How rich is Kin Arad, daughter of the genuine Earth and author of Continuous Creation (q.v.)? The Company paid its servants in Days, but since they could earn far more than a Day in a day, they often sold surplus time for more traditional currencies. Temporally, then, her account showed that she had another 368 years, 5 weeks and 2 days in hand, plus 180,000 credits -- and a credit is worth a credit these days.
In any case, credits were backed by Days. The galaxy had rare elements in plenty. The transmuter at the heart of every strata machine or dumbwaiter could make anything. What else but longevity itself could back a currency? Kin could buy life. Could Solomon have done it? Could Cloritty have done it? Could Hughes have done it?
She was rich.
An alarm bleeped. Kingdom's sun bulked in the forward screen as a fire-rim black disc, the sensors having long ago been appalled by its brightness.
Kin switched off the ship's voice, because she hated the countdown to an Elsewhere jump. It was like waiting for death. If the computer was right, and it was never wrong, the ship would jump just as soon as it was at an acceptable orbital speed with regard to--
(a few seconds of vertigo, a brief agony of despair. Soullag, it was called on little evidence. Certainly something in the human mind refused to travel faster than -- it had been experimentally verified -- 0.7 light-years per second, so that after even a short jump through Elsewhere-space there was a hollow black time before the rushing mental upwellllll--)
--the destination world. Kin caught her balance, and looked out. The Kung sun was a cool red dwarf. Statistics said it was small. They lied. From 4 million miles away it was a giant. Kung practically rolled through its upper atmosphere -- and there it was, a perceptible black disc. Kin smiled. Kung, living under permanent cloud cover, were mad enough to begin with. What sort of religion would they have developed if they had been able to see the sky?
Three hours later she left the ship a few miles from Kung Line Top.
The satellite was decorated in Kung style -- grey and brown-purple predominated, with startling touches of heart-attack red. There was no immigration control. Kung welcomed smugglers. Smugglers were rich.
Her suit's jets wafted her gently into one of the airlocks, which cycled automatically.
Line Top! The spaceward end of the monomolecular wire that linked every civilized world with the greater galaxy! The gateway to the stars, where robots jostled with ten-eyed aliens, spies moved circumspectly, golden-bearded traders of strange and subtle wares sold curious powders that made men go mad and talk to God, and crippled boys busked strange electronic instruments that plucked emotions. Line Top! A hefty kick and you had escape velocity. Line Top! Threshold of the universe!
Anyway, that was the idea. But this was reality, and Kung was in a poor time for the tourist trade. The kung that loped through the tethered satellite's corridors were admittedly colourful, but familiar. There was an unipodal Ehft operating a sweeping machine in one corridor. If it was a spy for the Galactic Federation, it was a master of disguise.
The big board on the main concourse said there was an hour to wait until the next downward shuttle. Kin found a bar with a window overlooking the shuttle hall. The bar was called The Broken Drum.
'Why?' she asked the kung behind the bar. Saucereyed he fixed her with the bland stare of barmen everywhere.
'You can't beat it,' he said. 'Your wish?'
'I thought kung had no sense of humour.'
'That is so.' The bar-kung looked at her carefully. 'From Earth?' he asked.
'Yes,' said Kin.
'Which one? I've got a brother-uncle on Real Ea--'
'The genuine one,' said Kin sharply. He looked at her thoughtfully again, then reached under the counter and pulled out a filmy cassette that Kin recognized with a sinking heart.
'I thought the face was familiar,' said the bar-kung triumphantly. 'Soon as you w…
