Svaha, page 8
"Gomenasai," he said. "To what do I owe the pleasure of this call, Hirose-san?"
"Perhaps I simply wished to meet you socially."
Even on a vid-screen, her sensuality made Yip ache. "Mata dozo," he said. Another time. "Though I find it unlikely."
"You're an attractive man."
He shook his head. "Perhaps to some. But not to a woman such as you, neh? What is it that you would like from me?"
Even her frown at his rudeness attracted him. Stop it, he told himself. She's a Dragon Lady. A geisha of the Goro clan, nothing more.
"Ja mata," she said. "I wanted to warn you that while the oyabun has taken your recommendation, he has also taken an interest in you. This is the reason for your recent promotion and the credits he has transferred to your account."
"Why?"
"He wishes to put you under obligation to him."
"I'm not yakuza, so I feel no obligation. What I want to know is why you are telling me this."
"I told you, Phillip. I like you."
"Domo." And I, you, he thought.
"I thought you should know of Goro-san's intentions," she added. "His interest in you has only begun."
"And am I now under some obligation to you for telling me this?"
Now her frown preceded a real anger. Her eyes flashed, her features became a mask. "I understand your caution,Yip-san, but I thought you a more insightful man than you are proving to be. Consider: In any relationship, a certain amount of faith is required of all parties concerned. Sumimasen. I am sorry to have interrupted your evening."
His screen went blank as she broke the connection.
Chiksho! Had he been wrong about her, or was she simply such a consummate actress? He felt like dirt. His heart ached.
A certain amount of faith?
Hai. But how much faith could he give to one who lived in the camp of the enemy?
Walking from the com-vid, he got his third Tombo from the fridge and put away half of the plastican in one long swallow.
A certain amount of faith.
He thought of Huan in the toilet at work, snorting frost in a cubicle. He hadn't spoken a word to his partner for the remainder of the day, and Huan hadn't approached him. How long had Huan been addicted? What had driven him to do it?
Yip had only been angry. Furious. Hurt. But he'd never thought to try to talk to Huan.
Hai, he thought. A little faith. But I will begin closer to home, Fumiko Hirose. I will clean my own house before I consider visiting yours.
If there was even a welcome for him there any more.
He finished the beer, looking out his window at the Zen pattern of the stones in the square below, then put on a jacket and left his apato.
SIX
1
It was a day, day and a half to the squats outside of the Trenton Megaplex, Ellis had said. But on his commandeered bike, Gahzee had made good time, better than he could have on foot. When he stopped to make camp that night, he could see a dull glow in the northeastern sky. The lights of the Megaplex.
This time Gahzee was careful. He left the bike and his pack where he planned to make camp, and made a sweep of the neighbouring buildings and streets, scouting for any sign of Outlanders such as Ellis and his people. He found none. By the time he returned to his campsite, a drizzle had started up. He retired to the ground floor of the nearest building before the acid rains fell in earnest, hissing and splattering on the cracked and buckling pavement.
Nanabozho joined him in his shelter, keeping his distance when Gahzee lit a fire by the door to warm water for tea, but coming closer as soon as Gahzee broke out some dried beef jerky which he shared with the coyote.
"No hunting for you tonight, brother?" Gahzee asked. "I'd think a trickster such as yourself could dance between the raindrops."
The coyote cocked his blue eye in the medé's direction.
"But there's no need, is there?" Gahzee continued. "Not when I've already provided for your belly."
He shared some dried apples with his companion, then went to work on his bow once more. Nanabozho lay by the fire, staring out into the wet night. When the rain finally let off an hour or so later, the coyote slipped out the door and was gone.
Gahzee immediately laid aside his bow and stepped outside as well, walking a Stalker's Wheel. The rain, for all its acidity, had still cleared the sky somewhat. Not enough to see the stars or Grandmother Moon, but the lights of the Megaplex appeared brighter. There was no sign of the coyote—no sign of anything, animal or man. This time Nanabozho had simply set out on his night's ramble, rather than sensing danger.
Returning to the building, Gahzee climbed its stairs to the roof. There he stood and stared out across the abandoned buildings, shadows lying thick around them, streets winding like pale ribbons between the structures where their routes weren't blocked by debris.
Gahzee had travelled by flyer to both the Nez Ch'ii Enclave of Navajo and the Wadi Enclave in Australia. There the tribes lived a life very different from that of his own People in the eastern woodlands of Kwarthas Enclave. Mother Earth's breasts were burnt and dry in their tribal lands. There were no forests, only deserts and lonely mesas. But there was still life there. Everywhere one turned, there was life. If one knew how to look. But here…
This was a land empty of resonance, Gahzee realized. There were people—such as the Outlanders who had captured him and those who lived in or about the Plexes—but they gave nothing back to their Mother. On that Wheel, there was little for their Mother to give in return, so the turn of the Wheel grew smaller and smaller.
The animals that still made the Outer Lands their home were not enough to restore harmony to these barren wastes. That was why Kitche Manitou had created the People. It was their Walk to bless the land and its children with their care, to speak with voices of drum and sacred smoke to the manitou, to weave the harmony between the Wheels that are and the Wheel of the mysteries. The path with heart.
The Outlanders had broken the spirit pipe that Manitouwaub had given him when he left the Enclave. Leaning against a parapet, he took paper and tobacco from his pocket and rolled a cigarette.
"Saemauh beendae/aeshkaugae," he said softly as he lit the cigarette. Tobacco cleanses my heart. "Saemauh beeninaendumishkaugae. Saemauh bizaundae/aeshkaugae." Tobacco cleanses my mind. "Tobacco brings calm.
He smoked slowly, sending the grey wreaths skyward—sacred smoke, sacred breath. When the cigarette was done, he flicked it over the edge of the roof and watched it land in a shower of sparks on the cracked asphalt far below.
Thunder grumbled in the sky, high and distant. Besreudang—the thunder that comes from the highest clouds and marks the end of a storm.
Gahzee looked up and smiled. "I hear you, grandfather," he said.
It was as he was turning away to go back down to his bedroll that he caught a flash of light from the corner of his eye. Something between his camp and the Megaplex. It came again.
He marked its position in his mind, determined to investigate its source in the morning.
He had much to learn of the Outer Lands. He meant to understand its smallest workings, for it would be his home, now that the Enclaves were closed to him. But first and foremost he was an animkwan—a dog-scout for the People. He could study and learn as he made his way through the TOPQ's barrens, but his primary objective was to find a downed flyer, and discover why an Enclave had suddenly ceased all broadcasting; not only ceased broadcasting, but also no longer replied to the broadcasts sent to it by the other Enclaves.
The fire had died down while he was gone, but he fed it no new fuel. Unrolling his bedroll, he laid it out by the wall near the dying coals. Sleep came quickly.
2
The yaks were about two klicks out of the squats and just planning to close in on their quarry when the thick cloud cover above loosed its first misting spray of acid rain.
"Shit," Kanji Yono muttered and tapped his partner on the back.
Masao Sho was already angling their scooter into the shelter of the nearest building. Neither yak was wearing the proper rain gear. But then neither was the pair they followed. Their quarry would have to wait out the storm as well. The faint hum of the Usaijin's Stirling engine faded as Sho shut it down inside the building. Yono got off the back to stretch his legs.
"Call in our position?" Sho asked, tapping the gridface of the scooter's com-link.
"Iie," Yono said, shaking his head. "Now we're neijin?"
Sho gave a curt nod, registering his own disdain. Neither of them cared to be considered toad-eating flunkies. One rose in the yak ranks through showing initiative as well as by following the oyabun's orders. One didn't rise if he called in every few minutes to ask if he could scratch his ass.
"They can't travel either," Yono said. "Not dressed as they are."
Moving to the door, he looked out through the rain in the direction that their quarry had taken, the infrared sights of his metallic contact lens allowing him to see as clearly as he might in daylight.
"Hai," Sho said.
He sat down by the Usaijin. With his partner taking the first watch, he brought out a hand-held vid Playman. He inserted a game chip and began a solitary game of go, playing against the smart circuits in the chip that simulated the style of a seventeenth-century go master. Even with a handicap, he'd yet to win a game with this particular chip.
3
When they first got there, all Lisa did was pace back and forth in the rubble-strewn foyer of the building where they'd taken shelter from the burning acidic rains. She was restless and paid no attention to the singed feathers of her headdress, the pock-marked stains on her jacket and mask. She let mask and headdress drop to the floor, continuing to pace while Donnybrook sat with his back up against a wall and quietly watched her. She finally paused by their stolen Usaijin and started to paw through the scooter's saddlebags.
"Find anything?" Donnybrook asked.
"Just yak shit."
A black cloth face mask. A small metal case of throwing stars. Spare Steeljack clips. A water flask half-filled with saki. Black fingerless gloves.
She tried the latter on, but they were far too big for her. She let them drop to the floor.
"Why don't you sit down?" Donnybrook said. "I'm getting wired just watching you."
Lisa sighed and came over to where he was sitting. She put her back against the wall and slid down until she was on the floor beside him.
"Did you ever get religion?" she asked.
Donnybrook shook his head. "Kinda hard to get into when you're living in the squats."
"Tell me about it."
"So why do you ask?"
"Just thinking," Lisa said.
"Kaoru?"
"Yeah. Kaoru." Her shoulders slumped as she spoke the name. "She didn't have religion either. Her mom taught her the Buddhist rap—you know, where Sakyamuni says that everything comes around again? But I dunno. I'd like to think she went somewhere better. I'd like to think she wasn't just going to show up in the squats again."
"Maybe she'll get reborn as a Plex baby."
"Fat chance. And who says that's better anyway?"
Donnybrook shrugged. "I figure it's all shit, Lisa. The lights go out and you hit the dark road…" His voice trailed off and he laid a hand on her knee. "I wasn't thinking."
" 'Sokay. That's the way I feel, too. Least this way nobody's gonna be dumping on her anymore, right?"
"That's one way of looking at it."
Lisa picked up some loose bits of stonework and began to pitch them against the far wall. "Remember the parties we used to have? It was Kay's idea to hit the badlands that first time. We had that big bonfire and we danced around it whooping like a bunch of Clavers in a dojin no vid. I got so wired on that 'yote button you gave me, I was sure I could see the stars that night."
"I always wanted to try the real shit," Donnybrook said, "but I never had me a Claver connection."
"Don't kid yourself—it's all synth. I don't care what anybody says. Nobody's got access to real peyote. Stuff we're doing probably isn't anything like the real shit. It'd be like the difference between smoking real tobacco and that Tabaccanin we get outta the Plex."
"Real tobacco was supposed to kill you—very slowly."
Lisa shrugged. "Yeah, but when you watch the Clavers smoking it, it's like it's sacred. Like it means something. Not just sucking back a nic' hit, synth or not."
"You're really into the Clavers, aren't you?"
"Nah. I just like the vids, that all. I know they fucked everything up in the real world. But they're kinda neat, when you imagine them, you know?"
"Did you ever want to go into an Enclave?"
"Oh, sure. Who didn't? And these—" she touched the dark red messenger tattoos on her cheek, "—'re just like the warpaint, you know, except they're permanent. But I'd die if I ever ran into one of those suckers in real life. I like my hair—on my head, not on some Claver's belt."
"Did you ever think that maybe it was all bullshit?" Donnybrook asked. "Just another Plex fairy tale?"
"Look around you," Lisa said. "This is what the Clavers left us. It's kinda hard to call this bullshit."
They were quiet for a long spell then, just listening to the hiss and splatter of the rain outside fade and finally stop. Lisa leaned against Donnybrook's shoulder.
"I'm really gonna miss her," she said.
"I know you are."
"I never thought it could hurt so much."
"It never gets any easier," Donnybrook said. "Comes with the territory—that's what the Ragman says every time we lose somebody. We've got the Plex, all squeaky clean, and then the badlands, and they're a different kind of clean. Empty, like a blank screen. And right in the middle, there's the armpit of the world. The squats. And who gives a shit what happens to its rats?"
Lisa nodded. "What do you think of the Ragman?" she asked. "What do you think about him being a tom—running the Co-Op?"
"I've known that for a while," he said, "so it's not like a big surprise for me. And he doesn't run the Co-Op. Everybody in it's got a piece of the action, Lisa. That's the whole point of it."
"So you really think there's a chance they can do something?"
"Don't know. But it's the best shot we've got. The only shot—at least that's the way I see it."
"I guess."
He gave her knee a squeeze and got to his feet. "Looks like the rain's letting up."
Lisa followed him to the door.
"I've got a funny feeling," he said as he looked out. "It's like something's not quite—"
His voice broke off and he started to fall. To Lisa, it was as though she suddenly shifted to a slo-mo vid. The air grew so thick that his body took forever to tumble to the floor, blood spraying out of his throat like a fountain on half-speed.
A buzz centered in the back of her head. She was drawing out her Steeljack before he struck the floor, before she was even really aware that he'd been shot, that he was dead. The auto-pistol filled her hand, rising up to point at the doorway, her finger squeezing off a round just as a blur of grey motion was filling the space there.
Her fléchette hit the yak square in the face, his features exploding. He was thrown back. His Steeljack dropped from his hand. Lisa stepped forward, moving slow because the air was like molasses and she had to wade her way through it. Her Steeljack was aimed out into the night. The buzz in her head became a shrill whine. She fired, her fléchette pinging against the metal of a yak scooter, throwing off a flare of sparks as it exploded. She started to fire again, but then something struck her at the base of her spine.
She sprawled forward, her third shot going wild, exploding in the air with a bright flash. She started to turn, tried to bring her Steeljack around in time to get off another shot. She knew she didn't have a hope in hell of matching a yak's augmented reflexes, but she had to try.
The second yak was just coming down from his kick. Her back felt like it was broken. Her Steeljack came up to cover him. He landed, but was already moving, to the side, in again. A flashing blur of a foot coming right for her. She tried to track him with the Steeljack, but the boot took it out of her hand with a blow that numbed her entire arm.
She fell, thinking, the bastard's so sure of himself he isn't even using his Steeljack. A callused hand grabbed the material of her jacket around her throat and dragged her up from the ground.
"The package!" he demanded, spittle spraying in her face.
He was cutting off her air. Her spine felt like it was on fire. Her right arm was a numb weight that dangled limply at her side. The buzz in her head was a high-pitched shriek. His metallic eyes looked robotic, like the sight sensors of a vid death machine. She started to reach for the grip he had on her throat with her left hand, then let that hand fall behind her. Her fingers closed on her buzz-stick. Thumbing it on high, she drove it up into his groin.
She used the toy out of desperation and almost wasn't prepared for the effect it had on the yak. Something to do with its electronics shorted out the yak's nervous system. His augments were implanted—not genetically tailored, she thought dully, everything still running in slo-mo.
A shudder ripped through the yak. He lost his grip and fell on top of her, the buzz-stick pushed farther into his groin, playing more havoc with his augments.
Lisa flexed her numbed right hand. Pins and needles burned up and down her arm. Her temples ached from the whine inside her head.
Work! she told her hand.
It crawled at a snail's pace towards her Steeljack. At full power, the buzz-stick had about ten seconds worth of juice left in it. In moments the yak would be fighting off the disruption of his augments and then she'd be dead meat.
Her fingers fumbled, finally closed around the Steeljack's grip. She brought the pistol up, muzzle pointing at the yak's left temple. Then the juice ran out of the buzz-stick.
"Puking gaijin!" the yak cried. "I'll—"
