Julia and Dan were in Midtown on a cold autumn evening, walking to dinner and arguing as they huddled in overcoats: his olive drab, hers black leather. The temperature had begun dropping away an hour earlier, and a gray drizzle was threatening to turn to sleet. Dan's mood matched the weather. He wasn't happy about her mixing with the wrong crowd, which in his opinion seemed to account for just about everyone who had ever associated with Slim Jim Davidson.
"If those federal agents were on his case, they probably had good reason to be," he insisted.
"Oh, puh-leeze! Come on, Dan, the good ship Lollipop pulled away from the pier a long fucking time ago. Haven't you been paying attention? Hoover is a fucking lunatic and a hypocrite and a screaming bender. He's only been able to hold on to his job because half the fucking country is terrified he's got something on them."
"But Davidson is a known criminal!" her fiance protested. "He doesn't even try to deny it."
"Was a criminal, Dan. But he's super rich now-'legitimate businessman' is now the correct phrase, I believe."
She could see that he was really ticked off, and she knew her gentle flirting with Davidson had probably been the cause. Dan's frown line, which she called the Grand Canyon, was etched deeply into his forehead. It was kind of cute, really, but it would get old if he didn't snap out of it soon. She was about to say so when her flexipad began to chime in a way that signaled a high-priority call from the office.
"Sorry," she said. "I have to take this."
The Times had secured two flexipads and one data slate, clearly at great expense. Besides giving them access to Fleetnet's publicly available Web cache, it also meant that Julia was instantly available 24-7, as long as she was within shortcast range here in Manhattan, or jacked into Fleetnet as an embed while on tour. It was rare for them to call, however. The traffic was mostly one way, when she sent in stories after the censors had cleared them.
A bitter wind blew grit into her eyes as she hauled the pad out of her overcoat.
While she was answering, Dan's pad went off, too.
"Shit," said Julia. "I'll bet something's up."
"What makes you-?"
She held up a hand and waved it to indicate that he should take his call. His frown added even more depth to the canyon, but he did as she suggested, wandering into a bookshop where it was little quieter, and probably warmer.
She remained on the sidewalk, oblivious of the passersby who were staring, some even stopping to gawk openly. The signal came through, and Graeme Blundell, the chief of staff, was frowning on Julia's display. A lot of the 'temps did that when they were confronted with the technology.
"What's up, Graeme?"
"Julia, you need to get over to Chambers Street, to the subway station. There's been an explosion. A bomb or something has gone off over there."
"What sort of bomb?" she asked as all of her nerve endings lit up.
"I don't know," he spluttered. "A big bomb, from the sound of it. There are a lot of people hurt. And that's not all. The wires are saying there are another dozen or more of these things gone off around the country. And we're getting reports from Hawaii that the Japanese have struck there again."
Julia shooed away a couple of teenaged boys who tried to crowd in for a closer look at the flexipad. "Piss off," she said. "I'm working here. No, not you Graeme, go on. How'd they get near Hawaii? I thought the Clinton left the better part of a fighter wing there. Sea Raptors and Hawkeyes."
Blundell threw up his hands. "I don't know, damn it! We don't know much about Pearl yet. It's all too early. But I can tell you, we've got a big story developing over at Chambers Street. And I'm afraid it's right up your alley, Julia. It looks like the sort of thing you say used to happen all the time, back where you came from."
"Yeah, okay," she said. "I'm sorry to hear that. I'll get over there right now. And just so you know, I've got Dan with me. We were heading out to dinner, and he took a call same time as me. That won't be a coincidence. There are no coincidences where I come from. If he can tell me anything about Pearl, I'll get back to you with an update.
"Do you think you could send me a briefing note on what you've got off the wires? I can't access them."
She could see Blundell shooting the flexipad at the other end a nervous look. "I'll get Miss Meade to do it. She's much better on these things than me."
"It's because she's a chick, Graeme. We're better at everything, y'know. See you soon."
She cut him off and looked around for Dan. He was still on the pad. If he was talking like that, it meant that Kolhammer had a live link running between the East and West Coasts. They didn't do that very often, because of the amount of dicking around involved in setting up the relay.
The shit had definitely hit the fan.
"Miss, miss, can we have a look at your flexipad, miss?"
It was those kids again. She recognized them as bicycle couriers, a new industry that had taken off in the city about a month ago. Now it seemed as if they were everywhere. Julia had even had a close call with a couple of female riders. At the time she hadn't known whether to be pissed at them for nearly taking her out, or proud of them for having the cojones to do the job in the first place. In the end, she'd opted for wry amusement.
There were no Lycra bodysuits, powered helmets, or carbon-fiber bike frames to be had in 1940s New York, but both of those girls had done their best to pull off the look. Julia was sure their raked-back riding helmets were made of papier-mache, and the sunglasses were strictly Ray-Ban aviators from current stock. But they must have stayed up late for a whole week cutting and sewing their black overalls to have them fit so tightly. And where they got the Day-Glo strips from, she had no idea.
The two boys jumping from foot to foot in front of her hadn't invested nearly so much effort. She looked in on Dan again. He was deep into some unpleasant conversation. Normally she'd have just tapped on the window and waved him good-bye as she rushed off to the job, but she wanted to know what his call was about.
"Okay," she told the kid. "But it'll have to be quick. You wanna music vid? Sativa or J-Two? Or I've got some very old Britney Spears here. I'm guessing you boys would be right into Britney."
"Oh, wow!"
"Awesome!"
"Okay, check it out," she said, bringing up a vid file and glancing at Dan again. "If you try a runner on me, though, I'll shoot you down before you get ten feet away." She let them catch a glimpse of the SIG Sauer in its holster under her leather coat. That seemed to excite them even more than the Ericsson.
As she was waiting for Dan to emerge, growing impatient, she heard the unmistakable rumble of a bomb going off a few blocks away.