10

Jerusha PalaThion stared out at the endless mirroring blue seeded with green island hummocks. She pictured it flowing past beneath the patrol craft like waters under the earth, pictured herself caught in an endless loop of time, freed from the suffocating futility of her duty… She blinked her eyes back into focus, glanced over at Gundhalinu where he sat reading behind the autopilot-locked controls. “How much longer till we get to Shotover Bay , BZ?”

He glanced up, down at the chronometer on the panel. “Still a couple of hours, Inspector.”

She sighed, and shifted her feet again.

“You sure you don’t want to read one of my books, Inspector?” He held up one of the battered Old Empire fantasies that he spent half his off-duty time wallowing in. It was in Tiamatan; she read the title: Tales of the Future Past.

“No thanks. Being bored is more interesting.” She flicked an iesta pod discreetly into the waste container. “How can an honest technocrat like you stand to read that crap, BZ? I’m surprised it doesn’t cause brain damage.”

He looked indignant. “These are based on solid archaeological data and analysis of sibyl Transfers. They’re—” he grinned, the vacant bliss crept back into his eyes—”the next best thing to being there.”

“Carbuncle’s the next best thing to being there; and if that’s any sample, good riddance to the good old days.”

He made a disgusted noise. “That’s exactly what I’m trying to get away from when I read. The real Carbuncle was—”

“Whatever it was, was probably just as bad. And furthermore, nobody gave a good goddamn about changing things then, any more than they do now.” She settled back in her seat, frowning out at the blue water. “Sometimes I feel like a bottle thrown into the sea, carried endlessly on the tide, never reaching a shore. The message I carry, the meaning that I try to give my own life, is never realized . because no one is ever interested.”

Gundhalinu put his book down, said softly, “Commander really knows how to try your sainted ancestors, doesn’t he?”

She looked back at him.

“I could hear every word both of you said yesterday, clear out in the ward room.” He grimaced. “You have more nerve than I have, Inspector.”

“Maybe just a shorter fuse, after all these years.” She pulled absently at the seal of her heavy coat. “Not that it made any difference.” They were still on their way to Shotover Bay on the edge of Summer, as near to the antipodes of LiouxSked’s universe as he could arrange on short notice. “A quarter around the planet in a patrol craft after a ‘possible’ smuggler report!”

“ ‘While the real criminals deal openly in Carbuncle and laugh in our faces.’ ” Gundhalinu quoted the end of it, from yesterday, with a sorrowful smile. “Yes, ma’am, it stinks.” His hands tightened over the wheel. “But if we really can knock down somebody running embargoed goods to the locals… We’ve gotten a lot of heat about that lately.”

“From the Queen.” Jerusha’s mouth twitched, remembering the royal display of hypocrisy that she had endured during her most recent official visit.

“I can’t understand that, Inspector.” He shook his head. “I thought she wanted all the high technology she could get her hands on for Tiamat; she’s always talking up technological independence. She wouldn’t care whether it was illegal. Hell, I expect shed prefer it that way.”

“She doesn’t care about Tiamat or technology or anything else, except in relation to how they affect her own position. And some of the contraband goods have been getting in her way lately.”

“Hard to imagine how.” Gundhalinu changed position carefully behind the controls.

“Not all the customers of the trade are harmless cranks.” She had read reports on smuggling in the Winter outback with interest and more than a little sympathy: The few independent smugglers’ ships that managed to penetrate the Hegemony’s planetary surveillance net could make a small fortune on a cargo of information tapes and tech manuals, power cells and hard-to-come-by components. There were always wealthy Winter nobles with an obsession about what made things shine and hidden labs on their island estates; self-styled mad scientists trying to crack the secrets of the atom and the universe. There were others privately stockpiling technology against the coming off worlder departure, too; planning to set up their own little fiefdoms, and never realizing that the Hegemony had its way of making sure they didn’t. There were even a few off worlders who had gone native living out here in this wilderness of water, and not all of them liked the restrictions the Hedge put on their adopted home.

“Somebody’s been harassing Starbuck and the Hounds when they go mer hunting, and I gather they’ve been having too much success. The mer population must be pretty well depleted by now; it must be cutting into the Queen’s profits… and her measure of control over us. The interference involves some sophisticated jamming devices and comm gear, and there’s only one place that it could be coming from.”

“Hmm. So if we arrest any smugglers, we might get a lead on who’s doing the harassing?” He shifted restlessly again.

“Maybe. I’m not holding my breath. This whole trip is a waste of energy, as far as I can see.” And that’s just what LiouxSked intended it to be. “Frankly, I hope we don’t find anything. Does it shock you, BZ?” She grinned briefly at his expression. “You know, I hate to admit it, but sometimes I have trouble convincing myself these tech runners are doing anything wrong. Or that anybody who objects to cutting one species’ life short so that another species can stretch out its own abnormally is in the wrong, either. Sometimes I think that everything that disgusts me about Carbuncle is tied to the water of life. That the city draws rottenness and corruption because its survival depends on a corrupt act.”

“Would you still feel that way if you could afford immortality, Inspector?”

She looked up, hesitated. “I’d like to think I wouldn’t feel any different. But I don’t know. I really don’t know.”

Gundhalinu nodded, and shrugged. “I don’t suppose either one of us will ever get to find out.” He changed position again, glanced down at the chronometer.

“What’s the matter, BZ?”

“Nothing, ma’am.” He gazed out at the sea with stoic Kharemoughi propriety. “Something I should have done before we left the city.” He sighed, and picked up his book.

Загрузка...