TekLords, page 14
“Business,” observed Gomez, “always business.”
“Let’s go over and talk some business to Holz ourselves.”
“Jake! Love!” A very tall blonde young woman had pushed her way through a group of poolside guests. She was wearing a scanty crimson dress trimmed in neon. Putting both arms tight around Jake, she kissed him full on the mouth, then patted his backside with her left hand. “Gee, I was under the impression you were still up in the cooler.”
Jake, gently, broke her hold. “Camilla,” he said, grinning, “would you do me a favor? Don’t holler my name hereabouts.”
The pretty blonde winked and lowered her voice. “You’re here undercover, huh?” She laughed, knuckling his ribs fondly with her fist. “I get the picture. Who’s your colleague?”
“I’m Gomez,” explained Gomez. “You’re Camilla Jugend, aren’t you?”
She smiled, reaching out to rumple his hair. “The Porn Queen, that’s me. We’ve got three vidcazes on the charts this week. Haven’t hit the top spot with any of them yet, but I’m in three, six and eight. Not bad for a onetime street hooker from the Santa Monica Sector.”
“It’s the American dream in action,” agreed Gomez.
Camilla gave Jake another hug. “Gee, I heard you got sent up to the darn Freezer for life or something.”
“That turned out to be a mistake,” he told her. “Camilla, could you introduce us to Holz and give him the impression we’re starting up a porn distribution system in—”
“In Central America,” suggested Gomez. “Since I’m often mistaken for a Central American business tycoon.”
Camilla asked, “You aren’t planning to arrest Frank, are you?”
“Nope. We’re not cops anymore.”
“What then?”
“Operatives with Cosmos,” he replied. “We don’t intend to do him any serious harm. Only interested in asking a few questions.”
“Oh, hey, listen, if you roughed him up a little it wouldn’t annoy me much,” said the blonde actress. “But were you to haul him away to the pokey, that might affect the Cultural Productions, Inc., studios—that’s what Frank’s calling himself—and that in turn would futz up my still-burgeoning career.” She smiled at Gomez. “How many of my films have you seen?”
“One.”
“Oh, so? How many times did you watch it?”
“Once.”
“Really? What was wrong with it?”
“Not a blessed thing, but—”
“Camilla,” persisted Jake, “what about the introduction?”
“Sure, I can do that much for an old friend from my former life,” she assured him. “Who are you supposed to be?”
“I’m Mr. Jaxon, he’s Mr. Chavez.”
Camilla studied Gomez. “No, he doesn’t look like a Chavez to me,” she decided. “We’ll call him Mr. McTavish.”
“That’s not,” Gomez pointed out, “an especially apt name for a Central American tycoon, Camilla.”
“But it suits you.” She took hold of his hand. “Come along, Mr. McTavish. You, too, Mr. Jaxon.” She caught hold of Jake’s hand. “We’ll go meet Mr. Holz.”
Holz settled into his desk chair. “If you find the wall distracting, gentlemen,” he said, chuckling, “I can switch it off.”
They were in his den, which had formerly been the office of the Golden Oasis Inn. On the wall behind the desk were five rows of a dozen vidscreens each.
“Are those samples of your wares?” Jake was sitting in a rubberoid chair facing the desk. To his right was a door leading to what had once been the motel parking lot.
Chuckling again, Holz traced his moustache with the tip of his little finger. “What you’re seeing, gentlemen, is what’s going on in the bedrooms right now. I’ve got fifty-seven bedrooms in my mansion, each one monitored.” He pointed to a screen. “There, for instance, is Mayor Merner in bed with one of her constituents. Up on Screen 13 you see Romo Styx—actually it’s his number one andy simulacrum, but she doesn’t know that—making love to a reporter from Porn-Billboard.”
“Interesting,” commented Gomez, who was seated near the door to the pool area. “But, as you mentioned, a mite distracting during a business conference.”
Holz touched a key pad on the left side of his desk. All sixty screens died. “When do you intend to begin operations, Mr. McTavish? That’s an odd name, if you don’t mind my saying so, for a Central American.”
“I’m the product of a mixed marriage.”
Jake said, “What I’d like you to do now, Holz, is fold your hands and keep them in your lap.”
“Huh? What the hell do you—”
“Do it.”
Gomez, swiftly, produced a lazgun. “All we want is a small amount of information.”
“McTavish, you may not be aware of this, but I happen to be in partnership with some very powerful people,” warned the pornographer. “You really don’t want to antagonize any of the—”
“It’s your partners we’re interested in.” Standing up, Jake drew his stungun. “You arranged with Warden Niewenhaus to get Dr. Gordon Chesterton off the Freezer.”
“That’s absolute bullshit. I never had—”
“This isn’t a debate,” Jake said. “I’m just telling you what happened.”
“Yeah? Well, I’m telling you that if you mess with me you’re going to have a half dozen Teklords on your ass.”
“That’s probable, sure,” said Jake. “But by that time you’ll be in less than tip-top shape. Unless you cooperate.”
“Who’re you with—one of the drug agencies?”
“Where’d you send Chesterton?” Jake moved over beside the seated man. “You can’t seriously injure a man with a stungun like this—unless you use it in an unconventional way.”
“As a bludgeon, for example,” suggested Gomez.
Holz said, “Both you assholes are going to be dead in a very—”
“In the meantime—tell us where Chesterton is.”
“I don’t know.”
Gomez sighed. “That’s not a very satisfying answer, amigo.”
“Listen, all I did was make arrangements to spring the bastard and accept delivery.”
“Had Chesterton been revived by the time you got him?” asked Jake.
“No, he was still in a box. I never even actually saw the guy.”
“Where’d the box go?”
“I turned it over to somebody.”
“Who?”
“I had the box delivered—unopened—to the Otosu Express Service in the San Pedro Sector. That was months ago and I have no idea where the goddamn thing went after that.”
“Who ordered you to arrange for Chesterton’s—”
A pounding began on the poolside door to the office. “Boss? You doing okay in there?”
Holz smiled. “I neglected to mention that my goon squad checks on me every ten minutes when I’m in a meeting with anybody they don’t know,” he said. “What shall I tell them, gentlemen?”
28
JAKE SAID TO HOLZ, “Tell your thugs everything is fine.”
“That wouldn’t be to my advantage.”
“Hey, boss—shall we bust in?”
“If I don’t respond at all, they’ll come on in anyway.” Holz chuckled. “Looks to me as though...Yow!”
Jake had used his stungun on him.
Holz stiffened in his chair, started to bring his hands up out of his lap. His mouth made a snapping sound as he slumped in the chair, unconscious.
Jake caught him, kept him from making a noisy fall to the floor. “Time to leave the party, Sid.”
Gomez was already at the rear door to the office and opening it cautiously. “No goons out this way yet.”
“Okay, boss, we’re coming in. Stand clear,” said one of the men at the front door.
Jake followed his partner out into the night. “Trouble,” he said.
Coming around the side of the building, about a hundred yards to their left, were two large men in tight suits. Each carried a lazgun.
“We can borrow this crate,” said Gomez. Parked about fifty feet to their right was a large black skybus. Emblazoned on its side in silver gloletters was—GUY LOMBARDO & HIS ROYAL CANADIENS—ANOTHER MUSIKANDIES FAVORITE!
Jake halted, dropped to the ground and fired.
The beam of his stungun hit the first goon. The big man formed a sudden X, then crumpled and fell.
The other man fired his lazgun at Jake.
He missed, succeeded only in slicing the back door of Holz’s office in half.
Rolling, Jake fired again.
He missed, too.
“Allow me.” Gomez had yanked out his stungun. He brought the second thug down.
“Thanks.” Rising up, Jake ran over to the bus.
Gomez had the door open. “I can fly this thing—by using a parasite control I happen to have,” he said, climbing aboard.
“I won’t mention to anyone that you were carrying an illegal device on your person.”
“Pick a comfortable seat and let’s take off.” Gomez hopped into the pilot seat and slapped a small orange disk on the control panel. “I just noticed that more goons are pouring out of what used to be Holz’s back door.”
The skybus roared to life, its door wooshed shut.
“Muy bien.” Gomez punched out a takeoff pattern. The big bus quivered, rattled once, then started climbing rapidly up into the midnight sky.
Three of Holz’s crew were standing down below, firing up at the escaping skybus with lazguns.
One of them hit it and managed to cut a neat saucer-sized hole in the floor of the rapidly rising craft about five feet from where Jake was standing.
Gomez said, “That hit doesn’t seem to have done us any serious harm. I think we’d better keep this crate until we’re a safe distance away. Our agency car can be reclaimed at a later date.”
Jake was looking down out a window. “Nobody is taking off after us.”
“With Holz unable to give orders, they probably don’t know whether or not to chase us. How long will he stay out cold?”
“Had my stungun on the maximum setting. So figure twelve to fifteen hours.”
“Then maybe we’ll have enough time to investigate the Otosu Express folks before anyone can warn them.”
“Maybe,” said Jake.
Beth said, “Dan wants to talk to you. He’s phoned here several times.”
It was nearly three A.M. The young woman was dressed, waiting up for him in the living room of her apartment.
Jake had just come in. “Did he say what it is?”
“He’s all right. I think it has to do with Kate.”
“Is she still alive?”
“Yes, but your son still isn’t especially fond of me, so he wouldn’t leave much of a message.”
“Going to have to figure a way to get through to him, since only emergency calls can—”
“He gave me the number of that nurse who’s befriended him. You can reach him through her.” Beth passed him the number.
Jake sank into the phone chair, feeling suddenly weary, and punched out the number. “You okay, Beth?”
“Far as I know. How’d you get the gash on your face?”
“In the line of duty. I’ll...Hello, this is Jake Cardigan.”
A plump blonde woman in a crisp white nurse uniform had shown up on the screen. “Well, it’s about time. The poor kid is very upset.”
“Is he awake?”
“Certainly he’s awake. If you kept decent hours, he wouldn’t have to fret half the night away while—”
“Okay, I’m here now. I want to talk to him.”
“You sit right where you are, Mr. Cardigan. I’ll fetch the poor kid.” She left the screen.
Beth stroked the back of Jake’s neck. “She’s not, apparently, an admirer of yours.”
“I’ve run into several people like that tonight. At least this one’s not armed.”
Dan, who’d obviously been crying, was on the phone-screen. “Dad, I’ve been trying to call you for hours.”
Beth moved silently back out of range of the phone’s eye.
“Sorry, Dan. What’s bothering you?”
“It’s Mom. She...she’s gotten much worse.”
“What’s her doctor say?”
“I haven’t even been able to talk to her real doctor. But one of those asshole android medics told me—”
“Don’t swear,” advised the nurse from offscreen.
“It’s okay, my father doesn’t mind. One of the andies says she’s slipped into a deep coma, Dad.”
“She’s still alive, though. From what I’ve been able to find out about this plague, she still has a good chance of being—”
“A few more days. She won’t live more than two or three days longer.”
“Who told you that?”
“Not any of the doctors,” admitted his son. “But I’ve been talking to lots of relatives of victims and...once that deep coma starts, you usually don’t live very long at all. Can you get over to the hospital now? We can sneak you in and I’d really like you to be here in case...you know.”
“Dan, I’d like to, but I can’t. I’ve got to go to Japan early tomorrow. We’re on the trail of the cure for this damn—”
“Couldn’t you stop by here first?”
“Not going to be enough time for that.”
“Why is this your job? On the vidnews they say that all kinds of government agencies are working on finding some kind of antidote for the plague.”
“We’ve got a strong lead to follow—It’s something I have to do.”
“Okay...I suppose I sort of see what you’re saying, Dad,” said his son forlornly. “But...I still wish you could be here for a while.” Turning, shoulders slumping, he walked out of the picture.
The plump nurse reappeared, shaking her head. “Poor kid,” she observed, and killed the call.
Jake stood up, facing Beth. “I can’t quite get him to accept or understand what I’m doing.”
“He’s getting closer—be patient,” she said. “What’s this about Japan? Did you and Gomez get a lead?”
“As it turns out, we got a couple of them. We’re leaving for Kyoto at six A.M.”
“Which we—you and Gomez or you and me?”
“You and me, Beth.”
“You sure you want me to come along?”
“I am, yeah.” He moved close to her and took hold of her.
29
FORTY THOUSAND FEET IN the air the skyliner was speeding toward Japan.
Beth and Jake were sharing a table in the blankwalled dining room. “Eat,” she suggested.
“What?”
Smiling, she pointed at his plate. “The ritual of breakfast usually involves eating,” she said. “Look at Agent MacQuarrie over at that other table. He’s on his second helping of soycakes and nearham.”
“MacQuarrie’s getting to see a lot of the world as a result of tagging after you.” Jake picked up his fork. “Berkeley, the Freezer and now Kyoto.”
“And Gomez is heading for where?”
“Tokyo,” answered Jake. “I would’ve explained all this to you in greater detail last night if you hadn’t distracted me.”
“Forgive me. Why Kyoto and Tokyo?”
“Frank Holz was the guy who arranged to have Dr. Chesterton smuggled free of the Freezer. Holz then arranged to have the doctor, still in a suspended state, packed in a crate and turned over to an outfit in the San Pedro Sector of GLA calling itself the Otosu Express Service.”
“Did you talk to them?”
“Not directly, no,” said Jake, grinning. “But last night, after Gomez and I got back from the Palm Springs Sector—I’ll tell you sometime about the skybus we borrowed. Last night we used the Cosmos Agency computers and a few contacts of our own in the information-siphoning trade. We found out that Otosu had shipped out not one but two crates of the size necessary to hold Chesterton’s body. Both were sent to Japan at about the same time. One to a warehouse in Kyoto, the other to a shipping firm in Tokyo. Trail ends there, since we can’t find out where either of the crates went next.”
Beth asked, “It’s possible, isn’t it, that both crates are decoys? That Chesterton never left GLA?”
“Sure, and Bascom is putting some operatives on that angle.”
“You’re betting on Japan, though.”
“Gomez found out that Tora Hokori is still alive and based in Japan someplace. Sonny Hokori seems to be the one who originally ordered Chesterton sprung from the Freezer.”
“And his sister is carrying on?”
“Seems likely.”
“You’d heard she was dead.”
“Supposed to have been killed in a train accident. But the Teklords, at least those who attended the get-together up on The Casino, talked about her as though she was alive and trying to run things.”
“They’re definitely the ones behind the plague?”
“They want the United States, and most of the other countries of the world, to quit interfering with the Tek trade. San Francisco is a sort of hostage.”
“If everybody agrees to lay off, then they’ll hand over the antidote?”
“That seems to be the plan.”
“Thousands of people are going to die before that happens.”
“Which is also part of the plan.”
“And if the government doesn’t concede?”
“More cities.”
Beth shook her head. “You can’t control a plague like this one. It’s going to keep spreading, beyond San Francisco and eventually beyond NorCal,” she said. “They really don’t know what they’ve turned loose, Jake.”
“They don’t much care. To them this is simply another useful business technique.”
“If only my father hadn’t...His anti-Tek system could’ve put them all out of business.”
“It still may, but right now we have to stop the plague.”
Beth asked, “Do you have contacts in Kyoto?”
“A few,” he said. “And Bascom’s arranged for me to work with an agency they’ve used before. An operative named Norman Itoko of the Senuku Detective Agency is going to meet us at the airport.”
