Hyperthought (5 page)

I found out about that movie because Jin got into a public shouting match with his father over it. I watched the archived video of their argument three times—and I observed something really strange. Jin’s words had actually been censored! Some of the things he said about the movie didn’t come through on the sound track. Preter-weird. This intrigued me, so next I searched every Jin Sura fan site, ezine archive and chat thread I could think of to discover what that banned movie was all about. Rien. Nothing. Not a single reference. I couldn’t even find the title. Jin’s father must have deployed a mega-slick creepy-crawler program to censor the Net that pervasively. It made me wonder.

Most of Jin’s archived interviews were typical ezine trash—dippy hosts asking cliché questions and Jin answering with glib one-liners. But one segment I liked. The dim-witted host asked Jin about the meaning of life, and instead of playing it smug, Jin answered in that precise, animated tone that reminded me of a professor.

“I’ve been reading about corals,” he said. “Centuries ago, small delicate animals lived in colonies under the sea. The young corals budded from the deposits of the old, and though each individual grew only a few millimeters long, the living and dead together built vast, intricate reefs of staggering beauty. Over time, their structures grew so large they created whole islands where many other creatures could live.”

“Meta-cool,” the host prattled. “Sounds like the mold in my refrigerator.”

Jin ignored that remark and continued evenly. “In a way, the corals achieved immortality. Their dead bodies fed their living ones, transforming death into life, and the shapes each individual left behind remained forever a part of the reef’s branching pattern. Some of the reefs still exist as fossils even now. The interesting question is whether the corals exercised free choice in the shapes they created. It would be comforting to believe so.”

The host bleated some forgettable quip, but I didn’t hear it. Jin’s answer stayed with me. D’accord, I had to think about those corals.

My browsing turned up reports about Jin’s father as well. Lord Suradon Sura, the chief of Pacific.Com. As a young man, Suradon had single-handedly set his Javanese house at the top of the Pacific.Com power structure—and left resentments in his wake. The proud old families of mainland Asia disliked answering to a brown-skinned, round-eyed Islander. In concession, or maybe in snide mockery, Suradon had had his eyelids cosmetically altered to assume the epicanthic fold. I figured a man like that had to be cynical and ruthless, but the archive photos always showed him smiling. He looked positively jolly. Apparently, something about the world really tickled Lord Suradon. I stored these bits of trivia at the back of my mind—who knows why?

Even as I wasted my days in depositions and lawsuits, the Net sang with rumors of insurgency. Rebels in the northern cities. Secret arrests. Hints of barbarism. Just as the year was ending, Jin and I met unexpectedly at an airport in Godthaab. Already, Euro had grown restive with checkpoints and curfews, but Greenland.Com’s capitol remained pristine, sterile in its opulence, too well policed for any unpleasantness to occur.

Luc and I were herding weary clients through a private gate. We had just returned from a six-day/five-night adventure in the open Arctic Sea. My chalk white hair was matted to my skull. I hadn’t showered, and ray temper was brittle. This trip had been more than usually fatiguing.

And mere stood Jin, holding a jacket in his hand. “La Sauvage. Well, well.” His whole bearing radiated glamour. Cinnamon tan. Slim, muscular elegance. Stylish clothes. He crossed his arms and looked me up and down. “The wild one returns from battle, wounded but unyielding.”

I was wearing grimy shorts, and my bare knees were scraped raw. A tussle with a submarine tiller in high seas had thrown me against a bulkhead. No big deal. I hadn’t bothered with bandages. Suddenly, those scrapes made me feel like a juvenile.

“Your cranium doesn’t look any bigger,” I challenged, scowling to cover my embarrassment “No brain enhancement? I expected bulging eyes at least.”

“Miracles occur in their own time, pretty Jolie.” He smiled with those perfect movie star teeth. He seemed genuinely pleased to see me. “You’re just getting in? Let’s have dinner. Don’t tell me you’re tired. I won’t believe you.”

Considering our previous encounter, you may ask if I thought twice before accepting his invitation. Sure I did. I bought a quick shower and had my eyelashes done and spent way too much on a dress in one of the airport shops. I was ready in half an hour.

At first, Jin couldn’t decide what sort of food he wanted. He asked me what I liked, and we surfed the local Net, browsing dozens of menus. Even so, we buzzed past five different restaurants, and he kept discussing cuisine. I began to note a trend. Gorgeous, charming, polished, Jin was certainly all that, but the man had a serious problem making up his mind. Me, I was hungry. My stomach was growling.

We ended up at some posh watering hole in one of those white-terraced buildings overlooking Godthaab’s central shopping plaza. Artificial trees swayed in artificial breezes, and lights twinkled in overhead holograms, suggesting a starry sky. The cyberservants were designed to appear human. We drank wine made from real hothouse grapes—the first I’d ever tasted. Is there any wonder it went to my head? Jin asked about my latest trip, and he listened to my answers. He really seemed to be glad of my company. Besides, he was so preter-good-looking. I could not pretend indifference.

That night, he was full of nervous energy. He’d just returned from his latest visit to Merida’s clinic, and I could tell he needed to talk about it. He tried to sound glib. Merida, he said, was an aging flirt with dyed-black curls who kept bumping against him and lying through her teeth. Jin mimicked her bawdy come-ons to perfection. Even though I liked Dr. M., I couldn’t help but laugh.

He said Merida had located her “neuroscience institute” in an underwater slum. She always was one to pinch a penny. Somehow she’d found dirt-cheap real estate in the ruins of a flooded city offshore from modern Frisco. He explained how, years back, tectonic activity had thrust the whole coastline deep underwater, and the friction of plates rubbing together had given birth to a trio of undersea volcanoes. Her clinic’s thick pressurized windows looked out on deep-ocean gloom and intermittent red lightning. Jin said the garish effect suited Merida’s place to a T.

He paused while the cyberservants brought our dinners. I’d never seen edibles so daintily arranged on a plate. After they’d gone, Jin told me about Boren, one of the inmates. It turned out all of Merida’s patients were brain-damaged California protes whose health care was subsidized by Nome.Com. California was a protectorate of Nome.Com, and the subsidies were Merida’s bread and butter. Jin said the protes received basic life support and experimental cures. Sometimes the cures worked.

Merida had implanted a molecule-sized nanomachine in Boren’s parietal cortex. On the day Jin met him, Boren declared that he could hear himself think—that the sound was mincing and painful, and that he wanted to make it stop. The two of them shared an enlightening conversation.

Jin had a way of turning the whole episode into a farce, but his stories unsettled me. I’d never imagined Dr. M. in such a sinister light before. Jin’s silver knife and fork flashed candlelight as he narrated with urbane wit. But the look in his liquid black eyes told me he wasn’t really amused. He didn’t tell me everything. I saw his eyelid quiver.

That’s when I noticed a pair of tiny brown scars, like a set of parentheses, centered above his eyebrows. Two pale brown incisions no larger than my fingernail. They frightened me. I said, “Surely you’re not going back to that place.”

He took a bite of his seared plankton steak and didn’t answer.

“What are those scars above your eyebrows, Jin?”

His laughter sounded forced. “We’ve implanted some nanobots, pretty pet Don’t worry. They’re just surveyors. They’re designed to measure and map my cerebral energy fields. It’s the first step.”

“Sacrée Loi! What have you done?”

I think my words came out a shriek. He had let Dr. Merida cut his brain? Dr. M, the con artist? The barroom flirt? I couldn’t for the life of me picture little Merida as a real doctor. Certainly not a neurosurgeon. She had never behaved the least bit like a scientist. All I’d ever seen her do was try to run scams on my clients—usually without success. And Jin Sura had actually put himself under her knife?

My kind feelings for the woman evaporated. I’d been naive. I had never imagined Dr. M. capable of real harm. I knew she was after money, but now I saw my charming little Mend in a new light. Merida was not just a fraud—she was dangerous. What injury might her quack experiments do to this vibrant young man? Unbelievable, that Jin Sura would risk his very sanity to such doubtful hands. None of his explanations made sense.

When he lifted his crystal wineglass, I saw his hand tremble. “My father has agreed to underwrite a new line of research. Judith and I are partners.”

“Your father? I thought you didn’t like your father. What new line of research?”

“They’re calling it Hyperthought. He thinks he’ll make another fortune. Father knows an opportunity when he sees one.”

“What opportunity?” I leaned closer to examine those incisions in his forehead.

We ordered another liter of wine and drank it all, but I could not get Jin to answer plainly. He talked about waking up his brain so he could choose the right course of action. I thought he laughed too much. At times, he seemed manic.

“Which would you rather have, Jolie—peace or freedom? We don’t even know if we have a choice! But soon I’ll know. Soon I’ll understand what I’m supposed to do with my life. I’m going to know everything!”

Sometimes he spoke so loudly, the other patrons turned to stare. I felt growing alarm for his state of mind. People around us were whispering. Even the cyberservants kept away. When he overturned his wine, I reached across the tablecloth and caught both his hands. His skin felt feverish. By degrees he calmed down, then grew sad. Finally, he spoke in a husky whisper, “Father expects me to fail. But he’s wrong, Jolie. He’ll see.”

“But Jin,” I said, “letting Merida dice up your brain is unzipped. How can your father go for this?”

Jin tossed his head arrogantly. A sudden rancor burned in his eyes. “My father approves. That’s all.” He glanced at our half-eaten dinners and signaled a waiter. “Pet, this place is dreary. Let’s find some music.”

I awoke the next morning in Jin’s arms. We had consumed untold amounts of wine, and in my residual intoxicated haze, everything seemed golden. Jin’s hotel room. Dazzling sun through the skylight Satin pillows on the burnished brass bed. Jin’s body. His arms and legs enveloped me in moist, salty warmth. I felt content Protected. Utterly complete. I didn’t want to move from the shelter of his embrace, not ever. Still, some part of me knew this was just female hormones urging me to bond. I knew Jin wouldn’t feel the same. He’d slept with me on a whim. Any moment he would wake up and break the spell.

“Mmm,” he murmured, moving against me. I stiffened and turned away, preparing for the break. But he moved closer. His tongue touched my ear. His chest slid firm and slick against my back, and his loins pressed my buttocks. We made love again, and slept and when we woke much later, the sunlight had turned lavender.

“Want to see something extraordinary?” He was munching sporebread and marmalade, dropping crumbs among the satin sheets. We were sitting naked, cross-legged in the unmade bed, facing each other across a breakfast tray. He seemed much calmer.

I said, “Sure.”

He leaned back and touched a key in a small hidden console. All at once, the six walls of our hotel room began to flicker with static electricity. I realized they were flat-panel displays. Slowly, the beige panels transformed into scenes viewed through windows. We seemed to be gazing from a lofty tower at the pale white surface of Godthaab—sans the smog. The details were much clearer than in real life.

“What is this, metavision? It’s preter-strange.” I stood up and twirled around in the bed to see it all.

“It’s a live transmission from the surface. Watch, don’t overturn the tea!”

He laughed and grabbed the pot when I jumped up and down on the springy mattress. I didn’t care about the tea. The view was fantastic. Surface Godthaab was not a wild place—it was an engineer’s dream of order. I’d seen it before, though not from this angle, and never this clearly. Paved runways alternated with long straight rows of surface equipment—communication towers, air exchange compressors, photovoltaic arrays. Everything had been spray-coated white—that was Greenland’s style. I could see drogue machines and surfsuited workers moving sluggishly among the equipment. Dominating the landscape, three vast domes swelled like glistening jellies.

“Plenty cool!” I spun around, enchanted. But then I noticed the angle of the sunlight. Late afternoon. Much later than I thought. I sat back down and wiped my oily fingers on the hotel napkin and kicked the silver tray aside with my toes. If possible, I wanted to end this little affair on my own terms. “Sir Jin, my next trip starts in two days. I have to find Luc. This has been fun, but us common folk have to work.”

Jin caught me in the crook of his elbow and pulled me to his chest “La Sauvage, the practical lady of business. Break your schedule for once. I’m not finished with you.”

The truth is, I adored being with him. I knew this would be our only time. So I fought my battle with dignity for about two seconds, then threw my arms around his neck. Weak behavior, I knew it even then. But my gut still ached with that damned female urge to cling. I hugged him close and felt the sadness welling up. In the hotel’s synthetic view, the white domes of surface Godthaab seemed to stretch to infinity.

Jin pointed past my shoulder toward the southwest “California,” he said. “I’m flying out tonight.”

The words filled me with dread. How quickly I’d begun to hate Judith Merida. “Jin, you should never go back there.”

He laughed at me. “Judith’s going to activate my latent senses. Humans have more than five. Oh, believe me, we do. We receive input at the quantum level. But in our overreliance on consciousness, we deny it or fail to understand it. Egotism, really. The fatal flaw of Homo sapiens. We trust conscious perception far too much.”