by M M Buckner
She tightened her lips and kept walking, glancing side to side without moving her head, and nudging closer into the employee group every time they passed under a camera.
“Nick-O, we severely need a place to hide.”
He took her to his gym. The doorkeeper was not a computer scanner but a pretty blonde named Sharon, whom Dominic knew on very intimate terms. Sharon balked at his altered appearance, and she asked a lot of questions, which he suavely vowed to answer at a later date. After some finagling, she let them come in without demanding the usual palm print.
At the back of the weight room, behind the stationary bikes, there was a small sauna hardly anyone used. It was the old-fashioned kind made of genuine, antique wood, and the water bucket had to be lifted manually to wet the heated rocks and make steam. Most members found this inconvenient, but Dominic preferred the privacy. In the larger spa rooms at the front, execs met to talk business and to impress each other with their body enhancements.
Just as he’d hoped, the small sauna was empty. He led Qi inside, closed the door and set the thermostat as low as possible. The heat reminded him of the miners’ colony, and it felt almost welcome after the frigid Trondheim air. In the pillowcase, he found his node, his oldest pair of down-at-the-heel house slippers and a box of snack mix.
Qi brushed a stray rose petal from his chest. “Take off your uniform. They’ll be watching for Lapp.Com insignia now. I have to kill that logo chip.”
“I should have asked you to get me some underwear.”
“Relax. I won’t look at your little pecker.”
Dominic started to say something but changed his mind. When he handed her the uniform, she spread it flat on the sauna floor, then picked up a heated rock, using his sleeve as a mitt. Half a dozen times, she smashed the logo emblazoned over the breast pocket, thrusting the rock down with such force that it finally cracked in two. “That should do. You can get dressed now.”
He pulled the uniform up to his waist and tied the sleeves in a knot over his belly. Beads of sweat rolled down over his bare chest. The sauna was too hot to dress completely. He sat on the wooden bench and settled his Net node across his knees, trying and failing to keep his eyes off Qi as she stepped out of her uniform and squatted nude to pound her own logo with a rock.
“I have a feeling the NP knows exactly where we are,” he said, stuffing his mouth with snack mix.
“Maybe.” She rolled her lean naked shoulders, then dipped her hand into the water bucket for a drink. “He hasn’t arrested us yet.”
Dominic spoke with his mouth full. “That thing is not a ‘he.’ It’s an it.”
“Aw, don’t be so testy.” She faced him with a smile and wriggled back into her uniform.
The full frontal view made him fumble a node command, and he had to mumble “Undo” three times.
Qi sat beside him and poured snack mix straight from the box into her mouth. About a third of the box disappeared down her gullet, and when she closed her lips, her cheeks puffed out like balloons. She crunched noisily and grinned. Dominic spoke to his Net node in clear, even words. “Full encryption mode. Call Karel Folger. At home.”
CHAPTER 20
* * *
PRIVATE ENTERPRISE
“YES, sir, um. Where are you, sir? We’ve been max worried. Um, are you in disguise?” Karel’s face warped unnaturally on the flat screen. His nostrils gaped like a pair of dark caves, his pink gums glowed, and his teeth thrust forward wolfishly. As usual, he was leaning too close to the camera lens.
Dominic touched his scarred, bearded face and winked at Qi. “Right, Karel. I’m traveling incognito on a mission for the bank. You’re surprised to hear from me, I suppose.”
“We thought those terrorists were holding you hostage, sir. I’ll call Mr. Lorn and let them know you’re safe. Would you like me to send a car?”
“No, Karel. Don’t call anyone. This is top secret. Do you understand?”
Karel’s eyebrows twitched. He turned his head for a second, and Dominic saw a voluminous red ear, grooved with dark declivities. Then Karel’s gaping nostrils reappeared. “Not anyone, sir?”
“I need your absolute promise of secrecy, Karel.”
“Yes sir. Nondisclosure. Count me in, sir. What’s the deal?”
Dominic relayed the necessary facts. In the sultry sauna, with the Net node balanced on his lap and sweat rolling down his chest, with Qi resting against his knee and munching snack mix, he said he needed to break into the Ark. He wanted to reroute his personal funds into an alias account without anyone knowing. Since the money belonged to him, it wouldn’t be illegal, no more illegal than some other transactions they both knew about. As he continued explaining, Karel’s buckteeth protruded in a smile.
“You once found a back door in the Ark’s firewall,” Dominic said. “Did you ever report it?”
“Negative, sir. A secret like that’s a negotiable asset. You taught me, sir.”
“Right. So this is payday, Karel. I need to use your back door, and you can name the toll fee.”
“For you, sir? Gratis.”
Karel’s stringy hair fell in his eyes. He seemed to be twitching all over with eagerness to please. Dominic couldn’t help but smile at his naïveté. “Nothing’s ever gratis, Karel. Everything comes with a price, so name yours. A raise? Promotion? Lump sum? You’ve caught me in a generous mood.”
Karel rubbed his nose. “I wouldn’t mind an upgrade, sir. Now that you’re president, maybe you could make me an AVP.”
This caught Dominic off guard. Assistant vice president? Karel was only seventeen. He hadn’t even completed the bank’s basic management course. Only youth and inexperience would make such a request, and Dominic tried to laugh it off.
“In time, Karel. In time. You’re on a fast track. I’ll skip you up two levels to senior clerk, how about that? With a 25 percent salary increase.”
“Plus an extra week of vacation?”
Dominic burst out laughing. “I did teach you, didn’t I? Yes, two extra weeks of vacation. Now let’s get down to business. Tell me about this back door to the Ark.”
“Well, sir, it’s hardware. The engineers left an open port in one of the timing servers. If you want to use it, you have to come into the bank and physically plug in.”
Dominic spent an hour interrogating Karel. He was hoping for some means to use the open port by remote access. The last thing Dominic wanted was to walk into the bank in person. He had a pretty clear idea what the NP would do if its flesh flunky came within reach, and he had no intention of becoming that bit-brain’s personal puppet. He’d already decided he’d rather die.
Vibrating with enthusiasm, Karel offered to handle everything himself. He had clearance into the computer room, and he often worked late. No one would suspect him. But Dominic refused to put the young man in danger. If the guards caught a junior assistant hacking the Ark, Karel’s career would be over before it started. They’d probably transfer him to rot away in some obscure post like that factory ship. No, Dominic couldn’t let Karel take the risk. He had no choice but to go himself.
He spent the next hour arguing with Qi.
“It won’t work. How will you get through the front door? They’ll scan your DNA.”
“We’re running out of time, Qi. I’ll sneak in. You’ll do your spy stuff and disguise me.”
“Sneak in how? If the NP catches you, how will the miners get their money?”
“Their money?”
“You know what I mean. Forget the heroics. We need a plan that might actually succeed.”
After exhaustive discussion, Dominic finally convinced her. Only he knew the Ark file structure well enough to counterfeit a cash account, and only he knew how to populate it with money. Ergo, he was the one who had to physically enter ZahlenBank, find the timing server with the open port, plug in a bus then sit there and work through a hardwired connection. It wasn’t as if he relished the idea.
Break-and-entry tactics he delegated to Qi. While
she and Karel linked online and pored over schematics of the bank building, Dominic slipped down the hall to use the shower. His gym catered to the upper ranks, and the furnishings were opulent. After so many days in primitive surroundings, this simple gym seemed like paradise. He marveled at the sparkling tiles. He admired the way the incandescent light spilled in artful pools across the floor. Orderlies paced the shower room in white jackets, sedately making themselves available for personal service. He motioned one of them to take his wrinkled uniform for cleaning.
“I need it back in five minutes, understand?”
“Yes, sir.”
The orderly didn’t recognize him. Good. He glanced around at the other four men in the shower room. He’d seen them before, they were all regulars at the gym, but they didn’t seem to know him either.
The instant he stepped into the wide white shower stall, the light softened and music began to play. The polished brass nozzle fountained hot water in twenty different programmable patterns. He chose “deep massage” and let the it splash over him till his skin puckered. Then he soaped up with a foam that smelled of jasmine and scrubbed himself all over with a rough sponge. It was almost better than sex.
From a wicker basket, he took three thick green towels, and when he was dry, he pumped a double handful of moisturizing lotion from the dispenser and rubbed it everywhere. Complimentary combs and brushes, shaving equipment, deodorant, tooth cleaner and facial cosmetics gleamed in a tray by the sink. Usually, he ignored them, but today, he fingered each bottle and tube with relish. Then he met his reflection in the mirror and flinched.
His first impulse was to hide his face. Now he understood why no one recognized him. It wasn’t easy to confront that feral apparition staring at him from the glass. His short hair had grown ragged, and a coarse stubble covered most of his cheeks. Above the beard, livid burn scars laced across the left side of his face. One eyebrow was missing, and a purplish lid covered his sunken socket. No wonder Qi wanted him to wear an eye patch. He was hideous.
Why hadn’t she said anything? All this time, she treated him just the same as usual. Teasing him. Making jokes. How could she bear to look at his mutilated face? He lifted a razor to shave, then thought better of it. Might as well take advantage of the disguise.
Slowly, he examined his full-length reflection. What he saw was a lean dark stranger, bruised and hardened—and tanned. Except for the parts of his body that his silk underwear covered, the sun had burnished his skin an even copper brown. He let out a wry chuckle. He was exactly the color of a ZahlenBank copper coin. Then he noticed the skin rash. It had spread above his right elbow.
The orderly approached with his clean, pressed uniform, and after slipping it on, he wiggled his bare toes and frowned. He still had no decent shoes. Major Qi expected him to wear those ancient house slippers. She had a wicked streak, that girl.
He eyed the orderly’s shoes. Polished black loafers with thick soles. They were about the right size. He could simply take them, and the orderly wouldn’t dare object. Then he glanced up into the man’s mild blue eyes, saw the sheepish nod and the one missing tooth, and he knew he couldn’t take this man’s shoes. He asked for a pair of scissors.
He snipped a long section of lining from the sleeve of his blue uniform and fashioned himself and eye patch. With some pride, he remarked on his growing ability to improvise. He was just finishing When Major Qi stuck her head through the door.
“Freaker, Nick. I’ve been looking everywhere. We’ve got places to go.” She slung the pillowcase over her shoulder like a vagabond sack and threw him the house slippers.
“Do you want to clean up?” he asked.
“No time. C’mon.”
He knotted his eye patch like a scarf at the back of his head and checked the mirror. The filmy blue fabric covered the worst of his scars, and with the beard and untidy hair, he looked like a pirate from a B-movie. He tilted his head rakishly till his good eye caught the light.
“C’mon. You look lovely. Karel’s meeting us with a car.”
Karel had found a way into the bank that Dominic and Qi never would have thought of. All they had to do was scale the outside of the Trondheim city dome, climb up ZahlenBank’s executive spire and enter through the aircar pad at the summit. That was Richter’s private entrance. No surveillance cameras monitored that entrance because Richter never wanted anyone to see his comings and goings. It went without saying that the best security money could buy guarded that entrance. And only one key opened it—Richter Jedes’ palm print.
Or a perfect replica.
Dominic didn’t think scaling the dome would be as simple as Qi advertised. He would have preferred to fly up in Karel’s car, but Air Traffic Control had standing orders to arrest any aircraft approaching Richter’s landing pad without authorization. Qi sat in the back of Karel’s car making a list of gear for the young man to buy at a sporting goods store. She chewed the tip of the stylus and frowned, then counted silently on her fingers and wrote something.
“You’re sure we won’t be arrested for climbing the spire?” he said.
Karel piped up. “Positively, sir. Juves climb the spire for fun. It’s kind of a rite. Cops always look the other way because they know the kids can’t get inside.” Karel swerved his car through the Trondheim shopping district with a slightly maniacal grin. He skidded into a parking space and slung Dominic against the passenger window. “We’re here, sir.”
Qi handed over her shopping list, and Dominic scanned it briefly in passing. He didn’t recognize half the items, but then he’d never climbed a city dome before. “Charge everything, Karel. I’ll pay you back before your statement arrives, I promise.”
“With interest, sir?” Karel laughed and slammed the car door. Dominic couldn’t remember the young man ever looking happier.
When Karel disappeared into the sporting goods mall, Qi asked, “You really think you can trust him?”
Dominic arched his back to pop his vertebrae. Karel’s economy car was putting a crimp in his spine. “I told you before, Karel wants to be a big man at ZahlenBank, and I can do that for him.” The bright windows of the gear shop displayed sleek climbing boots on sale at a bargain price. Dominic massaged his neck. “Besides, he’s enjoying this.”
A short while later, they parked in front of a maintenance airlock that would take them outside the dome, and for the second time in less than two weeks, Dominic struggled into a silky Kevlax surface suit. This time, the price tag still dangled from the sleeve. He let his blue eye patch hang around his throat like a neckerchief when he pulled on the helmet. Funny, the suit seemed superfluous now. Hadn’t he traipsed through the Norwegian countryside in his bare feet? But Karel insisted on full protection, so he resigned himself to the clumsy helmet and gloves. He didn’t mind the thick-soled boots at all. Qi tugged her suit on with ease, while Karel behaved as if he were dressing for a party. Right, wear the surfsuit, Dominic reflected. No sense courting death. Then he threw his head back and hooted, just like Major Qi.
Airlocks were old news to him now. He’d squeezed through so many underwater ones that this surface model didn’t even faze him. When the outer door whooshed open, he watched Karel’s excited expression through the helmet faceplate.
Outside, Qi slapped the hardened ceramic dome. “Didn’t I tell you this would be a stroll in the mall?”
Like a glowing moon half buried in the Earth, Trondheim’s dome swelled above them and vanished in the smoggy morning sky. Behind its opalescent panes, vague shadows moved, as pedestrians milled near the wall. The milk white glass was less than a meter thick but strong as titanium. When Dominic stepped backward to see the top, his boots made crunching noses in the gravel.
In the heavy smog, they could see little of the bleak exterior landscape. They had to stay close just to see each other. Touching the opalescent glass with their gloves, they circled around the dome till they reached a point where two enormous panes met in a reinforced steel seam, and Karel pointed out the small
steel rings sunk every couple of meters up the seam.
“This is where the juves climb up,” Karel said. “I’ve done it myself. Please don’t tell.”
Dominic chuckled. “That isn’t the worst thing you’ve done, Folger. We all have secrets now. Maybe we should form a co-op.”
“A mutual secret association.” Karel guffawed and slapped his glove against his helmet.
Qi looped climbing rope over her shoulder. “Nick, have you ever worn a climbing harness? No? Oh you’ll love this.”
The first lesson in climbing a dome, Dominic discovered, was overcoming tedium. It just went on and on. He’d toughened up during his trek through the miners’ colony. He’d climbed so many ladders that scaling this gentle arch barely winded him, but it seemed like they’d never reach the top. Qi had rigged him in a climbing harness, a figure eight of bright orange strapping looped around his legs and waist and pinned together in front like a diaper with a big titanium carabiner. They traveled on what she called “belay,” linked to each other in some complicated tangle of ropes and carabiners that only she understood. The rings they used as steps were barely large enough for toeholds, but Dominic’s spanking new surface boots offered stiff protection for his feet, somewhat better than rags, he thought with a wry smile.
Light from the dome illuminated the smog and made it seem denser. All he could see now were the glowing white glass and the trail of metal rings. Ghostly colored shapes moved beneath the glass. Aha, they were laser advertisements projected from inside. He could read their backward text—popular brands of beer, condoms, movies. They put him in mind of bright red and blue fish gliding in a pool of milk.
A random gust momentarily lifted the smog, and he glimpsed the ZahlenBank spire towering above the dome in the distance. He didn’t often see it from outside. Like a lacy gothic fortress drawn thin and sharp as a needle, it pierced the sky. Its faceted windows glittered, and its framework of heat-annealed alloy seemed to drip down the sides like iridescent amber. He couldn’t see the summit, nearly a hundred meters above the dome, but that alloy looked slick as ice. No ready-made ladder of steel rings would simplify this climb.
