by Wil McCarthy
The Verva Hotelo looked much like an Earthly resort, though not a large one. According to the safety card he'd read before going to sleep, the hotel was so solidly constructed that it would more likely fall over than apart, in the case of an unusually powerful quake. And remembering the squat shape of the place, Jhoe thought its falling over an extremely unlikely thing.
Unua. Malhela. A century-long expedition.
He drew in a deep breath, let it expand him and strengthen him. The time had come for him to stop acting helpless, to stop acting like a child away from his mother for the first time. The city, the whole world, lay waiting for him.
A shower? No, Unuans did that only weekly. A sponge bath, then, and a dab of cologne in his hair. Yes, that would do nicely. But first, some business!
Pushing away from the window, he flopped once more onto the bed, reached across it for the bucket-shaped device, labeled TELKOMILO, that lay on the night table. Like the floor, a thing of textured plastic. It weighed less than he expected.
He fussed with controls for a few moments before he got the thing to produce a hum, and then a holie image of one of the hotel staff. The image focused on him, smiled. “Salutes, Doctor Freetz. What can I help you with today?”
“I'd like to order some breakfast.”
“Certainly! Would you like to eat in your room?”
“No, I think I'll come downstairs. I'll find the restaurant on the ground floor?”
“Indeed you will,” the clerk agreed with the same unfaltering cheerfulness. “Would you like us to prepare something... familiar to you?”
“No,” Jhoe said. “Quite the opposite. I'd like you to surprise me with something uniquely Malhelan. Can you do that?”
“Of course. Will you be requiring anything else?”
“Yes, actually. Could you link me through to Port Chrysanthemum? I've got to check with some friends.”
The clerk looked at something down below screen level. “Uh, yes. Can you pause for couple of minutes?”
“Yes.”
The smiling face vanished, and the word PAUSE appeared in the screen, cast in shiny brass letters. Faint music started to flow from somewhere behind the screen.
Well, the world could wait a few minutes for him.
He sat patiently, fidgeting very little. One hundred and twenty-six standard years had taught him the art of waiting. Other arts, too, like rationalization, shifting blame, farting silently in a crowded room. So many skills to be mastered, thank heaven he had the time. He wondered what wisdom his next century might bring.
PAUSE vanished then, and a new face appeared in the telkomilo. Not a scrubbed and cheery face like that of the clerk, but a tired one, with mussed hair and a comlink hanging askance from one ear.
“Port Chrysanthemum,” the tired face said.
“Hello,” Jhoe said to it. “I would like to speak with one of the Terran scientists, a Doctor Tomus Kreider.”
Wordlessly, the tired face vanished, and PAUSE returned to the screen. In silver letters, this time.
Again, Jhoe waited, and after a time, the face of Tom Kreider appeared behind the screen. Large as life and twice as ugly, as NAU staffers often said. Like the com-tech, he appeared very tired.
“Yes?” Tom said. Then he looked at Jhoe and his face brightened a bit. “Oh, hello.”
Jhoe grinned at the older man. “You seem surprised, Tom. Did you expect some other person to call?”
Tom smoothed his hair back, straightened. Behind him was some sort of equipment rack, and the noise of several people speaking at once. “Yes,” he said, “as a matter of fact, I did. I hadn't expected to hear from you so soon, and things have really gone to hell up here.”
“Really? What's happened?”
Tom blinked. “You haven't heard? Introspectia lit out of here about nine hours ago, headed for Soleco. Some kind of scientific emergency, it seemed like. The captain kept denying any problem, but she was hustling everyone around, and really didn't seem inclined to discuss it. The Red King is screaming at us all, about breaches of protocol, and—”
“The who?”
“The... oh, sorry. The, uh, the president. Jafre Shem. Yezu and I have shared a sort of joke about him.”
Jhoe's smile had gone. “And how fares Yezu?”
“Asleep right now, I believe,” Tom said, smoothing his hair back again. “As if we didn't have enough going on, he got a half-hour personality fax from his wife. It really upset him, I guess; he wouldn't talk about it, but afterward he played a really savage game of chess.”
“I...” Jhoe waved his arms, trying to express a thought. “I don't completely understand your circumstances. What kind of situation have you got, right now? Are you working yet?”
“No,” Tom said. “And there lies part of the problem—most of us up here never got the chance to unload our equipment. We're setting up temporary laboratories with all sorts of makeshift gear, but there isn't enough to go around, and... Well, a Malhelan ship departs for the Centromo tomorrow, and Yezu and I plan to be on it. We just hope our equipment will catch up with us before too long.”
“Introspectia really left in that much of a hurry?” Jhoe asked. “Why? What could drive them with such urgency?”
“I've just told you I don't know!” Tom snapped. Then, “Forgive me. I haven't had any sleep since you left. About ten hours ago?”
“About that much, yes.”
Tom nodded. “Okay, well, listen: I'm glad you've got off to a better start than we have. I'd love to chat, but I really do have to go.”
“I understand,” Jhoe said, though he didn't, completely. He hadn't expected turmoil from above, and certainly not from Introspectia's calmly efficient crew. Abandoning him, as Jack-Jack had, as Uriel had. Stranding him here on the planet! What in heaven could have happened up there? Headed for Soleco, Tom had said. Why? What secret emergencies could a dead star hold?
“Well, goodbye then,” Tom said, and then the telkomilo went blank in Jhoe's hands.
~~~
“There you are!”
Jhoe looked up from his breakfast to see Uriel Zeng stomping into the restaurant, an impatient expression on her face.
“Good morning,” he said.
“I've been looking all over for you.”
“I've been right here.”
“Well, hurry up! We're due at the power station in forty minutes!”
“Power station?”
Uriel nodded impatiently. “Yes, you were supposed to have the tour today.”
“That's odd,” Jhoe said, “I don't recall asking for one.”
“Well,” Uriel said, “I arranged it for you.” She held up a hand. “I know, I know, I said I'd tell you before I scheduled anything. I forgot! I'm sorry! But we really do have to go if you want to see the facilities today.”
The Unuan government had assigned Uriel as Jhoe's guide and liaison, which he supposed was thoughtful of them. She seemed to interpret the role rather broadly, though, as if she were somehow in charge of him, as if she somehow had the right to command his obedience. Jhoe could think of no reason why she might actually be so entitled.
He took a last bite of his “pitch cakes”, dabbed the corners of his mouth with a napkin, and offered Uriel a patient, an old man's smile. “And what, precisely, would I see if I went?”
“The power station,” Uriel said, blinking. “You know, one of our geothermal turbine emplacements. They're very important for the functioning of our society.”
“Oh, I believe you. Still, it doesn't sound like something that would interest me very much. If you want to introduce me to your society, why not let me follow you on a normal day's work? I think I'd get a much better feel for—”
“You're impossible, you know that?” Uriel said, with what seemed like genuine anger. She flicked a thin plastic card onto the table. “Here's your itinerary for the week. I spent a long time on it.”
“Well, I'll have a look,” Jhoe said, picking up the card. “It's very kind of you to w
ork so hard, but I wish you hadn't gone to the trouble. I expect I'll have a few ideas of my own.”
Uriel did not appear to take that remark very well.
~~~
Today's flight seemed only slightly rougher, only slightly more frightening than yesterday's. Given Uriel's bitter mood, this seemed to Jhoe like a sort of blessing. She could be flying much worse than this! Still, it might help her mood, and his stomach, if he improved relations a little.
“Let me thank you again for your efforts,” he tried saying. “You were very thoughtful to draw up that itinerary for me, and I could have been a little more appreciative. But you were angry at me before that, and yesterday, too. I wish I knew why.”
She cast a brief, hooded look in his direction, then jerked her eyes forward again and pulled hard on the controls. The chopter dove, swooped, and turned, cutting near the top of a relatively high building. She jerked again, and the vehicle leveled out.
Manual controls! Not a link harness, not even a manual link interface. Jhoe had noticed this yesterday, as well: Uriel did not guide the vehicle, suggesting a course for its control system to follow. Uriel actually was the control system! The levers she pulled and twisted at seemed integrated with the actual mechanisms of the vehicle, so that the roughness or smoothness of the ride was fully a function of her own dexterity.
Incredible! Together they hung, suspended in the air by a bubble of metal and plastic, which was in turn suspended by whirling blades turned by motors inside the metal-and-plastic bubble. And the whole, improbable contraption under direct human control. He wondered what would happen if she made a mistake.
“Uh,” he said as the chopter swooped again, “this seems like quite a complicated vehicle. It must be very difficult to operate.”
“My license is up on the panel,” she replied without turning.
Jhoe looked. Atop the panel sat a row of primitive indicators, brightly marked discs and spheres floating in clear fluid inside clear plastic bubbles of their own. And behind this, yes, a hologramatic card of some sort. He pinched the card between his fingers, pulled up on it against resistance, a clip or bracket of some sort. The card came free in his hand.
“Good heaven,” he exclaimed after examining her holograph and biograph and chopter licensing information. “Have I read this wrong? Have I misunderstood your calendar?”
She looked at him, less angry now. “What?”
“This says you were born only thirty-four standard years ago.”
“Yeah? So?”
“Thirty-four years? Really? I would have guessed you were much older. You don't carry yourself like a little girl.”
“I'm not little girl!” Uriel snapped, her mood turned sour again. “Darkness, everyone thinks you have to be hundred years old to know what you're doing! I'm Assistant Deputy Administrator at the Power Board, I fly chopters, fix high-voltage lines and generators. I've been doing it for five years.”
“Forgive me,” Jhoe said quickly. Faux pas number two—people grow up fast on the frontier. “I meant no offense. It's just that achievements like yours happen rarely on Earth, even among very exceptional people. Our young people mainly sit around and complain.”
“It's rare here, too,” Uriel admitted, her eyes focused on the rushing scenery ahead and below.
Aha, thought Jhoe, low standards of modesty. A usual thing, here, or restricted to young achievers? Or to Uriel herself?
“Then you'll accept my apology?” he asked sincerely.
She sniffed. “Yeah. Whatever.”
~~~
“...and this is—Doctor, you have to step out of there before the door closes. Right. And this is the Deputy Administrator's floor.”
It looks just like the other three, Jhoe wanted to say, but did not. Low against the cityscape, the Power Board building did not present an imposing edifice. But considering that quakes would come again in an hour or so, Jhoe liked it low and plain, free of the heavy and possibly fragile ornamentation that an equivalent building on Earth might wear.
“And over there is the Deputy Administrator herself.” Uriel pointed between a pair of columns, toward a corner office. Jhoe craned his head, saw a red-haired woman in there leaning over a telkomilo, growling something.
“Come on, I'll introduce you,” Uriel said.
Jhoe followed her into the office. The red-haired woman looked up as they entered. “Uriel, I'm glad you're here. We've got lines down near the southwest transformer station, and Powell is threatening to shut it down, to keep it from shorting.”
Uriel staggered, grabbed at her heart melodramatically. “Shut it down? Shut it down? Oh, darkness.”
The red-haired woman did not smile at this. “Darkness is right, virineto. Remember, the backup transformer is offline? Powell pulls that switch, the southwest goes brown, we're out a week's pay at least, so I want you to get a chopter out there now, and kick his rear end really hard. Oh, and get those lines up while you're at it.”
“Luna!” Uriel said, her voice rising almost to a whine. “I've got full queue today! Send the zeta team out on it.”
“Kiss me. The zeta team is out on it, but last time I checked zeta was under your little wing. Let's not fight about this, okay? The call is pretty urgent.”
Uriel huffed out a loud, long-suffering sigh, and jerked a thumb at Jhoe beside her. “Can I bring him with me?”
The red-haired woman seemed to notice Jhoe for the first time. “Oh, you're that Terran sociologist.” She mimed slapping herself on the forehead. “I signed the auth two weeks ago, you'd think I'd remember.” She winked at Jhoe. Then, to Uriel she said, “Of course you can't take him with you. Has he got a license? Has he even got a suit? Go on, I'll take charge of him for now.”
Uriel Zeng seemed very displeased by that. She glared at the red-haired woman, then at Jhoe, then back at the red-haired woman again. “You promised I could do this,” she said, then turned and vanished.
It occurred to Jhoe, with no small degree of surprise, that Uriel had perhaps volunteered to be his guide. How odd! Why did she then act as though she hated him?
“I'm sorry about that,” the red-haired woman said, smiling vaguely. “I hope we haven't caused you any distress. Now that I think about it I did promise her, but hey, the electricity comes first.”
I hope, Jhoe thought, this woman doesn't expect me to spend the day cooped up in her office. A whole planet awaited his exploration!
“Uh,” he said, holding crossed fists out before him. “Doctor Jhoe Freetz. It pleases me to meet you.”
“What?” said the woman. Then, “Oh. Right. Power Board Deputy Administrator, Luna Shiloh.”
She grabbed Jhoe's fists and shook them lightly. She had said her title in a lilting, hyperbolic way that suggested self-deprecation, as if she found her name and her job title somewhat foolish. She had put on a crooked grin, and as she looked at Jhoe she tried, without much success, to straighten it.
He liked that, liked the easy unaffectedness of it. He returned the smile.
“Hey,” she said, her expression shifting suddenly, “What the hell is going on with your ship up there? Our allocation tables were favoring the spaceport pretty heavily, because there were supposed to be all these landings, and they needed the radar and the lidar and the lights... But hardly anyone's come down, and I heard rumor that the Introspectia's left dock already! Quakes, what are you people up to?”
“Uh,” Jhoe said. “I really don't know that much about it.”
“Did the ship really leave?”
He grinned slightly. “Everyone seems determined to abandon me in inconvenient places. Yes, the ship left port last night. Something about that black hole, Soleco. I don't know, I guess the crew was really excited about something and they wanted to go back and check it out. I didn't catch any of the technical details.”
“Huh.” Luna Shiloh raised her arm, checked a readout of some sort that she had strapped there with a band of metal. A watch? A wrist watch? “It's late enough I could break
away for lunch, I guess. Should we find someplace with a news holie? Catch up on the latest?”
“I just ate about half an hour ago,” Jhoe said. And I've come here to study you, not to watch you watching holies about us.
She frowned. “Well, I can't leave you here alone, can I? Come on, I'll buy you a drink.”
“It's a little early for that, isn't it? By my clock, anyway. I've only been up for a couple of hours.”
Luna rolled her eyes at him. “Okay. Come with me now, and I'll buy you a drink later on to make it up to you. Okay? How would that be?”
“Oh!” Jhoe said, understanding at last. “You're asking me out, for a drink.”
Ordinarily, he considered the reading of people and circumstances one of his stronger talents, but Malhela seemed to have jammed his gears. Now, though... he felt red warning diodes light up in his brain. He had not been out, for a drink, since the days of Shareen Brugiere. Shareen, the emotional hypermass who had gracefully, waltzingly crushed him to dots. Again, the thought of her stung him, stung his heart. Oh, damn romance! Damn women and their games.
“Doctor Freetz,” Luna said, looking perplexedly at him, “Is everything this difficult on Earth? Would you like me to leave you here with somebody else?”
“No,” he said distantly, with resignation. Love at first sight was an exceedingly rare phenomenon, but so-called “contextual infatuation” happened frequently. Especially to those who found themselves alone and far from home. And knowing this wouldn't help him; Luna Shiloh had a kind of beauty, a kind of charm that, if turned in his direction, he doubted he could resist. Would she seize him? Would he become locked, redshiftedly, in a swan-dive through her distorted spacetime? “Falling forever,” he mumbled, “like Black Hole Bahb.”
Then he realized, with some alarm, that he had spoken out loud without intending to. Just like a complete, blithering idiot, and good heaven, that was one of the warning signs of contextual emphatuation! He was suddenly acutely aware of how he must look to Luna Shiloh, and then he felt another tingle of alarm, because acute self-consciousness was another symptom!
