The Peripheral (10 page)

KYDEX

F
rom between her bedroom curtains she saw Burton come around the corner of the house, walking fast in bright sunlight, swinging the handle of the tomahawk. He held it as if the head were the T-shaped top of a walking stick, which meant its edges were clipped into a Kydex minisheath he or one of the others had made. Making thermoplastic sheaths and holsters was a hobby of theirs, like macramé or quilting. Leon teased them about merit badges.

One of those big retro-looking Russian motorcycles, shiny and red, with matching sidecar, was waiting by the front gate. Rider and passenger wore round black helmets. The passenger was Leon, she saw, the jacket unmistakable.

She’d slept through again. Remembered no dreams. Angle of sun said early afternoon. Leon removed his helmet as Burton came up to the red motorcycle, but stayed put in the sidecar. Took something from a jacket pocket, passed it up to Burton, who glanced at it, then put it in his back pocket.

She stepped back from the curtains, put on her bathrobe, gathered up clothes for after the shower.

But first she needed to tell Burton about Conner. She headed downstairs, in robe and flip-flops, clothes under her arm in a towel. Heard the Russian bike heading out.

Burton was on the porch. She saw that the sheath on the tomahawk was that flesh tone, like orthopedic devices. That was the shade they all preferred, black being considered too dressy. Maybe if somebody saw that orthopedic shade, under the hem of your shirt,
they’d just think you’d had an operation. “Seen Conner lately?” she asked him.

“No. Just pinged him, though.”

“What for?”

“See if he wants to help us out.”

“I saw him last night,” she said, “in the parking lot at Jimmy’s. Seriously not good. Like he was that close to doing something to a couple of football players. Right in front of everybody.”

“Need somebody to watch the road, nights. He’d stay straight for that. He’s getting fucked up out of boredom.”

“What was that,” she asked, “on the back of the trike?”

“Probably just a .22.”

“Shouldn’t somebody be trying to help him, he gets that fucked up?”

“Way less fucked up than he has every right to be. And I’m trying. The VA isn’t going to.”

“I was scared.”

“He’d never hurt you.”

“Scared for him. What was Leon here for?”

“This.” He pulled a state lottery ticket, bright and stiff, out of his back pocket, showed it to her.

Leon stared at her out of a blurry foil hologram, to the left of a retinal scan. “Looks like it should have his genome on it,” she said. It had been a while since she’d seen one, their mother having taught them both never to pay what she called the stupidity tax. “You think he’ll win ten million?”

“It’s not that much, but if he does, we’re onto something.”

“You weren’t here last night, after I talked to Milagros Coldiron.”

“Carlos needed some help, tightening the pattern. Who was it?”

“Neither of the ones you talked to. Name’s Netherton. Said he was human resources.”

“And?”

“Wanted to hear what happened. Told him, same as I told you.”

“And?”

“He said they’d be in touch. Burton?”

“Yeah?”

“If it’s a game, why would anybody want to kill you, just for seeing something happen in a game?”

“Games cost, to build. That’s some kind of beta version. They keep all that shit secret.”

“There wasn’t anything that special about it,” she said. “Plenty of kills that ugly, in lots of games.” Though she wasn’t so sure about that.

“We don’t know what it was, about what you saw, that they’d think was special.”

“Okay,” she said, handing him the ticket. “I’m taking a shower.”

She went back into the house, through the kitchen, and out to the shower.

She was taking off her bathrobe when her phone buzzed on her wrist. “Hey,” she said.

“Macon. How you doing?”

“Okay. How’re you?”

“Shaylene says you’re looking for me. Hope it’s not a user satisfaction issue.” He didn’t sound worried.

“More like tech support, but it’ll have to wait till I can see you.”

“I am just now holding a little salon, as it happens, in the snack bar here. We have Hefty’s famous pork nubbins. Pretty much all of them.”

“Confidential.”

“Absolutely.”

“I’ll be over on my bike. Don’t leave.”

“You got it.”

She showered, then dressed in the jeans she’d worn the day before and a loose gray t-shirt. Left the robe and towel and flip-flops on the shelf outside. Headed around the house to her bike.

Didn’t see any of Burton’s posse, but assumed they were there, more settled in. And the drones would be up too. None of that seemed very
real to her. Neither did the gaudy ticket with Leon’s hologram and retina on it. Maybe Conner wasn’t the only one batshit, she thought.

She unlocked her bike, got on it, seeing that Leon had somehow managed to not actually deplete her battery, and pedaled away, smelling the roadside pines in the warm afternoon.

She was about a third of the way along Porter, when the Tarantula passed her in the opposite direction, engine whining, too fast for her to get even a glimpse of Conner.

She rode on, through the fried-chicken smell, until that thinned and was gone, and forty-five minutes later was locking her bike outside of Hefty Mart.

Macon had his own table in the snack bar, furthest from where you paid. It was because he could troubleshoot for the local management, handle things the chain’s headquarters in Delhi didn’t have a handle on. When things went wrong with inventory tracking, or with the shoplifter blimps, Macon could fix it on-site. He wasn’t on any payroll, but part of the deal was that he got to use the table in the snack bar as his office, with an open tab on snacks and drinks.

He wouldn’t do anything, for anybody, that had to do with building drugs, not the usual position for someone in his line of work. It could make things tricky for him, if people who built drugs had something that needed fixing, but it could make other things easier. Deputy Tommy Constantine, in Flynne’s opinion the closest thing in town to an attractive single man, had told her the Sheriff’s Department called on Macon if they couldn’t get their shit fixed otherwise

The snack bar smelled of nubbins, the pork ones. The chicken ones didn’t smell as much, maybe because they lacked the traditional red dye. Macon was working his way through a plate of the pork ones as she came up to the table. His back was to the wall, as always, and Edward, to his left, was fixing something that wasn’t there.

Edward had a Viz in either eye, she assumed for the depth perception, and a lavender satin sleep mask over them both, to block out the
light. He wore a pair of tight flu-orange gloves, with what looked like black Egyptian writing all over them. She could almost see the thing he was working on, but of course she couldn’t, because it wasn’t there. It might be in the manager’s office upstairs, or for that matter in Delhi, but Edward could see it, and control the pair of plastic hands that held it, wherever that was.

“Hey,” said Macon, looking up from his nubbins.

“Hey,” she said, pulling up a chair. The chairs here all looked like they were molded from the stuff Burton had coated the inside of the trailer with, but less flexy.

Edward frowned, carefully placed the invisible object six inches above the tabletop, and reached up to raise the sleep mask to his forehead. He looked out at her through the silver webbing of the two Vizs, grinned. A grin was a lot, from him.

“Nubbins?” Macon asked.

“No thanks,” she said.

“They’re fresh!”

“All the way from China.”

“Nobody grows pork nubbins juicy as China.” Macon, lighter skinned than Edward, sort of freckled, had very beautiful eyes, irises mottled greenish brown. The left one, now, was behind his Viz. “Phone’s bricked, huh?”

“Don’t you worry about those things?” she asked, meaning the Viz. “Seeing everything.”

“Ours have been pretty thoroughly fiddled with,” he said. “Right out the box, you’d be wise to worry.”

“Mine hasn’t bricked,” she said, knowing he knew perfectly well that it hadn’t. “Thing is, Homes stuck Burton out on the athletic field at Davisville High, to keep him from beating on Luke 4:5.”

“Sorry to hear,” he said. “He didn’t get to beat on them at all?”

“Enough to get taken into protective custody. So they had his phone overnight. What worries me is that they might have looked at mine while they had his.”

“In that case,” he said, “they’d have looked at mine as well. Your brother and I pretty much in a way of business.”

“You tell, if they had?”

“Maybe. Some bored Homes in a big white truck, looking for porn, I could probably tell. To be frank, if they did, I’d know. But some panoptic motherfucker federal AI? Fuck only knows.”

“Would they see my phone was funny?”

“They could,” said Edward, “but something would have to be looking at you, something that really specially wanted to know about certain people’s phones.”

“Actually,” said Macon, “we did you quite the job. Manufacturer in China hasn’t spotted one of ours yet.”

“That we know of,” said Edward.

“True,” said Macon, “but usually we hear if they do.”

“Basically, you don’t know?”

“Basically, no. But I’ll give you permission not to worry about it. Free.”

“You get anything for Conner Penske lately?”

Macon and Edward gave each other a look. Edward lowered the sleep shade over his Vizs and picked up the thing that wasn’t there. Turned it over. Prodded it with an orange and black forefinger. “What sorta anything you thinking of?” Macon asked.

“I was over at Jimmy’s last night. Looking for you.”

“Sorry I missed you.”

“Conner was there, getting into it with a couple of high school dicks. Had something on the back of his trike.”

“Yellow ribbon?”

“Kinda robot snake-spine? Hooked up to a monocle-looking thing.”

“We didn’t fab him that,” Macon said. “Surplus off eBay. Legal. We got him a servo interface and circuitry, is all.”

“What’s on the business end?”

“Nothing we know of,” he said. “Arm’s length.”

“He could wind up in some serious trouble. You know that?”

Macon nodded. “Conner, he’s a compelling motherfucker, you know? Hard to say no to. That trike and shit’s all he got now.”

“That and wakey and drinking. If it was just the trike and some toys, it maybe wouldn’t be so bad.”

Macon looked at her, sadly. “Little manipulator on the end,” he said, “like Edward’s using, but fewer degrees of freedom.”

“Macon, I’ve seen you do guns.”

Macon shook his head. “Not for him, Flynne. No way for him.”

“He could still get one.”

“You could walk through this town, fall down ’most anywhere, you’d land on a fabbed gun. Not like they’re hard to get. I stay out of Conner’s way, then his shit stops working, then the VA can’t fix it for him, so his quality of life falls off, fast. If I don’t, and we keep his shit up and running, he’s grinning up at me asking for whatever he knows he shouldn’t have. It is, honestly, very hard. Understand me?”

“Burton might be hiring him.”

“I like your brother, Flynne. Like you. You sure you don’t want a plate of nubbins?” He grinned.

“I’ll pass. Thanks for the tech support.” She stood up. “Be seeing you, Edward.”

The lavender sleep mask nodded. “Flynne,” he said.

She went out and unlocked her bike.

One of the blimps was hanging over the lot, pretending to just be advertising next season’s Viz. But the banner with the big close-up of an eye behind a Viz made it look like it was watching everybody, which of course she knew it was.

VERY SENIOR

N
etherton had never been in Lev’s grandfather’s drawing room before. He found it simultaneously gloomy and gaudy, foreign by virtue of being somehow too vehemently British. The woodwork, of which there was a great deal, was painted a deep mossy green, gloss enamel highlighted with gilt. The furniture was dark and heavy, the armchairs tall and similarly green.

He was grateful that Ash had specified a gender for Detective Inspector Ainsley Lowbeer, the first law enforcement officer to have set foot in this house since its purchase by Lev’s grandfather.

Her face and hands were a uniformly pale pink, as though she were lightly inflated with something not quite so dark as blood. Her hair, short and businesslike at the back and sides, was thick and perfectly white, like sugary cream, and swept up in a sort of buoyant forelock. Her eyes, too brightly periwinkle, were sharply watchful. She wore a suit as ambiguous as she was, either Savile Row or Jermyn Street, not one stitch placed by robot or peripheral. The jacket’s cut accommodated broad shoulders. Her trousers, ending above a banker’s very precise black oxfords, revealed slender ankles in sheer black hose.

“Extremely kind of you to see me on such short notice, Mr. Zubov,” she said, from her armchair. “And most particularly in your own home.” She smiled, revealing expensively imperfect teeth. In recognition of the historic nature of her visit today, Netherton knew, two large vehicles were even now circling through Notting Hill, each bearing a battle-ready contingent of Zubov family solicitors. He himself avoided the hyperfunctionally ancient whenever possible. They
were entirely too knowing, and invariably powerful. They were quite few, though, and that was by far the best thing about them.

“Not at all,” replied Lev, as Ossian, looking even more butler-like than usual, brought in the tea.

“Mr. Murphy,” Lowbeer said, evidently delighted to see him.

“Yes, mum,” said Ossian, freezing, silver tray in hand.

“Forgive me,” she said. “We haven’t been introduced. Someone my age is all feeds, Mr. Murphy. For my sins, I’ve continual access to most things, resulting in a terrible habit of behaving as if I already know everyone I meet.”

“Not in the least, mum,” Ossian said, staying in character, eyes downcast, “no offense taken.”

“Which,” she said, to the others, as if she hadn’t heard him, “in a sense, of course, I do.”

Ossian, carefully expressionless, placed the heavy service on the sideboard and prepared to offer small sandwiches.

“You may also understand,” Lowbeer said, “that I am looking into the recent disappearance of one Aelita West, United States citizen resident in London. It would be helpful if you would each explain your relationship to the missing party, and to each other. Perhaps you would like to begin, Mr. Zubov? Everything, of course, becoming a matter of record.”

“I understood,” said Lev, “that there were to be no recording devices of any kind.”

“None,” she agreed. “I, however, possess court-certified recall, fully admissible as evidence.”

“I don’t know where I should begin,” said Lev, after considering her narrowly.

“The salmon, thank you,” Lowbeer said to Ossian. “You might begin by explaining this hobby of yours, Mr. Zubov. Your solicitors described you to me as a ‘continua enthusiast.’”

“That’s never entirely easy,” said Lev. “You know about the server?”

“The great mystery, yes. Assumed to be Chinese, and as with so
many aspects of China today, quite beyond us. You use it to communicate with the past, or rather
a
past, since in our actual past, you didn’t. That rather hurts my head, Mr. Zubov. I gather it doesn’t hurt yours?”

“Far less than the sort of paradox we’re accustomed to culturally, in discussing imaginary transtemporal affairs,” said Lev. “It’s actually quite simple. The act of connection produces a fork in causality, the new branch causally unique. A stub, as we call them.”

“But why do you?” she asked, as Ossian poured her tea. “Call them that. It sounds short. Nasty. Brutish. Wouldn’t one expect the fork’s new branch to continue to grow?”

“We do,” said Lev, “assume exactly that. Actually I’m not sure why enthusiasts settled on that expression.”

“Imperialism,” said Ash. “We’re third-worlding alternate continua. Calling them stubs makes that a bit easier.”

Lowbeer regarded Ash, who now wore a slightly more staid version of her Victorian station-roof outfit. Fewer animals visible. “Maria Anathema,” Lowbeer said, “lovely. And you facilitate Mr. Zubov in this colonialism, do you? You and Mr. Murphy?”

“We do,” said Ash.

“And this would be Mr. Zubov’s first continuum? First stub?”

“It is,” said Lev.

“I see,” said Lowbeer. “And you, Mr. Netherton?”

“Me?” Ossian was offering him the sandwiches. He took one blindly. “A friend. A friend of Lev’s.”

“That’s the part I find confusing,” said Lowbeer. “You are a publicist, a public relations person, complexly employed through a rather impressive series of blinds. Or were, rather, I should say.”

“Were?”

“Sorry,” said Lowbeer, “but yes, you’ve been let go. You’ve unread mail to that effect. I also see that you and your former associate, Clarisse Rainey, of Toronto, were witness to the recent killing of one Hamed al-Habib, by an American attack system.” She looked around
the table, as if curious to see reactions to the name, though there seemed to be none.

It had never occurred to Netherton that the boss patcher would have a name. “That was his name?”

“It is,” said Lowbeer, “though not very generally known.”

“There were many witnesses,” Netherton said, “unfortunately.”

“You and Miss Rainey were notable in your virtually localized views of the event. In any case, you seem to be having quite a full week.”

“Yes,” said Netherton.

“Could you explain the circumstances of your being here now, Mr. Netherton?” She raised her teacup and sipped.

“I came to see Lev. I was upset. Over the patcher business, seeing them killed that way. And I thought I’d probably be sacked.”

“You desired company?”

“Exactly. And in the course of speaking with Lev—”

“Yes?”

“It’s rather complicated . . .”

“I’m rather good at complications, Mr. Netherton.”

“You know that Aelita’s sister is, or was, a client of mine? Daedra West.”

“I was so hoping we’d get to that,” said Lowbeer.

“I had arranged for Lev to give Daedra a gift. On my behalf.”

“A gift. Which was?”

“I’d arranged for her to have the services of one of the inhabitants of Lev’s stub.”

“What services, exactly?”

“As a security guard. He’s ex-military. A drone operator, among other things.”

“Was security something you thought she was in need of, particularly?”

“No.”

“Then why, if I may ask, did it occur to you?”

“Lev was interested in this one particular military unit in his stub,
the one this fellow had belonged to. Transitional technology, slightly pre-jackpot.” He looked at Lev.

“Haptics,” said Lev.

“I thought it might amuse Daedra,” Netherton said, “the oddness of it. Not that imagination’s her forte, by any means.”

“You wanted to impress her?”

“I suppose so, yes.”

“Were you having a sexual relationship with her?”

Netherton looked at Lev again. “Yes,” he said. “But Daedra wasn’t interested.”

“In the relationship?”

“In having a polt as a security guard. Or in the relationship, it soon turned out.” It was, he was discovering, somehow unnaturally likely that one would tell Lowbeer the truth. He had no idea how she managed that, but he didn’t like it at all. “So she asked him to give it to her sister instead.”

“You’ve met Aelita, Mr. Netherton?”

“No.”

“Did you, Mr. Zubov?”

Lev swallowed the last of his sandwich. “No. We’d arranged a lunch. It would have been today, actually. She was quite interested in the idea. Of the continuum, the stub”—he looked at Ash—“as you will.”

“So this person,” Lowbeer said, “from the stub, the ex-soldier, would have been on duty in the period of time during which Aelita West is assumed to have vanished from her residence?”

“It wasn’t him,” Netherton said, then resisted the urge to bite his lower lip, “but his sister.”

“His sister?”

“He was called away,” said Lev. “His sister was his substitute, for the past two shifts.”

“His name?”

“Burton Fisher,” said Lev.

“Hers?”

“Flynne Fisher,” said Netherton.

Lowbeer put her cup and saucer down on the table beside her. “And who has spoken with her, about this?”

“I have,” said Netherton.

“Can you describe what she told you she saw?”

“As she was going up for her second shift—”

“Going up? How?”

“In a quadcopter. As a quadcopter? Piloting one. She saw something climbing the side of the building. Rectangular, four arms, or legs. It turned out to contain what sounds like a swarm weapon. The woman who came out on the balcony, whom she identified as Aelita from an image file we showed her, was killed with that. Then destroyed. Eaten, she said. Entirely.”

“I see,” said Lowbeer, unsmiling now.

“She said he knew.”

“Who knew?”

“The man Aelita was with.”

“Your witness saw a man?”

Netherton, no longer certain what he might say if he spoke, nodded.

“And where is she now, this Flynne Fisher?”

“In the past,” said Netherton.

“The stub,” said Lev.

“This is all most interesting,” said Lowbeer. “Really very peculiar, which isn’t something one can honestly say about the majority of investigations.” She rose unexpectedly, from the green armchair. “You’ve all been so helpful.”

“Is that it?” asked Netherton.

“I beg your pardon?”

“You’ve no more questions?”

“Many more, Mr. Netherton. But I prefer to wait for still more of them to arrive.”

Lev and Ash rose then, so Netherton stood as well. Ossian, already
standing, by the dark, mirrored sideboard, came to attention in his chalk-striped apron.

“Thank you for your hospitality, Mr. Zubov, as well as your assistance.” Lowbeer shook Lev’s hand briskly. “Thank you for your assistance, Miss Ash.” She shook Ash’s hand. “And you, Mr. Netherton. Thank you.” Her palm was soft, dry, and of a neutral temperature.

“You’re welcome,” said Netherton.

“Should you wish to contact Daedra West, Mr. Netherton, don’t do it from these premises, or from any other of Mr. Zubov’s. There’s a potential for excess complexity there. Unnecessary messiness. Go elsewhere for that.”

“I had no such intention.”

“Very well, then. And you, Mr. Murphy,” stepping to Ossian, “thank you.” She shook his hand. “You seem to have done very well for yourself, considering the frequency of your youthful encounters with the law.”

Ossian said nothing.

“I’ll see you out,” said Lev.

“You needn’t bother,” said Lowbeer.

“We do have pets,” said Lev. “I’m afraid they’re rather territorial. Best if I accompany you.”

Netherton had never had any sense of Gordon and Tyenna being anything more than existentially creepy, and in any case he’d assumed they were behaviorally modified.

“Very well,” said Lowbeer, “thank you.” She turned, taking them all in. “I’ll be in touch with you individually, should that be necessary. Should you need to reach me, you’ll find you have me in your contacts.”

Lev closed the door behind them as they left the room.

“Sampled our fucking DNA,” said Ossian, examining the palm of the hand that had shaken Lowbeer’s.

“Of course she did,” said Ash, to Netherton, else she encrypt. “How could she be positive we’re who we claim to be?”

“We could bloody sample hers,” said Ossian, frowning down at the teacup Lowbeer had used.

“And be renditioned,” said Ash, again to Netherton.

“Gets right up me,” said Ossian.

“Murphy?” asked Netherton.

“Don’t push it,” said Ossian, briefly but powerfully wringing the white cloth in his large hands. Then he flung the strangled tea towel onto the sideboard, picked up two of the small sandwiches, put both into his mouth, and began to chew, forcefully, his features regaining their usual impassivity.

Ash’s sigil appeared. Netherton met her eyes, caught her very slight nod. She opened a feed.

He saw, as from a bird’s point of view, one able to hover in complete stillness, Lowbeer. She was getting into the rear door of a car, a very ugly one, bulbous and heavy looking, the color of graphite. Lev said something, stepped back, and the car cloaked itself, jigsaw pixels of reflected streetscape scrawling swiftly up the subdued gloss of its bodywork.

Cloaked, it pulled away, seeming to bend the street around it as it went, and then was gone. Lev turned back, toward the house. The feed closed.

Ossian was still chewing, but now he swallowed, poured tea into a crystal tumbler, drank it off. “So,” he said, but not particularly to Ash, else it encrypt, “we’re using student quants at the London School of Economics?”

“Lev’s agreed,” said Ash, to Netherton.

“County’s economy is entirely about manufacturing drugs,” said Ossian, to Netherton. “We might well have all we need there.”

Lev opened the door, smiling.

“How was that?” Ash asked. Netherton saw a flight of birds cross the backs of her hands. She didn’t notice them.

“What an extraordinary person,” Lev said. “Hadn’t met a senior police officer before. Or, for that matter, any police officer.”

“They aren’t all like that,” said Ossian, “thank Christ.”

“I don’t imagine they are,” said Lev.

You, thought Netherton, have just now been sold something. Very thoroughly and a good quick job of it. He saw no reason to doubt that Inspector Ainsley Lowbeer was capable of that.