The Scarab (22 page)

“But then you won’t close in time,”
Nigel complained.

I smiled. “I’ll get him. He just
won’t see it coming.”

About two minutes from the
deadline, I said, “On the interface, select a very brief pulse to blind them to
satellite for a short time. Hit Exotech with it, then close.” At sixty seconds
to the deadline, she zapped them with a type three satellite burst.

As soon as they went satellite
blind, I sent a broadcast message that included all players and the media.
Exotech was the only team that couldn’t hear my gloating. “The X-ray Powderpuff
can’t see and be invisible at the same time. This is a serious flaw as you will
observe.”

Over the Andiron link, I spoke the
single word, “Brake.”

The Andiron Express was built to
semi-trailer specifications, with a sturdy under-tow bar welded to the back
end. I’m told the main use was to prevent damage to loading docks. As soon as
the Andiron Express slowed, the Exotech vehicle impacted on the iron bar, and
its plastic front end crumpled completely. The X-ray spun out of control,
slowing to a dead stop as the road abraded away most of their grid.

“Target on radar,” I announced to
the group in the room. We would close the remaining distance in under thirty
seconds. “Slow to combat speed. Arm the turret gun. Once you’ve scored your
first hit, use the set-it-and-forget-it button. He’s a stationary target and
our onboard computer will have no trouble keeping him centered in our sights automatically.”

The safety features of his vehicle
had spared the Exotech pilot’s life, but Frodo didn’t have much left to fly. “He’s
putting up active ECM. At this range, he’s over-amping our filters. We can’t
take this long.”

“Open wide. Dr. Hayes has some
medicine for you,” I muttered, sending them a special file by mail. “In range
now. Strafe them with the paint balls first. Use them all.”

Soon, they were blinded by blue
paint splotches and couldn’t see to aim whatever weapons they might have left.
The ECM shut down when we shattered their fragile broadcast array. “I’m taking
fire control.” I switched to live ammo at pointblank range. “Initiating the
lead fire hose,” I told them, hitting the function key that I had been waiting
months to try. Hundreds of computer-targeted rounds sprayed the two meter arc
as we passed. Loud sound effects burst from the Sansui. I laughed with evil
glee as we knocked the Exotech craft over with the force of the fifty caliber
shells. We were now almost out of ammunition for the main gun, but this had
been worth it. Under our torrent of machine gun fire, the stealth craft melted
away like a snowman drug through a car wash. I was recording this in slow
motion so I could show it in the theaters downstairs later. The CD player blared
“Another One Bites the Dust” on cue, but I kept the fire hose on till a tiny
mushroom cloud appeared on the overhead display. He left a nasty hole in the
asphalt, too. “The quarterback is toast!” I shouted.

Once I switched off the guns, Mare
accelerated past the Andiron Express. She credited him for half of our fuel
profits, as per our deal. Meanwhile, I watched Charon activate and drain what
little remained of the Exotech craft’s soul. I used the judge’s interface to
scan the Exotech’s mail queue. He hadn’t read my final message. Blast. What
kind of rude bugger doesn’t read his own kiss-off message? Angry, I used the
judge’s interface to open the message. It seemed to take forever, but
eventually, the rattler file was added to the very end of the input stream
being sent over the telephone lines to Kali.

As soon as we were sure the Andiron
Express wouldn’t attack us from behind, Mare disconnected the Pensatronics
device and recycled the spare batteries, decreasing our payload by another twelve
kilograms. The Exotech death registered on the score board two minutes before
the leg ended, skipping us ahead a full slot in the rankings. Even if Kali hadn’t
been nailed by the Feds by now, her disk drives were certainly destroyed.
Everything was perfect. I told Mare to put Ghedra on autopilot, and we did a
victory dance.

“Do not pass Go, do not collect
$200!” shouted Steve. “He’s out of there!”

Suddenly, I knew what Kali had been
after all along.

As the session ended, the airwaves were awash with the
historic Berlin Wall, retrospectives on the Cold War, and a few spy movies.
Josie explained that the charity event in the hotel banquet hall would warm up
with prepared statements by SimCon Consortium speakers for the first fifteen or
twenty minutes. Then, we would make our entrances. Once all the finalist teams
were seated, dinner would begin. If we were lucky, we’d be out of there in half
an hour. We could even use the extra fifteen minutes at the end to shoot the
photos for Car and Driver.

I took Foxworthy aside and told
him, “Nigel, I have a secret mission for you. I need you to contact the team
lead for Exotech. Ask them for the tapes they made of our suite between 12:30
and 1:30 yesterday afternoon. Can you get your friends to drop the Senate
probe?”

He shrugged. “It’s possible.
Exotech will have to plead no-contest to the charges, but the committee will
have a lot of leeway in determining the fine.”

“Good. Offer them that and some of
the credit for slipping the grave robbers a disk virus. Suggest immunity on the
eavesdropping if they hand over the tape for evidence in the murder case. Kali
admitted to the killing to me on tape.”

Nigel took a moment to overcome the
shock. “What if they deny everything?”

“I trust your judgment. Offer them
anything you want except my slow-motion recording of the kill. That made the
whole convention worthwhile,” I said evilly. “I just have one restriction. Tell
them the offer is only good till I take my first bite of dinner. I could find
several amusing ways to embarrass them further, but I’d rather extend the olive
branch. Go! You only have another twenty minutes. Meet us in the banquet hall
if you get it,” I told him.

I pulled Mare and Whitaker into the
kitchen to confide my revelation about Kali. “It’s so obvious,” I bragged. “You
can name that conspiracy by answering two questions.

“First, what was Charon the boatman
interested in?” I asked.

Whitaker had the answer “The money.
He wouldn’t let the dead into the underworld without it. That’s why the Greeks
always put coins on the eyes.”

“Correct. Her program is after the
money. Second, what other way is there to end the race other than dying?”

Mare handled this one. “Finish,
like the Tasmanian Tornado is going to do in another hour.”

I made a magician’s gesture.

“The prize money is electronically
transferred directly to the winner’s bank account!” she guessed. “If Charon can
steal data files while the main program isn’t looking, it can empty the SimCon
bank account during the first window. Twenty five million. That’s got to be it.”

Whitaker nodded. “But how do we
stop her? Those judges are really up tight about anyone touching their sacred
program.”

“We don’t have to. The Consortium
has a form to request payment by check instead of electronic disbursement. If everyone
fills one out, she’ll have nothing to steal. However, the Feds can use the
window to trace her bank accounts from the inside. You’ll have enough evidence
to hang her by sundown,” I said confidently.

Whitaker left to begin the sting
operation. I would send Steve to get enough copies of the form for everyone. He
would turn ours in and give copies to LAS, HEO, North Ameri-Car, and Porsche
before the press conference. I would handle BW and Muramatsu, teams that had
not been our closest allies.

Steve was glued to the TVs when I
asked him to run the errand. “Why me?” he asked. The announcer from ESPN was
stressing that this was the first time that dead teams had a chance for prize
money. Depending on how well the survivors did, several companies already out
of the action could win big.

“Mary Ann is going to need the time
to slip into her Cleopatra outfit, and she’ll need Josie to do her hair,” I
lied. The real reason was that I didn’t want his feelings trampled if the next
phase didn’t work out. I didn’t want to accuse his new girlfriend of being a
spy in front of him. However my plan worked out, I didn’t want him to blame me
for the heartache. “I need to print off some schematics, and I already sent
Nigel away. It would mean a lot to me if you could swing this. We’ll be able to
tell you more after the arrest.”

The hint about the arrest pushed
him over the edge; he wanted to help his sister get ahead. “Sure. I’m not here
to be a couch potato.” He grabbed a black bag with a red cross on it.

“What do you have in there?” I
asked him.

“The usual first aid gear,
bandages, and coagulants. I had the Feds get it for me. With you around, I’ve
got to be prepared. Just tell me one thing. Why do we have to go to a costume
party? I mean, this costume isn’t much more than a loin cloth and mascara.”

“Two reasons,” I explained. “It
always makes the news. The costumes are ten times more interesting than the
dinner. I suppose it draws more guests and media people. The vendors in the
arena might even sell more. Why do they have Marti Gras?”

“And the real reason?”

“We have to make some sacrifices if
we want the women to dress up in slinky clothes.”

“Team DeClerk!” he said on the way
out.

I put on the rest of my costume,
including the flack vest, and a shepherd’s crook with an amber orb on the top,
while watching the ladies prepare. “You did a great job, Josie. Where’s my
mask?”

“Under the sink where it won’t get
crushed. It’s a hawk’s head. I made you Horus, the Avenger, and slayer of
serpents. I would have made you Osiris, Lord of Death and Resurrection, but I
couldn’t find a decent jackal’s head on short notice,” she apologized.

“Quite alright. I wouldn’t want to
be known as Lupo, the dog-faced boy. These convention fans can be pretty
brutal.” I watched Miss Valencia put peacock blue eye shadow on Mare as I
approached the delicate subject. “Ladies, did you hear the good news about our
ranking?”

Both said no.

“We’re virtually guaranteed fourth
through sixth place if we stay joined as one unit. But if we split up, we could
take third and fourth with the sleds,” I said. She didn’t know that the left
sled was crippled, and we didn’t have the interfaces or pilots for three
independent vehicles.

Josie remained impassive, arranging
Mare’s hair-do around tight golden coils. The white tunic Mare had on was
stunning, accentuating and revealing in all the right ways. I whistled
appreciatively and fetched my mask.

When I returned, Josie said, “If
you decide to split up Ghedra, won’t the main unit fall behind? LAS and Andiron
Enterprises would probably pass you. You’d drop to eighth place for your final
vehicle, that’s if no one decided to shoot. I’m no mathematician, but you get
less prize money by 125 grand if you split up. Doesn’t sound too good to me.”

“Ah, but the increase in team
points would get us 125 grand for the team award. If we splashed the Muramatsu
vehicle, maybe the main unit would only come in seventh. I see your point,
though, the money’s the same either way. How should I break the tie?” I said,
avoiding the fact that we were nearly out of ammunition for the guns, and
couldn’t make the kill without great risk.

Mare kept quiet, letting the
pressure build. Josie was having trouble getting the last bit of hair to
cooperate in the tiara. “What sort of incentive would you consider?”

I grinned while I tried on the hawk
mask. The mask was covered with real feathers and had a realistic beak that
came out of the forehead, leaving the mouth region uncovered so I could still
eat and talk with ease while wearing it. The effect reminded me of the old
Hawkman comic. Josie had included some dark brown makeup to conceal the top of
my face and complete the superhero theme. Putting a stripe across my eyes, I
pretended I was an Indian brave putting on war paint.

Mary Ann smiled at how distracted I
had suddenly become. “You could ask for a favor, like entrance to the Japanese
market,” Mare suggested, continuing to bait Josie.

“Naw,” I said. “The FCC would never
let us export this stuff, too hush-hush.”

“A vote,” Mare suggested
conveniently. “We might need someone on our side on another petition, and not
have time to bargain. A guaranteed vote for our side could come in handy.”

Josie put down the hair-spray and
comb. “I’d be careful about raising this issue with the Muramatsu team.
Yamoto-san, their manager, doesn’t take kindly to threats.”

“What could they do?” I laughed,
taking off the bird head. I ignored the warning, partly because her orange hair
and harem suit made her seem harmless.

“Oh, just for an example, did you
know that the name of your vehicle, Ghedra, is already trademarked by another
company, which is probably owned by someone in Japan. Nobody has sued you yet.
But if word got out that the name was being used by someone who hated the
Japanese people, and worked for the same government that bombed Hiroshima and
Nagasaki, that would change,” she threatened with as much enthusiasm as she
used elsewhere. Her brown eyes were hard and unyielding. It amounted to a
Mexican standoff.

“Let’s say I wanted to extend the
white glove, a truce,” I said, with more respect.

“Hmm. I can’t speak for their team,
but that’s what they have already. You might get an abstention at best. You
know, neutrality for neutrality,” Josie replied.

“What if I had a piece of valuable
information which could save them hundreds of thousands of dollars,” I tried.

“Again, I’m no authority, but that
might get you permission to use the name. Not North Ameri-Car, though. Too much
bad blood and slander in the press for that. No, they’ll have to make their own
deal, and I wouldn’t want to be on the negotiating team,” she said, finishing
Mare off while I stewed.

“There, what do you think?” Josie
said when she was done.

“That will do.” I said, meekly. “You
wouldn’t happen to know how a guy could contact Yamoto-san, would you?”

She pulled a gold makeup compact
out of one of her many veils and handed it to me. “Stop being clever. Hit
recall on the last number I dialed. And don’t mention this to Steve, or the
deal’s off.”

I tinkered with the tiny, high-tech
device in admiration. It appeared to function as a handset for a video link.
The actual transmitter was probably hidden elsewhere in her purse. Josie couldn’t
afford these gadgets on her royalties alone. I wonder what she did when she
wasn’t spying at conventions. “A girl’s got to make a living,” I said, perhaps
too harshly.

The ladies proceeded downstairs
while I did some quick haggling. Yamoto-san had been expecting a call, and the
deal was made in about three sentences. He didn’t understand why the form was
necessary, but I gave him my word.

Despite how quickly I finished, I
didn’t get to ride down with the ladies. Half the FBI guards went with them to
secure the route, and I had to wait for the next elevator car. Maybe Mare
thought I was being too harsh as well. I used the time to phone BW on the
compact and made a similar deal, the white glove for an abstaining vote. I
threw in the form for free to smooth over any bad feelings about Mare scoring
their forward observer.

The compact phone was handy and it
smelled nice, too. A couple guards stared at me when I sniffed it. What was I
thinking? An engaged man shouldn’t be sniffing another woman’s phone. I put it
away, picked up my bird head, and stepped into the elevator as if this happened
every day.

On the ride down, Whitaker pushed
the button for me, and I caught a glimpse of his weapon. It was one of those
power hand guns, the ones that used caseless ammo and fired with electronic
ignition. The clip on that sort of gun held about twenty rounds and could empty
in ten seconds. He had a funny-looking scope on it, not the usual laser kind. I
asked him about it.

“Infra-red sensing. Unless you hit
the override, it only fires when you’re going to hit a human being. If you
preprogram the sights with a specific person, it can discriminate.”

“So it can’t be used against its
owner?” I asked.

“Normally. Right now, your pattern
is locked in. If you get taken hostage, I won’t need to worry about killing you
when I open fire. The surprise will give me the second or two I need to drop
the perp,” he said with clinical detachment. I swallowed hard, and decided not
to talk to Whitaker when he was working anymore.

When I got to the banquet room,
Mare was surrounded by men with gold hotel employee jackets. One with a manager
name tag waved a newspaper at her, demanding, “What do you intend to do about
this?”

I snatched the paper out of his
hand and scanned the headlines. Apparently, the gentleman from the Palmeri
Syndicate, among others, had leaked a distorted version of my story to the
papers. They had blown the case into a bomb scare involving Arab terrorists,
but then claimed the Mob offered me money to buy my silence. According to the
article, I was being sequestered by the Federal Witness Protection Program. “This
is way out of control,” I told Mare.

“I know. I heard another rumor that
you were already in the Protection Program from a previous trial, that’s why
you won’t let your picture be taken,” she related. “Since eyewitness accounts
about you don’t agree from one day to the next, some of the Scarabs must be decoys.”

I rubbed my left temple. “How are
we going to explain this one?”

The coordinator for the event
leaned into the hall way and shouted, “You’re on in three minutes, people.”
Team members passed hurriedly through metal detectors and lined up at the various
entrances.

“We’ve taken the liberty of
composing a statement for you to sign,” said the manager. “It absolves the
hotel of all wrong-doing.”

I took the five-page document he
handed me and scanned it. The whole thing was worded like an affidavit and contained
at least three questionable facts on the first page alone. “I can’t sign this.”