City of Pearl Read Free

shockproof section: a two-centimeter-square case that would have rattled if she hadn’t packed wadding into it to stop the seeds inside it giving the game away.
    Technically, the tomato seeds were illegal biomaterial, but she was EnHaz, and nobody would stop her. Anyway, she no longer cared. It wasn’t a contamination risk. But she was damned if one more agricorporation was going to tell her what she could plant and grow and eat. All seed varieties were the patented property of a company; so her own crossbred tomato plants, reared on a windowsill from carefully hoarded seeds, were unregistered. Technically, it was an act of theft.
    Technically.
    She tucked the seeds deep into the folds of her cold-weather suit at the bottom of the grip. In a few months, maybe, she’d have the first plants growing in her own plot, somewhere out of the way where there were no Gene Inspectorates or patents or licensed crops. She thought of the hairy green leaves and their pungent cat’s-pee scent, and saw her father carefully tending a straggly plant in the windowsill high above her head. He looked down at her. Never lose touch with what you eat, sweetheart. Touch the soil. Embrace it.
    He never did. The best that her apartment-bound family could do was visit friends with a smallholding. And then her father was dead. At least he had finally embraced the soil.
    Oh, Dad.
    McEvoy appeared at the open door. “Bingo, Guv’nor,” he said. “Rummage One’s located a grade-A biohaz containment area. You okay?”
    She snapped alert. “Well, they couldn’t exactly hide something the size of a warehouse up here, could they? Any indication what it’s busy containing?”
    â€œIt’s not a new flavor of soda, that’s for sure.”
    â€œAh, joy upon joy unending.” She opened the secure link on her swiss, flicked the keypad and gave him a wink. “I feel an order for suspension of government licensing coming on. There.” She tapped SEND . “That’ll get their attention.”
    McEvoy sagged visibly against the frame of the hatch. “Come on. You know this is pissing in the wind. They’ll be back on agriweapons and god knows what as soon as they’ve paid the fine and sacrificed a few executives. Companies are bigger than governments.”
    â€œMaybe. But this’ll cost them in lost production. Put a crimp in their bottom line. Let them know the electorate isn’t going to lie down without a struggle.”
    â€œThere’s times when I really understand eco-terrorists.”
    She paused. “Me too, son. Me too.”
    Oh yes, I understand them all right. Was McEvoy trying to say he knew the gray areas in which she worked, that she had her deniable connections, and that it was okay by him? He wouldn’t have been the first. In a way, it helped to have those rumors flying round. Thwart EnHaz, and you’d find yourself dealing with people who worked well outside the law to express their disapproval of environmental tinkering. Governments had always made use of cheap, effective terrorism when it suited them. It certainly suited her.
    â€œWant a look round?” McEvoy said.
    â€œOkay.” Shan slipped on her uniform jacket and pulled on the boots that anyone could hear pounding down a corridor. She waited to follow McEvoy down the passage.
    â€œAfter you,” he said.
    â€œNo, you go ahead,” said Shan. “Clear a path for me, eh? Be the ice-breaker.” She knew she looked like bad news. It was something you could learn to do. Her old sergeant had taught her twenty years ago to never step aside and never break eye contact, and it worked as well as it ever did. McEvoy swung through the hatch leading off to the containment area, and they were suddenly facing a small group of technicians in pale green lab suits.
    The techs were leaning against the bulkheads or had their backsides perched on sills. A couple of them straightened up