Free The Pleasure Tube by Robert Onopa

coffee boils over in the kitchen, Erica lurches up. "Goddammit."
    "Can you find out?"
    "What?"
    "Where she went, whom she was transferred to."
    "You know, you'd better watch your step," Erica says from the kitchen/bar. "One of the security men last night said there was a tracer out on you."
    I feel blood rush to my neck, my heart beginning to pound.
    "Whom to, Erica?" She says nothing. "If you don't tell me, I'm going to find out for myself."
    "Shit," she says. "Look at this mess. I'm on your side, lover, but you're not going to get anywhere on this one. Steiner," she says. "Steiner, Eva B.
That's
who."
    I reach Giroti on audio—he has been awake for hours, he encourages me to pack all of my clothes. The next three days we will spend at LasVenus, he wants to show me something he's had flown in.
    I tell him my service has been transferred, I want her back. Is there anything he can do?
    "Ahhh," he says. "Did she do something special? Tell me about it."
    "I'm not sure that's it, Massimo, it's more complicated."
    "A man as young as you, don't get attached," he tells me. "You must be part Italian."
    "I want to find out why," I tell him. "And I want her back. Is there a way I can make an inquiry?'
    "Ahhh, passion, to be so young. In the circuits of the ship—well, a man like you can find out almost anything. But to get her back... No, if I were you I'd give it some serious thinking. Since it wasn't your request, it was handled from the outside. That's very unusual."
    "Then you know nothing about it?'
    "Nooo, I heard nothing. You didn't mention this, my friend."
    It could have been his woman, I think. Massimo and I will talk later, after disembarkation. At the moment I need to make a computer search before we land; the landing could change everything. I ask one more question.
    "Who runs the ship, Massimo? I mean, what organization?"
    "The corporation," Massimo says. "Which is controlled by EnergyWest. Which is controlled by NoAm Congress. From that you could say SciCom, but with SciCom, who knows?"
    "SciCom? Did you say SciCom?"
    "Ah, but who knows with them, whether they run anything or not?"
    "SciCom."
    "Rawley, my friend, good luck. Until we see one another—LasVenus, ah,
fantastico. Ciao,
my friend,
ciao.
Drink to poor Italy."
     
    "Patching in."
    "This is traffic. How did you..."
    "Do you have an open line?"
    "Iden, please." Another voice crackles: "He can use 363." First voice: "I'll need an authorization figure, or do you want this through control? I can give you a circuit in the console dome."
    "No, patch me through this terminal, identify as deadheading. What you can do instead of an authorization figure is give me a line through Guam SciCom."
    "That's like Sunday at the zoo—uh, look, use 363, it'll be open. How long do you want it?"
    "Indef. Let's say a ten-day parameter."
    "It's yours. I'll just vacate. That's a big ship—you've got a downangle, LasVenus arrival in less than an hour. Look, when you touch down, you're going to have to loop the channel through ground."
    "Affirmative. And in the meantime, how about a sixty-second display on PT/coord. 1427-82, location map LASVENUS, then sixty more, personnel write on Steiner, Eva B., codex 1819-79, passenger PT class one."
    "Eva Steiner? The EnergyWest VP, a Director, that one?"
    "Eva B."
    "Roger and out. Traffic series 300."

 
PART II:
     
    SCHWARZCHILD SOLUTION [=df special solution to general relativity which describes the distance between event horizon and naked singularity.]

 
Chapter 5
Welcome to LasVenus
     
    I sit at the oblong window of this pale green cushiony room, my head throbbing. I am watching the ships being serviced on concrete pads and the light traffic on the trans-port runways. Shuttles sail in on the long glide path on seagull wings past this thick, tinted glass; I watch yet another offload then towed to a pad for dismemberment into units by the cranes. Behind me the wall screen displays the single readout I have been able to punch through.