Koban (55 page)

The shade was welcome as they passed under the overhang. Telour’s
shuttle had parked far enough out that Jake had an unobstructed view of the entrance
now, but they didn’t relax their protocol. Three people in the last week had been
stung by skeeters that darted from over the dome. Jake saw them coming but couldn’t
warn the people without transducers. A crewmember was always on door duty with some
of the Prime residents. At least the Jazzer they carried wasn’t lethal if the victim
were also hit.

They met Maggi at the center of the Great Hall, where some resentful
glares were directed their way. Thad wasn’t with her, and she said he hadn’t answered
his door.

Mirikami noticed that the people no longer avoided his return
gaze, and had apparently accepted that even though he had taken on a leadership
role, he wasn’t trying to force them to follow orders, or even suggesting what they
should do.

Maggi led them to a two-foot diameter six foot high post that
looked like it was a tree trunk section of the blue and yellow wood.

The list pinned to it was on a foot wide strip that looked more
like fabric than paper, and had a color between red and tan. It had sixteen black
Krall scripts in a column down the left side, followed by sixteen printed names
in black lettered Standard of the people that had been selected.

The top name drew his attention. It was Deanna Turner, their
first recruit from the Koban Prime population. She now helped staff the supply commissary
they ran, located in a secure room that happened to be directly above Greeves quarters.
It turned out that every level had sixteen lockable rooms in exactly the same locations,
at the ends of radial corridors. They had needed Telour’s permission to get a door
code.

Twenty-one volunteers from the dome were working with the people
from the Fancy. A dozen others were waiting for positions they could fill. The volunteers
didn’t receive any special privileges that other dome residents didn’t receive,
with one exception. Only volunteers were allowed to sleep on the flight of Fancy
if they chose.

Mirikami stood directly in front of the list, and snapped a picture
of it on a small camera he had brought over. When he pressed the send button, it
sent the image to the repeater unit inside the dome, and thus to Jake via the fiber
optic cable.

Looking around he noticed the Primes were giving them a wide
berth today, and there wasn’t anyone within easy hearing. The Testing Day announcement
only reminded them that the new people weren’t at risk.

To his group he said, “All of us including Maggi would like to
know if there is some pattern to these numbers and names.”

He had mentioned Maggi’s name to be sure she would be added to
the Link. They waited for a reply from Jake and it came quickly.

“Sir, the black characters on the left are in Krall number script,
in various octal values. To the right of those numbers are human names listed in
our files as residents of Koban Prime from before we arrived, although two now live
on the ship.

“Eight of those are names presently listed as volunteers working
for the Flight of Fancy, or perhaps it is more accurate to say working for Captain
Mirikami. Two other names on the list have submitted applications to volunteer but
are not presently working. One name is listed in our records as a companion of a
working volunteer. The other five names have no record entry available to me, other
than that they live in Koban Prime.” He paused.

“I do not wish to exceed your previous instructions concerning
brevity, Sir. Should I continue?”

“I see the numbers and names, but does their selection appear
random out of the population of Koban Prime, or is there a pattern?”

“Ten names have completed volunteer applications for working
with ship personnel, and an eleventh name is correlated with a volunteer. Those
eleven are unlikely to be randomly selected, to a very high level of probability.
The other five names could match a random distribution.”

Just when they thought he was following his brevity restriction,
he added, “The ten names on the Testing Day list are on the first ten applications
submitted to Captain Mirikami, of thirty two applications.”

Now that’s way more than intriguing
, Mirikami thought.
“I reviewed those applications two weeks ago and they were not approved in the order
submitted, some have not even been approved at all. You said the
first
ten
applications, but we had more. Where were the applications stored?” He had never
see a list, only the application data on a computer screen before he did interviews.

“Sir, the first ten volunteer applications were entered into
a portable computer by Mister Rigson thirteen days ago in the morning, and five
additional applications were entered that same day in the afternoon. The probability
that only the first ten names appearing on that posted list is due to random selection
is close to zero. The actual numerical…”

“That’s enough.” This silenced Jake, and Mirikami’s expression
was clearly one of anger.

He looked at Noreen. “Is Mister Rigson still on limited duty
here, or is he working back at the ship?”

Maggi looked stricken. “He wouldn’t have done that Tet! Mel risked
his life for us.”

Now Mirikami was surprised. “Damn woman, he’s not under suspicion!
I’ve taken too much of Mel’s poker money for too many years to think he has a sneaky
bone in his body!”

“Oh, I am truly sorry,” she turned red with embarrassment and
stammered, “you..., I mean..., when you asked about him you looked so angry. I assumed
you thought…” her voice trailed off.

Seeing his normally unflappable mentor embarrassed and at a loss
for words, Dillon made a slight humor miscalculation. “You get the rope Maggi and
we’ll string him up, Old West style.”

Leaning against the post and grinning at her discomfort, Dillon’s
chuckle suddenly strangled in his throat. Tiger Lady demonstrated the difference
between one feared persona and that of sweet old Tiger Lily.

Calmly returning her Jazzer to her small holster, she smilingly
asked Mirikami, “Tet, you were inquiring as to the location of that nice Mister
Rigson?”

Numbly sliding to the floor, his back against the wood post,
Dillon mumbled that he couldn’t feel his legs, and that he thought he might have
wet himself.

Stepping over his outstretched legs Maggi said sweetly “Let’s
all sit over there so this boy’s silly comments won’t interrupt the adults when
they talk.”

Despite the serious reason for why they were there, each of them
had trouble choking back their laughter. All except for Chief Haveram, who had no
trouble at all, because he made no effort to hold back anything.

“Right in the balls!” he howled. Roaring with laughter he had
to add, “It’s Fireball Brigade for real when his feelings return.” Tears started
running down his cheeks.

Dillon was most distressed when he saw that Noreen had not only
turned her back, but her shoulders were shaking up and down. They all were laughing,
except Maggi, who merely smiled sweetly at him before sitting with her back to him.

It was a few minutes before a semblance of peaceful sanity returned
to everyone but Dillon, who would begin to tingle painfully in about five minutes.
He was muttering under his breath about grouchy oversensitive old ladies.

“Maggi,” said the Chief, “I sure don’t want on your bad side.”

“Why, I’m just a frail elderly Lady,” she answered. “How else
could I teach a tough young gunslinger to show respect for his elders?”

Mirikami was still smiling despite his best efforts to be serious.
“There goes that reputation I was counting on to intimidate the locals.”

“Poor Dillon,” Noreen lamented. “I’m so ashamed of myself for
laughing so hard.”

“Well, he’ll be happy to hear that this was his best zinger ever
on me. If it hadn’t been, he would have gotten off with just another whack on his
package.”

She fluttered her hand towards him, “But enough about that boy’s
over used groin. Tet, are we going to speak to Mister Rigson about who could have
gotten that list? If we know who, we might figure out how they tampered with the
lottery.”

“Mel’s on his way from the ship. Between the Chief’s gales of
laughter, I asked him to get a hauler ride and join us. He’s bringing his pocket
computer.”

When Rigson limped in five minutes later, they were serious enough
to start solving the mystery, despite Dillon’s occasional complaint and asking for
a drink.

“Ankle getting better Mel?”

“Yes Sir, but the torn tendon isn’t healing as fast as I expected.
I think the extra Koban weight is slowing the process. He looked over at Dillon,
sitting on the floor rubbing at his thighs.

“Don’t mind Dillon,” said Maggi. “He suffered a slip of his tongue.”

Before the conversation drifted again, Mirikami asked, “Did Jake
fill you in on what we learned about the names of our volunteers showing up on the
Training Day list?”

“Yes Sir. Moreover, I have an idea which two people might have
had a chance to copy a partial list of applications. On the day I made those entries
into this,” he pulled out the pocket-sized computer from a left vest pocket.

“I was on door duty in the maintenance bay, keeping my sore foot
propped, sorting through the paper applications. I’d removed them from the lock
box we put over there,” he pointed by the double doors they used most often. The
hard copies never left my possession, and I destroyed them one at a time as I entered
them into my computer.

“I had fifteen forms and I entered exactly ten before I took
a lunch break. After lunch, I did the other five. It was at lunch in here that I
think two people probably got hold of my unit and made a copy of the active folder.
Only the ten names on that list were entered at that time, and I confirmed the file
creation times while riding over here. That was the only time just those ten names
were grouped alone.”

“How did they get to your computer, and who do you think it was?”
Mirikami asked.

“Two people came over to join me for lunch, something Primes
don’t do all that often with us. A man and a woman, and they sat real friendly and
close. The man’s first name was Caltron, if I heard it correctly, and he talked
and acted like a studious geek type, like those we have walking all around the Fancy.
No offense Mam,” he added looking to Maggi.

“We
are
geeks, and proud of it, so don’t worry about it.”
She patted his arm.

“Anyway, the woman had probably been really attractive before
Koban worked on her, and still looked pretty good. She said she had been here over
four years, and her name was Arless.”

“How do you think they did it?” The Captain asked.

“They sat on each side of me, and the woman got flirtatious.
The social standards here have slipped a lot, but she was acting just like some
women do at home when a Spacer comes to port. Fresh male genes, no attachment or
contract, you know the type Sir.”

“I do.”

“My pocket comp was in my left pocket of my vest, sticking out
slightly, like this,” He used his uninjured left hand to slide it into the pocket,
where an inch protruded. “I’ve been carrying it like that because digging it out
of my right leg computer pocket is awkward, not being a lefty.”

“The woman got more physical, rubbing the inside of my right
thigh, and suddenly asked to see my bandaged hand, which had been used to ‘fight
off the wolfbat’ she said, like it was heroic instead of self-defense. You
know, flattering me. That means she knew something about me already, so I guess
I was set up.

“The man made a comment that sounded like he was jealous of the
attention I was getting from her, and jostled me as he stood up to leave. The woman
also pulled my face over and kissed me on the cheek just then, which I now think
was to distract me from feeling him lift the computer.”

“Obviously they got it back to you.”

“Yes Sir. Several minutes later, the man returned with three
of those green fruit drinks for all of us. He apologized for his bad manners, saying
being away from polite society had changed everyone here. I don’t know where he
found those drinks so fast now that I think about that. That juice is hoarded so
it must have been ready for him.” He shrugged.

“In hind sight I think he returned the computer then, and must
have copied the folder I had in standby mode into another unit he probably had with
him. They left as soon as the drinks were gone, and I’ve not seen them since, so
they may be avoiding me.”

“Mel I think you narrowed down who could have done it, and when.”
Thank you.

Maggi shook her head. “Why does anyone want to get rid of people
working with us? The list tampering probably has gone undetected for some time,
and this clumsy move has only revealed it.”

Noreen said, “Survival instinct can explain trying to save oneself.
But choosing whom to send is the same as murder. They weren’t content to let random
picks fill in the blanks, leaving their own names out of the list. They arranged
for names to be picked.

“Maggi, who told you how they get notified of a Training Day,
and how are names selected and printed?” she asked.

“Multiple people told me,” she replied. “The Krall computer is
in the north maintenance bay. No one knows for sure what it was originally used
for, but a couple of years ago a Krall programmed it to randomly sort through a
list, and pull up however many names are selected when the program starts.

“There are Standard characters pasted on the computer keys that
were reprogrammed to display in Standard on the screen. New names are inserted in
the list at that keyboard, and once a name is printed for a Training Day list, it
is removed from the computer. After that you either have immunity or you are dead,”

“It is supposedly set to randomly run through however many names
are in the computer file. They print two lists of selected names. They post one
here and give one to the Krall so they know which humans are going.”