Sins of the Father (20 page)

"Chandra? Uh... I think I'm going to have to call you back..."

There was a muffled cry, and the sounds of a struggle. Then, a child's voice could be heard clearly, the tone shrill and vengeful.

"Kill him, Leonard!" the boy's voice shrieked. "He's one of the bad men! He's one of the men who hurt me! Kill him! Kill him, Leonard! Now!"

Abruptly, there was a crunching noise and a wail of feedback. Then, the recording fell silent.

"That's all that was on the tape." Dorden handed the recorder to Anderson. "As close as we can tell, Mayzell's headset must have fallen off during the struggle." He pointed at the damaged comm-set beside the body. "Then, somebody trod on it and broke the connection."

"Still, it confirms what a witness told us at the first homicide," Anderson said. Accepting the recorder from Dorden, she placed it in one of the pouches on her own belt. "One of the perps is a child. And now we know the name of the other one. The giant's name is Leonard."

"You've got more than just his name," Dorden said. He went to his belt again, in a gesture that reminded Anderson incongruously of a sleight-of-hand magician about to pull a stuffed rabbit from his hat. Taking a folded square of paper from another pouch, he opened it out and handed it to her. "Now, we even know what this Leonard looks like. It ain't a pretty picture."

It was a 2-D photo-scan on glossy paper, its grainy texture and flattened angles indicating it had been forensically enhanced and re-configured from a Tri-D photo. It showed a close-up of the snarling face of a mutant, seen from a strangely askew downward angle, his features illuminated in the light of a photo-flash. The mutant's skin was grey and leathery, his face disfigured by a series of bony ridges, his nose a strange leaf-shaped thing with a broad, deep crevice at its centre. But for the long greasy hair that hung down from his head, the mutant's face might have put Anderson in mind of some kind of giant bat.

"You're right," Anderson said, as she passed the photo-scan to Lang. "With a face like that he wouldn't win any beauty contests. How did you get this?"

"When I entered the scene I found a Tri-D camera lying on the floor alongside the comm-set," Dorden told her. "When I gave it to the Teks for analysis, one of them found a picture in the camera's memory. The time-stamp indicates it was taken at the time of the attack. Best I can figure it, Mayzell was probably already holding the camera when the perps attacked him. Maybe he tried to use the camera-flash to ward them off, or he just pressed the activation button by accident. Either way, he caught the mutant on camera. Extraordinary, I know. But it can be like that with investigations. Sometimes, you just catch a lucky break."

"Don't I know it." As Lang passed the photo-scan back to her, Anderson stared down at the image again as though trying to read some portent in the lines of the mutant's face. "All right, so we've got audio on one perp and a visual on the other one." She looked back up at Dorden with a sardonic half-smile. "I don't suppose you managed to find their driving licences and social security numbers while you were at it? Or maybe just their addresses? You know, anything to make our jobs really easy."

"Sorry," Dorden gave her a grim but good-natured smile in return. "Can't help you there."

"Have you thought maybe this helps explain some things?" Lang said to Anderson. "We were wondering why the victims saw the killers as one corporate being. Take a look at the mutant, though. Guy's so ugly, he must have scared them half to death when they saw him - never mind the fact he then started strangling them. Maybe that's why the victims always put the boy's face on the mutant's body. Maybe their minds were trying to blot out the thing that frightened them, even as they died."

"It could be." Far from convinced by Lang's theory, Anderson gave a noncommittal shrug. "I'll admit, I wouldn't like to run into Leonard here in any dark hallways. But I get the impression there's a lot more going on here than we realised. I don't know what it is yet, but there's something here we're just not seeing."

"Another hunch?" Lang asked.

"I suppose you could call it that," Anderson said. "We're Psi-Judges. Sometimes, bizarre and unexplained hunches just go with the territory. I'll say one thing, though. The words the boy said while the giant was killing Charles Mayzell confirm that there's a personal motive behind these killings. You heard what he said about Mayzell. 'He's one of the men who hurt me'."

"I heard it," Lang said. She stared for a moment at the body of the dead man, reading aloud the message written on his torso. 'Your sins will find you out'. The question is, what were the victims' sins? And what did they do to the boy to hurt him? We already established that we thought Joseph Kapinski was an innocent who wouldn't hurt a fly. What could he have done to the boy to make him want to kill him? What could any of them have done for that matter?"

"I don't know. But the perps' motives are the key to this whole case, I'm sure of it." Anderson sighed and rubbed her eyes tiredly. "Grud, even with this new evidence, it still feels like we're chasing our tails. Give me a simple purse-snatcher over a serial killer any day. At least then, there's a motive you can understand."

Anderson shook her head as though to clear it, before she continued.

"Anyway, enough theorising," she said. "I think we'd be better adopting a practical approach. Our next step is to psi-scan Mayzell's body and see if it gives us any more leads." She turned to Dorden. "Meanwhile, can you forward a copy of the picture of our perp to Control? Ask them to release it to the news media with the announcement that it's the face of a suspect wanted for questioning in three murders. Have them give the media the names of the victims as well. Maybe if we start to make things hot for our giant, he'll be forced to reveal himself in some way or he'll make a mistake that will lead us to him."

"You think that will work?" Dorden asked her. "After all, we're not talking about a citizen here. The guy's a mutant. If he's living in the Big Meg, he's used to staying underground and keeping out of sight."

"It's a long shot, I'll admit," Anderson said. "But it comes back to the fact that we've got a boy and giant working hand-in-hand to commit a series of murders. That's an unusual combo, even by Big Meg standards. And, with a face like the giant's got, there's no way you'd forget him after you saw him. No matter how good they are at keeping out of the limelight, they need food and shelter just like everybody else. The chances are, they have somebody helping them. It's hard to stay hidden in a city of four hundred million people, never mind when you look like an escapee from an old-time freak show.

"Somebody, somewhere, must know what they are about."

FOURTEEN

MOTHER STANDS FOR COMFORT

I: The William Gull Memorial Med-Centre, Mega-City One, 2102

"I realise this is bad news," the doctor said as he looked at the young woman seated on the other side of his desk. "But you have to understand that no one will think any worse of you because of it. Sometimes, these things just happen. I wish we could prevent them. But what with all the radiation left over from the war..." He paused and shook his head sadly. "Really, there's nothing we can do."

"It must be a mistake," the woman said. She seemed dulled by grief, as though the news he had delivered had robbed her of feeling. Only her fingers, picking fretfully at the thin white smock she had worn during the examination, betrayed her agitation. "There's been a mix-up at the lab. This can't be right..."

"It's all done by computer," the doctor shook his head again. "And there are safeguards built into the system. The results have been checked and re-checked a half-dozen times. There's no mistake."

"But there must be," the woman protested. "You have to check the results again. There's nothing like this in my family. And my husband Leonard, he was normal."

"I'm sorry," the doctor said. "I know this all must come as a shock, but you just have to accept it. Honestly, we see this all time. Heredity is no guide in these matters. There's nothing unusual about two perfectly healthy parents conceiving a mutant." His eyes strayed briefly to the screen of the computer on his desk as he skimmed through her records. "Now, am I right in thinking your husband is no longer with us?"

"He was a geotherm technician," the woman muttered. She had bowed her head and, though he could no longer see her eyes, from the tone of her voice the doctor was sure she had started crying. "He was killed in the terrorist attack on the Power Tower, two months ago."

"Yes, of course, I read about it in the news-zines," the doctor nodded sagely and tutted in sympathy. "I'm sure right now it must seem like your world has turned upside down. First, your husband's death. Then, this. It's terrible, I know."

There was a box of tissues on his desk, intended for use by his patients. As the woman began to sob quietly in her chair, the doctor slid the box towards the edge of the desk until it was within her reach.

"I could arrange for you to see a bereavement counsellor," he said. "Actually, it's mandatory in these cases anyway. You can make an appointment now if you'd like, along with the appointment for the termination."

"Termination?" The words cutting through the fog of her grief, the woman gave a start and raised her head to look back at the doctor. "You want me to have an abortion?"

"That's mandatory too, I'm afraid," the doctor said. As he returned his attention to his computer screen and began to type on the keyboard, he gave the impression their consultation had dragged on too long and he was eager to end it. "It's the law. Under the Genetic Purity Act, when a pre-natal gene-scan indicates evidence of foetal mutation, termination is the only option." He shrugged his shoulders and gazed towards her in sympathy once more. "I know it seems harsh. But it's the price we have to pay for genetic stability. The incidence of mutation has been increasing ever since the Great Atom War ended. If we let things go unchecked, it would only be a matter of time before there would be as many mutants in the city as there are in the Cursed Earth. And no one wants that."

"But there has to be another way... You can't just kill my baby..."

"I'm sorry," the doctor said. "But the law is very clear in these matters. I suppose, strictly speaking, you could choose to go into voluntary exile in the Cursed Earth rather than comply. But, really, that's hardly an option. A normal person would be lucky to last a week in that rad-infested hellhole, never mind a woman in your condition. I wish there was another alternative. But, realistically, you have no choice other than to terminate the pregnancy."

For a moment they sat there in silence as the doctor gave the woman time to let his words to sink in. Then, checking his wristwatch as though he was late for an appointment elsewhere, he spoke again.

"Listen, I realise this is a lot to handle. Why don't I leave you alone for a few minutes here while you think it all through?" He rose from his chair, and began to head towards the door.

"Is it a boy or girl?" the woman asked, her voice calling out to him as he reached the door and opened it.

"I... I don't really see how that can help things," the doctor said. Caught half in-between his office and the corridor outside, he seemed ill at ease as he turned back towards her. "You have to remember we're talking about a ball of foetal tissue no bigger than your fingernail. To talk about its potential gender at this stage is hardly relevant..."

"Please," the woman said. She looked up at him with sorrowful eyes, tears running through her mascara to stain her cheeks. "I just to need to know. It will make things easier. Please."

"It's a boy," the doctor replied. He shifted uneasily on the threshold, then left the room and closed the door behind him.

Again, there was silence. The woman sat in her chair, tears streaming, her head downcast. Finally, she put the palm of her hand flat across her belly.

"A boy," she said. The words were hushed and quiet, their tone reverential as though she was praying aloud to any god who would listen. "A baby boy."

"Leonard," she said. "I'll call him Leonard. Just like his father."

II: Apartment 39-B, Anne Frank Block, Mega-City One, 2103

"Hush now," she whispered softly to her baby. It was the middle of the night, and she had woken from sleep to the sound of his crying. She crooned to him, gently cradling him in her arms as she sat beside his crib in the apartment's single bedroom. "Hush now, Leonard. You are my special little boy. Hush now, and let momma rock you back to sleep."

She would not let them kill her child. Sitting in the doctor's office after she had been told the news, she had realised the baby was all she had left of her husband. She was no saint, nor was she free of the prejudices so commonplace among her fellow citizens in Mega-City One. Like most people, she had always been sickened and horrified by mutants in equal measure. To be told her own child was a mutant, though, had made all the difference. She would not give him up. Something deep inside her had refused to concede to the doctor's blithe assurances it was all for the best. They had wanted to kill her baby. She would not allow it. Come what may, whatever hardships awaited her, she had known at once she would do everything in her power to protect her son.

In the year since she had made her decision, her life had changed beyond all recognition. She had been lucky in some respects. Grud knew that no amount of money could compensate for the loss of her husband, but the death benefit from his life insurance policy had given her the funds to do what she needed. Liquidating her savings, she had asked around and made contact with an identity broker via an introduction from a friend of a friend. The broker had sold her a complete new identity: false papers, a driving licence, a new citizen ID number to allow her to claim social security and be granted an apartment by the Housing Department. She had moved to a different part of the city, discarding her birth name and her old life with the same finality with which she had abandoned all contact with her family and former friends. It was hard creating a new life from nothing, but she knew the doctor would be required to notify the Judges once she failed to attend the appointment to have her pregnancy aborted.