Austin had done no better than the previous generation, the business rags told Kea. He had been reluctant to newbroom the greedheads out of the holding corporations until almost too late. Then he had decided there was a far brighter future transporting people instead of commerce from world to world, and had a quarter of the Bargeta fleet converted to liners, just as a medium-size recession had cycled through the Solar System. Austin had proudly and personally bid on new transport routes, routes that thus far had failed to be profitable. Kea laughed quietly then, a sort of laugh Bargeta senior would have found familiar.
Now, as to Austin himself. Covenanted, naturally. To an ex-poser, Ms. Smiling Breasts of a few years back. Two children. Mansions. Travel. Philanthropy. Ratchetaratcheta, Kea thought. Where's the dirt. Ah. Austin travels alone a lot. With his staff. Richards squinted at the holo showing Bargeta and staff boarding a spaceship. Even with the retouch, it appeared that Austin considered eye appeal a definite factor in his choice of advisers. There was more explicit gossip, and even some holos, in the sleazier and less controllable tabs.
That was enough. Kea placed the call. Austin was thrilled. Delighted his old friend, his roommate, the man who had taught him everything, would take the time. They must get together. What's the matter with tomorrow? Kea wondered, deliberately pushing it Oh, well, there was this meeting. Stuffy, dull, but you know, I must wave the banner and look concerned, make a couple of real Decisions. Take all day. Ah, Kea said. I understand. Let me check the old logbook here (Kea had found that the execs he socialized with loved it when he used nautical terms, terms that no self-respecting swab back of Barrier Thirty-three would have recognized unless he heard them in dialogue on a vid). Oh. Hell, you can't believe how tied up I am, Richards said. He was scheduled, pretty close to fourblocked himself. Let's see here. McLean Institute next week... that thing in New Delhi... plus you know I've been talking to some people about some interesting things I've considered, things that directly came out of what happened Out There. There were some interesting commercial possibilities I'd discussed with the late Doctor Fazlur that seem to be worth developing. But we'll get together. Sometime. Maybe after I put together some venture capital.
Suddenly Austin's meeting was unimportant. Tomorrow it was! Smiling, Kea clicked off, and the smile vanished as quickly as Bargeta's image. All right, you bastard. On my terms this time. And we'll talk about me becoming your Pet Adventurer.
In fact, they talked about a lot of things, over three days, several meals, and many bottles. Everything except Mars. Austin tentatively mentioned Tamara once. She was now married—how old-fashioned—to some transoceanic hovercraft racer five years younger than she was. They were living in the new offshore resort near the Seychelles.
Kea nodded. Hoped that she was quite happy. Be sure and say hello, if you happen to talk to her. And remember the time you got blasted, and we sprayed CALTECH with acid across the Rose Bowl's synthturf just before that stupid groundball match they used to play every Newyear's? Ah yes. Those were the days.
By the end of the marathon session, which Kea's always-sober backbrain labeled as mental coitus interruptus, Richards had a job. The amount, terms, and exact definition of which were undefined. "You know," Austin went on, still in that nasal tone and collegiate slang that Kea had almost forgotten, "we'll let the suits finagle everything after the decimal."
That wasn't exactly how it worked. Two mornings later, Kea showed up at Bargeta Corporate, ready to work. The press, mysteriously tipped the wink, arrived about an hour later for the announcement and a press conference. The negotiations began. They were handled by the same legals who had gotten Kea the sizable advance on his memoirs. Kea had told them to shoot for the stars, and they did. One of the Bargeta Ltd. negotiators had gone, in outrage, to Austin's office. Bargeta wasn't interested in tiddly little numbers and clauses. Make the damned deal. This man is my friend. Besides, he said, after a pause, the media's been talking about how we stole a march on everyone getting him to work for us. Do you want to be the one to say that Bargeta could not afford the universe's biggest hero? Do you? I certainly won't. He stared at the negotiator. The negotiator returned to his office, contacted Richards's attorneys, closed the deal, and sent out his resume.
At first, Austin and Kea traveled together a lot. Austin never got tired of saying that it was just like the old days, and Kea never missed a chance to agree with him. It was going very well, Kea thought after half a year. He was meeting the real movers and shakers.
Plus, he had been able to offer a few real suggestions to Bargeta. Suggestions that were obvious to anyone who didn't live with a solid gold suppository up his bum. Suggestions that'd made Bargeta Ltd. a few million credits. Bargeta was starting to think that he'd made a real bargain adding Kea to his staff—and boasted to his mate that he had always been able to fit the right person for the right peg, and he had seen the worth in Richards years and years ago, back as far as Cal Tech. Now it was time for the next stage. A good swindler always salts the mine with a little real gold. Gold, or whatever valuable the mark will easily recognize. Cal Tech was the salt this time.
Kea hunted down the most respected, most recondite professor on the campus. A double Nobelist. Kea had conned his way into one of the woman's seminars when he was a freshman, and suffered mightily. Dr. Feehely remembered Richards. What had he been doing since he'd taken her class? Well, she hoped. She remembered him as not being gifted in theory, but showing great practical promise. Was he well? Was he happy? Had he perhaps achieved some post at a university somewhere? Kea, trying to keep from laughing, came up with some plausible story about labwork and study. The reason he had wanted to consult with this woman, whose mark had been made in microanalysis, was that someone had presented Kea with a particle concept. He did not understand anything on the fiche, and, remembering Doctor Feehely, had sought her out. Could she take a few minutes? And would she mind if Richards recorded her?
She normally did not take consulting jobs... but for an old student... Feehely scanned the fiche. Raised eyebrows. Snorted. Raised eyebrows. Snorted. Raised eyebrows, and shut off the reader. "If this particle existed," she said, "it would be quite interesting. Your friend did not present an adequate synth, and the only way I could see this model existing mathematically is if one posited it were some sort of nonconventional matter. I would hate to use a popular term such as ‘anti-matter,' because that would be a misnomer."
"How would this particle... if it could exist, work as a tap-pable source of energy?"
Eyebrows. Snort. The doctor chose her words. "Again, this is an incorrectness. But I will take an analogy from ancient history. Assuming—and this is also an impossibility—this particle could be handled safely, the effect would be that of using nitroglycerine... you know what nitroglycerine was?"
"No. But I'll learn."
"As I said, using nitroglycerine as fuel in an internal-combustion engine. An enormous amount of energy, but one that the engine could never handle. Of course, all this is mere amusement. Fairly puerile, I might add. Such a particle could not exist in any sane universe."
"Thank you, Doctor. I have won my bet. Would you mind giving me the mathematics on that?"
"Well... all right. But I am afraid I will have to charge you for that, so I hope your bet is of a consequential nature. Perhaps... a lunch?"
The description, of course, was an abstract of the AM2 particle. Kea had laboriously taught himself how to write the description of the last six months. And Kea knew of an engine that could handle that power. Stardrive. Again, all he lacked was a "handle." And the bet was of a consequential nature: The Universe.