II
Chimbarazo Interplanetario was just another spaceport. It was big, but who’s ever seen a small one? We had a half-hour to kill before getting on the Tour flyer, so I found the nearest newsprojector, slid a demipesa into the slot and pushed the button marked “English”.
“Section please,” the machine said.
“Let me have the wannads section,” I said.
“Wannads? Query? We have no wannads section.”
What did they call wannads on Earth? Wish I’d hit the books a little harder those last three days. “How about jobs?”
“How about jobs?” it echoed. Goddamn dumb machine.
“Do you have a ‘jobs’ section?”
“Jobs? Query? We have no jobs section.”
Employment? “Do you have an ‘employment’ section?”
“Yes, we have an employment section.” Click. “Your time has expired. Please deposit two demipesas.”
“But I already paid, you stupid —“
Click.
I gave up and slipped it another two demis. A list of jobs came on the screen. Turning a knob, I started to scan them.
It didn’t look very promising.
EMPLOYMENT OPPORTUNITIES
Chimbarazo-Macro-BA Area
ABSTRACOTYPIST, senior, 30K, gd wrk cond, 314-90343-098367.
ACETOGRAPHER, degr only, 12K, 547-23902-859430.
ACTOR, sal var, feelie-sens, exp only, no minors, 254-34290-534265.
AEROSPACE ENG, PhD only, 38K, cisplan envir spec pref, Lun office, 452-78335-973489.
… and so on. Didn’t even know what half of them meant. I must have scanned a hundred before one caught me eye:
GLADIATORS, prizes to 20K, tax free, esp vibroclub. 8 indiv, 75 team openings. Some animal work. 738-49380-720843.
I wrote down the number and ran to the flyer, just barely making it in time. The Dean scowled at me as I strapped myself in, feeling guilty for taking up a whole row of three seats. On our way to the art museum in Macro-Buenosaires, I studied the city map and found a large arena, not far from the museum. As soon as the Tour landed, I slipped away. So much for culture; I had work to do.
I’d seen a couple of gladiatorial matches before; not on Springworld, of course, but places like Selva and Nurodesia. They don’t have to fight their planets so much, so they fight each other in the arena. On Earth it turned out to be quite different, and even more popular.
I bought the cheapest ticket and found my way to a bleacher area. Everybody was cheering and yelling at once; a solid roar like thundersurf. Hard to see what they were so excited about. Two men were slugging it out down in the arena, but from the bleachers you could hardly tell what they were doing. I rented a scope from a robot vendor.
Don’t think either of them were Earthies. One was tall and black like B’oosa, probably a Maasai’pyan. The other was tan and shorter, but seemed to have a weight advantage. They were fighting with short clubs, each with his left hand taped behind his back. It was exciting, and looked kind of hard; lots of fancy footwork and dodging back and forth.
After a few minutes the short guy hit the tall one a solid blow to the throat, knocking him down. A white-suited man ran out and looked at the one who had fallen. Then he made some signals to the crowd, waving his arms in wide circles. When the black guy tried to get back up, he pushed him down again, not too gently. The crowd was going insane. It was pretty obvious the guy in white was some kind of referee, and he’d just declared the short guy to be the winner. A couple of boys with a stretcher came out and tried to carry the loser away. He pushed them aside and limped off by himself, rubbing his throat.
I turned to the man sitting next to me and tapped him on the shoulder. He looked at me and jumped, really jumped — must have had his eyes on the fight the whole time and not noticed a giant sitting next to him.
“Pardon me for surprising you,” I said in bad Spanish, “but I am a stranger here and am in need of some information.”
“You certainly are a stranger,” he said with a laugh. “Don’t think I have ever seen anyone stranger.” I think that was a pun in Spanish. “What would you like to know?”
“How much did that little fellow just win?”
“Little?” He looked me up and down, shook his head. “I guess he is, to you. He just took the heavyweight club — vibroclub — championship of Macro-BA. Twenty-five thousand pesas.”
“Sounds like easy money.”
He laughed again. ”No, sir. For every one who even gets within reach of the championship, many dozens go perdid.”
“Perdid? What’s that?”
“A gladiator who can’t fight anymore. Sometimes because he’s wounded too badly and has to retire. Sometimes because fear grabs his heart and he can’t face the ring. Sometimes because he’s dead.”
“They let people die?” Oh boy, they hadn’t said anything about this in the textbooks.
“Not ‘let’, sir. All gladiators are supposed to be friends, and who would kill a friend? But nevertheless, it happens. It is considered bad; bad form.” He turned back to watch the ring.
A man in formal clothes handed the winner a piece of paper, probably a check. He held it up high and strutted around the arena. The crowd roared, about half of them cheering and the rest booing or hissing.
“Where’s that guy from? He looks too big to be an Earth … Earthman.”
“He’s from Hell. Most of the heavyweights are. Mean bastards. Get some heavyweights from Maasai’pya — like his last opponent — and some from Perrin or Selva, occasionally Dimian. Never saw one as big as you, though. You a Springer?”
“Yeah. Would I fight in their class?”
He laughed again. “There isn’t any heavier. You have fights on Springworld?”
“No. I never saw one until I went to Selva.”
“Then don’t even think about it, friend. Go up against a Heller and you’d be perdid in three seconds. They’re trained from birth to maim and kill.”
“Springworld’s no vacation spot. I think I could take one on.”
He shrugged. “Don’t set too much store in your size and strength, sir. The big ones fall, too. Training is everything.”
I remembered how B’oosa had knocked me senseless. “I suppose you’re right. But I could learn. Where would one go to learn more about the fights?”
“Well, there’s an information office beneath the box seats over there. But if you really want to see what’s what, go to the Plaza de Gladiatores. That’s where the fighters are.”
“Far from here?”
“No it’s inside the city. About two hundred kilometers north.”
I watched one more match, a quarterstaff duel — really felt for the guy who lost — then took the underground express to the Plaza de Gladiatores. It was a large square, very pretty in the afternoon sunshine, full of trees and bright flowers. All around the edge of the square were taverns full of people, many crowded around outside tables talking loudly under the awnings. Bands of musicians roamed from tavern to tavern, strumming on guitars and tooting horns, trying to drown each other out. Sounded pretty confusing at first, but after I got into the swing of things it seemed to fit together nicely.
I walked to the nearest tavern and went inside. Practically had to bend over double to get through the low door. People were talking and laughing loudly, but they stopped when I crawled through the entrance. By the time I found a table they had rightly sized me up as a tourist and were loudly ignoring me again.
The chair was too tiny and too low, so I dusted off a piece of floor and sat down.
I ordered cerveza preparada — beer with lime — and when it came, two men walked over to my table. I was having some trouble figuring out which of the crowd were tourists and which were gladiators, but at least one of these guys had to be a fighter. One was obviously an Earthie, short and slim but muscular, wearing a white jump-suit so tight it looked like he’d been dipped in a vat of plastic and left to dry. The other, the fighter, was a litt
le too tall and heavy to be an Earthie. His face was horribly scarred, three puckering lines going from his forehead to his chin. Most of his nose was missing and the scars pulled down his eyelids to give him a permanent wide-eyed stare. He spoke first, in English.
“Mind if me and my friend join ya?” He didn’t wait for an answer, just hooked his foot around a chair, pulled it out noisily and sat down. His friend did the same, but without all the commotion.
“How did you know I could speak English?”
“Shize, big as you are, you gotta be a Springer. Springers talk English, don’t they?”
Never met a Springer who “talked” English the way he did. We usually save cuss words for special occasions. But I nodded and asked where he was from.
“New Britain. That’s a place on Hell. My friend here’s an Earthie — where’d you say you’re from, Angelo?”
“Mexico,” he said in Spanish, pronouncing the “x” as an “h”. “But I also speak English.”
“Both of you gladiators?”
“I’m a gladiator,” the Heller roared. “Little Angelo here, he’s just getting started.”
“How do you go about getting started?” I asked Angelo.
He took a sip from the mug of spiced wine he was holding. “First there are many years of schooling. Then you have, what you would say, an apprenticeship; where you fight the animals. If you are good at fighting the animals, you may have luck and be asked to join a team. That is as far as I have gotten; I just joined the Mexico D.F. — in English, uh, you would call it Meck-sico City — quarterstaff team.”
“Then, if you’re gonna be a real gladiator,” the Heller butted in, “the crowd’s gotta notice you. You gotta stand out. Then ya get offers for two-man matches, an’ that’s where the real money is.”
“How much real money?”
“Smallest prize’d be around five grand, goes up from there. Biggest has to be the Earth Championship, quarter of a million. No tax, either; every pesa free and clear. Any other job, Welfare tax takes ninety-five dightin’ pesas from every hundred you earn.”
“It is a just tax,” said Angelo. “Fair to all.”
“Bullshize!” he snorted. I don’t see how you can sit there and take it. Less’n a million workin’ people takin’ care of billions of lazy dighters.”
“It works, amigo, it works.”
“Sure it does — as long as the guys payin’ taxes keep on pluggin’ away. What is they all up an’ quit? Place’d fall apart. Wouldn’t have no offworlders comin’ in to take over their jobs.” He turned to me, grinned. “ ’Cept for gladiators. Always be lots of us comin’ in for that, long as it keeps payin’ them tax-free pesas.”
“What about me?”
“You? What about you?”
“I could use some of those tax-free pesas myself. Be a gladiator.”
The Heller cackled, then laughed loud and drained his beer mug. He banged it on the table twice. “Sorry, Goliath, wrong ballgame. Angelo was talkin’ a lot of bullshize, but one thing he said was right. If you ain’t studied for years, you ain’t got a chance in the ring. Be perdid in a couple of seconds.”
“Probably not just wounded,” Angelo added, shaking his head. “Dead.”
“Damn right. Fighter’d be a fool to give you a chance to get hold of him. Bet you could break a man like he was a stick.”
I probably could. “So why do you think I’d get killed right away? Maybe I wouldn’t give my opponent the chance. I’m in pretty good shape.”
The bartender brought over a pitcher and filled up the Heller’s mug and mine. He took a sip, held it and studied me over the rim of the mug. “Look, you Springer’s do arm wrestlin’?”
“You mean ‘elbows on the table’?”
“Right.” He planted his elbow in front of me, forearm straight up. Muscular, but kind of puny next to a Springer’s. “Now, I’ll bet you this round of beer that I can pin your arm before you can pin mine.”
Easy money.
“That’s a bet.” I put my elbow next to his and he curled his hand around my wrist. I was getting settled to push when his left hand lashed out and I felt the point of a dagger digging into my throat.
“Now you can ether go down real gentle or I can cut your throat and just let your arm drop on its own.” The bartender stood behind the Heller, grinning. Angelo was smiling gently, looking away. The Heller just stared at me, his expression as cold as the steel of the dagger against my throat. I’d been had.
“You win.” I let him pin my arm and tossed the bartender a pesa.
The Heller put the dagger back in its hip-pocket sheath. He leaned back in his chair, grinned. “You look like a pretty smart fella. Get the idea?”
“Yeah. No rules.”
“Well, they got rules, but they ain’t that strict about enforcin’ them, if you know what I mean. And fighters learn lotsa tricks.”
I squeezed the last drop of lime into the beer and drank a little. It was bitter and warm. “Still, I may have to do it.”
“No dightin’ way. They wouldn’t let you. Easier ways to commit suicide, anyway.”
“But I need money, and fast. Sounds like nobody but gladiators can make any money on Earth.”
“How much do you need, Springer?” Angelo asked.
“Almost 17,000 pesas. I’ve got a little over a month to find it.”
“There might be a way …”
“What? Anything.”
“Most places have animal fights — you don’t have to be a real gladiator and they pay four, five hundred pesas. Tax free.”
“Shize, Angelo, you want to get him killed?”
He shook his head and looked straight at me. “You’re almost as big as a bull. You could fight the bulls in Mexico.”
“What’s a bull?”
“It’s a big dightin’ animal with horns a mile wide. It’d eatcha for breakfast.”
“It also has teeth, then?”
“No, amigo, he was joking. Bulls don’t bite people. But they can be ferocious animals and their horns are sharp. Still, it would be less dangerous than fighting the gladiators.” He scribbled something on a slip of paper and handed it to me.
“Go to the Plaza de Toros in Guadalajara and talk to this man. He may be able to arrange some fights for you.”
I finished the beer and went back to the underground express. Maybe I should have gone straight to Guadalajara, but I wanted to think about it a little and get a good night’s rest. And find out something about bulls.
III
The Tour was spending the night in the Hotel de la Bahia, a huge old hotel on the harbor, in the middle of downtown Macro-BA. I got my room number from the clerk and took a lifter to the 167th floor. My roommates B’oosa and Bolivar were already there.
“Ah, the peasant returns,” said Bolivar. He was standing in front of a mirror, combing his beard. B’oosa was draped over a couch, reading a tape. He grunted, didn’t look up.
“So how was the museum?” I asked.
“Lots of pictures. Fossils. Cultural relics of all sorts. Worth seeing. Where were you all day?”
“Out hunting a job.”
“Job-hunting? What do you want with a job?”
“Have to pay back the Extraweight Alien Tax.”
“Hell, why bother?” Bolivar slumped into an overstuffed chair. “Nobody else is going to — and you can’t help having been born a big ugly monster.”
“It’s important. To me.”
“Besides, what kind of job can you get on this crazy planet? They’re socialized from top to bottom — nobody gets to keep a tenth of what they earn.” He grinned. “Except criminals, I guess. You going to —“
“And gladiators,” I said.
“Ridiculous,” B’oosa rumbled. “Don’t you know they kill gladiators here? Ignorant savages. You’re going to risk your life just because a few of the other peasants are mad at you?”
“As I say, Mr. B’oosa, it’s important.”
“It’s ridiculous.”
He went back to his tape.
“Mr. B’oosa’s right, Carl. It’d be suicide for you to go up against a professional fighter. Didn’t he knock any sense into that thick head of yours?”
“I won’t be fighting men, Francisco.” Didn’t have to call Bolivar “Mister” until he turned twenty-one. “I can make enough money going up against animals.”
“They fight animals here? What kind?”
“Somebody mentioned bulls.”
“Bull whats?”
“I don’t know. Just bulls, I guess.”
“A bull is a male cow,” B’oosa said without looking up.
“That’s great,” I said. “What’s a cow?”
Francisco shrugged his shoulders. B’oosa didn’t say anything.
“One way to find out.” I fished in my pocket for the piece of paper the Mexican had given me. It had a name and a number. I punched it up on the phone.
A girl’s face filled the screen. “Buenas noches. Plaza de Toros de Guadalajara.”
Hauled out my creaky Spanish again. We always used Pan-swahili around B’oosa. “I’d like to speak to Mr. Mendez please.”
“Just a moment, please.” She disappeared and came back in a couple of seconds. “Whom shall I say is calling?”
“I’m Carl Bok, of Springworld.”
“I see, yes. What is it you wish to talk to Mr. Mendez about?”
“I’d like to arrange to fight a bull.”
“Just a moment, please.” A holding pattern appeared on the screen and then dissolved to show a dark man in a business cape, a thick cigar protruding from beneath his bushy moustache. He spoke in heavily accented English.
“Señor Bok. I am taken to understand that you are from Springworld and you wish to fight the bulls.”
“That’s right.”
“Have you ever fought the bulls before?”