Idolon

by Mark Budz

  "Zenocide. Evilution."

  "Never heard of them."

  "Japanese screw."

  Nadice regarded her with unabashed skepticism.

  "Tokyo punk that's been slowed way down," Marta explained. "It was popular a few years ago, for almost a month."

  "Sounds harsh." Nadice sat up on her bed.

  Marta shrugged. "No different from wrap or spunk."

  Nadice gave Marta a blank look. "I don't listen to a lot of music," she confessed.

  "Not your thing?"

  Nadice's smile was more of a wince. "I guess not. My grandmother wasn't into it. So neither was I."

  "She didn't approve?"

  "No. I mean, we sang in church and all, like everyone else. But when we were at home she liked things quiet while she painted, and that was nice. I got used to not having very many distractions."

  "Your grandmother raised you?"

  "I was adopted—one of those frozen fetuses that Right to Light women decided they'd give birth to so we wouldn't get cloned."

  Marta steered the conversation toward safer ground. "What kind of stuff did she paint?"

  "People, mostly. Landscapes. She worked with electrostatic gel and LEBs, light-emitting bacteria. After they were dried and polished, she sold them on consignment in a couple of bazaar shops."

  "Was she any good?"

  "Yeah. I used to watch her when she wasn't looking and wish she'd paint me, put me in one of her scapes. You know, take me from this world and put me in another world."

  "Why?"

  "Because that way she could make me more beautiful. I could live in a nice house with beautiful gardens forever."

  And without worries. "Like philm," Marta said.

  "Except I'd never get old or sick, and I wouldn't want to change." Nadice's gaze slid past her. "I wouldn't want to be someplace else or someone else. I'd be happy with where I was, and who I was."

  _______

  "What about you?" Nadice said when the sun was a little higher in the tatty denim sky, the glare off the bay brighter. "Why are you here?"

  "It's complicated." Marta stared up at the light rippling on the LED-dotted ceiling panels.

  "You don't have to tell me if you don't want."

  "My older sister," Marta said finally. "Concetta. I'm trying to find out what happened to her."

  Nadice shifted on the bed beside her, a dim blur along the chalk-white rim of Marta's vision. "She disappeared?"

  "Three months ago. Just like that. No message, no nothing."

  The shadow scooted closer. "I'm sorry." Marta adjusted her shoulders on the creased bedspread. "We don't know why she vanished. If it was something we did. Something she wanted to do. Or..."

  Or what? That was the hardest part.

  "That must be terrible," Nadice said. "Not knowing, I mean."

  "Yes." Marta stiffened under the fingers that brushed her arm. But the touch was brief, as tentative as it was comforting.

  "Do you think she joined?" Nadice said.

  "No." Marta blinked, and the light on the ceiling blurred and smeared.

  "Then how come you're here?"

  Marta closed her eyes and tried to sink into pinched blackness. But even the dark hurt to look at.

  "Maybe you're not just looking for your sister," Nadice said. The words trembled, like water in a glass. "What if you're also trying to find yourself?"

  _______

  A TV came for them late in the afternoon.

  "Everything all right in here?" she asked, poking her head into the room. Blinding sunlight skipped off the flat surface of the bay, washing out the digital lint clinging to her head and arms.

  "Why wouldn't it be?" Nadice said.

  The TV's gaze flitted anxiously between them. "Just wondering."

  "What's up?" Marta asked. The TV wasn't just checking up on them out of goodwill. Her lead-in was clumsy, a pretense.

  "There's a meditation session at four-thirty for all the new mothers. We'd like you to attend."

  "What kind of meditation?" Nadice said.

  "Think of it as an orientation." The TV smiled sweetly. "It's to help you settle in and answer any questions you might have."

  Time to get indoctrinated. It was bound to happen. Sanctuary always came with a price.

  _______

  The meditation room had once been a penthouse restaurant with a 360-degree view of Monterey Bay and the Santa Cruz Mountains. The windows had been replaced with programmable graphene panes. Some of the panes were clear glass, others were philmed with silk fabric. The floor was bare oak. Except for a table set up at one end of the room as an altar or pulpit, there were no tables or chairs. Tatami mats had been laid on the floor in even rows. The mats were identical, two-foot-by-three-foot rectangles spaced three feet apart.

  Two dozen or so women milled around the room. Most clustered in groups of two or three. Roommates sticking together. Huddling against the unexpected. Nadice stayed close to Marta, quiet but welcome comfort.

  Whispers circulated around the room in currents as subliminal as the movement of air. Eddies formed and dissipated, little whorls of conversion that tugged her in, then let her go.

  Some of the women seemed excited, jubilant. The true believers. Those who had asked to come here or decided to convert after the fact.

  Nadice nudged her in the ribs. "Check that out," she whispered, her breath warm and moist against Marta's ear.

  Marta turned her attention to the altar. It was decorated with an odd collection of apparently unrelated objects: a brass handbell with a mahogany handle; a white porcelain bowl; a short glass tube, filled with water or some other clear fluid; and a partially empty wine bottle. It didn't make much sense, but the items had been carefully, artfully, placed.

  "Ikebana," Marta said.

  "What?"

  "Japanese flower arrangement. It reminds me of that, but without the flowers. Everything perfectly positioned." Marta had come across the term at the store where she worked before the Get Reel. Runeways specialized in self-help spirituality. The shop carried everything from tarot decks, aromatherapy sticks, and books on the I Ching to chakra-stimulating body art and water-divination kits. "It literally means to 'make flowers become active, or alive.' The idea is that the person arranging the flowers is supposed to give life to them even though they're dead."

  "Give life how?"

  "By arranging them in a way that they enhance each other and give the illusion of life."

  Nadice frowned, leaving a cleft in her forehead. "Why kill something just so you can make it look alive?"

  Good question. Marta stared at the altar. Religion was more about death than life. Overcoming death. Being resurrected, born again, or raptured into life everlasting.

  Was that why she wanted to find Concetta? Was she afraid to let go, afraid that a part of her would die with no hope of salvation if Concetta died?

  When the priest entered the susurration died, like windblown grass falling suddenly, eerily, silent.

  "That's Jeremy," Nadice said.

  The whisper stirred tremulous eddies. Marta blinked. "Who?"

  "The TV I told you about. The one who was super nice. The one who talked to me at the shelter."

  He wore a static-philmed robe. The static changed color and intensity as he made his way to the table. From there, he gazed out at them and spread his arms, lifting them high. The ceiling lights doused and the graphene panes opaqued, ebony awash in a blizzard of pure white static.

  Stars. That was what the static represented; hundreds of billions of tiny pinpricks of light.

  It was as if the windows and the ceiling had vanished... or had never been there at all.

  Jeremy lowered his hands. As he did so, acolytes began seating the women in the room, helping them onto the mats.

  Nadice squeezed Marta's hand—giving or receiving reassurance, Marta couldn't tell—then lowered herself to the mat she was standing on. Marta sank to her knees and sat back on her heels, relieved to be off her fee
t.

  "The light of the universe," Jeremy said when the congregation stilled. He picked up the brass bell and raised it, like a chalice. "In the beginning, there was the Singularity," he intoned.

  "One light," the acolytes replied in unison.

  He rang the bell... a single pure note that reverberated for a long time before falling silent. "The mind of the universe fills our minds."

  "One mind," came the response.

  Jeremy laid the bell gently, soundlessly on the table. He picked up the glass tube. Placing a thumb over one end, he uncapped the opposite end and held it over the ceramic bowl. "The heart of the universe fills our heart."

  "One heart."

  Jeremy lifted his thumb, allowing a drop to fall into the bowl. There was a gentle plop. Concentric waves rippled across the walls. The room seemed to vibrate. Marta's head roiled.

  Jeremy set the glass tube on the bowl, fitting it into notches on the rim, then lifted the wine bottle to his lips. "The breath of the universe fills our lungs."

  "One breath."

  Instead of sipping from the bottle, he blew into it, coaxing forth an eerie, haunting note.

  "The blood of the universe flows in our veins," he said.

  "One blood."

  This time he tipped the bottle. The blood-red wine touched his lips, but he set the bottle down without drinking.

  "The life of the universe flows in our lives." His voice was a sonorous singsong.

  "One life," came the chorus.

  Jeremy spread his arms wide, as if to embrace them all. An ethereal keening rose within the room.

  Marta glanced around. The acolytes had closed their eyes and bowed their heads, touching them to the mats. Everyone else, except for the converts who were copying the acolytes, were doing what she was—watching.

  Nadice, looking like a bound prisoner on her knees, mouthed something under her breath. This is crazy.

  Marta nodded, all she could manage. She too felt caught—trapped by the sound. Eventually the keening would absorb her, swallow her whole, and she would lose herself in its dying echo.

  29

  Pelayo loitered across the street from the Get Reel. He sat on a wooden bench and nursed a mocha while he watched the cosmetique, waiting for an opening.

  It was busy. A fat white guy did the actual modwork—tats, philm edits, grafts, and appliques—while a girl worked the counter. She sold ware that didn't require professional installation and helped customers try on accessories in curtained-off fitting stalls. Most of the customers were teenage kids and chronic philmheads. Lowest-common-denominator clientele.

  What the hell was Marta doing, working in a place like this? It didn't make a lot of sense. In some ways, she was even more of a stranger than Concetta.

  Pelayo finished the mocha and tossed the plastine cup into the recycling bin next to the bench. Distracted, his gaze traveled to a nearby boutique called Third World Threads. Colorful dresses and blouses hung in the large display window. The designs were mostly African, and included a number of fashionable headdresses. Next he checked out the latest selection of surfware at a Hang Ten shop. Hang Ten sold surf and skate clothing with waterproof wetronics. They had a decent selection of loud Hawaiian shirts, tees, and shorts.

  He selected a black-and-red-flowered shirt, a pair of smart-camo cargos, and rubber-soled shoes. In one of the tiny fitting rooms, he dephilmed. But when he tried to download The Hang Ten ware, the beta clothes refused to update. Uri hadn't authorized him to modify the default settings. He couldn't change the way he looked.

  Ten minutes later, there was a sudden lull at the Get Reel. A smob had formed at a sidewalk display half a block down, sucking people out of the Get Reel.

  Pelayo crossed the street and pushed open the glass door. It chimed in response to his DiNA signature and greeted him in a bright contralto. "Welcome to the Get Reel, your chance to get a life."

  Pelayo made his way past racks of nanomated appliques, bacterial tinctures, and nanoFX sculpture paint to the sales counter. Shrill muzik plucked at him, whining for his attention.

  "Can I help you?" The girl sported an uncomfortable-looking pair of face screens—gold Renaissance-carved picture frames attached to a red velvet mask that concealed the top half of her face and forehead. Below the mask, her lips sagged in a desultory pout, languid as half-melted wax.

  "Your boss around?"

  "You a rep?"

  "Philmplants."

  "What kind?"

  Like she really cared. "Genital."

  "Yeah?" She smacked her lips.

  He stepped away from the counter and reached for his fly. "You wanna private demo?"

  That did the trick. She rolled her eyes in exaggerated disgust and jerked her head in the direction of the privacy screen set up at the back of the store. "Jhon's in back."

  "Thanks." He winked at her. It had the desired effect; her eyes glazed over with practiced stupor.

  "Whatever." She yawned and rhinestones glittered on her tongue, chipping away at the enamel on her teeth.

  Pelayo slipped behind the screen, through a curtained doorway into the edit room. The curtain was sound-absorbent. When he zip-locked it in place, the muzik retreated to a distant screech. The room was furnished with a recliner that flattened into a table. The overhead LEDs were surgically bright and recessed.

  A door on the far side of the room stood partially open. Pelayo went over to it and peeked in through the narrow crack.

  Jhon slouched behind a desk, a pair of wasp-sleek spex screwed tightly into his sockets. He wore a NASCAR pit cap over pale hair that hung in limp, stringy tangles. A faded black-and-white-checkered flag flapped on the front of his sweat-stained T-shirt. The 'skin he wore was philmed with stock-car racing decals as well as ads for various brands of motor oil, lite beer, and domestic cigarettes.

  The man had attitude, Pelayo had to give him that. Jhon's hands were concealed below the back edge of the desk, fiddling with something in his lap.

  Pelayo rapped on the door. "Excuse me."

  The guy started. His hands jerked into view. "Who the hell are you?" He gaped, his mouth slack, his cheeks flushed pink.

  "Jhon, right?"

  Embarrassment turned to anger. "How'd you ge in here?"

  "Your girl out there. She was real helpful. I give her high marks for customer support."

  Jhon wet his lips and removed the spex, leaving two circular indentations around his eyes. "Who you with?"

  "That's not your concern."

  Jhon risked a glance at the door. Pelayo shut it behind him with a soft click. Now, it was just the two of them. He took a step forward.

  "What the hell do you want?" Jhon set the spex on the desk and made a show of collapsing them into a medallion-thin disk.

  Pelayo leaned heavily on the desk, resting his palms on the front edge. "I'm looking for Marta."

  "She's not here."

  It came out quickly, too quickly. "Yeah, I already got that. Now tell me something I don't know."

  Jhon fidgeted with the spex. "I don't know where Marta is. She never showed up for work."

  Pelayo watched Jhon's pudgy hands twist and untwist, fumbling to get a firm handle on the lie. "I don't believe you."

  "Fuck you. It's the—"

  Pelayo shoved the desk. Hard. It caught Jhon in his doughy paunch, doubling him over with a half-congealed grunt. The spex dribbled out of his grasp, skittered across the table, and dropped to the floor.

  The guy might be soft, but he was heavy, deadweight. It took everything Pelayo had to push him into the wall and pin him there, gasping for air, spittle drooling down his chin.

  "You're starting to piss me off," Pelayo said.

  "—the truth," Jhon finished, coughing up the words in a phlegmatic gurgle. "I swear."

  Pelayo cupped a hand to his ear. "What's that?"

  "She quit this morning."

  "When?"

  "First thing." Jhon wheezed several times in quick succession, panting. "She gave notice.
Walked out."

  Pelayo kept the pressure on, his weight against the table. "She say why?"

  A hasty shake of the head. "There was a fucking TV with her. The two of them left together."

  "She converted?"

  "What do you think?"

  "I think you're lying." Marta would never convert, not willingly. Would she? The Marta he knew, or thought he knew, didn't believe in anything—not even herself most of the time.

  Pelayo lifted the table a few centimeters off the floor and heaved his weight into it, jamming Jhon's ribs and cutting off a sharp yelp of pain. "You got one more chance," he said.

  Jhon's eyes lolled. Saliva glistened on his chin and a sour stench bubbled up from his throat. Pelayo eased off enough for the guy to draw in a breath. Jhon grimaced as he sucked air through his clenched teeth.

  "Turned her in," Jhon grated. "The TVs. They pay me. To recruit."

  "You sell customers to them?" Sweatshops. Indentured help. Pelayo knew that shit happened all the time. But religion. Christ.

  "Most of 'em are worthless fuckheads, anyway," Jhon said by way of justification. "Street trash."

  "That what Marta was?"

  "Naw. Marta was a knocked-up cunt. What the TVs are looking for now. Paying extra for them. Triple, if they're between the ages of fifteen and thirty-five."

  "Why?"

  "How the hell should I know? Maybe the only quim they got these days is old and dried up."

  "How do you know she was pregnant?"

  Jhon snorted. "Sick all the time. Plus, no tampons in the garbage for the past few months. I don't know who dirty-dicked her. I didn't think there was a key in the world that would open that box."

  Pelayo tightened his grip on the edge of the desk. "Where'd he take her?"

  "Beats me."

  Pelayo lifted the desk a few centimeters off the floor, threatening to give it another shove.

  "I didn't ask," Jhon said quickly. "None of my business." Sweat streamed down his face. His cap was flaccid, drenched with sweat. Greasy hair coiled out from under the rim. His eyes were jaundiced under the LEDs. "What're you gonna do?"

  Pelayo breathed heavily, from anger as much as exertion. He eased away from the desk, taking a step toward the door.