Caleb sounded shocked. Nancia apologized imme- diately. She hadn't realized that trying to get an incompetent bureaucrat ousted came under the head- ing of "personal interests." But Caleb was doubtless right; he always was. And she felt quite guilty as he lec- tured her about the consequences of being flighty and expecting glamorous a.s.signments. He was right about that, too. Service loyalty demanded not only that she go where she was needed, but that she do so willingly and cheerfully.

Nancia closed her loading dock and tried to lift off for their next vaccine delivery with a willing and cheerful heart, Bahati, Central Date 2752: Darnel!

Darnell leaned back in his upholstered stimuchair and activated the interoffice transmitter. "You may send Hopkirk in now, Julitta mlovely."

"Oh, Mr. Overton-Glaxely!" Julitta's delighted gig- gles came clearly through the transmitter. Darnell activated the double display screens as well and en- joyed two views of his secretary. The top screen107.

showed her tossing her pretty yellow curls and preen- ing with delight at his compliment; the lower screen displayed her shapely legs, crossing and recrossing restlessly beneath the desk. Darnell noted with pleasure that J ulitta's petiskirt had ridden up almost; to her waist Such a delightful, twitchy t.i.ttle girl.

Darnell considered Julitta, like the second display screen and die vibrostim units in his executive chair and the view of Bahati from his gla.s.s-walled executive office, to be one of the perks appropriate co a Man Who Had Made It He let Hopkirk wait awkwardly in front of his desk while he contemplated with equal delight his own rapid success, his immediate plans for Julitta, die view of her legs in the lower display screen, and the fact that Julitta didn't know about die second screen.

"Hopkirk, I've got a job for you," Darnell ordered.

"Productivity in the glimware plant dropped by three thousandths of a percent last month, I want you to get out there and send me a full report of any contributing factors.''

"Yes, Mr. Overton-Glaxely," the man called Hopkirk murmured.

"It's probably c.u.mulative worker fatigue due to the poor design of the a.s.sembly line," Darnell continued Ah, that was better; a flash of pain crossed Hopkirk's features. Six months ago the man had owned, designed, and managed Hopkirk Glimware, producers of fine novelty prismagla.s.ses for the luxury trade. And managed it d.a.m.n poorly, too, Darnell thought; the place would have gone bankrupt soon enough anyway, even without his interference. Now it was a profitable, if small, addition to Darnell's revital- ized OG Shipping (and other) Enterprises.

"Questions, Hopkirk?" Darnell snapped as the man remained standing instead of speeding to his task.

"I was just wondering why you did it diis way," Hop- kirk said.

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"Did it what way?"

Hopkirk shrugged. "You know and I know that Hopkirk Glimware would have done all right if you hadn't manipulated the Net to bring my stock prices down and cut off my credit"

"That's a matter of opinion," Darnell told him.

"Admit it, Hopkirk. You're an engineer, not a manager, and you didn't know how to run the com- pany. It would have crashed eventually in any case. All I did was help it along."

"But why do it this way? Why ruin me when you could have bought the company for a fair price and still made your profit?"

Darnell was pleased that the man didn't argue the basic point He'd been an incompetent manager and he knew it "You're a brilliant businessman," Hopkirk went on.

"Look at how you turned OG Shipping around in just a year!"

With a little help from my friends... Darnell quashed that thought Sure, Polyon's ability to hack into the Net and get advance information had been useful. But it was also true that Darnell had discovered within himself a true talent for efficiency. Cut out the deadwood! Fire the in- competent, the lazy, and those who've merely foiled to get results! And know everything! Those were DarnelTs new mottoes. Those who'dbeen fired talked about the Reign ofTerror. Those who hadn't been fired yet didn't dare to talk. And OG Shipping prospered ... leaving Darnell free to amuse himself again.

There was Julitta, of course. There were an infinite number of JuHttas. But Darnell had discovered that no number of willing girls could give him quite the thrill of victory that his business manipulations brought He regarded Hopkirk thoughtfully. The man seemed to intend no offense; perhaps he honestly wanted to understand the workings of Darnell Over-109.

ton-Glaxel/s brilliant mind. A laudable impulse; he deserved an honest answer.

"Sure, I could have done it straight," he said at last "Would have taken a little longer. No prob. But," he winked at Hopkirk, "it wouldn't have been as much ftm... and that way I wouldn't have had you working for me, would I? Get on with the job, Hopkirk. I've got another a.s.signment for you when you get back."

Now that he'd as good as admitted his illegal use of the Net to Hopkirk, Darnell thought, the man had to go. It had been fun to keep him around for a little while, using him as a clerk and gofer, but one couldn't risk disgrunded victims getting together to compare notes. Once OG Glimware was taken care of, Darnell would "reward" Hopkirk with a free vacation at Sum- merlands Clinic. The Net revealed, among other things, that Alpha bint Hezra-Fong's patients on the charity side of Summerlands had an unusually high death rate. He'd "suggest" to Alpha that it would be convenient for both of them if Hopkirk never came back from Summerlands. That way n.o.body would talk about Darnell's use of the Net; and in return, he'd get Polyon to fix the Net records so that n.o.body would raise inconvenient questions about the number of charity patients Alpha had lost Achernar Subs.p.a.ce, Central Date 2752: Caleb and Nancia "I wonder if he'll really be able to resolve anything,"

Nancia said thoughtfully as she and Caleb watched their latest delivery being greeted at Achernar Base on Charon. The short, spare man whom they'd brought halfway across the galaxy wasn't doing much to take control of his first meeting with the Charonese offi- cials. He was just standing there on the landing field, listening to the speeches of welcome and accepting bouquets of flowers.

110.

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"None of our business," Caleb reminded her.

"Central said, take Unattached Diplomatic Agent Forister to Charon, and do it fast. They didn't say to evaluate his job performance. And we've got another a.s.signment waiting."

"Don't we always?" But the little group of pompous Charonese officials that surrounded Forister was moving off now, leaving the s.p.a.cefield clear for Nancia's liftoff "It's just that I like to feel we've accomplished some- thing," she lamented as Caleb strapped down for liftoff, "and I do feel this Charonese situation calls for somebody a bit more ... more forceful." Somebody like Daddy, for instance. With his brisk, no-nonsense manner and willingness to enforce his decisions, Javier Perez y de Gras would have made short work of Charon's seven feuding factions, the continual war be- tween the Tran Phon guerrillas and all seven provisional governments, and the consequent destruction of Charon's vital quin.o.bark forests. He'd have been using Nancia's comm facilities and working the Net every minute they weren't in Singularity, preparing for his descent on the Charonese, arming himself with every last detail of the conflict, softening up the princ.i.p.al offenders with stern warning messages.

This Forister had spent the three days of the voyage reading ancient books - not even disks, but some ac- count of an Old Earth war too minor to have been transcribed to computer-readable format. And when he wasn't reading about this place called Viet Nam, he wasted his time in relaxed, casual conversation with her and Caleb, chatting about their families and upbringing, their hopes and dreams. Too soft to stop a war, Nancia thought contemptuously. Oh, well, Caleb was right - the results were none of their business.

They were Courier Service; they went where they111.

were sent, quickly and efficiently. Sticking around to report on the failure of the resulting mission was not in the CS job description.

Bahati, Central Date 2753: Fa.s.sa "You can't just leave me like this!"

Fa.s.sa del Parma y Polo paused at the door and blew a mocking kiss at the gray-faced, potbellied man who was looking at her with such pain in his eyes. "Watch me, darling. Just watch me." She touched her left index finger to the charm bracelet on her wrist.

There'd been an empty prismawood heart there, just the right size to hold the minihedron recording this stupid bureaucrat's sign-off on the Nyota ya Jaha s.p.a.ce Station contract. "Our business is done." All their business, including those boring maneuvers on the man's synthofur rug. At least it hadn't taken too long. These old guys had dreams of grandeur, but they really couldn't do much when they did get the chance.

You're past it, sweetheart, and the future belongs to me. Some- thing uncomfortable writhed under the triumphant thought, some question as to why she exulted so much in the moral destruction of a small-time civil servant old enough to be her father; but Fa.s.sa pushed the question away with the ease of long practice. She had got what she wanted. It was as simple as that "But we were going to live together. You were going to quit this messy, unfeminine job, now that you've got enough money to pay for your sister's metachip pros- thesis, and we were going to retire to Summerlands..."

Fa.s.sa laughed out loud. "What, me? Spend my last hundred years tending to some old man in a Summer- lands retirement cottage? You've been popping too much Blissto, my friend." She paused to let the rejec- tion sink in before delivering her final warning. "And don't even think about blowing the whistle on me.

112.

Arms McCaffrey fcf Remember, you've got more to lose than I have." She always set it up that way.

There was an unwelcome surprise waiting for her when she reached her offices. Two, in feet. One was minor; some kid was slumped in the corner sackback chair in the outer office, fiddling with forms. Employment applications were supposed to be handled in a different office; the kid should have been sent there to begin with.

Before she had time to point this out, her secretary lowered his head and apologetically informed her that Bahati CreditLin insisted on one more palmprint before they would release the final payment for the s.p.a.ce station construction into her Net account. Just a formality, the secretary quoted the CreditLin officials.

Fa.s.sa's brows snapped together as the man a.s.sured her there was nothing to worry about. "Inspection?

What inspection? Everything's been pa.s.sed and signed by Vega Base." Or rather, by the befuddled old fool she'd just left, who hadn't even bothered to take a transport up to the station and walk its corridors in person, much less a.s.sign a qualified engineer to the task of a detailed structural inspection.

"That's what I told them," the secretary said, "and I'm sure this will take no time at all, since Vega's en- gineering division has already signed off on all the main structural elements. Just a formality," he repeated. "It seems there's been a new law pa.s.sed; CreditLin is obliged to send one of its own inde- pendent inspectors to verify that our construction meets standards before they can transfer the credits."

A new law... d.a.m.n! I thought all the Bahati Senators had been paid off. Do I have to do everything myself?

Fa.s.sa suppressed the thought with a quick frown.

She'd deal with the legislature later. For now-so there was one more fool of a man to deal with, to wheedle and distract and please into forgetting the obvious checks that would reveal her substandard materials. Annoying, that113.

was all. She didn't like surprises. But it would, after all, be one more minihedron to fill her charm bracelet Fa.s.sa caught a flicker of movement in the corner, just enough to distract her for a moment The kid in the sack- back was stretching, rising out of the enveloping chair.

Notnow. Go away. I ^w other things to thJnkaboiU.

"Miss del Parma y Polo?"

Not such a kid; a man grown, older than she was herself- but not by so very much. Fa.s.sa took in his appearance with growing appreciation. Broad shoulders, legs long enough to carry off his out- rageously psychepainted Capellan stretchpants, black hair and eyes whose blue was set offby slashing streaks of ochre face paint. A pretty peac.o.c.k of a man. Maybe I'll hire him after all, even if he did bypa.s.s the employment office.

Who cares whether he can do anything? Keep him around just to look at.

"I should introduce myself now, I guess." He smiled down at her and enveloped her hand in his. "Sev Bryley, chief inspector for Bahati CreditLin. I reckon it'll be a pleasure working with you, Miss del Parma."

Cor Caroli Subs.p.a.ce, Central Date 2753: Caleb and Nancia Caleb slammed one fist into the opposite palm and paced the width of the central cabin, growling deep in his throat. He paused opposite a purple metalloy bulkhead with silver-gilt stenciled borders and raised his fist again.

"Don't even think about it," Nancia warned him.

"You'll only hurt your hand and damage my nice new paint job."

Caleb lowered his fist. A reluctant smile twitched at the corners of his lips. "Don't tell me you like the paint job?"

"No. But it seemed suitable for our role. And I don't wish to return to Central looking as if I'd been through 114.

fcf a clawing match with some of Dorg Jesen's popsies, thank you very much."

They had been undercover for this mission, Caleb posing as a debauched young High Families scion who wanted a cut of Dorg Jesen's secret metachip supply. In return, he was to have offered the feeliep.o.r.n king secret information on certain of his High Families customers.

"Could be dangerous," Rahilly had warned them, back on Central Base. '[Jesen doesn't like awkward questions. Try to keep the meetings on shipboard.

Nancia, you'll have to protect yourself and Caleb if Jesen tries anything."

But they hadn't even lured Jesen into one ship- board meeting. He'd taken one look at Caleb's vidcom image, listened to Caleb's stiff delivery of the speech he'd been a.s.signed to make, and burst out laughing.

"Pull the other one, it's got bells on," he taunted Caleb.

"And next time Central decides to send someone to in- vestigate me, tell them not to make it an Academy boy with a Vega accent you could cut with a knife, in a brainship with a tarted-up central cabin. If you're High Families, I'll eat my..."

Nancia cut the sound transmission at that point.

"Perhaps," she said now, "undercover work is not our metier"

"I hate lies and spying," Caleb confirmed moodily.

"We should have refused this mission." He looked up with a glimmer of hope in his eyes. "Unless... did you get anything?"

Nancia had used the brief minutes of the vidcom link to insert feelers into Jesen's private computer system, so private that it didn't even have a Net connection. Central had surmised he might have such a system in addition to the open accounts he maintained via Net, but nothing could be checked until they arrived planetside.

"Nothing," she told him. "I did get into his supply acquisition database, but all the metachips in the115.

records there show perfectly legitimate Shemali Base control numbers."

Caleb made a fist again. "Then you didn't get into the right records. Somebody's counterfeiting metachips, and Jesen could lead us to the source ...

could have led us. He must be keeping three sets of books. Do you think if I got him on vidcom again..."

An incoming transmission reached Nancia, and she activated her central display screen. Dorg Jesen's nar- row face appeared. "Been doing a litde research of my own," he announced, almost pleasantly. "Got your Central ID now to add in to my report. CN-935, lift your Courier Service tail fins offplanet in fifteen minutes and we'll forget this episode ever happened.

Otherwise I'll file a formal complaint with CS, charg- ing you and your brawn with entrapment.''

"You can't win them all," Nancia tried to soothe Caleb when they were offplanet and on their way back to Central. "We do many things well. Lying doesn't happen to be among them, that's all." But fm lying, right now, by saying nothing. Nancia made an internal playback of the datacordings she'd made four years earlier, on her maiden voyage. There was Polyon, cheerfully announcing his plan to slip metachips past the SUM board and sell them to unauthorized opera- tions like Dorg Jesen's feeliep.o.r.n empire. If only Caleb knew what she knew, he could make a report to Central that would send them straight to Shemali.

Except... he wouldn't do it In the four years of then- partnership, Caleb had never once wavered or com- promised his moral principles. He would never stoop to using a datacording made without the knowledge or con- sentofthe pa.s.sengers. And he would neverrespectNancia again,oncehe knew whatshe'd doneon thatfirstvoyage.

Sadly, Nancia ended the replay and slapped five more levels of security cla.s.sifications on the datacord- ing. Caleb must never know. But there must be some 116.

way to point Central's investigations towards Shemali, to stop them thinking in terms of counterfeit metachips and start them thinking about the prison factory.

Shemali, Central Date 2754: Polyon Polyon slapped the palmboard built into his armchair and activated a vidcom link with Bahati.

"Summerlands Clinic, Alpha bint Hezra-Fong, private transmission, code CX22." That would scramble his message so that only someone with the CX22 decoding hedron would be able to see and hear anything but gibberish. "Alpha, my sweet, you were just a tad premature in announcing that you'd finished your Seductron research. The free sample you sent up has one of my key techs too blissed-out to do any useful work. I've no idea when he'll stop con- templating his toenails, so you'd better find out-and fast Unless you want to be the next test subject." He smiled sweetly into the vidcom unit. "I can arrange it, you know."

The next message went to Darnell, using a similar scrambling technique. In a few words Polyon in- formed Darnell that IntraManager, the small commlink manufacturing company Darnell was presently trying to take over, was not to be touched.

"It's one of mine," he said pleasantly. "I'm sure you wouldn't have made a takeover move if you'd known that, would you now? By the way-did I show you the latest vids of the metachip line?" A tap of his fingers on the palmboard called up a datacording from the lowest circles of h.e.l.l: suited and masked workers toiling amid clouds of poisonous green steam. This was the last and most dangerous phase of metachip a.s.sembly, when the blocks between the polyprinted connection pat- terns were burned off with a quick dip into vats of acid.117.

The burn-off process released a gaseous form of Ganglicide into the atmosphere. Before Polyon's time, this phase had been handled - rather badly - by automated servos that misjudged the depth and timing of the burnoff phase, dropped metachip boards, and quickly self-destructed in the poisonous atmosphere. Expensive and wasteful. By contrast, prison workers in protective suits could process more than three times as many metachips in a session, and only a few of them were lost each year to leaks in the suit sealing.

"See the third man from the left, Darnell?" Polyon spoke into the vidcom while the images unreeled. "He used to be High Families. Now he's a Shemali a.s.sem- bly worker. How are the mighty fallen, eh?"

He cut the connection on that - an implied threat was ever so much more effective than a specific one.

Actually, Polyon had no idea who the masked workers on the line might be. They were the sc.u.m of the prison system, the expendables who had neither tech train- ing nor business sense to justify keeping them in the safer areas of design and preprocessing. And while there was indeed a High Families convict on Shemali, the man had been sent there for a particularly revolt- ing series of crimes involving the torture of small children. Polyon didn't really think he could frame Darnell for something like that and make it stick; anybody would see the rich boy didn't have the guts to torture anybody.

But I won't need to, will I? The threat witt be enough to keep old Darnell in line.

The last call was to Fa.s.sa. He was lucky enough to catch her in person. Polyon enjoyed the sight of Fa.s.sa's eyes widening while he explained in detail just how unhappy he felt about the collapse of his new metachip a.s.sembly building, how personally hurt he was to discover that Polo Construction had supplied 118.

fc?

the substandard materials used in the building, and exactly what he might do to a.s.suage his sense of loss and betrayal. The only trouble with the live connec- tion, Polyon thought, was that he didn't get to finish outlining the list of things he could do to Polo Con- struction as a company and to Fa.s.sa personally. Before he was half through, she was stammering apologies and practically begging to be allowed to rebuild the as- sembly facility. Free of charge, naturally.

Polyon graciously accepted the offer.

Just one more item ofbusiness to clear up. "Send in 4987832," he commanded.

A few minutes later, a pale-faced man in the prison uniform of green coveralls came into the office. He gave Polyon a confident smile. "Thought it over, have you?"

"I most certainly have," Polyon agreed. He smiled and shrugged with palms outspread. "Can't say I'm al- together happy about the idea - but I see you leave me no choice. You're a clever fellow, 4987832- Who were you, before?"

^ames Ma.s.son," the prisoner said. "Head of re- search for Zectronics - you've heard of them? No?