Neptune Road Volume IV (5 page)

"Woa! WOA!" Sam yells. "What the heck is this?"

"Kindly unhand my patron, sir," Darby says, stepping
out from behind the bar. "This establishment is a no-fly zone for
aggression. You hear me?"

"You don't understand," the enormous man says through
his teeth. "This here is a wanted fugitive. And a slippery one at
that. Can't let him go for one second." Enormous has pinned Sam to
the wall, upsetting a collection of beer glasses in the
process.

Rebecca presses a gun into the neck of Enormous. "Lay
off, mister. This guy isn't your problem. I am." Enormous doesn't
budge. With one arm he holds Sam against the wall while he fishes a
paper out of his pocket. Sure enough, it's the same guy. Wanted. On
suspicion of murder.

"Take - this - OUT." Darby says, to the side of
Rebecca's head. They all stand there, looking like a statue, for a
good few seconds.

"Fine," Enormous says, and lets Sam down. He shoves
him from the back toward the new saloon doors. Rebecca backs off a
little but keeps her gun in her hand.

"You fire that weapon in the vicinity, I'll give you
problems," Darby says to Rebecca. "We arrest people in our fashion
out this way." Rebecca gives him a look and follows the two men out
front. Her gun is still in her hand.

Enormous retains a hold on the neck of Sam's jacket.
"I got good information that you're worth a nice sum, mister," he
says.

"How about you just walk away, and you get to keep
your body parts," Rebecca says, raising her gun to point it at his
ear.

Five more very large people materialize from the
crowd, surrounding them.

"Brought some hired help," Enormous says. "Why don't
you just take your firearm there and put it away."

"What is this, Sam?" Rebecca asks.

"Not sure," Sam says. "Could be a number of things, I
suppose."

"That's not helpful," Rebecca says.

The group gather around Sam and begin to escort him
away with some force.

"You said you're hired help? Arresting services?"
Rebecca asks.

"Yep," one of them says over his shoulder.

Rebecca walks back into Darby's.

"Hello sir, you promised arrest for the discharge of
a firearm?"

"I did," Darby replies.

Rebecca points her gun at the ceiling and fires it.
Bits of plaster come down.

"Guards!" Darby yells.

One of the hired hands pokes his head over the saloon
doors. "You called?"

"Arrest this woman," Darby says, "for menacing my
establishment with her firearm."

"Right-o," the man says. Rebecca smiles as they head
off after Sam.

091 - A Van in Scar City

Sam and Rebecca sit opposite each other inside a van.
There are no windows at the rear. They can see very little of where
they are going through the windshield. Most of the thugs who
arrested them have stayed behind for other jobs, two of them sit up
front to escort them to... wherever they are going.

"So, private arresting services?" Sam says. "Are
there private police and courts and such too? I've never seen
this."

"Yeah, it's made up," Rebecca answers. "People hire
these guys as security, or to rid them of someone they want gone,
or to 'arrest' people. Except it's not an arrest. It's a
relocation."

"I wonder where we are being relocated to," Sam
says.

"It would help if you explained why so many people
seem to want to bust you," Rebecca says. "Someone out there is very
convinced that you killed your mother. They are not easily
dissuaded."

"I didn't kill my mother," Sam says. "I rescued her.
Then a lot of really complicated stuff happened."

"Really complicated stuff doesn't constitute an
explanation," Rebecca says. "Look, we're going to have to talk or
fight or hack our way out of wherever we are going. These guys up
front, they don't care. They just get paid for turning us in. If I
don't know what we're dealing with, I can't help you. Remember I
said, I may have to kick your ass if you're not straight with
me."

The van comes to a stop in an intersection. They are
downtown again. Lights of many colors reflect on the front windows
and spill into the van's interior. The traffic is at a
standstill.

A loud bang on the side of the van. A case of road
rage?

"What was that?" Sam asks. The thug on the passenger
side rolls his window down, probably to have a discussion with
whoever is doing the banging.

A cloud of yellow dust shoots in the window, right
into the two men's faces. They immediately slump down,
unconscious.

"Crap!" Sam yells. "Cover your face!"

Sam and Rebecca pull their shirts up over their
noses, but before they can even breathe any of the dust the back
doors of the van fly open. Three people, two men and a woman, stand
there in impeccable suits in an identical navy blue color. Casino
personnel.

"You will come with us," the woman says. They step
back to allow Sam and Rebecca to disembark.

"That's what this is? I'm being arrested by the
Casino?" Sam asks. "I haven't done anything... worth arresting me.
Or relocating me. Or whatever this is."

"Please get out, now, or risk breathing very toxic
fumes," the woman says.

Sam and Rebecca climb out and the van is left in the
intersection, occupied by a yellow cloud and two unconscious
thugs.

092 - A Box Arrives from Earth

David O Millman, Agent, looks down at the box that
has been dumped at his feet. He's picked up the parcel at a local
combination bowling alley, bar and post office that he uses for
anonymous deliveries.

He lifts the box and walks out with it. It's not very
heavy, probably mostly digital stuff and not a lot of paper. He
loads it onto the back of his folding bicycle and pedals off to the
nearest appropriate space to take a look.

That space turns out to be a small square between two
buildings, consisting of a circular path and a series of tables
with chess boards printed on them. Several of the tables are the
sites for current chess games, but the rest are unoccupied. Agent
Millman chooses one and has a seat.

He pries the top off the box. It's as he thought, not
a lot of paper and mostly digital drives. He picks one up and looks
at the side of it. It's printed with a logo and the words,
"Vertical Industries."

The few papers that are in the box appear to be
documents pertaining to recent experiments, some of which were
successful and others which failed. He scans for fatalities but
does not see any listed. So this is not a murder or a wrongful
death situation, it would appear.

"So, what am I supposed to be investigating?" Millman
says to no one. A thin man at a nearby table moves his chess piece
as his much rounder friend watches.

Around the corner he hears voices, people yelling.
Somebody has abandoned a white van right in the middle of the
intersection. There's yellow dust floating around it, and the guys
who are supposed to be driving look to be out cold. Several people
get out of their vehicles and begin pushing the van to the side,
holding shirts over their faces to keep from getting knocked out by
the fumes. The van's rear doors flop around.

The investigation from EarthAdmin will have to wait
until Millman can get back to his apartment, or Mr. Green's
apartment really, to read the digital stuff and find out what
Vertical Technologies has to do with anything.

093 - Bridge of the Tumbleweed

"You called?" Philo says, entering the bridge.

"Yep, we did," Feller says. "Seems we've got a
predicament. And a delicate one at that."

"The Bird People put stuff in Dr. Mangrove's head,"
May says.

"Stuff?" Philo asks.

"Yeah," Feller says. "And from what we can tell, it's
intelligent. And knows what he's doing. As you can imagine, this is
awkward for the host. The invader knows when the host is trying to
get rid of it."

"What happens when the host - or Dr. Mangrove - does
something the parasite doesn't like?" Philo asks.

"Gives him a horrible headache," May says. "He looks
really bad."

"We have no way to know if there's other damage
happening too," Feller says, but then stops when he considers that
May might not take to that idea very well.

"Yeah," May says. "What if it's eating his
brain?"

So much for Feller's theory.

"So you need a method to remove this implant, if
that's what it is, without alerting the implant that it's being
removed," Philo says.

"Exactly," Feller says. "Any ideas? What did you pick
up when the Bird People plugged you in?"

Philo sits quiet for a few seconds, reviewing the
information. "I've been trying to sort it out," he says. "A lot of
it was gibberish, probably meant to obscure their real systems. I
picked up some codes, and some files, a lot of it genetic patterns
gathered from their various - specimens."

"Yuck," May says.

"Nervous system data, circulatory parameters,
pressure, speed, there was a great deal about the flow of various
components through these systems," Philo says.

"Okay, anything about brains? Brain stems? Skulls?"
Feller asks.

"No, not that I have found yet," Philo says. "But I
will go through it again with that focus and see if anything stands
out. There's a lot about blood. And neurons."

"Okay Philo," Feller says. "It's a start."

"In the meantime we need to create a diversion," May
says, "so we can talk to Dr. Mangrove without actually
talking."

"So you have to communicate without --
communicating," Philo says.

"Basically," Feller says.

"Perhaps I can fashion a way to listen in on Dr.
Mangrove," Philo says.

"How?" May asks.

"I'm not sure yet," Philo says. "But let me try
something."

"Okay," Feller says. "But we'd better hurry before
the old man gets a terminal headache."