[03] Elite: Docking is Difficult (13 page)

‘Wow,’ said Phoebe, actually impressed that Glen always seemed able to find some genuine new way to surprise her.

‘It gets better. The restaurant will
revolve
. And the entire menu will be themed around synthetic noodles. You love synthetic noodles.’

Phoebe nodded. ‘I do.’

‘Which is why I want you to manage it. We’d be a team.’

‘WHY DON’T WE HAVE A
VENUSIAN
HISTORY MONTH?’ said the hen, nodding at the waiter.

Phoebe idly wondered why Glen had brought his annoying pet to a romantic meal. The hen grinned at her.

‘I’ve just noticed,’ said Phoebe. ‘Does your hen have teeth?’

‘Of course it does, beak dental-augmentation, I’m not a luddite.’ Glen took one of her hands in his. ‘So come on, what do you say?’

‘Look, Glen. I’m not saying none of it was fun when we were dating, in a mind-bendingly stupid kind of way …’

‘It was! It
was
fun. We’re
good
together. You and me, we’re like the ingredients to a pie. You’re like the baking soda – useless on your own – and like I’m another ingredient, a slightly better ingredient than baking soda, eggs maybe. Or celery.’

‘Celery?’

‘The point is, you put those ingredients together and they suddenly work.’

‘I don’t know. Baking soda and celery? It sounds like a pretty disgusting pie, Glen.’

‘It’s a metaphor, babe.’

Phoebe suddenly stared at him.

‘What? What is it? Have I got food on my face?’ Glen dabbed at himself with a napkin.

‘Ingredients!’ exclaimed Phoebe.

Glen smiled at her as if she were an endearingly slow child. ‘Yes, cupcake, that’s what I’m trying to tell you. We’re like ingredients.’

‘No. The
ingredients
.’ Phoebe pushed her truffle chair back and stood up. ‘We need to get back to the ship.’

‘What about us?’ said Glen, looking exasperated. ‘Are we an item again?’

‘What? Oh, sure, whatever.’

She downed her glass of wine, and ran out of the restaurant. Glen shook his head and clicked his fingers at the waiter. ‘Jesus. Chicks, man.’

‘WHY ARE WOMEN SO SELF-ENTITLED?’ said the hen.

‘Shut up, hen,’ said Glen.

‘Misha!’ shouted Phoebe, as she barrelled in through the door of the
Lili Damita
.

‘What?’ said Misha, frantically stabbing at the remote. ‘It just turned to that channel automatically.’

‘Ingredients!’ Phoebe ran across to the flight console, not listening to him. ‘We’ve been so busy looking at the
effects
of the drug, we forgot to look at the
ingredients
.’

Misha stared at her blankly.

‘What if the mysterious box wasn’t the reason they put a hit on you?’

‘Well, of course it was the box,’ said Misha. ‘What other reason could there be?’

Phoebe called up a copy of Cliff’s confidential drug report and the digital wallpaper was replaced by a dense pile of text. She flicked through a few pages. Then she stopped, and zoomed in on something. ‘Look. Look there.’

Misha looked. ‘What about it?’

‘Read the
words
.’

Misha read the paragraph she was pointing to:

‘Artificial synthesis of the main active ingredient, [henceforth to be referred to as compound X] has proven to be a dead end. The only naturally occurring source of the chemical is the Apostasioidae scrufus plant. Unfortunately cultivation of these plants is not possible on any planet other than the world to which they are native (see Appendix
6
for speculation as to why this may be so). Because this is a naturally occurring compound we will not be able to copyright it. Therefore it is vital, prior to public announcement of Knuckle Down, to secure a monopoly on the supplies of Apostasioidae scrufus plants.

Misha shrugged. ‘I’m still not following.’

‘Come on, Misha, keep up. The
pigs
. That’s what they were interested in. Not the stupid box, the pigs. That hit was targeting
you
. It just happened, by coincidence, to be the same day you’d picked to try your hand at intergalactic smuggling. Some poor sap must be wondering where his antique vase is.’

‘So you mean, the publishers …’

‘…
want your pig farm
. They want a pig monopoly. They were trying to drive you out of business by blowing up your transport barn. Force your dad to sell up.’

Misha blanched. He flipped on a comms channel, and dialled the number home. It went to voicemail. ‘He’s not answering. Oh, Laika’s biscuits! We need to get back to Gippsworld
right now
.’

The
Lili Damita
’s door hissed open again, and Glen and his hen sauntered up the ramp.

‘Did she tell you the news?’ said Glen.

‘Yes!’ said Misha. ‘It was the pigs all along!’

‘No, I meant about us being an item again.’

Glen grinned. Misha felt all the blood drain from his face and pool somewhere around his ankles. Phoebe did an awkward little shrug and examined her fingernails.

‘I’ve got poor posture and a monstrous leg,’ she mumbled, defensively. ‘And I really like noodles.’

Misha swallowed very hard. ‘Congratulations,’ he said.

‘You’ve turned a weird sort of colour,’ said Glen. ‘Are you feeling okay?’

‘Probably space-flu,’ said Misha.

They didn’t have to wait for a landing slot, because the
Lili Damita
was the only ship in the entire New Vladimir Putingrad spaceport. All the traders’ fancy out-of-town Pythons and Panthers and Asps had vanished. The Samaritans banner was back up in the arrivals lounge and dirt had started to gunge up the windows of the air traffic control tower again. As they exited through a deserted duty free shop the familiar acid sting of the planet’s atmosphere hit Misha at the back of his throat like an old friend. Phoebe and Glen both made the sort of faces people tended to make when first stepping onto Gippsworld.

‘This is worse than Bloomsbury Alpha,’ said Glen, wrapping a scarf over his mouth, then pulling on a hair net for good measure. ‘And Bloomsbury Alpha is one big sewage processing plant.’

‘We bid for the same contract,’ said Misha, sounding slightly wistful. ‘The Bloomsburians have never let us forget it. Unfortunately, the sewage company felt Gippsworld didn’t have the requisite level of élan to reflect their effluent-based brand.’

‘Why is it all so
quiet
?’ said Phoebe, surveying the boarded-up artisanal bakery and the empty array of galleries. ‘This doesn’t seem much like a planet in the middle of an unexpected art boom.’

Misha frowned, because she had a point. He stuck out a thumb and flagged down a solitary passing hover taxi. They piled into the back. To Misha’s surprise, he saw that it was Vitali behind the wheel.

‘Vitali!’

‘Oh, hey, Misha,’ said Vitali, with a sleepy smile. ‘Where to?’

‘The farm, thanks. And if you could put your foot down, that would be great.’ Misha looked at where Vitali’s conical hat and kaftan now lay crumpled in the glove compartment. ‘What happened? Where are all the traders? And why are you driving a taxi? I thought you were a leading light of the Outsider Art Movement now?’

‘Oh, man, where have you been?’ Vitali let out a rueful little laugh. ‘It all went wrong. It all went wrong.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘You really don’t
know
?’

Misha shook his head. Vitali rolled his eyes and started to explain. ‘Happened a few days ago. I turned up at the mineshaft as usual with some new pieces – my best work to date, I’d really started to get the hang of making faces look more like faces – but nobody was around. There were no traders at all. So I took a trip up to the
Jim Bergerac
, and same deal: nobody was interested. Poor Yevgeny was distraught, going on about how much he’d spent to have the Omar Sharif’s carpets shampooed, wanting to know where everyone had disappeared to. Still, I figured it was just an off day. But, next morning – exact same thing! I slashed the prices on
A Remembrance of Cows
and
Unhappy Residue
. Didn’t do any good. Suddenly, couldn’t even
give
the things away. And it wasn’t only me, it was like that for everyone.’

‘That’s terrible,’ said Misha, half meaning it. ‘But how come you’re not just kicking back? You must have already made a fortune, right? You guys were raking it in.’

‘Yeah, not so much. I blew through a fair chunk of it. A lot of us did. There was a sudden craze for cosmetic surgery, you know, the stuff that makes you look like zoo animals, like on the TV show.’ Vitali leaned forward and pointed to where a small tail was now poking through the back of his trousers. ‘And good surgeons don’t come cheap. Seems a bit silly in retrospect. One of those collective hysteria things, I guess. The real problem is that we had another city meeting a little while back, and the President thought it would be a good idea for us all to invest in something called the Gippsworld Outsider Art Fund. Showed us a lot of nice graphs. Well, you can probably guess what happened: that crashed pretty badly the same morning all the traders disappeared. Turns out “investing in yourself” isn’t such a hot idea. Not when yourselves are us, at any rate.’

Vitali sighed, and the taxi came to a juddering halt. ‘Anyway, here we are. That’ll be two credits. Though I also accept payment in leftover food or cardboard to help build the rest of my shelter. My habitation pod got repossessed.’

Misha handed Vitali his last couple of credits, commiserated again about how things had gone, and sprinted up the path to the farmhouse. To his relief, he found Misha Senior sitting out on the porch flipping through a gossip magazine, apparently unharmed.

‘Dad! You’re okay!’ Misha bounded across the porch and hugged him. ‘I’ve left about a dozen messages!’

Misha Senior extricated himself awkwardly from the hug.

‘Of course I am okay. Why you do vulgar public display of affection? This is the womanish behaviour of a methane farmer.’

‘I thought they might have done something terrible to you.’

Misha paused, and looked his father up and down. He frowned.

‘Why are you wearing a suit?’

His father scratched his neck and looked away. ‘I like suit. Why should I not wear suit? Who died and made you king fashion man?’

Misha narrowed his eyes. ‘You only wear that suit for special occasions. Aunt Lushka’s funeral. The year we beat Lansbury Five in the atmo-surfing bowl. The time our prize-pig won best-in-show. Why is
today
a special occasion?’

‘I do not know what you talk about,’ muttered Misha Senior evasively.

‘And why weren’t you answering my calls?’

‘You ask all these questions. What about
my
questions? Where is transport barn? Why you disappear for entire week? Who is this girl? Why her posture so poor? Who is this man? Why his teeth so shiny?’

Glen and Phoebe, loitering self-consciously behind Misha, waved.

‘I asked first, dad – why weren’t you answering my calls?’

‘I was out.’

‘Where?’

‘I was having dinner.’

Misha fixed him with a hard stare. Misha Senior pouted. ‘Fine. If you must know: I was having dinner with top movie star Zargella Lombard.’

‘Oh no.’

‘She turns out to be very stupid woman. I tell her many pig farming anecdotes. I tell her the funny story about our threshing machine accidents. I tell her about smells to be found in pig silo. I tell her about time I have the foot-rot. She does not laugh once at these stories, even though they are all A
1
good anecdotes. She spends whole dinner picking at food like bird. I ask if she does not like the goulash. I make it myself, using all the best Gippsworld parasites. She says she is watching what she eats. I compliment her sturdy thighs. After an hour she says, “Okey-dokey, that’s my time done, I’m out of here.” Then she leaves! I get no kiss.’

Misha’s stomach lurched. ‘How did you come to be having dinner with Zargella Lombard, dad?’

‘Fine, you make me say it: I swap dinner date for pig farm,’ said Misha Senior. He shrugged, and folded his arms.

‘You can’t have done,’ said Misha, slapping his forehead.

‘I’m afraid he has,’ said a voice from behind them.

Misha turned round to see an urbane man with a phosphorescent cravat and a white Zirconium suit coming up the path towards the farmstead. It took Misha a moment to recognise him as the mysterious stranger who had gotten everyone so excited about Gippsworld indigenous art in the first place.

‘And, now the paperwork has gone through, as of this morning you are both on private property owned by the Gollancz Arms, Books and Narcotics Publishing Conglomerate, of which I happen to be Senior Head of Marketing. I’m going to have to ask you to leave.’

The man doffed his hat, walked past them into the farmhouse with an airy saunter and slammed the door shut behind him in quite a pointed way. Misha Senior looked sheepishly at Misha. ‘Why you so upset?’ he said. ‘You hate pig farming. You always badgering me to sell farm. You are fickle son.’

‘Dad, how could you? For one dinner date!’

‘Not only date,’ said Misha Senior, brightening up a bit. ‘Shares in Gippsworld art-fund.’

Misha groaned.

‘It is not my fault. I am lonely. Zargella Lombard remind me of your mother. Similar stout neck and fleshy back before threshing machine accident. I an old man. Do not be angry with me.’

‘This is touching,’ said the Senior Head of Marketing, sticking his head back out of the door, and coughing politely. ‘But I really
am
going to have to insist you get off the property. Listen, though, no hard feelings – take a card.’

He handed Misha a card. It said ‘PUBLISHING INTERN OPPORTUNITIES, GIPPSWORLD PIG IMPRINT’ next to a toll-free number.

‘There’s a coupon on the back that gives you
25
% off your first order of Knuckle Down. Launches this winter. It’s the get-up-and-go drug all your friends will be talking about.’

The door slammed shut again.

Misha looked beseechingly at Phoebe. ‘Can’t you do something?’ he said.

‘We’ve got no evidence of criminal wrong-doing, Misha,’ Phoebe replied, giving him an apologetic shrug. ‘I think it’s over. I’m sorry.’

‘In that case,’ said Glen, ‘is it too much to hope there’s somewhere on this wretched planet that we can get a drink?’

‘You know what my trouble is?’ said the President, watching sadly as two men in Gollancz overalls took down from above the sandwich bar the painting of him wrestling the creatures. ‘I tried to fly too high. I’m like Icarus. And Gippsworld is like the melted wax in my wings. But I swear to you, I was just trying to do the best for this place.’

‘Icarus didn’t try to fly for the benefit of the wax in his wings, did he?’ said Phoebe, leaning on the counter of the Spaceport’s Bar and Grill while a baristabot poured them all some unappetising milkshakes. They’d found the President sitting out in the street, tearing up election posters, and had dragged him inside before the constant driving rain gave him pneumonia.

‘Well, no, the analogy doesn’t entirely work. Maybe Gippsworld is Icarus and I’m the wax. I’ve lost track. Point is – I’m a terrible president.’

‘Don’t be so hard on yourself,’ said Misha. ‘You didn’t know.’

‘I didn’t! I really didn’t. I mean,
perhaps
I should have asked a few more questions. But he seemed so keen to help out. He said that with just a small investment from what was left of our municipal budget, he could transform our fortunes. And the next day, the very next day, we turned out to all be fantastically talented indigenous outsider artists!’ The President paused. ‘Like magic. In retrospect that did seem a little too good to be true.’

‘Why are they taking down your pictures?’ asked Misha.

‘They’re closing this place, turning it into a public relations office. I sold all the civically owned leases in order to invest in their Outsider Art Fund. You’ve got to spend money to make money, that’s what he said. Again, seemed to make more sense at the time.’

There was a clang from outside, as a tank-sized demolition bot knocked the Gippsworld Spaceport sign off the control tower.

‘And we’re not going to be called Gippsworld anymore,’ added the President. ‘As of tomorrow we’re Bio-Agri Product World
69
-d. It’s not as catchy. We’ll need new headed notepaper. What a disaster.’

The President downed some more of his drink, and then started singing a miserable old Gippsworld folk song about a foot-rot epidemic.

‘I’m really sorry it didn’t work out better, Misha,’ said Phoebe.

‘Yeah, it sucks,’ said Glen. ‘It’s a shame about your farming business, and it’s a shame that untold millions are going to die because of this terrible drug. But let’s not forget the
upside
: at least this whole sorry escapade finally brought me and Phoebe back together.’

‘Yes,’ said Misha, staring at the bottom of his glass. ‘I suppose it did at least do that.’

‘Anyhow, it’s getting late,’ said Glen, yawning. He put an arm round Phoebe. ‘We should really be leaving these guys to it. How do you fancy maxing and relaxing in my timeshare over on Kembel?’

Phoebe sighed. ‘Why not? It’s not like I’ve got much of a career to go back to. And I don’t think I can face bumping into Alicia back at the station after all this. Once word gets round that I took two weeks off work only to fail to solve a homicide case I wasn’t even assigned to, I’ll be a laughing-stock.’

‘You’ll love it on Kembel,’ said Glen. ‘There’s a gym. Neo-chromatic sauna. Fully heated swimming pool. The works.’

‘I like swimming pools,’ said the President, breaking off from his folk song and rejoining the conversation for a moment. ‘As it happens, I ran for president on the platform of re-tiling the municipal swimming pool. If only I’d stuck to that. Me and my stupid dreams.’ He started to cry quietly onto Misha’s shoulder. ‘You know, I really thought that one day we’d be able to turn the advertising hoarding on. That was what I
really
wanted. It would have been a powerful symbol of how the inhabitants of Gippsworld were finally worthy of targeted marketing strategies.’

Misha put down his milkshake mid-gulp. He turned to the President, and fixed him with a serious look. ‘Our giant floating advertising hoarding. Does it work?’

The President shrugged.

‘I guess. Never had cause to actually test it. I mean, one of the more poorly thought out aspects of the project was that the thing would cost a fortune to run, even for a few minutes. We can barely afford to pay the electricity bill as it is.’

‘Listen, guys, don’t go just yet,’ Misha said, jumping up off the bar stool, his face suddenly animated. ‘I think I’ve got a
plan
.’