The Pure Cold Light

by Gregory Frost

  She let his number buzz a dozen times before giving up.

  She’d seen him ignore the phone for days at a time when he was editing; but he behaved like a phobic paranoid when she suggested he get a call-retrieval package, arguing: “Those goddam things pose a clear and present danger, since anybody with a gnat’s brain can loop themselves in, take your calls off the circuit before you do, and run off with half your business while you squat in your jammies, waitin’ for doo-dah. Yeah, put me down for three of them things.” Even though he had a small handset built into the arm of his chair, she couldn’t make him understand that, if he didn’t flip his phone on when it rang, he wasn’t going to nab any business, either.

  She folded the set back into its case.

  Gansevoort was still talking about corporate charity. Peat nudged her and nodded at the unit. “I should make a few arrangements for our arrival,” she said loudly, and took the phone.

  Gansevoort said, “This situation is an example of how we at SC need to work more with the Undercity populace.”

  “That’s only fair,” Lyell answered, “considering the enormous part Box City plays in your company’s test programs.” He hesitated. She said, “You didn’t know that? You didn’t know SC routinely drafts them as white rats for drug and additive testing? Sure—that way, nobody complains if something goes wrong. In fact, there’s an unfounded Boxer-myth that if they don’t come back they’ve won a place in the Overcity.”

  “I don’t believe it.”

  “Some other time, remind me, and I’ll show you evidence.”

  Troubled by her ready offer, he glanced sidelong at Angel and fell silent. Peat winked congratulations at her. A few minutes later, nodding, she handed back the phone.

  Angel appeared to have ignored the conversation. With the borrowed LifeMask staring flatly out at the multitude of passersby, at the clipped trees and shrubs adorning the edge of the skyway, the shops and cafes clustered where the skyway entered a tower, it was impossible to tell to what extent he was paying attention.

  When the pedicab drew up, he glanced around as if waking from a dream.

  “Hey, your clinic’s in this tower?” Gansevoort asked. “So’s my apartment.”

  “Quite a coincidence,” Peat observed. She helped Angel down from his seat, and instructed him quietly as to what they needed him to do.

  They grabbed an elevator and managed to keep it to themselves. Lyell pressed the button for the thirty-second floor.

  Before the doors could close, Angel gasped, clutched his head, and dropped to his knees. All the while, his projected face grinned.

  “My God! He’s not going to make it to the clinic,” Lyell exclaimed. “Quick. Where’s your apartment?”

  “Ten, tenth floor,” Gansevoort said, and hit the button. They shot up.

  The doors opened. The three of them dragged Angel upright. They might have been hauling a drunk between them. His head lolled, and he made hissing noises as if each jounce pained him. Feverishly, Gansevoort fumbled out his biocard and inserted it into the door of his apartment.

  Like most single personnel at management-level, he had a tiny one-bedroom affair. The word “couch” would not have fit in the outer room, and the bedroom was no more long nor wide than the bed itself. The single large window offered a view of the blue, shining tower across the plaza.

  They placed Angel in the only stuffed chair in the place. He hunched up with his head down, groaning every few moments. Lyell stepped back and scanned the room, recording everything she saw—DATs of Frank Sinatra and other crooners of that period scattered atop the built-in stereo system; one recessed bookshelf half-filled with out-of-date college business texts, their bindings already rotting from age; two tiny Turkish rugs hung as tapestries that must have set their host back a fortune unless he’d actually bought them before the viral-bombing of Istanbul; and three clumps of cast-off clothing on the tile floor or draped over a folding chair which made it appear that previous guests of Gansevoort had dissolved.

  He tossed aside the clothes. “I haven’t had time to get them cleaned,” he commented.

  Peat knelt beside Angel, appearing to take his pulse.

  “I think I’d better call in,” Gansevoort said. “SC’ll give you any assistance you need. Besides, they should know where he is.” He took a step toward the phone in the bookshelf, but Lyell blocked his way.

  “You don’t want to do that,” she said.

  “Excuse me?” He adjusted his collar.

  “You can’t call.”

  Peat interjected, “You know what they did to my school? If you tell Mingo where all of us are, what happened to Isis will happen to you.”

  Gansevoort stared at them each in turn. Angel raised his head and looked placidly back at him. “Your school? Who are you? You’re not doctors.”

  “She might be. I’m not. He sure as hell isn’t.”

  Gansevoort cried out and dove toward the bookshelf. Lyell grabbed his wrist as he went past and spun him around. He slammed into the wall, swung about and backed against it. “You’re Xau Dâu!” he cried.

  Peat snorted. She got up and approached him. “Where would you get a crazy idea like that? Of course we’re not Xau Dâu.” Passing, she glanced at Lyell. “Right?”

  Lyell shrugged, snatching away the phone. “I’m beginning to wonder, myself.”

  “You’re going to kill me!”

  “Gansevoort,” Angel said, “Why would you think such a thing?” Mildly surprised, the women stared at him.

  “You could be the ringleader—I’ve heard the rumors about the Moon, I put things together. You don’t even know what you are.”

  “What is Xau Dâu, will someone please explain it?” he asked.

  Peat said to Lyell, “Your turn. Why don’t you explain it to all of us.”

  “Including myself.”

  “What are you going to do?” Gansevoort asked.

  Peat patted his shoulder sympathetically and he flinched away. “Not exactly an action figure, are you?” she said.

  “I head a personnel department!”

  “Yes, as you’ve overstated.”

  Lyell said, “Mr. Gansevoort—Ton—I need very much for you to go sit in that other chair.”

  “What?”

  “Please.”

  Leaving him in Peat’s supervision, she turned and strode into the bedroom. There was an armoire built into the corner opposite the bed, offsetting by design the bathroom door. A revolving shelf in the armoire produced suspenders, belts, and a few socks. She tossed Gansevoort’s small phone into the depths, then gathered up a few likely looking items. She also grabbed a fistful of ties and a pressed gray jacket. Carrying out her booty, she snagged the folding chair in passing and hauled it along beside her. “Right here, if you would.”

  Peat nudged Gansevoort forward. Like a condemned man, he walked to the chair and sat down. He gave Angel a look of utter betrayal. “I don’t understand.”

  Lyell looped a belt around his wrists, and then a tie that she fastened to the dowels in the chair-back. She explained, “I don’t want to tie you, but I have to prevent you from telling anyone about this for a while. Besides which, your associate, Mr. Mingo, would not be pleased to hear that you helped Angel Rueda escape the siege Mingo went to such trouble to prepare.”

  “Mingo?” The enormity of the accusation struck him dumb.

  “Mingo’s going to kill us if he finds us. So, if I were you, I would spend my time considering very hard what I could say to minimize my involvement in our escape. For instance, I wouldn’t mention using my clout to get us through the checkpoint. No, I would not do that.”

  Peat tied his ankles. Angel looked on, his false face ever-passive.

  “Otherwise,” said Lyell, “Mr. Mingo will probably feel the need to kill you, too. He hasn’t exhibited much restraint in that pursuit.”

  Gansevoort’s mouth hung open.

  “You seem like a nice man. Be very careful around him.” She turned to Angel and
offered him the clean jacket. “Here, it’s probably too big for you, but put this on. You can give it back later.”

  Peat got up and gave him a kiss on the cheek. “I didn’t believe her at first, either,” she said.

  They went out, leaving him in the center of the room, from which vantage, looking over his left shoulder, he could just see the tinted windows of his office.

  ***

  He had been told to wait and to protect Chikako Peat and Thomasina Lyell, and that was what he did. He sat at the triangular desk, shifting the screens overhead from one working camera to the next throughout the school, observing the silent slaughter.

  To the extent that he could hold any thought for long, the bullgod found the task dissatisfying. Violence robbed of its sound and fury wasn’t much fun to watch, worse than a video. Back in his arena days … now, that had been excitement.

  Taken from an orphanage as a child, genetically engineered to be the bone-crushingly biggest of middle-heavyweight wrestlers, by the age of fifteen he’d stood like a mountain on top of the world. His two English managers had once told him that his image adorned flags in Japan and posters on the Moon. Kids watched his exploits on satellite broadcasts and dreamed of him; “The Mick” was the arena name he went by.

  He’d defeated opponents from every country in fair combats. He’d never thrown a fight because neither of his managers had ever asked him to. They both knew he was too witless to be relied upon. Even if they’d been able to explain the financial benefits of purse manipulation, once he got in the ring and got smacked a couple of times, he set about relentlessly crushing his opponents’ vertebrae. A tremendous combatant, yes, but too single-minded. In a word, a cretin.

  The drugs had done that—constrained his mental capacity. He had muscles as big as most men’s fists, but not much else on the ball.

  Above all else, he was terribly, blushingly shy; speechless in the presence of the opposite sex. His managers saw a way to divest themselves of The Mick and make a killing in the bargain.

  The Belgian combine, Aubépine, owned a female fighter named Mouche who was tearing up Europe. A deal was struck to pit her against him. Both sides, knowing of his Achilles heel, bet weightily against him, the odds-on favorite.

  He went before the cameras in the Circus Supremus of Rome, into the ring, and found himself confronting what appeared to be a beefy transvestite. Her face had a vague feminine aspect if he ignored the prognathous jaw; but her breasts and other traits that The Mick identified as female were buried within numerous swollen chemical enhancements, muscles like tectonic plates. His breasts were more prodigious than hers. She might have been a woman but he couldn’t see it.

  In the first round, during which time he liked to warm up, grapple a few times, get the heft of his opponent, Mouche split his lip and broke two of his fingers. She tried to rip his balls off, as well, but there he was grossly underdeveloped—again, because of one very fucked up chemistry—and, though she hurt his shriveled up scrotum, it was not the thing she’d intended.

  Between rounds, his managers reminded him of how unforgivable it was to strike a woman. The Mick licked salty blood off his swollen lip.

  The second round bell sounded. The Mick got up, walked out into the center of the ring and hit Mouche as hard as he could in the throat, crushing her larynx. The crowd loved it. His managers and numerous executives of Aubépine promptly filed for bankruptcy.

  The combine sued, forcing a reluctant investigation into combat rigging. The two managers fired The Mick. Subpoenaed for the hearings, he inadvertently learned from a solicitor that he had virtually no finances left him—his managers had squandered it, stolen it, spent every credit dollar on pleasures that should have been his. He dully considered them across the judicial arena while various barristers droned on. Perhaps because he stayed still long enough, an idea crawled into his brain. It was to be the most creative idea of his life.

  He turned to the solicitor and explained that he had to go to the lavatory, then got up and started out, around the rear of the courtroom, but instead of exiting, he came down the center aisle. He crossed the row in back of his ex-managers and, when he was right behind them, slapped a meaty fist on each of their skulls. With surprisingly little apparent exertion, he shoved their heads straight down through their collarbones.

  In the Circus Supremus, such a move would have won him a standing ovation. In the law courts it won him a steamship voyage to Corson’s Penal Isle, where ICS had found him. In retrospect he liked his life in Philadelphia. He supposed now that he would be sent back to the prison. The ways of the world confounded The Mick as much as did his own stirring feelings about these two women. Impotent he might be, but also bedazzled. The one woman—never mind it was the wrong one—had touched him, tenderly. Her eyes had promised things. The memory of it made him sigh.

  For her he would have abandoned his principles, if could have thought of any. For the two of them he would lay down his life.

  At one-fifteen, having subdued virtually everyone else in the place, the security forces of ScumberCorp, led by the shadowy Mr. Mingo, charged into the principal’s offices. They found The Mick seated at the controls.

  “Good work,” Mingo told him. “Way to go, Ace. We’ll take over the helm now.”

  At which point, The Mick shot Mr. Mingo through the left thigh. He would have ventilated him, but the overused gun ran out of ammo with that first shot.

  Perhaps in his simplicity, The Mick could see through Mingo’s false camaraderie. Or maybe it was the instinct of the ex-fighter that told him this man meant to murder his newfound love. Somehow, he’d put it all together where better minds were deceived.

  The security team gaped at the insuperable Mingo rolling on the floor, clamping his fingers around the jetting femoral wound; considered with newfound respect the titanic red-headed bull behind the desk; and, without a moment’s hesitation, executed him by fusillade.

  The Mick’s final, ennobling act, inadvertent though it may have been, was to smash the keypad with his forehead as he fell. Doors and gates throughout ICS-IV suddenly swung shut and magnetically bolted.

  It would take Mingo an hour and a half just to get out of school. He left it in a stretcher, unconscious from the loss of blood.

  Chapter Fifteen: Bordello

  Thomasina Lyell had never visited the twenty-third floor of Rittenhouse Six. She’d heard of Grofé’s, of course; and her introduction to Chikako Peat had taken place in similar surroundings.

  The exterior room resembled an 1890s restaurant, smugly steeped in fin de siècle atmosphere. There were imported mahogany tables clothed in the purest white linens that, like the draperies, were trimmed in silver embroidery. The walls were divided horizontally, with a pastel green upper half, and a dark, ornate tulip dado along the bottom. Thick carpets covered the floor. One could spend an afternoon in Grofé’s, eating and drinking in pleasant company, and never have the urge, or the suspicion, to penetrate further.

  The maitre d’ appeared as they entered through the double doors. He wore a purple silk suit and had waxed the tips of his mustache. “Lunch—a table for three?” he asked, as though they were dressed with the utmost taste. Peat, whose attire came closest, took the helm.

  “No,” she replied, “just tea.”

  He bowed stiffly and directed them toward a set of crushed velvet curtains at the far side of the room.

  A few heads turned as the three of them made their way across the carpet—a LifeMask was uncommon enough at these levels to attract some attention, but nothing compared to the stir the bypass would have caused. Reaching the far corner of the room, they slipped between the heavy curtains into one of the most popular tearooms in Philadelphia.

  The intricate dado relief, in the second room, had been expanded to cover the walls in a dark green arabesque of swaying stems and tulip bulbs. Small palm trees in large, diagonally striped vases framed the doorway and shaded the various booths around the walls. The air was smoky and smelled of someth
ing sweet that wasn’t perfume. A few bright impressionistic paintings added to the decor, drawing the eye away from the booths.

  At first glance, Lyell failed to notice the booths’ odd configuration. She focused on a man and woman sharing one. They were facing each other, but they were both lying on their sides. A low table separated them and an attendant seated on a stool in the middle was pouring cups of tea for them. Padded cushions supported the couple, concave pillows propped up their heads. The pillows and the reclining figures told her the rest. She looked then for the telltale pipes. One woman was smoking hers while an attendant kept the flame going beneath its pregnant bowl.

  Scattered about the center of the room were larger tables on pedestals for parties of three or four at most, for those who merely wished to sip tea or an aperitif and enjoy the ambience of the den, the smell of the opium perhaps. It was a scene torn out of time, nothing at all like the dens she had visited in the Undercity.

  A new headwaiter, dressed (by comparison with the maitre d’) for a funeral, asked “You will be dividing up?”

  Peat said, “We’ve business with Mallee.”

  “Ah, you’re special guests.” He flashed a broad smile.

  “Old friends,” she corrected. “Tell her Chikako’s here.”

  He nodded, muttered “Chicago” into a throat mike that he pressed, then nodded pleasantly again. “You’re expected.”

  “It helps.”

  “I’m Lalep,” he said, although no one had asked.

  Beaming with bonhomie, Angel shook his hand. Lyell dragged him aside. “What did they give you downstairs?” she asked, “a joy-buzzer?”

  “A lot of healing is attitude,” he told her. He looked drunk.

  “You should be recovered in about ten minutes, then. Try to remember that we don’t want to stand out more than we have to, okay? Try not to plunge across somebody’s table.”