Agency

69 Heathkit

Stepping down, in front of the barista on his Harley, it occurred to Verity that she should probably have the hoodie up, because people in the building whose parking lot this was might be getting pictures or video of the encounter, particularly if they could also see the drone. This rare and temporary patch of fall sunlight felt great, though, so she left it down.

The barista reached up and pulled his mask away from his face, then down. Releasing it, it rode beneath his chin like a white plastic voice box.

“Is Eunice dead?” she asked him.

He briskly mimed the emoji she thought of as amazement at another’s cluelessness, his open palms turning briefly up, with a simultaneous shrug and eye roll. Then he raised a forefinger, reached into his jacket pocket with the other hand, and produced a folded paper bag, handing it to her. Stamped in brown, she saw, with 3.7-sigma’s logo.

There seemed to be nothing in it. She unfolded it. The all-caps message was in fluorescent pink industrial paint pen:

“Grim Tim,” she said, looking up from his note.

He was opening a black mesh bag, bungeed to the top of the Harley’s tank. He looked up, flashing her a version of that look of somehow agreeable contempt she knew from 3.7. From the mesh he produced what she assumed was the Faraday pouch she’d seen before. When she’d accepted it, he pulled up his mask, lowered the visor of his helmet, took his pink-lettered message from her, crumpled it one-handed, stuffed it back into his jacket pocket, and gunned his engine slightly.

“Thanks,” she said, taking a step back, uncertain how she felt about communicating with some sort of partial Eunice.

He turned the Harley, waited for a gap in the traffic, and was gone, a single sharp backfire ringing in his wake.

“Get in,” Conner said, from the drone behind her. “Time we go.” She turned, to find it standing in the open passenger door, arms braced. “Let me sniff that first.” And one arm was there, that quickly, long and thin, with three different kinds of retractable device, sensors she supposed, in various proximities to the bag. “Seems clean,” he said. “Get in. I’ll open it.”

“I’ll open it myself,” she said, climbing up, past the drone and into the van, where Sevrin remotely closed the door behind her.

Taking her seat behind Sevrin, she held the pouch on her lap in both hands. Sevrin was turning the van, then waiting for an opening in traffic. When one arrived, he pulled out. She undid the pouch’s folded lips and looked down into it. Against its white lining, she saw the Tulpagenics phone, the case for the glasses, the headset, and their three chargers.

When she spread the temples of the glasses she found their inner surfaces had been shallowly excavated, then refilled with something darker. “He said everything’s been modded for security. Ash?”

“Yes?”

“He said Eunice’s branch plants will be in touch. So should I put these on, turn on the phone?”

“Wouldn’t you, even if I told you not to?” Ash asked. “I would.”

“Why didn’t you know that would be him, following us?”

“That would be the branch plants,” Ash said. “They aren’t very forthcoming.”

Verity put the glasses on. She got out the Tulpagenics phone. Two small square holes had been neatly cut in the back of its case, then patched with dark blue plastic tape. When she powered it up, the display was unfamiliar. The headset, she found, had its own hole and blue patch. She turned that on as well, hung it on her ear, put the earbud in place, pressed power, then pressed power on the glasses, causing the headset to ping, once.

No cursor.

She let out the breath she hadn’t known she was holding. She turned the phone over, looking at its back again. “Why did they cut these holes,” she asked Ash, “instead of just opening it?”

In her glasses: The unit is designed to self-destruct if opened by unauthorized personnel. Postfactory access now bypasses that system. Under no circumstances attempt further exploration, disassembly, or modification.

White Helvetica, across the back of her phone, her hand, her jeans. “Who are you?” she asked.

Unable to formulate reply.

She looked at Virgil.

He raised an eyebrow. “Sup?”

This communication is encrypted.

“This phone’s encrypted?”

All units are currently secure.

“May I speak with Eunice?”

No.

“Why?”

Unable to formulate reply.

“Who else can I communicate with, on this system?”

Make a specific request.

“Joe-Eddy?”

Not available.

“José Eduardo Alvarez-Matta?”

Available.

“No shit?”

Unable to formulate reply.

“How do I contact him?”

Text José Eduardo Alvarez-Matta as HEATHKIT. Press send.

Verity looked from Virgil down to the drone between them, then back up again. “It says I can text Joe-Eddy.”

“What does?” Virgil asked.

“One of Eunice’s branch plants, if Grim Tim was right. That’s how he introduced himself. Thing reads about as human as pharmaceutical instructions and won’t answer most questions. I’d text him now, but you told me he’d only be able to use it under the covers.”

“Do it anyway,” Ash said. “If he isn’t on the device now, he’ll see it when he next uses it.”

Verity, opening Messages, started one to HEATHKIT. Hey, she typed, you okay? I’m okay. V.

Pressed send.

“Who else can I text?” she asked.

Make a specific request.

“Stets. Stetson Howell.”

Not available.

She frowned.

What are you wearing?

“Fuck off, Joe-Eddy.”

You probably don’t even have to pretend you’re fapping. I have to be under the covers with porn on my real phone, when I do this. Don’t know if it fools Cursion, but the lawyers are having a hard time not giving me looks.

“Got him,” she said, with a glance for the drone.

“How can you be sure?” asked Ash.

“If it’s not him, it’s a good facsimile,” Verity said, glancing back at the phone’s screen. Where she read:

Can’t chat but sending you prepared update of cryptic shit in meantime. Now back to living room before Trevor and Celeste decide I’ve suffered onanistic stroke, break down door to give me CPR. Take care tho not necessarily the way Trevor and Celeste think I’m doing.

“Make that a really good facsimile,” Verity said.