Medusa: A Tiger by the Tail

people had gone up and we had no curious gawkers, but there was certain to be a couple of curious train people pretty quickly.

The two monitors were pushovers. I managed to chop them both cold before they realized what had happened, then killed them a bit more cleanly but no less efficiently. I had to move damned fast—their bags were still on the platform, and the camera would at least have seen that.

I quickly got rid of the transport clothing and pulled off the man’s monitor uniform. I was working against time and just barely got it right. Fortunately, the man was not too far off my size, so I was able to adjust myself for a reasonable, if slightly uncomfortable, fit. It only had to look presentable.

I took the risk of rolling the bodies out and under the train when a quick peek showed, incredibly, nobody looking in my direction or even, it seemed, aware that anything was going on. Then I walked back out onto the platform, picked up a bag, turned, and called back loudly, “Okay, I’ll meet you in the main terminal!” Hoisting the bag on my shoulder, I then took the moving stairs myself.

The main terminal was, of course, still pretty busy, and that helped a lot. I needed another switch, one not so easily traced, and quickly, but no opportunity presented itself. I walked¹ into the lavatory, looked through the bag, found some evidence that this private was a new. transfer to Gray Basin, and decided to take a chance, at least for the moment. The train wouldn’t be turning around until it was cleaned and serviced, about two or three hours. If they didn’t look for that passenger agent too hard, I might have some tune before the bodies were discovered. Such callous murder was so totally alien to this society they would search everywhere for the missing agent before looking for a body. The other recruit was almost certainly new herself and unlikely to be missed immediately, either. If, and it was a big if, the computer hadn’t flagged the two of them dropping their bags and running out of view. But who could know?

Using the private’s card, I took the bus to TMS headquarters. I needed another TMS body because, again, I bore only a vague resemblance to the dead monitor. Luckily, I knew Gray Basin’s TMS building pretty well, including, thanks to the probably late Major Hocrow, many of its own dead areas.

I got off a couple of blocks before reaching headquarters and managed to toss the bag into a trash receptacle before walking boldly down to the building. If only the people knew how many dead zones there were in any major city there’d be hell to pay, I thought with some amusement. The alley with the trash bin had a camera, but it was mounted high on a wall and easily seen. So by just keeping the trash bin between me and it I couldn’t be seen. They still might send somebody to check the trash, of course, but by then I’d be somebody else—I hoped.

I entered by the garage rather than the front door, my uniform being sufficient to get no more than nods from a few monitors.

There was a single camera mounted on a slowly rotating and wide-open mount in the center of the car- maintenance garage. A piece of cake. I just walked along until I found a monitor checking a car for something, struck up a mild conversation, then, when the camera and mark were easily in the right positions, chopped him. This time I had had a few minutes to study the intended victim’s features and the luxury of a less messy kill, so I had no trouble in duplicating her features. She was a fairly large woman and things fit pretty well, and, under the car, I was able to change quickly and efficiently into her uniform.

I found the replication trick a cinch, at least as far as I knew. Just concentrate on the victim, match his or her Warden configuration to yours, and let your Wardens emulate the pattern. It was kind of weird to feel hair grow out rapidly on my head, and to watch flesh act as if it were something independently alive and fluid; but the actual change was so damned easy, now that I had a few minutes.

When I climbed out from under the car I was the private, to all onlookers, anyway, and again I timed the camera just right to stash the body in the car’s trunk. With any luck, it might be a couple of days before the body was found, and I didn’t need that long.

Satisfied, I took out “my” card, called the elevator, and rode up to the desk and central processing area I knew so well. This was always a busy area, and the risk I ran here had mostly to do with meeting some friend of the person I was supposed to be. I couldn’t hold that kind of pose for a moment against somebody who knew the original well.

The important thing, though, was to look and act as if you belong and you’re working on somebody’s instructions. Usually that’s enough to get by in public areas, where people just don’t expect this sort of thing. I went in back to the small compartments, each with its own terminal, that TMS monitors used when filing reports. I picked an empty one, flicked on the terminal, and started.

While I expected no trouble in breaking the simple computer codes generally used, I was surprised to find that these terminals needed no codes at all. You just stuck in your card, which certified that you were a legitimate TMS monitor, and that was enough when the computer monitor checked appearance against file. No fingerprints, no retinal check, just a simple method for a society that took far too much for granted.

I punched up kor—chtno—lu and then sat back and waited for the data to come up on the screen. I scrolled quickly through the basics to the last entry, which was what I wanted:

arrested 1416 officers centrum 17-9-51. processed ob tms 0355 18-9-51, judo ud, subj. ref. centrum district, REL. CENTRUM CUST. 0922 18-9, DEPT. 41 IV GB

1705. case closed. ref. #37-6589234.

It wasn’t hard to figure out what had happened. Ching had been brought here in the early morning, processed, judged guilty and sentenced to UD—Ultimate Demotion—then turned over to Centrum officially. She was to leave at 1705—in less than an hour. The computer didn’t say how, but it had to be via the shuttle. I punched the reference number given and got a similar readout:

HONO, W-O UNCLASS., ARRESTED 1416 OFFICERS CENTRUM 17-9-51. The rest of the listing was identical to Ching’s, except, of course, that the end reference referenced Ching’s case. So they were both going out on the shuttle. Well, maybe I should, too.

Bluff and bravado will only get you so far, but it does wonders in a tightly regimented society. I walked out the front door without any problem and headed for the bus to the central terminal. I wasn’t about to risk trying for a TMS car—the motor pool authorizations would be pretty tightly watched. Then I stopped, cursed myself, walked around to the garage, and found the car with the body still hidden inside. This, of course, had to be her car, and that would make things easy—if the damned thing worked.

It did, and I was soon out of the garage and heading toward a city gate, a dead body under the back seat and a really irritating squeal coming from somewhere in front that had obviously been the reason for the service.

I reached the road gate to the space terminal with no problem, but had to get out, present my card to the monitoring machine, and tell it that I was going out to the terminal with some special paperwork that some other monitor had forgotten. It was a routine enough thing, and I had no trouble getting the barriers lowered quickly.

The shuttle was already in, and I made it with almost twenty minutes to spare. I hadn’t been back here since arriving on Medusa, but the place hadn’t changed much. It was small and cramped and not very impressive, since passengers were infrequent. I saw only a couple, both official-looking, sitting around now. No sign of Ching or Hono, though, let alone of the arresting officers. For the first time I began to fear that I’d blown it.

My confusion must have been all too apparent, for one of the government employees waiting to board, a white-haired man of middle age, stood up and came over to me. “Something the matter, young woman?”

I was a little startled for a moment, since I’d forgotten I was playing a woman at this point. Actually, this was the first conversation I had had with anyone since assuming this identity, and the change had almost slipped my mind.

“Yes, sir. I have some papers that never got cleared for a couple of prisoners supposed to go out to Centrum, and now I don’t see ’em.” The voice sounded funny, but more or less female, which was all that mattered on a world like this.

He frowned. “Let me see them.”

I was ready. I had made hard copies of several forms with the dispositions of Ching’s and Hono’s cases for just such an eventuality. They wouldn’t fool a monitor, but they’d get by a bureaucrat, I hoped.