her think of Marty. She looked at the mansion in front of her, biting her lip. Bitch. She felt bested by Marty and hadn’t forgotten any of the slights or her arrogance. But I got you, she thought. I got you good.
No you didn’t. She escaped. You don’t have her. You didn’t think she’d get away. You thought you would pick her up the next day. You failed. Again.
She didn’t like this voice. And it was speaking up more often. The more she succeeded, the more the voice had to say about her failings. She wanted to stop it but she didn’t know how. It seemed it was never satisfied.
You lost. You lost Martine Shorne and you lost Gabriel Zumar. You had them both -
Wait. Shut up. That’s it. That’s where I’ve seen him before. Walking with Bo Vinh. The images that Shorne presented. Jonah James Oliver is Philip Zumar’s son. Gabriel, the runner, is his brother. And Sir Thomas made him his nephew. But why? She chewed her lower lip and folded her arms across her chest. Then, twisting her upper lip between a thumb and a forefinger, she contemplated her revelation.
Cochran strolled slowly across the lawn to the door of the mansion, thinking it would be hard to sleep now, wondering if Sunita would be awake.
Chapter 34
Outskirts of Bangkok, Outside the Residence of Jonathan Wigley
Friday 14 February 2110, 10:25pm +7 UTC
The cicadas sang loud enough to cover the sounds of me climbing over the wall. I felt an urgent need to urinate. A mosquito buzzed around my ear. I felt it land and a moment later took a hand off the ladder that went up the wall in front of me to rub the bite.
I needed to urinate badly. I knew it was nerves but I still needed to pee. I couldn’t. It would leave too much trace. I thought about getting off the ladder and retracing my steps along the bottom of the wall to the Titan parked half a kilom away but dismissed the thought. I brought my bladder under control and took out one of the small sealable bags that Maloo had given me. I took out my cock and put it in the bag. Closing the seal around my cock, not too tightly, I relaxed.
My pee sounded loud to me as I scrunched over, crouching and hanging off the bottom rung of the ladder that went up Wigley’s wall. I changed angle so the splash would hit the side of the bag. It was quieter. I squeezed out the last drop and shook off, taking the bag off my cock, sealing it and placing it in a zipped pocket. On my way to kill someone with a bag of my own pee in my pocket.
Focus. I softly breathed out. I was hidden from view by the trunk and branches of a tree. I started to climb, one hand over the other. As I climbed, the sound of my heart thumping in my chest beat out the cicadas. I stopped, listened. The cicadas came back. In the far distance, a dog barking, music playing, jazz.
Reaching the top, I extended the ladder. I had to control my breathing. There was a light in a downstairs window. I looked around. Nothing. Nobody moving. No one in sight. I started out to cover the gap. It was about three meters. Moving forward in a crawl, hands and feet on the pipes of the ladder, I crossed the gap between the wall and his balcony. I crouched below the railing, hidden from the street by the pillars of the Greco-Roman style mansion. If Gabriel was right, this was Wigley’s room.
I reached into the black coveralls and felt for the handle of the dagger. I had to move. Move. The panic came on slow but strong. A light in the room went on, illuminating the back of the curtain. I realized that the light was turned on by Wigley, turned on by the man I was here to kill. I kept my breathing as shallow as possible but it seemed to speed up each time I tried to keep it quiet. No, I can’t do this. I can’t kill. I swallowed and licked my lips. My tongue was so dry that it stuck to them. I crawled back over the bridge to the wall, looking around me again. No one saw me. I went back over the wall and down the ladder to crouch behind the tree.
I slowed my breathing. My brain cleared. I heard the cicadas again.
My thighs ached from crouching. I cleared my thinking. Far off I heard a fight erupt among a pack of dogs. It’s not a choice. You have to do it. There is no other way of getting past Sir Thomas. None. If you don’t do this, you die, Mariko dies and maybe six point three billion people die. Or he dies. It’s either all of them or just Wigley.
I took my Devstick part way out of my inside pocket, shielding its light with my coveralls. 10:29pm. All of that happened in four minutes. It has to be done.
I swallowed. My throat was too dry. I opened the coveralls again and took a sip of water from the bottle that Maloo had provided. Don’t get dehydrated. I went up the ladder swiftly. I slowly raised my head over the wall and took another look around. Still nothing. I noticed that the cicadas had stopped. The night was still. The faint scuffling of rubber shoes on the rungs of the ladder was all that I could hear as I made my way to Wigley’s balcony. I went into a crouch against the railing and waited.
The light went off inside. I put on the gas mask and waited.
My thighs burned with the energy of being in a crouch and when I could stand it no more I went over the railing and laid flat on the floor of the balcony. The sound around me stayed the same. Nothing. In the distance I could hear the hum of a Travway. But nothing where I was. I swiveled until my face was mins from the clearfilm sliding doors.
I needed to cut a hole in the door so that I could pump in the gas that would knock Wigley out while I broke in. Maloo had given me a small circular disc, one side covered in tape to stick on to the door, the other a handle to pull out the plug. Far down on the right of the door I placed the disc and pressed hard to stick it to the door. I gave it a tug to make sure it was firmly attached to the clearfilm and then pulled the small cord that would cause the disc to burn through it. The edges of the disc started smoking. Tendrils of the smoke, the fried remains of the clearfilm door, floated up to be caught by the breeze over the balcony. The plug came free in my hand. I put it, and the circle of clearfilm attached to it, into my pocket.
I felt the cool air inside the room hit the end of my fingers in their thin-tipped gloves. I inserted the nozzle of the canister and turned the valve open full. In thirty seconds, six cubic liters of gas vented into Wigley’s room. I took out the magnet and placed it near the handle, holding it lightly against the door. With my thumb I turned it on and felt the pull of the metal bolts. I pulled it downwards and the doors unlocked. Maloo had obviously invaded property before as everything he had told me was working.
I slowly slid the door open. The seal squeaked once as it came free from its partner. I stopped and listened. Nothing. I could hear Wigley breathing. I slid the door open fully and stepped into the room. I could feel carpet under my feet, and I felt down the curtains with my hands until I found the manual button on the wall. The curtains slid open quietly and light from the Moon let me see in the room. I stayed low and went over to the edge of the sleeper. Wigley was on the other side. In a crouch, I crossed his room and checked his door. There was no bolt to lock.
I crouched my way back across the carpet to where Wigley lay sleeping with his head on his arm, curled up in the fetal position. The gas was enough to knock him out for five minutes, long enough for what I had to do.
I took out the injection Maloo had prepared and lifted the cover of the sleeper to one side. I grabbed the little toe of his left foot and carefully inserted the micro needle of the injector. It looked like it was in. I swallowed hard and pressed the button. The injector made a soft hissing noise and ended with a click. I pressed the red button and the micro needle withdrew. I put the injector, disarmed, back into my pocket and took out the mobile biosensor. I placed it against his throat, leaning over him. Wigley was dead.
I steeled myself and reaching over with thumb and forefinger, his eyelids suddenly opened and his eyes stared into mine. Why? I screamed in my mind. Why didn’t the injection work? Safety. The safety-catch on the injector. Maloo had stressed it three times. You have to twist up and around to release the safety catch. I hadn’t done it.
His eyes were just cents from mine and shocked. I dropped on top of him with my upper body, my hands grasping his upper arms and my legs pinning his thighs to the sleeper. His eyes were glazed. I waited. I could hear my heart in my eardrums. His pupils narrowed and he tried to sit up. Then he realized what was happening and pushed.
“Who, why, who are you?” he strangled out as he strained against my hold. I saw in his eyes that he was going to shout out and I dropped on him, forcing my gloved hand over his mouth. He got his left arm free and flailed
