“I would take care of you.”
I roll my eyes. “You think those children care about you? You think they would grow up into people who would care about you? To them, you’re just a weapon.”
“And what am I to you?” Volga asks. “If I was not a weapon, you would not keep me with you.”
“Well, I sure as hell don’t keep you around for the conversation.”
By the look in her eyes, I know I’ve finally gone too far.
Something breaks. Something important. “Volga.” My hand reaches out halfheartedly like she’s falling as she takes a step back from me. But then I lower my hand, and she sees me lower it, and she turns and walks away. The door to the suite slams and she’s gone, and I know deep down under the cool tide of the zoladone that this is how our story together ends.
Alone again. And better for it.
I leave the hotel room soon after Volga has gone. I don’t go back to my spot, fearing Republic Intelligence or maybe Gorgo might pay a visit. Instead, I find myself in the street outside Cyra’s apartment, staring up at the glass building that billows up into the sky like a piece of string on the end of an airduct. I wanted to see where Cyra lived. I don’t know why. Maybe for closure. To see how she lived so I can understand why she put a dagger in my back; but I can’t go inside. There’s retinal scanners in the lobby, and the building has private guards.
So I stand on the street as the rain falls, looking up at the building, wondering which glass window Cyra looked out and will never look out again, and realizing I never understood who she was, not really. Not her. Not Dano. Because I kept them on the street looking in, and they returned the favor in kind.
I walk the streets, passing through steam coming up out of the sewers, through a forest of noodle vendors and fleshtech salesmen, all calling to passersby. They transmit a kaleidoscope of sex advertisements from holo broadcasters perched on their shoulders like metal gargoyles. I walk the old route Trigg and I used to take from the Promenade, past the Gravity Gardens, all the way south to seedy Old Town. I outstrip the path we walked together and continue into the early hours of the morning, long enough to witness the changing of the guard from the nocturnal men to those of the day. All of it bathed in the hazy pink of the long sunrise.
As the city wakes, I eat a breakfast of doughy cinnamon noodles and coffee at one of my favorite old stands on the edge of the wharf, and feed the seagulls like Trigg used to. Below, in the water of the Sea of Serenity, large scrubbing robots collect litter. Afterwards, I catch a cab to my storage unit. In one of the private rooms, another slender robot with forklift arms sets the metal box onto the table and leaves me. In the box are my ready bags. Two of them, both slick black leather. I’m surprised how much it depresses me thinking this is all I have of my life. A thief with nothing worth packing. Sounds like a bad joke. Maybe this is what I’ve been looking for. A chance to start clean. I’ve got nothing aside from stacks of hard plastic currency in the bags, IDs, several DNA sleeves, two suits, the two pistols, and a stash of backup zoladone pills. I pocket those, but I don’t take one yet. Save it for the ride.
I take a cab to the private aerial skyhook, a floating star-shaped port for the rich and famous three kilometers above the city. It’s suspended there on gravLifts, room enough for ten private yachts to dock. It’s offensively expensive chartering a private ship, but I need to be armed, so commercial is out of the question. I’m deposited on the top level of the skyhook at the reception level. The taxi takes off the concrete runway and dips back down into the flow of terrestrial traffic, leaving me in a parklike expanse above the clouds. A fashionable Pink stands behind a reception desk in a white uniform with a tilted cap on her head and a fur coat. I shiver in the thin air.
“Good afternoon, citizen. Welcome to Zephyrus Trans-Terrestrial. Will you be checking in for your flight today?”
In my pocket, I slip one of the transparent DNA sleeves over my finger. I pretend to lick the finger and I swipe it through her sampler. “Ah, Mr. Garabaldi.” She smiles obligingly as her computer registers one of my false IDs. “We’re so pleased to have you today. The Eurydice Wind will be ready to receive you in thirty minutes. Your pilots are performing preflight checks.”
“Am I the first passenger to arrive?”
She references the manifest. “Yes, Ms. Bjorl has not yet arrived.”
“Notify me when she does.”
“Of course. You may depart whenever you like after the preflight checks have been performed, but we welcome you to enjoy our worlds-famous services in the terminal until then.” She pushes me a holoMap from her datapad. Mine catches it. “You’ll see that we have two spas, a saltwater pool, alt reality pods, massage and pleasure staff on hand. We also have a game room, two lounges—the twilight and the sky….”
I follow a bellhop who takes my bags to the well-appointed bar. A man plays a piano in the corner of the sunrise-washed room. I sit on the crème leather, my back to the windowbanks of clouds and eerie pink sky, my eyes on the door, waiting for Volga’s immense bulk to fill it. Other passengers come and go. Most are Gold and Silver, and their conversations tinkle like spoons on rare china. Some are actresses I recognize, and one or two famous racers. Soon it sounds like the buzzing of gnats to my ears, claustrophobic, irritating. The cramps from zoladone withdrawal are starting. Still I don’t take one.
After my third drink, Volga hasn’t arrived. I retire to the ship, where I meet the Blue captain and flight crew and settle my bags in the sleeping quarters. The flight stewardess makes me a vodka litchi and I wait for Volga in the ship’s lounge. An hour. Then two more.