Midnight Lamp (33 page)

They fell silent, listening to Julia: who was trying, with the nervous insistence of one who feels her head is on the block, to coax Allie into fixing their avatar lab appointments. ‘I’m still prostrate with grief,’ remarked Ax, in a pause.

‘Me too,’ said Dora, ‘I couldn’t give anything real to being dunked.’

They were wondering how long they could stretch this out. The polls, Hollywood’s mighty oracles, said that Fiorinda’s death itself was cool, the punters found it romantic. On the other hand, her friends were tainted, since suicide equals failure. They could hear the sound of their credit running out. Word was, while he was talking to them about reprise dates at the Bowl, their good friend Harry Lopez was telling the studio bosses that he could do without the custom avatars, and he’d be happy to let the English go.

Sage’s preparations for the funerary rites involved the UCLA neurology faculty, at the West LA VA—where a virtual-movie camp follower, one of Harry’s Hollywood scruffs, was a postdoc. She’d given Sage access to the cyclotron/PET lab, where he’d been scanning the Few in batches, at dead of night. No one had challenged them. They had Lissa’s security clearance, and several members of the party able to look perfectly at home in a neurology lab: should anyone have wandered in. On the final trip, when Lissa the postdoc had done the raw processing for him, he went alone with Doug Hutton, in an anonymous second hand motor, still at dead of night, to pick up the plates.

Doug was sour, because he was spooked. ‘I’ve had some peculiar drug requests from you an’ Ax in my time, but securing a supply of radioactive carbon dioxide fuckin’ tops it. What was all that about?’

‘The word radioactive worries people,’ explained Sage. ‘You have to sign things. If Lissa had nicked what we needed we’d surely have been spotted. You nick it from another hospital, we’re in the clear. What’s wrong with you?’

‘I don’t know that it was nicked. I just bought it. What’s it for, eh?’

‘It’s a marker. I have the folks inhale the gas, it gets into their blood. Then I can track the increase of CBF, cerebral blood flow, and glucose take-up, across the brain. From there, with some fancy coding on an immix processor, I can get down to fractional firing, single neurons, stuff I can use. PET tech is ancient, but it’s very slick these days, an’ it’s commonplace. If I’d gone after realtime cognitive scanning, it would have been a shitload more trouble. As it is, I have the raw material for an immersion of Fiorinda here, enough aspects of her to engineer an entanglement, without—’

‘I don’t know what you’re talking about, and I don’t want to know.’

‘Then why d’you ask? Just drive around the block, while I go in and pretend to be a visiting researcher again. Hey, Doug, d’you realise I could have worked here, what d’you think? In a real white coat, an’ all.’

‘I think you’re nuts. Take the mask off, at least.’

‘Right.’

Lissa the brainy tinsel-town wannabe was waiting for him, with her pretty body-mods and a top knot of coloured braids. She handed over the stack of slim black boxes that held his darling, and he gave her a fistful of backstage passes in trade, plus a few rounds of her cutting-edge drug of choice. She’d have liked a different deal, but not one he could offer.

‘I get that you’re monogamous, Sage,’ she said, as she let him out of the silent basement, her cat-whiskers twitching. ‘I mean, binogamous. But no one thinks party-sex is being unfaithful, and it would be good for me, socially, if I could say we did it. Wouldn’t it be good for you? I mean, I’m hip and young.’

I am not so hard up, he thought, that I have to jump your skinny underage little bones. Not that kitten-faced morsel was underage. Lissa was older than Aoxomoxoa had been, when he’d delivered that cutting line (lying through his teeth) to a fourteen year old Fiorinda. Her fair-dealing attitude made him think of Billy the Whizz, and that brought his mood to earth.

‘No, it would not be good. Don’t tell anyone you did me, Lissa. It could bring you bad luck. Don’t let anyone know who gave you the passes, either.’

She stared, kitten-eyes wide and thrilled. ‘Am I in danger? Hey, is this something to do with the murders?’

‘You’re not in danger, but be discreet. G’bye, and thanks again.’

He sat with the plates in a plastic bag on his knee, watching the swathes of security light on lawns and trees as Doug negotiated the dark campus. The car paused, obeying a stop sign: and who’s that, heading back the way we came, crossing the gracious shadow of a midnight tulip tree? It’s a raw-boned middle-aged Irish fellow, a woollen shawl around his shoulders, a rifle in his hands and a whacking great sword at his back. Lissa is under my protection, thanks, he thought. Give me credit. But he believed he knew what the ghost meant, and it comforted him.

You see all sorts of things, in this town at night.

A week before the date they gave Harry a preview, at Digital Artists village, in the faux space of a virtual model of the Bowl. Sage insisted his immix effects must stay under wraps, but Harry saw the supergroup performance, and his relief was pitiful. It was a shame to let the bastard off the hook, but he was more and more stressed-out, and supposed to be on the point of dumping them. If they’d stalled any longer, he might have decided to cancel.

Three days later, Ax and Sage and were summoned to a meeting, held in a conference room in the depths of the Los Angeles Civic Centre. Doug Hutton and Allie came too, but in the end they weren’t allowed in. Harry was there, and Philemon Roche and his partner Karen Phillips. So were Lou Branco, and Marshall Morgan from Digital Artists, looking very scared and confused. The other faces around the table were new. A big sixtyish man in a sober suit, with a long, heavy-jowled face, two power-dressed forty-something women, one of whom would surely have been more comfortable in uniform, a few more suits, plus a couple of people who looked like rumpled academics. The big man they recognised at once; the principal women were also easy to name.

They could have been visiting their own past. Everything was different, these were not hapless hijacked young musicians, but the shell-shocked disbelief was the same. The atmosphere hit them when they walked into the room, and filled them with terror. The big man introduced himself as Joseph Raine, and said he was Philemon’s boss. Ax said politely that yes, he knew Mr Raine’s position.

No other names were offered, no dogtags or placecards were on display. The white power-lady stared hard at Sage, but he wasn’t asked to remove the mask. Mr Raine told them, in case they hadn’t worked it out, that they were looking at the Committee brought together by President Eiffrich, to investigate the problem on which Mr Preston, Mr Pender and the late Ms Slater had been consulted. He expressed his shock and sympathy. They nodded.

Ostensibly, the news was that the body had at last been formally identified, and could be released. Dental records and DNA profiles had been accepted in evidence by the coroner, plus a faxed affidavit from Fiorinda Slater’s legal next of kin, her grandmother; who had viewed the less distressing evidence by video link. The expense of the cold air freight for her last journey, back to England, would be covered by the US government, with all honours for a very brave lady, who had suffered greatly in her country’s service. Mr Raine once more expressed, on behalf of the Committee and Mr Eiffrich his deep regret.

Fiorinda’s gran had been the willing accomplice of Rufus O’Niall, in the rape and torture of his daughter. She was over eighty, completely crazy, and confined in a high security nursing home, under close supervision. The ex-dictator and his former chief Minister did not ask to see the affidavit.

Ax thanked the Committee for their sympathy.

‘That’s all our business,’ said Mr Raine. ‘We felt you should hear it from us, in full session. We felt we owed you that. We know the uncertainty has been a cruel addition to your loss, and in a sense we’re glad to be able to end it. Now there’s a document we’d like you to sign, drawing the line under your involvement with our investigation.’

One of the minor suits came round and presented a folder to Ax, a second folder to Sage. They glanced at the printed pages. The clause that jumped out said that they agreed never to raise the issue of suspicious or unexplained circumstances around Fiorinda’s death: either with media representatives, or any other public or private agency, in the world, ever.

What would happen if they didn’t sign, it didn’t say.

‘The thing I remember,’ remarked Sage, ‘is when we came to Hollywood, we were taken to a crime scene. We were asked for an opinion on Celtic human sacrifice, with your weapon-developers maybe messing around with natural magic, an’ all. I don’t really follow what happened about all that?’

Philemon Roche looked at the tabletop, Karen smiled uneasily. Harry Lopez rubbed a hand across his felt-tip moustache. Lou Branco looked like a toad plunged in boiling water, paralysed by fear and astonishment.

‘With the greatest respect, Mr Pender, and Mr Preston, sir,’ said Joseph Raine. ‘Fiorinda’s death is a tragedy for your nation, and a great personal grief to many. I wish to God this hadn’t happened, but we must disengage ourselves from any reflection her suicide may place on the highly secret work of this Committee.’

‘You’ve given us a lot to think about,’ said Ax, evenly. ‘Probably we ought to take legal advice, could it be arranged?’

Marshall Morgan said, in an undertone, ‘the studio can provide lawyers.’

Murmurs round the table, Digital Artists’ lawyers would be acceptable.

‘Thank you,’ said Ax. ‘We’d appreciate that.’

The folders were retrieved. It was agreed there would be a second meeting, after the Bowl concert, with the studio lawyers present.

Ax and Sage were rescorted from the room.

‘They took it quietly,’ said Mr Raine.

‘They do that,’ said Harry. ‘Stoneface, it’s a double act. They won’t throw you a bone. They go away and think about it.’

‘Mr Preston is a guerrilla fighter,’ remarked the dark-complexioned power-lady dryly. Her accent betrayed that she came from the east, probably New England, indeed. ‘He won’t engage superior forces in the field, he’ll back off and harry us.’

‘Harry, do you think they know they’re under surveillance?’

‘Yes,’ said Harry, miserably. Of course they fucking know, he thought. Do they look like morons, those beautiful
galley-slaves
? Everything you hear is scripted. He could not believe how badly this situation was being handled. But he could do nothing, the situation was far, far beyond his reach.

‘Is there
no
way we can talk frankly to Sage Pender?’ asked one of the scientists from Vireo: oblivious of the atmosphere. ‘An exchange of views, with the Zen Self champion. It would be very, very valuable.’

‘We’re past there, Joey,’ sighed the white power-lady, whose accent revealed her as a Texan. She ran a well-manicured hand through her spiky blonde hair. ‘We’re in the worst case scenario. Can’t you keep that in your head?’

‘I want those two out of the country,’ said the other woman. ‘With their friends, soon as possible.’ She looked sternly at the movie-men. ‘The publicised concert must go ahead, but immediately after that.’

Joseph Raine said, ‘I take your point, Miriam, but there are considerations—’

Lou and Marsh were like new boys in the playground. They didn’t look at anyone, least of all each other. They feared they might not get out of here alive.

*

Ax and Sage were taken to join Doug and Allie, and asked to wait. Maybe it was hoped they’d start babbling wildly. They waited, exchanging banal remarks of mourning, and were released (given clearance to leave the Centre) about an hour later. In the lunchtime bustle of the lobby they spotted Harry, talking to the unmistakable Kathryn Adams. Harry didn’t see them, but Kathryn did. One guarded, hopeless look, and she turned away. They were not surprised. They already knew Kathryn was no longer on their side.

‘This body,’ muttered Allie, ‘What shall we do with it?’

‘Let the US government freight it to London,’ said Ax, ‘They wanted to burn her. Let the fuckers bury a fake.’

At Sunset Cape they escaped to the Triumvirate suite. Sage’s board lay on the rug, facing a row of high-rez screens and an immix sketchpad flatbed. He was working twenty hours out of the twenty-four now, crosslegged in front of this array, surrounded by the slim, leaf-shaped ‘plates’ that were the descendants of the big old immersion-master Black Boxes he used to haul around, in the days of Dissolution. He barely ate, he didn’t sleep. The gig? First time we’ve been on stage together in years, and it must be magnificent? They’d have to wing it.

Sage folded down at once, and reached for his eyewrap. He wasn’t using his new contacts. They weren’t familiar enough, and besides… We don’t know our enemies, but we know there’s no one we can trust at Digital Artists. Use nothing that’s alien. Ax picked up his cherry red Les Paul from beside the bed, and sat with it, softly picking. He knew this didn’t disturb the maestro.

‘Did they really think we’d sign that thing?’

‘Fuck knows. Do they have to be rational? Was it rational to kidnap her? I have no idea what’s going on in their heads.’

They were routinely using signal jammers, in the house. They spoke freely in here, and if there was some bug they hadn’t found, well God’s will be done.

‘We don’t know they kidnapped her,’ said Ax. ‘We don’t know anything.’

Sage had used the UCLA basement connection because he did not want anyone to spot what he was trying to do. But few people in the world could have guessed, and with anyone but Fiorinda on the other end of this, the task would have been hopeless. He was trying to set up a
cut and paste
, lifting (a known map) Fiorinda, from an unknown location in local information space, (local a relative term here), and fusing it with the immix he’d created from his PET scans, (an entangled facet of the same known map). In four dimensions, bit by fucking bit.

‘How’s it going?’ asked Ax, a question he rationed. ‘Shall I leave you to it?

‘Too slow. Shit, my eyes are
fried.
Stay? I like having you there.’