Timothy Zahn - Angelmass

The TransTruck pulled to the curb and they got out. The front door opened as they approached and Hanan led the way inside. The young man at the counter, poring over a display screen, looked up.

"Hello, sir," he smiled. His eyes flicked to the string, and for just a second the smile seemed to freeze in place. "Ah—what can I do for you?" he asked, his voice suddenly gone odd.

"I understand you have some Ahandir conduyner coils in stock," Hanan said. "I'd like to buy two of them."

"Ah—certainly," the clerk said, bobbing his head once. His eyes flicked to the string again, turned resolutely away. "Let me check."

He bent over the display again; out of his sight, Hanan gave Chandris a wink. "Yes, we have some," the clerk said, straightening again, his eyes flicking once again to the string. "You have a Gabriel credit line, I assume?"

"Yes," Hanan said, handing over a thin card. The other took it, dipped it briefly into the slot on his display—"I'm sorry. You said you wanted how many?"

"Two," Hanan repeated pleasantly.

"Right," the other mumbled, bending again to his task. Across the room, Chandris saw, three customers who'd been poring over various equipment displays were staring at Hanan, a fascination that was instantly submerged as Hanan sent a leisurely glance around the store. The clerk finished, straightened—"Ah—will you need help loading them?" he asked, eyes struggling again not to stare.

"No, thank you," Hanan told him, leaning over to touch his thumb to the confirmation plate. "My associate here and I can handle them."

"Okay. Uh..." Licking his lips, the other craned his neck to look over at the delivery rack running along the side of the store. "They should be out any minute, sir," he said, his voice starting to sound distinctly uncomfortable.

"Oh, that's all right," Hanan assured him. "We're not in any hurry." He looked over at the three customers, who had now moved closer together and were whispering earnestly among themselves.

Again, his look was all it took to turn them swiftly back to more innocent activities. From the side came a ping—

"There they are," the clerk said, and there was no mistaking the relief in his voice. "If you need help—"

"Not at all," Hanan said, stepping over to the rack and motioning Chandris to follow. "As I said, my colleague and I can handle them."

"Yes, sir. Thank you, and—uh—please come, uh, come back here. Again."

"I certainly will," Hanan said. Picking up one of the packages, he led the way outside.

"Well?" he asked Chandris as the TransTruck pulled away from the curb. "What did you think?"

She shrugged. "I was right the first time. It's just like scoring a track."

"How so?"

"You play off human nature," she said. "People don't like to ask questions they think will make them look stupid. So they don't, and you wind up getting away with things you otherwise wouldn't."

"Huh," Hanan grunted thoughtfully. "I never really thought about it that way, but you're right." He looked over at her. "I guess we're not as different as either of us would have thought."

Chandris felt her lip twist. Except that you'd never stoop to anything so rude as actually taking money away from people this way, she added silently. Scrubbed saints, both of you.

And yet...

No, he didn't take any money. But he kept pulling these stunts. Even though they sometimes made people look foolish.

Even though Ornina clearly didn't like them.

The first wisps of uneasiness began to curl around her stomach. They'd seemed to work so well together, he and Ornina; friendly, with a sort of harmony in their activities. People who cared for each other.

Just like she and Trilling had been at the beginning.

She glanced surreptitiously at Hanan, now humming softly to himself as he gazed out at the passing cityscape, the knot in her stomach tightening. Was that the real reason they kept the extra angel around? Not for any stupid soft-touch thing about helping the poor unfortunate downtrodden, but because they couldn't live together without it?

A shiver ran up her back. All along she'd known there had to be something else lurking behind this deal. But this hadn't been what she'd had in mind. Fellow scorers she could handle, and maybe even score right back again. But psycho defectives...

She gritted her teeth. All right, let's not go and pop any cords here, okay? she growled at herself.

After all, this was all pure guesswork. And hadn't Hanan just said that angels weren't active?

And that was the real problem, she realized suddenly. She knew next to nothing about these nurking angel things. And most of what she did know had come from the Daviees. What she needed was more information. "That Angelmass Studies Institute ship you showed me," she said. "Is it based with the rest of the hunterships?"

Hanan looked at her, mild surprise on his face. "Yes, it's got a service building at the southwest edge of the landing strip. Why?"

"I thought it might be nice to learn a little more about angels," she said. "Especially if I'm going to be helping you hunt them."

"Well, then, you don't want the ship but the Institute itself," Hanan advised her. "It's out in the eastern part of Shikari City, at One Hundred U San Avenue. There are public terminals on the first floor that should tell you everything you need to know. You want to go over today, after we drop off these coils?"

Chandris hesitated. As far as she was concerned, the sooner she tracked this down the better.

But in her mind's eye she saw Ornina, worried about whether or not Hanan could handle the coils by himself. "Thanks," she told Hanan. "I'd rather stick around and watch you put these coils in. I've still got a lot to learn about the Gazelle."

Hanan glanced at her, and she could tell what he was thinking: wanted by the police, she was skittish about going out alone in public. "Okay," he said. "Just let Ornina or me know when you want to go and we'll show you how to call a Gabriel line car."

"Thanks," she said again. Tomorrow, or maybe the next day, she told herself, she'd go.

And after that she would decide if she was ever coming back.

"Jereko?" Gyasi's voice came from the open doorway.

Kosta looked up, being very careful not to move his head too quickly lest it fall off. "Mm?" he muttered, wondering vaguely if he looked as rotten as he felt.

If Gyasi's expression was anything to go by, he did. "I take it," Gyasi said, "that you haven't had much experience with zero-gee space travel."

There was room there for some kind of witty reply, but Kosta was too ill to bother. "I'd say that's a fair statement," he said instead.

"Uh-huh," Gyasi nodded. "Well, if it helps any, they'll probably be rotating the ship on the way back to the catapult. Unfortunately, they can't do that on the way in—it would foul up too many of the experiments." Gyasi looked at his watch, a frown creasing his forehead. "You know, that stuff you took should have taken effect long ago."

"Oh, it is," Kosta told him. "Starting to, anyway. I'm not feeling quite as queasy as I was."

"Ah. Good." Gyasi peered at him. "You must have a pretty exotic metabolism for it to have taken this long."

If you only knew how exotic, Kosta thought. But he was feeling better, and improving by the minute.

"How long till we get to Angelmass?" he asked.

"Maybe twenty minutes," Gyasi said. "That's to the inner radiation region. We've been inside the outer field since we 'pulted."

"I know." It wasn't something Kosta could have missed; the gamma-ray clicks from the ship's electronics were pretty distinctive. Also just a little bit scary. "That base—Angelmass Central—it sits out here permanently?"

"Sure does," Gyasi nodded. "Has to, you see—hunterships come and go across the clock, and the net and catapult have to be running at all times."