by John Barnes
But by that point Clarbo Waynong was already advancing on the negotiation table, having paid no attention. Jak heard a soft ululating hoot, like a dying bassoon audiomixed with the bibby-bibby finger to the lips sound—a frustrated-to-the-point-of-exasperation Rubahy. Shadow came through the door and came to attention.
“Hi, I’m Clarbo Waynong, Hive Intelligence. Which one of you is the King?”
Only Witerio was wearing a crown.
“Well, which one’s the King?” Waynong came to a halt at the edge of the table. He was a breathtakingly handsome young man. If you had been looking for a model for the cover of an intrigue-and-adventure viv, clutching his best girl with one hand and his weapon with the other, this was the heet you would have photographed. He had café-au-lait skin tanpatterned in this year’s heliopause of clash-splash-and-smash, Fractal Leopard Remix. His hair was a rich yellowish blond, his eyes deep ocean blue, and one sight of the jaw told Jak that this was a true patrician. Centuries of genetic sculpting, crossbreeding, and trying again had created the chin that anyone from the Hive could recognize—the chin that was on every poster at every election, the sort of chin you would trust to tell you that war had broken out or that economic productivity was falling off.
Jak drew a slow breath through his teeth, glared, and said, “Yes, you are Clarbo Waynong. And your ill manners and aggressive rudeness clearly indicate that you are a member of Hive Intelligence. I am Jak Jinnaka. Your orders are that I am the commander of this mission. Therefore—this is a direct order, Clarbo Waynong—sit down at this table immediately and remain quiet.”
Waynong remained standing and said, “Oh, yeah, weehu, I know, I know, they told me that you were supposed to be the person in charge and all that, but you know and I know that as soon as they can Hive Intel is going to take this away from you, and they’ve got some big-deal agent coming out to take care of that, and if I’m going to get anything good on my record then we need to get this deal wrapped up. We can do all that respecting and bureaucratic stuff later, after we get that Nakasen thing bought and paid for, Mister-Bureaucrat-Sir. Now, which one of these heets is the King?”
There was the sort of silence that occurs when a four-year-old describes his latest bowel movement, loudly, in public.
“Shadow,” Jak said firmly, “thank you for bringing Mister Waynong here, per your instructions, and please stand by in case I need him removed. Article Eighty-eight, conduct in diplomatic settings. Section Ten, overt misbehavior, and Section Seventeen, open defiance of a superior, are relevant here.” Still ignoring Waynong, Jak turned to address the rest of his delegation. “I’m sorry to cut into your time off this evening, but it may be necessary for us to hold a formal conference about Mister Waynong’s behavior—”
“Cyxy! Weehu, hey, Cyxy!” Waynong whooped.
Prince Cyx had bound out of his chair—about head high, in the Martian gravity—and leapt across the table to embrace the Hive Intel agent. The two of them pounded each other’s backs, then stepped back and formally grasped each other’s forearms.
“You know this … man?” King Witerio asked.
“Know him? We were roommates and toktru toves, Dad! Clarbo was the lightest of the light! He taught me everything I needed to know to come back here and get fashion turned around. (Not that some people get it—look at these robes! But we’ve argued about that before.)”
Witerio glanced sideways at Jak; Jak raised an eyebrow, not sure how to express the sympathy he felt.
Xlini Copermisr’s hand was plastered across her face as if it were an octopus trying to eat her nose. Pikia appeared to have only just discovered that the wall was vertical, and was rapt in the implications.
Prince Cyx burbled on. “You remember that wonderful, incredible vacation on the moon, during Long Break of junior year, when I got to try big-slow-wave surfing in the aquadomes? Remember how excited I was about it and what a long message I sent you about it? Well, I went on that trip with Clarbo’s family. This is the Clarbo that I’m always mentioning for maybe someone to marry Kayadi, if you ever decide you do want to mix some commoner blood into the line, because even though his pedigree is commoner, he’s just—well, look at him, Dad, a natural aristocrat.”
He does have a light smile, Jak thought. What was the name of that ancient heet, one of the Al-fredis? Al-fredi-Packer? Al-fredi-Boom-Boom-Cannon? Al-fredi-Nomen, that was it. Anyway, it’s the same smile. No wonder people will vote for anything named Waynong.
Cyx turned back to Clarbo and said, “So how have you been?”
“Oh, you know, you know. Have to work a job, get some of that experience and those credentials before they pick out a seat for me in the Hive Assembly or appoint me to a cabinet post. That earning your privileges thing, Principle 133, you know. Doing things for Hive Intel since graduation. A little work here, a little work there, just haven’t quite found a place where I fit in yet, you know. Lots of misunderstandings. Need to find some toktru sympatico toves in the leadership, haven’t quite done that. Always having to deal with these petty bureaucrats and all these officious formalities.” He nodded in a way that he doubtless thought was subtle, directly at Jak. “So here’s my big chance, you know, to get something worthwhile done for Hive Intel. We know you have that wonderful book or tape or whatever it is, and here we are with a lot of money, and here you are, a little tiny nation on a dumpy old poor planet, and it isn’t the kind of thing that you folks ought to have—it could fall into the wrong hands, masen? The wrong sort of people could read it and get ideas. And with your feeble little army, who’s going to guard it? So it’s time for me to make you the offer and for you to accept and then we’ll be leaving with this Nakasen thing. Now how much do you want for it, old tove? The treasury’s loaded; don’t be shy about naming a big number.”
He was still grinning, holding Cyx’s forearms with his; Cyx withdrew his right hand and turned his left over gently, then yanked hard on Waynong’s forearm and jabbed hard with his right fist. The sucker shot flew directly into the young patrician’s nose, sending him reeling backward, trailing blood from his nostrils, to lie supine on the floor of the conference room.
“Your Splendor is too kind,” Jak muttered, then added aloud, “I believe both delegations will want to regroup.”
“Agreed,” Witerio said. “Let us adjourn sine die. I’ll communicate with you privately about when we’ll resume talks.” As the two of them shook hands for the camera, the King murmured, through clenched teeth, “Don’t expect my call anytime soon.”
Clarbo and Cyx had been toktru toves, and neither of them was the sort to hold a grudge (or any other idea) for very long. Gradually they were making it up; Xlini dedicated herself to the task of getting the problem explained to Cyx, trying to help him see that Clarbo had not intended any of the grave insults he had spouted, and that the two of them could settle the whole matter in no time, stressing how much it would impress the King. “Cyx is perfectly representative of his class,” she said at lunch with Dujuv and Jak. “A big kid with a small army. We’ll get him around. How’s it coming with Clarbo?”
Jak shrugged. “The person who’s really having an effect is Pikia. I have to say that for someone I was ordered to bring along and keep out of trouble, she’s been worth her mass in plutonium. And about as dangerous if she got mad, I think.”
“My boss always gives me the loveliest compliments,” Pikia said, coming up behind them. “May I join you in this dining room? My eyes are getting tired from all the batting and I need people who will give me sympathy if I decide to scream.”
Dujuv reached for the button; a chair rose out of the floor. “Of course you’re welcome, Pikia, join us and tell us all about it, and don’t leave out a single ghastly detail.”
“I ought to take you up on that and repeat everything that man has said to me while I sat and looked adoring,” Pikia said. She plopped down, grabbed a burrito from the platter, and tore into it. “Armph murph.”
“ ‘Armph murph’ indeed,” Xlini sa
id. “Eat, then talk. We’ll hang around. None of us has anything urgent to do.”
While Pikia wolfed the sandwich, two bowls of noodles with scallops, a large orange-and-spinach salad, and half a pot of tea, Dujuv had three desserts to keep her company. Jak and Xlini watched the race between the panth and the unmodified teenage appetite with awe.
“What’s silly about Cyx and Clarbo,” Xlini said, “is that they’re toves. They like each other. The deal would already be done if they didn’t fuss so about honor. If Clarbo would just act impressed about Cyx being a prince, or if Cyx would just act impressed with Clarbo’s brilliance … how’s the King taking it all?”
“The King and I see a lot of each other, but we don’t talk much. Mostly we play Maniples,” Jak said. “At least he’s really good and it’s not difficult for me to lose.” Jak had been the PSA’s school champion, setting several records, and in his senior year he had attained the rank of Master. “The King doesn’t have the time to practice as much as he would need to, but he could easily be a Master.”
“About the same way that you could be a Great Master if you did nothing but play Maniples?” Dujuv asked, between bites of papaya puff pastry. He seemed to be winding down, while Pikia was still going, but then he’d had a head start.
“About like that,” Jak said. “Not like you and slamball.”
“Ubrade slabble?” That was all that escaped of “You played slamball?” through Pikia’s salad.
“When you get to the PSA (and I think you will, Pikia, you belong there, and if the Admissions Committee has two brain cells to rub together they’ll find a way to get you in),” Jak said, “anyway, when you get to the PSA, check out the athletic trophy case in the Hall of Honors and count off how many times you see Dujuv’s name next to a record or an award. He could’ve turned pro.”
Dujuv shrugged. “Still could. And if I were a second-stringer on a minor league team, I’d be making twice what I make as a Roving Consul. Then I consider the pleasures of spending a lot of time in the little capital towns of all these little nations, trying to keep petty kings and minor republics from doing stupid things that get people killed, and I ask myself, ‘Is there anything to that stereotype about panths being stupid?’ ”
Pikia swallowed the last of her salad and belched. “Excuse me. ‘Such a lady,’ as Great-great-grandpa Reeb would say. Weehu, it’s a relief to eat without being constantly corrected.”
“Your great-great-grandfather does that?” Jak asked.
“Clarbo Waynong does. He tries to fix everything in the universe around him.” She belched again. “Oh, that’s better. Not the belch, being able to do it.”
“Good, because the entertainment value is wearing thin,” Xlini said. “So how is the attempt to culturally sensitize him going?”
“Well, I listen. He tells me about what fine people his family are and how he’s expected to be promoted quickly to senior agent and then be in the Assembly and in the Cabinet and be prime minister someday. I don’t think he realizes that any of those jobs involve doing anything; he’s supposed to collect jobs the way scouts collect badges. And then everyone will love him and think he’s a good boy. Because that’s what the universe is here for.
“As far as he understands things, he’s supposed to bring back Nakasen’s lifelog and be a hero for it and then everyone will love him and his career will be back on track. And he doesn’t dak why people don’t understand their place in the script.
“He does grasp that Prince Cyx’s feelings are hurt, but I think he thinks that if they play golf together, or perhaps go out and shoot a couple of animals, everything will be fine.
“I listen and smile and bat my eyes.
“As far as he grasps the world, you ask for what you want, and the world gives it to you, and that makes you a hero.”
“So,” Dujuv said, leaning back and gazing up at the ceiling, “at least the food’s good here, masen?”
Dujuv said, “Let me just point out that your old demmy has a gift for being a pain in the ass.”
Jak managed a sad chuckle. “When have we ever known her to be convenient about anything, masen?”
“There’s the Princess’s yacht,” Pikia said, pointing. The winged dot, like a distant hawk, cut a great swipe across the vibrant blue sky.
“Hard to imagine that sky was ever red,” Jak said.
“If it still were,” Dujuv pointed out, “that yacht would drop like a rock. Pity it’s not.”
They were standing on the quai. Red Amber Magenta Green’s landing field chief had been ecstatic to have a visit from a Hive warship followed by a royal party, within a week. The chief, and Clarbo Waynong, were probably the only people happy about this, and Clarbo tended to be happy about everything.
The just-rising sun was dimmer and smaller than it was from the Hive and less sharp-edged than it was from Deimos. The huge-winged launch finished its last circuit and started its descent to the landing field.
On the platform, the arrangement of people had been carefully worked out by protocol officers. Jak had to be there, as the Hive’s ranking officer in the Splendor. Jak had insisted on having Dujuv, Shadow, and Pikia with him. Clarbo had insisted on being as important as Pikia with a clear implication that he should have been as important as Dujuv.
Since it was a visit from the Crown Princess of a major nation, the King and the Prince both were there. Witerio was in full outdoor regalia and looked as if he were going to a costume party as Barbarossa. Prince Cyx was as close to fashionable as he dared. Jak specked this had to do with the many stillpix of Princess Shyf. He could have told Cyx that if Shyf was interested in anyone besides Shyf, it was in Psim Cofinalez, the Duke of Uranium, not so much for the Duke himself as for the chance to tip half the lower solar system into war.
“Stand here,” Jak said, not turning his head, but sensing that Clarbo Waynong had once again bounced out of the position dictated by protocol and was on the brink of being somewhere offensive. Pikia towed the temporarily obedient Hive Intel agent back into position. Jak reminded himself that when she finished gen school, he owed her a hell of a graduation present.
The Princess’s yacht, a large modern launch, came in straight and level, its vast wings flexing in the sticky thin air. They curled under at the trailing edge, and the ship glided onto the linducer track. The wings scooped forward to lose speed, then rolled in from the tips and slipped into the fuselage. The Princess’s yacht stopped before them like a dancer finishing a difficult piece by simply dropping her arms.
The boarding ramp dropped from its side onto the quai. At Witerio’s nod, the band struck up a march.
The band had played through the march three times, Pikia had discreetly sheep-dogged Clarbo Waynong back into position two times, and Witerio was beginning to tap his foot—not in time—when the Princess and her party emerged from the launch.
Pikia murmured, “Oh, weehu, Surrealist Safari.” Dujuv strangled a barely audible laugh.
Clearly Shyf thought of the Harmless Zone the way many people did, as a playground for the weird and a land of indulged fantasies, inhabited by bizarre savages. Doubtless hoping to make an impression, she had arrived in something that looked very much like a costume for “Memsahib at Amateur Strip Night.” Where there was fabric, the fabric was crisp, pressed, blindingly pure white, and very starchy. Where there wasn’t fabric, which was often, black lace and bits of Shyf peeped out.
The costumes she had chosen for the Royal Palace Guardsmen around her were similar, though they covered more in most places, and there didn’t seem to be any black lace under them. Jak and Dujuv had briefly served in the RPG, sometimes all too accurately known as the Rutty Princess’s Gigolos. Ever-changing degrading uniforms had been part of the whole degrading experience, but these uniforms were truly something special, even for Shyf.
The Princess strode forward to bow to King Witerio, and delivered a prettily worded compliment about the five times that members of their royal houses had officially met before. By
carefully concentrating on the exact words, Jak figured out that this had actually been three shopping trips to Green-world and two overland walking tours of the Harmless Zone that had happened to pass through Red Amber Magenta Green, and that all five visits had been honeymoons, going back about three hundred years. In Shyf’s phrasing, they sufficed to establish that the monarchs of Greenworld and of the Splendor were the most toktru of toves and closest of cousins.
Jak’s heart hammered; perhaps her scent drifting this way, perhaps the mere sight of her.
After she finished flattering Witerio, and the band played a short march in honor of that, she had to spend nearly as long greeting Prince Cyx. Witerio had been polite and correct; his son was just as correct but appeared to be thunderstruck.
When she had finished with the Splendor’s delegation, she squealed and threw herself into Jak’s arms. “Jak, so good to see you again, Jak!” A good performance, even if Jak had seen many like it. His conditioning responded.
Over her shoulder, Jak could see his old tove Kawib Presgano, decked out in the full Royal Palace Guard Surrealist Safari rig, barely controlling his rage. Kawib was much more thoroughly conditioned than Jak; his whole adult life had passed as the Princess’s sex toy and object of torment.
Shyf’s hands trailed down the outside of Jak’s arms from shoulders to wrists, the backs of her nails brushing him through his sleeves, to keep him painfully aware of the contact.
He wanted to kneel at her feet and pledge eternal obedience. He wanted to hit her in the face, straight from his shoulder with everything he had. He wanted to shit his pants. He did none of these things.
She turned from him to Dujuv. “You handsome man, you haven’t changed at all.”
The panth, who she had more than once referred to as a “half-animal” and worse, smiled as if he liked her. “I can see you haven’t changed.”
“And Shadow on the Frost.”
“Princess Shyf, you have long been the tove of my tove.” He bowed deeply and correctly. Jak envied the Rubahy his lack of facial expression at that moment.