“Dump it in the parking lot on Sixth Avenue,” says Lynx. “Leave the suit there too. Get on the blue line underhaul. Get off at Little Kensington.”
“That’s where Sarmax’s house is.”
“Exactly. That’s where you’re going.”
“That doesn’t sound very safe.”
“Said the guy who’s running around in a suit which may as well have STOLEN FROM MAXIMUM SECURITY spray-painted on the side. But cheer up, Carson: I’ve got you covered. They got you on the sting. I got them on the hack. They knew you were up to something. But they couldn’t figure out what. So they just hit you with the worst possible charges. And we just beat the rap. I’ve switched your identity about five times in the last five minutes. And there’s a lot more to talk about but it’s going to have to wait till we can do it on Sarmax’s private lines. I managed to cover our traces there too. Now how about you go back to shutting the fuck up.”
The Operative tells Lynx to fuck himself. And says nothing more. He just lets Congreve’s skyline stream past his visor. Fifteen minutes later, he’s walking through the residences of Little Kensington. Five minutes after that he reaches Sarmax’s door. He goes on through, takes the elevator up to the study.
To find Sarmax sitting in front of at least fifty different screens. He has his feet up. He doesn’t turn around.
“Where the fuck have you been?” he asks.
“We need to talk.”
“You don’t know the half of it,” says Leo Sarmax.
* * *
B ut they’re starting to get the idea. They’re standing in another tunnel mouth, looking out upon the plateau where the Flats begin. That plateau’s so high up it’s drenched in cloud. Mist is everywhere. Searchlights pierce the mist, flicker this way and that.
“Looks like a perimeter,” says Marlowe.
“Sealed up pretty tight,” Haskell replies. “This way’s hopeless.”
“Not necessarily.”
“It’s not those defenses I’m worried about,” she says. “It’s what’s up there.” She points upward, at the unseen sky. “We’ll be too exposed out on that plateau. Even with the camo on our armor.”
“You’ve got a point,” he says.
“Let’s double back to the last intersection.”
Five minutes later they’re walking down a narrow tunnel. It’s only wide enough for a single rail. Five minutes farther, and they find a hole in the ceiling, along with a ladder leading up.
“Maintenance shafts,” she says. “Should put us straight into Seleucus’s center.”
“Any sign of what’s up on Seleucus’s zone?” asks Marlowe.
“Looks like it’s as fucked as the rest of the city.”
But they’re heading in toward it all the same. They climb up the ladder, head out into a warren of crawl spaces. Haskell starts to pick up more of Seleucus’s zone. But what she’s detecting is strange. It’s as though it’s been chipped away piecemeal.
“Meaning what?” asks Marlowe.
“Meaning it’s been shut down altogether in some areas. Not sure why. Civil war. Bombs. Who the hell knows?”
“Only one way to find out,” he replies.
He’s got a laser cutter out now, is slicing through a wall. They stare at the space thus revealed.
“Looks like somebody’s basement,” she says.
“Let’s find out if they’re still home,” he replies—and leads the way through discarded furniture and dust, heads up a set of stairs. They enter a living room.
A young woman sits on a couch within. Her head flicks around toward them as they enter. But she doesn’t move. Doesn’t really react. Just stares at them with hollow eyes, starts talking in a language they don’t understand.
“Easy,” says Haskell gently.
“Heat signature,” says Marlowe. “Behind that couch.”
“She’s got children,” mutters Haskell. “Talk to her, for fuck’s sake.”
And Marlowe does: starts looking for some common ground. Finds it fairly quickly in a dialect of Mandarin. The woman answers his questions in a voice that’s nearly monotone. He translates for Haskell.
“She killed her husband. He’s upstairs.”
“Did you ask her why she killed him?”
“He tried to kill her.”
“Ask her how come she’s shut down this apartment’s zone access.”
“Already did. She says it was letting in demons from hell. The same demons who possessed her husband.”
“I’m going to check him out.” Haskell leaves Marlowe to cover the room and goes upstairs, where she finds a man sprawled in a bathroom with a carving knife stuck through his skull. Blood’s everywhere. But there’s enough of his head left for her to figure out what’s happened. Then she reaches out into the zone: very covertly, very carefully. She finds exactly what she thought she would. She goes downstairs again.
“What’s up?” asks Marlowe.
“What’s up is that all the software in Seleucus got hacked. Including cranial implants.”
“I’ve got those. So do you.”
“So did her husband. He was a cop.”
“So?
“So police are almost as wired as we are. And unlike us, he wasn’t shielded by a razor like me. The Manilishi took him over.”
“Bullshit,” says Marlowe. “Implants don’t allow control.”
“Looks like they do if the target’s got enough of them and they’re getting hacked by a next-generation AI. This thing fucked the whole sector.”
“You mean—”
“I mean everything. Household robots gutting their owners, cars running over people, toasters exploding, the fucking works. This thing we’re after has gone completely batshit.”
“Or maybe this is merely phase one of some master plan it’s cooked up?”
“Those two aren’t incompatible.”
“So what now?”
“We need to get closer to it.”
“We still don’t know where the fuck it is,” he says.
“That’s why we need to get closer to it.”
He stares at her. She beckons. They leave the woman and what’s left of her family behind, open the apartment’s front door, and walk out into a street that’s both covered and deserted. Closing the door behind them, they edge their way along the street.
It gives way into a broader area, one in which grass slopes away into shadow. It’s a park. Most of the lights stitched across the cavelike ceiling have been broken. Trees line the walls.
“We got movement,” says Marlowe.
“I see it,” says Haskell.
Up amidst those trees, three figures have started moving down the hill toward them.
“You okay?” yells Marlowe.
No answer. The figures are picking up speed. There’s no expression on their faces.
“Stop or we’ll shoot,” screams Haskell.
Marlowe doesn’t wait. He opens up, starts landing shots. But his targets aren’t dropping.
“Hi-ex,” says Marlowe.
“I can’t,” says Haskell.
But as their assailants close to less than ten meters she discovers that she can. She starts firing—adds her fusillade to Marlowe’s as they knock those bodies off their feet, start knocking them to pieces. And keep on shooting. Because even without legs, arms are still crawling forward to get at them. They fire, reload, fire until all’s still once more.
“Can you work with that?” says Marlowe.
“I’ll have to,” says Haskell.
She’s staring down at the head of the man she’s just shot repeatedly at point-blank range. She figures he must have been some kind of mercenary while he was still alive. He’s more metal than flesh. Haskell drops a wire from her finger, slices it into his ear—and from there into his head.
And falls onto her knees, starts kissing dirt. The world tilts about her. The logic of the sector’s last four hours blasts through her mind. The logic of the mind that’s set it all in motion comes blasting into focus. She sees the Manilishi gazing at her. It wears the faces of those it’s slaughtered. It opens empty eyes. It grins through shattered teeth.