Juggler of Worlds Read online

  The more arrogant, the better the news, Sigmund reminded himself. Once two cannolis and a slice of baklava found their way to Ander’s end of the table, Sigmund took out his comm unit. “Protocol gamma,” he said. Sound suppression, bug suppression, and a translucent holographic screen around the table to stymie lip-readers. Red, yellow, and green dots slowly chased one another around its screen. “We can talk freely.”

  “Free except for that matter of my bonus.” Ander blotted his lips with his napkin. “I leave that entirely to your discretion.”

  Sigmund waited.

  “Very well. You’ll be amused to learn that I caroused our way to success.” Ander tipped his head, smiling in fond memory of something. “Once one has been accepted, there’s pleasure to be had even on West End. You should come back to Jinx with me.”

  Sigmund flinched. Since he had limped home from Forward Station, near catatonic with the flatlander phobia, the idea of leaving Earth terrified him. He’d been unable to face even the short trip to the Oort Cloud, where instantaneous hyperwave radio worked, to spare Ander a far longer voyage.

  “It sounds like you’ve already gotten your bonus,” Sigmund said.

  A cannoli disappeared, pastry flakes raining onto the tablecloth. “As directed, I befriended workers employed by Gregory Pelton’s project. I concede the process was not without its amusements.”

  “And?”

  “You suck all the fun out of a story, Sigmund. I was eventually hired, of course. A drinking buddy recommended me. It didn’t get me into the inner circle, of course, but I hold a responsible position in the back office. Close enough to the action to know, I think, who the inner circle is.” Ander waved his fork. “Yes, I know. You’re asking yourself why, if I have a responsible position, I could get away.”

  Murmurs penetrated the sound suppressors, no more intelligible than the snippets that might leak out. Sigmund said, “Stet. How?”

  “That’s the good thing about being middle management, just one transistor in the machine. No one thought anything of it when I said I needed some time off.

  “It’s my sister, you see. She got herself arrested in the flatlander riots.” Ander dropped the sudden theatrical voice. “I told them I thought I could get Sis’s charges dismissed—but those are the kind of favors one calls in only face-to-face.”

  A waitress came by with fresh coffee. Sigmund waited for her to leave before asking, “So what did you learn that couldn’t be put into an encrypted recording?”

  “Pelton’s little secret. The reason he’s been planning a big expedition, although, alas, not the coordinates of its destination.” Ander leaned forward conspiratorially.

  “And that secret is?” Sigmund prompted.

  “Antimatter.” A smug grin lit Ander’s face. “He found a futzy whole world of the stuff.”

  THE MOST UNUSUAL world.

  That I-know-something-you-don’t-know smirk on Pelton’s face had galled Sigmund for years. Someday soon, that smirk would come off. “Ander, you’ve earned that bonus after all.”

  “Excellent. A bit of celebratory brandy then?” Ander gestured to the waitress. “Some Cerbois Armagnac. The 2588, I think. Sigmund?”

  He had no one to leave his money to, as Feather was once apt to remind him. The ache when he thought about her and Carlos was another reason to drink. “Why not.”

  Ander continued his report, and the challenges of Pelton’s hoped-for expedition slowly became clear. No normal ship had the fuel capacity to rendezvous with the fast-moving antimatter system. And once there, then what? Antimatter solar wind had already destroyed a GP hull. Survival required entirely foolproof electromagnetic shields to divert charged antiparticles, and equally dependable lasers to target and ionize any neutral antimatter streaming their way.

  Perhaps enough antimatter couldn’t be captured simply from the solar wind. Sigmund let Medusa record Ander’s particulars—some specifics, and more speculations—about concepts for mining the planet itself. A gravitationally levitated base camp. High-powered lasers to boil off the antimatter surface, the ionized vapors then to be captured in magnetic bottles.

  “Who knows the location of the system?” Sigmund interrupted.

  Ander blinked. “Gregory Pelton, of course. On-site, Barry Kellerman, Tabitha-Ann Wong, Don Cramer, and Melanie Donnatello. They’re the inner circle. Our buddy Beowulf must know—like Elephant, he’s been there—but I’ve never seen Bey at the facility.”

  If only he had enough proof to squeeze Pelton! Sigmund couldn’t imagine going to the Secretary-General with just Ander’s word. It wouldn’t work. If he tried, news of the infiltration of an ARM informant might get back to Pelton. And while Pelton remained off-limits, Beowulf was, too. Tanj! He needed corroboration.

  “Are the insiders you named all Jinxians? Bey and Pelton aside, that is,” Sigmund said. A snifter of aromatic and obscenely expensive brandy sat in front of him, unsampled.

  “Mostly. Cramer’s another flatlander.”

  “Who in the group is official?”

  “Jinxian government? No one, I think.” Ander grinned. “West End is a very small, close-knit community. That’s why it took me so long to get accepted. In the end, being a flatlander probably helped. Cramer handles personnel matters, and he errs on the side of caution. He doesn’t want anyone from the government or the Institute of Knowledge getting in.”

  There was that name again. It sounded familiar, but Sigmund couldn’t place it. “Medusa, what do you have on Don Cramer?” It wasn’t Medusa he asked, of course, merely the subset he could carry around. The rest of her, cut off by the privacy screen, remained on the net.

  “A longtime business associate of Gregory Pelton,” she said.

  That still sounded familiar. “Any relation to our . . . other investigation?” Ander wasn’t involved in the Puppeteer hunt. Medusa was subtle enough to catch the hint.

  “Maybe,” she answered. “I can show you onscreen, if you like.”

  Ander had also taken the hint. He turned his attention to his brandy, pointedly looking away while Sigmund angled his comm unit so only he could see the screen.

  “Go ahead,” Sigmund said. A tiny representation appeared of Medusa’s tangled web. She panned and zoomed until he saw only a corner of the graphical network. A few symbols near Cramer’s suggested small amounts of GP money. (Correlation is not causation, mocked the voice only he heard.)

  Cramer himself wasn’t thought to have gotten GP funds. Because he had enough money of his own—or of Pelton’s? Maybe, but Sigmund had another explanation. He knew all about off-limits Pelton associates. Maybe Cramer was too dangerous to approach.

  The problem with an all-but-omnipresent AIde was coping in those rare instances when she wasn’t around. Like years ago, inside the electronically suppressed domain of an exclusive, private Manhattan club. Pelton’s words came rushing back: “Not me, not my friends, not my associates. There will be no further interest in Dianna Guthrie, or Beowulf Shaeffer, or Sharrol Janss, or Don Cramer, or anyone close to me.”

  Sigmund remembered making a mental note that day to track down who Cramer was. Too much had been going on; the matter had slipped his mind. “Are there other overlaps?”

  The affinity web expanded to incorporate buddies and co-workers Ander had mentioned. Most showed only the simple white icon that denoted “nothing unusual known.” A few icons, all close to the so-called inner circle, showed varying degrees of the purple tinge of suspected Puppeteer funding. Sigmund asked, “Medusa, what’s your guess?”

  Serpents writhed. “We’re not the only ones trying to locate the antimatter solar system.”

  • • •

  SIGMUND ROAMED CENTRAL Park, the evening breeze tugging at his suit, fallen leaves swirling about his legs and crunching beneath his shoes. A copseye floated overhead, indifferent to his off-key whistling.

  Almost certainly, Puppeteers and Jinxians knew no more about Pelton’s plans than he did. That left Pelton himself as a threat. Finagle on
ly knew what Pelton planned to do with antimatter. It hardly mattered. If Pelton’s purpose was somehow utilitarian and benign, the mere presence in Human Space of antimatter in large quantities remained unacceptable. Whether Pelton, or a corrupt colleague, or lurking Puppeteers took possession, the danger was intolerable.

  But harvesting antimatter would be difficult indeed. Much could go wrong.

  This time, Ander traveled to Jinx with his prospects for a bonus quite unambiguous. To earn it, Ander had only to see to it that a few things did go wrong. . . .

  39

  Not until Achilles had lived among humans and learned to speak Interworld did he discover a word to truly describe himself. He was a rebel.

  Disagreement was rare among Citizens. There were differences of opinion, certainly: concerning art, music, fashion. On matters of public policy, the Concordance had long consisted of the two great political organizations. Experimentalists championed courses of action that no Conservative could ever advocate.

  But Achilles had seen, among humans and Kzinti, real politics and true struggles for power. Hearth had neither. Responsibility for Hearth’s governance shifted between Experimentalists and Conservatives only after an overwhelming reversal in popular consensus. Even then the shifts often changed nothing. No matter who was Hindmost, managing Foreign Affairs remained primarily an Experimentalist duty and social justice a Conservative role.

  So how different could the parties be?

  Achilles dug a forehoof indulgently into the mead-owplant that so thickly carpeted the deck. It was a rare Hindmost who left Hearth, but the vessel maintained at the ready for him, for that remote contingency, was luxurious.

  He thought about the mental flexibility required to leave the home world, and adjusted his cynicism: There was a difference between parties. No Conservative had ever left Hearth.

  Achilles awaited the imminent conference in the bustling comfort of the ship’s relax room. In the privacy of his thoughts, he sneered at this crew. They thought themselves strong, and yet they ventured little farther than a routine shuttle run to one of the farm worlds. They need never make the jump into hyperspace. This trip took them only barely outside the singularity, for a hyperwave consultation with Nessus.

  Once, before knowing the word, Achilles had hoped Nessus was a fellow rebel. Now Achilles knew Nessus was only a screwup.

  Crew came and went, fluting and warbling to one another. A few apologized for disturbing Achilles’ thoughts. Most did not bother, or took no note of him. He ignored them all.

  On the relax room’s main viewer, one star blazed far brighter than the rest. Giver of Life, it was called, and so it once had been. Its expansion into a red giant had nearly extinguished all life. Only moving Hearth itself had saved the herd—while driving many permanently catatonic.

  Now they fled the slow-motion death not of a sun, but of a whole galaxy.

  He stared at Giver of Life, remembering a walk on the beach. A communion with, he had believed, a kindred spirit. A great red spark had hung low on the horizon, a thousand reflections glittering on the waves. . . .

  “EXPLORING HAS ITS rewards,” Achilles said. “That includes unparalleled privacy here on Hearth.” It was a partial truth. Pastoral reservations such as this also encouraged scouts to keep their disturbing, manic-depressive selves away from their well-adjusted betters.

  A protégé cantered at Achilles’ side, sand flying from his hooves. The young one still toyed with his choice of scout name, favoring for now the obscure centaur name of Nessus. “I could get used to this.”

  But you won’t, Achilles thought. You’ll spend most of your life off-world, with little-enough companionship even from your fellow misfits. And for nothing. Unless you join with me, that is. “A beautiful setting.”

  They ambled along the shore, warm waves easing up the shallow slope to swirl about their hooves. To their left, towering arcologies ringed the beach and blocked out the sky. To their right, to seaward, the view was entirely different. Stars sparkled above ocean swells that extended to the horizon.

  Achilles let the vista speak for him.

  “It’s very peaceful,” Nessus finally said. “When I graduate and ship out, I shall remember this as part of what we protect.”

  “And yet,” Achilles said. He paused to stare out to sea. He always did. It was best that he not seem to be recruiting. “Never mind.”

  Nessus chanted delicately, with harmonics of trust and respect, “Yet what?”

  Achilles swept his gaze across the sea. “Look how empty it is. We’re told the planet is full. That’s why so few are permitted Brides.”

  “Surely it is full,” Nessus replied. The answer was swift and orthodox, as he had been taught, but puzzled undertunes sounded through.

  His confusion was predictable enough. At this point in their training, scouts were at their most vulnerable. Loners and misfits all, they saw the possibility within their grasp, some for the first time in their lives, to belong. Most would do anything for acceptance into the fraternity of explorers.

  Now was the moment, with deftness and skill, to recruit Nessus into another community. Several young allies watched from a distance, awaiting the signal to greet their newest fellow.

  Achilles stopped walking. He straightened a neck, pointing out the brightest star in the sky. “Giver of Life. It nurtured us. Then, when we were ready, it did what good fathers must. It encouraged its offspring, us, to take responsibility for ourselves.”

  Nessus was mute for a long time, struggling with the metaphor. “A stern parent. To leave Hearth in its natural orbit would have meant incineration. Extinction.”

  Achilles raised his heads and assumed a confident, wide-legged stance. “The simplest course would have been to move Hearth very gradually, as Giver of Life expanded. Next simplest would have been to move Hearth immediately to its final distant orbit, and ring the planet with artificial suns. But what was done?”

  “The oceans were seeded with genetically engineered, infrared-photosynthesizing plankton,” his student said. “At the rim of the solar system, away from the danger, our sky became dark.”

  “The herd did more than relocate far from danger,” Achilles clarified. “This is the history we’re not taught. Our world was at risk before the sun showed its first instabilities. Hearth was baking in the waste heat of a half-trillion occupants and their industry.”

  As they resumed their stroll, Achilles brushed flanks with the young scout. In the teeming arcologies and pedestrian malls, such casual contact was unavoidable, reassuring but impersonal. Here on the empty beach the touching was freighted with meaning. “We freed ourselves of heat as a limit on our population. In a few generations, the number of Citizens doubled.”

  They walked on in thoughtful silence. “There were consequences,” Nessus finally said. “It is said that many went mad.”

  So some had, but almost exclusively among Conservatives. That ancient history would matter more to Nessus than to most of his recruits. Achilles had studied the would-be scout’s file; he came from a long line of Conservatives.

  “But the world is surely full now,” Nessus went on. “Isn’t it?”

  A wave crashed onto a pile of surf-smoothed rocks, splashing them both with spray. Achilles locked eyes with his protégé. “Not the ocean floor. Most of the world’s surface is ocean.”

  Of a trillion Citizens, all but a few lived in stacked cubicles deep in the bowels of vast structures, the very air they breathed replenished by filters bonded to stepping discs. What sky they saw they experienced by holovision or by teleporting elsewhere. How would their lives change if those boxes lay under the sea?

  Achilles now poured out his vision, of the ocean floor covered in arcologies built of impervious hull material. Surely Hearth could support two, even three trillion more Citizens.

  More young ones waited nearby, all previously initiated. Achilles had honed the process. First, the approach: overwhelming an eager-to-please protégé with his charisma. Indiv
idual attention from a high official at the academy was usually enough. Then, the warm welcome from a few peers. Finally, the group assembly, bonding the recruit—a lonely misfit, as every scout trainee was—into Achilles’ growing sect.

  The initiates he had designated sidled closer, eager to perform their parts. Vesta, tall and lithe, with his booming contralto voices. Clotho, of the dancing green eyes and striking russet patches. Nyx, of the boldly striped coat. As they approached, Achilles rhapsodized about their wondrous future, his voices thrumming with enthusiasm—

  And Nessus recoiled! “I don’t understand. What of such arcologies’ waste heat, bubbling up from the seabed?” A nervous whinny escaped him. “The oceans remain the lungs of the world.”

  “Plankton was genetically engineered once.” Annoyed undertunes crept into Achilles’ voices. Had they not just discussed that? And his disciples might hear Nessus’ impertinence. “The plankton can be reengineered, if need be, for greater heat tolerance.”

  “I see.” Nessus tugged at his earnestly plain mane, the reflex putting the lie to his tentative words. “In theory, that is.”

  Nyx edged closer. “Respectfully, sir, I had begun to wonder about the implications of disturbing seabed methane clathrates. . . .”

  “Methane clathrates?” Achilles snapped back, warbling in anger. “What is this trivia?”

  “Methane trapped in ice in the ocean-floor sediments,” Clotho said. “How would its release affect—”

  “Silence!” Achilles trilled, his undertunes demanding immediate obedience. “I know what they are,” he lied. None of this mattered. His true interest wasn’t trillions more theoretical Citizens. Of course there were questions and unpredictable implications.

  All that mattered was that a single arcology be deployed to the ocean floor as an experiment. Such a test would require a cadre of volunteers. Scouts were the obvious source—as soon as enough had pledged their loyalty. And surely the research population must include a Harem House of potential Brides.

  He would be their Hindmost, master of the ocean floor, commanding them all.