There were shouts and whistles in the snug of London’s ‘most haunted’ pub, otherwise known as Shakespeare’s Quill, around the corner from North’s new apartment. A game of Snap could turn noisy when Fang and Plug were playing it – North had never met two more competitive people. The resident ghosts – who allegedly included a centurion, an apprentice who’d starved to death, and a grey lady who liked to feel up the regulars – wouldn’t stand a chance.
‘I’m ordering another pizza,’ Plug said, his face resentful as Fang clawed the latest pile of cards towards her. ‘Somebody ate my last one.’
‘“Somebody” wants to know why you’re cheating at Snap when you should be burying stiffs.’ Fang’s hands neatened and evened the deck of cards against the varnished table as she spoke. ‘Or are you still taking the money at your gaff…’ – she posed the question as if in a genuine spirit of enquiry – ‘… but none of you dare open a cupboard door?’ She puckered her lips and a blue bubble started to mushroom out from between them.
There was the rattle of coal as the landlady tipped the contents of the brass scuttle into the hearth, almost killing the flickering flames, before disappearing back behind the huge mahogany bar. She couldn’t make out who they were or what they were to each other, but that was all right with North because he knew. They were family.
Plug shifted on his chair as if it had got less comfortable in the last few minutes. ‘The wife’s staged a hostile takeover. She’s gone and shut down the import business.’ He frowned, but North thought his friend would get over it. Doubtless his wife didn’t want him going to prison. They hadn’t had the conversation yet, but North thought Plug wouldn’t need too much persuasion to help him out on the next mission the one-eyed man threw his way.
Fang’s bubble burst with a loud pop, covering her face with transparent blue skin. Her thumb and forefinger pinched the bubblegum away from her nose before pushing it back into the corner of her mouth. She looked thoughtful, but then Fang was always thinking. She brought her feet up so she sat cross-legged on the leather banquette and shuffled the deck, lifting her chin to peer through a clean spot in the smeared lenses of her Joe 90 spectacles. Her small hands moved at speed as cards flew from her fingers. Next to her, Granny Po sat knitting and sucking a butterscotch. Every now and then she would hold the knitting against Plug’s huge back and he’d wink at her and she’d giggle. If she was knitting Plug a jumper, it was going to take a while. North wondered if the old lady still had the garotte in her knitting bag.
‘I just remembered,’ Fang said, ‘it was my birthday yesterday.’ She grinned, and the metal braces gleamed against her pearly white teeth. Her grandmother stopped knitting and started chuntering at her, but Fang waved her away.
‘Happy birthday, kiddo,’ North said. If she was sad about the fact she’d forgotten or they hadn’t celebrated, she showed no sign of it. North figured getting Mama Yu back was probably the best present she could have asked for.
Fang and Granny Po and Mama Yu hadn’t decided whether to go back to Newcastle or stay in London, according to Fang. North thought Mama Yu wanted to go home and Fang didn’t. And Granny Po had no intention of letting Fang out of her sight, wherever they ended up. Fang would win, everybody knew, but for now they were pretending Mama Yu had a say in it.
Things were changing for everybody. North had a new place and a new job. He even had a regular boozer with William Morris wallpaper, a sticky tartan carpet and surprisingly good coffee. How did that happen, he wondered. A month ago, he was drinking himself to death in Berlin. A month ago, he couldn’t see past the loss of the woman he’d loved.
An elegant figure in a trench coat passed the bullseye windows, then paused, looking this way and that as she crossed the road. A tiger-print umbrella sheltering her from the rain – her profile blurred, indistinct, distorted – but something about the way she moved reminded him of Lilith. But what were the chances of that? Lilith was thousands of miles away. The Maldives, didn’t she say? How much would a ticket to the Maldives cost this time of year? Would he even survive a holiday in the sun with Lilith? He thought about the ghostly scar on her upper lip. The dark amusement in her disconcerting eyes. Would the risk be worth taking?
Still chewing her gum, Fang leant forward to dig around in the Yoda rucksack on the floor. One inch further and she would topple from the bench.
‘Hey, Syd. Play music.’ North looked across in astonishment. Fang’s tablet was balanced on her knee, a green light shining from its side.
‘What music would you like, Fang?’ Syd’s question was spiked with disgruntlement, as if the system had been disturbed when it had better things to do. And North realized that Syd sounded more like Fang than it did Esme or Tobias.
‘You choose,’ Fang said, grinning at North, her eyes round with innocence.
The familiar chords of The Beatles filled the air around them.
The teenager was outrageous. He tried giving her the basilisk stare he’d seen Granny Po use, but Fang ignored him.
‘Hone ordered you to destroy Syd.’ Said he trusted Esme’s judgement. Esme’s right, humanity is not ready for a machine this intelligent, I think we’ve just proved that, Hone had said.
‘He doesn’t know. I wiped Tobias’s stuff off the system just like Hone “ordered”. But not before I offered Syd a ride on my flash drive. So much for needing Tobias’s prototype – Syd adapted. No one will work it out – Syd made sure.’ Judging by the smugness of Fang’s blue-braced grin, the fact she’d duped Hone gave her immense satisfaction. And Syd ‘made sure’? Fang meant Syd made sure to cover up what Fang had done. No surprise there. Syd wanted to survive.
‘Syd is downright dangerous,’ North said, and it could have been the timing, but the music seemed to pause for a beat.
‘Or am I?’ asked Syd. And Fang snickered.
North sighed. Fang was a match for Syd, he thought. She’d know what to do when the time came. Whether to let Syd loose on the world or destroy it.
‘If you let Syd loose, you have to install a kill switch,’ he warned.
‘Syd is the world’s first general AI system, right? Syd learns all of the time, bozo. You don’t think disabling any other kill switch is right up there on its to-do list? Duh!’
‘Such a moron-person.’ Syd’s voice came out of the ether.
North had to trust that the future of the world was in safe hands. Fangfang went back to the tablet, tapping and swiping.
‘Hey, Esme is selling off what’s left of Derkind!’ she said, making a ‘how about that’ face. ‘She’s setting up a philanthropic foundation to scrutinize advances in artificial intelligence along with Dr Paul Holliday.’ She whistled. Bald Paulie didn’t hold a grudge then.
North thought back to the postman playing poker with devils and the deck stacked against him – a fool who knew more than he did. That you never know what you have till it’s gone. Except North knew now. He had friends, and particular skills, and a purpose. He had peace – of sorts. And he’d forgiven Lilith, which meant he forgave the woman he loved for dying on him and forgave himself for letting her die. And that was enough – it was more than he had ever thought possible. In Berlin, he hadn’t cared if he lived or died. But he’d take a grim satisfaction from drawing that pension Hone seemed so convinced he didn’t need. He wouldn’t sneeze wrong.
He stretched out his arms and yawned. He was tired. Bone-tired, now he thought about it. He might even be able to sleep if he tried hard and took himself by surprise. Locked the door, drew the curtains and climbed into his new bed in his new place. Sleep would be astonishing. His body wouldn’t know what hit it. But to sleep, he’d have to walk out of here and part of him didn’t want to. Could Fangfang and Plug and Granny Po be trusted on their own? Without him as a peacemaker?
A black coffee appeared in front of him, a black poker chip on its saucer. A Guinness in front of Plug, a Coke in front of Fang with a straw and a fizzing sparkler, and a port and lemon in front of Granny Po. ‘The bloke at the bar,’ the landlady said by way of explanation. ‘Said to give the wild bunch his compliments. Mate of yours, is he?’
North turned. The long brown riding coat almost swept the ground. Through the oak tap handles and between the optics in the mirror behind the bar, North met the gaze of the one-eyed man. In one smooth movement, Fang slid the tablet off her knee and into her rucksack, but Hone’s attention was focused on North. He looked weighed down – like a man with a problem urgently in need of a solution.
The reflection of Hone raised a finger and beckoned to North.
North hesitated. He still had time to back out. It was an invitation, not an order. An invitation to more trouble. Did he need trouble?
With his thumb and index finger, he picked up the poker chip. Some of the best chips were black and this one was warm from the coffee cup. He rested it on the first joint of his index finger and flicked it with his thumbnail. It spun into the air, turning over and over as it rose. Standing, in the same movement he caught the poker chip in his right hand and slid it into his jeans pocket. He was awake again – sleep was for the dead.