DeathWeb (Fox Meridian Book 3) Read online

  ‘Huh?!’ Fox’s eyes widened and she felt her stomach lurch. ‘I don’t do–’

  ‘Politics. Yes, I know, but we have a perfect pairing for several of the test amendments, like this one. The general has the authority, and Miss Meridian has the passion. You can see how she wants to see justice done.’ She punctuated the statement with a clenched fist stabbing at the air. ‘I want both of them in interviews. I have a list of the people we want them in front of.’ Fox’s stomach finished lurching and sank into her boots.

  Jackson was wincing. ‘You do realise that Fox is a guest in my home occasionally? If I have to listen to the complaints about this, you’d better be absolutely sure you need her.’

  ‘I am. Trust me.’

  That just made Fox’s stomach sink further.

  ~~~

  ‘You need to take your own advice,’ Marie stated flatly. ‘Confidence. You know what you’re doing, you know what you want to say, just have some confidence.’

  ‘She’s right,’ Sam added. ‘We have been spouting that rhetoric at her for weeks and it does apply.’

  Fox looked at Kit, in case she had something to say. She did. ‘I’m not saying anything. I don’t want that scowl directed at me.’

  ‘At last, someone with sense!’ Fox raised her eyes, and hands, to Heaven. ‘I am really not the kind of person you want in front of a camera pontificating about politics.’

  ‘Why?’ Sam asked, his gaze level despite the scowl.

  ‘Because… Because I’ll get pissed off and say something–’

  ‘And you don’t think this Barrera woman has figured that out?’

  ‘I–’

  ‘You don’t think that, maybe, she wants you to blow your stack, even if it’s in a controlled way. She said she wanted you for the passion you bring to the debate.’

  ‘I know, but–’

  ‘Your opponents will be debating this entire resolution largely on passion. They’ll be suggesting that NAPA cannot do the job and that private citizens should be handling it. There will be much talk of militias and the right to bear arms. Despite the probable need for contracted private organisations, the emphasis will be placed upon communities policing themselves, defending their own values, which is in many ways a laudable goal, but in practice it never seems to work out as well as intended. There needs to be logic to explain the problems, but there needs to be passion to counter the emotion.’

  Fox glowered at him. ‘I should hire you to do it for me.’

  ‘I am not the CIO of Palladium Security Solutions. I do meet another useful requirement of a partner for General Graves, however, and you also have that in spades.’

  ‘Huh?’

  ‘People still believe beautiful people more than ugly ones,’ Marie said.

  ‘My young colleague has it right again,’ Sam said, smirking.

  Fox gave up, sagging into the cushions of the sofa. ‘Oh, don’t start. Ryan says he wants me on the recruiting blips for when we need to pull in more security staff. Graves said something about… Rosie the Riveter?’

  Kit’s lips twitched, though it seemed like even Sam had not encountered that reference. The kitsune raised a hand and an image appeared beside it: the classic ‘We Can Do It!’ poster image of a tough woman in a blue shirt and red polka-dot bandana flexing her muscles. ‘She was a cultural icon during the second of the world wars. The idea was to get women into roles which were traditionally male, such as riveting, since the men were off fighting and someone had to build the equipment.’

  ‘I do not look like that.’

  ‘No.’ Kit flipped the image to show a sexier, blonde version of the same, this time a still of considerably better quality. ‘This is a singer, Christina Aguilera, portraying the same style of character in a much later music video. More your style. The “Rosie” archetype continued well into the early part of this century, particularly as the equality movement picked up. It died away again in the forties.’

  ‘There was a really crass Army recruiting campaign in the late forties,’ Fox said. ‘“Come Join This Man’s Army.” The slogan was accompanied by a woman with enormous tits who would have been seriously on charges for the state of her uniform. Did suggest she was kicking ass, but it was fairly sexist. It worked, raised recruitment of both sexes for the next two or three years.’

  ‘Sex sells,’ Sam said, ‘even now when it’s more readily available than ever.’

  ‘You two could sell sand in a desert,’ Marie said.

  Fox gave a shrug. ‘Only if I have to be passionate about it.’

  8th June.

  ‘Oh it just gets worse,’ Fox moaned as she stepped out of the shower. ‘And when does Barrera sleep?! Barely eight-thirty and she’s wanting plans for a conference I hadn’t heard about until two minutes ago.’

  ‘There’s a conference?’ Marie mumbled. She sat up, rubbing at her eyes. ‘What conference?’

  ‘According to this, it’s going to be the “Future of Policing Conference,” and it’s going to take place in a convention centre MarTech Services runs beside the main MarTech tower.’

  ‘Future of Policing. Right.’

  ‘And the proposers of the resolution are holding it, but the announcement says it’ll cover all aspects of policing, no matter what the outcome.’ Fox frowned, sitting down to pull a bodysuit up her legs. ‘So they’ve been planning this for a while, but they left the announcement and, presumably, the booking to the last minute to give everyone else no time to prepare.’

  ‘Uh, why? When is it?’

  ‘A week, starting the twenty-first of June. Okay, nearly two weeks, but still…’

  Marie shook sleep out of her head and blinked. ‘You can do that? Just book a conference hall at that kind of notice?’

  Fox gave a shrug. ‘Apparently. Large-scale things like this aren’t that common. A lot of them are held in virons. I guess the building is mostly hotel, but it has facilities for hosting a conference and it’s sometimes useful.’

  ‘Generally for large, corporate events,’ Kit said, appearing beside the bed. ‘MarTech occasionally gathers as many people together as possible for a company party. Political or semi-political events are not so uncommon. Many with political leanings like to do their persuading face-to-face.’

  ‘I guess that makes sense,’ Marie said. ‘Kit, could you make sure the coffee is strong? I feel like I need the motivation.’

  ‘Just because you didn’t get the part yesterday,’ Fox said, ‘doesn’t mean there won’t be another along soon. And it’s all good experience.’

  ‘This was stage work. Real stage work, on a stage, with real costumes, and sets. On a stage.’

  ‘I got the stage element of the deal.’ Fox understood what Marie was getting at: there were relatively few actual stage acting roles about these days because there were relatively few theatres. ‘There’ll still be other roles. You realise that you haven’t really been trying to do this for that long?’

  ‘I know.’ Marie stumbled out of bed and then walked around, past Fox, to get to the shower. ‘I just really kind of wanted– Hey!’ Her whine was cut off as Fox pulled her down onto her lap.

  ‘Have some breakfast, let it settle, and I’ll come out running with you.’

  ‘It’s too hot to run.’

  ‘Not if we take the maglev out to the tower and run in the park at the top.’ Bending her head, Fox nipped at the point where Marie’s shoulder shaded into her neck and Marie let out a soft moan.

  ‘If you keep doing that, I’ll just want to go back to bed.’

  Fox nibbled her way up to Marie’s ear, and her hands slid up to cup Marie’s full breasts. ‘Get yourself nice and motivated and I’ll see if I can spare an hour this afternoon to finish what I’ve started.’

  Marie squirmed. ‘That’s mean… But it’s working. Let me go before I stop thinking.’

  Fox pinched the girl’s nipples, getting a cry of something between pain and pleasure out of her before letting go and standing to give Marie a push. ‘Your
wish is my command.’

  ‘You’re mean. I’m going to come in the shower.’

  ‘Not if you want there to be any coffee left when you get out,’ Fox sing-songed as she skipped toward the door.

  With an outraged squeak of protest, Marie bolted for the shower and Fox grinned, even as she began composing emails to be sent out to various people asking about the damn conference.

  ~~~

  A kilometre up in the air seemed like an odd place to go running, but the park at the top of the MarTech tower was quite a beautiful place and, even if all you could really do was run in circles, it was temperature controlled and comfortable, even in the baking heat of a New York summer.

  Fox could not entirely enjoy it since her head was full of data, and Terri and Jackson. ‘You really think we can present the detective kit at this thing?’ Fox asked of the two telepresence portraits. The people they represented were in the same building. Jackson could have seen her by looking out his window, though Terri was down in one of the labs. This was still the easiest way to handle the conversation.

  ‘We’ve got a couple of weeks,’ Terri said. ‘Well, almost two weeks. I’m pretty sure we can have the basic AIs ready by then. It’s the hardware that worries me.’

  ‘I think we should be fine,’ Jackson said, ‘assuming that I can get some time on the fabricator in Sam’s house once that’s fitted.’

  ‘That should be this week, right?’ Fox said. ‘I mean, Alice was talking the end of this week for completion.’

  ‘I’m assuming next week before we can use the thing. That should still be enough time to produce the equipment. We run the presentation as a trio. For some insane reason, people seem to like hearing the tech stuff from me, but the two of you doing a lot of the presenting will definitely pretty the whole business up. If there’s one thing I’ve learned over the years, it’s that a pretty face goes a long way when you’re selling things to people.’

  ‘And we want Fox to get a fair bit of exposure at the event,’ Terri added. ‘This way, you can actually show off what you know about detective work as well as showing off our new product.’

  Fox flicked a glance at her running partner. ‘Hey,’ she said silently, ‘we want this to be worn by anyone and for it to be useful, right?’

  ‘That’s the idea.’

  ‘So what if we get someone, not a detective, to wear the thing and do some detective work. Think it’s up to it?’

  ‘If it’s a straight technical problem, yeah. Fingerprinting or some other form of evidence collection. You want to get one of Ryan’s security guys up on stage?’

  ‘I was thinking of someone who really doesn’t know much about police work.’ Aloud, Fox said, ‘Hey, Marie, it’s not actually acting, but how would you like a job on a stage?’

  ~~~

  ‘You have to be kidding,’ Marie said. To be honest, Fox was impressed: most people were paralysed for several minutes on seeing the inside of Jackson’s solarium. Marie had recovered quite quickly from visiting one of the richest men in the world while wearing bright green running gear. ‘I don’t know the first thing about forensic analysis.’

  ‘That’s the whole point,’ Fox replied.

  ‘We get someone who knows nothing, or next to nothing, about the subject,’ Terri said, ‘and we get the tutor system to walk them through it. If you can do it, then someone with basic security training, or even some local guy with barely any training at all, can do it. I’m confident of my software, Marie.’

  ‘And I am… reasonably confident of my hardware design,’ Jackson said. ‘There may be a little rapid prototyping involved, but I’m sure we’ll have everything ready for the presentation.’

  ‘Do I at least get to try it out?’ Marie asked.

  ‘We make sure it fits,’ Fox said, ‘and that it interfaces properly with your implant, but that’s it. We really want you to put the thing on and just do what it tells you.’

  Terri grimaced. ‘We’d normally at least try this out before we do it for real in front of an audience. I guess there’s nothing wrong with trying it in the lab with another tester. Wow. Now I’m nervous.’

  ‘It will make an exceptional demonstration of the capabilities of the system,’ Jackson said. ‘All we have to do now is make it work. However, Marie, that is not your concern. If you’re happy to do this, we’ll pay standard rates for the week. There’s a stand in the vendor hall which we can put you to work on, handing out leaflets, sweet-talking the delegates, and we’ll get you out to demo the harness. And after that, I think, we’ll have you in it on the stand because people will want to see it up close. Yes, I believe this is going to work quite well.’ His attention shifted to Fox. ‘You need to talk to Dia. She’s sorting out the debates and lectures we plan to get involved in. I’ll tell her about the presentation plans.’

  Fox nodded, sagging a little. ‘Yeah. So, Marie, you up for this? You can say no, but it’s paid work.’

  ‘And on a stage,’ Marie said, grinning a little. ‘I’ll do it. It’s for a good cause anyway.’

  ‘Which good cause is that?’ Fox asked.

  ‘Oh, I could really do with some better clothes for doing casting calls in.’

  11th June.

  ‘The crew are having some difficulty getting the fabricator equipment into position,’ Vaughn said, her avatar shuffling a little in its virtual seat. ‘I’ve a list of excuses. Extra precision required in the support structures. Unusual size of some of the components causing difficulty. Basically, however, it comes down to Monday before the fabricator is in place and then they’ll need another day to clean up and make sure everything’s finished off properly.’

  Sam, who would not normally be sitting in on a Palladium board meeting, shrugged. ‘My apartment is paid through the end of the month. I was not planning to move in a hurry. I’ve never got to do it in a leisurely, measured fashion before and I plan to enjoy it.’

  ‘Jackson’s been informed?’ Fox asked. ‘He was keen on getting that fabricator to build him prototypes for the new hardware.’

  ‘He knows,’ Vaughn replied. ‘He’s been keeping a watch on the workmen ever since they started on the installation.’

  ‘Uh-huh, and I think my house guest will be okay with waiting on moving back for an extra couple of days. Marie?’

  ‘I’m fine. More time for acting practice. Once we’re back over there, I have to do housekeeping things too.’

  ‘Since we have our “demo dolly” here,’ Eaves said, almost keeping the smirk off his face, ‘perhaps we could discuss the conference?’

  ‘Pretty sure that’s a politically incorrect term,’ Fox told him, ‘but I’ll accept it once since she is a real doll. In the old, Hollywood sense of the word.’

  ‘You’re not really old enough to remember Hollywood,’ Sam pointed out.

  ‘I like old movies. Some of them.’

  ‘And they still do stage versions of Guys and Dolls in Chicago,’ Marie put in. ‘I can live with being a demo dolly. Especially since the contract came through and Mister Martins’ idea of standard rates is apparently a little higher than most people’s.’

  ‘You were thinking of standard rates for actors, I’d imagine,’ Eaves told her. ‘He was thinking of standard rates for short-term office staff in MarTech. MarTech pays well.’

  ‘They sure do. From my perspective, the gig is easy enough. I’ll be nervous as Hell at the presentation because I don’t want this kit screwing up because I did something wrong, but I even had a very vague word with my acting coach and his opinion was that being nervous would work for us. The audience will see it and know I’m not faking it. I’ll need good briefing material for the stand though. So will anyone else you plan to have on there.’

  ‘We’ve got that taken care of,’ Vaughn said. ‘Full briefing documents and a virtual tutor program which can take you through the company line on pretty much everything. What kind of implant do you have?’

  ‘It’s a MarTech VirtAI Ten.’

  ‘
But she runs LWOS on it,’ Fox added.

  Marie’s cheeks coloured. ‘It does what I need!’

  ‘The hardware is quite adequate to run our software,’ Vaughn said. ‘LWOS is perfectly adequate for many people, Fox, even if I believe a true virtual assistant is preferable.’

  ‘Rumour is that LifeWeb agree,’ Eaves said. ‘The version seven software is apparently going to be quite an upgrade. Class three AI instead of class two. Increased use of modularity to make it more flexible.’

  ‘They’ve built LWOS on a class two for years,’ Fox said. ‘Why the change?’

  ‘Well, rumour is that it was Grant that kept the same codebase going. Now he’s finally retired they’re taking the opportunity to shift to more effective software. Yet another rumour suggests that they may produce a class four AI version which would finally be effective with all those social interaction modules they tried to force onto a class two.’

  ‘I love sitting in on board meetings,’ Marie muttered, her eyes wide.

  ‘Your implant could not run a class four AI, Marie,’ Kit informed her, smiling, ‘but it could handle a class three, assuming they do not go over the top with it.’

  ‘I can live with that,’ Marie replied. ‘Anyway, if we’ve got support for the stand, it should be good. Have you decided on some sort of corporate look for us minions?’ Eaves looked at Vaughn who blinked back at him. ‘Maybe something like the uniform you use for your security people?’

  ‘I’ll talk to marketing,’ Eaves said. ‘Good call. You can come to our meetings more often.’

  ‘She’s going to be cleaning my home,’ Fox said. ‘Don’t be surprised if she does.’

  ~~~

  The murder room was looking full. Fox turned slowly, taking in the new images and links. ‘Are you sure about this, Kit?’

  Kit nodded. ‘Ninety-two per cent taken across the board with a variance of three point nine per cent. Eleven victims so far, the last of those was found on April twenty-seventh of this year in Berlin, Germany. I do not believe I will uncover more until the killer strikes again.’

  Fox followed the trail. ‘So he kills number six here and then number seven turns up on Christmas Day in Cape Town, South African Federation.’