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CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE



“What I can do for you two?” Sako dropped into the massive couch near the front of her hotel room. Her DTI bodyguards remained outside. “Your AC said you wanted to speak with me?”

“That’s right,” Isaac answered. He and Susan sat down in chairs across from her. “We have some follow-up points we’d like to clarify with you.”

“Is this about the League mob?”

“Partially, but we can start there.” Isaac opened his notes. “Where were you during the attack?”

“At the Pollen Mixer. We went straight there after the tournament.”

“And what were you doing at the Mixer?”

“You know, celebrating.”

“Were you with anyone else?”

“My tagalongs, obviously.” She bobbed her head toward the door where two DTI agents stood watch. “And Wong Fei.”

“Were all three with you the whole time?”

“Sure.”

“In the same room? In visual contact?”

“Uh no, actually. Wong Fei rented a private room for us, and I told the agents to wait outside.” Her brow creased. “What’s this about?”

“What were you doing in the private room?”

“Celebrating.”

“How?”

“Do you really need to know?”

“Please answer the question.”

“Fine.” She shook her head. “We were making out. It probably would have led to sex—and some really good sex at that—but then the agents barged in and told me to be ready to move.” She sighed. “That thoroughly killed the mood, and all for nothing. None of the protesters headed up the Pistil. All we did was hunker down in the Mixer and wait it out. Shingo had it way worse than me.”

“Did you ask Masuda to attend the tournament’s second session?”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

“I don’t know.” She leaned back and looked away. “I kind of did it on a whim. Thought it’d be nice to have him in the audience.”

“What was his response?”

“He told me no but then showed up anyway.” She shrugged. “Go figure.”

“Whose idea was it to head to the Pollen Mixer?”

“Mine.”

“Weren’t you concerned about your safety?”

“Maybe a little. But I’m not about to let fear rule my life.” She leaned forward and flashed a grin. “Besides, it worked out in my favor. Those protesters never guessed I was still up in the Pistil!”

Yes, Isaac thought. Isn’t it strange how that all worked out for you?

“Moving on, I have a few questions regarding your finances.”

“Oh? What does that have to do with anything?”

“Perhaps nothing,” Isaac admitted. “You donate heavily to a few charities, correct?”

“That’s right.”

“And the charity you donate the most to is the Heller Foundation.”

“Correct again.” She smirked at him. “Sounds like someone has access to my background check.”

“Why that one in particular?”

“Because I know the founder and I trust her. The others I donate to fund Lunar revitalization projects. But you know how it is with charities, right? How much of the money ends up being put to good use and how much goes to ‘overhead’? The other two—Mothers of Luna and Tycho Rebirth—both have good reputations, but with Debra, I know my money is making a difference. That’s why her foundation gets the most.”

“What’s the nature of your relationship with Debra Heller?”

“I used to work for her back when I was a teacher. Why are you asking me these questions?”

“What kind of boss was she?”

“An excellent one,” Sako stressed in a defensive tone. “Very supportive. Truly cared about the kids.”

“Are you aware she was fired from her principal position?”

Yes.”

“Did that affect your opinion of her?”

No.

“Why not?”

“Because it was a stupid, overblown scandal brought on by morons who wanted to force her out. That’s why.”

“Why do you say it’s—”

“Look, Detective,” Sako huffed, “why don’t you cut straight to the questions you really want to ask?” She gave him a come-at-me gesture with both hands. “I’m a big girl. I can take it.”

“And what questions might those be?”

“The ones where you ask if I’m a Lunar terrorist.”

Isaac grimaced, taken aback by her directness. He glanced over to Susan, who looked surprised by the answer.

“Fuck!” Sako stood up and rounded the couch. “I fucking knew it! I had to put up with this shit back home, but I thought this place was different! I thought you’d be different!”

“Please calm down, Miss Sako.”

“You’re such a fucking disappointment! You know that?”

“I don’t care whether I disappoint you or not,” Isaac replied with equal bluntness. “The only matter that concerns me is solving these crimes.”

“And you think I’m involved?” She splayed a hand over her chest.

For better or worse, at least she’s talking, Isaac thought. She’s angry and unbalanced. She might slip up if I press her further. If she’s involved, that is.

“I wouldn’t be asking these questions if the possibility didn’t exist,” he replied.

“Why? Because I was born on Luna and give some of my hard-earned money to charities there? Does that somehow make me terrorist material?”

“Of course not.”

“Then why are you here asking me these questions?”

All right, here goes, Isaac thought. Let’s see what happens when I turn up the heat.

“Because I can’t help but notice how you’ve acted recently.”

“What’s that supposed to mean? I’m one of the victims!”

“Yes, but you’re not acting like one, and I want to know why. Someone has threatened to kill you. Someone threatened Masuda as well. Someone helped those protesters break into the Flower. And yet with all that, what have you been doing? Partying at the Pollen Mixer? Visiting protesters at the hospital?”

“I already told you I’m not going to live my life in fear!”

“You also encouraged Masuda to leave the safety of the chronoport.”

“What? Are you implying I knew the League would break in?”

“Did you?”

“Oh, fuck you!” she snapped, cheeks reddening. “What a load of shit! Is this what I have to look forward to?”

Isaac paused to ponder her words.

“What did you mean by that? Looking forward to what, exactly?”

“None of your business!” she raged. “You going to charge me with a crime?”

“I’m not here to charge you.”

“Then get out!” She pointed at the door.

“Miss Sako—”

“Get the hell out! We are done!”

Isaac locked eyes with her, and she stared back at him, arm outstretched and finger pointing. He was tempted to press harder just to see where it led, but he also knew he had no evidence she’d committed a crime. This was an interview, not an interrogation, and he respected the difference, even if the line between the two could become gray on some cases.

He closed his notes, rose from his seat, and walked out the door without saying another word. Susan came up beside him, and they headed back to the grav tubes.

“That could have gone better,” she commented in security chat.

“Bit of an understatement there.”

“Did you notice how she dodged your question?”

“The one about the League’s break-in and her knowing about it? I did, though it’s hard to say what that means, if anything.” He frowned and shook his head. “Maybe I pushed too hard.”

“The tournament’s almost over. If someone intends to strike, it’ll be soon. I’d say a little pushing might be just what we need.”

“Maybe so, but push where? That’s the problem. We still have no idea who’s behind this, beyond one flimsy theory.”

They’d almost reached the grav tubes when a call came in. Isaac checked who it was and answered it immediately.

“Hello, Nina.”

“Hey. Are you two free? Can you stop by the stadium?”

“Sure. Got something for us?”

“Maybe. Whatever I’ve got, it’s at least more than nothing. Come by the stadium and I’ll walk you through it.”

“Understood. We’re on our way.”

* * *

They found Nina near the tall archway that served as one of several upper entrances to the stadium. Abstract police cordons hovered in wide circles around the arch, and wall paneling on one side had been removed and stacked, revealing dense racks of infostructure nodes.

Nina sat on one of her drones while she reviewed a virtual report. Another two drones floated beside the exposed wall, their pseudopods connected to the largest node on the rack.

“I thought you were looking into that anonymous message sent to the League,” Isaac said, stopping next to her.

“I did. Led me here.”

“What did you find?” Susan asked.

“First, let me get you two caught up.” Nina pushed off her drone seat. “Data forensics sent me the final reports for both Kohlberg’s office and home infosystems, and I finished going over the man’s pendant. There are copies of the reports in your mail.”

“Is there any point in me looking at them?” Isaac asked.

“Not unless you want to bore yourself to sleep. In short, all three analyses turned up nothing.” Nina shrugged with a sly smile. “Except for porn. Someone needs to find that man a girlfriend.”

“Not our problem,” Isaac replied dryly.

“Yeah, well, you didn’t get an earful from an AC complaining about all the sex scenes she had to sift through while looking for data anomalies.” Nina chuckled. “Kind of makes me want to send in even more of Kohlberg’s garbage.”

Susan cleared her throat. “You mentioned the League message?”

“Just about to get there.” Nina patted a fat infostructure node. “So, at first, I took one look at those messages and almost gave up, because I could tell the routing codes were fake.”

“How did you know?”

“Well, for one, whatever program generated the fake codes wasn’t very creative. They were randomly generated strings, which means most of them don’t even exist.” She chuckled and leaned against the node she’d been resting her hand on. “Though, it turns out, one matched up with an address on Ganymede. I’m sure that’s nothing more than a weird coincidence. It’s not like the Crimson Flower has any infostructure in Jovian orbit!”

“Then what brought you here?” Isaac asked.

“Don’t get ahead of me,” Nina warned. “And no, before you ask, I didn’t ignore your request, even if I thought it was fruitless. I started by going down to the Flower’s base and spot-checking the nodes near the protesters. You know, ones our anonymous message might have passed through.”

“Did the League give you any trouble?”

“Nah.” Nina waved the concern aside. “They have other problems now, like a whole line of state troopers in riot gear glowering at them. They didn’t so much as look at me funny. And the trip paid off because I found two nodes those messages passed through.”

“Which would have also shown fake routing codes,” Isaac noted.

“Yes, but then I had a hunch.” She waggled her eyebrows at him. “What if I could guess where the messages came from and check those nodes? I thought to myself, ‘Nina? Where have you spent too much time recently? A place that must be tied to this case, somehow?’”

“Pistil Stadium?” Isaac ventured.

“Right you are!” Nina knocked on the node she was leaning on. “And then I lucked upon the messages. Both passed through this node!”

“Can you tell who sent them?” Susan asked.

“No, but I do know it was someone in the stadium. That much I’m certain of.”

“That doesn’t narrow it down much.” Isaac crossed his arms. “Were the players in the pods at the time?”

“No,” Nina said. “I already cross-checked the timestamps with the tournament stream. All five players were outside the isolation pods for both messages.”

“Then one of the players could have sent them.”

“No way for me to rule it out,” Nina confirmed.

“But it could have been anyone in attendance,” Susan noted.

“I know,” Isaac sighed.

“Sorry.” Nina shrugged. “I wish I had more for you.”

“No, it’s all right,” Isaac said. “This is solid work. It’s just…we need more.”

* * *

Isaac sat down on the edge of the stage, leaned forward and propped his elbows on his knees, and placed his chin atop laced fingers. He stared at the floor, deep in thought. Susan took a seat in the row in front of him, Cephalie appeared atop the LENS, and Nina used the top of one of her drones for a mobile chair.

They were the only people in the stadium. It was dead silent except for the distant hum of ventilation and the occasional clank of Nina’s drones replacing wall panels.

“Where do we take our investigation from here?” Susan asked after a while.

“I don’t know,” Isaac said quietly, still staring at the floor. “There has to be something we’ve missed.”

“That’s pretty obvious, Isaac,” Cephalie tittered.

He gave her a sour look.

“Sorry.”

“Let’s look at the facts again.” Isaac held up a finger. “We have three crimes so far. Number one, the severed head in Sako’s hotel room.”

“Produced by the same kind of prankware found on Lacan’s wearable,” Nina said.

“Which we suspect was planted there by someone using an Admin PIN,” Susan added.

“Right,” Isaac said, nodding.

“And there aren’t many people who could have pranked the printer,” Susan continued. “From the players, we have Lacan, Sako, and Wong Fei.”

“For non-players, Pérez and his agents round out the list.” Isaac held up a second finger. “Then we have the message in the game.”

“With no idea how it got there,” Nina said. “Every infosystem the UAM file passed through came up clean, and the hardware checks out as well. Nothing unusual to report.”

“We have the surveillance video and records from the stage and understage.” Cephalie summoned a trio of windows. “Plenty of clear, unbroken views all around. After Kohlberg loaded the files, no one touched the pods until the players arrived.”

“Which is where our theoretical hacker comes into play,” Susan said.

“That’d have to be some hacker to get past all our scrutiny,” Nina sighed, “but I suppose it’s possible. Unlikely, but possible.”

“And he or she would have to be a SysGov software expert,” Susan added. “Someone from the Admin wouldn’t have the necessary skills.”

“Finally”—Isaac held up a third finger—“we have the message to the League with the keycode.”

“The Admin’s keycode,” Susan emphasized. “Pérez sent me the list of people who had a copy: all three players and his entire security team, basically.”

“Plus whoever provided it to them,” Isaac noted.

“Which is ActionStream.”

“Three crimes.” Isaac rested his chin on his fingers again and stared down at the floor. “Three crimes that don’t seem to point to one place.”

“You still think we’re dealing with more than one criminal?” Susan asked.

“I do. I don’t see how one person could have pulled all of this off. Or at least done it so cleanly as to leave us scratching our heads. Two parts of the crimes—framing Lacan and altering the Weltall UAM—stand out as requiring different skillsets.” He pointed to his IC. “Cephalie, you’re good at hacking.”

“Well, I don’t like to brag…” She twirled her cane with a wolfish grin.

“Could you have pulled this off?”

“Some of it. Modifying Weltall would be a breeze for me, though there’s no way I’d be able to cover my tracks like this. Getting the keycode to the protesters wouldn’t be hard. I know a few good ways to generate fake routing codes.”

“What about framing Lacan?”

“Doubtful. Admin systems are too different. I might have been able to pull off something similar, but Nina would have caught it, I’m sure.”

“And the same holds true if we look at it from the other side,” Isaac said. “Right, Susan?”

“Absolutely. None of the players—or anyone at the DTI for that matter—has much experience with SysGov infosystems. Not on the level we’re talking.”

“Which brings us back to at least two people.” Isaac sat up on the stage. “One from the Admin and one from SysGov.”

“But who?” Nina asked.

“Still considering Sako?” Susan asked.

“I am. But if it’s her, who would the coconspirator be?”

“What about Wong Fei?” Susan suggested.

“Our star player?” Nina asked incredulously.

“He’s committed intimidation crimes in the past,” Susan noted. “Sending replica severed hands to people? Sounds similar enough to me. Plus, he and Sako have grown close in a very short period of time.”

“You raise a good point with those past crimes,” Isaac agreed. “And while his career as a gamer doesn’t exactly cover the skills we’re looking for, his criminal record tells us he already has them.”

“But, come on!” Nina protested. “Wong Fei? I don’t buy it.”

“We have to consider all possibilities,” Isaac replied.

“If Sako has been radicalized,” Susan went on, “then it’s possible she recruited Wong Fei’s aid at some point.”

“Kohlberg seems the more likely helper to me,” Nina offered. “Just imagine it. A lonely guy like that gets approached by a hot foreigner asking for favors. She shakes a little ass, shows a little cleavage, and next thing you know he’s helping her sabotage the entire political landscape.”

“What would he need Sako’s ass for when he can go home to his synthoid harem?” Susan countered.

“Plus, he’d be hurting his own company,” Isaac noted. “That’s been my problem with the Kohlberg angle from the start. Sure, perhaps he could fool all of us and alter the UAM somehow, but why? What’s in it for him?”

“Sweet. Admin. Ass,” Nina repeated.

Susan shook her head.

“Hell, I bet if I shook my ass at him, he’d commit a few crimes,” Nina continued with a quirky smile.

“Please don’t,” Isaac grumbled.

“Just saying. You know, as a hypothetical.”

“Cephalie?” Isaac asked. “How about you? Any thoughts?”

“Sort of. It’s more of an approach than an idea.”

“I’m all ears. Let’s hear it.”

“Okay.” Cephalie opened Sako’s background report and produced a timetable of her actions prior to arriving in SysGov. “Let’s say we keep going with the Sako angle. Speculating who she might have partnered with is all well and good, but the question then becomes where did this conspiracy form?”

“It would have to be in the Admin,” Susan said. “This is Sako’s first time in SysGov.”

“Right.” Cephalie highlighted one entry in the timetable. “And that brings us to where she first came into contact with potential coconspirators.”

“The universal qualifier at Byrgius University,” Isaac said.

“Exactly. And even if Sako’s not the one we’re looking for, the conspiracy had to form somewhere. This is where all the people we’ve been looking at—all the players and the people in their orbits—began to mingle.”

“That’s a very good point,” Isaac said, “but unfortunately Byrgius is in the Admin.”

“Why’s that a problem?” Susan asked.

“Well, it’s…” He frowned at her. “It’s in the Admin.”

“True.” She nodded. “So?”

“It’s in the Admin, Susan,” he repeated, unsure how to make the problem clearer.

“But they made you an investigator. Your authority extends that far.”

“Yes, I suppose you’re right.” Isaac let out a weary sigh. “Point taken. We can talk to Noxon. It’s not ideal, but we should be able to put together a list of material for them to collect and bring back.”

“I’m sorry, but I think you’ve misunderstood me,” Susan said.

“How so?” Isaac asked, confused.

“You’re an investigator,” she stressed. “And we have two chronoports sitting in the hangar.”

“Wait a second.” He gulped. “You don’t mean…”

“That you should requisition one?” she finished with a bright smile. “Why not?”


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