The Long Run

by The Long Run (new ed) (mobi)

  These are facts. Clean. Simple.

  They tell you nothing about the city.

  * * *

  Luna City, Terry Shawmac wrote in one Dateline column, has a soul.

  It is unlike any city on Earth. It is unlike any city I have visited off Earth. In size and traffic the only place I have ever visited off Earth that it resembles is Halfway. But the differences with Halfway outweigh the resemblances. Halfway is the ultimate company town; Luna City has no relationship that approaches the importance of the relationship between Tytan Manufacturing and Halfway. And Halfway is aggressively proud of being a city in drop; it lacks consistent local vertical, and most downsiders are never truly comfortable there.

  Luna City, through some happy accident, ended up a fusion of the best elements of downside cities and all the other off-Earth communities. It would have made more sense if Luna City were one of the newer off-Earth communities, but that's not the case. Luna City is the oldest city in existence off Earth. It was never planned, and later attempts at planned Lunar or CityState communities have never worked as well.

  It just happened.

  Some of it is accidental. The Flight Caverns are a good example. That muscle-powered flight was possible in a pressurized Lunar cavern has been known for over a century; as a plaque inside the Flight Caverns tells you, a futurist named Heinlein described it in 1957, the same year the first artificial satellite was launched. But it was accidental that appropriate caverns actually existed less than five kilometers from the original center of Luna City. When the original dome was constructed, back in the early '20s, there was no discussion as to site: they placed it smack on top of what are now called the Flight Caverns, and opened the Hotel Copernicus on top of that.

  Look down on Luna City from above, in sunlight, and you will see what is easily the loveliest sight on Luna's surface, and that is another accident. In the early '20s there was no such thing as practical fusion power; the fields of solar power panels that surround Luna City, which glitter in the sun like the petals of a flower, were obsolete within four years of their construction.

  Much of Luna City's beauty is planned.

  The impression many downsiders have of cities on Luna ("in Luna," as loonies would like it) is that of artifice--of airplants, of the recycling of water and other resources, of an existence dependent on machines. So far as it goes it is an accurate picture; survival in Luna City does depend on machines, and its inhabitants never forget it.

  But I have never walked through any downside city, including some in tropical climates, with so many growing plants. Plants in every corridor, in every open area. Shrubs, potted plants, flowers--I remember the amazement and delight I felt the first time I entered one of the long cross-town corridors--this was my first day in Luna City--and saw that it was covered with grass as far as I could see.

  There are cities on Earth that are known for being pleasant to walk through. Most of Luna City is beneath ground, and it stretches for kilometer after kilometer, through eleven levels beneath the surface of Luna and three above. I spent six months of my life walking through the corridors of Luna City, and I saw perhaps half of them. Because of the gravity, walking is not wearying; even downsiders in poor health can spend half a day sightseeing without tempting exhaustion.

  There are eight or nine twenty-four-hour restaurants--ten-hour restaurants, as SpaceFarers would have it--and four times as many bars. Unification propaganda to the contrary, there is no violent crime to speak of, and most of what crime truly exists is directed either at evading Unification taxes, or at conducting commerce with Free Luna. The latter, though technically illegal, is so widespread that even the large and constantly growing contingents of Peaceforcers have not been able to put a dent in it.

  I said Luna City has a soul. I was speaking metaphorically, of course. No creation of plastisteel and ferrocrete can really have a soul.

  But Luna City does have the Gardens.

  In October, on a great redwood platform reaching sixty meters above the Lunar Gardens, Trent dined with a SpaceFarer named Felix K'Hin. Eerie, impossibly thin green-leafed and evergreen trees reached up from the Gardens, grew around the platform on all sides so that the diners could see nothing but the trees. They were only ten meters beneath the very top of the dome, and the scent of flowers and growing things permeated the air around them. It was "raining" over the Gardens, a fine gray mist that fell away from the interior surface of the dome, falling gently and implacably throughout dinner. Electrostatic fields projected above the tables and walkways kept perhaps half of the surface of the redwood platform dry.

  There was a gentle breeze so cool it was almost crisp. Trent did not know where it came from.

  It was unlike any place Trent had ever seen in his life. The closest analogy that occurred to him came from holos he had played against the wall in his apartment on Flushing Street, forested areas in the northwest United States and Canada. It was only a vague resemblance; the Gardens was itself, nothing else.

  It was the second time Trent and K'Hin had attempted to meet; the first time, the SpaceFarer had shown up for their meeting on SpaceFarer time, and Trent had arrived on Unification time. Now, for their second meeting, it was two o'clock in the morning by Capitol City time, the clock that U.N. Luna and Halfway ran on. Despite that it was fairly busy in the most expensive restaurant on Luna; Trent and K'Hin were only two of about thirty diners. Like most of space, Luna City was slowly evolving away from the Earth cycle of day and night.

  Over dinner Trent and K'Hin discussed price of passage to Mars, and then to Ceres, with a valid passport for Trent and one unidentified female, for the Association of Belt CityStates. K'Hin, a huge black man who reminded Trent of Reverend Andy without the muscles, was one of the most powerful SpaceFarer brokers in Luna City. He was explaining that what 'Sieur Vera wanted was impossible, and if it was not impossible--not that K'Hin was conceding this for an instant--it certainly could not be done for the ridiculous sum 'Sieur Vera was suggesting.

  Trent smiled at the man. "It gets worse."

  K'Hin looked honestly amazed. "What? You mean besides the fact that you're looking for a passport for a Unification citizen whose name you can't give me, besides the fact that you can't tell me when or where the damn ship is supposed to land to pick the two of you up, besides the fact that nobody I've been in touch with on Earth or off has ever fucking heard of a Thomas Vera, besides all that there's more?"

  "There may be--problems--with the Unification as a result of this passage. The SpaceFarers' Collective needs to be aware of this."

  K'Hin looked delighted. "Really? War, maybe?"

  Trent smiled at the man. "There's very little chance of war arising between the Unification and the SpaceFarers' Collective over this. Simulations I've run put it at less than one in five."

  K'Hin started to laugh and then stopped abruptly. He sat under Trent's steady gaze, simply looking at Trent. In a different voice than Trent had heard him use before he said, "You're serious."

  "I'm a thief, Felix, and I'm going to boost the Peace Keeping Force. I've narrowed it down to three targets. Only one of those targets presents any serious possibility that its loss will cause the Unification to go to war."

  K'Hin said slowly, "It's possible. There's members of the Collective's Board of Directors who wouldn't mind seeing someone give the PKF the boot. Thomas, I'll tell you what I'll do. I'm going to set a base price of sixty thousand hard CU. That's SpaceFarer CU, silver, not that Chinese crap. That's covering pickup at a convenient location such as the Luna City landpads. You guarantee no hassles from PKF or Space Force with a bond that's forfeited in case of serious trouble caused by you. In return, with at least two week's notice, we guarantee prompt pickup, a fast ship, two passports. You'll probably need to meet with a representative of the Collective's Board of Directors at some point before the boost goes, to describe in a general way the boost you're planning, the upside and the downside for the Collective."

  Trent said, "Base price?"


  K'Hin shrugged. "It gets dangerous, the price goes up."

  Trent nodded. "All right. In general, that sounds good. We're going to need to work out some of the procedural details, but--" Trent broke off as the lone human waiter on duty approached the table.

  He addressed Trent. "'Sieur Vera?"

  Trent looked up. "Yes?"

  "You have a call, sir."

  Trent glanced at K'Hin. "Hang in there. I'll be right back."

  K'Hin leaned back in the delicate, impossibly thin chair. "I'll wait. A while."

  Trent rose, walked along the path away from their table, with railings to keep the customers from falling to their probable deaths below, and into the restaurant proper. The waiter led Trent to a small cubicle near the restrooms; there was a terminal inside, the holofield flashing the words Call Waiting at Trent.

  Once the waiter had left Trent unhooked his handheld from his belt, jacked it into the terminal. "Johnny Johnny?"

  "Yes, Boss?"

  "Cut off the terminal microphone. Alter my voice print as it goes out."

  "Done, Boss."

  Trent touched the Accept stud.

  Candy Blain's image formed in the field. He glared at Trent. "I've been trying to get ahold of you for more than an hour."

  "So?"

  "Nathan's been shot."

  "What?"

  "Nathan's been shot. A Peaceforcer squad dropped from orbit on his partitions out at Aristillus. He had some warning, apparently, was in his p-suit when they blew the place down to death pressure."

  "Is he alive?"

  "Yes. Or was," said Blain, "when last I heard. He had some heavy ammo, God knows what he was doing with it; damaged the semiballistic the Peaceforcers came down in, blew the tracks off a crawler that tried to follow his chameleon into the desert."

  "The bolt hole," said Trent stupidly.

  "Yeah. I'm one of the best goddamn friends he has on this planet," Blain said bitterly, "and I don't know where his bolt hole is."

  Trent said, "I do."

  "Tell me about it."

  "How badly was he hurt? Exactly."

  Blain looked weary. "I don't know. Rumor at Aristillus says the PKF reported at least three lasers got a piece of him. He was losing air when he reached the chameleon."

  Trent was not certain he wanted to hear the answer. "Why?"

  Blain's glower flared again. "Harboring a fugitive--'Thomas'."

  "How long ago?"

  "Three, three and a half hours ago."

  Trent took a deep breath. He was surprised at how shaky he felt. "All right. Thanks, Candy. I'm on it."

  "Sure." The word was openly skeptical. "One last question."

  Trent looked away from the holocams, at the image floating in the field. "What?"

  "Are you Trent?"

  Trent cut the connection and unhooked his handheld. He walked back to Felix K'Hin without hurrying. "Felix."

  Trent's expression must have alerted the man; he sat up very straight. "What is it?"

  "The word's gone up on a friend. I need a semiballistic hopper to Cassini, and a crawler from there."

  K'Hin grinned broadly. "The semi's going to cost you, my friend. You're looking at--"

  With his handheld Trent reached across the table and swept K'Hin's meal off the tabletop, knocked it ten meters out into the open air. K'Hin stared at Trent in shock; even among SpaceFarers, for whom the starvation of huge portions of Earth's population was only another item on the news Boards, wasting food was very close to being one of the worst crimes a man could be guilty of.

  "Felix, don't fuck with me. I'll pay what it's worth. I need it. Right now."

  K'Hin's grin came back slowly; then, if anything, it got broader. "It's done."

  From Luna City at Copernicus, Trent took an SB to Cassini crater, slightly north and east of Aristillus, north and slightly west of Nathan's bolt hole, in the foothills of the Caucasus Mountains.

  There was a crawler, modified to cover its tracks, waiting for him at Cassini; that crater, putatively a part of the United Nations, was practically owned by the Syndic, and the Peaceforcers went in only in force.

  From Cassini, Trent headed south.

  Nathan was not at the bolt hole.

  Trent backtracked, toward Aristillus. He drove through darkness for nearly half an hour, across the regolith, growing more cautious as he ventured further away from the bolt hole. He was on the verge of turning back when he finally found the chameleon, the tracks still churning, jammed nose-first against the side of a small hill. A rock slide had come down to cover the front of the vehicle; it took Trent over an hour to dig through the rubble until he managed to reach the airlock. Cycling through the airlock, Trent found Nathan, in his pressure suit, sitting on the long bench seat before the control panel, slumped face first on the controls, pressure suit patterned with laser tracks.

  Trent could tell by the limp feel of his own pressure suit that the interior of the crawler was pressurized. Trent gently pulled Nathan's still form up from the control panel, killed the engine, and removed his own helmet and then Nathan's. When the engines died it was abruptly very quiet inside the crawler. There was blood all over the inside of the helmet, all over Nathan's face. Nathan's head lolled freely on the seat's headrest.

  A distant sigh was all the sign Nathan gave that he was alive. The front of Nathan's pressure suit had been blackened by a maser burst. At the abdomen the reinforcing rings had melted.

  "... Trent ..."

  The word was the merest ghost. "I'm here." Trent did not even consider trying to remove Nathan's pressure suit; it was probably all that was holding him together.

  Nathan's eyes flickered open, stared sightlessly up at Trent, up toward the ceiling of the chameleon. "... first-aid ... stimtabs ..." Trent debated with himself briefly and lost. He took both a stimtab and a painkiller from the kit, injected the painkiller, waited ten seconds and broke the stimtab under Nathan's nose. The response came quickly; Nathan's eyes flickered, focused on Trent.

  "Thanks," Nathan whispered hoarsely. "Undignified damn way to go, nose down on the control board."

  Trent could think of nothing to say.

  Nathan seemed to gather his energy. "How'd you find me?"

  "SB to Cassini; I rode a crawler from there."

  "If I don't get to a medbot," Nathan wheezed, "I'm going to die. They shot me with a maser, Trent, it burned ..."

  "Nathan--I--I can't get you to a medbot in time. I'd have had to bring the SB down right at the bolt hole. I didn't do that, Nathan."

  "Oh." Nathan grinned weakly. "That was a mistake."

  "I'd have had to give the pilot the coordinates for your bolt hole, Nathan. I thought you needed a hiding place."

  Nathan's voice faded. "Second mistake." His eyes closed. "Trent?"

  "Yes?"

  "Do you know Catholic last rites?"

  "No."

  "Trent?"

  "Yes?"

  "Can you take me to the bolt hole, Trent?"

  "I can't take you to my crawler, Nathan. I heard they shot you and I brought a spare p-suit with me, but--if I try taking you out of your suit it'll kill you."

  Nathan snorted, coughed blood. "No kidding." He laughed shakily, blood dripping off his chin, to the scorched surface of his p-suit. "This thing--" His voice was cut off by another round of coughing. When he resumed his voice was noticeably weaker. "--move at all?"

  "The chameleon?" Trent looked over the control panel for the first time. "I don't know. There's not much fuel left."

  "Auxiliary tanks are on the ... rack. Outside, in back," Nathan whispered. "Change them."

  "All right. I will."

  "Take me home."

  "I'll do my best."

  It took most of ten minutes before Trent had the fuel tanks changed over; he had never attempted to change a crawler's fuel tanks before, and he botched the first connection and sprayed the fuel at high pressure over the crawler's rear. The second and third tanks he got on correctly. He cy
cled back through the airlock and brought the tanks on line. The fuel gauge flickered back to Full; Trent backed the vehicle up, drove past the crawler he had come in, and headed north.

  He sat in the middle of the long bench seat, helping Nathan keep upright. He considered letting the man lie down on the seat, but there was blood in his lungs. Trent could hear it every time Nathan gathered the necessary energy to speak, a bubbling sound in his voice, and he was afraid that if Nathan lay down he might drown in his own blood.

  Nathan whispered, "How much longer?"

  "It took me half an hour to get here. Call it twenty-five minutes before we reach the bolt hole."

  "God, it hurts." Nathan's eyes were losing focus as the crawler rolled across the surface of the Moon. "Do you know what it felt like when the maser beam hit me? I wanted to die just so the pain would stop."

  "Nathan, you need to conserve your strength." Trent looked at the pained expression on the man's face, and said gently, "When we get to the bolt hole I can call Cassini, have them send a hopper." Trent was certain that the semiballistic would not get there in time. "Just be quiet and try to relax."

  Trent could not tell if Nathan believed him or not; the man did not try to speak again for several minutes.

  There was silence then but for the sound of Nathan's wheezing.

  The crawler rolled across the Lunar surface.

  "Trent?"

  "Yes?"

  "Who were they after? You, or me?"

  Trent said nothing.

  At length Nathan said, "It was you. They were after you."

  "Probably."

  "I guess it ... doesn't matter."

  "I can't see how, Nathan."

  "I think I'm going to die, Trent."

  "Everybody does."

  "Soon."

  Trent said, "I think you are."

  "Well, shit." Nathan's breathing rattled hollowly in his throat. "Trent ... you can't fight them. This is what happens when you try to fight them."