K Jeter - Noir

“You think so?” The Adder clome’s sweating brow creased. “I see it going the other way. If Harrisch and his bunch hadn’t shut down this project-if they’d gone ahead and put the ultimate TIAC on the market-it would’ve put the free juice back into sex. Taken it out of the cash registers and sent it on some deep wacko plane, straight out of D. H. Lawrence and Charles Bukowski, you know, those ancient erotic visionaries. Reading people like that was why I got into this business in the first place. I thought you could do something with this stuff, something meaningful .”

“More fool you, then.” McNihil wasn’t interested in the other man’s aspirations; he’d already lost most of his own. “Wake up and smell the-”

“Yeah, right,” interrupted the Adder clome. “I’ve heard that line already. ‘Burning,’ we’ve got here; ‘corpses’… maybe not. Prowlers are alive as you are; they just have different agendas. But what I said before is still true. There were possibilities here once.”

“Harrisch hath murdered possibilities. But that’s his job-to reduce possibilities to certainties. Late-generation capitalism isn’t about speculation; it’s all about making sure you get the money.”

“Don’t tell me about what I already know.” One of the Adder clome’s ash-smeared hands gestured at the surrounding flames and smoke. “This really doesn’t seem like the place for an economics lecture. You’re more connected-up in the head with Harrisch and his bunch of sub-execs than I am, and I’ve been on his payroll a lot longer. You’re missing the sheer wonder of this system, the way all the pieces come together.” He laid the flat of his hand against the sleeping girl’s shoulder blade. The touch didn’t evoke a low moan from her as much as did the Don’t Tread on Me snake image slithering up under the Adder clome’s palm. He glanced over at McNihil. “See that? Now that’s a beautiful thing.” The Adder clome pulled his hand away before the tattoo could migrate onto his skin. “A lot of value there. Maybe more than the DynaZauber corporation wants to deliver for the purchase price; that’s probably why Harrisch and the others nixed it. Because of the repeatability factor: the effect produced by any one pattern diminishes over time, but for quite a while, as long as the subcutaneous optic receptors perceive it moving over the skin from spot to spot, there’s still a measurable thrill derived from it. So memory is taken out of the head and moved onto the body, where it can really be appreciated.” He gestured again toward the girl. “You can’t say she’s not getting something out of all this.”

McNihil made no reply. His own body felt dehydrated from the heat of the burning hotel, his lungs and heart laden with smoke. The relief of ashes hadn’t come, would never come in this place. The girl on the bed of flames could not even die as much as his dead wife had; she breathed in fire and breathed it out, her breasts like soft glass lit from within; her silken hair twined in the mattress’s flames, like the mating of serpents, two close species coiling around each other. But was not consumed. No death here , thought McNihil. Not even the littlest one . So the Adder clome was wrong. It didn’t have anything to do with sex at all.

“So this was the end of it?” McNihil pointed to the girl, lost in the heat of her own dreaming, wordless and without image, wired to pure coded sensation. “The end of the TIAC project?”

The Adder clome nodded, mired in his own wistful brooding, the contemplation of what might have been.

“But it wasn’t the end,” said McNihil, “of what Harrisch wants to do. Of everything that DynaZauber wants to use the Wedge for. He may have cut you out of the loop-he fires people as well as hires them, or just puts them on eternal hold-but that doesn’t mean he wrapped things up and left. You know how they work. Once DZ has taken over a territory, they don’t just hand it back.”

“True.” Another slow nod from the Adder clome. “The End Zone Hotel-at least this one, in this world-it’s pretty much a DynaZauber property anymore. Owned and operated by, as it were.”

“Harrisch and his bunch didn’t leave; they just switched operations. Didn’t they?” McNihil watched for the other man’s reaction. “From TIAC… to TOAW.”

A look of fright appeared in the Adder clome’s eyes, discernible even through the smoke filling the hotel room. “Maybe you should drop it right there.” The Adder clome’s voice had been scraped down to a whisper. “You don’t want to poke into TOAW. Not if you know what’s good for you.”

McNihil’s laugh felt like a lit match dropped inside his throat. “Even if I ever did know that… I’m past caring. Why would I be here otherwise?”

“It’s your job.” The Adder clome made a simple statement. “Maybe Harrisch forced you to take it, but it’s still your job.”

“I could’ve gotten out of it. There’s ways; there’s always an exit door. You just have to decide which is worse. Besides…” McNihil held his palm just above the sleeping girl’s hip and watched the smaller tattoos begin drifting toward it. “Maybe I’ve gotten to the point where I’m the one who wants to know.”

“About that poor bastard Travelt? And the prowler that’s got him inside?” The Adder clome shook his head. “Give it up. It’s gone someplace where, even if you do locate it, you’re not going to be able to communicate with whatever’s left of the human part. You’re never going to find out what you want.” A sour, gloating tinge entered the Adder clome’s voice. “You might as well go back to Harrisch and tell him that it’s a wild-goose chase. It doesn’t matter whether there’s anything of Travelt that’s not dead yet. There are some places that are even farther away than that.”

“Like where?”

“Don’t bother. Don’t even try threatening me.” Another shake of the head, the Adder clome obviously savoring the moment. “You can do whatever you want, wipe up the floor with me-in a place like this, that might actually be fun-and it’s not going to help you now. Because there isn’t any now . This is something you’re remembering. Remember?” That made the Adder clome smile evilly. “It’s out of your control-just like everything else.”

“Maybe so.” Unperturbed, McNihil let one fingertip touch the sleeping girl’s skin. The tattooed image of a single tear collected under his finger, like a black raindrop that all the fires couldn’t evaporate. “But that doesn’t mean it’s under your control.”

The Adder clome stiffened, drawing away from him. “What do you mean?”

“Just what I said. Somebody else is running this show.” McNihil took away his hand from the cube bunny. “You know it. And I know it.”

A moan sounded, less of pleasure and more of pain. The flames rose higher from the bed, catching McNihil’s hand, sending a hot, quick stab through his arm. On the engulfed mattress, the sleeping girl writhed, barely visible through the fire that had finally penetrated her dreams. Inside her open mouth, the kiss-notched tongue drew back from the scalding teeth. Thicker black smoke billowed up into McNihil’s face, the sudden pressure enough to push him into the center of the hotel room.

“You think you’re so smart.” The figure of the Adder clome and his glaring eyes could be seen past the flames that had suddenly vaulted from the floor to the charred ceiling. “I tried to help you-to warn you-but you wouldn’t listen to me.” A storm of ashes, black and etched with hot sparks, swirled through the hotel room; the last fragments of glass in the broken windows spat through the stifling air as oxygen rushed from the night outside. McNihil guarded the mask of his face with his hands as the sharp flecks stung his shoulders and upraised arm. “So have it the way you want,” came the Adder clome’s voice. “You want to talk to whoever’s in charge? Fine. Just don’t blame me if you don’t like what you hear.”