Dream Park

"Yeah," Griffin agreed. "A hell of a thing."

Chapter Ten

NEUTRAL SCENT

Griffin managed to catch a couple of hours sleep before his scheduled meeting with Harmony. His office couch was uncom­fortably soft, but it was better than tubing back to his apartment for a mere catnap. Afterward he shaved and washed his face in his office lavatory.

The face in the mirror was a stranger's. The green eyes, the close-cropped black hair, the massive shoulders, the two-inch scar under the left ear... these he knew. But the vulnerable look made it a stranger's face. Murder made a difference.

There had been deaths at Dream Park. Coronaries, strokes, a drug overdose or two (one thing he would never understand was people who came to Dream Park to do their drugs. While most people struggled to maintain emotional equilibrium under the sen­sory overload, there were those few whom even Dream Park's magic couldn't satisfy. Call it evolution in action), and even a few

genuine weirdies, like the kid who somehow managed to drown in thirty-six inches of "quicksand" in the Treasure Island Game a couple of years back.

But never a murder. Never. He remembered the stillness of Rice's face, the tangible aura of death that had touched everyone who came into the room. Not here. Not at Dream Park. Things like that didn't happen here.

But they do, and it has. Even here, you can die. And U's in your lap now, he told the frightened stranger. He checked the stranger's shirt for nonexistent wrinkles and checked his sleeve for the time. 4:25 A.M. Five minutes to get there.

Griffin's office was on the second floor of the Administration complex, a ten story building in the exact center of Dream Park, standing on an island in the middle of the central lagoon that con­nected the wedges of the Dream Park pie. Harmony was on the sixth. The halls on the sixth floor were empty but for a single forlorn maintenance ‘bot whirring almost inaudibly as it sucked up dust.

Griffin let himself into the outer office, past the empty Reception desk, and knocked on Harmony's door. A radio a

The Dream Park Director of Operations could easily have de­manded an office on the eight or ninth floors, among the luxury suites. He preferred to be within easy reach of his staff. The office was not impressive from the outside. Inside, it was a delight. The outer wall was all window, above a magnificent view of the lagoon and sections I and II of Dream Park. The room was high-ceilinged and carpeted with natural fiber. Best of all, and the thing that made it such a pleasure to visit: most of the furniture was made of beautiful, expensive, delicately stained wood.

The mahogany desk was massive, and so was the man behind it. Harmony must have weighed two hundred and thirty pounds, only about twenty of it fat. He was in his late fifties, balding, and wore inappropriately delicate pince-nez. His nose was flat enough to bring water to a plastic surgeon's eye, and his shoulders had that linebacker look to them. Only the voice betrayed the image of overwhelming physicality.

"Griffin. Glad to see you." The tones were cultured in the ex­treme, every word lovingly rounded, as if shattering the bruiser image were an old and favorite game. Harmony reached across

the desk to shake Griffin's hand with crushing strength. "Have a seat, please. We should probably wait for O'Brien."

"Skip's in on this? Oh, right. We need some tech assistance."

Harmony successfully stifled a yawn, shaking his head. "Dam­nable hour to roust someone from bed, but as long as we had to do it, we might as well spread a little of the grief around, eh?"

Alex laughed and looked out of the window absently. It was still too dark to see anything out there, and he found himself hop­ing the meeting would last until dawn came to Dream Park.

"Albert Rice," Harmony was saying. "Blond fellow?"

"That's the one."

"Was he a good man?"

"He was reliable and intelligent. He was up for a desk job if his psych profile fit the bill. My guess is that he would have been working over here in a year or two."

Harmony clucked softly. "Seems to happen like that much too often. Well, this whole thing is a mess, Alex. It puts Cowles Industries into a rather sensitive position, and I'm not sure of the best way to handle it. How much have your people learned?"

"Just what you already know. The target was a storage area on the third floor. It may have been something in development for one or more of the new attractions. The whole thing appears to be a case of industrial spying gone sour."

Skip O'Brien opened the door. "Good morning," he said, then shook his head. "I guess there's not much good about it, is there?" He carried a loaded briefcase to the unoccupied chair. "I got together as much information as I could on short notice. Alex, are you sure that that was the only cabinet disturbed?"

"Absolutely. The record tapes on the locks all say that the ac­tion happened between nine-thirty and ten-fifteen. The door to the little biochemistry lab in Development on the third floor was opened at about nine-forty. The project file had been rifled, and we believe that a sample vial of some sort may have been stolen."

"Oh, my." It was all that Skip said, but he cracked open his briefcase and began to run notes through a small viewscreen. When he looked up, there were little worry lines creasing his f ore­head. "I don't think that you have to tell me which file it was. And the corresponding sample vial was missing? Was the ifie des­ignation ‘Neutral Smell'?"

Alex nodded. "How did you know?"

"If you spent your time in R&D, you'd know the talk. There

was only one thing in there that might have inspired a theft like this. It was sent down from the big Cowles facility in Sacramento. Really secret. This was only the second sample we've received. No offense to you, Alex, but they were worried that something like this might happen. They don't have to worry about Garners and tourists, so their security is tighter. Anyway, if someone was after that file, then he was hunting very large game indeed. Poor Rice got caught in the middle." He paused, preoccupation unfocusing his eyes. "I hope that whatever information I can give you helps you catch the bastard."

Griffin jumped a bit at that. He couldn't remember ever having heard Skip curse.

O'Brien noticed. He said, unhappily, "If I hadn't recommended him, Rice might still be alive."

Alex was a handspan too far away for a comforting touch, so he tried to put softness in his voice. "He needed a job, Skip. He wasn't your responsibility, just another ex-student of yours, and you helped him. I don't think he'd blame you for the way things turned out."

"Maybe not. Maybe he wouldn't. I don't like it anyway."

"None of us do, Skip," Harmony told him. "So let's have what you've got. It'll clear the air, and might even enable us to catch the bastard. As you so neatly put it."

"Right." Skip fiddled with the viewer until he seemed satisfied. "Some of this is going to be a bit thick, but I'll try to hold the pidgin Swahili down to a minimum."

Harmony leaned back in his chair and steepled his fingers, eyes half closing. Griffin crossed one leg over the other and canted for­ward.

"Dream Park deals in illusions both subtle and gross. Gross effects include physical constructions, holograms, most of the sound effects, and so forth. Subtleties are mainly concerned with the results of combining different stimuli in the attractions, the manipulation of time and space in the waiting areas, et cetera. Basically, then, placing the customer in a proper mood to ‘cor­rectly' interpret the gross effects. Without the ‘immersion period' immediately preceding a ride or experience, the illusion isn't as convincing. This is old stuff. The Disneyland people used to use waiting time to prepare the customer psychologically.