Tears in Rain Part 19

"And how did they reply?"

"They haven't replied yet."

"You don't say."

That was alarming indeed. Mercenaries, spontaneous demonstrations that appeared to be carefully organized, the collusion of the news media...and now the archive as well. So many fronts at once. It was like a dance, a sinister, well-rehea.r.s.ed dance. On her way to Oli's bar, Bruna had noticed the public screens: nine out of every ten messages were diatribes against reps, with varying levels of anger and intransigence. Some of the comments were so violent that even a month ago, they would have been censored by the Department of Harmonious Coexistence. She recalled a couple of poisonous statements, and the bile rose in her throat. She had to make a real effort to reflect calmly, and she looked at Yiannis and Oli to prevent herself from being swamped with hatred for humans. The rep was well aware, moreover, that the public screens, despite their name, were not at all public; citizens had to pay a monthly fee if they wanted to upload their pictures and messages. It was a private company, easily controlled and manipulated. A company that anyone could hire and use to launch a poisonous campaign. Bruna couldn't believe-didn't want to believe-that nine out of every ten humans wanted to destroy her.

"And another thing: they killed one of RoyRoy's sons," added Yiannis.

"The supremacists?" asked the detective, appalled.

"What have the supremacists got to do with this?" replied the archivist, mystified.

Yiannis and Bruna looked at each other in confused silence for a few seconds. How can you have faith in communication between the species if friends can't even understand each other? thought the android with misgiving.

"No, no, Bruna, forgive me, it has nothing to do with what we were talking about before. What I meant was that RoyRoy has also lost a son."

Also? She realized he was revealing a personal matter.

"A sixteen-year-old boy. He was shot by mistake during a police operation. He was walking past, quite by chance, and the shot shattered his skull. Poor RoyRoy. That's her heartache, you know. That sorrow you can always sense within her. It was a long time ago, but it's never over."

He likes her, the rep thought with surprise. She had a sudden intuition-not entirely pleasant-that old Yiannis liked the billboard-lady. Of course. Another grieving parent, another wasted son. In the months after Merlin's death, when Bruna was lost and devastated, Yiannis had taken her into his home; he'd taken care of her and managed to get her back on her feet again. The android was enormously grateful to him for all he had done, but she'd always had an unsettling suspicion that his friendship was based on the pain of bereavement, that Yiannis had turned his life into a temple to the memory of his son, and what attracted him to Bruna was her grief at the loss of Merlin. As if they could share the emptiness. But the android didn't want to dedicate her short life to memories. Let Yiannis befriend RoyRoy; let them exchange sorrows; let them build an enormous cathedral to honor the children they had lost. It was all the same to her.

"You see, Bruna, everyone drags along their own little bundle. Sometimes, it seems to me that we humans-and you technos, of course-we're like ants, all walking along with the overwhelming weight of our lives on our heads."

The rep hated the tone of self-pity in his voice.

"But you once told me that what distinguished us is what each person does about it," muttered the rep.

She couldn't bear seeing the archivist so mournful, so adolescent. Falling in love makes you stupid, she thought with a certain bitterness.

Yiannis sighed.

"Yes, I suppose it all depends on what you do."

A short time later, when Bruna left the bar, she was still feeling annoyed. She'd always believed that her friend was as sealed-off from emotional fickleness as she was. Yet again, she felt odd. Different from everyone else. She was rare, even among the reps. A genuine monster, as the supremacists maintained. But hold on a minute, hold on! It's me who's falling into self-pity now. By the great Morlay! It was a wretched vice, weak and contagious.

CHAPTER TWENTY.

Tall, hips swaying, her dress clinging to her exaggerated curves as convention dictated, her blonde hair wafting just above her shoulders, the detective didn't go unnoticed when she walked into Saturn, which turned out to be a retro-style bar with marble pedestal tables and pseudomodernist wall lights. A sufficiently old-fashioned atmosphere for reactionary types. It was eight o'clock in the evening and the place was half-full: all humans, more men than women, the majority of them young. Bruna strolled slowly around the place as if she were trying to decide where she would sit, while covertly studying the clientele and allowing herself to be checked out. When she was sure that everyone present had taken note of her arrival, she sat at a table near the door and again ordered vodka and lemon with two cubes of ice. She liked to develop the fict.i.tious personalities of her creations and be true to the tiniest details, to the point where she almost believed them. Right now, for example, she was beginning to feel that there was no better drink than a vodka and lemon. She took a sip from the gla.s.s the robot brought her and glanced around through the veil of her eyelashes. A couple of women and half a dozen men were gazing at her invitingly, trying to catch her eye and initiate some sort of interaction. After a brief a.n.a.lysis, she decided that none of them seemed very useful, although two of the young men formed part of a more promising group seated around a couple of the tables. Just then one of the two young men got up and came toward her, swaggering and swaying like a c.o.c.ky little idiot. He stopped at her table.

"You're new around here," he declared.

"Yes."

The youth grabbed a chair and sat down, full of self-importance.

"I'll tell you what we're going to do. We're going to have another drink-I'm buying-and while we're drinking it, you'll tell me all about yourself," he p.r.o.nounced.

"No! I'll tell you what you're going to do," Bruna replied. "You're going to go back to your table, and you're going to tell that man in the green vest that I'd like to have a word with him."

The man in the vest was a few years older and seemed to be the one in charge of the group. It was that air of strict hierarchy that had led Bruna to suspect that they might be militant supremacists.

"And why the h.e.l.l do you think I'm going to obey you?" said the youth, infuriated.

"Because if you don't, it's possible the man in the green vest will get mad at you."

The young man gave an angry snort, but he got up like a lamb and went straight to his table to deliver the message. There's a boy who knows how to do as he's told, thought the rep.

The guy in green listened to the message and took his time. Better, thought Bruna to herself. The longer he takes, the higher up he must be in the chain of command. She saw him order something from the robot, and she ordered another vodka, too. Five minutes later, after he'd had a few sips of his fresh beer, green vest got up and came toward her.

"What can I do for you?"

He was very short and plain-looking, with muscles all over, probably silicon implants. Bruna smiled. She was blonde, she was shapely, she was retrograde. How did ultrafeminine, ultraconventional blondes smile? Not with eyes blazing like Bruna's, of course, but as if making an offering, with moist tenderness, demonstrating that her mouth was yet another cavity. With promising submissiveness. Bruna-Annie smiled coquettishly and said, "You see, they told me that people from the HSP meet in this bar, and clearly you're the most important person in the bar right now. That's why I think you can help me. I want a meeting with Hericio."

The man screwed up his face in a comical manner, caught between two opposing emotions: personal flattery and suspicion at the request. Uncertain, he dropped into the same chair the youth had occupied earlier.

"Let's a.s.sume for a moment that I am from the HSP. Why do you want to meet Hericio?"

"Because he's the only one who seems to know what to do in these times of danger and insanity. Because we're condemned to disaster at the hands of a government of useless replickers. Because like all good people, I can see the abyss into which we're headed if we don't remedy the situation. Because I want to collaborate in the defense of the human race, which is what's at stake, nothing more, nothing less," she railed emphatically.

And then, in a moment of absolute inspiration, she added, "Because I don't want to leave any future child of mine with the legacy of a corrupt, perverted, heinous world."

And she smiled her most maternal and helpless smile.

Bruna-Annie's fiery speech seemed to have some sort of an impact on the man, who scratched his chin hesitantly-or, rather, the implants in his chin, which made his jaw look more manly and powerful. Under the soft skin of his arms, his silicon biceps moved up and down like tennis b.a.l.l.s. But all the same, he still wasn't entirely convinced.

"Sure. And you suddenly turn up here from nowhere, saying all these lovely words, and you want us to believe you. Where have you come from? Who the h.e.l.l are you? I've never seen you around here, nor at any of our events."

"I was born in the Britannic region, but I live in New Barcelona. Here, I'm transmitting my ID number to you. Three days ago I took part in a supremacist demonstration and the police arrested me for a.s.saulting a rep. They finally let me go for lack of evidence. But I'm a university professor and I can't afford this sort of thing or they'll fire me from the university. You know how strict they are about these things. That's why I've come to Madrid to offer my a.s.sistance. Better to be active here and live in New Barcelona. So the right hand doesn't know what the left hand is doing."

The man agreed.

"But you don't need to see Hericio to collaborate with the cause. I'm Serra, one of his deputies. Won't I do?"

Bruna tried to look like a p.u.s.s.ycat, softening her usual tiger look as much as possible. Her cheek padding helped because it rounded her mouth and made her look insipid.

"I'm delighted I wasn't wrong; I knew you were someone important. I could tell. However, I still have to speak to Hericio. Because I'm thinking of making a donation to the party. I know you're in a period covered by an FP. Well, I want to give some money to the cause. But I want to be certain that Hericio is all he makes himself out to be. That we're inspired by the same ideas."

Serra nodded his head. The talk of money seemed to resolve all his doubts.

"Okay. I'll see what I can do. Where can I find you?"

"I'll be at the Majestic Hotel. But only for three days."

"I'll get back to you," he said.

And he walked away, his tennis b.a.l.l.s wobbling like jelly with each step.

Bruna noticed they were following her as soon as she hit the street. She had a.s.sumed that they'd tail her and she tried to make it easy, because the tail, one of the boys who had been with the man in the vest, was not at all good. He was so clumsy that she was almost tempted to ring Lizard so he could give him a few pointers on how to tail someone without being seen.

She entered the Majestic and asked for a room as Annie Heart. The hotel was from the middle of the twenty-first century but had recently been replastered and converted into a lower-range establishment. Bruna had stayed there when she first arrived in Madrid and, as was always the case with her, had taken note of what the hotel had to offer. She went up to her room, which was on the top floor, and checked that everything was still as she remembered it. If you were a guest of the hotel and had a key, you could get down to the street via the external fire escape at the back of the building. It ended up at a lung park that hardly anybody ever used. She left her bag in the room and went downstairs to the hotel bar, which was half-full. It was eleven o'clock at night and she was hungry. She asked for a gigantic real-chicken sandwich and a vodka and lemon with two ice cubes, even though the two drinks she'd had earlier on an empty stomach had left her with an unpleasant throb in her head. But consistency was consistency. She saw her tail at the back of the place doing a disastrous job of hiding behind an interactive screen and decided to put on a good show for his sake. Just then, two Apocalyptics came into the bar, handing out brochures and promoting their cause.

"Brothers and sisters, listen to the word. Here you are losing your most precious a.s.set-your lives-in alcohol and recklessness. The world is ending in one week. Don't close your minds to the truth!"

There were vague rumblings of annoyance, and the barman rushed from behind the bar to throw them out, which he did quite easily. They were fairly docile visionaries.

Bruna swallowed her mouthful of sandwich and spoke loudly enough to be heard throughout the bar, taking advantage of the momentary attention the business of the Apocalyptics had attracted.

"They might seem like a couple of crazies to you, and they certainly are, but it is true that the world is ending. That's to say, the world as we know it. Do you want those technological freaks to finish off the human race? The reps are our creatures! Our artifacts! We made them! So are we now going to let them exterminate us? They're our mistake! Let's put an end to this dangerous error!"

Some applause was heard from the other end of the counter. It was an endors.e.m.e.nt that left Bruna with a bitter taste in her mouth. She had completely lost her appet.i.te, so she paid and, pretending to be a little more inebriated than she was, went up to her room, supposedly to go to bed.

But she still had much to do. She pulled off the wig and the false eyebrows; she removed all the padding and undressed; she opened her bag, took out the solvent and removed the dermosilicon covering her tattoo. Next, she took out the contact lenses and got rid of her makeup, and had a quick vapor shower. She sighed with relief on rediscovering Bruna in the steamed-up mirror. After she had dressed in her usual clothes-a dark purple latex jumpsuit-she put away the items of her disguise and went out into the corridor with considerable stealth. She crossed the deserted corridor and, using the key to her room, opened the service door that provided access to the fire escape. It was twelve thirty at night now, she was on the fourteenth floor, and on the external metallic platform an unpleasantly cold wind was blowing that raised goose b.u.mps on her skin, still damp from the shower. She again swiped the chip in her key across the electronic reader that controlled the emergency staircase and the steps quickly unfolded ahead of her descent, making a worrying metallic screech that could have betrayed her presence. Just as well that the tinkling of the nearby lung park served to cover it up. Bruna hadn't thought of any of that, neither the noise of the staircase nor the unexpected help from the artificial trees. She was irritated by her lack of foresight; she was too tired to think properly. Thank goodness she'd had luck on her side.

She reached the bottom, jumped onto the sidewalk, and the staircase folded itself back up above her. The keys only worked to go down, never to go up. That was why the android was forced to do what she was about to do now. She walked around the corner, entered the Majestic, walked up to the reception desk and asked for a room. The manager, a pale man with prominent cheekbones, looked at her in a strange way. In a flash of inspiration Bruna realized, He's going to tell me there's no vacancy. The android felt feared, felt hated-more hated and more feared than ever before. She felt segregated and a sudden, distressing premonition made her imagine a world like that, an Earth where reps couldn't go into hotels or travel on the same sky-trams as humans, or even mix with them. A drop of cold sweat slid down her skull, following a line parallel to her tattoo. And at that same moment, just when the immobility of the receptionist was starting to become unnatural, the man broke his absolute stillness, cleared his throat uncomfortably, and asked Bruna for her details so that he could check her in. He doesn't dare, said the android to herself; the idea of refusing her had probably pa.s.sed through his mind, but he hadn't dared. Discrimination between the species was still illegal.

He gave her a room on the twelfth floor, two down from Annie Heart, and the rep went up to her new room, for which she'd registered with her real name, dragging her feet and feeling vaguely disconsolate. She went into the room and, suddenly feeling all the exhaustion of her overlong day, allowed herself to fall flat on her back onto the bed. She could sense the tiredness building up in her muscles, in the lower parts of her legs and arms, as if the fatigue were water weighing down on her body and pressing her into the bedspread. She was tempted to close her eyes briefly and sleep right there, but she knew it would be better to go back home. With a force of will, she spun around on the bed and scrunched up the sheets and the blanket so that the robot cleaners would have something to do the next morning. Then she got up, grabbed her gear, and left the building, again using the emergency staircase.

She walked a few blocks so that they couldn't connect her to the hotel and to check that she wasn't being followed, and then she caught a cab; she was too tired to economize. She got out in front of her door and, as usual now, came face to face with the alien in the middle of the night, so alone, so different. The rep felt the anguish rising up inside her again and blocking her throat. Poor Maio. Poor Nabokov. Poor victims of Nabokov. Poor everyone. She crossed in front of the bicho, not wanting to look at him, and rushed to put the imprint of her finger on the lock to open the door. Her fingers must have been stained with the cosmetic silicon, because she had to repeat the action several times. An unease was growing inside her and already turning into an ache in her chest. Four years, three months, and sixteen days, she thought, like someone whispering a refrain. A private mantra for moments of anguish. Four years, three months, and sixteen days.

"It's fifteen days, Bruna. It's almost two in the morning. It's Thursday already," babbled Maio's liquid voice.

The rep stood paralyzed. The sound of the lock opening resonated in the silence, but the detective didn't push open the door. She turned her head slowly toward the alien and they looked at each other for a few seconds without saying a word.

"Yes. I can read your thoughts, Bruna. I'm sorry. Perhaps I should have told you," whispered Maio.

And his words sounded like grains of sand tumbling gently inside a hollow tube.

I'll be d.a.m.ned, thought Bruna. Well, I don't care. The bicho has won. Let him sleep at my place. We'll find him a place to live. But he'd better not think he's sharing my bed again.

"Don't worry, Bruna, I can sleep on the couch. Thanks a lot," said the alien.

The android sighed, somewhat exasperated: Heavens above, she thought, so-"

"So I don't need to talk to you; you can guess everything without me saying a word?" she concluded out loud.

"Oh no, no, Bruna, it's much better to talk normally; it's more comfortable, because that way we're on an equal footing. And often, what you humans think isn't what you end up saying. And what you say is what you want the world to hear. I prefer to hear your words, and that way, I know who you want to be on the outside."

His reasoning seemed far too confusing for Bruna, given how late it was and how tired she was.

"Fine. Forget it. Let's just go in. Are you hungry?"

"No, thank you."

"Good. I have no idea what you aliens eat. And don't tell me now. I don't want to know. I just want to sleep."

She spoke sharply and grumpily, but it was true that, in some way, Bruna felt better for having told the Omaa to come in with her. Monsters united were somewhat less monstrous. Four years, three months, and fifteen days. Fifteen days.

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE.

Bruna had to admit that the Omaa was no trouble, despite the fact that the bicho was very big and the apartment was on the small side. Moreover, he and Bartolo got on really well: the bubi was beside himself with joy when he saw his compatriot, and from the moment the alien arrived, the pet didn't move from his side. The greedy-guts slept coiled up next to Maio's back, and was now perched on his shoulder. It was Maio who prepared breakfast for everyone, guessing exactly what the rep liked; reading her thoughts had its advantages. The alien ate some sort of powdered cereal for breakfast, which he moistened in a hot broth, making neat little b.a.l.l.s from the resultant dough with his fingers. The rep watched him eat with fascination and then saw how he stored the rest of the food in his backpack.

"Omaa food. They sell it in the interplanetary section of some of the gourmet supermarkets, though it's pretty expensive. I can also eat your flours but they provide far less energy. I have to eat kilos of Earthling bread to get as much nourishment as these little b.a.l.l.s give me. I also like cheese and fruit, and I've learned to eat eggs. They don't taste too bad, but if I think about what they are, they make me feel a bit ill. No corpses, please. Neither meat nor fish. Not even seafood protein paste. They put shrimp and other creatures into it, as well as algae concentrate," he explained, as if he were answering a question.

And it was true that the rep was mentally asking herself just that.

"And the business of not eating dead bodies, is it a matter of principle or doesn't it agree with you? Physically, I mean."

"It really doesn't agree with us. It hardens the kuammil. It can even kill you over time. The kuammil is like your soul."

"We don't have souls."

"Neither do we. We have kuammil."

"I mean the soul doesn't exist."

"Well, it was to give you a simple comparison. The kuammil does exist. If you like, I can give you a summary of how our bodies work."

Bruna looked at the Omaa's translucent skin, pinkish and bluish, throbbing, as changeable as the sky at dusk, and she shivered. It had been a while since she had been conscious of the alien's difference-in fact, she was starting to get used to him-but she suddenly became uneasily aware again of how incredibly strange his body was. Just then, a call came through on the mobile Mirari had given her and Bruna welcomed the interruption, as she didn't have to answer Maio, and instantly thought, How stupid, given that he's already sensed everything I've been thinking.

She answered the call in invisible mode. The face of Serra, Hericio's deputy, appeared on the screen.

"Why can't I see you?" the man asked suspiciously by way of a greeting.

"I've rigged my mobile to prevent anyone from locating me; I don't want any evidence of this trip to Madrid. Remember what I said about the left hand not knowing what the right hand is doing. But I must have broken something in the process because I can't send images."

The guy nodded, rea.s.sured by the reply.

"Yes, we also couldn't understand why you were untraceable."

"It's illegal to track a mobile."