THE FIRST SERVANT
CHAPTER 1
The ruler is the First Servant of the State—Frederick, The Great
The City of Castor, 6713 CE
The adventure began when my partner in our struggling little news agency, Portice Wilson, burst into the office clutching a press release fresh off the ticker tape.
“There’s been a discovery at the Lorian site.”
Startled by the abrupt entry, I swung around, spilling coffee on the desk top. “My dear Portice, what matter of importance could issue from that poor jinxed project?”
His breathless exposition scattered the tranquility of the brief period between first arrival and commencement of the work day.
To demonstrate the sanctity of the morning routine, I ignored the paper strip dangling from Portice’s hand and peered out the window to follow the path of a balloon floating like a two hundred pesa long sausage across a cloudless sky. A thin plume of gray smoke trailed from the stack of the craft’s boiler at the rear of the gondola. Then with skepticism, I faced my diminutive friend, who in words attributed to the mythical playwright Shakespeare was often much ado about nothing.
“Look Baden, I think they’ve hit on something.” He presented the tape.
“Not another ‘Second gunman at the KGL assassination’, I hope. We’re History’s Discoveries and not the tabloid conspiracy production company upstairs.” An extra dram of bitterness crept into my tone in remembrance of competitor and fellow tenant, Conspiracy Theories, had beaten us in the last audience popularity competition.
I read aloud from the strip. “Mistress Amber Deland predicts an imminent breakthrough in the search for artifacts of Lorian culture.” I paused, raising a skeptical stare. “She’s related to Darius Deland?”
“Yes, his daughter, also an anthropologist. One of those suffragettes you fancy. When the father took leave of the project last year for health reasons, she stepped into his place. He dedicated his life to the excavation with nothing to show for his efforts but a few engravings on scraps of a material no chemist could identify.”
I resumed reading. “Discovery of a hitherto hidden chamber leads to expectation of a major breakthrough in the diggings, now into its twenty-fifth year.” I put the tape aside. The paper ribbon contracted into a tightly coiled spiral on the desk top. “Will this be another discovery, based more in hopes and wishes than hard science?”
“True statements when the old man held the helm, but since she took over, the imaginative claims have stopped. This is her first release.” Portice paused and added with a crafty tone, “Besides, she’s easy on the eyes. That has to be worth something.”
Photographs came to mind of a slim yellow-haired woman with gray eyes, hawkish in their intensity like a man’s. The eye color may have suffered the vicissitudes of inaccurate photographic transmission, but nothing could corrupt the fairness of her hair. “An excavation is not a fitting place for a female, even an enlightened one.” The circumstances surrounding Amber Deland continued to fill in. “Besides, doesn’t Klaus Dudley have her under a ring?”
“Yes, they announced the marriage banns last month. A winter wedding, it will be.”
I pictured the unlikely pairing of Klaus Dudley—one of the class of entrepreneurs made rich by the war recently ended—with Amber Deland. “I wonder how the old professor pulled the match off, with the Regional Minister no less.”
A twinkle of green eye preceded Portice’s chuckle. “Not hard to figure out. Remember, Darius is old money. Dudley has wealth but, despite the recent election to RM, not the name. On the other side, I suspect the Deland fortune is running low. I can guarantee, somewhere in the marriage contract is an agreement to supplement the Lorian dig.”
“No man sympathizes with women’s rights more than I, but there are limits. Forsaking bustle corset and pressed daywear for trousers and coarse shirts ventures beyond my personal tolerance. Furthermore, slacks regardless of the mannish cut, outline limbs to a degree bordering on scandalous.”
“In all fairness, Baden, her options were limited. On what most consider a lark, with only Mica’s epic poem as a guide, her father committed the family fortune to the speculative enterprise. When the professor couldn’t go on, she had no husband or male blood relatives to step in.”
“From what I hear, I can certainly understand why there’s no spouse.” Again, I gathered an image of the stark, but handsome, clean-featured face, familiar to the media outlets. Imposing but also hard to forget.
Portice nodded. “I’m sure the sharp tongue has scared off more than a few suitors.”
“Well, apparently she hit the lottery with Dudley, although I don’t know how long he’ll put up with her notorious behavior.”
A lascivious grin and arch of eyebrow filled Portice’s countenance. “Most likely, he’ll tape her mouth shut. Heaven knows, no fault can be found from the neck down.”
After snickering in agreement, I pictured the Spring/Winter pairing. “Miss Deland may not be a cinema beauty but is more than a middle-aged, ruthless capitalist like Dudley deserves.” For a moment I pitied the young bride to be.
An elaborately curved brown moustache, adorned by scented waxed pomades, twitched in the round face when Portice responded. “This is all fun to speculate upon, but puts no bread on the table.” He stretched the tape to the point I stopped reading. “I’ve been following the project. She may be a mite hard to live with, but she’s thorough and competent.”
My lips flattened to a scowl. “Being thorough or competent, or even correct serves no purpose. She’s too disliked within her profession for anyone to render a fair listen.”
Portice’s retort stung. “It was only a single outburst at the Antiquities Convention. Understandable considering the revelations made recently before regarding her father’s health. Besides, for objective newsmen, likability shouldn’t matter.”
Inside, I shrank away from a point well made and changed the subject. “Sounds like someone has a crush.”
“Not likely, with a wife and three kids. The divorce courts would have me in the work house should I try to ditch them.” Portice’s eyes cut craftily toward me. “You on the other hand are an eligible bachelor. Act with dispatch and you could challenge the banns.”
A vision of the mercurial Amber came to mind, and I snorted. “Yeah right, when cattle learn to fly.”
As if on cue, a cargo airship carrying a load of livestock floated by. Both of us remained silent until the portentous appearance faded into the morning haze. My partner spoke first. “Given the elder Deland’s penchant for crying wolf in the past, we’ll probably be the only group there.”
I weighed the prospects of a potential exclusive against the growing pile of bills and financial obligations the company faced. Little doubt existed of which would prevail. “All right, while you gather a crew I’ll arrange for a dirigible. We’ll need a cameraman and a couple of interns.”
“Shall I bring along Bruce for narration, and Sara to do make-up? You know, for file footage in case we decide on producing a story?”
I chuckled, putting away considerations s of bankruptcy. “You are being the optimist. Sure, why not?”
Once we decided on the project, I put the crew on a fast schedule. Sensowitz, my mentor, often joked of raising the urinals by six centipesas to maintain the staff on their toes. In such a spirit, I set a pace to keep everyone breathing hard and undistracted. Soon, the complement trundled to the roof of our broadcast studio, carrying cameras, microphones, and whatever paraphernalia needed for program recording.
We quit the office steps ahead of the property manager’s agent come to collect the week’s rent.
Portice pointed skyward. “There’s the vessel.”
A crosswind worried the cumbersome inflatable. The propeller blades hammered the air like mechanical eggbeaters. Eventually, the craft’s shadow hung overhead. A crew of line handlers rushed to anchor the unwieldy conveyance as it settled on the pad. An advertisement featuring our rival’s logo Conspiracy Theories in pesa high red calligraphy rippled on the helium-filled, canvas flank. Even the mocking irony of our rival’s signage couldn’t dull the building interest among our crew.
“If nothing else, we’ll have respite from the coal dust.” Portice said.
“We’ll have more than that, I think.” Once freed of the earlier inertia, my thoughts became like a predator on the hunt after the most elusive of all prey for journalists, an exclusive story. From the corner of an eye, I spied Portice’s self-satisfied aura of vindication.
“You’re clear to board Mister Cartwright,” the chief line handler said to me.
“Do you think we have enough batteries?” I asked at one point. “There’ll be no surplus electricity at the site.” At the Lorian dig, coal-burning generators produced direct current to meet local needs with nothing to spare.
My partner ran his finger down the list. “Enough for six hours.”
An intern hefted the box full of supplies into the baggage compartment. “If only the alchemists and metaphysicians had been correct,” I said.
“What do you mean?”
“Remember the piece we did on the history of attempts to discover alternating electric current and volatile liquid fuels? Items the Lorians, according to Mica, mastered and produced in abundance.” From our ten-story vantage, I gazed across the skyline of Castor, the regional capital of the republic. On the street below, steam-powered carriages, accompanied by the occasional horse drawn, filled the broad avenue. “For a thousand years, the best minds of our culture have dedicated significant efforts, to no avail,” I continued.
Before Portice answered, we both paused to once again observe the varying conveyances in their transport of the city’s two-hundred-thousand souls to their destinations. “Personally, I think heavier than air flight and tales about Tesla’s electricity are all a myth,” Portice replied. “Still, we can dream, I suppose.”
Floating above the main part of town, a drayage inflatable injudiciously blew tubes. The whole city witnessed the thick black exhaust, visible to the horizon. Such a violation wouldn’t go unanswered. Within minutes a sleek police cruiser, powered by counter rotating propellers, rose from a rooftop and caught the offender.
Fascinated by the apprehension, Portice stopped in mid task and gawked, loading his equipment bag only after the authorities led the malefactor off under tow. Upon finishing, he turned to me. “By the way Baden, how tall are you?”
“A hair over two pesas, why?”
“Then you should take the front window seat. It has the most legroom.”
I settled in, as did the others of the entourage. The smallest of us, Sara groused about having to sit in the fold-down jump bench at the rear of the compartment next to the hot boiler. As a show of her displeasure, she took forever to settle her cotton dress and bustle in place. Then we lifted off. Our silent ascent carried the craft above the city. Building spires, little more than silver stilettos, peeked through the ground haze. Only from the perspective of height did the pervasiveness of the semi-opaque blanket become clear. Even with strict emission management, no one braved city streets without an over garment and, for bad days, a pair of goggles. A growing number of medical professionals believed the exhaust, besides being generally oppressive, also posed a threat to health, particularly the lungs.
Bruce Devlin sat in the seat ahead. With a flash of thick white hair and contrasting tanned face he turned from the prompt sheet in his hand and halfway faced me. “Really Baden, this material is as old as the Lorian ruins.” He didn’t face fully backward as doing so nauseated him, a situation familiar to all present.
“Grant me respite, friend. With no notice, this represents the best I could come up with. The information is still accurate.”
Turning more toward the window and farther forward, he assumed his resonant narrator’s voice and read from the sheet of file material. “According to the Alternative Theorists, the Lorian civilization flourished worldwide until a catastrophe of undetermined nature destroyed them. Originally believed to be a universal flood, current research points to eruption of a super volcano blotting out the sun…yadda, yadda, yadda.”
“So what’s the problem?” I asked.
“At least let me dump the bit regarding the calendar.”
From the rear, Sara contributed her tidbit of knowledge. “The only thing everyone agrees that came down to us intact is the system of charting time. No report is complete without mention of it.” I turned as she crossed legs with a glimpse of prim ankle Portice couldn’t take his eyes from.
A worn and stained logbook hanging over the master’s steering console served as a crude day planner. Five pages, torn away, reminded me almost half of 6713 C.E. had passed.
Portice interjected reality into my musing. “When we mention a particular year, do we refer to it as the Common Era or the Christian Era?”
Sara’s whiney voice trickled in above the rhythmic pull and whoosh of the pistons. “I vote for the Christian one.” No surprise, the silver crucifix lying on the lace of her bodice advertised the expressed preference.
Bruce sucked in a contentiously-toned gasp. “The Hamm Standards won’t allow it.”
I drew away from the group, pressing against the window glass. “I understand the Censor Board’s policy. Bruce will use the term Common Era exclusively.” I’d had my rounds with them before. Once sufficed.
With nothing more to discuss until we arrived at the site, I settled back to enjoy the rest of the ride. Approaching from behind, the passenger express from Castor to the seacoast town of Pollio chugged away. The festively-colored mechanism passed so close I could make out the features of the riders beyond the line of round glass portals running the length of the cabin.
Our helmsman guided the balloon through the airspace with exceptional precision, following the Simi River downstream for nearly two hours.
“The runoff from half a continent flows through an intricate network of tributaries to this broad waterway, and then to the sea.” Bruce explained for Sara’s benefit.
Below, ships, some larger than cargo blimps, plied the tannish water. Their tilted back funnels emitted a pale gray haze, indicative of efficient burning. A few possessed sails. The prevailing winds expanded the canvas to brilliant white bags against the black decks and hulls. The vessels moving in our direction fell behind. In time, they’d make their way to destinations ringing the sea or even across the ocean.
“Look, there’s the lake,” Sara cried out.
Every eye of our crew turned to the tan oval of shallow water stretching to the horizon. The ruins lay between the south shore and a bend in the Simi. Ten freighters placed end to end wouldn’t span the mighty river. A steady hiss from outside indicated the venting of helium, the beginning of a descent.
A cluster of ash-colored pinnacles rose from the surrounding countryside. The scale of the fragmented ruins dwarfed, by several times, the tallest buildings back in town. These were the remains the Delands jousted with most of their professional community over.
Around the site, various shades of verdancy covered the ground except for the precise gridded excavations. We had descended to less than fifty pesas. With heavy slipping sounds, the mooring lines deployed from their reels along the gondola’s length. On the open land below, twenty men scrambled to make us fast for the reel-in.
I surveyed a field devoid of competing agencies and turned to Portice. “You were right. We’re the only ones here.” Then a glint of gold among the small knot of spectators captured my attention. Focusing on the source revealed a young woman dressed in khakis and hiking boots. She stood legs akimbo and in vivid outline, wearing the kind of expression to go with the arrival of trouble rather potential assistance to a threadbare cause. Her stare never left our descent.
Portice announced, “See, I told you she wasn’t hard on the eyes.”
I concentrated on the clean-featured face. The reflection of the gold barrette, our observer’s only concession to personal adornment, caught my eye during descent.
“With a little help from me, she could be quite beautiful.” Sara craned her neck to get a better view of the young anthropologist, now crowding the line handlers and standing as close as safety permitted. “Oh God, are those blonde streaks?” The cosmetician gasped aloud.
“She’ll make no points with Emma Pelage,” the cameraman added. Emma represented the final authority on matters of correct style and etiquette, in this part of the world at least. I shuddered to think what her opinion on the slacks might be, but suspected such judgments would mean nothing to the intense, young woman who waited below.
With a jolt almost hard enough to knock teeth fillings loose, the gondola struck ground.
Bruce inquired after Sara’s yelp upon impact. “Are you all right?”
“Yes, but if we record anything, you’re going to have to make do with cinnamon-brown lip gloss. The crimson one spilled all over the floor.” Shades of red showed best on black and white broadcasts.
Amber Deland bore down on us, raising small clouds of dust behind with each step. She clattered up the ladder and met us in the compartment. The photographs did not do her justice. I had thought her eyes were smoky gray. In her person, I learned them to be of such a blue as I can only compare to the color of the seas around Pollio in full sunlight, and the contrasting lightness of her hair compounded the effect. “You must be Baden Cartwright.” She extended a work hardened hand, a healthy tan like every exposed part of her. The strong grip didn’t surprise me.
“Yes, and please call me Baden. I brought a crew, even a narrator.”
“I expected no less. You may call me Amber.”
“There’s been a discovery at the Lorian site.”
Startled by the abrupt entry, I swung around, spilling coffee on the desk top. “My dear Portice, what matter of importance could issue from that poor jinxed project?”
His breathless exposition scattered the tranquility of the brief period between first arrival and commencement of the work day.
To demonstrate the sanctity of the morning routine, I ignored the paper strip dangling from Portice’s hand and peered out the window to follow the path of a balloon floating like a two hundred pesa long sausage across a cloudless sky. A thin plume of gray smoke trailed from the stack of the craft’s boiler at the rear of the gondola. Then with skepticism, I faced my diminutive friend, who in words attributed to the mythical playwright Shakespeare was often much ado about nothing.
“Look Baden, I think they’ve hit on something.” He presented the tape.
“Not another ‘Second gunman at the KGL assassination’, I hope. We’re History’s Discoveries and not the tabloid conspiracy production company upstairs.” An extra dram of bitterness crept into my tone in remembrance of competitor and fellow tenant, Conspiracy Theories, had beaten us in the last audience popularity competition.
I read aloud from the strip. “Mistress Amber Deland predicts an imminent breakthrough in the search for artifacts of Lorian culture.” I paused, raising a skeptical stare. “She’s related to Darius Deland?”
“Yes, his daughter, also an anthropologist. One of those suffragettes you fancy. When the father took leave of the project last year for health reasons, she stepped into his place. He dedicated his life to the excavation with nothing to show for his efforts but a few engravings on scraps of a material no chemist could identify.”
I resumed reading. “Discovery of a hitherto hidden chamber leads to expectation of a major breakthrough in the diggings, now into its twenty-fifth year.” I put the tape aside. The paper ribbon contracted into a tightly coiled spiral on the desk top. “Will this be another discovery, based more in hopes and wishes than hard science?”
“True statements when the old man held the helm, but since she took over, the imaginative claims have stopped. This is her first release.” Portice paused and added with a crafty tone, “Besides, she’s easy on the eyes. That has to be worth something.”
Photographs came to mind of a slim yellow-haired woman with gray eyes, hawkish in their intensity like a man’s. The eye color may have suffered the vicissitudes of inaccurate photographic transmission, but nothing could corrupt the fairness of her hair. “An excavation is not a fitting place for a female, even an enlightened one.” The circumstances surrounding Amber Deland continued to fill in. “Besides, doesn’t Klaus Dudley have her under a ring?”
“Yes, they announced the marriage banns last month. A winter wedding, it will be.”
I pictured the unlikely pairing of Klaus Dudley—one of the class of entrepreneurs made rich by the war recently ended—with Amber Deland. “I wonder how the old professor pulled the match off, with the Regional Minister no less.”
A twinkle of green eye preceded Portice’s chuckle. “Not hard to figure out. Remember, Darius is old money. Dudley has wealth but, despite the recent election to RM, not the name. On the other side, I suspect the Deland fortune is running low. I can guarantee, somewhere in the marriage contract is an agreement to supplement the Lorian dig.”
“No man sympathizes with women’s rights more than I, but there are limits. Forsaking bustle corset and pressed daywear for trousers and coarse shirts ventures beyond my personal tolerance. Furthermore, slacks regardless of the mannish cut, outline limbs to a degree bordering on scandalous.”
“In all fairness, Baden, her options were limited. On what most consider a lark, with only Mica’s epic poem as a guide, her father committed the family fortune to the speculative enterprise. When the professor couldn’t go on, she had no husband or male blood relatives to step in.”
“From what I hear, I can certainly understand why there’s no spouse.” Again, I gathered an image of the stark, but handsome, clean-featured face, familiar to the media outlets. Imposing but also hard to forget.
Portice nodded. “I’m sure the sharp tongue has scared off more than a few suitors.”
“Well, apparently she hit the lottery with Dudley, although I don’t know how long he’ll put up with her notorious behavior.”
A lascivious grin and arch of eyebrow filled Portice’s countenance. “Most likely, he’ll tape her mouth shut. Heaven knows, no fault can be found from the neck down.”
After snickering in agreement, I pictured the Spring/Winter pairing. “Miss Deland may not be a cinema beauty but is more than a middle-aged, ruthless capitalist like Dudley deserves.” For a moment I pitied the young bride to be.
An elaborately curved brown moustache, adorned by scented waxed pomades, twitched in the round face when Portice responded. “This is all fun to speculate upon, but puts no bread on the table.” He stretched the tape to the point I stopped reading. “I’ve been following the project. She may be a mite hard to live with, but she’s thorough and competent.”
My lips flattened to a scowl. “Being thorough or competent, or even correct serves no purpose. She’s too disliked within her profession for anyone to render a fair listen.”
Portice’s retort stung. “It was only a single outburst at the Antiquities Convention. Understandable considering the revelations made recently before regarding her father’s health. Besides, for objective newsmen, likability shouldn’t matter.”
Inside, I shrank away from a point well made and changed the subject. “Sounds like someone has a crush.”
“Not likely, with a wife and three kids. The divorce courts would have me in the work house should I try to ditch them.” Portice’s eyes cut craftily toward me. “You on the other hand are an eligible bachelor. Act with dispatch and you could challenge the banns.”
A vision of the mercurial Amber came to mind, and I snorted. “Yeah right, when cattle learn to fly.”
As if on cue, a cargo airship carrying a load of livestock floated by. Both of us remained silent until the portentous appearance faded into the morning haze. My partner spoke first. “Given the elder Deland’s penchant for crying wolf in the past, we’ll probably be the only group there.”
I weighed the prospects of a potential exclusive against the growing pile of bills and financial obligations the company faced. Little doubt existed of which would prevail. “All right, while you gather a crew I’ll arrange for a dirigible. We’ll need a cameraman and a couple of interns.”
“Shall I bring along Bruce for narration, and Sara to do make-up? You know, for file footage in case we decide on producing a story?”
I chuckled, putting away considerations s of bankruptcy. “You are being the optimist. Sure, why not?”
Once we decided on the project, I put the crew on a fast schedule. Sensowitz, my mentor, often joked of raising the urinals by six centipesas to maintain the staff on their toes. In such a spirit, I set a pace to keep everyone breathing hard and undistracted. Soon, the complement trundled to the roof of our broadcast studio, carrying cameras, microphones, and whatever paraphernalia needed for program recording.
We quit the office steps ahead of the property manager’s agent come to collect the week’s rent.
Portice pointed skyward. “There’s the vessel.”
A crosswind worried the cumbersome inflatable. The propeller blades hammered the air like mechanical eggbeaters. Eventually, the craft’s shadow hung overhead. A crew of line handlers rushed to anchor the unwieldy conveyance as it settled on the pad. An advertisement featuring our rival’s logo Conspiracy Theories in pesa high red calligraphy rippled on the helium-filled, canvas flank. Even the mocking irony of our rival’s signage couldn’t dull the building interest among our crew.
“If nothing else, we’ll have respite from the coal dust.” Portice said.
“We’ll have more than that, I think.” Once freed of the earlier inertia, my thoughts became like a predator on the hunt after the most elusive of all prey for journalists, an exclusive story. From the corner of an eye, I spied Portice’s self-satisfied aura of vindication.
“You’re clear to board Mister Cartwright,” the chief line handler said to me.
“Do you think we have enough batteries?” I asked at one point. “There’ll be no surplus electricity at the site.” At the Lorian dig, coal-burning generators produced direct current to meet local needs with nothing to spare.
My partner ran his finger down the list. “Enough for six hours.”
An intern hefted the box full of supplies into the baggage compartment. “If only the alchemists and metaphysicians had been correct,” I said.
“What do you mean?”
“Remember the piece we did on the history of attempts to discover alternating electric current and volatile liquid fuels? Items the Lorians, according to Mica, mastered and produced in abundance.” From our ten-story vantage, I gazed across the skyline of Castor, the regional capital of the republic. On the street below, steam-powered carriages, accompanied by the occasional horse drawn, filled the broad avenue. “For a thousand years, the best minds of our culture have dedicated significant efforts, to no avail,” I continued.
Before Portice answered, we both paused to once again observe the varying conveyances in their transport of the city’s two-hundred-thousand souls to their destinations. “Personally, I think heavier than air flight and tales about Tesla’s electricity are all a myth,” Portice replied. “Still, we can dream, I suppose.”
Floating above the main part of town, a drayage inflatable injudiciously blew tubes. The whole city witnessed the thick black exhaust, visible to the horizon. Such a violation wouldn’t go unanswered. Within minutes a sleek police cruiser, powered by counter rotating propellers, rose from a rooftop and caught the offender.
Fascinated by the apprehension, Portice stopped in mid task and gawked, loading his equipment bag only after the authorities led the malefactor off under tow. Upon finishing, he turned to me. “By the way Baden, how tall are you?”
“A hair over two pesas, why?”
“Then you should take the front window seat. It has the most legroom.”
I settled in, as did the others of the entourage. The smallest of us, Sara groused about having to sit in the fold-down jump bench at the rear of the compartment next to the hot boiler. As a show of her displeasure, she took forever to settle her cotton dress and bustle in place. Then we lifted off. Our silent ascent carried the craft above the city. Building spires, little more than silver stilettos, peeked through the ground haze. Only from the perspective of height did the pervasiveness of the semi-opaque blanket become clear. Even with strict emission management, no one braved city streets without an over garment and, for bad days, a pair of goggles. A growing number of medical professionals believed the exhaust, besides being generally oppressive, also posed a threat to health, particularly the lungs.
Bruce Devlin sat in the seat ahead. With a flash of thick white hair and contrasting tanned face he turned from the prompt sheet in his hand and halfway faced me. “Really Baden, this material is as old as the Lorian ruins.” He didn’t face fully backward as doing so nauseated him, a situation familiar to all present.
“Grant me respite, friend. With no notice, this represents the best I could come up with. The information is still accurate.”
Turning more toward the window and farther forward, he assumed his resonant narrator’s voice and read from the sheet of file material. “According to the Alternative Theorists, the Lorian civilization flourished worldwide until a catastrophe of undetermined nature destroyed them. Originally believed to be a universal flood, current research points to eruption of a super volcano blotting out the sun…yadda, yadda, yadda.”
“So what’s the problem?” I asked.
“At least let me dump the bit regarding the calendar.”
From the rear, Sara contributed her tidbit of knowledge. “The only thing everyone agrees that came down to us intact is the system of charting time. No report is complete without mention of it.” I turned as she crossed legs with a glimpse of prim ankle Portice couldn’t take his eyes from.
A worn and stained logbook hanging over the master’s steering console served as a crude day planner. Five pages, torn away, reminded me almost half of 6713 C.E. had passed.
Portice interjected reality into my musing. “When we mention a particular year, do we refer to it as the Common Era or the Christian Era?”
Sara’s whiney voice trickled in above the rhythmic pull and whoosh of the pistons. “I vote for the Christian one.” No surprise, the silver crucifix lying on the lace of her bodice advertised the expressed preference.
Bruce sucked in a contentiously-toned gasp. “The Hamm Standards won’t allow it.”
I drew away from the group, pressing against the window glass. “I understand the Censor Board’s policy. Bruce will use the term Common Era exclusively.” I’d had my rounds with them before. Once sufficed.
With nothing more to discuss until we arrived at the site, I settled back to enjoy the rest of the ride. Approaching from behind, the passenger express from Castor to the seacoast town of Pollio chugged away. The festively-colored mechanism passed so close I could make out the features of the riders beyond the line of round glass portals running the length of the cabin.
Our helmsman guided the balloon through the airspace with exceptional precision, following the Simi River downstream for nearly two hours.
“The runoff from half a continent flows through an intricate network of tributaries to this broad waterway, and then to the sea.” Bruce explained for Sara’s benefit.
Below, ships, some larger than cargo blimps, plied the tannish water. Their tilted back funnels emitted a pale gray haze, indicative of efficient burning. A few possessed sails. The prevailing winds expanded the canvas to brilliant white bags against the black decks and hulls. The vessels moving in our direction fell behind. In time, they’d make their way to destinations ringing the sea or even across the ocean.
“Look, there’s the lake,” Sara cried out.
Every eye of our crew turned to the tan oval of shallow water stretching to the horizon. The ruins lay between the south shore and a bend in the Simi. Ten freighters placed end to end wouldn’t span the mighty river. A steady hiss from outside indicated the venting of helium, the beginning of a descent.
A cluster of ash-colored pinnacles rose from the surrounding countryside. The scale of the fragmented ruins dwarfed, by several times, the tallest buildings back in town. These were the remains the Delands jousted with most of their professional community over.
Around the site, various shades of verdancy covered the ground except for the precise gridded excavations. We had descended to less than fifty pesas. With heavy slipping sounds, the mooring lines deployed from their reels along the gondola’s length. On the open land below, twenty men scrambled to make us fast for the reel-in.
I surveyed a field devoid of competing agencies and turned to Portice. “You were right. We’re the only ones here.” Then a glint of gold among the small knot of spectators captured my attention. Focusing on the source revealed a young woman dressed in khakis and hiking boots. She stood legs akimbo and in vivid outline, wearing the kind of expression to go with the arrival of trouble rather potential assistance to a threadbare cause. Her stare never left our descent.
Portice announced, “See, I told you she wasn’t hard on the eyes.”
I concentrated on the clean-featured face. The reflection of the gold barrette, our observer’s only concession to personal adornment, caught my eye during descent.
“With a little help from me, she could be quite beautiful.” Sara craned her neck to get a better view of the young anthropologist, now crowding the line handlers and standing as close as safety permitted. “Oh God, are those blonde streaks?” The cosmetician gasped aloud.
“She’ll make no points with Emma Pelage,” the cameraman added. Emma represented the final authority on matters of correct style and etiquette, in this part of the world at least. I shuddered to think what her opinion on the slacks might be, but suspected such judgments would mean nothing to the intense, young woman who waited below.
With a jolt almost hard enough to knock teeth fillings loose, the gondola struck ground.
Bruce inquired after Sara’s yelp upon impact. “Are you all right?”
“Yes, but if we record anything, you’re going to have to make do with cinnamon-brown lip gloss. The crimson one spilled all over the floor.” Shades of red showed best on black and white broadcasts.
Amber Deland bore down on us, raising small clouds of dust behind with each step. She clattered up the ladder and met us in the compartment. The photographs did not do her justice. I had thought her eyes were smoky gray. In her person, I learned them to be of such a blue as I can only compare to the color of the seas around Pollio in full sunlight, and the contrasting lightness of her hair compounded the effect. “You must be Baden Cartwright.” She extended a work hardened hand, a healthy tan like every exposed part of her. The strong grip didn’t surprise me.
“Yes, and please call me Baden. I brought a crew, even a narrator.”
“I expected no less. You may call me Amber.”
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