Cessus seemed pleased. He pressed one of his black thumbnails down hard with the palm of his hand.
"We got it covered. Every one of those machines makes a hash check off the image Tonx's guy posted in Hawaii, then passes it around. Uses the same check system native to the Chinese update system, yeah?"
Fede nodded.
"So we're set. They grab their little chunk, mutate to be able to process the best fit, and post their result along with their processing code to one of three newsgroups. We sit back and watch it roll in, cross off redundant responses, and get a full picture in under a week. Cakewalk, yeah?"
"Unless" began Fed.
"Unless nothing" said Cessus. "You designed this thing from the ground up, Fed. We've tested it backwards and forwards. The only way we're going to know if there's an error in your code is if we launch it. The time for doubting yourself is over, man. Let your brain have a rest and do some background processing. Live in the now, you know?"
Fede nodded again, pulled off his goggles. The image of swimming bits of code, a graphic representation of the genetic algorithms, swam in petri dish after-images of laser light on the inside of his eyeballs. He'd been watching them for hours. They never acted the same way twice, but they usually did the job. Usually.
"C'mon" said Cessus, standing up. "Let's get something to eat beside those damn nutrient bars. Chances are good Marcus is going to want to make the rest of the trip in one go. If you have to piss now's your chance."
As they came out of the truck they saw Marcus and Cass leaning against the cab, looking out over the parking lot to the next lot over. It was a hotel, and a fairly fancy one if the neatly trimmed hedge was any indication. The front drive was u-shaped, curving up and under an overhang. As they watched a limo pulled out and onto the road just as a second one pulled in.
Cass scratched under one armpit, wincing as she stretched her ribs. She'd found a new t-shirt at the Red Cross and it had stained almost instantly from riding in the back of the truck. Cessus nodded at the limo.
"What's up?" he asked.
"We were discussing how you could tell who was security and who was just a date" said Marcus. The second limo stopped under the overhang and a bellhop ran up to open the door. An immaculately dressed man with a full beard stepped out, smoothing his tuxedo as he stood. He was followed by an angel in blond hair and a long, pure white evening gown, tiny pearls glimmering in a sheer web across the drape of the fabric. Their driver had come around and was gathering up the gown as it spooled out of the car, gently lifting it up in an arc behind her as he followed them inside. The car slowly shut its doors and drove over to one side as soon as they had left.
"What do you think?" asked Marcus.
"Date" said Cass. "Those are Manolo Blatnik shoes, definitely not made for any kind of action. They're incredibly comfortable, though."
Cessus snickered. "Give me a break" he said. "I'm just impressed she could walk in them."
"I'm serious" said Cass. "Those heels are as comfortable as these boots I'm wearing. They should be; they cost more than your house was worth." This last was aimed at Cessus, and she smiled as he rolled his eyes.
"For shoes?" asked Fed.
Cass shrugged. "It's what people will pay for them. Believe me, you have to spend eight hours standing around looking pretty and they'd start looking like a good investment to you too. I know a guy who has a friend who knows the guy who invented the heat conductive cooling sets they put in tuxedos, and the guy lives like a king down in South America. At a certain point the money is sort of a secondary thing."
She scratched herself again before turning to spitting on the hot cement.
"Come on" she said, walking towards the mini-mart. Let's piss and get back on the road. I've got a boyfriend to beat up."
Marcus chuckled and keyed in a locking sequence on the cab before following her. Behind them another limo pulled up to the hotel, then slowly pulled away.
When they got into the mini-mart there was two unisex restrooms. Cass came out before Marcus was finished, and Cessus went next. Fede browsed among the magazine rack as she sorted through the juices for one with a remotely recent date.
"Do you miss it?" he asked.
"Miss what?" she said.
"Miss dressing up like that. Miss limos and fancy shit." Fede knew he sounded like an idiot, didn't much care. He found, to his surprise, that he really wanted to know.
"No" she said thoughtfully. "Not really. I mean… " she stopped to pull out an orange juice but left the cooler door open, letting the cool air slowly pour out and over her legs.
"It was nice, in a way, to be so comfortable so much of the time. To eat nice things, to only wear clothes that really fit. But it had its costs, and the benefits never outweighed them."
"What costs?" asked Fed.
"Freedom" she said, slowly scratching the price tag off the juice with one grimy fingernail. "I was never free. I went where I was told, wore what I was given to wear, ate what was cooked for me. I played by the rules and was pretty successful at it. But it was never
my
life."
She shrugged and let the cooler door swing shut. "I guess it's a matter of what's important to you - being safe, or being happy. I could have stayed the rest of my life in evening gowns and limousines, but I wouldn't ever have been happy there. Took me a long time to figure that out, but when I did the rest was easy."
Marcus emerged, nodded at them before heading back out to the truck. Fede turned to head for the bathroom.
"Scratch that" said Cass. She stood straight now, her arms hanging loosely at her sides as she looked past Fed's head and into the parking lot beyond.
"It was never easy. But once I made that choice it started to be worth it."
Fede shuffled to the restroom in the back.
Fede spent the rest of the ride in the passenger seat. Marcus drove, one large arm draped over the wheel, his thick legs hiding the pedals. He'd gotten Cessus to plug in the old white MP3 player into the stereo, selecting a constant stream of ancient French lounge music Fede found relaxing. It was like one long song, the way the MP3 player played it, blending each song into the next.
Cessus had started the trip up front with them, but ended up going into the back to setup for the run. Marcus had asked about his life growing up in the 'burbs, but there wasn't much to tell and they'd ended up talking more about mod fighting. Marcus had done some crazy things in his life, and didn't mind telling Fede the truth about it. Fede liked Marcus; he treated him with respect, even when he asked stupid things or didn't know about something that must have seemed obvious to Marcus.
Every so often the pale green light of the GPS would flicker on over Marcus's face, and eventually Fede noticed it had become nighttime. He'd nodded off a few times during the drive, but every time he woke up Marcus just took it like the conversation was still going. Eventually they stopped talking entirely, watching the plain scrub of the desert roll by. It'd been like that for hours, the night getting darker and darker. Not like in the city, where evening dropped down like a blanket over your head, but slower. It eased in over them, the countryside getting dimmer and dimmer. Shadows grew, and it got harder to make out the little cacti and stumpy trees alongside the road. He tapped his foot in time with the music. Marcus pulled slowly off the cracked pavement and onto a dirt road.
He turned and looked at him. The big man's face was painted in green light, a frown driving his eyes deeper into the folds of his face.
"What up?" he asked. "You know where we are?"
Marcus didn't say anything for a moment. Then he grunted.
"Yeah, but it doesn't make any sense. Keep an eye out, would you?" he said.
The drove on and the crushed rock of the road gave way to a rutted track through the sand. Then even that disappeared, and they followed a series of bare patches through the weeds.
"This shit keeps up we're going to get stuck" Marcus grumbled.
Just then they came to a rise and crested it, the truck bouncing and bucking as harder ground lifted beneath them.
"Well fuck me silly" coughed Marcus.
Ahead of them the dune crested to a long low beach, white sand spreading out as far as they could see in both directions. Their lights spilled over three trucks, similarly sized to theirs, all pulled up next to each other parallel to the beach. Their headlights were on, bright white LED light glaring against plastic tables and beach chairs. Just beyond the reach of the headlights a circus-type pavilion had been set up, the yellowed light of alcohol lamps rolling over a circular bar propped up on wooden struts. Dozens of people staggered and danced between the bar and the tables, and out beyond them Fede could see dripping bodies playing in the surf.
Soon after they'd crested the rise one of the bodies separated from the bar and ran up towards the truck. As it came closer Fede could see it was Tonx, tanned nut brown and ferociously drunk.
"Welcome! Welcome welcome welcome!" he called, pounding over the sand to jerk Fed's door open.
"Just in time for the party, goddamn" he panted, pulling Fede out of the truck and subjecting him to a bone crushing hug. He smelled of sweat and the ocean, and of strong liquor.
Cessus appeared, one lens out and his fingers tapping frantically on his chest.
"What the fuck is this? Jesus Christ, have you seen the bandwidth out here?" he said.
Fede hadn't, and made to reach for his goggles.
"Don't" said Tonx. "No need. What're you getting, Cessus?"
"Upload and download speeds are both at the top of the possible spectrum!" he said, his dreads bouncing crazily as he gaped at Tonx, at Fed, at the bar below. "It's pure unshared bandwidth just for us!"
"It gets better out by our tent" said Tonx. "But forget that, I'll explain it later. For now come get a drink."
"What the hell is this?" asked Fed.
"What do you think? It's a party! Don't ask stupid questions and you'll have a good time. Where the hell is my girlfriend?"
Cass was suddenly standing in the mixed light from the beach, her fists balled up, eyes gleaming wet as she regarded her shirtless, dirty, drunken boyfriend.
There were certain times, Fede was convinced, that the right thing to do was the unexpected one. He decided that Tonx was a master of it that night, when he grabbed his girlfriend in one long, deep kiss. He did it right in front of everybody, almost hitting Marcus as he came around the front of the truck, and he took an unabashedly long time of it. When Cass stood upright again she was flushed and speechless, and Fede knew everything was going to be okay.
"Park the truck next to the others. Leave it on electric, we got generators everyone runs in the morning. Grab yourself a drink on my tab and I'll see ya'll in a while" he said. Then he lifted Cass up off her feet and ran down the beach, disappearing around the bar and into the night.
"That motherfucker never ceases to surprise me" said Cessus, his fingers still dancing over his shirtfront, his eyeglasses dimly illuminating the whites of his eyes. "We got serious net connectivity here, and traceroute's giving me a different path out to the net every time. This shit's as bizarre and secure a setup as I've seen in a while."
He turned towards Fed. "I don't know where the hell we are, but if we're going to launch from anywhere, this is the place to do it."
Fede smiled a half-smile, stared at the dark of the beach where his brother had disappeared.
Marcus's heavy hand fell onto his shoulder.
"You want to help me park this thing?" he asked.
"Yeah" mumbled Cessus, standing back so Fed could climb up ahead of him. "Then we have a hard-earned drink to enjoy."
A short while later they'd parked the truck, a redheaded guy with a beard and a mumu showing them how to tie into the generator line for the morning.
"Better to set it up before the hangovers start" he'd said, his eyes unnaturally wide and bright. He'd slapped Marcus on the shoulder a number of times, amazed at how loud it sounded. Then he'd led them over to the bar, explained to the bartender that they were on Tonx's tab, and disappeared.
They settled into a table out near the truck, Fede nursing something Cessus had ordered for him that tasted like nail polish and lemons.
"It's a gimlet" Cessus advised. "Give your tongue a chance to get used to it before you throw it out."
He'd ordered something that came in a glass the size of two fists, thick clear glass revealing a dark swirl of small, almond-shaped leaves. It oozed cold perspiration in the warm night air.
"Mint julep" he said, noticing Fed's gaze.
"I like mint" said Fed.
"Not like this" said Cessus, although he handed the drink over. A few coughing gasps later Fede agreed. It did bear a resemblance to what he knew of as mint, but only a passing, noxious one. Fede tried to finish his drink and succeeded, eventually, before deciding to try a martini. He'd only seen martinis in vids, classy guys drinking them like sodas. It turned out to be horrible. It tasted like pickle juice and gasoline, so he slurped it down as fast as he could, trying to gulp it when he thought Cessus and Marcus weren't watching.
Marcus drank mineral water. After he'd finished half his martini Fede asked him why.
"You know how much I weigh?" Marcus asked, an amused smile on his face.
"No" said Fed.
"Somewhere around four hundred pounds. You know how much booze it would take to get me drunk?"
"But it's on Tonx's tab" said Fed. His head hurt, a little, and he was having a hard time following the conversation. He kept getting distracted.
"That's not the point. I have the same size liver as you do, you know" Marcus said, then laughed. Fed's head had become too heavy all of a sudden, and he'd dropped his drink to spill over on the table. Marcus steadied Fede with one hand and tipped the table with the other, the glass and its contents rolling off into the darkness.
"Grab that, would you Cessus?" he asked, reaching over to pull Fede up and out of his chair.