Chapter 4

FUTURES

The datscape explodes upon my skin. Cascades of dark violet flakes drift through an umber skein of smoke as I step in. Close by, a magma heave of glowing cerise rests at the centre of a landscape of outrageous geometric shape, outrageous colour. If I gently squeeze my eyes within the mask, vision reveals the ghostly layers beneath, another dozen data levels, all of it painted in vital, vivid colours, like a child’s spilled toy box, distortedly alive, in constant movement, constant flux.

Everything has meaning here. Our senses are fine-tuned to discriminate. Colour denotes commodity, density value, fluidity the transferability of stock.

It is a market, after all.

The great curve of the dome arches above me, studded with glowing metallic teats – ten thousand and more – spinning fine threads of information into the flow, like coloured silk, building and demolishing the datscape nanosecond by nanosecond, like the universe itself, a constantly unfinished work.

Layers. There are endless layers to this. The datscape has the power to make a metaphor quite literal. It is a massively complex feedback system, the computer world’s most powerful metonym, accurately reflecting the world of markets. Subtle changes of colour, of texture, of flow, all of these are significant, for everything here has a mathematical expression. In the instant it exists, everything here has a precise monetary value.

I move on, past massive termite towers of a dense cyan blue, past pulsing, globular moulds of bright magenta. Skeletal trees of silver-black thrust skyward, their branches rippling like the innards of some pulsing, transparent insect. Beyond lie massive hills of coloured geometry and shape – mushroom growths heaped up alongside crystals of a thousand different hues, subtle variants of shade from which furred golden leaves and sinuous chains of bright red stickiness emerge like parasitic growths. And through it all flow streams of fierce, glowing colour, steaming and vaporous, while in the air a spectral, flickering snow storm of fine crystals briefly blurs the sensory feast.

Dali’s migraine. Cyber art meets cyber commerce.

A world of avatars and avarice. How does it look? I’m often asked. How does it feel to be inside? But it isn’t how it looks that strikes one most, nor how it feels. It’s how it smells.

For just as every stock and share, every commodity and company has its own colour and shape, its own density and viscosity, its warmth or frigidity, so it also has its scent. It can be fresh or stale. Colour and shape, they’re indicators, certainly, but smell is what I ‘look’ for, what I sniff out, as I make my way.

Freshness is all. At least, for what I do.

Trading results, capital growth, investment and R & D, recruitment policy, new patent registration – all these are reflected in the smell of a company’s shares. If the company is young, dynamic, get-ahead, it has a green, springlike freshness to its smell. It will emit… pheremonally, that is. Whereas an ageing company whose sales are falling, whose staff are leaving; a company dependent on financial cushioning, let’s say. Well… do you know the smell of dead meat?

I close my eyes sometimes – metaphorically speaking – and smell my way about the datscape, sensing the acid-taste of some giant plastics company on my tongue, the tickle of shipping stocks in the fine hairs of my nasal passages.

There is a primacy to smell. It doesn’t lie the way that colours lie. A fresh paint job… you can’t do that with a smell. You can try to mask it, to deodorize it, and only a fine nose can discern that.

Which is what I’ve been trained for. It is all breathed in, you see, through the fine filter of my mask. Information. Endless information. Processed not as a computer might process it, but in a primal, instinctive fashion, using the back brain. For my job is a process of letting go. Of submitting to the Market.

The best of us don’t simply look around, we trawl the Market. We suck it all in, let it fill our pores and overload our senses, hunters in some dark, primeval forest. A hundred and fifty thousand years of instinctive decision-making gathered in, life and death stuff, fine-tuned, fine-focused for this brave new world.

But I mislead you. You might think I am alone here. Far from it. The datscape is alive with avatars; not only the servants of the eight big companies that service the virtual Market, but those of the fourteen hundred and ten much smaller brokers that prey like lampfish in its stygian depths.

How many? Fifty thousand, perhaps, at any one time. It depends. Some are conservatively ‘dressed’, as samurai, perhaps, or famous captains of industry, but there are pirates too and dragons and other mythical creatures, gods and heroes, lobsters and robots, lions and Lilliputians, hill trolls and hobbits, bulls and bears, spiders and grey-bearded sages, Eurydice and…

Whatever the imagination can devise, you’ll find it here, walking the Dantean circles of this great Erewhon – this nowhere place – crawling up its walls or flapping their great wing-ed arms across the inner sky.

Only right now I am heading for the future. And before you ask, let me answer you. You can walk there. You need only move your virtual legs and there, on the far side of the cavern, lies a doorway, or rather, a membrane. You just have to step through. There, on the far side, in a cooler, less-crowded, less eye-disturbing place, the future waits, silent and sterile, a great warehouse of what-will-be.

There is marginally less here than in the present, and as one walks on, further into the weeks and months ahead, so the landscape grows less crowded still, until, a year or so ahead, there’s empty floor space under foot. Here, one can identify stocks and commodities at a glance.

Yes, and here’s where I do much of my business: identifying what’s going up and what down, which is a good risk and which poor, using what I’ve learned from the ‘Now’ of the datscape, to gamble on the ‘Then’ of this other place. Buying cheap to sell dear a year from now. Guaranteeing supplies for my masters and oiling the wheels of commerce in the years to come. Making sure it all continues.

Futures. That’s what I do. I deal in Futures.

The cameras stopped. Behind the actor, dangling in his harness, the elegant curve of the blue screen reappeared as the projection vanished.

‘Okay, Jake… that’s great… word perfect… and great visuals too…’

Slowly they lowered him.

‘Jeez, it’s hot in this…’

He was dressed as a massive go piece; a huge black stone, tiny limbs and an equally tiny head sprouting from the curved, unblemished surface.

‘Stop moaning,’ Carl, the director, called to him. ‘You’re being paid twice what you’re worth!’

It wasn’t true, but it didn’t matter. He liked doing this stuff.

As his feet touched the floor, the prop men hurried over, unhinging the costume and letting him step free.

‘Have a shower, Jake, then we’ll talk.’

Jake nodded. He liked Carl. They had the same acerbic sense of humour. And Carl knew what he was doing. He had understood at once what Jake was getting at.

As he showered, Jake thought about the shoot. When he’d first become a login there had been no guidelines, no training ‘immersions’ to help him find his feet. He’d been thrown in at the deep end to sink or swim. But things had been different back then. The virtual Market had been so much smaller, so much easier to deal with. In the last ten years more and more companies had signed up, until now it was impossible to float a company without being in the datscape.

Now training was all the thing, and he, their star turn, their golden boy, had been asked to make the latest training immersion.

He stood beneath the hot air stream, drying off. Because of the shoot he had been given the evening off. Friends were coming round. They were going to have a meal and watch the latest episode of Ubik.

Chris and Hugo were coming, along with Jenny and Alex. And, of course, Kate.

Speaking of which…

Jake pulled on his shorts, then pressed the tiny implant that lay beneath the skin just below his right ear. At once he was connected up.

‘Get me Kate. Voice only.’

The implant vibrated gently. As it stopped, Kate’s voice filled his head.

‘Hi, sweetheart… how did it go?’

‘It went wonderfully. We got it in one. You still okay for this evening?’

‘Be there at seven.’

‘You can come earlier if you want.’

Her laughter made him smile. She knew what he meant.

‘Seriously. I’ve just got to have a quick word with Carl, then I’ll be home.’

‘Maybe… but I’m not promising. I’ve got to finish a few things.’

‘Okay… I love you.’

‘Love you, too.’

He cut the connection.

Turning, he noticed the steward standing against the wall across from him. The man’s head was bowed, his eyes averted, but Jake had the feeling that he’d been being watched.

‘You…’

‘Yes, Master?’

‘Book me a hopper. I want it on the roof in twenty minutes, okay?’

‘Yes, Master.’

Jake watched him go. Chinese. Of course he was. The Chinese got in everywhere these days; body servants and cleaners, receptionists and doormen. It seemed like there wasn’t a single service industry they hadn’t infiltrated.

He finished dressing and went back upstairs. Carl was waiting for him, sitting in the bar, the big picture window behind him giving a view of the river and the dense mass of high-rises that was the City.

‘What are you drinking?’ Carl asked, getting up and coming across.

‘Just a Coke.’

‘You don’t drink?’

‘Oh, I drink… but only when I’ve a day or two to recover. You can’t take any chances when you’re inside. You need your senses about you.’

Carl grinned. ‘Literally so, from what you were saying… A Coke it is, then.’

They went over to the bar.

As Carl ordered the drinks, Jake studied him.

‘If you don’t mind me coming to the point, what is it you want?’

Carl turned, handed him his drink. ‘From you? Well, I certainly can’t match what you make with Hinton, but… if you want to do some more of this stuff… and I don’t just mean the corporate packages… well… I’d love to work with you.’

‘That’s very flattering…’

‘No. Not at all. You’re good. One of the best I’ve worked with. You’ve got a real gift for it, Jake. And that text… I loved it…’

‘I wish I could claim sole credit, but I had help from my friend, Hugo.’

‘Well, introduce him to me. Here’s my chip.’

Jake took it, stowed it in his pocket, then raised his glass to the other man. ‘Maybe… let me talk it through with my fiancée.’

‘You’re engaged?’

‘She doesn’t know it yet, but… yes…’

Carl’s eyes flew open wide. ‘You mean…?’

‘A permit, yeah… it came through yesterday.’

‘Christ! Then we have got a reason to celebrate!’

Jake smiled ‘I’d love to, only… Another time, eh?’

‘Sure. Take a copy of the chip for yourself. You’re welcome to call any time, day or night. My avatar fields all my contacts.’

‘Thanks. I will.’

The hopper was waiting for him on the roof, as he’d asked. There was no sign of the steward. Then again there was no reason for him to be there, only…

You’re getting paranoid…

Maybe, but they had been warned only last week. Industrial espionage was on the up. Yes, but the man worked for Bellini’s, and Bellini’s were a top-class establishment. They’d have double-checked his credentials before hiring him. Jake relaxed.

Even so, you had to be careful what you said and to whom.

He fingered the chip that was in his pocket. Carl, for instance, was extremely open in giving him his chip, especially as it was being handed on to someone he’d never met. It showed trust. Only trust wasn’t a strength these days. In some circles it was seen as a distinct weakness.

As the craft lifted and banked out over the river, Jake looked out to his left. He loved this sight, especially at this time of the day, with the sun turning the river into a snaking coil of silver and gold. He was looking back, past the enclaves, towards the poor districts. From this high up you could see the enclave walls, their creamy marble almost Mediterranean in the sunlight.

Like a fortress within that ancient sprawl.

Slowly they climbed. It was only five minutes to his apartment, but he wasn’t in a hurry. It was hours before his guests would turn up.

Across from him the new-builds began to climb the sky, endless needles of dark glass that surrounded the central ‘hub’ built in and around the ancient heart of the City. Like something from the datscape. The Hinton building lay in the shadow of two other massive buildings, on old Eastcheap, its H-shaped structure adding a faint tinge of green to the blacks and greys and whites of the nearby buildings.

It wasn’t the biggest, not by a long way – that was the great pagoda-shape of the China Construction Bank – but it was getting a reputation as the best. In these harsh and unforgiving times Hinton rarely got it wrong, and Jake and the hand-picked team of logins he worked with were almost entirely responsible.

Hence today’s ‘immersion’. For if they were to maintain their steady climb to the number one spot, then they had to recruit the best and give them the best training possible.

Jake had bought his penthouse apartment in direct line-of-sight to his place of work. Every morning he would wake and go out onto the broad balcony and look across at it before breakfast with a kind of possessive fascination. Mind, it was hardly surprising. Hinton had recruited him at fourteen from among thousands of eager, fresh-faced applicants. They had sent him to their academy in the wilds of Cumberland. There he had begun the intensive training that had led to this, first as a ‘runner’, then as a ‘board-man’ and finally as a login – a ‘web-dancer’ as they sometimes called them.

It had been an exhaustive education and he had come out of it with Firsts in History, Economics and Political Science. The world had been his oyster – provided he stayed with Hinton.

Jake took out the tiny black and silver-blue chip Carl had given him and studied it a moment. A tiny hologram of Carl’s smiling face looked up at him from an octagonal inset at its centre.

It was flattering of Carl to offer him work – especially work in the media – but he enjoyed what he did far too much. In fact, some days he would simply stop and laugh aloud to think that they paid him so much to do the thing he loved.

Not that his bosses didn’t know that, but they pampered him anyway, keeping him ‘sweet’, giving him whatever he wanted.

Which was why he had his own entry pad to the Market, located in his apartment: a vaulted box room they’d had specially built. It was intended to be used only in emergencies, but he went in there sometimes, when something was troubling him.

Tonight, however, something else dominated his thoughts.

The permit… Should he tell her tonight, when everyone was round and ask her to marry him? Or should he wait until they were alone?

Of course, if she came early he could do it then.

As the craft set down on the roof of the private apartment block, Jake leaned forward, thanking the pilot.

‘Cheers, Sam. Put me down for two flights, will you? I’ve had a very good day…’

‘Thank you, sir. And have a good evening.’

‘I will… I most definitely will.’

He stood back as the craft lifted away, then turned and made his way down the single flight of stairs that led to his apartment.

As ever, everything looked spick and span. The panoramic glass windows gleamed, not a speck or a fingerprint on them. Jake liked that. He was a highly meticulous man. He didn’t like mess or clutter. It got in the way. The only ‘mess’ he liked was inside, in the datscape. That was a mess he revelled in.

They were four hundred and fifty feet up here. Fifty floors, give or take. And the view was spectacular. He never tired of it.

‘Trish… give me news,’ he said, speaking to the air. ‘Non-Market specific.’

At once the big screen on the wall behind him lit up. He turned to face it.

‘Afternoon, Mister Reed…’

‘Hi, Trish… How’re David and the boy?’

Trish was Jake’s filter avatar, his very own AI, programmed to keep Jake’s diary, run his apartment and field all calls.

Part of her job was to trawl the media for items that were specifically to Jake’s taste or that he’d find of interest. She didn’t really exist, but it made it more pleasant to pretend she did. Jake had given her a husband, a young child, and a two-bed in one of the orbitals. He’d made her his own age, twenty-six, but there any similarities ended. Jake was ‘exec’ status, Trish wasn’t. She was ‘service’.

‘They’re fine, Mister Reed.’

‘Good… so what’s been happening?’

‘First up is the new manned mission to Mars.’

As he spoke, the screen showed the massive Shenzou 41 rocket thrusting its way up into the clear North China skies on a plume of fire and roiling smoke. The bright red craft had a large gold star facing four smaller ones painted on its flank. Inside, its crew of twelve – six males, six females – smiled broadly and gave a thumbs-up for the watching cameras.

‘You think they’ll beat the Americans there?’

‘The Chinese say it doesn’t matter. There’s room enough on Mars for everyone.’

‘They say that now… Next?’

The image changed, showing the British Prime Minister, the Right Honourable Andrew Isaiah Yates, addressing the House of Commons.

Trish gave commentary.

‘As you can see, the PM forced a new package of vagrancy laws through parliament last night in a lengthy late night sitting. At the same time he announced yet another crackdown on the “unprotected”.’

Again the image changed, showed the Security forces, ‘suited and booted’, in full riot gear with truncheons drawn, charging a line of stone-throwing citizens while water cannons fired over their heads. Buildings were burning, and in the air close by a number of massive police hoppers shone their searchlights down on the masses. The air was full of the pop-pop-pop of gunfire.

Just another night in the suburbs.

‘Next…’

The image changed, showed what was clearly the avatar of a beautiful woman. Naked and full-breasted, she held a bright red apple up to the camera and smiled. Behind her, perched on the open door of a black iron-barred cage, was a massive jet black crow. There was a small coin in its beak, while its golden eyes stared out from the screen in a challenging, almost threatening fashion.

Music played quietly in the background.

‘On the media front, diva Eve Adams is releasing a new album, her first in four years. It’s called Crow-Nickel, and will be available in all formats from today.’

Jake smiled. He liked Eve Adams. ‘It’s a dreadful pun… Old stuff or new?’

‘New,’ Trish answered. ‘But as you’ve noted, the album’s a kind of personal chronicle. Adams says the songs reflect what’s been happening in her life. It’s fairly dark…’

‘But then so is her life… Next…’

A new image, this time of a grey-haired African, shaking hands with a smart-suited Han. Behind them was what looked like a massive chemical plant.

‘What’s this?’

‘It’s a big new deal…’

‘I thought I said non-specific…’

‘You did. But I thought this one would interest you. That building in the background… it’s a drilling station.’

‘I don’t understand…’

‘It seems they’re going to tap deep into the earth’s core,’ Trish went on. ‘Into the magma itself…’

‘What are they looking for? New energy sources?’

‘That’s just it. What they say they’re doing is generating oxygen.’

‘Oxygen,’ Jake laughed. ‘Air, you mean?’

‘That’s right. It seems the atmosphere’s been depleted these past twenty years, and they want to do something about it. It’s a pilot scheme…’

Jake stepped closer, trying to make out the details. He’d not heard of anything like this before, and for the Chinese to be doing it seemed strange, to say the least.

‘Next.’

‘A personal one this time…’

The image changed. Seeing who it was, Jake grinned.

‘Hey, that’s Hugo…! What the hell is he doing?’

‘It’s a charity show… for the Campaign For Legal Representation. He’s written a new piece, for electronics and orchestra. They’re going to perform it next week.’

Jake was in two minds about Hugo’s charitable activities, but he kept that to himself. If Hugo wanted to be a liberal, let him be one.

‘I’m surprised he didn’t say…’

‘You’ve been busy,’ Trish said, as the image faded, the pixels breaking up like the dissolving pieces of a puzzle.

The screen was now filled with the image of a windswept field of grass of that perfect shade of green Jake found most relaxing. The same green that, in the datscape, represented ‘liquid’ cash.

He smiled. ‘Thanks, Trish… We’ll speak later.’

‘Sure thing, Mister Reed.’

Jake turned away. He ought to have been speaking to the chef, sorting out the menu for tonight, only he didn’t feel like it.

No, what he felt like was seeing Kate. Only Kate had things to finish off.

He walked through, into the bedroom, then stretched out upon the low, Japanese-style mattress.

The room, like the rest of the flat, was minimalist. Jake didn’t see the point of surrounding himself with things when you could hire whatever you wanted and have it delivered at a single command. Why keep things when someone else could store them for you?

And by now, on what he was earning, he could afford to have things shipped from anywhere. Almost anything he wanted. Jake closed his eyes. The session today had been exhilarating. He hadn’t enjoyed anything quite so much in ages. Anything ‘outside’ that was.

So maybe he’d do some more, after all. Take up Carl’s offer. That is, if Hinton let him.

He closed his eyes. Found himself thinking about China.

There was a Chinese painting on the wall. It had been here when he’d moved in and he hadn’t bothered to have it removed. As far as he knew, it was an original, on loan to Hinton Industrials from one of their clients.

He spoke to the air.

‘Trish… what is that painting?’

Trish knew without asking which painting he meant.

‘It is Emperor Hui Tsong’s copy of Lady Kuo Kuo’s Spring Outing. The original was by Chang Hsuan in the eighth century.’

Jake rolled over and looked at it. It was very pretty. The stylized horses, the faint pinks and lime greens of the ladies’ skirts, the whole thing, in fact, demonstrated a highly delicate sensitivity.

‘Have you told me this before, Trish?’

‘Several times.’

‘When I was drunk, you mean?’

‘I wouldn’t wish to comment…’

But there was the faintest hint of amusement in Trish’s reply that implied that he had indeed been drunk. As you’d expect, perhaps. Jake had, after all, programmed her himself.

Oxygen generators… now what’s that all about?

The latest space launch did interest him, however. Since the space race had begun again in earnest thirty years back, it had been a matter of national pride. As a student at the academy, he had had pictures of astronauts on his wall. Americans, Russians, Chinese, Europeans, including one or two pure-born Englishmen. Those were the new heroes. And when he’d graduated at eighteen, it was an astronaut he’d really wanted to be, not a login.

Logins… sounded so prosaic. And so unreal, from what he’d heard. But he knew better now. This world of theirs depended on logins. Without them things would grind to a halt. Astronauts, romantic as they were, were a luxury.

Hugo, of course, thought otherwise. He thought them the saviours of the world. Or, at least, the pioneers of new and better worlds.

Jake, however, didn’t believe that. He thought it was a lot of sentimental bullshit. He’d seen first hand what really happened. Seen how the moon-based ore companies had trebled and quadrupled their profits these last few years.

Brave New World, my arse, he’d say. It’s the new Klondyke.

There were colonies on the moon already. The Chinese had six, the Americans four, the Russians a further two. The EU had built one, but there’d been an accident and they’d all died. And now there would be colonies on Mars.

Jake stretched, relaxing, wondering what it was like up there.

And after Mars?

Jake felt a faint vibration in the tiny insert behind his ear. He sat up.

‘Kate?’

There was a moment’s silence, then Kate’s voice filled his head.

‘Hi, sweetheart… I’m incoming… I’ll be there in five…’

‘Thought you had things to do?’

‘I did. But I cancelled them. You sounded needy.’

‘Needy?’ He laughed. ‘I could have sent for one of the company women.’

‘Over my dead body.’

He smiled at that. ‘See you in a bit.’

‘See you.’

They cut contact.

Jack sat there a moment, wondering just how he was going to play this. Should he tease her? No. It was too big a thing for that. Well then, maybe he’d just hand her the sealed packet the permit had come in.

Yes. That was it.

And afterwards? Did he ask her then? Or did he take her to bed? Show her how much he wanted her, then ask her, in the afterglow.

Jake let out a long breath. This was the start of it. The permit meant they could get married and have children. Without it the whole thing was a non-starter. Any child they’d have had would have been outside the protection of the legal process, would have been ‘unprotected’, and whether you agreed with that or not – and there were many, Hugo included, who didn’t – it was how things were.

Yes, the permit was the key. It opened doors.

‘Hey…’ Hugo said as he stepped from the lift, handing Kate the flowers and Jake the wine, ‘something’s up, I can sense it.’

Kate looked to Jake.

‘Not yet,’ he said. ‘Wait till the others are here.’

Hugo let Jake take his coat. As he turned back he saw that Jake was smiling.

‘What?’

‘I saw you earlier, on the news…’

‘Oh, the campaign… you don’t approve…’

‘Someone’s got to help the UPs. But I was more interested in the piece. You didn’t tell me you’d written something new.’

Hugo shrugged, as if it was nothing. It wasn’t that he was modest, he just kept things to himself. It had always been this way, since their schooldays. You always had to drag out of him what he was up to.

‘Where’s Chris?’ Kate asked, as they went back inside the apartment. ‘I thought he was coming with you.’

‘He’ll be along. Something cropped up, last minute. You know how it is…’

Chris was Hugo’s partner. He was ten years older than Hugo and ten or twenty million Euros richer, but you wouldn’t have known it.

As the door irised shut, Hugo made an exaggerated gesture of sniffing the air.

‘God, that smells wonderful! You got a new chef, Jake?’

‘I thought I’d try Bellini’s… I was there today.’

‘At Bellini’s?’

‘Yes… making a new immersion for the firm.’

Hugo looked impressed.

‘Remember that piece you helped me write… you know… about being inside the datscape?’

‘Sure.’

‘That’s what we used. The director, Carl, loved it. So much so, in fact, that he gave me his chip to hand to you. Says he’d like to work with you sometime.’

Jake handed him the chip. He’d not had time to look at it himself.

Hugo stared at it a moment, then slipped it away in his pocket. ‘Serendipitous,’ he said. ‘I was about to look for a director… for the new piece.’

‘Well, Carl strikes me as a good man. He’s keen, intelligent…’

‘Gay?’

Jake laughed. ‘No… at least, I wouldn’t have said so.’

Kate reappeared at that moment with drinks. She had put on an ice-blue, full-length dress for the evening, and had tied her hair back in a bun, giving her a classical, almost Grecian appearance.

‘You look stunning,’ Hugo said, accepting his glass with a nod. ‘Not only that, but you look like a girl with a secret…’

‘All in good time,’ Jake said. But Kate was blushing now.

‘I won’t spoil things,’ Hugo said, as if he already knew.

Trish’s voice rang out. ‘Your other guests are here, Mister Reed. They’ll be touching down in approximately one minute.’

Jake looked to Hugo and smiled. ‘Trust Jenny to make an entrance…’

They went out onto the roof to watch the hopper set down. It wasn’t a ‘taxi’ or a company hopper, but one of the big military versions, similar to those Jake had seen on the news item, the craft bristling with heavy armour.

As Jenny and her partner, Alex, stepped down from inside, two uniformed guards saluted Alex, then stood back as the door hissed closed and the craft lifted, merging into the darkness.

They came across. Jenny was giggling now.

‘Sorry about that,’ Alex said. ‘Just thought I’d cadge a lift.’

Alex was Security. ‘Plain clothes’, as he liked to call it. But Jake knew he was special forces. Jenny had told him when they’d first started going out together, three years back.

Back inside, Kate brought more drinks, then looked to Jake. ‘Have we got to wait for Chris?’

‘Oh, no, don’t…’ Hugo said. ‘You know what he’s like… it could be ages before he gets here. Just tell us…’

‘Tell us what?’ Jenny asked, intrigued. She was wearing red, but otherwise, she and Kate could have been twins.

Jake looked to Kate. ‘You want to tell them, or shall I?’

She blushed and looked down. ‘You do it…’

‘Okay… but before we do, I think something special’s called for… a bottle of the eighty-one, possibly. No… let’s go mad… two bottles!’

There was laughter.

Jake went out to the kitchen, returning a moment later with a tray of glasses. He had obviously prepared for this moment.

As they took their new glasses, Jake looked across at Kate and winked.

When he’d told her earlier she had gone very quiet. At first he thought that maybe she had a problem with it. Then he realized what it was. She was crying. Crying with happiness.

They had made love, gently, tenderly, like it was the first time. They couldn’t conceive, of course – Kate would have to go to the clinic to have the implant removed – yet it felt different. It wasn’t just sex any more, it was creating.

They had ‘created’ once more before showering and getting ready for their guests, but Jake had never seen Kate so happy, so bright-eyed and rosy-cheeked. Hugo was right. She looked stunning.

As he raised his glass, the others copied him.

‘To my future wife…’ he began.

‘A permit! You’ve got a permit!’ Jenny squealed, almost spilling her drink in her excitement. She put her glass down then rushed to hug Kate.

‘Oh, you darlings! You precious darlings! I am so happy for you!’

Hugo was grinning in a kind of ‘I told you so’ fashion, as if he’d known all along – which was quite possible, knowing Hugo. Alex, meanwhile, had a calm smile on his features. ‘Well done,’ he said. ‘I’m really pleased.’

Kate met Jake’s eyes, then raised her glass to him. ‘To my future husband…’

‘Oh, Jake…’ Jenny said, tears in her eyes now. ‘Don’t stand there like a lemon… kiss her…’

He kissed her. The others cheered and raised their glasses high.

‘To Jake and Kate,’ Hugo said, looking about him. ‘May they have health, wealth and happiness… and many children…’

‘Hear, hear!’ Alex said, nodding vigorously.

But Jake only had eyes for Kate.

Sometime in the past, Jake had been at a party. It was a firm ‘do’ – Hinton had thousands working for them at all levels – and they had hired Hampton Court Palace for the evening, flying their employees in along a protected corridor over the ghettos of Wandsworth and Wimbledon.

He’d spent an hour talking to colleagues, making an appearance, ‘networking’ as they called it, though why he, a rogue creature of the datscape, should need to ‘network’ was beyond him. To be frank, he had been bored. Bored shitless, as he’d later recalled when telling the tale. He had decided to seek out his line-boss and then leave. Get a good night’s sleep and get in early – make the firm some profits before the sun came up.

It was then, as he’d crossed the room, having spotted old George Hinton, to whom he nominally reported, that he ran into her – almost literally.

She had turned and stepped backward, even as he made to move past her in the crowded room. As he later said, he didn’t have a chance.

‘She literally threw herself at me.’

It was Kate, of course.

‘I am so sorry,’ she said, her face an agony of embarrassment. ‘I really, really didn’t mean to do that.’

Jake had picked himself up and, putting his hands up as if to ward off any further assault, answered her. ‘No, that’s perfectly fine… you didn’t see me… I was moving very fast…’

‘Very,’ she echoed, but she was smiling now that she could see he wasn’t angry with her.

‘And you are?’

‘Kate…’

It was almost a whisper. People were watching now, amused by this sudden entertainment, and Kate clearly didn’t like being the centre of attention.

Jake liked that. He had liked it immediately.

‘Well, Kate… I’m Jake, and I am really pleased I bumped into you.’

She seemed surprised. ‘Are you?’

‘Yes, actually, I am.’

He had been a login only eight weeks back then. A novice, making up with keenness what he lacked in skill and subtlety. And Kate? Kate was the daughter of the chief exec of one of the City’s biggest insurance companies. One he knew by touch and scent. A very ash grey kind of company.

That was how it had begun. Accidentally. And now this.

As Kate cleared the table, he watched her, pleased that he’d done so well. She was grace personified and, as far as his bosses were concerned, the perfect partner for such a high-flier as he. Now, when he got an invite to a Hinton ‘bash’, it was for ‘Kate and Jake’, as if she too were an employee.

‘Kate…?’

She looked to him from the doorway, pausing, the tray full of dirty plates balanced tremulously. ‘Yes, my love?’

‘Have we any of that glorious stilton your parents bought us?’

‘I’ll get it.’

And she was gone.

Jake turned, looking to Alex, who was facing him. Alex was staring down into his brandy glass, slowly swirling the dark liquid about. Sensing that Jake was watching him, he looked up.

‘You’re a lucky man, Jake. A very lucky man.’

‘I know…’

‘Looks, brains… she’ll be a good mother, too, I bet… but d’you know why you’re so lucky?’

Jake shrugged. ‘Go on… tell me.’

‘Because she’s kind.’

It was a very un-Alex kind of thing to say. Alex was always so formal, so… closed. But he had drunk a lot tonight – they all had – and he had loosened up considerably as the evening had progressed.

‘She is,’ Jake said, nodding his agreement.

He looked to Hugo. ‘Have you given up on Chris?’

‘I don’t know… he’s probably buggering some poor little office junior…’

‘Hugo!’ Jenny protested. ‘He’d never…’

‘Oh, wouldn’t he.’ But they could see he was teasing. In truth he trusted Chris absolutely. Chris was, after all, the love of his life. ‘Jake… about what you were saying earlier… about the Chinese…’

‘The Han,’ Jenny said. ‘They call themselves the Han.’

‘The Han, then… Do you really think they’re still our enemies? I mean… it’s been more than fifty years since they joined the global economy. They’re fully integrated into our world. I mean, it’s their world too, only…’

‘What the fuck are you trying to say?’ Alex asked.

‘I don’t know…’ Hugo shrugged. ‘It’s just… well, I deal with a lot of them… you have to… more than half our sales are in the Far East… only I’ve never felt I’ve got close to any of them. I can’t say, even now, that any of them are my friends.’

‘We don’t mix,’ Alex said, leaning forward, his face serious now. ‘Half the cases I deal with these days… well, I can’t say, of course… but I know who’s at the bottom of most of them. The Chinese.’ He looked to Jenny. ‘The Han. Horrid and Nasty, we call them. And you know what? They are. They’ve got whole armies of hackers, hacking away at our data. Stealing it or corrupting it. Like burglars, breaking in and sniffing our dirty underwear.’

Jenny looked appalled. ‘Alex…’

‘I know. We do it, too. Only for them it’s like a mission. They don’t have ideas of their own, they steal ours. Always have done, ever since they came out of the dark ages and started to trade again.’

Hugo sat forward at that. ‘Oh, unfair, Alex… You can’t say that. They’re every bit as creative…’

‘As us? See how we talk “us” and “them” when it comes to the Han. We don’t talk about the Yanks that way.’

‘No, but the Yanks are us. Genetically. They’re Europeans. The Han…’

‘Are Ha-han, o-o-ho…’ Alex said, doing his best Elvis Presley impersonation.

There was laughter, but beneath it there was a sudden, darker edge to things.

Kate reappeared, carrying a large platter filled with various cheeses.

‘Oh, Kate,’ Jenny said, jumping up to help her. ‘They look wonderful!’

‘You wouldn’t catch a Han eating cheese,’ Alex grumbled. ‘Just bloody noodles…’

Jake looked down. He wished now he hadn’t mentioned it. Wished he’d kept it to himself. But there was some truth to what Alex was saying. If they weren’t enemies, then they most certainly were rivals. He knew that from the datscape. When it came to the acquisition of raw materials, China was voracious. Was a giant mouth that demanded to be fed. It was the only reason they were out in space…

Trish interrupted his thoughts.

‘Mister Reed… two more guests have arrived. They’re coming up in the lift right now…’

Hugo jumped up, casting his serviette aside. ‘It’s Chris… I wonder who he’s brought…’

Jake felt a brief flash of irritation. Chris might at least have asked. It was, after all, a private occasion. Now he’d have to make small talk to some stranger.

Only it wasn’t a stranger. It was a very old friend.

‘Alison… how in god’s name…?’

‘I found her,’ Chris said, stepping past Jake to give Hugo a peck on the cheek. ‘Hi, hon… having fun?’

Jake just stared. ‘The last time I saw you…’

‘…was on the steps of New College five years ago.’

She stepped closer, embracing him. It wasn’t a hug, Alison never hugged, it was more the slightest physical touch, an establishing of boundaries. It reminded Jake of why they’d broken up; of how insular, how self-contained she was. There was the faintest scent of perfume about her, but the dominant impression was of her cleanliness. Hair, clothes, manners, all were so neat and precise.

‘Jake?’

He turned. Kate stood there, smiling, looking to him to make an introduction.

‘Kate… this is Alison. Alison, this is Kate, my fiancée.’

‘Ali…’ Hugo pushed past Jake to take Alison’s hands, leaning in to plant a kiss on her cheek. ‘I wondered when you’d make an appearance…’

Jake turned back, looking to the others for an explanation.

Hugo answered. ‘We bumped into each other a month or two back, at some gallery or other… I meant to tell you…’

‘But it escaped your mind…’

Jake glanced at Kate, could see how she was dying to know who this new woman was.

‘Hugo and I were at uni with Alison. She was majoring in art history…’

‘A big mistake,’ Alison said, as if it were amusing, only there was no amusement in her cold blue eyes.

‘So what do you do now?’ Alex asked. He alone had remained seated.

‘I work for GenSyn.’

‘GenSyn?’ Alex frowned, trying to locate where he’d heard the name. ‘What do they do?’

‘Genetic Synthetics. We build things. Living things.’

‘That’s one hell of a change of direction.’

She nodded, acknowledging that. ‘They retrained me.’

Kate opened her mouth, as if to ask something, then seemed to change her mind. She smiled, becoming the perfect hostess once again.

‘Look… I’m being very rude… what’ll you have to drink?’

‘I’ll have a large brandy,’ Chris said, ‘and a carbonated soda for the lady.’

Kate looked to Alison, who nodded.

‘Come, take a seat,’ Jake said. ‘Are you hungry?’

Again Chris answered for her. ‘Gods, no… we gorged ourselves on canapés, didn’t we, Ali?’

‘We did,’ she conceded, letting herself be led over to the table. Hugo brought another chair in from the back room and placed it between his and Chris’s seats.

‘Are you married?’ Jake asked, knowing even as he asked it how pointed a question it was.

She smiled; a neat, formalized smile that gave nothing away. ‘No.’

‘Boyfriend?’

‘Not right now. I haven’t time.’

‘No?’

‘No. You could say I’m married to the job. It’s very demanding. We’re a small family firm…’

‘I know.’

Jake recalled it now. When she’d first mentioned the company’s name, he’d not made the link, but now he had. It was why he was so good at his job. Attention to fine detail.

‘The Eberts… right?’

She bowed her head a little. ‘Very good… But then I’m told that you’re the best at what you do.’

Jake looked to Chris who shrugged. ‘Only telling the truth, old boy. You’re the bee’s fucking bollocks.’

Hugo laughed. ‘I think it’s dogs, not bees…’

‘Mixed metaphor,’ Chris said, waving a hand dismissively. ‘The best kind…’

‘Who’d a thunk it,’ Alison said, making Jake look at her again, surprised that she’d remembered.

Old dead comedians…

But then, why would she forget? Had he forgotten?

Kate returned with the drinks.

‘So what do you actually do at… GenSyn, is it?’

Alison looked up at Kate, accepting the fluted glass. ‘I evaluate.’

‘Evaluate?’

‘Potential lines of research… projects, I guess you’d call them. Whether they’re viable… whether we’d make any money out of them…’

‘So they got you in the end, eh?’

Alison turned her head, looking directly at him. ‘They got us all, Hugo aside…’

‘Oh, no,’ Jake said, finding himself, for a moment, back in the conversational mode of earlier years, ‘they got Hugo, too. Didn’t they, Hugo?’

‘Golden hook, line and sinker…’

Trish’s voice interrupted them.

‘Forgive me, Mister Reed, but you asked me to remind you when your programme was about to start…’

‘Thank you, Trish…’

Alison looked about her for an explanation.

‘Ubik,’ Chris said.

‘Ah… I’ve not…’

‘Not seen it?’ Hugo was appalled. ‘You can’t not have seen it! It’s…’

‘Ubiquitous,’ Jenny finished. And there was laughter. Only not from Alison.

What are you doing here? Jake thought. And why tonight? Why, when I was finally over you, do you turn up again in my life?

He turned his head, looking to Kate. She was watching Alison, a hardness in her eyes, as if she were trying to work out who this new woman was and what her role in things might be. And she was right to, because Jake had only ever loved two women, and here they both were.

‘Trish… full wall…’

They went and settled on the sofas as the opening credits ran.

‘It’s sci-fi,’ Hugo explained. ‘From the good old days. One of Dick’s best…’

‘Dick who?’ Alison asked, and there was laughter. She smiled and looked about her. ‘What did I say?’

‘It’s Philip K. Dick,’ Jake explained. ‘He was the writer.’

‘Ah… And he’s good, is he?’

‘He saw it all,’ Chris said. ‘Seventy-odd fucking years ago he wrote this, and boy did he know what was coming!’

They fell quiet, watching the wall. This was the last episode of four, the finale, and it had taken the media by storm. Everybody was talking about it.

How did you not know about this? Jake wondered, glancing at her, seeing how she watched the giant screen, trying to understand what was going on. Is your life really that circumscribed?

Apparently not, for she went to galleries.

Yes, but what was she doing here? Why had she let Chris talk her into this?

‘God, this is weird,’ Alison said quietly.

‘Isn’t it?’ Chris said excitedly.

The others made hushing noises.

Kate shifted a little on the sofa next to Jake, pressing up against him and putting her head on his shoulder.

He smiled.

On the screen the ‘anti-psi’, Joe Chip was trying to climb the stairs. Trapped in the threatening nightmare of the ‘half-life’ world, he struggled to climb each step, like Sisyphus, or like a diver coming up from the depths of the ocean bed. None of it made sense. Not yet. But it would, and when it did…

Jake shivered. Back then, when Dick had written this, in sixty-nine, there had been no internet, no world wide web or datscape, no virtual worlds. Yet what was the world of Ubik, if not that? A half-life… yes. Sometimes, not always, he felt like that; like he was trapped inside some hallucinogenic, drug-induced dream.

‘What’s with the spray cans?’ Alison asked.

‘Later…’ Hugo said, reaching out to touch her arm. ‘We’ll explain it all.’

Yes, if we can make sense of it…

But that was why it was so good. Because it made so little sense to begin with. But now it was all joining up. All the stuff about precogs and telepaths, and the evil little boy, Jory… And Ella Runciter…

As the end credits ran, they sat back, great sighs of satisfaction and amazement escaping them.

‘Fuck, that was good!’ Chris said, shaking his head.

Jake looked down. ‘It’s strange, but it’s like that at work some days… All those outrageous-looking avatars. There’s even some based on Dick characters. Palmer Eldritch for one… Some of them try to get into your head…’

‘How do they do that?’ Hugo asked. ‘I thought it was all about surfaces and using your senses…’

‘It is. But there is penetration.’

There was a comic ‘ooh’ from several of them at that.

Jake shook his head. ‘Come on, now. I’m being serious. That’s what it feels like. That they’re trying to get right inside your head. They hack in, you see. The datscape acts fast, of course, to shut them down. It doesn’t like penetration, but in those first few moments, when they’re in… well… they can find out a lot. They can do a hell of a lot of damage.’

‘But at a cost, eh?’ Alex asked.

‘Sure. Those who do it find themselves locked out.’

‘But they’re expendable?’

‘I guess.’

‘Our friends again, eh?’

Alex was talking about the Han again, the Chinese. And he was right. They were the chief culprits.

Alison stood. ‘Look, I’d better get going. I’ve got an early start.’

Kate stood, smiling at her. ‘Must you? I was going to do coffee and some little pastries.’

Unexpectedly, Alison smiled back at her. ‘That’s kind, but I really must. I need my sleep.’

‘Moi aussi,’ Chris said in his best mock pretentious style, standing and stretching, as if he were suddenly tired. ‘We could share a hopper, eh, Hugo?’

Hugo was clearly still thinking about Ubik. He looked up, meeting Chris’s eyes. ‘What’s that?’

‘Alison’s got to go… I was offering her a lift.’

‘Oh… we’re not staying then?’

Jake grinned. ‘As it happens, I’ve got an early start, too.’

Kate looked to him. ‘You didn’t say…’

No, and Jake hadn’t really thought about it, until a moment ago. But now that he’d thought about it, he was determined. He didn’t like being away from the datscape for too long – and eighteen hours seemed a very long time.

He stood, looking to Alison. ‘Are you sure you won’t stay for coffee?’

‘No. I must go. I only came because—’

She stopped, conscious that they were all listening.

‘Go on,’ Jake said, surprised by the strange change in her face.

Alison looked down. ‘It’s just… my father died. Yesterday. I know how much he and you got on…’

‘Oh, Alison…’ He stepped forward, as if to hold her, then realized that her body language screamed at him not to make a fuss over it. Besides…

‘I didn’t know,’ Chris said, all sympathy. ‘You poor dear…’

‘I’m so sorry,’ Jake said.

Alison met his eyes. Her own were clear. ‘I just wanted to tell you, that’s all. For old times’ sake.’ She looked to Hugo, forcing a half smile. ‘He’d been ill some time, but… it’s still a bit of a shock… when you hear…’

Fuck, Jake thought. And now she’s alone. No wonder she came.

Her mother had died while they were at Oxford. He had attended the funeral with her; stood at her side while they put the coffin in the ground. And now here she was.

And she was right. They had got on. Like father and son. But when he’d stopped seeing Alison, he’d cut all links to her father.

‘He was a lovely man,’ he said quietly. ‘A really lovely man.’

‘Thank you…’

Afterwards, when they were all gone, Kate came over to him. ‘She was very pretty.’ ‘You think so?’

‘Yes. Were you lovers?’

‘That’s very direct of you.’

‘I’m a very direct kind of girl.’

He hesitated. ‘Yes. We were. And we probably still would be. Only she wanted more than me. More than what I was, anyway.’

Kate had looked down. ‘How long were you together?’

‘Three years.’

‘Ah…’

She hadn’t known. But then, he hadn’t told her. Hadn’t made anything of it.

She brightened. ‘Did you know… Alex got his promotion.’

‘What?’

‘He’s full captain now. Jenny told me when we were out in the kitchen.’

‘No wonder he was in such a good mood. I did think it odd. He’s usually such a surly bugger. But why didn’t he say?’

‘Didn’t want to take the edge off our news, I guess.’

‘That was nice of him.’

‘Wasn’t it.’ She paused, then. ‘I know you two don’t see eye to eye on things, but… he’s a good friend.’

‘Yeah…’ And when he thought about it, he realized it was true.

But a captain, eh? In Security. What did that mean? That he was in charge of torturing suspects?

Jake didn’t want to think of it, but that was how it was these days. The Oil Crash of twenty-two had jolted politics to the right in a major, some felt irreversible way. Social welfare as a political concept had died, stoned to death by angry, rioting mobs.

‘Jake?’

‘Yes, my love?’

‘Do you really have to go in early? I was thinking maybe we could get up late and have breakfast together on the verandah.’

He wanted to please her. To say yes, why not? Only the datscape called him. Not so much an addiction as a basic need, stronger than sex. Even so, he didn’t want to spoil her special evening.

‘Okay… but I’m going in at ten, all right?’

She grinned. ‘Yes. Now come to bed. I want to drive all thoughts of any other woman from your head.’

‘You don’t have to…’

‘Worry? I don’t. But I want to show you that I want you. As you are. I don’t need more. I have all I need.’

Jake stared at her. He was a lucky man. He knew that. But just how lucky he hadn’t realized until that moment. In that sense it was good that Alison had come tonight. In one regard it was perfect timing, for he knew now he had nothing to regret. He had loved her, yes, but that was in another life. He had been a different person back then.

He took her in his arms. ‘Kate… I love you. More than words can possibly say. And the thought of having children with you…’ His smile broadened. ‘I can’t wait…’

She sighed. ‘Only you’ll have to. Apparently it takes four to six weeks for the effects of the implant to wear off. The body has to adjust…’

He kissed her, mainly to shut her up, but the kiss seemed to light something in them both and after a moment they were tearing at each other’s clothes, ignoring the fact that the big panoramic window was unshuttered. It didn’t matter.

‘Fuck me, Jake,’ she said, naked beneath him, her mouth warm against his ear, using that word she never used. ‘Just fuck me!’