On his way Scott called the hospital. Lanigan had taken a sick day. Damn. He reached her house, a small, neat place in the suburbs with a compact car in the driveway. Sort of place with 2.5 kids and 3/8 of a dog playing in the back yard.
    He slipped under the front door after a moment to look and listen. In the front hall he found the first 3/8 of that dog. The rest of it was nowhere to be seen.
    Shoot.
    That she had been professionally interrogated was clear, once he had reconstructed the scene somewhat. Felix had apparently come in quickly, knocked her out, tied her to the bed, broke all her limbs. When she finally, presumably, talked, the killing blow had been quick and quite likely painless. Scott searched the place thoroughly and found no sign that Javelin was still in the building. Her money and credit cards were gone from her wallet. The car was still there. No sign of her medical bag either.
    He checked the closets and under the bed. The latter yielded results, a spot where a floorboard had been pulled up and set back into place. He slithered into the space beneath it and found a good deal of dust in the small space, and some metal splinters. Whatever had been there, Felix had it now. Maybe the money she had been bribed with, in which case he now had all the funds he would need.
    She had a computer. Scott turned it on and went through the files. Personal finances, all looked in order there, given his limited knowledge. Last month she had made a couple extra mortgage payments. There was also a journal. He popped a disk into the drive and copied the file onto it, took a cursory look through the it, focusing on the dates around the transfer.
    A knock came at the door.
    He sent a pseudopod to check the scene.
    "Everything okay in there?" Creak as he pushed the front door open. "Oh my god." Probably a next door neighbor who had just seen what was left of the dog. "Honey, dial 911!" he called to someone outside, taking a few slow steps into the front room.
    Then he did what was simultaneously one of the most ludicrous and brave things Scott had yet seen in his brief life. He pulled out a Swiss army knife, unfolded the large blade, and continued on his way through the house. He didn't pick up or touch anything, at least. Scott ejected the disk and turned off the computer.
    Before the neighbor could approach the back of the house, Scott flowed across the hall to the bathroom, keeping the disk safe within his body, and went down the toilet pipe.
    "Doc?" The neighbor was approaching the back bedroom. "Oh...." It wasn't long before he followed Scott, retching violently, but the robot was already safely away.

    Meanwhile, Lucky called Winters.
    "Hi, it's Kyla, I can hang up now if you don't want to talk to me right now."
    "Now's as good a time as any," was the cautious reply.
    "I was wondering if you wanted to... get together somewhere and discuss things, I think there's some things you deserve to know."
    Pause. "Not right now. I'm a little bit busy, and I think you are, too. Why don't we put this off, say a week? Let the city calm down. Okay?"
    "I am on your side. I know you don't believe that—"
    "I know you're on my side."
    "Thanks."

| Top |