The journey to the shores of the Great Republic was less than a thousand miles—half an hour in a high-speed Trader aircar. For his own reasons, Lyle Connery had instead arranged for sea travel and an entry at one of the Republic ports.
Sea time dragged, as Connery knew it would. It was impossible for Mike and Jake to avoid each other. After two days on a crowded vessel, they had reached a wary accommodation. Neither would mention training camp, or the Darklands training mission, or Melinda Turak—especially Melinda. Instead, they swapped information about the mission and the Great Republic. Jake was better informed than Mike. He had already made four trips to the Republic mainland and had traveled it from Arctic Islands to the Unified Empire border.
"One thing we don't need to ask ourselves," he said, "is, do they really want a deal? They
need
the Strine clone techniques. Their total population is only thirty million."
"That's more than the Strines."
"Yeah. But the Strines have always been that way. The Yankee system was set up for ten times as many. They can produce plenty of food—that was all automated before the Lostlands War—and transportation systems, but they can't get the rest of their technology moving the way they'd like to. It's been falling apart at the seams for two generations. Like that." He gestured over the bow of the ship. Mike and Jake were standing there, drinking cola tea and staring at the approaching coast of the Republic. "I've traveled this route twice before. Each time, the skyline is a little more ragged."
The ship was skirting the southern shore of a long, narrow island, heading for the airport that would carry the Traders to Skeleton City. Ahead of them, dark against a rosy sunset, a hundred fingers of tall buildings reached up to the western sky.
"Impressive, eh?" Jake commented.
"It certainly is."
"Now take a look with the spyglass."
The little Chill telescope brought the distant skyline close to hand. Instead of scores of delicate, needlelike spires reaching up to the clouds, Mike could now see a different structure. The tall buildings were worn and broken, windows gone, walls crumbling to reveal steel pylons beneath. They no longer stood isolated from one another. They were a single, linked structure, a precarious balance of tensions and compressions. Mike could see an ugly array of crisscrossing girders and support beams, running between the upper levels of the buildings. Cables hung in long catenaries between buttresses and Archimedean arches. The skyscrapers were held upright by a maze of beams, cables, and ground tethers. At the lower levels, the buildings were mottled with dirt and decay.
"There's the Great Republic for you," Jake said. "A big mess, all ready to fall apart under the right wind. And the people know it. Raincloud has trouble holding on to his power. Half the Yankee budget goes into weapons. They're supposed to defend the Republic against outside aggression, but I don't think he'd hesitate to use them internally. And nor would I. They are a decadent group."
Kallario's face did not show emotion, but Mike shuddered at the viciousness in his tone. Somewhere on the road from trainee to Trader, Jake's compassion and sympathy for other regions had been lost. Mike turned again to the spyglass and the ruined prospect ahead of them, as the ship crawled on through dark, polluted waters.
* * *
A plane was waiting when they docked the next morning on the island's southern shore. They took off at once and flew inland for nearly two thousand miles.
Skeleton City was a pleasant surprise after their port of entry. Their destination—Skylinetown, to its first residents—sat on the eastern slope of the continental divide, poised like a silver filigree crown on the mountain foothills. Tall, narrow buildings rose forever, towering up to two thousand feet above the plain. At forty-foot vertical intervals they were joined by open horizontal crosswalks. Each shining walkway, narrow and without handrails, was a couple of hundred feet long and perhaps eighteen inches across. The walkways provided both structural support and paths between buildings.
There was a brisk breeze. Thin crossways twisted in the wind, flexing and turning under their varying loads. As the car settled in to a landing at the base of the tallest structure, Mike saw dwarfed figures of people far above him, sauntering along between the buildings.
Jake Kallario had been following his look. He gave Mike a nasty grin. "Don't like that, do you? You'd better get used to it. They live with heights here from the minute they're born."
"But they know damn well that we don't."
"Yeah. It's part of their negotiation technique. Why'd you think Raincloud chose Skeleton City as his base?"
Mike glanced up again. One of the figures far above them was standing at the very edge of a crosswalk, looking down. Mike grabbed at the waist-high railing next to the aircar steps. "My God. Let's try for our meetings at ground level."
"No chance."
A small welcoming committee of one ugly old man and one beautiful young woman, each dressed in traditional paint and feathers, stood waiting as they descended the aircar steps.
The woman stepped forward. "I am Robin Songbird, Martin Raincloud's personal assistant—"
She was interrupted by a female cry of fear from far above. While Mike and Jake were looking at Robin Songbird and her companion, a bound figure had been carried out onto one of the crosswalks by two men. Before the Traders knew what was happening, the body was swung outward and thrown clear. The walkway was about five hundred feet above ground. The scream of terror did not end until the woman's impact with the stone flags of the sidewalk.
Robin Songbird looked at Mike and Jake. "My apologies for an unfortunate piece of timing. That execution was supposed to take place earlier today. I cannot account for the delay." She sounded mildly embarrassed. Her handsome face was inscrutable beneath the layers of paint.
"What was the crime?" Mike kept his voice as casual as he could.
"Treason. She plotted against the welfare of the Great Republic."
"I see." And the timing was an
accident
? More likely it was quite deliberate, designed to unsettle the Traders. So far as Mike was concerned, it had succeeded.
The man with Robin Songbird had not spoken. He was small and wizened, with a left leg that ended below the knee in a metal brace. His paint was minimal, merely a couple of simple lines on cheeks and chin. He had watched the execution as impassively as Robin Songbird; now he stepped forward and looked at her expectantly.
"And this is Old-Billy Waters," she said at last. "Cityboss deputy. Second in command to Martin Raincloud." And I hate him for it, her voice said. "He's going to be the man who will negotiate with you."
Old-Billy Waters nodded to Jake and Mike. "Raincloud is busy so I'll show you where you'll be staying." He grinned like a small and good-natured monkey. "And Robin didn't say it, so allow me: Welcome to Skeleton City! May you enjoy your stay here."
Behind him, the crushed body of the executed woman was being scooped off the sidewalk.
The two Traders had agreed on their first order of business in the Great Republic when they were still on the open sea. While Mike clattered about the suite as noisily and visibly as he could, Jake made a fast inspection. After ten minutes he gestured to Mike to follow him into the bathroom and turned on the shower full force.
"At least one Fly in the bedroom, up in the corner of the ceiling," he said, his mouth a couple of inches from Mike's ear. "And one in the main living area. But no sign of one here—unless it's too cleverly placed for me to find. Our instruments didn't record any other sensors."
"What do you think?"
"Leave them where they are. If they move around too much for us to keep track of them, we'll make other plans."
"Sounds good to me." Mike reached into his pocket and took out a tiny black box. "What about this one? We want it where it will do the most good and where they won't find it."
"Raincloud's private quarters." Jack Kallario held out his hand for the box containing the Fly. "Here. Give it to me. You keep their attention, and I'll find a hiding place they'll never guess." He turned off the faucets. "Let's go. Old-Billy Waters doesn't want to keep Raincloud waiting."
* * *
The cityboss had chosen the highest point of Skeleton City as his eyrie. Mike and Jake were taken by Old-Billy Waters to a central building, a sheer cylindrical column nearly two thousand feet high. It rose far above all its neighbors, a lonely pinnacle that would catch the morning sun five minutes before any other point of Skeleton City. They ascended on a spiral escalator that curled in a smooth helix around the outside of the edifice. Crossways connected to other buildings up to the sixteen-hundred-foot level; above that, Martin Raincloud could be approached only through the escalator and the outside staircase.
As they rose higher, Mike felt disorientation. They seemed to be standing still, while the world spun away beneath them. He felt dizzy. He stood as close as he could to the smooth metal wall of the building, placing his hands flat against it. Above fifteen hundred feet, where the shielding of all the other buildings was gone, the west wind grew suddenly stronger. It swirled about them, tugging at their clothing, pulling them toward the abyss. Mike looked down only once. The people on the cross-ways had again become tiny, insectlike figures; but now they were
below
, instead of far above.
At its summit, the building changed character. The final hundred feet curved upward and outward, with smooth walls and no escalator. It could be ascended only by means of a steep spiral staircase, open to the winds and no more than two feet wide. Led by Old-Billy Waters, Mike and Jake went up to the topmost floor. The roof itself was a flat, bare circle, forty feet across. A narrow lip circled it, with a metal rail just beneath. A parked aircar occupied the available space on the roof.
"For Raincloud's own use," Old-Billy said. "But he hardly ever uses it. Anybody who wants to see him comes here."
He paused at the entrance to Raincloud's living quarters and looked around him. He appeared to be enjoying the view. Jake Kallario was just behind him. Mike, still on the last narrow step, gritted his teeth, pressed close to the wall, and wished they would hurry up and move inside.
"I have traveled the Great Republic from shore to shore," Old-Billy said at last. He finally stepped inside. "But the air and the view here, at the very top of this building, is the best anywhere." He sniffed, looked west, and nodded to himself. "Big blow on the way, coming in from the mountains. We'll have wind and rain by morning."
The building quivered, as though in anticipation. Let me inside, and you can have my share of the air and the view, Mike thought. He hurried in after the other two.
They had entered a large, semicircular room, with one flat wall and a curtained doorway at the far end. Settees and soft cushions were scattered randomly across the floor. On the walls, display cases of vicious swords, knives, and tomahawks stood between elaborate murals. Following Old-Billy Waters, Mike and Jake walked slowly around the room, looking at the scenes painted on every available square inch.
When they came back to the entrance, Jake gave Mike a nudge and a nod of his head. Mike stared at him.
That quickly?
Jake winked.
The man was good. Mike could never feel comfortable with Jake Kallario, but he could appreciate skill when he saw it. Where had the Fly been placed? Mike made another circuit of the room. He could see no trace.
"You like these murals?" Old-Billy Waters asked. He was following Mike closely. "That will please Raincloud. He painted them all himself. He is very aware of the history of the Great Republic."
On every wall, battles were being waged between near-naked painted warriors and rough-clad men dressed in animal skins. The paintings were garish, bloody, and full of crude violence. In every one, the painted men were winning. "They are very . . . distinctive," Mike said.
"An excellent choice of words," Old-Billy grinned. Did Mike detect a flash of humor in the little man's eye—something that suggested cityboss and deputy were cut from different cloth? Maybe it would be possible to negotiate here after all.
Before Mike could reply the curtains at the end of the room were thrown back. Raincloud stood there, hands on hips. Old-Billy Waters jerked fully upright.
The appearance of the top cityboss was familiar from their briefing materials, a squat, waddling figure with a bull neck and a pink, balding head. The paint on his face emphasized a jutting nose, thin slip of a mouth, and broad cheekbones, and his remaining hair was long, brown, greasy, and tied behind his head. The eyes were black, protruding, and wide apart. Raincloud responded to Old-Billy Waters's introduction with a low grunt. He stared at Mike and Jake.
Mike stared back. The cityboss was even uglier in person than he was in pictures.
"Traders."
He spat the word out like an oath. "Holding the rest of the world to ransom. But some day, sooner than you think, you will lose your power. Why should we use you as negotiators, when I am quite capable of dealing with the Strines myself?"
"That is your option." Jake Kallario's voice was calm. Neither Trader had met Martin Raincloud, but on the basis of Jake's experience with the Great Republic they had agreed that he would be the principal spokesman. "I feel sure you are correct, you are
capable
of dealing with the Strines." But you and I know, his tone said, that they would never deal with anyone who was not a Trader.
Instead of replying, Raincloud turned and strode back through the curtain. At Old-Billy Waters's urging, Mike and Jake Kallario followed. They came to a smaller room, little more than a long, dark cubbyhole. Along one wall ran an elaborate set of display screens. Beneath the screens stood a vast control console.
Martin Raincloud was already seated at the console. "Power! This is power." His mood had changed. Now he was chuckling as he jabbed at the keys, causing images to chase one another across the multiple screens.