FALLEN DRAGON (2 page)

All around the bar, men were pushing back chairs and rising. Coming to help their mates.

"No!" the man in the waistcoat shouted. "He's in Skin!"

It made no difference. The youngster was going for the big bowie knife in his belt scabbard, and nobody was paying any attention to warnings as they closed in.

Lawrence raised his right arm high, punching the air. He could feel a gentle rippling against his wrists as peristaltic muscles brought the darts forward out of their magazine sacs into launch tubules. A ring of small dry slits peeled open above his carpals, black nozzles poking out. The dart swarm erupted.

As he left the bar, Lawrence turned the cardboard sign on the door so it said
closed
and shut it behind him. He made sure his hat was on square, a fussy action, covering his anger. God damn the Armory Division. Those bastards never erred on the side of caution, always on the side of overkill. He'd seen two of the men lying on the floor start to convulse, the dart toxin levels set way too high for a simple incapacitation sting. The bar was going to get very noisy with police, very quickly.

A South American couple was sitting at one of the tables on the bar's veranda, studying the laminated menu. Lawrence smiled politely at them and walked off down the main street back to the skycable terminus.

*
 
*
 
*

Ambulances and police vehicles were parked down the length of Kuranda's main street when Simon Roderick's TVL77D executive liaison helicopter whispered over the town. They were at all sorts of angles to each other, completely blocking the road for thirty meters on either side of the bar. There were obviously no traffic regulator nodes to guide anybody through Kuranda's streets. Thoroughly in keeping with the town's doughty throwback nature. He shook his head in bemusement at the chaos. Emergency service drivers could never resist the dramatic slam-halt arrival. Tough luck if one of the injured needed a paramedic crew urgently; the closest vehicles were all police. Paramedics clad in green boilersuits were maneuvering stretchers around awkward angles, sweaty faces straining from the effort.

"God, what a bunch of no-brainers," Adul Quan complained from the seat behind Simon. The Third Fleet intelligence operative had pressed his face against the helicopter's side window so he could view the town directly. He never liked utilizing sensor feeds through his direct neural interface, claiming the viewpoint switch made him giddy. "We should bid to manage the state's civil operations. At least offer them AS coordination, bring them into this century."

"We have the urban area franchise," Simon replied. "And all our people have some kind of medical monitor fitted in case there's a problem. We can retrieve them wherever they are. That's what matters."

"Good PR, though. Devoting resources to helping civilians."

"If they want our help they should take a stake in us, contribute and participate."

"Yes, sir."

Simon heard the skepticism in the other's voice and made no comment. To get where he was, Adul had built up a large stake in Z-B, but even that couldn't make him understand what true belonging meant. In truth, Simon thought, no one except himself did. That would change eventually.

Simon used his DNI to feed a series of commands to the autopilot, and the helicopter swung round over the little circular park at the top end of the main street. As he came back to the scrubland truck lot he'd identified as a landing zone, he saw that some kids had spray painted an open eye on the corrugated roof of a derelict shop. The fading green and blue symbol was big enough to stare up at all the strategic security division helicopters that zipped through the tropical skies above the town. Like a perfect portrait painting, its gaze followed Simon as the TVL77D extended its undercarriage and sank down on the baked-mud surface. Rotor downwash sent a flurry of crushed tins and junk-food wrappers tumbling away from them as the fuselage lost its gray sky-blur integument, reverting to ominous matte black.

He paused for a moment as the turbines wound down. His personal AS had extended trawlers to retrieve all the emergency service e-traffic within the local datapool. The relevant messages were relayed straight through his DNI. A display grid snapped up within his apparent field of vision, its indigo color, invisible to the human eye, ensuring it didn't obscure anything in his actual physical sight. But for all the torrent of information presented to him, he was still left lamentably short of hard facts. Nobody on the scene had yet established what had actually happened. So far they just had the one unconfirmed report of a suited Skin running amok.

His attention flicked to one of the medical grids. He called it up, and five high-resolution graphs expanded for him as he stepped from the helicopter cabin. The handheld blood analyzers that the paramedic teams were applying to the victims were establishing links to the Cairns General Hospital's databank, working through chemical profiles to identify the agent involved in the poisoning.

Simon put on a pair of old-fashioned wraparound sunglasses. "Interesting," he murmured. "Do you see this?" He had sent copies of the analyzer results to Z-B's bioweapons division AS, which gave him a positive match on the agent His DNI relayed the secure package to Adul.

"Skin toxin," Adul observed. "An updosed incapacitation shot." He shook his head in disapproval before unfolding his own sunshade membranes across his nose. "One definite fatality. And those two with allergic reactions are going to wind up with nerve damage."

"If they're lucky," Simon said. "And only if these paramedics get them to the hospital fast enough." He ran a hand over his brow, dabbing at a thin layer of perspiration that had already accumulated in the intense heat "Shall I have the antidote dispatched to the emergency room?"

"Incapacitation toxins don't need an antidote; they clear automatically. It's what they're designed for."

"That dosage level will put a hell of a strain on their kidneys, though."

Simon stopped and looked at Adul. "My dear fellow, we're here to investigate how and why it was used, not to act as nursemaid to a bunch of retarded civilians who are too slow to duck in the first place."

"Yes, sir."

It was that tone again. Simon thought he might soon be reconsidering Adul's usefulness as a security operative. In his business, empathy was a valuable trait, but when it veered into sympathy...

The pair of them threaded their way through the maze of emergency vehicles parked along the main street. The few clear passages were clogged by people: locals, sullen and silent, and a few tourists, frightened and excited. Around the bar's veranda, police officers in their shorts and crisp white shirts milled about trying to look as if they had a reason and purpose. Their chief, a tall captain in her mid-forties, wearing full navy blue uniform, stood beside the rail, listening to a young constable making his excitable report.

Simon's personal AS informed him the officer in charge was Captain Jane Finemore. A script page containing her service record expanded out of the grid. He scanned it briefly and dismissed it.

All the police fell silent as Simon and Adul made their way forward. The captain turned; there was a flash of contempt as she took in Adul's mauve Z-B fleet tunic; then her face went protectively blank as she saw Simon in his conservative business suit, jacket slung casually over his shoulder.

"Can I help you fellas?" she asked.

"I rather fear it's the other way round, Captain... ah, Finemore," Simon said, smiling as he made a show of reading her discreet lapel name badge. "We intercepted a report that indicates someone in a Skin suit was engaged in hostile action here."

She was about to answer when the bar's doors slammed open and a paramedic team carrying a stretcher hurried out. Simon flattened himself against the veranda railing, allowing them past. Various medical bracelets had been applied to the patient's neck and arms, small indicator lights winking urgently. He was unconscious, but twitching strongly.

"I haven't confirmed that yet," an irritated Captain Finemore said when the paramedics were clear.

"But that was the initial report," Simon said. "I'd like to establish its validity as a matter of urgency. If someone in Skin is running loose, he needs to be dealt with immediately, before the situation deteriorates any further."

"I am aware of that," Captain Finemore said. "I've put our Armed Tactical Response Team on standby."

"With all respect, Captain, I feel this would be best dealt with by a counter-insurgency squad from our own internal security division. A Skin suit would give the wearer an enormous advantage over your ATR team."

"Are you saying you don't think we can handle this?"

"I'm offering every facility to ensure that you do."

"Well, gee, thanks. I don't know what we would do without you."

Simon's smile remained in place as various police officers snickered around him. "If I could ask, where did that original report come from?"

Captain Finemore jerked her head toward the bar. "The waitress. She was hiding behind the bar when your man opened fire. None of the darts hit her."

"I'd like to talk to her, please."

"She's still in a lot of shock. I've got some specially trained officers talking to her."

Simon used his DNI to route a message through his personal AS. The captain wouldn't have a DNI herself— Queensland State Police budget didn't run to that—but he could see her irises had a purple tint; she was fitted with standard commercial optronic membranes for fast data access. "Did nobody else witness this man in a Skin suit? He would hardly be unobtrusive."

"No." The captain stiffened as the script scrolled down across her membranes. "There was just the one sighting." She was talking slowly now, measuring every word. "That's why I haven't ordered a general containment area around the town yet."

"Then finding out is your first priority. The longer
you
wait, the wider the containment area, and the less likely it will succeed."

"I've already got cars patrolling along the main road to Cairns, and officers are covering the skycable terminus and the train station."

"Excellent. May I sit in on the waitress's interview now?"

Captain Finemore stared at him.
His warning message had been very clear and backed by the state governor's office. But it had been private, enabling her to save face in front of her officers—unless she chose to make it public and destroy her career in a flare of glory. "Yeah, she'll probably be over the worst by now." Said as if she were granting a favor.

"Thank you. That's most kind." Simon pushed the bar's door open and went inside.

Over a dozen paramedics were in the bar, kneeling beside the toxin victims. Orders and queries were shouted among them. They rummaged desperately through their bags to try to find relevant counteragents; medical equipment was strewn about carelessly. Their optronic membranes were thick with script on possible treatments.

The victims shuddered and juddered, heels drumming on the floorboards. They sweated profusely, whimpering at painful nightmares. One was sealed in a black bodybag.

It was nothing Simon hadn't seen before during asset-realization campaigns. Usually on a much larger scale. A single Skin carried enough ammunition to stop an entire mob dead in the street. He stepped gingerly around the bodies, trying not to disturb the paramedics. Police officers and forensic crews were examining walls and tables, adding to the general melee.

The waitress was sitting up at the counter at the far end of the bar, one hand closed tightly round a tumbler of whiskey. She was a middle-aged woman with a fleshy face and permed hair in an out-of-date fashion. Not really seeing or hearing anything going on around her.

Clearly there wasn't a single viral-written chromosome in her DNA, Simon decided with considerable distaste. Given her background, the absence of such v-writing inevitably meant she had low intelligence, bad physiology and zero aspirations. She was one of life's perpetual underdogs.

A female police officer sat on a barstool beside the waitress, a sympathetic expression on her face. If she'd taken in any of her specialist training, Simon thought, the first thing she would have done was move the woman outside, away from the scene.

His AS was unable to find the waitress's name. Apparently, the bar didn't have any kind of accountancy and management programs. The AS couldn't even find a registered link to the datapool; all it had was a phone line.

Simon sat down on the empty barstool next to the waitress. "Hello there. How are you feeling now, er...?"

Weepy eyes focused on him. "Sharlene," she whispered.

"Sharlene. A nasty thing to happen to anyone." He smiled at the police officer. "I'd like to talk to Sharlene alone for a moment, please."

She gave him a resentful look, but got up and walked off. No doubt going to complain to Finemore.

Adul stood behind Sharlene, surveying the bar. People tended to take a wide detour around him.

"I need to know what happened," Simon said. "And I do need to know rather quickly. I'm sorry."

"Jesus," Sharlene shivered. "I just want to forget about it, y'know." She tried to lift the whiskey to her lips. Blinked in surprise when she found Simon's hand on top of hers, preventing the tumbler from moving off the countertop.