But Idiot Savant did have their human friends and supporters, who were among those chatting with them now. Traitors, thought Grey. A pretty human colonist had her arm slung around the singer’s shoulders, even went so far as to plant a drunken kiss on his brass cheek. Must be a buzzer addict, Grey’s mind sneered. He didn’t doubt that the thing had even slept with her.
Outside the club it was snowing lightly (all that Weather Control would allow—a little atmosphere for the approach of Christmas, not enough to clog the streets). Two men had just entered the club, snow sparkling on the shoulders of their heavy overcoats and on the brims of their hats. One was oriental, the other white. Grey had begun to dismiss them and light up a fresh smoke when peripherally he saw the men cut briskly across the floor, reaching simultaneously under the flaps of their long coats.
Just as his eyes flicked back to them, the dusky club flashed with bursts of light and rang with the loud sharp cracks of gunfire. The white man had one pistol, the oriental a pistol in each fist. The guns had no flash suppressors or silencing features: they must have wanted this to be a dramatic show. People began screaming, diving under tables, glass shattered, the rushing music of DeVeined Shrimp was rudely derailed.
Not recognizing the assassins, Grey at first assumed they belonged to Neptune Teeb, Punktown’s top crime lord, and nearly dove for cover himself, but a moment later it became apparent who their true victims were. The members of Idiot Savant.
Organ was slammed back against a wall, flailing and twitching spasmodically like a bug pinned by a sadistic child, the multiple synthesizers in his body whooping and shrilling in a cacophonous performance. One robot bolted for the door but the oriental trained both bucking guns on him. The robot went down, scrambled a bit on what passed for hands and knees, then flopped on his belly and was still. The oriental kept up a few seconds longer, however. Bullets tore holes in some parts of the machine, whined off others. A humanoid Tikkihotto with nests of clear tendrils for eyes was punched on the jaw by a ricochet and dropped.
The singer opened his black rubbery lips in a wide O and wailed for mercy, but the white man extended his arm and blasted off rounds as fast as his finger could loose them. The brass face was indented only, but slugs that bit into his throat caused arcs of violet electricity to leap free and jump like wind-blown ribbons in the air.
A ricochet shattered Grey’s glass beer mug and he threw himself sideways to the floor, hoping the wetness blinding him was beer and not blood from shrapnel-punctured eyes.
The fusillade had ended, the assassins obviously departed. Grey rose from the floor, his sight already restored as he blinked the beer from his eyes. There was still a tumult of noise, however, from persistent screamers. Brushing off his turquoise sports jacket, Grey surveyed the damage, and caught his breath when he settled on the singer, slumped dead by the jukebox. Arcs still danced out of him and connected him to the human woman who had kissed him, via her earrings. She, too, was slumped dead, eyes half-lidded, painted lips slack, a cruel flowing hole punched in the center of the cleavage her dress exposed. People were crouched around her but fearful of touching her with the electricity still linking her to the mechanical cadaver. Grey had taken a few involuntary steps toward the grim tableau, but stopped when several agonized faces turned up at him accusingly.
“Your buddies did this, Harlequin!” a woman screeched at him.
“I’m sure it was an accident,” he muttered, sickened at his own excuse even as he said it.
“Mad dog psychopaths!” the woman shrieked. “Gangster!” She rose to her feet, pointing to Grey, yelling at the top of her considerable lungs. “His friends did this! Gangsters! He’s a gangster!” She jerked free of a more timid friend’s hand when he tried to pull her away.
Grey thought it was a good time to leave, and headed for the door and the snowy street beyond. Eyes followed him, and though every regular in this club must already know that he was this district’s captain for the Triad, one of Punktown’s strongest organized crime syndicates, he still felt embarrassed and even ashamed as he went.
* * *
Being who he was, Grey was always permitted by the owner of the club to park his vehicle in the scrap of lot around in back. Lighting a fresh cigarette as some measure of warmth against the air’s wintry sting, he had nearly reached his hovercar when he heard a strange skittering or scrambling sound, and slowed his pace. His hand pushed his lighter into his jacket, came back out holding a chunky little block of automatic pistol loaded with industrial strength plasma capsules.
Gripping the handgun in both fists, he swung around the front of his car, and saw a giant insect there half propped against the grimy tiles of the club, the creature’s armored hide glittering in places with reflected Christmas lights. No—it wasn’t an insect, after all, but one of the robots from the club, jagged holes punched in it, a green-yellow fluid flowing from several of these wounds. Its limbs worked as if in agony, claws scraping desperately across the ground and the wall tiles. A moment later and Grey recognized it as one of the members of Idiot Savant; it was the only one composed primarily of a bright blue alloy. During their set, at one point this particular robot had entertained the audience vastly by playing various portions of its own anatomy with a pair of drum sticks, inspiring roars of delight when it drummed its metal crotch.
The distressed machine lifted what loosely served as a head, and eyelessly gazed up at Grey. His machine, the gun, gazed down on it dispassionately with its one empty black eye.
This robot was lucky it had escaped the scene of carnage. Or was it lucky, considering the misery it pantomimed? Was it truly in a kind of pain, or merely suffering nervous reactions? Could it possibly be panicking in fear for its mock life?
It made no sound, staring up at him. It was one of the enemy. Grey thought to finish it off. After all, who would know? Unlike those of the assassins, his gun was discreetly silent.
But he felt no animosity for the wretched thing, seeing it so helpless. If anything, he was more inclined to shoot it just to put it out of its suffering, whatever the nature of that suffering was.
“To hell with it,” he muttered more to himself than to the automaton. “It’s almost Christmas.” He stuffed the pistol back into his jacket, let himself into his car. He was still on guard, wary that the thing might leap upon him now that he was empty-handed, but it merely watched him slip into his car.
It might die of its wounds, or it might crawl away to be repaired by its fellows. At least he had given the pathetic thing a fighting chance. After having been so harshly accused in the club, it made him feel better about himself to show some mercy. A little better, anyway...
He left the robot cowering there, drove off into the snow and the night.
* * *
It was still snowing lightly the next afternoon, the windows of the Middle Eastern restaurant ringed in colored bulbs. Grey and the older man opposite him had both ordered taboule and falafel, but Grey had chosen a chicken dish and the older man had ordered lamb. Ng Yueh-sheng, leader of the Triad, had joked to Grey more than once that it was their mutual affection for Middle Eastern cuisine that had inspired him to make Grey a captain. That, and their similar tastes in music.
“You know how I love jazz,” said Ng, by way of explanation for the previous night’s hit. “It made me sick to think those machines might win a jazz contest over a wonderful group like the Shrimp. Robots stealing this tremendous music that’s foreign to them, just taking it over like they try to take everything from us: the jobs of common workers, my own personal business...”
“Jazz is foreign to the Chooms, too,” Grey offered as politely as he could make it sound. “But they weren’t killed.” He didn’t dare press the point by adding that jazz was not traditionally associated with the Chinese, either.
“Chooms are nearly human. Their feelings aren’t a clever sham like the robots’ feelings. These things probably really believe in their emotions, which makes things even more sickening. But it wasn’
t just that I was upset about jazz being played by machines, Grey. They were sent from the Nuts gang. They’re the enemy, flaunting themselves in my territory, and making friends they can turn into dealers for them. I’ve had enough of that. It was time to slap those robots back down into the subway a little. So I brought in a few guns from my brother’s clan on Earth, to help keep identification impossible. I wanted it to be public, though, so maybe people around here will begin to think twice about dealing with these toy soldiers, and buying those buzzers.”
“But I’m afraid that we might have alienated this neighborhood a bit, sir. They weren’t happy about an innocent bystander killed and another one wounded. And the police won’t like it, either...”
Ng raised a languid hand in a gesture of dismissal. “I’ll double their pay-offs for the week of Christmas. That will cleanse their consciences.”
“I just feel uneasy, sir, about innocent people...”
“You never struck me as so sensitive before, my dear boy.” Ng smiled saying this, but many had learned to fear Ng Yueh-sheng’s smiles.
“I’m not squeamish. It’s just that I never saw innocents go down under our guns before, and I wouldn’t think it...think it wise to set a precedent.”
“My brother’s men are a bit crueler than mine, perhaps,” Ng allowed. “They have to be, on Earth. You haven’t been there since you were a child, correct? Well, it isn’t getting any more gentle there, my boy. There are teenaged killers on every corner that make a Peter Maxwell Wegener look like a choirboy.”
Grey sighed, looked down into his small espresso cup, the coffee in it almost a sludge it was so strong.
“Did you know these victims personally, Grey?”
“No.”
“Well, try to forget them. I’ll have some money sent to their families; anonymously, of course.”
Grey nodded, knowing that Ng’s gesture was meant as much to placate him as it was to buy the silence of the grieving families. But it was not born of true concern, he knew. Grey Harlequin considered it ironic that his boss’s feelings were no less a sham than those of the machines he railed against.
In fact, as much as Grey disliked the Nuts clan himself, he often wondered if—however the robots had originally been synthesized—their emotions were at this point as authentic as his own.
* * *
It wasn’t a good sign that Ng would order a hit on Grey’s turf without first letting him in on it. Perhaps this indicated a lack of trust on Ng’s part; disappointment. And disappointment could be fatal, in this business. Their debate in the restaurant, however understated, might have only aggravated this disappointment. It might be a good idea to get far from Paxton—the “town of peace” its denizens knew better as Punktown—while he was able...
While he was still contemplating the need for such a move, Christmas came, and with it an invitation to Ng’s yearly extravaganza as if nothing at all were wrong. It would be held at the opulent Paradiso Hotel, and as his date Grey asked a young woman he had only dated for the first time last weekend. He had met Maria at the jazz club, and as she shared his taste for that music they had hit it off quickly. Perhaps she would charm Ng enough to loosen some of the subtle tension between Grey and his boss.
Maria was as lovely as on that first night when she had breezed up beside him at the club’s bar. Grey just looked her up and down and wagged his head in awe when he arrived to pick her up. She laughed. Her clingy metallic gown was red like Christmas foil, and with her wide, full lips painted a similar color she seemed a personification of pure sensuality, almost unearthly for her earthy perfection, every man’s carnal dream made flesh. Grey felt a deep physical ache, he so hungered for her, but on the night of their first date she had politely resisted his attempt at seduction. He wouldn’t press her again; he didn’t want to run the risk of chasing this one away. Oh...but what a Christmas present it would be to unwrap that foil tonight...
On the dance floor, Grey and Maria embraced and swayed dreamily to an ancient Christmas recording. “Who is this?” she cooed, smiling at him from only inches away, making him suffer at her beauty. Her soft chest was flattened somewhat against his. It took him a few moments to think.
“Bing Crosby.”
“Bing. Sounds like a Choom.”
“No...a twentieth century Earth singer.”
“Nice. Your boss has eclectic tastes. He seems like a nice enough man. Of course, I’ve heard stories...”
Not from Grey, she hadn’t. But he was curious. “Such as?”
“I heard about a band of robots who got all shot up in our favorite club a few weeks ago. They say your boss was behind that.”
Grey glanced around, then murmured close to her ear in its fragrant nest of black curls, “I’m not admitting to knowing anything, of course, but I hear that he was offended at the robots playing jazz.”
“That’s pretty sick, if that’s the reason. I thought it had to do with those buzzers the robots sell. I thought your boss suspected Idiot Savant of dealing.”
“Buzzers were definitely part of it. But so was the music.”
“You sound like you disapprove. Is it because his act was so cruel, or is it just that you think he acted irrationally?”
They passed close to another couple, a Triad captain from another district and his mistress. Grey whispered, “Let’s talk about it later, okay?” He drew her a little closer without being lascivious about it. “Maybe we can celebrate Earth New Year together, too, huh?”
Maria hesitated for a second, during which Grey’s heart dangled suspended over a well, and then husked, “That would be nice.” But she didn’t sound as enthusiastic as he would have liked, and his heart didn’t feel properly fitted back inside him afterward.
“You don’t have to if you have other plans,” he said, sounding foolishly like a hurt little boy to himself.
This time Maria’s embrace tightened. “I like you, Grey,” she whispered, her red lips nearly brushing his ear. “You’re nicer than I would have thought, being a gangster.”
He chuckled, assuming this was a joke. He thought of the accusations in the club that terrible night...
“May I cut in?”
It was Ng, having snuck up on them from behind. As if embarrassed at their closeness, Grey and Maria stepped away from each other. “Sure,” Maria said, smiling, before Grey could consent.
Ng took her hand. “You have a lovely girl, here, my dear boy. Maria.” He spoke it like music. “What a lovely name.”
“My last name isn’t so lovely,” she laughed. “Rotwang.”
“Well,” Ng chuckled, “eveyone must have one imperfection at least.”
Maria put her arms around the leader of the Triad. “Grey,” she said over his shoulder, “can you get me my cigarettes? I left them in my coat pocket.”
“Send a waiter to get them, Grey,” Ng said. The two were dancing already, a few steps from him.
Maria said, “Oh, Grey’s not afraid of a little exercise, I should hope.”
Grey’s smile was tight. “I’ll get them.” And he turned from them and began to cross the vast, thronged room.
She was getting rid of him so as to be alone with Ng. It was blatant, and Grey felt like vomiting, he was so angry. So hurt. For all her talk of Ng’s cruelty, she was now acting charmed by him. Ng was attractive for his age, but more importantly, a man of great wealth and power. Had she only dated Grey so as to get near him, used Grey to achieve what she really wanted? He felt duped, used. Maybe he was over-reacting. Maybe he should stand in the lobby for a few minutes and gather his thoughts while he smoked a butt of his own. But he was tempted to walk right past the coat room, walk right through the lobby, walk right out into the night and out of this bloody town for good.
When he had reached the wide double doors of the ballroom he hesitated, couldn’t help but glance back to see if he could spot the cozy couple.
He could. In fact, Maria had her eyes on him as well. Had she watched him the whole time he had crossed the
room? He was about to turn away in disgust when she waved to him. Was it a mocking gesture, or meant to reassure him of her interest in him? With a sigh, Grey lifted a reluctant hand to wave back. Apparently satisfied with this exchange, Maria exploded.
The flash blinded Grey, and in a split-second on its heels came a rolling shock wave of concussion that hurled him backward. He felt strafed with bullets, tearing his skin. His back smashed into the opposite wall of the carpeted hallway
He slumped there, his back half-propped against the wall, blood oozing out of his shrapnel wounds. From where he sat he could see directly across into the ballroom, though it was as hazed as a battle field. There were a few screams, but more moans and whimpers, and mostly there was silence. Grey heard voices from down the hall, from the staircase above, as the hotel guests responded to the cataclysm.
In one stroke, the Triad had been obliterated. Maria had used him, after all...
Rotwang. Only now, in view of all this—sitting there with a calm clarity born of shocked numbness—did he realize her joke. He was a lover of old Earth art. He should have caught it before. Metropolis...
A man’s ragged torso lay in the threshold, its tuxedo and head and limbs stripped from it in the blast. A shallow bowl of skull and scalp lay on the carpet near Grey’s feet. And between torso and skull cap, its flesh black and smoking, a woman’s arm. The flesh was so deeply burned in spots that the bones inside showed through—glittering bones of metal. A bright blue alloy.
Had she been the same creature he had spared in back of the jazz club? Come for revenge against Ng for his crimes, come to crush the competition? Had she been repaired, and then suited up in a few beautifully crafted layers of cloned human flesh, a terrible Christmas present artfully wrapped? A martyr for her kind, a new martyr for Christmas?
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