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"She's my wife. No, wait. Used to be. She used to be my wife." "I'm dying,
Jake. The least you can do is admit we're married."
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"But we're not. You divorced me while I was up in the Freezer."
"Who told you that? Was it that little whore you're sleeping with?"
"Do you know this person?"
Dan came in from out of the fog. He was wearing a dirty hospital gown, too.
"Dad, you promised me you were going to help us. But you've just kept screwing
things up and now Mom and I are going to die."
"You're not dead, Dan. You're still up and around."
"These people are both closely connected with the spreading of the plague in
San Francisco," charged Inspector Hachimitsu. "I intend to hold them for--"
"Don't let him, Jake." Kate was beside him now. "He'll hurt Danny."
"My son doesn't have a damn thing to do with--" "We'll let the courts decide
that, Mr. Cardigan." "Stop him, Jake." Kate placed a knife in his hand. Jake
frowned down at the weapon. There was already blood smeared on the long, sharp
blade. "Inspector, I won't let you arrest my son."
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"Kill him, Jake!"
Jake made a desperate effort and was able to stand up. He started, stumbling
some, toward the policeman.
"Go ahead," Kate urged again, "kill him."
:i35;:
ake lunged at the inspector, trying to slash him with the knife.
Hachimitsu easily dodged him. Smiling, bowing mockingly he retreated into the
thick fog that had filled the living room.
Jake lost sight of him. Then he spotted a figure in the drifting mist.
But it didn't seem to be the policeman.
All at once the fog was gone. Jake was sitting on the floor, the bloody knife
held loosely in his right hand. "How're you doing, amigo." "You're not
Hachimitsu."
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"A good thing, too. If I was, I'd be dead on the floor of your bathroom. How
do you feel?"
"Sial?" Jake shook his head, slowly, from side to side. "I'm not quite sure.."
what the hell is going on?" He noticed he was hooked up
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to the Tek Brainbox that was supposed to be sitting on the black table.
Except there wasn't any table.
"I know it's risky to stop a Tek session before the chip runs out,"
said his partner, who was squatting next to him. "But I decided to risk using
the turnoff button on the gadget you're connected to."
"Feels like I'm coming out of it okay. I don't think I'm likely to have any
negative side effects."
"What would you say to standing up?"
Jake considered that while he, gingerly, detached the electrodes and discarded
the Tek gear on the floor. "I think I can stay on my feet, once up." With
Gomez helping him, he got shakily to an upright position. "How come you're not
in Tokyo?"
"I journeyed here fast as I could to let you know that MacQuarrie might be an
andy."
"He might be, yeah. Not a kamikaze, though."
"No, they apparently decided to get rid of you in a nastier way. By
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killing an important local cop and making it look as though you'd knifed him
while in a Tek stupor."
"Tekkies rarely kill people while using the stuff."
"We know that, but it might be tough to convince the Kyoto constabulary of
that right off. Especially if they'd popped in here and found the inspector
dead in the john and you sprawled there with a bloody knife in one hand and a
Brainbox in the other."
"MacQuarrie--the android MacQuarrie I guess that would he told me Beth had
been hurt," he said, remembering. "He brought me back here to the inn. I saw
Inspector Hachimitsu's body and then Yeah, MacQuarrie used a stun gun on me.
Thing must've been at the lowest setting, so I was only out for a few minutes.
While I was unconscious, he hooked me up to this damn Tek gear." Jake let it
drop to the floor, along with the blood-smeared knife. "He set the Brainbox to
spin out an hallucination for me about killing the inspector."
"Not a bad scheme, and one that takes advantage of your past record.
They get rid of an annoying local policeman and also incapacitate you for a
while," said Gomez. "I'd guess the cops are being alerted about now--or they
could be already wending their way here."
"I've got to find Beth--I'm worried about her."
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"Any notion where to find her?" Gomez knelt near the knife, fished a small
metal rod out of his side pocket.
Jake glanced up at a floating ball-clock. "She's due to visit a professor
friend of hers about now. We're supposed to meet near there in a half hour."
"I suggest you borrow my air car and hasten there." Clicking on the rod, which
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