City of Golden Shadow (40 page)

He shook his head. She could smell the beer on his breath, but he seemed relatively steady on his feet "He gone home. What you making 'em line up now?"

She stared at him in puzzlement.

"Another man sitting in a car out in front when I got home, Big man, beard. He drove off when I walked up."

Renie felt a swift pang of fear. " A white man?"

Her father laughed. " 'Round here? Naw, he was black as me. Somebody for one of the other places, probably. Or a robber. You keep that chain on the door when I'm not around."

She smiled. "Yes, Papa." It was rare to see him so concerned.

"I'll see if there's something to eat" He hesitated in the doorway, then turned. "That friend of yours, he's one of the Small People."

"Yes. He's a Bushman. From the Okavango Delta."

There was a strange look in her father's eye, a small fire of memory. "They the oldest folk, you know. They were here even before the black man came-before the Xhosa, the Zulu, any of them."

She nodded, intrigued by the faraway sound of his voice.

"I never thought I'd see one of his kind again. The Small People. Never thought I'd see any more."

He went out the distracted expression still on his face. He shut the door quietly.

CHAPTER 14

NETFEED/NEWS: Merowe To Face War Crimes Trial

(visual: Merowe surrendering to UN General Ram Shagra)

VO: Hassan Merowe, the outsted president of the Nubian Republic, will face a UN tribunal for war crimes.

(visual: UN soldiers excavating mass graves outside Khartoum)

As many as a million people are thought to have died during the ten years of Merowe's rule, one of the bloodiest in the history of Northeastern Africa.

(visual: Merowe's attorney, Mohammad al-Rashad)

RASHAD: "President Merowe is not afraid to stand before other world leaders. My client singlehandedly built our nation from the smoldering ruins of Sudan. These people all know that a leader must sometimes take a firm stand during times of chaos, and if they claim they would have done differently, then they are hypocrites. . . ."

A neon-red line crawled at the edge of his vision, as though one of his own ocular capillaries had suddenly become visible. The line wriggled and turned on itself, branching and then rebranching as the expert system which it symbolized did its work. Dread smiled. Beinha y Beinha were not trusting his promises on security-they wanted to know his virtual office as well as they knew their own. Not that he would have expected anything different. In fact, despite some successful past partnerships, he would have had serious doubts about hiring them again if they had taken him at his word.

Confident, cocky, lazy, dead. It was the Old Man's mantra, and a good one, even if Dread sometimes drew the lines in different places than the Old Man would. Still, he was alive, and in his kind of business that was the only measurement of success-there were no failures who were merely poor. Of course, the Old Man had something to show for his greater caution-he had been alive longer than his hired gun. A lot longer.

Dread augmented the field of abstract color outside the office's single window, then returned his own attention to the virtual white wall as the Beinhas' gear finished checking the security of his node. When it had satisfied itself, it disconnected, the red line vanishing from Dread's own monitor program and the Beinha twins immediately snapped in,

They appeared as two identical but almost featureless objects, seated side by side on the far side of the table like a pair of headstones. The Beinha sisters disdained high-quality sims for personal meetings, and no doubt regarded Dread's own expensive replication as a meaningless and flashy example of excess. He enjoyed the prospect of their irritation: noting the tics of other professionals, and even of his victims, was the closest he ever came to the fondness for the habits of friends that enlivened the existence of more mundane people.

"Welcome, ladies." He gestured to the simulated black marble table and the Yixing stoneware tea service, so important for doing even virtual business with Pacific Rim clients that Dread had made it a permanent part of his office environment. "Can I offer you anything?"

He could almost feel the annoyance that emanated from the twin shapes. "We do not waste our net time on amateur theatricals," one of them said. His satisfaction increased-they were annoyed enough not to hide it. First move to him.

"We are here to deal," said the other faceless shape.

He could never remember their names. Xixa and Nuxa, something like that, elfin Indio names quite out of character with their real selves, first given to them when they were the child stars of a Sao Paulo brothel. Not that it mattered whether he remembered or not: the two operated so much as a single entity that either would answer questions addressed to the other. The Beinha sisters considered names almost as much of a sentimental indulgence as realistic sims.

"Then we'll deal," he said cheerfully. "You reviewed the prospectus, of course?"

More irritation, revealed in the slight pause before reply. "We have. It can be done."

"It will not be easy." He thought the second had spoken, but they used the same digitized voice, so it was difficult to tell. The sisters had an effective act-they seemed to be one mind inhabiting two bodies.

What if it really is only one person? he suddenly wondered. I've certainty never seen more than one of them at a time in RL. What if the whole "deadly twin" thing is just a marketing gimmick? Dread put aside the interesting thought for later. "We are prepared to pay 350,000 Swiss credits. Plus approved expenses."

"That is unacceptable."

Dread raised an eyebrow, knowing his sim would mimic the effect exactly. "Then it seems we'll have to find another contracting agency."

The Beinhas regarded him for a moment, blank as two stones. "The job you wish done is only technically within the civil sector. Because of the importance of the . . . object you plan to remove, there would be many repercussions from the national government. Loss of the object would, in fact, have worldwide impact. This means that any contractors would have to prepare a greater degree of protection than is usual."

He wondered how much of their unaccented English was voice-filters. It was not hard to imagine a pair of twenty-two-year-old women-if his information on them could be trusted-purposefully shedding their accents along with everything else they had jettisoned on their way to becoming what they were.

He decided to poke them a bit "What you're saying is, this is not really a civilian job but a political assassination."

There was a long moment's silence. Mockingly, Dread brought up the background music to fill it. When the first sister spoke, her voice was as flat and inflectionless as before. "That is correct. And you know it"

"So you think it's worth more than Cr.S. 350,000."

"We will not waste your time. We do not want more money. In fact, if you sweeten the job for us with something else, we will ask only Cr.S. 100,000, most of which we will need for post-action protection and a cooling-off period."

Again the eyebrow lifted. "And what is this 'something else'?"

The second of the two shapeless figures laid spatulate hands on the tabletop. "We have heard that your principal has access to certain biological products-a large source of them in our own hemisphere."

Dread sat forward. He felt something tightening at his temples. "My principal? I'm the only person you deal with on this contract. You're on very dangerous ground."

"Nevertheless, it is known you do a great deal of work for a certain group. Whether they are the ultimate source of this contract or not, they have something we want"

"We wish to start a side-business," said the other sister. "Something less strenuous for our old age than our current occupation. We think that wholesaling these biological products would be ideal, and we seek a way into the business. Your principal can grant us that. We seek a franchise, not a rivalry."

Dread considered. The Old Man and his friends, despite the immense influence they wielded, were certainly the objects of many rumors. The Beinhas traveled in the sort of circles that would know much of the truth behind even the most horrifying and improvable speculations, so their request didn't necessarily imply a breach of security. Even so, he did not particularly relish the thought of going to the Old Man with such an impertinent offer, and it also meant he would lose some of his control over his own subcontractors-not the sort of thing that suited his future plans at all.

"I think perhaps I should give this job to Klekker and Associates." He said it as lazily as possible-he was angry with himself at being caught off-balance. Second move to the Beinha sisters.

The first shape laughed, a snick of sound like a breadknife being drawn across someone's windpipe. "And waste months and credits while he does the backgrounding?"

"Not to mention trusting the job itself to his team of bravos," added the second, "who will come in like wild bulls and leave hoofprints and horn-scars on everything. This is our territory. We have contacts all over that city, and in some very useful sectors of it, too."

"Ah, but Klekker won't try to extort me."

The first placed her hands on the table beside her sister's, so that they seemed to be performing a seance. "You have worked with us before. You know we will deliver what you need. And unless you have changed mightily, senhor, you plan to play the role of foreman yourself. Whose preparations would you rather trust your own safety to-Klekker, working in a strange place, or us, performing in our back garden?"

Dread lifted a hand. "Send me your proposal. I'll consider it."

"It has just been transferred."

He curled his fingers. The office and the faceless sisters vanished.

He dropped his glass of beer to the floor and watched the last few ounces foam out onto the white carpet. Fury burned in him like a gutful of cinders. The Beinhas were clearly the right people for the job, and they were right about Klekker and his mercenaries, which meant he'd at least have to talk to the Old Man, tell him what the sisters had requested.

Which would mean going back to the mad old bastard on his knees, at least symbolically. Again. Just like that ancient advertising logo, the dog listening alertly to the radio or whatever it was. His master's voice. Down on all fours, like so many times in his childhood before he had learned to answer pain with pain. All those dark nights, screaming under the other boys. His master's voice.

He rose and paced back and forth across the small room, his hands fisted so tight his fingernails cut into his own flesh. Rage swelled inside him, making it hard to breathe. He had three more interviews to go that night, minor ones, but he didn't trust himself to handle them properly just now. The Beinhas had him where they wanted and they knew it. Ex-whores always knew when they had you by the balls.

Answer pain with pain.

He walked to the sink and filled his palms with cold water, then splashed it on his face. It matted his hair and dripped from his chin onto his chest, soaking his shirt. His skin felt hot, as though the anger within had heated him like an iron stove; he looked at himself in the mirror, almost expecting to see the water rising from him as steam. His eyes, he noted, were quite wide, so that a rim of white showed all the way around.

Relief, that was what he needed. A little something to soothe his thoughts, to cool the tension. An answer. An answer to his master's voice.

Through his small window he could see the saurian hump of the bridge and the vast scatter of shimmering lights that was Greater Sydney. It was not hard to look down on that pulse and glitter and imagine each light as a soul, and that he-like God in His high place-could just reach out and extinguish any one of them. Or all of them.

Before he could get any more work done, he decided, he would have to get a little exercise. Then he would feel stronger, the way he liked to feel.

He turned up his inner music and went to get his sharp things.

"I do not doubt it is true," said the god. "I ask is it acceptable?"

The rest of the Ennead stared back at him with the eyes of beasts. Eternal twilight filled the broad windows of the Western Palace and steeped the entire room in a bluish light which oil lamps could not entirely dispel. Osiris lifted his flail. "Is it acceptable?" he repeated.

Ptah the Artificer bowed slightly, although Osiris doubted that Ptah's real-life counterpart had done anything like it. That was one of the advantages of the Brotherhood conducting its meetings on his own virtual turf-his governing systems could insert at least a modicum of courtesy. As if to prove that the bow had not been his own gesture, Ptah snapped back: "No, damn it, of course it's not acceptable. But this stuff is very new-you have to expect the unexpected."

Osiris paused before replying, allowing his anger to cool. Most of the other members of the Brotherhood's high council were at least as stiff-necked as he was; it would do no good to put them on the defensive. "I simply want to know how we can lose someone whom we ourselves placed in the system," he said at last "How can he have 'disappeared'? We have his body, for God's sake!" He frowned at this accidental self-mockery and folded his arms across his bandaged chest.