The Highest Frontier (47 page)

“And great symbolism.”

“The Mound below,” he agreed. “All those taxplayers, the foundation of government.”

“However sinful.” Soli couldn’t resist.

“However wasteful,” he needled back. “Play and spend.”

“Yes, yes,” interposed Dylan hurriedly. “The powwow ground will be
chulo
; don’t you agree, Bobby?”

Next to the Weaver DIRGs, Bobby Foxtail Forrester smiled. “No trouble, no trouble. We’ll cooperate in every way.” The Shawnee would be in on everything, as would Mount Gilead, represented by Judge Baynor until the mayoral election. Judge Baynor had a barrel chest and the largest size power bands Dylan had ever seen. The judge cleared his throat and nodded curtly; he wanted out of here to get the last of his soybeans in. Quade had turned off the rain to get the bean moisture down.

The head Weaver looked up, still scanning her box. Her blue neck ring turned green, with a variant star design, as did the neck rings of both DIRGs at her side. The rings, and their box windows, would change style at coded intervals. “The powwow ground is way too open. Projectiles could come from anywhere, overhead in the hab. We’ll need a bell jar enclosing the stage.”

The bell jar was standard, ever since a candidate got bumped off at a primary debate the year Rosa won. Above the table projected a model of the grassy powwow ground, with a stage covered by a nearly invisible “jar” of transparent amyloid. It looked like one of those domes that now enclosed desert cities; Congress had just passed a bill to build one for D.C. The stage contained models of the two candidates at their podiums, with a model Clive. Clive of course was here at this meeting, not physically, but spliced in the toyroom alongside several other ToyDebate staff.

Jeremiah stroked his chin. “Could the jar rise from outside the ground, cupping the whole audience? Kind of like the Firmament.”

“That too,” said the Weaver. “Both layers of protection are warranted. Plus we need trigger barricades all around.”

Dylan nodded. “I assume your DIRGs will get to work on this.”

“They have already.”

“There will be no … disruption of classes?”

“Our Weavers are discreet. Please note our special concerns.” A long list scrolled through, everything from poison dart frogs to the plutonium source in Reagan Hall’s physical science lab.

“A very small radiation source,” Dylan assured her. “For teaching purposes.”

“Nonetheless, one disruption there could render your hab unfit for life.” A cheery thought.

“Any criminal element?” asked Soli. “That incident last weekend?”

Dylan’s heart took a plunge. Of all people, why those
chusma
had to pick Jenny. “The college has addressed the incident, and charges have been filed.” The courthouse would get to it in December, when a sprinkling of snow for Christmas marked a brief respite before the winter planting. But Nora would deal with the perps well before then.

Jeremiah pursed his lips. “I’d say the college staff and students need checking out, like everyone else.”

“Minimally intrusive,” the head Weaver assured him.

“There are privacy rules,” ventured Dylan. “The college is bound by FERPA.”

“So are we.” She blinked over to his box a hundred-odd pages of regulations.

Dylan turned to the codirectors. “How are we set for accommodations? Your candidates’ special needs?”

From his spliced slice of toyroom Clive spoke. “We need accommodations for all our service personnel, including my style crew.”

“The town has that covered, don’t we, Judge?”

Judge Baynor gave a satisfied smile. “Frank’s printed out a four-star hotel.”

“My style crew requires a separate block of rooms, plus a special menu.” Clive’s staff had listed twice the requirements of the two candidates combined.

*   *   *

At each dorm and residence, a Weaver-class DIRG emerged from the printer, just like Jenny’s mental had tried to do. Forewarned by Dean Kwon, the students went about their business as the DIRGs discreetly scoured the campus, looking politely into every dorm room.

“What if they find someone’s stash?”

“What if they find a facehugger? ROTFLMAO.”

“They’ll find ultra for sure.”

For some reason, the Weavers took all day going through Ferrari house, politely emptying every drawer and cataloguing the minutest items. “Did you hear—those DIRGs recorded everything they found,” Anouk told Jenny. “Even the stains on their underwear.” She added primly, “Of course, if those
chicos
used proper hygiene and avoided impure behaviors, they wouldn’t have stains.”

Jenny looked up, toward the woodland curving out past Mount Gilead. A wisp of smoke floating downward into the cloud. “
Dios mío,
what’s that?”

Off the Buckeye Trail, a city-trained Weaver had stumbled upon a bear’s den. The mother bear got strafed by a helibot sent to cover the DIRG. The DIRG got discreetly hauled off, leaving a mess for the ecoengineer. Elephant Man took home the orphaned cub to bottle feed.

Meanwhile, Jenny had other concerns, specifically her mother. She’d reserved a special table at Café de la Paix for her mother plus the Kearns-Clark twins, the most presentable of her friends. And she finally got Tom to show her his painting from Father Clare’s art class, eager to add that to the list of her
novio
’s talents.

The student paintings were all lined up on the fresco wall in the art building. The wall had a peculiar damp smell. “Wet plaster,” Tom told her. “You have to paint on wet plaster, made from lime, calcium hydroxide. The alkali reacts with carbon dioxide from the air, and it traps the colors.” Each student had done one panel on the wall. Some had picked Renaissance themes, like Giotto’s saints, while others looked more like Diego Rivera’s workers. “If it dries out, you have to plaster and start over.”

“Guao.”
Jenny thought it sounded like a lot more trouble than digital paint. “So which one is yours?”

Tom seemed to hesitate. “It’s there,” he said evasively.

A shape of a willowy female with long dark hair, pink pigment for her shirt, black pants, kneeling on the grass. Her hand held the head of a
chico
lying down in an awkward position, perhaps injured. A large guy, with football shoulders. Jenny peered at the faces, which were hard to make out. Then she stepped back. Warmth crept up her neck. “It feels so long ago.” The opening night on the powwow ground. Charlie had stepped into the bear’s den, and Tom had lent her his rolled-up shirt. Swallowing hard, she dared not look at him.

Tom’s hand pointed to a dark smudge at right. “That was supposed to be the bear, running off. I’ll plaster it over.”

“It’s lovely.” She smiled, remembering. “You should take your shirt off again.”

*   *   *

At the Café de la Paix, the table for four was set with an elegant white cloth and spotless silver. A print of a Paris street on the wall. All as her mother could wish, Jenny thought.

Yola said, “Hope your trip went well, Ms. Kennedy.”

Soledad waved her hand expressively. “Space was cleared for our flight, thank goodness. But for how much longer, I don’t know.” She shook her head. “Your scenery is beautiful. The birds; the sparkling river; the brook trout.”

A preappetizer arrived, a single Périgord truffle upon a crostine, lozenge-shaped like the spacehab. Jenny admired the presentation, simple but elegant. Ken ate his truffle, carefully reserving the crostine so as not to chew the murdered wheat.

Soledad pressed Yola’s arm. “Congratulations to your parents, for the new library. Such a generous gift.”

“Thanks,” said Yola. “Our dad just goes nuts about Frontera.” Ken only frowned; he would not say a word about his dad.

“I share your father’s passion. Frontera’s lovely; George and I have reserved our own spot of land here.”

Yola was taken aback.

“Just for vacations,” said Jenny hurriedly.

“Everyone can’t live out here,” muttered Yola. A sensitive topic; they heard too much from the First Firmament folks.

“Of course not,” Jenny’s mother agreed. “We need to get beyond that notion. That is why this election is so important. Your college has been so hospitable, taking the trouble to host the final debate. I hope the students are signing up voters.”

Ken said, “We don’t vote, but sure, the Bulls are signing people up.”

Jenny tensed in every muscle. She cast about for a change of subject.

“You don’t vote?” Her mother’s fork stilled, suspended in air.

“The candidates are all so corrupt,” Yola explained. “Ken and I decided years ago that voting for any of them would violate our principles.”

Ken nodded. “That Sid Shaak, for instance. Who’d vote for him?”

Jenny said, “Ken is phenomenal at defense. You should have seen him at Towers.” Their first away game, against NYU, last weekend.

“Asombroso,”
exclaimed Yola. “We were twelve points down against NYU; a grudge match for them, after we whipped them last year.”

“We even had a player out the second half,” Ken recalled eagerly. “He got sick at the halftime show.” The towers collapsing; Jenny had seen it any number of times, but the first time could be unnerving.

Yola popped a cage diagram into everyone’s toybox. “Fran had the ball, but the NYU guard had her covered. So Ken set a screen. The guard plowed straight into him; how they didn’t get a foul, I don’t know.”

Ken shook his head. “The ref hates us.”

“But Ken slips out and takes a pass. What a slan! Jenny was right there too.” Yola winked.

After the game, the NYU coach had sent Jenny a secret offer to sign her with a pro team. She doubted Play Twenty-nine could stay secret much longer. But then, it wouldn’t—next week was their own grudge match, at Rapture.

Her mother was nodding, between forkfuls of Tom’s special, the rack of lamb
persillade
with extra herbs to make up for the lack of salt. “George and I loved the game. Jordi would have been proud.” She caught Jenny’s hand. “I’m glad you got out to Towers. A break from your studies. Did you get to play the toyworld?”

“No, too much to study.”

“We’ve got a hundred toyworlds here.” Ken enjoyed his spirulina soufflé—how Tom got it to rise, Jenny could not guess.

“Well, Jenny, you’ll enjoy Iroquoia over October break.”

Yola looked up. “Iroquoia? I’ve heard of it.”

Soledad nodded proudly. “George is the original sachem. We’ve scheduled a Condoling Council.”

“Fantastic! What do you think, Kennie-boy?”

Ken’s eyes lit up. “Could we play?”

Soledad pursed her lips. “A level-ten authentic preindustrial society. No voting.”

“No way,” exclaimed Jenny. “You guys
don’t
want to play.”

“She thinks we can’t handle it,” said Yola.

“We’re in,” said Ken.

“But Mama—”

“You’re in,” her mother agreed. “Check your box for your summons. I suggest you bone up on Kanienkehaka.”

For dessert Tom brought a
gateau au chocolat
with dark
ganache,
decorated with white chocolate stars of the Great Bear and Little Dipper and surrounding northern stars.

“Perfect,” exclaimed her mother. “My dear, you eat so well here.”

“Tom,” called Jenny before he could leave. She caught his hand. “Tom is my special friend,” she said in a rush. “He paints beautiful frescos. And he always gets the daily molecule.”

“A-triple-plus in chemistry,” agreed Yola. “He’s a dwork, just like Jenny.”

“Impressive,” said her mother. “Dylan’s scholarship program certainly draws talent.”

*   *   *

Jenny walked arm in arm with her mother, up Buckeye Trail. The lights of Mount Gilead were like stars, an occasional peeper called, although fewer since the rain was off.

“Now
hijita,
” her mother began. “I want you to know I understand all this—this youthful rebellion.”

“Mama, it’s not that.”

“All this flirting with the opposition, and not voting.”

“That’s not me. Look, I’ve knocked on dozens of doors for Father Clare.”

“I know,” sighed her mother, “you were always good for the locals.” She stopped. “I just don’t want you to flip like your aunts. Promise me you won’t.”

“Of course not. How could I? The stupid firmament.”

Soledad hesitated. “We always have to compromise. If a few more vote for us, who cares what they think of the night sky. They still admire NASA,
¿entiendes?
”

Jenny turned away.

“I know it’s hard to get excited about Anna. She’s no Kennedy.”
Claro.
“But she’ll do the best for now. There’s Glynnis; you understand her, the solarray engineer. She’ll get her chance too.”

Silence. As if ten thousand klicks separated them both.

“Your Tom. He’s a good
chico
.”

Jenny turned quickly. There was an edge to her mother’s voice, something unsaid.

“I just feel for you so. I only want the best.”

“What do you mean?”

“He lacks an entire chromosome.” No male-X, just the old degenerate Y. “All those singleton genes, with no backup. You can’t know what that means. And his first fifteen years without preventive care.” Soledad shook her head. “You know how it felt, losing your brother young. You’d lose this one too, by my age.”

38

Jenny’s latest assignment on Aristotle addressed the Best Government, in which citizens led the best life. The best kind of human beings (the Greeks) governed the best cities; while the Northerners were ungovernable, and the Asians were enslaved. The best governors required education, particularly in the arts of music and drawing.

“ToyNews—From our box to yours.” World news, a welcome break from ancient philosophy. “Our Antarctic peacekeeping forces encountered heavy resistance today in their defense of Ellsworth Land. The regional commander is confident of protecting our crops of wheat, lichen, and bryophytes … On the home front, new forms of ultraphyte are invading our cities, some larger than Florida pythons. Twenty deaths today from cyanide poisoning. The new biotypes go undetected by Homeworld Security. And the latest on the presidential race; the two tickets still splitting the pollmeter down the middle—”