Fede had done a little show, watching the data flows and even doing a little preliminary programming, sketching out the shape of a program he'd been thinking about since they got to China, then darting in here and then to start filling it in. The Otaku that were free to watch seemed impressed, but he wasn't sure how to read them - the constant nodding and muttering was unnerving. A bunch of biofeedback equipment had been hastily assembled in the upstairs room and Cessus was busily putting people through their paces. Fede was shocked at how badly the Otaku programmers did - they couldn't keep calm minds to save their lives. It was like they were blind people, casting their arms around wildly as they tried to code, or crawling step-by-step with no leaps at all. It reminded him of when he'd first gotten prosthetic legs, way back as a kid, and how badly he'd walked. He couldn't keep his balance, then. He hadn't known how.
"What's wrong with them?" he'd asked Cessus during a quiet moment as the older hacker leaned back against a desk, watching his new students go through the games.
"Shut up, you arrogant little prick" Cessus said agreeably. "I told you you were good. Now get out of my hair. I've got another hour of this and then I need to learn the entire Beijing traffic system."
Fede left. The truth was there was nothing for him to do. The Otaku were in charge of some series of hacks and political maneuvers Tonx and Xing were orchestrating, and Marcus and Cass were charged with setting up the meeting point. Cessus was helping the Otaku and running cracks against the Chinese systems, and Fede just couldn't follow it. He was a coder, not a networks guy, and although he knew viruses he knew next to nothing about direct system break-ins. So he'd peddled on the bikes for a while, getting used to his legs, building up muscles long unused. He reviewed his code. He listened in on conversations between Tonx and Xing and Cessus, and understood none of it. It was made clear that his job would be answering any questions Chow or the Big Circle representatives had about his code and that the less he knew about the rest of it the better. So he tried to work on his pet program, and found that'd he'd improved. His code was tighter, more efficient. He was better than before, and it felt good. He slept well the second night after the decision, against all odds, his thighs burning, lines of code bright against the giant empty space inside his skull.
"Feed, wake up." It was Cass's voice. "Wake up, we're starting."
Fede fumbled out of sleep, the tiny cave under the desk he'd staked out as his own suddenly claustrophobic. Dim lights illuminated the empty room beyond, one of the multitudes of cubical-warrens the extra Otaku space was riddled with. His own cube, Fede realized, his eyes adjusting to the light. Cass had a tiny headlamp pulled up against her forehead, her eyes red-lined with exhaustion and nerves.
"It's time?" he asked.
"Yeah. It's time" she said. "Come on. You need some food in you before we head out."
"Where are we going?" he asked.
"The warehouse. We already went over this" she said.
Fed's brain slowly reeled in the memories. They were going to send in substitutes to fake out Chow and then redirect them to a new location for the actual meeting. They'd come to the warehouse where Fede and Tonx and the others were, hopefully unprepared. Tonx had made plan B's, but Fede didn't know what they were, shouldn't know. He'd asked Tonx about it the night before, late, before he'd crawled under the desk in the cubical.
"The less you can give away, the better" Tonx had told him. "You're our bluff card, Feed. You've got to convince Chow he won't be able to replicate your code. Not easily, anyway."
"But anybody could do it" Fede had said.
"No" said Tonx. "Not everybody could. You've got to believe that. Trust me. Chow will know, he'll know when he talks to you, he'll know what it would take and how hard it would be."
"Why won't you tell me what's going to happen? What about our auxiliary plans?" Fede pleaded.
"Onions" said Tonx, his face in his hands. He reeked of stale sweat and green tea, fatigue pouring off him in an invisible cloud.
"Layers within layers" he muttered.
"What?"
"You plan and plan, Fed, and eventually you just have to go with it. I've tried to anticipate everything, but I'm… It doesn't matter. You need to stay safe. If the unexpected happens we just have to hope things work out. Knowing about everything else won't help you. You have to trust me."
Fede hadn't said anything.
"Feed?" Cass asked.
He was staring at his hands, his fingertips resting lightly on the polished metal rims of his legs, the smooth puckered line where the plastic and rubber socketing pressed against his skin.
"Yeah" he said. "Yeah, I'm coming."
They'd eaten some kind of tofu rolls, Otaku members coming in and out, in and out as they sat. Cessus joined them, a long thin spliff resting casually between two trembling fingers. Marcus was in a makeshift bed, some sort of huge lazy-boy / smart chair hybrid with oversized metal flanges supporting his legs and arms on white temperfoam slabs. His gray skin looked pale in the dim LED light, but he smiled when he saw Fed. They'd hardly spoken since he'd gotten out of the hospital.
"Goob to 'ee you" he said, his deep voice fainter than Fede remembered. "'Goob to ee you,' too" Fede joked.
Xing appeared then, surrounded by a phalanx of Otaku wearing headsets and wielding display tablets. He was an unperturbed as ever, glancing at data thrust at him from all angles, nodding slightly at this suggestion or turning his head at that idea. He reminded Fede of the proverbial eye of the storm, the calm space around which tornadoes spun.
Then Tonx came into the room. He had his hair pulled back in a tight ponytail and was wearing a heavily detailed motorcycle jacket, thick layers of armor aggregating around his joints, tiny scales of carefully stitched leather over padded plastic. The thick ridges over his spine cascaded down like a tail, covering the back of his pinstripe wool suit pants like an alien tuxedo coat.
"We're ready" he said as he slumped down across from them. "I've spoken with Chow and we're on. He should be at the dummy site in half an hour. That gives us a little over forty minutes to get into position. You all know what you're supposed to do. We've prepared all we can- now it's just a matter of hoping."
"It'll work out" said Cessus, a thick cloud escaping his lips and obscuring his eyes as he spoke. "We're the good guys, remember?"
"Right" said Tonx, a rare smile drifting across his lips.
"Listen" he said. "Listen, whatever happens, I just… "
Marcus's huge hand gently crushed the can of Pokari Sweat he'd been drinking and let it fall, tinkling, to the table.
"We know" the big man said. "We know. It's going to work out fine. We've done our homework. We've planned. We're prepared. Now's the time to think of success, Tonx."
"'The time to worry about failure is after you've failed'" said Cass. "You taught me that, Tonx."
Tonx smiled again, fully this time. "You're right" he said. He rooted through the pile of take-out and wires before him and fished out an unopened tube of green tea. He popped the lid with his thumb and held it aloft.
"To our success" he said, his smile wide, full of confidence. The Tonx they knew.
"To success" they echoed.
They were in a tiny car, an ancient metal-framed electrical affair, humming across the tarmac between giant dark buildings. They'd gone by subway and then bus, separating and rejoining, pretending not to know each other. The rain had kicked up again as Fede had gotten out of the last bus, waiting at the nearly empty stop for the car. Cass had gotten out of a taxi a block down and walked up to join him once it had left, her eyes deeply roughed in black circles, her hair a cascade of loose dirty spikes.
She pulled out a packet of cigarettes as she stopped next to him under the shelter.
"Smoke?" she asked him, the pack sprouting a single cigarette as she did something sudden with her fingers.
"You don't seem like the type" he said, shaking his head. It disappeared into her oversized woolen overcoat, the tips of her military boots peeking out dimly from the hem. She produced a cheap blue plastic bic. They waited.
Eventually the car had glided slowly out of the gloom and the door kicked open. A plume of smoke came from inside and they smelled weed. Fede smiled despite himself as it was followed with Cessus' beaming face.
"Come on, we got to hurry" he said. "Your friend here drives like a granny."
Tonx drove. Everyone had goggles on, and every few minutes Cessus would drum his fingers against the cheap plastic paneling on the inside of the car and they'd see a skip in their data as he switched secure channels. The wind gusted and the car rocked, and Tonx suddenly turned them down a loading ramp into a basement. They got out into the dark.
Fede had borrowed some canvas shorts from Xing and tied them off just over his stumps. He was glad he had; he could feel the chill in the metal of his legs, an invisible draft leaking up into his kneecaps. The leather jacket he'd bought had busted its zipper while he was on the bus, and the yuppie vest they'd gotten at the airport underneath did nothing to keep him warm.
"Anybody have a hat?" he asked.
"Shhh" hissed Tonx. Fluorescent lights flickered on in a low ceiling overhead, revealing a wide empty room. A hallway led off to the left, and stairs led up ahead. He waved them forward.
As they came up the steps a dim red light came on high above them, tiny LEDs lining the support struts in the warehouse ceiling. It filtered down in a kind of bloody twilight, revealing a few hazy shadows dancing around the perimeter, tiny manlike figures shadowboxing with themselves. In the middle of the room a table sat on a stage with two chairs. In the distance Fede could see a giant door in the wall opposite them, sensor arrays blinking yellow lights around its edge.
"Who are they?" Fede whispered.
"Fuk Ching" said Xing from behind them.
Tonx had gun out and lined up at Xing's forehead before Fede had even turned around. He wondered, over the rapid thump of his heart, how long Tonx had had it.
"Don't fucking do that, Xing" Tonx said. Xing smiled.
"My sorry. It's an habit" Xing said. "To answer Feed's question those men are Fuk Ching combat specialists. You would like to meet them?"
"Sure" said Cessus. His lenses were out and tiny bits of light danced across his eyebrows and over the bridge of his nose, an avalanche of data.
Xing turned to the dark corner of the building to their right and raised a hand. A figure separated from the shadows there and sped toward them at a dead sprint, hands smoothly pumping up and down, legs raised. Suddenly the man was in front of them, standing quietly two paces from Xing.
In school Fede had had to study physiology as an alternative to taking classes in floor hokey or gymnastics. He'd been fascinated at the way the muscles connected over the structure of the skeleton, the way the model of the human musculature was so efficient. This man looked like that model had, his jawbones razor sharp and his muscles etched so tight it seemed as though there were cracks in his skin where they met. His eyes were set deep in his skull, his pale yellowed skin thin and papery-looking. As he stood there Fede could see that he was breathing fast, the rims of his nostrils flaring slightly in and out, in and out. But otherwise he stood stock-still. He seemed, somehow, like he was listening for something they couldn't hear.
Xing said something in Chinese that Fede couldn't follow and gestured at Cass. She's bowed deeply at him, avoiding his eyes, and the man nodded back. He wore loose black cotton cargo pants and thick black rubber boots, and had a dirty gray muscle tee. A wife-beater, they used to call them, sleeveless deep-necked undershirts. That was it.
The man turned and nodded at all of them in turn, his thin lips held tightly together, and then turned quickly and darted away.
"What kind of mods?" asked Cessus, his eyes far away, looking at data.
"You could guess" said Xing, glancing at Tonx.
"Dangerous work" Tonx said. "Full body muscle blending? Fast twitch weave, enhanced metabolism? Drug implants and oversized heart?"
Xing shrugged. "I don't honestly know. But I assume you're right on at least some of it. I do know they eat sticks of butter mixed with nutrient supplements every half hour or so, and have had a lot of meditation training in order to obtain enough REM sleep. From what I've seen they sit very still for one half hour out of every four, but I don't think they have to. I think it's part of the program."
"It doesn't look comfortable" said Tonx, staring after the deep shadow of the corner the man had disappeared back in to.
"I don't think that is a concern" said Xing. He gestured at the small stage with the table in the middle of the room. "Would you sit? They should be here soon, and the rest of us should be away by then."
Tonx nodded and started forward. Fede moved to follow.
"Go with Cass, Feed" said Cessus.
"What?" asked Fed, bewildered.
"You're too valuable" said Tonx without turning around. Xing continued walking ahead of them, away toward the stage. "We need you safe."
"But I'm supposed to talk to Chow" said Fed.
"You will. Through me. We have an infrared connection they shouldn't be able to trace, and you can feed me answers as he asks them. We'll all be tied in" said Cessus. "Chow demanded that the virus author be at the meeting. I'm your stand-in."
"Fuck that" Fede spat. "You can't me out like this!"
"What's Chow doing with your program?" asked Cass from next to him. She'd pulled out another cigarette and was slowly tapping the filter end against her lip.
"What's that got to do with it?" asked Fed.
"We don't know what he's doing with it" answered Tonx, finally turning around. "But it could be anything. He could be devising an incurable disease that only works on his enemies - it's not unrealistic. He could be making a new AIDS."
Cessus nodded, his dreads bouncing jauntily in the red light.