“But the shirt!” She swept back a curve of raven hair. “I hope I haven’t ruined it. I can have it cleaned! Oh dear, just another foul-up in the day! What a botch!” A tiny foot stamped with frustration. “Dammit!”
Looking up, Todd for the first time got a full view of the woman. He had been about to utter some nothing of a dismissal, but the words stuck in his throat.
Time seemed to stop. The utterings and mutterings of the sparse crowd shuffling through the aisles, gawking at this holoslice matte or that mosaic of charged starstone stilled in his ears as though all this were merely a movie and some dunce had snapped off the audio.
“You’d think after a dozen displays I’d have learned some grace, some élan.” The woman sighed, then drew daintily at her cigarette. She released a gust of smoke with a cough. “Wretched habit. Must give it up. Dirty and filthy.” Mascaraed eyes that held all the best of day and night fixed softly on Todd. “Oh. Would you like one?”
Though he didn’t smoke, Todd said, “Okay.”
Slender fingers unsnapped the mauve leather shoulder-bag folded over a rounded hip. She wore a simple ensemble of black scufflers, tight beige flyaways ridged by ivory buttons up the legs, and pale purple band leader tails, cut to perfectly describe her body’s sinuous flowings. Her white ruffled blouse dived to just above the navel, revealing fleshy hints of discreet but ample décolletage.
A wing of hair drooping fecklessly over an eye, she fumbled among odds and ends in her bag. “You like Cupid Darts?” she asked casually. “Hope so. It’s all I’ve got. Smuggled a supply of the stuff. Toxic beyond belief. Black market, you know. Illegal. Almost as bad as Harpy’s Nails.”
“Okay,” Todd said, all pain and inconvenience forgotten.
“Here we go!” She produced a plastic pack with elaborate art deco borders and hot pink letters constructed of hearts. “Snazzy, huh?” She tapped a cigarette out, throwing back her hair with an easy, quintessentially feminine shrug. Her eyebrows arched inquiringly. “You like modern artwork?” Her eyes darted over him: a mixture of shyness and awkwardness, delightfully fetching from someone so lovely. Absently, Todd grabbed at the cigarette, poking it into the side of his mouth, promptly forgetting to flick the tip’s igniter.
“I like art,” he replied. The cigarette bobbed.
Though her thin body was a study in lithe loveliness, perfectly fitting Todd’s ideal of female form, its qualities were merely percussion to the concert of her features. A long curved nose was perfectly balanced by small nostrils. High cheekbones and a rounded chin were the symmetrical foundation upon which other facial aspects played to astounding effect, all mounted on a slender neck. Her smooth complexion played games with light and shadow. Her expressive mouth, in repose, was a thoughtful, vulnerable pout. In a smile, a thing of pure illumination.
But, ah, the eyes ...
“You’re staring at me,” she said in a surprised tone.
Those eyes were curious and shy and mysterious, a certain amount of innocence in their brown embrace that no quantity of experience could kill.
Todd Spigot felt as though his brain were melting and leaking from his ears.
“I’m sorry,” he said, averting his gaze. “You look ... you look like someone I used to know.”
“Oh? Back on Earth? Funny, I’m not a clone of anybody.”
“It’s not important,” Todd said. Especially because it wasn’t true. But he had to keep her talking.
Moments of intensely charged awkwardness passed.
“Here, let me light your cigarette.” She took her own and touched its tip to Todd’s. A glow burst. Smoke. The subtle scent of her body wafted faintly. Todd thought he would die of delight.
A glimpse of the side of a breast, and then she was back, away from him, regarding him with frank curiosity. “I’m Veronica March. I draw and paint and step on nice people’s toes. You?”
“Todd Spigot.” Without thinking. “Computers. I save planets.” Suddenly realization flooded him, temporarily pushing back awareness of his gaffe. “Veronica March?” He spun, pointing back to the set of art displays behind him that he had just been admiring. “You did these?”
“My sins, yes.”
“Very nice! The colors! The compositions!”
“Imported paints. From all over the universe. Chemical substance is as important as ambience exuded.” She strode past, pointing to a picture of a woman caught in midflight between diving board and pool. “Part of the paints here are from Rigel Three mudflats. The deeper hues are from Bailey’s World. Certain berries growing wild in swamps. I have degrees in physics and chemistry. My specialty is light theory and application. Reflection and refraction.”
“Wait. Can’t you just synthesize your paints on Earth for the right chemical composition and hue?”
A lemon twist of a smile. “But my dear, that wouldn’t be—” She savored the word between dainty tongue and lips. “Exotic.”
“Yes—well, you certainly know your spectrum.”
“The actual composition and structure I just do off the top of my head. I just like to play with levels of light and shadow in color. Colors are quite psychoactive, you know.” She glanced at the painting critically. “I like to think that my paintings can change people’s moods. The brushstrokes, the molecularly measured sprays—the mathematics of emotion. What does this one remind you of, Mr. Spigot?”
“Suicide.” The word leaped to his lips. “I don’t know why ...”
“Something like that. From the Turner-like luminosity of this corner here ...” Her finger sketched an imaginary line. “To the Dutch School gloom at the bottom of the pool. Perhaps it’s more depression than suicide, Mr. Spigot.”
“The others just leap out at you,” Todd said, fascinated, glimpsing something of the artist in the art. “And they’re not holos ... Are they?”
“With the methods of illusion available these days, you never really know, do you? No. I controlled the display lighting, though. Quite vital. I must admit, though, I do employ a spectrograph and computer in my studio. A mesh of science and craft mixed, hopefully, with a dab of talent, Mr. Spigot.” She gazed back wistfully. “Certainly, feeling.”
“Please. Todd or ...” Todd said quickly, realizing that he wasn’t supposed to be Todd on this trip. “Or Charley. Charley Haversham. Please call me that, okay?”
“Wait a moment! Todd Spigot. I recognize that name. On the news-fax last year.” Her eyes grew wide. “You were on the last voyage of the Star Fall.” Her voice increased in volume, excited. “You’re that Todd Spig—”
“Shhh!” Panicking, he stepped to her side, squashed his mouth to her mouth.
“Humph!” she said, struggling in his grasp, then abruptly not struggling. There was a moment of sublime mixture of breath and lips before Todd pulled away, saying, for the benefit of the heads that had turned their way. “Wonderful to see you again, Veronica!” Then, whispering: “Top secret. I’m supposed to be Charley Haversham on this trip.”
Her eyes were wide with surprise as he drew away. “Right. Charley Haversham. But you can’t keep on kissing me, Charley.” She placed her hand smartly to her hip. “How are you going to keep my mouth busy the rest of the time?” Her eyes shone playfully.
“I’ll take you to dinner tonight and stuff it with food. How’s that?” Todd said nervously, caught between fear and fascination.
“Very well. Where?”
“Where? Uhm. The Effervescence Lounge. We can watch the Star Fall’s entry into Underspace. Six o’clock?”
“I’ll be there in bells.” She started to walk past him, then halted, looked at him with a gleam in her eyes. “I thought, though, it was called Insertion.”
Smiling, without waiting for a response, she turned and paced down the aisle. Todd watched her trip over a taped-down piece of cable, curse, shake her head, then disappear around a turn.
&
nbsp; Although he had barely begun his tour of the show, Todd found himself drifting toward the exit. Past heart-stirring landscapes, past detailed alien float-tanks bathed in mystical color, he walked, unnoticing. By captivating collages and penetrating portraits and horrific holos, all seemingly the stuff of sorcery he traipsed, unmindful of their resplendence, heedless of their siren sounds, their luminous lure.
“Mr. Haversham!” the Art Director called at his heels. “That was rapid. What are your opinions of the show?”
Partly tugged from his daze, Todd turned and said, “Energizing, Ms. Henderson. Wonderful.”
Before the woman could thrust her carefully prepared questionnaire in his face, Todd let his mind float back to rejoin the clouds and stumbled to a waiting tube-car.
* * *
With a circuitry maze, relays clicked, pseudoneuronic connections formed. At the bequest of metal digits’ light tap-dancing on stiff keys, power surged through microminiaturized silicon chips.
SPEC/ROBOT DESIG. CODE 9H#3BA221.
In darkness, a thing jerked, crab-scuttled, stiffened as the radioed information surged through its receptors.
SUBJECT: TODD SPIGOT. IDENTITY CRYSTAL FOR MATCH-UP FOLLOWING IMMEDIATELY.
The surface of the crystal glittered as it was lifted, showing intricate traceries of wires and chips embedded within like faults in a diamond. The metal fingers fitted it in the necessary slot with practiced ease. A soft thwup sounded as the keyed vacuum effect sucked it into the heart of the mechanism.
Toggles were touched. Verniers adjusted.
IMBED SUBJECT INTO FABRICATION PRIME, SCENARIO 17.
In the dimness: other squirmings as other units were programmed.
QUERY: INFORMATION BANKS FILLED? the biobot’s fingers requested.
A blue light shone.
IN SPEC/ROBOT DESIG. CODE 9H#3BA221, tiny wings fluttered, tiny claws clutched.
Neuro-needles extended.
* * *
Rebathed, refitted in his best apparel and highly nervous, Todd Spigot arrived at the Effervescence Lounge a half hour early. He ticked off the time with sips of white wine, settled in a null-grav chair by the wiggle-bar.
The lounge resembled a bubble in a glass of champagne; a clear dome bulging from one side of the Star Fall’s hull. The interior was fitted in the style of the Cassiopaen pleasure domes, though with infinitely better taste, depicting refined landscapes in the glow-glob tables rather than salacious alien sexual cavortings.
A subdued resplendence sheened from every surface in shades of umber, bright turquoise and mahogany. Sub-audial emanations from hidden stations cycled a controlled giddiness into the room’s inhabitants similar to the effect of two glasses of fresh champagne. The substance of the room itself was the equivalent of one gigantic speaker system, rendering the light cocktail jazz tinkling from a piano, synthar and bass-perc a delightful mélange indeed; like standing in a sprinkler system of music.
Despite the valiant efforts of these mood-control devices on Todd Spigot, he felt simultaneously uneasy and ecstatic. The former because he was unsure about his conversational abilities in the crucial situation. The latter because never before had he encountered someone like Veronica March.
All the romantics of old were right about women. You just had to find the right one and there, before your eyes, was a living goddess: eyes pouring forth poetry, mouth gentle musics; all mythology in her form, all magic in her scent.
Gulping the faintly bitter golden chablis, Todd replayed the tape loop of their encounter in his mind for the hundredth time, simultaneously appreciating the humor of the situation and the almost sorcerous chemistry.
Todd straightened his mauve jacket, adjusted his tie, then yanked a handkerchief from his back pocket to attend to his nose. Bit congested today. Perhaps there had been something in the atmosphere mix in Hurt’s chamber which had affected his sinuses. Funny guy, Hurt. A gentleman certainly. Hardly seemed to be a threat to human civilization.
Damn this nose, anyway.
He honked it twice, sniffling and cleaning his throat noisily between blows.
“Express coming through?” a voice asked behind him.
Startled, he jerked around, shocking blue cloth still affixed to his nostrils.
She stood there, a vision of pink chiffon frills arrayed provocatively about a body less than classical in its partial baring, yet precisely to Todd’s taste. Classic nudes, after all, had curves that were gentler. Hers, however, were more abrupt, emphasizing her boyish litheness without sacrificing a degree of femininity.
“Veronica!” he said, voice muffled in the silk. “You look—lovely.”
“Thanks.” She swept around the wiggle-bar. “You hiding from a wife or something?”
“Hmm?” Todd’s eyes turned down to the handkerchief. “Oh. This.” A perfunctory wipe, and he shoved it into the side pocket of his jacket. “My communicator.” He smiled slyly. “I’m a secret agent for the Aslasi and I was just reporting in to headquarters.”
A beam of light sprayed from the bar, assayed the woman’s dimensions, then promptly disgorged an appropriately modeled chair into which she could snuggle her delightful posterior. “And pray tell,” she breathed suggestively, half-closed eyes regarding Todd coolly. “What does”—she lifted her hands to her nose—“‘Ahnk! Ahnk!’ mean in Aslasi?”
Todd nonchalantly pressed plastic. A glass of wine popped up in front of Veronica. “It means, I have just met a really sexy broad.”
Her long eyelashes fluttered and she coyly put a demure hand to a not-so-demure bosom. “Oh? You have another date later on?”
“Come on, Veronica! Surely you realize you’re gorgeous!”
Wearing her distinctive frown-pout, she said with conviction: “But Todd, truly, I don’t think I am.” Her eyes gently turned away and her fingers toyed with the stem of her glass.
“No really beautiful woman does,” Todd said. “That’s part of their charm.” Not bad, Spigot, he thought. But where are you coming up with these gems? His subconscious must be working overtime. That, or his libido was snapping the whip to his wit.
“Liar,” she whispered, but she smiled. “When’s Underspace time, then?”
“Eightish. I’ve taken the liberty to book us dinner here, in a spot giving us a terrific view. Is that okay?”
“You’re asking me? Fine! I mean, this is a really delightful bar. What kind of food do they serve, though?”
“Delicious. I’ve got us a gourmet booth. We can program our own meal, right down to the thickness of the sauce or the alcoholic content of the wine.” He sipped his wine. “Best place in the ship, though, is the King’s Attic. You have to go there three days in advance. They take a sensory/brain reading on you then. When you arrive at the designated time three days later, they have a feast prepared exactly tailored to your taste buds.”
“Take me sometime.”
“My pleasure.” A moment of silence as he surveyed her, his uncertainty about what to say next edged away by the sheer delight of gazing on her. He noticed that she wore a jeweled black choker around her neck, which explained the new fashion in which she wore her hair—the device could only be a force-styler. Force-styler or no, the dark hair was a delightful collection of waves and curls that tumbled and twirled, a boil of artful froth around Veronica’s perfect face.
“Are you enjoying the Star Fall?” he asked, an easy conversational opener. He had to take his eyes away lest he stare too much.
“Oh, yes,” she said with childlike enthusiasm. “Just wonders wrapped in wonders, don’t you think? And the notion of visiting other worlds, of having other cultures look at my work—thrilling. I never in my wildest dreams imagined I’d get past the solar system.” Eyes wide, she looked up. Beyond the dome burned Sol, fiery bright amid the lesser lights of the planets and stars. “I feel so very ... I don’t know, small. Insignifican
t in some ways.” Her voice filled with enthusiasm. “And yet so important in other ways.”
“Relativity. Yes, I understand.” He smiled kindly. “Rather like being a big fish in a swimming pool of an ocean liner. Against the backdrop of the ship ... you’re something.” Todd gazed up at the polarized translucent glassteel which admitted light but hindered harmful radiation. “Yet, against the hugeness of the sea ... you’re nothing.”
“All in the mind, I suppose,” she murmured. “All in one’s attitude.”
“No.” He touched her arm lightly. “It depends entirely upon whom you know, who’s important to you, how much you give of yourself.” He laughed. “My God, but you must excuse me! Philosophizing at a moment of celebration!” He clinked her glass with his. “You must also forgive me for my presumption in choosing your drink for you. Would you prefer something else?”
“Oh! No, this is fine!” She smiled agreeably and drank some of the wine as though to prove her satisfaction with it. “Lovely.” She shivered, wrapping her arms around herself as though experiencing a moment’s chill. “My goodness. It’s quite strong. I’m feeling a touch giddy already.” Fingers to mouth. Wide eyes. She giggled, trembling the ruffles of her dress in a manner that almost straightened Todd’s hair. She placed a hand on his shoulder to steady herself. A kind of emotional electricity tingled through him.
“No. It’s not the drink.” Todd explained the effects produced by the techno gadgetry of the bar. “You won’t feel woozy. Just nice,” he concluded.
“Marvelous,” she pronounced, leaning over to pick up her wineglass and promptly dumping it over. Some liquid splashed into Todd’s lap.
That won’t cool me down, Todd thought.
“Oh my, I’m such a klutz!” She grabbed a nearby paper napkin and tried to dry Todd off.
And that certainly won’t either. Todd gently caught her wrist, remonstrating. “You needn’t worry. Watch.” Even as he spoke, colored light moved, twirling and twisting and melding within the obsidian-hued bar. The surface suffused with glow, absorbed the splotch of wine. Simultaneously, the arms of Todd’s form-fit joined over his lap. A brief hot sensation, then the arms resumed their normal position, with Todd dry once more.
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