24. Absolute #2
Astrid looked at him like a worried mother. “Oh, don’t tell me you don’t have a food line hooked up to you? I can’t live without them – every time I come in here I feel ravenous. I need to match up with my body.”
She highlighted her selection and made an order for the table.
He stared at her. “You’re kidding, right? You’re being fed intravenously?” He knew this was all a game to her. He’d known her for too long. Astrid relished feeling superior.
She pursed her lips. “I spend a lot of time in this bloody reality. I’d starve if I didn’t.”
“And who hooks you up?” Isaak pointed at Jewel. “Her?”
Astrid shook her head. “No, no… Jewel is purely tasked with guarding my body, in both realities.” She leaned forwards and rubbed a hand from her chest down her side, the black shirt rumpling beneath her slim fingers, and flashed him a too-white smile.
“She does a very good job, doesn’t she…? Ah, here’s lunch!”
A man walked into his field of view, wearing a black-and-white server’s uniform.
He didn’t have a face. It was a dumbwaiter, an AI agent, designed purely to serve food at the Emporium.
The lack of visage shook Isaak up. A flash of the man he shot appeared in front of his eyes and then disappeared again.
Isaak recoiled in place, a shiver going down his spine as the bot placed down a platter covered by a silvered purple cloche.
Astrid’s eyes gleamed at his reaction. “Everything okay, Ike?”
“It’s nothing.” But the guilty hallucination forced his hand. He had to ask again. “Who did I shoot—”
The server – AI – whatever it was, reached in and pulled the cloche from over the platter.
“Meow!”
A tabby cat stood and stretched and started gently attacking the utensils on the table.
It took a few seconds for Isaak to summon any words. “What the fuck is this?”
“Hmm… My thoughts exactly.”
Isaak frowned. His system was flooding with adrenaline, urging him to look for a way out.
The only way she would know about the cat is if she had been watching them somehow…
Jewel stood right next to him, like a polished metal brass wall, perfectly still.
Isaak looked into her unwavering face. Even if he made it out of here, he’d never make it somewhere safe enough to tape out.
After a few seconds, he gave up on thinking of ways to leave. The tabby cat made its way to his side of the table and nudged him for attention. He kept his eyes down, his arms crossed, resisting any contact with it.
“I’m not much into cats, Astrid…”
“Really? That’s surprising, considering…” A veiled threat.
“What?” The muscles in his neck tensed. He placed his hands on the table, making to get up.
She turned to her companion. “Jewel?”
Jewel immediately grabbed him by the shoulder, forcing him back down into his seat.
“Please, stay!” Astrid raised her voice.
Struggling under the woman-wall would get him nowhere, it seemed.
Astrid’s smile became welcoming and warm. She brought a finger to her lips. “Shh…”
Isaak acquiesced and stopped squirming. He shook the pain out of his shoulder as Jewel released her hold.
The cat proceeded to groom the area beneath its legs, splayed on the table like none of this was happening around it. The name tag attached to its breakaway collar glinted in the dim light of the pub. Mister Tomcat. Like a mate to Miss Kitty.
“Did you think I was going to harm this cat?” Astrid laughed. “I do still get the meat craves, who doesn’t? But I’m not such a barbarian that I’d eat a cat!” Her voice took on a sinister tone.
“This isn’t funny.”
She blew air through her lips, cheeks puffing out. “Fine.” She waved to Jewel. “You, take the cat away.”
Jewel leant down and grabbed the cat unceremoniously, hugging it against one of her massive shoulders without a word.
Astrid pouted like a toddler. “Now I have to find someone else. You’re done working for me.”
He looked her up and down as she stood up, Jewel making room for her to pass. He felt himself getting flustered, an emotional torrent threatening to jump out of his skin. “Was it worth it? Using me like you did?”
Astrid grabbed the flaps of the collar on her blazer and touched them together, the blazer closing all the way down to cover her neck and chest under a black protective shroud. Her icy stare seared into him, leaving him feeling naked. She was judging him like a piece of meat.
He wanted to puke.
“There were some things I liked, yes. But all in all… I was expecting more from you.” She paused, as if considering whether to keep going, but evidently didn’t have to consider for long.
“When I found you, you were less than nothing. Your shitty knee. Your career down the toilet. No woman would touch you.”
He faced away from her, grimacing. Looking at her made his insides turn. It was repulsive.
She made her way across the Emporium, but stopped short of leaving through the door. “I did enjoy using you…” Her tongue slid across her lips, and she took a hand to one of her breasts, lightly squeezing it through the suit. “A lot.”
Absolute cunt.
Isaak let her words hang in the air for a moment. Finally, he summoned the courage to get up and follow her outside.
As he crossed through the door out into the Boulevard, he spotted her further ahead, already materialising away.
The bright light of her exit silhouetted her sharp, black figure.
His heart rate sped up as he saw the last of her remnant body slowly blink out.
Jewel stood behind, keeping guard, waiting for her exit to complete.
Soon there was nothing left of Astrid, the reality of the tape unperturbed.
He nodded at Jewel – the kind of nod you give when you don’t have anything to say to someone, when you’ve barely spoken, but you still feel a need to acknowledge them.
He thought he might see pity or sympathy from the bodyguard, but he got nothing in return.
She completely ignored him, following her orders like a good soldier.
He wanted to tell her how Astrid would completely fuck her over once her usefulness ran out too, but he kept his thoughts to himself.
Didn’t fancy following up the conversation he’d just had with a punch in the face.
The sun here had set now, as programmed into the Boulevard’s day and night cycle.
There were more people milling about than before.
How many people used the tape at any one time?
Among the multitude of people, clothes, voices, noises, garish and dark colours, his derezzing was unlikely to even be noticed.
Back to reality, and his studio in Brixton, sitting on the black desk chair, sole companion of so many strides into the Tapeworld. The faux leather was beginning to crack and tear.
Typing the message came easy to him, but tapping the send button was open heart surgery, his own heart on the operating table.
@isaak: I stopped working for Astrid. I want to see you.
There was a lump in his throat. It made his intentions clear.
Sent.
He went back to the chair, exhausted from dealing with Astrid.
Existential dread made its unwelcome presence known.
Silence outside but for the occasional sound of a fool gunning the road on a motorbike.
On the desk was a stack of opened envelopes – rent, other bills, that he wouldn’t be able to pay without Astrid’s credits.
Keeping the Gunkatana, lying to her about what happened, and was Astrid aware of what he did with the cat he gave Dylan?
Was she aware Dylan even existed? Had she been watching them?
What was the connection between her, the Third Kingdom, the wolves, and the black spheres?
He stood in front of a chasm filled with a vast, black emptiness, behind him the multi-luminescent streets of the Boulevard.
Shooting that man, lying to and spying on Dylan, and what he’d done with Astrid…
All the stealing, and the sex. Finding that photo inside the sword.
He longed for the blackness to consume him. To free him of his guilt.
He raised his foot, waves of pain hitting his knee from every direction, the last thing he’d feel before stepping forward into the black depths—
He woke up with a jolt, slamming his fist down to his right. His mind was filled with the image of a woman in a white dress, blue-on-blonde dyed hair. Dylan. His fist stopped short of hitting the wall.