Time's Chariot

‘Which one was mine?’ she said.

‘The second. The third… we had to do a routine courier job in gamma-Vienna. Pick up the superintendent’s report, nothing special. Except that the superintendent there was abusing his position with the bygoners. Rico took him to task for it… he must have symbed a complaint into the report crystal I was carrying and we brought it back without even knowing it. I reported my version as well, but it doesn’t seem to have done any good.’

If Su had just come to beg, Marje would have dismissed her. If Su had asked her to use her influence, such as it was, with Fieldwork’s Commissioner Ario, the result would have been similar. But Su was simply stating facts, and whether by design or accident, that was the approach that captured Marje’s attention.

‘Op Garron has a lot to learn about tact if he’s to make progress in Fieldwork,’ she said.

‘Rico used to be senior to me, Marje. He was a Senior Field Op in Specific Operations.’

‘Really?’ Marje stopped walking. Now, that did surprise her. The Specifics were the elite of Fieldwork. ‘I see,’ she said, to give herself time to think. ‘Thank you for telling me, Su, I’ll… I’ll look into it.’

Su still didn’t smile: she bowed her head slightly. ‘Thank you,’ she said, and turned to walk away.

‘Wait,’ Marje said. With the matter of Garron out of the way, something else that Su had said finally sank in. ‘What did you mean when you said Li did more transferring than you thought?’

Ten minutes later an even more pre-occupied Marje Orendal entered her office and sat down at her desk. Li had gone transferring? Li had gone transferring?

Su had told her about the list of transferences they had found in Daiho’s effects. She and Garron hadn’t thought twice about them; but then, they hadn’t known the man. Marje had, and if ever a man was born to be a stay-at-home stick-in-the-mud it had been Li Daiho.

One transference here and now, well, maybe.

But a spate of seventeen was… odd. Where could he have gone?

Well, that was easily settled. Marje called up the list herself, on her authority as Commissioner. ‘Compare against list of approved transference sites,’ she symbed, and the answer came back: they weren’t approved sites.

‘Not approved?’ Marje exclaimed out loud, in sheer surprise. But Li must have got those coordinates from somewhere. Co-ordinates were assembled from historical records, or simple deduction, or on-the-spot Field Ops, and in all cases were entered into the database of approved sites… assuming they were found to be safe. But there was another source of information, as she of all people should know.

‘Compare against all co-ordinates returned by correspondents,’ she symbed cautiously.

And there it was. Marje gazed in awe at the two lists displayed side by side across her vision. Every site chosen had been reported by the same correspondent, RC/1029. (Where had she seen that correspondent’s designation before? She pushed the question away, to come back to later.) None had subsequently been entered into the approved general list, which could only mean one thing. Li didn’t want anyone following him.

And that would be fair enough: if a Field Op transferred to co-ordinates that were found to be unsuitable — for instance, they were in the middle of a crowded room, or something — then that site would be put on the banned list and, if bygoners had become aware of the Home Time as a result, the Specifics would be sent in to clear things up. Not unusual.

But to go unerringly to seventeen unsuitable sites? And — it took a second to check — the Specifics had not been sent in. Li had kept all this secret. And that itself was illegal.

Another thought…

‘Summarize the reports in which these co-ordinates were delivered.’ Another heartbeat’s pause, and then the bald summaries were laid out before her. Each time the correspondent had been interviewing a philosopher.

I really did not know this man, Marje thought. But she remembered where she had heard of RC/1029: Li had been getting regular reports from him. And then, apparently, going along to see for himself.

Having a hobby was one thing — but this? What had he been doing?

Well, she was going to find out. If her predecessor had been engaged in illegal activity then she had to find out; and if there was an innocent explanation that was simply escaping her right now… well, she should find it. She really should.

And she knew just the man for the job.

‘Op Garron. Come in.’

It had taken over an hour in a healer, but Rico’s wrenched thigh had been unwrenched, his bruised tissues regenerated and the damage from the beating was just a memory, so he was able to enter the office without difficulty. It was only the second time he had seen Acting Commissioner Orendal face to face, and it seemed there was a momentary warmth there before she froze over and became appropriately formal. She was one of those people, Rico decided, who for some reason felt that different personae were needed for their private and their public lives.

She stood up as he entered her office and held out a hand; he hesitated for just a fraction, then walked across the glowing carpet (Twenty-first century? Hideous, anyway) to shake it. He had resolved, to himself and to Su, that he would behave himself. He was suspended and she might — might — be able to do something about it, so there was no point in antagonizing her.

‘Please, sit down,’ she said. He sat in the chair indicated, across the desk from her. It was more modern than the rest of the office, an empty frame with a forcefield for the seat. Perhaps, he thought, Orendal was imposing her more contemporary tastes on her predecessor’s room with a wave of modernity that emanated outwards from the desk but hadn’t yet reached the rest of the office. She rested her elbows on the desk top, steepled her fingers. The lines on her face showed she was perfectly capable of smiling, if she chose.

‘Thank you for coming,’ she said. ‘I want to make you a proposition.’

‘Please do,’ Rico said.

‘You’ve been suspended, pending a tribunal, and that’s partly my fault.’

‘One of the reprimands was because of a complaint from your office, yes,’ Rico said without expression.

‘One of them,’ she said pointedly. ‘Of three.’ Rico said nothing. ‘I’ve no doubt that the matter will be cleared up at the tribunal and you’ll be put back on the active list.’

‘Will you be speaking on my behalf?’ Rico said innocently.

‘No,’ she said. She paused a beat, while Rico thought, typical, then: ‘the individual who made the complaint will be speaking instead.’

‘I see.’ Nice touch, he thought. ‘May I ask what this proposition is, Commissioner?’

‘You may, but first I’d like to know about the other reprimands.’

‘They’re on my record, which I expect you’ve read by now,’ he said.

‘I just finished, yes, but I’d still like to hear about them. The most recent one — I gather you gave a supervisor some lip, or something like that?’

‘Something like that,’ Rico said, thinking, what the hell. He still had no idea what she wanted with him and his reprimands were none of her business, but… ‘He was a superintendent, who… aw, let’s name names. Superintendent Adigun is in charge of sixteenth-century gamma-Vienna and he’s shacked up with one of the bygoner women. I… well, I took exception to his using his position to that purpose.’

Any remaining hint of humour or goodwill in Orendal’s expression had vanished. ‘Go on,’ she said.

‘I drew attention to the matter and he construed my words as insulting. He made a complaint.’

‘Was his conduct mentioned in your report?’

‘I’m not the senior partner so it wasn’t my report. But no, it wasn’t. There are firmly defined areas, Commissioner. If he had been beating her, we could have reported him. If he had told her anything about the Home Time, we could have reported him. But as it was, he wasn’t doing anything illegal.’

‘Morbern’s Code—’

‘Isn’t law,’ Rico said. ‘Not all of it. Physical abuse, yes. Emotional, no.’

Orendal still held his gaze, but her eyes were blank and he guessed she was symbing. ‘Edigun?’ she said.

‘Adigun.’