MYTH-Interpretations: The Worlds of Robert Asprin

by Robert Asprin

  Another curt nod and the screen reverted to its original display showing the opposing fleet hanging motionless in space.

  "Well, that's that," the commander said, almost to himself. Then he hardened his tones to the firm voice of command.

  "Pass the word! Battle stations!"

  "Battle stations aye, sir!"

  "Sir!" It was his communications officer again. "There's a call coming in on subspace."

  A frown flashed across the commander's face as he both felt and hid his irritation at this unexpected interruption.

  What in heaven's name could that be? A late change in orders from Command Central?

  "Patch it through," he said, trying to sound calm and unruffled.

  Again came the annoying whistle.

  "Commander Stone here," he said, knowing that subspace communications did not allow visual exchanges.

  There was a moment's silence, then a tentative voice came from the speakers.

  "Raymie? Is that you?"

  The crew exchanged startled glances, then looked at their commander who was staring at the speakers in what could only be described as frozen horror.

  "Mom?" he said, at last.

  "There you are, Raymie." The unseen voice was now confident. "I was just calling to see if everything was all right with you."

  "Mom, what are you doing calling me here?" The commander shot an uncomfortable look at his crew, who were now steadfastly ignoring the exchange. "It must be costing you a fortune to call me direct."

  "It's not cheap, but I'll manage." The vast void of space was not sufficient to mask the martyrdom in his mother's tones. "It's worth it just to hear from you."

  "What do you want, Mom? I'm kind of busy right now."

  "I know, I know. My son, the big shot fleet commander. I could grow old and die before you found time to call me on your own."

  "That's right. I'm busy," the commander grumbled. "And right now is a very bad time for me. So if you can just tell me what it is you want?"

  "I just wanted to check to see if you were all right," his mother said. "I mean, it's Mother's Day and I hadn't heard from you. So I thought there might be something wrong."

  "Nothing's wrong, Mom. I'm fine. Really. It's just been a very busy day . . . and it's about to get busier in a few minutes."

  "I knew it had to be something important. I mean, after you didn't call on my birthday . . . and couldn't find time to come home for Christmas, I knew that you wouldn't let Mother's Day go by without calling unless something life or death came up."

  "As a matter of fact, it is a matter of life or death, Mom," the commander said. "We're about to go into battle in a few minutes, and I have a lot to do before we start. So if there's nothing else . . ."

  "You're what? Going into battle?"

  "That's right, Mom. So . . ."

  "On Mother's Day??"

  "Come on, Mom. It's not like I planned it this way. It's just how it happened. Okay?"

  "NO, it's not okay! And don't take that tone with me, Raymond!"

  "But Mom . . ."

  " ‘But Mom' nothing! You listen to me, Raymond. I've accepted that you're working in the fleet now, and that on any day you could get blown up or shot down or whatever it is that you do to each other. I haven't liked it, but I've accepted it. A mother has to let her children make their own choices, however painful it may be."

  "Mom . . ."

  "Now you tell me that you're going into battle, maybe get yourself killed, on the one day of the year set aside for mothers? I've never heard of anything so inconsiderate or heartless. You want me to spend the rest of my life remembering Mother's Day as the day my son got himself killed? I won't hear of it!"

  "So what am I supposed to do? Call it off? Because it would make my mother unhappy?"

  "Is that so much to ask? Oh, I suppose if making your mother happy isn't enough of a reason, you can say that you ran out of fuel or something. Just promise me that you'll postpone this war or whatever of yours until tomorrow or next week."

  "But Mom . . ."

  "I don't ask you for much, Raymie, but I'm asking for this. I want your solemn promise . . . and I'll sit right here on this communicator until I get it."

  "I . . . I'll see what I can do."

  "PROMISE!"

  "ALL RIGHT, ALL RIGHT. I PROMISE!"

  "There. Now that wasn't so hard, was it? Well, I've got to go now myself. Wish your mother a happy Mother's Day!"

  "Happy Mother's Day, Mom."

  The commander's voice and face were expressionless for this salutation, and remained so after the shrill whistle signaled the end of the exchange.

  After a long silence, he turned to his communications officer.

  "Get me Zoltron on the hailing frequency."

  Again, the enemy commander's face swam into focus on the main screen.

  "Commander Zoltron. I don't know how to say this, but . . ."

  "Let me help you, Commander Stone," Zoltron said. "Your mother has made you promise to postpone our engagement for a least one day."

  Raymond joined his crew in staring at the screen in shock.

  "How . . . how did you know that?" he managed at last.

  "Simple, commander. I just received a similar call from my mother. It seems your mother called here to find out your ship code so that she could call you. To further shorten our exchange, allow me to inform you that my own mother exacted a similar promise from me."

  "Really? I didn't know your empire celebrated Mother's Day at all, much less that the days were identical."

  "We don't," Zoltron grimaced. "Apparently after your mother explained to my mother the reason for her call, my mother thought it was such a good idea that she's adopting the holiday personally."

  "Gee. I'm sorry about that."

  "It could be worse. I'm only afraid that she'll pass it along to other mothers in the Empire. By this time next year, it could be a legitimate Empire holiday. In case you didn't know it, our mothers hold no less sway than yours do."

  "Hmmm. Tell you what, Zollie. Did you and your ships have anything planned for the rest of the day . . . except this battle, I mean?"

  "Not really. We had kind of figured this would be it. In fact, we left our schedules open in case it ran long."

  "Tell you what. There's a neutral refueling station not far form here, and I know the bar never closes. What say you and your crews join us in hoisting a few?"

  "Sounds good to me. Just be sure everyone on your side joins you in swearing to the Mother's Day truce, and I'll do the same with mine."

  "No problem . . . but why?"

  "Well, I figure if nothing else, it will eliminate the chance of interservice brawls once the drinking gets serious. It will be hard enough to explain to our respective superiors why we don't fight today without also having to explain to our mothers if we did end up squaring off."

  "Amen to that!"

  Con Job

  Robert Lynn Asprin

  The hotel room was American generic. Perhaps a bit larger and better decorated than most, but after all, this was the Hyatt in downtown Atlanta. Not so much better, though, as to justify the inflated room, room service, and drink prices the hotel charged. Especially at times like now when they were hosting a large convention.

  Max spent most of his time on the road, and often wondered exactly why it was that his fellow travelers, businessmen and vacationers, would be willing to pay such high prices for impersonal rooms, short pour drinks, and mediocre food. The only answer he had come up with was that the situation was pretty much the same all across the country, so people became blind to how much they were paying for how little. Either that or they were willing to pay premium prices just to get away from wherever it was they called home.

  Max knew exactly why he was willing to eat the expense. He was planning to make it all back, and then some, by the end of the long Labor Day weekend. He wasn't a businessman or a vacationer. Max was a professional thief and scam artist.

  To be more exact,
he was part of a team that toured the country, following the crowds and the money they brought to sports events, conventions, and festivals. While they had never worked a science fiction/fantasy media convention before, how different could it be? A crowd was a crowd, and the people that make up a crowd are notoriously careless with their money when away from home.

  This DragonCon was supposed to draw somewhere between thirty and thirty-five thousand people. While they had worked bigger events before, they should be able to turn a tidy profit here.

  He started to reach for the phone, then changed his mind. It would be better to get in the habit of using the cell phones. While today's computerized switchboards made it harder to listen in on conversations, there was no sense in getting careless. Reminding himself to keep his unit recharged, he flipped open his cell phone and cued up a number from his memory file.

  "HELLO?" came the shouted response.

  "Yeah, Doc. It's me, Max. Pass the word around the team that I've got Briar Patch established. It'll be room 912."

  "WHAT ROOM?"

  "Nine twelve."

  "FIVE TWELVE?"

  "Negative. That's NINE twelve."

  "NINE TWELVE. GOT IT."

  "Where are you, anyway? It sounds noisy at your end."

  "I'M IN THE PARASOL. THAT'S THE LOBBY BAR AT THE HYATT. IT'S KIND OF A MADHOUSE DOWN HERE."

  "What are you doing there?"

  "JUST THOUGHT I'D SCOUT THE LAY OF THE LAND A LITTLE. YOU SHOULD SEE IT DOWN HERE."

  "I thought the convention didn't start until tomorrow."

  "IT DOESN'T. A LOT OF THE ATTENDEES HAVE ROLLED IN EARLY. WHY DON'T YOU COME DOWN AND I'LL BUY YOU A DRINK."

  "No thanks. I think I'll turn in early so I'm rested tomorrow. Besides, I thought we agreed we shouldn't be seen together too much."

  "BELIEVE ME, MAX, NO ONE WOULD NOTICE."

  "Yeah, well, don't forget to get some sleep yourself. Oh, and while you're down there, see if you can pick up a program schedule for me. Top priority."

  Max stared at the phone for several moments after ending the call.

  Doc had sounded a bit strange, even for Doc. Of course, Doc had been the one to question this job when it was first proposed.

  "DragonCon?" he had said. "That's one of the biggest multimedia cons in the country, if not the biggest."

  "What? You've been to it before?" someone had asked.

  "No, but I've heard of it. It's big."

  "C'mon, Doc. We've worked Superbowls before. Weekend-long partying crowds are our bread and butter."

  Doc had shaken his head.

  "Yeah, but these are fans," he said.

  "Overaged Trekkies in home-made costumes. So what? They can't be any worse than sports jocks."

  "If you say so." Doc had shrugged, and they had moved on with their plans.

  Maybe Doc was more familiar with these events than he had let on. Maybe that's why he seemed to be "going native." They'd just have to keep an eye on him and remind him to stay focused.

  Check in had taken a bit longer than normal, but Max had shrugged it off as being the regular early rush at a big convention. In some ways, he had been lucky to even get a room at one of the main hotels. That's why they were resorting to the "briar patch" system.

  One of the crew's usual tactics was to hire someone locally to infiltrate the hotel staff a few weeks before the event, preferably in reservations or on front desk. That would get them a master key to the rooms and access to room bookings.

  This time, however, it turned out that all the rooms had been booked solid months in advance. Fortunately, with their man in place, they had managed to highjack a cancellation and put it in Max's name. Or, at least, the name he was using this weekend. Unfortunately, they could only manage one room, so they would be using this as their base of operations, their "briar patch" for the weekend.

  The rest of the crew would be using it to change outfits and to stash various things it would be wisest not to carry with them constantly—like large amounts of cash or identifiable items that fell into their possession during the course of the job.

  That also meant that someone would have to be in the room at all times, both to let people in and out, and to keep housekeeping from coming in and finding the very things they wanted to keep quiet. Max had been elected as room sitter and coordinator for the crew, though he expected to be relieved from time to time.

  It was a system that had worked for them in the past, and there was no reason not to expect it to work now.

  The next day, Max was roused by a knock on his door. It was Doc bearing, among other things, a Styrofoam takeout food box and a cardboard beverage cup.

  "Morning, Max," he said gaily. "Wanted to drop off that program schedule you wanted and swung through the food court on the way to pick you up some breakfast. Wasn't sure if they had in-room coffee makers here, so I brought you some wake-up juice as well."

  " 'Preciate it, Doc," Max said, seizing the coffee. "What does the event schedule look like?"

  "Big," Doc said, with a shrug. "It's like I told you coming into this thing. What do you want a schedule for, anyway?"

  Max frowned at him.

  "I thought we went over this in the planning sessions," he said. "If we're going to hit some of the guest rooms, we need to know when they'll be out. The professional guests are most likely to be traveling with extra money and valuables, and the schedule tells us when they're slated for appearances, so we know they won't be in their rooms. All we need to do now is pass a list of their names to our plant at the front desk, and he can tell us what rooms they're in."

  "Well, you'd better start on that fast, then," Doc said, shaking his head. "Registration is up to their eyebrows with check-ins, and someone is bound to notice if he tries to take an hour off to look up specific room bookings. He'll have to work it in a bit at a time."

  "You think it will take him an hour?" Max frowned.

  "Easy," Doc said. "There are something like eight hundred professional guests at this thing. You'll see when you try to sort out the schedule. There are fourteen or fifteen separate lines of programming running hourly starting at nine in the morning and going on until midnight or later. I don't envy you the job of sorting out who's going to be where and when."

  Max rubbed a hand across his mouth and scowled.

  "Maybe we'd be better off focusing on the attendees," he said. "I'm sure there are some major events that most of them will be attending. That might be a good time to hit the rooms."

  "I don' know," Doc said. "The costume competition is probably the best attended, but not everyone goes to that. I heard they cover it with closed-circuit television, so people can watch it in their rooms or in the bar."

  "This just gets better and better," Max said, shaking his head.

  "Well, here's another little goodie to try planning around," Doc said. "After today, maybe even as soon as tonight, security will only let people into the various main hotels if they have convention membership badges."

  "What? They can't do that!" Max said. "What about someone like me who's a paid, registered guest of the hotel but not registered for the convention?"

  "You'll probably have to work something with hotel security," Doc said. "Of course, that will draw attention to yourself as someone who's wandering through the hotel who isn't a member of the convention . . ."

  ". . . and we don't want that," Max finished for him. "We'll just have to get convention badges for everyone."

  "I was afraid you were going to say that." Doc sighed.

  "What's wrong?"

  "Well, there's about a three hour wait in line to register for the convention," Doc said, "plus it costs something like a hundred dollars apiece. That'll run our overhead for this job right through the ceiling."

  Max stared at him.

  "Doc, we're thieves," he said carefully. "I didn't say ‘buy us all memberships.' Steal us some badges. Got it?"

  "Got it," Doc said with a nod,

  "I can't believe how tight
a lid they're trying to keep on this thing," Max grumbled. "Who are they expecting, anyway? The Pope?"

  "No. He was a guest two years ago," Doc said.

  Max stared at him.

  "I told you it was a big convention." Doc shrugged.

  "You're kidding. Right?" Max said at last.

  "As a matter of fact, I am." Doc grinned. "But it's still a big convention."

  Max heaved a sigh.

  "Okay. You got me, that time."

  "Sure," Doc said. "If you bothered to check their website, you'd know the Pope canceled two months ago."

  "Website?" Max said. "This thing has a website?"

  Doc gave him a hard look.

  "Max, my nephew has his own website. You might try living in this decade sometime."

  "Yeah, well, they teach kids all kinds of stuff in college these days." Max grimaced.

  "That's true enough," Doc said. "But my nephew's still in junior high. Well, I'd better start working on getting us those badges."

  He headed for the door.

  "The Pope canceled two months ago?" Max said, the comment finally sinking in. But Doc was already gone.

  But Max's day was just beginning.

  The next ones to check in at Briar Patch were Allen and Alexis, the brother/sister team of pickpockets. They both seemed a bit down at the mouth, which was surprising—particularly for Alexis. She was petite and curvaceous and always seemed to glow with sunny innocence. It was part of what made her the perfect distracter and let her brother do his work unnoticed.

  "What's the trouble?" Max said. "You two look as if they just made petty theft a capital crime."

  "It's this job," Allen said. "I'll tell you, Max, I'm about ready to throw in the towel. Pack it in and write the whole thing off as a bad caper."

  "Is it the badges?" Max said. "They can't be that hard to liberate."

  "No. In fact, that was easy. Here, we even got an extra for you in case you decide to wander around a little," Allen said, handing over a laminated rectangle on a lanyard. "We didn't even have to steal them. Doc figured out an angle. You see, if someone loses their badge, they go back to registration and report it, show some identification, and are issued a new badge for a token penalty fee. All we had to do is buy some badges from attendees for twenty bucks over the penalty fee. We get badges and they get replacement badges and a profit."