“Nothing’s going to brew,” Moses commented.

Manz considered briefly. He knew the layout by heart now, and it wasn’t his job to actually keep watch over the shipment. He wasn’t a gunny; he was an adjuster, and he could adjust just as well from the comfort of a Jacuzzi.

“Okay, we’ll take you up on that. Thanks for the tour. Enlightening, but depressing. I’ve got one or two notions percolating that might lead to some …”

WRRRAAANGGGG!

Alarms multiplied like protons cast off fissioning atoms. Half a dozen Company agents came stumbling out of opposite doors, weapons in hand, looking for someone to nerve-fry. Hafas and his remaining plainclothesman drew their own guns, as did Manz and Vyra. Administration workers who had been strolling the courtyard or walking blissfully from one office to another stopped in their tracks, paralyzed and bewildered. A couple who had been seated on a bench next to the landscaped planter found themselves unceremoniously hustled off for a security check, uneaten sandwiches still in hand.

Someone finally shut off the bells and sirens, which made the inspector audible. His expression was agonized as he lurched toward the center of the courtyard, its elegant flora, and the enigmatic but now somehow ominous bulk of the security shed.

“Not now,” he was muttering to himself. “Not already.”

Manz didn’t wait for an invitation. He and Vyra followed as Company agents and JeP police converged on the shed.

They were soon joined by the slightly overweight Company rep. Out of breath, he waited with the rest of them for Security to unseal the door. The rush of air that accompanied their entrance suggested that the shed’s integrity had not been violated.

There was barely enough room inside for the rep, Hafas, Manz, and Vyra. Several shipping containers of varying size and composition rested on the shelves where they’d been placed. So did the gleaming titanium case that not so very much earlier had been banded to the rep’s wrist. Squinting uncertainly, he picked it up.

A neat, fist-sized hole in the bottom showed where it had been pierced.

They waited impatiently for him to produce the wand that would banish the alarm nimbus. He pointed it at the case and thumbed the necessary combination. Then he extracted a small metal stylus from a security pack of its own and inserted it into a hole in the side of the case. There was a delay while the container’s lock cycled, then a soft click. The rep removed the key and inserted it in a matching hole on the other side, repeating the procedure. Only then was he able to open the case without setting off its internal alarms.

The padded foam cutouts that lined both sides of the case were empty, their contents gone missing. Manz wasn’t surprised.

The rep blinked back at him, utterly baffled. “I don’t understand. We just put this in here a little while ago.”

“We don’t understand either,” growled Hafas, “but we’re going to. By God, we’re going to.”

That’s it, make positive-sounding mouth noises. Gets the adrenaline rushing, makes you feel better. Humans are unsurpassed at their ability to fool themselves into thinking things are going to get better.

Manz rubbed the back of his neck and eyed the inspector. “You want to make the announcement or should I”

“I’ll split it with you. I’ll tell my people, and you inform yours.”

“That means I get to tell Gemmel. Lucky me.”

“Lucky him,” murmured Vyra. She was conducting a minute inspection of the seam where the metal walls met the ceiling. “He’s the one who has to notify the Board.”

Revelation of the unprecedented fourth successful jacking at the Port’s maximum-security transshipment facility placed those responsible for its security even more on edge. The uneasy conversation and nervous speculation that the previous heists had engendered resumed unabated.

“Would you be believing in black magic, Michele?” one of the Company’s own agents said to his partner later that evening. “Or for that matter, any kind o’ magic?”

“Not a chance, Ryan,” she replied from behind her desk. She rapped firmly on the half-filled coffee mug that had been a gift from her younger sister. “The Little People aren’t behind this. Knock on wood.”

In the techno-crammed, claustrophobic cubicle that served as the nerve center for Administration Security, a frustrated Hafas was alternately berating and empathizing with the Port Authority technician in charge.

“… And you saw nothing?”

The man winced but didn’t back down. He was very pale, with hair blonded to match, skinny but not nervous. When he responded, his voice did not shake.

“I’ve been here since the shed was sealed, sir. I may have looked away from the monitor for a few seconds every now and again, but the recorder was on and I’ve reviewed everything. There’s no indication anywhere that anything went amiss.”

Hafas turned, running his fingers through his thick black curls. “There are no monitors in the shed mounted on the floor and looking upward. I guess that’s our next adjustment. These bastards always seem to be one step ahead of us. I’m puking sick of going in circles.”

“You’re not going in circles, Inspector.” Vyra was studying the images on the multiple screens. They displayed the interior of the atrium, the shed itself, and precious little that was of any use. “You’re on a Möbius strip. We all are.”

“What finally set the alarm off?” Manz asked quietly.

The technician turned to him thankfully. “A minute amount of smoke from the hole the intruder cut in the bottom of the titanium case. It took too long to disperse and register. Since there was no air in the shed, combustion by-products were minimal.”

“If there was any combustion at all,” Moses added.

Manz glanced at the mechanical. “Explain yourself.”

“I’m envisioning a small, very precise, high-frequency acoustic cutter. Wouldn’t activate most alarms and doesn’t require oxygen for operation.”

The door to the cubicle burst open and a uniformed JePPO stood in the portal, breathing hard. His gaze traveled from the inspector to Manz and Moses before eventually settling on Vyra. She smiled at him and he blinked, as though forgetting what he’d come for.

“Yes, Officer?” Hafas had to prompt him.

The man tore his gaze away from Vyra. “Sir, they just found Officer Dominguez and Sergeant Dutoit.”

“I wasn’t aware they were lost,” the inspector replied coolly.

The officer glanced again at the visitors, continuing when his superior raised no objection. “Sir, they’re both dead.”

Manz peered hard at Hafas, his voice taut. “This is unprecedented, isn’t it?”

Hafas looked dazed. “It might be unrelated. A Port Authority this size deals with trouble on a daily basis.” He started for the doorway. “I have to look in on this, jacking or no jacking.”

“I know,” said Manz. “It could be related, too. Mind if we tag along?”

“No. My brain's already operating at capacity. I can use the extra storage.”

They followed him out. Moses, for once, offered no comment.

More killing. You do that all the time. Sometimes for a recognizable motive, just as often not. I tend to think of it as an inherent form of postadolescent population control. It’s in your genes. As medical science extends your organic lifespans, the murder gene becomes more dominant within the population. As infant mortality declines and individuals live longer, nature finds other ways to limit your numbers. Good thing, too. There are far too many of you on the settled worlds as it is.

VI

The blank, drying eyes of JePP Sergeant Pascal Dutoit were focused on something of vital importance. Of that there was no doubt whatsoever in Manz’s mind. Unfortunately, they had no way of finding out what it was. Dutoit wasn’t going to tell them, ever. The expression permanently frozen (or at least until the morticians got ahold of him) on his face suggested surprise, shock, recognition of the unexpected. It implied that he had had time to recognize his assailant, if not to react.

Manz studied the expression closely. You could learn a surprising amount from a dead man’s visage. Vyra had turned her attention to his deceased colleague, who lay sprawled facedown on the corridor floor. A Port Authority officer was making a recording of the dead man and his immediate surroundings.

Officers and Braun-Roche-Keck agents clustered around a tall woman clad in a red-striped white coat. An embroidered caduceus was prominent on her chest and back. Turning from his examination of the unlucky sergeant, Manz strained to overhear.

“Necks broken,” the woman was informing her audience, which currently included Hafas. “Both of them. Almost as if they were hung.”