Alan Foster - The Icerigger Trilogy

The solution to the problem of availability and cost was one and the same. Without it he couldn’t so much as think of calling company headquarters.

Skua accompanied him to the gleaming underground communications center. Together they eyed the cluster of government functionaries and scientists gathered outside the broadcast console. The actual screen and its attendant instrumentation were enclosed in a bubble of smoked acrylic. As soon as one concluded his or her communication someone else entered the bubble. New hopefuls arrived in a steady stream. The number waiting to make use of the transmitter rose and fell without ever falling below a dozen.

September eyed the line of hopeful supplicants. “How are you going to break into that? And if you succeed, how are you going to pay for this? Use your retirement fund? This ain’t like calling your old Aunt Tilly, you know.”

Ethan smiled confidently. “You’re right on both counts, but I’ll manage. At least, I think I will.”

He led September forward, pushing and excusing his way past irritated, curious members of the outpost population, until they were standing just outside the entrance to the broadcast bubble.

“Hey, you,” snapped one of those in line, “there’s a queue here.”

“Sorry.” Ethan flashed his most convincing smile. It was a salesman’s smile, a professional smile; well practiced, endlessly rehearsed, subtly effective. “First-priority communication.”

A smirk appeared on the face of the midlevel bureaucrat next in line. “First-priority? I don’t recognize you. You’re not government or research. You have any idea what a First-priority costs? Kitchen help couldn’t pay for a First if the whole crew pooled a year’s pay.” He bestowed the dubious eye on both of them. Battered by the time spent out on the ice, Ethan had to admit that he and September probably didn’t look like they could afford a short sentence between them.

He just smiled at the man. “We’ll see. If you’re correct, we’ll be in and out of there in half a minute, won’t we?”

The bureaucrat performed an exaggerated bow and gestured magnanimously with his right arm. “Leave us not waste unnecessary time then, shall we?” The woman standing behind him turned to her friend and giggled.

As soon as the functionary inside completed his business, Ethan and Skua stepped inside. Some of those farther back in the line might have disputed Ethan’s right to try his luck even for a few seconds, but no one seemed inclined to strike up an argument with someone the size of September, which was why Ethan had brought him along in the first place.

The beam operator was tired, near the end of his shift, but not too tired to regard the newcomers uncertainly. He was blond and pale, and Ethan decided his ancestors would have been more at home on Tran-ky-ky than any other humans.

“What department are you two with? I don’t see any insignia.”

“No department.” Ethan slid into the broadcast chair as though he owned it, trying to hide his nervousness. “I want to make a private call, First priority.”

The middle-aged beam technician rubbed his golden crew cut. A single long, silver earring dangled from his perforated right earlobe. “A private call? First priority?

That means clearing the lines between here and wherever you want to call to.”

“I’m aware of that.”

“You know what that’ll cost? The amount of time and energy involved? Even if it’s Drax IV, and that’s the nearest world with a receiving station, the number of relays involved are…”

“I don’t want to talk to Drax IV. I want to talk closed-beam to the House of Malaika, which is located in the city of Drallar, on Moth. Can you set that up?”

The operator looked mildly offended. “I can set anything up—if you can pay for it. Right through Santos V and Dis and on to Terra. You’re talking a lot of parsecs, friend.”

“Devil take the parsecs. Set it up.”

The operator shook his head. “I don’t touch button one until I have some kind of financial clearance.” A hand hovered over instrumentation that had nothing to do with chatting in null-space.

Ethan swallowed. “Enter code twenty-two double R, CDK.”

Warily, the operator entered the information. “Mighty short code. This wouldn’t be some kind of joke, would it? I wouldn’t put it past Marianne and the guys.”

A few moments fled before the words “Unlimited Credit” appeared on the small tridee screen near the operator’s elbow. His eyebrows lifted. He gaped at the two words but nothing else materialized, no elaboration, no explanations. Just the two words.

“How’d you gain access to an account like this?”

September put just enough of a Tran-like growl into his voice to be intimidating. “You a cop or a beam operator?”

The man shrugged and turned to his instruments. “Hell of a distance,” he grumbled. “Have to patch in fifty stations at least.”

“You can set anything up, remember?” Ethan taunted him gently.

September leaned close and whispered, “How did you get hold of a code like that?”

“Colette du Kane,” he reminded his tall companion. “Remember her? She said if I ever needed anything, to use that code.”

“My kind of woman.” September had not forgotten the plump industrialist’s daughter who’d been marooned on Tran-ky-ky in their company. She’d proposed marriage to Ethan only to be turned down.

“Let’s not make fun of her in her absence,” Ethan chided his friend. “Especially since she’s paying for this.”

Despite his boasting it took the operator ten minutes to set up the call. Outside the communications bubble the functionaries who’d mocked Ethan cooled their heels while trying unsuccessfully to peer through the opaque plastic dome.

The static-filled screen in front of Ethan cleared slightly and the first sound filtered through. It was distorted and incomprehensible, not surprising considering the distance it had to travel. The operator cursed softly to himself as he adjusted his instrumentation.

Deep-space beams traveled in the mysterious region known as null-space, while KK-drive ships ploughed their way through space-plus. Sandwiched in between were stars, nebulae, and people in the region called normal space. Glory and a lifetime of ease awaited the physicist who could find a way for a ship to travel in null-space, a discovery that would reduce the travel time between the stars from weeks to minutes. Unfortunately, everything that ventured into that insane dimension came out scrambled, like eggs: Experimental animals sent through null-space arrived at their destination as soup. This muted the enthusiasm of potential human followers. So far, pictures and chatter were all that the Commonwealth’s men had figured out how to put back together again.

The picture cleared, revealing a figure as massive as September but not nearly as tall seated behind a hardwood desk. His complexion was ebony and his beard rolled out over his chest like waves across a beach. Though his frame occupied most of the image Ethan could make out a few details behind him. There was the desk of inlaid rare woods, a glass wall, and in the distance a city glowing with light. Drallar. Only a name on company documents until now. No reason for salespeople in the field to visit Moth. Actually, he’d heard it was something of a backward world, largely unpopulated, successful only because of its extreme laissez-faire attitude toward commerce. As a result it was headquarters for a number of major trading houses, among which was the House of Malaika.

Maxim Malaika regarded his caller across a distance of some seven hundred parsecs. The awesome gulf reduced his booming voice to a whisper.

“ Faida, but this is a surprise. I don’t take calls from lower-level field representatives, but then they usually don’t call from such a distance.” He paused while he glanced at a monitor whose screen was hidden from pickup view. “Tran-kee-kee, is it?”