Part 9 (2/2)

Suddenly he stiffened and went silent. For a few seconds he remained that way, and I wondered if I was going to have to deadhead the hover onto the ground by myself while Marin twitched and raved in the back. Then he convulsed, a gentle, wavelike spasm through his whole body, and turned his head to me in a single sharp movement.

”I have some more bad news, Mr. Cates,” he said, turning the hover in a smooth arc. ”New York is on fire.”

My sudden ennui shattered. I sat up straight in my seat. ”What?”

”Food riot started in Battery Park yesterday. An insufficient SSF force was sent in to subdue it, and the arrogant f.u.c.ks did what they always do, tried to overawe the rioters with force. Two SSF officers were killed in the ensuing melee. Over five hundred citizens were killed as well, but apparently two dead System Cops were enough to inspire everyone, and the unrest has spread throughout most of the island. The SSF is holding the crossings by force right now.”

I rubbed my eyes. ”G.o.dd.a.m.n it,” I muttered. ”That complicates things.”

Riots never lasted. A bunch of starving, ignorant people throwing rocks couldn't last long against the System Pigs, especially when the Stormers landed and brought in the hovers. But they could do a lot of damage in the meantime. I'd lived through three riots so far. One had lasted three days, and the stupid f.u.c.ks had even elected a mayor to speak for them. He was dead now. It hadn't been pretty.

”I'm afraid this means I can't take you directly into New York,” Marin continued. We were nearing Manhattan. I could see black smoke billowing into the air. ”I can get you in close, up north-island, but that's it. You'll have to make your own way south, if south is where you need to go.”

There wasn't anything north of Seventieth Street anymore in Manhattan. The Riots-The Riots-had razed huge tracts of the city to the ground, just like in Newark. I turned to study d.i.c.k Marin, the King Worm, sitting just a foot or two away from me, calm and silent-but smiling, for no reason I could detect. Riots-had razed huge tracts of the city to the ground, just like in Newark. I turned to study d.i.c.k Marin, the King Worm, sitting just a foot or two away from me, calm and silent-but smiling, for no reason I could detect.

We started our descent. ”A word of advice, Mr. Cates: Be on your toes. Colonel Moje has almost certainly made your name known to every SSF officer in the area. You're wanted in several outstanding investigations, so there is no legal problem with arresting, molesting, or murdering you. But when a brother System Cop puts up someone's name onto the wire, everyone's enthusiasm level rises accordingly, do you understand?”

I nodded glumly.

The hover set down on the river's edge, gra.s.s waving in the displacement field, the worn-down remnant of a foundation not too far away, the sky filled with black smoke and light flakes of ash drifting everywhere. I took a moment to take stock. My team was scattered, I'd just had my a.s.s saved by the biggest System Pig in the world, I had every other SSF officer in the area carrying my picture in his wallet, and the last cop I'd tried to kill was by now probably sporting a fission heart and a digital uplink to the Electric Church. I was in fine form. I was taking home the door prizes. I was beginning to think twenty-seven was where the Avery Cates train pulled into the station for good.

”Mr. Cates? Get out now, please. I have a meeting with several Joint Council undersecretaries in a moment, and I'm sure this New York situation will be number one on the agenda.”

I pushed open the door and stepped out of the hover. I shut the door behind me, but Marin clicked it back open.

”Do you have a plan, Mr. Cates, or should I arrange flowers for your funeral?”

A plan? I grinned at the King Worm. ”I guess it's back into the sewers for me, d.i.c.k.” I grinned at the King Worm. ”I guess it's back into the sewers for me, d.i.c.k.”

XVI.

The Hand of G.o.d Himself 00000.

”Do you not tire of this empty struggle? Do you not long in your secret heart for peace? Does the cycle of suffering not cow you into desperation?”

The Monk was pretty entertaining. It stood on a wooden box, preaching. It had been there three or four hours ago when I'd first emerged from the sewers into Longacre Square, the old unused roads splitting off in all directions. It didn't move, it just kept preaching. The crowds, angry and as well-armed as they could manage, surged over everything they could, smas.h.i.+ng and stealing and burning, but they gave the Monk a wide berth. I leaned back against the old statue of George Cohan (whoever the f.u.c.k he'd been) and smoked a found cigarette, my back aching from standing for so long. It was a beautiful day, sunny and clear. A perfect day to burn your city down to the ground.

The SSF was establis.h.i.+ng ”order” block by block. They had air superiority and squads of Stormers on the ground, so it was only a matter of time. The riot had been going on for about twelve hours, would probably be suppressed in another twelve, and I felt sorry for anyone trapped in the poorer sections of the city once ”order” was re-established. SSF punitive sweeps were pretty thorough.

Across the street, the mob was smas.h.i.+ng their way into one of the upper-cla.s.s stores where the wealthy shopped. An SSF hover swooped into position with startling speed and a team of Stormers dropped from it on thin cables. I faded back, edging into shadow. It always upset the System Pigs when some of their own got killed. The accepted wisdom being that you could never let the poor f.u.c.ks think they could actually kill kill a System Cop. People had to believe that the hand of G.o.d Himself would reach down and squash them if so much as a drop of SSF blood spilled. The hand of G.o.d here taking the form of a hover, some Stormers, and a group of hapless Crushers who double-timed into the square to form a ring around the firefight, facing outward to guard the Stormers' backs. a System Cop. People had to believe that the hand of G.o.d Himself would reach down and squash them if so much as a drop of SSF blood spilled. The hand of G.o.d here taking the form of a hover, some Stormers, and a group of hapless Crushers who double-timed into the square to form a ring around the firefight, facing outward to guard the Stormers' backs.

The Monk had also disappeared, but I ignored that. I wasn't interested in the Monk. I was tracking Kev Gatz's old roommate, the Teutonic f.u.c.k. Through him I expected to find his source for genetic augments, Marcel, who Gatz recommended for just about any illegal service.

Kev had given me enough background on the German to start with, and even in the midst of a riot some of my contacts still worked. Pickering's was on a war footing, but was still selling terrible booze and information. Pick himself had come out from his little office, grunting along on comically skinny legs below his balloon body, to have a belt with me and grouse about the stupid f.u.c.ks burning down the city.

The Teutonic f.u.c.k made his living and paid for his illegal gene-spliced augments by providing bodyguard services to other, slightly-higher-on-the-food-chain hoods. Like most augment-junkies, he was all flash and no sizzle. The augments that made him a huge, rippling mound of muscle left his bones weakened and his metabolism fatally compromised, meaning he was fragile as a bird and, while strong, easily winded. During moments of crisis like this, however, there was no need for his services because all the smart hoods were holed up in secure hiding places, waiting for the storm of SSF to pa.s.s them by. In such situations, the German made up his lost earnings by pulling mule duty for a few drug cookers. Since drug use of all kinds increased during times of severe social unrest, he was working overtime, following fixed routes on predictable schedules.

As I watched, he emerged into the square with two companions, ignoring the slaughter happening a few hundred feet away. The German was easy to spy. He was between six and seven feet tall, unbelievably muscled. His arms stuck out from his sides slightly because he could not lower them any farther. He had no neck at all, just a tree trunk of tendons ending in a red, lumpy face. His hands were shovels. He carried a nasty-looking pump-action shotgun, old but serviceable, and his legs looked like they'd been carved out of stone. Like a lot of other crazy augment-junkies, he wore a skin-tight latex uniform to show it all off. He glanced at the group of exhausted-looking Crushers, and a few nodded back. At least the German's bills were paid up.

Everything twitched as he walked. There was nothing natural about gene-spliced muscles. One look at this moron and I knew he had about two years, maybe less, before some catastrophic genetic breakdown turned him into a pool of reddish pus. But he looked dangerous, and a lot of times that was all that you needed to get by. Everything was a f.u.c.king act. His two companions were oily, dirty women, obviously terrified. I'd be terrified, too, if I had enough drug condoms sewn into me to kill a f.u.c.king herd of elephants.

With a glance at the battle raging to my left, I stepped out directly in front of the trio. They stopped about ten feet away, the German leveling the gun at me. That didn't bother me. I've had plenty of guns pointed at me, and recent adventures had forced me to reconsider who really was a threat to my life. If you weren't a cyborg killing machine or an elite System Security Force officer, you just didn't get my blood pressure up.

”It not worth it, friend,” the German said. His accent was so thick he seemed to be picking the words from a muddy stream. I flicked my cigarette at his feet and exhaled smoke. The cigarettes used to be better. It was like booze. Sure, you could find them, and if you had the yen you could even buy good ones-but the best were pre-Unification. Maybe that was romantic bulls.h.i.+t, but everyone swore they tasted better despite the age and even the s.h.i.+t cigs were unG.o.dly expensive. For most of us, s.h.i.+t was all we ever saw.

”Listen, you Teutonic f.u.c.k, f.u.c.k, you know me. Kev Gatz was your roommate. We've met.” you know me. Kev Gatz was your roommate. We've met.”

He squinted at me, his shoulders and arms twitching. It was unappetizing.

”Ya,” he said at last, his flat, red face breaking into an ugly smile. ”I see you before. Sure.” The smiled snapped off. ”Get the f.u.c.k out of way.”

I held up both hands. ”I just need to find Marcel.”

The smile came back. ”Marcel? Ya, I know Marcel. He hiding. I tell you where he is. Five hundred yen.”

A wave of tired rage rippled through me. I was tired of obstacles. The grinning red potato of a face pushed the wrong b.u.t.ton, so I took him down. It was ridiculously easy. Big men-especially big men who have paid dearly and suffered much discomfort for their hugeness-usually overestimate the amount of force required to break them.

It didn't take any special kung fu. I nodded and glanced down at the street, waited a beat, and then launched myself forward directly at the shotgun. Before the German could react, I slammed into the barrel of the gun, ramming it up into his nose. He went down, his nose shattering into a b.l.o.o.d.y pulp. I held on to the shotgun as it slipped from his fingers. Since the last thing I needed was some drug lord coming after me in addition to all my other admirers, I whipped the barrel down and held it on the two mules.

”Stay,” I advised. ”Our business will be done soon.”

As the German writhed on the ground, an explosion went off near the store, blowing a warm wind past us. The mules glanced over but I kept my eyes on them. I kicked the German lightly and he moaned.

”You've got bones like a f.u.c.king bird, friend,” I said. ”Just give me the skinny on Marcel and you can finish your deliveries. f.u.c.k with me some more and I'll break every single hollow bone you have. You understand?”

The German moaned. ”Ya, ya.”

”Good.” There was a second explosion, a second blast of warm wind. I winked at the two mules. ”No worries, then.”

Everything was on fire. Outside the beat-up old hotel, every fifth building was burning, and most had already burned once or twice in previous uprisings.

”Why do they always burn s.h.i.+t down? Every single time things get out of hand, all they want to do is burn s.h.i.+t down. Took us hundreds of thousands of years to get to this point, and they want to f.u.c.king p.i.s.s it all away in an evening.”

I shrugged. ”None of it's theirs. Burning it's just entertainment.”

Marcel was a plump man of indeterminate nationality; so used to being tracked down and accosted he didn't bat an eye when I emerged from the sewer drain down the block and walked into the old hotel he was living in. He'd made the ornate lobby his headquarters, and it was like a G.o.dd.a.m.n oriental court: People just lounged lazily around him looking bored, all of them young, good-looking, and heavily armed. Polite, too, with a few Crushers on the payroll standing uncomfortably here and there. Except for the Crushers, they'd all had a lot of cosmetic augmentation done, men and women, and drifted about in silky threads, not looking dangerous at all. Which made me think they just might be.

His people did nothing to stop me introducing myself, and for five minutes Marcel was happy to shoot the s.h.i.+t with me about the weather, the summary SSF executions he'd witnessed outside his windows, about the fact that no one knew how to riot properly anymore.

I'd heard of Marcel through Gatz and sc.r.a.ps of talk here and there, but there were a thousand operators in New York. They all thought they were the f.u.c.king G.o.dfather and usually ended up dead before too long. Marcel had shown up in gossip about a year or so ago. He was heavy, had lazy eyes that remained half-shut, and since I'd arrived he hadn't moved so much as an inch from the plush chair he was ensconced in.

”Well, Mr. Cates-who is such a good friend of Kev Gatz that Kev never mentioned him-I appreciate the social call under such extreme circ.u.mstances, but what can I do for you?”

I nodded. ”I've come to beg a favor.”

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