Platinum donkeys, p.17
Platinum Donkeys, page 17
Maggie cut him off. "Hey! What is this about you trying to take over Megasat?"
Delano looked at her, then at Simon, then his eyes split to point at them both. "Simon, I insist on being present when you discuss financial matters."
"She has questions, Delano. Apparently you didn't sate her curiosity."
"Ah. Hmn." He smiled at Maggie, throwing his arms wide. "I'm merely representing your interests, my dear. You've been a ward of the corporation for so long, I wanted to become your new guardian."
"What bullshit are you talking about? I don't need a guardian."
Simon raised his hand, as if to try and calm her. "You're non compus mentis. Legally, you need a guardian."
"And let's be honest," said Bailey, stroking his mustache with one finger, "You fall somewhere between a 'public hazard' and a 'natural catastrophe'."
Maggie turned on him. "Aren't you supposed to be helping?"
"Oh, no. I'm just an observer."
"We've been contesting the Megasat corporation's custody agreement. I've tried arguing your status should be normalized...but considering the recent killings, I think that approach will fail. Best we can do is make Van Hoogan industries your new guardian."
"One corporation, the other corporation, what does it matter?" said Delano. He tried to put his hands on Maggie's shoulders, but she backed away. "Nothing will change for you, dear lady. We're just shifting numbers on a balance sheet."
"Yeah, right. Do you really think Mega will stand for this?"
All the men who were readying for their chance to speak—which apparently included all of them—caught their breath. The pause lasted long enough for Simon to blink, rattle his head, and say, "Pardon?"
The buzzing sound behind Maggie's head grew louder. "Mega owns Megasat. I get an allowance. I don't own anything. He's not going to let you take the satellite, or me, without a fight."
There was another second's pause, while Bailey and Simon looked at each other, and Delano's cross eyes shifted between them both. "Maggie," said Simon in slow, soft tones, "Mega is dead."
It was her turn to stop breathing. She put her hands on her ears, to stop the buzzing from pounding into her skull. "No. That's not true."
"He died five years ago. That's when they declared you not of sound mind."
Bailey coughed into his glove. "With cause, I think."
"Oh, god. I should have known she would do this. I should have noticed—"
"No. No, no no..."
—when the police at the airport were arguing, and she tuned them out, they were saying, "Her legal guardian was Mega, and he's dead. If you're not a representative of the Megasat corporation, why should you be allowed to act as custodian?"
But Simon had an answer for that, he always did—
Fucking Delano beamed at her. "But don't you see? You were Mega's heir—"
"No!" she screamed, "Shut up! No!"
—"That may have been part of it," said Simon, but Maggie stopped listening. She paced around Leah's lab, looking for something sharp, as he continued. "They might also have used the drugs to prevent you from taking control of the corporation when Mega died..."
"—you own everything. Megasat, the corporation, it's all in your name."
She backed up against the corner of the bed, shaking her head with her hands clapped around her ears. But even through that, even through her sobbing, she could hear them and she could hear the damned buzzing. "No! I don't want it, I don't..."
"What do you want, Maggie?"
"I wa—I wa—", she said, unable to keep a breath. "I want my DADDY!"
And with that painful cry, she collapsed onto the floor, curling up and rocking on her knees. Simon was at her side in an instant. She shrank away, shivering, wailing—
—and then something snapped.
In one fluid motion she stood back up, into a balanced pose. Simon was knocked back by the sudden movement.
Her need to cry was gone. She raised her head, threw her shoulders back. She felt powerful. Statuesque. Her skin seemed radiant, as if spotlit, as if a studio of cameras were on her and the ratings were scrolling up. With a smooth, predatory stare she surveyed the room. The men that surrounded her had changed. They were an audience to tame, they were eyeballs to enslave. They were meat.
Simon crawled backwards to Fianna's side. "Bailey?"
"Something odd there," the butler said. "Not a schizoid break, I don't think. Dissociative in some way, though."
She glared at him. "Shut up, Montana." He withered, stepping back against the wall.
With a step and a turn, she faced Simon, who had put his plastic tart between them. "You want to fuck Megasat? I'll give you names and embarrassing details. Do you know how many parties I've attended with corporate suits? I know what kind of blackmail to cram between their cheeks." She pointed and scowled, and the poor man clutched at his chest. "But you work to get me free, you understand? No criminal charges, no guardians, none of this proxy bullshit. You got me?"
"Y-yes. I'll do what I can."
"Good." Movement in the doorway caught her eye. Some of the guests were sidling out of the room, while other, hardier donkeys shoved their way in to see the show. Delano had a hand raised as if to stop them, while one eye stayed on her. She advanced on him.
"As for you, you cocksucking Cassandra," she said, jabbing her finger into his chest, inching him backward. "Keep your goddamn, shitgrubbing badger paws off me and mine. You don't touch my company, you don't touch my satellite, and you don't touch me. And if your Twat-Eating Momma hurts one of my fans—" Stepping close enough to press against him, Maggie reached for Delano's crotch. She found the bulges there and squeezed them with all her might. "Just one out of four billion, I will bury you deeper than you've ever been. No, I won't leave enough of you to bury. Got it?"
Delano focused two eyes on her with a placid stare, despite the vice grip she had on his testicles. "Certainly," he said.
She gave another crushing squeeze—getting no reaction—and then pushed him aside. The audience at the door suddenly decided to leave the show. She walked out through them, as they stood with their backs pressed against the walls of the corridor.
One in a purple dress, furthest from the doorway, cackled as she passed. "Feeling good, psycho?", asked Leah.
"Fuck off, bitch," Maggie said, stalking past. She mounted the stairs as if it were a coronation, and gouged her fingernails into the cherry banister as she climbed.
After she had gone up a floor, she felt the audience drop away. Nobody was left to carve a path through. No reason for the cameras to be on. But she maintained her poised thespian walk and her practiced, feral grin.
Pretend they're still watching. Pretend that you're in control.
As she reached the third floor, as she headed toward her room, the buzzing began again. She tried to ignore it. Just a technical glitch, a stagehand fucking around on the job. She pretended not to hear it.
It's easy to pretend. Pretend the cameras are on. Pretend they're all following your script. Pretend that you're in charge, that you've always been in charge.
She got to her room, slammed shut the door. Walked to the balcony door and slammed that shut too.
Pretend your Daddy's still alive.
She felt the collapse before it took hold. She leaned against the wall, clutching the curtains, as strength drained from her limbs. Her body began to shake, on cue with her ragged sobs, as the buzzing grew louder.
Maggie turned around and watched the door not open.
A pretend door opened, superimposed on the real bedroom door. She watched, half-lucid, as pretend camera bots flew in through the pretend doorway. Control strips snaked onto her walls, stilt-legged servants carted in trays of liquor and knives, a unicorn pranced in with its foreleg gears grinding, and every single one of them vanished when they were no longer in her immediate vision.
Then he walked in, through the open doorway that wasn't there.
He wore a plain work shirt, a businessman's slacks, and a kind smile. His rounded eyes looked at her with love, but his hands dangled uselessly at his sides. His hair was the same blonde as hers, something she had never noticed before.
With a hoarse whisper, she asked, "You're not Mega, are you?"
He smiled again, yet his face was sad. His eyes were in pain, yet full of love. I'm pretending all of those expressions. Which of them did I actually see?
"You're my real father. That's how you looked, just before mom—" She caught herself. His expression didn't change, it never would again. She couldn't imagine it doing anything except stare, and stand, and open its mouth to speak.
"You're a very special girl," the apparition said.
On the last word Maggie blinked, or thought she had, so that for an instant she saw neither the vision nor the reality. When her eyes opened again her father and his entourage was gone. The bedroom door was shut.
Something was still buzzing.
She spun around, looking into the high corners of the room for an errant camera or—she hoped—some insect. It didn't sound like a camerabot. The buzzing modulated, almost like human speech, if through a tinny speaker or from inside a metal box. She started searching the bed, throwing aside the lace-bordered satin sheets, because the noise seemed to be coming from there. A random glance solved the mystery. At the foot of the bed, the copper box containing her governor was vibrating enough that it was jiggling across the hope chest.
Gritting her teeth she grabbed the thing and ran to the balcony door. But she stopped with her hand on the latch. The buzzing was distorted speech, but not the governor's computerized monotone. The voice seemed human, and warm. And it was female.
Maggie opened the case.
"Maggie!" the governor said. It didn't try to shoot lasers into her eyes or otherwise get her attention. In fact, all the eyeline beads were dark. "Thank god you've answered. Please, you've got to listen, you're in terrible danger."
"Who the hell are you?" A chill crawled up Maggie's back. Is this real? How do I tell, when technology can do anything?
"My name is Lieutenant Susan Jones of Globalpol. We've been listening through the governor for you. We needed to warn you, you're in danger."
"Simon told me the governor couldn't work through the box."
"Simon doesn't know everything. Are you alone? Is there anyone in the building who you think might be dangerous?"
"Yes," Maggie said. Her shoulders slumped and the words started gushing out. "Every single fucking one of them is dangerous I'm in a house full of wackos and this Delano guy has—"
"Okay. Calm down," it said. "We can protect you. But you have to come under protective custody. You're not under arrest, if we wanted to do that we would have done it in Perth. Are you willing to come with us?"
"Yes," she said again, before she had thought about it. If she wasn't in trouble, the police needed to stop Delano. "But I don't know where I am. I'm in the mountains, somewhere."
"That's okay. Just walk out on your balcony."
Confused, Maggie paused for a moment before pulling the door open.
The sky was as blue as before, and the scenery as gorgeous. The sloping forest floor held small shrubs and exposed rocks, with a sprinkling of needles and leaves. A breeze ruffled across the treetops, making the pines sway. Maggie went to the railing. She began looking about for people, when she noticed the one pine tree that had stopped swaying and had started to fold up.
The lower branches of the tree bent upward, tucking neatly together against the thick trunk. Above that a set of branches twisted themselves together, their needles meshing into a solid weave and transmuting into a dull silver. The trunk flowed upward, leaving a slender, flexible support bracing the center of mass against the ground. The top branches, knitted into two flat silver blades, began to spin. They picked up speed, cutting through the tops of other trees nearby. The folded branches in the central part flowed like water and turned charcoal grey, with another, smaller rotor spinning to one side. The support snapped; the machine bobbled in the air, shifting to drop sled rails, form a doorway, and extrude stubby wings.
I didn't know they made mimic-metal helicopters, Maggie thought. Then she frowned. No, of course they don't. This isn't happening. I've lost it.
The copter rose above the treetops and flew closer, creating a new, powerful wind that was harsh with the smell of cut pine. Maggie looked up, trying to force herself to see the sun through the delusion's hull. It descended next to her balcony, buffeting her hair and making the railing quiver. An android of the same material as the hull leaned out of the cargo door, extending its hand.
This is it. If I lean over the balcony, I'll be reaching for an illusion. They'll find my body in the woods, and never know...
Someone shouted behind her. Maggie turned to see Simon, pushing Bailey aside as they charged through her bedroom door. Before they could reach her, before she could warn them away, a gray metal arm hooked around her waist. It lifted her up in a rush of wind that smelled of pine and ozone. The donkeys gathered on the balcony, watching her ascend, as they and the ground fell away.
Chapter 13—Ensemble Freeze
Interstitial
Delano rotated his snifter of brandy, staring at it—and also off into the distance, toward the treacherous blue sky.
"What will you do now?" asked Hwong. The man shadowed him so much and asked so many questions, Delano was worried he'd ask to be paid a salary.
"What I will do is never at issue. 'When' can be confusing. But my mind makes itself up, so I've already done what I must do."
Hwong's face was expressionless. Sometimes Delano could detect a slight tilt of his head by the way his fiber optic hair settled. This time he gave nothing but his typical, intent smile.
"I don't understand."
Delano put his snifter down, already knowing how the brandy would taste, and already knowing he would not drink enough to get drunk that afternoon. Maybe later in the evening. He could feel a comfortable buzz enveloping him, but it was yet hours away.
"My dear Bartholomew, did you know that my father owned the last diamond mines in Namibia?" He waited for the hesitant Asian to give a slight shake of his head. "He did, in fact. I remember visiting them as a boy. It was before fabber technology became commercially viable—the end of the diamond market was coming, but we were eking out all the profits we could.
"I remember one time I sat on an overlook above the main shaft, watching the men and those clumsy old machines. The sun was hot and I had a kheffiyeh, but I had taken off my headwrap because I had felt wind in my hair a few minutes earlier. I felt then that, some time later, something struck me on the face. My chin bled, and there were abrasions across my neck... It was unpleasant, of course, but I was accustomed to my foresight by then, and I took the injuries as a clear warning. I had been thinking of climbing down the cliff side to join the workers for lunch. Obviously, if I did that, I would slip and scrape myself on the rocks. So I decided to stay where I was.
"It was almost an hour later that my father's helicopter landed, on the flat overlook where I was sitting. It kicked up gravel from the escarpment, blew it around like a miniature dust storm. I put my hands up to shield my eyes, but bits of rock and sand embedded themselves in the wounds on my chin and neck—and I knew I had been a fool.
"My father got out of the helicopter and quizzed me about my injuries. He was teaching me to use the gift, just as his father taught him. I explained, and immediately afterward I felt his slap on my face, although he would not raise his hand for several minutes. I never have learned how he managed to time his punishments like that..."
He picked up the brandy snifter again, feeling that it was time for him to quaff what he had tasted minutes before. After a leisurely draught, he smiled at Hwong. "What angered my father was my cowardice. If I had wanted to climb down the cliff, that is what I should have done. The gift is not a warning, he told me. It is a verification. There is no logic in trying to evade one's senses. I must always commit to a course of action and engage, and damn the consequences, especially when they have already revealed themselves."
Hwong nodded, but the man's eyes were still puzzled. Delano waved at him to prevent the tedious questioning. "What I am saying is that I already know what I must do, because I felt myself do it hours ago. I felt the rush of excitement, the thrill of success—and, yes, a shadow of guilt. I felt it because it will happen, must happen, and thus I have no decision to make."
"Yes. But what will happen?"
Delano smiled, and with an adamant will he forced both of his eyes to focus on his sniveling companion. Hwong really was a dim bulb, as mad geniuses went. Once he had secured his empire, some program would have to be invented to weed out the low-watt donkeys. But for now he needed them. First he had to deal with traitors, and trollops, and threats to his immediate plans.
"I am trying to tell you, good fellow," he said, swirling his brandy again, already savoring the taste of his next sip. "That the deaths were on my head hours ago. I sent the command minutes ago, when my predestined course of action was clear."
He sipped the liquor, just as the taste left his tongue.
"What will happen now is that we will bask in our future victory."
It seeped into Maggie's brain, slowly, that the police helicopter was real. There was no other way to explain the detail: The uncomfortable spongy harness, the vista of the foothills below, and the strange, mimic-metal android that was her only companion. She tried asking it questions, but it shook its head and said nothing. The governor had fallen from her hand during her escape.
Escape? Abduction? She realized that it depended on her intentions, and she was too numb to sort them out.
Through a small window Maggie watched the terrain. They flew across rock-strewn woodlands, until the pine trees broke into gentle, grassy hills. A sparkling blue river twisted through the prairie in almost random loops. The copter flew low enough that Maggie thought she saw a massive herd of animals. They appeared as a wide brown swath, speckled throughout the grassland, that shifted its boundaries like an amoeba.
