Designated Targets

But as she spoke, her voice became faster and her hands began to fly around like birds released from a cage. “The Times had just deposited some hazard money into an account for me,” she said, “back up in twenty-one, which I could access through the Clinton, and the office here agreed to pay that out dollar for dollar, in order to get me on staff. Which meant I got another big fucking payday right away. And then I had a lawyer do my contract negotiations for me, this chick named Maria O’Brien. Actually, she was the one helped me set up my garage sale. I would never have thought to charge anyone fifty grand local for an iPod with a flat battery. She used to be with the Eighty-second, but she finished her hitch about five days after the Transition. She’s gone into business for herself here, providing legal services for anyone wanting to do business in the Zone. I tell you, Dan, she’s going to be as rich as a fucking astronaut.”

“A what?”

“It’s an in-joke. Forget it. Anyway, she got the Times to honor my pay and bonuses, and to pay me what she called a temporally adjusted salary—which, bottom line, is a shitload more than a reporter gets here, and she squeezed a great big fucking on-signing bonus out of them, as well. It was all more than enough to pay for this, and make some strategic investments with the leftovers. I’ve got another place, even bigger than this, over in Gramercy Park. I bought it with Rosanna, and we’re going to redo it together.

“Maria’s formed a partnership with a local brokerage house, and I’m having about half of my salary invested by them. You could get in on it if you wanted, Dan. You should think about it. This war’s not going to last forever, and when it’s done, you’re looking at compressing eighty years of growth into a decade or two. It’s going to be fucking crazy. It’s already crazy.”

He didn’t know quite what to say. He’d never been on the receiving end of a spiel quite like it. The closest he could recall was opening his door to a Fuller Brush salesman once. That guy had made him feel like he’d be on the road to hell if he didn’t finish the day owning a complete set of Mr. Fuller’s brushes.

Julia made him look tame.

“Uh, well, I guess I could,” he said. “I don’t have much to do with my pay, except buy you presents.”

“Well, forget about that, buddy. Get yourself a portfolio. You’re in town for, what, three days? We’ll set up a coffee with Maria and . . . Hell, fuck that . . . Let’s go see her right now. She never sleeps.”

As so often happened around Julia, Dan Black felt himself swept along in her wake. She disappeared into her bedroom and reappeared with her flexipad.

“There’s no net here,” he said.

“I know. But Maria’s got a mil-grade unit that’ll pick up a point-to-point message within five klicks, if it’s on . . . Hah! And it is!”

Julia ran her fingers through her hair and looked into the flexipad as though it were a makeup compact.

“Hey, Maria. It’s Jules. Dan’s in town and my head’s in a different time zone. You up for a drink? Zap me.” She tossed the unit onto a cushion in the chill-out zone and took his hand. “Come on, baby. Let’s have a shower and get ready.”

As she led him through into the bathroom, which looked like something out of the later Roman Empire, he heard the pad chime behind him.

Music and the sound of a party followed them into the shower.

“Hey, Jules!” he heard a woman call out. “Great to hear from you. Bring your big boy out. I’m with the famous Slim Jim down at the Bayswater. And get this, Frank Sinatra’s here!”

16

SPECIAL ADMINISTRATIVE ZONE, CALIFORNIA

Having been born in 1969, Admiral Phillip Kolhammer wasn’t a true child of the digital age. He grew up with rotary telephones, cassette recorders, black-and-white TV, pinball machines, one type of Coke, and the unfortunate musical legacy of the 1980s. The most secure personal files on his flexipad were a collection of bootleg tracks by a long-forgotten country rock band called Lone Justice, and the first two seasons of Miami Vice.

He’d never really mastered text messaging by thumb, but like everyone who grew up after the rise of digital entertainment, he had learned to split his attention along multiple tracks. Given the immense flows of data that streamed in from a properly monitored battlespace, he was often required to concentrate on a surprising variety of information from competing sources.

Even so, chairing the R & D committee was a real pain in the ass.

Six full-time members came to each meeting, but anywhere up to eighteen or twenty part-timers, consultants, or guests might also attend. The sessions were held every Friday afternoon, between 1400 and 1600 hours, in the largest briefing room of the nondescript, two-story prefab offices that were the power center of the Special Administrative Zone.