Yojin Suru
Qidan absently scratched his cheek as he pondered the offerings spread out along the server's
counter. One of the things he liked about these quarterly can-feels was the food. Börek, beygls,
krupuk, tamale, brik, scones, gugelhupf, sandkage, idlis, and Arán bocht tí. He hefted a
buttermilk scone, broke it open over his plate, squirted bagoong over it, lifted a half, and took a
big bite. His teeth cut through the thick, but crumbly biscuit. Then, the salty-sour of the fish
paste broke out over the hint of yeast. He mashed on contentedly.
"Ladies and gentlemen," Ap-Pre called out. "Please to join me."
Qidan added an Arán bocht tí to his plate, picked it up, and turned from the server. Another thing
he liked about these meetings was the can-feel room itself. Not really a room, more like a glade.
Jungle — zhuhndí jungle — surrounded them, at a considerate distance, with soaring tree trunks,
wrapped with leaf-heavy vines, dappled with brilliant lulo flowers, so dense the attendees couldn't
see out — and no one could eavesdrop without getting close enough to activate the wards.
Overhead, a dense matte of leaves, the first of at least four such layers, completely blocked the
sky, yet allowed filtered sunlight to wend its way down and convert the jungle floor to an emerald
dusk. The air around them stirred gently, caressing them with oxygen and moisture and exotic
scents. Yet there they were, only a few kay seconds outside of Cay Rock, the Prime Direvnya of
Glenn Continent.
"Mijnheer Qidan?" said someone at his elbow.
Qidan looked around. He saw a tall man, fair-skinned with lots of hair on his head and face.
"Yes?"
"I am Lincoln Gerovitch Prokopowicz, an ad-hoc member of the Board."
Qidan acknowledged with a slow nod. "'Qidan' will suffice." He added a faint smile while
wondering what the man wanted.
The other man bowed slightly. "An honor. Please address me as 'Jerry.'"
"I shall."
Ap-Pre boomed, "Ladies and gentleman, I call this meeting/can-be-felt of the Board of Directors for
the Mirnaya Direvnya to order."
Relieved by the interruption, Qidan rolled his eyes at Jerry, then hurried to his place at the
table, a sprawling oval of ipê-wood. Around it sat the people responsible for overseeing the
current operation of the Mirnaya Direvnya and ensuring that the Em-Deh continued to serve the
people of Yeibichai well into the future:
* representatives of various global industry associations — Hans Erlandsen for agriculture, Ran
Ulph Twistleton for construction, Wykeham-Fiennes for infrastructure, Ma Reksky Kamin for
infraware, Young-ho Hoe for gastronomics, Zeb Edee Nungak for resource-harvesting, Jacob Parrott
for tekware, Mary E. Walker for transportation — plus Qidan himself for Anshinkan
* Ap-Pre, representative of the Cygnus Group Academy — as a courtesy to the Sector's
Governor-General — and acting as the can-feel's coordinator/moderator for this quarter of the year
* m'Horn Suky, tactician of the m'Cairn combine, who operated the intercontinental lattice that
made the Em-Deh truly global, maintained all the automata that embodied cyberspace and made it
available to Yeibichai's zhee-tely, and set the standards that made participation by even the
smallest zhuhndí direvnya possible
* the ad-hoc representatives of the planet's zhee-tely themselves — selected each year by global
lottery to balance the professional organizations on the Board — including Baker of Hastings, a
cryo-chemist from Gagarin; James Livingston Harvey Barnum Junior, a fish farmer from Shepard; Foot
Vanbarhonormedal, an avian-botanist from Grissom; Randall Shughart, a granite sculptor from Titov;
Gar y!Gordon, an instructor pilot from Glenn; Bucha Paul, a predictive theosophist from Carpenter;
Jerry, an Anshinkan chief — ah, he probably wanted a job in Qidan's combine — from Nikolayev; Lor
Tay-len Aljames, an organo-programmer from Popovich; and cKer-Tha Brian, a linguistics professor
from Schirra
"First topic," said Ap-Pre, a muscular, keen-eyed blond of Teutonic ancestry. He covered his
atrophied eyes with the slick band of a multi-spectrum, neuro-interlaced sensor. "Capacity
planning. m'Horn Suky, a report on the trial of those Spaceª data-storage devices, if you
please."
"Of course." Suky sprawled, knee propped against the table's edge. Narrow interface tubes arched
over her short blonde hair to focus on her eyes, ears, and mouth. A slender cable flowed out of
their nexus implanted at the back of her head, down over her shoulder, and dropped to a largish box
resting under her chair. She spoke to the assembly, but her off-center focus on cyber-information
coming from her photon spouts made her seem distracted.
"We currently run the Em-Deh with three-hundred, seventy-three exabits of on-line storage, plus
twice that in slower near-line devices, all duplicated in five operations centers around the
planet. We also keep twenty times that off-line at our facility here, but retrievable on request.
Demand has been growing at three exabits a year for the past four with slight acceleration.
"Even with the attometer-caliber devices, we still use up a lot of floorspace — and you have to
remember that size determines speed — so when this combine that calls itself 'The Tangent' said
they could beat that by three orders of magnitude, we were definitely interested. Even when they
claimed to have developed a Spaceª environment inside their boxes — I mean, no one has been able
to do that anywhere near a planet's surface!
"But we have been running three of their prototype devices for going on twenty days now. As
prototypes, they require operators. Huge guys, but the gentlest males I've ever met. Very odd
features. And they really get into their work, very hands-on, you could say.
"The boxes — Spaceª or no Spaceª — do seem to work. If you'll look at your 'screens, I'll show
you the capacity and performance we've been able to achieve ..."
#
"Thank you, Tactician m'Horn," Ap-Pre rumbled. "Ladies and gentleman, we adjourn for nine-hundred
seconds exactly."
An image of sandkage, warm icing oozing down its side, flashed into Qidan's mind. He set himself
to stand up.
"Qidan?"
"Hmm?" He looked up to see Jerry standing across the table from him. No avoiding it now, but
let's see how hard this guy wants to work for it.
"I'd really like to talk to you about Ganj Dareh," Jerry said.
Qidan knew the name. Messages about this besieged direvnya had been showing up in his queues for
many days now. He'd even sent someone to see if Exiles had anything to do with it — they didn't.
Yet, ever cautious, he said, "Where's that?"
"Popovich."
Toss back some chaff, relevant, but still chaff. "They're behind in their association dues then."
Qidan settled back in his chair, a sour taste prickling the back of his throat. Quite relevant, in
fact: Popovich's delinquency had been cramping his cash flow for quite a while now.
"What?"
"Byukan-Hamil Consortium stopped paying for Yojin Suru services two years ago." He lifted an
instructive finger. "And most of their Anshinkan combines quit making their excessive-demand
insurance payments before that. I'd have to check how far behind this direvnya — uh?"
"Ganj Dareh."
"— how far behind Ganj Dareh is. Do you want me to check?"
"Does that mean you wouldn't help them?"
No, it does not; it just means I'd pay for it out of my own profits. Yet, still cautious, he said,
"It depends." He stopped there and observed Jerry's reaction carefully.
The tall man settled thoughtfully into his chair across the table, his face pensive, his jaw
working like he were chewing over Qidan's words. "Bad shit happening there," he said slowly.
"Real bad shit."
"I know," Qidan said and sharpened his gaze even more. This guy's concern might just be genuine.
The other face opened in surprise. "How? You didn't even know where Ganj Dareh was, couldn't
remember its name."
Just because they're behind in their payments, doesn't mean I neglect them. "What's
Ganj Dareh to you?"
"Gatogrebok is bidding on an anshinkan contract there, their first attempt to compete on the
continent in decades. I contracted to provide peace-management advice to their tactician on-site.
He's young, but learning fast."
"Caught in the cross-fire?"
Jerry nodded sadly.
"And what have you advised him to do?"
"Lay low. Let the locals handle it."
"And if the locals can't 'handle it.'"
Startled again, Jerry stared across the polished yellow-brown tabletop. "What do you mean?"
"From what I've seen so far, I wouldn't bet one way or the other. This Chief Heejanus and the
leaders of Ganj Dareh's Collective might be able to stay ahead of the unprecedented social
unrest that's plaguing their direvnya. Then again, they might not. What are you going to tell
your clients in that case?"
Jerry's face hardened. "Are you telling me now that you wouldn't intervene?"
Qidan sighed, then straightened in his chair. Do these people — my clients — think I'm made of
money? Don't they know how much they pay me to fill in their gaps? Don't they know the rules they
set down in my contract? I guess even "experts" have their limits.
"I will be very reluctant to intervene anywhere on Popovich." He held up a hand with spread
fingers. "Here's what I will consider." He touched the protruding little finger. "Will the
violence spread beyond Ganj Dareh?" Another finger. "If it does, does it threaten the rest of the
planet? How much demand for my services are my paying clients making? Has Heejanus kept
up her insurance?"
Qidan closed those fingers, leaving only the thumb protruding. "Last, but most important: has
Heejanus asked for my help? My contract forbids my going anywhere I haven't been asked." He
wrapped the thumb around his fist and lowered it slowly to the table. "Clear?"
Jerry nodded glumly. "Clear."
"Good." Qidan stood. "Now, if you'll excuse me, I see a sandkage with my name on it." He turned
away. Now, at least one of the parties in that forlorn town knows the score. I hope it's enough.
