Oto and Chatter sat across from each other in a little diner below the tower. The difference was stark. The penthouse was full of glass and light and white marble and paintings and real plants with real eggs and bacon. The diner was dark, it lay in the shadow of the apartment; mice an roaches along the walls; homeless sleeping in booths until the diner staff kicked them out.

  Oto poked at his omelet. Lab-grown eggs mixed with lab-grown ham. “They said we’d save the environment,” he muttered as he thought of all the pics and vids and newscasts he had seen in his lifetime of whole communities on the coast disappearing from the sea level rise. The loss of Miami was the big one, but thousands of small towns gone. “All so some rich fuck can toss out real eggs.”

  “What’re you saying?” Chatter looked up from his salad. “Still upset about the way things went with Arno?”

  “Upset we owe the son of a monster a favor is all. And he didn’t really help us meet our contact.” He ate the eggs. A plastic taste stuck to his tongue. “Now we have to go the Loop, find some gangster, then maybe see who the hell wants the blockade gone.”

  “Hell,” Chatter snickered, “maybe it’s Arno and his father.”

  Oto motioned out the window to men patrolling the sidewalks, the BL insignia on their bulletproof chests, visors over their eyes that scanned everything. “If they wanted the blockade gone I’m sure the BCM would happily oblige. Maybe restart the war even. The Hache’s would make a killing.”

  “I did some research on that guy. Apparently some dynastic war shit is brewing since Gordon Hache is almost eighty. That old man couldn’t keep his dick to himself. Has thirteen children with four different wives. Arno is the youngest son of the third wife. Total and complete shitshow, my friend.”

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  “And you think Arno’s favor will have to do with that?”

  “Something that makes him look good at least. The media’s all up the ass of the oldest sister, Lucinda. She helped her father through the corps most ‘fraughtful’ time. Some dealings with the Pacific States.” Chatter plopped a fake tomato into his mouth. “Arno will want something big I think, and doubt it has to do with moving zhiming around.”

  “We need to figure out how to get in the Loop.”

  “The Loop?” Some old guy the table over said. “You rich? Cuz you sure ain’t look it,” the dark-skinned man laughed, his gray beard shaking. “I went to the Loop near a decade ago to move some old computer parts, vintage that stuff was … Anyway the only help I can give is make a bazillion bucks or get lost.” He drank a warm tea then wiped his mouth and said, “they shoot on sight over there. Anyone trying to breach the wall is killed. Thrown in the lake. Maybe even the bombed out north.”

  “So we’re fucked?” Oto threw up his hands.

  “How’d you get in?” Chatter asked the old man.

  The man looked around before leaning in close. “Snuck in from the bombed out part. They don’t have as many patrols since most don’t live that way. We used a faulty grate over the north branch to get in. That’s surely been patched up, but I meet mules all the time who sneak in and out. Just don’t get caught.”

  “Maybe some of Skye’s friends can help,” Oto thought aloud.

  Chatter shook his head. “Oh no, we are not going to them with this. One: we don’t know them. Two: one of them is a junkie surfer who can barely go five minutes without plugging in. Three: the other is a toy. Who knows who she spills secrets to.”

  “Mighty judgy,” Oto said with another bite. “Who do you think we should talk to?”

  “Find the Westside Chefs, maybe they can help.”

  The old man nodded as he blew on his tea. “They own the toy shop in Logan Square. Can’t miss it,” he gave a yellow smile, “boy did I have some fun times there.”