Xenotech Queen's Gambit: A Novel of the Galactic Free Trade Association (Xenotech Support Book 2) (7 page)

“But they didn’t know what to look for,” I said. “Could you also arrange to get me a kilo of fresh hamburger from the employee cafeteria and a bottle of
Lethe?”

“The hamburger shouldn’t be a problem, and I’m sure I can round up some
Lethe
. What dosage?”

“You’re the doctor,” I said, smiling. “What would I need to knock out something with the body weight of a watermelon?”

“I have a doctorate in xenobotany,” said Mistress Marigold, “not medicine. But I’d expect a hundred milligrams would do it. I’m sure my VP of Sales will have a drawerful of samples in various dosages.”

“Thanks. Please have the meat and the pills delivered to me in the security office, along with a large, resealable plastic bag.”

“I’ll see to it.”

“Great.”

I finished my water and excused myself. Mistress Marigold was on the phone before I’d left, getting me what I needed. Not far from her office, I found one of Dree’s beach balls in the hall. I tossed it toward the lobby and followed it quickly, making a fast break for the elevator. This time I was lucky. The doors opened before Dree could give me another hug. As the doors closed, I did get another look at her rhizome feeding pods. Some of them looked fairly mature and there were some empty spots where I suspected budding clones had once been connected. My hunch was growing stronger.

“Bye, Dree!” I said through the last crack before the elevator door sealed.

As I descended I heard the thump of tendrils slamming into the door to wish me a safe vertical journey.

I got off on the ground floor and had Vic call his boss, Venna. She escorted me downstairs to the building’s security monitoring room. Whatever weird irresistible-to-women pheromones I’d been giving off earlier didn’t seem to work on her, or on Mistress Marigold, thank goodness.

I remembered Venna—we’d worked together when the building’s security was initially installed. Mistress Marigold had called and asked her to do whatever she could to help me. Venna was a younger Nic
ó
sn with short beard tentacles so white they practically glowed.

After First Contact it took humans quite a while to learn the physical differences between male and female Nicósns, since their general body shapes were much the same. Once we realized that beard length was a gender signifier rather than a stylistic choice, humans who weren’t comfortable until they knew the right pronoun to use were a lot happier. I understand that our more pronounced sexual dimorphism is disconcerting for Nicósns, but you’d never know from the way they interact with us.

We sat down at a bank of monitors and started reviewing recordings from the seventh floor microclimate zones. I set the search parameters to find any instances of something moving on the seventh floor after normal working hours that
wasn’t
wearing a security bracelet. The cameras were motion-sensitive and tied into the building’s security databases, so that wasn’t difficult to specify. We did pick up movements—lots of them—but we couldn’t tell what was triggering the cameras’ sensors. Whatever was there was either moving too fast for us to follow or blended in with the foliage in the zones. There was a lag before any motion drew the cameras’ attention and we couldn’t see what was moving. We did notice that the count of sacks of bone meal had declined by one in the room with the Balaam’s Asters. Venna could track something crawling underneath the thick ground cover, but couldn’t tell what it was.

“This is getting us nowhere,” said Venna. Her beard tentacles were standing straight out in frustration.

“I’ve got an idea,” I said. “Let’s take a look at the recordings from the executive floor’s elevator lobby for a few days before the problems started.”

There was a knock on the door to the security monitoring room. It was Vic holding a large, resealable plastic bag filled with a kilo of raw hamburger in one hand and a small pill bottle marked with the MF&P logo in the other.

“Mistress Marigold said you wanted these, Mr. Buckston,” he said. “I hope
you
know why, ’cause I can’t figure it out.”

“Call me Jack,” I said. “We could use another set of eyes. Want to help?”

“I’d be glad to,” said Vic, “but my shift just ended.”

Vic and I both looked at Venna for her approval.

“Stay on the clock, Vic,” said Venna with a smile. “I’m authorizing you for overtime. I have a feeling we’re both going to learn something.”

“Great,” said Vic, finding a seat in front of a bank of monitors. “Now I can find out why you wanted the meat and pills.”

“Not quite yet,” I said to Vic, then turned to Venna. “Please put the recordings on high speed playback on three screens. We can each take a day. Queue it up to begin after the place clears out at night, say seven or eight o’clock.”

“Will do,” said Venna. “What are we looking for?”

“You’ll know it when you see it,” I said. “Call out if you notice anything unusual.”

I checked the wastebasket next to the desk where I was working and confirmed that it had several plastic liners inside for the convenience of the janitorial staff. I removed the second liner down and flattened it out on the desk.

Keeping half an eye on the screen I was supposed to be watching, I opened the kilo of hamburger and separated it into nine approximately quarter pound balls on the plastic liner.

I was comfortable with the metric system—and the galmet system, for that matter—but a quarter of a pound still sounded more natural to me than a tenth of a kilo when it came to burgers.

Then I opened the bottle of fast-acting
Lethe
and pushed a pill deep into each ball. I surveyed my handiwork, saw that it was good, and put the balls back in the plastic bag. I finished by tossing the liner in the trash.

I hadn’t been paying much attention to the recordings flashing by on my monitor, so I was pleased when Vic spotted something.

“Look!” he said, freezing the frame on Dree and the executive floor’s elevator lobby.

“What did you find?” said Venna, leaning in, her beard tentacles now relaxed and writhing naturally.

I smiled. Vic had found what I’d been expecting. He’d frozen the screen just as two of Dree’s mature clones had broken off from her roots and moved toward the elevator. It was clear that several more were ready to separate soon.

“Who knew the juvenile form was mobile?” I said, musing.

Vic played the recording forward in slow motion. We saw several three-foot mini-Dree clones assemble in front of the elevator.

“Switch angles,” I said to Venna.

She switched to the same time stamp on a camera observing the elevator doors. Seven of nine junior versions of Dree formed a plant pyramid and collectively pushed the up button. Then they boarded the elevator and disappeared.

“I’m going to wash my hands, then head up to the seventh floor,” I said. “Please clear that level of all employees so the mini-Dree clones won’t be afraid to come out.”

“Right away,” said Venna.

“And Vic?” I said. “Use your eagle eyes and track where the other two clones went.”

“Will do.”

I took the bag of hamburger, hit the washroom for some soap
and water, then rode up to the top floor from the basement. Venna followed me on the security cameras and opened the security door to the seventh floor as I approached it. I walked down the access corridor until I got to the Balaam’s Asters zone, since that looked like where several of them were hiding. Then I took seven of the nine balls of hamburger with the
Lethe
inside and lined them up a foot apart down the center of the corridor. I whistled a doo-wop song as I walked away and took the elevator back to the basement and the security monitoring room.

“Hey Jack! Great plan,” said Venna, pointing to one of the larger monitors.

Four of the clones had already used their root-legs to enter the corridor from the Balaam’s Aster zone and had taken the bait. They were gulping down their drugged meatballs and looking quite pleased with themselves—and a bit sleepy. While we watched, three more came out from the Rigeliotropes’ zone and did the same. Soon, seven mini-Dree clones were sleeping soundly.

“You can send the professional xenobotany staff back to the seventh floor,” I said. “Cleanup on aisle seven.”

Venna was already a step ahead of me.

“Do you want to tell Mistress Marigold, or should I?” she asked.

“You can do it,” I said. “I still need to go up to seven and take care of some overdue preventive maintenance.”

“Uh-oh,” said Vic. “You’re not going to like this.”

Venna and I crowded in and looked over his shoulder. Vic played more of the recording from the sixth floor elevator lobby and we watched as two of the mini-Dree clones took the elevator
down
to the first floor, where they made their way to the employee cafeteria. Vic switched views and we saw the clones leave the building by way of the loading dock and head for the thirty acres of greenery at the Atlanta Botanical Gardens.

The foxes are in the hen house now, I thought. I’d better get upstairs and talk to Mistress Marigold right away.

* * * * *

It turned out to not be as big a problem as I’d first imagined. Mistress Marigold was on the board of the Gardens and had quite a lot of influence with their executive director. More meatballs laced with
Lethe
would be placed around the grounds and the remaining two mini-Dree clones would likely be found soon. I completed my preventive maintenance without incident and Mistress Marigold complimented me on my creative solution to her problem when we met in her office late that afternoon for a wrap-up.

“Nicely done, Jack, especially when I’m the one responsible,” she said. “My apologies. I guess I still have a lot more to learn about how Dree’s species reproduces.”

“Don’t worry about it,” I said. “I think we both thought of Dree as one of a kind.”

“True enough, but even so, I want to say thank you,” she said. “I’ve left a nice bouquet of exotics for you and your young lady at the reception desk.”

“My young lady?” I said. “How do you know about Poly?”

“Word gets around, Jack. Word gets around.”

On my way out I gave Dree a big hug, played with her by tossing beach balls, and didn’t say anything about the mischief her clones had gotten into. Plants have feelings too, you know. Some plants, anyway.

Before I left the building I picked up a beautiful flower arrangement and checked to make sure none of them were self-mobile varieties. It was time to head for home. Poly should be awake by now and we had a lot of catching up to do.

Chapter 8

“Mens sana in corpore sano.”
— Juvenal

When I got back to my apartment I was disappointed. Poly was already up and gone. She’d left me a note next to Queen Sherrhi’s invitation saying that her parents and sister would be pleased to attend and thanking me again for picking them up at the airport on Wednesday afternoon. It had lots of Xs and Os on it, so she realized how much of an imposition it was to have me pick up her family without her around for moral support.

I put the flowers in a large vase on the dining room table, pleased that none of them were going to walk off and terrorize the Ad Astra complex. I was tired, so I put a couple of Nic
ó
sn tortilla fish in the toaster and ate them with another few inches of ripe Dauushan mega-banana. Then I went to bed.

Tomorrow, Lieutenant Lee and I had the dubious privilege of interrogating Jean-Jacques Bonhomme, the CEO of WT&F, about his dealings with Factor-E-Flor and what he knew about a certain two-hundred-and-fifty-foot robot. It would primarily be Martin’s show—I was just coming along for the ride—and I was looking forward to watching him work.

I fell asleep watching an old Guillermo del Toro movie called
Pacific Rim
on my bedroom’s wall screen and remember thinking
my robot looks cooler
as my eyes grew heavy and I slept.

* * * * *

Instead of using Poly’s voice, my phone decided to wake me another way, with the soothing notes of
Ranz de Vaches
or the Call to the Cows
,
the third movement of Rossini’s William Tell Overture. No, not the Lone Ranger theme part, the music that’s always used to signify morning’s arrival in famous cartoons from Warner Brothers and Disney.

I woke quickly and got out of bed to prove I was awake before my phone escalated to the finale of the
1812 Overture
.

I’d gone to bed early so I was up before dawn and could take my time drinking a mug of tea, reading the latest news from New York Times Twitter, and checking for messages.

I smiled when I saw something had come in from Poly. She’d sent me a text to let me know she was still where I’d expected—at her Georgia Tech A.I. lab with her adviser checking out new configurations for composite artificial intelligences. She said Professor Urrrson’s mate had brought them a pizza last night, so she’d been fed and I shouldn’t worry. Poly closed by thanking me again for picking up her family and added more Xs and Os. She must be feeling really guilty.

I made up my mind to be as gracious about the situation as I could, since I was confident I’d need favors of my own someday. I knew relationships weren’t about keeping score, and most of the time I was focused on what made Poly happy, but my brain couldn’t help it. I was nervous about meeting her family without her there and wanted to make a good impression. I knew Poly had challenging relationships with her mother and father, but she hadn’t told me anything at all about her sister Pomy.

I’d find out soon enough.

Speculating about Poly’s family made me consider where my own mom and step-dad were now. Mom was still moving from project to project as an engineer. Last I’d heard she was off-planet working on power systems for the
Charalindhri
, an asteroid mining ship half the size of the Death Star that the Dauushans were building in orbit.

The ship was designed to find metallic asteroids, spin them, melt them with congruency-provided stellar heat, and then process the resulting layers. It was supposed to be a very efficient refining method since the various metals sorted themselves out by relative density.

Dauush had an ever-increasing need for raw materials, and the mining ship would go a long way toward meeting the demands of the planet’s massive fabricators once it was operational.

I loved my mom and she loved me, but we hadn’t been close since I’d gone off to college. We called each other on our birthdays and touched base every other month or so, but most of the time we lived our separate lives.

My step-dad was currently working as a guide for human sportsmen on one of the more rugged Short Pâkk planets. Pâkk like to keep their undeveloped land wild and populate their wilderness areas with “challenging” varieties of fauna from across the galaxy that make lions, tigers and grizzly bears look like koalas, so it was an exciting line of work. Mom had a weak spot for adventurers. She’d married my step-dad when they’d met in Houston, three years before First Contact.

Thomas Jefferson Buckston was a petroleum engineer who’d been exploring potential Alaskan fields for years. When he wasn’t looking for oil, he worked as a guide for hunting parties—using both guns and cameras—and he’d swept my mom off her feet when he was reassigned to headquarters. Mom said they’d met when she needed to talk to someone with expertise in permafrost.

T.J. told me he’d fallen for my mom the first time he’d seen her, sitting across the table from him at a planning meeting. He’d asked her out as soon as the meeting broke for lunch. When I was older he explained that they never did end up having lunch that day. Mom just blushes.

Since my bio-dad had disappeared before I was born, T.J. effectively became my father, and a few years later I took his name. He showed me how to run network cables, configure firewalls and rebuild engines. He also taught me how to hunt, fish, defend myself, and stay alive in the Alaskan bush and Louisiana bayous. My step-dad was my Scout leader and my hero—until he was transferred back to Alaska and my mom went to Aswan to convert an Egyptian dam’s turbines to run on congruent energy instead of hydro power. She took me with her.

My family would get back together for less than one month out of twelve in the years ahead. The separations were hard for me to handle. They were also hard on my mom. She and T.J. parted amicably a few months after I left for college. My step-dad sends me wildlife photos on SpaceBook and we exchange short emails every few weeks. I know he’s proud of me. I keep a picture of my mom and step-dad and me in my bedroom. They’re standing on either side of me when I got my Eagle Scout award and we’re all smiling. It’s a happy memory.

Enough maudlin musing. I had enough time to hit the gym and was overdue for a modest workout. I put on a Mulbiri Tech t-shirt, shorts and a pair of cross-trainers, shoved my phone in a pocket along with some ear buds and left my apartment.

The humanoid gym in the Ad Astra complex was in the basement of one of the buildings in the opposite direction from Tom
á
so and Terrhi’s place. I hadn’t been there in far too long. Ruby, the receptionist, checked me in.

“Where have you been, Jack?” she said. “Are you okay? I heard you’d been shot.”

“I’m fine,” I said, smiling. Ruby was a grandmotherly kangaroo-shaped alien with a face like a raccoon and long, dexterous fingers. Her species came from the planet Marsul, where they brewed great beer, or so I’d been told. It was supposed be something about the hops. Ruby didn’t need a chair. She was resting on her large hind feet and leaning back on her tail, knitting and entertaining several grandchildren in her commodious pouch. It was a great part-time job for a retiree—much better than being a Walmart greeter.

“That leg doesn’t look fine,” she said, pointing at my dinosaur claw scar. I’ve got to be more diligent in applying Vitamin E.

“You should see the other guy,” I said, taking pride in the fact that the other guy, a virtual reality dinosaur, was dead—or at least deactivated. That reminded me of Columbia Brown, the person who’d shot me. I’d have to ask Martin about the status of the search for her after we grilled Jean-Jacques. My ribs started aching just thinking about her still being at large.

“Take it slow,” said Ruby. “And don’t be a stranger.”

“I will,” I said. “And I won’t.”

I stuck in my wireless ear buds, cranked up a
Queen
play list in honor of Terrhi’s mom, and headed for one of the humanoid treadmills to warm up. I started out slow, at a steady walking pace, then gradually increased the speed until I was jogging, then running. Maybe I wasn’t in such bad shape after all? To make things more interesting, I instructed the Orishen-made treadmill to start throwing obstacles at me as I ran. Simulated rocks, logs and fire-ant mounds appeared and tested my ability to dodge or leap over them. After a few minutes, and a few near misses, I shifted the treadmill into cool down mode and thought about what station to try next. Strength training, I decided.

Much of the strength training equipment is Orishen. It’s able to adapt to the needs of multiple species. That makes it very important to specify your species when you login to a given machine. For example, Ruby could leg press a compact car, even at her age. I hit a wrong key when I typed in my identifier and tried to do a P
â
kk strength routine, then got so discouraged I switched to free weights. I stationed myself over near the Musa workout area where I could watch the tiny mouse-sized aliens lifting barbells the size of babies’ rattles. That did my ego a lot of good, until I realized that the Musans were hoisting five times their body weight. For me to do that, I’d have to lift Terrhi over my head.

I gave up on strength training—my heart wasn’t in it—and thought I’d play a little pickup basketball, just for fun. Unfortunately, the court was filled with Tigrammaths. I had no interest in playing against seven foot tall opponents with cat-like vertical leaps. I decided to head back home and soak in my spa tub instead. Ruby smiled at me when I left. I wasn’t sure if she was pleased I took it easy or thought I was a wimp for leaving so soon, but maybe I’m projecting.

It was still cool on the walk back to my apartment, but I could tell the day was going to be a hot one. Summer starts early in Atlanta. The parklike, tree-filled Ad Astra courtyard was mostly quiet, though I could hear the sounds of something small and quick scurrying through the foliage that paralleled my path. “Squirrels,” I thought. “Where’s Spike when I need him?”

My soak was brief, but delightful, and the high intensity massaging Chinese Gunpowder variant I selected as my shower program afterwards helped me come close to having a healthy mind in a healthy body.

I enjoyed a bowl of quadrotriticale flakes with milk and a few more slices of ripe Dauushan mega-banana for breakfast. Then I cleaned up my dishes and was ready to face the day.

I was even ready to face Jean-Jacques Bonhomme, the CEO of WT&F, especially since this time I didn’t have to do the heavy lifting. Truth be told, I
liked
confronting J-J. There was something about his straightforwardly avaricious attitude that made it fun to bait him. But this wouldn’t be my show.

Maybe Martin would let me play good cop to his bad cop this morning. Whatever happened, I hoped J-J wouldn’t take out his frustrations on Mike. Poly and I both wanted him on the Xenotech Support team as soon as we got our hiring plans figured out, but in the meantime, J-J could make his life miserable.

While it was more entertaining to think about making Jean-Jacques squirm, it was eight-fifteen and time to get moving, since Martin and I had planned to meet at nine. I grabbed my backpack tool bag, summoned my van and headed for a rendezvous with destiny, or at least with Lieutenant Lee.