Antigua lowered the tall, tapered glass. “Life ees not healthy, sonny. Living can be dangerous to your health. But you are not old enough to know that.”

“You might be surprised.”

“It would not bee the first time.” Swaying slightly, he focused on the gleaming Minder, started to say something, then lost the thought. “I did not expeect company. What can thees poor withering quasi-corpse do for you surprising people? I can teel thet you are not the kind to frequeent a place like the Pissers, nor the type to barge into another man’s booth in search of free booze. You sought me out for a purpose. Geet to it.”

Manz couldn’t keep from grinning. Drunk or not, the old geezer was as sharp as a pimp’s perception. “Okay, here it is. A number of years ago you worked for a company called Borgia, in their secret research and development program.”

Antigua swallowed something bright green. “Seence you are so sure there eesn’t much point in my trying to deny it.”

“Information that has come into my possession leads me to believe that your departure from the company was other than voluntary.”

“Voluntary!” The old man slammed the beaker of jade fluid down onto the table. “Freend human and automaton, I was sacked! Deposed, removed, pushed out, seent packing forthwith! Unjustly, too, I says. Beest goddamn freelancer those corpocorpro squeents ever had working for them. And they got reed of me.” As he subsided, his expression turned crafty. “Sort of.”

Manz felt a stirring inside. It might have been his lunch, or … “Sort of? You didn’t choose to contest the termination. If you felt you had a legitimate grievance, the Brotherhood would’ve backed you.”

“Peerdition’s apogee they would have! But why go and make a lot of trouble for everybody, I says? The Cardinal turned out to be a seensible man. Put me on a nice peension, weeth bonuses for good behavior. All I had to do was go quietly, and stay quiet, and not make awkward noises. It’s worked out not too badly, I says. Anyone bothers with me, all I have to do is contact Mr. Monticelli and he takes care of it for me. Sometimes you have to work hard at doing nothing at all, but most of the time it’s easy. I got no complaints about the business end of our arrangement, no.” He cradled a beaker. “It’s only thet sometimes my sleep is troubled.”

Smiling ingratiatingly, Manz leaned forward. “You make it sound more like you were promoted than fired. I wonder why a suave hardass like Monticelli’s being so nice to you? It just doesn’t stand to reason that he’d fire you only so he could support you.”

“Reeson? You want reesons?” Antigua stared into his drink as if searching there for … something. “Hard to sleep,” he mumbled. Manz was afraid he was going to black out, but he underestimated the oldster. The ex-spacer was only warming up.

“You’re a gravmav like most everyone, but I don’t hold it ageenst ye.”

“Thanks,” Manz replied carefully. To the Minder he whispered, “Record.” The sphere rotated and dipped a little lower.

“Got any idea where Ceti ees?”

The Minder responded. It was quite capable of performing more than one function at a time. “Far out. Empty space. Unexplored volume.”

“The heel it ees.” Antigua chuckled. “I been there. Found a seestem, I deed. With two … two, mind ye … inhabitable planets.” His eyes glazed over as he stared into the past. “Eighteen months out, thet first run took. Eighteen months back. Three years out of my life, deepsleep notwithstanding. And I deed it solo.”

“Two new inhabitable worlds,” Manz murmured softly. “That’s a discovery worth keeping quiet, all right.”

“It is also a serious violation of the general law,” Moses added.

Manz shot the mechanical a warning glance as Antigua blinked uncertainly. Either the old man finally decided he didn’t give a damn who they were working for, or else the liquor had loosened his tongue from his brain.

“You beet it ees,” he muttered jovially. “Teel you something else, too.” He leaned over the table and looked around with exaggerated caution. “Thet fourth planet, the second of the inhabitables? Damn me for dark matter if it deedn’t have sentient life. Native sentient life! Aliens, they were. Almost as smart as we are in some ways, but preety stupid een others.”

Manz did a yeoman’s job of concealing his reaction. If the old man wasn’t making it all up, then he was being paid in booze to sit on the most important discovery of the past century. The adjuster prided himself on his ability to maintain a poker face in light of the most astonishing revelations, but this one was so unexpected and extraordinary he nearly had to excuse himself.

He did not, only because, discovery of the century or no, he was still being paid to do a particular job, and in addition to other attributes Manz had always possessed a considerable amount of employee loyalty. Revelation could come later, following confirmation. All he had right now was an outrageous old man’s equally outrageous story.

Hadn’t he heard somewhere that spacers never lie? When one has traversed the firmament, it must suddenly seem a foolish waste of effort to maintain the superstructure of half-lies and untruths that passed for everyday existence.

He did, however, finish the rest of his own drink. If true, Antigua’s revelation was far more important than any information he and Moses had come seeking.

“That would be the first-ever contact with an intelligent nonhuman life-form. You could be famous on several worlds, Kohler.”

“Fame!” The old man spat to his left. “You can’t eat fame, sonny, and at my age I don’t particularly feel the need for it. I do all right. Like I says, Mr. Monticelli and hees people are fair by me. How else could someone like me afford to come to a place like thees, much less eat and drink here? All they ask is that I let them break the news in their own time. They know they can’t keep it a secret forever. They just want to be sure it’s done proper and right.”

“And that they profit to the maximum from it while they can,” Manz added.

“Weel, sure,” replied Antigua challengingly. “Nothing wrong weeth thet. Mr. Monticelli, he says too, thet when the news is released I’ll be geeven proper credit as the deescoverer even though I was working for the company at the time.”

It made some sense to Manz now. “Any idea how much longer they’re going to wait before they release the news to the media?”

Antigua shrugged. “Preety soon, I understand. Not that I’m in any hurry. I’m having the time of my life, except for where I’m leeving. Thet will all change too when the news is let out. So why should an old man like me make waves? I would just as soon wait, like they ask me nicely to do.”

“You says,” Manz murmured.

“Yes; I says.” Antigua smiled, confident that he’d done right and nothing was amiss. “It weel be interesting when people find out. Those folk on thet fourth planet of Ceti, they are peculiar. Not unfriendly; far from it. Just deeferent, they are. Reel deeferent.” Again his eyes misted over. He was remembering …

The lander dropped like a stone toward the green planet. Preliminary readouts suggested an Earth-type world, with close to the same convivial proportions of water, oxygen, nitrogen, and gravity. Scans indicated there was nothing likely to fry him if he decided to go for a stroll. It didn’t take him long to make up his mind. He’d been in space for a year and a half.

“Not a watering hole in sight.” Since there was no one else on board and the attitude of the company-programmed mechanicals was relentlessly prosaic, Antigua had developed the habit of talking to himself. It wasn’t too bad, so long as the arguments didn’t get too violent.

The orbiting scout drone the ship had released immediately upon arrival topoed small north and south polar caps, a lot of interesting islands, some northerly tundralike plains, and a lot of ocean. About half this world, provisionally dubbed Ceti Four by the ship’s built-in Minder, was water. The rest appeared to be covered with forest and jungle.

As the lander roughly kicked atmosphere, Antigua winced and tried to snug deeper into his seat. With each skip he dropped another hundred kilometers closer to touchdown.

The actual landing wasn’t as precise as it would have been had a human pilot been handling the lander’s controls, but everything (including Antigua) arrived in one piece. He was no pilot. Though his official designation was grander, in reality he was a glorified caretaker, included in the inventory as a last-resort backup for the expensive and wholly competent mechanicals. It was also his job to deal with unforeseen circumstances and unexpected developments. The discovery of two inhabitable worlds more than qualified.

Impossible to think of commencing the long, dull journey homeward without embarking on a modest exploration of both globes. The first was interesting enough, but Ceti Four, with its forests and intense alien vegetation, held forth the promise of endless fascination.

Releasing himself, Antigua headed not for the airlock but for storage, intending to fortify himself before starting out. Once prepared, he moved to the large oval port and proceeded to give the alien surface its first in-person once-over.

As expected, there was no alien band or chorus line of half-naked girls waving banners proclaiming “Welcome to Ceti Four” or “Kohler Antigua for Premier!” He sighed. Anyone who thought deep-space exploration was glamorous or gravid with romance had never spent time in deepsleep. Though alive with promise for future development beyond the dreams of the expedition’s underwriters, to the incredibly bored Antigua it was just one more chunk of dirt orbiting yet another unfamiliar and unfeeling star.

Six months earlier, during one of his scheduled deepsleep breaks, he’d vowed that this trip would be his last. He’d spent entirely too much of his life in sleep coffins, isolated from the rest of humanity. Money or not, he’d ground himself permanently as soon as he returned from this trip. It would be good to go out on a high note. Two inhabitable worlds! Borgia's stockholders would be ecstatic, and his homely puss would be splashed all over the media. Maybe fame would finally enable him to meet a good woman. Nothing else ever had.

He was also looking forward to making the acquaintance of some aged scotch that hadn’t cycled through his body several times.

For all his melancholy (an occupational hazard of deepspace travel), Antigua was fully alert and ready for whatever might come. Sophisticated automation and expensive mechanicals couldn’t protect a fool, and he was no fool. Despite the ship’s assurances he manually double-checked the atmospheric analysis, searching for potentially dangerous variables, and rechecked the contents of the biomicrograph. If the forest outside the lander was frantic with inimical spores, he wanted to know about it before he cracked the lock and took any deep breaths.

Even when he was confident it was safe, he still made his preliminary excursion encased in a seal-suit. Perversely, the possibility of encountering something larger than himself didn’t worry him. It was the bugs and microorganisms that he was concerned about. It wasn’t the creatures that could rip off your clothes you had to fear. It was the ones that could sneak up your pants.

He went for a stroll around the lander, inspecting its exterior and underside, enjoying the springy turf underfoot. He also kept throwing glances over his shoulder. That was understandable, considering how much time he’d spent in free space. Still, something about the landscape troubled him.

It took him three days to realize what it was. Though attractive and full of color, it was too regular, almost gardenlike. As if it were regularly trimmed or weeded by unseen attendants.

He was outside collecting specimens for Borgia’s R&D department when something made him straighten and turn. The small pistol that was his only defense against theoretical hostile life-forms felt inadequate in his fist.

There was a definite rustling in the forest, and not from the insignificant breeze. Shakily, he pointed the tiny weapon. “All right,” he said, not knowing what else to do, “you in there! Come on out. I’m Kohler Antigua, a freend from another world. You understand ‘another world’? You understand ‘freend’?” He swallowed. “Understand anything?”

Thees is crazy, he told himself. There’s nothing here. Time to reembrace the comfort of deepsleep, where worries and creeping insanity were automatically banished by monitors and drugs.

Though nothing appeared or responded, if anything the disturbance intensified.