Sign of the Dragon (Tatsu Yamada Book 1) by Niall Teasdale (e reader TXT) 📕

‘Don’t even joke about that.’

‘Who’s joking? Walking through walls, I’ll grant you, isn’t possible. At least, not without demolishing the wall. However, modern active camouflage is good enough to get you past security sensors. You can practically walk up to someone and tap them on the nose, if you’re good enough.’

‘I still don’t think that’s what happened.’

‘No,’ Tatsu conceded. ‘Zima probably had a way of getting people in past the building’s security. He let his killer in and didn’t want it known about. Could be one of his own crew, there for a secret meeting. Could be one of those toys he shares with his wife…’

‘What have you been able to find out?’

Tatsu sighed. ‘Mostly negatives. There’s a lot of speculation about who might have done it, but nothing worth following up. It would pay to run the boyfriends and husbands of any women associated with Zima. He generally didn’t care much whether his toys came with baggage. And I’ve heard nothing, but maybe your crime intel people can come up with something outside Chiba which could have resulted in bad feelings?’

‘They’re on it.’

‘Good. His gang doesn’t know who did it. Looks like Grigory Vasilev is taking Zima’s place, but I doubt Vasilev would off his boss for the promotion. They work a lot on internal loyalty. You don’t betray your friends with that bunch. I dropped a subtle hint that they should leave any reprisals to the police, but if they figure out who ordered the hit, they’ll try to take them out themselves.’

Nakano nodded. ‘Of course. To be honest, I’d expect no less. A lot of these criminal groups are fraternal.’

‘There’s a sorority in Chiba, but I take your point. I’ll keep an eye on them, but I don’t get the feeling they’re going to be ahead of us on this one. None of the noises around Chiba sound like anything other than baseless rumour. Nothing clicks.’

Nakano sighed. ‘And my clean-up rate was looking pretty good.’

‘You should move to Chiba. When I attend a scene with a body, I usually have the one responsible bleeding out from the knife wounds he got making the body.’ She paused, looking thoughtful. ‘Of course, we have more gun crime. You’ve got more chance of getting shot.’

‘Not that that bothers you. You’ve got armour under that skin that you’re still showing too much of.’

Tatsu ignored the prod. ‘Of course I’m bothered,’ she said. ‘Bullet holes ruin your clothes.’

Chiba.

There was a personal message waiting in Tatsu’s queue when she accessed it. She made a point of not taking notifications for personal stuff while she was working, unless she knew something important was coming. She got few personal messages anyway.

Directing the message to her wall screen, she sat down on her stool to take her boots off and watched as Kobayashi’s face appeared. She had been at home when she recorded the message. She was likely at work by now considering that Tatsu had got back to her apartment at eight in the evening. The dancer was also fresh from the shower and towelling herself off, apparently oblivious to the camera recording her.

‘Tatsu, it’s Sachiko. Which you can see. I was hoping we could hook up again tonight. I get off at ten and, well, I wanted to get off with you later. Ping me, okay? Later.’

The video froze; Tatsu sighed. The image on-screen was enough to make Tatsu consider going out to The Hole again, but… She found Kobayashi’s contact details and fed them to a voice-message app.

‘Sachiko, this is Tatsu. Which you can’t see since you’re probably at work and I don’t want to disturb you with a video of me drying my wet tits. Maybe for later. I’m hung up on work. Sorry, I won’t be free tonight.’ Pause. ‘I’ll call.’

‘She’s a very attractive young woman,’ Izanami said.

Tatsu looked over her shoulder. ‘Not to mention really skilled in the sack.’

‘You should see her again. She’s good for you.’

‘I spent one night with her. We banged each other senseless and that was that.’

‘It doesn’t seem like she thinks so. She knows you’re a cyborg?’

‘It came up in conversation,’ Tatsu admitted.

‘And it appears that your night of passion was not simply a case of novelty. She’s still interested.’

Tatsu frowned and turned to look at the still frozen image on the screen. ‘I don’t do personal entanglement, Izanami. You know that.’

‘I know you like to think of yourself as a loner. I also know you enjoyed yourself with Miss Kobayashi.’

‘You know I did.’

‘I may have peeked.’ A smile graced the avatar’s lips.

‘Voyeur.’

‘I have to amuse myself with something. And I have an ongoing project to reverse the declining birth rate among native Japanese. Have you any idea how low it is now?’

‘Yes, and I also know I’m never going to contribute to a rise in those figures. Considering the extension in lifespan PIN affords, I’d have thought a lower birth rate was a good thing.’

‘There’s such a thing as too much of a good thing. At the rate things are going, the refugees will outnumber our native population in a couple of decades. They still have children.’

Tatsu looked back at her immaterial friend. ‘Not entirely by choice. Put some energy into state-sponsored birth control and you’d see those figures change. As it is, not everyone in the refugee zones can afford contraceptives. Since fucking is one of their short list of entertainments, of course they end up with kids.’

‘I’m aware.’

‘I assumed you were.’

‘But it’s hard enough getting the government to support even the basic medical facilities here, never mind something like that.’

‘Politicians are weird.’ Tatsu turned to look at Kobayashi’s naked body once again. ‘I’ll see if she’s free on Saturday night, okay?