“Wait, what?” Mali looked ill. “You’re the one behind those drug psychosis episodes? What the hell are you doing selling shit like that?”
“Zaxy is an IP hoarder.”
“So liberate more of their antivirals. Or go after those new marrow regenerators. Nobody needs Zacuity.”
“People want it. Plus, it is kind of a necessity. When you’re competing for jobs with people who take it, Zacuity could mean the difference between employment and unemployment.”
Jack wasn’t even convinced by her own argument. Mali shook her head, her face reflecting a mixture of care and anger that looked too complicated for her youthful features.
“Jack, I’m worried about you. This Zacuity situation… we’ve seen some really bad stuff at the hospital. And Zaxy is just as likely to murder you as they are to arrest you.”
“I know, but I have an idea. I think I can make this right by getting some data out to the public that proves Zaxy is selling an addictive drug. I can release it with a therapy, too. Bring down the whole corrupt corporation.”
“Are you nuts? Zaxy owns half the reps in the Zone, and probably in every other economic coalition, too. Plus, who is going to believe you? It’s not like you’re a scientist anymore. You’re a…”
Mali paused awkwardly and Jack stared at her coffee. What was Mali going to call her? A pirate? Criminal? Dealer? It didn’t matter, because it stung enough to hear her old friend say she wasn’t a scientist. Jack’s whole world was science. She spent most days in the lab tinkering with molecules so that even the poorest could benefit. But of course someone like Mali wouldn’t see it that way. To her, Jack was no better than a lab monkey, churning out copies of other people’s drugs.
“I know it can’t be me who releases the data. I’m going to leak it to someone who can. Someone who’s a real scientist.” Jack’s words came out more bitterly than she’d intended.
“I’m sorry, Jack. I didn’t mean it that way. But you don’t need to go public with this. We’re already working on a therapy at the hospital, and we can’t be the only ones. You need to hide.”
“You don’t get it, do you?” Jack finally looked at Mali again. “It’s possible that something genuinely good could come out of this. Zaxy broke the law. When the public knows, it could lead to real changes.”
“Do you really think so? Or are you just going all martyr because…” This time, Jack appreciated Mali’s habit of trailing off. Was Jack trying to kill herself to make up for what she’d done? Maybe. Probably. She didn’t know.
“This isn’t just about my life, Mali. This could destroy one of the most corrupt pharma corps in the world. We might never have this chance again.”
Mali sighed. “True enough. How are you going to do it?”
“You’re already way too implicated. The last thing you need is more information.”
Abruptly, Jack realized that Judy had started sobbing again, her cries muffled but distinct. Mali noticed at the same moment and looked resigned.
“Is there anything I can do besides pay you for the shipment today?”
“Actually, there is.”
There was no way that new mom Mali could resist the tug of protectiveness when Jack told her about Threezed, indentured as a child, rescued from a brutal client, and desperately wanting autonomous work. As Jack talked, Threezed remained silent, his expression completely blank. Mali gave him a hug and said she was sure she could get him a gofer job in one of the research labs. The credits wouldn’t be brilliant, but they’d cover an apartment and ramen.
Finally Threezed spoke, in his politest AU schoolboy accent. “Thank you so very much. I had thought I might be of further assistance to Jack, but this would be perfectly lovely.”
“Come along with me for the morning shift. Just leave the dishes here for the girl to clean up.” Mali disappeared into another room. Before they left together, Threezed shot Jack a look that hovered between anguish and rage. But she couldn’t worry about that right now. He was safe, and that’s what mattered.
Somehow Mali had also talked Jack into taking a shower, followed by having a nap in a real bed before she hit the road. The nanny sang a song to Judy as Jack blasted herself with hot water. Lake country was the best place to get clean—no water shortages meant no cutoffs. In twenty minutes, she was sound asleep in Mali’s guest bed, dreaming about nothing.
Med was buried deep in her research at the workstation farthest from the reception area when the gofer from the hospital lab dropped off the samples. But somehow, while the young man waited for some results, he found his way to her desk. Then he stood in the perfect spot for looking over her shoulder at the neural map of the man who didn’t want to stop painting.
He started talking to her with no preamble. “What’s that? A brain?”
She hadn’t discussed her research with anyone yet. Nobody would return her messages about it, nor comment on the articles she’d tried to post. Frustrated, she found herself infodumping on this new lab gofer.
“It’s one of my patients, who has developed a novel kind of addiction. I’ve never seen anything like it—his dopamine system has been completely tweaked in a matter of days. Probably caused by some street drug he took. A pretty damn sophisticated drug, though.”
For a long time, the gofer didn’t say anything. Med realized, with a pang of embarrassment, that he must not have any idea what she was talking about—until he dug deep into the pockets of his jacket and pulled out a tiny box decorated with images of Ganesh.
“A drug like this?” he asked.
She took the box from his hand and shook a few pills out into her desk. The gleaming, onyx gelcaps were etched with the words “EAT ME” in a pink Comic Sans font. Without thinking, she tossed one into the spectral analyzer.
What she saw, on a cursory reading, brought her up short. “Where did you get this?”
He grinned and leaned on her desk with one hand, hip cocked coquettishly. It occurred to her that many humans would consider this lab gofer to be quite beautiful.
“I know the person who makes them.” He used an incongruously flirtatious tone. “Want to meet her?”
When the door to the bedroom slammed open, Jack sat up abruptly and palmed her knife. Mali’s bedside clock said she’d been out for six hours.
Standing in killing range were Threezed and a pale, terrified-looking young woman in a medic’s lab coat. The medic stared at the sheen of Jack’s scar, a fat pink track that started on her neck, divided her breasts from each other, and crossed her entire stomach. Jack knew it was the kind of deformity that medical students read about, but rarely glimpsed. Scars were so easy to prevent with a variety of Fresser skin glues.
At last, the woman spoke. “I need to talk to you about the schematics for Zacuity. Now.”
8
BRAINS
JULY 9, 2144
It was time to try a new experiment. Over the past day, Paladin had discovered that including “military bot” or “military robot” in pretty much any search related to sex got him petabytes of fictional representations, and nothing about reality. The lack of data only made his desire more urgent. Maybe it was a quirk of his programming as a reconnaissance bot, designed to gather intelligence where nothing was known.
Or maybe it was something about Eliasz.
Paladin faced the man in their tiny hotel room, and tried for the first time to initiate a conversation. He modeled it on what he’d learned from Eliasz.