5. Heroes Shed No Tears
Old Yee showed him a mouth of yellow tombstone teeth and gave Ko double the normal portion of curry noodles, taking the fold of yuan with his clawed fingers. Yee was from the mainland and refused to speak in anything but a thick dialect of Mandarin. Ko understood maybe one word in three, but he mosdy got by on the fact that the old geezer liked him. He wasn’t exactly sure why, but Yee made good noodles and his mobile stand always seemed to be open whenever Ko was hungry. He took a plastic bottle of Tsingtao and saluted Yee with it, then skirted the snake-buses as he crossed Hennessy Road. He made for the plaza, past the tourists being funnelled into large armoured people-carriers, great blocky things painted in gaudy tropical colour patterns that hid the snouts of stun nozzles.
The big holoscreen on the side of the CloudReach Shopplex was showing highlights from the day’s endorsed track duels at Happy Valley, and Ko winced around a mouthful of noodles as it slo-moed the horrific impact kill of a G-Mek V12 Interceptor striking the barrier at three hundred kilometres per hour. The car gently disintegrated into metal shavings, and an overlaid graphic pointed out the instant when the steering column speared the driver. The betting results faded away and up came the BloodPool sweepstake. Ko fished in his pocket for his ticket and realised with a frown that he’d forgotten to get one that morning. He chugged a gulp of beer to wash down the annoyance. Around him, foot traffic slowed as other people stopped to see the lottery numbers. Ko was always fascinated by the way that people from the States or the EU went crazy with their hooting and cheering when they gambled. That kind of behaviour was alien to the Chinese mindset. Games of chance required the most serious mind, not the loutishness that the gwailos displayed, scaring off the spirits of good fortune with all their noise. The tickertape ran the numbers. Low fatalities during the race day were balanced by an industrial accident at Quarry Bay and a restaurant boat hijacking that went bad out at Aberdeen. Hong Kong’s daily death toll was green for good, but without a ticket the score was meaningless to Ko. The holo-screen showed a streetcam view of the winner-a little woman in a viddysilk cheongsam-and the hesitant crowd around him broke up and melted away. Ko watched a little longer as the display went on to post scores for the state-sponsored manhunt going on over in Macao. That’s how to make money here, he thought. Win it, steal it or kill for it.
He finished the cooling noodles on the way toward the Causeway Bay metro station, crossing the road through a plastic tunnel. The tube glowed as he entered it, the walls fading into a grainy CGI model of a sun-kissed beach. It was meant to seem like Ko and the other pedestrians were ambling along the edge of a tropical island but the swearwords and flyposters dotting the walls spoilt the image. Ko watched a poorly rendered copy of Juno Qwan smile at him from the tree line. She had her hands cupped and glittering indigo liquid ran over her fingers. He blinked as the sublims kicked in, making him feel twitchy, and stared at the fake sand beneath his feet until he reached the other end of the tunnel.
Ko had never seen a blue ocean. A memory popped in his head, bright and hard. The day Dad had taken them on a trip up to the Peak so they could look out beyond Hong Kong Island and out into the haze. Ko had expected blue, the azure glitter they showed on the vid; but instead it was all the same dirty bottle green that lapped at the piers on the Kowloon side.
Blue. Ko wanted a blue sea, a blue sky, an endless road. He wanted freedom, if there was such a thing, but the idea of it was so ephemeral and directionless he couldn’t hold it in his mind for long. He was only sure of one thing. It would cost him money to get to the blue. He needed a big score to take him there, not the pissant pocket change he got from runs and road challenges. Ko sighed, crumpling the beer bottle in his hand. It wouldn’t be enough to get there alone, though. Ko thought of Nikita and the drug packet. He had to get her away too, before the city saw her weakness and killed her with it.
He went over the road with the metallic woodpecker of the crossing indicator rattling in his ears, and just for a moment he felt his black mood lift a little. There, on the shallow concrete bank where they always gathered, he saw Gau, the Cheungs and Poon clustered around one of the public benches. As ever, a string of hyped-up subcompact cars filled the roadside parking spaces. Second’s green Kaze with its black-tinted windows was there at the front of the rank, but Ko couldn’t see him or hear his braying laugh.
Gau had a magazine foldout in his hands, and the rest of the gang were engrossed in it. Ko saw a wide expanse of pale female flesh.
“Not real,” Little Cheung was saying. “You can see it’s just a render.” He pointed at one visible breast. “The tits are too good.”
“Too good is never too bad,” broke in Ise, tugging at his orange quiff. “I’d nail that, oh yeah.”
“Can you find your dick with both hands?” Gau asked. “Naw, Little Brother is right. You can see this is a fake. They mocked it up using pictures of her from that photo shoot she did in Free Malaysia.”
The image was of Juno Qwan, naked on a hardwood floor, cupping her breasts and wearing an incongruous little-girl smile. The image seemed off to Ko, too. It wasn’t uncommon for the tabloid screamsheets to make digitals of the idols-of-the-moment and then put them in compromising positions, just to sell a few more issues. Big Cheung patted his belly and leered at Ise. “You wanna see them boobies for real, I gotta sense-disc of her. Load it inna skin suit and you could have her all night long…”
Ise snorted. “That’s jagged, man. You keep your sick fantasies to yourself.”
“Hey,” said Ko as he approached them.
It was as if a switch had been flipped. The mood changed instantly, the air becoming chilly by degrees. People looked away, composing themselves.
Gau met his gaze. “Hey Ko. You drive in?” It was the standard conversation-starter in go-ganger circles, but it seemed stilted and forced.
He jerked a thumb over his shoulder. “In the shop. ”That was a lie; Ko’s Ranger was parked in a multi-story a few blocks away, hidden behind a ferrocrete stanchion. He hadn’t wanted to turn up on the street with it sporting the busted headlights that were Nikita’s payback for destroying her Z3N stash.
“Huh,” said Gau. “Right. Didn’t think we’d see you tonight.”
“Not after what happened…” added Ise, without looking him in the eye.
The air of easy banter had evaporated the moment Ko opened his mouth; now the vibe was frosty and strained. Everyone there wanted him gone.
“I’m missing something.” Ko said in a low voice, the first flickers of annoyance catching inside him.
“Got that right,” Poon said it so quietly he almost didn’t hear her.
Ko fixed Gau with a hard look. “You want to help a guy out?”
Gau looked away. “Don’t think I can, man.”
Ko opened his mouth to speak, but Little Chung bounced to his feet and broke in. “Look, Ko. Out at the airport, that was off-book.”
“What?” he retorted. “Like to see you jack a corp ride like that!”
“Yeah, but it was zero, chummer! You never did something so airhead!”
“Ko, man,” said Gau, “Rikio was by earlier tonight. He said about what Hung did. You’re giving us a bad rep. You shouldn’t have popped a corp’s car, that makes shit for the rest of us.”
“You gutless fuckers,” whispered Ko. “You’re always on about a big score, but you never do anything except…” He swallowed hard as the conversation he’d had in the Vector came back to him. Making yuan off races and taking pinks where you can. “All I’m saying is,” Gau continued, ignoring the outburst, “you might want to go dark for a little while, man. Just… Stay off the scope.”