Company Man 1.0 --Introduction-- by Patrick Hurh
copyright 1994
I'm writing this introduction to preface the archived Company Man
files that Hubert Bartels has graciously agreed to house as a
separate file on the Chatsubo archives (catalina.opt-
sci.arizona.edu/pub/chatsubo). This allows new readers to ftp the
whole series easily and old readers to ftp the series to fill in any
episodes they may have missed. If anyone needs only one or two
episodes and is adverse to downloading the entire series, please feel
free to e-mail me (hurh@fnal.fnal.gov) and I'll send them to you.
Company Man was written over the period of about 10 months or so. It
was originally started as a simple exercise to train my writing
talents in two ways. One, to keep me writing on a consistent basis
and, two, to write a little more quickly (turn off that damn internal
editor!). The exercise quickly snowballed due to reader interest and
my own active imagination into a long and complex story told in short
episodic cliff-hanger-like installments.
The pulp series format was an attempt to keep my writing flowing
without worrying too much about literary content (cliche's, stupid
metaphors, or shallow characters). I just wanted to train myself to
write greater than, at that time, 300 words per hour! Thus, the
series is very pulpy and not too deep. The only recurrent theme that
could require a lot of reader thought is that of trust versus
loyalty.
The original posts included my own comments and acknowledgments on
each episode. I did not save these comments so the episodes archived
here are 'stripped' of such notes. Of those comments I only remember
a couple of acknowledgments listed below:
- Tae-Guk Station's architecture is based loosely on Greg Bear's
Thistledown from his book _Eon_.
- The acro-dogs in the Vortex Hall are inspired from similar
creatures from one of Iain Bank's 'culture' novels (_Consider
Phlebas_, I think).
- Terminology such as 'vid-screen' was lifted from numerous PK Dick
short stories.
All characters and plot devices are generally original (as much as I
can tell; my imagination is doubtless an amalgam of other authors),
including the concepts of Arachniware, acceleration gel, and Lake
Miowa ;-)
The series is probably best read in sittings of only one or two
episodes each, making for good noon time reading. Taken all at once,
the cliffhangers are probably too annoying.
Please excuse typos and minor continuity mistakes. I have not
rewritten the series for this archive. These are the episodes as
they appeared when I posted them. I'm sure you can find a lot of
faults if you look for them.... Just take it as an enjoyable read.
I hope you enjoy Company Man, and please send any and all comments to
me via e-mail (hurh@fnal.fnal.gov). BTW, the exercise worked on
point two (I'm up to 1000 words an hour), but failed on point one....
Writing is still the most painful pleasure I can put myself through.
--patrick.
7-14-94
____________________________________________________
Company Man 1.1 by Patrick
Hurh
copyright
1993
The report of the small muzzled pistol was almost indiscernible
over the thundering slams of the battering ram against the outer door
of the containment lock. The man struggling to get his legs into a
bulky pressure suit suddenly straightened his lanky body, his arms
finally jerking the bottom half of the suit on in a spasm.
"Fish!..." he cried, and then tumbled forward. Blood from the small
wound in his back seeped through soiled orange coveralls.
Kwanchaan leaped forward at the downed man and curled his
finger around the sweaty trigger again. This time much more
confidently than the last. "Don't call me Fish," he said softly and
another muffled pop was lost amongst the noise in the small lab field
room.
Kwan turned quickly to look at the inner containment lock door.
Its massively reinforced steel was not shuddering yet. Security must
still be battering the outer door. That gave him some time at least.
He passed his fingertips over his closed lips, brushing them slightly
in thought.
Surveying the room for useful equipment was almost useless. He
didn't know what most of it was for. Kwanchaan's eyes rapidly darted
from one brightly lit mechanical device to another. One entire wall
was full of refrigerated cabinets, the transparent cabinet doors
revealing row after row of petri dishes. He started towards them and
then halted hesitatingly. What good would the tech be if I'm going
to die trying to get out of here. He looked at the other body in the
room. Dr. Roberta Gonzales was on her side in a pool of blood. He
crossed to her quickly and bent down to look at her face. She was
indeed Gonzales. "No Gonzales, no tech, and no god damn way out... I
am truly fucked," he said outloud. He straightened upright and gazed
stiffly at the booming door. The slams were louder now and
accompanied by the screech of metal ripping each time the ram
extricated itself from the outer door. This wasn't how it was
supposed to go.
Kwan stood still listening to the rhythm of the crashes and
screams of battered steel. What the hell was he supposed to do? His
hand holding the pistol began shaking uncontrollably. His breath was
short and shallow. Eyes open wide, he twirled about the room
searching for anything that could help him. An incredible crash
echoed through the lab room and suddenly he could hear voices of the
spiders that were searching for him. He knew they were through the
outer door. He started to babble, "Oh shit, they're through the
door. Shit, shit, shit. They're through the fuckin' door...fuck."
He threw the pistol wildly at the door and covered his mouth loosely
with one hand. He ran back to the half-suited figure on the floor.
Kwan continued to mumble obscenities through the curled
knuckles of his hand as he pulled at the inert body on the floor with
an outstretched arm. The death head of Scott rolled at him as he
turned the body over. The bullet from Kwan's second shot had exited
the head just above the eye, tearing much of Scott's forehead away
with it. "Fuck."
Kwanchaan looked away from the citizen's face aghast and
towards the pressure suit clumped at his midsection. The suit!
Scott was doing something to it when Kwanchaan set off the alarm.
And when the spiders came knocking at the outer door, the fucking
traitorous hacker had yelled something about ditching Fish and
started to pull the thing on.
He pulled the suit from Scott's long white fingers and wrestled
it off the dead legs frantically. His mind grasped at the action of
getting into the pressure suit. No matter how irrational it seemed,
it was something he could understand how to do. Kwan pulled off his
boots with a sucking sound and stuck his feet into the leg openings
in the suit. The suit was about five sizes too big, but that made it
easier for him to dive into it.
The inner door was now cracking open with each impact of the
security spider's ram. Kwan glanced at it and quickly gave up on
trying to thread his hands through the suits arms and into the
strange shaped gloves he felt there. He reached down and managed to
zip the suit up from the inside almost to the neck of the suit. The
suit was so big Kwan's head didn't even reach the inflatable head
bubble. His eyes were level with the chin switches in the stiff
bottom half of the helmet bubble. He stared at them as the lights
went out in the room. The tremendous blows of the automated ram must
have jarred the overhead light circuit.
Kwanchaan stumbled in the oversized suit with his arms folded
up inside the torso. The free flexible arms of the suit flapped with
his struggling motions and swept small tools and devices off of
neighboring lab counters. The debris hit the floor in a clatter
amidst sudden silence. The battering ram had stopped when the lights
had gone out. Kwan tried to turn to face the door. His left foot
trod on the flipper like boot of his right foot and he crumpled to
the floor with a thud. He listened.
Although the suit and partially destroyed door heavily muffled
the voices of the spiders, Kwan could still make out a word or two.
Something about emergency lighting. He smiled in the darkness. The
idiots still didn't know that Scott had hacked their entire phys ops
system, just leaving a shell of life support and faulty indicators.
Still that got him nowhere. He was still dead unless he could figure
a way out. Somehow he did feel safer hidden in the suit though. He
jerked his body around until he lay on his side in a fetal position.
A dull glow of yellow light filtered its way in through the
deflated helmet bubble above his head. "Shit," Kwanchaan whispered.
A flurry of spider voices and the pounding of the ram began again.
By the sound of it, the door would give way soon.
Kwan stared at the darkened forms of smooth chin switches
before him. They were so close to his face he couldn't even focus on
them. He had no idea what they were for, but he hoped one of them
powered up the suit somehow. He snaked one of his hands up next to
his face. In the constrained neck of the suit, he had to smash the
back of his hand against his nose in order to just touch the bottom
of one of the switches. But he couldn't extend his hand enough to
flip it.
The pounding of the ram ended in what sounded like a small
explosion. The inner containment door finally gave way and crashed
to the floor.
Kwan froze in the suit as the room was entered by the spider
security team. He saw streaks of light through the helmet bubble as
the spiders splayed the room with ultrasonics and the glow from hand
held flashlights.
"Got two positives down!"
"Make that three!"
"No that's the drill suit..."
Kwan heard rushed footsteps in the room and scuffles as bodies
were prodded.
"Looks clear to me..."
"Shut up, Forrester. That's my decision."
"Well, there isn't anywhere to hide in this room. All the
cabinets are transparent and the venting system is interlocked for
chemical isolation."
"I said shut up, dumb shit. No one puts down their guns 'til
we identify these two Yellows."
The one called Forrester piped up again. "How do we know
they're Yellows?"
The spider team leader, "'Cause who else would be all the way
out here for fuckin' spiderware except the Cat. Now go check that
suit out, Forrester."
Footsteps neared Kwan's head. He heard the rustle of the loose
double polymer helmet material inches above his head as Forrester
prodded it with his gun. Kwan bit his lip to keep from yelping.
"Nobody home here, boss."
Forrester backed away from the suit, his footsteps merging into
the other shuffling noises of the spiders as they looked around the
empty room.
"Shit," the leader spoke. "This one's Doctor Gonzales... The
other Yellow must still be in here."
Boots suddenly broke into a frenzied scuffling as spiders
searched for targets. Kwan tried reaching one of the chin switches
again. He could almost reach it...
"The suit! It's..."
Kwanchaan punched his hand upwards as hard as he could. The
switch flicked over. The suit popped and suddenly inflated with air
launching Kwan off the floor with a start. He could hear guns firing
into the floor below him. He thrust his hands into the now
unobstructed arm holes of the suit. His left hand grabbed some sort
of control and squeezed impulsively.
The suit shot around the room on its one of its attitude
thrusters. It crashed into wall after wall as Kwan pumped the hand
control spasmodically. He could feel ribs crush and blood was
already flowing from his nose into his eyes. He could hear screams
from the spiders. Some were shot from their own cross fire as he
ricocheted about the room. His head jammed into another of the chin
switches and a he felt rather than heard a great roar from the middle
of his chest. His chest seemed to collapse from the roar and he was
flung backwards against a wall. Kwan stopped pumping the attitude
control and for a moment all seemed silent.
Moans from a couple of men left alive in the lab room combined
with a low creaking sound to create an eerie wailing noise. He
realized he was doing most of the moaning. He shut his mouth and
tried to start crawling away. But it was too painful to move. The
deep creaking was joined with a high hissing sound. A sound that was
easy to identify. He heard one of the spiders call out weakly,
"Breach..." followed by the faint scrabbling sounds of the soldier
trying to reach the containment hatchway. The low protestations of
the station's hull continued to grow. Popping and cracking sounds
joined the wail of the hull in staccato counterpoint. Kwan tried to
move again. Searing white hot spikes stuck in his chest. He started
to moan again as the hissing increased abruptly.
The explosion of the hull into the vacuum of space was
incredibly loud... and short. Kwanchaan felt himself lift from the
pressure of the deck beneath him and rush towards the unseen breach.
He craned his neck and peered out the top of the pressurized suit in
time to see a ragged burnt hole blur by him as he sailed into vacuum.
Then everything was silent. Without the air to carry the mayhem to
his ears, he could only hear his own raspy breathing as he passed
out.
*************************************************************
Warm rivulets of water cooled rapidly as they ran down his bare
back. He stepped from the chromed shower stall and grabbed a plush
white towel from one of the wall racks. The towel was stitched with
the words, "Peoria Hilton", in thick black threads. He opened the
door of the bathroom a handbreadth to allow the steam from his shower
escape into the cool climate control of the hotel room. Not wanting
to wait for the mirror to uncloud on its own, he pulled a fresh towel
from the rack and swabbed the wall sized surface. He glanced at his
reflection for just a moment before using yet another towel to dry
his dark hair.
He let his small frame dry slowly, hips wrapped in the last
bath-size towel, as he combed through his thick hair and brushed his
bright white teeth. The cold air of the bedroom invaded the small
bath and evaporated the last sheen of water from his body. His light
brown skin broke out into a dimpled surface of tight goose pimples.
He shivered slightly and hurried from the bathroom, satisfied that he
had used all the towels the hotel had left for him.
He ignored the blinking message light on the vid-phone console
and quickly crossed to the neat pile of clothes he had laid out the
night before. He pulled on bulky but loose fitting pants, pleats
running from the waist to well below the knees. He covered his torso
with his only white linen shirt, extravagantly expensive. He
buttoned its ancient buttons with care and, as he tucked the tails
in, appraised the line of the shirt's cut in the mirror over the
dresser. His wide, flat feet slipped into a pair of foam insulated
black boots which slowly constricted as the heat from his body
triggered the foam's shape memory. He added accessories to his
groomed outfit. A black belt with a gold buckle, gold plated
cufflinks and a bright yellow neck tie, narrow and stiff.
He crossed to the vid-phone console next to the bed and punched
up his messages. His fingers adjusted the knot of his tie as he
listened. The first message was audio only.
"Message One for.... Mr. Kwanchaan Vishnu Phadwahji, Junior
Executive of Product Development, Caterpillar Enterprises. Issued
by.... Caterpillar Personnel Placement Department. Received by
Peoria Hilton Message service at.... 06:20:56. Security encryption
level... zero. Subject..."
The voice cut short as he tapped the button to forward to the
message itself. The voice resumed.
"Mr. Phadwahji, please report to the Personnel Department,
Cooler briefing room, at nine o'clock this morning for discussion of
possible job placement. This meeting is mandatory."
The box issued a small squawk and the blinking message light
went out.
Kwanchaan Vishnu Phadwahji grabbed his suit jacket from the
back of a chair and slipped it over the smooth texture of his shirt.
He turned quickly on his heel and headed out the door. He hadn't
really needed the reminder of his meeting this morning. After all,
it was the entire reason for him being in Peoria at all. The first
step of his surely illustrious career was going to be taken in just
under an hour. His steps down the carpeted hallway were measured but
unhurried. He had learned in recruit school how to walk with
authority but without seeming rushed or overly determined.
Recruit school had taught him many other skills as well. Five
years of military like training and loyalty swearing in the Chicago
school had groomed Kwanchaan into an excellent example of fresh, new
company talent. He felt like his life had started there and not in
Bakersfield, California twenty-six years ago. He was born a United
States citizen and was sent through the US public school system by
his second generation mixed race parents. They were true patriots.
Even while the entire neighborhood went corporate, his parents, the
ever astute and unwavering Drs. Phadwahji's, stuck to strict US
doctrine. They would never give up on the nation that gave their
parents the opportunity to start all over again in the grand USA with
nothing but a dime in their pockets and the rags on their backs.
Meanwhile, Kwan's friends transferred to corporate schools,
participated in corporate youth leagues and were treated for the
inevitable scratches of youth at reputable corporation run hospitals
and trauma centers. Kwanchaan learned US history from fifteen year
old textbooks... books, for god's sake! He paid fees taken out of
his low allowance each week to play in the Yamaha Summer Little
League until he got his nose broken by a not so random wild pitch.
And when he was taken to the Yamaha Trauma Center by mistake, he was
refused at the nurses desk and had to wait outside the concrete
bunker of a building for three hours in sweltering heat for his
father to come and set the crumpled nose himself in the back of their
ten year old station wagon.
After his parents divorced, his mother revoked her US
citizenship and became a renaturalized citizen of the new Unified
Korea nation, Kwanchaan made up his mind to betray his country and
join a company as soon as he was of legal age. Unfortunately this
also meant he would have to become accepted into a recruit school of
a major corporation. He buried himself into his studies for the last
two years of his high school life. He discouraged friendships with
his citizen classmates and followed the exploits of his favorite
corporations in the trade magazines which he hid under his mattress
as a normal boy would squirrel away pornography. Kwan missed most of
the adolescent experience and he blamed it on the US government for
its seeming educational ineptitude and his father for his unflinching
patriotism. Most of his high school memories were painful ones of
rejection and boring, mind numbing memorization. His acceptance
into the Cat Company College was the reward. A reward without
benefit until today.
Today he graduated. The past five years were filled with
grueling mental and physical exercises and tutorship, but today it
was over. Not with the pomp and circumstance celebration of a
nation-state graduating their spoon-fed students to take the places
of their parents in a welfare state, but with the quiet efficiency of
a well-oiled corporation.
Gone are the days of barracks living, dawn exercises and
personality inventory exams, Kwanchaan thought. Gone are the hours
of struggling to keep control of a young platoon of recruits, the
back-stabbing conferences of psychological manipulation, and unending
polygraph sessions.... Gone is the hated nick-name of 'Fish'... Here
is the first hour of my new life.
Kwanchaan walked up to the closed elevator door and pushed the
button at its side. He glanced at the floor indicator above the
button and counted silently to seven, in time with his pulse rate. He
strode forward just before the doors opened. His entrance was
perfectly timed. The doors peeled open just as his left boot swung
through the air between them.
There was no one in the elevator. Kwan turned to watch the
doors sweep closed and said, "Lobby." The inside of the doors were
chromed brilliantly with only small local distortions of the
substrate metal near the bent corners of the doors to mar his
reflection. He studied himself for a moment. The meeting coming up
was not only his graduation but his first job assignment. The
assignment would be based on the needs of Cat and his recruiters'
opinion of his capabilities. Many executives' careers had been
broken before they started by a bungled first job. Kwanchaan could
not let that happen to him. He had worked much to hard for this
chance. He wondered what jobs would be trusted to a rookie
executive. Probably something mundane without much responsibility.
Cat probably left the defector and merger missions to the more
experienced executives.... like Jim Hawthorne, the infamous
Arachniware executive. Someday, Kwanchaan thought, someday.
Kwan peered at his reflection in the doors. His thoughts of
Jim Hawthorne made him selfconciously aware that his chosen outfit,
down to the linen shirt on his back, was a poor imitation of the
picture he saw of Hawthorne in the last issue of Inside Trader. He
was sure that Hawthorne's face in the picture was not his real face,
but the clothes were certainly cut with class. "Well, what's good
enough for Jim, is good enough for me." He slipped one hand into the
oversized jacket waist pocket smoothly and leaned back against the
elevator wall, modeling the suit in the doors' reflection.
The elevator had almost descended to the lobby level. Ten more
seconds, his internal clock told him. Kwanchaan knew that this
meeting was going to go smoothly. He had thought of everything, as
usual, and he had packed all necessary paperwork and other related
data in his leather bound data pouch the night before. He patted his
chest to assure himself of its existence in his jacket pocket. It
wasn't there. An irrational panic began to sweep through him. He
went through his other pockets in rapid order. All his pockets were
completely empty. He must have forgotten to put anything at all into
his pockets before leaving his room. His panic ebbed as he realized
he still had 54 minutes before he had to show up at the Caterpillar
complex across the street.
Kwanchaan Vishnu Phadwahji stared ashamedly at his own
reflection as the doors opened to the hotel lobby. His face bore a
peculiar shade of red as he strode forward with mock confidence
towards the lobby desk to politely ask for a spare key.
Company Man 1.2 by
Patrick Hurh
copyright 1993
Kwanchaan's pain started with a sneeze. The sneeze startled him out
of his state of grogginess and forced him to open his eyes. The pain
was deep in his gut and, as he explored it, continued out from his
torso in fading waves to his extremities where it beat and crackled
in small fireworks of intense pinpricks. His view of the stars
outside of the bubble helmet was tinged with red. At first he
thought it was just the fine spray of bloody mist from his sneeze,
but as he struggled to look beyond the foreground mess he realized
that he was spinning wildly end over end and the crimson pool at the
edge of his vision was the blood still _in_ his body, forced to his
head. His arms were splayed out over his head, pulled by a couple
G's of centrifugal acceleration. He stared at the blurry mess of
stars whirring by and wondered why he wasn't dead yet.
Grimacing, Kwan pulled his heavy hands down from above his head
towards his hurting body. As he pulled them in toward his center of
mass, he began to spin more rapidly. His vision grew even more dark
and crimson. When his arms were at about shoulder level, he passed
out again.
**************************************************
Sweltering heat and stagnant air had, over the years, spawned a
thick miasma which assailed Kwanchaan's entire person with a clinging
pungency. The smell of Peoria. Risen from the depths of Lake Miowa,
the stench was not the direct product of industrial plants and sewage
treatment facilities, but rather, the lack of. When the earthquake
of '93 hit, just after the peak of the Great Flood, the course of the
Mississippi was altered cataclysmically to pound into new territory
east of its millennia old banks. When it found the already furrowed
seed of the Illinois/Fox rivers, it sprang along the new path,
slicing a mile wide furrow through Peoria and filling the basin of
land from there to its old habitat with dark murky water. Lake Miowa
was born (although mainly contained within the original borders of
Illinois) and another Great Lake, this one already filled with septic
tank sewage and pesticide runoff, forced topographers and
cartographers back to their CRT's.
Kwanchaan stepped off the Hilton's stoop and ignored the cabbies
and limos that lit in front of him. He gracefully sauntered around
the chromed bumpers and bleeding tail lights to reach a center weed-
covered median in the center of the hotel's driveway. He looked
across the street at Caterpillar's newly rebuilt headquarters.
Yellow walls glowed a shimmering golden sheen under the morning's
unrelenting sun. He patted his chest once again to ensure that his
data pouch was secure and stepped off the curb and down into a dank
underpass beneath the furious highway.
After stepping down three short flights of wooden stairs ('Sorry
for the inconvenience,' glowed a dozen fluorescent signs), he reached
the card reader which controlled access to the underpass. Cat tape
card already in hand, Kwan zipped the card through the reader's thin
slot and proceeded into the seeping tunnel.
By the time he got to the other end, his tape card was safely in
his data pouch and the pouch was back in his yellow jacket's inner
pocket. Kwan stepped into the tawny lit elevator awaiting him and
said, "Personnel."
The Cooler briefing room wasn't named for its cool climate
control. The room was just a couple of degrees cooler than the
outside air that was breezing in through the cracked windows that
lined the west wall of the room. The secretary who had ushered him
in said something about aftershocks, but after fifty years?
Kwanchaan looked out over the rebuilt and expanding city. The Cooler
was on the twentieth floor (second to the highest floor in the
building since new building codes refused permits to any buildings
over 300 feet) and he could spy out the hastily poured gray-micro
levies that had saved the city from complete destruction. Still, the
city was an exploding shambles. "Why control a mega-corp from
here?," Kwan thought. Even though Chicago was reduced to less than a
million people packed onto a twenty mile swath of land between the
Fox and Lake Michigan, it still offered more in the way of culture
and refinement than pork-fed Peoria.
Kwanchaan sighed and turned from the window toward the expanse
of a heavily lacquered oak conference table. Twenty more seconds,
his internal clock told him. He pulled a cushioned chair out from
the table and sat down with his legs crossed, european style. He
rubbed the small beads of nervous sweat from his upper lip with a
quick flicker of his finger tips and leaned back.
The hiss of the door exactly at nine o'clock did not surprise
Kwan. Of course his administrators would be at least as punctual as
he was trained to be. A short, pudgy woman trod heavily into the
static room. She glanced at Kwanchaan superficially and dropped into
a facing chair. She wore a yellow smock/moo moo affair with a brown
scarf tied about her flat head, smashing her curly, mousy hair, like
a terri-cloth headband. Although Kwanchaan could tell it was pure
silk.
"Mister Pad-woah-gee, I presume," she belted out in syllabic
bursts. "Sorry to only be 'just on time', but the pedway is out from
my usual sector of this rathole."
"That's quite all right, sec. I'm pleased just to be here."
Kwan couldn't quite make out if she was really this informal by
personality or if she really held some position of great power, or
both. He had used the pronoun of secretary to be on the
conservative.
"I'm Secretary Goldbreath," she emphasized 'goldbreath'
lubriciously and withheld a snicker just after saying it. "But you
can call me Goldie."
"Yes, sec.... I mean... Goldie."
"Good. I knew you could do it." Goldbreath stared at a point
just above Kwan's left nipple for half a second, then continued,
"Just between you and me, Fish-nu... I've looked at your recruit
school record and your personality inventories and I like you.
You're straight company line, innovative and skinny too."
Kwanchaan was flying high, a stupid grin breaking on his face,
until he heard the last comment. He puffed out his meager chest
perceptively.
"You...," Goldbreath continued, "you, I'm going to give a
special assignment. One that will try every ounce of your tired
little rookie ass." The yellow tent on her shoulders rustled as
Goldie leant forward plop her elbows on the edge of the table. "If
you want it..."
Kwan had bent forward and placed his own arms on the table when
the Secretary had done the same, almost unconsciously and definitely
conspiratorially. "Yes....," he whispered with a half growl in his
voice. "I want the job."
"I thought you'd say that." Goldbreath reached into some hidden
slit in her robe and withdrew a small sheaf of papers, folded once
lengthwise, and bound together with a green rubber band. She slapped
the package on the table. A small bright yellow diskette slid out
halfway from the folds of paper with the impact. "Here's the job.
Simple really. Infiltrate the Spindle Station, pick up Roberta and
high tail it out."
Kwan covered the documents lightly with his small hands and
looked at her. "Uhh... What do you mean: infiltrate?"
"Fish-nu... fish-nu...," Kwan flinched at those sounds. "Don't
you know what Spindle Station is?"
"It's an asteroid mining station."
"And who is it run by?..."
"The spiders... uh.. I mean Arachniware corp."
"Good. So what's your question?" Goldbreath leaned forward
even further until her trachea was so stretched out along her ribcage
that her breath was noticeable as audible wheezes.
"Uh... What am I supposed to do?" He thought he knew what he
was supposed to do, but this was defection and merger talk. A rookie
couldn't possibly be entrusted with this kind of thing.
"You are supposed (...wheeze...) to infiltrate Spindle
(...wheeze...), pick up Doctor Roberta (...wheeze...) Gonzales, and
bring her back (...wheeze...) HERE!" Goldbreath fell back into her
chair. The table creaked as she dragged her arms along it.
"But what about a team to help me?" Kwan whined.
"It's all in the package." She blinked down at the pile under
his hands. "Recruit some of the citizens recommended there..."
"Citizens?," Kwanchaan peered into her small eyes. "I can't
work with citizens... they don't have any loyalties!"
"Their loyalty is the money and the chance to let their
patriotic morality fly out the window for the sake of the job." She
intoned this like an incantation. "They'll do what you want, if you
know how to ask them."
Kwanchaan picked at the edges of the folds of paper in front of
him. He looked up at the Secretary, sighed, and then slowly
collapsed from the front edge of the chair into the cushioned depths
of the high back chair. He knew this job was over his head. Way
over his head. How could they ask a junior executive to do this.
Either they really liked him or he was being set up for a fall.
Either way he had to do the job or he was fucked.
Secretary Goldbreath inhaled suddenly, "Well, that's it. I'm
heading back to my slightly cooler sector." She eased out of the
chair, one buttock at a time. "You have an expense account set up on
your Cat PIN and the rest should be self-explanatory." She pointed
at the papers on the table and turned to exit the Cooler.
"Wait!," Kwanchaan called. "What if Gonzales doesn't want out?"
Goldie turned back slowly with a placating grin on her face.
"She's the one that contacted us. Of course she wants out... If she
changes her mind, kill her and take whatever prototype tech you can
and get your skinny oriental ass back to Cat!"
Kwanchaan stared at her, stunned.
She turned quickly and walked toward the door. When it didn't
hiss open as expected, Goldie stopped just shy of it and cursed,
"Fuckin' shit hole." She uplifted a heavy hand and slapped it open-
palmed against the door. The door chugged into operation and
haltingly slid open. Goldbreath started to walk through the doorway,
hesitated and then quarter-turned towards Kwan still seated at the
conference table.
"By the way... Happy Graduation," she threw called over her
shoulder and exited. The door slid shut behind her, her sweaty palm
print riding it back to stare at Kwanchaan.
Yeah, Kwan thought, happy fucking graduation...
**********************************************
Pain woke him once again as he twirled through vacuum. He saw
the stars swim blindingly face across the polymer of the bubble
helmet. He groaned and winced at the sound. What was he doing still
alive?
Kwan had to stop this spinning, so he could stop the blood
pounding in his head. He realized his hands were splayed out above
his head, pulled there by the incessant flipping. He struggled to
pull them in. The more he pulled them in, the more he had to
struggle. The lights were flashing faster now... His vision turned
dark...
Company Man 1.3 by Patrick Hurh
copyright 1993
He fired the right hand attitude jet again, about a one second
spurt. Something was wrong with the left hand jet. He just felt a
kind of high frequency vibration with no discernible effect when he
squeezed its trigger. He doubled up his short body and uncurled it
again as quick as his pain would allow. His head floated back up
into the bubble helmet, his hands letting go of the attitude and
other digit controls at the ends of the suit's long arms.
Kwan's spin had slowed to an inching crawl. It had taken him
about a half an hour of flipping toggles and squeezing strange
cushioned levers to achieve, but he took fatigued satisfaction in
this accomplishment. He watched stars slowly rotate about him. The
station that had spit him out would float into view every so often
from the left and disappear to the right. It was still brightly
reflecting the sun's light, solar panels spread out in long backward
jointed arms. From this distance it looked like a metallic spider
poised on a dark wall of stars... not menacing, just poised, ready
for action. Hard to believe that probably everyone on it was dead or
dying.
His chest and gut didn't hurt so much now. He had found a
glowing red cross symbol just above a chin switch. When he flipped
it moist pressure surrounded his entire torso region with a hiss.
The constriction was comforting and Kwan hoped it had stopped any
external blood loss and he was sure that it also acted like a giant
derm. A warm anesthetic swept through his body, leaving him a little
giddy but calm.
Unfortunately with the medic cocoon wrapped around him, he no
longer floated freely within the expanse of the suit. He had to kick
and fold his legs in strange gyrations in order to transport himself
between positions where he could reach the digit and attitude jet
controls in the gloves and where he could look out of the bubble to
observe the external effects of his blind adjustments.
Kwanchaan winced and shrugged his shoulders to move him back down
to the controls. He had only a few more to experiment with in the
right glove before he had tried them all. He inserted his hand in
the large glove, carefully avoiding the large palm squeeze lever,
that one had precipitated the original breach. His fingers slid into
a stiff framework of hinged plastic and webbed polyamide. He
immediately bent his two smallest fingers until he felt the framework
lock into a toggle position. He removed his hand, bent fingers
barely managing to slip out of the toggled position, and kicked his
way back up to the helmet bubble. Nothing looked different.
His eyes scanned the indicator lights above the chin switches.
Something bright stabbed at his eyes from the extreme edges of the
bank of lights. As he turned his eyes to look, he heard the hiss of
the attitude jets and suddenly he was spinning in space again. He
quickly looked back to the center of the helmet and he heard the hiss
again. Slowly his rotation stopped, attitude jets firing short
bursts of static in percussive patterns. He now saw, floating in
front of his face a very fine and light gridwork of green lines. As
he turned his head to see if it extended beyond his immediate range
of vision, the suit began to turn again accompanied by the sound of
thrusting jets. "H-U-D," Kwan muttered, and then smiled.
He looked back down at the chin switches, surprised that the suit
didn't track the vertical motion of his eyes. Actually it made sense
when he thought about it. He didn't want to be flipping somersaults
every time he looked at a chin switch or status light. Small
floating beads of sweat and blood collided into his open eyes for
about the tenth time. He blinked the sticky moisture away and
worried for the tenth time if the suit's air system had been damaged
in the escape from the spiders.
His eyes refocused on the status lights. The one that sported a
small, dimly flashing icon of a red audio speaker had him bothered.
He wasn't able to discern any hint of a communication system except
for this and if it was indicating that it was damaged, his chances of
being picked up by a scavenger or rescue ship were slim. Especially
this far from the mining station.
Kwan squirmed his way towards the top of the suit. The attitude
jets hissed as his eyes cast about the helmet until he tilted his
head upwards and the tracking beams lost his eyes. His shoulders now
touched the underside edge of the stiff collar ring and he doubled up
his legs to anchor the suit's position relative to his body. Then,
clamping suit material between his legs, he pulled the suit down with
his legs and up and out with his right arm until his elbow was free
of the suit's arm. He relaxed and pulled his arm all the way out of
the arm hole and straightened it against his body. The bulky cocoon
about his torso constrained his freedom but he still had enough room
to maneuver his right hand down to the orange coverall's thigh
pocket. He reached into it and fished out a thin but exceptionally
long pen.
Kwan visualized the writing pen in his hand as he grasped it and
pulled it back towards the empty sleeve. The golden fountain pen was
about ten inches long with small depressions along its smooth sides
near the tip, where grasping fingers would hold it.... did hold it.
Kwanchaan remembered the fingers that the pen was molded for and
choked back an involuntary whimper of guilt-ridden grief. He winced
and pushed his arm back through the suit's sleeve.
His chest began to throb again after he had finished. He could
feel the damp cocoon readjust itself after his strenuous activity.
Too much more of that and the cocoon would probably knock him out.
Kwan shrugged his head back into a good central location within
the helmet and stared at the center of the displayed grid to steady
the suit. He looked to his left along the grid and could feel the
jets kick in and start him spinning.
The station swam into view again, this time looking even smaller.
Kwan tracked the station's image with his eyes until it was centered
on the grid floating in front of him. He then carefully snapped the
focus of his eyes to a position exactly three grid divisions to the
right of the grid and station center. The jets twirled him around
slowly. Kwan started his internal counter and concentrated on only
staring at that particular crosshair intersection on the H.U.D grid.
When the station rotated back into view and crossed the center
grid mark, Kwan stopped counting at just over eleven ticks. He
repeated the process with the same result. Finally he doubled his
counting speed and counted to eleven again as he stared at the grid
mark three from center. When he reached eleven, this time staring
out into space away from the station, he snapped his eyes back to the
center grid position. Keeping his eyes rigidly fixed on the
intersection of those central fine green lines he reached down with
his right hand toward the right palm squeeze switch. He extended the
pen from the ends of his fingers and felt it contact the soft bulb of
the switch.
Kwanchaan took a deep breath and released it slowly. Then, he
shoved the end of the pen into the palm switch. A roar of vibration
swept through him centered on his numbed chest. He saw the faint
flicker of a blue flame erupt from below his line of sight, but he
didn't dare look down and lose his H.U.D. mark. Moist globules of
blood and sweat fluid splattered against the inside of the bubble
helmet in front of his face. The splashes congealed incredibly
quickly into small pools, surfaces rapidly vibrating with the
acceleration. One by one, red status lights and indicators came on,
flashing and reflecting off the internal surfaces of the helmet. He
released the pressure on the bulb.
The roaring stopped. His chest was ablaze with new pain. He
ignored the flashing lights and chin switches and shifted his gaze to
the left. The left attitude jets did not come on. He tried the
other direction, haphazardly rolling his eyes to the far right. The
suit jerked him around quickly, the station flew by before he could
look at it. On the second time around he was able to look at it, but
without the left attitude jet he realized he couldn't halt his
spinning. He watched it rotate out of his sight again.
The cocoon felt suddenly tighter on his body, and warm too. Kwan
watched the station pan around him again, this time his vision was
blurry and his eyes couldn't keep up with it. The painkillers from
the cocoon pulled him down into a warm moist haven. The last time he
saw the station pass by, he tried to convince himself that it looked
just a little bit closer. Then he closed his eyes.
****************************************
A deep electronic bell rang as a giant translucent sign lit up
over the dance floor. The sign's glowing surface was imprinted with
a thick-lined stick figure of a dress frocked woman. A rumble of
soft voices and quick steps then ensued as dozens of dress clad women
crossed the polished wood floor to pick out their partners for the
next tango. Dour faced men leaned against the pit walls surrounding
the dance space and allowed themselves to be pulled by their arms
away from their perches to the open floor, all the while never
seeming to quite make eye contact with the women that just selected
them. The women, too, seemed content to stare just over the shoulder
of their somber faced companions even as they embraced stoically for
the start of the dance. Music swelled to fill the tango hall, deep
beats at the pace of a slow slavic ballad accompanied by a subtle
spanish influenced melody. The dancers commenced a shuffling pattern
of steps which only slightly resembled the passionate tango that
Kwanchaan was familiar with from old movies. A deep female voice
began to sing lyrics that, although sung in a language he could not
understand, reminded him of the melodramatic and tragic verses of an
American country-western song.
Kwan walked slowly around the peripheral balcony and looked down
upon the heads of the melancholy, shuffling crowd. He was looking
for the head of an old class mate of his from recruit school. One
that had made it out of school when he did, but not because he
graduated.
He stepped around a small group of men gulping vodka from tiny
thick glasses. Even the drink did not seem to lighten their spirits.
They stared at Kwan as he walked around them, but when he looked back
they averted their gaze quickly to the ground. The scowls on their
faces looked unfriendly but not directed at himself or anything in
particular. The furrowed brows and set chins seemed chiseled into
their features. Kwan wondered if anyone in Oulo ever smiled.
He continued his way to the far side of the hall. The music had
finished now and the tango partners were on their way back to their
respective gender-divided sides of the floor. From this vantage
point, Kwan could scan the line of men waiting for the next dance to
start. Everyone looked so similar. But it helped that Scott was
young, probably about fifteen years younger than most of the crowd
here. His youthful smooth skin stuck out amongst the other weathered
and lined faces. Kwan spotted him almost immediately and headed for
the nearest stairway down to the dance floor level.
As he came off the bottom step, the deep bell sounded again.
Kwan looked up at the glowing sign hung 40 feet above the dancers.
This time it bore a defrocked stick figure, the international rest
room symbol for a man. Kwan pushed through the crowd of women lining
his side of the floor. A few muttered something at him, but most
simply moved aside and looked away from him. He hit the open floor
only to confront a ragged wall of uncertain men walking towards him.
A few looked surprised to see a man amongst the female participants,
but most ignored him in a manner that was getting to be annoying.
Kwanchaan strode through the approaching dancers and then to his
left searching for Scott's bearded face. His short height amongst
these people didn't help him in his search at all. He crossed the
floor quickly to the opposite wall and almost jogged along its length
to the spot he had spied Scott at from the balcony. He wasn't there.
He most have gone to the women's side to pick a tango partner.
Kwan turned and saw a sea of couples embracing for the start of
the next tango. He waded out into it a bit and spied Scott's head
somewhere in the middle of the crowd. He hurried towards it
wondering who exactly Scott had clutched to his chest. The drones of
the next song began to echo through the hall. The couples started
shuffling.
Kwan kept catching glimpses of Scott and his partner bobbing from
the middle of the floor, but every time he tried to approach a
swaying couple would cross in front of him. He was as polite as he
could be in side stepping most of them, although he did manage to
bump quite a few of them in the close quarters. He could feel the
permanent scowls of those he had trespassed burrowing into his back.
Finally, he worked his way into arm's reach of Scott's turned
back. He called out to him, but the music was loud and most of the
dancers seemed to be in some sort of melancholy trance. Kwan reached
out to grab Scott by the shoulder, but missed as Scott led his
partner a few shuffles further away. Just as his arm extended,
another couple slid into Kwan sharply. He stumbled and almost fell.
Righting himself, he bumped into another dancing pair that had
slipped into the open space Scott had left. He cursed frustratedly
under his breath and skirted around the interfering couple quickly
and strode up to Scott and his tango partner.
Kwan reached out with both hands, grabbed a shoulder of each of
the duo and forcibly separated them as he yelled, "Sco...".
He was cut off by the forehand slap of Scott's partner. Kwan
looked at her, surprised and she scowled back at him. At least he
had finally gotten someone to look him in the eyes, he thought as she
drew back to strike him again. A rumble in the crowd arose as she
slapped him again. The music jarred to a halt and the dancers near
Kwanchaan slowly stopped shuffling and looked toward the commotion.
Kwan folded his arms in front of his face in an effort to deflect
anymore incoming blows.
"Scott?"
"Is that you, Fish?," a deep but hesitant voice asked.
Kwanchaan peered through his arms at Scott. "Yeah, it's me." He
saw Scott turn to his irate tango partner in front of him and mutter
something indecipherable. Whatever he said, it seemed to calm her.
Kwan lowered his arms completely and readjusted his skewed
jacket. Scott turned to him, grinning widely.
"Good Lord!," he beamed. "What's a Fish like you doing in
Finland?!"
Company Man 1.4 by
Patrick Hurh
copyright
1993
The two men approached the front stoop of the wide, low cabin.
Its exterior walls were constructed of long thin logs set
horizontally in graying mortar. The transit train they had just
stepped off of shuddered behind them as whirring flywheels
transferred their stored energy to the track. They heard it pull
away.
"So this is your place?" Kwan gestured in front of them.
"Well, actually it belongs to Finland. They let me live here
while I'm in the geo-nation."
"And when you're outside the geo-borders?"
"I rent from whatever nation owns the land..."
"Or corporation."
"...or corporation," Scott sighed and stopped just before the
high step to the deep porch. Kwanchaan joined him there in silent
contemplation. During the twenty minute ride into the forested hills
outside Oulo they had kidded jovially and traded Cat quips to cover
the awkwardness between them. But now that they were off the loud
train and surrounded by the silence of the cool evening, it seemed to
be too hard to avoid.
"What have they got you doing, these days?" Kwan asked.
"Oh, not too much. Running credit checks and tweaking census
programs... hopefully they'll let me start checking up on the likes
of you soon."
"I thought they'd stick you right into that coming from a
corporation recruit school."
"No, unfortunately it's because of my Cat affiliation that they
don't trust me with stuff like that yet. I could be a double agent
in their minds... Sometimes I play the part just for the fun of it."
Scott grinned and climbed up onto the porch. He walked over to a
wooden bench and sat.
Kwanchaan followed him and sat a couple of feet down from him.
"What's the deal with the tango stuff?"
"What do you mean?" Scott looked at him, smiling in the darkness.
"That stuff back there?"
"Yeah. I knew tango halls were popular in Finland, but I always
thought it was more of a party thing. Those guys just kind of looked
dead or depressed or something."
Scott chuckled. "Well, that's how my countrymen are, I guess.
We're just a lot more private up here... long seasons of light and
dark... most of our needs taken care of by the government and no real
initiative to get out and 'make it' on the outside. We just kind of
like it here and hope everybody minds their own business."
"That's not like you though, or the other Finlanders I've met
around Chicago."
"Most Fins you meet outside of the geo-nation haven't spent any
appreciable time here. They are usually naturalized citizens.
Although I was born here, most of my childhood was spent jumping
around from school to school in North America."
Kwan contemplated this as they sat there. Forest branches
creaked as they bowed lightly with the brisk wind.
"Still it's so odd to see so many people take a passionate dance
like the tango and do it so morosely."
Scott laughed loudly. "The passion is still there. We just
don't show it the way you do."
"What I wanna know is why you were there."
Scott's reply was like a verbal sigh, "Not much else here to do,
but tango, drink and talk on the net." Scott stood up and headed
toward the door. Kwan stopped him with a word.
"Don't."
"What?"
"Don't talk like your life is over. It's only been a few months
since you were... discharged. You'll get back on your feet. After
all you asked for it..." As soon as Kwan said it, he knew Scott
wasn't going to let it go by, so he just trailed into silence.
"I didn't ask for it," Scott said softly. "You turned me in,
Fish."
"You wanted me to. You had to... You knew that if you told me,
I'd..."
"I should've known you'd blame this on me! I told you because I
trusted you. More than anyone else in the platoon... more than
anyone else in the company!"
"You told me because you wanted out. Period. If you knew me as
well as you thought you did, you'd have seen the outcome."
Scott sat down on the bench again. "I don't think I really had a
choice. I had to tell someone or I was going to lose my mind. I
thought you'd understand."
Silence again.
Kwan spoke hesitatingly, "Did you ever have... feelings, for me?"
"I had feelings for all you guys, Fish! How could I not? We
were all a family. We worked together, ate together, fought
together. If I didn't have feelings for all of you , we... you would
never have made it through."
"No, I understand that. I meant, you know... personal."
"I couldn't let myself. I had to close that part of me off.
Some people called me half of a man when I left... but in reality I
was half a man when I was denying myself from who I really was...
am." Scott looked at his hands in his lap. "I love you, Fish. But
not as a lover, just as a friend."
"That's cool." Kwan couldn't help but sound a little relieved.
"Hey!" he continued with mock anger. "Stop calling me Fish!"
"You get what's coming to ya, Fish," he grinned back. "Let's go
inside and get something to drink."
"Fuck yeah, but none of this vodka shit. Beer!"
"Do we have a choice?"
"Shit."
As the evening progressed Scott tried to bring up the subject of
his discharge again and again. It was obvious he wanted to explain
his feelings of betrayal and furthermore explain his reasoning behind
hiding his true self from his best friend for three years. But
Kwanchaan wouldn't join in talking about it. He didn't want to talk
about it. The best way to avoid feeling uncomfortable for Kwan was
to just ignore the issue and continue on as if nothing had really
happened between them. The only comment Kwan made on the subject was
that Scott could probably find a corporation that openly allowed bi-
sexual executives in their ranks. Scott however seemed to be
resigned to hacking for Finland for at least the near future.
Besides he couldn't legally revoke his citizenship for another five
years.
Actually when Scott had first opened up to Kwan during their last
days of recruit school, Kwanchaan was secretly pleased. He was
pleased that he had so thoroughly gained the confidence of someone
using the executive mind tricks that they both were learning at the
time, and he was pleased to discover a useful secret about someone
close to him. Kwan liked Scott a lot, but he himself trusted no one
to the extent Scott was willing to. He had thought, and still
thought, that Scott was a little naive and definitely too easily
persuaded. In fact Kwanchaan looked at their friendship at the time
simply from the perspective of building up a dedicated and loyal co-
worker that would come in useful at a later date in his career. Like
now...
"So does Finland do any poking around the Spider's web?" They
were sprawled out in neighboring chairs set around Scott's impressive
looking net terminal.
"Uhh..this wouldn't have to do with work would it?" Scott asked
conspiratorially.
"Of course not. I would never involve impartial Finland in dirty
corporation biz!" Kwan mockingly exclaimed. "But if you were
interested in what an average junior executive is assigned for his
average first job for an average yellow corporation, I may be able to
give you some average clues... in exchange for a little friendly
poking around."
"Aha! I knew you just didn't come here to catch me dancing a
tango with a fat Olga!"
"Tango with Olga, sounds like a great name for a band." Kwan
chortled and took another chug off of the unlabeled vodka bottle.
"Jesus, this stuff stinks..."
Scott dropped a data egg out of one hand. "Hey, if you don't
like, don't drink it." He reached for the bottle with his free hand.
Kwanchaan pulled it from his reach.
"Hey, man! You're driving, not me!" Kwan gestured at the large
screen overhead, then laughed and relinquished the bottle.
Scott grabbed it and started to tip it to his mouth, then
hesitated. "You know, if this is gonna get serious, I better slow
down." He set the bottle down by the neck on the floor and picked up
the data egg again. He leaned back in his chair and stared at the
overhanging screen. "If you want to get to know the dirt on a corp,
you know where you go?"
Kwan shrugged and said the ubiquitous, "Where?," and picked up
the almost empty bottle.
"You go to the nearest competitor."
"And who's that?"
"Why our good friend, the fuzzy yellow Caterpillar." Kwan leaned
back in his chair at those words. Scott started to squeeze the data
eggs in both hands. The overhead view of a paused video game was
quickly replaced with flashing text. While still maneuvering the
mishmash of servers on the net at this hour, he said, "You still got
the same access codes?"
"Yeah. Of course... no wait, I did get a new PIN with the dat
for this job."
"Well, give it to me. And just what is your rookie assignment
anyway?"
When Kwanchaan finished giving Scott a synopsis of his meeting
with Goldbreath and his brief analysis of the little information
given to him on the yellow disk, Scott just kept staring up through
his stere-optic glasses at the display. He punched a few more chords
on the eggs and the entire screen glowed yellow with four foot high
letters spelling CAT. "Something sounds fishy to me, Fish."
"That's why I'm here... and lay off the fish stuff. I'm really
trying to get that behind me."
Scott grunted and then lay still. Kwan put his stere-optics back
on and lay back in his seat also. The room they were in had a pit
dug out from the center of the floor. They sat in large adjustable
cloth chairs, both leaned back almost flat at the moment. The black
data eggs in Scott's hands were connected via thick cables to a low-
profile deck which sat on a short pedestal at one end of the pit.
The deck's front face was blank except for one tiny glowing red LED.
The only other light in the room came from the large flat screen that
hung directly above the two chairs. It was only about five by eight
feet in area but it was hung only four feet above their heads. The
glowing letters snapped into eerie perspective as Kwan settled back
in his seat. He tilted his head toward Scott but couldn't make him
out with the glasses on. "You still awake over there?"
"Yeah, jus' thinking.... Listen you may call this paranoid, but
an extraction, a high level defect and merger, isn't rookie stuff.
Something very serious is going on and I'm not sure I would trust any
of the information you received from Goldbreath or anything else from
Cat until this all over."
"I know... But what I don't know is how to know when it's over."
"You may never know."
Scott started pumping the eggs again. The letters crumbled away
and were replaced with a small blinking cursor way up in the right
hand corner of the screen. Both heads tilted to look at it. A few
clicks from Scott's hands and the cursor grew in distinct steps and
repositioned itself to a more central location on the screen. The
cursor rapidly flitted across the screen leaving simple ascii in its
wake. Kwan recognized the words.
CATERPILLAR LINK UP SERVER>>>>WHISKER<<<<AUTHORIZED STUDENT
ACCESS ONLY
"Shit, Scott. What's the old school network going to do for us?"
"I may be able to convince it to let your old log-on work."
"So?"
"Any information you get with your new PIN will definitely be
tracked. They may even load it with info they _want_ you to see....
As long as I can get on the damn thing, I may be able to hack my way
to some useful information."
"But I've already used the new account from my data pouch."
"Good... then maybe they won't be looking for you so hard
elsewhere."
As Scott talked, he was also rapidly manipulating the eggs. Kwan
could just catch the words, ACCOUNT EXPIRED, every couple of seconds
as the text flew on the screen.
"Shit," Scott slowed after a few minutes. "Time to pull out the
heavy hitters." The screen flashed again and the original display
seemed to swing away on the flat screen. It was still visible but
just flattened by extreme perspective. In its place was a vast plane
of colored and pulsating cubes. Some taller than others, they
stretched out in a dynamic cubic ocean.
"What's this?" Kwan asked.
"This, Fish my friend, is Whisker. But just visualized
differently. All the different cubes correlate to different data
access ports that are being used at the present time. Most of it is
probably just through flow. But some of it consists of students
happily hacking Whisker and trying to learn how to serve the great
Cat better."
"Like we used to."
"Like _I_ used to."
Their viewpoint began to swoop in closer to the plain of virtual
data.
"So what's the plan?"
"If I can find a suitable, gullible student, I just may be able
to set you up an anonymous account." Scott smiled in the shifting
light.
"But you're not in yet. How can you set up an account on a
computer you can't access?"
"I don't, I have the kid do it." Kwan opened his mouth to ask
more, but realized that he probably wouldn't understand anyway. Not
that he thought he couldn't understand, but when he was in school he
had specialized in other areas of 'hacking', namely mind hacking.
Better let Scott do what he was good for. If I wasn't such a good
social engineer, Kwanchaan thought, I'd never have coerced him to
this point anyway.
"Ahh.. here we go," Scott said mischievously. "Kid probably
thinks he's just going through a required hacking exercise before
dinner." A small central cube blew up to fill almost half the
screen. Scott whispered something and the cube inverted it's color
patterning. Pounding the eggs at his sides, Scott navigated the
viewpoint of the screen down below the plane of the cubes and started
to follow the strand that extended from his chosen cube. It would
have been impossible to follow among the thousands of like shaped
cords that hung from below the cube plane surface except for the fact
that its altered color made it stick out like a piece of black
spaghetti. Scott followed the strand from one pulsating clump of
strands to another. Finally he clamped onto the strand just outside
one of these data junctions with an animated device that looked a bit
like an insect's curling antennae. "OK, kid let's see what you're
doing." Scott hit a chord on his left egg emphatically.
The colored screen blanked out and left a display similar to the
initial Whisker log on screen. Indecipherable text rapidly filled
the screen. "Bin hex," Scott muttered, "What's the boy up to?" Kwan
took off his glasses and tilted his head at Scott. He could see
Scott's lips moving quickly. The text flashed dully off the
polarized lenses in his stere-optics. Suddenly his large jaw clamped
tightly and his data eggs erupted in a fury of clicking. Kwan
returned his gaze to the screen and slipped on his glasses.
At least now there were some recognizable words on the screen.
Words typed in a thin column on the right of the screen interspersed
with nonsense characters. Kwan could make out, "ACCOUNT" and "PIN
NUMBER" and "REPEAT TO VALIDATE". But they were gone before he could
assimilate them all.
Scott took a pause from the chording action and spoke, "I'm a few
steps ahead of him, but he's pretty fast..." More clicks from the
eggs. "I restructured his paltry hacking exercise into a standard
hack for the Whisker server. He thinks..." Scott had to pound out a
few more chords. The text on the screen jumped through a few
iterations. "He thinks he's just doing an exercise, but I'm leading
him through a step by step hack to the Whisker's OS command line..."
He fell silent. The screen blanked totally out overhead. Then the
blinking rectangle of a cursor came back on in the corner of the
screen. "OK, he's in. Now to get him to do what we want."
Scott went back to rapidly chording command sequences into the
opened channel. Kwan could imagine the Cat recruit sitting, pimply
faced in front of a terminal surrounded by a dozen other learning
hackers, swearing over the homework assignment due the next day. The
kid probably thought he was a fucking gibson cowboy, setting up phony
accounts on a make-believe server.
"There you go, Recruit James Thompson Hawthorne. Your new
Caterpillar account is open and waiting for you."
Kwan sat up and grinned. "No fucking way! Jim Hawthorne?
What's the password?"
"Spiderspawn," Scott ominously voiced with a snicker. They both
erupted in laughter.
After they calmed down, Scott took off his stere-optics and
looked at Kwan. "You know you are in some serious shit here, Fish.
And you've probably only got this account for the night, at the most
until the kid's tutor calls up his solution off of disk tomorrow."
"Yeah, we've got some serious hacking to do."
"We?"
"Come on, Scott. I need you now. I can't wade through this shit
and come up with anything meaningful. If you're really my friend,
you wouldn't have brought me this far just to stop now. This could
mean my career... or at worst, my life."
Scott put his glasses back on and leaned full out in the chair.
He sighed heavily, "Well, against all better judgment I don't think I
can turn you down when you put it like that.... But on one
condition."
"Name it."
"I get to call you Fish from here on out, with no objections."
"Deal."
Company Man 1.5 by Patrick Hurh
copyright 1993
The spinning playground merry-go-round is painted in swirling
gradients of orange, dull at the center and glowing yellow along its
outside edges. Kwan sits in the middle of it and looks out dizzily
between the cold iron bars that slope up and out away from him. He
sees whirling greens and whites beyond the seemingly still handrails.
A wave of nausea overcomes him and he is afraid he is going to be
sick again. He grabs the rails tighter and peers out to the edge of
the rotating carousel. The rusty steel disk he sits on seems to tilt
wildly with respect to the blurred horizon. The children hanging on
to the outside railings, squatting like young gorillas with their
buttocks hanging out in the open wind, all turn their heads to look
at him. Their faces are warped and drawn out and.... taunting. His
old classmates are pointing at him and chanting, "CITIZEN!" at the
tops of their lungs with malice. Their voices come slow in speed and
low in pitch. His nausea increases. A bobbing face pops up beyond
the edge of the children's spinning ring, the smiling face of Johnny
Hawthorne. As he runs to catch up with the edge of the merry-go-
round Kwan feels his heart leap. His friend is here to help him, he
thinks. He sees Johnny reach out to grab the iron bar closest to
him. Kwan gets to his knees and screams, "Hawk!.... help me!" But
Johnny does not leap on and clamber his way to pull his best friend
from the derision of the others. Johnny, instead, continues to run
with his hand on the playground carousel's railing, pushing the huge
spinning disc even faster. Kwan hears the others whoop in delight.
He sinks back to his terrified, braced position in the center. He
watches as Johnny Hawthorne looks back directly into his eyes, mouths
the word, "Fisshhh," slowly and then gives the iron bar a final
shove...
Kwan woke with a start. His legs kicked out straight while his
arms rapidly snapped to his chest. Only the stiff suit kept him from
pulling a groin muscle. Still, his chest cried out with the sudden
movement. He felt the medic cocoon tighten again.
He blinked with watering eyes at the glowing switches blinking up
at him from the neck of the suit. He gazed up through the bubble and
saw Spindle station slide by from right to left. It was definitely
larger than before he had passed out. Hopefully he had hit the
trajectory without much error, but at this distance, he could still
float right by Spindle, missing it by several miles, and into the
asteroid belt beyond. He could only hope to be noticed as he neared.
Kwanchaan groaned again and shut his eyes. There was nothing he
could really do but wait it out. He thought back on his dream.
Typical, he thought. The only one I can count on is myself... and,
at least so far, this insane space suit. He opened his eyes again.
Out of all the blinking monitor lights the only one that really
had him curious was the orange one directly in the middle of the neck
display. It was placed a little out of line with the rest of the
lights and switches, and a little crooked too. It looked as if it
didn't belong there. The symbol on its face was the ancient
'propeller' icon for nuclear radiation imbedded within another
equally terrifying icon, three intersecting circles. Kwan studied
the odd combination of symbols, the new symbol for molecular
nanotechnology surrounding the old symbol for nuclear radiation. It
didn't make sense.
Kwan contemplated this inconclusively as his eyes drifted halfway
shut. Spindle station drifted across the thin crescent of his vision
again and again as he fell once more to sleep. He understood the
individual patterns of the icons but not the juxtaposition. And why
would either be on a spacesuit?
*****************************************************
Air brakes hissed as the gleaming white train jerked to a stop.
A tinny female voice spoke crackling nonsense at the line of waiting
pedestrians. It was indecipherable with the boosted decibels of
scratchy treble. If Kwan was wearing his data pouch ear receiver he
would have heard the voice clearly announcing this train to Victoria
Station. No matter, he knew where it was going. All but a few
trains went to Victoria Station from Heathrow.
A warning beep accompanied the extrusion of aluminum walk plates
from under the still closed doors of the train. The grooved plates
clacked lightly in unison on the edge of the concrete platform.
Kwanchaan raised his eyebrows. He could see this new tube system was
going to take some getting used to. The doors rumbled open and he
stepped into the fluorescent lit interior.
Although the inside of the train car was respectably clean, the
jostles Kwan received from other boarding passengers laden with
luggage from their recent plane flights reminded him of earlier
incarnations of the ancient underground system. The doors shut with
another warning ping and stale recycled air filled Kwan's nostrils.
He found a seat along one side of the car between an oriental couple
coming home from a vacation, the surrendered realization of returning
to their mundane reality displayed across their tired faces, and a
bland businessman who carried nothing but a small, gold clasped book.
Kwanchaan looked directly ahead at the opposite wall of the train
car after he was seated. He carefully avoided the eye contact of the
people across from him in the age old tradition of subway riding.
There weren't any windows on the new car. They were replaced by
moving pictures of some sort, kaleidoscoping images of pastel
colors. Boring, but entrancing enough to capture the gaze of a
wearied traveler.
The pull of the train as it rounded a curve caught Kwanchaan by
surprise. He hadn't even realized they were moving yet. Quite a
difference from the old system. He glanced at the people across from
him, a lanky woman in a sun dress with a small boy next to her. The
boy was looking directly at him breaking the no eye contact
tradition. Kwan smiled at him and the boy stuck his tongue out at
him in return. The child was about eight years old and wearing a
blue uniform of some type. It almost looked like an old public
school uniform, complete with rounded cap. The boy looked hot and
uncomfortable in it. He reminded Kwan of another boy. A boy named
Johnathon Hawthorne who had been Kwanchaan's only friend for over a
year of his life.
Kwan closed his eyes and hugged his yellow blazer closer to his
chest. He could feel the data pouch in the jacket pocket. He
remembered Johnny Hawthorne as his head bounced along with the other
passengers as the train went over a rougher section of track.
Johnny had been one of the only last hold-out citizen children
that Kwan knew during his childhood. Kwan's father and Johnny's
father had become quite close even though Johnny's father was a
British citizen on his father's native American soil. They got along
because they were the only parents left in the small Bakersfield
residential neighborhood that didn't join up with a corporation.
Both Kwan and Johnny were ribbed by the other corporation children
for remaining citizens. They went to poorer schools and couldn't go
to the corporation parties that the other surrounding families held.
The two outcasts became defiant though and proud of their
differences. They formed a sort of rebel duo. Kwan knew that he
could always trust Johnny to be around for him.
Kwan sighed in the plastic train seat. Johnny would still be
with him today if his own father hadn't come between them. Kwanchaan
still didn't know what had come between his father and Johnny's, but
whatever it was, it tore the families apart. Kwanchaan's mother left
his father shortly there after and, before Kwan knew it, he was
waving a teary eyed goodbye to Johnny as a moving van pulled away
from in front of Johnny's house. Kwanchaan had begged his father to
send him to corporation school along with Johnny but his patriotic
dad would have none of it. "An American school is good enough for an
American kid, god damn it!" his father had yelled. "I won't have you
turning traitor on your country like Jim Hawthorne did on his!" Kwan
had cried himself to sleep that night. He knew it was all his
father's fault. If he had a real father like Johnny's things would
be different.
Kwanchaan roused himself as a loud tone issued through the train
car. It stopped just long enough for an amplified voice to announce,
"Entering Wind Jammer audible range. Please take proper ear
protection precautions. Caution. Entering Wind Jammer audible
range. Please take proper ear protection precautions." The constant
tone began again.
All around him people were pulling out small ear plugs and
placing them in their ears. The little boy across from him tried to
escape his mother's grasp, but the young woman managed to shove
something that looked like cotton in his ears. Next to him, the
business man placed his book in his lap and simply placed his hands
over his ears. Kwanchaan hastily did the same as he heard a deep
whoomp crescendo. The low thump was followed by a tremendous clap
that made Kwan jump along with the British boy across from him.
After a second of silence, people started to remove their earplugs
calmly. The little boy pulled at the cotton in his right ear using
both hands. Kwanchaan lowered his hands hesitatingly. His ears were
ringing slightly and it was several moments before he realized the
warning tone had stopped.
Kwanchaan dug through his memories to explain what he had just
witnessed and came up dry. He pulled his data pouch from his jacket,
opened it and began to access its online database. He blinked as he
realized that there was an incoming message blinking priority yellow
on the small active matrix display. He punched it up in a hurry.
Looks like this 'Wind Jammer' business was just going to have to
wait.
The message was from Scott. That much was obvious from the
server addresses that he had bounced the message off of. But why not
just contact him directly?
"Your brother's wedding brunch is confirmed.
Something's fishy in Finland, must be in the nets.
Here's beer in your eye.
compromised.
Gotta go
--Maki"
Kwanchaan stared at the nonsensical message on his data pouch.
What the fuck was this? Either Scott was just playing a joke, was in
trouble because of their little fun on the net last night, or coded a
message because he thought Cat was listening to his data pouch
transmissions. Probably the later... but what if the message didn't
come from Scott at all?
Kwan stared at the message a while longer before committing it to
memory. No matter how he decoded it, it either didn't make sense or
it didn't tell him anything he didn't already know. He thought back
to their searches last night and shuddered involuntarily. He cursed
himself for losing control and looked around the train car to see if
anyone noticed. The little boy was picking his nose and staring back
at Kwan.
Kwanchaan smoothly put the data pouch away and velcroed the
pocket shut. He reviewed the information they had uncovered.
By retrieving low priority mail messages that had been discarded
but not disk erased by the Whisker server, Scott and Kwan had pieced
together a marginal sketch of what Cat knew about recent Arachniware
activities. They knew from Arachniware press releases that the
spiders were delving into nanotechnology, especially terra forming
and habitat construction nanotech. This was quite a departure from
Arachniware's usual line of biochip implants known as spiderware.
The announcement had made waves not only amongst competing
corporations but also amongst the anti-tech crowds who viewed
nanotechnology through mataglap-colored glasses. The dreadful
consequences of mataglap far outweighed the benefits, they claimed.
The Arachniware press releases also mentioned the pioneering work of
Dr. Roberta Gonzales, the subject of Kwan's defection and merger
operation, and her successful efforts to completely avoid the
mataglap syndrome through superior nanoprogramming and reverse
transcripting technology. All of this was well documented in
Goldbreath's original data disk.
What they also found, however, were seemingly innocent
conversations between Cat operatives discussing the ease by which
Gonzales could be extracted from Arachniware. Normally conversations
such as these would be disk destroyed and even their message logs
encrypted and hidden, but the light hearted boastful attitude of
these messages obviously revealed that the message originators were
merely talking in jest or in a hypothetical situation. Still, both
Kwan and Scott thought it was strange to leave any incriminating
evidence on disk. Kwan came up with an explanation before Scott did.
Perhaps Cat _wanted_ to put Arachniware on alert for the defection
and merger. It didn't make a lot of sense, but it sure seemed like
Cat wanted Arachniware to know that an extraction of Gonzales was at
least being considered.
If this assumption were taken a step further and coupled with the
strange assignment of a rookie exec to an unusually high level
clandestine operation such as a defection and merger, it became
obvious that Kwanchaan was most likely being set up for a fall. For
what purpose, Kwan and Scott could only guess, but Kwan's intuition
was that he was expected to make a lot of noise trying to extract
Gonzales from an Arachniware trap resulting in the spiders holding
him high on a pole so the whole world could see of what evil
Caterpillar was made. In other words, a diversion. A big, fucking
fake move...
Realizing this just made things worse, not better. Kwan couldn't
choose _not_ to take the assignment. If he didn't do what was
expected of him, he would be squashed flat. Besides he actually did
feel loyal to Cat. He wasn't going to turn traitor on them like he
had been betrayed all his life. He'd just have to try to figure out
a way to get on Spindle Station and extract Gonzales that would work,
regardless if the spiders knew he was coming...
Kwanchaan knew the train was about to reach its destination when
the other passengers began gathering their luggage and straightening
in their seats. It frustrated him not to know where they were
getting their clues from. He could barely observe a slowing
sensation and there didn't seem to be a noticeable change in the
noise level of the surrounding machinery. He frowned, disconcerted.
A warning bing sounded and then the doors slid open.
Kwan stepped out into a dingy Victoria Station. Crowds hurried
down the platform to be the first on the escalator maze to their
individual destinations. Kwanchaan stood still to get his bearings.
He wanted to simply get to the train station proper and catch the
Intercity 125 to Swansea. He scanned around for a sign to follow.
He spotted one that read, "To all trains" and headed in that
direction.
It seemed like a thousand people all wanted out of London at that
moment. The pedways were crowded with sweating travelers and
commuters. Kwan tried to push forward through the swamp of
pedestrians for a moment and then resigned himself to leaning against
the sticky handrail of the pedway. Posters for bad theatre and bad
food trailed by him as the conveyor carried him down the hot tunnel.
A party of reveling football fans passed on the nearly empty pedway
next to Kwan, traveling in the opposite direction. Long red and
white knitted scarves were wrapped around their necks. Arsenal, Kwan
thought absently.
The pedway let out to a short platform, still surrounded by tiled
tunnel walls, that ended in a steep escalator up to the train
station. A pile of people was gathering at the inlet to the
escalator. It seemed fewer people could fit on the ascending
escalator than were being dumped onto the small landing by the
pedway. Either that or the crowds of people were hesitating slightly
before continuing up the moving staircase. Regardless, Kwan felt
himself pushed from behind into the thickening crowd of commuters
struggling to find purchase on the emerging stairs of the escalator.
He excused himself to the back of a gray haired head that he had
just bumped into and attempted to move to the side of the escalator
entrance point so he could try hoofing it up the steep concrete
stairs that ran alongside. Something was stuck to the bottom of his
left boot. It felt like a piece of paper. He shook his foot to try
to loosen it. No good. He looked down and saw that it was the front
page of a newspaper. He lifted his foot and bent over at the waist
to pick it off when he was bumped from behind.
The shove sent Kwan hopping across the landing, one hand holding
the paper on his shoe, the other flailing wildly to keep his balance.
He careened into the stairwell next to the escalator and twirled to
present his backside to the sharp cornered stairs. He sat down on
the stairs with a solid thud. The paper ripped from his boot and he
held it up in front of his face, exasperated.
He suddenly noticed the greasy figure sitting next to him on the
stairway. A bum who had been sitting there all the time. Kwan
stared at the man. His faded brown trenchcoat blended into the
concrete stairs; his head was covered with a soiled sweatshirt hood.
Kwan broke into a smile and tried to hand the man the paper.
"Here," Kwan yelled over the noise of the piled up crowd.
"Here's something to read."
The grimy man's wrinkled face peeked out from within the hood.
"Canna read!" he grinned. "Keep't, ya got a lon' journy heada ya!"
"What?"
The man just shook his head and waved backhanded at Kwan.
Kwan sat for a moment and then started to wad up the paper. A
badly smudged picture of a spider-like structure caught his eye. He
smoothed out the tabloid page across his knees. Spindle Station.
The contrast rendered the image almost incomprehensible but Kwan knew
it was definitely Spindle Station. Overlaid across the edge of the
photo of the asteroid mining station was the artificially highlighted
profile of a pretty blond woman's face. Kwan jerked his eyes up to
the headline. In gigantic point font it screamed,
Patricia Spindle Flaunts Playboy Boyfriend in Uncle's MegaCorp
Millionaire Face!
Kwan smiled and proceeded to fold up the used sheet of newspaper
and looked back over at the bum. The grizzled man leaned against the
tunnel wall. It was impossible for Kwan to tell if he was even awake
with that hood pulled over the his face.
Kwanchaan stood, slipped the folded paper into his jacket waist
pocket and, in the same motion, fished out a 20 dollar coin. He
dropped it into the hooded man's lap. He turned and started up the
long stairwell at a slow measured pace. His breathing fell into a
rhythm with his steps. By the time he arrived in Swansea to
interview Jerri Sergei, he was certain he would have it all worked
out.
******************************************
Kwanchaan stirred from another disturbing fit of dreams to gaze
blurry eyed at Spindle Station as it floated by. The station was
traveling on a diagonal, skewed path across his field of vision. He
blinked slowly. His rotation must have precessed slightly, his
sluggish mind told him. He closed his eyes again. His chest was
definitely hurting more now and it was feeling much warmer too. He
felt like he was hugging a heated basketball to his torso. It was
almost comforting....
He shrugged slightly and drifted off......
Company Man 1.6 by Patrick
Hurh
copyright
1993
Jerri set the cup of tea down when the vid-phone chirped at her
from across the parlour. She uncrossed her legs and scooted her
Queen Anne chair back from the tea service in front of her. The
chair caught slightly on the oriental rug beneath it and she was
forced to ungainly muscle the chair back. She really should have the
rug removed, but in her tiny flat there was no place else to display
it and she really enjoyed showing it off when prospective employers
stopped by.
She stood and smoothed her cotton dress over her upper thighs.
The vid-phone had chirped several times now and, by her calculations,
was ripe for answering. It just didn't do to let people know you
were eager to answer a machine just because it beeped incessantly at
you. She crossed to the small wood shelved communication center and
punched on the connection. As the caller came on line she smiled
slightly and put on her professional face.
"Sergei Social Engineering. Jerri here," she beamed at the CCD
iris.
"Ms. Jerri Sergei?" The video display remained a dull blue
color.
"Yes, this is she. What can I do for you?" Jerri reached
forward quickly and hit the caller ID button. She never appreciated
being watched without being able to watch back.
"Recently you received a call from a Mr. Stephan Fish," the
rough male voice spoke quickly, "concerning an employment
opportunity?"
"Excuse me?"
"A man who introduced himself as Stephan Fish has recently
contacted you in regards to a job he was offering," the caller
placatingly explained. "We know this because he works for us. We'd
like to..."
"Hold on now," Jerri interrupted. "First off, I don't know what
you are talking about. Secondly, who the hell are you referring to
by 'we'. And thirdly, I don't appreciate talking to a blank
screen." The digital readout under the video display blinked on,
showing a caller ID number. Jerri recognized it. The number was an
anonymous phone server. She could eventually figure out who this
was, but only after doing a lot of digging and definitely not while
she remained online with this bastard.
The caller coughed out a reply, "Listen... number one, we have
transcripts, recordings and logs of you talking with Fish, so quit
the ignorance bit... number two, all you need to know about 'we' is
that 'we' can make sure you never work for a corporation again... and
number three, I'm so butt-ugly that I don't want to scare you by
showing you my face. Now, personally I would just love to put a
little red line through your name and get a disk later of your
digital screams, but as a company man, I'm going to have to give you
a message first."
Jerri cocked her head slightly at this and then softened her set
chin. "Well, in Chicago that line might work, but here in the
Queen's England, we generally only use threats as a last resort.
They tend to reveal too much of the identity of the caller."
"You don't know who I am," the voice blurted out, suddenly
conscious of his accent.
Jerri let silence take its toll.
"Stephan Fish called you about a job." This time the words came
hesitant and unsure. "We know he called you. He might have told you
his name was something else... but, in any event, we don't want you
to work with him. This could be profitable for..."
"You don't have records of any call," Jerry stated.
"Yes, we do..." stammered the voice.
"If you did, you would know what name he used...
hypothetically."
"Er... Listen. Things will get very bad for you if you work for
Fish...."
"I don't know who Fish is! But I know who you are. Go bugger
off back to Peoria, you yellow-bellied pussy. I worked for you guys
once and I never will again! So even if your Mr. Fish did approach
me, you have nothing to worry about anyway... Good day, Mr. Company
Man, and might I suggest a refresher course in hostile personal
communication skills."
She cut off his reply by punching out on her vid-phone. The
caller ID number was still flashing beneath the blue video display.
She stared at it for a moment and then pulled the qwerty keyboard out
of its niche and began typing. She had to start the macro running
that would trace the intruding call and request the British
government net to grant her digital immunity from the originator.
One of the nice advantages of being a citizen, she sighed.
When the macro was initiated, Jerri replaced the keyboard,
slapped the vid-phone on auto-answer and walked quickly to the hall
stairs that led up to her bedroom. She had to hurry to get ready for
Mr. Stephan Fish's visit.
Kwan settled into an empty double seat facing the front wall of
the coach. The train car was an older model. It was probably one of
the original passenger coaches that had been converted from rail to
lev thirty years ago. The plexiglass window on his right was fogged
and scratched and, although obviously re-upholstered, the foam of the
synth-cotton lined seat under him had been molded to fit the lowest
common denominator of a human's backside. Kwanchaan sighed, after
the commotion of Victoria Station, the relative quiet of the
environment within the train was soothing.
The ragged tabloid paper rustled in his pocket as he moved to
more comfortable position and reminded him of his desperate need for
a workable plan. Scott had set up this interview with the Sergei
woman after they had exhausted their search of accessible Cat files.
"She can diagnose and manipulate better than you," Scott had retorted
when Kwan voiced his desire to go it alone. He still felt that under
the present circumstances he should try to handle it without drawing
others within his circle of confidence. Even involving Scott seemed
to overly threaten his desired independence. He'd only agreed to
meet with the Britisher because he needed something to do while he
thought up his plan. And as it turned out, the serendipity of the
journey itself could pay off in a very big way.
Kwan pulled the newspaper's headline page from his pocket and
pulled it taut in front of his eyes. In typical tabloid fashion it
only included about five sentences of text on the crowded front page
after the screaming headline and photo. The story was no doubt
continued after the breast baring beauty on page three, which he
didn't have the fortune of possessing. No matter. Kwan reached in
his jacket and slipped out his data pouch.
Scott's message was still displayed on the screen when Kwan
touched it to life. He wondered at it again. If he was a complete
paranoid fanatic he should probably stop using the net personality of
Stephan Fish completely. But, although Scott had him convinced last
night that Cat had it in for him, this morning it seemed more and
more like a dream. Cat wouldn't let him down like that. There must
be a rational explanation for all this. Besides if Cat found him
snooping around the data files of Patricia Spindle, they probably
just thought he was doing a thorough job of researching his
assignment.
Kwan went ahead and logged onto the data net as Fish. Funny,
but he never had a hard time with the name Fish when he thought of it
as a phone personality he controlled on the nets, just when someone
else said it to his face. He used the touch sensitive screen to run
searches in the major global data havens for Patricia Spindle,
starting from the most recent entries. As the data pouch sent its
request to the nearest net server he found his eyes drawn back to the
profile of Patricia's face which he had set on the seat next to him.
She was amazingly beautiful but with her face displayed an
intelligent nonchalance that served to disarm him. But it probably
wasn't her original face, Kwan told himself.
The data pouch vibrated dully in his hand as his data search
began to yield information. Kwan heard the tiny molecular disk array
buzz up to speed as the incoming data rapidly overflowed the
available RAM. Titles of articles arranged themselves quickly on the
small screen, font sizes rapidly down sizing until at least 50
percent of the titles could be seen. The articles ranged from
newspaper and tabloid stories to fashion layout credits from several
pop magazines. Apparently, Patricia had something to do with the
high-profile market of young designer clothes. No wonder he hadn't
heard of her before this. He punched up one of the fashion layouts
to start with. Kwanchaan always liked to start with something
intuitive when performing background research on people he may end up
manipulating.
Unfortunately the article he had selected consisted mostly of
graphics which took a long time to download. The captions of the
photos came through almost immediately however:
"Native Cybergoths are shown here in their natural surroundings
clad in Pat Spindle's new line of spiderwear. As her previous
spiderwear collections, this one makes extensive use of her Uncle's
spider_ware_ biochips to animate ultra-light polymer fabric."
and:
"Fiery Reds and Glowing Greens combine in this contrasted pair
of outfits to create a feeling of didactic eclecticism. Once again
Spindle utilizes the spiderware chips, this time to oddly shift the
tones and hues of the thermal chameleon pant suits."
and:
"Thin chains of beryllium-copper flex in discordant harmonies
over the smooth sheen of Spindle's latest evening gown. Unisex in
design and practicality, this gown is the only Spindle-fit in the
collection unveiled at the Saigon show that relies on the natural
forces of air and gravity to give it life."
Kwan grimaced but decided to hold judgment on Patricia Spindle's
fashion sense until after some of the photos were downloaded. He
picked two photos to start downloading and then switched the data
pouch back over to its search mode screen. He called up the factual
biography of the rich niece. It would be short, as most biographies
of mega-corp families were, but Kwanchaan thought it would be good to
at least brush up on the official data.
The train began to move, sluggishly at first. The coach groaned
as it lifted on its cushion of opposing B fields. The door connected
to the neighboring train car ahead of Kwan flapped open noisily.
Kwan jumped slightly in his seat and his hand went reflexively to the
stun-gun trigger on the side of his data pouch. Hanging on to the
opened door handle was a middle-aged woman dressed in a pea-green
overcoat and black oriental flats. She smiled at Kwan and gestured
over her shoulder with a thumb, "Smoking Car."
She stepped fully into the coach and closed the door behind her
carefully but lacking in precision on the gently swaying train.
Kwanchaan eased the safety back on the stunner and smiled back at the
woman. She disappeared behind him as she chose a suitably distant
seat from Kwan.
He sighed and looked back at the data pouch and skimmed through
Patricia's biographical data. She was the daughter of Phillip
Spindle's sister, who had never married. Patricia carried her
mother's first name as well as her last; Patricia's mother had died
shortly after her daughter was born. This might mean complications
from child birth but somehow Kwan doubted that Patricia Spindle
senior had carried the baby to term herself. He tapped with his
middle finger on the mother's name. The screen faded into the
biography of the mother. Kwan was right, the mother's death was
listed as due to natural causes.
Little Patricia was probably fertilized from a frozen egg...
probably after her brother had hit it big and gave her the money to
afford it. He wondered how old the venerable Phillip Spindle was
himself. At least as old as Arachniware mega-corp itself, and that
ran back about three-quarters of a century. Kwan backpedaled the
data pouch to Patricia junior's biography.
Patricia was presently twenty-eight years old and was the
principal designer and producer of her own line of fashionable
designer clothes. She had never married and never published any
written material although she held several degrees in literature and
the fine arts from several specialization schools. Kwan doubted if
they were all real degrees. Some people are just born into it, he
sighed. The vacuous smile on the biography's accompanying duo tone
image solidified Kwan's silver-spoon perception of Patricia Spindle.
He glanced back at the tabloid photo on the seat next to him.
The profile shot made her look so much more knowing and seductive.
Amazing what black and white can do for a face, he muttered.
The first of the two photos he had requested was finished
downloading. It was the 'Cybergoth' picture depicting Patricia's
'spiderwear' designs. The dithered image probably could not do the
colors justice, but Kwan could see well enough that the clothes were
out of the ordinary. Members of the fashion elite Cybergoths were
gathered around a small bon-fire lit in a wet, dark alleyway. The
orange flames reflected as slick highlights on the surrounding brick
walls. The goths posed as if in motion but somehow Kwan knew that
they were standing still for the photographer. Their arms, and
sometimes legs, were lifted in strange contortions that emoted stiff
anger and remorse. The crimson fabric draping their naked bodies was
obviously moving. It seemed to float about each pale human form in
thin coiled strands and broad curving sweeps. Nowhere did the fabric
actually seem to be touching flesh. The lines of the fabric subtly
echoed the lines of the bodies, putting a softer edge to the anger
and emphasizing the remorse. Bits of the fabric had floated too
close to the fire and had lit into small flames which seemed to
descend towards the hot pyre instead of flying upwards in the
generated thermals.
The data pouch display signified that an animated version of the
photo was available to download, but Kwan had neither the time or the
memory storage to take a look at it now. He glanced again at the
Cybergoths. He wouldn't describe what he saw as clothing, but he was
strangely attracted to the image. Kwan wondered if this attraction
was more attributable to the designer or the artist that photographed
it.
Kwanchaan shook himself from his intent stare and returned the
data pouch to search mode. He quickly found and punched up the
article corresponding to the tabloid headline he had picked up. Kwan
highlighted the text without reading it and sent the data pouch
searching for similar texts. He then scanned the tabloid article
quickly and found only a few paragraphs worth noting:
"The mystery man Palatable Patty has chosen for her romping
visit to Tae Guk Station is none other than Raymond Stone, the owner
of Rolling Stone enterprises. Perhaps Patty is getting a little
worried about her wrinkles and wants to get in good with the
rejuvenation experts at Rolling Stone. Or perhaps she is just taken
with the idea of having a boy-toy more than twice her age!
Regardless, Patricia's father is not taken with anything Raymond
Stone has gotten his hands into. Nameless Sun sources have informed
our professional writing staff that Mr. Spider himself, Phillip
Spindle, thinks of Raymond as an 'incompetent playboy' and describes
Rolling Stone enterprises as on the brink of economical and
technological disaster. Raymond Stone's reply? "I don't think we've
ever met." Witty as always Raymond..."
and:
"Prankster Patty herself has told Sun reporters that Raymond is
a flirt and a laugh and Tae Guk Station is just the place for them to
finally get into a good argument over. And we know what she means by
that! Tae Guk is known for its black market nano gaming halls and
meat puppet clubs. Very techno-goth and very unlike Raymond Stone.
Raymond, referring to Tae Guk Station, said, "Sounds like a real
adventure, and there aren't too many of those left in this
world...I'm always up for an adventure, especially if Patty is
involved." What a true romantic, Raymond..."
Kwan tapped on the words 'Raymond Stone' and 'Tae Guk Station'
and then started scanning the new information the data pouch had
gathered on Patricia's upcoming trip to the pleasure station.
Raymond was too good to be true. If Patricia Spindle possessed the
mentality to be truly interested in this guy, it would be a cakewalk
to turn her romantic attentions to himself. And if the opposite was
true and she was just playing with Raymond for the sheer decadent fun
of it (which is what Kwan silently wished to be true), it would make
it all that much easier for Kwanchaan to gain her confidence.
He flicked on the time display at the upper right hand corner of
the data pouch display for a half-second. He had about 37 minutes to
finish his research and complete his plan. Kwan already knew where
Jerri Sergei could fit in and, if she was as good as Scott believed,
this defection could really turn into a finesse job. One that both
Cat and the spiders wouldn't be expecting. For the first time since
Goldbreath's office, Kwan finally felt in the groove. He would pull
this off yet.
Kwanchaan commenced tapping on the data pouch screen, pursing
his lips every few seconds as the bytes all fell into place.
Company Man 1.7 by Patrick
Hurh
copyright
1993
"What do you mean its gone?" Phillip Spindle barked at small
video
screen. The shrunk face displayed there was a map of fear and dread.
"We searched Spindle around the area of the nano-lab pod and
used
drone ships to scout a one kilometer radius volume as you suggested,
but we
haven't found the suit yet... sir."
Phillip groaned and looked over the edge of the flat screen
unit,
staring at nothing. The plane dipped suddenly in a small pocket of
turbulence and then stabilized. Engines wound back up to speed,
barely
audible in the elaborately furnished and insulated cabin. He
returned his
gaze to the monitor. "Keep searching. You have to find that suit.
Suspend rescue efforts. Place all available staff on the search
detail!"
"Yes. We are... we will do that." The despair on the spider
officer's
face seemed to increase a notch. "Sir? The vacuum pull of the
breach
could have shot the suit out well beyond..."
"I am not interested in that," Spindle interrupted. "Just find
the
god damn suit!" His thumb punched one of the many fat buttons spread
out
on the flat workstation surface before him and the young officer's
face
blinked out.
It was replaced with a profile view of the plane's pilot.
"ETA, pilot?" Spindle demanded. He was eager to get to the
space
port.
"Twenty minutes, sir." The pilot looked calm and untroubled.
His
eyes flicked down at the instrument panel and then back up to the
forward
windscreen.
Spindle hit another button, this time a large screen hung to his
right
flickered on. He twisted his lean body slightly to view it. The
dark
leather of the chair creaked softly with his body's adjustment. As
the
contrast sharpened, a deep field of stars became visible. At the
center
hung Spindle Station, a badly damaged Spindle Station. Overlaid
across the
bottom of the image in white letters flashed textual data revealing
magnification factors, viewing direction, distance to focal point and
other
optical information. Right now, Phillip couldn't care less about
optics.
He really even didn't care about the damage to his station. He was
obsessed with finding the nano-suit. If that got out into a public
habitable region or, in another sense, 'out' into the media, his
entrapment
plan could backfire and Arachniware could be implicated in a mataglap
production conspiracy. That had destroyed corps in the past and
probably
would again.
He zoomed the viewing drone's image into a close-up of the
station
with a small flexible joystick inset into the mahogany framed
workstation's
smooth surface. An uncoordinated flurry of small drone ships and
powered
suits roamed the station in the area of the breach. Although the Cat
perpetrators had disabled the station's phys-ops and emergency
circuits in
order to hack the security system, the localized breach was at an
extremity
of the station and the twists and turns of the halls and corridors
that
connected it to the rest of the installation had acted as baffles to
the
out rushing air. Several astute troops were able to don their
pressurized
suits in time to avoid severe injury. Many spider workers who
survived had
been out in the belt, piloting mining ships and experimenting with
new
bio-chips. All had been called into activity at the moment the
breach had
occurred.
Spindle watched as small drone ships attached themselves to
towing
braces of the station's frame. The drones' small drives winked on and
off
to equilibrate the station from the small velocity it had acquired
from the
breach. A chime sounded and the smaller display screen blinked
rapidly,
the pilot's profile image oscillating with that of an incoming
message
image. The image was that of the spider officer on Spindle.
"Video on. Monitor one," Phillip stated. The small central
monitor
faded out the pilot's face and re-solidified on the lieutenant's
image.
"Sir, we found one of the assault spiders which confronted the
Cat
operatives in the nano-lab."
"I hope he's dead," Spindle spoke with mild anger.
"He is..." the officer continued, "although his battle tech
spider
recorded the nano-lab fight."
"Is the suit visible?"
"Uh... you'd best see it yourself. I'm patching the video
through
now, sir." The screen blinked blue and then a grainy pixelated image
replaced it. Overlaid text stated the encryption standards and
levels
being used. The white text blinked out and the image began moving.
The frame of the video kept jerking rapidly as the spider
operative
whose head gear they were looking through jumped into the darkened
lab
room. White beams of light shot out from hand-held torches below the
camera's viewpoint. Thin white cross-hairs in the center of screen
focused
on petri dishes, lab counter tops, and eerily shadowed machinery.
The
spider was searching for targets. The camera suddenly snapped down
to a
suited human figure sprawled on the floor. The cross hairs flashed
red. A
rifle barrel sprang into view, drawing an instant bead on the fallen
form.
The cross hairs flashed red and then green. Dark stains spotted the
figure's coveralls. The cross hairs returned to white. The view
hesitated
and then jerked around about 120 degrees settling on a close-up view
of a
hand of another body outstretched on the floor. Most of the body was
hidden behind the vertical edge of a dark cabinet.
"Sound?" Phillip called to the officer on Spindle.
"That couldn't be recovered," came Nelson's reply.
The view from the spider's head gear dropped in a blur and
seemed to
roll quickly leaving swirling afterglows on the monitor. The
vertical edge
of the cabinet tilted into view from a different perspective. The
cross
hairs flashed red again as they centered on an immobile face. The
grainy
face of Roberta Gonzales.
"She was, of course, dead," the voice from Spindle Station said.
The camera jerked around offering views of the floor and other
spider
troopers. Things seemed to have calmed. The view panned to the
right
revealing a trooper poking at something bulky with the thin barrel of
his
weapon. The suit.
Spindle leaned closer to the monitor, his breathing coming
quicker.
The trooper in the image retreated casually from the collapsed suit
on the
floor. He raised his torch hand in the air and started to shrug his
shoulders. The view panned back to the left, jerkily, to focus on a
central spider figure. Phillip sucked in a quick breath as he viewed
the
assault spider in its full battle tech. He still felt pride and awe
at
what his Arachniware could accomplish. The black and white image
caught
the silhouette of the spider with it's long arms moving rapidly in
unison,
simultaneously targeting on alternate targets, while the head, clad
in
streamlined armor with widely bifurcated stere-optic goggles, calmly
turned
oblivious to the jerking precision of its appendages. Its muscles
were
tuned to respond to the battle-tech input without bothering the brain
of
the human except for command decisions. The spider team captain
suddenly
gestured with its torch hand and dropped to his knees.
Suddenly the view swung back to the suit, cross hairs strobing
red.
The rifle barrel flew into view and flashed. The screen flared
white.
When the camera came back on line, Phillip, sitting in his leather
chair,
no longer felt like he was witnessing the actual events within the
room.
The collage of images were too disjointed and without reference.
Small,
dark objects flew about the monitor display incoherently. The camera
seemed to focus randomly on other spiders, the floor, the petri
dishes and
once on the suit that now seemed to be careening about the room.
The video froze on that image. The officer's voice came back on
line.
"That's the last clear image we have. As you can see... someone
or
something was in the suit."
"What?"
"Someone was in the..."
"I heard you!" Spindle passed his hands through his white hair.
"Was
it Cat?"
"Most likely..." The officer sounded scared.
"How did they get in there? I thought the lab was sealed off!
The
whole god damned pod should have jettisoned the instant you sensed
Cat
finally got here!" He slapped the polished wood in front of him.
"We set
this whole thing up and you're telling me Cat just waltzed in and
made off
the suit?!"
"They used some very.. uh, unique approaches." The voice was
trembling now.
Spindle smiled at his manipulation of the obsequious lieutenant.
Things were not quite going as he planned but were still salvageable.
If
the missing suit was really in the hands of Cat and not just floating
off
into space, the double entrapment just may work after all. He
focused on
the still image of the suit on the monitor and realized the scared
spider
was hiding behind it. He quickly snapped a finger on the signal
interrupt.
Immediately the networked workstation re-established the link to
Spindle
Station, this time the Lieutenant Nelson's sweaty face looked back at
him
instead of the pixelated image of the suit.
"Unique approaches? I hope you use some unique approaches to
get that
suit back..." Spindle trailed off as the officer on screen cocked his
head
distracted.
"Sir? Scanners indicate some rather large masses, almost
certainly
industrial ships closing quickly on the station."
"Is the defense perimeter still up?"
Hesitation from the spider.
"Is the defense perimeter still up?!"
"Yes, it's up. But we can't spare the drones to defend it..."
The small screen on Spindle's workstation began to flash again.
The
flashing images this time signified highest priority.
"Christ!" Spindle cursed. "You," towards the young officer,
"stay on
audio, bug-mode only. No input."
"Yes sir."
Spindle tapped a few of the macro buttons and said, "Monitor
one.
Video channel scan." The image of the plane's communication officer
solidified on the display.
"Sir, I have an incoming call from Chairman Rostenkowski of
Caterpillar. All check sums clear and intercorporation encoding
signatures
are green."
Phillip Spindle sat stunned for a moment. He hadn't expected to
be
contacted by the head Cat himself. He blinked and then began to
smile
craftily. Perhaps even this could be turned to his advantage.
Phillip turned to his view of Spindle Station still displayed on
the
large monitor to his right. He manipulated the joystick and the view
widened appreciably to encompass about a thousand kilometers around
the
station. He spoke, "Put him through on audio only."
Silence for a moment, then he heard a cough and Rostenkowski
spoke.
"Phillip? You there?"
"Yes, Dan. I'm here. Came to gloat, huh?"
"I... I'm not sure what you're talking about." Of course he
wouldn't.
Danny knows as well as I that this dialogue is probably being
listened to
by every major corporation player, Spindle thought. His fingers
danced on
the macros silently. Several orange boxes appeared on the large
display of
the star field.
"Hmmm, well why did you call then? Just a friendly hello?"
Spindle
flicked a few buttons and the orange boxes centered on Spindle
Station
"Phillip," Rostenkowski said gravely, "We know Spindle has
suffered a
great damage of some type. I want to assure you that Caterpillar has
taken
no hostile action against you. In fact, due to the severity of your
situation, I have sent several of my nearby mining ships to Spindle's
domain to assist in your rescue efforts. You have no ships close
enough or
large enough to handle the salvation of your workers."
Spindle manipulated the joystick again centering and zooming the
view
on a dense cluster of boxes on the periphery of the screen. Quickly,
the
sight of several yellow behemoth ships filled the large monitor. Cat
construction ships.
"Dan, you do not have permission to enter Spindle's defense
perimeter.
I repeat, any intrusion of our defense perimeter will not be
tolerated."
"Phil, listen to yourself. This is already becoming a media
circus.
You will not survive this if the public sees you deliberately letting
people die simply because you can't let down your corporation guard."
The word, media, caught at Spindle. He suddenly realized that
besides
other corporations listening in, the media was probably hanging on
every
word. He spoke with mock haste, "Dan, that's not what I meant. Any
deliberate offensive action against Arachniware and Spindle Station
will
not be tolerated. Of course your ships will be allowed into the
region of
space to help with our already speedy efforts of rescue."
"I knew you would agree."
Phillip could imagine Danny grinning to himself in his yellow
terricloth bathrobes he always wore in public. He smiled to himself
also
and added, "But I remind you that any action resulting in the injury
of
Arachniware personnel or equipment will be met with severe reprisal."
"Understood. I am sending the order to proceed into your
perimeter."
"Goodbye, Dan." Spindle punched the interrupt button. "Fuck!"
he
yelled for the benefit of the overhearing Lieutenant Nelson and then
tapped
Spindle Station back on-line. Before he could utter an instruction
to
Nelson, the young officer was chattering at him.
"Sir, I didn't want to break in your conversation with Chairman
Rostenkowski, but we found the suit!"
Phillip barely hid his dismay. "Is it... damaged?"
"Uh... we haven't actually picked it up yet. It's actually
several
thousand kilometers out from station coreward, but it's heading this
way
quickly."
Phillip relaxed. It may fall into Cat's hands yet. He looked
at the
lieutenant, wondering if he should trust him and ensure the suit's
theft or
carry on the deception for a while longer to utterly convince Cat
that the
theft was truly a theft. Better to continue the deception, he
thought.
Besides it was a lot more enjoyable.
"How do you account for the suit's return, lieutenant?"
"I.. I don't know. Whoever was in it must have steered it back
somehow." The officer's brow was lowered in thought. "I'm sure it's
the
same suit, 'cause it's EM signature matches the last sig on record
for that
suit."
"I'm sure it is too," replied Spindle. "Listen. You have to
retrieve
that suit. It is imperative that you put all available drones, fully
armed, in the path of its oncoming trajectory."
"Yes, sir."
Spindle looked up at the video drone display. It was tracking
the
blocky yellow ships as they crossed the defense perimeter. He zoomed
out
rapidly, looking for the little orange box that must be surrounding
his
nano-suit. He couldn't find it. Probably too small to reflect the
light
necessary. "Sure is one hell of a resourceful exec."
"Sir?"
"Nothing. Do you have the trajectory of the suit computed yet?"
"Sir, the suit is going to miss the station by several hundred
kilometers... If it stays on its present trajectory it will arrive in
the
midst of the oncoming Caterpillar rescue fleet in about fifteen
minutes."
Spindle's blue eyes lit up for a half second and his thin right
leg
began to bounce in an anticipatory jiggle. He rapidly covered the
instinctive actions with a mask of despair. "Shit!" he groaned.
"Sir?"
"Send everything out after that suit. Bathe it in ultra-sonics
to
knock out whoever's inside and grab it. Do not let Caterpillar even
near
it! Use force if necessary..."
"But the Cat fleet may not even know it's coming if they aren't
looking for it," Nelson objected.
"Oh, they're looking for it all right.. they're looking for it,"
he
lied. "Just make sure they don't get it!"
"Yes, sir!"
Phillip punched the vid-phone off and leaned his chair back for
landing. "Just make sure they see you fighting for it, Nelson," he
sighed
to himself. "Just make sure they see you fighting."
Kwanchaan struggled his eyes open slowly and squeezed them shut
again.
Moisture came forward reluctantly from his tear ducts to lubricate
them.
He tried again. This time the colored flashing lights that woke him
came a
bit clearer. Kwan raised his hand for about the fourth time to wipe
the
mist from his helmet bubble ineffectively. The obstructing matter
was
congealed on the inside surface of the bubble.
At first Kwan had thought that the flashes of light were from
the
suit's chin switch panel. But after squinting at the panel, he dimly
ascertained that the light was coming from outside his suit!
Obviously
something was going on out there and from the frequency and color of
the
brilliant flashes Kwan thought it looked like he was floating in the
middle
of a full scale stellar war.
Unfortunately, no matter how hard he concentrated, his cocoon
drugged
mind and dry eyes could not piece together a coherent picture of what
was
going on. Kwan could see angular objects flickering in the staccato
lighting that must be ships, but he couldn't make out who they were
or even
if there was more than a few of them.
A tingling sensation went through his legs. He could feel them
drift
off even further than they already were from the cocoon's
medications. He
tried to move them to assure himself that they were still there. If
they
were, he received no positive indication. Sonics, his mind thought
detachedly. I'm being wiped with sonics. Kwan looked up through the
helmet and peered for something he could recognize. Strobing images
of the
red wetness inside the helmet backlit by the glowing metal wounds of
surrounding ships confused him. This is like being born, he thought
almost
incoherently.
Suddenly a shape did seem to make sense.... or rather, a color.
As
several quick bursts of plasma charges collided into the warring
ships,
Kwan glimpsed the huge bulking mass of a freighter just overhead. It
glowed bright yellow in the white flares. Yellow...
Another sweep of sonics froze Kwanchaan's lips as they were
about to
mouth the words he had just thought. He stared, open eyed at the
bottom of
the gold behemoth. He imagined the yellow hue even when the
afterimage had
long faded from his unseeing eyes.
I'm yellow, he yelled in his thoughts to the passing ship, I'm
yellow...
********************************
It was hard to tell. Her hair could have been tinted just a
shade
darker than blonde, but it was really hard to say. Kwan looked at
the back
of her head as she poured another cup of tea from the gleaming silver
pot.
He wondered if she had slightly drugged the tea to make her look more
attractive or if she was wearing some type of aphrodisic perfume.
No, this
feeling is not one of lust, he thought. This feels more like... like
excited contentment.
Jerri had answered the door with a rustle and a smile. Her
cotton dress had rustled with the breeze from the old-fashioned
hinged door
and her lips had smiled shyly without a glint of teeth as if he had
already
somehow complimented her just by being behind the door when she swung
it
open.
Scott was right, she was good. Twenty minutes into a
supposed
interview and he, the interviewer, somehow felt like the interviewee.
Kwan
quickly chastised himself for so easily falling for the tricks of the
trade
that he himself was trained in. It just seemed so genuine coming
from
Jerri. There was no harm in going along for the ride, at least just
for
the duration of the interview. He stopped wrestling with his
emotions and
tried to turn on his analytical mind when she turned back to him and
set
the white porcelain cup of tea on the arm of his chair.
She returned to her chair, faced him squarely and said,
"So,
Stephan, you work for the big Cat?" She smiled at the flicker of
surprise
that crossed his face. "You don't mind me calling you Stephan, do
you?"
"Not at all Ms. Sergei." Kwan emphasized the 'Ms' rather
loudly.
"I understand your confusion. My yellow jacket must look quite
familiar
to the corp conscious. But I must assure you that I am strictly
working on
my own in this.... well, except for a certain Finn, whom I believe
you
know."
"Ah, yes, Scott. Such a sweet man. We've worked together
before, although very distantly. I actually have never met him in
person.
Never thought he'd end up working for the Cat though..."
"He doesn't. And neither do I... but look, it doesn't
matter who
I work for..." Kwan uncrossed his legs and leaned forward toward
Jerri.
"...I am interviewing you for a job. This job will require secrecy,
cunning and intelligence and, more than likely, some physical
prowess.
Scott has emphasized that your talents in social engineering would
compliment my own. I hope I can trouble you for a little more
information
than that."
As Jerri began her reply, Kwan brought the fingertips of
his left
hand up to his lower lip, elbow resting on the chair arm. He felt
like he
gained back part of his role as interviewer with his last statements.
He
barely heard Jerri's first words as he traced the edge of his lip
with his
fingers.
"I am well aware of the secrecy and 'cunning', as you so
dramatically put it, required by most of my employers. I hope you
will
respect my privacy and not demand a list of previous jobs or
particular
talents." Kwanchaan was listening now. "My reputation may be soft
spoken,
but I am willing to do anything that a job requires. No questions
asked...
even as to who I am working for. Except in this case, I know you are
working for Caterpillar and I've made a personal commitment to avoid
working for Yellows wherever possible."
Kwan let a pitying look cross his face. "Jerri... What can
I
say? If you really didn't want this job why didn't you let me know
over
the vid-phone? It would have saved a lot of trouble and expense...
and all
because of the blatant association you made of my yellow jacket and
the
Caterpillar Corporation." He began to get up as he sensed her
reaction to
his nonchalance.
"Wait... I _know_ you work for Cat," Jerry spoke quickly,
"not
because of your coat, but because of a message I received today from
someone at Cat who offered..." She cut herself off abruptly. Damn
it, she
thought. He caught me. He had turned his apparent desperation for
her
services, which she had been trying to cull to fruition, back on
herself.
She tried not to sound too anxious as she continued. "Tell me about
the
job you have in mind."
Kwanchaan's brain seemed to split into four distinct trains
of
thought. At the most basic level, he relayed the basics facts as to
the
type of job (defection and merger) and his preferred job method
(finesse)
to Jerri, leaving out all references to Arachniware, Caterpillar and
the
other personalities involved of course. He could fill her in on all
those
if she decided to take the job. On a more cognitive level, he
wondered
what could have been the subject of Cat's supposed message to Jerri
that
had convinced her to at least consider working for Cat. Scott had
even
particularly warned him about her great aversion to Caterpillar. On
the
top most and paranoid level of his mind, Kwan asked himself how the
hell
Cat had been able to track his movements down to Jerri Sergei? And
why
would they be contacting her so obtusely? They must have tracked him
to
Scott's and then... Ahh... Scott's electronic message and his hack of
Whisker must fall into play here somewhere. He recalled the strange
message from his memory:
"Your brother's wedding brunch is confirmed.
Something's fishy in Finland, must be in the nets.
Here's beer in your eye.
compromised."
Noting that Cat's trace of his whereabouts and plans most likely were
only
possible through the careful tracking of his network trails under the
name
of Stephan Fish and possibly by tracing the hack of Whisker back to
Scott,
the message seemed to gain some clarity. Obviously, 'fishy....in the
nets'
must refer to Scott sensing something or someone poking about his net
identity files.... probably looking for Kwan. 'Fishy' could also
refer to
Kwan's false net identity of Stephan Fish... The strange indentation
after
the last word, 'eye', of the third nonsense line seemed conspicuous
also.
Then it dawned on Kwan... 'NET(s)'-'EYE'-(in)DENT-'COMPROMISED'. His
net
identity was compromised and probably Scott's too. A moment of panic
swam
through him. His recitation of the job facts to Jerri faltered for
an
instant. But after snapping all his attention for a moment to the
conversation at hand, he regained his composure and continued. Jerri
seemed genuinely interested in what he was saying and didn't seem to
notice
the hesitation. The top level of his mind wandered back to Scott's
message. If Cat really was tracking him via his net identity, it
could
mean that his worst fears were correct... 'YOUR (brother's wedding
br)
hUNCH IS CONFIRMED'... Cat was setting him up for a fall.
Below his paranoid thoughts, all through his wondering at
Jerri's
sudden motivation, and over the top of his ongoing discussion of the
defection and merger, Kwan's mind was infused with a singular thought
on a
deep emotional level. Why did he so desperately want to trust this
woman?
And in circumspect, why did he feel that he never would?
Company Man 1.8 by Patrick
Hurh
copyright
1993
The flat door swung shut behind him. Kwanchaan hesitated for a
moment, thinking about Jerri's parting words, and then stepped down
the concrete stairs that bisected the small front garden. The latch,
wetly oiled, snicked at him as it shut behind him. He stood looking
out across the polluted tidal bay before he turned to his left and
began to head back to the shuttle train station that would carry him
from the small town of Mumbles back to the broken down industrial
port of Swansea.
As he walked, he tried to fit the pieces of what he had learned
from Jerri's interview and Scott's message together to fit into a
coherent picture. One that was not tilted crazily toward the
paranoid image that he presently envisioned. He could not. At least
he should be able to feel good that Jerri had decided to take the
job, but after what she had just said upon his exit soured his
feelings.
Kwan looked up and realized he had walked by the entrance to the
train station. He kept walking. Hell, it's only a few miles to
Swansea anyway, he thought. He tried to mentally kick start his
brain into thinking analytically about the job ahead, but his
thoughts kept coming back to Jerri's words, "You know, Fish... I'm
only doing this because Cat wants me not to..." Last thing Kwan
needed was someone who was on the job solely for revenge purposes.
He sighed. Another last thing he needed was Caterpillar looking over
his shoulder plus compromising his and Scott's net identities. Cat
was trying to sculpt his job for him and, if it was indeed a set-up,
he didn't feel like heeding their plans. He wondered if Scott was
still kicking. After attributing some kind of meaning to his
mysterious message, Kwan was afraid to contact Scott. If their net
identities were compromised, Scott was either in a world of shit or
would be in a world of shit. Finland probably wouldn't even stick up
for him if Caterpillar came down hard.
Kwan continued down the pavement. Passerbys were mainly older
with chubby faces covered with weathered Welsh skin. Low stratified
clouds over head were passing inland from the sea. A misting rain
was already starting to fall. The kind an umbrella didn't help
protect from. The slowly descending water just held in a colloidial
suspension of viscous air and wetted clothes regardless of gravity.
Kwan sighed and thought, the final, 'last thing I need' is a drink.
And he turned into the red paneled alcove of The Antelope.
Inside the air was a few percent less humid, but the percentage
water content removed was replaced with the stale outgassing of
cigarette fumes from the dark red leather and fabric that covered
everything that wasn't worn wood. There were only a couple of men at
the bar and a few at scattered low tables. They seemed friendly
enough, but when they finished glancing at Kwan's quick entrance they
resumed their conversations, speaking Welsh. Kwan swore he had heard
English voices when he first opened the door. He walked up to the
high bar.
"What can I get you?" The bartender was an older, slim woman,
replete with cigarette between lips and a blonde bun of hair. The
hair was dyed and growing out; Kwan couldn't help but think of the
color of nicotine stains on grainy teeth as he looked at it. He
clambered onto a stool.
"A pint of Usher's, please."
"Sorry, no Usher's, darling. That's been gone for over two
years."
"A pint of Flowers then," said Kwanchaan, eyeing the colorful
pump handle at the end of the bar.
"Sorry again, hon." Her eyes tracked his. "That's just there
for the atmosphere."
"Ahhh... and what atmosphere it is." Kwan eyed the other pump
levers and draft handles raising his eyebrows with inquiry at the
woman.
"Tennant's about all we got now on draft. The smaller breweries
closed down 'cause of the flooding in the North... no hops, you see."
"Well then I'll have a pint of Tennant's extra."
The woman didn't say anything, but went ahead and filled a glass
with the yellow lager. She set it in front of Kwan just as the
carbonation foamed over the edges of the glass.
"Four pounds twenty, sweetheart."
Kwan looked at her. She used the words, hon and sweetheart like
they were genderless pronouns. He wondered what she would call him
if he reached across the bar and ripped her expressionless face off.
He pulled out his data pouch and punched in the amount quickly. The
pouch whirred and spit out a disposable magnetic strip. Kwan handed
it to the bar tender.
She sighed and plucked it from his hands. As she slid the card
through a tape reader, she tapped long fingernails on the wooden bar
top and said pointedly, "We usually like to do things the old way....
the real way." She shrugged and stabbed the card onto a small metal
spike, topping a handful of other checks paid, Kwan supposed, with
actual cash. The bar tender returned to her station in front of the
small, dirty aquarium behind the bar. She trained her eyes on the
vid monitor mounted on the opposite wall.
He gulped at the beer. It was a little too biting for his
taste, but he hadn't tasted a British beer in a long while and with
the rapid development of his new career in the past couple of days,
he really felt like he needed it.
He spun slightly on the stool and surveyed the other patrons.
None looked back at him. They were all engaged in slow Welsh
conversation. The words came in syllabic bursts always seeming to
end in a questioning tone. Pauses were long and quite frequent. The
old way, Kwan thought. Idiots. They'd sooner sit here and reminisce
about the way things used to be. Didn't they realize that by
complaining about the state of the world, their town, their local...
that they were doing nothing but miring themselves in the old way. A
way that could not possibly survive even another decade, at least not
on this little, but industrialized, island.
Kwan was halfway through his pint and his mind was beginning to
meander back to his predicament at hand. He tried to put it out of
his mind, at least until he finished his beer. He looked at the bar
tender again and felt disgust rise at the back of his throat. The
old way... idiot, he thought. He knew his anger was driven by his
frustration with dealing with his assignment, but he didn't care. He
needed to vent his frustration somehow... on someone. He looked at
the old men at the tables again. No, there isn't a soul in here that
even deserves my attentions, he thought with confident superiority.
He quickly finished the pint and set it on the bar loudly.
"Fuck it," Kwan said softly but emphatically. "Back to work."
The old men at the tables turned to watch him as he stormed out
of the Antelope. They shook their heads with condemning wisdom.
Outside, Kwan almost trotted on his way back the direction he
had come and ducked into the shuttle train station's entrance. He
stepped onto a down moving escalator, thought about standing still on
it, then continued to hop down the moving stairs. He barely
registered a notice pasted above the entranceway to the platform.
Something about trains only running every hour due to low rider
volume. Some shuttle, he thought.
Inside his jacket, the data pouch began to vibrate. Kwan
automatically reached for it then thought better of it when he saw
the train cars sitting on the southbound tracks. He heard a tone
sound out through the station and he broke into a run. No way was he
going to sit for an hour in the Mumbles train station.
Kwan jumped through the doors noisily, knocking into the central
door divider as he leapt. It spun him around but without much pain.
Last one aboard, he thought for an instant. Then he spied another
figure far down the platform slither between the train doors just as
they shut. Just another late comer? Perhaps... Kwan thought.
He sat down in the nearly empty, white train car. It jolted
into action as he decided to let whoever was tailing him, if indeed
he was being tailed, come to him. If it was an assailant, he or she
had already lost their element of surprise. He sighed and
concentrated on slowing his pulse rate back down after the sudden
spurt of energy.
The data pouch began to buzz again in Kwan's pocket. He pulled
it out hesitantly, unsure whether he should risk answering it with
Cat possibly listening in. He decided to answer it; afterall Cat
already knew he was in Swansea and he could feign complete innocence
about interviewing Jerri. They hadn't told him _not_ to interview
candidates outside of the list they had provided. That list and the
data disk that held it were now in the possession of Scott. Scott
had thought that the information there might be of a disclosing
nature, particularly if everything on it was assumed to not be true.
Kwan knew Cat better than that. All of their data would have enough
truth to it to make it hard to decipher what was to be trusted and
what was pure manipulative speculation.
Kwan stared at the encrypted message for a few moments before
realizing that he was looking at a privately coded message. Any
message encrypted by Cat would have been recognized by his data
pouch, verified by the palm print of his hand holding the pouch and
decoded automatically. This unrecognized message must have been
encrypted by another party, hopefully Scott. Kwanchaan slid his
thumb along the bottom edge of the black data pouch. A small,
rectangular section of the pouch popped off the main unit and into
his waiting hand. The section was his private crypt module. It was
hard-segmented from the rest of the data pouch to protect it from
corruption or infiltration. The keys contained within its electronic
memory were not known by Cat, at least not to Kwan's knowledge. If
this particular message was from Scott, he would have hopefully
properly used one of Kwan's private keys.
He punched the data pouch again and wrote out the encrypted text
message to magnetic strip. After tearing the strip off the pouch he
directly fed it into the crypt module. The crypt hummed silently for
a moment and spat the strip back out. Kwan caught it and slipped it
into a waist pocket. The crypt began to vibrate in his light grasp.
Kwan's eyes widened. The vibrations signified that whoever sent
the message had used Kwan's most secure key. The key that assumed
that Kwan was in danger and could not openly read the text message.
Scott was the only one he had given that key to. Kwan hoped his
conditioned memory was up to snuff and he could remember the proper
chording.
As the crypt cranked through prime numbers, Kwan took the spent
magnetic strip and passed it over a hidden magnet in his boot. Then
he tore it into a couple of pieces and rolled them into little,
wadded balls. Looking up and down the train car, he flicked the
balls out into various areas of the almost vacant car.
The crypt vibrated in his hand once more. Kwan looked toward
the front of the train again (no sign of the late comer) and then
grasped the crypt module tightly in his hand, fingers pumping in the
last chorded password to secure the message. Then the crypt began
talking back. It's rubbery surface undulated in his hand,
imperceptibly moving Kwan's fingers in chorded sequences. Kwan
closed his eyes to concentrate on reading the chord feedback. As
words and phrases spelled themselves out, he filed them away
consecutively into his conditioned memory. He didn't even try to
grasp the context, he would play it back from his memory later. He
only had the one chance to decode the message since the crypt deleted
the message as it went along. His brow furrowed in concentration;
Kwan had never been very good with chorders.
When the crypt finally had stopped pulsing in his hand, Kwan
opened his eyes and looked around him. It had seemed like an
eternity but a glance at the display of his data pouch revealed that
only twenty seconds had passed. He immediately began to recall the
message from memory as he checked his surroundings again for hostile
activities.
It was strange to receive a message from someone else through
his own memory. The message was indeed from Scott, but as he played
it back, his mind would jump ahead in the message grasping concepts
before the actual words registered. It was like realizing his mind
contained knowledge that he didn't know he had before. Kwan quickly
forgot the actual words and just understood the meaning. He then
realized that this experience was probably similar to what an
experienced hacker like Scott felt while manipulating the net with
both fists. Scott probably didn't even think about the data eggs in
his hands, but just thought 'go there' and he was 'there'.
The message was basic really and the readback from his memory
was so tainted with Scott's personality that Kwan didn't doubt that
Scott was the originator. Scott had sent the heavily encrypted
message to notify Kwan that he was using a new net identity and that
he had constructed two net identities for Kwan. One identity,
actually a continuation of Kwan's present net personality, would
continue his job assignment on the net as an automaton identity. It
would use a pseudo-ai soft to predict and execute the net actions
(searches, e-mail, transactions, travel, etc...) of Kwan as if he was
pursuing the extraction assignment according to Cat's wishes, which
was assumed to be a frontal assault on Spindle Station. The second
identity was a fake one, but a full one. It was designed to
withstand over ten levels of interrogation. The identity had a
complete net history and shouldn't raise any red flags in Cat's big
brother net scans, especially if they weren't looking for it. Any
transactions from Kwan's Cat PIN account would be transferred through
electronic fund laundering to the fake identity. Kwan's new identity
on the net was Christopher Pike.
Kwan winced when he recalled the name. Scott's fucking fish
sense of humor again. Scott also relayed that because Kwan pushed
him into hiding from Cat, he was now also forced into joining Kwan's
extraction team. He asked Kwan if he could arrange a big room (real
world) meeting place.
Kwan smiled and realized that although he hadn't intended it to
go down this way, he was again proud of his ability to pull Scott
into the job. He quickly reprogrammed the data pouch to answer to
the new identity of Chris Pike and set up the ai program as per
Scott's instructions (although because of the medium of the message
he felt like he knew how to do it all along). Then he sent a message
to Allen Bell, Scott's new net identity, explaining the next step of
his plan. He coded the message with encryption level two, anything
higher would be a wasted effort; the volume of international e-mail
being so high that Cat probably would never come across the 4 K ascii
spurt. Then he punched out a message to Jerri Sergei and relayed (in
subtle hints) that she too would be getting a new net identity and to
prepare for travel to NA continent immediately. This message was
encrypted with a private key Jerri had produced especially for Kwan.
Hopefully it would prove that Pike was really Fish.
By the time Kwan had finished with his correspondence, the train
was braking into the Swansea terminal. He slipped the data pouch
away after giving it the command to generate another private chording
key as it sat in his jacket. No sense in trusting the old one again.
Kwan attempted to smooth a few more of the wrinkles out of yellow
jacket and stepped towards the door. He glanced at his reflection in
the shuttle train's window and mentally tsk'ed at himself. He'd have
to hit the dry cleaner's when he got into San Antonio.
Recognition hit him in the face when she came close enough to
smell. The cloying odor of stale cigarette smoke assailed his
nostrils, only marginally covered up by some sweet smelling perfume.
Lilac, Kwan thought automatically. She turned and sat down next to
him on the train's stable seat. He stared her in the face and she
smiled confidently back at him.
"Hello, again," she said. Kwan turned his head away from her
and toward the opposite row of travelers. He watched the evolving
fractal patterns displayed behind their heads and tried to figure out
how he had completely missed her approach.
"Taking a aeroplane somewhere, sweetheart?"
She must have followed him all through Victoria Station and onto
the tube train to Heathrow. Although she now looked the same as she
had in the pub, she must have changed her appearance while she was
tailing him. The figure he had noticed slinking behind him looked
nothing like the spindly bar tender next to him.
"Are you with Cat?" Kwan asked of her.
"What do you think?" she smiled.
Kwan turned to look at her and fixated on a gold inlaid denture
that sparkled from within her grin.
"Why are you tailing me? Is Cat trying to take me out?" Kwan
studied her lean face.
"Just keeping track of you, hon. Don't mind me... I'll be with
you for a while. Cat just wants to make sure you are doing what you
say you're doing." She raised her left fist toward Kwanchaan's face.
It was holding something oblong and green. Kwan flinched.
"Chewing gum?" she asked innocently and giggled.
Kwan shook his head once.
She pulled a stick from the pack and folded it into her mouth.
Over the effort of starting to chew through its stiffness she said,
"That reminds me, Cat tells me you recently sent a message to Dan
Simmons, the demolition man from Jersey." She smacked loudly on the
gum. "I didn't see you make that call..."
"So?" Kwan interrupted.
"So, what's up chicken butt? What are you delaying your message
postings for?"
When he didn't reply she went on, "I don't really care, you
know. I just relay it all back to the big pussy." She pointed at
her right ear. There was something slightly lighter than flesh color
hidden in the folds. "Wired," she said matter of factly, "for
sound..."
"Well, you can tell Cat that I'm not..." Kwan started.
"You're telling them yourself, hon," she giggled and pointed to
a piece of jewelry perched her flat bodice. Kwan couldn't help but
notice that her giggles and mannerisms were more like that of an
adolescent girl than a badly middle-aged woman. She went on, "No
vid, though..."
"Listen, Goldbreath or whoever's listening there," he addressed
the broach. "I can't do my job unless I'm left alone to do it! I'm
doing what you want... interviewing candidates, setting up research
data bases and buying wares..." (at least he hoped his ai counterpart
was) "...for the job. To succeed at this I'll need some secrecy, not
some gum smacking babysitter." She dropped her jaw in mock
disappointment. Kwan went on, self-consciously whispering at the
strange woman's bust, "Just back off or I'll make you back off..."
"Nope. They're not buying it, Jack," she cut him off. "Seems
like we'll be together for a while, hon." He felt her right hand
grab his left wrist.
Kwan straightened up slowly from talking into her breasts. He
glanced around the train car and saw the tail movements of people
looking away from him hurriedly. Great, he thought. Real
inconspicuous. Maybe he could lose her at Heathrow... or maybe even
on the train. He started to stand.
"Uhn uhn," the ex-bar tender chided. Kwan felt the cold touch
of metal on the back of his hand. He looked down and saw her other
hand holding a small tazer device against the back of his hand. She
slightly squeezed the disc shaped unit. Kwan felt a mild electric
shock course up his arm and through his body trying to find a local
ground. His feet jerked slightly.
She leaned over at whispered in his ear, "The more you try to
move, the more I squeeze. The more I squeeze, the more you hurt."
She released the pressure on the tazer and Kwan visibly relaxed. He
looked about the train car. As before, no one would meet his gaze.
Shit, he thought.
She returned to an upright position but still leaned against
Kwan like lovers holding hands. Her grip on his wrist suddenly
tightened as a long steady tone emitted from the train car's intercom
system. Passengers in the car began to pull earplugs from their
pockets and purses.
"Wind Jammer," his babysitter muttered. Kwan turned to her.
"Hey, what is this Wind Jammer thing anyway?" He lifted his
right hand to at least cover one ear. He could tell she wanted to do
the same, but she determinedly kept a firm grip on his wrist and kept
the tazer pressed to his hand. A low rumble began to build from
outside the train.
She was looking a little worried but began to answer, "It's the
thing the Americans built over here to try to influence the weather
back in the States. Works on chaos... hey!"
Kwan had waited until the low rumble had built to a crescendo
and then leaned forward and jerked away from the woman just as the
Wind Jammer clapped piercingly. She held tight to his wrist and
squeezed the tazer, hard. That was her mistake. The shock she
applied speared through Kwan's legs and launched him across the aisle
of the car. She followed with her shoulder wrenched almost out of
its socket. She screamed and lost her grip on the tazer.
Kwan grabbed the arm that was holding his, spun, and lashed out
with his foot, catching her on the knee. He could feel her crumple.
Other people were screaming now and the train seemed to lurch
slightly. Kwan grabbed a railing and steadied himself. The train
lurched again and then began a constant, grating braking. Kwan
looked back down at the beaten woman and wondered what Cat thought
about all this. He reached down and snagged the wired broach from
her and threw it at the end of the car.
The train had completely stopped now and Kwan's ringing ears
finally picked out a new message issuing from the intercom, "This is
an emergency stop due to a passenger disturbance. Please remain
calm. Security is on its way... This in an emergency stop due to a
passenger disturbance. Please...."
Kwan looked around wildly for an exit. Stupid fuckers, he
thought as he headed towards the nearest fractal mural. The
emergency exits are pointing my way out! The border around the mural
was flashing red. Passengers sitting in front of it scattered as he
approached. He pounded against the face of the display with both
hands and it popped out cleanly. He clambered out into a dark
tunnel. From somewhere close by he heard another low rumble begin to
crescendo...
Company Man 1.9 by Patrick
Hurh
copyright
1993
The top of the shipman's ladder bobbed into view. After several
hundred steps it's corroded rails were a relieving sight. Kwan
renewed his efforts and doubled his pace up the steep steps. His
well padded boots made no contact sounds with the grated metal slats
that he stepped on, but his constant shifting weight on the old
ladder made it creak with a slow rhythm. Just over a minute ago he
had heard the distant squeak and felt the tremors of someone climbing
far below him. He imagined the gum smacking face of the Welsh bar
maid rising obscenely under him. Kwan grabbed the top hand rails and
hauled himself out of the hole.
He immediately turned and looked back down the shaft. He could
see nothing and the hissing noise of the machinery in the room he had
just emerged into obliterated any sound that may have wafted up the
tube from his pursuer.
Kwanchaan leaned on the hand rail and tried to make out his
immediate environment in the gloom. The small concrete lined room
was lit from the center of the ceiling by one flickering fluorescent
circ-light. It was barely adequate to reflect the images of
ventilation equipment bolted to the floor on viton anti-vibration
gaskets. Dark tides from the corners of his eyes began to obscure
even this dark vision, seeping in from the periphery as he tried to
catch his breath. He leaned over, hands on flexed knees, and tried
to shake his head clear.
After a moment Kwanchaan's breaths came slower and his vision
began to clear. He looked up and saw an emergency exit sign above a
dark rectangular shape on the wall ahead of him. The sign was
predictably dark and unlit. Kwan was surprised he could make it out
in the deficient light. As he took several steps towards it he heard
distant clangs echo from the shaft behind him.
"Fuckin' bitch," he whispered to himself. He went on, this time
silently, "she can't have made it this far on the ragged, middle-aged
body I just saw her in." Kwan paused with a hand on the door's crash
bar and listened a little more. Her footsteps on the ladder sounded
more like clanks than steps. Gum Smacker was definitely more than
she seemed, even for a Cat agent.
Kwan could tell that his pursuer had finally caught sight of the
top of the ladder when he heard her pace pick up rapidly. He would
have to put up a stand either just outside the door or from within
the confines of the utility room. Gum Smacker made up his mind for
him as she sped up the ladder noisily and threatened to emerge
imminently. "Good god," Kwan thought as he swung the door open and
jumped out of the room to avoid being seen. "What the hell is she
made of?"
The other side of the door presented a field of rough hewn weeds
and thistle. Crickets silenced their legs as Kwan ran to the right
around the side of the small service building. Any noise that Gum
Smacker might have made was silenced by the door that had swung shut
behind him. Still, Kwan could imagine the yellowed bun of hair tilt
jerkily behind her head as she silently glanced around the utility
room he had just exited. He disappeared behind the back side of the
building at looked out at his surroundings. Heathrow was about three
miles distant directly ahead of him. He could see the glowing
landing strip lights reflect against low hung clouds. A low shadow
covered the ground to his right. Kwan studied it for a moment and
then realized it was some sort of berm laid out along the horizon. A
long mound of earth that started about 50 yards to his right and rose
about 200 yards out away from him, towards the airport, to culminate
in a 50 foot metal clad peak. "What the hell," Kwan thought. Then a
low rumble began in the ground below Kwan and somewhere to his right,
seemingly from under the earthen berm. It grew in decibel jumps as
Kwan whispered, "Wind Jammer..."
Secretary Goldbreath wriggled her considerable girth in the
plastic chair that held her captive to the edge of the board room
table.
"Yes, I know he's a rookie and that's just why I think we should
keep him on the job!" Her words met with resistance from the other
Cat secretary at the table. She rolled her eyes, exasperated, as
Rostenkowski's private sec grimaced in confusion.
"We need him to act like a rookie so he'll take the fall...."
she continued.
The chairman's lackey still looked confused.
She tried again, "Fish is innovative, but not enough to go
against his loyalty conditioning. He'll do the job the way we say he
should. Believe me, I saw his personality inventory."
"But he practically went AWOL and fled to Finland after his job
assignment..."
"To visit a discharged recruit, a friend of his..."
"A dishonorably discharged recruit."
"New graduates often look for support from their classmates just
after their first job assignment... I mean look where he's going
now."
"Jersey?" The private secretary was beginning to look very
disoriented. Goldbreath jumped on this.
"Yeah! Right where he should be going. Interviewing Dan
Simmons, one of our men on the list."
"Yes, but he first went to Sergei, who definitely is not on our
list," the privvy went on. "He's a loose cannon and you said
yourself that he probably knows he's being set up for a fall..."
"But it doesn't matter if he knows," Goldie interrupted.
"Don't you get it? Fish can't say no, 'cause he's too loyal to Cat!
We're more important to him than his own hide! Besides we put
Geraldine on his tail and she witnessed him leaving Segei's hours
ago."
"I thought she just reported him phazing and becoming hostile to
Cat?"
Sec Goldbreath paused before really throwing the private
secretary. "Yes, I was online for the confrontation. Besides the
fact that Fish almost took her out, his reaction should convince us
to stick with him! He knows he's being watched and he knows he has
to please us. It doesn't matter that he hates us... that probably
helps! He's so pissed off that he'll get panicked and do just what
we want... attack with a messy frontal assault that will give us the
diversion we need."
The Gum Smacker came around the corner in the middle of Wind
Jammer's deafening clap of sound, hopping awkwardly on one leg and an
outstretched arm. Her unused leg supported very little weight as it
dragged along behind her, bent at an impossible angle. Blood ran
from her nose as she grinned at him. The Wind Jammer shock tube
hissed into silence as her broken leg seemed to paw at the dirt
spasmodically.
"Fishy!... Where ya runnin' to?"
Kwan froze against the side of the building. Cold concrete
abraded the shoulder blades beneath his jacket. Gum Smacker
stepped/dragged another meter close to him. Although she was
crippled her stride seemed confident and sure, as if she were born to
walk with that hideous gait. Kwan inched a step away from her,
rubbing his back against the concrete.
"Think you did a number on me, huh?... Back there on the tube?"
Step/drag closer... "Guess you should know..." Step/drag closer...
"My last assignment?... Got me outfitted with some primo
spiderware..." Step/drag closer...
Kwan opened his mouth hesitantly, "I, uh... can't have you...
uh, following me. I'm doing what Cat wants, but I work best on my
own." A low rumble began under their feet.
Step/drag closer...
"Yeah, I can see that," Gum Smacker smiled at him. The
trembling growl under them grew a few decibels. She raised her left
arm, the one that had been clutched along the outside of her thigh.
Kwan caught the glimmer of polished steel. "I seem to work better
without you, too..."
Kwan raised his arms in futile defense against the gun. "No,
you misunderstood me..." A sharp clap thundered from the peak of the
berm and Kwan quickly dove down to the ground and rolled.
He couldn't hear the sharp report of the Smacker's gun with his
suddenly numbed ears but he saw the muzzle flash. It was bright
yellow.
The privvy tapped his hand thoughtfully on the plexiglass table
as Goldbreath tried to get her wheezes under control. "No, I don't
like it. What if he loses the tail and we can't keep track of him?"
"As far as I'm concerned he did lose the tail... at least from
what I heard from the Geraldine recordings. We can still keep track
of him on the nets... and don't forget that the only way he can
possibly mess this up is if he gives up too soon." Goldbreath
slapped both hands down on the table top, "Remember, as long as he
gets out there and makes any kind of noise it'll help our people on
Tae Guk."
He came up running, convinced that the Gum Smacker couldn't
chase him on that broken leg. He ran in a zig zag pattern and dove
headfirst over the low edge of the Wind Jammer berm. He peeked over
it's edge.
The loping figure of his pursuer came at him with surprising
speed. The useless leg was almost flailing in the air, her body
propelled by the rapidly moving good leg. With each jump she splayed
to the ground and rolled, not quite acrobatically, and emerged in a
crouch to spring again. The glint of her pistol made silver traces
in the air.
Kwan pulled himself together and ran towards the peak of the
berm, rapidly trotting up the back bone of the Wind Jammer. The air
was crisp, cold, and harsh as he sucked it past the back of his
throat. A glance over his shoulder revealed the Smacker loping up
the gradual rise after him. He renewed his efforts to escape.
The privvy still looked unsure as he took off his wire rimmed
glasses and wiped them on a yellow handkerchief.
Goldbreath sighed and said, "If we take him out now, the only
thing for Phillip Spindle to watch will be his _niece_."
The private secretary slipped his glasses back on and looked up
at Sec Goldbreath with some understanding at last. "I guess," he
looked back down at the table. "I guess some noise is better than
none..."
Goldie snorted in triumph and pulled at the knot of the scarf
around her head. "Trust me," she winked at him.
With only yards to go, he felt the data pouch bouncing off his
chest in rhythm with his steps. He slowed and grabbed at it while he
dove to the ground on his left. He hit awkwardly and somersaulted to
the peak's edge. His face looked down through 150 feet of air at a
mesh of metal covering the gaping maw of the Wind Jammer shock tube.
He dug his feet in and spun on his right hip to meet the Gum
Smacker. She was about 20 feet away and seemed intent on closing in
on him rather than shooting him down. He pulled the data pouch free
and trained it on the grimacing figure. He pulled the stun gun's
trigger and her face went slack...
Goldbreath smiled as the door slid behind her...
"Trust me."
...But her body kept moving. In jerky strides, her good leg
pumped and her arms rotated in their sockets. Her right hand, curled
about the handle of the pistol pointed at Kwan and spasmodically
squeezed off a few rounds. Dirt flew in Kwan's face as he rolled
further out of the way. He felt the berm beneath him tremble with
the approach of another shock wave.
Her face passed his suddenly. Her eyes were wide and red tinged
saliva dripped from a drooping bottom lip as she went over the edge
of the tunnel mouth. Kwan watched her drop for an instant, her limbs
still jerking from the spiderware chip commands, then the shock wave
blew through her body.
He felt his own body rise from the earthen lip of the Wind
Jammer driven by the exiting pressure wave and then return, hard, to
the ground. The pain spiked through his inner ears and throbbed
behind his eyes. He clamped his hands to his ears, dropping the data
pouch, too late and rolled several times down the side of the berm.
He felt a sickly wetness in his ears and removed his left hand
to see a small gleaming oasis of blood floating on the dirty surface
of its palm. He flipped the rest of his way over onto his back. He
looked up and saw the flashing metal crucifix of a plane approaching
Heathrow to land.
"Well, at least I know the way to the airport," he sighed and
then closed his eyes.
Company Man 2.0 by Patrick
Hurh
copyright
1993
He had started to think of the anonymous hotel room as home
about halfway through the agonizing plane trip. He knew what it
would look like, a comfortable, moderately plush, generic Hilton
hotel room with light brown shag carpeting. He knew what it would
smell like, the crisp dry air tainted with the odor of clean hotel
disinfectant and industrial clean sheets. And he knew what it would
sound like, the white noise hiss of climate control punctuated with
the muted sounds of travelers traversing the hallway beyond the shut
and locked door. He needed to feel and sense those familiar things
in the distant hotel room. He needed to run away from the caked
blood itching in his ears and the stabbing headaches punched into his
head by the constantly shifting air pressure. He needed to go home.
Kwan dabbed at his right ear with the last clean corner of his
yellow handkerchief. He looked at the moist red spot left on it and
repeated the motion to his left ear. This time the cloth came away
with nothing. His left ear was completely plugged with dried blood.
Kwan's head swam as the pressure in the plane's cabin shifted again
minutely. He looked over to his left at the woman who sat sleeping
next to him. She hadn't said anything about Kwan's constant ear
dabbing, but he could tell it irritated her. He had told her it was
nothing and to mind her own business in a voice that he was sure, in
retrospect, was too loud even for the noisy cabin environment. It
was hard to gauge how loud he was talking when it sounded like he was
lying below a couple dozen fathoms of water.
Kwanchaan tried to ignore his present condition and concentrate
on his vision of the hotel room. By his calculations, only a few
more minutes and he would be landing in the heat of Texas Nation. He
confirmed the time by looking down at the data pouch in his lap. He
had been looking at it a lot lately because it now served as his
ears. The pouch attempted to decipher sounds it heard through its
small microphone into ascii text that Kwan could read. At the moment
its display was trying desperately to phonetically represent the
sounds of the airliner. Kwan smiled halfheartedly at the long line
of consonants and vowels that paraded nonsensically across the
screen. Then he winced as the cabin pressure adjusted again. God,
he wanted to get home!
****************************
Phillip Spindle sank into the acceleration couch. His head was
filled with echoes of the verbose he had just screamed at his highest
ranking spider officer left on Spindle Station, Lt. Nelson. He
smiled wanly in spite of the dread he felt of committing to the
acceleration couch's narcotics. He played people like crude
instruments...that's the only way to play them, he thought, for they
are crude devices, not always entirely predictable, but stroke them
enough and along the most reactionary vein, and they can produce the
most beatific results. Like Lt. Nelson, determined to recover the
nano-suit for his forlorn employer... what a travesty Spindle's
predicament must seem to tiny Nelson... the Great Spindle Station
infiltrated... Arachniware's most pinnacle technology stolen... and
only _he_ can help. Just keep it up Nelson, Phillip thought. Keep
it up and Rostenkowski and his bunch of yellow pussies just might
believe you and grab the suit.
He felt the drugs take hold of him immediately after feeling the
slight burning sensation of the transdermal jet spraying the
depressants into the back of his now jelly covered hand. He wasn't
afraid of the high accelerations of modern space travel or the
thought of crossing millions of miles of space unprotected, but he
was terrified of being cut off from his company... his people... his
kingdom. He knew the trip would take well over twelve hours, with no
coast time. Direct acceleration and deceleration, but in the interim
so much... so very much could happen in the big time, the real time.
Phillip Spindle hardly noticed when he stopped breathing gaseous
air and began sucking in the oxygen enriched gelatin that surrounded
his entire body. He did feel, however, the increasing pressure of
the jelly as it pre-stressed his body for the impending trip. He
attempted to sigh, was rewarded by a rush of viscous glop through his
nasal cavities, and quickly fell into semi-consciousness for the rest
of the trip.
******************************
"Bellman? Mr. Pike?"
"Uh, no. I don't have any luggage. Just... just tell me again
what floor I'm on."
"Floor forty-seven, sir." The hotel desk clerk looked confused.
"Your room is on floor forty-seven. Elevator's to the right behind
you.... Do you require medical assistance, Mr Pike?"
Kwan had already started towards the elevator when he heard the
clerk's concern over his health. He turned back sluggishly and
leaned on the high, chromed desk/bar surrounding the clerk.
"No, I'm all right. Just a little tired from the plane trip."
He fingered his right ear nervously. It registered the warm dampness
there. Kwan started back towards the elevator and promptly crumbled
to the floor.
"Medic!"
******************************
The hotness in his belly, the incredible warmth that he hadn't
even realized was there until it was gone, vanished suddenly. Kwan
felt cold and empty in the suit. His arms flapped loosely and
grotesquely as his body was subject once more to gravity, the suit's
folds collapsing around him as the exterior pressure quickly rose to
match that of his suit's. Gravity, he slowly pondered. Atmosphere,
he thought. "I'm alive," he whispered as he fell heavily to the
yellow floor of the airlock.
Kwan felt rough hands push and prod him. Voices surrounded
him... noise engulfed him... He heard the deep guttural sound of what
sounded like a drain sucking on the last vestiges of a viscous
whirlpool. He realized sluggishly that it was his own throat. The
golden room filled with dark, rapidly moving figures faded...
Kwanchaan turned his head on the stark white pillow. The
intense brightness saturated his eyes now, rendering shapes almost
indecipherable in high contrast. He saw the silhouette of a head
bending over his, hair falling over him like a long branched tree.
He heard it's voice and his eyes quickly strove to focus on its
source.
"Fish? Can you hear me? Just take it easy... We've got you now
and everything's going to be okay. All of us made it out... ALL of
us, thanks to you. We'll take care of you now... You're a fucking
hero."
Kwan wondered at what the figure said. He recognized the voice,
but couldn't understand the content. Patricia? He tried to say it,
"Pit--shaw?"
"Shh.. now, Fishy. You're going to be okay. Everything is
going to be okay."
Kwan let the muscles in his neck that were straining in tandem
with his delirious concentration relax minutely. Patricia... He
remembered her face as he had last seen it. Framed in a flowing
cellulose head dress, almost alive... almost. His head then filled
with a vision of the crimson draped Cybergoths, clothed in Patricia's
spiderwear... Curls of dark shimmering fabric against the pale white
flesh of the unearthly lean figures... Tall and slick alley walls
darkly reflecting the sparkle of the bon fire... Kwan stared at the
flowing shapes in his mind...
****************************
"Fish!" Scott cried as the bellboy dropped Kwan in the plush
hotel room foyer.
"Hiya, Scott," Kwan muttered weakly. "Hey... don't call me
fish."
The bellboy left quickly without even waiting for a tip.
"I thought I could call you anything I wanted now..." Scott said
absently as he crossed to Kwan's prone form on the brown sheen of the
rug. "Jee-ssuhz... What the fuck happened to you?" Scott had spied
Kwan's dripping ears.
"Long story..." He looked around at the hotel room. It was
much larger and more expensive than the small private room he had
dreamt of on the plane. "Where's the bed?"
"Man, we got to get you to a medic. You look like shit!" Scott
put an arm under Kwan and attempted to drag him into the main room.
Kwan lolled in Scott's arm and managed to roll over onto his back.
He stared at the ceiling.
"They gave me some sedi..." Kwan paused, unsure, "...sedee...
sedatives, at the front desk..."
"I'll say..." Scott gave up for a minute and called over his
shoulder into the bedroom. "Hey, Janet! Wanna give me a hand with
your future employer?"
Kwan registered this request with some interest. "Janet? Whose
she?"
"Some muscle, man," Scott said as a dim figure entered from the
bedroom. "She'll be great on the Station job. Believe me."
Kwan groaned,"No... no muscle. This is gonna be a finesse
job... Finnnesss..." He suddenly realized that Scott and the new
comer (what was her name? Janice?) had pulled him onto a couch. He
rolled his head until his right cheek hit the embroidered cushion
under it. His eyes focused on a bowl of white powder sitting
innocently on the coffee table in front of him.
"Coke?" Kwan muttered with disbelief.
"Yeah," Scott replied with a stereotypical western drawl. "No
wacky-tobacky in this town, pardner. Thas' for them hippies and
commies... pig fuckerrs all 'o' them. Jus' the white snow to keep
the spurs on your shitkickers shiney! Yer in the naishun o' Texass
now..."
Kwan stared back at Scott and glanced at the dark figure of
Janet. "No muscle, this job,' he said quietly.
Scott knelt down and put a hand on Kwan's shoulder. "Kwan, this
is someone you've got to see. Believe me," he said, drawl non-
existent now.
"No...." Kwan sighed again. "No muscle... Finesse..."
"Kwan. You don't understand. This is someone you have got to
_see_..."
Scott's blurry figure moved to the side to allow Kwan to focus
on the face of Janet for the first time. Kwan concentrated and
managed to snap Janet's face into as much sharpness as his fatigued
eyes would allow. He saw the strong jaw under tanned skin, broad
face with upturned nose, and delicate, incredibly long eyelashes.
Her hair was too dark, but Kwan recognized her instantly...
"Jerri?" he called out quietly. The silent figure shook her
head and walked away, her head sliding out of Kwan's view. He was
too tired to try to track her with his head. "That's Jerri Sergei, "
he muttered to Scott.
"No, that's Janet Springer. Texas National and your new
bodyguard..."
"Thas' Jerri... I know it," Kwan went on, oblivious.
"Fish!" Scott shook Kwan lightly, "Fish, they're blastocyte
twins... _blastocytes_!..."
"No," Kwan continued. "That's Jerri and she's..." he drifted
off for a moment. "...she's come back to me..." He shut his eyes.
Scott looked down at Kwan and stood up, smiling. Higher than a
tunnel junkie, he thought. "Janet?" he called into the bedroom.
"You wanna help me get this guy to a medic?"
Company Man 2.1 by Patrick
Hurh
copyright
1993
He had memories of waking before in this bed. As before he felt
warm and comforted and feared to open his eyes to what might spoil
his contentment. He tried to picture what he had seen during his
other awakenings, what womb-like environment surrounded him. His
mind jumped suddenly in panic as he remembered the whirling scene of
stars, the smell of his own body's stench, his blood and saliva
plastered against the inside of his helmet bubble. He felt a tight
constriction in his throat as he attempted to wheeze out a cry for
help. Just as his panic built to a climax he remembered the feeling
of his bruised body hitting an airlock floor, of realizing Cat had
come for him. Relief flooded through and over him. It was all over.
He was safe in the belly of a Caterpillar freighter. He knew that
his company wouldn't let him down.
A yellow light shone through his eyelids and teased his wakened
pupils. He imagined it to be the approving gaze of Caterpillar
itself and felt like basking in its warm and proud glow. It flicked
brighter suddenly.
"Yes, I think he is waking again."
"Well, stop the drip and I'll call for the Doc."
A set of footsteps clacked out of the room quickly while another
shuffled next to his prone form. He heard a click and then felt a
warm hand slide under the back of his head. He realized he was bald.
"Come on there," a voice coaxed from above him. "Don't get away
from us again." The voice was reassuring yet oddly tired. It
continued then in a hushed whisper, "...and don't get sick on me
again."
Kwanchaan Vishnu Phadwahji's head lolled forward slightly on a
loose neck. Guess it's time to wake up, he thought. Kwan opened his
eyes.
****************************************
Fiducial's closed at five but Kwan had convinced the large but
pudgy clothier to stay open well after six with one swipe of a credit
tape from his data pouch.
"Mr. Pike, you have impeccable taste, of course, but I do think
that if you plan on wearing a Patricia Spindle dinner suit you should
at least let me drape this gorgeous spider-wear scarf about your
neck. You just can't wear a Spindle without the spider-wear," the
fawning proprietor protested with almost convincing concern on his
face. He waved a thin gossamer stretch of crimson fabric in one
thick fingered hand.
Kwan flinched perceptibly at his image in the mirror. He was
wearing a close fitting dark green outfit. Stiff angles of fabric
the color of dried, oxidized blood and the texture of rough burlap
protruded from his shoulders, elbows and other various joints. When
he moved he could feel the taut pull of the lycra undergarments as
they tugged and creased the various stiff ornaments.
"Here just let me switch it on and you'll see the delicate
manner in which it compliments the ensemble." The clothier had a
remarkably high pitched and boyish voice for such a large man. Kwan
waved his hands above his head as Claude Fiducial tried to lower the
now gently squirming scarf around his neck.
"No! I told you that I didn't like wearing things that moved!"
Kwan glared at the larger man's reflected eyes in the mirror.
Fiducial was almost two heads taller than Kwan and, even within the
narrow perspective confines of the gold framed mirror, Fiducial's
wide body could be seen peeking out around both sides of Kwan's slim
one. Kwan spun around decidedly and stepped out the other man's
reach. "I'll take the suit, but without the scarf. Bill me for it
if you like but you can keep it for yourself."
Fiducial looked slightly taken aback, his fashion pride
faltering for an instant, but then he brightened. "But of course,
sir. I'll just package the scarf separately and you may do with it
as you wish." He crossed to an ornate walnut counter and placed the
limp scarf within a waiting box.
Kwan turned and looked at himself again in the mirror. Sort of
foppish, he thought, but then again, once on Tae Guk station it would
probably look reasonably dashing... especially to the young woman who
had designed it.
"Mr. Pike?"
Kwan turned back to face Fiducial. The clothier was holding the
stained pile of yellow clothes that Kwan had worn when he first
entered the small, plush store. Fiducial had a strained expression
on his face.
"Will you be wearing your purchase out of the store? I can
dispose of these..."
"No," Kwan interrupted. "I'll change back." He shot a don't-
ask-any-questions stare back at the fashion snob.
"Yes, sir. I'll just leave them here." Fiducial laid the
clothes on the counter and turned to the gold inlaid terminal behind
him. He started tapping on its touch sensitive screen with
perfunctory stabs of his huge digits.
Kwan walked to his clothes and was picking them up when Jerri
appeared through a low, tapestry framed archway. She began to laugh
then stifled it quickly as Kwan glared at her.
She was still smiling when she said, "I'm sorry Kwan. It's
just with those bandages... and that outfit..." She began to chuckle
again.
Kwan had forgotten about the wads of white padding plastered to
his ears. He looked in the mirror quickly as he started toward her
and saw that the small rubber tubes that allowed him to hear through
the bandages were comically poking out from the sides of his head,
flapping lightly as he walked over to her. He did look pretty goofy.
He started to laugh at himself quietly.
Jerri caught his amused look and her giggle grew a little
louder. She widened her eyes slightly in mock surprise. "Why, Mr.
Fish! I believe that tube goes all the way through your head!" She
broke into loud laughter.
Kwan began to laugh also and then caught himself. He grabbed
her shoulder. "Hey," he whispered intensely into her ear. "My
name's Pike, you idiot. Chris Pike. Don't blow the cover!"
Jerri burst into more laughter and turned away from Kwan,
slightly bent over from laughing so hard. She looked like she was
going to slap her knee. Kwan whirled quickly and glared at the
amused Fiducial behind the counter. He grabbed his pile of yellow
clothes along with the neat white box that contained the spider-wear
scarf and headed for the dressing room. "Here," he snapped at
Fiducial, lofting the box over his shoulder. "Keep it!"
The giant clothier clumsily stumbled for the falling box and
batted it a few times as Kwan disappeared behind an oriental screen.
Fiducial's left foot caught behind his right as he lunged a final
time for the box. It fell through his hands and landed noiselessly
on the plush Persian carpet. Fiducial followed immediately after
and, much more loudly, plopped down face first on the floor. He
groaned slowly.
Kwan listened to Jerri laugh even harder, almost hysterically,
as he fumingly pulled his soiled, yellow clothes back on.
Kwan didn't notice until they had left Fiducial's and were
walking along the sculpted river front that bordered the rich San
Antonio Mall District that Jerri hadn't bought anything at the
expensive clothier's.
"Jerri, didn't you get anything? What are you going to wear for
our entrance to Tae Guk?"
"Don't worry, Mr. Pike. Scott's out shopping for me," Jerri
replied slyly.
"Scott? He doesn't wear anything but black jeans and tee
shirts! You need something that will announce our presence on Tae
Guk, something that will capture the eye of Raymond Stone. I'm
sorry, but I know Scott. He's got the fashion sense of a drowned
rat."
Jerri laughed and took Kwan's arm in hers. "Trust me, babe. I
gave him a list."
Kwan felt the warm touch on his arm and wondered why he couldn't
become angry with her. Frustrated, yes, but not angry. He didn't
like the feeling. It felt like he was losing control. He shrugged
her arm off of his and walked quickly on. Surely she must be
exerting her social engineering talents to establish some kind of
control over him.
"Okay, Jerri. I'll trust you this time but you better hope that
what you buy is enough to seduce Stone. In fact, I'm going to
demand..."
"Do you think that what _you_ bought back there is going to
seduce Spindle?" Jerri interrupted. "You've got to be joking!"
Kwan stopped walking. "She designed it, god damn it! It'll get
her attention... _I'll_ do the seducing." He started walking again.
Jerri, who had stopped walking when he did, did not follow him
along the riverwalk. She called after him, "You haven't even told us
what you plan to do _after_ we seduce them!"
Kwan kept on walking swiftly. He raised an arm and emphatically
waved it in frustration.
Jerri whispered, "...son of a bitch" and turned on the back of
her heel. She backtracked to the nearest riverside cafe and sat
heavily at an outside table. When the waiter came she ordered a Dos
Equis.
The door to the hotel suite clicked open and half a second later
Scott sauntered through it. Although Kwan had his data pouch in hand
as he sat on the deep couch, the bearded Finn was surprised that Kwan
didn't already have him sighted with the scope of some silent weapon.
Kwan looked up at him inattentively and then went back to tapping the
data pouch screen.
"Losing your touch, Kwan?" Scott crossed to a low end table and
set a pair of dark sun glasses down on its lacquered surface gently.
"I saw you from the balcony. I knew you were coming in," Kwan
said preoccupied.
Scott headed for the small built in bar to get a glass of juice
and called back to Kwan, "You want anything?" Kwan ignored him.
Scott shrugged his shoulder and pulled the door of the small
refrigerator open. He grabbed a bottle of Texas Citrus, did a
double-take and peered back in at the chilled interior.
"Hey! What's this in the ice box? Some clothes or
something..."
Kwan looked up. "That's my outfit for Tae-Guk... it started
wilting. Fiducial said to keep it cold." Kwan spoke quickly
apparently not realizing how ludicrous it sounded. He went on
quickly, "I booked our flight to Tae-Guk, but I'm starting to get
worried about this fake net identity, Christopher Pike. I think
maybe it might start to wear a little thin. Have you checked on my
ai personality recently?"
Scott closed the door to the refrigerator and straightened
upright. "Yeah, I've got you, or rather your 'official' fake net
identity of Stephan Fish, hunting for an old asteroid tug ship over
on the west coast. Cat shouldn't suspect anything...."
"Hmmm... Well I'd rather put in a personal appearance to Cat at
some point. Make up some excuse for me to leave the coast and come
here to Texas. Something about needing some special weapons
outfitting from Gilley's. I'll shuttle up to Houston tomorrow and
use a vid-phone to talk to Goldbreath personally."
"Sure thing, Kwan. Don't know if that's such a good idea
though." Scott cracked open the bottle of Texas Citrus and poured it
into a glass. "Cat's bound to put another tail on you in a matter of
hours."
"Well, we leave for Tae-Guk just after that. And once I'm
there, even if Cat guesses what I'm up to, they'll have to go along
because it will be too late to turn back..."
Kwan suddenly jerked his head toward the hotel door. His right
arm quickly followed, aiming the data pouch at the now sliding door
as he thumbed off the stun gun safety. Scott froze with the glass to
his lips.
Janet walked in. She smiled at them and then deftly side
stepped Scott and disappeared into the other room of the suite. She
was carrying an armload of brightly colored and reflective plastic
bags. Scott and Kwan heard the abrupt rustle of the packages as she
dropped them on the bed.
Scott finished swallowing his mouthful of pale orange juice.
"Looks like the cavalry is back."
Kwan relaxed and snapped the safety back on. He slid the data
pouch into his recently sonicleaned jacket and stood up. "Janet?" he
called toward the open bedroom doorway.
"Yes?"
"What'd you buy?"
Janet stuck her head through the doorway and smiled sweetly.
"Just a few toys, Mr. Pike."
Scott chuckled and sat down in an armchair. "I'll bet..." he
muttered.
Janet emerged the rest of the way from the bedroom. She had
taken off her black leather jacket. Underneath she wore a tight
lycra blouse and loose baggy cotton trousers. Both were pitch black.
She laughed lightly and placed a foot on the edge of the table where
Scott had left his sun glasses. She looked at Kwan directly and
said, "I picked up a needle flechette pistol, a thumbnail garrote, a
set of infrared contacts and a few other feminine necessities."
"You won't get on board the Tae-Guk shuttle with that pistol..."
Kwan complained.
"It's all sintered polyamide-imide construction with a non-
chemical beryllium-copper launch mechanism." She flashed him a
sultry smile.
He stared at her. "I don't like garrotes. They're messy and
the victims always flail too much before they go under..."
"This one is coated with organic nano anesthetic. Promotes
clotting and floods the victim's blood system with a tranquilizer."
Kwan looked at her expressionless for a moment and then sat back
down on the couch. He pulled out his data pouch as Janet pulled her
foot off the end table, smiled coyishly at Scott and headed back to
the bedroom. Kwan, still looking at the data pouch, said, "Did you
make an appointment with a salon?"
"First thing in the morning, darling..." she called over her
shoulder and shut the bedroom door behind her.
Scott and Kwan looked at each other. Scott laughed and took
another drink of juice.
"I can't get over how much they look the same, yet act so
different," Kwan said, a little softly so Janet wouldn't hear.
"Well, even though they're twins they are different people,"
Scott replied.
"How well do you know both of them?"
"I know Jerri fairly well. We met before recruit school.
Janet, not so well. But I like her a lot."
"Hmmmm... They don't seem to like each other though." Kwan
rubbed his bottom lip. "They're so... different."
"Well, how would you like it if there were god knows how many of
_you_ running around this world. Wouldn't you try to be different?"
"You mean they didn't know they were raised from cloned
blastocytes?" Kwan looked at Scott, incredulous.
"The clinics _never_ tell them. They didn't even know each
other existed until two years ago!"
"Jesus... Do you think there are more of them out there?"
"I don't know. But its a good reason for them to hate each
other."
"If they hate each other, why'd Janet accept the job?"
"I don't know... maybe they need to be together so they can
prove they are different to each other somehow... I don't know."
Scott sighed and picked his glasses up from the end table next to
him.
Kwan chuckled suddenly, "Which of them, do you think, colors
their hair?"
Scott smiled. "Probably Janet. She's..."
He cut off short as the door to the bedroom suddenly slid open.
Janet slipped through quickly and caught both of the men looking at
her guiltily.
"My ears are just burning!" she exclaimed and strode around
Scott's chair. She bent down and picked up the innocuous bowl of
cocaine from the table and quickly headed back to her room. "Hey, if
it's free!..." The door slid behind her.
Scott took a last gulp of his juice and fondled his new
sunglasses. Kwan looked back at his data pouch and began to tap out
a query on Tae-Guk's reputed underground crime circuit. A second
later, the muffled four-four pounds of mosh music began to issue from
behind the bedroom door.
************************
Phillip Spindle coughed up what he hoped was the last of the
acceleration gel from his trachea. God, how he hated that stuff. He
sat up in the couch and immediately hit the vid-com button. Although
he couldn't speak yet, he had to see what had happened during the
last twelve hours. Several messages were waiting for him but he
skipped to the latest message from Lt. Nelson on Spindle Station. It
was marked urgent and was only recorded about twenty minutes earlier.
The sweating face of Nelson clicked into view. He began to talk, but
haltingly. Get on with it, Phillip thought. I need to know what
happened!
"Sir, I... the suit came in on its initial trajectory and ..
uh.. we got there first... but only with our drone ships at
first...."
Spindle's fingers began to drum nervously on the edges of the
armrests. Was this good? What was Nelson trying to say? Did they
get the suit?
"...we... uh put up a good fight. But the Cat ships... they,
uh... I don't think they were just freighters, sir... No, they
couldn't have been... uh, freighters. They had all sorts of plasma
charged weapons.... when our manned ships got there... we, uh...
well, we lost a lot of men. Cat... Cat got the suit. I'm sorry...
but they, well they got it and... uh, sorry... We'll see you shortly,
sir." The babbling lieutenant reached forward quickly and shut off
the transmission recording.
Spindle didn't say anything for a moment. His long fingers dug
tightly into the couch's armrests. A slow gurgling sound that could
have been laughter came from his throat. He relaxed slightly and
mentally calculated the time of the suit's apprehension. He tried to
get up, but he was still too groggy from the deceleration into the
belt.
Phillip Spindle laid back fully in the couch with a half smile
on his face as he wondered if the Cat freighters would have time to
get back to Cat space before it happened... before the mataglap.
Company Man 2.2 by Patrick
Hurh
copyright
1993
"Random acts of violence won't make you any stronger." Patricia
Spindle entered Kwan's glorified sick bay cubicle. "Nor will they
make the food taste any better."
Kwan looked up at her as the ceramiplastic bowl of green mush he
had swiped off the feeding tray coasted through a few more slowing
spins before clanging to the antiseptic floor upside down. A grimace
was frozen on his face. "It tastes like shit."
Patricia regarded his bald countenance for a moment, then said,
"The rest of the crew is clamoring to get what you've got, real
frozen peas and a soft bed to lie your ass on." She sat on the edge
of the bed, laid one hand lightly on the feeding tray. "Besides,
after the treatment Cat gives you back in Peoria, you'll have the
means to eat almost anything you want."
Kwan knew what Cat spacers ate and he was sure it tasted much
better than the green pea mush he had been fed at almost every meal
for the past three sleep shifts. He leaned back fully against the
inclined hospital mattress. The starched pillows tilted his head
toward the ceiling. "I feel fine," he sighed. "There's nothing
wrong with me. I can stomach more than this shit." He raised his
head slightly to look at Patricia. She was silent.
He leaned back again. "Look, I don't know what all these tests
are for and I don't know why I'm not allowed to get up and walk
around..." He shook his lightly tethered feet for emphasis. "...but
if everyone thinks I'm such a god damn hero, why can't I eat some
real food? A measley piece of meat and a beer... a twig of fucking
hydroponic brocolli... or even just a slice of god damn bread? I'm
sick of this shit!"
Patricia didn't seem to hear what he said. She smiled at him
and said, "I still can't believe you pulled it off."
"Pulled what off?!" Kwan had heard this line far too many
times.
"Why, nabbing that suit...thing... and saving our asses, of
course.... Kwan I can't believe you would forget that." Patricia
was beaming at him. Her young face glowed surreal with a maternal
gaze. Why are you treating me like the prodigal son, Kwan thought.
I'm older than you and, christ, I almost killed you.
Patricia Spindle had been visiting him a lot since he woke up.
He could only assume that she had probably visited him while he was
still incoherent, recovering from his escape from Spindle Station.
At first Kwan had thought that Patricia was just a figment of his
thoroughly trounced mind and later, when her prescence had proven to
be physical, that she had somehow been taken by Cat and forced into a
merger. Forced..., he thought. More like brain-washed. She kept
talking about him as if he were a hero, as if he rescued her and some
mythical companion from the melodramatic snapping jaws of death
instead of, as he knew to be true, placing her and all that were with
her at their slavering lips.
Kwan attempted to blast through Patricia's matronly love with a
frigid stare. "Don't start that hero stuff again. I don't
understand what the hell you're talking about..." Patricia began to
shake her head silently, still smiling. Kwan quickened his speech,
"...No, listen to me, Spindle. I am not 'addled by a bump on my
head' nor am I your son... or even little brother. I do not know
what I'm being tested for or what in the hell I'm being kept in sick
bay for. I do know that you are treating me like an imbecile,
fawning over me like some kind of deranged mother and constantly
avoiding my questions. Now, what the hell are you talking about?"
"I'm not supposed to tell you until you're debriefed, Fish."
"Debriefed? I've been poked, prodded, drilled, swabbed, stuck,
kneaded and dosed by clamp lipped white coats for the past two days!
Don't you think someone could have debriefed me by now?"
"Fish, it's that... suit. You may feel well, but it's the drugs
they've been giving you. That suit you were... floating around in.
It was contaminated or something. I mean look at you..." She
fumbled with a shiny brooch at the neckline of her yellow issue
jumpsuit. She held it out toward him so he could catch his rippled
reflection. "...you're withering away. The doctors think you'll be
ok, but they want to understand what happened to you... what the suit
did to you..." She trailed off, suddenly somber.
"The suit?" Kwan stared at her. "The suit saved my life..."
"And, in a way, it saved ours too," Patricia softly added.
"What do you mean 'ours'? You weren't even on Spindle... who
else are you talking about?"
Patricia looked furtively over her shoulder at the gap in the
curtains of Kwan's cubicle and whispered, "You know... Jim on Tae
Guk."
"Jim? You mean Raymond... Raymond Stone?"
Patricia jumped at the loudness of Kwan's query. She appeared
angry for a moment, then her face softened and smiled. "Yes, I guess
you're right. It was Raymond Stone..."
Kwan shook his head in disbelief at her seeming confusion.
"What do you mean, 'I guess'? Who else could it..."
Kwan was cut off by a burly hand rapidly stringing the curtain
of his cubicle open.
"Hey!" Kwan managed to utter as the yellow curtains swept aside.
A man in yellow coveralls pushed his way in next to the bed wheeling
a small terminal mounted on a glinting two wheeled dolly. Patricia
stood up suddenly and started off.
"Spindle! Where you going?" Kwan yelled after her.
Patricia called back, in almost sing-song phrasing, "Gotta go,
Fish! Looks like it's time for your debreifing..."
*****************************
He could put it off no longer. The others would be here in a
matter of minutes.
Small clumps of people occasionally shuffled by the transparent
panels of the vid-phone booth, their clacking heels and rolling
luggage echoing through the thin walls of the plastic structure.
Kwan looked out upon them and realized he would not be able to
disguise his location... even if he had the video off, the noise of
the NASI space terminal would reveal his location to the careful
listener. And Kwan was sure that Cat would be listening especially
closely.
He quickly removed his data pouch from where he had propped it,
up above and slightly behind the lens of the CCD camera, and tapped
in another row of text, "just arrived in Houston Space Terminal from
Jersey with D. Simmons." The words joined about ten other lines of
text on the small screen. He thought for a moment and then realized
that if he was coming from Jersey he probably wouldn't have left the
earth's stratosphere. He replaced 'Houston Space Terminal' with
'Houston Intercontinental Airport' and sat the data pouch back up
above the lens cover. The vid-phone booth and bustling terminal back
drop should be generic enough to pass for any crowded transportation
hub in Texas. He scratched his newly healed ears and hoped the small
amplification devices that fit into his ears like flesh colored slugs
weren't too obvious.
Kwan glanced over the notes he had left himself on the data
pouch screen one more time and then slipped a cred-tape through the
waiting slit in the vid-phone console. He hesitated before punching
in his Cat contact number. What if Sec Goldbreath saw through the
ruse? Would he be able to remember all the details of his fake net
identity's progress on the net? How much of Scott's programmed ai
net identity activity did Cat actually believe?
Kwan fought down his nervous hesitation and started to punch in
the number. At the last instant he purposefully altered the last
combination of digits that would connect him to Cat on lowest
priority, without any sort of encryption. He relaxed a little. Why
hadn't he thought of that before? With the unsecured public line and
encryption off, Goldbreath couldn't possibly expect him to go into
too much detail. Maybe this was going to be easier than he thought.
His newly repaired ears itched sharply and Kwan reached to rub them
slowly as the call was placed.
Almost instantly the vid-phone screen faded from its instruction
screen blue to a glowing yellow color. An artificial sounding voice
announced itself as the text of the message it was verbalizing
spelled itself across the golden screen:
YOU HAVE REACHED THE CATERPILLAR LINK-UP VID-PHONE SERVER.
THIS SERVER IS FOR AUTHORIZED CAT PERSONNEL ONLY. TRESSPASSERS
WILL BE TRIED UNDER MULTI-NATIONAL CORPORATE LAW. MINIMUM
FINE FOR UNAUTHORIZED USE IS 50,000 NEW DOLLARS AND NET PAROLE
OF FIVE YEARS. MAXIMUM FINE IS LIFE IMPRISONMENT.
PLEASE ENTER ENCRYPTED CAT PIN NUMBER:
Kwan attempted to slip the cred-tape that he still held in his
hand into his jacket pocket and retrieve the magnetic strip tape of
his PIN number that he had already printed from his data pouch.
Instead his hand slipped uselessly on the green lycra outfit that he
was wearing. Dysfunctional piece of overpriced clothing, Kwan cursed
to himself and then dropped the used cred-tape to the booth floor.
He struggled to pull the PIN strip from the thin pocket on his hip.
By the time he had it out and ready to swipe through the phone's tape
reader, the screen announced:
LOG-IN TIME EXCEEDED.
CONNECTION BROKEN.
The screen faded from yellow to blue. Shit, Kwan whispered. He
grabbed the data pouch and printed out another cred-tape. Pulling it
from the pouch with the same hand that held the PIN number, Kwan
readied both tapes for use. He swiped the cred-tape through the vid-
phone slit and rapidly punched in the Cat server number again. This
time he was ready for the PIN number request when the screen glowed
yellow again.
CONFIRMING PIN NUMBER AUTHORIZATION
CONFIRMED
CALL BEING TRANSFERRED TO PERSONNEL SERVICES
Kwan tapped his hand on the side of the data pouch anxiously as
he waited. Suddenly he realized that the data pouch was in his hand
instead of propped up out of sight where it could silently prompt him
through the discussion with Goldbreath. He quickly placed the pouch
above the camera lens as the screen said into his stomach, "Hel-LO?
Anybody out there?"
It was Sec Goldbreath. Kwan retreated from the lens until he
was within its depth of focus.
"Sorry, Secretary Goldbreath. I... uh, was just adjusting the
vid-phone lens."
"Kwan! How nice of you to call again..." Again? "...and
look, we match this time." Her fat fingers gestured to the green
scarf matting her brown hair against her forehead. "You sure are a
fast dresser," she commented without thinking and then seemed a
little troubled upon reflection of what she had just said.
"Uh, yes," Kwan stammered trying to downplay his relatively
strange costume. "I'm going to Gilley's after this and I thought I'd
party it up a little after I pick up the demolition stuff for Sim..."
"Whoa there, champ. This is an unsecured line you know."
Shit, she was right. What was he thinking? He had to gain his
composure back. Kwan took an almost inaudible deep breath through
his nose and released it as he said, "I apologize. I just thought
I'd let you know that everything is going smoothly and..."
"Yes, I know... 'and soon you'll need to break off direct
communication due to the nature of the job'. You just told me that
over your data pouch communication. An _encrypted_ communication.
What's going on Fish?"
What the hell? Kwan stared into the phosphor eyes of
Goldbreath's image. Realization finally dawned on him. His ai
identity must have just placed a call into Cat before he made this
call. Quickly he tried to recover.
"I, uh... well I guess because, this being my first job and all,
I'm sort of nervous I just wanted to talk to you personally. This is
a big job for me and I kind of need all the..."
"Listen, Fish. This isn't a self-help line. You've got what it
takes and we're backing you completely. Don't play footsie with
me... We've been tracking you closely and know what you are up to.
Don't disappoint us and we won't ever let you down, Fish."
"I know that. I just... I guess I just needed to hear it
personally."
"Fish," Goldbreath said firmly, "The one or two still images,
22kHz audio, and double-standard _encryption_ that your data pouch
provides should be personal enough!"
Kwan started to say something and then realized he didn't have
anything to say.
Goldbreath continued, "I've got to go now. And from now on
you're on your own." She hesitated for a moment before ringing off.
"If you've got any more pertinent information to relay, use your god
damn encrypted data pouch."
Secretary Goldbreath's image grew on the screen as she leaned
forward to flick the communique off. The screen faded to yellow and
then quickly to blue.
Kwan slumped against the back wall of the booth and looked out
onto the space terminal passenger hallway. He could feel warm sweat
turn cold in the pits of his arms and his lips twitched with nervous
energy.
That was it. Goldbreath now obviously knew he was up to
something behind Cat's back. Not that it mattered too much. He
doubted that Cat could get a trail on him before the shuttle left for
Tae-Guk.
Kwan grabbed his data pouch from the ledge over the vid-phone
camera. He looked at its screen of prompting notes and shook his
head slightly. His fingertip erased the screen with a tap and then,
with a moment's hesitation, entered a reminder to check on Scott's ai
program. Scott knew about his planned call to Cat and the ai net
personality should not have been granted leave to place its previous
call. He pushed on the door of the booth as he slipped the pouch
into his jacket. Scott had been right, though; his own personal call
to Goldbreath had not served any real purpose. He wondered why it
had seemed so important to talk to her. Kwan stepped into the
brightly lit hallway.
Flourescent light panels passed lowly over his head as he began
to make his way to the fountain in the middle of the terminal. A
black uniformed possieman passed in the other direction. He scanned
Kwan's facial features, apparently determined that they did not
appear quite hispanic enough to warrant a green tag hassle, and
continued to stride past.
Fuck the possie, Kwan thought absently as he reconsidered the
vid-phone conversation. Perhaps Goldbreath meant what she said...
maybe she knew of his Tae-Guk plans and this was her strange way of
voicing her support over the open line. Either way it hardly
mattered, the shuttle was leaving in a few minutes. He might as well
believe that Cat was still behind him; at least this way he had his
company to believe in, not like dealing with nation-governments,
citizens or, for that matter people in general.
He spied the small fountain just ahead. He reminded himself to
keep an eye on Scott's work. Never place your trust too much in a
citizen, he thought. He had trusted Scott too much. "I won't do it
again," he muttered as he approached the meeting spot.
Scott stared at the yellow cube hanging before his eyes. If I
don't let Cat know about Kwan's Tae-Guk plans now I'll never get a
second chance, he thought. The cube rotated slowly. He thumbed a
few chords with his right hand and the cube slowed to a stand still,
the new server routing allowing greater bandwidth. What to do? I've
tried to keep Cat at bay for this long, he thought, but it hasn't
been easy, playing a hiding game with both Kwan and Caterpillar.
Scott sighed and glanced at the clock display at the upper right
of his vision. The red colons blinked back at him. He shut his eyes
and removed the sunglasses. Sitting up from his slouched position in
the ped-way seat, he rubbed his eyes and glanced up and down the
conveyor's length. Several hurried business men in wide lapeled
suits and pleated pants trotted by, stylish brief cases in tow.
Scott leaned back, prepared to simply sit on the ped-way as it pulled
him from the Houston train station to the space terminal.
He put the glasses back on. The yellow cube was tumbling
helplessly at the far left of his vision. Scott pumped the mini-
chorder in his jacket pocket automatically and the cube quickly
reoriented to its previous still and central position. What does
Kwan mean to me anyway?, he thought. He was just a good friend in
recruit school. And then he had turned on me, turned me in when I
confided in him the most. The rage I had felt towards Kwan then;
I've never felt anything like it before. Probably its lingering
remnants prompted my agreement with Cat to inform them of Kwan's
plans after they, and the Finnish net police, caught me for the
intrusion into Cat's Whisker server, Scott thought. But I didn't do
it. I just couldn't rat on my friend the way he ratted on me. So
now I've been playing this Cat and Fish game for days, trying not to
let the right hand know what the left is doing. I'm sure I've made
some mistakes. Maybe I should call Goldbreath and tell her about
Kwan's plans for Spindle's neice on Tae-Guk. That would settle it.
Scott checked the clock display again. He would have to start
walking soon if he wanted to get to the fountain on time. Forcing
his eyes to focus on the dimmed view of the ped-way floor, he arose
from his seat and started to lope his way between the moving
handrails. With his eyes focused ahead of him the yellow cube was
just a blur of light, a tiny fuzzy speck floating on the surface of
his eye.
Overhead a large white banner spanned the wide ped-way. It
read, "Welcome to the NASI Houston Space Terminal" in fat red
letters. NASI, Scott thought abstractedly, National Aeronautics and
Space Incorporated. What did national governments do anymore?, he
thought. The conveyor rumbled beneath his moving feet.
Scott spied the fountain just ahead. The ped-way dumped out
right in front of it. And just beside it was Kwan, walking the last
few steps up to the low walled pool of water. The short, dark haired
man looked at the bubbling liquid for a moment and then straightened
and surveyed his surroundings, obviously looking for Scott and the
others. Scott focused on his time display for a moment. Fish is
right on time, he thought. Just like always.
The last steps to the end of the ped-way passed quickly and, as
they did, Scott flicked the power off to his glasses. The spinning
yellow blur faded from his vision. He couldn't do it. He didn't
know why Cat didn't want Kwan on Tae-Guk, but if it meant turning on
someone he loved, he just couldn't play the traitor. For all his
naive posturing and obnoxious demands, Kwanchaan still attracted him,
still seemed to reach out to Scott and ask for his caring love.
Janet approached the two men from the opposite side of the
fountain after observing them for a few minutes. She couldn't make
up her mind if this job was a good thing or a major career blunder.
Scott seemed cool and definitely up to any technical tasks that they
might encounter. But what technical encounters might they encounter
on Tae-Guk? As she understood it, her role would even be minor.
Just act like a body guard as the oriental guy and my tube-twin
sister act like big-wigs and hob-nob with the real thing, she
thought.
Kwan and Scott didn't see her coming until she was almost on top
of them. She hesitated for a moment before announcing her prescence.
In the space of a second she thought about working with Jerri again;
ironic that it's with Cat again. What's making her do it?, she
pondered to herself. I don't know but I guess I'll find out.
"Hello chummers. Wanna take a lady on a trip?"
Kwan spun around quickly and almost lost his balance into the
small fountain, "Hey!"
Scott just turned slowly and smiled, "Janet, you look great!"
"Thanks Maki. I guess I take that as a compliment. Whadaya
think Fish?" Janet turned around slowly, certainly impressing a few
passer-bys.
"You look like a god damn razor-girl!" Kwan was not impressed.
"You said make it look like I was a body guard!"
Janet was wearing yet another black leather jacket. This one
was trimmed off high above the waist. Her baggy dark green trousers
were flared at the thigh, obviously accomodating numerous pockets and
hiding places, and tightly constricted about her slender ankles. Her
feet were hidden within a pair of thick black flats. The canvas tops
pf the shoes looked two sizes too big and the soles were at least the
thickness of a breakfast waffle. Whatever she was wearing underneath
her leather jacket was small. So small in fact that Scott wondered
if she was wearing anything at all under its shiny smoothness.
"A body guard," Kwan said through half clenched teeth. "Not a
body gawk."
Scott stifled a laugh and said, "Listen Kwan she'll be alright.
And anyway, she has to look different than Jerri, at least for now."
Kwan's red ears registered Scott's last words and he leaned
forward toward Janet. He said forcefully, "AND I told you to dye
your hair! How the hell are you supposed to pass for..."
Kwanchaan's loud voice trailed off quickly as Janet's hair
silently changed color into a light brown.
"Close your jaw, Fish," she said with a smirk. "It's a wig."
Her hand rustled in a high perched leather pocket and her hair
melted into a bright purple.
"Pretty cool, huh?"
Kwan turned away from her suddenly.
"Yeah, it is pretty cool Janet," Scott said. "How does it
work?"
"I'm not sure exactly, but the sales clerk said its based on
some kind of..."
"Hey all!" Jerri Sergei walked up to the group from the same
direction that Janet came from.
Kwan turned to face her quickly and Janet, cut off by Jerri's
entrance, flared her hair to a bright orange and sat down on the edge
of the low fountain wall.
"Jesus..." Kwan muttered. And louder, "What the fuck are _you_
wearing!"
Jerri was wearing a soft cardigan sweater over a white cotton
blouse. Small inset jewels could be seen glimmering on the hem of
her ankle length brown skirt. Her feet were clad in light cotton
sandals, toe nails polished with a natural finish.
"Nice to see you too." Jerri stepped away from Kwan and toward
Scott noticably. "What's up his tract?"
"Uhm.. I think he wanted to see you..."
"I'll tell you what's bothering me," Kwan broke in. "I'm the
employer here and, whether you like it or not, I plan our little
group's actions. You don't know all the details or all the nuances
of how we have to perform in order to pull this finesse job off!
It's not a romp in the forest or a big slumber party! There is no
majority rule.... You have to learn that when I suggest something
there is a damn good reason for it..."
"Well maybe if you _told_ us a few more of the details, we would
be more inclined to follow your god damn suggestions!" Jerri
interjected.
Kwanchaan looked at the floor tile before his feet. "I _told_
you that whatever you end up wearing you had to be glamourous enough
to seduce Raymond Stone, owner of Rolling Stone Youth Enhancements,
at our reception at Tae-Guk Station!"
"Yeah," Janet chimed in. "You look like a rich librarian or
something."
"Good," was Jerri's reply.
The noise of the space terminal converged on them suddenly.
"Look," Kwan said, a little more politely, "we're just going to
have to find you something more suitable at one of these space
terminal shops. Something that's a little more..."
"I'm afraid there's not enough time, Fish," Scott said as he
flicked his sunglasses back on. "That board up there..." he
indicated an electronic departure sign, "...and the one in here..."
he pointed at his glasses, "...says that we've only got two minutes
before our shuttle leaves."
"What?" Kwan cried. "Well, let's go!"
He turned and broke into a light run toward the nearest ped-way.
"Fish!" Scott yelled after him. "Fish! It's that way! Gate
17!" He pointed to a ped-way perpindicular to Kwan's course.
Kwan quickly readjusted and headed towards the new direction.
He looked back at them. Scott was starting to run after him, but
Jerri and especially Janet were barely away from the fountain.
"Come on, you citizen fools!" Kwan yelled and turned back to
the ped-way.
Jerri broke into a slow trot with Janet lagging behind.
"I don't see what the big deal is," Janet complained. "If we
miss this one there's another shuttle at midnight."
"I think Kwan's got something big planned for our 'reception',"
Jerri said over her shoulder. "Come on we better get going, he'll
probably get on the wrong shuttle or something..."
Secretary Goldbreath leaned back heavily in her chair after
hanging up on Kwanchaan. She sighed and looked over at the Private
Secretary.
"Doesn't look good," she said. "Mr. Maki has definitely not
been on the level with us."
"He's definitely hiding something," put forth the Privy. "He's
even more of a rookie than I thought."
"Yes, but he's a loyal rookie," Goldbreath wheezed.
"No matter, what can we do? Should we call him off?"
"If we can."
A buzz from the video console bleated out in the paneled room.
"What is it, Henry?" Goldbreath asked.
A small tinny voice spoke from the console. "The call was
traced to Houston Space Terminal as you suggested, Sec Goldie."
"My god," the Privy moaned. "He's going to Tae-Guk."
"If he catches the next shuttle, we can't catch him. And we
don't dare cause a scene on Tae-Guk..."
"Why not?" the Private Secretary interupted. "That moral devoid
playground is probably just the...."
"Because it would blow the entire defection! That's why... We
just have to hope that Fish is as incompetent as he seems." She
flattened a button on the console in front of her. "Henry?"
"Yes, Sec?"
"Please cut off Kwanchaan Phadwahji's PIN expense account, net
identity: Stephan Fish."
"Yes, Sec."
Secretary Goldbreath removed her finger from the intercom
button.
********************************
end of 2.2
Company Man 2.3 by Patrick
Hurh
copyright
1993
Phillip Spindle's thin arms, backlit from the bright showers of
the airlock flouro-tubes, threw gangly shadows across the scorch
marked walls behind Lt. Nelson's head. The long silhouettes danced
emphatically in time with his words.
"What do you mean 'no mataglap'?"
"I... I mean, I don't know what you're talking about, sir!"
Spindle continued his quick pace past the confused lieutenant,
not pushing through so much as slithering past. Orange coveralled
guards standing at the entrance to Spindle Station's main corporate
thoroughfare picked up Spindle's gait adeptly and followed him into
the fantastically wide hallway. Spindle trod lightly, long legs
poling him forward over a thin orange carpet that ran down the center
of the hallway. To each side the hallway spread out at least a
hundred feet to end in dimly lit orange walls lined with dozens of
thick oak doors. Obviously, as he had hoped, Spindle's office, his
command center, had not been badly damaged by the Cat offensive. As
he strode down the hallway, his head nearly hit the extremely low
ceiling but, due to his smooth gait and confidence, he didn't
hesitate or hunch his shoulders even for an instant.
"Lieutenant Nelson?" Spindle called out without looking back.
"Sir?" Nelson half shouted, trailing several yards behind his
CEO.
"Please fetch Gonzales from the brig, have her cleaned and
brought to my office."
"Sir?" Nelson stopped trotting for a moment. "Sir? Dr.
Gonzales is dead, sir..."
"Not that Gonzales. The one in the brig, cell H4."
"H4, sir?..." Nelson jumped and began to run forward again,
realizing that Spindle wasn't going to stop and face him. "...I
think that sector was sealed off during the breach."
Spindle stopped walking suddenly and, without turning, said, "I
do not care what you think, lieutenant. Just go to the brig and
retrieve the body, alive or dead, from cell H4 and bring it to my
office."
"Yes, sir," Nelson watched for a moment as Spindle resumed his
journey, then he turned sharply and ran back to the service
corridors.
*********************************
The hissing of cabin rotation startled Kwanchaan back to
wakefulness. He opened his eyes and looked around himself, a little
frustrated that he had gone to sleep during the flight. Although he
had gotten little sleep lately due to his research into Tae Guk and
Spindle Stations, he still reprimanded himself for dozing off just
before the big performance was about to begin.
A long gold pen floated across his view, tumbling end over end
in the moment of weightlessness. Kwan began to grab for it, then
realized his hands were entangled in the jutting rust ornaments of
his dinner suit. A hand flashed quickly in front of his face as the
passenger across the aisle to his left picked the pen out of the air
with a smile. Kwan looked over at the man slowly and rolled his eyes
instinctively as he realized who it was and where the pen came from.
The smiling passenger placed the pen lengthwise on the tray in front
of him. It rebounded slightly and then settled to the plastic
surface of the tray as deceleration began.
Kwan finished fishing his arms out from his discombobulated
outfit and placed them on the arms of his seat. He jumped slightly
when Jerri, sitting on the other side of him, moved her arm out from
under Kwan's descending elbow. He closed his eyes again, feigning
sleep.
The cabin had just finished its rollover which meant they were
about two hours out from boarding Tae Guk. Like most shuttles, the
Tae Guk shuttle from Houston used acceleration and deceleration
equally to provide a semblance of gravity to its occupants. Except
for the initial lift off into orbit, the shuttle accelerated towards
Tae Guk's docking port at approximately 0.8 G and then, after
rotating the passenger cabin 180 degrees, decelerated at the same
rate into a matching orbit. Kwan visualized the squat shuttle's
braking burners continuously firing in rapid blue bursts as it closed
quickly with the hollowed-out asteroid station.
The weight of Jerri in the seat next to him shifted and suddenly
he could smell the light smell of sandalwood and that of her body
close to him. He opened his eyes to see her torso as it squeezed by
his knees on the way to the aisle. Kwan quickly twisted his legs to
get out of her way and she took the opportunity to smooth the brown
cotton cloth over her thighs before stepping into the aisle.
"I believe you rescued my pen," Jerri smiled at the blonde man
across the aisle from Kwan.
"Ah, yes. Indeed I did, Miss..." The stranger paused, waiting
for her name.
"Katz... But you can call me Liza."
Liza? Kwan was stumped. He snapped his head around and stared
into the seat back in front of him. Jerri had been flirting with the
blonde man since they had boarded. Little glances and smiles... but
still Kwan, with his training, had noticed. And Jerri, with her
training, couldn't help but have planned the advances toward the
young and obnoxious man.
Kwan looked about him to assess the positions of the other
members of his team and to try to ignore Jerri's figure smoothly
seating herself on the other side of her new found suitor. Scott was
reading the emergency instruction card for the tenth time, a seat
over on his right. Kwan remembered Scott's low-gee aversions during
their years of training together and smiled. He always had to read
something, hopefully something very repetitious. Kwan twisted around
and caught sight of Jerri in the seat behind him, standard position
for a bodyguard on a shuttle. She was twiddling with her garrote
thumbnail, obviously bored and not appreciating the happy loving
couple having at it in the seats next to her. Kwan looked at her
deadly thumbnail again and felt an involuntary shudder run across his
neck as he thought of her position behind him. She looked up at him
and rolled her head sharply towards Jerri. Kwan turned back around
and tried to eavesdrop on Jerri and the smiling blonde man.
As far as he could tell, Jerri had nothing in common with the
man, except her adept ability to flirt. Every sultry comment that
Jerri made was countered with the flair and audacity of a rich and
flamboyant young man. Still she persisted, demurely fondling between
her small fingers the gold pen she had lofted across the aisle. Kwan
peered at the pen with closer scrutiny. It seemed familiar to him;
the shape and color called out Caterpillar to him.
"...so you see, Katzy, not only did he lose all his money in
that hand, but he also gained all my debt!... not that my debt was
that much, but it's the principle of the thing... the principle.
Don't you agree?"
"Oh, of course, Jacob. A man without principles is a man
without love, I always say," Jerri said as she rose alongside him
into the aisle.
"Indeed, Liza... indeed."
The two bounced down the aisle towards the small bar section of
the cabin. Jerri feigned a trip and grabbed hold of Jacob's well
muscled bicep. He tensed his entire body at her touch as if he had
to prove that he could prop her complete weight on his outstretched
arm. Kwan stared at their backs long enough to catch Jerri's
taunting smile as she stepped around the front row of seats to land
herself in a pile next to Jacob on a vinyl couch.
Kwan spent the next hour and a half aboard the shuttle fiddling
with his data pouch and wondering why Jerri was so flirtatious with
this strange Jacob. The data pouch was not of much use in the
shuttle because it was out of range of any cellular grids that might
support it. All Kwan was left with was what he had stored on its
internal drive, and he had been through those articles and documents
dozens of times. He tried to think ahead to the expensive reception
that he had planned for Jerri and himself when they arrived. But his
troubling thoughts of Jerri and Jacob together seemed to pervade his
entire thought process.
Kwan imagined Jerri was simply trying to get back at him for his
assumption that she wasn't dressed properly in order to seduce Stone.
She was flirting with Jacob just to show that her taste in clothes
could work with any man. Kwan didn't think that to be universally
true, however. If she was going to make a splash at the reception,
she had better stand out amongst the crowd of arrivals. Of course,
the reception itself should garner some attention.
The research Kwanchaan had performed on Tae Guk high society
life revealed many useful items. The foremost being the Tae Guk
custom to dine on the terraces of local restaurants and hotels
surrounding the arrival dock and witness the new influx of high
rollers on the early evening shuttle. Kwan already knew that
Patricia Spindle and Raymond Stone were on the pleasure station and
he was willing to bet that they probably would partake in the
traditional evening ritual. Kwan supposed that most of the rich Tae
Guk guests probably watched the new arrivals so they could either
ridicule the naive newcomers or pick out their next prey for that
evening's gambling or sexual adventures. No matter; that would serve
his plans well. If he could make a big enough splash with his
prearranged reception, it might just gain him... and Jerri... a way
into the high social circle that he imagined Spindle and Stone to be
engaged in.
He began to feel confident again. It would all work... as long
as he and Jerri could pull off the reception. But he couldn't do it
unless Jerri was with _him_ not Jacob.
Kwan sat up and started to slide his data pouch into his jacket
before realizing that the data pouch had come back on line.
Evidently the shuttle had pulled within Tae Guk's private grid. He
looked over at Scott and saw him, sheltered behind his sun glasses,
squeezing the mini data chorder in his pocket like a tall and bearded
adolescent just discovering masturbation. Kwan's lip flickered in a
half smile and he rose to his feet to say a few words to Jerri and
hopefully retrieve her before they arrived at Tae Guk.
"Uh... Mr. Pike, I'm afraid we've got a major problem."
Kwan halted, a step into the aisle, and turned his amplified ear
towards Scott. "What's the problem?" he whispered.
Scott's glasses were pointed away from Kwan but his words were
directed at him. "You better sit down for this." Scott's free hand
patted the seat next to him, the one Jerri had vacated.
Kwan slid into the seat quickly and growled, "What is it, Scott?
I've got to go get Jerri before we dock."
"Seems like while we were in transit, Mr. Stephen Fish's expense
account was frozen."
"What do you mean frozen!" Kwan wished he could see Scott's
eyes clearly.
"I mean it's been cut off... deleted... frozen."
Kwan was silent for a moment, then softly, "How much money was
transferred to Pike's account before it was... frozen?"
"Barely enough."
"Barely enough to what?"
"Barely enough to get off this station..." Scott pulled off his
glasses and stared at Kwan. "I guess that's it, Fish."
"It's your fault, god damn it." Kwan's voice grew from its
previous whisper. "You screwed up the ai net personality. I knew it
as soon as I got off the phone with Goldbreath..."
"Kwan, I don't know what you're talking about." Scott's face
colored with guilt for something he had thought about, but hadn't
done. "Believe me Kwan I wouldn't turn you in... not after what Cat
did to me..."
Kwan's face began to wrinkle into a sneer but relaxed instead as
he regained control of his emotions. "Well, it's not over yet,
Scott," he said. "I've still got the twins working for me... Don't
let them in on this... at least not yet."
"But how the hell can we continue with this," Scott rebutted,
"when we'll hardly even survive Tae Guk?"
Kwan felt the back of his seat sway from his body as it was
pulled from behind. He cut off his answer to Scott as Janet's head
jutted through the seat gap to his left.
"What the fuck is going on with you two?" she asked forcefully.
"If something is up, you better let the rest of us in on it..."
"Just a change in plans, Janet." Kwan turned back to Scott.
"What about the reception?"
"Well, what did you pay... cash or credit?" Scott already knew
the answer.
Kwan groaned lightly but then spoke hopefully, "But won't it be
charged to Pike?"
"Sure, unless they decide to run a last minute credit check...
most of the money is tied up in that anonymous Zurich account you
insisted on."
"Hey," Janet interjected. "You better not be talking about our
payment money here."
"Janet, you'll get the rest of your god damn payment when the
job is done," Kwan whispered from the side of his mouth. He looked
back at Scott. "Can't you transfer some of the Zurich funds over to
the Pike credit..."
Kwan was interrupted by a muted dinging that floated through the
cabin.
"Too late," Scott said calmly and looked up at the glowing seat
belt indicator light overhead. "We'll have to just go out there and
see what happens."
A shudder rumbled through the shuttle followed by the whirring
of several servo motors. A sudden increase in the rate of
deceleration pushed the passengers deeper in their seats. This
downward force eased off gradually after a few moments and then a
second shudder quickly shook the cabin.
Kwan tried to pry himself out of his seat and move up to the
front of the cabin towards Jerri, but the huge hand of a passing
space steward pushed him back down. "Please remain seated until the
exit sign flashes, please..." The steward continued down the aisle
pressing a few more eager tourists back to their cushions. Kwan
edged forward to the edge of his seat and eyed the exit sign
anxiously.
A few moments before the sign brightened, Kwanchaan was out of
his seat and headed up the aisle. After only a few steps however,
his path was blocked by other hurried passengers. He pushed and
sidestepped them as best he could, turning his hips sideways to
squeeze through the narrowest of spaces. He glanced over his
shoulder and saw Janet following him. She was rudely pushing people
out of her way. "Bodyguard... bodyguard coming through," she intoned
loudly in a tired voice. Up ahead he spied Jacob's blonde head and,
next to it, Jerri's light brown one. They were standing very close
together but, thank god, they weren't moving anywhere. A few more
moments of maneuvering and he was able to lay a hand on her shoulder.
"Jer..."
Kwan was cut off by a sudden movement of her head. She followed
her head with her shoulders until she was almost facing Kwan. Kwan
began again.
"Uh... Liza. Don't you think we should prepare for the
reception?"
Jerri began to shake her head, but before she could open her
mouth, Jacob turned toward Kwan and smiled, "Oh, are you having a
reception too?"
Kwan looked at the muscular man with confusion. Jacob just
smiled wider and raised his eyebrows inquisitively at Jerri.
"Oh no," Jerri replied with faint laughter. "My cousin has, of
course, just heard of yours... I mean who hasn't?" She glared at
Kwan for a split second.
Jacob looked between the two for a puzzled moment and then
smiled again. "Well in that case, maybe your cousin..."
"His name is Pike, but his friends call him Fish," Jerri filled
him in.
"...maybe Fish here would like to join us upon exit?"
"Oh, no!" Jerri responded before Kwan could react. "Fish has a
nervous reaction to attention. I mean just look at him now..."
Jacob and Jerri studied Kwan's uncomprehending and sweating face for
a moment. "...besides, he has to stick with his bodyguard."
Janet finally had made it up the crowded aisle and clapped Kwan
on the shoulder. "Hey, slow down there, pardner... where's the
rodeo?"
Kwan spun around to throw her hand off. But Janet's hand
dropped quickly to his wrist and, as he twisted toward her, his own
body motion curled his arm around behind his back. Janet lifted
Kwan's captured wrist between his shoulder blades and pulled him to
her chest. Kwan winced slightly and glared into her half-lidded
eyes.
"You better be square with me, Fish. Money or no money, I meant
what I said. Any change in plans and we _all_ get to hear about it.
Right?"
"Of course," grunted Kwan. "But remember... if something
happens to me, Cat will be on _your_ tail. Money or no money..."
"Whatever you say, Fish." She dropped his arm reluctantly as
the aisle traffic began to flow and smiled mischievously. Kwan
glared at her again and straightened his elaborate outfit as he
turned back towards Jerri and Jacob.
Only they were gone. During his interaction with Janet, the
newly formed couple had made their way to the exit of the cabin and
through the airlock. In the muffled distance he could hear synth
music start up in a swelling chorus. He turned back to Janet. "By
the way, you get to carry the luggage," he said and then began to
make his way towards the cabin exit.
It was obvious by the time Kwanchaan exited the airlock into
chamber one of Tae Guk Station that the blaring reception was not for
him... or Jerri. He emerged from the cycling airlock into a
tremendous space like a large courtyard, surrounded on all sides by
terraced glass and earthen buildings that seemed to lean precariously
inward toward the dock runway he stood upon. The sky overhead was
filled with a light fog and lit by a strong blue linear light that
stretched hundreds of meters overhead disappearing amongst the
buildings' rooftops. It seemed that all the terraces were filled
with seated people, numbering in the hundreds. Several were clapping
their hands or calling out to the arrivees below, while others seemed
to be strangely still, surveying the spectacle.
The spectacle consisted of thousands of colorful drone
butterflies engulfing a small group of arrivees who stood isolated on
marbled tile at the end of the arrival dock runway about twenty
meters from Kwan. The artificial butterflies flew, not like their
natural, constantly flapping counterparts, but like birds beating
their wings to gain altitude and then soaring down amongst the
reception group like small paper aeroplanes. The arrivees smiled
openly and waved their arms in the storm of soft wings. Some were
dancing slowly in time with the synth music, shaking their heads with
its jangles. Several butterflies were inadvertently knocked to the
ground and trampled by moving, celebratory feet. Nowhere did Kwan
see a sign of the shape memory balloons he had ordered or of the
mariachi band he had hired for their arrival.
He walked toward the reception group slowly. He felt self-
conscious since most of the other passengers not included in the
reception had already moved toward the baggage claim area at the side
of the dock. He glanced behind him and saw that Janet was following
him with a wary look in her face. She seemed unaffected by the
spectacular environment. Scott was a few steps behind but arcing
towards the other side of the dock, and, with his glasses on, it was
hard to read any reaction into his hidden face.
Kwan continued walking decisively towards the reception. He
could make out Jerri's expressions on her face as she talked to
someone hidden in the flurry of nylon wings. It wasn't Jacob because
he could see the blonde man in a cluster of people over to the left
of Jerri. Kwan started to look back towards Jerri when he did a
quick doubletake on Jacob's bevy of friends. He spied a very
familiar face amongst the crowd. Patricia Spindle.
He almost altered his course to intercept her, but then realized
this was neither the time nor place to impose himself upon her. But
she was here... in the flesh. At least that part of his plan had not
gone haywire.
Kwan stopped walking about four meters from where Jerri stood
talking. That was when he finally recognized who she was talking to.
It was Raymond Stone. Kwan fingered his right ear and upped the gain
a notch.
"...well, thank you, but it was really Patricia's idea. She
wanted her brother to feel... welcome to Tae Guk. Especially after
his last visit..."
"No need to explain that, Mr. Stone..."
"Oh, please call me Ray. And you are..."
"Lisa... Lisa Katz."
"Friend of Jacob's?"
"Oh yes. We go way back." Jerri smiled facetiously.
"Well, no one goes 'way back' with Jacob Spindle," Stone replied
with his own smile.
At the slight pause in the conversation, Kwan moved toward them
suddenly, thinking to be included in the conversation. However, his
amplified ear had caused him to overestimate his proximity to the
couple and by the time he was within speaking distance Jerri had
manipulated Stone's stance so that his back was facing Kwan's
approach. Kwan hesitated for a moment and Jerri shot a 'back off'
glance towards him.
Unexpectedly, Stone leaned forward and took Jerri's hand.
"Lisa, I would be most pleased if you would accept an invitation
for dinner with Patricia and I at the Through Door, tonight..."
Kwan altered his route slightly and walked past them, afraid to
intervene.
"I'd be pleased to join you," he heard Jerri demurely speak over
his shoulder.
"Wonderful," Stone pronounced the 'w' as a 'v' and laughed at
his out-of-character accent. Jerri responded with a giggle, arm
still outstretched with her hand lightly grasped in Stone's.
Kwan turned round to gaze at them once he had walked by a few
meters. Through the flitting cloud of butterflies, he saw Stone's
stocky form tilt at the waist as he brought Jerri's hand to his lips
softly. He kept hold of her hand as he straightened and turned
toward the rest of the reception group. Jerri, led by Stone's
pulling hand, followed him into the boisterous group of partiers. A
flurry of the silky flying drones then obscured them from Kwan's
view.
Kwan stood there, flustered for a moment, and waited for Janet's
approaching form. She walked up and, not looking him in the eye,
pointed a finger over toward Scott on the other side of the dock
runway. She said, "Luggage is that way, boss."
Kwan followed her finger and started off towards the loitering
Scott. With the little credit they had, he thought, looks like its
chamber six for us tonight.
Company Man 2.4 by Patrick
Hurh
copyright
1994
Phillip Spindle sat at his wide mahogany desk at the top of the
Station's control dome. His office had been designed to offer him
full vigilance over the Station's operations and, by way of extensive
flat screen displays, his corporation's terrestrial activities as
well. The office was circular in shape, the desk at its center, with
a low ceiling that the dome shape necessitated. A long and thin
window of reinforced quartz ran around the office periphery about a
meter and a half off the floor letting in the stars' faint light in a
horizontal wash of luminescence. Screen displays were mounted above
and below the ringing window and Spindle spun his desk slowly around
to point at one that had just brightened to attention.
The screen showed Lt. Nelson escorting a disheveled figure
through the low ceilinged, carpeted expanse that surrounded his
office. Phillip rotated his desk around again to face the office's
main entrance hatch set into the floor. At the touch of his finger
on an invisible controlling surface of his desk, the hatch silently
slid open to reveal the heads of Gonzales and Nelson as they bobbed
up the stairwell into the top of the dome.
"Roberta!... I'm glad to see you weathered the attack without
serious injury." Spindle flicked a finger at Lt. Nelson and he
backed out of the office. "You see then, the confinement in the brig
was really all the better for your safety." The hatch slid closed
behind Gonzales.
Small lines in Roberta's middle aged face deepened as she pulled
her lips into a sarcastic smile. "Yes, I'm sure that's what you had
in mind when you put me in there... fourteen days ago!"
"Now, now, Roberta. I'm sure you would have done the same if
you learned that your most prized scientist was ripe for a
defection." Spindle rotated his desk about 15 degrees. "By the way,
it was thirteen days..." He motioned at a screen that came to life
at his gesture. "And you see now, my plans are finally coming to
fruition."
Roberta only saw some yellow blobs on the flickering screen.
"What plans? All I see is some..."
"What you see are the images of Cat 'freighters' leaving Spindle
Station's defense perimeter."
"What were they doing here in the first place?" Roberta's eyes
revealed a sudden dread.
"Presumably to pick you up..."
"But I never made the deal with Cat... I just let them know I
was... Why are you letting them go?"
"But they didn't pick you up," Spindle ignored her stammering.
"They picked up something else instead..." Phillip pressed his thumb
down on another macro switch on the edge of his desk and the screen
flicked to the black and white, pixelated image of the nanosuit
frozen in uncontrolled flight.
"The suit," she whispered. Then louder, "The suit! Are you
crazy? I told you how unstable it is... I need more time to balance
its equilibrium!"
"Exactly, Roberta. I let Cat have the unstable suit. By the
time they figure out what they've got, it'll be too late."
******************************
Tae Guk Station was old by space station standards. It was
built thirty years earlier, almost a decade before the
tachyon/graviton connection and particle/string theory were fleshed
out into inertia based 'synthetic weight'; it relied on the
traditional use of centripetal acceleration to simulate gravity.
Hollowed out of a large asteroid, Tae Guk was built by the nation of
South Korea to house its first off-world research and development
center. It was to be a shining example of the emerging industrial
nation's ingenuity, not only in manufacturing but product design as
well. However, when South and North Korea re-unified only two years
after its completion, the resulting Unified Korea's economy collapsed
under the increased burden of suddenly tripling in population without
a likewise increase in resources, and the station was converted into
a tourist attraction, albeit for the very rich.
The rich, however, did not come to Tae Guk in its geo-synch
orbit over Korea. It was not until Unified Korea sold the Station to
Viacom, which then brought its vast media forces to bear on Tae Guk,
that the orbiting rock became a popular tourist attraction. Tae Guk,
now moved into a new geo-synch over Texas for a better transportation
link, became the playground of the wealthy... and a fertile field for
the decadent vice-mongers and poor crap-artists that the wealthy
thrive upon.
"Tae Guk Station is comprised of seven chambers carved out of
the asteroid rock you see in the tunnel walls about you. Each
chamber is shaped like a short cylinder and all the chambers are
stacked with their axes aligned to create an assembly much like a
roll of mints... or poker chips..." Kwan rolled his eyes at the poor
attempt of a joke that he had already heard twice since they had
boarded. The wall-shuttle's intercom droned on, "The entire Station
revolves upon the common axis to provide the simulation of gravity
that you feel pulling you to the floor. In fact, at the moment,
since the wall-shuttle you are riding is embedded in the asteroid's
outer wall, you should feel two percent heavier than you will when
walking on the wall's inner surface..."
Kwan tuned out the annoying voice and looked at the other
occupants of the wall-shuttle. Besides Scott, Janet and himself, the
shuttle was nearly empty. Most of the passengers had gotten off at
earlier stops at chambers numbered between two and five. Those
chambers housed tourist spots and guest hotels; generally the lower
the chamber number, the higher the class of tourist. Chamber One,
where the reception courtyard and shipping dock were located, was so
exclusive that most visitors never saw it except for on their way
into and out of Tae Guk. And that's where Jerri is now, Kwan
thought. He looked at Scott and saw that he was engrossed in net
activities again. Hopefully he was doing as Kwan had suggested and
searching the hotel database for signs of where Spindle and Stone
were staying... and also to see if Jerri had managed to hook into
their entourage.
"Any luck?" he called over the drone and buzz of the wall-
shuttle.
"Not much," Scott replied as he took his glasses off and slid
them into the breast pocket of his black tee. "I did find out that
the Through Door is the Swiss Embassy's elite restaurant in Chamber
One. You won't have an easy time getting in there..."
"Hopefully I won't have to." Kwan's mind churned their options
over once more in his mind. Without any credit to any of their net
personalities, their options were truly limited.
"Come on, we're there," Kwan spoke to the others. The wall-
shuttle groaned to a halt in front of a wide and dark platform.
"We're here..." Janet whispered to no one in particular.
"So we'll see you at the Door in about 4 hours then?"
"Uh, yes. I'll be looking forward to it." Jerri watched
Raymond Stone's back as he turned away from her and crossed the
furniture crowded hotel lobby. "If I can find something to do until
then," she muttered to herself.
Jerri turned purposefully and threaded her way through plush
green couches and thin smokeless ashtrays, as if she had someplace to
go. After she concealed her moving form behind a brushed aluminum
pillar, peacock feathers engraved into its surface, she slowed and
looked about her. Raymond's group would be in the elevators by now,
heading up a few floors to a no-doubt very secured private floor. If
the floor was high enough, Jerri could imagine Stone and Spindle's
guests losing their weight slowly, probably inducing a feeling of
skeletal empowerment and invincibility, as they stepped off the
elevator.
Ahead and against a deep blue curtained wall Jerri spied an
unobtrusive comm panel. She hoped she wouldn't be too conspicuous as
she used it; most of the Tae-Guk elite that populated the Peacock
Hotel were wired into the Station's cellular grid. She strolled
casually over to it, her low, brown cotton skirt smoothly skimming
the dark and gold-specked carpet.
Halfway to the comm panel her eye caught at a face, a face that
she had glimpsed with Stone and Spindle's group. The short and thin
man looked over at her and flashed brief recognition before moving on
to scan the rest of the lobby. Bodyguard, Jerri thought.
Immediately she picked up her pace and walked by the comm panel and
toward the hotel's open doors to her left. She imagined the
bodyguard's gaze surveying her traverse. As she passed through the
curtain of turbulent air and heat that comprised the hotel's entry, a
hand descended on her shoulder. She fought a reflex to shake it off
and turned demurely.
"Liza! Where are you going? I had you pegged for a Peacocker!"
"Jacob... I, uh..." Jerri stammered for a split second, looking
at Jacob Spindle's face. "There must have been a mix-up with the
travel agency," she recovered. "Apparently the Peacock is overbooked
and, without a last name like Stone or Spindle," she gave his arm a
nudge, "I've been... bumped," pronouncing the last word as a
delicate, high-pitched hiccup.
"What? That's ridiculous... Listen, I know for a fact that
there are plenty of rooms in the Peacock, especially on my sister's
floor." Jerri batted her eyes at the obviously infatuated blonde
man. "I'll... I'll see what I can do, come on."
Jacob pulled at Jerri's shoulder and, as she began to walk
toward him, slid his hand down to the crook of her arm by which he
led her back to the reception desk. Jerri followed unresistingly
and, laying her other hand over his guiding one, asked, "Is she
really your sister?"
"Well, more like a second-cousin by now," he replied.
"Look, Kwan. What she's saying makes sense." Scott leaned over
the other two as they sat at the sidewalk vendor. "With what little
credit we have, we can't do anything but survive here in chamber six
for a few days and get kicked out with the next maintenance sweep..."
"And if I take our credit instead and bet it on the game, we at
least have a chance of supporting Jerri. I mean right now, after she
flunks the first credit check, she's a good as dead. This way we..."
"Why are you so concerned about Jerri all of a sudden?" Kwan
cut her off and spooned another mouthful of the mushroom broth into
his mouth.
Scott sighed and stood straight. "Just give her the dosh, man."
He backed off a few steps and fiddled with his sunglasses, now gone
clear in the dark haze of the twisted alleyway.
Janet just sat and stared at Kwan, her hair shifting through a
subtle spectrum of crimson. A deep thrum of ventilation machinery
filtered through the humidity and filled the silence, punctuated only
by the neon crackle of a meat-puppet brothel sign that hung a few
meters down the alley.
Kwan set his spoon down quietly in the shallow puddle of the
bowl and tilted his head toward Janet. "You sure you know what
you're doing?"
"Fish," she smiled, her hair tinting to a deep blue, "I know
what I'm doing."
******************************
Roberta Gonzales didn't know which was worse, an incredibly
large nuclear fusion explosion or mataglap. The sure destruction of
the first was tremendous but mataglap's potential to swallow worlds
was horrifying. She refocussed her eyes on the colorful screen in
front of her.
"How long ago was the core's magnetic bubble switched off?" she
asked numbly.
"As soon as the Cat operatives pulled the suit from its power
dock, I imagine."
Roberta turned to glare up at Spindle. He remained lounged at
his central desk while Roberta worked at a small console near the rim
of the office.
"How long?"
"Twenty hours or so. Check the video log if you want to want to
know exactly.... What I want to know is when will it go mataglap?"
He leaned forward and then slumped back again. "Answer me,
Gonzales!"
"I don't know..." Roberta continued chording commands onto the
console surface. "I'm setting up an interactive run of the nano-
fusion model. If the model is at all correct it should predict which
of the processes wins out."
"Which process...?"
"Fusion chain reaction or mataglap. I'm using the latest output
from a batch job that was left running when you threw me in the brig.
It was modeling the effects of the magnetic bottle containment of the
plasma and should provide about the right input parameters for the
circumstance."
"Doctor," Spindle spoke strongly. "I do not want a fusion chain
reaction. I would, however, like a nice little case of mataglap."
Spindle stood from his chair. "Now when exactly will this suit of
yours destabilize and deliver it to me?"
Roberta slapped a final chord and turned from the screen. "I
told you, I don't know! I don't even know if the nano-machines will
win out over the energy output of the fusing plasma!"
A strained look came over Spindle's long face and he took a few
steps toward Roberta. She backed up against the console.
"But the model I'm running should be able to give us an idea."
"How long will the model take to run?"
"About twenty minutes, depending on the number of singularities
it has to reduce..."
"Well, start it!" Spindle barked.
"It's already started..."
Roberta turned back to the screen and watched the colored pixels
swarm.
Company Man 2.5 by Patrick
Hurh
copyright
1994
Humidity washed over Scott's body as he stumbled down the shallow
elongated stairs, his black tee showing blacker stains in splotches
on his back, under his arms. He stooped forward, caught the next
upright as it slid by, stopping his forward motion like a child
stopping a merry-go-round. He leaned his wet face on the slick
surface of the twisted sign post marked 'Row F' and looked out over
the stadium.
A small turmoil of heads and hats leapt and squirmed in the end
field bleachers before him, their owners already light from the
reduced 'gravity' of Chamber 7. He had entered the bleachers at a
radius only about 8 meters from the center of rotation of Tae Guk and
the shallow steps extended down and out away from him only about
another 15 meters before they met the player conveyor track.
Certainly centripetal acceleration even at that low point couldn't
make up more than about half of earth's gravity. Scott licked his
lips, tasting salt and grime, plus something acidic... stomach acid.
His own stomach tightened as he recalled the stranger in the
crowded bleacher lift, the man's face painted in an angry clown's
grimace as trails of vomit cascaded from his mouth, spraying the
other elevator riders lightly with a fine mist. Two others retched
just from being witness. Scott escaped the brunt of it, he was
positioned near the doors, and exited just as the sickly-sweet smell
overcame him. If it wasn't for the two pink octals he dropped after
he left Janet at the betting booths, the incident probably wouldn't
have upset him this much. He peered out through the swirling
atmosphere and tried to focus on something across the stadium,
something to steady him.
Scott felt a shaky hand on his shoulder, then a shove. His body
crunched against the sign post and slipped off. He managed to roll
his shoulder in as he went down and landed sprawled across the
descending aisle on his back. Surprisingly the pain was muted by the
octals although it had only been minutes since he had dropped them.
The floppy end of a pointed hat, its end tipped with a bright orange
crocheted ball of yarn, flipped over into Scott's line of sight. It
was followed by the slow rise of pancake greased face. The clown
from the bleacher lift frowned within his smudged grin and rolled
glazed eyes at Scott.
"Sorry.... I'm..." The buffoon grappled the arm of a spectator
in an aisle seat and got to his long feet. "I'm really sorry...
Please forgive me..."
The octals really started to kick in then. As Scott stared up
at the towering clown his vision twisted and contorted until the
clown seemed to be hovering horizontal above a sea of people, his
exaggerated face seeming to grin with some arcane and hidden
knowledge. "I'm sorry," he seemed to cry again, but the smile
painted on his face belied his true insult. "Gee," he moaned, "I'm
sorry.... I won't ever do it again." Then the clown, snapped back
into perspective, stumbled over Scott's head and down toward the
conveyor rink.
Scott, still on his back, stared straight up above him and saw
the sea of heads over which the clown had seemed to float. They were
the heads of the bleacher bums seated diametrically across from him
on the other side of the cylindrical arena. His sense of balance
began to reel again and he shut his eyes. Yet, even with the
unsettling sight shut out, Scott envisioned himself hanging, back
stuck to a gymnasium-high ceiling, above a tilted plane of
spectators.
"Hey." He felt a poke at his mid-section. "Hey, man. Don't
ever look up in this joint, man." Scott opened his eyes, saw a flash
of color, then allowed himself to be wrestled into a sitting
position. "Kinda wipes you out, don't it?" Scott looked for the
voice's face. "Sorry I knocked into you there, man. But I thought I
saw this guy that owed me money down by the conveyor." The large
toes of two scuffed and exceptionally long shoes flapped down on the
steps on either side of Scott's hips and he felt himself being lifted
from behind. It was the clown. Scott started to giggle.
"Hey now, guy. What's so funny?" The savior clown spun Scott
around and looked into his eyes. "What'd you drop, man?...
blues?... reds?... a handful of Susans?"
"Pinks... Two pink octals," Scott blurted out. He was becoming
more aware of himself now. He tried to shake off the clown's grip on
his shoulders, but the painted man wouldn't let go... only now he
didn't look so... painted.
"Octals, my ass, man. Someone slipped you some Lazy Susans and
shipped you up here!"
Scott tried to pull away from him again. Somehow the clown had
transformed into a tall sweaty man with long brown hair tied back
under an orange bandanna. He looked drunk or stoned but seemed to be
in more control of himself than Scott was.
"Listen to me, man..." The man that was a clown pulled Scott's
face closer to his. "Don't ever take rollers or downers and then
come up the bleacher lift, man. It'll kill you... literally. Now
you wanna find a seat over here with me or do you wanna fall the rest
of the way down the Vortex Hall?"
Slices of some sort of hydroponic citric fruit sloshed in
Janet's drink as she set it into the holder next to her cushioned
betting chair. Her leather jacket hit the chair back next. A sigh
of relief issued from her lips as it did so. The jacket's weight had
seemed oppressive through the humid walk along the conveyor to the
betting compound. Here though, in one of the dual ring tunnels that
circled the Vortex Hall arena, the air was climate controlled and
even the spin generated gravity was up to almost 75 percent. Janet
sank into the chair unselfconsciously. No one here was watching her.
Everyone was either intent on working out their betting strategies or
trying to relax before the first bout of wagering.
No one was watching except for the referee/security drone that
is. Janet smiled at the multifaceted camera eye hovering on a thick
stalk above her betting chair and console. Besides offering general
security for the Tae Guk betting patrons, it also watched/scanned for
illegal electronic/cellular paraphernalia and unfair betting methods.
The probably one sure bet in the compound was that at least fifty
percent of the gamblers would be disqualified before the first game
was over. The human refs out in the arena usually made a lot of
close calls and last minute changes to fool the novices and weed them
out early. Placing a bet too late, with insufficient funds, or
stacking the odds on individual kills were all easy to do in the heat
of the game, but all resulted in instant console disconnection.
After that first game, things usually got easier.
Except tonight. Tonight, Janet thought to herself, tonight I
have to win every game. Leave the kills to the scavengers. Those
small ante's will never add up to what I need.... what we need. Win
all the games just to get to the challenge match with a respectable
amount. Then do what every other con-artist loser is doing in this
place and bet on the underdog... and then just sweat it out.
Janet looked past the two flat screens in front of her and
towards the plexiglass ceiling overhead. She stared out through it
into the Vortex Hall. Although bright yellow lights illuminated the
entire Hall, Janet could barely make out the other side. The clear
tracks of plexiglass that separated the betters from the arena curved
around the cylindrical Hall into a light mist on the far side, fading
from view as they met each other some 40 meters distant from Janet.
A splash of red suddenly splattered across her vision and she
jumped slightly, dropping the slice of fruit that she had been
absently fiddling with. She looked more closely at the outer surface
of the plexiglass above her and saw a spray of blood from the acro-
dogs dancing in the center of the arena. Focusing her eyes back to
the center of the Hall she spotted the pair of hairless monkeys
swooping in the vortex winds and low gravity. As she watched, the
distance between the two closed rapidly and, as their long bodies
gyrated, they passed each other claws extended to slice the other.
Janet looked back down at the slice of fruit that she had
dropped on the carpeted floor. She reached down, picked it up, and
turned it over in her hands. Her absent tearing and the floor's
impact had smashed it into a facial resemblance, a smiling face.
Janet smiled back at it and then placed it on top of the referee
drone overhead. The drone dipped on its stalk imperceptibly and the
smiling fruit face slid off and landed on one of the flickering flat
screens. Janet frowned and flicked off the slice with a finger.
Under the drying juices, the screen held the picture of two men
talking avidly about the upcoming events. Janet recognized them
instantly from her experiences in the off-track betting halls down in
Houston. She thumbed the volume down on the console and then reached
for the earphones. Slipping them into a new pair of the small
sanitary cases provided, Janet noticed that her credit finally had
cleared and she could start thinking about where to place it on the
complex console. She fitted the phones into her ears and flicked the
volume up until it was just loud enough to create a buzz of
excitement and anticipation.
Kwanchaan looked up from the black granite sink and into the
wide mirror mounted over it. He saw his tired face reflected there,
slight bags of dark skin beneath his dark eyes. He smiled then and
tried to light up his face. It worked, his face always took on a
confident and almost healthy sheen when he animated it. Some people
have natural beauty emblazoned on their still, restful faces while
some have to express their beauty through motion, Kwan thought. I
guess I'm one of the latter. My charisma just takes a little work.
"Nice smile you got there, sir."
Kwan turned to his left and took the plush towel that the
attendant offered him. Wiping off his damp chin, he studied the
hunched, white suited man.
"Thanks, but it won't get you a bigger tip." Kwan handed back
the towel and turned back toward the mirror.
"That's okay. I'm not in it for the money."
Kwan raised his eyebrows slightly and looked at the attendant's
reflection in the mirror. "What else would you be 'in it' for?" he
asked.
The attendant shrugged inside his starched uniform and started
to arrange the many varied colognes spread out on his silver cart.
"Word is," he said, almost secretively, "there's a maintenance sweep
coming through Tae Guk tonight. I just got this gig yesterday, just
in time."
Kwan looked quickly back at his own reflection, pretending to
straighten his Spindle jacket. He had just gotten it pressed at an
all night cleaners in Chamber 3. It had taken the last few credits
he had left after he gave the most of it to Janet to gamble with.
"It's all right for you fancy types in your cool credit clothes,
but for us regular people who have to prove our right to live here,
we have to worry about every last credit... every shitty job we can
hold... and I just heard that they're fuckin' raising the min-cred
limit again..."
The attendant cut himself off suddenly as he realized that he
could lose his job from talking to the clients that way.
"Don't worry," Kwan said to him softly. "I'm a lot more like
you than you think."
The attendant wrinkled his face and watched Kwan as he left the
rest room and stepped back into the lounge of the Through Door.
Kwan sauntered back over to his stool at the sliver of a bar
that wrapped around the edge of the dining pit. The large fire in
the center of the restaurant was leaping higher now and its low
crackle could be heard beneath the clinking glasses and scrape of
silverware. Kwan looked across the dining pit to the other side of
the circular bar. He could just make out the thin bartender through
the smoke that rose in a fluted column to the copper ventilation
scoop overhead. The image of the bartender's skinny body wavered in
the turbulent air's thermals, making him twist in a sort of obscene
snake dance.
Kwan touched the service wire at the edge of the bar and saw the
bartender's head whip around gracefully. Kwan raised his hand
tentatively and the small platform that the server was standing on
began to slide silently around the edge of the pit towards him. Kwan
swayed forward on the balls of his feet nervously a couple of times
and patted his pockets to ensure that he indeed had remembered to
throw all of his identification, including his data pouch into the
toilet's incinerating disposal system. He felt naked.
"What can I get for you, sir?" the thin bartender snaked up to
him.
"I'll have a vodka-collins."
"Right away, sir." The bartender reached below the bar to the
tubes of well drinks that ran along its length. He quickly moved his
hands in an indiscernible fashion and suddenly produced the drink,
poured in a short hi-ball glass. "Shall I charge that to your
table, sir?"
"Of course."
"Your table chit?"
"I misplaced it in the bathroom, friend." Kwan smiled at the
long frowning face.
The bartender's thin lips pursed for a moment, then replied, "No
problem, sir. Can you tell me which table..."
"I'm with the Stone/Spindle party." Kwan gestured to the long
table below surrounded by several white coated servers.
The bartender raised his eyebrows slightly. "Of course, sir.
I'll see that the table is charged."
"Thank you."
Kwan sipped at his drink and looked down over his new
benefactor's table as the bartender slid away toward another rich
client. At the head of the table of about twenty people sat Raymond
Stone. On either side of him sat two stunningly attractive women.
Patricia Spindle sat quietly on his left, looking bored, while Jerri
engaged Stone in a lively conversation to his right. Kwan smiled as
he saw Jerri flirt with Stone. She really was good, he thought.
Although, a boring fart like Raymond Stone wasn't much of a match for
even a mediocre social engineer. Still a man like him was hard to
get to, especially on Tae Guk.
When Kwan had first entered the restaurant, he had tried to
catch Jerri's eye. If she saw him she had made no reaction at the
time. He had hoped she would see him and attempt to get him closer
to Spindle. But after twenty minutes of pacing around the dining
pit, Jerri still had not made a positive move.
A flash of white caught Kwan's eye then as a short serving
person broke from the ranks of waiters standing around the table and
approached Stone. The white coat bent over towards Stone's ear and
apparently whispered something. Stone just waved him off with one
hand and continued his conversation with Jerri. Patricia Spindle
however caught the waiter's arm and pulled him over to her. After a
brief exchange the waiter pointed up toward Kwan.
Kwan smiled and pretended to look into the fire for a moment.
Looks like my charging scheme is about to pay off, he thought. He
looked back down at the table, but Spindle's chair was empty. He
scanned the sea of tables quickly and spotted her, tailed by two
beefy looking white coats, on her way up the shallow stairs to the
bar level.
Kwanchaan swallowed the last of his drink quickly and prepared
himself to meet an irritated Patricia Spindle.
Raymond Stone jumped slightly when Patricia pushed her chair
back suddenly and left the table. He looked back to Jerri who
widened her eyes inquisitively.
"I guess my attention to you has left her a little cold." Stone
smiled half-heartedly.
"She seems to really love you, Ray." Jerri looked at him
frankly.
"Yes she really does...." Stone glanced over at Patricia's
retreating back as she climbed the stairs to the upper level of the
restaurant. "You know, I really think I..." He trailed off quietly
and turned back to Jerri.
"I can see why though," Jerri said. "I actually am really
surprised by you."
"What do you mean?" Stone shifted uncomfortably.
"Well, not to sound offensive, but the media always portrays you
as so... well... stiff. A bit of a prude."
Stone smiled widely. "I guess I am, in a way. Things have
changed since I met Patricia."
Jerri looked down at the small plate of long, thin slices of
vegetables layered over a beige cream sauce set in front of her. She
couldn't figure Stone out. He seemed to flirt with her and then have
bouts of longing for Patricia. I'm either going to have to go for
broke or give up, she thought. And having Fish hanging over my
shoulder isn't making it any easier.
Jerri looked up from her plate, composing her face for a final
try at seduction. She settled her napkin over her thighs and turned
her gaze over to Stone's, reaching for his hand under the table.
But her hand halted prematurely as she saw a strange
manipulative look come into his eyes. Stone was smiling at her
slightly and fingering a long stick-like object in his hands. She
looked at the stick closer and realized it was a yellow writing pen.
Recognition flashed through her mind.
"I believe this is yours." He handed the pen to her. "Jacob
asked me to return it to you since he went to the Vortex Hall
tonight."
"Oh... thank you." Jerri held the pen in her lap.
"I seem to recognize that type of pen," Stone said matter of
factly.
"Yes," Jerri quickly answered. "It's a popular model in the
UK."
"No... I think I saw something like it during some of my
business travels. Perhaps it is a company pen of some type?"
Jerri did her best to look confused. "I'm not sure where I
picked it up... It could be a..."
Stone cut her off with a snap of his fingers. "I remember. It
was during my visit to Rostenkowski at Caterpillar." Stone looked
into Jerri's eyes, suddenly serious. "Are you sure that isn't a
Caterpillar pen?"
"Oh my, I think you're right," Jerri exclaimed without missing a
beat. "I had an old boyfriend who was a Cat exec. He left the pen
at my hotel room the last time I saw him." Jerri looked away from
Stone nonchalantly.
"Well, now's the chance to return it."
Jerri snapped her head back to look at Stone, who wore an
unerasable smirk on his face. "What do you mean?" Janet inquired
too loudly.
"Well... Isn't that your old boyfriend up there?" Stone
gestured up over Jerri's head to the overhanging balcony.
Jerri turned and saw Patricia Spindle backed by two of Stone's
bodyguards, talking to a very cornered looking Kwanchaan. The silent
bartender slid by the overhead group on his platform and deftly
picked up a drained glass and slid on.
Stone cleared his throat behind Jerri's turned head. "You know,
we really weren't expecting you until tomorrow night."
Company Man 2.6 by Patrick
Hurh
copyright
1994
"Well, the bitch looks strong, alright, but the prick has about had
it, so I'd say the first game'll probably start within a few
minutes." Grady turned back from the neighboring spectator and
looked at Scott again and shrugged his shoulders. "Hey, man. I
didn't know this asshole was siting here."
Scott nodded his head and looked out into the middle of the Vortex
Hall. The asshole next to Grady had been complaining loudly for the
last fifteen minutes about the lateness of the starting time. Jesus,
Scott thought. Even I know that the game can't start until one of
the acro-dogs bites it.
The long figures of the genetically engineered monkeys could be
clearly seen slicing against a light background of humidity. Every
now and again the triangular delta of a tail would fan out, catching
the whirling vortex wind, as one of the two mates prepared for
another swoop. The blood hardly ever reached this far back into the
axis bleachers behind the goals, but just earlier a particularly
brutal engagement of the acro-dogs had left a spray of red droplets
across the crowd about five rows down from him. Those sprayed had
seemed especially pleased with this unexpected drizzle, rising from
their seats and cheering loudly. Scott wondered if it would have
affected the impatience of the spectator sitting on the other side of
Grady. He looked over to study the irritable man, however Grady was
blocking his view.
"Hey, Grady."
"Yeah, man?"
"Are you sure there wasn't some guy in a clown outfit on that
elevator with us?" Scott rubbed his bristly face with one hand.
"I'm sure I saw something..."
"I'm sure you saw a lot of things with all those Susans you took."
"Yeah, I guess... but this clown guy threw up in the elevator. It
got all over everyone. I can't believe I just imagined it... and the
guy who sold me that stuff told me they were Pink Octals."
"Scott." Grady placed a hand on Scott's sweaty shoulder. "You were
the one that threw up in the bleacher lift, man. Don't you remember?
I'm the guy that picked you up off the aisle stairs after you fell
out of the elevator."
Scott rubbed his face again, this time with both hands. "Jesus,
those Susans must be... Hey..." Scott peered at Grady's face through
his fingers. "How'd you know my name?"
"You told me," Grady replied laboriously. "You told me about a
hundred times after we sat down here, man."
Both men looked out at the tiring acro-dogs. One of them had lost a
limb now. Scott couldn't tell which one.
"Man, I'm really messed up."
Janet had gone over the stats for the first game a couple of times.
That was all they warranted, the novice teams being almost evenly
matched. She reached forward and tapped on a peripheral touch pad.
The circular symbol on it lit red and her credit total, displayed at
the top of the console, diminished by 50 units. Long shot, she
thought. But worth it for later on.
She looked up through the plexiglass to see if the acro-dogs' bodies
had been cleared from the arena yet, but she couldn't really make out
what was going on in the small huddle of grounds-keepers on the far
side of the Hall. She looked back at the two vid screens. On one of
them was another boring player interview, but on the other was a
close-up of the clean-up crew. Janet saw one of the grounds-keepers
straighten suddenly, shouldering a quaint wooden rifle and aiming at
the bloody mess between her feet. A sharp flash and a muffled crack
followed. The bitch must have survived the fall, Janet thought.
Only to be killed by a part-time cleaner. A roar went up in the
crowd.
It makes me wonder why we do it, she said to herself. Outfitting
ourselves for survival like those scientists engineer and raise those
monkeys for fighting. Only to face death when our purpose has been
fulfilled. I guess we do it because there isn't anything better to
do. Like those monkeys, I've never known anything else and when I
face the unknown I just have to let instinct run its course. I hope
I get to see the face behind the bullet that rips through me.
Janet smiled, amused at her musing, and looked about her. The
tension in the betting compound had upped a couple of notches with
the deaths of the acro-dogs. Two late comers rushed by her looking
for an open console before the all the unoccupied one were locked
out. The air was still hissing coldly about them, although now the
hiss was interrupted occasionally by faint curses as gamblers
misplaced a bet or chided each other over the odds they had locked in
at.
She looked down at her own board. Only about half a dozen of the
thirty or so indicator lights were glowing. Just a few large and
safe bets, she thought. Plus just a few kills to place when things
got boring.
Up above her, on either side of the plexiglass ceiling, the player
conveyor tracks groaned into life. They shuddered slightly and then
began to move in their circuitous route around the periphery of the
cylindrical Vortex Hall, both in the same direction, opposite of the
Station spin. Suddenly cheers went up as the novice Vortex teams
stormed out of their locker rooms and jogged next to their respective
tracks. This game had one team, the Saints, in green and the other,
the Nay Sayers, in yellow. Janet could imagine the loud ruffle of
their loose uniforms as they ran by her position behind the
plexiglass. After running a full revolution about the Hall, the
players burst into sprints and then jumped upon the conveyor belts.
Only a couple of the rookies stumbled and went to their knees on the
belts. Another roar from the crowd.
Janet checked out her board again and switched one of the vid-screens
over to the individual players' odds channel. Silently, small
checkmarks went next to the players' names who faltered on the
conveyor leap. In unison the kill odds on those players were cut in
half. Janet made a mental note of the players' jersey numbers and
looked back overhead.
The players were now speeding by at quick pace and the lead players
were beginning to run again, this time on the conveyor belts
themselves. The other players began to follow them each lagging the
other by about 4 meters. Suddenly the lead player from each team
jumped mightily into the air and snapped their arms and legs outward,
stretching taut the loose fabric of their uniforms into yellow and
green kites. They sailed backwards and upwards into the middle of
the Hall, now unbound by the gravity of Station spin, but buffeted by
the swirling winds of the Hall's thick atmosphere. The other players
quickly followed and soon all the players were lofted into the
Vortex.
Janet quickly looked down at her betting console. The floating,
spinning players disoriented her. She much preferred to watch the
coverage on the vid-screen. She switched the players' odds channel
over to a game play channel and was greeted with a close-up shot of
the end of the pellet canon as it readied to fire the first game
pellet into play.
A boom echoed through the hall and rumbled Janet's seat beneath her.
She stared at the vid-screen as the camera drone tracked the pellet
out into the Hall. Instead of a shiny chrome color, the randomly
selected game pellet was a bright red.
"It's red!" exclaimed a woman with binoculars behind them. "It's a
red pellet!" An appreciative murmur rose from the spectators around
Scott and Grady.
Scott squinted into the Vortex Hall. "What's red?" he asked.
"The game pellet." Grady shaded his eyes, having trouble locating
the pellet himself from their bad seats. "I think if it's red it
means something to the gamblers..."
"It means that the better wins a video drone for the duration of the
games!" exasperated the spectator on the other side of Grady. "If
the better placed the bet properly, that is."
"So what?" replied Scott. As Scott sobered, he realized that this
irritating fan was really grating on his nerves.
"So.... it's an amazing advantage for the better. He can see things
the other betters can't. Up to the final challenge match, that is.
Then the better loses the drone." The obnoxiously knowledgeable
spectator sized up Scott with nod of his pudgy head. "This your
first Vortex, rookie?"
Scott bristled. "Yeah, it is. But I don't see why that gives
you..."
"Hold on there, Scotty," Grady interrupted as Scott began to pull
himself to his full height. "Don't be in such a hurry to be an
asshole, man." The know-it-all hid behind Grady's shoulder slightly
and pretended to watch the start of the game. Scott swayed slightly
on his feet and, realizing Grady was right, settled back to his seat
on the plastic bleacher.
Out in the middle of the Vortex Hall, the red game pellet floated,
making small orbits around the center of null gravity as the vortex
winds buffeted it back and forth. Players from both teams swooped
through what must have been strategic paths between the two hooped
end goals. The goals were about a meter in diameter and eerily
floated at either end of the cylindrical Hall along the Hall's axis
of rotation. To Scott, the players seemed to be rotating and moving
wildly in a chaotic pattern, the outstretched flaps of their uniforms
catching the swirling air currents. But then he realized that, since
the players had canceled the Station spin using the conveyors and
since he was still spinning with the Station, the players only seemed
to be rotating madly about the Vortex Hall. From their own
perspective they may in fact be in highly predictable patterns
relative to each other. After a few minutes of squinting, Scott
found himself being able to visualize the player's positions and the
patterns of their swooping.
Suddenly a yellow player that was circling on the outer periphery
stretched his arms and legs to full sail, caught a tremendous vortex
wind, and, doubling up his body into a small golden ball, used the
speed to slice his way toward the central game pellet. At the same
time a green suited player that was hanging on to the rim of one of
the end goals, launched herself down the axis of the Hall, using the
vortex winds to torque his body into a living propeller. The ball
that was the yellow player sprung open as it neared the pellet and
stuck out a gloved hand to scoop up the red orb. But the green
player, now a swirl of motion, caught the pellet in the folds of her
uniform just before her opponent could reach it. The heavy pellet
quickly fell loose of the thin fabric, but not before the green
player was able to launch it at considerable speed, using her cape-
like suit as a sling, towards a team mate. A cheer went up from the
crowd as the receiving player caught the pellet in his glove, his
body set into a quick spin by the absorbed inertia.
Scott found himself on his feet with the rest of the spectators as
the opening plays unfolded. It was almost impossible for him not to
get caught up in the action as his mind tried to unravel the patterns
the players wove in the Vortex Hall as they passed the heavy pellet
back and forth.
A deep pitched horn blared suddenly and a collective groan issued
from the audience. The players seemed to lose their determination
and started to float laxly, looking about them.
"What's going on?" Scott asked.
"Penalty of some kind, I guess." Grady started to sit back down.
"Bummer. Just when the Saints were starting to get it together."
Scott sat down next to Grady. "Is that your favorite team?"
"Naw, man. I just put a fiver on a three point spread, though."
"Three point spread?" Their obnoxious neighbor couldn't keep his
mouth shut. "On the Saints? Come on now, you must be desperate for
dosh or something..."
"What... You think the NaySayers can come back after MJ retired
during mid-season?" Grady turned his back on Scott to begin
discussing stats and odds with the pudgy man. Scott rubbed his face
and looked back at the Vortex Hall, trying to sober up a little
faster.
The gambling talk next to him made Scott think about Janet for the
first time since he sat down in the bleachers. He wondered how she
was doing. It was going to take a long streak of luck, he supposed,
to build up the credit that Kwan had lost from Cat. His hand went
quickly to the sunglasses in his jacket, only to find that he wasn't
wearing his jacket. Scott panicked for a moment, but then felt the
comforting bulge of the glasses in one of his pants' pockets. He
withdrew the glasses, wondering when he had remembered to transfer
the glasses from his jacket to his pants. Then he wondered when he
had lost his jacket. Man, those Lazy Susans really kicked my ass, he
thought.
The glasses slipped comfortably on his head and he thumbed them on,
linking up to the Tae Guk grid. He reached in his other pocket and
grabbed the one data egg that lay there. His hand, sweaty from the
humidity and the game's excitement, wrapped around it and he began to
send out a data search for Janet. He halted suddenly when he
realized that there was no easy to contact her while she was in the
sequestered betting compound.
Scott looked past the data constructs floating in his vision and
looked back at the game. The pellet was back in play. He began to
take the glasses off and then realized that he should at least leave
a message for Fish. He started to massage the chorder in his pocket
when Grady spoke to him.
"Getting too bright in here for you, man?"
Scott glanced at Grady. "Yeah, I guess I'm still coming down off
those Susans."
"Hey man, I got something that'll take the edge off that Susan high.
Some killer blues'll mute those bright photons, man."
"No way. I got into enough trouble earlier... besides I'm broke."
Scott looked away hoping Grady wouldn't push him on it. Why was he
trusting Grady so much anyway, he said to himself.
"I'll take those sunglasses for five blues, man. Those are pretty
hip shades." Grady peered closer at Scott's glasses.
"No way, Grady. You're out of luck... man." Scott heavily
emphasized the word 'man'.
"Okay, okay Scotty. But you don't know what your missing." Grady
turned his head back to the game.
Scott wiped another layer of moisture from his forehead and started
to chord a message for Kwan, putting it in Chris Pike's name, of
course. "Why's it so hot and humid in here?" he mumbled.
"That's so then the pellet can cut through the..." Grady started to
answer before being cut off by the neighboring fan.
"That's an old wives' tale, you yippie. The atmosphere is kept wet
'cause it's the only way to keep an atmosphere all the way through
the Hall. The players wouldn't get any oxygen at the center, if
the..."
Scott let Grady and his new found buddy argue as he composed his
message. Nothing much to tell Fish except that they made it to the
Vortex Hall all right. Well, almost all right, Scott thought as he
glanced at the two next to him.
The vid-screen caught Kwanchaan's attention as they entered the posh
hotel room. It was tuned to the coverage of the Vortex Hall and Kwan
crossed the deep pile of living organic carpet and stood in front of
it. Patricia Spindle came up behind him and reached her hand out to
tap the power switch. Kwan sidled against her arm to stop her.
"Aren't you interested in the games? I thought the challenge team
tonight was your Uncle's?"
Patricia moved away from Kwan's body and slouched against one of the
engraved silver pillars that lined the large vid-screen unit. "Come
on now, Chris. Why would I be interested in Uncle Phil's team
tonight... especially tonight?" She passed a hand through her blonde
hair. "Besides, Jacob's fixed the game anyway."
"Jacob fixed the game so Arachniware would lose?" Kwan questioned.
"Yes, of course. It was the only way to make sure he'd not be
hanging around tonight. He just loves screwing over Phillip whenever
he can."
Kwan looked back at the vid-screen and saw the orange suited Spiders
start to leap expertly onto the player conveyors. He raised his hand
and rubbed at his upper lip; it was suddenly damp with moisture.
"You okay, Chris? Is anything wrong?" She sounded nervous.
Kwan looked back at Patricia. "Uh, yeah... I mean, no. Nothing's
wrong."
Patricia laughed for a moment and then looked straight at Kwan and
said, seriously, "I still can't believe we're doing this."
"You mean this?" Kwan stepped toward Patricia and cocked his head to
maneuver his lips against hers. Patricia practically jumped away
from him.
"No," she laughed again. "You know what I mean."
Kwan stepped toward her again.
"Come on, Chris. The guards aren't watching anymore..."
"Well... exactly," Kwan smirked.
There came a sudden swish then as the doors to the room slid open and
Raymond Stone's voice boomed out to the body guards standing watch
outside the entrance. "...and don't go running to the tabloids with
this one, boys!"
Kwan purposefully stepped close to Patricia and put his hand around
her waist, hoping to spark Stone's temper. However, as Stone came
around the corner from the room's foyer, Kwan saw that he was not
alone. Raymond had Jerri in tow and she did not look very happy
about it.
Patricia wriggled out of Kwan's grasp and trotted over to Stone where
she was received with a warm embrace. Jerri, now free of Stone
crossed to Kwan and gave him a confused and frustrated look.
"He knows you're from Cat," she whispered.
"What?" Kwan's return whisper was clearly audible.
"We weren't expecting you until tomorrow night," Stone said. He
stood with his arms around Patricia. "I've got a flechette in the
bedroom," he told Kwan plainly. "But other than that we're
practically naked."
Kwan didn't let his surprise show on his face. "Show me."
Stone walked briskly back through one of the penthouse's elaborate
doorways, still holding onto Patricia with one hand.
Kwanchaan, following the couple slowly, whispered to Jerri. "What
the fuck's going on?"
"I don't know," she replied. "He told me the same thing and then
just started flirting with me again as if nothing happened.
Something is very wrong."
"Yeah, very wrong," Kwan repeated as he entered the bedroom.
Stone sat on the edge of a round bed. He was expertly slapping a
fresh cartridge of needles into the flechette pistol. Looking up at
Kwan he said, "It's not much, but I figured you wouldn't be able to
get anything in past her bodyguards." He gestured at Patricia, who
was busy changing her shoes on the other side of the bed.
"Let me see it." Kwan held out his hand, genuinely surprised when
Stone handed him the weapon without question. Kwan raised an eyebrow
and, trying to look in command, said, "Better than nothing." He
turned the pistol over once in his hand. "Where's your comm unit?"
he asked suddenly.
"Behind the couch in the other room," Stone answered.
Kwan strode out of the bedroom. He heard Patricia call out, "It's a
clean unit, just like you said..."
Kwan thought, "What the hell?" and then logged onto the comm unit as
Chris Pike.
Scott almost jumped up after Grady and Bob when he thought he saw his
jacket tucked under Grady's arm. Then he thought better of it.
Better to stay where I know where I am, he said to himself. Grady
and the pudgy sports fan he had befriended continued down the aisle
stairs toward a vacant bleacher closer to the action. The seats had
been emptied when an Spider had lost control and fell into the
spectators there. It looked like most of the struck fans survived,
but the Spider didn't. The clean up crew had scrubbed the plastic
bench, but most of the spectators were still loathe to sit where the
body had just smeared. But not Grady and Bob, they jumped at the
chance.
I wonder if that really was my jacket Grady had, Scott thought.
Seems to me I traded it for those first Pink Octals... Could Grady
have been taking me for a ride this whole time? Jesus, I really
can't trust anyone. He straightened up and tried to forget the
incident. It's just a jacket, after all.
Scott's sunglasses vibrated in his hand for a one second pulse. They
vibrated again as he shoved them on his head. A glowing two way
arrow was there, floating in his vision. He grabbed the data egg in
his pocket and started a real time encrypted ascii conversation with
Chris Pike:
SCOTT.... <BREAK>
PLEASE ANSWER IMMEDIATELY. <BREAK>
SCOTT, PUT ON YOUR DAMN SHADES!!!<BREAK>
FISH, I'M HERE. ARE YOU CERTAIN THIS IS A CLEAN
CONVERSATION?<BREAK>
SCOTT! LISTEN TO ME.
SOMETHING IS VERY WRONG WITH S/S SITUATION.
1 DO NOT LET J BET ON SPIDERS, GAME IS FIXED
2 TAKE WHATEVER SHE'S WON AND BUY US TRANSPORT TO SPINDLE STATION
3 MEET US AT THE SERVICE DOCKS<BREAK>
I CAN'T GET A MESSAGE TO J <BREAK>
FIND A WAY <BREAK>
WHY ARE WE GOING TO SPINDLE? THERE'S A MAINTENANCE SWEEP TONIGHT.
PASSAGE OFF TAE GUK WILL BE $$$ <BREAK>
CAN'T ANSWER NOW, JUST DO IT <BREAK>
HOW WILL I FIND YOU AT DOCKS? <BREAK>
YOU'LL SEE <BREAK><BREAK><BREAK>
Company Man 2.7 by Patrick
Hurh
copyright
1994
The vid-screen picture lazily panned about the image of a
Gothics player in auto-aim mode as the blue-suited figure rotated
through the Vortex Hall. Janet checked the jersey number, 23,
against her mental list of rookies to watch. It would be nice to
nail one more before the final match, she thought and looked back
down at her betting console.
The touch panel's surface was blinking red in most areas,
betting in those categories being timed out this late in the game.
But a few were still black, waiting for last second gambles, if she
were willing. Janet unfocused her eyes to get the feel of the
betting console overall, the symmetry of her wins sparkling in green
versus the red timed-out areas and the yet to be filled voids of
black.
A sudden motion on the vid-screen caught her attention and her
left hand instinctively went for the kill panel. She waited until
she was sure of the player's intentions, looking for the nervous
eyes, the adrenaline sweat, and the psychotic twitch of a rookie
going for his first kill. There, she thought and slapped her hand on
the betting button a split second before the player made his move.
Next to her, Janet heard the curse of a gambler who was too late.
She smiled. This is too easy with the drone, she thought. But I'm
not complaining.
Her thumb reached forward and flicked the auto-zoom toggle off
on the video drone controller, but left the auto-aim on. The vid-
screen showed the rookie Gothic swooping away from the camera and
toward a lone opponent floating on the periphery of the arena. The
opponent, outfitted in white, had just caught the game pellet in her
glove and was wildly looking for a way to get rid of it before the
Gothic, obviously bent on a kill move, slashed his way to her. A
black and white ref drone entered the vid-screen picture from the
corner, silently observing the action, ready to stop play if the
white player was attacked after she had passed the pellet on to a
team mate.
Janet watched in the murmuring quiet of the betting compound.
She thumbed the zoom in to feel closer to the action and wondered for
a moment if she had made the right gamble. That white player looked
awfully panicky. Perhaps number 23 would get a kill after all...
instead of being killed.
On the vid-screen, the Gothic player seemed to move in slow
motion before his final approach. He tumbled slightly in a high
pressure pocket and then let the Vortex Wind spin him up to a furious
speed. He shot out at the frantic white player, his body tucked into
a tight ball.
His opponent met him with a wide stare. She cocked a white
fabric wing to one side of her body and, giving up on passing the
pellet to a team mate, wound up to sling the pellet... directly at
the descending number 23. Her body snapped around with the wind and
the chrome pellet popped out as a streak. She struggled to get out
of his path.
Number 23, unnerved by the counterattack, snapped his blue
uniform taut. His long arms careened and flapped like a clumsy bird
for a half second before the pellet struck his exposed side.
He crumpled instantly and clutched his side in pain. His
folded form whizzed by the player in white and tumbled, battered by
the winds, to the spinning plexiglass arena floor. The body, held
together only by the fabric of his blue uniform, smeared and skidded
fifteen meters before coming to rest almost directly over Janet.
She looked up at it and smiled. Her fingers dialed up the
volume on her ear phones and she listened to the roar of the crowd.
"So Mr. Pike, you're in charge of this... Are we leaving right
away?"
Kwan stared back calmly at Raymond Stone. Something was not
right, he thought. Something was definitely wrong.
"I thought we'd wait for a little while, perhaps until the
maintenance sweep," Kwan finally replied. He glanced at Jerri. She
was studying Stone's face, her own barely revealing her intense
scrutiny.
"But no one knows when the sweep is coming!" Patricia crossed
the living room to stand next to Stone. Her hand nervously reached
for his. "We should put as much distance behind us while we can."
Kwan looked down at the flechette pistol in his hand. He
thumbed the safety off and, still handling the gun casually, looked
up at the pair. Stone was eyeing him suspiciously. Kwan pointed the
gun in his direction.
"Something's not right here," Stone said. "You're not from Cat
are you?"
Kwan smiled and let silence fill the room.
"Who are you?"
Jerri took a step closer to Kwan and watching Stone closely
said, "The question is, Raymond... who are _you_?" Stone just
glanced at her and then stared back at Kwan.
Kwan motioned with the pistol. "Stone or whoever you are, move
away from Patricia... slowly... and sit down on the couch." He half
squeezed the trigger and the flechette's spring mechanism cocked with
a wet snick. Stone raised his hands slowly and began to move away
from Patricia. She moved with him, clutching at his hand.
"Wait!" Patricia exclaimed. "We were supposed to go
together... you can't separate us!"
Kwan jerked his head at Jerri and she moved around behind Kwan
to Patricia's side. She pulled on Patricia's arm and they both
separated from Stone. Patricia looked about her in a daze, her
fingers trembling. She began to mumble softly.
"I don't know who you are," Kwan said to Stone. "But you're
getting in the way." Stone raised an eyebrow. "Now, sit down, keep
your hands where I can see them, and, when I tell you to, call for
your bodyguards."
Jerri held on to Patricia with both arms and looked at Kwan.
In her arms, Patricia said, "I thought it was almost over. I thought
we were finally going to get away..."
Kwan ignored her and kept his aim on Stone who was looking
toward Patricia. "It's never over," he said tiredly and began to sit
down on the low couch. Kwan relaxed his aim slightly and glanced
over at the comm unit.
Suddenly, Stone, his legs bunched beneath him from the action
of sitting down, launched himself at Kwan with surprising speed. One
hand caught under Kwan's gun-holding wrist, the other powered up
against Kwan's jaw. Kwan's head bent back smoothly and he collapsed
his body to roll with the attack in the low gravity. Jerri jerked
Patricia out of the way and covered her widening mouth with a sweaty
hand.
Stone landed on top of the soft living carpet next to a
scrambling Kwan, his hand still clutching Kwan's wrist. He gave it a
practiced squeeze and the flechette dropped out of Kwan's grip. Kwan
flipped over quickly and jabbed with his free hand at Stone's exposed
kidneys. Stone groaned and released him.
Kwan sprung to his feet spryly and jumped back a step from
Stone who was rolling quickly toward him. Stone's arm whipped out
and grabbed the fallen flechette pistol. He swung it in to bear on
Kwan. But Kwan was already in motion, his right foot snapping in the
air in front of him. It hit the outstretched pistol with a crack and
the weapon went flying across the room. It clattered against a
stucco wall. Jerri released her hold on Patricia and went after it.
Stone got to his feet and squared off against Kwan, one hand
held high, the other moving repetitively in a low scooping motion.
Kwan hesitated and then feinted with a left jab. Stone moved to
block it and Kwan leapt high off his right leg and spun away from
Stone with his left leg kicking out backwards at Stone's face. Stone
deftly caught Kwan's foot and gave it a rough twist before shoving
the smaller man to the ground. He dove on Kwan's body.
But Kwan, rebounding from the floor in the low gravity, was
able to get a foot in the middle of Stone's descending chest. When
his back hit the floor again, he pushed Stone's body with his leg.
Stone flew up and over Kwan's head and hit the hotel room wall upside
down with a crash.
Kwan scrambled to his feet again just as Jerri yelled at them.
She had found the pistol and now approached Stone quickly, the thin
barrel pointed at his head. "Okay, slowly, Stone!" she yelled again.
Kwan, breathing hard, looked around for Patricia. She was
running to the comm unit behind the couch. "Jerri," he yelled.
"Let's get the fuck out of here..."
Patricia's hand descended on the comm unit panel and a blaring
siren rang out. Kwan sprinted to the front door with Jerri close
behind. He leapt at the doors just as they swished open. His arm
punched forward ahead of him and caught an entering body guard in the
solar plexus. They both flew out into the hallway and Kwan kneed the
huge man in the groin and clipped him with both hands on the side of
his head. He rolled off the inert man to see a second bodyguard
stumbling from the open doorway. The bodyguard crumpled to the
floor, turning as he fell. Kwan saw his grimaced face riddled with a
thousand flashing pinpricks.
Jerri burst into the hallway waving the flechette pistol and
pulled on Kwan's arm. She sneered at him, "Now what, Fish..."
It was a plain green sphere. Scott pumped a few chords into
the data egg and revolved around it. There was simply nothing coming
in or out of the Vortex Hall betting computer. He sighed and stared
past the geometric construct floating in his vision and out at the
arena. Another kill on the white time, he noted. Probably the last
for this game. Scott wondered if Janet had a bet riding on that one.
He refocused on the green ball. He had to contact her before the
next game, the challenge game, started. He zoomed in to the surface
of the sphere and began yet another careful survey for any sign of
input, but he was not hopeful.
Scott glanced up at the game again as the closing buzzer went
off. Around him spectators stood up and cheered. Shouts of "Tae
Guk!" started to fill the air. The crowds were priming themselves
for the challenge match. The Tae Guk Yangs had not been beat in over
two years.
Suddenly Scott's attention was drawn back to the data-plane. A
thick jumble of multi-colored data sprouted from the green globe. He
zoomed up to it quickly and clicked out macros on his data egg to
start his analysis daemons. Information came back quickly. The data
was a heavily encrypted stream of pulses all across the spectrum.
Scott sent a speedy, unobtrusive daemon up the stream. It's small
yellow form flashed up the data path towards its destination.
Scott pulled back from the data flow to a more secure position
away from the green globe to think. Within seconds the yellow daemon
was back. It flashed the addresses of the data stream's destinations
on the inner surface of Scott's sunglasses. Scott scrolled through
them quickly. They were all credit havens and customs houses. He
only had to think for an instant to know what the data consisted of.
The data stream was full of authorized credit transfers from the
gambling results of the last game.
Scott zoomed back up to the flowing data to check on his other
analysis daemons. No luck. The daemons reported high quality
encryption schemes with multiple tampering checks. Scott slumped in
his bleacher seat. Of course the data was heavily protected. They
were probably transferring millions of credits between gamblers'
accounts.... Scott straightened suddenly. He started to scan the
rest of the smooth green sphere. He had a hunch.
"I don't know... I just don't know." Stone held Patricia tight
against him. He could smell her fear mingled with his sweat.
"They were supposed to take both of us," Patricia said again.
"Why didn't they?"
The two stood in front of the comm unit in the shambles of
their Peacock hotel penthouse. Stone's finger was on the call
button. A large group of his private bodyguards waited on the other
end.
"Even if they were from Cat I really don't have a choice but to
send the guards after them. I can't blow my cover... even now." He
bent his head and kissed Patricia lightly on the forehead.
Stone pressed the button and hurriedly began to give
descriptions of the assailants to his bodyguards.
There it was, a thin drip of binary coming back to the betting
computer from the credit havens. Scott grinned and set a daemon out
to analyze the trickle of unprotected checksums. It came back
reporting very low grade security. Of course it did, Scott said to
himself. The checksums just verified the validity of the credit
transfers, not the transfers themselves. He initiated a macro to set
up a small microsecond buffer. Then started a daemon searching the
buffer for the account number of Christopher Pike.
Just a few misplaced zeros, Scott thought, and the ultra-
suspicious betting computer will have to shut down Janet's console,
at least until the next time it can verify the account data. _And_,
because the betting computer only allows i/o between games... Janet
will just have to sit out of the next game.
Scott smiled to himself as the daemon caught the Pike account
checksum packet. He made the necessary changes and then held on to
the altered data, waiting...
The cart of dirty plates and half-filled glasses smashed
against the hallway wall as Kwan pulled it violently from the service
elevator. He stabbed at the close door button and Jerri jumped
inside just as the doors swished shut. Jerri reached past him and
pushed the button marked LL. The elevator began to drop.
"I assume that's where you want to go." She glared at him.
"Just what the hell were you trying to pull? A kidnapping?"
Kwan looked past her and stared at the wall. He could feel his
full weight returning as the elevator descended. "It would be better
to have a bargaining chip when we confront Spindle at his station."
Jerri let out an exasperated sigh.
"You saw how things were going," he tried to explain. "I had
no choice. We walked into a situation we knew nothing about, and I
was trying to turn it to our advantage..."
"We knew nothing about it!" Jerri yelled. "We should have
waited until we understood the situation better!" She slumped
against a padded wall. "Stone was definitely not who he was supposed
to be..."
"Regardless," Kwan interrupted, "we have no choice but to
continue with the original plan, a frontal assault on Spindle
Station."
"What? Are you kidding? We aren't prepared for that kind of
mission! Just admit it, Kwan. You've failed. Just give up! Go
back to Cat with your tail up your yellow arse... I'm not going with
you to Spindle..."
The elevator doors swished open. A chaos of white uniformed
workers filled the large hallway that greeted them. Some pushed
carts of laundry, others carried armloads of dripping wet dishes and
buckets of silverware. All were in a hurry. Kwan stepped out into
the midst of them.
Suddenly a yell went out from Kwan's left. A white coated
woman stumbled into him clutching at her breast. A red stain spread
from beneath her fingers. Kwan caught her and looked up quickly. He
saw an approaching army of determined bodyguards pushing through the
crowd of workers. One leveled a weapon at him.
Kwan ducked back into the elevator and crouched to the floor.
He reached up and pulled Jerri down with him. "I don't think you
have much of a choice what you do... Those guys aren't going to let
you just 'give up'..." He crawled out of the elevator quickly and
darted between a couple of large laundry carts.
"Fuck!" Jerri mouthed to herself and then crawled after him.
Company Man 2.8 by Patrick
Hurh
copyright
1994
"Sweep!"
The harried man at the door turned to look back out onto the
street and then yelled it again.
"Sweep!"
He darted further into the club with his shoulders hunched and
made his way to the dark back puppet rooms. Around him a few patrons
raised their heads sharply and got to their feet, drinks forgotten.
Some followed the first man toward the back of the club. Others ran
forward to the front windows of the club to peer between tubules of
flashing neon and through smudged and scratched plexiglas.
The remaining patrons of the Shining Pebble returned to soft
conversations and wet drinks, their eyes lit with a flame of
superiority, of true belonging. The dronebox in the corner flashed
on automatically and started belching out sound, the latest popular
groove with dubbed over, karoke-type home made lyrics. The skinny
faced bartender pointed a small black box at it and it groaned into
silence.
Kwan and Jerri didn't need the warning from the first sweep-
dodger. They had just ducked into the Pebble to avoid the Sweep.
Kwan rubbed his side slowly and grimaced in pain. Looking over at
Jerri, he climbed onto a sticky stool and tried to assume the smug
countenance shown by the sitting patrons.
"It's getting tougher as we get to the end chambers," he
quietly informed Jerri. "The police know the barrel is more infested
at the bottom... where the scum coagulates."
"Right where you belong." Jerri remained standing and wiped
the sweat off her brow with a handkerchief she pulled from a hidden
pocket in her skirt.
Kwan stared at her for a moment. "You know that I didn't have
a choice... I mean, if it wasn't for me, you would have never gotten
out of the Peacock alive."
"Those goons of Stone's were idiots. I would've done fine
without you. And as far as the police are concerned, anybody could
get by them on those levels... They presume you're rich until proven
poor up there..."
A yelp came from the front of the club, near the windows. The
small cluster of sweep-dodgers there suddenly broke from the windows
and split up. One woman ran out the front door; the others headed to
the recesses of the club.
The lone woman ran up the street, away from the Pebble. Kwan
turned to watch her through the windows and saw two black helmeted
policemen chase after her. A trio of police, dressed in riot gear,
crossed in front of the windows and blocked Kwan's view. One said
something into a cellular headset and then opened the door of the
Pebble.
Kwan turned quickly back to Jerri. "Well, you might need me
down here. Let's go!"
Kwan jumped off his stool briskly and headed to the back rooms
along with several others spooked by the policemen's appearance. The
club broke into a loud buzz of voices and motion. He looked behind
him to keep in contact with Jerri, but she was still at the bar...
pretending to finish a drink.
"Jerri!" he yelled. What the hell was she up to? "Jerri!" he
called again.
A short, fat man to his right answered, "What! Who the fuck
are you?"
"Not you!" Kwan shoved himself past the man back towards the
bar.
"Asshole..." the other 'Jerri' muttered and shuffled through
one of the back room doorways. A ragged curtain closed behind him.
Kwan stepped around the last of the tables and started after
Jerri... and stopped in his tracks. He watched Jerri put down a
half-empty glass delicately and calmly walk straight toward the trio
of police. They looked at her for a moment and then returned their
dour survey to the unruly club crowd. Jerri walked proudly past the
officers and out through the front door. She disappeared around a
corner.
Kwan glanced down at himself and tried to straighten the green
lapels of his dinner jacket. They snapped back stubbornly into
pointy wrinkles. Kwan sighed and put a cheerful look on his face and
started walking toward the door. He thought about what would happen
to him if they decided to stop him... no identification, no credits,
no employment. He shuddered internally and took a long slow breath.
Just as he was passing the three officers, one of them bent his
head slightly to listen to an incoming call. Kwan could hear the
tiny buzz of fuzzy police voices from his helmet. "No, we're down in
Chamber Six now," the officer said outloud and rolled his eyes at the
other two. One of them chuckled nervously.
Kwan edged by the last policeman and stepped out the doorway.
A cold glove grabbed him by the neck and pulled at him roughly.
"Just where do you think you're going?"
Kwan tensed his shoulders for a moment, feigning panic, and
then relaxed them in submission. He let himself be drawn back toward
the officer.
"I think my date just left. I've got to catch up to..."
The policeman's brash laugh cut him off. "Right!..." the
officer exclaimed, "...you're trying to tell me that dish was with
you? Pea-sized brain to go along with that pea-sized body, I
guess..."
It was Kwan's turn to interrupt. He squatted suddenly,
doubling his legs up quickly, and felt the officer's grasp falter.
Spinning on the balls of his feet, he turned and jabbed hard at the
policeman's crotch. His stiffened hand met the hard plastic of a
protection cup, but the policeman still let out a satisfying whuff.
Kwan wrapped his arms around the man's knees and then stood, pushing
forward with his head. The policeman tumbled backward onto the other
two officers and all three collapsed into the club's entrance.
Kwan, cleanly extracting himself, tore off after Jerri. He
could hear the police as they struggled to right themselves and come
after him.
Scott mustered a silly grin and stumbled his way down the row
of spectators toward Grady. He clasped his sunglasses in one sweaty
hand while the other prodded people out of the way. Small complaints
and snickers of protest from the sitting spectators announced his
arrival to Grady ahead of him.
Grady looked up at him with a pained expression on his face.
"Hey Scott... There's no room for you down here, now, man. You
shoulda come down with us before..."
Scott held out his sunglasses and waved them quickly before
Grady's face. "Here ya go, Grady," he said. "I'll take those Blues
now if you got'em..."
"What man?" Grady screwed up his face. "I ain't got 'em
anymore... Now, get outta here before the game starts."
Scott wavered in front of Grady. "Here!" he yelled loudly.
"Here's my glasses, man. Give me those Blues!" He leaned back
purposefully and knocked the hat off a neighboring spectator, his
arms starting to pinwheel.
Grady grabbed Scott and pulled the tall Finn to him. "Ok, ok,
man... just shut up and get out of here, kid." He slipped Scott a
handful of capsule shaped beads and snatched the glasses skillfully
from Scott's grip.
"Thanks man," Scot mumbled and then backed out of the bleacher
row, trying not to step on any toes. He reached the aisle and headed
up the shallow stairs rapidly, dropping pills one by one to the
floor. They rattled silently amongst the chatter of the crowd.
That should do it, he thought to himself as he entered the
Bleacher Lift. No way was I going to keep those glasses on after
that little burn. Hopefully the Tae Guk cellular grid is tight
enough to pinpoint Grady wherever he ends up after the games. The
lift doors closed and Scott felt his welcome weight return.
Janet had just finished spreading her bets out on the console
when all the betting indicator lights went out. Not red, but
completely dark.
"What the fuck?" she whispered. Then louder, "Hey, what the
hell is this?!"
Gamblers in the console seats around her glanced her direction
and then back at their own boards. Some chuckled to themselves
quietly. Another rookie bites the dust, they thought. Janet bolted
upright and looked around the room.
"But, I didn't do anything wrong! My board just went dead!"
She looked up at the ref drone over her head and tapped its lens with
hardened fingernails. "Hey! What's wrong with you!"
"Shhh!" a disturbed gambler hissed. "The game's about to
begin!"
Two white-suited men appoached her. Janet turned to face them,
hands on her hips.
"You guys better get me another console, and quick. I got a
lot riding on this one." She gestured up over her head as the player
conveyors started up.
"I'm afraid you don't have anything riding on this one," one of
the attendants smirked. "Your credit's been put on hold until..."
"What?" Janet steamed. "On hold? What the fuck for!"
"...just until your bank's computers can confirm the
transactions from..."
"But that will be to late!" She looked around her, towards the
ref drone, down at the darkened console, and back at the attendant
reaching for her arm.
"Get your hands off me!"
"Can we offer you a drink at the bar until this is all cleared
up?" queried the other attendant as his partner drew his hand back in
a hurry, eyeing Janet's twitching muscles.
"What for? This is the last game!" Janet grabbed her leather
jacket from the betting chair and stormed by them, heading for the
compound exit.
"Miss?..." Janet heard from behind her. "...the doors will be
locked for the duration of the game!"
Janet ignored them and headed straight for the doors. At them,
a guard was just entering the locking code into a keypad mounted in
the adjoining wall. Janet leapt at him suddenly and used her
momentum to knock him out of the way. She slapped the keypad
roughly, ruining the code input, and then pushed on the doors. They
swung open smoothly. Janet strode out of the compound into the humid
heat of the Vortex Hall.
She was pissed. Scott could tell by the way she stiffly walked
through the wandering crowds of spectators. He smiled to himself and
took off after her, shouldering his way past a cheerful oriental
couple.
Janet's bright red hair made her easy to follow and he caught
up to her a few moments later. She was leaning up against one of the
large aluminum girders that flanked one of the Hall's main gates.
"Well, Janet. Shouldn't you be in there making us all kinds of
dosh?" He couldn't help but smile gently.
"It wasn't my fault!" she erupted. "The damn thing just shut
down... I had it all wrapped up too!" She pulled away from the
girder and started to walk away with her head down. "God damn
fucking assholes..." she muttered.
Scott followed behind her, still grinning. Suddenly Janet spun
around.
"What bank had Fish's money?" she blurted out. "Get out your
goggle thingies... I want to get hold of them..."
Scott shrugged his shoulders, palms up. Janet kept on talking,
looking at Scott but not seeing him.
"I want to squeeze those bastards so hard, damn it!" She took
him by the shoulders and stared up at his face. "Let's burn 'em
Scott. Let's fucking forget this Fish stuff and burn that bank. You
and I could do it. Couldn't you just get some..."
"Janet," Scott interrupted. "Janet, I closed down your
account."
"...no, wait. If I went into the bank dressed as one of those
meat puppet girls dropping off a load of hard cred for..."
"Janet," Scott tried again. "I closed that fucking account so
you couldn't fucking bet on the challenge match!"
"...what..." Janet said vaguely. Then again, "What? What the
hell did you do that for?! God damn it, Scott, I can't stand
assholes!"
"I did it because Fish wired me that I wasn't supposed to let
you bet on the last game..." Janet wrinkled her brow in question.
"Supposedly it's a fixed game..."
Janet relaxed slightly and let go of Scott's arms. "That
little asshole," she said quietly. Her hair muted down a few hue
levels. "What are we supposed to do now? I didn't make that much
money... Is the whole fucking thing called off?"
"I... I don't know, I guess." Scott's voice faltered.
"What do you mean, you guess?"
"Well, Fish told me to try to book a ship to Spindle Station
from the aft service docks and wait for him and Jerri..."
"Doesn't sound like it's off to me," Janet replied. "Although,
I'm not sure I cherish the thought of trying to infiltrate Spindle
with you bozos."
"Do you think you made enough money to pay for transport to..."
"Yeah, plenty enough for that."
"Are you sure?" Scott questioned. "There's a Sweep on tonight
and prices for refuge or transport will be high."
"Sweep? No wonder there's so many cops out here tonight."
Janet looked around her. "There go a couple now."
Scott twisted around and spied the policemen. One was busy
talking on his headset. The other was surveying the crowd. Suddenly
the one talking jerked his head, the black helmet bobbing amongst the
throng of spectators. He raised a hand and signaled inconspicuously
toward the main gate.
Scott looked back in that direction. To his surprise he saw
another trio of policemen in riot gear just arriving at the gate, not
four meters from where he and Janet stood.
He jerked on the sleeve of Janet's jacket.
"Come on let's get out of here."
They rounded the corner into the alleyway, feet slipping on
puddles of ethylene glycol and water. Kwan started running again.
Jerri reached out and pulled on Kwan's shoulder.
"You ass! Now the police will be all over us, all the way to
the docks!"
Kwan said nothing. He broke her grasp and started to run.
Jerri glanced behind her, thought of the pursuing police and then
lightly ran after Kwan.
Ten meters into the alley were stacked several tiers of boxes
on plastic palettes. Kwan stopped suddenly next to them and motioned
to Jerri with his arm. She stopped with him and began to question,
but Kwan silenced her with a hand and gestured ahead of them. Jerri
peered over a box and listened.
She saw two policemen. One was standing. The other was bent
over a prone figure on the ground, his helmet pulled off. The
standing officer seemed nervous and paced a bit in the narrow, wet
alley.
The one on the ground said loudly, "...just keep moving like
that and maybe I'll let you go for another month..." Jerri narrowed
her eyes. A pained groan issued from the captured woman. "Come on,
it can't feel that bad... you give it to all these other Guk scum all
the time..." The policeman's body began to jerk again rapidly
against the fallen woman.
Jerri turned to Kwan, but he wasn't there.
A sudden movement drew her eyes back to the two policemen.
Kwan silently sprung from behind the standing officer and wrapped his
arm around the man's neck. He twisted it with a vicious jerk and
Jerri heard a distinct crack. The policeman on the ground heard it
too. He rolled over and, panicking, struggled with his pants. Jerri
leapt over the boxes toward them.
Kwan shoved the dead policeman's body out of his arms and to
the ground. He bent down and picked up the officer's night stick.
Flipping the shock toggle on, he looked over at the other policeman
climbing off the ragged woman.
Before the rolling man could get to his feet, Kwan savagely
beat him in the head with the night stick twice. The smell of ozone
and burning hair filled his nostrils as the policeman slumped over
dead, one hand outstretched, the other in a fist over his crotch.
Jerri ran up and leaned on Kwan, one hand over her mouth. Kwan
looked down at the frightened woman. Her gaudy dress was torn and
soaked. She stared back at them and began to cry softly.
Jerri went to her then to comfort her, but stiffened suddenly
when voices were heard at the mouth of the alleyway.
"They must've gone in here then... Hey, Fred! They went in
here!"
Kwan pulled at Jerri's arm. "Come on," he whispered urgently.
Jerri looked at his eyes. "We can't just leave her here,
Fish... we can't save her just to leave her to... them." She glanced
behind her. Boot steps were approaching the stack of boxes.
The crying woman suddenly whispered at them. "Take me with
you. I... I know the way to a service elevator..."
Kwan bent over her quickly. "Where?" He shook her shoulder.
"Up ahead, in the next doorway.... push two, three, three,
seven... Take me with you!" Her eyes widened as she pleaded with
them.
Kwan straightened and without looking at Jerri reached down
with the night stick. He touched its end to her wet breast over her
heart and the discharge shook her entire body.
A yell went up from beyond the stack of boxes and Kwan burst
into a sprint in the other direction.
Jerri hesitated and then screamed, "You fucker!"
Kwan kept running.
"You fucker," she said again more softly and then ran after
him.
"Well, they'll take us. But they say we can't leave until
_after_ the maintenance sweep." Janet looked at Scott. "And they
want an awful lot of dosh, too..."
"Take it," Scott said into the din of the service docks.
"What?" Janet said, Scott's words covered up by a nearby
dockloader.
"Just tell them we'll take it!" Scott yelled at her.
Janet raised her eyebrows and turned back to the small group of
spacers standing on the edge of the dock. She stepped a few paces
closer to them to be heard and started to talk.
Scott backed away and looked about the service docks. How he
was supposed to find Kwan and Jerri here, he had no idea. The docks
were three tiers of movable platforms that were covered with crates
and pressure vessels. And now, in the midst of a Sweep, they were
also covered with swarming, creditless human refuse. All of them
forced to this end of the station like fleas to the nose of a
drowning dog.
Scott climbed up onto a crate marked with the same oriental
characters that adorned the ship that they were booking. It was easy
climbing due to the reduced gravity near station axis. He sat on its
edge, his long legs dangling freely, and kept surveying the crowd for
the slight forms of Kwan and Jerri. He sighed and reached for his
sunglasses forlorn.
"How are we supposed to meet them?" Janet came up to his side.
Apparently the business transaction was completed.
"I don't know," Scott admitted. "He just said that we'd
see..."
"Great."
They both scanned the crowd. At the far end was a crowd of
black uniformed police. They were rounding up and processing as many
of the sweep-dodgers as they could. Several other police were
fanning out on the docks to search out any stowaways.
Scott looked behind him at the ship Janet had hired. It was a
small contract ship, fitted with asteroid mining outriggers.
Probably going to Spindle Station for some contract mining. Scott
wondered if it was a scab ship hired to overcome a labor dispute.
Its supply hatch was wide open with a wide tongue of a ramp leading
down to the dock platform. Inside, Scott could see a well-lit high
bay area with a small gantry crane. Didn't look like a very
comfortable ride.
Janet nudged him suddenly and he turned to follow her pointing
finger. A commotion had broken out at one of the service elevator
shafts across the dock from them and about fifty meters spinward.
Dock hands and refugees alike were streaming out of its small foyer
and running into dockloaders and each other. Scott got to his feet
on the crate.
Suddenly a bright yellow dockloader dashed out of the elevator.
It was piled high with unmarked cardboard boxes on plastic palettes.
One of them slid off wildly as the dockloader turned tightly. It
continued on, plowing into a group of refugees who tumbled like
tenpins, and finally careened off a support girder and stopped. Two
spry figures jumped off the back of the dockloader and looked around
them, obviously confused.
Scott and Janet, suddenly aware of the situation, both waved
their arms over their heads and called at their two partners. Kwan
caught sight of them and pulled on Jerri's arm just as a group of
policemen swarmed from the elevator and tried to close in on them.
Several of the running police raised riot pellet guns and took wild
shots at the pair, attracting the attention of all the other dockside
policemen. They all came running.
Janet jumped off the crate. "Let's go!" she yelled. "We gotta
get this tub ready to blast!" She pulled out her flechette pistol
and ran toward the ship.
Scott slid off the crate and followed her up the ramp into the
high bay of the ship, stopping once to look back for Kwan and Jerri.
When he made it into the ship Janet had already cornered two of
the crew with the pistol and was yelling at one of them, presumably a
pilot.
"I don't care where the captain is!" she yelled at the cowering
worker. "You get up to the cockpit and fire this baby up!" She
looked over at Scott. "Here," she said to him. "You take the pistol
and watch the dumb one and I'll escort this one up to the controls."
"But we can't just take off without Station permission!" Scott
protested as he took the pistol.
Janet scoffed at him, "They'll let us go if we ask right!" She
grabbed the pilot by the neck and dug her sharp fingernails into his
throat. "Let's go, boyo..." She lead the small man away,
disappearing into a hatchway. She called out behind her. "Oh, and
watch out. The captain's on board somewhere... Keep your eyes open!"
Kwan dove over a one meter canister of rice and rolled expertly
by a passing dockloader. He got up and used the dockloader as cover
as he trotted to the ship Scott had disappeared into. He looked
behind and saw Jerri scampering around a rigged palette of crates.
He smiled slightly and ducked his head down to avoid a low crane
hook.
A fresh spattering of rubber pellets rained about him. One
struck his arm, just over the triceps. He felt it go numb and he
rolled again to obtain better cover. He stopped behind a low box of
some sort and peeked over its top. The black bobbing helmets of the
police were about ten meters behind him. He looked ahead of him and
saw Jerri making a final sprint for the ship ramp. Kwan shook his
head in wonder and then jumped suddenly as a piece of the box he was
using for cover splintered away from a bullet, and not a rubber one.
Kwan rolled again and searched out the area to the right where
the shot had come from. He saw a group of three beefy men in white
jackets running at him. Stone's bodyguards! "Shit," Kwan said
softly. He broke into a ragged sprint for the ship's ramp, zig-
zagging and trying to keep his head tucked from the buzzing whine of
angry bullets.
His feet hit the metal gangway and he rushed into the ship. He
dove behind a lone crate and searched the high bay interior for a
hatch closing mechanism. He couldn't find one.
Out on the docks, a stray bullet from Stone's men had hit a
Station policeman. Now, the police were pelting the bodyguards with
rubber. One of the guards lay on the floor in a fetal position.
Several of the multitude of pellets bounced their way, helped by the
low gravity, into the high bay.
"He's in!" yelled Scott into the ship's intercom.
"Okay! Hatchway closing," it squawked back. Behind him he
heard the slam of the high bay door as it locked into position. He
ran over to Kwan who squatted on the floor, panting. "You alright?"
"Fine, Scott... just... fine." Kwan got to his feet. "Tell
Janet to blow the locks and blast."
Scott returned to the intercom on the wall to give the order
and Kwan crossed over to Jerri who was holding Janet's pistol on a
scared looking crewman.
"I'll take that," he said to her.
"Will do," Janet said and took her finger off the intercom
button. "Okay, pal. You heard the man, blow the fucking locks and
get us out of here."
"But the dock doors aren't open," he rasped in protest.
Janet pulled on her detached thumbnail a little harder. The
wire that was attached to it dug a little deeper into the pilot's
neck, the thin trail of blood drying quickly as the coagulant
treated garrote sealed its gruesome passage. "Just fly right at the
doors. They'll open 'em to save their precious station."
The pilot reached for the controls.
**********
Roberta Gonzales watched the last of the pixels boil off the
screen as the nano-machines devoured the last of the fusion core.
She sighed and thought of the consequences. In her model there was
no other energy source available so the nano-machines, designed to
eat and breed, would die off quickly, short life span. But in
reality... a reality that wouldn't have happened except for the
megalomaniac impulses of the man behind her, she glanced at Spindle
behind his desk and shuddered... in reality, plenty of energy sources
abounded, especially on a space freighter.
Roberta switched the terminal off and sat back in her chair.
She crossed her arms and stared at the blank screen.
And after that, she thought, after that ship is converted into
a googol of breeding nano-machines, what if the nightmare survived
to intercept a planet, or a sun... or a solar system...
**end of 2.8**
Company Man 2.9 by Patrick
Hurh
copyright
1994
"Diversion? For what?" Kwan lifted his head weakly to stare at
Goldbreath's image.
"For something that you almost royally fucked up on Tae Guk!"
The Secretary's face glared back at him.
"What?..." Kwan thought for a moment and lay his head back
down on the starched pillow. "Something with Patricia Spindle? Cat
was trying to defect Spindle's niece?" he asked incredulously. He
lifted his head again. "Is that why she's here on the freighter?"
Goldbreath didn't say anything. Her image flickered for a
moment on the vid-screen. The CRT unit was perched crookedly on the
cart it was wheeled in on. It sported a flexible yellow antennae on
its side and looked a bit battered from use.
"What would you want with Patricia Spindle? She can't possibly
offer you anything that you couldn't already..."
"It's not her," Goldbreath's chubby image wheezed. "It's what
she brought with her."
"What some kind of spider tech?"
"No, not exactly." The Sec smiled widely for a moment. "No,
the only tech we got out of the deal was that baby you flew out right
from under Spindle's pointed nose."
Kwan leaned his head back. "The suit," he sighed.
"Yes, the suit." Goldbreath peered at Kwan through the CCD
lens. An odd look came over her face, triumph mixed with a bit of
pride and respect. "I really have to hand it to you, Fish. I didn't
think you had it in you. I was hoping at best you'd be able to just
die noisily..."
Kwan shifted in the hospital bed uncomfortably. He looked at
his scarred hands laying on top of the yellow blankets. "Well, maybe
you could tell me what I almost lost my life for then... What did
Patricia give us?"
"Ask her yourself, Fish. I can't tell you, but she might."
Goldbreath chuckled lightly as she pushed a bloated finger toward the
disconnect button. "Funny thing, your name...Fish... like you were
the bait... and they bit. But they bit off more than they could
chew..." The image snapped and was replaced with a field of uneven
yellow.
Kwan thumbed the call button on the side of his bed. Almost
instantly the orderly/spacer who rolled in the vid-screen appeared.
He flashed Kwan a questioning look.
"Yes, I'm done with it. Take it away... she's done debriefing
me..." He sighed, wondering what was next, as the cart was pulled
back through the privacy curtains. Kwan rubbed at his newly balded
head absently, and then, realizing what he was doing, more intently.
What would have caused this, he thought. Probably radiation of some
type. Probably damaged my immune system and a lot of other cell
producing functions as well. He wondered if this was the only
mission he'd ever perform for Cat... or anyone else.
The curtains swept aside with a rattle and Patricia Spindle
appeared grinning widely. Kwan tried to sit up in bed a bit more.
Over her shoulder, Kwan could see that there was another person still
hidden by the privacy curtain.
"Fish! Are you all debriefed?"
Kwan just looked back at her without emotion.
"Well... I thought you might like to meet someone," she said
happily and pulled back the curtain further.
Raymond Stone stepped forward through the opening. He was
smiling also and looked at Kwan with what seemed to be genuine
affection. "Hi Kwanchaan."
Kwan looked back to Patricia. "I've met Stone before, or don't
you remember..."
"Didn't the Secretary tell you?" Patricia smiled even more
broadly as Kwan shook his head hesitatingly. "Fish, I'd like to
introduce you to James Hawthorne," she announced and grabbed onto the
man's arm.
Kwan looked at the man's face in disbelief. He studied the
man's large body and shook his head slightly. "No way. You can't be
Jim Hawthorne. I'd have recognized you back on Tae Guk."
The man looked down on him. "Kwan, listen to what you are
saying. You must know that my appearance has changed in the past
almost as many times as the companies I've worked for..." Kwan
wrinkled his eyes in confusion. "...Besides, who else would be able
to tell you about the time you and Johnny got trapped by those
Hitachi kids out behind the sewer plant. It took your Dad and I
almost two hours to clean that shit off you kids and pull your shorts
out of your asses."
Kwan looked quietly up at Jim Hawthorne and, after a moment,
began to smile.
*****************
The giant aluminum-sided crate slid crazily across the non-skid
floor of the high bay. One of its corners dug into the floor
covering and the box flipped over and wedged against a steel wall. A
moment later it was jarred loose again by another sudden movement of
the ship.
"Look out!" yelled Kwan as the heavy box flipped its way
towards Scott and the crewman standing on the other side of the
highbay. They both scrambled to avoid it. Suddenly the floor tilted
and another unsecured load, this one a pile of hexagonal shipping
canisters, rained down from a storage area just above the low rails
of the overhead crane. Jerri ran from underneath them and jumped
onto a ship's ladder that seemed to lead up to the rest of the ship.
The canisters flew across the room and bounced wildly, some splitting
open and releasing hundreds of smaller cases and pieces of packing
material. Kwan dove to the opposite wall and hit the intercom.
"What the fuck's going on?" he yelled into its small speaker
grill.
A crackle responded and then, "Can't talk, Fish. The captain
just busted in on the cockpit... and he's pretty pissed off!"
"Just get us out of Tae Guk!" Kwan jumped back from the
intercom then as the ship twisted again. A canister narrowly missed
hitting him in the back. Shit, he thought and imagined the small
asteroid mining ship tumbling about within the confines of the Tae
Guk docking port.
All of a sudden a great siren blared out in the high bay
accompanied by flashing red lights. Kwan looked about him, trying to
find its cause.
"What's going on, Fish?!" Scott yelled. He was hanging onto
the ship's ladder. The crewman was above him, scrambling up the
ladder's remaining length. Jerri must have already disappeared
through the hatchway at its top. "What the fuck is going on?"
Kwan spotted on of the red lights and pointed at the small
blinking sign that hung there. "Get out!" he screamed back. "The
hold's being depressurized!"
Scott took one look at where Kwan was pointing and then jumped
at the ladder. He began to climb but was thrown off when the ship
lurched again.
Kwan danced his way across the pitching floor to the base of
the ladder and pulled himself up quickly. He reached the hatchway
just behind the fleeing crewman and scrambled through. Looking back
down, he saw Scott trying to make his way through the debris back to
the ladder. Kwan could feel the crewman standing next to him over
the hatchway opening and he looked over at him.
A cry went up from Scott in the hold. A canister had tagged
him in the shoulder throwing him to the floor. The ship made another
roll then and Kwan's view was blocked off by the shape of the large
aluminum crate as it careened just under the hatchway.
The sirens seemed to grow louder and Kwan's hand pulled on the
hatch's handle to swing it shut, but suddenly it was wrenched free of
his hand. The crewman next to him had jumped on the hatch and was
now sliding expertly down the ship's ladder. Kwan watched nervously
as the wiry crewman shoved flying canisters aside and pulled at
Scott's fallen form. Scott, with the crewman's help, got to his feet
and was able to make it to the ladder. The crewman pushed from
behind and, as the ship suddenly lurched again, both men flew through
the hatchway.
Kwan slammed the hatch shut and spun the bolt wheel in place.
Seconds later he heard the whoosh of the hold depressurizing.
Kwan looked down at the two men where they lay on the floor of
the hallway and then determinedly made his way past them towards what
he perceived should be the cockpit. He felt like both men were
staring holes in his back.
Janet moved to slap away the captain again, but this time he
was after something else than the helm controls. He was rushing to a
bank of flashing red lights far out of her reach. She looked back at
the frontal vid-screens and saw the dock doors approaching rapidly.
She couldn't leave the controls now.
Janet looked back at the small Chinese captain, he was about to
flip a set of toggles. She jerked the attitude jet joystick and the
ship made a sudden roll.
"Aieee!" yelled the captain and Janet smiled slightly and
reaimed the ship at the dock doors.
All over the comm panel, lights and displays were flashing for
attention. But Janet ignored them. They'll get the idea pretty
soon, she thought. Besides, she couldn't even reach the comm panel
over the fainted body of the pilot.
"Hey!" the captain yelled at her, eyeing the vid-screens
nervously. "Hey you! What you doing?!"
"What's it look like?" Janet called back over her shoulder.
"No! You must let air out of hold! You must do it before we
go... outside!"
Janet looked back at him. What the hell was he jabbering
about? He looked at her anxiously. "Let me do it..." He pointed at
the bank of toggle switches. "...let me let air out before explode!"
Janet hesitated and then nodded once at him. He jumped back to
the panel and began to throw switches.
Janet looked back at the vid-screen. The doors were opening!
She saw a black darkness between them that grew wider as they hurtled
toward it. The edges of the great dock doors were lined with flood
lights that illuminated a diffuse cloud of dust and debris as the
dock atmosphere rushed into the vacuum of space.
She smiled as they passed through them and noticed out of the
corner of her eye that the pilot was beginning to recover. Janet
reached into her jacket pocket and readied her pistol.
Suddenly Kwan burst through the door into the small cockpit
area. The tiny hatch flew off its light hinges and knocked into the
captain. He gave out a high pitched grunt and fell silent, rubbing
his shoulder and eyeing Kwan.
Janet tapped the throttle into silence and weight of
acceleration dropped from their bodies. She flipped the flechette
expertly over to Kwan who caught it with one hand and pointed it at
the pilot who was just starting to get up.
"Captain?" Kwan questioned of Janet.
"No," Janet replied and nodded to the small Chinese man rubbing
his shoulder. Kwan redirected his aim.
"Captain..." he asked, searching for the captain's name.
"Why you do this?" the captain barked sharply. "Why you do
this to my ship?"
"Now, Captain. Don't worry, you'll get paid in full for all
the damages, plus for the trip to Spindle Station." Kwan grabbed
hold of a cushioned support to steady himself. "Now what was your
name?"
"His name is Tang," Janet said.
"I am Captain Tang," the captain repeated. "You make me in
very big trouble. Very much trouble with Tae Guk police..."
"So what!" Kwan exclaimed tiredly. "There's no police in
space! There's no space police to pull us over! Listen, Tang, I
know your type and you very well know that blowing docks during a
Sweep happens all the time... If you ever have to dock at Tae Guk
again in this tub, you can grease your way back into good graces with
the credit we'll pay you."
The captain arched his brow. "Credit?" he asked. "You owe me
lot of credit. I want credit now." He pointed to the comm panel.
"Credit. Now."
Kwan trained the flechette directly on Tang's right eye.
"Credit," he said. "Later."
Jerri chose that moment to float her head into the cramped
cockpit. "No one else on board, Fish." She wriggled her nose at the
smell of sweat and fear in the cockpit. "Fish, this place is tiny.
We're lucky we left two of the crewmembers behind or there wouldn't
be acceleration couches for all of us."
"Left behind?" the captain's voice growled. "You owe me big
credit... Fish," he grunted into the multi-faceted barrel.
"Don't call me Fish," Kwan said quietly back. Jerri stifled a
giggle.
Kwan looked back over to Janet. "Janet, dress that man's
wounds and then have him set in a high accel course for Spindle." He
looked around at the rest of them. "Couches, everyone."
Jerri removed her head from the cockpit and Scott followed her,
the crewman that had pulled him from the high bay between them. As
they left, Kwan could hear Scott ask the man his name.
Kwan sat down in one of the cockpit couches and began to strap
himself in. He motioned with the pistol for Captain Tang to do the
same.
Zhejing sat forward on his seat and tapped the vid-screens back
into life. They came on line showing status displays and location
vectors. He studied them for a moment and then began to adjust
attitude thrusters accordingly. Eventually he sat back in the seat
and looked over at Kwan.
"That's it?" Kwan questioned. "That's the entire
acceleration?"
"What do you think this is?" the pilot replied. "A cruise
ship? This is an asteroid miner. We can't afford to waste fuel just
to..."
"Spare me the justifications... how long is the coast?"
"Thirty hours."
Kwan sighed and looked back at the captain. He was asleep in
his couch.
"When can you program the navvy for the decell to Spindle?"
Kwan asked without looking away from the captain.
"About six hours before the decell initiation."
"Well, I'd like you to do it as soon as you can."
Zhejing bristled in his chair and Kwan looked at him squarely.
"All right with you... pilot?"
"You're not the captain of this vessel... Fish or whatever
you're called. I don't take orders from you."
"Well, Tang sure doesn't seem to be in a position to give any
orders." Zhejing glanced back at the captain. "Besides, I've hired
this ship and going straight to you with the orders just eliminates
the middleman, doesn't it?"
Zhejing just glared at Kwan.
"You don't like me much, do you, Zhejing."
Zhejing looked back at the vid-screens sharply. Kwan studied
him for a moment and then began to unbuckle himself from the couch
restraints. He hesitated when Zhejing spoke quietly.
"You could have killed a lot of people back there... probably
did kill some. I don't agree with that. I've worked hard to get to
this position..." He trailed off into silence.
Kwan finished unbuckling his belts and hit a button on the side
of the couch. The high expansion gel depressurized and let go of his
body with a wet squelch. He pushed himself up then and looked at
Zhejing as if to say something. But instead he turned quietly and
floated over to Janet who was busy trying to make sense of the
foreign comm panel.
"Complaints are starting to come in, Fish. That Tang wasn't
kidding when he said you bought him some big trouble."
"Just put out a standard disclaimer and ignore the replies,
Janet."
She looked up at him with a grin. "No problem, boss... Sorry
to hear that we have to coast so long; I'm anxious to finally see
some action."
Kwan didn't smile back. "Actually," he said, "I'm looking
forward to it myself. To do something straightforward for once..."
Kwan started to push himself away, then turned back to Janet.
"Of course..." he began to say, but then halted.
"Of course... what?"
"Nothing," he replied to her and then headed back past the
sleeping captain to the ship's corridor. Of course, he said to
himself, I'd be happier if we actually had a chance of surviving.
He floated into the loud hum of the ship.
There were three hatchways in the ship's corridor. Two of them
were closed. Kwan pushed himself to the open one and grabbed onto
the cushioned handles flanking it. A fluorescent light flickered on
automatically and Kwan found himself looking into a free-fall
commode. It was actually quite clean, ceramic coated fixtures and
even a little shaving mirror on a flexible stand. A vacuum hose
floated loosely in the small compartment.
Kwan pushed himself away from the bathroom and the light
flicked out. He went to one of the closed hatches and spun it open.
It was only quarter sealed and came open easily. Another light
flickered on and he looked in on a small storage area. First aid
supplies in a cabinet on his right and several container shelves of
hard plastic tubs lined the ceiling the floor and the wall on his
left. He closed the door quickly.
Finally, Kwan opened the last hatch and saw Scott, Jerri and
the third crewman sitting up in their couches talking to each other.
Apparently the room doubled as the living quarters since the walls
were lined with bunk bags and the back wall was covered with
automatic food dispensers.
All three in the living quarters looked over to him. Scott and
the crewman looked like they were playing cards! Kwan grabbed hold
of some cushioned rungs over his head and floated his way surely into
the room to hover above them.
"I see you made yourselves at home," he said without emotion.
Scott looked down at the card holder in his hand and then over
at his opponent. He cleared his throat. "Uhh... Fish, I mean Kwan,
this is Raife. He's the one that pulled me out of the high bay."
Kwan smiled down at Raife. "Pleased to meet you, Raife."
The crewman looked up at him but didn't smile. "Hello," he
said softly with a Hispanic accent.
"Fish, just what the hell are we supposed to do at Spindle
Station?" Jerri asked loudly. She shifted out of her couch and
floated up next to him. "We aren't prepared for a..."
Kwan reached out quickly and silenced Jerri with a loose palm.
She jerked away. "Shh..." he urged. "Not now..." He looked down at
Raife, who pretended to look away.
Jerri floated closer, her face stern. Kwan could smell her
salty sweat. "We aren't ready for anything," she said softly but
still emphatically.
"I know," Kwan whispered back. "But I've got a plan and, like
I said before, you don't have much of a choice."
"Back there I didn't, but out here, I just may..."
"Hey, you two! You're blocking the light!" Scott reached up
and pushed on Kwan's leg sending him in a slow spin. Scott sent a
conspiratorial look at Raife and he responded with a low chuckle.
Just then the captain pushed his way into the living quarters.
"Too many people here!" he barked out. "Get out! This my ship!"
Jerri floated out into the corridor as the small captain ducked
beneath her, going for the back wall.
"This my ship!" he announced again and poked a combination into
a locked cabinet on the wall. Kwan, spying this, moved quickly over
to him and brought out the flechette pistol.
The captain ignored him and opened the cabinet, removing a
plastic bottle of cognac from it. He closed the cabinet door and
scowled at the others. "This is my cognac!"
Kwan relaxed and pushed himself off the ceiling to float down
to Scott's level. The captain maneuvered his way to one of the bunk
bags and began to fashion himself a free fall hammock.
"Scott, could I have a word with you... in private." Kwan
gestured to the corridor.
"Sure, Fish. Just let me finish out this hand." Raife placed
a card from his holder down in the center rack between them.
"Now," Kwan said.
Scott looked at his hand for a moment, then sighed and
unbuckled his waist belt. He pushed off to the corridor. Kwan
turned and followed.
Kwan ushered Scott into the storage room and shut the hatchway.
"Listen, Scott. I wouldn't get to know the crew too well.
Once we get to Spindle Station we've got to contain them to the ship
somehow. We can't let them blow our cover. Besides you should
probably be looking into using the ship's computer to work up some
low level hacks of the station's phys ops... not playing cards."
"So you're planning to pose as miners?"
"Why not? It should get us into the station."
"But what are we supposed to do with the real miners?"
"That's exactly my point," Kwan explained. "Listen, I just
wouldn't start trusting them is all. You trust people too much."
"Actually, Fish. I think I'm starting to get a little more
picky in that regard."
Kwan stared at him in the fluorescent light.
"Whatever," Scott said. He turned and exited quickly.
Kwanchaan sighed and made his way to the cockpit. On his way
he saw Scott return to his game of cards. Kwan shook his head and
floated into the cockpit.
When he entered, Zhejing was rubbing the scabs on his neck and
trying to find a more comfortable position to lay his head. Looks
like he's never going to leave that couch, Kwan thought. All the
better.
Jerri was talking softly to Janet next to the comm panel.
Janet's face was screwed up in confusion. Kwan rushed over.
"What's up here?" he asked, trying to sound non-invasive.
"Nothing," replied Jerri curtly. She gave Janet an emphatic
twitch of her square chin and then turned to leave. Her skirt
floated up around her waist as she floated through the hatchway feet
first.
"Janet," he tried again, "what's going on?"
"I don't think I even know." Janet looked at him puzzled and
then smiled at him. "What are you doing for the next fifteen
hours... Fish?" She wrapped a leg around his and drew him closer.
The captain had been the easiest to kill. Kwan just had to
pass by him and tap him with the end of the makeshift dart he had
prepared from the med-supplies. He wasn't even sure if the captain
had even felt the pinprick.
Raife was harder. Kwan had to corner him away from the others
as he exited the commode. The man had life enough to give a small
struggle and an incomprehensible yelp as he collapsed into a floating
huddle. Kwan sucked up the small spheroids of spittle and blood with
the bathroom's vacuum dryer. No one heard Raife die.
Zhejing was already dead. Janet had suspected all along, but
wasn't sure. Her thumbnail garrote was supposed to have been laced
with an instantly fatal toxin. She was surprised when Zhejing hadn't
died right when she applied it to his narrow throat. Instead the
toxin must have been faulty or diluted, Zhejing died a slow death in
his chair. Janet watched over his programming of the navvy. She
only had to correct him twice.
Kwan pinched the dart between his fingers lightly. Another
clear drop of deadly liquid oozed out from its tip. This last
killing would silence the mutiny that he had felt brewing in the
crew. He looked down at the back of Jerri's neck. Her hair had
fallen forward as she lay sleeping in one of the couches. It
revealed white, unblemished skin.
Kwan grimaced then. His hand made a light pawing motion and
then put the dart back into his jacket pocket. He couldn't do it.
He still felt oddly attracted to her, even after his time with Janet
just hours ago.
Kwan looked back at her neck, studying it. He remembered the
fresh memory of Janet's bare neck, her taut body identical to the one
now before him. At the time, he had felt invigorated and
tremendously excited. He had even imagined he was with Jerri and not
her twin. But now, looking at the passive slender neck before him,
he felt like his time with Janet was fake, forced somehow.
He grimaced again at no one and floated away trying to convince
himself that he had spared Jerri because he needed her help at
Spindle Station.
Company Man 3.0 by Patrick
Hurh
copyright
1994
"But what ever would make you want to defect from your
company?" Kwan asked in confusion. "You're supposed to be the most
loyal exec in the..."
"Don't believe everything you read in the trade mags, Kwan."
Jim Hawthorne smiled down at him. "Besides, loyalty is one thing.
Happiness is another." The big man put an arm around Patricia's
shoulders. She returned the embrace with a squeeze of his arm.
"To think that someone from Jim's past would be the key to our
happiness..." Patricia trailed off as she looked lovingly down at
Kwan.
Kwan thought for a moment, thinking about what he was hearing.
He was filled with a warm feeling of belonging, of love for these
people. It made him uncomfortable. It triggered memories of his
childhood.
"What about Johnny?" he asked of Hawthorne.
Hawthorne opened his mouth to reply, but was cut off by the
sudden wail of an emergency siren. The translucent privacy curtains
around Kwan's bed lit up with a yellow pulsating glow. Hawthorne
tilted his head and listened for a moment then whirled around and
peeled open the curtains with a rattle.
Beyond the curtains, Kwan could see yellow alarm lights
flashing above doorways and a few spacers rapidly flitting from room
to room. Hawthorne made to leave, but Patricia clung to his arm.
"What is it Jim?" she asked loudly.
"Probably just an isolated fire or a spill of some kind in one
of the lab rooms," he replied. "Still we should report to the
nearest comm unit." He looked at Kwan. "Relax, Kwan... Someone
probably just entered a lab room with an energized weapon, that's
all. We'll be back in a couple of minutes."
The couple disappeared quickly into the hall outside. Kwan
looked around him with despair. He didn't like this. He didn't like
any of it. Something did not feel right. He struggled to get out of
the bed, to sit up and try to get his bearings. His weak arms could
barely support him. They shook and faltered under the weight of his
torso.
He gave up and rolled over onto his side and lay still for a
moment. No, he thought. I don't like this at all.
*************************
"Get in the damn uniform, Jerri. The ship docks in seconds."
Janet looked at her twin. "Listen," she went on softly. "Once we're
inside, if things aren't going right, we can turn over on Fish...
We're citizens not company men. The spiders won't hold anything
against us if we can give them something."
Jerri flapped the orange coveralls out with a snap in the null
gravity. She looked back through the hatchway at Kwan in the
cockpit. "Sure... that's easy to say now. But who knows what Fish
has gotten us into? He's a cold hearted newbie pratt!"
"He may be an asshole, but he's good, Jerri... being cold
hearted isn't such a bad quality... And Scott's good too. He said
that he's already into the station's physops net."
Jerri started to pull on the coveralls. "Fish has changed his
plans too many times. He just makes up this crap as he goes along.
I'll be glad just to get away from him... off this ship... Jesus,
these things are baggy!"
"Good plans are always flexible, Jerri." Kwan's voice rang out
in the ship's corridor. Jerri jumped slightly at his words. "And
this is a good plan."
"Sure, just like kidnapping Spindle was a good fucking plan..."
She twisted to face him. "...and like trying to seduce Stone was a
good fucking plan..."
"Those plans had a good chance of working if it had not been
for extenuating circumstances." Kwan floated over the twins as they
dressed. "We walked into something we had no control over.
Therefore we had to improvise and continue. I think we've done a
fine job."
"A fine job at senseless murder!"
Kwan didn't respond. Jerri's face smoothed over
professionally.
"Are you done with your little pep talk?" she asked.
Kwan looked down on her and smiled. "Not quite," he said and
drifted over to the highbay hatch. "Scott's gotten through the
physops system. We'll be able to monitor your progress through
emergency vid cameras that are positioned throughout Spindle. He
says that Doctor Gonzales is in a field lab, alone." He looked up at
Scott who just floated into the corridor.
"Gonzales' clearance allows her access to almost anywhere on
Spindle Station, including the docks." Scott's long body cramped up
against the others. He continued, "It should be easy to walk her out
of there, as long as she knows we're coming." He looked back at
Kwan.
"And she does," responded Kwan.
"Uhh.. Fish?" Jerri questioned with mock naivetŽ. "How do two
miners get clearance to get to her in the first place?"
"Scott'll tie up the security net by clogging the bandwidth
with physops alarms. Hopefully there will be enough confusion to
allow you to wander through any check points."
"That sounds like an awfully loose security system for Spindle
Station..." Jerri protested.
"It is," Scott said. He blinked his eyes and looked at Kwan
then back to Jerri. "That's the only thing that makes me nervous...
It's a little too easy..." He looked at Kwan again. "...but just a
little." He took a breath. "It's like all the right things are
happening at just the right times..."
"Well, it's about time things started falling our way..."
Janet interrupted. "Come on, let's get going." She moved to tuck
the flechette pistol into her coveralls.
"Hold it, Janet. Weapons won't get past the first check
point." Kwan reached over and plucked the pistol from her grasp.
"You shouldn't need it anyway."
Jerri floated closer to Scott when Kwan grabbed for the pistol.
"Scott, what do you mean it's too easy," she asked, grimly. Scott
just shook his head and looked at Kwan.
Suddenly there was a beep from the control room and all four
started to drift towards the corridor floor quickly.
"OK," Kwan yelled out. "We're within the graviton field. The
automatic docking procedure should take about a minute. Then you're
on your own." He muscled his way back up to the cockpit.
"Hold on Fish!" Jerri yelled and grabbed for him, but missed.
"You still haven't told us how we're getting off this station. Or
why you aren't joining us!"
"That's the easiest part!" Kwan pulled Scott after him into
the cockpit. "I have to stay here to monitor your progress and
control the operations." He began to shut the cockpit hatch, then
halted. "As far as getting off the station, Scott can burn the
physops net just after we leave," he called out. An alarm blared
from within the cockpit. "We don't have time to get into it! Just
trust me!"
Kwan swung the hatch shut and twirled the bolt circle.
*********************
He reached for his data pouch. Its new body was vibrating
against his side and bleating for his attention. Jim Hawthorne
hurriedly pulled it out of his jacket as he rushed down the cushioned
hallway.
"Jim?" Patricia struggled to keep up with him.
He flipped the pouch open and looked through the transparent
covering at the LCD display. Yellow alarm lights played across its
surface.
"It's the cold tank again. I'm afraid we've left our secure
area for too long visiting Kwan."
"What does it matter anyway?"
Jim answered the page, flipping the display over to audio.
"Two in the Bush, here." Patricia giggled at their code name.
"What now?"
"Where the hell have you been?" the junior executive yelled on
the tiny speaker. "You weren't supposed to leave the Safe House
until..."
"Looks like you just blew your assignment, junior. You really
thought you could rely on that antiquated sentry drone?" Jim
chuckled at the silence on the other end. "Now, what's going on?
Why the yellow?"
"I'm not sure, sir. The aft science section has had a fire or
something. The Sec has been holding on line for you since the yellow
went out."
"Well, put her through."
"It's just a text message now, sir."
"Well, put _that_ through!" Jim grunted in disbelief and
headed around a corner in the hallway, changed his mind and headed
toward the bow of the ship.
"Where are you going?" Patricia asked, caught off guard by his
sudden change in direction.
"To the bow. Something doesn't quite smell right. Come on,
I'm not losing you now!" He pulled her after him.
He brought the data pouch up to his face again. It read in
flashing letters:
E V A C U A T E N O W !
G O L D Y . . .
He slipped the pouch back into his jacket. "I'm way ahead of
you, Goldy... always was," he muttered and continued down the hall to
the bow shuttle bay.
****************
"D-eleven." The spider slapped a glowing sticker over Janet's
right breast. He let his hand linger for a moment and grinned at her
lubriciously from beneath his helmet's black carapace.
Janet's lips twitched into a snarled, sarcastic smile and
slapped her hand hard over the smooth bulge of the spider's crotch.
Her fingernails dug in around the protection cup beneath the canvas
of his orange coveralls. She squeezed her hand tightly once, prying
the cup painfully to one side, and let go.
The spider uttered a surprised grunt and his lips crinkled with
sudden rage. He pushed Janet away from him and reached for his shock
stick sitting on the stool next to the check-in podium.
Janet stumbled into Jerri who was just ahead of her in line.
After a light collision with Jerri's back, Janet danced around in
front of her trying to evade the spider who was ineffectively waving
his shock stick around him while his partner held him back.
"Jesus, Stooly!" yelled the partner. "Take it easy, man. You
wanna get sent back to rock duty?" The two orange and black suited
figures wrestled for a moment.
"Fuck, man..." the stick waving spider muttered. "She needed a
fucking lesson."
"Yeah right, Stooly."
Janet pulled Jerri deeper into the outgoing hallway. "Come on
let's get going. You D-eleven too?"
Jerri stiffened as she was pulled. She whispered loudly,
"Let's just turn over now, Jan. We're never going to make it to
Gonzales. Be better if we hand Fish over before you get us in the
brig..."
"No way, sister. Let's have some fun first. Might as well see
how far we get. They'd probably just think we're fucking nuts anyway
if we just came out and told them." She stopped walking for a moment
and let an incoming miner within earshot.
"Hey," Janet exclaimed in a friendly manner to the young
oriental man. "What would you say if I told you I was a Cat secret
spy sent here to escort a defection of one of Spider's top docs?"
The miner chuckled. "I'd say you're fucking stupid or crazy...
or both."
"You're probably right on both counts." Janet winked at Jerri
who had also stopped in the hallway. Jerri just shook her head once
and then turned quickly and headed down the hallway toward the miner
barracks.
Janet clapped the oriental miner on the shoulder and said,
conspiratorially, "... but I'm having loads of fun." She trotted off
after Jerri.
Scott sat down at the communications console and looked at the
vid-screen absently for a moment. Then he spun in his couch and
looked at Kwan who was just coming away from the cockpit hatch.
"You know that I can't jam up any of the real security check
points, Fish. I'll be lucky to confuse even a few of the traffic
flow points."
Kwan looked at him silently.
"What are they going to do when they run up against a check
point? They aren't going to make it very far... Fish! Tell me what
the fucking real plan is!"
Scott got to his feet when Kwan didn't answer and glared at
him. "Janet's right. You don't trust anybody. You think this is
some kind of game." Scott moved toward the cockpit hatchway. "Well
it's all going to back fire on you, Fish. You may think you control
people by only telling them what they need to know, but all that does
is convince people that you don't know what you're doing! You don't
even know how we're getting off the station, do you?"
Scott put his hand on the hatchway handle. "You don't have any
chance without me, Fish. And I'm leaving..."
"Scott," Kwan said tiredly. "Scott, don't go. I do trust
some... things. I just couldn't tell Janet the whole plan because
it's the only way to handle her. Otherwise she just balks at
everything I suggest."
"Well, maybe you should learn how to 'suggest' with a little
more tact."
Kwan sighed. "I don't have time to be tactful, Scott." He
placed a hand over Scott's on the hatch handle and looked him in the
eyes. "Listen Scott, Cat knows I'm trying an infiltration of
Spindle. That's been in the cards all along. I know Cat and I know
they wouldn't leave me... us... stranded."
"Have you been in contact with them?" Scott asked
suspiciously.
"Yes and no."
Scott started to withdraw his hand from under Kwan's.
"I mean," Kwan went on quickly, "I've left coded transmissions
for Sec Goldbreath. If she looks for them, she'll find them. With
Cat's own mining sectors next to Spider's, I'm sure that they're
watching and waiting along the perimeter to help..."
"How do you know they'll be there."
Kwan smiled at Scott and said, "I have to trust them."
Knowing they were probably under the watchful eye of a vid
camera somewhere, Jerri and Janet entered the D-eleven barracks and
headed to a few of the cleaner cots in the back corner and sat down.
Around them were strewn about twenty aluminum framed cots. They were
so light that various occupants' movements had skidded them into
disarray. A few of them were overturned, their stained mattress pads
folding in on themselves. The room was unoccupied except for the two
women.
Janet caught her twin's eye with a 'Now what?' expression and
bobbed her knees nervously. Jerri stared back at Janet for a moment,
then looked up at the corners of the dank room where the temporary
plastic walls met the corrugated aluminum ceiling.
"No telling who's watching us," she said softly.
"Hopefully someone nice," Janet smiled. She picked at her
thumbnail, pulling on it slightly, clicking it in and out of its set
position. "Come on, we've been here long enough." She stood and
headed back to the barracks entrance.
Jerri stood and followed after her, arm outstretched towards
Janet's back. Her hand caught Janet's shoulder as they passed
through the doorway. Janet stopped and tilted her head toward Jerri.
"At the first checkpoint, ok?" Jerri's voice almost trembled.
Janet's eyes narrowed in concern. She started to turn to face
Jerri completely, but Jerri's arm stiffened and rebuffed her. Janet
nodded her head once sharply then and she walked into the central
hallway.
Scott tapped the console panel and the vidscreen flickered to a
view of an unoccupied hallway, its length made longer by the camera's
optics. He tapped again. A view of a small loading bay appeared.
Another tap and he was looking at the barracks central hallway.
Several miners were walking across the field of view and disappeared
into a barracks room. Suddenly Janet's head bobbed into view and
then halted for a moment, tilted back as if listening.
"Fish! I got'em..."
Kwan straightened from his kneeling position by the captain's
couch, put something in his pocket and moved behind Scott to peer
over his head at the vidscreen.
<<...first checkpoint, ok?>>
"What was that?" Kwan asked.
"Something about the first checkpoint... I couldn't quite make
it out." Scott looked down at the panel and tapped a few keys. The
vidscreen jumped through various views until it showed Jerri and
Janet walking quickly out of the central hallway into a small foyer
in front of a large security door. A small card lock unit was
mounted into the wall next to the orange painted door. Yellow
letters were emblazoned over the orange: NO UNAUTHORIZED ENTRY.
"Can you open it?"
"Not without setting off an alarm." Scott's fingers tapped the
console. The view flickered to show an empty hallway. "No one on
the other side though."
Kwan rubbed his upper lip quickly. "Okay, pop all the security
doors along the miners' barracks. Try to close some immediately and
leave the others open."
Scott glanced up at Kwan and then pounded out a quick staccato
rhythm.
A blaring siren crackled the small monitor speakers and the
door on the screen opened revealing Janet and Jerri.
"Cut the audio."
A tap and the overworked speakers fell into silence. The faint
sound of the siren could be heard through the ship's walls.
Janet and Jerri sprinted through the opening and the huge door
slid shut behind them. They crossed through the field of vision and
disappeared.
"Spiders?" Kwan asked.
Scott flicked the vidscreen through various status displays
until he hit the main security comm panel. He upped the audio.
<<Nelson, here. Whaddaya got?>>
<<Real weird, sir. All ports to the miner barracks O-C'd for a
second. Some of 'em are still open...>>
<<Well, get two Spider units down there and check...>>
<<I already sent three down there, sir>>
<<And?>>
<<Nothing, so far...>>
<<Security vids?>>
<<Nothing on the Pat Recog yet, but so many doors opened...
there's a lot that didn't get didged.>>
<<Call me when Sec Comp's done with Pat Recog... tap into Five
Joint and let them know we've got the sit...>>
"Cut the audio and find the twins," Kwan interrupted the
security patter.
Scott tapped on the console and the display flickered through
several views. Kwan backed away from Scott and paced the small
cockpit slowly.
"Scott, you better start some of the more minor phys-ops
alarms. Temperature sensors in the executive offices, flow rates in
the hydroponics, fluctuations in the a-grav... Just enough to start
to get them nervous." Kwan wiped the sweat off his lip.
"Got'em!" Scott barked out.
Janet and Jerri were visible on the vidscreen walking calmly
down a small hallway.
"Where are they?"
"About halfway up to Joint Five."
"Cut to the checkpoint at Five."
The screen flashed over to show three light suited Spiders
sitting within a spherical room. Four blue glowing vidscreens lined
a small flat console in front of one of the Spiders. That one sat up
suddenly as one of the screens lit up with several red pulsating
blocks. The neighboring Spider looked over to the screens.
<<What's going on?>>
<<Just some shit with the H-VAC system again.>>
<<Fuck. They better not leave us rotting in here again for the
rest of shift.>>
"Up the alarms, Scott."
Scott tapped furiously for a moment.
<<Shit! Fucking Four's breaching!>>
<<What?..>>
<<The whole fucking Joint, man!>>
<<No way!>>
A siren wailed through the protesting speakers again. Small
orange lights began to strobe faintly above the frantic Spiders.
"Cut the audio and go to Janet and Jerri..."
The vidscreen snapped over to show the twins, halted in the
hallway looking up at the orange lights. Their mouths both began to
move at the same time, yelling at each other. Janet pointed over her
sister's shoulder toward the checkpoint, but Jerri shoved the arm
aside and began to head back to the barracks.
"Show me the checkpoint."
On the screen, only two of the Spiders could be seen. One was
tapping at a console while the other seemed to be frozen with panic.
"Set off the intruder alarm."
"Which Leg?" Scott looked up at Kwan.
"Joint Five."
Scott started to move and then looked back up at Kwan.
"Five?.."
"Just do it, Scott!"
"But they'll get nailed!"
Kwan leaned over and pushed Scott's long arms out of the way.
He tapped a few keys slowly, unsure of himself. Scott just sat there
immobile as he worked. Finally, Kwan hit a last pad and stood up.
On the screen, the Spider that had been standing still suddenly
pointed to one of the vidscreen displays. The other at the console
stood and grabbed for his shock stick and ran out of the field of
view. The remaining Spider leaned down and opened a cabinet under
the console and pulled out a stubby projectile rifle.
Scott tapped the panel and the vidscreen flickered to show
Janet flying through the air, her body distorted by the wide angle
lens into a flattening bubble, one foot extending in front of her
like a bayonet. She collided into the first Spider, the shock stick
flying from his grasp, and quickly recovered as he came at her. The
Spider wrapped his arms around the small woman and backed her up
against the wall close to the vid camera's hidden location. Their
faces loomed large in the screen.
Janet did something unseen with her elbows and the Spider's
grip loosened. Janet spun him around and with the same motion pulled
out the thin wire of the thumb garrote. It wrapped around his neck
and dug in tight under his chin. The Spider's mouth opened in the
silence to grimace at the camera.
Suddenly a bright flash of red tore across the screen. The
faces blurred into quick motion and then became still. Half of the
Spider's jaw bone was stripped away from under the visor of his black
helmet. Skin hung loose in strips along his neck as redness began
to saturate the shoulder of his uniform. The sharp bone fragments
from his jaw were impaled in Janet's neck. Her mouth worked slowly
open and close as her blood joined the Spider's. A second red flash,
a blur, and then Janet's image was thrown from the screen.
"Jesus..."
"Scott, get the security comm panel up with volume."
Scott sat there, staring at the screen. Across the display ran
the Spider with the rifle. He was heading toward the barracks.
"You've killed them!"
"Scott! Get the security comm!"
Scott stood up suddenly and wheeled around at Kwan. "Fuck you,
Fish! You fucking killed them! Now what the hell are we supposed to
do?"
Kwan pushed by him and tapped the console until the comm panel
was displaying. He upped the volume.
"Fish! You're such a little..."
"Shut up, Scott!" Kwan turned the audio up higher.
<<...on Leg Five. They came in on Leg Five! All that physops
shit must've been a diversion...>>
<<Seal off Five and send all available Spiders, full battle
gear, to...>>
Kwan turned to Scott and smiled. "That's our fucking
diversion, Scott! Come on!"
Kwan unbolted the hatchway and ran out into the ship's
corridor. He bent down and began to pull on a pair of the orange
miner coveralls. Next to the coveralls on the plastic coated floor
lay Jerri's gold pen. She must have dropped it when suiting up
before. Kwan picked it up quickly. It felt warm to his touch. He
dropped it into a pocket of the coveralls.
"Hey, Scott! Let's go!"
Scott walked through the cockpit hatchway. He held Janet's
flechette pistol in his hand. It was pointed at Kwan.
"Why should I go with you, Fish?" he asked calmly. "You
screwed over everybody else on this job."
Kwan slipped on the last sleeve of the coveralls. "Because the
Spiders might be able to trace the hack of their phys-ops back to
this ship... because if you don't, you won't get off this Station
alive."
Kwan reached in through the open zipper of his coveralls and
pulled out a small projectile pistol. Scott's eyes widened and he
pulled the trigger of the flechette. The needle gun clicked without
effect.
"I emptied the clip before I left it on the console for you,"
Kwan said. Scott looked at him and then threw the flechette down.
"I think you're learning something, Scott. I never thought you'd
pull the trigger."
"Where'd you get that gun?"
"From under the captain's couch. I noticed that he kept
reaching down there during most of the trip.... oh, and it's loaded.
I checked. Now, come on and get that suit on. I still may need you
to get into the field lab."
**********************************
Jim Hawthorne hit the simple red button marked 'LAUNCH' in
yellow letters. There wasn't much else to do in the basic escape
pod. The vidscreen in front of him began to count down from five in
flashing numbers.
Patricia grabbed his arm suddenly and he quickly tried to push
it back into her acceleration web. "Not now, Pat. Keep inside the
web..."
The vidscreen displayed a zero and then a shudder went through
the pod. A giant hand reached out and punched the tightly wrapped
humans in their chests. The webs began to stiffen inelastically as
they stretched.
Without a view to the outside, Jim felt their motion only as
this mighty crush. He smiled slightly. Got away one more time, he
thought before he passed out.
The escape pod had just left when the bow shuttle bay began to
simultaneously crumble and melt. Plastic wall panels unbound their
carbon links and began to flow, expelled energy eaten by the surges
of nanites behind them. Metal girders powdered as ionic bonds
failed. Entire structures reduced into gigantic colloidal puddles
only to be reborn into an oozing gray mass. A living sludge of
nanites.
The mass leaped out at the trails of vapor and heat left by the
departing escape pod. Streamers of gray rushed to the airlock doors
and penetrated through melting petroleum o-ring seals. The nanites
feasted in the airlock for a moment on the clouds of thermal and
chemical energy and then punched out into the vacuum of space. In
the outside emptiness, the thin wisps of heat and unburned fuel from
the pod stretched out like a river.
************************************
Kwan walked the last few steps to the containment lock door.
Scott came up behind him, panting hoarsely. Kwan gestured to the
lock panel next to the door.
"Open it."
Scott went over to the panel, looked at it for a moment and
then tapped a button. A grinding sound emanated from behind the lock
door followed by a deep throated whoosh of air.
"It's already open."
Kwan nodded. "Gonzales must be waiting for us."
The door split in half and swung inward. Kwan and Scott
stepped through. Kwan motioned with the gun at the inner lock panel
again and Scott stepped up and tapped on it without emotion.
The door behind them swung shut and the air in the lock chamber
began to recirculate. Kwan felt the shower of sonics and looked over
at Scott.
"After we're through, lock the doors behind us."
Scott nodded, almost sullenly. Kwan didn't like the way he was
acting. Almost like a robot.
The inner containment lock door opened, sliding to one side.
Kwan stepped through and looked around calmly for Gonzales. He
didn't see her. Immediately he crouched down behind one of the lab
benches that lay in rows across the field lab room.
Kwan peered over the top of the bench and through the clutter
of lab mechanisms. He crawled his way to the end of the bench and
peeked around it. A hand lay on the ground there. Its white sleeved
arm disappeared behind a lab bench.
Kwan heard the inner doors lock behind him and then worked his
way over to the fallen figure. It looked like Gonzales.
"It's locked."
Kwan looked up at Scott who was walking over to the body.
"Is that Gonzales?" Kwan thought he could hear insolence
behind the words.
"Yeah, I think so."
Kwan turned the woman's face up to the light. It was shiny
with sweat and even felt a bit warm, but it also had a plastic
quality to it. Kwan reached out and felt for the woman's pulse.
None.
*********************************
He tried to get up again out of the hospital bed, but his arms
couldn't support him. He fell back to the tangled sheets and lay
there listening to the creaking and rumbling of the freighter. It
sounded like it was being wrenched apart, eaten from the inside.
Kwan stared at the ceiling. Mataglap, he thought. He
visualized the hazard symbol he had seen in the suit's chin switch
console and realized he had brought it with him. He heard a crash
then and suddenly the sound of the ship rending was all around him.
The lights flickered and a trail of smoke went up from the other side
of the privacy curtain. Kwan looked around him briefly, his vision
blurred by something in the air, and then returned his resigned gaze
to the ceiling.
The ceiling was covered with a yellowish textured material.
Sort of a stuccoed plastic. It blurred into embossed images of faces
Kwan had known. The eyes and ears and noses of familiar faces
coagulating into an amalgam of acquaintances he had never trusted.
He recognized Jerri's neck, Scott's eyes, Goldbreath's fat nose, his
father's lips... maybe he should have trusted one of them... some of
them.
Then all of the features melded together and Kwan saw the face
of Johnny Hawthorne laughing at him for a moment. Laughing.
Then it all disappeared into darkness. He could feel his body
being eaten, broken down... to be reborn as mataglap. He wondered if
any of his consciousness would migrate to the new form, survive the
transformation...
*********************************
Shit, Kwan thought to himself. His hand came up to his upper
lip and rubbed there slowly as he thought. He could smell the
woman's sweat on his hand.
Suddenly a huge boom shook through the room. Both Scott and
Kwan whirled to look at the containment lock inner door.
"Spiders," Scott said.
"Shit, it's a fucking set up..." Kwan whispered aloud. He
looked around himself. There was only one way out. Through the
doors.
Scott turned and glared at Kwan. "You fucking asshole, Fish!
You've killed us all, Fish. You've killed us..." Scott trailed off
as his eyes looked over Kwan's shoulder at something hanging in a
case on the wall.
Kwan followed his gaze and saw a large white pressure suit with
an oversized chest pack on its front.
Another boom rang through the lab room.
Scott pushed by Kwan to the wall case. He flung it open and
started to pull out the suit.
"What the hell are you doing, Scott?! What good is that going
to do you?"
Scott continued to pull the heavy suit out of its case. "This
might be a miner's drill suit!" he yelled over the din of another
blow to the containment door.
Kwan shook his head in confusion. His breath was coming
shorter now. He felt light headed and he couldn't think straight.
He jumped at another boom.
Kwan turned and ran over to the inner door. He stared at it as
it vibrated with the shock and cursed silently. Turning back to
Scott, he yelled, "What good is that going to do?"
Scott didn't reply. He was struggling to get his legs into the
clumsy pressure suit. His back was to Kwan.
Kwan took a step toward him and yelled again, "Scott! What the
fuck are you doing?" He leveled the gun at Scott's back. His hand
shook. "Tell me!"
He squeezed the trigger.
**end of CM**
Back to the index for this section
Back to the Tea Bowl