This Thing of Ours

By Matthew Jarpe


‘Bidli, G’nith, nice to see you again.’ Finn settled himself at the bar and nodded at the bartender. A glass of port appeared in front of him instantly. They knew him well at the Human Condition.

‘Mr. Finn/ creator of status/ found our lost dataset,’ Bidli answered. ‘We are pleased you could have a word with us on such short notice.’

‘Hey, I like working for the Ptang. I don’t need an environment suit to survive inside your offices. What can I do for you?’

‘One of our associates has dangerously threatened our position. He has obtained unexpected status. This troubles us.’

Finn nodded. ‘That does sound troublesome. How did this friend of yours get so much status all of a sudden? Successful business deal?’

‘No,’ G’nith said. ‘He has achieved a decorative coup. It seems one of your competitors has obtained a collection of Terran cultural artifacts. These artifacts are displayed prominently in our competitor’s inner offices. We have not yet seen these artifacts, but they are rumored to be exquisite, and genuine.’

‘I had heard of some ancient Egyptian relics on the last transport,’ Finn said. ‘But of course it’s illegal to remove cultural artifacts from the planet of origin, isn’t it?’

‘Not precisely,’ Bidli answered. ‘It is illegal to exchange these artifacts between species, but not for the species that owns the planet of origin to traffic in them. Rare pieces can be displayed in museums, but never bought or sold between species.’

‘Yeah, I remember now. This is all so stronger species don’t loot the cultural history of the weaker ones. It makes sense. It also makes it difficult for poor planets to gain economically. Art is about all Earth has that anyone else wants.’

‘Art and the artists who create it,’ Bidli agreed. ‘But back to our status problem. We suspect that there are more cultural artifacts on this transport. It seems unlikely that anyone who is willing to break the law will do so on such a limited basis. We would like you to obtain some of these objects for our office.’

Finn scratched his chin. ‘Well, I don’t know, fellas. This is an illegal act you’re requesting, after all.’

‘We will pay handsomely,’ Bidli said. ‘And as for the legal issues, you have nothing to worry about. We can’t tell you the details, but in this particular circumstance you have nothing to fear.’

Finn pushed his empty port glass in such a way that the bartender knew he wanted another. ‘I’m not convinced.’

‘We will be happy to send our business to your competitor, Mr. Finn. B’shan is happy with the work of Mr. Van Leiden. We would likely be as happy or more, considering what we can afford to pay.’

‘Hey, that isn’t necessary,’ Finn said. ‘I think we can work together. But I’m going to need a promise from you that you’ll step forward with those details if we get caught. I can’t afford trouble with the law, you understand?’

‘I believe we can work something out,’ Bidli said.

#

‘Let me get this straight,’ the Provost said, leaning forward at her desk. ‘You want me to arrest you?’

Finn held out his hands, wrists together. ‘Take me away, Killu. I’m a bad man. I’ve sold Terran cultural artifacts to the Ptang. It’s against Conglomerate law. I need to be made an example of.’

Killu gave Finn a narrow look. ‘What’s this about, Eric? What kind of scam are you running?’

‘It isn’t a scam,’ Finn said. ‘You can check the evidence.’ Finn pointed at her desktop, where files were appearing. ‘I’ve provided everything you’ll need to prosecute my case before the Vega Ring board of Provosts. You can lock me away for a long time. Just like you always wanted.’

‘I’ve wanted to put you away for worse than this,’ Killu said. ‘But what the hell? They got Al Capone for tax evasion.’

#

‘G’nith, Bidli, can I have a word with you?’ Jerry took a seat in the chairlike object in front of the sunken workstation in the Ptang inner office. Mr. Nine- fingers stood in the doorway behind him.

‘Mr. Tollman/ works for Finn/ very knowledgeable,’ G’nith said. ‘How may I ask did you gain entry to our inner offices? Security is the best our money can buy.’

Jerry smiled. ‘And we installed it, remember? So as not to ruin the décor. We’ve got a problem, gentlemen. My employer is standing trial for something he did on your behalf. You promised to help him out if that should ever happen, and you have refused to appear as material witnesses.’

‘Now is not the right time to make that information public,’ Bidli said. ‘We didn’t realize he’d be so stupid as to get caught right away. We will come forward in due time.’

Jerry shook his head sadly. ‘That’s not the right answer, Bidli.’ He reached forward in his seat and picked up a priceless Ming vase. He dashed the flowers and water on the floor (and what possessed them to fill a Ming vase with water and plants?) and held it out. ‘Nine, get me one.’

Nine stepped down into the pit and came back to drop one eyestalk into the vase. He returned to his station by the door and crossed his arms. He hadn’t said a word. Bidli was a paler shade of green, and G’nith was doing his best to comfort his wounded partner.

‘I’m going to have quite a bouquet here before I leave, unless you gentlemen become more cooperative.’

G’nith pointed many spindly limbs in Jerry’s direction. ‘This will accomplish nothing. You will be prosecuted for your brutality.’

‘Two from G’nith, Nine.’

When he had his three eyestalks in the vase, Jerry put it back onto the stand. ‘Gentlemen, you can see how this is going to go. Even after you can’t see at all, you’re going to feel how it goes. But before we blind you completely, take a good look at me. You don’t understand human facial expressions, so let me translate what you see into words. I’m not afraid of anything you think you can do to me. I’m willing to bet right now that you are very much afraid of me. We both know where this is going to end up. Let’s cut the crap and finish this now.’

‘You have your assurances,’ G’nith said. ‘We will come forth immediately and exonerate your employer. Now leave and let us heal these wounds you’ve inflicted.’

Jerry laughed, and glanced back at Nine, who laughed as well. ‘That’s good, G’nith. Your assurances. Your assurances didn’t do Mr. Finn any good. Why should we accept them? No, I’m afraid we’re going to need more than that.’

#

‘I’m calling in your marker,’ the Dutchman said, holding up the electronic chit. G’nith and Bidli stared at him with their remaining eyes. They had met in a Ptang bar, near their offices. Van Leiden had not come alone. Six large Terrans were spread out through the bar, glaring down at the spindly Ptang and saying nothing.

‘Our marker? But we gave that to Jerry Tollman.’

‘So? It’s mine now, and I’m calling it in. Transfer the assets now.’

‘But that marker is assurance that we’ll help Eric Finn with his prosecution,’ Bidli said. ‘We plan to come forward today in his defense.’

‘Yeah, well I hate Eric Finn. He can rot in jail for all I care. Now give me my money.’

‘But that marker represents a significant fraction of our business,’ G’nith wailed. ‘We’ll be ruined.’

‘That’s real interesting, Slim. Now give me my money. I’ve got a game of chance in which the resulting outcome is not in question. I’ve got a card game with Jerry Tollman tonight, and I’ve got a little surprise for them. The only variable is the amount of money I care to bet, and I intend to put everything I’ve got on that table. Capiche?’

‘A game of chance against Jerry Tollman, you say? We have a strong desire to do financial harm to Jerry Tollman. Perhaps we can make some sort of arrangement.’ Bidli and G’nith turned to one another and carried on a long conversation that was not translated. They turned back to Van Leiden. ‘We’ll provide the money we owe you and more, if you will do us a favor.’

#

‘But… but you said the outcome of this game of chance was not in question!’ Bidli was flushing a deep shade of forest green as his many limbs shook against one another. It had been a long night, and the Ptang were visibly wilting.

‘Yeah, funny thing happened,’ Van Leiden said. ‘You were there, you saw how it went down. You win a few, you lose a few.’

‘But you showed us how you were going to cheat,’ G’nith wailed. ‘It was a flawless plan.’

‘No plan is completely flawless,’ the Dutchman explained calmly. ‘It’s a shame about your assets. Hey, I lost a bundle myself. But you guys shouldn’t worry about this. I’ve got a plan that will get our money back.’

‘We’ve had enough of your plans. We’re going to return to Finn’s men and offer to get him out of trouble. They have our marker back and then some. They’ll surely accept our help in return for our lost assets.’

‘But I understand you guys didn’t want to release that information in the first place,’ Van Leiden said. ‘I know of a way you can get your money back without having to speak up in court. You realize that Finn’s goombahs are breaking Terran law, don’t you? We just have to bring this whole mess to the Provost and we can throw the bunch of them in jail, get your money back, and nobody has to get wise to your little secret.’

G’nith turned to Bidli. ‘This plan does make a great deal of sense.’

#

‘Thanks for waiting,’ Finn said as the robot guard led Loni into the visiting room. A forcefield, clearly marked, prevented them from touching, but allowed them to see and hear each other clearly. Loni had been expecting prison fatigues, but Finn wore one of his better suits, the midnight blue with the thin dark red pinstripes. ‘Donna and the kids just left.’

‘How are they holding up?’ Loni asked. She was wearing a light yellow sundress and sandals. She had found some flowers to put in her dark brown hair.

‘Ah, they expect this kind of thing. I’ve been lucky so far. But they know about the Family. Well, some of it, anyway. How are you?’

‘I miss you. How are they treating you?’

Finn shrugged. ‘Not too bad. I never see anyone but the robots. The hardest thing is that I can’t rearrange the furniture in my room. It’s all stuck to the floor.’

‘I’ve got a couple of messages for you. Jerry says the Ptang account is going super fantastic. That’s the exact phrase he used. He thinks they should be finished by the end of the week.’

‘Tell him that’s fabulous, exact words. And tell him I left my spare keys in the desk.’

‘You left your spare keys in the desk, right.’

‘That’s not code for anything, I really did leave my keys in the desk.’

‘Right. And he also passed along a message from Hans Van Leiden. He wanted me to tell you that the Ptang are a bunch of dumb shits, and they’re nothing but pussies. And he also wanted me to say that you’ve got some stones after all. Heck, I could have told him that.’

#

Killu Torkka accepted her Ptang guests graciously. She was in charge of the Enclave, not Terran foreign policy, but she had had her share of state dinners. The Ptang were among the more agreeable non-humans that inhabited Vega Ring. Terrans routinely came in contact with only four of five of the hundreds of species that shared the vast space station. One reason was habitat conditions. The Ptang, the Loloft and Krchaitch breathed the same mix of gasses as the Terrans and enjoyed roughly the same room temperature. Another reason was that humans didn’t have many common purposes with, for example, the slow talking, methane drinking Bod or the pent up electrical fury that was the Zott.

Killu was familiar with the Ptang, and her cranial implant supplied the names and social standing of her two guests. G’nith and Bidli were the most affluent businesspersons in the Ptang enclave. What she read in her heads up display, however, didn’t seem to coincide with what she saw before her. The Ptang were a confident species, used to wielding power and buying and selling whatever they wanted. These two seemed cowed, dejected. She noticed a few recent injuries, still healing under transparent bandages.

‘What brings you to the Terran Enclave?’ she asked as they settled their many spindly limbs into the chairs as best they could.

‘It embarrasses us to speak of it,’ Bidli started. ‘We fear we have been the victims of some kind of swindling on the part of a group of your tenants.’

‘One of your most prominent businessmen, Eric Finn, has brought us to financial ruin and grave bodily injury,’ G’nith went on.

‘Tell me everything,’ Killu said. This time, she told herself, Finn would not get away with what he’d done. The two Ptang laid out all of the events of the past few days. They described everything from the first financial transaction to the disastrous card game that had wiped out the last of their assets. They named the men who had participated where they could, and uploaded images from their brain-interface hardware where they could not. Killu’s face grew more grim with each detail added to the story.

‘Thank you, gentlemen. I will admit to you that I have known for a long time about the criminal activities of Eric Finn and his associates. Terran legal complications have prevented me from arresting him, but the story you’ve told me will help me put him away for good. It helps that he’s already in prison for the crime of selling Terran cultural artifacts to you. However, I must tell you that in revealing this story, you have admitted culpability in that original crime. If it were up to me, I’d offer immunity in exchange for your testimony. However, it isn’t my decision. We have to submit the request to the Council of Provosts and let them decide. In the meantime, I’m afraid it’s my duty to inform you that you are under arrest.’

‘We have a perfectly reasonable explanation for that,’ G’nith said. ‘There is no need to arrest us. We were trying to keep this announcement a secret, but circumstances force us to come forward sooner than we’d like.’

‘We did not violate the law when we bought those cultural artifacts. It is legal for the owners of a planet to traffic in artifacts from that planet. The Ptang are in the process of purchasing the Earth, where these objects originated.’

Killu stared at the creatures across her desk. ‘Purchasing the Earth?’

‘The whole Sol system, actually. The transaction is nearly complete. We have a few more assets to transfer to the Conglomerate, and we have yet to physically occupy the property, but the transaction is far enough along that no crime has been committed. The grace period in the law even allows Mr. Finn to escape prosecution, although we still hope we can put him in prison for what he’s done to us.’

‘How can you purchase our planet?’

‘I don’t believe that the Terrans fully appreciated the debt they were taking on when they joined the Conglomerate and made use of our technology. We simply took advantage of the situation. Apparently the Terrans never even realized that they had a finite amount of time to retire their debt.’ The Ptang sounded positively gleeful at their own cleverness. Didn’t they realize that Killu was a Terran herself? Did they even care?

‘We’re providing your computer with all of the pertinent legal documents, Ms. Torkka,’ G’nith said. ‘We also have priority access to the main Linling processor array on Vega Ring. That should allow you to sort through the arguments much faster than if you had to go through Vega Ring authorities. In fact, my implant tells me that our claim has already been accepted. So, are we free to go?’

Killu looked down at her desktop, her fingertips brushing the appropriate icons numbly. ‘Your explanation seems to be checking out. You are exonerated of your crimes. Apparently, you are free to go.’

‘Excellent. We will keep close watch on the prosecution of Eric Finn. We will provide any other assistance we can. We hope that you can recover our assets soon. We have important business transactions to complete.’

Killu nodded and said nothing as the Ptang picked their way out of their office. She looked back down at her desktop. Apparently, the accelerated legal review did not only work in favor of the Ptang. Vega Ring informed her that Eric Finn had been automatically released from prison as a result of the Ptang’s new information.

#

G’nith and Bidli stopped as they entered their office. They began backing out as soon as they saw Eric Finn and Jerry Tollman sitting uncomfortably in the Ptang chairs and studying the screens of the Ptang computers. They ran into Bogs and Nine, and scrambled forward into the room.

‘Finn/ swindler/ ruined our lives, what are you doing out of prison?’

‘G’nith, Bidli, good to see you guys. Thanks for coming forward with the truth. Vega Ring authorities sprung me right away.’

‘But why are you in our offices? Don’t you have someone else to steal from?’

‘You forget that I own this business now. Jerry managed to get the legal transfer taken care of this morning. That gave us access to your accounting database. Just in time, too. We’re trying to save this place from complete financial ruin.’

‘But you brought that financial ruin on us yourselves. What are you doing to our database? Aren’t you finished destroying our lives?’

‘Gentlemen,’ Finn said. ‘We can argue all day about who swindled whom, and who pulled out whose eyestalks. But we’re all just businessmen, here. We’re all just trying to make an honest buck. Now Jerry here has managed to find some significant ways to save money and liquidate some assets, isn’t that right, Jerry?’

‘Don’t you know it,’ Jerry said. ‘I found a huge payment on a property that you guys really don’t need. We kicked back that purchase to the Conglomerate and got a full refund. Luckily, we were able to find a buyer pretty quickly.’ He turned the screen around to show what he had done. G’nith and Bidli studied the figures and turned a pale shade of lime.

‘But you’ve sold the Earth back to the Terrans. We were to make that final payment today.’

‘You know,’ Finn said, ‘I’m surprised they trusted you fellows with such a big responsibility. You even had the codes that would allow you to turn back all of the ships that were en route to Sol. Of course, we had to change those codes for security purposes, but we’ll make sure we keep those in a safe place. That was an awfully big ticket item, a whole system. Now you’ve got your money back and we’ve got a lot of capital with which to operate. I didn’t know you guys were such big shots. I’m impressed.’

‘We’re not big shots anymore,’ G’nith said. ‘You’ve destroyed the last of our status. Can we even hope that you’ll do us the dignity of killing us?’

‘Oh, things will pick up for you again,’ Finn said. ‘If you boys ever find yourselves in need of a job, we can always use carpet layers.’

#

‘So how’s it feel to be the big hero who saves planet Earth from the aliens?’ Jerry asked.

Finn smiled. ‘It feels good. I guess I’m not such a parasite on society after all. But you know Jerry? Sometimes I think about retiring.’

‘From the decorating business?’ Jerry smiled.

‘From the Family. I get tired of doing this thing of ours. Sometimes I think I’ll just stay with Donna, no girlfriends. Just decorate offices for a living, no more stealing, no more killing. Sometimes I think about just letting Van Leiden take over. Or you, if you think you can handle it.’

‘I’m not boss material,’ Jerry said. ‘You serious about that? You really want to leave all this?’

‘I said I think about it. Sometimes I think about the opposite, raising my fist at the old man 26 light years away and saying ‘Screw you, I’m the boss here.’ I just go back and forth. I don’t know where I’m going to end up, Jerry.’

Nine stumbled into the doorway, his chartreuse blazer a smoldering ruin, a nasty burn taking up residence with all of his other facial scars. ‘It’s Van Leiden, boss. The truce is over.’

‘OK,’ Finn said. ‘You boys are duly authorized by the power vested in me to go out and whack that bastard. But be careful. The Dutchman doesn’t screw around. Jerry, you go with them. Call if you need me.’

‘You staying with us a while longer, then?’ Jerry said, standing up.

Finn leaned back, put his hands behind his head and his feet up on the desk. ‘It’s good to be the boss.’

Page 3 | Page 1 | Page 2 | Page 3