"Koval Moore. Director, Intelligence Bureau."

  The man had sharp features, his skin tanned to Saltillan standards. He was dressed from head to toe in yellowish khaki and heeled in rugged brown moccasins and balding in a wide and conspicuous strip starting from the crown down the middle of his head.

  "Well met," Jirani said, accepting the extended hand with his own powerful grip and affording a grim smile.

  "Well met… to you too, Commander Mzeeka," Koval nodded emotionlessly. His face looked frozen into ennui, and when his mouth moved none of the other muscles in his face moved with it, and the look was uncanny and unnatural enough for Marja to wonder if Koval suffered from some paralysis of the maxillofacial muscles.

  'The spymaster,' she thought to herself, committing, as a matter of course, the man's features to her eidetic-feeder-enhanced memory and cross-comparing it with a list of faces she had already memorized. Over the years she had committed several thousand faces to memory, a practice borne of the Lebensraum guideline on spies. The guideline was aimed at reducing the chances of infiltration and/or misdirection from persons who pose a high risk of espionage. 'His face doesn't fit anyone I know,' she concluded after several seconds.

  "And to you, Deputy Marshall ma'am," Koval said, taking her limp hand in his.

  "The pleasure is all mine," she said, pressing her lips together. Handshakes had never been her strong suit.

  "Please," Koval motioned for them to take their seats, and even before their weight could settle completely into the canvas chairs the carriage doors closed with a resounding boom and a high-powered hum crescendoed and then melted away into the background.

  The familiar feeling of movement's interplay with gravity asserted itself upon Marja's bowels and informed her that they had started moving. Behind her she felt rather than heard the shuffling of feet upon the chrome-colored flooring, as the balance of one or two of the corporals was suddenly compromised

  "Alf, you can leave us. I'll call if I need you," Koval twisted his torso around to address the soldiers, and the one he called 'Alf' nodded a crisp 'yes, sir!' before leading the guard contingent into the back carriage.

  "I am meant to courier you to the Vines up in the southern quadrant," Koval said, turning back to regard Jirani beside him once the carriage door had closed. As he said this he looked straight into Jirani's eyes and never once wavered in his intonation, and there was such a regular canter to his speech that Marja wondered if the earphone he wore was relaying the tick of a metronome.

  "You've been put to much trouble," Jirani replied, leaning back and pursing his lips. "Is there any person in particular we should thank for this hospitality?"

  Marja glanced at Jirani, making sure to keep her expression straight but all the while worrying if Jirani was perhaps not committing a social gaffe by being so forward.

  But Koval seemed not to have taken offense (not that it was possible to discern anything from the man's barren countenance), instead suggesting that "you can make your thanks known to the host of the meeting you will be attending shortly. Such secure measures are necessary anyway. You will by now have heard of the terrorist group."

  "If you're referring to the Gimma Ashby—that's the second time we've heard them mentioned. The first time we've heard them called terrorists," Marja said, talking across Jirani. "Our infoments didn't have anything on them, so we will appreciate a primer."

  "That is not surprising. They have been a small group until some of their recent posts gained traction on the Protectorate-Intraweb, so I will doubt if there has been adequate time to prepare a comprehensive Infomentary; but I will say that their terroristic quality is quite evident," Koval said, leaning forward so that he could lock down Marja's gaze with his own.

  "How so?" Marja inquired, matching Koval staredown for staredown.

  "They have as one of their stated goals the secession of Saltilla from the Sylvan Protectorate. Another one of their goals espouses a 'return to tradition'—a return to the lifestyle of the Bejana the Gimma Ashby speciously claim all Saltillans are descended from. Anyone can see that they do not hide their nature," Koval said. "If you need any more convincing, then you must know that they hold a hatred for all things Democratic."

  "You've made your point," Jirani returned, shifting his weight. Marja stared out the small windowpane, thinking suddenly that the train ride felt smooth as butter—she supposed it utilized maglev technology.

  "But are they popular at all? Every society has its fringe group," Marja remarked, unwilling to break eye contact. "Even in population-centers like Saltilla which rely heavily on mass-compulsion-matrices to smooth out tensions… that has been the experience, that such fringe groups exist, but I imagine such groups are cut off from any real uptake."

  Jirani chortled, like he always did when she said something stupid. Her cheeks reddened. Why do you have to do this?

  Koval's expression remained flat as a rock. "I should say, Deputy Marshal, it is precisely the overuse of mass-compulsion-matrices which creates the holes in society that are so exploitable. Compulsion works on intentionality, and it is in the nature of human intentionality to splinter and rebel against the grain. People are always searching the market of ideas for alternative opinions. Mass-compulsion-matrices are a useful, if blunt, tool, meant to shore up support for our great suzerain, but susceptible to idiosyncratic patterns of breakdown."

  "Director Moore couldn't be more right," Jirani felt it necessary to add, taking on the tone of a teacher, a tone of voice she recognized from her youth. Marja rolled her eyes.

  "You'd do well to listen, Marja. I should add that, in a place as filled with tension as Saltilla—what with the conflict between Jegorich and Saltilla and the internal unhappiness surrounding the 'wealth gap' between rich and poor Saltillans—the liberal use of mass-compulsion-matrices are unavoidable. Saltilla is between a rock and a hard place," Jirani explained. "Can't live without a ton of compulsion, can't live with too much of it."

  Koval turned to look at Jirani, finally breaking eye contact with Marja, and she took the opportunity to blink. She had won the staredown, but suddenly she felt how foolish it was to make a competition out of such trifling things.

  "You have a handle on the main issues," Koval said to Jirani, a newfound respect sparkling within his dark pupils. "That is indeed the… the gist of things." Turning to Marja, he continued: "To your original question about whether the Gimma Ashby are popular, Deputy Marshal, they have indeed become very popular very fast… and quite recently. It was not more than a month before you first arrived that they staged a mass protest—ten thousand strong—at the Agave."

  "What is that, the Agave?" Marja asked, shooting a glance at Jirani. That old man scrunched up his fatless cheeks like he had just stifled a yawn and seemed to be melting lazily into his chair, and otherwise continued staring blankly into the windowed dark before them.

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  "It is what we call our shopping district. The Agave protests took us by surprise and you can be sure it made some waves. We've had to use plainclothes Jegorichians to monitor that place ever since, since we couldn't confirm the mental profiles of the Saltillan Police's troopers within the appropriate margin of error."

  "That's fine then. It's clear they are a problem," Marja nodded, unsure of how to continue. Koval stared at her but otherwise did not reply.

  She observed Jirani's slump and, though his expression betrayed nothing, knew he was already barely listening. She thought of raising the issue of high rates of insubordination amongst the Saltillan Division, but, finding that it would amount to airing her grievances in an inappropriate forum, thought better of it.

  As such, she settled on staring out the front window, watching the occasional light shoot by on the outside and hearing the rush of wind cut against their transport from out of dark nothings. And she was glad that Koval remained silent and sphinx-like through all that, even as he made a point of watching her closely throughout that journey.

  They alighted and once they bid a terse farewell to Director Koval Moore they were led by a tiny, uniformed man through a lobby whose only similarity with Hydrax Station was the fact that it was deserted. Terumpet Station was expansive and garishly colored for all that, and its lobby space was hung with parti-colored pennants and carpeted in navy and beige finery. And as they funneled into a long tunnel-like chamber, they found every inch of the place covered in advertisements—not the dry, facetious touts which took up wallspace in the shopping district, but tasteful advertisements that stood out for artistry and effort and luxury and eye-catching opulence.

  The lion's share of advertising space was taken up by terminal-screens whetting high-SES appetites for Caturdhara-manufactured products—eye implants and full-range prostheses with a variety of image-processing upgrades as well as assorted VR capabilities, limb substitutes created to bespoke-specifications with 'perfect feelings, perfect forms', brain neuro-implants with consciousness-expanding, Incunabulum-supplementing characteristics (with, if it was to be believed, altered-consciousness-on-demand capabilities), and willpower and intentionality fortifiers, amongst others.

  And there were Kincaid LLE's high-def dancing holograms, not so much glowing as they were reflecting light bounced off of oily skin and frilly dresses and one hundred thousand splaying strands of hair. Cheetra AI-Tableaux, the form said—Cheetra, who could not have been anything but a woman, said—is the companion to tide you over bad times and to share in your good times. A True Friend, a True Companion, a Lover for You. Special. She blew a kiss at Jirani as he stalked past, puckered lips red against skin that was smoother than butter and cheeks just darker than sepia.

  Along the portside wall leading up to the entrance was a wood-colored bas-relief depicting a snippet of harmonious Saltillan life shuttered between its glorious obelisks: thickly muscled babushkas with smiles on their face, helmeted with hardhats bearing the 'N' of Ninsei and pushing trolleys brimming with Ninsei survival paraphernalia; lines of women, young because they were lithe, their heads bound in kerchiefs and their sleeves rolled up suggestively and their hands bearing knives and other artifacts of war, their lineaments scrunching together N-like; young men with turgid faces frozen mid-mirth and armed with biceps of incredible size, the ranks of men overlapping and straining agains their clothes amidst cross-sections of Ninsei munitions factories; Saltillan men of war leaving the warmth of the city and fording out into the Desert darkness in sleeveless vests, their striated forearms tangled up in straps and slings of weapons hidden behind their girthy forms.

  Exquisite make. There are stylistic details to make a master weep.

  The bas-relief was protected behind a panel of tempered glass and, as Marja tramped past—scrutinizing it, admiring it—she found the material reminiscent of fine oak. As she ran her eyes across its lacquered surface she found discoloration where she supposed a knot had been and speculated absentmindedly at the prohibitive cost of importing such a marvelous piece of wood across half the galaxy.

  They reached the end of the bas-relief where the soldiers were leaving the gate, and there Marja found a copper-colored attribution panel fitted into the wall. On it was stamped the following words: 'NINSEI DESERT INDUSTRIES LLE', as if it weren't clear enough who the sponsor of the piece was. And under it a separate line read: 'Hand-carved by Basset Morning-Hughes'.

  As the three of them—Jirani, Marja, and their diminutive guide—pushed out Terumpet Station's revolving door, they saw in that tunnel-space, furnished with holograms and suffused by warm, orange light, orderly rows of well-heeled citizens bedecked in fine clothes and idling on their floating holo-scooters, the affluents mumbling amongst themselves and casting side-long glances at them.

  And somewhere above them the PA system was crackling in clear and audible tones: "... South loop shuttle services will resume shortly. The train bound for Noon Quadrangle will arrive in three minutes. The train bound for Shukrich Airport will arrive in two minutes. We apologize for any inconvenience caused. …"

  The guide, Jirani and Marja behind them made their way down the semi-circular flight of steps; to their left, holo-scooters whined past them in the opposite direction and shimmied through the vehicular ingress right of the revolving door.

  At the foot of the staircase they turned rightwise into a solid face of rock, a rectangular portion of which outlined and then opened with a swipe of the guide's matte-black access card across a hidden terminal; then it was down a long and meandering hallway beaten down by white OLEDs hanging two meters above their heads, the hallway bending left and right and ending in a circular lift lobby.

  They entered the rightmost lift, and Marja's eyes widened when she saw that the far side of the elevator was completely transparent—beyond it was an immense chamber flooded in pseudo-neons and lighted like the Saltillan day, the square directly below them churning with a sea of bodies and holo-scooters and holo-cycles. Canals of light pierced tributaries into quadrilateral collections of buildings hung with flamboyant signage advertising a million types of beef and churkey and uniquely seasoned stews, and as her eye traveled clockwise over the panorama the flesh-parts became three-dimensional and hologram-like and then shaded into billowing artifacts of clothing and catwalking models and faces so artificially perfect you wondered why the concept 'beauty' ever applied to human beings.

  "That is being the Underground Bazaar," was what the guide told them, pointing with two fingers at the scene, explaining that it usually wasn't so crowded before the dinner hour, speculating airily that the temporary suspension of the south loop train service had, most likely, contributed to this flash of premature consumption.

  "Isn't there a war happening?" Marja asked out loud, her brows squeezing together and her tone implying disparagement. She brought her face close to the elevator's transparent siding to better continue her voyeuristic expedition.

  "It is not the place," Jirani interjected, clasping his hands behind him and cutting short the conversation. Fighting the urge to let fly a snarky comment, Marja settled back coolly onto her heels.

  They watched in silence as the lift accelerated upward, and Marja felt her quadriceps tense against her body's inertia. Then the Underground Bazaar fell away and disappeared underneath a sheet of rock and layer upon layer of sediment flitting past in a blur of gray and brown.

  And suddenly they were aboveground and gaining height so quickly a single blink was all it took for them to traverse ten stories. The blanket of artificial light making the Saltillan day had become orange-yellow in the late afternoon and their vision was mostly obscured by the other Saltillan columns. Below them were more people, faceless people, moving, jostling, moiling about in microcosms of confusion that aggregated to make macrocosmic purpose.

  The Market. Human competition. Grand purpose.

  It was a full minute of travel before the elevator came to a complete stop, its deceleration calibrated to barely be noticeable to its occupants. The doors slid open smoothly and without sound.

  Their first experience with the Vines was a carpeted hallway about three meters in width bathed in mellow-lighted splendor. The lengths on both sides of the hallway were fitted with windows canted diagonally downwards, and when Marja moved towards them, the daylight illuminating her curious face from below, she could see liquid shapes shift and flow viscously like honey. 'More people,' she thought, 'many kilometers away.'

  "This is being the second highest level of the Vines," their guide explained, pointing with two fingers toward the end of the hall. "The apartment is at the end there."

  The long hallway that they were in led to a vestibular space where a chandelier was hung by a crystalline stalactite affixed to the high ceiling. Their feet found the cerise carpeting give way to marble, and before them was a single set of large double-doors perched atop a flight of stairs consisting of four steps, the steps themselves carved out of a slab of marble protruding from the floor. A titanium plate hung by the lintel with the letters 'A.G.' embossed into it.

  Marja breathed in deep, and detected in the air faint notes of cardamom and lemon.

  The soft and padded silence had been substituted for discordant sounds in her ear. There was music. Ysa?e Sonata No. 4, she recognized, a great favorite of the Hollow violinists she had so loved to associate with in her childhood. Double-stops, triple-stops, masterful legato. It had been almost forgotten…