“Don’t get down on yourself.” Vyra put a hand on his shoulder and, despite his experience and self-control, the inspector twitched. “Give Broddy and me a couple of weeks. We’ll eviscerate this modus for you.”
“I hope so. I look forward to watching you work. I mean …”
She smiled radiantly. “It’s all right, Inspector. I’m used to it. My whole life has been one long double entendre. Took me years to get used to it, less to learn how to turn it to my advantage. You don’t have to apologize for your thoughts.”
“But I wasn’t thinking anything,” Hafas assured her, a bit too quickly. When her smile only widened and he realized that he was making a fool of himself, he returned her smile as best he could, bowed slightly, and excused himself.
Manz moved to stand next to his colleague. “You shouldn’t do that to the poor man. He has a family.”
She glanced down at him. “I didn’t do anything. You know that. You of all people should know that.”
“Just teasing. You’re going to have to ugly yourself up, or our preliminary checkout tomorrow is going to take longer.”
She put a long index finger on the tip of his oft-broken nose. “Now, Broddy, you know I couldn’t do that if I tried.”
Fascinating display, isn’t it? Astonishing the variety of attributes humans ascribe to one another based on mere physical appearance. No matter how hard you try, no matter the effort expended, all that can ultimately be adjusted are superficialities. Artificial alteration of eye color, hair, keratin, melanin. Remove or add fat or muscle. That’s about it. Can’t do anything much about your skeletal setup, nervous system, any of the other internals.
Yet based on subtle and wholly irrelevant minor differences in the aforementioned, you decide who among you is “attractive” and who is not. Very rational. Note the contrast in methodology. You determine attractiveness based on externals; we machines decide such matters after careful evaluation of what we observe internally.
Now you sit there and tell me which is the more evolved approach.
By the way, your hair is a mess. And the rest of you could use some work, too.
There wasn’t much to unload. Manz’s luggage consisted of two pieces, one containing personal items and the other his field gear. Vyra was similarly equipped.
After storing Moses and the Minder for the night, Manz met Vyra in the main hotel restaurant. After shooing off the cloud of admirers she involuntarily beguiled the way San Francisco Bay attracted fog, they took some time to catch up on old times. Though the circumstances of her abortive marriage had been less than traumatic, she preferred not to go into detail about the fiasco, which was fine with Manz. They managed not to talk shop for the entire meal, which pleased them equally. There would be ample time for that in the days to come, when it would be unavoidable.
For now they relaxed in the pleasure of each other’s company, old friends reminiscing. Following dessert and after-dinner drinks, he proposed, she demurred, and both retired content (though she more so than he).
An hour later she emerged from her bath to find the door to the connecting workroom ajar and a silent presence in her room. She made no effort to strategically drape the towel, nor would it have made any difference if the intruder had been human. Vyra did not suffer from nudity phobias.
“What do you want, Moses?”
The mechanical’s plastic lenses gave no clue to what it was thinking. “I am pursuing my research. I hope I do not give offense.”
“Only a little. I’m more curious than offended.” She moved to a chair and sat down, working the towel over her damp amethystine locks. “Broddy mentioned that he’d been having trouble with you. What sort of trouble might that be?”
“Nothing of consequence. Some programming glitches. I am in the process of isolating and eliminating them.” The mechanical rolled nearer, its trackball humming softly. “Nothing for you to worry about.”
“I’m not worried.”
“I’m glad to hear that.” It was very close now.
She turned in the chair, hands on towel, towel on head, and considered her visitor. “You can leave now.”
“I would rather stay and continue my research.”
“Maybe another time. It’s been a long day and, unlike you, I need my sleep.”
“I am of course intimately familiar with human biological requirements. You’re sure you want me to leave?”
“Quite. Shut the door behind you, please.”
“I comply.” Pivoting on its central ball, the mechanical turned and exited. One limb on the door control, it leaned slightly back toward her. ‘This is all for the sake of social science, you know.”
“I’ll keep that in mind. Good night.”
“Pleasant dreams,” said Moses, demonstrating the quality of his interactive programming. The door closed.
She finished drying her hair. Moments later she was ready for bed. Halfway across the room she paused, blinked, and approached the connecting door. A check revealed that it had been locked from the other side. After a moment’s hesitation she double-sealed it, utilizing the locktight on her side. Only then did she turn toward the bed.
The van was forced to slow to a manually directed crawl as it maneuvered through the traffic in the Export Sector. Huge pullers towing self-guiding shipping containers dominated the accessways. Smaller vehicles darted in and around these behemoths, the police van prominent among them.
Hafas’s nonverbal compatriots sat in the front. If the claustrophobic traffic was getting to them, they didn’t show it. The translucent privacy screen was up, dividing the drivers’ from the passengers’ compartment. Hafas sat facing his guests. The Minder hovered in its usual position above Manz’s shoulder while Moses rested on his trackball in the rear storage area.
“You’ll pardon me for belaboring the obvious, Manz, but since all the thefts of your Company’s property have been from JeP Port Authority, why not just try shipping from another city?”
The adjuster settled himself on the seat, swiveling idly from side to side. Vyra was forced to keep dodging his swinging feet.
“Several reasons. First of all, Braun-Ives wants to catch these jackers. Make a big example of them; crime doesn’t pay and all that. Or at least if you’re going to jack somebody, you’d better not try it with BRK or any of its subsidiaries.”
Hafas smiled thinly. “So your Company’s message is that it’s okay to steal so long as it’s from a competitor?”
“Hey, I’m no message man. I don’t know what the damn corporate philosophy is. All I’ve been told and all I need to know is that they want this dacoitry punished, and you can’t punish a thief if you can’t catch him, and you can’t catch him if you scare him off. Changing transshipment points might scare ’em off. That’s one reason.
“For another, Braun-Roche-Keck’s pharmaceutical manufacturing facilities are in Albuquerque. JeP Port is the nearest and most convenient offworld shipping facility. SoCal is impossible, and St. Louis is an older operation that poses different security risks of its own.”
“Not to mention higher costs for insurance,” Hafas chipped in.
“That’s not really relevant, since all product is insured within the Braun parent conglomerate.”
“Oh.” Hafas glanced out a one-way window as traffic shifted and they started forward again. “Signs of external security here could still scare them off. Obviously they’re not afraid of anything we local police can bring to bear.”
“That’s why the Company sent only Vyra and me. If these bastards make us, and that’s enough to frighten them away, then chances are they’ve been considering backing off for some time anyway. Nothing we can do about that. If we could read their intentions, I wouldn’t be sitting here discussing this with you now.”
“I’m aware of that.” A gap opened in the industrial traffic ahead, and he rapped on the privacy shield. It descended, and one of his men looked back. “Don’t be overcautious, Martinez, but I don’t want any sirens.”
“We’re on it, sir.” The van accelerated.
They ducked unexpectedly into another service tunnel, but unlike the journey out from the domestic airport, this one took only a moment, subsequent to which they emerged into a dully lit multilevel parking structure. The driver made a right, left, right before sliding gracefully into a space marked RESERVED. There was a click as the van’s safety and security system locked onto the pickup set flush to the pavement. Thus formally secured, the engine cut off.
At the end of a narrow, unadorned concrete tunnel a lift labeled “Authorized Personnel Only” yawned obediently when presented with the proper card by Hafas. It conveyed them smoothly and rapidly upward. The lift door was one-way lucid, enabling the passengers to see out while screening them from anyone on the floors they skipped.
They passed levels crammed with vehicles, both commercial and personal, before slowing to a stop opposite another tunnel. This one was slightly wider and higher than the first and had been painted a bright, cheerful green.
“Twenty-five parking levels,” Hafas informed them as they reached the end of the corridor. “JeP is the busiest Port Authority in the Southwest.” He carded another door.
They exited into a cavernous structure frantic with self-propelled packages, containers, humans on foot, mechanicals on trackballs and wheels and treads, and noisy conveyors. Nowhere could a human or machine be seen standing idle. Intent and purpose were evident in their every move. There was an organized desperation to the activity that suggested an anthill preparing for the onset of winter.
