Timothy Zahn - Night Train to Rigel

“He knew the importance of his mission,” Hermod said soberly. “Do you know what kind of weapon he was shot with?”

“Snoozer and thudwumper rounds,” I told him. “Fortunately, they didn’t need to escalate to shredders.”

“Human ordnance, then?”

“Yes, but that doesn’t necessarily mean anything,” I said. “Terra Station’s very particular about keeping alien weaponry out of the system.”

“Except at the various nonhuman embassies on Earth and Mars,” Bayta said. Her face, which had gone rigid at my announcement of the kid’s death, was back to an expressionless mask. “I understand embassy guards are permitted to carry and use equipment that would otherwise be interdicted.”

“True,” I said. “Which means using one to commit a murder would be about as clever as leaving a sheet of the ambassador’s personal stationery pinned to the body. As I say, the choice of weapon doesn’t tell us anything. Forensics might have had better luck if they got around to putting him through the sifter.”

“Why wouldn’t they have?” Hermod asked, frowning. “He was a murder victim.”

“He was also a man with no ID, credit tags, or apartment key,” I said. “Dit rec mysteries notwithstanding, in the real world we’ll be lucky if they even stored away his ashes after the cremation.”

Hermod sighed. “I see. Well… thank you, Mr. Compton. And good luck.”

Neither Bayta nor I spoke again until we were settled into the Quadrail car, me in my original seat, her in the one behind me. “I presume you aren’t planning to gas me for this leg of the trip?” I asked, swiveling around to look at her as we started moving.

A flicker of surprise touched her eyes. “You knew about that?”

“It was pretty obvious,” I said. “I don’t suppose it ever occurred to you or Hermod that all you had to do was ask me in for a chat?”

“We needed to keep the conversation a secret,” she said. “A conductor came in shortly after we left Terra and told the rest of the passengers that there was extra space in the main third-class area two cars up and that as a result they’d all been upgraded. We needed you asleep so he’d have an excuse to leave you behind until later.”

“Again, you could have just asked me.”

“It was thought it would look more realistic if you didn’t know what was going to happen,” she said. “That was why the ticket was made out to Yandro, too.”

“That part certainly caught my attention,” I said sourly. “I take it we’re not actually going there, then?”

“Not unless you want to. At any rate, the bags the Spider took from you at Terra Station are waiting in the front car in a first-class compartment that’s been reserved for us. We can move up there as soon as we’re back with the train.”

Not just a first-class ticket, but a compartment, as well. They were definitely rolling out the red runner here. “Nice,” I commented. “Any chance of similar accommodations if and when we change trains?”

“Of course,” she said, as if it were obvious. “There’ll be an empty compartment kept available for our use on all Quadrail trains in our vicinity for the next four months.”

“Even better,” I said. “Okay, first things first. Do you have a map of the Quadrail system? A complete map, I mean, one that shows these sidings and any other hidden goodies?”

“I don’t know what you mean by goodies ,” she said as she selected a data chip from her belt pouch. “And you’ll need to use my reader,” she added, pulling it out and plugging in the chip. “The data is masked on normal readers.”

“Good idea,” I said, taking the reader from her. “What’s your last name, by the way?”

“I don’t have one,” she said, adjusting herself in her seat. “We’ll be rejoining the train in about an hour. If you have any questions, please wake me.”

She closed her eyes, and for a moment I studied that nondescript face of hers. She’d be watching every move I made from now on, I knew, ready to whistle up the nearest Spider at the first wrong step.

I turned back around to face forward. I still didn’t know if the Spiders were on to me or not. But if they were, they were certainly giving me plenty of rope with which to hang myself. It would be a shame to let that much good rope go to waste.

Settling back into my seat, I got to work.

Exactly one hour and nine minutes later I felt a slight jolt run through the car. Two minutes after that, the connecting door at the front of the car irised open and a conductor appeared from the vestibule, its slender legs picking their way carefully down the narrow aisle toward us. I watched it come, listening to Bayta’s slow breathing behind me; and as the Spider came within five meters of us I heard a sudden catch in the rhythm as she came awake. “Yes?” she called.

“I think we’re here,” I said, half turning to look at her.

“Yes, we are,” she said, her fingertips rubbing the skin on either side of her eyes. “He’s come to show us to our new compartment.”

“Do you know which one is ours?” I asked.

“Yes.”

“Then tell it thanks, but we’ll get there on our own,” I said. “An escort will just draw unnecessary attention.”

She hesitated, then nodded. “All right,” she said, locking her eyes onto the conductor. Its globe dipped slightly in response, and it reversed direction and left the car. “So?” she prompted. “Are we going?”

“Patience,” I said, studying my watch. So apparently all she had to do was to look at a Spider to communicate with it. Interesting. “In another twenty minutes we’ll reach New Tigris. There won’t be a lot of traffic coming and going, but at least we won’t be the only ones on the move.”

We sat in silence until, twenty minutes later, we decelerated to a stop. Then, as the expected trickle of passengers began, we headed forward.

The walk proved more interesting than I’d expected. On the Quadrail trips I’d taken while working for Westali I’d normally traveled third class, making it up to second only on the rare occasion when some nervous medium-level bureaucrat insisted on having an escort assigned to him. In each of those latter instances I’d ended up in cars dominated by other humans, either business or government types or minor celebrities who couldn’t swing the price of a first-class seat.

Now, as we passed through the last of the second-class cars into the first-class section, I got to see how the galaxy’s elite and powerful traveled.

The seats themselves were, not surprisingly, larger and better furnished than those in second and third class. They were also far more mobile. Third-class seats were fixed in place, with only limited adjustability. Second-class seats were a step up from that, attached to small floor circles that permitted them to both rotate and also move laterally to a limited extent, allowing passengers to create little conversation circles for themselves. The first-class cars had gone this one better, with seats that could be moved anywhere in the car, allowing a lounge atmosphere in which neat rows and aisles were pretty much nonexistent.

What was surprising to me was how the occupants had used this flexibility to sort themselves out. Unlike the lower classes, where travelers tended to congregate with their own species, the first-class cars were much more heterogeneous. Shorshians and Bellidos sat together, engaged in serious discussions, while here and there humans conversed as equals with Halkas or Juriani, despite the fact that both those races had been busily colonizing their home solar systems when Charlemagne was still planning his conquests of Central Europe.