Harmony by Project Itoh Read Free Book Online Page A

of June, 2060, shining down on a giant hospital ward stretching to the horizon on both sides of the river. Mankind was trapped in an endless hospital.
    
    I’m sorry, Miach.
    
    I couldn’t do it. And it had taken the sacrifice of a life to the gods of medicine for me to understand. I started to cry there in the backseat of a taxi. My mother’s eyes remained fixed forward on the road ahead, as though she didn’t notice. After I cried myself out, I leaned back in my seat and fell asleep.
    ≡
    I opened my eyes again.
    Tuan Kirie, senior inspector, age twenty-eight.
    Étienne was shaking me by the shoulder where I lay next to the crates of cigars and wine.
    “We are at the base, ma reine .”
    05
    The “blushing maiden brigade.”
    That was what people called the medical corps. I think they meant it as a compliment.
    If you were wondering whether every admedistration’s medical corps wore pink uniforms, you were right. Go to France, Russia, or Mexico, and every medical corps uniform, helmet, and armor transport was painted the color of a lightly ripened peach. Like the army always wore drab olive, and the navy black and white.
    Which was why the tents in the Niger armistice monitoring camp were all pink.
    Against the sea of pale pink, the deep crimson coats we Helix agents wore stood out. We stood out everywhere, for that matter. Now I was making my way through the tents, back to where the crates were being unloaded—our backyard.
    I carried off the portion for myself and for our server techie— call him Alpha—and left Étienne and his crew to handle the rest of it. I would get back to my own office as quickly as possible and drink myself into a stupor, as I always did. At least, that was the plan.
    I had zero interest in knowing the details of how Étienne divvied up the booty from the Kel Tamasheq, or how much money he made, or how much he skimmed for himself. He would always pass me some credit after we were done, so I knew he at least wasn’t stealing everything. That was good enough for now. All I needed were smokes and booze. That was it.
    
    
    
    
    In my world, you had to come all the way out to this hinterland, to a battlefield, just to find ways to damage yourself. Effective, yet ultimately trivial ways. Far more trivial than what I had attempted back in high school, before I lost Miach.
    “I brought the goods,” I announced, stepping past the pink flap of the tent where Alpha worked—where I found not only Alpha surrounded by his infield terminal screens, but also my boss with an excessively stern look on her face. I caught the look of abject fear on Alpha’s face and realized things had taken a decided turn for the worse. “We were waiting for you, Senior Inspector Kirie,” the woman in the crimson coat just like mine announced.
    “You needed to talk to me about something, Os Cara?”
    “Only about what that is you’re hiding behind your back.”
    I shrugged and tossed the vintage wine in her direction. I had a reputation for giving up easily.
    She caught the ancient Petrus, the ruby red liquid sloshing inside the glass bottle.
    
    Château Petrus
    
    Brand name of an alcoholic beverage originating in France’s Pomerol region. A “bordeaux wine.” Noted for its label depicting Saint Peter, the twelfth apostle.This château wine vaulted from relative obscurity to immense popularity after winning a gold medal at the 1889 Paris Exposition. One of the most expensive wines in its heyday, after the Maelstrom and the ascendance of lifeism it shared the same fate as all other alcoholic beverages.
    
    
    It had already been over forty years since anyone in a developed country had been able to freely enjoy alcohol. “What do we have here?” Os Cara breathed as she caught the bottle of forbidden pleasure lightly in her left hand. “I would ask if