Undercity - eARC

by Catherine Asaro

  Lavinda sipped her mug of kava. “You are an inordinately difficult person to find, Major.”

  “My apology.” Normally I would have given her my spiel about why I needed secrecy, but I had told Chief Takkar I would be available and then I had gone shrouded. Lavinda had good reason for her annoyance.

  However, she said only, “Takkar is concerned about the violence you think might break out in the aqueducts.”

  Interesting. Most people in Cries said “the slums.” Aqueducts or canals were the names we used ourselves. “The cartels have been fighting for generations,” I said. “With Scorch’s weapons, they can ramp up their battles.”

  “It would help to know where they plan to fight.”

  “I don’t know.” Which was true. I had no idea.

  Lavinda sounded frustrated. “We getting nowhere in tracking those stolen guns.”

  “Don’t laser carbines have chips you can trace?”

  “That depends.” She tapped her finger against her mug. “We assumed they were part of several shipments that disappeared last year, but tracing the chips in those carbines only led us to junk heaps. The smugglers had cut out the chips and thrown them in the waste.”

  Okay. This was my opening. “I’m not convinced these guns came from an offworld smuggling ring.”

  She was studying me closely. “Why not?”

  Why indeed. I couldn’t accuse an ISC officer without evidence, and I had none against Braze that wouldn’t also implicate Jak. I chose my words with care. “I would suggest you do a search on chips for gun shipments that originated in Cries. Not stolen shipments, but weapons properly sent and supposedly delivered to military bases.” The crates in the cavern had been recent issue. “Something within the last year.”

  Her voice turned icy. “Just exactly what are you implying?”

  “I’m not implying anything,” I said. “It’s a suggestion. If it comes to nothing, that’s all for the better.” It would mean either Braze was smarter than I gave her credit for and had covered her tracks, or else I was an idiot with a stupid idea.

  Lavinda took another swallow of her kava. I could almost feel her mind pressing against mine. I kept my thoughts shuttered.

  After a moment, the colonel quit trying to spy on my mind, or at least the pressure receded. She set her mug on the table. “Anything else, Major?”

  “Probably nothing,” I said. “It looks like Scorch was also dealing fake drugs.”

  “Challenging the other cartels?” Dryly she said, “They probably wanted her dead, too.”

  That was the logical conclusion, but I didn’t think so. “She wasn’t dealing anything worth their time, I don’t think. Just a phony designer drug. Supposedly it made some kids act crazy, but the only person I know who actually tried it told me that it had no effect at all.”

  “I’ll note it in our files.” She sounded preoccupied, still concerned with of smuggling and military treason rather than more minor issues. “Does this fake drug have a name?”

  “I’m not sure,” I said. “I heard it called node-bliss.”

  Lavinda froze, all of her attention suddenly on me. “What did you say?”

  “Node-bliss.” I didn’t know what to make of her response. “Apparently it’s slang for a drug called phorine.”

  “Gods almighty,” she said. “Who the bloody hell is taking it?”

  Her reaction hardly fit the legendary Majda restraint. “I’m not sure. The gangs maybe. Does it matter? From what I heard, it doesn’t do anything.”

  She set her mug on the table and stood up. I watched her pace across the room. It had no windows, so when she reached a parchment wall painted with birds in red and gold plumage, she turned to me. “Thank you, Major. I will let you know if we need any more information.”

  Yah, right. I got up and stalked over to her. “I can’t do the job you hired me to do if you hold back information.”

  Lavinda pushed her hand through her hair, mussing up the short locks. “You have no idea.”

  “So give me one.”

  “Phorine is a neural relaxant.”

  “I know that. I have no idea what it means.”

  “It affects a neurotransmitter called psiamine.” She looked as if she were debating whether or not to continue. But she did go on. “It’s an amino acid that psions carry. Psiamine allows psions to interpret the signals they receive from the brain waves of other people. The stronger the psion, the more phorine affects them. If she had given it to Dayj, the euphoria would have been almost unbearable and the withdrawal would probably have killed him.”

  “Good gods. Is he all right?”

  “Yes, fine.” More quietly, she added, “His body showed no trace of drugs.”

  “How is he?” One normally didn’t ask after Majda princes, but she had brought him up.

  “He is well.” In a less formal voice, she said, “Happy, actually. He’s more excited about college than any of us would have imagined. Parthonia University has agreed to admit him, contingent on his placement exams.” She seemed bemused. “He is studying for them. It looks like he might do quite well. I’d never realized he spent so much time educating himself.”

  “I’m glad he’s doing better.” Another understatement. “As for the phorine, it might just be a rumor that Scorch was selling it.”

  “You said these rumors claimed people went crazy. What does that mean?”

  “I’ve no clue.” They were paying me to have a clue, but trying to fool them wouldn’t achieve anything useful.

  “Maybe they were in withdrawal,” Lavinda said.

  “It seems unlikely,” I said. “They’d have to be psions. We’re talking about people in the undercity here, not aristocrats with psi abilities or Abaj Tacalique warriors.”

  Lavinda rubbed her eyes, making no attempt to hide her fatigue. She seemed more willing to admit vulnerability than her sister, the General of the Pharaoh’s Army. Lowering her arm, she said, “You’re right, here on Raylicon the Kyle traits have survived mostly in the aristocracy and the Abaj. Those are our two most inbred populations. The royal Houses deliberately select for Kyle genes. That’s one reason Dayj was betrothed to Roca Skolia. They’re both powerful psions.”

  “And the Abaj Tacalique?”

  “They don’t reproduce,” Lavinda said. “They clone themselves. They’ve been doing it for centuries. It’s kept the Kyle traits strong in their gene pool.” After a pause, she added, “It’s also why they are dying out. It’s difficult to clone psions.”

  I spoke wryly. “The last time I looked, I didn’t see any aristocrats or Abaj warriors hanging around the aqueducts.”

  Lavinda smiled slightly, but then she stopped and stared at me. “Hell and damnation.”

  I blinked. “What?”

  “Who does live in the undercity? The only other population on Raylicon that has been inbred for generations. Gods, maybe even millennia.”

  “You think we’re breeding psions?” I felt silly even saying the words. “That can’t be.”

  “Maybe not,” she said. “But it’s the population we missed, the one that until recently my people barely knew existed.”

  I didn’t want to open up to her; it went against every grain of my undercity heart. But this was too important. “Children live there, run together, grow up, fall in love. They never leave. Adults find jobs in the aqueducts rather than in Cries. We’ve been having children for as long as Cries has existed, never mixing with the above-city.” Had we unknowingly been producing the most sought after human resource known, the psions the Imperialate needed to survive?

  “Never leaving,” she murmured.

  I didn’t need telepathy to know her thought. “No,” I said. “You can’t go kidnapping our children or putting the adults in jail.”

  “Jail?” She seemed baffled. “No one is going to kidnap or imprison anyone, assuming they aren’t breaking the law. We can help your people, bring them to live here in the city proper.”

  Now when we might have
something they wanted, suddenly they cared. Screw that. “My people don’t want to live in Cries. If you try to force it, they will fight you.” I felt tired. “Colonel, we need to reach out to them. Let them choose. Make them want to come forward.”

  “Would they?”

  It surprised me how easily she switched gears. Most Cries authorities would have reiterated their right to do what they wanted in the undercity. She asked a good question, and I wasn’t sure I had an answer. After a moment, I said, “The aqueducts work on a barter system.” Thievery, too, but that was better left out of this discussion. “My people won’t take anything they perceive as charity. If we could find an exchange they could relate to, some might agree to Kyle testing.”

  She regarded me warily. “What sort of exchange?”

  That was easy. “Food. Especially meat. That’s hard to come by in the aqueducts.” We could grow plants by modifying the dust and filtering water, but animals rarely survived down there. Humans were the only ones, and we weren’t making such a great go of matters.

  “You mean, offer them a meal?” She seemed bemused by the idea of food as currency.

  “That’s right.” I doubted the gangs, riders, or punkers would trust such an agreement, but adults with children might agree.

  “And then?”

  “They let you test them. That’s the bargain.”

  “I mean, after the tests.” She considered me. “You say your people don’t want charity, but everything else you say implies they need aid. So how do we give that aid?”

  Good gods. Another offer to help. Although I resented that it took the possibility of psions in the undercity to stir her interest to this level, she had asked, and that mattered. I had promised her before that I would think about her questions. So how did I answer? I knew best what had worked for me. It wasn’t for everyone, but it might offer a start.

  “You could invite them to enlist,” I said. “A few might take you up on it.”

  “We welcome recruits,” Lavinda said. “What would encourage more to join?”

  I paused, unsure how much to say. This could be a minefield. “If the army didn’t make it so prohibitive for us.”

  Lavinda frowned at me. “We treat everyone the same. You came from the undercity and ended up as an officer. If others are willing to work hard, they can better themselves as well.”

  Yah, right. “If you think I was treated like everyone else, you’re naïve.”

  Her voice cooled. “Take care, Major.”

  “With what?” I knew I should be cautious, but my old anger stirred. “The truth? I was ridiculed, humiliated, overlooked, given the worst of every assignment, and told I was worthless at every juncture. The only reason I succeeded is because I’m a cussed stubborn bullhead who would rather die trying than let them win. That’s your egalitarian army, Colonel.”

  Incredibly, she didn’t fire me for mouthing off. Instead she said, “So your army records say.”

  I blinked. “They do?”

  “You never give up. That’s one reason Vaj hired you.”

  I had nothing to say to that.

  She spoke quietly. “Major, let us try this one step at a time.”

  “What do you suggest?”

  “Just bring a few people in for testing. Let’s see if anyone shows signs of the Kyle traits.”

  I wished this didn’t feel like Let’s see if your people have value to mine. Still, we needed to know if that value existed. Otherwise Cries could take advantage of us, rounding up psions the way they rounded up our children, except they would hang onto the psions much more tightly. If we became savvier, however, our value could become our currency. We could truly bargain with Cries.

  I said only, “I thought psions were too rare to show up in a small sample.”

  “Very rare,” Lavinda said. “The incidence of empaths in the general population is about one on a thousand. Telepaths are one in a million.” After a moment, she added, “Prince Dayj’s ability is one in a billion.”

  No wonder they protected him so fiercely. “Then why bother testing only a few people?”

  “Their DNA can tell us a great deal. Kyle mutations are recessive. People often carry them without showing any traits.”

  Ah. I saw where she was going now. “So if the genes are more common in the undercity population, that implies psions are, too.”

  The colonel nodded. “A difference of even one percent would be like finding a mother lode.”

  That sounded like they were mining for ore. “They’re people. Not a resource.”

  “Yes.” She spoke quietly. “Major, I only want to do a few tests. They aren’t invasive. As an exchange, we can offer a meal and a health check. Food, water, and medical help if they need it.”

  It was a reasonable bargain. I pushed back my natural distrust enough to say, “I’ll see what I can do.” No one would come to Cries for testing, but maybe I could figure out some workable compromise. This bargain might fall apart in mutual distrust, but we could at least try.

  One step at a time.

  XVII

  Braze

  Vice never stopped its wheels, not even with rumors of a drug war rustling through the whisper mill. Jak’s casino was full to bursting tonight. I stood at a rail overlooking the main room and watched people in glittery clothes lose obscene amounts of money. Waiters eased their way among the crowd, serving drinks, food, and who knew what else. Bartenders listened to the woes of patrons who were tired of gambling, and exotic dancers gyrated in discreet alcoves. In the private rooms, some of those dancers were probably earning their pay in more intimate ways. Jak kept the lights dim, except for the shimmering walls and laser-drop drinks.

  “Braze is here,” a voice said at my side.

  I looked up as Jak joined me at the rail. “Where?”

  He indicated a table across the room. A holographic roulette sphere rotated in the air above the table, the orb filled with bouncing holo-balls. A brawny woman with muscular arms and a florid face was sitting at the table.

  “Idiot,” I muttered.

  “That’s rather ungracious,” Jak murmured. “Braze is one of my favorite customers.”

  “Yah, because she’s playing holo-roulette.” I scowled at him. “I mean, come on, even a baby knows you can program that wheel to do whatever you want.”

  “I can’t speak for the intellect of my customers,” he purred. “I can only express my appreciation for their patronage.”

  “Aren’t you the gracious one.” Listening to him, you’d think his customers were contributing to a fund that supported the arts rather than losing their shirt to an undercity king of thieves.

  His smile faded as he watched Braze place a bet at the table. A young man with a long gold fork scooped up Braze’s glittering chip and deposited it in a niche on the table. The handsome fellow wore tight clothes that did nothing to hide his well-built physique, providing an effective distraction to the women at the table, including Braze, who was seated closest to him. She was going over the line, however, leering at him, patting his hip, making comments. The youth reddened, but kept doing his job, spinning the holo sphere above the table.

  Jak spoke into the comm in his wrist gauntlet. “Get someone over there and make sure she leaves him alone. No touching. If she keeps it up, take her away from the table.”

  A man’s voice came out of the comm. “Got it, boss.”

  “Is Braze always that bad?” I asked after Jak thumbed off his comm.

  “Yah,” he muttered. “Someday I’m gonna kick her butt out of here.”

  So far this Braze hadn’t struck me as someone bright enough to become an ISC commander. Either she had skills that weren’t obvious or else she had some damn good connections.

  “Gourd says Braze has a lot of contacts,” I said.

  “I’ve been checking,” Jak said. “Looks like she knew Scorch.”

  “Think she realizes we suspect her?”

  “I doubt it. I haven’t said anything. You’re the only o
ther one who knows.”

  “I told Lavinda Majda.” As Jak tensed, I added, “I only said I thought the stolen shipments originated on Raylicon. I didn’t give names or reasons.”

  He scowled at me. “You’re walking a narrow edge, Bhaaj.”

  “I have to. It’s important.”

  “Why?”

  “Node-bliss.”

  “What about it? The stuff is useless.”

  “Hardly. It’s a Kyle drug. It only affects psions.”

  “Oh.” After a moment, he added, “Well, I already knew I wasn’t one.”

  “You said some kids took it and went crazy.”

  “Whisper says. Maybe it’s true. Maybe not.”

  “I need to talk to them.”

  “You think we got empaths down here?”

  “Maybe.”

  He took a moment to digest that thought. “I’ll try to find them. I can’t make any promises.”

  “Fair enough.”

  After that, we watched Braze gamble and get drunk. She was settling in for a long night.

  * * *

  The soup kitchen wasn’t actually called a soup kitchen. The sign on the front said Concourse Recreation Center. It wasn’t a bad name. If they had called it anything that suggested charity, no one from the aqueducts would ever come here. Rec Center was nice and bland.

  Watching Braze lose money had grown boring, so I left the Black Mark and went in search of the soup kitchen. Dig claimed the police ran this place, looking to lure in drug punkers so they could arrest them. I had no idea if that were actually true, but it didn’t sound far-fetched. Even if the people here had no ulterior motives, my people would assume they did.

  When I touched a panel by the entrance, the tall door swung inward. I walked into a large room, more of a hall, really. Tables were scattered to my right with a few game slates on them, and bedrolls lay piled against the wall. On my left, counters stretched out cafeteria style. Most were empty, but one had fresh vegetables on ice and hot food steaming in a few slots. Several rows of waters bottles stood on another counter. This was all free? Someone needed to kick some sense into the undercity. Charity or not, this looked worthwhile.