Read The Gordon Mamon Casebook Online
Authors: Simon Petrie
Tags: #mystery, #Humor, #space elevator, #Fantasy, #SF, #SSC
“That is the most depraved, sadistic, ruthless …” Gordon let the adjectives dwindle on his lips.
“Thank you.”
“But if the medgurneys can do all this,” protested Gordon, while Haier pulled out a felt-tipped pen and drew what felt like a dotted line across the detective’s forehead, “why the powersaw?”
“I’m a hitman,” said Haier. “I prefer the hands-on approach.”
“You’ll never get away with this!”
“There, I
told
you you were just waiting to say that. Better now?”
“In the circumstances,” replied Gordon, “no. But you were saying?”
“Don’t think I was,” said Haier, as the illumination briefly zeroed once more. “Bloody faulty lamps. You got a light?”
It’s not a fault in the lights
, Gordon told himself. “There’s no smoking on any Skyw—uh, no. But if you’re looking for a battery-powered light source, my handheld, on the floor over there, has an illumination function.”
“Right,” said Haier, and moved off to retrieve the handheld. As if on cue, there was another brief flicker of darkness.
Gordon turned to face Claudia Iyzowt. She didn’t look fully aware, but there was no help for it. “Mrs Iyzowt. Claudia,” he said, quietly but urgently. “Be brave. I’m hoping you’ll survive this, one way or another. Looks like I won’t. Please,
tell the cops at Skytop what’s happened
, because they need to know. And tell them to pass on a message to Belle, for me.”
“Belle?” asked Iyzowt, trying to sit up and failing. “Who’s Belle?”
“Too long to explain,” said Gordon. “But they’ll know.”
“What’s this message? And why am I tied up?”
“Tell them, to tell her—”
But Haier was back again, with the handheld, the surgical saw, and a distressing degree of enthusiasm.
The powertool in Haier’s hand, just centimetres above Gordon’s forehead, whirred into full speed, its clinical whine deafening. Then the hitman twitched, and the lights flickered off again.
* * *
For a few terrifying seconds, the basement was filled with darkness and the shrieking whirr of Haier’s surgical saw. Gordon’s medgurney jolted and tipped alarmingly at an angle. Then the chamber’s lights reasserted themselves, tentatively at first, then with more confidence.
He could still hear Haier—or rather, he could still hear Haier’s power-tool—but the armoured hit-man himself was not within Gordon’s field of vision.
“Mr Mattock,” said Claudia, from the gurney to which she was secured, “what’s happening?”
We’re trying to survive a badly-overwritten climactic scene
, thought Gordon, who, very much against his wishes, was thoroughly used to this kind of thing by now. “The belts are playing with the circuitry,” he explained, without even turning to face her. “It’s interfering with Haier’s—with the armoured guy’s wiring, with his movements. But he could be back on his feet any second now. Can you get free, at all?”
The sound of her struggle was drowned by the whirr of the power-saw, joined by an animalistic howl and a grunt from Haier. There was more jostling of Gordon’s gurney, and the staccato shriek of blade against metal. It sounded as though Haier was trying to saw through one of the medical trolley’s supporting legs. Gordon tried again, to no avail, to free himself.
“Just got this last one to go,” said Mrs Iyzowt.
“What?” asked Gordon, astonished. Abandoning his futile attempt to spy Haier, he turned his head and saw that the heiress had somehow liberated herself from all the straps but one and was now bent double unbuckling the fastening around her ankles. “Um—how did you do that?”
“Before I met my Dennis, who introduced me to the wonders of waxworks,” she said, climbing off the trolley, “I was a contortionist. And an escapologist.”
That’s just the sort of coincidence that can totally spoil suspension-of-disbelief
, Gordon thought. “Your Dennis?” he asked just as, with a metallic squeal and a thunk, his gurney lost half a leg and tipped further, bringing him almost face-to-face with Haier’s twitching, metallic feet.
“My late husband.” Standing on the Haier-free side of Gordon’s gurney, she began unbuckling his straps. He tried not to notice how close to his feet and legs was the powersaw in Haier’s erratic grasp.
“
Dennis?
I thought your late husband’s name was Jeffrey.”
“Oh, Dennis is the one who’s
dead
. Jeffrey’s just not good with clocks. But you said, the belts were playing with the circuitry.”
“Yes. They do that, down here, when the activity’s a bit higher than normal. The basement’s not shielded like the main floors.”
“But if the belts were interfering, why did—who did you say that armoured man was?”
“Haier,” said Gordon. “Still is.” He yelped in shock as the surgical saw managed, in a disconcertingly clinical fashion, to slice through his ankle restraint. “Uh, I’ve no wish to sound ungrateful, Claudia, but can you undo those any quicker?”
“I’ll do my best. Why did Haier use the belts, if they interfered?”
“Huh?” asked Gordon. “No, I didn’t mean
that
kind of belt. You’ve heard of the Van Allen belts?”
“I don’t really keep up with fashion, Mr Memo,” she said.
“
Mamon
.” Gordon hastily climbed off the medgurney. Pointing towards the nearest exit, and with a wistful glance to where his precious handheld lay, beside the flailing armour-suited killer on the floor, he said, “The belts are charged particles and radiation. I’ll explain properly later. Let’s just get somewhere safer, away from old Tinbrain.”
They reached the doorway none too soon. Haier appeared to have regained some coarse-motor skills and was lumbering in their direction, groaning incoherently.
* * *
“I’m sorry, Mr Marksman. I just can’t go any further.” Claudia was sitting stiff-legged on the corridor floor. “Unless we can find somewhere to recharge?”
“Recharge?” Gordon asked, surprised. He wasn’t sure what was the problem with Mrs Iyzowt’s legs—they’d got as far as the seventeenth floor with nothing worse than the inevitable biochemical bickering between adrenaline and fatigue, and she’d suddenly announced herself unable to proceed. He’d coaxed her to at least stumble along the corridor towards the north escaladder, painfully aware of their visibility. From the sound of it—grunts, heavy breathing, and not a little clanking—Haier was only a couple of floors below. “What do you mean,
recharge
?”
“My legs are flat,” she explained.
“No, they’re—I mean, you have
electric legs
?” Gordon asked, curiosity jostling with concern at their predicament. This, at least, explained her unexpectedly low centre-of-gravity, and the heaviness which had thwarted his previous efforts to help her move. “Why do you have electric legs?”
“Let’s just say my last public attempt at escapology didn’t go to plan. I’m sorry, Mr Marram. Really, I thought this latest set of batteries would have lasted longer.”
“
Mamon
. The circuitry could’ve suffered damage from the belt’s magnetic field.”
“You might well be right. But you go on. There’s no reason both of us need perish.”
“I’m staying,” muttered Gordon. “Now we should hush.” Haier was only a floor below, now, if that.
Gordon waited with mounting fear while the armoured assassin drew ever closer. The first glance down this corridor would suffice to reveal them … and yet, astoundingly, when Haier appeared on their level, he lumbered past, continuing noisily up the rampway.
His visual sensors must be out
, Gordon thought wonderingly.
So he
did
take damage, down in the basement. I wonder how he’s navigating?
Gordon waited until Haier had advanced a floor or two further, and cautiously set out in what he hoped was a sufficiently quiet pursuit.
He could not see Haier ahead of him, but it was easily possible to discern Haier’s progress by the grunts and clanks.
There wasn’t much more above them, now. Just the obs—
There was a crash, and a shout; and a frantic, deafening rush of wind that threatened to pull Gordon up the rampway, towards the obs deck. Then steel shutters clanged resoundingly shut against the hull breach, and the wind was cut back almost completely to a thin kettle-shrill whine, then to silence.
Gordon raced to the shutters, heart still pounding, and planted his ear against the metal barrier. Hearing nothing, he retraced his steps to find the nearest freight-tower security panel. Flicking through the securicam feeds, he found an external cam shot that did indeed show a large, metallic object falling away from the station in the dimming light of dusk, gesticulating helplessly as it fell. Gordon didn’t want to dwell too deeply on how far that fall would be.
He remembered how he’d first encountered Haier.
Well
, he thought.
There’s poetic justice for you
.
He’d be down to check on Mrs Iyzowt in a minute, and to try to find a charging cable for her legs. But it was getting dark, outside. First, he’d better notify the police down on Skyward Island, about what was going to land in their lap, with nightfall.
Acknowledgements
I’m indebted to the editors who, perhaps unwisely, first showed favour on these stories; to Jacob Edwards for proofreading above and beyond the call of duty; to Lewis for some truly excellent cover art; and, as always, to Edwina for showing me ways to make my words shine.
I’m also very appreciative of the web-hosting generosity of my fellow SpecFicNZ members Cassie Hart, Dan Rabarts, Darusha Wehm, Beaulah Pragg, and Debbie Howell, on whose pages various portions of a hastily-improvised version of ‘A Night to Remember’ first appeared.
None of the above should be held responsible for any glitches that remain in the surrounding pages. The defects are down to me, and Gobfrey Shrdlu.
About the Author
Born on the South Island of New Zealand, Simon Petrie now lives on the North Island of Australia, where a local university pays him to think about molecules. He has been an avid reader of science fiction for more than four decades, but only in recent years has developed the nerve to write the stuff. His writing has netted him the Sir Julius Vogel Award for Best New Talent in 2010 and a couple of ‘Year’s Best’ Honourable Mentions (and a coveted Dishonourable Mention, in the Bulwer-Lytton awards) in 2011. His first short fiction collection,
Rare Unsigned Copy: tales of Rocketry, Ineptitude, and Giant Mutant Vegetables
, is also available from
Peggy Bright Books
.
Simon is a member of the
Andromeda Spaceways
publishing collective and the
CSFG
(Canberra Speculative Fiction Guild) and
SpecFicNZ
writers’ communities.
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