by Marko Kloos
“It’s good to see you again,” she said when she walked up.
“It’s good to see you as well,” he said, smiling. “I don’t know about you, but Mnemosyne messages are a poor substitute for seeing someone’s face in real life. Even if they are instantaneous across a hundred million kilometers.”
“I will have to agree with you on that,” Solveig said. She glanced at the executive receptionist, who was looking at her array of screens and pointedly not paying attention to the exchange. “Are you ready for lunch?”
“Very,” Berg said. “I was running a bit late this morning, so I haven’t actually had any breakfast. If you don’t count the coffee from the dispenser at the office.”
Solveig made a face. “Coffee isn’t breakfast. Come on, then. Let’s get some food into you before you fall over and I have to explain myself to your boss.”
He ran a hand through his unruly brown hair and laughed.
“He’d probably send you a letter of civic commendation. It seems I annoy him a lot.”
The executive canteen took up one of the building’s corners, and it afforded a fiftieth-floor view of Sandvik on two sides of the room. Detective Berg paused in the doorway when they walked in and looked around in awe.
“You call this a canteen,” he said.
“It’s probably a bit nicer than the ones in police buildings,” she admitted.
“A bit.”
The attendant led them to one of the choice tables near the corner of the room, where the view was unobstructed. Solveig nodded her thanks and took a seat, and Berg sat down across the table from her in a slow and careful manner, as if he was afraid to break something or make an untoward noise.
“And you get to eat lunch here every day?” he asked.
“I usually get them to bring it to my office,” Solveig replied. “I don’t like to complicate things.”
“Well, I appreciate that you are taking the time today. I was only mildly serious about coming to join you for lunch. As soon as I said it, I feared I might be imposing. But I am glad you took me up on the suggestion.”
The executive canteen sometimes served as a room for larger functions, so it was much bigger than it needed to be to accommodate the lunch crowd on this floor. The room was mostly empty, but a few of the deputy directors and various assistants were sitting at some of the tables, and Solveig was keenly aware of the glances in her direction. She didn’t usually eat here because she liked to be by herself, and she had certainly never eaten here with company from the outside. The administrative assistants at all levels of Ragnar were the most efficient network for the spreading of gossip, and she knew that if her lunch date wasn’t common knowledge already, it would be by the time she was back in her office.
“Did you really have errands to run in the area, or did you go out of your way just to have lunch with me?” she asked.
“Well,” he said with a smile. “I didn’t have an errand when we talked earlier. So, I picked one that would give me the excuse for the detour.”
They picked up the ordering compads that displayed the menu choices for the day. Berg let out a low whistle.
“You were not making a joke about that beef fillet with herb butter,” he said.
She felt strangely embarrassed by his awe at the selections.
“Can I ask you a favor?” she said.
“Of course.” He lowered his compad and looked at her.
She hesitated for a moment to gather her thoughts into a coherent request.
“I’m the daughter of the man who used to own this company,” she said. “I went to Sondstrom Academy when I was eleven. I spent seven years there. Then I went to the university for five years. And now it’s four months after graduation, and I’m in a nice office here on the top floor.”
She put her comtab back on the table and made a vague gesture around the room.
“This is what I know. This is my default. I know it’s not how most people get to have lunch at work. But I haven’t been out in the real world enough to know any different. So please let me know if I ever come across as an entitled little brat. Because I don’t think any less of anyone for doing lunch at some little hole-in-the-wall place on Savory Row. Truth be told, that’s what I’d prefer most days anyway.”
Berg smiled and shook his head.
“You do not come across that way. And I don’t think any less of you for getting to eat here instead. Or for having an office with a great view. Although I will say that I am jealous you got to do your tour of authentic Acheroni noodle joints.”
Solveig laughed. “That was worth the trip. Even if I had to pay a heavy price for it. Corporate meetings for days. And lots of business meals and receptions where the only people in the room within ten years of my age were the servers.”
“Still,” he said. “You got to see Acheron. I’d put up with some boring meetings to get to see the place in person.”
“You’ve never been?”
He shook his head. “Never been off-world. It’s hard to find the time with my work schedule. And whenever I do have the time, I never have the funds. Junior inspector salary, you see.”
She opened her mouth to apologize for staying on the subject of relative privilege, but his smile told her that he wasn’t offended, so she swallowed the words.
We really are from two different worlds, she thought. Even if we live in the same part of the same planet.
They put in their food orders, and an attendant came to collect the order compads.
“Our canteen has a food line,” he said. “They don’t serve you at the table.”
“I wouldn’t mind that at all. Sometimes I don’t know what I want until I see it. And I am absolutely not above carrying my own meal tray.”
“I didn’t think you were,” he said. “But it’s a major downgrade from this arrangement. The food is pretty okay, though.”
“I’d like to try it,” she said.
He laughed. “Oh, no, you wouldn’t.”
“Sure,” she pressed on. “Why not? You came to have lunch here. I’ll come have lunch with you. Do they allow you to have visitors for mealtimes?”
“There’s no rule against it,” Berg replied. “Not that our police headquarters canteen is a major culinary destination in the city, mind you. People tend to pay extra to not have to eat there.”
“I am serious. I will carry my own tray and eat all the food I pick. No special treatment. Are you in the office tomorrow?”
Berg laughed again and leaned back in his chair.
“All right. If you absolutely want to have the experience of eating mediocre food among a bunch of foul-mouthed civil servants, I will not deny you the opportunity. I am indeed in the office tomorrow.”
“Good,” she said. “Then that’s settled. Noon?”
“Any time you want,” he replied. “I’ll be there anyway. Once you get there, you’ll have to ask for me at the front desk. I’ll have to come downstairs and sign you in.”
“Are you sure? I wouldn’t want to pull you away from anything important.”
“Honestly, there isn’t much I wouldn’t let you pull me away from,” he said.
They smiled at each other, and Solveig felt a fluttering in her chest that was only partially due to the good-looking young police officer sitting across the table from her, or his obvious reciprocation of her interest in him.
I didn’t have to cover my tracks this time, she thought. I’m sitting out here with him in plain sight. And tomorrow I will go see him at his office, without having to look over my shoulder.
A comtab in his tunic pocket hummed a soft but insistent-sounding alert. He frowned and pulled it out to look at it.
“Forgive me for being impolite,” he said. “This is my duty device. I have to acknowledge the message.”
“Not at all,” she said.
Berg looked at the comtab without making a screen projection, and his frown deepened. He looked up after a few moments, clearly unhappy.
“I’m a
fraid I really have to be rude and desert you for lunch. There’s an all-hands-on-deck emergency order from headquarters. I have to go and report in.”
“Is everything all right? What happened?”
He hesitated for a moment before responding.
“Someone bombed an Alliance military vehicle. Out on the southern loop bridge. Operations says there are civilian casualties.”
“Gods,” Solveig said. The rush she had been feeling a few moments earlier dissipated as fast as it had come. “Another bombing?”
Berg stood up and tucked the comtab back into his tunic.
“I’m afraid so. Would you please excuse me? I’m very sorry I have to run off on you like this, believe me.”
“No apologies needed,” she said and got out of her chair as well. “Your duty is more important. I will see to it that they get you downstairs quickly.”
They hurried across the room, drawing curious glances from the sparse lunch crowd. Outside, she led the way to the executive reception.
“Detective Berg has a police emergency and needs to get out of here in a hurry,” she told the receptionist. “Could you clear the VIP skylift for him and make sure someone from security meets him at the bottom?”
“Of course, Miss Ragnar.”
“Thank you,” Berg said when the VIP skylift arrived. He brushed her hand with his as he walked past her and stepped onto the platform. The brief, unexpected touch of his bare skin on hers almost made Solveig jump.
“And I really am sorry. I was looking forward to our lunch. And not just because of that beef fillet with herb butter.”
“Please stop apologizing,” Solveig replied. “I’m not offended in the least. And I will see you tomorrow. Hopefully we can do a repeat without any emergencies. And if there is one, you’ll be at work already, right?”
“Right,” he said. “Sorry for all the apologies. I will see you tomorrow.”
He smiled at her as the skylift doors closed between them.
With Berg gone, she no longer had any desire to sit in the executive canteen and eat lunch by herself, so she went back and told the attendant to have her meal brought to her office. Then she made her way back across the floor, disappointed and excited at the same time. Next to her office door, Anja was waiting, compad in her arms as usual.
“Was that the policeman from a few months ago?” Anja asked.
“It was,” Solveig confirmed. “But he wasn’t here for work. He was paying a friendly visit. Have you seen any news bulletins come across the networks?” she asked before Anja could continue her probing.
“I have not,” her assistant said. “Did something happen?”
“He got called away for work. Something about a bomb on the southern loop bridge. They called everyone in, so it must be big.”
She walked into her office and tapped the controls for the viewscreen projector at the head of the room. The screen popped into existence across most of the wall next to the restroom door, displaying a slowly spinning Ragnar company logo.
“Vigdis, show me the network digest,” she said.
The room AI dutifully changed the screen to a grid layout that showed the feed from a dozen different network streams. Most of them were showing the same scene from various angles and distances—a bridge spanning the Duna River where it finished its wide loop around Sandvik to the south. There was a big, many-wheeled military vehicle on the road in the middle of the span, and smoke was wafting from its front and side.
“Ber—the detective said there are people hurt,” Solveig said to Anja, who had walked into the room behind her and was now watching the digest grid with one hand on her mouth.
Several of the feeds showed a wider angle of the bridge. On one side of the river, there was a mess of transport pods in a haphazard column, and some of them were smoking as well. There were people running around on the bridge, but the distance was too great to make out who they were or what they were doing.
“Gods, what a mess,” Solveig muttered.
“I don’t understand it,” Anja said next to her. “Why do they keep doing this? They’ll only make these Alliance soldiers come down on everyone that much harder.”
“Maybe that’s why they keep doing it,” Solveig replied.
“Well, I don’t like the occupation. But I really don’t like feeling like I could get blown up at any time on the way home. Just because I’m in the wrong spot at the wrong time.”
Solveig glanced at the window that had been replaced after shrapnel from an explosion on the square three months ago had torn a deep gouge into the Alon. She had been standing not too far away from that spot at the time.
Her personal comtab trilled an incoming vidcom request. Her heart did a little jump in her chest when she thought of Berg. But when she brought up a screen between her thumb and index finger to see the sender node ID, the disappointment was amplified by mild dread.
“Would you excuse me, please?” she said to Anja, who snapped back into her professional self and turned to leave the room. Solveig walked over to her desk and opened a screen, then flicked the comms request from her comtab over to it.
“Hello, Papa,” she said.
Falk was in his office back at the estate. He looked tense and concerned, but she couldn’t see any anger on his face, and she allowed herself to relax a little.
“Are you watching the networks?”
“I have them on right now,” she replied. “Someone lit off a bomb on the Duna bridge down south. But that’s a long way from here. Are you sure you’re allowed to call me at the office?”
“If it’s a family emergency. That’s why I connected to your personal device and not the office one. Is anything going on in the city?”
She looked out the window. On the far end of Principal Square, protesters were gathered just like almost every day now, but there was no sign of danger or chaos. In the distance, halfway across the park, the blue shimmer of the security barrier marked the beginning of the government Green Zone. Beyond, there was some activity, but it was too far away for her to make out clearly. As she watched, two gyrofoils climbed into the sky from somewhere behind the Green Zone and turned to head east at low altitude.
“There’s some military traffic in the air over by the Council Hall, but that’s it.”
“What are your plans this evening? Are you staying late?” Falk asked.
I don’t think you’ve ever asked me about my workday plans instead of telling them to me, she thought.
“Not today, Papa. I was going to come home right after my last meeting. I wanted to talk to you about a few things.”
“I see,” Falk said. “Are you taking the company bird? Because I’d really rather not see you in a pod on the road today. I’d feel much better if I knew you were a thousand meters up in the air on the way home.”
“Don’t worry. I was going to take the gyrofoil all along.”
“Good.” He sighed with visible relief. “What is it that you wanted to discuss?”
She hesitated for a moment. The subject would be a tricky one on a normal day. Right now, with her father on edge because of the bombing, it didn’t seem like a good thing to bring up, not if she wanted concessions out of him. But she could tell that making him wait until tonight would only increase his anxiety again, and she didn’t want him to be three strong drinks into his evening already when she got home.
“It’s a pretty long way from the house to work,” she said. “I spend a lot of time in the air or on the road. I was thinking it may be a good idea for me to get a place in the city. Closer to Ragnar.”
“You want to move out of the house,” he said matter-of-factly, and for a second she thought she detected a spark of the old anger in his face.
“I don’t want to move out,” she replied. “It would just be a place for during the week. I’d still come home on the weekends. It would save a lot of time and money. I ran some numbers. The monthly rent for a little suite would be less than what it costs to run that gyrofoil for three fl
ight hours. That’s just a week of commuting time.”
Improbably, Falk laughed.
“Of course you ran the numbers,” he said. “You’ve never asked for more privileges or new things without presenting me with a detailed cost-benefit analysis to make your case, you know.”
“If that’s the case, I got it from you,” Solveig said. “But we can talk about that tonight, Papa.”
He rolled his eyes in mock exasperation and shook his head.
“But you’re not asking for a privilege,” he said. “You’re twenty-three now. You’re beyond asking. And I need to recognize that. I meant what I said the other day. You’re an adult, and you’re the vice president at large. You don’t have to ask me for permission anymore. You want to stay in the city during the week, you can start looking for a place. Not that you haven’t picked out a dozen suitable ones already.”
For the second time this week, Solveig was momentarily disoriented by the mental whiplash of her father expressing a sentiment that was diametrically opposed to the one she had expected to come out of his mouth. It took her a moment to realign herself mentally, and from the little smile in the corners of his mouth, she could tell that he knew and that it amused him.
“I still wanted to get your blessing,” she said. “Make sure you don’t think it’s a stupid idea. Or that I am ungrateful for what I have already.”
“I’m not going to lie. I’d rather see you home. I don’t care how much the stupid little gyrofoil costs per flight hour. That’s a few drops in a very big bucket. But you’re young, you want to see what it’s like to be on your own, and you want to be closer to the nightlife. I get it. You may find it hard to believe, but I was twenty-three myself once.”
He leaned back in his chair and raised an index finger.
“But. There are some things you won’t be able to negotiate.”
“And what are those?” she asked.
“You want your own place, you pay for it. Even if it’s one of our company properties. Which it will be. Because Marten will want to make sure the security arrangement is airtight. And you will get a shadow for protection whenever you are off company property. They won’t be breathing down your neck at all times, but they’ll be nearby wherever you go, just in case.”
