Holy Fire - Bruce Sterling [2]
Mia followed her canine escort into a mural-crusted elevator. They emerged on the tenth floor, onto pavement set with stone cobbles. The building’s internal lighting glowed in superrealist mimicry of northern California sunlight. People had hung laundry inside the building’s sweet breeze and light. Mia worked her way through the big potted jacarandas and bought a shrink-wrapped pack of dog treats from an automated street shop. The dog accepted a bone-shaped lozenge with polite enthusiasm.
Fragrant wisteria vines were flowering on the stone veneer of Martin’s apartment. The heavy door shunted open at a single knowing touch of the dog’s paw.
“Mia Ziemann is here!” the dog announced heartily to the empty air. The living room had the sanitary neatness of some strange old-fashioned hotel: potted palms, a mahogany media cabinet, tall brass floor lamps, a glass-topped teak table with spotless untouched glassware and hermetic jars of mixed nuts. A pair of large rats with control collars were eating lab chow from a bowl on the table.
“May I take your coat?” asked the dog.
Mia shrugged out of her tan gabard and handed it over. She was wearing what she usually wore to shop: tailored trousers and a long-sleeved blouse. Informal clothes would have to do. The dog gamely engaged in complex maneuvers with a hatstand.
Mia hung her purse. “Where is Martin?”
The dog led her to the bedroom. A dying man in patterned Japanese pajamas lay propped on pillows in a narrow bed. He was asleep or unconscious, his lined face sagging, his thin, lifeless hair in disarray.
At the sight of him, Mia almost turned and ran at once. The impulse to simply flee the room, flee the building, flee the city, was as strong and raw as any emotional impulse she had felt in years.
Mia stood her ground. Confronted with the stark reality of encroaching death, all her advice and preparation meant precisely nothing. She stood and waited for some memory—any memory—to hit her. Recognition came at last, and the dying face fell into focus.
She hadn’t seen Martin for more than fifty years. She hadn’t loved him for more than seventy. Yet here was Martin Warshaw. In what was left of his flesh.
The dog prodded Warshaw’s hand with his cold nose. Warshaw stirred. “Open the windows,” he whispered.
The dog tapped a button near the floor. Curtains rolled aside and floor-length windows shunted open onto damp Pacific air.
“I’m here, Martin,” Mia said.
He blinked in grainy astonishment. “You’ve come early.”
“Yes. I met your dog.”
“I see.” The back of the deathbed rose, propping him in a sitting position. “Plato, please bring Mia a chair.”
The dog gripped the bent wooden leg of the nearest chair and lugged it over clumsily across the carpet, puffing and whining with the effort. “Thank you,” Mia said, and sat.
“Plato,” said the dying man, “please be quiet now. Don’t listen to us, don’t talk. You may shut down.”
“May I shut down? All right, Martin.” The dog sank to the carpeted floor in deep confusion. His long furry head fell to the carpet, and he twitched a bit, as if dreaming.
The apartment was spotless and dustless and in suspiciously perfect order. By the look of it, Mia could tell that Martin hadn’t left his bed for weeks. Cleaning machines had been at the place, and civil-support personnel on their unending round of social checkups. The deathbed was discreet, but to judge by its subtle humming and occasional muted gurgle, it was well equipped.
“Do you enjoy dogs, Mia?”
“He’s a very handsome specimen,” Mia said obliquely.
The dog rose to his feet, shook himself all over, and began nosing aimlessly about the room.
“I’ve had Plato for forty years,” Martin said. “He’s one of the oldest dogs in California. One of the most heavily altered dogs in private ownership—he’s even been written up in the breeders’ magazines.” Martin smiled wanly. “Plato’s rather more famous than I am, these days.”
“I can see that you’ve done a great deal with him.”
“Oh, yes. He’s been through