Vacuum Flowers (9 page)

It was not an easy trip.

Not many hours later they were following a pierrot into one of Londongrad's most exclusive business parks. Under the canopy of druid trees, languid paths lit by wrought-iron lampposts meandered through dark fields and small stands of trees. Fireflies drifted hypnotically through the grass. A snowy owl swooped down on them, snapped out magnificent white wings at the last possible instant, banked, and was gone. “Wyeth,” Rebel asked, “why did we spend all your money on these clothes? There were cloaks that looked just as good for nowhere near as much.”

“Yes, but they weren't made of real Terran wool. When you go to the rich to ask for money, you must
never
let them suspect you actually need it.”

“Oh.”

“Now don't talk. Remember you're painted up as a recreational slave. So don't smile, don't talk, don't show any initiative. Just tag along.”

Rebel moved her crossed wrists back and forth, setting the leash connecting them to Wyeth's hand swinging. “Yeah, well, I'm not exactly thrilled about this part of the deal either.”

“It gives you an excuse for following me around. More importantly, it'll confirm all of Ginneh's worst suspicions about me. She'll love it.” He hesitated, looked embarrassed. “Look, if it'd be any easier on you, I could take a minute and program you up for real. It's only for an hour or so, anyway—”

“No goddamn way!” she said, and Wyeth nodded quickly and glanced away. Rebel's revulsion went right down to the bone, so complete she was certain it came from both of her personas. Well, that was
one
thing she had in common with Eucrasia.

The pierrot halted and, bowing, gestured to one side with a white-gloved hand. A brick walk led around a lilac bush to a simple office—a floating slab of polished wood for a desk, and two plain chairs—backed by a rock outcrop and sheltered by a Japanese maple. At their approach a small, quick woman rose. “Wyeth, dear! It's been years since I've seen you.” Her skin was somewhere between amber and mahogany, her eyes midway between shrewd and cunning. She dressed corporate grey, down to the beads of her braids, and her nails were scarlet daggers. Her business paint brought up her cheekbones, played down her wide mouth. She gave Wyeth a swift hug and a peck on the cheek.

“Hallo, Ginneh.”

The executive studied him. “Same old Wyeth. Taciturn as ever.” Then she noticed Rebel. “Well!” Ginneh smiled, but made no further comment. She gestured Wyeth to a chair, and he dropped the leash, leaving Rebel ground-hitched.

Rebel stood by, as good as invisible, as the two exchanged pleasantries and moved on to business. Wyeth said, “I wondered if you were still providing professionals for the Outer System. Maybe the Jovian satellites?”

“You were hoping for something on Ganymede? Oh, Wyeth, I'm so sorry.” She placed a small hand on his forearm. “This comes at such a bad time in our orbit. Please.” A schematic phased in over her desk, showing Eros Kluster leaving the inner edge main sequence asteroid belts, heading sunward. “We're losing our competitive edge, industrially. Half the refineries are shut down. And we're not close enough to the Inner System for the mercantile economy to come up full. You know how difficult it is to find a position in a service economy. Maybe if you came back in a month. Thank you.” The schematic faded away.

“Well, perhaps I will.” Wyeth stood and retrieved his leash. “Been nice chatting you up, Ginneh.”

“Oh, don't rush off! Stay and talk. You haven't even asked what I'm working on. I've been transferred to the People's Mars project. You must let me show you it.”

“Mars?” Wyeth frowned. “I'm not sure I'd be interested—”

“It's a lovely package! Overview, please.” Holographic projections appeared behind her, like a line of windows winking open in the air. Spacejacks working on an enormous geodesic. A cluster of tank towns. Cold fusion reactors being towed slowly through the Kluster. An elaborate floating sheraton nearing completion. “The total cost is upwards of half a million man-years. It was wonderful how the whole thing just snowballed. It began with the orbital sheraton—the Stavka wanted to create a tourist industry. See the transformation storms, that sort of thing.” They swiveled to look at the holos. Wyeth took a chair.

Now that their backs were turned, Rebel felt free to slouch. She scratched an itch that had been bothering her for some time. Already she felt bored and ridiculous and annoyed at Wyeth for getting her into this. People did this kind of thing for
fun?

Ginneh and Wyeth were discussing the tank towns. “I don't understand why the Stavka would want them,” Wyeth said. “Even as scrap, they can't be worth much.”

“Don't be naive, dear. People's Mars is having labor trouble. We dump a few dozen slums in their neighborhood, and the price of labor takes a nosedive.”

“Hmmm.” Wyeth glanced over his shoulder and frowned at Rebel's posture. She straightened involuntarily, then stuck out her tongue. He'd already turned back, though. “That puts you in something of a morally ambiguous position, doesn't it? I mean, if you squint at it just right, it looks a lot like dealing in slaves.”

The executive laughed. “We're selling People's Mars the
tanks
. Whether the people living in them choose to go along or not is up to them. Oh, we're distributing the Stavka's propaganda for them, and we'll sweeten the deal by suspending rent for the duration of transit, but nobody's being forced to do anything. Next sequence, please.” All the scenes changed. “This is simply a terrific deal. It's big and hot and fast. We've even had to go out-Kluster for some of the skills. Most of the muscle and skull come fron Londongrad, of course, and we're providing the slums, the sheraton, the gedoesic and the raw oxygen. But—you see that holding sphere? Closeup, if you would.” A translucent sphere packed with something green and leafy and wet zoomed closer. “That contains a young air plant. We hired a team of macrobiologists from that pod of comets passing through the other side of the system, to look after it.”

The view switched to wraparound, and they were in the center of a small biolab. Some twenty people were at work there, dressed treehanger style, their bodies covered neck to foot in heavy clothing with embroidered inserts and oversized pockets. They talked as they worked, oblivious of their viewers, and touched each other casually, a tap on the shoulder here, a nudge in the ribs there. Somebody said something and the others laughed. Rebel wished she could join them, sign on to work among them. (But what would she do? Her skills were gone, along with most of her memories. No matter. In the largest possible sense they were all family, and she longed to be with them.)

“This is all tourist stuff, Ginneh,” Wyeth said in a flat voice.

“Ah? Well, perhaps this next one will interest you. You haven't asked how we expect to transport the slums to Mars orbit without crushing everything within them.”

“Is that a problem?”

“Oh my goodness, yes. Even the slightest acceleration would be enough to collapse the interiors, shanties, people and all. Didn't they teach you any physics in kindergarten? Please show us the ring.”

“Well, I—” Wyeth stopped. The wraparound had switched to the interior of a floating weapons platform. It had been built cheap, all boilerplate and seam weld, but the laser sniper systems that crouched on the metal deck, gently shifting to track their targets, were bright, state-of-the-art killing machines. The human triggers floating beside them had the unblinking, fanatic look of the rigidly wetwired.

The systems were aimed through laser-neutral glass walls at individual specks moving through a cluttered floating construction site. The holo zoomed up on one speck, and it became a worker in distress-orange vacuum suit. She was bolting together complex-looking machinery, hooking cables to ports, wiring terminals to terminals. Other orange-suited workers labored nearby, climbing blindly over one another as needed, yet perfectly synchronized. Tanks were mated to valves installed an instant before, complex wiring sequences were abandoned by one to be picked up by another, with never a glance to see how the others were doing. Hundreds worked in scattered clusters along the length of a half-kilometer arch of machinery, looking more like hive insects than humans. Beyond them hung more weapons platforms, enough to track each worker individually. “We brought in a team of Earth to build the transit ring,” Ginneh said.

“My. God,” Wyeth said, horrified. “You can't deal with the Comprise.”

“Don't be silly, dear. Only Earth knows how to build an accelerator ring. This deal isn't possible without help from the Comprise. Please expand from the third quadrant. You see the green tanks? Liquid helium. We've rented half the liquid helium in the Kluster for this caper.”

“Let me make myself a little clearer, Ginneh. Earth and humanity are natural enemies. We're talking survival of the species here. You don't cut deals with something that threatens every human being in existence. I'm not talking abstractions here, Ginneh. I'm talking about you, me, and everyone we know—our selves, our minds, our souls, our identities. Our future.”

Ginneh shrugged. “Oh, I'm sure you exaggerate. Our security is excellent. You saw the weapons platforms. If anything, we're being overcautious.”

“Machines!” Wyeth snorted. “Machines are the easiest things in the universe to outwit because they're predictable—that's their function, to be predictable, to do exactly what they're designed for, time after time. And you've put them under the control of guards so tightly programmed they're almost machines themselves. Real bright, Ginneh. I ought to strangle you and every one of your fellow corporate whores myself. It would only improve the breed.”

“I suppose you could do better?”

“Damn right I could!”

“I'm glad to hear you say that,” Ginneh said complacently. “Because I believe I
do
have a position for you, after all.”

Rebel's nose itched. She scratched it, and the leash tapped her belly lightly. Grimacing, she pulled her hands free of the thing and dropped it on the ground. The hell with it. She rubbed her wrists slowly and luxuriously, staring at the back of Wyeth's head with shrewd speculation. How much did she actually know about him? Very little. Enough, though, to know that he was involved hip-deep in some kind of weirdness. It certainly wasn't altruism that powered his actions. He had his own plans, whatever they were, and somehow she had been fitted into them. Logic told her it was time to cut and run. Leave him and his bitch to their little schemes.

Ginneh and Wyeth had their heads together, conferring quietly. Neither noticed her go.

The biolab had been retrofitted between two underwriting firms on Fanchurch Prospekt in midtown Londongrad. Rebel got the address from a public data port. She might not have her skills, but any working group needed someone to do the scutwork, and she could fetch and carry with the best of them. Her plan was to hide among her own kind, where she would be effectively invisible, because she wouldn't stand out. And when they left to return to their comet worlds, she'd go with them.

All it'd take was a little grit.

At the doorway she hesitated, remembering the public surveillance cameras inside. Well, there were millions such throughout the Kluster. What were the odds that somebody looking for her would be watching? Slim. Taking a deep breath, she went in.

“
Hey
-lo!” A lanky treehanger stuck a genecounter in his hip pocket and leered at her. Another man whistled. All activity within the lab came to a halt.

Rebel stopped in confusion. Everyone was looking at her. They were staring at her breasts and stomach, some involuntarily and with embarrassment, and others not. She fought down the urge to snap her cloak shut, and her face flushed. A short, grey-haired woman turned from a potting bench, brushing her hands together, and said mildly, “Can I help you, dearie?”

“Uh, yes, well … Actually, I just wanted to stop by for a chat. You see, I come from a dyson world myself.” The words sounded false, and Rebel felt irrationally guilty. Sweat beaded up under her arms.

“Gone a bit native then, ain't you?” the lanky one said.

“Haven't you work to do?” the woman said in a warning voice. “All of you! What are we getting paid for, hey? Squatting in the bushlines?” Then, in a gentler tone, “Where do you hail from then?”

“Tirnannog. It's part of the original archipelago, just moving out into the Oort.” The names came to her without urging, but none of them sounded familiar to her.

The other engineers were working quietly, not talking, so they could overhear what was said. Now a stocky, blond-haired kid with walnut skin looked up, interested. “Oh yeah, I been there,” he said. “We're all from Hibrasil, practically spitting distance, hey? Couple weeks transit in coldpack is all. Got family in Stanhix, ever heard of that? Just outside of Blisterville.”

She shook her head helplessly. “Blisterville?”

“You never heard of
Blisterville?
Threetrunk past the Sargasso? Five hundred thousand people?”

A woman looked up from a tank of water voles and said, “Bet you we got one of those ravers on our hands. You know—too much electricity shot up the medulla oblongata.” The treehanger beside her laughed and punched her shoulder.

“Hey, listen, I'm not lying to you, sport! I really am from Tirnannog. I can explain—”

“Where does an airwhale fit into an ecosystem? What do they sell in Green City? Why can't an anogenic construct eat? What are the seven basic adaptations to weightlessness?” the stocky kid asked. He looked Rebel in the eye and sneered. “How many bones are in your hand?”

She didn't have the answers. It was all information that had been destroyed with her original body. She opened her mouth, but nothing came out. One of her hands was trembling.