Idolon (15 page)

"Here we are," Jeremy said. The TV helped her out of the private van he'd picked her up in.

"What is this place?" She craned her neck to see, following the straight, rectilinear grid of the building's facade.

"A conference center." He seemed preoccupied. "We use it for a wide variety of activities: Retreats. Seminars. Planning sessions and special events." He led her by the hand to the front entrance. "There are a number of women here already."

"Like me?"

"Yes."

Nadice glanced nervously at the street and the steep hill leading up to the hotel. She didn't want to be here, but Mateus had given her no choice. He would never let her go. He had never intended to. He would string her along with promises or threats, whatever it took to keep her in line.

Jeremy caught her staring at the street. "What?"

"I'm worried about Mateus. He'll follow me. He found me at the shelter—he'll find me here."

"Mateus is your boyfriend?"

She shook her head. "The man I work for. I have something of his. He'll want it back."

"Something you stole from him?" Jeremy said. He turned the full spotlight of his attention on her.

"Not exactly."

He waited for her to explain.

"I'm carrying something for him," she said, uncertain how to word it. She should have said something sooner, so he wouldn't think she was trying to hide it from him.

"Something?"

"I don't know what it is." She rolled her shoulders. "He didn't tell me. I brought it into the country for him, when I was transferred from my previous job in Lagos."

"You're a Monospace?"

"It was just for this one time. It was the only way I could get free of Atherton... so they wouldn't force me to give up the baby."

He frowned, and her stomach pinched. It was over, she thought. No way he was going to take her now.

"Who's the package for?" he asked.

"I don't know. This guy examined me yesterday. I guess whatever I have wasn't ready yet. I'm supposed to see him again."

"When?"

"Today, I think. Mateus was supposed to let me know."

"So there could be others looking for you, in addition to Mateus."

She ducked her head. "I'm sorry."

He smiled philosophically. "These things happen. We'll just have to deal with it, if it comes to that."

Relief flooded her. He wasn't going to cut her loose, wasn't going to send her back to the shelter.

A pair of heavily armored security guards loomed just inside the main double doors to the lobby.

"See?" Jeremy said. "You're perfectly safe. We're used to assholes coming up here and causing problems."

Nadice smiled at the exoskeletoned guards. They projected the don't-fuck-with-me attitude of professionals. The shelter hadn't had security like this. If it had, Mateus would never have gotten inside. He would have a harder time getting to her in here. As far as she could tell, the only way in was through the well-defended lobby.

Jeremy registered her at the front desk. The process involved a DiNa bar code and retinal scan. Since she wasn't waring a built-in eyefeed, she was given a pair of spex. When registration was completed, he took her to an elevator framed by tall plants in Raku pots. The graphene foliage was programmable. It changed shape and texture, alternating between variegated leaves and the fluttering, diaphanous wings of insects. The effect left her unsettled, and more than a little light-headed.

"Hungry?" he asked.

She bit her lip. Her stomach churned, remembering the rice she had tossed on the commuter train.

"You look a little pale," he said. "It might help if you lie down."

_______

Her room overlooked the Boardwalk and a ribbon of seawall that meandered along the coast, holding the ocean at bay.

"That's Monterey over there," he said, pointing. Through the floor-to-ceiling window, she could make out the hazy outline of coastal hills hunched across the bay. "On clear days, you can sometimes see whales. Their waterspouts, anyway."

Exhausted, Nadice plopped down on the side of the bed. The tempergel molded to the undersides of her legs.

"Try to get some rest," Jeremy said. "You're scheduled for a medical exam in two hours."

There was a second bed in the room. "Who's that for?"

"We might need to pair you with someone else. I'm afraid space is rather limited right now."

Were there really that many of them?

"I'll check back with you before the exam. In the meantime, if you need anything, feel free to query the building datician."

Nadice fingered the spex in her lap. "How long will I be here?" She hoped it was for a while. She couldn't believe how totally wiped she was... how much tension she had been holding. All she wanted to do was sleep.

"In a day or two, if you're healthy enough to travel, you'll be transferred to a more permanent facility."

"And then what?"

The smile reappeared. "You become a mom."

_______

Dr. Kwan pursed cherry-blossom lips as she looked Nadice over. She wore white slacks and a pink disposable lab coat with matching slippers. Her head was shaved. Any second, Nadice expected the doctor's scalp and the rest of her 'skin to philm over with the prickly static all of the street TVs were screening these days.

"How do you feel?" the doctor said.

"Tired," Nadice admitted. The two-hour nap had helped, but she still felt weary, a little disoriented and, well... overwhelmed. She still wasn't sure what she'd gotten herself into, if this was the right move or not.

The doctor gave a curt nod. "That's to be expected."

Nadice couldn't tell if this vague generalization referred to all pregnancies or to hers in particular.

The doctor pinched the skin on the back of her hand. "It looks like your electronic skin has started to degrade."

Nadice nodded. "It started three days ago."

"I assume there's a security marker in the 'skin, and when the degradation reaches a certain point you'll be toxed."

Nadice showed her the ampoule she'd been given at the Get Reel. "I'm supposed to take this to slow things down. But I've been afraid to take it because ... because of the baby."

Kwan plucked the ampoule from her, examined it, then dropped it into a side pocket in her lab coat. "Have you experienced any numbness or muscle weakness so far, or had any difficulty breathing?"

"Not yet."

"Good. Jeremy also informs me you might have been doped with additional GPS, RF, or chemical taggants."

"I'm pretty sure."

"All right." Kwan seemed unperturbed, her manner matter-of-fact and confident, equipped to handle all contingencies. "We'll check for those first. Spybots, too. Might as well cover all the bases." She stared at an eyefeed image and tapped a command on a small palm d-splay.

Nadice watched her brusque, efficient eyes, trying to see into them, through them, for any sign that might betray her underlying feelings.

"Now, let's take a look at the baby. Shall we?" Kwan offered her a clinical smile. Not particularly warm, but what it lacked in fuzziness it made up for in competence.

Nadice relaxed. It didn't matter if the doctor liked her or not. Kwan would do her job. As long as Nadice had the baby, the TVs would protect her, keep her safe.

"Please take off your clothes and lie down," Kwan said, nodding at the recliner in the corner. The doctor dipped her hands into a tray filled with sterilizing solution. When she removed them, they were gloved.

Nadice stripped. The room was aseptically cool. Her nipples, already tender, hurt as they stiffened. At least the tempergel on the cushions was warm. So was the overhead light. The goose pimples on her arms retreated.

"Open wide."

Nadice spread her knees and stared at the milk-white ampoule Kwan held between pinched fingers. "What's that?"

"Nanocams and a linked simage array," Kwan said. "They will embed in the wall of your uterus and keep a close eye on things for us."

Kwan slipped the ampoule in. It was coated with some kind of slick lubricant and dissolved almost immediately.

Kwan produced a second ampoule. "This one contains wetronics to disable the security ware and neutralize any other maltronics you might have picked up. There are also several proprietary applets that will enable us to download and manufacture specific protective n-zymes."

"What kind of maltronics?" Nadice asked.

"REbots and nanomals from industrial spies and black-market hackers looking to steal downloads or rip copies of philm."

Nadice pinched her brow. "REbots? Nanomals?"

"Re-Engineering bots and nanobot malware. They break down the functional and structural components in electronic skin so they can be analyzed and copied. Most of the time they're fairly benign. You don't even know they're there, but not always."

"It sounds like you see that a lot," Nadice said.

"All the time." Kwan deftly inserted the ampoule, then straightened. "We think these bots may be how you became pregnant, by disassembling DiNA sequences, which later recombined to form packets of nanoanimated motile DNA."

Nadice blinked. "Sperm, you mean."

"Yes. Or the functional equivalent."

Nadice clamped her knees together, feeling suddenly vulnerable. "How?"

"We're not sure." Kwan pursed her lips. "The odds of that kind of nanomation and exaptation occurring spontaneously and simultaneously in hundreds of women around the world are astronomical. That's why we believe the mechanism is divine in nature ... that it arose from the background radiation of the universe."

Nadice stared at her. "You're kidding, right?"

"In every fetus we've examined so far," Kwan said, "no two DNA profiles are the same. Each contains new genetic material we've never seen before."

Nadice dug her fingertips into her trembling knees. "That's nuts. Just because you don't understand something doesn't mean it's a miracle. How do you know it's not some hack job?"

Kwan's face clouded.

"Do you know what these nanomated genes do?" Nadice asked.

"Not yet. The only thing we know for sure is that the development of the fetus is accelerated."

"Accelerated?"

Kwan peeled the gloves from her hands. "Gestation appears to be about twice the rate of a normal fetus. Growth starts out fairly normal, then speeds up after the first eight weeks or so. We've received a couple reports of early midterm abortions where the baby was developmentally much farther along than it should be."

"Why would they grow so fast?"

"Good question." Kwan tossed the latex gloves into a translucent pink biohazard recycler. "We're still not sure how many of the babies will prove viable. There appear to be a much higher than normal incidence of mid- to late-term miscarriages, possibly caused by the rapid development."

Nadice stared at the discarded gloves. She could lose the baby. That was what the doctor was telling her. "That's why you're looking for pregnant women, isn't it?" she said. "So we won't get abortions when we find out what's inside us."

Kwan folded her arms on her chest.
"I
want every woman to have access to good information and good medical care so they won't make a rash decision. I want to be sure every baby has a chance."

Why? What were they looking for? Hoping for?

_______

When Nadice got back to her room, she discovered she had a roommate. The woman from the Get Reel. Marta. She lay in a fetal curl on the bed, staring blankly at the eggshell-smooth wall.

"What are you doing here?" Nadice asked. Stupid, but the only thing that came to mind.

Marta sat up. "You, too?"

Nadice nodded, unsure what she was referring to—that the TVs had found her, or that the conception was immaculate.

"I'm sorry." Marta took her hand and squeezed it, first in sympathy, then in solidarity. Marta had long, delicate fingers. Nadice's were ugly in comparison, cracked and calloused from years of cleaning up after other people, disinfecting soiled lives. She pulled her hand back, curling it into a self-conscious ball.

"When did they come for you?" Marta said.

"Last night."

Marta returned a sour grimace. "They caught up with me first thing this morning. Gave me the good news."

"I just had my first exam," Nadice said.

Marta snorted. "I guess they don't waste much time around here. How did it go?"

Nadice sat on the edge of the other bed so they faced one another, her back to the big sun-warmed window. "The doctor inserted some nanocams in me to keep an eye on the baby."

Marta forced a laugh. "I can't wait."

"It's not too bad."

Marta regarded her coolly. "Are you one of them?" "No."

"You could just be saying that."