Who the frag are you? I ask silently. "Renraku Computer Systems provide you with the security of a solid reputation coupled with the leading edge in computer and Matrix technology available today," says the trideo. My attention is drawn back to the trid, where an image plays of a dark, endless vista lit by glowing neon shapes and glittering forms of slick chrome and pure color, too smooth and perfect to exist in the real world. The image zooms through the world of lines and shapes that rush by, moving toward a giant black pyramid in the distance. I can almost feel myself fly along through that world, and I suddenly feel a terrible longing for something I can't find the words to describe. That is my world. The place where I belong and, perhaps, the answer to some of my questions. The view zooms up to the pyramid and focuses on a logo etched along the side in bright blue and red neon, a dot and expanding wavefront symbol beside a name written in both English and Japanese. The announcer's voice reads the name at the same moment that my lips silently form it: Renraku. "Renraku. Come join the winning team." Then the screen switches back to a view of the newsroom and another talking head who begins to go on about a speech given in the UCAS capitol by Vice President Nadja Daviar. An image of a beautiful woman with midnight hair and pointed ears fills the screen, but I don't even pay her any attention, so entranced am I by the image that came just before. Renraku… Renraku. The name means something to me. The taste and feel of it in my mouth is familiar. Why? Do I have something to do with Renraku? What? My head starts to hurt and my fists clench and I want to slam them through the store's window, smashing the smiling face of the elven woman talking on the trideo about national healing and racial unity between humans and other metatypes. My vision blurs with tears and I pound my fist against the glass, but it resists blows harder than mine every day and my fist only bounces off with a dull thud. I want to just curl up in a ball on the sidewalk and start crying when a swarthy man comes running out the door of the shop. He has rough skin and tusks coming out of his mouth, like Weizack's dead partner Riley back at the charnel house, except he's a bit shorter and his skin is darker. I realize that neither his looks nor Riley's surprise me the way the ghoul's did. They seem almost normal to me. I stand there staring at him through blurry eyes for what seems like a very long time before I realize he's yelling at me. "Fraggin' chiphead! I said what the frag are you doin' to my fraggin' window, drekwit! Have you burned out too much of your fraggin' brain? You deaf?" He hefts a dull silver club with a black rubber handle, and I back away a step from him. "Maybe you'll listen to this, you worthless piece of drek," he says as he lifts the club, from whose tip bright blue sparks leap and crackle. I suddenly become very angry at being threatened by this… thing. What the frag does he know? I'm having a very bad day and I'm in no mood to be threatened by some street scum kawaruhito. I pull Weizack's gun from the waistband of my jeans and level it at the club-wielding shop owner. His jaw drops a bit and I can see in his eyes that he expects to die. I saw the same look from Riley the split-second before I shot him. I stare at the ork over the barrel of the gun for what seems like a very long time, thinking about how Riley's face disappeared in a spray of red as his body fell to the floor. The ork starts to slowly back away from me and my hands begin to shake a bit. "Buzz," I hiss out in a low tone, and the ork suddenly bolts back into the store yelling something that I can't hear. I turn and run away from the shop, bolting across the street. Cars screech on their brakes and honk their horns at me as I run past, still holding the pistol, tears of frustration and anger blurring my vision. One of the drivers yells something at me, an offer of help or a curse or something else I don't know. I don't hear him. I just keep running, wanting to get away from there and down through darkened streets and alleys, far from the lights and sounds of the strip.
I don't know how long I run for or where I'm going, I just need to get away, to run away from the terrible feeling of emptiness inside me. Away from the looming black holes in my mind and all the questions that cluster around them. My name, what the frag is my name? Someone told me, but I just can't remember. My head feels so full I can't find anything in it. Too cluttered, too many things going on at once. I just need to sort it all out, make sense of the jumble of thoughts. I stop running in an alley somewhere and huddle against the cold brick wall as a wave of exhaustion sweeps over me. I shiver in the growing chill of the night air and grip the pistol tighter as I wrap my arms around my knees and lay my head back against the wall to look up at the cold, gray sky lit by the distant lights of the city. The tears streaming down my cheeks make the reflections of the city lights into multicolored blurs against the darkness. I can almost imagine for a moment that I'm in that perfect, safe world I saw on the trideo. The world where everything makes sense and I know who I am and what my purpose is. I'm so tired, so very tired. I have to rest, just for a little while, close my eyes for a second and rest…
5
The megacorporations, beyond the reach of any national or international law, are capable of dictating terms to any government in the world, so tight is their hold on the world's economy. However, the same economic system also binds the megacorporations as surely as it does any of their customers. Corporations exist solely to generate profit, so they depend on the ability to continually gain market share and produce new products to sell to their customers and to draw in new customers. This ongoing competition between nation-spanning giants might well have degenerated into open warfare among the megacorporations without having to resort to the needless destruction of company assets. The Corporate Court is the invisible force operating behind the scenes of the megacorporations to maintain the delicate balance between them; keeping the most powerful forces on Earth from each other's throats and so keeping the unsuspecting citizens of the world safe from what could escalate into the most devastating war humanity has ever known. -Professor Henry Gallow, The Invisible Hand: The Corporate Court and World Economics, MIT amp;T Press, Boston, 2052 The Corporate Court was called into session shortly after Lynn Osborne's visit to her Fuchi colleague, once all of their fellow justices had arrived on the orbital. Osborne showed up early and watched the other justices slowly file into the central area of the station to take up their positions in the courtroom. The Rotunda, as the central core of the orbital was called, was made up of a single hexagonal shaft to which the other station tubes and modules connected like branches spreading out from the trunk of a great tree. It was large by the cramped standards of a space station, capable of holding the gathered justices and their trusted aides and assistants comfortably, although it was rare for all thirteen members of the Corporate Court to gather together in the same room. Like David Hague, most of the justices preferred to conduct their business via the Matrix, only visiting the court chambers of the Zurich-Orbital on the gravest occasions requiring utmost security. Like now. It was difficult to create a dignified courtroom atmosphere in the zero-gravity of the orbital, but the Court had done its best to see that tradition and the decorum were upheld. A narrow ledge ringed the cylindrical chamber. Between the ledge and the wall was a gap wide enough for the court justices to position themselves, held in padded harnesses to the wall. The ledge formed the "bench" from which they dispensed justice. It held sophisticated computer displays and information-retrieval systems linked directly into the Zurich-Orbital mainframe, one of the most sophisticated computer systems ever designed. Designed by Renraku, in fact, Osborne recalled with a bit of a chill as she ran a finger over the flat black macroplast surface of her console. Renraku's specialty was computer architecture and, although Fuchi, Mitsuhama, Ares, and others had provided much of the hardware to build the system, Renraku had pioneered the algorithms and the software to run it. The floor of the court chamber was reserved for the few assistants needed on hand for any particular occasion as well. Only rarely were others allowed into the chamber with the justices. Most testimony and evidence presented to the court was carried over the Matrix using the sophisticated holographic systems built into the bench-ring, which could project nearly any image in three dimensions into the center of the chamber for all to see. But the Zurich-Orbital would not be communicating with the Matrix for now, not while the court was in session. If what Fuchi and the other megacorps believed about Renraku's surge of new technology was true and Fuchi's security was compromised, the Matrix could not be entirely trusted, and so the court would be isolated, cut off from the rest of the world while they heard evidence. Osborne carefully reviewed each justice and his or her position in her mind as they entered the central chamber and made their way to their appointed area. David Hague was one of the first to enter, and Osborne had no serious concerns about him. Hague was loyal to their mutual employer and Osborne knew from their talk earlier that, while Hague had his doubts and concerns about Fuchi's plans, he would do nothing to endanger his employer or his own position of prestige on the Court. Hague was a native of Europe, and his loyalties shifted between the Yamana family, who controlled Fuchi Pan-Europa, and the Villiers family, which currently controlled Fuchi North America and the corporation as a whole. He had been a compromise choice between the two camps. Osborne was loyal to Villiers and had been chosen more recently, when Richard Villiers was in a strong enough position to dictate terms to the rest of Fuchi. That, and Osborne's reputation for getting things done, was why Fuchi-which meant Richard Villiers, these days-wanted Osborne to handle this matter rather than Hague. The next to enter the courtroom was Jean-Claude Priault, elder statesman and chief justice of the Corporate Court. He carried himself with unassailable dignity and grace even in the awkward environment of free-fall, and his fringe of gray hair was neatly trimmed in the finest European style. Priault was in the employ of Saeder-Krupp Heavy Industries and supposedly answered directly to the great dragon Lofwyr himself, who had bought the corporation with some of the riches from his fabulous horde after emerging from his centuries-long sleep. Having served on the Court longer than anyone else, Priault had certainly earned his status as Chief Justice. Osborne knew Priault was sharp as a monoblade and