The setting was a partly outdoor terrace midway up the half-mile-high Farworlds Tower, which stood twenty miles inland from Gweths, one of the major cities of Xerse. Far below, a wide valley with a mirror ribbon of river winding among forested shoulders of hills extended inland toward distant mountains, while to the north the ocean lay behind a spit of headland that broke up into a chain of islands stretching to the horizon. Overhead, the higher reaches of the tower soared in overhanging cliffs of crystal that covered half the sky.
It was a leafy, flowery place, virtually a park in miniature, with mounded lawns, secluding shrubbery, backdrops of falling water, paths to walk on, and a lake. The Farworlds staff used it for relaxing and socializing. Sarvik met the three people from Farworlds in a low-walled niche set between rockeries and a screen of trellised climbing plants, where a cane table and chairs stood beneath a large red and white sunshade. Indrigon, sitting at the far end, and a woman called Lequasha, to Sarvik's right, introduced themselves as being from the directorate but gave no indication of their precise function. The third was Umbrik, the security chief whom Sarvik had contacted initially, doubtless there to see what he could glean of how Sarvik had penetrated the Farworlds system.
Actually, Sarvik had no idea if any of them was even on the continent of Xerse, since they were all using a telepresence hookup. He himself was remote coupled from a public booth in Pygalhe didn't trust Tuil Garma not to have bugged the in-house services at Replimaticonand sitting in a worn chair that was beginning to shed its padding. The image of the cane chair and the table before him, along with the figures around it and the scenery behind, was a visual composite from data streams originating in different places, varied continuously by the spectacles he was wearing to match his head and eye motions. The arms and other parts of his body that he could see were interpolated from the booth's video pickups, which were sensitive enough to capture a loose thread on his sleeve or a rough edge on one of his fingernails. The only thing that clashed with the illusion was a stale, garlicky odor pervading the booth. Probably some frustrated city worker with rustic yearnings had decided to take an instant vacation somewhere while eating lunch.
After the introductions, Umbrik opened with the comment that security was the paramount consideration in an organization like Farworlds. Sarvik had caused considerable consternation by breaching the defenses, and naturally the directors were anxious to learn about the ways in which the system was vulnerable. Umbrik conveyed without any great excursion into subtlety that the rewards could be significant for parting with even a little of the pertinent information.
Sarvik took such a transparent affront to his credulity as a test to see whether they were talking to somebody of a caliber worth the time of dealing with at all. If they imagined that he believed that two members of the directorate of an operation the size of Farworlds would involve themselves personally in an unexceptional discussion of security measures, he said, then they were wasting his time. If the management really had fallen to being that inane, then whom should he apply to for Umbrik's job, right now? The insult earned him his due respect, and the way was open for more serious business.
But among the Borijans nothing was ever simple and direct. Lequasha took things to the next level. She was tall and lean, with a dark blue crown streaking to black in places. Her attire, a trousered suit with a short, high-necked jacket, all in somber maroon, added to her general air of aloofness.
"Let's stop playing games," she suggested. That was fine by Sarvik. He was there purely to see what he could find out. "Even if you don't want to discuss details, what tipped you off about Leradil Driss must have been the pointers in the Toymate files that it was Toymate who infiltrated her. Fair enough. They were bogus, and we put them there." Lequasha glanced sideways at her colleagues with one eye. "Why waste more time denying it?" They returned negative shakes of their heads to indicate that they agreed. She turned back to Sarvik. "So it's obvious that we know about the animal emulation you've produced that's good enough to make toy veeches behave like real ones . . . But toys, Dr. Sarvik?" One of Lequasha's epaulets quivered on the verge of disdain. "We send intelligences out to other starsintelligences that reproduce themselves and manage entire manufacturing complexes. Leradil Driss was put inside Replimaticon merely to update us on what the coding research labs are doing these days, because advanced coding is of interest to us. When you saw through the Toymate deception, it occurred to us that perhaps a person of your abilities might be interested in more profitable employment here than in your present situation. That's all. Don't go treating yourself to false flattery on any other account."
But Sarvik wasn't buying that line, either. They knew what he was worth. If they'd gotten into Toymate, they were aware that the whole spiel about toys had been to set up Prinem Clouth. "Oh, come on," Sarvik said, feigning impatience. "Have they relegated you to junior tech recruitment? Places like Farworlds use smart-toy animators to brew the graff. If you think that's my level, then just say so, and we can call it a day."
"We get all kinds of people trying to edge in here," Umbrik said. "It's a lot of action. Everyone wants a slice."
"It was you that asked me here," Sarvik reminded them.
"You think as a favor?" Lequasha asked him.
"Suppose you tell me what you want," Sarvik suggested. Then, feeling that he had an edge, he risked adding, "Assuming that you know. Frankly, I'm beginning to wonder."
Indrigon had been following from the far end of the table but saying little. He was squat and sturdy, florid-faced, and dressed in a mix of reds, blues, and metallic grays that said he was a person who could do pretty much as he pleased. Sarvik had already tagged him as the decisive influence among the three. At that point Indrigon leaned forward. Sarvik rested his hands on the edge of the cane table and waited. It felt distractingly like the chipped countertop inside the public telepres booth at Pygal.
"Very well," Indrigon said. It meant that Sarvik had satisfied him that he was distrusting enough to do business with. "In the course of the past century the syndicates involved in remote manufacturing have built up a unique store of experience and knowledge, Dr. Sarvik. Their projects run themselves without Borijan intervention, operating for decades, across interstellar distances. Farworlds is way ahead of any of its rivals. We think that the time has come to capitalize on that lead."
Sarvik smoothed his epaulets and nodded. It would have been foolish to disagree. "Yes."
"Colony ships," Lequasha came in. Sarvik's epaulets pricked up in interest. He looked with one eye at her, at Indrigon with the other. "Interstellar colonization," she said. Sarvik shifted the eye watching her to join the one looking at Indrigon.
Indrigon nodded. "It's time for Borijans to get out of the Kovar System at last and go to other stars. The benefits to the first organization to do it would be enormous. Accordingly, as a pilot projectand this is a highly confidential matterwe are formulating plans to redesign the Searcher ships into generation craft capable of carrying people. Survival at other stars will involve a massive deployment of machines. That will require computing methods more sophisticated than anything we've used so far." He gestured as if the rest didn't really need saying. "Hence our interest in the most advanced work currently going on at places like Replimaticon."
Sarvik considered the suggestion skeptically. Borijans always acted under a compulsion to find a flaw somewhere. "You'd never get anyone to go," he declared flatly, "apart from natural dupes and losersand who'd want to entrust a starship to the likes of them?"
"We think there's a solution to that," Indrigon told him.
"What?" Sarvik asked.
"Do you seriously expect us to tell you?" Umbrik scoffed.
"Do you expect me to be interested if you don't?" Sarvik shot back.
"We'll make that a condition of the deal," Lequasha offered.
"What kind of a deal are we talking about, anyway?" Sarvik asked.
Indrigon turned one palm upward this time. "Your expertise for a share. You head up the software development groups."
"How much are you asking for on a time basis?"
Indrigon made a face. "All of it, Dr. Sarvik. We're talking about a total commitment."
Sarvik would have to pull up his other stakes. There would be no time for Replimaticon as well. "I'll have to think that over," Sarvik said.
"We assumed that would be the case," Indrigon replied. "Further discussion would be contingent upon your agreeing. Could we have an answer, say, by tomorrow?"
"Tomorrow?" Sarvik stared at them incredulously. "You're out of your minds. What do you want, a serious coding chief or a bubblehead? I need fifteen days."
"Impossible. Do you think we're growing flowers? Two days, then," Indrigon answered.
"Why rush? You're putting together a starship program, not a weekend dance. Ten."
"Four."
"Eight."
"Six."
And, amazingly, they settled on seven.
After decoupling at the booth in Pygal, Sarvik took a long walk and stopped at a graff shop to sit for a while and think. He believed the story about modifying Searchers into generation ships, he decided. The Farworlds people's body signals had rung true, and it would have invited too many awkward questions and needless complications if the story had been fabricated. He believed the story as far as it went. But his instinct told him that there was more to it yet.
The time had come for Borijans to get out of the Kovar System, Indrigon had said. Why now? It was the reason Indrigon had given that seemed weak. Why the haste? Why all of a sudden was Farworlds in a hurry to transport people to other stars? It would be interesting, Sarvik told himself, to try to find out.