In principle, we reported directly to the Terrestrial Council and so had levels of political, legal and economic authorization that I had never previously needed or wanted. Morris had told us that the true purpose of the committee was more comprehensive than just investigating the Fairy Dust, but I had never really considered what he meant. It took a few moments to remember where I had read the top-level codes. Few people had any reason to read that appendix of the Constitution, especially not agents in CI.
The three agents looked profoundly uncomfortable, so I offered to give a deposition freely in the interest of everyone’s welfare. Reluctantly, they agreed, so I repeated the part about our travels, adding that our destination had been a restaurant in Prosperity Square called the Merry Merchant where we had intended to eat lunch with two Political Officers we had met on the Lansdorf. I noted that the Imperial agent looked even more uncomfortable at that but continued anyways. I recounted how we had met the false work party right after we entered the service corridor, adding a few details that MacFinn had not considered important, like the colours and style of their loincloths and body paint, matching them to their roles in the attack. I gave a similar description of the second work party, noting that none of them had joined in the attack, except for their cries of pain and terror as they tried to shelter their injured companions.
When I got to the words I gave to the CI agent, I expanded the description of the Exterminators considerably, naming names and identifying places, giving detailed descriptions of their methods and purposes as I had understood them after my return from Mars.
I only mentioned the ones I thought might still be alive, omitting those I had killed. Identifying them might have resulted in my immediate detention while Law Enforcement tried to investigate their disappearance. I had been careful over the years to erase evidence of the murders whenever I found it, once the screaming stopped in the back of my head.
I emphasized again the critical importance of keeping our only captured agents of the Exterminators alive for questioning and expanded on the importance of the two LE tokens to prevent emoji attacks. Considering Rouseth, this assassin, and the request for the LE tokens by the Martian warships, it looked like our enemies were using a sophisticated emoji system to control their agents. I added that the Imperium had tried a similar attack against the TDF with less success.
When I wound down there were a few moments of silence. The Imperial agent shuddered once, cycled through the airlock and left the room on the run. The other two followed a few moments later. I was pretty sure our lunch tomorrow was going to be watched, but that would have been true anyways. I did not intend to say anything incriminating.
Nasruddin and MacFinn sat staring at me for long enough that I began transcribing my nightmares again. I doubted either of them had wanted to hear that much detail about the Exterminators, nor about the level of my security authorization.
Just before dinner, Agent Mahon returned with the opaque helmet and asked if we would be willing to remain where we were overnight? None of us wanted to risk a return trip through the corridors. A few minutes later she stepped out, returning with bed frames for MacFinn and Sa’id, and dinner following MacFinn’s careful prescription. She mentioned casually that the sirens were off, but all of Commerce was still on lockdown and would remain so for at least another shift.
She shook her head, adding that the late shift had been unable to enter and it was unclear whether the early shift would either. Nor could she leave. She would be staying just across the hall if we needed anything.
After dinner, I resumed some of the simpler exercises that could be done with nothing more than my wheelchair. Nasruddin and MacFinn watched the news, some dramas, and a report on the state of medical care in L1 that would have been interesting if I had not been deep into the transcription of my dreams. I kept up my cycle of exercise and transcription, but as I grew tired my control started to slip. I began to flash intense moments of horror in reaction to the dreams I was describing. MacFinn finally told me to stop and get some sleep again.
2357-03-25 20:00
The Angel of Hope
In the morning, we went through the usual ritual of breakfast and light exercise until Agent Mahon came by to tell us that the lockdown had been lifted. She looked exhausted and mentioned casually that she was on her third round of stims, having been interviewed a dozen times overnight by people who sometimes presented authorizations from the highest levels of the Lunar, Terrestrial and Imperial governments. Sometimes, they presented no authorization at all but were escorted personally by her commander and a team of heavily armed guards. I thought I recognized several independent delegations from the internal security apparatus of the TDF and Lunar Law Enforcement, but I had no idea what the Imperium thought about any of it.
I was surprised that so many delegations had spoken with her, but not with us, who sat at the core of the issue. She replied that they undoubtedly would when they were ready. For the moment, they were more concerned about the prisoners who had been captured. As she phrased it, “They claim they know who you are and know how to contact you when they need to. They said you were in most ways just another high-level asset, whereas the prisoners offer a direct window into a clandestine criminal organization of critical importance. After what you told me, I don’t want to know what that means.”
It is always nice to know how highly you rate in the world. A little humility can be refreshing, especially after learning about my security authorization. I could only guess that the different intelligence agencies were not passing critical information to each other.
She said that Prosperity Square was open for business. The crowds were sparser than yesterday but would undoubtedly pick up. The public had not been told of the attack but so many visitors had been trapped in Commerce by the lockdown that everyone was wary.
She asked what our plans were after the luncheon. Nasruddin replied that we would return to our quarters, probably by a different route. He was considering the options, but it was difficult to decide which routes presented the lowest risk, after the attack in what should have been a safe and well-monitored corridor. He asked if anyone knew where the attackers had come from or how they knew our route.
She shook her head. Only one work party had been authorized, the second one we had encountered. They were trying to catch up to confront the first when the attack happened. If they had succeeded, she believed they might all have been killed. She added that real work parties in that corridor carried proper insignia and wore regulation uniforms, shorts or long pants with shoulder belts, not loincloths and body paint. The attackers had been so fashionable that they were clearly disguised for inconspicuous passage through the crowds outside.
We would not be. MacFinn insisted that we all wear full armour. I refused since I already had light armour. Anything more might imply to the poloffs that I did not trust them. Nasruddin agreed to wear his armour but coloured it to resemble a loincloth with body paint. He tucked his helmet in the bin under my wheelchair.
At the appointed hour, we left our security guards in the lobby of Commerce and ventured across Prosperity Square. Squares on the Moon were hardly bigger than a large auditorium on the Earth. As always, the walls and ceiling were built of ironcrete, a composite material like concrete but made of regolith glued together with a nickel-iron alloy instead of limestone, reinforced with woven carbon nanotube cables. The ceiling rose into a graceful dome painted with blue, white and grey swirls, a very classical pattern intended to remind people of the skies of the Earth.
Businesses in Lunar cities tended to occupy long tunnels dug into the surrounding regolith, with service corridors along the back and a brightly coloured facade on the front facing onto a square or road. Prosperity Square was typical, with businesses tunnelling off three sides and Commerce on the fourth. Roads sprouted off each corner of the square, joining it to a grid of adjoining squares, each road lined with more offices and stores.
Commerce was a very large complex, fac
ing onto three separate squares: Prosperity in the middle, Flourishing to the east and Confidence to the west. Prosperity was nominally the safest since Commerce itself blocked what would otherwise have been two roads leading away from the square.
The service corridor behind Commerce faced onto Law Enforcement and the public hospital operated by Health. All three institutions were intensely concerned with security. Mahon mentioned as we left that the attack in such a well-guarded corridor had sent shock waves throughout the whole sector.
The arrival of the Imperium had shut down Lunar commerce. Rumours of the new Imperial Directorate of Commerce had drawn desperate business leaders to a series of meetings and forums that kept the squares beside Commerce busy while others languished.
The previous day’s lockdown had forced the cancelation of those meetings but today people would be returning to make up lost time. When we ventured out, the square was becoming busy, if not yet crowded. Looking around, everyone seemed tense and ready to bolt for the exits. I saw three Public Officers watching the crowd, ready to direct people to safety in case anything untoward happened.
The Merry Merchant, on the far side of the square, specialized in substantial fare for breakfast, lunch and dinner. It was flanked by the Centre of Attention, a well-known hair and body-painting shop, and by the Goody Box, a rival café that specialized in lighter fare, snacks, desserts and exotic beverages. Both cafés had patios out front, separated by a low fence. There were two other businesses that served food on the flanking sides of the square, but both were primarily meeting halls with food services. The Drunken Peddler served alcohol at dreadful prices but had a well-appointed meeting room suitable for larger business meetings and debates. On my previous visits, it had been constantly busy and noisy. The Lion was much more sedate, full during working hours in each shift with meetings in its many small rooms but deserted between shifts when everyone was going home or coming to work.
The Merry Merchant had a large banner out front that advertised “The Unbelievable Has Arrived!” I hoped they did not mean us. We wound our way across the square through clumps of nervous people who parted as we approached as though we were contaminated and hurried on to their business.
A teenage girl in a flouncy chartreuse loincloth and matching body paint admired my hat and expressed sympathy for my wheelchair. I reassured her that I had done the damage to myself and was now recovering. Standing in front of my wheelchair, to Nasruddin’s annoyance, she studied the hat, saying, “I love it, but it is too wide to go with my loincloth.”
I replied, encouraging her with my hands to step aside, “Yes, but with a narrower brim and a long ribbon you could fold it around your face like a bonnet.”
She did not move, tilting her head appraisingly. “Yes. A bonnet would work, and the mask is absolutely darling… But no one could tell if I was pouting or smiling.”
Nasruddin, from behind, said, “A half mask, just to cover your eyes? Could we get through?”
She flashed a huge smile at him, “And I absolutely love your clothes! Totally fashionable, yet it looks just like armour. Where ever did you get it?” Fortunately, her parents called to her that they were ready to leave, so she thanked us for the ideas, skipped across the square and disappeared.
Nasruddin mumbled, “We are a damned fashion plate. I should have thought of that.”
The two poloffs were already in the café, sitting at a table in the patio out front. There were very few other customers, leaving a ring of empty seats around them as though people were avoiding the Martian invaders. It was not true, of course – the Moon does not work that way. Everyone was nervous, sitting close to their friends. It would take an ice-breaker of some kind to make them relax into the usual Lunatic friendliness.
“Benevolent Ones,” I greeted them, “How do you like my hat? It is a twenty-five-year-old fashion. The gown is out of style by twenty years, although I owned one like it for a while. I think Martian fashion houses will do well on the Moon if they use lighter fabrics and can keep up with the teenage culture.”
They looked at me as though I was a large, colourful spider, but then recognized who I was and relaxed a bit. Nasruddin was back to being Commander Sa’id in this group, although he retained the decoration on his armour. He greeted the poloffs, bowing formally and waiting for their acknowledgement before taking a seat.
The Imperial poloff poked at her plate. “Can either of you tell me what this is and how to eat it? We had to order randomly off the menu. I am unsure even how to pronounce the word. I feel lost here. It is all so strange.”
I glanced down at the plate and would have done a double take if the Ghost had not been solidly in charge. On each of their plates, there were three large green leaves, covered with a low mound of narrow, orange slivers, and curls of bright red with a shiny skin. On the table was a small pitcher of thick, oily liquid. I had not seen anything like it since I left the Earth. Regardless of the details, Sergei had told a true story; somewhere deep in the agricultural levels, someone was running an experimental farm that had successfully raised seed-bearing plants in Lunar gravity.
“Benevolent One, this is a salad. The green leaves are lettuce. The orange is carrot that has been julienned, sliced into narrow strips. The red is bell pepper. This is unbelievable. I understand the banner above us. Unbelievable!”
She said, “Thank you, but how do you eat it? Do I pick it up in my fingers? It is too big to eat with a spoon. They did not give us bulbs or chopsticks. I recognize this bizarre knife that has no edge, but what is this metal stick with prongs? I have been here for a few days, but have not seen anything like it.”
“May I illustrate, Benevolent One?” I picked up the knife and fork, speared a corner of the lettuce and sliced it with the knife. “The knife is deliberately dull so you cannot hurt yourself accidentally. The pointy tool is a fork, for poking things while cutting and for picking them up afterwards. The lettuce is fresh and crispy. So is the carrot and pepper. Unbelievable.
“Until now, these foods have only been grown on the Earth. You can get them in space for dreadful prices frozen or dehydrated, but never fresh. I heard that the TDF once sponsored a meeting of senior government officials on the Moon and imported fresh salad vegetables from the Earth. They had to pick them, pack them for rough handling, race to the airport to load them onto a dedicated shuttle, run them through the earth station onto a FAS, and blast for the Moon. Even with that, the lettuce had started to wilt when it was served. A plate this size would have cost a month’s salary for a senior civil servant. These must have been grown here.”
She looked even more nervous. “Is it safe? I have never eaten Earth food. What if I react to it?”
That was not a trivial question. I looked for guidance to Sa’id, who looked distracted for a moment, then picked up the pitcher and read the fine print on a label wrapped around its waist. “MacFinn says no one born in space will have the appropriate intestinal bacteria to eat the salad straight, but the salad dressing should have the necessary probiotics. Pour the dressing onto each bite and all should be well. He also recommends you chew it carefully.”
The poloff still looked doubtful, so I asked, “May I illustrate?” She nodded, so I picked up the forkful of salad I had cut, poured a few drops of dressing onto it, and popped it into my mouth. It was delicious, crispy, cool, a peppery tang from the dressing, the gentle sweetness of fresh veggies. “Unbelievable.”
I called the waiter over and asked for clean utensils. She nodded silently and left to fetch them. When she returned, Sa’id and I put in our own orders. I skipped the salad and ordered eggplant parmigiana, with real eggplant and melted nearcheese. Sa’id chose syntheggs with onion, real onion. Most of the calories still came from pseudobread and almost-rice, but the real vegetables made the meal special beyond words.
People walking by looked at our plates and stopped to stare. They glanced up at the banner, then asked what we were eating. When I explained enthusiastically, some stepped in to try
for themselves. Others left but came back dragging friends a few minutes later. The Merry Merchant started to fill and our waiter was kept hopping taking new orders.
Her reserve never broke, not a trace of a smile and hardly a word that the job did not require. Some people that I recognized as long-term employees in Commerce spoke with her gently and got a pleasant reply but strangers like ourselves were just customers.
After the meal was over we sat quietly. The poloffs had invited us and would raise their business when they felt ready. As we sat, sipping our drinks, a gaggle of teenagers emerged from the Centre of Attention, laughing and joking. In their midst was a couple with the most elaborate body paint I had seen in years. The girl was blue and white in great angular blocks from head to toe, highlighted with streaks of turquoise and green, accented in black. Her hair stood up in a chipped block of white, like the top of an iceberg, although I doubted she had ever seen one. The boy wore blended streaks of red, orange and yellow on his legs, fading into smoke-like curls of brown with lightning bolts of white up his torso, topped with a hairdo that streaked together fading reds and billowing black, sparkled with dots of light. They both wore loincloths in colours matching their do’s. As they walked past our café, one of their friends chided, “You two behave yourselves! No kissing, no hugging, not even hand holding! You know the paint has not properly set and you must not smudge the colours. Save that for tonight.”
They headed towards the road to Tranquility Square. Before they got to the entrance, an older man, heavy-set with a severely short haircut and wearing the shorts and sash of a Public Officer, jumped up from the patio of the Goody Box and ran after them, yelling, “Hey! You kids! Stop! You cannot go that way. Stop, right now!”
Lord Banshee Lunatic (Nightmare Wars Book 3) Page 12
