Bruce Sterling - Islands in the Net

"It's the biggest terrie operation since Santa Vicenza,"

,Arbright said.

"What happened there?" David asked innocently.

Arbright gave David the bIank look one gives to the termi- nally out-of-it. "Maybe you an tell me exactly what hap- pened at your Lodge in Galveston," Arbright said at last.

"Oh," David said. "I, uh, guess I see what you mean."

" `Damage limitation,' " Laura said. "That's what hap- pened in Galveston. "

"And in a lot of other places-for years," Arbright said.

"So you two are nonpeople, deep-background, off the record.

Kinda tough on the good old First Amendment ... " Arbright flashed some high sign at a brown-suited stranger in the crowd, who grinned and nodded at her. "But Vienna can't stop us from discovering the truth-just from publicizing it."

They filtered toward one of the exists. Arbright tapped her platinum watchphone. "I got a limo waiting...."

"The Vienna heat's here!" David said.

Arbright glanced up placidly. "Nah. It's just some guy wearin' viddies."

"How can you tell?" David said.

"He's got the wrong vibe for Vienna," Arbright told him patiently. "Viddies don't mean much-I wear 'em myself sometimes. "

"We've been wearing viddies for days," Laura said.

Arbright perked up. "You mean you've got it all? Your whole tour of Grenada? On tape?"

"Every minute," David told her. "Damn near."

"It's worth plenty," Arbright said.

"Oughta be," David grumbled. "It was a living hell."

"Emily," Arbright said, "who owns the rights, and what are you asking?"

"Rizome doesn't peddle news for money," Emily said virtuously. "That's gesellschaft stuff.... Besides, there's the little matter of explaining what Rizome personnel were doing in a pirate data haven."

"Mmm," Arbright said. "Yeah, that's a tough angle."

Glass double doors hissed open and shut for them, and

Arbright's stretch limo flung its door over curb amid a line of taxis. The limo had mirrored windows d a set of microwave beamers in its roof that looked like water-cooled ray guns. They jumped in, following Arbright's lead. The limo slid away.

"Now we're cool," Arbright announced. She popped down a sliding cabinet door and checked her makeup in a stage mirror. "My people have worked this limo over-it's surveillance-right. "

They headed down a curving access ramp. It was an ugly day, gray September overcast cutting across the Atlanta sky- line. A mountain range of skyscrapers: postmodern, neo-

Gothic, Organic Baroque, even a few boxy premillennium relics, dwarfed by their weird progeny. "Three cars are fol- lowing us," Emily said.

"Jealous of my sources." Arbright smiled, her eyes light- ing up to television wattage. David turned to look.

"They're tracking all of us," Emily said. "The whole

Rizome committee. Got our apartments staked out-and I think Vienna's tapping our lines." She rubbed her eyelids.

"Dianne-you got a wet bar in this thing?"

Arbright picked up an eyebrow pencil. "Just tell the machine. "

"Car, make me a Dirty Kimono," Emily commanded. She rubbed her neck, mashing curls. "Not much sleep lately-I'm a little wired."

"They're really after us? Vienna?" David said.

"They're after everybody. Like an anthill jabbed with a stick." The car gave Emily a cloudy mix that reeked of sake.

"This meeting we held with Kymera and Farben-'summit,'

they called it...." She blinked and sipped her drink. "Laura,

I missed you."

"Getting crazy," Laura said. An old tag line from their college. days together. How tired Emily looked-crow's feet in the fine-boned hollow of her temples, more gray threading

'in her hair-tired hell, why mince words, Laura thought, they were both in their thirties now. Not college kids. Old. An impulse struck her, and she rubbed Emily's shoulders. Emily almost dropped her glass in gratification. "Yeah," she said.

"Who are you with?" David asked Arbright.

"You mean my company?"

"I mean your basic loyalties."

"Oh," Arbright said. "I'm a professional. An American journalist."

David looked tentative. " `American?' "

"I don't believe in Vienna," Arbright declared. "Spooks and censors telling Americans what we can and can't say.

Cover-ups to deny the terries publicity-that was always a half-assed idea." She tossed her head. "Now the whole system, the whole political structure... is gonna blow to hell!" She slapped the seat with the flat of her hand. "I've been waiting for this for years! Man, I'm as happy about it as a cutworm in corn!" She looked surprised at herself. "As my granddad used to say ... "

"Sounds kind of anarchical...." David rocked the tote on his knees. Little Loretta didn't like the sound of political stridency. Her face was clouding up.

"Americans used to live like that all the time! We called it

`freedom.' "

David looked dubious. " I meant, realistically speaking the global information structure ... " He let Loretta grip his fingers and tried to shush her.

"I'm saying we need to pull the masks off and tackle our problems head-on," Arbright said. "Okay, Singapore's a pariah state, they just trashed their rivals-fine. Let 'em pay the price for aggression."

"Singapore?" David said. "You think Singapore is the

F.A.C.T?"

Arbright leaned back in her seat and looked at all three of them. "Well. I see the Rizome contingent has another opin- ion." A dangerous lightness in her voice.

Laura had heard that tone before. During interviews, just before Arbright was about to nail some poor bastard.

The baby wailed aloud.

"Don't all speak up at once," Arbright said.

"How do you know it's Singapore?" Laura said.

"How? Okay. I'll tell you." Arbright shoved her makeup cabinet shut with the toe of her Italian boot. "I know it because the pirate databanks in Singapore are full of it.

Y'know, we journos-we need a place to trade information, where Vienna can't get on our case. That's why every damned one of us worth his salt is a data pirate."

"Oh ...

"And they're laughing about it in Singapore. Bragging.

It's all over the boards." She looked at them. "All right. I've told you. Now you tell me.''

Emily spoke up. "The F.A.C.T. is the secret police of the

Republic of Mali."

"Not that again," Arbright said, crestfallen. "Look, you hear ugly rumors about Mali all the time. It's nothing new.

Mali's a starvation regime, full of mercenaries, and their reputation stinks. But they wouldn't dare try a stunt as huge and flagrant as FACT's attack on Grenada. Mali, defying Vienna with an international terror atrocity? It doesn't make sense."

"Why not?" Laura said.

"Because Vienna could knock over Mali tomorrow-there's nothing to stop them. Another coup in Africa wouldn't even make the midnight news. If FACT were Mali, Vienna would've wiped them out long ago. But Singapore-well! Have you ever seen Singapore?"

"No, but-"

"Singapore hates Grenada. And they loathe Vienna. They hate the whole idea of a global political order-unless they're running it. They're fast and strong and reckless, and they've got a lot of nerve. They make those little Grenadian Rastas look like Bill Cosby."

"Who?" David broke in. "You mean 'Bing' Cosby?"

Arbright stared at him for a moment. "You're not really black, are you? Either that, or that's not really your baby, fella."

"Huh?" David said. "Actually, uh, there's this, uh, sun- tan lotion...."

Arbright cut the air with her hand. "It's okay, I've been to

Africa, and they tell me I look French. But Mali-that's just disinformation. They've got no money and no motive, and it's an old rumor...." The limo came to a stop and inter- rupted her.

"Oxford Towers, Miss Arbright. "

"That's our stop," Emily said, putting her drink aside.