Haze and the Hammer of Darkness (19 page)

Lyvia frowned. “We have marriages and civil contracts and people who live together without either, and people who live alone. Some relationships are what you'd call traditional, and some aren't. We don't apply any stigma or prohibition to same-sex unions, if that's what you mean. All couples are treated the same. We do apply certain restrictions on those situations where more than two adults are involved in a relationship. History has shown such multiple unions do have a tendency not to carry their own weight in society.”

“Restrictions? Such as?”

“If someone in that kind of relationship decides to have a child, someone has to post an educational and support bond.”

“If they don't…”

“They can terminate the pregnancy, or they can be relocated into a situation where they can both work and have the child.”

“Even you can't make everything work through economics.”

“No … but mostly personal economics work. Some people always require the force of the state to behave and not to take criminal advantage of others.”

“What about you?”

“What about me?” replied Lydia with an amused smile.

“Are you in some sort of … arrangement?”

“I have a partner. She and I have a daughter.”

That explained more than a few things, Roget thought, including Lyvia's ease in maintaining a professional relationship and the very light fragrance that she used.

“Most arrangements here are still heterosexual,” she went on. “That's the way human genes usually operate.” Lyvia stood, stifling a yawn. “I'd like to get home to see Aylicia.”

“Then you should.” Roget slipped from his chair.

They walked toward the front of Classica, and along the way Lyvia paid the bill with her belt-tube.

Once outside, Roget asked, “What about tomorrow?”

“I'll have to see what we can work out. I'll meet you for breakfast, the same as today.”

Lyvia said little as she walked with him back to his guesthouse, and while Roget knew he should be finding out more, he discovered that he was too tired to press the issue. When he did reach his quarters, his feet ached, as did his shoulders. The shoulder pain had to be from the tension he'd only been peripherally aware of—at least, that was what he hoped.

But how could he not be tense when it was getting clearer and clearer that both the Federation and Dubiety were trying to use him? How could Dubiety be so aware of the Federation without the converse being true? Unless … Dubiety was more advanced than he'd even thought. Yet, if that were so, then the casual attitude of the colonel made no sense, unless he happened to be so arrogant that he and the Federation could not believe any splinter human culture might have surpassed Federation technology.

Roget could see permutations upon permutations.

Finally, he downloaded a duplicate of
Hildegarde in the Sunlight
to the quarters' system, amazed that the system actually accepted his flash memory, then adjusted the projection to the wall opposite the sofa. The dachshund he'd seen through the window the night before had reminded him. He sat down and looked at the familiar image of Hildegarde on the blue velvet sofa. He smiled.

“You've been in a lot of places, little girl,” he murmured. “I'm not certain that you haven't learned more than I have. Especially here.”

Hildegarde just continued to look at him expectantly, and that was fine with Roget as he leaned back and closed his eyes, trying to let his thoughts clear.

 

16

24 LIANYU 6744
F. E.

Roget stood in the high-roofed chamber. He glanced around but didn't recognize it … and yet, in some way, he did. There were small dark wooden desks arranged in a tiered semicircle. Most of the desks were occupied, primarily by men. A considerable proportion of those in the chamber were white haired. The ceiling was high and domed, and there were murals painted on the lower levels of the dome, just above the gallery where only a few people sat, looking down.

Why couldn't he make out the subjects of the murals? The light wasn't as bright as it could have been, but his eyesight was better than that. He squinted. It didn't help.

“A point of order has been raised against the motion to consider the amendment.” The words boomed from somewhere, amplified.

Roget glanced toward the front of the dais opposite the middle of the tiered desk. A heavyset man with jowls sat at the single desk. He was the one who had spoken. Above and behind him on the wall was a large seal that featured an eagle. One claw held stylized thunderbolts. The other held some sort of branch.

“The amendment is germane. Under the rules, any amendment that references a specific clause in the bill…”

Roget's eyes flicked around the chamber. For some reason, he felt light-headed, and he put out a hand to steady himself on the nearest desk.

“Are you all right, Senator?” The young man who asked the question wore a dark jacket with a silver emblem in the lapel.

Something about the coat nagged at Roget. He couldn't say why. “I'm fine.”

“Yes, sir.” The young man moved away, as if relieved.

His feet seemed to turn him, and Roget found himself walking out of the chamber along an aisle between the evenly spaced desks. None of those at the desks looked up at him as he passed. Two women made a point of looking away.

He walked through an empty reception chamber or anteroom and then out a long colonnaded hall into another area where arched steel door frames were flanked by men in unfamiliar dark blue uniforms. He took the narrow exit space and made his way outside the building, where he stood between two massive marble columns at the top of a wide set of marble steps. Beyond the columns where he stood stretched others, holding up a long marble pediment above him. Below him stretched wide marble steps that descended and descended, finally ending at a wide concrete sidewalk.

People walked up and down the steps. Only a few looked in his direction, and they looked quickly away.

The sky overhead was dirty, covered in a haze of gray and brown. For all the haze, an orangish sun poured out heat. Sweat oozed from all over his body. After several moments, Roget walked down the marble steps. The stone felt gritty under his shoe soles, and the sun beat down on his uncovered head.

“Senator…” A young woman hurried toward him. She held a thin and angular microphone that she thrust at him. “Can you tell us the progress on the debate on the agreement proposed by Beijing?”

“Progress?” Roget laughed. “What progress? They want to take us over. We don't want to be taken over, but we don't want to pay the cost of independence … or of an effective military. Everyone wants someone else to pay, but now that you've taxed the upper middle class out of existence and driven the rich offshore, who's left to pay? You people have crucified anyone brave enough to explain that. There's no one left in there who has enough nerve to tell their constituents that … or to tell you.” He pushed the microphone away and resumed walking down the marble steps.

Behind him there were murmurs.

“… say he's lost it … coherent only some of the time…”

“… why they keep electing him…”

“… blaming us…”

Roget walked to the base of the steps and turned left on the sidewalk beside the empty asphalt drive and toward the low white buildings to the north beyond the trees at the end of the short expanse of green. Why couldn't they see it? Why was the obvious so impossible for them to understand? He felt so tired.

He reached inside his jacket for his phone. Except he wasn't wearing a jacket, and the phone had vanished. He needed to call …

Who was it that he needed to call? He couldn't remember. Why couldn't he remember?

Where was his jacket? He had been wearing a jacket. He couldn't go out into the chamber and speak on the floor without it. Where was it? He looked around. How could he have been so stupid as to have forgotten his jacket?

A blinding pain shot through his chest, and he staggered. His eyes watered. A moment of blackness washed over him … and passed.

When he could see again, the white marble buildings that had been less than a hundred yards before him swirled and melted into oddly shaped red stone. Some were only a few meters taller than he was. The green grass and trees had vanished, and he was walking on red sandy soil.

He stopped and glanced down at his chest. He was clad in a one-piece coverall of shimmering white. So white …

An institution? Had the administration had him committed? Carted off because he'd said too much? Or had they used national security as an excuse?

Roget blotted his forehead. How had it gotten so hot? He tried to swallow, then moisten his lips. They were dry and cracked.

He shook his head. It felt like it was splitting, and everything wavered around him. Where was he?

Something brushed his hip. He looked down at the white cylinder attached to his belt.

It was … he grasped for a name.

What was it?

His monitor! That was what it was. With that recognition, he looked around again, then reached down and grasped it. His eyes burned, and his fingers were clumsy, but he finally managed to get his position. He was nearly at the foot of Shinob, a good klick east of the Mill Creek wash and the Virgin River.

How had he gotten out here?

Dehydration. That must have been it. How could he have been so stupid? He reached for the small water bottle at his belt on the left side. It was full. He drained it.

After several moments, his head seemed to clear, and he turned back west. He kept his steps measured as he followed the old and dusty trail back toward the Virgin River. He still didn't understand how he had gotten on the east side of the river. He'd only been at the bridge itself. At least he hadn't fallen in. He could have drowned, even in the shallow water, but his boots and his singlesuit showed no sign of dampness.

And what about the delusions about being called “Senator”? Or the marble buildings and the hazy sky? He knew he'd never been anywhere like that. He'd never seen buildings like those, nor had he seen a sky that polluted.

He knew about dehydration, but there had been nothing about delusions. Nothing at all.

He kept walking. No one was about to come after him any time soon, even in the comparatively mild midday heat of winter. He was just glad that he wouldn't be in St. George in full summer.

He hoped he wouldn't be.

He tried not to think about the dehydration delusion as he walked on. While it had seemed so real, it had been a delusion, hadn't it?

Or … his thoughts were still foggy … Something had happened. What? In a dingy café … that was it!

The Lee House. The lunch with Marni and the momentary blackout when the busboy had hit him with the tub of dishes, but what they had done must have been what gave him the delusion. He finally accessed his internal monitors, but they indicated no toxins, only borderline dehydration, and how had he gotten here?

Slowly, he recalled. He'd been taking a water chem reading …

He shook his head. He needed to get back to the bicycle and back to the FSS building, and he needed to drink more, as soon as he could. Dehydration … that had to be it. Didn't it?

 

17

19 MARIS 1811
P. D.

Roget woke earlier than he would have liked on Saturday, while it was still dark, or as dark as it ever seemed to get on Dubiety. He did have another thought, something he should have considered far earlier. Before he even dressed, this time wearing his own blue singlesuit, he walked into the main room of his quarters and began to search the holojector menu. If it accessed entertainment and other real-time material, there was always the possibility that it offered more.

After close to fifteen minutes, he located something called “Inquiries” and pulsed it.

“State your inquiry, please.” The words seemed projected into his ears and nowhere else.

“Orbital shield system, functions and construction. Respond in Federation Stenglish.” All the system could do was refuse to answer.

“Stenglish not an option.” But the holojector did create an image of Dubiety, shown as a schematic cross-section of the planet. The molten core was somewhat smaller than Roget expected, and the planetary magnetic field depiction showed six poles, rather than two, and none of the three sets had anywhere close to the same orientation, nor did they correspond even approximately to geographic poles. The maximum field strength of each set was also at differing distances from the planetary surface. The fields generated by each looked to be more tightly focused than “normal” planetary mag-fields.

Roget grinned, if momentarily, until he realized that he could have discovered the inquiry aspect of the holojector/commnet earlier.

He did have to ask the system to repeat the explanation three times before he thought he had a general understanding of how the shields worked. Supposedly, each shield level was linked to a specific magnetic field, and the fields generated some sort of current or secondary field that created the orbital motion of the shield components.

When Roget couldn't get any more information on how the fields were structured or maintained or precisely how the orbital motion was accomplished, he tried another tack.

“Internal construction of each individual orbital unit?”

“Please restate your inquiry.”

Between his nonexistent Dubietan old American and his use of simple words, it took close to a dozen attempts before the system projected another schematic. Each piece looked like a miniature modified lifting body, but that didn't make any sense because there was no atmosphere to speak of, not for aerodynamic purposes, at the orbital levels of even the lowest shield. The diagram showed a thin outer skin with what looked to be some sort of miniature devices along the inside of the rounded edges, but the system did not provide dimensions or details on the internal devices.