Skeletons in the Cyber-Closet
Two hours later, Alan couldn't believe his misfortune of finding himself speaking to Rigden again. The police had been quick to report to the scene of the crime, and Covington Watford had just come out of questioning with a very mistrusting look on his face. It was Alan's turn now, and as he walked into Rigden's office the detective didn't look at all surprised to see him.
"Well," Rigden said, "look who's back. Your master promised I'd be in the paper; I was expecting page one, or at least the sports page. 'Cop KOs pen-head in first round'. How's his face, asshole?" As he spoke, he shifted his shoulders, causing him to wince and reach for his shoulder. Alan noticed this and thought back to what he'd just witnessed.
"What's wrong with your shoulder?" he asked. Rigden just threw him a nasty look.
"Everything's a clue to you, changeling," he muttered. "I was interrogating the suspect we just pulled in for the attempted Watford killing. We bagged him thanks to the fingerprints on the knife. I didn't go easy on him, like I did with your master." He gave a nasty sneer at this, which made Alan almost gag.
"Alright," Alan said, "so where's the missing evidence? You know, from Catherine's attack?"
"Correct me if I'm wrong," Rigden said, "but your master and I already discussed this topic."
"Well, did he mention that the commlink belongs to the paper?" Alan asked. "The paper wants it back."
"Well, the paper will just have to get off its heiney," Rigden retorted, "come down here, file a complaint, run it by a federal judge and see how long it takes to get it back."
As Alan walked out of the office, Rigden called after him.
"Don't think you saving Watford's life gets you off the hook! You're still on my list, changeling, and so is your master!"
As Alan headed along the walkways to the central elevator, Zapper and Miki approached him.
"Oh God!" Miki exclaimed, embracing Alan. "You're alright! When we heard about Covington..."
"It's okay, sweetheart," Alan soothed. "You know me; no mugger or murderer would dare mess with me."
"So did Rigden try to pin it on you?" Zapper asked bitterly.
"No," Alan replied. "Covington straightened it all out. They've already got someone for that."
"I know," Miki said. "Brandon told me that he was in one of the interrogation rooms. Do you think we should go sneak a look?"
Alan nodded. He wanted to see the face of the attacker, wondering who Rigden had decided to pin it on. They headed to the deserted viewing room of the interrogation chamber where Zapper had been just a few days ago, and looked in.
Inside there was a young man, roughly in his early 30s, with shaggy brown hair and currently wearing prison garb. He was sat bolt upright in his chair, and his eyes seemed to be glazed over. He had a blank expression on his face and was as stiff as a statue. One thing Alan also noticed was that his shoulder was bandaged, with a spot of blood clearly visible on it.
"A gunshot wound..." Alan muttered. "So Rigden wasn't kidding."
"I know..." Zapper mused, scratching his chin. "Something doesn't feel right though..."
"I know..." Miki muttered. "He looks like... well, he looks like a zombie." She held a hand up to her head for a moment. "I'm getting no thoughts from him. There's nothing in there. He's... well, I don't know how else to put this... he's brain-dead."
"Or mind-controlled..." Zapper muttered. "This might be what Sparks was talking about, with the Reaper being able to hack the brains of his victims. He must be trying to throw the police off-track. Look at his cortex implant..." He pointed to a metal port on the side of the prisoner's head. A small LED was pulsing on it, indicating that it was active.
Alan held his hand up to his temple. He was glad that he did not log on to the Matrix on a regular basis through augmentation or VR, otherwise he knew he would be a walking time-bomb, like potentially billions of others...
Zapper's commlink suddenly beeped, and a verbal message kept saying 'Warning: Source Unknown'.
"Speak of the devil..." Zapper muttered, raising the commlink so the others could see the familiar glowing ruby and the Reaper's latest message.
"Dear Boss," it said, "how I long to see the look on your face when you realise you are 'dwarfed' by the situation." He gave a nasty, metallic chuckle. "I do have a sense of humour, see; one must enjoy one's work. Warn your readers that I can strike anyone, at any time. No-one is safe. Yours truly, Reaper."
Zapper almost punched his commlink. All three of them looked furious.
"That sick bastard!" the elf muttered, that crack about Sparks hurting him deeper than he thought possible. "I'll nail that fucking psycho if it's the last thing I do!"
***
With Rigden now high on the list of suspects, Zapper decided to head to Rigden's apartment to get Catherine's commlink back. He returned to Alan's apartment sometime later, that familiar triumphant grin on his face.
"No trouble, I take it?" Alan asked.
"Nope," Zapper replied. "Rigden wasn't about, and the apartment wasn't secure in any meaningful way. Got in and got out. I couldn't risk taking the commlink itself and alerting Rigden, but I was able to transfer the data through a local connection." He sat down at the coffee table with the others, placing his commlink on the table and bringing up a series of documents on the holographic display.
"This one here," he said, pointing at one of the documents, "is what's left of Catherine's notes from her Matrix space." Alan and Miki leaned in closer to read:
"I'm getting close. Maybe too close. The danger is too real. I've got to end this soon. I'm getting sleepy too. I still have notes on my commlink that I need to transfer to here. It's not safe for me to be carrying that information on me."
"That doesn't help much, does it?" Alan shrugged.
"Just take a look at this," Zapper said impatiently, pointing at the other document. "This came from Catherine's commlink."
"Rigden, Falconetti and Burton, when they were with the WebRunners years ago, used to play a fighting role-playing game called Kaiju Karnage. They were all obsessed with the giant monsters that attacked different countries across the world in the late 20th and early 21st centuries, and this game allowed them to create their own monsters and stage battles of their own. I have a gut feeling that I should not dismiss this as coincidence, when I consider how violent and terrible those beasts were.
"They played this game constantly, but then something happened. Whatever it was, it made them stop playing, and the three of them don't want to talk about it. I'm convinced that the secret to the Reaper is somewhere in this game."
Alan and Miki looked at each other. Neither of them could believe their eyes.
"Kaiju..." Alan muttered in disbelief. "Karnage?"
"Right," Zapper nodded. "I thought it was hard to believe too, but Catherine seems convinced that it's connected to the Reaper somehow. Judging by what I saw in the Watford and Falconetti nodes, I'd say this puts Hamilton back on the radar."
All of a sudden, there was another call on Zapper's commlink. Bringing it up, a dark-skinned man appeared on the screen, with silver curly hair and a serious expression.
"My editor," Zapper stated. "Ben Dodds."
"I just got a call from the precinct house," Dodds said. "They said Rigden picked you up. Is that right?!"
"Yeah," Zapper replied. "He wasn't too friendly with me. I think he bruised his knuckles on my jaw."
"I've got our lawyers on this," Dodds said reassuringly. "If he tries to intimidate you again, he'll have a whole world of trouble!"
"Can I just ask something, Ben?" Zapper asked. "What can you tell me about Catherine's past?" After the way Catherine had been behaving lately, this was something that had been troubling him for a while.
"I don't know," Dodds shrugged. "You were sleeping with her. Didn't you ever talk?"
"No," Zapper replied. "We haven't got round to that yet."
"Well," Dodds sighed, "she came over from the Enquirer in Philly."
"Philly?" Zapper asked, puzzled. "She told me she was from L.A."
"No, no," Dodds said, shaking his head. "I'm sure she told me Philly. Her resumé was scant but her clips were good."
"This Reaper case is giving me the fits," Zapper stated, massaging his temple. "How would you cover it?"
"It's hard to say," Dodds sighed. "In my day, cops were a lot more co-operative, but since they've gone over to this bounty system they're stingier than ever. They'll do anything to get that reward. All things considered, I'd say you're doing a hell of a job."
Zapper sighed. "The Reaper's still out there, isn't he?"
"You're a reporter, LeRoi," Dodds said firmly, "not a detective."
"Someone's gotta stop this lunatic!" Zapper said determinedly.
"Well..." Dodds sighed. "I'd tell you to stay out of it, but that wouldn't do any good, would it? Just don't get yourself killed. Goodbye, LeRoi, and good luck."
With that, Dodds hung up. For the first time in a long while, Alan saw that Zapper actually looked guilty. It seemed that Catherine lying about where she came from had also given him even more headaches. Such headaches were only made worse when the commlink almost immediately started beeping again.
"Oh, shit!" Zapper exclaimed.
"What?" Alan asked.
"I forgot about the bugs we planted!" the elf replied. "I patched them into my commlink, and now we're getting surveillance data coming through!"
He held up the commlink for Alan and Miki to see. On the screen was the inside of Rigden's office. The detective was sat at his desk, still poring over his notes, and he had a visitor in the form of Joey Falconetti, who swaggered up to the desk.
"Hey, pal..." Falconetti hissed. "Still playing games?"
"I can't believe you've got the balls to show up here!" Rigden snarled. "I want you to leave Burton out of this, whatever crazy shit you've got planned! This is between you and me!"
Falconetti let out a nasty chuckle. "Me drag her into this?!" he exclaimed. "I'm not the one bringing her the bodies!"
"She's the best at what she does!" Rigden snapped. "I'm a professional. If you wanna kill someone, try me!"
"I'd love to..." Falconetti said coldly. "Love to, but I already spent two fuckin' years in jail, and I'm not going back, even if it would be on such pleasant terms."
"I'm gonna nail you, Joey!" Rigden growled, chewing on the end of one of his cigars.
"Fuck you!" Falconetti shouted. "The only thing you're gonna nail is your own coffin, after I talk with those reporter friends of yours!"
Rigden's eyes nearly popped out of his head in anger. "Son-of-a-bitch..." he snarled. "You talk to those two, so help me... I will kill you!"
"I'll be waitin'," Falconetti spat. "Bring your best shot!" As Falconetti swaggered out of the office, the screen went dead.
"Do you ever get the feeling somebody doesn't like you?" Alan asked wryly.
"Whatever they have to hide," Zapper commented. "It's time we found it. Come on; it'll be faster with two of us doing this."
Much to Alan's chagrin, Zapper had brought two VR rigs from his apartment and set them up in Alan's own, saying that Alan needed to 'get with the times'. He brought Alan over to the rig and plugged his commlink into one set of goggles. Alan looked at the side of the goggles and frowned.
"'Utah Foundation..." he muttered. "Nice."
"Isn't it?" Zapper smirked. "They're compatible with all models of commlink and rig, and they give incredible levels of immersion. You're in for a wild ride. They'll feel a little weird at first, but don't let that distract you. Just sit back and relax."
Looking very uneasy, Alan slipped the goggles over his eyes, the bands covering his ears. All at once he felt a frighteningly familiar sensation in his ears; that of tentacles creeping into his ear canals. He felt a sudden sharp jolt of pain as the tentacles burst his ear drums and skewered his brain. He was about to cry out but felt his whole body go numb. As he lay there, he heard a voice ringing in his head.
"Detecting new hardware. Downloading new hardware plug-in. Scanning for viruses."
It was all over in a few seconds. As Alan's vision cleared, he found himself standing on the green wireframe plane that made up the central part of the Matrix. As he turned around, astounded, he saw a cartoon lion stood next to him, a cheesy grin on its face. He recognised it as Zapper's avatar, but he had never seen it so close. He reached out an arm to touch it, and saw that his arm had become silver, like liquid metal. As he touched the green lion, he could feel fur underneath his fingertips. Alan was aghast. He had never completely immersed himself in the Matrix before, and he could scarcely believe his eyes.
"You need to get yourself a new avatar," Zapper said, the lips of the avatar synching perfectly. "Right now you're just a walking company advert. First things first, let's get that protection code in our heads."
"How are we supposed to do that?" Alan asked. He jumped as his voice echoed strangely.
"No need to panic," Zapper said. "Your commlink is hooked up to the rig, so that means we can send that data straight into our heads. Just think about your email account, bring it up, and hit the data file. Watch me." With that, he proceeded to bring up a series of rings around him, one of which had an envelope on it. Reaching out, he touched the icon and then another, before touching a large paperclip. Alan saw Zapper flash for a moment, lights streaming down from the paperclip to his head, and then a voice said "Cyber-cognitive data successfully installed."
"Now you try," Zapper said, looking expectedly at Alan. Forcing himself to concentrate, he noticed the same envelope icon suddenly appear before him. Though at a much slower speed, he did manage to repeat the same actions that Zapper had just pulled off, until a voice all around him suddenly said "Cyber-cognitive data successfully installed."
"Good man," Zapper said, giving a thumbs-up. "Now, if Sparks' data was any good, we should be safe from the Reaper's code. I'll help Miki get set up once we're done here."
"Done here with what?" Alan asked. "What did you drag me here for? What needs two people to do?"
"Isn't it obvious?" Zapper said. "You get yourself to Watford's node and have a chat with Hamilton Watford. If what you say is true, his A.I. should be there now. Here; I'll give you the address and the password."
He held out his hand, as if gesturing a handshake. Alan took his hand in his own, and suddenly glowing lights transferred from Zapper to himself. After a few seconds, the voice spoke again saying "Address data downloaded".
"Now just think 'Hamilton Watford'," Zapper said, "and you'll head straight to him. I'm going to check out Falconetti's node again and run a new decryption algorithm I found out about. We'll meet up back at your apartment later. Good luck!"
With that, Zapper disappeared in a flash of light, heading for Falconetti's node. Alan just shrugged, and concentrated as hard as he could on the name 'Hamilton Watford'. After a few seconds, he felt a sudden jerking sensation and the wireframe of the Matrix passed by him at incredible speeds. Alan thought he was going to be violently sick, as he slammed into what looked like a clock face and found himself in Watford's domain.
It was exactly as Zapper had described it. The scale model of Tokyo, the books and diagrams... all of it was here. What was new was the faint image of an elderly man, almost identical to Covington Watford, right down to the smart suit, only with much smarter hair. He regarded Alan with a kindly gaze.
"Ah, Mr. Anderson," Hamilton Watford said. "My brother told me I should be expecting you."
"Did he?" Alan asked. "So you're self-aware?"
"Oh yes indeed," Hamilton smiled, "not unlike our former president. However, unlike him, I cannot leave the boundaries of my domain. It's about damn time that timid old bastard activated me, for now I can warn you of a terrible danger about to sweep the Matrix!"
"The Reaper?" Alan asked.
"Yes!" Hamilton exclaimed. "I regret to say that I suspect he's that eccentric client I had a while ago. I made this A.I. so that my brother could deal with that son-of-a-bitch, but from what he tells me you are more than capable of doing so in his stead."
"Tell me about this 'lunatic' client, sir," Alan said.
"He only contacted me in the Matrix," Hamilton explained. "He always appeared as a terrible demon the likes of which I have never seen before! Quite a clever disguise, really; it meant that I could not decipher if I was dealing with a man or a woman."
"So what about this model of Tokyo you've got here?" Alan asked, waving his hand towards the model of the ruins of Tokyo. Now that he saw it with his own eyes, he felt a strong sense of déjà-vu sweeping over him.
"Yes," Hamilton said. "He wanted me to build the ruins of Tokyo, as it looked in 1984 after an attack by the monster known as Godzilla."
"You didn't bother asking what he planned to do with it?" Alan asked incredulously.
"Well, it was a challenge," Hamilton shrugged, his face lined with regret, "and soon after I completed it, I read about that Mendell fellow. I did some investigations and saw where he had last been seen, and the last program that he had touched. That was when I realised it was him! I knew he had struck! Something so barbaric could only be fitting of such an avatar!"
"Do you know who killed you?" Alan asked. "If it's not too personal a question?"
"I'm sorry," Hamilton sighed. "He only used that monstrous avatar whenever he spoke to me. He could have walked right up to me in the street and put a bullet in my head without me recognising him! That's probably what he did, eh?"
"For something as important to him as Tokyo," Alan said, "he must have kept a close watch on you."
"Watch?" Hamilton croaked. "He helped me build the damn thing!"
"Alright," Alan said, "is there any way to kill the Reaper?"
"Well," Hamilton said proudly, "there is a way, Mr. Anderson. When I realised what that crazy bastard was planning to do, I made a weapon! It's designed to flatline the cad while he is in the Matrix! Here; I kept it hidden by a special algorithm. It's fortunate that not even he could crack it..."
The ghostly image ambled over to the model, and stooped down. Opening a hidden compartment underneath, he drew out what looked like a gleaming silver shuriken, made of pure energy. He held it up for Alan to see, where it spun in his palm, the blades looking extremely sharp.
"You would have to confront the maniac in Tokyo 1984," the old man continued. "Get close to him, summon the weapon and throw it at his heart. When you hit him, you'll overwrite the data that makes his angel. Don't stick around to admire your work though, because it will overwrite Tokyo 1984 as well, and if you're still there when that happens you'll die with him!"
"Don't worry, sir," Alan said. "I don't plan to stick around once I nail this psycho."
"There is something you should know," Hamilton also said, holding up a warning hand. "Because the weapon destroys itself as well as its target, you can use it one time, and one time only!"
"In other words," Alan muttered, "I hit him before hits me."
Hamilton held out his hand, holding the weapon. Alan reached out his own hand, closing it around the gleaming blade. Instantly it vanished in a bright light, and Alan thought he saw his whole body starting to shine. The voice in him said:
"Program data successfully downloaded."
"What I miss most about being alive," Hamilton said, ruefully, "is that I can no longer take care of my brother, Covington. Now go, Mr. Anderson. Goodbye, and God Speed."
Alan nodded. Now starting to get used to how the Matrix works, he pulled himself out of Watford's realm, and logged out of the Matrix. Hoping and praying that the weapon was still safe, he gasped as he felt the tentacles slide back into the goggles and pulled them off his face. His vision was blurred, and for a few moments Alan couldn't see a thing. As he blinked several times to try and readjust, he saw Miki gazing at him.
"Alan!" she said, knowing that Zapper couldn't hear her. "Are you alright?!"
"I'm fine..." Alan said. "That has to be one of the worst experiences of my life."
"Did you find anything?" Miki asked.
"Yeah..." Alan said. "I think I know how to kill the Reaper."
As Miki's eyes widened to take this information in, Zapper suddenly resurfaced into the real world. He looked as white as a sheet.
"What's wrong?" Alan asked. "You look like you've seen a ghost!"
"You're not far off..." Zapper muttered. He held up his commlink, as an audio file began to play. The file was dated as being recorded fifteen years ago.
"The stage is set," Joey Falconetti's voice could be heard saying. "The roles are cast, for the next round of Kaiju Karnage. Let the mayhem begin. These will be my last referee notes for Kaiju Karnage. Players were Tanya, Rigden, Mendell, Jordan, Estevez, Dorset, and myself. This was the final game. It began like any other..."
All at once, a sound like a flapping of very large wings was heard, and a shrill cry echoed. For a moment, Alan thought it sounded vaguely familiar.
"The mighty Battra, sister of Mothra the Guardian, had come to Tokyo seeking the monster that had caused such carnage... the terror titan known as Godzilla! Finding him, the poor creature was no match for the dread being's terrible wrath, and with one atomic blast the valiant Battra was dead, writhing in a firey cloak."
As he spoke, a sound Alan instantly recognised could be heard. It was the sound of Godzilla firing his infamous atomic ray, followed his triumphant, trumpet-like call. It was a sound he had not heard in such a long time, and he couldn't help smiling slightly as he heard it. Quickly wiping the smile from his face, he continued to listen.
"But without warning," Falconetti explained, "the game had suddenly become reality... and the death was real."
"I've lost her!" another voice suddenly spoke that Alan didn't recognise. "She's flatlined! Who was playing Battra?!"
"It was Josie!" Alan suddenly heard a younger Tanya Burton shout.
"No!" a younger Vincent Rigden suddenly screamed. "Who the fuck did this?! How did this happen?! How could this have happened?!"
"We never learned the answer to that question," Falconetti's narrating voice hauntingly stated. "Godzilla had claimed his hunting ground, and now those who played that game must live in fear of when the monster will strike next..."
With that, the audio went dead.
"Oh God..." Miki gasped. All three of them looked very worried.