The woman seated in the captain's-style chair at the rear of the cabin looked Spanish. She had her sable hair drawn back sleek and flat from her brow. The gold wire lead of a datawire hung from her right temple. She wore black visorshades, a sparkling red jacket adorned with swirls of black, tight black slacks and gleaming scarlet boots. Her name was Sarabande. She was kuromaku, a fixer. She motioned casually to the chair facing her from across a small oval table. Gordon accepted the offer and sat down. The subtle thumping of the chopper's rotors grew louder as the craft ascended, swinging out over lower Manhattan and across the Hudson, toward the blighted regions of Jersey City and Newark. Gordon glanced at the drape-covered windows and guessed at the chopper's movements. He also checked his watch: 01:18 hours. The upper stories of Tower Five would be back on-line by now, fully illuminated and operational, while some slag down in Facility Control would be wondering what the hell had happened. "Your business?" Sarabande said. "On chip."