The Far Shores (The Central Series) (11 page)

He cheated on Half Pigeon,
not even really trying to bring his foot up to touch his elbow, bent over his
one leg while the other extended straight out behind him. Katya curled across
her leg casually, forehead resting on the mat between her elbows. He couldn’t
see a trace of concern on her face.

Alex dropped out and let
her finish the routine without him, but if Katya noticed, then clearly she
didn’t care. He stared out the window at the barren hills that surrounded the
Far Shores on three sides, a view of dead grass and exposed dirt. Not as if
Alex had other options – watching a girl doing yoga felt pervy, even if it was
Katya. He waited politely while she ran through the Surrender Series, ending in
the sinisterly named Corpse Pose – lying flat on her back, arms and legs
extended, palms up, chest rising and falling rhythmically as her breathing
slowed, a half-smile on her face. Alex wondered idly why Katya never seemed to
have a boyfriend, then realized he was staring and averted his eyes before she
opened hers.

“Okay,” Katya said,
sitting up and toweling sweat from her neck and arms. “You wanna know about the
Far Shores?”

“Sure,” Alex said,
shrugging. “I have nothing but time till we go back to the Academy.”

“Poor thing,” Katya
said, smirking. “I guess you could call it a research group, though I’d be more
inclined to call it a cult. They renounced their allegiance to the Hegemony and
conflict with the Black Sun, after all, and got an easement from Central out
here on the Fringe, where no one wants to live in the first place, so that they
could spend more time staring at the Ether.”

“Seriously?”

“Yeah. They call
themselves scientists, but I’m not sure that tells the whole story.”

“What do you mean?”

Katya stood and started
to roll up her mat.

“Just what I said. They
are clever, but not all of their ideas are particularly scientific. They are
more into theory than practical application, for one thing – they mostly study
the Ether for its own sake. Vivik claims they’ve done some important research,
and he’s a huge nerd, so I believe him – but even he admits that almost
everything useful tied to their work has been created by someone else. Vladimir
and the Academy’s engineers were responsible for building that power plant they
are so proud of, you know, even if the Far Shores did come up with the concept.
I’ve heard some weird rumors about some of what they believe – about the nature
of the Ether, the creation of Central, all that – and some of it sounds more
like a religion than anything else. That’s why they built their place right on
the edge of the Ether.”

“I figured that made
sense, since they study it.”

“It would, assuming they
actually did that kind of study. But they don’t do a whole lot of laboratory experimentation
or field study. They’ve got a big library, and they spend a lot of time
thinking
about the Ether,” Katya said, snorting with contempt as she stowed her mat
next to her gym bag. “What’s the point, you know? Can’t make anything from it. That
leads to the other issue...”

“There’s more?”

“Well, like I said, they
are mostly concerned with theory. No weapons development, no industry, nothing
of direct benefit to Central. Which makes it more than a little suspicious that
they get all of their bills paid out of Central’s research budget, no questions
asked. Do you know how difficult it is to get allocated anything out of
Central’s budget?”

“Um. Not really.”

“It’s hard, okay?” Katya
grimaced. “Most of the smaller cartels wouldn’t have any presence at all in
Central if their headquarters weren’t subsidized. Between that and maintaining
the Academy, there isn’t much of a budget left for anything else. But these
guys get carte blanche – for thinking real hard about the Ether. Sound likely
to you?”

Alex considered it while
Katya took a long drink from her water bottle.

“I guess not.”

He stood and rolled his
own mat into a loose bundle, following Katya out of the gym and back toward the
makeshift dorm that had been established for them in the Audits building.

“That’s not even
factoring in this whole secret facility that the Director built out here for
the Auditors. It was apparently vacant, up until we arrived a few weeks ago.”

“I think it actually
was,” Alex said, following Katya down the utterly featureless white hallway.
“The dust underneath my bed was pretty thick.”

“I agree. But that’s not
my point. I’m trying to point out that Central invested in this place for at
least one reason other than their ‘theoretical’ research – this shiny new Audits
facility, conveniently vacant and available when the Committee punted the
Auditors off the Academy campus.”

Their footsteps echoed
off the linoleum. The hallway was lined with unpainted beech doors, all flanked
with a plastic plate that bore a numeral designation, and nothing else to
indicate the room’s purpose or function. Without Katya’s help, Alex probably
wouldn’t have been able to the find the canteen or the gym.

“The Director is a
precognitive, right? I figured he saw it coming...”

“Sure. Of course,” Katya
agreed dismissively. “Doesn’t change the fact that the Board diverted a huge
amount of very limited resources in Central to this particular facility –
which, on paper, has no strategic value whatsoever. I mean, why would you want
to house the Auditors in the middle of a bunch of weird scientist-philosopher
types?”

Alex considered it on
the stairway, which was also white-painted and barren. The gym was on the third
floor of the building, while the dormitory was located on the fourth – girls on
the west end of the building, boys on the east.

“Maybe nobody cares if
they get killed?”

Katya paused mid-step,
almost sending them both tumbling, then laughed and smacked his shoulder.

“Not bad, Alex,” she
said, grinning. “Might even be true.”

He basked briefly in the
rare praise while they finished the climb to the dormitories.

“Okay, I get the
suspicious part, but I still don’t see what makes them a cult.”

Katya frowned while she
put her palm up to the biometric reader mounted on the door – a security feature
that seemed to be universal at the Far Shores.

“I hear weird rumors
about them,” she said finally, pushing the heavy steel-lined door open. “That
they think the Founder wasn’t human – that they worship things that supposedly
live in the Ether, or the Ether itself. That kind of thing. I mean, haven’t you
noticed the way they smile all the time?”

Alex nodded hesitantly.
Now that he thought about it, Dr. Graaf had a pleasant smile on his face during
their entire orientation, when they arrived at the facility over the weekend,
as had the staff who been assigned to show them their rooms and the Audits
building’s facilities.

“Not in the canteen,
though – the cooks seemed normal.”

“They are support
personnel. Family of Operators without the potential to use protocols. They
just get assigned wherever, so they don’t count.”

“I don’t know,” Alex
said doubtfully, pausing at the junction where he would turn right and Katya
left. “Are you sure you just don’t like them?”

“Maybe. Tell me – do you
wanna find out for sure?” Katya poked him playfully. “You up for some
unauthorized after-hours shenanigans?”

Of course he agreed.
What else was there to do?

***

“The kids giving you any trouble,
Doc?”

Dr. Paul Graaf glanced
at Alice Gallow pleasantly and shook his head.

“Not at all. Though I do
feel a bit bad that you found us so unprepared. If the Director had given us
advance notice, we could have prepared classes and activities for them. He only
mentioned the impending transfer of the active Auditors, however, so I did not
make arrangements for juveniles...”

Dr. Graaf was short and
round, and therefore had to struggle a bit to keep pace with Alice’s long
stride. The beach that they walked along was level and uniform, and would have
been postcard perfect if not for the perpetually grey skies overhead, and the
leaden sea of Ether that churned where the ocean should have been. The wind
blew from inland, as it always did, and it carried the faint scent of coastal
sage and a mild smoke. In the distance behind them, the twin chimneys of
Central’s power plant spewed steam into the otherwise featureless sky, the only
by-product of their unique process of generating electricity.

“Not to worry, Doc. They
were all graduated, or pretty close to it, anyway. Gaul has ’em set up for
Friday and Saturday classes during the half-week they will be back at the
Academy anyway.”

“Nonetheless, I believe
we should arrange something to engage them. It would be a pity not to expose
them to the unique work that we do here. And please, do call me Paul, Miss
Gallow. We are to be neighbors, after all.”

“Sure. And you call me
Alice,” she said, with her twisted grin, “neighbor.”

“Indeed,” he said,
returning her smile with an amiable one of his own. “I hope that you are
finding the Audits facilities sufficient for your needs?”

“And then some. These
digs might be nicer than our old place back at the Academy. Little quiet for my
taste, though. Don’t you ever miss Central, all the way out here in the Fringe,
Paul?”

“On occasion,” Paul
admitted, pausing to light a thin brown cigar, offering a second to Alice, who
accepted after some consideration. “We do have bus service back to Central,
twice daily, though,” he said, shielding his silver-plated lighter from the
wind for Alice. “Our work here is rather consuming, however, and I have little
time for other affairs.”

“Gaul warned me about
that,” Alice said, drawing on the cigar experimentally, then exhaling a thin
stream of blue smoke. “Huh. Guess I like cigars.”

“The Director warned me
of your unique circumstances, as well,” Paul said, snapping his lighter closed
with a smile. “I will be frank with you, Alice. We have met before, though it
is my understanding that you most likely do not remember.”

Alice winced and started
to walk again, her pace a bit slowed.

“I do not.”

“That is for the best,”
Paul said, with a brief laugh. “I am afraid that you did not like me very
much.”

“Life is full of second
chances,” Alice said, grinning at him from behind her cigar. “Why don’t you
consider this one of them, Doc?”

“Indeed. I hope to make
a better impression this time. I am frankly pleased that you wish to speak to
me at all. My popularity among apport technicians has been dismal of late.”

Alice perked up.

“Why’s that?”

“The latest grand
project here at the Far Shores,” Dr. Graaf explained ruefully. “A bold
transportation intuitive. We have discovered something that promises to
revolutionize the transport of matter, utilizing entirely different principles
than apporting, and requiring none of the special talent. A democratization of
transport to Central, if you would. Some who share your talents are less than
thrilled with the prospect.”

“Little hint, Doc –
nobody shares my particular talents,” Alice explained, knocking ash from the
end of her cigar into the ocean. “I’m not a delivery girl. I don’t do
logistics.”

“Of course,” Dr. Graaf
agreed, with an apologetic half-bow. “I didn’t mean...”

“I am curious as to how
it’s done,” Alice said, cutting him off. “If there’s no apport, how do you move
things from point to point?”

“Ah! That’s the beauty
of the process,” Dr. Graaf exclaimed, clenching his hands in excitement. “You
see, it’s already there!”

Alice laughed.

“I think you lost me,
Doc.”

“It isn’t easily
explained,” Dr. Graaf allowed. “A demonstration would surely suffice, but the
machinery is not yet fully operational...”

“Another time, then,”
Alice said, shrugging.

They walked and smoked
in silence for a few minutes. The beach was utterly monotonous, without a
single rock, shell, or piece of garbage to interrupt the plain of grey sand. Alice
found the perspective disorienting – the monotone shade of the sand, sky, and
Ether nearly uniform, causing her to search for the soft line of the horizon
with a sort of visual desperation.

“Gaul said he had a
bitch of a time convincing you to allow the installation of Vladimir’s power
plant – and then again, when he started construction of the fallback Audits facility.”

“It was rather
contentious, I suppose. I value our isolation, and our neutrality, and have
made every effort to preserve it, for the benefit of our work. Additionally,
Dr. Hsang had concerns about the effects the power generation facility might
have on the purity of the Ether in the area, that it could influence our
experiments. Fortunately, none of those concerns bore fruit, and the situation
was resolved amicably.”

“Right, but it leads me
to wonder – why no such objections to my arrival with a bunch of Auditors and
students and support personnel in tow? I gotta assume that our presence does
more to threaten the neutrality and peace of your work environment than a
glorified steam engine...”