Realms of Light

by Lawrence Watt-Evans

  The old man’s yacht was ablaze with light, as well; someone had apparently turned on every emitter aboard. Ads for the New York were writhing across the hull. And every floater that could still fly was hanging motionless in a neat array around it, about three meters off the ground.

  “It would seem they got new orders,” I said.

  “Indeed,” Grandfather Nakada said. “Let us go aboard and see if we cannot give them better ones; I have no doubt there are a great many frightened people in this place, waiting for rescue.”

  I started to say something about the manual emergency releases on every door, then stopped. The Nakadas and their employees were inside, in rooms that had gone dark and dead, breathing air that was still and silent, with no idea what had happened. Most of them wouldn’t think to use the emergency latches; hell, most of them might not know there were emergency latches, let alone how to use them in the dark. I remembered my own moments of near-panic in the service tunnel, and tried to imagine something like that happening without any warning at all, striking me in my own home, a place I thought I was safe.

  They were probably terrified.

  “Hurry,” I said.

  Chapter Nineteen

  The clean-up wasn’t really all that bad; the sudden shut-down had set off alarms all over American City, and emergency services had been on the way before we were out of the tunnel. No one died, despite the power outage; the worst injury was a concussion where a masseuse had tripped over a box in the dark and hit her head on the table. Ordinarily the table would have been soft enough to avoid serious injury, but without power the flexion fields had vanished and the internal mechanisms had locked in place, creating hard spots.

  Ukiba became Grandfather Nakada’s personal fortress; he refused to let anyone aboard except himself, me, and Captain Perkins. Even Singh was no longer welcome. I was pretty sure he didn’t want anyone to find Yoshio-kun.

  It had been the old man’s upload that took charge when the power went out, using the link that had been set up so it could keep Shinichiro distracted; it had lit up the ship to serve as a sort of beacon, and had sent orders to the floaters to assume formation and await further instructions. We didn’t tell anyone that; when outside floaters and rescue workers started arriving they were directed to ignore the ship and attend to the compound buildings.

  The city immediately offered to run temporary lines in to restore power, but Grandfather Nakada rejected the offer. He also refused to say how the outage came about, but he did tell the authorities that it was his problem, on his property, and he would take care of it.

  We had the ship, but the rest of the household would have to find temporary quarters elsewhere—the old man said power wouldn’t be restored for days. He watched as the compound’s inhabitants and guests were brought out of the lightless buildings one by one, into the glare of the big emergency lights the city had sent and set up on all sides. They were guided out by floaters, and by rescue workers carrying small lights and coms. The old man acknowledged each refugee and directed each of them to safety, pointing some to a line of waiting cabs, sending others to the medical station the city had set up, and leaving a few to their own devices.

  He let Singh go off to help with the rescues, but he kept me close at his side, and I stood there, feeling useless, as the buildings were emptied of humanity and the sky overhead faded to black. Eta Cass B rose in the east balefully red, changing the color of the shadows, and I was still kept waiting.

  I would have been happy to help get people out, or clean up damage, but Grandfather Nakada wouldn’t allow it, and I was fairly sure it was because he didn’t trust me to keep my mouth shut about his family secrets.

  And then came the moment the old man had been waiting for—an old woman emerged from one of the family residences, a young man from the city holding one arm, a floater watching her closely from above and behind her head. She was unsteady on her feet, her expression a mix of terror and confusion.

  “Kumiko,” the old man called. “Come here, daughter.”

  She looked up and saw him, and trembled visibly. She stopped in her tracks.

  “Turn on your gun,” Yoshio told me quietly. Then he called to the man helping her, “Bring her here, please.”

  I powered up the HG-2, but I wasn’t happy about it. I’d never shot a human being. I’d threatened a few when I was angry enough, but I had never pulled the trigger, and I had never pointed a gun at one when I wasn’t awash with adrenalin.

  I give the rescue worker credit; he asked Kumiko if she wanted to come before he brought her over. She obviously didn’t want to, but she knew she couldn’t avoid it, and told him that she would speak to her father.

  When she was a meter away he settled her onto an equipment locker, and told the rescue worker to leave.

  “You’re sure it’s okay?” he said, looking at her.

  “He’s my father,” Kumiko said. “I’ll be fine.”

  The man gave Grandfather Nakada an unhappy look, then turned and headed back to see if he could find anyone else.

  When he was safely out of unaugmented earshot, the old man said, “I am disappointed in you, daughter.”

  “I don’t understand, Father,” she said, eyes downcast.

  The old man gestured to me, and I raised my gun, aiming it in her general direction. I didn’t lock it on, verbally or otherwise.

  “If you are going to conspire against me,” Yoshio told her, “you should commit to it, and not abandon your partner after a single failed assassination attempt.”

  I watched, weapon ready, as she thought that over, and considered various responses. I give her credit; she never looked at the gun. Then she said, “I didn’t expect him to get as close as he did, Father; you were always smarter than Shinichiro. I agreed to help him to see what would develop. I could see commercial possibilities in his scheme to use dreamers to provide new bodies for uploads. Killing you for control of the family—that was stupid, and I should have told him as much. I assumed you would survive, and that we could then use the household security staff to find a scapegoat—Shinichiro’s control of the household systems should have made that easy. I didn’t expect you to go outside, to hire this person, and send her to Nightside City to investigate Seventh Heaven.”

  Grandfather Nakada considered that, and nodded thoughtfully. “You might be telling the truth,” he said.

  She didn’t bother to insist on her story; they knew each other better than that. She glanced back at the residence behind her. “What happened?” she asked.

  “I used drastic measures to remove Shinichiro from control,” Yoshio said. “I could not tell where he had penetrated and where he had not, so I shut down everything.”

  “You did it? Not Shinichiro?”

  “I did it.”

  “Is Shinichiro...” She hesitated. The word that had obviously scrolled up first was “dead,” but she knew her brother was long dead. “Did you erase him?” she asked.

  “No.”

  “Are you going to?”

  “No.”

  Startled, I turned, and swung the gun around. “It tried to kill you,” I said.

  “Nonetheless, it is all that remains of my son,” the old man replied calmly, ignoring the HG-2 that was now pointed directly at his belly.

  “What are you going to do?” Kumiko asked.

  “Shinichiro had proposed to make uploads of the dreamers, and run them in their own fantasy worlds,” Yoshio said. “I think it would be fitting to allow my son’s memory to test the feasibility of this idea. It should not be impossible for Seventh Heaven’s programmers to create a fantasy version of Prometheus in which I died in the service tunnel beneath my residence, and my son was restored to human form.”

  Neither of us knew what to say to that; after a few seconds of awkward silence, Grandfather Nakada added wistfully, “I will be able to visit with him in his dream-world, playing the role of my own upload. I think it would be pleasant to speak with my son in this fashion.”


  I needed several seconds to absorb this. “The dreamers know their dreams aren’t real,” I eventually pointed out. “Do you think Shinichiro won’t figure it out?”

  “I honestly don’t know, Mis’ Hsing,” the old man said. “I don’t believe anyone has ever sold an upload the dream before.” He waved a hand. “If he does realize the truth, I can simply have him rebooted.”

  Kumiko shuddered at that. Then she asked, “And me?”

  Yoshio smiled. “I think, daughter, that I have not paid you enough attention of late. I hope we will be very close in the future.”

  Kumiko hung her head and said nothing, but I was not satisfied. “That’s all? No memory wipe or anything?” I asked.

  “That’s all. I do not tamper with the minds of members of my own family.”

  “She conspired to kill you.”

  “I do not believe she will do so again. I will be changing my will, of course, to remove future temptation, but I doubt it’s necessary.”

  “You’re going to trust her?” I demanded.

  The old man’s smile twisted wryly. “Oh, I haven’t trusted her since she reached puberty, Mis’ Hsing,” he said. “Why would I start now?”

  I realized I was still pointing the gun at him. I raised it slightly higher. “You trusted me,” I said. “What if I’m not satisfied with letting her run loose?”

  He shook his head, still smiling. “You won’t shoot me, Hsing. You won’t shoot Kumiko, either. You are in no imminent peril, and it is not in your nature to kill a fellow human being in cold blood.”

  “Are you sure of that?” I said, pressing the button that made the gun whine as if homing in on a target.

  “In fact, I am. Before hiring you I checked into your background extensively, and had a full psychological analysis done. You might kill in self-defense, or in moments of anger or stress, but shooting an unarmed human under circumstances like these? No. I am sure.”

  I wanted to call his bluff. I wanted to blow his brains out. The damned superior old man treated me like a tool he could use as he pleased, and I resented it.

  But he treated everyone as mere tools or game-pieces, and he was right. It wasn’t a bluff. I couldn’t pull the trigger. It wasn’t that shooting him would get me sent straight to reconstruction and probably a total wipe; it’s that I wasn’t a murderer, and refused to become one.

  I lowered the gun. “Has the case been resolved to your satisfaction, Mis’ Nakada?” I asked coldly.

  “It has, Mis’ Hsing.”

  “Then I would like my fee.”

  “Your father and brother are on their way to one of the city hospitals, and a dream contract for Guohan Hsing has been negotiated with Eternal Adventures. When you present an itemized bill, you will be paid the remainder of your fee and all expenses.”

  “Good,” I said. I started to turn away.

  “However, Mis’ Hsing,” the old man called after me, “I would like to amend our agreement.”

  I turned back. “A deal’s a deal,” I said.

  “Indeed, and I will honor ours. However, I wish to offer you another commission.”

  I looked at Kumiko, standing there. “Not interested,” I said.

  “I really think you should reconsider.” His voice turned cold. “I am not a good enemy to have.”

  I hefted the gun. “Are you threatening me?”

  “Yes, I am.”

  I hadn’t expected even Grandfather Nakada to be quite that blunt. “Why? What do you want?”

  “Because you are in a position to threaten me, Mis’ Hsing. You know too much about my family. You know what Kumiko and Shinichiro did, and what will become of Shinichiro. You know what was in my ITEOD files in Nightside City. You know what Shinichiro intended to do with Seventh Heaven Neurosurgery, and it’s entirely possible I may want to pursue some portion of his scheme. You have said you will not allow me to modify your memory, and I am not going to force you—legally I can’t, practically it would be extremely awkward to do so without risking damage to your personality, and all in all, I would prefer to keep our relationship one of mutual trust and respect.”

  “I know how to keep secrets,” I said. I glanced at Kumiko. He hadn’t mentioned the existence of Yoshio-kun, even though that was something he’d want to keep quiet, and I guessed it was because his murderous daughter was listening.

  “Even when you believe those secrets to endanger innocents?”

  I didn’t answer that. He had my psych work-up.

  “May I tell you what commission I’m offering?”

  “I’m listening,” I said.

  “It’s a very simple one,” he said. “I will pay you one hundred million credits to leave the Eta Cassiopeia system and live elsewhere for the rest of your life.”

  I didn’t take it in at first. “What?” I said. “I... what?”

  He held up a finger. “No, wait—a better idea. I will pay you one hundred million credits to leave the Eta Cassiopeia system and live elsewhere for the rest of my life, or until such time as I ask you to return.”

  “Live elsewhere?” I looked around a little wildly. “Where?”

  “Anywhere,” he said. “Anywhere but this star system.” He lifted the finger again. “No, wait again—upon further consideration, anywhere but this system or Earth. Nakada Enterprises has enough interests on Earth that your presence there might be inconvenient.”

  “My sister Alison is on Earth,” I said. I didn’t really mean to say it; I was free associating to avoid thinking about the actual offer.

  A hundred million bucks. I would be rich. Oh, not by Nakada standards, but by mine.

  But I would be in a strange city somewhere, on an unfamiliar planet, circling a different star.

  “Perhaps we can find her for you,” he said. “She might want to join you in your new home, or if not, at least you can communicate with her.”

  I didn’t know whether I liked that possibility or not; my relationship with Ali was... odd, I guess. I hadn’t really intended to mention her. I changed the subject.

  “The rest of your life?”

  He nodded. “I am a very old man, and you are a young woman. You should easily outlive me, and once I am gone I see no reason to continue to restrict your movements.”

  “And if Kumiko murders you ten minutes after I leave Prometheus?”

  “Then you are free to return and investigate my death, should you so choose. It is of no concern to me what you do after my death.”

  “How do I know you won’t just have me spaced once I’m off-planet?”

  “I told you, Mis’ Hsing, I trust you. I think this galaxy is a better place with you in it. And while my moral code is far more flexible than your own, like you, I prefer not to commit murder if I can accomplish my ends without it.”

  “But... one hundred million credits?”

  “It is nothing to me, Hsing; I am an old man, with far more money than I could ever hope to spend, more than enough to leave all my descendants wealthy. It pleases me to make you wealthy, as well.”

  I looked at Kumiko.

  “This is between the two of you,” she said stiffly. “I do not interfere with my father’s whims.”

  “Do you hire assassins willing to travel interstellar distances?” I asked.

  She had the grace to look embarrassed. “I suspect my father will make certain that I cannot do so with impunity.”

  The old man nodded.

  I looked at them, and then I looked up at the sky.

  It was full night now, and the compound’s screens were all down, the buildings all dark. The portable lights were focused elsewhere, and the glow from the city outside the compound’s walls was not overpowering. The red glow from Eta Cass B wasn’t enough to do more than add a little color. The air above us was cool and clear, and I could see a handful of stars shining against the blackness.

  I had never particularly wanted to visit them, but the idea wasn’t unpleasant, either.

  “One hundred million,” I said. “I
n addition to the five million you already owe me.”

  “Yes.”

  “You’ll provide transportation wherever I want to go?”

  “That was not part of the original offer, but I think I can throw it in, so long as you stay within human-settled space.”

  “Achernar? Fomalhaut? Eridania?”

  “Wherever you please. Once there, you will be on your own.”

  “I’ll want some time to choose.”

  “And I need time to restore this place to normal operation,” he said. “We will need to analyze every single system before allowing it back online, to make sure Shinichiro’s influence has been removed.”

  “Ten days, perhaps? That will give me time to say my goodbyes and make sure Dad is settled in.”

  “That sounds fair.”

  I looked up at the stars again, at those spots of light in the sky that were suns, with worlds circling them, and I wondered whether this was real. One hundred million credits—had I somehow wound up in a dreamtank without knowing it? Was I an upload being fed an elaborate fantasy? My father had said I was living a life like one he might see in his induced dreams—was it all unreal?

  Did it matter? If the images I saw came from light reaching my eyes, or projections onto my retinas, or direct stimulation of my brain, did it matter? Did it make any difference whether I was thinking with electrochemical reactions in a lump of organic tissue, or with microcurrents through silicon and optical fiber? I saw what I saw, and thought what I thought, and if it wasn’t real it was so perfect an imitation that it might as well be.

  I had already left one world behind. And really, I didn’t even like Prometheus.

  “You have a deal, Mis’ Nakada,” I said.

  Chapter Twenty

  I invited Dad and Sebastian to join me. I didn’t tell them the terms of my agreement with the old man, only that I was leaving the system.