Doyle Phoebe Heejanus
Phoebe padded out of her kitchen, her aching feet stepping from cool, stone tile onto soft, furry
carpet. A cleansing shiver stroked up her legs, then spine, to her neck. Two long days of trying
to change people's minds inside and outside her combine, will-see after will-see, had stuffed her
with straw, it seemed, stiffening her joints and cramming her brain full of chaff. That's why
she'd called this dinner break for herself.
Not that I won't work, just at a slower pace, allowing myself some luxuries.
At her desk, she shifted the hot teapot from where she had cushioned it two-handed against her
abdomen and over to the shelf where she always kept it. She lifted the mug she'd carried inverted
over the pot's top and set it down on the desk. Then, she poured her first mugfull. Aromatic
vapors curled from the amber stream as it arced from spout to mug. But she didn't really
appreciate the smell until she dropped to the chair by the desk, hunkered over the mug, and waggled
her nose through its steam.
Tea, just plain old Orange Pekoe, Yeibichai variety of course. The steam carried the earthy,
just-a-trace-bitter aroma moist and warm around her face and up her nose, seeping into the dryness
above it, between her eyes, loosing the tightness in there that she couldn't really feel until it
relaxed. Something trickled back down, and she grabbed for a tissue to catch it as it leaked out.
Now she sipped, the steam a boon once more, but the heat and wet and taste flowed over her tongue
and down her throat till it woke her insides with its warmth. She sipped again, still careful of
the near-scalding temperature, then set the mug back down.
Even as she straightened back up, images, pushed aside by her little making-of-the-tea ritual,
burbled back into her mind. The face of Gavrilo, her staff tactician, time after time, as Phoebe
guided her in re-directing calluses and staff and her local automata operators. "Toadstools," as
Kanpa called them. The neighborhoods of Ganj Dareh from her patrolcraft as she reworked tactical
patterns on the fly to enable her combine to handle an eight-fold increase in Incidents yesterday.
And even more today. The faces of the other Prime-Direvnya chiefs as they matter-of-factly
rejected her requests for loans of psych-tek — and her slurry of puzzlement because they'd always
been cooperative before. What do I say to Cliff about that? A customer's fury-purple face as he
complained about the inconvenience of renewed violence on the paths, and by the way, "I want to
talk to a person, not automata, when I call you." "I hear you," you tell them, even if you're not
going to change a thing. Panels of her workstation, in her office and aloft, prompting her with
reminders, showing her messages out- and in-bound, tracking her lists of contacts. How would I get
this job done without those little elves of mine? More faces, this time of retirees, as she called
them back to duty personally. Good to see old faces again — and meet new ones, of those gone
before I came on board. Her recruiting program had added over two-hundred-fifty to her ranks so
far. Jumbling together like a collage of the last two days.
She sighed. She'd taken to climbing into the job before dawn and driving it and herself hard all
day as she tried to steer a juggernaut of habit and inertia onto a new course.
Gut it, focus on results, she scolded herself. What'd I get done with all this? I doubled my
capacity on the paths, that's what! Twice as many people handling Incidents and customers
zhuhndí. And when I get those Rendezvous Recruits quick-trained, I'll have even more. And I can
resume my regular seconds on the job.
Grinning, she went back to the mug, sipped once, twice, and let those rapid-fire images of the
immediate past richochet about without any attempt to prune them or rank them or filter them for
action items. She abandoned the control that enabled her to manage over a thousand employees and
over a million customers. She'd learned that if she didn't let these pictures run, they'd never
escape her consciousness, they'd never go away, and she'd never get past today and onto tomorrow.
Lifting her head, Phoebe closed her eyes and heeded the muscles in her neck as they eased off from
the harp-tight condition they reached earlier and earlier each day. She peeked at a clock. So
late! Nearly a quarter of the warm night gone. Seasons didn't change the length of daylight on
Yeibichai, but summer's weather did make the dark seconds more accessible. I wonder what good
times are being had out there in my direvnya tonight. I hope the Incidents aren't keeping too many
people at home. They usually slack off after dusk anyway. She'd see for herself soon enough, when
she returned to the skies for a few more kiloseconds of patrol.
She pulled at the mug again, a long drink now that it was cool enough. The tea, lightened and
softened by lemon juice, bit gently at her palate, played its complex flavor around her mouth and
in her nose, and worked its relaxing wiles on the rest of her body. Eyes closed again, she rode
the tangible feeling of let-down as it stroked her shoulders, arms, back, legs, and finally, even
her poor aching feet.
A trumpet-call cracked through the house! A jolt that spilled her tea and threw her heart against
her ribs and convulsed her neck into a rigid, straining ache. Only then did she recognize her
personal-page clarion.
Wha — Gut it — Not now, not after all we've handled today. Words twisted through her mind and
died as gusts of emotion swept them away: grief, outrage, fear, love, and finally, duty.
"What?" she screeched at her private entrance, which turned her yell into a calm, "Chief Heejanus.
Go ahead."
"Harlan here, Jefe." Just audio: not a good sign. "Bad news at The Bluffs. 'Crisis in public
confidence' kind of stuff. You'd better show up."
"How bad?"
"Risk-of-Injury Incident, High-Multiplier," Harlan answered calmly. "No deaths so far, but some
people hurt muy malo."
"Chui?" Perpetrators?
"No good eyewitnesses — it was dark as usual. Guest-workers, though; they all agree on that."
"Thanks. I'll be there." She swatted the air, adjourning the can-hear. "Wake up my ship!" she
snarled in the privacy of her own automata, spun in her chair, and left it in a crouching run.
First, to her closet for tomorrow's sneak-boots — she couldn't bear thrusting her feet into
today's sweat-damp and -smelly boots — then out the front door. She sprinted through a sullen and
shadowy orchard toward the glare and noise of her patrolcraft.
She broke out onto the landing strip, and something, sight, maybe another sense, brought her to a
stumbling halt and pulled her around. Above the pitch-black sea of leaves that crested over her
head, The Bluffs glowed like a rising moon, but harsher, flatter, wider.
"Gut it," Phoebe whispered. Harlan was right. "Stuff it!" The entire Collective would be
catching this event, zhuhndí or Em-Deh; one way or another, there'd be an accounting. Wheeling to
her craft and climbing in, she muttered, "And mount it on the wall," just to complete the pattern.
The patrolcraft rolled immediately and leapt into the air, scrambling for altitude hard and fast,
banking toward the Incident Site, pressing Phoebe against her seat. She rode it like a charger,
hunched, intent, assembling her tools of battle about her.
She slipped on her headset. "Summarize Incident at The Bluffs."
Panels unfolded before her eyes, time-stamped entries, triage summary, on and on. The facts:
two-hundred three patrons and fifty-six staff injured, all in the dining area; no one below ground
hurt. An unknown number of assailants — Die Gastarbeiter, according to nearly every description
— had swept out of the dark woods, struck down everyone they came across, then withdrew. No
arrests yet.
Troubled, she shut the information off, squeezing her eyes shut, grabbing air through her mouth.
Put it in perspective. "Today's activities, show me counts."
A stark panel listed numbers: "Incidents = 959," divided into "Risk-of-Death = 0." How narrowly
we've avoided numbers there, she thought unhappily and read on. "Risk-of-Injury = 711,
Risk-of-Abuse = 122, and Risk-of-Disturbance = 129," resulting in "Detainments = 24 and Charges =
11."
"Compare to yesterday."
Percentages lined up alongside the counts. Incidents had grown twenty-two percent above
yesterday's surge, but she noticed that the growth came all in Injuries and Abuse. Phoebe sighed,
her breath tinged with despair. Charges and Detainments were down, though, showing that informal
justice was taking a better hold. Tempers are shorter, but a little dreamstick cools them off.
Thank the Fates for dreamsticks. And her pattern of keeping her people inducted, though
deactivated when off-duty. Once path-qualified, always one step from being immune to dreamsticks.
A little zap of encrypted ultrasonic-wave and they're back to work. Rendezvous Recruits, however,
wouldn't go that fast. Dreamsticks were now in short supply, and the med-tek surgery to implant
the inducer laid people up for several days.
Spreading glare drew her attention out of cyberspace. Incident-Site lamps, hovering on their own
fans, illuminated the bluff from edge to woods. Surface lights extended visibility under the
trees.
The Site itself confirmed that something terrible had happened. Phoebe knew the place well from
the air. Tables, set on slightly larger pads, normally marched in diagonals from the cliff front,
with none interfering with another's view. Grass, constantly groomed, just long enough to wave,
covered the rest of the open area. The restaurant's combine kept the kitchen and other facilities
underground, of course, with delivery and member access through doors at the base of the bluff.
A very nice place, Phoebe remembered. The last time she'd been up there to dine was ...
before she'd made chief ... with Niger — Never mind!
Now, though, amid broken and upended tables, people's bodies dominated the scene.
Anshin bodies moving quickly and assuredly, tending victims with med-tek, asking them questions,
ferrying them to air ambulances, examining the grounds with clue-tek, carrying out their duties
well.
Victim bodies — most had been evacuated already, but the sight of those remaining dug into her
heart: motionless as though dead, although she knew better from the triage report; stirring in
response to aid; walking off their shock.
Where was all this coming from? Were people so base they couldn't scoot over and make a little
more room for others less fortunate? Were people so mean they would begrudge the blessings of the
Fates to others more fortunate?
No! Not now, not here, not on my watch! They're just trapped by hard times and bad habits. Well,
they're just going to have learn better.
Phoebe's patrolcraft slipped through the ambulances cycling between the Incident Site and the
clinics. It settled out of the air onto the very edge of the bluff, then rolled to a quick stop.
She climbed out and walked the scene.
She heard moans and complaints, assurances and instructions. She smelled blood and antiseptic amid
delicious aromas of roast meat and tangy sauces and rich spices. She saw everyone in need being
cared for, while the less injured waited more or less patiently. She felt chilled, though the wind
barely touched her.
Why? Why did these particular Gastarbeiter climb up the hill — that had to be their access —
then just spread out across the landscape like a swarm of gwira? Why did they yell as though
celebrating? Why did they rampage in threes? Why did they speak to their victims, cursing them or
declaring curiosity or complaining about their treatment in town? Why did they hit people, most
just once apiece, even when the victims fought back? Why did they strike some people hard and some
not so much?
If only I could ask one of them ... But the perpetrators had all escaped. Has that happened
before? She couldn't remember the statistics. =Central!= A sparkling chime in her mind indicated
Central's attention. =Battery statistics: identity ratio of striker-versus-strikee.=
Tonelessly, Central replied, "98.7%."
We need to fill that gap, Central, make it 100%. Have the original Response Teams revisit those
victims and/or scenes with clue-tek and try harder to identify those chuis that got away. Central
chimed acknowledgment.
A small action, but Phoebe felt better for it. Open and Accountable, the pattern says. If we're
ever to have a chance to regain control, we've got to hold everyone accountable. You hurt
someone, you have to make up for it.
Tonight, every patron of The Bluffs had been hurt to some degree, some seriously. Fate had
provided a Nurse. If she hadn't rendered first aid, they would have lost a couple zhee-tely,
people who expected and deserved their allotment of years. Phoebe wondered which one of her
combine members had protected those Life-Expectancies. She could ask Harlan.
Phoebe took a stand, separate from the activity. Her feet hurt. Tomorrow's sneak-boots didn't
make enough difference. Ah, well, duty called, with a voice that drowned out such tiny
complaints.
She contacted her craft via her transducer. =Comm-gear, create can-hear between me and the Site
Tactician here. Phoebe to Site. Have you got a moment to talk?=
Harlan answered, =Everything's under control, Jefe. I'll be right over.=
Now Phoebe had a moment to register belated surprise as she searched through the Site for the
stocky tactician. Harlan was assigned to Ar-Kansas Community. The Bluffs belonged to Alaxxchia in
Brome-Missisquoi. She hadn't thought about that when Harlan called her at home. Now, when she
spotted him working his way toward her across the scene, she asked him via can-hear, =What are
you doing here?=
=Overtime, Jefe. Brome-Missisquoi is running short of Site Tacticians, so I volunteered to work
for Alaxxchia on my second shift.=
Duty must have called to Harlan. It sure wasn't the overtime pay. Wait! I can now "hire" for
overtime. Start paying my core personnel for their devotion. Phoebe grinned. Wait till Jik Dain
catches that when he queries my accounting data.
=I'm glad to see you here,= she said. =Anything I should know about?=
Through victims faltering and rescuers deliberate, Phoebe saw him shake his head and move his
mouth. She heard, =No-sir. We should have the last of the casualties out of here in another
thousand-and-a-half seconds. We're using a lot of ambulance time.=
Phoebe shrugged. She'd doubletalk it, matter-of-fact it, or even stonewall it if Dain ever brought
it up. =Can't be helped. Don't worry about it. Where's the Nurse mentioned in the reports?=
Now closer, Harlan spread his hands and complained, =I let her go. She wanted to be air-lifted
with her injured companion. I didn't know you'd want to talk to her.=
=Who was it?=
"Foxfire." The can-hear cut out; they were close enough.
Even with over a thousand people working for her, the name should at least sound familiar. "One of
ours?"
Harlan shook his head. "No match on the combine database. My identity agent said she lives over
in Skeinswift Neighborhood — The Tangent, Jefe — works at their 'Neighborhood Health Concern.'"
Phoebe remembered the name now. It surfaced amidst a memory of her standing over a small body
smashed to the ground. Pain, like shrapnel lodged in her soul, reverberated around that
Ibrahim-like image.
The shrill voice cracked through her mind. Didn't someone named Foxfire speak out for Gatogrebok
in the will-hear yesterday? Fingers of compulsion tweaked her spine from the inside.
"Jefe?"
"Yea, Harlan?" She caught the edge in her voice, so she added a smile and focused on the Site
Tactician to cover it over.
"The assailants didn't get away unharmed."
"What's that?"
"We found a few of the victims, including Foxfire, who got a few licks in. Foxfire, in particular,
scalded one with hot fish."
"Good for her!" That really didn't hurt to say: they were all together now, resisting the same
enemy. "Notify our clinics."
"Already done."
Another thought lurched up through her gut: potential doom in the form of a hulking, brown-skinned
man that she'd almost run over. She pictured his shiny face with eyes losing respectful regard to
wide-eyed surprise. Respect? She hadn't gone back to that memory before. Why would Annadetcall
respect me?
"Jefe?"
"Yea? Oh, sorry. Did you notify the competition, the Gatogrebok clinics?"
"No," Harlan gruffed.
Phoebe reached out toward Harlan in sympathy, but her words corrected his attitude. "It's more
important for us to do everything we can to stop these attacks. Get Gatogrebok involved. Show
them how to detain suspects and report to us. Besides —" she smirked now "— they want to be
anshin; let them take on one of the hard parts."
Harlan smirked back. "Yessir."
That took care of site evidence. How about public surveillance? "Anything on Beobachtung to help
us identify the attackers?"
Harlan shook his head.
"I realize it's out in the open, but that's what the satellites are for. Surely—"
Harlan spat on the ground. "Our so-called Surveillance Support Center in Byukan-Hamil reports
'technical difficulties' — again. I'm getting so I don't ask them anymore."
Phoebe recalled that particular Reason-for-Tactical-Deficiency showing up on many reports
recently. Eyes fixed on Harlan, she told her patrolcraft to remind her to take it up with Jik
Dain, then found herself studying the tactician, efficient and disrespectful, hard-working and
plain, honest and dependable. "What do you think is going on?"
Harlan twisted to look over the Site.
"Not just here on The Bluffs, Harlan."
He turned back to her. His lip lifted in a half-grin. "I know, Jefe, I know. I was just ...
thinkin'." His tongue slipped out, dampened his upper lip, and vanished. "Ratoneros."
"Ratoneros?"
He nodded. "Ratoneros. Buzzards. Bad people." He shrugged as if to apologize. "There're always
bad people, Jefe. Some people are never happy. It doesn't matter how many choices the patterns
offer. They enjoy being mean. Only El Dios knows why.
"This Rendezvous is drawing ratoneros like dingos to a watering hole. They come to prey on the
good people. Good people, looking for help, make their way to Ganj Dareh, that's fine. But even
more of the bad have come. And full trains arrive each day.
"Out there —" he swept his arm along the horizon "— good people hold what jobs are left.
Tacticians let bad people go first, then good people. So, in Die Gastarbeiter, there are more
Huevones than we're used to.
"We need help, Jefe. With more of them, there should be more of us."
"I've doubled on-paths capability in the past two days."
"Yea, I know." He gave a quick nod of acknowledgment. "Not to go statistic on you, Jefe, but
Incidents have more than doubled, way past normal, and we were staffed for normal."
"I hear you, Harlan." Phoebe realized that this man deserved more than that fake-sincere
brush-off. She stepped forward and touched his arm. "I'm working on it ... strategically." The
barest form of an idea wriggled into her mind, more like a theme than an idea. "I'm thinking that
we should take this 'crisis in public confidence,' as you so aptly put it, and turn it into a
public forum. Get everybody to figure out ways to reduce the Incidents before they start, rather
than just get better at cleaning up the mess. What do you think?"
Harlan lifted one cheek in a wry grin, but his eyes narrowed. "Anything so I can stay home
con mi familia and stop worrying about them when I'm not."
He doesn't trust "strategic initiatives" and he doesn't like hearing me using the Partners'
favorite "we don't know how to fix this and frankly, we don't care" phrase. This time, though,
it's the right phrase and the right approach.
Still just a kernel, the idea seemed to involve Cliff, the Rendezvous, and a Collective-wide
forum. And it might fix a few other problems, like this stone wall around psych-tek supplies.
"Why don't you get back to work?" Phoebe gave Harlan's arm a gentle push. "You've done a good job
here. Tell your people I said so. Nothing tactical for me to do, so I have no choice but to go
'strategic.'" She grinned over the word. "That's the way I like it."
The Site Tactician grinned back with appreciation, maybe even some relief at the sarcasm she aimed
at herself.
But is it really doing something? Muscles all over her twinged with a need for action. Stand
down! she scolded her body. Other people, like Harlan, do tactical. I do strategic because no
one else will, and that's how we truly fix problems, not by just kicking ass and taking names, not
by a long shot.
Harlan spun around and trotted away.
Something clicked in Phoebe's mind, like a spotlight switching off. Her one-woman show was over
for now. She had stepped upstage, no longer under direct scrutiny by her most important audience,
the members of her combine. She let her tactician-guard down and found fatigue and challenge
pulling at her from different directions. She almost swayed, but her people at the Site were still
watching, so she turned that small momentum into a slow trudge toward her patrolcraft.
She ached with trying to protect them all. She'd spread her arms like wings over her combine, and
through them, over all of Ganj Dareh. Until recently, she'd been able to complete the circle, lock
her hands, and keep all of her charges safe and warm within the haven of her intelligence and
compassion and resolve. Not without some struggle, not without some sacrifice, not without some
failure, but all in all, she believed, much more good than harm had come from her work as Chief.
But now there were forces prying at her fingers, threatening to break open her sanctuary. Inside
Ganj Dareh, lively and smart offspring, like The Tangent, bumped up against the bounds of her
sanctuary and tried to break loose. Outside Ganj Dareh, clever and well-funded competitors chipped
away at her armor by shining lights through its chinks and cooing through its cracks. And Die
Gastarbeiter? At once, invading wholesale and begging for mercy, thrust upon her good offices and
full to bursting with their own troubles. On top of that, carried along with these struggling
souls, were parasites, these ratoneros of Harlan's, who could be making a difficult situation
impossible.
The need to care for them all, Gast and Haupt alike, all Neighborhoods, spread within her,
squeezing every part of her, heart and soul and mind.
Can I handle this? She snorted at the dumb question. Do I have a choice?
No. Failing was not an option, not and take care of her people. Quitting was not an option, not
and take care of herself.
Her invisible hand, her obsession, her compulsion, had returned, its grip on her spine firm and
reassuring, though its twanging along her nerves scared her.
Phoebe slid into her craft. She would protect Ganj Dareh. How should she start?
Watching the tactical more closely.
"Central!" Phoebe barked. Central chimed its attention. "Change criteria for
Reports-for-the-Chief. I still want to know about Risk-of-Death Incidents immediately. Now I want
that same notice on Risk-of-Injury High-Multiplier. And copy me on every alert, same priority as
on-duty, but after them in the queue. Acknowledge." The same trill closed the transaction.
Then there's working the strategic smarter . She'd think on that while on patrol, coax that idea
into something she could implement.
"Let's go," she told her patrolcraft.
