tell. If not native, then someone who’s lived here a long while. Long enough to sprinkle his chat with Tlel terms. That’s as clear a mark of a long-termer as you can find.”
Would his father give himself away as a possible collaborator of the Meliorares by showing such explicit interest in the adaptability and improvement of another human being? On the other hand, who on Gestalt would have reason to suspect that such questions might have their origin in such an illegitimate history? This Anayabi’s questioning and studying of someone like Eustabe might be perceived locally as nothing more than the tactlessness Eustabe himself had initially felt it to be. Harmless, if tasteless, chatter between one of hundreds of recluse settlers and a deliveryman. To ascribe to it anything of greater significance one would have to look at it from an entirely different perspective.
The perspective, he knew, of one all too familiar with the Meliorares and their work.
Though she was unable to locate the source of it, Pip fluttered her pleated wings as she shared her master’s increasing excitement. This Eustabe was presenting him with a long shot, Flinx knew. An extreme long shot. Almost as great a long shot, albeit on a much reduced scale of physical values, as relocating the perambulating Tar-Aiym weapons platform. His lips pressed against each other. If he could take off across a sizable section of the Arm in search of the latter, he could damn well spend another day or two checking out the former. More than one long shot in his past had proven worth the pursuing. Clarity Held, for example.
“Young Mr. Mastiff, sir?”
“What?” Dragging himself back from contemplation of several unrelated curvilinear forms, Flinx remembered that he was supposed to be conducting a formal interview for an unidentified employer. “Yes, this Anayabi, uh, fella of yours certainly sounds like he might fit the profile of the kind of folks we want to include in our survey. Do you happen to have any additional information on him?”
Eustabe shook his head. “I just made my scheduled deliveries, that’s all. I never had a hundredth the interest in him-wise that he did in me. You can try researching him through the Shell, but it’s my experience that folks who like that much physical privacy take care to shield their personals as well. If you go looking, I don’t think you’ll much find.” He smiled broadly. “If he can fit into your survey, then I expect your bonus will fit into my account.”
Setting a secure, private link between their respective communits, both men worked in silence. While Flinx transferred the specified bonus credit to Eustabe’s personal account, his guest provided Flinx with what little additional information his personal sybfile contained on the hermetic Anayabi. The mostly speculative peripherals did not interest Flinx half so much as the coordinates of the settler’s residence.
A quick check showed that the locale in question lay at the extreme limit of a standard skimmer’s range. Its very remoteness was a good sign, though pre-arrival research had indicated how seriously many of Gestalt’s iconoclastic artists, writers, and self-proclaimed philosophers valued and protected their privacy and isolation. So, too, Flinx knew, would anyone who had once had professional intercourse with the Meliorares. Anyone with any common sense, that is.
He had to force himself not to utilize his own communit to link to the Shell, but to wait until he could once more access a public terminal to research the cryptic Gestaltian resident named Anayabi. He was at once disappointed and pleased to discover that Eustabe had been correct. There was nothing in the public records beyond the most basic listing to be found on anyone by that name. Only a single, terse, uninformative identification string through which Mr. Anayabi could be reached via the Shell. Nor did inputting the coordinates Eustabe had supplied produce any information
Would his father give himself away as a possible collaborator of the Meliorares by showing such explicit interest in the adaptability and improvement of another human being? On the other hand, who on Gestalt would have reason to suspect that such questions might have their origin in such an illegitimate history? This Anayabi’s questioning and studying of someone like Eustabe might be perceived locally as nothing more than the tactlessness Eustabe himself had initially felt it to be. Harmless, if tasteless, chatter between one of hundreds of recluse settlers and a deliveryman. To ascribe to it anything of greater significance one would have to look at it from an entirely different perspective.
The perspective, he knew, of one all too familiar with the Meliorares and their work.
Though she was unable to locate the source of it, Pip fluttered her pleated wings as she shared her master’s increasing excitement. This Eustabe was presenting him with a long shot, Flinx knew. An extreme long shot. Almost as great a long shot, albeit on a much reduced scale of physical values, as relocating the perambulating Tar-Aiym weapons platform. His lips pressed against each other. If he could take off across a sizable section of the Arm in search of the latter, he could damn well spend another day or two checking out the former. More than one long shot in his past had proven worth the pursuing. Clarity Held, for example.
“Young Mr. Mastiff, sir?”
“What?” Dragging himself back from contemplation of several unrelated curvilinear forms, Flinx remembered that he was supposed to be conducting a formal interview for an unidentified employer. “Yes, this Anayabi, uh, fella of yours certainly sounds like he might fit the profile of the kind of folks we want to include in our survey. Do you happen to have any additional information on him?”
Eustabe shook his head. “I just made my scheduled deliveries, that’s all. I never had a hundredth the interest in him-wise that he did in me. You can try researching him through the Shell, but it’s my experience that folks who like that much physical privacy take care to shield their personals as well. If you go looking, I don’t think you’ll much find.” He smiled broadly. “If he can fit into your survey, then I expect your bonus will fit into my account.”
Setting a secure, private link between their respective communits, both men worked in silence. While Flinx transferred the specified bonus credit to Eustabe’s personal account, his guest provided Flinx with what little additional information his personal sybfile contained on the hermetic Anayabi. The mostly speculative peripherals did not interest Flinx half so much as the coordinates of the settler’s residence.
A quick check showed that the locale in question lay at the extreme limit of a standard skimmer’s range. Its very remoteness was a good sign, though pre-arrival research had indicated how seriously many of Gestalt’s iconoclastic artists, writers, and self-proclaimed philosophers valued and protected their privacy and isolation. So, too, Flinx knew, would anyone who had once had professional intercourse with the Meliorares. Anyone with any common sense, that is.
He had to force himself not to utilize his own communit to link to the Shell, but to wait until he could once more access a public terminal to research the cryptic Gestaltian resident named Anayabi. He was at once disappointed and pleased to discover that Eustabe had been correct. There was nothing in the public records beyond the most basic listing to be found on anyone by that name. Only a single, terse, uninformative identification string through which Mr. Anayabi could be reached via the Shell. Nor did inputting the coordinates Eustabe had supplied produce any information
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