Infoquake (27 page)

Who was this man and why was he staring so intently at Natch?

The tour continued for most of the next hour. They made their way through the halls of the Gandhi University and saw the room where
Sheldon Surina had lectured for most of his life. Natch peered through
the windows of the Creed Surina auditorium and saw the pulpits where
teachers and minor bodhisattvas preached the gospel of scientific innovation. He received cursory introductions to a few distant cousins of
Margaret's who appeared to be the only civilians wandering the halls.
After twenty more minutes of this, Natch grew increasingly bored.
Either Margaret had not inherited her father's fabled magnetism, or
she was storing up her energy for more important performances.

The Islander, too, appeared to have lost interest in Margaret's spiel.
Every time Natch turned around, he found the big man staring at him
with two brawny arms tucked in his pockets like siloed missiles. The
stare contained neither malice nor menace. If Natch had to choose a
word to describe his attitude, it would be skeptical.

A thought occurred to him. Was this whole lap around the Surina
compound just an excuse for the Islander to check him out?

As they made their way back to the Center for Historic Appreciation, Natch decided to subject the Islander to a test of his own. He
focused all his attention on the Revelation Spire-as the tall protruding spike atop the Surina residence was called-and then pretended to lose his footing. The fiefcorp master would have bet his
weight in gold that he would have crashed into Margaret before the
Islander could stop him. But in the space of a heartbeat, the Islander
lashed out from his rearguard position and gripped Natch firmly at the
base of his ribcage. The entrepreneur could feel the rings on the big
man's fingers digging into his flesh.

Natch met the Islander's stare, and for a split-second he could see
straight through the man's defenses. He saw a look of concern for Margaret's safety that went far beyond any expression a bodyguard would
have displayed. This is personal for him, thought Natch. This man is no
mercenary.

The husky Islander set Natch back on his feet as he would a toy soldier. For the first time, Natch noticed that the man was about the
same age as Margaret. The Islander let a sly grin creep into his countenance. He saw right through Natch's ploy, but instead of being
angry, he seemed to appreciate Natch's resourcefulness.

Margaret did not even notice the interruption. The two men
exchanged no words as they followed her into the Center for Historic
Appreciation and back to the library room, now decorated with a
single functional dining table.

Natch made awkward small talk with Margaret as they grazed on
authentic Indian cuisine. Curry and cumin danced on the end of his
tongue, and he soon found himself settling into a mellow post-vindaloo stupor. Natch was ready to concede to Vigal that his suspicions
had been unfounded, that Margaret really just wanted his participation
in this upcoming 400th birthday celebration for Sheldon Surina. The
Islander popped in and out of the room several times, eating nothing.
Natch was no closer to figuring out the man's place in Margaret's retinue, but this was a mystery he could solve another time. For now,
Natch wanted desperately to draw the dinner to a close and get back
to Shenandoah, where his bio/logic programming bars were waiting.

And then, after the dishes quietly slid into a compartment in a
back wall, Margaret leaned forward and pressed her fingertips together.
"You are probably wondering why I invited you here," she said.

Natch nodded.

"You are here," said Margaret, "because Len Borda is planning to
have me killed next week."

The atmosphere became deathly quiet as Natch tried to think of something pertinent to say. Margaret's eyes suddenly glared at him like
spotlights. The Islander stood by the door with the intensity of a coiled
snake, looking as if he might pounce at any moment. That explains why all those guards are roaming around with itchy trigger fingers.

"So the Defense and Wellness Council is trying to kill you," said
Natch, affecting nonchalance. "What does that have to do with me?"

Margaret drummed her fingers together. "Sheldon Surina used to
say that we are all connected in a fundamental-"

"Don't patronize me," Natch snapped. The bodhisattva gave an
exaggerated blink of shock, and couldn't resist a sidelong glance at the
equally perplexed Islander standing in the doorway. Natch pressed on.
"So Len Borda is going to kill you. That's wonderful. Why should I
care? If you're so worried, go send a message to Sen Sivv Sor or John
Ridglee. I'm sure they'd love to spread the news all over the Data Sea.
But me-I've got a business to think about. I don't have time for politics."

Margaret's face toyed momentarily with outrage, ventured into
amusement, and finally settled on weary fortitude. She laid her palms
flat on the table and leaned forward. "They tell me that the only things
you care about are money and power," she said. "Well then ... let me
translate this into language you can understand. I am about to present you
with an opportunity for more money and more power than you can possibly
imagine. Number one on Primo's is a child's fantasy by comparison.
You can either hear me out, or leave now and go back to fighting for
scraps on Primo's. It is your choice."

Natch could have chosen to be insulted at the way this woman had
casually belittled everything he had fought for since the Shortest Initiation. Sharp retorts hovered on the tip of his tongue. But then Natch
remembered how easily he had fallen for the bait that the capitalman
Figaro Fl had laid out for him all those years ago. I won't be manipulated,
he repeated to himself over and over like a mantra. Natch looked at the
Islander, who stood, amused, struggling to suppress his laughter. He
knew, at least, that Natch had proven his point: Margaret's wealth and
pedigree would not intimidate him. So instead of shouting, the fiefcorp master activated a relaxation program called OceanBreez 38 and waited a few seconds for the bio/logic code to suffuse his body with
calm.

"I'm listening," he said at length.

The bodhisattva spread out her hands in a gesture of peace. "Let
us start at the beginning," she began. "I am guessing that you were
born sometime in the 320s ..."

"331," said Natch.

Margaret nodded. "331, then. You know what kind of position the
economy was in at that time. My father's death and the collapse of
TeleCo left the bio/logics industry in ruins and millions of programmers in the diss. The Economic Plunge of the 310s, they called it,
though it lasted longer than that. People in the orbital colonies were
starving for the first time since the Autonomous Revolt. Not a good
period for business. Not a good period for anybody.

"Of course, by the late 320s, things were already turning around.
High Executive Borda had started handing out enormous defense contracts to the fiefcorps, hoping the credits would funnel down to the
masses. For ten years, the Council gave subsidies to just about anyone
who asked-including me."

Natch's eyes were beginning to glaze over. According to the legends, Sheldon Surina had also been fond of historical digressions. Did
I take the tube halfway across the globe and lose an entire day in MindSpace
for a civics lesson? "So Len Borda gave you money."

"Yes," she continued. "I approached the Council with blueprints
for a new set of memory enhancement programs. Programs to drastically extend the potential of the human brain, based on the technology
my father left behind at his death. I painted Borda a picture of Council
officers with total recall and soldiers who could memorize the tiniest
details of a battlefield. He was impressed."

The fiefcorp master frowned. "I don't understand," he interrupted.
"Why did you of all people need Council credits?"

Margaret gave a wry smile, and her face clouded up momentarily with a far-off look. Then she stood, shook off the gloom, and fetched
two tiny cups of Turkish coffee from the access panel in the wall.
"Natch, my father might have been a scientific visionary, but he was
never a prudent businessman." She deposited one of the cups on the
table in front of Natch. "Yes, he made breakthroughs in teleportation
technology, but he never figured out a way to pay for them. Let us just
say that TeleCo was not the only organization Marcus Surina left on the
brink of bankruptcy when he died."

Natch sipped the bittersweet brew from the delftware cup and
thought about his mother holed up in the towers of Old Chicago. He
felt a brief surge of anger, but batted it away. "So Borda anted up," he
said.

"Yes. The Surina Perfection Memecorp received one of the largest
appropriations of the entire Economic Plunge. You see, it was a winwin situation. We desperately needed financial stability, and the public
desperately needed confidence in the future, in their governments. And
who could provide a better hope for tomorrow than the Surinas?"
Natch listened carefully but could find no trace of irony in her voice.
"So everyone got what they wanted. We got the funding we needed to
turn ourselves around. Borda got a shining example of prosperity to
show off. And the economy recovered.

"Which leads us to today.

"We have not been idle all this time. After trying its hand at a
variety of projects, the Surina Perfection Memecorp has spent the last
sixteen years in research and development. And now Len Borda is
about to find out exactly what he paid for all these years ago." The bodhisattva's voice crackled slightly at the end of her sentence. An expression of fear? Of regret?

"The Phoenix Project," Natch said.

Margaret rolled her eyes and gave a knowing look to the Islander,
who responded with a smile rich in irony. "I despise that name. Some
drudge coined the term. It wasn't supposed to be so secretive. We really did start out with memory enhancers. We never intended to provoke a twenty-year guessing game on the Data Sea."

"Okay," said Natch, shifting uncomfortably in his seat. "So what's
this big invention then? Not memory enhancers, I take it."

"No. Not really. It's a bio/logic program. But much more than just
a bio/logic program."

"You're going to have to be more specific than that."

Margaret remained maddeningly calm. She blew on her coffee and
watched the wisps of steam disperse around the room. Her eyes were a
lake of measureless depth. "I can't. Not yet."

The mounting tension was too much for Natch. He let out an irritated puff and threw his hands in the air. "So we're back to the original question. What do you want from me?"

"I want you to license my technology," said Margaret.

Nobody spoke for several moments. Natch bounced his gaze back and
forth between Margaret and her silent companion, wondering if
somehow the Patel Brothers were behind this, if they had conned Margaret into diverting him here while they solidified their number one
position on Primo's. The Islander looked Natch up and down as if
taking detailed measurements.

"Let me get this straight," said Natch. "You're asking me to license
some new product without telling me what it is? And if that's not
enough, the Defense and Wellness Council is willing to kill you to
keep the whole project quiet? Well, forget it. I don't want anything to
do with this. What makes you think I want Len Borda coming after
me?"

The bodhisattva's demeanor softened, though whether it was an
expression of sympathy or merely a change of tactics Natch could not
tell. "Let me ask you a question, Natch. What's the quickest way to neutralize a poison?"

Natch thought for a moment. "Dilute it," he said.

"Precisely. Dump any poison into a large enough ocean, and its
effects are nullified."

"Okay, I see what you're driving at."

"The Defense and Wellness Council sees my technology as a
poison. My technology, Natch-my life's work, which I've spent sixteen years building." Margaret abruptly looped a bony finger through
the handle of the coffee cup and raised it into the air. "But pour this
poison into the largest ocean of all-the Data Sea-and it becomes
part of the ocean itself. It becomes inert. More importantly, once you
release the poison, it cannot be bottled up again. " She raised the cup to her
lips and drank it to the dregs in one angry gulp.