Farewell Horizontal Read Free Page A

pink dot, jabbed toward him. “And that’s why two thousand.”
     
    “Twenty-two-five.” It’s what you get, thought Axxter, for dealing with people like this.
     
    “Twenty-two-five was before you pissed me off. Now it’s two thousand.”
     
    “I should’ve gone straight to my own agent.” He looked back out at the sky. Serves me right, I suppose.
     
    In his ear, Lenny’s voice went blunt. “Two thousand is also so your agent doesn’t find out about all this. Non-info costs, just like real info does.”
     
    It’s what I get. Axxter punched out the confirm transfer without looking, screwed it up, then got it right. From a distance he heard some parting shot from Lenny. Should’ve kept it for myself – the thought became bleaker with repetition. To cheer himself, he blinked up his bank account.
     
    The payment had already gone through, zipped in via Lenny. The numbers crawled across his sight, digits kissed by the two thousand wad. He was afloat again, at least for a little while. Maybe that’s what my luck is. The cheerful edge had already worn off the morning’s event. Maybe just getting by, hugging the wall with the wind at the back of my neck. Getting hungry lets you cling even better, spine tight to the metal.
     
    MESSAGE FROM REGISTRY. The words crawled into view. NOTIFICATION, TRANSFER OF OWNERSHIP, FILE BLAH-BLAH-BLAH; YOU DON’T WANT THE REAL NUMBERS, DO YOU?
     
    “No.” Screw it. At least he wouldn’t have to pay to see the mating angels, as everyone else would; the original images were still inside his archive. At least I’ve got that much. “Call up Brevis, okay?”
     
    His agent’s face came up in his sight, in sufficient-enough resolution. In the corner of his eye, the Wire Syndicate’s call charges nibbled away at his bank account.
     
    “Ny – I was just about to call you.” Brevis smiled.
     
    And pay for the call from his end? That’d be the day. “Yeah? Why? – got a lead on some new clients?”
     
    Brevis’s eyes closed above his smile, as though he’d just been nicked by some pleasurable bullet. They opened again. “Working on it, Ny. Promise you – there’s going to be something coming up that’s going to make you very happy. You can count on it.”
     
    “Yeah, right.” Brevis being a smoother, cooler version of Lenny Red; for this he gets ten percent? Axxter heard his own voice harden: “I’ll nip aroundwall to Linear Fair and pick up some supplies I need. When they ask about getting paid, I’ll tell ’em you said they could count on it . How’s that?”
     
    A tilt of the head, acknowledgment of witticism. But still smiling: “Just . . . be patient a little longer, Ny. You’ll see.”
     
    You’ll starve; for a moment he thought that Brevis had actually said that, until he realized it had been a glitch on the line. Or in his own head, out too long on the vertical. You’re starting to lose it, he warned himself.
     
    “I’m trying.” Axxter kept the hard edge in his voice. It was either that or start whining. “I really am. But I’m cutting it a little thin out here, you know. I’m down to the bone , man. If some money doesn’t come in pretty soon, I could wind up defaulting on my Moon and Wire charges.”
     
    The words emerged from his mouth like all the words before them; in his throat a thick clot of nausea formed.
     
    Pure fear: both of Cylinder’s communications agencies reacted unkindly to defaults. Fat chance of operating as a graffex, or anything else on the vertical, without them. “I need something to come through.” Hard edge gone now, having scared himself.
     
    Brevis’s expression changed to one of woeful sympathy. “What can I say, Ny? None of your holdings have paid a dividend or a bonus in . . . quite a while.” The smile again, manfully facing up to his client’s imminent ruin.
     
    “Yeah? And whose fault is that? Jesus Christ .” He heard his own voice screeching, worn brake on cable, still unable to