Between the Stars by John Maddox Roberts, Eric Kotani Read Free Book Online

the huge, wheel-shaped chamber were stacked tiers of business facilities, provisioning yards, restaurants, hotels, entertainment centers, media facilities and other attractions, in vast profusion. Everything seemed to be thronged. He had come through an access tunnel onto a tier devoted mainly to entertainment. There were roughly equal numbers of tiers above him and below.
    "Derek!" He turned. Recognition at last. Then he saw who it was. "You owe me, boy! You and your friends busted up my place and I intend to be paid. You want the debt police after you?" The debt police were mythical. The phrase meant that Derek stood in danger of being posted as a deadbeat or welsher. In Belt society, that was several degrees lower than being dead.
    It had been a graduation party months ago that had grown a bit raucous toward the end. Derek muttered as he handed over his credit crystal. "There were twenty of us at that party. Why didn't you get one of the others?"
    "You were the first one to show his face." The barkeeper fed the crystal into his belt counter, then handed it back. "Besides, you're the one who discovered that thing, so I knew you'd be able to pay up."
    "Nice to know my fame is good for something." He broke off when he saw the man who was coming toward him with an intent, bouncy stride. "Oh, no." It was François Kuroda, possibly his least favorite living relative. There were, however, many others in competition for that position.
    "I heard you got fired," François said without preamble.
    "I quit," Derek insisted. "It's different. What kind of welcome is this, anyway? I made the most important discovery in the history of humanity and I get treated like an Earthie."
    "The way I heard it," François said, "you practically tripped over the damned thing. Nobody's found a use for it anyway. What kind of discovery is that? I also happen to know you left your job broke and low on fuel, and here you are after a mysterious absence getting your ship reprovisioned and your fuel topped off. I just saw you repay Fischetti for busting up his place. Where did this sudden wealth come from?"
    "I put the touch on a soft-hearted relative," Derek said with his best fake sincerity.
    "Crap. You don't have any soft-hearted relatives. Just us."
    "Who appointed you my watchdog?"
    "Ulric," François said, grinning.
    Derek winced. This sounded bad. Ulric Kuroda was the head of clan security. One of his duties was the disciplining of members who strayed too far from clan standards of propriety. He lacked a reputation for tolerance. "I suppose he wants to talk to me."
    "Immediately," François confirmed. "Come on."
    They walked to a tube station for the short ride to the old Sidon mining site, where the Kurodas had their stronghold. All the way, Derek kept hoping for a reporter to stop him for an interview about his exotic find. Nobody seemed to be interested.
    The Sidon district was a large, mined-out hollow surrounded by residential tiers. More than half of them were claimed by the Kurodas and collateral families of the extended clan. The warren was protected by the latest vault doors and all units were interconnected by a maze of tunnels, in which certain family members were rumored to be still wandering around lost after a massive party at the Ciano place twenty years previously.
    The largest door was marked with the Kuroda plum-blossom mon . It slid open at their approach and a battery of security devices trained on them just in case the door's system had been faulty. The place seemed to be deserted, which was nothing unusual. The family's mining and freighting operations kept most members on their ships or at their sites most of the time.
    "After you," François said, gesturing toward a door bearing Ulric's personal wolf-head crest.
    Derek took a deep breath. The spin-induced gravity at Sidon was Mars-normal, about one-third of Earth's. He tried to use the gravity to achieve a confident stride as he walked into the wolf's den.
    Ulric sat