Neal Stephenson - Reamde

Once Csongor was logged on to a computer it took him only a few moments to establish its IP address and a few moments more to snoop around the local network getting an idea of what IP addresses might be assigned to neighboring machines. So “checking his email” took only a few seconds, and then he was logged off and ready to go. He walked toward Zula, breaking stride as soon as he got within about a meter of her, and then turned sideways. For he had not approached her to talk, or for any reason other than to be in her presence. This had become his habit. Zula had grown accustomed to it. She felt better when he was there, just on the edge of her personal space. It appeared that he felt better there too.

Sokolov had taken some phone pictures of fishermen traipsing out of a ferry terminal yesterday afternoon and showed them to Yuxia, zooming in on their heads and urging her to get a load of their hats. They were the most retarded-looking hats Zula had ever seen, and she didn’t believe for a moment that Sokolov wanted to go fishing. He had some other plan in mind and had realized on the spur of the moment that Yuxia could help him with it.

The somewhat comforting feeling she got from Csongor’s proximity was now wrecked by a sort of icicle-through-the-heart sensation as she realized that Yuxia was about to get tangled up in this. And that was at least partly Zula’s fault.

Yuxia and Sokolov finished their business and logged off. “We go to buy hats,” Sokolov announced, and then he stood to one side, as was his habit, waiting for the ladies to go first.

YUXIA WAS GOING to make finding wangbas a million times easier, but there was a price to be paid, which was that they could not simply go straight from one to the next while maintaining the pretext that they were only doing it so that Csongor could check his email. No one needed to check his email that frequently; and if he did, it would be easier to just hang out in one wangba rather than flitting from one to the next.

Sokolov’s plan—whatever the hell it was—concerning the fishing equipment helped to solve this problem. For they devoted about forty-five minutes now to walking to a store where it was possible to buy the goofy-looking cloth hats favored by septuagenarian Chinese anglers. During the walk, Zula got to know Yuxia a little better. In fact, she pestered Yuxia with questions, because she was a little bit nervous that Yuxia might start asking her questions that, given the circumstances, would be difficult to answer. The script that they were working from was flimsy and would not stand up to scrutiny from the lively mind of Qian Yuxia.

She learned that Yuxia lived in a town up in Yongding that was something of a tourist attraction because of its tulou: huge round fortresslike buildings of rammed earth, constructed centuries ago by the Hakka people. Most of the tourists were Chinese who came up in buses from Xiamen. But the place did attract some Western travelers, mostly backpacker types, and so during the tourist season she worked for a hotel that catered to such people. She hung around at the bus station and wandered about the main tourist game trails, and when she saw Westerners who looked lost, she greeted them, talked to them, and steered them to the hotel. She drove them around the region in a van so that they could see some of the off-the-beaten-track tulous . That, and watching movies, and reading books left at the hotel by the backpackers, was how she had learned her English. During the off-season she drove the van to the distant outskirts of Xiamen and made arrangements to park it somewhere, then rode the bus into Xiamen, stayed at a hostel, and plied her trade as an itinerant tea merchant. Mostly this was a matter of wholesaling tea to established retail shops, but she was not above approaching end users directly, as she’d done yesterday with Zula.

That got them as far as the hat shop, where Sokolov purchased an even dozen of the shapeless hats that he wanted. Then it was time for Csongor to “check his email” again. So they found another wangba and Csongor did that while Zula slurped noodles and Yuxia helped Sokolov find a store that traded in rod-and-reel cases.

Then they repeated the cycle: they set out on foot to a place where Sokolov was able to purchase some rod-and-reel cases, and then they found the nearest wangba so that Csongor could “check his email” yet again.

Zula asked Yuxia what a Hakka was and learned that they were the only Chinese who had refused to take up the practice of foot binding. So “Big-Footed Woman” was not just a throwaway line. Not only that, but they would buy the unwanted female children of their Cantonese-speaking neighbors and raise them. Yuxia was not the type to deploy terminology like “feminist” or “matriarchal,” but the picture was clear enough to Zula. She was able to draw comparisons to her early years being raised by Marxist-feminist teachers in caves in Eritrea, which provided a safe topic for time-consuming chitchat as they wandered about in the streets.

This third wangba was on the top story of a four-story commercial building that fronted on a side street, perhaps wide enough to carry a car going in each direction if uncomplicated by pedestrians, bicyclists, or carters. It was a bit smaller than the first two they’d visited and had a younger clientele and a somewhat seedier vibe about it. There was a single PSB officer stationed at the entrance, but he didn’t have the high-tech system for monitoring what was shown on the customers’ terminals. A few mirrors were planted about the place, theoretically making it possible for him to look over people’s shoulders, but in order for it to work, he would have to care and he would have to look up from his glossy magazine (in Chinese, but exclusively concerned with the personnel and doings of the National Basketball Association), neither of which obtained. This wangba was considerably louder, not with music or with game sound tracks but with conversation. As they perceived after they paid their way in, the hubbub all emanated from one corner, where a dozen or so teenagers had locked down a cluster of terminals and were playing a game together, looking over each other’s shoulders and calling out warnings, orders, encouragement, mockery, and wails of despair.

As usual, Csongor went to one terminal while Yuxia and Sokolov went to another. Zula drifted over toward the corner where the young men were all playing. As soon as their screens came into view she recognized that they were playing T’Rain. The style in which they were communicating told her that they must all be part of a raiding party going on an adventure together; their characters were all in the same place in the T’Rain world, probably conducting a dungeon raid or fighting it out with a rival gang, and so a warrior might be calling out to a priest that he needed to be healed or a mage might be requesting protection from a menacing beast while he cast his spells. It was a common enough play style.

She could tell that they were badass. This was confirmed when she got into position for a better look at their characters: massively powerful and expensively equipped.

The landscape in which they were fighting looked strikingly familiar.

It was the Torgai Foothills.

They were fighting near the ley line intersection with the trebuchets.

She became aware, suddenly, that she had been watching for a few minutes and that Sokolov was right next to her, close enough that she could sense his warmth. He’d read the look on her face, come over to see what had transfixed her.

Feeling suddenly conspicuous, she turned away and walked back toward where Csongor was sitting. He was looking aghast at the screen of his terminal.

“What is going down?” Qian Yuxia wanted to know. “What is you guys’ problem?”