Replicant Night Read Online Free PDF Page B

interview scene-it's not on the list for today, but what the hell..." A disgusted shrug. "This whole shoot's so screwed up." He clamped a hand on Holden's shoulder-the guy was at least a head taller-and steered him down the hallway. "Man, I don't even know if they're trying to make a movie here." His glance went down to the briefcase dangling from Holden's grip. "Is that supposed to be it? The whatchacallit . . . the Vogue-Kafka. Or whatever."
    "Voigt-Kampff." It didn't take even a split second for him to respond. "Sure," lied Holden. You got it -the other man was obviously operating on the assumption that Holden was connected to the video production in some way. One of the actors? He wondered if there was supposed to be a Holden as well as a Deckard in this thing. Whatever . He wasn't about to contradict the guy and get his cover blown. "That's what it is, all right."
    "Doesn't look the way I thought it would." The other man frowned at the briefcase in Holden's hand. "But it'd be typical of them to tell the props people to just throw something together on the cheap."
    He's buying it , thought Holden. All that was necessary now was to keep the guy bulishitted, then find a way of giving him the slip and continuing to search for Deckard. This was the security that he'd been so worried about running into? The briefcase's voice could've skipped all the dire forebodings.
    "In here." The other man pushed open one of the hallway's doors and walked Holden through it. "This is the set you're down for-they wouldn't need you out on the big one."
    As his eyes adjusted to the dim space, Holden found himself standing in the middle of what looked like a small office, with a couple of high-backed chairs facing each other across a table. Something fluttered above his head; he looked up and saw the blades of a ceiling fan turning lazily in the room's air. Beyond the fan and the narrow plank on which it was fastened was nothing but the studio's empty reaches, studded with gantrys and walkways, lights extinguished as blind eyes.
    "Stay put." The other man turned back toward the door. "I'll go get the rest of the crew."
    "Maybe I should go along." Holden lifted the briefcase with both hands against his chest. "Instead of just waiting here." A sudden, irrational panic had sped up the bio-mech heart in his chest; he could feel his pulse bouncing off the briefcase's leatherette flank. "Maybe-"
    "Forget that." The other man's voice turned harsher. "I don't want you wandering off while I'm trying to round up everybody else. Just sit down and relax. Won't be a minute."
    When the other man had left, the briefcase spoke up. "Way to go." The voice was tinged with a familiar sarcasm. "Door's locked, isn't it?"
    Holden gave the knob a futile twist, but didn't bother to give an answer. Hefting the briefcase onto the table, he pulled back one of the chairs and lowered himself into it. From the corner of his eye, he saw letters imprinted on the headrest; his vision had adjusted well enough that he could also see them on the empty chair. They spelled out TYRELL CORP.
    A memory stirred uneasily in the darker space inside his head. From a long time ago, back when he'd had a real fleshand-blood heart and lungs ticking and sighing under his breastbone. The room, even with its nonexistent ceiling and switched-off video-cams peering in, seemed familiar to him, in a way that made the machine-pumped blood crawl in his veins. He drew a blank on it, but knew that it wasn't because he was unable to remember. More likely, he didn't want to. The memory sat obstinately at the back of his skull, refusing to show itself in even the room's partial light.
    Two chairs that said TYRELL CORP on them . . . and a slowly revolving ceiling fan. There was smoke , Holden remembered. Cigarette smoke, drifting blue, hanging like some semitransparent snakeskin in the air; from the cigarette that'd been in his own hand. He'd still been smoking then; he'd given it up some time after he'd