“I just don’t think Lynch is the best solution for this community,” the bald girl said. “You know they’re just gonna flip it. Just take this whole town apart and sell it for scrap. That’s what they’ve been doing with every other rig-burg they buy.”
“They might.” Hwa leaned over the rail. The early September sun was already hot at this early hour. She yearned for winter, when no one would look twice at her long sleeves.
“Doesn’t that, like, concern you?”
“They wouldn’t have bought this place if they didn’t think of it as an asset.” Hwa watched the maglev slide into place above them. It, too, came from somebody else’s future: a smooth fibreglass one where every machine looked a bit like a dolphin. “I’ll worry about it more when they make some kind of announcement.”
“But we have a chance to influence them right now!” the girl said. She blinked furiously in Hwa’s direction. Then she did it again. Four times, with an earnest stare at the end.
“She doesn’t have any eyes,” one of the girl’s friends said. He winced just looking at Hwa. “You have to show her something … real.”
“What? Really? No way.” The girl closed her eyes tightly, waited a beat, and then opened them again. When she did, her mouth fell open. Her hand raised to cover it. She had seen Hwa’s true face, without any Mind Your Manners filters. Now she couldn’t help but stare. “Oh,” she said, finally.
She knew Hwa was poor, now. She knew that whatever test might have warned Sunny about the baby she was carrying had been either ignored or unfinished. She knew that Sunny hadn’t thrown her embryo in the CRISPR drawer and looked at what came out. What she didn’t know was that the only reason she could see Hwa’s face at all was that Sunny had missed the province’s new twelve-week cutoff and had to keep her. That Sunny had even talked about giving her up, until the girl behind the desk at the agency’s adoption arm talked her out of it. Because nobody would want Hwa. Not unedited. Not with a face like that. Not with Sturge-Weber, and its associated potential for blindness and seizures and Christ knew what else. Not when they could just buy a better baby somewhere else, one that came pre-edited and perfect. So Sunny should just try and be a good mother. After all, she obviously loved her little boy—the one she’d brought out to this city, this tower of flame and poison floating on a dead ocean—so very much. She just needed to try harder with Hwa. Really. The love would come. Eventually. Maybe.
“Does it…?”
“No,” Hwa said. “It doesn’t hurt.”
*
Nail stood waiting for her in the elevator court at the base of Tower Three.
“Morning,” she said, as he guided her to the private elevator that would take them to her union rep’s headquarters. Nail didn’t answer. He had given his voice to Mistress Séverine; he spoke only when allowed to. It took a bit of getting used to. The first few times they’d met it was awkward. Now Hwa just considered him a good listener.
Nail had to duck his head as they entered the elevator. As they descended, so did the temperature. Hwa kept her eyes averted from the numbers above the door as they changed. She hated to think of all that water pressing in above them. Finally the elevator came to a stop, and the red light in the ceiling turned vibrantly green.
Nail spun the winch on the door. When it swung open, the smell of burnt sugar and saddle soap wafted through. They entered a circular space walled almost entirely in glass save for the door behind them. The space was completely underwater. Through the glass, the black waters of the Atlantic and whatever inhabited them were plainly visible. Right now, what inhabited them was a man in a breathesuit. He stood chained inside a shark cage.
“Oh, good, Hwa.” Mistress Séverine stood up. She wore a white silk robe that gleamed and rippled as she crossed the room to shake Hwa’s hand. Her grip was as ferociously strong as ever. Hwa could still feel the power in her hands through Séverine’s leather gloves.
“Ma’am.”
“Please sit. Nail, please bring another place setting. You will eat, won’t you?”
Nail disappeared into another room before Hwa could protest. She almost called out to him that he didn’t have to go to any extra trouble for her, but the kitchen door clanged shut behind him and she swallowed her words.
“Hwa, do sit. Please. And ignore the man in the cage. One of his neural implants started malfunctioning during his third tour of duty. He has asked me to help him reexperience fear. The process requires our complete disregard.”
Hwa found her seat on a low white sofa. Mistress Séverine resumed her club chair, which sat quite a bit higher. Hwa understood that the arrangement of the furniture was meant to make clients feel like supplicants, but it was annoying for everyday business. She hunched forward.
“Don’t slouch, Hwa.”
She sat up straighter. “Yes, ma’am.”