Zero History

49. GREAT MARLBOROUGH
All was forward, turn, forward, turn again, and a sharp smell of hairspray.
Her body remembering to lean into the turns, hugging what she took to be a strong thin
girl, definitely breasts in there, through layers of armored Cordura. Very little she could
see, past the smudged plastic of the visor, under wing-beat strobings of streetlight. Ahead,
the yellow of the rider’s helmet, scratched diagonally, as by something with three large
claws. To either side a blur of abstracted London texture, as free of meaning as sampled
skins in a graphics program. The awning of a Pret A Manger, brick, possibly the green
round of a Starbucks sign, more brick, something in that one official shade of red. And
most of it, she guessed, in the service of evasion, a route no car could follow. At least
there seemed to be relatively little traffic now.
And then they slowed, stopped, the rider reversing into a parking place. When the
ignition was cut, London was instantly, strangely quiet. The rider was removing her
yellow helmet, so Hollis released her, then reached up and removed her own, which she
now saw was black.
“You might need the loo,” said the girl, twenty-something, fox-faced, pale brown hair
mussed by the helmet. The hairspray wouldn’t have been hers.
“Loo?”
“Downstairs,” the girl said, indicating a sign: women. “Clean. Open till two. Free.” She
looked very serious.
“Thank you,” said Hollis.
“Fiona,” said the girl, over her shoulder.
“Hollis.”
“I know. Hurry, please. I’ll check my messages.” Hollis dismounted, watched as Fiona
did the same. Fiona frowned. “Please,” she said, “hurry.”
“I’m sorry,” said Hollis, “my head’s not working.”
“Don’t worry,” said Fiona, who sounded neither British nor anything else in particular.
“If you’re not right back up, I’ll come and find you.”
“Good,” said Hollis, and took the stairs, her knees behaving oddly, down into bright
cheap light, white tile, the smell of some very modern disinfectant.
Seated in a stall, the door shut, she briefly considered screaming. She tried to remember
if she’d hit her head on anything, because her brain felt too large for it, but she didn’t
think she had. It wouldn’t have been possible, with what Aldous had made the seat belts
do, which she recalled as having involved a sort of neck brace, as well as some
biomorphically triangular cushion across her chest. If you were going to be bashing into
cars, she supposed, you’d want that.
“My God,” she said, remembering, “that was Foley.” Milgrim’s Foley, from the blue-lit