“Yes, and it’s frightening, Mr. Thompson.” It was no surprise that none of the Tourists had heard of a blabber. The only solid lead coming back to Larry had been from halfway around the galactic rim, a nook in the Beyond that had only one occasional link with the rest of the Known Net. That far race had no direct knowledge of the blabbers. But they heard rumors. From a thousand light years below them, deep within the Slow Zone, there came stories … of a race matching the Blab’s appearance. The race was highly intelligent, and had quickly developed the relativistic transport that was the fastest thing inside the Zone. They colonized a vast sphere, held an empire of ten thousand worlds—all without ftl. And the tines—the name seemed to fit—had not held their empire through the power of brotherly love. Races had been exterminated, planets busted with relativistic kinetic energy bombs. The tines’ technology had been about as advanced and deadly as could exist in the Zone. Most of their volume was a tomb now, their story whispered through centuries of slow flight toward the Outside.
“Wait, wait. Prof Fujiyama told me the ansible’s bandwidth is a tenth of a bit per second. You’ve had less than twelve hours to work this question. How can you possibly know all this?”
Larry looked a little embarrassed—a first as far as Hamid could remember. “We’ve been using the AI protocol I told you about. There’s massive interpolation going on at both ends of our link to Lothlrimarre.”
“I’ll bet!”
“Remember, Mr. Thompson, the data compression applies only to the first link in the chain. The Known Net lies in the Beyond. Bandwidth and data integrity are very high across most of its links.”
The slug sounded very convinced. But Hamid had read a lot about the Known Net; the notion was almost as fascinating as ftl travel itself. There was no way a world could have a direct link with all others—partly because of range limitations, mainly because of the
number
of planets involved. Similarly, there was no way a single “phone company” (or even ten thousand phone companies!) could run the thing. Most likely, the information coming to them from around the galaxy had passed through five or ten intermediate hops. The intermediates—not to mention the race on the far rim—were likely nonhuman. Imagine asking a question in English of someone who also speaks Spanish, and that person asking the question in Spanish of someone who understands Spanish and passes the question on in German. This was a million times worse. Next to some of the creatures Out There, the slug could pass for human!
Hamid said as much. “F-furthermore, even if this is what the sender meant, it could still be a lie! Look at what local historians did to Richard the Third, or Mohamet Rose.”
Lazy Larry smiled his polliwog smile, and Hamid realized they must have been arguing about this already. Larry put in, “There’s also this, sluggo: the nature of the identification. The tines must have something like hands. See any on Hamid’s Blabber?”
The slug’s scarlet fringe rippled three quick cycles. Agitation? Dismissal? “The text is still coming in. But I have a theory. You know, Larry, I’ve always been a great student of sex. I may be a ‘he’ only by courtesy, but I think sex is fascinating. It’s what makes the ‘world go around’ for so many races.” Hamid suddenly understood Gilli Weinberg’s success. “So. Grant me my expertise. My guess is the tines exhibit
extreme
sexual dimorphism. The males’ forepaws probably are hands. No doubt it’s the males who are the killers. The females—like the Blab—are by contrast friendly, mindless creatures.”
The Blab’s eyes rolled back to look at Hamid. “Sure, sure,” she murmured. The accident of timing was wonderful, seeming to say
Who is this clown?
The slug didn’t notice. “This may even explain the viciousness of the male. Think back to the conversation Mr. Thompson had. These creatures seem to regard their own females as property to exploit. Rather the ultimate in sexism.” Hamid shivered. That
did
ring a bell. He couldn’t forget the
hunger
in the tines’s voice.
“Is this the long way to tell me you’re not going to protect us?”
The slug was silent for almost fifteen seconds. Its scarlet fringe waved up and down the whole time. Finally: “Almost, I’m afraid. My caravan customers haven’t heard this analysis, just the threats and the news broadcasts. Nevertheless, they are tourists, not explorers. They demand that I refuse to let you aboard. Some demand that we leave your planet immediately … . How secure is this line, Larry?”
Fujiyama said, “Underground fiberoptics, and an encrypted laser link. Take a chance, sluggo.”
“Very well. Mr. Thompson, here is what you can expect from me:
“I can stay over the city, and probably defend against direct kidnapping—unless I see a planetbuster coming. I doubt very much they have that set up, but if they do—well, I don’t think even you would want to keep your dignity at the price of a relativistic asteroid strike.
“I can
not
come down to pick you up. That would be visible to all, a direct violation of my customers’ wishes. On the other hand,” there was another pause, and his scarlet fringe whipped about even faster than before, “if you should appear, uh, up here, I would take you aboard my barge. Even if this were noticed, it would be a
fait accompli
. I could hold off my customers, and likely our worst fate would be a premature and unprofitable departure from Middle America.”
“T-that’s very generous.”
Unbelievably so
. The slug was thought to be an honest fellow—but a very hard trader. Even Hamid had to admit that the claim on the slug’s honor was tenuous here, yet he was risking a twenty-year mission for it.
“Of course,
if
we reach that extreme, I’ll want a few years of your time once we reach the Outside. My bet is that hard knowledge about your Blabber might make up for the loss of everything else.”
A day ago, Hamid would have quibbled about contracts and assurances. Today, well, the alternative was Ravna&Tines … . With Larry as witness, they settled on two years’ indenture and a pay scale.
Now all he and the Blab had to do was figure how to climb five thousand meters straight up. There was one obvious way.
IT WAS DAVE LARSON’S CAR, BUT DAVEY OWED HIM. HAMID WOKE HIS NEIGHBOR, explained that the Blab was sick and had to go into Marquette. Fifteen minutes later, Hamid and the Blab were driving through Ann
Arbor Town. It was a Saturday, and barely into morning twilight; he had the road to himself. He’d half expected the place to be swarming with cops and military. If Ravna&Tines ever guessed how easy it was to intimidate Joe Ortega … If the Feds knew exactly what was going on, they’d turn the Blab over to Tines in an instant. But apparently the government was simply confused, lying low, hoping it wouldn’t be noticed till the big boys upstairs settled their arguments. The farm bombing wasn’t in the headline list anymore. The Feds were keeping things quiet, thereby confining the mindless panic to the highest circles of government.
The Blab rattled around the passenger side of the car, alternately leaning on the dash and sniffing in the bag of tricks that Hamid had brought. She was still subdued, but riding in a private auto was a novelty. Electronics gear was cheap, but consumer mechanicals were still at a premium. And without a large highway system, cars would never be the rage they had been on Old Earth; most freight transport was by rail. A lot of this could change because of the Caravan. They brought one hundred thousand agrav plates—enough to revolutionize transport. Middle America would enter the Age of the Aircar—and for the first time surpass the homeworld. So saith Joe Ortega.
Past the University, there was a patch of open country. Beyond the headlights Hamid caught glimpses of open fields, a glint of frost. Hamid looked up nervously every few seconds. Selene and Diane hung pale in the west. Scattered clouds floated among the Tourist barges, vague grayness in the first light of morning. No intruders, but three of the barges were gone, presumably moved to orbit. The Lothlrimarre vessel floated just east of Marquette, over the warehouse quarter. It looked like the slug was keeping his part of the deal.
Hamid drove into downtown Marquette. Sky signs floated brightly amid the two-hundred-story towers, advertising dozens of products—some of which actually existed. Light from discos and shopping malls flooded the eight-lane streets. Of course the place was deserted; it was Saturday morning. Much of the business section was like this—a reconstruction of the original Marquette as it had been on Earth in the middle twenty-first century. That Marquette had sat on the edge of an enormous lake, called Superior. Through that century, as Superior became the splash-down point for heavy freight from space, Marquette had become one of the great port cities of Earth, the gateway to the solar system. The Tourists said it was legend, ur-mother to a thousand worlds.
Hamid turned off the broadway, down an underground ramp. The Marquette of today was for show, perhaps one percent the area of the original, with less than one percent the population. But from the air it
looked good, the lights and bustle credible. For special events, the streets could be packed with a million people—everyone on the continent who could be spared from essential work. And the place wasn’t really a fraud; the Tourists knew this was a reconstruction. The point was, it was an
authentic
reconstruction, as could only be created by a people one step from the original source—that was the official line. And in fact, the people of Middle America had made enormous sacrifices over almost twenty years to have this ready in time for the Caravan.
The car rental was down a fifteen-story spiral, just above the train terminal.
That
was for real, though the next arrival was a half hour away. Hamid got out, smelling the cool mustiness of the stone cavern, hearing only the echoes of his own steps. Millions of tonnes of ceramic and stone stood between them and the sky. Even an Outsider couldn’t see through that … he hoped. One sleepy-eyed attendant watched him fill out the forms. Hamid stared at the display, sweating even in the cool; would the guy in back notice? He almost laughed at the thought. His first sally into crime was the least of his worries. If Ravna&Tines were plugged into the credit net, then in a sense they really
could
see down here—and the bogus number Larry had supplied was all that kept him invisible.
They left in a Millennium Commander, the sort of car a Tourist might use to bum around in olden times. Hamid drove north through the underground, then east, and when finally they saw open sky again, they were driving south. Ahead was the warehouse district … and hanging above it, the slug’s barge, its spheres and cupolas green against the brightening sky. So huge. It looked near, but Hamid knew it was a good five thousand meters up.
A helicopter might be able to drop someone on its topside, or maybe land on one of the verandas—though it would be a tight fit under the overhang. But Hamid couldn’t fly a chopper, and wasn’t even sure how to rent one at this time of day. No, he and the Blab were going to try something a lot more straightforward, something he had done every couple of weeks since the Tourists arrived.
They were getting near the incoming lot, where Feds and Tourists held payments-to-date in escrow. Up ahead there would be cameras spotted on the roofs. He tinted all but the driver-side window, and pushed down on the Blab’s shoulders with his free hand. “Play hide for a few minutes.”
“Okay.”
Three hundred meters more and they were at the outer gate. He saw the usual three cops out front, and a fourth in an armored box to the side. If Ortega was feeling the heat, it could all end right here.
They looked
real
nervous, but they spent most of their time scanning
the sky. They knew something was up, but they thought it was out of their hands. They took a quick glance at the Millennium Commander and waved him through. The inner fence was almost as easy, though here he had to enter his Guide ID … . If Ravna&Tines were watching the nets, Hamid and the Blab were running on borrowed time now.
He pulled into the empty parking lot at the main warehouse, choosing a slot with just the right position relative to the guard box. “Keep quiet a little while, Blab,” he said. He hopped out and walked across the gravel yard. Maybe he should move faster, as if panicked? But no, the guard had already seen him.
Okay, play it cool
. He waved, kept walking. The glow of morning was already dimming the security lamps that covered the lot. No stars shared the sky with the clouds and the barges.
It was kind of a joke that merchandise from the Beyond was socked away here. The warehouse was big, maybe two hundred meters on a side, but an old place, sheet plastic and aging wood timbers.
The armored door buzzed even before Hamid touched it. He pushed his way through. “Hi, Phil.”
Luck! The other guards must be on rounds.
Phil Lucas was a friendly sort, but not too bright, and not very familiar with the Blab. Lucas sat in the middle of the guard cubby, and the armored partition that separated him from the visitor trap was raised. To the left was a second door that opened into the warehouse itself. “Hi, Ham.” The guard looked back at him nervously. “Awful early to see you.”
“Yeah. Got a little problem. There’s a Tourist out in the Commander.” He waved through the armored window. “He’s drunk out of his mind. I need to get him Upstairs and quietly.”