State of Decay

out, and the streets and sidewalks were thick with early-morning commuters. When the train joined the main railway, the concrete building facades flashed by, and in the distance, past the field of monorail tracks, the city sprawled for as far as the eye could see. Skyscrapers formed a mass of geometric shapes, dwindling to the horizon until they were lost in the haze of morning snow. Beyond that, the city proper’s skyline rose like a huge monolith above the rest. I watched it for a while with a sleepy stare as droplets streaked across the window.

The car was clean but showing its age, with worn trim and fading LCDs that scrolled schedule information, advertisements, and public-service warnings. It was packed full but quiet, as passengers stared at their computer screens, keypads, and styluses, whispering just over the hum of the track. They had the heat on a little too high, and the air smelled like coffee and cologne. Despite the attacks and the general unrest on the streets these days, it was almost peaceful.

I had managed to pinpoint the security camera closest to the corner where the murder took place, and had them send me the contents of its recording buffer for the hours corresponding to the time of death. I watched it on my computer tablet as another train whipped by the window, heading in the opposite direction. I could make out the vehicle in the lower left-hand corner of the frame and was able to pick out the license plate number. The sidewalks were crowded with people on either side of the street, heading back and forth and ducking in and out of shops. Everyone was bundled up against the cold, making it hard to pick out facial details. After an hour or so it had begun to snow, further obscuring the image.

A message came in, flagged urgent. Someone was on the line, waiting. Moving the footage off to one side, I brought up the image a second before I decided I should screen it. In a window I could see Serena’s face, lips pressed together as she waited. A receipt had already been sent, so it was too late to try to duck her. The expression on her face said I’d already been doing that too long.

I opened the connection and typed.

Hello, Dr. Pyznar. I’m on the train. Nonverbal only, please.

She looked at me from the screen and frowned, but not in an angry way.

These psych exams are mandatory, Faye. For everyone in the department.

I know.

The results of your blood chemistry have come back.

And?

The bottom line is, it’s obvious to anyone who looks that you take too many stims and too many tranquilizers. Knocking yourself out and then shocking yourself awake isn’t the same as sleeping.

She didn’t have to tell me that, but unfortunately, at the moment it was all I had. I was a second-tier citizen. I never served in the military, but I was wired for Posthumous Service. Making detective was the first step toward at least a first-tier retirement. My caseload would dictate the rest.

Are the levels within tolerance?

You mean, are they within the department’s acceptable range? Yes, but—

So I’m okay?

She pursed her thin lips, fixing me with a frustrated look. My recommendations hold some weight.

My eyes drifted to the window containing the security footage. Scanning through, I watched the snow pile up in fast motion until it covered the windshield of the car. People continued to cross in front of it until a small figure broke off and approached the driver’s-side door and got in. I stopped the image, backed it up, and let it play.

The figure was female: the victim. She approached the car, unlocked it using the remote, then opened the door. She didn’t seem as though she heard or saw anything strange. She got in and shut the door behind her.

This shouldn’t even count as the evaluation. Doing something else at the same time isn’t helping.

Doctor, I’m in the middle of a murder investigation.

She sighed.

I know. Tell me, at least: Are you still having the dreams?

Yes. I had one last night.

How are they affecting you these days? How do they make you feel?

Sore.

If you’re tense enough in sleep to wake up with muscle aches, that’s not good.

Tell me about it.

What about the voice?

It’s not a voice, it’s my voice…. Talking to myself helps me think. That doesn’t make me crazy, does it?

Not yet.

Can we call this done?

On the screen she frowned again, but again, not in an angry way. She wasn’t mad; she was concerned, and I knew that, but there was just too much going on.

The next exam is in three months. You have to come in for that one. Physically come in.

I will. Thank you, Doctor.

There’s no point in making first tier if you work yourself into an early grave. Slow down.

I will. Thank you.

Closing the window, I smiled, thinking that it had gone better than I expected. She was going to give me a pass for now; one more thing off the list. I turned my attention fully back to the security footage.

It had gotten dark out by that point in the feed, and the car was in shadow. Even after enhancing the image, all I could get from the driver’s-side window was a reflection. The people on the sidewalk were passing right by the grille of the car, completely unaware that behind the blanket of snow on the windshield, Mae Zhu was being quietly murdered.

I watched closely, but there wasn’t any observable movement to tell what was happening inside, and no one gave the car even a passing glance that might indicate they had heard anything strange. I followed the passersby while keeping track on the camera’s timer; it took only fifteen seconds before anyone who had been close enough to see what happened had moved on, outside the line of sight. In that amount of time, not one of the hundreds of people on the street was even aware of the fact that anyone was inside the car. It would have been the same when he got in.

I started scanning through again and saw the back door open and a man get out. He shut the door behind him casually, and walked out of frame as if nothing was wrong.

I backed it up to try to get a better look at him, but he knew about the camera; he was wearing a long, dark coat that covered his body, with a hood that concealed his face, given the camera angle. More than that, though, when I tried to enhance the image, there was some kind of distortion, like something corrupted the signal. He must have been carrying a baffle screen in his pocket or on his belt. He obviously didn’t mind being seen, but he didn’t want to be recorded.

I scanned back, looking for the time when he actually entered the car, but he had been in there for a while; the security cameras began overwriting every twelve hours, and he had gotten in at some point before the beginning of the current buffer.

All those people around. That was bold.

I rubbed my eyes. He’d been sitting in that car as I was home in bed, finally managing to drift off to sleep.

“Holy shit,” a young man said from toward the front of the car, his voice piercing the quiet. I looked up and saw the passengers in the seats ahead were focusing outside the window. I saw something flickering up ahead.

“Is that for real?” someone asked.

It took a few seconds to register—something up ahead was on fire. The train approached the source of the flames, and people began moving to my side of the car to get a better look.

When we got closer I saw what looked like an armored car was sitting in the middle of an empty parking lot where disused buildings towered on three sides. Fire poured out of the cab, and sent blue-black smoke upward in a thick column that rose high into the air. I could see a crowd of people had started to approach the vehicle before