Neuromancer - William Gibson Page 0,48
were uneven, a stencil effect produced by selective melanin boosting, multiple shades overlapping in rectilinear patterns, outlining and highlighting musculature; the girl’s small hard breasts, one boy’s wrist resting on the white enamel of the table. They looked to Case like machines built for racing; they deserved decals for their hairdressers, the designers of their white cotton ducks, for the artisans who’d crafted their leather sandals and simple jewelry. Beyond them, at another table, three Japanese wives in Hiroshima sackcloth awaited sarariman husbands, their oval faces covered with artificial bruises; it was, he knew, an extremely conservative style, one he’d seldom seen in Chiba.
“What’s that smell?” he asked Molly, wrinkling his nose.
“The grass. Smells that way after they cut it.”
Armitage and Riviera arrived as they were finishing their coffee, Armitage in tailored khakis that made him look as though his regimental patches had just been stripped, Riviera in a loose gray seersucker outfit that perversely suggested prison.
“Molly, love,” Riviera said, almost before he was settled on his chair, “you’ll have to dole me out more of the medicine. I’m out.”
“Peter,” she said, “and what if I won’t?” She smiled without showing her teeth.
“You will,” Riviera said, his eyes cutting to Armitage and back.
“Give it to him,” Armitage said.
“Pig for it, aren’t you?” She took a flat, foil-wrapped packet from an inside pocket and flipped it across the table. Riviera caught it in midair. “He could off himself,” she said to Armitage.
“I have an audition this afternoon,” Riviera said. “I’ll need to be at my best.” He cupped the foil packet in his upturned palm and smiled. Small glittering insects swarmed out of it, vanished. He dropped it into the pocket of his seersucker blouse.
“You’ve got an audition yourself, Case, this afternoon,” Armitage said. “On that tug. I want you to get over to the pro shop and get yourself fitted for a vac suit, get checked out on it, and get out to the boat. You’ve got about three hours.”
“How come we get shipped over in a shitcan and you two hire a JAL taxi?” Case asked, deliberately avoiding the man’s eyes.
“Zion suggested we use it. Good cover, when we move. I do have a larger boat, standing by, but the tug is a nice touch.”
“How about me?” Molly asked. “I got chores today?”
“I want you to hike up the far end to the axis, work out in zero-g. Tomorrow, maybe, you can hike in the opposite direction.” Straylight, Case thought.
“How soon?” Case asked, meeting the pale stare.
“Soon,” Armitage said. “Get going, Case.”
“MON, YOU DOIN’ jus’ fine,” Maelcum said, helping Case out of the red Sanyo vacuum suit. “Aerol say you doin’ jus’ fine.” Aerol had been waiting at one of the sporting docks at the end of the spindle, near the weightless axis. To reach it, Case had taken an elevator down to the hull and ridden a miniature induction train. As the diameter of the spindle narrowed, gravity decreased; somewhere above him, he’d decided, would be the mountains Molly climbed, the bicycle loop, launching gear for the hang gliders and miniature microlights.
Aerol had ferried him out to Marcus Garvey in a skeletal scooter frame with a chemical engine.
“Two hour ago,” Maelcum said, “I take delivery of Babylon goods for you; nice Japan-boy inna yacht, mos’ pretty yacht.”
Free of the suit, Case pulled himself gingerly over the Hosaka and fumbled into the straps of the web. “Well,” he said, “let’s see it.”
Maelcum produced a white lump of foam slightly smaller than Case’s head, fished a pearl-handled switchblade on a green nylon lanyard out of the hip pocket of his tattered shorts, and carefully slit the plastic. He extracted a rectangular object and passed it to Case. “Thas part some gun, mon?”
“No,” Case said, turning it over, “but it’s a weapon. It’s virus.”
“Not on this boy tug, mon,” Maelcum said firmly, reaching for the steel cassette.
“A program. Virus program. Can’t get into you, can’t even get into your software. I’ve got to interface it through the deck, before it can work on anything.”
“Well, Japan-mon, he says Hosaka here’ll tell you every what an’ wherefore, you wanna know.”
“Okay. Well, you leave me to it, okay?”
Maelcum kicked off and drifted past the pilot console, busying himself with a caulk gun. Case hastily looked away from the waving fronds of transparent caulk. He wasn’t sure why, but something about them brought back the nausea of SAS.
“What is this thing?” he asked the Hosaka. “Parcel for me.”
“Data transfer from Bockris Systems GmbH, Frankfurt, advises,