Silver Shark (12 page)

Claire took another sip of tea and checked the tab. Passion raspberry. Hmm. Delicious.

It was thirty minutes past five. The building was mostly empty. The support personnel had gone home, eager to escape and start their weekend, with the exception of the psycher assistance unit. Both Rukah and Angelia were logged in, although Rukah was coming to the end of his shift and Angelia was just beginning hers.

In the past week Claire had made more executive decisions than she cared to admit. Venturo spent every waking hour logged into the bionet. Attempting to reach him proved futile. He simply brushed her off. Lienne carried her own workload and the couple of times Claire consulted her, the older woman defaulted to "Ask Venturo."

In the end she resolved most of the problems herself, under the banner of Ven's authority. If Lienne or he ever realized who had handled most of the arising problems, she would be fired on the spot for overstepping. Claire smiled to herself. Right now getting fired didn't seem overly tragic. Sure, she would have to find a new job, and her probation period had shrunk to mere six weeks instead of twelve, but it might be worth it.

It would be worth it to be free of Ven. To be free of the fantasy that would never come to pass. She was too proud to spend the entirety of her life as his silent shadow, while he imagined her beating off the prospective assassins with her tablet.

Ven's mind approached.

Claire sipped her tea.

He emerged from the shadowy hallway, the bionet suit adhering to him like second skin. She ogled him quietly, looking through her eyelashes while pretending to drink from her cup.

Ven dropped a stack of pseudo paper next to her and landed on the couch. "I found you."

She almost panicked, but her shell was firmly in place and thick enough to withstand a probe. "I wasn't hiding."

"Yes, you were. Lights are off, your desk is organized, as if you've left. If it wasn't for your bag, I wouldn't know you were in the building."

"My desk is always organized."

He looked exhausted. The laugh lines around his eyes seemed more pronounced. His cheeks were withdrawn. And yet he radiated a kind of magnetic sexual energy that made her watch him. Being in his presence was like having sex without ever approaching orgasm - she could watch and imagine, but he would never be hers and he would never want her the way she wanted him.

He sprawled on the couch, resting his head on the padded arm rest, straightened his legs, and winced. Cramped.
Clocking nearly eighty hours in the bionet in one week will do it to you.
She'd done it before and it was unpleasant.

Ven nodded at the pseudopaper. "I found these."

Claire glanced at the sheets. The Quattrone Family quote.

"I know Lienne didn't approve this. Nor did she compile the data for the quote."

She didn't feel like lying. "How?"

"Lienne has a best friend, Fotina Heleni. When they were both sixteen, Deo Quattrone stood her up. They were at a party together, and he saw his ex-girlfriend in the crowd with another kid and made a giant scene. It got ugly. Lienne despises him and the whole family. If her hate were a plasma converter, she could launch a thousand spaceships into orbit."

Claire laughed. "Are you trying to hint that your aunt holds grudges?"

"I'm not hinting. I am saying it. So who helped you with these?"

She sighed. "Would it be so terrible if I had done them myself?"

"The quote shows a detailed knowledge of the bionet," he said. "Who is the co-conspirator, Claire? I promise I won't punish anyone. In fact, I may give this person a raise and unload the rest of the quotes on them. Although that would be a punishment in itself, I suppose."

Frustration boiled up in her. "You're right, Ven. A drone like me couldn't possibly understand the expense involved in structuring the spiral cell protection."

He focused on her. "You are not a drone. We've discussed that."

"And you never like to repeat yourself." She had to stop talking.

Ven sat up, propping himself on the armrest. "Why are you upset with me?"

Say nothing. Say nothing.
Claire forced her voice to sound even. "I am not upset. I'm just tired."

"I get it," he said. "Unloading all of my work on your shoulders wasn't fair. But I have no choice. You can keep your helper a secret, if you wish. I'll find out eventually anyway."

No, you won't. You can't find someone who doesn't exist.

"You're still looking for your mystery woman?" she asked.

He nodded.

I'm sitting right here.
"What's so important about her?"

He sat up. "Have you ever seen a silver shark?"

"No."

Ven reached for her tablet and pulled up the console. His fingers flew over the keys. A large digital screen ignited in the opposite wall. It was intense, deep blue, suffused with rays of pale green light, and she realized she was looking at the depths of the ocean.

Something stirred far in the distance. A hint of movement shifted the water.

A pale silver star winked in the distance.

Another ignited close by it.

Claire leaned forward.

More stars ignited and shimmered with nacre fire, shifting through the entire rainbow spectrum. A serpentine shape swam to her, graceful, beautiful, sheathed with silver scales and rippling with color. The sleek creature paused in front of the camera and coiled, displaying a multitude of wide fins bristling with spikes. There was something hypnotic in the way its body moved, sliding its coils through the water.

"This is what she was...?" Claire asked.

"Yes. It's a silver shark serpent off the Coral Coast. Except she was more like this." Venturo tapped the tablet.

The sea serpent grew, swelling, filling the screen. Her head sprouted ivory horns, tinted with intense electric azure. A mane of silver and blue sheathed her spine, flaring around her head. Some of her fins widened, turning into razor-sharp blades, others grew into wide wheels, rippling with iridescent rainbows. A line of pale blue lights ignited along the serpent's body. She gathered herself.

The lights pulsed.

Sharp blades of ice exploded from the creature, freezing the screen.

That's how he saw her... "How did you get this image?" Claire said, her voice barely above whisper.

"I drew it with imagining software," he said. "From memory. It doesn't do her justice. She was incredible. I wish you could've seen her, Claire."

The admiration vibrated in his voice and suddenly she was intensely jealous of herself.

"I've never seen anyone like her," Ven said. "Every psycher sees the bionet in his own way. I see it as shallow ocean with islands. I was patrolling when I got a ping from one of the Security Forces installations."

"I didn't know Guardian had any Security Force contracts."

"It's not a fact they want us to advertise," he said. "Anyway, I swam that way and saw her. She had accessed a coral tree - the installation's data banks - and was coming back. She had to slither down a spike-studded channel barely wide enough to hold her. Thirty centimeters in either direction and she'd be skewered. It was insane."

He sounded obsessed.

"How do you even know it was a woman?" Claire murmured.

"A feeling I got. I brushed past her mind and it seemed familiar somehow. I've met her before. I've been breaking my brain trying to recall where and nothing." He rubbed his face.

She couldn't help herself. "May be she came to apply for a job."

"No. I would've remembered."

Oh you idiot.

"And I would've hired her." Ven sighed.

Claire set her now empty teacup on the table. "Just out of pure academic curiosity, what are you planning to do if you find her?"

"I'll drop to my knees and propose marriage on the spot."

What?

He leaned back and laughed. "You should've seen your face. I finally managed to rattle the imperturbable Claire Shannon."

She almost hit him. "All this time in the bionet clearly altered your thinking patterns."

"If I see her, I'll try to buy her," he said. "Or kill her. I haven't decided."

"That's a bit extreme."

"If DDS finds her, they will do the same," he said. "Not only is she Grade A psychic, she's been trained. She has the kind of combat expertise that takes years to master. During our fight she cloned herself. She actually made copies of herself and they moved independently of her. They lasted only a second or two, but it would be very useful in a fight. I've been trying to figure out how she did it."

It's not that difficult really. You shed copies of your outer thoughts within milliseconds of each other. Same process that produces your shadow.
Claire clamped down on that thought before it turned into words.

"Well, good luck in your quest," she said. "I think I'll go home now. I've spent too much time in this building this week."

"That's an excellent idea." He rolled off the couch and stood next to her. He was half a foot taller and he was standing too close. If she raised her hand, she could touch his face. "Come on a trip with me."

What? "Where?" she asked calmly.

"To the provinces. I need to see a friend of mine anyway, so we can pretend it's a business trip."

"And what would it be really, if not a business trip?" she asked.

He leaned toward her a fraction of an inch. His eyes laughed. "It would be me and you getting away from this building."

What did that mean, exactly? "Your aunt wouldn't approve," she said.

"I can go whole days without giving a damn about what my aunt thinks. Weeks even. Come with me, Claire. You've never been to the provinces and Celino's wife is a fantastic cook."

She hesitated, still not sure if the offer was genuine or if there was some hidden catch.

"It's not an order," Ven said. "Just an invitation from a friend. Whether you accept it or decline will have no bearing on your position with this company. I don't want you to feel obligated."

"I don't," she said. "How far is it?"

"About an hour by aerial at top speed. I promise to have you home before midnight."

"Why midnight?"

"When you take a young girl out with her parents' permission, it's understood that you must return by midnight." He shook his head. "It's just an expression. Forget it. Come with me."

"Are you sure your friends won't mind my presence?"

"I'm sure," he said.

"I need to get my bag."

"I need to shower. Tenth floor deck in fifteen minutes?"

Fourteen minutes later she climbed into his aerial. Ven grinned at her. He wore civilian clothes: a dark pair of pants and a light grey shirt that molded to his chest and arms. His hair was still wet from the shower and she smelled a faint hint of his soap. She didn't know the name of the scent, but it made her want to kiss him and see if she could taste it.

"I'm glad you decided to join me," he said.

"Me too." She just hoped she wouldn't regret it later.

The aerial shot into orange light of the afternoon.

Ven pushed the com and typed in the number. A man's face appeared on the screen: masculine, intense, with harsh grey eyes. His hair was almost blue black. Recognition flooded the man's eyes. He smiled and became a different person - warm, welcoming. "There you are. We expected you earlier."

"I'm on the way to you," Ven said. "Celino, I'm bringing a guest."

"What kind of a guest?" a female voice called off screen.

"A young female one," Celino said. "She is a co-worker."

"Oh!" the woman off-screen said. "I better make desert."

*** *** ***

Celino and Imelda Carvanna lived in a beautiful two-story structure with cream walls and a wrap-around balcony shielded by a green roof. Surrounded by orchards and trees, the house drowned in a vast garden, and as Claire walked next to Ven down the twisted path from the aerial landing pad, a sea of dahlias bloomed on both sides of her: peach, orange, yellow, blood-red, deep purple, blue fringed with white, some large, some small, some with wide petals, some with narrow frayed florets, others a mere single ring of petals around a flat disk in the center. It was as if someone had taken a rainbow, put it into a blender, and tossed the result out.

"Anemone," Ven pointed out different varieties. "Waterlily. Ball. Starburst."

"I didn't know you were a botanist," she said.

"I'm not. Growing dahlias is like a national sport. I remember one year a neighbor somehow bred one that was indigo and wouldn't let anyone have any tubers. Almost started a feud. I think someone got stabbed over it."

Claire laughed.

"It's not funny," Ven said, smiling. "Dahlias are serious business."

Celino and Imelda waited for them on the porch of their house. On the ride over Ven had told her most of the details. Celino's family and his had been neighbors. Celino was twelve years older than Ven, forty-five to Ven's thirty-three, and the two of them didn't pay much attention to each other until Celino, who had become a financial shark and accumulated a huge fortune, decided to retire. He required bionet protection for his rather large fortune and business interests, and so he looked up an old neighbor. They soon became close friends.

Looking at Celino Carvanna now, Claire could barely see the traces of the ruthless financial magnate. He seemed perfectly amicable. Charming even.

"This is Claire," Ven said. "She works with me. Claire, this is Celino and that's Meli."

Celino smiled wide and nodded to her. "Welcome!"

"Thank you."

Celino slapped Ven's shoulder. "I have news for you. Come."

They went into the house.

Meli Carvanna smiled at her. She was short, dark-haired, with a big breasts and wide hips, and beautiful brown eyes on a tan face. She looked as if she belonged on the porch of this house, in the garden of dahlias, on this planet. This is what the women Ven grew up with looked like, Claire realized. Standing next to her, she felt at once awkward and inadequate. She would never be like this. She shouldn't have come.

"No matter how much time Celino spent in the city, he's still a man of the provinces," Meli said. "Men retire to discuss Important Business, and we women are expected to entertain ourselves by cooking. Since I already finished dinner, I say we revolt and drink wine on the balcony instead."