The Administration Series (231 page)

In a way, he hoped Warrick would think better of the idea and quietly forget it. For the rest of the week, it seemed as if he had. Nothing was said, nothing arranged. Toreth continued to stay at the flat, but it felt different — suddenly claustrophobic at odd moments. Unconsciously, Toreth had been aware of his residence there as a temporary thing. The possibility that it could become permanent, even though it would be elsewhere, had changed things.

However, at the end of the week, on Friday morning, a message arrived at work from Warrick. He read it over, several times, then went out to speak to Sara.

"I'm leaving at four today, or I'd like to. Is there anything urgent that I don't know about?" he asked, hoping for a yes.

Sara shook her head. "Nothing at all. You know how quiet it's been since, well . . . "

Since the revolt. Part of the problem was that the Administration's systems were still in confusion. However, the lack of work could largely be put down to uncertainty. It wasn't easy for a division devoted to investigating political crimes to find cases when no one knew for sure any more what a political crime was.

"Where are you going?" Sara asked.

For a moment, he had a ridiculous urge to lie. Then he said, "Flat hunting."

"Oh, right." She looked back at the screen and he thought he'd got away with it, then invisible antennae twitched and she turned round. "On your own?"

The innocent enquiry didn't fool him for a second. "With Warrick. He's looking for a new place."

"A new place for him?"

"Who else?" Yes, lying was easier. It wasn't as though they'd actually
agreed
anything yet. "He just thought I might be interested to see what the places looked like."

Her eyes went wide. "You're moving in with him!"

Heads came up around the room. Toreth tried to ignore them. "Put it out over the fucking system, why don't you?"

She paled. "Sorry," she said, in almost a whisper.

He hadn't meant it that seriously. What the hell was wrong with her? Whatever it was, it — and then it hit him.

Carnac.

She was still feeling guilty about what she'd said to Carnac about his parents. He ought to have guessed at once, because this wasn't the first time; the weirdest things set her off about it. Toreth added another few euros to the debt to be extracted from Carnac if they ever met again. The bastard was going to have to put on some weight to come up with enough pounds of flesh to cover it.

For the moment, he had no idea what to say to her. All he could think of in the end was to ask, "Fancy coming along?"

To his surprise, her face lit up. "Can I really?"

"Sure, if you like. Although I don't think it's going to be that exciting."

"What? The kind of places Warrick's going to be looking at? Who
wouldn't
want to?"

Well, himself, for one, but neither could he bear the idea of Warrick making the decision on his own. However, he felt unexpectedly better about the idea. Sara would be moral support, in a way. Someone from his world, not Warrick's.

Toreth paused and considered that last thought. Christ, but he was making a production out of this. They were only looking at a bloody flat.

Warrick picked them up in the SimTech car. He didn't seem in the least surprised to see Sara, although her inclusion apparently came as a shock to the other man in the car — Rob McLean. However, his expression of surprise was short-lived, and after a round of greetings, the security consultant made a stoically silent fourth to the party.

Fine from Toreth's point of view, although now Sara's interest in McLean seemed to have waned, Toreth was willing to concede the man wasn't too irritating. Hard to forget, though, that he'd been a witness to Carnac's little speech.

When Warrick began to speak, Toreth was grateful for the distraction.

"I have two places to try this evening," Warrick said as they drove off. "One's a new complex — I have a recommendation for it from one of the sponsors. The other one's somewhere older. Even if you don't like them, it'll give you an idea of the size and layout I have in mind. Then I thought we could go back to the flat and look at specs for other places."

"Sounds fine." Toreth winced inwardly at his own voice — he sounded like Warrick was offering a trip to the morgue.

The drive felt like an eternity, although it was actually only fifteen minutes. The car turned left, a barrier lifted, and they drove down into an underpass — brightly lit and obviously newly constructed.

Toreth glanced at Sara, who was craning her neck round, trying to get a glimpse through the darkened front of the car. Then the incline changed and they headed up again.

The complex opened up in front of them like a puzzle box, surrounding them on all sides — a mesmerizing construction of multilevelled buildings in glass and white stone. An open area of grass and flowing water in the centre softened the effect. The newness of the place — everything clean and sharp-edged — was overwhelming. It looked like a brochure, or a CGI presentation.

Hearing a low whistle, he tore his gaze away from the window to find McLean looking faintly embarrassed. Sara, sitting opposite him with her mouth wide open, said nothing. That was how he'd describe it later to Chevril — classy enough to shut Sara up.

Toreth looked at Warrick. "Jesus fucking Christ. You have got to be fucking
joking
."

Warrick smiled, looking as delighted as if he'd built the incredible place himself in the sim. "Not at all. However, I should say don't get your expectations up too far. We'll be looking at one of the smaller flats."

They left the car outside the front entrance. Passing through the doors, which had no suspicion of a smudge on the glittering glass, Toreth felt a very strong sense that he ought to be on duty. He'd never been anywhere like this when he wasn't.

Warrick gave SimTech's name at the vast reception desk and then they waited there. Toreth looked round at decor and people. The whole place stank of money, of corporate privilege and Senior Administration weekday residences. The kind of place people like Tillotson dreamed of living one day, when they'd backstabbed and slimed their way to the upper grades. Toreth had never even thought about it.

When their guide arrived after a minute or two, Toreth was almost too distracted to notice that it was a very attractive young woman, with the same shiny, expensive perfection as the building. Not quite that distracted, though. He put 'fuckable staff' down in his mental 'pros' column.

McLean seemed to like the security, nodding approval to himself from time to time as they walked through the corridors. Toreth spotted plenty of obvious cameras, as well as a number of more discreet versions. There were equally discreet uniformed guards in evidence, some clearly armed. No doubt the security had been tightened up after the revolt.

Toreth remained in a slight daze for the first part of the tour of the complex facilities. The ground floor held expensive shops and a variety of restaurants, currently almost empty. There was also a vast and comprehensively equipped gym that Toreth tried to imagine having the freedom to wander into any time he chose. Another big plus, and it made the concept of living in a place like this marginally more real, but at the same time somehow more uncomfortable.

Toreth felt like a . . . a something he couldn't remember.

As they walked through the endless corridors, he distracted himself with a search for the nagging word. Something he'd heard a long time ago and stashed away. By the time they reached the door of the flat, he had settled on either 'concubine' or 'catamite'. Not that he could remember what the latter meant, but he didn't much like it.

Despite Warrick's warning, Toreth had prepared himself for something ridiculously vast; as it turned out, the flat was merely large. His own place would've just about squeezed into the combined living and dining area. There must be far bigger flats in the complex, but Warrick wouldn't waste SimTech's money gratuitously.

Still, it was comfortable for two, and definitely excessive for one, at least by normal New London housing standards. Toreth wondered if McLean knew Toreth would be moving in, and whether SimTech security assessed the suitability of cohabitees as well as habitations.

As they inspected the flat, Toreth derived a certain amount of amusement from the confusion the composition of their party caused their guide. Since Warrick — or at least SimTech — had made the appointment, she addressed the majority of her remarks to him. McLean had such an obviously professional air that he couldn't be anything other than paid security. However, she kept looking between Toreth and Sara, trying to work out the relationships, clearly wondering whether either of them ought to be included in the sales pitch. Judging by Warrick's occasional smile when the woman's attention was elsewhere, he'd also noticed her confusion and wasn't about to enlighten her.

The air smelt strongly of new carpet and fresh paint.

"I'm afraid you can't go in," the woman said as she opened the bathroom door. Tiles shone, spotless. "They finished decorating this morning and the adhesive isn't cured yet. This section of the complex has only just been opened for sale and we're expecting them to go quickly. We brought the opening date forwards, despite the recent troubles."

"Or because of them?" Warrick asked.

"Yes." She stepped back to make room, addressing her next remarks to McLean. "We've had enquiries from a number of corporate security departments. We provide a full protection service, with a twenty-four-hour armed security presence."

McLean nodded. "I've seen the brochure. It's very impressive."

Sara had taken the invitation to look around at face value. As Toreth peered over Warrick's shoulder through the bathroom door, she reappeared beside him and grabbed his hand.

"Come and look at this," she said, in a whisper that would have carried the length of the building.

She led him through an open plate glass door and onto a large balcony.

"Isn't it fabulous?"

The flat was high up and tucked away in an angle of the architecture, and he wondered how much difference that made to the price. Perhaps not as much as before if many corporates were retreating into havens like this. From up here, the activity in the complex was more obvious: a handful of expensive cars entering or leaving, people strolling between entrances or along glassed-in walkways. Toreth leaned on the railing and looked over the edge into the centre of the complex, judging distances to cover and lines of sight.

"McLean won't like it," he said after a while. "Alarmed or not, this is a large exterior access."

"The whole complex is secure, though, isn't it?"

"Yeah, I suppose so." The comment crystallised the feeling he'd had since they drove in. The elegant, beautiful buildings made him think of the detention level at I&I. Closed off from the outside world — a prison.

"Come on," he said.

Not surprisingly, they found Warrick in the kitchen, discussing fittings and fixtures options with the agent.

Toreth waited patiently for about ten seconds, then said, "Are you done?"

It came out as more of a demand than a question, and Warrick looked round, surprised. "I . . . yes, I suppose so."

"Good. Let's go."

As they walked back to the entrance, Warrick asked, "What do you think of the gym?"

"Nice."

"Situation?"

"Well, it's within walking distance of I&I, if I use one of the other gates. Further than my flat, but not too much further."

"So, overall, do you like it?"

"It's fantastic. But — " He shrugged, unable to find the right words. "I mean, it's a bit . . . "

Warrick shook his head. "No, actually, it's a lot. I don't think I could live here."

Toreth blinked at him. "I thought you liked it," he said after a moment.

"I do. The flat was excellent. However, there is a fine line between security and imprisonment. This is much too far across that line for my tastes."

McLean, a little way ahead of them, must have heard, but he didn't comment. Toreth assumed that the security consultant had learned by now the futility of trying to change Warrick's mind once it was made up.

Sara sighed and tilted her head to gaze with exaggerated wistfulness at the entrance to the shopping area as they passed it. "And I was so looking forwards to visiting you here."

Warrick patted her shoulder in mock commiseration. "You'll get over it. See what you think of the next place."

At the second prospect, they parked the car a little way away rather than use the secure underground entrance. The late afternoon sun coloured the three white buildings a golden orange as they walked towards them. According to Warrick they had been rescued, at an expense Toreth couldn't imagine, from the clearing of the ruins of the old city. The decontamination alone must have cost more than the construction of a new building. Something Toreth had never understood — what did it matter if they were the real thing rather than a modern copy?

At first inspection, the trio of buildings were nowhere near as extravagant as the complex they had recently left. Nor were they in one of the prized corporate residential centres. However, Toreth knew the area from cases he'd investigated. Set on the edge of the corporate heartland of New London, roughly halfway between the university and the Int-Sec complex, the flats had a respectable location.

"What do you think of it?" Warrick asked.

He liked the style of the exterior — clean curves, distinctive and idiosyncratic but not outrageously ostentatious, and he said so.

Warrick nodded. "Art Deco." He smiled suddenly, brilliantly. "I've always wanted to live here, or somewhere like here. But flats rarely come up for sale, because there are so few. They're not to modern tastes."

As they walked, Toreth examined the outer perimeter fence. Decorative metal, high and with regular notices warning of anti-intruder measures, nature unspecified. He liked the look more than the last place. At least the outside world was visible.