Flashlight. In my purse.
Laney-san
Looking back to see Yamazaki, one sleeve of his green plaid coat pulled free at the shoulder, his glasses missing a lens. Arleigh had taken a phone from her purse and was cursing softly as she tried to get it to work.
Yamazaki caught up with them at the next landing. The four of them continued down together, Laney still holding the blind drummers hand.
When they reached the street, the Western Worlds sullen crew of doorpeople were nowhere in sight. A single policeman with a plastic rain-cover on his cap was muttering frantically into a microphone clipped to the front of his rain-cape. He was walking in tight circles as he did this, gesturing dramatically with a white baton at nothing in particular. Several kinds of alien siren were converging on the Western World, and Laney thought he could hear a helicopter.
Willy Jude dropped Laneys hand and adjusted his video-goggles to the streets light-level. Wheres my car?
Arleigh lowered her phone, which apparently was working now. Youd better come with us, Willy. Some kind of tactical unit is on the way
Nothing like it, Rez said, and Laney turned, to see the singer emerging from the Western World, brushing something white from his dark jacket. That physical thing. Too much time in the virtual, we forget that, dont we? Youre Leyner? Extending his hand.
Laney, Laney said, as Arleighs dark green van pulled up beside them.
28. A Matter of Credit
Maryalice opened a curved drawer that was built into the pink beds headboard. She was wearing a black skin-suit with big red Ashleigh Modine Carter-style sequin roses on the lapels. She took out a little blue glass dish and balanced it on her knee. I hate these places, she said. Theres lots of ways to make sex ugly, but its kind of hard to make it look this ridiculous. She knocked the gray end off her cigarette, into the blue saucer. How old are you, anyway?
Fourteen, Chia said.
About what I told em. Youre fourteen, fifteen, for real, and no way you were on to me. I was on to you, right? It was my move. I planted on you. But they dont believe me. Say youre some kind of operator, say Im just stupid, say that Rez guy sent you to SeaTac to get the stuff. Say youre a set-up and Im crazy to believe a kid couldnt do that. She sucked on the cigarette, squinting. Where is it? She looked down at Chias bag, open on the white carpet. There?
I didnt mean to take it. I didnt know it was there.
I know that, Maryalice said. What I told em. I meant to get it back off you at the club.
I dont understand any of this, Chia said. It just scares me.
Sometimes I bring stuff back for Eddie. Party favors for the club. Its illegal, but its not all thatillegal, you know? Not hard stuff, really. But this time he was doing something else on the side, something with the Russians, and I didnt like it. Thats what scares me, that stuff. Like its alive.
What stuff?
That. Assemblers, theyre called.
Chia looked at her bag. That thing in my bag is a nanotech assembler?
More like what you start with. Kind of an egg, or a little factory. You plug that thing into another machine that programs em, and they start building themselves out of whatevers handy. And when theres enough of em, they start building whatever it was you wanted them to. Theres some kind of law against selling that stuff to the Kombinat, so they want it bad. But Eddie worked out a way to do it. I met these two creepy German guys in the SeaTac Hyatt. Theyd flown in there from wherever, I figured maybe Africa. She mashed the lit end of the cigarette into the little blue dish, making it smell even worse. They didnt want to give it to me, because they were expecting Eddie. Lot of back and forth on the phone. Finally they did. I was supposed to put it in the suitcase with the other stuff, but it made me nervous. Made me wanna self-medicate. She looked around the room. She put the blue dish with the crushed cigarette on a square black side table and did something that made the front of it open. It was a refrigerator, filled with little bottles. Maryalice bent over, peering in there. The pistol-shaped lighter slid off the pink bed. No tequila, Maryalice said. You tell me why anybodyd name a vodka Come Back Salmon Removing a little square bottle with a fish on its side. Japanese would, though. She looked down at the lighter. Like a Russian would make a cigarette lighter that looks like a pistol.
Chia saw that Maryalice didnt have her hair-extensions in anymore. When they were taking DNA samples, in SeaTac, Chia said, you stuck the end of your extension in there.
Maryalice cracked the seal on the little bottle, opened it, drained it in a single gulp, and shivered. Those extensions are all my own hair, she said. Grew em out when I was on sort of a health diet, understand? They catch people doing recreationals, when they take those hair samples. Some recreationals, they stay in your hair a long time. Maryalice put the empty bottle down beside the blue dish. Whats he doing? Pointing at Masahiko.
Porting, Chia said, unable to think of a quick way to explain the Walled City.
I can see that. You came here cause these placesll re-post, right?
But you found us anyway.
I got connections with a cab company. I figured it was worth a try. But the Russiansll think of it, too, if they havent already.
But howd you get in? It was all locked.
I know my way around these places, honey. I know my way entirely too well.
Masahiko removed the black cups that covered his eyes, saw Maryalice, looked down at the cups, then back up at Chia.
Maryalice, Chia said.
Gomi Boy presented like a life-size anime of himself, huge eyes and even taller hair. Who drank the vodka? he asked.
Maryalice, Chia said.
Whos Maryalice?
Shes in the room at the hotel, Chia said.
That was the equivalent of twenty minutes porting, Gomi Boy said. How can there be someone in your room at the Hotel Di?
Its complicated, Chia said. They were back in Masahikos room in the Walled City. Theyd just clicked back, none of that maze-running like the first time. Past an icon reminding her shed left her Venice open, but too late for that. Maybe once you were in here, you got back fast. But Masahikod said they had to, quick, there was trouble. Maryalice had said she didnt mind, but Chia didnt like it at all that Maryalice was in the room with them while they were porting.
Your cash card is good for twenty-six more minutes of room-time, Gomi Boy said. Unless your friend hits the mini-bar again. Do you have an account in Seattle?
No, Chia said, just my mother
Weve already looked at that, Masahiko said. Your mothers credit would not sustain rental of the room plus porting charges. Your father
My father?
Has an expense account with his employer in Singapore, a merchant bank
How do you know that?
Gomi Boy shrugged. Walled City. We find things out. There are people here who know things.
You cant tap into my fathers account, Chia said. Its for his job.
Twenty-five minutes remaining, Masahiko said.
Chia pulled her goggles off. Maryalice was taking another miniature bottle from the little fridge. Dont open that!
Maryalice gave a guilty little shriek and dropped the bottle. Just maybe some rice crackers, she said.
Nothing, Chia said. Its too expensive! Were running out of money!
Oh, Maryalice said, blinking. Right. I dont have any, though. Eddies cut my cards off, for sure, and the first time I plug one, hell know exactly where I am.
Masahiko spoke to Chia without removing the eyecups. We have your fathers expense account on line
Maryalice smiled. What we like to hear, right?
Chia was pulling off her tip-sets. Youll have to take it to them, she said to Maryalice, the nano-thing. Ill give it to you now, you take it to them, give it to them, tell them it was all a mistake. She scooted on her hands and knees over to where her bag sat open on the floor. She dug for the thing, found it, held it out to Maryalice in what was left of the blue and yellow bag from the SeaTac duty-free. The dark gray plastic and the rows of little holes made it look like some kind of deformed designer pepper grinder. Take it. Explain to them. Tell them it was just a mistake.