Longevity (6 page)

"That obvious, huh? Has everyone noticed me nodding off?" Livvy asked.

"We're detectives. We notice things," Meg said. She cocked her head and nodded at
ELU
again. "But unfortunately, a lot of our work is following through on violations involving that stuff you've been trying to study. Some of it is a moving target.

"You came here from Homicide?"

"Yes. Ten years. In San Francisco."

"And Tactical before that, I understand. So I'd guess you've seen your share of the more exciting side of life," Meg said.

"I'm behind on sleep," Livvy said, "but not, I can assure you, because I'm worried about missing any action."

"And the Chief has given you a missing doctor to find. McGregor'll be back soon and you'll get to go out on your first real LLE case," Meg said, her eyes glinting in a way that reminded Livvy uneasily of Mike's wicked smile. "The Chief asked me to give you some background."

"On the missing doctor? So he said. But it's a new case and not much of one. It turns out that the doctor called the clinic on Friday to cancel his appointments for the day. He's barely missing. A few more calls and we'll probably find out that it's just a family emergency or something else that he got wrapped up in and absent-mindedly forgot to call the clinic about Monday and Tuesday. A non-starter, in fact."

"And you're already wondering about the black hole you've hitched your star to," Meg said. Her eyes were still glinting, but then she hesitated and seemed to gather her thoughts. "LLE handles things differently. We try to be proactive. Any time it's a missing physician or molebiologist who does Longevity or enhancement clinical or research work, detectives go out if anything is called in. And we require the clinics to call in any schedule irregularities or unexpected absences. It's possible, for example, that Josephson was under duress when he called in to cancel on Friday.

"As for this being a new case," she added slowly. "It may be and it may not be. Josephson has a history of considerable significance to LLE."

"I couldn't find anything in Archives or in the ethics cases in AAMP or AAMB," Livvy said, a little chagrined. "What did I miss?"

"There wouldn't be anything in the official records. For what this sorry son-of-a-bitch did, you have to get the story from the few of us who were around when he did it. McGregor and I were here. The Chief wasn't, but he keeps a cross-indexed file of these kinds of cases so he can assign repeat offenders to the original detectives."

"But if it was an old LLE case, wouldn't there at least be a record of an Incident Alert in Archives?"

"Not necessarily," Meg said. "A lot of the calls LLE went out on in those early days were on things that weren't yet illegal. It was a molebiol wilderness and we were on the frontier. LLE has been proactive throughout its history. McGregor pioneered the way LLE handles things."

Meg looked around the office at the other LLE detectives. About half were at their desks, the rest were out of the office or elsewhere in Enforcement or City Central, Livvy supposed.

"Back to Josephson and why there are no records of his involvement. One reason is that he's a physician. The Chief has asked me to give you some deep background. The kind you're not likely to get from McGregor, who's...

"Rusty on dealing with a partner. Yes, I know," Livvy said.

Meg smiled and took a sip of coffee. "In Homicide did you ever come across a case of medical malpractice that resulted in a death?"

"A few."

"So maybe you have some idea of the power of the AMA. Nowadays LLE deals more with the AAMP, because although it was ostensibly spun-off from the AMA to increase the lobbying power of the practitioners who specialize in Longevity and enhancement technologies, it also allows the AMA to stay out of some of the worst of the molebiol controversies. Unfortunately, while Josephson's involvement may have been heinous, even to the AMA, which was the only Association they all shared at the time, it was not illegal, and couldn't even be proven to be unethical.

"By the way, if you want to get a sense of how powerful the AAMP lobby is, witness how Longevity and enhancement technologies are licensed for use only under the supervision of a physician. Only the AAMB comes close to matching them in power. Court battles between the two have been epic, with the molebiologists who do clinical work claiming they have been virtually enslaved by the medical profession.

"On the other hand, the people still like having that M.D. handy. Even in the hotlabs, patrons with the funds to finance it will try to have a physician on retainer." Meg shrugged. "Considering what can go wrong, I've always thought it was a good idea."

"Are there really that many molebiologists and physicians out there ignoring the Laws?" Livvy asked, intrigued. "You just don't hear about it being a big problem."

Meg gave her a meaningful look. "Exactlly. That's the goal. That's because of the way LLE handles it."

"I'm starting to get that," Livvy said.

"LLE has an aversion to the limelight. We don't just fail to seek the public eye, we shun it," Meg said. "It's very important that you understand this, so I'm going to say it again: we try not to let the public know how much of this is going on. It just fuels the fires if they know."

"Huh," Livvy said thoughtfully.

Meg watched her. "Think of it this way. Two years ago a man severely beat his girlfriend when she got pregnant. She miscarried and almost died. Now, this sort of abuse has been going on for, well, as long as careless jerks have been mistakenly getting careless women pregnant. But now, there are... new twists to the problem. The man was plugged into Longevity, so he risked losing 50 years if the woman chose to have the baby. The careless jerk claiming he didn't want the baby is not a recognized legal recourse."

"Was that his motive?" Livvy asked.

"Yes, but it really doesn't matter, does it? That's the point. Just the suspicion... It wasn't even an LLE case. But associated with his arrest, there were riots, anti-Longevity riots, and 3 more people died. Do you see?

"The desire to keep LLE's activities underground affects how we handle a lot of our work. You might say it's the unofficial LLE mission statement. People know we exist. We're happiest if they believe we just sit here and monitor allotments and resets and catch an occasional black marketer," Meg said, still watching Livvy as though she was gauging her reaction.

"This is key to understanding the work we do here," she added.

At this point Richard Williams sauntered over from the coffee corner and hitched a hip on the side of Chris' desk. "Lend me your venerable wisdom, Meg. What's key to the work? I've been here ten years and I haven't figured it out yet." He took a sip from his mug.

"Not emulating a colleague who's clueless as to what's key to the work," Meg said without a pause. Then, in an undertone to Livvy, "And he's worked here ten years."

Meg turned back to stare at Williams with a patient expression and after a few seconds said pleasantly, "This is private."

Livvy thought she saw a fleeting resentment on Williams' face, but it vanished too quickly for her to be sure. He threw up his hands in resignation.

"I was just hoping it was a bitch session on McGregor, so I could contribute my load," he said to Livvy. "Anytime."

He stood up and sauntered back to his desk.

"Sorry," Dalton said when he had left. "I don't have time for him this morning."

"You were going to tell me about Josephson."

Dalton was looking through the glass windows into the Chief's office. Livvy noticed that the Chief was watching them, and some wordless, motionless signal might have passed between them, because Dalton stood up unexpectedly.

"Do you feel like a walk?" she asked. She went over to the coffee corner and freshened her cup, then waited while Livvy followed suit. "We'll go talk in the Atrium. Have you found it yet? Bring Louie if you want. He'll like it, too.

Out of the office and a few turns later, they began down a long, straight hall towards what appeared to be a lush miniature topiary set on the edge of a cliff. It made Livvy want to hurry to get there, except that at one point, the hall turned into a glass-enclosed bridge as they passed from the Enforcement building into City Central. They were seventeen stories up and she had her first view of the D.C. skyline. The Washington Monument and capitol dome, sixty years after their reconstruction, were visible high above the rest of the city, and the soaring Laws Memorial, only 10 meters shorter than the capitol, was framed between them. Meg paused so they could just look for a while, and Livvy noticed that Meg was also gazing out over the city.

"I never get tired of it," Meg murmured. "First view?"

Livvy nodded. She couldn't have said anything if she tried.

"McGregor and I were here when most of it was destroyed. Over there," Meg said, pointing off to the right, "are most of the remaining embassies, from those nations still intact enough to maintain them. The rest of the mansions have gone to molebiol billionaires."

They started walking again and reached the extension of the hall into the City Central building. "I'm assuming you flew in Sunday, and then yesterday and today you came in on an UGH and up on one of the swift-els straight from there. When McGregor took you out on your call you used the fastest route to the motor pool and back the same way, with few deviations. From now on you can come in this way when you have time. Even Chris does it, when he's not in a hurry, which is all too infrequent."

"UGH?" Livvy asked with only half of her attention on the answer.

"Underground Hop. The local underground conveyances that feed Metro are all called that, whether they're Coasters or Paceways."

They had emerged from the hall to stand in the middle of the topiary garden, and they threaded through the cross traffic of people moving at a wide variety of speeds until they reached the railing at the edge of the cliff.

"So, like it?" Meg asked.

"It's magnificent," Livvy said.

"City Central's Atrium is its architects' one concession to aesthetics. If you come in on an UGH, you can come in to the Atrium Station and walk up to the ground floor courtyard. From there you can walk, if you really want some exercise, or take one of the slow Atrium els up to 17 where we are, then find the garden here, take the hall back, and follow the route we just came. Enforcement, and more specifically LLE may be, as you saw, in one of the satellite buildings, but other than having to traverse the longer entrance hall and the bridge, we get the benefit of the Atrium all the same."

Seeing Livvy's face, Meg laughed and added, "Don't worry, I'll be going back with you this morning."

It took Livvy a few moments to adjust to the height, and then she began to appreciate the whole scheme. The City Central building itself was a gigantic cylinder with an open core that was bout 75 meters across at the base and widened gradually as it reached the 20
^th
floor. Broad, cantilevered stairs spiraled up the sides of the Atrium, clinging to the glass walls, and on very floor there was a long - 45 meters Livvy guessed - garden-bedecked landing. When Livvy looked down, she could see an extensive pond and what appeared to be a tea garden with flagstone paths and arched bridges in the ground floor courtyard. The suspended gardens spiraled up from there in a green ribbon with bright splashes of other colors. Two stories above them was a radiant garden designed to look like a rainbow, and on the third, sixth and 12
^th
floors there were small waterfalls that cascaded down to a pool in one of the gardens below. With the sun at the right angle they looked like sparkling silver ribbons.

"As you can see, all of the gardens are different, and when you come up the interior els, you pass through one every five floors. These are the slow els, and because so many people like them, they stop a lot. I try to take a different el every day," Meg continued, "unless I have time to walk up."

Livvy looked up, beyond the three floors above them, to see open sky.