System Seven (35 page)

“Daniel Harutaka, my
father’s only son, vacationing in Hong Kong. I’d planned to visit him before we
left. He suffered a heart attack and we are on our way to hospital.”

“Please study your
father’s dossier carefully. Your updated papers are included.” She handed him
the folder and turned to Anki. “And you are?”

“Vickie Harutaka, his
wife of three years, no children. Never met father.”

“Very good,” she
nodded once. “There is additional background for you to read, as well. Please,
if you would both spend a minimum of one hour with those documents. Daniel, you
have a protein drink waiting in the kitchen. Edward offers best wishes for a successful
outcome. Your room is the first door on the left upstairs. A bathroom is across
the hall. Please, I will need your decks to update them.” She smiled. “Do you
have questions?”

He shared a look with
Anki. “Uh, what’s for dinner?”

A moment’s insight is sometimes worth a life’s experience.
- Oliver Wendell Holmes, 1809-1894, American Author

The taxi slipped
through Tokyo’s morning traffic. The driver timed his lane changes perfectly
and took side streets, honing in on their destination. Austin watched and
admired his efficiency to keep his mind off his nerves.

“This isn’t so bad.”
She smoothed her hair and ran a hand down her arm.

His eye twitched. The
underlying tissue and muscles were cinched unnaturally to form his Asian
appearance. Constance had applied gel to his face that caused localized
swelling. The biocats’ work combined with his swollen pale olive skin made him
a body double for Daniel Harutaka. When he spoke, his voice box tickled from
the unfamiliar resonance.

“It could be worse.”
If only the stomach gymnastics would stop
.
He countered them by reviewing the dossier from memory, focusing on the details
he’d most likely need to use.

“Relax, Daniel. It’ll
be alright.”

Twenty minutes later
the taxi pulled up in front of St. Luke’s Hospital. They emerged into the
shadows of the twin towers of St. Luke’s Garden across the street. The taller
of the two skyscrapers rose fifty-one stories over the city with a connector
walkway at the thirty-second floor. The hospital’s eleven stories were dwarfed
by comparison.

“They don’t mess
around, do they,” he said.

“No,” she replied,
immediately aware of eyes upon them. “I suppose they don’t. Let’s hurry, I’m
concerned for your father. Time could be short.”

Inside, a volunteer at
the desk found Mr. Harutaka’s room for them. “High Care Unit on the fourth floor. Elevators are there.”

Sleek and modern, the
hospital lacked the typical chemical sterility and boasted more of a Four
Seasons feel. Two hospital workers and an older Japanese man dressed in blue
waited for an elevator with them. Off to the side, two suits stood by the
stairwell like guards.

Anki rubbed his hand
to comfort him. “Maybe he’s come to by now.”

He shrugged. “I don’t
know. We’ll see.”

“You know you care
about him. Why be so difficult? This is the perfect time to let the past go. He
needs to hear you say it. Give him some peace.”

The elevator car
arrived and the doors slid open. He removed his hand from hers. “I’ll be fine.
He’s
my
father.”

Put off slightly, she
remained quiet as they rode the elevator. He went passive and extended to the
three strangers. Something about the man suggested aggression. He probed
further and found it to be only strong American disdain. The two workers got
off on the third floor.

The doors opened on
the fourth floor and they stepped out. The man in blue brushed past them.

“There.” Anki pointed
to the HCU sign.

Another sign pointed
the opposite direction, to the ICU where the crime lord was situated. A yakuza
suit stood against the wall, surveying them as they passed.

At the HCU nurse’s
station they showed identification and were taken to Mogami Harutaka’s room. Light from the window softened the old man’s
slack face and bald head. The room stood bare of any personal effects, as if he
were just a prop. In a sense he was. A callous thought, one he immediately
regretted.

A woman approached and
greeted them.

“I am Niwa Uchime,
physician’s assistant to Dr. Tomoe. I am
sorry that Dr. Tomoe is not available right now. However, I can provide you
information. Your father remains in coma,” she looked at her watch, “thirty-two
hours after the cardiac event. We have conducted EEG scans on the brain as
recently as this morning. The findings are considered grade three, which
unfortunately offer no definite positive prognosis.”

“Grade three?”

“Yes. We see dominant
theta activity in the brain with no detectable normal alpha activity. To have
grade-three EEGs at around thirty hours is concerning but not indicative of a
final prognosis. The chance for brain damage increases dramatically the closer
to seventy-two hours coma gets. Further testing is scheduled for later this
evening.”

He asked, “So he could
already have brain damage?”

Niwa nodded. “It is
possible, yes.” The silence grew awkward
and long. “That’s all the information I have for now. Do you have questions?”

He shook his head.

“There is a restaurant
and ATM on the first floor and a convenience store at the basement level. St. Luke’s Garden is across the street and
has many restaurants. A connecting walkway is on the second floor. We have
special rates available for you at the hotel, as well. If there is anything you
need, please see the nurses’ desk and they will be glad to help you.”

“Thank you, Niwa,”
Anki said.

“Of course.” She
withdrew graciously.

Austin took a chair
across the room from the old man.
Halfway
to brain damage.
Anki sat down near the door, the same concern for the man
on her face.

He rested his head in
his hands and proceeded to seek calm. Two men’s lives hung in the balance,
neither regarded as important save for extracting knowledge from one of them.
Once extracted? Edward’s instructions were clear but limited: keep Sakuma alive
until called and told otherwise. Memories of Marcel’s grilling DFA scenarios
bore a whole new dimension as he listened to the soft wheezing of Mr. Harutaka.
Would they even try to revive the old man? Could they?

Anki cleared her
throat, a sign he needed to get started. He sat back in the chair, crossed his
arms, and extended his legs. Anki produced rosary beads and began to pray
silently.

“I should have taken
those sleeping pills,” he muttered. “Didn’t sleep at all last night.”

Further relaxed, he
waited several minutes before letting his head tilt to one side, as if asleep.
He extended passively, a small dome of awareness at first.
Good thing.
Someone nearby was heavily scanning for meta sentience
in the grid. Riding the feedback from that scanning, he extended further, bit
by bit, until a direction came clear: the ICU. They had someone near Mr. Sakuma
– near the
target
– actively
scanning people for threat. One radar to fool? How many more hands on
deck? To find out required the next step
which, as practiced as he’d become at it, still felt like a drop off the rim of
the Grand Canyon.

Just a little walk.

The step-by-step
approach to traveling still worked best. From a top corner of the HCU room, he
saw the fuzzy image of Anki sitting near the glass door, working the beads. His
own form, stretched out in the chair, lacked a face. The next instant he stood
by the bed.

Mr. Harutaka’s face
was blanked, a reminder of his hostage status. Briefly, images of his father
locked up in a cell came to mind.
Also
hostage?
He buried the thought and moved into the hallway. Anki looked up
and nearly at him, as if sensing him, before resuming her prayers.

He drew himself inward
to hide before venturing out. Past the nursing station and down the hall
towards the elevators, he eyed every person in sight for recognition of his
movement. The guard remained posted by the signs with no indication of energy
blob or other awareness. However,
something...
big
lay ahead in the ICU
wing.

The elevators chimed.
Doors slid open to reveal a group of men with bulky sport coats. An
uncomfortable hospital administrator emerged first and led them towards ICU.

Austin relaxed. They
were the SAT units, the counter-terrorist defenses Constance said would be in
place. He followed them past the reception counter, still trying to resolve the
feeling of
bigness
looming. A SAT
peeled off and entered the waiting room. One of the men appeared to be a
commander because he issued instructions as they went.

The hallway hooked
right. The intensive care unit lay on the left side, the critical care unit on
the right. The special teams spread out and took up positions.

At a central nursing
station, a SAT joined sentry near an Ookami-shita suit. They looked awkward –
anti-terror police and the syndicate working together. Austin followed the
commander into the ICU to Mr. Sakuma’s room. Two SATs took up sentry outside.

Austin passed into the
room and found the crime lord’s face blotted out. Various tubes ran into his
arms. Life support systems blinked and bleeped softly. An Asian woman sat on
the edge of the bed with her hands wrapped around her husband’s. Mrs. Sakuma
nodded to the SAT commander. She spoke in Japanese but it was clear she was
thanking him.

The commander bowed
slightly, an unexpected gesture. Mrs. Sakuma seemed to swell. He turned to
leave and Austin followed him into the corridor.

That they could
possibly need his help seemed remote. Only the feeling of something big still
bothered him. Something
big
...

He moved around,
looking in various rooms. The closer he got to the east-facing windows, the
heavier the feeling became. It didn’t make sense. What was so big? The feeling
of death? He stepped through plate glass windows to inspect the area outside. Nothing.
Sliding up into the fifth floor he found administration offices. Only two women
worked there, a receptionist busy with paperwork and the other in a large
office studying a computer. He sank down into the third floor, apparently a
dayroom of a psych ward. A woman in pajamas rocked with arms around a pillow.

“Yureeeeeiiii!!” The
woman screamed, threw her tissue box at him, and ran for the nurses’ station to
pummel on the glass.

He recoiled through
the ceiling and into the fourth floor again. She’d seen him or some aspect of
him. He’d have to run that by Sean. Way too much commotion, in any case. Still
the feeling of something big loomed. He retreated from the windows and the
feeling lessened. Anki might know what to make of it.

With the thought, he opened
his eyes.

Anki was gone. Her
rosary beads lay on the floor.

• • •

The comm sounded.
CoreOps again. Director Tomov answered and listened, slowly nodding his head.

“Yes. Understood. Of
course. I agree. Confirmed.” He closed the connection and marveled at what he’d
just heard. An agent had taken up position at the hospital and found that
whoever had Sakuma locked down wasn’t aware of the underlying meta resonance
technique. That suggested the Korda’s new and powerful controller was not fully
trained. The agent would start the resonance via Sakuma’s body. Whoever had him
locked would become a beacon, broadcasting that signal. They had only to detect
it.

“Ops, establish an
open relay channel across all units, authority code U42, mandatory. Schedule execution
for ten minutes from now with a sliding go-slot no wider than three
minutes. And send a runner with some
blues and a Coke.”

He itched his nose.
They had no idea where the controller was so the resonance would be sent
globally. A massive and risky undertaking. Interrupting so many units, so many
operations. An unprecedented and aggressive strategy. Outside the box.

Something Overseer
might come up with.

• • •

“Damn. Still can’t
reach him. He’s completely cut off.” Edward cursed softly. He rose and removed
the shùil. “He isn’t monitoring Sakuma’s core meta feed. They’re going to use
it.”

Sean stared at Johan’s
sleeping form. “He’s too strong. We need better control.”

“I’m quite aware of
that. They’re going to set up a pulse at St. Luke’s. Get Austin involved. Clear
access through the SAT commander. Get at least five of Rodelli’s best to try
and reach Johan. If you can’t get them try the Tedesco family. If a pulse goes
out we’re in trouble.”

Sean indicated Johan’s
prone figure. “Shall we try to move him?”

“Not yet. However,
have the van readied then send staff home.”

“Williams?”

“Him, too. Cullstone’s
stables will be his to clean if he balks.”

• • •

At 2:17am Greenwich
time every available unit in G2 went passive, sensing. Given a ten second
sample of what to feel for, hundreds of sensitives around the globe expanded
their reach to their effective limits and beyond.

Within fifty seconds,
the command to cease and resume was broadcast: a unit had located the
resonance.

• • •

“Signus status?”

“Signus 8 is formed
with the reporting agent who will be airborne in five minutes. We’ve already
got north of London in a vector and will begin narrowing it down when
translocation begins.”

Director Tomov shared
a glance with his Ops officer. “What do you think?”

She shrugged. “Could
be big.”

“Get every aero team
we have in line with that heli’s twenty. I want them half a mile back and ready
for AMS. Have Oscar prepare a scenario for local authority but I want to see it
first.”

“Confirming aero
support with All Methods Strike readiness. Engaging Overseer analysis.”