Islands in the Net

by Bruce Sterling

  This accusation wounded Winston Stubbs. The Rastafarian underground had never favored “steel drugs.” The substances they made were sacramental, like communion wine, meant to assist in “i-tal meditation.”

  Karageorgiu scoffed at this. He knew the real sources of the Grenadian syndicate and recited them with relish. Cocaine-crazed Colombians cruising the streets of Miami in armored vans crammed with Kalashnikovs. Degraded Cuban boat-lifters, speckled with prison tattoos, who would kill for a cigarette. Redneck American swindlers like “Big Bobby” Vesco, who had specialized in the sucker’s shell game with a series of offshore fronts.

  Winston Stubbs heard the man out peaceably, trying to defuse Laura’s horror with skeptical brow wrinkling and little pitying shakes of his head. But he bristled at this last remark. Mr. Robert Vesco, he said indignantly, had at one point owned the government of Costa Rica. And in the legendary IOS scam, Vesco had liberated $60 million of illegally invested CIA retirement funds. This action showed that Vesco’s heart was righteous. There was no shame in having him as forefather. The man was a duppy conqueror.

  After the second day’s negotiations broke up, Laura shakily joined Debra Emerson out on the seaside verandah for a private conference. “Well,” said Emerson cheerfully. “This has certainly cleared the air.”

  “Like lifting the lid of a cesspool,” Laura said. A salt breeze blew in from offshore, and she shuddered. “We’re getting nowhere with these negotiations. It’s obvious they have no intention of reforming. They barely tolerate us. They think we’re saps.”

  “Oh, I think we’re progressing nicely,” Emerson said. Since the talks had started, she had relaxed into a glazed professional ease. Both she and Laura had made an effort to break past their formal roles and to establish the kind of gut-level personal trust that held Rizome together as a postindustrial company. Laura was reassured that Emerson took the company’s principles so seriously.

  It was good, too, that the Committee had fully acknowledged Laura’s need to know. For a while she had been afraid that they would try some security bullshit, and that she would have to go on the company Net and make a stink about it. Instead they had taken her into the core of negotiations. Not at all a bad thing, career-wise, for a woman still officially on infancy furlough. Laura now felt vaguely guilty about her earlier suspicions. She even wished that Emily Donato hadn’t told her anything.

  Emerson nibbled a praline and gazed out to sea. “It’s all been skirmishing so far, just macho one-upmanship. But soon they’ll be getting down to business. The critical point is their blackmailers. With our help, with a little guidance, they’ll join forces in self-defense.”

  A seagull noticed Emerson eating. It swooped up and hovered hopefully above the walkway’s railing, its flat yellow eyes gleaming. “Join forces?” Laura said.

  “It’s not as bad as it sounds, Laura. It’s their small scale and fast reflexes that make the data havens dangerous. A large, centralized group will become bureaucratic.”

  “You think so?”

  “They have weaknesses we don’t,” Emerson said, settling deeper into her reclining chair. She cracked off a chip of her praline and studied the floating bird. “The major weakness of criminal groups is their innate lack of trust. That’s why so many of them rely on family blood ties. Especially families from oppressed minorities—a double reason for group loyalty against the outside world. But an organization that can’t rely on the free loyalty of its members is forced to rely on gesellschaft. On industrial methods.”

  She smiled, lifting her hand. “And that means rule books, laws, stiff formal hierarchies. Violence is not Rizome’s strong suit, Laura, but we do understand management structures. Centralized bureaucracies always protect the status quo. They don’t innovate. And it’s innovation that’s the real threat. It’s not so bad that they rip us off.” She tossed her chip of candy and the gull caught it instantly. “The problem comes when they outthink us.”

  “The bigger, the stupider, is that the strategy?” Laura said. “What happened to good old divide and conquer?”

  “This isn’t politics. This is technology. It’s not their power that threatens us, it’s their imagination. Creativity comes from small groups. Small groups gave us the electric light, the automobile, the personal computer. Bureaucracies gave us the nuclear power plant, traffic jams, and network television. The first three changed everything. The last three are memories now.”

  Three more freeloading gulls swooped up from nowhere. They jostled gracefully for space, with creaking screams of greed. Laura said, “Don’t you think we ought to try something a little more vigorous? Like, say, arresting them?”

  “I don’t blame you for thinking that,” Emerson said. “But you don’t know what these people have survived. They thrive on persecution, it unites them. It builds a class chasm between them and society, it lets them prey on the rest of us without a twinge of conscience. No, we have to let them grow, Laura, we have to give them a stake in our status quo. It’s a long-term struggle. Decades long. Lifetimes. Just like the Abolition.”

  “Mmmm,” Laura said, not liking this much. The older generation was always going on about the Abolition. As if abolishing bombs intended to destroy the planet had required transcendent genius. “Well, not everyone shares that philosophy. Or else these data sharks wouldn’t be here now, trying to roll with the punches.” She lowered her voice. “Who do you think is blackmailing them? One of them, maybe? Those Singaporeans … they’re so aloof and contemptuous. They look pretty suspicious.”

  “Could be,” Emerson said placidly. “Whoever it is, they’re professionals.” She threw the last of her candy to the gulls and stood up, shivering. “It’s getting chilly.”

  They went in. Inside the Lodge, a routine had emerged. The Singaporeans always retired to their rooms after negotiations. The Europeans amused themselves in the conference room, running up the Lodge’s telecom bills.

  The Grenadians, on the other hand, seemed deeply interested in the Lodge itself. They had inspected it from tower to foundation, asking flattering questions about computer design and concretized sand. Since then the Grenadians seemed to have taken an active liking to David. They had gathered with him in the downstairs lounge for the third night running.

  Laura went to help with the washing. The staff was bearing up well, despite the security requirements. They found it exciting to have actual live criminals in the place. Mrs. Rodriguez had stuck appropriate nicknames on the guests: Los Opios, Los Morfinos, and, of course, Los Marijuanos. Winston Stubbs, El Jefe de los Marijuanos, was a staff favorite. Not only did he look most like a proper pirate, but he had tried to tip them several times. The Morfino Europeans, however, were on everyone’s shit list.

  Debra Emerson had not escaped—no one called her anything but “La Espia.” Everyone agreed that she was weird. Poca loca. But she was Rizome, so it was okay.

  Laura had not gone running in three days. Her ankle was better now but the forced confinement was making her antsy. She needed a drink. She joined David and the Grenadians in the bar.

  David was showing off his music collection. He collected old Texas pop music—western swing, blues, polkas, conjunto border ballads. A sixty-year-old conjunto tape played over the lounge’s speakers, rapid accordion riffs punctuated with high-pitched wails. Laura, who had grown up with synthesizers and Russian pop music, still found the stuff eerie as hell.

  She poured herself a glass of the house red and joined them around a low table. The old man sat slumped in a chair, looking drowsy. Sticky Thompson and the Church woman sat together on a couch.

  During the debates, Sticky had been very animated, almost hyper at times. Among his luggage, Sticky had brought a thermos of what he claimed was acidophilus milk. He was drinking it now. Laura wondered what was in it. Sticky couldn’t be older than twenty-two or three, she thought. He was a little young to have ulcers.

  Carlotta had a glass of orange juice. She had made it clear that she never touched coffee o
r alcohol. She sat intimately close to Sticky, pressing her black-stockinged thigh against his leg, tugging lightly at the curls at the back of his neck. Carlotta had never taken part in the debates, but she shared Sticky’s room. She watched him with animal raptness—like the gulls outside.

  The sight of Carlotta and Sticky—young love played at 78 rpm—gave Laura a sense of unease. There was something horribly bogus about their ambience, as if they were deliberately mimicking a romance. She pulled a chair close to David’s.

  “So what do y’all think?” David said.

  “It’s better than those yodeling cowboys,” Sticky said, his amber eyes gleaming. “But you can’t say this is your roots, mon. This is Third World music.”

  “The hell you say,” David said mildly. “It’s Texas music, I’m a Texan.”

  “That’s Spanish they’re singing, mon.”

  “Well, I speak Spanish,” David said. “Maybe you didn’t notice our staff are Texan Hispanics.”

  “Oh, seen, I notice them,” Sticky said. This was the first time Sticky had used such a thick patois. “I noticed you sleep up in the castle tower.” Sticky pointed upstairs. “While they sleep down here by the kitchen.”

  “Oh, you reckon so?” David drawled, stung. “You want those old folks to walk up two flights of stairs, I guess. While we keep the baby down here to wake our guests.”

  “I see what I see,” Sticky said. “You say, no more wage slaves, equal rights in the big mother Rizome. Everybody votes. No bosses—coordinators. No board—a Central Committee. But your wife still give orders and they still cook and clean.”

  “Sure,” Laura broke in. “But not for us, Sticky. For you.”

  “That’s a good one,” Sticky said, riveting his hot eyes on Laura. “You talk a good line after those P.R. courses at the university. Diplomatic, like your mother.”

  There was a sudden silence. “Chill out, Sticky,” the old man murmured. “You gettin’ red, boy.”

  “Yeah,” David said, still smarting. “Maybe you better take it a little easy on that milk.”

  “There’s nothing in this milk,” Sticky said. He shoved the thermos at Laura, who was closest. “You try it.”

  “All right,” Laura said abruptly. She had a sip. It was cloyingly sweet. She handed it back. “That reminds me. David, did you feed the baby?”

  David grinned, admiring her bravado. “Yeah.”

  There was nothing in the milk, she decided. Nothing was going to happen to her. She sipped her wine to wash the taste away.

  Carlotta laughed suddenly, breaking the tension. “You’re a caution, Sticky.” She started rubbing his shoulders. “It’s no use you bein’ down on Mr. and Mrs. Married Life. They’re straights, that’s all. Not like us.”

  “You don’t see it yet, girl. You haven’t heard ’em talk upstairs.” Sticky had lost his temper, and his accent. He was starting to sound more and more like a cable news announcer, Laura thought. That flat Mid-Atlantic television English. Global Net talk. Sticky pulled Carlotta’s hand away and held it. “Straights aren’t what they used to be. They want it all now—the whole world. One world. Their world.” He stood up, pulling her to her feet. “Come on, girl. The bed needs shaking.”

  “Buenas noches,” David called out as they left. “Suenos dulces, cuidado con las chinches!” Sticky ignored him.

  Laura poured herself another glass and knocked back half of it. The old man opened his eyes. “He’s young,” he said.

  “I was rude,” David said contritely. “But I dunno, that old Imperialist America line—it gets me where I live. Sorry.”

  “Not America, no,” the old man said. “You Yankees aren’t Babylon. You only part of her, now. Babylon-she-multinational, Babylon-she-multilateral.” He chanted the words. “Babylon she come to get us where we live.” He sighed. “You like it here, I know. I ask the old women, they say they like it too. They say you nice, you baby’s cute. But where she growing up, that baby, in your nice one world with its nice one set of rules? She have no place to run. You think that over, seen? Before you come down on us.” He stood up, yawning. “Tomorrow, eh? Tomorrow.” He left.

  Silence fell. “Let’s go to bed,” Laura said at last. They went upstairs.

  The baby was sleeping peacefully. Laura had been checking her crib monitor with the watchphone. They pulled their clothes off and slid into bed together. “What a weird old duck that Stubbs is,” David said. “Full of stories. He said … he said he was in Grenada in ’83 when the U.S. Marines invaded. The sky was full of choppers shooting Cubans. They took over the radio station and played Yankee pop music. The Beach Boys, he said. I thought he meant the Marines at first. Beach boys.”

  Laura frowned. “You’re letting him get to you, David. That nice old codger and his poor little island. His poor little island is taking a big bite out of our ass. That snotty remark about Mother—they must have dossiers on both of us, the size of phone books. And what about that Church girl, huh? I don’t like that business one bit.”

  “We’ve got a lot in common with Grenada,” David said. “Galveston was a pirate haven, once upon a time. Good old Jean Lafitte, remember? Back in 1817. Hijacking shipping, yo-ho-ho, bottle of rum, the whole routine.” David grinned. “Maybe you and I could start a haven, okay? Just a snug little one that we could run from the conference room. We’d find out how many teeth old Sticky’s grandmother has.”

  “Don’t even think it,” Laura said. She paused. “That girl. Carlotta. You think she’s attractive?”

  He sank down into his pillow. “A little,” he said. “Sure.”

  “You kept looking at her.”

  “I think she was high on those Church pills,” he said. “Romance. It does something for a woman, to have that glow. Even if it’s fake.”

  “I could take one of those pills,” Laura said carefully. “I’ve been totally nuts about you before. It didn’t do any permanent damage.”

  David laughed. “What’s gotten into you tonight? I couldn’t believe you drank that milk. You’re lucky you’re not seeing little blue dogs leaping out of the wall.” He sat up in bed, waving his hand. “How many fingers?”

  “Forty,” she said, smiling.

  “Laura, you’re drunk.” He pinned her down and kissed her. It felt good. It was good to be crushed under his weight. A warm, solid, comfortable crush. “Good,” she said. “Give me ten more.” His face was an inch away and she smelled wine on her own breath.

  He kissed her twice, then reached down and gave her a deep, intimate caress. She threw her arms around him and closed her eyes, enjoying it. Good strong warm hand. She relaxed, sinking into the mood. A nice little trough of chemistry there, as scratchy pleasure melted into lust. The wariness that took her through the day evaporated as she relaxed into arousal. Good-bye, calculating Laura; hello, connubial Laura, long time no see. She started kissing him seriously, the kind she knew he liked. It was great to do it, and know he liked it.

  Here we go, she thought. A nice solid slide inside her. Surely nothing was ever better than this. She smiled up into David’s face.

  That look in his eyes. It had scared her sometimes, the first times, and excited her. That look of sweet David gone and something else in his place. Some other part of him, primal. Something that she couldn’t control, that could take her own control away. Sex had been like that in the first days of their affair, something wild and strong and romantic, and not entirely pleasurable. Too close to fainting, too close to pain. Too strange …

  But not tonight. They slipped into a good thumping rhythm. A good mauling hug and a good solid pounding. Fine solid, dependable sex. Building up to orgasm like laying bricks. Angel architects laid bricks like this in the walls of heaven. Level one, level two, taking their time, level three, almost done now, and there it was. Climax washed through her, and she moaned happily. He was still at it. It was no use aiming for another one, and she didn’t try, but it came anyway, a small little twinge with a pleasure all its own, like smelling brandy i
n another room.

  Then he was through. He rolled onto his side of the bed, and she felt his sweat cooling on her skin. A good feeling, intimate as a kiss. “Oh, lord,” he said, not meaning anything, just breathing the words out. He slid his legs under the covers. He was happy, they were lovers, all was right in the world. They would be sleeping soon.

  “David?”

  “Yes, light of my life?”

  She smiled. “Do you think we’re straight?”

  He laced his hands behind his head against the pillow. He looked at her sidelong. “Tired of the missionary position?”

  “You’re such a help. No, I mean it.”

  He saw that she was serious and shrugged. “I don’t know, angel. We’re people, that’s all. We have a kid and a place in the world.… I don’t know what that means.” He grinned tiredly, then rolled onto his side, throwing one leg over hers. She dimmed the lights with her watchphone. She didn’t say anything more, and in a few minutes he was asleep.

  The baby woke her, whimpering. This time Laura managed to force herself from bed. David sprawled himself over, into her space. Fine, she thought. Let him sleep in the wet spot.

  She got the baby up, changed her diaper. This had to be a sign of something, she thought sourly. Surely avant-garde rebel enemies of the system never had to change diapers.

  Laura warmed Loretta’s formula and tried to feed her, but she wouldn’t be comforted. She was kicking and arching her spine and wadding up her little face.… She was a very good-tempered baby, in daylight at least, but if she woke at night she became a bag of nerves.

  The sound wasn’t her hungry cry, or her lonely cry, but tremulous, high-pitched noises that said she didn’t know what to do with herself. Laura decided to take her out on the walkway. That usually calmed her down. It looked like a nice night, anyway. She shrugged into her night-robe.