Caveat Fuzzy

by Wolfgang Diehr

  Coombes shrugged. “It’s less of a mouthful than the People of the Colony of Zarathustra versus Holloway and Kellogg. Sort of. Even Victor calls it that, now.”

  “Speaking of the great Victor Grego, how did you two meet?” Gus asked.

  Coombes considered the question before answering, then shrugged. “I was working for Page-Nicholson-Hautmann and Lee at the time. I was one of a team of lawyers trying to block a Terra-Baldur-Marduk Spacelines takeover of Preston-Lane, Inc. Well, the lead attorney came down with the flu and I got handed the job of presenting our case to the judges. I tossed out the argument my boss had written and winged it.”

  Gus grimaced. “Got your head handed to you, eh?”

  Coombes shook his head. “Nope. Nailed it. Won the argument, blocked the takeover and was fired.”

  “Fired? You won!”

  “Page-Nicholson-Hautmann and Lee doesn’t care for showboaters. But before the ink on my pink slip was dry, I got a call from Victor Grego offering me a job. He was in the courtroom when I won the case and liked my style.”

  “Wait, didn’t he work for Terra-Baldur-Marduk Spacelines at the time? You beat him and he wanted to hire you?”

  Coombes smiled. “Victor doesn’t waste energy holding grudges or plotting revenge. If he wins, he’s magnanimous to the losers. If he loses, he picks up his marbles and starts a new game.” Coombes looked Gus straight in the eye and said, “He never blamed the Fuzzies or you or Jack for the loss of the charter. He was rather embarrassed about his actions up to that point, though. When Victor is wrong, he owns up to it and respects others for doing the same. Mostly, he respects ability and talent, even when they’re used against him. Especially when they’re used against him.”

  Gus was about to ask another question when one of the plain-clothes cops ran up to him and Coombes. “Piet says that there is nobody home, but there is a computer with a lot of research data on it. He also found a secret storage space under the bar. Its empty, but he wants to know if you want to come in and take a look.”

  “Hell-fire and damnation, absolutely not! Just ask him to download as much as he can to a mini-backup, if he has one, and get the Nifflheim out of there.”

  “Have Mr. Slade give a recorded verbal consent, first,” Coombes added. He glanced at Gus and added, “It couldn’t hurt.”

  “Yes, sir!” The cop spun around and practically ran back into the house.

  A tapping sound behind Gus drew his attention. Max waved them back into the aircar.

  “Should we wait for Thaxter to come back and try to nab him, or what?” the Marshal asked.

  “What do you suggest, Max,” Gus questioned.

  “Set up some discreet live cameras around the perimeter and have two man-teams keep an eye on the place a few miles from here. I think we could find an empty cabin to use as an observation post. We don’t want our pigeon spotting the unmarked car and slipping away.”

  Gus nodded. It sounded like a solid plan to him.

  “Why not just post a couple of men inside with sono-stunners and bag him when he comes home?” Coombes asked, though he again knew the answer.

  “Because we’re walking a fine line, legally, as it is,” the Marshal explained. “If it turns out that this isn’t Thaxter’s place, and to be honest, I don’t believe that for a Freyan second, then massive quantities of damnthing droppings will hit a very large fan. I would rather not be standing in front of that fan when it hits.”

  Coombes nodded. “Agreed. Can we chance at least one camera inside the cabin?”

  Gus shook his head. “Definitely need a warrant for that, even if Clancy allowed it. It isn’t really his place and we all know it. A legal fiction will only stretch so far. If it is Thaxter’s place, even as an escaped con, he still has certain rights.”

  “And sometimes I’d like to strangle the left-wing libertarians who instituted those rights,” Max growled, “but these are the cards we have to play.”

  “Well, I’ll be glad to get back to my day job once I finish prosecuting your kidnappers, Gus. All this police work is too complicated. Give me a good tort any day.”

  * * * * * * * * *

  Ivan Dane watched the replay of the news with a look that could only be described as unholy glee. The photos he bought from the CZC employee were worth every centi-sol of the five thousand sols he had paid for them. Those photos had been the center of the news report on Fuzzy Astronauts B.I.N. ran at 1800 hours, followed by another editorial on the incompetence of the Colonial Governor and possibly even criminal collusion between the Governor himself and the Charterless Zarathustra Company. The editorial ended with a demand for a recall vote. Dane couldn’t help enjoying the broadcast. Even the storming entrance of Brandon Murdock wouldn’t shake his moment of triumph.

  “Five thousand sols?” Murdock said without preamble. “When do we start seein’ a return on this—what did ya call it—investment?”

  Dane pointed at the screen. “Right there. The public will see these photographs and automatically jump to the conclusion that those are the pilots of that rocket. And since those appear to be the oversized skeletal remains of a trio of Fuzzies….” He let the sentence dangle waiting for Murdock to finish it.

  “Then Fuzzies are from another planet an’ this ain’t a Class IV inhabited world,” finished Murdock. “Yah, I get it. An’ why didn’t ya just use pictures of the bones we got downstairs instead of payin’ someone else?”

  Dane resisted the temptation to pound his head on his desk. “How have you survived so long with such minimal mental resources?”

  “Ya want I should show ya?” Murdock raised a hairy fist and took a step towards Dane.

  Dane held up one of his hands in a placating gesture while the other surreptitiously reached for the gun he kept in a holster under the desk. “I’ll explain. If we used the photos of our own skeleton in the basement, we would have to be able to account for its existence and our access to it. We can’t do that without ending up in jail. Are you with me so far? Good. Three sets of Fuzzy bones are more convincing than just one set, anyway.”

  “’Kay.” Murdock dropped the fist and took a seat.

  Dane took his hand off the gun with an inward sigh of relief. “Now we have, as far as the viewing public is concerned, proof positive that Fuzzies are from another planet. We are one very large step closer to running this world. Stop counting five and ten centi-sols and keep your eye on the big picture.”

  Murdock thought about the situation. “’Kay, your smarter than me. I wouldn’t be following you if ya wasn’t, but watch the insults. Ya can’t stop my fist with your brains.”

  Actually, I just did, Dane thought.

  “So what’s next?”

  Dane smiled. “We hire a local law firm with a certain, ah, flexible morality, and start them working on proving that the current government is illegal and should be disbanded, then hire a political machine to set up the reformation party. I already have petitions on the street demanding a recall vote for the governorship. That requires twenty thousand signatures, but we can get a fair chunk of that in Junktown alone. We’ll also have to make sure that the Company doesn’t get its old charter back, but that should be simple enough.”

  “More cash out the air lock,” Murdock growled. “I thought ya was some hot-shot shyster. Why don’t ya do all the legal stuff?”

  “Oh, I will be involved, of that you may rest assured, but no one man could possibly manage all that paperwork and research, not to mention typing up and filing motions, presenting briefs and bribing clerks. Besides, I have B.I.N. to run, and the greater plan to keep on track. Now, just for variety, did you have something else to talk about besides money well spent?”

  Murdock glared for a second, then relaxed and shifted in his seat. “Yah, I do. Laporte has vanished an’ the cops are tearin’ Mallorysport apart lookin’ for him.”

  Dane leaned forward. “Indeed? Any word on why?”

  “Word on the street is he got mixed up in the Brannhard kidna
ppin’.”

  And Rainsford was out for blood. The Colonial Governor had enacted some rather bloodthirsty laws to protect the Fuzzies. Imagine what could happen to anybody involved with hurting one of his friends.

  “This is both a problem and an opportunity for us, Murdock.”

  The thug raised an eyebrow. “How so?”

  “If the police manage to capture Raul Laporte, he could be encouraged to explain how we extracted Leo Thaxter from Prison House, even though we managed to do so without his direct assistance. That would be unfortunate. On the other hand, his sudden disappearance creates a vacuum, one we could fill.”

  “How so?” Murdock repeated.

  Not for the first time Dane wondered how Murdock had escaped incarceration for so long. “Think about it. Thaxter is gone off-planet somewhere. Bowlby is dead and gone. Laporte is now out of the picture. That leaves Spike Heenan as the last remaining crime boss on Zarathustra. And Spike is a pushover compared to Laporte or Thaxter.”

  “How do ya know so much about Spike?” Murdock asked. “In fact, ya seem to know a helluva lot about this planet an’ the people we deal with for somebody who just got here two months ago.”

  “Research, Murdock,” Dane said. “Now, you go and have a talk with Spike. Take some of your people with you. You’ve had two months to work with them, so you should know who you can rely on. Let Spike know who is running things, now. Oh, and while you are at it, I understand a number of new prostitution rings have opened up. Find out who is running them and bring them to heel.” Dane thought for a second, then added, “And have a few samples of their wares sent over for…inspection.”

  Murdock nodded and left the office. Whatever his faults, he knew how to find things out and get things done in the underworld. Dane was confident that Murdock would handle things discreetly and effectively. Granted, a few people might come up missing—more fuel for the M/E converter—but that was all omelets and eggs.

  Dane leaned back in his chair and wondered how he might get control of The Bitter End now that the owner of record had vanished. He would have to look into that.

  XVII

  The five men stepped out of the egg-shaped shuttle and were welcomed by Captain Zeudin and Thor Folkvar. John Morgan, Ben Rainsford, Gerd van Riebeek, Victor Grego and Gus Brannhard shook each man’s hand in turn.

  “Nice little ship you have here,” Gus said.

  “Thanks. I won it in a poker game.”

  Grego, Rainsford and Gus looked surprised.

  Morgan laughed. “That was a joke. Actually, I had it custom-ordered on Terra after I hit the ten billion sol mark in my liquid assets about twelve years ago. I put it to work as a luxury liner until it paid for itself, then remodeled it for cargo transport and exploration.”

  “You haul a lot of cargo,” asked Grego. “Like what?”

  “Well, the big money was in hauling foodstuffs from Freya and Terra to Yggdrasil, but I also moved furs, precious metals, manufactured goods, fissionables…pretty much everything at one point or another. One time I was paid an obscene amount of money to transport some convicted criminals from Fenris to Terra. I can’t say any more about that, though. It was very hush-hush. I never even found out what they were convicted of.”

  Grego noted that Morgan wasn’t speaking as a man bragging about his accomplishments; he was simply relaying the facts.

  “Sir, if I may interrupt,” the Captain spoke up, “Johann and the others are very anxious to know what you’ve accomplished here.”

  “Quite right, Captain. Gentlemen, if you will follow me.”

  Rainsford dropped back a bit to walk with Grego. “Victor, you said the man was rich, but you didn’t say he was this well off. His own spaceship? How much does a craft like this go for?”

  “More than you’ll make in your lifetime, Ben, if you stay honest,” Grego said. “Actually, I could afford a model like this if I cashed out some of my own Company stock, but it would be an unnecessary extravagance. No point since I am quite content to stay on Zarathustra and not go gadding about the universe.”

  The group piled into the cargo elevator as the standard lift would not accommodate seven people comfortably, especially with Gus Brannhard and Thor Folkvar in the party. They stepped off a moment later on second level. Ben Rainsford was immediately drawn to the live animal pens and cages. He recognized the various species by reputation alone. One pen held two oukrey, a male and female. A glass-enclosed cage next to the oukrey held at least a dozen kholphs; it was impossible to get an exact count as the quasi-primates were leaping and moving all about.

  Every cage and pen held a representative of Freyan fauna save one. The last pen held three Terran horses, one stallion and two mares. Rainsford was especially fascinated by the animals from his home planet. Like most humans, he had never seen a live horse before.

  Gerd, having looked at all of the living specimens, was then drawn to the cryogenic units. Each was labeled as holding the frozen embryos of this or that species. One was marked as containing horse embryos.

  “Are you planning on duplicating Freya’s ecosystem on Zarathustra?” Grego asked. “Pretty big project, Morgan. You’ll need a fairly large crew to run something like that.”

  “If ever I heard a cue, that was it.” Morgan turned to Thor and nodded. Thor crossed the hold and went through a door. “Gentlemen, what you are about to see may seem a bit startling. Let me assure you that the people you are about to meet are intelligent, not dangerous, and very much in need of our help.”

  Gerd, Gus, Grego and Rainsford steeled themselves for what they might see. Thoughts of a new sapient species, horribly disfigured refugees, illegal cloning subjects or even unrecorded mutations went through their minds. Those possibilities were still going through their minds when several, for lack of a better term, creatures entered the room with Thor Folkvar.

  The beings were short by Terran standards. The tallest could not have been more than five feet six inches tall, barely reaching Thor’s chest. The shortest, a female, stood around five feet. The height didn’t even register on the four men.

  The first things to catch their attention were the faces and the heads in general. The heads were large in proportion to the bodies. Rainsford took in the entire picture and thought he was looking at recreated Neanderthal men and women until he realized the foreheads were too pronounced, not sloping backwards as Neanderthal skull fossils indicated. The lantern-like jaws, while large, were within the human norm.

  Gerd was impressed with the extreme musculature of the creatures. Even standing next to Thor, an impressive specimen of human muscular development, they looked incredibly overdeveloped. These were people who had spent uncounted years at hard physical labor. The large one in the forefront looked as though he could beat any three men at arm wrestling and not break a sweat.

  Gus was rather taken by the fact that every one of the creatures was as hairy as he. Even the females. Hair running the spectrum from strawberry blonde to platinum covered almost every visible inch of skin. The group was dressed in shorts and short-sleeved shirts displaying the hirsute arms and legs of each member.

  Grego, after a cursory examination of the creatures, locked onto the CMC logo stenciled on the left breast pocket of each of their shirts. The Chartered Magni Cooperative was best known for its mining interests and ore processing. Grego, as a businessman, kept abreast of news on competing companies as well as those he personally invested in.

  “These are miners from Magni, yes?” Grego asked.

  “Jawohl, mein Herr,” said the largest one next to Thor. “I apologize, I meant to say, ‘yes, sir.’”

  Gerd was visibly surprised. “You speak German? Woher kommen Sie?”

  “Wir sind auf Magni geboren, aber wir stammen von Freya,” replied the large male.

  “Wait, my German is a little rusty but I caught Magni and Freya in that exchange,” Rainsford said.

  “Gerd, how about a translation for the German-impaired?” Gus asked.

  “Ver
zeihung,” That is, my apologies,” the large male said. “I was explaining that my clan is from Magni, but our Großväter, ehh, grandfathers came from Freya. Ach, my manners. I am Johann Torsseus. I understand one of you is the Gouverneur…eh, what is the word…?”

  “Governor,” Gerd supplied.

  “Ja, danke,” Johann nodded. “Der…eh, the Governor of this world.”

  “That would be me.” Rainsford stepped forward and extended a hand. “Welcome to Zarathustra, Mr…Herr Torsseus. Please, call me Ben.”

  Johann accepted the hand and shook it with a firm grip. Rainsford got the impression that Johann was being very careful not to crush his hand.

  “Danke. Call me Johann, bitte.”

  Taking their cue from Rainsford, Gerd, Gus and Grego moved forward and introduced themselves and also offered their hands. Morgan noticed that Gus winced a bit as one of the males shook his hand. Introductions were made all around.

  “So your family came from Freya?” Rainsford said. “I didn’t know they had two sapient species….”

  “They don’t,” Gus interrupted. He looked about at the newcomers and shook his head. “Don’t you get it?”

  Rainsford looked puzzled for a moment, then his face cleared in shock. “Wait! Somebody did this to you? Great Ghu, how could anybody…?”

  “Ben,” Grego interrupted. “A little tact, please.”

  “It is not offensive to us, Herr Grego,” Johann said. “We know what was done to us. Or rather, to our ancestors. We were changed to be more effective workers in the mines.”

  Gus was too nauseated to speak for several minutes. The idea that anybody could do something like that to the most beautiful humanoids in the known galaxy was beyond endurance.

  “Gentlemen, let’s adjourn to the lounge where we can discuss this in a more comfortable setting,” John Morgan suggested.

  He led the pack back to the cargo lift and escorted them to First level. Once off the lift, the group moved down a hallway where they passed two Thorans and an Ulleran.

  Morgan, noticing the furtive glances at the alien crewmembers, said, “I hire for ability, not appearance or planet of origin.”