"You did what you had to do, John."
Had he? He looked around for the object that Roscoe had carried into the fight. He found himself hoping that it was something lethal. He saw the thing; it was a sap. The two men had wanted him alive. Was it right to kill one of them for that? "You think he'll be all right?"
"He's a human, John. They're not very resilient. The one at the front door wasn't."
The one at the front door wasn't what? John decided he didn't want to know. "I don't want him to die."
"He had no business being here," Faye said matter-of-factly.
"Isn't that a little extreme?"
His answer was a creaking noise that he recognized as the door to the loading dock. The woman. He'd forgotten about her. She must have heard some of the noise and come to investigate. He didn't want any more trouble. Maybe she'd see how things stood and he could bluff her off. He rose, hoping to take advantage of his height and look impressive.
"You're the only one left," he said, as she barreled out of the deep shadows near the door. "Best you just leave."
She didn't stop, but she slowed down, her rush transforming into a strangely casual stroll. She took in the sprawled bodies of her fellows without any sign of alarm. She spoke as casually as she walked.
"Looks like ya caught Roscoe and the Flake by surprise. I'm not so easy."
"Don't be so sure."
Without a pause she said, "Yer a little short."
"Huh?"
She nodded at the splintered stump of the defense stick that he still held clenched in his hand. "Ya ain't got what ya used ta have, tall, pale, and comely. It'll take a bigger tool than you've got ta impress me."
Tall, pale, and comely? He'd heard that phrase before. Could it be? He took a closer look at the figure confronting him. She was tall for a woman and broad enough in the shoulders that she filled the shoulders of the baggy milspec jacket she wore. The pants were milspec, too, but the shoes, a mismatched pair of Aeroboks™, weren't. Her face was shaded by a broad-brimmed, floppy hat that had clearly seen better days even before she'd recovered it from the trash. A stray beam from the streetlight reflected triple flashes from three tiny chrome studs on her cheek. He knew this woman; she was a zip artist from down near the Barrier. He'd heard she was a kicker.
"You're Spillway Sue."
She squinted at him, frowning. "Man's got good eyes. Zeiss?" She reached into a pocket and pulled something out. A flick of her wrist unsheathed a twenty-centimeter blade. She held the weapon with a casual confidence. "Good price for top-grade eyes."
She took a step forward, moving cautiously enough that John knew she was not as unconcerned about facing him as she pretended. He found reason to be concerned himself; her stance was very good; she was no novice knife fighter. He flipped his stick in the air and caught the splintered end. It would be more useful as a club now. It would pack a significant wallop, but would still be slower than the knife. They began to circle each other.
With a squeal of rusted metal torn free from its encrusted moorings and a rumbling thunder, one of the loading doors began to rise. Harsh light flared into the building, washing both combatants in actinic glare. John put up his free hand, trying to shield his eyes. Spillway Sue stood frozen, staring into the light like a rat caught in a flashlight beam. A rat never would have looked so put out.
A squat figure stepped into the light. Whoever it was wore a long coat that made his figure look like an animate box with a hall on top. The intruder must have been confident that they didn't have any guns; silhouetted as he was, he made an easy target. An armed target, however, as John saw when the man advanced; he held a heavy caliber pistol in his right hand. As the man stepped into the loading area, John realized that he was quite short. His voice was deep and gravelly, so much so that John suspected the man might be deliberately trying to hide his normal tones.
"I suggest that you drop your weapons and stay put."
Unfrozen, Sue spoke. "This is a private party."
"Not anymore," the man said. "Don't try to run. I have men covering the exits."
Spillway Sue made an elaborate show of looking around. "I only see one of ya. Maybe ya got everything covered and maybe ya don't. Suppose I just go check it out."
She took a step away from the man and toward the shadowy safety of the warehouse area. The gun muzzle shifted slightly in her direction.
"Suppose you don't," the gunman said.
Sue stood still. Her tongue flicked along her upper lip. John figured she was calculating the odds. Did she think she had any chance of outrunning a bullet? For his part, he stayed very still. When the man demanded they drop their weapons, he let go of what was left of his stick. The clank made by the bronze head covered whatever Sue said in response to the man's command. She gave John a hard glance and slowly opened her hand, letting her knife fall to the floor.
"My name's Wilson," the man said. "You don't know me, but we have a friend in common. Big fellow. On the street, he goes by the name of Bear."
"I don't know ya from Adam. Ain't never heard of Bear," Sue said.
"I wasn't talking to you," Wilson said.
Wilson bent down and placed something on the floor. He shoved the object with his foot, sending it sliding toward John. It was a vid reader. "There's a disk in this. Run it."
John picked it up and pressed the button. In a moment the screen lit, showing a head and shoulders shot of a bearded,
blond man. John recognized the face at once. It was Bear, all right.
"Jack, it is important that we talk," the recording said. "Go with this man."
The screen went blank.
John stared at the screen. That's all? Two sentences! John slammed the reader onto the floor. It shattered into a thousand shards of plastic and silicon chips.
"What's this all about?" he demanded.
"Good question, dode," Sue said.
"You shut up and stay out of this," John snapped.
"Hey, hey, it's null. So, ah, I'll be going."
"I think not," said Wilson. He shifted slightly and let the piercing light illuminate his gun. "For the moment it will be safer for everyone if you accompany us."
Sue shook her head. "I ain't going nowhere."
"What us you talking about, Wilson? I didn't say I was going with you," John said.
Wilson cleared his throat and shifted his weapon slightly. Light glinted from the metal. "I suggest you reconsider."
"Whatcha gonna do?" Sue asked mockingly. "Shoot us?"
Wilson gave them a tight smile. "That was suggested as the path of least resistance."
"We won't be much for conversation if we're dead." Sue didn't sound quite so confident as she had a moment before.
Wilson's smile opened up. "Who said anything about shooting you dead?"
A red dot appeared above the barrel of Wilson's gun. Another appeared on Spillway Sue's knee. Seeing that John was looking at her legs, she looked down and saw the spot. She didn't flinch away, which John thought showed real nerve, but her voice did start out a little weak when she asked her next question.
"What about Roscoe and the Flake?"
Wilson shrugged. "Since they have been so kind as to sleep through our meeting so far, I see no reason to take them along."
"Ya gonna kill 'em?"
Wilson didn't answer.
"Ya are, ain't ya? Ya already done Cholly, ain't ya?"
"Who's Cholly?"
"Ya know. Ya took Mm oat up front before ya came back here, didn't ya? Ya killed Cholly, now yer gonna do these guys. How long we got?"
Faye's earlier words about the man who had been on the front door were now explained; Wilson was the reason. John was glad that Faye hadn't been involved. Unfortunately, now he was facing this Wilson.
"You do seem obsessed with death, young woman," Wilson said.
"Occupational hazard," she mumbled, essentially to herself. Louder she said, "Hey, dode. What's Shorty want with ya anyway? Ya know, as far as I got interest, the two of y
a can just buzz on off, eh?"
"I think not," Wilson said.
"Why not let her go, Wilson? She's not part of whatever Bear sent you here for."
"Tall Jack's tight." Sue chimed in. "I got no interest here."
"Young woman, I am here as an escort for Jack. By being here, you are involved. Your presence has complicated the matter by jeopardizing security."
"I'm sooo sorry."
"As am I, young woman. I intend to complete this mission with minimal trouble. There is no threat to those who are no threat."
"'What's that supposed to mean?"
"It means that you should now move on out to the dock."
He gestured with his gun. Spillway Sue looked unhappy as she moved to comply, but she did move. John was relieved. She might have been here on some unspecified mission to do him ill, but he didn't want to see her gratuitously maimed. He followed her toward the glaring light. He could hear the soft scuff of Wilson's shoes behind him.
As she stepped onto the deck, Sue asked, "Gonna leave the wet stuff ta yer partners, Shorty?"
"Just proceed on down the stairs," Wilson said.
There were two vehicles in the yard. One was a high-bellied off-road truck, the other a long, low-slung limousine. The limousine's back door opened, revealing a softly lit interior.
Bear wasn't waiting there. In fact, no one was there. John looked at the vehicles. No one stood next to either, and both vehicles had opaqued windows; their interiors and any riders were screened. For all John could see, Wilson was alone.
The light that had heralded Wilson's arrival was on the roof of the truck's cab. As they started down the stairs, the lamp went dark. The sudden change in illumination almost made John stumble. Spillway Sue missed a step and fell to the ground. Her head swiveled around as she got back to her feet.
"I don't see anyone backing ya, Shorty."
John didn't either.
"The tower," Faye whispered.
That had to be the Lantham Building; it was the tallest structure nearby. The loading dock would be visible from there. John ran his eyes up the spire. Most of the windows were dark pocks in the surface of the building. From one of those dark pits near the top, something looking very much like a long-barreled sniper rifle protruded. He felt confident that someone sat hunched behind the weapon: a sniper. Spillway Sue followed his gaze. John didn't know if she saw the sniper, but she stopped objecting and stepped toward the car. John followed.
As he neared the vehicle, John whispered, "Stay out of this, Faye."
"John—"
"No arguments," he said as he bent over to get into the car.
"That would be a good choice, fairy," Wilson said.
John froze halfway into the car. He stared at Wilson. "You know about her?"
"I know about a lot of things. Arthur's waiting and we're wasting time. If you want your questions answered, you'd better get in the car."
John did want his questions answered. He slipped into the soft seat. Spillway Sue had slid all the way across and was fiddling with the controls in the armrest, with no visible results. Wilson closed the door on them. A moment later John felt the limousine shift as a new weight was added on the passenger side. A second later they were rolling.
It was only then that John remembered: Bear's real friends didn't call him Arthur.
CHAPTER
6
The bed they'd had prepared for him was supple, covered in a smooth fabric that felt cool and soft on his dry skin. The coverings were of the same lightweight fabric. Something hummed beneath the mattress, something that provided heat to warm him. That was good; it allowed him to use his resources for more important purposes than maintaining the heat of his blood.
The pillow was good too, fluffy and soft, although it smelled like nothing he knew. It was not stuffed with down or cotton wool; he knew those smells. Whatever cushioned his head so comfortably had never been alive, so far as he could tell. It was too soft to be mineral, its character too yielding. A wonder of this new age, no doubt. Like the lamps that smelled of lightning. An age of wonders, for truth.
Joel Lee relayed his orders, and he listened carefully to the words that his new slave used, learning. He noticed that those to whom Joel Lee spoke looked to another before fulfilling the slave's orders. Normally he would have been incensed by such presumption, but he was not yet normal; he was a spirit locked in a body stiffened by the passage of time, not yet limbered by the rush of fresh energy. When his strength permit-
ted, he turned his head to observe this other, this source of authority.
Two stood where the servants had looked. A man, an Asian, dark of hair and solemn of mien, and a woman of Latin blood, dark also but in a different way and grim of demeanor. She had something of the beauty of the finest of the New World primitives who had hailed him as king and god. He could feel that one of them was the one with the sign, the one who had come to end the long sleep, but his perceptions were still weak and so clouded that he could not tell which.
So, he had not dreamed that a follower of the Path had come to him. This place was so foreign and barren that he had l eared—no, fear was too strong—conjectured that the disturbance of his sleep had been some sort of mistake. He was pleased to see that his memory of the sign had not been a fragment of dream, a hopeful imagining. Here was vindication. The followers had been true, biding in the passing world until the time of the awakening had come, and arriving at last to wake the sleeper.
Had his mind not been so muddied by the ages of sleep, he would have known at once which of the two was the follower. He studied them, observing the subtle play of expression and stance and gesture. He could see which was the superior: the man. As was appropriate.
The power need not be squandered when the mind would serve.
But some squandering could be excused. Strength at the first. It would be best that they not think he was as weak as he was. Though his strength was still wanting, that was no longer of such concern as it had been; Joel Lee assured him that there were more to feed his hunger. The followers would provide. A show of strength then. He reached out, kindling the fire in the sign.
The Asian jumped.
Had not his body been so locked in the deep sleep, he would have laughed. Had not the Asian known he could do that? How could a follower not know? How much had they lost? He had Joel Lee call the Asian forward and ask his name and degree.
"Ryota Nakaguchi, Venerated One." The Asian spoke the honorific in the secret tongue. Perhaps they had not lost so much. "Fifth degree."
Fifth? And yet he knew so little of the link between the sign and the sleeper. The followers may have persevered, but they were not all they should be. He would see that changed!
But not in his current condition.
Nakaguchi interrupted his thoughts. "Venerated One, how may I address you that I not dishonor you?"
It was a question that ritual demanded he answer personally. He focused his sparse strength, forcing his first word in centuries. It was appropriate that the word be his name.
"Quetzal," he said.
"Not Quetzoucoatl?" Nakaguchi sounded upset.
Fool.
"The Awaited One, the Lord of Change," he had Joel Lee say, feeding him the ancient words.
Nakaguchi's eyes widened, his aura flaring with respect. The man bowed deeply, a pointless gesture. Joel Lee issued Quetzal's demand for sustenance. Nakaguchi bowed again and saw to it. Nakaguchi's servants brought an old man before Quetzal. Not the woman? He was disappointed; she would have been tasty.
The room was lit only by the backflash of the data windows open on the wallscreen and the glow of the half-dozen screens and submonitors on the C-shaped console. Pamela stood for a moment after closing the door behind her, waiting for her eyes to adjust. The room's occupant gave no sign that she knew Pamela had arrived, but Pamela knew her entrance could not have gone unnoticed. As Pamela became used to the dim light, she made out the form of the woman seated in a Console Queen™ office lo
unger in the center of the console board that filled the room. Sheila Rearden, her flabby flesh supported and confined by the CQ chair, was still save for her fluttering hands. Her flexing fingers hit the keys of a virtual keyboard and her rotating hands tapped and twisted controls that only existed within the computer's world. Rearden was a technomancer, a wizard within the context of the machine; that was why Pamela employed her.
Pamela couldn't remember the last occasion she had seen Rearden standing upright on her own two feet; the decker rarely stirred from her office, and Pamela had yet to see Rearden in the corridors of the building. But it wasn't Rearden's athletic prowess or command of etiquette that Pamela found interesting. Rearden got results.
"Have you anything for me?" she asked the supine form.
"Maybe." Rearden remained focused on the wallscreen, refusing to look in Pamela's direction. The console cowgirl wore virtuality goggles, but Pamela didn't have to see her face to read Rearden's anxiety; she could recognize the tension in the decker's body and hear it as she said, "I think I can get in, but he's got his stuff under a personal access code with a front office protection chop. Ruffle big bird's feathers if we go after this stuff and get caught with our hands in the cookie jar. You sure this is important enough?"
"It may be vital."
The writhing fingers stilled. "It's my ass gonna be fried if his deckers trace my footprints."
"Just don't leave any footprints."
"Not like I want to, Ms. M. I got a real attachment to my
ass."
"It's not just yours on the line."
"Yeah?" She turned slowly in her chair until the mirrored surfaces of the virtuality goggles pointed at Pamela. "This really big enough to chance pissing off the sama-san?"
"I believe so," Pamela said firmly.
"And you ain't gonna cut me loose if they come hunting heads? I know how easy it is for a suit—no offense to you personally, Ms. M, you're okay—to blame it on us anarchist decker types."
Pamela leaned over the nearest console and touched her portacomp to the input panel. A new window opened, bearing her personal seal and showing a standard-format approval file in the transfer box. She touched the screen and initiated the release to Rearden's databank. "My own codes to authorize your actions."
robert Charrette - Arthur 02 - A King Beneath the Mountain Page 9