Juggler of Worlds (5 page)

Jinxians:
That
wasn’t a happy thought, but Sigmund tried to keep his expression neutral.

Jinx was the human-colonized moon, marginally habitable, of a gas-giant planet orbiting Sirius A. The surface gravity on Jinx was 1.78 standard. Living there
shaped
a person. Jinxians were built like boulders, short and squat, with arms as thick as Sigmund’s legs, and legs like old tree trunks.

Why would anyone live there? Raise families there? Flatlanders and spacers alike chalked it up to Jinxian craziness.

Not Sigmund. Jinx was the kind of world on which to raise an army of supermen.

A waiter came by, insinuating himself with admirable grace through milling crowds and between full tables. Sigmund accepted a fresh beer bulb while the opportunity presented itself, but his dark thoughts remained fixed on Jinx.

Not even supermen could threaten Earth—not without first defeating Earth’s vastly larger fleets. Hence, the unsubstantiated certainty that had set Sigmund onto this trip. Where better for the Jinxians to seek technological superiority than in that world’s immodestly named Institute of Knowledge?

The institute’s sprawling museum and vast public data banks suggested openness, but much of its research remained “proprietary” to its scientists. That secrecy seemed not to bother people. Why would it, what with the institute being a public, not-for-profit organization? A myriad of endowments, corporate sponsorships, academic alliances, and government grants funded its operations.

Sigmund took a long sip of beer, and resisted the urge to smile. He’d once been one hell of a forensic financial analyst. And so, on Jinx, he’d mined the public record.

He had not braved hyperspace and alien worlds for nothing.

Most of the institute’s academic alliances were with government-run Jinxian universities. Much of the corporate sponsorship came from businesses holding Jinxian government contracts. The endowments came from the Jinxian elites, with countless ties to current and retired officials.

Money laundering was money laundering.

With a mind of its own, Sigmund’s left hand crept to his stomach. Autodocs only removed physical scars.

Passengers kept wandering in and out of the lounge. The ratcat bared his teeth when anyone approached him. Sigmund’s scowl was a pale substitute. He wasn’t surprised when a shadow fell across his table.

“Mind if I join you?”

Sigmund looked up to a willowy blonde with twinkling green eyes. Earth willowy, not Belter skeletal. Her voice had a throaty quality. She eyed him frankly.

He pointed to an empty seat. “Help yourself.”

She sat. “I’m Pamela,” she said. “I’ve never met a Wunderlander.”

“Sigmund.” He stroked the beard he’d grown for the trip. More than a home world, the beard implied a station in life. The beard’s most prominent feature was a waxed spike sprouting from the right side of his jaw. Close-cropped stubble covered the rest of his chin. He had dyed his whiskers snow-white to contrast with his black suit. “Ah, the beard. Funny story, that.”

A funny style, as well. Its singular “virtue” was the absurd amount of time required for its maintenance. On Wunderland, the human-settled planet orbiting Alpha Centauri A, asymmetric beards were all the rage among the idle rich. Pamela probably thought he was from one of the Nineteen Families of original settlers—parasites all.

“I’d love to hear it.” Pamela smiled at the returning waiter. “Vurguuz.”

Vurguuz was a Wunderland concoction. Sigmund had tried it. Once. Years ago. He remembered a fist to the solar plexus and a minty-sweet aftertaste.

So Pamela wanted to impress him.…

“An interesting choice,” he said. “It makes my story even droller.” He said no more until her order arrived and she took a squeeze. Her eyes grew round.

Sigmund handed her his spare beer. She sucked the bulb dry in one convulsive swig. “I’m from Earth,” Sigmund said. “I just liked the exotic look. Wunderland is the final stop on my grand tour. When in Rome, and all that.” Jinx was neither the first nor the last stop on his itinerary, neither the shortest nor the longest stopover, the better to disguise his interest. He signaled for two more beers.

“That
is
funny.” Pamela coughed, her eyes tearing. “Two flatlanders. Still, I like the beard.”

The best disguises are simple, Sigmund thought. Across Human Space, most people disdained the Wunderlander aristos. At home, revolutionaries
fought to overthrow them. Only an oblivious buffoon would travel aping one.

Who’d ever suspect him of being an ARM on a covert mission?

The brazen twinkle had returned to Pamela’s eyes. She laid a warm hand on Sigmund’s arm. “Sigmund, tell me about your grand tour.”

Starships offered few diversions. Drinking shipboard was expensive. The obvious alternative for consenting adults was free. Sigmund couldn’t imagine perky little Pamela matching the athletic send-off Feather had given him—nor that Feather would expect him to abstain. He patted Pamela’s hand. “It’s so crowded here. Perhaps we could adjourn—”

Pamela was looking past him. The whole lounge had fallen silent. Glancing over his shoulder, Sigmund saw the ship’s captain approaching. Sigmund had taken his turn at the captain’s dinner table. It was hard to see the genial host chatting up his first-class customers in the grim-faced man now approaching.

“Ausfaller?” the captain said.

“Yes.” Sigmund’s reflexive thought was of the Kzin passenger. There had been six Man-Kzin Wars. Why not a seventh? ARM HQ might expect him to take custody of the alien.

“Come with me, sir.”

Sigmund followed the captain to the liner’s bridge. And once Sigmund had decoded the priority hyperwave radio message from ARM HQ, he felt like he’d had the vurguuz.

Arching one neck, the Puppeteer accepted the proffered ID. It set the disc on its desk and began a thorough examination. Apart from the few padded, backless benches and the oval desk, the office suited We Made It norms. The wall holos all showed scenes of human worlds.

The mundane decor didn’t surprise Sigmund. Puppeteers didn’t give clues about their worlds—never a name or description, much less a location or representation.

He trusted the aliens as little as they trusted him.

Sigmund had never met a Puppeteer in person until today. The flunkies and functionaries had passed him along, one to the next, and now to this latest one, almost too fast to form impressions. What had struck him was
how everyone in the outer offices appeared to have assumed a humanized name. Satyrs and centaurs, fates and furies, heroes and muses… when time permitted, he intended to ponder the aliens’ evident fascination with human myths.

This
one, Sigmund decided, was a decision maker. Standing, it matched Sigmund’s height. That was the only similarity.

The Puppeteer stood on two forelegs set far apart and one complexly jointed hind leg. Two long and flexible necks emerged from between its muscular shoulders. Each flat, triangular head had an ear, an eye, and a mouth whose tongue and knobbed lips also served as a hand. Its leathery skin was off-white with patches of tan. Its elaborately coiffed and ornamented brown mane covered the bony braincase between those sinuous necks.

Apparently Sigmund’s ID passed inspection. “You are quite far from home, Mr. Ausfaller. I do not understand the United Nations interest.” Like the Puppeteers in the outer office, it spoke perfect Interworld in a startling contralto.

It? Puppeteer genders were as mysterious as their origins. Despite their feminine voices, all were addressed as he. “Might I ask your name?” Sigmund asked.

Heads turned; for a moment, the Puppeteer looked himself in the eyes.

The mannerism meant nothing to Sigmund. Nor did its aural accompaniment, like a large glass window shattering in slow motion.

“More relevant is my responsibility within General Products Corporation. In human terms, I am the regional president here on We Made it.”

If the Puppeteer chose not to offer a name, Sigmund did not mind assigning one. Broken Glass seemed the obvious choice, but for the many demigods in the outer office.

Sigmund’s work and personality alike demanded attention to detail, and he’d noted many subtle distinctions among the aliens. Black, brown, and green eyes. Variations in height and build. Dissimilar skin patterns, in patches of brown, tan, and white.

The
big
disparity was in manes. Passing from worker to worker—up the corporate ladder?—mane styles became ever more elaborate. Like the aristo Wunderlander beards, an elaborate mane style denoted social status. This boss Puppeteer, Sigmund decided, his mane resplendent, will be Adonis.

“Again, Mr. Ausfaller, I do not understand UN interest.”

You conniving weasel, Sigmund thought. Perhaps one new human spaceship in 20
isn’t
built in an exorbitantly priced General Products hull, reliant on claims of invulnerability.

Adonis stepped out from behind his melted-looking desk. He gave a wide berth to the row of human chairs, and the “dangerous” edges on their legs. To show Sigmund the exit?

Sigmund said, “It has come to our attention that a Sol system citizen died recently in a GP-supported experiment.” Not that there were Sol system citizenships, but it sounded plausible, and Peter Laskin had been a Belter.

“Ah, the Laskins.” The Puppeteer lightly pawed the floor with one forehoof. “I’m now doubly surprised. Their ship was only very recently recovered. A tragedy, to be sure.”

Other ARMs had studied Puppeteers. Pawing the floor was believed to be a flight reflex.

Hyperwave radio was a wonderful thing. It was instantaneous where it worked: everywhere except deep within gravity wells. Comm buoys in the comet belts of all settled solar systems converted between radio waves and laser beams for intrasystem messaging and hyperwaves for interstellar messaging.

The ARM placed a
very
high priority on infiltrating General Products. Did Adonis suspect? How surprised would he be to know Raul Miller secretly worked for the ARM? That while piloting the salvaged
Hal Clement
home from BVS-1 Miller reported back to Earth?

Thereafter, it made perfect sense that ARM HQ had notified Sigmund, already en route from Jinx to We Made It. Both Laskins held research grants from the Institute of Knowledge.

“Very tragic,” Sigmund agreed. He ignored Adonis’ implied question. “But their deaths are only a part of our concern. What most interests me is how they died inside one of General Products’ supposedly impregnable hulls.”

THE PUPPETEER professed bafflement.

His idiom and accent were flawless. Sigmund did not doubt the Puppeteer’s acting skills. “Show me the ship,” Sigmund demanded.

“Why not.” The Puppeteer looked himself in the eyes again. “We also want to understand what happened. If you can explain, so much the better. Come with me.”

Adonis had a transfer booth in his office. They stepped through. Outside the destination booth, a spaceship rested on its side. It was about one hundred meters long and pointed at both ends. General Products sold only four hull versions; this was the #2 model. One end was painted, the rest left transparent, just as it—as all GP hulls—had been delivered.

Then Sigmund made the mistake of looking up.

We Made It was among the most inhospitable of the human-settled worlds. Summers and winters, the surface winds approached 250 kilometers per hour. The colonists built underground.

Hotels catering to the tourist trade had gravity generators. Elsewhere there was no ignoring the paltry gravity, a mere six-tenths gee, or the Belter-gangly natives, but Sigmund could—and did—stay indoors.

This wasn’t a hangar.

He stood on a ground-level roof. The ship was the only structure of any kind. Featureless desert stretched to the horizon in every direction. Although it was spring, he couldn’t see even the smallest speck of greenery—seasonal winds scoured the land clean of life. In a too-bright sky, above the blazing, too-blue sun, hung the piercing red spark that was Procyon B.

His heart pounded. His hands shook. Sigmund told himself the crawling on his skin was only the arid desert air.

Eyes cast down, he strode toward the ship. Its hull was transparent, but massive apparatuses inside cast long shadows. He stopped for a closer look in a comforting pool of shade beneath the stern.

Things appeared—wrong. The landing shocks were bent. Panels and equipment looked like they had melted and been forced aft under tremendous pressure.

A gust of wind flapped Sigmund’s trousers. Dust and gravel spattered off the hull. The breeze smelled—wrong. He hurried into the air lock.

He was in the main crew quarters when Adonis joined him. Something had torn loose the acceleration couches and sent them crashing into the ship’s nose. Instruments and chairs alike had crumpled. Walls, decks, ceiling—everything toward the bow—were thickly spattered in something brown.

Sigmund knew the answer before he asked. “These brown splashes?”

“That,” said the Puppeteer, “is the Laskins.”

ALIEN SKY SUDDENLY didn’t feel like a problem. Gulping, Sigmund walked back to the air lock. He and Adonis cycled through.