Read Online Surfacing by Walter Jon Williams - Free Book Online Page B

contract while Jockstrap was riding you.”
    Philana shook her head silently. Anthony looked up into the Milky Way and imagined the stone wall falling from the void, aimed right between his eyes, spinning slightly as it grew ever larger in his vision. Smashing him again.
    “All we have to do is get the thing out of your head,” Anthony said. “After that, let him sue you. You’ll be free, whatever happens.” His tone reflected a resolve that was absent entirely from his heart.
    “He’ll sue you, too, if you have any part of this.” She turned to face him again. Her face pale and taut in the starlight. “All my money comes from him— how else do you think I could afford the yacht? I owe everything to him.”
    Bitterness sped through Anthony’s veins. He could feel his voice turning harsh. “Do you want to get rid of him or not? Yes or no.”
    “He’s not entirely evil.”
    “Yes or no, Philana.”
    “It’ll take years before he’s done with you. And he could kill you. Just transport you to deep space somewhere and let you drift. Or he could simply teleport me away from you.”
    The bright stars poured down rage. Anthony knew himself seconds away from violence. There were two people on this boat and one of them was about to get hurt. “ Yes or no!” he shouted.
    Philana’s face contorted. She put her hands over her ears. Hair fell across her face. “Don’t shout,” she said.
    Anthony turned and smashed his forehead against the control panel of the flybridge. Philana gave a cry of surprise and fear. Anthony drove himself against the panel again. Philana’s fingers clutched at his shoulders. Anthony could feel blood pouring hot from his scalp. The pain drained his anger, brought a cold, brilliant clarity to his mind. He smashed himself a third time. Philana cried out. He turned to her. He felt a savage, exemplary satisfaction. If one were going to drive oneself against stone walls, one should at least take a choice of the walls available.
    “Ask me,” Anthony panted, “if I care what happens to me.”
    Philana’s face was a mask of terror. She said his name.
    “I need to know where you stand,” said Anthony. Blood drooled from his scalp, and he suppressed the unwelcome thought that he had just made himself look ridiculous.
    Her look of fear broadened.
    “Am I going to jump off this cliff by myself, or what?” Anthony demanded.
    “I want to get rid of him,” she said.
    Anthony wished her voice had contained more determination, even if it were patently false. He spat salt and went in search of his first aid kit. We are in a condition of slow movement through deep currents, he thought.
    *
    In the morning he got the keys to Philana’s yacht and changed the passwords on the falkner controls and navigation comp. He threw all his liquor overboard. He figured that if Jockstrap appeared and discovered that he couldn’t leave the middle of the ocean, and he couldn’t have a party where he was, he’d get bored and wouldn’t hang around for long.
    From Philana’s cabin he called an attorney who informed him that the case was complex but not impossible, and furthermore that it would take a small fortune to resolve. Anthony told him to get to work on it. In the meantime he told the lawyer to start calling neurosurgeons. Unfortunately there were few neurosurgeons capable of implanting, let alone removing, the rider device. The operation wasn’t performed that often.
    Days passed. A discouraging list of neurosurgeons either turned him down flat or wanted the legal situation clarified first. Anthony told the lawyer to start calling rich neurosurgeons who might be able to ride out a lawsuit.
    Philana transferred most of her data to Anthony’s computer and worked with the whales from the smaller boat. Anthony used her yacht and aquasled and cursed the bad sound quality. At least the yacht’s flight capability allowed him to find the Dwellers faster.
    As far as the Dwellers went, he had run all at once into