Jinx On a Terran Inheritance

by Brian Daley

  "I see." The baron regarded him closely. "Can you prove what you said? Can you disprove that young upstart's claim to nobility?"

  Floyt spread his hands. "Not without my reference materials, my books—"

  "A detail," snapped the baron, distracted now as he thought through others. "There are large data banks at the Central Complex. But can you retrieve the information I require?"

  Floyt thought about it, where Alacrity, in his place, would've said yes immediately whether it was a lie or not.

  "If the data's in there, sir, I don't see why not," Floyt decided at length.

  "That's the spirit," the baron said with a kind of patronizing robustness. "And while you're at it, lowman, you can look into a few other matters for me. Matterse isn't the only pleb running about with pretensions to gentle blood."

  He beckoned to Gute and, when the local arrived, indicated Floyt. "Have this man cleaned up and suitably attired, then delivered to me at the main entrance of the Central Complex at the tenth hour, tomorrow morning."

  Alacrity cleared his throat loudly. The baron lifted an eyebrow toward him.

  "Uh, what about me?" the breakabout plunged in. "I'm his, uh, helper."

  Floyt nodded. Gute's expression was blank.

  "And you would describe yourself as an apt, hard-working fellow?" the baron asked. Alacrity nodded for all he was worth.

  "In that case, you'll be able to perform cesspit details by yourself, won't you?"

  The next morning Floyt went through another cleansing and deverminizing process, though he and Alacrity had taken a long one only the evening before. His lowman outfit was replaced with a nondescript coverall of yellow and brown and stiff, uncomfortable slippers.

  He rode beside Gute in the little runabout while Alacrity, riding a flatbed trailer behind, glared sourly at them both. They stopped in front of the Central Complex. Floyt was ushered in, the maroon-clad guard having instructions from the baron on the matter.

  Then Gute headed back for the spaceport. "Lucky, your friend Delver," he told Alacrity, who'd moved up to the passenger seat once Floyt had left. Gute didn't seem to mind. "Good, easy work, I'll bet. Safe."

  "Who is the baron, anyway?"

  Gute spared Alacrity a rare sidelong glance, then went back to the prestigious business of driving. "It's not a very good idea to ask too many questions, Shipwreck. Make sure your friend knows that."

  The next job of the day involved transporting two big plastic vats of succulent-looking salted hams from their holding point at the spaceport to the kitchens at the complex. The vats comprised the complex's share of a joint purchase.

  Alacrity did all the work, of course, but it wasn't too hard, since they had a powerjack along. At least the job didn't require a slave collar and a funny costume.

  As the runabout eased away from the loading dock, Alacrity commented offhandedly, "Gute, I've been thinking."

  "That is not permitted without written permission from the Betters."

  "No, really; I'm just wondering how come a bright fella like you isn't doing just a little better for himself."

  Gute kept his eyes on the lofty task of driving. "I will not forbid you to talk, within reason, at this time. But do not expect me to answer or agree to any disloyal or dishonest proposal."

  "Of course not! You bet. Well, I'm just sitting here saying to myself, 'There must be something Gute would like to have for himself.' A luxury—some clothing, or a bottle of something offworld, maybe? Or a gift for somebody you'd like to be nice to?"

  Gute didn't comment; Alacrity pressed his luck. "There's a lot you could get for yourself if you instituted a few creative management procedures around here."

  "Creative—that has a very impressive ring to it."

  "Pull over there—right behind that shed—and I'll show you what I mean."

  Gute thought for a moment, then complied.

  Alacrity dismounted and took up a water hose attached to a spigot at the rear of the shed. "Name something you wish you had. Within reason, that is."

  Gute looked around carefully. Seeing no one, he answered uneasily, "A Spican Atlas."

  "Seriously? Huh!" Alacrity bunked, surprised. He'd expected Gute to have his heart set on a flashy loincloth, liquor, or maybe a particular partner for some slap-and-tickle.

  The Spican Atlas was a magnificent book, showing all the beauties of that populous system and its unparalleled Precursor wonders.

  "Yes," Gute said excitedly. "Denzio, the master of hounds at the Hellfire Compound, has two copies."

  "Here's a simple solution." Alacrity held up an index finger. "One: Gute would like one of those atlases—so he can see the places he'd like to visit."

  Gute shrugged irritably but didn't deny it.

  Alacrity turned on the hose, splattering an irregular, tepid trickle onto the hardtop. He held up a second finger of his free hand.

  "Two: what's Gute got to swap?"

  Alacrity looked around, scavenged a discarded plastic liter bottle from a waste bin, and began filling it. Gute finally lost his temper.

  "What are you getting at? We'll be missed; we should go!"

  "I'm just timing the flow, the weight of the water. Be through in a sec." He counted off the time to himself under his breath.

  "But what has this to do with an atlas?"

  The bladder had filled; Alacrity tossed it aside carelessly, doing conversions in his head. "You need something to swap. If you just look back there in the vats, you'll see a small mountain of trade goods, courtesy of Gresham's World."

  Alacrity put his finger over the hose's nozzle and began experimenting, trying for a fine spray.

  "Put that from your mind!" Gute yelped, round-eyed with shock. "The hams have been counted. I would be nerve-flogged and cast out! You would be put under the flensing beams, or have your actijot energized, full force!"

  "The hams haven't been counted, dammit," Alacrity corrected. "They've been weighed. By the vat. It's stenciled right here on the sides of the vats, in Panlang." He was keeping careful lookout, to make sure no one was watching.

  Gute, who could puzzle out a little Terranglish and trade-slang but plainly couldn't read anything else, furrowed his brows.

  "But what of that? They will weigh the vats at the complex, surely."

  "Uh-huh. And the weight'll come out just right, making allowances for the difference in gravity."

  So saying, Alacrity turned the fine mist of the hose and began wetting down the meat, keeping count of the time so that he had a pretty fair idea of the weight of water he was transferring.

  "Or maybe just a little more, to be safe," he pondered. "Would you do me a favor, please? Check and see how much is leaking through?"

  Gute was familiar with the way salted meat absorbed water. He went through a moment's torment of doubt, then, thinking of the wonderful Spican Atlas, did as Alacrity requested.

  "Nothing yet." He, too, looked around. "And the vats will weigh the same? There will be no trouble?"

  Alacrity was shifting some of the hams around as he hosed them down. "They will once we take out two or three for you to trade to Denzio. There'll still be plenty left for the Betters; they bring in twice as much as they can stuff into their faces anyway, isn't that what you told me? It's just that you're getting the leftovers off the top, instead of the kitchen staff hogging them later."

  "You still have not told me how you profit from this," Gute pointed out dubiously. But he was already shifting the meat around so that Alacrity could get at it with a hose, picking out two hams for himself.

  "You keep me and my friend off heavy labor duty—if he doesn't have a solid berth already, that is. Keep us off the dirty jobs and the dangerous ones. I'll show you a lot of other things we can do for you. Gute, I've been around starports most of my life."

  When Gute looked hesitant, Alacrity added, "You can always change your mind later. You can also blame everything on me; what more can they do to me?"

  "And what happens when Captain Dincrist s
hows up?" Gute objected.

  "Then the deal's over." Only, I plan to be long gone by then! Because I'm a free operator again!

  It bothered him and yet he exulted in it, the one thing he hadn't brought himself to tell Floyt. Since awakening, he'd been free of the torment of the conditioning. Whatever Skate had done to him in the Mountebank, he'd inadvertently freed Alacrity of his bondage to Floyt and the mission. He was his own man once more.

  "There's a little water trickling down here and there," Gute reported, "but only a bit."

  "Well? What d'you say, Gute?"

  Gute hefted one of the hams, feeling its weight. "Teach me more about science."

  The baron's mask that day was a conservative visor of thin, dove-gray leather trimmed in red-orange flame of metallic thread, his forked beard projecting from the bottom.

  He came alone, in coral body swathings, meeting the Earther at the guard post where Gute and Alacrity had dropped him off. The guard sealed around Floyt's wrist a short-term color-coded pass bracelet that would dissolve when no longer valid.

  The Earther was also given an unremarkable, yellow, half face-mask, a loaner.

  The baron motioned for Floyt to follow him. Floyt hastened to take up position one pace behind and to the right, where he'd seen other servants station themselves.

  The megastructure of the complex was soaring, prismatic, letting in light and broad sky-vistas, vaulting high and open to the air.

  It's not Frostpile, Floyt thought, but it's damned impressive. Gorgeous, for such an evil place.

  They crossed a vast rotunda under a splendid bowl of skylight into a spacious high-ceilinged promenade. The motif was sybaritic-cathedral; the area was devoted to very decorous shops and spas, cabarets and galleries. Mason led Floyt past sensory cloisters, rejuv clinics, and debauchery agencies. Most of them had discreet metal or holo placards offering goods and services "By Appointment Only" or to "Members Only."

  Mason led him off along a grand esplanade as Floyt saw for the first time that the complex fronted a wide, rainbow-sanded beach and a serene red sea.

  The gaudy and boisterous Betters of Blackguard strolled or frolicked through the place under the watchful but very tolerant gaze of big, businesslike offworld guards—male and female both—in the maroon outfits with grotesquely padded shoulders and codpieces. There were sometimes exchanges of nods or passing pleasantries between groups, but the masks kept things on a very reserved and standoffish basis.

  For all the opulence of the place, and the Betters' pretensions to sin and depravity, the complex—and the Blackguard itself, for that matter—seemed tame to Floyt in comparison to the Grapple.

  The baron appeared to be strolling along contentedly, in no hurry and paying little attention. Floyt ventured, "You refer to this place as a kleptocracy, isn't that right? Government by, um, theft?"

  The Better considered that for a few paces, then stopped to face Floyt. "Are you a discreet man? Do you know what happens to indiscreet people here on Blackguard? Take the interrogation chambers at my own Citadel Compound, for example; that's where indiscretions have led a good many people. One of the first things my interrogators do is pull all the subject's teeth, so he can't bite off his tongue or gnaw through the arteries in his wrists or some such, to escape his situation. Were you aware of that?"

  "N-no … "

  "Ah. Now, as to kleptocracy—yes. But in Blackguard's case, a government by thieves, not by theft. And many of us are descendants of long, long lines of successful thieves—rulers, not cutpurses. Our diverse governments function by the age-old forces of supply and demand, and function to our profit at every turn. Are you still with me?"

  "Yes, I think so."

  "So. Master thieves are very proprietary of their prerogatives. Their plunder, if you will. They resent arrivistes and upstarts. I think you're a man who knows about upstarts. I think you're a man who can root them out for me."

  "You're Baron Mason, aren't you?" Floyt said. "You're the one who ordered my friend and me be held at Central Labor instead of Orion Compound. And you drew Matterse into that conversation in the garderobe because you had us put on cesspit detail, and you knew we'd overhear."

  Baron Mason nodded, eyes narrowing. "I count myself very fortunate you came my way. Yes, it served Matterse right for not knowing his history; the citadel is built precisely to old specifications, and spies eavesdropping on the garderobes was a classic ploy during Styx's dark age."

  "But how did you know I knew about genealogy and history?"

  "I'd already had word from others who were there, of the difficulties Dincrist had with you and your friend on Epiphany. And after all, you have had a monograph picked up for off world publication … Citizen Floyt."

  Floyt wet his lips but said nothing.

  "And you have my word you'll be much better off with me than you would if Dincrist fed you to Sile and Constance."

  "And when Dincrist comes back?"

  "Problematic, of course. It might even turn out that you've died, and there'll be a body to prove it—though it won't be your body. But in the meantime, let's see what you can do for me, eh?"

  They continued. Fountains blossomed; joyslaves followed or led their patrons along. Music and subsonics played, to encourage passion and excitement; they were as wasted on Mason as they were on Floyt.

  "Your name will continue to be—what is it?—Delver Rootnose?" the baron said offhandedly. "Yes; to everyone but for myself, is that clear? Confidentiality, you understand."

  Floyt nodded vigorously.

  "There are things I wish you to know," Mason went on. "For example, have you ever heard of a man named Praxis? Head of the Church of Human Potential? 'Saint of the Irreducible I,' and all that? No? No matter; you will."

  A party of revelers came the other way, laughing and shouting, waving drinking vessels and big, filigreed inhalers. One, trailing, staggering a little, was being helped along by two giggling adolescents—a slim boy and a coltish girl, both of them wearing filmy chlamys. The children were very merry, very forward with him; actijots made for conscientious joy-slaves.

  The man had taken off his bull-mask and was puffing on a long black cigar. He wore an extravagant suit of shirred and ruffled black silk and dancing shoes covered with gold sequins. Floyt recognized him, one of the dour, drab achievement coordinators from Egalitaria from the spaceport.

  They left the public-access corridors behind, entering a restricted zone of blank walls and security fixtures. The numerous doors needed only Baron Mason's least gesture to move aside. Floyt dogged his heels.

  "Most of that back there—it's a pitiful excuse for iniquity," Floyt said.

  "The point behind Blackguard is that the kleptocrats—and some few of our friends—are better off not letting the subject populations know what we do, or how we enjoy ourselves."

  "Couldn't you do that at home and just keep it quiet?"

  "Well now, in a repressive society, the ruling class can get away with anything. But most of us come from places where public opinion—and public outrage and public prosecutors—count for something.

  "And what does that leave us? Isolated playrooms? Moldy basements? No, no; you miss the point, Citizen Floyt. The point is to live high, wide, and handsome—to set ourselves apart from the sheep. To prove what we are, in a place that is all ours."

  A descent to a subsurface corridor and a short trip on a railbench brought them past several checkpoints to a heavy vault door. It occurred to Floyt that all the baron's talk of torture might be leading up to something. But this was hardly the route to the citadel's dungeon, and the Better didn't seem the type to indulge in a lot of unnecessary deceit.

  The baron debarked the railbench; Floyt followed suit. They were admitted to a command center staffed by a dozen or so nonhumans.

  The Earther flanked Mason past rows of monitors and data banks, displays and commo panels. Those on duty showed some surprise, noting Floyt's bracelet; no one dared question the baron.

  "Is Pollol
o active just at the moment?" the baron asked the empty air at random. A little, stick-thin humanoid—who put Floyt in mind of a cricket—dashed to fall in at attention before the Better.

  "Yes, Lord. But he is, ah—Superintendent Pollolo is in ablutive submersion right now. He's due for a molt very soon, and—"

  "He won't be otherwise occupied, then." Baron Mason approved with a fey smile. He started for an armored hatch set in the far wall of the command center.

  The humanoid started to object, thought better of it, and retreated, bowing.

  Floyt trotted after the Better, avoiding eye contact with anybody but taking in as much as he could. Much of the equipment mystified him; technologies had diverged after the First Breath and were only slowly reconverging in the opening laps of the Third.

  With only a limited amount of off-Terra experience behind him, he nevertheless thought he recognized a lot of the equipment, at least in a vague way—enough, that is, to make him envious. It was very advanced stuff, far beyond anything available on insular, xenophobic Earth.

  The tall hatch rolled aside, admitting them to a corridor lit only by free-standing lightshapes glowing a dim red. At the opposite end another hatch was marked with a universal warning symbol indicating an area of altered gravity—in this case 86 percent Standard, as opposed to Blackguard's 98 percent. Passing through, they came into a chamber nearly as large as the main control room. Floyt suddenly felt light on his feet.

  This one had a minimum of apparatus, a few stations for live operators widely separated, partitioned off from one another by their placement. All, that is, except for one position at the center of the place, the most remarkable. There, human-style controls had been replaced by smaller, more complex, almost miniature ones. There was also what looked like electromagnetic induction and receiving gear, but not shaped for a human skull.

  The walls of the chamber were covered with projections and excrescences that poked and protruded, clotted and bulged, seemingly assembled bit by bit, like a coral reef. Floyt noticed that the facility was equipped with a small swimming pool or large bathing tank set at floor level. It was filled with murky, gray-brown water.