this out.”
He went back through and down the hall where the sleeping rooms were, opened the room he had (at least on the books) with Bird.
“Shit!” was his first reaction.
Not as if they had much to disarrange, but thieves could have hit and been neater. Four days to get their Personals out of police hands and here was everything they owned strewn over the sink, the lockers open, their laundry scattered on the bed—and a big bright red sticker on the mirror that said: This area was accessed in search of contraband by ASTEX Security acting with a warrant. Please check to be sure all your personal items are present and report any broken or missing articles or unsecured doors immediately by calling your ASTEX Security Public Relations Department at…
He pulled the sticker off the mirror. Paper thicker than tissue was worth its weight in gold. Literally. You could fold the thing and write important secret notes on the edges if you could find a pencil, which was equally frigging scarce.
Shit, shit, shit!
He opened the side door that led into Meg and Sal’s room—it was technically a quad. Same mess, only more so. Meg and Sal had more clothes.
Meg and Sal were going to kill them. That was one thought going through his head. The other was outrage—a sense of violation that left him short of breath and wanting to break something.
What in hell were they looking for?
Something off that ship?
Datacard?
He had a sudden cold thought about the charts. But he had that datacard in his pocket, where he always carried it. He felt of his pocket to be sure.
Damn!
He headed out, locked the door, walked down the hall and tried to collect himself for Mike, who asked, “Anything wrong?”
“Not that I know. Be back in a bit.” He kept going, to the nearest Trans to get him up to 3-deck.
He had this terrible cold feeling, all the ride up, all the walk down to the gym and the lockers. His hands were shaking when he used his personal card to open the locker. He suddenly thought: Everywhere I use this card they can trace it. Same as in the Institute. There’s nothing they can’t get at…
He got the door open, he felt of his suit pocket—
The card with the charts was there. He’d been so excited about the Assay report he’d forgotten to switch it back.
But, God, where’s it safe now?
In the room they’ve already searched?
Maybe they’d expect him to do that. And they might be looking for one kind of trouble—but if they found something illegal—
Damn!
Dekker opened his eyes tentatively, hearing someone in the room—realized it was his doctor leaning over him. The drugs had retreated to a distant haze.
“About damn time,” he said.
The doctor moved his eyelid, used a light, frowning over him. “Mmm,” the doctor said. Pranh was his name. Dekker read it on the ID card he wore.
“Dr. Pranh. I don’t want any more sedation. I want out of here.—What did the police find out?”
Pranh stood back, put his penlight in his pocket. “I don’t know. I suppose they’re still investigating.”
“How long?”
“How long what?”
“How long have they been investigating?”
“Time. Does that still bother you?”
It still touched nerves. But he was able to shake his head and say—disloyal as it felt to say—”I know Cory’s probably dead. Right now I want to know why.”
Pranh’s face went strangely blank. Pranh looked at the floor, never quite at him, and started entering something on his slate.
“You haven’t heard from the police,” Dekker said. It was hard to talk. There was still enough of the drug in him he could very easily shut his eyes and go under again, but he kept pushing to stay awake. Pranh didn’t answer him, and he persisted: “How long has it been?”
“Your partner is dead. There’s no probably. Denial is a normal phase of grieving. But the sooner you get beyond that—”
“I don’t know she’s dead. You don’t know. For all I know that ship picked her up. I want to talk to the police. I want a phone—”
“Calm down.”
“ I want a phone, dammit!”
“It’s on the record. A rock hit you, a tank blew.”
“There wasn’t any rock—”
“You said there was. Are you changing your story?”
“I’m not changing anything! There was a ‘driver out there. It didn’t answer our hails, it ran right over us—”
“Denial,” Pranh said quietly. “Anger. Transference. I’ve talked to the investigators. There’s no ‘driver. There never was a ‘driver near you. One was working. It’s possible there was a high- vrock. A pebble.”
“Pebble, hell! I want to talk to the police. I want to know what that ‘driver captain says! I want a phone!”
The doctor went to the door, leaned out and spoke to someone outside. And left.
“I want to talk to somebody from Management!” he yelled at the empty doorway. “Dammit, I want to talk to somebody who knows what’s going on out there!”
But all that came through the doorway was a pair of orderlies with a hypo to give him.
He swore when they laid hands on him and when they gave him the shot; and he swore all the while he was sliding back down again. He felt tears running on his face, and his throat was raw from screaming. He thought of Cory, Cory shaking her head and looking the way she did when something couldn’t be fixed.
Can’t do it, Dek.
And he said to himself and to Cory, Hell if not.
Two pieces of news Ben had for Bird when he walked into the Hole, and good as one was, the bad won. Hands down.
“We got an LOS on a big one,” Bird muttered as he sat down on his bed. He threw that out flat, because it was completely swallowed up in this. “Sure it was cops?”