Inside, he found two dozen pairs of eyes regarding him intently.
The walls that were not windowed with shatterproof, polarized glass alloy were covered with drawings and motilites and artscapes depicting various modes of contemporary transportation. At the moment, the class was dissecting the interior of an intercontinental hypersonic transport, but not to study the aerodynamics of its design or the physics of its hydrogen-driven engines. For those who were interested, such technical details could be better analyzed at home. Instead, they were learning travel etiquette: how to order food, how to eat while onboard, how to use the bathroom, how to deal with troublesome other passengers-in brief, how to survive and get along in the world of modern air travel.
Their instructor was a slim young woman with dark hair and a narrow face whose work attire was presently masked by the uniform of a United Varig flight attendant. United Varig, of course, paid for the privilege of having its corporate logo so prominently displayed in an institute of learning. The nins didn't seem to mind. They were too busy trying out recommended travel phrases on one another.
"Keep practicing those short conversational routines," Alicia Tavares ordered them. "There'll be an oral quiz tomorrow." Groans rose from the well-dressed junior citizens. This was not a poor school district, Cardenas reflected. In the urb where he grew up, schools had no money for such frivolities as clothing masks.
"Can I help you?" She caught the flash of his ident. "Oh dear, I hope no one's in trouble. That business with the ice cream truck-"
"Has nothing to do with my visit here today," he finished for her. When he smiled, the tips of his drooping mustache rose half a centimeter. The action invariably brought a grin to the lips of anyone near enough to note the phenomenon, and Tavares was no exception.
"I'm relieved to hear it. What can I do for you"-she eyed the ident one more time-"Inspector?"
"This month you're supervising a student named Katla Anderson."
Tavares nodded, and her expression changed to one of concern.
"She's not in any trouble, is she?"
"We don't know yet. If she is, it's not of her doing." He looked past the teacher, to the busy class of well-fed children. "She's not here today."
"No."
"You don't seem surprised."
She eyed him inquisitively. "You're very perceptive, Inspector. Katla's quite a bright girl. In some respects, brilliant. But she has a real problem keeping up her attendance. It's not her parents' fault, as near as I can tell. But there are days when she just doesn't show up. Her parents protest, and claim to have spoken to her about the problem, but it persists. Really a shame. Such a clever girl."
"Her parents didn't call in to say she'd be held out today?"
Tavares shook her head. "As far as I know, there's been no communication. These unexcused absences are random, so I don't think Katla's skipping to partake of some scheduled outside activity."
Cardenas nodded. "How does she get along with her fellow nins?"
"Well enough." Having replied reflexively, the teacher proceeded to qualify her response. "Although when not engaged in programmed activities, I have noticed that she does tend to keep to herself. Why don't you ask some of her sochemates?" Turning, she addressed two girls who were exploring trays of simulated food. "Malaga, Rose- could you come here a minute, please?"
Cardenas found himself looking down at two twelve-year-olds, one the color of coffee, the other of sand. He smiled, and his mustache danced. Eyeing him curiously, the lighter-colored of the pair glanced up at her teacher. "This isn't something that's going to be on the quiz, is it?"
"No," Cardenas assured her. "I just want to ask you about a friend of yours-Katla Anderson."
The other girl replied first. "You mean the goofac?" She giggled.
"That's what we call her. Because she sucks up everything around her, but when you ask her a question, half the time all you get back is this weird smile, like she knows the answer but isn't sure how to tell it to you."
"That's right," added the first girl quickly, her words threatening to stumble over one another in the style of speaking common to twelve-year-olds. "Katla, si, she's muy cerebro, but she's still a weird. Cabeza vareza, you verdad?"
Tavares made a face. "Malaga, mind your manners."
The girl looked up petulantly. "Hoy, the fedoco asked!"
"I don't care." The sandy-skinned girl was nearly as tall as he. "Katla's not here today."
"Noho," her friend agreed indifferently. "Shunted, you sabe?"
"You know where she might be?" Cardenas asked easily.
The girls glanced at one another before the taller one responded. "Nobody knows where the west wind goes. That's Katla."
He smiled softly, his words gentle. "You're lying to me, Malaga."
She looked at him sharply. "No I'm not. Some days, Katla just doesn't image-in."
"That's not what I asked." He leaned a little closer, his eyes boring into hers. "You know what I asked. And you know that I know that you're lying. Por favor, don't lie to me again, Malaga."
The girl looked to her friend for help. They were silent for a long minute. Then the one called Rose spoke up, though with obvious reluctance. She did not meet the visitor's gaze. "Katla's hard to talk to, sometimes. It's not like she's rude: just quiet. But sometimes- sometimes she'll tell us where she's been when she's not here." The not-quite-woman's voice had fallen to a whisper, as if she was afraid someone not present might somehow overhear the conversation.
"She likes to focus with the crazyboys."
Cardenas exhaled softly. "Katla Anderson is twelve. That's too young to be focusing with the ninlocos. They would laugh her off. She'd slow their pulse."
Malaga was shaking her head. "Not the subgrubs. They'll take you if you're eleven." Aware that she might have divulged too much forbidden knowledge, she added hastily, "That's what I induct, anyway."
The Inspector straightened. Subgrubs were loose, casual groupings of antisocs not yet old enough to be initiated into a real gang. Despite what the girl had told him, he had never encountered or heard of one as young as eleven being admitted to the clique. But twelve-at twelve you would be tolerated. Thirteen to fourteen was the average age of a subgrub, after which you moved on up to a real ninloco gang, went cleanie-or ended up solo on the Strip. Or dead.
Subgrubings were fluid bands of mature children and immature teens with no real structure or organization. Unlike the ninloco gangs, members owed allegiance only to one another. Bonds were formed through friendship and dissolved as casually as they were begun. Serious crimes were rarely perpetrated by the kids involved. Most turned to antisoc activities out of boredom, not conviction. They were delinquents rather than felons.
It was a good time to catch them out, before their lives started spiraling down the toilet. Especially a bright, apparently promising kid like the Anderson girl.
Drawing his spinner, Cardenas requested the names of all the known subgrub factions reported to swirl within a ten-kim radius of the school. Beyond that, a twelve-year-old would start to find herself in alien territory. "Gobreski," he recited aloud as the names appeared on the screen. "Narulas. Pinks, Habaneros, Terravillas. The Lost Perros. Vetevenga. Socratease. Convirgil."
"Vetevenga," murmured Rose. "That's the one. I don't know where they focus."
"There's something else." Cardenas shifted his attention to the taller girl.