beautifully. Oh, and before you ask, although the RA-17 is a single allele, it only arises as a result of complex polygene forms elsewhere. Hence the rarity."
"But why are they taken alive if they're then killed?" Serrin tried to reason, ignoring the genetics.
"Because they must have value to whoever it is that's taking them," Michael said slowly. "It isn't money. It's not their genius-level intelligence either. It must be something directly to do with the allele. With the blood group."
Serrin felt slightly sick for an instant. "What are you telling me?" he managed to say. "We're dealing with a slotting vampire or something?"
"Something rather nastier than that," Michael confirmed. "I don't think garlic, Hail Mary's and hows-your-fathers can stand up to this one. In fact, if I'm right, he cannot exist. Which is why I'm waiting for Professor Richard Bruckner to call me. This should be interesting. I'll record the call and get Geraint to pass it along to one of his Oxbridge men in white coats. I don't know enough about this to verify it myself.
"In the meantime, I'll investigate the ongoing paperwork for visas to the Zulu Nation. There shouldn't be any problem. It's the lack of shots I'm worried about. You can catch any one of a tremendous range of exciting and colorful diseases in Umfolozi and we won't have much in the way of protection against them. Tom says he can deal with most things, even things he doesn't know about yet. I still want to do my homework on emergency medical care, though. It could get interesting."
He was still flying, buzzing with it all, "Kristen, you're going to have a problem in the Zulu Nation, huh?"
"Yeah, I guess so," she said miserably. "But I'd be useful to you."
"How?" Michael asked bluntly.
"I know how to avoid button spiders the really dangerous ones. And the giant scorpions. I know which plants are safe and which aren't. I know what to buy to protect your skin against insects and to keep the bees off you if they swarm. I know what's smart to wear and what
isn't." She would have gone on, but he stopped her, smiling.
Half of it just wasn't true, and to come through she'd have to call in some favors and get a lot of help and advice really fast. But she didn't want to see these people disappear from her life as quickly as they'd entered it. And, while she hadn't been able to understand anything of what Michael had said, she had caught the word vampire and, crazily, that had excited rather than frightened her. She knew too much from the trideo and nothing about the reality of them.
"But you don't have a passport, do you?" She shook her head. "And only the basics in the way of an ID?" She nodded.
"Know any fixers who can fit you up with a good passport fast? Like, in a day?"
"Why don't we just get her a real one?" Serrin asked. "She's entitled, surely."
"Fine. And wait three weeks. Even with palm-greasing, a few days at the very least. That allows plenty of time for any interested parties to find us here and maybe even figure out what I've been doing if they have a good enough decker. We don't know what's shadowing us," Michael retorted.
"I haven't been able to find anyone yet," Serrin said, thinking of his watchers and astral surveillance.
"Which could mean that there isn't anyone only because they just haven't gotten to us yet, or else there's someone who's so good you can't see him. Either way, why sit here like a duck with a carton of orange sauce in its beak waiting for the guy with the gun?"
"Very colorfully put," Serrin said sarcastically.
"Quack," Michael grinned. "So, do you know someone, Kristen?"
"I think so," she said, "but it won't be cheap."
"Not if it's any good, it won't be," Michael replied. The telecom beeped; he went and took the call in the bedroom.
"We need to go to Umfolozi to find the other mage they tried to kidnap," Serrin told Kristen. "He may be able to help. If he knows, or saw, something, if we can
find out why they tried to take him, then we may get to the truth of who tried to kidnap me."
"I know that," she said slightly impatiently.
"How difficult will it be for you there? I just don't know about these things," Serrin mumbled.
She hissed. "Zulu people don't like Xhosa," she said angrily.
"But we're white. Won't it be worse for us?" he said, genuinely puzzled.
"Are you kidding? The OV's are the best friends the Zulus have," she said. She was really only parroting what she'd heard about the proud eastern nation and the Oranje-Vrystaat. Never having been anywhere near either of those neighboring states, never having learned any history at any school, it was only what she'd heard on the streets. But she knew about the Zulus she'd seen in Cape Town, and they liked mixed-race faces about as much as she liked having her faced rubbed in drek.
Michael half-emerged from the bedroom, the portacom clutched tightly to his ear. "Many thanks, Professor. This really does help with my dissertation. Yes, sir, I'll make sure to give Professor Malan your regards. Thank you again, sir. It's been most helpful." He flicked the off switch and threw the phone back on the bed. He smiled at having so successfully passed himself off as a Witwatersrand postgraduate.
"That's the guy who isolated the Bruckner-Langer HMHVV strain," he gloated. "Says it isn't totally impossible for a metahuman to have the strain and somehow survive. It's never been known, but theoretically it's just possible. It would depend on, um, compensatory RNA-stabilizing polygenes and something to do with the CS-cascade system in immunology." Michael, for once, looked as if he wasn't entirely sure that he'd learned something properly. To Serrin, it was almost a relief.
"So our man or our elf, to be more accurate could, just possibly, exist after all. When you have eliminated the possible, the impossible that remains is obviously the answer. It's simply a question of showing that it can happen, as Holmes would have said."
"I don't think he did say it quite like that," Serrin complained, searching out the brandy in the fake mahogany cupboard.
"Oh, box it. Just because you've got my deerstalker hat doesn't mean you can spoil all my fun," Michael mocked him. "Now all we have to do is to find our target. An elf nosferatu. Since I doubt that he lights it up in neon, we may have some way to go. Hopefully our Mr. Shakala can tell us something that will put our feet on the path.
"We should go. Back to Indra's. I can't risk my deck there, but I don't want to stay here any longer than necessary. This place is just too obvious," the Englishman concluded, beginning to lock up his case. "Take the brandy with you. I might even take a little snifter myself. I've had a good day."
He paused and gave Serrin and Tom a sly grin as he picked up the deck with a grunt. "By the way, Bruckner says that if such a creature existed, it's quite likely that he might have special requirements in the feeding department, though he couldn't be precise about the details. Now isn't that interesting?"
He was halfway out the door. Serrin took Tom by the arm as the troll made to follow him.
"You're very quiet, chummer," he said quietly. "What were you up to all day? Not a dereliction of duty, surely?"
The troll's soft brown eyes turned to him. "Just something I had to do," he said non-committally, then followed Serrin out the door.
Magellan realized far too late that they had gone. There had been no activity in the apartment during the morning and his watchers had told him nothing. Finally, he did the simple thing and changed into his uniform in the shoddy little hiding hole he'd rented for almost nothing.