You get out and walk up the pavement to the front door with the red geomarker twirling over it. Kemal is right behind you. “I think something is not right,” he says quietly. You follow his finger to the front door. It’s ajar.
Someone screams inside, a shriek of inarticulate terror. It only lasts a second before it’s cut off sharply.
Kemal is past you in a hurry as you hit the phone again: “Backup now! Violent incident in progress!” Then you’re after him as he shoulderbarges the door and charges up the stairs. There’s a moment of confusion as you take in the scene—living room off to one side, kitchen off to another, staircase in front, Kemal’s legs punching the treads—then Kemal is coming back down the stairs, arse over tit, tumbling loosely. You shout “police!” as someone else comes down with him, lands boot first on top of Kemal, and launches himself at you.
You brace for the impact, fists raised—he’s a big man, vaguely familiar from your lifelog video as you held the door, leaving Appleton Tower—bingo—you try to block but he can outreach you and he’s swinging a wheelie-bag in one hand. He knocks you head first into the kitchen. Things are vague: You try to get your hands up and someone is nagging something in your ear about backup but the door is open and the man is gone.
You gasp for breath for a few seconds, then get back online. “Control, we have an incident. Violent offender, 195, hundred kilos, carrying a suitcase. Attacked two officers, fleeing the scene.” Whatever the scene is. You push yourself up and stumble into the hall. Your head aches painfully. Kemal is lying limp at the bottom of the stairs. “Ambulance needed on scene, officer down.” You lean over him long enough to confirm he’s breathing, then take the stairs.
“Target is the man on the staircase?” asks Control.
“Who else?” You bite back an impolite suggestion. That’s why I was sending you my real-time video feed, idiot. “I’m searching the scene. Pass it to airborne, unable to maintain hot pursuit on foot right now.” Read: Kemal is stirring but won’t be chasing anyone for the next few days, and as for yourself, you feel like you’ve been kicked in the head.
“Roger, calling airborne assets now,” says Control. “Backup arriving by car, estimated two minutes away.”
You hear something from up the next flight of stairs. Panting, you climb them and find Anwar lying on the floor. There’s something yellow in his mouth, and he’s turning blue. Writhing. You realize his hands and feet are tied: the yellow thing—he’s choking on it. For the next double-handful of seconds, you’re busy kneeling down and tugging at it frantically. When it comes free he gasps for breath in deep whooping intakes of breath. His eyes are rolling. You drop the yellow rubber duck and watch as it expands, then look around. You see bedroom doors to either side, a trapdoor with a ladder coming down from the ceiling, and a noose dangling in the solitary sunbeam that slants through the trap and puddles on the perennial victim, lying panting on the floor.
The last handful of dominoes click into place on the board.
You dive down the staircase just as Kemal is sitting up, holding his head. “Don’t go anywhere. I’ve called an ambulance.”
“Don’t need—” He sounds vague.
You hold up a hand. “How many fingers?” He squints at you. “Ambulance, Kemal. Understand?”
He nods, then winces. “Is Hussein—”
“Still alive.” Not for much longer if we hadn’t hurried. It’s a very strange feeling, and a rare one, to know you’ve just directly saved someone’s life: almost counterbalanced by the gnawing fear that by not giving hot pursuit, you may have let a murderer slip through your fingers. You hit the phone again. “Control, Kavanaugh here. The absconder in Gilmerton is on foot and dangerous. Provisional identification as alias John Christie, real name unknown. He may be armed, and he’s wanted for murder and attempted murder, repeat, murder and attempted murder.” He was going to hang Anwar. Fake a suicide. Wasn’t he? The MO is different from MacDonald, but Christie clearly isn’t a regular spree killer. He has no history: He’s like a nightmare that stepped out of nowhere, just as the BABYLON killings began. Which is yet another coincidence to consider at length. Is he here to tie up loose ends, or is he a loose end in his own right? “Cross-reference to the Appleton Tower murder: This is probably the same perp.”
“Control here, please hold.” Blue FLASH alerts begin to scroll up your CopSpace log, going out to every soul on the police net within a couple of kilometres. Seconds later, you hear sirens in the distance. “I’m proceeding with that, Inspector. Is there a warrant?”
“Real-time response.” The paper-work mountain that’s about to hit you would cause your desk to collapse if it wasn’t entirely digital. You begin to climb the stairs to the second floor: “We have an ABH and attempted murder victim here; please confirm second ambulance.”
Hussein is sitting up, leaning against the wall beside an open bedroom door. There are children’s toys scattered on the floor, an unmade bed. His eyes are half-closed. After a moment, you clock that he’s weeping quietly.
You squat down in front of him. “Mr. Hussein. Anwar.” He shows no sign of noticing, which is probably no surprise: Probably in shock, you figure. You bring up the check-list, tell your specs to run a body-temperature scan, but he’s not looking particularly cold, and his respiration’s within spitting distance of normal. “Can you talk to me?”
His shoulders shake. “The man who was here.” Body posture: utter desolation. “Who is he?”
Hussein shudders. “Colonel Datka’s man.”
Who? You focus. “Colonel who?”
“Said he worked for Colonel Datka.”
Right… “Who is Colonel Datka?”
Anwar takes a deep breath and looks at you. “I am the honorary consul of the Independent Republic of Issyk-Kulistan. Was. Told him I’d resigned, but he wouldn’t listen. Colonel Datka works for Kyrgyzstan. Police, or spy, or something. The bad man. Calls himself Christie, came to take some papers from me—another passport. Says he’s Peter Manuel. Left his suitcase with me.”
Suitcase? This is making less and less sense, but in your experience these things seldom do when they begin to unravel. “What about the suitcase?” you ask, hoping this is going somewhere.
“Bibi opened it.” He closes his eyes. “Then she left me.” His shoulders shake again. “She thought I would have something like that! The shame.”
“Hang on a minute,” you tell him. Then you open a voice channel back to ICIU. “Moxie? Can you run a search for me? Multiple names: Colonel Datka, Kyrgyzstan. Issyk-Kulistan. Then Peter Manuel, alternate identity, John Christie.”
Sirens getting louder, then cut off abruptly. Voices downstairs.
“I’m looking, skipper. How do you spell those?”
“How should I know? Try soundex.” You look at Anwar, who is snuffling damply into his moustache. Bibi is his wife? But if he was also hanging out with Adam MacDonald on a gay hookup site… “It’s related to BABYLON and the Appleton Tower killing, and you can dial it up to eleven. I’m going to put you on hold now.”
You turn back to your victim: “It’s going to be alright, Anwar. There’s an ambulance coming, and we’d like to ask you some more questions. While Christie or Manuel or whoever is on the run, we’re going to want to keep you in protective custody. Do you understand? Christie was…” You nod towards the trap-door. “Wasn’t he?”