Steel Rain (32 page)

Machiko is a bit puzzled by this reaction. She finds it difficult to accept. For she knows how she would feel were she in Gordon Ito's position, and that is not very different from how she feels being in her own position. "I wonder if this is how you truly feel, Ito-san."

"Feeling's got nothing to do with it."

This Machiko can well believe. Here, in all likelihood, she faces a man who is never guided by emotion, only intellect, the checks and balances of a merchant's records, the account sheets of an executive. What words would affect such a man? "Certain files I have read say that you rarely come down from Fuchi's tall towers. You do not generally micromanage operations. This leads me to wonder, Ito-san, why you are standing here now. What could your motivation be to speak with me? Why did you agree to this meeting? Why did you answer the telecom?"

Ito takes a drag on his cigarette. His features reveal nothing of his thoughts. "I'm here to collect Scudder."

"You trusted no one else for this task?"

"I'm also evaluating a potential new source of intelligence. You."

"Is there anything about me you do not already know? which you have not already previously evaluated?"

Ito seems to consider that, then says, "I know you're an expert in the serpent-style of aikido developed by your
sensei
Kuroda. I know you can hit moving targets with shuriken at twenty meters five times out of five. You're qualified with just about every man-portable weapon in the inventory. You're a phys-adept. You see heat. You're very quick. You can probably see the astral, but you use it selectively because the ability makes you vulnerable. You entered the GSG academy at age fourteen. You started training in kendo at age five. You had a pet snake as a kid and you wear a size six shoe, six-narrow. You honor your adoptive parents and you're fanatically loyal to Nagato's Chairman." Ito paused to take a drag on his cigarette. "Yeah, I've got all the basics. What I don't know is how far I can trust you."

"Then I will tell you," Machiko says. "You can trust me to consider all that I do with regard to the wishes of Chairman Honjowara Akido, and the interests of Nagato Combine."

"Nothing's ever that simple."

"It is duty," Machiko says. "Duty may be easy or hard, as easily fulfilled as a child's game, or a true challenge to loyalty and honor. But it is almost always very simple. If the search for my enemy and yours were this simple, the danger would already be past."

Ito seems to consider that, but then says, "How deep did you go interrogating Scudder?"

"Deeply enough to confirm that his words are accurate." Briefly, Ito nods. He does not appear surprised. "I've got real problems with people who don't make good on their agreements. You said you'd bring Scudder and you performed. That's the kind of currency I trade in. It's worth a gesture of my goodwill."

The last word is almost alarming, coming from a man like Gordon Ito. But Machiko maintains a settled spirit. She asks, "What form of goodwill, Ito-san?"

"Information." Ito takes a drag his cigarette. "I've been tracking attempts at penetrating Fuchi subsidiary mainframes. That's brought out some interesting discoveries. You may not be familiar with the financial details, so I'll tell you that your Nagato Corporation is mortgaged to the fragging hilt. And somebody's buying your debt. They've swallowed a few of your most major creditors whole. A few more big buys and they'll own you."

Machiko wonders if this is even feasible. She knows little of finance and corporate law, but the one thing she does know is that the leaders of the three clans own the entire body of Nagato Corp stock. So what Gordon Ito says cannot be true in precisely the way that he says it. "Nagato Corp stock is not publicly traded."

"Own your debt, I own you," Ito says. "I call in your loans. You can't pay everything at once. So I make you a deal. Sell me blocks of stock to satisfy the debt or sell me certain selected assets. Either way, I take the best parts of Nagato in hand."

"You mean that an attempt is being made to take over Nagato Corp?"

"I've been watching funds transfer in and out of Zurich. You don't move the kind of coin that's being moved just to make a couple of nuyen factoring people's debt. Someone's staging to carve you up. That's what this so-called corp war is about. Making Nagato look two steps short of the grave. By this time tomorrow your creditors will be selling your debt at a discount, just to get out. Then the process snowballs. You don't have much time."

The prospect, the theory, is more than a little unsettling. Even if only half of what Ito says is true, disaster looms. Machiko wants so much to face an enemy she may defeat with sword and fist she could scream with outrage. She had never known anything so frustrating as this elusive enemy who attacks from the north and from the south, down from the mountains and up from the sea. How can she fight such an enemy?

She struggles to keep calm, to breathe. She says, "Ito-san, you began by saying that you have been tracking attempts at penetrating Fuchi computers. How did this lead to discoveries about Nagato debt and transfers of funds to and from Zurich?"

Ito takes a drag on his cigarette, and says, "Do you know who designed the operating systems for the local telecommunications grid?"

In fact, Machiko has no idea. But, based on what Ito is saying, his manner in saying it, the answer seems apparent.

Ito says, "There's quirks in the software that the freaks decking out of Vaux Hall and Shadowland never hear about. There's layers of code that Telco security doesn't know exists. How did I make my discoveries? I put a genii into the grid. We'll leave it at that. Except for one other thing.

"The orders to the Zurich banks buying your debt are coming out of the Nagato private grid, the system access node assigned to your Chairman's estate. So tell me again how simple a thing duty is.

"You've got a loyalty problem."

Ito blows one final stream of cigarette smoke toward the blackened concrete floor, then turns and walks back to the Nissan sedans awaiting him.

Machiko breathes a slow, deep breath.

34

The ride to Downtown is short—up Bowery Street to Park and Twenty-ninth and Nagato Tower—but it seems to last hours.

A loyalty problem, Ito said. A strategy to make Nagato Combine appear to be on the verge of destruction so that banks and other creditors will sell Nagato debt cheaply, all into a single pair of hands, hands striving to seize control. That's what it's all about, Ito said. But is he right? And if he is right, who orchestrates the offensive? Is this truly the work of Gamma and the White Octagon? Or is there another greater enemy, perhaps an enemy with knowledge of business, and thus the vision to conceive of such a campaign?

That the orders to the Zurich banks should be routed through the access node for Honjowara
-sama's
estate seems almost a joke. Honjowara
-sama
is no traitor. Of this, Machiko has no doubt. The man would not betray Nagato Combine for the simple reason that he would be dishonored, and without honor he would be nothing, a ruined man. He would rather die, he would welcome it with open arms. By strength of character and force of principle he has all but single-handedly guided Nagato Combine back to the honorable path of their ancient ancestors. For Honjowara
-sama
to turn from this now would be impossible, a betrayal not merely of Nagato Combine, but of everything he believes, his values, his whole life.

If the node for his estate has been used by traitors, that is mere coincidence, or perhaps an attempt to deflect suspicion, or possibly to cast doubt where no doubt should ever arise and so cast Nagato Combine into confusion.

Confusion to the enemy. An ancient martial strategy. Machiko must see it defeated.

When her car arrives in the parking complex beneath Nagato Tower, she waits for the SDF troopers to get out, then uses the sedan's telecom to contact Colonel Satomi. "Do you have any reason to doubt the loyalty of any Nagato Corp personnel with expertise in computers?"

"None at all," Satomi-san replies. But then he frowns and adds, "We of course conduct periodic reviews of all corporate personnel. Have you some new data that I should be aware of?"

Machiko relates what Gordon Ito has said.

Satomi-san replies, "I will make inquiries with my people. Possibly there are some borderline individuals who should be investigated."

The time is just past one a.m. when Maeda Komachi steps briskly into her walnut-paneled office on the fifteenth floor of Nagato Tower. She comes abruptly to a halt, eyes widening. Machiko sits in the tall synthleather chair located behind Maeda-san
's
desk. Maeda-san stares at her as if astonished. Machiko understands. It is unlikely that Maeda-san has ever seen a member of the Guard sit behind anyone's desk, much less her own.

A small soft sound of startlement or dismay slips from her lips. She hesitates. She bows more deeply than is necessary to show proper respect, and says, in a voice that briefly wavers, "Machiko-san . . . I. . . I. . . that is . . ."

An awkward moment, intended to be so. Machiko has seen this woman many times before, at various meetings, but does not know her very well at all, does not know what to expect of her, or whether she is as loyal as Machiko might ordinarily suppose. Were Maeda-san in fact a traitor, she would have unparalleled opportunities to utilize the Nagato private computer grid. She is in fact in charge of that grid, Director of Network Administration.

"Please excuse me if I seem rude or presumptuous," Machiko says. "I have had little rest since before dawn. This chair seemed available."

Maeda-san slowly rises from her bow, looking very anxious and uncertain. "P—please," she says. "My office is yours. I am merely, merely confused .. . your telecom call..."

"I have been authorized by Honjowara
-sama
to make certain inquiries," Machiko says.

Maeda-san's expression turns to fear. She swallows. "Have I committed some offense? Is that why . . . why you are here?"

To Machiko, it does not now seem very likely that Maeda-san has committed any crimes, small or large. She does not speak clever words. She responds as would a loyal executive of Nagato Corp, who is also a woman of delicate stature and apparently of a sensitive nature—with surprise and fear and perhaps now even a touch of horror. She shows these things openly, like one genuinely afflicted by emotion, like one who has nothing to hide.

"In the Chairman's name," Machiko says, "I must request your assistance."

"I will do anything, of course," says Maeda-san, abruptly bowing.

"There is possibly a traitor in Nagato Corp," Machiko explains. "This traitor, if extant, may be using the system access node of the Chairman's estate to send certain messages to Zurich banks. These messages may include instructions directing the banks to purchase Nagato debt. How may we determine if this is so?"

Maeda-san seems troubled by all of this. "It would be a tremendous task, Machiko-san," she says. "Perhaps impossible. Computer activity is routinely monitored and the records compressed and archived. We might find some indication of these messages you speak of within the archives, but these archives contain immense quantities of data. And certain records are kept for only a short period. If these messages are very old, the records may no longer exist."

Machiko considers, and says, "If the messages have been sent at all, they are most likely very recent. Perhaps only days old."

Maeda-san nods. "Then the relevant records should exist."

"Then they must be examined."

"I will summon a team of analysts at once. My most capable people." Maeda-san moves to the side of her desk and swivels the telecom to face her. "We have little direct traffic with Zurich. That should aid in our search."

Machiko says, "I do not know if the messages went directly to Zurich."

"We will do whatever we must to find what you want." Machiko opens her mouth to praise this display of dedication and loyalty, but the woman is already speaking to the telecom. She makes several calls. Each time, she says, "I must ask you to come in at once to assist with a matter of vital importance to the Chairman."

It is not long before Maeda-san
's
experts have assembled in her office. They are an eclectic group of both metas and norms and both genders, some in suits, others dressed like vagabonds. Machiko tells them what little she knows. Maeda-san then gives her own instructions, using language of such a technical nature that Machiko grasps very little of what is said.

Semi-autonomous knowbots?

Did she even hear this correctly?

Maeda-san concludes, "Advise me the moment you find anything you believe may be significant. I will be here until we reach some result."

The experts bow and file out.

Machiko considers what she might do while the experts work at their computers. "It may be some time until we do obtain some results," says Maeda-san. "At least several hours. Perhaps not until morning."

"Is there no way to hasten the process?"

"Even with unlimited resources, it would still take time, Machiko-san. We have many terapulses of datastores to search, and only a few clues to guide us."

Machiko grows conscious of the fatigue in her shoulder and the gnawing in her stomach. "You may contact me via the command center," she tells Maeda-san. "I will be in the building."