Master Walk, page 1
MASTER WALK
Tales of the Advocacy #1
Sharon Lee and Steve Miller
Pinbeam Books
http://www.pinbeambooks.com
This is a work of fiction. All the characters and events portrayed in this novel are fiction or are used fictitiously.
MASTER WALK
Copyright © 2003, 2004, 2011 by Sharon Lee and Steve Miller. All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, without permission in writing from the author. Please remember that distributing an author's work without permission or payment is theft; and that the authors whose works sell best are those most likely to let us publish more of their works. First published in 2003 by SRM, Publisher.
ISBN:
Kindle: 978-1-935224-42-6
Epub: 978-1-935224-43-3
PDF: 978-1-935224-44-0
Published April 2011 by
Pinbeam Books
PO Box 1586
Waterville ME 04903
email info@pinbeambooks.com
Cover Copyright © 2003 by Steve Stiles
Table of Contents
Title Page
Copyright Page
Dedication
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
About the authors
Thank you
Dedication
Dedicated to
Ted White
and his days as editor
at Amazing
Chapter 1
"I have heard the phrase 'not fair' a dozen times today. Fairness is not a consideration. Fairness means nothing to the universe. It means nothing at Trigrace Academy. Facts and feats are what we're concerned with. Accomplish something! Then we'll talk about fair..."
—W.D. Faro, II—From a talk given to each new class at Trigrace Academy
THE TAVERNA WAS open non-stop; with each arrival on their own time system there was little utility in enforcing an external schedule on patrons of a space base like Summitave. There were slow periods, however, and the meeting was timed to take advantage of that.
The bar was usefully crowded even at this off-hour: enough noise to make eavesdropping difficult. The merrymakers were mostly miners up-world for a break and spacers from the massive battle-ready Warhoon docked at the public docks—an ostentatious reminder that the Advocacy was mighty even in this back-current part of the spaceways.
The human sipped unworriedly on his beverage, a Mulligan tonic with extra caffeine, nursing the trade along. What he was doing was legal. What the buyer did—was the buyer's business. Initial contact with the buyer had been via compunet. Now he'd have to translate contact into exchange—carefully.
The buyer, Dargreen, was of the cat-like Hypatians. Unlike a cat, he was voluble—or the flood of words might simply have been a trade ploy. Drew let him have a good long say before he thumped his glass to the table-top and interrupted.
"Fairness is not a consideration!" W.D. Faro IV—William to the Advocacy and Drew to friends—was insistent. He'd studied trading and knew the Chenri approach. He'd become expert in the sparse field of Chenri history. A Chenri in farshloggin would do no differently.
"Fairness is always a consideration, young sir. I suggest you may need to offer a lower price!" The alien twitched the claws of his right paw spasmodically.
Drew shrugged—a human gesture not lost on the alien. Besides, a shrug was less likely to be translated if anyone in the back of the bar was paying attention to this particular pair of traders. Then, as if a thought had just struck he touched the side of his ear—meaning "listen up!"
"The original trade was my information for your book and databases. Let us not speak of cash just now...."
Drew let his voice trail off. Reading the merchant was hard, for his feline eyes were nictated and the size of the pupils was masked. On top of that nictation, Dargreen's nose had twitched at exactly the same interval since the trading began—no hint there, either.
"Ah. I have been waving coals at a carbon factory, have I?"
Drew laughed politely at Dargreen's joke, held up his empty hands in a half-shrug to emphasize that nothing had changed yet.
"Yes, I see," said Dargreen. "And am I to offer you random databases, or open my memory banks till you suck your fill?"
"You've checked my references!" said Drew, hiding his nervousness. The whole of his quest, his farshloggin, could revolve on this transaction. "Value for value."
"You treat like a Chenri!" The tail twitched decisively. "Yes, I want what you offer. I have the book, and the databases from the Advocacy Arm. The latest arrivals, I swear."
Drew nodded, felt the cat-man waiting for one more bargaining point. Drew was patient. The trader's need was great—and possibly a matter of life-and-death for someone. Drew'd fought with himself about selling the information when a side-line of his research on the Chenri brought him the report of a "private" planet—it could start a war! But suppressing the information could also start a war. In the end his own goals won out, and now he was selling to the first buyer able to supply the ancient story book he'd been seeking.
"I expect clear proof of the existence of proper heirs of the planet we discussed—backed by gene pool analysis of the missing twins, and their current whereabouts," said Dargreen
"I understand," said Drew solemnly. "I have it. Also, in case you're concerned that the information you sell me might be linked to you through my error—I do not require an exclusive license. Sell it as many times as you like, make the scent muddy, make the profit great. Do we deal?"
"We deal!" said the feline trader with fervor. "Agreed!"
From his right pocket Drew took two folded printouts he'd made just before leaving his berth earlier in the morning.
The trader took them, held them close, opened them. Huge cat-eyes slitted to near invisible. The ears twitched, started to flatten, then stood straight forward.
"You do have the raw data, and not merely the official printouts, I hope?" Drew asked, daring to press the issue.
Dargreen's eyes unslitted, focused on Drew again. "You collect strange information, young sir. Strange info. Eight systems worth of raw shipping and gross berthing and docking information. Done."
"The ancient hard copy too—I haven't forgotten!" That book! What treasure in a child's book!
"It is here," said the cat creature.
Drew relaxed then and negotiated, forgetting for awhile the flechette gun nestled neatly in his inner pocket, and the imperative that had bought it in the first place.
* * *
DREW'S EAR HURT. Dargreen was a shrewd trader. Drew's own constant pounding for attention had left his right ear ringing. He shook his head as he walked away from the taverna, sighing. He'd had to buy a near duplicate of one of his own file updates but the rest of the stuff was good. And the hard copy! Information in a book a thousand years old could make the whole trip worthwhile!
Turning right, he left the noise behind, entering a gray hallway leading to ship deck. He'd signed up for a day room at the taverna but he'd be more secure going back to the cramped quarters of his tiny stateroom on the ore-carrying Reshevsky's Revenge. Using his TeraComp there would arouse no comment—but if he brought it onto the station someone would surely see it carried a double BoostPack.
He sighed. The double BoostPack gave him ten times as much storage and three times the speed of a standard TeraComp. He might have bought a small ship for what it set him back.
The sound of a shuffle behind him was nearly lost as he rubbed his ear again. He twisted, felt the shock of metal striking his arm and elbow instead of his head.
As he went down his Kharetic training came to the fore and the flechette gun was in his hand before he bounced off the grilled metal floor.
A hulking human stood with a long metal pole upraised. Training accomplished what the stunned mind refused and the flechette gun hissed out its tiny spinning missiles.
The pole fell as the man's arm and hand took the shock of fifty of the needle-like missiles.
Drew rose quickly, remembering the training films he'd seen much against his will. Without hesitation he knocked the stunned man to the floor and slapped the emergency button beside the airlock.
"S'not fair!" moaned the man, staring into the muzzle of Drew's flechette pistol, barely audible between the bleep of the emergency horn.
"...was only goin' to hit ya!"
"Fairness is not a consideration!" Drew heard himself say, watching with fascination as the man's sleeve turned from grey to red with blood. Then he snapped open the airlock's first aid kit, vaguely wondering about the fairness of helping the man who'd tried to crush his skull.
* * *
WHAT A WAY to start on his farshloggin! Drew, nearly an hour in the detective's office already, found his mind wandering.
He sighed. He was the first human to be given the required sponsorship to pursue the Chenri title of Osara, a title roughly translating as "Master of Information."
His entire quest—and his life!—could have been ended by this one accidental event. He'd dismissed the idea that Dargreen set him up to insure secrecy. Far too dangerous for the cat-man if word of his newly-purchased information were to leak out. And besides, Chenri might intervene if a farshloggin—a near holy rite of passage to the mysterious spacefarers—was interferred with.
Robbery must be the motive!
"Hey, Faro" said the detective.
Drew snapped out of his reverie.
"Right. Let's try this one more time. I've got the key points, I think, but I'm looking for the nuance, Faro."
Drew grimaced. One more time—like his grandfather trying to ferret out all the facts of a situation at Trigrace Academy for Untraditional Students. He'd been through that often enough!
"My name is William Drew Faro," he told Lt. Barone. "My permanent residence is Box 425 Owings, Trigrace Academy, Khareton City, Khareton 2. I am an information consultant. I was attacked on my way to my stateroom. I disabled my attacker with a registered defensive weapon and called for assistance."
"Right! You've said that word for word three times now. But why were you attacked? Did you punch Milo in the stomach? Steal his night-friend? Spit on him?" Barone's voice grated.
"None of that! I was walking from the taverna to my berth on Reshevsky's Revenge when I heard a sound behind me. I was hit on the elbow and knocked over. I shot the man before he could bash my face in. Is self defense disallowed on Summitave?"
Now it was Lt. Barone's turn to grimace.
"Look, what we have here is that you've shot one of our imported core-metal workers. True, he hasn't been here for long, and he doesn't have an exemplary record prior to being here—but he hasn't given us any trouble.... "
The Lt. flicked a glance at the desk compuscreen. "Well, he's hardly given us any trouble, and besides that, he's indentured and the company is a co-injured party with him. Someone's got to pay the hospital bill, the alarm bill, and for these proceedings! I'm trying to find out who!"
He tapped the desk computer. "If I arrest you, who do I go to? You've got this citizenship of Khareton—hmmph, served in the defense forces—well, well. No wonder Milo couldn't zap you. No ambassador here, though. Through your mother you've got, let's see—ouch! Onitarian System Three citizenship? They couldn't pay a littering ticket for you! And from your father... well now! A Star Class citizen of Fanlin! They'd pay...."
A raucous bleep sounded and a message stud began to flash beside the computer screen.
"Aha! You might as well watch our reconstructions. They'll tell the story!"
Drew moved to the screen. He'd heard of police animations before but had never seen one in person.
A red number 1 appeared, followed by a string of numbers and letters, and finally the screen flashed to a dead black and steadied into two white rectangles. A closeup of Milo's face formed in the right rectangle—under the heading SUSPECT. Drew's face appeared under COMPLAINANT.
Fascinated, Drew watched the computer go through its paces. The column beside his face showed the computer's catalog numbers of his features: his eyes were "shade GY 15-5A," his new mustache was "style 22B, Modified, Non-military", and his hair color, "Dark Brown 66." The stats of his slightly wide face were given in detail—even his skinny ears had a catalog number.
A ghostly blue line outlined the shape of his skull, and after a moment the head rotated, notating hair length, neck size, and other features. Face forward, the screen lengthened and showed him as tall and slender, though compared to the companion image of Milo he looked short and downright skinny.
The computer displayed more catalog numbers, finger and palm prints, and the blue ghost of his skeleton. The images shifted and were gone.
Now came a stark outline of the hallway he'd been in. That outline solidified into a decent semblance of the corridor as slow motion movement began.
Here came Milo, carrying his metal pole lazily over one shoulder, ambling unconcernedly down the hallway. Behind him came a grim-faced Drew, running. Milo, unaware, bent over to inspect his shoes and the Drew-figure rushed on, looking at his wristcomp and not seeing Milo at all. Milo stood up, accidentally brushing the passing Drew with the very tip....
"What? That's absurd. That's stupid! It bears no relation to what happened! This—"
"We'll restrain you, Faro!" Barone snapped and Drew lapsed into a mutter.
On screen the startled Milo was slapped in the face, fell, and was blasted with the flechettes as he scrambled to rise. The screen cleared, and a blue block with black letters reading PROB> 31 / 33 < CONTRAPOINTS EXIST.
Immediately the ghostly hall took shape again, a red 2 in the upper corner.
This animation showed Drew walking at a comfortable pace. Suddenly Milo came from behind, holding the pole like a bat.
"Watch it!" Drew yelled into the screen—too late. Milo struck. Drew's arm and elbow caught and he fell. Twisting, he came upright, pulling the gun and shooting his assailant. The scene held for a moment on the crumpled figure of Milo, then winked into the blue box with black printing—PROB > 87 / 99 <
"Damn," said Barone, "the company will just love this."
He slapped several switches and hit a key. The last moment of Milo's version appeared again, followed by the blue box. Barone punched something into the comp and the screen slowmoed back to the section where Drew shot the falling man. It then ran forward again at an agonizingly slow pace.
This time the flechettes were visible: a cloud of bright yellow darts swarming the man. Drew shuddered at the image of the arm swelling with their impact. Dozens of the darts went through the arm and then bounced off the floor, scattering. The screen action slowed yet again. Green marks appeared on the corridor floor, and elsewhere were yellow spots.
"That's conclusive. Damn!"
"What's conclusive?" Drew asked.
"That replay is. Green marks the spots the flechettes were found. Yellow shows what would have happened if you'd shot him when he was down. And this is just one of five contrapoints. Damn!"
Drew felt himself reddening.
"And what's wrong with the truth!" he asked.
"The stupid paperwork! If you'd been picking on him we'd just have put a bounty on you. You could've paid it off and been on your way—paying hospital bills and lost time first, of course—and I could've put this in Closed. Now I'll have to have this guy pay, put him on service indenture and fill out forms for administrative oversight and—"
"Next time I shoot someone in self defense I'll arrange it better, all right? Geesh! Doesn't it matter why he tried to bash me?"
Drew's sarcasm was lost on the policeman.
"Why doesn't matter. Things would've been easier for all of us if you'd killed him!"
Barone looked away from yet another contrapoint on the screen and saw Drew still standing, watching over his shoulder.
"Go. Be gone. We have your statement. Your account will be credited from our indemnity fund. Leave."
Drew shook his head.
"Now what? You're not going to insist we try him while you're here, are you?"
"No. I want my gun. It looks like I need it! And my bag!"
"That's it? You need your toys?"
"It is necessary." Drew wondered if Barone was going to keep the gun anyway. There'd be little he could do if he wanted to get on with his farshloggin—but the book in the bag was irreplaceable.
"You traveling kids get on my nerves," Barone snarled. "Acting like you own the universe—like you got real business. All you do is waste time putting off getting a job."
Barone got up from his desk-comp, and yanked open a file drawer.
"Sign this. And get out!"
The cop handed him the flechette pistol and a six-part form. The bag he thumped onto the table, and Drew grimaced, thinking of those fragile ancient paper pages....
"Sign anywhere it says 'owner of seized material.'"
Drew did so, deciding not to explain matters to the cop. Real business indeed! He handed the form over.
"If you're not out of my office in ten seconds I'll have you up for delaying an investigation!"
Drew was gone in four...
Chapter 2
"Recognizing information is a skill you must learn else all the discipline in the universe will do nothing but make you excel at things others want you to do."
—W. D. Faro II—to incoming students
DREW FOUND HIS way out of the police warrens, Barone's voice echoing in his head and his elbow bruising rapidly beneath his sleeve. The police medic said he'd be sore in a few days, but he was sore now.
