Ure Infectus (Imperium Cicernus Book 4) Read online

“Settle in, girlfriend,” he said with a gesture to one of the cots, “it’s gonna be a long trip. But one thing you’ll learn about Jericho is that he’s a man of his word; you crack that code and he’ll do as he says.”

  There was the distant sound of a massive horn blowing, and Masozi realized it must have been the seafaring vessel’s castoff alert. She looked down at the pad in her hands and took a short breath before making her way to the cot and examining the seemingly endless stream of data.

  Chapter XI: One Solution Deserves Another

  It turned out that the stream of data was, effectively, endless. After examining it for nearly a week—during which time Benton and Jericho barely said a word to each other, and neither said even a single word to Masozi.

  Eve had made several attempts to interact with her, but Masozi had politely declined each such advance. The re-programmed hover drone’s overt sexuality was more offensive to Masozi than she had expected it to be. That irritation may have been more related to her being locked inside the cargo container without leaving for even the occasional breath of fresh air, but Masozi well-and-truly did find Eve’s personality more pathetic than she could tolerate for more than a few minutes at a time.

  Eve had, however, brought a set of real clothing for Masozi to wear. It was not a precise fit, but she gladly changed into it at the first opportunity. Without that wretched bodyglove clinging to her in all the wrong places, she felt more like herself—and considerably less exposed.

  On the eighth day of researching the seemingly random files, Masozi finally thought she found what she had been meant to uncover.

  Buried in the thousands upon thousands of items on the data pad, she found a correlation between the dates of each entry and several nouns which were placed prominently—which were often suspiciously mis-capitalized—and they began to form a kind of vocabulary.

  Another three days of research—during which time they drank plain water and ate nutrient bars, which was fine with Masozi in general but the lack of variety was beginning to wear thin on her—produced a rudimentary message which she triple-checked to verify its contents. Once she was certain she had done so, she went to Jericho and handed him the pad. She was interrupting his usual routine of calisthenics—a routine which Masozi had observed with more than a passing interest.

  He stopped in the middle of a set of push-ups and took the pad from her wordlessly before examining its contents and handing it back to her. “That’s a start,” he said evenly as he rolled his neck around, eliciting several audible cracks, “now tell me what it means.”

  “They’re the names of various magistrates, barristers, and even a few non-professionals with what seem to be notarial privileges,” she said shortly. “Each name has a date and an alphanumeric—which I can’t decipher—attached to it. So far I’ve found seventeen of them.”

  Jericho nodded approvingly as he keyed in a sequence of commands to the pad before handing it back to her. “You’ve got questions,” he said, rather than asked, “and I promised to answer some more of them.”

  “How is any of this related to where we’re going?” she asked measuredly, having considered the question carefully.

  Jericho rolled his shoulders and removed his exercise shirt, and for the first time Masozi saw a cluster of scars over the left side of his chest—one of which appeared to have been made quite recently. “Those are over a year old, so the only value they hold is as a primer to one of our many methods of communication. Essentially,” he said as he stretched his calves against a nearby wall, “whenever an Adjuster receives an Adjustment to carry out, that Adjuster has to find a minimum quantity of evidence supporting the popular request’s validity. The vast majority of requested Infectus Adjustments never take place,” he explained as he winced after moving his leg awkwardly. He gritted his teeth and continued, “Since most officials who actually are corrupt are too good at covering their tracks.”

  “I’m sorry, ‘Infectus Adjustments’?” she repeated.

  Jericho nodded shortly. “You’ve seen the three phrases on the Mark of Adjustment,” he said, as though it explained everything.

  And after a moment, she realized that it probably did. “Ure Infectus,” she repeated after recalling the image of the Mark on Mayor Cantwell’s desk.

  “Burn the Corrupted,” he said by way of translation as he began to stretch his arms over his head. “Ultimately, Infectus Adjustments are what the Timent Electorum does more than anything else. But it’s not enough to prove that a public official is corrupt; there are several criteria which need to be met before an Adjustment can take place.”

  “You keep calling them that,” Masozi interrupted, “you say ‘Adjustments’ when you’re really talking about simple assassinations.”

  “There’s nothing simple about an Adjustment,” he retorted in a tone that was both unyielding and somehow sympathetic. “And while some T.E. Adjusters are often little better than shackled assassins—including some of the ‘best’ of us, if I’m being totally honest,” he added darkly, “most of us don’t do this for the license to kill.” He snorted derisively, “There’s too much paperwork, for one thing, and for another our finances are strictly regulated once we take up the cause.”

  Hearing him speak of what he did as though it was little more than another form of law enforcement was both fascinating and disturbing. Masozi had, like everyone else on Virgin, learned the importance of keeping powerful officials in check. And the truth was, the record of human history showed that something like the Timent Electorum passage in their Bill of Rights was the only proven method to prevent wholesale oppression of a society.

  “We’re just tools, Investigator,” Jericho said as he began to wipe the sweat from his body. When he had matted his torso off, he picked up the data pad and handed it back to her, “And you’re not quite finished yet.”

  She cocked an eyebrow incredulously before looking down at the pad and seeing a whole slew of official documents, including tax filings, purchase receipts, bank records, and a whole host of other documents. She nearly gasped when she saw the name at the top of the file before breathing, “Mayor Cantwell.”

  “That’s his Adjustment record,” Jericho nodded gravely. “And by showing it to you I’m committing an epic breach of protocol, but I thought a gesture of good faith on my part was called for. Given the circumstances,” he added dryly, “you’ve been pretty sporting about all of this.”

  She scanned through the documents and found several alarming connections in just a few minutes’ time. Apparently, Mayor Cantwell had received a truly massive bribe from the PHL—the Professional Hammerball League—which amounted to nearly one hundred million credits. It was a staggering sum and the more she read, the more she realized just how corrupt he had actually been.

  “You begin to get a true picture of the man you, yourself, voted for three times,” Jericho said offhandedly.

  “How do you know…” she began, only to realize that with people like Benton working with—or, perhaps, for—him, there was very little information that Jericho would be unable to access.

  “All it would take is one look at your file to know everything there is to know about you, Investigator,” he said a bit more coldly than she would have liked. “Do you think those surveys you’ve been forced to fill out every day of your adult life aren’t logged somewhere? And do you think,” he added with a lopsided grin, “that there’s any way to keep a man like Benton from breaking into that log if the price is right? A person with that information would know more about you than anyone—including you.”

  Masozi stiffened, feeling as though she had been somehow violated but, oddly, also feeling less than surprised about it. There were comedians who made very good livings criticizing the nature of life on Virgin, specifically regarding the role of government in its citizen’s daily lives, so she supposed the idea had already taken root somewhere in her subconscious. “And you’ve read my ‘file’,” she concluded bitterly.

  Jericho shook his
head and chuckled softly. “I didn’t need to; I just guessed your voting pattern based on your line of work and departmental affiliation—he ran ninety four percent approval with New Lincoln law enforcement,” he explained with an indifferent shrug. “But to answer your question specifically, no,” he said seriously, “I didn’t read your file—and neither did Benton—which is why my revealing any of this to you is a sizeable risk on our parts. Five minutes with your file would have removed any trace of doubt from my mind as to how you would respond to all of this,” he gestured to the chamber with a wave of his arm, “but you’re not in need of Adjustment, so it would have been wrong of me to violate your privacy like that.”

  Masozi was actually more surprised by his admission—and the apparent veracity of it—than she was about anything else he had revealed in this, their longest, conversation.

  “That file,” Jericho said, pointed to the data pad emphatically, “shows that eighty five million credits were confirmed to have been transferred into off-world accounts which were verified by five, wholly independent, officers of the court. The evidence provided therein satisfied, to their impartial and unbiased judgment, a degree of reasonable certainty which in turn satisfied the criteria for Adjustment. Hence,” he said as he pulled a new shirt over his head, and Masozi stole a glance at his truly remarkable physique—especially for a mundane, well-past-his-physical-prime, man of his age, “the scene in Cantwell’s office—a scene which your former boss is now attempting to blame on you.”

  The reminder that her boss had betrayed her still stung her deeply, but she forced the rising tide of emotion which accompanied that particular memory. “Even if Cantwell accepted the bribe,” she said hesitantly, hoping to change the subject, “who decides the threshold for ‘Adjustment’?”

  Jericho nodded approvingly. “That’s the right question. I’ll assume you’re more or less familiar with our Sector’s financial system, wherein each year a thorough census is taken and factors like life expectancy, overall economic output, and thousands of other variables are computed to provide that year’s credit value?”

  Masozi nodded. It had been one of the founding principles which all of the worlds in the Sector had agreed to following the wormhole collapse. “The Sector-wide average life must be valued at one million credits’ worth of productivity, and the formula keeps the numbers more-or-less in line,” she said when it was clear he expected her to do so. “This minimizes the possibility for economic manipulation by exchanging currencies unscrupulously, and exerts free market forces on the various industries of the Sector.”

  “Right, it does do that,” he agreed almost reluctantly, “but it also defines the value of a human life.”

  Masozi had held several debates in school regarding this very issue and, while she had never been wholly convinced that the moral implications were as he was suggesting, even she had to admit that it was a reasonably valid way to interpret the data.

  “Once we have that number,” he explained, “we can determine the damage a person’s actions cause society. As you are no doubt aware, we use this number in sentencing guidelines for convicted criminals, among other things.”

  “Yes,” Masozi allowed slowly, “it’s one of our founding principles: the punishment should always be determined based on the severity of the crime. This ensures impartiality.”

  Jericho snorted at her last, but made no comment. “To make a long story short, we use the same basic criteria for determining whether an Adjustment should be instigated.” He pointed to the data slate, “Mayor Cantwell’s corruption cost his constituents roughly two billion credits in economic and industrial damages when the Anvil came to New Lincoln. He allowed the PHL to disrupt the city’s industry, economy, and—potentially the worst of all—its morale without securing fair recompense for the citizens who elected him.” Jericho shook his head piteously, “And he did it all for an eighty five million credit payoff, of which he could only hope to see half after laundering and securing the funds. His actions created enough suspicion on the part of his constituents—the only group’s opinion that matters in an Adjustment—that an Adjustment was instigated and, ultimately, executed.”

  “But that money wasn’t truly ‘lost’,” Masozi argued in spite of her general inclination to agree with Jericho’s stated reasoning behind Cantwell’s assassination. “If what you’re showing me is factual then the PHL simply profited at New Lincoln’s expense, but ultimately the money didn’t disappear—it just changed hands.”

  Jericho shook his head slowly, as though he had participated in this precise conversation a hundred times. “The PHL didn’t elect Cantwell, though—neither did the many thousands of entities who benefited from his corruption,” he said pointedly. “The people who suffered were his voters—the very people whose interests he sword to protect and, if possible, advance. His actions cost those voters literally two thousand human lifetimes of productivity—that’s two thousand people who are now functionally enslaved to interests over which they have little or no control.” He folded his arms over his broad, muscular chest and asked, “Can you think of a better reason to execute a man than him enslaving the very people who depended on him to protect their collective livelihood?”

  Masozi had already concluded much of what he had just said, and found that she fundamentally agreed with his assessment. But that had not been the point of pushing him to explain the situation—hearing him compose the defense, and watching him for nonverbal cues while he did so, had been the object of the conversation.

  “So what about the PHL?” she asked after a moment, and Jericho nodded approvingly. “What does the T.E. do to them?”

  “We do nothing to them,” he said pointedly. “They were merely attempting to advance their private agenda; if we Adjusted each enterprising entity which sought to exploit every possible advantage—including bribing public officials to gain preferential treatment—our economy would stall and everything that depends on it would crumble in little more than a generation. Let the bureaucrats fight the corporations in the courts—I’ve got bigger fish to fry.”

  “So you won’t condemn the people who pay the bribe,” she said in wonderment, genuinely surprised at his dismissive rationale. “But you will ‘Adjust’ the person who accepts it?” she asked with an open challenge in her voice.

  “Exactly,” he said in what she took to be mock approval, which made her clench her jaw tight to forestall a sharp objection. “When the contents of Cantwell’s Mark of Adjustment are made public, the body politic will have an opportunity to choose whether or not to provide the PHL with continued financial support.” He smirked and shook his head as though in bewilderment, “A sharp decline in revenue hurts a corporation far more than a bullet to the skull of its director ever could.”

  He turned and made his way to the cot he had used for the previous week and a half, and Masozi called after him in irritation, “I’m not finished with my questions.”

  “Open the file stored on that pad named ‘Goat’ and examine the evidence it contains,” he said without turning to face her. “Whether you like it or not, you’ve become a part of this so you might as well make yourself useful.” He turned and gave her a dry look before adding, “Until you decide to do your civic duty and turn me in, of course.”

  Chapter XII: A Summons

  “Message for you, boss man,” Benton called out, and Jericho awoke from his nap at once. He threw his legs over the edge of the cot—which was surprisingly comfortable for a device of its nature—and made his way to Benton’s bedside.

  He didn’t even need to look to know that Masozi was asleep.

  It had been four days since he’d given her the Goat assignment, and she had been remarkably focused in her efforts to unravel the latest mystery thrown her way. Jericho could understand how she ended up working as an Investigator in one of Virgin’s most populous cities.

  “Have you verified it?” Jericho asked as he reached Benton’s large bio-bed. The cost of the aperture must have been
tremendous, and the continuous supply of drugs and synthetic biological components must have cost literally millions of credits per year, but he knew that money was the least of Benton’s worries.

  “Sure thing,” Benton replied in his increasingly aggravating archeo-slang. “You’s been waitin’ for it, and now you’s got it.”

  A sharp look from Jericho made Benton roll his eyes in deference as he nodded. Jericho looked up to the bank of monitors on the far wall as it sprang to life with several hundred distinct images, and as he had seen Benton do countless times before, the master hacker extracted the required data from each of the displayed sources and migrated those scraps of information onto a single screen.

  The entire process took no more than a minute and when Benton had finished compiling the data Jericho saw a long, completely unintelligible message spelled out. That message was then run through a decryption filter and a new message appeared which read: Well done in New Lincoln. Meet me at the unusual place in Aegis and we’ll discuss your next assignment(s)—O

  “You’ve verified every bit of verbiage?” Jericho repeated deliberately. He needed to know for certain that he was to meet in the ‘unusual’ place, rather than the ‘usual,’ or ‘abnormal,’ or ‘normal’ place. He had only been summoned in this fashion once before…and it had been under very different circumstances.

  “Yes,” Benton replied shortly, clearly upset with Jericho’s insistence that he stick to a vocabulary that at the very least resembled modern parlance.

  “Ok,” Jericho said as he considered the implications. He had expected such a summons—in fact, he had quite literally done everything in his power to achieve such a meeting with what could be roughly termed his ‘superior’ within the Timent Electorum’s hierarchy…if the T.E. could be said to have such a thing. “Good work, Benton,” he said with genuine feeling, “and thank you for allowing us to hitch a ride to Aegis. I know how much you value your privacy.”