Planetary Parlay

by Cameron Cooper

  I almost laughed at their dumbfounded expressions. I knew Lyth would not thank me for volunteering him for hours of work, but he had already intended to hack into the Terran’s broadcast channels, and this would give him a legitimate reason to poke around. He wouldn’t have to hide the work, just the details.

  I waved to Calpurnia and we stepped out of the suite. I said to Slate, “Where would Isuma, or Rayhel or Constantine be, right now?”

  Slate turned toward the back of the building. “In the dining room of the royal residence, Danny.” He didn’t quite lift his near-useless arms, but I got the gist. He was pointing to the other building, the one we’d never been in, that was connected on all levels to this one.

  I pulled my shirt down. “We’re visiting royalty, I guess. Lead the way, Slate.”

  “Dressed like this?” Calpurnia asked softly, as we walked down the open sided corridor. Drigu passed us, most of them carrying things. All of them walked swiftly.

  “We are what we are,” I said shortly. “I’m not stopping to put on a ballgown just to ask a question. I don’t have time. What’s more, I don’t think Marlee has, either.”

  “You think she’s been taken, too,” Calpurnia said.

  “I think she’s too smart, too sensible, to take off and not let us know she’s okay,” I said. “Even if she needed time to cool down first, she still would have reached out to us before now. And if she took off and got into trouble, by now she would have figured out a way to catch our attention. She’s Xavien and the former basemind of the Rangers base on Katriona. She’s probably got the entire field survival manual stuffed in her memory.” I shook my head. “Something screwy is going on and before everyone starts screaming about the parawolves today, I want to ask a few direct questions.”

  Calpurnia grinned.

  “What?” I snapped.

  “You maybe shoulda eaten breakfast first, Colonel. You’ve got that look on your face.”

  I nodded. “I wish I had eaten,” I admitted. “My stomach is protesting.”

  But that was probably nerves, too. Dealing directly with Terrans made me jumpy.

  Slate trod down the stairs to the second floor, staying close to the side the way the Drigu did. Then down to the very bottom floor. He moved over to the covered bridge between the two buildings and for the first time I consciously noted that it was raining—a steady drip of water nothing like the storm we’d trudged through coming back from the wreck of the Success. It pattered on the roof of the bridge and drew attention to itself.

  Slate moved across the bridge and we followed him into a building which had the same open-sided design as this one. It tucked into the trees surrounding the palace, which was why I had failed to notice that the royal residence was far larger than the Parliamentary Palace. It was shady and cool on the first floor, because trees crowded against the roofline.

  The open floor plan was interrupted by another spiral staircase, as wide and grand as the one at the front of the palace. This one was in the middle of the floor. Like the palace, behind us, this building’s ground floor looked to be purely for the public. Groups of chairs—softer and more luxurious than the palace ones—between artwork on the walls. It was the first time I had seen art decorating walls. Until now I hadn’t known the Terrans used flat representations and expressions of creativity. These were not digital displays. They appeared to be originals.

  There were also statues and carvings on plinths, with lights—powered ones, not naked flames—showing all their details. Because the day was dull, the lights made the statuary stand out. I spotted human figures, busts, and a great many animals in action poses. I couldn’t name any of the animals and most of them looked very strange to me. But whoever had carved them knew how to make a figure come alive. There was a hint of movement and of life in them that drew the eye.

  “They live a little better over here, don’t they?” Calpurnia murmured.

  “This could be to impress visitors,” I pointed out.

  “It’s working.”

  Slate headed for the bottom of the stairs.

  “If we’re going up to the next floor, why didn’t we just cross using the bridge, Slate?”

  He paused and said, “The second floor and third floor bridge are for Drigu only, Danny.” Then he moved up the stairs. “This is the way to formally access the residence, as you wish to do.”

  “Okay, then.”

  At the top of the stairs, I glanced to my right to see if there was a next flight, but there was not. We were clearly in the heart of the residence, and we were inside walls.

  They were permanent walls, too, for I could feel the crisp, fresh air that spoke of refined environmental controls. A scent lingered. Perfume, or perhaps the aroma of the blooms which sat in big vases in various places around the room. Several doors lead off the room, all of them closed, including two large ones that made me think of the entrance to the assembly hall. My money was on one of the three Assembly officials being behind those doors. The rest of the room was made up of odd angles, curved walls, both convex and concave, and indirect powered lighting.

  Thick carpets on the floor deadened the sound any feet might make coming to and fro. Between each island was a sea of warm gold bamboo flooring with its gleaming protective coating.

  The building was required to be made of materials which could be renewed in a year, but clearly that restriction did not apply to anything inside the building. This was another level of luxury altogether.

  “Yep, should have worn a ball gown,” Calpurnia muttered.

  Lyssa? I sub-vocalized.

  Here, she said. What are you up to, Danny? Your heart rate is spiking.

  About to call on royalty, I warned her. Listen hard, ‘kay? I might be too dazzled to remember everything later.

  I’m here.

  “Slate?” I murmured, for he stood in the middle of the room, not moving. His feet were not on the rugs.

  “We are being scanned,” Slate told me. “You will be given permission to enter after the scans are completed.”

  “And what if they don’t like what they find with the scans?” I asked, thinking of the blades here and there inside my clothes. And would they pick up the micro-channel between me and Lyssa? How sophisticated were their scanning capabilities? They hadn’t found anything untoward about my person in the Assembly hall, where they must surely have scanned us, too. But this building seemed to run to more advanced features. The Terrans had been hiding aspects of their nature, all along.

  Well, we were even. I’d done my best to keep some of our capabilities hidden, too.

  I would have to tell Jai about this. He would be disappointed, I know. Both sides had come to the negotiation table purportedly to cooperate and find mutual compromises, which required openness and good faith. And neither of us had offered either.

  The double doors opened and a Drigu came through—one of the taller ones, who must come from a different source than the domestic Drigu running the parliamentary building.

  “You cannot be here, Colonel,” she said. Her tone, via Slate’s translation, sounded cool. Which matched with her appearance. She was blonde and pretty, and young.

  “It is an emergency. I must speak to the Director or the Secretary or the Deputy Director,” I said. “They can come to me, if they prefer, but I must speak to one of them now.”

  And I really hoped they wouldn’t decide to come to me. Being told I couldn’t go inside made me want to see what was in there.

  The Drigu hesitated.

  “A life may be in jeopardy,” I added. Which could well be true.

  “Wait here,” she said and headed back inside once more.

  “Snippy tone for a Drigu,” I murmured to Calpurnia.

  “She doesn’t look like any of the others, either,” Calpurnia replied.

  “But she’s wearing the same tunic.”

  The blonde returned in ninety seconds. “This way,” she said. “You have five minutes.”

  We’d see about that.<
br />
  The corridor curved around a wall, then opened into an area that…I didn’t know what to call it. It was a room, but it was nothing like any room I’d ever seen. It wasn’t square, but it was big. The walls curved and came together in ways that made me want to knock them back to true—there was not a single ninety-degree angle anywhere, and there were far more than four walls.

  The light in this room had been designed to mimic the light of a sun—yellow and warm.

  Plants were everywhere, hanging from the roof, curtaining the walls, standing on horizontal surfaces—big, dark green leaves, soft pale fronds, delicate lacework greenery. Trailing vines, exploding leaves, cascading verdure. I didn’t recognize any of the plants, or the blooms displayed by some of them. It was all alien to me.

  A small pool of water had been built into the floor. Water flowed into it, making a bubbling cheerful sound. All three of the people I sought were beside the pond—Constantine, Isuma and Rayhel. Two of them were wearing simple shifts that left their knees and lower legs bare. Also, their arms. It wasn’t the basic tunic the Drigu wore. There was more style about these shifts, and the cloth appeared to be better quality, too.

  All three of them reclined on couches. Isuma had three Drigu surrounding her, one of them tending to the woman’s face with a tool that vibrated. The second was smoothing something over Isuma’s arms and I recalled the notions Kamil had smeared on me after my first shower here, and the way it had left my skin feeling.

  The third Drigu was feeding Isuma mouthfuls of whatever was on the plate on the Drigu’s lap, carefully popping morsels in when it didn’t interfere with the first’s tools.

  Rayhel was naked. He lay on his stomach—for which I was grateful—and a muscular Drigu was kneading his back. A massage. A plate sat on a short table beside Rayhel, with more strange looking food on it.

  “Why don’t they just…I don’t know, step outside, if they want this around them?” Calpurnia murmured.

  “You don’t find this out there. Not on Terra,” I whispered back.

  Constantine had a Drigu on either side of him, too, but I don’t know what services they were providing him, for he pushed them both aside and sat up. He spread his legs to straddle the narrow couch.

  He didn’t seem to care that we could see everything about him. I shifted on my feet, moving a few centimeters to my left, which put his knee in the way of a view I’d try very hard to forget.

  “You have an emergency, Colonel?” Constantine barked, sounding irritated.

  “An ongoing one. I appeal to you for help, Director. We have not found Marlee Colton, and it has been more than twenty-four hours. She is a capable woman and if she has not made her way back to us by now, then her circumstances must be dire, indeed. I need your help to find her.”

  He looked relieved. “This computer of yours? Can’t you trace it yourself?”

  There were too many responses I could make to that, most of them well beyond rude. I channeled Jai Van Veen, instead. I recalled his calm when faced with a similar ignorance and even though I was frothing inside, I managed to actually smile at Constantine. “She is human, Director, and a valuable member of our mission. We are highly concerned about her welfare.”

  I sounded polite, but I still wanted to shake some sense into him.

  “We’ve been talking about your Xavien,” Rayhel said and turned over to look at us.

  I kept my gaze on his face. I heard Calpurnia’s breath ease in a slow exhale, too.

  He propped himself up on both elbows and waved away the masseuse. “We’ve been trying to figure out how you got the computer into the body. I don’t suppose you’d care to explain? I have money riding on it.” He looked highly amused.

  I tried again. “All I’m asking for is a perhaps a squad of your security people, or a shuttle I can take up and look for her.”

  “For a computer?” Isuma’s voice was muffled, and her tone disinterested.

  Before I could answer, Rayhel said, “Whose body was it you gave to her? Were they already dead? Or did the computer steal it?”

  “They buy the clones, dammit!” I snapped. “And you know that—Marlee told you.”

  The silence from the Terrans was almost profound

  “Danny…” Calpurnia whispered.

  I know, I know. I should have eaten. I shouldn’t have let them get under my skin with their prejudices and their bigotry, but I had. Too late to reverse it. Damage control was my only option.

  Isuma pushed her Drigu away and sat up, staring at us. Constantine did, too.

  Rayhel smiled and it wasn’t his laughter-filled expression. There was something almost covetous about it. “Clones,” he said. “You know how to transfer consciousness to clones.”

  A simple statement, but his expression…his voice…

  Fear touched me. This moment had shifted from a bad diplomatic slip up to…I wasn’t even sure what it was. The one thing I did know was that I had stepped into something that was way over my head.

  I needed help.

  Lyssa, get Jai. NOW! Tell him what’s happened!

  On it.

  Meantime, I had to find an answer. “I’ve got no idea how any of it is done,” I told Rayhel and the other two, who were listening just as closely. “I’m not a scientist. I do know it is extremely complicated.”

  Danny, I’m here. Jai’s voice, passing through Lyssa. Relief touched me.

  Isuma got to her feet and came toward the two of us. She studied us as if we were specimens. “You,” she told Calpurnia, “are not all natural. Are you a humanoid?” She had figured out Calpurnia’s enhanced and oversized tendons.

  “I’m born human,” Calpurnia said stiffly. “But extra strength is an advantage to me in my line of work.”

  “You are a warrior?” Isuma asked, passing around the back of us.

  “I’m a ship’s captain,” Calpurnia said truthfully.

  Isuma leaned in close to me, looking at my face. “Flawless,” she said. “A twenty-year old would be envious. Are you a clone?”

  Oh, shit. I swallowed.

  Tell them the truth, Jai breathed into my mind.

  My voice wobbled as I said, “This is my second body.”

  All three of them stared at me.

  Isuma stepped backward. Two paces. She didn’t look away from us.

  I trembled, because I knew what she would say next and I didn’t want to answer it.

  “How old are you?” Isuma demanded.

  Tell them, Jai urged me. This will make a difference, Danny. Tell them.

  “I’m one hundred and seventy-three years old,” I said. This time my voice didn’t wobble, but it was an empty husk because my throat had closed over and squeezed the strength out of it.

  Their expressions became voracious, and truly scary.

  “You extend life with clones,” Constantine said and for the first time since I had met him, I consciously processed his grey hair and the lines on his face. Isuma’s fine wrinkles, carefully smoothed out with cosmetics and treatments, and the soft skin on her throat. Rayhel’s flecks of grey hair amongst the black.

  They didn’t have longevity therapies as advanced as ours. What they had was not advanced at all. It was topical. Short term.

  I didn’t need Jai to tell me to answer with the truth. I said, “Cloning is a relatively new development. Regenerative therapies have been common for centuries.” I still couldn’t speak above a dried-out murmur.

  “Regeneration…” Isuma breathed, and there was a sharp note of longing in her voice.

  The three of them looked at each other. Excitement was building between them.

  I’d had enough. “I came here for help to find Marlee Colton. I can see that I must take care of the matter by myself. I’m sorry to have bothered you in your…sanctuary. Good morning.”

  I turned and fled, bringing Slate and Calpurnia with me.

  *

  Jai met me at the door of the suite as we almost ran inside, and caught my arms. “You did fine,�
� he told me. There was a fierce note in his voice that had an uncanny resemblance to the eager voices of the three I’d just left behind. “This changes everything, Danny.”

  “It does?”

  He nodded. “You’ll see. Make sure you’re at the meeting this morning.”

  I had been intending to hide out in my room and recover, and think things through—oh, and figure out how I could find Marlee—but now I couldn’t. I nodded at Jai. “I’ll be there.” My voice still shook.

  He moved away to finish preparing for the meeting himself.

  Slate hadn’t put himself in the corner like he usually did. He hovered by my side. I looked up at him. “Something I can help you with?” I really wanted to get alone, where no one but Dalton could watch me process what had just happened.

  Kamil came up to me and held out a plate with a breakfast roll on it, still steaming. I managed to thank her with a near normal voice, as Slate twisted and dithered.

  Slate said, “Are you truly one hundred and seventy-three years old, Danny?”

  “It isn’t as wonderful as it sounds,” I assured him. “I’m not wise. I still have to scramble to pay bills every month. Nothing changes,” I added bleakly. “Ask anyone here. They’ll tell you the same.” I took a bite of the roll. I wasn’t hungry anymore, but I needed the calories.

  Slate twisted, but this time it was to examine everyone in the room. “Everyone is as old as you?”

  “I’m only twenty-seven,” Mace said, as he passed us.

  “Twenty-seven…” Slate repeated.

  I studied Slate as I chewed. There had been a wistful note in his voice. “You’re nearing the end of your life,” I said to him. “You must know by now that getting older is nothing more than marks on a calendar. It’s what you do with that time that makes a difference.”

  Slate turned back to me. He looked at me for a very long time. “I must take your word for that, Danny.” This time the sadness in his voice was unmistakable. “I am six years old and for all six years I have served at the pleasure of The Melissa.”