I go down the stairs and out through the lobby door.
The air outside is cooler, and the red light of sunset cuts through gaps in the high buildings, striping long shadows over the streets which now teem with beat-up, rusted out bikes and small cars. People walk the sidewalks in a hurry, coming home from work. I pass by a gang of skinny, shirtless scumbags in an alley throwing dice, stacking cash chips on the cement. One of them whistles when he sees me, but I ignore them and keep walking, and they don’t follow. Some toothless junkies with sallow, purple-blotched skin shoot up on a stoop next to a collapsed, unconscious man wearing only soiled underwear. This is Brink. This is what I’m fighting for.
My guess is that it’s about seventeen thirty. I’ve got time, but I’ve also got a long way to walk.
Over the course of an hour or two, I’ve made it through downtown, skirting through the busy streets of Rumville, keeping my head low and my strides stiff and long in order to keep the authorities’ facial recognition and gaitmatching software from picking me up on one of the many security cameras and randomly patrolling cam drones. That software is easy to trick if you know it’s looking for you, but one slip up, one glimpse of my face straight on, could cost me my life.
As I pass into uptown, the rich, quiet, restrictively zoned part of the city north of Rumville, the sky is going dark, illuminated windows spackling the skyscrapers. The NewLanding shines bright with lights of many colors, packed and noisy and bustling this time of night. I press between middle-aged snobs in business casual and giddy rich kids decked out in garish clothes, keeping my head low, aware that I don’t fit in here. I’m alone, and I look like a poor person. The sound of someone yelling incoherently grabs my attention, and I cautiously look across the street to see two policemen dragging a homeless man away. He struggles and kicks until finally one of the cops jabs him with a tranquilizer, knocking him out. They’ll book him and take one of his teeth for a fine, if he still has any.
About halfway to the famous sand fountain at the far end, I arrive at my destination, a swank, exclusive old-school tavern called The Eridani, which has been here over a hundred years. Staying across the street, I lean against the outside wall of a Jinn Clothing boutique, enveloped in the sleek holographic projections of the view-glass, images of fashion set against Paris and Tokyo and Ryland City and some snowy, pristine glacial bluff I don’t recognize. Thick pedestrian traffic passes by me, but no one gives me a second look or eye contact as I wait, watching The Eridani and the patrons who periodically arrive. A wide variety of ages are represented, all wealthy, mostly couples in fine eveningwear and groups of businessmen in suits. I can’t help but resent them from afar, all of them wrapped up in the stupid little bubbles of their own lives.
Eventually, a single man in a light blue suit with a lapel-less modern cut arrives, looking out of place as he glances around nervously. I only get a brief glimpse of his face before he goes inside, but it’s definitely Brady.
So he showed.
He assisted me in escaping the SCAPE Bank, gave me his jacket, and even tackled a security guard. I decked him pretty good, but the cops would still have had questions for him, and probably should have even arrested him. I was worried that the police would have detained him, but suddenly it occurs to me that I should probably be equally worried that he’s here, walking free.
My mind goes down a morass of twisting paths of logic and possible narratives. If Brady was working against me the whole time, why did he help me escape the bank? Why did he save me from being shot by that security guard? On the other hand, what does he have to gain from helping me? He already got his promotion. The danger of associating with me far outweighs the potential benefits. But if he’s working against me, why not just let me die or get caught? I’m unarmed now; maybe the plan was to get me to abandon my weapons and lure me to a dense place with no vehicular traffic in order to minimize the risk to civilians and police when they take me out, but that seems awfully convoluted. Do I have something that someone needs? Some information that would necessitate being taken alive so that I could be questioned?
The real question is where else I can turn, where else I can go. And the real answer is nowhere.
Taking a deep breath, I cross The NewLanding, slipping past people who are too preoccupied with their families and dates and business deals and shopping to notice me. The ancient wood and wrought-iron front doors of The Eridani open for me automatically, and I go inside, each step apprehensive.
I’ve never been in here before, it’s out of my price range. I stand just inside the doorway for a second as my eyes adjust to the low light emitted by weak, wall-mounted lamps made to look like old-fashioned incandescent light bulbs. The space is bigger than it looks from the outside. Dining tables are packed close along the two-tiered floor with booths lining the walls and a bar in the very center. A man in a cream-colored tuxedo plays old jazz music on a grand piano in one corner. Beef is incredibly rare and expensive on Brink, but supposedly The Eridani is modeled after twentieth century steakhouses on Earth. Everything is rich, polished wood, which must have cost a fortune. The place is full, with every seat occupied and a dozen or so people waiting in the atrium, the noise of a couple hundred conversations washing together with the melody of the piano. Where is Brady?
A bald, mustachioed maitre d’ in a black old-style tuxedo with thick, serrated lapels notices me looking around, and asks politely, with just a hint of condescension, “Can I help you, miss?”
“I’m looking for someone,” I tell him.
He eyes my shabby borrowed clothing with obvious disdain. “Perhaps I might page him or her for you?”
“No,” I tell him, annoyed, “I think I’ll just have a look, if that’s all right.”
He steps out in front of me, blocking my path. “I’m afraid the dining area is restricted to customers of The Eridani, in order to provide an exclusive fine dining experience.” Seemingly assured that I don’t know anyone in the restaurant, he adds, “I’d be happy to deliver a message?”
Brady Kearns steps up beside him. “Excuse me,” he says, startling the maitre d’, “my friend will be joining me.”
The maitre d’s lip curls in annoyance for a split second, but then he takes a curt little bow. “Very well, sir. Enjoy.”
We move past him, and I follow Brady between rows of tables, alert that each and every person we pass could be an assassin sent for me. But we reach the back of the restaurant without incident, and Brady motions to an open booth situated in a dim spot between two of the little light bulb lamps. The table is set with two places and a bottle of red wine. I sit, angling my back toward the red brick wall in order to keep all lines of approach within my field of vision, and he sits down across from me.
“I asked for this table specifically,” he says, surprisingly calm.
“Limited angles of attack. How romantic.”
“I bet you’re hungry,” he says, pouring some wine into the empty glass in front of me.
“I am,” I answer, eyeing the wine with suspicion, “but there’s no way I’m eating anything here. Could be poisoned.”
He just shrugs, acknowledging the logic in that. His casual, relaxed demeanor is starting to worry me. He has no right to be so nonchalant, and under the circumstances it’s irritatingly out of character for him.
“The cops bring you in?” I ask.
He nods. “Just for questioning. They threatened to charge me as an accomplice, badgered me for a while, but in the end they said there wasn’t enough evidence for charges.”