Chapter 9

Ming Na Liu

12:00 AM

Ming sat down at one of the desks. She had cleaned up most of the broken glass, but a gaping hole remained in the conference room window, and a spicy musky smell invaded the room. Dean had locked Ivan in the holding cell and was now sprawled out on the ground in front of Ming. His shirt had been torn, and he was bleeding. "You sure he won't get up soon?"

"Yes. Whatever freaky thing that girl is, she's strong. He won't be getting up for a while," Dean spoke through the cloth on his face.

"How did she pick him up?" Ming asked.

"You're asking me? I have no idea where she came from. If Jeremy was right, she just vanished from the room," he said. "Maybe she reappeared in the same way. Just like Star Trek. Saves me from having to investigate her murder."

"You don't believe her story, do you? Somebody did kill her, right?" Ming needed to dig this out. Leaving a mystery like this alone was not in her nature. Part of her wanted to accept that Barbie believed what she was saying, but ghosts and nanites were a bit far-fetched, even if she had seen her.

"So, she said. But with no body to check and the victim walking around, I can file this under 'Unsolved' and let it go. Too bad we don't have 'Loony'. Or just plain freaky." Dean paused. "I will probably get a uniform to check out the place where she said her body was dumped in the morning. Just to cover all the bases."

Ming tapped her pencil on her notepad. "You looked really good out there," she said, bending over him. "I was impressed."

"Really?" He pulled the towel off his face. "I thought I was losing." He scowled at her. "Next time, drop the smirk when you say that."

"Can't help it." Ming covered her mouth with her hand and suppressed the giggle. "You set yourself up for it so well, and my lack of sleep has impaired my judgment." Turning serious, she leaned back over the detective. "On the other hand, she knows who Slazney is and said the man had been in Vegas for over thirty years."

"Can you really trust her?" Dean said, sitting up. "You've been searching for this man for a while. Her story sounds unbelievable, impossible and just plain weird." He paused. "But my instincts aren't telling me to stay away from her, so I don't think she's hiding anything." He shrugged. "I wish my gut came with an instruction manual sometimes."

A slight vanilla scent filled the room. For a second, Ming let her fantasies play out in her mind. She saw him, naked, muscles gleaming and grabbing her with his two strong arms.

Then he farted, shattering the illusion into a million pieces.

"Sorry about that," he said. He didn't even have the decency to look embarrassed.

"Don't worry about it. It was exactly what I needed," she said, waving her hand in front of her nose. "As for trusting her, I want to, but it's difficult. Believing everything she's saying about Greater Vegas, well, that won't happen soon." She ground her teeth just thinking about Barbie. "Her story is too unbelievable."

"Let's go check on them." Dean stood and walked to the interrogation room. They passed by the holding cell. The big mute was sleeping. He was bigger than the cot, flowing over it. According to Bobby, the man was an enforcer for the Bratva in Russia. He was dangerous, but his employer, Gregory, was the real problem. That man had connections in everything from assassination to selling high-priced chocolate on the black market. Bobby still hadn't explained their connection to him or why he was so worried about the man's humming.

"Have you finished yet?" Dean asked, slamming open the door to the room. "I'm still not sure why I haven't arrested you."

A slight odour of unwashed bodies mixed with coffee and something else assaulted Ming. For once, she was glad she had allergies and didn't have to smell it for long.

Bobby looked up from the computer screen. His bloodshot eyes pierced the gloom of the room. "Fuck off, Detective. You have nothing to arrest me for anyway."

"How about the destruction of the precinct? Impeding an investigation? Or just plain wasting my time."

"That wasn't me, and you know it." Bobby started mumbling, checking the code line by line. "One small miss in a space or using an apostrophe for a backtick screws everything up. They both look so similar."

Dean scoffed. "Excuses."

"You leave the Maker alone," Barbie turned to Dean. She was drinking another cup of cheap police coffee. "He's doing the best he can."

Dean frowned and sat across the table from them. "How many of those have you had?" he asked her.

"I don't know. Is seven a lot?"

Ming watched the two of them banter. Dean must be feeling slighted because he couldn't touch Ivan, and the twig of a girl smashed him into the floor, breaking the tiles. She stared at the pink girl out of the corner of her eyes. Ming's eyes bugged. Hadn't they given her a blue sweater from the locker room?

"When did you get that pink sweater?" she asked. It even said LVPD on it.

"Like it? Pink's my favourite." Barbie picked up the front of her sweater, showing it off. "I can't stand wearing any other colour, so I changed it. My nanites have enough juice in them thanks to the Maker's jump start. He's coming with me." She clapped her hands.

"It's very nice," Ming said, getting out her notebook and hiding her eye roll. Her nerves were poking her. Dean would call it his gut, but she needed more evidence, "How did you really do that?"

"Nanites," she said slowly, sipping her coffee.

Ming lowered her head and sighed. "I thought we already covered that. Nanites are in the sci-fi realm. I've read a few reports on them, but nothing to the level you're saying."

Barbie shrugged and continued drinking her coffee with two hands.

"Can we continue our discussion about Slazney?"

"Maybe later. I want to watch the Maker work." Barbie stared into Bobby's face like she was absorbing every pore in his skin.

Closing her book, Ming turned back to Dean. She needed assistance to get through to Barbie. His eye was turning purple, and there was a bruise spreading across his sculptured chest visible through his ripped shirt. The man had it all. He was handsome with a good job. Her mother would like him. Showing up with him at the next party would certainly get her to stop trying to fix her up. She licked her lips and stared at him.

"What are you looking at?" he asked. His blue eyes were searching her face. Why hadn't she noticed how soft they were?

"Just wondering what you were doing tomorrow night? My Uncle wants to have dinner with us," she said. It was just the two of them now. Bobby's clicking in the background had faded away. She envied how Barbie could stare into the face of the man she loved.

Ming jerked back at the thought of the word 'love' and noticed a strange smell in the room. It was vanilla, with lilacs and butter mixed with a cheesy tang that left an aftertaste on her tongue. It was the same as in the main hall. "What's that smell? Why am I thinking crazy thoughts?"

"Oh, sorry," Barbie said. "I was releasing my lust scent. It's much better than that nasty chew the Maker was using. I had the nanites whip up some for me. It uses them up faster, but that's okay, we're going home soon. It usually helps people focus on the things they like the most and covers up the smell of blood quite nicely. I hate that smell. I'm surprised you noticed it."

"Your lust scent?" Ming mouthed. A similar expression of disbelief was on his face. It was turning red. She wasn't the only one affected. Ming wondered what he was thinking. She went out to the break room, grabbed the jar of coffee from the corner, and inhaled. With her sense of smell back, she returned to the interrogation room and passed it to Dean. He copied her and said nothing.

"I'm almost finished," Bobby announced. "I hate that goddamn backtick." He typed a few more keys and stopped. Turning to Barbie. "Are you sure about this? I was surprised you knew so much about the code."

"Yes. My Handler forbade me from ever touching a computer again, but I can help. I need to get home. I want to take you with me, if you want to come. You're not safe here, especially with that man after you. Besides, my Handler said we could find a place for you, if we needed to."

"I don't know if that's a good idea, but something is making me trust you," Bobby said. "I wish I knew why. The block is pretty weak now, but I know this code is not something anyone should play with. What if I got it wrong?"

"You've just forgotten the beauty of this code," Barbie responded, grabbing his face and kissing him on both cheeks. "If you've input it right, it can give you your heart's desire, bypassing most of the cost." She turned and hit enter.

Nothing happened.

"Not again," Bobby groaned. "Let me check it."

"No. Wait." Barbie went to the CD file and started up some Motley Crue. "You just forgot the music. The music needs to exist with the math. They can't work alone." A drum solo blared over Bobby's speakers. She hit enter again.

A hum filled the room. It started in the computer speakers and spread to the people sitting at the table. The sound grew louder, forcing Ming to cover her ears. Even then, it pierced between her fingers, shaking her fillings.

"What the hell is this? Turn it down!" Dean yelled. "My ears are going to burst!" He stood up and went to the door, his hands covering his ears.

"It's working!" Barbie giggled. She grabbed Bobby's hand. "We're going home."

"What about us?" Ming yelled over the racket. She reached down, pulled off her socks and stuffed them into her ears. They helped dampen the noise but didn't cut it out completely.

"You can come with us. Just type your names in the command prompt and hit enter again when we've gone. You'll love Greater Vegas." Barbie gushed.

"Fuck!" Bobby squeezed his eyes shut as light poured out of his computer screen and engulfed everyone in the room. "Not again."

"What did you do, Window Washer?" Dean yelled, moving towards Bobby, hands outstretched into claws.

Ming could no longer see anything. The light and sound invaded every crack, stabbing her eyes and blocking out Bobby's response. She could hear Barbie's squeal over the noise, but everything else went white.

Ivan

2:00 AM

The sound woke Ivan up. He sat up and looked around the holding cell and sighed. Gregory was going to be angry. He wasn't nice when he was angry. Ivan tested the bars of the tiny cell and started a Gregorian chant. He did that whenever he was too stressed. The sound helped him relax. He could bend the bars, but Gregory didn't like that kind of attention. Ivan shivered and let the hum go. There was no way he was getting out of here before the morning, and there had been too much destruction already.

A bright light filled the precinct, forcing Ivan to put his hand over his face. The white seeped through his fingers and stabbed the back of his eyes, but didn't go any further. He remembered this kind of thing happening before with Petor, and it never ended well. Then there was silence. Nothing moved. He winced and held his ribs. That blond girl was strong. What had she been on?

The silence stretched for a few minutes before the sounds of someone walking echoed through the dead office. A door opened, and a computer clicked shut. The door closed, and the footsteps walked away.

Petor was gone. Ivan closed his eyes and went back to sleep. He'd deal with this in the morning. Right now, this was the most comfortable bed he'd slept on in years, and he wanted to enjoy it. American prisons were so soft. It was almost worth it letting Petor go.