I sent him a vidfax, telling him I was coming back on the next flight with some fresh bodies.
The cheese-on-wheat was delicious, and I'd taken three hefty bites, washed down with Scotch, before I paused in mid-swallow. I felt like a chump.
When Nicole noticed me staring at the half-eaten sandwich she let out a girlish giggle.
"Funny, huh?" I said.
"You think maybe I doctored the cheese," she said. "You're furious because you didn't make me take the first bite. Correct?"
"Correct," I admitted sourly.
"Hunger before suspicion," she giggled.
I thrust the cheese-on-wheat at her. "Here, you finish the thing. If it's lethal we'll both end up stiffed."
She took a nip, chewed, swallowed and handed the rest back. "Goon, you're the starving man. I wouldn't be dumb enough to try a double-cross two times running. You'll get indigestion worrying over nothing, Sam."
I snarled, still feeling like a chump, but finished the sandwich. All I could do was believe her; she seemed to be all through with her phony act and ready to spill what she knew. I told her I was waiting to hear about F. "Who is he? Describe him."
"Can't. I've never seen him, never talked directly to him." She flushed, sipped at her bourbon. "He had something on me dug up by one of his sneaky subworld contacts and he used it to make me work for him. He's ruthless. I knew he'd turn what he had over to Sergeant O'Malley if I didn't cooperate in decoying you."
I let that sink in.
"What's the F. stand for?"
"I don't know that either. I'm just a small pawn in whatever cosmic game he's playing." She tossed her red hair and gave me a long, level stare. "I've told you everything I know, Sam."
"Not quite," I said. "What does F. hold against you? What dirt did his goons dig up?"
"It has nothing to do with this case," she declared with some heat."It's personal and I don't intend to reveal it to anyone." Her sea-green eyes flashed. "If you'd like to slap me around some more then go ahead. But I've told you all I'm going to. Period."
I knew she wasn't bluffing. And I like my chickens spirited. I'd leave her pride alone.
"Okay, then, forget it," I said, dumping the last of the Scotch down my craw. "There's just one more thing I want from you."
"What's that?"
"Can't you guess?" This time I was leering. The cheese-on-wheat and the Scotch had put me back in a mood to dally.
And Nicole knew how to dally.
She peeled off the glosex blouse and joined me on the couch.
I peeled off everything else.
* * *
Before I left her, Nicole did remember one more thing to tell me — that F. had another branch office on Jupiter, in Whisker Town. She recalled the address on a faxcard he'd sent her.
This info made me change my plans about going directly back to Mars. It might be well worth my while to take a shot at seeing what I could find on Jupiter.
I vidfaxed Umani and told him to hold the fort until he heard from me. Warned him not to leave his unit. With Esma there I was gambling he'd be okay until I could run down this new lead.
"Be careful, Sammie," Nicole cautioned in a husky after-bed voice. She tickled my nose with one of her exposed nipples. "F. plays for keeps."
"I can handle anything he can throw at me," I said. "Trouble is my middle name."
"I don't believe you," she said.
"Okay, take a look," I showed her my license. She giggled. Then I kissed her and left.
I didn't tell her what the T really stood for. My mother had exercised a wild sense of humor in naming me. Samuel T Space.
T for Temperance.
Nine
I was heading for the Fat Marble. That's what I call Jupiter, and that's the way the planet looks to me, coming in toward it: like a giant fat agate in the black sky. I never liked going there for a lot of reasons. For one, I figure that nobody needs twenty-five billion square miles of anything; the damned planet is just too big for comfort. For another, they haven't yet licked the gravity problem on Jupiter inside the domes, and I hate wearing a contra-gravbelt. But a guy like me, at about 190Earthpounds, would weigh close to 450 on the surface without one. And you can't hop around much at 450.
We were nearly there, so I put my belt on, snapping it into place. I guess what bugged me most about it was that the damn thing always reminded me of how pudgy I was getting around the breadbasket. I needed more exercise; maybe finding F. would provide it.
Nicole's faxcard had listed his Jupiter office address as 129 G-Section, Whisker Town — and that's where I headed after landfall. No use playing paddyfoot; I was going right up to F.'s and beard the lion in his den. Providing the lion was at home.
G-Section was built with future expansion in mind — a midclass nabe of massive spider units, suspended web-fashion from the central citydome. The hollow support cables doubled as tubeways. I took No. 6 and tabbed up slowly toward 129, riding with hundreds of other commuters, a scattering of whom were Martians and fellow-Earthmen. Most were native Jupes, the ambitious little mouse people who made up the bulk of the planet's citizenry.
"Are you a tourist?" one of the mice asked me. He was hatted, suited and toted a small briefbag — a respectable member of the business community.
"Nope," I said. "I'm here for other reasons."
"Having to do with enforcement, I would guess," he piped. "Otherwise, why carry a weapon?"
Being as small as he was, he could look directly up and see the holstered .38 under my coat.
"I'm a licensed detective working a case," I said.
"Oh, how Mickey!"
In Jupetalk, Mickey meant great or wonderful. It tied in with their religion; they worshipped one called the Big Mouse who came first to Earth way back in the 1920s to prepare the way for universal joy. The Mouse was supposed to have created a benevolent Earthling named Walt Disney as his human spokesman. Before the Great Quake, which knocked out the Old West Coast in 2020, this Walt Disney had — so went the legend — built a giant shrine in honor of the Mouse. In a place they called Anaheim. That was how the Sacred Mouse Book told it. But I wasn't much for religious history. Worshipping some ancient rodent seemed pretty dumb to me.
"You wouldn't think what I do was so Mickey if you had to do it," I told him. "I hear you mouse folk don't approve of killing."
"Oh, no," he squeaked, ruffling his neck fur. "The Big Mouse would punish us if we killed. His wrath is genuine and immediate. Yet it is nonetheless exciting, in a perverse manner of speaking, to encounter a bonafide Earth detective. Do you plan on killing anyone here?"
"Maybe," I admitted. "That depends."
"Could I watch?" the mouse asked.
"Hell, no!" I snapped, glaring down at him.
"Just inquiring," said the mouse. His whiskers twitched apologetically. "I meant no offense."
I stepped free of the tube, leaving him to continue upward. I was glad to see him go; the little devil asked too many questions. But I admired his gall. Jupes are tiny but they have plenty of gall.
According to the wallgram, F.'s office was directly ahead, just two tall doors to the left. I tensed, preparing myself for action. My plan was harsh and simple: kick my way inside, .38 in hand, and face F. square-on. If he wasn't there I'd force whoever was there to tell me where I could find him.
Simple.
But things didn't quite happen that way. I had my .38 out, facing the tall door, when a swarm of police mice hit me — at least a dozen of them, squeaking furiously and clubbing my ankles with their small nearwood billies.
I dropped the .38 as pain blazed and exploded up my ankles. Any cop in the System can tell you that a billy on the ankle is damned effective. And a dozen of them, no matter how small, could put the toughest spacer out of action within seconds.
"You are officially under city-state arrest," one of the copmice informed me. He was a squad leader, with dyed neckfur indicating his rank. Several of the other mice had stun weapons aimed at me. "Do yo
u wish to resist?"
Rubbing my sore ankles, I told them hell no I didn't wish to resist. This seemed to disappoint the squad leader; I think he would have enjoyed putting me to sleep. He reminded me of a miniature Sergeant O'Malley.
They quick-marched me back into the tube and we headed for ground level. All twelve of the stern-eyed mice kept their weapons centered on me all the way to the bottom.
Outside the building they had a police vancab waiting. It was a surface vehicle, and large enough to carry Earthlings.
"To enter," directed the squad leader, waving his stungun at me.
I climbed inside, feeling a little ridiculous, and the dozen armed mice joined me for the trip to HQ. The squad leader sat next to the driver, holding my .38 on his lap in a giant zipsack. The gun was larger than he was which made things a bit awkward for him.
Mouse Headquarters was an odd jumble of flat white windowless cubes in a dizzying variety of sizes. If you were a giraffe head from Oberon they had a very tall cube for you; if you were round and squat, as were the slugbellies from Callisto, they had a wide cube to fit; if you were Earthsize they used yet another special cube designed for humans.
I was impressed.
They took away my contra-grav belt after I was seated. My body suddenly seemed gross and massive. Under the crushing pull of Jupiter's raw gravity it took immense effort simply to raise my arm.
The mouse in charge of questioning sat down at a tiny desk facing me. The desk was on a raised platform in line with my nose.
"I'm Police Inspector McFarlin," he told me. He was solemn and gray, with multi-dyed neckfur; he wore thick rimless glasses just above his whiskers. "You are guilty of a very serious crime, Mr. Space."
He prodded my ID papers with a large pair of forceps.
"How can I be guilty of anything? I haven't been given a hearing."
"Unnecessary," he piped. "We dispense with hearings when we have mouse-eye evidence, as in this case. You are clearly guilty of attempted assault with a lethal weapon, combined with potential forced entry." He removed his eyeglasses with a brown paw and regarded me with watery eyes. "Why are you Earth people so violent?"
He didn't expect an answer to that and I didn't have one for him. Instead, I asked him a question that had been rankling me. "How did you know I'd be there? Did that nosy bizmouse I talked to in the tube turn in a police alarm?"
"No, he did not," said McFarlin. "You needn't concern yourself with who tipped us. Suffice to say that we had prior warning that you were on your way to the site. We were, of course, helpless in a legal sense until you pulled out your weapon. This gave us full authority to move in and arrest you."
I wondered if Nicole had set me up. Again. It didn't scan otherwise. No one else knew the address I was headed for. Had she given me another con? I wasn't sure. But I'd find out.
"As to my weapon," I declared, "I have an in-date solar permit to carry my .38 and it's legal anywhere in the System. I had good reason to believe that a dangerous criminal — a murderer — was inside that office and I felt fully justified in apprehending him by force."
"You were ill-informed, unwise and extremely impulsive in a destructive sense of the term," the mouse said coldly. "You were acting well beyond your licensed authority." He laced his paws in front of him, peering intently at me. "And just who is this dangerous criminal?"
"I wish I could tell you. His name begins with F."
The Inspector mouse-clucked at me. "And is that all you know about him?"
"I know he's ruthless. I know he tried to have me done away with and that he hired professional Loonies to kill Dr. Emmanuel Q. Umani on Mars."
"But you don't even know his last name?" The tone in the tiny voice was heavily sarcastic.
"I was about to find out when you cop mice swarmed all over me," I growled. "I was hitting one of his branch offices."
"That branch office, the one you were about to ‘hit' with your deadly weapon in hand, belongs to one of the most respected citizens of the System."
"And who would that be?"
"Ronfoster Kane of Mercury."
"The Robot King?"
"Precisely. The entire robo force of Pluto lies under his direct control. We wouldn't be eating Zubu eggs today were it not for Ronfoster Kane!"
"I hate Zubu eggs," I said.
"That is wholly beside the point," said McFarlin.
"Maybe F. and this Kane are in cahoots," I suggested.
"I am not familiar with the term."
"Maybe they're tied together somehow," I said. "F. sent a faxcard from Kane's office, using that address. How do you account for it?"
The mouse had reached the end of his patience. "I do not have to account for anything," he declared. "But you do, sir. To suggest that Ronfoster Kane is in any way connected with murder is simply outrageous. Why, he developed all of the robot Moonsaints — a most holy and respected group."
"Whomping up tin saints doesn't make him one," I snapped. "I'm going to have me a little talk with Mr. Kane."
The mouse shook his head. "Not after Minnie is through with you."
"Who's Minnie?"
"She's the key to your future, Mr. Space." The Inspector chuckled softly and stroked his neckfur. His black eyes shone behind the thick glasses. "We shall retain your weapon as a legal curiosity — as you'll have no further use for it."
"Hey, I don't think —"But the mouse had touched a section of his desk and the floor of the cube suddenly dropped away. "Go in peace!" he said. I felt myself falling into darkness … into unconsciousness. I woke up inside Minnie.
Ten
I was flat on my back on a hard metallic surface. Sitting up was a job without the contra-grav belt, and it took some doing, but I made it, feeling like the fat woman in an Earth circus.
It was dark but the darkness was shot with eyes — countless winking lights which danced and sparkled from the walls. Sounds filled the chamber; clacking, buzzing, rasping, clicking, giant-bee sounds. And I could smell lubricants and fluids.
It was a machine, and I was in its bowels.
But what kind of machine?
Hello, there, Sam, it said. My name is Minnie.
Not said. Not aloud. The words were fired directly into my brain; the machine could read thoughts and answer them internally.
"Why am I in here?" I asked. "And what are you going to do with me?"
You must not speak aloud, the machine said. Your voice is grating and unpleasant.
Okay, I'd play Minnie's game. I mentally repeated both questions.
You are here because you broke the law. You did so because you are mentally defective. As to what I intend to do with you: I intend to cure you.
How?
I shall simply erase all aggressive impulses and thoughts from your mind, substituting non-aggressive impulses and thoughts.
A brainwash. McFarlin had sent me down here for a lousy brain-wash. A crummy little mouse with dyed neck-fur was going to put my thinker on the fritz!
You see, said Minnie. That's just what we wish to protect you against — angry, violent thoughts regarding inspector McFarlin, Mr. Kane and your other neighbors in the System. Such thoughts can only harm you and those around you. I shall remove them.
And she did.
Minnie's interior humming rose to a shriek. I felt metallic vibrations enter my body, my brain. Red and yellow fire seemed to bloom within my head. Colors fireworked before my eyes.
The vibrations diminished, died away. The fire and the wheeling colors sparked to black inside my skull. I was aware of the normal humming sounds of Minnie's interior.
I blinked, swallowed, ran my tongue over my dry lips. My heart had been pounding; now the pounding slowed, became regular. My pulse slowed, evened. I sighed.
How do you feel, Sam?
Fine, Minnie. I feel just fine.
That's nice. Isn't it nice to feel fine?
Everything is nice, I told her. I am nice. You are nice.
It is nice to be sitting here
inside you. It is nice to be visiting your friendly planet. And all mice are nice.
I chuckled at my little rhyme.
Are you happy, Sam?
I am very happy, Minnie.
And what do you wish to do?
Nothing at all. I wish to do nothing.
But every member of the System does something.
Anything. I'll do anything. I smiled at all of Minnie's pretty lights.
That's nice to hear, Sam. I'm going to send you back topside where you'll be gainfully employed. Won't that be nice?
Very nice. That will be very nice, Minnie. It is very nice of you to help me.
It is my duty and my pleasure to help anyone in the System who is entrusted to me. You are a very nice man.
That's nice, I said.
And Minnie sent me topside.
* * *
I don't remember much of what happened after that until I got to Pluto. My new job on Pluto was helping the work robots find Zubu eggs.
"Look," said a large freckled scaly creature, speaking to me during my first workperiod, "I'm a Zubu and I've got a lot of problems. First of all, I don't know whether I'm a fish or whether I'm a bird — and I'm not sure what sex I am. That's for openers."
"Yes," I said. "I'm listening."
"Well, I think I'm both male and female which would explain the fact that I never seem to have any fun with other Zubus. That is to say, I seem to impregnate myself and fertilize my own eggs."
"Please continue," I urged.
"Fine. Next, I go to one heck of a lot of trouble hiding these eggs of mine. There's a lot of work and time involved."
"I'm sure there is," I said.
"Not to mention intensive thought and exacting location selection. No sooner do I finally hide the last of my eggs than you people come along and go around digging them up. It's downright depressing. Believe me, it just adds to my basic insecurity and sexual maladjustment."
"I don't know what to tell you," I said to the freckled fishbird, or birdfish. "I just work here."
"It's no good talking to a work robot." The creature whistled sadly. "They're round and shiny and have metal heads and lack sensitivity to Zubu problems. The minute I saw you I said to myself: he's different. I could see right away that you were not round and shiny and metal-headed. I figured I could really talk to you about my situation."
Space For Hire (Seven For Space) Page 5