“No.” I paused a moment, measuring advisability. “You been long on the Strip yourself?”

He grinned. “All my lives. Why?”

“I’m looking for some friends. Thought you might know them.”

“Yeah? You a cop? Enforcer?”

“Not recently.”

It seemed to be the right answer. His grin came back.

“They got names, these friends?”

“They did last time I was here. Brasil. Ado, Tres.” I hesitated. “Vidaura, maybe.”

His lips twisted and pursed and he sucked his teeth. It was all gesture learnt in another, much older body.

“Jack Soul Brasil?” he asked warily.

I nodded.

“You a Bug?”

“Not recently.”

“Multiflores crew?”

I drew breath. “No.”

“BaKroom Boy?”

“Do you have a name?” I asked him.

He shrugged. “Sure. Milan. Round here they call me Gungetter.”

“Well, Milan,” I told him evenly. “You’re beginning to irritate the fuck out of me. Now are you going to be able to help me or not? You know where Brasil is, or are you just getting off on the rep vapour he trailed through here thirty years back?”

“Hey.” The pale blue eyes narrowed. His arms unfolded, fists tensed to small hammers at his sides. “You know, I fucking belong here, sam. I surf. Been shooting curls at Vchira since before you were a fucking splatter up your mother’s tube.”

“I doubt that, but let’s not quibble. I’m looking for Jack Soul Brasil. I’ll find him with or without you, but you can maybe save me some time. Question is, are you going to?”

He stared back at me, still angry, stance still aggressive. In the ten year old sleeve, it was less than impressive.

“Question is, sam, what’s it worth to help you?”

“Ah.”

Paid, Milan was forthcoming in grudging fragments designed to disguise and eke out the very limited nature of his knowledge. I bought him rum and coffee in a street café across from the shop he was tending—can’t just close it up, sam, be more than my job’s worth—and waited out the storytelling process. Most of what he told me was readily identifiable as well-worn beach legend, but from a couple of things he said I decided he really had met Brasil a few times, maybe even surfed with him. The last encounter seemed to have been a decade or so back. Side-by-side empty handed combat heroism in confrontation with a gang of encroaching Harlan Loyalist surfers a few klicks south from Kem Point. Facedown and general battery, Milan acquits himself with modestly understated savagery, collects a few wounds—you should have seen the fucking scars on that sleeve, man, sometimes I still miss it—but the highest praise is reserved for Brasil. Like a fucking swamp panther, sam. Fuckers ripped him in the chest, he didn’t even notice. He tore them all down. Just, like, nothing left when he was done.