Under the Skin (3 page)

"Tell me it doesn't matter again,” he whispered hopefully, but the dream was gone, and he fell into a fitful slumber.

"It's time to get up."

Padraic opened eyes that he wasn't even aware he had closed. He found himself looking up at Jenner, who was peering down at him like a hungry owl.

"No, it's not..."

"The clock and the Inoue heir at the door say otherwise."

"Inoue—oh, fuck."

Padraic sat up and promptly wished that he hadn't. His body felt like it had been beaten with a sack of oranges. He staggered to his feet and then glanced behind him at the bed.

"Just a good dream,” Padraic muttered, and apparently Jenner had good aural enhancers, because he grinned widely.

"I'll say,” Jenner agreed enthusiastically.

"Wait, how did you..."

"You are loud when you have sexy dreams."

"Oh."

"And explicit.” Jenner paused. “Like, I came in to make sure you hadn't sneaked someone in, or, I don't know, they hadn't sent you a complimentary hooker I wasn't aware of."

Padraic ended the conversation by walking into the small bathroom and closing the door between them.

"Hurry it up, too,” Jenner called through the door. “Inoue looks unhappy."

Padraic was convinced that the second presentation actually went worse than the first.

The three men came in, and after short bows that felt cursory even to Padraic, they sat down and looked at him expectantly. He forced himself to ignore what his translation system was insisting that Minoru was saying and forged ahead. They let him finish, but it seemed like a near thing. The three shook their heads sharply when he asked if there were any questions and then filed out again, as if pleased to be getting away.

The other two had already left the room before the youngest of the men stopped and looked at Minoru.

"The very lucid person, it is Inoue. Try to brag about your father."

"Your word, uncle, truly thank you."

The door closed behind them, and Minoru immediately started pacing back and forth across the small meeting room. If Minoru were the sort who threw fits, Padraic had a feeling that he would be ducking chairs and diving for cover.

Apparently Jenner felt the same way, because he swiftly put himself between Minoru and Padraic.

"Okay, so they're not interested, and it sounds like that last guy took a cheap shot at you. Not the end of the world,” Jenner started.

"That's what you say,” Minoru retorted. “Not the end of the world? I know what this company is like—"

"—and we don't,” Jenner finished meaningfully. “And unless we get a clue, we're going to be like anchors around your neck, right?"

Minoru blinked and regarded Jenner more carefully.

"I had thought you were simply Mr. Dahl's bodyguard."

Jenner shrugged. “Well, I'm that, too."

This was the first that Padraic had heard of the “something more,” but he managed to keep a straight face when Minoru looked over at him.

"I think it's time that we sat down and planned a strategy, all three of us together. It is my fault. I thought they would be won over by the merit of your work alone, and I apologize."

Padraic wasn't sure why he found himself smiling. “Thank you. I'm not sure that I've ever received as many compliments on my design from one person, ever."

"That is a shame, because it deserves it.” Minoru nodded decisively. “And we'll make this company see that it deserves it yet."

"We need to get out of here and have some space to think,” said Jenner thoughtfully. “Outside of company walls."

"My apartment,” suggested Minoru. “It's on company property, but—"

"Out of the question,” Jenner said cheerfully. “Some of the bugs that you had installed in our rooms were good enough that I couldn't get to them. I just knew that they were there. I'll bet you dollars to doughnuts—or is that going to be yen to takoyaki?—that yours aren't any more accessible."

Padraic blinked. He had assumed that Jenner had disabled the bugs during the sweep. He remembered Jenner's comment about Minoru being hot and the noises that Jenner said he had made, and he felt heat rush to his face. He sneaked a glance at Minoru, but the Inoue heir only looked thoughtful.

"So what this all boils down to,” Jenner continued, “is that I've heard about these maid cafes that you've got over here."

Forty-five minutes later, they were seated in a very comfortable restaurant that looked no different from the late-night diners that Padraic frequented back home. The booths were the same, the menus were practically the same, and even the smells of grease and coffee were the same.

The cheerful girls in the
Alice in Wonderland
costumes, Padraic granted, were new. Jenner looked at the menu and randomly pointed at a line of text, smiling at the waitress. Padraic, feeling less brave, pointed out a picture of a cheeseburger. He wondered briefly if he was going to be eating American food for his entire stay.

Padraic risked a glance at Minoru, who, with his jacket off and his sleeves rolled up, looked even handsomer than he usually did. Idly, Padraic wondered how it would feel to run a finger up along that bare arm, up to the crook of Minoru's elbow, but even something as innocent as that made Padraic redden and look away.

He couldn't imagine that Minoru would thank him for thinking thoughts like that on company time and resolved to be better about it. He forced himself to pay attention to what was going on.

"We need to think bigger,” Jenner was saying. “They aren't hearing what we want them to hear when it's just Padraic up there talking, so we need to find a way to really talk to them on their level."

"Unfortunately, that might involve interpretive dance and a month-long series of negotiations over dinner.” Minoru shook his head. “I don't have the time, and I really don't have the patience."

"Well, maybe we should start by cornering someone further up the food chain, you know? They got there for a reason, and there ought to be someone who can see what we've got. We could get them alone and then..."

Minoru made a small, impatient noise.

"They're all aware that they are only as good as their last success. That means that they'll be polite enough to listen to the president's son and dead terrified of making a decision that is going to reflect poorly on them."

"Which means more bowing and even less work getting done, huh?"

"We could give them a demonstration,” Padraic suggested. “I mean, it seems like the most obvious thing, right?"

"I'm glad you said it and I didn't,” Jenner grinned. “From me, it just sounds so calculated.” Padraic blinked, but Minoru was nodding.

"I think,” he said slowly, “that my father's company is going to be much more influenced by negative consequences than positive reinforcement."

His comment was punctuated by the arrival of an undersized hamburger and what appeared to be a sampler of nine varieties of pie.

"Work on your timing,” advised Jenner, digging into the slice of blueberry. “Saying something like that usually needs thunder and lightning, not the magical appearance of pastry."

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The apartment was tiny, and Padraic was certain that if he really tried, he could touch the opposing walls with his fingertips. The sensation of claustrophobia was made much worse by the bank of glowing computer interfaces and screens that were built directly over the window. When he glanced up, he saw that the bed had been rigged to the ceiling on a pulley system, though he had no idea how far it would actually lower, given the tightness of the room.

Jenner had decided that the place was safe enough and was currently checking out the snack selection in the grocery store on the ground floor.

If Jenner hadn't closed the door behind him with a final click, Padraic might have bolted. Instead, he stood as still as he could and watched as Minoru talked to their eyeless hostess.

Minoru turned to Padraic, and for a moment, Padraic thought he was going to be introduced.

"Take off your shirt,” Minoru said, and turned back to the eyeless woman without even waiting to see if Padraic obeyed.

Padraic swallowed hard and found his hands automatically starting to undo his shirt.

Never been here before, have we?

Padraic shook the thought away, but it clung like dirty plastic, making it hard to move, making it a little hard to breathe. He must have been more pent up than he thought if Minoru ordering him to expose himself in a grimy room was doing it for him.

The buttons above his interface were surprisingly hard to undo. He reminded himself that it was just one more piece of tech, just as inert as any of the machinery that lined the walls, but he couldn't convince himself of it. It might be metal, but it was him.

He undid the final buttons, exposing the interface to the cold light of the room. He forced himself to breathe slowly. When Minoru and their hostess turned back to him, he could almost call himself calm. He shifted uncomfortably from foot to foot, trying not to flinch whenever someone's hands came too close to his interface.

Spidering software would get him into Inoue security systems, remove what it found there, and destroy any copy left behind. It was incredibly effective, and even possessing it was a misdemeanor, with greater penalties for selling it or buying it.

The conversation between the woman and Minoru got increasingly intense. The translation program spat out words from time to time, and as much as he told himself that it was only a faulty download, another part of Padraic knew that he was just lying to himself. His hardware would need attention, and need it soon, but then Minoru turned around to introduce him to Yuuka.

Padraic tried not to stare at the electric blue orbs that had replaced her eyes. They wired her to a network of cameras and visual imaging devices all over the world. The feedback must have been intense, but she nodded at him calmly enough.

"She says it's nice,” Minoru translated for him. Padraic tried to smile, but then her fingers were trailing over the inputs in his breastbone, causing him to shudder involuntarily. Bio-jacks never really healed up thoroughly, and the small amounts of static that radiated from her fingers—scoping radiation? Simple magnetic fields?—made his skin tingle unbearably.

The pads of her fingers were rough and calloused, and when she ran them against skin that was already overly-sensitive, he wanted shake like a dog just to get her off. Padraic thought that he had been in hardware design too long; an attractive person touching his chest was making him feel tampered with instead of aroused. Her touch was more violating than he thought it would be.

Minoru said something to her sharply, and when she ignored him, he gently but firmly took her hand and pulled it away from Padraic's chest. Padraic felt his hands unclench and let out a breath that he hadn't been aware that he was holding.

"I'm sorry,” Minoru said in annoyance. “She is very good at what she does, but she does not always remember that people are connected to her precious toys."

That sounded more than a little ominous to Padraic, especially when Yuuka handed him a small black lead. At Minoru's nod, he plugged the lead into the input jack in his chest, flinching a little at the buzzing sensation. After a moment, the buzz resolved to a more bearable hum, and he relaxed. His neural net was designed for data storage, but for actual software installation, he could expect a wait.

After a few hushed words and some money pressed into her hands, Yuuka walked out the door, leaving Padraic alone with the Inoue heir for the first time.

Gingerly, Padraic sat down on a narrow workbench that was shoved against the wall. His weight on the bench caused it to shift slightly, and a small stack of comic books that had been leaning against it went sliding down to the ground. Before he could reach for them, Minoru was kneeling on the ground, fastidiously stacking them up again.

"You shouldn't move, you might dislodge the lead."

"Can't have that,” Padraic muttered, and even he was surprised by how irritated he sounded.

Minoru regarded him a little warily.

"If you had a problem with this course of action, you should have said something earlier..."

"I don't!” At Minoru's eloquently quirked eyebrow, Padraic sighed.

"I really don't,” he insisted. “I just don't see why it's necessary."

When Minoru tried to speak, he cut him off.

"I mean, I know why this is going to prove to your family beyond a shadow of a doubt that they want this software, but I just don't see why this has to be so difficult. You and Jenner seemed to figure it out quickly enough, and even if you aren't the one running things, I would have thought that people who really knew about these things would figure it out, too..."

"But you didn't know,” Minoru pointed out. “I seem to remember your bodyguard saying something about you planning it for in-house data transfer...?"

"Yeah, but I'm just a hardware junkie.” Padraic gestured emphatically, causing another tower of comic books to waver. Minoru caught it handily and propped it back up, even straightening it a little before taking his hand away.

"It's about potential, Mr. Dahl,” said Minoru softly.

"Is that your polite way of saying that I'm short-sighted and lack ambition?” Padraic laughed self-consciously. “It's been said before."

It had, and it had been screamed at him as well. His aunt was never very shy about saying what a waste of breath Padraic was, but it was nothing compared to the hurt that he had felt when Arch said it.

Arch was Arch, and even if he delivered it with all the subtlety of a sledgehammer, he could be relied on to spit out something like the truth.

"You're not going anywhere,” Arch had said with complete candor, and even all those years ago, Padraic had known that he could only hang his head and agree. Other people traveled fast, moved forward, and to some extent, Padraic always knew that he was going to be left behind.

Arch had also said that Padraic had a way of laying himself on the chopping block for any handy executioner to come by.