Phule Me Twice (10 page)

"Right," said Phule. "But in the Legion, we've got some pretty good equipment for enhancing that kind of raw material. And Sushi's our best computer man-"

"Sure, and you think that's gonna nail the perp," said Dunstable, shaking his head as if Phule had told him he thought the robbery had been committed by little green elves. "I'll tell you, the better computer enhancement gets, the less I trust it. The operator can make it look like anything he wants by the time he's done, and ain't nobody in the world can tell you how he got from where he started to where he ended up."

"Give me a little more credit than that," said Sushi. "We aren't just clearing up the picture; all that does is show us the person's appearance, which a good disguise or plastic surgery is going to change, anyway. With this equipment, I can pick out subtle patterns of movement and posture that are unique to the person, things even a trained actor can't disguise."

"There's another point, too," said Phule. "Sushi has certain contacts that-well, maybe I'd better not say too much about them. But they gave us a much wider sample of suspects than you'd come up with. As our chaplain told you, there are plenty of Landoorans that fit the description of the robber. But the man we're after today doesn't just fit the description, he has the right walk and everything else."

"He'd better have the right fingerprints and DNA profile, too," said the cop. "Arrestin' a citizen for something we can't prove can get us in a lot of trouble."

"Gee, you didn't seem to worry about that when you thought the robber was a legionnaire," said Sushi.

The cop glared at Sushi, but before he could say anything, Phule hissed, "Here he comes!"

They turned to look out the windshield along the street. Sure enough, here came a black-garbed figure, whose dark pompadour and long sideburns were visible even at a distance, rounding the corner just behind a young woman pushing a baby carriage. Dunstable pressed a communicator button to alert the indoor team, then turned to Phule and said, "That looks like the perp, all right. But like you said, there's dozens of guys look like that. How do we know this is the one who robbed Takarnine's joint?"

"This has got to be him," said Sushi. "He's the only member of the Church of the King who lives in this part of town. It'd be way too much of a coincidence for another one to show up here right when he's due home from work."

"You been a cop as long as I have, you seen lots of coincidences," said Dunstable.

"Yeah, and I bet you arrest 'em anyway," said Sushi. Then he said in a lower voice, as the suspect came closer, "Are you sure he can't see us?"

"Not without he's got X-ray eyes," said the cop. "OK, he turns up the walk, we get out and cut off his escape, just in case he spots the inside team and spooks."

The suspect came closer, strolling unconcernedly behind the baby carnage, and his features became clearer. Phule found himself thinking that, now that he had a reason to distinguish between dozens of King look-alikes, how easy it was to spot differences. This one, for example, was obviously of Asian ancestry, a fact the alteration of his features could not conceal. Phule was beginning to understand how computer image analysis could single out this one man from a crowd of faces that, to the casual eye, looked exactly the same.

Of course, once they caught him, they'd still have to convince a local jury that the evidence was as damning as Sushi claimed it was. If the suspect's lawyer got his trial delayed until the company was off Landoor, and Sushi's expert testimony unavailable, he might win an acquittal. Even if Sushi did take the stand, he might get an acquittal. Phule wasn't sure he himself understood all the wrinkles in the case, and it had been his idea.

The suspect cut ahead of the stroller and turned toward the building, and Dunstable grinned wickedly. "OK, let's get this creep," he said and threw open the hovervan's door, ready to close the trap behind their quarry.

Unfortunately, exactly at that moment, the young woman with the baby carriage gave out a monumental sneeze. The suspect turned around just in time to see Dunstable leap out onto the sidewalk, with Phule and Sushi behind him. A glance toward the building showed him several uniformed policemen emerging from the doors. At that, the suspect dropped his lunchbox and began to sprint across the flower beds. That was enough to convince Phule. "Stun him, Sushi," he shouted and dropped to one knee to allow a clear shot.

But Officer Dunstable didn't know about the stun ray, and neither did the woman with the baby carriage. Or perhaps the fleeing suspect deliberately used them as shields. In any case, both were in the direct line of fire. Sushi raised his stun gun, then shook his head. With others in the line of fire, he wasn't going to risk it.

Meanwhile, the woman and her carriage were directly in Dunstable's path. He came to a halt just short of running them over. The woman let out a shriek and stopped. But when Dunstable made as if to go around them to the left, the woman took a step back and pulled the carnage toward her, blocking him again. This time, he stopped so abruptly his feet tangled under him, and down he went in a heap, just managing to miss the carriage. He stumbled to his feet, but by then the suspect had disappeared around the corner.

The other cops saw the suspect running, too. A group of them cut across the garden to intercept him. But before they got more than a few steps, they found themselves at a thick hedge. A young policeman with a square jaw and muscles like an athlete's tried to force his way through. He immediately got stuck on the inch-long thorns that had kept the others from trying. This left him squealing and leaving behind small bits of his uniform and person as his partners tried to haul him out, joining him in occasional indecorous exclamations as the thorns caught them, too. Meanwhile, the suspect could have walked away.

"The robber's escaped," said Phule, smacking his hand into his fist. "Now we'll never be able to clear our people of suspicion."

"Oh, I don't know," said Dunstable, returning. "I think you've got a good case, now. The guy took off the moment he saw us, and that's proof he's guilty of something."

"Yes, but maybe it's no more than unpaid parking fines," said Phule dejectedly. "I want my company cleared of all suspicion, and as long as this fellow's running free, someone can still say we left the planet under a shadow."

"Hold on, Captain, my backup plan might still work," said Sushi, looking in the direction in which the fugitive had disappeared.

"Backup plan?" Phule turned and looked accusingly at Sushi. "You didn't mention a backup plan!"

Sushi answered with a sheepish expression, "That's because, if we didn't need it, nobody needed to know about it. Especially not the cops."

Phule stiffened. "It's not your place to decide what I need to know, Sushi. I'm your superior officer."

"And I'm the head of an interplanetary, uh, organization," said Sushi. "Which on behalf of our restaurant owner, Mr. Takamine, decided to call in a favor from. We'll see if it works."

"The Ya-" Phule began.

"Ya, ya," Sushi cut him off with a finger to the lips. "No need to mention names here," he said, looking at Officer Dunstable.

"What the heck you talkin' about?" said the policeman, but then a shout came from the cops extricating their brother officer from the thorn hedge, and he turned to look. "I'll be damned, he's coming back!"

Sure enough, the suspect was walking slowly back toward them, a resigned look on his face. His body language radiated utter defeat. A short distance behind him-almost as if by accident-a stout, middle-aged Japanese man walked with a small, nervous dog on a leash.

"See? I told you that business venture of mine would come in handy one of these days," said Sushi. He turned to Dunstable. "I don't think you'll have any more trouble with him," he said. Sure enough, even as he spoke, one cop took the suspect in hand, and he surrendered without the least sign of resistance. The middle-aged man walked on, speaking softly to his little dog, and nodded politely to the policemen as he passed.

Only someone who was looking for them might have noticed the elaborate tattoos that identified the man as a member of the Yakuza.

Journal #526

With the capture of the robber, the company's last business on Landoor was effectively over. My employer now concentrated his efforts on the transfer to our new base. And the troops' curiosity was to some degree assuaged when their captain finally received permission from State to reveal the Company's destination.

Of course, that just started speculation in a new direction.

Tusk-anini squinted in the bright sunlight reflecting off the Landoor spaceport's tarmac, then reached into his uniform pocket and put on his dark sunglasses. Over his warthoglike snout, the effect was comical, but the Omega Mob had gotten used to it, just as they'd gotten used to the fact that the swinish-looking Volton was one of their most intelligent comrades. "Gnat, why Zenobians ask for military advisors?" the Volton asked. "They look like good fighters to me."

Super-Gnat shifted her duffel bag off her left shoulder onto the ground and looked up at her partner. "I've been wondering about that, myself," she said. "If Flight Leftenant Qual is a fair sample of what they've got, I'd hate to see the kind of trouble that makes them ask for outside help."

"Hate it or love it, we getting to see it soon," said Tuskanini glumly. "Why else they want us go there?"

"To show them we are the best," said Spartacus, one of the Synthian legionnaires. His duffel bag was riding behind him on his glide-board. "To show them how all races can work in harmony to defeat the enemies of the people."

"Yeah, but who are the enemies of the people?" said Super-Gnat. "It's gotta be somebody pretty fierce to make the Zenobians call for help."

Tusk-anini grunted. "And whoever, why they our enemies? They no hurt Tusk-anini. Why we need to go fight them?"

"Nobody's said we're going to fight anybody," said Brandy, dropping her own duffel bag with the others in the staging area. "We're advisors, remember? We aren't going to get in any fighting unless somebody attacks us. Besides, nobody's said that the Zenobians are being attacked, either."

"Whatever you say, Brandy," said Super-Gnat, but her expression was skeptical.

"That's right, whatever the sarge says," agreed Rev with his usual crooked smile. "We're all just soldiers here, followin' orders and waitin' for our big chance."

"We're legionnaires, not soldiers," said Brandy, frowning.

"Sure, Sarge," said Rev with a little grin that made it clear that he didn't think the difference was important. A couple of legionnaires-ones who'd had their face reshaped in the image of the King-chuckled.

Brandy frowned again but didn't push the issue. She still didn't entirely appreciate the chaplain's influence on her troops, especially not when he said things that cast him as the troops' friend and her as something else. There were times when a top sergeant needed to motivate her troops by intimidation, and other times she needed to be a confessor and big sister to them. Rev was doing his best to co-opt the latter function. It occurred to Brandy that part of the chaplain's job might be to make things harder for sergeants. That didn't mean sergeants had to like it.

"I hear the lizards are trying to overthrow their emperor, and the government wants us to help 'em beat the rebels," said Double-X, who'd been hovering around the fringes of the group. "So it's lizard against lizard, which is why they're having so much trouble."

"That'd make sense," said Spartacus. "But we should be joining on the side of the people, not of the tyrants."

"The Alliance wouldn't send us to take sides in a civil war," said Super-Gnat. "That's asking for trouble."

"Hey, this planet right here was in the middle of a civil war when we came in, right?" said Double-X. "If the captain hadn't got both sides interested in something other than fighting-"

"Not the same thing," said Brandy. "The war was over when we got here, and Landoor was already part of the Alliance. The lizards just signed on. I can't see how the government would let us be used that way."

"I know what it is," said Tusk-anini. "Legion headquarters don't like Captain Jester. They try get him in trouble all the time. Maybe they trying to send us someplace where there more trouble than we can handle."

"That's enough of that," said Brandy sternly. "We're Legion. The brass aren't going to put us in any situation we can't handle. Don't go asking for trouble, Tusk."

"I never ask trouble, Sarge," said Tusk-anini. "I get plenty without asking." But he didn't say anything else.

Brandy was just as glad. They'd have enough to worry about just going onto a brand-new planet-new to the Legion, anyway. It didn't help to have the troops thinking the brass were trying to walk them out on a limb and saw it off. Even if, as Brandy suspected privately, Tusk-anini was damn likely right.

Then, somewhere in the distance, a band struck up a lively march. Its sound came closer, and the waiting legionnaires saw flags and the glint of sunlight on polished brass and chrome. "All right, guys, let's see you form up nice and pretty for the departure ceremony," said Brandy.

"You aren't gonna get this too many times, so we might as well enjoy it."

Besides, she thought to herself, they're always glad to see the troops leave. It's a whole different story when we show up someplace for the first time. Not even Captain Jester had managed to change that eternal verity of Legion life.

Journal #528

For reasons familiar to those who have worked in any sort of bureaucracy, my employer's success in achieving his goals was not matched by an equal rise in his esteem with his superiors. Or, to put it directly, General Blitzkrieg's enmity was a constant.

But the company's new assignment had been initiated by State, and the foreign power in question had specifically requested Omega Company to serve as advisors in their current crisis. So the general had little choice but to acquiesce in the decisions made by those in positions of greater power.

But while someone who has no choice about a matter is often well advised to make the best of things as they are, General Blitzkrieg was of a different school. Given lemons, he was not only reluctant to make lemonade; he made the most concerted effort I have ever seen to convert the lemons into rotten apples.

Major Sparrowhawk cast a speculative eye on the young officer standing in front of her desk. Major Botchup, his name tag said. Young was the definitive word for him; despite his having achieved the same rank she had reached after eleven hard years of Legion service, he couldn't have been much over twenty years old, Standard. Rich parents bought him a commission, she thought sourly. It was the normal way such things happened in the money-starved Space Legion.

"General Blitzkrieg will see you in just a moment," she said, doing her best to cover up her almost instant dislike for this pipsqueak. There was something in his face and in his bearing that would have made him annoying even if he'd been an enlisted legionnaire or a civilian.

And above all in his voice, she was reminded as he answered her, "Thank you, Major." He managed somehow, in three superficially harmless words, to convey the strong impression that, despite their equality in rank and her status as aide-de-camp to a Legion general, he considered her his inferior. Well, as long as he could do the job the general had for him, it wasn't her job to find fault with him. Still, she felt like letting him sit in the outer office for an hour or so, cooling his heels, instead of showing him in when the general emerged from the rest room.

She made no effort to strike up a conversation with Botchup. What would they talk about, his hair stylist? Instead, she turned back to her computer and the speech the general had given her "to proofread," which meant rewriting it nearly from scratch to keep him from appearing even more of an ass than he was. Given the necessity of keeping most of his opinions intact (although she did what she could to disguise the most fatuous ones), this was no mean feat. For a moment, she wondered whether talking with Major Botchup might not, after all, be preferable to salvaging the speech, but then the general stuck his head out the door and said, "Welcome, Major! Come on inside," and the moment was gone. The major swept into the inner office, the door closed, and she returned to unsplitting the general's infinitives and unmixing his metaphors, a job comparable to unscrambling eggs.

She was trying to figure out whether Blitzkrieg meant anything in particular by "Every legionnaire must be ready to confront the vissicitous priorities that may have been left on his back burner for the time being but always remembering that the hand of fate has a way of stepping in without preamble or precedent." She had just about decided to leave it the way it was and hope somebody in the audience asked him to explain it, when he signaled her. "Major, I thought I asked you to give me the personnel files for Omega Company," he said over the intercom.

In fact, she had given them to him when he'd first asked for them. She suspected they were somewhere in the mess atop his desk, in which he claimed to be able to lay his hands on anything but almost invariably couldn't. "Oh, I have them right here, sir," she said innocently and picked up the duplicate set she'd made. "I'll bring them right in."

She found the general standing with his hands behind his back, looking out the office window, while Major Botchup sat in a chair in front of the desk, sending a reproachful stare at Sparrowhawk. Little do you know, sonny, she thought. "Here are the files you wanted, sir," she said, ignoring Botchup and placing the printouts on the general's desk. The general always wanted printouts; she suspected that was because he hadn't learned how to open electronic files.

"Ah, at last," said the general. He walked over and picked up the folders and said, "Now, Major, here's everything you need to know about this outfit. I don't mind saying that they need a good man to put the company to rights. The thing is, you're going into a possible combat situation, and I'll uphold whatever measures you judge necessary. We can't have legionnaires exposed to danger because of incompetent officers. When I first sent Jester in, I thought he might be up to the job, but he proved me wrong almost at once. No point dwelling on it, of course."

"Of course," said Botchup smugly. "In a case like this, it's best to clear the screen and start from scratch. Make sure they know what you expect, and then hold them to the letter of the law. I suspect I'll have to make examples of a few of them before the rest realize the party's over. But I can promise the results will be worth it." After a beat, he added a very perfunctory "Sir."

Blitzkrieg didn't notice the perceptible pause. "Good man, Major, that's the spirit I'm looking for. Now, I want you to hold Jester to the same standard as the rest of them. I'll warn you, the fellow's spent so much time currying favor with the troops that they may resent you coming in, but that shouldn't hinder a good officer like you."

"I have a better regard for my position than to cotton to the dregs of the Legion," said Botchup with a slightly raised eyebrow. "If you'll pardon my saying so, of course."

"No, no, Major, never any harm in telling the truth," said Blitzkrieg. His grimace was full of malice. Heaven help Phule and his men when this little snot gets hold of them, thought Sparrowhawk. Then, after a moment's reflection, she amended the sentiment: Heaven help the Legion if this little snot actually succeeds.

It was after midnight, Galactic Standard Time, and the space liner's passageways were empty, the lights dimmed to conserve energy. Except for a few scurrying maintenance droids, the ship was quiet; even the crew member nominally on watch had dozed off, relying on the ship's automatic systems to warn him of anything requiring his attention. He really wasn't needed. Odds were, any emergency the automatics couldn't handle would kill the ship no matter what the man on watch did. The starship line didn't tell its passengers that, but the experienced travelers had long since figured it out. It didn't stop very many people from traveling.

So there was nobody awake to see the hatchway to Ernie and Lola's stateroom slide open and the custom-designed Andromatic robot they'd stolen from the Fat Chance Casino step quietly into the passageway. It looked both ways, determining its location within the ship-its memory had diagrams of all standard starship models stored-and headed aft.

The robot's incredibly realistic external appearance notwithstanding, its programming was, at core, very simple. While its appearance had to deceive not just casual observers but reasonably close acquaintances of the person it was designed to mimic, its internal list of tasks was short and basic. It could carry on a simple conversation long enough to give the impression of independent thought. It could notice who was listening so as not to repeat itself too obviously when mingling with a crowd. It could respond appropriately to a fairly wide range of questions or to situations requiring action.

As long as it made every effort to follow orders and to protect human beings, it could act to protect itself and to preserve its owner's investment in it, a sum that even a multimillionaire might not consider small change. And so, being stolen had called its self-preservation program into operation. Its Asimov circuits had prevented it from making its escape while the humans who had stolen it were still awake-if they tried to recapture it, it would be forced to choose between saving itself and harming them. Best to avoid that conflict. But now the two humans had fallen into an exhausted sleep. It was a matter of moments to escape the primitive restraints they had attached to it and leave the cabin. Now its primary purpose was to find a way to return to its owner.

The lifeboat bay was a rarely used area of the ship. Regulations required a lifeboat drill within twenty-four hours of departure from any port where passengers had come aboard, but on most ships this was a formality, carried out with the aid of realistic holos. A passenger who was so inclined could follow the drill from the comfort of his cabin or the first-class lounge. But most passengers simply ignored it. As a result, the robot found the lifeboat bay deserted.

A human wanting to commandeer a lifeboat would have had a hard time overcoming the electronic safeguards built into the system. For an Andromatic robot, the process was simplicity itself. Overriding outdated civilian security hardware aboard the ship was child's play for the milspec programming Phule had ordered installed in his robot double. The first thing the crewman on watch knew of the escape was when an alarm buzzer woke him. By then, the lifeboat was clear of the ship, accelerating away. The crewman stared at the blinking dot on his radar screen and cursed.

Once free, it would automatically seek out the nearest human-habitable planet and make a soft landing there. The lifeboat had only rudimentary controls on board, for dodging debris in the vicinity of a damaged mother ship. There was no way to take control of it remotely. The only way to prevent the escape would have been to send another, faster lifeboat, equipped with grappling gear-something only a military vessel would carry.

The crewman looked at his screen again. The skipper would have his hide for this; lifeboats were expensive, and he might have been able to prevent its loss if he'd been alert. He hadn't been, and it was probably going to cost him his job. But he was already in all the trouble he could get into, and there was really nothing more he could do about it. Having come to that conclusion, he yawned. The skipper would learn what had happened in the morning, and that would be time enough to face the consequences. He yawned again and settled down to go back to sleep.

On the screen, the blinking light moved slowly away from the ship, seeking a planet to land on.

Journal #533

To call Zenobia a swamp world is, of course, a gross oversimplification. As with any world large enough to support highly evolved life forms, it presents a rich variety of habitats, from warm, tropical bays to frozen tundra, from mountain meadows to salt marshes, from rain forest to stony desert. Not to forget, of course, that as a planet that has given birth to an advanced technological civilization, it has by now become to a great extent an urban landscape. The capital city boasts as much square footage of glass, concrete, and polished metal as any city of old Earth.

But the Zenobians themselves evolved from swamp and jungle dwellers, and (not surprisingly) they retain the habits and preferences of their remote ancestors. Landscape designers work overtime to create the illusion of deep jungle on the grounds of popular resorts, and some of the most affluent suburbs of the great cities look, from the air, much like primitive swamps. Where a human civil engineer would be looking for ways to drain a swamp to get some buildable land, a Zenobian looks for ways to drown a desert.

So, despite the popular image of the Zenobians as swamp dwellers, it came as no surprise to my employer when the Zenobian government requested that he set up his base in a semiarid highland some distance from the capital city. They were no more likely to ask him to set down in swampland than a Terran government would ask offworld visitors to locate in the middle of a golf course or football stadium. The fact that it was comparatively comfortable to us had nothing to do with it.

What mattered to the locals was that it was, from their point of view, a completely worthless piece of property. And of course my employer had no intention of letting them know that it had any attraction whatsoever to him.

Of such conficting values are bargains created.

The black ship settled onto its landing skids, surrounded by a cloud of dust from the dry land underneath. After an interval, the dust settled and the rear hatch swung down. A moment later, a party of armored legionnaires were out onto the ground, taking up strategic positions. Above them, a bubble turret popped up from the lander's roof, with energy weapons poised to fire on anything that threatened the landing.

When the advance scouts were in position, they began digging in. So far, nothing unexpected had happened. Lieutenant Armstrong, who led the initial party, spoke into his wrist comm unit. "All elements in place," he said. "No sign of resistance, no hostiles in view. Perimeter secure, in my opinion."

"Reading loud and clear," came Mother's teasing voice. "Electronics report no power equipment except ours in use within five kilometers. And there's no sign of any large life-forms within the same radius. So it looks as if you're all safe for now, cutie pie."

"Good," said Armstrong crisply. "Get the next wave out, then. The sooner we get some shelter set up, the happier I'll be. This place is hot. "

"Aww, don't you fret, now, Armie," said Mother. "We'll send somebody out with a nice cool drinkie for you. Just keep your pants on." She broke the connection.

Almost immediately, the second echelon, led by Chocolate Harry on his "hawg," began to roll down the shuttle's ramp. Where the first wave had been equipped to deal with possible enemy action, this group's mission was to get secure shelter set up in the shortest possible time. For the first time since Phule bad taken command, the company wouldn't be quartered in a first-class hotel; the Zenobians' buildings were scaled for their own race, far too small for comfortable use by humans.

Chocolate Harry's team steered a large trailer carefully down the ramp and across the landing area until it was well clear of the shuttle-nobody wanted to spend time setting it up if it was going to be knocked off its moorings by the departing lander. Harry scowled at the site the remote sensors had selected for setting up the structure, pacing its length and width, looking at the ground for any sign that the electronics had been wrong. At last, satisfied that everything was up to spec, he nodded. "OK, let's get this muvva set up," he said. "You ready, Double-X?"