by Lee Killough
Mama rubbed a hand over his scalp. “Can we be sure this caused the seal failure? It had to be there when the suit techs ran their tests and we saw the seal hold under four atmospheres of pressure.”
True. Janna felt her excitement fizzle. Disappointment showed on Doubrava’s face, too.
Cathmore, however, sniffed. “When they tested in the assumed conditions of the porto. No heat.”
The three of them stared down at her.
Mama spoke first. “We need to re-test with heat.”
Doubrava said, “That won’t prove anything unless we can identify a heat source in the porto that triggered the wax’s meltdown.”
“Aren’t the suits heated?” Janna asked.
“Not that much. When we drilled in them I remember feeling chilly standing still, but comfortable moving around.”
“To keep the wearer from overheating,” Cathmore said, “the suit adjusts according to the body heat activity is generating.”
Mama said, “The porto did have one heat source. The printer. In the inquest recording Fontana mentions panels cooling on the out-tray.”
Doubrava’s brows went up. “Right. But how much heat would that generate?”
“How about asking Saleem?” Janna said.
Cathmore nodded. “Do that while I see how much more wax I can scrape out for testing.”
“Let’s see if she’s free.” Doubrava touched his headset. “Athena, what is the current location of Iowana Saleem?”
“She monitors everyone’s location?” Janna said.
“Not as such. When asked, though, she’ll locate an individual. Usually through facial recognition on all current surveillance. Sometimes by scib use.” He touched his headset, murmuring.
Handy, Janna reflected. Too bad Topeka’s larger population, comparatively less surveillance, and lack of an AI like Athena, prevented a similar system there. Not to mention public outcry at feeling they lost privacy. Replacing j-scibs for adult ones at eighteen, most individuals opted out of a GPS in it for that very reason.
“Saleem purchased a drink in Tesseract five minutes ago. But before we go . . .” He reached into a cargo pocket for two evidence bags, one with a flat plastic container like those for shoe polish and the other containing a pale smear. “The tin is the wax from Chenoweth’s cubby. Though if it matches that from the seal I’ll be surprised. Maybe the killer left prints, though?”
Cathmore rolled her eyes. “Thank you. It would never have occurred to me to check.”
He just grinned and handed over both bags. “This other has a sample from the only wax I found in Titus’s cubby.” He raised his brows at Janna and Mama. “No sense alerting him to our suspicions if he’s part of the smuggling.”
Giving Cathmore a salute, Doubrava led the way out.
* * *
On the threshold platform Janna expected him to walk around the shaft right or left to an elevator or cable lift. Instead, to her horror, Doubrava went headfirst down the adjacent handrail. Mama followed, forcing her to do so, too . . . cursing.
Once in the shaft, however, with perception turning it horizontal, and copying Doubrava’s rhythm — pull, sail, pull, sail — she began enjoying herself. Exhilarated by the sensation of swimming, or flying. Feeling as friction-free as that token.
Six levels ahead, past the guest quarters and four green-paneled sections to the orange lLevel Eleven — the equivalent of over ten building floors if she remembered Nakashima’s comparison correctly — Doubrava swung off the handrail onto the platform with the lettering: Arcade.
Stepping through the portal, Janna expected to find an arcade. Instead, beyond an e-capsule beside the entry and an open six-foot cross-section like those in the Admin module, portals lined the central hallway. Five on each side, one at the end, a sign above each . . . nine lighted. A sign down on their left read: Tesseract. Janna blinked. No wonder Officer Fox laughed when asked if the station had a bar. It appeared to have eleven.
The module did have an actual arcade . . . the open cross-section, circumference lined with holo and VR games bleeping, buzzing, and flashing their siren invitations. The single player below to their right — playing what looked like Chindi Station — indicated the sirens ran a poor second to the bars.
“How did this happen?” Mama asked.
They stood aside for a male and female shuffling unsteadily out of a bar called Pie-Eyed In the Sky. Sotted or toxy, Janna wondered automatically, and strained to smell and identify the scent around them.
Doubrava sniffed and shook his head. “Fizz-khiz. Local product stronger than your khiz below but has a built-in timer that neutralizes it in around two hours. So nothing we generally worry about. Okay . . . origin of the Arcade. When Fontana managed the greenhouses here, he caught personnel stealing plants and fruit to brew alcohol.”
As people everywhere seemed to do, from whatever they could find, Janna reflected. Alcohol and drugs . . . in prisons, desert islands. Even the Ares I crew on Mars.
“The station director tried to stop it. Booted anyone they caught. But the moonshining continued even after several deaths. Fontana kept suggesting they take a lesson from politicians,: permit it under controlled conditions. After the director rejected that, Fontana approached Crispin Lanour on Lanour’s next visit. Lanour said give it a try. Fontana became the new assistant director — in the wake of the director’s bitter resignation and the assistant being promoted — and invited the shiners to brew and distill openly. Providing they buy the ingredients from the station and dispense their product in space provided by the station for a nominal fee.”
Mama’s brows rose. “The shiners agreed?”
“Once Fontana pointed out how to offset expenses and make a profit by selling their product rather than bartering as before. After learning the sometimes hard lessons of competitive pricing and attracting customers, what has evolved . . . ” Doubrava waved at the hall with a grin. “. . . is the most individualistic assortment of gin mills you’ll find anywhere.”
“Individualistic how?” Janna asked.
“Expressing each lessee’s vision of the perfect watering hole. I encourage you to pub crawl before you leave.”
Janna winced. “I have more respect for my body than subjecting it to moonshine.”
Doubrava clucked. “Hardly moonshine. Consider our labs and the uberQ chemists, botanists, biologists who staff them. We have wines from our own little vineyard, craft beers and ales, and — produced by some miraculous alchemy — a single malt that will make think you’ve gone to heaven. There’s also genuine moonshine for those with a taste for it, served in Barleycorn along with all manner of other, shall we say, experimental potables. To be drunk at your own risk.”
The lone holo game player yelped and, tearing off his goggles, kicked up to the hall. Bony face as red as the orange zig-zag pattern on his body suit, he glared at Doubrava. “They’ve done it again! Why don’t you do something about them!”
Doubrava’s mouth compressed, suggesting a repressed smile. “What happened today?”
“When I reached a corridor I’m sure led to the station core, the machine shocked me!”
The repressed smile turned to a grimace. “I’ll report it right away.”
“Do something more than report it or what good are you!” Quivering in fury, the player stalked out the portal and dived off the platform.
“They?” Mama said.
“Computer Q’s who keep hacking and reprogramming the machines. Last week they linked half a dozen machines so the play jumped between them and players had to keep running back and forth to win.”
“Impressive.” Janna smiled, imagining it.
A corner of Doubrava’s mouth quirked. “Amusing to watch, yes. But programming a shock to prevent a win — not amusing.” He shook his head. “We do need to ID these Q’s. Right now, though, let’s find Sal—” He went still, head tilted. “What? . . . Where? . . . I’m on my way.” He shrugged at them. “Sorry. Other duty calls. Let me know what you
learn.”
Watching him leave, Mama said, “Good. I was going to ask to go on our own.”
Free from the restraining presence of Security.
Janna started for Tesseract, down past a bar called Helen’s Half Acre.
“Wait. First let’s go in here.” Mama pointed at a closer portal on their right.
Janna eyed its sign. “Belithroche? That’s not where Saleem is.”
“The name intrigues me.”
Mama led the way in, only to stop so abruptly in the portal, Janna collided with his back. When he stepped forward and disappeared, she understood his halt. The portal opened into empty space. Rather, it opened into a semi-circular cross-section of the module, with the portal at the midpoint of the diagonal wall.
Looking down, she spotted Mama standing at right angles to her below the portal. A step down over the lip of the portal put her beside him and turned the portal into an opening at their feet.
From there she took in more details. The bar looked narrow, seven or eight feet wide. Wide enough, though, to accommodate the column tables spread along the circumference now arching above them. Presently occupied by nine customers. A bar with two more customers at it stretched along the down the diagonal to the circumference, containers in pockets on the side wall behind it. Lighting came from the tables, the bar’s top, and six translucent tubes fanning out from the diagonal to the circumference. Languid music played just loud enough to be heard, while images of chemical diagrams drifted across the side walls.
A male in a suit with glowing seams propelled himself down a tube to the bar, where he collected a pair of drink bulbs, then returned along the tube to his table and a female whose suit shimmered in waves of color.
Down the bar, a female in a skin suit of gold and silver nebula swirls used a 3D pen to diagram some complex molecular structure for a ponytailed male companion in a scarlet tank-top body suit.
The bartender floated toward Mama and her, a male wearing a hooded red and blue costume with a web design on it. Electric blue eyes peered from the eye holes. “Good evening. What can I mix you?” He waved at containers behind him.
“We’re just exploring at the moment,” Mama said. “That’s an interesting ensemble.”
The blue eyes crinkled. “Spider Man, a twentieth century comic character. Classics are my bob.”
“Is that the reason for the Eric Satie music?”
“You recognize it?” The bartender sounded pleased. “I don’t know if the customers like it but it’s my choice in my bar and I don’t hear them complaining.”
“The name sounds Italian,” Mama said. “Is it classic, too?”
“Sort of.” The hood covered the bartender’s mouth, but his tone suggested a smile. “It’s short for Better Living Through Chemistry. The past motto of a chemical corporation. I’m a chemist when I’m working, as are most of my patrons.”
Hence the diagrams on the walls and the 3D creation down the bar.
“So you serve your own creations?” Janna pointed at the wall pockets.
“Some. I also trade with other bars, and carry samples that colleagues have created. Would you like to taste test one?”
“Later,” Mama said. “Right now we’re just looking around.”
“Are you new personnel?”
“Guests of Mr. Fontana,” Janna said.
“Ah. Excuse me.”
He moved down the bar and began chatting with the couple there, gesturing at connections in the molecular structure.
Mama eyed him. “Did the temperature in here just drop?”
The bartender’s attitude definitely changed. “I wonder why. Interesting. So, on to Saleem?”
Without answering, Mama moved to the entry portal and stepped down through it.
Down the rabbit hole, Janna mused.
Back into the hall. Janna started for Tesseract, but Mama crossed the hall toward the Quark.
She hissed in exaggeration. “Mama!”
“I’m just going to see what it’s like.”
One male of a pair coming up the hall from Helen’s Half Acre said, “It claims to be full of flavors and charm, but it’s run by some very strange ducks.”
His companion grinned.
“Mama.”
He shrugged and turned away from Quark’s portal.
Janna headed for Tesseract again.
Only to have him catch her shirt, almost breaking her loose from the deck. “Let’s just take a look in here first.”
A bar called Event Horizon.
“Mama!” Crap! He was like some kid in a candy store! “Okay, ok— Holy shit!”
An exclamation ripped from her as she followed Mama through the portal.
With the same cross-section configuration as Belithroche, the space gave the illusion of real space. A field of stars and nebulas spread across the right-hand side wall, the diagonal above and below the portal, and the circumference. The image of a black hole filled the left side wall . . . animated . . . ringed by light being sucked into it. The star images on the other surfaces moved toward it, too, she realized moments later.
Accompanied by eerie music emanating from a circular stage in the middle of the perimeter, where a female in a shimmering black skin suit wrapped herself bonelessly around a pole. The pitch of the music altered with every change in her in posture and height on the pole.
Mama whistled softly. “Amazing. She — or someone — has developed their own version of a theramin.”
Which sounded in Janna’s estimation no more musical than the standard antenna and loop version played with the hands.
She balked at going any farther than the portal. How could anyone enjoy drinking in here with the black hole dragging the galaxy from under their feet? “I’m going to Tesseract, with or without you.”
To her relief, Mama followed instead of side-tracking again.
Tesseract’s portal opened on a roar of voices and jivaqueme music that made Janna feel instantly at home. Ignore the semi-circular structure and squares of colored light on the side walls pulsating in random patterns, and it could be the Lion’s Den. Ignore the head-swimming haze of khiz fumes, too. Few of the mushroom-shaped tables — a shape she recognized from the bar fight images they saw earlier — remained unoccupied. Two bartenders worked the bar stretching the full length of the diagonal wall . . . one a coffee-complected female with metallic green ringlets and a costume of the same color consisting of ribbons connected to bands at her neck, wrists, ankles, and waist.
Mama smiled, no doubt enjoying the glimpses of curved flesh between her ribbons as she moved. Personally, Janna preferred the male bartender, who wore only a thong. An eagle tattoo covered his bare torso, the wings spreading out across his shoulders and upper arms. The talons reached down his hips, where his thighs ended in stumps.
Swinging along the bar toward them, he smiled genially. “What’ll you have?”
His lungs matched Vernon Tuckwiller’s for making himself heard.
Janna shouted back, “We’re looking for Iowana Saleem.”
After tipping back his head to peer up at the tables, he pointed at a table overhead. Where Janna spotted Saleem’s distinctive braids.
Tesseract lacked Belithroche’s tubes between the tables and the bar level. Did that mean going to where the circumference met the diagonal and walking the perimeter to the table? Or making a gymnastic leap? Surely not. The bar would want it convenient for customers to come after new drinks. She eyed the side wall.
As though reading her mind, Mama put a foot on it and nodded. She followed him up over the pulsating color blocks.
The four males and two females at the table — all wearing colorful body suits — turned at their approach. Saleem wore purple shadidng from pastel at the neck to near black at her wrists and ankles.
“What can we do for you?” a jon in gold-and-black zebra stripes — and a vaguely familiar face — shouted above the music.
“They can go hell,” the other fem said. “It’s the pair Bow
ie described going into Admin with Nakashima.”
Their faces went stony.
First Belithroche’s bartender, now this group. What was going on? “We’re—”
Saleem’s lip curled in a snarl. “We know who you are, and why you’re here. Like Kaela says, got to hell.” She kicked away from the table to the portal and left the bar.
The others followed.
Mama gestured for the two of them to go, too.
In the hall, frowning after the group, Janna said, “What the hell? Are they protecting Titus? Or Fontana?”
“For that I think we’d get the standard, sorry, don’t know anything. This feels like someone — shall we guess our smuggler? — spreading word not to talk to us.”
“Spreading it fast. We’ve been here, what, nine hours?”
“It could have started Sunday, after Fontana invited us.”
She considered that. “You think the smuggler hacked the call to Paget?”
“Fontana could have started it himself.”
“Then why invite us in the first place?”
“For one thing, it isolates us and our murder/smuggling theories on the eve of the stockholder’s meeting.”
Something desirable for Fontana, even without him being involved in the smuggling.
“For another . . .”
Mama broke off while a couple coming out of Barleycorn made their way to the module’s entrance, the female shuffling with inebriated care.
“That’ll teach you to drink something with colors that won’t mix,” the male said.
“There’s no more talk of calling in the Feds,” Mama continued.
Even more desirable for Fontana. “So we’re helping him suppress bad news for the station. And we’re really suppressed if no one will talk.”
Mama nodded. “Let’s ask Belithroche’s bartender. He went cool on us, but not hostile.” His eyes focused past her. “Hello.”
Janna turned.
A mermaid swam up the hall toward them. It had to be a costume, but the transition from silvery skin to iridescent green tail — showing through a glittery skin suit shirt — looked uncannily seamless. Matched by trompe-l’oeil gill tattoos on her neck. A few wisps of green-gold hair framed a heart-shaped face with silver eyes, while her headset separated the wisps from a long braid floating behind her.
