Zurich Meet Tomorrow by Alastair Reynolds - Book - Page 17
Accra, like Lagos, has been forced to make an accommodation
with the changing times. The character of the city loosens as
it spills against the ocean. Blocky, green-clad skyscrapers
and office blocks give way to funky, low-rise, peri-urban
developments, threaded with blue-green corridors and built
up on stilts or pilings, able to rise and fall with the tides and
storm surges. There’s a new mid-century music in these places,
wherever they are in the world: lazy, adaptive, confident.
They find a bar, rowdy but friendly, where Amaka goes
unrecognised among the younger clientele. They are hipsters
here, exactly the sort of people her mother complains about.
At least none of them are in any bothered about Mitsu.
Amaka orders a drink, some high-end cultured meat. Pricey,
but what the hell. They watch the sun sinking down. Amaka
gets a little drunk and starts to feel better about things. There
will be work again, come what may. While it would have been
nice to have the association with the space elevator, there are
worse things than to stand by your principles.
She is not too far into intoxication when Mister Zhang calls.
‘I wasn’t expecting...’ she stammers, on the cusp of
apologising.
‘I must commend you,’ he says, before she goes any further.
‘On behalf of the consortium, we are all very grateful for the
outsider’s perspective you brought to our table. And after due
consideration ... we have embarked on a radical redesign of
the climber capsule. You were quite correct in voicing your
reservations.’
She swallows hard.
‘I see.’
17
