Yuen-Mong's Revenge (22 page)

     
Satisfied with his conclusions, he began browsing through an old
Galactic Foundation Families news update, waiting for Yuen-mong to get
off the treadmill. He had never bothered with that in his former life — his
first twenty-five years before Aros. The experiences on Aros and living
with Yuen-mong had made much of it irrelevant. He could not imagine
returning to it and even if he did, it would not be the same. His priorities
had all changed.

     
Although twenty years old, the news items and gossip from various
parts of the Galaxy were amusing. He almost skipped over the item on
extending the HST network to Santori, but the name Scardan caught his
eyes. Wasn’t that the name of Yuen-mong’s father? So, he started
reading. It reported that this link had been made possible by a radical
breakthrough made in the UniCom long distance research section under
the direction of Dr. Takash Scardan.
It is her father. How exciting — I
must tell her.
He read on. There was a brief description of other scientific
contributions made by Dr. Scardan. The report ended with a short note
that Dr. Scardan had recently married Dr. Zoshan Shen, the only daughter
of Chen Young, board chairman of UniCom. It hit him like lightening.
Yuen-mong the granddaughter of Chen Young, one of the most powerful
and wealthy men in the Galactic Federation? And he had made love to
her … violated the covenant followed by Galactic Foundation members
that their daughters and sons entered arranged marriages pure or else they
would be stricken from the family tree. Pearls of cold sweat appeared on
his forehead. What had they done?

     
He heard Yuen-mong enter the flight deck. His first reaction was to
hide that article from her. He would have to prepare her carefully for this.

     
"Atun, tell me why you are upset."

 
     
How silly of him trying to hide anything from her. She probably already knew that something was wrong before she entered the flight deck.
She did not need to see his face. "Here, read this," was the only thing he
managed to say at that moment, shifting away a bit to make it easier for
her to see. She leaned on his left shoulder. It felt comforting.

     
"How interesting. This is about my father… Where does this come
from?"

 
     
"It’s from a Galactic Foundation Families news update, twenty years
old."

 
     
"Galactic Foundation Families — what are they?"

 
     
"It’s an exclusive order of the most powerful families in the Galactic
Federation."

 
     
"Did my father belong to that?"

 
     
"Probably not, but your mother. Read to the end."

 
     
When she was finished, she asked: "Is it this that upset you? Why? I
don’t understand."

 
     
"Your mother never told you about their covenant rules for marriage?"

 
     
"Oh, she mentioned a tradition that in her family marriages were
usually arranged to cement old ties and create new ones between different
families. She also said she married my father against the wishes of her
own father. But tell me, Atun, what has upset you. Surely not that my
mother belonged to this order?"

 
     
He explained to her the rules of marriage and the implications to go
against them. "You’ve now ruined all your chances to marry into one of
the other powerful families."

 
     
"Oh, Atun," she said laughing, "I chose you. You are my mate. You
cannot seriously see me be bound by such rules. I make my own
decisions, rules or no rules — or what did you call it?"

 
     
"Covenants."

 
     
"Covenants or no covenants. Don’t you know me better?"

 
     
"But you may be stricken from the family tree."

 
     
"So what? I was not on it in the first place, and I don’t want to belong
to something that forces me to follow the decisions of others — at least
not as long as I have a choice. Maybe my mother has already been
stricken off since she went against her father’s choice."

 
     
"I don’t think so. They would not have reported on her husband’s
achievements."

 
     
As they talked, he realized how foolish his agitation had been. No, the
free spirit of his Yuen-mong would never be bound by such covenants.
He rose from his seat and took her into his arms. "I’m silly."

 
     
"You said it, not me," she replied, smiling, offering him her lips.

     
"But are you aware of the other implication of being the granddaughter of Chen Young?"

 
     
"Do you mean that the killers of my parents could be my own
family?"

 
     
"Yes."

 
     
"It will make no difference to me. Whoever did it will have to bear the
consequences."

 
     
"You are not thinking of killing, are you?" He was suddenly perturbed.

     
"No, that would be too light a sentence… Destroy them, forcing them
to live the rest of their lives reminded daily of their guilt."

 
     
A sense of relief let him gain his calm again.

     
That night, when he wanted to initiate love making, she held him
back. "Atun, we might start a baby, and I would rather wait a while
longer. We cannot do it for the next few days."

 
     
He felt touched by her openness. Kissing her, he whispered into her
ear: "There are many other ways to give pleasure. I don’t have to be
inside you."

 
     
"For both of us?"

 
     
"Yes, for both of us."

 
     
"Then teach me."

 
     
He smiled at her directness. No fuss or long deliberation, but decisive
action — that was the woman he loved.

10

"Old Earth, Old Earth, this is Vishnu. Do you copy? Over."

     
They were nearing old earth on a direct approach course. Atun had to
call twice more before he got a response.

     
"Vishnu, this is OE control. We copy. What do you want? Over."

 
     
"Permission to land. Transmit protocol. Over."

 
     
Again it took a short second before the answer reached them. "Not so
fast. What class ship? Over."

 
     
"PA4, private. Over."

 
     
"Haven’t seen one of those in years. On its last leg? Want to dump it
here? Over."

 
     
"No."

 
     
"Landing fee 12,000 credits. How do you pay? Over."

 
     
"Cash, in gold. Over."

 
     
"Gold? Where do you come from. Over."

 
     
"You would like to know, wouldn’t you. No luck. You accept gold?
Over."

 
     
"Sure we do, but it will cost you twenty percent over the official rate.
Over."

 
     
"You mean twenty percent below. Over."

 
     
"No, more. Over."

 
     
"No deal. We’ll bypass you. Over."

 
     
"Atun, but we want to land there," Yuen-mong whispered.

     
"Just wait, he’ll back down." He winked. "Getting gold at the official
rate is too good a deal."

 
     
There was a moment of silence before Old Earth control came back.
"OK, you can pay at the official rate. That’s final. Over."

 
     
"Accepted. Transmitting ship ID. Send landing protocol. Over."

 
     
There was no response for several minutes. "ID not legitimate, not on
our list. Looks fishy. Will cost you more. Over."

 
     
"Ship was lost. Check twenty years back. Over."

 
     
"Come in anyway. We’ll settle on the ground. Protocol coming.
Roger, out."

 
     
Almost an hour later they set down, close to the foothills of the
Aoraki Alps on the southern island of Aotearoa, 30 kilometers west of
Otautahi. The brief historical sketch in their system’s atlas said that this
was the new city of fewer than 100,000 people, built farther inland from
Christchurch, after that city drowned in the rising ocean levels of the 22
^nd
century. Its economic base was mainly agricultural exports, including
wines, as well as tourism.

     
By the time they had shut down the engine and put the ship on park,
ground control had checked their ID in the ‘ships lost’ file, and wanted
to know where they had recovered it. Atun had little choice but to tell the
truth.

     
"Aros?" questioned the sole port traffic controller. "Is that where the
gold comes from?"

 
     
"You said it, man. The Aros ring is just dripping with gold."

 
     
"That’s not what the reports say."

 
     
"Well that is what it looked to us in the evening sun, but you’ll just
have to find out yourself, won’t you?"

 
     
There was a short silence, then the controller came back: "I just
remember that a Palo mineral exploration team reported they lost a
manned shuttle there recently. That you?"

 
     
"Yes."

 
     
"Better report back to your company."

 
     
Atun knew that, according to the regulations, traffic control at the first
port of contact was in fact supposed to do that, but maybe on Old Earth
they were somewhat more lax about such things. However, they showed
no lack of formality when it came to pay the landing fee. That had to be
settled before they were given clearance to have the ship serviced and
receive permission to leave the port.

     
He did not like that the weighing of the gold was watched by more
than a dozen curious bystanders who had probably never seen a quarter
kilogram of gold. He was afraid that this would inevitably attract them
to the attention of people he would rather have kept at more than arm’s
length.

     
The first thing they did was to upload the latest navigation atlas, as
well as renew all recycling systems. The guy who filled their water units
proudly announced that this was the best water in the entire galaxy.
Better than Aros water?
mused Yuen-mong silently.

     
They also planned to restock their catering unit, but she wanted to
check out first what was on offer. Although there had been no choice but
to eat what the ship carried, she disliked the artificial taste of the various
flavoring condiments. She wanted real, natural food.

     
While the ground service crews did their work, they made sure to
keep a close eye on them. Atun found time to look up his credit balance.
It was still intact, 20,000 higher than the 30,000 credits he thought he
had. The Palo Exploration Company must have made another few salary
transfers. However, since Old Earth had no HST link and relied on the
updates from the monthly courier run, they would only be able to pay
small amounts from his account.

* * *
 

It was late afternoon before they could lock the ship, arm it against illegal
entry, and take the old electric ground shuttle into the city. They were the
only passengers, but then Old Earth received few intergalactic ships, and
they only saw two huge cold-store freighters and several old air-bound
craft on the ground. He was surprised that the shuttle had a human driver.
On Palo all public ground transport was fully automated. The driver told
them that his was the last trip to or from the port until the following
morning, since no further incoming local short-haul passenger craft were
scheduled.