by Jack Yeovil
“What do you reckon to their outfits?”
The deadfellas were dressed square, in black cloth suits. No glitter, no frills.
“Don’t rightly know, Burnside. Let’s take a closer scan.”
Tyree had hoped he wouldn’t say something like that.
Without too much evident distaste, Quincannon examined one of the corpses, slipping gauntleted fingers between material and meat. He unpeeled a section of jacket from the crushed chest. The dead man wore a simple black suit and a shirt that had been white once but was now mainly red. The shirt was fastened to the throat but there was no tie.
“Funny thing,” said Quincannon. “No pockets. No belt. And, scan, no buttons…”
The dead man had fastened his coat with wooden pegs.
“We found this.” Burnside handed the sergeant a broad-brimmed black hat.
“He wasn’t with any of the usual gangcults, that’s for sure,” the Quince said. “The ratskags who zotzed him might have taken his weapons, but they’d have left holsters or grenade toggles or something. This damfool wasn’t even armed.”
“Do you reckon he was an undertaker? All in black, like. Or a preacher?”
“Second guess is more likely, Leona. Though what the hell he was doin’ this far into the sand is beyond me.”
“Preachers these days pack more firepower than Bonnie and Clyde,” Burnside put in. “Take the Salvation Survivalists.”
“The other is dressed the same,” Tyree observed.
“Just a gang of pilgrims, then. Looking for the Promised Land.”
“The Amish don’t use buttons,” she said. “Or the Hittites.”
“As far as I know, the last Amish were wiped out in ’93. But that’s a good thought. Plenty of religions about these days if a man has a fancy to pick a new one. Or an old one.”
Quincannon stood up and dropped the hat over the dead man’s face. He observed a private moment of silence and made a gesture that could either be the sign of the cross or the hoisting of a last drink.
“What should we do?”
“Bad news, Leona. You found ’em. You gotta scrape ’em up and bury ’em by the roadside. I’ll call it in to Valens. Burnside, break out the entrenching tools and give the lady a hand. Then we’ll go up the road a ways, following the tracks. There are tracks?”
Tyree nodded. After the pilgrim-flattening session, the killers’ tires would be bloody enough to paint a trail for three counties. The white strip down the middle of the road was a solid red.
“Thought so. Anyway, we see who’s at the end of the trail. If we’re lucky, we get to kick badguy ass before suppertime. If not, we ride through the night and head ’em off at sunup.”
The Quince saluted. Tyree and Burnside returned the salutes, and pulled neckerchiefs up over their mouths and noses. They’d had all the infection lectures about handling suspect deadfolks. At an adjustment, the bandanas shrivelled onto their faces, functioning as filters
“Remember, disease is your worst enemy,” Quincannon said, “so check the seals on your gauntlets before you interfere with these former citizens. Snap to it, men.”
IV
8 June 1995
The girls were loitering around the Virtual Death Unlimited Arcade, a roof on stilts raised over a platoon of credit-machines. The games centre was attached to Arizona-Wonderworld, a failing mall out in the Painted Desert. In the stores, all goods were on massive discount. Jazzbeaux had glommed a pair of snazz boots on American Excess, a card she intended to pay off when Dracula got a suntan. She even found a stall specialising in ornamental prostheses and tried on a selection of eyepatches, none of which took her fancy.
Jazzbeaux, nee Jessamyn Amanda Bonney, was Acting War Chief of the Psychopomps. Mostly girls, the ’pomps favoured spike heels, fishnets, glam make-up, stormcloud hairdos, Sove sounds, painted nail-implants, Kray-Zee pills and Kar-Tel Kustom Kars. Their turn-offs included lawnorder, school, soce workers, white picket fences, Ken Freakin Dodd, Mom’s apple pie, Maniax and anyone over twenty.
She popped a cold can of Pivo, the new Czech beer currently benefiting from major marketing muscle. A mouthful was antidote to the subliminal brainwashing in the jingle. She squirted the vile stuff onto the ground and tossed the can in the air, drawing a killing bead on it with her finger as it arced towards asphalt.
There weren’t many other customers kicking around. Solids stayed away from the sand. The mall was covered in dog-piss spray tags that marked the place as Maniak Territory. Since T-H-R took down the Western Maniax in a joint action with the United States Cavalry, the backbone of Ariz-Wonder’s custom was kicking around the Reformation-Confinement Environments the newsies elaborately didn’t call concentration camps. Without its status as a major Maniak drop, this place was headed for ghostville. Unless some new, hungry faction stepped in and took over the patronage.
Let’s face it, girlie-girl, a power vacuum invites initiative. As Acting WC, it was her place to think ahead a month or two. Without the Grand Exalted Bullmoose and his Merry Marching Morons, Utah and Arizona—at least—were up for grabs. A nice piece of territory, and a chunk of change. She’d seen stats; it was a profitable patch, and someone had to provide the services the Maniax had been delivering. Some things might not exactly be legal, which meant corps had to filter products through street execs.
Andrew Jean, her trusted lieutenant, had opened talks with the Winter Corp and even the Mighty GenTech. If the corps had things (like drugs and guns and virtual porno) that solids wanted, why should feebs in government stand in the way? Wasn’t the Prezz supposed to support Free Enterprise? The Psychopomps were notionally communist, if only because the reds had better uniforms and songs. It was better for all conce if alternative enterprise was handled by a gangcult with broadly commie principles rather than a rabidly capitalist krewe like the Daughters of the American Revolution.
Sweetcheeks, plump and adorable in leopard-print leggings and a monumental fakefur jacket, wiggled her butt as she zapped into a wraparound screen, her head insectile under the VR helm. She was playing Mambo Massacre, a game program combining dancersize and combat; kidstuff until Level Nineteen, when the player faced Fred and Ginger with chainsaws. Some of the others fooled with games but most just sat on out-of-order consoles and looked out at the sand. Varoomschka was triple-coating her nails with a hammer-and-sickle motif, working as meticulously as if she were putting the final touches to a Fabergé Easter egg.
So Long Suin’s shower radio hung from the frame of one of the cars, tuned to Radio Moscow. Petya Tcherkassoff put his tormented soul into “The Girl in Gorki Park”. Jazzbeaux was over her queensize crush on the Soviet musickie but still found it hard not to sway when she heard this song. It was about the singer’s beautifully pale ex-lover; in the last verse, it turned out she was pale because she was dead. When Petya threw her over, she lay herself naked in the snow and willingly hypothermed. According to Moscow Beat magazine, the girl was based on a real person, Natalia Ludmila Someonova, but Jazzbeaux felt the song was just for her. She resented sharing it with the rest of creation.
Her life had not presented unlimited opportunities. She’d bought the gangcult package early and worked her way up from Shrimp to Acting WC. In her early teens, when Papa Bruno was alive and kicking, she did time as warehouse gladiatrix, racking enough brownie points to make her a chapter leaderine. She lost her left eye in a rumble with the Gaschuggers, and Ms Dazzle, her sponsor, personally paid Doc Threadneedle for the augmentation surgery. The Psycho-pomps were more a family to her than her late, lamented daddy and long-gone mama ever were. No ’pomp had ever tried to sell her; well, not lately…
Jazzbeaux knew the ganggirl scene was stupo, but—hey?—what else did she have to do? She could read and type, so her basic education was taken care of. No way was she going out for indenture to a Japcorp; she didn’t want to turn tricks for scuzz like her Daddy, thank you very much; and there weren’t many other career opportunities for a fillette from the Denver NoGo in Th
ese Here United States, so she’d taken a vacation and was opting to hang out for the rest of her life.
She’d be seventeen in November. If she made it, maybe she’d take a look at her life-pattern and change it. Or not. Nichevo, as they said. It didn’t matter, much. Everything was going to end one day. Probably soon. Five years from now, when the odometer ticked over all those zeroes, there’d be a big bang. Everybody said so.
She didn’t pay tax but according to Andrew Jean her cut of last anno’s yield put her on a salary par with a mid-level exec with an American multinat. If today’s negotiations settled favourably, she’d be up there with a fast-track Japcorp software samurai. She wondered if any of the shoulderpad dolls who strode through offices on business soaps started out in gangcults. That wouldn’t be for her; she’d never wear a suit.
Sometimes, they’d burn money. Literally. It became a drag to haul it around in paper or negotiable gems. When they couldn’t jam the trunk shut, they’d scatter stuff for the sand-rats. The ’pomps were wild like that.
Andrew Jean hunched over a Virtualsex Machine, cockatoo beehive dipping, pretending to interface. The game was hooked to other locations on the VDU chain; you could virtually rut with anonymes. This model was sneakily altered to function as a terminal for a one-time message. It was part of the II service. Word had been sent to the DAR that the ’pomps could be reached in the Painted Desert and word had come back that the Daughters were agreeable to one-on-one negotiation.
Jazzbeaux was bored. Until the Daughters approved a site, she was hung up on this spot. The others kept their distance, as always when a negotiation was in the immediate offing. She understood. No one liked to be too close to someone who might shuffle. After, they’d cluster around like amorous octopi and throw her a party.
If she shuffled, she hoped Petya Tcherkassoff would sing a song about her. “The Girl in the Ground”?
A dust devil rose out in the Des, coming this way. A heavy machine. Sleek enough not to sound a whisper.
So Long came out of lotus and looked at the silent tornado. She was the kar krazy of the chapter.
“It’s a V12,” she said, “G-Mek.”
Very heavy machine.
Jazzbeaux shut her good eye and lifted her patch. Her optic fed a heat picture to her brain. It was blurry but hot dots told her the V–12 was loaded for bear.
The DAR couldn’t know they were here. Virtualsex was guaranteed secure. Both gangcults were laying out a cool ten thou to Irving’s Intermediaries, ensuring mutual mystification.
The Daughters should be loitering at some other site, waiting for the window to open.
So Long hefted a rocket-launcher and drew sight on the car. She initiated a countdown.
“One pop and bye-bye,” she said.
Jazzbeaux shook her head.
“Stand down, tovarich. It’s just a solo cruising through. We need no hassle today. ’Member, we’ve an appointment.”
Also, from the V12’s heat pattern, she doubted So Long’s hatpin missile would dent its hide.
“I think it’s an old girlfriend.”
So Long triggered an abort sequence, pissed-off. It wasn’t good for deathware to get boiled up but not let off.
The ve-hickle made an elegant curve, dropping rpms, and smoothed to a halt by the porch of the VDU Arc. Close up, it hummed like an electric appliance. As dust settled, Jazzbeaux clocked the Turner-Harvest-Ramirez tag. An antique pin-up was stencilled on the fuselage: a girlie in a bathing suit posed on a knobby little bomb with fins, showing one shaved armpit and a Pepsodent gleam. Everyone knew ’Nola Gay. And the machine’s owner.
There was an uncomfortable shifting among the ’pomps. PMS. Pre-Massacre Syndrome. Weapons eased out of sheaths, safeties switched. Andrew Jean remained intent on Virtualsex but ’Cheeks hauled out of cyberdisco and put the helm down.
The V12’s door opened silently. A long, long leg slipped out, and touched a dainty boot-toe to the dirt. On the hip was an empty holster. Then the driver got out, holding up a side arm. She wore her naturally red hair long, a rare affectation.
Redd Harvest, the H in T-H-R. Probably the most-profiled Sanctioned Op in the Enforcement Sector, despite her publicity-shyness. The only woman with whatever it takes—sheer guts, colourful psychoses, queensize deathwish, elephantiasis of the ego—to declare war on the Maniax.
“Hello, Jessamyn,” Harvest said. “Still pissing it away with these panzer pussies?”
Jazzbeaux didn’t remember Rancid Robyn, her alleged real mother, but Harvest always came on like a mix of Mom, High School Principal and long-suffering Big Sis. They had History back to the ’80s.
“Hi, Rachael,” Jazzbeaux said. She knew Harvest didn’t like to be reminded that she no more used her real name than anyone else. It made her too like the gangbangers who were her prey. “Neat outfit.”
Harvest wore a functional one-piece, with a flakjak and a utility belt. Her hair was held back by an Alice band, but frizzed out a lot around her shoulders. It must get in the way in fights.
“And cool gun, ma’am. Real horosho killing piece.”
The Op holstered her side arm. It was something sensuous, with a big kick. She looked over the ’pomps, probably totalling rewards in her head. Everyone in the krewe had paper hanging over them in some state or other. Most had gone federal and were just wanted.
“Small-timers,” Harvest said, snorting. “We’ll get down to you someday, but just now we’ve got a moose to fry.”
“Got away, did he, Rachael?”
The Op shrugged.
“If there is a he.”
The Grand Exalted Bullmoose of the Maniax was probably a mythical being. No one had ever seen him and lived. Jazzbeaux reckoned it was a revolving office; the Maniax were basically Anarcho-Capitalists, so their hierarchy was about as stable as a lavalamp. That was what made them hard to stamp out; like ticks, cutting off the body wasn’t enough, you had to dig the head out of your skin and burn it.
Harvest looked Jazzbeaux up and down, not showing her opinion in her face. If she wore make-up, she’d be a pretty woman. With her legs, she’d even look good in a dress. Once, in previous lives, they’d got close. Too close for mutual comfort.
Jazzbeaux pouted and leaned on a Blood Bowl console. She let her tongue play over her lower lip and fluttered her single eyelash.
“You should have more fun, Rachael,” she said, meaning it.
Harvest looked blank.
“Fun is not an early priority.”
Before she went into the private sector, Rachael Harvest was a Denver beatcop. She’d rounded up Jazzbeaux back in her gladiatrix days and they’d played Mama-Daught games neither wanted to remember much in the harshness of the ’90s. But the Op always made Jazzbeaux feel twelve.
“How’s blat, Jessamyn?”
Jazzbeaux shrugged. She knew the woman cared (under the armour plate, the Op was a dogoodnik) but she’d never understand. For her, everything was right or wrong and pick-yourself-up. She’d never had a Daddy like Bruno Bonney. And she’d never have a daughter like Jessamyn Amanda…
“Must be business openings this anno,” Ms Harvest mused. “Especially in pharmaceuticals supply. If I were a smart fillette, I think I’d pass them up. Prospects are strictly short term.”
Out of the Op’s sightline, Sleepy Jane hefted a blowpipe and took aim. She usually packed tranks but she had a variety of interesting psycho-active darts.
“I wouldn’t exhale if I were you, Miss Porteous,” Harvest said, not turning her head. “If someone were to give that thing a good shove, you’d lose those expensive steel-core teeth.”
The blowpipe went down.
“How do you do that, Rachael? A pineal peep implant?”
Harvest didn’t crack a smile.
“Jessamyn, Jessamyn, what to do about you?”
“Here’s a radical concept, how about getting off my back and leaving me the freak alone?”
Jazzbeaux fancied a wind of disappointment blew across the Op
’s smooth face. Jazzbeaux would have killed for Harvest’s complexion.
“One day, my dear,” Harvest said, “there’ll be a reckoning ’twixt thee and me.”
“Won’t that be something to see, though?”
Jazzbeaux knew she was flouncing like a lolita, shoving hips against her skirt and blowing bubbles with non-existent gum. It was uncanny how far back the Op took her.
“Jessamyn, grow up,” the Op said, a feeble parting shot. She slipped back into ’Nola Gay and the door descended. The windows were one-way opaque.
The ’pomps drew fingers and popped off gun-noises at the V12, thumbs recoiling. Sweetcheeks had a bad case of hiccough-giggles and had to be slapped on the back.
Jazzbeaux wondered why she let Redd Harvest get to her.
“Dance on my finger, ladylove,” she said, not loud enough for the car’s sensors to pick up.
“Attention,” a computer-generated speaker said, “your warrant status and current locale have been down-loaded with the nearest node of the Highway Patrol net.”
“I’m so scared,” So Long said, exaggerating. She’d kept quiet and hung back while Harvest was out of her car.
’Nola Gay did its famous nought-to-ninety trick and zoomed off for the desert horizon.
“Thank Cristo for that,” Andrew Jean said. “I’ve been sitting on the message for minutes. How does Moroni, Utah sound to you? It’s up near Silver City and Spanish Fork. Ghost town.”
“Snazz.”
Moroni? Irving specialised in ghost towns with silly names. II would have scouted the site. The commission was to find absolutely neutral territory for negotiations. Somewhere, the DAR rank equivalent of Andrew Jean would be receiving the same message.
Jazzbeaux gave Andrew Jean the nod.
“I’ll tap in an acceptance. Boyar, it looks like you’re invited to single combat. A duel of honour and business.”
Andrew Jean knuckled keys, authorising the transfer of funds to II, accepting the site. As the message was processed, the Virtualsex simulated an affirmative orgasm. The Daughters must have gone with Moroni, too. It used to be form for both sides suspiciously to turn down the first proposal but Irving got offended easily.