Chapter 21. The Murder
Shep and I slept too. I was sort of surprised. I hadn't thought about it, but I would have guessed that we wouldn't—wouldn't need to. I guess it's good that we did, or we would have been awfully bored while they were asleep.
When the Ys woke up, they got up and showered and got breakfast out of a magic hatch in the wall.
Aha! Shep and I concluded simultaneously. They're in their TSA. Kirk A's TSA.
Sure enough, when the Ys were finished, they went outside and into a landscape that looked sort of like the Death Star from Star Wars: all concrete buttresses and bunkers, small ugly concrete buildings and one big ugly concrete building, which was of course the one where Kirk A had his office, or his headquarters.
They passed a sentry at the door and a guard at the elevator (What are they guarding? I asked Shep. Or from what? he answered) and went up to the top floor and into a huge office with windows around three sides of it.
Why the windows? asked Shep. There's nothing to see. And indeed, Kirk A hadn't created a spectacular view for himself the way everyone in our TSA had. He looked out on acres of desolate concrete.
The Ys crossed about an acre of dark red carpet to a desk that was a long, thick slab of black stone on sturdy wooden legs. There was nothing on the desk but a black leather pouch, maybe eight inches square. There was no other furniture in the room except a high-backed black leather chair behind the desk. I think the effect was supposed to be impressive and maybe intimidating, but it was mainly sort of ridiculous.
The man behind the desk looked like Andrew Kirk, but then again he didn't. He looked like his evil twin, or his evil older brother. He sat with his hands folded in front of him next to the pouch while the Ys hiked across the carpet.
"Alibi established?" he asked curtly when they had reached the desk.
"Yes, sir," answered Yancy.
"Good. Here's your equipment." He gestured with his head toward the pouch. Yancy leaned over the desk and picked it up.
"You're clear on the procedure?" asked Kirk A.
"Yes, sir," Yancy answered again.
"Good," repeated Kirk A. "You'll have forty-five minutes, which should be ample. You'll be returned here and then be reinserted immediately, in one continuous operation, so after you've done the job, you'll wake up in your own beds. Doctor Olbers is waiting for you."
"Yes, sir," said Yancy again. "Thank you, sir." The Ys turned and hiked back across the office to the door. They took the elevator down to the eighth floor and got out in an anonymous linoleum-tiled fluorescent-lighted windowless corridor. They opened a door numbered 6 and went into a lab sort of like the one we had gone home from, only more spartan.
A middle-aged man with heavy black-framed glasses gestured them curtly to two gurneys with not-very-clean covers, and they lay down. He didn't bother to say anything but quickly injected them, probably with the same stuff Nick had used on us.
Uh-oh. We're on our way to kill Halloway, Shep said, and then we were asleep.
We and the Ys woke up in what I first thought was a little park. It was nighttime, dark, and we—they—were lying on grass behind a screen of shrubbery. After a moment or two they sat up groggily and checked their watches. It was just after 12:30. They got up and pushed through the bushes onto a path and began walking.
Hey! said Shep. It's the university campus. He was right—it was the campus of the State University at Lincoln, the city in which Yancy and Yarnall had just established their alibis, the city Shep and I lived near in our own world. I recognized the bell tower and then the new library building. There were lamp posts at regular intervals, and we weren't the only people up and around, although there weren't many others, and none of them came near enough to really see us.
The Ys ambled across campus to the president's house, which was dark. Nobody was paying any attention as they cut across the grass and around to the back door. Yancy slipped a key out of the black pouch and opened it.
They must have studied a floor plan of the house ahead of time. They slipped off their shoes in the kitchen and made their way quietly and quickly down a hallway, into the foyer, and up the stairs.
The door of the master bedroom was open, and we could hear the whiffle of heavy breathing. The Ys stopped outside, and Yancy took a plastic bag out of the pouch. In it were two cloth pads, which he removed, giving one to Yarnall. They held the pads out to their sides at arm's length as they went into the bedroom and over to the bed. Yarnall went around to the other side.
The room wasn't completely dark—the bathroom door was open, and there was a nightlight on in the bathroom. Yancy was on Halloway A's side of the bed. He was sleeping on his back. Mrs. Halloway A was on her side with her back to him. Yancy nodded at Yarnall, and they simultaneously brought the pads down near the faces of the two sleepers.
Yarnall kept an eye on his watch, which had a luminous dial, and after ninety seconds they draped the pads over the faces of Mr. and Mrs. Halloway A. Yancy put the pouch down on Halloway A's night table and got out an ampoule and a syringe, filled the syringe, and put it ready.
"Okay," said Yarnall in a normal tone of voice. It had been another ninety seconds, and the two sleepers were apparently completely drugged. The Ys removed the pads, and Yancy put them back into the plastic bag and the bag back into the pouch. Yarnall turned on the bedside light.
Yancy turned back the covers, pulled down Halloway A's pajamas, and measured with his hand from hip bone to pubis, then put his finger down midway between. He—and I, and Shep—could feel the heavy, steady pulse.
"Femoral artery," he said with a wolfish grin. He picked up the syringe and jabbed the spot, drawing bright red blood back into the needle and then slowly injecting whatever had been in the ampoule, 10 mgs' worth. He pulled the needle out and put his thumb firmly over the injection site. He held it there while Yarnall looked at his watch.
"Two minutes," said Yarnall eventually. Yancy cautiously lifted his thumb. There was no bleeding. He pulled Halloway A's pajamas back up and covered him again. Yarnall turned out the light, and they left, locking the back door behind them. They ambled back across the campus to the spot where they'd arrived.
"Forty-two minutes," said Yarnall. "Perfect." Yancy got two smaller syringes out of the pouch. They sat down on the ground and injected themselves.
The next thing we knew, Shep and I were waking up in our separate rooms in the TSA—our TSA.