Nàiměi laughed, as he’d intended, because it was true, especially since humans had yet to run into any hint of alien civilization in the multiple thousands of planets they’d cataloged and the nearly six hundred Earth-like planets they’d scraped and terraformed. Most of the family agreed that Sòng Tiān Cì’s picture should be next to the galactic dictionary’s entry for “eccentric.”
“I concede your point. Did you hear that to celebrate his hundred-and-eleventh birthday, he entered the Ursa Majoris Thousand Parsec Distance Rally with his race yacht and came in second? I think he mostly did it to get a rise out of Great-Grandmother.”
Lièrén snorted. “After he disappeared for the entire second year of their marriage because he was crewing on an exploration spacer, I doubt anything he does surprises her.”
“Very true,” she said with a laugh, then patted his hand. “Find another lover, Lièrén—or two or three—however many will make you happy.”
“One is sufficient, thank you.” He’d tried the triad experiment more out of loneliness than adventurousness.
“I’m serious, Lièrén. We almost lost you with the accident. Life is too short and too precious to waste being alone. Any prospects?”
She was more single-minded than the puppy that was now determinedly chewing on his nephew’s pant leg. “No,” he said, then added teasingly, “unless you count the bartender and the server at the hotel bar.”
He should have known better, because she pounced immediately. “Details, didi. Is either of them female? How old is she?”
Lièrén laughed and held up his hands in surrender. “Server Leviso is male. Bartender Sesay has an eleven-year-old son, so she’s probably at least in her late forties. I’m too young for her.”
She gave him a knowing look. “But she’s not too old for you, I think. You like her, or you wouldn’t have mentioned her.”
Lièrén knew when to be quiet and quit digging the hole he’d gotten himself into. Besides, Nàiměi wasn’t wrong. He did like confident, clever Imara, but their respective lives had no possible intersection once he returned to field work.
Nàiměi took pity on him and changed the subject to tease him about his ultra-styled clothing that she claimed made him look like a cross between an air-race pilot and a romantic version of pirate clan. Every bit of clothing he owned had been destroyed in the flitter crash, so he’d shopped on the net via a local autotailor for replacements. At the time, he must have still been befuddled from a recent surgery, because his selections had been… interesting. He certainly stood out compared to the ultra-bland corporate fashion the local CPS agents favored. He hadn’t had the patience or time to shop again, and preferred to wait until he could have more appropriately conservative clothing shipped to whatever ship or station he’d be assigned to.
Nàiměi, in between mostly polite interruptions by various children, who were well trained in the family’s tradition of respect, and thwarting the puppy’s impulse to urinate on her sweater, told him about her various business ventures, and some new lines of business brought in by one of the newer family adoptees, all of which were doing well. She epitomized the family’s entrepreneurial spirit far better than he ever would, which was why he worked for others and she’d been nominated for a seat on the board of the family trust.
By now, his family was used to him not being able to talk about his activities or assignments, although he knew they suspected his unit’s mission was more complex than handling trade disputes. He mentioned that the accident had killed his partner, Fiyon Machimata, because she’d met him once, but apparently, it wasn’t news to her. It reminded her of the tragic death of one of their myriad cousins, an ex-CPS Minder Corps veteran, who had died of multi-system failure at only age sixty-six.
“Great-Grandfather, of course, has been telling everyone who will listen that it was a new maintenance drug that killed her.” Minder veterans sometimes ended up needing a lifetime of drugs, an unfortunate downside to the enhancement drugs that made active-duty minders more effective.
“Of course he has,” agreed Lièrén. No one who had anywhere else to be on time got Sòng Tiān Cì started on the pharmaceutical industry, another of his favorite conspiracy hobbyhorses.
“Do you remember that skinny little imp, Chiang? Cousin Liu’s youngest?” She continued when he nodded. “He grew big and tall and joined the Jumpers. He’s got so much animated body art that it must be like sleeping with an ad wall in the room. Of course, no one says that to his face, except Great-Grandfather. He’s conflicted, since the Jumpers are part of the CPS, but he’s very proud of Chiang.”
It wasn’t the first time that Lièrén had experienced a pang of envy that his own career as a CPS minder was less acceptable to his great-grandfather than what other family members did. When Lièrén was sixteen, in the middle of his fourth year at the Academy, his parents had died when their interstellar transport was raided by a jack crew. His great-grandfather had come to New Kulam personally to see him at the CPS Academy to break the news.
The loss had pained him, but in some ways, they’d been long gone. When his parents had delivered him to the Academy, he’d only seen them three times after that via live holo calls on his birthday. They were always traveling for business and never home when he was. He’d spent breaks and holidays with Nàiměi’s family or his great-grandparents. Sòng Tiān Cì had spent that visit and the next five years trying to convince Lièrén to leave the Academy, then to leave the Minder Institute, then not to accept the special field-unit position they’d offered, a rare honor for someone as young as he’d been. No matter what Lièrén had achieved, it seemed he’d never win his great-grandfather’s approval.
“Lǎo shūshu, would you like to hold Hóng Lǐyú?” Jing was standing before him, holding the extremely tolerant puppy like it was a baby. A long-snouted baby who was assiduously licking her face with a long, thin pink tongue.
“Thank you for such a generous gift, Mistress Jing, but he looks happy with you.” Lièrén waited until Jing solemnly nodded and walked away, then turned to Nàiměi and whispered. “She named it ‘Red Carp’?”
Nàiměi gave him a shrug that said “children will be children” and stood. “Help me collect the monsters. We have tickets to the Central League historical exhibit tour, and it’ll take us an hour to get there. Spires is more crowded than ever.” She called the children, who obediently converged on her, though their dragging feet revealed their reluctance to leave the park.
“Everyone wants to be near the halls of power, I suppose,” said Lièrén as he scooped up Jing and her puppy. She giggled in delight, and the puppy yipped in chorus. Lièrén was pleased he was able to lift her easily. Four weeks ago, he could barely hold himself up without pain. He gave her a kiss and set her on her feet, then pulled the leash from around his neck and attached it to the puppy’s harness.
Nàiměi pulled on her sweater as they walked. “Even if I were rich enough to live anywhere in the galaxy, I wouldn’t choose Concordance Prime. It’s never good to have your face and name known by the authorities. Especially if you’re a minder.”
He forgot sometimes that Nàiměi was a mid-level finder with an affinity for business opportunities. In some ways, the patterner class of minders had it harder, because their skills caused deep-seated, simmering resentments, instead of immediate fear the way telepaths and telekinetics did.
He gave her a teasing smile. “Maybe Con Prime should be considered a punishment post, like being sent to an extreme weather planet, or on an exploration spacer.”
When they parted company, he exchanged hugs with the children and his sister, but drew the line at kissing any puppy named after a fish. Nàiměi extracted a promise to be better at staying in touch, telling him he’d been too long apart from those who loved him.
After they had piled into the large autocab and it had vanished into the swarm of low-altitude air traffic, he took his time making his way back to the hotel, choosing to walk part of the way instead of riding the me
tro.
He had the disconcerting sensation of being set adrift, as if he’d lost his mooring. Looking back on his existence the past few years, he felt like he’d been an observer instead of a participant in his own life. Maybe the floating sensation was natural after a near-death experience, but it was more likely caused by no longer having his regular enhancement drugs. The worst of the physical withdrawal symptoms had finally faded, but he suspected his persistent, creeping melancholy and yearning for connection were attributable to the nearly weekly changes in drug protocols.
The latest drugs had him feeling itchy, like he was listening to constant white noise, with absurdly emotional responses to silly music, caring children, and a sister’s love. Worse, his talent was feeling as jumpy and unruly as a red fox puppy, like it hadn’t felt since he was in the Academy. He was more sensitive to people exercising their minder talents, and to the synaptic discord in the minds of liars. He would have liked to ask the opinion of the sifter assigned to him for therapy, but he was too timid and deferential for Lièrén’s liking, and he’d have to report every word to his coordinating medic and the CPS, which was a sure way to be stuck on Con Prime even longer. He’d been specifically instructed to report any talent improvements he’d experienced, and so far, he’d reported no changes. His regular enhancement drugs weren’t perfect, but the side effects were worth the talent focus and control benefits.
On impulse, he bought a broadcast earwire so he could listen to the newstrends as he walked. He’d hardly even checked galactic headlines in years. He was so out of touch with current cultural references and common slang that Nàiměi had to translate some of what the children said, and explain the terms. He’d become a hè ǎixīng, a brown dwarf star, someone stuck in the past, longing for the good old days that never were.
Unsurprisingly, since the CGC High Council was currently in plenary session, political stories dominated the spectra. The High Council voted to slash the CPS’s budget request for more Testing Centers. A planned TSAC march by veteran minders in High Spires to deliver a petition to the CPS planetary head office was drawing angry objections from some and fulsome support from others. A high officer in the CPS was fighting a public relations firestorm, claiming she’d been taken grossly out of context when a public vid had surfaced of her declaring that minders who participated in the TSAC march were looking to create another Rashad Tarana atrocity. The vid was damning. What was it about politicians that gave them amnesia about modern recording technology?
He stopped for a takeout meal to carry back to his hotel room. Night had fallen, so he darkened the windows and brightened the lighting. He used to turn on holos for company, but now they made his head hurt, so he turned on some music instead. He ate, took his new daily enhancement drugs, and picked up CPS messages.
He was shocked to learn that his field-unit supervisor, Uvay Garbey, a sifter and twister like he was, had collapsed from a heart attack two days ago and hadn’t been discovered in time before irreparable brain damage had set in. She’d been young, only ninety-four, and had never mentioned a history of coronary disease. The internal memo mentioned that it had been quite a shock to everyone. The memo included the code to an anonymous cashflow account for everyone to make a contribution to the field unit’s remembrance offering for the family, and Lièrén gave generously. The last section of the memo announced that Field Agent Cini Talavara had been appointed as acting supervisor until the CPS appointed a permanent replacement.
That was now five out of nine people in his field unit who were dead or incapacitated. Even his accident-addled brain knew such a high casualty rate was unlikely to be chance. The unit might be covert, but plenty of jackers who preyed on interstellar shipping, blackmarketers, indenturee traffickers, and fugitives knew it to be effective, to their cost. Had the unit become a thorn in someone’s side? Or was someone out for revenge?
He knew the OII would be digging harder than ever. It was tempting to let them handle it, but he knew Talavara well enough to know she’d firewall any outsiders meddling in unit business, especially the OII. No one liked the OII, but she was militant in her hatred of them. He didn’t think he could take the chance that the OII would stop whoever was targeting the unit before they got around to fixing what was likely their only failure—him.
He eyed his percomp with the idea of doing a little data diving in the unit’s case files to see if he could find a pattern that fit the deaths so far, but he was tired from too much walking, and his throbbing headache was back. For once, he couldn’t attribute it to anything but stress.
As Lièrén prepared for bed, he wondered what Talavara’s next move would be. Fiyon Machimata had disliked her. Lièrén thought of her as a competent agent with multiple talents, but being a good retriever didn’t necessarily make her a good leader. He hoped he’d live long enough to find out.
CHAPTER 5
* Planet: Concordance Prime * GDAT 3238.211 *
The enormous, clear pillar was rising smoothly, almost as if floating on the light breeze, and then it wasn’t. The closer end drifted and suddenly picked up momentum, heading straight for the tall road-crew leader. Knowing he hadn’t seen the threat, Imara launched herself into Rackkar’s knees and tackled him to the ground. The end swung by where Rackkar’s head would have been and over the curved roadway before swinging like a pendulum back the other direction.
Rackkar Horis scrambled to his feet and shook his fist at the operator of the antigrav suspension lifter. “Farkin’ A, Faith! Quit playin’ lopar, and get the X-axis under control!” He was red-faced and steaming. His grip tightened on the oversized spanner wrench like he was ready to throw it through the lifter cab’s windshield. He was the epitome of a road-crew man, big, burly, and mean looking.
Imara beamed him a big smile as she stood up and dusted off her ugly but nearly indestructible uniform shirt and pants. She’d been trying to civilize him since he’d joined the crew, and she was proud of his restraint. A couple of years ago, he’d have dragged the kid out and tried to feed her, head first, through the conduit extruder.
“Sorry, boss,” shouted Faith. “You okay?”
“We’re fine,” shouted Imara. “Try it again. Don’t adjust the Z-axis so soon.”
Faith, who was barely twenty and full of the oblivious optimism of youth, gave a thumbs-up signal and went back to the controls. The pillar went agonizingly slowly this time but finally slid perfectly into place. It made up the last piece of the clear vertical support for the new metro platform and walkways. Imara insisted that all her road crew cross-train on the commonly used equipment, which was why she had a noob like Faith learning to use the lifter. Imara also insisted on first names with her crew, a trick she’d learned from her dad, to help make them a team instead of a random collection of individuals.
She was glad she checked in on this repair site first. Since the collapsed metro platform affected a visible part of the Spires skyline, it had been moved up in priority, forcing Imara to juggle work teams and schedules. Never mind the plain folks out in the Rim, the flatland neighborhoods that surrounded Spires, who would have to wait another month to get their sinkhole repaired. Imara’s family had been as poor as desert rats, so she felt for the Rimmers, but everyone in Spires knew that politics—and optics—drove everything.
She rubbed the sore elbow she’d cracked when she’d tackled her crew lead. “Rack, while I’m thinking of it, I’ll be out a week from next Tuesday. Derrit’s got his twelve-year minder testing.”
“Okay,” he said. “You worried?”
“No,” she said firmly. Rackkar’s dislike of the local government colored his opinion of all large organizations, government or otherwise.
He frowned. “Once he’s tagged as a minder, there’s no going back.”
Imara shrugged. “Yeah, but he’s already a minder, whether or not the CPS registers him. Better to have it on the record. That’s why he’s getting private tutoring.” She’d let Rackkar assume Lièrén Sòng was a freelancer, rather tha
n a CPS employee.
“He’s a good kid. If anyone gives him shit about being a minder, send ‘em my way.” Rackkar brandished his spanner with an itching-to-fight grin.
“You got it,” said Imara, smiling. Rackkar, for all his near-pathological dislike of authority and explosive temper, had a good heart.
“Hey, boss,” said Rackkar. “Didja hear? Some H.C. halfwit wants the city to install translucent nets under the lotus parks to stop suicides, like that farkin’ pair of jumpers last week.”
Imara rolled her eyes. “No, I hadn’t.” The galactic government’s High Council was a continual wellspring of knee-jerk, short-sighted ideas, like their ridiculous resolution to order the city to channel the upcoming TSAC march onto narrower roads, so as not to disturb the “citizens,” meaning the High Council and their staffers. Since disturbing the citizens was the whole point, the TSAC was likely to do the opposite of whatever the council wanted. Most of the road crew was of the staunch opinion that the Concordance government was a boil on the ass of the galaxy, and that the elected city government was a pimple wanting to be a boil.
Chioma, an older woman who looked like everyone’s sweet aunt but could peel paint with her acerbity, chimed in. “Yah, wait till the tourists see all the pretty, dead birds that get caught in them. That will go over well.” Colorful, long-tailed birds of paradise were iconic fauna in Spires, almost as famous as the skyline itself, and gave rise to one of the city’s other nicknames, “Cuckoo Land.” It had taken fifty years just to train the birds not to slam into the lighted glass walls. Tourism was the city’s second-largest source of revenue, surpassed only by the political lobbying industry.
Wallo, a skinny, very dark-skinned man with a surprisingly deep and melodic voice, handed out the drinks it had been his turn to fetch. “What will go over well?” As usual, he’d forgotten to get one for Imara. She waved him off when he offered to go back again.
Minder Rising: Central Galactic Concordance Book 2 Page 6