by Dan Wells
“He’s my boyfriend,” she said quickly, “he got in a bar fight. We’ll be fine.”
“Dump the loser and get with a real man,” he said, stepping out into the sidewalk.
“Mari,” said Sahara, “you need to get out of there.”
Saif stirred again, his eyes half opening; one of them was rapidly swelling. “Mrrrr,” he said. The man on the street stepped closer, and Marisa let go of Saif to stand up straight, ready to defend herself. The approaching man only smiled.
“Mrrrrisa,” Saif slurred. “Did you punch me in the face?”
A passing car ran its headlights across them, causing the blood on her SuperYu fingers to glisten. The man saw it, paused, and backed off with a smile.
“No problem here, sister, you do what you gotta do.” He laughed. “Hit him once for me.”
“Mrrrrisa, I think you broke my face bone.”
“He’s kind of stupid when he’s unconscious, isn’t he?” said Fang.
“I’ve got Bao,” said Sahara. “What’s the message?”
“Tell him to meet me . . . by the USC campus, southeast corner. And then tell him to turn his phone off. We’re going dark.”
“Be safe,” said Sahara, and Fang and Jaya echoed the same. Anja was already offline. Marisa took a deep breath and shut off her djinni.
The world seemed to shrink.
The first sensation was, fittingly, blindness. It was still only twilight, and the street was still lit by neon signs and speeding headlights, but Marisa had become so accustomed to the djinni’s heads-up display lights that the whole world seemed darker with them off. Gone were the chat alerts, the news feed icons, the subtle navigational cues that were so much a part of her existence she didn’t even think about them anymore. Her peripheral vision had been filled with information overlaying the world, and now it was gone. She felt the darkness like a tangible object, smothering her like a cloak.
With the darkness came a sense of isolation—she was surrounded by people, but they were strangers, and the people she actually relied on were cut off and unreachable. Sahara and Anja were only a few miles away, but without that constant link they might as well have been in China with Fang. She couldn’t send messages, she couldn’t make calls, she couldn’t even blink the police or an ambulance if something went wrong. She had no one to rely on but herself.
It terrified her.
She almost turned her djinni back on, but it wasn’t safe. Even if they couldn’t control Saif, they could control others, like the five college students who’d killed eLiza. The only way to be safe was to hide. She stopped dragging Saif and stooped down, gently trying to shake him the rest of the way into consciousness.
“Saif, wake up. Come on, cuate, let’s stand up. Come on.” She pulled on his arm, urging him to his feet, and he stood up gingerly.
“My face hurts.”
“You’re lucky that’s all that happened,” she said softly. “I need you to turn your djinni off.”
“Did you punch me?”
“And I’ll do it again if I have to,” said Marisa, “but it’s better to just turn off your djinni.”
“Why do I have to turn off my djinni?”
“Because you’re an idiot drug dealer who uses his own drug.”
He seemed to freeze for a moment, then deflated slightly, his head drooping. “You said they could . . . control people,” he said. “Is that why I can’t remember the last ten minutes?”
“That and my fist,” said Marisa. “It was the only way to break their control. Now turn off your fracking djinni before they take control again.”
He nodded, and after a pause he seemed to cringe. “Oh, this is freaky.”
“Tell me about it,” said Marisa, and pulled him forward. “Now, let’s get walking. The people who did this were trying to silence you, because of something you know, and that means two things: first, they’re going to keep coming, so we have to stay offline and we have to get away from this spot, which is the last place they knew you were. Second, you need to tell me whatever it is they don’t want you to tell me.”
“I don’t know what they don’t want me to tell you.”
“Think,” she said, stopping at a curb while the traffic roared by. “Start at the top: do you know who programmed Bluescreen?”
“Of course not.”
“Do you know who manufactures it?”
“No.”
“Do you know . . .” She covered her eyes with her palm, trying to think, then looked up again as he pulled her forward; the traffic had stopped, and they crossed the street. “Do you know where to find them? Where their warehouse is, where they operate from, anything like that?”
“I don’t know anything,” Saif insisted. “I’m a low-level dealer, Marisa. I get the drives from a supplier, and the next time I see him I give him the money I made and he gives me more drives.”
“The supplier, then,” said Marisa. “He’s our first link in the chain. What’s his—” She stopped shaking her head in frustration. “I was about to ask for his name, so I could look him up and try to track his djinni, but that’s obviously out of the question right now. I hate being disconnected like this; it’s like someone . . . chopped my brain in half.”
“Tell me about it.” Saif thought for a moment. “I don’t even know his name, honestly, just some street handle he uses: Kindred.”
“Do you know where to find him?”
“Confronting him is not a good idea,” said Saif.
“Obviously we don’t confront him,” said Marisa, “but we can watch him. He meets with other street dealers besides you, right? So we can watch a handoff, and maybe follow him back to whoever he reports to.”
“This is getting way too dangerous,” said Saif. They crossed another street, arriving at the corner of the university campus. “These are hardened criminals,” he said. “Do you know what they’ll do if they see us?”
“A little too well,” said Marisa. “That’s why we make sure they don’t. There’s Bao.”
“Marisa!” Bao ran toward her, wrapping her in a bear hug and then stepping back awkwardly, as if the display of emotion had embarrassed him. He was dressed in a black jacket, faux leather, with intentional gaps at the shoulders held together by safety pins—the effect was ragged, but one of studied banality. Half the tourists in Hollywood wore safety pin jackets these days, and with his plain brown T-shirt and blue jeans he was perfectly dressed to blend into a crowd. “You’re safe. And you . . .” He looked at Saif. “Well, you’re safe-ish. Unless whatever did that to your face is still following us?”
“You’re looking at her,” said Saif.
Bao’s eyes widened. “Ouch, Mari. Sahara told me you punched a guy, I didn’t realize it was this one.”
“She probably saved my life.” Saif narrowed his eyes. “And you are . . . ?”
“I’m sorry,” said Marisa. “Saif, this is Bao, he’s one of my best friends in the world, and a professional . . .” She didn’t want to say thief, even though it was essentially true. “Sneak,” she said at last. “He’s the guy best qualified to help us disappear. Bao, this is Saif, a former Bluescreen dealer. They’re trying to kill him.”
“Oh, this is that Saif,” said Bao. “I thought we didn’t trust him?”
“I’m standing right here,” said Saif.
“We didn’t,” said Marisa, and shot Saif an apologetic grimace. “No offense, but you were kind of a . . .” She paused, rephrasing to something more polite than arrogant asshat. “You’re the one who got Anja in trouble, and up until ten minutes ago you had a lot more in common with the enemy than with us.”
“Glad I convinced you,” said Saif.
“You didn’t,” said Marisa. “They did, when they tried to kill you.” She looked back at Bao. “Speaking of which, we’ve got to hide.”
“I can’t stash you anywhere long-term,” said Bao, “but I can at least get you off the streets for the night. Sahara kind of filled me in—your djinnis are off?”
“We’re completely disconnected,” said Mari. “Honestly, I can’t believe you live like this; this is utter hell.”
“You lived like this for twelve years,” said Bao. “And the human race survived like this for thousands of years, if you can believe it.” He led them to the side, away from the streetlights. “But the upside is, this city is just as dependent on djinnis as you are. As long as you stay turned off, ninety-five percent of the ways anyone’s going to use to find you will be completely useless. Now, step two is even simpler—get off the roads, get out of sight, lay low. If you don’t feel safe at your place, you’re welcome to crash at mine—”
“I know how to hide in my own house,” said Marisa. “I need you to show us how to hide here, in the middle of the city. We’re going after Saif’s supplier.”
Bao looked at Saif, then back at Marisa. “Oh, this seems incredibly stupid.” He pointed at Saif. “Your plan?”
“Hers,” said Saif. “I’m with you, though, this is way too big for us to be messing around with.”
“This was your idea!” said Marisa. “This is what you asked for: to meet me so we could figure out a plan. Well, now we have a plan.”
“Honestly?” said Saif. “I didn’t think you’d take it this far.”
“But then . . .” Marisa stared at him, her face screwed into a look of confusion. “Then why did you want to meet me?”
“Why do you think he wanted to meet you?” asked Bao.
“Please,” said Saif, with a look of disdain. “Like I have to play superspy to get girls? If this was just about getting into her pants, the deal would already be done.”
“Oh, for the love,” said Marisa, slapping her hand over her eyes. “You are a bigger blowhole than I ever imagined—and that’s saying a lot.”
“I have my own plans for these dealers,” said Saif. “Plans that do not involve chasing them around until they shoot me. But first I need to know what you know.”
“You know what I know,” said Marisa, practically shouting. “Bluescreen takes over your mind. They can control people like nulis. They can control you too, apparently, and they’re willing to kill you to keep you from talking, so why are you chickening out when I talk about stopping them? This is your life we’re talking about.”
“I told you, I have a plan,” said Saif. “I’m going to go to the police.”
“The police are useless,” said Marisa. “Not ten hours ago I watched Omar talk a police chief into a felony; with as much money as Bluescreen is making, they’re sure to have some cops in their pocket as well, assuming they don’t control a few outright with the puppet program. We can’t rely on the police for anything.”
Saif clenched his jaw, and shook his head slowly.
“She’s right,” said Bao, “but she’s also talking crazy. Knowing that the cops can’t protect us is all the more reason to run screaming in the other direction. Going after the Bluescreen dealers by ourselves is suicide.”
“Only if we get caught,” said Marisa. “Which we won’t, if you help us. So that gives you three options: help me, or I go by myself, or you knock me unconscious and drag me home.”
“Why is this so important to you?” asked Saif. “Why are you willing to risk your life for it? You don’t even have the virus.”
Marisa looked at him, a thousand answers rattling through her head, each one some angry variation of because it’s important. But she knew he was right—it had to be more than that. There were plenty of important issues she never did anything about, drifting through the internet and plugging herself into Overworld and forgetting her real life as much and as often as possible. This was different. This was personal. Was it the threat to Anja? Or was it even closer to home?
“Because I want to trust someone,” she said at last. “Look around—do you know any of these people? Do they know us? Do any of them even care? Most of them are on their djinnis, their minds half a world away. We’re in the middle of a crowd and yet we’re isolated from everyone but our closest friends and our strictest authorities, and we can’t trust the authorities: the government is corrupt, the cops are paid off, and the megacorps that run the world just look at us like walking bank accounts. And now with Bluescreen we can’t even trust our friends anymore. We have no security, no privacy, we have nothing we can rely on. I want to rely on something again, because I can’t do this anymore.”
Bao sighed. “Fine. Let’s track these guys down.”
“And find what?” asked Saif. “More people you can’t trust? Even if I take you to my supplier, and by some miracle we find a way to spy on him without being seen, what then? They’ll keep selling Bluescreen, the cops will keep taking bribes, the whole world will go on exactly like it always has. The people with the power will still have it, and you won’t have anything.”
“I’ll have information,” said Marisa.
Saif nodded. “What will you do with it?”
“I’ll figure out how to get more,” said Marisa. “Sooner or later, we’ll have enough to do something.”
Saif studied her, his eyes dark, his face lit by the dim yellow of a streetlight. After a long silence he glanced at Bao, then back at Marisa. “I’ll help you, but only tonight. I’ll show you my supplier, and then you’re on your own.”
“Thank you,” said Marisa.
“Then let’s go,” said Bao, “but we go carefully, and you do what I say, and if I see anything suspicious we cut and run. Deal?”
“Deal,” said Marisa. “Saif, where’s Kindred?”
“An industrial park a few zones south of here,” said Saif. “We’re going to need a car.”
“I’m guessing neither of you can pay for one without your djinnis?” asked Bao. Marisa and Saif shook their heads, and Bao pulled out a slim piece of plastic. “This is untraceable credit, representing a full day’s work and my family’s food. You’ll pay me back?”
“Absolutely,” said Marisa.
“Come on.” He walked to the curb, hit a few buttons on his phone, and an autocab rolled to a stop. It slid its doors open with a cheerful welcome.
“Good evening!” said the cab. “Where can I take you today?”
Saif gave it the address and helped Marisa in. Bao followed, tapping his plastic card on a small flat panel.
“We should be there in about thirty minutes,” said the cab, sliding the doors closed behind them. “Would you like a—”
“No ads or offers,” said Marisa. “Ay, I hate these things.”
“Tell me about where we’re going,” said Bao.
“It’s called the Donato Center.” Saif kept his voice low. “It sounds swankier than it is—mostly just rentable warehouses and office space, maybe ten or twelve buildings with a little web of roads between them. But we’re not going right there—I didn’t want there to be a cab on the grid heading to that address, in case these people are monitoring. Instead the cab’s taking us to a little strip mall nearby: taco stands and dry cleaners and that kind of stuff. We can walk the rest of the way, and most of it in the dark.”
“That’s smart,” said Bao. “Does the Kindred guy use one of the offices?”
Saif shook his head. “Just one of the parking lots. The place is empty after hours.”
“Even better,” said Bao. “Any security cameras that see us won’t belong to anyone who cares. We should be prepared for private surveillance nulis, though—a guy selling drugs is going to have at least a couple of those to watch his back.”
“And they’ll be doing more than just scanning for djinni IDs,” said Marisa. “Even Cameron and Camilla have nightvision. And infrared. We can’t let them see us.”
“That’s why you have me,” said Bao, smiling for the first time that night. “This is how I make my living, remember? Item number one.” He opened his jacket and pulled something from an inner pocket: a short black stick with a foam cone on one end. “Directional microphone,” he said. The end opposite the foam had a small earbud, which Bao pulled out on a taut, retractable c
ord. He let go and the earbud zipped back into its housing. “The first rule of sneaking in somewhere is that the less ‘in’ you have to sneak, the better. This will let us hear everything they’re saying from two hundred meters away. Item number two.” He handed the microphone to Marisa and reached into a different pocket, pulling out a beige cloth cap, like a ball cap, rolled into a wad. He unfurled it to show the logo on the front, the stylized black bear of Monarch Studios, a movie company.
“How is a Monarch hat going to help us?” she asked.
Bao smiled, and reached his finger inside the hat up under the brim. He pressed a button and the logo vanished, replaced by the Cherry Dogs logo Marisa had designed.
Saif frowned. “That still won’t help us.”
Marisa smiled. “It’s electric ink. He can make any logo he wants.”
“The second rule of sneaking in,” said Bao, “is that looking innocuous is more important than not being seen, because not being seen is impossible. The hat has a camera, so I can re-create any logo I see. Hold this.” He handed the hat to Saif, then took off his black jacket and turned it inside out, revealing a second surface the same color and material as the hat. Even the safety pins were gone, replaced by a normal shoulder seam. Bao put the jacket on, then the hat, and looked for all the world like a uniformed employee of some generic company. He reached one more time into his pocket and pulled out what looked like a slim plastic block with a clip at one end; he unfolded the block into a single flat sheet, and Marisa saw that it was clipboard. “This is the costume I use for loitering; anytime I need to just hang around and listen to someone, or stand in a crowded street and snag bank numbers from passing tourists. People get suspicious if you just stand there, and now that nulis do all the menial jobs like groundskeeping and custodial, you can’t just pretend to be picking up trash. But stand around with a clipboard, talking to yourself and making a mark every now and then, and people think you’re official. Better yet, stand in a busy street with a clipboard and try to talk to people, and it’s like you’ve just turned invisible.”
