Judgment at Proteus Read online

  But all the determination in the world couldn’t make his chair go any faster, and at the rate we were walking he had no hope of catching us before we left the bay. Even if he decided to pursue this further, he wasn’t going to get to Hchchu until after Bayta and I had been dealt with and presumably sent elsewhere in Proteus.

  And that would be a shame, because I was rather interested in hearing what the crippled Nemut had to say. Bracing myself, I abruptly leaned backward and dug my heels into the floor.

  My two attached Fillies came to a jerking halt, stumbling as my unexpected move threw them both off-balance. “What do you do?” Hchchu demanded, spinning around.

  “Someone’s calling you,” I said mildly. “It’s rude to ignore him.”

  Hchchu’s eyes shifted to Minnario, still trundling determinedly toward us. “What does he wish to say?” he asked, looking back at me.

  “If I knew that, we wouldn’t need to wait and hear him, would we?” I said, still leaning back against my handlers’ grips.

  Hchchu looked at Minnario again, then gestured to my guards. Their pull eased, and I straightened up again.

  [You must not do this,] Minnario said as he came up to us, bringing his chair to a gliding halt. [He’s an honorable Human, who risked his life to save all of us aboard the galaxy-crosser. He chased down a murderer who would have killed us all—]

  “Peace, visitor,” Hchchu said. He really needed to work on his habit of interrupting people. “Mr. Compton is not under investigation for activities aboard your galaxy-crosser or any other Quadrail.”

  [Then what do you do?] Minnario demanded.

  “He is charged with the murders of six santra-class Filiaelians,” Hchchu said. “Specifically, the murders of Isantra Snievre, Isantra Golovek, Esantra Chavine, Asantra Morloo, Asantra Crova, and Asantra Vaermas.”

  I frowned as he rattled off the names. This was getting more absurd by the minute. I’d never even heard of those Fillies.

  “Isantra Golovek,” Bayta murmured suddenly. “New Tigris.”

  I grimaced. Of course. I hadn’t known most of those Fillies, at least not by their actual names. But now I did recall Isantra Golovek’s name going by once or twice. He’d been one of the six Filiaelian walkers who’d tried to keep Bayta and me from sneaking a ten-year-old girl named Rebekah Beach off New Tigris and out of the Modhri’s grasp.

  Which made the multiple murder charge even more ridiculous. I hadn’t killed more than one of those Fillies, and that had been in the middle of a firefight that the Modhri himself had started. In fact, now that I thought about it, I couldn’t remember more than four of the six actually dying. The other two had been taken down with snoozers and subsequently hauled off by the local cops to the Imani City lockup.

  So I’d been told, anyway. At the time my main concern had been getting Bayta and Rebekah off the planet before the Modhri could regroup for another crack at us.

  Minnario couldn’t know any of this, of course. But amazingly enough, that didn’t seem to matter. [I don’t believe it,] he said firmly. [There must be some other explanation or reason. An honorable person remains honorable in all things.]

  “Your comments are noted,” Hchchu said, gesturing to his jumpsuited minions as he turned back toward the exit and started walking. One of the Jumpsuits gave me a nudge, and both Fillies started pulling at my arms.

  I thought about digging in my heels again. But Minnario had had his say, and as nice as it was to have my own cheerleading section, it didn’t make much sense to antagonize Hchchu just for more of the same. Nodding to Minnario, I let them lead me away.

  But Minnario wasn’t finished yet. [Where did these alleged crimes occur?] he asked, keying his chair forward to try to keep up.

  “This is none of your concern, friend Nemut,” Hchchu said, clearly starting to get annoyed.

  [Justice is everyone’s concern,] Minnario countered. [Where did the alleged crimes occur?]

  “It was on New Tigris,” I told him. “One of the worlds of the Terran Confederation.”

  [Then it’s a cross-empire proceeding,] Minnario said firmly. [Mr. Compton will require a legal defender certified in cross-empire law.]

  “Is that what you need?” Bayta murmured.

  “No idea,” I murmured back. My Westali training had included a unit in interstellar law, but only those sections that dealt with jurisdictional disputes. The fact that the New Tigris authorities didn’t want me for anything kicked this into an area I knew nothing about.

  From the look on Hchchu’s face, I gathered this wasn’t his area of expertise, either. “I will make inquiries,” he said to Minnario. “Perhaps there is someone aboard whom we can consult.”

  [No need.] Minnario reached into a pouch at the side of his chair and extracted a card. [I am Minnario chu-DeHak, Attorney of Blue Stature with the Nemuti FarReach,] he continued, handing Hchchu the card.

  He turned his gaze on me. [If it’s acceptable to Mr. Compton, I will defend him.]

  * * *

  We ended up in a small room just off the entry bay, our luggage arriving with two more Jumpsuits half a minute behind us. From the room’s setup, I gathered that Hchchu’s original plan had been to frisk me, frisk my luggage, and then lock me up somewhere out of the way.

  But with Minnario on the scene, all such bets were off. Instead, we all stood around waiting while Hchchu sat at the desk making call after call, trying to locate someone on the Proteus staff who knew something about cross-empire law.

  Midway through the comm marathon Emikai gave up his part of the vigil and left, promising to check in with me again once he and Aronobal had Terese settled wherever she was supposed to go. I used the occasion to again remind Hchchu that I had my own obligations concerning Terese, but the protest didn’t even evoke a reaction, let alone a response.

  And while I listened to Hchchu’s increasingly irritated conversations, I studied Minnario.

  I hadn’t seen much of him during our trip aboard the super-express, partly because I’d had more urgent matters on my mind, mostly because Minnario had been a very solitary traveler. Even the Modhran mind segment aboard that train hadn’t gleaned more than his name and his reason for traveling to Filly space. I’d spoken to the crippled Nemut only once, just after the train’s resident madman had kicked him out of his compartment, and I’d noticed him later among the stream of subdued first-class passengers when they were all finally allowed to return. After that, he’d apparently settled back into his earlier hermit ways.

  Yet now here he was, charging to my rescue, volunteering his professional services to a Human he barely knew.

  And that worried me, because I knew that the late and unlamented Asantra Muzzfor had played his cards very close to his layered tunic. Logra Emikai and Dr. Aronobal had both worked for him, though Emikai hadn’t known that and Aronobal had given no sign that she had either.

  Had Minnario been another of Muzzfor’s minions, knowingly or otherwise? More importantly, did he know about my role in Muzzfor’s death?

  But whatever was going on behind those watery eyes, it wasn’t making it to the surface. He scrolled busily through a series of pages on the reader connected to his chair’s display, all the while sporting the same poker-faced expression that I’d seen on dozens of other lawyers across the galaxy. My knowledge of written Nemuspee was far too limited for me to follow what he was reading, but from the headings I gathered he was skimming through a compilation of cross-empire laws. Maybe it wasn’t really his area of expertise, either.

  Finally, after nearly twenty minutes, Hchchu closed his comm and put it away. “Our legal representative is on his way with the full specifications of the case against Mr. Compton,” he said. “In the meantime, he tells me I have full authority to confiscate any of Mr. Compton’s possessions which may pose a threat.”

  Minnario inclined his head. [You may proceed.]

  “Take off your jackets,” Hchchu ordered as he lifted our carrybags onto the desk and opened them. “And remove
all contents from your pockets.”

  My Beretta was the first to go, of course, the gun that had served me so well on New Tigris and other occasions. Hchchu turned it over a couple of times in his hands as he examined it, and I could tell he was wondering if this was the very weapon that had slaughtered six of his fellows in cold blood. He also took a close look at the Hardin Industries ID card that our other ally Bruce McMicking had given me, which included a reciprocal galaxy-wide permit to carry the weapon.

  Of course, the card was made out in the name of one Frank Abram Donaldson, not Frank Compton. It would have been nice to have gone with the Donaldson identity, but unfortunately Aronobal and Emikai already knew me as Frank Compton. Fortunately, Hchchu was apparently not well enough versed in written English to spot the discrepancy. Without comment, he set both the gun and the ID aside.

  My multitool went next, even though not even the Spiders classified it as a weapon. Minnario argued that very point, but Hchchu argued right back that even a two-centimeter blade could kill quite efficiently if the handler knew what he was doing. My watch, lighter, and Bayta’s limited selection of jewelry went next, on even flimsier grounds: the necklaces could conceivably strangle, the ear cuffs and watch could be used as throwing weapons, and the lighter obviously would allow me to burn down the station. That was followed by our readers and data chips, with Hchchu not even bothering to float an excuse for those.

  Last of all, to my quiet chagrin, went the kwi. I’d hoped to hang on to the weapon by claiming it was a bracelet or handwrap, but having already confiscated the rest of our jewelry Hchchu had neatly short-circuited that argument. I couldn’t think of anything else to say, and of course Minnario had no way of knowing this strange gadget needed to be argued over.

  So in the end the kwi wound up sealed inside a lockbox with my Beretta and everything else. “It will be deposited in the security officer’s safe,” Hchchu said as two of the Jumpsuits took the lockbox and disappeared through a side doorway. “If you’re acquitted of the charges against you, it will be returned.”

  “Can I have a contract to that effect?” I asked.

  Hchchu touched a switch and a piece of code-marked paper slid out through a slot on the desk. “Read,” he said, offering it to me.

  I grimaced as I took it. My knowledge of written Fili was probably right up there with Hchchu’s knowledge of written English. But I had no choice but to try to slog through it.

  [May I?] Minnario asked, holding out a thin hand.

  “Be my guest,” I said. I handed it over and then turned back to Hchchu. “I presume that I’ll now be permitted to fulfill my obligations on Ms. German’s behalf?”

  [I trust you don’t intend to lock him away,] Minnario spoke up, his eyes still plowing through the Filiaelian legalese. [You’ve offered no weight of evidence sufficient for that.]

  “Nor does it permit release on his own parole,” Hchchu said, a bit huffily. “But there is a third option.” He turned toward the doorway through which the lockbox had disappeared. “Bring them,” he called.

  There was a short pause. Then, one of the Jumpsuits reappeared, leading two of the nastiest-looking animals I’d ever seen.

  They were dogs for the most part, or at least that was how my Human eyes and cultural viewpoint reflexively tried to categorize them. They were about the size of adult Dobermans, and there was certainly a lot of canine in their torsos, legs, and snouts.

  But with that the resemblance to Fido dozing on the hearth ended. Their ears looked like small seagull wings, their spines bristled with low diamond-shaped spikes, and their backs and the tops of their heads were covered with an organic armor somewhere between armadillo scales and the skin on a pineapple. Their lower torsos and legs were covered with a feathery fur, with an overall color scheme that reminded me of a tabby cat seen through a rose-colored filter. Their eyes, encircled by faint raccoon masks, were deep-set, greenish-white, and decidedly unfriendly. If anyone was planning a remake of the dit-rec mystery The Hound of the Baskervilles, I had the perfect casting for the title role. “And what on God’s green Earth are these?” I asked.

  “They are called msikai-dorosli,” Hchchu said. “They are used as guard animals in many parts of the Filiaelian Assembly.”

  “I can believe that,” I said. The animal closest to me opened its mouth a little, and I spotted a double row of sharp-looking teeth inside a cavernous opening. “So what’s the deal?”

  “They will accompany you everywhere you go while aboard this station,” Hchchu said. It was a little hard to tell, but I was pretty sure there was some malicious amusement in his voice. “They will keep you out of places where you should not go and prevent you from harming anyone.”

  “What will keep them from harming us?” I countered.

  Hchchu snorted. “Do you take us for barbarians? They are not merely mindless beasts who rip and tear indiscriminately whenever they are hungry. They have sufficient intelligence to comprehend their duty and understand their orders. Observe.” He beckoned the animals forward.

  Obediently, they trotted over to him. {Identify,} he said in Fili as he pointed to Bayta and me.

  Both animals turned their heads and eyed us balefully. {Identify,} Hchchu repeated, gesturing again.

  Reluctantly, I thought, the animals walked over to us. “Offer your hands,” Hchchu ordered.

  Feeling like a sacrificial goat, I gingerly extended my left hand. Bayta did likewise, and the two animals spent a few seconds sniffing each of us in turn. One of them then turned back to Hchchu and emitted a startlingly dog-like woof. {Limit, and guard against trouble,} Hchchu said.

  The lead dog gave another woof and stepped to my right, while his companion settled in on my left. “They are now on duty,” Hchchu said.

  “I’m so pleased,” I said, trying not to sound too sarcastic as I looked down at the pineapple top of my new watchdogs’ heads. “Do they have names?”

  “Could you pronounce them even if they did?” Hchchu countered.

  “Probably not,” I said. Most Fillies I’d met had made a point of modifying their own names slightly to make them more pronounceable to the non-Fillies they dealt with. Here in the middle of the Assembly, Hchchu himself apparently felt no need to be so accommodating. “How good are they at learning new ones?”

  “They will understand.” Hchchu snapped his fingers twice. {The Human will give you new names.} “Proceed,” he said in English.

  The first watchdog looked up at me, I swear with the same expectant look as a two-year-old Human who’s been promised a magic trick. I looked back, trying to think up something appropriate. The watchdogs obviously couldn’t talk, so something from the dit-rec comedy silent era? Buster and Charlie? Charlie and Harold?

  I focused again on the watchdog’s face. Those raccoon masks around their eyes … “Doug,” I said, pointing to him. I shifted my finger to the other watchdog. “Ty.”

  Doug snuffed once, then lowered his head again. “What about their care and feeding?” Bayta asked.

  “Their food and beds will be delivered to your quarters,” Hchchu said. He looked at Minnario. “When you have signed the contract, you may go.”

  I looked at Minnario. [It seems in order,] he said as he handed me the paper. [You may sign.]

  “Thanks.” I took the contract and held out my hand to Hchchu. “My pen left with my reader case.”

  His blaze darkened, but without a word he pulled his contract pen from its tailored pocket in his tunic and slid it across the table to me. I signed on the first line and handed both the paper and the pen back to him. He signed the second line and slid the paper into another slot on the desk. “You may go,” he said, putting the pen away.

  “We first need to know where Ms. German was taken,” I reminded him.

  Hchchu tapped a few keys on the desk’s computer and peered at the display. {Escort them to Sector 25-F,} he said in Fili. “The msikai-dorosli will take you to the proper sector desk,” he added in English.

&nbs
p; I looked down at Doug’s head. “A map would also be handy,” I suggested.

  “They will take you,” Hchchu said. “Good day, Mr. Compton.”

  Apparently, we were dismissed. “Right,” I muttered. “Heel, Doug. Or whatever.”

  {Go,} Hchchu added.

  The two watchdogs turned and trotted toward the door. “You coming?” I asked Minnario.

  [I need to wait until the station’s legal representative arrives,] he said. [After I’ve learned the full weight of the case, I’ll find you.] He eyed me closely. [At that point, we can discuss the matter further.]

  “I’ll look forward to it,” I said. The watchdogs had reached the door and were standing there expectantly, eyeing me over their shoulders. “My masters call,” I murmured, closing our carrybags and setting them on the floor beside us. “Let’s go.”

  * * *

  According to the material I’d read aboard the Quadrail, Proteus was divided into a number of sectors of different sizes and shapes, each acting like a combination hospital floor and New York City neighborhood. Most of the medical sectors were arranged with the testing and treatment facilities grouped in the center, surrounded by patient and staff quarters, which were in turn surrounded by shops, restaurants, and entertainment facilities. The non-medical sectors, the ones set up for meetings and conventions, had similar layouts, except that the rooms were considerably fancier and the restaurants and entertainment facilities correspondingly pricier.

  Living areas for the workers were scattered throughout the disk, most of them consisting of a dozen corridors’ worth of apartments grouped around a community-center dome that cut through several decks to give the locals a taste of open space. The brochures were a little vague about how those domes were arranged, and what was in each one, but hinted that the décor was largely up to the inhabitants of the neighborhood.

  All of the various living and working sections were in the hundred and fifty decks that ran through the central part of the station’s disk, with the domed areas above and below the disk dedicated to storage, recycling, power generation, maintenance, and the vectored force thrusters that kept the station from losing position and starting a long, leisurely fall toward the sun a billion kilometers away.