House of the Sun

by Nigel Findley

I sighed. Corporators. I should have known better than to try and run a bluff. I raised my hands in mock surrender. "Okay, okay, you've got me."

  Barnard paused. Then he said quietly, "You know, I would rather you take this matter on voluntarily."

  "Why?"

  He paused again—longer, this time. "Do you want the truth, Mr. Montgomery?"

  "If it wouldn't strain you too much."

  His expression changed. Not quite a smile, but something very close. "Because I respect you, Mr. Montgomery. And further, I like you."

  He waited, as if he expected me to come back with some hard-hooped rejoinder. I always like being unpredictable, so I kept my trap zipped. Eventually, he smiled, his "business" smile again. "You know, Mr. Montgomery, you haven't asked the major question yet."

  He was enjoying this. "Okay, Barnard," I said wearily. "Where am I going?"

  He chuckled. "Have you ever been to the Kingdom of Hawai'i, Mr. Montgomery?"

  I must be losing my fragging mind . . .

  I sat back, staring at the telecom screen. The vidphone pane had cleared and vanished, but the data display still burned with its plasma glow. According to the data onscreen, I had an open ticket on the Global Airways suborbital hop from Casper to beautiful downtown Honolulu about twelve hours from right then. A corp ticket, no name on the manifest, and enough "don't-worry" flags that ticket agents, customs officers, and the like wouldn't dig too deep into my supposed identity. According to the datawork, which I could download onto my own credstick whenever I felt like it, I'd be traveling under the auspices of some outfit called Nebula Enterprises. A minor subsidiary of Yamatetsu, no doubt ... or maybe not, come to think of it, if Barnard was so hinky about this whole thing getting traced back to him. Maybe Nebula was some independent that owed Yamatetsu as a whole, or Barnard individually, a Big One, or that chummer Jacques had under his corporate thumb.

  In addition to the ticket itself, the flatscreen display showed me that my account at the Sioux I-face Bank had just more than quintupled, with an infusion of 22-Kay nuyen "contingency funds."

  Finally—also for download onto my credstick—was an "electronic password," I guess that's the best way of describing it. The message I had to deliver to Barnard's "colleague" in Hawai'i wasn't something I could memorize and recite verbatim—of course not, that would mean I'd know what the message was. Instead, it would be delivered to me on optical chip—no doubt encrypted and loaded with enough ice to chill a good-sized lake of synth-scotch—when I arrived at the Casper International Airport for my boost to the islands. The electronic password would identify me to the appropriate gofer at the airport for the handover.

  I stared at the data displayed on the screen, and I fretted. Not because my comfortable little life was getting turned upside down and shaken out like a garbage can—well, not only because of that, at least. No, what worried me the most were my own reactions. Just a few hours before, I'd been thinking I didn't have the instincts to survive in the shadows anymore (if I'd ever had them ...), and now I had proof.

  Proof? Yeah.

  I found myself wanting to trust Jacques Barnard, wanting to believe he was telling me the chip-truth about the trip to Hawai'i. About the fact that he didn't consider me in hock to the corp. That he'd picked me for the messenger job because he respected and—maybe—liked me. Worse, I found myself wanting to like him.

  Trust him? Like him? Get fragging real. Barnard was the Johnson to end all Johnsons—I'd had enough personal proof of that four years before, hadn't I? If I thought he would—or could—feel any genuine human emotion for a convenient tool like me, I was naive at best, schizophrenic at worst. And the fact that I felt an urge to reciprocate those nonexistent feelings . .. well, maybe it was time to hang up the old trenchcoat and hip flask and carve out a nice, safe career selling greeting cards or some drek.

  With a snarl I shoved my credstick into the telecom's slot and punched Download. As the system transferred the data—ticket, operating funds, and password—I forced myself to think through the situation coldly and logically.

  Okay, no matter how Barnard couched the "request" in polite and friendly terms, the fact was that I didn't have much choice but to go along with him. Debts are debts, and megacorps are even harder on welchers than loansharks. I was going to Hawai'i, carrying a message that I couldn't read, to a person that I didn't know, under circumstances that I couldn't control. Anything I'd missed? Oh yes—facing potential opposition that I couldn't analyze or estimate. Great, better and better. In other words, this situation was the exact opposite of the "shadowruns" I usually chose, I thought bleakly. Maximum exposure, minimum leverage, and probably zero backup. Going in blind and stupid.

  Well, at least I could do some research. I groaned as I thought of spending the next four or five hours whipping together another smartframe like Naomi to scope out any and all connections that Yamatetsu as a corp, and Barnard as an individual, had with the independent Kingdom of Hawai'i. Well, hell, I could sleep on the plane, I supposed.

  Wait a tick here—there might be another option. I had one resource that might be able to tell me something useful. This resource seemed to have an almost encyclopedic memory for facts, factoids, and scurrilous rumors about corps the world over, and key players within them. Considering that he'd been involved with Yamatetsu and Barnard himself—albeit indirectly, through the intermediary of one Dirk Montgomery—he might be able to shed some interesting light on the subject, on what I was getting myself into.

  I leaned forward again, rattled a command string into the telecom's keyboard, then waited while it dialed a CalFree State LTG number. For the second time tonight—my time for cold relays, apparently—I watched the icons blink as my call was routed through a couple of intermediary nodes. Then, finally, the Ringing symbol flashed on-screen.

  Someone answered immediately—through a blank screen, audio only—a thin, somewhat asthmatic voice that brought to mind images of a weasel-faced punk. "Do desu ka?"

  "Get me Argent," I told the screen.

  The weasel paused. "And who the frag are you?" he demanded.

  "The fact that I know about this relay means I don't have to answer that, doesn't it?" I pointed out.

  "Look, priyatel," the weasel snarled, "you want to play fragging games, you play them somewhere else, neh?

  I imagined him reaching for the Disconnect key with a dirty forefinger and shrugged. "Okay, omae," I told him, "we'll play it your way." It didn't really matter anyway. "Tell Argent that Dirk Montgomery wants to talk to him, okay?"

  "Montgomery?" The weasel's voice changed, the habitual hostility vanishing. "Hey, the Man talked about you, priyatel, told me some stories. We got something in common, you know that?" I didn't really want to think about what that might be, but the weasel went on, "We're both refugees from the Star. How about that, huh? Small fragging world, neh?"

  "Yeah," I said, muffling a sigh. "Small fragging world. And you are ...?"

  "You can call me Wolf."

  "Oh." I tried again. "I need to talk to Argent, Wolf."

  "Can't do it, priyatel, he's over the wall and out of the sprawl. On biz."

  "When's he due back?"

  Wolf/Weasel chuckled thinly. "You ever known Argent to give you a straight answer to that one?" He paused, then went on more seriously, "I'll get him to call you when he gets back, that's the best I can do. Got a relay number?"

  I gave Wolf the LTG number for a voice-mail service in Cheyenne. Nowhere near as secure as a true cold relay, of course, but since the voice mailbox was rented in the name of a dead man, at least it wouldn't lead interested parties directly to my doorstep. I exchanged a few more empty pleasantries with Wolf/Weasel and logged off as soon as I could.

  I sighed again and checked the time. Close to eighteen hundred. It had been a full couple of days, all in all, and it didn't look like the pace would be slowing any time soon. I reviewed the details on my S-O ticket: departure, oh-six-hundred, check in and be in the boarding lounge no later than one
hour before dust-off. No worries there ... at first glance. Unfortunately, however, the only airport in the Sioux Nation capable of handling full-on suborbitals is in Casper, not in Cheyenne—and almost 300 klicks away. Which meant a short-hop "Skybus," which left from downtown Cheyenne. Which, in turn, meant a cab from my doss to the Skybus terminus, unless I wanted to pay an arm and two legs for parking my car. Which meant ...

  I sighed one more time. I'd better start packing.

  4

  Traditionally, the screamsheets and datafaxes have absolutely nothing good to say about the many short-hop carriers in the Sioux Nation. Too many companies, too little inspection, too many cases of pilot error, too few meaningful afterincident investigations, drekcetera. So when I boarded the Federated-Boeing Commuter VTOL, all shiny in its Sioux Skybus livery, and strapped myself into the window seat, I was expecting a hairy ride.

  No flap, chummer, smooth as synthsilk. Okay, it's true, I could see past the little bitty curtain into the flight deck, and it did disturb me a tad to watch the pilot and copilot—jacked into the flight systems via fiberoptic cables—playing a heated game of crib while we were climbing out. But other than that, no problems.

  We put down at the commuter terminal of Casper International at oh-four-forty-five, which gave me fifteen minutes to collect my baggage and hump it over to the international terminal. According to the signs, there was an automated people-mover to carry passengers the klick or so from one terminal to another. But, according to other signs—hastily hand-lettered—the people-mover was down for maintenance, and should be back up and running three days ago, thanks for your patience. There were shuttle-buses too, but the one I tried to catch was full—or so the big, burly Amerind driver told me, even though I could see a dozen empty seats—and fragging near rolled over my toes as it pulled out. Well, it was a nice morning for a brisk walk anyway.

  Not only did I get my exercise, but I also got a good view of the international terminal that I would have missed if I'd ridden the underground people-mover. It's a sight I wouldn't have missed for anything ... null! In the darkness of predawn, under the harsh glare of arc lights, it looked like an overgrown bomb shelter or missile bunker: prestressed ferrocrete with less aesthetic appeal than a brick.

  The suborbitals, though—they were a different story. As I hiked my way beside the access road—cursing silently at the two shuttle-buses that blazed on by me without even slowing—I could see three of the things out on the apron beyond the terminal building. Gleaming white under the carbon arcs, they were beautiful—geometrically precise, like the crystalline purity of mathematics itself somehow made tangible. Okay, I admit it, I copped that last line from a trideo talking head. But he was right. The suborbitals were unbelievably striking, unbelievably beautiful in a kind of heart-stirring way. They don't belong here, on the ground—that's the thought that struck me. Any time they spend down here in the dirt is just waiting, just marking time before they can re-enter the element for which they were born . ..

  That heartwarming feeling of awe lasted until I'd entered the international terminal, and vanished precisely one microsecond after I'd laid eyes on the hard-case customs and safety inspectors waiting for me at the security gate. Sigh. You'd think the fact I was carrying an open corp ticket would give me some kind of clout with the inspectors, wouldn't you, would guarantee me some special treatment? No luck there, chummer. (Or maybe—and this was a scary thought—what I went through was special treatment ...) In any case, as a gaggle of technicians poked and prodded and X-rayed and assensed and MNR'ed my bag, a couple of hard-eyed and horny-handed trolls in undersized uniforms did much the same thing to me. Metal detectors to analyze the composition of my dental fillings. Chemsniffers to check if I was wearing clean underwear. Magical examinations to make sure I wasn't actually a fire elemental trying to fool them. The whole enchilada. Finally—and only after the fine uniformed gentlemen had made a detailed manifest of every speck of lint in my possession—was I gestured on.

  Then came Immigration Control or Emigration Control, or whatever the frag the Sioux government's calling it now. Once again, I was looking up at a couple more uniformed Amerind trolls while their 'puter whirred and clicked and tried to decide whether it liked the passport data on my credstick. And I was trying not to sweat; it was supposed to be the best fake datawork (a lot of) money could buy, but you never really knew how good this kind of drek was until it was put to the test. My sphincter contracted as the 'puter went brack sharply. But the trolls handed my credstick back without a word and gestured me on. Signs directed me to the departure gate, so I followed them.

  And almost had a childish accident when a heavy hand landed on my shoulder. I spun, and I think I stopped myself from yelping aloud. I looked up, expecting another troll ... then quickly down when the slag who'd stopped me cleared his throat rattlingly. A dwarf, he was, even stockier and more dour than most of his metatype, still on his toes after reaching up for my shoulder. He was wearing the nondescript black suit I've come to associate with government agents, and a cold fist squeezed my stomach. Somehow, I managed to force a well-meaning smile onto my face. "Is there some problem?" I asked genially.

  "You're Brian Tozer?"

  I nodded; that was the name on my fake datawork. "That's me, er ... sir. Is there a problem with my ticket?"

  "Follow me, please." And he turned his back on me and walked off without looking back, fully expecting me to follow him blindly.

  Which I did, of course—not that I had much choice. I followed him through an unmarked door into a small, bare room, and I braced myself for a cavity search or worse.

  The dwarf didn't say anything once he'd shut the door behind me. He just scrutinized me, dark eyes narrowed beneath beetling brows. If he wasn't going to say anything, neither was I. If we were going to play the old "who speaks first" waiting game, some years from now an airport employee would open the door and find two desiccated corpses in this bare room, still glaring at each other.

  Finally, he frowned, and his brows merged into something that looked like a road-killed squirrel. "You are Brian Tozer?" he asked.

  And that's when I got it. I pulled out my credstick—the one with the digital signature on it—and extended it to him. He sneered—"Fragging twinkie," I could hear him thinking—and he slipped it into the oversized chipjack mounted in the base of his skull. His eyes rolled up in their sockets for a moment. Then, with a quick movement, he clicked the stick free from his slot, tossed it back, and held something out to me. An optical chip: a tiny sliver of impure silicon the size of a pen-point, in a plastic chip-carrier the size of my first thumb-joint.

  "That's your payload for our mutual friend," he grunted, already starting to turn away.

  "Hold it," I said quickly. He turned back, and one of his eyebrows tried to crawl up into his hairline. "Look," I told him, "I don't have any of the details on where I'm going, who I'm supposed to give this payload to, and when. Don't you think it might make my job a little easier if—"

  He cut me off with a sharp, "You'll be met." And again he turned his back on me and strode off. This time I let him. I glanced down at the chip-carrier in my hand, and for just a moment I had the impulse to throw it to the floor, grind it under my heel, and just run like hell. The pleasant fantasy didn't last long. I sighed, opened the door, and re-emerged into the concourse.

  In the course of following the dwarf, I'd lost track of my gate. Fortunately, some airport employee—a flackish-looking slot with a carcinogenic tan and plastic smile—noticed me looking lost. He was actually polite to me—a first for the day—and he led me directly to the Global Airways departure lounge.

  That's when things started to look up a tad. I'd expected the usual barren, sterile-looking holding pen with its plastic seats designed to make it categorically impossible to find a comfortable position in them. The usual stained, institutional gray carpet. The usual boarding and departure announcements that might as well have been made in Urdu, for all the meaning they conveyed
. The usual crush of (meta)humanity, where you try to avoid having your toes stepped on while you play the old game of "Spot the Hijacker."

  Buzzz, thanks for playing! This was where the open corp ticket came into play big-time. The flackish kind of guy led me right through the holding pen where the hoi polloi were contained, past an armed sec-guard who actually touched his cap to me as I passed, and through a pair of double doors that could have been real mahogany. As we stepped through, me and my flackish shadow, I saw arrays of tiny LED ripple and flicker on both sides of the doorway. Yet another weapon-detector of some kind. I congratulated myself once again for deciding to travel completely unarmed except for my rapier wit.

  The Global Priority Class Stand-By Lounge—that's what the nameplate on the door identified it as—looked like a cross between a gentleman's club in Edwardian London (or, at least, the BBC rendition thereof), and a high-tone computer dealer's showroom. Heavy wood paneling, burgundy plush carpets, wingback leather chairs, crystal decanters on mahogany sideboards ... and everywhere, suit-clad travelers tapping away on palmtop computers, babbling into cel phones, or staring off into space with fiber-optic spiderwebs trailing from their temples. Of the fifteen or so people in the lounge, the only people who weren't engaged in some form of electronic or verbal intercourse were me, the flack—who, with one final unctuous comment, made himself scarce—and a particularly shapely bartender (bartendress? bartendrix?) whose smile hinted she really needed my patronage to make her day complete. Out of the goodness of my heart I obliged her, and spent the next ten minutes savoring the best of all possible lands of single-malt Scotch whiskey—free singlemalt Scotch whiskey.

  Finally, the boarding call came—delivered in person by a shapely, and decidedly mammalian, flight attendant—and we started to make our way through the priority boarding tube. This was a transpex cylinder—scrubbed so clean you could see the walls only by the way they diffracted lights outside—which extended from the terminal building to the first-class passenger door of the suborbital. Twenty meters away was another, similar tube—which suddenly reminded me of those "HabiTrail" things kids use to incarcerate gerbils—used by the declasse from the economy-class holding pen.