The Legend of Ivan (10 page)

The only equivalent device I had to his impressive array of hardware was the processing and intrusion pieces intrinsic to our brains. His indelicate pings suggested he didn't know much about finesse in that department, so I took my only chance.

His beam was charged again, but his hands clapped to the sides of his head. My program succeeded, opening a port in his own firewall and transmitting a connection to the nearest open wireless terminal. His consciousness was cast into a random pool of information.

Cain's head dropped to his chin, appearing as though he'd merely fallen asleep as he fell to the deck with a heavy clang. I cursed as small, deliberate pings suggested he only established a connection to a restaurant's transaction terminal in the bazaar.

I took off at a run, moving past the downed body. I considered my options for one tiny moment. An eternity of calculation, anger, and regret blazed through my thoughts before I fled, palming the hatchway to Minerva.

There was no chance. I believed I could exact some severe injury, tearing off his organic lower jaw being about the most heinous. However, there was no further incapacitation or life-ending method capable of succeeding before he recovered and blasted me apart at point blank range.

I could have bashed his shining skull against the decks for a month without breaking through. I could have tried to peel away the metallic plates which protected his functioning organs, but that too would take time and analysis. Hitting arteries, nerve clusters, even the most basic methods of dirty fighting were protected against.

No wonder Cain had killed so many Archivists. He was well-armed and defended. Nothing I had in my own arsenal could compete, so I had to run.

I strapped myself into the cockpit and rushed through pre-flight checks as I was cleared by the station to depart.

Even as Minerva slid out of the stall, I became gripped by the wild urge to fire her main guns. My desire to vaporize as much of Cain and the surrounding deck as I could, perhaps preserving his head and brain tissue, was startling to me, but desperate caution overrode. I liked Dei Lucrii XVII. Security might overlook an Archivist fight and perhaps even the gruesome victory it could bring, but opening fire with ship weaponry inside of a docking bay might sour my image in their eyes.

"Damn," I whispered as my vessel soared away from Dei Lucrii XVII, barely ninety minutes after my arrival. Being followed, hunted even, and I now was not the only one dredging for Ivan information.

At least I knew where to travel next.

Archivist Sid

Assignment:

Seeking information regarding the truth and whereabouts of Ivan.

Location:

Dei Lucrii XVII

Report:

Utilized local datalink to gain information on possible contacts [Traverian Grey, Voux Hanatar].

Probability
:

N/A

Summary:

Stopover on Dei Lucrii short but useful. Discovered possible connection to both Ivan and Traverian Grey in Voux Hanatar. Currently imprisoned; may have information on Grey whereabouts as well as info on long-standing Ivan rumor [Caused Hanatar downfall].

*Addendum: Met Archivist Cain, barely escaped. Need defensive hardware upgrade ASAP, as he is tracking me and will not likely cease.

Chapter 5: How to Dismantle a Massive Criminal Organization

Voux Hanatar had influences upon seventeen major worlds near the core and dozens outside of it. His syndicate spread across thousands of light years and dealt in the black market, slave trade, addictive substances, and anything else of high profit and questionable legality.

The man was famous. He had a dozen homes and many hidden bases of operation, the organization holding no massive presence in any one place. It was compartmentalized. Any number of his underlings could fall without compromising his own position. The few times any circumstantial evidence warranted an arrest, Voux Hanatar complied without resistance. The witnesses, prosecutors, judges, bailiffs, or anyone associated with the case invariably disappeared, and the charges had always been dropped.

In a galaxy full of corruption, it was not difficult to make someone disappear, even someone well-guarded and protected. With the exception of the more righteous brand of civil servants and the hundreds of grieving widows left behind by his business dealings, few had truly wanted Voux Hanatar out of the picture anyway. Indeed, the rumor was that his biggest clients were corporation-based.

He was smart, and he was nigh untouchable.

Until one day when Hanatar was discovered unconscious in a pool of a victim's blood, the murder weapon still clutched in his fingers as the dead man lay slumped on the sofa. This was in his own home, and suddenly no one wanted anything further to do with him.

Minerva slid into a port upon Gretia, the world of Voux Hanatar's primary residence. It was a simple, average planet with no direct corporate ownership or strong original nationality. Indeed nothing really of note, aside from considerable amounts of food production, but they did that quite well at least.

Voux Hanatar's estate, containing a very large, luxurious home and many acres of land, was located outside of the small city of Viera.

Before his arrest, he had been under constant observation by the Galactic Security Agency, the main policing force for the dwindling Galactic Central Government. Even with their monitoring, the first officer at Hanatar's home on the night of the incident was one local Sheriff Declan Donnely, who received an anonymous tip. In spite of a fierce jurisdictional battle with the quite embarrassed GSA, who hadn't the slightest clue that murder occurred during their surveillance, Declan Donnely was recorded by history as the man who took down Hanatar. Even the first round of the trial was held in a court on Gretia.

I wanted to know the truth behind what happened the night of the arrest as preparation for my intended meeting with the famous criminal, so I traveled first to the former home world of the former crime lord.

As a stark contrast to Ethra's high-towering cityscape stretching everywhere conceivable, Gretia remained a more agricultural world with spread out, smaller cities. Its wealth level featured an average to low gradient, but a few of the fancier gadgets from the core could be seen. People on worlds like these, indeed in many places of the galaxy not receiving immediate and constant technology upgrades, live in what seems to me like the somewhat distant past.

In spite of hundreds and thousands of years of progress and galactic expansion, wondrous technology has not produced the enlightened era envisioned by those early industrial primitives. In reality, not much has changed: people live, die, work, and go about their business, most of the time staying on one continent of one world. Even with ease and speed of travel, only about twenty-five percent of galactic population will actually travel to another planet in their lifetimes.

Unless a particular world finds a niche in the galactic market or can fulfill some role, its economy doesn't too often extend beyond its own borders and perhaps nearby systems.

Even police stations, from the archived photographs I've seen, were not much different than the one I entered. Offices, rows of desks, conference rooms, and holding cells were largely the same. Standard equipment has improved somewhat, but the facilities served the purpose well enough before, so no changes were truly necessary. Policing itself remains a task won or lost by the individual officer's aptitude and intelligence.

People of various shapes and sizes moved about, working, and many eyes were upon me as I traveled through the station. I walked into Declan Donnely's office, five minutes early for my meeting. Though commendations decorated the walls, it seemed the sheriff had done little with his fame other than to easily win the subsequent elections to his posting.

"You Sid?" the graying-haired, overweight individual asked. He was seated at a desk, peering into a terminal screen. Scans with my synthetic eye detected nothing besides an ordinary, God-born, flesh and blood human.

He stared at me, suspicion clear in his expression as he sized me up. His gaze lingered at my metallic hand, which lay upon the desk.

"So Mr. Sid-" he started.

"No mister," I interrupted. "Sid. Or, Archivist if you prefer."

He nodded. "Archivist... right." Donnely leaned back in the chair, rubbing his mustache before folding his arms. "You know, I've never actually seen an Archivist before. Never believed they existed."

I sighed inwardly. He appeared hesitant, unwilling to speak overmuch. "Does this pose a problem for you?"

Donnely rubbed his chin. "Not really, but I've got no obligation to speak to you at all, much less about a case from, what, fifteen years ago?"

"Seventeen, but what you might have to offer me isn't a matter of planetary security, and I do believe local laws have a freedom of information policy." I said this as politely as I could.

"Hmmm... but that applies to criminal records and court transcripts, not arrest reports."

Irritation rising, I responded, "Yes, but evidence records would also be a part of that, including your testimony on the matter."

The sheriff shrugged. "Well, I suppose you don't really need any of my help then, do you? The records office is on the other side of town. I can give you directions, if you like."

Frustrated, I closed my eyes, touching fingertips to the side of my head.

"Look, son," Donnely leaned forward in his seat, folding his hands on the desk. I tried not to bristle at the condescension. "I can see you've got your fancy limbs and eyeball there, but you've gotta give me some decent reason as to why you're asking about the Hanatar case. As far as I'm concerned, it's long since closed. His property's been split up and sold off, and there's ain't been a mention of that piece a' shit in five years now. So tell me," he raised an eyebrow, "why are you here? Are you working for him? Is he shootin' for another appeal?"

Unable to help myself, I laughed and shook my head. "I'm not here representing Hanatar. Besides, an appeal wouldn't help very much considering the extra hundred years added to his sentence from escape attempts, am I correct?"

"Afanasi Sergeyevich Lukyanov." I didn't bother mentioning his more well-known title as of yet, "and Traverian Grey."

He gave a blank stare. "Never heard of them."

With a thin smile, I replied, "It's possible you have and aren't aware of it. If you'll answer my questions, I'll be on my way."

"What do these folks have to do with Hanatar?" Sheriff Donnely persisted.

"All I wish to know is what happened the night you made the arrest, and that includes the anonymous tip."

The sheriff drew in a deep breath and blew it out slowly, staring at me with his arms folded. "There's not much to tell other than what's in the report."

"I haven't seen the report. I'd rather hear it from you."

He repeated, "There's not much to tell. I got an anonymous phone call saying someone had been killed at the Hanatar estate."

"Who called?" I asked.

Raising an eyebrow, he said, "Son, do you understand what the word 'anonymous' means?"

I rolled my eyes. "Yes, what I meant was: did you get any information about who it was, where they called from, or anything else?"

The sheriff blew out another breath. "Oh, let's see... male, deep voice." He paused, thinking. "Thick accent of some kind. A fella I picked up for drunk and disorderly, a tourist a couple years ago, made me think of that call. He said he was from... New Kharkov, some colonized moon or some such, I think."

If the sheriff's memory was correct, this was good evidence. New Kharkov was indeed a world settled by the descendents of Old Earth eastern-Europeans. The speech patterns could match, in theory.

I asked him, "Have you ever heard any mention of a man named Lukyanov, called Ivan by some, as being affiliated with Hanatar?"

"Excuse me, son. Did you say Ivan?"

"Yes, I did."

Clenching his teeth, the sheriff scowled. "I shoulda known... Goddamn people can't give good officers credit for their hard work." He pounded his desk. "They gotta invent some kind of superhero because obviously we couldn't have handled something as big as Hanatar."

"Listen, sir, I meant no offense." I held up my hands in a surrendering gesture. "My task is finding the reality, the truth behind the myth, and there's a lot of people who believe Ivan had something to do with it."

Sheriff Donnely glared at me in silence.

"Ivan is supposedly of eastern-European descent; that's the accent you heard. It means he might have been involved in a set-up to-"

The sheriff pounded a fist on the desk, shouting, "Hanatar killed that man! The evidence was there, and he was found
guilty
by a jury of his peers!"

"Set-up as in getting caught in the act, not as in framing." I tried to reassure him. "I'm not questioning your work, Sheriff. Hanatar went down, and the success of the police-work speaks for itself." I paused. "You
did
think there was something else to it, didn't you?"