(eng) Patrick S. Tomlinson - Children of a Dead Earth 01 by The Ark (v5.0)
Author:The Ark (v5.0) [Ark, The]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00
Chapter Seventeen
As it happened, they didnât, but one of them did have a bag of Mahjong tiles. After a brief struggle, they agreed to the Old Hong Kong rules to give Benson a fighting chance, then proceeded to embarrass him in successive games anyway. It was just as well the Ark didnât use hard currency, because they would have cleaned him out.
âI think you three are ganging up on me.â
They all flashed their best âwho, us?â looks and laughed. One of them even slapped Benson on the back.
âNo, you just bad player.â
âMaybe, but Iâd wipe the floor with you at cribbage.â
On cue, one of them reached into a backpack and pulled out a small cribbage board and a deck of cards.
âYou know cribbage?â
The man shrugged. âLot of time to kill.â
âWait, you said you didnât have any cards!â
This was met by another round of laughter. They were enjoying jerking the foreigner around.
âYeah, yeah.â Benson set up the board. âWhich one of you jokers am I going to beat first?â
Heâd just started to shuffle the cards when the phone rang in his head. It was Doctor Russell.
<Jeanine, you have something for me?>
<Well, hello to you too, Bryan.> She didnât bother hiding the sarcasm in her voice.
<Iâm sorry. How are you today? Lovely weather weâre having. Is that better?>
<Loads. Where are you? Your voice is patchy.>
Benson smirked as he dealt the cards. <Iâm about to run the board with some cribbage newbies over in Shangri-La.>
<Shouldnât you be sleeping?>
<Shouldnât you? Whadaya got for me?>
<Well, I stayed up late and ran the tests you asked for. Larabyâs torso is still frozen solid, but his legs and⦠remaining arm are thawed, along with most of his dermal layer. I can already see some bruising and other signs of physical struggle.>
<And youâre sure itâs not from decompression?>
<No, vacuum and freezing leaves uniform damage to the capillaries across exposed flesh. These arenât uniform, and theyâre deeper in the tissue. Theyâre consistent with handprints, like someone squeezing his wrist and shoulder. But thereâs more. I found skin cells and traces of dried blood under his fingernails.>
The man who had volunteered to play slapped him on the hand, pulling him back to the scene in front of him. Benson glanced down and realized heâd misdealt the hand. <Hang on, Jeanine. Really sorry.> He picked up the cards and reshuffled, then dealt them properly.
<OK, go ahead.>
<Sorry, am I interrupting your game?>
<No, itâs⦠complicated. Anyway, fingernails?>
<Yes, Laraby had someone elseâs skin and blood under his fingernails when he died.>
Bensonâs excitement almost boiled over. <Enough material to run a DNA match?>
<More than enough, and I already ran the test. The skin cells belong toâ>
<Donât say it!> Benson mentally blurted out. <Not over an open com. Are the results accessible on the net anywhere?>
<Well, yeah, but theyâre firewalled behind medical privacy protocols.>
<Thatâs not enough. Put a copy on a tablet, then pull the file from the central database and delete it. Power down the tablet, take its battery out, then hide it somewhere. Do you understand?>
<Yes, I think so.
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