Part 23 (2/2)
”Like me, there's no one. I'm the best. But apart from me, maybe a half dozen.”
”And which of them might have done it?”
”Of those, none.”
”Why not?”
”The majority of the mem pirates are very bad. They use random plots bought on the black market and images synthesized by a computer. Their mems are garbage. But those killer memories are incredible. Unusual, very unusual. I've never seen anything like them. Very violent and full of hate, but also full of truth. There's definitely a writer behind them. Someone who's desperate to express himself. They're short-barely forty scenes-but they're good. The pirates I know would never have been capable of making them.”
”You astonish me. How do you know about the content on the killer mems?”
”Well, we all have our contacts...and it's my profession. What's more, you could say that my life depends on it.”
”You say they're unusual. Is that why you think there are new traffickers in town?”
”No, no. I didn't say that. That's what's so strange about the whole business. There aren't any new traffickers. There aren't any new memorists. There's no adulterated consignment. No one's putting killer mems on the market. No one's selling them. It's not a commercial operation. It's not drug related. Do you understand what I'm saying?”
Bruna thought for a moment, processing the man's words.
”You're saying that the victims didn't buy the implants voluntarily, that the memories were inserted by force, and that they probably weren't random victims but they've been chosen for a reason.”
”That's it.”
Which meant that not just Chi but also all the other replicants were likely to have been carefully selected according to some plan.
”Then why are they killing the regular traffickers as well?”
The memorist scratched the tip of his ear nervously.
”Hmmm...That's a good question. I'd love to know the answer.”
He was scared. The man was frightened, the rep suddenly realized. That explained a few things.
”You're frightened that they'll kill you too. That's why you wanted to talk to me.”
”I've already told you that seeing you had to do with Nopal. But it's logical that the deaths alarm me. As the saying goes, there's no smoke without fire.”
”And you don't have a theory?”
”What about you? You're the detective, after all.”
Bruna furrowed her brow in thought.
”At first I thought it was a battle for the market, to get rid of the compet.i.tion.”
”No. It doesn't look like they want to finish everyone off. They've only killed one of my regular colleagues. I was in his company, together with another trafficker, when they killed him, but they didn't touch the other one. It would seem that they also pick and choose.”
”Perhaps because of something they know?”
The memorist went pale. That's why he's had such savage surgery, said Bruna to herself. Everything was starting to make sense. It wasn't plastic surgery but a complete change to his looks and his ident.i.ty. Here was a man who intended to hide, a fugitive.
”Because of something they know,” the mem pirate repeated gloomily.
”About that secret EU project to implant artificial mems with induced-behavior programs into humans, for example?”
The idea had suddenly occurred to her out of the blue. The android tended to run with those sudden flashes of intuition. She was convinced that sometimes those thoughts worked their way into her mind because somehow she had picked them up from her surroundings. The batch of combat replicants to which Bruna belonged had been provided with an experimental enzyme, nexin, which supposedly boosted their ability to empathize, to make links. The experiments hadn't been conclusive and the enzyme was officially considered a failure, but whatever the bioengineers might say, it seemed to the detective that nexin worked-at least from time to time. The memorist cringed.
”How do you know about that?” he asked, lowering his voice.
”As you put it, we all have our contacts.”
The man seemed uncomfortable.
”It's a very...ahem...I took part, yes. I don't mind telling you that. I took part in those experiments. They were secret, true, but official. A matter of state. And then, when they hurriedly and unpleasantly shut down the program, they made my life impossible. They accused me of things I hadn't done. They expelled me from the profession. They didn't allow me to return to my work as a memorist. And I was the best. I am the best. That's why they hired me.”
”That doesn't seem fair.”
”It was an outrage!”
”And who were the people who did that to you?”
The man grimaced.
”I don't intend to say any more. I've already said too much. It's dangerous.”
”But those wretches who hired you and then destroyed your life, they deserve to have people know what they've done.”
Furious, the man retorted, ”If it were known, I'd already be dead! Do you think I'm an imbecile? Don't try to make me feel outraged. You won't get any more information out of me by using such a crude tactic.”
Bruna raised her hands in a gesture of appeas.e.m.e.nt.
”Okay, fine, my apologies. It's true that I was trying to ingratiate myself...somewhat. But it's also true that I find it a terrible story. And it could be the reason for the murders. Who was running the project? Who did this to you?”
The memorist screwed up his eyes and bit his lower lip. But he was too angry to be able to contain himself.
”It wasn't the fault of the person leading the scientific section. In fact, the scientists were also...”
The man suddenly stopped speaking and stared at Bruna wide-eyed, with his deformed mouth wide open. It all happened in a fraction of a second-the immobility, the shocked expression-and then a stream of blood gushed from his mouth. By that stage, the rep had already flung herself headlong onto the floor and rolled under the floating divan. The air smelled of burnt caramel-the smell of plasma-and of the sickly sweet smell of blood. Plasma shots didn't make a sound, so you only knew someone was shooting at you when the cold light opened up a hole in you. Bruna crawled under the sofas and sought protection behind the Ming chest of drawers. She took out her own gun, which seemed so small in her large hand, and tried to weigh up her options. From behind her precarious barricade, she couldn't see anyone. The memorist had fallen facedown on the floor; the shot had entered through his neck and seemed to have split his windpipe. They must have used a black plasma gun, an illegal weapon of the sort that turned its luminous impulse into a broad beam when it hit the target. That was the reason why so much blood had come out of the memorist's mouth, the reason for the instant destruction. Anyway, the shot must have come from the door. It was the only entrance to the place, right next to the elevator, and it clearly led to the stairs. She held her breath and listened carefully. She couldn't hear anything other than the liquid bubbling of the dead man's blood. And she couldn't see anything either.
But the a.s.sailant, or a.s.sailants, must still be there.
Or maybe they'd only wanted to kill the memorist?
She waited.
And waited. Surely they're gone already, she thought. The Chinese chest of drawers she was trying to shelter behind was of no more use against a black plasma gun than a sheet of paper. If the a.s.sa.s.sin had wanted to kill her too, he would have done so already. Cautiously, and following the route she'd previously worked out, Bruna moved from the chest of drawers to the big armchair, from the big armchair to the table, and from the table to the desk. There she stopped, because the worst part came next, an un.o.bstructed and relatively long stretch to the door. The warehouse didn't have any windows but instead was illuminated by solar panels, so she'd have to leave the same way she had come in, but taking the staircase rather than the elevator, which could turn into a cramped trap. Use the same route that the a.s.sailant had no doubt taken.
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