Tal Klein - The Punch Escrow

Joel 2and I obliged. I wasn’t sure how he felt about it, but considering I’d spent the earlier part of the day running around with my ass hanging out of a hospital gown, the notion of a bunch of Levantine spies gawking at my junk didn’t move the embarrassment needle much. I was actually pleased to part with my dirty makeshift fake-doctor outfit in favor of some clean clothes. Also, the vest made me feel a bit like a badass.

“We’re here,” Zaki said just as Joel 2and I finished changing. “But it looks like we have some company.”

The rear door of the van opened, revealing the silhouette of a certain waifish woman who’d recently made both my and Joel 2’s acquaintance. She looked almost ethereal against dusk’s last blood-orange embers and the high-intensity lights that illuminated Chelsea Piers’ twenty-four-hour operations at night.

“Pema,” Moti breathlessly said her name.

“Pema!” Ifrit said excitedly.

Pema stepped toward our vehicle. She wore an oversized shawl-collared granite-colored sweater that dramatically swayed as a gust of misty wind off the Hudson enveloped her body.

“Hello, Joel and Joel. It’s good to see you both in one place. May I ask which is which?”

Before either of us could answer, Moti asked her point-blank, “What are you doing here, Pema?”

“You asked for a deal. I got you one.” She winked at Ifrit.

The Levantine woman blushed.

“Eventually, Pema,” an uncharacteristically irritated Moti said, “conscientious objector, double agent, or loyalist, you will need to choose a side.”

“There are no sides, Moti. Nothing is black-and-white. Corina doesn’t need me to tell her what your designs for Taraval are. International Transport is well versed in the methods of the Levant. They know you want leverage; you know they want control. Don’t pretend like you’re not playing the same game on the same board.” She put her hand into a black satchel she carried on her back. Seeing her movement, several of the Levantine soldiers pointed handheld weapons. Moti remained steadfast, merely raising a curious eyebrow.

“What is it?” he asked as she held up a brushed metal orb roughly the size of a softball.

“A prototype.”

He took it from her, rolling it around carefully in his hand. “So it’s true?”

She nodded. “A Honeycomb grenade. Technically, it doesn’t exist. The perfect weapon for hostage extractions.”

“Or kidnapping people,” Moti said pointedly. “And Corina sent you to tell us this? Doesn’t she know that we already have a backdoor into Honeycomb? Any Levant they try to grenade there we will simply extract and delete.”

“She only knows what I tell her,” Pema said.

Moti tsk-tsked. “You don’t give her enough credit, Pema.”

“The way it’s supposed to work,” she said, ignoring his affront, “is to teleport everyone within its ecophagy cage and send them to the glacier for safekeeping. Then the wielding party releases who they want, when they want.”

“And what’s an ecophagy cage?” interjected Joel 2.

“Nanotech one oh one stuff, apparently,” I told him. “It’s a cage that keeps self-replicating nanos in check. Without it, the nanos that clear people in TC foyers would keep on going, killing everyone in their way.”

“And how big is this cage?” asked Joel 2.

Pema pressed her fingertips together. “It’s meant to be adjustable in production models, but the radius for this one is around four meters.”

“But?” asked Moti expectantly.

“But—there’s no Punch Escrow,” she admitted. “Anything goes wrong, there’s no safety net. No guarantees that the teleportee doesn’t get lost en route to the glacier.”

“Ha!” Moti snapped his fingers. “Well, it would appear Ms. Corina Shafer knows more than you think, Pema. She trusted you would bring us the grenade and that we would be foolish enough to use it. But I have no interest in handing William Taraval over to International Transport. I assume the real reason she sent you here is because Mr. Taraval deleted all his previous backups from the glacier, and they would like us to procure a new one for them at the expense of Levantine life. How kind of them . No, I think we will do things our way.”

Moti looked Pema over. “You tell Ms. Shafer that I’m not here to capture her rogue vizier so she can get him back naked and unarmed in her custody. We won’t be her black-bag assassination squad. You tell her that her peace offering is rejected.” He considered the prototype grenade, then carefully placed it in the same compartment from which our borrowed clothes had come. “On second thought, no. We will have a counteroffer for her shortly. Zaki, please keep Pema comfortable here—”

“I’m not—hey!”

Zaki was more brisk than I, and certainly Pema, might have anticipated for a man his size. In a blink he was behind her, pinning one hand to her waist and the other to the back of her neck. He pressed her forward, deeper into the van’s cabin. “And if she tries to comm anyone?” Zaki asked.

“She won’t,” Ifrit said. “Will you?”

Pema shook her head obediently, though it was plain to see she was seething beneath her facade. Oblivious or apathetic to her anger, Zaki pushed Pema firmly into the seat next to Ifrit. She sat down beside her, crossing her legs and arms tightly.

“Good,” Moti said, fetching another TIME cigarette from his packet and lighting it. “Now, let’s see what we are dealing with out here.”

MAKE WESTING

THE SUN HAD NOW COMPLETELY SET. The lights had all come on in the IT shipping yard. Other than the half-full moon, no stars or planets could be seen in the sky, owing to the fluorescence of the lights and the refraction from the mosquito-piss rain.

Our arrival on the scene had not been lost on Taraval. He’d chosen his perch specifically for its strategically superior view of the surroundings. Of concern to Sylvia was that he didn’t seem hurried or concerned at all upon seeing our small detachment appear. Quite the opposite, in fact.

“The cavalry arrives at the edge of the world!” he shouted, his eyes glistening, a mild breeze dancing through his lab coat. “Not to worry, Sylvia—this is where my grandstanding ends. It’s time to eat our own dog food, drink the Kool-Aid, whatever the appropriate platitude may be. My darling girl, this is where we usher the Luddites forward!”

For the first time since he’d kidnapped her, Sylvia dared to hope. She didn’t know what she was hoping for, really. She’d run through all the possible endings in her mind, and none had concluded with happily ever after . The best she could muster was the magnet holding her over the concrete portal failing, followed by a short fall and a quick, painless death. But now, through the haze of blood pounding in her upside-down head, she saw a slight possibility of survival. That she might miss that chance was by far the scariest thing that had happened to her since she got back to New York.

“Don’t worry, Sylvia. They are not here to impede us—they are our escorts .”

“Escorts?” Sylvia stared at him in confusion.

“Escorts, companions, entourage . The Greeks had company in their journey through the underworld. We go to Elysium to be reborn, while our friends go to Asphodel Meadows to await our beckoning. All eight million of them.”

Sylvia’s eyes went wide as, for the first time, she fathomed his full design.

“You can’t!” she shouted. “Joel!”

Taraval took the roll of foil tape from his lab coat and ripped off another piece. “Can’t have you spoiling your own surprise party,” he grumbled, going to tape her mouth shut again. He screamed in agony as she bit down on his fingers with all her might.