The Year's Best Science Fiction: Eighteenth Annual Collection

by Gardner Dozois

  He spoke of the first halting steps toward Far Space and of the gradual emergence of humanity from the cocoon of the Solar System during three hundred years of experiment and daring colonization. He spoke of the new morality that emerged from the Time of Troubles, the ecolaws that limited the size of families and prescribed a human density of no more than one person per thousand hectares of land surface on any inhabited planet. (Great populations tend to produce political instability, to say nothing of epidemics.)

  He spoke of the Great Diaspora, the scattering of humankind among the stars to insure that what had almost happened in the past could never happen again. He spoke of a species obsessed with security and order, and pointed out what a good thing it was that people had, for once, learned from the past, so that they would never have to repeat it. He spoke about the liquidation of democracy and explained the strange term as a Greek word meaning “mob rule.” He ended with a kindly word or two about the friendly aliens like the Darksiders who had now become part of humanity’s march toward ever greater heights of stability and glory.

  All across the city, students were recording the lecture. So were people who were not students but had a hunger for learning. In his apartment, Stef listened because he was still recovering from his night in the Chamber and had nothing else to do. His chief reaction to Yang’s version of history was sardonic amusement.

  “Pompous old glupetz,” he muttered.

  In another shabby apartment, this one opening on a rundown warren of buildings near the university called Jesus and Buddha Court, Kuli—whose real name was Ananda—and the beautiful Dián—whose real name was Iris—also listened to Yang. Their reactions tended less to laughter and more to scorn.

  “I liked the bit about the Darksiders,” said Ananda, fingering his rosary. “A bunch of smelly barbarians our lords and masters use as mercenaries to suppress human freedom.”

  “You’re so right,” said Iris, shutting off the box. “How I hate that man.”

  “Oh well, he’s just a professor,” said Ananda tolerantly. “What can you expect. Look, is there a Crux meeting this week?”

  “I don’t know. Lata will have to message us, won’t she? Nobody we know has been arrested. Maybe the excitement’s over,” she added optimistically.

  “I thought Zet was getting spooked.”

  “Well, he’s old. Old people get scared so easily.”

  She smiled and sat down on the arm of his chair. Ananda used his free hand to rub her smooth back. Not for the first time in history, conspiracy had led to romance. The relationship had begun with talk and more talk; change the past, restore life to the victims of the Troubles and at the same time erase this world of cruelty and injustice. Neither Ananda nor Iris could imagine that they might cease to exist if the past were changed; they thought that somehow they would continue just about as they were. Maybe better.

  Growing intimate, they had told each other their real names; that had been a crucial step, filled with daring trust and a quiver of fear—somewhat like their first time getting naked together. The fact that Ananda in the past had told other girls his name and had tried to recruit them for Crux was something that Iris didn’t know.

  Indeed, Ananda had forgotten the others too, for he was floating in his new love like a fly in honey. In the middle of the disheveled apartment, surrounded by discarded hardcopy, rumpled bedding, a few stray cats for whom Ananda felt a brotherly concern, Iris of haunting beauty bent and touched her lips to those of the ugly young man with the rosary at his belt.

  “I’d better go,” she murmured. “I’ve got a lab.” Her tone said to him, Make me stay.

  “In a minute,” said Ananda, tightening his grip. “You can go in just a minute.”

  A few streets away, in a less shabby student apartment occupied by four young women, the mashina was still playing after Yang’s lecture, only now switched to a commercial program.

  One of the women was insisting that she needed to make a call, but the other three were watching a story of sex among the stars called The Far Side of the Sky and voted her down.

  “You can wait, Taka,” they said firmly. Taka, who was twenty, had begun to argue when a news bulletin suddenly interrupted the transmission.

  “Suppose I make my call now—” she started to say, when something about the bulletin caught her attention.

  “Hush up,” she told the others, who were bitterly complaining about the interruption of the story just as the hero had embraced the heroine deep in mag space.

  “I want to hear this,” said Taka.

  After the bulletin the story quickly resumed. Taka thoughtfully retired to her bedroom and sat down on the floor, folded her slim legs gracefully under her, and reached for her compwrite. The compwrite transmitted through the mashina in the other room but gave her privacy to work.

  “A letter,” she said, “to—”

  Who? She wondered. Daddy had always told her to obey the law but have nothing to do with the polizi, who were, he said, scum, gryaz, filth. How then to get her information to them without using the boxcode that had appeared on the screen during the newsflash?

  “To Professor Yang, History Faculty,” she began, rattling off the university address code from memory. “Send this with no return address, oké?”

  “I am waiting, O woman of transcendent beauty,” said the compwrite. Taka herself had taught it to say that and was now trying to make it learn how to giggle.

  “Honored Professor, I am sending this to you as a person I honor and trust and admire,” she began, laying it on thick.

  “I have always been a law-abiding person and there was a news bulletin just now where the polizi were asking for information about a terrorist group called the Crooks. Well, a student named Ananda, when he was trying to climb aboard—scratch that, make love to me a couple of months ago, stated that he belonged to this group and tried to make it seem incredibly important, though I had never heard of it myself up to that time. In any case my native dialect is English and I happen to know what Crooks means and I was angry that somebody would try to involve me in something criminal.

  “Hoping that you will convey this info to the proper authorities, I remain one of your students choosing to remain anonymous.”

  She viewed this missive on the screen and then added, “PS, this Ananda is an ugly guy with a rosary of some kind he wears on his belt. I think he’s an O.B. He is skinny and wears a funny kind of cross under his jacket. He says it is a symbol of something I forget what.”

  She added, “Send,” and headed back into the front room, where the current chapter of The Far Side of the Sky had expired in a shudder of Far Space orgasms.

  “Well, I suppose I can make my call now,” she said, and did so, setting up an appointment for tomorrow with the mashina of a depilator who had promised to leave her arms and legs as smooth as babyflesh, which she thought would look very nice.

  Professor Yang’s infatuation with Selina was leading him deeper and deeper into debt. He tried to stay away from Radiant Love House, but instead found himself dreaming of the White Tiger all day and heading for the District by hovercab at least three times a week.

  He told himself all the usual things—that this was ridiculous in a man his age, that he would lose face if his frequent visits became known, that he couldn’t afford this new extravagance. No argument could sway him; he wanted his woman of ivory in the blue peace of the electronic room where for an hour at least he feasted on the illusion of youth regained.

  He was again in the middling expensive parlor waiting for the White Tiger when Stef lounged in and collapsed on the double divan.

  Ordinarily, Yang would have ignored the fellow, but when Stef said, “How are you, Honored Professor?” he felt he had to say something in return.

  “Quite well.” Brief, cool.

  “I watched your last lecture,” said Stef, who was inclined to chat, knowing that as usual he had time to kill before Dzhun could receive him.

  “Really,” said Yang, thawi
ng slightly. He was paid .10 khan for every box that tuned in to his lectures. It wasn’t much, but he needed every tenth he could get.

  “Yeah. I’m not a student, but I am ill-educated and I occasionally try to improve my mind, such as it is.”

  Stef pulled over a wheeled censer, dumped a little kif into it from a pouch he carried, and turned on the heating element.

  “Inhale?” he asked, unwinding two hoses and handing one to Yang.

  “The waiting is tiresome,” Yang allowed, and took an experimental puff. Finding the quality acceptable (local kif, not Martian, but pretty good) he took another.

  “May I ask your profession?”

  “Investigative agent. I’m also a licensed member of the Middlemen and Fixers’ Guild.”

  “Ah.” Yang looked at Stef sharply. “Are you good at what you do?”

  “Well, I live by it and have for years. Why? Need something looked into?”

  “Actually,” said Yang slowly, “I received an anonymous letter a few days ago and I’ve been wondering how to handle it. It claims to place in my hands certain information that I, ah, feel somebody in authority ought to know. Yet I have no way of checking it or naming the sender, who claims to be a student of mine. It may be worthless; on the other hand, if it’s useful, well—”

  “You’d like to be paid for it,” said Stef promptly. “I can handle that. Insulate you from the polizi. There are ways to handle it confidentially and at the same time claim a reasonable reward if the information’s good. What’s it all about?”

  Yang thought for a moment and then said, “It concerns something called Crux.” All of Stef’s long training was just barely sufficient to enable him to keep a marmolitz—a marble face.

  “Ah,” he said, clearing his throat, “the thing that was on the box a few nights ago?”

  “Yes.”

  Briefly he told Stef about the letter, witholding, however, the name Ananda and his description.

  “What do you think it might be worth?”

  “How happy I am,” interrupted the box in the corner, “to inform you, honored guest, that Dzhun is now ready to receive you.”

  “Tell her to wait,” said Stef.

  To Yang he said, “Let me try to find out if the matter’s really important. If so, I wouldn’t hesitate to ask ten thousand khans in return for such information.”

  “Ten thousand?”

  The kif pipe fell out of his mouth.

  “It must be something major,” Stef pointed out, “or it wouldn’t have been put on the air. At the same time, I would recommend caution. This is clearly a security matter, and you certainly wouldn’t want to expose yourself to the suspicion of knowing more than you actually do. That’s a short path to the White Chamber. Luckily, I have a friend on the inside who’s not polizi and can make inquiries.”

  “And your, ah, fee?” asked Yang.

  “A flat ten percent of the award. I’m an ethical investigator.”

  “Good heavens,” said Yang, who was perfectly indifferent to Stefs professional ethics but whose mind was engaged in dividing K9,000 by 120 to reached the astounding figure of seventy-five hour-long sessions with the White Tiger in the electronic room.

  “What do you need?” he asked.

  “Your chop on my standard contract, one sheet of hardcopy with the message, and about two days.”

  “You shall, my friend,” said Professor Yang rather grandly, “have all three.”

  Yama and Stef sat at the duroplast desk in the Lion House staring at the hardcopy.

  “One name. And what a crappy description. Maybe I should turn Yang over to Kathmann just to see if he knows anything more.”

  “An honored professor? Come on, Yama. Stop thinking like a security gorilla for once. Yang doesn’t know a damn thing except that he needs money to rent his albino. What we need is to find this Ananda.”

  “How? Call in the polizi?”

  “Hell, no. Get the credit yourself. First of all, access the university records. Tell your mashina to search for Ananda as both a family name and a given name. Let’s say for the last two years. Do you have access to the polizi and city records?”

  “That’s Earth Central stuff,” said Yama with a cunning look. “It’s off limits to us. Of course I’ve got access.”

  “When you get some names from the university, have the box start calling their numbers and checking the faces of these Anandas. That’ll eliminate some—they can’t all be skinny, ugly guys—and meanwhile you can be having the names checked against the polizi records for arrests and against the city records for everything else—property ownership, energy payments, tax payments, everything. Then there’s the Old Believer angle—”

  Yama was already talking to his box. “I want confidential access to university records. Now.”

  He turned back to Stef. “By the way, how much is this costing me, assuming it leads to anything?”

  “If it leads to Crux, I promised Yang fifteen thousand.”

  “Petty cash,” said Yama. “If it leads to Crux.”

  The box chimed. “Sir, I have accessed the university central administrative files.”

  “Search admission, registration and expulsion records for the name Ananda,” said Yama promptly, “especially expulsion.” He added to Stef, “Terrorists are often students, but very few of them are good students.”

  Dreaming of the money, Stef paced the room impatiently. The university records were voluminous and ill-kept. There was no Ananda as a family name. Searching given names was just getting underway—“This baby does it in nanoseconds,” promised Yama—when the whole university system went down. And stayed down.

  After more than an hour of waiting and pacing and dreaming of kif, Stef lounged out, holding his nose until he was past the Darksider, and took a hovercab home. There he called Earth Central and reported to one of Kathmann’s aides that he and Yama were following down an anonymous tip that a student was a member of Crux.

  Then he called Yang and told him that the money was practically in hand. Yang was ecstatic.

  “You don’t know what this means to me, honored investigative agent,” he bubbled. “I’ve had so many calls on my purse lately.”

  “I know what you mean.”

  “What do you think this Crux organization might be?”

  “I don’t have the slightest idea,” Stef lied. “In English the word means, uh, the essential thing. Like the crux of an argument.”

  “Of course there’s also the Latin meaning.”

  “What’s Latin?”

  “It’s a dead language. The original source of the word. In Latin it means cross. Hence the crossroads, the critical point.”

  “Ananda wears a funny kind of cross,” said Stef slowly.

  “Yes. My informant thought he was an Old Believer.”

  “I wonder—”

  Stef’s box chimed. He quickly made arrangements to bring Yang his payoff and cut the circuit.

  “Say,” he told the box.

  “Stef, I got the names,” said Yama, abrupt as usual. “Got your recorder on? Here they are. Last year, Govind Ananda, withdrawn. This year, Patal Ananda, Nish Ananda, Sivastheni Ananda. That’s all.”

  “Boxcodes?”

  “Got ’em all except Govind. Like so many of those damn students, he may have a pirated mashina. I’m having the box call the ones we’ve got, and at the same time start running through the city records. Got anymore bright ideas?”

  “No,” said Stef, “except I want a vacation when this is over. And my pay.”

  “Stop kidding me, I know you’ll take your pay out of old Yang’s reward money. Don’t try to … wait a minute. Box reports Patal and Sivas-whatever don’t resemble the description. Nish is away from home. Wait a minute again. Govind Ananda paid the energy bill on No. 71, Jesus and Buddha Court. Didn’t the letter say something about a rosary? And about him being an O.B.?”

  “Keep trying Nish, Yama, but send three or four of your thuggi to meet me at J and B Court. I
’m going to try Govind. I like the smell of that address. It’s near the University and the names would echo for an Old Believer.”

  “You got ’em. Plus a Darksider in case things get rough.”

  “And a gas mask.”

  Stef rang off, plunged into a battered Korean-style chest on his balcony and brought out his one-centimeter impact pistol. He touched the clip control and chambered one of the fat, black-headed rounds.

  Action elated him, freed him from his memories of being beaten, his sense of uselessness. Suddenly he felt wonderful, better than when he was on kif, better than when he was drunk, almost better than when he was about to make love. A flutter of fear in his belly was part of the frisson. So was the taste of iron filings beginning to fill his mouth.

  He rummaged through his closet, dragged out his most ample jacket, tore the right-hand pocket to give him access to the space between cloth and lining. Hand in pocket, he pressed the gun against his ribs to hide any bulge and slipped through the door, listening to it click behind him, wondering if he would ever unlatch it again. He whispered a goodbye to Dzhun. On the roof he signaled for a hovercab.

  “Jesus and Buddha Court,” he said, when one drew up.

  The cab’s black box said, “Gratizor.”

  On Lake Bai in the evening the tinkle of samisen music mixed with the thrumming of a Spanish guitar, the notes falling like lemon and oleander flowers into the dark, cold water.

  Half a click down in the huge lake—really a freshwater inland sea—glacial ice still lingered, surviving into the heat of an earth warmer than it had been since the noontime of the dinosaurs. Shrieking happily, goosepimpled swimmers were leaping into the water from the floating docks of lakeside villas. Further on, strings of Japanese lanterns illuminated teahouses and casinos and sliderrinks where the children of grandees cavorted on expensive cushions of air.

  Back in the hills, spotlights illuminated palaces. Bijou villas lined the shores, and on the veranda of one of the smaller ones Stef and Dzhun idled, wearing light evening robes and not much else. Dzhun kept returning to Stef’s account of the raid, trying to get the story straight.