had made himself scarce and rejoined his companions in another cage.
“No need to worry about that, Myr Russ. I’ve got adult plumbing down here, and the truth of the matter is it doesn’t get stretched
Fred was all but trapped in the corner of his cage by the girl, and he looked around for escape. The waitress swam by and caught his eye. “Like I said,” he told the girl, “I’m busy.” He extricated himself from the corner and left the cage.
THE WAITRESS LED Fred to a stockroom in the back. Before she shut him in, she stuck a tiny cam/emitter to a carton bin. When Fred was alone, he swiped the cam/emitter, and to his surprise, instead of the elusive Charlie D., who should pop up but the proxy of Veronica TOTE.
“Don’t look so shocked, Commander,” the proxy said. “You must have been expecting me to show up sooner or later.” Veronica’s face had unpacked somewhat since their last meeting at the CITP node, and Fred saw what she must have looked like before joining the jar-headed TUGs. But it was small improvement; she had pronounced, coarse features. “Fred, Fred, Fred,” her proxy said, wagging its head. “Honestly, we didn’t bring you up here to start a race war with the donalds.”
“What
“I already told you, to take charge of a space gate, a task you’ve made no headway in achieving.”
“If you’ve been watching me, and you obviously have, then you know why.”
“Excuses, excuses. Listen, we know the donalds are repulsive people, but they have real juice around here, and we need their full cooperation, not their open hostility. You’ll have to set aside your personal baggage for a while and perform like the professional we know you are. Think you can do that?”
“In a word, no. Russes aren’t even allowed realbody access to the docks. My supervisors and coworkers despise me, and the TECA mentar is obviously in someone’s pocket.”
While Fred spoke, the proxy floated along the bins, inspecting star codes printed on the sides of liquor boxes. “Not a bad summary,” it said, “but no obstacle to someone with your abilities. Ah, here it is. Come over here and open this carton for me.”
Fred pulled the carton out of the bin and opened it. Inside was a small, silvery shipping shell, like a briefcase. Its sides were printed with antitampering glyphs: any attempt to open or disable the shell without an authorized ID would result in the total destruction of its contents.
“Go ahead,” the proxy said. “It’s keyed to you.”
Fred swiped the lock plate, and the shell unbolted with a series of snaps. He opened the lid and looked inside. “What the hell?” Inside the shell was a one-liter flask of Raspberry Flush. “You’ve brought me a piss starter?”
“Yes, I have. Tell me, Commander, have you ever heard of the ‘twin shackles’?”
“That’s nothing but an urban myth.”
“Is it? An urban myth like clone fatigue?” Fred winced, and Veronica-by-proxy went on, “Oh, I don’t know if clones can fall out of type, Commander, but I do know that all modern clones, even newly batched russes, are shipped with the twin shackles locked firmly in place. From the point of view of your masters, it would be stupid not to use them. Now, we don’t have a clue what the donald’s ‘must’ is, or any clone’s must, for that matter. Applied People and Capias World guard their musts very closely. It’s probably some rare but innocuous chemical mixed into their food precursors. Any donald who goes off the reservation won’t have access to it, won’t even know it’s missing until his teeth start to fall out or he has a stroke or something.
“But we
Fred took another look at the flask.
“Yes, Flush, specifically Raspberry Flush, a flavor you won’t find at any NanoJiffy because it doesn’t officially exist.”
“Then, what is it?”
“Oh, it’s Flush all right. If you or anyone else, who is not a donald, drank it, you’d be camping out on the toilet as you’d expect. But to a donald, you’re holding five hundred doses of the most mind-bending high you could ever imagine. They would kill to get their hands on it. The aslams and xiangs hate it, though, because the donalds get even randier than usual when they’re on it, and I’m told that’s a sight to behold.
“The task we have for you requires your actual physical presence on the docks, not your fecking proxy. So, let’s fix that. We are going to supply our freaky little friends with a steady source of Raspberry Flush. You won’t have anything to do with that. You won’t even be aware of its arrival, except that the flasks will arrive in shells like this one, and only your swipe will disarm them. The little tykes will need your realbody presence and cheery cooperation in order to get their buzz on. They’ll do anything to secure a supply of Raspberry Flush, even help you to reinstate realbody russ patrols. When they do, get yourself assigned to one of the spars servicing Oship freight and cryocapsules.”
“Is that all?” He spoke with sarcasm, but she didn’t seem to notice.
“Yes. Nothing to it. Things will run pretty smooth after that. You’ll mostly just be around to handle glitches and, of course, to keep the donalds in line.”
Fred was about to close the shell, but the Veronica proxy said, “Wait. Look under the Flush.” Fred lifted the flask. Tucked into the padding under it was an ether-wrapped package with the spider logo of the Spectre Corporation. It contained a brand-new military-grade sidekick. “It’s so you can reach me,” the proxy said before vanishing.
Anagram
The Spectre sidekick was a dream. A model favored by paramilitary organizations around the world, it was much closer to the HomCom blacksuit controller than the cheap, gutless sidekick that TECA issued its port security. Suddenly Fred’s visor cap fed him ten times more useful information than it had previously been able to. Now he could image concealed weapons, energy fields, cables and conduits behind walls, heat trails, concentrations of gas, and any number of other objects. He could make iris scan identification and voice analyses. The Spectre boasted a built-in lie detector, EMT adviser, bioevidence collector/compiler, access to proprietary tech and crime libraries, language translator, and much, much more. Happily, it could piggyback unobtrusively on his TECA sidekick. No wonder, as the firm’s advertising slogan claimed, SPECTRE means RESPECT.
WITH HIS SPECTRE set to image EM fields, Fred surveyed the corridors that led to the donalds’ blister. Wherever he found a comlink shadow, he plotted it on his map. Deep inside what he had come to regard as donald territory, he found the site of his earlier humiliation. There was no one there, but he was sure that that wouldn’t last long. He entered the blister and swam to the rosette of windows. While he waited, he double-checked the lock plate of the briefcase shipping shell he’d brought, as well as the charge of his omnitool.
A trio of donalds arrived first and blocked the exit, just like before. Fred started his Spectre recorder. More donalds arrived within minutes, about fifteen of the bastards in all. They spread out but kept their distance and mocked him without mercy. A few took spittle potshots at him, and these he singled out for positive identification. The excitement in the blister mounted, like at a packed stadium before the main event. Fred managed to remain somewhat calm through a stress-reduction mantra he had learned at the Russ Academy.
Before long, the chief donald showed up, the one who had assaulted Fred and who he had come to think of as Top Ape. Fred had decided to imitate the donald’s spare use of words, and before Top Ape got too close to him, Fred raised his hand like a traffic cop. Top Ape ignored Fred’s signal to halt, of course, and approached him to within a tail’s length. He grinned at Fred, exposing rows of teeth filed to points. Fred grinned back.
With everyone in place, Fred started the show. Like a magician setting up a trick, he slowly raised the small shipping shell over his head and wordlessly pointed at its lockplate and antitampering glyphs. His audience, eager to get to the good part, voiced their impatience with hoots and curses, but Top Ape seemed curious, and he popped his leathery cheek for silence. Fred raised his other hand and brought his open palm down in a grand sweeping pass
