“You done?” It was Gruen’s voice. “You oughta be done after wearing me down like that.”
Niko heard a slap.
“Ow.” The woman’s voice. “You hadn’t got to do me like that.”
“You know you like it.” Gruen again.
“Yeah, you’re right. It’s better than some. Better than a lot of ’em.”
Niko heard a deep sigh. He wondered when he could break this up. He wanted to get on with it.
“You better get out now.” Gruen’s deep voice.
“Why you wanta push me out right away? You don’t wanta go again? I could go again. Couldn’t you?” The woman laughed.
“Shut up.” Gruen. “Just shut the shit up and get out now. You had enough for one night. You got what you came for. Go back to what’s-his-name.”
Now Niko started getting nervous. If they had a fight, he’d have to wait even longer. If the shack had a door, he would have knocked. But it didn’t. And he couldn’t let whoever she was see him. She’d start asking questions, and that would leave them open to a ratting out. So he waited behind the shack in the dark. His stomach growled, and he remembered he hadn’t eaten in a long time.
Then he heard a commotion inside: Gruen telling her to get dressed, her complaining about him, and they went back and forth until Gruen finally pushed her out onto the path.
“I’m tired,” said Gruen.
“Yeah, you’re always tired after. But not before. I think I oughta tell someone about how tired you are.”
“Here.” Gruen’s voice. “Take this.”
“Wow.” The woman. “You musta liked what you got tonight. I’m gonna buy me a real pretty something for the next time. When’s that?”
“I don’t know. I’ll find you sometime soon. Now you go on back to him, and don’t tell him nothing or there won’t be nothing for you next time. Understand?”
Niko heard some more fumbling and then footsteps fading into the night. Carefully, in case she was hanging around, he slid along the hut wall until he could see Gruen standing there, scratching his head in the dim light that came from his hut.
“Pssst, Gruen,” Niko whispered.
Gruen spun around, his fists ready to pound whoever was there. He couldn’t see well in daylight with only the one good eye, but at night it was even worse.
“Hey, it’s me,” Niko said.
“Man, what’re you doing out here? I almost thumped your head in.”
“I got it,” Niko told him.
“What?”
“The plans. You know. What we talked about.”
“Shh, come inside.” He pulled Niko by the arm. “Shit, that woman don’t know when to stop. Insatiable, that’s what she is. And that man of hers ain’t worth shit for nothing. Keeps a roof over her head but never fucks her. So she comes around here every night almost. I can’t get rid of her.”
“Got you a regular beauty queen?” Niko joked.
“She must be one ugly bitch to come around here every night and want me. You get a look at her?”
“Sorry, I was hiding in case . . . well, you should be careful,” Niko said. “Maybe she’s on the payroll. She could be a ratter.”
“Naw, she’s not. Good for what she is, though. Keeps a man’s head on straight. You know what I mean? So, what’ve you got?”
“We better go in.” Niko had lowered his voice. He figured Gruen bragged about women because he was disfigured, just to prove he was still in the game. But Niko also thought it made Gruen vulnerable. That made him a possible danger too.
The huts in the section were packed pretty tightly together, with laundry lines and electric poles and InCom screens everywhere. He could hear snoring from nearby and a baby wailing farther off.
Gruen’s hut was dark except for light from a streetlamp outside the back window. Not actually a window, it was just an opening that let in dust and rain and bugs. Niko walked the few steps to switch on a small lamp on a box next to what Gruen used for a bed. Just a thin pad on the floor, sheets all rumpled and kind of gray looking, as if they hadn’t been washed in a long time. There was a musty smell of sweat and dirty laundry. Niko opened his shirt and pulled the rolled papers out of his belt, then unrolled them under the light.
“Those the plans?” Gruen asked. He stood next to Niko and looked down at the papers with his head tilted toward his good eye.
“I think so. You were right. I don’t know why they were stashed in that newspaper office, though. Seems odd to leave them there. Think it’s a plant?”
“The guy who gave me that piece of info used to work over there. It was a payoff for something I let him have, that he needed really bad. He’s no ratter. Did some computer stuff for them before he got sick. A fucking tech genius, he is. Told me one day he saw some reporter come in real hush-hush and stash some papers in his files. So this guy, name’s Fuller, when no one was lookin’, opens the drawer and takes a look. And sees these papers he thinks must be plans for the whole of Infinius. You know, the underground stuff and all the walls and The Perimeters. He let it go at the time, but when he told me about the medicine he needed and how I could get it for him outside the city, well, that’s when he told me he’d have some info that could be useful for that kind of operation. Because, you know the higher-ups, they get past The Perimeters all the time. So there must be ways.”
They spread the papers on the floor and held the small lamp down to cast light directly on the lines and symbols.
“Yeah, look, there’s The Ring. And the Tower. And all the roads.” Niko was breathing hard. This was a goldmine. He followed the plan with his finger. All the roads. And The Perimeter. And there, up in the northeast corner, what looked like a huge park and low buildings.
“So there really is a compound where The Overseers live.” He pointed to an outlined area that was marked Area C.
“You said it, brother.” Gruen whistled. “I wonder what it’s like in there.”
“A lot better than here or The Ring, or the Tower, or anywhere we know.” Niko traced around The Compound and down along the edge of the drawing like he was studying a treasure map. “Probably where the rat Villinkash hides out, too.”
“What about the other papers?” Gruen reached down and slid out papers under the master plan. “I can’t tell what they say.” He squinted at one, his head cocked to one side to look with his good eye.
Niko laid them all out and moved the small lamp from one to the other.
“They’re details of everything,” he breathed. “It’s the whole city right here in front of us. Perimeters and even down to details of walls and barbed wire. And look,” he said, pulling over another sheet. “This one seems to show the InCom wiring system.”
He looked up at Gruen. “Do you know what we could do with this? If we had someone who knew about electronics and computers?”
Soon after that night, El hurried along a street early in the afternoon. She carried a large package wrapped in yellowed newspaper.
“What have you got there?” Niko called out from the shadow of a doorway.
She stopped abruptly, ready to fight. She’d grown more womanly by then, looking older than her almost sixteen years, and had learned to protect herself.