01. Midnight At the Well of Souls Read Online Free PDF Page B

diplomatic service.
    "I think it is fascinating you are so old, Captain," she said pleasantly. "Perhaps you are the oldest man alive. My race, of course, has no rejuve—it is not needed."
    No, of course not, Brazil thought sadly. They lived their eighty years as juvenile specialist components in the anthill of their society, then calmly showed up at the local Death Factory to be made into fertilizer.
    Anthill? he thought curiously. Now what in hell were ants?  
    Aloud, he replied, "Well, old or not I can't say, but it doesn't do anybody much good unless you've got a job like mine. I don't know why I keep on living—just something bred into me, I guess."
    Vardia brightened. That was something she could understand. "I wonder what sort of world would require such a survival imperative?" she mused, proving to everyone else that she didn't understand at all.
    Brazil let it pass.
    "A long-dead-and-gone one, I think," he said dryly.
    "I think we shall go back to our rooms, Captain," Hain put in, getting up and stretching. "To tell the truth, the only thing more exhausting than doing something is doing nothing at all." Julee rose almost at the same instant as the fat man, and they left together.
    Vardia said, "I suppose I shall go back as well, Captain, but I would like the chance to talk to you again and, perhaps, to see the bridge."
    "Feel free," he responded warmly. "I eat here every mealtime and company is always welcome. Perhaps tomorrow we'll eat and talk and then I'll show you how the ship runs."
    "I shall look forward to it," she replied, and there even seemed a bit of warmth in her flat voice—or, at least, sincerity. He wondered how genuine it was, and how much was the inbred diplomatic traits. It was the sort of comment that was guaranteed to please him. He wondered if he would ever know what went on in those insect minds.
    Well, he told himself, in actual fact it didn't make a damned bit of difference—he would show her around the ship and she would seem to enjoy it anyway.
    When he was alone in the wardroom, he looked over at the empty dishes. Hain had polished off everything, as expected, and so had Vardia and he—the meals were individually prepared for preference and body build.
    Julee's meal was almost untouched. She had merely played with the food.
    No wonder she's wasting away, he thought. Physically, anyway. But why mentally? She certainly wasn't Hain's niece, no matter what he said, and he doubted if she was an employee, either.
    Then, what?  
    He pushed the disposal button and lowered the chairs back to their floor position, then returned to the bridge.
    Freighter captains were the law in space, of course. They had to be. As such, ships of all lines had certain safeguards unique to each captain, and some gimmicks common to all but known only to those captains.
    Brazil sat back down in his command chair and looked at the projection screen still showing the virtually unchanging starscape. It looked very realistic, and very impressive, but it was a phony—the scene was a computer simulation; the Balla-Drubbik drive which allowed faster-than-light travel was extradimensional in nature. There was simply nothing outside the ship's energy well that would relate to any human terms.
    He reached over and typed on the computer keyboard: "i suspect illegal activities. show cabins 6 on left and 7 on right screen." The computer lit a small yellow light to show that the instructions had been received and the proper code for the captain registered; then the simulated starfield was replaced with overhead, side-by-side views of the two cabins.
    The fact that cameras were hidden in all cabins and could be monitored by captains was a closely guarded secret, though several people had already had knowledge of the accidentally discovered bugs erased from their minds by the Confederacy. Yet, many a madman and hijacker had been trapped by these methods, and Brazil also knew that the Confederation Port Authority would look at the