Ure Infectus (Imperium Cicernus Book 4) Read online

  “I thought not,” the Agent said smoothly, not letting even a moment’s silence linger between them as he spoke conversationally. “It truly is a pity; society could use men like you working for them.”

  “Nice try; I’m not playing the word games,” Jericho snorted. As far as he was concerned, making Adjustments for the Timent Electorum was the highest form of public service of which a person was capable.

  “A pity,” the Agent chuckled, “I do so enjoy a bit of foreplay.”

  “Can I assume you’re less than interested in stopping the Adjustment?” Jericho asked evenly.

  “You may indeed,” the Agent replied warmly. “Truth be told…after reading the man’s file I find myself ambivalent regarding the necessity of your discharging the duty of your ‘office,’ such as it is.”

  The railway carriage the two men were riding came to a stop and the doors opened. The occupants moved out of the conveyance and the video feed switched stiffly between the previous video feed to one at the small boarding station.

  “So if you’re not interested in stopping me,” Jericho said, more than slightly surprised to hear the man admit such so readily, “then why follow him?”

  The target stopped and began to peruse a nearby window display, causing the Agent to do likewise. “My father was a big game hunter,” the Agent explained after the two had resumed their trek toward the target’s residence, “and he taught me when I was very young to learn as much about an animal as possible before putting it down. He said it was an opportunity to learn not only of the animal but also of myself, and I believe he was right.”

  “It’s a good piece of advice,” Jericho admitted, knowing that his work as an Adjuster had taught him a very similar lesson. He relaxed his body and leaned his shoulder against the butt of the rifle in a long-practiced, pre-shot routine which had served him well for decades.

  “I certainly think so,” the Agent agreed. “I must admit that you are considerably more interesting than most of my assignments…and, between you and me, I’m genuinely curious whether you’re going to electrocute him by overloading the magnetic coils in the lift, blow the apartment with a gas overload, use nerve gas—likely concealed beneath the kitchen sink—or pull the trigger of the rifle you’re holding against your shoulder.”

  Jericho felt the hairs on the back of his neck stand up. But he knew that if the Agent had a bead on him, either directly or indirectly, he would have already made it known. That Jericho had initiated the call meant that he still had an intelligence edge over the mysterious Agent—an edge that would seem to be disappearing more quickly than he had anticipated.

  “Make no mistake,” the Agent continued into the brief silence, “I cannot officially condone any of the aforementioned acts of barbarism, but it will illuminate several factors which may later be useful to me.”

  “So…what you’re saying is that you like to watch?” Jericho deadpanned as the two men neared the target’s apartment building and the camera feed switched to one of that building’s external security units.

  The Agent burst into laughter and actually drew some attention from passersby as he did so. “Nothing could be further from the truth,” the Agent assured him after quickly suppressing his laughter. “But I am glad to see that you have a sense of humor. Our line of work is usually so tedious, is it not?”

  “Are you suggesting we do the same thing?” Jericho asked neutrally. He knew it was important not to divulge too much about himself, but he also knew that he could gain valuable information about his pursuer if he played things right.

  “Of course,” the Agent replied with a hint of surprise in his voice. “We each locate, verify, and eliminate threats to our society’s well-being.”

  “Sounds like we should have drinks later,” Jericho said dryly as the video feed showed the target entering the lift—a lift which Jericho had actually considered overloading, just as the Agent suggested, but decided against it because of the cost to repair the damage.

  “If you like,” the Agent allowed as he went to a fire escape stairwell and, with little more than a quick series of taps and the swipe of his palm, overrode the security measures which restricted public access to it outside of an emergency. “But forgive my selfishness when I say I would prefer our little game went a little longer than that.”

  “You’re forgiven,” Jericho said as the Agent slipped off the camera feeds. His operator had apparently been unable to override the fire escape’s internal cameras, so although the Agent was inside a building over a hundred meters away, Jericho’s senses sharpened as he knew that he needed to be ready for anything.

  “So…no elevator,” the Agent said smoothly in his perfectly-composed voice, “which indicates that you’ve got something of a conscience. I suppose it wasn’t to be expected, considering the agency you work for.”

  “It’s not an agency,” Jericho said irritably.

  “Forgive me,” the Agent gushed as the lift bearing the mark stopped at seemingly each floor on its way to his destination: the sixteenth floor. “But we know so little about the actual operation of your people that some clarity on the matter would be greatly appreciated.”

  “It’s all in the First Right,” Jericho quipped as he settled against the butt of the rifle again while scanning the roof of the building for signs of movement. He was unwilling to risk the possibility that the Agent decided to line up a counter-shot after the Adjustment had been made. “Maybe you should read it?”

  “I prefer actual history to studying the philosophical wet dreams of our ancestors,” the Agent retorted casually.

  “You want history?” Jericho said measuredly. “Ok…how’s this? The man you followed, for whom society requested I target for Adjustment, is a Public Works and Highways overseer in Tsushima. Two years ago he shut down a major intersection and has, since then, re-routed traffic some three kilometers around it. This put unnecessary pressure on the adjoining streets and has already cost society roughly three million credits per month in lost productivity—due to trapping several thousand people per day in a needless diversion which lasted an estimated three minutes forty three seconds—in addition to unnecessary vehicle maintenance totaling nearly half that amount.”

  “Oh, I understand that part,” the Agent replied as the Adjustee exited the elevator.

  “Good,” Jericho said dryly as his link shifted from a camera feed to one showing a three-dimensional grid of the building across the street. A small, red, flashing dot appeared and was marked ‘Agent,’ and it did appear that he was still in the fire escape.

  A brief text message flashed across the screen which read, Getting hot here. Can’t crack their encryption before they break into my own system.

  He quickly tapped out a reply which read, Bug out ASAP. I’ll contact you in two hours’ time.

  He received a prompt reply, Copy that. I’ll make it up to you.

  “Something happen?” the Agent asked smoothly.

  “Just making sure everything’s where it should be,” Jericho replied as the target approached his front door. “Where was I?” he asked dryly.

  “Something about side streets,” the Agent replied, his voice a warm, encouraging tone.

  “Right,” Jericho said, “anyway, this guy has a cousin who owns a contracting company that won several bids for city street maintenance contracts in Tsushima. Long story short, the diversion of traffic increased the wear on an intersection this guy’s cousin maintains.”

  “Come now,” the Agent quipped irritably as the target entered the flat. At the same moment, the Agent’s icon on the three dimensional display moved down the corridor toward the same unit. “You can’t expect me to believe you would risk capture at this stage in the game over a little wasted concrete?”

  Jericho switched off the safety on his rifle and leaned in tight to the butt of the rifle. “You know that, do you?”

  “Of course,” the Agent replied with a long-suffering sigh, “even my limited psych profile suggests that while you
do care about the financial burden corruption places on society, it’s not what motivates you.”

  Jericho was surprised to hear the man suggest he had a psych profile on him, but he supposed it was possible—and equally possible that it was all a ruse. “Ok…let’s say a little girl was boarding her school shuttle the morning after the traffic was diverted,” he said, feeling a slight surge of anger as he did so. “And let’s also say that the human driver of that shuttle wasn’t aware of the redirected traffic, and an overloaded cargo hauler ran sidelong into the shuttle, killing both of its occupants while the hauler’s driver walked away without a scratch.”

  “Even if I accepted the premise that this was your real motivation for accepting this assignment, it sounds like you’ve got a few places you could assign the blame,” the Agent said casually as the target moved into the kitchen and washed his hands. When he finished doing so, the Agent sighed, “No nerve gas…interesting.”

  Jericho had considered the nerve gas also, but had decided against it for several reasons. He had used poison in the past, but there was something about it that never sat right with him. He was an instrument of the people’s retribution, and was decidedly against a painless death like that afforded by most of the available nerve gases.

  “I suppose you could place the blame on the driver of the cargo hauler,” Jericho said as he relaxed his body. According to surveillance records, three days out of four the Adjustee would sit in a chair set beside the window on which his rifle was trained. “You could even lay the blame at the feet of the shuttles driver…or, if you really want to stretch things, one could fault the local traffic directors for failing to put up the requisite warning signage. There’s probably even an argument for the people who allowed the overloaded vehicle to operate on a public road.”

  “Precisely; there are several people who deserve punishment in that particular chain,” the Agent said, as though it explained everything. “So what gives you the right to choose who gets punished?”

  Jericho smirked as the Adjustee settled into the chair for what would be the final time of his life. “The voters,” he replied as he squeezed the trigger, sending a round of depleted uranium-wrapped lead powder through the window. As it broke through the glass, the shell of depleted uranium broke apart and unleashed its contents, turning the Adjustee’s body into a shower of gore which covered the far wall in a shower of red.

  The bullet had been specifically designed to break apart after penetrating the transparent alloy of the window, and had delivered every Newton of its energy into the target’s body, essentially vaporizing his upper body in the process.

  The icon representing the Agent entered the flat as soon as the round impacted, but then the icon went dark. Jericho understood that the Agent had deliberately cut off the signal…and that suggested the Agent had been toying with him the entire time.

  “No explosion, either,” the Agent said disappointedly as he appeared at the window, through which a perfectly round hole a half inch across marked the bullet’s entry path. He looked through the newly-made hole and, seeming to make eye contact even at such a distance, smirked as he waved invitingly with an energy pistol gripped in his hand. “A traditionalist, then…interesting.”

  Jericho pulled back from the window, switched off the link, and initiated the countdown for a time-delayed acid shower to spray over the room and its contents after he had left. It would not destroy the equipment completely, but it would remove any organic trace evidence in the unlikely event the Agent decided to investigate the scene for clues.

  Jericho picked up the grocery bag which contained Benton’s requested pasta—which was a small price to pay for interrupting the man’s legendary privacy, especially for the entire voyage to Aegis Port City—and left the apartment, grateful for having successfully completed the first leg of what he was certain would be an increasingly dangerous journey.

  Chapter X: Cast Off!

  Masozi had examined the local news feeds at length after coming to terms with the fact that she had been framed by Chief Afolabi and an off-world Agent whose identity was still very much a mystery. She still had little in the way of concrete information, but she had corroborated most of the images Benton had shown her inside his secretive hideout.

  “Ain’t nuthin’ to be worked up over, girlfriend,” Benton said after several hours. He had gone for nearly an hour without speaking after helping her access several public news sources—as well as a few private ones, including the Investigator’s update channel. “Just think on it like you be gettin’ a fresh start; not many people be so lucky, you feel me?”

  She refrained from a biting remark, which required a not-insignificant amount of willpower on her part since her entire life had just been turned upside down in less than a day.

  “I’ll try to keep that in mind,” she said evenly as she flipped through a recent wave of reports that had just hit the feeds. Her heart sank when she saw that three more people had died as a result of the explosion at her apartment building, bringing the total to forty two.

  “It ain’t your fault,” Benton said, and she turned sharply toward him and saw his eyes—eyes with pale, pink irises—snap back and forth across the myriad displays arrayed above his bed. “They took advantage of your trust and set you up, yo. Only way you can get back at ‘em be by keepin’ your head down and servin’ up an ice-cold plate of good, ol’ fashioned, revenge.” Before she could reply with something scathing, there was a soft, clanging sound from below and Benton slapped his hands together before rubbing them in anticipation. “A-ha, dinner; I hope you like pasta, shorty.”

  She liked pasta very much, but she doubted she could work up an appetite. Still, the smell of veal and fresh, genuine, mozzarella cheese carried into the chamber as Jericho appeared at the door to the room with the medium-large parcel under his arm. The parcel was marked with the logo for the world-famous Casa Mia restaurant, which was far more expensive than Masozi had ever been able to afford—even for a major occasion. A single meal with drinks would likely cost as much as her entire month’s salary.

  “My favorite,” Benton said eagerly as Jericho brought the parcel to the obscenely large man’s bed. As he approached, a small table folded up from the bed’s side and Jericho placed the parcel on it. The horrifically obese man opened the parcel as Jericho pulled up a nearby chair—of which there were only two in the entire room, as Masozi had previously noted to herself. Benton produced a trio of disposable, thermal containers and said, “Dig in, y’all; this be the last real cookin’ we get ‘til Aegis.”

  Jericho waved off the proffered food and Masozi did likewise. Although…despite the turmoil going on between her ears over the day’s events, the food really did smell delicious.

  “Suit yourselves,” Benton said as he opened the first thermal container and delicately skewered its contents with a provided utensil. He drew a large forkful of crisp, green lettuce with tiny, pink shrimps speared on the tips of the fork and placed the bite of salad carefully into his many-chinned mouth. He chewed loudly, and Masozi was quite certain that her resolve to avoid eating would soon disintegrate in the presence of such gourmet food.

  “You have questions, Investigator,” Jericho said into the brief silence. “I promised I would answer however many of them I am able.”

  She focused on the man sitting on the other side of Benton’s bed, and studied his features. His eyes were the same, grey-blue color that she remembered, his skin was barely a shade darker than white, and his jaw was squarely-shaped with a pronounced dimple at the point of his chin—none of which traits were common to Virgin. His hair was significantly more salt than pepper, and was cut in a flat-top, military style. It was obvious from the way he moved and held himself that he was a powerful, agile specimen.

  She took a short breath and made her first query, “Why?”

  Benton, who had been chewing loudly on the delectably crisp lettuce—the last bit of which had been joined by tiny slivers of mozzarella cheese—stopped an
d cast a curious look her way while Jericho merely held her with his steely eyes.

  “Too vague,” Jericho said after a few, tense moments, during which time Benton’s eyes went back and forth between the two of them with open amusement.

  Masozi took an unconscious step forward. “Why would you save me? While profoundly shocking to me—in a manner which someone of your ilk is likely incapable of comprehending—I can at least understand several possible motives behind framing me for the various crimes of which I am now publicly accused.” She took another step forward, and stopped herself after realizing she had been unconsciously seeking the food which Benton had proffered. Masozi had the brief thought that she may never get another opportunity for such a fine meal, but she kept her focus on the mysterious man whose intervention had inexplicably spared her life.

  “Someone of ‘my ilk’?” Jericho repeated as a twinkle of amusement flashed across his eyes. He shook his head before sighing, “I suppose I can’t blame you that. There was a time I felt the same as you…but I’ve since opened my eyes to the realities of human existence. Still, to answer your question,” he said as he reached out to take one of the salad dishes Benton had offered, “I saved you because, simply put, it would be a waste of everything you are to let a man like Afolabi frame you…especially since several of the ‘crimes’ you are accused of were actually committed by me—”

  “And me!” Benton cut in, as though in comic protest and Jericho nodded shortly in acknowledgment.

  “None of what I do would be possible without the assistance of like-minded people,” Jericho said with a note of gratitude, which Benton seemingly ignored as he continued to devour the exquisite salad.

  “That still doesn’t answer my question,” Masozi said evenly, forcing her eyes to stay locked with his and not stray to the increasingly tempting food on the opposite side of the bed.

  “I imagine it doesn’t,” Jericho allowed with a shrug as he held the salad easily in one hand. “But I can say that someone of your qualities would be of great benefit to me in what I aim to do next. Beyond that, you’ll have to prove that you’re worthy of more clarification on the subject.”