by David Weber
Raibert set the thoughts aside and ventured deeper into the wheat field. He drew closer to the singing and began to pick out some of the words. The fierce and energetic tune told the story of a tumultuous romantic relationship between the moon and Earth that didn’t end well for the former.
The singing stopped, but he had a good sense for where it originated, and he pushed through the wheat field until he came out to a path that ran perpendicular to the road.
“No funny business, newcomer.”
He quickly slouched and cupped his balls.
A young woman in a wool tunic and slacks sat atop a horse-drawn cart loaded with farm tools. Her round face possessed a sweet, homely quality that Raibert found immediately comforting.
“Ma’am, I…I…” He paused to sneeze. “I am uncertain what sort of business you refer to, but I can assure you I find none of this funny.”
She looked him up and down and raised a playful eyebrow.
He sneezed again.
“I’m just teasing,” she finally said. “Besides, you wouldn’t get away with it. The guards are just looking for an excuse to haze you. Their lightning strikes may not permanently kill you, but they hurt. Trust me, I know from experience. If you want my advice, be on your best behavior until they get bored.”
“I intend nothing less, I assure you.”
“You have a name?”
“Professor Raibert Kaminski.”
“Neat. What were you a professor of?”
“History with a minor in chronometric physics.” He tried to stand a little taller while still shielding his dignity.
“That sounds awfully specialized.”
“It’s a required combination where I come from.”
“You’re not former Admin, are you? Did you work for the DTI or something?”
Raibert spat upon the ground.
“I’ll take that as a no,” she said.
“Ma’am, I don’t wish to impose, but do you have a coat you could lend me? Or pants? Really, anything you’d be willing to spare would be an improvement.”
“Sure thing.” She sat up and tossed him the folded blanket that served as her cushion.
“Thank you.” He draped the blanket over his shoulders and pulled it across his chest.
“You heading to the temple?”
“I guess so. Should I be?”
“That depends. How do you feel about compromising your pride in exchange for preferential treatment?”
“Ma’am, in my current state, I am open to any compromises you might suggest.”
She laughed.
“Then hop on up.” She slid over and patted the cart seat. “The name’s Cynthia, by the way.”
“Nice to meet you, Cynthia.” Raibert grabbed a post and hauled himself up. “And thank you again.”
“Don’t mention it.” She flicked the reins and the horse trotted forward. “Inciting a riot, arson, aiding and abetting known terrorists, murder of two superintendents, and attempted murder of an under-director.”
“I beg your pardon?”
“That’s what I’m in for. I find it’s a good way to break the ice.”
“Oh. Well, thank you for sharing.”
“How about you? What’s your dirty deed?”
“I suggested this entire universe is a mistake and we need to go back in time and fix it.”
She laughed. “Well, I guess we all feel that way some days. But seriously, what was it? You with Free Luna? I wasn’t, but a lot of you new arrivals seem to come from there these days.”
“No, can’t say that I am.”
“The Allied Belters?”
“Nope.”
“You sure you don’t want to share?”
“I thought I just did.”
She eyed him with incredulity and raised an eyebrow.
“What?” he asked.
“Well, don’t worry. I’ll guess it eventually.” She guided the horse onto the main road and flicked the reins again. “We’ve got plenty of time.”
“No, I really am in here because this universe is wrong.”
“Uh-huh?”
“It’s the honest truth.”
“Sure it is.”
Raibert sighed and sat back. Of course she wouldn’t believe him. Why would she? Why would anyone in this place?
Fields of crops gave way to a forest half-harvested for its lumber, and then up and down another hill to a village of wooden and brick huts and cobblestone roads. Cynthia guided the cart down a central thoroughfare, and Raibert spotted blacksmiths and tanners and butchers and bakers and— His stomach grumbled.
“Umm. Excuse me? Cynthia?”
“Don’t worry. We’ll get you fed at the temple. After that, you’ll have to work for it. Sound fair?”
“Quite fair, actually,” he said as his mouth watered.
“Good, because those are the rules.”
They passed several stone statues like the ones at the portal but inert. Perhaps the guards interfaced with them when problems occurred. The buildings grew denser and taller as they approached a rectangular marble temple that overlooked the village from atop a wide hill. Tall fluted columns supported a heavy triangular roof in what must have been someone’s notion of ancient Greek architecture.
Raibert grimaced. “The columns are wrong.”
“What’s that?” Cynthia asked.
“Columns. Don’t you see how they look concave?”
“What are you talking about?”
“It’s an optical illusion with tall, narrow structures. Take a closer look.”
Cynthia squinted. “Now that you mention it…”
“They’re missing what’s called the entasis. A slight bulge in most columns corrects the optical illusion and makes them more attractive. This temple was built with straight columns.”
“Oh well.” She urged the horse to the side. “We did the best we could, and the warden doesn’t seem to mind. Come on. Let’s get you inside. And then you can have your real orientation.”
Cynthia brought the cart to a halt, climbed out, and tied the horse to a hitching post. Raibert wrapped the blanket around his waist like a skirt and followed her to the temple. Inside, he gazed up at the marble statue of a woman in flowing robes, the same woman he’d seen at orientation. Flowers, food and drink of all kinds, wooden and metal sculptures, oil paintings, elaborate tapestries, crude musical instruments, and all manner of other offerings lay at the statue’s bare feet. Six stone statues stood guard over her, three to either side.
“So, you people worship the warden?”
“No, of course not!” she giggled. “But a little politeness and flattery can go a long way. After all, you have to admit she basically is a god in this place.”
“I suppose you do have a point there.”
“It’s simple, really. We behave extra nice and show her our gratitude, and she makes the crops grow faster or the weather more pleasant. Stuff like that. And then there are the special events!”
“Special events?”
“Last year she let us fight a dragon.”
“That doesn’t sound pleasant at all.”
“Oh, it was great fun. She saved the town’s domain state beforehand and dampened everyone’s pain receptors so if we died, it felt more like an inconvenient papercut than anything else. It was a hell of a fight, but we all banded together and eventually brought it down. Great team building exercise when you think about it. I hope she lets us fight another one someday.”
“Interesting.” Raibert nodded thoughtfully, and gazed up at Warden Ixchel’s visage.
Note to self, he thought. Prison’s virtual defenses include dragons and lightning strikes.
“Cynthia?”
“Yeah?”
“Would you mind telling me more about these events?”
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
Yanluo Blight residential blocks
2979 CE
“Nox, you’re not staying?” Shigeki asked as his shuttle set down on the private landi
ng pad adjacent to his family’s penthouse suite. The thrusters switched off, the hatch split open, and a ramp extruded to the pad.
“That’s correct, sir,” Nox said. “I have a social engagement tonight.”
“Really?” He couldn’t recall the last time Nox had a social anything. “Well, it’s not like you’re required to be on standby as part of my nightshift detail. Don’t let me keep you.”
“Thank you, sir.”
Shigeki nodded to his chief of security and hurried down the ramp. He was already late.
“Also, sir.”
“Yes?” He turned back and hoped he didn’t sound annoyed.
“I’ve doubled the number of agents on this floor and the next two down and have arranged for an extra Switchblade patrol around the residential blocks.”
“That hardly seems necessary, what with the professor in prison and his ship secure in Hangar Four.”
“Maybe so, but I prefer to be cautious. Unexpected arrivals do that to me. I hope you don’t mind.”
“No, not at all. See you tomorrow, Nox.”
“Yes, sir.”
He jogged over to the double doors, slipped his cap under an arm, and smoothed his hair. The shuttle took off as he transmitted the passcode from his PIN, and the doors parted to reveal Jackie standing on the other side with her arms crossed. She narrowed her eyes and scowled at him.
“Yes, I know I’m late,” was all he could say.
“You better believe it, mister. We had to start dinner without you.”
“Sorry.” He stepped in and let the doors contract shut behind him. “I tried to get away at a reasonable hour.”
“It’s not like you to almost miss Sunday dinner. Is everything okay at work? That’s two long nights in a row.”
“Things are…complicated.”
“More so than usual?”
“You could say that.” He flashed a warm smile. “Come on. Let’s join the others.”
“All right.” She gave him a peck on the lips and led the way through the foyer and down half a flight of stairs to a bowl-shaped depression in the floorplan. Their three children, Ixchel, Jonas, and Thaddeus, sat at a round table with half-cleaned plates of salad, pretzels, and spaghetti. Starlight and aircraft running lights glinted through the domed ceiling, and vines hung from its edges. Clear water burbled down three decorative stone slopes, filling the air with a pleasant coolness that mingled with the warm aroma of garlic and tomatoes.
“Mmm. Spaghetti.”
“I figured you could use some of your favorite de-stressing food,” she said with a wink.
“Hey, I’m never going to turn down spaghetti.”
“I played around with the pattern a little this time, added a dash of sour cream and bacon to the sauce. Let me know what you think.”
“Smells delicious.”
“Glad you approve.” She gave his behind a pat and walked over to the table.
Shigeki set his cap down and took his usual seat.
“Hey, look who finally made it!” Thaddeus proclaimed energetically. “I guess Dad isn’t sleeping at work again!”
“Hey, I’m just as happy about that as you are. Probably more so.”
“Hey, Dad,” Jonas said.
“Thanks for joining us,” Ixchel said.
“No problem. Is there any salad left?”
“A little. Here you go.” Ixchel placed the large glass serving bowl next to him.
“Thanks.” He grabbed the tongs, tilted the bowl, and scraped what was left onto his plate.
“So, Dad! Do you know how it ended?” Thaddeus asked, puffing out his chest.
“Know how what ended?”
“The Legion of Patriots game, of course!”
“Here he goes again.” Jonas shook his head.
“It’s all he’s been talking about since we got here,” Ixchel chuckled.
“Because we didn’t just win. We shut them out!”
“That’s my boy. I’d expect nothing less.”
“I scored on three of my four runs, and we shut them down every single time! Rodriguez thought we should save up for a late juggernaut rush, and Sylvester kept arguing for a midrun swarm, but I told them no, these Yanluo-lovin’ blighters—”
“Thad!” Jackie cut in. “Language!”
“These honorable opponents, whom we totally trounced are really weak in the early game, and it’s only when people don’t pressure them that they get their economics going and are able to roll over their opponents in the mid and late game! So I said, and I held my ground like you told me to when they tried to convince me otherwise, and I said no! We need to crush them in the early game, and they listened to me because I was really forceful and confident with them, and it worked Every! Single! Time!”
“Breathe, Thad,” Jackie said. “Breathe.”
“You saw me on the replay. Right, Dad?” Thaddeus asked.
“No, son. I’m sorry, but I haven’t gotten to it yet.”
“Aww, Dad! Come on!”
“Thad, enough,” Jackie said. “Bring it down a few notches. Your father’s been very busy lately.”
“And he’s not the only one,” Ixchel sighed.
“Oh?” Shigeki asked. “What’s going on?”
“Ixchel got audited,” Jonas announced.
“Yup.” She swirled the spaghetti on her plate.
“Standard domains or the one-ways?” Shigeki asked.
“Mostly the standards, but they did check all of our one-way transfers. The new DOI director’s been auditing all the prison domains, and apparently I got to be one of the first.”
“I’m not surprised.” Jonas leaned in. “Our new chief executor ran a campaign on abolishing the one-ways, along with all his other dumb promises.”
“Won’t happen,” Ixchel said. “One-ways are here to stay. Besides, they didn’t find anything. I run a clean prison. The audit produced nothing but a few very minor prisoner-abuse infractions, which I’m going to appeal, and buckets upon buckets of pointless busywork for me. It was a rough week, but it’s behind me now.”
“They’re done looking over your domain?” Jonas asked.
“For a while, at least. They’ve got a lot of other domains to go through, and I’m sure there will be some stinkers they’ll zero in on for a second audit round.”
“Then you’ll be in the clear for a while?” he asked.
“Yeah, I think so.”
“That’s enough, kids,” Jackie stated. “What do I keep telling you? Leave work at work.”
“Sorry, Mom,” Ixchel said.
“Yeah, sorry.” Jonas sat back.
“Besides,” Jackie added, “you know how I hate hearing about those dreadful places. I know it’s your job, but…” She trailed off and shook her head.
“I wish we didn’t need them either.” Shigeki broke off a piece of a jumbo pretzel and used it to sop the salad dressing left over in the serving bowl.
“But they’re necessary,” Ixchel said. “If there’s no punishment for bad behavior, then all you get is more bad behavior. Human beings are naturally selfish, and a healthy society requires devices to enforce order.”
“But we already have the prison domains,” Jackie said. “Those should be more than enough, I think.”
“They aren’t,” Ixchel stated firmly. “If there’s no worse punishment than life in a comfortable abstraction, then what motivation do prisoners have to behave like civilized human beings? If you saw the insides of my prisons, you’d understand. When there’s a troublemaker, there has to be a mechanism in place to get rid of them. Violence in prisons is like a communicative mental disease. If you can’t throw out the bad apples, eventually they all go rotten.”
“How about it, Dad?” Jonas asked. “Don’t you think Ixchel has a point?”
“Me?” Shigeki pointed a fork at his chest. “Well, I think I’m going to follow what your mother said and not bring my work to the dinner table. That’s what I think.”
Ixchel chuckled.
“Come on, kids,” he said. “Let’s give it a rest. I think we can all use a break from our work.”
“In that case, want to hear about the game again?” Thaddeus asked.
“No!” Jonas and Ixchel spoke in unison.
Shigeki smiled as he plopped a mound of spaghetti on his plate and lathered it with Jackie’s new sauce. It really did smell fantastic, but when he sat down, he found it difficult to enjoy the main course. The conversation moved on, and he barely kept up with it as his mind drifted to thoughts of Kaminski.
Sending the professor to prison with a show trial wasn’t the worst thing he’d ever done, not by a long shot. He’d backstabbed (figuratively, of course) more than a few rivals on his ascent to directorship, and he’d used the resources of the DTI to ruin several troublesome politicians. It was amazing the kind of dirt people left in their pasts, and he had whole squadrons of time machines at his command. He didn’t even need to send them looking. Their mere presence and their ability to find out anything that happened anywhen gave him an incredible amount of power within the Admin, and his colleagues fulfilled his “requests” with the utmost speed and efficiency.
In the last thirty years, the DTI had grown from a tiny research project into one of the most powerful departments in the System Cooperative Administration, and he’d used that power to destroy criminals and terrorist organizations that threatened the Admin, but also to protect himself and his family. His position drew a great deal of unwanted attention, both from within the Admin and without, and he didn’t always wait for those threats to strike.
Yet those people chose their paths. They’d either targeted the Admin at large or him directly, and they deserved their fates.
But Kaminski? He was different. His crime, if you could even call it that, was wanting his world—this SysGov—to exist again, and knowing only one way to bring it back. He was a historian, not some secessionist radical. Just a little man in over his head. Did he really deserve to be dumped into an abstraction for that?
“Csaba?” Jackie asked. “Hey, Csaba?”
“Hmm?” Shigeki blinked. “I’m sorry. I drifted off.”
“Look, the artist finished it.”
