Doctor Who_ Blue Box - Kate Orman [78]
‘Miss Swan,’ I said, ‘what’s clear to me is that you’re sick.
I do want to help you. Let me take you to your Doctor.’
Then Swan called me a name which made up my mind about her. ‘You dumb faggot,’ she said. ‘Do you know how much trouble I’m going to get you in?’
I sat back in my little plastic chair and stared at her.
‘This is the biggest opportunity I’ve ever had,’ she told me. I wasn’t sure if she thought I knew everything, or if she just didn’t care to explain It to me. ‘I’m sorry, but I’ll break anybody to make the most of that windfall. Does your editor know the LAPD still want you for bashing your editor there?’
‘Lady’ I said,’I didn’t bash anybody. Someone throws a punch at me, I throw it right back at them. Seem fair to you?’
‘You won’t be throwing any punches at me.’
‘I won’t be throwing any crumbs your way, either.’
‘Can’t you guys understand?’ Swan’s voice was creaking.
‘I’m going to wreck you. I’m going to crush you. Anybody you like, anybody you love, I’m going to take them down too.’
‘You’ll try. And we’ll push back three times as hard as you push us. You don’t know when you’re outclassed.’ I stood up. ‘’Scuse me. I’ve got some shopping to do.’
It only took three tries with the air gun to shoot out the camera above Swan’s doorway. I managed it easily from the sidewalk.
From our little expedition into Swan’s security setup, I knew I was invisible where I stood. Through the curtains of the house next door, I could see a family eating miniature chocolate bars from a bowl and playing with a new chess machine. They took no notice of me. It gave me the creeps to be standing by their front yard with a toy gun, and them all unawares.
Swan was back at the office; I’d phoned before I’d driven out to McLean, hanging up when I heard her voice. The broken camera would warn her anyway: I didn’t have long to take the obvious step of busting a window and making off with her prize.
Swan had absolutely isolated herself. She never spoke to her neighbours, she was friends with no-one at her office. She had bullied every hacker and phreak in the greater DC area, but now she couldn’t trust any of them, even her old pal Luis.
She couldn’t even use social engineering to rustle up some support from unsuspecting technicians; Swan’s style was strictly antisocial. She was on her own. That made her very safe in one way, and incredibly vulnerable in another way: she couldn’t even have someone guard her house. I wrapped my hand in my pocket, and busted the window on the porch.
I had a rough map of Svian’s house in my head built out of glimpses. I only wish I’d had a genie, like the Doctor’s guide in the mud, to carry me straight to my goal. There wasn’t a lot of light inside, but I knew the areas she was watching had to have their bulbs lit. I crept up the stairs – not an easy thing to do, when you’re in a blazing hurry – and located the bathroom where Swan was keeping her prisoner.
The air gun claimed another camera as its victim. The shape in the tub didn’t even flinch when I shot the lens out. It wasn’t easy to see in the dim yellowish light and behind the grubby shower curtain, but then, I wasn’t looking at it too closely.
There was no putting it off. I held my breath and ripped back the slimy plastic barrier between me and the monster.
It didn’t look at me, too busy with the guts of a pushbutton phone and a hand-held football video game to care. I could see its fur rippling with tiny appendages, like the legs of a caterpillar or a wormy slice of meat, keeping a firm and elegant grip on the components it was toying with.
It never looked up, but I still had an intense feeling of being watched, of being looked back at. The longer I stood there, the more intense that feeling got, as though I was the most important thing in its little echoing bath-tubby world. It was the kind of warm and important feeling you get as a kid when you’re the centre of everybody’s attention. All that, and it never so much as glanced at me.
The thing was about the size of a six-year-old, and as light as though it really was