CHAPTER NINE

Rook had ridden in helicopters before, police choppers, old two-seaters with few amenities and lots of noise. Freddy Marion's executive expressair was something else entirely. Luxurious seats covered in soft yellow leather, deep pile carpeting, cool, conditioned air, and a surprisingly quiet ride, despite the huge engines at work on both ends.

When they'd stepped aboard, Rook had been concerned about how little Plesur would handle this, since, basically, she'd never flown anywhere in a conscious state. Her delivery to the United States had been in a smuggler's shipping crate, packed in foam, connected to an oxygen tank and wrapped tightly in soft cotton swaddling. She'd known nothing of the journey. To her it had simply been a blank period between leaving the bright, sunny creche where she'd "grown up" for six months, and waking up on the pad in the medical section of the building in New Jersey where General Sangacha had collected her.

Since then, well, Plesur had lead a sheltered life, you might say.

But, as it turned out, the expressair wasn't bad at all, since she wound up sitting in the middle of the cabin next to Rook in a comfortable seat equipped with a wrap around virt screen. She never looked out the window at all, being way too absorbed in Able's Body, one of her favorite sexvirts, which rolled a steamy soap opera into a mildly pornographic fest of hunky bods and fabulous females.

Seeing that she was happily absorbed, Rook relaxed, though he did his best not to even glance in the direction of the screen that had Plesur's full attention.

The expressair lifted off with smooth, barely perceptible motion, swung around and headed for Manhattan, which lay about ninety miles southeast.

At the same time a young man wearing a pink t-shirt and white hot pants, appeared out of the back with a tray bearing drinks. For a moment Rook wondered if this houseboy figure was another Pleasure Model. Freddy caught his look and put a hand on his arm.

"Rest assured, Jonny is one hundred percent natural. I found him in Boston. Rescued him, didn't I, sweety?"

Jonny smiled blankly at Freddy. Rook sensed more Narcosuma at work.

Plesur had something that smelled of bananas and lemons, and had no alcohol. Rook had a beer. Freddy was drinking sea-green marjarinas. Grim faced Oakes drank bottled water and sat forward, alone.

Freddy made some quick calls, each conversation laced with code words, nicknames and endless sexual references. The general tone, as far as Rook could tell, was that some group, referred to as the Gorrillas from Georgia, had been beaten to the punch.

Then phonecalls were finished for the moment. Freddy drained his glass, nudged Rook's elbow and nodded at the window. The big chopper was passing over an area of complete darkness, with just a handful of lights showing at the southern end. Rook figured it had to be the military proscription zone.

Something was clearly troubling Freddy.

"You ever wonder what lies in the darkness, Venner?"

"Darkness?"

Freddy was staring at the dark ridgeline beneath them.

"Darkness has its uses, Venner, we all know that." There was something odd, almost obsessive in the way Freddy said this.

"But there was too much darkness, and things were done," Freddy seemed to shiver. "Regrettable things."

"Yeah?" Rook had no idea what Freddy was talking about.

"But it's all behind us now, you see. So that's why these fools are so dangerous."

"I guess I don't, uh, you know, I don't."

"It was in the shadow time, Venner. Now we have the echoes. Old crimes, best left to molder in the grave, really." Freddy was staring down at the dark area with a strange intensity in his gaze.

Rook finally connected the dots. "Isn't that what the Sangacha case is all about?"

Freddy turned to him. His eyes were wide, the pupils distended now. Rook was surprised, considering how much Narcosuma Freddy seemed to consume. Something else had to be competing for attention in the young man's system, perhaps a phenethylamine-base of some kind, not methamphetamine, Rook was sure, that would be too crude for Freddy, but there were so many variants these days.

"Those fools. They don't know how dangerous this is."

"Dangerous?"

"To the nation, I mean." Freddy turned back to the window. The dark region was falling behind them now. Lights were visible beneath them, the sprawling glows of Orange County towns, from Middletown down to Harriman were laid out like a row of islands of light.. A soft, female robot voice announced that they would reach Manattan WestSide Heliport in twelve minutes.

With the the old military proscription zone falling behind them, the tension seemed to drain away. Freddy put his head back and took another hit on the blue tube.

"Ahhh, better. Sometimes, you know, I wonder why I do all this."

Rook had wondered a little bit, too.

"You know?" Freddy clutched Rook's arm. "I'm glad we got you outta there, an' everything, but there's a degree of wear an' tear involved."

Rook's mirthless smile appeared unbidden. "Welcome to the life, Mr. Marion."

Freddy giggled. "Yeah, I s'pose you know about all that, SIO Venner." The blue tube went to his lips again.

"Don't you worry about nerve damage?" murmured Rook.

"What? From this?" Freddy waved the little tube, it was half gone now. "No, that's all myth, my friend. They have to put out myths like that. It keeps the booze lobby happy, you see."

"It's harmless?"

"Pretty much. Oh, it is addictive, make no mistake there. But it doesn't do all the scary stuff they say. You know, alcohol is way worse for the body. But it's legal."

"Yeah, I guess," Rook nodded.

"Thing with this stuff is," Freddy waved the blue tube around again. "We can't let ordinary people use it. It's too addictive and it's too nice. Nobody would show up for work." He broke off into giggles.

Rook turned away, disturbed. Something warred under his skin. Obediance to the system was a given, otherwise there was not only chaos, but there was the loss of everything that kept you in the insured world. Rook knew the uninsured world all too well, and he knew he didn't want to live there. But this cynical chatter from a golden child of wealth and privilege disturbed him.

Irritated, he finished his beer and thought hard about getting the fuck out of this thing.

"Maybe I can disappear. Go to LA, you know?"

Freddy stared at him, something close to disapproval in his big baby blues.

"Too late for that, Venner. You're in this for the whole ride."

"Yeah? I didn't exactly sign up for...." Rook waved a hand, indicating everything that had happened in the past few hours.

"True, but we don't get to choose sometimes."

"Well, sure, but I think I'd like to live a litle longer."

Freddy laughed, bright, happy sounds.

"That means you gotta see this through, Venner. See, if the other side wins, they're gonna hunt you down. They have to."

"The other side?"

"Yeah, the bad people."

This did not sound good.

"Okay, so why don't the bad people want the Sangacha case investigated?"

Freddy produced a cynical sounding chuckle. "Oh, they do, but they want the waters muddied. They want it taken up to a Federal case and they want to use it as a form of pressure."

"Pressure? On whom?"

"On my Auntie, of course, who else?"

Freddy's phone buzzed. It was someone very important for he got up at once and disappeared into the back of the cabin. Oakes turned around to watch him go and then stared at Rook, as if daring him to make a move.

Rook tried to relax. It wasn't easy.

The expressair was over the Hudson Highlands now and ahead was the broader glow of Westchester and Northern Jersey. Somewhere past Westchester was the deeper, brighter blaze that signified Manhattan.

He was just an SIO in a regional homicide squad. This case was way too big for him. And now he had some crazy faction of the elite trying to kill him for murky reasons that had nothing to do with him or even with the case, or so it seemed.

It had turned out to be just as dangerous as he'd imagined. He felt like a mouse that had been dropped into a cage full of cats.

Beneath them the lights thickened up as they sped over Westchester from north to south. Ahead now the towers of the city loomed like spires of electronic fire leaping from the blaze below.

Rook had seen this view from planes before, but never from this angle, since this was well off the commercial pathways. The huge South Bronx RenoVa towers sparkled in a cluster around Yankee stadium, which was lit up like a well of white light in their midst. Over the river the Harlem RenoVas marched down the avenues towards the dark mass of the park, while beyond that glittered midtown.

Plesur had finally torn her eyes away from the sexvirt and was staring at the view out the window with her mouth slightly open.

"City?" she said in that soft husky voice of hers.

"Yes, be there soon."

"Big place," she sounded amazed, excited, but not afraid.

The expressair whirled over the incredible landscape of light, then spun down to a landing on a pad on the west side, in the river.

Freddy emerged from the back just as they came in to land.

"Ready for some fun?" he said.

"Fun?" Rook was puzzled. It was not quite three in the morning and they were up to their hips in the Sangacha thing. Wasn't it time to go hide somewhere safe?

"Yesss," whispered Plesur. "Fun."