“That could be a problem,” Joe said thoughtfully. “You don’t have an appointment and he’s a busy guy. How long are you gonna be here?”
With a grimace, Gina said, “Just four days.”
“Yeah,” Christine nodded, “and this is the most free time we’re likely to have.”
Joe looked at them and raised one eyebrow; the row of spikes above it made a rippling, musical sound at the movement and he smiled to see Christine’s mouth open in unconscious appreciation.
“Look,” he said, “I’ve got an appointment for Lazro to finish up some work on my back, but I’m gonna be here for another week, so I can reschedule. If you have a couple of hours right now, I’ll let you have my appointment.”
Cries of joy and delight met his suggestion and he rose from his seat.
“C’mon then, we’ve got some traveling to do. You won’t find anybody like Laz here in cotton candy heaven.”
Joe gestured contemptuously at the affluent crowd around them. “Not a tat showing.”
The shop was named Torture Tattoo, as a holo with a faint sonic undertone of screaming proclaimed outside. Most of the storefronts along this corridor were dark, and it was as close to a run-down neighborhood as the station boasted, with color-coded conduits thick on the low ceiling. Inside, it was long and narrow, with a smell much like the hospital’s, but with a harder edge of disinfectant and old, old metal.
Laz was more of a pattern than a person. He was tall and wide and bald, covered with swirling, flashing colors worked into fanciful designs everywhere except the parts covered by a twisted cotton loincloth—and, Gina thought with a start, probably there, too.
He’d chosen bands of designs rather than building out from a single image.
Christine whispered in Gina’s ear. “An unkind person would say he looks like the bargain bin in a ribbon shop.” Their giggles had a nervous edge, and Laz reacted not at all.
His face was hard to read with all that motion going on; actually it was hard to even see his features, as wild horses in galloping motion were superceded by abstract patterns. But with a flick of a muscle his visage was suddenly naked.
And he was still hard to read, all massive bones and coarse pores, but no trace of beard stubble. The gold rings in his ears moved slightly as he raised his eyebrows.
“We… I want a tat,” Gina said, fighting an impulse to turn half away and talk to him over her shoulder. “A cybertat.”
“That’s the reason people usually come here,” Laz agreed, nodding. He looked at Joe. The boy in leather—and he suddenly looked much more like a boy to both of them— spread his hands.
“They’re only here for four days, Laz,” Joe explained. “I said they could have my appointment. I’ll make another for… say the first week in June?”
“It’s your money and time,” Laz shrugged, with the slightest hint of a smile, before turning to the girls. “Bye.”
He didn’t say much and that was said curtly, and his prices were sky-high, but Gina immediately fell in love with a display of a three-color mandala that swirled clockwise and changed shades, simultaneously, never repeating itself.
“How does it do that?” she said.
Laz smiled again, with a quirking curve of his thick lips. “Chaotic pattern,” he said. “The algorithm is simple, but the permutations are infinite. I call it seminfinity. It runs off your body heat, like the others. Lasts indefinitely.”
“Oh, yeah,” she replied dreamily.
He considered her with a technician’s eye. “It would just about fit on your stomach,” he said. “Use the navel as the pivot, and—”
“No!” Gina said. “What’s the use of a tattoo you only show in the shower?”
“Or to your boyfriend,” Christine said, chuckling even more at Gina’s quelling look.
“I want it in the middle of my forehead.”
He shrugged. “In order to center it right, it’s gotta be smaller, so there’ll be less detail.”
Gina pouted. “I really like this design.”
Laz shrugged. “It’ll be seventy less for the smaller version—the detail’s there, but you’d have to let your friends get real close and use a ‘scope to see it all. We’ll put the control here,” he said, tapping her lightly on top of her head. “That way you won’t turn it on and off by accident every time you change your expression.”
“Sold!” Gina said instantly. She had a hundred and seventy-five in her account—half a year’s scrimping, so she could afford to bring back something from this trip. His original price would have left her with nothing. Now, at least, she’d be able to afford an extra soda now and then.
Two hours later Gina was in the shop’s tiny and not very sanitary bathroom wondering why she was feeling so drained. Worse. She felt logy and very faintly nauseous— the sort of sensation that made you hungry but the thought of eating repulsive.
Well, she reassured herself, it’s kind of like an operation. Not to mention all those hours on the vomit comet getting here.
Gina sighed and laid her head against the cheap extruded synth of the partition behind her, a sensation neither hard nor soft, cold nor hot.
Then she heard voices coming through the wall. The nausea was forgotten as she pressed her ear to the synth. The material was very strong, but so thin it acted like a giant hearing membrane at close range.
“Okay, so what’s the story? What’s so important that you can’t talk to me in a completely empty store?”
The voice was male and young, with an accent she didn’t recognize until she thought of holo actors playing spacemen.
“Look at this,” another male answered; his voice was gruff and deep but carried the same slight everywhere-and-nowhere twang.
There was silence, then, “Holy… you can’t be serious!” the young voice said.
“As explosive decompression.”
“Man.” The young voice was filled with awe. “This will blow the whole station wide open—peel it like a banana!”
“Yeah,” the gruff voice said. “And, sadly, they’ll never see it coming.”
“They should’ve hunh?” younger voice said.
“If they weren’t idiots they would have. They deserve to be blindsided.” The deep voice was bitter. “‘That’ll teach ‘em to make fun of me.”
“This’ll teach ‘em all right,” younger agreed.
“And too late to do ‘em any good.” There was a deep laugh that matched the voice. “They’re gonna regret it, all those jokes, the lousy quarters. I’m gonna make them so sorry.”
“Whaddaya mean?” the younger voice asked.
The answer was spoken so low that Gina couldn’t make it out.
“You’ve got to be kidding!” younger said. “You can’t do that!”
“Gina, are you all right?” Christine asked, banging on the door.
Gina jumped and gasped. She heard the sudden silence on the other side of the wall as threatening and fumbled with the lock. She rushed from the lavatory; snatching Christine’s wrist to drag the other girl out of the shop and hustle her down the corridor.
“Whoa!” Christine said, digging her heels into the rubbery nonslip flooring; it was slightly worn here Gina suddenly noticed, which meant this part of the station was ancient.
So ancient it doesn’t have surveillance? She thought, frightened—all the books and holos she’d read containing menacing conspirators and secret agents coming back with a rush.
“What are you doing?” Christine cried.
Gina turned to look back down the corridor. Laz had closed his door—they’d paid by retina and voiceprint, as usual—and nothing else was moving.