Death Match - Diane Duane [28]
Darjan paused a good while before replying. “They’re twitching. What do you expect? Even in years when things go according to plan, they twitch. There are always factors they can’t control in the other sports they run. Weather, civil unrest, player injuries…But this is worse, in a way, because it could have been controlled further down the line, if anyone had thought it was necessary. No one did. Now…” Darjan trailed off. “Now it’s too late, and matters can’t just be allowed to take their course. Now people have to start getting involved to stop it. And the upper-ups hate having to do anything that looks like involvement. It’s too easy to leave a trace, a trail….”
The sky was darkening, going not so much gray as a weird kind of bruise-green, and slowly the wind continued to rise. “Well,” Heming said, “after tomorrow, when we lay down the law…and also the reward for doing what he’s told…you should be able to tell them to stop worrying. Between that, and what Chicago should do to them in a few days, a lot of people should be pretty relieved.”
“So the arrangements are in place for the tournament ‘cubic,’ then….”
Darjan stretched. “They’re just there for experiment’s sake at the moment. The intervention is expected to be minimal at best. We may not even need them. Shouldn’t, if Chicago delivers. If we do need to use them…” He shrugged. “We’ll use them judiciously enough that no one will suspect anything. It’s a test, as I said. For possible use elsewhere.”
They were both silent for the moment as the bar waiter came around by their table, making his rounds through the lounge space. “Anything, gentlemen?”
They shook their heads. The waiter went off to one of the few other tables that was presently occupied. It was one of the reasons the two of them were here—this place tended to be quiet in the afternoons. When he was well out of range, Darjan said, “The game is two o’clock Sunday. Without overtime and with the usual breaks between the halves, it’ll be over around four-thirty. I’ll be expecting to hear from you at five. And so will they.”
Heming nodded. He reached down and picked up his glass again, jingling the ice cubes in it a little. “Chicago,” he said.
Darjan nodded once and held up his glass as well, but didn’t clink it with Heming’s. Heming gave him a look, waiting. Finally he drank.
A wild electric flicker came from down the parkway in the direction of the art museum, followed by a long rumble of thunder that rolled up the parkway on a sudden, gusty bluster of wind; and behind it, pelting down diagonally, came the rain.
Heming shivered, and finished his drink.
The next morning Catie got up much earlier than she strictly had to on a Saturday. Partly it was to get some chores done, for over the last few days, she had somewhat slighted her attention to the chores roster that her mother had left written on the slick white LivePad faired into the refrigerator door. Specifically, the word lawn, which had been there by itself on the LivePad on Tuesday, had additionally been circled sometime on Wednesday, and on Thursday had had many flashing arrows in various colors drawn pointing to it. Then, some time last night, it had developed an alarming number of exclamation points which alternately flashed red and blue like some kind of warning from the local emergency services. Her mom might nag, Catie thought as she got the lawn mower out of the garage around nine, but at least she did it in a way that made you laugh rather than want to leave home.
The mower was a John Deere “Hunter,” powered by photovoltaic panels on the top, and normally mowing the lawn was just a matter of taking it out of the garage, putting the meter-square box-on-wheels out on the grass, and turning it loose. The border sensors and the onboard motor normally did the rest—though there was one spot near the corner of the front lawn where you had to watch the thing, especially if the lawn was fairly overgrown, as it was today. For some reason, under