Windswept (5 page)

“No, wait,” said Bloombeck. “I always get that wrong. Isn’t a K supposed to be a million?”

I looked at him. “Bloomie,” I said, “did WalWa pay off your neighbor with five
million
yuan?”

He nodded, giving me a blue-gummed smile.

“Even the biggest cane plantations aren’t worth a quarter mil,” I said. “Five million for a lousy quarter hectare?”

“Ain’t it all crazy?” said Bloombeck.

“Insane,” I said.

“Brittona, she takes the money, of course,” said Bloombeck, “and that’s what got me thinking: we ought to get in on the same deal.”

“And what deal is that?” I said.

“Getting bought out!” said Bloombeck, his piggy eyes wide. “That’s why I want to give you this information about the Breaches: it’s collateral.”

“Bloomie, where do you keep getting all these big words?” I said. “You’re starting to scare me.”

“Like I said, I know how to work an angle,” said Bloombeck. “If I tell you about the Breaches, then you owe me. And then
you
can pay me back by helping me buy a little cane farm that’ll get stuff dropped on it so
I
can file a complaint and get bought out. Hell, we can even get some of that Union infrastructure money to make improvements, and that’ll mean we can get even
more
cash out of WalWa.”

I looked at the rum behind the bar. It was past six o’clock, but getting drunk was beginning to look like a good idea. “I’m still not clear where I come in.”

“I got an eye on one of these parcels off Saticoy.”

“What parcels?”

“The ones that are next to the Old Windswept Distillery.”

“And what do you propose I do about that?” I said.

Bloombeck shrugged. “Well, I hear you’re trying to buy the place...”

“‘Trying’ is not the same thing as ‘owning,’” I said. “And I’m sure as hell not going to jinx the deal by bringing you into the mix.”

“I ain’t gonna ask for much,” he said. “Like, half a hectare.”

“That’s more than I’d be willing to part with,
if
it were my call,” I said. “Which it’s not.”

“But it
will
be!” said Bloombeck. “And once WalWa dumps stuff on it, I’ll give you a cut of the settlement!”

“Even if this information were accurate,” I said, “which I very much doubt, considering how much weed Jimney Potts smokes, it’s not worth making a deal with you.”

“It could be.”

“Saticoy is upwind from Thronehill,” I said. “Did you think about that?”

He shrugged. “The wind could always change.”

“Oh, God,” I muttered, then nodded. “Fine. I’ll do what I can, if I can.”

Bloombeck straightened up, a neat trick for a pile of crap like him. “Plus three hundred thousand yuan.”

One of the things I learned in business school was how to deal with a ludicrous offer: you nodded like you were considering it, then you came back with an equally ludicrous counteroffer. I gave Bloomie the nod, then said, “Make it one fifty.”

“Hey, I’ll go for tha–”

“One
hundred
fifty,” I said. “Then a decimal point, then two zeroes.”

A weak cry fluttered from Bloombeck’s belly. “Who do you think I am, Padma? You think I’ll stand for that kind of insult?”

“Yep,” I said, rising from my chair.

“OK, OK, OK!” he said, reaching toward me. “I’ll take it!”

I smacked his hand away. “What do I get in return?”

“What do you mean?”

“You think I’m going to haul my ass all the way to Thronehill and track down Jimney just on your say-so? You’re gonna have to do better than that.”

Bloombeck nodded, then flashed his ruined teeth. “Only if you make the deal. One of us’s gotta blink it in.”

I sighed. One hundred fifty yuan wasn’t pocket change for me, but I could spend it without feeling too guilty. “Fine,” I said, blinking up with the forms and filling in my data. I shot it over to Bloombeck, who took his sweet time filling in his part. He blinked the finished contract to me, and then I double-checked the thing, its ISO-20K-compliant font hovering in air: I would give him one hundred fifty yuan and help him secure a plot of land near Saticoy, and he would give me the name of the ship.

“Of course, I still have no way of trusting this information,” I said. “I’m surprised Jimney even remembered who you were.”

“I got the proof,” said Bloombeck, “but it goes into escrow.”

“How you learned that word, I’ll never understand,” I said. “OK.”

I blinked on my pai’s video capture, sending the feed straight to the Public. “I’m looking at Vytai Bloombeck, Partridge Hutong, Brushhead, Santee City,” I said. “He and I have just struck a contract, transaction number whatever–”

“Hey, do it right,” said Bloombeck.

I blinked up the contract number and read it aloud. “I’m putting one hundred fifty yuan in escrow for the information he’s selling me, and I’ll release the funds upon delivery blah blah blah boilerplate boilerplate blah blah blah.”

“And I’m looking at Padma Mehta, 42 Samarkand Road, Brushhead, Santee City,” he said, “and I approve this contract.”

“God help me, so do I.”

We closed our feeds, and the escrow officer on duty checked out the deal. The approval blipped through, and Bloombeck stared at me. “Well?” I said.

“Well, what?”

He shifted in his chair. “Aren’t you going to offer me a drink? You’re always supposed to share a shot once you’ve closed a deal.”

I raised a fist. “Only shot I’ll give you is one to the nose.”

“I’m just saying, it’s tradition.”

“Yeah, but not a good one,” I said.

“All the same,” said Bloombeck, looking toward the bar and raising a finger.

“Jesus,” I sighed. “Fine.” I turned around and did the same. The bartender started to pour two shots from the bottle in front of him, then caught my glare and reached under the bar. The light glinted off the foil Co-Op seal on the new bottle’s cap, and I nodded. I knew I couldn’t afford to be choosy in a place like this, but I’d be damned if I was going to drink export rotgut.

The bartender brought the bottle and two glasses to our table, then left when I handed him a tenner and a few fifty-jiao pieces. “Make with the proof, and it had better be solid.”

“The drink first?”

I grabbed the bottle, a seven-fifty of Nelson’s Column, a silver. Deirdre Fantone, the distiller, used coral steel tanks for aging, so the rum had a sharp flavor, like getting punched in the face with a grapefruit. I imagined the cap was Bloombeck’s neck as I twisted it and cracked the seal. My warm, fuzzy feeling vanished as the room filled with the smell of mustard gas and raw sewage. The unconscious drunks around us all bolted upright, and I grabbed Bloombeck by the scruff of his neck and hauled him out as the bartender yelled to clear the room.

Outside, the air wasn’t much better, but at least it didn’t make my eyes burn. I still had the bottle in my hand; most of the rotgut had swished out as I’d ran. I held the bottle up to the light and saw black flakes and oil slicks swirling inside. I blinked a picture and sent it to Tonggow along with a note (
Co-Op product going bad?
) before tossing the bottle into a nearby storage crate that was acting as a public trash can.

“Ugh, what was that?” choked Bloombeck.

“Nothing that’s relevant,” I said. “Ship name. Now.”

“OK,” he said, then looked away.

I leaned forward. “You
do
have proof, right? ’Cause if you don’t, you know the law says I can have that contract voided
and
be allowed to kick your ass all over the island.”

“It’s with Jimney,” he said, beads of sweat forming along his hairline. “He insisted.”

“Jimney Potts doesn’t know
how
to insist,” I said.

“Still, it’s with him. In Thronehill.” He gave me a sheepish grin. “Guess we’re going on a field trip, huh?”

“No, I am,” I said, getting up. “You wait here. I’m going to show Jimney a new meaning of the word ‘insist.’”

“I really think I should go with,” said Bloombeck, eyeing the exit of the alley. “Me and Jimney, we’re pals. I worry.”

“That’s what I like about you, Bloomie,” I said, following him toward Kadalie. “You care.”

Jilly huddled up in the front seat of the tuk-tuk. She took one look at Bloombeck and said, “
That
isn’t riding in my rig.”

“Watch your mouth, scab,” said Bloombeck.

“Is that any way to talk to a future member of our Union?” I said, climbing in next to Jilly.

Bloombeck looked at Jilly and sneered. “Some muck-scratcher from the kampong’s gonna come into
our
Union?”

“Bloomie, if we can let you in, we can sure as hell let her in.” I patted Jilly on the shoulder. “Fastest way to WalWa HQ, kid. And just ignore him. I usually do.”

“Why aren’t you now?”

“Business trumps hygiene. Drive.”

Jilly shook her head, but pulled a U-ie onto Kadalie and headed toward the setting sun. We bumped over the Sway Street Bridge, across the green waters of the Ivory Canal, and sped up the road to Thronehill.

If Brushhead’s crammed architecture and riot of smells were one end of the Santee Anchorage experience spectrum, then Thronehill was the polar opposite. Every corner was planned down to the millimeter, its buildings were all square, squat and made of the same gray pourform. It was built entirely by WalWa people, and it felt it. The air was cold and clammy and made me want huddle inside my deck jacket, even though it was summertime. Whether it was a trick of microclimate or some urban heat sink effect, I was never sure. I hated coming here. The Fear loved it.

After a brief drive through the edges of the kampong, we came to the district gate. A lone WalWa security goon stood in front of his, mirrored helmet shield flipped up, riot hose trained on us. “This district is closed to nonessential personnel,” he said. (At least, I think it was a he. I knew there were women who became goons, but the armor and steroids made it tough to tell them apart.)

I put my Union card in his face. “I’m as essential as they get, stud. Shift it.”

The goon took a step back, blinking like crazy as he tried to make sense of my card and the messages it triggered in his pai. I waved it around, his beady eyes following. “Still need to see a work order,” he said.

“OK,” I said, tucking the card back into my pocket. “Say... what kind of armor you wearing?”

“What?”

“Armor, stud, what kind?”

The goon snorted. “Mark Six.”

I nodded, then put my hands on his waistband. “Good to know,” I said. “The emergency release is still exposed on the Mark Sixes.” I grabbed two red tabs on his armor and yanked as hard as I could. There was a hiss, and the caneplas plates clattered to the ground, leaving him naked to the breeze.

I jumped in the tuk-tuk. “Make sure to ask for an upgrade. Might save your life.” I patted Jilly’s shoulder, and we scooted into the frigid streets of Thronehill. I didn’t have to tell her where the main office was; it was a good ten stories taller than every other gray box of a building, and the street signs all pointed the way in giant orange letters. Even with the reduced trans-stellar traffic, there were hundreds of other WalWa departments in this district, all the good little Indentures beavering away to fulfill policies that had probably changed when they were still in transit. Fewer and fewer of them got promotions that allowed them to flee up the cable, so it was just a matter of time before they all Breached or sealed themselves inside the giant Colonial Directorate building so they could hide from the big bad world they pretended to manage.

“I already regret listening to you, Bloomie,” I said, shivering under the buildings’ shadows, “and we’ve only just gotten here.”

“It’ll be worth it,” said Bloombeck. “Pull up to the main office ahead, kid.”

“I know where it is,” said Jilly, the fear in her voice replaced by annoyance. She would go far.

“You stay here,” I said to Bloombeck as we squeaked to a stop.

“But–”

“Bloomie, you really think they’re going to let your spivey ass in there? This is official Union business, and you are not a Union official.”

“But how’re you going to find Jimney?”

“I’ll follow the smell.”

The main office loomed overhead, like someone had dropped a block of granite from orbit. It was one of the first structures to be built after the lifter, and it was a prime example of Big Three architecture: take the worst of native materials and turn it into the least functional of buildings. The only things that worked were the elevators and the atmosphere purifiers. The black caneplas doors squeaked open, and a blast of triple-scrubbed air from inside made my nose twitch. A pair of goons, their riot hoses at the ready, stood on either side of a battle-axe of a receptionist.

“Hi,” I said, flashing my card. “Here on business.”

The receptionist held a scanner to the barcode, and her desk chimed. “Mehta, Padma,” said the desk with a pleasant female voice. “Santee Anchorage Freelancer’s Union. Level Three access.”

Every piece of Big Three hardware that talked used what we called the Univoice. It bubbled out of all sorts of salvaged, obsolete, or stolen gear. It was one of the few Big Three bits of tech that didn’t annoy me, though that didn’t stop me from figuring out ways to make the Univoice cuss.

“You get all that?” I said, giving the receptionist a broad smile.

“I know who
you
are,” said the battle-axe. “I knew before you brought your... air in with you.”

“Then you know to call off the steroid munchers,” I said. The goons tightened their grips, and I blew one a kiss. “Jimney Potts. Owes me dues. I’ll find my own way.”

The receptionist twitched, making the WalWa logo inked on her cheek crinkle. “Follow the lighted path,” she said. “Or we cannot be held responsible for what happens.”

“I appreciate the thought,” I said, scratching my cheek with my middle finger, right on my Union fist. The receptionist sneered and stabbed a button on her desk; a line of golden tiles lit up, snaking past the desk and into the bowels of the main office. I waved at the goons as I followed the Yellow Brick Road.

The interior halls were painted stomach-churning shades of brown and red, like someone had thrown a dozen hedgehogs in a blender and smeared the results on the walls. Some genius in WalWa’s Work Environment Conditioning division had probably done a study to figure out what colors made people feel small and insignificant and had come up with this result. I whistled the WalWa corporate anthem, making sure to hit the high notes with extra gusto every time I passed some doomed office drone, his eyes staring dead ahead into oblivion. The lit tiles ended outside a janitor’s closet; the scents of chiba and body odor leaked out from underneath. I didn’t bother to knock.