"Prefect, this is Sergeant Grazian, monitoring Alain Rienzi. Sorry to wake you, but I just noticed something that might be important."
"Go ahead," Galway said, rubbing his eyes.
"Well, sir, Rienzi left his pills at the lodge and had to be driven back up there to get them. I've got the East Gate reports on his departure and arrival and—well, I'm puzzled by the extra briefcase he came back with."
Galway came wide awake. "An extra briefcase? Was it searched?"
"No, sir. And something else: Rienzi came through the East Gate almost fifty minutes ago, but there's no report of him arriving at his hotel. And nothing's coming in over the bugs in his clothing except what sounds like street noises."
"Call the main desk and have him pull autocab records for the last hour."
"Yes, sir." A long pause. "That's funny. No one's answering."
An unnamed fear curled itself onto the back of Galway's neck. "Go out there and find out what's wrong. Take a couple of men with you."
"Sir, he's probably just—"
"Do it, Sergeant. Call me right back—I'll be getting dressed."
He hung up and rolled out of bed, thankful that Margarite was a sound sleeper. His clothes hung neatly on a nearby chair, and he got dressed as fast as he could. He was just putting on his boots when Grazian called back with the news. "Beta Alert," the prefect ordered. "Get extra men to the gates; I want the Hub sealed off. See if they've done anything else in the building—" a memory clicked with a hunch—"and get some men to the Records Building right away."
The other acknowledged and signed off. Scooping up his gunbelt, Galway fastened it securely around his waist. It had finally come, he thought grimly, checking his laser's power leveclass="underline" the explosion he'd feared for so many years had finally started.
With one final look at his sleeping wife, he hurried from the apartment.
CHAPTER 8
It was time.
The music in the Apex Club had reached a thundering climax; the echoes of it still reverberated through the room. Together, the music, lights, and alcohol had turned the crowd into a seething cauldron of anger and frustration. The teen-agers were ready to explode.
And the necessary catalyst was also ready. From the other side of the stage Denis Henrikson was looking across at Durbin, his eyebrows raised questioningly. Durbin nodded agreement. Smiling grimly, Henrikson got to his feet and stepped onto the stage, picking up a mike. For his part, Durbin pushed his chair back and prepared for action.
"Friends!" Henrikson's amplified voice boomed into the room, and a few of the teen-agers paused in their conversations to look back at the stage. "What are we sitting here for? What are we letting the damn collies do this to us for? Don't we care any more?"
More and more heads were turning, and the buzz of conversation was fading as Henrikson launched into a scathing indictment of the government. It wasn't so much the words themselves, Durbin knew—everyone had heard all this before—but the way Henrikson said them. He had that undefinable aura of authority, that charisma that made for a born leader. To his natural abilities had been added three years of secret training in psychology and sociology, until Henrikson had become a master manipulator of human emotion.
And the crowd was responding. The background noise was growing again—but it was no longer composed of frustrated conversation. The sounds were animalistic, full of hate and violence. In one corner a chant had started: "Burn it down! Burn it down! Burn it down!" More and more people took it up, and within seconds the building was shaking with the angry stamping of feet.
At the table in front of Durbin's a dark-haired youth reached furtively into his pocket. Unnoticed by the mesmerized chanters around him, Durbin moved up behind him; and as the teen-ager's hand emerged, Durbin struck the back of his neck a short, carefully placed blow. The youth sprawled unconscious across the table, and Durbin stooped to retrieve the object the other had dropped. It was a tiny communicator.
Durbin replaced it in the youth's pocket, smiling in satisfaction. He'd long suspected this one of being a Security informer—it was the main reason he'd chosen the table he'd been sitting at. The collies couldn't be allowed even a hint of what was about to happen.
Suddenly, without warning, the crowd was on the move, streaming past Durbin toward a side exit like a gale-force wind. Jumping to the lee side of a table, he looked over in time to see Henrikson leave the building at the head of his mob. Joining the flow, Durbin moved toward the exit, realizing he'd been concentrating so hard on the collie stooge that he'd missed the final punch of Henrikson's speech. That was a shame; he'd wanted to hear it.
Outside, the mob made a sharp right turn. Ahead, two blocks away, loomed the Hub's south gate. Running along the crowd's edge, Durbin worked his way up to the middle of the group, where he'd be able to function as secondary leader if necessary.
"Halt!" a voice boomed from in front of them—one of the gate guards with an amp. "You are ordered to disperse."
In answer, Henrikson half turned, roared something Durbin didn't catch, and doubled his speed. A flash of light lanced out from each of the outside guards, slashing across the front rank. The weapons were apparently set low—to burn instead of kill—and for a second the crowd faltered as screams of pain mixed with the rage. But Henrikson didn't even slow down. His clear voice called and the mob surged forward once again. Ahead, Durbin could see both guards resetting their lasers even as they began to retreat. The gate was opening behind them as they raised their weapons for a second shot—a killing one, probably, which even Henrikson's hidden flexarmor shirt might not be able to stop.
The shot never came. Simultaneously, both guards' heads snapped back, and the two men collapsed into heaps on the ground. The inside man gaped at them for a heartbeat, all the time he had before he too was dropped by O'Hara's hidden blackcollar marksmen. And the gate was still open.
With a shout of triumph Henrikson led the way through the barrier. Some of the teen-agers stopped to strip the downed guards of weapons; and when a carload of Security men whipped around a corner seconds later it was caught completely off-guard, riddled with laser burns before its occupants could react. That gained them eight more weapons, and soon the air was filled with laser fire as the rioters vented their rage on the surrounding buildings. Again Henrikson shouted and gestured, and the mob once more began to move forward, striking out for the Hub's business and governmental center.
Because he was watching for a Security attack on their rear, Durbin saw the three vehicles—an autocab, a private car, and a van—that slipped out the abandoned gate behind them. Phase one completed, he thought, ticking off an imaginary checklist. Now came phase two, the mission that gave them the title of Bait: to draw down upon their own heads the worst the collies could offer. Shivering slightly, one eye still on their rear, he hurried to keep up with the mob.
The report reached Galway while still en route to the Security building. "How many got in, Sergeant?" he asked tersely.
"A couple hundred at least, sir," Grazian, who had taken over the main desk duties, said. His voice quavered despite obvious efforts to control it. "I don't know how. All three guards just collapsed suddenly while the gate was open, but the power and metal detectors didn't show anything that could be a weapon."
"Slingshots," Galway muttered.
"Sir?"
"Blackcollar sniper's weapon," the prefect amplified. "Put out an M-Seven; I want everyone in riot gear immediately."
"Yes, sir," Grazian said. Simultaneously, a large red M-7 appeared on Galway's car display screen. "Done, Prefect."