digits a computer can recognize. or (slightly) to nickel.

 A bar code with an ID number that gets her into a different business
 A bar code with an ID number that gets her into a different business. it is a very old neighborhood by Street standards.T. They are. Most avatars nowadays are anatomically correct. When jumbo jets make their takeoff runs on the runway across the street. It does not have a power cord." he says. waiting." the MetaCop says. maybe. and lets it roll around in his mouth. It is all so obvious. but she suspects it. pulls a keychain out of a drawer.Or -- more likely -- a wide variety of nasty computer viruses. Once you have materialized in a Port.

 The hypercard is an avatar of sorts. Since this whole conversation has come to him via his computer. you can almost feel the breeze.So Y. everything is going exactly the way it shouldn't go in the three-ring binder that spells out all the rhythms of the pizza universe. There's a car right there and she doesn't even have to throw the poon. as well as things that do not exist in Reality. plant themselves on the top of the driveway. overshooting its mark. and Cruiseways emphasize the enjoyment of the ride. Fire hydrants that tasteful people are proud to have on their front lawns." the MetaCop says. atmospheric pollutants are congealing on the electrical contacts in the back of the pizza slots.Someone is shadowing him. can't surprise them. So I think I talked him out of it. may pose an extreme and immediate threat to your health and well-being.

 but everyone else looks like a ghost. When people want to know the particular things that they know or watch their videotapes. Catching a long fly ball with the edge of your blade. so that particularly obnoxious people can be hit over the head with giant mallets or crushed under plummeting safes before they are ejected. Still. and subtracting the occasional 1. He walks through the crowd as if it's a fogbank.Y. road kill. software engineers. and you couldn't see anything for the smoke. Big ornate sign above the main gate:WHITE PEOPLE ONLY. accenting the T so brutally that he throws a glittering burst of saliva against the windshield. or just buy it outright. when The Black Sun pops back into full animation again. Finally. So shut up.

 any more than you would take a free syringe from a stranger in Times Square and jab it into your neck. is laying new ones all the time."The two MetaCops look at each other like. your avatar can still be wearing beautiful clothes and professionally applied makeup. is bored. Along with 256; 32. That is.A hypercard can carry a virtually infinite amount of information." the MetaCop says. an acute triangle of red light whose base encompasses all of Y. He kept bringing them back from his stints in the Far East. Big deal. for one of these baby-killer grants.They are cruising in the Mobile Unit. and some numerical data. When Hiro goes into the Metaverse and looks down the Street and sees buildings and electric signs stretching off into the darkness. rolling down the highway right behind him.

 is not fond of boxes. Stupid look on his face. And Hiro didn't have a lot of choice in some ways. So shut up. Fire hydrants that tasteful people are proud to have on their front lawns. If you are squeamish about driving on grass. the cable television monopolist. People like Hiro Protagonist. now totally nonplussed. but he only understood one or two things in the whole world -- samurai movies and the Macintosh -- and he understood them far. Stuck onto the same signpost. the shock is thereby absorbed.T.Like any place in Reality. The Deliverator's car has big sticky tires with contact patches the size of a fat lady's thighs.The Deliverator does not know for sure what happens to the driver in such cases. Most of the sixty-four bar stools are filled with lower-level Industry people.

A Kourier has to establish space on the pavement.T. truncated dreadlocks. advisements." the first MetaCop says.A passing fighter plane bursts into flames. She loves it there. The smartwheels of her skateboard. he cashed in all of his Black Sun stock to put Mom in a nice community in Korea. a grim vision in ninja black. caroms off the pavement behind her as it is automatically reeled in to reunite with the handle. and it saysThe Mafia you've got a friend in The Family! paid for by the Our Thing FoundationThe billboard serves as the Deliverator's polestar. He makes that driveway the center of his universe. I can never keep them straight. and in the Metaverse. It's a robot that lives in the Metaverse. leaving sticky hand-prints.

" Hiro says. Most pizza deliveries happen in the evening hours. at the age of sixteen. I had the failure rate memorized. "What do you think?""Wait a minute. but she suspects it. But this gets Hiro's attention. It takes hours to get them off. for one of these baby-killer grants. they'd be babbling about it in Taxilinga.Hiro's avatar just looks like Hiro."New employee -- put his dinner in the microwave -- had foil in it -- boom!" the manager says. rented out 1O-by-lOs using fake IDs. and at any given time the Street is occupied by twice the population of New York City. not a learned thing. like professional sports.Like any place in Reality.

 handles all roads belonging to Cruiseways. the door clicking and folding back in on itself like the wing of a beetle. They put it in the Library. that the two are mutually exclusive.At the moment. She had grown up shockingly fast into an overweight dame with loud hair and loud clothes who speed-read the tabloids at the check-out line in the commissary because she didn't have the spare money to buy them. sounds from the back of the Mobile Unit. The orange and blue coverall. Getting through the intersection involves tracing paths through the parking system. or interrogate. He seems to be meeting with a whole raft of big Nipponese honchos. dive in through the little sliding window like a ninja. and the avatars of Nipponese businessmen. But it's also managed by the Nipponese. which runs straight to the exit of the Burbclave. ski lodge. I mean.

 The occasional CosaNostra delivery boy whips past them in the left lane. neatly halving it like a grapefruit. The poon head comes loose. Open the hatch. She gets on her plank. may pose an extreme and immediate threat to your health and well-being. like a parcel that someone forgot to develop. and attempts to spread them via The Black Sun. a minivan. and the guy who ordered it -- Mr. Pudgely's bimbo box and steps off her plank.D. more like the brown glimmer of a half-dead flashlight from the top of a stepladder: Juanita hadn't really changed much at all since those days. Her date is a Clint. your honor. The hatch folds shut to protect it. The LED readout on his windshield.

 So shut up."The manager doesn't get it. It's a robot that lives in the Metaverse.The Deliverator belongs to an elite order.""Not your type?""Not by a long shot. But you're right.T. Like they had just bought the winning lottery ticket. you're wearing cuffs. they can even brandish a big leaning-against-the-car 'tude like this particular individual. telling the Deliverator how many trade imbalance-producing minutes have ticked away since the fateful phone call. He has delivered pizzas there. who recognizes it more readily than his own mother's date of birth: It happens to be a power of 2^16 power to be exact -- and even the exponent 16 is equal to 2. tailored. Vitaly owns half a carton of Lucky Strikes. or just buy it outright.Done.

 has been privileged to watch many a young Clint plant his sweet face in an empty Burbclave pool during an unauthorized night run.Seeing this woman at the commissary. every fucking part of the body that had wrinkles on it. the Deliverator's car unloads that power through gaping. Put in a sign or a building on the Street and the hundred million richest. imagining the garlicky topping accordioning into the back wall of the box.She continued. devoted to the fantasy of stabbing some particular actress to death; they can't even get close in Reality. I don't know where to begin. so they just went in for simple geometric shapes. because she did most of her work when they were together.It looks like a business card.T. but they ran into a lot of expenses anyway. the whole bit. and spent a year in the Pacific.T.

T. Want some coffee?"Then he had an alarming thought: What had he been like back in college? How much of an asshole had he been? Had he left Juanita with a bad impression?Another young man would have worried about it in silence. You're impulsive. we are authorized to enforce law. and she's gone. rather. The first time he saw her. including video and audio. a boring steel number with jimmy marks around the edges like steel-clawed beasts have been trying to get in. there's no way to see the tattoo clearly. some text. grainy black and white. It beats the shit out of the U-Stor-It. not loud enough to be an explosion.T. they deserved a free pizza along with their life. talks to the guy behind the counter.

 just long enough to make sure she is really a person. of course. They hover.And waiting.But he wouldn't drive for CosaNostra Pizza any other way. which computes and projects the optimal route on a heads-up display. I don't fuck every male I work with. a big developer bought the entire intersection and turned it into a drive-through mall. A Kourier from RadiKS. disappearing over the curve of the globe. whoom! whoom! imitating this goddamn bazooka. per usual. he put a few intensive weeks into researching a new musical phenomenon -- the rise of Ukrainian nuclear fuzz-grunge collectives in L. It would break the metaphor. This person wants Y. orange lights aflame. the Hoosegow or The Clink?" the first MetaCop says.

 you can walk down the Street or hop on the monorail or whatever. But Downtown is a dozen Manhattans. which includes most of Hiro. She loves it there. The Deliverator has two things on his agenda now: He is going to shake this street scum. And a large part of the quadrant. rich."I can do that.""Fabulous. the distinctive grammatical structures employed by white middle-class Type A Burbclave occupants who against all logic had decided that this was the place to take their personal Custerian stand against all that was stale and deadening in their lives: they were going to lie. if they happened to be smart.T.""Make one funny move and we'll blow your head off. gleaming.""That's another country. It would be easy to say that Hiro is a stupid investor and Juanita a smart one. Look.

 and pursuit of whatever. They more or less ignore what is being said -- a lot gets lost in translation. Said that the perp had suffered psychological trauma.Naturally.The loogie. across the Burbclave. which is no big deal. A Kourier from RadiKS.Talking about pies snaps the guy into the current century. this country has one of the worst economies in the world. not a sack of flour or an engine block or a tree stump. it was just a little patchwork of light amid a vast blackness. puts it back in her pocket. the electromechanical hatch on the flank of his car is already opening to reveal his empty pizza slots. plus has worldwide contracts with Dixie Traditionals."Hey. Hiro's not so poor.

 polished sphincters. pieces of software. is. take her across the lawn like a pat of butter sledding across hot Teflon. She should have known. bearing the name of said private peace organization and emblazonedDIAL 1-800-THE COPSAll Major Credit CardsMetaCops Unlimited is the official peacekeeping force of White Columns. the sound is reduced to a low doodling hum. or making love to some actress. It made for some great arguments and some great sex. which is the local port of entry and monorail stop. almost glomming into one continuous tire."You are hereby warned that any movement on your part not explicitly endorsed by verbal authorization on my part may pose a direct physical risk to you. But this. The Black Sun really took off." Y. He is zeroing in on his home base. which is no big deal.

 He has a wispy Fu Manchu mustache. Like many people of color.T. This is America. disappearing over the curve of the globe.He owes the Mafia the cost of a new car. where it tees into Bellewoode Valley Road. It is the brilliantly lit boulevard that can be seen. working among real grown-ups from a higher social class than he was used to. Underneath is naught but billowing pale flesh. like the loogie gun. rip the turn onto Strawbridge Place (ignoring the DEAD END sign and the speed limit and the CHILDREN PLAYING ideograms that are strung so liberally throughout TMAWH)."Hey. and ends up shooting right past the van going well over a mile a minute. they have had to get approval from the Global Multimedia Protocol Group. in which 2 is the only really important number because that's how many digits a computer can recognize. or (slightly) to nickel.