While he was still staring around him, a high-pitched whistle came from behind.
Mike and Melly turned quickly. Waddling toward them across the landing square came two pudgy, squat figures. The smaller one stepped right up to the two Traders.
"Hello." There was another whistling grunt, and the blunt head smiled to reveal two big, orange-yellow incisors. "I am Dolly Caps, and this is Benjy Caps. We are at more than thirteen thousand feet altitude, but I hope that you do not feel too uncomfortable."
Cappies. Enhanced capybaras.
Mike looked at the thinly haired paw held out toward him. There were four fingers on it, with thick, hooflike nails, and the webbing of skin between the digits had been surgically cut to allow more independence of movement. The capybaras were about five feet tall now, standing upright, but looking at the callused paw, Mike could see that they were probably more at ease on all fours. Both the big rodents wore orange suits with brown pouch-pockets over their fat, tailless bodies.
He took Dolly Caps's paw and shook it firmly, then watched while Melly did the same with Benjy Caps. Whatever Mike thought of the rulers of the Unified Empire, he had nothing against the Cappies. The enhanced capybaras were supposed to be patient, docile, obedient, and conscientious—just about everything, in fact, that their masters were not.
"We are your reception committee," Dolly said. The words were very slightly separated from one another as the implanted synthesizer helped out the Cappy's own throat limitations. Dolly Caps smiled again, showing those frightening teeth. Vegetarians, Mike reminded himself. All the while the eyes high in the square-muzzled head shifted randomly from side to side. "If you will please follow us, we will take you to your quarters."
She turned and began to amble across the landing area. After a few steps Benjy dropped, with a grunt of relief, to walk on all fours.
Mike caught Melly's arm as she started to follow. "I think they're both blind!"
"They are." She put her hand on top of his and gripped surprisingly hard. "Didn't you read our briefing materials? That's one of Dominic Mantilla's nice little ways. He enhances his Cappies as much as they can be enhanced—but he blinds them so they can't ever think of running away to live wild."
"I didn't see anything about that in the briefings."
"Then you didn't read everything. That information was in the last packet that we were given. We were supposed to read all of it. Didn't you?"
She started forward, leaving Mike standing with his mouth open. The packet she was referring to had been given to them when the flight began—but there had been five hundred pages of new material. Was she telling him she
had
read it, every word, on their three-hour trip? Mike had spent the time sleeping.
He hurried after the others. Although the Cappies could not see, they seemed to know exactly where they were and where they were going. Dolly took them to a parapeted balcony at the edge of the landing area and pointed out and down at the hairline of white scar that curved away toward the Pacific.
"Glissando," she said. "For any human who wants to play the ultimate game." She giggled.
"What is that?" Melly asked. The parapet marked the end of the flat ledge and jutted out over three hundred feet of air. Melly was casually leaning far out over it. Mike had no particular fear of heights, but he felt dizzy watching her. "I can't see the end of it."
"It is polished ice." Benjy Caps spoke for the first time. "Glissando is an ice-run all the way to the ocean. Over fifty miles distance, dropping well over two miles in height. The sleds are very carefully shaped—they are traveling at more than two hundred miles an hour when they plunge into the Pacific."
"But that would kill the rider!" Mike said.
"Yes. The player must aim for a set of rings near the end of the run, which slow the metal sled electromagnetically. A player who misses will hit the ocean at full speed and be killed." Benjy stood upright again, and the broad head lifted. The Cappy stared at Mike with sightless, cheerful eyes. "Do you think that you will try it while you are here? It is said to be the most exciting game on Earth."
Mike looked over and shivered. "Not for me, thanks. Melly?"
She was still staring, hanging far into space. "Maybe. At the very least, I'd like to take a closer look. How are the sleds controlled?"
"From inside them," Benjy said. "A sled can hold one or two persons. You should mention your interest to the Lord Dominic." He dropped back to all fours. "We will take you now to meet with him. He can arrange a ride if you wish. There are many experiences here in Dreamtown that you may wish to sample."
They were descending along a ramp that led below ground level and cut back under the surface of the landing area. As they went, the architecture became steadily more ornate and colorful. Great corridors with walls of gleaming white and gold were filled with erotic statues and flanked by holographic murals of every conceivable sport and pleasure. Mike was reminded again of a basic fact: the business of the Unified Empire was
pleasure.
They knew more here about the art of making people excited than the rest of the world put together. And Dominic Mantilla as Lord of Dreamtown was one of their accepted masters.
Mike was pleased to see that Melly found the erotic murals and statues a lot less distracting than he did. She was looking at everything but the murals, and with great intensity.
"Just in case we get into trouble and need it," she said, in answer to Mike's quiet question on her wide-eyed staring around them. "You know. Rule Fifty-seven."
Anyone can get into trouble. Make sure you plan a way out of it.
That was Rule 57 of the
unofficial
rule book. So Melly was quite willing to quote it herself when she felt like it. Mike filed away another confusing data point.
Before he could give it much thought his attention was captured by something else. Dolly and Benjy Caps had been trundling along on all fours between Mike and Melly, explaining what they were seeing—mainly the doors and viewing balconies of the underground game rooms. But, as the Cappies approached a tall door they both stopped talking and rose suddenly to stand on their hind legs. As they moved in front of Mike, he could see that Dolly's plump back was quivering gently. They all turned a corner and went through an archway into a room with a waist-high partition across its center. The two Cappies advanced to the partition, then turned back to face Mike and Melly.
"The Lord Dominic," Benjy said, and now it was obvious that he was shivering, too.
On the other side of the partition stood a tall, smiling man. He had classically handsome features, with an aristocratic nose and a beautiful, smiling mouth. He was hugely tall. Discounting the polished, high-heeled boots of black leather, Mike estimated the other man's height at some seven feet four inches; the poised, straight-backed stance made normal men seem puny and stooped.
"Welcome!" Dominic Mantilla stepped forward and opened a gate in the waist-high room divider. "My dear lady and gentleman, please welcome to Dreamtown. May your visit here be the source of a hundred new delights!" He turned to the two Cappies, who were standing uncomfortably upright. "Thank you, Dolly, and you too, Benjy. You may leave."
The Cappies bowed a little, then scuttled away, still fully upright.
"Splendid servants!" Mantilla said. "Where would we be without them?"
"Wouldn't they be more use to you if they could see?" Mike asked mildly.
"Oh, a little." Dominic Mantilla gave an expansive shrug. "They manage well enough, though, and the loss of sight isn't all that important to them. I have asked them the question, would they give up the enhancement if I gave them back their sight?—and each one has agreed that they want to keep the enhancement."
Great choice. You take my eyes, or you take my brain. No wonder the Cappies answered that way. But Mike did not say what he was thinking.
"Please, allow me to introduce myself," Mantilla went on. He gave a great, toothy smile. "I am Dominic Mantilla, Lord of Dreamtown, and I and the whole of this facility are completely at your disposal. May I say how much I am looking forward to working with you on this negotiation?"
Mike smiled back just as hard. He had been nice before to people at least as unpleasant as Dominic Mantilla. He would be polite now. But Melly's actions were another matter. She was staring at their host as though she had never seen anything so wonderful in her whole life.
"Lord Dominic." Her voice was faint and breathless. "This is such a—a
thrill
for me."
"My dear lady!" Mantilla seized Melly's hand, bent over it, and kissed it. Then instead of releasing her he remained crouched forward, looking deep into her eyes. A thin, bluish tongue licked at his full lips, his nostrils flared, and he seemed all set to take a bite out of her. "The pleasure of this meeting is all mine. Such beauty! No one warned me of this."
Mike stood and waited to be noticed. The air was practically purple with pheromones, and he felt like the world's most unnecessary presence.
After a minute or so Mantilla finally became aware of him again. The tall figure turned and shook his hand vigorously. "'Trader Asparian. The fame and reputation of you and your beautiful companion has preceded you. I tremble when I think of negotiating with you. If I left it for a few more hours, my courage would probably fail me completely. Therefore I have arranged that we begin at once."
While you are fresh and we are still suffering from travel fatigue, Mike thought. Melly merely smiled at Mantilla admiringly. "That sounds perfect. If we might first drop off our bags in our rooms . . ."
"Of course, of course, my profound apologies. Where is my courtesy?" With a great flourish of long-fingered hands, Mantilla waved the Traders forward. "Let me show you to your rooms at once. And after we have finished talking today, I would like to offer a special event for you—a party in your honor, and a guided tour of all the facilities of Dreamtown. And of course, should one of the attractions appeal to you, you will be my guest."
His tone suggested that one of the attractions for Melly might include access to Mantilla himself. And she did nothing to disillusion him. As he showed them through to their quarters, she went inside, then at once called through the open doorway. "Lord Dominic, I wonder if you could help me a little with my case."
Mike stood motionless in the entrance of his own suite of rooms. He heard low voices from the next suite along the corridor, Melly's laugh and Dominic Mantilla's answering bass chuckle. Then the door closed. He could hear nothing at all.
He could imagine a great deal.
* * *
Mike had his own way of preparing for a hard negotiation. First he stretched out on the bed for ten minutes and tried to push all worries out of his mind—tried to forget about Melly's superior status and odd behavior, about the failure of the first two Traders here, about the overflowing self-confidence and casual cruelty of Dominic Mantilla.
Then he took a long shower, as hot as he could stand it, and allowed all the worries to seep back in. He needed them. A good negotiator
had
to have a head stuffed full of worries, because any one of them might be the item that would provide the key bargaining point.
He was in the shower for nearly a quarter of an hour. When he finally came out of it, naked and rubbing at his wet hair with a towel, Melly was sitting quietly on his bed. Her face was flushed.
She looked Mike over with the emotional detachment of someone choosing a wallpaper pattern. "You look better
without
clothes on, too," she said. "You've added muscles. How did you get the scar on your arm?"
"Little bit of fun in the Strine Interior. Look, would you mind awfully if I put some clothes on now?"
His sarcastic tone had no effect on her. She gave his body another up-and-down sweep with that silver-gray gaze. "Mike, we need to talk—before the negotiation."
"Something new?"
"I think so, but I don't know how to evaluate it. Dominic Mantilla was saying how much he was looking forward to spending more time with me after the big reception tonight. I asked him who would be there. He said, quite casually, that two of the people would be Wernher Eckart and Cesar Famares. They're alive, and obviously they're not tortured or locked up in a cell somewhere. What do you make of that?"
Mike sat down naked on the bed next to Melly, his shirt forgotten in his hands. "Alive, and free. Hmmm. Normally I would say it had to be tranquilizing drugs, or brain surgery—but I've never heard of a truth drug that could break Trader Oath, and the surgery to do it would make the two of them into walking vegetables."
"Maybe they are. All he said was that they would be there tonight."
Mike nodded and finally began to pull the shirt over his head. "We'll find out what's going on then."
"Maybe." She handed him his pants. "Mike, do you know how to run an interference test?"
"Sure. But I've never done one."
"I have. Let's do one tonight. You make sure you hold Mantilla's, attention for at least half an hour. While you're doing that, I'll run the test on Wernher Eckart and Cesar. If there
has
been major surgery of any kind, the interference test will show it." She stood up. "Dominic Mantilla will be coming back in twenty minutes. I'd better get ready. One other thing, Mike. Mantilla really has the hots for me. He made a pass in my rooms, and he'll certainly try again tonight. I know I'm senior partner on this mission, but I'm not sure of the best strategy. What do you think?"
Her tone was totally businesslike. Mike stared at her, his trousers still at half-mast. "Think about what?"
"I mean, should we let him have me, or not? Let me know your opinion, would you, before the reception?"
She left the room. Mike remained sitting on the bed, his trousers ignored. A senior partner on a trading team was supposed to teach the junior member everything he knew. Mike had the uncomfortable feeling that in certain areas, Melly knew far more than he would
ever
learn.