Kosho opened the envelope, rubbing slick parchment between her fingertips. "This is real paper…" She turned opened the sheet inside, eyebrows rising to see a flowing hand in vibrant green ink. "My dear captain Hadeishi," she read. "I am entertaining the Imperial Prince Tezozуmoc, son of the Light of Heaven, long may he reign, at my estate in the suburbs of Parus on Thursday night. I would be delighted if you and some of your officers could attend. Grace of God, Mrs. Greta Hauksbee Petrel."
Susan looked up, faintly alarmed. "There is an Imperial Prince here?!"
Hadeishi put on a very strict face. "You are best suited for this task, Sho-sa Kosho. Take those junior officers who would benefit from rubbing elbows with the mighty and a security detachment of your choosing."
"I am best suited?" Kosho's dark eyes flashed dangerously. "How so? Am I expected to make appropriate smalltalk with the Light of Heaven?"
"You've training I lack, Susan." Hadeishi wondered if he'd pushed her a little too far. "And display a full dress uniform far better. Go on, Sho-sa. We've a great deal of work to do."
Giving him another sharp look – not a glare, to be sure, but something close – Kosho bowed and left. Hadeishi sighed, rubbing his eyes again, and stumbled through the hatchway into his sleeping cabin. Yejin had turned down the coverlet on his tatami and set the lights on a steadily darkening sleep cycle. Faintly, a recording of waves breaking on the shore at Sasurigama played. A discerning ear could pick out the sound of branches creaking in the night wind.
The Chu-sa stared at the door to the bathroom for a long moment, then gave up on the thought. Too tired. I'll take a long shower in the morning. We can afford the water entropy – we'll have our supplies replenished within the week… Shedding the rest of his uniform, he crawled into bed. Hadeishi was asleep within moments of his head touching the rice-husk pillow.
A little later, the steward stepped quietly into the bedroom, folded up the crumpled uniform to be cleaned and pressed, and shifted the sheets to cover Mitsuharu's chest. Yejin scowled, face nearly invisible in the fading light, thick fingers brushing across a fresh hole in the cotton sheet. There were others, carefully mended, but the fabric was nearly translucent with wear.
The Imperial Development Board Warehouse Sobipuru Spaceport
Chief Machinist's Mate Helsdon thumbed the ident panel of a crate marked with Fleet colors and raised an eyebrow in interest as the contents listed themselves. "Microcell power units, six dozen? These will fit in our field equipment and shuttles. You don't need them?"
"Already replaced." The shop foreman shrugged, waving his hand at the wall of shipping containers the Fleet engineer was examining. "They sent us sixteen satellites for a first-tier global information grid, along with replacement parts to cover five years of attrition and the shuttles to place them in orbit. Ten of the satellites failed within a week of going operational, so then they sent us another sixteen – but of a different model!"
Helsdon nodded, bending down to examine the bottommost crate of a dangerously tall stack. Despite the efforts of his shipsuit to adapt to the climate, he had to wipe sweat out of his eyes before he could read the manifest. "Sensor relays, type nineteen. Are these in good shape? We could use hundreds of them…they run our automatic compartment doors."
"Like I said," the foreman chuckled, lank dark hair tied back behind his head in a ponytail. Watery blue eyes glinted with amusement. "This whole wall is redundant material. Small equipment power cells, replacement comm panels and nodes, synchro-tracking lasers, the works! The development board director wants me to surplus the whole lot to the slicks as an economic stimulus project. But between you and me, Helsdon-tzin, I'd really rather trade for something I can use."
"Trade?" Helsdon frowned, fiddling with the environmental controls on his shipsuit. Normally, the temperature regulators built into the millimeter-thick fabric under his uniform shirt and pants kept him nice and cool. The shop foreman didn't seem to mind the heat – he wasn't even sweating. "What kind of equipment do you need?"
"Well," the foreman frowned, "what I really need is a whole 'nother cargo shuttle – the humidity here breeds a bacterium capable of metabolizing hexacarbon – and if I had five or six hundred Macana auto-rifles and ten thousand rounds of 8mm caseless, I could raise the cash to buy one…" He raised a placating hand at Helsdon's grimace. "But! But…I've no d esire to hand the slicks something that will wind up aimed at me, so the real thing I could use is whatever scrap metal you might have on hand."
"Scrap?" Helsdon gave up on not sweating and feeling miserably hot. "We've suffered some battle damage. We planned to dump the wreckage…"
"That," said the foreman with a broad grin, "is exactly the kind of trade goods I can use."
"So," Helsdon said, scratching his jaw and turning on an earbug channel to the ship. Thai-i Isoroku would be interested in this bit of bartering. "How many square meters of hexacarbon steel are you looking for?"
The Petrel Estate
Despite Chu-sa Hadeishi's suggestion that she attend the Legation party in a traditional furisode-style kimono, Kosho stepped out of her groundcar in a straight, knee-length black silk dress. Conceding a non-Fleet, civilian occasion, she did not pin up her hair. She also dispensed with her usual command bracelet, settling for a comm-thread disguised by foundation and blush powder on her cheek. A chevalier-style jacket disguised a palm-sized shockpistol. Two silver bracelets obscured her medband.
Rain threatened, charging the air with the sharp smell of imminent thunder. The sky over Parus was clogged with fat, dark clouds as night advanced. By the time her car was within sight of the estate, Kosho decided to get out and walk. Strings of globe-lights atop the walls gave her an unmistakable heading. A great crowd of locals milled about at the edge of the security perimeter. An instant festival had sprung up on the sidewalks, complete with carts and canopies, and vendors selling steaming drinks, roasted meat, and confections of all kinds. The peculiar cinnamon smell of the Jehanans mingled with wood smoke and boiling tea in the sweltering twilight.
Fleet ID and the invitation passed her through to an ivy-covered gate. The mansion sprawled within a rectangle of crumbling red-brick walls. The one-and two-story buildings themselves looked quite old to Susan's eye, but she couldn't tell if this was by design or circumstance. The customs of the rich often ran counter to what she considered common sense.
A stream of party-goers crossing an ornamental garden carried her towards the main house. Servants were waiting to take coats, hats, ornamental cloaks, and umbrellas beneath the shelter of an imposing entranceway flanked by tall granite statues. The figures were Jehanan, bulky, muscled bodies carrying the lintel of the doorway on their shoulders. Kosho made a face at the overwrought tableau as she passed into the vestibule, a very small purse in hand.
Beyond the entryway, the main, hexagonal hall of the house rose towards a lofty ceiling circumscribed by a mezzanine-style balcony. Old-style chandeliers supporting clusters of shimmering paper lanterns hung down on long cables. Dozens of slow-moving fans stirred the air. The wavering light, reflecting across the ribbed vault of the roof, reminded Susan of sunlight dancing on the walls of a sea cave.
She guessed there were nearly a thousand people packed into the room, and found a section of wall to stand beside, out of the press of traffic. Humidity and constant noise enveloped her, pressing tight against her flesh. Within a heartbeat, a servant appeared before her with a platter of drinks. Politely, Susan took one – something amber-colored, which she hoped was beer – and waved him on.