Friends in the Stars

by Mackey Chandler

  “I’m not sure exactly to whom I should speak. I have an Earth client who is interested in buying shelf stable provisions for a planned expedition and outposts in the beyond. Who does your sales and production planning?” Sam inquired.

  “You want our sales manager. His short customary name with Humans is Walton. I’ll give him your card and see if he can take a break and speak with you now.”

  “Do you do much business with humans then?” Sam asked.

  “Sure, everybody has to eat,” she said cheerfully. It came to her so easily Sam suspected it was a stock answer, but not very informative.

  Walton came back with the secretary card in hand. He had on spex like Sam, which surprised him. They weren’t a big item with the Derf. He’s seen them on Derf at the orbital station and at his bank. Also against all odds, a sandwich shop he frequented had spex on all the help.

  “What can I help with Mr. Lloyd? I should I say solicitor Lloyd?”

  “That’s the British version, my brother-in-law calls me counselor, but I’m just Bernie. When I hear Mr. Lloyd I look to see if my father is behind me.”

  “That would happen with familial names, wouldn’t it? You’ve taught me something already,” Walton said.

  “I’m hoping you will instruct me,” Sam said smoothly. “My partner and I advise both Humans and Derf on dealing with Earth law. On occasion, we do the reverse and get asked to explain Derf law and custom to somebody who wants to do business here.

  “We had a North American client that is looking and planning to seek leases and rights when the planned Derf Claims Commission becomes active. He’d like us to find out for him what supplies could be staged forward from Derfhome instead of Earth.

  “Can you quote me what Human compatible foods are available on a two-year lead that can be transported and stored well in a Derf similar climate?”

  Sam expected to be told he’d need a month to consult and then they would need to discuss Human tastes and dietary requirements. Instead, Walton said, “Miriam, print out catalog twenty-three and a price list good for three months for Mr. Lloyd.

  “Two things,” Sam said. “Sometimes clients have a silly thing on which they are fixated. Rather than argue I try to humor them.”

  “Oh, we don’t have any customers like that,” Miriam said, and rolled her eyes, “other than the fellow who demanded a different font on our sweet bun labels!”

  “Good, then you understand. The only item he specifically inquired about was Graham crackers. One supposes he is a big fan,” Sam said and made a face raising his eyes and looked to the heavens. If she didn’t know that Human gesture yet Miriam could add it to eye-rolling in her repertoire.

  “It’s on the list,” Walton said, laughing. It seemed to be genuine amusement. “I will gift you a case as a sample to take away if it will fit in your car.”

  “It’s that big? I’m using a car service, so I can ask for a delivery van I suppose.”

  “Do it,” Walton suggested. “It will give you something to report to your client you know he cares about. We can formulate them differently, but the usual version we make is heavily seasoned with a local spice similar to cinnamon and sweet. Humans seem to like it too.”

  “Thank you. The other thing is I wonder if I can get a walkthrough?” Sam asked.

  “Not in the production area. You’d have to suit up and it’s a big bother. We can do a walk around not through and you can see some of the lines from above. You’ll see there aren’t that many people on the production floor, but we have some windows that look down on it. Then out the back, and if you call now for your ride you can see your crackers loaded up and join the driver to return home.”

  “That would be very nice and as much as I need to tell my client what my overall impression of the operation is,” Sam said.

  “He probably wants to know it is clean and you don’t see vermin running down the aisles,” Walton said. “A lot of people have no idea how automated we are and they think anything off Earth is backward. You’re too polite to say so, but I’ve had to dispel that sort of misconception before.”

  “I’m not sure he has a bad impression but if he does I’d correct it,” Sam said.

  “Come on then, we need to go up to the next level,” Walton said, motioning him to follow along.

  * * *

  “My buyer at the Fox and Hare informs me our vendor of Roquefort and Gruyère has told him they are currently sold out and unable to fill his cheese order,” April said. “I’m not sure how long Gruyère is aged, but I’m sure Roquefort is aged in caves for so long there has to be a huge stock of it in storage that is released to the market on a regular basis. One finds it difficult to believe they suddenly have none. They made apologies but made no effort to even suggest alternatives or indicate when they’d be available to us again.”

  “When they serve orange sorbet in hell,” Jeff assured her, deadpan.

  “So, they are starting to cut us off,” April said.

  “Even as bad as the economy is in North America, they still buy a lot more from France than all the Spacers put together ever will. They are seeing to their own interests. No point in getting upset with them over it,” Jeff told her. “Just buy blue cheese from another source. It will lack the mystique of the regional label and the inflated price. It will be made from milk and probably the same mold culture as the real thing. Though, if you can find me two people above the atmosphere who can taste them both and tell you which is which, it will surprise me. Even the difference between the sorts made with cow’s milk instead of ewe’s. If they cut us off from Champagne, we’ll just have to suffer along with some other sort of bubbly too. Do make sure we have the cultures in case we have to set up production on one of our own planets.”

  “There are other Human settled worlds I’d rather ask to produce anything involving cattle or invasive species before we take a chance of messing up the ecology on our worlds. Both of them seem rather fragile and I’d rather not risk them.”

  “That works for me,” Jeff said. “There are a few worlds with Amish or Mennonite colonies and they probably make some kind of cheese already. It would just be asking them to add another variety. I don’t know if they make wine at all.”

  “Neither do I,” April said. “I’ll make some polite inquiries.”

  * * *

  “Your Graham crackers are outside in the parking lot,” Sam said, rummaging in his desk for a box opener. “Would you help me bring them in?”

  “You know I’m no fan of pranks?” Bill said. It was more warning than question.

  “No joke. I got a free sample and a Derf case of them is thirty boxes of four tins, each tin two kilos divided into four sealed foil packs. It’s too heavy to drag and too bulky to tip back on a two-wheel cart.”

  “Then how did you load it?” Bill asked.

  “The damn Derf driver just tossed it in the back like it didn’t weigh anything.”

  “You could have had him bring it in,” Bill said.

  “I could, but he was smirking and thought it was funny. I wouldn’t give him the satisfaction. He’d have probably charged me to carry it in,” Sam said.

  Bill sighed. Sometimes Sam was a pain in the butt.

  “Coming,” he said.

  “I asked for a quote on shelf-stable Human food,” Sam said, as he hacked the crate open. “He just quoted the catalog number by memory and told his secretary to print a copy and current price sheet out for me.”

  “There’s that much of a market?” Bill said, surprised.

  “Yep, a list of fifty-four items, only four of which they warned a lot of humans disliked. He took me around an enclosed catwalk that looked down on their operations. If you didn’t know what they were making it could be any sort of manufacturing. The actual food is rarely visible until it is all sealed up in cans and boxes.

  “But then this fellow, he goes by Walton,” Sam said, “took me out through the shipping department to give me these crackers and load them in my cab. I ran my
spex in recording mode and got what I wanted.”

  “The secret plans?” Bill said, in a thick Eastern European accent.

  “Sometimes, I don’t think you appreciate me,” Sam objected.

  “You are a fine partner, but even Ms. Harvac, as irritating as she can be, is a lot cuter than you. Being an agent sure limits one’s dating options,” Bill said.

  “Don’t complain about it or they may give you a pill for that too,” Sam said.

  “See this?” Sam pointed out the Derf writing, hoping Bill would drop the other topic. “When I was walking through shipping there were some big crates like this with writing I couldn’t read, but in English, it said ‘Foy’ right in among the Derf characters.”

  “Hot damn, you do have them dead to rights,” Bill agreed, “now if we only had some clue why they are stockpiling a bunch of food. Are you still going to go break in and find out more about what kind of food they are storing?”

  “I’m not sure it worth the risk now, what does it matter what kinds of food? It’s not like they are hiding nukes or something. I’ll keep the room in case I change my mind. We could ask Headquarters if they have a clue why they would be doing this in the next report,” Sam suggested.

  “Hmm, maybe after we know more. This is pretty thin,” Bill said.

  * * *

  “This is wonderful, how did you take this video and get it out?” Lee asked.

  “When the last passenger left Larkin’s shuttle, they didn’t even wait for them to get out of sight. They killed the surveillance camera with a laser and hauled the spies out and dumped them against the opposite bulkhead with take-holds for newbies. They gave them a spray up the nose to start them reviving and let loose a drone that flew up in the air duct, attached itself and started recording. When all the action was over, the drone backed up a little and went into a quiet waiting mode where it didn’t emit anything. It just listened and when the next Larkin shuttle docked there three days later it was signaled and flew in the shuttle hatch and was recovered.”

  “They’ll know it’s a hoax of course,” Lee said.

  “Oh sure, to try to make it seem real would take years to plan. This was expensive enough as it was. The paper on the documents was wrong, the ammo was too modern, the leather goods were reproductions. But this sort of thing leaks out and is a pain in the butt for them. It mocks them, and the harder they try to suppress any news about it the more it convinces conspiracy nuts that they are covering up a real event.”

  “I’m surprised they couldn’t ID them right there,” Lee said.

  “They remove their agents DNA and other data from the databases. Supposedly so they can’t be “made” from a hack. If anyone has hacked you that badly you have far bigger troubles than them identifying an agent,” Eileen Foy assured her.

  “That helped the chaos and general confusion. Just to put the frosting on the cake we picked an era where we know the original records were lost and destroyed. Then in doing brain scans of these two to find out who they worked for and what they were up to we established their real names with some certainty. The brain really trips its circuits to your childhood name. So we put that on their false period documents.”

  “I’ll share it with the Mothers,” Lee said. “I was concerned they might see this as a treaty breach and start talking about war again. Turns out they have a wicked sense of humor I didn’t understand and are delighted by this. You did it… artistically.”

  “Thank you. It freaked out the brass badly enough for them to send a special group to take custody of these two, instead of just quietly returning them to Earth. That again played into the false narrative. The drugs left them in no state to be interrogated. They’re useless now as agents and will probably be pensioned off.”

  “Or quietly shot in the head,” Lee said.

  Eileen shrugged. “Which is no worse than you could have done to them, by all the standards of civilized warfare, when you caught them spying in your vessel.”

  “We’re not at war with them,” Lee objected.

  “Don’t kid yourself,” Eileen told her, scowling. “At best you have a cease-fire with these people, because it is convenient for them. Vic corrected my thinking on this. They’d destroy you in a second if the opportunity presented itself and not ponder the morality of it for a moment.”

  * * *

  “What’s up?” Pamela asked Kirk when he came in.

  “The strangest thing, Lee Anderson had a meeting with a couple of locals. One I understand. He is a Derf at the big university in town, but he came with a Badger from the Badger and Bill embassy. Why would they be working together, and to add to the mystery they rented storage at the same place the Foys use and have made a couple of trips out there. They charged the rental to Anderson.”

  Maybe they aren’t connected at all,” Pamela said. “Maybe they are just cheaper being over on this side of the ridge and getting most of the new business. I read the earthquake wasn’t as severe on our side of the ridge, something about the geology and soil being different.”

  “I don’t believe in coincidences. I want to get in and see what these people are doing with all this storage. How are you coming along?” Kirk asked.

  “I have a tiny sample of the local honey,” Pamela said. “Not enough to take to the food processors yet, but just enough to test. Do you want to try it?”

  “Yes, as long as you realize I’m no expert. I’ve had regular honey, and once I got a tiny jar of orange blossom honey in a gift basket. But I’d enjoy trying it,” Kirk said.

  Pamela squeezed a scant cubic centimeter on a spoon and handed it to him.

  “It’s darker than clover honey which is probably what you consider regular honey.”

  “Have you tried it yet?” Kirk asked.

  “No, I wanted to see your reaction first,” Pamela said.

  Kirk nodded. A few weeks ago Pamela wouldn’t have given a damn what he thought of the honey. She wouldn’t have offered it or consulted him. He used the tasting to give himself a quiet moment to reflect on that. When Pamela looked expectant, he raised a forestalling finger like he was thoroughly considering the honey.

  There was no way to call attention to this change in his status with her without ruining it. He had to just stay silent and accept it with good grace. But he didn’t trust such a big change in such a short period of time. He couldn’t see anything he’d changed to merit it. Best not to read too much into it in case it flipped back the other way just as quickly.

  “It has a much stronger flavor than I expected,” Kirk said. “The closest flavor I can think of is nutty, but a hint of bitter like walnuts. See what you think.”

  Pamela took even longer than him to wait for any faint after taste.

  “I can taste it too. What comes to mind for me, however, is buckwheat. Have you ever had that?”

  “I’m not familiar with it at all,” Kirk admitted.

  “Our cook used to make buckwheat pancakes when I was a little girl. I’m not sure if it was a regional New York thing or ethnic. She was European. I haven’t run into them elsewhere.”

  She sounded nostalgic.

  “Well, Derf don’t seem put off by strong flavors. I predict this will sell to them just fine,” Kirk said.

  Pamela nodded like she took his opinion seriously, which was kind of scary.

  “A thought,” Pamela said. “There can’t be that many renters in the storage facility yet. It’s brand new. Two are already connected in your mind. You should make an effort to discover who else is in that building from public contracts and surveillance.”

  “That’s a good idea. I’ll start on that tonight. I’m glad you’re making progress.”

  “This hive is definitely thriving. They aren’t taking up that much pollen substitute. And they are making honey in excess of the sugar support we gave them. I’m confident enough now to bring the others out of storage before we lose too much of the summer. When I have enough in the new frame to extract a half liter, I’m going to approac
h the processors to show them what sort of a product I will have available for them next year.”

  * * *

  “Something is bothering me,” Atlas told his mentor and professor Leonardo.

  “I remember, you were quite explicit in saying Born and his Badger helper, or whatever he is, irritated the hell out of you.”

  “Yes, but beyond that, I’m trying to figure out what they are doing with all these disks they have been bringing in and coating on the machine. I’ve been in their place, and unless they are sending them to the scrap yard or throwing them in the trash they don’t have room for them. I’ve been in Born’s offices and lab. It would be filled up to the ceiling by now if they were keeping them all.”

  “I doubt they are scrapping them out,” Leonardo said. “I’ve seen what they are spraying or sublimating on those disks and no scrap yard would touch them. They have all sorts of things that would ruin them for spec steel or anything but junk steel, structural stuff or cheap castings. Some of it is even toxic.

  “Besides that, I find it hard to believe they’d toss the funds they have invested in those disks. I’m not sure what they are looking for, but if they need to retest one it would be an unnecessary cost to make it over. If I were them, I’d consider stripping any off that were unpromising and recovering them.”

  “Yes, although their patron seems to have a bottomless purse, Atlas said.

  “Even so, anything they don’t have to spend can find its way into their wallets,” Leonardo said. Atlas nodded. He was of a similar mind on budgeting.

  “I tell you what, take some time and find out what they are doing with these, or if they are saving them up where they are storing them. I might even rescue a couple for us to examine to try to figure out what they are doing if they’re lax with their security.”

  “Why not?” Atlas agreed. “Obviously they are just toxic trash with which they are being somewhat careful. They may even come to us for help in disposing of them.”