Virtually True (22 page)

True dodges the bean artillery, ducks further into the whirling crowd, hurdles a cask of sake. A man jumps True, kisses him on the lips. True slips aside, wipes his mouth, keeps searching for a way out. The bike continues to close, the bosozoku knocking people aside. The face of one of True’s
Kosoku Dori
attackers.

There. A ray of an opening. A building insulted by the quake, a gaping hole cut through it leading to open air, then the bridge. Leaning against the façade, a line of people passing the time, sipping rice wine. There’s a hand-painted sign, which True can’t read, and a man inside practicing karate, blocking imaginary blows and striking back furiously. True fights through the bean-eaters and shoots through the hole.

He’s suddenly in a field, a towering white castle in the distance. A man is scaling castle walls, eluding flying knives and crazed ninjas sprouting from dust. True looks to his right: a data grid, a list of Virtual Reality options—in Japanese. His wrist-top translator is gone. (The program doesn’t allow cheating.) A ninja springs forward. True puts up his hands reflexively and blocks the kick. No pain. Out of the corner of his eye sees 20,000 added to his score. The other player is in the billions. The ninja kicks again, hits True with a series of rapid-fire karate chops, although True doesn’t feel them, any of them. His point tally holds pat.

There’s a commotion, but it’s coming from outside the program, anger that True didn’t wait his turn and amusement over his plight. Now the yowling motorcycle. True tries shutting down the program, points to the grid. First the sky changes to green, then the terrain goes from flat to mountainous to desert to urban jungle back to medieval; rivers appear, disappear, the ninjas speed up then slow down. But he can’t find the fucking
off
switch.

A wizard with a cocaine-white beard drops down, waves his wand in mesmerizing circles—into the Ouroboros. True backs away, blinded. He’s been nuked. The game is over. The wizard trash talks, tells True he’s toast. True jumps through the hologram and out, toward the bridge. The bosozoku shuts down the game and the Harley growls again. True picks up a plank, sidesteps the bike, and jousts. The rider strikes wood, riddling True’s side with splinters. But he goes down. Hard. The bike groans on solo, lists, topples.

True limps to the bridge. The speed triber is back on his bike and gunning for him. True blurs by leaping bungee-ers, his lungs squeezed against his ribs. His nemesis is on the bridge, closing, his rifle sight jiggling with the bike, shining on an expansion joint, a bungee jumper, True’s wrist.

He weaves. A rifle’s smack and echo. Pandemonium on the bridge. Over there, his bungee mate waving him on, knife clenched in her teeth. No hesitation. He leaps onto her and they plummet to the ground; the bridge, the buildings, the world scream upward as True falls downward. He’s vaguely aware of more gunshots as they hold each other tight. The cord groans, cranky iron joints, the ground about to swallow them. They jerk to a stop. She cuts the cord and they hurtle down an embankment, bullets kicking up dirt around them. Into a patch of woods.

“Cool, huh?” she says after they slip out of sight. She’s breathing hard. Eyes shine.

“Thanks.”

Waves him off like it’s nothing. “Come back. We’ll get high and do the inverted elevator together. Now that’s, like, some shit.”

She hefts his balls slightly. Her way of paying respect.

CHAPTER 17

True’s back at WWTV. Opens the door and sees Reiner at work. “Where’s Dog? In fact, where’s your car?”

“Dog’s dead, the car stolen, and I’m on deadline.” Reiner says this without looking up. She’s cutting footage and splicing narrative: “And in a controversial decision, the Japanese Government has voted to retain Tokyo as the nation’s capital. Details are not available, but it is generally accepted that there were bills favoring a return of the capital to Kyoto, the ancient capital, and Osaka, among others. One radical suggestion was to eliminate the concept of a capital all together, proposing that governmental ministries be spread evenly throughout the nation.

“But in the end, as is usually the case in Japanese politics, it’s the status quo. I’m Reiner Jacobi, WWTV Global, reporting from Tokyo.” She files her story. “Finally finished. You want to get high?” She rubs her hands together. When she notices True, her eyes bubble. “Nice. I’ll get the medkit.”

True looks into a mirror. The splinters are ugly, but he’s surprised to see his body looking better. He’s put on weight recently, muscle too, looking more like he used to. Rustlings, then Reiner emerges. She cleans his wounds, lathers on cream to dissolve the splinters, and towels it off. When finished, she says, “You want to tell me what happened?”

“I ran into one of our friends from the expressway. I got away, but not without a little trouble.”

“Fucking speed tribe Neanderthals. Soon, them and the yakuza are going to own the whole bowl of noodles here.”

“Don’t forget the corps.” A memory: True wandering down 5th Avenue. A woman with a micro-boombox squeezing CyberRap ordering him out of her beat, as if she owned the rhythm. The question is, Who owns what in Tokyo today? “Hot was right about the capital.”

“Never should have doubted him. I’ve been trying to find out who sponsored the bill to keep the capital here, or even find out who voted for it. But nothing. The gov feels vulnerable, no doubt.”

“They should feel vulnerable.”

“I’ve got something for you to see.”

Reiner pulls up some video, unedited footage, panoramic scenes of a frightened city, sweeping shots of people in the days after the quake. True watches the city crumble again, buildings folding like accordions, people pinned under rubble. Then, enraged storms of fire.

The vibrations yield a tidal wave that pounds the shore and spills into the city. A train surfs by. The spectacle is awesome—nature obliterating trillions of dollars worth of property, squelching millions of lives. Then the aftermath. Dazed residents pulling themselves free from wreckage, the search for the missing. Reiner filed countless reports—on the quake, the economy, gang violence, survivalist groups, religious cults, life in temporary shelters.

Reiner freezes the video: “See this guy?”

True: “Yeah.”

“I’ve been filtering this video chunk through a computer. Took all the possibilities, ran it through this chip-based unit, and looky here.”

She accesses the phonic enhancement program. The computer answers, “Taro Tamura, aged 38, divorced, works as a vice-president for the Matsuo Real Estate Company, Ltd.”

Reiner waves a finger at the screen. “After analyzing Tamura’s lip movements and those of the dude he’s yakking with, the computer gave me this synopsis. Check it out. This is sweet.”

Subject Tamura agreeing to pay one million yen to unidentified male for rights to property, located at 5-2-11 Mitsukoshi-cho, Ikebukuro, Tokyo.

“One million yen is nothing.” True plugs
Matsuo Real Estate
into his wrist-top, accesses their biz-biofile. “No land purchases in five years. Lots of sales, though. It’s as if the people running the company knew to get rid of the land before the quake.”

“I’ll get Odessa to tap into the datasphere.”

“How’ll he get power for that?”

“He’ll work something out. He practically put together the whole system by stealing microchips from vending machines and public phones after the quake knocked them out.”

She inputs a communication’s code, and almost immediately Odessa’s face, grotesquely distorted, fills the screen. “Har-dee-
har
-dee-har-har.” He backs up, now clear. “What the fuck you want?”

“Like, I got a job for you? You
do
want to make some money?”

“Natch, scratch be the right match for this hacker-deluxe catch.”

“Sending data now.”

Studying for a second, Odessa says, “Easy shit. It’ll take a while, though. It ain’t centralized, and if I’m going to be inside land transactions databanks, that means avoiding the mad dog. I got enough problems, you know?”

“I know. Just do it.”

“Yeah, yeah.”

His face dissolves.

*          *          *

True’s awake, sweaty scared, his heart gunning. He. Is. Stoned. Extremely. Sto-o-oned. They’re in his bedroom, but Reiner’s on the floor, back against the wall, blowing pot rings, watching them float away like saucers.

She offers, “Hey handsome. You want some? You had a lot before you passed out.”

True accepts the narc. Does the narc. Doesn’t even faze his lungs now. He blows smoke through his nose and falls again into shattered worlds.

“True. I’ve been thinking.” She leans forward, touches his arm. For a moment True thinks she may be seeking love. But no. “Sorry I treated you like shit before.” She stands, legs spread in an upside down V. “Get some REM. We’ve got a long day tomorrow.”

Reiner closes the door, and True hopes he’ll dream of love. Of Eden.

*          *          *

“Shit. Not having wheels sucks.” Reiner says this after she and True ride three buses and finally stand outside Matsuo Real Estate Company. It’s a small shop held together by tape. Inside, a lone cop waving a halogen torch. True’s first instinct is to run. Reiner steps in.

“Ah, Reiner-san,
Konnichiwa
.” The cop bows, his light bouncing off the walls, off True.

“
Konnichiwa.
” Reiner bows back.

Electric Translator on.

The cop notices his light is on and flicks it off.
I am impressed. There is a murder and you arrive seconds after I do. Are you monitoring my communications again?

I would never—Why aren’t there any police cars out front?

No electricity. No gas. How did you hear of this so quickly?

I thought I might get a good deal on a new WWTV office.

Matsuo Real Estate is not a landlord.

Who’s dead, Captain Togo?
Reiner makes a production of turning on her wrist-top.

Togo poses with a vinyl smile.
This is a strange circumstance, but the public should be assured that the police are working on it assiduously.

Noted
. Reiner at her driest. If only Togo knew how fizzle-brained Reiner is after a night of reefer madness.
So who’s dead?

Togo leans over and whispers into Reiner’s ear. She looks at him and turns off her wrist-top. Off the record. But True can still pick it up.

Witnesses claim that Taro Tamura, while speaking with a customer, collapsed into air. There is no body that I’ve been able to locate. The witness is being truthful, so far as I can determine.

Tamura disappeared, like
poof
?

It appears so. And with most of my platoon either dead or with their families, I’ll be working on this, and many other cases, alone.

Not much a chance to figure out what happened here, then?

I am sad to report that what you say is true.

Is it possible he was murdered? Perhaps a new type of laser. But then why would anyone murder him?

Maybe speculation.

Go ahead. Speculate.
Temper, temper, Reiner.