Code Noir

by Marianne de Pierres

  ‘You look different from the others, Glida,’ I said.

  ‘That’s cos my hair is worth somethin’.’ She rubbed her mostly bald scalp. ‘They don’t get as much for theirs.’

  I noticed the ma’soops had tufts missing here and there. Nothing like Glida’s.

  The abusiveness of it fired my boosters. These children had been crossbred right here in Mo-Vay. Why would anyone want to do this? Who would want to do this?

  I thought of Loyl Daac. What he was doing wasn’t such a large step away. His genetic mods might not be as dire as these but his notion of breeding selectivity was.

  In a single heart wrench my resolve was restored.

  Over the next few hours Glida and Roo showed me a dozen different ways down to the street, safe access between conjoined villas and a couple of routes to Splitty’s bar, including an attic cut-thru. I logged them carefully in my compass memory.

  Glida described food vendors whose food might kill me, and those that wouldn’t. Then I told her to wait until I’d done what I’d come here to do and that afterwards I’d find her, and the ma’soops, and take them with me.

  I took Roo aside. ‘If I’m not back by tomorrow, I want you to take Glida and the ma’soops back to Torley’s without me.’

  He gave me a look. ‘But Teece—’

  I stared him down. ‘Who do you think needs protecting, Roo? These kids? Or me?’

  His young face hinted at warring emotions, his eyes straying to Glida as she played with the ma’soops.

  He sighed. ‘OK, boss. But if you get killed or anythin’ Teece said he’d pull my implants out. That wouldn’t leave me much.’

  ‘Nice type, that Teece,’ I consoled, hiding a grin.

  I left the ma’soops jumping and somersaulting in excitement and nervousness at the idea of leaving Mo-Vay with Glida growling parental warnings about the brittle ceiling and Roo shyly watching her.

  She went to tug out her last knot of head hair and slip some of it into my hand.

  I stayed her hand and patted Loser, sloughing off a handful of his instead. ‘He’s good currency,’ I said. ‘Look after him until I get back.’

  She blinked at me, unsure of what to say. ‘If youse come back.’

  ‘I might need you to help some others. Keep a watch over Splitty’s. If you see some people come out of there that aren’t from round here, show them how to be safe until I get back to you,’ I said.

  She rolled her eyes. ‘More like you?’

  I grinned. ‘I’ve been told there’s no one like me.’

  I wasted precious time finding someone who’d trade for a Zippo and information. As the day got old, I risked food and water from one vendor on Glida’s recommended list. The water swelled my tongue again, but my stomach toughed the food despite its peculiar taste. That was one puzzle I hadn’t solved. How did they get food in this place?

  As far as I could tell nothing came in from the rest of The Tert, which left Fishertown bay.

  After I’d eaten I found my way back to Splitty’s. The python still hung from the doorway, flies buzzing, mouth in mortis as the afternoon switched to evening.

  Tears stung my eyelids and I pushed down a resurgence of misery. I sent a mental plea for forgiveness to the snake - along with a picture of some serious arse kicking.

  Then I marched into Splitty’s, a knife carelessly loose.

  I stood in the middle of the room with my back to the bar. ‘Who killed the python?’ I demanded.

  Most of the patrons turned their backs. A couple headed for the door. I hustled over to stop them.

  ‘No one leaves until I know who killed the python.’

  ‘What’s it to you?’ said the barkeep. I saw him whispering into his bio-comm. How long until the Twitchers came? No turning back now.

  ‘What about it?’ A thickset man at a table, tattooed like the kids in the alley. Pig-faced and belligerent.

  He wasn’t the only one. Belligerent didn’t go close to describing my mood.

  ‘Take the python down and bury it,’ I told him.

  He turned his head away and kept on drinking.

  ‘TAKE IT DOWN!’

  He slammed his beaker on the table. ‘Fuck you.’

  In two steps I was on him, letting his blood. I forced him from his chair across to the door.

  The rest of the bar froze into uncertainty. Who was I? What would I do? Everyone waited for someone else to act. I kicked the door open and yanked his hand up high on the frame. Then I stabbed the dagger into it with all the force of my anger. He hung there, crucified by one hand and still screaming.

  Not a good feeling, eh scud?

  In minutes, glistening-naked Twitchers swarmed the bar.

  I busted outside, using my logged memory of Glida’s knowledge to lead them on an elaborate chase. Several times I doubled back over their heads, climbing in and out of attic cut-thrus. They got easily confused, sparking fights among themselves.

  An hour or more of exhaustive dodging and I circled back using another of Glida’s cut-thrus to get back into the ceiling at Splitty’s. With steady hands I disabled the movement detectors, smashing the heat sensor into shards against a beam with the butt of the Gurkha. I let myself down through the manhole and into the corridor. Half a dozen steps to the closet and I was in the cellar.

  Like a berserker I kicked the stills over and unscrewed every keg, until the place was awash with grog.

  Then I scrambled up to the hatch. This time it was wide open. Moonlight spilled in. Half a dozen Twitchers had climbed through in a hurry.

  One hadn’t.

  I catapulted straight into her arms - a close-up of a savagely hormonal face, down to the wildly dilating pupils, pussing acne and a gaping, ugly neck jack. Ike’s army came complete with anger, skin complaints and programming plug. But something was wrong.

  I tilted my headband down the length of her body. Her genitals were grossly overdeveloped and her muscle mass was huge. As if someone had flicked the puberty-on button and jammed it.

  She banged my thigh with her shok for peeking.

  My leg buckled, but I compensated. When she moved to shove it into my stomach I was quicker, and much, MUCH madder.

  I brought the flat side of the Gurkha’s blade around, a semi open-shouldered swing that should have knocked her unconscious. All it did was send the knife ricocheting out of my hands, clanging into something nearby.

  A fast squint spotted the outline of a quadrulma with outsized mudguards and alloy wheels shining, parked against the wall. Just like the one outside Chez Nutter.

  The Twitcher staggered backwards but steadied, a stupid grin on her face. I’d given her my best whack and she was laughing. My strength came from hard work and some good genes and the occasional use of stim, hers had to be from a total endocrine jack-up.

  I couldn’t beat that.

  She uttered a guttural, totally meaningless sound, which I interpreted as now it’s your turn, baby.

  I jumped away as the first punch came, but it caught me on the jaw, slamming me hard into the wall near the hatch.

  Somehow I stayed on my feet. I fumbled for the Zippo.

  Back inside the cellar I could hear the cavalry slopping about in the grog. Splitty’s bar would remember my visit for a while. Not only had I staked a regular to the doorframe, I’d also smashed up the booze cellar. There wasn’t much worse in the Big Country than a pub with no beer.

  I ignited and jammed the Zippo and dropped it back through the hatch, flattening against the wall as flame spouted out and engulfed the Twitcher.

  The taste of burning flesh clogged my airways as I vaulted on to the quad-runna and gunned it.

  The glow lit my way toward the buildings.

  As the wind cooled my skin, I started to come down from my fit of rage. The aftermath left me distressed at what I’d just done, and more than a little horny.

  It was better than the numbness of the last day.

  Whatever the next few hours brought, I just hoped I di
dn’t end up alone anywhere with Daac.

  I knew he was still alive. The sky hadn’t fallen.

  Not to say that it wouldn’t.

  Which led me on to to Ike’s private army. Was their age and hormones their only qualification?

  And what the hell had he done to them?

  I gave up brain-straining over it, and took up eyeballing what was out ahead of me. The outcrop of buildings I was coming up on was ringed by a smooth, glistening expanse that could have been a lake.

  The buildings looked neglected - dilapidated roofs, buckled window frames, rusted pylons, and above it all, a huge darkened canopy. Underneath one end of the canopy stood the litter of small rectangular objects that resembled statues.

  Light seeped sideways from one of the buildings and like a suicidal moth I winged towards it. The sweat that drenched me set off a shivering fit. My neck prickled with the possibility other Twitchers might jump me.

  As I reached the glistening lake, a musty smell wafted my way. It made me want to sneeze. I reined in the quad near the edge and examined the surface. It was coated in a mottled, vaguely luminescent, dry mould. Quad and ’ped marks crisscrossed everywhere, declaring earlier traffic and a solid base. It gave me confidence to nose a wheel out. The mould filaments crunched like thin ice, but the quad’s tracks gripped on to something hard underneath. I revved up and shot out on to it amongst the crazy confusion of old tracks. As I threaded between the eerie maze of statues I noticed that the front of each one had broken plas panels and defunct displays. Some even had hoses attached like long, flexible arms.

  What in the freaking Wombat were they?

  I got as close to the lit building as I dared before I powered down the quad and settled it snugly in behind a statue. Boots crunching, it took me a lifetime to creep the rest of the way, and another to decide it was empty and safe to enter.

  The door was unlocked. Obviously Ike was short on uninvited guests.

  It took me moments to comprehend what was inside. Hundreds - thousands - of petri dishes growing cultures sat on rows of old supermarket shelves. I threaded among them whispering the labels aloud.

  ‘“Zygo-my-cota”, “Bas-idio-mycota”, “Asco-mycota”. ’ I didn’t need the sci-speak to know they were fungus: brilliant but creepy colours and textures.

  A popping noise drew me to the back where I found a bank of upright refrijerators containing vats brimming full of viscous muck, each with a skin across the top like two-month-old hummus.

  The frij labels read ‘Pysarum polychephalum’.

  What had Monts called it? Crawl.

  Voices suddenly interrupted my snoop. Two figures entered and stopped by the first row of shelves. One began checking the dishes.

  I dropped down behind the last row of shelves and peeped along the aisle.

  ‘- set fire to one of the bars,’ said a male voice. ‘I can’t spare you any more people. I’ve got a drop coming in.’

  That had to be Ike.

  ‘What if it’s Plessis?’

  Tulu! I could see enough to know.

  The maybe-Ike figure straightened up and swivelled towards her. He wore magnifying glasses. Not just shades. The real thing! I mean nobody wore optical glasses anymore. Nobody made glasses - corrections were as easy as scoring painkill or Lark. And shades were used only for . . . style.

  Beneath his glasses I imagined rather than saw a set of wide, crazy eyes. His body was encased in a top-shelf, matt-black exoskeleton. I’d heard about them, dreamt about them; never seen one. They bulked you up; gave enhanced endurance, speed and recovery.

  A fine black web grew out of the back of the suit and attached into his neck and bald head. Colour coordinated wetware. His head looked like an exorcism - his body looked like a graphic novel. He reminded me of someone, but I couldn’t quite nail it.

  ‘Yes, Plessis,’ he observed. ‘Why this obsession with her?’

  ‘I admit an interest. And so should you. According to the Chino she’s the only one able to resist the change.’

  Mei! Wait ’till I got the scrawny little . . . But Tulu hadn’t finished.

  ‘I have other reasons, though. Plessis may be useful barter. I’ve tried to get to her before, but she’s crudely unpredictable. She has a lot of people watching her back. In the end it seemed simpler to get her and Loyl Daac to hunt me.’

  ‘I’m impressed by your thinking. But what does an erratic hothead like Plessis offer as barter?’ Ike picked up and gently handled the top of a dish. ‘She’s what you might call sociopathic trash.’

  I swallowed hard on the personality analysis and leant further out into the aisle, risking discovery. This I had to hear.

  ‘Let’s just say I have to have her. You understand?’ She picked up a dish and rattled it.

  ‘Put it back,’ he said coldly. ‘I don’t tolerate blackmail. Besides, now I have Daac she’ll come for him. Anna tells me they have a . . . bond of sorts.’

  A bond? With Loyl Daac? I wanted to shriek. Eavesdropping was more mindblowing than any trip. And who was Anna?

  I moved back behind the rack to let out a deep, indignant breath. Too deep. A set of aluminium dishes clanged against each other.

  ‘Someone’s in here?’

  ‘It’s the frij,’ said maybe-Ike. ‘The polychephalum are stretching its ability to cool.’

  ‘Why do you have to keep the filthy stuff cold anyway?’

  ‘It reproduces rapidly above fifteen degrees. That’s why it’s so effective as a containment field if you possess the dispersion emulsion or some way of cooling it.’

  I could almost hear his voice shine with pride. The Devil was a geek.

  ‘What did you want with Daac?’ Tulu’s question sounded casual but I could tell it was far from that.

  ‘He’s the Cabal’s heir apparent. His contacts go deep into Viva. I can’t risk him uspetting my projects. You see he’s the one who commissioned Anna to do the original research when he realised some of the inhabitants of the Fishertown slums were displaying immunity to the heavy metals. He knew what he was doing when he involved her. Her intellectual pedigree is impeccable. But she can be so . . . unimaginative.’

  Schaum! She’s alive. And she’s here? The two thoughts simultaneously elated and depressed me. I peeked around the shelving again.

  ‘What will you do with him? Didn’t the Cabal run you out of The Tertiary?’

  ‘You are informed.’ Ike’s exoskel practically swelled in reaction to his anger. ‘You say you want Plessis as barter. I wish to use the Cabal’s prince for the same purposes. But it can wait until she’s taken the bait.’

  ‘If I don’t get her, our agreement will be at risk.’

  Maybe-Ike studied her hard, as if he didn’t trust her. ‘I am allowing you the use of equipment and a trouble-free environment to work in. So far I have seen very little return on my investment. You put me at risk with my providers.’

  ‘I brought you Loyl Daac. My primary end is fulfilled. As for the other matters, I need Plessis and I need time.’

  ‘Anna has nearly finished her contamination process on the Trophins. I’ll send more of them out for Plessis - after the drop. Meanwhile, stay out of sight. If you are seen, our arrangement will be fatal for you.’

  Finished contaminating what?

  ‘Keep your promise to me. I know a lot of people.’ Tulu’s voice lowered to a dangerous timbre. She raised a threatening hand to him but he batted it away with a wheeze of his skel.

  The air filled with the sound of heavy blade traffic just as I thought they might hurt each other.

  Shame.

  ‘It’s here.’ He turned and walked out.

  Tulu stayed behind. She ranged down through the shelves, bringing her closer to me.

  I crept across to the nearest frij door and slipped in between two vats, squeezing behind them, hoping she couldn’t pick my chattering teeth from the indigestion of my gelatinous companions.

  She stopped and stared into each frij cabinet as if she could
sense something.

  I willed myself to think serene thoughts. Like how I would like to stick her potion pouch down her throat and tape her mouth and nose up. Choking to death was memorable.

  She uttered some words I couldn’t hear and sprinkled a pinch of something from her pouch.

  I suddenly wanted to run out past her. It came on me as an intense, unquenchable craving. In desperation I pressed my body hard against the steel of the vat. My muscles bucked and twitched but my flesh stuck where it contacted the freezing metal and the sensation shortcircuited the compulsion.

  I felt rather than saw her go - the draining aftermath of her voodoo.

  Cursing and crying, I peeled my skin off the vat and crawled out of the frij. It wasn’t until I thumped the circulation back into my legs with the backs of my bleeding hands that I realised I’d picked up a passenger.

  A dribble of PP suckered enthusiastically at my ankle. I pulled out the Cabal dagger and sliced it clean off, along with a hunk of my pants. It fell to the floor and writhed.

  With a shudder I made for the door. All I wanted to do was to go home, but I still had to find Daac and the shaman.

  And now there was the small matter of Anna Schaum. This was where Lang had brought her.

  Lucky girl.

  My toes itched. If there was one person in this whole goddamn world I desired to put the fear of all things bad into it was that little babe. Looks like I needn’t have bothered, she’d done it herself.

  The quad was where I’d left it and I gunned across to the next building, hoping the noise of the ’copts landing covered the engine.

  Outside the near-full moon hung behind a dross of grey cloud leaving a dull illumination. I reparked the quad and in my hurry to get under cover tripped over the concrete lip and crashed against the door jamb.

  It would have been nice to lie there, maybe sort my love life out, but the moon was only a night off being full. No shaman by tomorrow night, no cure.

  Seemed like everyone had plans for King Tide.

  I got up and wobbled inside.

  The door sucked shut behind me, climate controlled, cool and dry, belying its dilapidated façade.

  Squinting around, I wished I had nightsight augmentation. I could see less in here than outside, so I found a wall and shuffled along it. I’d made it a few metres down the west side when I tripped a light sensor.