Stellar Ranger

by Steve Perry

  Interesting that a man as rich as Tuluk would risk it all by doing something really illegal. Oh, sure, wealthy men cut corners, they could be unethical and competitive to the point of really nasty and most of the ones Cinch had run into were, to a degree, but when you were so rich you’d never be able to spend it all, what was the point in trying to gather more if you had to step that far over the line?

  Then again, Cinch knew the thrill of the hunt, the joy of the chase, and that wasn’t about money. Maybe Tuluk was in the criminal business for the rush it gave him. Men had done stranger things.

  As he dressed, he thought of other ways he might go about his investigation. The pot was probably stirred sufficiently by now. Maybe he would go into town and have breakfast there. His resolve about Baji was strong, but then again he wasn’t made of steel.

  * * *

  “What now, boss?”

  Tuluk leaned back in his chair, steepled his fingers, and looked at Lobang. “I want somebody stuck to the ranger like a field tick. Get some people he hasn’t seen. I want to know if he belches, and if he does I want a recording of what it sounds like. If he appears to be calling in the troops or sending signals that could imperil our operation in any way, he is to be stopped.”

  “But I thought you wanted it to look like an accident–”

  “I didn’t say kill him, I said stop him. Clonk him on the head and bring him here, whatever, we can figure something out. I don’t think he knows anything dangerous yet. We must see to it that he does not learn such things.”

  Lobang nodded and left.

  Tuluk worried over it like a cat with a bit of tough meat. Things had escalated past where he thought they would. He thought he was still all right, but doubt had raised its hairy eyebrows at him and it bothered him more than a little. He liked to be in control, liked to have the pawns move under his command. This ranger was a wild card and Tuluk did not like it in the least. He would have to do something. He would have to find out exactly what the man knew and what he planned.

  What, after all, was the point in having all this money and power if he couldn’t exercise it?

  Then again, if the truth must out, this was all most stimulating. He hadn’t felt quite this alive in a long time, you didn’t count the recent bedroom escapades. It was fun to play–as long as he won.

  * * *

  Morning found Cinch cruising toward town. There were a couple of restaurants there, one that didn’t look too bad. Given that there was a choice and not many tourists to keep them in business, one of them ought to be fair. Local people could stay home if it wasn’t.

  The ranger picked the smaller of the two places, not far from Wanita’s. It was Everlast plastic, but somebody had painted it a flat white and put a sign over the door that said MELINDA’S.

  Inside was a counter with stools and a dozen tables. The smells of beef and eggs and some kind of flat bread or cake baking blended into a nice aroma. The grill was behind the counter and a thin woman stood at it, cooking. Another woman, younger and more corpulent, did the waitressing. There were twenty people eating, talking, or waiting for breakfast. Most of the tables were full. A good sign.

  Wanita sat alone in a comer, sipping coffee or whatever passed for it here. She saw Cinch come in.

  “Hey, Ranger. Come have a seat.”

  He smiled at her and nodded, moved to sit across from her.

  “Haven’t seen you in a while,” she said, “Been busy?”

  “Doing this and that, yeah.”

  The waitress came over, put a thick white mug full of steaming coffee in front of him without asking. He nodded at her. “Thanks.”

  “You want breakfast?”

  “Sure. Whatever Wanita’s having.”

  The waitress bustled off and he turned back to Wanita. “How do you know I’m not having pig guts or fishheads or something?”

  “You can eat it, I can.”

  She laughed. “I like you, Ranger.”

  “Cinch.”

  She sipped at her coffee. “My brother kinda likes you, too, though he’d break his arm before he would say so. He any help to you?”

  “Some, He seems like a good kid.”

  “He is. Would have been better if he’d never gone to work for Tuluk, but it’s a small town. So. What’s on your horizon ?”

  “Little more poking into things.”

  She grinned again. “Yeah? Any particular kind of things you poking into?”

  Cinch blinked. Was that a double entendre? Easy enough to find out. He said, “Wherever I might fit.”

  “I have some thoughts about that,” she said.

  “Oh?”

  “How hungry are you? For breakfast, I mean?”

  “I could miss it, there was something better to eat.”

  “Why don’t you come to the pub with me? My living quarters are off the back. See if we can find something for you to poke into or nibble on.”

  It was Cinch’s tum to grin. A grown woman , very attractive, one who not only found him so but was willing to act on it. He couldn’t think of a better offer, bruises and scratches notwithstanding. He pulled a ten MU coin from his pocket and dropped it on the table to pay for their breakfasts and coffee. Carne to his feet as smoothly as he could manage and extended one hand to her.

  * * *

  Cinch always thought high praise for a person’s body was that they looked better without clothes than with them.

  Wanita looked better nude than covered, and that was saying something. He told her so, and she was pleased. She was lean, had a dancer’s musculature, smooth skin the same color as her face. Her breasts were small, with dark chocolate nipples, her pubic hair a dense thicket of blue-black. She stripped without modesty and helped him shuck his clothes before they moved to the bed.

  They kissed, touched each other gently at first, explored each other with hands and lips and knees and then everything else.

  Cinch quickly found out that Wanita’s nickname of “magic mouth” was well deserved, and she found out a few seconds later that it had been some time since he had been with a woman, A couple liters ago, Cinch felt, somewhat embarrassed. But she laughed and it was fine and not even a little bit messy,

  Thus warmed up, they exercised considerable affection and skill upon each other, so that each of them reached a peak twice more in the next hour, a third time in the hour following.

  If Cinch had been tired and sore before, he was nearly comatose by noon. And he couldn’t remember a time better spent, in more than one sense of that word.

  Lying side by side and exhausted, they held hands.

  “Not bad for an old ranger,” she said.

  “You’re pretty good for an old pub owner yourself.”

  They laughed.

  “Thanks,” he said. “You are quite delicious.”

  “Don’t thank me, I got as good as I gave.” She shifted a little, pressed her hip against his.

  “Forget it,” he said. “I’m an old ranger and I’m done.”

  She laughed. “So, how goes the investigation?”

  “Slow. I have some ideas but I’m kind of easy to keen track of. Tuluk is having me watched, makes it kind of hard to sneak around.”

  “How can I help?”

  “Well. I don’t know that you can. But your brother might be able to do something.’

  “If it would cause Tuluk any grief, all you have to do is ask.”

  He smiled, put his hand on her hip and stroked her. “Could you get word to him to contact me? My com is probably leaking big, but he could leave a message with you if that would be okay.”

  “No problem.”

  She rolled over onto her side to face him. Ran one finger along a scar on his arm he’d never bothered to have revised. “Big adventure?”

  “Nah. Cut myself shaving.”

  “My. He
re, let me show you something.” She moved down.

  “Wasting your time,” he said.

  Normally Cinch didn’t like being wrong, but it didn’t bother him at all this time. Magic, indeed. This woman was practically a miracle. When he got ready to buy that ranch and raise kids, he was going to come back here and look her up. Assuming he ever got the strength back to be able to stand up and leave ...

  WOULD THAT this business were all he had to worry about, Tuluk thought. But, no. There were a hundred other items that needed his personal attention each and every day of life. A man who sat at the head of a multimillion-standard empire could not simply sit back and let his underlings handle all the details. Such a man would quickly find himself being robbed blind or extended into places he would rather avoid.

  His computer having been given the proper instructions, set up priorities each morning. There were calls from bankers, legals, suppliers, and others with whom he did business, calls that must be attended to to keep his connections patent. There were orders to be signed, moneys to be dispensed legally and otherwise–bribes went a long way toward keeping the machinery of his business Iubricated–decisions to be made that only Tuluk himself could make.

  He paced in his office, giving his computer secretary verbal instructions. Would that this ranger and his vast potential for interrupting the new income via the blueweed Twist were his only worries. Why, could he turn all his attention there, the matter would certainly be resolved quickly. But rich and powerful men had large responsibilities that could not be shirked.

  “–tell Wiggis Awan at Offworld Export that his offer is too low by half,” Tuluk said. “Put it in the proper form.”

  “Sure thing, honey,” the computer’s voice said. She had been programmed to sound like a holovid star from Tuluk’s youth, a sultry woman who had been the wet dream of billions of teenage boys for probably thirty years. He wondered what she looked like now, or if she were still alive. Better to keep the fantasy and not know, he decided.

  “Tell Diba Akang that I am expecting the delivery of my responder order on time or I shall certainly invoke the penalty clause and he can kiss his profits good-bye. Phrase it just so.”

  “Right, babe.”

  “Put in a call to Vice President Wither and arrange for a lunch date for my visit to the capital next month.”

  “Anything you want, sweetie.”

  “And tell him no Subbonesian food this time; that crap makes my stomach burn.”

  “No Subbonesian food, got it.”

  “Order a case of my single-malt scotch from Bernard’s and tell them I want it within a month this time.”

  “Scotch, within a month, yes sir, honey.”

  Tuluk paused in his pacing. “What’s next on the list?”

  “Dogmatics has some question on the warranty for the replacement parts ordered by M, Lobang for the biomech.”

  “Some question? To hell with that. The damned springdog failed to perform as advertised! They’ll make it good or I’ll sue them!”

  “Gee, baby, I hate to point this out, but according to your personal and private record, the biomech was altered beyond factory specifications and therefore the warranty is, technically speaking, void.”

  Tuluk nodded to himself. Ah, yes. Wouldn’t do to have a representative of the company showing up here to argue the point now, would it? The ranger would be all over him like flies on fresh dung.

  “All right. Cancel that. We’ll eat the cost.”

  “You’re so very clever, Manis.”

  Tuluk grinned and shook his head. How many billions of men would have given their left nut to have the woman whose voice was his secretary comp say that to them? Being rich had its compensations, Money might not buy you love, but it sure could buy you something that looked and felt and tasted just like it

  “Okay. What’s next?”

  * * *

  Cinch’s walk to his borrowed car was slow but a lot looser than it had been before he and Wanita had been together. He grinned as the afternoon sun tried to cook him, Sorry, he thought, I feel too good to be bothered by a little heat.

  As he drove back toward the ranch, he worked out the beginnings of a plan. Strictly speaking, what he intended wasn’t legal. Hell, what he intended was as crooked as a Teleganian pirate; still, that line between the letter of the law and the intent of those who had made the law did get real blurry. Nobody knew that better than a ranger who had to interpret the difference in places where a hammer or a microscalpel might be the only tools you had. As long as he could get up and look at himself in the mirror without flinching, Cinch figured he wasn’t doing too bad as a translator.

  * * *

  Baji flounced into the kitchen as Cinch dug through the cooler looking for something to eat. She was not in the best of moods.

  “I thought we were going to have lunch,” she said, her arms crossed tightly.

  “I don’t recall that was supposed to be today,” Cinch said, pulling a packet of thinly sliced steak from the refrigerator.

  “Where have you been?”

  It was all he could do to keep from laughing. Last night he’d locked his door because he was worried this little girl might sneak in and try to have her way with him. Last night was a million years away, now that Wanita had squeezed him as dry as a sponge left outside in the bright sun for a week.

  “Working. I’m a ranger, remember. I had some sources I needed to see in town.”

  “And was one of those ‘sources’ Wanita the slut?”

  “I thought you liked her.”

  “I was just trying to be polite. You shouldn’t waste your time on her, she doesn’t know anything that can help you.”

  Wrong about that, Cinch thought. I can’t remember when I was helped so much. And my time on Wanita was anything but a waste. But he said, “That’s for me to determine, Baji, I know how to do my job.”

  “She’s not what she seems, Cinch. Don’t say I didn’t warn you!”

  With that, Baji flounced out of the room.

  Cinch grinned. It was hard to remember how much he had wanted to play games with her only a few hours ago. Wanita certainly had dulled that particular edge for him. Baji seemed much more like a spoiled kid than she had when they were naked together in the hot tub last night.

  Cinch went back to his search for food. He needed it.

  * * *

  Tuluk’s day wound down.

  “Incoming call from M. Ulang,” his computer said. “Shall I cycle it?”

  “No. I’ll talk to him. Level One security scramble.”

  “Sure thing, sweetie.”

  Ulang was an alias, of course, and probably the man was having his end of the conversation routed through three or four bounces so anybody trying to trace the com wouldn’t have a prayer of doing so.

  Ulang was the dope dealer who was going to fatten Tuluk’s wallet beyond his ability to haul it around without a trailer rig.

  “Ah, M. Ulang, So good to hear from you.”

  “M. Tuluk. How’s the weather?”

  “Tolerably warm. You know how it is.”

  The conversation, which would run along these lines for another five minutes or so, was nothing but a cover. The real communication was already over, a speed-pulse of subsonic electronic code scrambled and one-time-only, now safely recorded in the flash memory of Tuluk’s computer. Anybody without Tuluk’s retinal pattern, the name of the first dog he’d owned and his EEG pattern wouldn’t be able to call the file up without wiping it; and even if they could manage to circumvent the wards, they wouldn’t be able to decipher it without the resources of a major cryptography lab and several weeks of effort. By which time it would be moot. All the message said was where and when M. Ulang would arrive on this world, and that was going to be in the next few days.

  M. Ulang and Tuluk had business to transact together. Major bu
siness, and neither of them wanted anybody else to know squat about it

  The conversation finished, and did it have a listener who somehow managed to overhear it, it would have sounded fatuous in the extreme. Tuluk had long been of the mind that anybody who listened to, or followed around, almost anybody for an average day would probably think them deranged. Such had been his experience when he’d viewed surveillance recordings or read reports filed by various of his spies. A man came out of his residence, walked to his flitter and drove away. Half a klick later he turned around and went home, alighted from his vehicle, reentered his house and stayed there for the rest of the day. What could have been on his mind? Or a woman being followed in a large market went up and down one aisle six times looking for something, Was she blind? Stupid?

  Ah, well. It did not matter.

  He entered the proper codes, allowed his eyes to be scanned by the security system, his brain to be graphed, and after the message pulse was expanded and decoded, got the gist of the conversation with Ulang: the man would be arriving in three days and he would meet Tuluk at the agreed-upon site, itself deliberately kept from this message. The place was the Flathead Mesa, a rock formation that looked like its name, some two hundred kilometers from Tuluk’s ranch house. It was in the middle of nowhere, the mesa, and thus the choice. No one was apt to sneak up on a man conducting business there–not unless he were invisible, too cold for IR gear to spot, and quiet as a flea in stealth boots. The time for the meeting was 2400 hours and any traffic out at midnight would be visible to the horizon to the watchers Tuluk would have posted.