Daylight on Iron Mountain

by David Wingrove

  Jake knew he would have to contact Alison and thank her. Only how could he ever repay her? For he understood it clearly now. They would have been ripped to shreds without them. Chewed up and spat out, for all Yang’s indignation.

  Outside the courtroom, too, things had changed. Before now there had been only a single security guard – an old Hung Mao, in his sixties if he was a day – but now there were six of them, armed with lantern-guns, their faces masked.

  Jake touched Yang’s arm. ‘Will you do something for me, Yang Hong Yu? Will you look after our friends while I make a call or two? I won’t be long.’

  There was a room at the end of the corridor where he could make the calls. He went there, getting himself patched through to Mary.

  ‘How’s it going?’ she asked. ‘Are you winning?’

  ‘I think so,’ he said, deciding that he’d explain it all later, when he was back with her. ‘But listen… has there been any mention on the news of trouble?’

  ‘Trouble? Not that I know, but… well, I did notice that some of the news channels had gone off the air.’

  Then it was true. There was something going on. That and the additional guards. All the signs pointed that way. Only when would some proper news break? When would they find out what it was?

  ‘Mary. I’ve got to go. Things to discuss. Only if there’s anything on the news… anything at all, then let me know. Send me a message, all right?’

  ‘All right.’

  He said his goodbyes and signed off, then dialled again.

  ‘Hello?’

  It was her. Unmistakably. Twenty years had passed, but she remained unchanged.

  ‘Ali?’

  Her smile was warmer than he remembered. ‘Hi. How did it go?’

  ‘Very well. And thank you.’

  ‘You’re welcome. And before you ask, it was Ludo’s idea. Ludo Ebert, that is. He’s Gustav’s son. He feels you were treated badly by his uncle. It’s him you have to thank.’

  ‘Ah…’ Only Jake wondered how he’d known. Had Alison tipped him off ? Explained, perhaps, what had happened to Jake?

  ‘Look, Jake, I’m busy right now. But let’s speak later, yeah?’

  ‘Okay. I’ll talk to you then.’

  ‘Okay. Bye for now.’

  Jake sat there a moment, lost in his thoughts. He could still remember the first time he had ever seen her, there on the pavement outside Blackwell’s, in Oxford. She had been talking animatedly to two female College friends. It was pure chance, because he had been intending to walk on past and meet a friend in the pub nearby, only the window display had caught his attention and he had stopped to look, and there she was. For the briefest moment their eyes had met and she had smiled…

  And that was it. Five years of his life. That’s where it began. On the pavement outside Blackwell’s.

  Jake stood, then looked about him. It was such a shabby little room. It made him wonder just how many shabby little deals had been made in it.

  More than enough.

  These last few days it felt as if a wall inside him had been breached; that, under the stress of the court case, he had re-awoken all of this old stuff, this difficult stuff. All those things he had learned to wall in and deny these past twenty years. All of it come back to plague him. Only that wasn’t strictly true. It wasn’t a plague. Not at all. The truth was that he liked it. Liked that feeling of having let go. Of having relaxed the constraints he’d set in place to stop him thinking of it all. All the things he’d lost. All those wonderful, beautiful things. Things that they didn’t want him to remember.

  Oxford. He had only to close his mind and he could see it all again, all of those images, imprinted on his brain. Scattered memories from the Age of Waste. Yes, he could see it now. How this world they inhabited had its roots back then, in their neglect, their wastefulness. How the West had thrown its future away, like some undervalued piece of trash.

  ‘Shih Reed?’

  He turned. It was Chi Lin Lin.

  ‘What is it, boy? Is it about to start again?’

  ‘No, Shih Reed. But my Master… well, he felt we should talk things through. Agree upon a strategy.’

  ‘Of course.’

  His mind wasn’t in it. His mind wanted him to stay there, on the pavement outside Blackwell’s, in that bright late autumn day.

  So long ago. So very long ago.

  The afternoon session proved a lot more lively.

  The Changs, it seemed, were not going to roll over and take things lying down. They had retrenched and reconsidered things during that long lunch break and had returned to court with a whole new tactic.

  Advocate Yang leaned in and whispered to Jake’s ear. ‘The bastards are playing the delay card. If they can’t get the case dismissed, then they mean to see you die before you collect.’

  He had been warned it might be so, for that was apparently how big corporations played it sometimes. If they couldn’t win they would delay. Keep the case in court for thirty years if they had to, wearing the opposition down until they were forced to make a deal.

  Or died.

  But the team GenSyn had sent him had anticipated this. Advocate Meng had risen to face the Judge, clearing his throat.

  ‘My Lord, I would like to…’

  Judge Wei brought his gavel down hard. ‘Advocate Meng… would you like a ruling now?’

  For the first time that day, Meng looked surprised. ‘My Lord, I…’

  ‘What is this?’ Jake whispered to Yang.

  ‘I don’t know,’ Yang answered, as much in the dark, it seemed, as Jake.

  ‘Do you want me to rule?’ Judge Wei insisted.

  Meng hesitated, then asked, ‘Might I consult with my client, my Lord?’ Wei nodded. ‘You may.

  We’ll have a short adjournment. Be back here in an hour.’ And with that he got up and left the courtroom hurriedly.

  ‘What in the gods’ names was that?’ Jake asked, alone in one of the anterooms with his team. ‘I didn’t think he could rule. Not without hearing all the evidence, and we’ve barely begun that.’

  ‘He ought,’ Meng answered. ‘Only I think our Lordship is playing another game. If it weren’t so outrageous, I’d think he was trying to start an auction.’

  Jake looked to him for explanation.

  ‘Well… I can’t be sure, but… I think the Judge is waiting for our offer.’

  ‘Our offer? But I thought it was between us and the Chang family if we wished to settle?’

  ‘If we wanted to settle out of court, yes. But I don’t mean that. Judge Wei has as good as said he’ll rule for the party that pays him the biggest bribe.’

  Jake should have been shocked, only he wasn’t. It was no worse than what the Changs had done in denying him what was legitimately his. In this rapacious world, the only wonder was that such behaviour wasn’t officially sanctioned.

  ‘So how do we answer him?’

  ‘You don’t want to pay the Judge, then, Jake? It would be cheaper for us all. Cheaper and less bother.’

  Jake bristled. ‘I most certainly don’t want to. But what happens if he rules for the Changs?’

  ‘Then we appeal.’

  ‘But that just plays into their hands, surely? It would take months to get a case re-scheduled.’

  ‘Not necessarily. And in the meantime we could find out a few facts about Judge Wei. Like how much the Chang clan have paid him, for a start, and whether they have any other kind of hold over him.’

  Yang, sitting there and listening, beamed at the thought. ‘And the Changs… could we investigate them too?’

  Jake interrupted. ‘But this all takes time and money, surely? Why can’t we force Judge Wei to behave as he ought?’

  Meng smiled patiently. ‘Why do you think the Changs had the case moved to this court in particular? Any higher and they’d have had trouble finding as corrupt a judge as our good friend Wei. Any lower and any decision the Judge made would be laughed… well, out of court.’

  ‘
Yes, but…’ Jake huffed, hating the fact that he had to deal with such rogues and pickpockets. It all seemed so unclean.

  Just then Chi Lin Lin came back. He looked troubled by something, but he said nothing, just sat there on a chair at the back of the room looking on.

  But Jake had noticed. He went across, leaving the advocates to discuss how to proceed.

  ‘Chi Lin Lin? What’s up? You don’t look the ticket.’

  Chi Lin Lin looked down. He seemed reluctant to answer Jake. Then he started to cry.

  Jake reached out and took his shoulders gently in his hands. ‘Aiya… what’s the matter?’

  Chi looked up at Jake through his tears. ‘I went home. To have a shower and get a change of clothes. And while I was there… well, there have been rumours, Shih Reed. Awful, terrible rumours.’

  Jake felt a strange dread. ‘What kind of rumours?’

  Chi looked past Jake at the wall-mounted camera, as if afraid to say what he was about to say, then said it anyway.

  ‘They say that Tsao Ch’un has killed one of his closest servants. One of the Seven. They say…’ His lip trembled. ‘They say it’s war.’

  ‘What’s that?’ Yang said, coming across. ‘War? What nonsense is this, Chi Lin Lin? You’ve not been spreading rumours have you, boy? The gods help us all if you have, because—’

  Jake cut him off. ‘It’s war. I thought it was earlier. And now I’m sure of it.’ He looked to Chi again. ‘What else are they saying?’

  ‘Nothing. At least, nothing that makes sense. There have been deaths, it seems. Random assassinations. Awful things, apparently. But no one knows anything for sure. The news channels… they’re hiding it. Trying to make out that all’s well and nothing’s changed, only…’

  ‘I knew it,’ Jake said. ‘I thought it had to be that. Tsao Ch’un and the Seven, finally at each other’s throats.’

  ‘Gods!’ Yang said, appalled. ‘Don’t even say it!’

  ‘What’s that?’ Advocate Meng asked, coming across.

  ‘War,’ Jake said, thinking suddenly just how small a matter his case was in the circumstances. ‘Tsao Ch’un has declared war on his trusted servants.’

  Jake returned to his room and lay down. He had not slept well the previous night and now he felt exhausted. Even so, he changed the screen onto one of the more reliable news stations, turned the volume down low, then lay back. But sleep quickly overtook him and, when he woke, his head was filled not with thoughts of the war, but with the dreams that had come to him.

  Dreams? Or memories?

  Unsurprisingly perhaps, the dreams had been of Alison and his days at College. They had never actually gone punting, yet while he slept that was what they were doing, Alison lounging in the long, narrow boat while he pushed them through the water, as the luxuriant green banks of the Isis flowed past.

  Somewhere south of the city they had stopped off at a pub and from its balcony they had looked back at the dreaming spires, framed by his own night-time imaginings in a perfect sunlight that was roseate pink, making the whole thing seem to glow with warmth.

  ‘Home from home’, he’d used to call it. Which was not surprising, after the spartan austerity of the Academy. That you could have framed in mud and ice and rain. In heaving lungs and aching legs. And other ‘let’s not mention it’ things.

  Only it hadn’t all been bad. He remembered how he had enthused to Alison about the datscape. About the smell and feel and touch of it. About the rush he got every time he went inside. Addictive, even then.

  But that day they had talked about the death of loved ones, and she had sat there, her head slightly tilted to one side as she listened to every word. About the crash, and after. About… well, simply about being. And that evening – in the real world that now seemed like a dream – she had taken his hands and led him to her bed, where they had made love for the first time. Eighteen she was, he nineteen. Destined, she’d said.

  Destined.

  Here they were, at the tail ends of their lives, and destiny had led them different paths.

  He had tried to get her earlier, but she had been too busy to take his call. But now she called him back.

  ‘We should get you better accommodation,’ she said, looking past him at the state of the room he was in. ‘That can’t be comfortable.’

  ‘It isn’t, but listen… the case…’

  ‘I’ve heard from Advocate Meng.’

  ‘Right… so what’s to be done?’

  Alison smiled, somewhat wearily it seemed. ‘It’s already done, I’ve spoken to Ludo and he’s authorized a beefing up of our presence in court. Five new advocates. And I’ve agreed to finance an investigation into Judge Wei and his connection to the Changs.’

  Jake stared at her, astonished. ‘How did you manage it? I mean… how the hell did you get this past Wolfgang?’

  ‘I didn’t. Again you’ve Ludo to thank. He knows how to placate his uncle. He’s the son Wolfgang never had, and he’ll be running things one of these days. You might say that what Ludo wants, Ludo gets. And you’re Ludo’s hero.’

  ‘Me?’ Sheer disbelief made him laugh. ‘You’re spinning me a line, girl!’

  ‘Not at all. He loves the datscape. He’s in it all the time. Once this is over he wants to meet you and…’

  The words seemed to die on her lips. She looked down, her face changing suddenly. ‘Jake…?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘These rumours…’

  He could see she wanted reassuring. That for all that she seemed in control, she was still a little girl. Her father’s daughter. The same little girl he had met all those years ago. So tough on the outside, but inside…

  ‘It’ll sort itself out,’ he said. ‘See if it doesn’t.’

  ‘You think?’

  ‘I know.’

  She smiled, grateful to him. ‘I’ll speak to you later, yeah?’

  ‘Yeah. And thank Ludo for me.’

  Afterwards he sat there, his back against the thick plastic of the wall, staring at the news screen. Wondering if that were so, if it would sort itself out, because things were already escalating. There were reports of trouble in the local stacks, appeals for calm.

  And then Mary called.

  ‘Hi, sweetheart, I…’ And then he stopped, taking in her face. She was as white as a sheet. ‘What’s happened?’

  He saw how hard it was for her even to begin to say. She was on the verge of breaking down.

  ‘Some men…’ She took a long, shivering breath, then continued. ‘Big men, thugs… they came here, Jake. Threatened us. They…’

  A tear rolled down her cheek.

  ‘Did they hurt you?’

  She shook her head. ‘They… warned me. Said…’

  ‘Said what?’ he asked gently, when she didn’t continue.

  He ought to go home. He knew it now. What with all that was going on. Only if he did, the Changs would have won.

  ‘Listen,’ he said, trying to keep in control. ‘I’ll speak to GenSyn…’

  ‘GenSyn?’ She looked up, staring at him, not understanding. But then she wouldn’t have. He hadn’t told her yet.

  ‘They’re helping us… I’ll explain it all later. But I’ll try and get protection. I’m sure we could work something out. Until I’m back.’

  Mary looked close to tears again. ‘Can’t you come back now, Jake?’

  ‘Tomorrow. Once things are settled. I promise you. Only I have to be here now. There’re things need to be decided.’

  ‘But can’t you do that from here, Jake? I’m… afraid.’

  That got to him. In all of their life together, she had never been afraid. Not enough to say as much, anyway. Only if he wasn’t in court what kind of signal would that send?

  ‘Look,’ he said. ‘I’ll sort something out. Okay? And then I’ll call you again. But don’t be afraid, sweetheart. Things will be fine. I promise they will.’

  Only what were his promises worth? It wasn’t as if he was an influential man.

>   He called Alison again and told her what had happened.

  ‘I’ll get onto it at once,’ she said, clearly pleased that there was something she could do. Some task to keep her busy and stop her worrying about the bigger picture.

  Good old Alison, he thought, as he cut connection. What would he have done without her?

  Only he didn’t have time to think about it, for right then Chi Lin Lin arrived, to tell him he had to get back to court at once.

  He arrived, late and breathless, taking his seat even as the Judge began his address.

  ‘Who the fuck is that?’ he asked, leaning in to whisper to Yang.

  Yang gripped his arm. ‘Didn’t Chi tell you? Judge Wei had an accident. This is Judge Yo. He’s in charge of things now.’

  Judge Yo was tall and skeletal in appearance. He looked like a hanging judge: his features, particularly his eyes, exuding a humourless disdain for the proceedings.

  ‘I will have silence while I speak!’ he said coldly, glaring at Yang and Jake. ‘And before we begin, let me make it clear… any attempt to influence my decision will be punished to the full extent of the law. You understand me, ch’un tzu? Good. Then let us proceed.’

  ‘So tell me, ‘ Jake said, three hours later, when they took a break. ‘Is Judge Yo a good thing or bad?’

  Meng Hsin-fa looked up from where he was studying some papers he had just received by courier.

  ‘I’m hoping good. But it’s hard to say. Judge Wei’s accident, it would seem, was far from accidental. And if it was the Changs who were to blame, then why would they take such action without knowing who would replace him? No. I would reserve judgement for the time being. But listen. I’ve been instructed to delay things – to seek a postponement until tomorrow. Help is on its way, it seems. Reinforcements.’

  The way he smiled made Jake think that there was something he wasn’t telling them.

  ‘This help… is it something special?’

  ‘Oh, very special,’ Meng answered, his smile widening. ‘But let’s not spoil it for you, Jake, neh? This is something I want you to see with your own eyes.’

  There was a note waiting for him when he went back to his room. Or rather, an envelope, in which there was a note and a key and other things, including a picture of them both when they were young.