David Drake - Patriots

For the most part, "out" was more mud and rain. They passed a few dwellings, plastic domes gleaming with water. Houses on Dittersdorf didn't have windows, but the bright light over each front door looked surprisingly warm.

The van spun ninety degrees, then straightened. The road was unpaved but so broad that even if there'd been more than occasional traffic, it wouldn't have been dangerous. "Surely it would be preferable to fly?" Dr. Jesilind said.

The driver turned his head like an owl. "Sure, you fly," he said in a chirpy voice. "I'll watch. If this thing breaks down, we're stuck in the mud. If your aircar breaks down, you're buried in the mud-and believe me, keeping things running on Dittersdorf is no picnic."

"Nor on Greenwood," Yerby agreed, "but we fly most places anyhow. We use blimps-gas bags-for loads, and one or two people alone use flyers. Solar-powered, which ain't the ticket for here."

"There's folk have aircars," the driver admitted grudgingly. "They're no use for driving a herd, though, and that's most of what travel there is hereabouts. People bringing meat to the port and going back to their home."

"Herds of what?" asked Amy. She looked a little queasy. The combination of slithering progress and the vehicle's constant rattling vibration wasn't doing much for Mark's insides either.

"Cows, ma'am," said the driver. "Earth cows. There's plenty of plants out there-ground cover, not trees, and it's all the same color as the mud so it don't look like much. The cows like it fine, though."

Mark wondered if the cows really did like Dittersdorf or if they just endured. Though… the driver didn't seem morose. The constant gray skies would drive Mark screaming up the walls if he had to live here for any length of time, but there were men (and maybe cows) who didn't mind it that much. Opening the universe to settlement made it possible for every human being to find the right place.

In theory, at least. Mark wondered if he'd ever find the right place for himself.

The driver hauled hard on the steering wheel, then stopped. "Here you go," he said. "Guess you owe me a drink, mister."

They opened their doors and for the first time Mark got a good look at his surroundings. The Rainbow Tavern was a yellow plastic dome encircled by a brightly lit walkway raised on pilings. Twenty or thirty vehicles, most of them similar to the van Mark rode in, nosed up to the walkway like boats at a dock.

For the moment there was dense fog rather than rain, so even Dr. Jesilind dispensed with his complicated umbrella for the walk into the tavern. Yerby stepped into the lead to open the door, pushing aside the driver without, probably, even thinking about it.

The interior of the Rainbow was brightly lit, garishly colored, and filled with people whose happiness was a sharp contrast to the caravansary's gray gloom. Somebody'd painted the walls and ceiling with enthusiasm and considerable skill, though it took a moment to see talent through the artist's saturated reds and blues and pinks.

The color choice was dictated by the need to contrast with the world outside. It warmed Mark and raised his spirits the instant he entered the room. The caravansary was a part of Dittersdorf and perfectly functional; the Rainbow was apart from Dittersdorf and absolutely necessary for a refuge, at least occasionally.

Most of the folk wore garments of leather or synthetic fabric. The man playing "Bless Them All" on the electronic organ in a corner wasn't very good, but the three friends singing to his accompaniment seemed happy enough. So were the dozen others listening.

"We've got a table," Bannock announced to the bearded man behind the bar, "but there's four rather than the three I said when I came by earlier."

The barman waved at tables extruded from some dense plastic, each of them a bright primary color. "Pick where you want," he said. "And I guess we've got food for all of you. Nobody's gone away hungry from the Rainbow yet."

He turned and called toward the open doorway to the side, "Madge? Folks from the port are here."

In a quieter tone, with a broad smile to Amy, he added, "And one of them about as pretty as you're going to see. Pleasure to have you in the house, miss."

"Might I record the room, sir?" Amy asked. She took a camera from what Mark thought was a small purse and extended the three lenses. "Would people be offended?"

"Offended?" the barman said. "Why, not at all, miss. I know I'd take it as an honor. But why would you want to picture a place like this?"

Amy was already at work, slowly sweeping the room. The separated lenses laid their information onto a recording chip from which a projection unit could create three-dimensional holograms of the scene. Amy kept the camera level and her movements steady so that the images wouldn't jump when she played them back.

"Miss Altsheller says that women have to be the historians of human expansion," Amy said, speaking to keep her companions from getting impatient. The camera panned the room as smoothly as if it was on gimbals. "Men won't take the time, so women must if tomorrow's history isn't to be fantasy like all history before our time."

"Well," began Mark. "I don't think you can say…"

But you could. History was a series of decisions about what to tell and a series of accidents about what survived after telling. Not truth, but a historian could search for truth, and the search was as worthy as any other human activity.

What Mark realized and Miss Altsheller probably didn't is that holographic recordings were no more true and absolute than earlier attempts to record facts. But Amy's holograms were as valid as the work of the scholars of future generations who would try to piece them into the mosaic of human expansion across the galaxy.

Besides, she pleased the folk inside the Rainbow. Folk nodded, waved, and even blushed in pleasure that somebody was taking the time to record them.

"That should do," Amy said, closing her camera.

"About time," said her brother. "I'm starved, girl." He was obviously proud of his sister.

None of the tables was empty, but when a man seated alone saw them look around he tipped his hat to Amy and moved to the adjacent table where two men were playing chess. Yerby sat down. Mark moved to pull out Amy's chair and bumped shoulders with Jesilind.

"Thank you, Mr. Maxwell," Amy said politely as she seated herself.

"Fellow at the end of the bar," Yerby said, nodding in the direction of a man in a blue-and-orange-striped rain jacket, "he's got an aircar that I'm renting tomorrow to fly to Minor to see if I can't get some help from the army."

"You're very wise to call in the duly constituted authorities, Yerby," Jesilind said. " Alliance troops will overawe the Zenith landgrabbers and send them scurrying away."

Mark frowned, though he didn't comment. The Protector of Quelhagen was threatening to close the Landingplace spaceport with Alliance troops-Terran troops-because of a quarrel over allowable exports. Mark hadn't followed all the ins and outs of the debate: he'd been on Earth through most of it, and his father had always said an attorney had to be above causes if he was to be effective. It was hard to think of Alliance troops as friendly, though.

"Mark here had a bit of a dustup with some Zeniths today, Amy," Yerby said. "He was kind enough to let me have a piece of it."

The food arrived, heaping platters of meat, bread, and vegetables; unordered and unexpected, at least by Mark. Apparently the Rainbow had one specialty, and the staff didn't bother asking customers if that's what they wanted. If they didn't, why had they come?

"Since when has there been a brawl within shouting distance that you didn't get involved in, Yerby?" Amy said sharply.

"I would have been badly beaten had your brother not rescued me, Ms. Bannock," Mark said. "There were four of them, and…"