Wine of the Gods 4: Explorers (18 page)

Greeson
narrowed his eyes at him. "Don't let your imagination run away with you. That's just one possibility, out of dozens."

***

:: You sound drunk. Be careful, and don't answer out loud. ::

Question
bit her lip nervously. Was it possible to control a powerful witch with drugs? Of course Never had been trolling for information, not trying to escape. "I'll start worrying in the morning." She glanced up at the dark sky. "In a couple of hours."

She
backtracked from the labor building to the gate.

Security was tighter, but that made it easier for her. Fewer people to dodge around on the sidewalk. The guards outside the windowed control room checked a woman's ID, then held the door open for her. Question hustled through on her heels, and nipped up the stairs. Up there it was crowded with people in uniforms.

"We can't just arbitrarily swap gate times around. If the gate anchors aren't turned on it increases the amount of time it takes to sync, and under the circumstances we can't charge the companies for that extra time. And if the Anchor is in a building, the chances of a halt or collision is too damned high."

The head uniformed guy was scowling. "I don't really care what you do, so long as you do not open any gates to these twenty-five worlds."

"Do you have any idea of what a missed gate connection can do to the image of Earthers on a Labor World? Or worse, a mining world. Once we look like we're vulnerable, like we can't call in the troops, they'll be all over our people."

Question eased around to where she could see the list. Nothing with a "Dallas" on it.
Good.

"I doubt the disruption will last more than a day or two. And I thought these places opened up and turned on their
gates plenty early?"

"They do, but not generally more than a few hours
early. The exploration companies are better about that. We might manage to move a few of them up as much as twelve hours."

Question dodged hastily as the woman
poked the list hanging on the wall.

"I'll try to leap frog Ha
lf Dome, General Star, Danube and Dallas ahead. If I can reach them and they can get their stuff ready. Then maybe, if you lot are competent, we'll only be a few hours late for most of the rest of the worlds." She shook her head as she started highlighting the companies on the proscribed list. "Late. Every single one of these."

The people running the gate interrupted her to line out a
world and check on the next. One with highlighter through it.

"Skip that one. Do this c
olony world."

"What about the convoy waiting to go through?" A man looked back and forth between the woman and the uniformed men.

Question left them to it, and nipped down the stairs and out the door. Brilliant lights kept the street as brightly lit as day. People in white jackets were sending people in green and yellow jackets off to the side and waving forward another set in red and black stripes. A line of gyps and tankers were leaving the gate. The tankers had ladders on the back and she climbed up on one as it slowed. She listened mentally. All the drivers were thinking about was going home. Which sounded like a good place to start.

They drove through a gate with a guard, but the returning vehicles barely got a glance. Looking behind, she could see the driver behind her with something like an ID card in hand, getting it close to a box on a pole. Then they pulled under short roofs,
probably sunshades rather than rain shelters. They pumped fuel into their vehicles, not the big tanks on back, but their own fuel tanks. Then they drove off, parked between painted lines, and walked off into various buildings. Question followed one driver at random. Keys turned in here, living quarters, there. The building was a like a huge city mansion, with hundreds of bedrooms. More like an army base, actually. Question poked her head in the kitchen and mess halls, entertainment rooms. Right.

She walked back to the bedrooms and closed her eyes, to concentrate. She needed a woman, sleeping. She found one, deepened her sleep. Triggered the electronic lock with a light touch and walked in. She eyed the skinny waif, and backed out of her room and tried another. The next one was a touch too large, but not enough that anyone was going to notic
e. It wasn't like the driver's clothes were tight fitting, anyway. A bit of extra bagginess was no problem. She experimented with the woman's ID until she could get it to trigger correctly.

Then, plan ahead. A backpack. Tools, nice. An electronic reader, and a bunch of book chips? She snickered at the titles. Never mind. She walked down, and used her stolen ID to get a large dinner. Then she walked across to the parking lot. Some gyps pulled in and parked. She focused on the last driver, sank deeply enough into her mind to stand in for the man who took the keys, accepted them, and sent her off thinking she was done for the day.

Question trotted back to the gyp and sat in the driver's seat. She'd seen Roxy and the other drivers do this. How hard could it be?

***

When Never woke, the first thing she thought was that she'd lost track of her books. The second, that she was alone. Or could their machines be watching her? She stirred and brought a hand up to the pillow. Rubbed it slightly to fix the charm to the material. An illusion of her, just as she was. Then she warped light and rolled off onto the floor as quickly as possible, so the transition was as brief as possible. Hmm, she was still in her orange one-piece, barefoot, and now with a fancy bracelet, metal with a green light. Too tight to remove. She could deform the metal parts of it, but perhaps not yet.

:: Question?
::

:: About time! Are you all right?
::

:: Yes. That drug
they gave me put me to sleep eventually. Are you still free? ::

::
Yep. I have checked the gate schedule. Dallas Twelve fifty-three has been moved up half a day. They will be going in four hours. I have a gyp, and I'm scouting. Is there any way you can get out? ::

::
I'll work on that. ::

She was stiff and sore and her mouth tasted horrible. The door was locked, something electronic that Question could get through in a moment. The clear substance looked something like glass, but was more organic, somehow. Feeling carefully, she saw where the bolts entered it, from floor and ceiling. She nudged the material
mentally, but it resisted her. The bolts themselves were something odd . . . all carbon, almost like a diamond, but in long strings so small it hurt to try and look at them. She couldn't seem to get them to do anything. All right. She wasn't going to escape until someone came and opened this door. She maneuvered herself back into her illusion, and ended it. Time to let them know she'd woken up.

She stretched, sat up and blinked around the room. The jail cell. She used the toilet, washed hands and face and rinsed out her mouth. Obviously the people weren't in too big of a hurry to question her again.

She sat cross-legged on the floor and closed her eyes. She could feel the Sun and Moon. Sunrise. There were more people to the right . . .  The pattern of people led her to believe she was in the same long plain building. One level below ground. Two men were approaching her. The door of her cell slid open as they reached it.

"Good morning
, Princess. Let's go have another chat." The man who had done the talking yesterday entered, with another.

She opened her eyes and started to stand. They grabbed
her by the arms and lifted her. Trying to intimidate? Poor sods didn't realize that touching her made energy drains much easier. Speaking of which, she soaked up power from the Earth with her bare feet, and made no attempt to look for her shoes as she was manhandled out of the cell and down a corridor. Another glass door, locked, with a guard on the other side. A buzz sounded and the door slid open just long enough to march her through. The next door had lots of people coming and going through it. A brief wait, for an ID check, then she was allowed to pass. They took an elevator up two floors. Their minds were alert, concentrated on her, and watching all around for danger. Did they
expect
a rescue attempt?

She was marched into what must be a conference room. Now all of her stuff was laid out on the long table. And the books were there. Five other people
, standing around, not sitting in the chairs pushed under the table. Conversing low voiced. She flicked her fingers to augment her hearing.

"Is it time to get rough?" The speaker looked to an older man.

"Oh, maybe just verbally, to see how she responds. She's very unwary, to be a trained agent. She may be a quick civilian pickup. We want her controllers." The old man was studying her impersonally. No squeamishness there, just calculation.

"Maybe we can bribe her with some breakfast." Young man, nervous. Worried that his already upset stomach might not be up to what was coming.

Never eyed her books. She'd like to take them with her.

One of the women turned and thumped the stack.

"I don't understand why she wants these. What use could they be to the One World? They're more like what a very well educated Native might want, to research us."

Very perceptive lady.

The older man shook his head. "Look at the genetic engineering. Don't fool yourself. She's a Oner, whatever her job."

The woman moved off
, and the old man approached Never. "Very interesting isotope ratios in that diamond. Never, from Ash. It doesn't seem to match any known source. Now why might that be?"

"Because
my world is such a recent discovery that our mines aren't known t'you. They belong t'us, not t'you."

"If true, they'll belong to us soon enough."

Never nodded. "Yes, I've heard that you are a world of thieves. That you claim rights above all others. That is not legal behavior, on my world, in my kingdom."

"A kingdom with
fair laws? Isn't that an oxymoron?"

"No, t'
king and all citizens are equally restricted by the law. If they kill someone they are tried. If they are convicted they are stripped of titles and sent t'prison."

That brought snickers of disbelief.

They are too corrupt themselves to believe in honesty.

One woman shrugged. "You said yesterday you knew a Nelson Manrique. Are you talking about
a geologist? Dr. Nelson Manrique of Exstar Exploration?"

"
Exstar Exploration? I don't know what that is."

"
Yeah, I'll bet. We'll track him down, even if he's out on one of their mining worlds. We had an auction less than a year ago, lots of new worlds, but I don't believe any of them had natives. So if you're trying a scam it won't work." She paused and watched Never. "Are you claiming to be a Native of a new world?"

"I was born on the w
orld that Nelson Manrique is exploring now."

"Is it a colony of One World?" The old man moved closer.

"No."

"And these two Wizards. From Scoone and Verona, you s
ay. Are those places through a gate, like the one you took to get here?"

"No. Those are other countries on my
world."

The door buzzed, two men in uniform entered.

Never observed the instant polarization of the Earthers. Whoever these people were, they did not like the military.
A different level of government? Or are my captors not governmental at all?

"You are government?" she asked.

Heads jerked around indignantly, as if surprised she could speak without prompting.

"We're all government here." One of the uniforms answered. Dark hair, grey eyes, average looking. She tried, and to her surprise, failed to read him. His thoughts were a faint buzzing, incoherent beneath direct sensory input processing. "The Army serves the World Council through our Commander-in-Chief, the President of Earth." He lifted a shoulder to indicate the people around the room. "They serve the Gate Authority, that controls everything around here. But the Authority also answers to the World Council."

Nice. A local authority responsible to the parliament, an Army commanded by their equivalent of the king. Oh yes. They might all be government, but they were not pulling in harness. Maybe she could get some honest answers.

"She's under our authority."

"For now. We're just here to observe." The other soldier's eyes swung back to her. "We have so little information on the One World."

"I tried t'
tell them yesterday that I did not know anything about t'One World. I'm afraid I will be unable t'assist you."

Her questioner from yesterday
stepped up and slapped her.  She blinked away tears from the impact, and reached into his mind and started making suggestions while weakening his resistance. He walked to the table and picked up her books. "These books are important to you, aren't they?" His people frowned, this wasn't how they expected the man to act. He handed her the stack of books.  "You were willing to trade a very large diamond for them. Are you willing to trade information?"