Part 23 (1/2)

But was it really so implausible to think Len Borda's goons might be scoping out Natch's apartment? Especially now, when he was mere hours away from demonstrating MultiReal to an audience of billions?

Horvil scurried out of the apartment and down the lift, whether to hide from the officers or to follow them, he could not say. He stood in the atrium and looked out the window, still vacillating between courses of action, when his eye caught a glint of metal on the ground reflected from the just-risen moon, past the billboard in the gutter on the side of the road. Horvil launched NiteFocus 50c and fine-tuned his vision with Bolliwar Tuban's TeleScopics 88 to make sure. Yep, definitely a bio/logic programming bar.

Eventually, the coven of Council troops moved westwards toward the hoverbird facilities. The engineer thrust his head outside the front door and scanned the horizon, left to right and back again. None of the officers carried bulky, shoulder-mounted disruptors, but who knew which of the surrounding buildings contained one the Council could summon at a moment's notice? When the coast was clear, he darted northwest as fast as his feet could carry him.

Horvil kneeled to the ground and examined the object closely, wis.h.i.+ng his multi projection could solidify long enough for him to pick it up. A thin rod of burnished metal, nondescript but for the Roman letter S embossed near one end and a small dent in one corner. The kind of dent a tightly wound programmer might make by repeatedly whacking the bar against a hard workbench.

If this was indeed Natch's bio/logic programming bar, then what were the odds of Horvil finding it here? The fact that the munic.i.p.al LPRACG had not swept it up by now was a pretty astronomical coincidence in itself.

And if it was Natch's-how did it get here? And what did its presence mean?

Jara had the same questions.

”I'm not saying it means nothing,” said the a.n.a.lyst, looking drawn and haggard from lack of sleep. ”I'm not saying the bar doesn't belong to Natch. But there have to be hundreds of people who walk by that spot every day carrying programming tools. Anybody could have dropped that bar.”

”But the dent,” protested Horvil. ”The fact that the bars weren't in his apartment ...”

”Circ.u.mstantial evidence. And besides, what if you're right? What if that was Natch's stuff lying on the street? It's useless information. Unless Natch left a trail of metal bars leading across town like breadcrumbs, it won't help us.”

Benyamin rocked back and forth in his seat impatiently. ”The least we can do is send someone to go get it.”

”No,” said Jara. ”Multi projecting to Shenandoah is one thing, but sending someone there in the flesh is another. What if someone's trying to use that bar to lure us away from the Surina compound? We came here to Andra Pradesh to keep safe. We need to stay here.”

The young apprentice muttered something under his breath and arose from his chair with a look of defiance. ”I'll go,” he said.

”No, you won't,” snapped Jara. ”You need to ride herd on those a.s.sembly-line programmers and make sure we've got a product ready to show this afternoon. Now sit down.” Blood rushed to Benyamin's face. He looked to Horvil, Merri and Quell for support, but found only awkward silence. Horvil gave an almost imperceptible gesture downwards towards the chair, and his cousin crumbled to his seat.

”I think we need to try contacting Serr Vigal again,” said Quell.

Jara shook her head. ”What's the matter with you people? We've been through this, Quell. We keep going round in circles, the same arguments over and over again for hours.” The a.n.a.lyst scoped out the conference table for a suitable object to use as a projectile, found none, and pressed her fingertips to the mahogany all the harder. ”Even if Vigal was returning my messages, we can't have him deliver the speech. He's just not a good enough huckster. Have you ever sat through one of his neural programming speeches? They're excruciatingly boring.”

”I'm afraid to say it, but I agree with Jara,” offered Merri.

”But Vigal's got a reputation in the programming community,” said Quell. ”He's got a following. He knows what he's talking about.”

”And after the tenth time he stops mid-sentence to scratch his bald head, people are going to wonder where Natch is. They're going to think something has gone terribly wrong in the Surina/Natch MultiReal Fiefcorp, and consumer confidence in us is going to plummet before we can even get a product to market. Blowing your first major company presentation is worse than not doing one at all.”

”So why don't we cancel already?” mumbled Horvil, his head bowed to the table under the confining archway of his clasped hands, as if waiting for a guillotine to drop.

”Because we have an alternative,” said Jara.

The Islander let out a brutish noise halfway between a grunt and a laugh. ”Now you're the one who's going around in circles. How many times do I have to say this? Margaret won't do it. She's handed the project off to Natch-she's not going to jump back into this whole business again.”

Jara frowned, brus.h.i.+ng one finger slowly over her bottom lip. ”I realize you've known Margaret longer than any of us-for process' preservation, I've never even met her except for that two-minute appearance she put in at the fiefcorp meeting the other day. But I'm just not convinced. We've got a first-rate demonstration. Merri's been working with Robby Robby to get the crowd fired up. The entire thing is laid out. All Margaret has to do is stand up and deliver it. How can she refuse?”

”The infoquake,” said Quell. ”She keeps saying the whole thing was her fault. She thinks those people died because of hear”

”Delusions of grandeur,” muttered Ben.

Quell glared sharp slas.h.i.+ng daggers at the young apprentice. ”When you're the daughter of the Surinas,” he snarled, ”there's no such thing as a delusion of grandeur.”

”That notwithstanding,” said Jara, ”I have to try to convince her. For process' preservation, Quell-this woman is a scientist. She'll listen to reason, won't she?”

Jara marched through the Surina Center for Historic Appreciation with her miniature fists clenched. Security guards haloed her like ma.s.sive blue-green planets...o...b..ting a small but furious star. She approached the atrium through an archway labeled Subaether Court. A score of disgruntled visitors glared at Jara when she pa.s.sed, as if she were responsible for their being muscled out of the atrium.

But the fault lay with the nondescript woman in the center of the domed room gazing up at the statue of a skinny man with a large nose. He was not the largest of the scientific t.i.tans adorning the dome, but his stone effigy had an almost mythical presence. The man stood calmly with one hand extended, not offering a welcoming gesture so much as making a commanding sweep. At his feet were carved the words: ANYTHING WORTH DOING IS WORTH PERFECTING.

-Sheldon Surina Next to the Father of Bio/Logics, Margaret Surina was a half-presence at best. She looked like she might disintegrate inside her bodhisattva's robes at any moment. Her face was solemn, even apologetic. An internal monologue flashed behind her eyes like distant lightning.

Jara could spare no time for pity. She shook herself loose from the Surina guards and stalked to the bodhisattva's side. The guards established a perimeter around the room and kept their distance. ”I've been trying to find you for almost two hours,” said Jara.

Margaret did not even acknowledge Jara's presence. ”The Texan governments tried to a.s.sa.s.sinate him,” said the bodhisattva, her gaze never leaving that of her ancestor. Even carved in stone, Sheldon Surina bore a look of self-importance. ”The public hated him for a long time too. People always forget about that. The Three Jesuses called him a devil, and the Pharisees slaughtered thousands of his supporters for sport. He came up with the idea for Minds.p.a.ce sitting in a cave in the Himalayas.”

”Natch has disappeared,” said Jara.

”I know.”

The bio/logic a.n.a.lyst took a step back in surprise. Margaret knew? Then why hadn't she answered all the messages and Confidential Whispers Jara had been flinging her way? As one of the firm's senior partners, why hadn't she immediately called a meeting to discuss alternative plans for the presentation? Jara felt like crying at the unfairness of it all. Why does it feel like I'm the only one willing to fight for this fiefcorp? Why is it that when push comes to shove, Natch disappears, Serr Vigal prives himself to all communication, and Horvil just falls apart? And yet I'm the one who's trying to get out of this whole nightmare. I'm the one who wants to put this MultiReal s.h.i.+t behind me and get on with my life.

”If you want to honor Sheldon Surina's memory,” Jara said in a slow and deliberate tone of voice, ”then you'll stop feeling sorry for yourself and help us figure out an alternate course of action.”

Margaret recoiled as if she had just been slapped. ”I have no idea where Natch is. I didn't do anything to him.”

”I'm not suggesting you did. But you're the one who set this whole thing in motion.”

”Indeed?”

”Come on, Margaret! You created this f.u.c.king program, you dragged Natch and the rest of us into this business. You stood up there in front of billions of people and announced a bold new era of multiple realities. It's too late to back out now. You have a responsibility-no, an obligation-to see it through.”

”An obligation to whom? To you?” The descendent of Sheldon Surina snorted haughtily. ”I don't know you.”

”You know Natch,” said Jara. ”You know Quell.”

Margaret firmed up her jaw, looking again at the cool stone representation of her ancestor. Natch's name had produced barely a ripple on the bodhisattva's face, but mention of the Islander had obviously shaken her. ”My obligation,” she replied, ”is to him.” By him, clearly, Margaret meant the big-nosed stone statue and not anyone this side of the grave.

Jara stomped her foot and, only by sheer force of will, restrained herself from yelling at the venerable bodhisattva. Hadn't she been through this same scenario with Natch just a few weeks ago, when he all but announced his intention to frame his apprentices for that little black code scheme? Was there something inherent in the bio/logics trade that caused fiefcorp masters to lose their moral bearings? ”So after sixteen years of working on this thing, you're just going to give up ,, ”Now who's playing the victim? You're not an invalid, Jara.” Until that moment, Jara had not quite been sure the bodhisattva even knew her name. ”I'm quite certain Natch didn't hold a dartgun to your chest and force you to sign an apprentices.h.i.+p contract. When you start a new business, there always are risks. You didn't think Natch and I were going to take all those risks while you sat back and watched millions of credits pour into your Vault account, did you?”

Blistering words clawed at Jara's windpipe, struggling for release. But at that moment, a Surina security guard trotted up to Margaret with a fist raised chin-level in salute. The bodhisattva gave the man a sidelong glance. Then the color drained from her face in response to some word she heard over Confidential Whisper.

”Go ahead,” rasped Margaret, stumbling towards the window with a hand clutching her stomach. ”You might as well tell her.”

The officer turned to Jara and saluted smartly. ”The Defense and Wellness Council is coming.”

”What?”

”Several hundred hoverbirds have been spotted on the outskirts of Andra Pradesh. Three or four legions of Council officers are heading this way.”