The Beam: Season Two (74 page)

“Bullshit,” Dominic said.

“Really?” Omar raised his eyebrows and smiled. “You’re a cop, Dom. When was the Flat prison system established?”

Dominic shrugged. He didn’t know history and didn’t care.

“Not until 2061,” Omar said. “I was in later than that, hearing about this in ’67. Now you tell me: How does a man do what he does, not get caught at the time — something that’s nearly impossible; ask an accountant — but then end up being prosecuted three decades later? I’ll tell you how: The way was greased. But then a reporter named Victor Harris dug up some bones somewhere in the ’60s and made a huge stink on The Beam about crimes recently buried — so much that the court had to make a wave toward putting Craig away for long enough to let public sentiment settle. It was a show more than anything else, and I think they even pinned him with something that was barely related to that stuff in the ’30s, but he did his time like a king and then left clean as a whistle.”

Dominic shook his head. “So what? He was a rich guy. There’s no conspiracy, Omar.”
 

This time, Omar shook his head. “Well, I think others in this group might disagree with you about that. There are rumors —
strong
rumors — that places like Xenia Labs are developing add-ons for that group, and that they really,
really
don’t want anyone below that top tier finding out about them.” He looked meaningfully at Kate then glanced at Dominic.
 

“I heard you out,” said Dominic. “Now: Where will my dust be tomorrow?”
 

“There is no dust, Dom.”
 

Dominic felt his temperature rise. His fists clenched, digging his nails into his palms. He didn’t need this. Not today. Not now.

“You heard me,” Omar repeated. “No use throwing a fit. You knew I was dry. I fed you my emergency supply after you got pinched then got you that small bundle you just took up. We haven’t brought a sizable shipment down in weeks. This last one was supposed to solve all the problems.”
 

Dominic wanted to scream and throttle Omar. Earlier, he’d had a fantasy of killing the dealer and stealing his stash. There was no stash, but Dominic wanted to kill him anyway, just for the pleasure.

“You piece of shit.”
 

“Ain’t no point in cryin’ about it, Dom. You wanna buy the dust, and believe you me, I wanna sell it to you. I need the capital. Which brings us back to the issue on the table.”
 

“You haven’t put an issue on the table!” Dominic blurted, bolting to his feet. “You’re just bullshitting as usual!”
 

Omar shook his head then said very deliberately, “No, I’m not.”
 

“You lured me here, promised me…”
 

“I wouldn’t have ‘lured you here’ if it hadn’t been for our mutual benefit,” said Omar. “Sit the fuck back down, Dominic.” He was staring hard, all of his friendly demeanor gone. Dominic sat.
 

“You’re a DZ police captain. That opens doors. Gets us into places we need to go.” Dominic turned to Kate. “And you? You’re exactly Craig’s type. I watched him cycle through all of Flat 4’s available women, and the only ones he took were tall, buxom blondes with an attitude. I left Flat 4 a few months after Craig. Then I looked him up because he told me to, said we’d do business. When I did that, I met his wife and his girlfriend.” Omar pointed at Kate and made a clicking sound with his mouth.

“And what exactly are you hoping to get from this guy?”
 

“What he told me about. The Beau Monde.”
 

Dominic laughed. The rumor mills circulated the idea of a modern Illuminati like tales of Shangri-la. And here was this asshole Omar, trying to build a rocket so he could fly to Heaven.

“It’s a real thing, Dom. You didn’t see what I’ve seen.”
 

“Or what I’ve seen,” Kate added. Dominic looked over for answers, but Kate said nothing.

“This guy’s such a friend of yours, why don’t you go talk to him?” Then, feeling chivalrous, he added, “…rather than putting the lady here in harm’s way.”

“Oh, fuck yourself, Grizzly,” Kate said, rolling her eyes at Dominic.
 

“Unfortunately, when I visited him at the end of my term, he turned out to be an asshole,” said Omar. “You know how people say, ‘Look me up when you’re in my town, and we’ll hang out,’ but they don’t really mean it, and then when you show up they look at you like you’re a dick?” He nodded. “Like that.”

“So you’re bitter,” said Dominic. “Your precious feelings were hurt.”
 

“Craig knows things. Things we should know, and that could solve all of our problems. Power and money for me. Kate gets…well, she recovers some status. You never have to worry about your dust supply again.”
 

“Why wouldn’t I have to worry about the Lunis supply?”
 

“Because based on what Craig told me,” Omar said, “membership has its privileges.”
 

“It’ll never work,” said Kate. “There’s a huge flaw in your plan to track down your old buddy and seduce him into letting us into the club.”
 

“What’s that?”
 

“Well, your bait girl, for one.” Kate laid a hand across her ample breasts. “I heard that the last guy who tried to stick his dick in her ended up dead. And also, go fuck yourself if my part is playing ass candy.”
 

“I’m sure you can be more creative than that. Persuasion through seduction, but without sex? I’m certain it’s possible.”

“Oh, I’m not,” said Kate. “There’s one sure way to get what you want from any man, no matter how dashing and carefree he is or used to be before certain changes.” She moved her hand from her breasts to between her legs, which she parted slightly. Dominic felt himself flush and turned away.
 

He turned to watch Omar’s face, thinking he’d be defeated. Dominic didn’t want to play the game, and the girl, Kate, wasn’t willing to be exploited. But Omar’s face did what it always did when it was hurtling toward defeat: It shifted into the expression of a freshly hatched scheme. That was the root of Omar’s wily success: The man was always confident. Even when the situation was dire, Omar believed that everyone would find a way to do exactly what he wanted them to do.
 

“Well then, I guess we’re done,” said Omar.

Dominic watched the man settle back then begin inspecting his fingernails.
 

“It’s too bad,” he continued, “because it really would have been an amazing team. Dominic has high-level Beam access, including permissions with City Surveillance.”
 

Dominic opened his mouth to object, but although he didn’t have access to CS, it was only a call away. He’d had it briefly just a few weeks ago, when Isaac Ryan’s man had gone missing. And he did have worlds of access that the rest of the NAU (or at least those below Omar’s fabled “Beau Monde”) didn’t dream was possible. Captain’s access could be like a key in a lock. If Kate really had killed a federal inspector on the moon, captain’s access was the kind of thing that could make The Beam forget about it.
 

“Kate here? She’s got a ton of talent. She’s pretty on the outside, but I know what she’s like on the inside, too. She can talk the skin off an apple and sell a Beamer his first nature hike. She’s got access to Beam add-ons that the rest of us can’t imagine. I hear she even knows where to find the fabled maker Ryu.”
 

“Lies,” Kate said. But despite herself, she looked flattered. Dominic could see it on her face: the sort of pleasure that only a large ego could take in itself.
 

“And me? I know Braemon and his weak spots. I can get us to him. I know he’ll talk because he’s talked before. I know how to create a favor in need of reciprocation. And that’s not to mention the other people I know — the vast network that only someone slick and oily like me can gather, right, Dom?” He flashed a smile. “But whatever. It’s not meant to be.” He flapped his hands, palms up, for dramatic effect, at Dominic and Kate. “I guess you can go.”
 

Dominic had expected an argument. Omar didn’t just let things go. But if he was only going to be passive-aggressive? Well, it had taken him off guard. Kate too, judging by her expression. Omar had told them to leave, and yet both had stayed frozen, waiting for the punch line.

“It’s been good doing business with you, Dom,” said Omar.

“Wait. What…?” Dominic began.

“And with you, Katie.”
 

Kate looked at Dominic. Apparently, they weren’t just dismissed. They’d been fired.
 

“What about the shipment?” said Dominic.

“What shipment?”
 

“The Lunis. On the moon. I…” he stopped then realized that debasing himself was all he had left. “…I
need
it, Omar. I don’t know anyone else. Not in time.” He sighed, realizing how humiliating it was for a DZ police captain to lay prostrate in front of a two-bit hood but no longer caring. “They’re out.
They’re going to start killing each other.”

“I can’t get the shipment off the moon.” Omar flicked his thumb at the woman. “Ask Kate.”
 

Dominic looked at Kate then back at Omar.
 

“Someone killed an inspector. The dust is bunkered, but the whole port will be locked down. They caught us off guard with a new detector, and now there’ll be more.”
 

“A new runner then,” said Dominic.

“Now hang on,” said Kate.

“Someone who can get past security,” Dominic begged. “You can’t be stopping trade. You need the income!”
 

“It is a shame.” Omar locked eyes with Dominic. “But without some sort of superior access, there’s nothing I can do.”
 

Dominic’s shoulders fell. From the corner of his eye, he saw the same sense of resignation pass through Kate. They were as linearly arranged as the Lunis supply chain, as wired together as Omar’s grandmama’s lights. Forget about tying a knot; Omar had tied one already while no one was looking. Like it or not, they were already all for one and one for all — or they were nothing for none.

Dominic looked at Kate. Once he got past the idea that he was, now, irrevocably a criminal and a stabber of backs, this really was the only solution that made any sense. You could do things the hard way because you were stubborn, or you could release the brakes and start coasting.

“Okay,” said Dominic, making himself comfortable in his chair. “Tell me about Craig Braemon.”

Chapter 5

Micah stood with his hands clasped in front of his waist, palms brushing the fine fabric of his best suit. For Micah Ryan, the idea of a “best suit” was saying something. His garments cost several times more than those at the line made each year.

The cube-shaped room — large and open, equal lengths of walls and ceiling height, painted a stark Beam white — always felt strange to Micah. He’d been to the White House a dozen or so times during his political career, and he’d never grown used to its oddity.
 

The senate occupied one large wall, stacked high in pure-white cubbyholes in a ten-by-ten honeycomb. The fifth row from the top contained an extra cubicle, but the other ten were squeezed to match, creating an odd misalignment in what was an otherwise perfect grid. Each of the senators’ cubbyholes was fronted with black Beam glass, stark against the room’s pure white. Micah knew that the glass was entirely transparent from the inside, but even as he stared directly at it, he found the idea hard to believe. The senators were anonymous, their identities obscured for supposed reasons of incorruptibility. They were supposed to respond to the will of their parties, but they were still people with minds of their own. They could vote off-party for issues that affected the entire union if they wanted; their ability to do so required a level of trust that the NAU, so far, had seemed entirely willing to give. Even the senators didn’t know who each other were or how they voted. They received Beam feeds but could not be petitioned by private interests because it was impossible to reach them. It was supposed to be the perfect, impartial representative system, but Micah wondered if that were true. There might be nothing behind the glass, and Senate decisions might be made by an invisible emperor, deciding yes and no with a turn of his thumb.
 

But of course,
that
wasn’t true either, because once a senator’s term was finished, he or she returned to circulation and was free to share anything they desired. That was when the world finally saw them. Many senators, with no alternative career to fall back on and used to an income far higher than most Directorate doles, wrote books or began speaking careers. There was no way to do that if they stayed in the closet.
 

And of course, the party presidents typically came from the Senate. Shiloh Reese, the Enterprise president, had been a senator. The up-until-recent Directorate president, Quince, had been a senator. And of course everyone knew all about Carter Vale’s term in the Senate because he was loud and proud in his telling of tales and had been since he’d taken over Quince’s position as party head.
 

Micah, standing behind President Reese with the rest of the Enterprise cabinet, looked over at Vale as he moved into position behind the lectern. The man was tall, dark, and handsome, like the hero of a storybook. He was attractive and compelling without being threatening. Ironically, most of the chatter on The Beam about Vale — from the low-rent Directorate camp, anyway — revolved around how he was “just like us.” The idea was absurd. As little as Micah liked to compliment his party’s opposition, Vale actually
was
handsome…whereas the average person singing his praises was anything but.