Steel Beach (31 page)

“Why did you come to me?”

“I didn’t expect you could solve my problem, if that’s what you mean.”

“You got that right. I like you well enough, Hildy, but frankly, I don’t care if you kill yourself. You want to do it,
do
it. And I think I resent it that you tried to use me to get it done.”

“I’m sorry about that, but I wasn’t even aware that’s what I was doing. I’m still not sure if I was.”

“Yeah, all right, it’s not important.”

“What I heard,” I said, trying to put this delicately, “if you want something that’s, you know, not strictly legal, that Liz was the gal to see.”

“You heard that, did you?” She shot me a look that showed some teeth, but would never pass for a smile. She looked very dangerous. She
was
dangerous. How easy it would be for her to arrange an accident out here, and how powerless I would be to stop her. But the look was only a flicker, and her usual amiable expression replaced it. She shrugged. “You heard right. That’s what I thought we were coming out here for, to do some business. But after what you just said, I wouldn’t sell to you.”

“The way I reasoned,” I went on, wondering what it was she sold, “if you’re used to doing illegal deals, things the CC couldn’t hear about, you must have methods of disguising your activities.”

“I see that now. Sure. This is one of them.” She shook her head slowly, and walked in a short circle, thinking it over. “I tell you Hildy, I’ve seen a rodeo, a three-headed man, and a duck fart underwater, but this is the craziest thing I ever did see. This changes all the rules.”

“How do you mean?”

“Lots of ways. I never heard of that memory dump business. I’m gonna look it up when we get back. You say it’s not a secret?”

“That’s what the CC said, and a friend of mine has heard of it.”

“Well, that’s not the real important thing. It’s lousy, but I don’t know what I can do about it, and I don’t think it really concerns me. I hope not, anyway. But what you said about the CC rescuing you when you tried to kill yourself in your own home.

“What it is, the
main
thing that me keeps walking around free is what we call, in the trade, the Fourth Amendment. That’s the series of computer programs that—”

“I’ve heard the term.”

“Right. Searches and seizures. An all powerful, pervasive computer that, if we let him loose, would make Big Brother seem like my maiden aunt Vickie listening with a teacup against the bedroom door. Balance that with the fact that
everybody
has something to hide, something we’d rather nobody knew about, even if it’s not illegal, that lovely little right of privacy. I think what’s saved us is the people who
make
the laws have something to hide, just like the rest of us.

“So what we do, in the, uh, ‘criminal underworld,’ is sweep for extra ears and eyes in our own homes…  and then do our business right there. We
know
the CC is listening and watching, but not the part that types out the warrants and knocks down the doors.”

“And that works?”

“It has so far. It sounds incredible when you think about it, but I’ve been dodging in and out of trouble most of my life, using just that method…  essentially taking the CC at his word, now that you mention it.”

“It sounds risky.”

“You’d think so. But in all my life, I never heard of an instance where the CC used any illegally-obtained evidence. And I’m not just talking about making arrests. I’m talking about in establishing probable cause and issuing warrants, which is the key to the whole search and seizure thing. The CC hears, in one of his incarnations, things that would be incriminating, or at least be enough for a judge to issue a warrant for a search or a bug. But he doesn’t tell himself what he knows, if you get my meaning. He’s compartmentalized. When I talk to him, he knows I’m doing things that are against the law, and I know he knows it. But that’s the dealing-with-Liz part of his brain, which is forbidden to tell the John Law part of his brain what he knows.”

We walked a little farther, both of us mulling this over. I could see that what I’d told her made her very uneasy. I’d be nervous, too, in her place. I’d never broken any laws more serious than a misdemeanor; it’s too easy to get caught, and there’s nothing illegal I’ve ever particularly wanted to do. Hell, there’s not that much that really
is
illegal in Luna. The things that used to give law enforcement ninety percent of their work—drugs, prostitution, and gambling, and the organizations that provided these things to a naughty populace—are all inalienable human rights in Luna. Violence short of death was just a violation, subject to a fine.

Most of the things that were still worth a heavy-duty law were so disgusting I didn’t even want to think about them. Once more I wondered just what it was the Queen of England was involved in that made her the gal to see.

The biggest crime problem in Luna was theft of one sort or another. Until the CC is unleashed, we’ll probably always have theft. Other than that, we’re a pretty law-abiding society, which we achieved by trimming the laws back to a bare minimum.

Liz spoke again, echoing my thoughts.

“Crime just ain’t a big problem, you know that,” she said. “Otherwise, the citizenry in their great wisdom would clamor for the sort of electronic cage I’ve always feared we’d get sooner or later. All it would take would be to re-write a few programs, and we’d see the biggest round-up since John Wayne took the herd to Abilene. It’s all just waiting to happen, you know. In about a millisecond the CC could start singing like a canary to the cops, and about three seconds later the warrants could be printed up.” She laughed. “One problem, there’s probably not enough cops to
arrest
everybody, much less jails to put them in. Every crime since the Invasion could be solved just like that. It boggles the mind just to think about it.”

“I don’t think that’s going to happen,” I said.

“No, thinking it over, what the CC’s doing to you is really for your own good, even if it turns my stomach. I mean, suicide’s a civil right, isn’t it? What business does that fucker have saving your life?”

“Actually, I hate to admit it, but I’m glad he did.”

“Well, I would be too, you know, but it’s the
principle
of the thing. Listen, you know I’m going to spread this around, huh? I mean, tell all my friends? I won’t use your name.”

“Sure. I knew you would.”

“Maybe we should take extra precautions. Right offhand, I can’t think what they’d be, but I got a few friends who’ll want to brainstorm on this one. You know what the scary thing is, I guess. He’s overridden a basic program. If he can do one, he could do another.”

“Catching you and curing you of your criminal tendencies might be seen as…  well, for your own good.”

“Exactly, that’s
exactly
where that kind of bullshit thinking leads. You give ’em an inch, and they take a parsec.”

We were back within sight of the visitors’ gallery again. Liz stopped, began drawing aimless patterns in the dust with the tip of her boot. I figured she had something else she wanted to say, and knew she’d get to it soon. I looked up, and saw another roller coaster train arc overhead. She looked up at me.

“So…  the reason you wanted to know how to get around the CC, I don’t think you mentioned it, and that was…  ”

“Not so I could kill myself.”

“I had to ask.”

“I can’t give you a concrete reason. I haven’t done much…  well, I don’t feel like I’ve done enough to…  ”

“Take arms against a sea of troubles, and by opposing, end them?”

“Like that. I’ve been sort of sleepwalking since this happened. And I feel like I ought to be doing something.”

“Talking it over is doing something. Maybe all you can do except…  you know, cheer up. Easy to say.”

“Yes. How do you fight a recurrent suicidal urge? I haven’t been able to tell where it comes from. I don’t
feel
that depressed. But sometimes I just want to…  hit something.”

“Like me.”

“Sorry.”

“You paid for it. Man, Hildy, I can’t think of a thing I would have done other than what you’ve told me. I just can’t.”

“Well, I feel like I ought to be doing something. Then there’s the other part of it. The…  violation. I wanted to find out if it’s
possible
to get away from the CC’s eyes and ears. Because…  I don’t want him watching if I, you know, do it again, damn it, I don’t want him watching at
all
, I want him out of my body, and out of my mind, and out of my goddamn life, because
I don’t like being one of his laboratory animals
!”

She put her hand on my shoulder and I realized I’d been shouting. That made me mad, it shouldn’t have, I know, because it was only a gesture of friendship and concern, but the last thing somebody crippled wants is your pity—and maybe not even your sympathy—he just wants to be normal again, just like everybody else. Every gesture of caring becomes a slap in the face, a reminder that you are
not well
. So
damn
your sympathy, damn your caring, how
dare
you stand over me, perfect and healthy, and offer your help and your secret condescension.

Yeah, right, Hildy, so if you’re so independent how come you keep spilling your guts to strangers passing on the street? I barely knew Liz. I knew it was wrong, but I still had to bite my tongue to keep from telling her to keep her stinking hands off me, something I’d come close to half a dozen times with Fox. One day soon I’d go ahead and say it, lash out at him, and he’d probably be gone. I’d be alone again.

“You have to tell me how this all came out,” Liz said. It relaxed me. She could have offered to help, and we’d have both known it was false. A simple curiosity about how the story came out was acceptable to me. She looked at the walls of the visitors’ center. “I guess it’s about time to piss on the fire and call in the dogs.” She reached for the radio de-bugger.

“I have one more question.”

“Shoot.”

“Don’t answer if you don’t want to. But what
do
you do that’s illegal?”

“Are you a cop?”

“What? No.”

“I know that. I had you checked out, you don’t work the police beat, you aren’t friends with any cops.”

“I know a couple of them fairly well.”

“But you don’t hang with them. Anyway, if you
were
a cop and you said you weren’t, your testimony is inadmissible, and I got your denial on tape. Don’t look so surprised; I gotta protect myself.”

“Maybe I shouldn’t have asked.”

“I’m not angry.” She sighed, and kicked at a beer can. “I don’t guess many criminals think of themselves as criminals. I mean, they don’t wake up and say ‘Looks like a good day to break some laws.’ I know what I do is illegal, but with me it’s a matter of principle. What we desperados call the Second Amendment.”

“Sorry, I’m not up on the U.S. Constitution. Which one is that?”

“Firearms.” I tried to keep my face neutral. In truth, I’d feared something a lot worse than that.

“You’re a gunrunner.”

“I happen to believe it’s a basic human right to be armed. The Lunar government disagrees strongly. That’s why I thought you wanted to talk to me, to buy a gun. I brought you out here because I’ve got several of them buried in various places within a few kilometers.”

“You’d have sold me one? Just handed it over?”

“Well, I might have told you where to dig.”

“But how can you bury them? There’s satellites watching you all the time when you’re out here.”

“I think I’ll keep a few trade secrets, if you don’t mind.”

“Oh, sure, I was just—”

“That’s all right, you’re a reporter, you can’t help being a nosy bitch.”

She started again to take the electronic device from around my neck. I put my hand on it. I hadn’t planned to do that.

“How much? I want to keep it.”

She narrowed her eyes at me.

“You gonna walk out into the bush, invisible, and off yourself?”

“Hell, Liz,
I
don’t know. I’m not planning to. I just like the idea that I can use it to be really alone if I want to. I like the thought of being able to vanish.”

“It’s not quite that simple…  but I guess it’s better than nothing.”

She named a price, I called her a stinking thief and named a lower one. She named another. I’d have paid the first price, but I knew she was a haggler, from a long line of people who knew how to drive a hard bargain. We agreed soon, and she gave me an elaborate set of instructions on how to launder the payment so what transactions existed in the CC would be perfectly legal.

By then I was more than ready to go inside, as I’d been trying my best to practice the fourth method of liquid waste management, and was doing the Gotta-Do-It Samba.

What with covering the Collapse from the site and chasing victims’ relatives, dome engineers, politicians, and ambulances, I didn’t make it into the newsroom for almost ten days after my Change.

It turns the world on its head, Changing. Naturally, it’s not the world that has altered, it’s your point of view, but subjective reality is in some ways more important than the way things
really
are, or might be; who really knows? Not a thing had been moved in the busy newsroom when I strode into it. All the furniture was just where it had been, and there were no unfamiliar faces at the desks. But all the faces now meant something different. Where a buddy had sat there was now a good-looking guy who seemed to be taking an interest in me. In place of that gorgeous girl in the fashion department, the one I’d intended to proposition someday, when I had the time, now there was only another woman, probably not even as pretty as me. We smiled at each other.

Changing is common, of course, part of everyday life, but it’s not such a frequent occurrence as to pass without notice, at least not at my income level and that of most people in the office. So I stood by the water cooler and for about an hour was the center of attention, and I won’t pretend I didn’t like it. My co-workers came and went, talked for a while, the group constantly changing. What we were doing was establishing a new sexual dynamic. I’d been male all the time I’d worked at the
Nipple
. Everyone knew that the male Hildy was strictly a hetero. But what were my preferences when female? The question had never come up, and it was worth asking, because a lot of people were oriented toward one sex or the other no matter their present gender. So the word spread quickly: Hildy is totally straight. Homo-oriented girls might as well not waste their time. As for heterogirls…  sorry, ladies, you missed your big chance, except for those three or four who no doubt would go home and weep all night for what they could no longer have. Well, you like to think that, anyway. I must admit I saw no tears from them there at the cooler.