Pla Cliff Derkinit
The canvas roof flapped as though exhausted, stirring occasionally when the wind provided enough
inspiration. In the twilight of dawn, Cliff eyed the roof and the makeshift booth it covered. Not
finding much in the faint light, he turned his wary gaze toward the east. The verge of Anu glared
painfully back at him; its companion still hung below the horizon. Feathery streaks of rose spread
out from this bright arc as if warning the restful shades of night to flee.
Long seconds before those harbingers reached Byukan-Hamil Direvnya. He must wait for them to do
their job there before he called Trina and found out how she had passed the night.
Unfortunately, the image of that mountain direvnya, like a rut worn in a path, turned Cliff's
thoughts to Jik Dain Bedlip. He hated the chronic cross-over from his wife to his new — and
unreachable — boss, but he had mused over his own role in the consortium — and its new offspring,
the Rendezvous of Futures — so much during the past three days, he no longer could avoid it.
What did Jik Dain expect of him? More to the point, what had Jik Dain done to him?
With that one short and sly message on "Organization of Training for Guests at the Rendezvous of
Futures," Jik Dain had dumped the entire responsbility for the gathering into Cliff's lap while
retaining all the authority and glory for himself.
"Sly" because nowhere in the message did Jik Dain direct Cliff to manage the Rendezvous, just
"assume responsibility for ... activities required to make productive use" of arriving "resources,"
otherwise known as people.
"Sly" because Jik Dain apparently understood him well — well enough to expect that Cliff would
take on all duties necessary to support his staff and meet the needs of his clients. Even if that
meant trying to manage the entire Rendezvous without authority.
Clients? Those raggedy-ass "numerous zhee-tely" with their "vast range of skillsets and combine
experience?" Ha! More like "lost and discouraged souls."
Finally, "sly" because Jik Dain had not turned another message or meeting or thought to the
Rendezvous since, both enabling and forcing Cliff to actually run the Rendezvous — so far.
On the other hand, did Jik Dain truly realize what — and whom — he had released here?
"Not bloody likely." Cliff grinned to himself just as a sound drew his attention back from the
dawn.
The train he was expecting burst out of the ground into the darkness hanging over Ganj Dareh's
drome. Its curved flanks bright with interior light, it swooshed out of the tunnel that enabled it
to decelerate from cruise velocity beneath the outskirts of the direvnya.
Cliff glanced at the train station. Its south terminal lifted a squat, many-lobed silhouette just
across the road. Its numerous windows showed dimly, as though sleep still ruled over there, as
they curved and tucked, curved and tucked, around the terminal's many wings.
He skimmed back to the train, now slowing so abruptly that his organs twinged in sympathy with its
passengers. Still, there seemed too much speed and too little space to shed it, though Cliff knew
better. Abruptly, the lead coach swerved off, heading toward the far lobe of the terminal. A
second later, the next coach broke off at a lesser angle. The final car made its jink. All three
merged quietly and efficiently with the station.
As Cliff shook his head over this everyday miracle, lights brightened across the way. Soon,
passengers from that train — some heading for the Rendezvous — would emerge. It would be time to
go to work welcoming those select few to their new lives.
He looked down at his llevar, which rested easily in his meaty hand. Its foilscreen showed a
schematic of his project plan. Like an angular spider web laboring with flies, gnats, and an
occasional moth, the unfinished plan throbbed. A day behind schedule, he thought, and we're still
not ready. Orders, supplies, and personnel — the substance of organization — flowed toward and
through Ganj Dareh, though very little had actually condensed into an entity that could handle
thousands of Gastarbeitern. We've done a lot, though, in the continuous spurt of sleepless seconds
since Jik Dain taxed us with this job.
Cliff's body throbbed with aches, but the real penalty came in the muzziness of his thoughts.
Nano-scrubs could clean out the toxins and debris of constant activity; they could do little,
however, to relieve a mind deprived of dream repair. He found himself giving voice to his thoughts
in order to focus them.
He scanned the first block of tasks in the plan. Have we done enough? Enough to accommodate the
trickle of people arriving on that train? "Probably."
Enough to catch up with those already wandering about Ganj Dareh looking for the Rendezvous?
"Possibly."
Enough to stay ahead of the rising flood of jobless, homeless, and hopeless yet to arrive?
He closed the llevar and pocketed it. He peered again at the station, failing to see through
windows glinting with the dawn's early light. "Doubt that," he whispered, "but first things
first."
Cliff turned toward the front of their narrow processing booth. Portable tables bracketed the
mouth that greeted the train station's main doors directly across the road. Seated there, Ter and
Zim exercised their commercial entrances to the Mirnaya Direvnya, their nimble fingers tapping
virtual keys, clear eyes intent on the holoscreens, young ears plugged for automata feedback and
background music. They pursued data across the Em-Deh, data about Ganj Dareh's recent past,
rounding it up and herding it toward the Rendezvous' newly created database. He doubted they heard
or saw or felt anything zhuhndí.
Cliff lumbered up behind them and rested his hands lightly on their shoulders. When they paused
their music and looked around, he asked, "Are we caught up yet?"
Zim, her doll face perfectly made-up despite the early hour, slipped her colleague a mock-rue
look. Bitching was still the opiate of the working class.
"We've got —" Lotte raised her sloe-eyes. "What? 1472 gong-she in Ganj Dareh, offering 73,600
rooms, altogether." She consulted the screen. "We've captured idents of Gastarbeitern already
registered in all but —" She checked Zim's expression. "Seven, do you think?" Her eyes came
back to Cliff, sparkling. "Would you believe only seven sleep-and-eats left to be accounted for?
And those the farthest from the drome."
Cliff nodded wearily, rolling his eyes up and over to Zim. She suppressed a snicker.
"What do you say, Cliff?" Lotte said. "We go after those remaining gong-she right now, two for
me, two for Zim, and three for you. How's that sound?"
"You never give an old man a break, do you?" Cliff peered down his nose at Lotte. Her round face,
short dark hair, blatantly female body, her whole presentation, seemed to quiver with excitement.
"I thought that was the deal: you never stop throwing your age up at us, and we never give you a
break because of it."
Cliff set banter aside. "A train just arrived."
"Our first one," Lotte squeaked.
"How many cars?" Zim asked, frowning.
"Three. Normal complement."
"Any idea how many Gastarbeiter?"
"Not at all."
"O.K. Let's take worst case: Gastarbeiter in all seats. That could be 147 arriving now. That's
nominal seating, so there could be fewer, but also 21 more if people are using all the extra
acceleration rigs.
"O.K. Let's check the direvnya's current capacity." Zim lithely stroked a few key glyphs, then
poked at something in her holoscreen; Cliff couldn't see because of his angle. "Ganj Dareh is
offering about 4700 empty billets at this moment." She glanced over at Lotte and up at Cliff.
"Normally, there're a lot more free slots, but there's a depression going on, don't you know.
Still, there's plenty of room for right now.
"O.K., but let's just see where the numbers are going." Commands flowed from her fingers. "O.K.
We've found 2483 Gastarbeiter already registered at gong-she around town. We'll assume the seven
we haven't yet merged into our virtual database have none. O.K. Let's graph their arrival
times."
After another flurry of keystrokes, Zim eased back and contemplated the outcome. "Too soon to
tell, really, after only three days, but it's enough to draw a line. O.K.? At the current growth
in the rate of influx, Die Gastarbeiter will exhaust gong-she capacity in two days." She lunged
forward, peered at her information, then settled back once more. "O.K. Two days it is." She held
up a pair of fingers to emphasize her statement. "O.K.?"
Cliff sighed and glanced up. Doors opened in the train station. "O.K.," he said absently, then,
"Moons! You've got me doing it."
People streamed out into the rosy dawn, most moving quickly. These routine passengers, familiar
with the layout — some chattering, their jackets slung over arms; others more interested in
continuing their reading than verifying their surroundings — flocked toward the path through the
berm that led to the nearest transport interchange and connections with the rest of Ganj Dareh.
They apparently preferred a brisk walk to waiting for a qi-che to the same destination.
But he also noticed others — a pack of singletons, one couple, then another, finally a family with
children — who trickled out of the station. They moved slowly as though plagued with stiff
muscles and uncertainty. They emerged, they glanced around, they found an empty spot there on the
walk outside the station, and they stopped, leery, dry-eyed people brought here by a hope they
couldn't acknowledge lest it be violated once again. Die Gastarbeiter.
Guest Workers? Ha! Victims, really, victims of places and times beyond their control. Victims of
Har Norma Byukan and her consortium and her willful focus on profits to the exclusion of people.
Victims eager to hew their way back into a productive life, given even a faint chance.
He envisioned these few multiplying, cramming their ways off train after train, trudging across to
his booths — have to set up more out here! — then marching into Ganj Dareh with hope reborn.
Today, nearly a thousand altogether. Tomorrow, twice that. The next day? Too far out to tell
yet, but the numbers would only pyramid higher and higher as the jobless across the continent
roused themselves unsteadily to new expectations.
Very softly, Cliff addressed these and all the other Gastarbeitern entrusted to him:
"I'll more than meet your expectations. Jik Dain doesn't want anything from me except to keep you
off his hands. I'm going to do better than that, along with Lotte and Zim and whoever else I can
hire to help me. I'll train you to understand the present and think about the future. I'll
re-establish your faith in yourself and in others. I'll help you bring forth your ideas, weed
through them, then breathe life into them.
"Har Norma got you here with promises of a new future. I'm going to see that promise is kept."
One of The Guest Workers caught sight of the sign pluming from the front of their booth. He
stepped forward to read its words: "Entrance to Your Rendezvous with the Future." He spun back
with desperate energy to grab up twin packs, then dragged a woman and three kids with him across
the road. Realization rippled through the rest of the clot; unplugged, it flowed after this alert
family.
Cliff drew himself back to the task at hand. He added quietly, "I just hope I can provide your
successors with someplace to sleep and eat while we achieve these wonderful things." Then, he
cleared his throat and declared so Lotte and Ge could hear, "We'll work on expanding gong-she
capacity after we tend to these folks." He dropped back two steps to let them settle into
their chores.
"Zhe Xiwangbo Aoxiuli," the middle-aged man announced, still a few meters away. His eyes, flesh
drooping at the outsides, like sails shredded by a storm, but still catching wind enough for
steerage.
"My wife," Zhe Xiwangbo went on, "Dan — Wang Dan Aoxiuli." Her eyes, too bright, too steady,
wide-open ports into the closely pinned desperation of her soul.
Closing in, his desperate grin ringing his words, Zhe Xiwangbo added, "My kids—" Their
eyes seeped excitement, subdued so as not to intrude on their parents' anguish, but persistent with
the energy, innocence, and faith of their young ages.
Cliff's heart leapt at the varieties of trust being dumped at his feet.
"Got 'em!" Zim called, one hand suddenly still above her keyspace, the other beckoning gracefully
to the man.
Lotte snapped fingers at her own slowness, then waved both arms. "Next!" she hollered. "Getcher
place in the Rendezvous rye-chere."
Cliff nodded with approval.
