The public trunk lines between EP7 and EP4 were among the busiest in the Loop, and it took Heikki almost an hour to find an operator who could give her a place in the transmission queue. Even so, it was over an hour’s wait before her slot would arrive. Heikki growled a curse at the empty screen, and pushed herself up from the workstation, punching a last series of keys to set her remote to pick up the incoming operator’s signal. She started for the suite’s main room, but paused in the doorway, hearing familiar voices.
“—this new woman of yours?” That was Santerese’s voice, cheerful as always, and Heikki started to pull back into the workroom, not quite ready to face such determined good humor.
“Heikki doesn’t like her,” Nkosi answered, and lifted a hand in greeting.
Fairly caught, Heikki came on into the main room, nodding to Nkosi. At least Alexieva was nowhere to be seen. Santerese emerged from the kitchen carrying a tray of steaming mugs, and smiled when she saw Heikki.
She set the tray on the low table, gesturing for the others to help themselves, and said, “Why not?”
Heikki shrugged, uncomfortable, and busied herself with the plate of spices. Nkosi said, not entirely playfully, “I do not think she trusts her.”
Heikki sighed, keeping control of her temper with an effort. “That’s true, I don’t, not entirely.”
“You can’t just leave it there,” Santerese said.
Nkosi smiled. “I admit, Marshallin, I do not—entirely—trust her. Not entirely.”
Santerese scowled, and Heikki said, “She wanted the job too badly, ‘Shallin, and she admits she works for Lo-Moth, or for Electra FitzGilbert, which to my mind is much the same thing.”
“That I am not certain of,” Nkosi murmured. “She said that she worked for FitzGilbert,”
Santerese’s frown was growing deeper. Hastily, Heikki outlined the circumstances of Alexieva’s hiring, and then her own suspicions. When she had finished, Santerese made a face. “Lord, doll, you sure can pick them.”
“Which, jobs or people?” Heikki asked, sourly, and Santerese touched her shoulder.
“Both and neither.” She looked at Nkosi, the smile fading from her face. “So if you don’t trust her either, why are you bringing her along?”
“Well, there are two reasons,” the pilot began, and Santerese glanced at him.
“I could stand to hear the short version, Jock.”
“As you wish.” Nkosi did not seem in the least abashed. “First, she is attractive, and when you are not growling at her, Heikki, she is good company. Second, or was that two already? No matter. The other reason, the last reason, is that I would rather have an eye on her than leave her out of sight.”
“There’s something I’ve been meaning to ask you,” Heikki said slowly. “Did you suggest her coming back with you, or did she ask you first?”
“Ah.” Nkosi gave her a rather sheepish smile. “I would have said I asked her, but I have been thinking, Heikki, and I believe she was hinting for such an invitation all along.”
Santerese looked from one to the other, and shook her head in disbelief. “It sounds to me like you did just what Lo-Moth—or FitzGilbert, or whoever’s running her—wants. She’s watching us, Jock, not the other way around.”
“The thought,” Nkosi said, “had crossed my mind.” He looked at Heikki, and then back to Santerese. “I am sorry. What do you want me to do about it?”
“Nothing,” Heikki said abruptly.
Santerese gave her a startled glance. “You’ve changed your tune.”
“No, look.” Heikki put down her mug. “We know she’s watching us, so we don’t let her see anything, right? And we still have a connection with Lo-Moth if we need it.”
“That makes a great deal of sense,” Nkosi said. “And I will not pretend I am sorry to have to keep an eye on Alex.”
I bet you’re not, Heikki thought, but a soft beeping from the remote cut off her next remark. “My call’s gone through,” she said instead, to Santerese, and looked at Nkosi. “Excuse me, Jock.”
“Of course,” the big man said, and Heikki retreated to the workroom.
A string of lights rippled across the communications display, now projected on the media wall. Heikki studied it, her fingers already busy on her workboard, finetuning her receivers’ frequencies to match more closely the numbers displayed below the flickering lights. The string steadied, became a solid bar, and the monitor system said, in its artificial voice, “Local station tuning within acceptable limits. System connect offered, system connection made. You may enter your contact codes when ready.”
Heikki had already hit the keys that transferred Galler’s codes to the system. A light flashed green below the bar, and then turned red. The monitor said, “Codes not valid. Please reenter.”
Heikki swore to herself, knowing she’d been overeager, and hit the keys again. The light flashed briefly green, then went back to red.
“Codes not valid,” the monitor announced. “Please reenter.”
Frowning now, Heikki reached for the tag she had taken from the message cube, and keyed the numbers in directly, reading them over twice before she pressed the button that flipped them to the communications system.
“Codes not valid,” the monitor repeated.
“Please reenter,” Heikki snarled in chorus. “I know.” Despite the expense of the connection, she hesitated, hands poised over the workboard. The codes Galler had given were no longer good, that much was obvious— and how typical of him, she thought, then pushed the complaint aside as less than useless. She could disengage from the system now, and would only have to pay a nominal fee; the local databanks should be able to give her any updates to Galler’s code listings. Still, she thought, there was no guarantee they’d have the most recent books from the other stations, and this was clearly a very recent change. Before she could think too much about the expense, she triggered the codes for EP4’s main directory service. The screen faded, shifted, and at last displayed a scratchy system prompt. She flipped it Galler’s codes, and waited. The system was silent for a long moment, the wall showing only the standard “processing” symbol, the speakers hissing faintly. Then at last the symbol faded, to be replaced by a dozen lines of closely-spaced printing. The last dozen letters were highlighted, and Heikki copied them into her own machine. A moment later, a chime and a second symbol indicated a successful transfer. She sighed, and touched a button, turning control of the communications system back over to the workroom’s operating system.
“End session,” she said aloud, and saw numbers begin to stream across the wall too fast for a human eye to follow as the automatics took over. She settled herself in her chair, staring at the codes that now filled her workscreen. Galler’s contact codes were listed—the new set—along with his present place-of-employ and his residence code. The date-of-last-revision was listed as well: less than thirty hours before.
You must want my help real bad, she thought, changing your codes like that at the last minute. The least you could’ve done was flip me an update—one thing I do know is that you have my codes. She studied the numbers for a moment longer, a slow smile spreading across her face. Never mind the mail system, she thought, never mind whatever stupid games you’re playing. I’ve got your residence number, and I’m going to show up on your doorstep—and I don’t care if it’s a corporate pod, or maybe I hope it is, and you have to explain my very unpointer presence—And, by God, when I get there, you’re going to tell me exactly what is going on.
That decision made, she touched keys, calling up departure schedules and a fare table. There was a train for EP4, a one-stop, that left in an hour. She ran her hand across her board again, transferring money, and reserved a seat. The diskprinter chattered, and spat a set of ticket foils; she left them in the basket, and ran her hand across her board, pulling chunks of data from the past hour’s work and melding them into a single reference file. When it was finished, she slid her lens from her pocket, and fitted it carefully into the read/ write socket. As she touched the sequence that would transfer the file to the lens’ memory, Santerese spoke from the doorway.
“What do you think you’re doing?”
Heikki gave her a guilty glance, but said, “I’m going to EP4 myself.”
“Was that what he wanted, your brother?”
“I couldn’t get him. He’d changed his codes.”
Santerese’s eyes narrowed. “So why are you going to EP4?”
“Because I don’t intend to put up with this run-around any longer.” The transfer light flicked off, and Heikki
