"Hey, what you think you're doing?" she squawked.
"I read lizards for a job. In your next life watch out some asshole doesn't come along and cut your head off."
She snatched her hand away and stalked off muttering about the weirdos she had to put up with in this job.
I was pretty soft over creatures. Not just creatures. Defenseless things. I guess when you wallowed around for long enough at the bottom of the pile you worked out your own code of ethics. I'd been pushed enough, used enough, that the battle wasn't just a hobby anymore. It was a fucking crusade.
I sipped on the latte and contemplated getting drunk, but I'd made a deal with the incredible leather hulk that I'd babysit his skinny friend and I knew I couldn't trust Doll for more than a few hours.
Maybe just one more drink.
They sent a Pet to serve me this time.
"You any relation to Mikey?" I asked it.
"Sure, lady." A strange, resonant artificial voice. "We-all look-a-like. We-all brothers."
I couldn't decide if it was joking.
The second latte made me feel a whole lot better. Milk and whisky. Innocence and vice.
As I raised the glass to drain it, a scent filled my head. Caustic.
A preacher of some sort in a dusty black coat, collar and hat shuffled in and sat on the torn vinyl of my booth.
"It's taken," I said curtly.
"So nice to see you again, Parrish."
I peered at the preacher. "I don't know you." My skin prickled in uncomfortable waves. Arms, legs, scalp.
"Let us pray that you might remember." He bowed his head.
Caustic. Stronger now. I remembered the scent. Lang? Io Lang? I took a drink to disguise my right hand as it fished for the garrotting wire.
He chuckled. "There is no need for such… brutal measures, Parrish. This is simply a business meeting."
I stared at his profile, searching for something familiar. This was not the man I had met at Jamon's dinner party. The nose was too long and crooked, the skin reddened and slightly peeling, the forehead protruding. His coat was strapped with beads and crosses.
"Don't tell me," I said sarcastically, "you're Lang's identical twin."
"Look closer, my dear."
He raised his head so I could see full into his face and for a moment the entire composition altered. Skin tones, bone structure, expression. The man who had warned me against the poisoned seafood at Jamon's emerged. Unmistakable.
"How did you do that?" I whispered. Manufacturing a disguise was one thing, but this was like… like magic.
"Let's just say I earned it." His face realigned back into its disguise as a preacher. "Perhaps you can too."
His words kick-started a wild hammering in my chest. The possibilities of possessing such an ability rushed over me, leaving me trembling. I struggled to be careful, to be cool.
"What do you want?" I knew I sounded too eager. Next thing I'd be asking if he wanted me to roll over.
He handed me a miniature disk. "Here's an address. Bring me the contents of their computer files. If anyone sees you, kill them."
"And?" There it was again. Little Miss Eager. Chill, Parrish, chill.
"I can make you invisible."
I signaled the Pet and ordered a straight black coffee, no alcohol. I didn't want Lang disappearing before I could get my head totally straight. I took a gulp of my drink and scalded the back of my throat.
The Pet giggled, a sound like a boy wheezing in a tin drum. I told it to scram before I ripped out its resonator.
When it had rolled away, I fixed Lang with a flat stare.
"That's a handy trick, Lang. But what does it take for someone to become like you? Voodoo? Do I have to cut out my heart and feed it to the devil?" Then I tossed in one last question for good measure. "And anyway, why me? There must be a thousand hacks in The Tert that could pull a break and enter. It's not really my line."
What was I doing? Talking him out of it?
He waited a couple of heartbeats, as if testing the weight of his next disclosure.
"The contents of those files, delivered into the right hands, will send your esteemed employer to death row."
Mondo on death row!
Whatever his reasons were, he had me. Hook, line and ten-ton sinker.
I'd do it for nix.
* * * *
By the time I got back to Doll's villa, Sto was asleep—drool stringing from the corner of his mouth, eyes rolling in REM—curled like a baby on a lab bench. I hadn't even used E-tell on him and he already had half the symptoms. He cradled a replica of a woman's head and torso in one arm. As I loosed it from his grip, I noticed the synth head had pink curls and almond eyes. And they say there's no such thing as love at first sight! Wait till I told Mei.
Doll was nowhere to be seen.
A faint thrumming started up in my ear, so I sat down in front of Doll's comm and answered my call. While it connected I played the usual guessing game people did as they answered their spike. Who was it? What lies would I need to tell?
I should have known.
"Parrish? Is that you? Is everything all right?"
"Who do you think you are?" I snapped at Dark's concerned face. "My freaking mother?"
"Is Sto safe?"
I sighed. "Your little buddy's fine. Now get on and rustle up his relatives. I'm busy."
"Have you been drinking?" His voice was sharper this time.
Have I been drinking? Who was this guy?
"If I thought it was any of your business, I'd answer that. But it isn't."
"Something's wrong?" He didn't give up easily.
I suddenly noticed that his chest was still bare. For some reason it made me even madder.
"Where are you?" I asked suspiciously. "Where's Mei?"
He gave a gut-deep laugh. "I could say, 'If I thought it was any of your business, I'd answer that,' " he mimicked my voice. "But that wouldn't get us anywhere, would it?"
Without the leather and chains he could have starred in an advertisement for men's aftershave: serious and clean-skinned; the kind of face every girl wants to rub her thighs over.
"There's a rumor around that there's a police embargo on crossing to the Outer. The cops want Razz Retribution's murderer. They've blockaded all the train stops. I don't think I can get out to find Sto's relatives."
It took me a minute to take in what he was saying.
The Tert had always been a strip of earth that the wealthy in Vivacity would like to have nuked (in fact they probably would have if it hadn't been too damn close for fallout), but there had never been any problem getting in and out.
Reason told me that it would be almost impossible to cut The Tert off. The Fishertown side alone stretched for nearly one hundred and fifty klicks. Then there was the Filder river access. How would they police such a huge, untidy sprawl? This embargo sounded more like a hallucination by one of Hein's more demented patrons.
"Aren't you too big for scary stories?" I sniped at him. His earnestness worked like a cheese grater on my psyche.
Frustration swept across his face. "Go and check it out yourself. See what I mean."
Pink fuzz appeared at the bottom of the screen, just below his jawline. Then the monitor tilted and Mei's face appeared.
"Parrish? Quit griping. He's right. There's an embargo at all Trans stops."
"What are you doing? And where are you?" I snapped.
She gave me that sly, eyes-half-closed look. "If I didn't know better, girl, I'd say you was jea—"
"Know better!"
A faint noise behind told me I wasn't alone anymore. "I'll contact you soon." I cut the connection.
"She's right about the embargo, Parrish! By the way, who's the beefcake? He looks familiar."
Doll stood in the doorway of the lab. The dull fluorescent light imbued her skin with a grayish tinge, reducing her expression to something callous and empty.
A flash of insight gripped me. A perspective shift. One I hadn't sought.
Doll—a tired, scared, selfish old woman. It left me marveling at what had ever led me to share a bed with her.
Probably the same thing that had sent me running from my stepdad. I'd thought men were the enemy.
Now I saw my mistake.
The enemy was anyone I rolled over for.
Ignoring the crack about beefcake, I rinsed my face off in one of the basins, patting it dry on some absorbent plastic. I didn't think Doll had it in her to do a jealous number, but I didn't want to find out right now.
Sto still snored peacefully on the bench top, one hand outstretched like he was reaching for something. Mei, perhaps? How could I mainline E-tell into someone who looked like they'd lost their favorite snuggly toy?
I couldn't.
Relief brought me out in a light sweat. Sto could keep what existed of his brain—Lang had offered me another way.
Doll broke the silence. "You need to go, Parrish. The whole world is looking for this jerk. Don't bring them to my doorstep."
"Sure, Doll." It wasn't worth an argument. I'd always be able to count on her for certain things, as long as I understood her limits. I did.
"Will I see you soon?"
"No," I said.
And now she understood mine.
I shook Sto awake and we left.
Chapter Six
We headed back to Mei's cubicle in Shadoville via The Slag, on a moped whose cracked solar panels wavered around on coils like deformed antennae. Solar 'peds weren't popular on account of their unreliability in bad weather.
Mostly Tert people used the more disfigured of the Pets if they wanted to travel distance inside the Tert, but I had an aversion to them. It didn't seem right riding on the back of a child even if it was the machine section that carried most of the weight. They reminded me a bit of a rocking horse with a kid's head—only the legs moved independently.
Not that I was naive about Pets! They had their own ways of taking care of themselves. Anyone stupid enough to hurt one usually wound up staked out on a poisoned slag heap somewhere. Pets might be low in The Tert pecking order, but even they had their defenses.
I took a route back to Shado through The Slag because I knew the Pomme de Tuyeau would be in chaos if the train had stopped. Plus I didn't like Sto's chances of staying unnoticed in the more commercial areas.
The Slag, Plastique and Torley's had distinct perimeter demarcations which, if you lived in The Tert, you learned to recognize easily. A network of monorails had once linked all areas of the villatropolis back to the Trainway that still ran down the eastern boundary. But the structures had been remolded and used to string up fragile hammock homes, or disassembled altogether.
Cramped living and lack of roads made for a crazy jumble of humanity. There were plenty of walkways—alleys big enough for scooters or 'peds or Pets—but you could get lost among them quicker than losing your virginity.
Tert people used compass implants to get around. Some had maps overlayed onto their retina. I couldn't see the point in maps; once you knew the territories, you knew enough. The rest changed endlessly.
Every now and then you'd come across a precious parcel of space; usually the gardens that had once served a hundred or so villas as a community meeting place. Occasionally you'd also find the concrete guts of an old swimming pool, legacy of the days when Australia was still a country of backyards and mortgages. Mostly, now, the pools were built over with who-knew-what living underneath.
When Sto and I stopped at a demarcated entry point to The Slag, the toll had already doubled.
Topaz Mueno might be a vain lump of flesh but he wasn't stupid. I pictured him rubbing his soft white hands with pleasure at the extra revenue an embargo would create, forcing traffic along The Tert's easternmost strip.
The toll keepers in The Slag weren't like the jacked-up jerks that policed the Pomme de Tuyeau in Plastique. They tended to favor Topaz Mueno's look: long-haired, soft-bellied, thick lips. It wasn't a look to mess with. They could do things with knives that I only REM'd about.
Their homogeneous look was a type of vanity. I'd read somewhere that humans were attracted to others that resembled themselves physically.
Know thyself!
In The Tert you had to know people. You had to see and smell trouble. I've got better than twenty-twenty vision and the best olfaugs bodyguarding can buy, but my intuition's kept me alive.
Wrong! With Sto toe-to-heel at my back, I paid the Muenos' inflated toll, hoping they wouldn't look too closely at him; wishing I'd taken the time to make some superficial alterations to his appearance.
The keepers eyeballed him as he bent over to pick shrapnel from his foot.
"Who's the bunny?" one .of them asked.
"Boyfriend."
"Where are your boyfriend's shoes?"
Mostly everyone wore shoes in The Tert. I lowered my voice to a conspiratorial whisper. "Caught him in bed with my mother. Thought I'd teach him."
They looked suspiciously from Sto to me, and back again. Sto's puny size against mine? I wouldn't buy it either—but I've said it before, it takes all sorts.
I turned my back to the toll keepers as they tapped queries into their comm.
"Get on the 'ped," I hissed between my teeth at Sto.
"But—"
"You want to make it out of here?"
He jerked his head up and down quickly.
"Jump on the 'ped. When I say… Now!"
We leapt for the machine at the same time. Five gold stars each for not ending up in a tangled heap.
I jammed the accelerator to full throttle and blasted through the toll with Sto's legs flailing out the back like streamers.
At top speed the 'ped only did twenty-five klicks. Hell, we might as well have got off and run! But Sto didn't look like he could walk more than two hundred meters before his skinny legs and tender feet caved in on him.
I turned every corner I could, and then some more, before we hit a cul-de-sac.
"W-what's wrong? What did you do that for?" he stuttered when we stopped.
If Dark grated on my finer feelings, then this guy gave me a dead-set migraine.
"Look, Sto," I said with patience I surely didn't mean, "there's an embargo on The Tert. Do you know what that means?"
"Cops?" he asked shakily.
"Worse. Cops and the media. We've been totally cut off from the Outer. Do you know what it's about?"
He swallowed as if he had a fist-sized marble stuck in his throat. "Me?"
I nodded. "They think you killed Razz Retribution. But you didn't, right?"
"R-right."
"No one kills a One-World newshound and gets away. The media are frigging royalty in this hemisphere. You've been set up to wear a murder rap by someone. Probably the Cabal."
"Who're they?"
I didn't even bother to reply because a noise above us triggered my body hair into a stiff salute.
Prier at twelve o'clock and descending—a media 'copter with military fruit but only a third of the size. Priers could land on a bald pate. They usually only carried one person—a journalist/pilot and a camera-mechanoid who doubled as a combat-model Interrogator.
Sto looked set to faint when I glanced back at him. If his skin got any paler, I'd be able to sell him for albino skin grafts. Shame about the freckles.
With Io Lang's deal burning a hole through my ability to think, all I wanted to do was steal the information he wanted and nail Mondo's arse. Stolowski, Dark, the embargo were all suddenly getting in the way of that.
I should dump Sto here! The Prier would pick him up in a few minutes—then I wouldn't have to worry.
Like an attack of conscience, a thrum started in my ear. My cochlea implant ringing again.
Guess who?
"Come on. We got trouble." I dumped the 'ped behind the remnant of a retaining wall and hauled Sto toward the nearest doorway. The Prier would already have a trace on the 'ped, sold and relayed by the Mueno toll keepers.
Well, if the media want
ed us, they'd have to get down and dirty.
I dragged Sto to the last door at the end of the pavement, where the buildings loomed like decrepit bodyguards. The villas only ran to four storys, but add on makeshift microwave dishes and the wasplike sleeping cocoons glued onto the roofs, and it made for a neck ache looking up. From above I imagined it looked like a mutated beehive. Maybe one day I'd get a chance to see it from that angle.
I tore through a makeshift barricade and booted the door off its hinges so whoever lived there knew we were coming.
Inside a stench of something other than human had me fast-twitching my olfaugs to low sensitivity. From the gagging noises behind me I knew Sto was at it again. Some guys have just got weak stomachs.
I sympathized… for about a heartbeat.
Inside was empty apart from a few planks of discarded wood. Sto sagged onto a large piece, burnt at one end and fashioned roughly into a bench.
"Don't you know treated wood when you see it?"
I asked, neglecting to mention the mangy, zirconium-fanged feline curled up underneath the plank, licking its hair clean.
"Treated?"
"Soaked with pesticides. Burn it and sniff it and you're on a one-way trip."
He leapt up like I'd stung him.
The feline ignored us and started on its belly.
It was hardly the time but curiosity got the better of me. This guy was such a lamb. It didn't add up.
"Where are you really from, Sto? Born, I mean?"
His pale green eyes misted. His lip trembled and the words spilled out. "M-midcountry. I got press-ganged to the Dead Heart. We… I escaped. P-please don't tell anyone…"
Now I can take most things. But crying isn't one of them. Why dilute a good dose of emotion- with tears is my attitude. When I feel bad, I get angry, but when runts like Sto cry in front of me, I get confused. Do I dump them where they stand? Or do I take care of them? I didn't like the fact that Sto was leaning me toward Thou shalt cosset.
Was that succor or sucker, Parrish?
He was an annoying little creep, but from what I'd heard, Dead Heart Mining Co-op made The Tert seem like a tropical paradise. Out there they used human labor because they were cheaper than maintenance on the mechanoids. Human underground work was's'posed to be illegal now, because the mines were old and dangerous, but no one really knew what happened outside supercity limits.
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