The Year’s Best Military SF & Space Opera by David Afsharirad Page A
Authors: David Afsharirad
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something there. Even though Grossman was fifteen years older than me and not particularly handsome, with the fat military contracts he’d landed in the early days of the war he could offer Maria a hell of a lot more fish than I could.
But there had been something between us—something real, something bigger and better than money. And she’d proved it that night in Lugwunta Bay, eighteen months after the wedding, when we’d met by chance at the casino. We wound up in bed together less than half an hour later.
When I woke up and saw her beautiful, sleeping face in the wormlight that oozed through the hotel window, I knew if I stayed on Venus we’d both regret it sooner or later. I didn’t wake her up to say goodbye.
I’d run off to the Marines that very morning. And after beating the Krauts at Ceres and Io, and losing a lot of good friends while suffering nothing worse than a broken nose myself, I’d crawled into the bottle. When I managed to drag myself out again I found myself back in California, where I’d been born and raised, and that’s where I’d stayed. Because I knew if I ever went back to Venus I’d regret it sooner or later.
Well, now it was later.
I’d come back.
And I regretted it.
I stared at the ceiling fan all night, thinking and sweltering instead of sleeping, but by the time Venus’s lame excuse for dawn rolled around, at least I’d made up my mind. I’d come here to do a job . . . I would do the job, take as much of Grossman’s money as I could, and get out.
After breakfast, I hailed a cab and gave the cabbie Mr. Ugulma’s business address. I always like to verify any information my clients provide, especially when the client is someone as trustworthy as Grossman.
Ugulma’s shop was on the swampier side of town, a typical Venusian structure that looked like a banyan tree topped with a slice of peat bog. The sign out front read UGULMA FUNGI in English with two lines of Venusian squiggles below it, presumably the same thing in the two major local languages. I had the cabbie drive past and drop me a few streets beyond it, then walked around to the back to scope out the place for myself.
Although the front of the building wasn’t much different from its neighbors, the back of the property was secured on three sides by a high greenbrick wall topped with broken bottles—not at all the sort of thing you’d expect of a legitimate fungus dealer. Score one for Grossman’s story.
As I inspected the wall, I got one of those feelings that a P.I. learns to respect—an itching at the back of my neck, like I was being watched. I whipped my head around as quick as I could, but saw nothing behind me.
But was that a splash I heard? Someone vanishing around a corner?
I crouched low and stayed still for a while, but nothing jumped me.
Returning to the street, I approached the shop’s front door just like an upstanding citizen. The door croaked a greeting as I approached—a habit of the local architecture I’ve always found disquieting—and as it opened itself, I was immediately met by the proprietor, Mr. Ugulma himself. He was just as plump and ugly as his photograph had promised, and his wide, shining eyes oozed suspicion.
“Can I help you?” he gurgled curtly. He spoke English with a German accent, which did not endear him to me. It wasn’t the froggies’ fault that the whole continent of Thugugruk had been German territory before the war, I told myself, but that accent still made me twitch.
“I’m looking for . . . something in the fungus line,” I temporized as I inspected the merchandise. The place looked not unlike a soggy version of an Earth lumberyard, though all of the planks and beams were actually slices of giant mushroom and it smelled of loam rather than cut wood. But I wasn’t really paying any attention to the goods on display—I was looking behind and between the stacks for signs of Ugulma’s other business.
“Fungi we’ve got,” he replied, gesturing to
But there had been something between us—something real, something bigger and better than money. And she’d proved it that night in Lugwunta Bay, eighteen months after the wedding, when we’d met by chance at the casino. We wound up in bed together less than half an hour later.
When I woke up and saw her beautiful, sleeping face in the wormlight that oozed through the hotel window, I knew if I stayed on Venus we’d both regret it sooner or later. I didn’t wake her up to say goodbye.
I’d run off to the Marines that very morning. And after beating the Krauts at Ceres and Io, and losing a lot of good friends while suffering nothing worse than a broken nose myself, I’d crawled into the bottle. When I managed to drag myself out again I found myself back in California, where I’d been born and raised, and that’s where I’d stayed. Because I knew if I ever went back to Venus I’d regret it sooner or later.
Well, now it was later.
I’d come back.
And I regretted it.
I stared at the ceiling fan all night, thinking and sweltering instead of sleeping, but by the time Venus’s lame excuse for dawn rolled around, at least I’d made up my mind. I’d come here to do a job . . . I would do the job, take as much of Grossman’s money as I could, and get out.
After breakfast, I hailed a cab and gave the cabbie Mr. Ugulma’s business address. I always like to verify any information my clients provide, especially when the client is someone as trustworthy as Grossman.
Ugulma’s shop was on the swampier side of town, a typical Venusian structure that looked like a banyan tree topped with a slice of peat bog. The sign out front read UGULMA FUNGI in English with two lines of Venusian squiggles below it, presumably the same thing in the two major local languages. I had the cabbie drive past and drop me a few streets beyond it, then walked around to the back to scope out the place for myself.
Although the front of the building wasn’t much different from its neighbors, the back of the property was secured on three sides by a high greenbrick wall topped with broken bottles—not at all the sort of thing you’d expect of a legitimate fungus dealer. Score one for Grossman’s story.
As I inspected the wall, I got one of those feelings that a P.I. learns to respect—an itching at the back of my neck, like I was being watched. I whipped my head around as quick as I could, but saw nothing behind me.
But was that a splash I heard? Someone vanishing around a corner?
I crouched low and stayed still for a while, but nothing jumped me.
Returning to the street, I approached the shop’s front door just like an upstanding citizen. The door croaked a greeting as I approached—a habit of the local architecture I’ve always found disquieting—and as it opened itself, I was immediately met by the proprietor, Mr. Ugulma himself. He was just as plump and ugly as his photograph had promised, and his wide, shining eyes oozed suspicion.
“Can I help you?” he gurgled curtly. He spoke English with a German accent, which did not endear him to me. It wasn’t the froggies’ fault that the whole continent of Thugugruk had been German territory before the war, I told myself, but that accent still made me twitch.
“I’m looking for . . . something in the fungus line,” I temporized as I inspected the merchandise. The place looked not unlike a soggy version of an Earth lumberyard, though all of the planks and beams were actually slices of giant mushroom and it smelled of loam rather than cut wood. But I wasn’t really paying any attention to the goods on display—I was looking behind and between the stacks for signs of Ugulma’s other business.
“Fungi we’ve got,” he replied, gesturing to
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