Jade Dragon

by James Swallow

  Juno discharged the injector into her eye and went into quiet shock.

  The cabin door sealed behind him and in the gloom Ropé crossed to the desk and took his seat. The window blinds were open slightly, slow-lidded eyes peeking a faint sky glow into the compartment. He licked his lips and touched a hidden control in the desk; obediently, a silent panel yawned open to present him with a drawer lined in rich purple velvet. Nestled inside was a book made of rusted steel. As they always did, the edges of the pages cut him when he removed it. Ropé clasped it in both hands and felt the thin streams of his blood pooling in the pockmarks and scored channels in the tome’s cover. His thumb was ripped gently as he stroked the meat of it over the spine of the book. Where the blood marked out the age-worn letters it was possible to see something of the title: The Path of Joseph.

  Ropé very much wanted to open the book, but that would have taken more of him than he wanted to give at this moment. There would be time, later. Time enough. A device in the desk chimed, and he bared his teeth. “I said not to disturb—”

  Already a screen was erecting itself out of the desk’s featureless top, and blinking in the corner of the display was the oval logo of RWB. This was an incoming call, a live feed overriding all his personal lockouts. There were only a few people who could do that.

  He had the book concealed and his hands knotting beneath a towel when Phoebe Hi’s face blinked into life before him. Ropé always thought she resembled a misassembled Darbie doll, a perfect It-Girl head wrongly attached to a tubby little body. This he kept to himself, showing the required degree of deference to his superior.

  “You spun that Popeldouris bitch well. The political opinion we could have done without, though.”

  He shrugged. “It seemed right for the moment. It also allows RedWhiteBlue to distance itself from me. You know, ‘these views are the personal opinions of Mr Ropé and not those of RWB, et cetera, et cetera.’ I’m providing plausible deniability.”

  Hi shook her head. “Don’t build up your part, Heywood. Your job was to ensure that the consumers will accept the talent’s appearance at the Victoria Peak event as spontaneous on her part, an expression of free will.”

  “I doubt she even understands the meaning of those words.”

  “We want the consumers to feel unfettered, Heywood. You understand how important that is to the work.” She paused. “How have things progressed since we spoke last? Any improvement?”

  Ropé gave a dry chuckle. “If anything, she’s grown worse. I’d like to remind you that I was against the idea of an American excursion. Too far from safety, too many distractions, too much input too soon—”

  “Those choices were not yours to make,” she broke in. “You would do well to remember that.”

  “Of course,” he allowed. “Fix the problem, not the blame, neh?”

  “Exactly.” Hi leaned into the screen, filling it with her face. “We have the remote feed here, Heywood, and Tang’s people concur with you. The instability you brought to our attention is of great concern, and I think at this stage we cannot proceed without instigating the more serious of options.”

  Ropé considered this for a moment. “You’re quite sure?”

  “Quite,” repeated Hi. “A liability is not what we look for in our talent, Heywood. Can I trust you to deal with it personally?”

  “And the… ?”

  “Preparations are being made,” she said, silencing the question before he asked it. “We’ve leaked the party to the press. Expect a significant presence there.”

  “All right.”

  Hi cut the link and left him in the dimness. Faint shafts of light crossed the walls as the aircraft began a languid turn toward the distant city.

  Ropé studied the ruins of his hands, watching the blood clot and scab over.

  At SkyHarbour there was an advance guard of machines waiting to capture the first images of Juno Qwan’s triumphant return to the city of her birth. In the car park outside Chek Lap Kok, news mobiles from a dozen different networks sat in a ring, like circled wagons from the Old West. Troopers from the APRC, reluctant to look lazy on international television, patrolled around them. The go-gangers knew better than to show up tonight.

  There were few human reporters in place at the arrival gateway. Only the nets at the very lowest end of the spectrum or the stringers clinging to their hopes of an exclusive, had bothered to send flesh-and-blood representatives. Stations like Wave-Net, ZeeBeeCee, Scramble News Network and CanalEuropa had posted squads of avatar drones, a gaggle of the brightly coloured remotes floating on ducted impellers or resting inverted on the ceiling. The insectoid machines deployed probes with wideband cameras and omni-directional microphones. Behind their unblinking glass eyes there were operators half a world away running them through goggles-and-glove interfaces.

  SNN’s drone, fire engine red with a buzzing, counter-rotating heliblade, spotted the party first and it launched itself at them. The other remotes went after it in a string of chattering motors.

  Juno was behind a pair of thick polycrys sunglasses by Minnuendo. Her hat was an Inverse Smile original, a wide-brimmed sunshade in the Loren style. She wore a Dior delta dress and her shoes were from Westlake. The clothes, the way she walked, the turn of her head—all of it was engineered to say “leave me alone”. Around the globe, automatic pattern scanners were taking the measure of her attire; the same outfit would be on sale in knock-off stores within less than a day.

  Ropé led the entourage, a couple of the more popular band members trailing behind and a circle of four men from RWB’s Overt Security Team surrounding Juno as she entered the glare of the floating cameras. One of the security men carried a handheld microwave field generator to discourage the drones from coming too close to the group. Wave-Net’s remote made the mistake of drifting near for a candid shot and it clattered out of the air, landing on its back, legs kicking feebly like a gassed cockroach.

  In their respective virtual studios, anchors from the networks were matted in to the live footage, smart transfer programs making it appear to the viewers that the reporters were actually there at Chek Lap Kok with the singer. They called out questions to her, but Juno excised them from her world, never acknowledging them, never glancing their way. Her face was set and thin-lipped beneath the Minnuendo shades. Ropé threw the armada of robots a clipped wave that signalled the end of this brief photo opportunity, as the security men ushered Juno into a waiting limobus. All the networks showed the same shot of the coach pulling away from the terminal with an escort of two APRC patrol cruisers. The flanks of the double-decker were a screen, and as the vehicle moved off a vid of Juno singing a cover of “Stage Fright” from her Malaysia tour rippled across it. Each station turned back to studio-bound talking heads who picked apart the brief flash of celebrity, examining every second of the footage and speculating on the singer’s mindset. Several new rumours about Juno’s love life were created spontaneously in the time it took the bus to emerge from the Western Harbour Tunnel on Hong Kong Island.

  If the drones at the airport had been the scouts, then the armies were waiting in the courtyard of the YLHI tower. Legions of reporters—real human ones this time –jostled one another for a glimpse of the starlet as her ride came to a stately halt outside the opulent entrance. Ropé stepped out first and took Juno’s hand. The girl’s foot touched the stone steps and ignited a lightstorm of flash strobes and camera floods. She hesitated and turned her head up to look at them. Somewhere along the way Juno had ditched the sunglasses. The singer threw the world her dazzling smile and with a playful flourish, she took off her hat and spun it into the crowds where her fans pressed in a hundred people deep.

  “Hello Hong Kong!” she called, her voice chiming like crystal. “I love you.” She blew kisses and detached herself from her manager in a jubilant pirouette. Juno skipped to the closest reporter, a local correspondent for the Chinese State Channel, and beamed at him. “I’m so glad to be home again,” she said, “I’ve missed my
city and my friends so much.”

  Her behaviour couldn’t have been more different from the cold aspect she displayed at the airport, as unlike as night and day. The crowd roared, jarring the stunned journalist to life. “Miss Qwan, what are your plans now you’re back?”

  She flashed that billion-yuan smile again. “I’m going to have some fun and unwind, but you can be sure I’ll be singing for you all very soon.”

  The elation crossed the courtyard in a wave. “Are you going to perform at WyldSky?” called the reporter as she drifted away from him.

  Juno laughed and threw him a coquettish theatrical wink. The chorus of her name followed the starlet into the building like radiance from the sun.

  “Here we are,” said Alice, as the elevator chimed. The doors parted and a wave of laughter and music swept over Frankie. He followed her out into the atrium. They were somewhere close to the upper levels of the YLHI tower, below Tze’s jade castle. A broad open space some three storeys high, the atrium was a festival under glass, a classical string quartet in one corner, a massive indoor waterfall in the other, and between them knots of people indulging themselves in whatever was on offer. Frankie spied tables laden with wines and liqueurs, others with endless swathes of food, including what had to be real meat. There were more discreet offerings too, vircade pods in the shadow of the stone pillars holding up the roof, or circumspect waitstaff with dishes of capsules and droppers. Alice handed him a flute of champagne and he sipped it gingerly.

  “Make yourself comfortable,” she told him. “Mingle.”

  “Right,” he said, covering his hesitation with another sip. Over the woman’s shoulder he saw Phoebe Hi and a group of ruddy-faced men. He blinked as he recognised Lasse Illstrom among them, the CEO of the Midgard Securities Group; only last month the Norwegian billionaire had been on the cover of both Business Week and CORP Magazine.

  Alice glanced around. “Do you like films?”

  Frankie blinked. “Uh, sure, I guess. ”

  She nodded. “Do you know that man? He’s an actor.”

  “Where?” Frankie turned to see Hazzard Wu in close discussion with three men who could only have been the Wachowski Triplets. He was miming the motion of cocking a handgun. “Uh… Yeah. I think so.” The more attention Frankie paid them, more A-list faces came into view about him. He saw the lead drivers from the Tiger Beer highway duel team, the host of You’re Out, You Loser, a few senior men wearing officer tabs from the Army of the Peoples Republic of China. Alice excused herself for a moment and Frankie decided to sample some vat-grown salmon.

  “Try the little crab things, man, they’re preem.”

  Frankie turned to see the lead vocalist from Charlie Fish, an indie band who were big with the ghettobomber crowd in SoCal. He blinked.

  “What?” drawled the singer.

  “Nothing… I’m just, well, surprised to see you here. Your music, its all that anti-corporate stuff…”

  Frankie received a weak smile. “Oh yeah. Well. We all gotta change some time, right?”

  The man wandered away and Frankie found himself at the window. He dropped onto a comfortable sofa, and his hand drifted to the PDA in his pocket. He popped it open and studied the files Alice had reluctantly given up when he pressed her about Alan’s death. Yuk Lung had used contacts with the metropolitan police division to unlock the incident report, and here it was in brutal colour on the palm-sized screen of the handheld. The cops said Alan had been walking along a Mongkok side street when a car had hopped the curb and slammed him into a shuttered storefront. He died on impact, so the coroner’s report had it. The car and driver hadn’t been found, but eyewitness testimony suggested that the attack had been gang-related. The conclusion was a triad hit gone wrong, most likely a case of mistaken identity. Not that this made dealing with it any simpler. YLHI had already dealt with Alan’s remains, cremating him and placing the compacted ashes in a bullet-sized capsule, to be buried in the company memorial park overlooking Clear Water Bay. Frankie paged through the data again. It was all blurring into one long string of dispassionate scrawl.

  “Francis,” said Mr Tze, his reflection appearing in the window like a waking phantom.

  Frankie snapped the PDA shut. “Hello, uh, sir.”

  Tze gave him a paternal smile, and Frankie absently rubbed his hand, tracing the lines of the knife cuts. The strange little ritual had unnerved him more than he wanted to admit. Tze guided him off the sofa and back towards the party. “I want you to enjoy this evening, Francis. Put behind you the pain of things past and look ahead. Will you do that?”

  He managed a nod.

  “That is good,” Tze took a capsule from a passing waiter and swallowed it down in one gulp. “We’re on the verge of a new acquisition. Something that is going to alter the landscape we move through on every level. Yuk Lung’s reach will truly be global, and we will need men like you to take us there.”

  “Me?” Frankie let out a laugh. “Honestly, sir, I’m flattered you think so much of me, but I’m only a minor echelon executive. I’m not sure I have the right stuff—”

  “You do,” said Tze firmly. “I don’t want men who look good on paper. I want men who have spirit.” He prodded him in the sternum. “Courage, Francis. You’re not some milksop choirboy with an MBA. You came from the street. You have an edge that none of these men raised on the corporate teat can even grasp at. I want you to make that available to me. I want you to understand that your participation in Yuk Lung’s future plans is, in a very real way, of universal importance. I know that you can fill the terrible void left by Alan’s passing. I know it. He knew it too, Francis. He told me so.”

  “Really?” Something rang a wrong note in Frankie’s mind. Not since they were teenagers had Alan been one for brotherly love.

  “Oh yes. And there will be rewards the like of which you have not dreamed.” He leaned closer. “Men crave power, Francis, all of us. I can give it to you, if you have the will to claim it.”

  Something deep inside Frankie was forcing its way up, and it manifested in a feral smile. He thought of Alan’s dismissive emails, of Burt Tiplady and a hundred overlooked promotion opportunities, of a lifetime of second place. It all came together in a hot rush. “Yeah,” he said quietly, “I’d like that.”

  Tze guided him over to the elevator stack as the doors parted, and the crowd burst into a round of rapturous applause. A cluster of men emerged and parted to let the executive make a gesture of presentation. “Francis,” he smiled, “may I introduce you to Miss Juno Qwan?”

  Her perfect eyes met his as she stepped from the lift and Frankie’s heart skipped a beat. “Hello.” He felt a spark of attraction flash between them.

  “Francis,” she said, smiling like a supernova, extending her hand. “Dance with me?”

  Tze left Lam and the singer to fall into one another and passed Hi with a curt nod. The woman had done well, once again turning a problem into an advantage. He would have to keep Hi on a tighter leash, less she begin to entertain thoughts above her station. The three girls he had chosen for his comfort tonight smiled at him from the shaded table where he had left them.

  Deer Child approached. The Mask had a woman in his grip, half-guiding, half-dragging her. “Sir.”

  “Is there a problem?” He turned an appraising eye on the girl. She had a lean, wolfish look in her eyes, and he saw immediately that all her clothes were cheap street copies of current trendsetters. He smelt greed and fear on her, and there in her eyes was the telltale glint of blue.

  Deer Child handed him a silver smartcard. “There appears to be an anomaly with this young lady’s invite, sir.”

  Tze turned the card over in his hand. The code was well past expiry. “What is your name?” he asked the girl.

  She flashed him a sultry look, cool and practised. “Nikita.”

  He smiled slightly. “I once knew an assassin with that name. Are you here to hurt me, Nikita?”

  “Only if you want me to,” she whispered.

/>   Tze’s smile broadened. The girl was putting everything she had into it. He handed the card back to the guardian. “I see no problem here. Bring the young lady a drink at my table.” He offered her his arm. “Join me?”

  “I’d love to,” said Nikita, and followed him into the shadows.

  http://junofans.rwb.vnet/r584923921/chatroom_enable

  Halo_kisser Has Entered The Chat Room.

  Junqfanl4342: hi halo

  Rusty: hlo

  Halo_kisser: hi yall

  Goth*Lolita: it was preem

  Goth*Lolita: I was nr teh guy who got her hat grrr. Missed it.

  Goth*Lolita: Juno looked sooooo good. I [heart] her!

  Halo_kisser: u were there? OMG OMG sooo jealous!

  Rusty: G*L lives in Honk Kong

  Rusty: sorry Hong Kong [grin]

  Goth*Lolita: number 1 fangirl!

  Junofanl4342: how did JQ look? She not on ZBC Pulse.

  Goth*Lolita: beautiful!

  Rusty: did u see pix from airport? She was v. moody

  Halo_kisser: not. How would u feel after NO crazeeness?

  Rusty: seem weird 2 me.

  Goth*Lolita: everything weird 2 you rusty!

  Junofanl4342: yeh rusty sez secret messages on junos discs!

  Rusty: TRUE

  Halo_kisser: is not, you R looped, rusty!

  Goth*Lolita: I posted pictures from my eyecam on my site–[link]

  Junofan14342: cool. Swipe 4 my wallscreen!

  Rusty: did ne1 read netfeeds about NO concert? Mad reports off samizdata grids

  Junofan14342: [frown] that stuff is jagged, rusty! Illegal u should not read!

  Rusty: just want to know about juno

  I_Witness Has Entered The Chat Room.

  Goth*Lolita: was ne1 at NO concert?

  I_Witness: me. I was there w my sister

  Junofanl4342: bet it was good

  I_Witness: r u high? Concert was psycho! They freaked us out!!!

  Rusty: I heard it was AAAA screw w lasers

  Goth*Lolita: yeh they h8 all j-pop