the Noise Within (2010) (29 page)

Not for him the dubious delights of some sleazy off Strip bar, but rather the finest restaurants, the swankiest casinos and, he hoped, the company of the most glamorous women in town.

His hotel,
The Celestial Crown
, lived up to its reputation. In fact, he found his suite almost too lavish. Perhaps things would have been different had Layla still been with him. She would doubtless have been delighted by the way the suite's wet room so effectively created the illusion of standing under a waterfall in some tropical paradise. Philip may have found himself revelling in sharing such an experience with her. Instead he just felt jaded.

Maybe he was pining for the project more than he'd realised. At that particular moment, everything about the suite struck him as pretentious, as if some egotistical designer had been let loose with limitless funds and the sole aim of demonstrating how clever he was; which might not have been so far off the mark, come to think of it. Even the delivery system for the complimentary fruit irritated him: it arrived as if washed up by some far-reaching wavelet, rolling to a stop by your fingertips as you lounged in a deceptively comfortable seat which masqueraded as a deckchair.

He did wonder though how much of what surrounded him was CGR and how much was down to the designer's craft and artifice. After careful consideration, he concluded that there was probably less CGR involved than might have been expected, and that the designer had been genuinely inventive in producing the suite's Tropical Island feel. Which didn't mean he had to like it.

To distract himself, he embarked on a virtual tour of the hotel's facilities, beginning with its various bars and restaurants. The Salamander Bar was first up, where all the food was 'live cooked'. The prospect of kicking and squealing animals being flung haphazardly into ovens and bubbling cook pots horrified him, but to his considerable relief it proved to be not the food that was live but rather the cooking methods. Bite-sized slivers of meat, dainty skewers of marinated shellfish and delicately spiced meatballs were flame cooked to order in front of patrons by genetically crafted fire-breathing lizards. Roughly the length of a man's forearm, these livid green bug-eyed reptiles patrolled a mirror-backed glass shelf behind the bar under the watchful gaze of the chefs, their keepers, ready to fulfil orders.

Pure gimmickry, but also quite novel, and Philip determined to drop in and sample a skewer or two if time allowed.

Next was the Bernaard Bluschtal Bistro, where the universally renowned chef prepared dishes in his own unique fashion. Philip had eaten at a Bluschtal establishment before, on Homeworld, and had been singularly underwhelmed. The man's trademark technique consisted of using vibrational sound waves to cook food rather than heat. The process evidently excited ingredients at the molecular level, breaking down and tenderising the food and even heating it in a semblance of cooking. Philip had long ago dismissed this as one big over-spun gimmick, enough to make fire-breathing lizards seem mundane. Bluschtal was not even likely to be here in person. With the number of 'exclusive' eateries he had dotted around human space he could never spend more than a day or two a year at any given one of them, for all that they bore his name. Philip vowed to give the Bernaard Bluschtal Bistro as wide a berth as possible.

The renowned Star Crown Restaurant, an open air à la carte dining experience situated on the hotel's roof, promised to be of greater interest. The place looked to be tastefully laid out, with the building's artfully staggered roof providing a series of tiered terraces which lent a sense of intimacy despite the restaurant's not inconsiderable size. However, Philip was tiring of this virtual tour. After only a cursory glance at the proffered menu, he cancelled the program and decided it was time to experience some of The Celestial Crown's delights first hand.

Foregoing the proffered plug-in earguide, he opted for the hotel's independent autoguide. The small hump-backed machine detached itself from the console to hover in the air before him almost expectantly; a beetle-like dome of glistening metal that would drift ahead at head height, taking him to wherever he pleased.

First stop was the serenity pool, which instantly redeemed the hotel in Philip's eyes. The subtle lighting, shimmering stretches of clear shallow water over pebbles and the general ambience combined seamlessly to create a sense of genuine tranquillity, and the masseuse who attended him - a young local girl - was beautiful, demure, unfailingly polite and very skilled. She even had the good grace to laugh at his attempted witticisms. Under her gentle cajoling the tension disappeared from his muscles, and it was all he could do not to drift off to sleep despite having the expert hands of a pretty girl roaming the contours of his body.

The more he saw of the hotel the more impressed Philip became. There were occasional instances of ostentation but these were rare and for the most part the place spoke of attention to detail and understated opulence. Experience had taught him just how difficult a balance that was to achieve. He could forgive his own room's perceived shortcomings; after all, he only intended to use it as a place to sleep. If the room were too comfortable he might never feel inclined to venture out and experience all the other things that the hotel and the resort had to offer.

There was so much provided onsite that it would have been perfectly feasible to spend an enjoyable week or two never venturing beyond the environs of The Celestial Crown, but that would have been selling the rest of the resort short, and Philip had no intention of missing out. So later that first day, as afternoon drew towards evening, he stepped out onto the Strip, looked around, and chose his first port of call: a swish-looking casino which the hotel's reception manager had recommended to him.

And it was here that he encountered Giazyu for the first time.

Philip awoke with a thumping head. Again. He knew he should have stayed off the Giazyu but it was so readily available - far easier to take a pill when offered than to refuse; if not the first or second time then the third or fourth, after alcohol had lowered inhibition and new-found friends were urging you to join in.

He came here thinking he knew what to expect of Frysworld, but Giazyu changed all of that. He had heard of the drug, of course - no halfway decent report on the resort could avoid mentioning it, but nothing had prepared him for this, for the sheer abundance and casual acceptance of the drug. Before arriving, he had viewed Giazyu as just one more thrill which the resort had to offer. He hadn't appreciated it formed such an integral part of the local culture.

His initial sampling of the native drug seemed so completely innocuous - a sugar-coated pill handed out by a smiling girl as he entered that first casino. She stood behind a tray of multicoloured tablets which glistened in vivid hues like some display of complimentary candy. He took one without a second thought - everyone was accepting a pill as they walked past, casually dipping a hand into the array of baubles without even breaking stride or pausing in their conversation. What could be more natural than to do the same?

He took a yellow one. This proved to have a mellow, euphoric effect, which saw him float through the evening and perhaps encouraged him to gamble a little more freely than he might otherwise have done. Good business from the casino's point of view, while he had a ball. No real harm done.

The next night he tried more than one, sampling different colours. The result was a stronger kick, but this time the combination affected him like an exaggerated slam of adrenalin, making him feel exhilarated, hyperactive and unable to relax. It also seemed to affect his concentration, sending thoughts flying off at unlikely tangents. His stay at the casino was brief that night and he wandered on to several bars.

The following morning, memories of the night's events were a little hazy. He remembered watching the gyrating forms of several naked girls. There had been poles involved, and, had one act
really
taken place in freefall? Fractured memory painted pictures of multiple venues and sleazy décor, so perhaps he had strayed off Strip. He also recalled kissing a doe-eyed, coffee-skinned local girl, the caress of her lips and her darting, energetic tongue. She had straddled him as he sat, running her hands across his chest and rubbing her crotch against his, but what had happened after that? He couldn't remember her in any other context, but had things progressed beyond kissing and caressing? Certainly he woke up in his own room and alone, but she could have slipped out and left him sleeping. He checked his belongings and nothing seemed to be missing.

All of this was disconcerting, but worse was to come. It was the black pill that proved his undoing. He took one on the third night. Whether it was pure luck that he hadn't done so before or some innate sense of caution which equated black with darkness and danger, he couldn't say.

The experiences of the previous evening had shaken Philip. While he was not averse to a little chemical experimentation, he had come to Frysworld to enjoy himself, and he couldn't honestly say the disjointed and hazy second night qualified, while the delicate state of his head the morning afterwards certainly didn't.

Ever the pragmatist, Philip took time out from his hedonistic pursuits to research Giazyu before venturing into the Strip again. As he relaxed at the Serenity Pool, allowing his favourite masseuse to banish the knots from clenched muscles and the tension from his mind, he reflected on what he'd learned. The tablets, so readily available on the Strip, were considered a safe, tourist-friendly preparation of the drug. So presumably it had been his random downing of various different coloured pills that caused his downfall the previous night - the combination proving more potent than the constituent parts. He resolved to take just a single tablet when he went out that evening, relying on alcohol for any further stimulus.

Unfortunately, he chose the black.

This particular preparation was clearly designed to expand the mind, a process Philip was all too familiar with. Giazyu was very different from Syntheaven, but the effect was not a million miles away and it was enough alike to start eroding the mental defences he had held in place so resolutely since the fateful night in his apartment back on Homeworld. He had not brought any of the hybrid Syntheaven with him on this extended trip, determined to prove once and for all that he was
not
addicted, that the inhibitor worked and his frequent use of the drug was simply a manifestation of the desire to discover what the augmented pilots experienced and not a need for the drug itself. No, he didn't bring any Syntheaven with him, but he did pack some of the inhibitor, just in case.

Part of him accepted the justification that this was only sensible, that if he were to get drunk one night while away from home and score some Syntheaven as a result, he'd be grateful to have the inhibitor close at hand. It was a precaution, nothing more. But another part of him was quietly afraid that there was more to it, that this was a sign of weakness, that deep down he must surely expect to take some Syntheaven during the trip, or why bring the inhibitor along at all?

His abstinence was a niggling ache, a slowly smouldering desire which he had successfully contained by pushing it to the back of his mind while the many distractions of recent weeks provided a more immediate focus, but the black tablet of Giazyu brought everything crashing back.

A little later that evening, with the black pill still tainting his veins, he sat in a semi-respectable bar which was not quite on the Strip but tried to claim otherwise. Here, Philip was forced to confront his demons full-on. He had gone there to be alone, to sit with a drink somewhere away from the relentless glitz and glamour of the Strip. He was fighting to keep his thoughts focused; on his hand, his drink, the table that supported it, the simple task of reaching out to grip the glass and lift it to his lips; the act of swallowing. All the while, the narcotic that raced through his system was attempting the opposite - to send his thoughts flashing off in a dozen different directions.

When a figure loomed over him, he stared up into the face of a swarthy, broad-featured native and wondered whether the man was really there at all. "Hey, Mister, you look like a man of discernment, a man who knows how to have a good time. Have you ever tried any
real
Giazyu? Not the sanitised shit they spoon feed you on Strip but the raw, wild elixir as it was meant to be taken."

Philip breathed deeply, gathering himself to say, "Go away," as firmly as he could manage.

"Hey, no worries. I can see when a man wants to be left alone, but you want a fast track to heaven at any time, just ask for me, Carlo. I'll see you right."

Philip stared at him and couldn't help but ask, "Just Giazyu?"

The man paused in the act of leaving, and laughed. "Hell, no. Angeldust, Syntheaven, Burn - whatever you want, I'm the man. Remember: Carlo." He winked, before turning and walking away.

Philip watched him go, so tempted to call him back, so tempted to follow; but he pushed himself unsteadily to his feet and, panicked by the strength of his own temptation, fled the bar. Yet as he left he stopped and turned around, staring at the place with its lurid blue tubular sign which formed the words 'The Blue Nymph' in one flowing length and ended in a stylistic squiggle suggestive of a woman's naked body. Then he turned and hurried back to the Strip, the hotel, and the dubious comforts of his island paradise room.

He slept fitfully that night, his dreams filled with dark shapes and a sense of fleeing, of being hunted by an unseen, relentless horror.