The gryphon vanishes, accepting the change.
She continues along Seahaven’s streets, following the pattern that remains constant no matter how the trappings change, finds herself at last in the market square. She moves through a gathering made unfamiliar by the Mayor’s choice of convention, human shapes rather than icons, male mostly, out of anime, a few caricatured women and robots, once a Masai prince striding with a spear, and makes her way to the heart of the space. There the wall glows neon-bright, prodigal images splashed along its surface, overlapping, overwriting each other. Here and there a message glows among the designs, and she walks along its length, following the threads. Trouble’s message is gone at last, but Cerise keeps walking, looking for some other trace of her old partner. There is nothing, not even among the tangles of artists’ imagery, and she stands for a long moment, considenng the wall. There is someone watching her among the moving people, a shape she almost certainly will not find familiar even if she looks. The brainworm translates the code to a prickling between her shoulder blades, itchy, uncomfortable, but she takes her time anyway, framing her own message, before she turns around. It is a woman, a girl-shape, really, thin and angular, big eyes in a sharp and pointy face above black leather.
The girl-shape smiles, pure mischief, impure invitation, Cerise blinks, intrigued in spite of herself, but returns to business.
She knows what she needs to say, and phrases it without apology—TREASURY/STARLING (the joined icon, not the words) ARE LOOKING FOR YOU, TAKE PRECAUTIONS—but hesitatesfor an instant over the identifier, and settles at last for the smiling cat that will for better or worse, evoke the old days. She wraps the words in a gaudy package that is much stronger than it looks, and seals it again, this time with Trouble’s harlequin, using the codes that they once shared, and hangs it on the wall before she can change her mind. She hears a murmur of surprise and curiosity behind her, but she does not look back.
And then the girl-shape is there in front of her, still smiling on the wire. Cerise blinks again, assessing the image, bad-girl chic black leather and silver chains and the unmistakable curves, and dispatches a quick query-program of her own. It is rebuffed, as she’d expected, but the flavor of the other woman’s work comes with it, smoke and mirrors and the hint of steel beneath it
Hey.
The voice is as much a pose as the rest of the icon, deep and smoky, but it’s well chosen. Cerise admits a silent interest, but suppresses all hint of it, because, after all, this may be a different kind of challenge.
Hey yourself.
The girl-shape shifts, takes up a stronger stance, hands on hips and Cerise grimaces inwardly, bracing herself for the inevitable. She is known, and a syscop, there are plenty of crackers who have dared her before now.
*You’re playing with fire,* the girl-shape says, gestures to the harlequin dancing against the wall. *Sure you’re up to it?*
Cerise laughs, lets the amusement ripple out onto the net. Are you?
Try me, the girl-shape answers, but she, too, is smiling, the mask of the icon-face creasing in a simulation of delight. Definitely on the wire, and Cerise nods, recognizing the skill.
Sorry, sunshine, she says aloud. *I don’t have the time.*
You could make time, the girl-shape answers, and flings up a hand, throwing out a shape like a mirrored sphere to surround them, blocking the sights and sounds of the plaza. Cerise reacts instantly, freezing the sphere literally half-formed—just to prove she can do it, she’s curious now herself about this stranger—then relaxes and lets the image flow like mercury around them.
And why should I? she asks, but makes no move to open the sphere, letting the lazy voice and the hint of contempt hold the other at a distance.
*I’m cute,* the girl-shape answers, and the words are meant to sting. *That’s supposed to be enough for you.*
I’ve seen better, Cerise thinks, and says nothing, lets the silence carry the message for her.
You a friend of that Trouble? the girl-shape asks, voice gone sharp with anger, and shapes the piping harlequin in the palm of one hand to make herself absolutely clear.
Cerise nods.
*NewTrouble’s not going to be happy,* the girl-shape says, and Cerise’s attention sharpens.
And whose friend are you, little girl?
Ah. The girl-shape’s tone changes again, goes faintly smug, the icon preening itself against the silver mirror. *Myself and mine. Maybe yours—if you’re interested.*
It’s not the challenge Cerise expected, and her eyebrows rise. It’s been a while since anyone approached her—being a syscop plays hell with one’s wetware. So just who are you?
Something scratches at the outside of the sphere, a tarnished shadow against the silver. One of the Mayor’s watchdogs, Cerise guesses, groaning silently, come to stop just this kind of conversation. The girl- shape glances up at it, gestures rudely, looks back at Cerise.
Silk, she says, they call me Silk. She reaches into her toolkit, icon-hand vanishing for an instant, to reappear clutching something that looks like an anarchist’s bomb wrapped in green-red-and-gold Christmas plaid. She tosses it gently toward Cerise, and it tumbles heavy to the illusory ground, rolls almost under her feet before it explodes in a cascade of blinding light. The silver sphere vanishes with it, exploding into a shower of gleaming shards. Cerise flinches back as they sting against her, blind for an instant before her filters override the image, and then the girl-shape is gone.
A watchdog—this one a shape like a hound, black and tan—whines around her feet, seeking a scent. Fragments of red and green litter the ground, bits of codes no longer holding meaning, and out of the corner of her eye she sees a scavenger trundling toward them. She frowns slightly, scans the broken bits again —whatever Silk is, whatever else Silk is, she seems to act with reason, and there must have been some purpose behind the Christmas-colored bomb—and this time sees the mailcode, lying harmless among the clutter. She collects it hastily, stashes it in a holding box, is standing innocent and aloof, the box well sealed, when the scavengers arrive. She steps over them, walks away, out of the plaza, thinking of Silk.
TROUBLE DROVE TOO fast, as usual, the speed warning flickering yellow at the base of the helmet display. Ahead, the flyway gleamed like a dirty mirror in the cloudy light, reflecting the grey of the sky. At this hour, dozens of tow-carriers rumbled in the central lanes, mostly heading south toward the markets; the private traffic was sparse, a couple of corporate limos and a handful of light trucks and runabouts, spread out for kilometers along the ribbon of the road. More letters flashed in the helmet display, warning that this was the last exit before the border tolls, and she eased the trike sideways into the slower lane. The exit ramp curved down into the scrubland behind the salt marshes, and the grid lights flashed at her, warning her that local roads were not under computer control. She matched the speed limit here—local cops were less forgiving than the grid—and turned onto the narrow road that led east, toward True’s Island and the sea.
The land was relatively crowded here, cluttered with low-built, sagging houses and cinder-block garages. This was car-farm country, a place to buy and sell spare parts and junkers. The road was busier, too, battered runabouts with unmatched panels and the ubiquitous pickups, each with its bed full of miscellaneous machinery. Trouble drove decorously, not wanting to attract undue attention: the border people were an insular group, didn’t welcome outsiders and particularly not the ones who took the back roads to Seahaven.
She crossed the border just south of Southbrook, skirting the town itself and its asphalt plains of discount shopping. On the horizon, she could see the neon sign, bright even in daylight, blinking the message that had been the town’s salvation, NO SALES TAXES!!! East of town, all the little roads wove together into a rotary, complete with a cop-shop in the center, mixed public and private station, the state insignia side-by-side with the logo of the
