“Welcome to SpecOps-5, Thursday—what did you think containment meant?”
He laughed a laugh that was slightly disturbing.
“As the saying goes: If you want to get into SpecOps, act kinda weird. We don’t tend to pussyfoot around.”
“Is it legal?”
“Not in the least. It’s Blind Eye Grand Central below SpecOps-8. We have a saying: Below the eight, above the law. Ever hear it?”
“No.”
“You’ll hear it a lot. In any event we make it our Rule Number Three: Apprehension is of minimal importance. What gun do you carry?”
I told him and he scribbled a note.
“I’ll get some fluted expansion slugs for you.”
“There’ll be hell to pay if we get caught with those.”
“Self-defense only,” explained Tamworth quickly. “You won’t be dealing with this man; I just want you to ID him if he shows. But listen: If the shit hits the fan I don’t want any of my people left with bows and arrows against the lightning. And anything less than an expanding slug is about as much good as using wet cardboard as a flak jacket. We know almost nothing about him. No birth certificate, not even a reliable age or even who his parents were. He just appeared on the scene in ’54 as a petty criminal with a literary edge and has worked his way steadily upward to being number three on the planet’s most-wanted list.”
“Who’re number one and two?”
“I don’t know and I have been reliably informed that it’s far better not to know.”
“So where do we go from here?”
“I’ll call you. Stay alert and keep your pager with you at all times. You’re on leave as of now from SO-27, so just enjoy the time off. I’ll be seeing you!”
He was gone in an instant, leaving me with the SO-5 badge and a thumping heart. Boswell returned, followed by a curious Paige. I showed them both the badge.
“Way to go!” said Paige, giving me a hug, but Boswell seemed less happy. After all, he did have his own department to think about.
“They can play very rough at SO-5, Next,” said Boswell in a fatherly tone. “I want you to go back to your desk and have a long calm think about this. Have a cup of coffee and a bun. No, have two buns. Don’t make any rash decisions, and just run through all the pros and cons of the argument. When you’ve done that I would be happy to adjudicate. Do you understand?”
I understood. In my hurry to leave the office I almost forgot the picture of Landen.
4.
Acheron Hades
. . . The best reason for committing loathsome and detestable acts—and let’s face it, I am considered something of an expert in this field—is purely for their own sake. Monetary gain is all very well, but it dilutes the taste of wickedness to a lower level that is obtainable by anyone with an overdeveloped sense of avarice. True and baseless evil is as rare as the purest good—and we all know how rare that is . . .
ACHERON HADES
—Degeneracy for Pleasure and Profit
TAMWORTH DIDN’T call that week, nor the week after. I tried to call him at the beginning of the third week but was put through to a trained denialist who flatly refused to admit that Tamworth or SO-5 even existed. I used the time to get up-to-date with some reading, filing, mending the car and also—because of the new legislation—to register Pickwick as a pet rather than a wild dodo. I took him to the town hall where a veterinary inspector studied the once-extinct bird very carefully. Pickwick stared back forlornly, as he, in common with most pets, didn’t fancy the vet much.
“Plock-plock,” said Pickwick nervously as the inspector expertly clipped the large brass ring around his ankle.
“No wings?” asked the official curiously, staring at Pickwick’s slightly odd shape.
“He’s a Version 1.2,” I explained. “One of the first. They didn’t get the sequence complete until 1.7.”
“Must be pretty old.”
“Twelve years this October.”