S Huang - Zero Sum Game

“Born and raised in rural Nebraska, moved out to Los Angeles a few years ago,” recited Checker. “On paper, totally boring until the arrest warrant for murder. She grew up with an aunt and uncle in Nebraska after her parents died. They didn’t have any kids who could have been a ‘sister’ either,” he added, preempting the question I’d been opening my mouth to ask. “And aside from them, all her living relatives are of the distant variety.”

“Does she have a psych record?” I asked.

“What part of ‘totally boring’ didn’t you understand?” said Checker.

“We ought to look into Dawna,” said Tresting. “Whoever she is.”

The buzzing pain got worse, the strange insistence of wrong, no, Dawna’s all right! still tugging at my consciousness.

I beat it back savagely with a mental crowbar. What the hell was going on with me? “Yeah,” I forced myself to say. “I agree.”

Checker levered one of the wheels of his chair and spun to a different keyboard, then looked back expectantly at the webcam. “Okay, Cas Russell. Give me what you’ve got on her.”

I took a breath, ignored the headache, and recited all the contact information I had, again with a flush of embarrassment at how little it was. I barely had more than her work and cell numbers. A slight pause followed my rundown, as if the two men were waiting for more, and part of me wanted to explain and defend myself—she had done something to me!—but my humiliation at being bested was stronger than the mortification of not having done a good background check, and I bit back the information.

Checker’s fingers danced over his keyboards. “Cell’s a prepaid disposable,” he announced. “And the work number…is also a prepaid disposable.”

I avoided looking at them, my face heating.

“Let’s try something else,” said Checker, and I tried not to feel like he was working to spare my feelings. He hit a few more keys, and Tresting’s second monitor lit up to show an array of photographs, mostly poor headshots. I realized they were driver’s license photos, women named Polk with the first name Dawna or Donna. I didn’t even know which way she spelled it. “Do you see her?” Checker asked. “If she backed up the alias with paperwork, I might be able to track it.”

Eighty-seven photos had matched his search, and I took a good minute to scroll through them all, even though I didn’t need that long. After all, bone structures are only measurements, and measurements are only math. None of the eigenvectors of the feature sets were even close to Dawna’s, but I compared the isometric invariants anyway, delaying the conclusion I already knew was true.

Dawna’s face wasn’t there. I shook my head.

“Color me shocked,” murmured Tresting.

My embarrassment was hardening into a cold fury. The anger gave me a focus, made it easier to think. “What about a picture?” I said. “Would that help?”

Checker brightened. “Sure! I’ve got the best facial recognition software out there. I know because I wrote it.”

“Pull up a map of Santa Monica.” One was up on Tresting’s other screen in front of me before I had finished the words. I reached over to the mouse and traced the cursor along the streets. “I met Dawna here at about four p.m. yesterday. We walked this way.” I carefully followed the walking route we had taken. “Then we sat and talked here for…” I thought. I’m capable of measuring time down to the split-second if I want to, but I hadn’t been paying attention. “About half an hour.”

Checker had begun grinning more and more broadly. “Oh, Cas Russell, good thought. Good thought!” His fingers did their mad dance again, and the map on Tresting’s other monitor disappeared to be replaced with a flickering slideshow of grainy black and white shots. A color photo came up in the corner of my own face, a frowning mug against the background of Tresting’s neat office—clearly a screen grab from our video chat—and digital lines traced and measured my forehead, cheekbones, nose, chin. The black and white security camera footage flashed by next to it faster and faster and then finally disappeared, leaving three still frames arrayed across the top of the screen.

“Downright disturbing, how much they see,” said Tresting.

“What are you talking about, Arthur? Security cameras keep us nice and safe,” said Checker sarcastically. “But it’s okay. As long as I can use their power for evil.” We took a good long look at the three frames that showed clear shots of both Dawna and me.

“That’s her,” I confirmed.

“‘She,’” said Checker.

I blinked. “What?”

“Predicate nominative. It should be, ‘that’s she,’ though I admit some allowance can be made for colloquialism because it does sound frakking weird to say that.”

Tresting flicked a finger at the computer screen. “Go back to being a computer nerd.”

“I’m a pan-geek,” Checker said loftily. “Besides, it’s your fault for giving me the Kingsley research to do.”

I stared at them, utterly confused. “That’s Dawna,” I repeated.

“Yes, yes, I know, supergenius on it,” Checker muttered, waving dismissively at me over the webcam. Dawna’s face replaced mine on Tresting’s screen, the digital markers now measuring her fine Mediterranean cheekbones. “I’ll start with the California DMV.”

The photos flashed by too quickly to see. A minute or so of suspense later, Checker sighed. “No matches, kids. We’ll go national. This might take a minute.”

“Somehow I’m doubting she’s a licensed driver at all,” Tresting said.

I slouched in my chair. “So we’re back to square one.”

“Not so fast, Cas Russell,” Checker crowed. “You gave me a photo! Do you have any idea what I can do with a photo? If she doesn’t show up in a DMV photo, or a passport photo, or on a private security ID or a student ID or in a high school yearbook photo—well, it doesn’t matter, because as we speak I am tracking her from your meet.” He gave me another manic grin. “See? You can never disappear from me!” And then, God help me, he threw back his head and gave a textbook evil laugh.

“You’re a maniac,” Tresting said with affection.

“Really?” Checker was still grinning. “What gave it away?”

To be honest, I was getting slightly uncomfortable with the knowledge the little hacker had my photograph and voiceprint now, but there wasn’t much I could do about it. I tried to stay focused on the case. “Okay. What can we do in the meantime?”

Tresting stretched, yawning. “Wait and get some sleep? Unless you know of anything else we can pursue.”

I thought of Dawna’s humiliating ability to get into my head. I thought of the men in dark suits at Courtney Polk’s house. I thought of Anton’s workshop erupting into flames, the heat searing my skin.

I thought about how much I still didn’t know about Arthur Tresting and his information guy.

“Nothing else comes to mind,” I said.

The headache continued to pound away behind my eyes.

“Wait,” I said, as Tresting moved to sever the connection. “I still want to see your data, remember? Whatever led you two to believe in the whole Pithica conspiracy in the first place.”

Checker laughed. When I only stared at him stonily, he said, “Wait, really?”

“Yes, really. Is that funny?”

He waved his hands limply. “It’s just, you know, there’s a lot of it.”

“So?”

He glanced at Tresting. “Okay.”

“And I want to see your algorithms, too.”

He crossed his arms. “Those are my intellectual property.”

“Then show me on Tresting’s machine now,” I said. “I don’t have a photographic memory.”