Paper or Plastic

by Mackey Chandler

  "I think your caution is commendable, but please, I think from his actions, Efraim would like to be an ally any time he can be in good conscience. And Barak could probably answer him for you," he said with a smile Barak ignored. "Speak freely."

  "Very well, it's not a fiction to avoid military service, we do have real branch offices that purchase things and sell trade goods for Joshua, Roger and Martee. We usually just call them The Three, or The Trio. We usually don't refer to any one company name, because we use a bunch of them. But to us the company is The Three."

  "But among we three there are divisions of interest," Joshua interrupted, to clarify. "We have joint ventures and private ventures both. Martee and Roger have been able to obtain patents on biologicals for example and proceed to a propagation program for the plants."

  "But now that we do have it all hammered out, this technology will be the greater venture," Efraim predicted.

  "Perhaps," Joshua agreed, "but I'm already finding my share in these other endeavors gives me as much income as a man can reasonably use. Your belly only holds so much, no matter how big your eyes are. That was a hard lesson to learn, but now I'm getting tired and eager to wrap this business up so I'm free to go out there..." he explained, tilting his head back to the darkening sky. "My friends are already off world and our staff is handling their affairs here. I'd be out there too if we hadn't needed a partner to be present to deal with your government."

  "I expect the US will always have warrants for us, even though extradition was refused. How long will they keep refusing them? Gratitude has a way of fading. I hope this visit really does mean we can wrap things up. I'm very aware the Americans are never going to let up trying to get to me and I want to be far away from their reach.

  "And many of your loyal staff wish to be out there at your elbow," Gil reminded him. "Anyway… as to what I do," Gil took the conversation back, "I'm Head of Security for the Italian branch. My job is to make sure the building is safe, physically, electronically and politically. I'm supposed to make sure people are aware of personal safety outside and offer any resources I can, but I'm not personally responsible for them offsite. I'm learning a great deal watching them deal with security issues here, we don't have in Italy – yet."

  "Given our covenants I'd have thought your security inside our borders would be easier than Italy - or elsewhere," Efraim protested.

  "Locally yes, we appreciate your protection. We know you have people in town and on the road watching out for us. But the Americans are so unhappy with us I wouldn't count on the border for protection. They can still infiltrate agents and they don't seem to take sovereignty seriously. We're very cautious about Josh leaving the house, even with considerable security. And I was told there was an ugly incident..." Gil admitted then stopped.

  Barak managed to look interested like it was a new revelation.

  He was aware Barak said very little compared to Efraim. The man probably knew the answers to half the questions already and Gil realized as a security director he wasn't imitating him very well. It was time to shut up on the rendition, even if Joshua didn't cut him off. Then the thought struck him that Haim was even quieter. Hmm… He wondered if anybody else had thought about that. The man suddenly seemed more interesting, than he had before that insight.

  "For example, as part of my instruction here I was observing two of Josh's security people on duty, before coming to supper. One is running a couple drones. There is one particular drone that is important and he is monitoring it and controlling it real-time out over the Med. There is a nuclear attack sub off shore that has been watching us. He thinks it is SSN 777, which is the North Carolina."

  "That gives you an idea what sort of resources the Americans are willing to commit to pursuing and harassing Josh. It was refurbished not too long ago and it controls a couple robotic outrider subs. We suspect they run on optic fibers because they don't radiate anything. One of them is really close into shore, near us right now."

  "It's so close to the house here that the fellow running the drone got nervous, which he should, because the flight time on a missile from it would be under a minute. We simply don't know if they are armed. So he asked for our ballistic defense to be active and manned real time, until they pull the mini-sub back. A blink of the controller's eye and the tracking goes from passive optical to auto tracking and fire with active lidar and millimeter-wave radar. They've done this stalking and looking us over a couple times before, so we're somewhat used to it."

  "Inside our territorial waters?" Barak asked unhappily.

  "Yes, the near robot is, not the manned vessel, but you can be sure they are aware exactly where they are and deniable. They're very stealthy. I assumed your people know the big sub is out there?" Gil said.

  "Is the Raytheon over there what you're talking about for defense?" Barak asked, changing the subject away from what they knew about the sub.

  Gil determined he wasn't going to offer Barak much more information, if he didn't give anything back like that. He looked at Joshua again to make sure he should answer at all. He was a bit irritated at the fellow.

  "Yes, the Raytheon unit can handle artillery and battlefield ballistics. I don't know how it would handle a real ICBM. It probably couldn't stop it far enough out, if it were fail fused. The way things are right now we assume your systems would stop a long range missile for us, but we're trying to design something of our own to cover that. We figure we'll need it - out there also," he waved at the sky.

  "You're implying they'd use a nuke. On our sovereign soil," Efraim seemed grim with that idea before him.

  "A clean, very small yield tactical nuke would be pretty deniable, but we understood they have some bunker busters and other conventional munitions configured for long range missiles. We're pretty far from town here," Gill pointed out. "It might bust windows in a few other villas and otherwise not make much fuss."

  Efraim's face said he didn't like that, but he nodded at the laser, wondering how the hell they’d gotten that in, without it being reported to him. Barak hadn't twitched when he saw it. If he asked Barak about it he'd probably pretend innocence and claim Efraim had simply never asked about it. "I didn't know the Americans sold any of those. They certainly haven't sold any to us," he complained.

  "We bought this one and quite a few pieces of two more for parts, from the Iranians," Joshua informed him. "As my partner Roger is fond of expressing it, the original owners 'didn't have any further need of them', so the Iranians salvaged them. When Josh is off-planet things should cool down and maybe we won't need all this security. Perhaps we could make these available to you when we no longer need them and you could reverse engineer them?"

  "Talk to Barak about that, but what have you been doing recently that would attract the attention of the US Navy? Surely not just old warrants?"

  Gil looked at Joshua again.

  "I'm sure New York was enough reason all by itself. As to our current activities...I think we should reserve any comment on that," Joshua finally said, having stretched openness to its limits. "But hey, enough business," he insisted, "dinner is ready."

  Efraim stood too, dinner smelled quite good, but in the back of his mind he was unsatisfied. Whatever Joshua and his people were currently doing, would the Americans know or see any difference between them and the State of Israel, or just assume any activities emanated from this group were sanctioned by his government? Well, in a few months they'd have enough to be upset over it probably wouldn't matter. The Americans with their sats would know something big was going on, just not what, he hoped. When they left he'd make sure Barak wasn't holding back anything from him in that regard either.

  Chapter 29

  Their first market day after the ugly scene with the police was over, the market manager had come around and Roger had informed him they wanted to stay beside Ri, but pay a full fee just as if they had their own stall. The man gave him such a hard time Roger finally stopped trying to be pleasant.

  "Look, old man. Nobody
in this whole place likes you. They all hate your money-grubbing guts and if you don't wrap us up a deal and shut the hell up and go away, Martee and I will start our own farmer's market and put you out of business. Half the people here would pay more for a sale stall, just not to see your ugly face twice a week. Name a reasonable price and then get out of my sight or I swear I'll do it."

  Heskeel had the brains to be more scared than angry and named a Pid a month just as Ri had predicted. "In advance," he added as an afterthought and a challenge.

  "Here's a hundred Pid," Roger said, shocking the old man. "Write me a receipt and that should cover us for ten of your local years. With any luck at all, by then your sorry ass will be dead and I won't have to ever talk to you again."

  Their neighbors had listened shamelessly and word of his conversation with both the policeman and the market manager was working through the community. Ri chastised him for showing he could spend that sort of money so freely, saying somebody might rob him. She looked irritated when he just laughed. Roger was getting a reputation. That was fine with him. It could be useful.

  The next day Roger had his date with Nadya. He and Martee learned a lot being with the locals and Nadya's housekeeper Aeribel was thrilled with the lace trimmed linen hankie, with violets embroidered around the edge, Martee gave her. They hadn't put those out to sell yet, but if her reaction was typical, there would be a good market in things of fifty to a hundred Pid.

  Roger made a gift of a MusicBox, with about fifteen thousand selections of all sorts of Earth music to Nadya, when he arrived for dinner. He only had a few and fairly small speakers, but she seemed an important ally to impress. She asked his suggestion for a selection and played Gershwin during dinner. He could see it deeply affected her, but she showed it much less than Martee. Still she turned it off after dinner, saying that was enough.

  When he returned, Martee pestered Roger, to know if he was going to see Nadya again and obviously wanted to know if they'd been intimate. He wouldn't give her any satisfaction, pretending to not understand what she was hinting at. When Nadya didn't call for another date very quickly she let off a bit. Roger was just happy Martee wasn't trying to pimp him. He might ask Nadya out himself, but didn’t want to look too eager, when they had a business relationship too.

  The second market day was an end of the week market and their doctor friend had come by and accepted a gift from them. He'd opened everything to the doctor's whim telling him he could have one of anything they carried. After hearing how Martee's ring was a symbol of betrothal, he elected to accept one of their stones, confiding he intended to propose marriage to a young lady he had been seeing frequently. He very much liked the custom and took a picture of Martee's ring, assuring them he knew a machinist who could reproduce it.

  They had another cash customer that market day, but the third market day was really busy. It seemed the word finally worked its way around the social circle and both he and Martee were busy with different customers, while others waited a turn. Everyone assured them the next end of the week market would be even busier. Several people said they were going to tell friends to fly in from smaller outlaying communities, before the selections were picked over.

  Now that they had local credit, Martee had taken him to a community cafeteria. She's warned him, but he was still disappointed in the quality. Everything was bland and the serving size was half what Roger was used to in an Earth restaurant. He'd been warned enough that he had a large bottle of Crystal hot sauce and wished he'd thought to bring a case. Second visit he took to bringing along a small jar of Ri's honey too.

  One brave young man asked to try the hot sauce on a dish. Roger wasn't sure if it was rice or a sort of barley, but he was quite generous sharing it. Unfortunately for the young man local custom required him to clean his plate once he'd accepted the serving. If he'd just offered a few drops, the fellow might have been back for more, making Roger run out faster in the long run. Instead he was generous. The kid finished it but the sweat was dripping around his ears and he drank a lot of water to get it down. That story didn't hurt Roger's reputation either.

  After the second market day Martee and Roger paid up the hotel bill and moved out by Ri. They wanted to spend more time picking everything they could from her mind and decide what they were going to do for a permanent and more comfortable headquarters on this planet.

  Ri was surprised when he asked if they might camp out near her place and visit more frequently with her than just market days. They also suspected their market days would be too busy to talk with her now.

  "You don't understand. I don't own my place; I just squat there. If I came home and somebody had moved in I'd be in real trouble. Their claim would be just as valid, in the mind of the law, as mine. So even if you wanted to move in right up against me there's nothing I could do about it," she assured them.

  "That's why most who decide to live out of town live in a group. They leave someone there all the time, so they never have their claim on it challenged. That's what all the farm families you see at market do. Once in awhile you do get somebody attaches themselves to an out-family like a leech and it can get ugly showing them they aren't welcome.

  "So is that why people will stay in town, when there's really nothing there for them? Is it for the security of not being turned out on the street?" Roger asked.

  "Even people in town don't own their apartments. The lease is part of the pay for whatever employment they have. I don't know if anybody actually leases a home for cash in city, from the government. Even the people no company wants, who end up doing government scutwork, have a one room apartment under basic, sharing a bath house with a whole building of single roomers."

  "What about the outlaying farming communities like where Aeribel's family lives? Surely they don't have this problem." Martee asked.

  "No, because the whole area, the whole valley you were in likely, is granted a charter, that makes it a recognized community and once the government declares active ownership of it and starts developing it, somebody like me couldn't move in, anymore than I could pick an open space in town and squat on it. If they decided to declare this area a recognized community I'd either have to start paying them to lease my own place, or move on. I suspect they'd set the fee to make me move along."

  "Anyway – in the case of Martee and you I'd welcome some company. Having some other folks around would make it less likely someone would try to take over my place. As long as you agree, if we get tired of each other you guys will move along."

  "You have our word on that. We're not – uhh – in my language the expression is 'claim jumpers' close as I can translate. Even if you don't have a legal claim we recognize it."

  * * *

  After the market close they drove to the ship and Martee flew to Ri's, while Roger drove their rental back to the market. Ri was almost the last to leave, only a few big farm stalls finishing the last of their packing. He followed her to her place. Martee was there already due to Ri's good directions and some overhead topo pix. It was quite a climb up from the city.

  They set up camp close enough to be handy, but far enough Ri would still have some privacy, out of casual hearing and far enough away Roger could string two circles of electronic security. The big trees looked like cover to sneak up on them, but they were perfect sensor mounts, just like Roger had at home.

  Ri had built with ingenious use of native material. She had thick walls of dry stacked rock, from the nearby stream bed and stucco walls inside, from clay and sand brought up from the flood plain of the city. It had taken two years hauling mud buckets home every market day to finish. The roof was thatched, but it had an inner layer of metalized plastic sheet, protected by the reeds. The floor was pounded gravel and the furniture discards from people in town.

  "Nobody gets on you for taking rock or other building material?"

  "Not for your own use. If you want to sell it, the paperwork and environmental checks are a nightmare."

  Roger made them a supper from
produce bought at the market and they settled down after to a cup of coffee. Ri very much approved of coffee.

  "What's so upsetting about this ownership issue, is I was thinking of coming out here beyond the city limits and building a place for our business. I won't do it without having solid title to the land. I can't believe the original settlers who came here would have agreed to those terms," Roger said, shaking his head. "Martee can you connect to the local net out here and do a computer search for the government history and documents? I'd like you to download all the files about the original settlers and if they have land records on file and charters, those too please."

  Martee found an abundance of information and pointed out something to Roger. "See this note in the corner? That indicates the file has not been accessed in twenty two-hundred local years."

  "How long has this planet been settled?"

  "About twenty-five hundred years."

  "Martee, I'm going to have a lot of questions about the exact wording of things in Todu. If nothing else I'm going to learn it a great deal better than I know it now. If we have to challenge something legally here, who do we see?"

  Ri smiled real big and answered for her. "Your girl friend Nadya rules on all legal cases, along with two judges she picks to sit with her. They have hearings every tenth of a year and usually it takes up most of a day to hear all the questions. Now are you going to ask her out again?"

  "No, I'm not going to ask her out for sure now. If she has to hear a plea from me she may feel obligated to, uh, 'recuse' herself. That’s the English word. How do you say that in Todu?" he asked Martee.

  "You don't. There isn't a word for that," she said after searching awhile.

  "What does it mean?" Ri asked. After a lengthy explanation, she laughed until tears ran down her cheeks.

  "Oh, Roger, you have no idea how things work in a small colony world," she finally said. "If anyone suggested Nadya 'recuse' herself then she likely would - how did you say? - rip them a new excretory orifice? We once had Mord Nillimit get up and argue a case as president of a forest products company and then stand up again and argue the case as Regulator of Environmental Purity, while sitting as an assistant judge to the case."