Video Star (Voice of the Whirlwind) Read Online Free PDF Page A

using a lot of computer enhancement on the vid, see?” Super Virgin said. “We can smooth out the jitters from the moving camera. Except for select bits to enhance the ver— the versi—”
    “Verisimilitude,” said Captain Islam.
    “Right. Just to let everyone know this is the real thing. And we’re gonna change everyone’s appearance electronically, so no one can recognize us.”
    Cut to someone moving into the hospital’s front door, moving right past the metal detectors. Ric saw a tall girl, blond, dressed in pink shorts and a tube top. White sandal straps coiled about her ankles.
    “A mercenary,” Virgin said. “We hired her for this. The slut.”
    Captain Islam laughed. “She’s an actress,” he explained. “Trying for a career south of the border. Wants the publicity.”
    The girl stepped up to a guard. Ric recognized Lysaght. She was asking directions, pointing. Lysaght was gazing at her breasts as he replied. She smiled and nodded and walked past. He looked after her, chewed his cigar, hiked up his gunbelt. Ric grinned. As long as guards like Lysaght were around, nothing was safe.
    The point of view changed abruptly, a subjective shot, someone moving down a hospital corridor. Patients in ordinary clothes moving past, smiling.
    “We had a camera in this necklace she was wearing. A gold owl, about an inch long, with 3D vidcams behind the eyes. Antenna in the chain, receiver in her bag. We pasted it to her chest so it would always be looking straight forward and wouldn’t get turned around or anything. Easy stuff.”
    “We gotta do some pickups, here,” Jesus said. “Get a picture of the girl moving down a corridor. Then we tell the computer to put all the stripes on the walls. It’ll be worth more when we sell it.”
    Subjective shot of someone moving into a woman’s toilet, stepping into a stall, reaching into handbag for a pair of coveralls.
    “Another pickup shot,” Jesus muttered. “Gotta get her putting on her coveralls.” He made a note on a pad.
    The point of view lurched upward, around, out of the stall. Centered on a small ventilator intake high on a wall. Hands came into the picture, holding a screwdriver.
    “Methanethiol,” Super Virgin said. “That stuff’s gonna be real useful from now on. How’d you know how to make it?”
    “Elementary chemistry,” Ric said. He’d used it to clear out political meetings of which the Cadillacs didn’t approve.
    The screen was off the ventilator. Hands were reaching into the bag, taking out a small glass bottle. Carefully loosening the screw top. The hands placed the bottle upright in the ventilator. Then the point of view dipped, a hand reached down to pick up the ventilator screen. Then the ventilator screen was shoved violently into the hole, knocking the bottle over.
    Airborne methanethiol gave off a horrible, nauseating smell at one-fiftieth of a part per billion. The psychology wing of the hospital was going to get a dose considerably in excess of that.
    The subjective camera was moving with great rapidity down hospital corridors. To a stairwell, then down.
    Cut to Super Virgin in a phone booth. She had a small voice recorder in her hand, and was punching buttons.
    “Freeze that,” said Two-Fisted Jesus. Virgin’s image turned to ice. Jesus began tapping keys.
    The tattooing shifted, dissolved to a different pattern. Super Virgin laughed. Her hair shortened, turned darker. The black insets over her eyes vanished. Brown eyes appeared, then they turned a startling pale blue.
    “Leave the teeth,” she said.
    “Nah. I have an idea.” Two-Fisted Jesus sat tapping keys for about thirty seconds. He pressed the Enter button and the metal teeth disappeared completely. He moved the picture forward a second, then back. Virgin’s tongue moved readily behind her tattooed lips. The interior of the mouth was pink, a lot of gum, no teeth at all. She clapped her hands.
    “That’s strange, man,” she said. “I like that.”
    “The