Ecolitan Prime (Ecolitan Matter)

by L. E. Modesitt Jr.

  Behind them came Geoffrey Evanston, the New Avalonian businessman, in a summer jacket, cravat, and white knee shorts and socks above matching white sandals. After Evanston ambled Jimson Sonderssen, the agricultural-technology factor from the Federated Hegemony, and the half dozen others that had come down from the Elizabeth the Great, former flag of the Wendsor Lines now reduced to outsystem colony traffic.

  A light and hot wind blew out of the west, carrying the odors of dust, decaying vegetation, half-burned hydrocarbons of some sort, and an unidentifiable fruity odor.

  “Pungent, too,” Nathaniel added.

  “The fruit smells like berries.”

  Not exactly, but Nathaniel couldn’t identify it, and his eyes flicked to the building ahead on the edge of the permacrete apron.

  A squat man in a white uniformed jacket with silver epaulets, also wearing white shorts and socks and glistening white shoes, stepped forward out of the shade as the two Ecolitans neared the portal under the Receiving and Customs sign. “Professor Whaler?”

  “The same,” replied Nathaniel in formal English, rather than the more colloquial and divergent Old American of Accord.

  “I am Robert Walkerson, the Port Chief here at Artos.” He offered a shallow and stiff bow. “Minister Spencer-Hawkes has requested that I do everything possible to assist you in your study.”

  “Most kind of you.” Nathaniel paused. “Minister Spencer-Hawkes? I was under the impression that—”

  “Quite right, sir. The Commerce Ministry requisitioned your study, but the coordination of arrangements for an outsystem dignitary falls under Defence Security. Port Authority falls under Defence.”

  “I am but an economist.” Nathaniel belatedly turned to Sylvia. “This is Ms. Ferro-Maine, my assistant. Her specialty is institutional structures.” Nathaniel added, “I know. The traditional wisdom is that developing economies have no institutional structures. They do. What they do not have is labels.”

  “You are also a dignitary, a former Trade Envoy to the Empire, and someone Artos is pleased to welcome.” Walkerson offered a perfunctory smile. “If you would please follow me. I must apologize, but Artos is less than a century out of stage two planoforming, and rather primitive. Also rather…quiet. Very little occurs here.”

  “It is far more structured than many places I’ve been,” answered Nathaniel. He could use some quiet, but he wondered if they’d actually get it.

  “You are too kind. Too kind.” Walkerson cleared his throat and stepped through the open doorway.

  Inside, out of the glare, Walkerson nodded to the uniformed man and woman behind the inspection consoles. “The Ecolitans are cleared.”

  Both nodded stiffly as the three walked past the consoles and to the far end of the long room where a moving belt inched along in a circle. Beyond the belt was another set of consoles, each with two uniformed figures, each armed with stunners.

  “As soon as your bags arrive, we shall be on our way. You’ll be quartered at the Ministry Guest House—much better than at the Blue Lion. That is our local hotel, and not much better than an outback horse station.”

  “Horses?” asked Sylvia.

  “We use them in some regions. They are ever so much more efficient than fuel-burners in certain applications, and there is certainly more than enough fodder here. There will be for centuries to come, although we do hope that you two will be able to pinpoint areas to speed our industrialization process.”

  “Infrastructure economics does not always promise speed,” Nathaniel answered. “We hope to identify optimal resource use patterns and suggest structural change options for developmental alternatives.” He shook his head. “I have been in the classroom too long. We will attempt to discern the least expensive manner in which to reach your goals. Not one that is penny-wise and pound-foolish, however.”

  The Artosan port officer gave a barking laugh. “Quite so. Quite so.”

  With a thump, a field pack appeared on the black fabric of the belt, followed by a second thump and second bag. The Ecolitans picked up their bags, Nathaniel using his right hand, Sylvia her left.

  “If you wouldn’t mind just putting the bags under the scanners there…?” ventured Walkerson. “And your cases?”

  “Not at all.” Nathaniel slipped his pack, then the datacase, under the right hand scanner, as Sylvia did the same under the left.

  “Clean, sir,” said the woman scanner operator to Walkerson.

  “Good.” The Port Chief nodded toward the old-style glass door behind the scanners and the four security types. “Shall we depart?”

  Nathaniel held the door for Sylvia, using the moment to survey the area outside the receiving building. He didn’t need a recurrence of his arrivals on Old Earth or Accord. The belt multitector showed no energy concentrations, and he could see nothing apparently out of the ordinary for a landing field—just a cracked permacrete circle of road, flanked with low bushes he didn’t recognize, that led out to another highway. A long bus, repainted pale green, and two groundcars were parked in the circle.

  The sky was bluish green—greener than that of Old Earth and bluer than that of Accord. Gray clouds piled up over the mountains to the north, and a hot wind blew out of the south, carrying a mildly acrid odor similar to ozone.

  “The first car,” said Walkerson.

  The pale green groundcar waited, its engine idling—liquid hydrocarbon—fueled from the smell—the rear doors both open, as was the trunk.

  “Your luggage can go in the boot,” offered Walkerson.

  “Thank you.” The Ecolitan lifted his field pack into the trunk, or boot, as did Sylvia—not that either had that much luggage—a datacase and an Ecolitan fieldpack each. He fingered the boot release—a simple lever, without even a lock—then closed it, checking to see if it released at a turn. It did.

  He caught the glint in Sylvia’s eyes that said, “Suspicious man,” more clearly than words, and answered, “Always.”

  “Good.”

  Walkerson smothered a quizzical look. “Then we’re ready to depart?”

  “We are proceeding into Lanceville?” asked Nathaniel, holding the rear door for Sylvia.

  She offered a smile and slid across the bench seat to allow Nathaniel to sit without walking around the groundcar.

  “Just outside Lanceville.” The port official eased himself into the front seat, and nodded to the uniformed driver. “The Guest House, Helverson.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “I’m glad you introduced me relatively early this time,” Sylvia murmured.

  “An absentminded professor am I, remember,” he murmured back in stilted Panglais. “Though I try.”

  “That won’t work here.”

  “Want to bet?”

  Sylvia raised her eyebrows and bent close to his ear. “After he pointedly noted your accomplishments as an envoy to New Augusta?”

  She was probably right, Nathaniel decided, but it was still worth a try to lower local expectations. The proverbs would help…he hoped.

  As the driver eased away from the port building, from which none of the other shuttle passengers had yet emerged, Walkerson turned in the front seat to face the two Ecolitans.

  “I really don’t know what ship time you might be on, whether it’s midday or at the end of three sleepless days.”

  “Near the end of one long day,” said Sylvia after the briefest of pauses. “A very long day.”

  “A long day makes for deep sleep,” added Nathaniel.

  “We won’t make it too much longer,” promised the Avalonian.

  Nathaniel looked out the scratched and tinted window, blotting his forehead and wondering when the groundcar’s cooling system would kick in, or if it even had one. To the right of the highway was an expanse of low plants, with narrow dark green leaves and clusters of greenish purple globes—synde beans. “Are all your hydrocarbon needs provided from the beans?” he asked. “Or do you supplement them with other organics?”

  Walkerson cleared his th
roat. “You know, professor, I couldn’t say. Around the port area, we grow and process a lot of beans. There’s a fuel-processing facility southwest of Lanceville, but I don’t know what else they process or where it might come from. I just have the groundcar refueled.”

  “I did not perceive any broadcast power grids.” Nathaniel tried again.

  “We’re still on a local area fusactor system. There are a number of areas not much beyond the oxy-creepers, second tier soil-fixing. They say we’ll need another ten to twenty years of iron-feeding the seas to stimulate algal oxygenation.”

  “You could get too extensive a bloom.”

  “They talk about that, but so far the basking shark-mods are taking care of that. They are ugly and rather large.”

  “Rather large?” asked Sylvia. “Is that Avalonian understatement?”

  As he blotted his forehead again, Nathaniel continued to smell fuel—raw hydrocarbon. His fingers flicked to his belt. “Stop the car! Out!”

  After a quick glance at the Ecolitan, Walkerson nodded to the driver.

  Nathaniel jumped out, almost before the groundcar eased to a halt on the highway shoulder, next to a ditch that separated the highway from the synde bean fields. He fumbled open the boot and grabbed the field packs. Almost on the run, he threw the packs behind the car, yanked open the front door, and jerked the Port Chief from the front seat.

  “What the—” Walkerson looked more bewildered than angry.

  Crack! Whooshhh! The bonnet erupted into a sheet of flame that flared across the entire front of the vehicle.

  Sylvia dashed toward the driver’s side, then abruptly darted back. She slipped toward the driver again, then retreated and crossed behind the vehicle, rejoining Whaler and Walkerson and shaking her head.

  “Dead?” asked Nathaniel.

  “Helverson is? He couldn’t be. That wouldn’t be proper,” protested the Avalonian. “Not at all.”

  “I’m afraid he is,” Sylvia said. “It looked like shards of something across his neck and chest. There was blood everywhere.” She swallowed and looked at the ground.

  “It can’t be!” Walkerson circled the blazing vehicle and dashed toward the driver’s door…once, twice, before returning to where the Ecolitans stood by their packs on the shoulder of the road behind the blazing mass of plastic and metal.

  “You were right,” the Port Chief admitted, “but I don’t see how something so awful could have happened like that.”

  As the rest of the groundcar burned hotter, the three backed away farther, the Ecolitans lifting and carrying their field packs another twenty meters back toward the shuttle port facility. Walkerson circled the groundcar again, then looked back down the highway toward the shuttle port.

  “Was it wise to go for the packs?” asked Sylvia in a voice shielded by the crackling of the flames.

  “This was an accident. So it had to be a fuel spark of some sort, except that synthoil takes a high jolt. And I prefer my own clothes.”

  “I think you prefer everything your own way.”

  “Don’t we all?” he asked with a harsh laugh, wondering if he should have pointed that out.

  Walkerson rejoined them. “The bus should be along momentarily. It has a comm unit, and it goes right past the Guest House. I’m most awfully sorry about this. Poor Helverson. How…”

  “It was certainly not your fault,” Nathaniel pointed out. “I am most sorry about your man.”

  “I just do not…” Walkerson shook his head again. “An engine fire…but an explosion…I…”

  A long green shape appeared on the permacrete.

  Whhheeeppp!

  The bus pulled up, and the driver leaned out. “What happened, chief?”

  “Some sort of engine malfunction. The entire front bonnet went to flames. I fear Helverson was killed instantly. We tried, but couldn’t get him out. Professor Ferro-Maine tried and so did I, but he was dead on the spot.” Walkerson wiped his sooty forehead. “Might I use your comm, N’Trosian?”

  “Hop on. I’ll drop you at the Guest House, and you can ring CenComm from there.”

  “Your comm is still malfunctioning?” asked Walkerson.

  “Still, chief? I’ve been on you about that for weeks. No spares. No spares ordered.” The dark-skinned driver nodded to the Ecolitans. “Folks, best you climb aboard. There’s nothing else going your way.”

  Whaler and Sylvia sank into the narrow plastic-covered seat in the third row, behind Jimson Sonderssen, the Hegemony agri-tech factor. Nathaniel blotted his still-sweating forehead and looked down at his field pack for a moment.

  The deeply tanned, tall and lanky factor, whose hair was half blond, half white, turned in the seat and gestured toward the smoldering groundcar wreck that the bus was leaving behind. “Hot enough for you, was it not enough already?”

  “It was hot enough.” Nathaniel admitted, shaking his head. “Far too hot, and this sort of event we do not welcome or need.”

  “And you?” Sonderssen inclined his head to Sylvia.

  “I agree with the professor.”

  “You see, Professor Whaler, Professor Ferro-Maine, the sad state of our transport infrastructure,” offered Geoffrey Evanston from several seats back. “What groundcars we have are few and in poor condition, yet the government will neither ship more nor sanction deep minerals development or asteroid drops to support local manufacture.”

  “I will keep your observations in mind.”

  “All other things being equal?” asked Evanston.

  “But of course,” answered Whaler with a smile. “I am not a one-handed economist.”

  “Perhaps there should be some.”

  Sylvia smothered a quizzical look with a bright smile.

  Port Chief Walkerson sat on the seat behind the driver, looking stolidly at the white strip of permacrete ahead, glistening in the afternoon sun as the bus rumbled eastward toward Lanceville.

  The Guest House boasted white plastered walls, a pale red-tiled roof, and a cooling system, Nathaniel noted with relief as they stepped inside the white-lacquered front doorway.

  “This is the Guest House, such as it is,” announced Walkerson. “The lounge is to the right, the dining salon to the left. The stairs lead to the quarters. If you don’t mind the haste, I’ll get you to your rooms, and then leave you for a bit while I deal with the accident.”

  “Of course.”

  They followed the Avalonian official up the antique tiled steps to the second floor and to the far end of the polished tiled floor. Each of the ceramic tiles bore the imprint of a horned beast.

  “These are rather unique tiles,” Nathaniel offered.

  “Unicorn tiles, made here on Artos.” Walkerson halted between a pair of white-lacquered doors with bronze lever handles. He opened the door on the right and then the left. “Two adjoining rooms, with separate refresher facilities—that was what you requested.”

  “Exactly,” said Nathaniel.

  “Thank you,” added Sylvia.

  “I imagine you two would like a chance to refresh and change. Then, I’ll join you for tea in the small lounge, and then, shall we say, a briefing on our situation here.” Walkerson flashed another perfunctory smile. “I need to report on the accident. Terrible thing. Terrible thing.” He turned to Whaler. “You said you smelled fuel?”

  “I perceived some odor when we entered the vehicle,” Nathaniel said, pulling at his chin thoughtfully. “I considered that it might have been my imagination after all the space travel or that it might have been the vehicle engine. We employ electro-vehicles for ground transport, and I am not familiar with fuelburners. After we had proceeded a ways, however, my perceptions become noticeably more distinct. That most assuredly should not have occurred. That was when I suggested that we depart the vehicle. At that point in time, I thought I saw an electrical spark or the equivalent, but I was not absolutely certain. That was when the hood was enveloped in flame.” The Ecolitan shrugged.

  “Did you see anything else, Ms. Ferro-M
aine? Or should I call you Ecolitan Ferro-Maine?”

  “Whatever’s comfortable, Mr. Walkerson, or is it captain or chief?”

  “Most call me Walker or chief.”

  “Walker, then,” Sylvia offered. “I can’t add much. There’s something in the air here, allergens maybe, and I’m not smelling things very well. I did see a glint of flame or sparks, and I ran up to try to help your man out, but…I told you. He was already dead. There was a huge gash in his neck, and…”

  “I’ll have the maintenance team check it out.” Walkerson shook his head. “I still can’t believe it.”

  Nathaniel had the sinking feeling that he could, at least to the degree that disaster seemed to be following him. How could he anticipate and act when he still hadn’t figured out who was involved?

  “Until tea, then.”

  “Until tea,” Sylvia confirmed.

  Nathaniel stepped into the first room, which contained a large bed with an off-white comforter spread, a table that could double as a desk, two pressed-wood armchairs, and a large window framed in white curtains that matched the comforter. Sliding doors concealed a closet, and an open door showed an old-style fresher room.

  He played the belt detector around the room. Surprisingly, the room registered clean, except for the equipment concealed in the sides of his own datacase and Sylvia’s.

  “Adjoining rooms?” Sylvia raised her eyebrows.

  “Someone told me that she thought she loved me, and I didn’t want to rush matters.”

  “Who said I even wanted adjoining rooms?” A mischievous smile flickered across her lips.

  Nathaniel threw up his hands. “A poor struggling professor am I,” he said in Panglais, “and arrangements I make the best I can.”

  “You still might pull that off.” The smile vanished, and Sylvia shook her head. “I don’t like it.”

  “No snoops?”

  She nodded.

  “This actually might be what they contracted for.”

  Her eyebrows went up again.

  “Foolish of me to think that, I suppose?”

  “Not foolish, but improbable.”

  In addition to the door from each room to the hallway, an inside door connected the two rooms. Nathaniel stepped toward the interior door.