Slant

by Eikeltje

  are carrying identified male passengers--ail but one. And that limo refuses to

  identify without court order.

  That is the one, Mary knows instinctively: an expensive, agency-brokered

  call-in.

  Nussbaum shudders. "Christ," he shouts at the med. "Leave the poor bastard

  alone! He's dead!"

  "I can't confirm that by myself, sir," the arbeiter responds. Mary heads for

  the hall.

  Human paramedics rush through the hall and look left, then right, into the

  90

  GREG BEAR

  as they run past her. Their own arbeiters are equally aggressive; the tracks and wheels grate and squeal against the floor.

  Nussbaum joins her in the middle room before the lift. "There's a broken

  tab from an ampoule of hyper-caff beside his hand," Nussbaum says. "I can't

  find the ampoule but it's either under him or it's rolled somewhere."

  "What was his connection to the psynthe deaths?" Mary asks.

  "He had investments in an entertainment group employing p. synthes. He

  knew the two men the manager had loaned the house to, as former business

  partners. It was a long shot, but I thought maybe he could tell us something

  about them. Doesn't seem right that he would just kill himself. Maybe it's

  coincidence."

  "With a projected confession?" Mary asks. "And why wear optical makeup?"

  "He didn't want the hooker to ID him." Nussbaum holds his hands out,

  baffled.

  The chief attending physician finds them by the lift. She strips away her

  skin-tight gloves and shakes her head. "Unrecoverable," she says. "It's uncut

  hyper-caff, about ten milligrams." She holds up the ampoule. "Injected into

  his left wrist. He's wiped his memory and any chance of restarting neural

  activity. His body's still going, but just barely."

  Hyper-caff is the strongest jolt of all, ten thousand times more potent than

  caffeine. Usually doses are no higher than a tenth of a microgram. A few

  micrograms can turn a dullard into a chess master--but at a price of weeks in

  bed. Some high-level managers indulge in it for critical competitive planning

  sessions, then take long vacations in stress-free climes.

  "Was he a corp manager?" the doctor asks.

  i

  "Even better than that," Nussbaum says. "He's famous. A multi-llionaire."

  "And we scared him?" Mary asks, dismayed.

  Nussbaum pinches his nose and shuts his eyes. "Why even agree to talk to

  us? Too easy."

  The physician listens intently. Nussbaum gives her a disapproving glare.

  "Haven't you got work to do?"

  She smiles sweetly. "He's dead," she says. "It's more interesting out here."

  "Any chance this is homicide?" Nussbaum grumbles.

  "Someone could have forced the drug on him, but it takes effect in seconds,

  and in that close, it kills in a couple of minutes."

  "We'll need her, then," Nussbaum says to Mary. "Material witness."

  "Right," Mary says. She enters the lift. As the light glows, Nussbaum gives

  her a thumbs-up, and the door closes.

  / SLANT 91

  WARNING:

  The text you have repeatedly accessed is from an INDEPENDENT

  source and is probably not a bestseller! Your friends may not

  recognize this work! Would you like a list of substitute texts AT A

  SPECIAL DISCOUNT with guaranteed HIGH PROMOTION and

  INSTANT RECOGNITION AMONG FRIENDS? (Y/N)

  ESC

  14

  At seven-fifteen, Jack Giffey has been standing on the corner of Constitution

  and Divinity for twenty minutes. He claps his hands together to keep them

  warm; he is not wearing gloves, and his coat is light, the night is cold, and

  the wind is rising. At fifty, he feels too old for this sort of thing, but he will

  give Yvonne until seven-thirty.

  He doesn't even know her last name.

  A few percentage points difference in the genome; the best laid plans of

  men and monkeys gang aft very a-gley.

  He looks south and then west, up the nearly empty streets. The students

  have retreated to their hostels for the evening, or to the relative safety of the

  mountain lodges for tomorrow's skiing. A snowstorm is on the way. Skiing

  and hunting keep the republic alive today; those, and paper for fine books.

  The last mining and timber harvesting petered out about ten years ago, leaving

  much of Green Idaho a barren, scarred wasteland.

  Giffey tracks back to the idea of book paper. It nags at him. He remembers

  the last mass market books when he was a boy, paperbacks they were called,

  for sale in public bookstores. He has a small box of old books in his attic back

  in Montana, in the small house he bought three years ago; they belonged to

  his mother and father, and were given to him by the federal agents who cleaned

  up the mess.

  Funny, though; he can't remember actually reading any of those books.

  "Jack!"

  He's caught by surprise and spins around. Yvonne is walking quickly along

  Divinity, a mockfur collar on her long black coat blowing up through her hair

  and around her ears. She looks as if a dark halo surrounds her head.

  "Sorry I'm late. Bill needed some stuff shipped up to the mills and I had

  92 GREG BEAR

  "I thought we'd eat at the Briar, up on Peace Street," Giffey says. Yvonne

  nods briskly; her face is flushed with the cold. She is very pretty and she looks

  very young. Something goes a little acid in the pit of his stomach, thinking

  of hanging around with someone so young. He hopes she can keep up her end

  of the conversation. He may be thinking of her body, but his own body has

  not yet made up its mind about this whole thing, and he'll need a little

  intellectual diversion in the meantime.

  Truth is, he's irritated to be kept waiting. If she only knew who it was she

  was keeping out in the cold, and what he was planning to do...

  She takes his arm and actually snuggles in close, as innocent and friendly

  as you please. She's caught that little abruptness in his tone, he thinks, and is

  making amends.

  "The Briar is nice," she says, "but there's another place about three blocks

  from here called Blakely's. It's more established and the food is better, and it

  doesn't cost any more. Besides, it's got more atmosphere."

  "All right," he says. "Let's go there."

  Blakely's is small and mock-rustic, but at least there are no stuffed deer

  heads on the walls. An ornate sign near the bar asks that all citizens turn over

  firearms to the barkeep. It's meant to be funny. Jack is carrying a gun now

  but he usually doesn't wear firearms, even in Green Idaho; if somebody is going

  to shoot you, modern weapons are so smart and extreme that you have to plan

  hours in advance to get a drop on your killers. Might as well let justice take

  them down, because you won't.

  Yvonne catches the waiter's eye and looks at Jack as if he might like to

  handle getting the table, but that's okay. Jack lets her do it, and when they

  e

  sit, he orders a bourbon and water and she asks for a beer.

  Then she looks him straight in the eye, very serious, and asks, "What in

  hell have I got to say that you'd find amusing?"

  Giffey snorts and takes a sip from the glass of water. Then he laughs.
"Christ,

  Yvonne, I haven't even got my game plan in order, and you want straight

  answers."

  Yvonne watches with darting eyes as the waiter drops off their drinks. After

  the waiter leaves, she says, "You're here because you want to take me someplace

  and screw my brains out, don't you?"

  Giffey gapes, then laughs again, a genuinely appreciative guffaw. And I

  thought this might be a bore. "A man's mind is an open book to a pretty woman,"

  he says. "I will not deny some parts of my anatomy look upon you with favor."

  Then he draws himself up in the chair. "I'm flattered you even think I could--"

  "The hell you say. You're no grandpa, Jack, and I'm no little girl looking

  for the cozy image of her daddy."

  "Good," Giffey manages.

  "I would like to talk, though. I need your opinion on some things. I think

  there's a chance you're more than half-smart. You might even know a thing

  /

  SLANT 93

  "All right," Giffey says. "Shoot." He plays with the glass of bourbon but does

  not drink from it right away. He certainly does not want to look like a lush.

  "Am I wasting my time? With my boyfriend, I mean, and doing all this

  menial shit?"

  "You could do better."

  "You mean, in the sex lottery, I'm not playing all my numbers?"

  Yvonne is very intense and Jack is dismayed he can so completely misjudge

  a person. On the other hand, he's delighted. Warm bed with young flesh seems

  out of the question, but the evening's going to be a hoot.

  "I think you'd better explain this sex lottery thing to me."

  "You know. Evolution and women, and how we're supposed to choose supportive

  men who'll stick around to raise our youngsters so we can pass our

  genes along. Because you can go out and get a hundred women knocked up,

  but we only have a few chances to spread our genes around. The whole Darwin

  thing."

  The waiter brings their appetizers and Yvonne removes her coat and hands

  it to him, something she might have done earlier. But if Giffey had reacted

  badly or said nothing at all to this opening salvo, she might have just stalked

  out of the Blakely and gone home.

  He's still in the game.

  "Last I heard," he says, "Darwin was sort of on the outs. But I only know

  what I read."

  "I've been with my boyfriend for six years. He's spent half that time up in

  the woods working, or looking for supplies and work. That's what foragers do,

  I accept that. But I feel stretched and dried like a moose skin. Is that just me,

  acting stupid?"

  "Sounds faithful, as if you're a pretty good person," Giffey says, and means

  it. He wishes his women had been so steadfast.

  Yvonne slugs back a third of her beer. Giffey takes his first sip of the

  bourbon. It's not the best. "I do not understand all this," she says. "If I were

  in Southcoast, with my skills and education, I'd be disaffected... The only

  work I could get would be in sex or maybe entertainment. You know. The

  Yox. That's a bad word around here." Her face goes slack, and she looks away,

  across the room, at nothing. "You know what I found out last week?"

  Giffey believes he is about to learn.

  "Up in the work cabins, up in Paul Bunyan land, they have Yox satlinks.

  They pay a third of their salary and at night, they just wallow in it. I've never

  even seen a Yox--not for more than an hour, I mean, and that was just a

  karaoke sitcom. But this other stuff... Is that being unfaithful?"

  "Men have their urges," Giffey says. He's becoming a little embarrassed.

  "You could be happy he isn't calling in."

  "Maybe," she says, and leans back. She's wearing a knit top with a glittering

  silver and clearstone necklace, and he was right about her breasts--womanly

  94

  GRG BEAR

  thinks, but her face is nice, even as she chews on a fingernail and looks away

  with her eyes moist. She is really mad.

  She leans forward, country earnest. "You know what some of the counselors

  told us in school? The girls? They're not even supposed to believe this evolution

  stuff. It's in the state constitution, don't teach it as fact, don't want to upset

  the pious folks. But they used it to keep us in our places. They said, 'Good

  men want their women choosy, and able to control themselves. You give in to

  desire, which is mighty strong,' they allow that much, 'you give in to having

  sex just because it sounds like fun, you'll end up with a lower grade of male,

  a shitless sort feeding on the muddy bottom like a catfish who will leave you

  soon as buy a new hat. Because high-grade men who'll stay aithful and help

  you raise your kids, they're sensitive types, and they want a woman who only

  gives herself to quality.'"

  Giffey can't help but laugh out loud. Yvonne's eyes twinkle as she says this but

  her face is still angry. The waiter comes back and asks what they want to eat.

  "Get the pike," Yvonne suggests. "It's flown in, but it's good."

  Giffey orders the walleye special. She doubles on that.

  "I was raised that way. That's what I believe in my heart. And now my Bill

  is up there with his buddies and they're doing karaoke orgies with women in

  India or who knows the hell where. Well, sometimes it's too much."

  "I don't put much faith in what people say about love," Giffey says. "No

  body knows what they're talking about."

  "You're saying we should just listen to what's inside us. But what if we're

  all wrong inside?"

  Giffey thinks the topic is getting a little stale. "I'm no wise man and I can't

  tell you what to do," he says. "You have to live your own life."

  e

  "I'm talking to you," Yvonne says coolly. "You

  you

  to

  me

  said

  wanted

  hear

  talk to you."

  "I get a little embarrassed when someone just.., spills their heart out

  on me."

  "I tend to be up front. Bill always says so. Lately, though, I've been asking

  myself some serious questions. About Bill, about what I want, about what my

  dad wanted moving us here. I've been thinking about going to the Corridor

  or Southcoast. Getting some real work, through a temp agency. Taking some

  training and maybe even getting therapy to hone my personality."

  "That's all a crock," Giffey says.

  "Did you ever try it?" Yvonne asks.

  "Don't need to eat the whole hog to know it's spoiled."

  Yvonne laughs, then puts on her thoughtful look, and her eyes squint down

  as if the Blakely's dim light is still too bright. "I deserve better," she says.

  "Bill is a dead end. I'm smarter than he is and I don't care what other men

  think about me or how I'm going to lead my life. My dad was wrong. All

  these folks here--they're stupid. They don't want to dance in the big world

  / SLANT 95

  Giffey can't argue with this. The outside world's a crock but Green Idaho

  is the scum on the bottom of the crock. "I suppose that sums it up," he

  murmurs, looking for the food.

  "What happens to me if I leave here?" Yvonne asks. "I don't know much

  about the outside. Bill has his Yox, but we don't have any ribes or satlinks in

  our
apartment. He says we can't afford them. There's the library, but it's been

  crowded lately--lots of people researching getting out, I guess. And so much

  stuff has been yanked out of there--banned this, banned that. Christ, the

  catalog is like Swiss cheese."

  "I don't know anybody you'd want to talk to," Giffey says, "if that's what

  you're hoping. Yvonne, I'm not a nice man and the people I know aren't nice,

  either."

  The waiter brings them their pike. It's drizzled in a walnut sauce with a

  faint hint of maple syrup and some berries on the side. Giffey lifts his fork in

  salute and takes a bite of the white flaky fish. "Not bad at all," he says.

  "No, they do it real good here," Yvonne says. "What are you looking for?"

  Giffey thinks this over and decides it would be polite to give some answer.

  "A way to gully the hypocrites."

  "I don't understand," Yvonne says.