Tears in Rain Part 30

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CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO.

Bruna opened her eyes and confronted Yiannis's face an inch from her own, shouting and gesticulating anxiously.

"For heaven's sake!" she exclaimed, sitting upright.

A wave of unsteadiness rocked her world. The room shook, her head ached, her stomach turned somersaults. Her body reminded her-before her mind did-that once again she had had too much to drink the night before. The archivist's shape was flapping frantically around the room like a trapped sparrow. It was a d.a.m.ned holo-call.

"Yiannis, that's it. I'm canceling your holograph authorization right now," groaned the rep, steadying her head with her hands.

"They've fired me! It's a conspiracy! And I can't get into the archive! I tried to let you know last night but you weren't answering."

True enough. She had a clear recollection of refusing calls. She'd arrived home, tired and depressed, and started to drink. At other times she drank because she was happy and relaxed. Or then again, because she was distressed. She was always finding reasons to get drunk. Looking back, her short life was composed of a succession of nights she could scarcely remember and countless mornings whose unpleasant beginnings she remembered all too well.

"Let me see...calm down and explain it to me again. Slowly. As if I were a b.i.+.c.ho and didn't understand your language very well."

Yiannis began to rush through the story of his conversation with the supervisor.

"Okay, okay, I see. Look, it would be better if I came over to your place. I'll be there in under an hour," said Bruna.

And she switched off, cutting the old man off midsentence.

Four years, three months, and twelve days.

She breathed in and stood up.

Nausea and dizziness.

She decided to give herself another paramorphine injection. It wasn't the best way to get rid of a hangover; it was like killing flies with a plasma gun or cutting off a hand because of a sore finger. But she knew she would feel better instantly if she did, and these times were so unsettled that it seemed wiser to go outside with all her wits about her. Anyway, her ribs were still hurting a bit, she rationalized, in an attempt to exonerate herself as she injected the dose. One more to go. A pity.

She looked at herself in the mirror. She had slept in her clothes again and they were all wrinkled and crumpled. She was still wearing the genuine netsuke from her fake mother around her neck. She decided to leave it on; she felt she needed its company. Or its protection.

The outside thermometer was showing fifty-seven degrees; the polar crisis was over. She had a brief shower with water, chose a metallic green outfit from her closet, and got dressed, now feeling really well, rested, and alert. And hungry, too. She headed for the kitchen area to prepare herself something and then she saw it-the puzzle was finished! Solved. She looked at it in amazement, and in among the shreds of fog that were blotting out the previous evening, she seemed to see herself placing the pieces. She must have been working on the jigsaw puzzle until all hours, and with extraordinary luck or superhuman determination. The image of the cosmos was complete and in the center, in the critical section that had previously been missing and had resisted her efforts for months, could now be seen the Helix planetary nebula, that spectacular gaseous object located in the constellation Aquarius that astronomers referred to as the "Eye of G.o.d." The Helix, of course, thought Bruna, almost disappointed at how obvious it was. How had she managed not to guess? The Helix was the most famous cosmic accident and there were even a couple of crazy sects that believed it was sacred. The final piece of the puzzle had triggered a small 3-D effect and the image seemed to vibrate and pulse with the vastness of s.p.a.ce. A beautiful eye trimmed with filmy, reddish eyelashes and with an intensely blue iris; a giant eye looking at her. What I do shows me what I am seeking. She was seeking the Helix nebula; she was seeking something obvious, and she hadn't realized it. And she had had to get drunk and lose consciousness-she had had to allow herself to be guided by sheer intuition-in order to finish the jigsaw puzzle. The Eye of G.o.d. The lovely, cold, and indifferent eye that observes us.

After quickly eating some turkey-flavored protein burgers, she put the junky plasma gun in her backpack, convinced that the outside world was going to be somewhat more unpleasant than it had been the previous day, and headed out. And the good weather indeed seemed to have added fuel to the fire of hatred. Groups of demonstrators surrounded by police cordons were yelling out slogans that Bruna couldn't catch, while the public screens above her head were spewing forth torrents of violence. There were overturned cars, broken store windows, burning recycle containers. As she pa.s.sed through the lung-park, she saw that several of the delicate artificial trees had been shredded and uprooted. Street intersections had been taken over by the army, and Bruna had to show her ID at two security control stations. She was worried she'd be frisked and they'd find her gun, but luckily that didn't happen. She was really on edge by the time she reached Yiannis's house.

The archivist's apartment was as old-fas.h.i.+oned as he was. It was a beautiful building, about three centuries old, which had survived various wars without excessive damage but was badly in need of refurbishment. The apartment had dark little corridors, useless rooms, and an incomprehensible number of bathrooms. Yiannis lived his entire life within the two main rooms, one converted into a living room and the other a bedroom, but he used the rest of the apartment to store the incredible amount of junk he kept, including an astonis.h.i.+ng quant.i.ty of old, valuable paper books. Bruna had lived in one of those book-lined rooms for some months after Merlin's death. Yiannis the human had taken care of her in the same way that the techno Maitena had looked after Lizard. But now relations between the species were decaying.

No sooner had she gone through the door than Bruna noticed something new: the little table in the entrance hall that was normally a mess had been cleared and the sole object on display was a blue jug with three yellow tulips. Natural flowers! The rep was stunned.

"Look at that. You've tidied the table."

"Hmmm..." replied the old man ambiguously, making a vague gesture with his hand.

They walked down the hall and into the lounge, and there she was, smiling demurely. Bruna had trouble recognizing her initially, as she wasn't wrapped up inside her billboard-lady panels.

"Hi, Bruna. I'm so pleased to see you," said RoyRoy enthusiastically.

"Me too," replied the rep automatically. "Although I'm a bit surprised to see you here. Have you left Texaco-Repsol?"

The woman looked at Yiannis with a slightly embarra.s.sed expression.

"Well, I've...I've helped her to free herself of that slave labor. Let's just say I've bought her her freedom!" replied the archivist on her behalf.

And then he laughed nervously at his own words.

"I mean, I've lent her money until she can find something better, and till then, she's...she's living here with me."

"Oh, good. Right. Terrific," said Bruna.

"Yiannis is very generous. But you already know that," added RoyRoy.

Yes, the android knew it. The archivist wasn't doing any more for the billboard-lady than he had done for her. Moreover, Yiannis looked...excited about RoyRoy. And she looked different too. Younger. More sure of herself. It was enough to make the rep happy for her friend. Bruna dropped down into the old, green armchair. Yiannis sat down on the sofa next to the woman. They made a sweet little couple.

"Not at all. RoyRoy is the generous one. You wouldn't believe what a support she's been in all this. Lucky she was here last night. As I'm sure you'll understand, I came back from the interview with the supervisor totally devastated."

"Yes, of course."

The woman couldn't have been in Yiannis's home more than two or three days, but there were traces of her everywhere. The furniture was arranged differently and the bookshelves were tidy. The screen showed successive images of Yiannis's child and of an adolescent whom Bruna took to be RoyRoy's son. Oh yes, the perfect couple, and intimately united by the wors.h.i.+p of their dead. She bit her lip, recognizing that her thoughts were unkind.

"So tell me exactly what that woman said to you yesterday, then," she muttered.

Why was she so irritated? Why wasn't she pleased that the old man had fallen in love? Hadn't she felt that Yiannis was pus.h.i.+ng her to hold on too tightly to the pain of Merlin's loss? And wasn't it better that he had found another, closer sorrow with which he could identify? The archivist was telling his tale, but Bruna was unable to concentrate on what he was saying. She saw Yiannis and RoyRoy sitting there, sitting together, humans, similar, much older than her, but even then probably longer-living. She saw them together while she was alone, hopelessly strange even among the strange.

The screen switched on automatically with a breaking news bulletin. An image appeared of Helen Six, the journalist currently in vogue, with such a tragic expression on her face that Yiannis stopped talking and the three of them started to listen to the news. And that was when they discovered that Hericio was dead.

He had been a.s.sa.s.sinated the day before. Not only had he been killed, but he had also been tortured. Someone had slit his stomach from top to bottom and then removed his intestines while he was still alive. It had been a horrific crime.

Just like Chi's hologram, Bruna thought immediately, despite being sunk in a sort of stupor. Yiannis looked at her.

"But didn't you tell me yesterday that you were going to see him?"

RoyRoy gave a start, opened her eyes wide and covered her cheeks with her hands.

"Bruna! What have you done?" she wailed.

"Meee?!" the rep spat out, outraged.

Then something very odd happened. The archivist raised his hand in the air as if he were going to say something, then brought it to his throat and slowly collapsed on his side.

"Yiannis!" gasped RoyRoy, leaning toward him and then also toppling over.

Bruna leaped from her chair and rushed to the two inert bodies. Small yellow bubbles were coming out of RoyRoy's mouth. Then Bruna noticed the smell, a subtle smell of danger. There was something in the air, a chemical threat. She held her breath but it was already too late. She noticed that her legs were getting heavy, and her body was no longer holding her upright. She fell to the floor, but she wouldn't give in. With an enormous effort, and a.s.sisted by her extraordinary strength, she painfully dragged herself on all fours toward the window. She had to get there; she had to open it. She focused mentally on the distance she needed to cover. But she was moving very slowly and she wouldn't be able to go on holding her breath much longer. She was only halfway there when a reflex reaction made her swallow a mouthful of air. She felt it filling her lungs deliciously, liberating her from the agonizing suffocation, and she also noted how it was poisoning her. It was like a sudden misting over her eyes. And then darkness and nothingness.

CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE.

Bruna opened her eyes. The house was buzzing and shaking. Liquid shadows looked as if they were chasing one another across the ceiling. It took her a few moments to understand that the noise was being caused by the sky-trams pa.s.sing right in front of the window. Of her window. Another one went by. Again the noise and the fluttering of the shadows. Bruna breathed deeply as anguish overwhelmed her. She knew what she had to do, and it was terrible.

She looked at the clock: Monday January 31, 2109, 09:30. She had to get a move on. Four years, three months, and eleven days. Four years, three months, and eleven days? What did that mean? Why had that temporal computation suddenly popped into her head? She got out of bed with a deep sense of unease. She was dressed. Better: more time saved. She felt dizzy, confused. A patina of unreality seemed to cover everything, as if life were skimming over every surface. She didn't recognize her house, for example. She knew it was her house but she couldn't quite remember it. That, however, was unimportant. What was important, urgent, frightening, was the mission she had to carry out in order to save little Gummy from his terrible fate. That was all too clear. Her mission and the child's predicament stood out above the general unreality of her surroundings like the fixed, detailed image of a horse running across a hazy background. Those were the only things she needed to do. Those were the only things she needed to know.

The belt was on the table, unfolded and displayed as if it were a jewel. And next to it, a small hologram of Gummy. The child was roaring with laughter, his little screwed-up eyes sparkling, his chubby cheeks smooth. He was two and a half. Bruna remembered herself kissing that new skin-that sweet, delicious flesh-and hot tears of fear and pain began to run down her cheeks. She swatted them away with her hand, as if she were killing an insect and then, with an enormous act of self-control, put on the belt. She was well aware of how it worked: first, she had to deactivate the safety switch, and then she had to press the touch-sensitive membrane for at least twenty seconds. When she lifted her fingers, the tiny ampoules would open, allowing the lethal gas to escape. At least it would be a quick death: less than a minute before she suffocated. Nothing like what they had promised to do to Gummy if she didn't keep her side of the bargain. An interminable, s.a.d.i.s.tic death. Bruna suppressed her retching. Stay calm, she implored herself. She had to concentrate. The deafening clamor of another tram spurred her to action. She was to release the content of the ampoules in the main sky-tram interchange to take advantage of the large number of people and the enclosed s.p.a.ce. It was located four blocks away. She switched off the holograph ball and put it in her pocket. She was heading out when she realized she wasn't wearing her mobile. How strange. She glanced around but couldn't see it. She searched for it more carefully: among the wrinkled sheets, in the bathroom, on the floor. Her mobile wasn't anywhere.

"Screen, locate my mobile."

There was no response. She looked at the screen; it was a very old model. She tried switching to manual and tapped a number. The computer wouldn't make the call. How odd. The feeling of unreality grew, an unreality buzzing around her like a swarm of flies. Then Gummy's face lit up inside her head again with icy clarity. What did it matter whether or not she had her mobile? She was going to die in a few minutes.

And yet...

Four years, three months, and eleven days. Again, that absurd mantra flashed through her mind. The elevator had an "Out of Order" sign on it, so Bruna walked down the filthy stairs, feeling she was carrying a stone in her heart, an ever heavier weight that was slowing down her steps. The number she'd tried to call with her computer was Paul Lizard's. So who was Paul Lizard? An acquaintance, maybe a friend. Lizard's name emerged from all the confusion like a secure harbor in a stormy sea. A corner of light in the icy shadows. Someone who might possibly help her? With each step down, Bruna felt more torn between the need to accomplish her mission and the horror that the killing inspired in her. But she couldn't avoid it. She had to do it.

And yet...

She reached the ground floor and noticed that the building was a sort of apartment-hotel. How strange that she didn't remember. In the damp, dark lobby there was a small counter and an electronic screen that displayed the prices. The light was on, but there was no one there. Suddenly, Bruna's feet propelled her to the counter. She looked at the small screen and saw that it was active. She keyed in Lizard's number before she realized what she was doing. The policeman's face appeared instantly. Because he was a policeman. Bruna gave a start as she remembered this and, at the same time, the mere sight of the man's features made her want to cry with relief.

"Bruna! Where the devil are you?" shouted Lizard.

"I'm...at home," she stammered.

"You're not at home because I'm at your place! Bruna, what's going on? You're disconnected. What's wrong with your mobile? I know about Yiannis and RoyRoy."

Yiannis and RoyRoy. The names generated concentric waves in her clouded mind, like stones falling into muddy water. She began to hear a m.u.f.fled buzzing in her ears.

"I have to go. I have to do something terrible," she moaned.

"Wait! Bruna, what are you saying? What's happening?"