CARDENAS THREW UP AN ARM TO SHIELD HIS chest, but his was not the one that blocked the thrust. That limb was larger, thicker, and composed of more than a dozen elements, none of which were flesh. Shards of welded metal gleamed in the ambient light that poured down from stolid street lights and flamboyant signs. Plastic flashed rainbow hues, fragments of salvaged machinery clanked and rattled, reinforced ceramic tinkled, and bits of metallic glass sparkled like clusters of ambulatory diamonds.
What looked like a giant crab fashioned from street scrap and industrial throwaway had clambered out of the nearby storm drain. While one arm blocked the Oozer's potentially lethal blow, a second tossed the heavy plastic drain grate aside. Blinking, Cardenas rolled to his right, onto the sidewalk and away from the street. His startled assailant bent to recover the blade that had been jarred from his fingers. A third metal leg struck him across the back of his head, knocking him senseless to the ground.
Catching sight of the fantastic mechanical apparition that had emerged from beneath the street, the downed Oozer's three murderous companions slowed to a halt. Though the clanking contrivance did not have the slick, professionally finished exterior of a law enforcement device, they were strangers in Namerica and could be sure of nothing. What they did know was that it had intervened to rescue the downed federale. Taking it on in the absence of their own advanced weapons would be tantamount to trying to break into a tank with a can opener.
Leaving their unconscious associate to his fate, they backed off, whirled, and fled, flinging only impenetrable strine obscenities in their wake. Cardenas watched them go. Keeping an eye on the downed compatriot they had abandoned, he climbed slowly to his feet and began brushing himself off. As he did, the mechanism approached, whirring and clicking.
Though three times his size, its six folding legs allowed it to snug into a portal with a diameter even smaller than the storm drain from which it had emerged. LEDs flashed within its motorized depths, eclectic raspings and moans issued forth as cobbled-together parts scraped noisily against one another. Hanging in the center of the snarl of mechanical limbs was a basket of wishwire that wrapped several times around the singular figure ensconced at its core. With his scraggly long hair, deep-sunk red-rimmed eyes, dark stubble, and scarred arms, the half-naked man resembled a drunk who had just been swept up by the late-night patrol. Except he did not act drunk, and clearly he was in control of the embracing machine, not the other way around.
Responding to a twitch of the man's right arm, a powerful limb rose on hissing servos to dexterously flick grime from the Inspector's windbreaker.
"You okay, Officer?" It took Cardenas a moment to make certain the voice had come from the man and not the machine he was riding-or that was riding him. Gazing at the fantastic plethora of parts and pieces, rubble and salvage, it was difficult to tell.
"I'm fine, thanks. And how do you know I'm with the police?"
"My friends and me been listening, I says." One eye suffered from a persistent twitch that was unnerving to look upon. Cardenas was equipped to handle the spectacle better than most. "Decided to jump in when you came free."
"Why not earlier?" Cardenas checked his spinner. It was still operating under the deading influence of the para-site gram that had been installed by the female Inzini. But if she had been telling the truth, the gram would expire in-he checked the chrono on his bracelet-forty minutes or so.
"Wasn't interested, I declares." The wishwire-cloaked recluse was marvelously indifferent to the Inspector's possible reaction. "It was only after you broke free. That I decided to help. Andale, hey, me hablas. Reconned you done did your part. 'Sides, four against one ain't fair odds." Behind and beneath the wire, he grinned, exposing teeth that were yellow, blackened, or absent. "Feral Dick's the name, avoiding taxes me game." The grin, unfortunately, widened. "You can call me Feral, suggests I."
"You said you and your friends had been listening." Cardenas cast a meaningful glance behind the crab mount. "I don't see anyone else."
"Tacka-tack-who said a thing about anyone? What's in a name, but a thing to be named?"
They came swarming out of the open storm drain. Ten, twenty, thirty-a bona fide multitude. Only once before had Cardenas ever seen as many, and the panic they had induced in the surprised soccer players and their fans who had been the recipients of the manifestation had been real enough, if ultimately unjustified.
Wugs.
Offspring of what had ultimately been designated, for lack of a better definition and in the throes of official bewilderment, wireless underground gofer systems, the wugs were tiny, exquisitely engineered, self-reproducing robotic lifeforms whose actions suggested but did not confirm that they were components of a communal mechanized lifeform directed by some kind of rogue artificial intelligence gram. Expecting the first true AI to arise from a confluence of mammoth research projects and profound university conferences, humans had been startled to see AI, when it finally manifested itself, take the form of mechanicals that were fist-sized and smaller. Initial fear and panic at the appearance of the wugs soon gave way to concern, then uncertainty, and finally to annoyance when the thousands of tiny devices exhibited nothing in the way of purpose, much less hostility.
Most of the time the wugs avoided people, hiding themselves in the enormous circulatory system of the Strip: air-conditioning vents, water and sewer pipes, transport tunnels, fiber optic conduits, and induction tubes. Like mechanical cockroaches, they shunned the daylight. Unlike their arthropodic counterparts, they were clean and did not carry disease. Nor did they often enter private residences or disturb human food. They simply reproduced. As the engineers who struggled for several years to devise a means of exterminating them finally conceded, people might as well get used to them. Short of dismantling and shutting down every mechanism and machine in the Strip, the wugs were here to stay.
After a while citizens grew used to, if not entirely familiar with, their presence. As one wag put it early on in the course of the "invasion," irregardless of what anyone wanted, the wugs was. While no wug had ever injured a human being, humans were constantly squashing, smashing, dismembering, and otherwise demolishing the elegant little automatons. Even children soon lost their fear of them. The assaults by humans engendered no retribution, provoked no retaliation. Those paranoicos convinced the wugs were out to take over the world quickly found themselves shorn of their followings, especially when it became clear that the wugs were nothing more than an irritation.
Virtually the only thing about the wugs that continued to bother people was that nobody could manage to figure out where the heck they were coming from.
They certainly appeared to thrive in the congenial presence of Feral Dick, Cardenas observed. He held his ground while a couple dozen of the minuscule machines swarmed up his legs. They poked and prodded him for a few minutes, gently and with what could only be termed respect for his nonmetallic person. Sensors and wires caressed and tickled, taking measurements for what purposes the Inspector could not imagine. Then, as if in response to a signal unseen and unheard, they scampered as one back down to the pavement to disappear into the open storm drain. No two of the diminutive wonders had been alike.
Feral Dick gazed fondly at the cavity in the street. "I likes the wugs, and the wugs likes me."
Cardenas was genuinely intrigued. "Is that why you decided to intervene and save me? Because the wugs wanted to examine me?"
Within the sessile whorl of wishwire, Feral guffawed. "A funny cop, laughs I! I don't know what the wugs want. Nobody does. How many wiggles will a wishing wug want?" He giggled as he recited the common children's rhyme. "But they seem to enjoy veteing around with me, and I kind of like the company. You live beneath the street instead of above it, you take any company you can get, sombers I. At least they don't nag." He spat something off to one side. Cardenas was mildly surprised it didn't clang when it hit the pavement.
"That still doesn't explain why you decided to help me."
The mechanical crab-shape began to scuttle sideways, in the direction of the gaping storm drain. "There's times now and then, observes me, when a feral might have needs of a little federale goodwill. Believes in banking official amity, shrewds I. Besides, I wasn't doing anything else at the time." A metal-plastic-glass claw rose in casual salute. "Fondly remember me to your files, Officer." The wishwire made it difficult to see those sunken, but not haunted, eyes.
Then, as swiftly as they had appeared, mechanical and riding master were gone, disappeared down the aperture. Walking to the edge, Cardenas could hear the tinny clattering of the cobbled-together vehicle's metal feet as the homemade transport ensemble skittered away under the street. Not a true antisoc, was Feral Dick. By choice he stood, or rather scuttled along, outside both belief systems.
The Inspector checked his spinner. It was still comatose, but not dead. A few minutes more or less and he would be back on line opto, with full access to the NFP box. If, he reminded himself, the dead Inzini had not been lying. There was no real reason for her to have done so, since she and her equally demised partner had intended for the spinner's owner to be far deader than his apparatus prior to its return to service.
A glance down the street disclosed only wandering citizens. There was no sign of the routed Ooze from Oz. He knew he ought to use a public comm to report in, to at least relate what had happened to him. But without the spinner he could not impart a true picture of his assailants. And if he waited too long, the woman he sought might go off shift-or worse, be visited by Inzini, Ooze, or some hypothetical other who shared in this sudden and unexpectedly irresistible interest in the whereabouts of Surtsey Mockerkin and her daughter.
Who were the Amerind assassins working for? The Mock, or themselves, or some other as yet unidentified group with an intense interest in Surtsey Mockerkin and her daughter? The same speculation applied to the Ooze. The more antisoc outfits that expressed a lethal interest in the pair, the more anxious Cardenas was to find them-first.
If he had to wait for a chance to talk with Coy Joy, he could do so just as effectively while simultaneously checking out her visitors. Turning, he headed back down the street in the direction of the Cocktale. This time he stayed close to groups of slumming cleanies. He also made a point of taking the measure of his surroundings every few steps, to ensure their reality. He had no intention of wandering mindlessly into another deceptive, misleading miragoo.
The Cocktale was easy to find. Located on the main street, right where Mashupo Mingas had indicated, it was squeezed in between the Featherdome and California Nights. Unlike some of the personnel hard at work within, all three establishments boasted fronts that were models of restraint. Their external lighting was subdued, signage was static rather than animated, and no lascivious adverts came barreling out of Madison ejectors to carny casual passersby. Though it had been a long time since he had worked a pleasure xone, Cardenas knew that not all sextels were alike. Based on what he remembered, these three neighboring businesses occupied a niche designed to appeal to upper-middle-class, or possibly lower-upper-class, clients.
Across the street, the enormous Rara Aves took up the better part of several city blocks. A joint Asakusa-Chubasco N.A. operation, it flaunted its wares as brazenly as it did its staff. Cheaper, less discreet, and downright Vegasian in its appeal, it boasted a steady stream of customers anxious to partake of its offerings, both hard and wet. In addition to satisfying one's lust of the moment, a patron of the Rara Aves could also spend the night alone, gamble, and consume in-house subsidized food and nonsexual entertainment. A one-stop international chain discount entertainment center for the employees of the maquiladoras, it enjoyed a solid reputation and was especially favored by blue-collar workers. There were franchised Rara Aves throughout the Strip, each virtually indistinguishable from the next. The merchandise on the shelves in Agua Pri was the same as that on offer in Elpaso Juarez, or Sanjuana, or Brownsville.
Although the sex trade had been legal in the Strip for more than half a century, there remained those citizens who for a great variety of reasons favored anonymity, not to mention a more personal style of service. This was to be found in confidential enterprises such as the Cocktale and its neighbors, as well as in those exclusive establishments that catered to the very rich. What was advertised on the outside was frequently supplanted by what a prospective consumer was offered within.
Furnished in period antiques from the late twentieth century, the outer waiting room was occupied by perhaps a dozen men and women. Some were waiting to penetrate, as it were, the inner recesses of the institution, while others were relaxing and having a rest subsequent to concluding their activities. One did not have to be an Intuit to tell which were which. Sauntering in, Cardenas drew an occasional fleeting glance from would-be and ex-customers. He was particularly taken with a middle-aged couple who sat on a couch, thoroughly engrossed in a vit program from a hundred years ago. It had no color, and was playing back on a vit the size of a small vehicle.
The unobtrusive lighting was tinted a soft pink, as if some deviant physicist had found a way to rouge photons. Landscapes on the walls showed scenes from Europe and South America. A picture of some French castle appeared lifted from a standard tourist brochure, until one noticed the orgy taking place in the courtyard. A southern Chilean forest scene conjured up memories of a visit to the Rockies, until you looked closer and saw what was taking place among the trees. Not to mention with the trees. Cardenas examined them with interest. They were very cleverly manufactured and, within the bounds of the subject matter they presented, surprisingly tasteful. Staring at them, he was not in the least embarrassed. This was not a place in which anyone should be embarrassed.
Off to his left, a well-stocked shop beckoned, proffering offerings unavailable even through a private box. The desk he approached was no different from what one might find in a well-appointed, mid-price hotel-provided one discounted the subtly writhing figures that comprised the expertly wrought sculpture clinging to the back wall. Attesting to the vitality of the Cocktale's business, there were three clerks: two women and one man, all clad in formal phototropic clothing that peekabooed strategically whenever they moved.
The woman who greeted him was in her late twenties. Though she was attractive, he knew from experience that she had been hired for her ability to process vertically integrated services; otherwise she would not have been stationed up front. Off to one side stood a silent, pale monolith with folded arms. The bouncer was as big as Hyaki. Cardenas suspected he was present more for show than action.
If the management frequently required the services of someone that size, then they had already failed in their responsibility. Obstreperous clients were more easily dealt with by simply flooding a room or hallway with narcoleptic gas.
"Welcome to the Cocktale, sir. How may I help you?" Her welcoming smile was practiced and professional.
He smiled back. In a place like the Cocktale, if you did not smile, no one would take you seriously. "I think I'm in the mood for something a little out of the ordinary."
The girl nodded. Without missing a beat, she leaned forward and whispered (a nice, if wholly unnecessary touch, Cardenas thought). "Someone's told you about us, then. They put you straight. The Cocktale didn't get its reputation by slamming solely straight." Her lips were close, her perfume weeping synthesized pheromones. "Did you have anything specific in mind, sir? Whatever you wish, if we can't provide it on the spot, we'll send out for take-in. You can rely on our guaranteed rapidio delivery of whatever you wish within the hour, drawn from the full resources of the Strip. Just tell me what you want, sir." He tried to, but she was full steam into her spiel, so he decided just to let her run down.
"You want it, you need it? The Cocktale has it, or can get it. Are you interested in sex with tactiles? We offer the latest military technology adapted to our exclusive specifications. You can stipulate tints, ambiance, fragrances, and sound, from music to purring. Or if you prefer something a little louder, rest assured all our apartmentos are rigorously soundproofed. If you'd prefer to solo in comfort, we have instant unrestricted world box access. Just online are some new designs from Chengdu based on ancient Han scriptures. Originally fantasy, of course, but with our omniphonic projectors all things are possible."
She continued to smile at him, waiting for a response, trying to ' size him up. Cardenas offered no assistance, waiting for her to run out of suggestions. She seemed nice enough, for a procurer, and if he interrupted her well-rehearsed sales pitch it might cost her merit with her employers. The deliberately cozy feel of the salon notwithstanding, he did not doubt for a minute that the entire conversation was being remotely monitored.
"We also offer a full range of standard morphs," the girl continued, undaunted by his continued silence. "Male, female, animal. We have two registered eeLancers on staff ready to build a custom morph dedicated to serving your personal needs." Her whispery come-on sank even lower. "For a price, I might be willing to provide the template for mastering a child morph. Semi-licit, guaranteed not actionable, bond posted by our own legal department."
The Inspector's distaste must have shown in his face, because she backtracked hurriedly. "Or are you a traditionalist? If that's the case, in spite of what you've told me, maybe you would find one of our sister establishments more to your taste." Straightening and glancing down, she drew forth a floating list that was outlined in glowing pink and red sparkles. A nice decorative touch, Cardenas decided.
On a whim, he inquired candidly, "How about you?"
List forgotten, she looked up uncertainly. "I'm afraid I am strictly front-office, sir." Clearly, she hoped he would not press the issue, lest her supervisor order her to comply with a client's wishes. "I'm flattered, but I should warn you that I'm more than half bionic."
Cardenas parroted the expression he had seen all too many times on the faces of sex offenders who had been brought into the station for booking. "Which half?"
While not personally reassuring, his response convinced her that the sturdy visitor with the profound mustache had come to the right place after all. "If you find my physical type appealing, sir, perhaps you might allow me to suggest-?"
Having established his pervert's credentials, he saw no reason to prolong the discussion. "I know what I want. I also know who I want. I just wanted to watch you yakk for a while. I want two hours with Coy Joy."
He had a bad moment when she failed to reply. Had Mashupo Mingas fed him faulty information from the beginning? If so, Cardenas was in for some wearisome backtracking.
He was worrying needlessly. The delay was only due to the need for the girl to check on the current status of his query.
"You're in luck, sir. Ms. Joy is even as we speak returning from break. She will be available to you in"-she checked a concealed readout-"five minutes. Two hours, you say?"
Cardenas mimed what he hoped was a wicked smile. "I like to take my time."
The woman shrugged. "We are each of us different."
They negotiated a price, which Cardenas paid with the special card the Department issued to Inspectors to pay for extraneous investigative expenses. He wished he could be present to see the face of the Department auditor who would eventually process the expenditure. Several minutes later, he was escorted by a very tall, very beautiful, and very well-armed woman down a corridor and into an empty apartmento. Since he had not specified a setting, he was supplied with what was clean and available.
The spacious chamber had a double cotton hammock, soft undulating sand for a floor, live dwarf palms and other succulents, a tri-walled holovista of a Pacific beach and sky, and automatonic fauna: crabs, gulls, a phlegmatic pelican, a couple of small lizards. The artificial "sun" overhead was less hot than its projected intensity suggested, and the imported salt water that lapped the sand pleasantly tepid. Killing time, he checked the contents of a nearby cooler. It was well-stocked with icy refreshments, toys, and an assortment of both pull-on and spray-on prophylactics, all no doubt hideously overpriced. As he absently took inventory, like any good customer, the pelican favored him with a lascivious, conspiratorial wink.
Apparently no one worried about the incongruity of a bathroom opening directly onto a beach, because that was where Coy Joy emerged from, in the midst of primping her pale, straw-yellow hair.
She wore nothing beneath a clinging blue-and-gold ersatz chiffon dress. She was slimmer than he expected, slightly taller than he, and not as tired-looking as many sylphs he had encountered. Though utterly devoid of any suggestion of naivete, her face was surprisingly unspoiled. The air of innocence, whether sincere or sham, was doubtless appreciated by many customers. He wondered how many she had facilitated prior to his arrival.
"I'm Coy," she began without preamble. "Do you want me to start? Since you asked for me, you know what I do."
Though his investigation did not demand that he know what she did, he was more than a little curious. Besides, it might acquaint him with something useful, however seemingly insignificant, about Wayne Brummel-Anderson.
"Sure." Taking a seat on the sand, which was pleasantly warm and electrostatically treated so it would cling neither to flesh nor fabric, he helped himself to a cold cerveza from the cooler and, to sustain the charade, loosened his shirt. "Let's get started."
Smiling sexily, she raised both hands high over her head. As well as pulling taut her upper torso, the gesture activated a small embedded gram that caused her clothes to disintegrate. The aerogel textile tinkled musically as it transformated into pixie dust and drifted to the sand. Music, low, languorous, and unashamedly erotic, began to emanate from hidden speakers. His eyes widened slightly, not as a consequence of viewing the dancing or hearing the music, but due to what was happening to Coy Joy's body. He now knew what her "specialty" was.
She was a color shifter.
Noting the change in his expression, she pursed her lips with satisfaction. "Like it?" she inquired softly. "Like me? You must, or you wouldn't have asked for me." Glissading to the slow, unsubtle throbbing from the unseen speakers, she ran one hand up her other arm, then alternated the self-caress. "Cost me a bundle, it did, but good gengineering is expensive. And every girl needs a specialty. This one was a lot of work, but in the end it's safer than some. And there's an added benefit. I like myself this way."
Entranced in spite of himself, Cardenas followed the performance with something more than just professional detachment. Color shiftering was only one of a thousand come-ons available in the sextels of the Strip. Though milder than many, as she had pointed out, it required a permanent commitment on the part of the catalyzer. He found himself wondering what had prodded her to undergo the extensive and complicated, though not particularly dangerous, course of treatment.
Coy Joy was the recipient of gengineered chromatophores. Derived from the epidermis of members of the order Cephalopodia, they had been implanted in her skin to give her the ability not only to change color, but to create a plethora of exotic patterns simply by visualizing them. As she pranced and pirouetted before him in time to the slowly swelling, throbbing music, her slender naked form changed from pale beige to dark brown, then to black, and back to beige again. All familiar human skin tones. But royal blue was not, nor burnt umber, nor teal or chartreuse or a flickering maroon. It was a performance any of her genetic antecedents, be they octopus or squid, cuttlefish or chambered nautilus, would have admired.
Fascinated, he watched as she began to move faster. Responding to a corollaried gram, the lights in the room dimmed. As she slipped deeper and deeper into the performance, her emotions were reflected in her appearance. Rapid color changes were enhanced by the patterns that flowed like light across her skin, except that they came from within her own body. Scale patterns replaced smooth flesh, to be banished in turn first by images of flower petals and then black leather. Red stripes appeared, giving the appearance of light whip strokes, to be replaced by three circles of light that burst outward from her main erogenous zones like spreading ripples in a pond. Her nipples flared pink, then burgundy, and finally a deep, pulsing scarlet. Faster and faster the emerging circles blinked, not lights but actual color changes, enticing him and drawing him toward her as she extended her hands in his direction. Her parted lips pulsed with a soft inner, unnatural pink no lipstick could realize.
She was changing color so fast and so frequently now that her flesh had become one continuous erotic blur-teasing, tempting, a veritable living maelstrom of panchromatic curves and searing light. And all of it was very close now, inclining toward him, half blinding his dazed vision. As he felt the heat of her body, so close to his own, he found himself concentrating on her eyes-virtually the only visible part of her that did not change color. Arching forward, she leaned her face toward his. The waves of crimson that swept outward from the center of her deepened to purple as they neared her extremities. All her extremities. Mesmerized by the sight, he swallowed hard as she reached for…
Taking a deliberate, deep breath, he drew himself reluctantly back from the abyss into which, on another day, on another occasion, he might gratefully have allowed himself to be drawn. Raising his left arm, he activated and flashed his ident bracelet. Her expression fell alarmingly. As if an internal switch had been thrown, the erotic panoply of pattern and color vanished from her exposed flesh. Once again she stood before him slim, naked, and brutally unadorned.
"This is a legal sextel, and I'm fully licensed," she snarled angrily. "What do you want? My health certificate was revalidated only last month, and I'm up on all my taxes. Has someone complained? If someone's complained, you've got the wrong-"
"Take it easy. I need some information. Nothing compromising, I promise you. And I've paid for two hours, so your commission is secure no matter what you do-or don't do. Look on it as time off."
"Fuck you. Or I guess not. I'm not telling you a thing, fedoco."
Cardenas sighed and took another drag of his self-chilling beer. It was starting to fill him up. Sometimes, being nice, being polite, could be counterproductive. That would do neither him nor the sylph any good.
"We can do this here or at the station. You know it'll go better for you here. If you end up coming with me-or I guess not-your employers won't be happy no matter what story you feed them."
She slumped, her breasts bouncing, and took a seat on the sand in front of him. She made a point of staying out of arm's reach. "Two hours. I hope to hell you haven't got two whole hours' worth of stupid questions."
"So do I." He shifted his own position on the sand and, after a moment's thought, helped himself to another cerveza from the cooler. The automatonic pelican was studiously ignoring him. "I'm interested in anything you can tell me about one of your regulars. Might have called himself George Anderson, but more likely went by the name of Wayne Brummel."
Her head jerked up and around. "If you know he's one of my regulars, then you probably know more about him than I do. I don't have anything to say. You want to skip me to the station, I'll dig out some stable clothes and we'll go, and to hell with Administration. If you want to know about Wayne, why come to me? Why not habla him yourself?"
As ever, Cardenas's tone remained unchanged. "Because a few days ago, somebody had him extirpated."
As her eyes widened and her lower jaw took a notable drop, her entire nude body straight away turned a blindingly pure ivory-white. Here, Cardenas realized as he looked away, was a witness he would not have to intuit. She could no more conceal her emotions from him than she could fly to the moon.
Although, he saw compassionately, she could no doubt imitate the flight.