The Ramal Extraction (21 page)

It didn’t take more than a minute into his exam before he realized what he was dealing with, and it was beyond his ability to get into it.

“Wow,” he said.

“What?” That from Jo, who was the only other person in the room.

“We need to get Formentara in here.”

Jo looked at him. “Why would—? Really?”

“Yeah. Our friend Booterik here is wired.”

“A Rel on augs? I never heard of such a thing.”

“That makes two of us.”

“I’ll get hir.”

“Formentara is gonna be as happy as a Malay monkey on mushrooms.”

Jo stepped out as Formentara came in. Outside the exam room, Kay stood, waiting.

“Your Rel is augmented.”

Kay nodded. “Yes.”

“You knew?”

“It seems a reasonable assumption. I did not detect hormone or somatic drug odors from him, so the augmentation is unusual. His demeanor was most un-Rel-like. His speed beyond that of a normal Rel. Augmentation would allow for that. From our short conversation, I got the impression his brother was no longer among the living. This one will have answers we need.”

“Formentara will figure out what’s what, then we can ask your Rel about it. It would seem to be connected to Indira’s kidnapping.”

“So it would seem—”

“Shit!
Shit—!
” Formentara yelled.

Jo and Kay blew through the door, Jo’s pistol out and Kay’s claws ready.

The Rel on the table jittered like a spider on a hot griddle. Wink frantically waved control-jive at his computer diagnostics, and Formentara did likewise to hir gear.

As they watched, the jitters stopped, and the Rel lay suddenly still.

“He’s arrested,” Wink said. “I’m going to pump adrenaline directly into his—”

“Don’t bother,” Formentara said. “His EEG is flat. He’s not coming back. Shit! I
missed
it!”

Jo said, “Missed what?”

“The second burner, dammit!”

Jo and Kay exchanged glances.

Formentara said, “He’s running a myotonic speed rig, custom augware, adjusted to Rel physiology—got a suppressor, too, so that’s why Kay couldn’t smell him.

“He has a brainburner implant, a high-voltage capacitor, set for query-discharge. If somebody opens his aug for inspection and doesn’t shut the CNS implant down, it zaps his limbics.

“First thing I did was close it. But there’s a
second
burner, wrapped around his cortex. A neural net. It fried him before I realized it was there. Stupid!”

Wink said, “Nobody would have caught that, it doesn’t show, it’s completely biological, there’s nothing to detect—”

“
I
should have caught it! Some asshead slipped it past me! And I tell you what, whoever did it is not from around here. This was done by somebody who knew what the fuck they were doing, and it is recent. Days old, no more.”

Jo had never seen hir so angry. She said, “Well, well. This is another whole ugly jar of worms, isn’t it? A Rel on aug, and with enough suicide in him to be doubly sure nobody could poke around in his head. Why?”

Cutter looked at his team. He was getting tired of having these meetings. “It seems that we keep getting more questions than answers.”

Nobody spoke to that.

“And it also seems apparent that there is more going on here than a simple kidnapping for money.”

“Figure out what, that probably gives us the ‘who,’” Gramps said.

“Go back to your contacts,” Cutter said. “Look for connections. Get some useful intel that doesn’t lead us into a dead end or a trap. Do it quickly.”

They all nodded at that.

Gunny took less care with her clothes than she had the first time she’d gone into Lakshmi’s Lair. Stavo Parjanya had already seen what was under them, so she didn’t need to get his attention that way.

“Hey. My favorite corporate warrior.”

“And my favorite bouncer. Well. On this world.”

“You wound me, fem.”

They grinned at each other.

“Here to, ah, pump me for more information?” he asked.

“Think you can produce any more?”

“Oh, yeah, or die trying. I’m off in fifteen minutes.”

“I know.”

Again, the smiles.

The woman had a lovely comvox: “So, smashball soldier, what can I do for you this time?”

Gramps stood outside, in the hard shade of the main building, watching a distant thunderstorm flash heat lightning. Too far away to hear the thunder. He said, “I thought I might buy you dinner and ask a few more questions.”

“When?”

“At your convenience, Lareece.”

“Tonight is good for me. Say…1500 or so?”

“That would be good. How about Krishna’s Song?”

“Here only a few days, and you already know the best restaurant in town. But it will be impossible to get reservations on such short notice.”

“Already have them.”

“Ah. A confident man. I like that. But what would you have done if I’d had other plans?”

“Eaten there alone,” he said. “Who could replace you?”

She laughed. “And a flatterer as well. Fifteen it is.”

“Dr. Tomas Wink,” came Vanyu’s voice over the com.

“It is I. How’s the one-and-a-half coming?”

“It’s getting there. I’m doing a session tomorrow, maybe. Forecast says there’s a chance of weather.”

“What kind of feeblet lets a little rain stop her from diving? Easier to see the water’s surface that way.”

She laughed. “A little rain doesn’t bother me. It’s the lightning and gale-force wind I worry about.”

He knew. There were players who would risk electrical storms, divers rarely got cooked, but more than a few had been blown over land in wind-heavy storms, which made for a really hard entry. Part of the risk.

“You going to be there?”

“I was thinking I might.”

“Weather probably won’t start until afternoon. We could get in a few dives if we get there early.”

“What’s early?”

“How about 0600?”

“I suppose I can cut my beauty sleep a little short. See you then.”

She laughed again.

Formentara met the augmentor she had dealt with before. The place was a small autocafe, run entirely by dins, invisible rails guiding them back and forth among the table. She sipped at maté as he arrived and sat.

He was more than eager to talk to hir. He practically ran into the place.

“I need more information.”

“Anything.”

“I believe there is a high-level augmentor working on this world.”

“Yeah, and I’m looking at hir.”

“Other than myself. This person would be keeping a low profile, and perhaps doing some experimental work.”

“Experimental how?”

“Possibly working on Rel.”

“Rel? Rel don’t do augs, everybody knows that.”

“Assume for a moment that everybody is wrong. Who would have that ability?”

“Nobody local, I can assure you of that.”

“Are there serious players who might not be local?”

“None I know about.”

“Can you find out?”

“I can try. What’s in it for me?”

“Have you heard about Rampant Systems newest Erector Set?”

“Of course. Supposed to be the best dickware ever made, infinitely adjustable, costs a fortune, raise wood on a dead man. But it’s embargoed here. We can’t get it.”

“If you knew the augmentor who created it you could.”

He stared at hir. “Really? No shit? That’s
yours
?”

Zhe smiled.

“More tea?” the Rajah asked.

“Sure,” Cutter said.

The Rajah didn’t have to lift an eyebrow, a server was there and pouring two seconds later.

This was a different room than he’d visited before, the walls of some dark, spalled wood with a thick coat of wax covering them. The ceiling was draped with cream-colored silk sheets and had some kind of indirect lighting that made the sheets glow warmly. The couch upon which he sat was a full-form biomechanical, the surface clone-suede, that adjusted itself perfectly to his contours. There was a faint tang of cedar to the air, from burning incense stuck in a large rectangular container of fine white sand near the door. The sand’s surface was raked into parallel lines, like a zen stone garden. The effect was most serene.

Cutter wasn’t much of a tea-drinker, but it was a popular beverage in some circles, and he’d learned to appreciate the taste. The local brew, whatever it was, had an astringent, slightly bitter tang, with flowery overtones and something like ginger under those. A little kick, too. He sipped at it. “It’s very good.”