Realms of Light (16 page)

Bad choice. The intersections were much
farther apart in this direction, so by the time I spotted the red
T6 on the wall above the corner tank I could hear footsteps in the
distance.

“Hello?” someone called. It sounded like a
man, not a machine, but you can’t always tell. “Officer Hu?”

“Over here,” I called. “Row Five.” I turned
and hurried back down Row Six, hoping we wouldn’t cross the Tier 5
corridor at the same time.

We didn’t. A moment later the voice was
behind me, calling, “Officer Hu?”

I was in Row 6, between the T4 and T5
corridors—did that put me in Tier 4? And which tank was Station 31?
I didn’t see any numbers.

“Officer Hu, if you don’t show yourself I’ll
have to call Security.”

“I’m over here,” I said, while I wondered who
I was talking to. Wasn’t he Security? Did he mean he’d have to call
for reinforcements? I stopped midway down the row and studied the
nearest dreamtank’s display panel. It was blank. I tapped it with a
fingernail.

The word STANDBY appeared on the panel.

“Status report,” I said.

“Officer Hu?”

“Right here,” I called, as the screen lit
up.

The red flashing lights were distracting, but
I could read the screen. TIER 4, ROW 6, STATION 18, it said at the
top. OHTA, AZRAEL—I took that to be the occupant’s name. A
screenful of data appeared below that—medical data, a list of
recently-played dreams, and more. Azrael Ohta’s blood glucose was
72 and his BP was 91 over 63, which both seemed a little low, but
otherwise he appeared to be in good health, and he was eighty-three
minutes into something called “Desert Encounter 306,” with
thirty-one minutes to go.

But he wasn’t my father. I turned around and
looked at the opposite side of the corridor. A tap on that panel
got me the STANDBY message.

And then a paunchy guy in a purple turban and
blue worksuit appeared at the corner of T5 and R6, looking at
me.

“You’re not Hu Xiao,” he said

“Neither are you,” I said, hoping to confuse
him.

“I saw a picture,” he said. “You aren’t
Officer Hu. Who are you? What are you doing here?”

I sighed, pressed the power button, and
raised the HG-2. “I’m threatening you with a heavy-gravity handgun
loaded with homing incendiaries,” I said. “That’s what I’m doing
here. Now, are you going to cooperate, or is this going to get
nasty?”

He raised his hands slowly and stared at me. “Who
are you?” he asked.

“I’m the person with the gun,” I told him, as
I stepped away from the dreamtank and trained the HG-2 on his
generously-sized belly. “That’s all you need to know right
now.”

“You’re trespassing.”

“Oh, there’s a shock,” I said. “Did you think
I hadn’t noticed?”

“What do you want here? There’s nothing worth
stealing.”

“Is that why you aren’t armed?”

“Why would I be armed? I’m just
maintenance.”

“Not security?”

“No. Why would we have a human guard here?
There’s nothing worth stealing!”

“Security has been summoned,” the room
said.

“Tell them to stay back—there’s a hostage
situation,” I said, keeping the gun pointed at the maintenance
worker.

“They won’t be here for twenty minutes
anyway,” my hostage said. “Our security is the casino cops from the
Ginza, and they’ll want to clear it with management before they
come down here.”

I considered that, then asked, “Why are you
telling me?”

“Hey, you’re pointing a gun at me. I don’t
want you getting nervous because things aren’t going the way you
expect them to.”

That made sense. “Which of these is Station
31?” I asked, nodding toward the dreamtanks on my right. “Give me a
hand, and I can be out of here before the casino cops ever show up.
No danger of getting caught in the crossfire.”

“Thirty-One?” He blinked, then pointed,
keeping his hand high as he did. “Over there somewhere.” The hands
drooped a little. “Is that what you’re after? One of these lose...
I mean, one of our clients?”

“That’s right. Can you get him out for
me?”

“You gonna kill him?”

I grimaced. “No,” I said. Then a memory of
what it had felt like when the three of us got the news that our
parents were dumping us stirred in the back of my head somewhere,
and I added, “Though he maybe deserves it.”

“He owes you money?” He shook his head. “He
can’t pay it. That’s part of the deal. The company takes control of
all assets and all debts when the babies go in the bottle. They
give up control of their own affairs. If he has any money left, he
can’t touch it.”

“I know that!” I snapped. “I’m not here
to...never mind. Just open Station 31, will you? It’s none of your
business what I want with him.”

He shrugged. “Sure. No juice out of
my
system.” He lowered his hands and headed toward one of the tanks.
He tapped the display and said, “Maintenance.”

The screen lit up. He glanced at it and said,
“Oops.” He moved two panels over and repeated his performance,
except this time instead of “oops,” he said, “Got it.”

I moved cautiously closer, keeping the gun
ready and staying a couple of meters out of reach.

TIER 4, ROW 6, STATION 31, the top line of
the display read, and the second line said HSING, GUOHAN.

That was him.

“Huh,” the maintenance worker said. “Is that
spelled right?”

“Yes,” I said. “Get him out.”

“I mean, it’s usually Singh, S I N G H.
That’s how I spell it. Maybe the H is in the wrong place.”

I put that together with the guy’s turban.
“He’s not a Sikh,” I said. “The name’s Chinese, with an archaic
spelling. Now, get him out of there.”

“I don’t know if that’s a good idea,” the
turbaned man—presumably Mis’ Singh—said.

“Security is on its way,” the room reminded
us. “Please do not take any hasty actions.”

“Get him out,” I repeated.

“He’s been in there a long time,” the
maintenance worker warned me. “If I get him out he’s going to be
pretty disoriented, and there’s probably been some muscle
atrophy.”

I hadn’t really thought that through. I knew
he might not be feeling very cooperative after being snatched out
of his mechanical womb, away from his pretty fantasies, but that
was one reason I’d brought the gun. That he might not be able to
walk could complicate matters.

I couldn’t take the whole tank; it was too
big, and built into the floor. It wasn’t designed to move. I had to
get my father out, and if he couldn’t walk, that was a problem.

Fortunately, I had a solution standing right
there.

“You may need to carry him for me, then,” I
said. “Don’t worry, he’s not a big man.”

“After all those years in there, I’ll bet
he’s not.” He glanced around. “Carry him
where
?”

“Anywhere I can get a cab.”

He looked baffled. “You’re taking him away
with you? Why? He’s a dreamer, nobody’s going to ransom him or
anything.”

“I know that.”

“Does he know something you want? Are you
planning to question him? Because there might be some memory
loss...”

“You ask a lot of questions for someone being
held at gunpoint,” I said. “Just get him out.” I pressed a button
on the HG-2, and it made a threatening whine, as if the targeting
mechanism were adjusting.

The real targeting mechanism was completely
silent, of course; the button was just sound effects.

The sound effects worked, though; Mis’ Singh,
if that was his name, stopped asking questions and got busy with
the panel on T4 R6 S31. A moment later there was a hiss, then a
whir, and then Station 31 opened and a bed slid out.

And there was my father, lying naked in the
bed—not on it, but sunk down into it, surrounded by worn brown
plastic. He was curled into foetal position, lying on his left
side, but going by the wear on the plastic, and the condition of
his skin, he had been turned every so often. Tubes ran into both
arms, his mouth, nose, anus, and urethra; a visor covered his eyes,
and a heavy-duty cable was plugged into the back of his skull and
secured with a clamp around his throat. He was shriveled and
shrunken, his skin dry and flaking, his hair long and ragged; the
only part of him that still looked healthy and normal was the wire
job on his neck and one side of his head.

I hadn’t seen him in years, and when I did he
hadn’t looked like this, he’d been healthy and alert, but all the
same, I recognized him immediately. This was Guohan Hsing, all
right. This was my father, genetically if not legally.

“Get him out of there,” I said again. The
maintenance guy tapped the control panel; the throat clamp released
with a sharp click, and tubes started withdrawing. I decided I
didn’t need to watch that, and focused my attention on the paunchy
man’s face, but I could
hear
the tubes sliding from their
places, which was almost as bad.

“Do you want him awake?” Singh asked.

“Waking Mis’ Hsing is a violation of his
contract,” the room said. “Please wait for Security before taking
further action.”

“I just want him alive,” I said. “Awake or
asleep doesn’t really matter right now.”

“Waking Mis’ Hsing is a violation of his
contract,” the voice repeated.

“Can you shut that thing off?” I asked Singh.
I gestured with the gun. “It’s annoying me.”

“Not from here,” the maintenance worker
said.

“It’s not very bright.”

“It doesn’t have to be, to watch over a bunch
of dreamers.”

The hiss and gurgle of retracting tubes
stopped, and I heard the rasping as my father began breathing
unassisted for the first time in years. I hesitated before looking
at him, though; I wasn’t sure I really wanted to see him.

“They didn’t give it much authority, did
they?” I said, putting off the inevitable. “You didn’t need to do
anything to override it.”

“You just said it’s not very bright, Mis’.
Would you trust it with anyone’s life?”

Then Dad coughed, a harsh, choking cough, and
I turned to help.

So did the maintenance guy. Between us we got
my father into a sitting position as he choked and gasped, his
lungs struggling to work unaided. He coughed uncontrollably for
what seemed like half an hour, but which my symbiote told me was
only about twenty seconds, and when he was finally able to stop he
was wide awake, sitting in his plastic bed. He raised one trembling
hand and lifted off the visor, then looked up at us.

He tried to talk, but all that came out was a
wheeze, and that started him coughing again. I decided not to wait.
“Pick him up,” I told Singh. I had lowered the gun while we moved
my father; now I pointed it again.

He hesitated, glancing at Dad. “What are you
going to do with him?” he asked.

“I’m going to get him off Epimetheus before
sunrise,” I said. “Pick him up!”

“Security will arrive in approximately
eighty-five seconds,” the room said. “Please stand by.”

“Off-planet? How?” Singh asked.

“I have a ship,” I said. “It’s waiting at the
port. Unless you want to get caught in the crossfire, I suggest you
pick him up and get him out of here before those eighty-five
seconds are up.”

Singh took maybe half a second to think it
over, then nodded. He bent down, tugged the loose clamp out of the
way, unplugged the cable from the back of Dad’s neck, then slid his
arms under shoulders and knees and picked my father up. Either the
maintenance guy was stronger than he looked, or Dad weighed about
as much as a cup of tea. He put up about as much resistance as a
tea cup, too.

“Which way?” Singh asked.

“Out,” I said. “Wherever Security isn’t. You
show me.”

He nodded and began walking, and said, “What
kind of ship?”

“A yacht,” I said, following him. I had to
trot to keep up. “Not mine.”

“Room for another passenger?”

I should have expected that. “If it won’t get
me arrested, there might be.”

“Hey, getting me out isn’t anywhere
near
as illegal as kidnaping this poor guy I’m
carrying.”

“Stop right there!” a new voice called.

I turned, the HG-2 in my hand, but before I
could say anything Singh called, “It’s okay, guys!”

I didn’t point the gun at anyone after all;
instead I just looked at the two cops who were coming down the
aisle toward us. They had guns, too—nothing quite as big as the
HG-2, but probably more than enough to kill me several times over.
A floater was hanging just above and behind them, scanning the
scene.

“What’s wrong?” I said, trying to sound
confused.

“The surveillance system here reported a
hostage situation,” the lead cop said, keeping his gun trained on
me. The second cop, I noticed, was pointing
his
gun at
Singh.

Singh had been telling the truth about
Seventh Heaven’s security; these two were in charcoal-gray suits
with the Ginza logo on the breast and security badges on their
sleeves. Casino cops—that was both good and bad. Good, because they
didn’t really care about the law, only about what was good for
business, and shooting potential customers was pretty much never
good for business. Bad, because they not only didn’t care whether
I
was breaking the law, they didn’t care whether
they
were, either—they could play rough.

“The surveillance system is an idiot,” Singh
said. “There’s a maintenance problem, that’s all—I had to get this
poor loser out before his tank poisoned him.”

“Who are you?”

Singh sighed. “I’m Minish Singh, second-shift
maintenance.”

“Who’s she?”

“Hu Xiao. She wanted me to check on this
guy—he’s a potential witness. Good thing she did; he’d have been
dead in an hour.”

I thought that was pretty good improvisation;
I wondered whether they’d buy it. I didn’t think
I
would
have, but I’m not a casino cop. Casino cops don’t like trouble.