Priam's Lens Read online

  He was instantly glad that he had opted for a more open look when he saw the two women sitting in the restaurant looking over a real printed menu and sipping local wine. He’d spotted Alan Mogutu, wearing casual clothing, lounging on the street just outside the place, clearly keeping an eye on the pair. He wondered if they thought he or, more likely, Park—would have the women kidnapped and debriefed with a hypno and a telepath. He suspected that it was just a precaution. Still, Mogutu would have spotted in an instant any attempts by him to disguise what he was, just as he’d instantly noted the mercenary even though most other people wouldn’t have given him a second glance.

  The place wasn’t crowded. In fact, it was almost empty, less a comment on its quality than on the hour, which was early for dinner. They were barely open, and their peak wouldn’t come for something like two or three hours It was also a routine workday bracketed by more of the same, not the kind of day when large groups decided to splurge on something decent.

  He liked the old-fashioned fanciness of restaurants like these, but they were expensive enough that he needed to ensure that the expense account would cover it before he dared enter. In this case, he slipped the mustachioed maitre d’ a small trinket and indicated with his eyes that he wanted to be seated near the ladies. The fellow smiled knowingly and led him to a table one over from the pair.

  He’d barely gotten seated and reached out to look over the wine list when he heard the two discussing entrées. This kind of restaurant experience was extremely rare, even for university doctors, and he suspected that they were trying to decide just which of the real, not synthetic dishes on the menu might be palatable.

  He glanced over at them and decided to try the quick opening. “Excuse me, but I couldn’t help hearing you trying to figure out the menu. I’m pretty familiar with the local dishes if you’d trust a stranger to make a recommendation or two.”

  Takamura didn’t seem all that keen on the intrusion, but Socolov, the young anthropologist who’d wanted to get out anyway, picked right up on it. “Why, thank you—uh? Lieutenant? Captain? What is that rank? Sorry—Navy isn’t my strong suit.”

  He grinned. “Warrant officer, ma’am. A kind of ancient rank that’s in and out over the centuries because, like commodore, it’s sometimes useful. Let’s say that I’m higher than a chief petty officer, but I’m outranked by the merest ensign but paid better. They give it to people who have very special skills they’re afraid will quit the service, or, sometimes, to people who win high awards by being stupid and getting themselves blown up and then declared heroes.”

  She found that amusing. “And which are you?”

  “Um, well, considering I’m a supervisor of the Shore Patrol, the Navy cops, at the base here, let’s say I’m not on the skill level. I got shot up and survived; few others did during that engagement long ago, and they needed a hero for the press, so that’s me.”

  “I’ll bet you’re just being modest. Would you care to join us, by the way? It seems quite silly for us to be calling table to table.”

  He looked over at the wan Takamura. “I don’t want to intrude, and three’s company. I’m not sure that your companion likes Navy men.”

  “Oh, it is all right,” the physicist responded softly, with a surprising accent. “So long as it is a purely social thing.”

  “Understood,” he responded, snapping his fingers for the human waiter to come over. “I’m joining the ladies. Just move a setting over, please.”

  The waiter nodded knowingly. They did the illusion of the old days really well here; he suspected that once that waiter vanished into the back, there was nothing but a robotic prep center programmed with the dishes of all the local and a few internationally famous chefs, but, what the heck, illusion was always what fancy restaurants sold even in the old days. Ambience, they called it. That and a menu that inevitably had a lot of stuff in French on it.

  “I guess I should introduce myself first,” he said, settling in on a proper chair between the two. “Gene Harker, of the frigate Hucamarea, in port here at the Navy base and getting a refit.”

  “Kati Socolov,” the cute anthropologist responded.

  “Doctor Takamura,” the physicist added, getting the formal distance down cold. He suspected that she was already sorry she’d come. She was, therefore, the one to work on a bit.

  “Well, Doctor, if I recognize your accent and ethnicity, you probably have an appreciation for sushi and sashimi. Unfortunately, nothing much of that sort here, but—” he looked at the starters “—the conami cocktail here is a well-prepared and spicy raw shellfish on a salad bed. We have several officers of Japanese or Korean ancestry aboard and they find it quite tasty.”

  Socolov looked at the menu and shook her head. “Not as easy for me. I normally don’t like to eat heavy meals, but it has been a long time between decent restaurant stops and it may be awhile again.”

  He nodded. “Well, there’s a mixed tungi plate here, which is fried and broiled local vegetables, all fresh, with a spicy sauce. It’s excellent. If you don’t think you can eat it all and something else, I’ll gladly share with you.”

  “Fair enough! And what for the main course, then?”

  “If you like fowl, the duck is excellent, and it’s true duck. It was imported here a couple of centuries ago and has become a main protein source. I’ll be stereotypical Navy and order the fillet, so there will be a good representative of local things on the table. The local blush wine might cover us.”

  “My! You are the gourmet here!”

  “Well, I’ve been stuck here for months, so there’s only so much you can do. The joints near the base are really joints, crawling with bugs and lowlife and with food and drink that makes the stuff on a Navy frigate seem good, and the on-base clubs are very limited. I try and get away once in a while to the city for something decent, even if it costs me an arm and a leg, because it is the only civilization I get, and, like you said, it might be a long time between decent meals.”

  “This meat and fish and fowl is all true animal matter?” Takamura asked, dropping a slight bit of reserve.

  “Yes, the real thing.”

  “I did not think they still killed things for people to eat in civilized areas,” she responded, sounding more concerned than chilly. “It seems so—unnecessary. Cruel and unnecessary, considering how perfect synthetics are these days.”

  He shrugged. “Some people just think that the real thing has a taste and character that the best synthetics don’t. Sometimes that means all the things you forgot, like gristle, bone, inedible parts, but there’s a mystique to it. You can get natural, all-vegetable dishes here, of course, if that is what you require.”

  “No, I—I believe I should not eat here. This is a place of death that pretends to be a place of delight. I cannot support it.”

  “Then I won’t eat, either,” Socolov told her, and everybody got up together, much to the consternation of the waiter and maitre d’.

  “No, no! Please! This was a mistake! I should have known it! I will get a taxi back. You remain and eat a good dinner and we will speak later.”

  “You’re sure?”

  “Do not worry! This man will make sure no harm comes to you, I think.”

  “But perhaps not to you,” he responded quickly.

  “Eh? What do you mean?”

  “Call for your taxi from inside and remain there until it arrives,” he advised her. “There was a man across the street in the shadows when I came in who only had eyes for this place, and he wasn’t looking for me. This can be a dangerous place, in this day and age, when so many desperate people feel they have no reason to remain civilized.”

  It really got to the physicist, and she walked over, ignoring the maitre d’, and peered out. “Where?”

  Harker walked over, looked out, and squinted. “There! In the alley over there and to the left of the store. He’s smoking something. You can see the burning ash every so often.”

  She frowned. “You see much better
than I do, apparently. Oh—yes, I see what you mean, but it would never have occurred to me that it had anything to do with us.”

  “I told you, ma’am. I’m a cop. Would you like me to make the call for you, or would you prefer I escorted you to wherever you wanted to go?”

  “No, no, that’s all right. Go back and have your dinner. I will take care of myself. The young lady has been under a lot of pressure of late and she can probably use a pleasant evening. I was talked into this but now realize that I do not wish to be here.”

  “As you wish,” he responded, and went back over to Katarina Socolov. He was a bit proud of himself for doing that to both the Doc and Mogutu. Now the mercenary would have to decide who to shadow, and Takamura would think she was being menaced. Two birds with one stone.

  “Goodness! You don’t think we’re in any danger, do you?” the anthropologist asked him.

  “I doubt it. But it’s best to take no chances with things like that. Come, relax! Let’s make our order and at least have a decent meal.”

  Over dinner—which she barely picked at—the two exchanged some small talk, he told her some true stories of his early life, the ones that you could still eat while listening to, anyway, and she opened up to him, if only in a generalized fashion.

  “You’re a full doctor of anthropology?” he said, trying to sound amazed. “And you’re here?”

  She laughed. “It’s not as amazing as all that. I’m fairly new, I’m heavily in debt with no close surviving family, and I’ve just finished a project with my old mentor and publication’s near. There’s not much call for my line of work in the remaining universities right now, and I needed funding for fieldwork, and I got an offer.”

  “For a field study? Where? Surely not herel There’s not much anthropology on this dirt ball unless you want to study the dynamics of the common roaches when they reach fertile new planets.”

  She laughed. “No, not here. I only found out where ‘here’ was when I decided to make this little foray. I gather we were all supposed to be off and well on the way, but instead we’ve been stuck here in orbit. Surely you must know that.”

  He nodded. “Yes, you’re the talk of the spaceport, really. I’ve even met a couple of your passengers. I assume that they’re not all on your expedition. That ancient opera singer wouldn’t be much good in a fight.”

  “Oh! You met Anna Marie! Isn’t she fascinating? Where did you meet her?”

  “In a bar inside the spaceport. I’m afraid. She came in and asked whether a fellow who happens to be at the top of the Navy’s ten most wanted criminals list was here. Then she rushed off to the ship. A few others have come through this way, too. I gather you were already aboard?”

  “Yes, they picked me up at the previous stop. Interesting about the criminal. What’s he done?”

  “He’s a pirate. I know that sounds like an ancient and outdated term, but there’s no other word for it. He attacks and loots transports. He’s not only stolen a great deal. He’s murdered a considerable number as well. The mention of his name is one reason why everybody’s so curious about your ship.”

  She seemed to think something over, then nodded. “I can understand your interest, then. So this wasn’t an accidental meeting?”

  “Well, yes and no. I’m off duty, nobody assigned me to come and have dinner with you, but I happened to hear that the shuttle was coming down and that the taxi had been hired for here. I decided to see if it was anyone familiar or someone new, and, in the process, get an excellent meal on the expense account—all of which has happened. Satisfied?”

  “Yes, I suppose so. It’s kind of disappointing that it wasn’t more of a chance thing, at least for an evening. I’ll be off soon and that’ll be that, the way people come out of those holes different ages and such.” Something seemed to strike her suddenly, a thought she hadn’t entertained until now. “You know—I suppose that work I did has been published by now. Probably long ago back at the university. Professor Klashvili was getting on in years when I left him. He’s probably well retired now, unless he’s dead. Strange. It makes me feel so—cut off. He and the department and research assistants back there were the closest thing to family I had. Does it get to you like this?”

  He nodded. “It did for a while. Then, over time, you get used to it and you simply don’t factor it in. You try not to establish any long-term relationships with people who aren’t going where you’re going, for one thing. We get to thinking of our ship and company as our family.”

  “You don’t have one of your own?”

  “No, most career Navy don’t. If you decide on a family, you wind up on a base and on port duty, period. You don’t go into space again unless you take the family with you, and Navy vessels aren’t built for real families. Spacers just don’t have homes except our ships. A lot of us are orphans—of which there’s a ton now that migration has turned to refugees overrunning all creation—or greatly estranged. Just make sure that when you decide to settle down, you settle down in a place you can grow old and die happy in.” She stared at him with sad big brown eyes. “And where’s that, Mister Harker? Where’s that?”

  “That’s the problem, isn’t it? If we could just make a jump to another arm, we’d have an escape route, but nobody who’s ever tried it ever came back. I dunno. So, let’s get on a happier note. What is your specialty, anyway?”

  “Retrogressed cultures,” she responded. “There’s a ton of them out there even now. Early religious colonies that got themselves deliberately lost and wound up building very primitive societies when they were cut off from The Confederacy, social experimenters, political radicals wanting to build their own colonies, that kind of thing. Mostly they cut themselves off on marginal worlds off the beaten tracks centuries ago, and they all thought, of course, that they could build a higher or better culture with no dependence on the old system. In many cases it’s less anthropology than recent archaeology, since they die out a lot. The ones that succeed can quickly become bizarre, even in a few short generations. They are, however, the finest living laboratories on human behavior and cultural evolution that exist, particularly since it’s unethical to deliberately do it to people or groups.”

  “Got an example?”

  “Hundreds, but I’ll just be general for now. The one rule we have found to be eighty percent true: people as a group will survive under the most incredible conditions, and sometimes even thrive. There a significant deviation but primarily as a group dynamic—a charismatic leader or some such who leads the desperate and trapped group to mass ritual suicide or the like. For the most part, however, people find a way, often by doing things that would have been inconceivable to them before. We’ve found cannibalism developing in desperate situations far more than we’d thought, for one thing, and even if they find a way to get around needing it as an emergency food source, it tends to remain as ritual. The general consensus is that the first practitioners are unwilling. They must eat some of their number to get out of a particularly nasty situation or they all die. After that, they have to justify it to themselves or they feel guilty, often consumed by guilt and nightmares. So, to deal with it as a survival practice rather than as a one-time thing, it becomes some kind of religious experience.”

  “Seems to me that if you began eating your fellow human beings, you’d soon not have any fellow human beings. The last two survivors would be hunting each other,” he noted.

  “No, no! It’s counterproductive if you do that, and you’re right, they’d all die. But suppose you were trapped by a seasonal thing—subzero cold and snow, or a long dormancy before crops appear, or a drought. Then it becomes more of an imperative, and after that it becomes something you have to justify to posterity. You keep it alive in limited form as a ritual—as many early human civilizations did back on our ancestral world—so that if the need arises you won’t have to go through heavy moral judgments or angry fights to do it.”

  He considered it. “I often wonder what happened to any survivors who weren’t
captured or whatever the Titans do to survivors after one of those worlds gets changed. You think they survive, maybe underground?”

  “Oh, I think they survive even on the surface. The Titans’ ultimate objective appears to be, well, gardening.”

  “Huh?” He’d been dodging and weaving around the bastards for decades but he’d never heard that before.

  She nodded. “The worlds they remake are uniformly in a temperate range that runs from sixteen to forty-eight degrees Celsius. That’s basically subtropical to almost hothouse, but it’s entirely within the life range of our race. Much of it is simply reseeded with Titan variations of local flora that can stand up to this range, lots of trees, lots of nutrient grains and grasses, but in the center of each growing area is a vast swath of, well, gigantic and exoticlooking alien flowers. You’ve certainly seen the photos. That’s what they do. They move in and they start planting and raising exotic flowers. Perhaps they compete at Titan flower shows. Who knows? At any rate, on a majority of worlds they use hybrids we’ve introduced there in the past for fruit and grain, even things like vegetables and sugar cane and the like. It’s possible to sustain a fair population on that.”

  “I knew about that. But they’d have to keep their numbers low to avoid attracting attention to themselves, and they’d be limited to totally nonpowered tools. Kind of an animal-like existence. I’ve seen surveys of worlds after a few decades that can show life-form densities, and we’ve never picked up anything that might be a significant population of humans. They’re down there, but they’re few and scattered.”

  “Yes, but they’re still there. I would love to be able to find out what sort of life they were living down there.”