The New Space Opera 2

by Gardner Dozois

  “My school isn’t here—and it doesn’t start for another two tendays. Our planet’s on a different cycle.”

  “Traveling alone, are you?”

  “No, with—”

  “With parents? They should have more sense than to let a minor out in the concourse alone. Lost, are you?”

  “No,” Karl said. “I’m not lost. It’s my brother and my uncle—they’re gone—abducted. These men—”

  “Abducted.” The man’s stare combined disbelief and annoyance. “Off this concourse? In this shift?”

  “Yes! That’s why I wanted to report—”

  “When do you allege this happened?”

  Karl wanted to grab the man and shake him. “I’m not alleging…I’m telling you. I was there, I saw it myself. Two men, one bigger than the other. They said they had a warrant—”

  “Son, let me give you some advice. You may get away with this kind of adventure-fantasy story where you come from—I can tell you’re rich—but it won’t play here. If something like that had happened, I’d have had a dozen reports from people I know—storekeepers, people on the concourse.”

  “But they’re gone,” Karl said. “I don’t know where they are, and Evan—”

  “Here’s what I think,” the man said. “If your uncle and brother even exist, and are your real uncle and your real brother—all of which I doubt—they went someplace without telling you—you probably overslept—and now you’re bored, so you want station security to waste its time looking for them, when they’re in no danger at all and probably up on Orange Five watching a ball game. I could hold your ID and stick you in iso for wasting my time, but I’m a generous man, so I’ll give you some advice. Go back to your fancy Blue Zone hotel, stay there, and think about somebody but yourself, for once in your life.” He shoved Karl’s ID over the desk at him. “And don’t come bothering me again.”

  “But Customs would tell you—”

  “I’m not going to waste my time or theirs. Get out.”

  Karl left the station, trembling with rage. How could security possibly treat him that way, not even listen, not even let him tell what he’d seen? And what could he do now?

  Bryce kept saying this place wasn’t safe—but he said that about everywhere. It was his job to say that. Karl struggled to remember anything more specific. Bryce had been here, been here as a boy. So maybe he knew…more even than their father.

  He himself had to stay free, able to do whatever…whatever he could think of. Right now, staying free and finding a source of money was all he could think of. Money. He had his credit cube, but the limit on it wasn’t very high. He had nothing on him worth much; one of Bryce’s rules had been don’t display wealth: it makes you a target.

  But yesterday’s purchases were back in the room. Players were worth something. He’d known boys at school who sold theirs to get money for something their parents didn’t want them to have. And Bryce might have something in his kit; surely he wouldn’t mind if Karl took it in this emergency.

  He would have to go through Customs and Immigration to get to the room, though. Would he be stopped? Searched? He’d never had to worry about that before; Bryce took care of such things. He started back toward the Premier Lounge access. He’d done this before, only with Bryce and Evan along. The officers should recognize him; he could tell them what happened and they would—his imagination gave them the same reaction as the security officer’s. Or worse. What if they were in league with the men who’d taken Bryce and Evan? What if they called Security, detained him?

  He would have to pretend everything was all right, that he had a reason for coming back alone. Somewhat to his surprise, the officers gave him no trouble at all. He flashed his ID; they waved a reader at it. “So you’re alone today?” Immigration asked.

  “Have a stomachache,” Karl said. “I’m going back to the room—”

  “Mint tea,” the Customs officer said, already turning away. “Any herbal store.”

  Thanks be that Bryce had trusted him with his own room key; it would let him in the hotel without alerting the staff and into his room. Karl was halfway across the Premier Suites lobby—empty as usual—when he thought of the other two room keys. Bryce had them both. Bryce was in custody somewhere and someone else—someone Karl had no reason to trust—had those keys.

  How long? Karl tried to think how long he had dodged around the concourse. Would someone have had time to get into their rooms? Would the Immigration and Customs officers have let them? What about hotel staff?

  What staff? That sour-faced woman who sometimes watched the lobby in dayshift? If they’d said they had a delivery…

  The corridor seemed to telescope; he was aware for the first time how long, how silent, how isolated…how much like a trap. Had Bryce seen it this way? He must have; that must be why he’d insisted on renting both suites, but making them all sleep in just one.

  Karl felt shivers running up and down his spine. Someone could be there. Someone could be stealing their things—or waiting for him. He looked back. No one, no sound, nothing.

  Then a sound. Faint, but audible…from behind the wall…which meant inside the suite. That would be—he thought a moment—the larger bedroom. The one he shared with Evan. It could be hotel staff cleaning the room…except the door wasn’t propped open with a cleaning and restocking cart in the corridor. The door was closed. Did housekeeping ever bring the cart inside with them? He didn’t know. Bryce would have known.

  Bryce would have had a weapon, too. Karl had nothing. He looked around again, though he knew he wouldn’t find one in this blank space. His instructors had told him—Bryce had told him—that he always had a weapon, between his ears, but he wanted something more tangible. He backed up, trying to be utterly silent, until he came to the door of the utility closet with its dual label of HOUSEKEEPING and EMERGENCY EQUIPMENT. Something in there should be useful, and emergency equipment lockers were always open, on space stations.

  Sure enough, there were two carts: one empty, and the other’s racks stuffed with containers labeled BATHROOM ONLY, COOKER ONLY, CARPET: FOOD SPILLS, CARPET: HUMAN, and the like. The lowest shelf held the vacuum, with its dual hoses, one connecting to Station Recycling. No mop, no broom, the only stick-like object the wand on the vacuum, which did not—when Karl yanked at it—come off its attached hose. Other attachments, racked on the far side of the cart, were shorter and lighter, but might be useful.

  He thought briefly about pushing the entire cart down the corridor and pretending to be housekeeping, but they’d probably bribed the hotel staff and knew housekeeping wouldn’t come. Armed instead with a narrow pointed vacuum attachment—good for getting into the creases of upholstery, he guessed—and a spray bottle of Bathroom Only, he headed back toward their rooms.

  Karl pulled the key from his pocket and laid it on the keyplate. The lock released and the door slid aside, revealing a man stuffing things into an already over-full suitcase, one he recognized as theirs. One supposedly locked safely away in Altissima’s bin. But surely nobody here but Evan had a Camp Korowea tag on a green McTallen & Bridges suitcase.

  “You!” the man said. “You’re supposed to—Cale, the other kid’s turned up.” He laughed, unpleasantly. “What were you going to do, clean the bathtub?”

  Karl could feel his legs trembling, his hands…he took a step backward; his back hit the doorjamb.

  “Oh, don’t be scared, boy,” the man said. “Just come on in and shut the door. We just got your stuff out of storage for you. Your uncle wanted it.” The other man came out of the smaller bedroom, Bryce’s case in hand.

  Karl tried to take a deep, calming breath, the way his instructors said to do before a match, but his chest seemed frozen.

  “You’re too tense,” the second man said. “You need to calm down—” He put Bryce’s case on the table in front of the couch and reached into his vest.

  Karl knew he needed to calm down, but his racing heart told him it was impossible. A sour taste came int
o his mouth. Was he going to throw up in front of these men? Throw up with terror like a stupid little boy?

  “This will help,” the second man said, walking toward him. His hand clenched, and Karl had an instant of utter clarity as something tiny and bright flashed toward him. He jerked aside, heard the tiny click of something hitting the doorframe and did the only possible thing: charge, spraying the man in the face with the bathroom cleaner. The sharp chemical smell almost choked him, but the man staggered back, swiping at his face with one hand and fumbling for something else Karl was sure would be even worse.

  “You stupid—!”

  “That wasn’t nice at all,” said the first man, who now held a thin black rod by a padded handle. “You didn’t have to be rude.”

  Karl, moving too fast to stop or change direction, ran straight into the man he’d sprayed. The man grabbed his shoulder, and his body took over, the moves his instructors had taught him to repeat, over and over, moves that he’d used before only on other boys his own age or the instructors, flowed from a base he corrected in an instant…breaking that hold, finding the right lock, and whirling with the larger man to meet the first man’s attack.

  For one glorious moment, his mind had time to register that what he’d been taught worked in real life; then he was submerged in a fight for his life. Two of them, grown men, heavier…but no time to be afraid now. He was down, took a painful blow on the back with the rod, but was rolling anyway, kicking, striking, jamming the vacuum tool—when he had an instant to yank it out—into one attacker’s face, where it skidded into the man’s eye. Elbow to the windpipe, heel to shin, then to knee…they were big, heavy, adult, with—he barely shifted in time to avoid it—at least one knife, at least one more projectile weapon spitting needles loaded, he was sure, with toxin to disable or kill him. He took more blows of the thin rod, each like a lash of fire; he could feel blood dripping on his face; he knew he’d been kicked and punched. He’d lost the cleaning bottle; he’d gained a cushion off the couch that absorbed three of the needles. But they hadn’t been trained as he had; Bryce had told him the difference, shown him some of the things rough fighters did that no one used in class…he could counter those.

  You’ll never really need this, one instructor had said when his muscles had burned with yet another repetition and he’d complained. But it’s best to learn correctly because if you do need it, you need it all. Not just strength, not just speed, not just agility, not just knowing the moves but owning them—owning it all.

  And only this past vacation had it come together for him…just barely enough.

  He lay panting on the carpet, amid the welter of the fight, half-amazed and half-proud that he was alive and free and the two men were—dead? He wasn’t sure. Not moving, anyway. As his breath came back, he forced himself up, wincing at the various pains, wiping at his face and staring for a moment at the blood he found.

  What now? He searched them quickly, found three more clips of the needles, labeled with a long chemical name he didn’t know, a slim cylinder with a button on one side and a slot for the needles, a more obvious firearm, another knife, credit cubes, dataprobes, and various keycards, one with a dirty paper tag saying PREMIER LOUNGE LUGGAGE BINS. One of the men stirred slightly; Karl rammed a needle in his neck, and then another, to be sure. No more stirring, but the man still breathed. The other made harsh sounds, like broken snoring. Karl put two needles in his neck too, beside the bruise his elbow had left. If it was just a soporific, it wouldn’t hurt, and anyway, they’d been ready to use whatever-it-was on him.

  He started shaking again; his vision darkened. But he fought it back. Bryce and Evan depended on him. He took the time to secure the two men—dead or alive, he didn’t know—with the ties he found in their pockets. They were too heavy for him to drag into the bedroom, and the sitting room had no closet, but he moved the couch so they couldn’t be seen from the door.

  In the bathroom, he looked at the damage to himself and his clothes. Cuts, bruises—deep ones here and there—and his clothes were a mess. He pulled them off, took a hurried shower, used the first aid kit supplied by the hotel on his face, dressed in fresh clothes. He looked in the mirror—his face looked almost normal. He was also suddenly hungry, hungry enough to eat one of those huge steaks…he rummaged in the supplies Bryce had bought. Most required cooking; he didn’t have time. He peeled a snack bar and wolfed that down.

  Bryce’s case yielded many smaller cases, one with clips of needles labeled with a long chemical name. Karl compared them to the others. Very similar, but he didn’t know what the difference meant. He didn’t know what most of the cases held—wires with jewels on them, wires without, wires attached at one end to tiny disks, tiny boxes in various colors. Two things with lenses that must be some kind of video surveillance gear. A thin, lightweight pale gray garment that looked like a coverall of silk, with attached gloves and booties. A row of little black buttons ran up each sleeve from wrist to elbow.

  Karl touched the lowest on the left sleeve. It disappeared. The entire garment, whatever it was, vanished…but his finger still felt it. He tapped it, and the whole thing reappeared. He tried a different button; this time the suit hardened, a rigid mass…and then relaxed when he tapped the button again.

  Bryce had told them about such suits. Chameleon suits, used by spies and special security agents, as well as criminals who could afford them, suits with all sorts of special qualities, from invisibility (not complete, Bryce had warned—they worked best in dim light) to partial protection against injury. Illegal in many jurisdictions…but…irresistible.

  Karl stuffed the rest of Bryce’s gear back into the black case and put the suit on over his own clothes, pulled the hood over his head. He looked in the mirrored door of the entertainment center. One touch: he vanished, and the room behind him appeared where he had been. When he moved, it wavered a little, like something seen through heat waves. He tried a button on the other wrist. He was back, visible, but the suit itself had disappeared, revealing the clothes he wore under it.

  He pushed the hood back and opened the front enough to fill his pockets with the men’s keys, including the luggage-bin key, and considered taking the luggage back to the bins. No. Too much chance of being seen, too many possible questions. Instead, he stuffed the two players they’d bought the day before, and a selection of cubes and slices, in his shirt, where they poked at his new bruises.

  He thought about what to do next. He could sell the players for money…but where? He didn’t have a parle; he’d have to use a public booth to find out where Novice’s open market was. Surely it had one…surely. And then he could use the money for…what? Bribing someone to find Bryce and Evan? Hiring someone to help free them?

  Whatever he did, he must get out of the room before someone came and found him there. Before those men woke up. He looked again. One had turned an ugly gray-blue color in the face; Karl looked away, swallowing against nausea. He had to go. He had to go now. He picked up Bryce’s case.

  No one was in the lobby…he walked out the door without incident, back to the arrival/departure lounge, back to the Customs and Immigration booths.

  “You don’t look like you feel much better,” the Customs officer said. “Sure you shouldn’t just take a long nap?”

  “I’m better, really,” Karl said. He forced a smile.

  “Go on through, then.”

  The concourse was no more or less crowded than it had been. Karl found an information kiosk and plugged in one of the data wands from Bryce’s case. Far deeper into the station than Bryce had led them, an area called “Day Market: casual goods. Traveler advisory…” He skipped the advisory, and headed for the market. As he walked, the bruises and scrapes from the fight reintroduced themselves; the things he’d stuffed down his shirt seemed to poke into many of them.

  The concourse looked much as it had before, until he passed the third section seal. Karl had been following the directions given in the information kiosk—very simple, he’d thoug
ht, and he’d been in a hurry. Now he could not help noticing the increasing dirtiness, the shabbier storefronts, the scruffier clothes people wore…and the suspicious looks directed his way. Bryce and the others on their security team kept him away from places like this, places he’d longed to see.

  It looked less enticing now, with the memory of the two men who’d attacked him. Karl tried to project a dangerousness equal to that of the young men lounging in a corner, but that only heightened their interest. He walked past: “keep going” was the only rule he could think of. Be inconspicuous? He’d already lost that one. He thought of turning on the camouflage suit, but realized that disappearing while in view would make him even more conspicuous.

  At the next turn, he could see the Day Market opening ahead of him. He had imagined a folk market out of his texts: little booths with colorful awnings, peasants in striped shirts or full skirts, tables laden with fresh produce, others with handmade goods. Instead, he saw an open space, even dirtier than the main concourse, with clumps of people in shabby clothes talking to one another and occasionally passing things from hand to hand. The only booths were two food stands, one at either end, both with long lines. Around the margin, some had spaces against the bulkhead, with merchandise at their feet and a chalked line delineating their border.

  Karl edged in, trying to figure out who sold what, and who might buy, and what the price structure was. He couldn’t sell the players for what they’d paid, but maybe a third off? He was still hungry; he went to the end of the line at one food stand and tried to ignore the suspicious looks he was getting.

  The line shuffled forward. He sensed people closing in behind him, but after all it was a line…he was third from the front, his stomach growling at the smell of fried food, when someone shoved him from behind. He staggered, bumped into the man in front. The man in front turned, face contorted, fist clenched.

  “What d’you think you’re doing! You—” His eyes narrowed as he looked at Karl. “Who are you, some up-dock security snip come slumming?”