Nemily wanted to say no, but she did not want to upset Koeln. She nodded shortly and made herself ignore the walls.
“You’re originally from Lunase, aren’t you?”
Nemily stared at him for a long moment, comprehension opening with a chill. “You’re security.”
Koeln gave her a measured look which lasted a second too long for him to then make a convincing denial. He must have decided the same thing. He nodded.
“Then,” she said, “this isn’t routine at all, is it?”
“No.” He shook his head in mock dismay “I must remember that not everyone is as trusting as Aeans.” He touched his screen and read: “Dollard, Nemily, InFlux number Nine-Five-Zed-El-One-Two-Dee-Eight-One. InFlux advisor Malcolm, Jeter Lowry. Point of origin, Lunase. Applicable skills, cyberlink. What did you do in Lunase?”
“My last position was on a splitter line attached to a fusion generator, water production. Before that I worked on a similar line for the alchemists.”
“Did you know a man named Glim Toler?”
Nemily hesitated. Koeln leaned forward.
“Do not lie to me, Ms. Dollard. You have made no errors in judgment since you’ve been on Aea. In fact, you have an admirable record. You’ve adapted well. Most people from Lunase have a very difficult time shedding certain habits of coversion. Understandable, given the circumstances from which they come. We tend to overlook most of it, but occasionally it refuses to be overlooked.” He sat back. “Let me ask a different question, then, before you compromise such a superb record. Had you ever been invited to one of Piers Hawthorne’s parties?”
“I went to one two nights ago.”
“Before that.”
“No.”
“He never invited you before?”
“No.”
“Why did he invite you this time?”
“I don’t know.”
“Did he introduce you to anyone specifically?”
“No. Other people in my department were there, they introduced me around.”
“Hawthorne himself did not?”
“No.”
“Did you meet someone?”
“Several someones.”
Koeln sighed. “I deserved that, I suppose. Let me be direct. You took someone home with you from the party. Who?”
“If you know I took him home then you already know who.”
“True, but a great deal rests on your willingness to cooperate.”
“Mace Preston. He was the—it was a party for him. His birthday.”
“Had you ever met him before?”
“Not that I recall.”
“He does volunteer work for InFlux. Are you sure you never met him?”
“I’m—it’s not my nature to forget things, Mr. Koeln.”
Koeln stared at her for a long time, then smiled again. “I’m told Mr.
Hawthorne spins a good time. Several years ago he was reprimanded by Structural Authority for one that nearly devolved into a riot. I wasn’t with the company at the time, so all I know for certain is that the reprimand was issued.”
“This one stayed civilized.”
“I’m certain. Now, to my previous question—”
“I knew a Glim Toler. He was my roommate’s lover. I didn’t like him so I had as little as possible to do with him.”
“Why didn’t you like him?”
“He was—it’s hard to say exactly—he was working vacuum—”
“Lots of people do that, contraband is almost a sacred calling to some. It doesn’t mean they aren’t decent people.”
“He wasn’t. Decent. He hurt Clare. I expect him to do badly, if he hasn’t already.”
“Mmm. Have you heard from him since coming here?”
She almost laughed. “No! He was one of the reasons I left Lunase.”
“A necessary question, Ms. Dollard. I apologize. In fact, I apologize for this whole thing. I required information, you’ve provided... not all, but enough. My thanks.” He touched the screen and the privacy field vanished. “You were sponsored here, did you know that?”
“Yes.”
“Do you know by whom?”
“No. I thought that was a confidential matter—”
“It is, it is. Like anything else here, it’s up to the citizen if he or she wants the subject to know It’s a gift and the custom of anonymity applies. Sometimes though there’s a specific reason a sponsorship is made and revelation is made. I wondered if perhaps you knew.”
“No, I was never told.”
“I see. I may wish to ask you a few more questions. Please don’t discuss any of this with your coworkers or supervisors.”
“May I go?”
“Of course. Oh, by the way, I’m originally from Lunase myself. It’s been some time since I’ve had any chance to speak with someone... from there. I wondered if—”
“Um...I really don’t....”
“Unless, of course, your schedule doesn’t permit it.”
“Are we finished, Mr. Koeln?”
“Of course.”
Nemily walked away, trying not to move too swiftly, trying not to attract notice. She managed to keep her stride normal despite a sudden, long-forgotten urge to run.
Everyone was gone when Nemily walked back into her office. She stood just within the door, heart racing, trying to understand why. Then she remembered the Last Day party for Torem on two and she heard herself laugh, sharply. She went to her desk and checked the time. Fourteen-ten.
She sat down, now glad to be alone. She had not been so frightened since her InFlux interview, the first one when she had been convinced they would send her back for importing vacuum. It surprised her a little that Koeln had not brought that up. But perhaps he did not know about it. She still found it difficult to believe security could be ignorant; she had come to assume that here they simply did not care about certain things the way they did in Lunase.
She tapped for an outside comm, then did a residence search. She found the number and made the connection.
“Preston dom, may I help you?”
The female voice distracted Nemily for a moment, until she recalled that Mace used a domestic personality. She wondered what kind of person owned such a voice.
Td like to speak to Mace, please.”
“May I say who is calling?”
“Nemily Dollard.”
“Please wait.”
The trembling in her legs moved into her abdomen briefly, then faded.
“Yes.”
“Mace, hi. I hope I didn’t wake you.” She felt herself flush at the remark, wishing to call it back and put another, preferably more intelligent comment, in its place. Too late.
“No, not at all. I’ve been up—oh, at least five minutes.”
She laughed loudly, embarrassing herself again. She drew a breath. This was getting worse. “I’m sorry, I can call later—”
“I’m kidding. I have a normal circadian, well, usually. Really, I’m glad you called. What can I do for you?”
Tell me I’m welcome, tell me I can stay on Aea, tell me I have no reason to fear... “Well...” She cast anxiously around for a reason, realizing that she had called him on impulse. “Urn... we never did get that lunch.”
“We didn’t?”
She remembered the conversation, remembered lunch mentioned, then she replaced the synthesist with the sensualist. Paradoxically, she forgot sometimes, even after so many years, that the unmodified did not have the same precision of memory.
“No.”
“I didn’t notice. Well, lunch is past. How about dinner?”
“If you prefer—” she began, prepared to give him a polite way out, as if he had not really meant the invitation.
“Dinner, then. I’ll be there at nineteen.”
“Oh. That would be great.”
“I’ll make reservations. See you then. Bye.”
The connection broke and she stared at the dead light.
Calmed by the concrete sense of an evenin
g’s plans, she checked her itinerary for any new tasks Melissa might have posted for her. The buffer was empty. She closed down her station and went home.
Seven – AEA, 2118
MACE LIKED AEA BEST during nightcycle. For him, the shimmer of light down its length, suspended like scattered jewels, looked like music, if it could be seen. He felt safe inside Aea, safer at night when the lights brought everything closer.
He walked the entire distance to segment two before catching a shunt. His path took him near one of the third-ring spokes that stretched from “ground” to the central shaft that ran from endcap to endcap, upshaft to downshaft. He craned his neck to watch a gondola rise toward its zero-g track along the spine.
On the shunt he closed his eyes, pretending to nap, revisiting his newly made memories. He had not sweated so much with a woman in months.
Frantic leisure.
Nemily accepted what was given, took a little more, and played with it, aggressively, athletically....
He straightened in his seat, the pressure in his pants pleasantly uncomfortable, and glanced at the other passengers. None of them seemed to be paying him any attention. He got off at the station before his stop and walked the rest of the way to his dom, burning residual energy. As he turned down his path, he recognized another sensation: wonder.
“Welcome home,” Helen said as he walked through the front door. “It must have been some party.”
“It was, it was. Remind me to let you badger me into those more often.”
“Obviously you aren’t just now getting back from Piers Hawthorne’s.”
“No.”
He walked into the kitchen and took a bottle of wine from the refrigerator.
“When will you learn to drink red wine at the proper temperature?”
Helen had always teased him about his barbaric taste in wine, lamenting that after all his time in Aea he had failed to cultivate civilized habits. He wondered if he continued to drink red wine cold just to honor that small difference between them.
“I prefer it cold,” he said.
“Are you going to tell me where you’ve been?”
Mace pushed the corkscrew down into the fake cork and gave a deft, quick twist, extracting both with a delicate pop. He poured half a glass of dark red liquid and took a drink.
“Maybe,” he said. “Do I have any messages?”
“You’ve been away for nearly twenty-three hours. You have several messages in the queue. Cambel Guerrera has been trying to get you since 0100 this morning. Philip Huxley has called twice today, Piers Hawthorne once. Officer Stat from Structural Authority would appreciate a return call, directory five-nine-five. And a Linder Koeln called at fourteen, requesting that you return his call as soon as convenient.”
“Structural Authority...” Mace swirled the wine thoughtfully. Officer Stat was a departmental front; there was no such person, so it was a general call, but directory five-nine-five was the section of SA security that dealt with immigration. “Probably concerns InFlux. Who was that last?”
“Linder Koeln.”
“Kellin?”
“Koeln. Linder.”
“I don’t know him.”
“The call originated at PolyCarb. He did not say what he wanted.”
Mace groaned. “More forms. Remind me never to sue a large corporation again. At least not for data. Money would have been easier to get.”
After resigning from PolyCarb, he had pressed a suit to open the company files on Hellas Planitia. The last judicial ruling had been in PolyCarb’s favor, which had made him decide to stop the search. PolyCarb had thrown money at him—bribes, for the most part, all couched in perfectly legal insurance settlements—but they had raised the stakes this last time and threatened countersuit and citizenship review. He had ceased his efforts to force PolyCarb to open its files. He was tired. The passive searches continued, but more and more he found himself less and less willing to tear at the curtains surrounding Helen’s death. Safer to wait, perhaps, and let the data come to him. He told himself it would, and often he believed it. In any event, he desisted from attacking PolyCarb anymore.
After yesterday he wondered how much longer he would care even about the passive searches.
He paused in the center of his turret, listening to the quiet of his dom. Perhaps this Koeln’s call was related to the Officer Stat call. Perhaps PolyCarb had proceeded with its suit anyway Either way, the intrusions were unwelcome. He did not yet want to shed the feelings from the past day
“Mace?”
He sighed. “Connect to Cambel, please.”
“Her house informs me that she is not home at present.”
She never called for anything trivial, he knew. “Continue attempt till I’m asleep. Did she leave a message?”
“No. Philip Huxley did and so did Piers Hawthorne.”
“Play Philip’s.”
A rich male voice filled the space. “Macefield, it’s Philip. I have some new pieces. These you should see. The engraving, the quality—and they’re pristine. Maybe this weekend? Call.”
“Piers.”
“Mace, Delia’s heart is broken. I thought I saw you leave without her. I thought perhaps you intended to connect with her later, but she says not. Did I misjudge your taste or were you playing with me? Seriously, though, I’m glad you came—to the party and afterward, whoever you ended up going home with. If you live, give me a call, we can compare notes.”
“He hasn’t lost his sense of humor, I see,” Helen said.
“How do you lose what you never had?” He started across the floor, to his music room, then stopped. “Connect to Piers.”
“Must I?”
“Yes, Helen.”
Presently, Piers’ voice echoed. “Mace? What time is it—?”
“It’s nighttime, Piers. I’m just returning the call.”
“About time—where—?”
“Give my apologies to Delia, would you? I’m sure she was well intentioned. I appreciate the gesture.”
“I’ll pass that along. Maybe you and she could—”
“I don’t think so. I have a favor to ask, Piers.”
“That party I threw for you wasn’t enough? Midlife greed, coming to surface at last?”
“The party was fine, Piers, really. I did appreciate it. Reminded me how much there is I don’t pay any attention to anymore.”
“Well... like what?”
“Some busybody from PolyCarb called me to make an appointment. It’s probably more nonsense about the disposition of Helen’s investments and follow-up on the suit. In case they didn’t notice, the court ruled in their favor. I’m not re-suing. And I think I’ve filled out enough forms and answered enough questions for one lifetime. I don’t even work for them anymore.”
“You are a shareholder, though.”
“I’ll divest if they don’t leave me alone.”
“You don’t want to do that, Mace, it could tangle up your pension and then they really might countersue.”
“Fuck my pension. I don’t need it that badly.”
“All right, be an idiot. How can I help you in your life’s pursuit?”
“Ask around and see if you can find out what this may be about.”
“Who called?”
“New name, I never heard of him before. Linder Koeln.”
“I don’t know him. All right, Mace, I’ll look into it and see what’s going on.”
“I appreciate it, Piers.”
“So... did you go home with anyone?”
“Is that really any of your business?”
“You’re asking me to get you information on the people I work for on your behalf. Quid pro quo.”
“Okay, then next time I have an opportunity I’ll spy on the people you work for on your behalf. Let me know what you find out, Piers. And please tell them to get over me. I’m going to get over them. End.”
Helen shut the link at the last word. Mace, feeling himself grin with self-satisfied mischief, continued
on to the music room.
“Who did you go home with?” Helen asked.
“Is it any of your business, either?”
“Of course it is. I can’t see that the vultures don’t get you if I don’t know where the bodies are buried.”
Mace laughed. “My, we are getting morbid.”
“Name, Mace?”
“Nemily Dollard.”
“She works for Piers.”
“So she claims.”
“Data collation and retrieval. She’s a cyberlink.”
“I know.”
“Immigrant, originally from Lunase—”
“Helen.”
“Yes, Mace?”
“Enough.”
“I don’t understand.”
“I seriously doubt that. I went home with her last night and spent the day with her. I enjoyed it.”
“Will you see her again?”
“Probably”
“You didn’t make a date?”
“Not as such. Why? I thought this was what you wanted me to do.”
“Certainly. I’d like to see you do this every other nightcycle. Go to a party and spend the next day with a woman you don’t know.”
“You never do this when I go to Everest.”
“They’re ghosts. Both of us know all there is to know about them.”
“You’re interrogating me.”
“You wrote the code, Mace. Part of my program is as caretaker. It’s my job to caution you and see that you do not take unnecessary risks.”
“That doesn’t mean nattering.”
“I’m hardly in a position to be confrontational.”
“Hmm.”
“Would you like me to finish running a background on Nemily Dollard?”
Mace opened his mouth to snap, but caught himself before he spoke. He had written Helens parameters and this was indeed one of its functions. The system was programmed to proceed to the next logical question after a prolonged silence during an unresolved dialogue. That, at any rate, would be how he might describe it to a prospective client. It was simply doing its job, unable to alter its program so much as to accommodate a new emotional paradigm.
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