“And the infants?”
“Azi care for them:”
“By shifts. Six hours on, two of exercise?”
“Yes, sera.”
Their steps measured the metal catwalk another length. “But you’re not sending these out to the estates anymore. You’re more and more crowded week by week, and you’re not able to move them.”
“We do what we can, sera.”
They reached the core, and the lift. Itavvy used his card to open the door, and they stepped in. SEVEN, Itavvy pushed and the lift shot up with heart-dragging rapidity, set them out on that level with a crashing of locks and doors, echoes in vastness.
It was otherwise silent.
All these levels, she began to understand, all these levels were the same, endless cubicles, floor after floor, the same. Seven above ground. Five below. And there was silence. All that space, all those cells, all that humanity, and there was nowhere a voice, nowhere an outcry.
Itavvy led the way out onto the catwalk. Raen looked down. These were all small children, six, seven years. The faces upturned held mild curiosity, no more. There were no games, no occupations. They sat or lay on their mats. Same grey coveralls, same shaven heads, same grave faces. At this age, one could not even tell their sex.
None cried, none laughed.
“God,” she breathed, gripping the rail. Itavvy had stopped. She suddenly wanted out. She looked back. Jim stood at the rail, looking down. She wanted him out- of this place, now, quickly.
“Is there a door out on this level?” she asked, perfectly controlled. Itavvy indicated the way ahead with a gesture. Raen walked at his unhurried pace, hearing Jim following.
“What’s the average contract price?” she asked.
“Two thousand.”
“You can’t produce them for anything near that cost.”
“No,” said Itavvy. “We can’t.”
It was a long walk. There was nothing to fill the silence. She would not hurry, would not betray her reaction, disturbing betas whose interests were involved in this operation, stirring apprehensions. Nor would she turn and look at Jim. She did not want to.
They reached a door like the one on third—passed that and its mate into sterile halls and light and clean air. She breathed, breathed deeply. “I’ve seen what I came to see,” she said. “Thank you, ser Itavvy. Suppose now we go back to your office.”
He hesitated, as if he thought of asking a question; and did not. They rode the lift to main, and walked the long distance back to the front offices, all in silence. Itavvy had the air of a worried man. Raen let him fret.
And when they three stood once again in the beta’s office, with the door closed: “I have an estate,” Raen said, “ridiculously understaffed. And a security problem, which affords me no amusement at all. How many contracts are available here?”
Itavvy’s face underwent a series of changes. “Surely enough to fill all your needs, Kontrin.”
“The corporation does reward its people according to the profits their divisions show, doesn’t it? All these empty desks . . this isn’t a local holiday, is it?”
“No, sera.”
Raen settled into a chair and Itavvy seated himself at his desk. Raen gestured to Jim, and he took the one beside her.
“So,” she said. “And the number of contracts available for guard personnel, azi only?”
The beta consulted the computer. “Sufficient, sera.”
“The exact number, please.”
“Two thousand forty-eight, sera, nineteen hundred nine hundred eighty-two males, rest females; nineteen hundred four under thirty years, rest above.”
“Counting confiscated azi, or are these on the premises?”
“On the premises.”
“A very large number.”
“Not proportionately, sera.”
“Who usually absorbed them?”
“Corporation offices. Estate-holders . . . it’s wild land out there.”
“So a great number of those tangled contracts in custody in the country . . . would be guard-trained, wouldn’t they?”
“A certain number, yes, sera.”
Itavvy’s eyes were feverish; his lips trembled. He murmured his words. Raen reckoned the man, at last nodded.
“I’ll buy,” she said, “all two thousand forty-eight. I also want sunsuits and sidearms. I trust an establishment which sends out guards sends them out equipped to work.”
He moistened his lips. “Yes, sera, although some buyers have their own uniforms or equipment.”