“Nah.” Ortega grinned. “But he doesn’t know that. ConSub do it sometimes, just to get major dealers off the street when there’s something big going down. Official reprimand for the officer involved and compensation pays out for a new sleeve, but it takes time, and the scumbag does that time in the store. Plus it hurts to get shot. I was convincing, huh?”
“Convinced the fuck out of me.”
“Maybe I should have been an Envoy.”
I shook my head. “Maybe you should spend less time around me.”
I stared up at the ceiling, waiting for the hypnophone sonocodes to lull me away from reality. On either side of me, Davidson, the Organic Damage datarat, and Ortega had settled into their racks and even through the hypnophones I could hear their breathing, slow and regular, at the limits of my neurachem perception. I tried to relax more, to let the hypnosystem press me down through levels of softly decreasing consciousness, but instead my mind was whirring through the details of the set-up like a program check scanning for error. It was like the insomnia I’d suffered after Innenin, an infuriating synaptic itch that refused to go away. When my peripheral vision time display told me that at least a full minute had gone by, I propped myself up on one elbow and looked around at the figures dreaming in the other racks.
“Is there a problem?” I asked loudly.
“The tracking of Sheryl Bostock is complete,” said the hotel. “I assumed you would prefer to be alone when I informed you.”
I sat upright and started picking the trodes off my body. “You assumed right. You sure everyone else is under?”
“Lieutenant Ortega and her colleagues were installed in the virtuality approximately two minutes ago. Irene Elliott has been established there since earlier this afternoon. She asked not to be disturbed.”
“What ratio are you running at the moment?”
“Eleven point fifteen. Irene Elliott requested it.”
I nodded to myself as I climbed out of the rack. Eleven point one five was a standard working ratio for datarats. It was also the title of a particularly bloody but otherwise unmemorable Micky Nozawa experia flic. The only clear detail I could recall was that, unexpectedly, Micky’s character got killed at the end. I hoped it wasn’t an omen.
“All right,” I said. “Let’s see what you’ve got.”
Between the dimly seen heave and swell of the sea and the lights of the cabin, there was a lemon grove. I went along a dirt track between the trees and the citrus fragrance felt like cleansing. From the long grass on either side, cicadas whirred reassuringly. In a velvet sky above were stars like fixed gems and behind the cabin the land rose into gentle hills and rocky outcroppings. The vague white forms of sheep moved in the darkness on the slopes, and from somewhere I heard a dog bark. The lights of a fishing village glimmered off to one side, less bright than the stars.
There were hurricane lamps slung from the upper rail of the cabin’s front porch, but no one was seated at the wooden tables there. The front wall bore a riotous abstract mural curling around and out from the luminous lettering of a sign that read Pension Flower of ’68. Windchimes dangled along the railing, winking and turning in the faint breeze that blew in from the sea. They made a variety of gentle sounds from glassy belling to hollow wooden percussion.
On the unkempt sloping lawn in front of the porch someone had set out an incongruous collection of sofas and armchairs in a rough circle, so it looked as if the cabin had been lifted bodily off its furnished interior and set down again further up the slope. From the gathered seats came the soft sound of voices and the red embers of lit cigarettes. I reached for my own supply, realised I had neither the packet nor the need any more and grimaced wryly to myself in the dark.
Bautista’s voice rose above the murmur of conversation.
“Kovacs? That you?”
“Who else is it going to be?” I heard Ortega ask him impatiently. “This is a goddamn virtuality.”
“Yeah, but…” Bautista shrugged and gestured to the empty seats. “Welcome to the party.”
There were five figures seated in the circle of lounge furniture. Irene Elliott and Davidson were seated at opposite ends of a sofa beside Bautista’s chair. On the other side of Bautista, Ortega had sprawled her long-limbed body along the full length of a second sofa.
The fifth figure was relaxed deep into another armchair, legs stretched out in front of him, face sunk in shadows. Wiry black hair stuck up in silhouette above a multicoloured bandanna. Lying across his lap was a white guitar. I stopped in front of him.
“The Hendrix, right?”
“That’s correct.” There was a depth and timbre to the voice that had been absent before. The big hands moved across frets and dislodged a tumble of chords onto the darkened lawn. “Base entity projection. Hardwired in by the original designers. If you strip down the client-mirroring systems, this is what you get.”
“Good.” I took an armchair opposite Irene Elliott. “You happy with the working environment?”
She nodded. “Yeah, it’s fine.”
“How long’ve you been here?”
“Me?” She shrugged. “A day or so. Your friends got here a couple of hours ago.”
“Two and a half,” said Ortega sourly. “What kept you?”
“Neurachem glitch.” I nodded at the Hendrix figure. “Didn’t he tell you?”
“That’s exactly what he told us.” Ortega’s gaze was wholly cop. “I’d just like to know what it means.”
I made a helpless gesture. “So would I. The Khumalo system kept kicking me out of the pipe, and it took us a while to get compatibility. Maybe I’ll mail the manufacturers.” I turned back to Irene Elliott. “I take it you’re going to want the format run up to maximum for the Dip.”
“You take it right.” Elliott jerked her thumb at the Hendrix figure. “Man says the place runs to three twenty-three max, and we are going to need every scrap of that to pull it off.”
“You cased the run yet?”
Elliott nodded glumly. “It’s locked up tighter than an orbital bank. But I can tell you a couple of interesting things. One, your friend Sarah Sachilowska was freighted off Head in the Clouds two days ago, relayed off the Gateway comsat out to Harlan’s World. So she’s out of the firing line.”
“I’m impressed. How long did it take you to dig that up?”
“A while.” Elliott inclined her head in the Hendrix’s direction. “I had some help.”
“And the second interesting thing?”
“Yeah. Covert needlecast to a receiver in Europe every eighteen hours. Can’t tell you much more than that without Dipping it, and I figured you wouldn’t want that just yet. But it looks like what we’re after.”
I remembered the spider-like automatic guns and leathery impact-resistant womb sacs, the sombre stone guardians that supported the roof of Kawahara’s basilica, and I found myself once more smiling in response to those contemptuous hooded smiles.
“Well, then.” I looked around at the assembled team. “Let’s get this gig off the ground.”
Chapter Forty
It was Sharya, all over again.
We dusted off from the tower of the Hendrix an hour after dark and swung away into the traffic-speckled night. Ortega had pulled the same Lock-Mit transport I’d ridden out to Suntouch House, but when I looked around the dimly lit interior of the ship’s belly, it was the Envoy Command attack on Zihicce that I remembered. The scene was the same; Davidson playing the role of datacom officer, face washed pale blue by the light from his screen; Ortega as medic, unpacking the dermals and charging kit from a sealwrap bag. Up ahead in the hatchway to the cockpit, Bautista stood and looked worried, while another mohican I didn’t know did the flying. Something must have shown on my face, because Ortega leaned in abruptly to study my face.