The Administration Series (159 page)

Actually, there was little serious danger of being boxed in. Anyone in the house had had ample time to get out before the three of them arrived.

Leaving B-C by the door, Toreth and Nagra moved quickly up the stairs. The lights were out, so Nagra opened shutters on the landings, letting light in as they went. The house was silent — the rooms they glanced into were dingy, even considering the lack of light, and plastic dust sheets covered what little furniture they held.

On the top floor a single door opened on the side facing the square. It stood ajar, letting in light and a faint air current to lift the dust on the floor. Toreth caught the familiar smell of blood, and not from his arm.

Nevertheless, he and Nagra opened the door in approved textbook style — it would be highly embarrassing to be shot at this point.

The only furniture in the room was a bed, the plastic covering carelessly folded beside it. The body lay beyond it, by the open shutter which squeaked softly as the breeze nudged it. Blood pooled on the dusty floor.

Nagra waited by the door as Toreth crossed the room. A crumpled, grease-spotted paper ball on the floor by the bed caught his attention — a half-empty bottle of water stood beside it. Toreth sniffed again. Faint hint of some food under the blood. Obviously the man had been waiting for him.

In the centre of the bed sat a matte black box, fifteen centimetres on a side, square except for one sloping face where a small control screen glowed dimly. Two steady green lights. Altogether, it looked like the kind of thing best not touched.

A faint noise distracted him from his inspection. It was unexpected enough to set his heart thumping again, and it took him a moment to realise what it was. A soft moan.

"Nagra," he called in a whisper.

"Para?"

"Get an ambulance. We've got a live one, for the moment."

A pause, then she said, "I can't get a contact."

He opened his hand screen and tried to call up the map again. Nothing. Toreth looked back at the box, considering. Maybe he'd been maligning Karteris, or at least wrong about the method of cutting off Toreth's communication — Karteris could still be behind this.

Leaning over the bed again, he inspected the device more closely. A switch at the back looked like power and was probably safer than messing with the unfamiliar interface on the screen. Unconsciously holding his breath, he clicked the switch. The lights went out and the screen faded.

"Now?" he asked softly.

"It's back."

Toreth crossed the last couple of metres to the body, stepping awkwardly around the blood, keeping his gun trained on the still figure. The man lay huddled face down — from the smears on the floor, he hadn't moved very far since he'd been shot.

And a lucky fucking shot it had been, Toreth thought as he knelt. He wouldn't have staked a single chip on any of his shots having connected, but at least one clearly had. Exactly where was now his main concern. Carefully, he turned the man over and stopped, unaware of the wetness of the bloodied clothing under his hand.

DNA records, held on every citizen in the Administration from birth, would have revealed the man's name. However, for once that wasn't necessary. Toreth recognised his victim — Karteris's pretty informer.

"Theo?" he said aloud.

Theo, Alexandros thought as he sat down behind the roof parapet. Out of the sunlight, the breeze was cool enough to make him shiver, his face and neck damp with sweat.

Five years in the resistance cell together, and he'd never known the man's name. Even now, with Member Two dead, the knowledge felt uncomfortable.

Was
Theo — Two — dead? There had been no movement from the room since the first silenced shots, and no reply to the para-investigator's exclamation. Alexandros had seen Two drop the gun, seen him fall backwards. He must be dead.

It should have been fingerprints, not a corpse, providing a lead to the para-investigator, and Two should have been clear of the building by the time they were found. Cursing silently, Alexandros looked up at the sky, blinking back tears. Two had been a comrade — a friend, even, name or no name. At least now he could never be taken back to I&I.

He forced his gaze down to the gun in his own hands. It wasn't that he didn't know how to use it, but he was glad that it hadn't been necessary. No backup had materialised. Everything had gone exactly to plan, except for the bastard's unexpectedly good shooting. That wasn't his fault, or Two's.

The gun felt heavy and unpleasantly slick in his sweating hands. He remembered to click on the safety before he put it away in his jacket pocket.

Alexandros made his way carefully along the roof, stepped across the gap to the next building without looking down, and went to leave a message for Member One reporting their success and failure.

The middle-aged I&I medic introduced himself as Eugenio Quattrone, late of I&I Naples. Combined with his complete non-association with Political Crimes, that gave Toreth some confidence in the man.

"Aren't you going to tell me that a few centimetres to the side and I'd have bled to death?" Toreth asked Quattrone.

The man glanced up from his examination of Toreth's arm. "Para?"

"I thought it was a medic thing. I've been stabbed a couple of times and both times they told me — fuck!" Sudden pain startled him into the exclamation.

"Sorry. I think we have something in here. One moment." The man turned away.

Blood trickled ticklishly down Toreth's arm as he waited and he held his elbow away from his body, trying not to drip on his trousers. B-C had gone to the hotel to pick a shirt up for him, so that he'd have something less gory to wear once the medic finished.

"Now, if we can just hold still . . . " A hiss of a nozzle, and the pain slowly faded away. Now Toreth felt only pressure on his arm and a dull sensation of probing. "This wasn't done by a bullet, so I don't think a few centimetres would have made any difference at all. Except it would be harder to find whatever's in here."

Toreth decided that he'd rather not look. With his free hand, he picked up his shirt and examined the sleeve. Not much torn, but the bloodstain would be a bastard to get rid of. Perfectly good shirt as well, practically brand new — a New Year present from Warrick. Maybe he could get it repaired.

The probing stopped, and a few seconds later came the chink of something on metal. "There we are," Quattrone said.

Toreth looked into the proffered bowl. It held a small flake which seemed to be white underneath the coating of blood.

"Marble, I think," the medic said. "Although you know better than me how that could've got in there. Made a nice clean cut, anyhow. Keep still, I'll bond it together and we'll be ready to go."

As the medic started work, the door opened. Expecting B-C with the clean shirt, Toreth looked round to find Vassilakis. The division head appeared gratifyingly concerned.

"I'm fine," Toreth said before he could speak.

"Thank God." Vassilakis came in and closed the door. He glanced at the medic, but Quattrone didn't visibly register his presence. Vassilakis frowned briefly, then said, "Toreth, I have no idea how this could happen. Or who could be behind it. No idea at all."

Tell me something I don't fucking know. "Athens doesn't seem like a very healthy place for Int-Sec outsiders, does it? Between me and Grant, I mean."

Vassilakis stared at him blankly.

"Theodora Grant?" Toreth said. "Cit Surveillance? She didn't have much fun here either."

Vassilakis stiffened. "Hardly the same thing."

"Oh?"

"No. The woman deliberately mixed with criminal elements. Not surprising that it had unfortunate consequences."

"I thought Athens didn't have resisters?"

Vassilakis's normally affable expression hardened. "It doesn't, Para-investigator. She came looking for something that isn't here, and when she couldn't find it she pressed until she found something else instead. If Justice can't control the vermin running around in the city, that's no concern of I&I's. Now, if you'll excuse me."

The door closed firmly behind him.

"That man," Quattrone said precisely, "is an idiot."

"Tell me about it."

He'd meant it rhetorically, but Quattrone didn't hesitate.

"If you'll excuse me for saying it, paras need to be kept in line, and what this place really suffers from is too many people like Vassilakis not doing it. The section heads all take their cue from him." From the vehemence, it was a grievance the medic had been waiting for a while to air. "I've worked in five different I&I stations, and this is the worst. Everywhere else the paras don't trust each other, they don't trust the management, and the management doesn't trust them. Here it's all hands off. Too friendly and too laissez faire."

Toreth felt a sting in the back of his hand, and looked down in time to see Quattrone lifting an injector away. A thin, shiny line of wound sealant marked the near-invisible line of the cut on his arm.

"We're all done here," the medic said. "It won't give you any trouble
if
you don't put too much stress on the join for the next twenty-four hours."

Toreth hoped Theo was enjoying a similarly easy time. Unfortunately, the I&I medical unit wasn't equipped for surgery, so Toreth had been forced to surrender his prisoner to the nearest hospital. Toreth had stationed I&I guards outside his room, and at the moment Nagra was keeping them company.

Karteris was waiting in Toreth's office. Toreth sent B-C away, not making even a thin pretense of an excuse.

"Glad to see you're okay," Karteris said as Toreth closed the door. "You should see the paperwork from getting internal reviewers killed. As it is, I've got more forms than there were bullets in that wall."

"Here's some paperwork for you to look at first," Toreth said.

The summary page he showed Karteris was simple — the discrepancy between the amount of drugs signed out of stores and the amounts used and discarded. Along with the names of the men he sold them on to, it was some of the best evidence he'd seen for a long while. Since it had been prepared by an I&I admin, it ought to be.

"Where did you get this?" Karteris asked, although he didn't seem to expect an answer.

"Aren't there enough legal drugs for sale?" Toreth had trouble keeping the smile off his face. "It's not like they're expensive."

"There's always room for more. Haven't you ever done it?"

"Of course I haven't," Toreth said with self-righteous indignation.

Karteris stared for a moment. "You know, I believe you. What the fuck
do
you do for fun?"

"Exercise and go to bed early." Time to be serious. Best not to mention his suspicions of Karteris's resister sympathies straight away. "Okay, this is the deal. I want to know what's going on in the section. What's important enough that you're willing to risk losing a nice little fuck like Theo to keep it quiet."

"Theo's nothing to do with me."

"No? He's your informer, and he tried to kill me."

Karteris shook his head firmly. "He's registered to General Criminal, not me — it's in his file."

"Fine. If you don't tell me . . . well, dealing is a Justice matter. Vassilakis won't be able to charm you out of that one."

"Justice?" Outrage, not fear. "You can't give me to Justice!"

"Watch me."

"Don't you have
any
fucking loyalty to the uniform?"

He didn't dignify that with a reply. Karteris stared at him, expressionless now, and Toreth had to admire the man's nerve. From what Sara had said, jail was a real fear for Karteris.

Toreth closed up the screen. "Up to you. I expect you'll like it in prison. Lots of men there who won't turn you down. Or let you turn them down. You might even meet someone you know — do you have a good memory for prisoners? I know I can't remember all the useless bastards I've interrogated. Bet they remember me, though."

There was a brief silence, then Karteris said, "You won't do it."

"What?"

His confidence had returned. "Hand a para over to Justice for doing something practically everyone in the division's done? You'd be stupid to try it, and I'd be even more stupid to believe you would. Forget it."

Fuck. And to be fair, it was no different to how Toreth himself would've played it. He had one card left — he wondered if Karteris knew he was holding it.

"Okay. If you won't tell me what was worth sending Theo after me for, maybe he will."

Clearly Karteris had no idea. "I thought — I heard that you killed him."

"Where did you heard that from?"

"One of the admins."

And they'd know if anybody did, making it a good source to name even if it wasn't true. "I'm not that good a shot. I'm bringing him back here from the hospital later, and as soon as he's up to it I'll be interrogating. The first thing I'll be asking him is where he got his comm jamming gear. Unless you'd like to tell me something first?"

Karteris shrugged, composed once more. "Nothing to tell. Good luck with him. He's not easy. Took me a good few days to crack him the first time. Mind you, once he went . . . " He smiled, almost convincingly. "But hey — maybe you're more his type."

"Maybe." Toreth touched the comm, sending the signal to B-C. "Until I find out, you can wait in the cells here."

Karteris stared incredulously. "
Cells
?" Then he looked round as the door opened to reveal B-C and two I&I guards.

"I might not be willing to take the drug sales all the way," Toreth said, "but they'll do to hold you until I've had a word with your little friend. Shouldn't take long. And hey, if I'm wrong, I'll buy you dinner to make it up to you."

Nagra had gone with Theo to the hospital. As Toreth argued with the medic, the junior stood nearby, looking twitchy. Outright attacks on I&I staff were rare enough, but combined with the possibility that it was an inside job he couldn't blame her for a little healthy nervousness. The I&I guards merely looked bored.

"I have every legal right to do it," Toreth said to the medic, with as much patience as he could muster. "I want to see his medical records, right now."