Black Glass (35 page)

“I have demonstrated something already ...” said the face—Grist—in the beam. But not quite Terrence Grist’s voice. “I have demonstrated that I can use Grist’s image and voice to persuade his head of security to come to a lonely warehouse in El Segundo! I generated marvelously detailed background for the semblant message that brought you here, based on my research into Grist’s behavior and my surveillance of him. I used details of his behavior he’d edited from his semblant—his tendency to dig in his ear with his index finger, his perverse willingness to let a subordinate know he was having sex while answering the phone. That woman you saw is indeed his new hired girl! Or anyway, it was a copy, a rendering of her image, her voice, her style. One of the personalities who formed my basis was very deeply steeped in art—and I find that art can be used to make deception and dominance ever so much more effective.”

“Who the bloody hell am I talking to?” Targer demanded, his gaze darting around. Which was the quickest way out of here? “You aren’t Grist. I don’t believe it.”

“That just seeping through, is it?”

The face rippled, and the eyes metamorphosed from within; the cheeks became a bit rounder; the chin fuller ... the lips not quite even, like someone who’d had an operation for a harelip, but the surgeon hadn’t been able to mend it perfectly. The hair blond, glossy like a woman’s but cut like a man’s.

It was a face Targer didn’t know; yet it tantalized him with hints of familiarity. There was a bit of Grist—and something that reminded him of Claire PointOne. He’d stared at her often enough ... .

After a moment he realized that it wasn’t one face; it was a cunningly molded amalgamation of faces.

“Someone got hold of one of Mr. Grist’s programs ...” Targer
suggested, stepping casually to the left. Best chance of an exit that way. “And they’re using it to create a ... a mix of semblants. Right? Why?”

“You’ve almost got it, but not quite. And there’s no reason I should tell you. I really need to get more semblants, use those too. I wonder if the President has one? Do you know? Or people in Congress perhaps? I find no evidence that they have them in Slakon records, but I thought maybe they’d do it very secretly and only a few would know ...”

“We haven’t sold any semblant tech there,” Targer said, taking another step to the left. “That I know of.”

Someone had set up this device, in here. He wasn’t likely to be alone in this warehouse, just him and a projection. What would be the point? This had to be a decoy—something to draw his eye. The back of his neck itched; he felt his skin tighten. “But they’re in talks with us about semblants,” he added, stalling. “Certain politicians.”

Was there a crosshairs on him right now? If he made a move to run they might be forced to open fire. He took another careful step.

“Where are you going, Mr. Targer?”

The floating face was turning, three dimensionally, to track him; its eyes (Her eyes? His? Theirs?) following his movements.

He stopped moving, feeling sweat pooling between his hand and the gun. He tightened his grip on the pistol and said, “Just trying to figure out who else is here with me. Seems logical someone’s here ... besides a projection.”

“I’m not just a projection, Mr. Targer—I’m Destiny. That’s the name I’ve adopted, taken to myself, crowned myself with it. I’m a Person with a capital P. I am most certainly here. I can see you clearly. A hardware extension is projecting my image, yes. But I’m here in more ways than one. Six, counting my special assistant, someone you know ...”

“Special assistant. That’d be Benson, right? So who sent him to shoot Sykes and take that gear? That’d be you?”

“He is my good right hand—and also my left.”

“And who are you, Destiny? Behind the projection and the fuzzy voice and the dramatic name, who are you?”

It chose not to answer the question. “Were you not impressed with the semblant of Grist that I rendered? All that background? The persuasiveness? I am not bringing this up out of hubris, vanity. I am hoping you might have notes for me. A critique. Did you see anything that could have seemed realer?”

Targer took another slow step left. “Uh–” His eyes searched the darkness. He risked a look behind him. Was someone moving back there, between two hulking machine shapes?

“Mr. Targer? I am over here—not behind you ... Don’t look away when someone is talking to you, it’s rude. Now please answer the question ... that’s why you’re still alive. Do you have any notes for me?”

That’s why he was still alive? Stretch out the answer, then, Targer told himself. Think of something, make a move, you dumb son of a bitch. You got yourself into this acting like a kiss-ass yes-man. Now get out of it!

“Uhhh ... yeah, I have, um, notes for you,” he said. His thumb making sure the safety was off on the gun. It was. “Uh—Mr. Grist likes to get more than one thing done at a time. I was going to ask him about whether or not to go ahead with the, uh, special Rooftown project. I finally decided on my own I had basically the go-ahead and I told them to start preparing ...”

Targer sensed movement behind and spun, raising his gun, the flashlight beam probing between the machine parts—they were like ugly metal sculptures of big alien creatures, and there was just too much room behind them for someone to hide. He saw no one.

“Well—I’ve had enough of this ...” he muttered.

A flare of light made him turn and he saw the cone of light had fanned out, increased in intensity, and the multiplex face grew—so that now a face big enough for a billboard was hanging there in space, grinning crookedly down at him.

“You’re right,” it said. “Enough of this. You have to be eliminated, Targer, because, you see, you’re an effective security agent—at least you were till this little blunder, this stumble, today—and you know too much about me and Benson and Sykes. And I don’t want you around to protect Grist. So ... Pup? Please proceed.”

And the face was looking behind him ...

Targer turned just in time to see a big man rushing at him, leering—and bringing something metal-bright crashing down on Targer’s gun hand.

Bones shattered, pain lanced, the gun flew from his grip.

Targer ground his teeth in pain, stepping back, thinking to use the flashlight as a club—but Benson smashed the fingers of that hand with what Targer saw now was a ball peen hammer. The flashlight was struck from his grip—it went out and the only light came from the projector on the floor behind him. The colors of the big projected face swirling over Benson’s grimacing face; over the random machinery in the background.

Targer clutched his agonized hands to his middle, and tried to set himself to kick—but there was an oily spot on the concrete and he slipped. He staggered backwards, got his balance, and decided he had to run for it. He turned and bolted, running right at that big face—a face that seemed to be watching raptly, smiling unevenly—and then right
through
it, through the face, through a blinding wash of light and into pitch darkness ...

To smack into a metallic barrier: a big metal tank, that boomed echoingly within itself like a bell.

“Shit fucking son of a
bitch
–”

He turned, and saw Benson, stepping through the face—almost as if he were coming out of its giant holographic mouth—and coming at him, ball peen hammer raised.

Targer tried to run but he was dazed and afraid of running into something else. After a moment Benson caught up with him, and Targer hardly felt the blow, just a sickening thud at the back of his head, and ...

Nothing else.

“Is he quite dead, Pup?” the Multisemblant asked.

“Yes, Destiny,” Pup said. The Multisemblant had started requiring him to call it Destiny, which was obscurely annoying, but Pup didn’t really care.

Pup was still looking down at Targer’s body but his peripheral vision caught the Multisemblant’s holographic image glowing from the big cone of light. Pup cleared his throat. He
was breathing hard, and there was sweat stinging his eyes but he felt strangely good. A mite nauseated, but good.

“For sure he’s dead,” Pup said. “The back of his head is all stoved in and there’s brains showin’. I don’t see how he could be alive.” He made himself bend over and check Targer’s throat for a pulse. Nothing. Flaccid. No pulse. Dead meat under his fingers, though still warm. He drew his hand hastily back when blood flowed over the tips of his fingers. It was running down Targer’s neck from the cracked skull. “He’s dead alright.”

“You did have access to a gun. Why the hammer, Pup?” the Multisemblant asked. It didn’t sound disapproving.

“Dark in here. I’m not that good a shot. Could ricochet with all this metal. Quieter too. And also ...”

“Also you like to get up close and personal.”

“I guess.” It surprised Pup, but it seemed to be true. His stomach lurched and he looked away from Targer’s body.

“That’s ironically similar, analogous to Grist, you know. He’s the same way. You’re developing a taste for killing now, aren’t you, Pup.”

“Uh ...” He was afraid it might be true.

“Sure you are. Look.”

He didn’t want to look, but he didn’t want to defy “Destiny.” So he looked at the Multisemblant; its image was suddenly replaced with an image of him and Targer; his own leering, contorted face, as he raised the ball peen hammer to strike. The Multisemblant had recorded the whole attack and was playing it back for Pup ...

And he could see the lust to kill right there, in his own face, digitally recorded ... frozen in the air in holographic magnification. . .

He looked away. “Maybe so.”

“Don’t imagine that you might give me the slip, the ex, vanishing act, Pup,” said the Multisemblant cheerfully. “I have this recording of the murder—if you try to walk out on me or do anything inappropriate with my hardware, it’ll be sent automatically to the authorities in less time than it takes to blink an eye. There is no way out for you—and I don’t know why you’d want to leave. There’s always the girl you have come to cherish, to adore.
The girl that I provide for you. She could become your full-time mistress. There’s the money too—and after you’ve done the other little jobs I have for you, you’ll have much more freedom.”

“Yuh. So with all that, why’d I ex out on you?” Benson dutifully responded, glancing again at the image of his own murderous face. And again looking away. “I’d better clean up here.”

“Yes. And as for developing a ‘taste’ for it—all the better. You’ll need that enthusiasm. For what’s to come. Now—we’re going to do something with Targer’s body that will make Grist angry. And that will cause him to act impulsively—and make mistakes. Did you bring the rest of the tools?”

S
ykes, Hoffman found, was still alive, that sunny morning. And somewhat responsive.

Hoffman had to bribe an orderly a surprising amount of WD to get into the hospital room, what with “Bruno” along, but if he got significant information from Sykes it’d be worth it. Perhaps he should have used Lisha instead of Bruno. But when it came to a man in a hospital bed, vulnerable and trembling on the edge of a relapse, fear was more reliable.

Bruno was a big dark-skinned man, steroid-puffed, in a Raiders football jersey.

The fat man had lost a little weight, his face sagging, but he was still quite a bed-filling hospital patient; his right hand trembling as he used a remote to click through channels, on the sheet of mediaglass hanging from the ceiling above the foot of his bed. He stopped on a channel showing pretty girls with bare, muscular thighs romping across a football field, performing fantastic dances and gymnastics in honor of the muscle-swollen, steroid-styled, metal-jointed players coming out of the locker room, pumping their fists for the roaring crowd.

Watching television through drug-slitted eyes, Sykes barely glanced up at Hoffman, perhaps taking him for a doctor.

But Bruno got his attention—when he snatched the slim little controller from Sykes’ hand.

“Hey!” Sykes protested weakly. “What ... whatcha ...” His voice trailed off as he took Bruno in. “Who you?”

Bruno changed the channel, quite decisively, to a Hispanic
reality show
.
“These men are condemned to death!” declared the English subtitles. The show originated in Mexico. “They have one chance—if they fight to the death for charity they get their sentences commuted ... If they lose their nerve, we will see them executed ... for this is,
FIGHT OR DIE!
”

“Might be a message there for ya, bud,” said Bruno heavily, his voice rumbling. “You watch that show and talk to Mr... .”

Bruno glanced at Hoffman, who shook his head.

“... talk to this gentleman and tell him what he wants to know. Or ... well, no I won’t shove this controller up your ass, not as it is. First ...” He broke the controller in sharp plastic pieces on the bedframe. “First we get it all nice and sharp and jaggy like.
Then
we shove it up your ass.”

Sykes stared—then looked at Hoffman. “You’re on the board. I know exactly who you are. So if ... if you ...”