String City

by Graham Edwards

  “Why? What’s it built from?”

  “Dung balls.”

  I waited while she thought it through. “Are you trying to tell me this beetle is one of the sewer’s thoughts?”

  “Not quite. Look, here’s how it works. You’ve got billions of scarab beetles rolling billions of dung-balls through thousands of miles of underground tunnels. All that traffic is what creates the sewer’s thoughts. But the hive-mind still has to interact with the rest of the world. So it sends out individual scarabs as avatars. To do the dirty work. So to speak.”

  Zephyr came out from behind the desk, held out her hand to the beetle.

  “Hello,” she said. “My name’s Zephyr. Care for some refreshments?”

  The scarab’s wing-cases vibrated in confusion. It wasn’t used to folk being polite. It reared on its back legs, bringing its antennae level with Zephyr’s face. Slowly it extended a feeler.

  “Um, do you have dung?” said the scarab.

  Zephyr’s smile might have been false, but it didn’t falter. “Sorry, no. There’s a pot of fresh coffee though. Do you take sugar?”

  “Twelve, please.” The scarab pulled a pencil from behind one of its antennae and used its mouth-parts to sharpen it to a point. “Um, where would you like me to sit?”

  59

  TURNED OUT WE were the scarab’s first ever assignment. It was twitchy, kept dropping its slide rule. When it moved, its shell creaked and my skin crawled, but at least it had manners.

  “It’s like a child on its first day at school,” Zephyr whispered to me once it was settled. “I feel like I want to wipe its nose.”

  “It doesn’t have a nose,” I muttered back. “It’s a bug.”

  The Scrutator tapped my shoulder. “I beg your pardon, but someone is calling for help.”

  “With ears like yours, can’t you always hear someone calling for help?”

  “Yes.”

  That brought me up short.

  “However,” the Scrutator went on, “this particular individual is within close proximity—directly outside the office door, in fact.”

  “There is no door.” I pointed to the wall that wasn’t there.

  We went outside to look. The air was calm, the city quiet. Eerie. I almost preferred the storm. Almost. A cry came from above. I looked straight up and saw a skinny man hanging off the guttering, twenty feet over my head.

  “Jump,” I called.

  “If I jump,” he answered, “I’ll break my legs.”

  “The robot will catch you.”

  The man considered this for a long time. Eventually he let go and fell. Sure enough, the Scrutator caught him and lowered him to the ground. The man brushed himself down, tweaking mustaches like yard brooms. Somehow he managed to grin around the wad of chewing tobacco that was filling his mouth.

  “Obliged,” he said.

  “How’d you get up there?” I said.

  “The wind. What else? That storm sure was a doozie.”

  “So where were you headed?”

  “Here. You the gumshoe?”

  “That depends who’s asking.”

  “I’m asking.”

  “And you are?”

  The man spat a black looger on the street. “Name’s Jarrett. Pete Jarrett. Got some investigatin’ needs doin’. You the man for the job?”

  “Depends on the job.”

  “Don’t want to say too much about that.”

  “Then I don’t think we’ll be doing much business.”

  I headed back inside. The Scrutator followed. The man loped after us.

  “They said you were the best,” he said to my back.

  “I am.” I continued to walk away.

  “So how about I tell you a little bit?”

  I stopped. “I’m listening.”

  “See, I work up at the Aeolus Corporation. Things up there—they ain’t right. There’s exploitation of the workforce—the boss, he’s denying the folk their basic rights. Me, I’m buildin’ a case. But there’s places inside the factory I can’t get. I need someone to dig, fella. Someone like you.”

  “What do you think?” I said to the Scrutator.

  “My interest is not significantly aroused,” came the answer.

  Zephyr was right. The robot sure was in the dumps.

  “Look, buddy,” I said to Jarrett. “Labor problems—it’s a noble cause. But this isn’t a good time. I’ve got cases coming out of my ears, I’ve got the taxman breathing down my neck. And, in case you hadn’t noticed, the front of my office just blew off. Then there’s the end of the world...”

  “I know some boys could help with that,” said Jarrett. He chewed some more, spat some more.

  “Help with the end of the world?”

  “Nope. Your missing wall.”

  “Still no deal. Sorry.”

  “I’ll pay up front. Cash is king.”

  I thought about the measly wad the Scrutator had got in exchange for its automobile. By now it was probably worth the price of a cup of coffee. Another day and it wouldn’t buy the paper cup.

  “In case you hadn’t heard, Jarrett, the king just got guillotined. Now beat it.”

  “Might change your mind,” said Jarrett, “when you take a look at this.”

  I ignored him. Nothing he could show me would make a difference. Then the Scrutator tapped my shoulder.

  “It appears that Mister Jarrett has an interesting proposition,” it said.

  Jarrett was holding up a pouch no bigger than a pomegranate.

  “Whatever coins you’ve got in there,” I said, “would barely cover the expenses.”

  “Ain’t coins,” said Jarrett. “It’s Schrödinger’s Gold.”

  I gulped. “Say that again.”

  “Schrödinger’s Gold.”

  I took the pouch from him. My hands were shaking. The pouch was ludicrously heavy, but that could have meant anything. I shook it. It sloshed.

  “What’s Schrödinger’s Gold?” Zephyr looked up from her desk, where she’d gone back to staring at the zoetrope again. I didn’t like the way she kept touching her fingers to its globe, or the way her face was still the same ash-white it had been all morning.

  “Quantum currency,” I said. “The most liquid assets you can get. And the rarest.” I glared at Jarrett. “Where d’you get it? If that’s what it really is.”

  Jarrett shrugged his shoulders. “Ain’t no secret. Picked me up a treasure map off this hobo. I gave him food, he gave me the map. Turned out X really did mark the spot.”

  I’d never heard a hokier tale, but right now that didn’t bother me. If the Schrödinger’s Gold was real, it would mean financial stability like I’d never known. With the city collapsing and the taxes due, that sounded like a good deal.

  I took the pouch and gave it to Zephyr.

  “Hold this up in front of the tokamak, honey,” I said. “If it glows green and sings a six-part harmony, put it in the safe. If not, bring it back and you can help me return this gentleman to the gutter he came in on.”

  She took it, her face registering surprise. “It looked full a minute ago. But now it feels empty. Can I look?” She started fiddling with the strings knotted at the top of the pouch.

  “No!” Jarrett and I shouted together. Zephyr took a step back, shocked.

  “Don’t open it, honey,” I went on. “If you do that, it could be worthless.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  I sighed. “Like I said, Schrödinger’s Gold is quantum. As long as it’s inside the bag, it’s either the most valuable currency there is, or it’s worth less than a pocket of beans.”

  “If I may correct you,” put in the Scrutator, “this is not an ‘either-or’ scenario. At any one time, the Schrödinger’s Gold exists in all possible states. It is both priceless and worthless—and all points between—simultaneously.”

  “You’re losing me,” said Zephyr.

  “It’s simple,” I said. “As long as you don’t open the pouch, any bank in the city
will classify this as the most valuable thing you can imagine. That’s because, in one of the many possible quantum states it occupies, it is. If you open it, all the quantum possibilities collapse into just one.”

  “Okay,” said Zephyr slowly. “I think I get it. But what if that collapsed state just happens to be the ‘most valuable’ one?”

  “Then you struck lucky. But the odds are against it.”

  She prodded the pouch with her index finger. Apparently full again, it wobbled like a little water bed. “What exactly does ‘most valuable’ mean anyway?”

  “A bag that big would buy you the entire cosmos fifty times over. Honey, you got the whole world in your hands.”

  60

  A FEW MINUTES later, Zephyr came up from the cellar.

  “I tested it. The tokamak light made the pouch glow, just like you said.”

  “Did it sing?”

  She nodded. “It sounded like Ave Maria. Is that all there is to identifying it? It’s so... silly.”

  “Most quantum things seem that way. Did you put it in the safe?”

  “Yes.”

  I stared at my new client. “Well, Jarrett, it looks like you hired yourself a private investigator. Zephyr—get our coats.”

  Her shoulders dropped and she shot a glance at her desk. “We can’t leave the office empty.”

  “The Scrutator can babysit the beetle.”

  “No. I’ll stay. The Scrutator can go with you.” She came close so she could whisper. “It might do Bronzey good to get out on a case—a proper case. It might lift him out of his depression.”

  The tax inspector looked up from where it was hunched over a pile of invoices. Its wing cases buzzed softly.

  “You sure you can handle this?” I asked.

  “I’m staying! Deal with it!” she snapped. She cooled as quickly as she’d blown hot, but still I took a step backward. “I’m sorry. It’s just that I’m not a helpless female to be rescued and coddled. The bug’s not a monster. It’s just trying to do its job. So go and do yours.”

  “Is something wrong, honey?” I said.

  Zephyr stroked the zoetrope. Inside it, tiny versions of her and Raymond whirled in their perpetual dance. “Look, you helped me deal with certain things. Issues. My past. But you’ve got a past too. If you keep on ignoring it, it’ll tear you apart.”

  “What the hell are you talking about?”

  She jerked her head toward Jarrett. “Go with him. Solve his problems. When you’ve done that, try taking a look at your own.”

  61

  JARRETT HAD COME in an automobile he’d built himself. It was a crazy contraption, thrown together from scrap. It ran on seven mis-matched legs powered by a baby tokamak. I wondered how he’d managed to drive it through the storm.

  “She’s built for bad weather,” he said, peeling back something resembling a door. He was proud of it, despite how it looked. “See how low she sits?”

  “I estimate these aerodynamic attachments will generate a significant downward thrust under the right atmospheric conditions,” said the Scrutator, waggling the sawn-off wing jutting from the top of the roll cage.

  “Spoilers glue her down, that’s for sure. Ain’t she a beaut?”

  I kept my mouth shut while they discussed the jalopy. Zephyr’s outburst had knocked me sideways. I tried to work out where it had come from, came up with nothing. Frustrated, I sulked.

  The ride was smoother than I’d anticipated, given the state of the street. Jarrett steered a tricky course between craters and corpses. Like the Scrutator, he had a knack for short-cuts. The car had a knack for gymnastics. When a nest of wrecked tramcars blocked our way we climbed to the rooftops, avoiding the street altogether.

  “See that smoke?” said Jarrett; ahead, the sky was smudged like a charcoal sketch. “Refugee camp. Passed it on the way in. Since the Birdhouse went up, half the city blocks are bomb sites. Other half’s abandoned. Most folk, they live in the camps now, eatin’ hog swill.”

  The route took us past the riverside camp. Jarrett kept the car up on the roofline, which kept us out of trouble. Gave us a bird’s eye view too.

  The refugee camp was a mess of tents, packed with the homeless. Someone had taken String City’s melting pot, stirred it up, tipped it out. Fires burned in the gutters; naked children played with unexploded ordnance; men and women shared canvas with nymphs, golems, winged serpents, minotaurs, shape-shifters of all, well, shapes. Name a species, it was there. The tents went right down to the river. The water was choppy. I thought it was the wind, which was picking up again. Then I realised it was people, swimming.

  Swimming in the Lethe.

  “Lot of folk, they’re goin’ plumb crazy,” said Jarrett. “Sayin’ it’s the end, or worse. Figure they got nothin’ to lose. Might as well wipe theirselves clean. So in they jump. Three of the four horsemen are in there too. Fourth held back on account of not havin’ any swimmin’ britches. So they say.”

  We left the camp behind. I was glad. It felt rotten to the core. It wasn’t just the filth or the hopeless looks on the faces. It was the place itself. The world was an eggshell and the refugee camp was built right over ten thousand cracks. And the cracks were getting bigger.

  None of it helped my mood.

  We turned south and headed out of town on an elevated highway. It was deserted. There were a few gaps in the road bed, but Jarrett’s automobile jumped well. Past the city limits, the road dropped into Jigsaw Canyon.

  Out here, it was like String City didn’t even exist. Canyon walls hugged the road and cacti as big as houses clung to the slopes, making shadows black as tar pits where coyotes hid from the noon sun. Vultures circled. The wind blew hard.

  The road became a dirt track, winding tight through the canyon maze. Jarrett steered the car through one turn after another. My sense of direction’s good but even I got dizzy. Every turn we made, the wind got stronger. Sand blasted the canvas canopy.

  A bronzed finger tapped my shoulder, making me jump clean out of my skin. “Sir?” said the Scrutator. “May I make an observation?”

  “Only if it’s useful,” I replied, lost in my own thoughts.

  “In that regard, I am afraid I cannot make an empirical judgement.”

  Sand leaked in through the torn roof of the car. Lump hammers thudded inside my head. “What’s on your mind, iron man?”

  “I am not made of...”

  “Just spit it out.”

  “Very well. For the past seventeen hours, I have been running a background algorithm to cross-refer all known encounters with Fools. I can now confirm categorically that there are no recorded occurrences of a Fool demonstrating any aptitude for logical and progressive thought.”

  The lump hammers pounded harder. “I don’t get it.”

  “To summarise: Fools do not make plans.”

  Now the thumping in my head was joined by that irritating itch at the back of my neck. I wanted them both to go away and leave me alone.

  “What are you trying to say?”

  “We know that a Fool—or perhaps even a group of Fools—has committed a crime by removing the Still Point of the Turning World from its place of safety.”

  “Removed? The Birdhouse was blown apart, pal, in case you didn’t remember.”

  “I remember everything. Now, in order to break open the Birdhouse, the Fools detonated a large quantity of scathefire which they acquired following an elaborate heist at the Tartarus Club. A complex plan.”

  I saw where this was going. “But you’re telling me that Fools don’t plan.”

  “Indeed. They are incapable of it. Fools are entities of the moment, with little concept of cause and effect.”

  I rubbed my head. A set of jack hammers had joined the parade. Dragging a pneumatic drill. “So whoever’s behind this, it isn’t the Fools.”

  “That is correct. The thought depresses me.”

  The canopy flapped back. A gust of sand scoured my face. The pain in my head burst like a bubble.

>   “So who exactly is pulling the strings?” I said.

  62

  A BUILDING LOOMED out of the canyon just as the sun broke through the sandstorm. It was vast, all curves and spirals, like a dozen conch shells all poured together. Its outer surface shone like mother of pearl.

  “That’s the Aeolus Corporation,” said Jarrett. “Where they make the weather. Runs twenty-four-seven. Canyon system channels the wind—there’s these big doors and valves set in the walls. Might be calm in the city, but it’s always blowin’ in Jigsaw Canyon.”

  I knew about Aeolus, of course, but I’d never seen his headquarters up close. It was the single biggest building I’d ever seen. And I’ve seen some. Huge as it was, however, it was hard to stay focused on it. My head was full of Fools. But this was a case, and Jarrett was my client. My paying client. The bag of Schrödinger’s Gold in my safe said so.

  “You say you work there,” I said to Jarrett, dragging my attention back to the task at hand. “Do you live in the factory too?”

  Jarrett spat. “We live our own lives! We’re workers, not slaves!”

  “No offense. So where’s home?”

  By way of reply, Jarrett aimed the car down a narrow gorge that ran beside the factory. The gorge was full of junk and airborne sand. The junk was old aircraft: twenty or so plane wrecks lashed down with guys and pegs. Most were old and weatherbeaten, but a couple looked brand new.

  “What are the shiny ones?” I said.

  “B29s,” said Jarrett. “A couple came down the other week. You musta seen them over the city.”

  I had. The dimensional instabilities had opened holes in the magnetosphere. Brought through all kinds of ships. Some with wings, others with eyes. A few with both.

  “For us, a plane crash is good news,” Jarrett went on. “Oftentimes they come down in the canyon. Wind here makes for bad turbulence. We salvage the wrecks, make them home.”

  What I’d thought was scrapyard was in fact shanty town. The aircraft fuselages were lined up, end-on to the weather. Broken wings stuck up, acting as windbreaks. The props on the big bomber engines were feathered, spinning hard—generating power, I guessed.