On Main Street Virtu, the place from which many lesser sites— conference rooms, bowling alleys, boutiques, Roman baths, and skating rinks—could be accessed, Link Crain wandered, looking for a birthday present for her mother. The street was pleasantly crowded, designed for browsing anonymously without risking a sensation of claustrophobia.
Stopping where a sidewalk vender had spread out a blanket displaying a variety of African pots and carved wooden fetishes, Link examined the wares. Intellectually, she knew that these were just scanned images of pieces that were no doubt stacked and crated in a warehouse in Verite, but the illusion was convincing. She could feel the roughness of the glaze on the piece she held, see the whorl of the potter’s fingerprints partially preserved in the clay. The mixture of artistry and error would appeal to Lydia, who never ceased to note that medicine was an art, not a science.
As Link set the pot down and reached for another, she noticed a neat stack of tee-shirts off to one side. The plain white fabric was printed with a slogan in square black letters. Glancing at the vendor, Link removed a shirt from the stack and shook it out. The words read: “Ginger Rogers Did Everything That Fred Astaire Did, Only She Did It Backwards And In High Heels.” On the back of the shirt was a simple, Art Deco style drawing of a man and a woman waltzing.
“What’s this?” Link asked.
“It’s a tee-shirt,” the vendor said, helpfully. “That slogan is very popular right now.”
He gestured, and following his motion, Link noticed that several of the people sauntering along the sidewalk wore them as did many of the sidewalk vendors.
“What do they cost?”
“It’s cheap for a copyrighted product,” the vender replied. “Ten eft for Virtu, fifteen for hardcopy in Verite—the shirt is a hundred percent preshrunk cotton.”
Her reporter’s senses alert to a possible story—pieces about fads and trends always sold well, especially if the writer could anticipate (and thus, to some extent, create) the fad.
“I’ll take one of each,” Link said. “Is that first pot I was looking at a unique item?”
“Of course, sir. As my sign says, everything here is handmade in one of the West African nations.”
“I’ll take that pot, then.”
“One pot and two shirts. A pleasure doing business with you, sir. Do you wish to wear your virt shirt now?”
“No, just send the license and software along to the same address as you’re sending the hard goods.”
“Very good. Have a good afternoon.”
“You, too.”
Link strolled on. She saw more of the tee-shirts as she walked. Impulsively, she hit her recall. Obviously, there was no time to be lost if she wanted to file this story first.
His brain a cloud of fury, Sayjak beat Svut with a branch he had torn from a nearby tree. Mechanically his arm rose and fell; Svut crumpled. As quickly as his fury had arisen, it faded. Sayjak glared at the assembled band of the People.
“Anyone else have problem with what I say we do?”
Heads (bullet-shaped, round like coconuts, furred, balding, broad-nosed, narrow-eyed, thin-lipped or full, all the varieties of the People) shook in frantic denial. Sayjak hardly recalled what Svut had said to put him into such a temper, but he knew that the underling had dared challenge what Sayjak—Boss of Bosses, greater even than old Karak—had commanded. Now Svut whimpered on the ground, leaking blood and piss. Two of his friends, Hoga and Congo, had crept forward and were looking to Sayjak for permission to drag him away and possibly mend him. Regally, Sayjak nodded.
“We go now,” he said, “out of the jungle, across to another jungle. We beat up all the creatures there. Take their jungle. Live there for a while.”
(Sayjak remembered now what Svut had said. He had asked what was wrong with their jungle. The eeksies and the bounties did not dare come into the People’s territory anymore. Sayjak felt a return of the red fury when he recalled the question.)
The war band leapt into the tree branches heading in the direction Sayjak had indicated. Many carried machetes, others carried clubs. A few shes too small to fight, their fur honey brown and lit with a golden light, carried hollow logs that made good drums. These they hit against tree trunks or pounded on with rocks or other sticks. The pounding could not be called music, but it did awaken battle fury in the fighters. Sometimes Sayjak wondered where they had gotten the idea; most of the time it did not occur to him to wonder.
He knew, however, when they had reached the jungle that was not their jungle. The tree limbs felt the same under his hands, but the wind was not so friendly.
“Watch now. Enemies come soon.”
Grunts answered his warning. The People moved on more cautiously. Sayjak had no idea what their goal was, only that he would know it when they had reached it. So they moved on, killing everything that they encountered, everything that they could reach. Sayjak himself pulled a long-tailed bird from the air as it fluttered in panic from its nest. Its bones crunched nicely and it made a refreshing snack.
They met the first organized resistance to their progress in an open space near the banks of a stream. When the People dropped from the branches of the trees to ford the water, two-headed, long-necked lizards erupted from the pebbly ground near the water. Although they were small, they were ferocious. Two of the People were killed outright, others wounded before Sayjak had an insight into how the lizards would be best slain.
“Rip ‘em like wishbones,” he hollered, demonstrating by grabbing a lizard so that he clamped both sets of jaws closed. Then he pulled outward, one hand on each head. The lizard split down the middle, revealing that it possessed two backbones—a nicety of design Sayjak was not equipped to appreciate.
The young shes began pounding their drums. A scream reverberated through the still air. Battle was joined. The People surged forward. To a watching eye, they glowed with a faint, golden light. Sayjak glowed more brightly than any other.
In his grove at the heart of his site, Markon received a most unwelcome visitor. Full-breasted, round-bellied, nude except for a great fall of dark green hair, she had appeared in his private realm uninvited. Reluctantly, Markon left his creatures to fend for themselves.
Virginia Tallent (who had refused to depart Virtu when the assault began) came to his side as he manifested himself in a shape of living stone. She held a Chaos Factor rifle loosely in both hands, its barrel aimed at the intruder’s pregnant abdomen. There could be no doubt in anyone’s mind that the ranger not only knew how to use her weapon, but that she was quite prepared to do so. Although he knew he should not be, Markon felt heartened by her presence.
“Earthma,” he said formally.
“Markon, you know me still, after so long.”
“How could I not? You, I presume, are the force behind this assault?”
“How did you ever guess?”
“The aura of the attackers reeks of sweetened charges. Only one of the dwellers from Highest Meru could continually support such a force within my realm. Tell me. I have rejected all attempts to make me an ally within this brewing war. Why do you assault me? I wish only to remain neutral.”
“You are too powerful to be permitted neutrality, Markon. I have decided that if you do not ally yourself with me, you shall be destroyed so that you cannot side with one of the others.”
The stone shape flared with a living green fire that made Earthma’s hair look as thick and flat as algae by comparison. Virginia Tallent steadied her rifle. Earthma did not alter her position by as much as a step.