"That's very kind of you," Darzek murmured.
"Not at all. I understand that you would expect to handle these purchases yourself, and it isn't every day that a trader is able to buy and outfit a spaceship - certainly not a trader from a poor world like mine. It's only fair that you should have a commission, too.
"One more thing. If my mission succeeds in every detail, I am to receive an enormous bonus, so I intend to be exceedingly careful to follow my instructions as precisely as possible. If my mission fails through no fault of mine, I also am to receive a bonus."
Darzek said politely, "In other words, there's no amount of payment that would persuade you to bend your instructions slightly."
"None whatsoever. I also have a strong feeling of loyalty to my employer, whoever he is. He's making me rich."
"Then all we need to do, just for a start, is to persuade Vezpro to provide enough solvency to purchase the ship."
If the spider had possessed a face, it would have been beaming at Darzek. "That certainly is the essential first step. Understand, I have no idea at all as to why the Vezpronian government wants to be a party to this transaction. It all seems very perplexing to me. But the solvency for the ship is certainly the essential first step."
11
Vezpro was hosting its annual trades fair, a gala occasion that lasted eighteen days, filled transient accommodations with traders, manufacturers, designers, engineers, and visitors who simply liked trades fairs, and brought most activities on the world to a temporary halt while everyone either took part in the fair or milled about with the visitors.
Miss Schlupe, who loved fairs of any kind, attended it the first day and returned disappointed. "It's like getting lost in a mammoth appliance store where everything has such an ultramodern design you can't figure out what it is," she said. "And there aren't any refreshments - no samples, not even anything for sale. Which gives me an idea."
"No," Darzek said firmly. "Absolutely not. I will not have you going into the fried chicken, or hamburger, or pizza business. We've got serious work to do here."
"Actually, I was thinking of tacos," Miss Schlupe said. "I told you once - it's frightfully difficult to start a fried chicken business without chickens, and as far as I know there aren't any closer than Earth. As for hamburgers -"
"Never mind. Did the fair suggest anything related to our problem?"
"Not that I noticed. Unless it's possible to hook up a billion nuclear-powered bookends and set off a world."
Darzek arched his eyebrows. "Nuclear-powered bookends?" "There were things that looked like bookends. I don't know what they were used for. I got the impression that almost everything Vezpro manufactures is nuclear-powered."
"No doubt that's why so many nuclear engineers and scientists come here to study and work."
"I suppose that's also why so many of them disappear here," Miss Schlupe said. "Did I tell you I've added another forty-seven to the list?"
"Did you ask the Zarstans to check it for you?"
"Yes. They only admit to knowing thirty-three of them. The Prime Number has finally grasped the fact that Vezpro has a potentially serious problem that could destroy his Order, and he's cooperating fully - after his fashion.
"How many genuine disappearances have you turned up?" Darzek asked.
"More than fifty."
"Other worlds may be hiring Vezpro's engineers in order to steal its manufacturing secrets. Naturally they'd go about it surreptitiously. "
"Do you believe that?"
"It's one more possibility. Look what happens on Earth with industrial espionage."
"This isn't Earth, and these characters are supposed to exist on a moral plane that's light-years above the one occupied by us groveling humans. Are you going to the fair?"
Darzek gestured wearily. "I doubt that I could learn anything from acres of nuclear bookends, but I'm going to the official reception, which of course they call a symposium. It's restricted to ultraimportant visitors, but for some reason the masfiln himself sent me an invitation, so I suppose I've got to go."
"You should feel honored," Miss Schlupe said severely.
"I don't. It isn't me that's ultra-important, it's the emissary of Supreme, and only the masfiln and the Mas of Science and Technology know who I am. There's no fun in being ultra-important if no one is aware of it."
"You might learn something."
"Not about our problem. No government official would dare/whisper at a trades fair symposium that next year's orders might not be filled because the world is going to blow up. There's just one thing I'm curious about. Is this slippery character Kernopplix considered an ultra-important person, and if so, by whom?"
Darzek blamed it on his Earth heritage: he never entered a building without wondering what it looked like from the outside. In a transmitterized society, his curiosity was rarely satisfied. One punched an address number on the destination board, stepped through a transmitter, and arrived in a foyer at his destination - or, if the building were a large one, in a reception room or hall. The exterior was not only unseen, but never seen, and - Darzek thought - probably just as well left to the imagination. Architects were unlikely to take pains with an invisible exterior.
If access to the building were restricted, then the transmitter number was private and known only to the select group whose status, business, employment, membership, or political pull granted admission rights. One also could personalize transmitters so that only one's self or a selected list of individuals could use them, and that by way of the invisibly tattooed solvency credential that all galactic citizens wore in some convenient place, usually the palm of a hand, if they had a hand.
The masfiln's reception was open to those who had received invitations, and the invitations stated the transmitter destination number. Darzek, impeccably attired in clashing colors that Vezpro considered proper symp-dress, punched the number, stepped through, and found himself in a milling mass of life forms that filled the Palace of Government's huge reception room.
He gradually maneuvered his way past a blur of misshapen arms, distorted legs, tentacles, bloated or attenuated torsos, and heads that varied from the grotesquely oversized to the apparently nonexistent. Eventually he reached the enormous but equally crowded symposium room beyond. At the far side, on a dais, stood the masfiln and a group of his delegates, none of them familiar to Darzek. There was no reception line, but anyone interested in being "received" mounted the dais and exchanged a few words with each official before moving on.
Darzek managed a complete circuit of the room without seeing anyone he recognized except the masfiln, and he avoided the dais. Apparently few of his trader friends were in the ultraimportant class, and if Kernopplix were present in such a crowd, Darzek knew he would happen onto him only by accident. Finally he maneuvered his way into an alcove, where odd pieces of furniture apparently had been grouped for the use of people who weren't speaking. Darzek seated himself and waited to see whether any mountains would come to him.
When one finally did, it was not the mountain he expected. Naz Forlan, the Mas of Science and Technology, quietly made his way through the throng and, with a nod and a smile, destroyed the furniture arrangement by moving a chair toward Darzek.
He leaned close, to make himself heard over a roomful of unblended communicative noises, and said politely, "Good evening,
Gul Darr. A state occasion such as this one must be singularly unexciting for you."
"It is," Darzek agreed frankly. "I've seen so many, on so many worlds. One circuit of the room, and the jumble of trade statistics I heard gave me a headache."
"I should have thought trade statistics would be important to a trader," Forlan observed. His soft, resonant voice remained distinct even in that jumble of sound.
"Only his own," Darzek said.
Forlan smiled. "Yes. I suppose each of those traders and fabricators is excessively concerned with his own statistics, and those of the governmental rep
resentatives have relevance only for each other." He paused. "Have you made any progress?"
"Except for passing along the demands presented by this character Kernopplix, none. By the way, I was wondering if he is here tonight."
"Kernopplix? At a state reception?" The mas seemed horrified at the thought.
"He does seem a bit on the slimy side," Darzek agreed.
"Is there any news of that unfortunate young engineer Qwasrolk?" "The chief proctor of Skarnaf has informed me that Qwasrolk has been sighted twice since our visit there. Each time he disappeared before he could be apprehended or even spoken to."
"Very strange," Forlan mused. "I have the feeling that he could help us, if only we could communicate. Such an accident as his is so excessively rare that it could not occur in industry without being widely publicized and discussed and investigated. So it must have involved some peculiar form of private research. Coupled with this Nifron D event and the threat to Vezpro - I very much wish that someone could talk with him."
"He's not likely to be of much help as long as he disappears the moment anyone sets eyes on him," Darzek observed.
"True," Forlan agreed. "And that may be more unusual than his injuries. Could there be a connection?"
"Between his injuries and his ability to teleport? I hadn't thought about that. I have no idea. It's an intriguing notion. Unfortunately, cause and effect aren't susceptible to frequent testing when the cause is a nuclear catastrophe."
"All of which leaves us - where?"
"It leaves us with Kernopplix," Darzek said.
"Yes. The masfiln presented his demands to the financial council today. I haven't heard the reaction."
Darzek asked in surprise, "Didn't you attend?"
Forlan gestured indifferently. "I'm a scientist. I don't know what the basis for the allocation of solvency should be called, but it certainly isn't scientific. Obviously a scientist wasn't needed, so I stayed away." He paused. "I'm worried, Gul Darr. I don't understand this thing - every scientist studies basic nucleonics, of course, and my experience goes far beyond that, but when I attend a meeting of my committee, I can't comprehend half of what is said. And then - the decision on the Kernopplix demands is completely out of my hands. I don't understand it, and I have no control over what is done about it - and yet the responsibility is mine."
Darzek turned to him and said frankly, "I've heard that your status as an alien is resented. I've even heard a suggestion that this entire affair was rigged to force you out of office."
Forlan's four arms shaped an emphatic negative. "That couldn't possibly be true. There are so many simpler ways of forcing a mas's resignation. Anyway, in politics everyone has a limited period of usefulness. One has only to let natural events take their course. Why go to any special trouble to get rid of me?"
"Certain irrational emotions seem to be the common denominator of the universe," Darzek said. "They may be mild in one place and harsh in another, but they exist everywhere. People look down upon, or fear, or resent what is strange - and an alien is strange."
Forlan turned a pained expression on him. "Did you ever hear of a world named Hlaswann?"
Darzek thought for a moment. "No. I never did."
"The world of my birth," Forlan said. "Its sun suddenly went nova. Thanks to modern science, this was predicted in time to remove the entire population. The natives of Hlaswann were scattered through a dozen sectors. Vezpro took a million of us. I was only a baby at the time. I have no recollection whatsoever of Hlaswann. Vezpro is the only world I've ever known."
His eyes were fixed on Darzek with intense sincerity. "You call me an alien because of my external shape, but I'm as native as any Vezpronian. This world gave me refuge, a home, education, a career, and prosperity with honors and distinction. I'll serve it in any way I can, whenever I'm asked. Not because I'm indebted to it, though my debt is incalculable, but because I am a Vezpronian. Because it's my world, the only one I've ever known." He got to his feet. "And," he went on, still meeting Darzek's eyes intensely, "though I was a baby, I know, vividly, what happened to Hlaswann. When I became older, I was curious enough to investigate, and I found a detailed record of a world being incinerated. Having had that happen to the world of my birth, I certainly don't want it to happen again, to my adoptive world." He turned with a gesture of farewell, friendly but distant, as though there were experiences that would forever set them apart, and moved away.
A few minutes later, Eld Wolndur appeared at Darzek's side. "I saw you talking with the mas," he said. "Did he give you the news?"
"He told me some things I hadn't known," Darzek said. "What's the news?"
"The finance council won't believe that there's any danger. It thinks Kernopplix is a fraud."
"Which he may be."
"It considers his demands so ridiculous that it wouldn't entertain them even if it were convinced that he was genuine. There can be no dealings with him of any kind in the name of the Vezpronian government. That's an order."
"It's an extraordinarily difficult proposition," Darzek said. "The only way he could demonstrate that the threat is a real one is by turning Vezpro into a sun - which of course would make it rather difficult for him to collect his ransom."
"It might make it easier for him to collect from other worlds, though," Wolndur said, a worried frown making ripples across his bald head.
"True. Does Kernopplix know he's been turned down?"
"No. Since the council has ordered that no one connected with the government should have any dealings with him, I thought perhaps that you ... "
Darzek got to his feet. People were continuing to arrive; the crowd was seeping into the alcove even while they talked, and twice he'd had his feet stepped on. "I'm certainly not accomplishing anything here," he said. "I might as well give him your news - now and see how he reacts. Suppose you meet me later at the Trans-Star office, and I'll tell you what happened."
"All right," Wolndur agreed.
Darzek edged his way into the slowly circulating mass and determinedly began to force a passage toward the reception room and the exit transmitter.
Suddenly a scream rang out.
Crowded as the room was, its occupants somehow managed to draw back and clear an open space. In its center stood a horribly burned and disfigured shape, a hideous caricature of a life form:
Qwasrolk, clad in a shabby robe salvaged from someone's rag bin. What remained of his hospital bandages were filthy rags. He looked about him; the gaping, seared hole that had been his mouth moved as though to speak. Then, just as abruptly as he had appeared, he vanished.
Darzek resolutely pushed his way through the horrified crowd.
There was nothing that could be done there and a great deal that had to be done elsewhere, at once. He finally reached the reception room and its transmitters and returned to the Trans-Star office. There he told Miss Schlupe what had happened and set her and Gud Baxak to work immediately, checking ships Qwasrolk could have stowed away on.
"If only we could talk to him," Miss Schlupe said irritably. "Find out why he came here and what he's looking for."
"At the moment I'm more concerned with how he came here," Darzek said.
"But the 'why' is as important as the 'how,''' Miss Schlupe objected. "Maybe he had a paranoid nostalgia that made him return to the place he worked, just as he returned to his childhood home on Skarnaf."
"Maybe. But I doubt that he did much work at the Palace of Government, or even attended any functions there. I'd like to hear from him why he came here. I'd like to hear anything at all from him."
They went to work on the problem, and Darzek, because he wasn't needed - Gud Baxak had a superb competence in any matter involving ship movements, and Miss Schlupe could supervise an entire investigative staff between knitting stitches - Darzek decided he might as well fulfill his errand to Kernopplix.
The spidery trader was home and pleased to receive a visit from the distinguished Gul Darr.
He greeted Darzek with the same oily cordiality he had displayed on Darzek's first visit. "I have been proceeding," he announced cheerfully. "I've renewed my option on the ship, and I have purchase orders ready for the passenger and freight compartments and the necessary supplies. How soon will the solvency be available?"
"It won't be," Darzek said bluntly. "Vezpro's finance council met today and rejected your request. It refuses to provide any solvency."
"Ah!" Kernopplix exclaimed. There was a strange suggestion of exultation in his voice, suggesting that his face, if he'd had one, would have been beaming at Darzek. For an instant Darzek wondered if he'd been misunderstood.
But when Kernopplix spoke again, it was with a note of regret.
"It's extraordinarily difficult to function without solvency."
"Virtually impossible," Darzek agreed gravely.
"Indeed it is. It poses enormous difficulties. The council's answer does, in fact, amount to an outright refusal. Am I justified in that conclusion?"
"I do believe that you are entirely justified in that conclusion," Darzek agreed. "Without the finance council's approval, no solvency is available. Therefore, whatever the administration's inclination may be, its only answer can be a refusal."
"Even if the masfiln is favorably disposed?" Kernopplix asked. "Even if the masfiln is favorably disposed, he can't make solvency available to us without the approval of the finance council. So the net result is a refusal, regardless of what he thinks."
"What does he think?"
"I have no idea," Darzek said. "I'm only a humble messenger, relaying information that has been relayed to me. Even if the masfiln knew me personally, I doubt that he'd confide in me."
"I see. What you want from me, then, is a reply that you can relay to be relayed."
Darzek considered this. "I doubt that the finance council is expecting a reply. Your message didn't sound like the opening of negotiations. It sounded like an ultimatum, and the council rejected it. However, if you have a reply, I'll see that it is relayed."
[Jan Darzek 05] - The Whirligig of Time Page 11