“This is the Etruscan,” Masahiko said. “The Etruscan accessed your father's expense account for us. He is most skilled.”
Something there for a second. Skull-like. Above the dirty glass. The mouth drawn and petulant. “It was nothing, really…”
She told herself it was all presentation. Like when Zona presented, you could never quite focus on her. This was like that, but more extreme. And a lot of work put into the audio. But she didn't like it.
“You brought me here to meet him?” she asked Masahiko.
“Oh, no,” said the Etruscan, the
Oh
a polyphonic chorale, “I just wanted a look, dear.” The thing like laughter.
“The woman,” Gomi Boy said. “Did you arrange for her to meet you, at Hotel Di?”
“No,” Chia said. “She checked the taxi cabs, so you aren't as smart as you think.”
“Well put.” The
put
the sound of a single pebble falling into a dry marble fountain. Chia focused on the glass. A huge centipede lay curled at its bottom, a thing the color of dead cuticle. She saw that it had tiny, pink hands—
The glass was gone.
“Sorry,” Masahiko said. “He wished only to meet you.”
“Who is the woman in Hotel Di?” Gomi Boy's anime eyes were bright and eager, but his tone was hard.
“Maryalice,” Chia said. “Her boyfriend's with those Russians. The thing they're after's in my bag there.”
“What thing?”
“Maryalice says it's a nano-assembler.”
“Unlikely,” Gomi Boy said.
“Tell it to the Russians.”
“But you have contraband? In the room?”
“I've got something they want.”
Gomi Boy grimaced, vanished.
“Where'd he go?”
“This changes the situation,” Masahiko said. “You did not tell us you have contraband.”
“You didn't ask! You didn't ask why they were looking for me
Masahiko shrugged, calm as ever. “We were not certain that it was you they were interested in. The Kombinat would be very eager for the skills of someone like the Etruscan, for instance. Many people know of Hak Nam, but few know how to enter. We reacted to protect the integrity of the city.”
“But your computer's in the hotel room. They can just come there and get it.”
“It no longer matters,” he said. “I am no longer engaged in processing. My duties are assumed by others. Gomi Boy is concerned now for his safety outside, you understand? Penalties for possession of contraband are harsh. He is particularly vulnerable, because he deals in second-hand equipment.”
“I don't think it's the police you want to worry about, right now. I think we want to
call
the police. Maryalice says those Russians'll kill us, if they find us.”
“The police would not be a good idea. The Etruscan has accessed your father's account in Singapore. That is a crime.”
“I think I'd rather get arrested than killed.”
Masahiko considered that. “Come with me,” he said. “Your visitor is waiting.”
“Not the centipede,” Chia said. “Forget it.”
“No,” he said, “not the Etruscan. Come.”
And they were out of his room, fast-forward through the maze of Hak Nam, up twisted stairwells and through corridors, the strange, compacted world flickering past…. “What
is
this place? A communal site, right? But what are you so worried about? Why's it all a secret?”
“Walled City is of the net, but not on it. There are no laws here, only agreements.”
“You can't be on the net and
not
be on the net,” Chia said, as they shot up a final flight of stairs.
“Distributed processing,” he said. “Interstitial. It began with a shared killfile—”
“Zona!” There across this uneven roofscape, overgrown with strangeness.
“Touch nothing. Some are traps. I come to you.” Zona, presenting in that quick, fragmentary way, moved forward.
To Chia's right, a kind of ancient car lay tilted in a drift of random textures, something like a Christmas tree growing from its unbroken windshield. Beyond that…
She guessed that the rooftops of the Walled City were its dumping ground, but the things abandoned there were like objects out of a dream, bit-mapped fantasies discarded by their creators, their jumbled shapes and textures baffling the eye, the attempt to sort and decipher them inducing a kind of vertigo. Some were moving.
Then a movement high in the gasoline sky caught her eye. Zona's bird-things?
“I went to your site,” Chia said. “You weren't there, some-thing—”
“I know. Did you see it?” As Zona passed the Christmas tree, its round, silver ornaments displayed black eye-holes, each pair turning to follow her.
“No. I thought I heard it.”
“I do not know what it is.” Zona's presentation was even quicker and more jumpy than usual. “I came here for advice. They told me that you had been to my site, and that now you were here…”
“You know this place?”
“Someone here helped me establish my site. It is impossible to come here without an invitation, you understand? My name is on a list. Although I cannot go below, into the city itself, unaccompanied.”
“Zona, I'm in so much trouble now! We're hiding in this horrible hotel, and Maryalice is there—”
“This bitch who made you her mule, yes? She is where?”
“In the room at this hotel. She said she broke up with her boyfriend, and it's his, the nano-thing—”
“The what?”
“She says it's some kind of nano-assembler thing.”
Zona Rosa's features snapped into focus as her heavy eyebrows shot up. “Nanotechnology?”
“This is in your bag?” Masahiko asked.
“Wrapped in plastic.”
“One moment.” He vanished.
“Who is that?” Zona asked.
“Masahiko. Mitsuko's brother. He lives here.”
“Where did he go?”
“Back to the hotel we're porting from.”
“This shit you are in, it is crazy,” Zona said.
“Please, Zona, help me! I don't think I'll ever get home!”
Masahiko reappeared, the thing in his hand minus the duty-free bag. “I scanned it,” he said. “Immediate identification as Rodel-van Erp primary biomolecular programming module C-slash-7A. This is a lab prototype. We are unable to determine its exact legal status, but the production model, C-slash-9E, is Class 1 nanotechnology, proscribed under international law. Japanese law, conviction of illegal possession of Class 1 device carries automatic life sentence.”
“Life?” Chia said.
“Same for thermonuclear device,” he said, apologetically, “poison gas, biological weapon.” He held up the scanned object for Zona's inspection.
Zona looked at it. “Fuck your mother,” she said, her tone one of somber respect.
31. The Way Things Work
“See how things work, Laney? ‘What goes around, comes around’? ‘You can run, but you can't hide’? Know those expressions, Laney? How some things get to be clichés because they touch on certain truths, Laney? Talk to me, Laney.”
Laney lowered himself into one of the miniature armchairs, hugging his ribs.
“You look like shit, Laney. Where have you been?”
“The Western World,” he said. He didn't like watching himself do those things on the screen, but he found he couldn't look away. He knew that wasn't him, there. They'd mapped his face onto someone else. But it was his face. He remembered hearing something someone had said about mirrors, a long time ago, that they were somehow unnatural and dangerous.
“So you're trying your hand at the Orient now?”
She hadn't understood, he thought, which meant she didn't know where he'd been, earlier. Which meant they hadn't been watching him here. “That's that guy,” he said, “that Hillman. From the day I met you. My job interview. He was a porno extra.”
“Don't you think he's being awfully rough with her?”
“Who is she, Kathy?”
“Think back. If you can remember Clinton Hillman, Laney
Laney shook his head.
“Think actor, Laney. Think Alison Shires
“His daughter,” Laney said, no doubt at all.
“I definitely think that's too rough. That borders on rape, Laney. Assault. I think we could make a case for assault.”
“Why would she do that? How could you get her to do that?” Turning from the screen to Kathy. “I mean, unless it really is rape.”
“Let's hear the soundtrack, Laney. See what you're saying, there. Cast some light on motive…”
“Don't,” he said. “I don't want to hear it.”
“You're talking about her father the whole time, Laney. I mean, obsession is one thing, but just droning on about him that way, right through a white-knuckle skull-fuck—”
He almost fell, coming up out of the chair. He couldn't find the manual controls. Wires back there. He pulled out the first three he found. Third did it.
“Put it on the Lo/Rez tab, Laney? Rock and roll lifestyle? Aren't you supposed to throw them out the window, though?”
“What's it about, Kathy? You want to just tell me now?”
She smiled at him. Exactly the smile he remembered from his job interview. “May I call you Colin?”
“Kathy: fuck you.”
She laughed. “We may have come full circle, Laney.”
“How's that?”
“Think of this as a job interview.”
“I've got a job.”
“We're offering you another, Laney. You can moonlight.”
Laney made it back to the chair. Lowered himself in as slowly as possible. The pain made him gasp.
“What's wrong?”
“Ribs. Hurt.” He found a way to settle back that seemed to help.
“Were you in a fight? Is that blood?”
“I went to a club.”
“This is Tokyo, Laney. They don't have fights in clubs.”
“That was really her, the daughter?”
“It certainly is. And she'll be more than happy to talk about it on Slitscan, Laney. Seduced into sadistic sex games by a stalker obsessed with her famous, her loving dad. Who has come around, by the way. Who is one of ours now.”
“Why? Why would she do that? Because he told her to?”
“Because,” Kathy said, looking at him as though she were concerned that he might have sustained brain damage as well, “she's an aspiring actress in her own right, Laney.” She looked at him hopefully, as though he might suddenly start to process. “The big break.”
“That is
going to be her big break?”
“A break,” Kathy Torrance said, “is a break. And you know something? I'm trying, I'm trying really hard, to give
you
one instead. Right now. And it wouldn't be the first, would it?”
The phone began to ring. “You'd better take this,” she said, passing him the white slab of cedar.
“Yes?”
“The fan-activity data-base.” It was Yamazaki. “You must access it now.”
“Where are you?”
“In hotel garage. With van.”
“Look, I'm in kind of rough shape, here. Can it wait?”
“Wait?” Yamazaki sounded horrified.
Laney looked at Kathy Torrance. She was wearing something black and not quite short enough to show her tattoo. Her hair was shorter now. “I'll be down when I can. Keep it open for me.” He hung up before Yamazaki could reply.
“What was that about?”
“Shiatsu.”
“You're lying.”
“What do you want, Kathy? What's the deal?”
“Him. I want him. I want a way in. I want to know what he's doinging. I want to know what he thinks he's doing, trying to screw a piece of Japanese software.”
“Marry,” Laney said.
Her smile vanished. “You don't correct me, Laney.”
“You want me to spy on him.”
“Research.”
“Balls.”
“You wish.”
“If I got anything you could use, you'd want me to set him up.”
The smile returned. “Let's not get ahead of ourselves.”
“And I get?”
“A life. A life in which you haven't been branded an obsessive stalker who preyed on the attractive daughter of the object of your obsession. A life in which it isn't public knowledge that a series of disastrous pharmaceutical trials permanently and hideously rewired you. Fair enough?”
“What about her? The daughter. She do all that with the Hillman guy for nothing?”
“Your call, Laney. Work for us, get me what I need, she's shit out of luck.”
“That easy? She'd go along with that? After what she had to do?”
“If she wants even the remotest hope of having a career eventually—yes.”
Laney looked at her. “That isn't me. It's a morph. If I could prove it was a morph, I could sue you.”
“Really? You could afford that, could you? It takes years. And even then, you might not win. We've got a lot of money and talent to throw at problems like that, Laney. We do it all the time.” The door chimed. “That'll be mine,” she said. She got up, went to the door, touched the security screen. Laney glimpsed part of a man's face. She opened the door. It was Rice Daniels, minus his trademark sunglasses. “Rice is with us now, Laney,” she said. “He's been a terrific help with your backgrounder.”
“Out of Control didn't work out?” Laney asked Daniels.
Daniels showed Laney a lot of very white teeth. “I'm sure we could work together, Laney. I hope you don't have any issues around what happened.”
“Issues,” Laney said.
Kathy walked back, handed Laney a blank white card with a pencilled number. “Call me. Before nine tomorrow. Leave a message. Yes or no.”
“You're giving me a choice?”
“It's more fun that way. I want you to
think
about it.” She reached down and flicked the collar of Laney's shirt. “Stitch-count,” she said. Turned and walked out, Daniels pulling the door shut behind them.
Laney sat there, staring at the closed door, until the phone began to ring.
It was Yamazaki.
32. The Uninvited
“We must
attack
,” said Zona Rosa, punctuating it with a quick shift to Aztec death's-head mode. They were with Masahiko and Gomi Boy now, back in Masahiko's room in the Walled City, away from the hypnotic chaos of the crawling roofscape.
“Attack?” Gomi Boy's huge eyes bulged as brightly as ever, but his voice betrayed his tension. “Who will you attack?”
“We will find a way to carry the fight to the enemy,” Zona Rosa said, gravely. “Passivity is death.”
Something that looked to Chia like a bright orange drink coaster came gliding in under Masahiko's door and across the floor, but the shadow-thing gobbled it before she could get a closer look.