Appropriate Time

Ch. 6 Talk to your adversaries

Put two ships in the open sea, without wind or tide, and, at last, they will come together. Throw two planets into space, and they will fall one on the other. Place two enemies in the midst of a crowd, and they will inevitably meet; it is a fatality, a question of time; that is all.
- Jules Verne

Cuin agreed with Daphne and Dave to leave for Los Angeles on Thursday, January 11, so all parties involved could prepare for the trip.

Traveling was not as common in the twenty-sixth century.

For one, the prizes to travel were exorbitantly high. A round-about ticket from coast to coast could easily cost 25,000 dollars. An ordinary man’s yearly wager. Traveling by plane was only doable for the happy few.

Secondly, because of the decrease in population worldwide, globalization was again something that had to be reinvented. Citizens were forced to stay put in their city of residence. Cars were scarce, so it was public transport. The system didn’t provide such luxuries.

The development of airplanes was tied with the research into space travel. Only recently, they rekindled their interests and projects using Artificial Intelligence.

There had been some contact between the Earth and the Moon, with whom all ties had been broken for several years. The possibility of spacetravel between the two planets only restarted a few years ago. The research was top secret and hush-hush.

But complot theory suggested a space station hidden underground in every airport throughout the country, eight major hubs in total. The time was long gone that every state had several airports. There were three on every coast and two in the middle of the land.

In the East, Daphne and Cuin had to travel from Airport International Westwing (AIW), one of the smaller airports at a four-hour drive from Daphne's place.

Cuin volunteered to pick her up. Of course, he also paid for her trip. That was and had always been their arrangement—money for the company with benefits.

They were special friends for many years.

Daphne had a mild case of the flu but wanted to join him anyway, and Cuin picked her up early that Thursday morning. Their flight was set at 7 o’clock that evening, so there was plenty of time to make the airport trip.

Charles was waiting in the car while Cuin sat at the kitchen table, Crypto at his feet. The Great Dane was coming along. Cuin made sure of a seat next to them on the plane.

“Wait just a few more minutes, darling,” she shouted from her bedroom.

“I didn’t finish packing just yet. Am awfully late as it is. Damned running nose, though I don’t have a fever. “

Cuin poured a coffee and read the headlines of the newspaper. Hong Kong riots, Thai uproar, and Indonesia in turmoil.

What’s new, he thought, putting the paper aside, sipping the coffee.

The world is on edge. Poor people are not going to put up with all the shit any longer. There was bound to be a revolt globally. Everything was relatively quiet in his country so far, but that could easily change into unrest and riot. He had witnessed it before.

Daphne entered the kitchen, kissed Cuin on the head, and patted Crypto. She left her trolly at the door.

“Well now, a quick coffee, and we are ready to go.” Her voice was a bit nasal. Cuin thought it sounded sexy.

Twenty minutes later, the three of them were on their way to the airport.

The 3,944 kilometers would take 4 hours and thirty-eight minutes. They would be in Los Angeles at approximately a quarter to midnight. Dave would pick them up.

They traveled economy premium, with three seats next to each other. Crypto got the seat in the middle. Daphne wanted to sit next to the window.

As soon as the plane took off, they ordered their gins and tonic. Crypto got a bowl with water.

The plane was far from crowded. On the contrary, only fifty people showed up and took their seats.

Plenty of leg space, plenty of room in the cubicles, they traveled separately from the others. Traveling was for the rich, and the rich just wanted to stay on their own—no mingling with other humans.

The cubicles were situated along a long corridor with several restrooms and a few small conference rooms. You could always work inside a plane.

Cuin worked a few hours on his laptop before joining Daphne and Crypto again in cubicle number ten.

They played chess, listened to Rage Against the Machine, an ancient band from the twenty-first century Daphne liked and played with Crypto.

Before they knew it, the pilot claimed to arrive in Los Angeles, International Airport Eastwing (IAE).

The two of them took their luggage, and with Crypto leading the way, they arrived at Gate number one.

“Hey there, welcome to The City of Angels,” Dave, a short, fat man with a barret, had his arm around the waist of a tall, skinny blond woman with a cowboy hat. They looked kind of out of place. Both were smiling. They motioned the new arrivals with hand gestures.

Cuin and Daphne squinted their eyes towards the sun's eclipse when leaving the sliding doors of Los Angeles International Airport Eastwing. Their trolly’s rattled on the uneven concrete pavement. Crypto was barking.

The four of them met in the best of atmospheres.

“Dave, old friend, great to see you both.” Cuin put on his sunglasses.
They shook hands and introduced their women.

“Daphne, meet Dave, Dave, meet Daphne. And who might this be?” Cuin turned towards the smiling blond.

“Hi, there Cuin, I am Pernell, Dave’s new wife. Great to meet you. I have heard so many things about you.”

“All good, I hope?” Cuin answered, patting Dave on the shoulder.

“All good,” laughed Dave.

The two men walked ahead with the two women following, all four talkative and smiling.

Crypto kept barking.

Los Angeles was the place to be. And that’s where it all should happen if Cuin had a say in it. His cover started at that very moment.

Everything was prepared as much as possible. One man was the target now. And his hunter had arrived.

That night they went to a nearby restaurant for an after-midnight supper. On the menu was a Chinese buffet with noodles, shrimps, vegetables, and porc.

Just as they were filling their plates with food, a man approached Dave, grinning.

“Oh,” Dave said, turning towards Cuin. “Now, here is someone I like you to meet. Cuin, this is…”

The face that was approaching was painfully familiar. Cuin dropped his plate. Shrimps fell on the floor.

“… Thruce, Baron of Everton.”

After cleaning the floor and apologizing for his awkwardness, he and the two men joined the two women, sat down, and ate their meal.

Thruce was enjoying himself, Cuin could tell while observing his opponent.

Change of plan, I get to know him even better than I thought. This can be convenient. I can observe him in real-time, that’s good. That certainly saves time.

“… and of course you are invited too. Isn’t that so, Cuin?“ Dave talked to Thruce.

“Hey, what? I was thinking about something else. What did you say?” Cuin woke up.

"I told Thruce here; we are going fishing one of these days. Of course, he can tag along. You don’t mind, do you?”

“No, no, that's okay by me,” Cuin picked up the conversation quickly, and the five of them had a jolly good time.

After an hour, the subject changed. Thruce was telling them about the misfortune he had the other day.

"... Someone just threw a rock through my front window. A brick, mind you. Quite heavy too. The window broke, glass everywhere, last weekend.

"It was on a Saturday, so it’s not that you can order a new window all of a sudden. I had to call a friend of mine who knew a guy who knew a guy. Anyway, 10,000 bucks to replace the window on Sunday. Damned if I knew why it was that expensive. And the important thing is, I know who did it. That same guy punched me blind the other night in the Night Club. Billy-Bob Vanderbilt, silly sod!"

Then he and Daphne got into a heated discussion over the Vanderbilts and their heritage.

Cuin excused himself and went to the men’s room.

He made a mental note of the name: Billy-Bob Vanderbilt. That could potentially be the solution to one of his problems. If he somehow could implicate that character Billy-Bob as the murderer of Baron of Everton, he was cleared. Nobody should trace this job back to him. He made damned sure about that. But now, there was a third interested party in the equation. He could find out more through Daphne; she obviously knew more about the family of the Vanderbilts. It could be fascinating.

He was glad he’d bring her along. She was good with people. And she was fun to be with.

That night they slept together in the spare room of Dave and Pernell.

They made love doggy style. They both loved that, but they had to keep quiet this time because their room was adjacent to Dave and Pernell’s.

That added more fun to the whole session.

They both went asleep satisfied! Crypto slept through it all.


WC:1561