Will had not been joking about that.
The big black blimp had once been a restaurant called Innerer Schweinehund. The passenger hold famously only had room for six tables plus a separate, tiny bar and then the kitchen. The chef, Werner Wolff, was a big deal, he’d had a popular Blink stream that was mostly just a camera looking down at the counter while he plated dishes. The man was an artist and a psychopath, working magic in his kitchen and then raging at staff and customers alike. Getting a table at his floating restaurant used to mean four years on a waiting list … or if you were Titus Chobb, you finally got frustrated with the wait and bought the restaurant, turning the dirigible into a company meeting space and Wolff into your personal chef.
Also, the blimp was “black” in the way a blinding spotlight is white; the surface was made of a special light-absorbing nanotube material that reflected no features or contours whatsoever. From the ground it was impossible to even grasp that it was a three-dimensional object, it just looked like a perfect hole punched in the sky. You could routinely find tourists staring up at it and blinking their eyes, thinking there was something wrong with their vision.
Zoey, Will, and Wu were told to board the restaurant from the rooftop of a building called Freya’s Palace (not one of Zoey’s, she’d asked) and were informed that the blimp would then take a leisurely hour-long circuit around the perimeter of the city. The airship was already perched on the roof of the sculpted marble tower when they pulled up. The building was all curves and flourishes (Zoey wondered if a woman had designed it) and from the ground, the attached blimp made it look like it was wearing a black beret. Inside, she found that Freya’s Palace’s interior seemed to be a gigantic spa complex for rich women, a silent space with customers shuffling around in white robes. They entered a glassed-in elevator that rose through a transparent tube surrounded by an aquarium, so that passengers could enjoy annoying exotic fish as they ascended.
Zoey put her hand into her jacket pocket and felt the tube of her mom’s stupid skin cream. She pulled it out, the little animated flower dancing on the logo. Guaranteed to give you the confidence of a … daisy? Still, she twisted out the petals and smeared it on her hands. Maybe it would stop them from shaking so much.
The blimp docked directly to a glassed-in enclosure on the top floor. As they stepped from the elevator, the black shape loomed overhead, blotting out the sun. They entered a narrow door to the airship’s passenger compartment and were met by the armored muscles of Chobb’s bodyguard, Dirk Vikerness. His beard was trimmed in the shape of a snake that emerged from his left sideburn and coiled around his mouth, ending where a normal mustache would stop. He had dazzling blue eyes and the expression of a man who knew they were dazzling. He wore sculpted yellow plates around his shoulders and chest, the armor flat black the rest of the way down. The company colors.
In an accent that sounded Swedish, he said, “Ah, you are here. I hear the fire at your building is nearly out. I am sure you wish you could be there, helping your people get to safety.” He focused on Wu and said, “I will need to collect your weapons, I’m afraid. Blimp rules.”
Wu looked at Zoey for confirmation. She deferred to Will, who nodded. Wu turned over his katana, several blades, and a bracelet weapon he had mounted to his good wrist. Even then, Zoey was confident he hadn’t given up everything. She had her augmentation-control necklace, but couldn’t see Raiden scars on Vikerness. She figured he knew he could cave in somebody’s skull using only what genes and steroids had given him.
The weaponry now in his hands, the giant man said, “Thank you. Now we are going to be brushing up against our max weight; are all three of you under two hundred pounds?”
Zoey said, “Yes.”
Looking right at her, Dirk said, “Are you sure?”
Zoey had to crane her neck to make contact with those icy eyes.
“I don’t get it, is this how you flirt? If so, will you consider it a turn-off if I keep stopping to laugh at your beard?”
Will, sounding annoyed, said, “You’re keeping your boss waiting.”
“Of course, everyone’s time is important, I’m sure,” said Vikerness. He gestured them into the passenger deck. “Life is always shorter than we think.”
They were led to a table where Titus Chobb was already sitting. He was a small, oily man with dark eyes and graying hair that was shaved on the sides and swept over up top, a style designed to be combed with fingers after rolling out of bed. His outfit was khakis and a denim shirt, looking like he was ready to go out and supervise some landscaping work. His eyes said he was being interrupted from something he’d much rather be doing and Zoey guessed that he wore that expression twenty-four hours a day, even when sleeping.
Will said, “Titus.”
“I got another meeting at this time, client is waiting in the bar area, getting more pissed off by the minute. Make it quick.”
They took that as their cue to sit.
Before they could begin, Chobb said to Will, “And before we even start, let me make it clear that this meeting fulfills the favor I owe you. Whatever you’re about to ask me for, it doesn’t start from a place of me owing you a debt. Even that is being generous. The favor was owed to Arthur, not you.” He turned to look at Zoey for the first time. “Your father was a great man. Tragic the way it ended for him, but also inevitable. Men like him typically don’t die in their sleep.”
Zoey got the “Your father was a great man” stuff a lot, usually at functions with donors trying to get on her good side. Her father had impregnated Zoey’s mother, abandoned her, then all but threatened her with death if she pursued paternity. He had made his money by crushing the desperate and vulnerable like grapes in a wine press. Still, Zoey had developed an answer that seemed to satisfy everyone.
“He was passionate about what he believed in.”
The whole room jolted. As the airship pulled away from the rooftop, Zoey watched the world sink down from the side windows. Her stomach did a drunken backflip and fell flat on its face.
“When he died,” said Titus, watching the city drain from their view, “his vision died with him.”
Will quickly cut off any chance for Zoey to reply to this. “I know your time is valuable. And you know the context for this meeting.”
“I’m actually surprised you’re up here talking to me, rather than down there trying to quell the uprising. Getting big enough to make the news now. Scaring away tourists. Destabilizing our fragile paradise. Every empire is a house of cards, as you well know.”
“But business must be booming for you,” said Will. “Every mom and pop shop will want private security at their door.”
“Only if said security ensures a steady flow of happy customers who’re in the mood to spend money. If there is unrest in the streets to the point that everyone is afraid to leave their apartments, then a guy at the door with a yellow jacket and a machine gun isn’t going to make a damned bit of difference. When the money dries up, so will security budgets. No, my perfect scenario is a completely peaceful city and a populace who appreciates that only my services can preserve that peace.”
A completely nude woman with a body like an Olympic swimmer strode up. She was wearing white body paint, so that she looked like a Greek statue. Zoey wasn’t taken aback—she was familiar with the chef’s crew of servers, as they had also been a prominent part of Wolff’s streams. The woman placed a platter on the table and Zoey glanced over at Will to see if he’d ogle her as she walked back to the kitchen. He did not. Zoey did. A bit.
The dish on the platter looked like some kind of chilled bean thing, served on a misty tray of liquid nitrogen. Yep, this was a Chef Wolff dish, all right.
Will said, “So we all have the same goal, then. We need to quell this.”
“How do you intend to do that?”
“A two-pronged approach of showing force in the streets, and putting these ugly rumors to rest.”
Chobb raised an eyebrow. “You think that’ll do it, huh? That’s making me think you don’t even understand what this is about.”
“We were there,” Zoey interjected, “in the middle of the riot. Bricks hit the van. I’m pretty sure I get it.”
Chobb laughed and looked back at Dirk Vikerness, who was looming over his shoulder.
“What was it, ninety seconds?”
The bodyguard chuckled.
Chobb turned back to Zoey. “I said to him before you got here, I’ve never known a woman under thirty who could go more than two minutes without talking about herself.” To Will, he said, “You didn’t give her the standard ‘let me do all the talking’ speech on the way here?” Back to Zoey, “I’d explain it, but I doubt you’d be able to stay quiet long enough.”
Zoey bit her lip so hard she tasted blood. “Give it a try. I’m always eager to learn.”
Chobb carefully rolled some of the bean things onto some kind of fancy cracker, sprinkled some kind of orange crumbles on top, then dabbed it with a pulpy red sauce.
As he chewed, he said, “A long time ago, a capable, strong man, perfected by millions of years of natural selection, emerged from his cave.”
Zoey thought, Oh, god. He’s one of these guys.
“Then another strong, capable man—and it was a man, not a woman—walks up and says, ‘Help me build my hut and in exchange, I’ll help you hunt later.’ And the man said, ‘Sure, but I don’t trust your caveman brain to remember this favor, so write it down on a note. A piece of paper that proves that I did something great and that in exchange, someone must do something great for me.’ Those transferable acts of heroism are what we call ‘money.’ Each and every dollar represents a bold action from a talented, competent, hardworking man somewhere in the past. When that system is functioning as intended, no one is victimized, no one is cheated. It’s just an exchange of glorious acts, men trying to do the most good for others so that they can get the best in return, until the untamed wilderness is transformed into a flourishing paradise.”
He paused to assemble another bite.
“Where that all falls apart,” he continued, to Zoey’s dismay, “is when bad actors decide they don’t feel like doing the hard work of achieving greatness—learning a skill, building something. They would rather just sneak in under the cover of dark and steal someone else’s heroism. Or, out of jealousy, demand the government take it and give it to them. Or, when lazy children inherit a stack of heroism from their hardworking father, then demand that they themselves be treated as heroes. Do you know what the name of this restaurant means? ‘Innerer Schweinehund’?”
“‘Inner pig-dog.’ I used to watch Chef Wolff’s stream, back when this was a restaurant. Though it’s kind of weird he went with that when ‘Cloud Nein’ was out there.”
“The inner pig-dog is the laziness that haunts a man’s soul,” said Chobb, explaining the thing that Zoey had just told him she already knew. “The voice telling him to quit, to kick back, to have a beer, that nothing is worth doing. It’s the part of yourself we have to kill to accomplish greatness. Any man in the world who has built anything, or become great at something, bears a medal on his chest declaring that he’s defeated the schweinehund. And we bristle when we see anyone who gives in but still gets their share of the spoils.” He pointed his spoon at Zoey. “That is why they hate you.”
“Because I inherited my money?”
“Because every man can feel when things are out of balance. We are built to be sickened by injustice.”
“And here I thought people were mailing me rape threats because they’re psychopaths who get turned on by spreading fear.”
“Psychopaths persist in the species because women find them attractive, thus breeding more psychopaths.”
Zoey felt Will shifting in his seat, sensing the annoyance building in him. He had little use for these debates that Zoey was somehow constantly getting sucked into.
“Whereas men,” she said, “choose their sex partners based purely on moral virtue. Getting back to the original topic, what, in your estimation, would make all of this go away?”
“You’ve seen the video of when the North Korean government fell? The crowds tearing down that statue? That’s when the mob will be satisfied.”
“Only I’m the statue. So, what, I should retire? Take some money and go back to Colorado?”
“No, I don’t think that would do it. I think they need to topple you.”
“Speaking of Korea,” said Will, before Zoey could open her mouth, “you built all of this off of contracts you had over there. When you were with Odin’s Hammer. All that off-books work behind the border.”
“You were there.”
“I was. I saw the aftermath of your people’s work in Kaesong. I understand they were paid very well. Deservedly so. It can’t be easy to shoot a five-year-old child, they make for such small targets. Well, I guess it’s easier when they’re starving. And barricaded inside a school.”
“And now their surviving comrades, instead of starving in the streets, can dine at one of the four Chick-fil-A locations that just opened in their city. What’s your point?”
“My point is, if I were to, say, smash you through that window and feed you to the propellers—”
Zoey grabbed Will’s arm. “Stop. Go. Walk away. Go outside and have a smoke.” She glanced back at Wu. “You, too. I want to talk to Mr. Chobb alone.”
Will stared daggers at her, but didn’t move.
She repeated. “Go. There’s a little bar through that door, right? Go have a drink.” To Wu, “And yes, go with him. Don’t make me say it again.”
They both left, reluctantly. Chobb almost imperceptibly nodded to Dirk Vikerness, who stepped away, taking up a position in the corner instead of leaving the room, as Zoey would’ve preferred. Chobb was spooning more beans onto a cracker. Zoey grabbed a cracker and started doing the same.
“What is this? Some kind of bean salad?”
“They’re all eggs. A mix of salmon roe, caviar, escamoles—that’s ant larva. The orange crumbles are sugar-cured egg yolks. These are fried blinis. The sauce is a Moroccan harissa.”
She chewed. The eggs were just frozen enough to kind of gently shatter in the mouth, the sauce was spicy and minty. The varying temperatures hit her tongue in waves. It was deeply unsettling and also she immediately wanted more.
Chobb nodded in the direction Will had gone and said, “You know he agrees with everything I just said, right? Don’t let him tell you any different. He knows he should be at the head of the table. I can’t even imagine what lies Will is telling you to make you think your interests are aligned. And I’ll say this—I think it’s cruel the way he’s stringing you along, letting you be the public face of the operation for whatever demented purpose he’s decided that serves. This summer, when I heard he’d supposedly found you like that and gotten you to a hospital, I said, ‘Ah, there it is. That’s how he’s going to do it once he’s decided he’s done with her. He’s set the stage.’ Soon they’ll find you in the tub with your wrists split open and he’ll say, ‘We all knew she was troubled, the poor girl. Even had to be institutionalized at one point. The burden of leadership was just more than what little Zoey could bear.’”
Instead of taking the bait, Zoey swallowed, leveled her gaze at Titus Chobb, and said, “They’re right. The Blowback, I mean. I had Dexter Tilley killed.”
She watched him very carefully. Anyone can suppress a reaction when the situation calls for it, but it is almost impossible to avoid that initial half-second response. It was in that fraction of a moment that Titus Chobb flashed an expression of mild amusement, the look of a man who had heard a statement he knew was a lie and was relishing the power of knowing the truth. And in that moment, Zoey knew that either Chobb had killed Tilley, or knew who had done it. It wasn’t that strange of a thought; the man’s empire was built on gunmen who, in a sane city, would have washed out of a police academy. If he wanted it done, he could have ordered it with a glance and a nod.
Still, Chobb’s expression recovered faster than most people’s, she had to admit.
“Well, that’s good to know. Am I supposed to be scared?”
The nude server returned and placed in front of each of them a small wooden plank. On each was a piece of meat that was still squirming. It was a flayed eel, its head intact but body sliced open and pinned to the wood, like a dissection in biology class. Zoey suppressed her urge to recoil in disgust but, just like Chobb, knew she did not do it in time.
Chobb said, “This way, you know it’s fresh.”
Zoey tried not to look at it. Still, she could hear it. A slimy exposed wound, writhing in pain.
“I don’t expect you to be scared of me, no. But if the roof blows off this city … it’s not going to look like anything you’ve seen before. How many private security staff do you have on your payroll?”
“Over a thousand,” he said, as he carved off a piece of eel. “And growing.”
“But you don’t accept anyone who has implants, and you don’t use any other Raiden gadgets. No tiny blasters that can melt a whole car.”
“That’s because none of it works. I just heard about a man who’s in the hospital, still on fire a week later.”
“The bootleg implants don’t work. They have buggy software, by design. That’s because there’s only one source for the real thing. And I’m not selling. Yet.”
Chobb stopped chewing. Just for a second, but she caught it.
She continued, “This situation in the city will get fixed, and soon. I can’t make them love me, but I can make them piss their pants at the sound of my name. I would prefer it not to be that way. But if they don’t leave me a choice?” She shrugged.
“I believe you. After all, you killed Dexter Tilley.”
He cut off another chunk of the thrashing eel and took a bite. As he chewed, they locked eyes for about three seconds.
Zoey looked away first. She picked up her knife and sliced the head off her eel, putting it out of its misery, and stood.
“Where’s the server? I want to leave her a tip.”