Heaven is a Place on Earth Read Online Free Page A

holiday or he's visiting friends, or something. You're not telling me something. Why do you think he's missing?”
    “ Because he is.”
    “ How do you know?”
    “ Because his tag has stopped responding.”
    Ginny didn't have to feign surprise or shock this time. “That's impossible,” she said. Everybody knew that.
    The detective studied her intently, clearly trying to judge her every reaction. It occurred to her that he might be unaugmented, seeing her real face. She hadn't considered it before but it would make sense for the cops to interview suspects with their augmentation turned right down.
    “ How could he do that?” she asked.
    “ There are ways.”
    She blinked at him, adjusting to this new information. The government line was that tags were infallible. That was one of the selling points. Everybody had to be tagged so that the augmented reality sensors could find them and identify them. If you didn't have a tag, you could just disappear. If people were not tagged, they could easily impersonate someone else. It guaranteed that the people you met were who they said they were – even in full VR. It also prevented criminals from walking around undetected. The tags were embedded into people's skulls, distributed right across the cranium, grown from implanted nanotech that was put there at birth. They couldn't be removed, they said, and tampering would have life-threatening side-effects. And people accepted tagging because, without tags, augmented reality – especially virtual reality – would become a playground for scammers and thieves, terrorists and worse.
    “I still don't see how I can help you, Detective Sergeant.”
    “ Dover, please. Forgive me for saying, Ginny, but you seem pretty nervous.”
    She didn't like the man's insinuations, however true they might be. In fact, she didn't like the man at all, with his smooth manner and his stupid name and his suspicions. “I've had a crappy day,” she said. “And this is just making it worse. I'm on a deadline and I need to get stuff done.” Nevertheless, she couldn't help herself asking, “Why would anybody remove their tag – or whatever Cal's supposed to have done? Surely you can't live without it these days. You can't even buy stuff without an identity check. You couldn't get through a door or take a cab. How could you live?”
    The detective shrugged. “I suppose there are other things you can do that outweigh the inconveniences. You'd be surprised how many people we lose each year.” He stood up, ready to go and she stood up with him. “Here's my card,” he said, passing her a virtual ID. “In case Mr. Copplin makes contact.” He walked the few paces to the door. As he stepped outside, he said, “Of course, he might not have turned his tag off deliberately. Sometimes they malfunction – especially in cases of severe head trauma.” Again, he watched her carefully, looking for any reaction. Whatever he saw, he seemed finished. “Thanks for your time,” he said, and left.
    -oOo-
    “Oh my God!” Della seemed more thrilled than shocked as Ginny recounted her day. “He actually said that? Oh my God!”
    They were in a bar in New York. Not a real bar in New York, of course. Both Ginny and Della remained in their tanks in their own homes, Ginny in Brisbane and Della in Sydney. But they were unlatched and thus free to visit any bar in the whole of space and time, real or fictional, as long as they could afford the entry fee. Travel was free and instantaneous. So the virtual world was their oyster. It was estimated that there were over three billion worldlets on QNet – of varying scope and quality. There were over two thousand virtual New Yorks alone, covering every conceivable time period and every worldlet designer's personal interpretation of the great metropolis. The “real” New York, built and managed on behalf of the City of New York, was just one among the two thousand.
    The Empire Bar was one designer's fantasy of a 1950s cocktail