Kaspar's Box

"I'm not, but by God them catechism classes finally come in handy. 'Twas a Catholic monk that found 'em, so there's a common source, if you please. Me sainted mother always hoped I'd become a priest, but there wasn't no money in it."

"And what's all that have to do with these pictures?" Broz interjected, impatient to go on.

"You don't get it, do you? You never heard of the Three Kings on that shiny sterile factory ship of yours? The three lost worlds of treasure and ease, where all your wishes can come true. That's them, you see. That's what they look like. Shows how much ugliness gets lost in the legend, don't it? That's where the stones come from. That's where whatever this is all about is centered. That's where your mysterious enemy is."

"So why don't we just pack up here and go there and face them down?" the tech asked, both bored and confused.

"Aye, see, that's the rub. Nobody knows where they are or how to get there, and them few what did never got back. Devil worship my ass! They found some rich suckers to do their dirty work for 'em, that's all."

"Who?"

Maslovic frowned and turned back to the screen. "Let's see if we can find out. What's that down at the base of the atrium, Broz? I thought I saw it as we were descending until we got sidetracked on the pictures."

The ferret's cameras turned back and then down. "Looks like the top of some kind of statue," she said. "Pretty big, too. Comes up not quite to the second floor itself. Must be real impressive when you come through the door."

"Get around and down a bit. I want to see as much of it as we can without actually touching anything on the ground floor for now."

"Can do. Now zoom out and-what the…?"

The position of the ferret allowed them to see the head and a bit of the neck of the statue, and it was not exactly as expected.

It was the devil, all right, complete with horns, pointed ears, and goatee, but it was one happy devil, with a grin from ear to ear and the happiest overall expression ever seen on a human or humanoid face. And on top of his head, balanced on one of the horns, was an outrageous top hat tilted to one side.

"He looks rather chipper," Captain Murphy commented. "I wonder if he'll break into 'Melancholy Baby'?"

As Ferret One made its way back up to the second floor and began, along with its companion, a survey of that level, Broz said, "They're not serious, are they?"

"Very serious," Maslovic shot back. "That statue's a thumb in the eye to all the religious types who might get in for some reason or another. These aren't people who are comedians, Corporal, they're people who are supremely confident."

"So far, all they look like are a study in the rich and lazy," Broz responded.

"Well, now that we've met Saint Phineas of Barnum himself, maybe we'll be able to see a bit of what they're up to," Murphy said hopefully. "But the greatest show off Earth won't be here, it's gonna be on them three worlds in the pictures. Too bad we ain't yet found a map to the places."

Maslovic thought about that. "We'd run the legend on the Three Kings when we went to identify and quantify those stones," he told the captain. "Now it seems that we have a more basic link. Not that those places looked like paradises. In fact, they don't look all that different than other worlds in these areas. Interesting, though, if they're true pictures of the real thing."

"That garden one looked pretty good," Murphy noted. "I could see meself lyin' there while voluptuous nymphs peeled me grapes."

Maslovic nodded. "And if I had to pick the one I'd least trust, it would be that one. Compared to the other two it's like sweets to a baby. It's the one we're supposed to look at. The hot, stormy, volcanic one, though, looks too unstable for any kind of base for any sort of advanced civilization. It must have a function, because if those three are real, then they were either built or terraformed, designed that way, but staying alive and staying healthy would be a full-time challenge there. No, if I were hiding out and running things, I'd go where nobody was likely to pick. I'd go to the smaller, dark, barren one. Not on the surface-that's the blanket you hide under. Underneath. Under the ground." He looked over at Murphy. "Those aren't mystical or nostalgic pictures, they're guides. And if I knew where they were, I'd use them to take me right to the enemy."

"You seem pretty sure they're an enemy."