Haze and the Hammer of Darkness

by L. E. Modesitt Jr.

  Roget nodded. “I’ll still have to take readings. That’s my job.”

  The man winced visibly. “I understand.” Then he turned and walked slowly back into the inn.

  As he completed his monitoring, Roget heard raised voices from inside the inn. That didn’t surprise him either. Neither did several yaps from a dog, but they were too sharp to have come from a dachshund.

  The second residence unit was a small dwelling up behind the historic opera house, not that far from the Seven Wives Inn. No one was there, and Roget completed the readings.

  Before he headed to the remaining commercial sites, he decided to make a slight detour. According to what he’d discovered so far, the inn owned by Bensen Sorensen was only a block away. In less than five minutes he had come to a stop outside the white picket fence of The Right Place. He tabbed in another entry and ran through the scanning and sampling. No one even looked out from the windows.

  Then he pedaled downhill to the boulevard and eastward to the Deseret First Bank building and the row of shops to the south of it. The shop there that was on the list was vacant, but that didn’t excuse the owner. Roget finished the readings. Then he had to pedal another block to where he monitored OldThings—an antique shop and antiquarian bookshop.

  When he finished, Roget rode slowly back to the central tram station. There he waited for a good fifteen minutes before catching the eastbound tram. Once more, he wheeled the bike into the second car and folded and stowed it, and tried to cool off as he sat there for the journey back out to the Green Springs station—again.

  He thought that several of the women in the front of the car might have been among those he’d seen leaving Green Springs when he’d first traveled there that morning. They didn’t look as hot and as tired as he felt, and he still had another three sets of readings to take and ten klicks on the bike.

  When he’d left the FSS that morning, Roget hadn’t thought that the day would be that long. By the time he finished the last river readings and took the tram back to the town center station and then rode uphill to the FSS, it was approaching five. He wheeled the bike down to the supply office and got there at five before the hour.

  “You cut it close,” offered Caron Fueng.

  “Long day.”

  “You look like it.”

  “That good?”

  Fueng just smiled.

  It was after five when Roget returned to the office. Sung was gone, and the system was locked down. After unlocking it and keying his codes in, Roget took out the thin fiber cable and linked the monitor and the system. Then he waited while the analytics processed the data.

  The first set of Virgin River readings showed a lower reading than the initial anomaly, but the second reading showed a thermal spike above ambient, while the third was lower than the second but clearly higher than the first. The system could not identify any probable cause, except “natural conditions, probably intermittent geothermal infusion.” Some help that was, but if it happened to be natural, that wasn’t something a monitor could do anything about.

  Ken’s Cleaners was definitely using excessive energy and emitting excessive heat, and a citation would go out, with a copy to the enforcement arm of the local patroller, once it was approved by Sung. The Seven Wives Inn’s readings were normal. A single spike might only result in a warning, if that, in addition to a slight energy surcharge. The other residence was running a slight overage, and Sung would have to decide how to handle that.

  The results from The Right Place were also intriguing. They showed that the inn wasn’t exceeding any limits. In fact, the readings seemed low compared to the Seven Wives Inn and even the single small residence. Then, that just might mean that Sorensen hadn’t had any recent tourists or pilgrims. On the other hand, the inn’s exterior walls were of native sandstone, and thick stone and modern insulation might be a factor.

  OldThings was borderline, but the vacant shop was running well above its limits.

  The first unexpected reading came from those taken at Santiorna’s. They showed nothing out of the ordinary. But … the monitoring information from DeseretData showed marked excessive energy radiation, but the system did not indicate any excessive energy usage.

  Roget frowned. That seemed more than a little strange.

  He shrugged and locked the system down again. He closed down the office. Then he stepped out into the corridor and ID-locked the door. He’d taken less than ten steps toward the front of the building when a figure backed out of a doorway and almost into him.

  “Excuse me,” he said politely, stepping aside.

  “Oh…” The woman turned. She held a large box in her arms. Her eyes were wide, blue, and innocent, and her shoulder-length blond hair was unbound. Rather, it was held in place by a dark blue headband. “I’m sorry. I didn’t think anyone was still around.” She offered an embarrassed half-smile. “I’m Marni. Marni Sorensen.”

  “Keir Roget. E&W.”

  “You’re the new field monitor, aren’t you?”

  “The same. And you?” Roget smiled politely, offering but a trace of warmth.

  “I’m the junior fiscal compliance auditor.”

  “Quite a title. What does it really mean?”

  “It means I ask the system if everyone is staying within their projected budget, and most of the time everyone is.”

  “No offense,” Roget said with a laugh, “but how could they not?”

  She grinned. “I didn’t say that well, I guess. No one can spend more than their budget, but what if a section obligates 80 percent of its resources in the first 20 percent of the accounting period?”

  “I see what you mean. But the system…?”

  “The system would flag anything that obvious, but what if it’s 7 percent over a time period when it should be 5? Is that a trend or just the result of capital equipment replacement?”

  Roget nodded.

  “It’s nice to see a new face, but if you would excuse me? I’m running a bit late.”

  “Go.” Roget grinned sympathetically. “Don’t let me keep you.”

  With an apologetic smile, she turned and walked quickly down the corridor.

  Roget knew one thing. She wasn’t running late. What he didn’t know was whether that was just a polite way to excuse herself from a non-Saint or whether she had some other reason for brushing him off.

  He took his time walking from the FSS building down to the town center tram station where he caught an eastbound and took it out to the station at 800 East. From there it was a five-block walk south to the apartment, a relatively new structure with twenty-one units that had been rebuilt on the site of a defunct university, located as many had once been on the basis of local politics and concealed vote pandering. Roget didn’t care for the desert landscaping of the space around the central bloc of units, much as he appreciated its necessity. His unit was at the south end on the ground level, and that made it the hottest one. For that reason, among many, he definitely wanted to complete his assignment before full summer descended upon St. George.

  He thumbed the scanner plate, then opened the door, his implants alert to possible intruders or energy concentrations. Although he sensed neither, he entered cautiously, glancing around the living room and the nook kitchen through the archway at one end. Then he checked the bedroom and attached fresher/shower.

  Only then did he use the antisnooper to scan himself for spyware. The device didn’t discover any. He took out his compact personal monitor and used the publink to run a check on Marni Sorensen. Most subs and mals didn’t have the equipment or the software to decrypt Fed burstlinks.

  He was somewhat surprised to find out that she had a doctorate in biology. He had also suspected she might be related distantly to Bensen Sorensen, not surprising when something like three hundred of the ten thousand–odd residents of St. George happened to be Sorensens. Saints had a proclivity for Scandinavian names—Jensen, Bensen, Swensen, Hansen, and more than a few others.

  He was wrong. She was Bensen
Sorensen’s much younger sister. That was interesting, and disconcerting. Even so, there wasn’t much he could do. Not yet. His instructions were clear enough. He was not to begin anything invasive out of his line of work for at least two weeks, nor to do anything that might call undue attention to himself.

  He snorted at the last. Just being an outsider in St. George called undue attention on himself.

  He checked for spyware again, but his antisnoop insisted he and the apartment were clean.

  After showering, he changed into clean underwear and a white shirt and dark slacks. Then he walked up to St. George Boulevard and toward a restaurant he’d noted earlier—the Caravansary. Although the sun had dropped behind the bluff to the west of town, the air remained warm.

  No one was waiting when he entered the Caravansary, and a solid-looking woman of indeterminate age merely nodded and gestured for him to follow her. As he did, Roget could see that, like most of the eating establishments in St. George, it was modest in size. There were no more than twenty tables set in a single L-shaped room. The lighting was muted and amber, imparting a sandy glow to the white plaster walls, on which were mounted, at irregular intervals, odd pieces of tack and other items meant to suggest desert, ranging from a faded and battered maroon fez to half of what must have been a camel saddle.

  “The menu is on the table. Thereza will be with you shortly, sir.”

  “Thank you.”

  Roget settled into the chair that allowed him the wider view of the patrons and who might be coming or going. A small slate was set in a holder on the polished wooden table with pseudo rattan legs. On the slate were chalked the night’s entrees: Lamb Marrakesh, Chicken Arabic, Mixed Kebabs, Rice Sansouci, and Brigand Lamb. None of the names meant anything to Roget.

  “Sir?” Thereza was twentyish, blond, and offered an infectious smile at odds with the severe flowing brown dress and its wrist-length sleeves. “I’m Thereza, and I’ll be your server. Everything on tonight’s menu is available.”

  “Is there anything else available?”

  Thereza looked at him. “You’re new here, aren’t you?”

  “Does it show that much?” Roget grinned.

  “Not that much. Most people who come here are regulars, except in full winter, when we get a few tourists and pilgrims. Most of them stay closer to the Temple. You’re the only new face I’ve seen in weeks.”

  “There must be more newcomers than that.”

  “Not many. You have to have a job, or money, or family to relocate here.”

  “And it helps if you’re a Saint?”

  “Not to get a job. The Feds watch that. But most who aren’t Saints leave sooner or later. Usually sooner.”

  Those who couldn’t leave, Roget had been briefed, often ended up in rehab for substance excess … or as suicides. Outsiders had a high rate of depression in St. George.

  “I could get you some sliced lamb with rice and gravy. That’s not on the menu.”

  “Of the items on the menu, which is the best?”

  “There’s no best. They’re all good. The Marrakesh is very spicy. The kabobs are tender but subtle…”

  That translated to bland, Roget suspected.

  “… the Arabic is sweet, sour, and mildly spicy. The Sansouci is hot, and filled with diced lamb and vegetables, and the Brigand Lamb is my favorite.”

  “I’ll try that.”

  “It comes with brown rice and sauce.”

  “Sauce on the side, please.”

  “That you’ll have.”

  “Red wine?”

  “The Davian or the Banff are both good.”

  Roget had never had the second. “I’ll have the Banff.”

  Once Thereza had left, Roget turned up his implants to see what he could hear.

  “… haven’t seen him before…”

  “He has to be new. She spent too much time with him … flirts with all the handsome ones…”

  “… can you blame her … after all that last year?”

  Roget wondered exactly what the speakers were talking about, but that couple returned to their food. He kept listening.

  “… council’s going to petition the Federation regional administrator to release 100 hectares from the land bank…”

  “The Feds won’t do it … say we have more than enough land for the population…”

  “Of course they do, but they’re using the amount of land to limit in-migration. That policy keeps families from gathering…”

  “Unless they’re born here…”

  “Half the fellows end up leaving … can’t get decent jobs here, and the Feds won’t hire many locals … heard the E&W monitor’s job went to an outsider … pay’s good, but you think any of our boys’d be considered? Be the same thing when Sung retires…”

  In the end, Roget found the food acceptable, Thereza diverting, and the conversations he overheard uninformative, except in confirming what he had learned in his briefings before he had left Helena.

  The evening was almost cool as Roget walked slowly back to his apartment. He wasn’t certain that he looked forward to the weekend.

  9

  17 MARIS 1811 P. D.

  Roget studied Lyvia Rholyn. While sitting, she was only ten centimeters shorter than he was. She had short legs and a long torso that resulted in a frame of slightly above average height. For earth, anyway. He hadn’t seen more than a handful of people so far on Haze … or Dubiety, he reminded himself. Her shoulders were slightly broader than the Federation norm, as well. Her hair was straight and light brown, remarkable only for the silky fineness that became obvious when she turned her head suddenly, and possibly one of the reasons why the woman cut it short, barely long enough to reach the middle of her neck. She also seemed unbothered by the high humidity or by his study of her.

  “Where are we headed, specifically?” he finally asked, blotting his forehead.

  “Eventually to the MEC—the Ministry of Education and Culture. That will be tomorrow. Immediately, I’m taking you to a guesthouse near the main square in Skeptos. I assume you’d like to clean up, get a good meal, and a good night’s sleep. After you clean up, I thought we could take a short walk to dinner, depending on your preference in cuisine. That would give you a feel for the city. Compared to Federation cities, I’m certain Skeptos is quite modest.”

  “You’re not afraid I’ll vanish?” He raised his eyebrows.

  “You can try if you want. Your shipsuit isn’t that outlandish, and you don’t look that different from anyone here, although you’re a trace taller than most men. But you have no link into anything, and the only way you can get food or anything else would be by some form of criminal activity. We don’t use currency or coins. We do punish criminals, especially those who use weapons or threaten with them.”

  “More public service?”

  “Some of it can be back-breaking hard labor. Since criminals have proved untrustworthy, they’re also limited either personally or by locale.”

  “Prison camps?”

  “Restricted hamlets is far more accurate.”

  Roget had doubts about the accuracy of that description. “So I should behave? Or else?”

  “You can do as you wish. We’re quite willing to provide you with much of the information you were dropped to obtain. At the proper time, you’ll even be able to return to your ship with it.”

  Roget doubted that as well, even more strongly, but she was right about the necessity of his playing along. For the moment. “Tell me more about Dubiety.”

  “Not until you’ve seen more.”

  “You’ve said that before.”

  “Verbal descriptions of places you haven’t seen create the possibility of false and lasting preconceptions. In your case especially, we’d prefer not to create anything like that.”

  “Is everyone here a philosopher?”

  “Hardly. Just those who are good at what they do.”

  Shortly, the subtrans slowed, coming to a stop. According to Roget’s internals, th
ey’d been traveling just over six minutes. Lyvia did not move.

  “Where are we?”

  “Avespoir. It’s where the peninsula joins the mainland.”

  “How far from here to Skeptos?”

  She frowned, as if mentally calculating. “A little over four hundred klicks.”

  Roget resigned himself to a good hour or more on the subtrans, perhaps several, then shifted his weight on the seat as three men entered the car. The tallest man wore shimmering dark blue trousers that were too loose to be tights, and far narrower than anything Roget had ever seen, despite the knife-edge front creases. His shirt was long-sleeved, pale blue, and equally tight-fitting with broad pointed collars that spread over a looser white vest.

  The man in the middle wore something akin to a standard Federation singlesuit, but the fabric changed from a deep black toward vermilion as Roget watched. So did the man’s boots. The third man wore a collarless, black tight shirt under a tailored burgundy jacket, fastened closed by a set of silver links, rather than by buttons. His high-heeled platform shoes were silver.

  The three took the set of four seats behind Roget and continued talking animatedly. He listened intently. For several minutes, he understood nothing except a few stray words. Then more words made sense, including a phrase that sounded like “range of plasma-bounded energy opacity.”

  The subtrans decelerated for a minute before halting. The doors opened, and the three men left the subtrans, but two women got on. Both wore singlesuits of the kind that shifted color, except the lower legs of the taller woman’s also turned transparent. The two talked so quickly that Roget understood not a single word. At the next stop, no one got off, but a rush of people boarded. Nine or ten, Roget thought.

  Lyvia moved to sit beside Roget, and an older couple took the seat across from them. Both were fit and trim, and their skin was firm, their hair color apparently a natural brown for the man and an equally natural sandy-blond for the woman. Their age was obvious only in the fineness of their features and in the experience in their eyes. Both wore singlesuits, his silvered brown, and hers a silvered blue.

  The couple exchanged several words, then addressed Roget and Lyvia.