by Ginger Booth
She threw up her hands to encompass the artfully medieval surroundings. Ben shook his head. “He knows what a Faraday cage is. Signal-blocking cloth.”
Indeed, Milo’s eyes darted to one of the standing desks. Ben stepped around and rifled the drawers. Voila. Padded mirrored thermal wraps, suitable for keeping pizza hot. Or hiding a computer from scanners and rough handling. He tossed one to Elise.
“Milo! Are more attackers on their way?” Ben held his eye while Elise translated. The captain didn’t wait for the response. Milo had no idea. “We’re out of here!” He paused to stun the master once more in the head. That should keep him out cold for hours.
But that didn’t ensure they had that long of a head start. Clay decided to pull the master into the same alcove where their cart was hidden, and arrange him as though catching a nap.
“We do not study the library?” Remi asked, puzzled.
Ben shrugged. “We got computers to study later. But what we wanted from a library was communications. That’s not what they do here. The other thing we want is information about this place. We take him for that.”
Indeed, Milo made a fine walking reference. It was a pity he knew so little of the world. But Ben already got the gist.
The ones who knew anything on Cantons were the wizards. And they didn’t impart their secrets to anyone.
He tucked away their prize laptops, well-shielded by smelly backpacks and spare cloaks. Clay volunteered himself to keep Milo under heel. And they slipped back out into the hallway, out of the building, and out of the university district, as fast as they could walk without drawing undue attention.
Ben suppressed any conversation, figuring it was safer to talk on the train to Iberia.
The train station was perplexing. They exited the city walls into a modest geodesic dome, empty except for a single conductor. Milo told them how much to pay, and Remi delivered. When the conductor rolled the luggage away, he confided worriedly that the ticket for the handcart cost more than a passenger.
A sausage-shaped, waist high bubble appeared, and the conductor waved them over imperiously. Ben stepped forward first, realizing only when he was closer that there was a single, reclined seat inside the bubble, with a transparent view all around. The train staffer popped the side open and offered a firm hand guiding Ben to sit. He adjusted the seat until the captain’s feet firmly connected to a block in the nose of the little chamber, then clamped Ben in with straps and buckle across the chest. With no further ado, the conductor shut him in, and Ben glided away through the dome in his pod, unable to even look behind him.
He breathed relief as his vehicle cleared an airlock to pass easily through the station wall and along the gentle curve of the track. How cute. A baby monorail!
Then the bubble accelerated. By the time that ‘gentle curve’ was past, Ben was pressed to the floor, practically lying sideways with a white-knuckled grip on the armrests, while the ground whipped past below at over 200 kph. He knew this for a fact because a little display on his surrounding view told him so. After he reached the straightaway to Iberia, the vessel righted itself and the speedometer crept higher.
He could see nothing behind him. Fogged windows and horizontal streaks of pale yellow rain encompassed him, making the scenery hard to appreciate. But at this speed, in mere minutes he saw the looming walls of Iberia, a blank rectangle to the skinny triangle footprint of France. In under five minutes he arrived, heart pounding, as the bubble pod went through a quick spray wash. Then it emerged into another train station, fancier this time, with sunny pastel colors on a geometric floor mosaic.
A masked conductor popped his bubble top, and helped Ben climb out. His handcart awaited. The captain rolled the belongings out of the way as directed by hand gestures and guttural gestures, and waited as his companions arrived.
Including Milo. Because Ben collected the nearest thing to a library he could find – a squirrelly university student willing to escape his master.
28
On Prosper, parked at their base camp, Hugo was thrilled to chair a briefing. At Ben’s request, the envoys on Cupid remained out of the loop for now, but the key Thrive Spaceways staff were logged in, plus Eli Rasmussen and Zan here on Prosper.
“We’re in a hotel right now,” Ben reported. “Iberia. I decided that was the safest way to grill our walking library, Milo.”
“He knows what we are?” Hugo worried.
“Can’t be helped,” Ben agreed. “Here’s what I’ve got so far. France is an absolute no. They speak only French, and do not accept immigrants. Basically because immigrants don’t speak French. For our purposes, there are two sorts of city-states: insular, and open. France and Iberia are insular. When we arrived here at the train station, they made us buy our train tickets out, and stamped our hands with the date. We have two days to reach the train station to Italia. On foot.”
“You were open about being travelers?” Sass asked, still in Britain.
“Three French speakers, one English, and Clay,” Ben retorted. “And we couldn’t supply a local address. So yes. But the train expects travelers. Didn’t bat an eye.”
“Good to know,” Sass acknowledged.
Hugo urged, “What city-states are open?”
“Britain, Benelux, and Deutschland,” Ben replied. “And some borderline cases. Scandia, we’re not sure about. Italia is possibly too disorganized to care. Hellada is desperate for tourists, and underpopulated. Polska and Zentrum want nothing to do with anyone. There’s also a special case, Baltica. The city was abandoned, but the walls are still standing.”
Abel, currently babysitting the two ships still in orbit, brought up a map on his box of the screen. He X’d out the closed cities in red.
“My take,” Ben continued, “is that the language barrier is a major hassle. Our guide seems to think Britain, Deutschland, and Scandia are the only cities where you can get by in English. Though the population of Hellada is so tiny it might not matter, Hugo. You’d outnumber the natives. And the educated in Benelux can read English. Big caveat here, though – my source has only ever visited France, Italia, and Hellada. And speaks French.”
“A university student?” Hugo pressed. “Is he very young?” Cantons offered an excellent train network. He would have expected anyone with a gram of curiosity to visit all of the city-states.
“Milo’s 24,” Ben replied. “Served four years mandatory in the French army, starting at 16. Now third year at university. But they don’t make it easy. Each subject master guards his secrets. The peons endure all kinds of mystical hazing trying to earn their way up to higher levels of initiation into the mysteries. To become wizards themselves. That’s at the technical university in Paris.”
“That’s insane,” Cope noted.
Eli countered, “This explains much about how terraforming regressed here.”
Hugo nodded. “We had a little breakthrough here today. Eli, explain.”
“The sulfur everywhere. They have atmospheric nanites doing sulfur draw-down. Exquisite nano-design, I’ll bring samples home to Mahina. They precipitate sulfur down to the ground. We spotted massive blowers between Scandia and Benelux, sweeping the stuff into a pit. Based on the pit shape, I was able to find them all over this plain, and a few scattered across the continent. I suspect they intended to keep drawing down the sulfur, and mostly abandoned the project as hopeless, or too expensive. But also Porter got some soil cores and ‘tree’ ring data correlated. There were definitely decades of cleaner rain and better growth. That period ended not long before Hugo visited here before.”
Hugo nodded sadly. “So we observed Cantons at its best, environmentally. Excellent work, Ben. Do we have a good feel for whether these ‘wizards’ are the same across cities?”
Ben shook his head. “The kid’s a low-level ‘acolyte.’ We stole some laptops from his ‘master.’ His eyes nearly bugged out when Remi bypassed the login system by simply copying the data to his comm tab. Milo barely knew a tenth of the material on the one
machine where he could login. His access was blocked. If we want to know more about the current tech base, we’d need a higher-level wizard. Apparently the most powerful ones live in Zentrum, and less secretive ones in Deutschland.”
“‘Suffrus fookin’ wizards,’” Cope supplied. “That’s what they call them here in Britain. Not popular with the masses.”
“Can you blame them?” Ben responded.
“Have you seen kids?” Cope blurted to his husband. “I haven’t seen any below working age.”
“No children?” Hugo pounced.
Ben shrugged. “I haven’t noticed any. Clay asked Milo about it. But the kid got extra evasive. Got the idea it was an issue.”
“Elise and I can try more,” Remi offered.
Hugo leaned forward, frowning. “So this Milo struggled for years for crumbs of knowledge, right? And he’s used to getting that in exchange for labor, or…”
“Humiliation, chores, hard labor. Lies,” Ben supplied.
Hugo snorted and shared a glance with Eli, who nodded. “Perhaps we should arrange pickup of Milo. And either Elise or Remi as translator. He might be more forthcoming on Prosper. Or wait, is there any reason to continue the southern tour? Hellada.”
He answered his own question. The underpopulated Hellada might be eager to accept Sanctuary immigrants to bolster their numbers. With a small enough town, even wizards might be accessible.
Ben shrugged. “Iberia only offers two trains. I’m done with France. From Italia, Clay and I can check out Hellada, then backtrack and rendezvous in Deutschland. I could smuggle the three French-speakers out, but it’s daylight for another…40 hours?”
Zan supplied, “Moons. Dark again in 60 hours for an 8 hour window.”
“I like to see Hellada. Elise, too,” Remi offered. The materials scientist presently kept Milo diverted in the adjoining hotel room.
“Yeah, let’s wait,” Ben decided. “The advantage of Milo on the ship is to make him available to Sass. And provide the data we slurped off the laptops.”
“But Sass, you can text us questions in the meantime,” Clay suggested. “We’ll get back to you when we can. Or develop your own source.”
Ben noted, “Every stop on Sass’s route remains a contender. English capability, however limited. Cities that accept newcomers. To some degree.”
Abel took advantage of the following thoughtful lull. “What are you seeing market-wise? I understand technology is…limited? But how about food supply, health, living conditions? Orderly?”
“Cranky,” Sass summarized the mood of Britain. “Unkind. A smattering of beefy, aggressive men, but most seem…pinched. Thin, drink ale for breakfast before work, out to screw somebody over. Shops are like a miserly Renaissance Faire. Not much interesting available that I’ve seen. They have enough to get by. The public transportation is…free. Effective. Not too pleasant.”
“Ceramics,” Cope added. “The massive walls. Furniture, locks, glassworks. Even circuitry somehow. I’ve never seen ceramics on this scale.”
Abel’s eyes widened. “Metal shortage? Interesting.”
Remi raised a finger. “Eli? Zelda and Porter, please do a full mineral assay. For Elise and me. Ceramics. They know how.”
Zelda and Porter were the grad students Sass brought to Sanctuary, now assigned as Eli Rasmussen’s science gofers. Hugo knew them well. But his meeting was going astray.
Hugo rapped the table. “Children. Adult education. Career paths. Medicine. Those are Sanctuary’s interests.”
Abel argued, “Granted, Hugo. And Thrive Spaceways can transport you here and drop you off. But if you ever want to see us again, we need to see a chance to uplift this planet through commerce to other worlds. I need a market analysis. Products we can sell them. Something worthwhile they can trade.”
Copeland backed him up. “It’s a serious consideration, Hugo. You don’t want to be marooned in Britain. Maybe we’ll see something better. But Mahina is turning into an inter-world crossroads. If only because it’s our home base.”
“Understood,” Hugo said, and made a note of it. “And career paths?”
“Brewers guild,” Cope replied. “Plumbers. That suggests other professions are guarded, too. Not just the fookin’ wizards.”
“Secrets of beer brewing,” Ben marveled. “And to think we each brewed a batch on the long trip to Denali. We looked up the recipes, and goofed around.”
“Well, the British beer is better than yours,” Sass quipped with a grin. Ben’s husband raised an eyebrow. “Though not Cope’s,” she amended.
Hugo recalled that Copeland worked in a distillery once. His expertise ran well beyond following a recipe.
“Practice makes perfect,” Hugo allowed, and sighed. “You know my opinion. Mahina is a better destination. But we’re here, and we need more information. I can’t pull the plug yet. Unless…has it been dangerous?”
“Too dangerous for your envoys in Britain,” Sass opined. “Unless I found a powerful sponsor first.”
“We ran into trouble in France,” Ben allowed. “But France is off the table.”
Clay shook his head. “Every male in France serves four years in the army when young and impressionable. They’re trained in aggression. All of them. I could be wrong, but I expect every city is harsh. High crime rate. Low social cohesion.”
Ben looked unconvinced. “The rings of Pono are blaster-only. I go armed on the streets of Schuyler. Though Cope doesn’t. Mahina Actual is orderly to a fault, security everywhere. The rest of Mahina isn’t. Denali? A quarter of the population is devoted to martial arts.” Zan grinned. “You get used to it.”
Hugo couldn’t imagine ‘getting used to’ violence and crime, jealously guarded trade secrets instead of open education. If it came to that, he’d rather raise his kids on Sanctuary. But he was free to choose Mahina for his family regardless of what the rest of his world elected.
Though his son Bron might choose his friends on Sanctuary over his family. They’d prudently left Bron and his pal Nico Copeland in orbit under Corky and Abel’s supervision. The boys found this outrageously unfair. They’d be draft fodder here. Though the interstellar visitors hadn’t observed warfare yet, merely armies marching around on drills. Knock on wood.
“Alright. Let’s continue the plan for now,” Hugo concluded.
This was his official role in the expedition, embedded liaison with Thrive Spaceways for the Sanctuary contract, for their aid in relocation. The envoys on Cupid would scream his ear off, no doubt. But the Thrive team had yet to identify a safe place for Cupid to land, or officials for them to meet and wheedle. Until then, it was better to keep the other two ships in orbit and save on fuel. Because they might yet decide Cantons was a ‘no,’ and visit Steppe instead. Though considering the language and cultural barrier here, the Russian-settled moon seemed unlikely to be an improvement.
“Thank you for your hard work. And stay safe out there.”
29
“Who is this man?” Kurt Schauble demanded. The Grand Wizard to the Chancellor of Deutschland, Fürst of the Wizards Guild, sneered through his mask at the minor wizard before him on the video display. Was such a worm even allowed to use a video call? At his age, if he was worth a damn, he should serve at the city-state level. But then Schauble would recognize him.
No one rose to that level without him personally vetting their competence.
“Master Reynaud, Highness,” Minister Violette sniveled. The birdlike advisor to the French Cabinet possessed skills more political than technical, mostly in the blackmail arena. Violette was a despised tool and butt-kisser. “Reynaud is Master of Paris waterworks, sewers, and airlocks. He claims rogue wizards snuck into his innermost lair. They stole two laptops, a gravity wand, and a third-year acolyte. I felt you should hear from him directly.”
Schauble’s brows lowered in anger.
Reynaud gulped and shot Violette a look of terror. “Excellence, they disabled me with a stun gun! My defenses were flawless. The laser
web activated, and the automated guns. But they knew what they saw. They easily thwarted the measures. These were no ordinary thieves. Please. I have video.”
Schauble found this a lot to digest. First, he had his initial doubt answered. Like so many among the French isolationists, Reynaud’s accent was terrible, his English hard to follow. Once the Fürst parsed the words, what the man claimed lacked any credibility.
Fürst meant Prince in German. Not the useless hereditary ceremonial type – that was a Prinz. A Fürst was a ruling prince. The distinction also sounded like First in English, which of course all wizards understood, their lingua franca – an oxymoron, given the execrable English of the French.
“Please, Excellence,” Violette interceded. “When you see, you will understand why I trouble you.”
The video – clearly edited, but only so as not to waste the prince’s time – showed a forgettable initiate leading unknown persons into the control room. A woman? She and another French speaker looked French enough, but their clothing made little sense. The prince was unable to assign a city to the other two men. The taller was conspicuously handsome, yet his complexion and features looked exotic. The shorter could pass as normal, an Italian perhaps, if not for the company he kept. And indeed, he was the one who suddenly pulled a stunner from his pocket and disabled Reynaud.
The prince insisted Violette replay twice, that he might catch subtle details.
They spoke English. Fluently, yet with a most un-British accent. They expertly dodged laser beams and rifled Reynaud’s pockets. They knew to seek a Faraday cage – by that name! – to shield the stolen laptops. His first thought was the sewer-master had been criminally remiss, to teach Faraday cages to a third-year peon. But it was the smaller English who reasoned that he must have such a thing.