The Caryatids (13 page)

"Call me 'George,' " he corrected. "My life is good. I have another baby on the way. That would be number three."

"Oh my."

Djordje helped himself to a fizzing glass of prosecco. "That's not what you say to wonderful news like mine, Vera. You say:
'Mnogo muske dece!'
'Hope it's a son!' " Vera had not seen Djordje face-to-face in ten years. He'd been a scrawny seventeen-year-old kid on the night he'd sabotaged the sensor-web, jumped the bunker wall, and fled their compound forever. The agony of having their little brother rebel, defect, and vanish was the first irrefutable sign that all was not well in caryatid fairyland.

The seven world-princesses, Vera, Biserka, Sonja, Bratislava, Svetlana, Kosara, and Radmila: they all had joined hands, eyes, and minds in their mystic circle, and sworn to eradicate every memory of their traitor-to--futurity. Yet he had left their ranks incomplete, and the tremendous en-ergies that unified them were turning to chaos.

Toward chaos, hatred, and an explosion of violence, and yet here was Djordje, their traitor, not vanished, not eradicated, as he so deserved to be: no, he was prosperous, pleased with himself, and as big as life. Bigger. Because Djordje was all grown-up. Grown-up, Djordje was very big. He was half a head taller than she was. His face was her face, but big and broad and male. Djordje had a bull's forehead, a bristling blond mustache, and a forest of blond bristles on his chin and cheeks and neck. His chest was flat and his gut was like a barrel and his big male legs were like tree trunks. She was horribly afraid of him. He was here and smiling at her, yet he should not be. His existence was wrong.

"Your brother has lent us this boat," said Herbert. "So that we could be alone—just for once! Out of surveillance. So I could ask you to marry me."

"It was my honor to lend you my old boat," said Djordje nobly. "And I approve of your aims."

"Nine years under a sensorweb," mourned Herbert. "Nine years in at-tention camps where the system watches your eyeballs! My God, it was Acquis-officer this, boss-and-subordinate that; no wonder we both were so stifled! You know what the next step is—after we marry? We need to work together to widen the emotional register of the neural society! No more of that hothouse atmosphere: half barracks, half brothel . . . something grand, something decent!"

"How?" said Vera.

"In Antarctica! It's a huge frontier."

"There's grass in Antarctica," said Djordje. "There's grain growing there. They're brewing beer off the melting glaciers. Truly!"

Herbert burst into deep, rumbling laughter. "I love this guy. He is such a funny guy." Vera sipped her bubbling wine.

"You'll do all right, Vera," said Djordje. "You never had a father fig-ure. Life with an older man suits you."

"Oh my God," said Herbert, "please don't tell her that!"

"Herbert, you are a genius," Djordje told him. "Every one of those girls has got a genius on the hook, someplace! The caryatids pick men up like carpet tacks. They are like a magnetic field." Djordje emptied his glass. "Do you know what makes me so happy, tonight? I have both of you here, on my old boat. At last, I am saving you. It's like I dug you two out of a coffin. No skull helmets on you, no skeleton bones on you! We're all free! I took you offshore! We are far outside the limits of the Mljet everyware!"

Djordje wildly waved his arms at the cloud-streaked twilight. "So: Go ahead! Access your mediation!

Boot an augment! There's nothing out here! We're free and out at sea! I haven't been this happy since I stole this boat ten years ago."

"Can I have more of that wine?" said Vera. The two men clashed as they grabbed for the bottle. Herbert hastily topped up her glass.

"My children love this boat," said Djordje.

"I would imagine," said Herbert.

"They love life aboard here, nothing but wind and sea," said Djordje. "Because kids are kids! Kids are the ultimate check on reality! You can't have a posthuman, brain-mapped toddler."

"There's a lot to what this man says," Herbert offered. He found a wheel of soft cheese inside the picnic basket. "When I was a kid, my granddad had a sheep station. We didn't even have television out there. Life was life."

The sun was fading over distant Italy, and the evening breeze grew sharper. The little yacht held its course across the Adriatic, leaning, jumping the chop.

"I stole this boat because it is a simple boat," said Djordje. "I could have stolen a fancy boat. The harbor was so full of them. The boats of rich idiots. All hooked up to their maps and global satellites." He laughed. "I cut that chip out of my arm—they never found me. This boat was just wood and water. Nothing else! The web ran out of ways to spy."

Vera found her voice. It was raw, but it was her own. "Do you spy on me with your web, Djordje?"

"A little, Vera. I have to look after you a little. You're a danger to yourself and others."

"How is your wife, Djordje?"

"Call me George," he said. "My dear wife, Inke, is just fine."

"Inke doesn't get a little bored with you? With her church, and her kids, and her kitchen?"

"That's right, Your Highness," said Djordje, with a level stare. "My Inke is a boring woman. She is nothing like you. My Inke believes in God, she's a mother, she's a housewife. She's a real human being, and she's worth about a thousand of you."

Vera shrank back in her deck chair, hissing through her teeth.

"Don't hurt Vera's feelings," said Herbert.

Djordje shrugged. "As long as we have the facts confirmed."

"The fact is that Vera is a very fine Acquis officer."

Djordje wasn't having any of this. "Look, we're all family now, so spare me your politics. Me, the wife, the kids: We are not political peo-ple. We're the real people in the real world. Okay? You fanatics and po-liticals and geeks and crusading communists . . . You say you want to save the world? Well, we are the world you're trying to save. We're the
normal
people."

Herbert emptied his glass. "I can sympathize."

"I am normal, I live decently. I have shareholders and eighteen hun-dred employees in Vienna. I'm into import-export and arbitrage, logis-tics, shipping-and-packaging. Industrial everyware: That's me, George Zweig."

"I do understand that, George. Please calm down."

A ghastly moment passed. Djordje was not getting calmer. "I'm okay, Herbert. I'm fine with life, I'm fine with all of it. It's a family thing, you understand? It's not too easy for me to be with your little bride here. I'm the rational one among our group. Really."

"This world is so full of trouble," said Herbert.

"Just keep Vera out of jails and camps," said Djordje. "Vera is the sweet one. Sonja is a soldier. Sonja is killing people. They should arrest Sonja. They should arrest Biserka. They should try to arrest my mother."

"I hate you," said Vera. She spat over the side of the boat.

"Shut up," Djordje explained.

"I want you to die, Djordje. To hell with you and your precious chil-dren and your stinking little wife.If I had my boneware on, I'd break you into bloody pieces."

"Well, you can't break me, you little whore! You never could, you never can, and you never will." She lashed out. "I'm not going to marry him!"

Djordje was stunned. "You love him. You
said
you would marry him."

"I never said yes to him. You didn't hear me say yes."

Djordje looked at Herbert. He offered a sickening smile. "Women."

"I'm not marrying anybody. Never."

"You're a virgin," said Djordje, like a curse. "You're not human. You're a robot. You're a walking corpse."

"Look, don't do this to each other," Herbert told them. "This is really bad."

"No, this is good," said Djordje. "I want to hear this little bitch spit out what she wants! You want to sell this guy out? You want to go for the big money! At the end of the day, our home belongs to
you,
doesn't it? It's all about you, Vera, you, you,
you!
"

Vera jumped to her feet. "I'm going to kill you now."

Djordje was out of his chair in an instant. With a roundhouse swing. of his right hand, he knocked her to the deck. With a roar, Herbert rose. He threw his brawny arms around Djordje. His bear hug lifted Djordje from his feet.

"You little slut!" Djordje howled, kicking his legs in a frenzy. "I owe you a lot more than that!" Vera watched the two men struggle. She touched her flaming, bat-tered cheek, and lifted her gaze. Overhead, uncaring stars dotted the troubled skies.

She took one deep sobbing breath, and flung herself into the sea.

Part TWO

LOS ANGELES

RADMILA CLIMBED DOWN THE THROATof the rehearsal pit. Her skirt floated around her kneecaps, a jeweled mass of air-tecture, bro-cade, and electric chiffon.

Glyn spoke up in her earpiece. "Mila, get back up here."

"I need one last run-through for my chair stunt. Just to test this cos-tume."

"You are perfect," Glyn pronounced. "You were perfect when you left makeup."

"This is for Toddy. Tonight I've got to be
superperfect.
"

"Roger that," said Glyn, a little sourly.

Radmila found her footing in the blackness. Sensing her presence, the rehearsal space woke around her. Wireframe exploded from the darkness. Prop sticks tumbled loose from their racks and flew like flung batons. The sticks clanged together, joining end-to-end.

The pit suddenly held the skeletal frame of a theater set: couches, a chair.

"Okay," Glyn told her, "you are a go."

Radmila dug her reactive slippers into the memory foam. "This pit is good. This place is so state-of-the-art. This is, totally, the hottest re-hearsal pit that the Family-Firm has ever built."

"Just watch your hat," said Glyn patiently.

Golden footmarks glowed on the floor. Radmila braced herself for performance.

"Whoa," said Glyn, "I've got a bad stress readout from your left ankle."

"My ankle is fine now!"

"The everyware knows you better than you do," said Glyn.

Radmila rucked up the hem of her costume. The stage gear protested scrunchily. Kinetic textiles never liked departing from their script.

Radmila flexed her left knee and extended her foot. "Okay, so let me see it. Show me now." Narrowly focused beams sprang from the walls and ceiling. They bril-liantly painted her leg with projected data. Her bones and ligaments ap-peared, neatly coded and labeled: "Navicular." "Cuboid."

"Anterior Talofibular." The working pieces of the human ankle. What ugly names they had. Radmila bent at the waist, gripped her extended toes, and rotated the joint. The simulated meat and bones writhed in a lively fashion, very glossy and painterly. Yes, she felt one leftover pang deep in there. One ugly, ankle-sprain pang. "Damn."

"You've overdone it. Let's cancel your stunt tonight."

"I can't cancel my chair stunt!"

"You're booked for that big hotel opening Monday. They want your full set: your precision jumps, your vaults, all your backup dancers . . . If you wreck your ankle here tonight, your investors will kill me." Radrnila's temper, always sharp before she went on stage, sharpened further. "Am I supposed to publicly appear tonight in the Los Angeles County Furniture Showroom, and
deny the public
my signature stunting-with-furniture?"

"Oh, is the diva losing her composure?" mocked Glyn.

"We can tape my ankle. That won't take a minute."

"Look: Tonight should be simple. You catwalk over to Toddy. You sit on Toddy's fancy couch. Toddy lectures her public all about historical furniture, and you just listen nicely and be all ingenue about it."

"I hear your concept," said Radmila. "Your concept stinks."

"We're in a furniture museum! Toddy's fans are a million years old! They won't care if you don't fly around the room like a fairy princess!"

Radmila seethed silently. What a pain Glyn was. No one could pull the rug out from under you like a member of your own family. Glyn un-derstood Montgomery-Montalban family values, nobody knew them better-but Glyn had never taken those values to heart. Because Glyn was a stage technician, not a star. Glyn had no magic.

"Toddy specifically asked me to stunt tonight. At dinner, Toddy asked me in front of everybody. I know that you heard Toddy ask me to stunt."

"If you're finally asking me about that idea, well, I think your cheap stunt upstages Toddy at her retirement show."

"That's
why Toddy wantsme to stunt,"
said Radmila. "She's
handing it over
to me in public tonight, don't you get that? Toddy is the old school. Toddy's retiring! Her public's very sentimental, they love an emo pitch like that!"

"The investors don't love emo pitches," Glyn said crisply.

"Think in the long term," said Radmila, and this was a very Family-Firm thing to say. So Glyn finally had to shut up.

Radmila struggled to compose herself. The last-minute backstage squabble had blown open the gates of her stage fright. Radmila's fears al-ways attacked her before she went on. Always. She never breathed a word about her fears to anyone, which meant that she felt them more keenly. What 'did she have to be so scared about, before a performance? Nothing—but everything. Her stage fright rose within her like a hurri-cane seeking a center. Her fear and trauma had to fixate on something. Suddenly, it centered on Toddy.

Yes. She was so afraid of losing Toddy. Toddy was her diva, her coach, her mentor. Without Toddy, she was ugly and useless. She had no tal-ent. She had no looks. She was just a lost girl who happened to have a strong rapport with ubiquitous systems.

Tonight the angry public would surely find her out. She was nobody's star at all, she was a fraud, a fake. Harsh, cold, staring eyes would drain all the blood from her body. The whole world would collapse. The shame would kill her.

Radmila stamped both her feet at the speed of her thudding heart.

"Okay, launch me!"

"Roger that!"

Radmila sashayed through her glowing footsteps, head high, shoul-ders back. Perfect. She leaped two meters and landed like a bird on the back of the skeletal chair. Ten out of ten. The simulated chair arced back on its two rear legs, FXing with su-pernatural ease. Radmila wheeled in place atop the chair. Light. Bril-liant. Her slippers flexed, the chair teetered, the wire flexed. The FX