Island Worlds by John Maddox Roberts, Eric Kotani Read Free Book Online Page A

An elderly man with a white goatee introduced himself as Kobayashi and conducted him to a side room floored with straw mats. On the way, they passed the jodo class, which Fu was teaching. The students were sparring vigorously with fifty-one inch sticks and, by ancient custom, they wore no protective gear. Many of them already sported red marks and swellings where they had not defended quickly enough.
    Kobayashi proved to be far stronger and fitter than he looked and was every bit as fierce as Fu had predicted. It was a long, hot, sweaty hour and Thor finished it sore and bruised, but he was feeling much better. He showered and resumed his street clothes.
    Fu met him at the entrance. "You had dinner yet?"
    "No. I'm starved." He realized that he was truly ravenous.
    "I know a good place a few blocks from here. We can walk if you like."
    "That sounds good. I need to work out some of these bruises. I'll leave my car here."
    On the street, Fu studied him. "First thing, though, we have to find something for your head."
    "My head?" Thor said, mystified.
    "No question about it. You're trying to pass as a prole, aren't you? The clothes are okay, but the haircut's all wrong. Come on." A few doors down, Fu led him into a clothing shop where he selected a black silk bandanna and tied it around Thor's head buccaneer-fashion. "That's better." He turned to the girl at the sales counter. "You got any lipstick, my sweet?" he asked.
    "What color?" she said, flashing iridescent eyelids.
    "Yellow?"
    She reached into her beltbag and came up with a stick of the requisite color. He drew a horizontal stripe beneath Thor's eyes and across his nose. "This is an Apache stripe. Face paint is very subdued this year."
    "You aren't wearing any at all," Thor said.
    "California students aren't wearing it this semester. Come on, let's go get something to eat."
    On the way, they stopped in front of a bank and put their cards into the row of slots set into the facade. Thor keyed the instrument to transfer the forty thousand dollars from his account to Fu's. Fu handed over a plastic carrier with a tiny crystal imbedded in its face. Thor stuck the carrier into his pocket.
    "That's the cheapest piece of first-rate scholarship you'll ever buy," Fu assured him.
    Thor noted a glowing graffito on a stained brick wall, painted over the faded graffiti of years past. "What's that?" he asked. "I've been seeing that symbol everyplace since I got to L.A." The symbol consisted of two figures: ©1.
    "You haven't run across that one before? It's been the top graffito for months!"
    "I've been out of touch," Thor said, defensively.
    "You must've been on the bottom of the Marianas Trench. The cross in the circle is one of the old astronomical symbols for Earth. The other figure, as you've no doubt already figured out, is a one. What's that make?"
    "Earth First," Thor said.
    "There you go," Fu said. "And here we are." They went into a small restaurant where robot carts wheeled among the tables, bearing trays of dimsum. The place was crowded and noisy. Most L.A. establishments were open twenty-four hours. They found an unoccupied table. A cart came by and Fu reached for his card but Thor made restraining motions. Fu wasted no time in returning his card to his pocket. Thor thrust his card into the cart's slot. "Help yourself," he said. They took bottles of beer from the refrigerated basket on the cart's bottom level and loaded their table with plates of pork buns, shu-mai, spring rolls and stuffed duck's feet.
    "It's none of my business," Fu said, "but this study you've commissioned and got with such commendable speed is not what I'd expect from a scion of the illustrious founding families of our expansion into space. It's what I'd expect from a media consulting firm, or a programming survey analyst."
    "You're right," Thor said. "It's none of your business." He dunked a pork bun into a sweet dipping sauce. "But, what the hell. I'll tell you anyway." He took the folded Earth First