Company Wars 01 – Downbelow Station

“I’ll talk to Elene. Let you know the date tomorrow. Take it easy. And call me

if you need.”

Josh nodded, turned, walked away, among the crowds who… might… know his face.

Like those on the docks, in his memory: crowds. It was not the same. It was a

different world and he walked in it, down his own portion of hall as the

newfound owner of it… walked to the lift along with those born to Pell, stood

with them waiting on the lift car as if he were ordinary.

It came. “Green seven.” He spoke up for himself when the press inside cut him

off from the controls and someone kindly pressed it for him. Shoulder to

shoulder in the car. He was all right. It whisked him down to his own level. He

excused his way past passengers who gave him not a second glance, stood in his

own corridor, near the hospice.

“Talley,” someone said, startling him. He glanced to his right, at uniformed

security guards. One nodded pleasantly to him. His pulse raced and settled. The

face was distantly familiar. “You live here now?” the guard asked him.

“Yes,” he said, and in apology: “I don’t remember well… from before. Maybe you

were there when I came in.”

“I was,” the guard said. “Good to see you came out all right.”

He seemed to mean it. “Thank you,” Josh said, walked on his way and the guards

on theirs. The dark which had advanced retreated.

He had thought them all dreams. But I don’t dream it, he thought. It happened.

He walked past the desk at the entry to the hospice, down the corridor inside to

number 18. He used his card. The door slid aside and he walked into his own

refuge, a plain, windowless place… a rare privilege, from what he had heard of

vid about the overcrowding everywhere. More of Damon’s arranging.

Ordinarily he would turn on the vid, using its noise to fill the place with

voices, for dreams filled the silences.

He sat down now on the bed, simply sat there a time in the silence, probing the

dreams and the memories like half-healed wounds. Norway.

Signy Mallory.

Mallory.

iv

Pell: White Dock: Lukas Company offices; 1830 hrs; 0630 hrs. alterday:alterdawn

There were no disasters. Jon stayed in the office, rearmost of all the offices,

took normal calls, worked his routine of warehousing reports and records, trying

in one harried corner of his mind to map out what to do if the worst happened.

He stayed later than usual, after the lights had dimmed slightly on the docks,

after a good deal of the first shift staff had left for the day and the mainday

activity had settled down… just a few clerks out in the other offices to answer

com and tend things till the alterday staff came in. Swan’s Eye went out

unchallenged at 1446; Annie and the Kulins left with Vittorio’s papers at 1703,

without question or commotion more than the usual close inquiries about

schedules and routing, for the militia. He breathed easier then.

And when Annie had long since cleared the vicinity of the station, beyond any

reasonable chance of protest, he took his jacket, locked up, and headed home.

He used his card at the door, to have every minutest record in comp as it should

be… found Jessad and Hale sitting opposite one another in silence, in his living

room. There was coffee, soothing aroma after the afternoon tension. He sank into

a third chair and leaned back, taking possession of his own home.

“I’ll have some coffee,” he told Bran Hale. Hale frowned and rose to go fetch

it. And to Jessad: “A tedious afternoon?”

“Gratefully tedious,” Jessad said softly. “But Mr. Hale has done his best to

entertain.”

“Any trouble getting here?”

“None,” Hale said from the kitchen. He brought back the coffee, and Jon sipped

at it, realized Hale was waiting.

Dismiss him… and sit alone with Jessad. He was not eager for that. Neither was

he eager to have Hale talking too freely, here or elsewhere. “I appreciate your

discretion,” he told Hale. And with a careful consideration: “You know there’s