Demolition Man Read online

  "But you were around then," said Lenina. "You must have some idea who this is."

  "I do. Wish I didn't. I was a rookie then. He was a big dealer. Narcotics. Software. Wetware. Prostitution. Loan-sharking. Murder for hire, murder for the fun of it. Anything where he thought he could make a little money. Make himself a bigger man. Simon Phoenix was always behind it. You could bet on it."

  Lenina Huxley's mind swam at the thought of such outlandish, flamboyant late twentieth-century crime. It sounded like something out of a fairy tale. And she felt the tiniest tingle of excitement. She was, after all, a romantic at heart.

  "Phoenix declared his own kingdom in South Central LA. And he MDKed whatever got in his way. In a bad time, Lenina Huxley, he was the worst."

  Huxley's thought of South Central San Angeles, an area of neat, well-kept megabuildings, and couldn't quite picture a private kingdom of crime there in such a docile, quiet, untroubled neighborhood.

  Alfredo Garcia was the next to recover from the shock of the horrifying events of the day. He had scanned the area around the prison and had discovered the dead motorist in the penitentiary parking lot. The man lay sprawled on the asphalt, his eyes open but unseeing to the bright blue sky, a very, very surprised look on his face.

  Garcia immediately queried the mainframe for a report.

  "One stopped code in penitentiary parking area," the voice reported without emotion. John Mostow, doctor."

  More wails and sobs came from the assembled policemen. This latest fatality brought the body count up to four people dead in a matter of minutes-more murders than had been committed in the city in the last three decades. Merwin, in particular, was beside himself with grief, and his weeping was beginning to get on Lenina's nerves. She gave his rolling chair a firm push, sending the distraught man drifting away across the station.

  Huxley turned back to her computer. "Is the doctor's conveyance still in the parking zone?"

  The reply was instantaneous. "The doctor's vehicle has been code fixed approaching the corner of Wilshire and Santa Monica Boulevard."

  Lenina Huxley pounded her fist in delight. "Glorious!"

  Chief Earle was beginning to recover and reasserted his command. "Fine work, Huxley. Order all nearby units. ProtecServe Wilshire and Santa Monica."

  Alfredo Garcia beamed at his partner. "Is there anything more groovy than the prevailing of justice?"

  Lenina Huxley could feel the adrenaline surge in the room as the San Angeles Police Force sprang into action. Even Merwin and MacMillan were wiping away their tears, comforted by knowing that justice would be done.

  Of course no man or woman in the room had even dreamed of the day they would hear of murder being committed in the city of San Angeles.

  7

  When Phoenix saw the rotating, speaking street sign that marked the corner of Wilshire and Santa Monica, he brought his car to a halt and jumped out, looking around the famous intersection for something he recognized. The Beverly Hilton was gone, that weird-looking CAA building was gone . . . The Wilson's House of Suede and Leather was still there, a testament to the continuum of history. Phoenix sighed in relief-at least something never changed.

  On one corner there was something he had never seen before, but which, curiously, something at the tack of his mind told him to look for. It was a CompuKiosk, the twenty-first century's answer to the lowly phone both.

  A CompuKiosk did contain a telephone, but it had much more. It was a full-service computer access center that provided all manner of assistance to San Angelenos. With a row of large buttons, a monitor, and a keyboard, all it took was the right set of codes to dial up all kinds of information.

  Right then the booth was occupied by a troubled-looking fellow who was sadly pouring his heart out to the computer terminal.

  "I dunno . . . Lately I just don't feel like there's anything special about me . . ."

  The computer's voice was male this time, but its tone was just as reassuring as its female counterpart.

  "You are an incredibly sensitive person," it told the upset young man soothingly, "and you inspire joy-joy feelings in all those around you ..."

  The fellow seemed to brighten slightly. "Really? Then why is it I always feel so . . . so . . ."

  He never got the chance to pose his question because Simon Phoenix had reached into the booth and yanked him out, throwing him roughly aside.

  "Get lost, jerk," he ordered. The man, who already had trouble with his self-esteem, slunk away, his feelings of inadequacy confirmed.

  Phoenix turned his attention to the booth and examined the array of services the CompuKiosk offered. There were buttons marked ego boost, citizen confessional, public psychiatrist, atlas, serenity sayings, banking, mail, telephone directory, and information.

  Just for the hell of it, Simon Phoenix hit the ego boost button.

  "You look great today," said the computer voice.

  Simon grinned. "Thanks, feel great, too."

  "You inspire love and loyalty in your family and associates," the computer continued, laying on the flattery with an electronic trowel.

  "How true," said Phoenix, laughing. The future amused the hell out of him. But he didn't need his ego stroked anymore. He hit the information button and then dropped his hands onto the keyboard, plugging into the information net as fast as he could.

  A different computer voice answered his queries. "You have reached secure mailbox facilities for- Simon Phoenix."

  He cackled. "Hey! That's me! Tell me what's up!" Information began flashing on the screen. Edgar Friendly's photograph was the first up, followed by the Scraps leader's life story; then maps of the city, routes, overhead and underground plans of the city.

  Phoenix took it all in just by staring at the screen, soaking up the information like a huge human sponge. The data flew by at light speed, but the velocity did not faze Simon Phoenix for a moment.

  "Damn, I'm possessed!" he said amazed at his own dexterity with the computer. "I wonder if I can play the accordion now, too."

  The information continued to blast across the screen. "Keep it comin', that's it. That's good." The screen told him everything he needed to know-except one thing. Phoenix pounced on the keyboard and played a computer concerto, pulling up the information he really wanted.

  "Gun," he whispered. "Tell me about guns, Mr. Wizard. Where to get 'em,"

  The computer voice was, this time, like a narrator in a nature documentary.

  "Noun: gun. Portable firearm. This device was widely utilized in the urban wars of the late twentieth century. Referred to as a gun, a pistol, piece, heat-"

  "I know all that!" yelled Simon Phoenix. "I don't want a history lesson. Hal! Tell me where I can get hold of some goddamn guns!"

  A morality box on the wall of the CompuKiosk buzzed into life. "You are fined one credit violation of the verbal morality statute." A thin sheet of paper slid out of the box, the reprimand printed in red on one side. Phoenix snatched the piece of paper, balled it up and tossed it away.

  "Yeah?" said Simon Phoenix. "Well fuck you two times."

  The box buzzed twice and two more sheets of paper appeared. The voice was very stern this time. "Your repeated violation of the verbal morality statute has caused me to notify the San Angeles Police Department. Please remain in place for your reprimand."

  "Is that a fact?" He was just about to punch out the box when two SAPD cruisers screeched to a halt right in front of him.

  "Oooh," said Phoenix. "You fuckers are fast, too." Before the morality box could pipe up, Phoenix buzzed at it himself-and punched in the speaker.

  Four cops stood in the middle of the intersection. They were dressed in the standard patrol garb of the San Angeles Police Department-blue tunics over blue riding breeches, a Sam Browne belt across the chest, and tall black side-buckle boots. Strapped to their waists were long scabbards that looked as if they contained thick swords.

  Phoenix took a step forward and folded his arms. "Now, don't you fellows look sharp!"r />
  In unison the four police officers unsheathed the electronic stun batons they carried in the leather cases. The batons hummed slightly when they were switched on.

  Phoenix was not aware of it, but a camera at the top of one of the light stanchions by the side of the boulevard swiveled and focused on him, beaming pictures of the encounter back to Lenina Huxley's station where the images were flashed on the giant screen in the dispatch room.

  As the street cops began moving in on Phoenix, the cops in the station began to clap and cheer.

  "Chalk one up for the actions of the benevolent ones," said Alfredo Garcia.

  Another squad car screeched to a halt and two more policemen emerged, one of them the sector squad leader. He got in position, glancing nervously at the Strategic Apprehension Computer he carried in his hand.

  "Maniac is imminent," said the squad leader to the screen. "Request advice."

  The computer did not hesitate. "In a firm tone of voice, demand maniac lie down with hands behind back."

  The squad leader nodded. "Simon Phoenix," he shouted, "lie down and put your hands behind your back."

  Simon guffawed loudly and slapped his hip. "Geez, gosh. Six of you. And in such tidy uniforms, too. I'm so scared."

  The police looked puzzled. "If you are scared," suggested the squad leader, "you should surrender immediately."

  Phoenix shook his head. "Don't you guys have a sense of irony anymore?" Turning his back on the policemen, he returned to the terminal and started typing busily.

  The squad leader sounded distinctly hurt and aggrieved. "Maniac has responded with mocking laughter and words," he reported to the Strategic Apprehension Computer, like a little boy tattling on a bully.

  "Approach and repeat the ultimatum," advised the SAC computer, "but use a firmer tone of voice . . . and add the words, 'or else.' "

  The squad leader cleared his throat. "Simon Phoenix, lie down on the ground, or else."

  Phoenix typed a code into the computer, and the graffiti-removing shock poles sprung from the kiosk sides, but instead of zapping a slogan off the wall, the bars swooped down on the nearest cop and electrocuted him. He jerked and sizzled as the juice zapped through him, his hair crackling and burning. It took less than three seconds to kill him. The whole area was suddenly filled with the smell of cooked meat and smoldering cloth.

  The cops on the scene and the cops watching on the monitor were stunned.

  "Attack!" ordered the Strategic Apprehension Computer.

  The members of the SAPD were nothing if not brave. The three cops closest to Simon Phoenix moved in, swinging their stun batons for all they were worth, trying to take out "the maniac" with a single blow. If they could just touch Simon Phoenix with the rods, they would be able to apprehend him-not even he would have been able to withstand the short, sharp, shock of electricity.

  Of course they never stood a chance. Simon Phoenix waded into the two men quickly. With the hard edge of his right hand, he snapped a neck, sending the nearest cop dropping to the pavement, his head lolling to one side at an odd and unnatural angle.

  Next he wheeled and speared-handed another policeman, jamming his rigid fingers into the sternum, driving fragments of ribs into the heart of his next victim. The bone chips were as hard as bullets. The ripped heart stopped midbeat.

  Phoenix turned to the third and with a well-placed foot, kicked the third cop violently in the chin, driving the man's jawbone straight up and into the brain.

  The last two cops were terrified and had not the slightest idea what to do. Even the Strategic Apprehension Computer was silent on the subject.

  Phoenix turned and swaggered forward. "And then there were two ..."

  The policemen started to back away as Simon Phoenix advanced on them.

  "Hey! I'm new in town . . . This is no way to treat a stranger. Not nice." He wagged a finger at the two completely petrified men.

  That was all it took. The two cops knew they had to get out of there in a hurry. They turned and started running down Wilshire toward Beverly Hills.

  Phoenix vaulted up and over the police car, effortlessly catching up with the two men. He stopped in front of them, corraling them like a sheepdog.

  "You know ... I hate rejection. It just doesn't sit well with me. Makes me upset. And when I get upset..." His actions spoke louder than his words.

  He fell on one of the cops and kicked him hard in the throat, shattering his larynx. The man dropped to the ground, and Phoenix kicked his head into the curbstone, as if he was place kicking a football. The cop's head split open like a watermelon, blood gushing down the street and into the storm drain.

  The last was the squad leader. Phoenix walked up to him, pulled the computer from his hands, dropped it, and stepped on it, grinding the machine into dust.

  His response was purely instinctual. "That's police property," said the appalled squad leader.

  "I'm sorry," said Phoenix. He put out both wrists, as if expecting handcuffs. "Here I am, officer. All you have to do is take me in .. ."

  But the cop was rooted to the spot, and he stared at Simon Phoenix, transfixed, unable to move, a deer caught in some onrushing headlights.

  "Simon says . . . scream!"

  Phoenix attacked. He grabbed the squad leader by the shoulders and drove him to the ground, flipping him over on his stomach as he fell. Sitting astride his hapless victim's back, he swatted away the man's hat, grabbed a handful of hair, and viciously smashed his head into the ungiving roadbed.

  Time and again Phoenix rocked back and forth, hammering the policeman's head over and over until jaws, teeth, tongue, and eyes were oozing from his skull.

  "Well, I think that ought to do it," he said finally. Phoenix stood up. Blood flecked his pants and his hands were stained with gore.

  He took a shallow breath and looked around as if wondering what to do next, now that there were no more people in the immediate vicinity that he could kill.

  Back in the police station the whole gruesome death ballet had been watched in shocked silence. Now that six-six!-San Angeles Police Department operatives lay dead, Merwin began to sob quietly.

  Lenina Huxley's blood seemed to burn in her veins. She had never seen anything even remotely as horrible as the terrible scene that had unfolded before her eyes.

  Simon Phoenix finally spotted the security camera that had recorded the entire bloody incident. A big grin on his face, he strode toward it, swinging a stun baton as if it were a walking stick. He ripped the cover plate from the camera stanchion and peered directly into the lens.

  "Simon says stand!"

  In fear and confusion half of the cops in the dispatch room actually did stand. Lenina Huxley didn't. She just stared at the huge, grotesque closeup of Phoenix on the monitor. It was a face she would never forget.

  Oddly enough, the next thing. Phoenix did was begin to sing. He did not have a very good voice, and it took the cops watching his performance a moment or two to realize that he was singing an odd parody of the old national anthem "The Star-Spangled Banner."

  Oh-oh say can you see a bad guy like me? Who so real-ly wants, to cause you some trouble.

  Who-oo kills just for fun With his hands or a gun Or a knife or a bomb Or a bro-oh-ken bottle.

  And I'll make you all sweat Till you really regret, The time that you made me stay in that hell hole.

  Oh say can you under-er-stand just what I am saying? Here in the laaand of fear and the home of the slaves.

  When Simon Phoenix had finished singing his little ditty, he grinned as if he was very pleased with himself, and then peered deep into the camera lens. LeninaHuxley shivered a little, as if he was looking directly at her, taunting and mocking her with his one blue and his one brown eye.

  "Play ball," he said ominously. Then he jammed the stun baton into the transmission cables and the picture shorted out. A cloud of static filled the screen.

  8

  It took a moment or two for the cops in the station to react to this bizarr
e performance. Lenina Huxley was first to snap out of the hypnotic effects of the senseless violence, and she realized that it was essential to keep in visual contact with Simon Phoenix. Her nimble fingers danced over her computer console, trying to bring up the optic net that encircled the Wilshire-Santa Monica intersection.

  But Simon Phoenix's action had blown the electrical currents all over the neighborhood.

  "We've lost every camera for six blocks in every direction," she announced. Plainly, Lenina Huxley was thinking fast. "I'm going to Century City at twelve hundred millimeters."

  She punched up a few more codes, opening up a huge lensed camera mounted on the roof of the old Century Plaza Hotel in the complex called Century City.

  The camera picked him up quickly enough. He was under the hood of one of the SAPD cruisers, jamming at something with his stun baton.

  Finally, Lenina was stumped. "What is he doing?"

  Alfredo Garcia supplied the answer, "He's going for the vehicle battery core. The capitance gel is what he's after, I'll bet."

  "Why on earth is he doing that?" asked James MacMillan between sobs.

  The answer was not long in coming. Evidently, Simon Phoenix found what he was looking for. He backed away from the car quickly, getting well out of range just in time. A second later the car exploded in a great gout of smoke and flame.

  By the time the billowing smoke cleared, Simon Phoenix had vanished. There was dead silence in the room as the policemen watched the car burning merrily.

  "Goddammit!" shouted Lenina. Of course, that single word was followed by the predictable buzz of the morality box. Some things never changed .. .

  The man who had created San Angeles-and now the absolute ruler of the city under the title of Mayor-Gov-was Dr. Raymond Cocteau. He was the architect of the order that governed the lives of every San Angeleno, and while he held a title that suggested some form of democracy, Dr. Cocteau was, in fact, elected for life. His power was absolute and unquestioned-except for the few Scraps who chose to attach themselves to Edgar Friendly.

  Despite Dr. Cocteau's supreme power, the Mayor-Gov was obsessed by the thought of Edgar Friendly and his ragtag band of followers. The Scraps so consumed him that he was apt to give lengthy lectures to the eight-person San Angeles Board of Supervisors, who were officials directly under Cocteau and who were responsible for carrying out his orders quickly and to the letter.