Night Train to Rigel

by Timothy Zahn

  “And this surprises you?” I countered. “People who are planning to start a war?”

  “But—” She broke off. “Of course,” she said. “Please, go on.”

  “Unfortunately for them, we picked up on their vanishing act and sicced the cops on them,” I said. “They got caught, but by immense good luck I then got hauled in there to talk to them.”

  “Or maybe it wasn’t luck,” she said slowly. “Maybe this someone had more agents than just those two Halkas.”

  “Very good,” I said. She had either a very quick mind or else a collection of prior knowledge. Unfortunately, at the moment I couldn’t tell which. “JhanKla, at the very least. Possibly Major Tas Busksha, too.”

  “Or possibly your friend Falc Rastra?”

  “No,” I said firmly, feeling a flash of annoyance. “I know Rastra. He wouldn’t be mixed up in something like this. And I already told you he’s not my friend.”

  “Yet you say you know him?”

  “Would you get off that?” I snapped. “I know all sorts of things about all sorts of people. That was my job.”

  “Yes, of course,” she murmured. “I’m sorry.”

  I took a calming breath. I was supposed to be watching for her reactions, and instead I was the one doing all the reacting. “Regardless, when the assassination attempt failed, they had to come up with a new plan.”

  She frowned. “Are you suggesting those two Halkas aren’t dead?”

  “Oh, they’re dead, all right,” I assured her grimly. “Nothing grabs official attention like someone who tries to kill you and then dies a mysterious death. Plan B was apparently for JhanKla to come charging in on a white horse and rescue us from Kerfsis and the united forces of Jurian legal displeasure.”

  “But why wouldn’t they want us in Kerfsis system? What could be here they don’t want us to see?”

  “Maybe this is the test system we talked about earlier,” I said. “Or maybe some of the preliminary work is being done here. All I know is that someone has gone to an enormous amount of effort to get us out of this specific system onto this specific Quadrail in this specific Quadrail car. I think it would be instructive to follow along for a bit and see where it all takes us.”

  A sudden shiver ran through her. “Or maybe they just want to get rid of us. Maybe they brought us aboard so they could do it in private.”

  “That possibility hadn’t escaped me,” I admitted. “But there are more anonymous ways of killing someone than luring the victims aboard a Halkan Peerage car. No, if it’s not Kerfsis itself, I’m guessing JhanKla thinks plying us with hospitality will help him find out how much we know or who exactly we’re working for. Speaking of whom, did your friends get that sensor data I wanted?”

  “Yes,” Bayta said, her brain clearly still working on the possibility of our sudden and violent demise. “The stationmaster will deliver it to the train.”

  “But not to us directly,” I warned. “I don’t want JhanKla to see us getting a data chip from a Spider.”

  “No, of course not,” she said. “He’ll deliver it to one of the conductors. We can pick it up from him later.”

  Given our current traveling situation, arranging such a handoff might be a bit awkward. But I had a few days to find an excuse to go wandering around the rest of the train. “Good enough,” I said.

  “So what do we do once we reach Halkan space?” she asked.

  “That depends on what happens between now and then,” I said. “If we can act cheerful and stupid enough, maybe we can convince them that it’s all a big mistake. That would take some of the heat off.”

  “And if we can’t?”

  “Then we’ll just have to be careful,” I said. “Either way, your next assignment is to get the Spiders busy finding out everything they can about our two freshly dead and cremated Halkas. I want their names, their families, their political affiliations, their business and social associates, their criminal records, their travel records over the past five years, and anything else that seems remotely interesting or unusual. Get the next Spider who wanders into range busy on it.”

  “That’ll take time,” she warned. “And it may require sources they don’t have access to.”

  I thought about my original Quadrail ticket with its forged photo and thumbprint. “I get the feeling there isn’t very much that’s beyond their reach,” I told her. “While they’re at it, let’s have them pull the same information on JhanKla.”

  “And Rastra?”

  My first impulse was to once again leap to Rastra’s defense. But she was right. “And Rastra,” I confirmed.

  “All right.” She gazed out the window, her eyes unfocusing for a minute, then nodded. “It’s done.”

  “Good.” I looked out the window myself at the drab walls and floor of the maintenance building, all nice and quiet and private. Distantly, I wondered if I might have overstated my assurances that this would be a poor locale for a couple of murders. “Let’s get back to the party.”

  EIGHT

  Four of the chairs had been pulled up to the geodium table in our absence. Rastra and JhanKla were seated in two of them, chatting about the Quadrail and their various travel experiences. Behind JhanKla, a short Halka dressed in the muted plaid of a servitor was busying himself with the refreshments on the far wall. “Ah,” JhanKla said, giving a sort of regal nod our direction. “I was starting to wonder if there was a problem with your accommodations.”

  “Not at all,” I assured him, sitting down in the third chair as Bayta took the fourth. “We were simply taking a few minutes to discuss what this change of plans was going to do to our travel schedule.”

  “We shall do our best to minimize any disagreeable effects,” JhanKla promised. “The Spiders have placed a shifter engine into position and will be moving us from the service building as soon as our Quadrail arrives. In the meantime, may I offer you a beverage?”

  “Thank you,” I said. “Sweet iced tea, if you have it.”

  “I do.” He shifted his attention to Bayta. “And you?”

  “Lemonade, please,” she said, her voice a little stiff.

  JhanKla nodded and half turned in his chair toward the servitor, giving a short fingertip gesture that sounded a brief oboe note from hiss double-reed claw sheaths. “I have been thinking about the unnamed resort you spoke of earlier,” he said, turning back to us. “As I stated earlier, there are many possibilities. But it occurs to me that there is one in particular that might have caught the special attention of thieves.”

  “Really,” I said. In point of fact, my description of the place had been deliberately designed to be as vague as possible. This should be interesting. “Please, continue.”

  “It is called Modhra,” he said. “It is a world located in the Sistarrko system, a minor colony near the end of the Grakla Spur, three stops past the edge of Cimman space.”

  “Sistarrko,” I repeated, trying to visualize that part of the Quadrail map. The Grakla Spur started at the Jurian home system of Jurskala, cut across the edge of the Cimmal Republic at Grakla and connected with two more of their systems, then pushed past their border again into Halkan space. Unlike the Bellis Loop, which linked the Terran Confederation with the Juriani on one side and the Bellidosh Estates-General on the other, the Grakla Spur didn’t connect to anything at the far end, requiring travelers to backtrack if they wanted to go anywhere else. That wasn’t a terrifically big deal when you could travel a light-year per minute, but it was enough of an inconvenience that worlds served only by spurs tended to be neglected by the main flow of interstellar travel and commerce.

  “You have not heard of it, of course,” JhanKla said, not sounding offended. “Most of the system is industrial and agricultural, of little interest except to its inhabitants. But Modhra is unique. It is a moon—a pair of moons, actually—circling the gas giant planet Cassp. Both moons are composed of small rocky cores completely covered by water.”

  “Frozen water, undoubtedly, that far out from the
sun,” I commented.

  JhanKla’s flat face creased in a smile. “Indeed. The outer surfaces of the moons are quite solid, the thickness of ice ranging from a few meters to nearly three kilometers. But beneath those surfaces, tidal forces and internal heat from the moons’ cores have created enclosed seas up to five kilometers deep.”

  “Interesting,” I said, nodding my thanks as the servitor set my tea and Bayta’s lemonade on the table in front of us. “Sounds a little like Europa, one of the moons in our own home system.”

  “So I have heard,” JhanKla said. “But unlike Europa, Modhra I has been extensively developed as a vacation resort. There is surface hiking and cliff-climbing, ranging from the simplest to the most challenging of slopes. There are several ski runs, of an equally diverse range of difficulty. There are also three tubular tunnels that have been bored through the thickest parts of the ice for toboggans and lugeboards, with two more under construction. Atop the ice is a lodge of quiet luxury; beneath it lies a hotel that offers access to the galaxy’s largest indoor pool.”

  “With the ice dome above, and the coral formations beneath,” I said, nodding as the name suddenly clicked. Modhran coral had been one of the big decorating fads across the galaxy when humanity first stumbled on the Tube thirty years ago. The stuff had been fantastically expensive, accessible only to the fabulously rich and spoiled.

  Unfortunately for Earth’s own pampered few, by the time we learned about it pressure from the environmental lobby had caused the UN Directorate to slap a complete embargo on the importation of all coral and corallike formations. One of the more arrogant of the rich and famous had tried it anyway. Unfortunately for him, he’d had the misfortune of tangling with an honest customs agent, and his subsequent bribe attempt had raised the incident into Class-B felony territory. When the dust finally settled, the would-be smuggler was doing three to six, a quarter of his fortune had been confiscated, and the rest of the upper crust had suddenly decided Belldic marble was just as decorative as Modhran coral and a lot safer to deal with.

  “Yes, there are many beautiful coral formations within submarine range, as well as excellent and intriguing rock formations,” JhanKla said- “For those who don’t wish to climb or ski or explore the depths, the surface holds spectacular views of the glory of Cassp itself, with its roiling and ever-changing ring pattern, plus the sight of the companion moon Modhra II as it speeds across the sky.”

  “Sounds intriguing,” I said. “And you say you’ve just opened it to tourism?”

  “Within the past year,” JhanKla said. “At the moment it is quite expensive, of course, catering to only the richest Halkas and outworlders.”

  “That would certainly put it near the top of any thief’s list of happy hunting grounds,” I said thoughtfully.

  “It is certainly one possibility,” JhanKla said, peering out the window. “Ah—we are moving.” We were, too, though so gently that there was no particular sense of motion. Heavy-duty shock absorbers, indeed. “We shall soon be connected to the Quadrail and on our way,” he went on. “Are the tea and lemonade to your liking?”

  I took a sip from my glass. “Very much so,” I assured him. I had suggested to Bayta that the purpose of this exercise had merely been to hustle us out of Kerfsis system. Now I was starting to wonder if the actual purpose had been to point us to Modhra and the Sistarrko system.

  Maybe there was a way to find out. “Modhra sounds exactly like the sort of place I’m looking for,” I commented. “Too bad we can’t swing by and check it out.”

  “What prevents you?” JhanKla asked.

  “I’m sort of in protective custody,” I said, gesturing at Rastra. “As a result of the trouble at the transfer station, Falc Rastra has to personally escort me out of Jurian space.”

  JhanKla made a sound that was half snort, half bark. “Ridiculous,” he said firmly. “Here in the Tube, you are legally outside Jurian space. Provided you don’t leave the Quadrail until you arrive at Sistarrko, Jurian law has no authority over you.”

  “Your pardon, High Commissioner, but that’s not the way the protocol is written,” Rastra said, a hint of stiffness in his tone. “Mr. Compton was involved in an incident that drew blood, and has been ordered to leave Jurian space.”

  “An order he will fulfill if he travels to Modhra,” JhanKla countered.

  “But the intent of the order—”

  “The intent is irrelevant, as you have so frequently pointed out on this journey,” JhanKla cut him off. “It is the letter of the law that matters. In this case, that letter has been fulfilled.” He shrugged, a full rippling of his skin. “At any rate, how did you expect him to return to his home again after his journey? All Quadrails to the Human worlds travel through Jurian space.”

  “He has a point,” I agreed. “You can certainly escort me out of Jurian space now, but I’ll still need to get back in at some point.”

  “True,” Rastra said. “Yet… perhaps.”

  “No perhaps about it,” I said, looking back at JhanKla. So with a single one-two punch the High Commissioner had pointed me toward Modhra and then cut me loose from the fiction that had brought me into his presence in the first place. Was that all he wanted?

  Again, there was one way to find out. “Of course, in that event, there’s no need for Bayta and me to impose on your hospitality any further,” I said. “We can find accommodations elsewhere in the Quadrail.”

  “I can’t let you do that,” Rastra insisted. “Not until I have clarified the protocol.”

  “And I would not permit it in any case,” JhanKla said, just as firmly. “Those who attacked you were shamed Halkas. It is my duty and my pleasure to offer my hospitality in recompense.” He looked at Rastra. “So let us compromise,” he went on. “You will remain my guests until Falc Rastra has had time to study the protocol and come to a decision. Is that acceptable?”

  “It is to me,” I said. “Falc Rastra?”

  “Yes,” Rastra said, clearly unhappy with the situation. “If the High Commissioner is correct, when we reach Jurskala in three days you’ll be free to travel wherever you wish, provided you don’t leave the Tube while in Jurian space.” He inclined his head to JhanKla. “You may even travel to Modhra, if you so choose.”

  “That would be wonderful,” I said, smiling with thanks and professional admiration. Very nicely, very neatly done.

  “Then all is settled.” JhanKla said in satisfaction as he gestured again to the servitor. “Let us bring out an Imperium card deck and find a way to pass the time until the meal is ready.”

  So that was that. Good-bye, interest and intrigue at Kerfsis; hello, interest and intrigue at Modhra. I just hoped all of this was related to the Spider’s vision of interstellar warfare. I hoped, too, that it wouldn’t interfere too much with the other job I was supposed to be doing.

  Most of all, I hoped that it wasn’t simply for the purpose of finding a more suitable place to dispose of our bodies.

  The first two days of the trip were uneventful. The four of us spent most of our time sitting around the lounge, chatting about issues ranging from interstellar trade and politics to the pluses and minuses of various house pets and the best ways of preparing spiced vegetables. At various points throughout the day JhanKla would declare that it was time for a cultural experience, and we would pause to listen to music or watch a dit rec, taking turns choosing something from the lounge’s large and eclectic collection.

  Bayta mostly stayed quiet during the conversations, her impassive mask firmly in place, listening closely but only rarely joining in. Her few comments were for the most part factual and neutral, providing no fresh insights into what was going on behind those dark eyes, The dit recs, on the other hand, seemed to fascinate her, particularly one of my choices, a classic Hitchcock called The Lady Vanishes, itself set aboard a twentieth-century EuroUnion train.

  At prescribed intervals, the aroma of cooking would begin to drift through the car, and in due course a servitor would appear to
announce that the next meal was ready. Each day’s menu was different, every one of them first-class, and at the end of each I could practically feel another half kilo of weight falling into formation around my waist. Eventually, late in Quadrail-time evening, we would part company with an appropriate round of good-nights and return to our individual compartments.

  Theoretically, at any time after that first night I could have excused myself from the group and taken a stroll forward to find the Spider with the promised data chip. Rastra had emerged from his compartment at breakfast the first morning to concede that JhanKla had indeed been correct about my position vis-à-vis Jurian criminal protocol, and that I no longer needed to remain in his custody. Still, as far as I was concerned, cheerful and stupid was still the order of the day, and for those first two days I wasn’t able to come up with a plausible excuse to even temporarily abandon the Peerage car’s luxury.

  Finally, with eleven hours remaining until our arrival at Jurskala, I managed to create my opening.

  “No,” I said, shaking my head firmly. “I’m sorry, but a proper Chattanooga nightcap can’t be prepared with anything but Jack Daniel’s.”

  “None of these will do?” JhanKla asked, gesturing to his array of beverages as, behind him, one of the servitors hovered in tense silence. “I’m told there are three other Human whiskeys available.”

  “And fine ones they are,” I agreed, though two were brands I’d never even heard of. “But this is a Chattanooga nightcap, also known as an Uncle T Special. It’s a cultural thing,” I added, knowing that with JhanKla that would trump all other arguments.

  “Very well,” he said, throwing an unreadable look at the servitor. Unreadable to me, anyway; the servitor’s flat face seemed to shrivel just fine beneath it. “I will send a servitor for a bottle.”

  “Actually, I’d rather go choose it myself,” I said, getting to my feet “There are several factors to consider—age and blend, for starters—and I’ll have to see what they have in stock before I know which one to get.”