He reached up to stroke LePiep, comforted by her warm presence against his neck. "Peep-o," he said—but couldn't finish whatever it was he wanted to say. His stomach was all knotted up, and so were his thoughts. It was those ghosts . . . He felt like an alien among humanity. Peep didn't care; Peep was an alien. But he wasn't. He was human. And what about the rest of these people? They were supposed to be human. So why were they all so unreal?
The directional led him to one of the many privacy-shadows, clustered at the edge of a guest lobby. He stepped inside. From within, the privacy-shadow shimmered colorfully, cutting off external sight and sound. A silver-haired woman smiled from behind a console. "I hope you had a pleasant transit, sir. May I help you with your accommodations?" She seemed almost seductive, with moist lips turned up slightly at the corners.
"Yah," he said. LePiep was buzzing in his ear, but he was captivated by that smile. He ignored the ou-ralot.
She asked what accommodations he would like. Basking in the sound of her voice, he barely followed the gist of her words. Luxury or standard? LePiep hissed, prodding him with her paw; he patted and shushed her, and nodded yes to the luxury.
"No!" he said an instant later, coming to his senses. LePiep had been warning him; he had fallen prey to the woman's hypnotic smile. But his credit wouldn't cover a luxury room.
Her smile collapsed to a frown as she asked for his credentials. He muttered, "Pilot Panglor Balef, flying for Grakoff-Garikoff, Shippers." She worked at her console, then gave him a room confirmation—economy single. There was a message waiting for him in central communications. "Right," he said. Her smile had lost its magic; she was now only a purveyor of information. Was that how they sold high-priced rooms? "Listen—"
But the woman, the console, and the privacy-shadow vanished. He was left standing, astonished, in the chaos of the lobby. God damn. A holacrum—the bitch was nothing but a holacrum.
Worse than a ghost.
What the hell kind of place was this, anyway? They came at you with illusions, went straight for the glands, tried to sell you something you couldn't afford—and if you refused, you were just baggage?
LePiep chirruped, nuzzling him. He exhaled and started walking, shifting the ou-ralot down into the crook of his arm. One day they would push him too hard—and someone would pay.
A psykinetic directional blinked, pointing out of the lobby. He followed it up several floors and down a corridor, then stopped where it pointed, glittering, through a door. He touched the edge of the door with his fingertip. It paled, and he stepped through. Economy single. It wasn't really all that spartan: small, but fitted with selectable holo-décor; a chair that seemed designed to discourage him from spending too much time here; single sleep bay; mistshower. Not bad, actually, by most standards.
LePiep fluttered around, making her own inspection. Panglor watched her for a moment, then frowned, remembering the message that was waiting for him. His orders, no doubt. He went to the com-console and activated the query line. "Message for Pilot Panglor Balef, The Fighting Cur. Please display," he said. He touched his fingertips to the ID scanner. LePiep was making vulgar, throaty noises as she squirreled about, making it impossible for him to think. "Hey, bud," he grumped. "Knock it off, huh?"
The ou-ralot landed on the counter and stared at him sullenly—a transparent play for sympathy, which he ignored. The message appeared:
"SENIOR PILOT PANGLOR BALEF, GRAKOFF-GARIKOFF DRISCOLL CLASS FREIGHTER #B387. AUTHORIZED, LAYOVER D3 WAYSTATION, NOT TO EXCEED TEN DAYS. PURSUANT TO ORIGINAL ORDERS, RECEIVE AND CARRY OUT INSTRUCTIONS FROM CURRENT LESSEE OF SHIP, BARRACU TRANSPORT AND DISTRIBUTION, INC KRAZEL. PROCEED TO SKY LORE LOUNGE FOR MEETING AT 2130 AFTER ARRIVAL. AWAIT CONTACT. APPROVED, GRAKOFF-GARIKOFF, LTD, SHIPPERS AND TRADERS INC VETI."
Well, that didn't tell him much. But it told him something. If the Cur was being leased to a company incorporated on Krazel, which was a lot like not being incorporated at all, then the company was most likely a front for Grakoff-Garikoff themselves. Why? To insulate them from the law?
He had expected something like that, but it dismayed him nonetheless.
"Peep," he said, "I don't know exactly what's happening, but I don't think it's going to be good." His voice cracked, and he turned away from her until his feelings had a chance to freeze solid. Then he looked again; the ou-ralot watched him with consoling eyes.
"Okay, now," he said, blanking the com-screen. "I've got two hours before I have to meet those rat-buggerers, and that's plenty long enough for a strong drink." He turned and tickled LePiep under the snout. "Want to come along or stay here?"
"Whooee!" she pleaded, eyelids dropping. She ruffled her wings under the brown fur of her back and settled down into a comfortable position. Her eyes blinked slowly.
"Okay." Panglor rummaged for a packet of wafers, which he opened and left on the counter, along with a nippled bottle of foxx-cream. Then he touched her behind the ears. "So long," he said. The door opaqued behind him. He tested its security with an elbow, then peered both ways down the silent corridor; he shivered, feeling watched.
An idea for a destination formed in his thoughts—a drinking and eating hearth—and a pair of psykinetic directional lines appeared, gleaming in mid-air.
* * *
The hearth looked dark but warm from the outer corridor. The entrance boundary shimmered as he passed through, and the corridor sounds died, replaced by a clinking of tableware and an undercurrent of string music. He blinked until his eyes adjusted to the gloom. Each of the tables had a closely hooded, colored lightcone; on the far wall, a rusty glow climbed from a hidden source toward the ceiling. A scent of burning herbs and wood drifted in the air.
Panglor crossed the room, feeling a tingle in his skin, a teasing suggestion of arousal. He suddenly felt wary. No one appeared to notice him, however. The next room was a brighter, earthier place, with stone walls and partitions. The burning scent came from a fireplace behind a long S-shaped bar. He took a stool.
The human bartender nodded. "Slaker," Panglor said. "Big one." He settled down into the stool, fiddling with the armrests, and tried to forget his self-consciousness.
The slaker was a lively drink, with a nice green glow. The first sip produced a rush up his spine to the back of his head, followed by a kick to the sternum. The liquor sparkled, as though winking slyly, as it spilled over the edge of the glass to his lips. It was a fine drink for contemplation, with a light taste of absinthe and trake-herb.
He was reminded of a bar in the orbital spaceyards of Eridani Neverlight, one of the rare places he associated with pleasant times. It was a strange association, considering what a bizarre and gloomy world Neverlight itself was, a hot but tilted planet that was habitable only in the half-year perpetual nighttime regions of the poles. His stay in the orbital spaceyards, six years ago, had been unusual; he had enjoyed a vacation from a well-paid job, and in the friendship of Lenia Stahl, a local spacer in the Neverlight system. He wondered why that memory should strike him now; and then he knew. There was a holo-mural above the bar that reminded him of one at that other station. The mural showed a vivid tropical archipelago set in a gemlike sea. As he watched, the image changed: to a supergiant sun, a blood-red eye, with a charred planet in the forefield. The mural's glow drenched the bar with scarlet light, and with it Panglor's thoughts. The memory of Neverlight OrbSpace, Lenia Stahl . . . keep it . . . let it linger . . .
He jerked his thoughts back to the present. For a year he had corresponded with Lenia Stahl; but he had never returned to see her, and it was unlikely he ever would. The memory was riddled with pain.
Panglor tipped the slaker to his mouth again. His hand trembled with the glass. He tightened his grip on the stem and signaled the bartender, thinking to ask for a bowl of barloam stew, something to settle his nerves.
The mural blinked. Now it showed a misted landscape, yellow-orange clouds half obscuring a spaceport on the ground. A tiny ship was caught in the act of descending to a landing pad ou
tlined by blazing red markers; its jets sputtered against the desolate world. This looked like the spaceport at Skyll, in the Boreaum Matrix, the most desperately lonely place Panglor had ever seen—a world that chilled the soul, and turned men into walking shadows of humanity. Panglor had been there once; few men went twice.
"Sir?" said the bartender, peering at him.
Panglor started. He shook his head, closed his eyes, felt the pressure in his skull begin to mount. He opened his eyes and gulped the last of the slaker. The drops twinkled as they ran from the glass and exploded hot and cold and electric in his mouth. He put the glass down, touched the receipt plate on the bar, and turned away, stumbling. A man in red pantaloons watched him curiously. Panglor steeled himself and looked for the way out. There was that tickling at his nerves again, as he went through the hearth, a scratching ghostly touch at his groin, vaguely arousing. Damn hormones, he muttered.
No. Not the hormones. External stimulation; they were trying to sell him a good time.
He left the hearth, and the twinges faded.
The time was 2120, and he was to meet his contacts soon, in the Sky Lore Lounge, wherever that was. Sky Lore Lounge, he thought. He walked along, thumbing and scratching his sides. His thoughts were everywhere, totally incoherent; he walked faster, trying to rearrange them. Sky Lore Lounge. Directionals blinked on, and he followed them without another thought.
The lounge was a high-ceilinged place, with platforms and tables supported by slender arms in a multilevel myriad. The walls were illusion-depth black, swirled with nebulas and starclouds. Hovering near the center of the lounge was a slowly evolving art holacrum, at the moment showing the face of a woman in ecstasy. Panglor glanced about uncertainly, then chose a table high in the room. A lift-field glowed faintly beneath it; he stepped into the field and rose to the table.
This time he ordered barloam stew before anything else, and the moment it was delivered, he gulped it furiously. Every few seconds, he peered around with his mouth full, to see if anyone was approaching.
Even so, they surprised him. He looked up as two people slid into the seats facing him. One was a man, slight and pale, with dark, slick hair powdered with silver glitter. The other was a woman, fat and gray-haired, with sharp eyes and small white teeth that gleamed disconcertingly. Panglor choked; he swallowed with difficulty, with one hand on his throat. He sat straight in his seat and looked around. A privacy-shadow surrounded the table.
He shivered and focused on the two visitors. He cleared his throat and released the pressure his fingers were applying to the tabletop. Then he began spooning his stew again, keeping his eyes on the two.
The woman leaned forward, turning her face up at an angle. Panglor hesitated in midbite, his heart beating violently. "Pilot Balef?" the woman asked expressionlessly.
Panglor grunted. He lowered his spoon and pushed the bowl aside, appetite gone.
"I am Secretary Nelisson, of the Barracu Transport and Distributing Company," she said. "With me is Deputy Director Demimoss." The man gazed at Panglor with a cloudy expression. Nelisson opened a small satchel and withdrew a set of documents. "These, Pilot, are a copy of the agreements of lease between Barracu and Grakoff-Garikoff, the owners of your ship."
Panglor blinked.
"And your flight orders." She passed the documents across the table.
He glanced at the leasing agreement, then examined the flight orders. They were simple, but puzzling. He was instructed to fly the ship unladen to Quetzal in the Formi star system; there he would load cargo and receive further orders.
Puzzling, indeed. He grinned, scratching his head, then frowned. Then he grinned again, shifting his eyes from Demimoss to Nelisson and back. "Well," he said, "no problem here." Certainly there was nothing illegal indicated. But why would anyone send a freighter such a distance empty? Flying a starship through foreshortening was expensive, even for a wreck like The Fighting Cur.
He gazed suspiciously at the orders. Though the grin remained on his face, he felt fear creeping up the back of his neck.
Nelisson tapped her fingers on the table and said, "Those are just for the record. That's not actually what you're going to do, of course."
Demimoss stirred, his eyebrows twitching. "No, we have other plans," he said mildly, running his fingers back through his hair. "In fact we—or rather, Grakoff-Garikoff—are going to give you that ship, for your very own, to keep. As soon as you've left this star system." He gestured with his thumb to Nelisson. She produced still another document, but did not pass it across to Panglor. "That's the transfer of title," said Demimoss. "Ready to become effective as soon as you make your foreshortening insertion."
Panglor stared at him, trying not to betray emotion. He had a bad feeling in his gut.
"All you need to do before this document is executed is to perform a certain orbital maneuver in your freighter," Demimoss continued. He stroked his hair back again, his eyes flickering. Panglor was beginning to find the gesture unpleasant, as unpleasant as the implication of his words. "Pilot, are you familiar with a shipper-class freighter, Deerfield, owned by Vikken Traders, Limited?"
Panglor shook his head, his nerves pinched with ice. That ship specifically he did not know; but Vikken Traders, Ltd., he knew very well. Very well, indeed. A major interstellar shipping firm—far greater than Grakoff-Garikoff—they had been his last regular employers. His very last. Vikken was the company that had terminated him, blacklisted him, and left him destitute on Veti IV. If there was a single entity he hated more than Grakoff-Garikoff, it was Vikken Traders, Ltd.
"Well, it doesn't matter if you know the ship," said Demimoss. "Deerfield is at this station, and on Third-day at 0875 it will depart this station, bearing a cargo of some considerable value, which needn't concern you. The ship is scheduled to make foreshortening insertion to Gaston's system." Demimoss peered at him, his eyebrows jittering up and down. "Unfortunately, it will never complete the transit. In fact, no one will know where it has gone, or what has become of it." He fell silent and pressed his lips together. Then he continued, sadly, "And you know what? It will have been a faulty insertion, caused by a near-collision just short of the collapsing-field."
His eyes held Panglor's. "The Fighting Cur will be cleared for departure forty minutes after Deerfield. The flight plan is already filed. It directs The Fighting Cur toward the same collapsing-field that Deerfield will use."
Panglor tried to swallow; his throat was full of sand.
"We leave the details to you as to how you program your course. The Fighting Cur has been provided with oversized drivers, which are being adjusted right now. Your only obligation to Barracu, and to Grakoff-Garikoff, is to see to it that Deerfield is diverted at the last possible moment. You are not to cause her to abort her insertion. You are to make certain that her insertion is faulty. Near-collision, Pilot—that is the report we will be looking for."
"That's suicide," Panglor said hoarsely.
"Not if you're good," answered Demimoss, staring with one eye. "If you plan it correctly, you can divert Deerfield with a near-collision and make your own insertion a good one, for your escape. We don't care where you go—hmm? If you make it to another system, you can take care of yourself, I think."
Panglor tried to answer, but the words kept stuttering deep in his throat, never reaching his vocal cords. Finally his protest rumbled up. "Well, then, it's murder. Sending a crew into limbo is no better than murder, is it?" he snarled. Lord, nothing frightened him more than the thought of bad insertion, of never coming out of foreshortening, or of coming out somewhere in the lonely reaches between the stars. He feared it every time he made a transit. Could he knowingly cast another crew to that fate?
Demimoss and Nelisson both smiled tolerantly. "Pilot Balef," said Demimoss, once more stroking his hair back, "I understand that you are held under certain—ah, obligations—to Mr. Grakoff and Mr. Garikoff. Isn't that correct? Of course it is." He sighed slowly. "Now, it's none of Barracu's concern why these obligat
ions exist. But we can repeat to you the assurances that Grakoff-Garikoff gave us when we leased the ship's services—when we asked if you might show reluctance."
Panglor glared.
"May I repeat for you, Pilot? You will be watched on the station. You will be watched in space. Your maneuvers will be watched. If you fail in your assignment, The Fighting Cur—the ship you stole—will fail in its escape. In fact, it will fail to make a proper foreshortening insertion at all." Demimoss paused, withdrew a tissue from his inner shirt pocket, and blew his nose delicately. His eyebrows jumped.
Nelisson tilted another document toward Panglor, without giving it to him. "The theft and piracy report on your ship. This document can be executed, or the transfer of ownership. The choice is yours."
For several moments, Panglor could not respond. He was still assimilating the meaning of this grotesque conspiracy. What they were talking about was not a new sort of crime; sometimes it was called piracy, sometimes industrial sabotage. A slight perturbation of a ship's insertion vector could do it. And it was done. It was a particularly savage form of corporate warfare.
"You people really work for Grakoff-Garikoff, don't you?" he said finally. He could not quite bring himself to answer their question.
"We told you who we work for, Pilot Balef," Nelisson said, shaking her head reprovingly. "We work for the Barracu Transport and Distributing Company."
Panglor nodded with difficulty. What difference did it make if they were lying or if Barracu was simply a front for Grakoff-Garikoff? "Well, then," he grunted, "why do you want me to do this? What do you have against this Deerfield?"
"That, Pilot, is really not your concern," said Demimoss. "But we don't mean to be unkind to you, either. We were given to understand that you might welcome a chance to do the job, after you thought about it."
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