by Jaym Gates
[Still got room on your plate, Pops?]
[Always hungry. What ya got?]
I fished up the gaudy Heartsync advertisement. [Can you see if there’s anything weird in the code for this?]
[Weird.] He said it as if he’d never heard the word.
[Yeah. Anything extra.]
[I feel like we’re going to get a virus just looking at it.]
[I know you’ll be careful.]
He gave a little grunt.
A note from a strummed harp sounded in my mind.
[Val?] Ruid beamed the message from the waiting room, only yards away.
[Yeah?] I shot back. I always sounded sharper in my mind than in person. Ruid never complained, though.
[I’ve got a few errands to run, including the weekend payments to drop off. Would now be a good time?]
[Sure, kid. I’ll be here forever.]
Another harp strum, this time in a lower key. A moment later, I heard the office door slap shut.
Keilani could learn something from that boy. I didn’t know if they’d be a good fit romantically—doubted it, in fact—but I never had to worry about Ruid storming off. Nothing seemed to stick to him. Of course, anyone who’d been sold into a modern equivalent of slavery and survived probably came away with a different perspective on what really mattered.
[You saved us some time,] Pops interrupted things I didn’t really want to be thinking about. His tone said he didn’t have good news.
[What?]
[Here’s your address.] He flashed a map of the Parvarti aerostat with a path leading from my office door to some docking bay supposedly closed for repair. It wasn’t anywhere near ring C.
[That was on the ad?]
[Yeah. It’s custom—and relatively new.]
[How new?]
[Five days. Invite’s for a meeting tomorrow.]
[Well we’re not waiting around for that. Lets see who’s setting up.]
His grumble said it got worse.
[What?]
[The invitation’s for Keilani.]
—
“You’re the rent-a-sec?” The jenkin tried to sound tough, but jutting incisors gave him a ridiculous lisp. “They say you’re on the list.”
“Yeah? Who says?”
He hissed the first word, “Mister Vine.”
“Sure.”
It took two tugs for the bouncer to wrestle open the graffiti-smeared corridor’s only grimy door. It was a back entrance for staff working the station’s for-lease cargo holds. Even so, the thin violet curtains and warm breath of nag champa that drifted through were completely out of place. Purposefully not glancing back into the mystery of the jenkin’s muttonchops, my hand settled inside my coat and I pushed through.
The shimmering curtains didn’t block just the door. Inside miles of fabric turned what should have been an airy space into a maze of twilight gauze. The hold’s overhead lighting had been disabled in favor of intimate tapers and the cinders of incense holders. Figures drifted between floor cushion enclaves and discreet alcoves, trailing murmurs of close conversation or the occasional exclamatory gasp. The space didn’t smell like sweat, though. It felt more like a particularly quiet club, or a drug den where no one had brought any junk.
Trying not to seem out of place, I slipped casually through the first makeshift room into its slightly smaller, sapphire twin. At the center of the space, a group sat cross-legged, their arms around the shoulders of their neighbors as they swayed and whispered dreamily. A couple of rainbow-haired kick junkies, a woman in a new lunar suit, some custom morph that looked creepily like mesh celeb Lupin T., and a fury with a nanotattoo of endlessly rolling dice—they didn’t seem to have anything in common. Only pantsuit and custom job looked like they had any money. The others could have stumbled in off the street.
This Heartsync stuff had to be a drug thing. That’s the only thing I could figure.
“Mom!” If whoever grabbed my shoulder had whisper-yelled any other word, they’d have had my gun in their face.
And I would have preferred that.
“Keilani, what the hell!” I shook his arm off, spinning him into the corner.
“What are you doing here?” He kept up the harsh whisper.
Flaring eyes backed up my beamed message. [Don’t even. Now talk. Why are you here and how’d you find this place?]
Teeth locked down behind his grimace.
I didn’t have time for that here, though. [I find an invite to whatever the hell this is—custom created for you—then find you here. Boy, I don’t know what you’re caught up in, but this …]
[I’m not caught up in anything! I’m here to find Ruid!] His beam was almost too fast to follow.
[Ruid? What’s he got to do with this?]
It came out in a rush. [We came to one of these Heartsync things last week—before you got the job. We didn’t know what it was. I’d just heard it was, like, some way to help people let go of bad thoughts, to get it all out there, to be happier and connect with people around them. I talked Ruid into coming with me. I thought it could help him.] Black curls dropped. [He’s so … inside himself.]
Sweet, stupid kid. I wasn’t sure if I beamed that or not.
[We listened to that Vine guy you’re after. He started off with a bunch of basic Neo-Buddhist stuff, then started into this whole group-living, self-sharing, transhuman family thing. It all sounded real schemey. When he started talking about getting implants, I wanted to go.]
[Implants? What did he say about implants?]
[I don’t know. Just that he worked with a group that had created some sort of new hypermesh insert.]
[Sounds like the Neo-Synergists. They use their implants to form their collected-intelligence.]
[No, that’s not what he called it. He mentioned that, called it ‘thinking like AIs.’ He said he created better ones, inserts that could help him lead those who got them toward a higher state—or something. Curated-intelligence, he called it.]
Curated? The porcelain nodule on Miss Klein’s neck came to mind. Then her screaming face.
I squeezed Keilani’s shoulder. [I’ll take care of this. I want you to get out of here.]
“No,” he said aloud, something uncommonly hard in his tone. He switched back to beaming. [Ruid’s here somewhere. When I wanted to leave that first time, he didn’t. I couldn’t convince him to go. We argued, and I … ditched him here.]
I didn’t need to say anything. He looked away. [When I tried to apologize, it was like nothing happened. He just went on a screed about Vine and the next step in transhumanity.] Worried eyes found mine. [Mom, it really creeped me out.]
[Okay. We’ll find him. He’s got to be around here somewhere.]
[I’ve looked! He’s not in the common area. These are all just hopefuls, meditating and trying to prove themselves worthy. Only those up to get Vine’s insert are allowed in back.]
[In back?] I gave him something between a pat and a push. [Show me.]
We slipped through a line of curtained dens in shades of saffron, vermillion, and olive. In that last one, like a muddy forest grove, a neotenic pod gave a slow wave.
“Welcome again, Miss Lonoehu.” The boyish morph gave a faux-innocent smile.
“I’m getting real sick of hearing strangers use my name.”
“If it’s any consolation, I haven’t told it to a single person.”
I’d seen this trick already. I didn’t know how it worked, but I didn’t need to to understand it was a trick.
I considered kicking this tiny Vine. I made sure my expression made that clear. “Thanks for the scene in the plaza earlier. I really liked that place’s shakshuka.”
The small morph bowed, a motion that seemed somehow appropriate in his curtain-matching olive get-up, something between robe and gi. “I’m sorry it had to come to t
hat. I admit to having mixed feelings. I’m either disappointed with Parvarti security’s lack of efficacy or impressed with your ability to extricate yourself from criminal charges.”
“You showed your hand too soon after bluffing. I know what you’re playing with now. If you had let me take your puppet in, there’s a chance I would have gotten paid and no one would be any the wiser.”
“Perhaps, but my former associates aren’t so easily duped. They know which me is me.”
“You’ve got quite the scene here. A bit dry for my tastes, but it’s a chill crowd.” I nodded around, checking to make sure no one had shown any special interest in our conversation. “What do we need to do to get into the VIP room?”
The kid’s smirk showed a single dimple. “It’s rather exclusive, I’m afraid. Only those open enough to truly accept the Heartsync are admitted. Feel free to enjoy yourself and broaden your mind communing with the others here, though. I will come lead them in the evening’s meditations shortly.”
“You’ve got Ruid back there,” Keilani blurted, obviously getting anxious.
Rust-colored eyes turned up to him. “Your friend has proven his dedication to the Heartsync. We will treat him well.”
“What the fuck is that supposed to mean?” Keilani’s look snapped to me. “We’ve got to get back there.”
“Just calm—”
Obviously Keilani didn’t hear the action he wanted in my tone. His hand came up to push the neotenic away from the curtain slit.
Keilani’s hand didn’t connect. Vine’s small frame shifted, dropping his weight onto one bent knee. He turned just enough to show a familiar porcelain node, rapidly blinking with magenta eyes. Before I could get a better look, though, his small fist shot out, slamming into my son’s stomach.
Before Keilani could groan my pistol was against Vine’s temple. Then there was no temple at all.
The screaming started before all of the neotenic hit the floor. A glance assured the panic was all flowing the right way—away from us.
Frozen, halfway to doubling over, Keilani gripped his gut and stared. He’d seen me use my gun plenty of times. Probably not at such close range, though—and probably not on anyone who looked like a twelve-year-old. Some folks had trouble putting down neotenics, others counted on it, but a sleeve’s a sleeve.
“Come on,” I pushed through the freshly painted curtains. I didn’t say it, but we didn’t have much time. Vine’s redecorations likely covered most of the hold’s security cams, but a half dozen different security sensors would have detected a gun shot. Fifteen minutes—twenty at the outside—before security got here.
The back room was more of the same, this time hung in shades of wine. Maybe a dozen wide-eyed, would-be worthies stared, their lounging interrupted. Only two moved, both digging into alcoves toward the back. When they turned, the steady thrum of those weird implants blinked from the base of their necks.
“You got a gun?” I asked over my shoulder.
“No. Of course not,” Keilani snapped—as if I’d chosen this moment to test him on my strict rules. For the first time ever I wished hadn’t raised such a savvy kid.
The two in the back, however, did. Pistols small enough to hide amid pillows came up.
I beamed Keilani some garbled warning and threw myself sidelong. The curtains behind me seared, Vine’s guards making up for bad aim with elastic trigger fingers. Cushions offered a soft landing, but made poor cover. My own weapon came up. I pulled off three rapid shots and fresh panic sounds swelled in the nearest lounge alcoves. One of the guards toppled back, tangling in a curtained wall as she fell. The other didn’t appear to notice, firing faster.
I leapfrogged a heap of tiger-striped pillows. The blasts followed close, one near enough to singe my outstretched calf. I winced, reflexively shut off my pain receptors, and told myself it was just a graze.
A graze that pissed me off enough to send two shots into the second guard’s throat. Hope he’d backed up recently, there was no way his cortical stack was getting out of that unscathed.
“Come on, get out of here!” Keilani shouted behind me. Lollygaggers funneled past him, cussing and whispering, but giving me a wide berth as I picked myself up.
A glance was enough to convince me it actually was only a graze.
[You alright?] I beamed over to Keilani. He nodded, first to me, then to the opening at the room’s rear.
“Stay a step back this time.” I kept to the edge of the lounge and looked through, ignoring the chest-shot guard on the ground.
“You can’t understand what you’re doing.” The voice from the other room sounded just as frayed as the shot-up drapes. “The work you’re impeding.”
“Probably not,” I yelled back.
A wild shot tore through the opening. I ducked low and waved for Keilani to do the same as he came up on the opposite side of the tear.
“Valerie, please don’t do this.”
Ruid’s voice was a slap. I dared a glance inside.
It wasn’t a lounge. Vine’s portable office was little more than a folding desk, small terminal, and a collapsible bed. No, not a bed, an ego bridge like you’d find at any body bank, pillowed but uncomfortable, placed at the perfect height for techs to tinker, resleeve … or upgrade.
Ruid sat up on the slab. Behind him, a shaky pistol in hand, hid the man from the Neo-Synergist’s file, the real Vine.
“You okay in there, Ru? He do anything to you?”
“I’m fine. I came on my own. You’ve got Harliss all wrong.”
“He put anything in you?”
“I’ve learned about his work, Valerie,” he went on like he hadn’t heard me. “His inserts are the next step in what the Neo-Synergists are trying to achieve. It’s a true transhuman network. The potential’s incredible.”
Was it that Ruid was sounding like Vine, or had Vine pulled his puppet trick on him? I tried again, harder. “Did he put anything in you?”
My voice almost broke.
“Ruid?” Keilani sounded more composed. “You don’t need these strangers and their weird tech. I don’t know what they’ve told you, but no hopeful future starts in a greasy rent-a-dock. Please come home.”
“I’m sorry, Kay, but I don’t have a home. You and Val have been beyond good to me, but I know I don’t really belong. That’s not because of anything wrong with you, it’s something wrong in me. The Heartsync can help me fix that.”
“There’s nothing that needs fixing.” It sounded hackneyed, but it was true. I didn’t have the first clue about how to make him believe it, though.
“There is Valerie. I know it, I feel it everyday. It’s not just because my family sold me off. It’s something deeper, something broken that new tech can’t fix. But maybe a new perspective can.”
“I’m going to help him, Miss Lonoehu.” Vine sounded like he was sharpening his scalpel. “You’ve tried your way, now let me try mine.”
“Don’t you lay another fucking hand on him!”
“Mom.” Keilani turned wounded eyes. He stood and stepped between the curtains, ignoring my complaint. “Ru, is this what you really want?”
Vine’s pistol shook around the outline of Ruid’s body.
“I’m sorry if I hurt you, Kay.” The words welled up from those dark eyes.
My son shook his head. “Mister Vine. What’s someone got to do to get your implant?”
“Keilani!”
He ignored me.
Vine perked up, his twitches slowing. “Not just anyone can join the Heartsync. They have to be compatible and offer something worthwhile. Based on your display here, though, you could make an interesting candidate.”
“Getting the insert. What’s it take?” His thoughts were obvious in his curiously cautious steps.
A showman’s grin split Vine’s face. “It’s as much about a state of willingnes
s as the hardware. It’s a modest upgrade, though, and one that’s compatible with most biomorphs. Yours would be a simple matter.”
Keilani turned his back to the table, indicating the port at the base of his neck. His eyes met mine, there wasn’t any hesitation. He took another step back, blocking my view of Vine. “Just here?”
Vine shuffled, his pistol coming to rest on Keilani’s shoulder. Sausagey fingers smeared the back of his neck. I could just barely hear him, “Right here. Yes. You even have open space. It would be a simple matter.”
“Kay, I’m not asking you to do this.” New doubt tinged Ruid’s voice.
Keilani looked over his shoulder. “I know. I’m just trying to help the only way you’ll let me.”
That was his only warning.
Keilani grabbed the menton’s hand, trapping the pistol on his shoulder, and extended his keratin claws. Blood coated the gun’s barrel as Vine, yowling, tried to struggle free. Keilani only forced his nails deeper.
The gun went off.
Broken digits blew through the curtain gap. Ruid screamed something I couldn’t make out.
Keilani didn’t miss a beat, though. Obviously he’d shut off his own pain receptors. While Vine cursed, he threw out a foot and yanked the menton’s shredded wrist. The pistol clattered to the ground, followed by a scientist avalanche.
A whirl of lotus-colored lights panicked at the base of the Heartsync leader’s skull. Vine’s implant was familiar, but more elaborate than the others we’d seen. Keilani didn’t waste time with the implications. He dropped his knees across Vine’s spine. Ignoring the grunting below, my son drove his remaining claws into the knot of lights. Veiny flesh split almost eagerly. Vine quivered, then went still.
A beat passed before Keilani and I both released a breath. I think we both expected to hear the menton’s cocky voice coming from behind the next curtain.
Ruid’s foot cracked across Keilani’s face, knocking him from the corpse.
Dropping off the table, he snatched up Vine’s pistol. “You bastard! You worthless, stupid trick!”
The gun trembled, so did his voice, but Ruid was too close to miss.