SNOW CRASH

segment in particular, the segment with the bigwigs on it, is rocking and seesawing violently, smoke rising from both ends. It has been blown loose from the rest of the pier.

All of its occupants fall down in the same direction as it jerks sideways and begins to move, yanked out of its place. Him can see the tow cable rising up out of the water as it is stretched tight, running a couple of hundred feet to a small open boat with a big motor on it, which is now pulling out of the harbor.

There’s still a dozen bodyguards on the segment. One of them sizes up the situation, aims his AK-47 across the water at the boat that’s towing them, and loses his brains. There’s a sniper on the top deck of the Kowloon.

All the other bodyguards throw their guns into the water.

“Time for Phase Five,” the man with the glass eye says. “A big fucking breakfast.”

By the time he and Hiro have sat back down in the dining room, the Kowloon has pulled away from the pier and is headed down theflord, following a course parallel to the smaller boat that is towing the segment. As they eat, they can look out the window, across a few hundred yards of open water, and see the segment keeping pace with them. All the bigwigs and the bodyguards are on their asses now, keeping their centers of gravity low as the segment bucks nastily.

‘When we get farther away from land, the waves get bigger,”

the man with the glass eye says. “I hate that shit. All I want is to hang on to the breakfast long enough to tamp it down with some lunch.”

“Amen,” says Livio, heaping some scrambled eggs onto his plate.

“Are you going to pick those guys up?” Him says. “Or just let them stay out there for a while?”

“Fuck ‘em. Let ‘em freeze their asses off. Then when we bring them onto this boat, they’ll be ready for it. Won’t put up too much of a fight. Hey, maybe they’ll even talk to us.”

Everyone seems pretty hungry. For a while, they just dig into breakfast. After a while, the man with the glass eye breaks the ice by announcing how great the food is, and everyone agrees. Hiro figures it’s okay to talk now.

“I was wondering why you guys were interested in me.” Him