Freeze Frames

by Katharine Kerr

  Soon, she knows from experience, Mulligan will drink himself into a stupor. Since in the meantime he can be safely ignored, she switches her comp unit over to voice op, but she doesn’t quite trust Mulligan enough to speak in standard Merrkan where he can overhear. Instead she uses Kangolan, a language so obscure that only about two million sentients in the Mapped Sector even know it exists and only about five hundred thousand of those actually speak it. Lacey learned it during a tour of duty spent as comp-officer on a frigate guarding against pirates at a hyperspace entry nexus that happened to be near the planet. She had plenty of time to study local customs because in the entire five years only two pirate vessels ever appeared, and one of them turned tail and ran as soon as its sensors picked up the frigate.

  “I am awake and operating.” Buddy’s voice is a pleasant if somewhat brisk tenor, Lacey’s own programming, overriding the seductive female voice provided by the factory.

  “I am pleased to hear it, Buddy. Did you dream of the new data I gave you while you were in silent mode?”

  “I did. It is incomplete in its current state.”

  “I know. I am hoping to access more sources as time goes along. File it and cross-reference with all murders in Polar City during the last year period. Then search and collate any instances of psychics being unable to access their memory banks because of pain. Both searches in the first extension only for now.”

  The unit makes a soft sound which Lacey always describes as “humming under his breath.”

  “I am finished. The cross-reference command is complete. The search and collate command is incomplete. I have no more examples of such instances in my current files. Is it possible that the Mulligan unit is providing false data?”

  “It is impossible. Why do you think the data would be false?”

  “The Mulligan unit is unsatisfactory.”

  “In what way?”

  “In every way. It is messy, ill-regulated, and prone to neural breakdowns.”

  “Say ‘he,’ Buddy, not ‘it.’ Mulligan is a human being.”

  “If my programmer insists, I will categorize him so.”

  “I do insist. As for the neural breakdowns, the proper term for that is intoxication or getting drunk.”

  “Only a previous neural breakdown would lead the unit to desire to drink himself to stupefaction.”

  “Well, maybe, but still, he’s also useful, even if what you say about him is true.”

  “If my programmer says so, I will define him as useful.”

  “Do it, yeah.”

  “Command executed. Mulligan unit is redefined as a useful human being. Next command?”

  “Go into waiting mode while I think about this.”

  Leaving the unit on Lacey gets up and strolls over to the wet bar to make herself another drink. Mulligan has already passed out, his empty glass half-overturned in his fingers, a thin trickle of watery whiskey staining his shirt. When she plucks the glass away, he sighs in his sleep and squirms like a restless child. Most of the turquoise hair coloring has ended up on his face in long streaks, letting the normal straw-color of his hair show through. She gets a damp towel from the sink and wipes his face, but even though the water’s cold, he stays asleep, merely squirms again and sighs.

  “Poor bastard,” Lacey remarks. “He’s just lucky he was born in the Republic.”

  “My data banks tell me that psychics are killed in worlds dominated by the Alliance.”

  “Usually as children, yeah. They’re not exactly welcomed with open arms by the Cons, either.”

  “Checking that assumption. I have found the file. In the Confederation those with psionic talents are considered mentally ill and are confined in comfortable if restricted nursing homes until those talents are destroyed by psychotropic drugs.”

  “As I say, he was lucky to be born here. Though, I don’t know, Buddy. Mulligan keeps saying he would have been happier with a mind-wipe.”

  “The Mulligan unit is inherently unstable. No rational intelligence desires the loss of some area of its prime programming.”

  “I wish you’d stop insulting Mulligan. He’s my friend.”

  Buddy hums for a brief moment.

  “I have recalled the definition of that term. Why do you care about his inherent welfare above and beyond his usefulness to you?”

  “Come off it! You know damn well that understanding feelings like friendship has been built right into your CPU. Who do you think you are, Mr. Spock?”

  “No. I am not in the habit of defining my personality module in terms of characters from ancient literature.”

  “You just watch it, pal, or I’ll flip you into automode so fast—”

  The monitor screen flashes half-a-dozen colors, then subsides to its normal dark gray.

  “I am ready to complete another command if my programmer so wishes.”

  “That’s better, yeah. Okay. Define relevant memory banks for carli burial customs and laws governing murder, the current political situation in Polar City, past murders, so on and so forth; search said banks and collate all information to the fourth degree of extension relevant to first the murder, second what happened to Mulligan when he attempted to perform his reading. Print the collation.”

  “Do I understand this implied directive? Relevant memory banks are to be defined thus: not only those in my immediate possession, but also those that I can access using assorted passwords and entry codes.”

  “You are correct. When accessing banks beyond those that belong to us, use a false ID.”

  “That was understood, programmer.”

  While Buddy hacks, Lacey paces restlessly around the room and wonders just why she does put up with Mulligan. He drops in at all hours of the day or night to interrupt her work; he drinks large quantities of her alcohol and barely says a thank you; he’s always scrounging meals or turning up without a place to sleep for the night; he has even on occasion borrowed money that he’s never paid back. She feels sorry for him, she supposes, a psychic fighting against a talent that he never wanted and that has quite literally branded him as a semi-outcast in society. Yet beyond the pity she has to admit that she genuinely enjoys his company. Mulligan sober can turn any ordinary morning into a party or a trip downtown into an adventure. There have been moments, usually when she’s had a couple of drinks herself, when she wonders if she might possibly be fonder of him than simple friendship would explain. For a Blanco, he’s a very good-looking man, with his soft full mouth and high cheekbones. Usually, as she does now, she dismisses such thoughts the second they appear.

  “Say, Buddy, check the comm channel listings, will you? If there’s another ballgame on, put it on screen. I need a distraction.”

  “There are no ballgames.” Buddy sounds both annoyed and absent-minded, as he always does when someone asks him to fulfill one of his multi-function sub-programs. “This might interest the programmer.”

  “This” turns out to be a news special, the President of the Republic standing at her imposing lectern in the bare press room of her residence, her hair hastily swept back into a messy braid and her make-up a little off, too—a carefully calculated effect, no doubt, to convince people that she has rushed away from something crucial in order to read this bland, soothing prepared statement about the murder of a member of the Confederation Embassy. His name, or rather his special name of the kind that carlis pick when they are forced to deal with aliens, turns out to be Imbeth ka Gren, roughly translatable as He who Smooths the Way, fitting since he was an undersecretary of protocol. The President also assures everyone that the police are working full time, and with the aid of the Public Bureau of Investigation, too.

  “Bet Chief Bates will just love that,” Lacey remarks in Merrkan. “A couple of PBI boys hanging around at his elbow.”

  “Indeed,” Buddy says. “The chief has made his views on the Bureau well-known in the past.”

  “And so,” the President looks straight into the camera, her large, dark eyes so utterly sincere that Lacey
feels like throwing something at the screen. “We’re calling on all our fellow citizens to aid the police in this matter. It’s super important that we get this here mystery solved just as soon we can.”

  “So the Cons don’t bomb the hell out of us, she means.” Lacey grabs the remote and mutes the sound.

  “Do not agitate yourself, programmer. The Alliance would not allow it.”

  “One of these days, one empire’s bound to call the other’s bluff over us. Then we’ll be well and truly liberated—blown to hell for our own damn good.”

  “It will not occur over this murder. I estimate that we have at least fourteen point six years left before escalating tensions make confrontation inevitable.”

  “You are a true comfort and joy.”

  Since he’s been programmed to recognize the subtle voice changes that indicate sarcasm, Buddy merely hums at her. On the screen, the camera zooms in for a shot of the Great Seal of the Republic, a large predatory bird of some sort, with a bunch of leaves clutched in one claw, a stylized space cruiser in the other, and a striped shield across its belly. In a band round the edge is the motto: e stellis pluribus una.

  All at once the screen flickers in long bands of ice-blue static. From outside she hears a rumble that rises first to a roar, then a shriek. She gets up and strolls to the window to watch as a shuttle launches from the port and cuts a swathe of silver across the lambent sky. She seems to have picked up something of Mulligan’s mood, because her eyes fill with tears, just briefly before she wipes them away. Although Mulligan may have had a chance at the majors, she’s had something greater taken away: the endless freedom of deep space. Trite images of birds in cages come to her mind; she dismisses them with a stoic act of will and has another swallow of whiskey.

  o~O~o

  Since carlis, the dominant race of the Confederation, value the visual arts highly, the Cons’ embassy is a beautiful building, a graceful half-circle made of pale beige plastocrete scored to look like stone blocks. In the embrace of the crescent are small diamond-shaped flower beds, filled with red and blue blooms native to the carli home planet, and thorn trees pruned and shaved into some semblance of symmetry. On guard by the enormous double door, made of a rich brown wood imported from Sarah, are two humans in stiff gray uniforms. As Chief Bates strolls up, just a bit after midnight, they salute with great precision, then open the door.

  Stepping inside the big reception room makes the chief feel twenty degrees cooler. The walls are pale blue-green, the thick carpet a darker shade of the same, and in the center of the room a real fountain murmurs and splashes as it runs over purple tile into an ivory basin. All along the walls are metal sculptures, the carli race’s most famous art form—thin twisted plates of gold, silver, oxidized copper, and the occasional jewel or piece of precious stone arranged in amazingly complex patterns, each one a good three meters by two. Bates is sincerely glad that the security of these treasures is someone else’s responsibility. Just beyond the fountain stands a heavy desk of imported rosewood, so highly polished that the comp unit is reflected down to the last toggle switch and key.

  Sitting at the desk is another human, a young woman, this time, with red-blonde hair and green eyes. Although many of the humans that live in the confines of the Confederation (and there are over twenty systems worth,) are white, Bates always finds them different from what he thinks of as “his” white people. The Con lot all seem to have thin lips, cold eyes, and no sense of humor. This young woman is no exception. When he gives her his best reassuring smile she merely looks him over as if making a mental inventory of the pieces of his uniform.

  “You must be the Republic policeman.”

  “I’m the chief of police in Polar City, yeah.”

  “I have orders to send you straight in.” Her tone of voice implies that she thinks this order is a big mistake. “If you’d go through the door on your left?”

  The door in question bears a sunken brass plate with both carli and Merrkan lettering, announcing that here officiates the chief secretary of protocol. Since he was hoping to see the ambassador himself, Bates is briefly annoyed; then he remembers that in the carli world no high personage is readily available in any emergency short of total war. That the chief secretary is willing to see him without making him wait for an hour in the lobby bespeaks a great willingness to co-operate. With a quick knock he steps in to another huge room, this one decorated in sandy pale browns and tans except for a four meter square tapestry that’s mostly turquoise on the far wall. The chief secretary’s desk is even larger and shinier than the receptionist’s. Pacing restlessly in front of it is a golden-furred male carli in the long green robes of the warrior caste. His ear flaps droop at half mast, indicating a real sadness.

  “Your excellency,” Bates says. “Allow me to tender my sincere sympathy for your loss.”

  “Thank you, sir.” His Merrkan is startlingly good, without the slight growls on the r’s typical of carlis, and Bates reminds hilf that formal speaking is the order of the day. “Ka Gren was developing into a fine officer. My name is Hazorth ka Pral li Frakmo.”

  “Ka Pral, I am honored. I am Albert Bates.”

  “Bates, the honor is mine.”

  They bow, then consider each other warily for a moment. The chief is inclined to like this carli. Since his chosen name means He who Walks Narrow Bridges, the equivalent of the Merrkan phrase He who Splits Hairs, the secretary apparently has a strong sense of humor about his job, and senses of humor among the carli are rare. His ear flaps gradually stiffen to full extension, a sign that he finds Bates reassuring.

  “Will you sit and take a drink?” The secretary gestures at a low green divan under the vast tapestry.

  Refusing would be rude, so Bates bows and perches gingerly on the edge of the piled cushions while the secretary rings for a servant. A young female carli in a plain gray jumpsuit pops in like clockwork with a crystal decanter and two glasses on a bronze tray. She sets the tray on the waiting stand by the divan, then bows so low her nose almost touches the carpet.

  When the secretary snaps out a word in their language, she turns and rushes out of the room.

  “She is learning,” the secretary says approvingly. “When she first arrived, she was slack.”

  “Ah,” Bates says. “Perhaps being so far from her home world was disorienting.”

  “You know, I never considered that. You may well be right.”

  The secretary pours out a pale green liqueur, hands Bates a glass, then takes the other and sits on the far end of the divan. They each raise their glasses, consider the color, then have a small sip. Bates is profoundly thankful to find the drink sweet and only slightly alcoholic; there are some carli liqueurs that can knock a BetaPic dragon flat on its many-spiked back with a single sip.

  “His excellency has exquisite taste in tapestries,” Bates says, with a polite nod toward the turquoise monster. “I would assume that this one was not produced here on our humble and unworthy planet.”

  “It comes from our homeworld, truly.” With a sigh of satisfaction Ka Pral settles himself among the cushions. “It was woven in a most unusual way.”

  About an hour later the conversation finally drifts toward the reason for Bates’ visit. After the chief learns that the murdered carli was just beginning to put together a fine collection of flat-woven rugs in the Old Earth style, Ka Pral remarks that Ka Gren was missing from the Embassy yesterday, that he left on some mysterious errand two hours after sunrise and never returned.

  “Since he was off-duty, of course I had no complaint, but it was distinctly odd. Like most of our young men, Ka Gren needed a great deal of sleep. Normally he went to bed immediately after his dinner and stayed there until woken for breakfast.”

  “I see, your excellency. Would it be presumptuous of me to ask who was in the habit of waking him?”

  “Our head housekeeper, Kaz Trem. Her main comp terminal is programmed to send automatic wake-ups to the auxiliary units in the rooms of our various personne
l, but she always waits by the monitor until they’ve all punched in a response. As I say, our young people sleep very heavily; it is a function, or so I understand, of our being carnivorous. When Ka Gren didn’t answer, Kaz Trem went to his room. All the locks are keyed to her palm, except, of course, those in the ambassador’s suite and offices. When she opened the door, she saw that Ka Gren’s bed had never been slept in, and she came straight to me. We were just discussing what to do when we received your commcall.” His ear flaps turn flaccid and droop in grief. “As soon as you said that you had one of our personnel, I was sure it was Ka Gren. He was the only one unaccounted for.”

  “And of course, your security head came down and identified him. I am both sorry and humiliated to have been the bearer of bad news.”

  “I share your grief but I wipe clean your humiliation.”

  “Your excellency has my humble thanks. I realize that I presume greatly to question you and yours during this time of mourning, but it is necessary that we—”

  “We will be glad to answer what we can. Bates, my species is like yours in savoring revenge. I want whoever murdered Ka Gren found and brought to your justice—well, if this sentient can ever be tried in your courts, of course.”

  Bates hesitates, then finally sees the subtle meaning. Ka Pral is hinting that the murderer may be part of the Alliance Embassy by implying that he, she, or neuter might have diplomatic immunity.

  “I am glad to hear it, your excellency. Then do you know of any reason at all that young Ka Gren would have gone into town without telling anyone?”

  “I know nothing, but I do have two speculations. The first is that he might have found somewhere to gamble. As I’m sure you know all too well, our young men are usually fanatically fond of human-style card games. The other speculation is much more complex. One reason that Ka Gren was such a good officer was that he was very zealous, what you humans would call gung-ho, I believe. He always took on duties above his strict obligations. Now, of course, for all of us here in the Embassy our prime duty lies in establishing and maintaining good relations with your glorious and admirable Republic.”