“They never do, I’m afraid.”
“What?”
His minder was still with him. A woman in a narrow suit. She smiled sympathetically. She had no reason to be sympathetic. It felt like pity.
“Decide anything. They don’t decide anything. Try again next month. Persistence can get results.”
“Do you have any idea how long I’ve been writing letters for? How long I’ve been petitioning, just to speak? Twelve months. That’s an entire year. How long d’you think it’ll take to get another hearing?”
She shrugged. “That’s the way it goes. I might say you were foolish to lose your temper.”
“You might say a lot of things,” he snapped.
He realized she was waiting for him to leave, no doubt under instructions to ensure he did not cause a scene. He tried once more.
“I can come back later. Talk to them again. You could help.”
“I don’t think so. Not today.”
“Tomorrow then.”
She did not reply. The doormen were exchanging glances. He strode angrily away, only to hear the woman running after him. “Don’t forget your coat,” she said. “It’s cold out.”
It was a kind gesture but it annoyed Vikram all the more to have to turn around and go back to the cloakroom. The attendant returned his unsightly coat. He yanked it on and heard the lining rip.
Helpless anger rumbled in the pit of his stomach. It was a warning. He knew what that rage could do and there was a reason he had worked so hard to still it. Images he had thought long banished rose up one by one. Mikkeli with a gun. Mikkeli floating. Her body shedding water when he pulled it onto the decking.
Where had those events lead? To a green cell and a flooded tank. Mikkeli was dead. Eirik was dead. And Vikram had sabotaged his one chance in front of the Council. He had failed all of them.
A security guard was walking towards him. Anger wouldn’t help now. He needed strategy. He needed time.
He turned back to the cloakroom. “I have to go to the bathroom.”
The attendant eyed him warily. Vikram clutched his stomach.
“I think I might be sick…”
With a look of distaste, the attendant jabbed a finger. “It’s that way.”
He walked meekly past the guards to the end of the hallway and out through the secondary doors. He was back in the main corridor. There were no windows, just soft lighting and soft carpeting, his worn down boots noiseless upon it.
He went left towards the lifts. No one was about. Fifty metres along was a statue of an early Teller, and just behind it, a small cubic space with glass cabinets housing Neon Age relics on either side. It was said that back then, people had lived to one hundred and fifty years, and they looked the same as they did at fifteen, their skin fresh and beautiful, their organs plucked from their bodies and replaced with newly grown ones. In this way they had achieved immortality, until the Blackout.
He slipped around the statue. The alcove overlooked the interior of the scraper. He could see the shadow of the lifts moving up and down inside the aquarium, people trapped in a watery world. It was a bizarrely pretty parody of imprisonment.
He turned away and studied the cabinets instead.
Engraved and personalised hologrammic device, he read. Twenty-second century, Alaskan.
He thought of Mikkeli’s precious map, pictured Alaska on it. The map had been their great secret. At night they had spent hours poring over the outlines of land, guessing where their ancestors had come from, until Naala found the map and said it was illegal and burned it in front of them. There were no maps in the cabinet.
The Eye Tower’s security was surprisingly lax. He had been searched at the border and on the way into the tower and the Chambers, but for all the Councillors knew he could be part of a larger conspiracy. He could be here to scope out the building. He might have a partner armed with explosives. Evidently they felt confident that he posed no kind of threat.
They were right. He didn’t. Not today.
Strategy was patience. Vikram settled on the floor, leaning gently against the cabinet. He would wait.
The City clock chimed three times on the hour; a deep, austere vibration. Vikram started. He’d let his mind wander. He heard what he was listening for: the sound of the great doors being levered open and well-shoed feet hurrying out of the Chambers.
The Councillors spilled into the corridor. Vikram watched them sweep by, oblivious to his presence in the alcove. Feodor passed, deep in conversation, and Vikram lowered his eyes in case a sense of mutual animosity should draw the other man’s gaze. He could not see the younger Rechnov. In the rush Vikram was afraid he had missed him, but then he spotted the sleek, charcoal-suited figure, a heavy coat slung over his arm, the auburn tint in his hazel hair.
Linus was one of the last out and he was alone. Two pieces of luck, which was more than Vikram deserved.
Linus turned right. Vikram waited for the last stragglers to amble pass and hurried after him.
The young man walked briskly, Vikram following a short distance behind. The corridor curved gradually and Vikram lost sense of how far round they had come. Linus went through a set of doors. The skyscraper was even larger than Vikram had supposed. Within its outer ring was a maze of tiny corridors. These too were carpeted, with wall-hung lamps and decorations which Vikram had no time to look at; portraits and long lists of names.
A little way ahead, Linus stopped. He put on his coat and did up each of the buttons and a feather collar. Then he disappeared through a door.
Vikram followed, opened the door and stepped silently out onto a balcony.
He was at least a hundred floors above surface. The skyline was spectacular: a medley of pyramid tops, flat, pointed and asymmetric, swathed in nylon mist. The wind met him ferociously. Another day, he would have admired the view, but today he had no time for it.
Linus was leaning against the wall, his feet casually crossed. A coil of smoke rose from the glowing cigarette reversed in one gloved hand. The upturned collar cut sharp angles across his jaw. Vikram guessed that the coat was lined with feathers too.
He shut the door gently behind him.
“Mind if I join you?”
Linus looked around. Surprise flickered for a moment in his eyes. Then it vanished, to be replaced by a cool, relaxed assessment.
“Not at all,” he said. He had a face that contained both strength and delicacy; the Rechnovs were undeniably a good-looking family.
Vikram took out his own cigarettes. His hands, lacking mittens, had become paws. The cellulose packaging of his cigarettes almost defeated him. His fingertips skidded on the top of the first tube, fighting to extract one from many.
“Shit.”
He saw the cigarette fall before he felt it depart his fingers. It wasn’t as if he could afford to throw them away. He brought the packet to his lips and teased out another with his tongue. The smell of oranges lingered on his fingers.
Linus passed him a lighter. Vikram cupped the flame and passed it back. They stood in silence.
“You must have been waiting some time,” said Linus at last.
“Twelve months.”
The Councillor gave him a quizzical look.
“Since I began writing letters. But that’s not what you meant.”
“No.”
“You’re wondering why I followed you.”
“I could take an educated guess.”
Vikram gestured. “Please do.”
Linus exhaled a thin stream of smoke. In his smart coat, he was well protected against the cold, and he appeared in no rush.
