It was cold, bitter cold. When the slightest breeze ripped through the hills it felt like her breath would freeze inside her lungs. But Kevin was warm with his arms around her. She couldn't look at him still, but when he kissed her she felt her heart beating in her throat and his heart beating in his, and her senses sharpened like an animal's. They climbed down, and this time Corrag caught herself in the barbed wire, and Kevin helped her get over, pushing her from below so she wouldn't cut herself as she extricated herself from the barbs. They laughed together as she fell and he caught her. His face was a sieve through which blew the hot African desert winds that had erased his childhood. His laugh was forced, a man in exile from himself. She loved him. They found a hollow under the pine trees. The water of the swamp was frozen into a sheet of silver at their feet. It was snowing, and they covered themselves with their coats and made love on the ground, blood pumping their mingling heat, blood and salt and then their bare skin becoming a painful reminder of where they were. Kevin laughed and sat up, pulling up his pants.
"Tomorrow we fight, so tonight we make love. We fight better."
"Yes," she said. "That's the theory anyhow. We'll see."
"No, don't doubt. It's bad luck to doubt."
"I don't doubt."
"If you doubt, Cesar will also and then we will run like scared dogs. You are the quful for us. You must not bend to anything."
Corrag's tears froze on her cheeks as they walked back down the hill through the trees. The wind whispered a song. Corrag listened hard, thinking of Ben, the first time they'd made love, in the park at night at the end of Unity Drive, but all she heard was a beating heart and then the music of the Korazan camp before sleep, the melodies of distant lands uniting in a common dream of a brighter, more human future.
Five -- The Battle for Alpha
The streets were thick with sad people carrying the repressed expressions of hidden allegiances and identities. Others looked straight at you as if they knew you even better then you knew yourself. Corrag, Kevin and Cesar dressed as street people with nondescript Huff boots and scuffed canvas flat soles and their black PeopleMart packs on their backs. A close observer would have noticed the way the packs sagged despite the tightness of the straps and the way they leaned forward when they walked. They took care to follow the rush hour crowds on this midday getting on and off the canal porters. The nanowalls on the newsstands were full of stories about the mad Chloe sisters and their escapades in Athens before performing there for the assembled members of the Committee for Growth, the exclusive trillionaires club. Corrag stopped and browsed at a corner shop while Kevin and Cesar reconnoitered the area around the Sandelsky Center. The canal porters belched out their crowds of commuters at the 96th and Broadway jetty. After getting her fill of meaningless but oddly comforting news, Corrag sat on the marble steps and placed her pack beside her and began to panhandle with the aluminum cup that had belonged to Gillema. A policewoman came by and asked her to move. But there were so many people around the plaza it was easy for her to move a few feet before sitting again.
The policewoman had disappeared. Then Kevin and Cesar glanced at her and she stood to follow. They walked along the canal in single file on the backside of the building going west. The sun was shining on the upper glass. Corrag imagined the ignorant conclaves of assembled power, not knowing that forces were gathering at their feet to sweep them into the dustbin of history.
The water was choppy, and Christmas party boats plied their way up the Hudson for dinner cruises. Corrag, Kevin and Cesar sat at the promontory of Morningside Park and watched the boats full of seasonal revelers passing far below.
"It's Christmas tomorrow," said Cesar.
"We never celebrated it in Democravia. We had Academy Night when the students gave concerts and performed in plays."
"No, it's big in Texas," said Cesar. "Lot of believers in the communities there. Whites and Latinos, but the Spanish baby Jesus had a soft spot for parties."
"Oh come on, Cesar," said Corrag.
"No, I'm serious."
Kevin laughed.
"This is a good place. We stay tonight," said Kevin.
"Seems quiet enough. I'd feel better if there were more people," said Corrag.
"Look there," said Cesar, pointing up the hill to a group of what looked like laughing teenagers, pushing and sliding on the snowy ground. Corrag recognized some Korazan fighters among them.
"We're everywhere," she said.
She had an idea of buying Christmas presents before nightfall. It was Christmas and Cesar had inspired her to celebrate. She thought of Beithune and whispered his name to herself, still hoping to hear something inside her head, some response from her cousin. She feared he might be dead; it had been so long since she'd heard from him. The hardest part would be waiting for the word from Korazan about the start of battle. Kevin read her mind.
"You want to go, go. We'll stay here and wait for you."
"No, Kevin. You need to go with her. I'll stay here with the stuff," said Cesar.
"No. Two with the Bograd. One can go and look for food."
"You two stay. I'll do that," said Corrag. She left them and walked down the path and over the footbridge to the intersection of Amsterdam and the West Side Canal. From there she continued up Amsterdam, the water of the canal sloshing and mixing with the falling snow to form a slushy mix on the walkway. Municipal bots were putting down scrap boardwalks along the worst of the flooded pedestrian ways. Corrag stopped at a little shop selling toys for children. There were metallic post-diluvian insects that jumped and chirped familiar melodies. There was the popular Birdman jigsaw puzzle and the Buzzhead vibrating jokesters for the little boys and the little ballerinas that danced on the head of a pin. It made Corrag miss her home and her friends. If she got through this stretch alive she vowed she would get a new, fully charged emosponder and find her parents. Instead of presents, though, she thought it would be better to get food for the night, knowing they only had a few more hours before being summoned to the fight.
A few blocks further along Amsterdam there was a food market. Corrag bought some fresh Brooklyn bread, some hydroponic mangos and a block of modified kefir cheese that was on sale for half price. They didn't have a lot of money to spend. Then she splurged on a bottle of New Albion maple wine, in honor of Beithune. Walking out with the bag hanging from her hand, a young man, hatless, just a thin, flannel shirt on despite the cold stopped her. His eyes were slits of pain and close set like a fox.
"Remember the whale. I'm guessing you know the answer by now."
She took another, closer look at the face -- a thin, raw face that once, not so long ago, had belonged to a young man. It was Lars from the Butterfly Club.
"Lars. What are you doing up here?"
"Getting by. How about you?"
"It's a long story."
"You're alive and well and out on the street. That's good."
"What happened to you?"
He had a red gash on his cheek that looked like it had recently been a bleeding wound.
"Tracer round. You know how it is. Been on the run now. All of the Bonanza crew."
"Was that your name? Beithune said you wanted us to join. Your posse."
"I did. Good thing you didn't. Beithune said he'd lost you. Went off the deep end."
"Where is he?"
"Picked up. Sent off to the Nenkaja."
"For disruptives?"
"Sure."
She'd known the Nenkaja as a top security prison for disruptive activists. "How do I get there?'
"What, the Nenkaja?"
"Yeah."
"Nobody goes up there. It's up past all shit. Probably I'd forget about Beithune. You'll never see him again."
"How do you know?"
"Don't get angry. Who's the wine for?"
"Not for you."
The way he tried to reach into her bag to take the bottle made Corrag angry. She grabbed it back out of his hand.
"Don't ever take things th
at don't belong to you."
"Guess you've grown a backbone." He smiled sheepishly.
Corrag gave him a disgusted look and then felt an instant wave of pity. Something about him reminded her of their days of struggle in Williamsburg. Beithune and she had still been under the spell of Beithune's dream of gaining inside access to the world of power and creative mastery. At one point Beithune had genuinely believed that Lars was someone with the key. Now Lars looked like someone who had given up on any means of building a life. Instead he depended on his wits and criminal gains. His sense of entitlement had disappeared, leaving just a risky bravado.
"Don't go, Corrag. I know how I can help you."
"How? Make it quick. I'm short on time."
"I can get you inside Sandelsky. Isn't that what you and Beithune wanted?"
"Not me. Beithune. How?"
"They have a party tonight for the bigwigs."
"And you're a part of it."
"I just got lucky. One day I was on the street, you know really hungry and tired and I asked this lady for a bit of food. She was eating this big loaf stuffed with meat and olives and sun-dried shit and she told me to come with her and that's how I got the gig. Been going every night for the last week. That's where I’m off to now. Come with me and I can get you in."
"Sorry. I've got to get back to my friends. They're waiting."
"Forget about them. Three or four in the morning after cleaning up’ll do you, and they'll have you back every night for the whole month if they like you. Come on.”
All the rules of life were upside down. Cesar and Kevin were not going anywhere without her. She went along with Lars, a sense of foreboding mixing with excitement as they approached the back of Sandelsky Plaza. A detachment of Repho military police lingered around the bays that let out on the canal. Corrag dropped her bag of food in an alcove that had once been a storefront. The retractable bimini tops on the boats lined up at the bays were coming down, and men and women in scanty, unseasonal party outfits lounged on leather cushioned berths, conversing and laughing. A few pedestrians approached the entrance along with Lars and Corrag, dressed sensibly against the cold. Inside the arches of the bays, continuing around on the walkway above the water, Corrag spied a security checkpoint. A policewoman with a tablet was checking names and performing scans. Behind her stood two private security guards. Corrag thought she recognized one of them from her first day in the Repho, when Beithune had challenged Shulder inside the Sandelsky showroom. It was the blond giant, the man who had given Beithune the Absolution in-tabs. Corrag averted her gaze as Lars approached the policewoman, hoping not to draw attention to herself. If she backed away now it would be suspicious. She had to go through the checkpoint.
“Name?” said the policewoman.
“Lars Guvner,” said Lars, looking into the scanner. “Food service. She’s with me.”
“Name?”
“Yula Kosh.”
Corrag looked into the scanner. She heard a beep on the console at the desk. The policewoman stepped away and looked at the console. A boat going through the bay revved its outboard props and popped its bow into the air and the people on board cheered raucously. The policewoman looked over at the two private goons. They smiled at her and shouted at the people in the boat. Corrag looked at Lars who looked back at her nervously. He looked like he might run in a second, and Corrag tensed, thinking she might have to do the same. The policewoman smiled. Some comforting, warm thought related to the boats and the two guards and the people onboard went through her mind. She looked at the console again, and her eyes glazed for a second, bringing her appointed task back into her consciousness despite the Christmas season. Lars looked at Corrag and almost imperceptibly jerked his head. Corrag scooted past the desk to catch up to him. The policewoman mumbled, and looked up to wave onward the next person in line.
Inside the elevator, Corrag looked at her reflection in the mirrored wall and let out a relieved breath. She did not recognize herself. She smiled at Lars. They had gotten in. If only Beithune could see her now, she thought. She seemed older, her face harder, looking more like Ricky than ever before. She had the Lyons chin that she’d seen in pictures of Ricky’s father, Al, on the jacket covers of the books he’d written, one about aviation and one about the natural history of birds. Ricky had always wished she would turn out to be the writer in the family to follow Al. Maybe at last she would do something meaningful that would make him proud.
The party was in full swing on the upper floors of the Sandelsky complex. A man in a white suit grabbed Lars as the elevator doors opened and pushed him towards the back.
“Hurry. Get changed. We need you now.”
“She’s with me.”
“Fine. Get her a fucking frock and get her out there, too. These people want it all and they want it yesterday!”
In the back rooms where the food was being prepared an Asian woman handed Corrag a frock and smiled when she put it on.
“You’re good to go, girl. Just pin your hair back," she said, taking Corrag’s hair and sweeping it behind her ear. “Now keep your mouth shut and stay out of people’s way. Don’t listen to the conversations and you’ll be all right. Lots of pretty girls do okay. But lots never come back. Don’t be one of those. Come back in here if you need a break. Remember, you're here for a reason. Don’t forget what that reason is. Christmas money, baby.”
Corrag couldn't help smiling to herself. This was like some book they would read in Miss Schilling's class. Under the flashing lights, in room after room she held her tray aloft and wandered, serving the food and drinks. People called her over in a frenzy of feeding, dancing and talking all at once. The music piped in on the sound system was a blend of patriotic Repho standards and funkier world beats cauterized of their defiance. Corrag’s eyes were drawn to the gold and jewels, furs and scrubbed suede animal skins draped from bronzed shoulders and thin arching necks. She noted the lines of mouths, the half smiling, twisted lips of feigned deep contentment betrayed by the eyes. The eyes glanced everywhere at once in a collective hunger that could not be contained for long by any words or points of contact.
“Here, girl,” called a young man with a blunt, fuzzy goatee.
"These are very good.”
“You must try the rock chevrets.”
The guests crowded around, jostling her. Corrag smiled and tried not to make eye contact. She felt her head swirling, about to explode with the music and the lights. Her hunger for real nourishment heightened her sense of the surreal atmosphere of the Sandelsky office party. The walls draped with neon bunting and the transparent columns filled with red and green lights seemed to sway and throb. On the way back to the kitchen she saw Lars with a tray of canapes, his mouth moving, emitting absurd, self-serving bits of randomness. She watched his back and well-oiled mannerisms. Their lack of augmentation gave them both a hunger, she realized, of looking out for themselves in a potentially dangerous environment. Despite herself, she found his attempts to win over the clientele sympathetic. The crowd of Repho elites, all on the Augment, all inside the whale, buzzing on a common chord of impulse and prompt, held people like Lars and her in contempt, a secret not-so hidden behind their wall of shared innuendoes and numbed emotional responses.
Drawn by some kind of inbuilt magnetism down the halls of rooms and alcoves, Corrag continued onward with a fresh tray of drinks. An old man in a grey spandex suit tried to pull her inside a room by the shoulder, but she broke away, barely able to keep the tray from spilling. Before the door closed she caught a glimpse of a dark pile of bodies on furniture. That was enough to make her gag. Even worse were the fighters inside a glass cube, greasy bodies streaming sweat and blood, and the men and women placing bets on the matches. Then somebody vomited and a door swung open. There was a large pool table and an overhead light. Someone called for a drink. Corrag went in and the door closed.
Her tray was empty. She slunk against the curtained wall, unbelieving and wanting to stay. Maxwell Gheko and Samael Chagn
on smoked a shared hookah in two fat recliners while their closest aides played pool around a table lit by neon overhead lamps. It had to be them; Corrag was sure, despite never having seen likenesses of either. A sort of halo of power, a nearly visible glow surrounded them. Gheko, the younger of the two, was the more ordinary looking. He seemed like a military man, with thick jowls and long red hair tied in a back bun. Chagnon had the look of a seal, lobos del mar as they called them in Rosaria, a sleek fat forehead and a sweeping widow's peak of silver hair, brilliant dark eyes that seemed to take in everything about the room with a single glance. Even though no words were directed at them, every move of the pool players was somehow connected to the two men in the chairs, as if they were black holes bending the visible and invisible around themselves, absorbing the energy into their negative spheres of influence.
"Hey, girl," said a pool player. "Fetch us a bottle of vintage. Enough of the cheap stuff."
"Moet if you please," said another.
Corrag stepped away from the shadows where she'd been leaning against the wall. She thought she would silently leave without bringing further notice to herself. If they only knew who she was they would surely hurt her. And if she only had a weapon she could do away with the crooked leadership of New York in a single blow. As if reading her thoughts, the seated old man she thought was probably Chagnon looked at her with a dour expression. She couldn't help staring back, looking into his eyes for a clue to his humanity or lack thereof. The secretive power behind the Gheko administration's ostensibly democratic governance of the largest, most important city in the Repho, Chagnon had an expression that suggested a sense of inviolable power, but also a curious probing and sorting, as if he were at once dismissive and trying to fit her into a mental scheme.
The Victor's Heritage (The Jonah Trilogy Book 2) Page 18
