Starrigger

8

Cops are the same everywhere, everywhen.

I stood before the desk at the Militia station, bare-assed and wearing a leather jacket.

Some joker walking by stopped to mock-whisper in my ear:

"Did you get a new tailor?"

The cop at the desk showed big yellow horseteeth. He thought it was a scream. The cops who brought me in from the flitter found it the soul of wit.

The joker walked down the hall looking back over his shoulder. "Huh?" he said, milking the gag, smirking. He ducked into an office, not waiting for my reply. Truly, I had one for him.

"Place of residence?" The desk cop is all business, all of a sudden.

"221-B Baker Street, London, England."

"Planet?" It dawns on him. "Look, McGraw," he said, showing me world-weary eyes. "I asked you for your address. When they come back from searching your hideout, I'll get it from your ID. So, let's do it the easy way. All right?" He squared himself at the console. "Now… place of residence."

"Emerald City, Land of Oz."

"Name of plan―" Again, he was slow on the uptake. He snarled at me. "Listen, you filthy piece of merte, I'm gonna ask you for your punkin' place of residence one more time, then you're in for trouble."

"Punkata teys familos proximos." It was an Intersystem phrase which suggested that he run along now and have sexual intercourse with various members of his immediate family, in so many words.

That got me a hairy back-of-the-hand smartly across the mouth. It was worth it. The rusty taste of blood seeped through my teeth onto my tongue.

A little too late, one of the other cops grabbed his arm. "Don't want him roughed up. We have orders."

The desk cop jerked his arm free savagely. "Don't do that again, Frazer," he warned. "Keep your hands off me."

"Fred, I'm sorry. We got orders. We're to keep him here until the Colonel arrives. I don't even think we should be entering him on the blotter. You better clear that entry."

"What the hell is he standing here for?"

"I don't know. Habit, I guess. They said to―"

"Then get him out of my sight!"

Grumbling, Frazer shoved me over to a chair. The seat was metal and very cold.

There I waited for about ten minutes until somebody very big and very important strode down the hall toward the desk, leaving a wake of underlings snapped to attention en route. He was a huge man, all bulk and no bulge, enough fabric in his sky-blue-with-white-piping uniform to shelter tent-cities of refugees. A red mustache thrived in whorls under a ramrod-straight nose. The eyes were caged, iced blue with determination and cold reserve. He marched past me, briefcase in hand, swagger stick tucked smartly under an arm, and the seminude man he passed just wasn't there.

As he went by the desk, three words:

"In ley amenata." Bring him in to me.

After a minute or two, I was led back through a maze of corridors to an office. I was surprised at the size of the station. Goliath was a frontier planet, from what I had seen, sparsely settled. But the planet was smack between two interchange worlds, a strategic location.

The sign on the door read bilingually: Tenentu-Inspekta Lieutenant-Inspector Elmo L. Reilly. I had the feeling I was not about to meet a man named Elmo. It was a small, windowless office with a metal desk, metal shelves, a few maps and plaques on the wall, picture of the family on the bookshelf, clean and uncluttered. Chemical light from the overhead fixture softened it a bit, but it was a cold, steely place. The big man sat at the desk, swaggerstick squared to his right, briefcase to his left. He still wore his white hard hat with its visorful of gold scrambled eggs.

"Colonel-Inspector Petrovsky will interrogate you," Frazer told me, and plopped me down in a small metal chair.

"This is not an interrogation," Petrovsky corrected him. Frazer slunk out the door. Petrovsky's Intersystem was weighted with Slavic ponderousness.

"What is it, then?" I asked in the best 'System I could manage.

"That depends. You may or may not be a material witness to a crime. You may or may not be a suspect. That also depends." 1

"Upon what, may I ask?"

Blue eyes bored through me. "Upon what you tell me and what I take to be truth."

"Then this is an interrogation," I concluded.

"No. An information-sharing meeting." Love those hyphenated monstrosities in the language.

I switched to English. "A euphemism."

"Queros?" He was annoyed. "You speak Intersystem poorly. You place the verb at the beginning or middle of sentences rather than at the end, like all Inglo-speakers. Very well, I will speak English."

"Good. I find it hard to carry on an intelligent conversation in Pig Latin."

'"Pig Latin'? This means you disapprove of the official Colonial language?"

"Like most artificial languages, it's a linguistic, cultural, and political compromise. Esperanto or Interlingua are better, inadequate as they are. Lincos is vastly better equipped for communication with aliens. And whatever the philologists say, 'System is still biased toward Indo-European language users."

He grunted. "Interesting academic discussion we are having. However―" He opened the briefcase and pulled out a reader and a case of pipettes. He loaded the reader, stabbed at the keyboard until he got what he wanted.

He looked up sharply. "What do you know of the disappearance of Constable Mona Barrows?"

"What should I know?"

"Do not word-play. Do you know anything?"

"Yes."

"Did she overtake your vehicle on Groombridge Interchange?"

"Yes."

"Then an encounter with a Patrol vehicle occurred?"

"Yes."

"And the Patrol vehicle fired on Constable Barrows' vehicle?"

"Yes. You knew that."

"We did," he said flatly. "The armaments on your truck are not capable of such destruction. We found the remains of the interceptor, or rather the radioactive trace. The telltale readings told us it was a Patrol intervention."

"Then, why ask me?"

"Eyewitnesses, if any, must always be questioned in these matters," Petrovsky stated.

"Better to tell your traffic cops not to do what Barrows did."

"She followed orders. Laws must be enforced. We cannot continue to be dictated to by an outside force, no matter how technologically superior they appear."

"Then again, the Skyway does not belong to us, really," I said.

Petrovsky looked down. Tiny characters danced on the screen. Without glancing up he said, "What can you tell me of the events that took place on Demeter, three standard days ago, at the lodging house called Grey stoke Groves?"

"Forgive me if I ask to what events you refer."

"Specifically," he read from the screen, "to the death of a man named Joel Dermot."

"Never heard of him. How did he die?"

"He was the victim of a hit-and-run accident."

"Unfortunate. Must have happened after I left."

"You did not check out of the motel."

'True. I was in a hurry."

'To what were you hurrying?"

"Business."

"Where?"

"Here," I said.

"Goliath? Your destination was Uraniborg."

"Eventually. First here."

'To do what?"

'To discuss business with the people your storm troopers routed out of their beds last night."

"The religious group? Unavoidable. What business?"

"None of which is yours," I told him.

The icy eyes frosted over. "Uncooperativeness will not help you."

"Am I officially under arrest? Am I going to be charged?"

A hesitation. "Officially, technically, you are not under arrest. You are under protective―"

"What!" I was more surprised at the bolt of anger that shot through me. I jumped to my feet, tool-kit swaying in the breeze. "Then I demand my immediate release. What's more, you will without delay have these mollycuffs removed and my clothes returned to me."

Unruffled, he said, "Mr. McGraw, you are in no position―"

"I am in every position imaginable!" I spat at him. "I have not been shown a warrant, I have not been charged, I have not been booked on a charge. I have not been afforded the opportunity to contact a solicitor. I am in every position to bring civil and criminal charges against you and all participants."

Petrovsky sat back. He was willing to let me rave on.

"Furthermore," I raved on, "you have no evidence or probable cause to use as a basis for taking me into custody."

Petrovsky fingered the russet swirls that covered his lips. "Evidence can be obtained. Tissue specimens from your vehicle."

Which meant they had tried, and failed. Sam would have a tale or two to tell about that. Stinky must have gotten him back in one piece in time, or Petrovsky would have had his evidence. "Can be? You arrested me on speculation?" I wasn't going to bring it up, but there had been no mention at all of Wilkes nor of any witnesses. Nor of any charges Wilkes had filed.

"Please sit down, Mr. McGraw. The view from where I sit is not a pleasant one."

"I will also do all that is in my power to initiate an investigation into the death of my friend, Darla ― “

A screeching stop. Darla's last name? My, God, I didn't know. The wind spilled out of my sails, and I stood there, blinking.

Petrovsky was suddenly magnanimous. "I will tell you what, Mr. McGraw. You will be unbound and… uh, given some clothes, on one condition ― that our talk will continue." He turned a rough palm upward. "Perhaps on a more amicable basis. Agreed?"

I was silent. He thumbed the call switch on the corn panel.

"You have not been exactly candid with me, Mr. McGraw. But then, I must confess I have not been entirely open with you."

"Indeed?" was all I could say.

Frazer poked his head in the door. "Yes, sir?"

"Remove the mollycuffs," Petrovsky ordered. "And find a pair of trousers for him."

"And shoes," I said.

"And shoes," Petrovsky agreed.

"Yes, sir, Colonel-Inspector." Frazer came over and freed me.

Petrovsky pulled out a pack of cigarettes with a label that crawled with Cyrillic lettering, lit one with an antique wheel-and-flint lighter. He pushed it and the pack across the desk toward me. I needed one and took one. I lit it, and regretted that I had. I squeezed off a cough and sat down.

We looked at each other for a moment, then Petrovsky puffed and eased back, receding through an acrid blue haze. His eyes found something of interest on the ceiling.

A minute went by, then Frazer cracked the door and threw in a pair of gray fatigue pants. "Working on the shoes," he said.

Petrovsky got up and examined a map of Maxwellville. I slipped on the trousers. They were a fairly good fit, if a trifle short at the cuff. I sat down and waited, smoking.

Presently, Frazer returned, and handed me shoes. "These are my own spares," he told me. "When you get your stuff, I want 'em back."

"Thanks."

"Well, it's okay."

The door closed and Petrovsky sat back down. "Now, Mr. McGraw, I will dispense with any preliminary questions and proceed to a matter of some importance."

"Which is?"

"The Roadbuilder artifact."

Rumor, wild stories, tall tales, canards ― become adamantine reality with an official pronouncement. It threw me.

"The what?"

"The artifact. The map. The Roadmap."

I shook my head slowly. "I know of no such thing."

Petrovsky caressed the desktop, looking at me, gauging my sincerity. "Then why," he asked evenly, "does everyone think you have one in your possession?"

I saw no'ashtray, and dropped the half-smoked cigarette between my feet. "That, my law-enforcement friend, is the punking" ― I ground the butt out fiercely―"zillion-credit question. I wish someone would tell me." I sat back and crossed my legs. "By the way, who is everybody?"

"Representatives of various races, various concerns, and us. The Colonial Authority, I should say."

"Who else specifically, besides the Authority?"

"I cannot think of one alien race within the Expanded Confinement Maze who would not like to obtain such a map. Specifically, we know the Reticulans want it, and are aiming to get it. Also the Kwaa'jheen, and the Ryxx. They have agents in the field. This we know. Every indication is that there are more."

I took another cigarette. I had quit years ago, but some crises scream for nicotine. "Why? That's my question," I said, snapping the lighter closed. "Why is this phantom artifact so bloody important?" I could guess, but I wanted his reasons.

"Just think about it, Mr. McGraw. Think of what it could mean." His tone was more academic than enthusiastic. "Do you have any idea of how far such a find would go toward solving the baffling mysteries of the Skyway? Would it not be the discovery of the ages?" He levered himself to his feet, the extra gravity making his weight more of a burden. "What price would you put on it, Mr. McGraw?" He began to pace, mighty arms folded.

"Okay, so it'd be a fast-moving item." I choked on an inhale. "So what? So you'd find out the Skyway goes all over the galaxy, and you find eighty billion other races living alongside it. The more the merrier. We would've found that out sooner or later."

Petrovsky held a finger up, waved it. "Think. Think what else the map may lead to."

I was totally fed up with it all. I didn't answer. All I could think of was that I had had Darla in my arms one moment, and in the next moment had watched her die. Petrovsky began speaking again, but I didn't hear him.

Darla…

"Can you conceive of it? You must admit that the possibilities are staggering."

I shook myself, struggling back to the issue at hand. "I'm sorry. What did you say?"

He stopped and rocked back on his heels, a bit irked at not being paid attention to. "I said that there is the possibility that the map could lead to the Roadbuilders themselves."

I took a long drag, my lungs already scarred enough to take it. "Yeah, and they're running a Stop-N-Shop on Interstellar 84."

"Stop and ―?" He walked behind the desk. "A joke, of course. But do you see that even the possibility would make the map invaluable?"

"But the Roadbuilders are long dead, or so rumor has it."

"Ah, but the remains of their civilization? Surely something has survived. The Skyway has. Think of the secrets, Mr. McGraw. The secrets of the most technologically advanced race in the known universe. Perhaps in the entire universe."

Well, now I knew his estimation of the phantom map's value. It was close to mine.

He leaned over the desk, propping himself with arms extended, huge hairy hands splayed over gray metal. He looked at me intently. "Who constructed the portals?" he went on. "Only that race which had mastery over the basic forces of the universe. Consider the cylinders. Masses more dense than these could not exist, except for black holes. Yet the cylinders are clearly artifacts. How were they constructed? Why do they not destroy the planets upon which they rest? What titanic forces keep them hovering centimeters off the surface? Questions, Mr. McGraw. Mysteries. Have you never wondered?"

"Yes," I said. "But I have another question ― for you. Why in the name of all that's holy does everyone think I have the answers? Why do you?"

Petrovsky lowered himself into the squeaky swivel chair, took another cigarette and lit it. "I, for one," he said between furious puffs, "do not."

"You don't?" I did a triple take. "Huh?"

"But that is my personal opinion, you understand." He shot pale smoke about four meters across the room. "I put the Roadmap in the same category as… say, Solomon's mines, Montezuma's gold, the philosophers' stone, and so forth. What is the phrase in English? Fairy tales. No, there is another."

" 'Objects of wild-goose chases' will do. I understand, but you didn't answer my question. Why me? Why do you think I have it?"

"You may have something. Or, more probably, you may want people to believe that you have something. A convincing forgery ― although I cannot imagine what that could be ― could fetch a high price. As to your question, I can only speak for the Colonial Authority. We are concerned with you on the basis of the rumors."

"What? I can't believe it."

Petrovsky plucked the fat cigarette from its nesting-place in his mustache, blew smoke at me. "Perhaps I have misled you. I may have given the impression that all available forces of the Authority are marshaled against you. No. I lead a special intelligence section within the Militia. Our chief function is to investigate all matters pertaining to the mystery of the Skyway. I have an office staff of five, and a few field agents. My rank obtains for me the cooperation I need to conduct operations such as the one you witnessed early this morning." He took off his helmet and tossed it on top of the briefcase. His short hair was the color of fresh carrots. "This is one of many investigations. Many. We have looked into many reports of strange sightings, phenomena… rumors. None have proved to be anything other than wild-goose chases, as you so colorfully put it." He dropped the butt, still lengthy, and stamped on it once. I think he was getting sick of them too. "I will be more than frank with you, sir. I do not like my job, but it is my duty. As for the Roadmap, I do not really have an opinion as to its reality or lack of it. When I see it with my own eyes, I will believe it. Do you understand?" His eyes thawed the tiniest bit, just for a moment.

"Yes."

"So." He slapped the desk. Back to the reader.

"Tell me," I said, trying to draw him out on other matters, "Why the raid? Why couldn't you have simply come to the house with a warrant? Or without one?"

"I was about to speak of that," he said. "As I have told you, we are not alone in our interest in you, nor in our surveillance. We also follow those who follow you. The Reticulans particularly intrigue us. We follow them, and they lead us right to you. Always. Most uncanny. But who can understand aliens?" He smiled, the first time. It was genuine, but fleeting. "As I was saying, we traced the Reticulans here, ergo you. They did not go to Uraniborg, as we did. We lost their trace in Maxwellville. However, a constable on a routine patrol found them stopped on the Skyway east of the city. Naturally, he could do nothing. He asked if they were having mechanical trouble. They said no, but he reported them anyway. The vehicle they drove was capable of carrying a smaller off-road buggy. At about the same time, we succeeded in tracing you to the Teleologists' farm. It was not difficult, but took time. But it was apparent what the aliens planned to do. They were stopped on the Skyway at a point about seventy kilometers from the farm by an overland route. I immediately ordered the 'raid,' as you termed it." He smiled again. "Do you see, Mr. McGraw? The raid was to protect you. We fully expected the Reticulans to have already captured you. Fortunately, we were in time."

"I see." Somehow, it was hard to argue with him. What with Roland having fallen asleep, and all of us dead-tired, we might not have stood a chance against the Rikkis. But there was the matter of Darla. "Where are my friends now?" I asked.

"I don't know. They were questioned. We have no interest in them."

"Did you warn them about the Reticulans?"

"Not in so many words. We told them to expect intruders. I assume they left and came into town."

Again, conspicuous in its absence was any mention of Wilkes in all of this. But Wilkes had friends in high places. Doubtless Petrovsky knew he was involved in this Roadmap affair, but it was not clear to me- how Wilkes was involved with the Reticulans.

Characters danced on the reader screen. Petrovsky squinted at it, steel jaw muscles tensing. He punched the keyboard with a sausagelike index finger, and the pipette began to rewind. He looked at me.

"I think, sir, that our interview is at an end."

"Uh-huh. Then, I can go?"

He didn't answer. The reader went ka-chunk, and he picked it up, put his hard hat back on, cracked the briefcase open, and threw the reader into it. He leaned far back in the chair and clasped his hands over his belly. "I am afraid… not just yet." The chair groaned as if the metal were about to fatigue and snap. "I do not have the facilities here to continue my investigation. You will have to accompany me to Einstein, where this affair may be concluded."

"Then you mean to run a Delphi series on me?"

"If necessary."

The twisted logic had my brain in knots. "Look," I said, trying to keep an edge of exasperation in my voice from cutting through, "you've as much as said that you don't believe I have the Roadmap. Yet you want to run a Delphi on me to find out if I do or not."

"I must follow procedure, despite my personal feelings. If you know anything, we will know. If the Roadmap is indeed real, we will know that. If the whole affair is simply a hoax, or a political ploy, we will know that as well."

The word had sounded an odd note, with intriguing overtones. "Political? How could it be?"

"All possibilities must be covered," he said, his gaze deflecting a bit, as if he regretted having mentioned it.

"Anyway," I said, thinking just then that now would be as good a time as any to make a break, "a Delphi would be quite illegal.",

"Without proper authorization, yes. But I have that authorization." The hands unclasped and went out at wide angles to his midsection, flopped together again. "The technique is not permanently damaging. You know that."

Was Frazerjust outside the door? Likely was. "Yes, but I'd be disabled for quite a while. Lobotomized."

"An exaggeration."

"I thought the Colonial Assembly recently passed a law against the Delphi process."

"Ah, but exceptions were provided for. The language of the bill was quite clear."

And who cared what the Assembly did? Rubber stamps just bounce. "Still," I went on, "you have nothing on which to hold me." How many outside the door? One? Probably two. Frazer and another.

"You are wrong," Petrovsky told me. "We have the deposition of the manager of the motel."

"Perez? What could he tell you?"

"From him we pieced together what transpired."

"I have the feeling," I guessed, "that Perez did not actually witness an accident."

Petrovsky tilted his head to one side. True." I had to admit, the man was scrupulously straightforward in some matters.

"However, his testimony gives us the 'probable cause' you brought up earlier. Besides―" He gave a helpless, resigned shrug. "There is a dead body to be explained. You must understand."

"Oh, yes."

Petrovsky was honest, but he was hoarding most of the cards.

"Of course," he went on, thumbs back to twiddling in the general area of his solar plexus, "if you have some information for me, and would be willing to volunteer it, the Delphi series would be unnecessary."

"That's a fine specimen of medieval logic."

Petrovsky frowned. "I don't understand."

"I think you do. By the way, have a chair."

I brought it up from between my legs and threw it over the desk right at him. A powerful arm went out to ward it off, a little late. The back of the chair caught the bridge of his nose and sent him leaning back precariously, hands over his nose, until he toppled over and crashed into a tier of metal bookshelves capped with cups and trophies. The shelves tumbled over on him thunderously. By that time I was scrunched up against the wall by the door. It burst open and Frazer rushed in, hand on his holster. I let him go, but neck-chopped his partner, who followed close behind. The cop went limp in my arms and I propped him up with one arm and grabbed his gun. Frazer was by the desk, turning around, still fumbling at his holster. "Hey!" was all he could get out before his partner came lurching toward him, propelled by one of Frazer's spare boots applied at the small of the back. They embraced and fell over the desk. I checked out the corridor, went out, and slammed the door.

I was halfway down the hall to the left when I heard someone about to come around the corner of an intersecting corridor. I squeezed off a few dozen rounds into the wall by the comer, sending splinters of Durafoam into Old Fred's face just as he made the turn. He staggered back with his hands up around his eyes. I doubled back down the hall, covering my rear with a burst every three steps, and while en route, met poor Frazer again as he rushed out of the office with his pistol finally drawn. I body-checked him and added an elbow to the chin into the bargain, sending him tottering back into the office and the gun skittering down the hall floor. I turned right at the corner and found this corridor empty. I ducked into a dark office to wait and listen, thinking to let forces pass me by as they converged on the starting point of the disturbance.

I checked the gun. It was a standard issue Gorbatov 4mm pellet-sprayer. The clip held 800 rounds and was nearly full, but the charge on the thruster was down. I pulled out the metal stock a bit more to fit snugly in the crook of my arm, then poked my nose out the door. I heard pounding footsteps, shouts. Which way was out, though? I had lost my bearings. Down this hall and to the right ― but no, that led toward the desk and front entrance. A back door should lead to a parking lot and squad cars. But where?

Two men tore around the comer to my right, and I eased the door closed and waited until they passed. I waited five more heartbeats, then slipped out and tiptoed in the direction they had come from, hoping to find the way to a rear entrance. I gave a look behind as I ran and saw a shadow leak across the floor. I whirled, hit the floor and fired, the Gorby buzzing like an angry hornet. The man behind the comer got out, "Drop ―!" before the gun flew out of his hand, followed by a few fingers. The rest of him was shielded by wall except for his right leg to the knee. His trouser leg flew into tatters of bloody cloth and the hardened foam of the wall smoked into powder as the Gorby vomited its fifty rounds per second. I stopped firing and rolled to the other side of the hall, huddling against the wall. I heard a groan and a thud.

I didn't like where I was. I looked down the hall behind me, but nobody seemed to be approaching.

Hushed voices, arguing. Then, a hoarse whisper: "I don't want him killed!" Petrovsky.

I took advantage of the hesitation to get up and run, spraying the corridor behind me with superdense, hypervelocity BB-shot. I ran through the next intersection and surprised two cops who had been sneaking up for a rear attack. I continued firing behind as I ran, cut to the right, ran past shelves of cartons and equipment, ducked left this time past stacks of empty packing crates, down past a row of lockers, and then found a set of double doors. I backpedaled, crouched, and carefully nudged one door open. It was a garage, with a few squad cars up on jacks and no mechanics around, but no vehicles that appeared operable. The large garage doors were closed, but there was a smaller door, and I sprinted across to it, knowing full well that I had lost time, expecting all exits to be covered by now. I hugged the wall and gripped the doorhandle, threw the door open. Automatic fire riddled the air where I would have stood if I had wanted to commit suicide. A coherent-energy beam sizzled through and started a small fire among the shelves of boxed parts along the far wall ― one good reason why such weapons were impractical for indoor use. They were throwing everything at me. High-density slugs thumped into the foam, ricocheting lead and steel sang all over the garage.

One of the doors was swinging; someone had come through. I looked around for cover, but I was ten paces away from anything suitable.

"All right, kamrada. It's over, so drop the gun."

It was Old Fred again, pointing a sniper rifle at me across the top of the clear bubble of a squad car. He was grinning evilly, and something told me it didn't matter whether I dropped it or not. But I had no choice, and let the machine pistol clatter to the floor. Fred raised the sights up to eye level, taking his time, drawing a deep breath as if he were in the finals of a Militia sharpshooter tourney, doing it all by the book, eyes on another platinum-iridium trophy for the collection on the mantelpiece, and all it took was one neatly placed shot dead center, nice as you please, one expert squeeze, all coming down to that, one constriction of a flexor muscle, and it was off to a watering hole with the boys and girls for soybeer and snappers…

Petrovsky came barreling through the doors and slammed into him, sending Old Fred cartwheeling over the floor to crash into a stack of tool boxes. When the clanking and tinkling stopped, Fred was on his back under a pile of metal, out cold. Long before that I had made a fraction of a move to go for the dropped gun, but Petrovsky had already drawn a bead on me with his pistol. I was astonished at how quick he was, both on his feet and with his hands.

"So, Mr. McGraw," he said, "there will be no more quibbling over a reason to hold you. Correct?" No triumph in his voice, just finality.

"I'm glad it's all settled," I told him. I really was.

A snatch of conversation came to me from out in the cell block just as the transparent door to my accommodations slid shut and cut it off.

"Colonel-Inspector, I realize that your rank and your special authorization from Central command our complete cooperation, but I must point out to you―"

The speaker wore lieutenant's pips and had accompanied the procession bringing me here. He had looked like an Elmo. I sprawled across the bunk. Petrovsky had his problems, I had mine, but I didn't care about either right then. I was content to lie there and let the filtered air from the overhead vent wash over me, listening to the dull throb of machinery conduct through the walls to temper the silence of the cell. The mattress was lumpy and reeked of mildew and urine, but I didn't mind that so much either. I let my brain idle for a while, allowed it to perk along and mark off the seconds, the ineluctable increments by which my allotted time was measured, one for each beat of the heart, for each millimeter of bloodflow, for each regret, each sorrow. And then one thought came to me: you can easily recognize the good parts of your life because they are starkly outlined in crap. The good things are mostly negative quantities: the absence of pain, the lack of grief, no trouble. Love, the absence of hate; satisfaction, a dearth of deprivation.

And I told myself: To hell with all that.

I decided to attempt active thinking again, there being a number of things to try it out on, such as the Paradox ― if there really were one. The Paradox seemed to be saying. You will get out of this, you will see Darla again, only to lose her once mare. And that would be the final time. I didn't like it, but there it was, for what it was worth. As I thought it through, I came to regard the notion as another specimen of crap. There was so little hard information to go on. Did I really have a doppelganger out there, a future self who had found a backtime route? Did my paradoxical self really have a Roadmap? Questions. More of them: Who had told Tomasso and Chang to be at Sonny's that day, light-years off their usual route? Did anybody? Oh, there were more mysteries, by the score, by the truckload. Wilkes, the Reticulans, the Authority, the chimera of the Roadmap ― who? where? what? why? And what did politics have to do with any of this?

Petrovsky's slip had been the most significant part of the interview. Of course, the Roadmap would be a great boon to whoever had the luck to snare it. But the Colonial Authority was the only power in Terran Maze, with only a weak Assembly passing rhetorical wind to the contrary. There were dissident elements within the Assembly, true, but they had been bugged, compromised, infiltrated, double-agented, and neutralized long ago, or so the roadbuzz had it. Oh, everybody talked of one glorious day when the colonies would achieve some measure of independence from the mother planet, but what was not spoken about so much was the glum fact that the Authority had already gained a sort of de facto independence and continued to rule all of T-Maze as if it were the Cradle of Mankind, and not merely Terra's proxy among the stars. The CA was a,self-perpetuating, bloated bureaucracy, a chip off the old monolithic Soviet system that had spawned it, and it was entrenched on planets closest to the home system by the Skyway, with its grip gradually loosening the further out you got.

But I knew very little of what had been happening lately, having sworn off listening to news feeds long ago. T-Maze is big, thank God, and the Authority's chubby fingers could not reach everywhere, nor could they control the Skyway, which has a life all its own. There' were undercurrents of rebellion out here, to be sure, at the grassroots level, but this Roadmap affair spoke of vastly larger dimensions. Some sort of struggle for ownership of the map was going on, both inter- and intra-Maze. It was a hunt, and many were riding to hounds. Call me Reynard.

And then there was Darla to think about….

There was a mirror above the wash basin. It was flush with the wall and rung hollow when knocked upon. Doubtless it hadn't been put there with the prisoner's cosmetic needs at heart. I was staring into the blind side of a one-way observation window, but that didn't bother me. What did was me sight of my reflection, a thirty-five-year-old face on a chronologically fifty-three-year-old body that was gradually winning its war of attrition against antigeronic drugs. The face had aged some. People say I look perennially boyish, but the child was sire to the old gent I looked at now, wrinkle lines at me comers of the eyes, black curly hair gone dry and a tad thinner, jowls going slack and pendulous, skin a lime more leathery, splotched, beardline more definite, its shadowy stubble more intractable.

Then again, I thought, I might just need a shave and a hot shower. I angled my face to get a profile shot. "Good profile," Mom always told me. "Strong." But what was that puffy area under there ― the beginnings of a double chin?

Enough. I lay back down. Self-absorption is not my usual brand of neurosis; besides, I felt a sudden headache coming on.

I wondered if I could afford the luxury of regretting the escape attempt. The cop I had shot would probably pull through okay if they had gotten him to a hospital in time. But an escape/assault charge was going to be hard to beat. The only thing I had going for me was the illegality of my detention, but I had the feeling it wouldn't go very far. Then there was the hit-and-run charge. True, I hadn't been driving, but drivers are responsible for their automatic systems….

Damn, that headache was in a hurry. I heard a curious buzzing sound coming from behind my head, and it stayed there no matter which way I turned. It quickly grew louder and louder. I sat up, feeling suddenly nauseous and dizzy. I put my head between my knees, but that only made it worse. The buzzing became deafening, as if someone were tearing through sheet metal with a vibrosaw directly behind my neck. Blood pounded in my head and I could see the pulse in my field of vision.

Well, this is it. Heart attack or stroke. Antigeronic treatments or not, the body has ways of extracting its dues from you. I hoped somebody was watching through the window. Petrovsky seemed to want me alive. Maybe he'd convince Elmo I was worth bothering to cart off to the hospital.

I slumped back against the wall.

… keep me alive, Petrovsky being the dedicated professional that he was, but going around with one of those isohearts; well, I didn't know about that…. They still hadn't perfected them ― tendency to go into fibrillation without warning; they didn't know exactly what the problem was, probably a mismatched enzyme that hadn't replicated true…. I was awake, wide-awake. The cell door was open. I shot to my feet. Someone had just been in here, doing something to me. What? There was a tingling on my upper arm, calling card of a tickler. It doesn't leave a mark, but my jacket had been pulled down off my left shoulder. I still had no shirt. I hadn't been out cold ― the state had been like Semi-doze, but very unpleasant at first, then a vapid nirvana. I had the distinct recollection of someone bending over me while I was sitting mere, and I hadn't even given him a glance, as if it hadn't been important enough to trouble myself. But I had seen, out of the comer of my eye or with some part of my perceptive gear, a familiar face. Very much so, but the face had been a blank, a hole in the cognitive field, a missing datum. I tried to fill in that blank, but I couldn't. The recognition signal was blocked somehow, lodged in the preconscious. I knew, damn it. I knew who it was, but I couldn't say it.

But there was no time now. I walked out of the cell.

The turnkey was on duty at his desk, with one side of his face down in a plate of stew, eyes open, staring. Quietly, I lifted his master key, went over to the door and waved it at the code plate, and let myself out of the cell block.

Everyone in the station was out but me. Wide-eyed bodies littered the corridors, office workers were slumped over consoles. Cops sat against walls, leaned on doorjambs with their guns drawn, looking at them stupidly, transfixed. In one office a printer had been left on and was spewing out reams of hard copy in a continuous roll, piling up on the floor. From the size of the pile I guessed that everyone had been out for ten minutes at least.

I was looking for Petrovsky's office, or failing that, trying to find where they stored prisoners' valuables, or where they kept evidence. I needed Sam's key. Nobody showed signs of coming to yet, but I hurried, running through the maze of white aseptic hallways, glancing into rooms and dashing off again. Reilly's office was empty, and no sign of Petrovsky anywhere.

I tried a half dozen more offices, stumbled onto an employees' lounge with two cops draped over a table awash with spilled beverage, found a communications room, a storage room filled with filing cabinets, a library, but nothing like a lock-and-key affair where evidence would be stashed. Maybe Petrovsky had been going through my stuff when the blackout hit ― if I could find him….

I found him in another office sitting upright at the desk, eyes glazed, deep in a trance that made him look like a redheaded Buddha, helmet in his right hand, white handkerchief in his left, both arms extended over the desk top as if in supplication. His head lolled to one side, gaze on infinity.

And on the floor in front of the desk lay Darla.