Idolon by Mark Budz Read Free Book Online

positioned the blade over the forehead. "I'm not that hard-core."
    She snorted. "Maybe you should be."
    "I'll work on it. In the meantime — "
    "Yeah. I'll send you the report as soon as it's done." Kostroff thumbed the I/O on the saw. With a whine, the diamond-tipped teeth on the blade chewed through bloodless tissue into cold, gritty bone.
     
     
     
     

 
8
     
    Pelayo lost the TV on the magtube from Santa Cruz to Palo Alto.
    The guy had either given up or lost innterest. It didn't seem likely he had rephilmed himself — that wasn't how TVs operated. They rescreened en masse and in sync. There was little individual variation. The overall theme was unified, connsistent. It went against their core faith to deviate from the big picture.
    Stepping off the train, into the raw unfiltered glare on the station platform, Pelayo opened an online message, mentally keying in the address for Lagrante Broussard. There was no answer, a sure sign the rip artist was in.
    _______
    Lagrante worked out of an apartment on the second floor of a four-level parking garage. A quarter of a century ago, in the aftermath of the Point Pinole quake, the structure had been converted into emergency housing for refugees. Over the years, ad hoc businesses had moved in, gradually displacing the hapless apartments. Actual residential space was confined to the outer walls, where windows of aging photoelectric plastic strained the light to piss yellow.
    The exterior architectural philm was a hodge-podge of styles: sleek Le Corbusier strip windows, aluminum Art Deco trellises, and colorful glass tesserae set in decorative arabesque patterns on the walls, support pillars, and outer circumference of the Moorish horseshoe-shaped arches that framed the entrances.
    Pelayo cut a quick glance up-down the street — nothing but the usual assortment of waterfront workers, street vendors, Monospaces, and delivery truck drivers — then ducked past the tinder-dry fronds of a squat palm tree next to the open security gate.
    Inside, the smell of brine gave way to espresso, grilled vegetables, chicken kebabs, and falafel in warm pita bread. He hurried through the street-level food court, the tables, partitions, and planters that subdivided the space. It was noon and the place was jammed, the din deafening despite the suspended ceiling panels.
    The elevator was just as loud, a cacophony of newzine segments, nanoFX commercials, vidIO game clips, and ad masks as watchful as gargoyles. Most of it hadn't changed since his last visit, four months ago. New look, same worthless content.
    Hopefully, Lagrante would have something more to offer.
    _______
    The rip artist was screening Archibald J. Motley, Jr. with a touch of Romare Bearden that added a jagged, almost demented edge to the otherwise suave exterior. Raw jazz seeped out of his pores, as unfiltered and unhurried as the Hongtasan hanging from his lips.
    "What's playin'?" Pelayo said. He could see himself reflected in the black lenses of the sunglasses Lagrante wore as an extension of his anatomy.
    "'Kind of Blue.'" The cigarette bobbed, scattering volcanic gray ash. "You know?"
    Pelayo shook his head.
    "Miles Davis. It's a classic." Lagrante let out a breath and creaked back in his leather chair. He ran hand over the triangle of stubble on the right side of scalp. "That's some crunk 'skin· you're waring. Treal retro."
    Lagrante fancied himself an artiste, an adherent of the true and real when it came to philm, clothing, and music. It wasn't about being genuine, in a radiocarbon sense. It was about being true to the spirit of authenticity. Pop wasn't treal unless it was a riff on Andy Warhol. Otherwise it was simply derivative, no different from a Chinese knockoff.  According to Lagrante, treal was all about taking something old and making it new, spinning it in a different direction without losing the gestalt, the existential integrity, of the original.
    "Well?" Pelayo asked.
    Lagrante tilted forward in the chair.