“You didn’t hear.”
Alik gave her a suspicious look. “How do you know this?”
“Because ten years ago, I watched her die.”
THE DEATH OF CANCER
RIO, AD 2194
Early morning on Copacabana beach, before the gold-skinned body gods began strutting their glistening physiques for the tourists and lovelorn to envy, the horizontal rays of the sun were playing across the water to create a dazzling shimmer. Not even Kandara’s category-four sunglasses seemed to offer much protection from the glare. She pounded barefoot along the sand, careful to keep out of the long tire furrows. Every day, the city’s heavy-duty sand rake servez came out in the hour before dawn, restoring Copacabana to an implausible level of purity in readiness for the daily crowds. In doing so, the wheels often left sharp ruts behind, which could trip the unwary before fresh tides and ten thousand playful feet trampled them flat again.
Just before reaching the southern end she turned around and ran back. Zapata, her altme, monitored her heart rate and oxygen consumption, splashing the data across her tarsus lenses. She used it to keep her pace steady, the optimal cardio routine she’d followed faithfully since leaving Heroico Colegio Militar twenty-four years ago. Proper diet, some simple telomere treatments, disciplined exercise, and her body had retained the stamina and speed of that twenty-one-year-old cadet.
Eleven minutes later she was closing on the other end of the beach, and more people were venturing out onto the sands. Stalls along the promenade were opening, the time-honored volleyball nets going up. Kandara slowed and walked over the Avenida Atlantica, her soles slapping the old wave-pattern mosaic as she made her way across to her apartment.
The high-rise hotels bordering Copacabana for close on a century had suffered the same economic fate as all hotels post–quantum spatial entanglement and had long since been redeveloped into blocks of luxury apartments above the street-level clubs and restaurants. Kandara had bought her own relatively modest apartment seven years ago. It was only on the third floor of the twenty-story building, but it did have a balcony that looked out over the beach.
When she opened the front door, King Jaspar, her elegant Burmese cat, was in the hallway, protesting loudly, as usual. Before she got him, she’d never heard a cat as loud. Mr. Parker-Dawson, her neighbor, wasn’t talking to her anymore because of the “infernal racket”; he’d also lodged several complaints with the residents’ board.
“All right,” she told King Jaspar. “Calm down, I’ll get your breakfast.”
In response he just mewled even louder.
“Shut up. It’s coming.”
Another penetrating cry.
“Shut it!” Her bare foot shoved at the cat’s silky fur. Not too hard, but enough that he’d get the message. She received a sulky look for her troubles.
“You little—” A hiss of exasperation escaped from her lips, and she made an effort to calm down. Mother Mary, it’s just a goddamn cat. Get a grip. “Come on.” She bent down fast and scooped him up. Her finger tickled him under his jaw as she carried him through into the kitchen’s small utility room. There was contented purring as she filled his bowl one-handed. Then as she put him down, an extended claw snagged on her Lycra running top. “Hell!”
Kandara glared at the fraying strands he’d tugged from the tight black fabric, now more annoyed with herself for the anger. The whole incident was like a feedback loop. Ridiculous! “Give me a status update on my neurochemistry and skull peripherals,” she told Zapata.
Standing in the middle of the long living room with its tall houseplants and Mexican rug wall hangings. Hands on hips. Impatient for the scan results. Sweat from the run glinting on legs and torso as the sun began to shine sharp gold rays through the big balcony windows.
“Neurochemistry stable,” Zapata announced. “Gland functionality one hundred percent.”
She snarled. It would have been easy to blame the little gland. It was a complex, delicate piece of medical bioware, secreting a carefully regulated dose of dopamine antagonist, helping keep the schizophrenia locked away in the darkness at the bottom of her thoughts like a slumbering beast. So she couldn’t blame her frustration on that. Maybe it was the run, pumping her up. Or the lack of work—over two months now. And it was no good calling around to her contacts. Work came to her, not the other way around.
She walked down the short hallway and opened Gustavo’s door. Gustavo had about the same status in the apartment as King Jaspar; he was certainly equally dependent—her houseguest, her charity case, her work in progress, her release. She’d found him in an alley behind a swish club seven weeks ago, beaten badly by a furious husband’s security team. He was nineteen and male-model handsome, so he explained, which was why he’d come to Rio in the first place, loaded up with excitement and hope. Except the modeling work had never arrived, despite his being on the books of three local agencies. Instead the agency bookers suggested he escort aging fashionistas to parties, to be seen, darling, so the right people know your name—a flesh accessory with far less value than their glittering jewelry and this-week couture. The fashionistas, colder and more calculating than any street pimp, began to pass him around their wealthy clients. He partied with them, smiled at their nonsensical jokes, then fucked them for half the night like only a virile teenager could. And when that stamina began to falter from the excesses, he took the right drugs to carry on regardless.
Gustavo was sprawled on the bed, snoring softly. She’d gotten him on a program, and he was staying clean; he’d even snagged a couple of gigs modeling sports gear and once as an extra in a music viz-u. But as charity cases went, she knew exactly what she was doing, and altruism didn’t much enter into it. He was convenient. Nothing more.
Her heel knocked the door shut. The noise woke him, and his head came up, showing him blinking sleep-confusion away. She grinned down at him as she tugged the spoiled Lycra top off over her head.
“Holy mother, what time is it?” he croaked.
“It’s morning.”
“You haven’t slept again, have you?”
“A few hours.”
“You need to sleep more.”
She wiggled out of her shorts. “I can sleep when—”
“You’re dead. Yes. You keep saying.”
“That’s right.” Kandara tugged his sheet away and climbed onto the mattress beside him.
There was a moment when he might have resisted. But instead he gave a sigh that played at reluctance. That left him soon enough as her hands moved proficiently across his lean body, banishing the last fog of sleep. After all these weeks she knew exactly how to rouse him, how to keep him hard while she rode him greedily. The sexual gymnastics her gened-up muscles let her perform on his bed never strayed into true intimacy. They were fuck-buddies, not lovers. All she wanted was the physical.
The doctors had cautioned her about her anger management. The glands infiltrating her mesolimbic pathway were not a cure, they said with their wise nodding heads; the neurochemicals would only treat the symptoms. In doing so there might be side effects.
Now she couldn’t even remember how she used to think before her parents had been slaughtered. Which behavior trait was new, artificial, psychological, bioneural, divine…Her trio of driving daemons had been brought under control: psychopathy, hypersexuality, insomnia. She ruled them with an iron fist now, used them as she needed to, gifting herself the perfect personality for her work. An avenging angel, cleansing the world of unchecked evil.
After she’d finished with him, she watched with mild fondness as he quickly fell asleep again before she slipped out to shower. Breakfast was a smoothie of her own concoction, a half dozen different berries and yogurt (natural organic; she didn’t do printed food if she could avoid it) mixed in her blender. She drank it, sitting beside the open balcony door, wearing a robe, her hair wrapped in a towel.
Gustavo wandered in when she’d already drunk half of the smoothie. He was naked, a beauty that competed with the view of the beach for her attention. “Sheesh, don’t you have any real food?” he moaned.
“Such as?”
“Orange juice? Toast?”
“I’m sure they’re out there on the street stalls somewhere.”
“Okay, okay. I get it.”
“I can mix some honey with yogurt for you.”
“Gee, thanks.” He slumped on a stool at the kitchen’s small bar.
She grinned as she busied herself with the array of expensive cookery gadgets she’d carefully acquired for her galley kitchen. All organic ingredients blended carefully, the deep-fill tray heating up to the perfect temperature.
“That’s yogurt?” he asked, puzzled, as she poured the thick, creamy liquid out of the blender and into a measuring jug.
“I’m making you waffles. My thank-you treat for this morning.”
His smile won out against the sun.
“You got anything on for the rest of today?” he asked as he wolfed down the third waffle.
“Meetings,” she said. Which wasn’t quite true; she’d booked a couple of hours on the shooting range to keep up her proficiency. Then she was due to meet a dark supplier to review some of the new lethal peripherals coming out of northern Russia. She probably wouldn’t have any implanted, but it would be good to know their capabilities.
“Can I come? I won’t get in the way or anything. I could be your assistant.”
“I don’t think so. Not today.”
He gave her a sullen look. “Fine. Sure. I get it. You think I’m stupid.”
“No,” she said, proud she wasn’t sighing in exasperation. After she’d moved him in, she’d told him she was a freelance design refiner for algae reactor initiators, used extensively during the early stage of terraforming. It was a good holding lie. But she hadn’t expected this hiatus to last so long. “You just need some basic qualifications to work in my sector.”
“Yeah, like I’m ever going to have that.”
“You could have, if you go to university.”
“Sure thing, mother.”
She gave him a sly lecherous smile and stood up. The uncertain look in his eyes was arousing. Her hand closed on the jar of organic manuka honey. “Would your mother do this?” she murmured, and opened the front of her robe, ready to pour the luxurious golden goo over her chest.
“You have a call,” Zapata informed her. The identity icon of her European agent splashed on her tarsus lenses made her stop.
“Go take a shower first,” she told Gustavo. The dramatic return of the pout made her laugh outright. He stomped back to his bedroom.
“Accept,” she told Zapata.
“Good morning to you, my greatest client,” the agent said. “How are you today?”
“Restless,” she admitted. “I thought you were dead, or in jail.”
“Like you haven’t got a dozen others the same as me tirelessly hunting the worthy jobs.”
“Maybe. If I do, they’re a lot more tireless.”
“I’m hurt.”
“I’m sympathetic. Come on, what have you got for me?”
“The biggest. The job of legend, the one that never happens. This is your pinnacle, my dear. You can retire after this and bore everyone in the bar all night long with tales of your imminent sainthood.”
“Bullshit. You said that about Baja.”
“This time, though. Oh, yes, this time.”
“I need a better agent.”
“No, you don’t, because no other agent could bring you a contract with Akitha.”
A small, cold shiver of excitement ran up Kandara’s spine. “Double bullshit! That’s Utopial central. They wouldn’t touch me with a bargepole.”
“Desperate times, my dear. Can I tell them you’re interested?”
“Is this on the level?”
“I guarantee it. I had to meet their representative in the flesh. That I never do. But for you…”
“What’s the job?”
“Oh, yeah, like they’re going to tell me.”
“Mother Mary. All right, when do they want me?”
“Now.”
“Seriously?”
“No offense, but if they want you, it has got to be monumentally urgent.”
“Give me an hour.” She looked down at the jar of honey she was still holding. “Make it two.”
* * *
—
It was King Jaspar who was the biggest problem. Kandara wasn’t entirely surprised by that. Gustavo was simple. She fucked him until the honey was all used up, then told him he had to go. She did the decent thing and paid a fortnight’s rent for an apartment in the respectable hilltop neighborhood of Santa Teresa.
Rage. Screaming. Threats. Pleading. But in the end he packed his bag and stormed out, yelling impressively obscene curses on both her ancestors and descendants.
Easy. Now try booking a pedigreed Burmese into a decent cattery in Rio with a half hour’s notice. It cost her more than the Santa Teresa apartment. After that she paid a lawyer to find King Jaspar a suitable new owner if she wasn’t back in a month. Rule 101: Always treat every mission as if it’s going to be your last. And in this case, she wasn’t under any illusion. If the Utopials were asking for her, it was going to be something very serious indeed.
* * *
—
The Rio metro network took her to the international hub, from which it was three hubs to Bangkok. That was where it started to get more interesting. She had to take a civic radial out to Prawet, where the Utopial embassy was situated. As she walked through the interminable portal doors with her bagez trundling along behind, Zapata checked her neurochemical balance, which was perfectly level. She breathed calmly into a Zen state. Ready.
A minute later she was walking up the embassy’s broad steps with fountains playing on either side. A Utopial called Kruse was waiting for her at the top, just in front of the main arched entranceway. Sie looked about thirty, with a mane of chestnut hair in which rainbow jewels glowed discreetly. Hir fawn tweed suit was very formal, with a skirt that came down over hir knees. Kandara had to tip her head up when they shook hands; Kruse was an easy forty centimeters taller than she was. But the omnia’s smile seemed genuine enough.
“Investigator Martinez, such a pleasure,” sie said.
“Likewise, and it’s just Kandara.” Being called Investigator threw her slightly, but if that was the way they were going to deal with her, so be it.
“Of course. This way, please, Kandara.”
Kruse showed her through a smaller door at the side of the main entrance. A short hall led to a single portal door. Kandara stepped through. She knew immediately they were on a space habitat; her inner ear could detect the subtle difference of rotation-induced gravity. Zapata confirmed the change, linking to the local net and questing its metadata.
“This is Zabok,” it told her.
Kandara had been expecting that. Zabok was the first large self-sustaining habitat built by Emilja Jurich, one of the founders of the Utopial movement. It was still an important center for them in the Sol system. There were several portals facing the one she’d just come through.
The ever-formal Kruse gestured to one. “Please.”
“Nebesa,” Zapata informed her after she’d stepped through. Details splashed across her lens. The Nebesa habitat orbited 100,000 kilometers above Akitha, a terraformed planet, itself orbiting Delta Pavonis.
Her inner ear detected another change, a slowing of the balance instability. Understandable. Nebesa was considerably larger than Zabok, making its rotation ponderous by comparison.
They walked along a brightly lit passage that opened out on a broad paved square. Kandara looked up, smiling as she took in the habitat’s inter
ior. The massive cylinders always engendered sensations of awe and reverence. Most people considered terraforming to be the greatest technological wonder humans had achieved. Nature had taken a billion years to produce multicellular life on Earth; now the human race could duplicate that process on a barren planet in under a century. But Kandara considered that a cheat; simply spreading microbes and seeds across sterile rock plains was merely carrying nature’s banner forward. The habitats, however…Ripping asteroids apart, forcing their raw metal and rock into cylinders the size of some of the old nations on Earth, bringing new air and water to the interior of these defiant islands in space—that was real engineering, combining all of scientific history’s knowledge into a victory over the most hostile environment possible: the empty universe itself.
“Magnificent,” Kandara said quietly, breathing down the humid air, cleaner than anything the South Atlantic winds swept across Copacabana.
“Thank you,” Kruse said in genuine appreciation.
Nebesa’s interior was sixty kilometers long and twelve in diameter. What looked like a splinter of captured sunlight burned sharp along the axis, bathing the interior in a tropical glare. That surface was a mixture of long lakes studded with islands, confined by land coated in a lush rain forest. There were even some mountains, with slender waterfalls tumbling down rocky slopes. Clouds beset with odd curlicues twisted slowly through the air.
They’d emerged at the foot of a gently curving endcap. The base of it formed a ziggurat ring of black-glass balconies, extending two hundred meters above the paving where they stood, a vertical city that made her mildly dizzy tracing its course all the way around the rim until she was looking at the tiny ebony band directly overhead.
“How many people live here?” she asked, trying to do the math without using Zapata. Even if everyone had an apartment ten times the size of hers, the population could be measured in millions.
“Just over a hundred thousand these days,” Kruse said. “It was more than twice that when the terraforming was at its peak. But everyone wanted to move down to Akitha when it was cleared for habitation. Now it’s just the senior grade industrial staff and administration personnel.”