Flight of the Maita Book 42: Con Game

By CD Moulton

Somebody pulling some kind of con game on the vacation worlds? Jornians? When the empire has Z, a Terran? Amateurs! They don't have a chance!

• Language: English
• Publisher: CD Moulton
• Release date: Dec 20, 2014
• ISBN: 9781311215253

CD Moulton

Born in Florida, travelled the world as a rock guitarist with some big names in the late sixties, early seventies. Been everything from a high steel worker to longshoreman, from musician to bar owner, and much more. Educated in botany and genetics. Now living in paradise (Panamá!)

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Flight of the Maita

Book 42

Con Game

© 1996, 2011 & 2016 by C. D. Moulton

all rights reserved: no part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, recording, or any other information retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright holder/publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews.

Someone is tampering with the empire translators. It’s obviously some kind of scheme, a con to force the traders guild to use agents.

A con game? Right up Z and Kurk’s alley! They’ll teach this bunch of rank amateurs how a scam should be run!

Critic comment: 1997

Rather standard fare, but a lot of fun.

*** DCM

2012

Very nice little comedy. Compared to what else is on the market today, it borders on hilarious.

**** Andres L

Contents

Prologue

Chapter one

Chapter two

Chapter three

Chapter four

Chapter five

Chapter six

Chapter seven

Chapter eight

Chapter nine

Chapter ten

Chapter eleven

Epilogue

About the author

CD was born in Lakeland, Florida, in 1938. He is educated in genetics and botany. He has traveled over much of the world, particularly when he was in music as a rock rhythm guitarist with some well-known bands in the late sixties and early seventies. He has worked as a high steel worker and as a longshoreman, clerk, orchidist, bar owner, salvage yard manager and landscaper – among other things.

CD began writing fiction in 1984 and has more than 300 books published as of 3/15/16 in SciFi, murder, orchid culture and various other fields.

He now resides in Puerto Armuelles David and Gualaca, Chiriqui, Panamá, where he continues research into epiphytic plants and plays music with friends. He loves the culture of the indigenous people and counts a majority of his closer friends among that group. Several have adopted him as their father. He funds those he can afford through the universities where they have all excelled. The Indios are very intelligent people, they are simply too poor (in material things and money. Culturally, they are very wealthy) to pursue higher education.

CD loves Panamá and the people, despite horrendous experiences (Free e-book; Fading Paradise). He plans to spend the rest of his life in the paradise that is Panamá

- Estrelita Suarez V. de Jaramillo – 3/15/2016

CD is involved in research of natural cancer cure at this time. It has proven effective in all cases, so far. It is based on a plant that has been in use for thousands of years, is safe, available, and cheap. He has studied botany, and was cured of a serious lymphoma with use of the plant, Artemisia annua.

Information about this cure is free on the FaceBook group, Artemisia Cancer Cure plus. CD asks only that all who try it please report on its effectiveness on that group.

Con Game

Prologue

A nightmare horror in deep black peered carefully over the natural rock ledge at the Terran known as Z as Z lazed back in the lounge chair on his patio by the fish pool, apparently half asleep.

A small tentacled being swivelled one stalked eye to peer at the Terran from its perch on the side of the small cliff above close to the little waterfall that dropped past the clouds of pink and white phalaenopsis orchids into the fish pool.

Two robots, one in the form of an amphibian Swaz, the other in the form of the reptilian Keth, moved very stealthily around the far side of the patio, being careful to stay out of sight, making no slightest sound.

The tentacled being made a sign and they all suddenly dove at the Terran – and right through him!

Z laughed from a step inside the entranceway to his home while the others untangled themselves. He'd been watching them on a holoscreen through the sensors he'd placed around. The crew often played such silly, juvenile tricks on each other.

I watched your meeting on the beach and knew you were up to something, Z said. That holo's definition is getting pretty good, Maita! It even fooled Thing and it can see a lot of light ranges I can't.

The bell tone (*) that preceded and followed each speech by Maita, spaceship, friend, co-conspirator in the tricks (on all sides) and emperor of the Maitan Empire, sounded.

*I can work through Tab and Kit to see the same way Thing does. It is pretty good, isn't it?*

[ You dirty...! ]

That ( [ – ] ) indicates the tuning fork middle C sound that sounds before and after Thing 'speaks'.

Thing is the little tentacled Mentan, a member of the crew and perhaps the most intelligent being in the galaxy – well, the Mentans, and Thing's one.

The furry horror, who was Kurk, the newest member of the permanent crew stood to his full two-plus meters, shook himself to get the sand and dust out of his ultra-black fur and grinned around the two long canines at Z.

Kurk came from another dimensional plane. He was a Pluton from a world called Hades. His world shared a nexus with Terra and his people had sometimes been transported through the vortex to be demons on Terra.

Tab was the Swaz robot and Kit was the Kheth robot. They were designed and built by Maita to act as detectives for the empire.

Kit suddenly grabbed Z, picked him up and dumped him into the deep fish pool.

Isn't that simpler and faster than the complicated schemes? he asked.

You shouldn't have done that! T6, Kit's spaceship, friend, partner and part said.

Why not? It's ... yuh!

Kurk picked Kit up and dumped him into the pond with Z.

That's why not!

Tab shoved Kurk in next, but Kurk grabbed his arm and pulled him in at the same time. Thing, who had moved to Tab's shoulder, went in with them.

Well, that's the bunch! TR (TRD-60, Tab's ship, friend, etc.) said. They always end up in that pond! All of them! I'm amazed those fish can live in there!

Maita, TR, T6 and Thing used speakers placed all around Z's and Kurk's home as well as everywhere else on Empire Center, or EC, a planet at the center gravity point of three differently colored stars in a flat equilateral triangular configuration.

Thing was a little empath who couldn't speak directly so Maita had built in a communicator with it, both directly and in a floater Thing rode around on much of the time. The floater or a harness Thing wore at times could translate when Maita wasn't around.

Z had his personal island covered with a collection of Earth orchids and orchid-like plants from hundreds of planets. He had collected them for the nearly four hundred years he'd been on EC. His father had grown orchids and he had always enjoyed working with them.

Thing, being from a high-density world, liked to build its gardens under the ocean between its own island and Z's. Those gardens were to a depth of more than three kilometers as Thing found that depth very comfortable.

A Parf stepped from the transmat on Z's patio, looked at the tableau and giggled. It took its paints and easel on down the path toward the ocean.

The whole galaxy knew how the emperor's crew played.

This one was Deus, a famous artist (paint), as were many of the strange Parf.

The Parf are four-footed, two-armed beings, but are not like Terra's mythical centaurs, being more birdlike. Deus was covered with silvery-blue feathers except for the thin circle of gray/blue around the eyes and lining the vestigial wings.

*Tab, you and Kit are getting a call for the agency. Take TR. Z, Kurk and Thing can take T Six to Hamfaaht to see what that's all about. It might keep you amused. I'll have to first go to University for some information, then will go ... why the strange look, Z?*

Ham fat?

[ Homophone. English. What's the trouble, Maita? ]

*Who knows? I'll be away for about a year. Try not to do too much damage to the empire while I'm gone. TAR One will handle most things here and Jlokht is running smoothly.*

Away? That much? Kurk asked. What'll we do when we need information? Those two outmoded garbage scows can't be expected to remember anything that long!

Not a problem! Z countered before TR or T6 could retort. "I'll still be here! I have a mind like a sponge! Like a blotter!

"Just ask me!"

[ A sponge, I know. It absorbs things and jumbles them up, which explains half of what you remember – and why you remember it like you do. What's a blotter? ]

*It's an absorbent pad used to remove excess inks in many primitive societies – such as the one Z's from – which might explain the rest of his babblings. It doesn't absorb the hard facts at all and gets the information it does manage to absorb backward. Three hundred eighty six years and finally! Z's, er, if you'll excuse the expression, mind is explained! What it doesn't jumble it gets backward!*

"Unless it has to do with hard facts. It doesn't mess with them at all! Kurk agreed. Why so long, Maita?"

*A serious problem on Mesorch. Extraplanal and you organics couldn't survive for long there. I'll be able to draw on some of our experiences at Vendu. I'll see if the transmat portals will work there. We may have to move a population and biosphere if the orbit can't be changed.*

Planetary collision? Z asked. What about transmats, Thing?

[ They won't work in TTH seven. Antimatter will, Maita. Very well! You can possibly deflect the way we did Ape's World. (Book two: Settling In) ]

*It may come to that. It will if the transmat won't work. If you say they won't, they won't. You be careful.*

You too, Maita, Kurk said.

They stepped into the transmats to go to the ships they'd work with. Maita moved from its cave and was gone, then TR.

The crew didn't waste time with goodbye. They saved it for hello.

Kurk, Z and Thing went aboard T6 and were soon headed for Hamfaaht.

Chapter one

[ I assume you have all the background facts we might need there, T Six? ]

It's a strange sort of thing, T6 replied. "The Jdtht are in some kind of trouble with the Holdkrends. I can't quite decide what's going on.

You might be able to figure it. It doesn't make any sense to me. Not even a little.

Why not? from Kurk.

Because we ... I'll let Thing explain, seeing as it's the only one here who might be able to unravel any of the mess, T6 answered. "It's able to see relationships in information even in fractals and certainly in abstracts and this one has some elements of each! It might be part of sociomath, which I can work with very well.

I can work with fractals and abstracts, but don't understand a lot of it.

[ Hmmm. I see. It's really rather simple. ]

"You’re really rather simple, Z said. What could be simple about a problem not totally concerned with abstract math or secondary fractals that T Six would miss?"

"It is a lot like abstract math! T6 shot back. I just said that! You never listen!"

Kurk switched the holovid comp on, waited and read, "`The Jdtht are, like several such races, based in a variant system of logic. There is a specialized ability among the race with those alternate mathematical concepts found only in the Mentans among the better-known members of the empire.

"`The point of view, as it were' – an Inktan wrote this! – 'is as valid as any other, considering the factual basis, should any factual basis exist of the omniverse or rather the lack of such a factual basis in the omniverse.

"`Perhaps there are such facts in their perspective.'

It goes on like that.

It sounds much like Rimalt, T6 agreed. (Rimalt was T6's original owner soon after it discovered it was independently intelligent. He was a professor, first at Inkta and later at University, the planet Maita had long ago established where only the top least particle of a percentage of professors could hope to ever be considered.) "This might be fun!

Confusing, but fun!

[ We had one little mystery with that kind of race. Do you remember the Ejahds, T Six? You have to admit that one was fun! You had to act like you knew what was going on to keep their trust and confidence. ]

Oh, groan! T6 cried. Tab and Kit almost went nuts trying to act like detectives.

Why? Z asked.

"Oh, they were told that things were being stolen, but they couldn't be told what and couldn't be given the information the Ejahds had already collected. They were even nervous about telling us where and when the crap was taken!

"It was stuff in the transhipping warehouses. We had to figure the logic in the storage system, then what was stolen, then had to check the port records of landings and takeoffs.

It was a mess!

Why couldn't they tell Kit and Tab what they knew? Kurk asked. How could detectives find anything if they didn't have information? They had to have somewhere to start!

[ Oh, they did. They were told something was taken. Several items. It was perfectly logical – to them. If they told any of their suspicions or what clues they followed or anything they would influence what the outside agency – Tab and Kit – found and would insert a bias, thus making their discoveries invalid or more than a little uncertain at the very best. The idea of having a second investigation was that the two unconnected agencies would come to an identical conclusion, Thereby each validating the other. ]

(The crew was used to Thing's and Maita's speeches having no inflection or paragraphing.)

That doesn't make any sense, Z pointed out.

It does to them, Kurk replied, grinning around the long tusk-like canines. "I sort of get the idea. We have many laws on Hades about an investigator starting an investigation with a personal bias making his findings suspect.

I assume we have to go in there blind and find the problem for ourselves, then solve it on our own?

Yup! T6 replied. We're there.

Oh? I thought we were here, Z retorted. 'There' suggests another location.

[ We are here, Fartface! 'Were' suggests in the past. ]

We were there then, now we are here, T6 agreed. "See? 'thought' would become 'think', as in I think we are here,"

I don't think any of you can think anywhere, Kurk added. "Does this mean we have to actually think before we say things?"

[ Yup, 'fraid so! One of the biggest drawbacks of this detective crap. ]

Damn! That takes the fun out of it! Z complained.

T6 landed at the port and the crew went aground teasing and joking with each other. Z and Kurk walked, but Thing rode its own specially-designed floater. It warned them not to ask the wrong questions and to not play their usual insult games. The people here wouldn't understand.

[ Ask the wrong question and we invalidate whatever we may learn. Remember that. It's probably better that we not to ask any questions. We'll have to see. I suppose we'll get clues pretty early as to how far and where we can go and what we can ask. ]

They won't have a sense of humor? Kurk asked.

[ Oh, yes, but we won't understand it as they won't understand ours, most probably, unless they've made a determined study of us. They tend to study things. They have a couple of students attending University so they're intelligent. I see from what I'm receiving that Prof. Dualt finds them amusing and confusing, but brilliant so far as comprehensive grasp and reaching a ... you see how much Inktans like them. ]

Our humor's different from normal people, Z said.

[ I explained 'unless they've studied us.' Be careful how you phrase things. The crew's humor is famous. Be precise or don't say anything. No stupid idioms! ]

They went immediately to the Trading Council offices to see what they could learn. Kurk suggested that they speak with the Holdkrens first. They'd expect questions, at least.

Their main contact with the Holdkren side of the question would be a female named Flordt Bet Khee, Bet for short. They placed the family name first.

The Holdkrens looked very much like large Basset hounds according to Z. They had large droopy ears and sad expressions, though the snout was much flattened and they were bipedal.

Such comparisons were labeled Z-scriptions by the crew. They seldom knew what he was talking about, but found when they finally saw the thing being compared they were mostly accurate.

It's something we all realize is probably a matter of some basic misunderstanding, she explained. "We find the Jdtht to be scrupulously honest. They are generally very easy to trade with because they use the machines.

Maybe the trouble begins with the fact the machines were designed to follow the logic paths of Emperor Maita, which are quite different from the Jdtht.

[ We've had some contact with variant logics. We came to you first solely because we can ask you questions, which might be forbidden among the Jdtht. We've met one race where that was the case, particularly where there was something that needed careful investigation. Their logic about such matters was different from ours, but equally as valid. ]

Oh, you can ask them any questions you like, she replied. "They'll be very happy to answer you – and their answers will be totally honest. I find them to always be honest. I keep stressing that because problems usually arise because someone is trying to be devious.

"You won't understand half of what they're talking about. They won't understand the question.

It can be most frustrating in business!

"Give us