Copyright 1991 by Jim Vassilakos.
                      All Rights Reserved.
           Permission is hereby granted by the copyright
           holder to copy and freely redistribute copies
         of this work, so long as no commericial or barter
       consideration is obtained in exchange for such copies.




                               Ten




She awoke before sunrise. Thirty feet below a small stag slipped
quietly between the sparse nettles foraging for his breakfast.
The slimy mud which coated her body the night before still masked
her scent. Now it was dry and threatened to crackle and fall with
her slightest movement alerting him to the threat.
   Slowly, the creature moved again, somewhere below and near.
She peered around her supporting branch and studied the dim
terrain through the icy predawn mist. The stag sniffed with his
nose to the ground as his pitch black eyes scanned the horizon.
Without hesitating another moment she cocked her arm back and let
it come down with all her strength. For a heartbeat the spear
seemed to hang motionless, its course predicted by years of
practice and an unerring instinct. Then, silently, it consumed
the space between them, twirling with reckless abandon as it tore
the skin just heartward of his neck, plunging hungrily into the
flesh below.
   The stag cried out as he bolted away, but already his legs had
buckled as he tried to run, and the dark stain of blood flooded
his coat and dripped to the ground beneath his hooves. The second
spear burrowed deep into the middle of his back as he staggered
deeper into the brush. She leaped to a lower branch and then to
the ground.
   The stag slowed at the frozen stream bed, turning suddenly to
face her. He bravely held his ground, confused and bewildered in
the thin morning mist, cautiously dipping his head to the smooth,
polished stones as if to drink. His blood splattered carelessly
over the rocks, forming crimson puddles in the white frost. The
third spear sunk deep into the small hollow above his ribs.
   She watched, out of spears, as the stag's black eyes seemed to
roll upwards toward the sky. The sun's first rays cascaded
between the tree branches, warming the cold earth below his
hooves as he slowly settled down into the bed of stones to die.

                          *     *     *

Dawn's saffron rays spiked beneath the dark, shifting clouds like
a flock of birds, slowly turning as they plunged toward earth,
each gliding back and forth along the icy, lakeside shore,
sparkling across the water's surface as thousands of tiny
droplets swooped from the sky, diving and splashing in an
endless, majestic dance of laughter and tears.
   Mike groggily opened his eyes, sniffing the clean, cold air as
the coarse stubble on his head began to prickle and rise against
the light drizzle. His booted feet sunk carelessly in the thin
silt like two half-buried logs. Niki lay stretched out over a
long smooth stone rising from the rippling water, her long black
hair beaded with the wet, diamond icing.
   "Good morning."
   "Is it?" She finally sat upright, letting her hair fall along
her slim shoulders as she pulled her legs inward, locking them
into a crossed position. Mike bit his lip as she closed her eyes,
ignoring him, the lake, the gentle shower; he watched her soft
hair begin to shed its icy glaze, dripping with an almost
determined precision.
   For several minutes she remained motionless, like a statue
sculpted from the white stone, searching, opening up into some
hollow place inside him. He remembered her drugged, corpse-like
body at the Solomon residence, a heartbeat as shallow and distant
as some unknown wave rolling steadily for the forbidding shore,
the ripples of raindrops mixing with its falling crest, snuffing
out its existence as it merged into something greater.
   She finally opened her eyes, unlocking her legs and letting
them dip into the cold water, sloshing them through to the muddy
bank, her head drooping low as she walked.
   "Niki...."
   She looked at him, then shifted her eyes to the rifle and axe
at his side. He shook his head, not knowing what to say.
   "Niki, I've seen this before, but never from you. What's the
matter?"
   She reached out and hugged him, her voice mutely whispering
something he could barely hear, much less understand. As though
by instinct, his arms tightened protectively around her, holding
her for a long minute in the icy mist.
   "C'mon Niki. We'd best be moving on."
   She pushed his hand away as he reached for the rifle's stock,
droplets of water streaming down her cheeks. Lifting it off the
brown blanket, she leaned its barrel over her shoulder as she
turned to face him.
   "Dangerous weapon."
   Mike nodded in acquiescence.
   "Well, I guess it is your turn." He lifted the soaked blanket,
wringing it out before rolling it into a tight bundle. Then he
reached for the axe. She turned away as he strapped it to his
belt.
   "Any idea which direction?"
   She glanced back over her shoulder, her staid expression
making him wonder if he slipped into Calannic.
   "Niki, any idea which way we should go?"
   She nodded, "It won't matter."
   Mike pondered her words, uncertain how to take their meaning.
Something about her mood told him it'd be better if he didn't
bother. He peered across the lake for a long moment, his eyes
half-expecting to see some dilapidated hydrofoil skirting over
the surface water. He shook away the vision and followed her
along the shoreline.
   The black silt gave way to bright yellow sand and shiny beds
of smoothed pebbles, the cold ground changing its features with
sporadic abandon. Images of the Tizarian coast kept springing to
mind, but he shoved the memories down into a place as distant as
their origin. The forest lay to the left, trees straddling the
lake shore, greedy for the water thus entitled. Long green stems
and orange-purple vines hung from the leafy canopy, the pungent
smell of apple resin hanging thick in the frosty air.
   They walked for two hours more before the clouds grew white
and parted. Niki's hair, drenched from the rain, seemed to
stiffen as it dried. Dark feathered birds appeared from the
treeline, their long supple frames gliding gently over the placid
waters as they searched for prey. Niki watched them as they'd
stop in mid-air and dive into the cold water, their wings
flapping with panic as they emerged. Something about the way she
carried the rifle told Mike to keep on going, as though she
wanted to be alone.
   The splash turned him around. A short metal-tipped javelin
protruded from her belly as she staggered for the stony bank, her
hands still knotted around the rifle. Mike raced toward her as a
dark, mud-caked figure fell from the branches above, throwing
sand into his face as it bolted for the rifle, wrenching it free
from her arms as Mike staggered toward them, axe lifted. He
hurtled it as the barrel pointed down in his direction, the
explosion deafening his ears as a bullet ripped through his
shoulder.
   For the barest instant, all he could do was fall backward into
the ground, his mind numbed by the shattered bone. He scampered
to his feet, instinctively sprinting into the light thicket, his
lungs clogged with terror. Legs tightened painfully as his limp
arm swayed back and forth almost comically. His boots kicked
furiously against the icy, damp earth, patches of dirty brown
snow, and beds of hard stone. Above, in the treetops, the birds
fell quiet, and the sparse woods seemed to close around him,
silently stealing his breath as he ducked between large bushes
and thick trunked trees.
   The noise of gunfire surrounded his senses, its tangibility
offered for the taking. Bits of bark snapped off nearby trees,
the wild sputtering, popping sound taking hold of his mind,
establishing rhythm in this legs as he stumbled, rolling end over
end in the soft loamy earth. She was there before he realized
what had happened, his chest heaving desperately, madly sucking
in air before it finished pushing breath out. She leveled the
barrel between his eyes sockets, cold black opals staring into
his without reason or remorse.
   "No... wait... Ambrose..." His tongue searched for something
in the Calannic, sputtering gibberish from a host of other
languages, all stained with worry and confusion. However, the
corners of her eyes twitched with recognition, as if he touched a
spark somewhere deep in her mind. Finally, he found the words.
   "Ambrose sent me... to find Cole."
   Dried patches of mud flaked off her skin as Mike gathered his
breath, the hint of recognition blossoming in her eyes.
   "Get up."
   Mike complied with her wish, moving where she motioned him
with the barrel.
   "Ambrose doesn't talk to negrali."
   "He talked to me."
   "You have proof?"
   "I think you're pointing it at me."
   Mike wiped the sweat from his forehead as she examined the
weapon, hoping against probability that she'd find something
distinctive.
   "Maybe, maybe not. What else?"
   "The axe from his cabin. Maybe you've seen it before?"
   She cocked a dark eyebrow, her memory of the hurtled weapon
still distinct.
   "Walk."
   Mike walked. Tall trees loomed overhead as she pushed him
forward with the sole of her boot, their wide branches and thick
foliage rustling with a gentle breeze. The wide expanse of water
remained still, its surface an icy, blue reflection of the
morning sky. Niki's crumpled form lay at the water's edge, her
legs settling below the silt as her hands gripped the stony bank.
The laceration cut deep into her skull, blood
dripping from the wound, falling into a crimson pool over the
smooth, white stones as it mixed with the soft, black silt.
   The woman dug the axe from the mud, washing it in the shallows
and then lifting it so that the sun's rays glinted off the quick
of its blade. She nodded with satisfaction, turning Niki over and
searching her body.
   "Niki..."
   The woman looked up, her dark unfeeling eyes staring through
him.
   "Was that her name?"
   "I killed her."
   "Yes...."
   Mike moved over to the body, stopping only when she leveled
the barrel back in his direction. She glanced him over and unable
to ascertain any threat backed away, letting him advance. He felt
afraid to touch her, as if the dead body would leap up or cry
out. Her flesh was still warm, and he searched half-hearted for a
pulse. The girl watched his expression of hope dwindle into one
of despair.
   "C'mon negral."
   "I'd like to bury her."
   "I don't have time to watch you waste yours. Come now or I
will leave and let you bleed to death, friend of Ambrose or no."
   Mike touched his aching shoulder. The cold air bit into his
wound, a trickle of blood dripping through the jacket sleeve, the
hollow chill slowly gripping his mind. He considered sitting down
to wait and imagined Niki waking after a day or two. It wouldn't
take long, he figured. He'd keep bleeding, shock would eventually
take over, and then...
   "Negral!"
   Her short, black hair and dirty, mud-caked body made him think
of the salamen on Aiwelk. He remembered crouching in a pool of
warm, muddy water, snapping images while two Yahhen hunters
readied their gauss guns, cold, black eyes staring skyward,
blinded and numbed by the tranq-crystal. They'd die later. Too
bad. He'd forgot what they paid him.
   She tugged him to his feet, pushing him forward with the stock
of the rifle. His legs walked at her direction, his mind not
bothering to imagine where. Birds, trees, rocks all blended into
a single panorama, the separate parts intermixed and suddenly
coherent. Spindles of light broke through the forest canopy as
they neared the shelter, its dull tin-colored doors marred by
bright red paint. An old IMC ammunitions dump. She punched
several buttons on the keybox, finally yanking the thick portal
open with both arms.
   She motioned him to an empty, polycermic crate, watching him
sit down and lean over before scrounging the shelves for a first
aid kit. Mike felt the lathery foam harden on hi
s bandages before
he realized the bleeding had stopped. She's injected him with
some wake-up.
   "You're gonna be needing a doctor."
   Mike watched her scratch a name on the smooth white surface,
as it squeezed his shoulder.
   "Something to remember me by," she added sarcastically.
   "You're Cole?"
   "I think you'll be interested in this."
   She handed him a flimsi-leaf, the lower tech variety with lots
of window space but short on memory. His face was reproduced in
three-dimensional facsimilation, a standard mug with the hair
electronically erased.
   "I don't understand."
   "Came off the relay three days ago, a chiphead and a psyche,
very sorry sight indeed, unless, 'course, you're looking for the
reward."
   "Ambrose didn't call ahead?"
   "Radio's out. Board's down. All I got left is public relay.
Regional News."
   "Then you heard about the drop."
   "I saw it. Kinda hard to miss fireworks that high up."
   "How much've they offered."
   "A million a head, DOA."
   Mike scowled. It had been several months since he'd been shot,
and even longer since he'd lost a friend. He wondered what he was
doing back on Calanna, as if one time wasn't enough, and imagined
the chain of events that led him back, that led to this. Niki. It
wasn't supposed to be like this. The local guard must of known of
the drop before the Vista ever reached system, which meant a bug
in security: someone very high up, someone who wanted them dead.
And Bill had guessed it, hitching along for the sheer hell of it?
   "The well is never that dry."
   "Say again?"
   Mike shook his head, pale implications fluttering carelessly
from the shadows into a hue of light he couldn't accept.
   "There were two others in the drop."
   Cole shrugged her shoulders in response.
   "Did they say there was anyone else they were looking for?"
   "No. What's it matter? They probably didn't know who was
coming down, anyway."
   Mike rubbed the scarred side of his face. It was this sort of
underestimation that kept getting him in trouble. Back on the
Vista, he'd wondered what Bill was doing. "Lots of neutrinos,"
he'd said. That would mimic a fusion plant on almost any passive
array, making Robin a target so bright the Calannans couldn't
help but take her out. Mike wanted to dissect her, not blow her
to pieces, though he had to admit the thought was somewhat
appealing.
   "Did I miss a joke or something?" Cole looked mildly annoyed.
Mike remembered the hollow feeling as his gaze fell upon the axe.
Its dull blade seemed to laugh wickedly from the shelter's dim
corner.
   "I've got to get to Xin. I'll have money once we're there."
   "Just like that."
   "Ambrose said you could take us... me." He turned his eyes
away from it, unwilling to meet its laughter or to accept what
had happened.
   "In your condition..."
   "In my condition, I could use a doctor. You said so yourself."
He tried to smile, "Don't go denying it."
   The smile wouldn't come. Niki was back there still, growing
colder by the minute. His fault.
   "Why are they after you?"
   "It's a long story." He looked away from her as he answered,
unable to make eye contact.
   "The relay doesn't even give a name. What should I call you,
negral."
   "Mikael."
   She nodded, strangely, as if considering its flavor. He
wondered why she bothered; all she should want is the money. It
made things much simpler. Money.
   "Come."
   His feet felt wobbly as he stood. She held his good arm with
her free hand, gathering the axe and rifle as she led him outside
and along a winding, dirt path. The glittering lake waters seemed
to dance and rejoice as if in celebration. Mike watched for
Niki's body on the stony beach, but it was as if she had
disappeared, the hungry lake gobbling her up with gleeful
abandon.
   The hydroplane sat docked in a shallow inlet, its grey,
metallic sheen casting a fuzzy shadow across the waters. They
waded in. The water, more than waste deep, felt icy and numbing.
Cole settled him into the passenger seat, buckling him down
before producing another hypo.
   "Is that really necessary?"
   "Not at all." She stuck him in his good arm, retracting the
needle with a satisfied smirk.
   "You bitch." Mike watched her climb around to the pilot's
controls, her long, sun-browned legs now shiny and clean as late
morning rays filtered through the cockpit window. The whine of a
chemical motor echoed somewhere along the distant coastline.
Beneath its vibration, Mike heard her whispering, the rattling of
vertical rods, grimy steel stained with sweat and a hollow
explosion mixed within the shattered bone, a texture so familiar
and soft, as though it were meant to be felt rather than
understood. Shades of blue huddled together beneath folds of
green and grey, his limbs tiring, nerves deadened, the dry cold
parching his throat as the sweet scent of apple resin stung
within the dark corners of his memory.

                          *     *     *

Their voices rose as hushed murmurs, traces of worries averted,
clandestinely dropping out of key like some harmonic duet, each
resurrecting the other, interchanging places, holding together
for sheer lack of hope.
   "We knew this would eventually happen." His tone sounded cold,
unfeeling. She saw the door crack open, streams of moonlight
licking around its edges.
   "Michael. Is that you?"
   They were afraid to touch him, afraid to even get too close.
Dim fluorescent rays scattered sullenly along the glassy white
walls, barely penetrating the icy darkness as he slowly wakened
from a dreamless sleep. A grey-haired stranger sat by his bedside
staring down from behind a professional expression of stoic
indifference.
   The loneliness quietly crept in between the cracks of his
senses, stealthily slipping beneath his skin, and hungrily
gnawing on his bones. With cunning elegance it swept upwards,
through his spine and into his mind, knotting itself around his
soul and slowly squeezing until he could feel the suffocating,
smothering, nothing.
   The woman curiously smiled. She wore a white medical tunic
without insignia or decoration. He concentrated on her face, on
the stormy blue of her eyes and the furrow of her brows, but the
features just blurred in and out of focus, shifting like waves on
some forgotten shore. He felt his lungs try carefully to breath;
short, unfamiliar, raspy sounds being the only response.
   She turned away suddenly, something was beeping, another
patient maybe, or perhaps someone died. She was talking to
someone now through a commlink. Her voice flowed sweetly, like
warm rain on summer days when he would walk through the barrens
and nobody would follow.
   A cold lump settled in his throat as he waited for her to
return, the cool breeze lifting brown and yellow leaves from the
broken asphalt, coiling sticky shapes, their edges fluttering and
preparing to strike. And the awful beeping, rising from the air
like some depraved siren, stung his ears, its intensity rising.
He wished somebody would turn it off and found himself reaching
out, his fingers touching it, the pulse tangible and real like a
heartbeat except stronger.
   "Mike." From a deserted alleyway he heard the voice call him.
He paused before moving forward, unable to see its source.
   "Wake up Mike. Get the hell outta there, now!"
   He felt his eyes snap open with the surge of electricity in
his mind. Sweat coated his body as he laid face-up on a simple
mattress in a small, dark room, cords of sunlight streaming from
the only window through a pair of wooden shutters. Police sirens
beeped loudly in the distance as a gentle rain pelted the open
ledge. Cecil? He looked around for the voice, but the room was
empty. He pulled himself upright with his good arm, shaking off
the daze of noises and confusion as the metal disk tumbled from
his pocket. The dim light played over its surface, tempting him
to pick it up. He pressed it against his bad hand, clenching it
with all his strength to force away the numbness and triggered
the catch, revealing the black surface within. The green dot
closed in toward the center, circular lines growing brighter,
pressing outward, fifty meters, forty-five, forty.
   Mike closed the disk, placing it back within his pocket. Beads
of sweat formed on his scalp as he moved toward the window,
lifting the shutters and crawling onto the ledge. He was four
stories up. A good jump? Teeth ground together at the thought as
drizzle mixed with the perspiration, forming a tiny rivulet down
the crevice of his nose.
   "Hey Mike? You in there?" It was Bill's voice. "Open up Mike,
it's okay."
   He crawled out further along the ledge, pulling his legs away
from the window. Vehicles knotted together in the streets below,
chemical combustion motors sputtering, whining, complaining to
their drivers beneath the dying sirens. The door broke open.
There was the sound of footsteps and an unfamiliar voice as dry
as caster-sand.
   "Shit!"
   Galanglic. Mike considered crawling back inside, then stopped.
   "I want his head you little weasel, you understand?! He knows
to much about Erestyl."
   Mike could almost see Bill nodding on the other side of the
wall.
   "I'll... I'll wait here until he comes back."
   "What makes you think he'll return?"
   "Where else can he go? He has no money."
   Wooden shutters swept away from the window face, the crackling
noise of metal and wood in violent separation resounding through
the room. Mike waited, breathlessly, for a head to peek out as
small black birds scattered along the ledges above and below.
   "Harrison has friends on Calanna, or have you forgotten? He'll
have ways of getting money."
   "What do you want me to do?"
   "First get that thing out of your kneecap."
   "And then?"
   "I trust you'll be able to figure the rest out yourself."
   Mike waited another two minutes as vehicles carelessly
zigzagged on the streets below. The small, black birds returned
to their cement roosts, the outcroppings serving as poor
protection from the rain. Like the wandering beggars, they seemed
ready to take whatever handout fate should devise. Mike finally
crept back inside and past the splintered door.
   The rain smelled musty and noxious, exhaust fumes clogging his
throat and stinging his eyes as he drifted along narrow walkways
beside the ground traffic. Street urchins clothed in dapple-gray
kirtles and drab brown coifs played amidst the traffic, climbing
onto the slow, red cabs to ask for money and ganging together for
some bashing to keep the stingy in line. Bums sat huddled along
the gutters, some clenching bottles and others holding small, box
batteries with thin, elastic cords connected to their head-jacks,
their emaciated bodies slowly rotting in the gentle rain as thin
smiles played across their lips, eyes glazed-over with the
entertainment of some abstract fantasy.
   "K'drin onuvalye?" One grabbed for Mike's boot as he passed
by. "Daro!" The box was out of juice, and he wanted money to
recharge it; just one chiphead asking another for a small,
important favor. Mike kept walking, finally stopping in front of
a large window facing the street. He did look like a chiphead,
even worse perhaps. The stubble on his head did a poor job of
concealing the jacks, and his left shoulder, still numb, sat
firmly in its temporary cast beneath the coat. He pulled the disc
from his pocket and glanced at the readings. Bill was on foot,
less than half a kilometer and heading northeast, toward the
city's heart, toward the underway probably.
   Mike turned and picked up the pace. He'd have to cut through
the rowens to catch up. Just his luck. The ground changed
abruptly from wet, black asphalt to soggy, brown dirt as he
skirted from the roadside and hopped the rusty gate. The fumes
and noises of traffic seemed to fall away as he crossed over the
damp earth, a peaceful, musty quiet replacing the garble of
chaos. Long columns of raised earth, sparse trees, and an
occasional thatch hut served as the only occupants. At least it
was still light out, he reminded himself. Stiff grey clouds
loomed above, blocking the sun's gaze. He tried to make out where
it rested, but it was no use. Morning, afternoon, or evening, it
didn't matter anyway. It was day, and his chances of getting
accosted were slim.
   Even so, he breathed easier when the tall buildings of the
uptown came into focus behind the curtains of falling rain. Mike
hopped the outer gate with a sigh of relief and headed toward the
underway, rechecking the disc's display with a nod of
satisfaction. Bill was right on schedule. Now the problem of
acquiring fare came into focus. Mike remembered the check Ambrose
had given him and felt around in his pockets, the slow
realization that he'd been robbed dawning on him for the first
time. Her name still lay etched in his cast, an unpleasant
reminder, but then he should have expected as much. That was
fifty million drin washed down the drain with five to ten
thousand being all he'd need for trans-fare. Mike cut through the
back allies, memory tracing his steps into the pawnshop.
   An old man with a thick, red beard and pot-belly knelt beside
a wooden stool, spray coating its legs with a plastic adhesive.
He ignored Mike as he continued working.
   "Hi."
   "Ain't got no juice."
   "I'm looking to sell."
   The man glanced up from the stool, seemingly unimpressed.
   "This coat."
   The man continued layering the legs, the nerves in his hand
jittering the fingers as he sprayed.
   "How much can I get for it?"
   "That coat has a hole in the shoulder. And it's stained."
   "I need ten thousand."
   He put down the spray can and turned the stool upside-down,
setting it on its seat.
   "How about five then?"
   "It's worthless."
   "One."
   He shook his head with annoyance as he unscrewed the nozzle
head, replacing it with another.
   "C'mon. Give me a break. I was shot today."
   "Nice boots you got."
   "They're offworld."
   Mike kicked them off and let the man examine them.
   "Contraband?"
   "No. Its legal. Look, it adjusts for the size."
   "That's pretty tricky. I'll give you twelve."
   "Fifteen, and I'll throw in the coat."
   He shrugged, taking the coat to examine.
   "See? Pockets on the inside."
   "What, do I look blind to you?"
   "No, not at all." Mike shook his head trying hard to sound
sincere.
   "Fifteen."
   Mike strode barefoot, avoiding the broken glass as he headed
toward the underway. The disk showed Bill ahead of him but not by
more than a hundred meters. Mike slowed his pace, taking the
escalators down to the ticket dispensers as a computer
synthesized voice droned above the background chatter.
   "Welcome to Xin terminals. Please have exact fare ready. CME
cards accepted."
   Once in the ticket lobby, Mike leaned against a shaded wall as
he consulted the disc. Hundreds of people lined up against the
dispensers, a young couple swapping spittle to the self-sustained
ignorance of those around them, a three-year old kicking his
mother's knees as he swung from her brown satchel, a tall
chiphead with spokes for jacks eating a quagga and manouri on
rye, drinking something blue and bubbly from a leftover sluice
tube. The green dot dipped off the display at it headed south,
the concentric circles shifting first into ovals and then
narrowing into thin slivers of their former shapes and the dot
came back into view for a moment and then descended off the
surface entirely. Mike pocketed the disc and stepped into line
behind the spokes man.
   "Where's the output, dude?"
   Mike looked up, surprised. The chiphead took a swig from his
sluice tube and offered the rest to Mike.
   "You get fucked up?"
   "Ummm... no thanks."
   "Damn, EI receiver point. You even got a manipulator plug.
Y'know, you can hook in an output jack there real easy. I know
this guy who'll do it for pretty cheap."
   His eyes roamed Mike's scalp with fascination.
   "You interested?"
   "I'm kind of in a hurry."
   "Hey, no problem."
   He turned around to buy his ticket, pausing at the entry gates
before continuing.
   "Just leave a message on the 'Doggie Blitz' if you change your
mind."
   Mike nodded as he fingered in his destination, the synthesized
voice finally acknowledging his presence.
   "Your fare is eight thousand five hundred drin."
   He shuffled a ten into the machine.
   "Do you accept credit for non-exact amount?"
   "Yes."
   "Thank you for traveling the Underway."
   "As if I had a choice..." Mike grabbed his ticket and entered
through the gates, another machine snapping up his slip of
magnetic paper and returning it as he passed to the other side.
"Credit: Drin 1500" was etched in red symbols at the upper
right-hand corner of the stub.
   The trams sat cushioned on gravitic fields, a recent
innovation Mike recalled as he boarded. Most everything other
than transportation and communication was despairingly backwater,
even in the capital's suburbs. He found a seat at the back of the
last car. Only two others entered with him, the young couple.
Probably evening then, he figured, everybody's going the other
way. They resumed their foreplay as the tram picked up speed, and
Mike turned his head more out of embarrassment than courtesy.
   "Feeling lonely?" Mike sat up, suddenly surprised. "Come to
'Temple of the Mermaid' where your whim is my command." The feminine
voice continued babbling over the car's speakers as the girl
started licking her boyfriend's face. The guy watched Mike out of
the corner of his eye, a cocky smirk playing across his lips.
"Satisfaction guaranteed, or your money back."
   The tram finally stopped, Mike pulling the disc from his
pocket and consulted its display as the doors slid open and
several dozen people entered. Bill was within half a kilometer
and moving on the rollers. Mike pocketed the disc and slipped
outside the car as its doors slapped shut behind him.
   Several rollers coasted by on cermelecon rails, arched bridges
making way for their passage. Mike hopped on one and inserted two
thousand drin. The digital gauge clicked away as he stepped on
the acceleration peddle and gripped the handrails. Soon he was in
the city's midst, the canopy of stone several hundred meters high
and around him thousands of sparkling lights, a lattice network
of railings, glowing exit pads, steel office complexes sitting
atop large cylindrical stalks, one built atop the other, and a
hive of cable connections hanging in the air like uncropped weeds
taking over a forest. Suddenly he realized he was sitting still,
the roller having shuffled off to the side so others could pass.
A small red light blinked near the money slot and zero's glared
out from the counter.
   Mike inserted another thousand and parked the roller before
the money clicked away. Two women in dapper, black frocks raced
toward him in long, determined strides, pushing past to the free
roller before anyone else could beat them to it. Meanwhile,
large, circular, iris valves continued disgorging a steady stream
of mainly government tight-necks, a few laughing but most sedate,
languid, or exhausted. Glowbeads sparkled on the sides of the
escalators like little droplets of sunshine, and as a line of
rollers passed overhead, their bright rims cast a dizzying array
of colors on the velvety black sheen of the thick, airy mist in
the space beyond.
   The disk showed Bill remarkably close, and Mike felt his head
duck almost imperceptibly as he crossed, unhurried, into a
deserted portal. The reading shifted slightly, circles bending
again into ovals. Mike tapped the surface with his index finger
and eyed the double doors of a maintenance lift. Suddenly the
green dot flickered and died. He cupped the disc into his pocket
and headed out the portal, finding a cool table beneath the shade
of a low hanging ceiling. The table's surface displayed the menu,
showing two-dimension pictures of each of the meals. Mike settled
for a glass of ice water, inserting a thousand drin into the slot
and collecting his change. The crystal cubes were still making a
faint sizzling sound as they clinked against the inside of the
glass. Mike sipped the fluid, the fuzzy numbness slowly receding
from his shoulder as he watched the portal.
   He turned back to the table's smooth surface and brought up an
area map of the city. Xaos, pronounced Za'-os by the natives, was
the capital of the lesser continent. Excavated long before the
civil war, it was utilized during the planetary revolt as a
stronghold of last resort. Its location, several kilometers
beneath the seabed, was virtually unassailable except by the
thermonuclear warheads which the Archduke would never use.
Afterwards, it grew, large suburbs like Xin and Xekhasmeno rising
at the surface like the first seedlings of a dwearmurgrove. Mike
examined the display. They'd done a good deal of construction
over the past two years. He brought up a voice window on the
display and pressed a few more keys on the interface, depositing
his change back in the money slot. The channel clicked several
times before there was any answer.
   "This number had been disconnected... if you need directory
assistance, please dial..."
   Mike killed the window and searched through directory
assistance for 'Cecil Dulin.' He then expanded it to the suburbs
and ran a search of the local emigrations and obituaries, finally
punching a few more keys in frustration. A red light flickered on
the display. Insufficient funds for a planetwide directory
search. He slammed his good fist against the table surface
without effect. The display shimmered, seeming to laugh at him
from behind its protective cover.
   "Have it your way," he finally conceded, taking the disc once
again from his pocket and consulting the reading. Somebody put
money in a soundbox, and Mike found his bare toes involuntarily
keeping time with the music as he rubbed his bad arm beneath the
castfoam and patiently waited for the reading to stabilize. The
green dot remained stationary, glowing steadily just beyond the
fifteen meter mark and then suddenly disappeared.
   "This isn't my day."
   Mike plucked the surface with a wary finger as the empty ovals
glared back at him.
   "C'mon Bill, don't do this to me...."
   Mike pocketed the disc and pulled himself up from the table.
The portal beckoned from across the walkway, its keypad nestled
against the maintenance lift doors. Stern, blue letters marched
across the lock's indicator, "access code required." Gears began
whining as Mike stepped to the side, clenching his good hand into
a tight fist. The double doors opened, and Bill started out, his
long, lanky arms dangling to his sides as his mouth opened in a
wide, toothy grin. Mike caught him in the neck with his fist,
taking him backwards with the blow. As Bill lay on the lift's
floor, crumpled and choking, Mike kicked him once in the stomach
and twice in the nards. Satisfied, the older gatherer twisted the
lift's operating lever and quickly removed Bill's fiberglass
pistol as the doors slowly shut.
   For a moment, stormy grey eyes betrayed anger and fear. After
that, there was only shame. Mike looked down, a course
determination quietly roiling within his guts as Bill clutched
his crotch with both hands.
   "You bastard!"
   "Niki's dead, Bill."
   "So ya gonna shoot me?"
   "I'm thinking about it."
   The lift stopped, its doors opening at Mike's back as he quickly
spun to the side of the lift.
   The room was cluttered with a variety of maintenance equipment
and medical gear. Two semi-automatic carbines rested on the far
wall, and a portable microframe lay at the floor's center along
with a package of optical storage disks and a large, black
dodecahedron. The room's furniture was sitting in the corner, a
single, short, wooden stool.
   "Nice place, Bill. You get good rent?"
   "Real good."
   Mike shook his head in concentrated disbelief.
   "Go on."
   Bill let himself be kicked forward into the chamber, the cool
flow of ventilation cutting across his shoulder blades as he
retreated into the dim light of an electric lantern.
   Mike sat stiff in the corner rubbing his bandaged shoulder.
Her name lay etched in the white surface.
   "You get shot again or somethin'?"
   "Here, why don't you come over and take a closer look," Mike
invited with a sarcastic snarl.
   "Mama gave it to ya?"
   "That's close enou..."
   A shin snapped into his forearm, and Mike found himself
reeling off-balance, falling backwards as Bill's fist nailed him
in the midsection. He never heard the stool splitting against the
floor planks as he tumbled backwards. Instead, silence seemed to
surround him entirely, and then there was only the deafening echo
that followed the silence and Bill slipping quietly along the
floor within the pool that was his own blood.
   "You stupid fuck!"
   "Sorry, Mike...."
   A twinkle of amusement roamed through his eyes, the grey
spheres seeming webbed within the clouds of a paternal haze. 
   "Bill!"

           _   /|
           \`o_O'
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