Joan Vinge - The Summer Queen

“I work for Sab Emo Humbaba,” Reede said, picking his teeth. “Therefore the police and I have a kind of symbiotic relationship.”

“A lot of people work for Humbaba,” Kedalion said. “I’ve worked for him myself. But the Church Police don’t scatter like cats when I say so.”

Reede sighed, and looked pained. “My full name is Reede Kulleva Kullervo. I’m Humbaba’s brains. I head his research and development. If anything happened to me….” He shrugged meaningfully. “You know who the real gods are, around here.”

The name sounded familiar, but Kedalion couldn’t place it. He stared at Reede, trying to picture the tattooed lunatic in front of him at work in a sterile lab somewhere, peacefully accessing restricted information, datamodeling illegal chemicals inside a holofield. “No …” he said, shaking his head. “Bullshit. What are you really?”

Reede raised his eyebrows. “What does it really matter?” he asked softly.

A s long as he had the power . Kedalion looked back at Ananke, still lying sprawled on the pavement, and took another swig from the silver bottle.

Ananke opened his eyes and sucked in a loud gasp of panic. He let it out again in a sigh as he realized where he was, and registered their faces. Kedalion kneeled down and fed him a sip of liquor from the silver bottle, watched his stupefaction turn into bliss, and grinned at him. Ananke pushed himself up until he was sitting alone.

“You mean,” Kedalion turned back to Reede as the realization suddenly struck him, “you could have done what you did here back in the club? We didn’t have to run—none of this needed to happen, no chase, no desecrating a temple, no scaring the shit out of the kid here—?” And me , but he didn’t say it.

Reede shrugged. “Maybe. But in the chaos, who knows? ‘Accidents happen,’ like they say around here.” His bloody grin crept back. “Besides, this was more fun.”

“Speak for yourself,” Kedalion muttered. He looked away from Reede’s molten gaze as he got stiffly to his feet.

“Well, let’s go,” Reede said, watching as he helped Ananke up.

Kedalion hesitated, suddenly uncertain. “Thanks, but I think we’ve got other—”

“Other plans? But you work for me now.” Reede folded his arms, and the grin grew wider on his face.

Kedalion looked at him, and laughed once, remembering what Reede had told the police. A joke. “I quit,” he said, and returned the grin.

Reede shook his head. “Too late. You drank my liquor. I saved your life. You’re my man, Kedalion Niburu.”

Kedalion went on staring, trying to read the other man’s face; suddenly feeling cold in the pit of his stomach as he realized that Reede was actually serious. “You need a runner—?” he asked, his voice getting away from him for the second time tonight. “No. Not until I know what you really do,” he said, with more courage than he felt.

“I told you what I really do.” Reede lifted a hand. “Ask around. Access it, right now.” He shrugged, waiting.

Kedalion felt a strange electricity sing through him, knowing as suddenly that there was no need to check it out. Everything Reede had told him was completely true. “I don’t much like drugs …” he said, somehow able to keep looking Reede in the eye.

Reede glanced at the silver bottle still clutched in Kedalion’s hand, and his mouth twitched. “Everything’s relative, isn’t it?” Kedalion flushed. “But what I make and where it goes are not the point. I’m looking for a ferryman. I need a personal crew.”

“Why us?” Kedalion said. “You don’t know me … I don’t even know him.” He gestured at Ananke.

“You’re a landsman—you’re from Samathe, so am I. Maybe I’m sentimental. And I know your reputation. I’ve already checked you out. You’re trustworthy, you have good judgment, and you deliver.”

“What happened to your last ferryman?”

“He quit.” Reede smiled faintly. “He couldn’t stand the boredom.”

Kedalion laughed in spite of himself. “What was this tonight? My audition for the job?”

Reede grinned, and didn’t answer. “I need somebody I can rely on… . Like your style. What do you charge for a run?”

“That depends …” Kedalion named a sum that almost choked him.

“I’ll double that on a regular basis, if you work out.”

Kedalion took a deep breath in disbelief. He hesitated, and shook his head. “I’m flattered,” he said honestly. “But I don’t think I’m up to it.” He glanced at Ananke, watching the mixed emotions that played across the boy’s face while he looked at Reede. “Come on, kid.” He started away. Ananke followed him like a sleepwalker, still looking back at Reede.

“Niburu,” Reede called, “You may find it exceptionally difficult to get the kind of work you want from now on, if you turn me down.”

Kedalion stopped, looking back. His mouth tightened as he saw the expression on Reede’s face. “We’ll see about that,” he said, not as convincingly as he would have liked. He turned his back on Reede, and started on again.

“Yes,” Reede said, to his retreating back. “I expect that we will.”

NUMBER FOUR: Foursgate

Hegemonic Police Inspector BZ Gundhalinu entered his office as he had done every day for almost five years, imitating the precise patterns of the day before; like a robot, he would have thought, if he had allowed himself to think about it, which he never did. He set a beaker of overbrewed challo—the closest thing to a drug he ever permitted himself—down on the corner of his desk/terminal, on the precise spot where the heat of past mugs had dulled the dark cerralic sheen of its surface. He sat down in his chair, turning it to face the view of Foursgate as he requested his morning briefing from the desk. He always took the briefing on audio; it was the closest he came to relaxing all day. The terminal’s irritating facsimile of his own voice began a condensed recitation of the file contents. He marked with a murmured word the things to be brought up in more detail, staring out the window at the city shrouded in cold mist. The windowpane was completely dry, for once; but as he watched the rain began again, random fingers tapping restlessly on the pane, droplets running down its face randomly like tears. Damn the rain , he thought, rubbing at his eyes. It was too much like snow.

“… The Chief Inspector requests your presence in his office as soon as possible...”

Gundhalinu stiffened. “Hold,” he said to the desk, and turned back, to face the message lying on its screen. The Chief Inspector . He stared at the inert forms of the graphics … in his office . Gundhalinu’s hands closed over the molded arms of his seat, anchoring his body in the present while the room around him shimmered as if it were about to disappear, about to leave him alone in the white wilderness… . He stood up, slowly, afraid that his body would betray him; that his legs would refuse to carry him forward, or that when he reached the door and stepped into the hall he would bolt and run. There was only one reason the Chief Inspector could have for wanting to see him in person. He looked down, checking the bluegray length of his uniform for a speck of dust, a line out of place. When he was certain that his appearance was regulation, he went out of his office and through the Police complex to where Chief Inspector Savanne waited for him.

He stood on the muted floribunda carpet before the Chief Inspector’s desk without a single memory of how he had gotten there. His body made the correct salute perfectly, habitually, although he was certain his face was betraying him with a look more guilty than a felon’s.

Savanne returned the salute but did not rise. He leaned back in the flexible confines of his seat, studying Gundhalinu wordlessly. Gundhalinu met his gaze with an effort of will. The Chief Inspector was not an easy man to face, even on a viewscreen. And now the uncertainty he found in Savanne’s gray eyes was harder to endure than the cold disapproval he had been expecting.