OceanofPDF.com

Another Word for Magic

Sixth book in the Family Law series

Mackey Chandler

Cover by Sarah Hoyt

OceanofPDF.com

Chapter 1

April woke up slowly. Normally, her eyes popped open and she was eager to get up. Today she still felt tired and a bit stiff, to the point she wondered if she was coming down with something. It had been years since she had even a cold.

“What time is it, House?” she called at the ceiling.

“Eleven o’clock and a tenth,” it replied.

“Oh, Derf time,” April muttered, trying to remember their system.

“Yes,” the house agreed, taking it for a question.

“How many hours are there in a Derf day, House?” April asked.

“Twenty.”

OK, so it was early afternoon, April thought. She’d slept longer than expected. She knew exactly with what inflection Heather would say “You must have needed it.” She might be right too. She had been through a long rough day from which to recover.

“Is Jeff Singh at home, House?”

“I am blocked from discussing Jeff’s location, schedule, or history.”

“Are you allowed to send him a message, House?” April inquired.

“Yes, I am,” It agreed.

“Then tell him I am awake if not actually up yet, House.”

“We have not been introduced for me to be able to define ‘I’,” it informed her.

April ground her teeth a little. There was nothing like dealing with an Artificial Stupid to irritate her. Even the top-end AI in a ship was so literal-minded it could reduce you to tears. An AI supposedly suitable for a house had the personality of a two-year-old. On the other hand, this was probably Jeff’s fault in granting his permissions, because he was paranoid. It tended to make for a paranoid machine too.

“Just out of curiosity,” April asked, “Do you have my voice sample logged from yesterday, House?”

“Yes, I do.”

“In those conversations did Jeff call me by name so that you could extrapolate that the voice sample you took matched my name?” April asked.

“Your name was never spoken by Mr. Singh,” the house said. “Your name was mentioned by him to the hotel preceding your arrival, but Mr. Singh has blocked me from accepting identification directly or inferring second-order associations by event, proximity, or third-party testimony. I may only attach a name to your voice file by his direct order.”

“I’ll ask him to do that, House. Please tell him that the guest, claiming to be April, informs him she is awake and contemplating getting up sometime today.”

“Message sent,” the house informed her. It took the computer a full ten seconds to parse out her statement and decide it passed every test.

She’d be even more irritated if it wasn’t for the fact AIs irked Jeff almost as much as they did her. For the first time, she considered that perhaps he brought some of that upon himself. In particular, she hated it even more when people used a cheap or free AI as an unannounced com answering avatar. If she called someone and found out several sentences into the conversation that it was just a message-taking program, she just disconnected. If they obnoxiously allowed the program to use their voice, she just deleted the contact. April had to admit that giving an AI any freedom to apply logic could come back on you in a nasty way. You had to worry about how they interfaced with other systems like the hotel and public com too. One way to deal with that was Jeff’s way, to lay narrow restrictions on them. Since that didn’t work very well with people, why should it with AIs? She still had no real solution at all, short of avoiding them at all.

“Hello, guest claiming to be April,” Jeff’s voice teased her from the ceiling. “Do you have some mutually known fact or private event to verify your identity?”

“You could march in here and see who is in your bed in about the time it took you to ask that. Or, you could check your guest registry and see how many other guests could be talking to you from your own bed through your insane, paranoid house computer, and identify me by process of elimination. At the moment I have as much or more reason to ask you to prove your identity. If you don’t introduce me to your house I’m going to go stay elsewhere.”

“No need,” Jeff assured her. “Just a simple DNA scan will satisfy me.”

“I could be a clone,” April warned him.

“Aged the same?” Jeff said. “I can imagine the Chinese might try to do that. Though I think you’d be one of their last choices who to try it out on. I could write a nasty horror novel where an April clone turns on its creators by its devious nature, and escapes to meet its twin leaving terrible destruction behind.

“I think I’d accept an April clone as functionally equivalent if we could do it,” Jeff said. “It might be handy to have two of you if one could be brought up to speed somehow.”

“The maintenance would kill you,” April assured him.

“You must be ready for lunch,” Jeff said.

“That wasn’t what I had in mind, but you’re right, I’m hungry already. Did you make an appointment to speak with Lee while I slept? Do we have time for lunch before seeing her?”

“I arranged for us all to have our luncheon together,” Jeff said. “She, the hotel kitchen, and I are all waiting in breathless anticipation for you to refresh yourself and join us. Your bag is beside the shower and when you arise. I will give word for Lee and breakfast to join us in a half-hour,” Jeff said. “Same table, same balcony as this morning. Do you think you can find it?”

“Likely, but if you will introduce me, the house can give step-by-step directions.”

“Oh, very well. House, the person I am speaking to is April Lewis. You may register that ID to her voiceprint and give her full administrative rights to the house.”

“Noted.”

“See, was that so hard?” April asked.

“We’ll see who comes to lunch,” Jeff said darkly.

“Or what,” April replied in the same ominous tone. “Conversation ended, House.”

“Noted.”

* * *

Lunch might take a half-hour to arrive, but Lee was well ahead of it, sitting at the table with Jeff when April came out, clean and dressed in fresh things, but with her hair still wet.

Something struck her as being off when she sat down. It was an odd déjà vu feeling that didn’t pass easily. Maybe because she was so tired when she’d eaten at the very same table. Her memory of it could be off slightly and unreal, like a dream.

Lee was talking about the clan Mothers and it was apparent Jeff had already spoken to her about talking to them. Lee was insisting nothing replaced a face-to-face meeting.

“If we talk to them on com, the First Mother will be on screen and the Second and Third Mum will at best be in a small corner window. You can’t gauge their reactions and you miss any byplay. You see nothing of the crowd that’s usually in the Great Hall. I’ve only been alerted before that something unusual was happening by the stir it created. Or in one case, by most of them running for the exits. It’s only an hour and a half across a narrow section of ocean from here to Fishtown, and another half hour by aircar to the Keep. It would take longer to lift to orbit and drop a shuttle directly to their lawn. I hate to land directly anyway. It doesn’t happen very often, so everybody stops working and gawks. The few times we’ve had to do it the Mothers have been very gracious about how disruptive it is, but I don’t like to impose.”

Jeff was leaning back in his chair, neither frowning nor smiling, just listening with that serious look that said he wasn’t off thinking about three other things at the same time.

That’s when it struck April what was off about the scene. Jeff was relaxed. There were only a few people he genuinely relaxed around. With most others, he sat up straighter, kept his hands carefully controlled, and his face much more intense. That spoke more to his judgment of Lee’s character than anything he could have said.

Resolving that anomaly, made April relax too. Lee looked at her oddly, aware something had changed. She didn’t have an extra century of experience from life extension like April and Jeff had. They were perceptive of little things even if they couldn’t always explain them. In recent years, others had found it almost impossible to tell a lie to them without displaying a bunch of little tells that betrayed them. Whatever had passed, the three were in the moment together now, very comfortable with each other.

“So, Jeff has told you Home will be here tomorrow?” April asked.

“He did! It seems unreal. I mean, I’ve been to Home so I have a clear mental picture of how big it is,” Lee said, gesturing expansively. “We saw how your ships could drag another vessel along when Gabriel volunteered to bring the Retribution back to Derfhome for us quickly. But I have a hard time grasping how you can do that to something so massive.”

“It’s something we worked up to bit by bit,” April said, “and it is far from routine yet. It scared the snot out of me to do it with a hab full of people, but the Earthies didn’t give us the luxury of time to gain more experience at it. We had to move them or see them shredded by a gravel cloud launched from out-system. So, necessity prevailed.”

“Do you blame us for precipitating this?” Lee worried. “It comes right after you openly allied yourself with us and issued an ultimatum to keep their hands off Derfhome.”

“That may have been the tipping point,” April admitted, “but they have been chafing under the L1 restrictions for a long time. If it wasn’t you, there would have been another excuse. They are short-lifers and none of the people in charge now are the ones who accepted the L1 limit in the first place. They only stay at the peak of their careers a decade or two before they retire. People believe what they want and seem to assume they are much brighter and abler than everyone before them. Why, before starships they were just grunting savages, weren’t they? The previous administrations might as well have been the Persians for all it matters to people today. A hundred years or two thousand, what does it matter? It’s all the dead past.”

“You sound bitter,” Lee said.

“More angry,” April admitted. “All they have to do is leave us alone.”

“I admit there were times I second-guessed our actions, accommodating them instead of saying no and fighting them,” Jeff said. “But the fact is that it bought us time. If they had attacked us the way they just did a year ago, they would have succeeded. We didn’t know we’d be able to move habs when we delayed but it worked to our advantage.”

“They must be perplexed that Central doesn’t try to take over Home, or that we can ally with Fargone or Derfhome and not try to tell them how they must govern. Their entire history is one of pushing to destroy any other nation or system that isn’t their own. The countless lives and treasure they have wasted doing it just boggles my mind,” April said.

“I experienced that the one time I went to Earth,” Lee reminded her. “I’m not a fan of Earth. The whole horrid experience turned me off planets. I took a break from exploring and sent my fleet off to do a loop without me. That is just for a time, to let me set up a replacement for the Earth Claims Commission. When they return, I’m going to go out again. If things change so that the new registry isn’t successful, I’ll go anyway. Even if I have to take a single ship and whoever will go with me.”

“Huh, got a berth for me?” April asked.

“Absolutely, you’d be an asset,” Lee said, and she wasn’t kidding at all.

Jeff looked uncomfortable, but April said, “I’ll retain that option and consider it.”

“Is it safe to fly Derf aircraft?” Jeff interjected. It dragged the conversation back to where she’d come in artlessly. April was sure Jeff wanted to kill this new idea. He got away with it too.

“Derf tend to be very conservative about engineering,” Lee said. “They favor prop-driven planes for commercial, but they still push about point eight-five Mach. Derf just aren’t very big on hurrying. Most have four engines so you’d have to lose two of them to be in trouble. We can get a late flight over so we can talk to the Mothers before they hear about Home from somebody else. I’m not afraid to fly Derf planes. I’ve always wondered if you long-lived folks get extra cautious.”

“Some few do,” Jeff admitted. “A few of our folks have moved off the Moon to our distant worlds just because they felt we were crazy to remain right by Earth where the they all seem determined to kill us.”

“At least the ones in charge,” April agreed.

“They’ll try it here, won’t they?” Lee asked.

“Don’t worry, they aren’t going to have the capacity,” April said. “Heather intends to clear all of North America’s starbases of heavy ships. They will retreat home with the lesser vessels or the entire base will be removed, with casualties if necessary. I already removed every major USNA ship I could identify from Earth orbit. That’s why I slept until lunchtime. I was exhausted from that and came here with no break.”

“I’ve been on Gabriel’s ship and seen the video of you turning them away from your own world, but are you certain they can be swept aside that easily?” Lee worried.

“Not easily at all. I almost ran out of drones and would have had to call for help if I’d lost a few more. I had one ship in particular with a really smart skilled captain. He took out two of my drones. If half of them had been able to do that, I’d have been in trouble. Looking back on it, I lucked out. I can see several ways he might have suckered me into risking and losing my ship, not just a drone.”

Jeff grimaced hard but didn’t complain about the loss of drones.

“They messed up by issuing ultimatums. If they had just struck the habs with no warning, they would have caught us unprepared. If they hadn’t tried to betray us and look good to their public, we wouldn’t have had enough warning to put out deep watchers. If they had struck at us just a year ago, we wouldn’t have had any way to safely snatch the habs away. It’s terrifying to think what a close thing it was.”

Jeff looked at April. “It’s exactly what we were talking about last night, how huge changes hinge on tiny changes that seem insignificant at the time. A collection of unlikely and unpredictable events can take your life off in unexpected directions.”

“Well of course!” Lee said, and looked at him like he was daft.

“Thank you, dear,” April said, and looked pleased.

* * *

On the Moon, the Sovereign of Central finished making her assignments and released her posse of volunteers to remove North America’s military presence from the heavens. She didn’t have enough ships or pilots to do it quickly. First of all because she wasn’t going to conscript anyone to fight for her or requisition their vessels. Indeed, if any presently in her hire wanted to opt-out, they were free to go. Welcome would be too strong a word. She would remember who volunteered and who didn’t support her. Those sworn to her she wouldn’t ask. That was an entirely different matter. Unfortunately, her very best pilots and ships were tied up removing the Home trio of habitats from danger. No help for that, she could make a start on it for now with volunteers and release weapons from her private stores to them.

“Are you going to offer the North Americans an ultimatum or give them a formal declaration of war?” her court spoks and assistant Dakota asked.

“Why?” Heather asked, eyebrows lifting in surprise. That didn’t even sound like Dakota’s normal way of thinking.

“What would be the point of it? To try to form the public opinion that we are the reluctant combatants drawn in against our will? The North Americans already made a terrible tactical error trying that with us. I’m sure Home would be shredded and they would have already turned their attention to our destruction if they hadn’t engaged in such silly posturing to claim a mantle of righteousness. Anyone whose opinion might be swayed is already either firmly under their influence or knows the whole sordid history of their serial oath-breaking beyond having their opinion managed. They should consider themselves lucky. We are only removing them from the stars and won’t drop a very big rock on Vancouver the next time this gang of criminals is in session.”

“It scares me when you sound more like me than yourself,” Dakota said.

That was interesting. Dakota might be mellowing slightly, Heather thought.

* * *

Jeff’s driver and bodyguard on loan from the Red Tree Mothers dropped them off at the port. Strangelove had a sour expression even Jeff could read on his Derf face. He didn’t however, try to renew his argument to accompany Jeff as his bodyguard. He at least had their assurance they would engage his protection as soon as they landed back in town.

Space operations had a different building than commercial air so everything on this side of the port was new and interesting to them. Jeff’s interest was piqued that April hadn’t as much as blinked when his Derf bodyguard was introduced as Specialist Strangelove. Did she know the origins of the name or was she just deliberately being blasé? He wasn’t going to inquire until they had some privacy. April could still surprise him.

Private aircraft were very rare and just operated directly from their owners’ hangars. The aircraft wasn’t as big as Jeff had assumed for a four-engine craft. He had a monster carrying three hundred or more pictured in his mind. He realized after thinking on it that a plane to haul three hundred Derf would be ridiculous. The plane had seating for thirty and there was no effort made to cram as many in as possible. Flying was still a luxury to Derf.

There was no tunnel or skyway and they walked up mobile stairs built on a motorized cart. The steps were Derf-sized and a challenge. The seats were Derf-sized too but now had a center slot in the cushions that hid a latch point so two Humans could share a Derf seat. They did not, however, discount the fare for Humans sharing a seat.

Boarding that way let Jeff look down the side of the aircraft. It wasn’t sundown yet and he had a good view. The engines had a complex fan inside a round intake so they were some sort of turbine. The engine seemed quite thin and long compared to the images he’d seen of Earth aircraft. The rear was not an exhaust nozzle but a complex six-bladed propeller with a curve to the thin scimitar blades that increased at the tips. The leading edges of both the wings and tail surfaces swept back sharply.

Only about half the passengers seemed to have data spex on, but both the pilots who went forward had them. Neither had any sort of uniform, not even a colored belt or sash. One, however, had an axe as did several of the passengers. Only one had what appeared to be a firearm to Jeff. It was more like Home or the Moon than any planet he’d visited. It did seem odd there was no door to the flight cabin and they could see straight out the front ports just like the pilot.

“Do you want to listen to the pilots?” Lee asked.

“They will be speaking Derf won’t they?” April asked.

“Yes, but I can get you a translation program off the local net,” Lee offered. “I wouldn’t trust a computer to fly this thing, but it will let you listen in well enough.”

“Sure, that would be fun.”

“Me too,” Jeff spoke up.

A few seconds later an icon appeared in their spex of Derf and Human heads yelling at each other. Somebody had a sense of humor.

There didn’t seem to be a very complicated preflight. They heard the pilots confirm their fuel load and navigation backups. They asked somebody outside to confirm nothing was under them where they couldn’t see, and no leaks or unexplained parts fallen off on the ground. Jeff was pretty sure from the tone of voice there was humor involved. He wondered why the plane didn’t have a belly camera, then realized on considering the matter that his ship didn’t. He might fix that. The translation program let a couple of words come through in Derf it didn’t know or couldn’t place from context.

“Wonderful Airlines evening flight for Fishtown joining on the ground frequency. We will be starting and taxiing to the main runway east and joining the air operation radio at that time.

“Props clear?” he inquired, and April and Jeff could hear the confirmation.

“Starting two inboard engines,” the second pilot said. There was an increased vibration but it wasn’t all that loud.

“They don’t use motors in the wheels to taxi?” Jeff asked.

“No, and wait until you hear how they handle traffic,” Lee said. “They don’t have any controllers. They just discuss it.”

That didn’t thrill Jeff, but it was kind of late to object.

“Wonderful Air to Fishtown is on the east end of the main runway, joining air op radio. Do I have any traffic behind me?”

“Reliable inbound from Blue Water. We’re five minutes out, go ahead and roll, Wonderful.”

“Starting outboard engines in our roll,” the copilot said.

They were thrust back in their seats with considerable authority from just two engines. When the other two ramped up it surprised the new-to-it Humans.

“Airspeed,” the pilot said, and the wheel noise stopped abruptly. Then the wheels clunked up and the engine pitch increased again. They were tilted back at an angle Jeff didn’t expect from a propeller-driven aircraft.

“OK, I have to buy a smaller version of this to play with,” April informed them.

“We have attained cruising altitude configured for level flight,” their pilot said after a few minutes. “Everything is optimal to proceed and we anticipate arriving at Fishtown in one and four-tenths hours. Please limit yourselves to two passengers at a time leaving your seats for weight distribution. We have a few humans aboard today, don’t worry about being up because you aren’t heavy enough to change our trim. If any of you like fresh fish cooked to perfection please try my sister’s place, Down by the Bay in Fishtown.”

“Well, a little family plug,” April said.

“Will it be dark when we get there?” Jeff wondered.

“It’ll be dusk,” Lee said. “This plane won’t outpace the sun but it comes pretty close.”

“Maybe we should try his sister’s place,” April said.

“Fine with me,” Lee said. “Fishtown is big enough to have a car service to find it for us.”

* * *

Fishtown airport was much simpler. There were no space facilities, and the operations building looked like a large garage. There was a restaurant next to it that was bigger and looked nicer than the terminal. The three Humans decided to go find the restaurant the pilot recommended before going to their rooms. The owner was welcoming with Human seats and utensils as well as being very aware of what could be safely served to Humans. Lee knew some teas were dangerous but wasn’t knowledgeable about seafood. It was all served in leisurely courses and it was dark when they left.

“That was delicious, but if we ever go again, I’ll tell them to chop the head off in the kitchen,” Jeff said after they left. He’d been warned about Derf hearing and didn’t want to offend their hostess. “I’ve never seen such nasty looking teeth before.”

“I have,” April said, “but only in pictures of Earth fish that live way down where there is no light. They look like they are all mouth too. At least this thing had some meat on him.”

“The owner seemed pleased we mentioned her brother,” Jeff said. “He probably eats there free for steering business to her.”

“Maybe, I don’t know what kind of family dynamics are normal outside a Derf clan,” Lee said. “The impression I’m getting is that trade towns started from people who walked away, people who were tossed out, and sometimes actual outlaws. Each one had to invent their unique social structure and rules without clan Mothers. I only get little hints now and then, about how things work inside a clan because of Gordon. He can be infuriating by how little he says. I met his father and was heavily involved with him and Gordon never bothered to tell me he was his dad. I had to figure it out from their names.”

“Is that common for Derf to be so reserved?” April wondered.

“No, that’s just Gordon,” Lee assured her. “I’ve had other Derf, who don’t have anything I especially wanted to know about, befriend me and refuse to shut up, flooding me with unwanted trivia. I have an aircar reserved for five in the morning. If we had more time, I’d have them drop us off on the edge of their property and walk in. Gordon and I have done that several times. There are some neat ruins I could show you too. But I don’t want to delay until news of Home’s arrival beats us to the Mothers.”

“I think we are both going to be here for a little while and there will be other times in the future to visit and sight-see if the Mothers don’t chase us off. You can show us ruins and other touristy stuff later,” April promised.

The service car pulled up, and they climbed in and told it to go to their hotel. Jeff was suddenly looking serious again and quiet.

“Is dinner disagreeing?” April worried.

“Dinner? No, not unless I get nightmares that my monster’s family comes looking for me. The way those needle fine teeth mesh makes me picture how wide it must open its mouth to get anything in past them. No, the reason I dropped out and what I was thinking is what you said about the Mothers chasing us off. Lee here is a Voice to the Mothers. I was just wondering if she couldn’t give Home permission to set up and stay all on her own?”

He wasn’t addressing Lee, but he looked at her expectantly as if he had.

“The Mothers made me a Voice to deal with outsiders and act for them in distant places. I’d feel I was abusing my authority to intervene with local matters and people who can easily be brought before them. In truth, I’m not sure what their will may be on local matters to speak for them. They may have entirely different thoughts and feelings on it than I can imagine. If I presumed to act for them locally, they might very well accept my decision on the matter to keep their word and then say: ‘Thank you, dear, we won’t be needing you as Voice anymore.’ I find I like being their Voice and don’t want to risk ending it in disgrace.”

When Jeff didn’t say anything for a bit April asked him. “You are Heather’s Voice. When you go back home will you jump in and speak for her when you hear a local dispute, to save her the trouble of hearing it at her court?”

“You do have a way of drawing parallels,” Jeff admitted.

“And no need to ram it through,” April said. “It would be a great convenience to park next to a living world. However, it’s by no means a matter of survival. If we need to put Home elsewhere and ferry supplies to them for a while, we have the means to do so. It would just be until we could replace the supply we normally get from the Moon. I think I can satisfy the Mothers that it will be a benefit to have Home stop here, not just as a favor to us.”

“Don’t forget to mention it will help develop Life Extension Therapy for Derf,” Lee said.

“Have they expressed an interest?” Jeff asked.

“Not directly, but neither have I seen any signs they are suicidal,” Lee said. “I’m just waiting to see how expensive it will be. If the cost is beyond applying to everybody, it’s going to be a delicate issue deciding who gets it and who has to wait.”

“That might move some clan Derf to become town Derf,” Jeff speculated.

Lee looked concerned until her brow creased. “That’s what Gordon did. We’ve both promoted the ambitious and talented moving to town. The Mothers too often waste their abilities. However, we don’t want it to drive a wedge between the clan Mothers and trade towns. I could see it creating a civil war. I’d expect the Mothers to win a civil war and lock Derf society in their mold for generations. I suppose Home will be a destabilizing influence too. I just can’t start to predict how. It’s too complicated to see all the directions it could go. Believe me, I’ve been thinking about it. The more I consider all the possibilities the less certain I am that I can see how it will end up.”

“Neither can we,” April assured her. “We, like you, are not without resources but the Earthies are billions of people living on an unbelievably rich planet. When they decided to move against us, we had two choices, flee or be monsters. We could never defeat them without committing mass murder and damaging the planet itself. There aren’t enough of us to administer a recovery either. They’d outnumber us too greatly even in defeat. I suspect in the long run they’d regain power and hold a grudge against us for generations if they came back from utter ruin. Sometimes there are no good choices.”

“Homicide, not murder,” Jeff insisted. “It would be self-defense by their own laws, but they already think I’m a monster.”

“A couple of times they pushed me right to the edge,” April admitted. “If I’d let loose on them like they were begging for, they’d be recording the aftermath on clay tablets.”

Lee was saved from needing to comment on that or ignore it in an awkward silence by their arrival at the hotel. The outside looked similar to a Tudor mansion, half sunk into the ground, as Derf were very fond of earth sheltering. The entry was a slot in the surrounding mound. There was a Derf at the entrance who was quickly outside their taxi door before it could open. It wasn’t clear if he was site security, luggage handler, or valet, but the personalized service was nice. He knew of their reservation by name and escorted them to their suite without needing the check-in desk. Their modest baggage from the plane was already there.

* * *

“The suite only has one bath,” Lee warned. “That’s one more than most of the rooms. They share a bath at each end of the hall on the lower floors. I warned them we were three Humans so they were supposed to put a Human seat on the toilet. Otherwise, you might tip back and fall in. There is supposed to be a restrictor on the shower too. I’ll go check and make sure they took care of it. A full blast Derf shower can peel bare skin. But if either of you wants to shower first, I’m in no hurry.”

“I imagine it’s easier to accommodate us than for a Derf to get suitable rooms in a Human hotel,” Jeff mused.

“Oh, for sure, though we won’t have real human beds in the sleeping rooms,” Lee said. “I think you will find a Derf sleeping pad is fine. They’re supposed to provide a pillow. Pick whichever rooms you want. I’d be happy to take the furthest from the bath.

“And a chocolate on my pillow?” April teased.

“It’s not the Old Hotel,” Lee admitted, “but they do try to accommodate. If you asked for that service, they’d do it, but you’d get charged to send a minion to a specialty shop to buy it and an appropriate markup. Derf like chocolate … well, some do. Too much chocolate has an unfortunate effect on Derf digestion, similar to cheese so it’s not a staple. I have a fourth-hour wakeup call to go meet our air car, so don’t stay up too late.”

“It can’t pick us up right here?” Jeff asked.

“Remember, Derf have very good hearing,” Lee said. “It wouldn’t make us very popular to wake up everybody in the entire building. We might not be able to get reservations in the future after such a trick. Air cars sound like a tornado rolling in.”

“Not on Earth now,” Jeff said. “The newer ones have active noise cancellation. They’ve had that now as pretty much standard equipment for about ten years.”

“Not out here on the edge of civilization,” Lee quipped. “Derf will buy new when the old is worn out to the point of no repair. It isn’t just the Mothers who are… frugal.”

“I caught that shift,” Jeff said, “best to be polite about naming it too.”

“Exactly,” Lee agreed.

OceanofPDF.com

Chapter 2

Lloyd Maddox was a past resident of Alabama, a former member of the USNA Space Force, and a deserter. He’d been on ISSII back when April’s bodyguard Tindal was busted out of the USNA module of the satellite by station security. Administration of ISSII rotated, but they had the bad fortune to have snatched Mack Tindal out of the public corridor when the Swiss had a fellow running the place by the name of Jan Hagen. If only they had done it before Jan when the Chinese were taking their turn, they’d have more likely congratulated them on the snatch. Jan took personal offense at it being brazenly done in the common public area.

Lloyd was one of the snatchers in the corridor, and later one of the injured when they depressurized the USNA module, driving everyone out into the corridors to be arrested. Suffering mild vacuum injuries, he’d been hustled off to the station infirmary with a handful of other USNA crew who’d been too slow to evacuate for one reason or another. He’d had the misfortune to be in the shower and took too long to try to dry off and dress. He’d been manhandled into a rescue ball by one of Jan’s men in a vacuum suit though he had mostly succeeded in getting dressed. All of which beats being left behind to die.

His misfortune turned out to be a blessing. In the infirmary, he found out from one of the other injured that they planned on pinning responsibility for the whole episode on him. It was obvious to anyone he didn’t have the rank to initiate the taking of a prisoner, but the little weasel who headed their capture team was well connected. The story concocted was that Lloyd got ahead of his orders and took the fellow down when it was just a surveillance mission to get a positive ID.

The fit ones of his group at ISSII were quickly hustled off station by Jan Hagen. The injured would have been shipped off all together when well enough to release, but he’d missed getting the riot gas and recovered a bit ahead of the others. Considering the charges he’d face, and how he’d seen similar cases go down in the past, he had no desire to go back to face a court-martial. Back home he’d be unemployable and at the very bottom of the list for social services. Fortunately, he had no close family to hold as hostages to his return.

When they released Lloyd from the clinic and gave him a temporary room and cafeteria card, he quickly tested his bank card at a terminal and got enough cash to buy passage to Home. By the time they missed Lloyd on ISSII, he was safely at Home and had a new job, citizenship, and had stripped his Earth bank account of what little it held.

Jan just wanted him gone. He didn’t care where. If Lloyd removed himself voluntarily that was fine. North America could be upset about him not returning Lloyd on top of everything else and Jan regarded it with the same indifference. Jan’s lack of concern for political realities was a mystery he never got to explore. There was something seriously hinky about the man beyond indulging his self-importance. Whatever, it benefited him.

If Lloyd learned anything from Gunny Mack Tindal’s capture and rescue it was that he was never going to visit anywhere the USNA had a legal presence. When the opportunity came to move to Central on the Moon, he was happy to be that much further away and more secure from North America. Going where life extension was available and legal was a plus he wasn’t even thinking about when he first defected. Things worked out very well for Lloyd.

He had a particular pride in the fact he was sworn to Heather Anderson now as his sovereign. Being clearly and permanently alienated from North America wasn’t enough to make Heather want or accept your oath. You had to bring some value to her kingdom. He’d found a niche as a ship handler and eventually an owner and Master.

When North America attacked his country’s allies, he was quick to volunteer his vessel to remove the continuing danger of USNA bases in the stars. The fact it served his long-standing grudge with North America was secondary.

His ship, Lloyd’s Lady, and Huma Bhabha’s Improbable,, were asked to support each other. That was fine. Lloyd knew Huma Bhabha as a competent ship handler with a sense of humor. She wasn’t someone he saw socially often but he counted her a casual friend. He didn’t mind being paired with her at all. They cleared two minor USNA stations. One was a fueling site with a single old frigate that didn’t argue with them at all. The ship could fit all their personnel aboard easily as there were only three active fuelers. Huma put a small cheap antimissile missile into the station after it was evacuated. It wasn’t enough to completely destroy it, but it rendered it unusable without bringing in materials and doing a lot of work.

The second station was orbiting the Elves world. They caught it with no USNA ship in attendance and the station was more a scientific outpost than a military. The station was supposed to have a ship there to protect it, though ships of other flags were welcome. It was missing. The aboriginal natives were as indifferent to their protection as everything else Human. Lloyd and Huma saw no point in making the few naval members of the station take a shuttle down to the world. They could just come back when they left, and the last thing they needed was prisoners. They just left it as no danger to their nation.

After two easy operations, they knew their main objective, Survey System 4803, might be more difficult. It was the furthest North American operation that approached being what one could call a base or a depot. There would be no system scan broadcast for incoming ships like a civilian system. It was strictly military and nothing else was welcome there even if technically they couldn’t keep you from transiting.

The two ships jumped into the outer fringe of system 4803 and listened. There was a low-power radar operating. The power level indicated it was for use local to the base. There was no long-range high-powered search radar in use. What light radio traffic existed was encrypted. They recorded and analyzed for an hour and jumped in deeper ahead of the wavefront of their entry emissions before they became detectable at the base. Base operations were sited on a large moon of a gas giant that supplied the fueling operation. There were no radio or radar emissions from behind them. Lloyd and Huma detected no system picket behind them to warn the base. They still seemed to be safe from detection.

“I’ll go in to a light minute from the base, pop a drone in a couple of light seconds from them to locate everything. If there is anything bigger than a destroyer or frigate I’ll go back in, safely off of my previous position, and hole it through the drive spaces, access the damage, and come back to share it with you.” Lloyd said.

“I don’t like being blind to a cone on the other side of the moon,” Huma said. “This action will be so brief we could have an unseen ship in orbit opposite your drone. I suggest you jump a second drone to the other side of the moon and sweep space there from another angle for any traffic.”

“That’s good thinking,” Lloyd agreed. “After we assess the damage and make sure we have disabled any larger vessels I’ll transmit an order to evacuate the facility to them. You keep an eye out-system behind us and watch for any bolters. Is that agreeable?”

“Works for me. Next stop we reverse roles,” she insisted.

“Absolutely. I don’t intend to hog all the action,” Lloyd assured her.

Lloyd’s Lady jumped in close to the moon and released drones. There were two destroyers in orbit and a heavy cruiser. There was also something that from its size and shape was probably a supply vessel, not a warship.

Lloyd sent a drone back after looking at the radar scan and holed the cruiser. If they had any kind of watch it didn’t respond in the twenty seconds he took to read the scan, make up his mind, and send the drone back to lance the cruiser. The drone emitted radar, shifted location to avoid loitering until it was a target, examined the radar return from the shifted location, and returned to Lloyd.

Lloyd moved his vessel back by Huma’s ship to share the data, before he could become a target too. The last image showed a fan of debris out the other side of the cruiser. The ship couldn’t possibly be operational. He composed a short ultimatum to the base.

“This is the Kingdom of Central vessel “Lloyd’s Lady” acting for our sovereign. A couple of days ago subjective time your nation attempted to destroy the trio of Home habitats. We are serving you notice your military presence outside the Solar System will no longer be tolerated. We have disabled your cruiser. Your smaller vessels remain to you for evacuation to Earth. Reply that you accept these orders and surrender on this frequency with a reasonable timeline to evacuate your base and exit the system. Refusal will result in the destruction of the remaining vessels and facilities on the moon. We have no interest in negotiating or discussing this. Attempts at a delaying discussion and any obstruction will be taken as a refusal.”

After five minutes there was no response. “I take it they are going to be difficult about this,” he told Huma, exasperated. “Perhaps I should hole that freighter to demonstrate we mean business. It isn’t likely they could haul much in the way of passengers on it anyway.”

“There is a bolter!” Huma called, sharing the data from a surveillance drone. “It’s coming out from behind the moon. Look at the track data on him. It looks like a frigate or a system cutter. I swear there was nothing in orbit. He must have been sitting on the surface.”

“Had to be,” Lloyd agreed. “But what in the world is he doing? It doesn’t appear he’s making a run to jump to get away.

“No, he seems to be making a slow long burn to assume an orbit around the gas giant,” Huma said. “Surely he isn’t going to conduct normal mining operations while we are in his sky threatening them?”

“He could have been in the radio shadow of the moon for my transmission,” Lloyd speculated. “They don’t appear to have any relay satellites up. However, they could recall him now. Unless he had no watch set at all he should have seen our radar survey. Even then, he should surely have noticed by now that the normal radio traffic from his base is absent. It makes no sense.”

“I’ll jump ahead of him and inform him the base is being forced to evacuate and order him back to the moon. If he is jump capable, he can take passengers. If he refuses, I’ll lance his engine spaces and leave the burden to rescue him on his mates.”

“OK, I’ll wait to say more to them until you determine what is going on with this rogue ship,” Lloyd said.

When there was no drone back from Huma after thirty seconds Lloyd started getting antsy. At a minute he couldn’t abide sitting any longer with no information. He’d also have to move soon for his safety and Huma wouldn’t know where to send her drone to report to him then. He sent three drones spaced out several light seconds apart in the rotational plane of the gas giant along the path of the fleeing vessel to scan and report.

Lloyd only got two drones back. One found nothing happening in the volume it surveyed. The other recorded the dissipating fireball of the X-head missile that destroyed Huma’s Improbable almost the instant it emerged from jump. The same drone recorded a fresh X-head detonation two and a half seconds after it emerged. That would be the destruction of the drone he didn’t get back. Lloyd sat shocked, his stomach knotted up and he felt sick. He jumped another drone back and confirmed there was only a dispersing cloud of ionized gas where the first detonation occurred.

There was radio traffic too but encrypted. Lloyd could imagine the content. It would be something like: “Good job, you sucked him right in.”

It hadn’t taken Lloyd long to realize what happened. The USNA had never publicly acknowledged the jump ship technology Central used. Their ships and drones could make a static jump without any significant velocity along the jump line. However, they must have seen enough unexplained exit emission bursts and impossible passage times to know it existed. Even if there was no official notice, certain crews must know of it from experience.

There was no way a USNA run-to-jump ship could get close enough to a Central vessel to release weapons. Somebody high up in the line of command on this base had figured out how to position X-head missiles or just their warheads like a minefield and sucker them into jumping right into the middle of it.

Lloyd recorded a new message on a drone and jumped it in near the moon.

“Well, some very bright boy figured out how to set a no lag ambush and destroyed my companion vessel,” Lloyd said with deceptive calm. “Have you thought far enough ahead to figure out that brilliant tactic will only work once? Are you prepared for the consequences?”

There was a pause of dead air time while they absorbed the bad news that he wasn’t dead. Then the reply the drone brought back was in the clear and the speaker didn’t bother to identify himself. He sounded as strained and sick at the revelation as Lloyd felt about Huma.

“You didn’t say you had more than one ship. In that case, I surrender the entirety of my command to you,” he said.

“Too late,” Lloyd said. “That was a one-time offer for which you breached the conditions. It expired.” There was nothing to add to that and the unnamed commander didn’t bother to grovel or beg.

The same drone that delivered that message holed one of the destroyer’s drives rather thoroughly. It jumped to a safe point and perforated the other destroyer as well. A different drone materialized close over the base and kicked out three weapons in a spread pattern over the target. It only lingered a few milliseconds to let each ejected weapon get far enough away from the drone not to be dragged along when it jumped back out. They were only a hundred meters off the surface and didn’t have time to fall very far before they all detonated together. They were relatively small, only ten kilotons each, but entirely sufficient to destroy the installation.

Lloyd considered the Judas goat ship moving away around the gas giant. If it was jump-capable it could return to Earth as Heather intended. Who knew how many warheads they’d laid out from the base depot or in what sort of a pattern? It would be folly to risk everything over such a minor prize. He wasn’t disposed to risk either his ship or even another drone to try to destroy it. He was certain the mind that devised his friend’s death died with the base and wouldn’t be on that lure of a ship. If it wasn’t jump capable, and nobody appeared in this system to rescue them before their life support and supplies ran out, they always had the option of scuttling the ship themselves. The fact they might have some time to reflect on it no longer concerned him at all.

Just to be sure, he sent a drone in close and examined the remains of the base. He was certain all the structures were damaged and pressure breached. If there was some deep bunker surviving or a few survivors who happened to be in suits it was no danger to him. His drones retrieved, Lloyd was about to leave the star system when a yellow icon appeared on his radar screen. There was a burst of exit radiation several light minutes away on a vector unassociated with the base or the direction of the surviving ship. It was barely detectable, especially with the noise the gas giant generated, but there was no target painted by his radar there before or after the burst. There was no chance another Central ship would be in the area unknown to him.

Before leaving the system, he jumped within a light minute of the exit whisper and examined his instruments. There was a trace of other emissions and he jumped in half the remaining distance before the signal had time to disperse. It was the characteristic pattern of a search radar, but strange. It was about the power of a hand-held radio, totally useless as far as having any range. Still, it would go in his report. Heather was death on neglecting to mention any detail even if he couldn’t explain it.

He started setting up his board to jump towards home and the incident was an itch that bothered him even while in his disturbed state from the death of his friend and her ship. If he kicked a drone out right now without making it jump anywhere it would be in a long-term stable orbit far above the gas giant. He set one up to simply listen, record, and respond to an inquiry to find it again before jettisoning it. That removed one problem tickling his brain. Reporting bad news to Heather was the other thing he had to do now.

* * *

“That’s the village a couple of kilometers to the west that I stayed at with Gordon the first time I visited the Mothers,” Lee said. “Let your eye follow the road until you see roofs.”

“I’d have never noticed it if you hadn’t said something,” Jeff admitted. “The road is barely a crease in the trees without much pavement visible, and there aren’t any open areas or things like water towers sticking up.

“It’s almost a tunnel,” Lee agreed, nodding. “We took a taxi there and then stayed at a cute inn overnight. It’s a trade town but it never took off and got very big like Fishtown. There’s nothing very big or special like fishing or mining to do there. The next morning, we rode with the mailman on his route to get to the Keep mailbox. It was still a bit of a hike in from there. It was educational to see how the country people live. We rode along and carried pies from one farm to another. There was even a goat tied up behind the mail truck for a few kilometers going to a new owner.”

“What did they do, slap some stamps on his forehead?” April asked.

“No that’s not official business. It’s a little something on the side. He wears a couple of hats to act for the package delivery companies too. Literal hats. He thinks it’s funny to put one on when he has a box from that carrier. Gordon assures me he gets treated very well once a year when there’s a holiday and he gets a ton of tips and gifts. Good thing, because the far end of the route is just wheel ruts and he can’t run it in the winter.”

“It gets that cold here?” Jeff asked.

“You wouldn’t be aware of it flying, but the land has been rising. Riding in a taxi you are much more aware you keep climbing hills but never go back down. From the village back there to the Keep you see a big difference in the trees and fields. Then, when you hike up from the mailbox to a saddle and look down on the Keep, the trees on the hilltops on each side and around the old fort are bent from the wind and stunted.”

“I’m glad we don’t have to climb those,” Jeff said, sweeping a finger along the far horizon. It was dominated by a wall of mountains still snow-capped this late in the season.

“Red Tree goes to the peaks of those mountains,” Lee told them. “It used to go partway, to a river you can’t see from here. Most Derf clans are defined by natural boundaries. They don’t have borders that are an abstract line across a plain. The river is such a natural line and they put a huge bronze chain across the river anchored to points cast right in the bedrock to symbolize the lands were joined.”

“Was it once wilderness and Red Tree annexed it?” April asked.

“It belonged to another clan. They got into some sort of dispute and Red Tree went to war with them and killed them all. That’s how they did things, though they haven’t had a war for over a thousand years. They eliminated their Keep, let their fields revert to wild, and wiped out every emblem and memory of their name,” Lee said. “They don’t keep trophies like humans who will keep a flag or banner of the defeated. They burn or bury it all. If that hadn’t happened the history of Human contact might be very different.”

“Why is that?” Jeff asked.

“The first Human landing was on the far side of the river. Who knows how the other clan would have received them or if they would have been subjugated like the Hin?”

“I suspect that even if they got a toe in the door early, the Derf might have been a lot more difficult to subjugate than the Hin,” Jeff said.

“True, but they would have destroyed the Keeps which pretty much define the Clan system,” Lee said. “It might still be a long time before you’d want to wander around the woods though. I’ve tracked a hostile Derf through the dark forest. They blend in and don’t make a sound. Imagine the woods full of Derf guerrilla fighters,” Lee said.

“I’d rather not,” Jeff assured her.

“If Red Tree goes clear to those mountain peaks why doesn’t it go all the other way to the ocean?” April asked. “I see no natural barrier like a river.”

“They are on a plateau,” Lee said. “The clan has never favored living in the lowlands. I asked the Mothers pretty much the same thing one time and they said the coast is too hot, full of vermin, and people get sick there more often.”

“Those are complaints I’ve heard about Earth’s tropical regions too,” April agreed.

The aircar got noticeably quieter even though they had ear covers to block the noise and allow them to talk. As the power was eased off, it headed down. a flat valley appeared below the last ridge of hills at which they seemed aimed.

“Hang left and come in over the saddle next to the old watchtower and fort,” Lee told the pilot. They tilted slightly in direction and the power eased on just a hair to make up for their increased drop as they slipped sideways.

“That’s a pretty impressive fortification,” Jeff admitted.

“The Keep is much bigger but it goes way down,” Lee said, “It’s as big on the surface as they ever intend it to be but they keep tunneling.”

“That’s similar to Central,” April said.

The bump in the middle of the plain resolved to terraces and gates in a mound that covered the true form of the structure beneath. It was hard to tell if it was all earth-sheltered and artificial or if it had started as a natural hill. Smaller buildings became visible until finally, they were close enough to see individual Derf. There were paths but no roads or any vehicular traffic.

“Aim for the edge of the big apron in front of the main gate and doors,” Lee instructed.

“Gotcha,” the pilot said in their ear covers and shifted aim a little, the rear of the aircar dipping a little as the glide path steepened. The very few Derf loitering around the plaza looked up and walked away clearing a spot on the stones.

“You don’t have to shut down,” Lee said. “just cut to an idle and you can lift as soon as we are clear. Thanks for a smooth ride.”

“Thanks for the fare,” the pilot acknowledged. They touched down with no jolt and the roar of the fans dropped to a loud hum.

The door that dropped formed a ramp and everybody hurried down with their minimal luggage. When they were fifty meters from the car the pilot cranked the power up again. Lee and her friends stopped, backs to the machine, and put their hands over their ears. A brief gust of wind blew over them from behind and the noise dropped off sharply when the car was a couple of hundred meters up and well away from the landing spot. Then the noise went back up again as the pilot poured on the power. He’d eased away at first out of courtesy for them.

When Jeff and April looked around, Derf everywhere had stopped or come out of the buildings to watch the car depart.

“That’s why I hate to fly in,” Lee said. “It disrupts work for everybody to run and see. Then they all have to talk about it. I’d walk in if we didn’t have time-critical news.”

“And what would that be, Missy Lee?” a huge armored up Derf asked. “And where is Strangelove? He’s supposed to be guarding this one.”

“We refused him coming along because we’d have had to hire a freight flier, and he’ll be right there to pick up guarding Jeff when we return. We’re perfectly safe here,” Lee insisted. “This is Jeff, as you guessed, and April.”

They both nodded politely. “This is the Champion of Red Tree, Garrett.”

He nodded politely too, almost a bow, but his wrinkled snout and flat ears said what he thought of the idea safety could be perfected anywhere. He didn’t bother to verbalize it. Lee got the message.

“Jeff and April are peers and partners to Heather of Central, and if you want to hear the news, come with us and listen while we tell the Mothers,” Lee invited.

“I shall, and to keep an eye on all of you since you dumped Strangelove.”

“Dumped is such a harsh word,” Lee objected. “We’ll be with him again the instant we step off transport back at Derfhome City,” Lee promised.

“From the timing, you stayed overnight in Fishtown, didn’t you?” Garrett asked. “I’d have assigned a couple of soldiers to watch you while you were there if I’d known.”

“We are not without resources,” Jeff said trying to jolly him. “It may not look like it but we have on armor superior to yours, and we’re both survivors of multiple assassination attempts.

“Oh yes, I find that so encouraging,” Garrett said, and turned to lead them in.

It was gloomy inside despite several skylights far overhead. It took the time they walked to the Mother’s table to adjust to it.

“Mum, Mothers, these are April Lewis and Jeffery Singh on the business of the Sovereign of Central. They have news and requests. Jeff came ahead and has shared information with my researchers out of concern for their safety and that of others. We expect it to speed up our understanding of gravitational tech. April joined us yesterday.”

“It’s good to meet allies,” the First Mother said. “You are welcome to our hospitality, and we thank you again for our system protection. Sit and talk with us and share refreshment. What exactly are you here to do that the Foys could not do for your queen?”

Jeff took that as leave to sit right across from the Mothers. He glanced at Lee who didn’t give him any sign he was being presumptuous. She was taking a seat at the table too. Jeff then nodded at April for her to field the question. Soon mugs of beer appeared for them.

“Jeff came ahead of me. He’s the developer of our stardrive and neither of the Foys has the technical background to explain it to Lee’s people. Since he left, the situation in the Solar System has changed. We came under attack again by the nation of North America. I’m surprised the pause in hostilities lasted as long as it did. None of the other Earth nations joined in the attack, but that doesn’t mean they are friendly at all. We had to abandon the location of the three habitats. Beta has gone to Fargone, Gamma at least temporarily has gone to orbit Mars, and Home is going to arrive in your system late today or tomorrow. I’m here to ask if we should stay or move on. If you do want us to stay, where we should locate and how we should comport ourselves in your domain.”

“Comport? Now there’s a word I had to look up,” the First Mother said. “I don’t get many of those in English now. I take it this isn’t a temporary retreat. Do you intend to abandon your places in the Solar System forever?”

“I can’t imagine we’d ever be welcomed back,” April said. “It was a near thing that they failed to kill us all. They made the mistake of declaring a deadline for us to surrender and setting the attack in motion to hit us minutes after, on the assumption we would not yield.”

“So, they bargained in bad faith,” the First Mum said. “We had the experience of that with the same people ourselves. We decided not to destroy them also. There are times I’m still not sure that was the right decision.”

“It is still an option we retain,” April noted. “Our reasons for staying our hand were slightly different. The planet itself is a storehouse of history and biologicals. They still discover new species. It would be a shame to destroy it over the actions of the temporary residents. We’ve removed samples of everything we can in case we are forced to do so.”

“Will they not pursue you to finish their war?” The Third Mother asked.

“That won’t be easy. I cleared Earth orbit of most of the USNA spaceships. Heather has sent her captains to remove all the permanent starbases that nation established. There are other Earth nations with armed vessels but only China has any significant number and a history of hostility to us. They are divided into at least three major factions and some ethnic regions that broke away. Who controls what assets in the heavens is uncertain. They have never established forward bases like the USNA. One suspects they don’t assume they can safely retain control of them the way North America feels theirs will always obey.”

“Then you aren’t bringing trouble to us,” the Third Mum stated as fact.

“I don’t expect that, no. If it does show up it will be of a nature the Foys could handle even without all the assets we bring with Home. I would like to sell you on Home as an asset to the Derf and Derfhome,” April said. “Heather still intends to keep Central on the Moon for the foreseeable future. It is near impervious to attack and gives us a base from which to observe Earth and make sure they don’t surprise us like they might without any eyes there.”

“What will it cost us to acquire this asset?” the Second Mother asked. “I’ve noticed that when merchants tell me how much I can save I often conclude I can save a full hundred percent off their best price by not buying at all.”

“You would have more humans living on your world, I’m sure,” April said carefully. “The Earth has been unsafe to visit and there is pent-up demand to walk under an open sky and see natural things. You of course don’t have to host them at all in any of the clan territories. This is like a private residence in their custom. They would visit the trade towns. There will probably be some who want to live in the trade towns and pursue business here.

“I don’t see them competing with town Derf because the sort of skills they have from living on a hab are very different than planet dwellers. They’ll bring in new skills and quite a bit of money. I wouldn’t blame you for being suspicious of Humans in general, given you had to war with them. The people on Home have gone through a selection process that removed a lot of the undesirables. First when Mitsubishi selected the workers back when M3 was populated. Then, the revolution selected among them further, for those who didn’t run back to Earth. I’m prejudiced, but I fancy they are a different culture. They are smarter, better behaved, and just a bit saner.”

“There will be problems if we allow this,” the First Mother said with certainty. “The question is if it is worth the trouble or within our ability to control by simple decree. You have been trained to command and experienced holding it,” she told April. “Surely, you have been told the principle that it is foolish to issue an order you know won’t be obeyed? We must consider if we will be creating such a hazard.

“I’ve read a great deal about Humans, and watched videos and flat films dating back to the First Atomic War and even some earlier,” the First Mother continued. “I remember there are those of you who dislike crowds and towns. People who yearn for wild places. They go off into the woods, or bush, or jungle. Homesteaders and farmers also, with a desire for land. A lot of your stories romanticize them. I find it hard to believe that has died out entirely. How can we prevent them from going off as far from the trade towns as they can, and soon we’d have hermit shacks and villages following Human custom existing independently? They may encroach on clan territory and become nuisances or worse.”

“Don’t you have Derf who do the same?” April asked her.

“Very few. Those who leave the clan go to town. The few who would choose not to do that are actual outlaws or the handful who are mentally ill and can’t get along with others. I could count the ones I’ve known to do that on two hands with digits unused.

“Each trade town has been free to form local councils and regulate themselves. Mothers make law for all Derf, but towns make their own rules. As long as there is order, neighboring clans leave them to their own devices. None of them have grown to where there is conflict.”

“Perhaps simply make it a law that outside the clans one must work with a trade town to occupy any land,” April suggested. “You can choose to enforce it or not outside your territory, just like you exercise discretion applying your law to the towns.

“Maybe,” the First Mother said. “That would imply we are not merely allowing them to make their own local rules, as we have until now, but approving them and giving them permanence if Humans are to depend on those rules. To step in and void them could be messy and we haven’t had to do so yet.”

“I would not suggest that only applies to Humans,” April clarified. “It should apply equally to Derf. You could make it the specific point of such a law that if anyone finds such town rules oppressive, they can appeal to the Mothers to issue a law to rectify it. That seems to me to be the present situation, you just never formalized it. You should. It’s always better in my opinion to spell things out than to have unspoken rules that supposedly everyone knows. It always amazes those who know and accept such rules when others don’t.”

The First Mother looked surprised.

“This is true. It always seemed heavy-handed to serve them notice we could step in and demand they alter their rules. It would suggest we intended to do so. We’ve never had to, so perhaps there is no point in retaining it as an unspoken right. We rarely take suggestions for declaring new law, but we’ll carefully discuss and consider this one.”

“It’s always good to have a safety valve for pressures short of armed rebellion, I think some might welcome knowing your precise limits instead of guessing,” April said.

“You speak from a different perspective,” the First Mum said. “We think of rebellion in the form of the male’s prerogatives to change leadership within the clan. The trade towns have never had the numbers or organization to present such a hazard. You may very well be correct that it is becoming a possibility. The fact there are already Humans living in the trade towns who share your perspective increases the likelihood of that. You do seem a contrary species. However, it is too late to ban them, because the right to be treated equally is basic to our Treaty with Man.”

“Better to get ahead of it then, before there is a problem,” April said.

“And yet, we could refuse to extend a welcome to this habitat and such a huge number of new Humans in our close heavens without breaking the treaty that speaks to our world. It never thought to address our relations in the heavens. That was an oversight since we didn’t have space ships, but one that may turn out to benefit us. Those who can arrive by ship are far fewer and more easily absorbed. Tell us again why we shouldn’t take that easy way out, by rejecting disruptive changes?”

“Let Jeff address that, please,” April said.

“We did not just scatter in fright without thinking,” Jeff said. “It would have served our purposes better to have stayed together. We had a unified Assembly on all three habs voting the same issues. Now that we are apart, we will naturally change and diverge for each of us to deal with our unique circumstances. We recognized it would be a greater burden to dump all three habs on one populated planet. But we were not prepared to all go together to a planet without a compatible biosphere.

“Home has an older, closer, relationship with Fargone, but we didn’t send it there. Fargone has a mature shipbuilding industry that wouldn’t welcome new competition. Home also has advanced clinics and practitioners of life extension therapies. Derfhome can benefit better from bringing both those businesses here where it is a fresh market.

“Beta being newer has much less industry than Home and will be welcome at Fargone. They will be more of a market for Fargone goods than competitors. They also have a smaller population that is pretty much all life extended. That works better with Fargone’s very restrictive immigration policies. All that depends on Fargone recognizing those benefits and being persuaded.

“Gamma has the most divergent population of all the habs. It has more people who are wealthy refugees wishing to leave Earth’s restrictive governments. That doesn’t mean they favor the same political model Home and Beta followed. Their votes in the Assembly were already diverging from the consensus of the older established habs.

“I predict they will have the greatest exchange of people who want to relocate after this first emergency move to orbiting Mars. They will have people leave to go back to Earth, to the Moon, and other Habs. Some few I expect to come all the way to rejoin Home or Beta. They were placed by Mars as a temporary measure. We’ll move them if they can arrive at a consensus and request it, but I’m not sure where they might pick. I couldn’t start to predict how their Assembly, separate from Home and Beta, would vote on the matter. They may even try to remain there, which I would consider a mistake.”

“And if we say we don’t want you, keep on moving, what would you do?” the Third Mother asked.

“My thinking at the moment is that I would present to the Assembly a motion to seek refuge at New Japan,” Jeff said. “They are isolationist, but Home started as Mitsubishi 3. We have a greater number of residents able to speak Japanese and familiar with their customs. If they don’t want us, I’d suggest moving on to the material rich brown dwarfs Lee discovered, or press on the rest of the way to Far Away if the Badgers would host us. We have several options and maybe somebody else will have a better idea.”

“That last is an audacious plan,” the Third Mother said.

“Is it? I have no idea how our Assembly would receive it. The journey is long, and you’ve made an agreement with them about a frontier. I’d send a delegation ahead to get permission before doing that, However, I think they might very well want us if asked.”

“Why? What do you have to offer them Lee’s Little Fleet didn’t?”

“Protection for one thing. As good as the Little Fleet demonstrated or better. They have the constant problem of the Biters and now they’ve seen other starfaring species exist that should worry them as well. Lee’s fleet didn’t want a mercenary role.”

Jeff shut up, aware he was on the edge of over-sell if he kept babbling.

“Where would you position yourself if you stay?” the First Mother asked.

“Keeping in mind we already have a space station,” the Third chimed in.

“If you embrace the idea of us staying, we would hope to orbit Derfhome rather than off in another part of your system,” Jeff said. “If you want us off in your outer system, I think most Homies would take that as a sign they aren’t really welcome but merely tolerated.

“I’d suggest in a trailing or leading position to your existing station. It would greatly facilitate business between them if they were within line of sight of each other, not around the curve of the planet. Our three habs danced around a common center in a halo orbit, on the far side of the Moon from Earth. That worked very well. There was a dedicated shuttle making cheap circuits of the habs several times a day. They were all close enough to share a common data network with a tolerable lag.”

“We found to our astonishment when we visited the heavens that we have Humans who though not a clan member, consider themselves citizens of Derfhome by residence in a trade town. How would your station dwellers see themselves?” the Second Mother asked.

“I can’t answer how they may like to see themselves,” Jeff replied. “Especially twenty or thirty years from now. Home has its own political system just as you do. We do have those who consider themselves citizens of both Home and Central. One a democracy and one a monarchy. Neither has prohibited dual citizenship. Lee is a citizen of Fargone, I understand. If she can balance her responsibilities to Red Tree and Fargone, how much easier the limited rules of a trade town and Home citizenship?

“I can’t see any great influx of Humans invited to be subjects of the Mothers when their skills are so unsuited to clan life. But your political system isn’t that different from Heather’s Central. She lacks the advantage of three sitting executives, but she does have Peers and others who give her counsel. The biggest difference is that her subjects are free to find their personal advantage in most economic matters without considering if it supports the community. Yet, if most of them manage to thrive by their choices, how could the community suffer for their successes?” Jeff asked. “There will always be a few who fail, self-directed or supervised.”

Lee had never seen all three Mothers blink in astonishment together, struggling to come to terms with such a radical idea. She had to struggle a little not to smile at it. Could they possibly think the vast majority of clan Derf would pick inappropriately to work or live in poverty without their direction? The fact that Jeff went right on talking, oblivious to the damage he was doing to their worldview, made it even funnier.

“Of course, you can simply decree dual citizenship is prohibited if you wish. I don’t think that would be a deal-breaker from our side. April and I intend to buy properties on Beta and perhaps Gamma. I can see a time when between Home, Central, Beta, Gamma, Hawaii, Derfhome, and Fargone we could end up citizens of seven or more states.”

“We’ll discuss these ideas,” the First Mother promised. Jeff looked disappointed because that signaled nothing would be decided today, unaware of how his casual remarks had rattled them. His face was so readable the First Mother added. “We are appreciative and friendly to Central and Home as allies. This is a step closer. It’s a sharing of common territory. We have to consider the past immediate consequences and consider second and third-order effects. We are deciding for other clans who may disagree and challenge us.

“I understand,” Jeff replied. “Home will arrive here later on today, but by no means do we need an immediate decision on whether they can stay. But is it permissible for them to orbit Derfhome while you consider the matter?” Jeff asked.

“Oh yes. Denying that would be like refusing a traveler a safe bed by the hearth. Let them enjoy the hospitality of our space while we consider,” the First Mother said with a very Human expansive wave of her true hand. That made it law. “We’ll inform our people on Derfhome station we are aware of the incoming habitat and speak with you again after supper. Rather than sit there until dinner, with nothing of interest to you happening, go settle into your room and refresh yourselves as desired. We’ll keep these seats open for your return.” She leaned back and thrust a true arm in front of the next worker passing by, reassigning her to guide their guests.

OceanofPDF.com

Chapter 3

The young Derf who showed them to their room seemed excited to meet new Humans. She fairly babbled about their Human doctor and the fact her principal duty was being her assistant. She introduced herself as Pasteur following the custom of assuming a short name for Humans that honored someone they admired. Jeff was kind enough to not inquire if she realized her namesake was a male. He just introduced April to the medic very formally, assuming she already knew Lee. She pointed out the obvious features of their room even knowing Lee had stayed there many times. They just attributed it to her age, enthusiasm, and being an obvious fan of things Human.

“I hope you don’t mind sharing a room,” Lee said. “Derf would never think to break us up into two rooms much less three. That sort of privacy just isn’t part of their social structure. Working groups are almost like family with Humans, and family is much looser, with child care shared and rotated among many relatives to expose cubs to different people and their activities. That’s how most of their primary education works. You don’t get specialized education until you are apprenticed out to someone.”

“So, their homeschooling is village schooled instead of parent schooled?” April asked.

“Yes, but when I stayed with my cousin in Michigan, they traded tutoring with other people much like the Derf. Some of them didn’t have children and did it unpaid, just because they enjoyed it. Negative tax people have a lot of time on their hands. My cousin certainly didn’t have any extra cash money to pay them for it.”

“I’m surprised North America lets them home school in any form,” April said.

“They had to be registered to public school, but the authorities long ago gave up trying to see if students sat in front of the screen and watched classes. The homeschooled are usually far enough ahead that they just take the state tests and do fine. Not that it matters, they pretty much pass you on to the next class if you take the test at all. It’s considered several kinds of cultural bias and discrimination to say any answers are wrong. Some of the negative tax people have been illiterate for three or four generations.”

“What a waste,” Jeff said. “The Derf don’t go for that sort of foolishness I bet.”

“Not the same way,” Lee said, “but Gordon would have been a barrel maker. That’s what they decided he was going to be apprenticed to do. So, they waste plenty of talent too.”

Lee’s criticism made Jeff get a thoughtful face and silently look around the room.

“You’re that sure we aren’t under surveillance?” he asked.

“It wouldn’t occur to them to even buy the equipment,” Lee assured him. “The mindset just isn’t there. They are right out front and expect if they give an order it will be followed as law. There isn’t any history of conspiracy and skullduggery. If there is going to be dissent the males express it rather directly, with the axe, not a campaign of whispering to form a coup. Besides, I’d tell the Mothers that to their face if they brought it up and wanted to discuss it.”

“I suppose there is a lot to be said for directness,” Jeff allowed. “I’d have found that much easier to deal with when I first met Heather and April. Now, they have me so trained to look for Human dissembling that I forget some people are still direct and uncomplicated.”

April and Jeff both had their phones vibrate as they had them muted to not make a spectacle for the Derf. A quick look confirmed what they expected, Home was in the system and the commander in charge of the move, Deloris, wanted instructions.

April told Jeff to take the call with a flip of her hand.

“We have permission to orbit, Deloris,” Jeff said. “That may not be permanent. We are still negotiating with the Mothers. I suggest you park Home trailing at the same level and equatorial orbit as Derfhome station but within line of sight. Not behind the curve of the planet. I know that isn’t going to happen quickly, but you might advise their traffic control that’s what you intend in a few days.”

“Over,” he added, knowing he was talking to a jump drone. That would tell it he was done and it would jump back to the outer system and play the recording for Deloris.

There was a pause until it returned.

“Yeah, I don’t have very precise orbital elements on the bodies of this system. I’ll see if I can get them when I talk to traffic control. It’s going to take a bit of celestial pool to make a chasing approach at the correct velocity. We’re going to have to fit a sleep period in so we’re fresh on our final approach. I’ll jump a drone in every few hours to check for messages until we get in talking range,” Deloris promised. “Oh, and expect several orbital shuttles to go to Derfhome station as soon as we announce we are in our final orbit and not going to do any more jumps. They are pestering me to know when that will be already. The explorer Snoopy undocked and departed for Fargone as soon as we jumped in. Also, expect a flood of messages when Home is close enough to tie into the local com system. Besides all the people who want to be doing business an hour after arriving there are about a dozen seriously peeved with Heather and with you since you are her peer and available to yell at. Over.”

“Any particular complaint? Has anyone challenged me to a duel? Over.”

“No formal challenge, yet. A few feel they were kidnapped. They were removed from proximity to Central and other markets ruining their business. A couple of them had family or friends on the other habitats or the Moon and were separated. They feel an Assembly should have been called and everyone given time to decide what to do and leave for other places if they wished. Wouldn’t that have been nice? Jon Davis and Robert Lewis barely had time to get everybody docked before we grabbed them and jumped out. Once it was announced what was happening nobody wanted to pilot a shuttle away anyway. You couldn’t buy passage at any price. The other habs each had one shuttle go to Central but that was it. Oh, and we couldn’t position your zero g housing to bring with Home, so we made sure everybody was evacuated to Home and did a one jump drag to toss it into a solar orbit between Earth and Mars. That’s all we had time to do. Over.”

“You save people from being shredded to hamburger and they still complain,” Jeff said. “I’d gladly put them back in front of the North American’s flying gravel pile if I could, but we have yet to build a time machine. We already knew we’d have to transport people to sort it out after the fact. That wasn’t hard to figure out at all. Thanks for putting the auxiliary housing where it can be recovered. I’d just written it off. Carry on, Deloris. Singh out,” he ended the call.

“She got the hardest one to move,” April said. “With the extra ring Home is delicate and you can’t change its velocity much with thrusters. It would take forever to do so.”

“Perhaps you should mount a lot of little thrusters all over it to distribute the force,” Lee suggested. “This is twice now that you’ve had to move it.”

She thought about it a little more. “If you keep moving it, if say, you decide to take it along the route to the Badger’s world and the brown dwarf stars, you could mount its own synced jump drives.”

“My goodness, you think big, Girl,” Jeff said. He didn’t want to remind her he had limited quantum material. His stepmother had moved her production to one of their safe worlds but still kept the facility small enough to be under her close personal control. He had to make decisions about creating another jump ship or equipping one they already had with a gravity lance. Jump drones were a necessity now, once they found how important they were for defense and communications. When Jeff found out how many drones were lost fighting North America he’d be horrified. Large fusion weapons were also worth building, but if you used them, the quantum fluid in them was lost forever. He was very anxious that the current war was going to use up a lot of their stocks of fluid.

It deeply bothered Jeff that he couldn’t solve the black box problem its production presented. He was starting to think his mother imported things she didn’t need, just to throw him off, or might depend on some trace ingredient she could carry in a pocket. Suddenly, Lee’s researchers finding a solution to their material shortage seemed more likely their salvation than a risk.

“Thank you. I don’t think Home masses any more than some of the alien ships we’ve seen. It’s just different because it spins instead of using gravity tech for the decks.” And is probably obsolete and will be seen as dated soon, Jeff thought for the first time but didn’t say out loud. It gave him a pang of distress to think that possible.

“There is however a matter of security. We haven’t shared the details of our drive with our Home allies. The details of it are only known to a handful of people. Not even to all of Heather’s peers. I’d have to be certain any drives attached to move Home were very secure.”

“Then all your fast ships are Central flagged?” Lee asked. “Somehow that detail never got explained to me.”

Jeff shrugged. “Perhaps because we just take it for granted. To my knowledge, there are six Home registered vessels, all explorers, with the same sort of drives the Earthies use. Only two were present in the Solar System when we performed our Bug Out of the habs. One was docked to Home and one in orbit around the Moon. The others are all out exploring. The superluminal vessel Snoopy undocked from Home and departed on a Fargone vector after Home entered the Derfhome system.”

“On your business?” Lee asked.

“No. It’s a privately owned explorer. Where it goes and to what purpose is none of my business,” Jeff insisted. “That there are any Home flagged private explorers says a lot about how much wealth resides in Home. Last I looked, there are only thirty-some explorers owned by Earth governments, universities, or huge corporations.”

“Well, that’s going to be a complication,” Lee said.

“Why so?” Jeff asked her.

“I’ve been holding my breath, waiting for the Claims Commission to cancel my claims and Gordon’s claims. We’ve had our bank on Ceres forward everything on deposit to Fargone and here. Any new royalty payments are automatically forwarded now. I just didn’t realize there are other non-Earth claimants. You can bet they will be excluded by the Claims Commission too.

“That’s their problem to deal with,” Jeff said. “We don’t speak for them.”

“I suspect they can speak for themselves,” Lee said. “This Snoopy that’s headed to Fargone, does it have any claims registered?”

Jeff tapped a string of inquiries in his pad. “No living world, but it has a decent number of mining sites, fuel rights in good locations, and one water world. Since it is out of Home, it is a partnership of six people. You can safely assume they are all billionaires in any Earth currency. That’s pretty common now.”

“Would they have followed all the rules the Earthies do?” Lee asked.

“Sure, they’d have to qualify to use the Commission,” Jeff said, “which is just another reason Central flagged vessels don’t register finds with the Commission.”

“Then what do you want to bet they are headed to Fargone to buy the latest weapons to replace the very limited sort they were allowed to carry as registered explorers?” Lee asked.

“That seems likely,” Jeff admitted. “That’s just one more unintended consequence the Earthies may have neglected to take into account.

“There are only the six ships,” Jeff reminded her, “but if they cut them off, they can act against North America or other commission members. They may seek reprisals for their losses or conduct attacks in retribution.” He stopped, with an astonished look on his face.

“What?” Lee demanded. “You might as well have yelled Eureka!”

“Back, during our war of rebellion, the Assembly authorized blanket letters of marque and reprisal for all Home vessels while we were at war with North America. There was never any reason to rescind that law. One would assume they retain force since the treaty was broken by the North Americans. I doubt the Assembly is in a mood to do so now, and even if the ship captains decide it applies to any registered members of the Claims Commission, I also doubt they would make any move to reprove them.”

“Oh great. We may have pirates now,” Lee said. And if they poach other nations’ vessels, they may set all the other Earthies against us, not just North America.”

“No indeed. Privateers,” Jeff insisted. “It’s a very different thing. Just ask Gordon.”

* * *

Lloyd was prepared for rage when he reported the loss of Huma Bhabha and the Improbable. Not at him. He knew Heather wasn’t an empty-headed despot who would shoot the bearer of bad news. He deeply feared for North America, however. Instead, her reaction was barely visible. Heather’s nostrils flared as she took a long deep breath and her lips narrowed in a thin angry line. Somehow that still managed to send a chill up Lloyd’s back. He had to suppress the urge to lift a hand and smooth the hair standing up on the back of his neck.

“Dakota, post a note to all ship owners and pilots. Effective immediately, you need not risk yourselves to leave smaller vessels for USNA to evacuate. This is due to the loss of a Central vessel to an elaborate ambush. Do not pursue fleeing ships to turn them back. They may lead you into a trap using X-heads as a minefield. Destroy them at the furthest possible range. If you come upon other Central forces in the field inform them of this order.”

“I’m on it,” Dakota said and left the room.

“Mr. Maddox, do you require rest or supplies before I give you another assignment?” Heather asked.

“No, Ma’am. I’m mid-day in my sleep cycle and was assured on landing that my ship is being fueled and serviced. I haven’t made a dent in onboard stores. I expended a munition and was told I’d have a new one in the rack when I returned. I’m ready to do whatever you command.”

“There are still a few small USNA ships in Earth orbit that April couldn’t ID. Military supply vessels, a couple of frigates, and even a few jump capable cutters. April got most of them. Disable them all and challenge any about which you are uncertain to identify themselves or have their drive spaces destroyed. They are well warned about what we are doing and our tactics now, so be that much more cautious. If you get no response, and can’t identify them visually, disable them. Your computer will have the profiles and last known orbit of all USNA vessels we have identified. If you have any doubts about their response disable them. If you accidentally damage the vessel of another nation, I won’t see you held personally liable. Do you need anything?”

“This is going to be a short, intense campaign. Do you have somebody who is not a pilot but familiar with flight operations and weapons systems to sit second to me? I can concentrate on flying then and they can talk and run the drones and missiles for me,” Lloyd requested.

“I have a jump apprentice if you are willing to further her training,” Heather offered.

“That’s fine, and thank you,” Lloyd said.

Heather’s eyes flickered briefly in her spex. “Ms. Orlov, would you consent to sit the weapons board for Lloyd Maddox on Lloyd’s Lady?”

After a pause, she added. “Whenever you can get to the field and join him. I suggest you take a couple of changes of suit liners.”

“She’ll be there,” Heather told him.

“Are we going to remove North American vessels that haven’t lifted?” Lloyd asked.

“Leave that to me,” Heather told him. “I intend to remove North American spaceports, the supporting infrastructure for space operations, and the production of most aerospace materials. I’m done playing softball with them.”

“Yes, Ma’am. I’ll try to beat Ms. Orlov to my ship if you are done with me.”

“Quite done. I’m sorry to send you right back out when you’ve had such a shocking experience,” Heather said.

“It’s war,” Lloyd said. “I expect it to be gut-wrenching and ugly.”

“Yes, and I suspect the North Americans may think it is mostly over. They haven’t had time to get reports from their furthest bases or any of their smaller vessels bringing refugees home. They are about to find out it’s just starting and I’m no longer in a mood to even entertain a surrender. They have a history of serial surrender and proving false to it. This time we simply remove their ability to support a space industry. I regret we ever allowed them to regain it after the Home revolution. I’m going to make it clear to them that in the future we will bombard any space facilities they try to rebuild without notice. North America is permanently out of the space business.”

Lloyd nodded his understanding of that and exited quickly. Heather was going to be very busy.

* * *

“To the various Earth news services, from the Sovereign of Central: The USNA, after orchestrating an attack on the trio of Home habitats before their stated deadline, has abused my efforts to minimize casualties in removing North American military presence in the heavens. The USNA base at Survey System 4803 not only refused to surrender but destroyed a Central vessel in a cunning ambush. The base was destroyed and my orders currently propagating to all our forces are to stop offering quarter to any USNA forces. The effort to leave freighters or minor warships to evacuate surrendering personnel is rescinded. North America is put on notice to vacate any space-related facilities immediately as they are subject to immediate destruction.”

* * *

The Humans were all glad to be called back to dinner. They all had modified metabolisms that increased their appetites. They were early because just a few Derf were drifting in to populate the Great Hall. The Mothers seemed in a good mood so they must not have received any bad news since they’d gone to their rooms.

“Have you received any new communications yet from your Home people?” the First Mother inquired.

“Just that they arrived, and will take a couple of days to refine their information about the objects and motions in the Derfhome system,” Jeff said. “It will take some time to plan their solutions to attain an accurate orbit trailing Derfhome station. The ability to change the vector of Home with conventional drives is very limited. They can do so to perfectly match orbits, but at such a low acceleration the inhabitants won’t even feel it.

“Despite the fact we were sorely pressed for time, I’ve been warned that there are people who have a grievance with my sovereign for whisking them away. They will likely express it to me as her peer in residence when they arrive within easy com range. I’m not sure they are aware April and the Foys are here to yell at. Under the circumstances, I don’t think I’ll reveal that to them. I remarked to my friends that you save people from being shredded to hamburger and still they are ungrateful. Let them yell at me or challenge me so the others can deal undistracted.”

“Do you mean a challenge at arms such as Derf do to establish law?” the Second asked.

“Yes, though we have different customs,” Jeff said. “I’ve survived one duel. I heard how your Champion William reduced the willingness of others to call him out. I intend to do something similar if some hothead insists on meeting me.”

“Beat them to a pulp without using the cutting edge?” the Third Mother inquired.

“Indeed, no. If challenged I have the choice of weapons. I’ve given it some thought, and if called out I will specify pillows.”

“Perhaps I don’t have the full usage of that English word. Soft headrests for sleeping?” the Third Mother asked. “How can that be lethal?”

“You simply hold it firmly over their face until they smother,” Jeff said.

The Mothers didn’t look at each other to share the horror of imagining how slow that would be, with the supporters of the challenge obligated to watch without interfering. Jeff seemed confident he’d be the survivor of such a test. One wondered if he’d planned some sort of tactics. It was a long silent pause before the Third Mother could bring herself to speak again.

“We’ve noticed gratitude is not an automatic Human response. But be warned various Derf can also neglect it to an amazing degree.”

“I’m glad one of our races isn’t virtuous at a saintly level,” Lee said. “If one was, the other would never be able to put up with them. We both need to be similar to get along.”

“Or even too dissimilar in the level we are defective,” Jeff said, amused at himself. “However, I want to say we discussed other consequences that should be summarized for you, but I’m tired of talking. If April would explain it for you?” he proposed.

April explained there was a handful of slower Home registered explorers and that they had long-standing rights to letters of marque and reprisal. That one had already left Home for Fargone and their supposition why. She explained the likelihood the Earth Claims Commission would cut off Lee’s royalty payments and those of the other off-Earth explorers.

“You’ve been expecting to be cut off?” the Second Mother asked Lee.

“I was shocked they didn’t do it back when they refused to register our claims in the deep beyond,” Lee said. “I can’t imagine they haven’t done so now with the resumption of hostilities, and word just hasn’t reached us yet. When we visited Providence, our reception was chilly. If we go again, I expect to be treated as a hostile vessel.”

The Mothers looked up and down the table at each other, the Second Mother in the middle pivoting her head back and forth to read the interaction between the First and Third Mothers. No word was spoken but they visibly came to a consensus with the First and Second Mothers giving the Third a nod to speak that they’d picked up from Humans.

“To clarify, do you think they will just cut off your royalty payments or would they repudiate the entire claim so your system rights and land claims would be voided too?”

Lee looked thoughtful. “To hold title to lands is so basic it didn’t occur to me they would try to invalidate them. But I’d like to ask Jeff and April what they think.”

“I’m afraid if they deny any one aspect of your claims, they will all be obligated to deny all of your claims,” Jeff said. “To accept one would give you a legal weapon to show they are all valid. There’s an underlying fact that overrides any legal nitpicking. They are simply too greedy to do it by half measures.”

“If they do that, then our holding on Providence will be invalidated too, because Lee will be deemed ineligible to have passed them to us,” the Third Mother reasoned.

“Is that going to put us at war with North America again?” Lee asked.

The First Mother held up a single taloned digit. “No need to get ahead of ourselves with suppositions. Even if they contest with you, we can wait for that to play out before we have any need to protect our derivative rights.”

“That puts it on me to defend our ownership,” Lee said.

“Indeed, it does, but I suspect you would do so for yourself in any case. I expect with a much gentler hand than we would feel obligated to apply,” the First Mother said. The hand with which she illustrated a slapping application was not a true hand but a middle one with claws extended.

“I’m not sure I have the means,” Lee worried. “Most of my crews signed up to explore, not as mercenaries. I’d have to recruit with honesty about what they were signing on to do. Right now, a good chunk of the Exploration Society is off with Thor in the Deep and I have a greatly diminished pool from which to recruit.”

“If it helps, we will put the Sharp Claws and the Retribution at your service along with any Red Tree crew who wish to volunteer for shares,” the First Mum offered.

“Shares of what?” Lee asked. “We’re not going exploring.”

“Why the loot,” the First Mother explained. “When clans warred, we kept the whole thing. If you have to take your planet back why would you limit yourself to what little they already granted you? Your limits on what you were able to claim were based on the Claims Commission shouldering the burden of defending it for you. If they void the contract and you have to assume that burden now you should be much better compensated.”

Lee was momentarily shocked silent.

Jeff cleared his throat loudly and waved a much less threatening digit than the Mother.

“We have several thousand Homies arriving in orbit. Any number of them are suddenly unemployed, many with military experience. None of them are restrained from acting on behalf of another government. Indeed, they are capable of declaring war and acting on their own behalf if they wish. I have. Also, several fine security firms on Home have experience working together as a team and are well equipped. We can recommend them as we’ve hired them ourselves with good results.”

“I’m not sure how many people live on Providence now,” Lee said. “It must be a couple of thousand to service the basic systems they have in place like the port, satellite com, and a space station. It would be hard to raise anything near that big of a counter-force, equip them, and transport them.”

“No need,” April assured her. “Most of the population are there to get as far away from Earth as they can. As long as you make clear you don’t intend to throw the genuine colonists out, or diminish their holdings, very few will concern themselves with protecting their Earthie administration. For that matter, make it clear you will provide expanded opportunities for land and reduce the fees for providing the services already in place. After all, you are seizing the infrastructure and don’t need to recover any investment. They may very well throw the scoundrels out before you can land and do it yourself.”

“Also, there are plenty of Homies with administrative experience if you do have to replace some of the basic oversight of things like the Port and communications systems. All Earthie bureaucracies tend to be top-heavy so you aren’t going to need that many. Even some who are minor government officials may ask to defect and work for you, if the alternative is returning to Earth,” Jeff said.

“OK, you’ve convinced me. The Mothers are willing to kick in the use of two warships. Are you willing to sit an overwatch on the system for a couple of days while we find and remove the Earthie administration and send them home? Just to keep any surprise North American presence from suddenly appearing in our sky.”

“I doubt they will have the assets free or the ability to communicate with them effectively,” April said. “Heather is making life difficult for them right now. I will however, sit high guard for you.”

“Do you have to ask Heather?” Lee asked.

“I have considerable authority to act for her,” April said. “In this case, I find it a logical extension of our protection of Derfhome. The Red Tree Mothers have extended territory there and it is in our mutual interest to maintain control of it.”

“Then I’ll start assembling the means to do this,” Lee agreed, “but I want to wait to move on it. The North Americans pretty much tell the Commission what tune to dance to, but I’d rather force them to kick us out rather than anticipate them. It just looks better.”

The first Mother smiled and nodded her agreement. A wave of her hand signaled that their dinner that was delayed a few minutes while they discussed business could be served.

* * *

After sweets and coffee, the Mothers inquired what Lee and her guests intended next.

"If things were much calmer, I’d love to take them to see the first contact site and march them up for a day at the old fort. Someday, I’d like to ask you to show them the old armor and weapons, but my researchers are asking for a meeting, my bank wants me to come in, and the Foys are begging a meeting with Jeff and April. I’m afraid we need to leave those pleasures for another time. We will walk out in the morning to the mail road, so we don’t make everything come to a halt again because everybody wants to gawk at an aircar.”

“You don’t have to, if it robs you of a morning,” the First Mother granted.

“It will be good for us,” Lee insisted. “Exercise isn’t just a weird Human fetish. It has health benefits which even life extension doesn’t fully replace.”

“You know, when airplanes were a new thing on Earth, people did the same thing. If they heard one passing, they would run outside to see it,” Jeff said.

“Maybe if they upgrade your older model aircars to be quieter it won’t be as interesting to people,” April speculated.

“They just need to be so common nobody thinks anything of them,” Jeff argued.

“Even if they are quieter, that sounds terribly invasive,” the Second Mother said. “We might as well pave a highway right to the Keep door to have them landing all the time.”

Lee didn’t say anything. Even more so because the Third Mother who was the most progressive of them had a thoughtful look. Lee wasn’t sure that sounded so bad to her.

* * *

Heather had a lot on her mind planning the removal of North America as a space capable nation. A demotion in rank that would leave it behind others they disdained as second or third world nations. A good dozen countries built a nominal space capacity to qualify for the Claims Commission subsidies that were much better than the payment shares to non-space nations. The last thing she was anticipating was Dakota rushing in with urgent messages from Mars.

“I know you don’t have time for this, but the Martians are complaining the Folks on Gamma are ignoring their traffic directives from Phobos, and they are requesting access to shuttle service because they didn’t have a lander of any kind docked to them when they were snatched away to Mars. The Gammans are complaining about pretty much the same things, but from their perspective.”

Heather blinked, not sure what to say to what she saw as conflicting thoughts.

“It would seem to me if the Gammans are requesting services of the Martians it would be the course of wisdom to try to get along in such matters as traffic control. Fighting them with the left hand while supplicating them with the right hand is folly. Who died and appointed me sovereign over either? Central is enough trouble to govern.”

“Undoubtedly, that’s pretty much how the Martians see it,” Dakota agreed, “but they are viewing it from their cultural perspective, which is that everything is run from a central authority. The idea there are private factions free to express opposing interests on Gamma is going to be a hard sell. I have my doubts about whether they’ll even believe such a thing is possible. It certainly would never be tolerated on Mars.”

“Why do they even want to go down to that pest hole? The Martians are hanging on by their fingertips as far as environmental security. They don’t produce anything in excess to trade with the Gammans. I’m not sure how the Martians would pay for anything if they expect the Martians to buy from them. I haven’t checked, but Gamma had no superluminal vessels working from that hab, and maybe a half dozen orbit to orbit shuttles. They can sit and stew for a little bit until I get this other stuff sorted out. Nobody is going to starve or run out of air in a week or two. They have fab shops. They could build a decent lander in a couple of weeks. This is a fake emergency. They should be discussing where they want to go not settling in like they are going to stay there forever.”

“I’d ask why you parked them there if you didn’t expect them to interact with the planet. I guess they don’t trust you not to abandon them now that you have stranded them there,” Dakota said. “They are asking the Martians to lift water for them. They want to drop where there are surface sources of water and recover them for the hab.”

“If that was viable or efficient the Martians would be doing it for themselves,” Heather said. “You get very little payload and waste most of it as reaction mass. The maintenance on the shuttles soon outweighs the benefit of the water you can transport compared to extracting it locally. It isn’t going to be all that far in the future that the Martians will need to rebuild and refurbish those shuttles. Habs have always orbited around some body. I guess we thought that’s just how things were done. Maybe that was a mistake. Nobody has ever put a habitat in Solar orbit all on its own. Even if it was, they should both be trying to find a path of cooperation.”

Dakota looked even more unhappy. “Worse, I don’t think there is anywhere in the equatorial band where you can get water without digging and mining it. They either have to set up a facility or land on the sections you and Jeff own.”

“OK, I do have to nip that in the bud,” Heather said.

“Do you? Couldn’t you just sell them the water?” Dakota suggested.

“They still need a way to get to it, and they aren’t displaying much patience or the good sense to call and ask how I can help. I suspect if I don’t make them feel secure, they will use what they have on hand in the way of orbital shuttles to invade Phobos to control access to the surface. That will complicate our already bad relationship with Earth. Just like Martians see Gammans as a whole, Earthies think Spacers are a monolithic group. Other Earth nations who were neutral or even favorable to us will condemn all Spacers if the Gammans invade Mars. I can see the giant font headlines now. Mars Invaded!” Heather said.

The two women stared at each other silently, thinking hard.

“It’s a temporary solution, but here’s what I’ll do. Send a message to Gamma security and request it be shared as an all-hands message. That will both cover whoever is creating this problem and everybody else allowing it, without us making inquiries to discover the details and players. Tell them I’m short of ships right now to help them, but that in approximately a week I will send a ship to grab a small snowball from the outer system and put it in a trailing orbit behind Gamma. When we are able, we’ll repatriate those individuals who got swept up in the emergency exit and return them where they want to be. When they have some idea where they would like the entire habitat to be moved permanently, we’ll facilitate that for them.”

“What about the two snowballs that got left behind when the habs were moved?” Dakota asked. “They probably have the machinery to process water.”

“And somebody owns those snowballs and the machinery,” Heather said. “That’s supposing the extraction facilities weren’t damaged or the snowball busted up. I’m not going to pay for them to give them to the Gammans. It’s about as easy for us to get a new snowball for free as move one of those. Indeed, this isn’t going to be charity. They can pay the bulk rate for cometary water and see to extracting it themselves. They aren’t without machine shops and work scooters.

“Remind them the polar regions are owned, and I will be sending someone with the snowball to oversee the sales of water and permission to land or extract anything of value from the Martian surface. I’m acting for Jeff without his permission, but I’m sure he wants his property to be secured. I won’t release access to any of his territory until I get his agreement. Is that sufficient for you to write up the message?” Heather asked her.

“Yes, I’ll create it. Do you know who you are going to send?” Dakota inquired.

“No, you can find somebody too. If you can’t find anyone free, look at which department has functioned best short-handed and rob them. Don’t bother me with a draft either,” Heather said with a dismissive wave.

“I’m on it. I’ll have it sent in a half hour and find somebody today,” Dakota promised.

* * *

“I’m showing you this first,” Tod Oliver, head of Gamma security said, “but then I’m releasing this message as she requested.”

“Are you afraid of the Moon Queen?” Franklin Abel asked after he read it.

“Damn right,” Tod answered with no hesitation. “Anybody above the atmosphere who knows how things work has a very healthy respect for her and that crew that runs with her. You had a complaint and a worry that got folks stirred up. She just addressed it even though it wasn’t an honest emergency, yet. If you just move right on to pick another point to complain about people are going to see a pattern. This isn’t a bunch of Earthies on Gamma, who will watch the talking heads on the telly and nod their heads in vacant agreement.”

‘We’re still isolated here with no transportation anywhere,” Abel said. “That isn’t any made-up issue.”

“She offers transport for the whole hab,” Tod pointed out. “If this mob can agree on where to go. I can see from your face that worries you about as much as it does me. If Mars isn’t ideal, at least we know something about it to deal with it. I wouldn’t want to put a vote about moving to the assembly yet. Especially not until she makes good on the promise to individually repatriate those who want to go elsewhere. That would change the demographics of it so much there’s no telling where they would pick. We could end up at some distant star with all our basic assumptions about which businesses are viable and valuable scrambled. Lots of us might have to start over from scratch.”

“That doesn’t change the fact we wouldn’t have local transportation wherever we end up. We’ll need surface shuttles or longer-range orbit to orbit transport anywhere we move,” Abel insisted.

“Then perhaps you should buy some transport,” Tod suggested. “There are still shipbuilding facilities in Earth orbit. If you buy something from the French perhaps you can get one of those improved drives that will do a constant boost for interplanetary trips. The time to do that might be now, before the mob decides to be taken to some far star system. After that, you may have to beg the Moon Queen for delivery. I assume you can’t afford a starship?”

“You’re right, I’m rich but not that rich. I’m not sure if anybody is even offering to build starships to a standard design yet. That’s not a half-bad idea to get a deep-space vessel while we’re still in the neighborhood,” Franklin Abel acknowledged.

OceanofPDF.com

Chapter 4

“I thought Mexico had seceded from North America in everything but making a formal declaration,” Heather said. “Why are the shuttle tire factory and these composites shops on the targeting list for North America but located in Mexico?”

“They may be quasi-independent but they aren’t stupid,” Dakota said. “They have this nice shop, building stuff the North Americans want. Why wouldn’t they keep selling tires and bucky tubes to their northern neighbor? There’s a lot of trade still going on and all sorts of games to get around the currency exchange problems. The Texans facilitate goods flowing across their territory and have been very reasonable about not price gouging. The funny thing is that the goods flow cheaper and easier now that there aren’t all the official inspections and delays at the border since it is all technically illicit and uncontrolled.”

“I’m hesitant to destroy those facilities,” Heather worried. “I’m going to remove so many other space suppliers that they won’t have anything left on which to mount the tires. I’d rather not turn anyone against us I don’t have to. Keep them off the list for now. I wish Chen and Jan hadn’t got caught up in the Home move. I’d trust them to have back channels to explain what I’m going to do to the Mexicans. I will take those facilities out if it is a future problem.”

“If I can contact somebody at the executive level or in their sales, I could politely tell them they are about to lose their USNA market, and they might consider diversifying to other buyers,” Dakota suggested. “I can hint that the continued existence of the facility is not a problem because we intend to remove the industry it supports. They can infer the corollary, that if North America manages to lift any new manned spaceships with their tires, it will be a problem.”

“Do that, if it isn’t too hard to find somebody who will take your call. I don’t think they can assemble anything manned capable to orbit in secret, but they might very well try.”

“You aren’t going to try to keep them from keeping utility satellites?” Dakota asked.

“No, the civilian population depends on them too much now to deny that to them. You might as well bomb their electric grid or water purification plants. Satellite communications, weather reporting, and crop surveillance are just basic services now. They get warnings for earthquakes and volcanic eruptions from satellites. Even the poorest nations with no lift capacity have to buy those things now from others. North America can do the same now. They can afford it better than most of the other countries. Maybe it will impart a little humility to ask India or Australia to position their satellites for them.” Heather said.

“You could say the same for them,” Dakota suggested. “They could buy those services from others who have satellites if you leave them no other choice.”

“I’m not quite ready to punish the general population that severely,” Heather said. “Let’s see how they respond. If they find some inventive way to be stupid, I’ll consider doing that.”

“Maybe you should go straight for the leadership,” Dakota said.

“Do you think their replacements would be any better?” Heather asked. “I’ve made that point before as Jeff has. I don’t think anything has changed.”

“Point,” Dakota admitted. “You’d have to go through quite a few layers, wouldn’t you?”

Heather just nodded.

* * *

“I’m going to walk you out to your pickup point,” Garrett insisted.

“Lovely, it’s a beautiful day. If we run into any wildlife or assassins, I’ll give you first shot at dealing with them,” Lee promised.

Garrett looked at her neutrally for a long pause, expecting an objection or at the least a further snide remark about how unnecessary it was to guard them. When it didn’t materialize, all the replies he’d prepared to argue with her were suddenly useless. He finally managed to give an awkward nod and a belated thank you.

Lee set the pace at a brisk walk. All of the Humans were enhanced so it was easy for them. Garrett could keep up with that easily. At a running pace, he’d never have the endurance to reach the mailbox, but it would be mean to demonstrate that.

Jeff in particular was intrigued by their closer look at the fortress on the hill when they passed closely crossing the saddle next to it. Lee promised they’d find a day to explore it before they left Derfhome.

“Is the same old fellow who was driving the mail route when Gordon first brought me to Red Tree still doing it?” Lee asked. “He is what Humans usually refer to as a character, meaning he’s a bit odd. You usually get if that is good or bad from the inflection.”

“Of course,” Garrett said. “That is an honored position. He’d never yield it as long as he’s able to do it. You can be sure he has a half dozen relatives all hoping he’ll eventually take one of them as an apprentice when he nears retirement.”

“Who appoints him?” April asked. “Do the Mothers have to approve who he trains?”

Garrett looked so surprised that even the new Humans saw that easily.

“The mailmen predate even the trade towns,” Garrett said. “They started with runners between clans taking messages from Mothers to Mothers. Often, they took a message and then continued on, instead of returning where it originated. I’m not sure who, but in the distant past some clan Mothers declared that by law one must offer a mailman hospitality and protection.

“It just followed when trade towns were formed, they sent their messages and packages by the folks already under the protection of the law. Very few of them will retire to a town though. The towns are under no obligation to support a retired mailman. They do get all sorts of tips and gifts from the townspeople now but no retirement. The Human delivery services found they had to hire them as agents because nobody else could compete with them. Since they started using vehicles that has all increased too. The nature of the job is slowly changing. Eventually, the towns are going to have to support their mail service more. The Mothers are subsidizing their retirement right now. They can still do that because there are so few of them.

“The fellow you rode with usually returns to Fast Water clan. He only makes the loop through the village out to Red Tree and some clans off the other way every week or so. The First Mother before you came didn’t care for the outside influence,” Garrett explained. “The mailbox was put out by the road supposedly to save the mailman time and effort. That’s only been since Humans introduced powered vehicles that he could make his drop-off and return the same day. It was a full hard day trip out to the Keep on foot before.

“Everybody knows it was to keep work from stopping almost as bad as an aircar landing does now. The mailman brought all sorts of unofficial news and gossip too. Since he could demand hospitality, including overnight lodging, he had lots of time before he left the next day to share it too. It wasn’t always news the Mothers wanted to be shared. The mailman could still stop early and insist on their hospitality, but would you force yourself on them when it’s made plain you aren’t welcome?”

“And yet, the Mothers haven’t pulled the mailbox in, even though there has been a new First Mother for some time now,” April pointed out.

Garrett looked at her, but wisely expressed no opinion about that, too cautious to even acknowledge it with a nod. That said as much as any comment he could have made.

“No wonder the Third Mum didn’t say anything about the idea of a road right in to the Keep,” Lee said.

“That one is no dummy,” Garrett agreed, “She knows her limits as Third.”

“It occurred to me you have plenty of flat land near the Keep to put in a short landing strip for cheaper fixed-wing aircraft,” Jeff remarked.

Garrett couldn’t keep his face straight at that. The idea was so radical he looked at Jeff in amazement. Jeff just smiled at him.

“Gordon told me that Red Tree never welcomed any Humans but the clan members were all aware from attending festivals that other clans had them visit. They still seem rather isolationist even with the old First Mother gone,” Lee said.

“Well, you busted that wide open,” Garrett insisted. It seemed to amuse him.

“The amazing thing to me is this is another one of those things Gordon never told me,” Lee said. “It irritates me how secretive he can be.”

Garrett shrugged, an acquired Human gesture. “I wouldn’t be too quick to fault him in this particular instance. It’s one of those stories you assume everybody knows.”

* * *

“I hear the aircar coming in,” Garrett said.

“That’s freaky,” Lee said. “We’re still a good kilometer short of the road.”

“Oh, he’s a couple of kilometers out still. I bet even you can hear him at a kilometer,” Garret said. “I can’t imagine living in a Human city with all sorts of machines like that roaring around all day and all night.”

“The newer aircars are much quieter,” Jeff said. “Earth Humans are constantly trying to reduce noise. They don’t have sirens on emergency vehicles now, and even tires are regulated on how much noise they can generate. They have gotten very strict about personal noise in the cities. You can get serious fines for disturbing your neighbors. On the habitats, we started with strict noise rules. At Central, with almost everything in tunnels, it hasn’t been an issue. If you read unfiltered Earth news it’s a common topic.”

“I think I hear it,” Lee said.

Jeff opened his mouth and panned his head side to side. “If you can, your hearing is much better than mine.”

“I noticed when it changed pitch,” Lee insisted.

Garrett nodded. “That was him cutting power back to descend.”

“OK, I heard him briefly,” April agreed.

“Yeah, just barely,” Jeff agreed. “But now I don’t.”

“Because he landed,” Garrett explained. “Should we hurry?”

“No need. He’ll wait for us,” Lee said. “He’s a good ten minutes early anyway.”

When they arrived, the aircar was resting on the meadow rather than the dirt track. That was good since it didn’t raise any dust.

The pilot was the same one that dropped them off. He was out of the aircar standing knee-deep in flowers. By all appearances enjoying the view and in no hurry for them to load up and leave. The serenity ended when he turned and saw Garrett.

“I hope he isn’t a passenger. Even if we could jam him in across three seats, I’d be pushing into emergency power to get this rig off the ground at this altitude. It’s not safe. She’d handle like a pig and suck fuel like crazy.”

“No worries. He just accompanied us as security and will walk back,” Lee assured him.

The pilot got an odd quizzical expression and turned looking all around. There were no buildings or people in sight. The dirt road that was barely more than ruts was the only sign it wasn’t straight-up wilderness. He was too polite to ask what hazard they imagined.

* * *

The aircar returned the trio of Humans to Fishtown with time to find lunch before they caught the return flight to Derfhome City. They picked a restaurant based on proximity to the airport rather than any special recommendation about its worth. They all agreed they would go further afield next time. The proprietor was flustered to accommodate Humans and they were fortunate to be carrying their own utensils.

Lee got a text from Musical and Born asking her to meet with them when she had time. When she asked if she should bring Jeff along, they demurred, asking it just be her this time. April and Jeff must know from her being quiet while she was communicating with her spex, but didn’t pry. They each had private business interests after all.

“What are you going to do to get ready for Home making orbit?” Lee asked.

“Brainstorming with the Foys,” April said. “We will try to anticipate what services Homies will ask of the Central embassy. There are a small number of people with dual citizenship, and others who will come to us as the only visible Human authority on the planet. There isn’t any official Fargone presence, is there?”

“No,” Lee said, “though they have intervened by sending warships to counter the presence of North American ships. The Mothers never asked them to do that, so it was an informal arrangement. Red Tree has no formal treaty or binding relationship with Fargone. To have asked would have implied a dependency and loss of their sovereignty to the Mothers. They left once Red Tree had two capable warships in the system again.”

“But the Fargoers sent one of their warships back out with your fleet again on their latest voyage, right?” April asked.

“Yes, but Gordon and I requested that of the Fargone admiralty. We have a good working relationship with Admiral Serendipity Hawking. He was happy to be able to send a delegation with our first voyage to show there are other Human interests besides the Little Fleet itself. The Mothers sent their junior member too so the Derf were represented.”

April and Jeff looked at each other with the same droll unbelieving expression.

“What? I’m not trying to mislead you,” Lee objected.

“Perhaps you are misleading yourself,” April said.

“Kindly put,” Jeff agreed, “better than I could have said it.”

“I’m misleading myself so well I have no clue what you mean,” Lee said.

“The way you described it is entirely believable, for when the Little Fleet departed on their first voyage,” April agreed. “It doesn’t represent the reality today. You are a sovereign entity by every measure that matters. You are a primary signatory on treaties spanning star systems. You dictated to the Earthies that you rejected their Claims Commission and were establishing your own. Or would you claim that action based upon the authority of the Mothers?” April asked pointedly.

“No, I did it for the Little Fleet, and to keep our word to the aliens,” Lee admitted.

“Whose word?” Jeff asked sharply.

“I believe Gordon was the one who made promises to them,” Lee deflected, but she’d hesitated long enough to show it was a discomforting question.

“So, the commodore of your fleet, issuing promises based on your policy,” April said.

“How can I be a sovereign with no territory?” Lee asked.

Jeff made a rude noise. “No territory except claims on a dozen rich systems with more resources than Humans have possessed since before they built pyramids until now. You ceded sufficient territory to the Red Tree Mothers to establish a colony comparable to what they hold on Derfhome while still holding plenty for yourself. If you asked them if you are sovereign, they’d look surprised and say of course! You even laid limits on that gift, reserving rights to reside there autonomously. None of the Mother’s subjects could do that. The Homies will have very little trouble understanding you or dealing with you because they are a voluntary association of sovereigns. They bind themselves to pay taxes and accept the vote of their peers making law. But people who are subjects like the Earthies, and even Heather’s sworn people, should not be misled as to your nature. It may cause needless conflict and confusion if you act as a sovereign and continue to deny it.”

“I don’t feel sovereign,” Lee objected. “I’m neither Mother nor subject in Red Tree. I don’t make law. I can’t command the Little Fleet or make war on anyone.”

“You are neither subject nor Mother in the clan. That’s obvious,” Jeff agreed. “For all your talk about reforming the Derf clan system, it escapes you that you’ve already done that by being something new in the system. Now that you have a special third status it opens the door to others, Human or Derf, doing the same.”

Lee’s face changed, lips clamped thin and eyebrows furrowed. “Gordon knew what he was doing from the very start, clear back when he sat me on his knee and shoved me in the face of the old First Mother,” Lee decided.

“Well yeah. You broke their system from day one,” April agreed. “Look at my shocked face that Gordon the renowned military strategist is a long-range political schemer. But everything you’ve told us says you agree with opening them up. Why be upset with Gordon?”

“Because he didn’t level with me about his intentions. He just used me.”

“I doubt you were up to that level of intrigue back then,” April said.

“Yeah. I once asked him if he didn’t know presenting me would create a problem, and he said he had every confidence I would respond appropriately by my nature.”

That seemed to mollify Lee somewhat.

Jeff jumped back in before she could enlarge on that. “As far as making law, I think that establishing a bureaucracy and forms to certify ownership of entire star systems and back it up by force qualifies. The war part is going to happen soon enough, when the Claims Commission cuts you off. The Mothers know it and have declared themselves your ally. You have crew who will join up to fight at your word, and had no objection to hiring mercenaries. I approve of waiting to take Providence back until they break the contract, but it’s a moral quibble. You know they are going to do it. It’s what Earthies do. I’d bet anything you want to wager that they will renege within six months. It’s just bureaucratic inertia and butt covering that has kept your shares coming this long. They know cutting off payments will have consequences. They just need to know who to blame when the backlash for that decision hits. It will be some minor functionary or political opposition that gets accused to the public for the economic fallout it’s going to create.

“It matters to me who breaks it,” Lee insisted. “I want to be able to say later that I treated them better than they treated me in the matter.”

“You elevate yourself to being their peer in the matter again,” April pointed out.

Jeff’s face transformed with such a sudden epiphany that April looked alarmed.

“I know why this is so hard for you to accept,” he said smiling.

“Why should that delight you so?” Lee asked suspiciously.

“Because I’m not adept at social things. April and Heather have to tutor and correct me all the time. But sometimes that allows me to have a certain detachment to see past social assumptions. You have a hard time seeing yourself as sovereign because you have none of the trappings of office. We value labels inordinately. Heather is the Sovereign of Central. The Mothers are sovereign over their clan. Of what are you sovereign? I don’t believe you’ve ever bothered to name your island or holdings on Providence. You have no crown and no court. You’ve named no peers. We don’t normally apply the term to a fleet commodore or a master of a ship even though he is an absolute ruler within his hull.”

“I think you hit the nail on the head,” April said. “It’s a deficiency of language.”

Lee got a horrid stricken look and heaved a big sigh.

“What got to you?” April demanded.

“Everything. I added it all up in my mind and have to agree I am sovereign. That isn’t anything to make me happy. I already feel responsible for so much. This just makes me even more responsible for what I decide to do. I can’t put it off on anybody else.”

“Heather would agree and empathize,” Jeff assured her. “On the plus side, I think your team will have a superluminal drive tested and ready for you to use by the time you need to go to Providence. They seemed to understand how it would need to be configured for their active material. They immediately spoke of sending orders to rapid prototyping, so they should have something for you very soon.”

“They messaged me they want to show me something,” Lee said. “That’s probably it.”

* * *

“Dakota, take a message and release it to the Earthie news services in my name with all the appropriate headers,” Heather said.

“Due to the preemptive attacks on our allies from outside the Solar System, I have determined the Kingdom of Central is not safe as long as the United States of North America is a space power. Starting in twelve hours from this notice the ability of North America to build, launch, and receive space vessels, including from civilian ports, will be removed. If other countries have spacecraft or aircraft in transit to North American destinations you should utilize this time to get them to a safe alternative destination. If you have aircraft or space vessels on North American territory now is your window to recover them. Any location attempting an orbital launch from North America or its naval assets after the grace period will be destroyed. Attempts to repair destroyed facilities will be met with escalating bombardment regardless of collateral damage. North America is out of the space business permanently.”

“Be sure to time stamp it prominently,” Heather said and turned to Johnson.

“Do you need to have April recalled to conduct the campaign?” Heather asked. “I can probably get her here in twelve hours if I need to.”

“No, ma’am. She laid out a clear plan of battle with priorities and explanations for every choice,” Johnson said. “We can implement it just fine. It all makes sense and I’d be hard put to justify any real changes.”

“Do it,” Heather commanded. “I’m giving you all the codes for kinetic weapons and low yield devices. Since the revolution, once Jeff set up a contract to manufacture rods, he never withdrew the order and let it repeat. As lunar iron became available it got much cheaper to make them. Over the years, he accumulated a cloud of near ten thousand rods. Very few of them deteriorated or were removed by opposing powers. They are simple, robust, and given Jeff’s skills at booby-trapping, far too dangerous to remove. Besides those rods, the Home militia left behind a cloud of rods when they left the Solar System. Thanks to Jon we have the keys to those too. If you encounter extraordinary resistance, I’m prepared to release strategic weapons but I’ll want to discuss it with you.”

“You want to hit them in exactly twelve hours?” Johnson asked.

“Give them five minutes so they can’t say we jumped the gun,” Heather allowed.

April’s plan that Johnson followed was to expend two-thirds of those rods to severely damage every major runway in the United States of North America above thirty degrees north and Florida. Texas and Mexico were excluded. Any facility that could handle a space plane or carrier launch vehicle was to be ruined. Vertical launch facilities got hit as well as supporting infrastructure.

The shops and facilities to manufacture the specialized materials and sub-assemblies of space vehicles got the much more precise attention of the ships carrying the gravity lance. The effect of that weapon was too subtle to render entire runways unusable and the number of runways that had to be disabled was too great for the limited number of ships still in the Solar System carrying that weapon. Many of those industrial targets were sited in areas where dropping a rod on them would cause unreasonable collateral damage.

Mexico was privately told several shops creating composite structures and space plane tires had to stop dealing with North America or they would be removed too. Heather worried that with their spymasters Chen and Jan both snatched away in the sudden removal of Home, she might have trouble knowing if the Mexicans honored the ban. She wondered if they could be persuaded to return to Central where their Earth network expertise would still serve Heather and her partners. That would go in her next message to Jeff and April at Derfhome.

* * *

“We’ll be landing in the city in a few minutes,” Lee called ahead and got Musical to the screen with Born hovering behind him. “Do you want to come by the hotel and make some sort of presentation?”

“We have some hardware it would be awkward to transport. Could you possibly come to our lab to see it?” Musical asked. His muzzle got that tight dimpled look of anxiety.

“Sure, I have no need to go home first. I’ll take a car from the port.

Musical’s muzzle smoothed out and his whiskers relaxed.

“I’ll see you in about an hour,” Lee promised.

Lee called ahead for a car to be waiting for her to land and had the car stop and get her a couple of sandwiches on the way to pick her up. Her guys weren’t gene-modified. Nobody had that available for Derf or Badgers yet. They could go on and on and never take a break to eat just like unmodified Humans.

Musical was waiting at the curbside when the car stopped. Lee was torn between thinking that was thoughtful and worrying that he was becoming a borderline fanboy. At least she didn’t have to worry he had a crush on her, being a Badger.

“OK let’s go see what you guys have cooked up,” she said. He gave a perfectly adopted Human nod of agreement and looked so serious she took his hand to walk in just like she would her friend Talker. That pleased him like it did most Badgers.

Born was waiting inside and disconnected a vacuum pump from a machine on the floor when they entered.

“This is the smaller transportable centrifuge we modified to continue testing the gravity collapsing beam where it would be safer,” Born explained patting it. “The information Jeff gave us interrupted our planned testing. We have a place to take it as far north as the roads go for harvesting timber. We even have an older truck purchased to take it back and forth. But there was an unusual event the last run we made with the big machine we wanted to explore with this smaller machine. The last run with the big machine didn’t produce a collapse line.”

“The Central people call it a gravity lance,” Lee supplied.

Born gave just as good a nod as Musical’s but didn’t let it interrupt him.

“It slowed down unexpectedly, but it wasn’t losing vacuum. The lower bearing got hot too. The bearing has very limited thrust capacity since we didn’t anticipate any load on it in that direction beyond its weight. When we tore it down there was damage and we replaced both bearings in this smaller unit with ones that have much better thrust capacity.”

“Does it thrust the same direction when you flip it over?” Lee asked.

“You just take all the fun out of a big presentation. Did you know that?” Born asked.

“OK, it isn’t tied to the local field. Sorry, I said anything, carry on,” Lee suggested.

“Yes, yes it does. So, as you seem to anticipate, this smaller unit is flipped over now. The disk is subjected to an intense electric field instead of magnetism like the… lance. We improved the smaller unit to work at a bit higher voltage without arcing too. But let’s go right to showing you what it does. But I promised Musical I would let him talk too,” the big Derf said.

“Thank you,” Musical said but didn’t let go of Lee’s hand. “That big plate on the floor with the diamond tread pattern is a freight scale. We had to wait two weeks to get it because a one-ton scale is a special-order item in the fab shops and the strain gauges under it are from Fargone. We didn’t want one made in-house from the university because we’re trying to be more security conscious. We’re not only keeping the orders for parts of the actual machine separated to different shops but the things we use to work on it too. It’s amazing what you can deduce of their work by knowing the tools and support equipment somebody is using.”

“And most especially, we don’t trust Leonardo, the Head of the Engineering school as far as Musical could throw him,” Born said. “I’d be happier if he didn’t even know we exist.”

Leonardo was another Derf who out-massed the little Badger eight or ten times. Musical wasn’t going to loft him short of building a catapult.

“I’m glad you said it instead of me,” Musical said. “I’d hate for you to think I had anything against him for being a Derf. Now, we left the scale bare so you could see there isn’t any sort of connections to pass-through power. Would you like to step on it to see it works normally?”

“Sure, good thing I’m not sensitive about my weight,” Lee said and stepped on the plate.

“Fifty-seven point six kilograms,” Lee read off the display hung on the wall, “that’s about right. Step up here with me,” she invited Musical.

The display went to a hundred and four point three two kilograms.

“OK, I feel like the person from the audience asked on stage to examine the props for a magic show,” Lee said. “If you wanted to fool me you could probably do it. You could have built something under the scale to alter its operation or be sending a false feed to the read-out. The thing is, fooling me would have bad consequences in the future. Not all that far in the future either. I think you are both too smart to think that would be of any benefit. I know we are from very different cultures, but I’ve never had any doubt you both deal with me honestly. Let's just go forward with that assumption. You can save tearing things apart and demonstrating their honesty for others who have less reason to trust you.”

“Thank you,” Musical said. “I’m not familiar with this magic show you mention, but fraud is not unknown among the Badgers, and the Bills practically consider it a sport. We expect intense examination when we show this machine to others.”

“I’ll send you some video of a magic show. My cousin’s children on Earth just loved them. It is more sport or entertainment in the context of a show. There isn’t any fraud because they expect to be fooled and there is no loss from it happening.”

“That will be enlightening I’m sure. Born is going to put the machine on the scale. Fortunately, since we have him, we didn’t have to install a crane,” Musical said.

The somewhat pointy-ended egg shape in a frame was about the size of a fifty-liter beer keg. A quarter Derf keg that is. It was still heavy enough to make an adult Derf visibly strain to tilt it and walk it until one edge was over the scale. There wasn’t much empty space inside. Besides his middle arms gripping the frame rails, he used his true hands on the top to steady it. Born then braced his foot against the bottom and eased it down on the plate. That accomplished, it wasn’t too hard to tip it up level to the plate and slide it to the center of the scale. The readout informed them it was four hundred seventy-nine point six kilograms. A good part of that was frame since they’d used cheap steel angles. The last digit flipped back and forth between 5 and 6 randomly.

“Notice, we don’t have any sort of cables or attachments that could pull on it either way.” Musical said. “That’s why Born pumped it down and removed that connection. We have two battery packs and power supplies. One to spin up the disk and a smaller one to generate the high voltage. He declined to try to lift it with the power supplies attached.”

They watched while Born sat the charged batteries into frames on the centrifuge and plugged and locked the cables into receptacles on the egg. The scale now read five hundred thirty-two point zero three kilograms.

“It only runs about ten minutes on the batteries, but it’s a demonstration of concept, not a finished product. We anticipate improvements. Power it up, Born,” Musical requested.

Born pointed a remote at the machine and delicately depressed the power button with a single claw. Two green lights came on the power supplies, using the Human color scheme for power status. The machine was too well balanced to vibrate or make any noise Lee could hear. The only change was the scale readout slowly started changing then finished its fall in a rush as the internals spun up to full speed. The display flickered back and forth briefly and settled on four hundred twenty kilograms.

“That’s some pretty good magic,” Lee allowed. “Do you think you can get one to lift itself against full Derf gravity?”

“I can’t make any promises,” Musical said, “but there is a lot of room for improvement. This smaller machine spins slower than the big one and neither was constructed with low mass as a priority. It’s limited by what size disk we can install and the voltage we can put across it without any unwanted discharge. We haven’t mapped the changes with where we apply the field or investigated any insulating schemes either. I think it’s hugely useful at this output level as a space drive once you are in orbit or above.”

“Yeah, I’d like to see some graphs. Thrust versus disk area and spin, field strength and orientation, and what happens if you flip the polarity of the field. Maybe spike electrodes compared to flat and what happens with stacked disks.”

Musical and Born exchanged shocked looks at the mention of stacked disks.

“That hadn’t occurred to us,” Born admitted.

“Does it still thrust down on the scale if you flip it over?” Lee asked.

“Why wouldn’t it?” Musical asked. “That was what the bearing heating seemed to indicate was happening in the big machine.” The question seemed to bother him.

“Do you understand why it thrusts like this?” Lee asked waving at it.

The batteries were running down already and the scale readout creeping back up.

“No, the physicists are going to have some work to explain it,” Born admitted.

“Well then, besides the other measurements, I’d suggest that you charge your batteries up, flip it over, and see from an actual scale reading that it pushes down when you turn it on,” Lee suggested. “I’d much rather know that before I’m depending on it to work for some life-critical function. I understand every indication from before suggests it will. If it seems unnecessary to you, please humor me anyway.”

“Certainly,” Born agreed.

Lee would have rather he acknowledge the idea had merit, but she wasn’t going to browbeat him into it. It was enough that he do it. She’d hate to start phrasing things as orders. Even Gordon, commanding a ship, phrased his commands as polite requests.

“Were we correct in showing this to you privately?” Musical asked. “We just weren’t sure if this falls under your agreements to share tech.”

“That’s a really good question,” Lee admitted. “Did you do this experiment because of anything Jeff revealed about his drive?”

“No, we did it because of what we saw the big machine doing before he ever spoke to us. We spoke of other things and never mentioned that event to him. I have no idea if a machine using his fluid would do the same. Since he spins it up in a conducting container, I’m not sure how you could build an equivalent device. Similarly, we’re still not a hundred percent sure yet we’ll be able to make an equivalent drive to his using our different materials.”

“But you have some ideas about what to try, right?”

“Enough ideas from our talks that we have components let to the fab shops,” Born said. “Even if they don’t work it isn’t a dead-end yet by any means.”

“Good. I’ll think about what we owe them and discuss it with you again,” Lee promised.

“It may be a week before we can start assembling a Central style star drive,” Born said. “But the other, flipping this machine, I’ll be able to tell you tomorrow.”

“Great, I consider myself current on events then. I’ll call a car and head home.”

After Lee was gone Born stood looking at the machine pondering it. “If the stupid thing doesn’t push the opposite direction when turned over how are we going to explain it?”

“I don’t think she’d expect us to explain it,” Musical said. “I don’t think she expects it to be different flipped, but she’d never assume how it will behave the same without testing.”

“I know. I keep thinking I finally understand how she thinks, and fail.”

“Could it be you are worried she’s smarter than you are?” Musical asked him.

“I’d consider that petty. I don’t think she’d give the question a moment’s consideration.”

“Neither do I,” Musical agreed.

“I’m going to do it right now,” Born decided, looking hard at the machine. “I won’t be able to relax and go to sleep thinking about it if I wait until the morning.”

“I’ll help of course,” Musical said.

OceanofPDF.com

Chapter 5

“We have a vertical launch in Idaho!” Johnson said. “Can anybody intercept it?”

“This is Tony in Random Numbers. I’m on the opposite side of the Mud Ball. I’ll come around and intercept but they will attain orbital altitude by the time I get there.”

“That’s no problem. Thanks, Tony. He looks to be going translunar.”

“What the devil has vertical lift facilities in Idaho?”

“They pulled everything out of the old Area 51 facilities when the Texans started moving in on New Mexico and Arizona and moved them up there. We didn’t have to hit the old site. They trashed it when they pulled out to leave nothing for the Texans. We cratered all the runways and taxiways at the new site in Idaho but apparently, this vehicle can take off without a runway or fancy pad. It’s hot too. It’s hasn’t dropped off acceleration since it lifted. No idea if it is manned or a drone.”

“I’ve acquired him on my radar,” Tony said. “Jumping a drone in to hole him.”

“I didn’t try to hit every building and support structure there,” Johnson said, “just the runways. They must have seen that’s what we were doing at civilian ports and not tried to defend it. I’m directing a new thorough attack to wipe everything visible.”

“Oops, sorry, but when I holed him the vehicle broke up,” Tony reported.

“And they might have other assets there. This time my first rods are being defended against heavily,” Johnson reported. “I’m gifting them with a heavy second wave and some ten kiloton devices.”

“This is Heather. Hit them until you get no further defense. Then I’m going to expend a strategic warhead on them. They are far from any town and I’d rather make an example of them than wait and do it somewhere else with worse collateral damage.”

“Yes ma’am. I’m doubling up. They must be protecting something to see this much resistance. I’m getting ballistic defenses from areas where we showed no facilities before. They must have been in tunnels or heavily camouflaged.”

It was a full fifteen minutes before Johnson reported. “My last ten rods got no response at all.”

“I’m still going to blind them before I risk a major weapon,” Heather said. “Don’t be surprised. I’m deploying three calcium bombs set to detonate very low, at three thousand meters. We’ll see if they are faking it if they try to intercept them.”

The weapons dispersed a cloud of radar opaque ionized vapor well beyond the edges of the base. All three burst with no attempts at interception.

“Incoming in six minutes,” Heather warned them. “Don’t look and get flashed.”

The bus dove at six gravities aimed at a point short that would be an apparent miss, then jinked up at the last second and detonated fifty meters above ground level.

“Holy…. I darkened my spex to two-tenths of a percent transmission and it was bright. There might not be anything close but that’s still going to bust some windows,” Tony said.

“As far as Oregon,” Johnson agreed, and trip every bhangmeter in the hemisphere.”

“Sensors in surrounding states are reporting it as an earthquake already,” Heather said.

“Good, let it rattle the politicians in Vancouver,” Johnson said. He got another alert.

“We have heavy equipment trying to repair the runways in Winnipeg,” Johnson said. “I’m going to drop two rods near them. If they don’t take a hint and withdraw, I’m going to lay a couple of ten kiloton warheads on the field.”

Heather said nothing and they knew she was monitoring, so she must approve.

“Johnson, this is Allison monitoring a commercial satellite watching the Pacific. We see a carrier group dispersing to all points of the compass. Image to your screen. They may be getting ready to do something stupid.”

“I’m on it,” Johnson assured her. He wondered just how long this whole campaign was going to take.

* * *

Born called Lee at a decent hour in the morning. She’d never had reason to explain she slept much less now. He’d promised an answer about the thrust today, not by any specific hour.

“As we suspected, the device does press down on the scale when inverted,” Born reported.

“Thank you for making sure of that,” Lee said. “I’d have hated to install it in a ship only to find out the hard way it would only thrust out of a gravity well.”

* * *

April and Jeff retreated to their suite at the Old Hotel. Like Lee, they messaged ahead to their subordinates about their return. Victor and Eileen Foy were requested to join them when it was convenient so they could strategize on the arrival of Home.

When the com signaled an incoming call, April assumed it was from the Foys, arriving and asking entry, so she didn’t screen the call. Ingrained habits of security, however, kept her from automatically calling out to the house, granting entry to their elevator to come up to the suite. She slapped the receive button and froze because the words in her mouth for the Foys were no longer appropriate.

Mel Wainwright wasn’t a stupid man by any measure. He knew as soon as April hesitated, that she had been expecting someone else and was a decent enough fellow to be embarrassed.

“Your pardon, Lady Lewis, I perceive you expected someone else. I’m just off the shuttle at Derfhome port. You and Lord Singh were the only two names from the Home public com list that got a match to the local directory. I’m an advance party from Home on behalf of Martha Wiggen and several others of your acquaintance. I wonder if I might put a question to you for them? I was given to believe Wiggen-Patsitsas was in your favor?”

“Indeed, I count her a friend and her husband Ben,” April agreed. “I’d be happy to help anyone who is an agent on Martha’s behalf and I have a favorable impression of you from the stories Martha told me. You did catch me out being surprised, because we are expecting business guests at any moment. How may I help you?”

“I’m here to either secure temporary lodging or buy property for a half dozen clients, including Martha. They want to get something before there is a sudden influx of buyers. I’d simply like to know if you have any suggestions? We may only be a few hours ahead of others and ahead of a mob in a couple of days.”

By this time Jeff was standing behind April.

“I’m intrigued,” Jeff said. “How did you get to the port ahead of Home coming into its trailing orbit?”

“Mr. Larkin launched a shuttle as soon as he had a maximum range solution to dock at Derfhome station with a two percent reserve. I anticipated he would do that and approached him.” Mel smiled. “I think he agreed to bring me mostly to keep me from going around seeking a different ride, thereby giving others the idea for an early launch. He is still up there arranging docking leases for his shuttle line. I caught the first shuttle drop to dirt to pursue my own business.”

“I’m not sure what business that is,” Jeff admitted. “You still work for Wiggen you say?”

“Only in the sense she hires me now and then,” Mel said. “I of course have other customers of the first rank like her, who I value more and take care of first. As you do, I’m sure.”

“You are in what then? Property management? You used to be in Wiggen’s security group,” Jeff remembered. “You were with her when she defected.”

“Property management, which will be complicated since I am managing Home properties for people left behind on Earth. People who have no idea where their property is even located now. I do a little bit of this, and a little bit of that, quiet behind the scenes promotions, business brokerage, and investments. But only computer and site security, not personal armed protection. I found that readily available on Home and didn’t wish to jump into an already competitive field. I’m happy to be out of the executive protection business.”

“We’re in the Old Hotel,” Jeff told him. “We find it quite comfortable and they accommodate Humans well. We’re keeping a suite here for business. If you act quickly to reserve rooms in your company name, I think it will please your clients better than some of the modern hotels. I’m told there is never a great deal of real estate for sale in the city but if you have funds building new is easy if not cheap. The Derf build for permanence and to survive local earthquakes and weather. You might find a few townhouses available but little in the way of free-standing homes.

“The usual thing here is to work through your bank. Banks here tend to act like a concierge service. I’d suggest you get accounts as your second action after securing temporary lodging. They will see to your interests and make a start at informing you about the differences in law and custom. We were fortunate to already have a Voice on Derfhome with local accounts for Central, and we’re learning those local things from political allies rather than merely commercial partners.”

“Do you suggest a bank?” Mel inquired.

“Lee Anderson uses the Bank of Derfhome,” April said. “She, the Derf Gordon, and his clan bank there. Others might suit you as well. I anticipate we’ll offer banking service here if Home stays. We have a great deal to learn before we can do that ourselves.”

“I’ll go with them if they are still open by the time I nail down some rooms,” Mel said.

“Why would they ever close?” Jeff asked.

Mel looked at him in silence for a long three count. “You’re right. I’m going to need some help with local customs. Thank you for your help,” he said and disconnected.

* * *

“The official response and the way the news organizations in other countries are treating our campaign in North America is very muted,” Heather said. She was scrolling through the Earth news outlets and looking at the screen skeptically.

“They believe their own propaganda and think we are crazy,” Dakota said. “They’re probably scared that saying the wrong thing will make you bombard them.”

“Do you sincerely believe that or are you being flippant?” Heather asked.

“It’s inherent to their having shorter lives than us,” Dakota insisted. “We have a continuity they lack. You’ve stayed the same, but most of their people forming policy to deal with you are working with inherited attitudes and are informed by third-hand information. If the people before them retired, and didn’t privately fill them in on what was fact and what was propaganda, they may believe the official narrative.

“The succession of officeholders and the passing of authority happens at a faster rate than how people count generations. Not only are people only at the peak of their careers for a decade or two, but the changes of administrations often remove the people from the brief, really important policy-making phase of their careers. They may only have the power to apply their personal ideology for four years or less.

“There was a period where retired officials tended to stay in the public eye. They got positions in the news agencies or important corporations and defended their previous policies if anyone tried to change them. If Life Extension had been legal, they’d have continued to do so. These are all people who retire wealthy. If they stayed in the public eye now, they’d risk people disbelieving they look so good into their nineties and beyond. They have to disappear now to be able to enjoy using their wealth to buy life itself.

“At first there was a market in making the newly young look older. That was OK for things like public appearances, but do you want to have to live in a disguise every day? Then there was a migration to other countries where full Life Extension was legal. Now, it’s hard enough to safely enjoy their extended life that people are disappearing and buying entirely new identities.”

Heather thought about it a little. “So, there may be a continuity of public policy, but the actual beliefs of those administering it changes?”

“You better believe it, and it’s dangerous. Previous administrations may have paid lip service to a policy, but known that actually acting on it would be a disaster. They may not have told the current people the truth of it. Especially if they were of a different party. In that case, they may never have had honest private discussions about anything when power transferred. The further you get from the source of a policy, the greater the danger they won’t question it. It gets set like concrete.”

“We’ve always been at war with Eastasia,” Heather quoted.

“Exactly. They may believe their contrived positions, unaware of their true origins.”

“I have to admit. I’ve grown weary of trying to follow all the details of North American politics. It seems like parties and candidates the natives see as vastly different, look much the same from where I’m sitting,” Heather said. “They all hate us, so what is the point of detailing why or how much? It’s like a story I read years and years ago about two nations fully invested in the importance of whether you cracked a boiled egg on the round end or the pointy end. Any sane observer would ask them what possible difference could it make?”

“And incur the hatred of both sides,” Dakota predicted. “Do you know the name of the current USNA president?”

“Sure, it’s that Durbin fellow. Bradley. The one with the pointy nose who they caricature and his wife is a real looker. He’s a Full Social Sharing Democrat, the ones that use the four-square hands grasping wrists for their logo.”

“And do you know how many seats they hold in the House and the Senate and their relative strengths in chairs and committees?” Dakota asked.

“Life is too short and busy to invest that much attention to it,” Heather said. “I have noticed that they change the names of the political parties more often now, but it’s slapping a different label on the same old policies and hoping it makes them work better somehow.”

“You see?” Dakota asked. “Your viewpoints are diverging. You look at the last three decades and feel you are dealing with basically the same entity. They look at thirty years and the time gap is as great as from the First World War to the First Atomic War. In North America, they had six different presidents even though one took three terms. In other places like Italy, they changed governments like I do footies. The way people lived and their technology changed completely. They see thirty years ago as the dead past to which they shouldn’t be compared. They would be horrified to understand you see little difference between them and their grandfathers.”

“It makes conflict almost inevitable,” Heather decided.

“No kidding?” Dakota said. “It was already pretty much unavoidable even when you and they were both operating on the same time frame. I think it’s a given now.”

That was interesting. Heather wasn’t used to the idea of Dakota being such a deep thinker or having such an interest in history. Her comments tended to be short and sarcastic. Heather always assumed they reflected her thoughts. She’d never opened up and expressed herself like this before, but she couldn’t have gained such a depth of opinion in just a few days. What had changed to move her to speak up so much freer?

* * *

Born spun the machine up and watched the scale rise. “You do get more force from stacking than trying to increase the rotation speed.”

“I wonder why?” Musical said.

“If I had any idea why one disk worked, I might venture a guess for two.”

“And yet,” Musical said, “somewhere in the way Lee thinks, she got the idea multiple disks might lead to a multiplication of forces.”

“I’d bet anything it isn’t a conscious thought process,” Born said. “You ask if you want. I’m afraid she’ll just say it was obvious.”

“It’s somewhat more than double the force for two identical disks spun up to the same speed as before. It was so much work to create this rotor. I think we should be more aggressive and make several of the possible changes to the next prototype instead of plodding along, one change at a time,” Musical suggested.

“We’ll introduce uncertainty about which change did what,” Born objected. “If the output declines, we won’t even know which change to remove.”

“But we may leap ahead to a functionally useful design. Then we can research those details at our leisure, confident our support will continue.”

“You think Lee will withdraw support if we don’t progress fast enough?” Born asked.

“Not permanently,” Musical said, shaking his head even though there were no Humans around to appreciate his usage. “However, we will have the last few pieces for the drive proto in the next couple of days. That is still our primary project. The better the report we can give on the thruster, the sooner I predict we’ll be allowed to return to working on it.”

“I hope it doesn’t look so good that she decides to form another team and hand it off to them,” Born worried.

“That would be difficult. She’d have to find somebody with the needed skills to recruit and arrange and pay for a separate physical facility outside the university. It would create all kinds of security issues to which her clansmen would object. Even if that happened, she has always treated us fairly. I’d expect we’d be promoted above any new hires as supervisors.”

“Perhaps, but I don’t want to just be an administrator and lose the hands-on part of the research. What kind of changes do you want to add all at once? Born asked.

“I’d like to go straight to four tapered high-speed rotors with fixed intermediate plates. And a high dielectric coating on the non-rotating plates that separate them,” Musical said.

Born considered that carefully. “We know more speed will help. The geometry seems a minor change. The only objection I have to the dielectric is we should have a deliberate failure point where it will be expected to discharge first so it doesn’t do damage elsewhere with unknown consequences.”

“Can we send the changes to a couple of shops in the morning so we can coat the rotors, assemble and test it the next morning? That may allow us a test run before we have to switch back to the drive project.”

“Sure, I was just going to totally waste tonight sleeping,” Born joked.

“I already have a couple of preliminary drawings and numbers,” Musical said.

“Then we may get to sleep before dawn. Show me,” Born demanded.

* * *

Mel managed to get five rooms on long-term leases at the Old Hotel. Only one was a suite and the manager refused to consider tying up more long term. He insisted they did not want to change the nature of the business to apartments and stop offering rooms by the day. Mel couldn’t blame him. Those day rate rooms always returned a better price, even if they did cost more in services. The place must already have a decent occupancy rate, and with the incoming flood of Homies, he predicted they would be full every night. If he bullied the fellow into more, he could easily resent it later, thinking Mel took advantage of him from inside knowledge. It wouldn’t do to slick one over on a local first thing. People noticed that and could hold it against you and talk it around. Mel wasn’t sure about local business ethics yet, but that kind of dealing didn’t fly on Home.

He did need some local advisors on the ethics of this culture, what services were available, relative scarcities, and hard black letter law. Mel visited the hotel dining room and ordered, then started searching the local data net while he waited. The bank would come next, but he doubted they would do everything he required. Searching businesses, there didn’t appear to be many aimed strictly at Humans. There were two clinics, one of which featured dentistry and the other had psychological services. Most listings were Derf businesses that made a point of saying they served Humans too, especially restaurants. A furniture store said they carried Human furniture and housewares. A construction company advertised experience at dual-species architecture. There was no listing for lawyers, although there were several guard services and private investigators.

Looking for counselors, there were several churches and spiritual advisors. Financial advisors and even personal trainers. One looked promising. Burnstein and King had an entire page instead of just a com listing. They promised cultural counseling, business referrals, drafting of contracts, and advice for dealing with foreign agencies and legal systems. Maybe tomorrow he decided. By the time he dealt with the bank he’d be done for the day. The truth was he was tired already.

* * *

Heather was jolted awake by her com’s priority alarm. Nobody had awakened her in the middle of the night in several years. She called out to the house for low lights and called to the com, “Audio only, open the mic. I’m coming.” A robe quickly snatched allowed her to talk face to face. She didn’t bother with slippers or combing her hair.

“Open video,” she allowed once she was decent. One look at Johnson’s face kept her from complaining about being rousted from her bed. “OK, what kind of bad news is this?” Heather demanded.

That must not have been the question he expected. He took a deep breath and a slow blink. Johnson was never contemplative. Three seconds was a long pause for him.

“It’s both political, military, and bad, but possibly more dangerous in a matter of hours or days than immediately. The North American Congress was in a dual session with the president addressing them. Many important members of his administration were there and they were bombarded. They are all dead.”

“Are we involved? Was it somehow by our hand?” Heather demanded.

“Not any of my people,” Johnson said. “I don’t think any Spacers were involved. The weapons were sub-launched hypersonics. Three were launched from deep water just out past the continental shelf. They all maneuvered evasively and dropped low by the time they crossed the coast. Two got through and one was stopped by close-in defenses. The shock wave from the low altitude approach and the defense did a lot of collateral damage.”

“Nukes?” Heather asked.

“No, not even a mini. One was a strictly kinetic weapon that divided into guided submunitions. It probably was aimed at defenses. The other was an oversized conventional bomb. It was an advanced metallic explosive by the flash, equivalent to eight or ten tons of H-6. It was still sufficient to obliterate the new capital building.”

“I expect they’ll still blame us. How loud are they yelling?” Heather wondered.

“I was calling you not a minute after the detonation. They haven’t had time to type out a headline and get clearance from an editor to interrupt programming with a bulletin. If you want to get ahead of it, I doubt if you have more than five minutes.”

“No, I think denials, before anybody accuses us, smells of deception. I’ll let them speak first and regret it at leisure,” Heather decided.

“Do you want me to strike any particular systems with which they might respond?”

Heather shook her head no. “Once again, switching to different targets would make it appear that was coordinated with the strike. I assume you already were hitting those sorts of targets since so many are space-based. Fixed location nuclear weapons are mostly obsolete and decommissioned. You may continue to degrade their space assets without any pause or change in your targeting choices. I’m sure I’m going to have some inquiries from the news services. I’m going to stay up and be ready for that. You may forward anything you don’t think will make the news services. I’ll be checking them after breakfast. I do appreciate having some time to think about what I’ll say.”

“Thank you, My Lady,” he said and disconnected. He didn’t show it but he was relieved he did the right thing in waking her.

* * *

“I just talked to Chen and Jan,” April informed Jeff. “They both expect Heather to request they come back to Central to help her with Earth intelligence. Chen is agreeable to returning in principle. It’ll be easier to transfer if she sends a ship for him and some of the others who got unexpectedly whisked away. The next four shuttles coming down from Derfhome station are all booked up. The bigger lift company that has two vehicles is adding a fifty percent surcharge because they are needing to return empty or near so. The other carrier is selling down leg seats by English auction right up until the hatch closes. Jan is coming down to check out Derfhome. He’s uncertain he ever wants to go back to the Solar System.”

“That’s happening more and more. I can’t blame them,” Jeff said.

“I know,” April agreed. “I can see Central becoming a hardship post that requires premium pay to get somebody to serve there in not too many years. Gunny was also caught in the transfer of Home. I assured him I doubt any serious enemies know where I am or have access to me. However, he’s bored and asked if he should come work alongside Strangelove just to keep a hand in. I told him it’s a mess trying to get transport down and to just stay there for now. He’s as bad as Garrett, seeing assassins everywhere. Just not as pushy about it.”

“Maybe the Moon will lose a lot of people,” Jeff said reluctantly, “but I can’t ever see us abandoning the Moon. We’re going to need to keep an eye on the Earth for a long time. You do need to find something for Gunny to do or he’ll feel he’s mooching. Which makes me wonder what Jan and Papa-san are going to do if they don’t work for us? With no Earth nearby to watch we won’t need to give them much work. I’m not generous enough to carry their annual retainers to just be on standby. I guess that’s their choice, their problem, not mine.”

“I wouldn’t worry so much about Papa-san,” April said. “I suspect I don’t have a clue about the depth of his assets.”

* * *

Born and Musical took most of the day to put the active material on the rotors from the prototype shop, then assemble the new rotor in the small centrifuge case. It had to be assembled layer by layer with the interspaced plates attached to the inside of the housing after each rotor was added. Then after the whole internal assembly was built up the top bearing was dropped over the end. That was OK for a prototype but a production machine would have to be much easier to assemble. At least they did it right on the scale so Born didn’t have to lift it. It was near supper time before they were through.

“Do you think it may have enough thrust to lift itself?” Musical wondered.

“If it does that creates all sorts of other problems,” Born said. “We’d have to tether it or build some guide rails to restrain it. It isn’t balanced and might drift off-center if it does rise. We don’t need it tumbling and smashing something if it comes down crooked. I’m certainly not going to hang onto it to try to keep it from sideslipping or rotating. Neither do I want to take time to switch the brackets around for the power supplies to flip it over again.”

“OK, pushing down on the scale was the right choice, even if it’s boring,” Musical agreed. “Do you want to do a half-speed run up first?”

“No, I expect us to switch to the drive project in the morning. I’d like to go home and to sleep at a decent hour tonight. Let’s spin this baby up and shut down for the day.” He was already putting the batteries in their mounts and plugging the cables in.

“Did you remember to charge the batteries?” Musical asked.

“You’re starting to sound a lot like my mother,” Born complained.

“I admit I’m a worrier. What happens if the push on the scale exceeds the capacity?”

“It just reads a full ton for anything over. I don’t think it has any way to indicate it is over the nominal load range,” Born said. “I didn’t think to ask for that in the specs. The support points with the strain gauges are far too beefy to damage.”

“By your leave?” Musical asked, picking up the remote.

“It’s your turn,” Born said.

The scale started registering thrust down on it, the rate increasing as before but faster. They never saw it register a ton because the display was an unreadable blur. Then the frame rails holding the egg-shaped housing buckled and the egg drove itself down a meter into the middle of the scale platen with a thud like a drop-forge. Three of the frame rails were now splayed outward around the main housing. The diamond-patterned plate steel platform of the scale was punched down with a big dent in the middle. The main housing was now sitting in the dent on the newly concave plate somewhat crookedly. It appeared the concrete floor under the scale limited its motion.

Musical belatedly turned the power off.

“I’m pretty sure that indicates out of load range,” Musical said pointing.

OceanofPDF.com

Chapter 6

Jan got off the shuttle carefully, gripping the handrail which was too fat for his hand and higher than he expected. The steps down were Derf-sized and a stretch for Humans. They needed to alter them to a happy medium. He stepped to the side looking around before he followed everyone else through the quaint terminal. Nobody paid any attention to him or hustled him along. He was used to that since he didn’t stand out and he had a relaxed sleepy-eyed look that put others at ease. If he stood very still, he blended into the background for any but the most observant.

As far as he could see there wasn’t a high-security fence surrounding the port and there were no security notices plastered on the half dozen doors facing the field. The public entry was obvious with double doors propped open to a pleasant day and glass window walls on both sides. The trees in the distance were a shade of green that wouldn’t have surprised him at any Earth port and the sky, if a bit pale, was definitely blue. It smelled good which was something pretty rare now near any Earth city.

Inside there was no line for any sort of customs or entry registration. The perfunctory customs inspection in orbit was apparently all he’d need to pass. In fact, if you had no business in the terminal it was a straight shot across to the open exit doors. That was refreshing. There was a mob around a car rental. Jan thought it foolishness to rent a car before seeing what the local roads and drivers were like. He didn’t know the local license laws, which side of the road they drove on, or if they favored taking their half out of the middle like seemed to be the frightening custom he’d experienced in Italy.

He’d been pleased to find his spex could be configured for the local net without buying new and he had them set to feed him English first before Derf or machine translations. An inquiry got him the information cars should be available outside the terminal. Alas, outside the doors there was a sign at the curb indicating the head of the auto-car queue, but no queue. They were all hired. Three Derf stood politely to the side with fliers for local restaurants. They didn’t even try to talk over each other.

“Are any of your places within walking distance?” he inquired. He wasn’t sure his English would be understood or if their spiels were memorized.

They all understood and gravely shook their heads no. It surprised Jan the Human gesture was so common here already.

“Everything is in town,” one volunteered. “There normally isn’t enough traffic out here to support a business. It’s just jammed right now because of the new hab. Are you from there?” he asked politely.

“I am. I would be happy to hire a local guide if you’d like an easier job with more pay. What do they pay to hand out fliers?” Jan asked. “I’ll better it.”

“I’m contracted for the day and pre-paid. If I break my contract it will be noted in the public records. All contracts are on the public net. Even one bad mark will hurt your future opportunities. I have a young nephew, however, who can do that for you. He’ll be able to get a car in town easier than here and you won’t have to stand at the curb there to be guaranteed a car. They will take care of the local fares in town before sending a car as far as the port empty so it may be a wait otherwise.”

“Done,” Jan agreed. “What would you consider a fair day wage for a guide?” Jan asked the other shills.

“A dollar Ceres,” one answered easily.

“Yeah, a day job doing anything is pretty much worth a dollar,” the other agreed. “If it involves really hard labor or special skills then expect to pay more.”

“Sounds good to me,” Jan said, so the fellow offering pulled out a phone and called his nephew. Jan didn’t say how good that sounded to him. Day work on Home paid a lot more. He’d take the bargain.

“I’ll take a flyer from each of you, but I’ll try your place first,” he told the Derf with the nephew. “How long for him to get here from the city?”

“About three-tenths. Call it twenty-five of your minutes.”

And there was another thing to learn so he wasn’t always converting in his head, Jan thought. He checked his spex to see if its clock was set for local time or Earth units.

Jan flipped the flier to the English side and read.

The Old Hotel offers pre-contact charm and architecture with modern updates in the heart of Derfhome. Human amenities are available in all rooms and our award-winning Golden Glow restaurant is illuminated by pre-contact carbon lamps. Full Derf and Human menus available as well as local and Earth liquors. Ask your server for adventures in native cuisine.

That sounded like just the ticket to Jan. Maybe they’d have a vacancy too.

* * *

“We had another small accident,” Born admitted as soon as Lee answered. Lee was getting better all the time at reading the full range of Derf expressions and Born was deeply flustered and embarrassed.

“Oh really,” She looked over her shoulder dramatically. “Yet the pictures are still on the wall and the vase with flowers isn’t smashed on the floor.”

“It was much more… localized this time. Musical made me call because I was the one in a rush and insisted on a quick run at full power. Here, I’ll take a picture with my pad and show you. We got rather more down thrust than anticipated.

Lee let off a long whistle that faded away. “I’m impressed. You got some serious punch out of that sucker.”

Born grimaced harder on punch.

“Don’t be upset. Nobody got hurt, did they?” Lee realized she should have asked that first. OK, Born should have said that first but he was rattled.

“No, although our neighbor down the hall came and looked in the door. I guess it was an impressive thump clear down in his lab. Thankfully, he checked to see we were both vertical before calling emergency services. I hate getting another report in our response file.”

“Yeah, that’s a reputation you don’t want,” Lee agreed. “I know you are hoping to start assembling a prototype drive tomorrow. When you get a break from the drive will you try to figure out what sort of thrust that generated?”

“Certainly. We’re rather curious ourselves. We figure from the way it tilted coming down that one of the frame rails failed first and then the other three followed quickly. Still, it takes a significant end thrust to get a fifty by fifty-millimeter angle channel to buckle. Is there anything else you want to be investigated when we get back to it?” He was just relieved it was still their project.

Lee thought about it. “When you design the next one, go for lightweight as much as possible. Maybe use aluminum or magnesium alloy for the housing. I’m going to need at least four of them, maybe more once you have the design tested without a crash or failure. The same size is probably going to be fine, but if we have the design, we can just adjust it at need a little bigger or smaller. They should have a side mounting plate to go on a boom and have a ballistic shield on the mounting side. Probably some sort of composite. It can be integral to the housing.”

“Ballistic shield? Is somebody going to be shooting at them?” Born asked.

“No, but if one of those rotors ever comes apart in a lightweight housing, I don’t want to be anywhere near it without some protection.”

“Ah, I understand now. I believe I can let those design changes by sending our current component plans to a couple of engineering firm and asking for a maximum mass reduction,” Born suggested. “We pay for individual jobs rather than engaging them in long term contracts. We’re also keeping design changes for the housing and rotors separated to different firms, so nobody sees the whole thing. Even then, they have no idea that we coat the rotors with anything after they fabricate them, much less with what. The fab shops that handle each are separate from the design people. Nobody should be able to deduce the whole from the part of it they work on or the changes.”

“I don’t see why that won’t work,” Lee agreed. “They shouldn’t have any clue about why any of the changes are needed.”

Born nodded, happy she agreed, and swallowed his next question, which was the very same – why did she need them?

“Call me when you start putting the drive assembly together. I’d like to see the progression before it’s all sealed up and ready to test,” Lee requested.

“Alright. If you come mid-day tomorrow, we should have everything laid out to see all the pieces and start assembling the bearings and fittings in the housing.”

“OK, I’ll bring a nice lunch for you guys,” Lee promised and disconnected.

Musical was standing to the side out of camera range but listening.

“Why would she want a bunch of thrusting mechanisms similar in size?” Born wondered. “I’d think she’d want a much bigger unit for a ship. It seems early to be thinking about actual production units instead of continuing to improve prototypes.”

“Maybe for distributed thrust on a habitat. I understand they are difficult to move. She’d want much smaller units to make some kind of a flying belt,” Musical said.

“More likely a flying suit.” Born could immediately picture how to make one. “But she would like something like that wouldn’t she?” he said grinning.

“Hold it in reserve, to suggest if her interest lags,” Musical suggested.

* * *

“I’ve had several calls,” Dakota said first thing. “There are some reporters here from Armstrong and even one from Marseilles who would like to know if you will entertain questions from the media?”

“Is security checking them out?” Heather asked.

“They already know they are real reporters. Not that reporters can’t be agents or moles. They will be sniffed, fluoroscoped, and inductively probed. Discreetly of course. They shouldn’t even know it is happening. Want to chance it?”

“I had no plans to hold a press conference. Today is court day. If they wish to put questions to me after court I’ll listen. I won’t alter my routine and give them priority over my own people seeking justice, but they can ask their questions after if they aren’t seeking a formal judgment. I may even answer them. How many is ‘some’?”

“Three reporters from Armstrong. One local and two Earthies. I’ll tell them exactly what you said,” Dakota promised.

The reporters were camped outside the door within ten minutes. That was sort of pointless because her court wouldn’t start for almost two hours. Heather had her oatmeal and was shown the security camera feed of the reporters by Dakota. They were interviewing each other in the corridor. When the first litigant showed up, they pounced on him for a quote. His response was never going to be published.

The reporters seemed interested as Dakota explained how the court worked and brought them to order for Heather to enter. They didn’t even react when Heather laid her pistol to hand on the table.

The first complaint was about a noise nuisance. It devolved into a technical discussion of inaudible frequencies and the transmission qualities of lunar rock. The reporter’s eyes glazed over and a couple of them started looking at their pads. They glanced up a few times to see if that was objectionable. When nobody yelled at them, they continued. When Heather said she’d heard enough and would rule they perked up and put their entertainment away.

“The only reason you are bothering your neighbor is for your convenience. You don’t need to position your machinery right in the corner of your property next to the elevator. It’s not a major expense to transport materials to a worksite nearer the center of your holding or even deeper. You should have done that in the first place, knowing his residence was already located close by. You will correct it now. If you need the use of a boring machine to do so quickly, we will donate the use of one for up to ten days at no cost. See my man, Mo, if you wish that. Be certain you cut it with proper offsets and dead ends to trap noise and for blast safety, with no shortcuts. You will also take such measures as are practical to minimize vibration and noise even after it is moved. It did not escape my notice you located your own residence at the extreme opposite corner of your property. Isolating mounts and absorbent wall coverings and flooring are durable and you will make their use a regular part of your planning. You should be much happier to do those things after your workshop is approximately equidistant from both your residential areas. Do you have any questions?

“No, ma’am, I’ll get started on that today.” The reporters looked at each other over the brevity of his response and lack of any objection at all. When he and his neighbor sat back down instead of leaving, the reporters sensed something was different from the way Heather and Dakota looked at them but they weren’t sure what. Most people were happy to leave after they received their judgment, but they were curious about the reporters who were visibly outsiders. Video of Heather’s court was always posted to the public net, but that would be later and with one camera only showing the person on the carpet speaking. The opposing party or Heather couldn’t be seen reacting. They could stay and see what happened in detail and the reactions off camera.

The next party was so interesting they didn’t go back to their pads in boredom. John Zimmerman was suing his ex for breach of contract. John was a large dark-haired man with a Five O’clock Shadow at ten in the morning. His ex, Kayla Orley, was a tall slender brunette with a braid rolled on top of her head. She must never need to wear a pressure suit.

“Step to the carpet and state your case,” Dakota instructed.

“My Lady,” John started.

Heather cut him off right there.

“You are not sworn to me. I’m not your Lady. Words have meanings.”

John nodded, rattled but thought how to rephrase it pretty quickly.

“Lady Anderson. Ms. Orley and I were married for a bit more than two years. She published a notice of our divorce on the public net six months ago. Since then, she has become an employee of Henderson’s Deli. I object she has unfairly used everything she learned from working with me in my catering business and diner to the detriment of my business. I ask she be told to seek some other sort of employment and not publish the recipes and methods unique to my business.”

“Do you have a copy of your marriage contract?” Heather asked.

“I didn’t bring a copy,” John admitted.

“I brought a hard copy of it,” Kayla said from the bench and waved a copy of it.

Heather blinked in dismay and didn’t look happy.

“How many pages is that? I can see it has some thickness from here.”

“A hundred-six pages and an index,” Kayla said.

“Let me take a moment,” Heather told them. “We have some visitors from Earth who likely do not understand what is happening here. I’ll make a brief explanation so they don’t return and make confused reports of things that aren’t the same as in their nations.

“My kingdom is not in the marriage business. We don’t license, tax, regulate, promote, or discourage marriage. Marriage is a civil contract which I will enforce. The religious and social aspects of it are your business without any official interest. If you wish to cohabit with no contract there is no legal censure, though I find it foolish. That said, a hundred and six pages is an unusually long contract for Central, even for commercial matters or employment agreements.

Heather returned her attention to the couple.

“Which one of you wrote this contract?”

John was still on the carpet so he answered. “I was the primary author but there were a couple of changes she initialed.”

“I don’t intend to read it. Though it is tempting to make you stand there while I do. So, answer me as to its content with the understanding I will have you banished from my domain if I find you have lied about this.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

“Did it address any aspect of your business as part of your marriage?”

“Yes, ma’am. It excluded any joint interest or change in our previous assets, including my business if the marriage ended.”

Kayla was nodding agreement so Heather didn’t quiz her.

“Did it address intellectual property or the value of training?”

“No, no it didn’t, but Kayla was my employee for over a year before we got married and those items are covered by a separate contract with non-compete agreements,” John said.

“I suppose you brought a copy of that?” Heather guessed.

“Yes, since it is relevant,” John said. He held up a document.

“Objection,” Kayla called out, rather loudly.

“We don’t have to follow Earth forms,” Heather said. “You were going to have a chance to speak, but go ahead if you wish to make a point. You aren’t interrupting him.”

“We can save some time here, by acknowledging that my employment contract was voided. I’m no longer his employee by his choice and without cause.”

“She continued working with me until the day before she posted a divorce,” John said.

Heather looked mildly perplexed. “How do I reconcile those two statements?” The question seemed aimed at either of them but Kayla answered.

“He stopped paying me when we married.”

The look Heather gave him made John take a step back. Then he made it even more obvious by looking down to see if he was still on the carpet.

“The marriage contract excluded previous assets,” Heather noted. “Did it address how or if things would become joint assets after your marriage?”

“It does not,” John said. “Indeed, her employment contract makes no specific mention of anything beyond her starting pay rate. No promises of increases or other compensation.”

“Did you grant her access to your personal or business accounts?” Heather asked.

“No, but that was a technical matter that could have been corrected by a visit to our bank and a stroke of the pen,” John said with a flourish of his hand.

“What a shame then,” Heather concluded, “that over two years you never found time to correct that oversight. As I said earlier, words have meaning. You cannot separate the idea of employment from compensation. Not unless you encompass the terms within the framework of slavery.

“Well, you can volunteer,” John insisted. “People work for charities that way.”

“What a novel theory,” Heather said, looking interested. “Did you discuss this and did Kayla agree to forgo compensation? You just both forgot to amend the previous written contract in a haze of love and goodwill? If you both agree to that, and you can show me what charitable works you have been funding with the business profits, I’ll allow it.”

Kayla saved John from responding by calling out, “I don’t agree.”

“Ah well, too bad. I think I have heard enough to rule, but if there is any major element missing this is your last chance to bring it up. I don’t feel I need to bring Kayla to the carpet. Was there any trouble with Kayla removing her possessions or taking things, not hers?”

Both of them shook their heads no.

“You don’t have to answer if you’d rather not but I’m curious what motivated you to leave after so long?” Heather asked.

“One day I looked at my accounts and realized I’d run through about a third of my savings,” Kayla said. “I could see the day coming when I wouldn’t have the means to leave.”

“Anything more from you, John?” Heather asked. He just shook his head no.

“We find this then,” Heather said in an oddly different tone of voice. “Kayla will be compensated at the rate she was paid as an employee for the period she was married to John. If other employees received wage increases during this period, she will receive the average of those increases for the entire period. The sum will be increased by three percent to reflect the time value of lost wages. John Zimmerman may not enter into any new contracts with others in this kingdom unless they have read the record of this case. They should know the sort of man with whom they are dealing. Do you both accept and acknowledge this ruling? Speak out, not just nod for the record.”

Since the alternative would be banishment, they both spoke up, but like the others, they stayed to see how entertaining the reporters would be.

“I don’t see any other petitioners,” Heather said in her normal voice. “I was given to understand you reporters wish to ask questions, not seek any judgment. If that is correct ask away. You don’t have to come stand on the carpet.”

The fellow from BBC was more aggressive than the others and stood quickly.

“Yes, I’d like to ask you about the bombing of North America and other issues, please.”

“Let’s be informal, but do you have a name, and are you with BBC or just a stringer?”

“I’m a full-time BBC employee but a USNA citizen, Wayne Howe, your… I’m not sure how to address you,” he admitted.

“Heather will do nicely,” Or Ms. Anderson if that seems too chummy for you. I’ll listen but don’t think I am compelled to answer you.”

“Heather, we have reports that the latest bombardment of North America escalated to decapitating the government. It’s the lead story just about everywhere on Earth today. Why was this done and what do you hope to accomplish?”

“The current war with North America is a matter of self-preservation. We can no longer risk our existence by allowing them access to the heavens. War has been a constant between us since before Central existed, dating from the rebellion of Home. It has been interspaced with false treaties and inconsistent promises. We are removing North America’s ability to access space from Low Earth Orbit and up. If that damages their economy and status among their peers that’s too bad. It’s the price of their faithlessness and arrogance.

“As to the bombing of the capital and destruction of their government, you’ll need to ask the why of those who did it. It wasn’t our action.”

“It’s been the uniform assumption that it was you,” Wayne insisted.

Heather looked amused. “I imagine that is a consensus of news organizations. I doubt you have polled a wider sample. Particularly the military. The hypersonic weapons were launched from submarines. You may not be aware, but Spacers have a conspicuous lack of armed submarines in our forces. Indeed, that sort of boost and glide hypersonic is not any design we have ever used.

“It would be an acceptable act of war to strike their leadership, though this was done very sloppily. There was no reason to do collateral harm to so many innocent civilians. Just the shock wave from the final approach of a hypersonic weapon can damage structures. Really though, what would be the point for us of doing this?”

Wayne looked confused. “In war, isn’t it always a plus to remove the best minds the other side has and those directing the war against you?”

“Best minds? Do you honestly think the best minds run most countries? I’d love to see more evidence of that. If one takes the contrary view, that the leadership consists of ineffective idiots, then it wouldn’t make any sense to remove them, would it?

“The truth is, nobody in the top tiers of North American politics wants peace with us or to keep the legacy treaties they made with us. They have rank upon rank of basically the same sorts of people ready to step into any vacancies and continue the same policies. Scum rises to the top. Unfortunately, Earth is a very big pot. We could skim the dross off for years and they’d never come near running out of defective personalities to replace them. You can’t be a decent person and rise anywhere near the top in North American politics.”

“My God,” Wayne said, “If I even tried to quote that for publication I could never go home. I’m not going to simply erase that. I’m going to trash the memory card.”

Heather pointed a thumb and finger gun at him and dropped the hammer. “Yes, they’d shoot the messenger,” she said. It seemed to amuse her. It horrified him.

“Is there any way to prove this?” Wayne asked. He was visibly rattled.

“Prove a negative? We’ve already both agreed it would have been a legitimate target for us. Why would we go to any great effort to disclaim it? I have no illusions it would suddenly reverse public opinion and make the masses love us. They will believe whatever they are told to believe.”

“You don’t care what people think of you?” Wayne asked.

“Oh, I certainly do,” Heather said. “Family and friends. My peers and subjects even. As I said, the greater mass of people will believe what they are told to believe. That’s out of my control. The people who direct their beliefs have a depth of technical ability to manage public opinion. It is a very mature science being wielded by entrenched agencies that I can’t hope to counter. But don’t forget, I don’t have to manage my population to get elected. I don’t have to put on a show for anybody.

“Surely, somebody else has a different question? Heather asked.

The reporter from Marseilles visibly gathered her courage. She just spoke without standing since nobody was trying to talk over her.

“Louise Adnet, ma’am. I’m local but a stringer for BFM. There was a huge explosion in a wilderness area in Idaho,” she said. “It was big enough to register as a minor earthquake and broke windows over the horizon. There were reports of reentry vehicles crossing the sky. Was that yours or was that somebody else too?” She sneered a little at the end jab but Heather ignored it.

“That was us,” Heather readily admitted. “We destroyed the runways and other facilities at a secret base. It was relocated there some time ago and expanded because the Texans consolidated their hold on New Mexico and Arizona where a similar facility was located. Our initial strike wasn’t sufficient to remove it as a space asset. It turned out they had vertical launch capabilities we didn’t know about. We made sure the second time that it’s out of business for good.”

“If you knew it was there it wasn’t much of a secret, was it?” Louise asked.

“It’s an official secret,” Heather said. “That’s different than a real secret. You can hardly construct runways and hangars with all the eyes in the sky and other countries not know. It just means your own citizens and organizations have to pretend it doesn’t exist. Going back to my conversation with Mr. Howe, it doesn’t seem the action of the brightest and best. More like delusional or schizophrenic. People in other countries can even look at commercial satellite pictures of the base but USNA citizens get a blurred-out spot on the map. They don’t even try to substitute fake wilderness. How much extra effort could that be? Don’t expect me to make sense of it for you. I think it’s ridiculous for adult people to play peek-a-boo with each other, like you’d do with a toddler.” She demonstrated the kiddie game with her hands. “I suppose the crater we put there will be secret and blurred out too.”

Louise smiled a brittle little smile and had no follow-up.

“Do you others have a question too?” Heather invited.

Both of them emphatically shook their heads no. Interviewing Heather was a horror of unusable quotes and disturbing heresy that could only spell trouble for them.

“Very well, we’re done then,” Heather said. “Please do leave promptly when you have your things gathered so Dakota can lock up. The cafeteria is not far away and there is signage to find it if you want to chat and compare notes with each other.”

* * *

Jan told his guide, Xerxes, to wait in the car and not release it back to the system until he determined if he was going to eat at the hotel and if they had a room for him. He retained his small carryall, however. He wasn’t that confident of his guide yet.

They had a doorman which was a nice touch. He wondered if that was a Derf custom or if they added it from the Human hospitality industry? The fellow held the door and nodded hello at him. That was probably another Human adaptation. He seemed more greeter than security, though a ton and a half of taloned carnivore might serve as both.

There was a traditional check-in desk that would have been right at home in a 1930’s black and white flat movie, except the top was armpit high to him. It was elbow high to his lower arms for the Derf clerk busy sorting papers with his back to the entry. Jan was in no hurry standing still, looking everything over. There was no bell on the counter as he’d expect in the period Earth movie. A monitor behind the clerk announced the daily specials for the restaurant and a ten percent discount for guests.

The clerk turned and jerked all over in surprise. It was too abrupt to be faked and his fur stood out around his ears and neck in what had to be a genuine reaction.

“I didn’t mean to scare you,” Jan apologized.

“Your pardon too,” the clerk stammered. “I’ve never met a Human I couldn’t hear as soon as they stepped inside the door. Most of them fairly stomp and even breath loud.”

“I’ve had people suggest I should wear bells,” Jan admitted. “Do you have a vacancy for at least one night? I’m not particular about amenities, just a place to sleep since I intend to be out and about exploring the city.”

“I have a single on the second floor looking west with a little balcony,” the fellow offered. “It’s ten dollars Ceres a night with a Derf sleeping pad and a Human pillow. If you will need it longer, renewing it before local noon the next day is greatly appreciated. There are the usual linens and sheets and blankets Humans expect. A full Human bed is a dollar a night.”

“The pad will be fine I’m sure. I’m going to have dinner at your restaurant and then I’ll go up and inspect the room,” Jan said. “Do I prepay?”

“Only if you wish. If you wait until checkout your tab at the restaurant and bar will be added and any service you request from the concierge. Do you need a guide service?”

“No thanks, I have a man in the car holding it. I wanted to make sure I had a room before I released it.” It amused Jan everybody seemed to have a guide readily available.

“I have a room,” he told his waiting guide. “If you want to work a little longer and have dinner with me, I’d welcome the chance to chat about local customs and things to do. If not, you can come back in the morning and we’ll start fresh on a new day.”

“I’d be happy to have dinner and talk if you are buying. The Old Hotel is a bit expensive for me. But it would certainly be a treat. I’d enjoy telling friends I’ve eaten there.”

“Let’s see if this works,” Jan said. He reached in with his Solar bankcard and swiped it by the car’s pay port. It turned green and displayed a Thank You.

“All the important elements of civilization,” Jan quipped.

OceanofPDF.com

Chapter 7

Lee looked in the door and wasn’t sure she had the right place. She double-checked her pad and the address was right. The office door was propped open with a large complicated hunk of metal with a big crack in it. She had no idea what the purpose of it could have been but it obviously was abused past any future use.

The lights were out and there was no service counter. A desk held three monitors all displaying something. One seemed to be the page of a catalog, another a page of Derf text, and the center a lovely Derf with a dark coat grasping the top rail of a fence while stretching, with visible claws, and smiling. Did Derf do cheesecake? Lee suspected that’s what it was. A side table held a huge espresso machine and a two-liter mug that displayed no evidence of ever being washed. Besides the desk stool, there was a huge upholstered sofa. She’d never seen one for Derf anywhere before. The door into the shop was a little bigger than normal Derf doors. It could easily pass a small ground car.

“Hello? Anybody home?” Lee called in Derf and then English.

“You have an abominable accent,” somebody called back from the shop. They had precise diction but sounded like they were speaking down a pipe or tunnel.

“I grew up speaking Derf as soon as I could talk,” Lee objected. “Do you always insult your customers?”

“Not the Derf. That was fine. I bet you learned English from an American.”

“Yes, my parents were from North America. I have no need to apologize for that. They had the good sense to leave. You have an accent to my ear. If you’re just going to yell insults from the other room I’ll go away.”

“Oh, very well. It takes a bit to wiggle out of this airframe. Hold on while I extricate myself. I don’t want to get hung up on something pointy and hurt myself, or worse, break something.”

The aircraft visible through the door was a shell with no doors or seats in the cockpit. It started shaking. Slowly two legs and then an enormous furry butt squirmed into sight with each shake of the airframe, until the mechanic could roll upright. He still barely fit in the cockpit sitting with his head bent down. He swung both legs out the doorless opening and started stripping elbow-length plastic gloves off all four arms. Lee thought about how much worse fur would be to clean of grease and oil. Long gloves and a leather apron made sense.

“I should hire a little thing like you. You’d get to the back of that tail boom without needing to be winched out. Someday I’m going to get stuck in one of these and nobody will find me for days.”

“You couldn’t afford me. Why don’t you have a helper anyway?” Lee asked.

“They all quit on me. The last one didn’t last a full day before I hurt his tender feelings. I just pointed out it’s bad business to kill your customers. It not only hurts repeat business but pretty soon others notice if there is a pattern of your planes augering into the ground. The bloody fool couldn’t find the right part, so he was going to use a cheap hardware store bolt and washer for a rated application between dissimilar metals in a corrosive environment.”

“Salt spray mist? A coastal environment near the beach?” Lee asked. “Or maybe around volcanic vents?” she guessed.

“Why yes. You’re not an idiot,” he said, shocked to discover that. “A plane based at a small island airport with surf upwind no matter which way the wind is blowing.”

“I’m not rated for aircraft but I can hum the tune and do a few steps for servicing planetary shuttles. You never know what kind of environment you may drop into on a strange planet. They can all find a way to kill you a long way from home.”

“Ah, the rings,” he said, looking closer and seeing her voyage rings in her ears. “My short customary name is Alonso if you’d care to use that.

“My short customary name is Lee if you like.”

He stopped peeling the last glove off and stared at her surprised. “And what is your long-form name? I’ve never known a human to claim one.”

“I’m the First daughter of the Third love son of the Four Hundred-Seventy Third First Mother of Red Tree, by the Hero of the Chain Bound Lands, Second line of the shorthaired folk, of Gordon - Lee Anderson, and Voice for the Mothers of Red Tree by their word.”

“Oh, that Lee. Crud, I really can’t afford to hire you,” Alonso said disappointed. He got up and came into the office, sitting down on the sofa hard. He made an inviting sweep of his hand to the other end but Lee took the stool as easier to mount.

“The compliment you’d consider it is still appreciated. Who is Alonso? Some pioneer of Human aviation?” Lee guessed.

“No, he was a chess Grand Master. You’d never know about him if you aren’t infected with the obsession. I rather like a few of the games he played.”

“I played with my father and never won so it discouraged me. I think you have to have some hope that you will eventually win a game to enjoy it,” Lee said.

“Darling, North America’s best played four-dimensional non-Newtonian chess across star systems, with ships for game pieces against Gordon, and got their butts whipped.” He wove his true hands in a complex tangle in the air to illustrate. “There’s no shame in losing a lesser game to him. What could possibly bring you to see me?”

“I’m told you build sports planes and can work on aircars,” Lee said.

“I’ve adapted some Earth designs to fit our needs,” Alonso admitted. “The difference in body mass makes it challenging. A nice six-seat Human plane makes a passable two-seat craft for Derf, or you can scale up smaller designs to an extent. I sometimes use a different wing profile or a local engine design. Changes that would horrify a Human regulatory agency and yank it right out of certification. We have no such thing to impede us, fortunately.

“There aren’t a lot of winged private aircraft and they are all hand-built. Nobody has set up a line to build one design. The market just doesn’t exist for it. I don’t seek aircar work much. The designs are pretty much straightforward copies of Human designs with very little change. The Derf capable models are just the freight versions.”

“Would you consider building a custom aircar chassis for me? A two Derf and two Human, or a four Human capable car, with any combo of seating. Fully pressurized and high altitude capable. Good visibility, rough field capable, and a ballistic safety parachute. I don’t have the thrust capacity of the power plants yet so this is just talking right now. I don’t even have a sketch on a napkin level of design.”

“What sort of budget, and could I build it in parallel with my other work so I still have other customers and a business when it’s done?” Alonso asked.

“No deadlines. But it has to be right. And if we have to saw it in half or start over because it isn’t right and we aren’t happy with it when it flies, we do that. Cost-plus. Whatever plus you can add and still look me in the eye after is fine. I’m not poor. I just got through building a private starship not that long ago. One hopes this won’t be quite that expensive.”

Alonso got this far away look. “If you swap two Derf from the front seats to the back seats that’s potentially a three-ton shift of mass a meter and a half to the rear. The only way you’d accommodate that and keep it stable in hover would be to have the engine pods not just pivot but shift fore and aft as much. Better to have them swing a bit more, say two full meters in case luggage or fuel movement is altering the center of gravity.

“It will be inherently unstable and fly by computer of course. It will have to have strain gauges on the engine booms and read the loading on the ground, so it knows which end to lift first and pivot the engine configuration each time before it throttles up to full power.” He stuck an arm out each way hand around an imaginary engine pod, and pivoted them smoothly before he lifted. It was handy having four arms to demonstrate it properly.

“See, you have it half-way designed in your head already,” Lee said. “Think a low cabin edge and a huge canopy for visibility. It can be a fixed canopy if you give me a hatch behind the cabin. A door on the cabin proper would give us an airlock too.”

Alonso opened his mouth to ask what kind of an aircar needed an airlock, and then thought better of it. “I’ll do some sketches. We’ll see if we can work together.”

“May I pay a retainer?” Lee offered. “Do you want to give me your bank name and I’ll pay whatever you bill me to your accounts?”

“Maybe later if we make a contract. Give me a token out of your pocket today, or I understand the Human custom is to shake hands.”

“I’ll do both,” Lee agreed. She crossed to him, shook his true hand and left a coin in it. “I’m in the Old Hotel if you want to contact me. Thanks,” she said and left.

Alonso looked at the coin, curious. It had a space station on it. He spoke English better than he read it, but recognized twenty-five grams. It must be gold but he’d never held a gold coin before. He had no idea what it was worth in the Ceres silver dollars he knew.

* * *

The hotel seated Xerxes on a floor pad and Jan got a regular chair. That put both their heads on a comfortable level to chat. The establishment seemed to have everything under control and well thought out. They had no trouble with plates and utensils appropriate to each of them. Indeed, his seemed to be actual silver, and the china and stemware could have been from Earth if he hadn’t known what that would cost.

He wasn’t the only Human in the room and nobody had taken any note of it when he entered. The menus were on paper held in a heavy card stock folder. That was rather quaint. Most developed nations on Earth had outlawed that sort of menu along with a lot of other potential disease vectors. They weren’t even plastic coated to make sanitizing them cheap and easy. A code square in the bottom corner invited you to scan for other languages if you weren’t able to use Derf or English.

“My menu doesn’t have any prices,” Xerxes said confused.

“I’m a guest of the hotel so I believe they are assuming you are my guest,” Jan said. “It’s rather old-fashioned. Don’t concern yourself with it. Just order what you like.”

What he liked turned out to be two petite hams. Jan would have called them picnic hams. A glazed sweet potatoes casserole covered with a local nut, a whole grilled pineapple, and a sweet wine over ice. Jan wondered if other Derf favored everything being so sweet?

Jan got a stacked pastrami and corned beef sandwich on a crusty roll, with Swiss cheese and what they described as deli dressing. The waiter only seemed surprised and a bit flustered when he asked for bottled water. Apparently, that wasn’t a big item locally. He wasn’t sure if the local water supply was sanitary for Humans and didn’t want to insult them by asking. He got coffee instead. That should be hot enough to be safe. The hot and crunchy platter got him a warning from the waiter that Humans often found it too spicy. He promised he’d eat around anything he found too hot. They brought it immediately as an appetizer and it was wonderful. A big scoop of kimchi was surrounded by sour cucumber pickle chunks, something similar to a radish, cherry tomatoes, and a ring of red, yellow, and black peppers. A loaf of something he’d call pumpernickel and a block of butter appeared unasked and sat on his side of the table.

“What do you do when you aren’t playing the guide with foreigners?” Jan asked when he had made a first-round sampling of his appetizer.

Xerxes blinked rapidly betraying surprise when Jan nibbled a black pepper.

“I’m a college student. I have very flexible classes except for some that require on-site instruction. I’m still living at home with family but I need to support myself and pay tuition, so I go to one of the day job services whenever I can. This is nice today because my uncle found you for me. I don’t have to pay a fee for the job service,” Xerxes said.

“What are you studying?” Jan wondered.

“Forestry management. Last season I went with a group and learned how to top a tree off, drop it without damaging the trunk or killing anyone, and how to move it to the sawmill or move a portable mill to it.”

“That sounds more like a lumberjack than a manager to me,” Jan remarked.

“How could I possibly manage workers if I have no idea what their job entails? I’d never have their respect, and would probably tell them to do something stupid.”

“That sounds entirely reasonable to me,” Jan agreed.

“I’m very likely going to work for a startup company that intends to make plywood. Humans here complain endlessly that they don’t have plywood to use for all sorts of things and go on about how handy it is.”

“I’m surprised you didn’t invent plywood well before other things I see,” Jan said.

“Oh, it was known,” Xerxes said. “It’s just it was laid up by hand for things like a base on which to build a shield or a very fancy sort of turned bowl that is a regional art form. What we don’t have is cheap mechanically made plywood in standard sizes and thicknesses with different modern glues and wide facings without seams. The roofers and boat makers alone are looking forward to having it available.”

“You can make some rather nice furniture with it,” Jan said. “I’d encourage you to look that up. It can be steamed and pressed into curves and shapes and retain that.”

“I’ll certainly look that up,” Xerxes said around some ham.

“Jan Hagen,” a voice said. “Do they know what they’ve let in?”

Jan twisted and looked over his shoulder. Mel Wainwright was standing, fists on hips giving him a dramatic scowl.

“They will if you blab it all over the place in your outside voice,” Jan said. “Derf have very sensitive hearing. Sit down and shove something in your pie hole if it will abate the noise,” Jan offered. Their waiter looked a question at Jan with his hand on a chair at a vacant table but didn’t move to bring it until he got a slight nod. He was going to have to leave that fellow a very nice tip.

“I thought I beat most of the mob down here. Has the mass stampede started already then?” Jan inquired.

“I’ll have you know I was here yesterday. I bribed and blackmailed old man Larkin into taking me to Derfhome station on his shuttle way ahead of the maddening crowd.”

“You bribed him and blackmailed him?” Jan asked.

“You have to apply pressure at every point to get him to agree to anything,” Mel said. “The man is very difficult. I offered an exorbitant fee to be taken along because I knew he’d be the first to launch when he had a half-liter of fuel margin, then, when he refused, I had to threaten to go around asking the other shuttle owners to take me as soon as they were in range to launch. He didn’t want me giving them the idea so he not very graciously allowed me along for only twice what I offered. He complained my mass made him lose five minutes on his planned launch time.”

“So, he still beat everybody there? That figures,” Jan said.

“Yes, when they finally do timidly launch and arrive, they will find he tied up a big chunk of the available dockage in long-term leases,” Mel said. “I don’t think the natives realize the income disparity and he got relative bargains. I did the same tying up a few suites in the hotel with long-term contracts for some clients. It won’t take them long to wise up.”

“No, it won’t with one native sitting at the table taking everything in. But then I told you they have very good hearing. Half the room probably could quote you verbatim.”

Mel looked at Xerxes uncertainly and got a carnivore’s smile that would have intimidated a lesser man.

“I didn’t mean to interfere with your deal,” Mel apologized.

“He’s just my local guide, hired as a day worker. I’m going to have him drive me around the city and point things out and answer questions. You can come along if you wish. In fairness, you should pay him too,” Jan suggested.

“You agreeable to showing both of us the sights and having to listen to us exchange insults and lies?” Mel asked him.

“It would be my pleasure,” Xerxes assured him. “I’m already benefiting from working for Mr. Hagen. My rate is five dollars Ceres a day or part day.”

“Wow, that is a bargain,” Mel said. “Count me in.”

Neither Jan nor Xerxes betrayed the least reaction on their faces, but Jan decided he was never going to play poker with Xerxes.

* * *

Dakota and Heather were discussing reorganizing the cabbage mines. With the trio of habitats gone there was suddenly no market for fresh greens, cut flowers, or prospects of a ready market for other staples already started, with a longer time to harvest.

“We can set up to freeze-dry easy enough. We have free vacuum. The trick will be to recover most of the water and not let it sublimate,” Dakota said. “If we need to transport it in bulk that will make it easy to do so.”

The com console pinged once and displayed a flashing light. Not the highest priority, but they weren’t engaged in anything time-critical. Dakota looked a question and Heather nodded.

It was a search robot that returned a hit on the BBC reporter, Wayne Howe.

“That’s interesting. I thought he was afraid to quote you,” Dakota said.

“Go ahead. Run the video,” Heather said.

It turned out the entire segment was a recording of the domestic dispute between John Zimmerman and Kayla Orley.

They watched, although they knew the story and Dakota commented over it. “Well, he figured out how to recover some sort of a story for the expense of coming here,” Dakota said. “It must be a slow news day.”

“Nah, he was already on the Moon for something else,” Heather said. “He was here too fast to have lifted and got here over the Idaho bombardment.”

They watched until both litigants presented their case and then the segment ended abruptly. He didn’t show Heather’s judgment. Rather, he provided commentary on how women and by implication all minorities were as badly treated on the Moon as in most unenlightened Earth nations. Heather and Dakota looked at each other.

“He deliberately abused my hospitality to present my justice as non-existent and the culture of our kingdom as toxic,” Heather said.

Dakota just nodded, afraid to say anything. She’d sort of suggested allowing the interview in the first place. That seemed a bad idea suddenly.

“I’ve never made a ruling about the duel. Suddenly it seems a good idea but sadly when the person to whom I wish to apply it is far away. He’d never return if I challenged him,” Heather said.

“No, he’d just twist it again to make you look bad to Earth eyes,” Dakota agreed. “They are very good at that, just like you expressed to him and the lady reporter.”

“Oh, yes… I tell you what. Simply release the full video record of that discussion, the case between John and Kayla, and my ruling on their case as one continuous video.”

Dakota smiled. “Including the segment where he said he could never go home.”

“Yes. I don’t think anybody will play the whole thing. They have the public trained to such a short attention span they’d all tune out. But they can cut whatever segments they wish. He was rather emphatic,” Heather said. “I think his bosses will see all of it.”

“Very much so. I don’t think the way he put that will be very acceptable to his superiors. It may never reach much of the public but yeah, the right people will see it.”

“Good, that’s exactly what I hoped,” Heather said. She seemed happier.

* * *

Lee ordered a picnic lunch from the hotel restaurant for two Humans, two Derf, and two Badger. She wanted variety and to have enough for sure. If it was too much, they could take some home. The cooler was big enough to be awkward so the hotel had a kitchen worker carry it to her car when it came. She called ahead to Born. He met her at the car and tucked the cooler under one elbow to walk her in, all chatty today.

“What’s this?” Lee asked. There was a new piece of machinery hanging in a cradle still sitting on the shipping skid with the cover freshly removed and to the side. It was a plate with a hole pattern on top and something complicated hanging underneath.

“That is a standard grapple post like on a space station. The drive will bolt on the plate with a cover over it, and the nose grapple on your ship will grab on the part hanging down.”

Lee squatted down and inspected the hard pin in a yoke. There were tapered flats on each side of the yoke that would engage similar flats in the nose of her ship. The claw that grabbed the pin would pull the flats into tension against each other, locking it in three dimensions. “So that’s what it looks like from the side. I’ve never seen one, except for head-on from the nose camera. I wonder if I can persuade Jeff to come along for a test flight?”

“I believe he is expecting that,” Musical said. “He suggested sending your ship on a few short hops and back to you remotely from one of his vessels. They used a drone in their early testing but they didn’t know near as much as we do now.

“Good. I’ll confirm that with him later. I doubt you are going to get this together today. Let’s have a bite and then I’ll sit and watch you assemble it. If you talk about what you are doing, I’ll try to stay quiet and not interrupt,” Lee promised.

She did try, and even made some notes of questions to ask later and took some pix, but she couldn’t help but interrupt a few times. By supper time she was ready to go home and reminded both of them they had no deadline and would benefit from going to supper and a good night’s sleep. They said they’d eat some of the leftover lunch and go home at a decent hour. She didn’t believe it for a minute.

* * *

Jan and Mel were in the front seats of the auto-car and Xerxes in the back, with the seats folded down, occupying the full width. He was hunched forward with his head between the Humans and true arms braced on their seatbacks.

“What do you think of the way traffic is handled?” Jan asked Mel with a broad sweep of the hand that encompassed everything.

“I love it,” Mel said in a heartfelt tone. “I got here before the mob yesterday and got a regular manual car. I let it run on auto for a while and just observed. Once I saw what everybody did, I switched to manual and made much better time.”

“I was afraid to try it cold with no instruction. I suppose I could have looked up the rules on the local net, but I was happy to have Xerxes bring a car from the city,” Jan admitted.

“It makes all kinds of sense. I just hated stop signs and stop lights in Earth traffic. This is like an endless chain of roundabouts except nobody slows down all timid and hesitant. I quickly saw that the auto-cars like this always yield if there is any doubt who has the lead. If you speed up instead of yield all the auto-cars will defer to you and most of the manual drivers. You can just rip like hell if you don’t mind a little lateral acceleration.”

“Oh, one of those,” Xerxes said slightly behind their ears.

“And what happens if the other fellow doesn’t yield?” Jan asked.

“Skreeee…. Thud!” Xerxes said high pitch tapering to a low rumble that dropped off below Human audibility. The onomatopoeia was self-explanatory. You could practically see the wreck unfold in your mind’s eye.

“Well yeah, if you’re stubborn,” Mel agreed. “But the brakes on these cars are really good and if all else fails they have no curbs and the landscaping always seems to be set back a bit.”

“Always walk along the concave side of the curve,” Xerxes warned them.

“I’m curious. You said you’re going into forest management, but you picked an ancient Human king for your short name. Does that indicate a secondary interest?” Jan asked.

“No, that’s just a custom. I picked it because I like how it sounds.”

“I suppose Paul Bunyan is a mouthful,” Mel quipped.

Xerxes didn’t say anything but leaned back to check his pad.

* * *

“It looks like an invasion,” April said in the lobby the next day.

“Did anybody stay on Home?” Jeff wondered.

“There can’t be that many even if they ran the shuttles as fast as they can turn them around. But I see three people I know and the other Homies stand out like a sore thumb.”

Jeff nodded. “Even if you go straight from auto-car to hotel the sidewalks are going to tear up footies in short order. Did they think the planet was carpeted?”

“A lot of these people haven’t set foot on dirt in decades. Some of them have never been on a planet,” April said. “The local stores don’t serve that big of a Human market. I bet they sell out of boots and shoes before the end of the day. We missed a chance to corner the market. Socks too,” she added.

“Look at that,” Jeff said, pointing.

There was an easel with a physical board, not a monitor, set where one had to walk around it between the door and check-in desk. It said “NO VACANCIES” in neat hand-drawn letters.

“Some of it is pent up demand. It hasn’t been safe to take a vacation on Earth for ages. People miss walking under an open sky and wandering along a beach. The ocean is only about fifty kilometers that-a-way,” April pointed. “If there is a road down there a lot of this crowd will go down to take a look soon if not today. After a week or two, a lot of them will head back up to Home.”

“I don’t know,” Jeff said, frowning. “A fair number of them are suddenly unemployed. It’s going to be cheaper to live down here than on Home. Fresh food will have to be lifted and it’s going to cost more than they are used to getting it from the Moon. Some are going to want to find jobs and stay here.”

“There are always a few who can never save anything and will have to find something down here quickly. If they liquidate their cubic to get funds there may be a nice wave of properties for sale at decent prices,” April speculated.

“I’m on that,” Jeff said, pulling his tablet out and punching in the preset for his real estate lady. It was no surprise she had a queue waiting to talk to her. With a little luck, she was tied up with sellers instead of buyers smarter and quicker than them. He left a text message to use her discretion to buy anything for them she considered below market. If he waited and tried to micro-manage her, somebody would get in ahead of them.

OceanofPDF.com

Chapter 8

“My guys should have the drive prototype assembled tomorrow,” Lee said. “I understand you are willing to accompany my vessel and help us do tests safely by remote control. Do you have copies of your superluminal control software I can test and make sure it’s compatible with my own navigation programs?”

Jeff blinked and thought about it a minute.

“I’m not sure that’s part of our deal,” He said. “I’ll check with my partners. The software is just software, not really gravity tech per se.”

Off-camera, April looked alarmed and waved both fanned hands in a negating sign.

“That’s true,” Lee agreed but she didn’t look happy. “Of course, the data embedded in your software is unique and very much gravity tech. If you give that data to us stripped out, we can write our own programs without all that much delay. It’s a security hazard bringing in new people and expanding our program, but that’s your choice. I thought you were intent on moving this forward as quickly as possible. My researchers have given you the process to produce their special material is that correct?”

“Yes, and I’ve sent that to Heather so they can have our people do a peer review.”

“Perhaps cooperation is looking less imperative now that you have enough to go forward on your own. Be aware that if we’re both going to very strictly interpret how we share gravity tech, then we won’t be sharing mundane engineering designs. After all, how to design rotors and their associated mechanical systems are all as well-known as how to write software. If we discover other novel uses outside the current art of a superluminal drive, then they will have to be subject to separate agreements and compensation,” Lee insisted.

April moved around to better be in Jeff’s line of sight. She was shaking her head and silently mouthing the word NO.

“That would make both of us waste time and resources on needless duplication, wouldn’t it?” Jeff asked.

April threw her hands up and closed her eyes in relief.

“That’s exactly how I felt,” Lee said. You could tell she was still put out.

“I’ll see that’s it’s copied and couriered to you rather than transmitted,” Jeff promised. “Make sure your pulsar location algorithms are compatible. You may have to run a faster clock to be as accurate.”

“I will. That’s a good idea and much safer,” Lee said. She nodded and disconnected without arranging a time for testing as she’d intended. Maybe after they received the software and integrated it into their systems.

“I didn’t mean anything by that,” Jeff said.

“Jeff, you sounded like an Earth lawyer,” April told him.

Lee sat looking at the screen she’d closed, but not really seeing it, rattled, and reappraising her relationship with the Centralists. Maybe it would be wise to not offer up everything they knew immediately but keep a few chips back before betting everything on their goodwill.

* * *

“Have you set up a headquarters already?” Jan asked. “Perhaps established an office?”

“I got some rooms and a couple of suites in the Old Hotel for my clients,” Mel said. “Just in time, since they cut off any more long-term leases after my requests. They are determined not to abandon the day room market and become just an apartment building.

“On expert advice, I opened a local bank account. It seems banks here will do almost anything you ask if it’s within their power. They will even do things I’d normally ask the concierge at the Hotel to do. I’m not quite comfortable with that yet. I need an alternative source of guidance for local customs and business practices. Even if I ask the bank’s take on certain things, I’d like a second opinion on what they tell me.

“There aren’t any lawyers in the sense Earthies have them. The clan Mothers make all laws and as far as I can find out it applies to the trade towns. I’m still trying to find out how that works. But looking through the local net there are a pair of Earth lawyers, Brunstein and King, who make a business of advising Derf on Human legal systems, and Humans on Derf law and custom. They seem to have been around for a while so they should have some experience. I’m going to check them out and see how they strike me,” Mel said.

“That must have been an awfully lean business before Home arrived,” Jan said.

“It does seem like it, doesn’t it?” Mel agreed. “Our arrival must be a bonanza for them.”

Xerxes pointed out some historic buildings and businesses but Jan was quiet.

After some time, Jan asked. “Is this the King fellow whose ad you saw?”

Mel looked at the fellow on Jan’s pad.

“I have no idea. They didn’t have portrait photos on their page. You think you might be acquainted?” Mel asked.

“I don’t know if he’ll remember me, but I may know him,” Jan said cryptically. “If he’s this fellow then he’s a North American asset, or at least was at one time.”

“Should I avoid them?” Mel asked.

“Not at all. If he’s the man I think he is, then I’d consider him well connected and wouldn’t have any problem networking with him myself,” Jan said. “One can’t get too heavily invested in political identities. I’ve worked the same job for different nations. It’s much easier when you don’t pay too much attention to orders, and do what you please anyway. There are people in all systems, striving to make things work. If they didn’t quietly work with each other to some degree the entire mess would collapse that much faster.”

“You’re welcome to come along and take the measure of them with me,” Mel invited.

“I think I’d enjoy that,” Jan agreed.

* * *

“North America wishes to send a representative from their State Department for a private consultation with the Sovereign of Central,” Dakota said.”

“To speak about what?” Heather asked.

“They didn’t say. They said he would present proper credentials.”

“Like Quincy Love had credentials?” Heather said with a sneer. “They sent him to negotiate, then fired him and charged him and his boss with being an agents of a foreign power within days of his signing the treaty with Jeff.”

“As we’ve discussed I’m sure the current authorities would resent you bringing up something from so long ago. They consider them as relevant as the Romans. Who knows, maybe they want to normalize relations. This is an all-new government,” Dakota said.

“Maybe they want to apologize for the ancient Romans? I haven’t followed what they did since somebody pretty well decapitated them. The line of succession must have been wiped out. Who are these people and how did they get installed?” Heather asked.

“The Secretary of Education, Karen Sealey, was in an auto accident in rural Idaho and missed her flight to be back in the capital. The military took her away to an undisclosed location and a federal judge swore her in, the Supreme Court being all dead. As happened in the past there weren’t clear guidelines for a loss in such depth. She pretty much had to fill all her cabinet positions and three justices with no functioning congress to approve them. The continuity of government programs kept all the agencies functioning as much as they function nowadays. The governors still haven’t filled all the congressional seats and are arguing about some. The governors in exile of Arizona and New Mexico they’ve maintained as a legal fiction are claiming the right to appoint people while Texas holds their territory. The Mexican states are an even worse mess. Nobody will seat them because there is no functioning Federal government in Mexico. Nobody is collecting income tax or other fees and the governors there are meeting in an ad hoc assembly. Texas invited them to send senators and most have done that by appointment. They seceded without formally declaring it.”

“What a mess. Could I even be sure I was dealing with their legitimate government?”

“Has it been legitimate any time in the last century?” Dakota asked right back. “I think I’d worry more about how they intend to treat us and less about Earthie conventions.”

“I can’t believe they suddenly have made a complete turn-about and will keep any agreement past or future,” Heather said. “They just want to sweet talk us into letting them access space again and will stab us in the back when it is convenient.”

“There’s a very strong theory repeated in the media that if it wasn’t us who did the strike on their capital, our campaign against their space assets emboldened others to attack them,” Dakota said.

“And these unknowns, powerful enough to field hypersonic glide weapons, haven’t followed up on the strike at all? Ridiculous,” Heather said.

“I think it was their own military,” Dakota said. “No follow up was needed, because it fully accomplished what they intended.”

“Tell them I have no desire to waste my time speaking to some flunky without portfolio who they can repudiate later. If they wish to speak to me face to face, they can come to my court like any other petitioner and they can send the Secretary of State at a minimum. If he’s afraid to risk his precious butt to the savage Spacers he can stay home.” Heather said.

“Usually I rephrase things for you, but unless you say otherwise,” Dakota said. “I’m just going to quote you verbatim on this. It’s too important to risk any ambiguity.”

“Quote me and inform them it is a direct quote. I feel what they are really asking is if their representative has safe passage. It’s infuriating because we have never treated them with disrespect. They’re the ones who jail foreigners on trumped-up charges. They’re no better than China that way. They’re just projecting their own behavior on others. If that is disrespectful at least it’s merely verbal. I’ve had enough of it.”

“I’ll tell them that,” Dakota promised.

* * *

“This is out of hand,” April said, midday. “I’ve never cut off my com from the public, but there is no way I can answer as many messages as people are leaving for me, and everybody assigns them an urgent priority. We aren’t a Central Embassy or Ambassadors. Neither are we experts on living and doing business on Derfhome. I’m setting up a cover page for all my calls, both voice, and text, stating that bluntly and that I can’t answer the volume of calls I’m getting. I’m suggesting that actual questions of policy or safety matters be directed to the Foys, that messages to clan Mothers are almost always as inappropriate as contacting Heather outside her court days, and practical questions of personal business and cultural education can be addressed by seeking to have accounts with a local bank.”

“Can we use the same portal?” Jeff asked. “You might mention the Derf have a university and some trade associations too. I’m flooded just as badly as you. One idiot I don’t know by name asked if I could suggest a good pizza parlor. Do I look like a restaurant reviewer? I have no idea if there is a pizza place on the planet.”

“We’ve never linked personal accounts like that,” April said. “How about if I title it as, Contact guide: Jeff Singh and April Lewis. Partners and Peers to the Sovereign of Central?

“That works for me. Anybody who I want to talk to already has a priority alert assigned to them on my pad. Anybody new will have to give me a very good reason to be added to that short list.”

* * *

Lee got a memory card with Jeff’s software from his bank courier. She found it interesting that he trusted the Foys’ bank that deeply already. She called Strangelove and asked if he could send it securely to the Mothers’ own instrument techs? He told her to hold it because both the Red Tree techs were at the Keep. He’d have one on a plane and here tomorrow where they could pick it up and take the next commercial shuttle up.

Born called Lee and informed her the drive was assembled. It would spin and the electric field deployed correctly when powered from the external cable connection. Of course, he and Musical were careful not to do both at the same time. That was great. Lee sent messages for the Red tree techs to receive the drive and ride up with the drive in their custody. Everything was coming together. They had one storage space on the Kurofune that would hold the drive with very little room to spare. It was stretching it to call it a hold but it would serve until they mounted the drive to test. It was a courier after all, not a freighter.

* * *

The Foys didn’t expect a long message from Capital Provisions. Walton, their salesperson, informed them of the attached list that itemized price increases on all the items of shelf-stable food for which they had standing orders. He apologized for the increases but noted the sudden influx of Humans was driving prices of Human compatible foodstuffs higher. Several items he reported he could no longer supply or might only have available at a spot price to be determined at the time of the sale.

“Well crap, why didn’t I anticipate this and get ahead of it?” Eileen complained. “As soon as North America attacked the habitats it no longer mattered if our stockpiling was a matter of public record. I should have switched to long-term contracts instead of open orders the moment we knew.”

“That wouldn’t have been any solution,” Vic said. “All that would have done is bankrupt our supplier. We are a big enough fraction of Capital’s business they couldn’t carry us at a loss and make a profit off their other customers. Given the Derf custom of contracts being public, they would have to shut down and liquidate if they defaulted on us. Even if they could carry us, it would make us a stink to them to have trapped them into such predatory contracts. Jeff would tell you that’s how Earthies do business. We need a solution that serves both of us.”

“I’m not sure there is such a solution. You mentioned this is probably a minor expense to Heather. I suspect she is piling up so much wealth from all the mining machines she has breaking down regolith, that she could just pay whatever they want. Not just gold and platinum but most metals and a lot of other elements. There are just a few rare earths and stuff like indium that she gets hardly any of from the French mills.”

“Iodine and likely sulfur and phosphorus too,” Vic added, “but who needs much of them? Shoveling money at them is no solution either. If Heather even demonstrated she can pay any price without announcing it, a few smart people will figure out the value of their money is entirely in her hands. Not knowing or trusting Heather they’d start acting to protect themselves. That would just make us part of the problem.

“With Home here, this is why we were stocking these provisions. We don’t have the full picture. They may need some of our stock for Beta or Gamma. We need to tell Heather how it is distorting the local economy and ask what to do. She never said how she intended to distribute our stores when the time came. She might not even have a plan in depth beyond we may need this someday. I’d suggest we stop our open orders and ask her permission to offer our stocks for sale at a modest markup. That will cool the sudden price inflation, at least in Human food.”

“I sort of expected her to offer it as charity,” Eileen said.

“That would distort the market just as badly,” Vic said. “With all that free food suddenly available why should any of the farmers or ranchers keep producing anything? It would be a real long bet to imagine they were going to be able to sell it, wouldn’t it? A lot of it is suitable for Derf, so it will impact that market too.”

“Yeah, I don’t know much about economics to anticipate those things,” Eileen said, “but I can see what you are saying. I’m impressed you seem to understand it.”

“I was a rancher. I know not to raise beef when the market is impossible to predict and likely turning to crap. I got out of that business a couple of years before The Day for just that reason. Going against the market is a bet that risks everything and can leave you homeless. Of course, if you let yourself get deep in hock, needing borrowed money to operate each year, you’d have no choice. Those people had to make their nut every year or fail to cover their note and lose the ranch. Derf are very conservative. I can’t imagine them working that way or their bank letting them get in such a precarious position. They seem to operate much closer to the mutually supportive business model of Homies than the Earth norm.”

Vic smiled. “If I was an honest-to-God real economist, I’d have said it in such obscure professional jargon that you’d have no idea what point I was trying to make.”

“I’m glad this Voice has such good advice,” Eileen said. “I think this problem is too hot to wait for a commercial messenger service. I’m going to ask April to run back to Central and consult with Heather. Do you think I should send a message back to Walton and shut down our standing orders immediately?”

Vic thought about it a couple of minutes.

“I would level with Walton about what is happening. He has very little reason or ability to take advantage of us. Tell him you are consulting with your sovereign about what to do. Let him know we may offer our stocks below market price so he doesn’t recklessly obligate himself to his suppliers. I’d tell him to shut down supplying you in an orderly fashion, and you’ll cover his deliveries at market prices for the next two weeks. I think that is generous. As you said, Heather can well afford it. If he is pressured by his suppliers to contract at new higher prices it gives him an actual reason to resist. He may end up looking prescient to his suppliers and customers from your warning, and grateful to you instead of resentful.”

“You call him,” Eileen said. “You can say it prettier than I can.”

* * *

“I have to run back to the Moon for the Foys,” April said. “They want to put an urgent question to Heather about their mission here. I don’t blame Eileen for not wanting to call it. I don’t want to touch it myself. I’ll inform her of everything happening. That Home has arrived safely and progress on the drive looks good. Besides Jeff, I’m asking Gunny to return on a mission for me. That leaves room for a passenger. We’ll give preference to anyone who it would serve Heather’s interests to return. Unless Heather has some mission, I expect to come right back so we’re available to test Lee’s drive.”

“I’d ask Chen first,” Jeff said. “I had two messages about Central people caught in the move. Let me search those messages while you ask him if he wants a ride.”

“I found him and said we’d give him a lift,” April said. “He is down here in town now sightseeing. I suggested he get to Derfhome station if he wants to go. He insists he wants to move his household in an orderly fashion and will return later when Heather makes transport available.

“Why do you have such a strange expression?” Jeff asked.

“It’s bothering me about Papa-san. I never pictured him splitting up with Chen. He was very polite but says he never had any desire to live at Central, and that he has been off Earth so long now that his Earth connections have become out of date and difficult to maintain. He’d rather not move his household and is comfortable staying with Home wherever it ends up. He said to tell you and Heather to stop his quarterly retainer, that he is comfortable financially and will be available if you have any questions in the future, just not his active participation as in the past.”

“I can see that,” Jeff said. “It’s a good time for him to move on.”

“Yeah, it makes sense but Papa-san has been a constant in my life for so long. I’ll miss Chen but I feel like I’m losing Papa san even though he is staying. I won’t feel I can just punch his code in my pad anytime and put a question to him. Not if we aren’t paying him.”

“It’s not like he died,” Jeff said. “There are people on Beta and Gamma I am going to miss too. We’ve scattered to the winds and may not see them or talk to them for years. There’s no telling where any of us will be a year from now. Not even what star system.”

“There is no help for it,” April agreed. “I know that, but it makes me sad.”

* * *

“We ordered a new platen fabricated for our scale when we wrecked it. We were able to install it easily today,” Musical told Lee in a text message. “A much bigger capacity scale would be quite a bit more money and a wait to get it. The housing and rotor checked out without damage. What Born suggested is we make a new frame that can slide on a pair of long beams. We’ll start at the far end and slide it along them until we have a firm reading and then calculate the static reading plus the thrust at that position, factored by its position between the support points along the lever. There’s no need to wait for a lighter re-engineered housing to get you some thrust numbers.”

“Aren’t you worried the frame will collapse again? Are you going to make it a lot heavier?” Lee asked.

Musical showed the tips of his incisors in a grimace that was a sign of acute embarrassment in a Badger.

“The frame rail buckled where it was drilled to mount support for the batteries and power supply. If we hadn’t weakened it there, it probably wouldn’t have failed. But we will use heavier L channels and U channels for the main rails, with no holes this time. They should be cut to length and delivered later today with the long beams. We’ll clamp on it anywhere we need support for auxiliary systems.”

“Sweet, take some video of the final run and the number on the scale,” Lee said. “I’ll look forward to seeing the report.”

“Maybe the day after tomorrow,” Musical said and terminated the call.

He hadn’t seemed disappointed that Lee didn’t ask to watch, and she felt she’d just used up too much of their time and attention the last time she’d been present.

* * *

“The lawyers are on the west end ahead there where you can see the hills start. That’s the very edge of what’s considered the old town where we’ve been heading, though we wandered off to the north a bit,” Mel said. “Of course, it’s not like you can take a straight line anywhere, is it? Are you up to dropping in on them unannounced?”

“I’d enjoy it actually. How are you going to present me? If I’m a business partner or a client they are going to want to know my authority and our relationship. We need to have that nailed down before we walk in so we don’t get caught doing a clumsy improvisation.”

“Can you pretend to be my security?” Mel asked. “That gives you a reason to be physically present and trusted to hear my business, but not have any reason to be questioned independently.”

“Pretend?” Jan smiled. “Make a token payment and I will be your security. If they somehow contrive to put a question to me, I can say in all honesty I am hired security and the veracity software will confirm it to a very high level of certainty.”

Mel fished around in his pocket and came up with a silver dollar Ceres.

“Please consider yourself hired for the day as my security,” he said handing it to Jan.

Xerxes in the back couldn’t help snickering at Jan receiving his old pay rate.

“Hush you,” Jan rebuked him sharply. “Everybody has to start somewhere. I’m going to regard this as a keepsake. It’s my first money earned on Derfhome. I’ve worked security before but it was always more administrative. I only got… hands-on, in occasional bouts of over-enthusiasm. I seem to be starting at the bottom again.”

“Oh…. I’ve been snookered already,” Mel concluded from the byplay. He wasn’t stupid.

“Indeed, I predict we are precipitating an extraordinary episode of price inflation,” Jan admitted. “I have no advice on avoiding it except to grab every asset you can early to stay ahead of it.”

“How much did I overpay?” Mel asked.

“Not a bit. I predict Xerxes’ rate will be ten dollars a day by tomorrow,” Jan said. “And look at the bargain you got with me today. That will never be repeated.”

“I’ll cherish the experience,” Mel promised.

* * *

“How does this change our mission?” Kirk asked Pam Harvac anxiously.

“Why should it change our mission?” she countered.

“Define what you think our mission is for me,” Kirk requested.

“Our Director, Wilson, was concerned the purchases of biologicals by Central might indicate they planned a strike on Earth capable of destroying entire ecosystems. A continental strike on North America at least. Possibly a hemispheric attack or even one that would touch every corner of the Earth. We didn’t get into arguments about what constitutes an extinction event, but anything that didn’t spare kudzu or crabgrass would be pretty rough on people.”

“Since they didn’t initiate such a wide attack even when Nor… when our nation attempted to wipe out all three habitats, isn’t the danger past?” Kirk Fuldheim asked.

“My goodness no,” Pamela said. The very notion seemed to surprise her. “I can see several ways the danger has increased. What was the biggest surprise of this whole sequence of events?” Pam demanded.

“I’m not sure I can pick any one thing,” Kirk said, avoiding the question.

“Well, why were we sent instead of depending on our intelligence services?”

“Oh, Wilson was very clear on that. He doesn’t expect to be on the inside for any real information. Everybody without any special leverage gets the mushroom treatment. Kept in the dark and fed crap. I have to agree, I think they cut us out worse than our actual enemies. They at least have some intelligence of par value to trade.”

“Look how true that was,” Pam told him. “We had no clue they were going to attack the Spacer habitats. They have enough access to the top tiers of government that they should have known. Now, has our situation improved in any way? Do we suddenly have any better idea about what they may do next?”

“No, but I thought things should be quiet for a while. Home is here, and word in the news services is that the other habs left too. So, what could either side do? If they were going to attack Earth they would have stayed there and done so instead of running away. What else would our agencies do to provoke them now that they have fled?”

“We don’t know, do we? But if you haven’t noticed, let me point out that moving a huge habitat to another star system is beyond our abilities. They can also do it faster. They don’t even try to hide that if you check the dates they gave in the news reports about them leaving the Solar System. We haven’t heard anything but their side of the story and nothing about what has happened since they left. The news they shared here is all from the perspective of public sources that had the move imposed on them as a surprise.

“Their leadership hasn’t felt any need to issue statements. It will be days before conventional jump ships bring us web fractions that have the old news stories from Earth sources. We have no idea what our government’s response has been to failing to destroy them. I also doubt that Central was satisfied to simply move the habitats out of harm's way and make no response. The Moon Queen, from everything I have heard, isn’t that nice.”

“You think they would attack Central again?” Kirk asked. “That didn’t work out very well for the Chinese. I’m no geopolitical strategist, but that would be an incredibly dangerous thing to do.”

“I don’t know. When we first came out here, I was naïve and expected better of people than I do now. I’ve kind of grown up and know now that they can do incredibly stupid things. It appears I may have become even more cynical than you,” Pam said with a sudden smile at that self-revelation. “I’m content to maintain our assignment and improve our cover business. Truth is, I think we are probably safer here than back in North America. If they wish to change our mission or withdraw us, they can find some way to tell us. Bureaucratic inertia being what it is, if we just don’t create any problems, they should be too busy to worry about us.”

“That’s a good attitude,” Kirk decided. “I won’t borrow trouble as they say. When we were on the way here, I was expecting it to be a hardship post. Then just a couple of months ago I was fretting about when we’d get recalled and my time with you would be over for the foreseeable future. I need to learn to just go with the flow and agonize less over things way over my pay grade and out of my control.”

Pam gave him a tight possessive hug. “I not only recommend that,” she said in his ear, “as your supervisor, I’ll make it an order. It’s now your official duty to chill out.”

OceanofPDF.com

Chapter 9

The building in which the Earth lawyers, King and Burnstein, had offices was an odd mix of Human custom and traditional Derf architecture that wasn’t seen much yet. The idea of combining residential and commercial space was common, as was office space on a shop or plant. Splitting the use of a large building between many offices had never taken hold because large businesses that existed to handle data and shuffle paper didn’t exist. Neither did vast bureaucracies or government agencies for military or regulatory oversight.

The building was perched high on the hillside with a small parking lot on the uphill side. A single row of spaces served since most people would be using car services. The building was long and thin because all the offices had a view over the river valley holding Derfhome.

“This is nicer than my bank,” Xerxes said. “How can they possibly afford this?”

“If their business is like most Earth law firms, they only have a portion of the building,” Mel said. “That’s a very common arrangement.”

“I bet it is mostly Human businesses then,” Xerxes predicted. “I’d never feel comfortable sharing a building with unrelated businesses. Excuse me if it offends but it seems low class.”

“Don’t be shy to tell me things like that,” Mel said. “Learning the Derf way of looking at things is exactly why I hired you. But we’re dealing with Humans here so just hold the car.”

As he expected, the guide to the occupants in the lobby bore out Xerxes' prediction. There was a clear majority of Human names and English business names on the directory. The lobby went straight through to a glass wall three stories high with a wonderful view. There was no elevator but Derf width stairs went up to a balcony on both sides and down to a lower level with a bridge at the middle entry and upper level. Somebody was bright enough to split the stairs into half steps for Humans that Derf could take two at a time. King and Burnstein were on the walk-in level.

“I don’t know the market, but this is nice,” Mel said. “There just isn’t that much trade to this world to support expensive consultation services. At least before we arrived. How can they afford this?” It didn’t seem a rhetorical question at all, as Mel addressed it directly to Jan with a piercing gaze.

Jan gave an indifferent shrug. Everything about him was low-key.

“You can ask quite directly. That often works rather than dancing around it.”

“I might,” Mel said. He made it sound like a threat.

The office had glass doors with handles and their names in gold leaf on the right door. With no entry pad or screen, it seemed an invitation to come in. The door was unlocked when Mel tried it but he stopped just inside, uncomfortable to go further until he called out.

There were a couple of leather library chairs and big leather sofas to the left, turned toward each other for talking but all favoring the window wall and view. They were all sized for Humans so that indicated their expected clientele. The window was framed by a couple of big frilly plants like ferns and an antique telescope on a tripod was available to examine the town below.

“Come in,” a voice insisted, and an arm stuck out from behind one of the chairs to wave them in. They were halfway to the setting before the fellow extricated himself from the depths of the chair to turn and greet them. His eyes went to Jan first, lingering, and to Mel like an afterthought.

“I’m Mel Wainwright,” Mel said forcing his attention to remain on him by offering his hand. “I’d like to talk about your services and possibly retain you. I am contracted to several Homies who intend to have some sort of a permanent presence on Derfhome even if they may move on if Home doesn’t stay here. I’m looking to provide secure residences and services so I need to come up to speed quickly. Derfhome will be a brief stay for some, a retreat and planetary vacation home, or a commercial site and market for others.”

“You look familiar to me,” King allowed. “But I know your associate. Are you partners or is he one of your clients?”

“I’m his customer. He’s my security escort. You haven’t looked me up in your spex?”

“I’m not very skilled at doing extensive searches on my spex and hiding it,” King admitted. “I don’t multi-task well and I think a lot of people who claim to be able to are fooling themselves. I’d rather not offend my customers by seeming distracted and not giving them my full attention. Some of them may assume I’m doing other business rather than attending to their needs. Give me a moment now and I’ll get that out of the way.”

It wasn’t that long, perhaps a full minute before he returned his attention to them. Mel took the opportunity to look at Jan who made a small affirmative nod without eye contact.

“OK. You were administrative supervisor over President Wiggen’s residential security, supervisor during her presidency,” King said. “I wouldn’t have bet either way, whether Jan Hagen might have hired you for security instead of the other way around.”

“I’ve never been one to do hands-on security,” Mel disclaimed. “Oddly, Jan claims the same. But I did remove President Wiggen from the White House when it was attacked.”

“That sounds pretty hands-on to me,” King said.

Mel shrugged. “One does what one must. I wasn’t entirely sure all my people were reliable. I had hidden assets none of them knew about, and if you get right down to it, I was rescuing myself as much as her. I’m sure I was on the target list of those coming for her. Is that going to be a problem working for me that I thwarted factions that may still be represented in the current North American government?”

“Not at all. They probably won’t know we are doing business. We are their source to monitor public events and contracts on Derfhome. I sincerely doubt it’s important enough to have redundancy. If anyone brings it up, we’ll just say we are spying on you. I’m sure we can find some mutually agreeable tidbit to feed them about you that is safe for everyone.”

Mel’s eyebrows shot up. “You readily admit you work for North America? How can you do that and not be yanked back home immediately?”

“Do you think we’re going to report our cover is blown?” King asked. “We have a good thing going here. We have a nice safe posting with no risk anyone is going to shoot us in the head or pack explosives in our car service rental as might happen in more adversarial environments. Who we work for is an open secret among the local agencies. We know each other by name. I’ve been told they are happy to know us and keep an eye on us. You have to understand, it isn’t even illegal to be a spy here. The Mothers have never thought to make a law against it. They’d probably think such a law silly. They sensibly seem to avoid making laws they know will just be ignored. If we were recalled they would have to discover who replaced us and learn everything about them from scratch. If a problem arises, we can give our counterparts a call and figure something out before our masters make one or the other of us do something stupid.”

Jan Hagen smiled and nodded his agreement.

“We have little to investigate or report we can’t get off the public net and summarize in a few hours every morning. With a little luck, we can stay here until retirement age and retain both personal assets and an ongoing business. Life Extension Therapy is becoming available here and both of us will be able to afford it when we choose to buy it. That isn’t an option back home. We contrived to make our position here secure. Even though USNA dollars aren’t what they used to be, we have managed to get most of our support transferred to local control. Who knows, we may even be able to do that with our retirement pay if things stay stable long enough.”

“How did you manage that?” Jan inquired. “I managed that by getting my pay routed to a Swiss bank. It must be more difficult with North American funds.”

“Doing any significant cash transfer would be hard and raise all sorts of red flags,” King said. “But if I order fifty kilos of chocolate and a gross of medium cotton t-shirts at a time on our accounts, it flies right by the tripwires. It’s all gravy at this point so it becomes a game, finding ways to convert funds. When they first sent us out here, we were given carte blanc to buy a safe house to avoid the uncertainty of sending support funds regularly. They didn’t really know real estate values and were used to getting horrible rates of exchange, so we bought this building in my name and have been collecting the rents ever since. It covers our expenses and then some nicely, with no way for them to claw it back.

“One always finds loose assets doing fieldwork,” Jan agreed. “Good job.”

Sam Burnstein came in the door just then and showed no surprise at their guests.

“There’s a Derf sitting racking up time in a rental in the parking lot,” Sam said. “Is he surveilling us? Should I go offer him coffee and a snack and see who employs him? He isn’t near sneaky enough to be a private investigator and I thought everyone else knew us.”

“He’s ours,” Mel admitted. “He’s not any sort of professional at all, just a native guide. Ignore him because we don’t want him knowing our business or yours.”

“OK, you’re Homies then,” Sam figured out, “even though you don’t look the part. I just saw a bunch of them in town and they are all dressed strangely and have on ballet slippers that will be in shreds before the end of the day.”

“We’re former Earthies and Home transplants,” Jan said. “Figure that we never went totally native. I dressed conservatively by habit to be less visible, perhaps it backfired in the present circumstances.”

“Yeah, a clown suit would have blended better than a one-ounce Italian suit and half-ounce bespoke Spanish shoes. You sure are pretty though,” Sam allowed. “I have entire outfits worth less than that tie.”

“Sam makes a hobby of being able to discern one’s origins and station in life from one’s dress. He is surprisingly accurate, even with Fargoers, and he’s never been there.”

“Accurate indeed,” Jan admitted. “But the suit was bought in Singapore, where the Italian tailors will fit you much cheaper than at home and the tie is a Hermes.”

“New spooks too?” Sam inquired.

“Close enough. Security professionals of slightly different flavors,” Mel said.

“We’re thrilled to have Home here,” Sam said. “We’ve been building a consultancy here but there just hasn’t been enough traffic to make it a very big practice. It’s a gift from the heavens.”

“We pretty much concluded that,” Mel admitted.

“You hiring us?” Sam asked directly.

“That is what we were working our way around to with your partner,” Mel said. “We have yet to understand what services you offer. I was told your bank will do things here that expand the envelope way beyond what any Earth bank will do. Yet there are things I hesitate to ask and areas I may not wish to bring to their attention.”

“Oh true,” Sam agreed. “Some things we do are very mundane. We know what sort of contracts the Derf will accept and what will be rejected. Their standards are different than Earth's custom. We can help you word them correctly. Oddly, one of the most difficult things to buy on Derfhome is insurance. You can ask your bank to issue a policy, but the sort they feel comfortable writing is much narrower than Earth companies. They regard personal life insurance with suspicion. They don’t have enough people wanting to buy insurance to be able to apply statistics and have valid actuarial tables.

“If you wish a business insured against loss and disaster your bank may take that as a sign you don’t have confidence in the soundness of the venture. Since contracts are a public matter your insurance policy tells everyone much more about your business than some people like to reveal.”

“And how do you get around that?” Mel asked.

“Banks here tend to serve a particular trade. We know how to write a proposal and which bank will entertain such an agreement. There are a couple of banks that serve the clans. They tend to be very conservative but they will take risks that are unlikely to apply to widely scattered clan territories. A bank serving ranchers and farmers tend to have customers in a small enough geographic area that weather disasters would apply to all of their customers and are thus too great a risk. A bank for merchants may accept a certain amount of exposure for weather damage but cap it and refuse any more, over a certain arbitrary ceiling. We know which is which.”

“We can also guide you to several Fargone businesses that will insure almost anything if they find the odds attractive. There are also a few Human insurers who will pool risk even in other star systems,” King added.

“Lloyd’s I’d wager,” Jan said.

“Yes, that’s one, and interesting that you’d phrase it that way,” Bill King said. Some of our Fargoer sources would simply be regarded as bookies on Earth, but that doesn’t mean they aren’t very sophisticated about calculating odds and they have the assets to be safe counter-parties. One we’ve used runs an actual casino, but they will take both sides of a bet, writing one policy to cover you for untimely death, and another to protect you against outliving your retirement assets.”

“That might be dangerous with Life Extension Therapy,” Mel pointed out.

“You can be sure there would be exclusions written,” Sam said. “The Derf also are not nearly as security conscious as Humans with their data systems and automated services. We can mine a great deal of information from them indirectly.”

If they were extracting data the owners weren’t aware they were providing, Jan took that to mean they were effectively hackers too, even if the systems were leaky.

“If you were financing a starship, you might not want your bank to be handling the details of arming it,” King said. “At some point, they might worry your level of physical protection indicated you intended to take it in harm’s way very aggressively. We know who to direct you to on Fargone or New Japan to handle those sorts of details discreeteley without a Derfhome contract.”

“To go back to something. You said your status as intelligence agents is an open secret on Derfhome. Does that mean you know others in the trade? That would be useful information to us,” Mel said.

“But much too dangerous for us to supply,” King said. “That could lead to our status being reported back home in retaliation.”

“Then other Earth agencies are active here,” Jan concluded.

“Of course!” King said, surprised he’d think otherwise. “I’ll give you this much for free. The Third Mother of Red Tree is the one who directs their intelligence operations. Mostly using their military personnel. If you want more, ask the Moon Queen’s people on planet, or Lee Anderson if she’ll speak to you. They can tell you who all the players are but they’ll expect you to share information back to them, not just coin.”

“I spoke with the peers, Lewis and Singh yesterday,” Mel said. “They recommended a bank but I didn’t know enough then to ask a lot of other questions that I would now.”

“You have their ear and you’d bother with us?” King asked. “If you want our services, I can offer them to you for a modest retainer, if you share the things you get from them that you judge may affect us.”

“I may owe them a higher loyalty than you. I’m reluctant to put myself in that position.”

“If something is that dire, just tell us to abandon our post and run for our lives,” King said. “We have several contingencies to remove ourselves rather than be removed.”

“You would, wouldn’t you? I tell you what. For somewhat limited service between us, and avoiding mentioning my name back to Earth. I’ll pay you a solar a year for such minor advice as you mentioned and introductions. I may have Jan here call for me.”

“I’ll state minor advice and introductions on our public contract. That will rouse little attention or worry. The more so for its brevity.” King said.

Mel gave King his contact information, produced a solar, and flipped it to King.

“That finishes us up then,” he said rising to leave.

“He’s at the Old Hotel?” Sam said when his partner shared the contact. “There’s a lot of traffic there but I’m going to expand my surveillance of the hotel and car service traffic there. If he’s living there, probably other important Homies will be in residence too.”

“Some of them his clients,” King warned. “Don’t work at cross purposes to our new customer.”

When Sam looked at him askance, he elaborated.

“I mean, don’t get caught at it.”

Bill was kind enough not to say, again.

In the hallway, Jan had a question.

“You named me as a continuing contact. Do you intend to extend my day contract?”

“No, but they don’t have to know that,” Mel said. “Consider it a tip. You have access to them if you should ever need it. They would have wanted a separate contract for you and I’m not entirely sure they are going to earn out that solar.”

“Thank you, boss.”

* * *

“Were they what you expected?” Xerxes asked when Jan and Mel returned.

“Yes, they may prove useful,” Mel said. “Let’s loop through the south side of town going back to see some different areas.”

“OK,” Xerxes said, instructing the car. “Did you figure out how they can afford such nice offices?” he persisted.

“They own the building,” Mel said turning his face full on and giving him Xerxes a different enough look that the Derf could tell he was provoking a new reaction he hadn’t seen before. “They’re into a lot more than their advertising would suggest.”

Xerxes didn’t look satisfied by that, but sensed Mel didn’t like all the questions.

“When we go back across the river, note the bridge,” Xerxes said. “It’s pre-contact stonework but only five hundred years old. It’s a good example of Derf engineering.”

“How did they pay for it?” Jan asked.

“Tolls, our car company will pay to cross it and it will be covered in our charges,” Xerxes said.

“I imagine it is long paid for,” Mel guessed.

“Yes, and very low maintenance. I believe the English idiom is that it’s all gravy now.”

* * *

“My Lady, we were able to run the small unit in a sturdier frame with no mishaps. We have a good solid thrust reading and I captured a video of the run which I’m attaching.”

An icon for the file appeared in the corner of her screen.

“Born, who told you to call me your Lady? I’m not nobility and I don’t require that.”

“My… Lee, I’m not sure who I heard using that, but it just felt right.”

“Just use Lee, please. If we have a special relationship that is fine. I very much appreciate both of you. But others will probably pick up the habit if they think it is something required, and that despite not having any close relationship. We’ll just keep our affinity both ways something private, OK?”

“Certainly. The reading was just under sixteen thousand Newtons. I’m confident of five percent accuracy. Musical suggests we can boost performance without retesting by closing up the gap from rotor to housing and deepening the clearance off the rotor edge. The prototype people are offering a design for a lightweight housing and a lighter rotor. The design numbers say it should be close to two-hundred ten kilograms. If you want to wait a couple of weeks for special order electric motors to be made for you at Fargone, we can shave that down to a hundred eighty kilograms. They will be significantly more expensive wound with silver wire. I wouldn’t recommend superconductors for a high-speed motor. They have catastrophic failure modes.”

“Safely?” Lee demanded. “That seems awfully light. Do they know this is a life-critical application? Not some industrial machine that if it busts and has to sit a week waiting for repairs it’s no biggie?”

“Indeed, it has a good safety factor. Design and materials just get better all the time. I’m constantly impressed too. Are you still interested in producing four working units without waiting for more design improvements? We’re so early in the design cycle that in a couple of years it will probably look quaint. I’m sure we can make incremental improvements if you want to wait and let us refine it a bit.”

Lee looked at the guesstimates Alonso made for a composite airframe, added allowance for avionics, and ultra-light seating. The excess thrust would more than work, it would give decent enough performance for an aircar, especially at higher altitudes.

“Please, I very much want four and a spare for a proof-of-concept prototype,” Lee said. “I’m not willing to wait for incremental improvements, I want to own the first. The guy I hired to build an aircar chassis has astonished me with how light it can be made. It benefits from the same advances in materials. In a couple of years, we can build another and donate this one to a museum. The weight savings for the motors sound worth the short wait. If the silver is expensive, it will be there at the end of the service life to scrap out, won’t it?”

“Then I’ll release them to the Fargone motor shop to start fabricating,” Born agreed.

“I reviewed my meeting with Jeff Singh and our written agreement. I conclude we agreed to share all gravity tech, even if unrelated to the superluminal drive. We will be sharing this thruster phenomenon with them, but I’m not in any hurry to do so before we have had a chance to gather more information about it. Is that agreeable with you or do you feel it’s dishonest not to make an immediate report?”

“I made no treaty with anybody,” Born said. “I work for you. I’m happy to help you fulfill your agreement with him as you see it, on any schedule you please. I believe the English idiom for this is that it’s above my pay grade.

“Then for right now, we’ll keep it private,” Lee said. “I’ll talk to you again soon.

“She’s going to fit them on an aircar,” Born told Musical after the call ended. “I thought they’d be for her ship or some other space application. I’m surprised.”

“I’m not,” Musical said. “That’s exactly what I expected. She won’t put one in her ship until we have improved them quite a bit. This is just a toy for fun.”

“Some toy at this much expense,” Born said.

“The rich are different than you and me,” Musical said. “They have more money.”

Born looked a question at him. It sounded like Musical was quoting someone, but he stopped and just shook his head.

* * *

“Here are the size, weight, and performance numbers for the lift pods I’ll be mounting, with the plate size, bolt pattern, and wiring connections,” Lee told Alonso.

She had it printed out for him, with a sticky-faced memory chip stuck on the first page.

“Sea level performance?” he asked skeptically. “It will fall off quickly at altitude you know. Turbine or battery? If the weight is to be kept acceptable you aren’t going to have battery range for anything but around the city. Any turbine that can produce that much thrust is going to be a fuel guzzler throttled back to cruise power. I know you are rich but a polywell fusion reactor is just too bulky for an aircar. A ducted turboprop will likely be your best compromise. Do you want it redesigned as a lifting body to extend the range? It would be hard to do that with the low sill and bubble canopy you want.”

“There are numbers in the spec sheet for current draw,” Lee showed him with her finger. “These will be constant thrust units and it won’t fall off at higher altitude. The electrical power unit will be novel too. Something new on the market out of New Japan. It’s a fusion reactor but a high-pressure coating of bucky tubes on a sintered platinum group alloy core. It runs hot too. You have to feed it fuel on standby or use battery power to restart it if you let it cool down.”

“I figured that was just auxiliary power usage. That wouldn’t be too bad a draw even with batteries. Don’t even tell me what that New Japan power unit costs,” Alonso said. He spread a big hand on his chest like it might make him go down in cardiac arrest.

Lee was impressed he’d picked up that Human gesture.

“There’s still a whole lot you aren’t telling me,” Alonso complained. “If you have some kind of magic motors that can do that, I want to buy some for myself.”

His wrinkled-up snout said it was sarcasm, not sincere belief.

Lee thought about it a little. She basically liked Alonso. His crude nature and crusty lack of respect for most everybody could be excused since plenty of people were idiots of both species, but it was irritating her today. She could lose him as an asset if she took offense.

“I will give you the Derfhome franchise on them for aviation,” Lee offered, “if you continue to give me preferential treatment in design and fabrication as you are able.”

His muzzle smoothed out and he looked amazed.

“This is no-shit real? This is going to be fun to build. I’d offer you a marriage contract to get one of these.”

Lee laughed. “I can’t imagine you married. Not even to another Derf.”

“Tried that, twice. They both lasted about as long as my shop assistants,” he admitted.

* * *

“Besides the new people, all our old contacts keep adding new associations,” Sam complained. “I may have to hand this over to a program to track and alert me to new ones instead of trying to keep it all in my head. It won’t fit in a Venn that isn’t a mess or a spider web of contact lines. The Foys seem intent on meeting everyone in town and Singh and Lewis are meeting people who were never on my radar. Lee is meeting some fellow at an aircraft shop I’ve never heard of before. For a Derf, there is almost no information about him but his public contracts are very high value. A lot of them are complicated swaps for service and materials instead of cash. Derf don’t have to avoid taxes so that’s unusual in a high-end business. There’s also like a huge black hole there that must be filled with cash trades that have no public contract.”

“I wouldn’t expect we’re the only ones who find ways not to post what they are doing on the public net,” King said.

“No, but if they have any reason to do that, then they are much more worth investigating,” Sam said.

OceanofPDF.com

Chapter 10

“Well, it took them long enough, but we’re cut off,” Lee told Gordon.

“Oh dear, the liquor store or the deli? Did the bank mess up and decline our charges?”

“The Claims Commission. It runs to twenty pages if you want to read it. The short version is that North America got their butts bombed so badly by Central that the commission’s biggest member can no longer serve the commission for defense as required. Since everybody knew they were the tail that wagged the dog this is no surprise. They claim to be broke, hurting, and feel badly used, yadda, yadda, yadda, and suddenly need that fifteen percent that was promised the little people, who obviously don’t deserve it anyhow. So, sorry, sucks to be you.”

Gordon nodded. “The Mothers sent me the transcript of their conversation with you about Providence. I was expecting this to happen even before being privy to that conversation. It was rather obvious from our visit to Providence. The governor was an ass. He disrespected us discoverers, and he is just a reflection of those who sent him.”

“Will you command a fleet from the Retribution?” Lee asked.

“I’m not sure. Tell me what the command structure would be,” Gordon asked.

“You as commodore. Pick two captains for the Retribution and Sharp Claws. I’m captain of the Kurofune and don’t wish to be linked for combat operations. I’d like to retain its status as a diplomatic vessel and only act defensively. I’m close to being able to have a Central type jump drive for it, and I have to show you other tech my guys are developing.”

“No planetary bombardment?” Gordon asked specifically.

“Not unless something on the surface shoots at you. I doubt that they have the ability.”

Gordon nodded agreement and presumably satisfaction.

“For whom am I acting?”

“Me.”

Gordon did that fake widening of one eye that implied a lifted eyebrow so well.

“Well, for me, and for the Mothers, as I granted them title to lands now in jeopardy, and for you. I’d argue I am acting for both of you. You own a third of the claim, more than the island I granted them. Since they defaulted on our contract, I intend to take the whole thing back. To protect the Mother’s interests and administer the development of the planet since the improvements they have made are forfeit. I do not acknowledge I am bound by their contracts with the colonists. After all, I’m repossessing it, not buying it so I should assume their liabilities. However, I intend to treat the leaseholders and contractors well. I hope most of them can be persuaded to stay on. At this point, I’m not even going to worry about our previous claims. We aren’t going to be paid for them either.”

“At better rates. I saw that in your conversation with the Mother’s,” Gordon said. “I will reserve the right to argue about my old claims when I have an opportunity. Be aware, some of the North American firms who paid the commission will probably be blocked from continuing to do business with you.”

“But it was open to bids from other countries too,” Lee reminded him. “If you don’t want your third of the planet for some reason, if you don’t like the new management, I can arrange to buy your fifteen percent royalties. I’m not sure how we’d calculate what it is worth after terminating all the leases and contracts. Do we try to project what they would have been worth? I intend to demand less on the old agreements and be generous on new ones. Most of the unapportioned land would revert to us. I can’t pay you a fair price for a third of the planet. Unless you want payments forever. I sort of assumed you would support repossession if you support everything else too.”

“I’m rich already without ever getting another payment,” Gordon said. “I’m also sure I’ll start collecting on our claims from the Little Fleet before I run out of funds I’ve received from the Claims Commission. I like the new management just fine, Sweetie, but I’m trying to calculate if the notoriety is worth the price. I’ll be a political figure like I’ve never been before and it will heavily affect my life. A life that may be much longer now.”

“I think you are oblivious to what a huge political figure you are already,” Lee said. “You are already notorious with the Fargone and Earth military. You even have a reputation with the Badgers and their civilization.”

“I just acted for the Mothers, like any clan son,” Gordon objected.

“I should have April and Jeff talk to you,” Lee said. “You’d listen to them better than me. They straightened my thinking out in that regard. I tried to take the same tack that I was just an agent for others with them and they blew that argument out of the water. They made irrefutable arguments that I’m a sovereign now. Not that I welcome that. It’s a burden. But if you aren’t a power in yourself, forcing agreements on nations and with Providence land holdings, you are at the least an agent of both the Mothers and me.”

Gordon closed his eyes and rocked his head back and forth, thinking.

“This is uncomfortable,” he eventually said. “I like to game everything out a hundred ways in my mind and arrange the responses in order of probability before I’m confronted with the reality and have to decide what to do. You had to dump a line of events on me I haven’t gamed out.

“My preliminary thoughts are that you indeed are sovereign, but I am not. I haven’t been signing treaties. I hold lands but in plain ownership. I never asserted I own them by my own power. If I do not wish to become sovereign, I can declare I hold them subject to you, or divest myself of them entirely. You don’t have to make the case to me that sovereignty would be more of a burden than a prize.”

When Lee didn’t say anything right away, he added.

“Don’t get too full of yourself and think this means I’m through raising you. You still have lots of rough edges to smooth off and things I can teach you.”

“I’ll try to stay properly humble,” Lee promised. “Any thought how you would divest yourself of your Providence claims?”

“This is all a new idea,” Gordon said. “Offhand, I could give them to the Mothers. Red Tree would be safer on two planets if not in small areas on each. On the other hand, I’m not sure they would rise to the challenge of governing a vast area. Clans have always had limited boundaries. It might be a damaging gift. I suspect if the Mothers wanted more land, they would have brought the matter up when they encouraged you to reclaim Providence.

“I could open my lands, a full third, not just my old claims with the commission, to Derf of all clans. Make them available like the ungoverned territories where trade towns and freeholders are allowed to organize. That would go a long way towards most of the goals we set to allow gifted young Derf out from under the Mother’s thumbs.”

“A third of a planet is enough to keep some private holdings for a residence and do what you are describing too,” Lee suggested. “I might be persuaded to join you in setting aside areas for homesteading of sorts. The Mothers suggested their ship crews be recruited based on sharing the loot. That would be one way to pay them. It would take some planning and we need to act to reclaim Providence fairly quickly, or it will appear an act of piracy to many, unconnected to their breaking our contract.”

“How about an agreement in principle and you accept I am only your agent?” Gordon asked. “Do you have any problem with me working for you and the Mothers?”

“And Fargone,” Lee reminded him. “I wouldn’t be surprised if you end up a citizen of Badger governed Faraway and Home too before this is all over. Who knows? Maybe even a citizen of Central if their worlds are ever open to us. It could happen.”

“But not a Caterpillar?” Gordon asked.

Lee made a face. “Now you’re just being silly.”

* * *

“The Moon Queen needs to grow up and act like a decent sober statesperson, if she is going to fit in the governance of nations,” The Secretary of State fumed.

“I see no evidence she aspires to be your peer at all,” the President said.

“Exactly! She deems herself my superior!” Porter sneered.

“Just because she can dump rocks on your head any time she pleases,” Wu said.

“Politics isn’t just brute force,” Porter objected.

“Well, not second, third, or fourth in order, no,” Wu agreed.

This conversation was not going the way Porter intended.

“You want me to go to the Moon,” he concluded.

“Not necessarily. I’m not thrilled over it myself, but the Moon Queen wants to talk to the Secretary of State at a minimum. For some reason I can’t quite understand, she sees us as an extension of all the North American administrations behind us and feels we are still tainted by their repeatedly trying to kill her friends and allies. That still puts us ahead of the Chinese I believe, but not by much. I don’t intend to go myself, but I can send whoever is currently Secretary of State,” Wu said.

That was plain enough even for Porter.

“You do know this will be a propaganda bonanza for them?” he still objected. “We will be conferring unprecedented legitimacy on her regime.”

“Oh Porter, keep the trigger words like regime for your press releases,” Wu said. “When have these amateurs ever effectively used propaganda? They are crude in issuing demands, but once they get their way, when have they ever crowed about it?”

Porter thought about that a little. “I do see the pattern you imply. You think they might not even announce my visit?”

“I think there’s a good chance of that if you don’t do it for them.”

Porter looked surprised. “That’s exactly what I would have done. If I announce first then it looks like we took the initiative and are in control.”

“Don’t,” Wu said. “I don’t think they really care how it looks. The Moon Queen isn’t worried about being reelected or how many seats her party holds onto next election.”

“And you’re sure they didn’t organize the strike that wiped out our predecessors?”

“They do have a critical shortage of submarines and I honestly don’t think they have an Earth ally that would do that for them,” Wu assured him. “Don’t fall into the error of believing your own press.”

“What sort of agreement do you expect me to get?” Porter asked.

“At this point, air travel, and to replace our satellites would be a win,” Wu said.

“OK, I will make travel arrangements, quietly,” Porter agreed. The alternative implied seemed to be his resignation, and he’d just started the job. A resignation now would end any career in government service.

He looked alarmed and distressed at a new thought.

“Exactly how am I going to get to Central?” he asked.

“There are still fields capable of handling biz jets. I’d suggest you take one to Cuba or Europe. I know Europe is in range of even small jets with a refueling stop,” Wu said. “I’m not sure if the military has one that can refuel in midair. I think going to Hawaii right now might complicate things with a wrong message.”

* * *

“Yes, that absolutely makes sense to use our stocks to stabilize the markets on Derfhome,” Heather agreed. “I hate to send you right back but I do want Eileen to get the message that is the correct response quickly before they moderate it or feel pressured to change it. I’d like to see Home stay there for some time. It simplifies supply problems for us to be by a living world. Is there any other way we can help keep the Homies from alienating the Derf? No pun intended.”

Jeff spread his hands in frustration. “We have very little besides money to influence them and too much money is already the problem. I see no way to use it that doesn’t just make things worse.”

“If you could induce some of them to move back to the Moon or even Gamma that would help,” April said. “We have no idea if there are any problems at Fargone or if they could absorb more people.”

“Go back to Derfhome and commend the Foys,” Heather said. “Tell them to follow their excellent plan. Then go to Fargone and assess the situation there. No need to run back here again if nothing is happening of any urgency. In fact, you can mention to Gabriel that he may send an occasional status report by ship mail or commercial drone, such as: ‘Still alive. Having a wonderful time.’ Announce we will provide free transport very soon.”

“Good. I need to help Lee safely test their version of our drive,” Jeff said. “They’ll probably be waiting for me when we get back. Are your techs making any progress with the new material here?”

Heather nodded yes. “They followed instructions to make the glassy version exactly and it was functional the first time.”

“I wonder how your step-mom is going to feel about that?” April wondered.

“Your guess is as good as mine,” Jeff said. “Maybe she’ll feel the pressure is off her now that there is another source. Of course, I could have been the other source for years now. If she’d have let me. I don’t think she’s entirely rational about it. The Chinese would happily steal the process for this new material as quickly as the old. They snatch any IP not closely guarded. Will the Chinese stop regarding her as a criminal for stealing her education? With China so broken up now, I have no idea if any faction is still interested in punishing her.”

“I never thought the Chinese especially rational about it either,” April said.

“Which only makes it more confusing,” Jeff complained. “She does have reasons for being paranoid. Who is judging it better? Her or me?”

“Who is smarter?” Heather asked him.

“About people? Definitely, her, just like both of you are. She certainly has more direct experience with China being raised there. Probably more sheer intelligence than me too.”

“Then I’d be reluctant to second guess her,” Heather said. “She is free and China is a fractured mess. If she has used you to that purpose, I can’t see she has harmed you by it, or us for that matter. Much the opposite.”

“Makes more sense than anything I could figure out,” Jeff admitted.

“Go back to Derfhome before I beg both of you to stay,” Heather said. “I miss you but I won’t be fit company until this situation with the North Americans is settled.”

“I’d say stabilized. I’m scared what settled might take,” April said softly.

“Oh, one result of removing North America’s space capabilities is that the Claims Commission suspended all extra-Solar payments. I think that news and you passed each other. Lee and Gordon probably will have heard when you return.”

“Oh joy. I have no idea how she or her great hairy father will react,” April said.

“Or Fargone, or New Japan,” Jeff said. “They both have citizens and corporations holding claims. They frankly worry me more. The jump ship Snoopy departed Derfhome for Fargone as soon as Home entered the system. We wondered if they might not be going there to arm up.”

“There is nothing we can do about any of them. You two go back to Derfhome. I’ll try to stabilize them,” Heather said. “If somebody else settles them then we don’t have to worry about doing it ourselves. They seem bent on making enemies.”

“I have a request,” April said.

“Really? So formal. Must I go into sovereign mode and hear you officially?”

“I don’t think so. I don’t really need Gunny right now and would feel much, much better if you accept the loan of him for a little bit. He’s bored and you are here near Earth without us. Now without Jan and Chen for the first time in ages. Would you do that for me, please?”

Heather regarded Gunny. He’d been standing in the background attracting as much attention as a piece of furniture. He was very good at that if he wanted to be.

“Are you agreeable with that?” Heather asked him.

“It would be my pleasure,” he assured her.

“You’ll likely still be bored,” Heather warned him.

“I have several new books to read. You won’t even know I’m here,” he promised.

“Yeah, sure. He’s kind of decorative anyway,” Heather said. “Go on, get out of here.”

“That was scary,” April told Jeff on the way to the ship. “She sounded just like you.”

* * *

“This is interesting,” Dakota told Heather. “Martini, who does a bit of business with the Turnip, tells me to pass along that the French and the Indians both have a new vessel under construction. They are offering big bonuses for early completion. Rumor in the trade publications is that from the sorts of orders going out for components, both will be capable of orbit to orbit and lander operations.”

“Earth landing?” Heather asked. “That takes a lot more performance.”

“I don’t know about that. Martini went around trying to find out more and nobody would tell him any hard details about the design. But what they did say, like it was no secret at all, was both buyers are Gammans and expect delivery there.”

“We can hardly complain about that,” Heather decided. “We did leave them isolated no matter where we parked them. I’m about to convert a bulk materials carrier to a transport temporarily by adding some scaffolding and seats in the cargo hold. They will move people from Derfhome and Fargone who want to be relocated first. However, send a message to Gamma, to their security again, informing them we’ll make transport available again in a couple of weeks to take people where they’d rather be.”

“If I may suggest,” Dakota said with uncharacteristically polite diffidence, “There are going to be people who don’t just want to be returned somewhere. I predict there will be a steady trickle of people changing their minds and wanting to go back and forth between all three habitats and the several planets.”

“I was trying to do people a favor and unravel this mess, not start a shuttle service.”

“Why not?” Dakota asked. “Maybe send the ship on a circuit. Get on where you are and get off where you please. If you are charitable enough to do a circuit or two for free that’s nice. But after that, start charging. I’ve never seen you or April and Jeff shy to start a business if there was a demand. There was a steady flow of traffic between the habs when they were all close together. Why not now?”

“We’re extremely security conscious with jump ships,” Heather protested.

“Is that really an issue between the habs?” Dakota asked. “Put your own sworn security on them or mandate how they be guarded. The Obarzaneks must be going nuts with the habs gone because they had a nice trade in transportation. Move their ships up to jump status. Can you imagine what sort of security Grandpa Obarzanek would run on their own jump ships? Eventually, you are going to have to expand the privilege of running jump ships beyond peers.”

“Yes, we know,” Heather admitted. Dakota heard that correctly as the small we that was the three of them.

“If it makes you feel better make the Matriarch, Frymeta a peer. That way it’s at least run under her supervision.” Dakota suggested.

“No,” Heather said, disappointing Dakota. “I’ll make her and her daughters Yetta and Laja all peers if she agrees, but I’ll make that offer before I propose anything about running jump ships. They’ve been very loyal and undemanding, although they’ve wanted jump ship status for years. I don’t want to tie the two things together as an offer.”

“That would work,” Dakota said. She wasn’t prepared for Heather to take her suggestion and run with it like that. She never was.

“I’ll still send an ore carrier around a couple of circuits,” Heather said. “It’s going to take that long to convert their ships. It’s a good thing we have this new material to fabricate new drives. With all the drones we’ve lost, we’d have to decide what to disassemble to equip the Obarzaneks’ ships.”

“It’s a shame we didn’t know this to tell Jeff and April before they left,” Dakota thought out loud.

“We’ll send the free transport to Home. They will still get the word it’s coming from you before the other stops. Then on to Fargone and Gamma before they return here. A day layover at each should be sufficient. I think this will all work OK,” Heather decided. “Assuming Frymeta accepts.”

“You aren’t sure?” Dakota asked surprised.

“With Frymeta you never know. It’s like dealing with the Derf. A different mindset.”

“Could you elevate one or both of the sisters if she refused?”

Heather's eyes got big in shock. “That would be like passing over the First Mother to deal with one of her juniors. I’d be directly suggesting they revolt and depose her.”

Dakota just nodded, surprised again. Heather liked one of her two suggestions. That was better than her average score.

* * *

April called Eileen while they were still in orbit. “We’ll be down in a few hours but Heather wanted you to know as soon as possible that she approves of selling the food and hopes it helps. How are things going? Are the Homies getting along with the Derf and not causing too many problems?”

“None of them have killed each other,” Eileen said. “That’s an improvement on the first landing. We had a couple of the early landers get sick on tea and word got around pretty quickly about that. The Derf don’t always know what makes Humans sick. A couple of Humans tried Devil Horn peppers and thought they were poisoned.

“There’s some friction, but less than I expected. One business got caught having different prices for Humans and Derf. I don’t think it helped their Derf business either. Most Derf found that unfair. A few Homies paid silly prices for small items, but when it comes to big things like buying a home, they seem to do their due diligence. It helps that contracts are all public so Homies can check what things cost before they arrived.

“A few were upset they aren’t welcome in the clan territories without an invitation, and nobody seems in any hurry to issue them. Lee informs us that is a lingering attitude because some of the early researchers and scientists were jackasses who left a bad taste in their mouths.”

“Hard to believe,” April said, insincerely.

“Did word reach here yet that the Claims Commission cut off extra-Solar royalties?” Jeff inquired.

“Yeah, it was on the news services, but I haven’t seen much interest in it,” Eileen said. “All the crew with the Little Fleet already knew that was a dead issue for them. We haven’t talked to anybody with payments from previous claims.”

“You haven’t talked to Lee then?” April asked.

“No. We haven’t had any business with her.”

“This is going to be interesting,” April said. “She’s been getting royalties off a class A world and she gave significant property, an entire island there, to her clan Mothers as expansion territory. There was considerable discussion about it with the Mothers. It’s going to be complicated.”

“And her dad Gordon was in on that world claim,” Vic reminded Eileen from the background.

“Oh. Oh dear,” Eileen said imagining just how complicated.

“Yeah,” April agreed. “Vic is right and we’ve been expecting this. It’s not going to play out in a day or two. Nothing else we’re doing will be affected by that. For example, we’re going to Fargone quickly. Jeff has some testing to do with Lee, but they may go to Fargone together. We’ll see. We may not even take the shuttle down if she’s ready to go. We’ll let you know when we return and if anything is happening with Beta at Fargone.”

“Testing with Lee?” Vic asked after the call. “I wish they’d share some details instead of dropping one isolated fact.”

“I know,” Eileen agreed, “I just don’t feel it’s my place to pry.”

* * *

“Are you ready to run a test on the device?” Jeff asked Lee on com.

“It’s on my ship,” Lee said. “We’ve been ready for two days. The software is installed and the normal radio links are sufficient to run it remotely. Is it possible to bring my two researchers along? They are keenly interested and they do deserve to see their work function in the field if it is possible. We have suits borrowed for both of them.”

“I have an extra couch for the Badger, but if you want to bring Born along, he’s going to need to be content with a pad on the back bulkhead and a cargo strap for a seatbelt. That means we’ll have to limit acceleration to what a Derf can handle. I can’t see that as a problem since we shouldn’t have any need for high acceleration. How much can a Derf handle anyway?”

“Three and a half g sustained. Five g for maybe fifteen minutes,” Lee said. “They have more physical strength but don’t breathe much better than Humans under acceleration. Gordon said he experienced eight g for a few seconds as an explorer and didn’t blackout. I’d rather not find out what his or my limits are. He’s older now than back before he worked with my parents. He’s middle-aged for a Derf, but I’m not going to mention that to him if I can avoid it.”

“I forget age can be a sensitive matter,” Jeff admitted. “He’ll lose that when you get Derf life extension working.”

“You sound awfully confident,” Lee said.

“Why not?” Jeff asked. “The metabolic paths are so similar and the genetic expression much the same. If there is a slightly different protein operating at some point they’ll adjust accordingly. If you doubt me, just go to a Fargone gambling site and ask them what kind of odds they’ll give against it ever working.”

Lee laughed. “That seems to be the new standard for probability. Let the Fargoers calculate it for you.”

“They’re very good at it,” Jeff agreed. “If you have no other destination in mind, I’d like to test your drive with a couple of short jumps and then one to Fargone. We’d like to see how Beta is getting on there.”

“That’s fine. If it all goes well, we’ll ride it back instead of running it remotely,” Lee said.

“Braver than me,” Jeff said. “Whatever you feel comfortable doing.”

“Says the guy who did it by accident,” Lee said back to him.

“Oh, they told you that story.” That’s all he said about it. “You’ll want to take the Kurofune from the station manually. Station masters don’t appreciate automatic docks and undocks without a person sitting ready to override, but we can take your techs aboard on the station so only you have to transfer in the outer system. Contact us on com when you are on approach to dock and send them on over.”

“Sounds like a plan,” Lee agreed. “We’ll be up on the next shuttle in about six hours.”

OceanofPDF.com

Chapter 11

“The North American Secretary of State called and is at Armstrong,” Dakota told Heather. “He craves an audience with Your Majesty. Should I tell him to appear at your weekly court or are you going to interrupt your busy schedule to meet this bird?”

“Please tell me he didn’t try to petition Us in fake courtly language,” Heather demanded.

“No that was me trying to pretty it up for him. It roils all the snark in me and raises it to the surface to talk to these people. I just want to scream at them instead of being polite. He also wants to know if he should bring his personal security or leave them at Armstrong.”

“He may do as he pleases with them,” Heather said. “I doubt most people here will know him by sight much less care to harm him. I’d be surprised if any care to approach or engage him in conversation. Most of them have such low expectations of North America they wouldn’t see any point in it. Having them may make him less fearful and better able to pay attention to business. I’ll see him privately whenever he comes. I’d see him after court anyway, so it would be petty to make him wait two days and then sit through the petitions and complaints.”

“I’ll tell him,” Dakota said and excused herself.

* * *

Lee followed Dionysus’ Chariot in Kurofune on a path that would take them past a minor gas giant into the outer fringes of the Derfhome system.

“If you will kill your drive and go ballistic, I’ll put the drive on my nose grapple,” Lee requested.

“Shouldn’t you have a companion for safety if you’re going EV?” Jeff asked. “I didn’t think to ask how you were going to do that. One of us can come help if you wish.”

“How did you do it when your first drive was mounted that way?” Lee asked.

“I had four drones with instrument packs. They worked together to push it on the grapple remotely. When I lost the drones, I had to go out and get it back in the hold manually. It wasn’t fun,” Jeff admitted. “It’s bad to be out there alone, but worse to both be outside with nobody to back you up in the ship.”

“We have a temporary deployment system rigged to let me do it without going EV solo. There is a winch behind the grapple knuckle and a cable run from it back to the storage locker and wrapped around the grapple pin. The hatch is shimmed not to close completely and damage the cable. All I have to do is open the hatch and rotate the ship gently away from the drive. It will float out the hatch and drift away from the ship. I need to slowly turn the ship to keep it pointed at the drive and gently reel it in. It will give me a light on my board when the pin is close enough to grab. I think it will work,” Lee said. “It did in simulation after I got the hang of it.”

“I like it,” Jeff said. “Everything is connected and you can’t lose them like happened with my drones for our first test.

“If I don’t get carried away and rush it,” Lee said. “I could get it moving too fast and break the cable or fail to keep the ship pointed at it. If I rush reeling the cable in at the last, it could swing across the center line like a pendulum and smack the nose of the ship faster than I could turn the ship to avoid it. That happened a few times in sim.”

“Take your time please,” Jeff said. “We aren’t on any schedule.”

It was over a half-hour before Lee informed him the grapple was closed and a green light said it was locked.

“I’m opening a computer port for remote operation,” Lee said. “Tell me when you have acquired it and have a live board. I want one of you to test it before I come across.”

“We have a board that should mirror yours,” Jeff said. “April is going to align the Kurofune with us and roll it so your lock is facing us. Keep your hands off your board for a moment and let’s see how it works.”

Born and Musical watched all this with intense interest but stayed silent.

Lee made a dramatic show of her hands palms out by her shoulders. The ship rolled and then turned, careful separate motions until Dionysus’ Chariot showed out her right port.”

“Does it show the drive menu?” Lee asked.

“Everything,” April assured her. “It’s displaying system status for everything. I scrolled through it. Jeff pumped down the lock and will open the outer door, ready for you.”

“Coming across then,” Lee said, closing her helmet and retreating to the lock.

Everyone listened to the lock cycle and status lights told the same story on Jeff and April’s boards. Lee came forward and took her seat beside Musical in the second-tier seats, her faceplate open but her helmet on. April and Jeff were of the same risk-averse habit. Her board was live but Musical’s had only the screen active.

Jeff was looking at Lee concerned.

“Is your EV gear stowed where it will be safe if we maneuver?” Jeff worried. “You didn’t ask for a locker to stow it.”

Lee blinked and looked confused.

“This is my EV gear,” she said sweeping a hand down her suit.

“Do you have a reaction pistol or something?” Jeff persisted, eyes searching for one.

“It was only fifty meters,” Lee said. “I just jumped.”

“What happens if you miss?” Jeff asked. His voice had an odd edge to it.

“I’d die of embarrassment if I could miss something the size of a lock opening at fifty meters,” Lee said. “Did you expect me to rig a line and come across hand over hand?”

“I would, if I didn’t have a thruster pack,” Jeff admitted.

“If I ever ask you to go EV for me I’ll rig one for you,” Lee promised.

She didn’t say that unkindly. Her tone was entirely factual, not sarcastic. Still, Musical looked over his shoulder at Born and they silently locked eyes for a moment. They were learning all sorts of things. Lee was aware of her guys’ byplay but ignored it, moving right ahead with their test.

“I’m moving the Kurofune off a kilometer laterally. I assume you want to start with a fairly short jump?” Lee said. “What is the lower limit for your unit to transition?”

“Twelve percent power seems to be the lower limit of our current design,” Jeff told her. “Drop two-tenths of a percent under that and it’s a toss-up if it works or not. Three tenths and you know it won’t. I suspect it’s just the variations in the noise of our power supply that will trip the quantum limit or not. The minimum jump seems to be about twelve thousand kilometers but the increases are not linear. I suggest you start very low and work up a half percent each step. Set your board to orient the ship and direct a pulse back to us for ranging to join it.”

Lee got a look of intense concentration and frowned.

“If you have other thoughts on how to do it, I won’t take offense if you express them,” Jeff assured her.

“It’s just the realization that if we lose the ship this is likely when it happens,” Lee said. “If I were piloting it and it ends up an unexpected distance or direction away, I could probably recover it by reversing the sequence. It’s hard to commit to doing this.”

“You are much more valuable and irreplaceable than a starship,” April said.

“If it vanishes, we’ll have learned a great deal and proceed from there,” Jeff said. “However, we’ll still have you.”

“I’m probably worried more than usual. It was so expensive and the Claims Commission just cut off my cash flow,” Lee admitted. “The Kurofune is going to be vital to correcting that situation.”

“My Lady, we have ships and can see to that if you are down to your last billion or two,” Jeff quipped. “Clear your mind of these secondary problems and give your full attention to the task at hand.”

“Oh my God, you’re doing the honorific thing now too,” Lee said.

“We discussed that,” April said. “We are bound to you several ways that make that proper.”

Lee nodded and composed herself while Born and Musical did some more intense nonverbal communication.

“Flip and ping macro set. Testing it here first,” Lee said, forging ahead.

The Kurofune rolled over a half turn and emitted a weak radar pulse behind them.

“I have it set on a five-degree cone,” Lee told them. “It has the emission characteristics of a heavy cruiser. I’ll set it back up to start at ten percent power. It will repeat at ten-minute intervals until it reaches full power unless I stop it. We don’t want the full power mode to hit us too closely. That should be safe and detectable at any reasonable distance. I’m aiming it back the same as us manually. The macro is thus undisturbed.

“I’m starting the drive at two percent power and increasing it each time by a half percent. I’ll call them off as it proceeds.”

At eight and a half percent power the Kurofune disappeared in a flash and a thump rattled Dionysus’ Chariot.

Lee held her breath.

“Ping,” Jeff said. “The time stamp on the ping indicates twelve-thousand-kilometer range. Too bad. I was hoping we might find a way to go shorter, but that seems to be the minimum for now.”

“Typical quantum phenomenon,” Lee agreed. “Want to catch up and we’ll do two more short jumps to be able to roughly compare our settings. We can fill out a bunch of points on the full graph later.”

“Anxious to test the big one?” April asked amused.

“Yes. What is your transition threshold for an interstellar jump?” Lee asked.

“Sixty-two percent power without any significant velocity or help from an external field,” Jeff said. “If you have velocity towards the target or a high negative potential it drops.”

“What happens if you aim off where there is no significant known mass at high power?” Lee wondered.

“Nobody has wanted to find out. Some suspect the few ships that disappeared and never reached their destination found out. If they had corrupted data or just a simple mechanical failure and were aimed wrong, they still went somewhere,” Jeff asserted.

“Maybe,” April hedged. “Unless they are still suspended in an indeterminate state.”

“Yes, the purgatory hypothesis,” Jeff said. “I’d rather not mix physics and theology.”

“Why not? It’s a miracle every time it happens,” April averred. “Tell me it leaves you unmoved.”

“It’s very moving,” Jeff said. That got a sharp look from April but she didn’t pursue whether he meant it literally and was toying with her.

“We also have not tested what will happen if you aim to jump through a star,” Jeff told Lee. “With the abundance of special material you’ve brought us maybe we’ll be able to afford a test vehicle to find out what happens.”

“OK, Doubling the power up to seventeen percent…”

Jeff interrupted Lee.

“I believe you’ll find that excessive. I suggest you go ten percent power.”

“Thank you. Going to ten percent,” Lee corrected.

That increase tripled the distance.

“I see what you mean,” Lee said. “Another percent?”

“Try just a half-percent,” Jeff suggested.

That yielded a half-light hour and Lee would have been worried waiting for the return ping without Jeff and April being so calm. She didn’t even say anything to reveal her doubts until the signal came in. Jeff brought them back beside the Kurofune.

“You don’t talk to your ship,” Lee said.

That was obviously a complete non sequitur from the confusion on Jeff’s face.

“It’s neither friend nor pet,” he said reasonably.

“When I rode with Gabriel, he did most of the operations by voice with his AI, Dilbert. He even had the Cricket come to him at the Armstrong field on its own. It spoke with the controllers and they knew each other. It can do docking on its own perfectly well. He just spoke dealing with my people and when we landed at an unimproved field.”

Jeff and April slowly looked at each other. April with a grimace and Jeff with frank horror.

“Oh crap. I stuck my foot in it,” Lee realized. “He didn’t tell me it was a secret from you.”

“The Cricket is his ship,” Jeff said. “He’s an adult and can do any bloody foolish thing he pleases.”

“He knows you wouldn’t approve,” Lee guessed. “What little I saw of Gabriel said he avoids conflict.”

“Indeed, he is of the ‘better to ask forgiveness than permission’ school,” April agreed. “It makes it difficult for me to trust him, but Heather trusts him. Until such a time as one of his hidden adventures ends in horrible failure, he’ll get away with it.”

“And that event may be fatal, so we don’t have to worry about any future indiscretions,” Jeff predicted. “Though we may never know what it was if he just disappears.”

“Those trips to New Japan,” April said cryptically, looking at Jeff again.

“Yes, that’s where he had to get it,” Jeff agreed, understanding her reasoning. “I don’t think we have anyone who could produce that polished a product.”

“We need to know much more,” April said. “Now, when I deal with a New Japan ship, I will be aware I may not be dealing with a Human. I hate that sort of deception with social secretaries. This is worse since ships are life-critical.”

“On the other hand, if New Japan has made real progress and it presented itself honestly as an AI, it might be useful in applications like drones,” Jeff said.

“I never thought you’d abide them for anything,” April said.

“I have yet to meet an AI I can’t confuse and get to say something stupid in just a few minutes,” Jeff said. “If I can do that it can be induced to make bad decisions as a pilot. Introduce me to one that can reason in any depth, and I’d accept it has limited uses.”

“You can be a very difficult man,” Lee told him. “I can confuse most people and get them to say something totally silly in a few minutes. It seems to me you are demanding higher standards of the machine than people.”

“She’s got you there,” April said.

“I’ll consider that further,” Jeff promised. “We have to consider such things as agency and motivation. I’m not sure how you program those into an AI. Before you say it again, yes, I have problems with the higher functions in people too. I demand higher standards of a jump pilot than your average person. We need to look into this but for right now let’s get back to the question of going to Fargone. Are you ready?”

“Yes, what setting do you think will work?” Lee asked.

“Fifteen or twenty percent should suffice. It’s a decent sized star and not a long jump. Higher power will take you a little deeper in-system on arrival. Let’s jump on the same tick. I suggest you set your ship to turn and radiate a wider search pattern with shorter intervals between pings. If we have any trouble finding it, I have some drones that can spread out in a search pattern and listen for her.”

“I’m at twenty percent power, oriented, and have the program set to turn and radiate differently,” Lee said ten minutes later.

“Checking distance,” Jeff said. “Twelve hundred meters. That’s plenty. This is your party. I’m slaving the Chariot to accept your count. Set the countdown on your clock so you can say you initiated your first jump. Oh, this counts towards a Central Jump Master ticket if you are interested in being certified. Do watch carefully,” Jeff said over his shoulder to include the passengers. “It’s easy to blink and miss the whole thing. There wasn’t anything to see before, but now Fargone’s star will suddenly appear.”

“The Kurofune will be gone in ten seconds from – MARK,” Lee said depressing a key.

Everyone was intensely silent.

“Sweet little goddesses afire!” Musical said from his seat.

“See? The Badgers find it a religious experience too,” April told Jeff.

“You’ve been through jump coming to Derfhome,” Born objected to his workmate.

“And if you think I was of a station to be invited to the control room to witness it you have an exaggerated opinion of my importance,” Musical assured him. “Have you ever done it before?”

“First time for me,” Born said not nearly as impressed. “It’s very nice to see what we made work.”

“And there is the Kurofune at twenty-two seconds and a bit. We practically ran into her.” Jeff said cutting Musical off from commenting on Born’s irreverence “What now? Do you want to come along to Fargone with us? We’re going to dock at Beta and scope out how things are going.”

“I don’t have a process to get the drive back in storage alone. I planned on going back and letting some of Red Trees people at Derfhome station come out with a scooter and give me a hand. How do you grapple on to dock with the drive out front on your nose? I couldn’t see what was happening with the Cricket.”

“Then Gabriel cut the video feed to your board. It swings back out of the way into a recess. Kind of like the nose wheel on an airplane,” Jeff explained with a bent wrist. “I wouldn’t expect you to make those sorts of major modifications until you saw it works.

“That sounds like Gabriel, being needlessly secretive. What are you smiling about?” Lee asked. She was worried something was amusing about her again.

“Just that an Earth government would have never done a test flight like this. They’d modify the ship to dock even if there was no need and have a test procedure document thousands of pages long.”

“And delay several years to do it until everybody had a chance to demonstrate their authority by demanding changes,” April said. “Then, you’d have a hundred controllers cross-checking each other and reading what you should do next to you, line by line. If everybody is responsible it effectively makes no one person responsible if it goes wrong.”

“Well, I have no business at Fargone,” Lee said. “I’d have been as happy to do this to an uninhabited star system. I’m just going to go back to Derfhome.”

“Oh, I didn’t realize that,” Born said from the back. “I was looking forward to seeing Fargone or at least the station.”

“We’ll only be a day, but you can stay with us and return tomorrow,” April offered. That at least gives you a chance to see Beta and Fargone from orbit. How about you, Musical?”

“I’d much rather do that too,” he agreed.

“No problem. I don’t mind going solo,” Lee said. “I have three presets for short jumps and my normal drive. It will be far easier than spending days under acceleration to be able to jump.”

“I’ll pull in close to let you board her,” Jeff said. If Lee noticed he edged in carefully to a scant ten meters away she said nothing. He waited until she was inside and the outer door was closed to pull away.

“Thank you,” Lee said on com before she departed. Any hard feelings from when Jeff almost denied her their software seemed to be completely gone. They watched until the Kurofune disappeared in a flash of light and a thump.

“It didn’t thump when we jumped together,” Musical said. “Why?”

“We left before the wavefront reached us at light speed,” Jeff explained.

“Did you really want to go to Fargone or were you afraid to cross to the Kurofune?” Born asked.

“I wanted to go, but if I hadn’t, I’d have asked anyway after the way she boarded untethered,” Musical admitted. “I’d have had to humiliate myself and ask Lee to rig a line. I don’t know how to use the clamp on suit jets and I’d be terrified to jump.”

“That’s just good sense,” Jeff said. “Be assured, I’ll never think less of you for that. By our standards, your patron is out of her mind to jump untethered when she doesn’t have to. She may do it ten thousand times flawlessly but sooner or later something will go bad and we can only hope we’ll be able to rescue her. You will note I didn’t volunteer to go out and stow the drive for her. I was an exhausted sweaty mess the one time I had to do it for us. If I never go EV again that’s fine with me.”

“That makes me feel better,” Musical said. “But given our different relationship, I’m never going to be the one who tells Lee that. I’ll leave it to you if it ever becomes necessary.”

“I’ve already put my foot in my mouth with Lee recently,” Jeff admitted. “I’d like to stay on her good side. She can eyeball it out the hatch and jump for Derfhome if she wants, as long as she doesn’t ask me to do the same.”

OceanofPDF.com

Chapter 12

Secretary Porter was shocked to find Armstrong wasn’t as pro-Earth or pro-North America as he’d been informed. The first private taxi he attempted to hire had turned him down with words that would have put the driver in prison in North America. The second had a mask of stone descend over his face and demanded ten ounces for a private ride to Central.

“Ounces of what?” Porter demanded.

“Gold. Do I look like some fool who’d take USNA toilet paper?” the man demanded.

Porter checked his pad. At the current exchange rate that was a hundred times the published fee for a private limo to Central on the local web. It was also an illegal transaction back home. Even if he was in a different legal jurisdiction, he’d never hear the end of it back in Vancouver. It was the sort of technically legal action one could never justify to political enemies. It said pretty clearly that the man didn’t want his business, so he walked away and was reduced to using public transportation.

The bus to Central from Armstrong cost much less, was clean, and had nicer seats than some airliners. Certainly, they were roomier. It also had two restrooms and a vending snack bar. There were free data ports and video. Porter disdained it not in comparison to a city bus because he’d never been on one in his life. It simply wasn’t something one of his class suffered. Nobody gave them a second glance or spoke to them.

When he stepped through the connector to Central a man was waiting with a pad held up that said, PORTER in bright green on black filling the screen. He was leaning against a cart that only needed a canopy to belong on any golf course he’s ever played.

“I’m Porter,” he said and felt silly. He and his guards were dressed so differently it was obvious.

“My Lady asked me to take you to her residence, Mr. Porter,” Mo said. “It’s some distance so you need a ride.”

Mo walked around and took the driver’s seat. The guards took the rear so Porter perforce took the front passenger seat. Mo noted they had no luggage so they didn’t plan to stay overnight.

They fumbled with unfamiliar lap belts as there was no passive restraint system. Mo touched a pad on the dash and a screen said the cart was in standby service, and then that it was on manual when they were all buckled. At least there was a windscreen but no doors and nothing to protect you in a side crash. They entered one of four tunnels radiating from the bus stop.

“What is your position on Miss Anderson’s staff?” Parker asked. He phrased it that way to get back at Mo for calling him, Mister. My Lady indeed…

“I’m Heather’s Chief Engineer and architect, but I do a little bit of everything. I designed her residence and court. I’m a mining engineer so tunnels and such were already my specialty.”

They came to a stop at the end of the tunnel about a hundred meters from the bus terminal. Mo flipped a switch and leaned back in his seat, releasing his grip on the wheel. The dash changed status to auto.

“I designed and maintain the traffic system we’re entering. In a bit, we will be going down. I had a heavy hand in designing the elevator system standards although I got some very good input from others. I’m the principal architect of the farming system or as we call them the cabbage mines.”

“And a driver for visitors,” Porter said skeptically, uncertain if they were being fed a tall story for the fun of seeing what newbies would believe.

Another cart whizzed past just off their nose. There was no way to see from the side tunnel that it was coming. The cart pulled into the larger tunnel on its own, now that it was clear, and accelerated. There was no lighting in this tunnel so a single spotlight came on, pointed down, and to the edge of the roadway far ahead. When another cart passed going the other way it was so close Porter flinched. The tunnel wall was similarly close but Mo didn’t bother to keep his hands on the wheel, sitting back, relaxed, and trusting his system. He did watch the roadway ahead to see it was clear.

“I happened to be on the surface to deal with a problem with one of the road paving machines. Heather demands her sworn people wear a lot of different hats. We have nothing like union work rules or restrictive licensing. I worked as a mining engineer on Earth so I’ve experience with that. I’ve had to sit and wait for an electrician before because I wasn’t deemed competent to reset a breaker. Here, I’ve worked as a space traffic controller, sealing corridor walls, and once planting trays of scallions when the cabbage mines were short-handed. It’s a one-way trip for me to deliver you, saving at least a half-man-hour that otherwise would be totally wasted by somebody making a round-trip to the surface. All the sworn simply do what is needed.”

“Sounds like communism to me,” Porter decided.

“More feudalism,” Mo assured him. If Porter intended to insult him Mo didn’t respond that way. “I’m one of less than a hundred peers. I resisted accepting that status for a long time because I had other obligations and felt I’d be divided in my loyalties. My children are independent now and my wife divorced and moved back to Earth. I felt I could accept the honor without any reservations. Somebody who is just a resident may run their own business or have a job with set hours and duties. Heather wouldn’t expect loyalty from them or to be able to call on them to drop their own interests to serve her.”

“What is the advantage of being a peer?” Porter wondered.

That made Mo silent for a moment. Porter thought maybe he wasn’t going to answer.

“Nobody has asked me that before,” Mo admitted. “I had to think about it. I get more work piled on than I can do,” Mo said smiling. “Heather would probably cite that as a benefit. That’s not a problem since I love my work. You don’t get a different pay rate for being a peer. I think the biggest thing is that Heather values any productive resident, but for any of her peers she would go to war. If I had a problem beyond my means to solve or wanted a starship made available, I’d ask her, assured that I’d be taken care of without counting the cost. Being a resident is a privilege but being a peer gives one a protected status. I have a safety net in my sovereign because I know she values me. I don’t get any discounts and I can’t cut in line, but being a peer means I get treated with respect in the community.”

“I see,” Porter said. He did see but he didn’t entirely believe it.

The cart pulled off into a recessed area along the tunnel wall, reversed into an open elevator, and the door closed across their nose. The elevator car was so tight they couldn’t have stepped out of the cart on either side. The elevator dropped for a long time. When it stopped it moved sideways for a couple of minutes and then resumed dropping.

“How deep are we going?” Porter asked.

For the first time, Mo looked unfriendly. “That’s a datum I’d rather not provide. If it had been me arranging your visit, I’d have made you strip and made sure you didn’t have an inertial navigation module on you. Heather is too polite for her own safety. I once was forced to collect targeting data for North America so I know how you work.”

“Nobody even checked us for weapons,” one of the guards volunteered.

“Nobody would care if you wore them openly,” Mo said. “We have enough trouble with Armstrong that you were cleared of heavy weapons, explosives, and bioagents before you ever got on the bus. Everybody gets scanned that much. You have a standard-issue pistol and your blond buddy has that, and a smaller one in an ankle holster, a Bucky Braid, and a plastic knife. We credit you with enough sense to know a direct assassination would lead to the destruction of North America.”

It was interesting he got no argument on that statement. Mo had expected one.

After they stopped going down, they still traveled again horizontally. Porter started wondering just how big Central was.

Turning off the tunnel with traffic, they entered another lighted tunnel with a walkway along the edge and slowed. Mo assumed manual control again barely above walking speed. There was an area to pull over and Mo stopped there. The dash screen said the car was in standby service again.

“Dakota, Heather’s assistant and office manager, is coming to let you in,” Mo said.

Porter hesitated. It would be bad form to insist on sitting until the door opened. He just nodded thanks and got out. A woman opened the door and looked at them expectantly before they were halfway there. When he looked over his shoulder Mo was gone.

“Mr. Secretary? If you will follow me, I’ll make you comfortable. You may address me as Dakota. Consider me Heather’s secretary. My Lady will join us in just a few minutes.”

“Thank you,” Porter said, nodding his acceptance. At least this minion knew how to address him.

They crossed a vast hall done in tall buttresses like a cathedral and with bright murals above, but with the lights turned low at foot level so they got an impression of size but only the patterned terrazzo floor was well lit. The sounds of their hard-soled shoes contrasted with their guide who had on soft slippers that were silent. The side alcoves were dark with dark shapes barely discernible. Near the end were simple wooden benches and a small table with a carpet in front of it and a matching wooden chair that they bypassed.

A door slid open as they approached and they went down a short hall with a dead end and turn off before it. Porter noticed the door though quiet was a half meter thick. There was a second door after the turn.

The room they entered could have belonged to any nice suite in an Earth hotel. Porter had no idea how the Moon Queen would live. If she’d live in ostentatious excess like a third world dictator or some unique style that had no Earth counterpart. There was a sunken area with two tiers and a huge stone slab table in the center. The overhead was recessed in steps with lighting increasing towards the top. It mirrored the seating pit below. There was no glitter, patterns, or texture. The color was a bright blue, but Porter suspected that was lighting. A large picture, almost a mural on the wall might be a screen rather than art, but it was difficult to tell. It showed a bench in a garden life-size.

“I’ve ordered coffee and snacks,” Dakota informed them. “Does anyone prefer tea or soft drinks?”

“I’d like a Coke if you have it,” one of the guards requested.

“I know we do,” Dakota said. She was then silent, so the order must have been sent by spex.

The lady who brought the coffee used a cart with a large tray for the coffee service and a separate tray with some small sandwiches, pastries, crudités, and the Coke. They went on the low central table.

His security looked at Porter and he gave a nod of assent. He hardly thought they would poison them.

The cups were so thin they looked impossibly fragile but were opaque. When Porter used a spoon to stir it had an odd sheen. He was certain it wasn’t silver but it wasn’t stainless either.

Heather came in with a large man trailing her and sat opposite them across the table between Dakota and the new man. The fellow immediately poured coffee for himself which seemed an odd protocol. He seemed a man of few words, just lifting an eyebrow to Heather and poured for her when she nodded.

“This is Mack Tindal,” Heather said of her companion. “He’s security on loan from my partner and peer April. I don’t usually keep personal security present, but she has been concerned for me so I am accepting his services to comfort her. She and our partner Jeff Singh have both been targets of assassination attempts. I have not, if you discount nuking the entire city. I can understand why they have developed a healthy paranoia. Don’t be surprised if he or my secretary Dakota feel free to comment in our discussion. We’re not terribly formal that way.”

“We will be more formal that way,” Porter said. “I don’t normally introduce my security. Nor do they have any standing to speak for North America.”

“Which brings up the question of how binding your agreement is on North America,” Heather said.

“I was sent directly on the President’s orders. If we can’t get any concessions, you should expect it will result in the failure of our government so the point is moot. You’ll have to deal with our successor if that happens. We are willing to push it to that point.”

That was such a blunt assessment of their precarious position that Heather was shocked he’d admit it. Porter’s bodyguards looked rattled too, but they’d already grown progressively twitchy since Heather arrived. The one with extra weapons had shifted his weight forward when he took his coffee and never returned to his previous relaxed posture. Gunny didn’t like it and decided if they became a threat the tense man would die first. He consulted the veracity software in his spex. It could provide much more about a subject’s mental state than the likelihood of a statement’s truth.

Gunny centered that subject in his vision and asked for a reading.

“This man is strongly afraid at a level that would drive many to flee or to action,” the program said.

“Anticipating an act of his own?” Gunny asked.

“Insufficient data. May I examine the video and audio backlog since you entered the room?”

“Yes,” Gunny agreed.

“Processing,” the software said.

After a few seconds, it said. “Utilizing external databases and processing.” That was unusual for the onboard program in his spex to need help. It took a full thirty seconds to report.

“The man atypically spiked emotionally when he saw you. Pupil dilation and heart rate elevated. His partner became upset when he saw his companion was upset. That continued and increased each time he looked at his partner until he plateaued. Both have now passed their peak organic reaction and settled down significantly.”

“Give me a reading on this man,” Gunny instructed, looking at Porter.

The machines took a long time again and asked for access to the house safety sensors. Fortunately, Heather had given him unlimited privileges to that system. He wouldn’t have interrupted her, not even silently.

“With moderate probability, this man is displaying physiological signs of grieving. He is depressed. Checking the house data against your earlier query confirms all previous conclusions.”

Gunny closed the program with his spex. He’d missed a few words but the conversation was still on theme. Porter’s security was running similar software on Gunny and didn’t like what they were seeing at all. His lack of concern wasn’t just a façade.

“I’m not saying we regard you favorably,” Porter was explaining. “We are privately willing to assure you we will take no further aggressive action in exchange for some moderation. It’s politically impossible to change direction radically because public opinion has been formed against you for too long. We don’t have any real opposition party yet. The public is somewhat accepting of those placed in power by the military. When the previous government was… removed, the military had much higher trust ratings than the civilian government. They had the good sense to retain a semblance of the previous government by not showing someone in a uniform in charge to the public. If we appear too friendly to Spacers, it is our opinion the public will vote overwhelmingly for anyone else in new elections.”

“So overwhelming you couldn’t fake the vote to appear otherwise?” Heather asked.

“I know you think ill of us but that isn’t something the current administration wants to do,” Porter said.

“That’s what happened to Wiggen,” Heather reminded him. “She failed to act against us and saw the reality that you are on the wrong end of the gravity gradient to fight a serious war.”

“That is before my time,” Porter said. “I studied that in college. There was considerable disagreement about what really happened. Many of the official records were destroyed. Let me ask. Was Wiggen secretly an agent of Home while still in office?”

“You see?” Dakota asked Heather.

“Indeed, I do,” Heather had to admit.

“I’m not following you,” Porter admitted.

“My Secretary is alluding to a previous conversation in which she warned the seminal events such as Wiggen’s overthrow are dead history to the current leaderships such as you. They may as well have happened to the Romans to have any emotional impact on your decision making. Yet Wiggen is fresh in my memory. Not only from the events when she fled to Home but I saw her just a few months ago having dinner in a club while I was there with my partners. She never worked for anyone but North America. Not that it was appreciated. If anybody wanted to know what happened you have a living witness to the times and events. But no historian has ever shown up to interview her to my knowledge. Of course, she was one of the thousands North America tried to kill by destroying Home. Perhaps removing those witnesses to an ugly past would be a bonus to that operation if not a primary objective.”

“You hate us,” Porter said. “Even though we are not the previous government.”

“Indeed, I loathe you,” Heather admitted. “Those feelings have taken as long to form as your public’s opinion of us and will be as hard to reverse. You admit you are captive to the fruits of that government’s campaign of propaganda and can’t deviate too far from it. You have yet to demonstrate you are different in any way that matters to us. Yet I’m willing to negotiate in a very limited manner with you. We have always regarded your population as held hostage to your policies and lies.

“If it weren’t for those common people under your control, we’d have wiped North America’s government off the map years ago. It’s just a problem of how to do one and not the other. Somebody, not us in case you wondered, did a very thorough decapitation of your previous government and what did it gain them? Nothing that I can see. You’d have to do it over and over before you could make a dent in the queue waiting to assume power. That’s why I suspect it was a coup for internal power, not another country.

“We should have fought you and paid the butcher’s bill in the past rather than allow you access to the stars. It never seems to get cheaper to put that off by appeasing you. I won’t make that mistake again today. We are beyond your reach in the stars and I’m going to make sure it stays that way.”

“Then let me appeal to you to moderate some of your sanctions for the sake of those common people,” Porter said. “It’s impossible to provide a modern life for our citizens without international air travel. We can’t have normal commerce with the rest of the globe without that.”

“I’d argue that. You’ve shut down air traffic on your own on four occasions in my lifetime for war or plague and you still exist. Most things can move by ship, rail, or truck. If you can’t buy fresh flowers and fruit from South America in the winter you could live with that hardship. We manage without a lot of cheap luxuries from Earth.

“Your air transport system is a convenience and a backup to military transport so you can call upon it at need. If we allow you to restore all these airports you will develop and conceal orbital capable assets until it would take a huge campaign again to end it. No, you are out of the space business. I’m not interested in helping you project power again up here or on the Slum Ball.”

Porter got an uncontrolled tic after Heather used that expression.

“A limited number then,” Porter suggested, “few enough not to be a threat or difficult to remove if misused.”

“That could work,” Heather agreed. “One on each coast with runways to handle large planes. Seattle and New York or similar, but open to foreign airlines and each other. You name them and I’ll inform my people to spare them.”

“Similarly, no modern nation can live without satellite services,” Porter said. “The present satellites need constant replenishment or supply. You are aware of all they do I believe.”

Gunny helped himself to some of the sandwiches everyone else was ignoring. He seemed relaxed and unconcerned but his slightest movement alarmed Porter’s guards enough to register on his software.

“We tried to avoid damaging civilian satellites,” Heather said. “The majority of nations are still not capable of building and launching their own satellites. They purchase those services. You can do the same.”

Porter nodded, thinking furiously, but unable to form an argument that didn’t amount to national pride.

“As you pointed out, the air transport system is integral to the military. The ability to monitor, and do command and control from orbit is also. We won’t be able to defend ourselves as you would leave us.”

“I believe you provided launch service for other nations' military satellites,” Heather said. “It’s time for them to return the favor. I know that doesn’t put you in the driver’s seat. Too bad, you’ll just have to be an actual ally and deal with them more as equals. Who exactly can threaten you? China is a mess and India has no designs on you. Europe and Latin America are too divided to pose a threat. If they held a summit to ally against you, they’d get stalled deciding where everyone would sit or what to have for lunch. If I thought it was a serious issue, I’d offer protection for us endangering you, but I think it’s a moot point.”

“I think the obvious answer to that is Texas,” Porter said.

“Ah, Texas. The problem there is that wouldn’t bother us at all. To us, Texas is pretty much a breakaway faction of North America with better manners. I have yet to catch them at any intelligence operation against us and they haven’t imposed any restraints on trade between us. Unless my sources are wrong a considerable portion of your economy is dependent on the black-market trade with Texas.

“For some reason, they haven’t approached me to seek support to undermine you. Their culture is more yours than Mexican and yet the old border is ignored, wide open, and thriving on both sides after being invited to send senators to Austin. Even the provinces from Coatzacoalcos east are effectively self-governing without any attempts at forcing them into joining the rest in sending representatives to Texas. You should do half as well with Quebec. They even use the same money and honor each other’s licensing. If you can’t form some compromise with people who are so easy going then I can’t see them supplanting you as a tragedy.”

“Slowly normalizing relations with Texas and occupied Mexico is a goal of my administration,” Porter said.

Heather laughed. “Yes, it wouldn’t do to move too quickly. Send somebody undercover and poll the people in the street or go in a café down there and ask them if they feel occupied.”

“They did take the eastern territory by force of arms,” Porter reminded her.

“Oh, totally true,” Heather said. “I do have to admire how they did it without destroying everything as they went or displacing the population. Almost as easy as inviting the Mexican states to send senators to Austin. It makes me wonder why they haven’t invited your states to do the same.”

“Oh my God, they have,” Dakota said.

“Are you running software on him?” Heather asked.

“I don’t have to,” Dakota said with a dismissive wave of her hand. “I could practically hear his teeth grinding and his muscle looked at each other. My wetware picked that broadcast up without computer support.”

“Well, that’s interesting but not politic to say. You have to understand, Mr. Secretary. We don’t look it but we are all past the century mark. You do become more perceptive in reading people, but we also seem to display some of the same qualities of naturally older people such as speaking our mind much more freely.”

“Thanks for the reminder. I had some experience of that with my mother.”

“Was there anything else then?” Heather wondered.

“About the starships in distant systems surviving your war on them…”

Heather cut Porter off with a chop of her hand and anger flared on her face.

“They better reflag or better yet never come home. I’m aware you sent a flurry of communications by ship and drone after your attack on our allies failed. We have no idea what your instructions were, but if a USNA military vessel shows up in the Solar System it will surrender or be destroyed. If you need to alter their orders with that in mind you would be well advised to do so. You will get no kind of armistice nor any treaty from me. I’ve had my fill of false treaties. You’d just use it to regroup to hit us again. You perpetuated this state of hostilities. Now you can damn well live with it.”

Porter just nodded. She was in such a temper nothing was safe to say.

“I think that minor humanitarian allowance is as much as we can agree on right now,” Heather said. “It’s more than I expected. We don’t have any requests. If after a few years the situation changes we may have more to discuss. I noticed for example you made no offer to drop trade restrictions or to moderate much less reverse the lies your media still put forth about Spacers and Life Extension. Most of those things you could and should have corrected unilaterally. We’ve grown to be independent of necessity so there is no need to beg trade of you. Think about that.”

“Might I have a document for me to show my President?” Porter asked.

“Dakota, print off a statement that we will not interfere with one international airport on each coast of North America, open to foreign airlines but not orbital service. I’ll stamp a copy for us and a copy for Secretary Porter to take home. Do you have anyone headed for the surface to return them to Armstrong?”

“Allow me to do that,” Gunny requested. “I’d like to see them to the lock and make sure they don’t get into any mischief along the way.”

“Very well. Check the bus schedule, if there isn’t one leaving soon, call them a private car and tell them to charge it to the sovereign’s accounts,” Heather said.

“Thank you,” Porter said.

Heather had an after-thought.

“Be aware, this concession for two ports of entry only applies if you stop trying to circumvent our blockade elsewhere. If you keep trying to repair or construct launch facilities elsewhere the deal for two airports on the coasts is off.”

Porter nodded his understanding.

Dakota put two hard copies before Heather to stamp with her hanko and gave one to Porter in a folio. Pointedly, Porter wasn’t invited to sign either. It was a grant, not a contract because North America gave nothing. Gunny stood and folded two more of the sandwiches in a napkin to enjoy on the way.

“The cart should be there by the time we go out the door,” he said and led them away.

OceanofPDF.com

Chapter 13

There was a bus departing in twenty minutes from when they arrived at the terminal. Gunny made sure they had tickets and sat in the cart until he saw them board.

Porter and his security took a mini-lounge in the bus, built around a table rather than the individual seats. It wasn’t near a shift change so the bus was near empty.

“Mark, would you go get us coffee, please,” Porter asked. He took out the document and looked at it again.

Mark returned with two coffees and the Coke he preferred.

“That fellow, Tindal, sat watching until we boarded,” the senior security, Dennis, said irritated by it. “Did he think we were going to trot off down a tunnel with no pedestrian lane?”

“I’d say that indicates there are ways to gain access back into the city if you know them. We might have found out how to call a cart or there might be walkways in one of the other tunnels,” Porter speculated.

“What upset you so when the Moon Queen walked in?” Mark asked Dennis. “For all that you have a poker face, your body language shouted there was danger. It scared me to see.”

“It wasn’t her. It was the bodyguard. Have they stopped showing the video of him at the academy?”

“I never saw him before. Why would they show us video of one lower rank Spacer like him?” Mark asked.

“Watch it yourself,” Dennis invited and turned his pad to Mark after he found the file.

Mark watched without comment as an imprisoned Gunny recovered from being Tased, snapped his steel handcuffs, and ripped his bunk from where it was welded to the deck. When he used the bunk frame to puncture a hole in the bulkhead and terrorize the security staff in the next compartment, he couldn’t stay silent.

“Oh, come on. I don’t believe it. That’s computer-generated propaganda. Nobody is that strong.” He looked at Porter.

“Believe your partner,” Porter told him. “That’s an incredibly dangerous man. That was recorded years ago in the North American interest section of the old ISSII. You can assume he has no more love of us than his Queen. If anything, assume he is more experienced and better enhanced now.”

“Let me see that again,” Mark said.

* * *

Lee had the Mothers’ technicians send the drive back down to Derfhome rather than stow it in the ship again. She wanted an arm fabricated and fit to stow it in a recess like on the Chariot. It was going to take a major modification of Kurofune’s nose to fit an airlock, docking grapple, and all the changes needed for the drive.

That would take weeks to design and much more time to install, even given the advances in fabricating. Then she’d need to fill in a lot more data points about the jump range of her drive at various power levels before using it to travel. Recruiting and provisioning couldn’t be rushed either. It was going to take months to get ready. Going back to Providence wasn’t going to happen quickly. Perhaps that was a good thing, she convinced herself. It would give the North Americans time to drop their guard if they anticipated her and Gordon showing up quickly in response to the Commission’s cut-off.

Her original philosophy that Humans should get out there and claim as much real estate as possible still was driving her, but she was having second thoughts about sending Thor and the Little Fleet off on a second voyage. It engaged her crews to keep them from dispersing, and she was sure they’d make some new claims, but it would be nice to have her best hands to recruit from to go to Providence. You just couldn’t keep assets in personnel sitting waiting to be used like hardware. Gordon would tell her she was learning important lessons in prioritizing. The tools at hand were sufficient and would have to be used instead of what she would like.

* * *

After Dionysus’ Chariot docked on Beta everyone took their pressure suits off, Musical helping Born to do so in the limited space without damaging something or someone.

“Jeff and I have people to meet,” April said. “Nothing we’re doing would be very entertaining for you. If you make sure your spex are registered on the local data net we’ll give you a heads up when we are near done and you should start back to the ship. Figure early tomorrow. Be aware rooms may be hard to get. If you must, call and we’ll let you back on the ship.”

Rooms weren’t hard to get at all. The hotel, a Marriot gone independent, looked OK if you ignored the fact the new name, Merit, didn’t cover the faint outline of the old lettering above the entry. The manager was delighted to see them. Five hundred dollars Ceres for a room made Born and Musical look at each other silently. Born was the first to shake his head no.

“Back to the ship,” Musical said.

“Wait,” the Human manager said. “What are you used to paying?”

“I can get a sleeping room on Derfhome for five dollars Ceres with a breakfast for Derf included,” Born said.

“I can’t cover my air and electric for that,” the manager pleaded.

Born looked around at the empty lobby.

“It seems slow. Whatever you make from us is that much less of a loss,” Born suggested. “I tell you what. We’ll split the cost for a hundred dollars Ceres. That’s an extravagance for us. We’re paying out of our own pockets. Otherwise, we’ll go sleep on our ship.”

“You have a ship and you can’t afford a room?” the manager asked.

“We got a free ride with April Lewis and Jeff Singh. We’re just technicians, allowed along to see some of our work tested.

“On one condition,” the manager said, lowering his voice though there wasn’t a soul in sight.

“What’s that?” Born said suspiciously.

“That you don’t tell anyone I let you stay that cheaply and you mention us favorably to Lewis and Singh.”

“Done,” Born said. He got his bank card out of his purse and held his breath. The reader took it without a hiccup.

“Why do you think his business is so slow?” Musical asked Born in the corridor.

“I suspect a lot of people went down to the planet. I bet it’s cheaper down there. And fewer Fargoers are coming up to see the new hab. Especially if they find out a room is going to run them five hundred dollars.”

“I bet you are right,” Musical said and grimaced. “I have to stop saying that around Fargoers. They take it literally.”

“The corridors aren’t very crowded either,” Born noticed. “But looking at the people I do see a difference in dress. I’ve seen just a couple of people I suspect are Fargoers, with very bright clothing and shoes that look suitable to wear outside. The Beta people run to pastels and the same sort of slippers or socks, footies they call them, that Home people favor. Stepping on a few pebbles will cure them of that. Humans have delicate sensitive feet.”

“My Boss told me Lee discussed that with him,” Musical said. “It turns out that some places on Earth very poor people go barefoot. He said that if you never wear shoes your feet are shaped entirely differently and covered with hard pads. But I don’t think most of our humans have ever seen such a thing. We Badgers don’t generally like to wear boots.”

“Poor is relative,” Born pointed out. “There is too poor to own shoes and then there is too poor to pay for five hundred dollars a night hotel rooms.

“I wonder,” Musical said. “Will his rooms get cheaper or will the rooms on the planet get more expensive?”

“That’s beyond me. If he told the truth about expenses, the hotel may have to go out of business,” Born said.

“Then this may be a never to be repeated treat,” Musical decided.

“Right now, supper seems a never to be repeated treat,” Born said. “I’m braced for what that will cost too.”

Musical looked alarmed. “Oh, dear. It will be proportional, won’t it? Can you net search for a cheap restaurant?”

* * *

“I believe the English idiom for this is a dive,” Born said.

“The Badger expression translates barn but that doesn’t really convey the full feeling,” Musical said. “We have different words for different kinds of barns and that one is for a stinky animal barn.”

“Nick’s - A working Spacer and Beam Dog bar with traditional bar food,” Born read off the local dining guide on his pad again. The door was steel-faced with modest painted lettering on it the only signage and it had no windows. It would have eased their minds to see inside. The place was on the half g level which was semi-industrial. The corridor was floored in rubbery tiles instead of carpet and carts going past carried goods.

“We can always leave if it’s too pricey,” Musical said. “I had no idea we should bring our own snacks. One of the university cafeteria’s grab-and-go sandwiches sounds pretty good right now, even if it was a little stale from traveling.”

“Yeah, especially since I usually get to finish two-thirds of yours. Follow me,” Born said with sudden resolve.

The bar was so dark they had to stop and wait for their eyes to adjust or risk walking into things. The only thing Born could see clearly was a massive table in the back with a long light hung low over it. It had a translucent shade over it bright with art that he would have never expected in such a place. The two Humans standing by that table with sticks looked at them and turned back to what they were doing indifferently.

Musical recovered first, being able to see the long bar that had lights low behind it to allow the bartender to work. There were more bottles on tiers behind it than he’d ever seen in one place. The man was sitting on a stool not busy at all at the moment, regarding them with interest. He was dark enough to blend into the gloom but had on a brilliant white apron. The light from below the bar made his face grotesque from the harsh shadows. Two other Humans were seated at the bar hunched over their drinks. Only five people were in a space that would hold fifty easily. Business must be as slow as the hotel. There was no music just an occasional tock, tock, tock, from the table in the back.

“Put your hand on my shoulder. I can see well enough to guide you. I see a little table by the wall where we’ll fit nicely. You can sit on the floor and the table will be plenty high for you.”

“I can see the outline of other tables now, I’m just not getting much color yet.” But he did let Musical guide him.

The bartender took his time coming over with a couple of single sheet menus.

“You guys speak Standard?” he inquired.

“No, sir, English, Derf, and Badger,” Musical said.

The bartender gave a forced little laugh.

“Local hab idiom, I guess. Standard is English with a little Japanese and Spanish tossed in.” He paused like he was thinking about it. “A bit of Tongan and Yiddish too for that matter. We’re a real mix. If you hang around very long, we’ll probably steal Derf and Badger expressions from you without compensation.”

“Oh good. We’re both proficient in English, at least enough to deal with our English-speaking patron.”

“That’s interesting. You work for Humans?”

“Yes, sir. We’re researchers for Lee Anderson, though she went back home to Derfhome. We’re here with April Lewis and Jeffery Singh. They have business to do, and cut us loose to be tourists while waiting on them.”

“Homies,” he said. “I know of them. I’ve seen both stand up in the Assembly and they show up on the gossip boards. You don’t have to sir me. Nick is fine.”

“Nick, we are finding everything expensive here. What do you suggest to fill my Derf friend here without busting our budget?” Musical asked.

Nick regarded Born’s size dubiously.

“A pitcher of beer should be a decent mug for him. Maybe four double burgers and I’ll throw in a big bowl of chili at the normal Human serving price.” He pointed to them on the menu and both managed not to whimper at the price.

“You mind spicy stuff?” he asked Born. “The chili is kind of hot.”

“You are obviously unfamiliar with our Devil’s Horn peppers,” Born said smiling. “The recent influx of Humans from Home found them hot enough to seek medical attention.”

“I’ll have to get some of those,” Nick said interested. “They might make some of my usual customers shut up who always complain our chili is too mild.” To his credit, Nick wasn’t bothered by the smile.

“If one may inquire without offending, those usual customers seem to be absent,” Born said. “Your establishment seems sized for a larger clientele. We noticed the same thing where we secured a room for this evening. Is my assessment correct? Has this move to Fargone disrupted business?”

“You’re so carefully polite,” Nick said, amused. “Yes, business is shot to hell. The pilots and maintenance guys are all laid off until they get more work and afraid to spend much until they see what shakes out. Quite a few went over to the Fargone station to set up routes and businesses between the stations or find work there. At the same time, some of the beam dogs and fabricators are working so much overtime they barely have time to sleep much less come spend money here.”

Nick did an exaggerated shrug.

“Eventually, they’ll all have either time or money again and the pent-up demand will be awesome. You don’t have to be so careful of my feelings. With all the careful precision and disclaimers, you sound like a college professor.”

When Born and Musical both broke up laughing Nick got the joke, too, smiling.

“You are quite perceptive,” Musical said. “What you suggested for the professor here, but just a beer, a single burger, and a normal size bowl of chili for me.”

“Coming right up,” Nick said. He retreated to the bar so there must be a kitchen somewhere out of sight. But he saw to their beer himself.

Sure enough, a shorter man with different pigmentation but similar black hair came from the back with their food on a big oval tray.

“I don’t know what you guys can eat safely,” the cook said. “We don’t get much alien trade. I’ve never seen a Badger except on video. So, it’s on you to know if what you ordered up is safe.”

“We’re aware,” Musical assured him. “My friend here can eat things you can’t. I can handle everything here.”

“Jolly good,” the man said putting the plates before them. “This is all the condiments for the burgers if you want to experiment.” He set a separate tray down with onion, pickle, hot sauce, mayo, mustard, and ketchup.

The burgers were big enough to allow Born to take two bites. That pleased him because he’d had burgers back home that were a scant bite, and he could toss one in his mouth whole. He loaded them up with everything until it was dripping out the sides.

“Will that hold you?” Musical asked when Born was on the last of his chili.

Born held a true hand spread out palm down and made a rocking motion. He’d picked that up from Lee.

“It’s not going to bust my belly but it will hold me. I could fast for a day after all. I just don’t want to.”

The same fellow from the kitchen came and removed their dishes. Nick looked across the room at them and made the gesture of lifting a mug.

“Do you want another beer?” Musical asked Born.

“Why not? What else do we have to do? I want to make a circuit of the hab at the one g level and look at everything but how long can that take?”

Musical nodded yes, emphatically enough to be seen from the bar.

The door to the corridor opened and a young woman entered with her spex heavily darkened. As soon as the door closed behind her she set them clear. Musical noted that trick to copy if they ever came back here. She was still a little blind, or maybe just cautious assessing the place. She had on the bright clothing and heavier shoes of a Fargoer. Even a Badger noted she was dressed differently though. He thought she had to be cold showing that much skin with no fur. She had on shocking-fuchsia velvet shorts that couldn’t be any shorter and still meet in the middle. Her shoes were a bright pink that didn’t match at all and her sleeveless rose top ended so short there was a large gap to the top of her shorts.

Musical looked over at Nick the bartender. His mouth was hanging open and his eyes were wide. He knew that was a look of surprise in Humans.

Now that her eyes adjusted, she saw Born and Musical in the shadows. The >Squeeee< she emitted was such a piercing shriek that one of the pool players jerked and knocked the cue ball clear off of the table. She started babbling to somebody on her spex. All Musical really understood of it was “Oh my God, Oh my God.”

The door burst open behind her and four more young women in outrageous outfits entered, one in mincing little steps because she had on very strange shoes. Musical had never been exposed to glitter makeup, green or purple hair, leopard skin, stretch fabrics, or sequins, but even an alien knew this was something different. They all rushed over and surrounded Musical declaring him a real-live-Badger to each other.

“Are you here for the Bode Benjamin show?” the pack leader asked breathlessly.

Musical was embarrassed to admit he wasn’t familiar with Bode or his show and got glowing reports of how they never missed the show and they’d had absolutely wonderful cute pix of Badger cubs when Lee and Gordon were on the show.

Another group of Fargoers came in the door, this one appearing to be couples and one of the girls hopped up and down excitedly waving them over. A couple of the men staked out a table of their own. Musical found somebody was holding his left hand and when he looked back at Born a couple of the scantily clad ladies were sitting on each leg coaching him to put his lower arms around them and show lots of claw for pix. When Nick came with their beer he had to push and tell them to make way through the gathering crush. The noise level in the room was way up.

“Bring these guys another round,” a girl in red leather leaning over Born’s shoulder called out before their glasses were even empty, “and some finger food for the table. Can you make a pitcher of peach margaritas?” she asked Nick.

The kitchen guy went past carrying what Born recognized as pizza. Since the house didn’t have music, somebody set their pad on loud to provide it. Pretty soon a few of them were dancing to it, drinks in hand. People were still showing up as their friends called them.

The crowd sort of rotated to their table and away, everyone who wanted them getting pix, patting and stroking Musical, and prodding Born to fake ferocity. After three rounds of beer, much calamari, and chicken tenders they begged off that they had to go to their hotel.

Born waved down Nick since Musical was invisible seated behind the crowd standing around the table.

“We’re heading out,” Born said reaching across several people to offer his card.

“Your money’s no good here,” Nick said shaking his head no and refusing to reach for the card.

“I don’t understand. It worked just fine at the hotel,” Born insisted.

Nick looked at him like he was crazy, then grinned. “It’s just an expression. It means you don’t owe anything, ever. In fact, you’re welcome here any time. Look at all the business you sucked in,” he said sweeping the place with a turn of his head because his hands were full carrying drinks.

“Oh, thank you,” Born said and signaled Musical to go before Nick changed his mind. Everybody waved goodbye but they seemed content to continue partying.

When he explained the source of their good fortune and Nick’s invitation to return out in the corridor, Musical said, “Now, if we could just figure out how to do that with the hotel.”

* * *

Born and Musical kept quiet while Jeff talked with Traffic Control and got them away from Beta.

“Did you find Beta interesting?” April asked Born and Musical once they were clear.

“Oh yes. We didn’t get to meet that many Betans,” Born admitted. “We saw a few but we stopped for dinner and we mostly got to meet people there visiting Beta from Fargone. The Betans we met were very hospitable though. We got a significant discount on our room. Then the fellow at the bar said our money was no good there and to come back any time we wanted. I had no idea Fargoers were so fond of Badgers. They were friendly enough with me, but being with Musical was like being with a celebrity.”

“I had no idea either,” April said. She looked at Jeff and got a shrug.

“Speaking of celebrity, people knew who you two are, and our patron Lee,” Born said

“Gordon too,” Musical reminded him.

Born nodded. “They were very enthusiastic about Lee and Gordon and their appearances on the local Bode show. Do you and Jeff get that sort of celebrity treatment?”

“No,” April said carefully. “We don’t have the connections to Fargone Lee has. Fargoers don’t give us a glance. People on Beta know us but not all of them are happy with us. Jeff in particular is more notorious than celebrated.”

“Here we go,” Jeff interrupted. “Jump in ten seconds from…mark!”

“I don’t think that will ever get old,” Musical said when Derfhome’s star appeared.

“That’s too bad about Jeff,” Born said, picking the conversation back up. “We’ve been able to work with you very well. Better than I expected. I’m afraid I was difficult with you at first. I’m sorry I didn’t say that before.”

“Don’t worry about it,” Jeff said. “You had little reason to trust me.”

There was an awkward silence, until Musical said, “The hotel manager at the Merit asked we mention to you that he treated us well.”

April got a slow smile. “I’ll definitely keep that in mind.”

“Did you know, things on Beta appear to be much more expensive than on Fargone?” Musical asked. “We aren’t really business people, but it looked to us like there will have to be a considerable adjustment. Some of the businesses will probably fail. It makes me sad for people like the hotel manager we dealt with.”

April made a mental note that Badgers could be very empathetic, even to aliens.

“That’s part of what we talked to Gabriel about,” Jeff said. “I think we will be a benefit to both Derfhome and Fargone. In the short term, however, we are disrupting their economies. We have more tools to use to ease things on Derfhome. Fargone may still send Beta away, or drive them away if they don’t grant more of them residence if not citizenship. I think we’re past that question on Derfhome. Unless I am reading the Mothers wrong. Heather is sending transport to shuffle people around where they want to go. If enough leave it may change the balance of things at Fargone. But that’s Gabriel’s to deal with now. We weren’t sent to hold his hand, just to inform him.

“Did you talk to Gabriel about his ship?” Born asked.

“About the AI you mean,” Jeff said. “The ship is perfectly fine. No, I’m neither his father nor his sovereign. It’s not my place to impose my tastes and opinions on him. I’m sorry you heard our differences. If you didn’t spread that around very far it would be a kindness. Nobody is swearing you to secrecy, but it might expose an operational weakness.”

“I’ll regard that like Lee’s business,” Born said. “I’ll only discuss it with those already aware of it.”

“Thank you,” Jeff said.

“Oh, let me show you the friends we made,” Musical said. He pulled up a picture on his pad and turned it to April.

Born was seated cross-legged on the floor. He had a pitcher of beer in a true hand and a young lady perched on each knee leaning back against him. His lower arms went around each of them claws fully extended and his teeth displayed in a huge smile. The girls were both displaying fake terror as well as possible while they couldn’t help smiling. Their dress was uniformly outrageous, and there were more young women crowded close behind Born, looking over his shoulders.”

April tried to stifle laughter and it came out her nose instead.

“Are you sure this was just a bar?” she asked as neutrally as possible.

“It said so in the net guide,” Musical insisted. “The food was decent and everybody kept buying us drinks.”

“Let me see that,” Jeff asked, and April turned the pad to him.

He was made of sterner stuff and didn’t laugh, just smiled.

“I have to have a copy of that shot,” Jeff demanded.

“Oh, sure. Everybody wanted a turn and a picture like that,” Musical said. “No problem.”

* * *

Back at Derfhome, Strangelove met Jeff at the port. He was a little surprised Strangelove hadn’t joined him at the station, eager to pick up guarding him at the earliest opportunity. He had a large car hired, big enough for all of them. April and Jeff dropped Born off at his home by the university and Musical at the Badger embassy, and continued to the Old Hotel.

Sam Burnstein, monitoring the transport systems, noted the fares paid for the shuttle down from the station and the destinations as the car dropped everyone off. The two researchers had lifted with Lee Anderson. Their associating with Lewis and Singh without Lee Anderson was a new thing. Did that signal some change in their relationship? It definitely was an inflection point and he noted it on his relationship chart. Strangelove sent the car back to the service empty, staying with Jeff. The car charge went to Red Tree, not Jeff, Sam noted. He couldn’t see any pattern there or relate it to the other comings and goings from the Red Tree safe house. Maybe it simply got charged to whoever called the car as an insignificant expense. You could over-analyze everything until you saw patterns where there were none.

OceanofPDF.com

Chapter 14

Lee looked at the report about her aircar project. She needed to talk to Sally from the bank about recruiting crew to go to Providence and review her new diminished finances. She needed to know what cash she had on hand and the rate she was spending it. She should see when her guys would have the thruster modules in hand and arrange for them to be delivered to Alonso. She needed to write out a formal plan and statement about how she intended to govern Providence and felt a fresh surge of irritation over April and Jeff being so far ahead of her recognizing her own status. She should have been thinking on this to make it go smoothly months ago since she was sure the Claims Commission would eventually cut her off. Maybe, when she had another century of experience, they wouldn’t always be one step ahead of her. The summary of money spent on the aircar suddenly seemed larger without funds being deposited faster than she could spend them. Not that she was broke but Lee wasn’t used to the numbers going down. Despite all the things she needed to do, Lee wanted to go see the aircar, not phone pix of it and touch it. Alonso was independent enough to be irritated that he was interrupted to answer the phone, and argue with her that he was too busy to show and tell. So, she didn’t call ahead, she just called a car to take her over.

“Oh, I didn’t think we were going to be able to have the canopy open,” Lee said when she walked in. It was propped open towards the nose slightly past the vertical. That left the entire cabin wide open with Alonso sitting on a front seat in the car turned sideways working on the adjacent seat.

“It only opens manually. I couldn’t justify the mass needed to power it open and shut. The safety aspect of locking it down permanently just bothered me too much. The docking adapter you requested is in the belly and extends to couple. That was all standard design for which I bought rights. There is a hatch to either side from the lock, but what if you crash it badly enough to jam the hatch in from the cabin?

“Neither is it hinged very strongly. You shouldn’t prop it open like this in a strong wind. Only in a protected environment like this hangar. It will lift off straight up in this position or if you release it while full down. That way it would drop off if you unlock it while flying inverted. You have to lift the back only about ten degrees to engage the front hinge.”

“That’s not all that holds it, front and back, is it? That’s a huge area under pressure.”

“Nope, see the slots in the channel where it seats?” Alonso asked. “A tapered draw hook grabs the canopy frame and draws it down every forty millimeters down both sides. That locks mechanically too. That grab handle between the seats isolates the power. I’m not going to trust the computer to manage that. Not even with a completely separate command screen. But it will still release under pressure if you want to ditch it for a quick exit.”

“What material?” Lee wondered. She laid a hand on it. “Oh, it feels as cold as metal!”

“It was deposited on a polished metal form,” Alonso explained. “A thin layer of sapphire so the inside isn’t too easy to scratch cleaning it. Then several layers of glass with metallic salts infused. The surface layers are meant to bond and to be compatible with the sapphire. The middle glass layers are a bit less than six millimeters thick. The outer sapphire has a thin layer of diamond on top of it. After it is laid up, it is baked hot enough to make the glass layers diffuse into each other slightly. We didn’t have to etch the metal away. The annealing and diffusion temperature left it ready to pop right off after it cooled because the form had a single atom thick layer of graphene as a release agent.”

“How fragile is it?” Lee worried.

“It should deflect most pistol fire and some rifle fire if it isn’t armor piercing. Hail if you aren’t flying into it at speed. If you hit anything bigger than a chicken, consider your warranty voided. So, nothing living that flies on Derfhome.”

“Thanks for the warning,” Lee said.

“It could be made stronger, but it’s already sixteen percent of the vehicle mass if you count the subsystems and controls. The entire cabin perimeter has to be stiffer to take the loads on it.” Alonso said. His voice implied that was too much.

“But it’s pretty,” Lee said.

“Yeah, isn’t it?” Alonso agreed. “It can be darkened, but it doesn’t do that by reflection. It becomes absorbent, so darkening is not a protection against any source that can heat it sufficiently to melt it.”

“Like a laser?” Lee asked.

“Or a close nuclear explosion or flying it into an extremely hot environment.”

“I’ll keep that in mind,” Lee agreed. “It doesn’t seem a very serious limitation.”

“There are better solutions,” Alonso admitted, “However, they would have to be made in Fargone or New Japan and still be heavier besides being far more expensive.”

“No, this is fine. This is a first of concept vehicle too. I bet it’s obsolete in five years,” Lee predicted.

“One or two, once your friends with money see it and want one,” Alonso said.

“You may be right,” Lee said, remembering how April wanted a sports plane after their flight.

“Do we have to swap the seats out for Humans and Derf?” Lee wondered looking at the difference between them. The seat Alonso was in was wide enough for his enormous rear end. The seat he was working on much narrower.

“Not at all. Observe,” he said.

There was a loop of belting hanging off the edge of the narrow seat. When Alonso pulled it wings extended from underneath and locked into place with a reassuring >CHUNK<. He then reached under the front edge to release a catch. The wings slid down and in when pushed on them gently, until they made the same solid sound of locking.

“The seats were much more difficult to design than the canopy. If they were only for Humans, we could get them down to four and a half kilograms each. To be convertible for Derf takes them to eight kilograms. The materials are cutting edge and expensive. Not anything practical to use in volume for the cabin structure itself yet.”

“But give it five years?” Lee teased him to see if he’d say one or two.

“Yeah, maybe ten,” he said being contrary. “Once they develop exotic materials, they have to get the R&D costs out early before something can be mass-produced cheaply. I could have taken fifty kilograms off the shell using the seat materials, but it would have made it cost ten times as much. It wouldn’t perform ten times better. You have to draw the line somewhere. Five years from now you can probably use the new materials at a reasonable cost but expect by that time they will probably have new better ones at an inflated price to tempt you to over-build again. It’s always expensive to be cutting-edge.”

Lee frowned. “If it doesn’t make you start over from scratch, could you put a belt receptacle in the middle of the seat when it is opened wide for Derf? Then two humans can sit in one Derf seat. Six Humans shouldn’t be any more of a load than two Derf and two Humans.”

“Yeah, that’s easy. And a belt on each side to reach the middle. Your humans better be pretty fond of each other,” Alonso said gesturing with his flat hands pressed together.

Lee just nodded. That was obvious.

“Just the back two should suffice,” she added.

“I have a request too. Ask your people making the pods to either put a bolt circle around the top of the pods for me or affix a sixty-degree wedge that will be horizontal when the pods rotate to thrust straight ahead.”

“Streamlining?” Lee asked. “But not a cone?”

“It’s complicated. Just give me 10mm bolt holes and I’ll fab them,” he decided.

“OK, I’ll tell them to give you mounting holes. I’m glad the shell is already fabbed and I don’t have to decide,” Lee said running her hand down the hull “I’d love to be able to tell you to go ahead, do anything, that money doesn’t matter, but the Earthie Claims Commission cut off all my royalties. I’m not broke, far from it, but there will be a pause in my income. I better learn to moderate my spending until I have new sources.”

Alonso looked concerned. “May one assume you are going to do something about that?”

“Yes. The Red Tree Mothers, myself, and Gordon are all laying plans to…correct this situation.”

“Oh, dear.”

* * *

“Do you have a moment?” Mo asked on com.

Mo was one of the few people who never called Heather without having something specific and worthwhile to say.

“I’m always happy to talk to you, Mo. If I brush you off you can assume there are warheads inbound or the place is on fire. It’s been weeks since you called and I do read your text memos. What’s up?”

“Two items,” Mo said holding his thumb and forefinger up to the camera. “The exotic material made to the formula from Derfhome checks out completely compatible for our uses. They require some changes to design being a glassy solid but that was easy. If anything, the new drives will be easier to fabricate than the old ones that needed to retain fluids. A prototype has been tested in an unmanned drone and we are using it to establish a conversion program for the minor differences in the jump parameters.

He withdrew the forefinger from play.

“What I’d like from you is permission to build a dedicated fabricating station to produce these drives as a bolt-in replacement for the current generation of jump drones. They can also serve as ship drives with suitable adapter frames for the old-style drives.”

“That’s marvelous,” Heather said. “Do you have sufficient materials to keep it running or do you need anything?”

“We have so much elemental material stockpiled from the French mills separating regolith that we can produce them for months.”

“Do it. Pull resources from anything not life-critical. What else?” she asked nodding at the thumb remaining.

“I have a technician, William Hardt, working as an instrument maker for us. He came to us through Home from Germany. He is not sworn to you. However, I have not been segregating workers and projects since you explained you and your partners found little value in unnecessary secrecy.”

Mo stopped there, waiting to see if Heather still approved or would reprove him.

“That wasn’t a whimsy likely to change easily,” Heather assured him.

Mo nodded.

“He was swapping stories at the break table with a fellow who worked on the failed Martian package. It seems the Europeans were trying to develop a quantum radar similar to the one the Martians recovered. They could never maintain reliable entanglement long enough to reach beyond orbital distances, and even then, the idler holding the local side of the entangled pair was only good for one pulse. The optical cavity in the Martian device must do better than that or it wouldn’t be useful in a spaceship. The German version he described as a manifold so it was definitely different.

“The thing is, they developed a useful processor. That’s the part torn away and missing from the Martian device. There are no guarantees but Hardt says he knows enough about the German processor to reproduce it. The question is, even if he can do so, can it be successfully coupled with the alien component to produce a working whole? It is encouraging that both appear to be multi-qubit devices that can process one idling signal without destroying the others.”

“You assume we can reproduce the idler container,” Heather said.

“Well, yes. That seems likely with a physical sample,” Mo insisted. “You might assign Martin Judd to work with him. The man is a wizard with electronics. Do you think this is worth pursuing?”

When Heather didn’t answer right away Mo wiggled the thumb, which was humor from him.

“What are your impressions of this Hardt person?” Heather asked.

“I’m not qualified to speak about personalities or normality,” Mo insisted.

“Neither am I but it doesn’t stop me from trying to wing it as best I can,” Heather said. “I don’t have a psychologist on staff. The fact that you brought up normality at all, tells me you do have an opinion.”

“He is nerdy. Socialized, but more interested in things than people. I occasionally have to tell him to stop working and go home. I’ve never heard him speak of family or home, but neither has he ever made trouble with coworkers. I’ve never run software on him. I don’t want that to become the norm between me and my people.”

“Do you think he would be open to being sworn to me?” Heather asked.

“Heather, I think the majority of your residents would swear to you if you conducted a poll. But I do feel in some cases it’s safer to invite people to be sworn than those who request it. Some may want the status for favor or gain and don’t appreciate the seriousness of it or intend to honor it if it becomes burdensome. Interview him and form your own opinion,” Mo counseled.

“Bring him by,” Heather said. “I will talk to him but I want your input on my decision after. I am going to run software on him and extend the conversation well beyond the narrow topics of his work and loyalties. I don’t want unbalanced people sworn to me. Dr. Holbrook taught me that lesson. If I feel comfortable with him, I’ll offer, but I think this project is too important to risk with an unsworn resident. I can see him deciding he has a package to take back to Germany that will give him status and income to offset whatever motivated him to leave Earth. I don’t want to hand such a device to the Earth powers. Call when you can both come to supper. I find that feels less like an interrogation and gives you opportunities to bring up a wider range of conversation. Besides, I have to eat every day so the slot is always open.”

Mo folded his thumb down, nodded his agreement, and disconnected.

* * *

Sam informed his partner he was going to surveil some of the new leads he was getting from car service records and publicly posted business contracts. He loaded up a few small bugs and drones to leave behind if anything seemed worth keeping an eye on them.

First on his list was the aircraft shop. Lee had visited there again and he had no idea why. There were no public contracts linking her to the shop and Derf don’t file incorporation papers or other sources of business information. He had no idea from the posted contract values if this would be a huge building with a hundred workers or a tiny shop with a handful of workers. He wasn’t prepared at all for it to be a single proprietor working alone.

The business was in a stand-alone hangar. There was room inside for four small airframes and any of the small craft tied down behind the building might be his too. The front door was up and Sam could see the rear was raised a half-meter or so, probably for ventilation.

He couldn’t believe everything was in plain sight and no netting or grill across the huge door or the office that filled one corner. He walked into the office. Seeing nobody, proceeded out on the shop floor.

“Yo…anybody home?” he called, but not too loudly.

Nobody answered. Sam knew Derfhome had a pretty low crime rate but there were all sorts of expensive tools on a long bench along the wall and a whole big rolling box of them pulled up to an aircar frame. Maybe the owner dropped dead and he just happened to be the first person to come by. He had a vivid imagination.

Sam did a slow circuit of the shop. There were two sports planes with wings, a vacant area to the back corner, and the aircar. No bodies. As unlikely as it seemed the owner must have gone out to lunch or to run an errand leaving the place wide open. It seemed irresponsible. The aircar was the most exotic item in the shop so he suspected if anything here was related to Lee that would be the item. He’d certainly never seen one with such a big bubble canopy. He’d grab a couple of pix of it, toss a camera bug high up on the wall by the office, one in the office where it could see the computer screens, and get out of here. He got a side view of the whole vehicle then leaned in over the low edge and got a shot between the seats. Rather than a dashboard like a ground car it had instrument panels with screens that swung in close after you were seated, or back out of the way when not needed, and a control stick with buttons at the arm-rest level on the back of the supporting post.

He took a couple of steps back and leaned in again, left hand on the edge of the open flight cabin. It wasn’t properly a cockpit as it was full width. He wanted one last shot on a different angle that showed the seats better. A hand gently fell on his right shoulder. The gentleness of it was remarkable because it was the size of a dinner plate and had four long claws extended but under such careful control that they were not piercing his shirt at all. The companion thumb was not visible but he could feel it laid across the back of his neck. If the Derf clutched it, the same as a Human clutched his fist, those claws were half the thickness of his shoulder and the thumb would extend over his spine.

“This one is spoken for, but if you are interested in an aircar I have hangar space free at the moment to build one up. We’re probably looking at a two-year delivery time though.”

That was delivered in a rumbling low voice in his left ear. Sam slowly turned his head and regarded the large face lowered to whisper in his ear. He didn’t have it in him to try to brazen out being a buyer. He wasn’t being treated like a potential customer and they both knew it. He brought the phone in his right hand back to his chest. It was a liability and he didn’t know what to do with it. He had a gun inside his waistband on the left, but putting the phone away as a normal gesture seemed beyond him at the moment. He could just drop it. Maybe the clatter of that would be distracting and once he had his pistol in hand it wouldn’t matter. He let his hand drift down that way thinking about it.

“If you are reaching for anything, it better be a business card,” Alonso said.

Sam’s hand paused.

“Let’s see the phone,” Alonso said sticking his other middle arm hand around Sam from the left.

“I can erase it if I was out of line taking pix,” Sam offered.

Alonso just wiggled his fingers in an impatient ‘gimme’ gesture.

Sam deposited the phone in his palm and watched the big hand close in a fist. There was a muffled >crunch< and when he opened it again a crumbled shape and a bunch of small pieces dropped on the floor.

He felt around Sam’s waist and removed his pistol. He didn’t say anything about that and neither did Sam.

“Now, let’s see you turn your pockets out slowly and carefully,” Alonso ordered.

“Hey, I haven’t stolen anything,” Sam objected.

Alonso didn’t feel like arguing. He hooked one claw in Sam’s left pocket and ripped it down. An assortment of bugging devices fell on the floor at his feet. The other pocket yielded a small knife and a coin purse. After a pat-down, a wallet joined everything else on the floor.

“Well, well, well. I recognize what a few of those are,” Alonso said of the bugs. He turned Sam around, none too gently, and pushed him up against the aircar, punching a com code in his phone with one true hand. That was a problem with Derf. He had two massive hands with claws to hold Sam, one to hold his pistol and one to use his phone. It didn’t present much opportunity to try to wiggle free and run. It made Sam feel handicapped with only two.

“Lee? Do you know this character?” Alonso asked showing Sam’s face up close on the phone. The fact he was held by the neck suggested he wasn’t a friend.

“Yeah, he’s a spy for North America, but not a very good one. Derfhome isn’t exactly a hotbed of political intrigue and counter espionage to send your best. At least it wasn’t when they were stationed here. Things may be heating up now. He has a partner and offices over on the west hills. They’ve been trying to build up a local business while still sending pro forma reports back home. We call that double-dipping. We’ve run into them before.”

“And he’s still walking around wasting air?” Alonso asked.

“If you waste him, they may send somebody competent,” Lee warned. “There’s still his partner to deal with too. He may show up if this one goes missing.”

“From what I’m seeing, that wouldn’t challenge me either,” Alonso said. “Perhaps it would be enough of a message to the partner for this one to disappear. I can find the sudden need for a test flight in one of my planes and push him out the cabin door about fifty kilometers offshore. Derf sea life is pretty nasty. Even Derf don’t like to wade in very deep.”

Sam couldn’t run but he could shiver.

“What exactly was he doing?” Lee asked.

“He caught me in the loo and went nosing around the shop, taking pix of your new aircar. No Derf would do that without invitation. They’d wait in the office until somebody showed up. If he isn’t new, just down off the hab, he should know better. He was carrying bugs and is armed too, which doesn’t speak to his good intentions.”

“He absolutely knows better,” Lee assured Alonso. “I wouldn’t kill him myself, but you do what you think is proper. It’s your shop he was burglarizing and my sense of justice is not entirely Derf yet. I still have strong Human influences.”

“What would you do with him?” Alonso asked, genuinely curious.

“I’d strip him naked, point him across town to the west, and let him walk back to his partner barefoot.”

Alonso laughed. “That’s evil. I like it. I’m not sure he wouldn’t rather be shot.”

Sam shook his head no vigorously.

“Well, he’s picking the walk, poor devil. I’ll do that,” Alonso agreed. “Thanks for your help.”

Lee nodded pleasantly and disconnected.

“I hope you do know if I find you anywhere near here again, you’ll go for that swim,” he told Sam.

Sam just nodded yes.

Ten-centimeter claws remove clothing faster than you can take them off yourself. Humans were rather disgusting bare in Alonso’s opinion. No wonder they wore clothes since they lacked proper fur. Alonso walked Sam with one hand around his neck past the workbench and got a spray can which he started shaking. When he got him to the door, he pointed left and informed him that was west.

“What’s that?” Sam asked when Alonso started spraying him.

“Penetrating dye. I use it to check castings for cracks. It fluoresces bright green under UV or sunlight.”

“There you go. Thank Miss Lee for your life and don’t let me see your face again.”

Sam said nothing, getting while the getting was good. Alonso watched the glowing green figure until he was out of sight. Humans were soft and kindly in his estimation, but he doubted they would stop to help another in distress who looked like they were the victim of some strange contamination. The west hills were a long walk away.

* * *

Jeff and April were leaning on the high rail enjoying the view from their balcony.

“I liked getting a better handle on Lee’s people,” Jeff said. “I got to see their personalities better than just working in their lab where I was more of an instructor. That was pretty much just talking shop and I didn’t see how they acted with Lee. We have so many friends and allies here now, each with their own people. I’m thinking we should get them all together with just a select few of the trusted Home people, and let them see the bigger picture. We can host it like a party. Looking at the Earth news coming in they won’t get any clear idea of what is happening there unless we reveal it. They should know and it may result in unexpected information or suggestions.”

“That’s very social of you,” April said. “I’d welcome the diversion just for the fun of it. We don’t do enough fun things. Some of these people will have their own sources. They may be moved to reveal some detail we don’t know. Ask Lee, her father and her researchers, the Foys, and Strangelove will insist on being by you of course.” She looked at the open door behind them and wondered if keen Derf ears could hear them. “Who else?”

“See if Lee might get Talker to come and the co-ambassador, the Bill fellow. I don’t feel like asking. I’m not sure it would be polite to ask the Third Mother of Red Tree and not the two ranked above her, but I can mention to Strangelove that he’s welcome to discuss the meeting with his superiors.”

“You don’t think he would anyway?” April asked.

“I’m not confident of that at all,” Jeff said. “He seems to compartment his jobs with higher walls than a Human would. He might classify the chit-chat as Lee’s business and feel no obligation to report to the Third Mother.

April nodded. “Derf think like us so closely that it’s hard to remember they can be very different. It catches you by surprise then when it does happen. Do you think Gordon reports to his Mothers?”

“After the way he went to go to town to seek his own fortune? No, I don’t think he’ll report anything unless he’s directly acting for them. He didn’t associate with the clan again to be back under their thumbs like a child. Lee let drop in conversation that he contributes what he pleases to the clan, not like workers sent to town who are contracted out by the Mothers and get an allowance. Lee insists he’s so secretive it drives her nuts.”

“Wiggen has moved into the building and isn’t keeping it a secret. She’s listed on public com. Ask her and her husband. She knows the mentality of Earth politics from the inside. You might as well invite Mel Wainwright,” April decided. “He is thick with Wiggen and discreet enough to decide what he can tell his other clients. Also, Jan, Papa-san, and Chen if he is still here.”

“And Chen and Papa-san’s wives,” Jeff said.

“I just assumed that,” April said. “That’s too many to try to seat at a table. We can set up a buffet and a bar. I’m not comfortable having hotel servers but for that many, I hate to do self-serve. I don’t want to be watching to make sure nothing is messy or runs out.”

“Ask Strangelove,” Jeff said. “I know he has people here in town. Just about anyone can tend a buffet and we might luck out and get somebody who can tend bar.”

OceanofPDF.com

Chapter 15

“Clarke, I have an independent assignment for you,” Strangelove said.

The dark-coated Derf carefully laid his tools down beside the parts he’d just removed from his 20mm rifle, and gave his commander his full attention. He’d never had a solo job. It wasn’t appropriate to make a big deal of being trusted. He just intended to do his best so Strangelove wouldn’t regret it.

“Jeff Singh, who I am guarding, and his partner April Lewis are hosting a little party in two days. We don’t want outsiders at this affair, so I want you to tend bar. Do you have any experience at serving fancy alcohol?”

“I can draw a beer or pour straight to a glass. Mostly, we just pass a bottle around.”

“Look in the Human web fraction to see the special implements used. Also, download several texts on the art and keep them all in your spex. You are authorized to spend whatever it takes to hire someone skilled in the art to demonstrate how to do the mixing this evening. Go to some establishments that mix fancy drinks, but if you can’t find somebody actively employed at this currently, call a temporary worker service and have them send out a bartender to instruct you. They can come here or provide a place of instruction. Buy equipment if you need to. I’m sure restaurant suppliers have what you need. Don’t try to hire any of the workers at the Old Hotel and don’t reveal who you will be serving to your instructor. It’s enough they know you are mixing for Humans, not which particular Humans.”

“I understand. Any activity by Mr. Singh is a security matter,” Clarke said.

“Exactly right. Set this card to your hand and use it,” Strangelove said, giving him a Red Tree card. That was a matter of trust well beyond working solo. He immediately peeled the touchpad cover and rubbed his finger pad on it firmly to make sure it registered him.

* * *

“What happened to you?” Bill King demanded when Sam hobbled in.

“Shower first, then something to numb my feet,” Sam insisted without answering his question. He kept walking right past him.

“And an antiseptic,” King said looking at the bloody footprints Sam left on the floor.

Sam held up his hand to keep King from touching him but he needn’t have worried. He had no intention of touching him unless he fell. He had a weird yellowish-green sheen to him that might be something nasty. It took three thorough scrub-downs before the color was much lighter. Sam suspected he’d still glow somewhat if he went out in the sun. He explained what happened while his partner scrubbed down his back. He couldn’t really scrub his feet but he sat on the tub edge and felt carefully with his fingertips to make sure there weren’t any sharp pieces embedded. The water still ran pink when he rinsed them.

King came back with their first aid kit.

“We have a numbing disinfectant in a tube,” King said and showed him, “but I’m not sure this roll of bandages will do both feet. Are you sure you don’t need a clinic?”

“I’ll put half the tube on each foot and then put on clean socks over it,” Sam said. ignoring the other question. “Double socks,” he decided after thinking about it, “the salve will ooze through. I’m going to be off my feet for a couple of days.”

“More like a couple of weeks,” King warned him. “I can’t believe nobody stopped to help you. What’s wrong with people?”

“The Derf would have no idea it wasn’t some bizarre Human custom. I saw three cars of Humans go past but they all just stared at me with their mouths hanging open. Would you tell the car to do an emergency stop to let a naked glowing green man get in your car?”

“I’m not sure what I’d do,” King admitted. “On Earth, I’d call the police and say they needed to send a mental health intervention team. I’m not sure there is any corresponding service in a trade town. Certainly not for Humans when they have no idea what is normal or insane in Humans. I never appreciated before how much Derf are self-policing. They don’t even have a fire department, which makes people take every precaution that they don’t let a fire get started in the first place.”

“On Earth, I’d have been arrested for indecency. Derf are perfectly legal in fur without so much as a belt or boots. I’d have been delighted to be arrested today.”

“Is there anything else I can do for you?” King asked after Sam had the socks on.

“Play nurse and bring me things so I can prop my feet up and stay in a chair,” Sam requested. “It might not hurt to look up the industrial hazard sheet for crack detecting dye.”

“What are we going to do about this?” King asked.

Sam looked at him in alarm.

“Not a blessed thing. The shop owner called Lee Anderson. Otherwise, I’d be dead and you’d never have had a clue what happened to me. He said directly to thank her for my life. I’m not going to do that literally, but neither will I risk approaching that building again. If we so much as look funny at that Derf, you can bet we will be regarded as stupidly ungrateful. She, that huge humorless father of hers, or her clan will finish the job for him. We’re trying to get ourselves established to be independent here. If we mess with any part of that crowd, life on Derfhome will be untenable for us.”

“He has your gun and all your papers,” King said, still unhappy to let that go. “You should add monitoring aviation radio with keywords for him and Lee. There’s no risk to listen.”

“He has a pocket full of bugs and spy bots and what money I had on me too. He’s welcome to them. I can replace them. I just lingered too long snooping around. I should have grabbed a few crude pix and made tracks. Nothing that big should move so quietly. I didn’t know he was behind me until he put his hand on my shoulder.”

“Where was he anyway? Did he run out to get lunch or something?” King asked.

“He told Lee he was in the loo.”

“You mean the toilet?” King asked.

“Yeah. It’s the weirdest thing. He speaks English like upper-class British, or what I think they sound like from period videos. It’s strange hearing it from a huge hairy monster.”

* * *

Clarke got a hundred dollars Ceres on his new card and read the local net ads with a critical eye. One fancy restaurant, in particular, made a point of advertising off-world liquor and exotic mixed drinks. That sounded like a worthy target and he called for a car.

The bartender briefly gave him a dubious look when he leaned on the bar. The stools didn’t lend themselves to Derf. They were too high and it might take four pushed together to hold his weight. However, when he came over, he was all professional politeness.

“What is your pleasure, sir?”

“I’m looking to hire your expertise,” Clarke admitted without any preliminaries.

“I’m Iverson,” the fellow said. “I work three on three off. If you have an outside gig for me, I do that if it fits my schedule.”

“I have to be the bartender for security reasons,” Clarke explained. “I’m a soldier and I’ve been ordered to learn how. I’m quite willing to pay for a short course. The house advertising led me to believe they must have competent people hired here.”

Iverson thought about that a little.

“I come on at twelve and we close up here at midnight. It’s a long day on your feet but after we close for the night they come in and clean the dining room and the kitchen finishes cleaning up. I can give you a little lesson after closing. I’d ask twenty dollars Ceres and of course, we have to pay the house for their ingredients.”

Clarke had no experience handling money and was a generous soul. Also, the unaccustomed money in his purse was exciting and he wanted to spend some.

“That seems cheap for your knowledge and extra time on your feet. Allow me to give you forty. The Mothers are paying, not me, and they can well afford it.”

“Ah, a clan Derf not a townie? We don’t get many of those in here. Thank you, tipping your bartender is a long-standing tradition if you are pleased. I’ll take a bonus gladly. Why don’t you grab a low bench for Derf from the dining tables and bring it over to the end of the bar? You stick out blocking the aisle here. You’ll be out of the way there and I’ll come down and talk to you when I get slow times.”

“If it gets that slow perhaps you could fit a partial lesson in early?” Clarke suggested.

“I don’t want to short my employer. But if you want to order a drink, I’ll mix it in front of you, explaining what I’m doing.”

“Marvelous. You aren’t making one now. What might Humans ask me to mix at a fancy dinner party that has a nice buffet?” He screwed his muzzle up thinking. “There might be Derf drinking too.”

“I’ll start you out with a basic Martini,” Iverson said. “Bring the bench over and I’ll have everything down there to do a demonstration. The rule of thumb for the house is to use eight shots of liquor serving Derf for one shot used with Humans.”

Clarke went for the bench. This was going to be fun.

“It isn’t just making the drink,” Iverson explained before touching a bottle. “A good bartender adds some showmanship. You don’t just pour. You pour and pull the bottle away so there is a long stream.” He demonstrated. “The trick is in a snap of the wrist to cut it off. Also, you don’t just shake. You turn it into a little dance as if you really enjoy doing it.”

Clarke could see how that would be amusing.

The crew was vacuuming the carpet in the dining room later and Iverson had just demonstrated a daiquiri. It was almost as good as a julep. Clarke briefly considered having Iverson make one of each again to do another careful sip versus sip comparison between the two to ascertain the truth of the matter. It seemed important.

“I think it’s time to wrap it up, buddy. They’re going to turn the lights out on us pretty soon. I’ll call you a car. Can you make it out to the car OK?”

“Yeth. I-am-perfectly-fine,” Clarke said enunciating each word carefully. He stood to demonstrate that and swayed a little but didn’t fall over. He pulled out the Mother’s credit card and made sure his thumb was on the taste pad. Iverson touched his bar pad to the card, kept a poker face at the total, and got a welcome approval light.

“Stop back and tell me how the party went if you’re in the area,” Iverson invited.

“I’m tharry, that-would-be-a-security-breach,” Clarke assured him.

* * *

“This is strange,” Dakota said. “There are three gentlemen here from Australia, France, and Brazil, and a lady from India, asking an audience with you. They came over unannounced in a private limo and are sitting, awaiting a response at the main entrance at the road terminal. They weren’t pushy at all.”

“One doesn’t usually think of those countries as being closely aligned,” Heather said.

“No kidding, but on the public com they crowded in so I could see all of them on the screen. They are all dressed very formally in the current style with long coats and Ascots like hundreds of years ago. At least they skipped the hats. The lady is in a long tunic and pants set that manages to almost look like a sari. Not a blessed one of them has spex. I checked. All of them are listed on public sites as working with their governments in their foreign services, but none of them are the top guys. They didn’t say anything about security and I didn’t see any behind them. What do you think? Do you want to talk to them?”

“Did one of them seem to be their spox?” Heather asked.

“The Brazilian fellow spoke for them but the first thing he did was introduce the others.”

“Send somebody to bring them down or have somebody up top do it if it isn’t too disruptive. Let them know once you have an idea how long it will be,” Heather decided. “Amy,” Heather raised her voice to be heard in the kitchen. “Get a light lunch and beverages for seven. No, wait. One of them is Gunny, so figure for eight. They are coming down from the surface so be ready to lay it out anywhere from a half-hour to an hour from now.”

“I’m on it,” Amy called back.

“I have Isaac Anosov coming in from Armstrong with a truck,” Dakota said. “He had a high-value cargo that couldn’t be sent on a self-driver. He could park the truck to recover later and escort our guests down on a cart.”

“Ask him if he’d mind doing that,” Heather said. “You can’t get two words out of the man normally, but they don’t need a tour guide. I can think of a few I’d be scared to have drive for them for fear we’d end up at war with all of them.”

“The old Finn, Jaako,” Dakota volunteered as an example.

“Oh, dear God, yes. Even his own brother can’t stand him. Let Isaac know what he’ll be hauling Earthies and ask him to make nice-nice.”

“He says that’s no problem,” Dakota reported in less than a minute. “I’ll call and let the Earthies know he’ll pick them up in about fifteen minutes.”

The delegation was happy to hear they would be received, because their driver wasn’t willing to wait for them, instructing them to hire locally to take them back or call him to come back. Since their governments were picking up the tab, they’d have paid him to wait for several days if necessary. He found his daughter’s tenth birthday more compelling than their necessities or affairs of state.

The tiny public terminal where the road ended had a few benches and some vending machines. The benches looked so fragile to Earth eyes that they sat down carefully, afraid they’d break. They were very springy but nowhere near breaking and surprisingly comfortable once they tried them. They each had a small soft-sided bag in case they needed to stay overnight. They moved them away from where their driver had dumped them by the airlock to the seats. The vending machines had coffee, tea, and chocolate that they expected, but also espresso shots, brandy, and butter at additional cost. The machine to measure your feet and produce custom footies was interesting. Other things made no sense at all. Why would little green tins of Bag Balm to soothe the chapped udders of dairy cows be sold on the Moon? There were bags of something called No-Stink-Um and John’s Helmet-No-Dust. At least they could figure out why those might be useful from the names.

The Australian tapped his card on the pay-port and was offered coffee at A$18.00.

“Is it any good or is it colored water?” the Brazilian asked?

“It’s better than I’m used to at home,” he admitted.

The Brazilian, being from a coffee producing nation was dubious, unaware the Australians grew coffee. They just kept most of it at home rather than export it. He swiped his card on the pay-port and hesitated just a moment at the display. National pride kept him from saying anything aloud. They wanted R$94 for the same cup. He paid but walked back in shock and said nothing. At least he had to admit it was a decent cup of coffee.

Isaac parked his empty truck on the surface lot and made his way in through a private entry for drivers. Dakota had a cart waiting for him and in a few minutes, he pulled up outside the bollards marking off the pedestrian area where the Earthies were waiting.

“I’m your transport to see my sovereign,” Isaac announced. He stayed seated and made no move to help them with their bags. The minister from Brazil set the example for them by grabbing his own bag. That was good because Isaac would have repeated the expression his mother often asked, “Are your arms broken?”

Six people were a snug fit on the two benches. Isaac handed his helmet bag to the rear seat and asked them to put it in the rear box with their luggage. He got underway without any discussion. He didn’t introduce himself or, typically for him, bother to tell them how long their drive with him would be

The French fellow ended up next to Isaac upfront. He looked him over with a quizzical expression. When he spoke, he had that slow methodical way of speaking that said he’d thought over what he wanted to ask and was speaking carefully.

“You are wearing a pressure suit. Did you just get off a spaceship before coming in?”

“No, I just came in from driving a truck to Armstrong. I’m not a pilot. I can’t say it ever appealed to me to try. There are automated trucks running to Armstrong all the time but if cargo is very high value or hazardous it’s always taken by a Human driver. An automated truck is too easy to jack. All you have to do is stand in the road and the AI will stop for you. If it looks like a hijacking I’d switch to manual and drive right over them. It keeps the recipients honest too. I record the unloading and get a signed receipt.”

“What sort of high value cargo needs such extraordinary care?” the Frenchman asked.

“I don’t think my Lady would appreciate my sharing that much of her business with foreigners,” Isaac said.

He wasn’t particularly forceful about it as if it upset him. The French minister just nodded and said that seemed reasonable.

The Indian delegate leaned forward to talk around the Frenchman.

“I’m surprised by your suit. Doesn’t your truck have a pressurized cabin like our car? Our driver didn’t wear a suit and seemed unconcerned for us or himself.”

“Oh sure. You’ll probably ask next how often they fail and lose pressure. The fact is I’ve never heard of any ground vehicle having a catastrophic pressure loss. But I’m a belt and suspenders sort of guy when it comes to vacuum. If we do have a failure, I don’t want them telling future visitors that they never fail, except for that poor devil Isaac Anosov.”

The French fellow laughed. “L'exception qui confirme la règle.”

“Yes, you don’t want that as your epitaph,” Isaac agreed.

If they were surprised he understood French, no one insulted him by saying so.

“A commendable attitude,” the Indian lady said. “On Earth we have hundreds of people perish every year because they trusted their vehicle to cross a desert without extra water or to drive through ice and snow trusting the heater to keep them alive.”

“The Australian spoke from the back seat. “Yes, we still have vast stretches like that in our interior. I wonder though if you Spacers don’t become more cautious, having access to Life Extension Therapies? Do you think it makes you more risk-averse?”

Isaac thought about it a bit before answering.

“I’m assuming none of you have had life extension. We learn to tell the little differences between natural people and gene mod. I understand some Earthies who get illegal modifications dye their hair and there are cremes that actually make wrinkles?”

“That’s true,” the Indian said, “but there are big differences between what is legal in various countries. Some things that are considered normal medical treatments in one country may be illegal gene mods in another. I have been treated to remove family traits that favor heart disease and a tendency to have a rare cancer that is very difficult to treat. But I’d be seen as a monster in North America. I’ve had nothing to change my appearance.”

Isaac nodded. “I figure you have all seen your fortieth birthday. Consider how differently you think about everything now than you did at twenty.”

He paused to let them do that. None of them wanted to comment on that.

“There is a natural progression of one’s thinking with experience. It impacts far more than how much risk you will accept. You get increasingly accurate spotting lies and defective personalities. It’s a shame in natural people that just when those talents are maturing, they start to decline physically. Some as young as in their sixties. That hits them in their cognitive abilities as much as their strength and reaction times. But how much difference do you imagine exists between the thinking and attitudes of a genuinely healthy ninety-year-old or a hundred-and-thirty-year-old person from your forty-some years? Will the difference be more or less than the twenty-year gap you see to your youth?”

Nobody replied but they all looked concerned.

“That’s the gap you’ll be dealing with speaking to my Lady Heather,” Isaac said in case they didn’t get the point clearly.

“May one ask your age?” the Indian was bold enough to ask.

“I’m a youngster. I’ll be eighty-eight in a couple of months,” Isaac said.

“If I saw you at home, I’d judge you to be in the mid to late thirties,” the Frenchman said.

“I have the life extension and extra things like the ability to synthesize my own vitamin C and a few other micro-nutrients internally. I’m a bit stronger and quicker than I was naturally even when young. I passed on the option for a fast metabolism that would require I eat a lot more. You can usually add such things if you decide you need them. It’s like adding accessories to a ground car. I don’t need quite as much sleep as I used to but they have yet to come up with a gene mod to let me breathe vacuum,” Isaac said sadly.

“There are rumors the Chinese have produced Humans with gills who can breathe water,” the Indian said. “It has long been uncomfortable being neighbors with them.”

“It has long been uncomfortable being neighbors with Earth,” Isaac said. “Don’t be surprised if my sovereign is blunt about how uncomfortable. We commonly call it the Slum Ball and worse. I’m just sworn to her, not a peer to be a close confidant, but she holds court and issues statements that make it plain she doesn’t mince words and dance around issues.”

“We rather noticed that with her public releases,” the Brazilian said drolly.

By that time, they were on their first long elevator drop.

“How far are we going down?” the Australian asked.

“Kilometers,” was as precise as Isaac would volunteer.

“Are we there yet?” The French fellow joked in a higher-pitched voice.

“Oh, you have children,” Isaac observed, amused. It was nice they weren’t humorless. “We’ll be there in another twenty minutes or so,” he promised.

* * *

“I got your fusion generator from New Japan yesterday. It was our last out-sourced sub-system to be installed,” Alonso said. “How much did this thing cost that you needed to have armed security deliver it?”

“Near as much as the rest of the vehicle and all the accessories,” Lee answered honestly.

“I should have charged you more,” Alonso decided.

“By the time I want a new one I’ll have some income again and you have my permission to gouge the daylights out of me for it,” Lee invited. “I won’t argue at all.”

“And we’ll make it two-thirds the mass and several times the thrust,” Alonso predicted.

“Did they deliver it fueled up?” Lee asked

“Not tanked up but two liters of four-nines heavy water in a separate carboy. It looks like you could drop it from orbit undamaged. I loaded it up for you.

“Does that mean you have it installed already?”

“All the flanges, mounting holes, and connectors were to spec so that took about a half-hour,” Alonso said. “That’s just what I’ve come to expect with New Japan equipment. You can watch me lift it if you want to keep your dainty little behind safe on the ground or take it up with me riding second. Whenever you can find the time that is.”

“I’m calling a car to come over right now,” Lee informed him.

“I kind of suspected you might,” Alonso said but he was talking to a blank screen.

The first thing Lee noticed when she walked into his office was a Dutch door had been added to the shop area with a sign on the bottom half that declared in large letters – RESTRICTED AREA – NO ENTRY WITHOUT PERMISSION. It was too bad Alonso needed to do that, but she was glad to see it.

“Permission to enter requested!” Lee called loudly through the door.

Alonso was in plain sight. She was just harassing him a bit.

“You aren’t a spy, are you?” he asked. “We grill spies and eat them.”

“Long pig is the English idiom for that,” Lee informed him.

“I knew that. I would teach you English if I had time, instead of that dialect you speak.”

“Is that what you decided to do with the fellow you caught the other day? He didn’t look very appetizing.”

“I followed your advice, but he seemed defective. He had a definite crack up his butt. I decided to spray him with fluorescing green crack finder so nobody would mistakenly install him in anything life-critical.”

“You didn’t,” Lee exclaimed.

“I certainly did,” Alonso insisted. “Magnaflux would hardly have been appropriate.”

“I applaud your sign,” Lee said. “I know it’s solid custom but that removes any question about it being a private area for flaming idiots and spies.”

“I put black and yellow safety tape across the floor at the hangar doors too. It says no trespassing in English and Derf. I won’t go so easy on another invader,” he warned.

“I wouldn’t expect you to,” Lee assured him. She put her hands on her hips and turned, regarding the aircar. Alonso wasn’t stupid and figured she was done talking about Sam.

“It was up on a rack last time I was here,” Lee said. “It looks a lot different.”

The car had no landing gear. Instead, the thruster pods on arms swiveled down vertically to suspend the car above the floor. It was much more stable than the way conventional aircraft had gear projecting from beneath the fuselage. It was even better than the skids of a conventional aircar. Right now, it was sitting with a dolly under each pod to allow it to be pushed around.

“Have you tested it at all?” Lee inquired.

“I’ve checked that there is power and data to all the pods and run diagnostics on the computers. That’s just on battery power and they are all charged up. The cabin has been pressure tested to three times Derf standard. You could lift her on battery power alone but just to move around the tarmac. I wouldn’t want to go very high without firing up the generator. The paperwork and manual said it takes about ten minutes to bring the generator up to full power from a dead cold start and that drains a good chunk of the battery reserves heating the core up. I figured to let you have the honors. I’ll instruct you of course.”

“Oh, please. Can we do that now?”

“As soon as I clean and put these tools away,” Alonso said. “Otherwise, you’ll give me no peace. Go pull the office door shut and I’ll be done by the time you return.”

Alonso was cleaning his hands by the time she returned.

“We’ll push her out this first time. It’ll be safer in case we have any control problems.”

He proceeded to lean on the rear with all four arms. Lee helped though he hadn’t asked. It was hard to tell how much she added. Lee suspected she might not be able to move it alone. Alonso didn’t stop until they were thirty meters clear of the building. He turned, phone in hand and ran his overhead doors down to a tiny gap from being closed.

“If the canopy is raised, I can reach in and grab a seat back and swing a leg up and in,” Alonso demonstrated, but didn’t finish the motion. “For humans, there is a foot-well here,” he pointed out. “There’s a take-hold half a meter to either side, just inside the canopy’s seal. I don’t expect you to use it often, but it’s there.”

Lee put a toe in the hole. It was surprisingly deep. She felt and found the take-holds and pulled herself up but like Alonso didn’t swing in.

“That’ll work fine for me,” she agreed.

“We’ll go in the normal way.” He led Lee to the hatch just behind the rear of the canopy. It opened in to his hand and they stopped and set it to Lee’s. He closed it again.

“Now watch. If you need the space inside that it would swing through, you touch this icon.” He did so. The hatch opened again but out. “It’s the same on both sides. On the other hand, you might be right up against something and need it to open in.”

“It doesn’t need the internal pressure holding it?” Lee worried.

“It’s hard to see the lines,” Alonso said tracing them with a finger, “but watch closely. No matter which way it opens it has a toggle in the middle then folds the middle in and narrows the hatch to withdraw it from a groove. It’s very strong and has backup power.”

“OK, I’d have called that a knuckle. It’s quiet too,” she said surprised. “I’d expect it to sound like a bank vault.”

“It’s going to fly as quiet as a twool,” Alonso said. “Why would you want to announce you’ve arrived to the world with a loud slamming door?”

“I’ve never seen a twool,” Lee admitted. “Never heard of one until now.”

“Maybe one person in a hundred has if they do the fall hunt. They don’t come out until deep dusk and a nut eater won’t know one is gliding down on him until he feels the claws. You still won’t hear him, just see him hunting if you’re lucky and paying attention.”

“That’s quiet, given Derf hearing,” Lee admitted. “I think you just named her for me.”

“Heh, that will do just fine,” Alonso agreed. He stepped in, ducking down a bit to fit.

The volume was large for an airlock and unusual in having an exit on both sides and the bottom. Sitting on the ground he couldn’t demonstrate the extendable docking collar. The entry to the flight cabin was a split door that popped out a few centimeters and slid to each side when Alonso palmed the screen. Alonso led Lee to the front seats waving her into the one configured for Humans. He reached up grabbing a handle on the back edge of the canopy and pulled it down as he backed up.

“I won’t be able to reach that,” Lee realized concerned.

“I wasn’t planning on opening it as a regular thing,” Alonso admitted. “I’ll hang a lanyard on it you can reach.”

The canopy did make a soft latching sound when it sealed and he took the other seat.

“Will it lift with the canopy up or are there safety interlocks?” Lee wondered.

“It’s not a consumer device made for idiots,” Alonso assured her. “There are very few things you can’t tell it to do. I assume if you want to turn it upside down, drop the canopy off, and lose any loose luggage and unbelted passengers you must have an urgent need to do so. The airlock is the same with an override to force both hatches open if you wish.”

“Now, note the control board.” He made an exaggerated gesture of releasing a lock and pulling the panel that was mostly screen in closer to him. When it was positioned comfortably, he punched the lock to hold it there. Lee copied it with her board.

When he laid his palm on the screen it came alive.

“This is the screen that will let you cold start your fancy little Japanese reactor. It also shows your battery status, the charge-discharge balance, core temperature, and other power system information. It is the top left of the row of reduced screen icons along the top of your monitor. They are hard to see in detail at that size but they are numbered.

“If you wish to change the order of the screens you must hold the function key in the bottom left of the screen and drag the screen to the place in line you wish it. Would you like to start it powering up?”

“Yes,” Lee agreed tapping the large red start button over a schematic of the reactor. It turned green and said warming. The battery and temperature readouts started changing.

“If you wish to reduce this display to a quarter of the screen to use other screens just touch a corner and swipe it to the center to push it toward that corner.” He demonstrated.

“If you touch other screen icons they will display as quarter screens from this mode. You should be able to fly with four screens or fewer showing. Touch an icon and it will remove that screen to clear a quadrant for another.” He made the screen vanish and reappear.

“Touch a quarter screen edge and you can drag it to a half screen, or half to whole.”

“Screen two shows the top view outline of the vehicle,” he said tapping it. “It shows outside temperature and pressure versus inside and the loading on each pod sitting on the ground in kilograms. The hatch status is shown and can be controlled from here too.

“Screen three auto displays once you lift. It shows the orientation of the car to the vertical and horizon. It will display turn and roll real-time, show rate of climb, or descend, and ground speed by radar or estimated speed out of range from inertial sensors. If you have a local map and GPS it can be run as a background in the perspective you wish.”

“Have you tested the smart paint?” Lee wondered.

“I’ve set it to white, blue, and the current black. You’ll have to set it to anything fancy. It and the controls for it added another six kilos. I’d have skipped it.”

“But it will be pretty,” Lee said smiling.

“It’s pretty in any color but you are the customer,” Alonso acknowledged. “The next screen is com functions. Several systems and diagnostic screens like the paint, and then the far-right icon is celestial navigation. You have to load the program and data for that. I’ve never used any and have no opinions about it.”

“The reactor is up to temperature and idling at five percent to recharge the batteries,” he pointed out. “If you don’t shut it down it will run just enough to keep the core hot. It can do that for a couple of months on a full fuel load. Notice it took a third of your battery charge to start it up.”

“It’s ready to lift then?” Lee asked.

“It is but you aren’t. Put it in flight mode and activate simulation. That will let you try out the stick and the screen will display what the car would do for those commands. Now, I’m going to detail the motions and control buttons on your stick. After you see me do it then you can try it to get the feel before we do it for real.”

It took another hour before Lee was ‘flying’ it.

“I’m going to set the control resistance up a little more. You have a heavy hand,” Alonso accused her. “You can ease it back if you learn some finesse.”

“Can we lift her already?” Lee asked impatiently.

“Yes, but lift to two meters and then lock the altitude by ground radar. That’s the center thumb toggle on the stick,” he reminded her.

“Finally,” Lee said. She set two meters for an altitude limit and pulled up the second screen. With the reactor running and simulation mode not engaged the pods spun up for the first time. There was just enough of a hum that you could feel the car was alive in the seat of your pants. Lee figured Alonso could probably hear it. The front pods showed a bit more weight on them and the corner by Alonso’s seat quite a bit more.

She squeezed the grip on the front of the stick and the numbers started counting down with the pods bearing more weight automatically generating more thrust. When the rear pods lifted clear of the dollies, they swung forward to take more weight. The front pods reached their balance point and shifted slightly too as they left their dollies. The screen switched to flight mode showing the aircar against a bird’s eye map of the airport with the hangar behind them. Slightly more pressure saw the car rise slowly until it reached two meters altitude and the screen informed her that they were at altitude. Lee toggled the lock to hold in that altitude.

Lee was grinning like she’d invented flight.

“We don’t have to announce that we are going to taxi which is what I consider flight at this altitude. Take her around the hangars and parallel to the runway with all due caution. Get the feel of her,” Alonso invited.

Lee looked out to the side and saw the dolly from the near pod.

“We seem to be drifting off location. Why would it do that?”

“You have the altitude set but no location. I imagine the breeze is blowing us along a little bit. That’s something to keep in mind if it’s very stormy,” Alonso said. “It should have a track recording for this flight. You have a menu down the left to retrace it or return directly to zero.”

“Oh, sweet.” She fiddled with the menu and the aircar adjusted the thrusters slightly and eased back over the dollies, turning just a little.

“And I’d have to set it to hold if I don’t want it to drift off again,” Lee said.

“Exactly,” Alonso agreed.

“If I want to move it without dollies, I can set it to a half meter and just push it around.”

“If a big gust of wind doesn’t come up or a plane taxi by. A good blast of prop wash or jet exhaust might have you chasing it,” he said amused at picturing that. “If you ever do that, somebody is almost guaranteed to catch it on video and release it to the public nets.

“OK, I’m going to move around,” Lee declared. She didn’t get too rambunctious. She did turn hard enough coming back to the hangar to make the car lift the outside edge in a bank. Lee didn’t expect that but, “It’s smart enough to lift the outside and not to drag the inside pods,” was her only comment. Back over the dollies Lee just asked, “Can we fly her now?”

“Yes, you are most restrained,” Alonso complimented her. He touched his screen.

“This is Alonso Air. We are testing an experimental vehicle running my transponder code doing a vertical lift and customer orientation flight from the small craft area. We’ll lift to five hundred meters, steer clear of the traffic pattern to the northwest by eyeball and add a climb above notification altitude over the ocean. Advise us of contrary traffic please.”

“Rudy freight flight on approach twenty kilometers out. You’ll be long gone for me.”

“I’m a hobby flier out of your way to the south. Rich man’s toy. Have fun with it.”

“You have no idea,” Alfonso told him.

“Up and that-a-way,” he pointed for Lee. “Try not to run into anything.”

OceanofPDF.com

Chapter 16

Sam listened to his bot report the radio traffic, frustrated. It told him nothing about the vehicle, which he suspected was the one he’d seen. He also assumed it was Lee Anderson being given a demo flight, but she was never actually named. He took the time to look up what customary altitude was excluded from reporting to local traffic as too high to interfere. Surprisingly, that was ten thousand meters. He wasn’t an aviation buff to know offhand but checking confirmed that was way beyond the capabilities of any normal aircar.

There was no way that he was going to risk even coming within sight of that hangar again. That Derf had zero sense of humor and wouldn’t accept any nonsense about innocently passing by. He’d have to pay a local agent to place a camera a safe distance away if he wanted to see the thing fly and confirm it was Lee’s. His own prejudices blinded him to the fact that dying him bright green showed a tremendous sense of humor. He called his favorite agency and asked them to send somebody to install a camera as quickly as possible.

* * *

“Can you set the map under the icon of the flying car to a satellite view instead of a road map and cartoonish icons for buildings?” Lee wondered.

“I don’t think anybody runs real-time optical coverage,” Alonso said. “There’s optical coverage for sale from a high-altitude orbiting drone but that doesn’t extend much past the city unless you pay for them to fly over to survey forest or farmland.”

“I wasn’t even thinking real-time,” Lee said. “Recent images would be useful. They don’t change roads or build houses all that fast.”

“I know of nothing. Given my business, if it existed, you’d think I’d have been targeted to offer it even before the general public.”

“In that case, I’m going to want a camera that can zoom in and out and pan.”

“There’s a tiny camera topside, but it’s part of the smart paint,” Alonso informed her. “It just looks at the sky to see how to color the bottom, and how bright, to make you near invisible.”

“Oh sweet. I had no idea it could do something so practical.”

“I’m sure you’ll find other things you want the car to do,” Alonso predicted. “There’s a ridge coming up ahead. If you leave the autopilot on five hundred meters don’t be surprised when it climbs at maximum power as soon as you cross it and then dives on the other side.”

Lee flicked the autopilot off and thought about it.

“How do I integrate the maps and autopilot to make it look ahead and ease over obstacles without jerking us around?”

“At five hundred meters you’d do better with collision avoidance radar,” Alonso said. “You can put limits on how fast the autopilot is allowed to respond, but that’s a lot safer at ten thousand meters. This low it could fly you into the ground or a new radio tower just faithfully following your orders. It would have to have the sort of thinking ability and discretion that I’ve never heard of them building into a full AI, much less a simple robotic pilot. I’m not going to trust my life to it. I have a hard enough time letting other people fly for me.”

“You may be surprised to know I had almost this same discussion with friends not long ago. Apparently, there’s some really advanced AI stuff being made in New Japan. It was just interesting then, but now, I’ll have to look into it,” Lee decided. “There’s the coast. Can I see how it will climb if I open it up?”

“Ramp the power up now before we cross,” Alonso suggested. “If it’s going to bust, I’d rather have it do so over land. That bright orange take-hold on the dash is the ballistic parachute. If things go really bad one of us should yank that. It will try to put us down gently and right side up if it can.”

“Not bad,” Lee decided as they were pressed in their seats. “There’s no reason not to get this thing inverted, is there?”

Alonso sighed. “No, I knew you’d want to play hard. There’s no reason you can’t fly along inverted either, if you don’t mind hanging in the straps. You could do that to look for stuff instead of your satellite view. Just make sure there’s nothing hard in your pockets to fall out and ding the canopy.”

“But I couldn’t run the stealth paint on the top to hide it in the ground image from above, can I? The camera now just sets the bottom,” Lee realized.

“An action the poor sane designers probably never anticipated,” Alonso said. “Of course, you could run camo on the bottom to make you match the ground behind you to anyone flying over while inverted. If you insist, we can mount another camera on the belly so you can be stealthed to both sides any way you turn. It will break down from the side.”

“Sweet. We’ll do that,” Lee said oblivious to the fact he was being sarcastic. “Fifteen thousand meters. That gives us some room to maneuver.”

Lee looked intensely happy. “Now, you should snug your belts and hang on.”

* * *

Sam’s phone chimed. The Derf who ran his favored private investigating agency informed him his camera was in place. It was attached to a frame holding a runway light above where the mowers might damage it. Alonso’s hangar was just off-center about a hundred meters away. The lens defaulted to a fish-eye setting that was tilted up to show more than half the sky although the light intruded. You could zoom in on any part of the image already recorded or zoom in in real-time with even better fidelity. He gave Sam the net address and thanked him for his business.

Sam left it recording full time but set the sensitivity high enough it wouldn’t alert him for every bird flying by. He closed the connection feeling much better.

* * *

After whipping the car through every maneuver she could imagine, Lee turned back towards land and their home field, leaving it on autopilot straight and level.

“I’m satisfied,” she announced.

“Does that constitute your acceptance of the vehicle?” Alonso asked.

“Don’t be so formal. I’m delighted with it. I accept delivery even if I want a few bells and whistles added. I’ll finish paying anything owed and whatever else we do is extra cost.”

“Thank you. I think you’ve shown nothing is going to fall off, but may I have the stick and test a little different configuration?”

“Have at it,” Lee said with a grand gesture. “What didn’t I do?”

“You haven’t had time to explore the full flight menu,” Alonso allowed. “It’s in lift mode right now. That gives it the most maneuverability, as you’ve tested so very well. I was happy to see it can do eight hundred sixty kilometers per hour at full thrust. That’s a little better than I expected even at this altitude. Observe this, however.”

He touched the ground speed frame and it dropped a menu. Alonso picked Mach. The display changed to point five nine.

“Watch what the pods do,” he told Lee.

The frame that said lift, he changed to lifting body. The pods were already tilted forward at about fifty degrees. They swung forward and in until they were riding almost straight ahead on their booms. The leading wedge only tilted up about five degrees. The surge forward was impressive but Alonso pulled the stick back and traded speed for climb until it dropped and held steady at Mach point six-five.

When he passed thirty thousand meters Lee was grinning from ear to ear at the view and the darkening sky. Then Alonso jammed the stick forward.

“Whaa-whooooo!” Lee cried at the roller coaster plunge.

All of a sudden, the chisel tops on the pods made sense. As they went through the Mach it vibrated briefly and the sound got different. Alonso increased the angle of dive at full power until their airspeed read Mach 1.36. The car was riding inside the shock cone from the leading pods, doing a little hula, the nose wanting to wander side to side. Alonso corrected something on his board that stopped it. Then he eased back both power and angle. The pods swung slightly into negative lift so the nose came up until their belly was outside the shock cone from the forward pods and acting like a big speed brake. It felt like a ground car on gravel and their speed plummeted. That wasn’t all that plummeted. The sky quickly looked normal again and their speed was Mach .72 and falling. The ground below was displaying a lot more detail of rivers and roads again.

“Not bad. Not bad at all,” he said smugly. “As far as I know you own the first transonic aircar. If the Earthies ever made one it’s never been in the trade literature.”

“Hot damn. I accept it all over again. What did you fiddle with back there to make it stop wiggling?” she demanded.

“I turned the leading edge of the wedges on the front pods up a couple of degrees on the outside corner,” Alonso said. He demonstrated it with his hands held flat.

“What does that do?” Lee asked mystified.

“It’s like a ground car. If you set the front wheels straight ahead it will drive you nuts wandering all over the road at the slightest breeze or variation in the pavement. You need to toe the wheels in a couple of degrees at the front and it wants to go straight then. Don’t worry, it will retain that setting now that it is entered. You should know if you exceed the Mach it will lay a shockwave along your flight path. The lower you are the greater the overpressure will be. It’s beyond anything my software could design to attenuate it.”

When they got back and the hangar came into view as they descended, eight bright orange safety cones were sitting around the dollies they’d left behind.

“Oh great, the grounds manager is going to yell at me for leaving a traffic hazard.”

“If they fine you, let me know. I’ll pay it,” Lee offered.

* * *

In the short time that Alonso and Lee were gone, Sam got two alerts from his new camera. A Human showed up and removed the tie-downs on a single-seater parked in the open behind Alonso’s hangar. After removing a cover from the windows, he did a walk-around. Once he climbed in and the propeller came alive, he taxied past the camera with a buzzing sound to take off. He was able to fast forward through most of that action to see nothing was concurrently happening with his target.

The second alert was triggered by a utility cart driven by a Derf stopping in front of Alonso’s business. The driver got out removing a stack of bright safety cones from a box on the rear and positioning them around something on the pavement in front of the hangar.

With the distortion from the fisheye lens, Sam hadn’t even noticed the dollies. They could have been a dip or oil spot on the pavement. He tried the zoom feature and got a better look. Sure enough, they were three-wheel dollies. Similar to what you’d use to move heavy furniture, like a grand piano. Other than the fact that suggested they’d pushed the aircar out rather than taxi it, that didn’t really tell him much of anything. A plane taxied past with a loud turbine whine, and then the worker drove away.

The third alert in such a short time made Sam wonder if this surveillance was more trouble than it was worth. Until he opened it up to find the aircar setting down gently on the dollies and the hangar door going up. Nobody got out right away and the car sat there for several minutes. He zoomed the camera in for a good tight view. Bizarrely, it changed color on the top part several times while the bottom stayed pale blue. It finally turned solid red all over. Alonso and Lee finally got out and rolled it inside. Alonso came back out and gathered the safety cones into a single stack and left them outside his office door.

Sam was irritated that the sound seemed to have died on the camera. He was looking for a function to run the gain up or down when a plane landed behind the camera with a squeak of tires and the roar of reversed engines. That was weird. The sound was working but the aircar hadn’t made any noise at all. Now that the action was over and it was inside, he backed the recording up a couple of minutes before the point where he’d come in. The car came into sight overhead but it was strange. It looked like a corrupted file or some sort of artifact. He backed it up and watched it three times before he was sure what he was seeing.

The car wasn’t visible until it got low enough to see the side a little. If you knew where to look you could see some blurring and a random flicker of darker or lighter pixels around the engine pods earlier but it was really low before you suddenly saw the top curve of the canopy and the body behind it. The bottom half of the aircar wasn’t clearly visible until you were looking pretty much sideways at it.

Sam called his partner Bill King in to look at the video.

“Watch here.” Sam circled an area of the screen with a finger and started the recording.

“Uh-huh, Uh-huh,” Bill said when the blue sky got splotchy and freckled.

He watched it all the way through until the aircar was pushed inside.

“Very nice. They have some serious high-end optical stealth there,” Bill King said. “I hope you didn’t place that camera yourself.”

“No, I hired out spotting the cam, and yeah, I figured out that it’s an active stealth system. But it’s so quiet. I’ve seen really expensive aircars back home that had high-powered noise-canceling speakers. But the very best of them just reduced the roar to a level that wasn’t painful. How can they possibly do that?”

“You’re missing the obvious. What kind of engine pods are those?” Bill asked.

“How would I know? I’m no kind of aviation buff or a gear-head. They’re kind of skinny and long not fat and short like shrouded fans, so I’d guess they are turbines?” Sam said.

Bill looked amused. “If they were turbines, I imagine the exhaust would have sent those dollies rolling all over the place and blown those safety cones away. They’re not filled with concrete you know.”

“I can’t say as I’ve ever touched one, other than inadvertently running over a whole line of the damn things one time.” Sam saw Bill thought he was humorous now and regretted calling him in. He should have puzzled it out on his own first.

“The give-away is both ends of those pods are sealed up. Believe me, you don’t flow enough air through one to lift that thing without a big hole we could easily see.”

Sam looked at the video again and zoomed in.

“It’s kind of a big deal then, isn’t it?”

“More than I know how to tell you,” Bill King admitted. “We have to decide if we are going to report this or keep it to ourselves. It’s going to be disruptive. The question is. Do we want to be in the middle of it? If we report it, I’m sure it will be considered too important to leave it up to us to investigate. I have no illusions. We’re here because we’re considered part of the B team. They will send in a couple of young hot-shots. Right now, that would mean sending them through other nations at great expense.”

“If they even believe us,” Sam said. “But we could still be yanked back home if they think we are nuts and don’t trust us in the field anymore.”

“I hadn’t considered that possibility, but you are right,” King said. “I’m surprised they haven’t terminated our mission and ordered us home yet. I’ve been dreading deciding what to do if they recall us.”

“I have no desire to return to Earth in either case,” Sam said.

“That’s what I wanted to hear again,” King said. “As long as we were just marking time to retirement and nothing big was happening there was no big decision to make. But if we fail to report this and they find out somehow it will be considered disloyalty. They’ll consider us compromised.”

“Which we are, technically,” Sam said.

Bill said nothing. Technically Bill was senior but as conspirators, they had to be equal.

“Tell me this,” Sam asked. “If we did report it, what difference would it make? Are they going to steal the vehicle? Would they bring in a mercenary team to snatch it? Right now, unless somebody is lying to us, North America is pretty well cut off from access to space. They can’t project any force into the Derfhome system. Even if we somehow managed to steal the guts out of one of those pods. We could get information out but we don’t have any facilities to disassemble it or reverse engineer it to extract that information.”

King nodded. “All we could do would be give them a heads up that they have a new technology. That isn’t of much benefit with zero details. What I’m wondering, is, why would she put this in an aircar instead of a spaceship?”

“Maybe it won’t work in a spaceship?” Sam suggested.

“I doubt that. Physics is physics, everywhere.”

“Maybe they are working on it for spaceships,” Sam said. “We’re not in any position to see what they are doing in orbit.”

“In which case we’re way too late to make a difference if it’s already trickling down to lesser applications,” King said.

“Then let’s agree to just continue watching,” Sam said. “I will keep everything we have on this tech isolated on one memory card.”

“I agree. We’ll just sit on it unless something changes. Where will you keep it?” King asked. “I need to be able to find it if it needs to be wiped.”

“In case I get run over by a bus?” Sam said.

“One never knows. Though that’s an odd name for an irate Derf.”

“See the big fern?” Sam pointed. “There’s a fertilizer stick in the pot. It’ll be under that. It looks normal for that to be disturbed.”

* * *

“Where are you going to keep your new aircar?” Alonso asked.

Lee didn’t answer. She just had a surprised and embarrassed expression.

“You didn’t think that far ahead,” Alonso guessed.

“I live in a hotel. I guess people don’t keep them at the airport?”

“The whole point of an aircar over a plane is being free of airports,” Alonso said. “I’ll take some blame for not asking. Most of my customers have owned aircraft before and are familiar with their care and keeping.”

“Can I leave it here for now? I’d be happy to pay storage until I can find a place.”

“For now. I’m into a couple of other long-term projects now but sometimes I need room for four vehicles. You need a fairly secure building. At least it’s so quiet that your coming and going won’t upset the neighbors.”

“Maybe the hotel would let me keep it on the roof,” Lee said.

Alonso shook his head. “It’s an old building. Even with no rotor wash pressing down on it the weight is too much for a roof that wasn’t designed as a landing pad. It’s all concentrated on four points too. Do you want it sitting out in the weather?”

“No, I guess not,” Lee agreed. “The Mothers have a security man, Strangelove, in town. He’s assigned to guard Jeff Singh. I’ll ask him what assets he has to store it close to me. I haven’t told him or anybody what I’m building. I owe the Central people a full explanation of the tech in due time but only my guys at the university knew I was up to something”

Alonso looked surprised. “Wouldn’t they have been a big help?”

“Yeah, and they probably will be to develop it further. We have… other projects with them. I was about to reveal this to them and we almost had a falling out. Truthfully, I want to rub their noses in it a little bit that we can do development without them. I’ll share it fully after I walk them out unannounced and give them a ride in it. Do you have alarms in the shop? I suspect the first thing Strangelove is going to ask is how secure the car is. He has guys covering some of our other stuff.”

“I have sensors that will call my pad. But I’m not a bank,” Alonso said. “I don’t have armed response hired. If you want to give me free professional security, I’ll welcome them and they can set up in the office and drink my coffee.”

“You know what?” Lee decided. “I’ll call him right now before I leave. If he wants to send a couple of soldiers over, I won’t have to get back to you and arrange it.”

“Soldiers?” Alonso’s attitude changed abruptly. “So, we’re talking military level security not just commercial? Yeah, let’s get that all ironed out for sure, right now.”

* * *

“Oh, my goodness.”

“Sam, I hate it when you say something like that out loud and then expect me to beg to know what has you upset. Can’t you just go ahead and tell me?” Bill asked.

“I’m sorry. Lee stayed at the hangar rather long. I expected her to head home. She waited to leave until a couple of Red Tree soldiers showed up in full gear. They had duffels and some equipment cases like they aren’t just paying a visit and they appear to be putting cameras and sensors out.”

“You probably precipitated that,” Bill King speculated.

“Then why not right after my visit?” Sam asked.

“Fair point. But maybe they would have been lax without anybody nosing around. The way you described it the aircar was just a shell at that point. You said it was up on stands. I bet it didn’t have the pods mounted yet, did it?”

“No. I can’t say I ever saw them sitting around either,” Sam admitted.

“Well, in any case, now they have a functional vehicle, with whatever is in those pods to make it go,” Bill said. “You may assume the chassis you saw before is nothing special so it wasn’t worth guarding. Be happy you didn’t go snooping around and get caught by Red Tree’s Finest instead of an irate mechanic. I doubt they’d let you go as easily.”

“I can’t argue that. These boys looked hardcore. I’ve been trying to think how we could use this locally instead of reporting it home and everything I come up with is simply too dangerous.”

“Keep thinking that way. And warn me if you suddenly get crazy brave because I don’t want to be anywhere around when you start juggling this time bomb.”

“No, I won’t do anything stupid,” Sam promised. “It’s just frustrating. We’ve been here years and when we finally start getting some important intelligence everything has changed so it’s pretty much useless to us.”

“It’s of a great deal of use to us in this way,” Bill said. “Earth was already behind Central and the far worlds in technology. That was a big part of why we didn’t want to go back. Our idiot masters seem oblivious to reality and determined to continue belligerence with these folks. It would appear to me that besides having better jump drives they are now going to have reactionless non-quantum drives. If they provoke the Spacers again it’s going to be a lot safer here than back on Earth. And I mean anywhere on Earth. I’m thus doubly sure we want to be on this side of any exchange. I’m more convinced than ever that we have to avoid returning at any cost.”

“I’m still with you on that,” Sam agreed.

* * *

“Thank you for calling me, no matter how late in the game,” Strangelove said when Lee was back home. “Alonso went home for the day and my guys are comfortable there.”

Lee waited a moment for more but it wasn’t forthcoming.

“That’s all? You aren’t going to yell at me for not telling you about the project?”

“I’ve found a small measure of wisdom from experience,” Strangelove asserted. “If you yell at people about security matters, they are even less likely to be forthcoming the next time there is a problem. It’s not so difficult with one’s subordinates. I stopped trying to make my men follow instructions. At our safe-house, if a soldier wrote down the password to the security system it took me on the average about five minutes to find it taped to the bottom of the mouse, incorporated in the name of a file on screen, or in one case on a stapler the fellow always had out as if he used it frequently. Now, I simply send the miscreant back to Red Tree and request another fellow to be sent for me to test.

“Would you like to guess how many transfers it took to get someone who would follow orders?” Strangelove asked.

“You can’t have that many qualified to post there,” Lee reasoned. “Four?”

“Six,” Strangelove said. “And yes, I was running out of candidates for city duty.”

“Did the bad boys get demoted?” Lee wondered.

“They are perfectly good soldiers for other purposes. If I ordered them to run headlong into live fire, I’m sure they would jump to it. But they expect to be called upon to be brave. They can’t see the purpose of my silly security rules. I might as well ask them to stop and turn around three times each time they enter the house and expect them to obey. So, no, they suffered no demotion in rank or privilege. I just have a note in their records that they aren’t suited to high-security work and why. My successor may need that data.”

“It may surprise you to know that makes so much sense to me that I’m going to make a note of it in a journal I keep,” Lee said. “I’m trying to keep all the gems I’ve learned about command. Most of them are from Gordon but a few like this are from others.”

“Then add this to your notes,” Strangelove suggested. “This pruning works well down the chain of command. However, when dealing with one’s superiors that option doesn’t exist to discard them until you find one more to your liking.”

“I’m not sure that’s true,” Lee said. “I’ve been reading a history about Earth governments in the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. It seems a lot of countries had serial coups with the military seizing power from the civilian government and ruling for a period and then installing another administration. Sometimes the same one, which seems crazy to me.”

“In theory, any Derf male could put the axe to the Mothers. But the clan would surely look askance at any doing it multiple times. I’d much rather wait upon one of them who is not active military to do so. It is too easy for soldiers to appear like they feel violence is the solution to everything. With all due respect, I think I’ll leave that custom to Humans.”

“I’m not recommending it. It was just fresh in mind from reading it. Do you have anywhere secure handy to the hotel where we could store my aircar?” Lee asked. “Then maybe you can free up the two guarding it.”

“I could probably get away with parking it in the courtyard of our safe house once. If we flew it in mid-day,” Strangelove said. “Even going middle of the day, if we kept going in and out, the neighbors would surely complain about the noise.”

“It’s silent,” Lee said.

“I’ve heard the Earthies have quieter ones now but Derf are still very sensitive to noise and would complain about anything louder than a ground car.”

“No, I really mean it’s silent, not quieter. Why do you think I’m building an aircar instead of just buying one? It’s very special. Revolutionary is not too strong a word.”

Strangelove’s eyes got big thinking of everything that a security team could do with a truly silent aircar. The insertions, the surveillance.

“You’re yanking my tail,” he said.

“Strangelove! Do all soldiers have to be vulgar?”

“Yes,” he affirmed, surprised she had to ask.

“Alonso has to do some work on it still. In a few days, he can fly it to your safehouse, or I can go back out and get it. Either way, your men can ride back on it.”

“It will lift three Derf? That’s impressive,” Strangelove said.

“Yeah. It’s designed for two Derf and two Humans. It’ll probably handle like a pig with three Derf but it will do it. I’m not sure it would lift four. Alonso would have to try it low and slow for sure. Don’t forget, we have a party with Jeff and April tomorrow.”

“Yes, I’m keenly aware. I supplied the bartender and server,” Strangelove said. “If you have Alonso instruct one of my men on flying it then he can take it to the safehouse and ferry it to Alonso anytime he wishes to service it, or drop it off right in front of the hotel and take a car back to our facility. Both my men there already know how to fly a standard aircar. How hard can it be to be shown the different controls?”

Lee chewed her lip and thought. She didn’t want anybody flying her aircar, but realized that was irrational. It would be a real convenience.

“Alfonso did indicate he wants it out of there, and he’s going to charge me storage fees. Go ahead if you’d trust one of your guys with your life flying and Alfonso agrees.”

“They’re both superb soldiers or they wouldn’t be there. I’ll call now,” Strangelove said.

OceanofPDF.com

Chapter 17

Dakota brought the Earth envoys into Heather’s apartment. They looked uncomfortable. Perhaps they expected a throne room and a court. Instead, they found a modern apartment without any of the ostentatious fittings associated with royalty. There were no paintings or ornate gilded furniture. Heather didn’t crave chandeliers, marble floors, or glitter covered ceilings. An antique Waterford bowl on a central table held hard candies wrapped in colorful paper. That was the only decorative item. Heather was dressed casually and sitting relaxed in a chair. She had on pants that were frowned upon for women once again in North America, but then the lady from India was wearing them too.

There was a rather large man sitting in another chair beside her but nothing about him said relaxed despite how still he sat. Heather didn’t introduce him. Dakota didn’t leave but went to work on her pad ignoring them.

The male envoys were so alike they might all have the same tailor. The lady, Heather noted, had enough high karat gold on to buy a country estate, and her embroidered outfit must have taken a month of man-hours to make. Yet Dakota hadn’t commented on that.

“Seat yourselves any way it pleases you,” Heather invited. “If you have any particular rank or one of you is spox sort it out or switch seats when you take turns. I’ve asked my housekeeper to make coffee. If you’d rather tea or something cold she can fetch that.”

There was a silent round of glances and barely noticeable nods. The India lady and the French fellow took one couch and the Brazilian and Australian the other across the table.

“The others intimated they like my voice,” the Brazilian said. “Gerald here said I should narrate audiobooks. I’ll keep that in mind as a backup career. We aren’t ranked for this endeavor. The purpose of having four of us is to demonstrate to you a genuinely wide interest in our inquiry. But all of us can speak equally if you wish to quiz us. If we’d sent one spox we feared you might question if he was truly speaking for the others, not of his nation. There are several others interested in determining your will in certain matters, but we didn’t want to descend on you in a mob.”

“Good, I’d have to entertain a large crowd out in the audience hall you came through. It would be a lot less comfortable. I don’t even have seating for a crowd. I suppose I’d need amplification to be heard. House, can you amplify my voice in the background without an echo or feedback?” Heather inquired.

“Try speaking now and advise me if it is sufficient,” the house computer invited.

“Amy, would you also bring some cookies or pastries with our coffee, please?”

The sound level ramped up as she spoke.

“Yes, I will,” Amy called from the kitchen. “That sounded strange. You usually just yell and I can tell where you are. That was like it was coming from the ceiling.”

“You can turn that off, House. It worked well but about half the end volume is sufficient.”

“That was interesting,” Heather said. “Just in case I do need it sometime. Now, do you want to identify the other interested parties and what you wish to know?”

“The Swiss, Germans, Russians, Confederation of South Africa and Argentina were all willing to send representatives but deferred to us to represent them. The United States of Central America is interested in what we learn but have no assets affected yet. There were five areas claiming authority over China expressing interest, but none would agree to join us unless we denounced all the other factions.”

“Good,” Heather said. “We’re safer as long as they are divided.”

“It is not the official position of my government,” the Brazilian said, “but many of Earth’s governments find a diminished China less threatening.”

“It is the official position of my government,” the Indian lady said. “If we can divide them further into smaller states at each other’s throats all the better.”

“It’s safer for them too,” Heather added. “A renewed China might be tempted to do something foolish. I once had to destroy a fleet of Chinese ships in lunar orbit and they still managed to drop a large fusion weapon on the center of my domain. It took years to backfill the crater, reestablish the streets and clear the tunnels near the surface. If that looked likely to happen again, I’d feel compelled to make sure they permanently returned to being a third-world agrarian society.”

“Most of us are glad your current dispute with North America doesn’t seem to be aimed at making them such a preindustrial society,” the Brazilian said.

“We just want to be safe,” Heather said. “There is nothing they need from space that can’t be had through the rest of you. They tried to murder about two-thirds of the population of our allies and friends. They are fortunate we didn’t return the favor the same day. I do hope you all know we are physically capable of that? Is that what your visit is about? We do realize that if it becomes necessary to reduce North America’s population and industry to the level of the early eighteen-hundreds it will adversely affect the entire Northern Hemisphere. The climate would be cooled for several years. I’d hate to do that.”

“I don’t think anybody doubts that is possible at present. Your forbearance in not automatically initiating an equivalent counter-strike is appreciated, but not the subject of our visit. The removal of North America as a space-faring nation is pretty well accomplished. I imagine you will engage in some… maintenance, to keep it that way.

“We are not here to persuade you to change that. Indeed, if you said they may restore their infrastructure and have access to space again today, the damage to Earth’s economy is immediate, increasing, and something we all share. North America was the chief sponsor of the Claims Commission and the Commission is destroyed. The fact the North Americans haven’t withdrawn their representative is a farce. The majority of other member nations have recalled their people even though they haven’t formally renounced their membership.”

“What do you want me to do about that?” Heather asked. “The Commission was one of the few things you ever did that made any sense to us. The spox from North America, Love, put it into one of many discarded treaties they made with us. We never discouraged it other than trying to dissuade you from flooding out among the stars armed to the teeth. Even that got reduced to just the point of the spear, the explorers, being limited to defensive weapons.”

“The historians have never been clear which lines of the treaty were from Love and which were from Singh,” the Brazilian said.

“That’s because they sat and hammered it out verbally in one short session,” Heather said. “They didn’t reduce it to interim documents passed back and forth a hundred times until every pronoun was nailed down in a final version. It wouldn’t surprise me if Jeff couldn’t remember who suggested what or in what order. He’d probably ask why we care?”

“We assume any clause favors the author,” the Australian said.

“I’d argue plenty of seemingly brilliant provisions come back to bite their authors on the butt,” Heather said. “In any case, not too many years later they gave us the choice of engaging in total war or letting them arm their national military vessels. In the end, yielding didn’t save us from being attacked. The entire strength of the Claims Commission was, in my opinion, that it was voluntary. Nations joined because it was to their advantage not under threats. I don’t see how you can restructure it to work now with two huge Earth powers absent from it. And the way it defaulted on paying explorers recently means that nobody will trust it again anyway. Reputations are easy to damage and difficult to repair.”

“Yes, yes. We agree with everything you are saying,” the Brazilian said. “We’re not here to try to fix that which is irreparable. We’re here to volunteer again.”

“Huh?” Heather had no idea what he was talking about and wasn’t ashamed to show it.

“We are keenly aware your ally in the Derf and the Leader of the Little Fleet stated her intent to form a separate Commission when their attempt to register claims was rejected. We are interested in voluntarily joining this new association. We need such a service so we don’t revert to the every-man-for-himself chaos the original commission avoided. The fact an entire alien civilization immediately jumped on board was very persuasive.”

“OK, this is making more sense to me,” Heather admitted.

“Nobody wants to publicly admit you have a superior star drive. That has been kept from the general public, though so many retired military and government officials know it that it is slowly leaking out. The media is still enjoined from discussing it. We assume that even though these allies haven’t displayed such tech visiting Earth that you are the power behind their public face. They could not be assuming such authority from a position of weakness. We also saw transit times from adding up the numbers after the fact to indicate either they are hiding equivalent tech or you are providing quick transit to them freely when they need it. You explicitly said their system is a protectorate. Are we in error or are there other factors of which you could apprise us?”

“You have the sense of it,” Heather admitted. “The situation is quite fluid and I think it would benefit us all to bring you up to speed on recent events.”

They all perked up and looked interested.

“I recently sent a peer and technical expert to Derfhome to freely offer our entire drive technology to Lee Anderson. She heads the exploration society that operates the Little Fleet. They were very close to making the technology work for themselves. There was a significant hazard that in testing it they could have done damage and endangered lives. At the worst, they might have destroyed the Derf capital city. I was just informed by the last vessel from Derfhome that they intend to test their version of the drive when my peer returns. This alliance has already proved beneficial. The drive we now have incorporates improvements over our old designs. You should expect to see the Little Fleet and Red Tree with drives equal to ours.”

Amy came in and deposited a coffee service on the table taking the candy away.

“May I ask if that will include Fargone, New Japan, or the alien races?” the lady asked.

“I haven’t been informed of such plans. I’d discourage that still,” Heather admitted. “You should know that both Lee Anderson and her father Gordon are now citizens of Fargone, so you may presume they would offer speedy transportation to them even if they don’t share the enabling tech.”

“Very interesting,” the Brazilian said. You could see he was thinking furiously, trying to incorporate the new data before saying any more. Heather poured and he welcomed the break to give him some time.

“Be aware. Central has not joined this new claims registry,” Heather told him. “We’ve been invited, urged to do so, but the principal benefit is joint protection. We’ve felt our own protection was sufficient. However, if our allies have equivalent drives, they can shoulder the burden of protection as equals rather than putting it off on us. So, you need to discuss this with them at Derfhome and see what sort of accommodation can be reached. I have no idea if they will welcome you into their association. Not just because they have better drives. Their alien allies after all have the slower style drives. But their volume of interest seems to be aimed away from Human space to that side. I’m just guessing here but if you join them, are you going to want to register older claims that were registered with the defunct commission?”

They all looked back and forth between themselves.

“That was an important aspect of it,” the Brazilian allowed. “Indeed, with reduced exploration and the resulting shrinking economy, the value of extra-solar holdings reachable by our slower drives goes up the closer they are to us. We want to avoid conflict over them. Which of course was the intent of the original commission.”

“If you speak to Lee, I’d be forthright about that,” Heather counseled. “For such a young person she is very quick and perceptive about follow on consequences. She’ll think you have given it some depth of thought if you present some of the potential negatives too. Better yet if you cite them and ideas to overcome them. Think of some positives to make it worth needing to police the nearby stars. They are after all, more distant for the new commission to deal with. Perhaps you can carry some of the policing burdens or at least carry on a watch over those claims and just call them in if they are needed.

“It’s a danger still, even with normal drives. One of the reasons we don’t welcome a widespread possession of the superior superluminal drive is that it makes interstellar conflict and crime much more likely. A ship could conduct a raid at the far end of the Human sphere of exploration and be gone anywhere off into the Beyond by the time anyone could respond.”

“While there are so few nations with these more advanced drives, I think it would be hard to hide acts of piracy,” the Australian said.

“It’s not just piracy,” Heather warned. “You may have outright war again like Red Tree brought against North America. It would be much worse with fast drives. Also, Home issued letters of marque during the war. The starship Snoopy owned by a partnership of Homie billionaires departed Home as soon as it arrived at Derfhome for the Fargone system. I’m not a gambler, but if I were, I’d bet they are exchanging their limited and suddenly obsolete explorer missile systems for modern Fargoer weapons.

“The Claims Commission cut the owners of the Snoopy off from their payments for several claims. It gives them legal justification to seek reprisal against North America for their losses. They are entirely within their legal rights to act as a privateer. I seriously doubt the Assembly of Home will rescind those letters out of love for North America so soon after they tried to kill them.

“Since I learned of that from Derfhome, a relayed messenger drone from Fargone has informed me the Snoopy jumped out on a heading that likely takes them to a distant USNA starbase at system 4803 where my forces reduced the base and ships with the loss of one of our ships.”

“Why would they do that?” the Indian lady asked. “They probably don’t have any way of knowing you destroyed it, do they?”

“No, but that is both good and bad. They likely intended to appear from behind their star and attack the base and capture a warship or two. That’s how I’d do it. They’d capture more missiles with a variety of warheads than they could afford to buy at Fargone. There would be fuel as the base is a fueling system and even after attacking it, the base would have salvageable supplies. Fargone sells radiation-enhanced weapons making such an attack to gain property much easier. That the goods are a little hot for a few months isn’t too difficult to deal with. The way we attacked it left less to salvage but some nevertheless.

“The good news is my force destroyed the drive spaces of the ships in orbit. They won’t be recovering usable ships to make their own fleet. It’s unlikely there are enough pieces or parts at the base to create a working ship. The bad news is they didn’t obliterate them so their weapons and systems are recoverable. There was also a vessel that escaped and we have no idea if it was jump capable or if it might still be there.”

“Things are getting complicated,” the Brazilian said, worried.

“My experience is they seldom get simpler,” Heather said.

The way she phrased that reminded the Earthies about their driver’s lecture. Heather did have a great deal more experience than them. It was easy to keep forgetting it.

“As a gift, and to demonstrate I have no desire to exclude all of Earth from the heavens, I’m sending a large transport to Derfhome tomorrow. I promised I would repatriate those caught by surprise and whisked away when we relocated the habitats. The transport will make a circuit of all the habs restoring people where they wish to be. It’s a freighter with scaffolding in the holds to support seats so it isn’t a luxury vessel. You are welcome to take it to Derfhome to discuss your desires with Lee Anderson. When it makes another circuit, you can ride it home. I believe after that I may keep it in service making the same circuit for a fee.”

“This is so sudden,” the Brazilian said. “We weren’t assigned to go to Derfhome. We didn’t prepare for a trip or have any authority to do so. We’d have to consult with our governments to get authorization to do such a thing.”

“I’m just offering. One or all. It doesn’t matter. There’s the com if you need to consult,” Heather said pointing across the room. “I’ll release the house to let you call anywhere you want. I won’t be surprised if they tell you all to come home while they think about it for a month or two, until the situation is as you say, even more complex. But it’s a free ride that will have you at Derfhome tomorrow instead of a week or so after your bosses make up their minds what they want to do.”

“We didn’t bring luggage or aides,” the Australian objected. “Just for overnight.”

“Derfhome is reasonably civilized,” Heather said. “They sell toothbrushes and underwear. They’ll take your government credit card. Home is in orbit there, where my ship will dock. They will have prêt-à-porter as well as auto-tailored clothing there if the planet doesn’t. Frankly, that would be more practical than the stuff you are wearing. Nobody you want to talk to will care about proper diplomatic wear. You could show up naked painted blue and they’d treat you with respect.”

“I’ll take your ride, thank you,” the Indian lady said without hesitation.

The Brazilian gaped at her, shocked.

“I’ll inform my superiors I’m going,” the Frenchman said with a sneer. “They appreciate their people displaying initiative.”

“Mine would think I’m grasping for power to do more than exactly as instructed,” the Australian said. “I’m not even going to ask them.”

“I didn’t even want to go to the Moon,” the Brazilian confessed. “I was assigned and I surely did not sign up for an unexpected trip to the stars. Have fun,” he told the two going. He seemed to think that constituted a witty riposte.

“Oh, I shall,” the Indian lady said. “I’ll send a postcard if they have such a thing.”

And just like that, the Brazilian’s contempt cemented those willing to go as allies.

“Is there a hotel for tonight?” the Indian lady inquired.

“There are a couple of bed and breakfasts. We keep guest rooms in Armstrong but it’s too far to do the round trip for overnight. If you don’t like the looks of the B&Bs off their net sites, you are welcome to our transient barracks. That sounds awful but they are clean and have privacy. They aren’t really barracks anymore, but the name stuck and we didn’t have to change our signage. It’s just one night so you don’t need a suite.”

“That should do nicely,” the lady agreed. The Frenchman just gave a nod.

“Dakota, show our guests the B&B sites and arrange to get the others back to Armstrong. While you are at it, inform the loadmaster for Derfhome we have two Earthie passengers for Derfhome via Home. Please inquire of the cabbage mines if there are any perishables we can’t preserve that might be sent to Home. I’d like to see if they will still buy them or if there is a market on the planet. If they can’t sell them and have to dump them to take on passengers it’s no loss. They have to box or bag them and load them overnight. We’re not going to delay departure.”

“I’m on it,” Dakota said.

* * *

“Wow, there’s some sort of big affair at the Old Hotel,” Sam told Bill. “Half the folks I track are headed there and even a couple of extra Red Tree soldiers from that Derf safe house.”

“You aren’t doing anything risky to try to find out what, are you?” Bill worried.

“Nope, just passive observation,” Sam assured him. “The more I think in terms of being private actors instead of state agents, the fewer risks I want to take. I know we left a bad taste in their mouth when we showed up at that storage facility at the same time a whole mob of them did. They don’t know what, but they suspect we were up to something more than picking up an extra tin of graham crackers from storage. If only I could convince them we are a possible asset to be utilized instead of a known opposition force to be tracked and neutralized, they could give us a lot of work.”

“Dream on. The Centralists seem pretty fair, but don’t even contemplate getting Pam Harvac to regard you with neutrality, much less favor,” Bill warned. “If you get her stirred up against us, she has lines of communication straight back home. She can do us dirty with very little downside to herself or the State Department. Come to that, I’d rather mess with the State Department than her rich father.” Bill lifted his nose and looked theatrically disdainful. “She’d ask fath-hah to sqaash us like a bhug,” he said in his best Boston accent.

OceanofPDF.com

Chapter 18

“I’m amazed you had a soldier who knows how to tend bar,” Jeff said. Clarke was busy setting up and displayed every sign of being familiar with his equipment.

“I didn’t,” Strangelove admitted. “I assigned him to learn how and gave him funds.”

“I was under the impression it isn’t that easy,” Jeff said. “I understand there are hundreds of mixed drinks and people are fussy about how their favorites are prepared. I remember an old flat movie quote: “Shaken not stirred.” I have to wonder how that could make any difference mixing them. Mixed is mixed, isn’t it?”

“What are spex for?” Strangelove asked. “He has all the recipes in an index that can be accessed in seconds. If it seems really difficult most of them have videos available too. I’d worry about the buffet server as much as the bartender, if I were given to worrying. Fortunately, it’s only my charges who make me worry, not my soldiers.”

Jeff gave him a brittle smile. He couldn’t argue he never gave Strangelove grief.

There was extra seating provided on request by the hotel. The usual furniture was pulled to one side and the loaners made into a second seating group. They all were shifted to one side to allow a buffet and bar to be set up along one wall. The Foys showed up first with a gift of flowers and dressed in Earth styles Jeff was surprised they still owned after all this time. Eileen was in a long blue dress, and Victor in a fancy shirt with pearl buttons and a hunk of turquoise at his throat as big as a duck egg.

“Get a drink and park yourselves wherever you please,” Jeff invited. Vic didn’t have to be asked twice. He headed straight for the bar.

“What’s the odd bottle there that looks different?” Vic asked.

“I’m informed that is a whiskey Mr. Singh produces as a hobby.”

“He still does that? I had some years ago. Give me a double neat,” Vic said.

Clarke stopped and his eyes flickered in the spex.

“That means without any ice or mix,” Vic supplied.

Clarke poured a generous double and managed to do the long pour without spilling any. He was a little disappointed Vic didn’t want anything fancier.

Vic took a sip before walking away and considered it thoughtfully. Took another sip and nodded at Clarke’s unasked question.

“That will do. I don’t need to add anything.”

By the time he rejoined his wife, she was talking with Martha Wiggen and her husband Ben. They’d met some time ago but it was nice to see them again. Mel Wainwright was standing at her elbow and Vic wasn’t sure if he was a guest or her security until he engaged in conversation easily. He wouldn’t do that if he was working.

The Badger ambassador known as Talker came in holding hands with the Bill ambassador Singer. They presented April with a bottle of alien liquor which she took to the bar. Lee came in behind and covered Talker’s eyes from behind. He threw his hands up like he was being robbed. Gordon did some kind of elaborate hand slapping greeting with Singer. Everybody seemed to be in a pretty good mood.

There was much discussion of the effects of Home on the Derfhome economy, speculation about where things would be in a year or ten. April and Jeff’s associates Jan and Chen showed up in tuxedos with their wives dressed to the nines.

Lee’s techs, Born and Musical, showed up and gravitated to the other Badger and the Bill but didn’t say much, intimidated by company that was their bosses and above.

The hotel kitchen was asking if they could bring up the buffet and Jeff asked if April was sure Papa-san was coming? He saved them begging a delay by turning up asking for clearance to come up on the elevator.

Strangelove went to the door to make sure the hotel staff handed off the buffet carts without coming in and Jeff noticed he inspected them closely for anything untoward. He very much approved of his caution. When everything positioned along the wall and Strangelove’s second soldier ready to help serve it, Jeff announced the buffet was open.

People got quieter and talked to those nearby while eating.

“I understand you are going back to the Moon,” Wiggen mentioned to the Lees.

Chen just nodded. His wife Huian was the one who perked up and answered.

“Yes, not immediately but Chen is needed there and I have business with various Earth people. I was conducting that through the Private Bank but Irwin Hall isn’t going back. I’m going to take over as his manager for the Moon and conduct any business in the Earth-Moon system he’d have done from Home before. He isn’t sure if he’s staying here or will move on if Home does.” She did an elaborate shrug being careful of her plate. “Wherever he ends up, there will be transport there and banking will be needed. He’s no fan of Earth and happy to be a bit further away.”

“That seems to be a recurrent theme,” Martha Wiggen admitted. “Even my husband set his last two books off Earth. He says when you are no longer immersed in the culture you lose touch with the changes in language and customs. Pretty soon your works are dated if you aren’t trying to write period pieces. He doesn’t want to write Earth-centric stories. The surprise to me is they are selling pretty well with off Earth settings. He even has Derf fans!”

Talker leaned back from a seat facing the other way.

“I’ve read both those novels, so you may be surprised to know he even has alien fans.”

“Sugar, this may come as a shock, but Derf are aliens to us,” Martha said.

“We need a new word then. All the people in our… uh, group. Badgers, Bills, Cats, and Sasquatch aren’t alien at all anymore. They’re known qualities. Some very strange,” he admitted looking over his shoulder at Singer. Singer made a gesture at him that was probably rude. “But well past being alien. I’m still thrilled to see a Hin, and I’ve never seen any of the self-isolating aboriginals from Human space. However, I’ve been around Humans and Derf so long now I don’t think of them as alien.”

“Mr. Ambassador, it would take a long time to explain, but that’s about the sweetest thing you could say. It speaks very well to your personality.” Martha reached and gave him a friendly scratch around his furry little ears.

“When you figure out what word you want to use for the comfortably familiar just start using it. That’s the nice thing about English. There’s no static standard. We can change it by usage whenever we please.”

“My daughter there,” Gordon lifted his chin and looked across the room at Lee. “Found the Earth Humans as alien as any Hin or Elf. It rather put her off planets at all. I’d like to see her get past that but experiences get mixed up with feelings. We’ve talked about it. She finds plenty of Earthies acceptable once she knows them, but the bulk of them are still on probation with her.”

“I read the account you sent to the Mothers,” Mel Wainwright said from behind Wiggen. “They entered it in full into the legal record for the other clan Mothers to see their reasons to declare war and to presume to speak for all Derf again.”

“Again?” Martha’s husband interjected.

“The Treaty of Man,” Mel explained. “Which they defended at considerable cost to the opposition. I’ll note they found no such objections to their war on North America, even though it exposed other clans to great risk.”

“They may not have appreciated they were at any risk,” Gordon said. “They well could have regarded it as a matter between Red Tree and North America.”

“But would the Treaty of Man have stood if Red Tree fell?” Mel asked.

“Read it again,” Gordon suggested. “Every statement is between Man and the Derf. Nowhere does it limit any provision to Red Tree.”

Mel nodded, accepting that.

“As a lawyer, even if I am somewhat in arrears on my bar dues, I’m curious. I have to ask why you didn’t instruct your attorneys to pursue and appeal the juvenile judge’s decision? Wouldn’t that have been much simpler than declaring war?”

“Much simpler but wrong. My Mothers would have disavowed it and corrected me if I had followed that course. You mistake why I was in court that day. I was going to invoke the Treaty of Man and ask for Lee back. It was a courtesy in the face of rude mistreatment. However, I was labeled an animal and kicked out before I could make any statement myself or through my attorney.

“Talking to my attorney later, he did invoke the treaty and a bunch of other blather I didn’t request. The judge was even told by the prosecutor that he was in opposition to his own government. To finish matters off Lee appealed to the Mothers’ law and asked the intercession of the Champion of Red Tree both in her case and to support the Treaty of Man. I was surprised at the time she had the understanding to invoke both.

“Once she appealed to the Mothers’ superior court, I’d have been undermining her case… her cases, if I appealed the cases in lesser Human courts as if they still had jurisdiction. It would have been hypocrisy to appeal and refuse to accept the ruling going against us, then declaring war anyway. Now, I admit there was a lot of miscommunication between me and my lawyers. They kept refusing to do the practical things I asked to do to find Lee and extricate her. They kept asking to pursue things I didn’t understand. But once she stood and asked for the Champion to act for her there was no way it would end in anything but war.”

“Oh my God,” Mel said. “I appeal to Caesar.”

“You said that in a different tone of voice, the way people do when they are quoting someone,” Gordon said.

“It ended a very famous hearing. Something we’d regard as a probable cause hearing. It might have ended with no charges but the man undergoing it didn’t want to risk being subject to that court, so he appealed to a higher authority. Who knows if it was the course of wisdom or unnecessary? It altered the history of western civilization in any case.”

“Did it end in war too?” Gordon asked.

“Not immediately, but it helped move along the destruction of that world power, its culture, and religion. It had already taken to wounding itself other ways without recognizing it. It just took another thousand years to bleed out on the floor.”

“Little girls can’t wait a thousand years for justice,” Gordon said.

“I’m glad she didn’t have to,” Mel said, “Too many little girls have had to do without justice entirely. But you are making me consider whether this culture and its adversarial justice system may be on a similar decline. Sometimes it’s hard to stand back and see such a big picture. If Lee’s case gave it a nudge in that direction, I won’t mourn it. I used to be an officer of the court but this conversation makes me see I could never go back and stand before the bar. I just hope whatever succeeds it is kinder.”

“The Mothers’ law is adversarial too,” Gordon said with a four-armed shrug. “Lee and I worry it won’t be up to dealing with the trade towns and the clanless Derf. Now Humans add a further complication since you have such different customs. Cases only arise out of conflict. If you can formulate a gentler system that removes some of that hostility, publish it and we’ll all give it serious consideration,” Gordon invited.

“Perhaps I will,” Mel said. “It seems like a worthy use of my time since my Life Extension Therapy is working so well. Are they making any progress on LET for Derf?”

“I’m no molecular biologist,” Gordon disavowed. “What I’m being told right now is that it took years to detail all the metabolic pathways and genetic deterioration aging Humans suffer. Derf are different but any biological machine that accomplishes the same thing will have similarities. We all metabolize glucose. We all transport oxygen with some form of hemoglobin. The details of the protein differ, but all carry iron. As one fellow explained to me, we all bleed red. Since they have a model in Humans and Earth species it will take much less time for them to detail the same functions in Derf.”

“And Badgers and Bills,” Talker piped up with hopeful enthusiasm.

Gordon looked and most of the others had turned their chairs around and were following their conversation.

“Probably everybody except maybe the Caterpillars and the tentacled people on Ocean,” Lee said from the other group. “I want to eventually get back and talk to them.”

“Good idea,” Gordon said. “They know we exist now. Better to go back and get to know them before they come looking for us.”

Talker’s eyes got big. “Can you imagine the difficulties of making an orbital shuttle in a planetary ocean with no dry land?”

“Oh, I don’t know,” Lee said. “They may wonder how we get anything done fighting gravity all day long. None of them are going to trip over their own tentacles and hit their head on the floor. They may wonder that we ever risk climbing a tree much less take off into the air. Look how long we persisted in doing that when it was obvious the transition back to the ground was often more abrupt than we wished.”

That got a lot of laughter but several phones pinged, clicked, and whistled. Some looked to check theirs from some sort of silent alarm. It broke the conversation and the ones not distracted returned to eating and waited, wondering what matter could be to touch so many of them at the same moment.”

“The ore freighter Out o’ My Way converted to passenger transport has entered the system and jumped a messenger drone ahead to give notice and request docking on Home,” April announced, raising her voice to read the message. “They intend to offer free transport to all the other dispersed habs or worlds if anyone cares to move or repatriate. Limited transport of personal possessions will be included up to four tons. The Way will make a layover of at least a day at each world and do a second free circuit before offering the same service as a paid routing. They’re laying over at least a day so you can finish your dinner before you make a mad dash for the shuttles,” April added.

“I suspect the majority of their passengers stayed up on Home, “Ben said.

“I’m sure that’s why their lay-overs are subject to change,” Eileen said. “Heather is reasonable and if her captain flew off to meet an arbitrary schedule, she’d have him on the carpet asking what he was thinking?”

Most of them there knew that carpet was literal, so they could picture the poor fellow standing on it making an explanation for his sovereign. Still, several of them were taking the time to do something on their pads or in their spex. Probably sending messages to friends or checking for private messages carried on the Way even if they weren’t intent on reserving shuttle space back to Home.

April moved over by Lee and didn’t whisper but addressed her quietly.

“My Lady Heather wishes me to inform you there are two Earthie envoys on the vessel who are intent on meeting you and discussing the possibility of joining your new Claims Registry. These two happen to be from India and France, but they seem to credibly have a wider coalition of nations they are representing.”

“Oh, my goodness,” Lee said visibly flustered. “What a bad time for them to show up when everything is booked up and the arrival of the Way will probably make it worse. I’ve so little experience dealing with diplomatic stuff. It doesn’t feel right to offer them rooms in my suite. What should I do with them?”

April was relieved. She was scared Lee would revert to denying she had the authority to deal with governmental envoys.

“I’d ask the hotel if they can put your guests in rooms. Make sure they know it is a day-rate rental. I believe they have their fill of long-term leases.”

Lee nodded and bent to her pad. It wasn’t long before she looked greatly relieved.

“The timing was perfect,” Lee said. “The desk informed me they had several cancelations as soon as the Way announced their arrival. They were happy to reserve two single rooms for the Earthies.”

“Now all you have to worry about is getting them down,” April said. “It may take a day for the rush to abate and shuttle seats to be open. Once the Way is gone the shuttles will catch up on anyone waiting to drop pretty quickly.”

Lee smiled far wider than anything April had said could explain.

“I think I have that covered, but I have to make another call. Would you call the Earthies and tell them you will arrange to provide them transport and will be back in contact soon?

Then inexplicably, when April agreed, Lee didn’t call but went across the room to Strangelove.

“Did your guys take my aircar to the safe house and has Alonso given them any instruction?” Lee inquired.

“It’s still at his hangar and he’s giving them lessons but he indicated it will take several days to complete them to his satisfaction. I wouldn’t second guess him on such a critical safety matter,” he warned.

“I wouldn’t think of it but I do have a sudden need to use it,” Lee said.

“So, ask him. He doesn’t think the moon keeps going around without your permission.”

“Alonso?” Lee asked. “Are we talking about the same guy? He barely acknowledges I might be trainable to be the village idiot.”

“Which is much better than he treats me,” Strangelove assured her. “He speaks to me carefully with little words. You see him reviewing them to see they can’t be misconstrued.”

“That’s not right. For crying out loud! You administer nuclear weapons. You have all kinds of tough guys who jump when you say FROG! He shouldn’t treat you like that.”

Strangelove looked around alarmed to see if anybody was watching when Lee raised her voice. He made a soft little restraining gesture with a true hand.

“Don’t say anything, please. He does come to trust people with time. There are so many fools in the world I can’t fault his caution. His trade by its nature is a matter of life and death and you have to make allowances for the mentality of great artists.”

“Artist?” Lee objected. “You feed it a file and the smart paint does paisley or tartan plaid if you have no taste. What are you talking about?”

“How many people do you think could make such a radical aircar that works so well the first time? It not only works well, it’s pretty. Most designers have to go through five or six generations of a device to get it that refined, picking up details from other smart people to get a mature design. If you don’t realize that then you don’t deserve such a splendid product. It should go in a museum when it is retired.”

“I did gush on it a little when I accepted it,” Lee admitted. “I was worried later I might have given him a big head. You really like it, huh?”

“I want one. Not exactly like yours, but with a powered canopy, a pair of 40mm autocannons, and a seriously armored belly-pan. Not my property, I’ll never be that rich, but for the service of the Mothers.”

“I tell you what, when we get things sorted out and I have some income flowing in again we’ll see if he’ll build one for you,” Lee promised.

“That would be marvelous,” Strangelove said, and refrained from begging.

“I’ll ask if he’d do me the enormous favor if ferrying it in for me and taking a car back home. Bearing in mind what you said about artistic temperament.”

Strangelove nodded. “I bet he will. You’re his only current customer that can afford to keep him playing with such neat toys.”

“I’ll find out,” Lee said punching in Alonso’s contact and glaring at the pad.

“Missy you don’t want to look angry,” Strangelove quickly told her. “Look distressed and hopeful. You want to melt his heart not frighten him.”

Lee looked surprised but tried to soften her face. It was good advice.

“Well, you’re right,” Lee said. “He cracked all offended, and asked if I wanted him to pick up a pizza on the way, but he said he’d fly it in and park it in front of the Hotel. I sweetened the deal by telling him he could skip the pizza because we have a buffet spread and he’s welcome to come up and hit it. He said he’ll use the flight to continue training your guys.”

“Oh, I’m hoping to take Jeff too. Please don’t give him a hard time. There’s no room in the car for you.”

Strangelove sighed. “Of course, you are. And you have Alonso and two of my soldiers coming to raid the buffet? Excuse me while I warn the kitchen.” He looked grim. “I’m calling my boys and telling them to be on their best behavior too.”

“Oh yeah, this is such a refined crowd,” Lee said. “Just throw a blanket over anybody too full and wasted to move and I’ll try not to trip over them when I come back.”

Strangelove looked around the room, considering.

“They may learn to declare the revolution and start committing mayhem with this bunch. Do hurry back.”

But he was talking to her back. She walked away calling to April.

“Would you care to go with me to pick up the Earth envoys?” Lee asked.

April had that wary look on her face, like Lee might be setting her up for a joke.

“You want us to leave our own party early? Do you have a shuttle or some way to cut the line on one? I know you have the Kurofune, but it’s not a lander, even if it kind of looks like one. I can’t imagine you could build one and keep it secret.”

She didn’t say from us, but it hung there in the silence unsaid.

“Once everybody has eaten it’s all down-hill. Half of them won’t know you are gone. Strangelove will take care of stragglers. This is my new auxiliary vessel, but it’s not a conventional shuttle. There’s room for Jeff too if you’ll share a Derf-sized seat. It only has four seats and I don’t think we should ask the Earthies to do that. It’s pretty cozy.”

“Jeff,” April called. “Lee has a proposal.”

* * *

“Bill, Bill! Come here. They just landed that crazy aircar in front of the Old Hotel.”

“Did you hack their security cams? Bill asked frowning at the screen.

“No need. They make all the external cams freely available to the guests and public.”

That thing is freaky,” Bill said.

“Tell me about it,” Sam said. “I’m dreaming I’m in a science fiction movie.”

Three Derf climbed out of the car, the last one palming the security screen to lock up.

“That’s a lot of meat for an aircar to lift,” Bill said.

“Four ton? Closer to five maybe. Those are big guys,” Sam decided.

“You’re recording, aren’t you?”

“Of course. It’ll be… where we agreed,” Sam said.

“You’re getting paranoid. I like that. No need to repeat it out loud when we haven’t swept the place today.”

“Aren’t you interested enough to watch?” Sam asked.

“Sure, but I want to go get my coffee and top it off. I’m just checking that you can give me an instant replay if anything happens.”

* * *

“Thank you for bringing my car,” Lee said.

“You had me when you said free food,” Alonso admitted.

“We might be a couple of hours. Put a car on my tab if you want when you go home.”

“Thank you, but I imagine you’ll want me to take it back. I’m just going to go with Strangelove’s men to their facility. It’s close. They can put me up and when you return, I won’t have to run all the way across town. I’ll just take it back there tonight. We’ll do another training run with them in the morning to return it to the hangar.”

“Did you leave it parked the way I asked?” Lee asked him.

Alonso smirked. “Yes, you’re a terrible showoff.”

“Thank you,” Lee said, totally unrepentant.

“I feel weird deserting my own party and worse, nobody seemed to notice we were leaving,” Jeff said in the elevator.

“Maybe that’s a sign you planned it well if you can leave and it doesn’t fall apart.”

“I think you are just trying to make me feel better,” Jeff told Lee.

When they walked out the front door Jeff was distracted by the odd stare the doorman gave him. He didn’t understand what had the Derf upset until he turned his head back and looked at the aircar. It was floating there with the bottoms of the pods four or five centimeters off the pavement. He didn’t say anything. That was made easier by the fact he was having trouble breathing.

Jeff walked around the vehicle slowly until he came back to them but stopped and waved a hand through the gap below the rear pod. April just stood and watched.

“OK, what holds it up?” he finally asked.

“Magic,” Lee assured him gravely.

“Any sufficiently advanced tech…” April partially quoted.

“I guess we’re there,” Jeff admitted.

He walked around it again.

“The flames are a nice touch.”

Thank you,” Lee said. “They were a custom on highly modified ground cars some years ago. I haven’t had time but I intend to animate them.”

“And this is orbit capable?”

“We’ll find out. I’ve had it over thirty thousand meters and transonic. If it did that OK it should be good to go,” Lee said.

“Let’s do it before I talk myself out of it,” Jeff said.

Lee palmed the lock and led them in.

“One of you can ride up front if you want now,” Lee offered. “Only the back seats double up. Or one each any other combo.”

“Let April have shotgun,” Jeff volunteered.

“I, uh, don’t have any weapons aboard,” Lee said.

“That means to sit beside the driver. It’s an old expression. As old as flames,” Jeff said.

“Older,” April insisted. “I think it goes back to stagecoach guards.”

“That would make sense,” Jeff agreed.

“If you pull the board towards you it will lock in place. The release is on the left bottom corner so you can push it away,” Lee told April.

When April had it in place and Jeff confirmed he was secure, Lee announced she was doing a vertical lift on the informal Derf radio net. Nobody was in conflict with her departure path so she grasped the stick and lifted away briskly.

“That’s downright eerie,” Jeff said from the back.

Lee said nothing. She wanted Jeff impressed deeply enough he wouldn’t think to look down on her techs or their contribution in the future. That seemed to be going well.

“I hope you know that’s not going to hack it when there are a couple of hundred aircraft of mixed kinds all stacked up needing to avoid each other,” Jeff said.

“I imagine it will have to be run by a central program for the region just like the city ground car net,” Lee said. “With a little luck, I’ll be off planet before it’s so crowded.”

“You have some navigation now?” Jeff asked from the back.

“The same software I run in my ship,” Lee assured him. “It has very limited radar. It only has a couple of hundred kilometers range. That’s sufficient for ranging to dock at my ship or a station. But we have a very good astronomical model with precise orbital periods that can predict positions out a few hundred years.”

“Do you have our jump data program running on top of it?” Jeff asked.

There was some dead air time as Lee considered that.

“I have not contemplated making the Twool a superluminal vessel.”

“Why not? It would be handy as hell. If you break the Kurofune or get it shot up somewhere it could get you home or at least someplace safe as a lifeboat. We have a jump capable lifeboat for the Chariot.”

“It will be a while before we have production set up for jump drives,” Lee said. “Mine is the only one in existence and it was hand-built. Born and Musical didn’t start looking into what sort of facility we need to make lots of them until the prototype worked. They haven’t reported back to me on that yet.”

“We might be able to help there,” Jeff suggested.

“When we do start producing them, I thought the armed Red Tree ships should get them first and then likely some of the Little Fleet. This car is experimental too. I expect my guys will quickly make improvements on the thrusters that drive it.”

“Is that why you didn’t put them in the Kurofune first?” April asked her.

“Yes, I didn’t want to do a major revision I’d be tearing out in six months. Besides that, I’ve wanted another aircar now for quite some time.”

“When did you own one before?” Jeff asked confused.

“We carried an aircar in the shuttle for the High Hopes.”

“A lot of Explorers don’t even carry a planetary lander much less one that can carry an aircar. You guys were well equipped.”

“My people weren’t interested in claiming a few mining sites or a fueling station hoping it would be along the route to somebody else’s big find. They didn’t have crew wanting to be cashed out after every claim and plowed what they did find back into stuff like the lander for when they did hit the big claim.”

“Did it make any difference?” Jeff wondered. “If they found an obvious living world their claim would have been as valid with an orbital survey.”

“You never worked with the Claims Commission,” Lee said. “If you do that, they spend a couple of billion dollars to send a big corporate explorer out with at least two big landers to survey the system and the world. That comes right off the top of your royalties and the survey crew gets a cut of the claim too if they have to pay to prove it out. You don’t get to make personal land claims from orbit or any of the claims on biologicals.

“We came back with proof it was a class A world with specific claims for food plants and potential biologicals that just had to be tested. My island that I’m sharing with the Mothers is near as big as Madagascar and the drainage basin I claim where my folks died is similar to the Columbia river basin in the USNA.

“When they sent an expedition fleet back to start developing Providence, they were so confident it would fully prove out that they took a core space station along with them grappled to one of the ships.”

“I didn’t understand the details of how that worked,” Jeff admitted.

“It tripled our payout in the first five years,” Lee said. “Most living worlds have been found by corporate ships and the crew gets a percentage of the corporation’s fifteen percent. That’s split maybe fifty ways with the command and specialty crew getting a higher cut. Gordon and I split the whole thing a third for him and two thirds for me.”

“And they’ve cut you off now,” Jeff said. It wasn’t a question unless she took it that way.

“Be assured we are continuing to plan to repossess Providence. The logistics of it will take some time and we will give you some notice when we intend to move. I still very much want to take April up on her offer to stand system watch against any Earthie incursions while we settle matters on the planet.” Lee stopped and considered what that offer was worth and that April hadn’t asked anything. She doubted Jeff would have done that.

“You should tell me what you consider a suitable reward for your service,” Lee told April, looking over at her.

Jeff was about to suggest something similar himself, but the way Lee pointedly spoke to April and cut him right out of having any interest or say in it made him swallow it. He was glad he hesitated trying to make sure his request was short and bullet-proof before he spoke up. He now suspected Lee would have slapped him down and asked how and when it became any concern of his?

“I’d consider it a better than even trade if you explain how this drive works,” April said.

Oh, bless you, thank you, thank you, Jeff thought in the back seat.

“It’s derivative of the jump drive, so I already owe that to you,” Lee told her. “You should pick a nice section of land for an estate or some mining rights,” she insisted.

“Thank you. That’s very generous of you,” April said.

OceanofPDF.com

Chapter 19

Dakota came in looking upset. When they were both working through mundane paperwork it was unusual for her to get up from her com console and interrupt Heather. She usually just stacked messages in their order of importance for Heather to work through as she saw fit. Even an emergency would just get tagged as such with red lettering at the head of the list if not life or death. Years ago, Dakota had been something of a drama queen and Heather had welcomed her slow conversion to a calmer demeanor.

“The Gammans have gone nuts!” Dakota proclaimed.

“All of them?” Heather asked. Gamma had the smallest population of the three habitats and the highest proportion of recent Earthie emigrants. However, a general psychosis seemed unlikely unless somebody put drugs in the water supply.

“Franklin Abel just declared he is annexing the middle latitudes of Mars between your territory and Jeff’s. Is that nuts enough for you?” Dakota asked.

Heather blinked slowly, trying to assimilate why he would do that.

“This is the same fellow who tried to call their assembly to complain we kidnapped him and ruined his business when we saved their butts?”

“I sincerely doubt they have two Franklin Abels,” Dakota retorted. “He has a net presence on Gamma and posts heavily every day about their removal to Mars, the evils of the Martian government, and what he regards as the European conspiracy to prop up the Martian regime. He hints darkly that they have no word back from Home and Beta so there is no proof they are even where we claim they are. He preaches that we’ve destroyed their businesses but Central is still sitting pretty as he puts it, unaffected.”

“Preaches?” Heather repeated.

“You’d understand if you watch one of his posts. He sounds like a very strident preacher giving his congregation a good talking to because he’s terribly disappointed in them.”

“Do we have archives of Gamman net traffic since they were moved?” Heather asked.

“Sure, memory is cheap. It just gets recorded with the speed of light lag now.”

“Compose a sample of his posts,” Heather ordered. “No more than a half-hour long. I’ll look at those before I make any decision.”

Heather looked back at her screen, the matter dismissed from her mind for the moment. She had plenty of other matters that needed her attention and was too disciplined to let one distract her from giving each her full thoughtful consideration.

Dakota froze for a second, well aware she was dismissed. She hadn’t realized she was asking for a judgment. She thought of saying that and it sounded stupid even to her. Heather would ask why she brought it up if she didn’t want it fixed. She looked over at Gunny sitting reading a book and found him staring her in the eye perfectly poker-faced. He knew she’d set something in motion but wasn’t giving any clue if he approved or not. She left before Heather noticed her unnatural pause and asked if there was something else.

* * *

“Home control this is the experimental vehicle Twool, Lee Anderson commanding. We are out of Derfhome port. Requesting entry to your control volume and short-term docking to pick up a couple of passengers.”

“We have no active traffic for twelve minutes Twool. You don’t appear on our registry. Do you wish to start an account for docking fees or pay cash?”

“This is April Lewis, Spox for the Sovereign of Central. Add Lee Anderson to the Central sovereign account for any vessel she is commanding.”

“Recorded. Please use port five on the north spindle flashing blue. I have a note twenty minutes old that your passengers are waiting at the north hub. I will advise them to proceed to hatch number five for pickup.”

“That’s nice of you. Thanks. Oh, my goodness. Look at the size of the Out o’ My Way,” Lee said. “How do you dock something like that? The docking grapples will pull the spindle over to it instead of pulling it down tight to the spindle.”

“Very carefully,” April said. “You use a flexible tunnel and the ship keeps station actively the whole time it is attached. They’ll undock and transfer cargo directly to a shuttle. One little bump and they’d have a thousand solar bill for busting the spindle.”

“Don’t talk to me for a minute,” Lee said. “I’ve never docked this tiny thing and I’m paranoid enough about that to dock in slow mode and watch carefully in case I need to manually abort.”

“Roger that,” Jeff agreed and shut up.

“Perfect,” April said after the grapples gripped with a clunk.

“Alonso is really good, and the docking collar is a standard design with published specs. I’m sure he just paid the license fee and gave the fabricator a file. Still, he had to integrate it into the design and wire it up correctly. His regular fab shop has likely made them before but I don’t think he has ever built anything with one before.” Lee said.

“He doesn’t build spaceships?” Jeff asked.

“He does now,” Lee said with a big smile. “His usual work is to build one-of-a-kind sports planes.”

“That is impressive,” Jeff allowed.

“My ears popped. Our pressure is matched,” Lee said, swallowing. “Let’s open up before they start beating on the hatch.”

Lee swung up the deck plate that let them walk over the belly lock door when the car was parked on the ground. She locked it in place and checked the pressure gauges and indicators carefully – with extra care because they weren’t wearing suits. There was no test hole with cock and wire so she bumped the lock hatch button briefly making it open a crack in the middle. There was no violent airflow, so she held it down a little longer until it opened about a quarter meter.

The docking collar indicators were painted green on the end and retracted flush to the ring when the grapples were fully engaged. All six were properly flush. The station hatch was a scant millimeter away to minimize air loss. Lee flipped the long lever over that unlocked the station hatch from their side.

The second officer of the Out o’ My Way, Jack Souza, was standing with his toe in a take hold and the two Earth envoys beside him. The lady was copying his foothold but he had a hand on the man’s waistband indicating he needed some help. Souza’s eyes were looking past them in their lock but shifted back to them pretty quickly because there wasn’t anything to see. All three had their heads pointed the same as Lee but opposite of Jeff and April. The Earthies quickly looked uneasy dealing with somebody upside-down to their experience. They couldn’t read facial expressions that way.

“Jack,” April said nodding. “Lee Anderson, Master of Twool, and our ride today. Jack Souza, Second Officer of Out o’ My Way.”

“Mr. Souza,” Lee said.

“Ma’am,” Jack said and inclined his head.

April turned her attention to the Earthies.

“I’m April Lewis and this is Jeff Singh. We are peers and Voices of the Sovereign of Central. We came along to introduce you to our friend and ally, Lee Anderson. She heads the Exploration Society Protection Registry.”

That gave Lee a little jolt. She had to control herself not to suck a deep breath. They had never referred to her as a friend. She sternly reminded herself that didn’t mean the same thing with them it did with her Badger friend, Talker. She allowed that to reach her face and Sousa noted and looked concerned at the change.

Lee got her face under control and nodded at them.

“I’m Jean Navarre, representing France and my associate is Kamala Naidu for India,” he said. “We have credentials if you’d like to examine them, but Heather Anderson didn’t bother past ascertaining we were actually associated with our governments.”

“Maybe later,” Lee said. “Not because I suspect you are some strange multinational diplomatic conspiracy. I’m just curious about what forms they follow. Why don’t we go ahead and board and let Mr. Souza get back to his ship?”

“Thank you. If you are done with me then?” His eyes checked April and Jeff too.

“Unless you’d like a receipt for them,” April quipped.

That hit his funny bone. “I should take it for a novelty, my Lady.” He left smiling.

“I tell you what,” Jeff said after it was fumbling and awkward getting the French fellow through the hatch. “Just fold your arms across your chest with your hands tucked in and cross your ankles. Pretend you are a statue and I can handle you much easier that way than trying to explain what to do.”

That worked marvelously.

The ladies hung back and Lee caught Kamala looking amused.

Jeff put Jean in the front seat and strapped him in. That made sense rather than needing to get Kamala past him later. He looked around and stared at the planet overhead through the big bubble canopy. It was a fantastic view.

“Get the deck plate secured over the docking collar, would you Jeff?” Lee requested.

“Are we taking this to a shuttle?” Jean wondered, looking over at Lee strapping in.

“This is my lander and my auxiliary to my diplomatic courier the Kurofune.”

Jean looked seriously dubious but said nothing.

“Docking port is secure,” Jeff called from the rear.

“Home control, Twool has concluded her pickup and is ready to depart. Uploading flight plan. Are we clear to depart your control volume?”

“Twool, hold five minutes please, for a departure. Ma’am, my computer is alerting me your flight profile is unusual. Are you aware and do you need to hold to review and amend?”

“No, thanks for your caution. This is an experimental vehicle capable of the filed plan. May I ask if you are sharing traffic control with Derfhome station?”

“Derfhome station is acting as the planetary traffic control and we forward all departures to them. They only advise us if there is a conflict, but it is still necessary to contact Derfhome control for a station-to-station transfer.”

“Thank you, Home control.”

“Our traffic is clear and you are released. Be careful out there.”

“Always Home, thank you.”

There was a muffled clunk and they were undocked.

“These double seats are kind of nice,” Jeff said.

“You behave back there!” Lee said a little louder than necessary.

There was giggling but Lee couldn’t tell if it was April or the Indian lady.

Nobody talked much with such a view. Lee made a call after a bit and asked Strangelove to have Alonso and his men pick the Twool up at the hotel. That was in Derf, too, and she didn’t bother to translate.

“Derfhome air traffic, Lee Anderson commanding Twool. We are turning on our transponder that reads Alonso Air and descending from station-controlled space to normal flight status over Derfhome City. We intend a vertical landing at the Old Hotel. Please advise us if you are conflicting traffic.

“Well clear but sweet Mothers’ mercies, what are you flying girl?”

“My auxiliary to the diplomatic courier Kurofune. Talk to Alonso and maybe he’ll build one for you. The Derf is an artist.”

“That he is but I’m hoping to one day be able to afford one of his two-seaters.”

“Fortune Freight, departing the port south if you are through chatting,” a voice said.

“Clear of you too. Apologies for the chatter,” the other flier said.

All that was in Derf so her new passengers didn’t follow it. Jeff and April followed the translation on their spex but said nothing.

“The Derf don’t conduct air operations in English?” the Frenchman asked.

“No, I know that is irregular but there is no governing body,” Lee explained. “The Mothers would have to declare a law to establish it and few clans have any air traffic in and out. Few of the early fliers spoke English so they use their language. It’s worse than you think. They don’t have controllers. They just follow what Humans would consider visual flight rules and informally advise each other where they are on approach or when ready to take off. We did just get admonished for being too chatty on the radio, however.”

“Then traffic must be very light,” Jean concluded.

“It is and it’s a race whether it will be English controlled or AI that can handle multiple languages by the time it is congested enough for this not to work.”

Details of the city were coming into focus as they descended.

“The roads…” Jean said.

“Yes?”

“None of them are straight.” he objected.

In the back, Jeff just laughed.

* * *

“I am irritated,” Heather announced.

Dakota was regretting she’d said anything.

“I need a ship. But they are all terribly busy and have backlogs of action or tired crews already asked to do too much. I can’t effectively inquire of the Gammans with a radio lag. It even ruins the flow of a conversation using a jump drone to relay messages.”

“If you have a pilot, the Hringhorni left the Remora off to help transport Home and has not been back to reattach her,” Dakota reminded her.

“I should have learned to fly her myself,” Heather said.

“Well unless you intend to learn this afternoon, you better get a pilot,” Dakota said.

“Who is available?” Heather asked her, but she was putting the list up on the screen even as she asked.

“Your brother just got in from Oasis and is off duty while his ship loads for his return trip,” Dakota pointed out. “He hasn’t flown the Remora but my understanding is there isn’t all that much difference between them.”

“The jump controls are the same,” Heather said. “Docking should be easier. Tell Barak to confirm the Remora is ready to lift and have his butt sitting in her hot to lift in an hour.”

“Since I precipitated this may I ask what is happening?” Dakota asked. “What are you intending to do about this Franklin Abel?”

“I viewed the samples you provided of his net postings,” Heather said. “The man is a demagogue. He only has a couple of hundred people who follow him and comment on his posts. Those are his hardcore fans if you will, but the numbers show a lot more lurk to see what he is doing. People have taken over countries from much smaller starts. Having a core like that gives him a tool to intimidate others. Especially because I don’t see any organized opposition. I intend to ask Gamman security why he has such influence. He’s said a lot of untruthful things about their rescue and Central. I intend to call him on it.”

It was easy to forget Gunny was there until he spoke.

“If you mean you will call him out please don’t endanger yourself. I trust your judgment if he’s a danger to Central. Just give me the nod and I’ll take care of it for you.”

“Who said you are even coming along?” Heather asked.

“You accepted me here,” Gunny said. “Are you telling me it’s safer at Gamma? If you think that, you need to wait a day to give yourself time to chill and think about it, because your emotions are making you stupid.”

Heather glared at him but didn’t say he was wrong.

“You can come, but I do not intend to call the man out,” Heather said

“Great,” Gunny said marking his book and closing it. “Tell me if you change your mind.”

* * *

The Hotel had a lovely apron between the street and the front doors laid in square granite pavers. As soon as they came to rest the doorman opened the hotel entry and four Derf came out. Lee exited the vehicle last and was consulting with three of the Derf while one attached himself to Jeff like a shadow.

Jean turned around and looked at the car from the outside for the first time. It was hovering off the pavement silently with no exhaust or spinning propellers. Kamala was admiring the Twool too but Jean was bold enough to go push on the side of the car. It yielded slightly for a couple of centimeters and then pushed back far harder than he could resist to its original position.

When Lee turned away the three Derf climbed in the car. Jean thought the entry hatches were generous, but now he saw why. They were snug for Derf.

“OK, tell me how the Devil it works.” He seemed a little angry about it.

“It’s magic,” Lee assured him.

That made Jean’s face cloud up even more.

“That’s an advertising slogan, not an explanation. They use it for meaningless adjective-fillers like the magic of cheese!”

Kamala had her hand over her mouth. It hid the smile but not the laughter.

“Oh Jean, can you really explain most of the things we use, like how a starship jumps or a pad does calculations? It is magic to us.”

“Yes, but although I am not a physicist, neither am I a primitive to disrespect,” Jean objected. “It offends me even more, that my veracity software says she believes that tripe better than halfway. I’m not asking for drawings and specs, just a general statement like – It’s antigravity.”

“Or an incantation to repeat?” Kamala teased him.

“I do not want to make you my enemy,” Lee said. “I’ll tell you one small secret that you didn’t earn. We don’t have the damnedest clue how it works.”

Jean looked incredulous.

“How can that be?”

“Do you think that when Ogg brought fire back to the cave from a lightning strike he needed a detailed concept of chemistry and oxidation before he could use it to stay warm? Well, our Ogg found some stuff that lets aircars float,” Lee said. “Since we don’t understand it, I’m not going to lie and make up some technical sounding nonsense. It would just be another word for magic.”

“My apologies for my temper and thank you for explaining it,” Jean said.

While they were speaking the aircar turned from deep glossy red with vivid flames tipped with tinges of yellow and blue to a pale blue on the bottom shaded to almost black on top. It lifted slowly a few meters and then with more authority. When it was a couple of hundred meters overhead it was almost invisible, just a blurry spot in the robin eggs blue sky. Then it was gone.

Jean lowered his gaze from watching it disappear.

“If you were trying to impress me, it worked,” Jean assured Lee.

Jeff and April watched all this with interest but no comment.

“Are you coming back up with us?” April asked Lee.

“No, I’ll see that the hotel takes care of these two and I’m done for the evening,” Lee said. “The food was pretty much gone so I bet everybody left by now.”

“Except Strangelove,” he’ll be waiting to resume guarding me,” Jeff predicted.

* * *

“Mr. Oliver, Heather Anderson just called on com and said to inform you she wishes to have a word with you. She asked rather rudely why your com address isn’t in the public directory. She signed off before I could explain why it is the security department policy.”

“Thank you, Helga. Forward it to my message queue and I’ll pop an answer back to her in a couple of minutes. I’ll give her my private address for her to reply. The lag is long enough a few more minutes won’t matter.”

“No sir. I mean that she is at the dock and coming to the office to speak with you right now. She didn’t even ask if you were here, just said that she was coming up.”

He paused. Oliver’s voice wouldn’t betray his concern if you didn’t know him as well as Helga did. She could hear he was rattled.

“OK, ask John Weaver to come to my office as quickly as possible and let me know when Ms. Anderson arrives,” Tod Oliver said.

Helga called John and then pulled out her private phone and called Frank Abel.

“Frank, you should know the Queen of the Moon is on the way up to talk to Tod, and he doesn’t seem thrilled about it. He called in John.”

“Why would he do that?” Frank asked but the tone was sarcastic.

“Because he’s terrified of her?” Helga asked back.

“I doubt John will shoot her for him,” Frank said.

“Wouldn’t that be embarrassing if he asked and was refused?” Helga said.

“And I doubt he’d stop her from shooting Tod. His being there is kind of useless. I’m thinking about it. I may just happen to show up needing to talk with Tod too.”

“You think this is about you?” Helga asked.

“Oh, for sure. About my notice to the Martians. She needs the Martians for her land deal and for Singh’s land purchase to have any legitimacy.”

“Show up and I’ll send you right in,” Helga promised.

“He might still fire you for that,” Frank warned her.

“Oh, boohoo. You’ll take care of me in a couple of weeks and we can’t let her derail the Martian takeover. Whatever she says in there he’s too spineless to resist her.”

“OK, but just forget to relock his door when she goes in, not unlock it for me. The log will show it was just a mistake not a deliberate action.”

“Smart. That will only merit a warning on my record,” Helga said “After all the whole thing is out of the ordinary and upsetting. No wonder I’m distracted.”

Frank just chuckled, amused, and ended the call.

When Heather walked in the door there was fire in her eyes and Helga was jolted. Not by her but by the large humorless man behind her wearing two Singh pistols with the grips sticking forward from under his embroidered vest. The hood thrown back on his shoulders indicated he was wearing Lunar armor beneath it all too.

“Ms. Anderson?” Helga squeaked. She immediately hated how it came out. It betrayed her anxiety when she wanted to project calm.

“No, the frigging Easter Bunny, fool.”

“I’ll tell Mr. Oliver you’re here,” Helga said and managed a closer to normal tone.

“Don’t bother, I’ll tell him myself,” Heather snarled.

When she slapped the door pad it was locked.

She stopped for a full two seconds frozen in disbelief at the arrogance of it.

“He is not playing dominance games with me,” Heather declared. She retreated even with Gunny to be safely out of his way. “Gunny, remove that door for me,” she said pointing if he hadn’t figured out which door she meant.

“That’s a high-security door,” Gunny pointed out. He visibly had a thought and looked over his shoulder. “That’s interesting. They don’t put her inside a security door,” he said nodding at Helga.

“Well, if you can’t kick it down, and you didn’t bring breaching charges, burn it.”

“OK,” Gunny said agreeably and pulled up his hood. “You might want to wait in the corridor, my Lady. There’s going to be quite a bit of molten steel spraying around.”

“No, no,” Helga said suddenly. “I’ll unlock it,” she said scrambling on the desk for the release.

“That’s smart,” Gunny said. “No telling how much damage would happen behind it.”

The was a solid >chunk< of six big lugs retracting.

Gunny held a forestalling hand up and stepped forward to open the door himself. He drew a Singh pistol, slapped the same pad Heather had and the door retracted to each side. He stabbed the tab to keep it open and stepped in the opening far enough to check both walls each way before he holstered the pistol again.

“Clear,” he informed Heather.

Oliver was staring at them with his mouth hanging open.

Heather squeezed past Gunny and planted herself in one of the two large, comfortable chairs facing Tod Oliver’s desk. Gunny went to the side and stood with his back against an ornamental bookcase, where he could see both of them and the entry.

“Start explaining what’s going on here you little weasel,” Heather demanded.

“Is that any way to treat a trusted ally?” Oliver asked. He was projecting anger, but it was stage anger, and his body language was shouting he was scared stiff and it was bluster.

“Central stopped being your ally when the North Americans made us disperse the habs for survival,” Heather informed him. “Once you couldn’t call an Assembly and have all three habs linking in a common session with a short lag, you were on your own. Each of you now has to see to your own futures without a common location and circumstances. If you haven’t called a new Assembly and started to iron out who you are and what you are going to do yet I have to ask, why? You might gain ally status with me again. Proximity isn’t an absolute requirement. Even distant Derfhome is now our ally. But making war on your neighbor who hasn’t done any aggression towards you isn’t a great start.”

Franklin Abel appeared at the door, glanced around the room, and seeing Gunny spoke before he entered. He judged it was past pretending he just happened by.

“I heard that,” Franklin said. “I believe this involves me. I sincerely believe no violence will be necessary. The Martians have no ability to resist any outside force. That’s why you and Singh extorted the majority of their territory from them so easily. I’m just picking up the scraps of territory you and Singh didn’t bother with taking yet. You are just pretending there is still any real Martian government to lend legitimacy to your claims.

“If I did make war on them that’s certainly nothing you, Singh, and Lewis haven’t done to the Chinese, North America, and everybody who supported the UN in trying to evict you from the heavens. The Assembly of Home never told you to curtail that.”

“You haven’t waged war on the Martians because your shiny new ship hasn’t been delivered,” Heather said. “If they don’t yield you will. It’s still a coup of aggression if they do so out of fear. So, why did you announce your annexation now, before you have the means to enforce it?” Heather asked.

John Weaver belatedly showed up behind Frank and cleared his throat.

“Excuse me, old man. I should be in there.”

“Both of you come in,” Oliver insisted.

Franklin took the other seat uninvited, which said a lot about their relative status. John looked a little lost then assumed a position opposite Gunny at a sort of parade rest.

“It seemed good to put them on notice and give them some time to come to grips with the reality of the situation. It avoids them taking foolish actions in the heat of the moment like they might do knowing I have a lander,” Frank said.

“And it is better to do now than waiting a few days until my transport arrives to remove those who want to be repatriated to the Moon or other habs,” Heather said. “If you called your Assembly now, there are quite a few people in residence who would censure you. I expect very few will be coming here when it is uncertain where you’ll end up and you have no superluminal transport of your own. The brightest and wealthiest, who would oppose you if they had to stay, will be leaving in a few days.”

“We have nobody like Muños, well known and trusted to run the voting,” Oliver said. “I have no political ambitions and no authority to call an Assembly or create any political entity. I’ll keep public order and serve whoever can muster a consensus.”

“Certainly not you,” Heather agreed. “This one will wait to do that until the Martians have yielded, having no other choice. You have far more newly arrived rich people steeped in Earth Think than Home, used to coups and waiting to see how things shake out. Feeling they can’t abandon their cubic that took the most of their fortunes to acquire. They’ll favor anyone who promises stability.”

“Why would it matter about the Martians?” Oliver asked.

“Are you really that dumb?” Heather asked. “Mr. Charisma here has a few hundred people that follow him on your net. That’s not enough to vote themselves into power. Not even enough to intimidate a large majority. Once he has control of Mars, he’ll declare that being neighbors you are naturally a single political entity just like the three habs were when they were close together. I can think of a dozen ways to sweeten the pot to convince enough of your people to accept that. Land grants, promising Mars will be a market to the businesses that suddenly have none. Just the ability to go visit a planet and stand under a sky even if it does take a suit. He may even float some idea about terraforming it that the gullible will buy. That on top of intimidation if they don’t go along. Then, he will have doubled his force of bully boys, because the Martians are a bunch of fanatics who are accustomed to following orders and currying favor with authoritarians. At that point, they will be a good third of your population and he will have performed a reverse annexation, Mars absorbing you.”

The look Oliver was giving Frank said he was that stupid and had never seen the whole picture before Heather spelled it out for him item by item. Well, he got it now. Unsaid was that Frank, fully in power, would want his own, wholly-owned Head of Security. He figured that part out all by himself.

“Even allowing that everything you said should come to pass,” Frank said. “If we are all independent, and have no common Assembly, what business is it of yours? Is Gamma not free to pursue our own governance and do what is good for us?”

“You mean good for you. You are destabilizing what small accommodations we have remaining with the Earth powers,” Heather explained carefully. “They see Spacers as a group and the Martians exist with the approval and support of the Europeans. You will tie Gamma to Mars which was never our intent when we parked you here temporarily. I see that was an error now. If you stay in the Solar System the burden of protecting you is on us. The way you do business you will eventually piss off some Earthies. They will remove you with a gravel storm just like North America tried on us. You can’t protect yourselves.

“While we are at it, I’ll mention your ingratitude for saving you from being killed and your lies about my motives and goals in doing so. I should put you back by Earth so you can have the joy of them as neighbors again or drop you off at a distant star where you can scrape along to survive until you can feed yourselves and develop a star drive.”

That idea visibly rattled Oliver and his man John, but Frank didn’t twitch.

“I think about my words, and I never spoke against you. I do object to Central gaining advantages from our misfortune. If nobody steps up to provide a plan and leadership for Gamma I may have to do so,” Frank said, spreading his hands like the matter was obvious. “You should be happy to have somebody to deal with and not an unorganized rabble who can’t even get it together to call a local assembly. I’m rational. You can deal with me.”

“I’m not a weak-minded idiot. You will never be happy with Gamma and the Martian Republic. You won’t be satisfied until you have the rest of Mars and by then you will be a threat to anyone wanting to tap other resources of the Solar System like the minor bodies and the moons of the gas giants. Your thoughts were not deep enough to see you can’t divorce what you say about Central from me. I am Central,” Heather said simply.

“Nevertheless, there’s nothing you can do about it,” Frank insisted. His manner abruptly was no longer supplicating or conciliatory. His voice had a rough contemptuous edge to it. “Are you going to declare war on Gamma? Are you going to punish our entire population by snatching us away in some sort of exile? I don’t think so. It would be political suicide. You’d make all the other habs and not a few worlds scared you would intervene the same way with them any time you fancy it.”

“True,” Heather said, letting the word hang there. She drew fast as a snake and fired before Frank had time to look surprised. The beam flashed the room bright briefly and caught him high on the chest. The dull >POCK!< of expanding steam tipped him and the entire chair on its back. Behind where her shot penetrated both Frank and the chair-back, a glowing yellow hot spot on the bulkhead quickly faded to a burnt gray scar.

John bent his arm a little, and locked eyes with Gunny who didn’t so much as blink. He foolishly ignored Heather who could have targeted him with a slight turn of the wrist and slowly relaxed his arm back to the rest position rather than die.

“Sorry for the damage,” Heather said. “He was right. If I let him go ahead there was no way to stop the progression of events he planned. The price in chaos and conflict down the road would only get worse steadily. But the other habs and planets won’t give a damn about one power-hungry low life being removed from the game today.”

She got up to leave and stopped at the door.

“Don’t make me come back to sort things out again,” Heather warned them.

They were shaken beyond responding but that was fine. It wasn’t a request.

Helga was clutching her chest sitting shaking all over when they walked past.

“She was complicit you know,” Gunny observed in the corridor.

“Yes, she had to have called him in. He got there too fast,” Heather agreed. “It doesn’t matter. The rest of his mob don’t really matter now. They’ll break up into factions without one forceful leader. If anybody stood out as a possible replacement Frank would have removed them by now. He understood the way that works.”

“As promised, you didn’t call him out,” Gunny said amused. “He had no idea that removing him directly was a possibility.”

“As Heather, I couldn’t have considered it, but as the Sovereign, I had no other choice.

I have the obligation of self-preservation for my nation far more than just myself.”

“Much more so,” Gunny agreed. “I’m sure you saved hundreds if not thousands of lives back there. If you stayed your hand to allow it to become a contest between nations that would have been a very poor and false morality.”

A few people passing them in the corridor registered shock and shied away or hurried on. Heather couldn’t figure why. Word couldn’t have gotten around that fast and if there had been a general com alert their spex would have told them.

When they opened the hatch to the Remora, Barak was revolted too.

“What happened to you?” he demanded of his sister.

Heather was embarrassed to realize she was running on far more adrenaline than she realized. She took off her spex she hadn’t even noticed were speckled and looked down the front of her white tunic that was now pink.

“Oh, I’m sorry, I was close to a person who exploded.”

OceanofPDF.com

Chapter 20

Lee left it to the hotel to show the Earthies to their rooms and suggested as it was late that they meet for dinner tomorrow and to talk at the fifteenth hour. When that got a raised eyebrow, she explained Derf ran on a twenty-hour day and suggested they get a local clock program for their pads that would display the time and allow them to set alarms.

The room was oddly proportioned. The ceilings were high and the doors sized for Derf. The shower stall was big enough to be a water park for a family of four, and a tag on the showerhead said it was the Human version. Why? Water was water, wasn’t it? The toilet had an adapter for humans that covered two-thirds of the opening. A second door turned out to be a connector to the next room, but it was lockable so that didn’t matter. Kamala didn’t explore the small balcony just yet. There was a real Human bed with a mattress and regular sheets and pillows. It would do just fine.

There was a com desk that seemed modern. Kamala was pleased she could access the local net on her pad without any fuss through the hotel. She didn’t have to use their screen. Wider mobile data service would require a day rate or weekly subscription and the cost made her grimace. She needed a currency conversion program too and alerts so her expenses didn’t get out of hand. The government could afford it but indifference to running up extravagant costs was one of those things that could come back to haunt you years later. Kamala had ambitions of advancing to a level where such things were scrutinized.

Jean sent her a message before she could get those basic things done or even unpack her very light single bag.

“Can we talk privately?” he requested.

“They took me to the very next room,” Kamala told him. “I’m not terribly concerned about propriety to have you visit my room midday. There are two doors connecting our rooms, with a gap and sound deadeners on the insides if you want to open yours.”

“That’s fine. I’ll check that out right now,” Jean agreed.

Jean already had his door open when Kamala opened hers.

“This place is built like a fort,” Jean said. “Look how thick the walls are.”

“How nice. It should be possible to sleep without your neighbor keeping you awake all night. I suspect the Derf have good hearing. They have ears like a fox.”

“I’m more concerned the walls have ears,” Jean said.

“You really think they would bother to bug us?” Kamala seemed dubious.

“I always assume all foreigners are monitored in a foreign land.”

“They have a restaurant if you want to go get a drink and maybe a snack. It’s a long time to breakfast local time and I’m hungry. Surely, they won’t bug all the public areas. The noise alone would make it difficult. Truth is I don’t think I have anything to say I couldn’t put on the public net,” Kamala said.

“I’d still expect to be debriefed when I return home,” Jean said.

Kamala started to say something and closed her mouth.

“To the restaurant,” she insisted.

She started to close the door but Jean blocked it with his foot. She took that as a very unfriendly action and took a half step back, not in fear but to give her room to set up a strike if he moved against her. She was smaller and knew her legs were much stronger weapons than her hands and arms. The way she turned slightly and braced off her back foot told Jean he was in trouble quickly if he didn’t explain.

“I don’t want to exit your room with you and I don’t want to leave my connecting door open from my side. I’ll join you in the hall,” he promised.

Kamala nodded agreement but didn’t drop her guard until his door was closed and she heard the bolt slide home. She did the same then and joined him in the corridor.

Jean expected her to try to converse in the hallway or on the elevator down to the first floor. Instead, she was entirely silent and appeared to have dropped the guarded stance she displayed at the door. She walked closely beside him not trying to hang back at all.

The greeter at the restaurant spoke to them in English. He got menus and headed for the favored window tables with a view. He was briefly surprised when Jean asked to be seated at one of the tables by the kitchen doors but altered course and sat them there.

“You want the kitchen noise?” Kamala guessed.

“That and these are always the less favored tables. If any are bugged, they are the least likely candidates. Unless they have them all bugged,” he added suspiciously.

“You are a spy,” Kamala said not bothering to hide her irritation.

“And you were doing those fancy steps back at your room getting ready to show me an Indian folk dance,” Jean accused.

“I’d have tap-danced all over your pretty face,” Kamala assured him. “I saw you telegraphing a block. I can assure you we follow different disciplines. You would have been surprised as you fell because I targeted the knee opposite your expectations. But I’m not trained as an agent. I’m trained as a young girl who my mother wanted to be safe to go visit the market or deal with the spice seller for the household.”

“Grew up in a rough neighborhood?” Jean asked.

“I grew up in an area with three overlapping cultures, none of which respect women.”

“I’m fully representing France’s commercial interests,” Jean insisted. “I’ll report back to the Minister and hopefully we’ll avoid the stagnation the North Americans will experience.”

“After you report to your real boss,” Kamala insisted. “Not that I care. I have worked in the trade office my whole career, not a spook agency. If I’m debriefed by our intelligence people when we return it won’t surprise me. It has happened a couple of times in the past and they had questions that didn’t make any sense to me at all. It’s just our priorities are different.”

“You and your intelligence debriefers or you and me?” Jean asked.

“Yes,” Kamala said.

Jean relaxed a little and laughed at her honesty.

“If we leave it at that, then I see no reason we can’t each do our job and it will never really matter in what order we make our reports when we go back home.”

“Agreed, as long as you don’t try to recruit me to do something stupid or jeopardize my mission by my being with you,” Kamala said. “Screw my side of it up and you’ll rue ever meeting me,” she promised.

Jean looked amused and tried to laugh it off but she was humorless.

The waiter shook his head no when Jean tried to order in French, then took their order easily in English. A corned beef sandwich on rye for him after soup and a plate of petite tenderloin morsels with scrambled eggs for her. They shared a pot of coffee that was surprisingly good.

When the busboy came to clean up after them, he never noticed the steak knife she’d used was missing. There was a whole bin of them and nobody kept count.

* * *

Jeff and April sat down with Lee in her suite early. It was past breakfast but Lee had coffee and pastries for them. They had things to talk over before the Earthies joined them later. They should have enough time to get their systems on the same clock and not be lagged too badly. Sally from the bank would be arriving about the same time too. Other than discussing policy, Lee intended to hand them off to Sally for her to explain the nuts and bolts of the Exploration Society Protection Registry. That would include actual forms for them to take home and publish for explorers to be familiar with them and decide if they wished to use them.

“Did you have any guests left last night?” Lee asked.

“No, you called that. The serving carts were gone and Strangelove even got the extra seating removed. He told us what you said about tossing a blanket over any stragglers. It seemed to amuse him,” Jeff said.

“I don’t think Derf are into private parties much,” Lee said. “But I’m given to understand they cut loose when they have big festivals with multiple clans together. He probably thinks we are pretty tame.”

“I’ll take that as a challenge to shock him in the future,” April said.

“Where is Strangelove?” Lee asked since he stayed so close to Jeff. I got him to promise Clarke to help us later after he did such a good job for you.”

“He said he’s checking surveillance of the hotel after he made sure Jeff wasn’t going out. So, he must not be far,” April said. “It wouldn’t surprise me if he’s giving the Earthies some special attention.”

“I’ve been thinking,” Lee said. “If we get a lot of Earth explorers using our registry, I might have to send a clerk to Central and have an office there where they can file claims and have a local net site that lists all the registered claims to aid developing them.”

“That makes sense, Jeff agreed. “You should be happy to know I’ve decided I’m going to recommend to Heather that Central start using your registry to claim some of the systems and resources we are utilizing close to Human space,” April said. “Not our populated worlds but sources of mining and the systems most likely to be waypoints along routes from Earth to our worlds.”

“That would be welcome. Would you explain what moved you to do that?” Lee asked.

“This registry is a good thing. At the moment, we don’t need it terribly. But after examining your claims documents we saw that we don’t have to open a system up to anyone who wants to bid on using it. We can claim it and keep it closed off for our private use indefinitely. The fact there are claims in Central’s name alone will be supportive. It should encourage others to use the registry. The filing fee isn’t that much compared to opening up a claim to development, but it’s still a little something to support your organization.”

“It will help pay Sally and our rent. We have offices and a clerk to help her now. It sounds like you intend to register enough to be substantially helpful,” Lee said.

“We’d like to help another way,” Jeff said. “Rather than direct your energies to produce jump drives I’d propose you let Central manufacture them for you. At least right now while you have other irons in the fire. You’d still have all the design details to make them yourself if you aren’t happy with our service. But our ships would share all the same drive dimensions, connectors, and mounting points. It should make things much simpler in the future to have one standard.

“Heather has sufficient materials and fabricating capacity to make a little something on each one and still make them cheaper than you could starting from scratch. We need a lot of them so we’ll be gearing up for large volumes. Just replacing the jump drones we’ve lost is critical for us. We lost material it took us years to build up. In my estimation, the facilities at Central are more secure than a plant on Derfhome.”

“The security aspect is a plus for both of us,” Lee agreed. “My guys have had to go to a lot of trouble to spread the work around to maintain security. Building our own plant is the only way we could do any serious volume. Other than, as you say, the little something you stand to make, what else is an advantage for Central?”

“We were hoping you could spend the saved time and coin on improving the design of your reactionless drive. We’d love to see it ready to deploy in ships. I have a fellow in mind, Walter Houghton, who I think would be an asset to work with your researchers to improve that drive,” Jeff said. “I can probably persuade Heather to assign him here. When she hears about the new drive, I’m sure she’ll be very enthused. You wouldn’t even have to pay him. Heather already carries him on the payroll.”

“It’s taking me some time to get everything ready to repossess Providence. I don’t think I want to wait until the Sharp Claws and Retribution can be refitted with new drives. That’s going to be expensive and a lot harder than my Kurofune. Why don’t we take the Kurofune to the Moon with my aircar grappled to my lock to show Heather? We can see if your man wants to come back and if Heather will let him go. With the new drive, it can be a day trip.”

“You have the new mount ready this fast?” Jeff wondered.

“No, but I can send the drive back up and leave it mounted in lunar orbit,” Lee said.

“A ride in the Twool would go a long way towards recruiting Walter,” Jeff predicted. “You can haul it around by only the docking collar without damaging anything?”

“Yes, Alonso was told to design that in at the start and he used the lightest advanced composites unless the prices were just ridiculous. That’s why the next version is going to be even better. The price of new advanced materials drops off month by month. In a year he’ll be able to make an equivalent airframe a couple of hundred kilograms lighter.”

“If you don’t mind discussing it, what sort of power source are you using in the Twool?” Jeff asked. “I can’t believe the normal sort of commercial batteries would be sufficient and you didn’t ask us for a fusion generator or the sort of solid-state storage we use.”

“New Japan has a fusion generator for sale now with much better energy density than a polywell reactor. They’re not cheap but they come in convenient sizes and no begging to buy them. I hate to depend on you for everything,” Lee said.

That didn’t seem to upset Jeff at all.

Strangelove returned and peeked in on them but retreated to the living room to do whatever he was up to.

“What sort of tech is it? Do you have any specs on it?”

“It’s a sintered metal shell with bucky tubes all over it in a high-pressure deuterium environment. It runs hot and the power is generated inside the core with thermo-electric modules. If you don’t let it idle using enough fuel to maintain temperature it takes a few minutes to heat up and come online,” Lee said.

“Very nice,” Jeff said. “Several technologies had to independently mature enough to let them build that by bringing them all together. That’s pretty much how I make things but no one human has time to keep up with the literature in one field much less two or three. It makes it very difficult to develop cross-discipline advances.”

“I thought you might be upset that it’s competition for your devices,” Lee said.

“There’s no point in that,” Jeff said with a shrug. “We’ve guarded the details of our fusion generator to use it to our advantage. After I find out more about the New Japan unit, I may feel it opens the door to offering ours commercially on a wider basis. It comes up off a hard shutdown faster. That may be vital to some users. Having alternatives in the market may allow us to make some money off the design if there is no point in keeping it secret.

“It’s always nice to make a little bit,” April agreed.

“Do you use batteries to bring the unit up to operating temperature?” Jeff asked.

“Yes, and it takes a good chunk of their capacity,” Lee said.

“As our ally, I’d sell you some high-density storage large enough to allow you to lift off without delay and bring up the reactor at your leisure,” Jeff said. “It is still proprietary so you’d have to trust it as a black box. It will self-destruct if you try to take it apart. With this particular device, the problem would be to open it up without making it release the stored energy. It doesn’t take any elaborate booby-trapping at all. We’ve felt much freer to sell them in devices for just that reason.”

“How much would this weigh?” Lee wondered.

“Figure three or four kilograms for the whole thing, in a protective case with bus bar connections suitable to an aircar. It’s what we use in our pistols,” he said, patting his.

“It must be pretty safe if you carry one around at your waist. The next generation aircar is going to be so light we’ll have to leave the pods pushing it into the pavement to keep it from blowing away,” Lee said.

Jeff smiled at the slight exaggeration.

The house announced Sally was downstairs and ready to come up. Lee told it to admit her to the elevator. Strangelove came in from the living room and took up his station against the wall behind Jeff since an outsider was coming in.

“I’ll call and have my drive taken up to the Kurofune,” Lee said finalizing it before Sally arrived.

“My man Clarke is observing in the kitchens and will come up with the food to fix drinks and serve us,” Strangelove told them. Lee hadn’t requested a second server for six people and Strangelove hadn’t suggested it.

The last time Jeff and April saw Sally she was barely into her first Life Extension Therapy. She’d finished that and had had two follow-ups now. Instead of a woman in her early nineties, she looked like a very healthy forty-year-old.

“Are you ready for a show and tell?” Lee asked her.

“Yes, I have hard copies and attached data cards.” She frowned at Jeff and April, struck by a sudden thought. “Should I have brought copies for these two?”

“Not at all,” Jeff assured her. “We’ve examined your material on the local net and were just telling Lee we’ll be registering claims.”

“That’s good. We just got the first claim made remotely yesterday,” Sally said, directing this at Lee. “The relay drone came in from Fargone and had a package with all the data about the claim and the fee for the Fargone ship Magic Cat.”

“The Fargoer’s can be as strange naming their ships as their children,” Lee said.

“And yet I bet they don’t have a single little Hringhorni Jr. running around,” April said.

“And one of them will take that bet because they are nuts that way too,” Lee predicted.

The house computer announced the Earthies were waiting. Lee let them come up and told the hotel kitchen to serve them in a half-hour.

The Indian woman, Kamala, stepped out of the elevator and started straight for them even before Lee waved her over. The far side of the suite where their table sat was across the longest open space in the suite. It ran along the diagonal from the inside corner with the elevator to the outside corner with the doors to the balcony. It was made that way on purpose to make the suite appear even larger than it was. The man, Jean, walked slower and looked around. If his face was any clue he was favorably surprised by the apartment. It was a full quarter of the top floor and much nicer than their second-floor rooms.

Lee offered the hospitality of the bar and informed them there would be a bartender along soon if they wanted anything complex and called them to the table.

Sally was at the foot of the table opposite Lee, and Jeff, and April sat on the long side away from the entry. That left two chairs open for the Earthies. Kamala in the lead grabbed the chair nearest Lee, opposite April, leaving Jean by Sally.

It seemed odd to the Earth people not to have drinks elsewhere and then get called to the table but they went with local custom. They were very comfortable seats so it made sense not to stand around then move. Sally and April agreed to split a bottle of Champagne when Clarke could decant it. Lee opened a bottle of whiskey that was a gift from Jeff and several tried it. They spoke about that being a hobby of his for a bit. Nobody seemed in a hurry to get to business so they just made polite conversation and didn’t push it.

After dinner was brought up and the hotel staff left, Clarke stayed to serve them. Lee offered for him to refresh their drinks if anyone needed that. Jean thought that was a lot to expect of one to serve six but Clarke did it fairly quickly. He took care of the ladies first. Jean wondered if that was an adopted Human custom or already the norm for a matriarchal society. They had three choices of soup, meat, and vegetable. Bread was put on the table in common, with rice and noodles. You’d have to be a very fussy eater or have religious restrictions not to find something.

Kamala was having a side conversation with Lee and Jeff was leaning over having a private word with Sally. Jean asked the server, Clarke, where the washroom was, wondering if he’d understand that or if he’d have to be less delicate about it. The fellow understood perfectly and leaned over giving him quiet directions. It caught the attention of Kamala who looked away from Lee when the Derf leaned in to direct Jean.

Jean quietly thanked him and put his napkin to his mouth like he had a bit of something objectionable he wanted to be rid of and placed his napkin on his plate. Kamala was observant and it didn’t make sense to her. He’d have done that before speaking with their server not after. She frowned but Jean wasn’t looking at her.

Lee was asking if anyone wanted another drink after Clarke cleared the table when Jean stood up to go visit the washroom. Kamala raised a forestalling hand to Lee who was still trying to talk to her. That cut Lee off mid-sentence so abruptly it made everyone look. Kamala reached over and picked up the napkin Jean left on his plate. The little silver egg that fell out hit the plate with a tiny >tock<. It might as well have been a brick in the sudden silence. They all looked at it lying there, inexplicable, and out of place. Jean, knowing what it was recovered first and moved quickly.

Jean spun around to get away from the table and found Kamala’s foot hooked around his ankle. He went sprawling on the floor. Kamala got up to the other side of her seat and turned to face him as he rose. He tried to step around her, and sucked his gut in, and jerked back as she made a lunge with the steak knife she’d stolen at lunch. It was lovely fencing form with one leg trailing and her other hand tucked behind her. It would have run him through if she had a decent foil but the steak knife was far too short. He was trying to get around her again on the side away from the table when Sally smacked him loudly across the back of the head with the Champagne bottle. It didn’t break but he went flying face down as slick as a ship being christened goes down greased ways.

Everybody was watching the two Earthies go at each other in shock. They missed Jeff reaching across to tip the little metal egg in his water glass and rushing to the balcony doors. Strangelove put out his hands to take it but Jeff put a hand out like he was going to stiff-arm him out of the way. That was ridiculous but Strangelove stepped out of his way. By the time Jean was knocked senseless on the floor he was coming back in and slamming the sliding glass door shut. He locked it and stood with his hand on it intent on preventing anyone else from opening it.

April was the first to see Jeff was out of place and looked a question at him.

“It’s some kind of a bot,” Jeff said. “Probably an assassin bot. I have yet to see any of them that are waterproof. It had to be on some kind of delay and would open up when he was off in the toilet. I’m so sorry, Lee. April or I was probably the target and put you at risk.”

“No,” Strangelove said very forcefully before anyone else could speak. “He wasn’t trying to get around Sally to Jeff. He was trying to get through Kamala the other direction to Lee. She was the target.”

They all looked at Lee.

“Oh, yeah. I had that figured out before he got off the floor,” Sally said.

“Welcome to the assassin survivors club,” Jeff said with dark humor.

“You should have handed it off to me and allowed me to take the risk,” Strangelove told Jeff. “That’s my job and what I’m expected to do.”

“I didn’t have time to stop and explain why it needed to be outside,” Jeff said.

It wasn’t exactly an apology but Strangelove nodded.

“What do you expect it to do?” Kamala asked, looking over Jeff’s shoulder at the water glass on the balcony. So far, the little metal egg was as innocent as an olive in a martini.

“If it opens up to deploy legs or wings it will probably short out and that will melt or vaporize the whole thing. It will probably do that just by a good soaking if it doesn’t activate soon. Even if it is waterproof and survives activation, I doubt it can get through this,” he said tapping the door glass. “We made sure the glass was all bullet-proof when we leased. We’ve had the experience of these sorts of bots trying to get to us.”

By this time all of them were crowded around the doors looking at the glass on the balcony. All but Clarke, who Strangelove directed with hand signs. He was turned half away keeping an eye on Jean.

Anything out on the balcony quickly attracted some of the little fliers. They were annoying if you tried to eat out there, always hoping you’d drop some scrap or leave a serving dish uncovered. Lee suspected some other hotel guest must feed them to keep their interest so active.

There were soon four of the little pests sitting on the rail. The little device didn’t flash in a discharge as Jeff expected but instead emitted a stream of bubbles. The motion motivated one of the fliers to launch off the rail to claim it before his fellows. He spread his wings and dropped on it but instead of a graceful landing he fell flat on his face with wings still spread, unmoving.

“Oh crap, it’s a chemical weapon,” Jeff said.

The fliers on the rail got unnaturally still and one by one fell off.

“Probably a neurotoxin,” Strangelove agreed.

“And it was going to kill us all while he was in the restroom,” Kamala realized.

“That means it won’t be persistent and he expected to be able to sit and wait for it to disperse in a reasonable amount of time,” April said.

“I vote we throw the son-of-a-bitch off the balcony,” Kamala said.

Everybody looked at her in shock at how blood-thirsty and crude she was suddenly.

“Oh, come on. Like none of you have ever killed anybody,” she told them. “But if you want to wait until he regains consciousness to toss him that’s fine too.”

“Not going to happen,” Clarke said, feeling on Jean’s neck for a pulse. “He’s a goner.”

“Crap… we can’t cap him now,” April said.

“Throw him off anyway, just to make sure,” Kamala insisted.

Sally still had the Champagne bottle in hand and lifted it to check the level. There was still quite a bit. She hadn’t spilled much wielding it as a club.

“Why don’t we sit back down?” Sally asked Kamala. “There’s still a glass for each of us and you can tell us how you came to hold Jean in such intense dislike.”

“Pour,” Kamala agreed, returning to her seat and started her story.

“So, we agreed at the end of lunch that it didn’t matter if either of us was an agent,” Kamala eventually said after describing how Jean was paranoid about surveillance and alarmed her by blocking her door at their rooms.

“I did warn him that even if he was a spy, he’d regret it if he interfered with my mission,” Kamala explained. “Since we got off to such a bad start, we didn’t speak or get together again today until we came up here. I stayed in and napped to get on the local clock and was happy he didn’t call. I had no idea he’d try to casually kill me and everyone else in the room to accomplish his mission. But I had enough reason to distrust him to keep my knife from our meal together. You can send it back to the kitchen,” she told Clarke. “I don’t think I’ll need it again.”

“They had to substitute this fellow for the French representative sometime before you went to Central,” Jeff figured out. “Where would they have had an opportunity?”

“We all met up at Whoops,” Kamala said. “North America still has an interest section there. I guess your sovereign didn’t want to risk relations with the other nations by going in and cleaning them out.”

“Whoops?” Sally asked.

“World Peace Station,” Kamala said. “Nobody calls it that. International Space Station Three would have been just as bad a name. When do you stop adding numbers? I’d bet the real French fellow is as dead as that one,” she said, nodding at Jean, “and in storage, until they can dispose of him.”

“That seems likely,” Jeff agreed. “Anybody object if I send pix of Jean to one of my own intelligence people on-planet and ask if he knows him?”

Nobody objected, so Jeff took pix with his spex recording and sent it to Jan.

“He’s not familiar to me, but I’m more Eurocentric. He seems to be in an awkward repose,” Jan said tactfully. His tone made it a question.

“That’s because he’s freshly dead,” Jeff said bluntly. “No need for condolences.”

“I know a fellow here with North American connections. May I forward it to him?”

“Sure, go ahead,” Jeff agreed.

“I’ll pass through the sound. No need for him to see you,” Jan said.

“Hey, Sam. I’m calling for Mel. Can you ID this fellow for us?” Jan asked.

“I don’t know him. Hang on while I call Bill.”

Jeff, April, Lee, and Strangelove all traded surprised looks around but said nothing. They all had a history with Sam and Bill and had no idea Mel or Jan even knew them. They’d have recognized him just from his voice.

Bill was in the room so rather than forward the file Sam just called him over.

“Hey, can you take a look at this mug and tell Jan if you know him?”

Bill sauntered over, all relaxed, and stiffened like a cat meeting a big dog.

“That is one dangerous son-of-a-bitch. He does wet work – assassinations – for North America. Tell Jan to stay away from him. I’d say kill him first, but he probably won’t be able to. Is he on-planet?” Bill demanded, visibly upset.

“He is terminated, as the expression goes, with extreme prejudice. No longer a concern for any of us now. Thanks, Bill,” Jan said and ended the call.

“Well, that was interesting,” Jan said. “You didn’t see his face but it scared the ever-loving snot out of the man to think he might be on the same planet.”

“I could hear it in his voice,” Jeff assured him. “He shared Kamala’s assessment of his genealogy too. Thank you for checking.” He didn’t ask how Jan knew the pair.

“You didn’t warn Jan about those two,” April said.

“He already knew their North American connection and Jan is no fool. They did just give us useful confirmation. It’s obvious they didn’t know he was on the planet and they didn’t protect him as a fellow North American asset before they knew he was dead. It seemed a bad time to speak against them when they were helpful.”

“OK, maybe they can be occasionally useful,” April allowed.

“I doubt you have to worry about him having any backup for now,” April told Lee. It had to be hard enough to sub him for the French guy. There wasn’t time to position support for him ahead by conventional ship.”

“Thank you,” Lee finally remembered to say to Sally for her intervention.

“It was obvious he was a baddy,” Sally said, shrugging her shoulders. “The table was in the way for anybody else to get to him.”

“Derf bankers really are full service,” Jeff marveled. That made Sally smile.

“You look a little rattled dear. Why don’t we wait and get together tomorrow to talk about registering claims?” Sally suggested.

“Yes, come back at the twelfth hour,” Lee agreed.

“That works for me too.” Kamala agreed. “I’m not going to be calm and thinking clearly until I settle down and get a night’s sleep. Thanks. See you tomorrow.”

After Kamala was in the elevator and the doors closed, Jeff turned to Strangelove with an odd expression on his face.

“Would you put a watch on her please? I’d like to know if she leaves and where she goes if she doesn’t return tomorrow. Just in case she isn’t what she claims.”

“Did you run software on her?” Strangelove asked.

“Yes, but it’s not infallible. Less so with agents. She may have only told us part of the truth,” Jeff said.

“But you don’t want us to stop her?”

“No, she might take a notion to go walk off her stress or something and still come back. She might also contact somebody and still return,” Jeff speculated.

“I’ll put a camera down her hall and watching her balcony,” Strangelove decided.

“You folks have such interesting, complicated lives,” Sally said.

* * *

“That should make Mel a happy client, who feels we are earning our fee,” Sam said. “How did you know that fellow? I didn’t think our people employed that sort of person.”

“We don’t. I’ve done plenty of inter-agency work and I can’t talk to you about it while there is any chance at all we may end up back on Earth. They’d cap me and have it out of me in no time at all if I ever have to be debriefed. That would be as bad for you as me,” Bill said.

OceanofPDF.com

Chapter 21

“What do you want me to do with the dead spy?” Strangelove asked Jeff.

“You know, we’ve tried to be artistic about returning them a few times. I just don’t have it in me to go to all the trouble again. Just dispose of him any way you like. It doesn’t seem to adjust their attitude at all. I doubt we can extract anything from his pad or personal gear. It’s a risk to examine it, so just toss him as is, the safest way possible for your men.”

“I have two soldiers on the way with a tarp. Clarke could wrap him up, take him down on one of the serving carts, and out the kitchen service entry but I hate to do that past all the kitchen help. He’ll be an obvious package even rolled up.”

“What would you do then?” Jeff asked.

“This corner doesn’t have an entry or anything below just landscaping. I’d roll him in the tarp but wait until late at night and toss him off to my guys,” Strangelove suggested.

“That would be much more private and make Kamala happy too. Do it,” Jeff said.

“That’s good. We’ll wrap him and leave him out on the balcony until then.”

April looked at Lee sitting silently. She might be as rattled as Kamala.

“Are you OK dear?” she asked, worried about her, not flippant like Jeff.

“No, I’m seriously annoyed. I’d like to hold North America accountable, but without a live spy to put under the cap, I don’t feel I can act on it. They have however used up any small patience I once may have had with them in the future.”

“Yeah, that’s where a lot of us have been mentally for years,” April agreed. “But we feel most of their population is innocent, held hostage by their system.”

“Don’t worry,” Lee assured them. “I would work from the top down.”

* * *

Lee didn’t order up a luncheon for Sally and Kamala. Noon was the tenth hour in Derf time and she wanted a short meeting. She had other things to do.

She was feeling somewhat more charitable to Kamala since Strangelove reported she did nothing untoward overnight. She had defended Lee even if Sally ended it.

She let Sally present all the forms and explain what languages they used. She showed some existing contracts and how they worked. Sally finished up and nodded to her.

“That’s the nuts and bolts. Now you probably have some policy questions,” Lee invited.

Kamala looked puzzled. “This doesn’t address anything about the kind of claimant. It just has a blank line. Is it all the same for a company, partners, or a sovereign state?”

“Same rules, same contribution to register,” Lee agreed. Your relationship with your government is your business. I’ll predict that if a state taxes their explorers excessively or limits their activities they won’t have any explorers under their flag pretty quickly.”

“You’ve almost reversed the payment percentages,” Kamala said. “Can you really afford to keep records, publish discoveries, and send ships to intervene if somebody challenges ownership for twenty percent?”

“I had Sally here, and the bank, model the payments for me. They have a wealth of practical experience with economics. I don’t think you realize how much was flowing to Earth’s economy. Earth is so big it could absorb it. It’s so big it needed it to sustain it. The global standard of living depended on that wealth. Still does for that matter and I don’t see any good end possible there. People are going to be poorer all over the Earth.

“Even archiving records on three planets is dirt cheap now. Similarly, we will post new claims on all the big hab or planetary nets. So, publicity is cheap too. If you are a supporting member of the Society all our news will be available or sent to your com address. Our new star drives are much cheaper than the Earth versions. They’re going to get even better and cheaper soon. I expect to have a sizable war chest in just a couple of years. If it gets too big, I might have to set up an explorer’s aid society or give dividends to the Little Fleet crew.

“Notice, we aren’t taking title and controlling development or letting bids for infrastructure. It’s not our claim. All those expenses are on the owner to bid out and manage, so the fee reversal makes sense. They develop and we get a passive fraction.

“People also know I have the support of my father Gordon. You may not know much about interstellar conflict but nobody wants to deal with him as an adversary. The Fargoers were relieved beyond measure when we got Fargoer citizenship. North America found that out, and they are about to get a sample again because we are going back with a fleet to repossess Providence soon. They cut off our fifteen percent and I’ll re-register it in our system since they defaulted on us.”

Kamala looked shocked. “Is that why they were trying to kill you?”

“I doubt it. You are the first person outside our inner circle I’ve told our intentions. They had plenty of animus from the war and that we established another registry. Expecting us to reclaim Providence credits them with more imagination than I’d easily believe.”

“I wish you hadn’t told me about Providence,” Kamala said. “I’m afraid my people will leak it and cause trouble for you.”

“I’m going to make it happen faster than they could do anything about it. But you don’t have to tell them if you don’t want to,” Lee said.

“No, they won’t cap me but they have good enough software and expert enough staff that they’ll have it out of me when they debrief me. They have a huge baseline on me.”

“Don’t worry about it,” Lee assured her. “We’re going to take it in any case. Heather has reduced their fleets to the point now it would be foolish to try to muster a force against us.

“There is something you should make clear to your people. I intend to tell any Earthies that we won’t register worlds off the other side of Human space. I had some very good advice from several very smart people that would lead to unreasoning conflict. There’s no set line yet but, generally speaking, anything to the far side of a plane between us and Earth will be off-limits for our registry,” Lee said and drew an imaginary surface with her hand.

“Half the heavens excluded. I have to think about everything that will do,” Kamala said.

“We’re going to the Moon tomorrow. Do you want a fast ride back?” Lee asked.

“Thank you, yes. That would be a kindness.”

“Call Sally if you have any other questions,” Lee said. She walked her to the door.

* * *

“I’m going to the Moon for a day. Maybe parts of two days,” Lee told Musical and Born. “There is a technician there we intend to interview and bring back to work with you on improving the thruster if he’s willing.”

“Will we be working for him or will he be working for us?” Born wondered. Musical looking at the screen over his shoulder looked concerned too.

“How is it being done now?” Lee asked.

“You never said either of us is the lead. We cooperate,” Born insisted.

“Except Born is a bully who browbeats me into doing it his way,” Musical insisted.

Lee ignored Musical being theatrical and Born rolling his eyes. If they needed to be silly now and then to stay sane, she understood it for what it was.

“I’d have said you both work for me,” Lee said. “But if Born being a bully is why you are both turning out such marvelous work, why would I disrupt that?”

“Sometimes he picks me up and carries me away,” Musical charged, enjoying playing the smart-aleck.

Born made a yapping mouth with a true hand and worked it vigorously.

“Have you considered biting him?” Lee asked.

Musical’s eyes got big.

“Would you?” he asked.

“No, but I can fire him. I expect you to all work for me and behave like responsible adults among yourselves. If you genuinely can’t come to a consensus on a course of action, you may ask me. Be warned, however, I may decide by flipping a coin.”

“We’ll manage,” Musical promised, and Born nodded agreement. Coin flipping seemed to be universal and didn’t have to be explained to either of the aliens.

* * *

“It’s rather well thought out and tasteful,” April said of the Kurofune control cabin, once Lee had clearance and they were away from Derfhome control.

“It’s going to mess it up and make them put a well against the forward bulkhead under the ports to fit the drive in the nose and put a lock there. It’ll have to be longer too.”

“Some things can’t be made pretty,” Jeff said. “Our acceleration canceling framework is ugly, and in the way frequently but I have yet to figure out how to make it less intrusive.”

“Why bother now that you don’t need to make a long hard burn to be able to jump? If you offered it to me now, I’m not sure I’d want to install it,” Lee told him.

Lee initiated the first jump and Kamala, who had never witnessed one from the control spaces, made a strange noise when a new star appeared.

“It’s still an option,” April said. “I’m not ready to rip it out. Maybe we should offer it.”

“It isn’t within the range of tech we agreed to share,” Lee said. “You had it even before your drive, right? I’m not hinting for a freebie.”

Lee checked her numbers and jumped again.

“I didn’t think you were. I’m changing my thinking. When we are all conveniently together with Heather, would you entertain the idea of expanding our cooperation to all important technologies? To thoroughly merge our proprietary horizons and culture?”

“What brought this on?” Lee demanded. “I had the sense you might go the other way now that you had what you needed the most. Jeff seemed ready to cut us out of sharing your software, remember?”

Lee checked her program for a match and jumped again.

“That’s because he deals well with fields and particles but can be a flaming idiot with people,” April said. “He reconsidered because I was jumping up and down and silently mouthing no at him or he’d have thrown your trust away.”

“It seemed like a perfectly reasonable point of order at the time,” Jeff said.

“OK. You have the right of it, or he wouldn’t have tried to justify it again now,” Lee told April. “I suppose you are used to saving his bacon periodically?”

“Heather and me both,” April assured her.

“Hey, I’m trying to do right now, and you both are harping on old grievances,” Jeff said.

“Fine, we will award you points for your present behavior, but answer this question. What moved you to offer such a thing now?” Lee demanded.

“I’m looking forward. I try to do that a lot,” Jeff insisted. “You are going out among the stars using the same drive tech. We always hoped having distinctive drives would cause any aliens to see us as different than the Earthies. That’s not going to happen with you. It seems to me it is safer to see that you have all the same tools, both offensive and defensive, if you are indistinguishable from us. I’d hate for either of us to have a ship captured.”

“This is not just theory,” April pointed out. “We have yet to meet a star-faring race that doesn’t go armed. Even your Badgers and Bills gave up going unarmed and were eager to buy weapons from us once they had the joy of meeting the Biters. There are some real bad actors out there.”

“Does that mean you’ll reveal all about who you’ve met among the stars?” Lee asked.

Jeff and April looked at each other. That still seemed to be difficult for them.

“If Heather will buy the whole package,” Jeff said, “I am willing to support my sovereign and hold back no secrets. Realistically, now that you have similar materials you will produce equivalent mechanisms in short order. Likewise, you are eventually going to stumble on our worlds or meet the same actors we have out there. I have to admire the things your researchers have done. The advances are just as likely to come from them as us, and we’d both be stronger for being allies and sharing.”

“I’m still back here,” Kamala reminded them from her seat. “Little old me, who Indian intelligence is almost certainly going to interrogate after I report to my trade boss. Though I don’t know if they’d believe this even if I’d recorded it for them. Do you really want them to know all this?

“Why wouldn’t they believe?” Lee demanded.

“How to say this?” Kamala sighed. “You sound more like my relatives squabbling with each other over a family dinner than political actors. None of you seem to have any clue how to speak in diplomatic language.”

Everyone else traded looks.

“I offended you,” Kamala decided belatedly.

“No, no. We were just at a loss how to politely tell you we don’t care,” Jeff admitted. “You should tell them about the French fellow being replaced. I’m sure Heather will pass that along to the French but they could have just as easily replaced you.”

“I’ll be sure to make that point,” Kamala promised. From the look on her face, she hadn’t considered she might have never made it to the Moon.

“This is the last jump,” Lee said. “I’ll get us close to the Moon and you talk to traffic control and get our clearances. I’m sure they perk up and roll out the red carpet for Heather’s peers.”

Two more jumps put them a few light seconds from the Moon on the good neighborhood side of its orbit.

“I’ll probably know whoever is stuck on traffic duty by name,” Jeff said. “May I have the comm, pilot?”

“It’s yours. The radio is on local control frequency.”

“Central Control, this is Jeff Singh on the diplomatic courier Kurofune. May I have an orbit assigned and tentative clearance for my pilot to bring our ship’s auxiliary down on my Lady’s private field?”

“Hi, Jeff. This is Boris. Sending suggested elements. When you are ready to drop call me from your shuttle and I’ll clear any of the great unwashed from your path to pad number two. You do want to drop to the hangar level?”

“Yes, please.”

“We’re in mid-lunar with full sun and no breezes,” Boris joked. “So, no landing lights but only the one active automated approach beacon if you wish to do a hands-off landing. Has your pilot been here before?”

“Yes, but not as a pilot I believe.”

“Well, elevator two will have a tremendously big, framed number two on it that you can see from orbit and a standard, twenty-five-meter SpaceX target painted over it in the center for insurance purposes. Sending the LPS coordinates along with your orbital elements. Be safe, and if you can’t, try not to fall on anything historic or valuable.”

“Thank you, Central Control, your care is appreciated. Please convey that we’d like a small repair bay so we can exit under pressure.”

“You got it,” Boris agreed.

“Yep, red carpet,” Lee said.

“You are on the list to be expedited,” Jeff revealed.

“I’ll test that sometime when you aren’t along,” Lee promised.

“Is the radio still on local?” April asked.

“Yes, it is,” Lee said after checking.

“They didn’t say Armstrong copied,” April noticed.

“I guess they dropped that courtesy after the Earthies tried to kill us,” Jeff said.

“Not all the Earthies tried to kill you,” Kamala reminded them.

“Noted,” Jeff agreed. It didn’t seem enough to make her happy.

* * *

The fact they were in just a tiny aircar made the eighty-meter square elevator seem even bigger. Kamala’s eyes got big and she was in awe when she realized the platform dropping them to the hangar was about the size of a soccer pitch.

“Coming in the back door is much more impressive than riding over from Armstrong.”

“I’d have mentally switched them from a resident’s perspective,” Jeff said. “I’ll see that you get a ride back to Armstrong. If you can’t get a lift back to LEO today, we keep a hospitality hotel room in Armstrong you can use.”

“Twool, this is the facility manager, Ron Burk,” the radio announced. “I have a twenty-meter square repair and assembly room open. Once you are inside it will take about ten minutes to bring it up to full pressure. I’ll stop your platform in front of it. How may I safely transfer your vehicle? Do you need dollies under the pods I see or a big enough freight cart to hold the vessel entire? I need to know where there are safe lift points to get something under you. I’m thinking now I should have sent a freight cart for heavy machinery to the surface for you to land on. You appear to be an aircar to me so I have no idea how you are orbital-capable much less how to handle you properly.”

“Mr. Burk, it would be much simpler if you just let me fly in,” Lee requested.

That produced a long silence while he absorbed the idea.

“The exhaust isn’t going to be damaging or the lingering gases a source of contamination in our pristine vacuum environment?” he worried.

“It has no exhaust in the sense you mean. Just a very minor outgassing of helium from our fusion reactor,” Lee assured him. It simply hovers.”

There was silence again probably because he didn’t want to call her a liar.

“This is Jeff Singh, Ron. April and I can confirm what she is telling you.”

“OK, this I have to see. Mind if I take a personal record off the video feed?”

“Ron, Lee Anderson, the owner here. You may record but I’d be happy to give you a ride if you want later.”

“Maybe, my people don’t hold much with hexing and magic,” Ron said.

Everybody in the Twool cracked up laughing.

“Sorry if I was offensive,” Ron said, confused.

“Not at all,” Lee assured him. “It’s just I’ve been telling people it’s magic when they ask what makes it work and someone finally beat me to saying it.”

“The lighted bay in front of you now is your destination if you want to, uh, move in.”

“Thank you, Ron.”

“If I may ask. Being an Anderson, are you related to the Sovereign?”

“I have no idea,” Lee said. “It’s a common name and if we are distantly related neither of us has bothered to investigate the matter.”

Lee set the control sensitivity way down for lunar gravity. It took some pretty firm stick to get the Twool to lift and move forward. With no view of the sky to read the LPS, she had no way to hover in place, so she sat it down on the deck but left the reactor idling.

“You may close us up and pressurize if you will, sir,” Lee requested.

“Yeah, OK, that is seriously spooky. I’ll have a cart in the corridor for you soon.”

“See that our guest Kamala is dropped off and arrange transport to Armstrong for her too, please,” Jeff asked.

The entry hatch slid down behind them. They couldn’t see any change outside. The walls were off-white and the lighting indirect. But as promised the external pressure stopped rising a bit short of ten minutes. Lee took it on faith it was breathable.

* * *

“I should have just told you to stay there because I’m going to want to see this with my own eyes,” Heather said.

“It’s far too important a matter for us to play pranks on you,” Lee insisted.

“That wasn’t my thought at all,” Heather said waving it away. “When this Derf fellow had it assembled, did you have him raise it on a video for you? Did you thank him and accept delivery from watching a video, or were you a little more enthused?”

“I couldn’t wait to fly it,” Lee admitted.

“There are a few things I’d like to run past you first if you don’t mind,” Jeff said “I’d like to call Walter Houghton in to see the Twool but he has no need to hear the policy ideas we’d like to discuss with you.”

“You want to steal him,” Heather predicted.

“Well yeah, but this needs to be upgraded and made into a ship’s drive as soon as we can. It’s worth sending Walter for a development period. You’ll get him back.”

“OK, what is your proposal?” Heather asked.

Jeff outlined his idea of full cooperation and sharing. April only chimed in a few times.

“That’s a lot to absorb all at once,” Heather said.

“But it is the direction we’ve been headed,” April said. “They’ve shared this drive with us when they could have played contract nitpickers and convinced themselves it was righteous to keep it.”

“I’m not saying no,” Heather insisted. “Let me think on it and see what questions come to mind, that’s all. Do you intend to detail all the other devices built on special materials?”

“That’s our thinking,” Jeff admitted. “We figure now that they have the special material, they will figure it all out without us.”

“Let’s have lunch and call Walter to come see the Twool with us after,” April suggested.

* * *

Walter walked around it much as Jeff had on first seeing it. He even cautiously passed a hand between a pod and the deck. Lee had it hovering and got nervous when Walter pushed it towards a wall. He held on, however, and dragged it back to the center of the room before it got near bumping a wall.

“I’d love to work on adapting the tech to ship suitable drives,” Houghton said.

“Do I hear an unspoken BUT, hanging there on delay?” Jeff asked.

“Yes, as intriguing as this is, I’m involved with… another project William Hardt and Martin Judd are working on.” He looked at Lee, uncertain he could speak freely about it with her there.

“And that quickly, my nose is rubbed in the fact it’s hard for us to cooperate in neat little compartmented projects,” Heather said.

“Not at all,” April denied in a snarky voice. “You simply need a vast security apparatus bigger than your actual research staff to place three or four handlers between the actual people doing the work to police their expressions. If that slows things down, you have to balance which is more important, advancing the project, or making sure nothing of any value leaks beyond your information containers.”

That was so bluntly put to their sovereign even Walter was taken aback.

“I’ve been waiting for you to speak up,” Heather said, fixing Lee with a hard stare.

“Your people came up with this idea of merging far closer. It seems fine to me, but if I have to sell it to you, I don’t need it. If that doesn’t tell you we’re equal partners, we’ll muddle along on our own,” Lee said pointing at the aircar silently floating there.

Walter looked like he wanted to be anywhere but trapped with all these people way above his pay grade hammering out a hard policy with zero tact or delicacy. He just kept quiet and hoped nobody demanded he express an opinion. Not that he didn’t have one. He felt pretty much like April. But even she had been too polite to call that sort of centralized secrecy Earth Think. He wasn’t eloquent enough to find a milder euphemism for it.

Heather did not look happy, but she took a deep breath and her voice and entire manner changed.

“We are disposed to accept your unanimous advice and expand the cooperation between the Exploration Fleet and Registration Society, represented in the person of Lee Anderson and the Red Tree clan for whom she is a Voice, with our own researchers already having a thorough record of the Little Fleet from their Claims Commission record We will open Our archives. We shall retreat to my quarters again to discuss this before you head back to Derfhome. We can’t think clearly gazing upon this freaky floating-thing-wondering what holds it up.”

She led the way out to their carts.

Lee hurried to drop the Twool on the deck, unwilling to leave it floating there and rushed to join them. They didn’t talk on the way back but everyone was thinking furiously When they got back, Heather poured herself a stiff drink, which wasn’t her habit at all.

“Go ahead and let’s hear your misgivings or limitations,” Heather told Walter.

“I can speak without security concerns?” Walter had to double-check.

“We’re going all-in allying with her,” Heather said, pushing with both hands like a poker player betting every chip in his pile. “Hopefully, our philosophies and goals will continue to be compatible. If it goes bad that’s on me not you. Speak freely.”

Somewhere along the cart ride back, she fell out of the plural majestic mode.

“I really want to work on this for you, but the project Bill and Martin are working on seems just as important as this one. We’ve made some progress already and I think we have a good shot at finally making a reliable working quantum radar.”

“Hot damn,” Lee said.

“Indeed. If I may beat my own drum a little, I think I can help motivate them. Bill is a little rigid in his thinking and has trouble regarding Martin as his equal. But when the direction comes through me, he accepts it better. They seem to find me useful as a rubber ducky too. Could I possibly come back regularly to help and review their progress? Then return to Derfhome? I keep hearing we never have enough ships, and that they’re busy dealing with the North Americans. But maybe when that slows down? The idea of working on an alien world appeals to me all on its own as a worthwhile experience.”

“From that then, I take it you have no problem working as a team of equals?” Lee asked.

“None at all,” Walter said. “I hate supervising others. If they need supervision, that tells you right from the start that they have issues or limitations. I’m not a babysitter.”

“You’d be working with two aliens of different species,” Lee revealed.

“Sweet. I’ve never done that.”

“As you suggested, as we wind down searching for North American assets there will be more ships available,” Heather said. “We have six in-system again already. I’ve started a ship on a circuit of the habs just like there was when they were conveniently close. They are going from Home to Beta and then Gamma before returning here. They are making two circuits for free and then we’ll try it as a paid route. There is no reason they can’t alternate going the opposite way, Home to Beta and Beta to Home, when they make their paid rounds. That would make it easier for you to return every third or fourth week without a wasted day at Fargone.”

“That takes care of all my objections,” Walter said.

“Why did you drop mentioning Gamma?” Jeff asked her.

“We had a problem with a fellow trying to annex the remaining Martian Republic territory. The man was a demagogue and would have levered it into a personal takeover of Gamma. Security at Gamma was useless to maintain order and nobody had called an Assembly to continue the sort of government the habs had in common.

“This would never have happened on Home, but Gamma has very different demographics. There was never the sorting Home went through being built with Mitsubishi demanding psychological profiling and restrictive background tests. To live on Gamma, you just needed a lot of money. Turns out, that isn’t a very good filter for finding people you want as neighbors.

“I went there and intervened. I’m still not sure they will remain worth having as allies, or if I’ll want to promote travel and business there or cut them off. I’m not even sure if we will relocate them if they ask it.”

“How did you stop him?” April wondered.

“When he informed me that I had no way to stop him I shot him dead.”

That got a couple of heartbeats of dead silence and they all dropped that discussion.

“Why don’t you take Dr. Houghton back with you now, before you move to repossess Providence dear?” Heather suggested. “I’ll have Dakota make sure he has priority access to the regular transport service once it is established.”

“April has volunteered to stand system watch for me when we do get back to Providence. I’d appreciate it if you allowed her to come to do that for me once I get the Retribution and Sharp Claws all provisioned and ready to go. I have my banker, Sally, getting our crew ready to go already. The Mothers are supplying crew too, for shares.”

“Nonsense. Take April and Jeff back with you. It just emboldens the Earthies if you don’t respond to them breaching your contract. If you let it go a few months, they think it is normalized and you are the aggressor to take it back.”

“The Mothers’ ships don’t have the new drives and we haven’t started making them. Jeff proposed we let you make them for us,” Lee said, “since we’re going all-in as you put it. I believe I’ll agree to that for now. It will be quicker for sure. They’ll have to go the slow way to Providence this time, and we’ll retrofit them later.”

“We’re not that slow off the mark. We are in a hurry to make them for ourselves. We need to replace our loss of years of carefully hoarded material in jump drones. So, there will be no big delay in supplying you. The Chariot and Hringhorni are still at Derfhome, correct?” Heather inquired.

“Yes, to move Home if the Mothers decide against allowing them to stay. We didn’t want to be seen as pushing them to reach a final decision,” April said. “Also, we figured the people on Home would find their presence reassuring until they see it is safe. They did just have somebody try to kill them all. And our crews don’t mind the liberty on a planet.”

“You can use them to drag the Mothers’ ships along to Providence and both stand watch over opposite ends of the system,” Heather said. “They should drop off the Mothers’ vessels near the planet so they see the extra Central vessels assisting you. Perhaps that will encourage them to be reasonable about yielding the planet to your governance.”

“That’s generous of you. Thank you,” Lee said.

“I will defer a ride on that magic carpet for another day,” Heather decided. “Can you pack a bag and be gone in say – a half-hour?” she asked Walter.

“I can but I can’t clear out my apartment that fast.”

“You are spending time back here periodically. You need a civilized place to stay, not bachelor barracks. You’ll keep your place and have whatever Lee informs me you need to live decently on Derfhome.”

“I can contribute to that,” Lee volunteered.

“If it makes you feel better, dear.”

Walter stood up looking a little stunned.

“I’ll go pack. Is there anything I’ll miss on Derfhome? Do you have coffee?”

“We’re growing our own now,” Lee said. “Earth liquor is expensive and shoes are hit or miss. But you have free passage on Heather’s ship so you can have them send anything you miss in just a few weeks.”

“You can carry stuff to trade on the side if you want,” Heather allowed with a wave. “Just don’t try to take advantage of me and expect me to haul bulk metals or bulldozers. Go pack and meet them back at the Twool,” she commanded.

He went.

“Do try not to make too big a mess of it at Providence,” Heather begged. “Our reputations are going to be linked now. You’ll have the Butcher of Jiuquan hanging over their heads on system watch. They should be properly terrified if you let it be known Jeff is there in support of you without needing to do an actual demo.”

“Why do they call him that?” Lee asked her.

“Because Butcher of the Yangtze River Valley doesn’t fall off the tongue as easily.”

“Gordon already made me promise there would be no planetary bombardment,” Lee said. “Come to that, what would I have to do to ruin the reputation of anyone called the Butcher of Jiuquan?”

Heather looked amused.

“Don’t take it as a contest. It would be rather silly to bombard anything you are trying to repossess, wouldn’t it? You go too. I’m sure we’ll have lots of little details to iron out later, but go take care of your business. I’m going to finish this drink and take the rest of the day off,” she announced.

OceanofPDF.com

Chapter 22

“Come conference with me when we get to Derfhome and I can call Sally and Gordon, would you please?” Lee requested of Jeff and April.

“What is the agenda?” April demanded. “I like meetings to stay on point.”

“To see how Sally is doing mustering a crew and letting Gordon know you will move the Sharp Claws and Retribution for us,” Lee said. “What else do we need to discuss?”

“What is your strategy?” Jeff demanded. “I know it may not last five minutes, but it is nice to have a plan even if it doesn’t survive contact with the enemy.”

“I’m interested in beyond that,” April said. “Once you kick the Commission-cum-North American administrator out of office, how are you going to run the place?”

“I asked Gordon to be the fleet commander. He’s the strategist. We can ask him how he intends to take control of the planet. I’m not sure I want to RUN the place. I was hoping to suggest the population there decide how they want to be governed in civil matters by referendum. Like the Mothers allow the trade towns autonomy. As long as they meet their new contracts, I wouldn’t interfere in local affairs.”

April and Jeff just exchanged a lingering glance at each other silently.

“Does that look mean I’m an idiot and you don’t want to say it out loud?” Lee asked.

“It’s so complicated I don’t know where to start,” April admitted. “Will you make overriding law on demand like the Mothers or Heather? Or will you issue a basic form of law to start and demand it be expanded case by case? How often would you hold court to do that? If you allow them to keep North American law, you get all the mess of corporations and the juvenile laws that saw you locked up. European or Asian legal systems all have similar horrid tenets you will find repugnant. I can’t see how you can embrace any of those legal systems and not have people assume they will serve the cultural assumptions that created them.”

“I’m surprised the Mothers didn’t have any suggestions when we discussed it,” Lee said.

“You can go simple. Are you familiar with the Ten Commandments?” Jeff asked.

“It sounds like something I’ve heard of before but I can’t remember,” Lee admitted.

“Look it up. It will be in the web fraction. I’m not suggesting it word for word but you could make a secular version. Call it Lee’s Twenty Principles or something like that.”

“People are too evil to follow broad direction and not push back,” Lee said after she examined it on her pad and thought about it briefly.

“Yes, that’s always been the problem,” Jeff agreed. “People demand all kinds of exemptions and want infinitely detailed rules. If you say, don’t murder, they want thousands of pages detailing what is criminal and what is justified homicide. They want it pinned down - what is a reasonable fear for life and limb to warrant a lethal response. Is a person vowing they are going to kill you out loud sufficient or must you wait until they draw a weapon? Maybe they are an idiot with a training gun or a marker and so you should wait and let them take the first shot! Common sense is not at all common, and you can find lots of ridiculous demands embedded in all the legal systems.”

“So, you would banish all legacy legal systems?” Lee asked.

“I think you have to,” Jeff agreed. “If you give them any recognition at all they will use them against you. You may be sure there is nowhere on Earth, not just North America, that will grant you standing or equal treatment.”

“That’s what Gordon was trying to say,” Lee realized.

“Tell her what you went through with Camelot,” April demanded.

“I’ll try to condense it,” Jeff said and was silent a moment composing.

“I got stuck with the Chinese lunar colony after we banned armed ships past L1. It seemed an obligation by all international standards to administer it as conquered territory. The problem was that it was a show colony, created for propaganda. It wasn’t self-sustaining and it was full of party functionaries. These political hacks felt just about any honest work was for peasants and beneath them. Worse, they falsely swore to Heather and then resisted and disrespected my administrator.”

“You didn’t just evict all of them?” Lee asked.

“I should have. It seemed like that would be abusive at the time. I unloaded it later as a package deal, and the new owners did fire everyone and trapped them into selling the properties I’d granted them cheap. So, all my efforts to be decent about it came to naught. A few of them didn’t deserve that. The ones who did real work like maintain the buildings and rovers. The party officials and show workers not so much.”

Lee looked grim. “I’m sincerely trying to learn from your mistakes. I’m not going to allow any pure administrators to stay on the planet. Maybe somebody who works in support services like IT or satellite communications but not just a straw boss for North America via the Claims Commission. If they try to declare a sudden desire to go native and become a colonist, I’m not buying it. Having my onsite administrator sounds good too.”

“No security people either. They may have cute euphemisms for them,” April warned.

“OK, their muscle. That makes sense. They could be trouble later,” Lee agreed.

“How are you going to return them to Earth?” Jeff asked.

“I’ll need you to drag the Retribution to Earth for me. Is that a problem?” Lee asked

“No, not at all,” Jeff assured her. “Taking a bunch of North American bureaucrats and thugs inside the Hringhorni would have been the problem. Even opening the hold to vacuum might never get the smell out.”

“I’ll drop you at the hotel,” Lee promised after parking the Kurofune in orbit nearby, not docked to Derfhome station. “Meet me in my suite later?”

“It’s past supper down there. How about the morning?”

“That works too,” Lee agreed.

“Walter?” Lee asked. He’d been quiet since boarding except for a few quiet exclamations when they lifted silently.

“Yes?”

“I’m going to take you to meet your fellow researchers. When you are done talking shop with them, have them show you how to call a car to bring you back to my hotel. I’m usually able to get people a room but if I can’t, I’ll put you up in my own suite. Check with the desk when you come in. We’ll have you set up with a place within a couple of days. Are you OK with being pretty much on your own right away? I have lots of other things to do. If you need to eat and don’t want to venture out there’s a restaurant in the hotel.”

“I’ll be just fine. It’ll be an adventure,” Walter assured her.

Walter got on so well with her people she wondered if he’d even be back today. They were hunched together over a disassembled thruster and so intent on it they barely acknowledged her leaving. She hoped they’d remember to eat.

* * *

“You’re not the boss of me anymore,” Sam called out to Bill.

“Like you hadn’t made an art form of insubordination even before we decided to conspire not to go back home,” Bill King scoffed.

“Yeah, thanks, but it is official now,” Sam said. “We are directed to shut down all operations, destroy all codes and records, and exit as we are able via a commercial carrier with whatever liquid assets may be recovered. The agency informs us they can no longer maintain contact in the area of assignment to resupply or direct us.”

“Like the occasional USNA dollars were worth more than walking around money to buy a coffee when we are in town,” Bill said. “Truth is, they probably have little use for what we were sending them. So, why should they pay to keep collecting it?”

“Should I tell them to go pound sand, that we quit?” Sam asked.

“No, no, no, no… You have this intemperate streak in you,” Bill said. “We’re already subsidizing our assignment from our own funds given the cost of drone relay messages. If you want to waste a little money for one last good-bye, you want to give the desk jockey who is handling our assignment reason to pigeon-hole our file so it disappears into oblivion as it gets more and more dated. Ideally, it will scroll off the active files and become an obscure item on some inactive backup that will never be called up and examined. If you are rude and insubordinate with him, you might provoke them into classifying us as rogues, or worst of all, initiating some plan to extract us, if he sees we don’t want to follow the directive.”

“OK, you are better than me at layering it on thick and deep. Tell me what to say.”

“Confirm their bias that we are serving in a Spacer hell hole at personal risk and sacrifice. Say the arrival of Home here has precipitated an episode of historic hyper-

inflation and political instability. Humans and foreigners are viewed with distrust and we will hunker down and keep a low profile. We will shut down operations as instructed but that leaving our secure location is both impractical and hazardous now. We’ll quietly continue our cover business for our personal survival until such a time as local conditions allow a safe exit by whatever indirect routing becomes available within our means.”

“Wow, I’m getting all choked up,” Sam said, “thinking about those brave agents caught up in distant chaos but valianly hanging on underground, to keep their secret safe.”

* * *

“Do you think she is lying?” the head of Indian Intelligence asked his second.

“You know better,” he said bluntly. “You just don’t want to believe.”

“Tell me why.”

“It’s too detailed. You couldn’t break her and install such a complex set of false memories given a year to work on her. She remembers some statements verbatim and doesn’t change the wording at all when she repeats them. If it was a lie, it would be a believable lie. You don’t impart an unbelievable fantasy. It’s not even useful as misdirection. She has no sort of resistance to veracity testing and scores solidly that she believes her story. Instead, we have all sorts of things we don’t want to believe and find insulting and improbable, if not impossible. The worst of which is their statement to her they just don’t care about the things she’d tell us.”

“And the French fellow was a substitute. He was a good match but not their man,”

“Are you going to tell them?”

The head of the agency sighed.

“Yes, if only to deflect any suspicion that we had anything to do with it. I suspect the Moon queen will inform them too. One hopes the stories match sufficiently to satisfy them. They had close contacts with previous French administrations and I’m not sure how much they have maintained them.”

“Look at it this way,” the number two fellow said. “Her mission for her ministry was a success. We did establish we can make claims in this new system to expand and protect our interstellar commerce. At least off in that half of the heavens.”

His boss nodded. “I expect that will move most Earth-based ships to explore in that direction as safer than the other, which has no organized protection. But everything else she revealed makes me unhappy.”

* * *

“Want to come over and have some breakfast early?” Lee invited Jeff and April.

“It’s barely sunrise,” Jeff said. “Did you rouse the others out this early?”

“No, but I know you two get up way early. Our talk yesterday made me realize I’m not prepared to deal with Providence, and I want to talk about it more. We can include Sally and Gordon later or even another day if I don’t have a plan to share with them,” Lee said.

“Give us ten minutes,” Jeff said. “I like that we have our elevators but sometimes I wish we didn’t have to ride down and back up.”

“You’d fret over the security if we had any common connection on this floor,” April said loud enough Lee could hear.

“You’re probably right,” Jeff admitted.

“See you in ten,” he told Lee.

Lee considered joking that they could remove the privacy panel and gap between their balconies. The trouble with Jeff was you never knew if he’d take you seriously. The thought did make her decide to serve them on the balcony and she ordered a breakfast buffet.

April and Jeff were dressed casually and without the lunar armor. Jeff’s shadow, Strangelove, was in spex and fur without weapons beyond his axe, was persuaded that he could sit with them since there were no others that had to be watched from behind Jeff. It was early enough in the morning that Jeff was soon reaching in his collar to dial up a little more heat. Lee had a pot of coffee she made before the hotel brought breakfast. She warmed her hands around the mug, preferring the old-fashioned kind instead of insulated. Strangelove got the rest of the pot after a cup for each Human.

“Did you get Walter set up?” Jeff asked.

“Not fully set up, but I introduced him to Born and Musical. I left them in full geek mode and have no idea if he even came back to the hotel. He had a room waiting for him if he didn’t pull an all-nighter with them.”

“He’s here but returned late,” Strangelove said. “I keep track of who is in the building.”

Jeff and April nodded and didn’t have other questions. They seemed to be waiting on her to direct the conversation this morning. That was typical of the Centralists, to speak little and somehow manage to make you reveal everything, but only fair today, since it was her problem and her party in several ways.

“I thought about it a great deal last night and decided I’m not old enough or wise enough to formulate a legal code. I sincerely doubt I’d create better than a couple of thousand years of human thought and history has. I briefly considered offering Heather sovereignty over Providence and decided she was too smart to borrow trouble.”

They both nodded their agreement to that.

“The idea of having an administrator like Jeff did with Camelot has a lot of appeal. The trouble as I see it is that they still need some sort of direction. My personal sense of what is right and wrong is a hodge-podge of Human and Derf, with a little Badger thrown in. I’m sure most of the people already living on Providence are North American. They’re going to think the cultural norms of North America as they learned them at their mother’s knee by observation are laws of nature and truth. That’s just Human nature.”

“No argument so far,” Jeff allowed. “Nobody ever tells little Johnny that you don’t eat your siblings. Yet by the time they are five or six they all know cannibalism is forbidden.”

“Normal children,” Lee said. “I’m just now seeing the comics and videos that teach all that undercurrent of cultural rules. Growing up in a mixed-species family with no external community, I missed a lot. I can figure out pretty easily that cannibalism is a bad idea as an adult. But it’s not the same instant revulsion that is taught by jokes and depictions of missionaries in big cooking kettles. I can’t tell you how weird I thought that was the first time I saw a cartoon showing white people in pith helmets in a pot surrounded by black folks with spears and bones in their noses intent on cooking them.

“I can’t even remember the written joke in the speech balloons. It gave me a glimpse of how deeply cultural prejudices are embedded in some things. Nobody would ever draw the black people in the pot and the missionaries outside putting wood on the fire. The North American web fraction my parents could buy had most of that sort of thing sanitized. But when I saw a wider web fraction later it was shocking. There were things my parents were uncomfortable explaining that I learned to ask Uncle Gordon. Some of them were so far outside Derf understanding he could only shrug and say he didn’t understand it any better than me.”

“It’s easy for us to forget you had an odd upbringing,” April admitted. “Don’t forget, we were both raised in a hab under North American law and most of the population was North American, even if there was some Japanese influence. I’m sure that, if we have to be totally honest, we both have lingering elements of Earth Think in our preferences. We can already see some divergence in the cultural norms at Central. Some things the younger generation find normal makes us uncomfortable.”

“That’s why I decided I can’t impose arbitrary standards on Providence,” Lee said. “If I tried, I think it would just lead to lots of conflict. I considered doing what Jeff regretted not doing and just forcing everyone to leave. It would be unjust. If it were just a couple of hundred people that might work. You could make some compensation. Then you could start over granting licenses and land.

“There are somewhere around three thousand people on Providence now. The Commission didn’t make a detailed census available. I don’t think I can remove that many people without being condemned by others who don’t even have a direct interest. History would condemn me. It doesn’t even feel right to me.”

“Since you are going to give us land, I’ll have an interest,” April said. “I’d rather the planet wasn’t in a constant low-level state of rebellion that must be suppressed.”

“Exactly,” Lee agreed. “You did help me formulate a solution by explaining why I can’t reject sovereignty. As sovereign, I can explain what basic principles I want advanced by my Voices. I can still invite the locals to form local regulations that feel right to them, but subject to approval and gaining the force of law from my Voices. I just have to pick Voices whose personality I trust to be reasonable even if they don’t make the exact choices I would.”

“I hope this isn’t a job interview,” April said. “I have no desire at all to ride herd on a bunch of North Americans, not even a full generation removed from the fatherland. I can assure you my choices for them would probably enrage them. Besides, I have a life.”

“No, and I’m not stupid,” Lee insisted. “I’m aware you have businesses and assets to oversee. You could throw mine away without bothering to count them.”

“Maybe not that vast a difference. But I shouldn’t try to correct you,” April said.

“If I appoint someone like you there is still the problem that all the Providians will look at you and expect you to follow all the norms they know are ‘right and true’,” Lee said.

“Did you just coin that name for your residents?” Jeff asked.

“Yeah, I opened my mouth, and it just kind of jumped out,” Lee admitted.

“So, how do you get around their expectations?” April demanded, dragging the conversation back on course.

“By always having at least one of the Voices a non-Human,” Lee said. “A Derf or maybe down the road eventually a Badger or Bill. Who knows? Maybe even a Hin if a crazy singleton could be recruited. They won’t have any expectation an alien shares the same values they do. It might even jar some of them into thinking.”

Strangelove mostly stayed out of their conversations while guarding Jeff, but this struck him so funny he couldn’t help but have a giggle fit.

Lee blinked at him, uncertain.

“I know you are amused, but still uncertain if it struck you as a good idea or terrible.”

“Oh, good. Definitely good, Missy. How to say this? Maybe you can hear it without taking too much offense. Humans tend to be smug. You have the sweetest toys and the newest tech. There are so damn many of you that you have more geniuses busy inventing new toys and tech than there are Derf alive. Knowing that, we don’t expect to catch up. But it does amuse me to think of Humans coming before a Derf to get approval for their own community rules. I’ve learned to read Human faces very well. I’ll tell you plainly that I can read them nearly as well as your veracity software. So, I can picture the repressed look of consternation some Humans would wear being judged by a Derf. It will be hilarious if you ever do implement it.”

“Maybe I should offer you the job so you can have the joy of it daily,” Lee suggested.

“Not-a-chance,” Strangelove declared absolutely. He showed all four palms to Lee in a gesture of rejection. “Like your friends. I have a life. I’m happy at what I do, and I do it well.”

He stopped and his countenance changed abruptly to serious with another thought.

“I will suggest, if you haven’t noticed, we Derf rely on the Mothers to govern and regulate our affairs. Not our Fathers. If you appoint a Derf as such a Voice choose a female. They are much more suited to the job by their way of thinking and temperament. You don’t want to pick a male unless you wish him to quietly put up with all sorts of nonsense until he’s thoroughly exasperated and ready to use the axe.”

“I’ll take that advice to heart,” Lee promised him.

“Assuming you use Strangelove’s suggestion, it sounds good to me too. That was another mistake I made with my Chinese,” Jeff admitted. “Their avowed philosophy was supposed to be Socialist and deeply committed to equality. The truth I found out after the whole affair wrapped up was that they disrespected my administrator because she was too young and female. It seems a few thousand years of Chinese history were imbedded in their attitudes deeper than a couple of hundred years of political indoctrination.”

Lee’s pad pinged her and Jeff’s and April’s phone pinged them before she could read the message. Strangelove’s spex alerted him last of all judging by the tilt of his head.

“This is strange,” Jeff said. “Jan is informing me Mel got this message and it is copied to several other people and marked as not being confidential. It lists your mechanic and aircar designer, that other Earthie, Pam Harvac, and several people I don’t know, andinforms them that the lawyers Sam and Bill are no longer working for any off-planet entities.”

“That’s polite talk for North America,” Lee said.

“Heather made supporting anything off-planet very difficult for them,” April said.

“They cut them loose?” Jeff asked.

“I can’t think of any reason they’d lie about it,” Lee said. “On the other hand, having a misunderstanding that they were still affiliated could be embarrassing or even lethal. Say if somebody comes looking for them and we thought we were being helpful to ID them.”

“Is that what you were just pinged about?” Jeff asked Strangelove.

“I don’t see how you knowing that helps me guard you,” Strangelove replied.

Jeff thought about it a little. “I guess it doesn’t,” he concluded.

“They don’t want to go back,” April concluded.

“Well yeah. I never thought they were that stupid,” Jeff said.

“How many left to go back to the Solar System on the Out o’ My Way?” Lee asked.

“A hundred eighteen boarded, but we have no idea how many wanted to go to Beta at Fargone, or Gamma at Mars. Even those who returned to Central may have business to do there and then get on the next trip to go somewhere else,” Jeff speculated. “There may be people who board at Beta to come here via Central. It will be interesting to see if there is enough traffic for Heather to keep it going as a paid service.”

“Are we still going to talk to Sally and Gordon?” April asked.

“If you will, yes, but later. I asked them to come this evening to give us time to unwind from this meeting and digest it before diving into another. Does that work for you or do you have commitments?”

“I leave scheduling to my ladies,” Jeff said.

“We’re in luck,” April said. “If we cancel your polo lesson and move your net-cast, we can fit in an evening meeting with Gordon and Sally.”

“See?” Jeff said. “They always make it work.”

* * *

“That’s crazy,” Kirk told his boss, Pam Harvac. “If they got recalled why would they tell everyone? Now, they are just two mediocre business guys without any government support or resources. How does that improve their situation here? For that matter, what in the world did they tell their agency? You don’t just remotely resign from an intelligence agency, do you? I’d think they’d demand a debrief of some sort.”

“It tells everybody who already knew they were grade B spooks that they have entirely different motivations now. It may even drum up some business that people wouldn’t give them as long as they had any connection to North America. As far as what they told their bosses, I have no idea. I just sort of assumed if Bill King is involved, it didn’t involve any excessive truth. Now that North America has been cast down from the heavens they would be returning to a very uncertain future. They might be pensioned off in a newly devastated economy so it would be risky to go back voluntarily. They could end up barely above a negative tax existence. They’re not that stupid.”

“You put things so oddly sometimes. Do you think they can survive OK here without being subsidized?” Kirk asked.

“With all the Homies that just moved in and the Moon queen promising regular visits by a ship making a circuit of the habs and worlds? They should thrive.”

She cut off the last awkwardly, like she had more, and had decided not to say it.

“I’ve gotten to know you too well. What did you just decide not to tell me?” Kirk asked.

“I don’t think you can know me too well, sweetie. I didn’t want to worry you,” Pam said, taking his hands, but we didn’t get any funding last month or this month. I imagine it’s the same for the spook lawyers. The banking pipe got cut off.”

“Oh, my goodness. What are we going to do?” Kirk worried.

“See? That’s why I didn’t want to upset you. You haven’t paid any attention to the books for our cover business,” Pam said. “If you had you’d see it can cover a great deal more than our reason for being here. It’s running sufficient profit that I could be sending support home instead of the other way. We’re just fine. The bees are busy working for us. The Derf love their honey and the price is not dropping at all. Price inflation in food has been strong and I can sell all we produce. I won’t say we’re rich. My father would be amused at that idea. But we’re comfortable and improving steadily.”

“Then we’re not in any rush to go back home either?” Kirk asked.

“With things so uncertain back home?” Pam asked. “I honestly think it would be foolish. If they do recall us, the State Department is much less fussy and formal about quitting. I’d do that in a minute and not have any need to lie about it to have a friendly separation. My father’s interests are large enough it would take a very long, terrible down-turn to damage his worth. But we don’t need to ask him for a rescue when things are going so well here. I feel good about that, and he’d approve of our success. Let’s just let things slide until we see how the Moon Queen’s actions play out for everyone before making any moves. I can be content here, can’t you?”

“As long as I have you here, yes,” Kirk agreed. “But I guess my work here isn’t needed now. I’m not sure what I’ll do.”

“Oh no. All your information gathering about the Derf economy and understanding them has been invaluable to my running the honey business. You should continue and add even more detail to the studies,” Pam insisted squeezing his hands. “I may even want to diversify eventually and will need your data for that.”

“Oh, I’m glad. Maybe I’ll write a book about it,” he decided.

OceanofPDF.com

Chapter 23

Jeff and April were relaxeding with drinks when Sally and Gordon arrived. Everybody waited while Gordon got a huge mug of chocolate and Sally got tea. Gordon eyeballed the finger food, decided to give the Humans a shot at it first, and sat down. Strangelove saw his inspection and gave him a wink.

“I talked with Jeff and April this morning,” Lee informed them. “The good news is they agreed to drag the Sharp Claws and Retribution to Providence so we can move forward a little faster than I thought.”

“The faster transit time will be welcome, but I still need another two weeks for provisioning,” Gordon informed them. “That is unless they intend to make supply runs to make up for the fact the ships aren’t fully provisioned.”

“How long are you intending them to be able to stay out?” Jeff asked.

“Just like when we went on the voyage to the Badgers, months,” Gordon said. “I intend to lay siege to the planet and not get into a fight, if that can be avoided.”

“Oh, that does change things. I’m not objecting,” Jeff hurried to add. “We didn’t know you didn’t intend to go in hot and get it over. Tell us more, please.”

“The exception to that is if there is still a USNA warship stationed there,” Gordon said. “It gets turned into scrap on sight. If it won’t leave dock that may be messy, but they can build a new mast for the station.”

“We have no objection to actively lending a hand,” April said. “We have jump drones that can go in and punch a gravity lance through a docked ship with no danger of damaging the station at all.”

“Sweet, we don’t need to hog all the glory. We’ll welcome some help.” Gordon agreed. “I’m also willing to take over the station if it can be done surgically and not turn it into a bloodbath and wreck it beyond a few forced locks and hatches.”

“Lee already mentioned you both agreed not to conduct a bombardment,” Jeff said. “I’m in favor of that. If they have any orbital capable interceptors would you have any objection to removing those?”

“No, though I doubt they do. What I don’t want to do is damage their water supply or power generation. If we do that, we can’t replace them easily. It would require new equipment from either New Japan or Fargone that might not be compatible with Earth systems. The delay would mean the small urban core already built would be unusable for long enough you’d have to evacuate the residential areas to the countryside. A lot of the facilities like sewage processing and fabricating shops were built with decentralized power. But if the workers can’t go home to power and water they won’t stay there working and the economy will collapse. If you remove one critical system the rest of the infrastructure becomes useless. If you do a clumsy job of it and hurt civilians you’ve created an opposition group and resistance who hate you.”

“What are your immediate needs to be ready to leave?” Jeff asked.

“With all the influx of Homies, we’re having trouble getting enough non-perishable food. We’ve added some freezer capacity to both ships and are buying fresh items to freeze but there isn’t any commercial capacity to process frozen in place. The Derf have never been big on freezing. We’ve set up in rented space and hired people to package and label to our specs and flash freeze it to lift to orbit. It’s slow.”

“Would you be satisfied with shelf-stable canned items?” April asked.

“Sure, and not too picky about the available menus as long as it isn’t the sort of survival stuff deliberately nasty so nobody wants to eat it. They do that to keep it safe from pilferage,” Gordon said. “The sort of rations they call prison bars.”

“Let me check something,” April said. She looked at the ceiling like people do to put a blank field behind their spex.

“Eileen? April here, Sweetie. How much of your food have you released to the market to moderate prices? Yeah? That much? No, that’s fine. We wanted you to moderate it not crash it. Since the boarding rush for the Out o’ My Way is over, how long do you think it would take to transport a quarter of the remainder to Derfhome station? OK, hang on while I put that to Gordon.”

April looked back down and regarded Gordon.

“I can give you twenty cubic meters of mixed shelf-stable food delivered to the port tomorrow. All high quality and safe to transport up to six g. It would be twelve commercial shuttle loads of about twenty-two and a half tons total. You can of course use your ship’s shuttles too. If you don’t mind putting the hours on them. That would work out to approximately forty thousand human meal equivalents with ship supplied water, less for Derf depending on your crew mix. Would that be helpful?”

Gordon blinked a couple of times - which was a strong reaction for him.

“That would solve my problem entirely and allow us to use the stores we already have as occasional special meals to maintain morale.”

April nodded and went back to her spex.

“OK, do it, Eileen. Have the port hold it to board for Gordon or his documented representatives. Thank you,” April said into her spex, finished.

“We didn’t ask Sally what her people budgeted for stores,” Gordon said. “I was leaving that in her hands. I do know the Mothers sent some things along for crew they supplied.”

April waved that away with a flip of her hand. “It’s a gift. We had it put aside in case we needed it. Now we do. What else do you need?”

“Very little,” Gordon admitted. “We decided to only take twenty of Strangelove’s troopers. I don’t doubt Garrett would allow him as many as he wants to use but we aren’t going to do a ground invasion any more than we wish to conduct a planetary bombardment. We only have twenty sets of lunar armor for Derf. I’m not complaining about that. I very much appreciate that you delivered after promising them your first trip here without me even needing to remind you.”

“Nineteen and me,” Strangelove interjected. “I will be there for Jeff.”

Jeff nodded and Gordon acknowledged that. “That’s plenty for any kind of action I can imagine. I’d use them to seize the station control room or to guard Lee on the ground. I do think she should have some Human guards mixed in for the sake of appearances.”

“Do you have any Humans you want to take as guards?” Jeff asked Lee.

“No, the ones I’d have picked are all off with the fleet.”

“May I ask an old friend in the business if he’d fill the assignment?” Jeff suggested.

“Have at it. Make sure he knows it could be long-term and away.”

Lee thought about it. “I can, however, sweeten the pot by offering land grants for their service.”

“That’s nice, let me inquire,” Jeff said. He let them hear the call just like April had.

“Otis, I have a possible assignment. It could be months long. Personal protection for Lee Anderson, our new ally, who is Voice for the Mothers of Red Tree and head of the new registration for explorers as well as the creator of the Little Fleet.

“Yes, yes, daughter of that Gordon. He’s sitting right here giving me the hairy eyeball.

“Well, the silly ducks cut off her payments. Cut off Gordon, too, for that matter. Since she had a contract with them on a class A planet and they defaulted, she’s going to repossess it.

“Indeed, that will involve removing the North American installed administration. It’s officially a Claims Commission overseer but you know that is a legal fiction. My understanding is the Commission has pretty much fallen apart without North America. We just had reps from Earth governments here asking about using her registry.

“You’d be working with a squad of Red Tree soldiers. Twenty of their best who might see some military action besides guarding Lee. They are kitted out for combat.

“I didn’t mean to imply that was beyond your abilities, but no, you won’t get to play with nukes. If it all goes well, there will damn well be no looting and burning. Though you should get some nice tracts of land as bonus pay.

“Would I joke about real estate? Really? Are a couple of your mates free to go too?

“That would be fine. I’ll tell her. No weight limit on personal gear, intoxicants are your business as long as you know when you are off duty. I expect the Derf will be heavy on breaching charges and other boomies if you want to go light.

“That’s not light. I doubt they have any armor, and I’d deal with that from orbit.

“I love you too, but my name is not Man. I’m sure you have two days to pack, and it wouldn’t hurt to be sober. We’ve got fast transport and you might arrive hungover.”

He looked at Lee and rolled his eyes. “Otis Duggan will bring along Eric Brockman and Christian Mackay. He has some other associates, but they are tied up working on Derfhome already. I’ll vouch for all of them being first-class security operators.”

“Did he mention a rate?” Lee worried.

“He said a solar a week plus support, but if you are cut off from your Commission payments, they are willing to negotiate for all payment in land. I’d go for that,” Jeff advised.

“You better believe it. I’ll have a lot more land than solars,” Lee said. “Sally has a clerk well trained on our registration processes who we’ll install after we’ve secured the planet. She is authorized to make land grants to the locals to pad out their current contracts and keep them on board to continue developing the planet.”

“I was thinking as I talked to Otis,” Jeff said. “If the Sharp Claws and Retribution have to stay at Providence very long, we can take jump drives to them as soon as Heather has a batch for you. They’d have to use them on their nose grapple temporarily, but that works fine. You can fit them permanently back at Derfhome after your campaign.”

“Yes, my drive on the Kurofune will still have to be mounted that way when we go. All the components are fabbed but we haven’t cut her open and installed them yet.”

She paused and frowned.

“Maybe we’re getting ahead of ourselves,” Lee worried. “Do we have the crew available to do this on the time scale we’re discussing?” she asked Sally.

“I’d have spoken up and cut you off from wasting everybody’s time if we didn’t,” Sally assured her. “We’re oversubscribed. The Mothers could support the whole action if they had to. They’ve been training sufficient crew to rotate them from ship to Keep. Instead, we’re getting their most experienced Spacers, some hands from the Little Fleet who didn’t go back out and are growing restless, and a long list of Fargoers who would be happy to sign up.”

“Any Hin?” Lee asked hopefully.

“I’m not sure there is even a Hin on the planet,” Sally said. “If you want Hin in your crews you may have to send a recruiter there and seek them.”

“I may - not for Providence, but for the next time I go out,” Lee said.

That produced an indulgent smile from Gordon.

“I’m aware,” Gordon said with a grave nod. “But depending on economic circumstances and the way your ship tech changes after working with the Centralists I’m not sure you will need or want a huge support fleet. I think it may be more of a hobby the next time you venture forth. You’ve already located more assets than your race can use in a hundred years.”

“You underestimate how fast we’ll gobble those up,” Lee insisted. “The population balance is going to shift from Earth to Spacers, and their numbers won’t fall off because they’ll mostly use Life Extension. There’s still a big shortage of livable real estate.”

Sally surprised them with her assertiveness. She raised a forestalling finger and spoke.

“I think both of you are partially correct. The directors of the bank work very hard to model the future, and we’ve had some quiet successes we don’t trumpet to the world. Our consensus is there will be a vast improvement in habitats out among the brown dwarf systems you found. The mining stations you plan to put there to work those deposits will become so comfortable that the second and third generations born to the stations will wonder why anyone yearned for an open sky and the huge waste of oceans. The cubic of artificial environments will be so cheap with the abundance of materials to make them that we can have room for parks and model eco-systems so people don’t feel confined. We expect personal living space to increase six-or seven-fold.”

“We have a park at Central that was an impossible dream for years,” April said.

“Then what about the planetary property like we’re going to take back?” Lee demanded.

“That’s simply going to be very high-end property for the rich,” Sally said. “I’d like to have one of those properties you are awarding on Providence. I think they will be prized like the fancy penthouse apartments in the big Earth cities back when they were safe and clean. I think the standard for the most desirable will be to have enough land that you can’t see your neighbor’s home.”

“We don’t speak of our worlds much,” Jeff revealed. “But they are very low population, and that’s already pretty much the standard for properties there.”

Sally just smiled, unsurprised.

“I’ll make sure you have that Providence home,” Lee promised Sally. “You’ve certainly earned it, and I suspect you will all over again in the future.”

“Do we know enough to set a departure time?” Jeff asked.

Lee looked at Gordon and then Sally, thinking.

“Everybody is on Derfhome City time. I propose we wrap up loading between local sunrise and noon three days from now. How far off Derf time is their landing city?” She looked at Gordon, knowing he’d have that datum from his planning.

“We’ll arrive about two hours before their local noon if we get away at noon. The Providence day is a little longer and they use an Earth-style twenty-four-hour day.”

“So, our first day there will be stretched a bit. That’s fine. I expect we will stand off and observe and communicate the first day. I suspect from our last visit they will be slow to respond and will try to obfuscate. If there is a USNA warship still there it may run like the last time we visited. We’ll deal with it as Gordon mentioned and allow a little time for that lesson to sink in. They seem to require an amazing amount of time to come to any consensus and decision. If we push them to answer us too fast, I think it just increases the odds they will do something stupid.” Lee looked around to invite comments.

Gordon nodded his agreement.

“Everybody on the crew list is on twenty-hour recall,” Sally said.

“That’s a plan then. Is there any other business?” Lee asked.

“Yeah,” Gordon said lifting his mug. “I need another hot chocolate.”

* * *

The commercial attaché cum CIA liaison for the North American embassy was enjoying a glass of wine and small plates at a favorite sidewalk café a pleasant walk from the embassy. He had a rather pretty, new employee in communications and data support and her boss with him. They were telling her all the places in Paris she should see while she was on the posting and both were sending zero signals to her of any personal interest. North America was so deep in a strongly prudish social cycle that one wrong word could destroy your career. It was much safer to fraternize with the locals who thought the North Americans outlawing of short-sleeved shirts and their obsession with fastening the collar button even without a tie was ridiculous.

A gentleman with wrap-around spex set mirrored stopped outside the ornate handrail separating the tables from the public sidewalk and turned to them. That face covering was considered the height of rudeness in North America or France.

“Johnathan Wilde?” He got no response but a hostile glare. Apparently, the question was perfunctory, meant to confirm he wasn’t confusing Johnathan with someone else. His head turned towards Wilde’s companions even though you couldn’t see his eyes. “Tell them this was for Jean Navarre.”

He lifted a handgun, in no particular hurry, and shot Johnathan through the forehead. The report was a dull >PHUT< that barely covered the noise of the round’s impact and the action didn’t cycle to add mechanical noise. It didn’t even make people at other tables turn. Johnathan’s head jerked back slightly then rolled forward. His balance ruined, he tipped slowly forward, face to the table. The man turned and walked away at a normal pace blending into the crowd before he reached the next street.

The two Americans looked at each other too shocked to speak and uncertain what to do.

“Should we just leave?” the new employee suggested.

“There are cameras everywhere. That would just delay the inevitable questioning.”

“Then what are you going to do?” she demanded of her new boss.

“I’m going to ask the waiter to have the manager summon the police, and finish my wine,” he added on reflection. She might have regarded that as callous if his hand hadn’t been shaking so.

* * *

Dionysus’ Chariot with the Retribution in its jump field materialized in the outer system of Providence simultaneously with Hringhorni bringing along the Sharp Claws, and Kurofune on its own. After releasing the Sharp Claws, Gordon directed the Hringhorni to jump within a light hour of Providence and conduct a preliminary surveillance where he could direct his jump drones precisely.

The jump drone from Hringhorni materialized ten light seconds from Providence and scanned the vicinity of the planet with radar, making no effort to be subtle and offering no ID. It jumped across to the other side of the planet and repeated its scan before returning with its information to the Hringhorni.

Jeff sent the drone back to speak to the station and to explain it was an unmanned automated probe of the Central jump ship Hringhorni that would relay their response out-system. It requested a current system scan and information on the last known disposition of North American ships in the system.

The station shocked them by complying without hesitation.

Not only did they give the current scan but a snapshot of the last three days.

The traffic controller, Ed Polonis, informed them that a week ago the USNA destroyer Syracuse made a hot transit of the system looking for the frigate Bolton which was assigned to maintain a USNA presence at Providence station.

The Bolton, however, had already left upon receiving word from a relay jump drone that all the major ships at their forward base had been disabled by Central ships. Only minor vessels were spared for evacuation back to Earth. The Syracuse warned them the Centralist ships did not have to run to jump and had drones of similar ability. They requested any transiting USNA ships be informed of that.

The Bolton jumped out before their tour was due to end but not on an Earth vector so they were not taking the opportunity to return to Earth. They were headed to Survey System 1824, which had no habitation or development. That was likely a move to hide their ultimate destination.

The station master’s scan, Ed provided them, reported that there were no other armed ships in the system to their knowledge and that they didn’t have the means or intention to offer any resistance to armed vessels. After being abandoned by their USNA support and seeing other USNA warships pass in apparent flight, they were open to inspection and welcome to dock without any fees.

“Wow, they really are scared for a station master to volunteer free dockage,” Jeff said to his crew. “I’m relaying that out to Gordon and Lee to see what they say. I’m also jumping in to three light seconds to have a conversation with the station. I don’t believe with the Bolton gone I’m in any danger of being attacked faster than I can jump out.”

“Tell them thank you for the offer, perhaps later,” Gordon replied. “Lee says we pay for everything we get at this point until we formally change the agreements and have new contracts. For my part, you can tell them we will cautiously survey the system and planet because we’ve seen ambushes prepared in other systems. No need to tell them how, in case nobody here is bright enough to figure it out on their own. You may assure them no hostile action is planned as long as we’re not fired upon.”

“I think he’ll be happy to hear that,” Jeff said back. “Relaying that to the station. Please inform me what I should ask next.”

“See if you can ascertain the current situation on the planet.” Gordon requested.

“Providence Station, could you please describe the situation below? My people out system wonder if the planet is calm and business proceeding as normal?” Jeff inquired.

“Calm? There aren’t any mobs in the street with torches, and I doubt if there is a pitchfork on the whole planet. However, the words are getting pretty heated with the planetary manager claiming emergency powers that aren’t written into anybody’s contracts. He’s ordering people he considers essential to report to work when they have been told they are laid off by their real supervisors who can’t pay them.

“And normal? No. The last messenger drone that came in carried news of the… conflict. There weren’t even any real details about that. It didn’t have any bank transfers or market reports. It didn’t have international news. Not even business or personal correspondence. We don’t know if family and friends are safe, and they probably have no idea about us.

“We’re completely cut off from the normal flow of information. People aren’t issuing payments for wages or goods because they can’t prove they have funds on account to pay, or if they would be issuing fraudulent instruments. They just get enough to cover until the next drone comes in. Nobody keeps extra funds available locally, so we need bookkeeping reports from Earth at least weekly. There should have been an actual ship arrive with supplies also, but the lack of information is worse. It’s a mess,” Ed said.

“So, people stopped working because they weren’t getting paid?” Jeff asked. “Did they stop growing food and have to shut off the utilities?” He’d seen all sorts of stupidity but was having a hard time imagining everyone having the things at hand they needed to feed and take care of themselves and just stopping.

“Laid off more like,” Ed said. “They just stopped scheduling work because they couldn’t pay and had no credit set up if the bank transfers didn’t come in on time. Not everybody. I haven’t been paid, but here I sit like a fool, working even though there is no work schedule posted. The station-master hasn’t complained about me being here or locked me out. It beats sitting in my tiny room staring at the bulkheads. The cafeteria is still serving me so the cooks must be doing the same as me. I’m super polite and thank them, too. I suspect I wouldn’t be treated very well if I decided to go down to the surface where I have no assigned apartment and no food service card. If there is an evacuation, I’ll be much more likely to get a slot assigned if I’m on the station than if they have to haul me back up from the planet.”

“Is that the rumor, that there might be an evacuation?” Jeff asked.

“Not officially. There really haven’t been any official announcements about what might happen. They only refer to it as a temporary disruption. I suspect they don’t have any more clue than me what’s going on. They heard the same stuff from the Syracuse. People worry if things are disrupted badly enough back home that they can’t keep in contact with us, the whole process of developing the planet might be over. We might have to go back home or struggle to survive on our own. I’m not sure how that would work. Not very well I’d guess. How do you proceed, when we can’t make electronics and have no fabricators capable of making heavy equipment? Do we even have enough people to fill all the specialties we need to make stuff now? I’m pretty sure we’d run out of drugs before we could synthesize all the different sorts people need. I don’t think there is a green coffee bean on the planet and I can name a few who’d go back home if they thought they’d never have a cup of coffee again. Can you give us any news about what is happening back at Earth?”

“A moment. I’m sending your statement to my ships in the outer system. Now… We seem to be in conflict with your administration. To us, the USNA was the tail that wagged the Claims Commission dog, so being at war with North America we feel is the same as war with the Commission. If I tell you our version of events, how can you believe it with any certainty?” Jeff asked.

“If you say you are at war with them, I can believe that,” the controller said. “It doesn’t take two to agree to have a war. One side can force that just fine. Tell us the rest and it’s up to us to believe or not. But nobody else is telling us anything.”

“OK. Here’s the abbreviated version,” Jeff said. “The USNA got tired of asking our leave to take armed military vessels out of the Solar System. They refused to ask transit clearance for a vessel and it was destroyed.”

“Oh, bad,” the controller said.

“Yes. The USNA then announced the trio of Home habitats had to surrender by a deadline or be destroyed. They set up a barrage of gravel clouds to do just that timed right at the deadline. So, it was a false deadline. They had the attack in motion long before the opportunity to surrender had passed. Interestingly, they didn’t try to challenge Central, just the habs. Even though they knew we were all allies.”

“Oh crap, did they succeed? Is there blood to be avenged?” the controller asked.

“No, they were not aware we could move the habitats to other star systems. They were snatched away to safe locations.”

“Have there been strikes at the Earth? Were they bombarded?”

“The Sovereign of Central has declared North America can no longer have access to the heavens. By way of enforcing it, she has systematically destroyed or disabled every orbital capable launch site in North America. Given their apparent independence, she hasn’t acted against Mexico, but they are on notice not to aid their northern neighbor. North America will be allowed a port on each coast for international air travel but not launches.

“A campaign was initiated to remove all USNA heavy warships not only around Earth but in distant bases. As you heard, the order provided that small vessels not be destroyed to allow evacuation home. That offer was rescinded after a Central vessel was ambushed and destroyed at a USNA forward base. Our directive is now to remove all North American warships without quarter.

“There has been no general bombardment of population centers or vital infrastructure on Earth. I don’t anticipate that happening unless they are stupid enough to strike Central again with nukes.”

“Again?” the controller asked.

“China did so in the past. Not North America. Your pardon, I tend to lump Earthies all together easily. Central is of course still there,” Jeff pointed out.

“I wasn’t aware of that,” the man said.

“News on Earth is carefully controlled and sanitized,” Jeff said.

The man didn’t challenge that or any of Jeff’s other statements.

“Are you passing that information on to the planetary administration?” Jeff asked.

“Hell, no. I’m doing this gratis. I’ve already copied it to everybody I know below. If I send it to just the big boss, he’s playing turtle. He’s not going to share it with anybody. But I don’t have him on my contacts list anyway and the public net directory is down. What’s he going to do to me?” Ed asked. “He’s the planetary manager. He and my boss here long ago had it out over territory. The station is a separate authority with its own charter and contracts. If I were being paid, he couldn’t dock me. Just another reason to stay up here.”

“Indeed, I appreciate your candor,” Jeff said. “I’m going to release some drones to observe the planet. There will be a message carrier popping in and out to relay their observations. It would be taken as a token of goodwill if you refrain from destroying them. I’m going to go consult with my friends and will return and speak with you again.”

“OK, I don’t think anybody has the means to destroy them with the Bolton gone. But that would be pretty stupid for us to do at this point,” Ed agreed. “I’ve been answering your questions to the best of my ability can you tell us what you intend to do here?”

“Oh, my bad for not making that clear,” Jeff apologized. “Central has allied with the discoverers of the planet. Who were cut off from being paid. The Commission defaulted on their contract. Lee Anderson is here to repossess the planet and add it to the registry she implemented on Derfhome to replace the defunct Commission. Ms. Anderson intends to seek new contracts and agreements with the leaseholders and contractors on planet.”

Jeff didn’t insult him by pointing out how common “pretty stupid” was. Ed didn’t seem to be afflicted with it. It was a shame he wasn’t the planetary manager.

“No kidding?” Ed said slowly with a thoughtful tone. “That’s going to stir things up.”

“We very much want to avoid violence and destruction,” Jeff assured him.

“But she does jolly well want her planet back,” Ed said. He didn’t say it like a question.

“Yes, she will insist upon it most vigorously if need be. We have both Red Tree Clan and Central ships in the system to support her,” Jeff said. “I’ll be back in a bit.”

“I’m seeing a situation here I didn’t expect,” Jeff said when he rejoined their fleet.

“That the Bolton ran away?” Lee asked. “They did the same thing when we came here the first time with just the Kurofune.”

“No, that the Claims Commission with their lack of planning has managed to treat their contractors and lessees here nearly as bad as they treated you and Gordon,” Jeff said.

“Oh, I hadn’t made the mental leap to see that yet. I guess I was fixated on being the offended party. But given everything that Ed fellow said it makes sense to me,” Lee agreed.

“I think they are so badly treated that what the Mothers said about them kicking the rascals out is a good possibility,” Jeff said. “We should have had a better well-thought-out announcement ready. I didn’t explain very well why we were here initially and Ed called me on it. I was just too concerned with finding out all the security issues. Perhaps you should quickly make some statements about what you intend towards the people already on the planet. Let them know they are going to be treated well, and they may be moved to have a heart to heart with the planetary manager and his support staff and encourage them to accept evacuation to Earth.”

“You better do that pretty fast,” Gordon said. “It may already be too late.”

“Why is that?” Jeff asked.

“The last drone switch brought back satellite images showing a lot of thermal sources in Providence City. I’ve seen this before. It looks just like when we upset the rule of the Teen and the crazy Bunnies started burning down their cities.”

“Oh, crap. Couldn’t they have held off a few hours and let us talk about it first?” Lee said.

“I guess they were already pretty peeved and near the tipping point,” Gordon said.

“I need to get down there and talk to them,” Lee decided.

“No, no. No indeed,” Jeff objected. “If it’s just a mob in the streets burning stuff down, they aren’t going to talk to anybody. You need to find out what is going on from orbit and see if anybody sensible is willing to talk to you. If there isn’t some sort of organization with a head guy or some sort of revolutionary committee you wait until they settle down.”

“That’s what I meant,” Lee agreed. “Down closer to the planet where we can talk real-time. I didn’t mean to just drop to the city uninvited.”

“Good, sometimes you scare me,” Jeff said.

Gordon gave him a significant look that implied he should get used to it.

“They didn’t mess with the Hringhorni. They aren’t interfering with the drones. Anybody see any problem with moving into a trailing orbit on the station with the Sharp Claws standing off five light seconds, emitting low power radar to make them aware we have an overwatch?” Gordon asked.

When nobody spoke up, Gordon ordered Dionysus’ Chariot to jump in taking them along and feeding the numbers for the move to everyone else.

OceanofPDF.com

Chapter 24

“He knows your voice. Carry on talking to him,” Gordon told Jeff.

“Mr. Polonis, are you still on duty?” Jeff asked.

“Still volunteering,” Ed corrected him. “Nobody is showing up to relieve me, but the office still has coffee, and talking to you is interesting.”

“Are you able to follow what is happening below?” Jeff inquired.

“Just what friends and acquaintances are sending me off their phones. Glasser shut down the planetary net for data. You can’t do video or get anything but an official page saying it is temporarily out of service, to stop the spread of disinformation. You can’t even look up other people’s addresses if they aren’t already on your phone. Either he was too stupid to shut off the voice and text functions or he needed them himself. Here’s the link. It should come up for you,” Ed offered.

“Thank you. I’ll save that to look at in a bit. So, you could only send the fact we have arrived to your friends?” Jeff asked.

“Yeah, but that’s near two hundred in my contacts. Then they are going to call their friends and so on. I figure pretty much everybody knew in an hour or two. A lot of them aren’t working so what do they have to do but get on the phone and gossip? Glasser is aware of you, because not long after I copied everybody about that, a message filtered back to me the same way saying that one of the survey geologists, Werner Brandt, marched up to the administrative offices with about a hundred friends and demanded Glasser find out what you want before somebody does something stupid, or stand down and resign so somebody else can.”

“Oh, how was that received?”

“He immediately did something stupid just like you’d expect,” Ed said. “He told his security to throw them out of the building. You had three guys on duty shoving against a hundred in a narrow hallway. They shoved back and the security started shooting, when they were the ones being pushed back and scared. Werner got out with a leg wound but they left a few behind. A friend told me Werner is kind of pissed off and in no mood to talk now. Can’t say as I blame him.”

“You have Werner’s com address? Can you patch us through to him?” Jeff asked.

“That would be trivially easy if I had his addy. Even if I couldn’t patch you through the board here, I’d just hold my phone up to the mic. I’ll send a request to all my contacts and if nobody has it, they’ll ask their friends. I bet you have a number in ten minutes,” Ed predicted.

It was three.

“You want to call this character?” Jeff asked Lee. “Do you need to write out a cheat sheet of points to make or to avoid? We can delay a little if you need to prepare.”

“I don’t think a day would see me prepared,” Lee said. “I suspect there are going to be aspects of this I’d never imagine. Meanwhile, bad things are almost certainly happening while I delay. Let me talk to Mr. Brandt. I’ll just have to wing it.”

“Mr. Polonis, Lee Anderson, the principal claim holder for the planet, would like to talk to this geologist Mr. Brandt. Would you mind patching her through please?”

“No need to be formal with me. I’m just Ed. I’m no official. You folks listening in, too, or is this a private talky-talk?”

“The command decks of all our ships are listening in. Why?” Jeff asked.

“I just wanted to know if you mind me listening in?”

“Not that I could stop you, but you’ve been helpful. You are welcome to listen in and advise us if we miss addressing some important local issue,” Jeff said.

“I appreciate that. I never was one to snoop on folks. I wouldn’t want somebody doing that to me. I’m connecting you now. He should answer,” Ed said.

“Ding, ding, ding, ding,” sounded.

“Werner here. Make it brief ‘cause I’m busy,” he growled.

“Mr. Brandt, this is Lee Anderson.”

“Yeah, I can read the screen. I don’t know you. What do you want?”

“I’m the principal claim holder for Providence and am sitting above you in orbit. I’m here to repossess my planet,” Lee said.

“I’ve never read who found it,” Werner admitted. “How do I verify who I’m talking to?”

“The traffic dispatcher on Providence Station is relaying my call. He can verify it originates from our fleet in orbit,” Lee suggested.

“I don’t know him either,” Werner said.

“You aren’t stopping to think and you’re being an ass, Werner,” Ed said. “Ask all your contacts if they know Ed Polonis the traffic controller on the station and they’ll verify me by consensus. Did you really expect to already know somebody who just arrived in an outside fleet? I doubt if any of your contacts know Lee Anderson either.”

“That makes sense,” Werner said slowly. “Give me a second to switch gears. I was busy getting ready to blow Glasser and his murderous thugs to hell.”

“If you have the situation contained and there is no rush, I’m undoubtedly better equipped to do that or extract him to justice,” Lee said. “I’m also much less likely to suffer repercussions for doing it later than you would be. I have a fleet. A couple of them, actually. I am a Voice for the Mothers of Red Tree and an ally of the Sovereign of Central. I have two of her peers and Voices here supporting me. I’m also wealthy well beyond my two-thirds interest in the planet you are standing on. That affords me significant protection.”

“Yeah, sounds like you might be a little harder to get back at than me. We have them contained in the administrative center. Unfortunately, the security section is in the building and they have long arms in there. We had some big dump trucks that were impervious to small arms fire drop a load of dirt against all four entry doors. They just backed up and dropped a load. Glasser’s guards shot at them but it was just a waste of ammo. All the doors open outward and none of the windows open. If they do bust out some windows and get out, they may be difficult to deal with since we don’t have small arms. I’d expect them to wait until night to do that.”

“How long until your local sundown?” Lee asked.

“Another four hours. Call it four and a quarter Earth hours,” Werner said.

“I can be on the ground talking to you with my personal security in under an hour, and have a squad of troopers there maybe a half-hour behind. I’ll help you, but I do not want to set up a detailed bureaucracy to govern. I want to install a limited number of Voices to keep local governments within limits, but allow towns to govern themselves. Are there any factions opposed to you in Providence City or can you claim to be the civil authority in control?”

“I’ve got a couple of hundred people here volunteering to do what I say. We never had an election but that’s better than the dozen or so Glasser has in the administration building. There hasn’t been enough time for anybody to organize an opposition.”

“Very well. I’m prepared to recognize you as the existing civil authority,” Lee said. “I will land and help you remove the previous, resisting administration if you agree to accept the future oversight of my appointed Voices with veto power over local rule. I intend to establish new contracts and leases to replace the previous ones with the Claims Commission. That will take some time to examine each and come to new agreements, but you can expect them to be on more favorable terms to you than the old ones.”

“That sounds good,” Werner said suspiciously, “but it’s mighty short on detail. Pardon me if I don’t let myself get rushed into agreeing to something too fast. If you can get down here that fast you can take a few minutes to answer a couple of questions.”

“Ask away,” Lee invited.

“Take my circumstances,” Werner said. “I work for an Earth company based in North America. If you take over here, I don’t see things being normalized and them being allowed to continue on the same terms or even better. They aren’t going to be allowed to send funds here and the last I heard they don’t let Spacer banks send funds to Earth banks either. Nobody is suddenly going to get reasonable about that. What will you do? Are you going to nationalize all the companies and their land and equipment? Are you going to start paying people to do the same work for you they were doing before? Or will you bring your own people in from Derfhome or Central? I’d add, I have no ambition to permanently change my line of work to politician. My mother raised me better. I’d go back home to Earth before I’d do that.”

“Very well. Tell me if I miss an important point,” Lee said. “I’m not interested in owning a portfolio of Providence companies. I want those operations back paying me just as they did the Commission. I have no mass of unemployed waiting to take your jobs.

“Indeed, I’d be hard put to come up with a geologist such as yourself. Unemployment is very low on Derfhome and any geologists there are probably not only already employed but specialized in the local geology.

“If Earth foolishly forces their firms to abandon their operations here, which I expect just as you seem to, I’d confiscate the physical assets and offer them to the operations managers or the employees as a whole for a dollar USNA, with the understanding they keep working them.

“I can jump-start the process again by picking up your wages for a month or two. I can afford to spend several billion dollars Ceres to pay them. I’d expect I’ll earn that back in a decade or two easily. I’m not sure what the exchange is now. It might be easier to just switch away from USNA dollars right away. If your company needs new supplies and equipment brought in, that’s going to have to happen from Fargone or New Japan. Unless you persuade me personally to invest in that, with a return - not as a gift, you’d have to approach the banks there or on Derfhome or even other Earth nations besides the USNA to finance such expansion. They won’t want to work in USNA dollars either.”

There was some dead air time as Werner tried to absorb all that.

“I’m Jeffery Singh,” Jeff broke in. “If my Lady Lee is short to carry that out, I can pledge my fortune and I am Voice to the Sovereign of Central to pledge her assets to the task as well.”

“Same,” April said. “I’m the other Voice, but I’m not poor either. We’re both going to get some real estate out of this deal so I’ll make out OK in the end, even if I have to invest a little. Neither of us has ever been too cheap to prime the pump.”

“OK, if half of those promises are any good it’s better than the mess we have now. Call me Mr. Mayor or whatever, but I agree to serve very briefly to reestablish order. We are behind the big warehouse about two kilometers west of the administration building. We can meet there and talk. It will shelter you from any rifle fire. There’s a park another two kilometers west where you can land a shuttle. It’s completely out of range of their rifle fire.”

“This is Gordon, Lee’s father, and fleet commander. “We noticed some fires in the city. Did you start those to limit visibility for their riflemen?”

“I see the smoke too. We smell it now and then. I have no idea what crazy people decided to burn. I sure didn’t order it. I’d guess though, that at least one of them is Glasser’s residence. Folks are kind of fed up with him right now. What do you intend to do with him if you dig him out of his offices?” Werner asked. “People are going to be very unhappy if you haul him back off to Earth. They’ll figure he’ll never answer there for murder off on some distant planet where he has some influence. We’ve seen the like too many times.”

“If you demand him to local justice, I’ll turn him over,” Lee promised. “You can convene a people’s court or let the relatives of the dead sit in judgment. I wouldn’t martyr him myself. Things like that create a stigma you may regret a hundred years from now. But I understand why passions would be running hot. I’d consider sending him back to the Slum Ball as a failure who lost an entire colony planet punishment enough.”

“We’ll see,” Werner said. “I’m not going to fight my people to keep him out of their hands if they demand him.”

“Our shuttle will land in the park,” Lee said. “I’ll drop my auxiliary near there, but it can travel along the surface to your location.”

“Oh really? That will be interesting,” Werner said. “I’ll be here. We’ll continue our prep in case your guys can’t dig them out.”

“I’ll see you in about a half-hour plus,” Lee said and didn’t address his doubts.

* * *

“I’m going down,” Lee said.

“We heard,” Gordon said. “I had no doubt you would even before you talked to him.”

“Some things you can’t do remotely,” Lee said.

“I shall stay here as an obligation of command. Who are you taking? Who can you fit in the Twool?” Gordon asked.

“My Human guards. The Derf will have to catch up. I’d like to take Jeff and April if they will leave their seconds in charge of their vessels.”

“Yeah, sure,” April agreed.

“Wouldn’t miss it for the world,” Jeff assured her.

“I object. If anything happens to Jeff my Mothers may find me negligent,” Strangelove said. “This has happened repeatedly but this time I don’t see why he can’t come down this time on the shuttle from the Retribution with me and my soldiers.”

Lee did some figures in her head quickly.

“You can ride down in the lock if you want and get in on the action early,” Lee offered.

When Strangelove looked unhappy and sullenly silent April spoke up.

“Ride up front with Lee, and Eric can squeeze in with us in a Derf seat. He’s thin like Jeff and we can all three fit under a Derf belt. It’ll be cozy but it’s not for that long.”

Strangelove looked at Lee and she nodded her assent.

“I’ll collect you directly at your locks,” Lee said. “I’m not going to wear a suit and try to switch to armor on the ground,” she warned them.

* * *

“It looked worse in infrared,” Strangelove observed as they dropped on the city.

There were only a few black plumes and one fire with visible bright flames.

“I think the ones with white smoke are just steam from buildings where the fire suppression system has put it out already,” Jeff speculated.

“So, there are probably a few firebugs running around setting fresh ones?” Lee asked.

“That’s my bet,” Jeff agreed. “There are always a few pyromaniacs in any Human community. They might not even be doing it for any political purpose. The unrest just gives them an excuse, and cover to do it for their gratification.”

Strangelove turned his head and regarded Jeff like he was waiting for the punch line to a joke. It never happened, so he looked back forward and said nothing. That had to take remarkable control.

The park was an easy to identify green rectangle. Lee waited late to brake to reduce their exposure. Nobody complained. She eased down the last few meters until they were under the old-fashioned, decorative street lights ringing the park, but above the roofs of the few ground cars parked in sight.

“Oh good. They do have a GPS running,” Lee said. She didn’t have any local maps loaded but it showed her longitude and latitude although that was useless at the moment. What it did supply, and what she appreciated was a compass so she could turn west with confidence.

* * *

The warehouse was huge and obvious as they got closer. The streets here were deserted, only two pedestrians stopping to stare as they floated by. It just required switching one street to the north to be on the road that led straight to the truck docks and massive doors where a crowd of people was working on something outside. There was no perimeter fence, which said a lot about the state of crime on Providence. There was, however, a line of cars and small vans blocking off the entry to the freight yard.

Lee floated past that barrier and sank to a half meter above the pavement. People stopped working and stared. A few jerked in surprise when they turned to see what the others were looking at. Shocked a machine could silently approach them so closely.

One group was visibly different, all standing around one man without any tools or materials in front of them. If they were talking to him that ended when Lee stopped and left the car in a low hover, locked to the location. That easily they found Werner Brandt.

Werner walked over as they piled out, limping a little. He had one trouser leg slit to above the knee and a bandage wrapped around one calf. Lee stepped ahead and offered her hand with April and Jeff behind on each side. She introduced them and Werner’s eyes went to the three Humans behind her. All her security were in civilian clothes with spex, though heavily armed and with lunar armor under the colorful outfits. Eric had baseball size bots floating over each shoulder turning and adjusting position continually. Strangelove could probably hear them, but they were silent to most Humans.

“Private hired security,” Lee explained, not introducing them.

“Mercenaries,” Werner said but without making it sound like a slur.

“The best,” Jeff assured him. He hooked a finger in his armor and pulled it down from a slit showing his eyes to politely reveal his face for Werner. He gave him a grave nod before lifting it back over his nose. April left her face uncovered like Lee.

“And him,” Werner said, tilting his head at Strangelove. “Is he a Derf?”

“Indeed, he is,” Jeff said, surprised he had to ask.

“He looks…. bigger in life than pictures would make you think.”

“Like a mountain filling your view instead of the photograph,” Jeff agreed. “This is Specialist Strangelove. He is not paid security. The Mothers of Red Tree seem scared I’ll die in their service and someone will blame them.”

“I am informed Jeffery is that sort of a deep thinker who goes off in introspective trances at the least opportune moments. I’m to guard against that,” Strangelove volunteered.

“So, a security specialist?” Werner asked.

“I command our nuclear forces,” Strangelove said, “but we strive to be flexible. If the Mothers have me sent me to the kitchens to chop vegetables it is my pleasure to do so.”

“Strangelove reports directly to the Champion who leads all their military,” Jeff said.

“Oh, you’re guarded by the equivalent of a four-star in charge of their nuke boomies. You do rate,” Werner told Jeff. “He looks like he might carry one for a hand grenade.”

He looked at April.

“And you are the only one without bodyguards,” he mused tilting his head.

“There may be a spectacular lack-of-need there,” Strangelove suggested.

Having appraised each of them to his satisfaction he returned to the elephant in the room and frowned at the impossible aircar.

“You are probably tired of the obvious question,” Werner predicted.

“Magic!” they all shouted in unison and broke up in hysterical laughter.

It was so contagious Werner smiled too.

“My squad has landed at the park,” Strangelove said, touching his spex to indicate the source of his information. “In a much more conventional shuttle,” he added for Werner’s benefit. “They should be here in just a few minutes. They could only fit six with full loads but that should be entirely sufficient if you wish them to end the siege of the administration building.”

“That would be very much appreciated,” Werner said. He gestured at the work underway. “We were using well casing to make two direct fire, smoothbore guns to propel explosive charges through the windows. There are possibly a few innocent workers who did not fire upon us and are scared to leave. There are records and com gear and other equipment it would be a shame to destroy, and difficult to replace.”

Looking behind them, Werner’s eyes got big suddenly and his mouth dropped open. Something not even the aircar had managed to do. They turned to look, too, amazed at the spectacle of Strangelove’s troops were arriving in a line on bicycles.

* * *

The drone was quiet and not much bigger than a hummingbird. Strangelove shared the screen with Werner and Lee, Jeff and April looking over their shoulders.

“I can’t see into the dark room through that mirror window glass,” Strangelove said, “but the majority of your people remembered that area as a meeting room. There aren’t any thermal sources showing through the walls, and there aren’t any other hot spots showing in the other outer rooms. There are some diffuse sources seen through the roof in the middle of the building. I think they have retreated to the inner rooms.”

“Makes sense,” Werner said. “The com room, records, armory, jail, and executive offices are all clustered in the center. They don’t have the numbers to cover every possible entry.”

“I’d make an entry right between the two windows furthest from the entry doors,” Strangelove suggested.

“Why not through one of the windows?” Werner asked him.

“It’s easier, so more likely to be booby-trapped. You can’t realistically booby trap every meter of the outside walls. Once four troopers enter, one sharpshooter will cover the breach from behind a portable shield. The other will be held in reserve to do anything needed.

“The trooper who breaches the wall will drop the tube and follow his mates in. Please wait until they confirm they have the building secure and two of them return to the breach to conduct your people in to seize records and secure equipment. After a second sweep of the building has been done, and opening all the closets and storage spaces, you can man the com desk. I suggest allowing us to open their armory to arm your guards so they can protect your people while you open the net back up and restore normal communications.”

“I have two techs who volunteered to restore coms, and two who can guard them once armed,” Werner said. “All four are experienced.”

“Ready then,” Strangelove said. He pointed at a trooper who unslung a tube launcher off his back.

“How big of a hole do you want?” the fellow asked.

“Big enough for you but not enough to make the roof cave in,” Strangelove requested.

The soldier reached in the tube and twisted a dial on the front of the projectile.

“Stay out of my backblast,” he warned everyone loudly. He dropped his ballistic faceplate and stepped from behind the corner of the building that was sheltering them. It seemed like he was leisurely about aiming precisely and then the hot spark of the rocket exhaust flew towards the building across the street too fast for the eye to track.

He stepped back in the shelter of the building and laid the expended tube out of the way where nobody would trip over it. They waited for the dust obscuring the target to clear. The wind helped a little and revealed a ragged hole. The roof was sagging a little over it but Strangelove decided not to be picky.

“Go,” Strangelove said, and they set off at a trot. The remaining soldier stepped out and planted a folding shield on the ground, squatting behind it. He dropped his 20mm rifle into a notch in the shield and started watching for targets to service.

The first trooper was still short of the breach when a sharp explosion went off strong enough to be felt through their feet. The windows blew out of the administration building and the roof in the center could be seen to lift briefly in a bulge. The line of troops reversed to trot back without needing to be told. The contingency of the building becoming unsafe to enter for any reason was covered in their orders.

By the time they returned to shelter the center of the roof caved in and flames were visible. It wasn’t long until a ball of white-hot gas erupted.

“There goes the power backup for coms and security,” Werner said. “What a mess.”

The fire subsided to an orange glow with the occasional pop of small arms ammo cooking off.

“Do you think they did that on purpose?” April finally asked.

“I certainly don’t think it was our breaching the outer wall,” Strangelove said. “There was nothing that should have penetrated deep inside through several walls.”

“I wouldn’t say they,” Werner said. “More likely he. But if his goons let Glasser set up a self-destruct thinking he might not use it, that was pretty stupid of them. You’d think they would save it as a last desperate measure to be used if they were overrun.”

“He might have sold it that way and panicked when he heard the outer wall breached,” Jeff speculated. “When you jury-rig something like that, it can’t be too hard to initiate.”

Werner sighed. “And I wouldn’t discount Glasser being stupid enough to make it some kind of dead man's switch that the jolt of our charge could set off.”

“Doesn’t matter now does it?” April asked, watching the core of the building burn out.

“If you have an empty commercial building, a storefront, or even a free-standing residence in the city, I need to set a clerk up to negotiate new contracts and leases. We’ll drop her off tomorrow. You can provide security for her. We’ll send small arms, since it seems most of them on the planet just burnt up. I expect things will be settled down by then. I will see that she has funds to allow payrolls to be made. That wasn’t something I knew we’d need when we arrived but we can print checks and hand them out. The important thing is we know they will be honored when they are referenced in data swaps to Derfhome. I’ll use my personal account number and see to it they are good,” Lee promised.

“What do you need me to do?” Werner asked her.

“Make all these people believe that’s going to happen and get them to go back to work. You successfully moved these people working behind you to act. Keep doing what has worked for you. Sound confident and if the people run veracity software on you, don’t say anything you doubt yourself. I will back up what you need if you have to make promises. If you can do that, you are a miracle worker. If their confidence can be restored, the rest of it will be easy. We need to convince them to switch over and run their accounts in dollars Ceres. I think we may introduce solars too,” she said, looking at Jeff. “That’s a jump too far at first but they’ve heard of Ceres banking just like Earth people know the Swiss are bankers, even if they don’t personally use them.”

“What do you want to call it? Don’t you have any guidelines on what sort of system you’d find acceptable?” Werner asked.

“It’s a city-sized government right now. It can change with the population. It can be a council or a city manager or an Assembly of the entire population like Home does. Talk to your peers and see what they want. Can’t you do something better than that?” Lee asked pointing at the burning building.

“I certainly hope so. It seems a low bar. I’ll see what we can do,” he promised.

“I have to go do a bunch of things to make this work myself. I’ll be back as soon as I can find a person or two to act as my Voice to oversee the moral direction of the planet.”

“As distinct from legal directions?” Werner asked.

“Yes. Endlessly expanding laws has never worked. They will have the power to tell a city council or a city manager that their law is oppressive, selfish, or stifling business. That it is simply wrong rather than illegal. I’m going to write them out some guiding principles they will share with you, but I’m still learning, and I won’t be shy to change and expand them.

“We’re not going to allow the foolishness of laws against short sleeves or brass buttons. Neither will there be detailed ordinances about how many centimeters high the letters can be on a merchant’s sign or endless licensing of professions to stifle business and drive up fees. We’re not going to endlessly aggravate people with that nonsense.

“I’m not fond of planets but we’ll see if it isn’t possible to make one that isn’t hell to live on. You can argue with my Voices or persuade them, but they will have the final say or I’ll be back and tear the whole thing down and start over a third time,” she warned him.

“Yes, ma’am,” Werner agreed.

“Come on,” Lee told her people turning to the aircar. “I have a lot to do.”

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Chapter 25

“I would like to ease my burden on you,” Lee said in the aircar.

“You can’t mean Strangelove, and you haven’t asked your security to do anything but stand and look menacing, so do you mean me or Jeff? April asked.

“Yes. You both spoke up and pledged your fortunes and even that of your sovereign. I’m honored but don’t want to be in your debt. It makes me uncomfortable.”

“I’ll tell you a deep dark secret,” Jeff said. He looked over at Otis and his gang. “You don’t gossip about this.” Otis gave him a nod.

“Heather has been running machines separating regolith into its constituent elements for years now. She has so much gold and platinum separated the trick is to moderate their release so she doesn’t collapse their value. We have similar, improved machines operating on other airless satellites of our private star systems. We call them French mills. The tech works better in that environment than on planetary surfaces with weather. We’re catching up on mining silver and copper and have as much stuff like tin and gallium as we need. However, we could let you have all the monetary metals you need and never worry about being paid back.”

“Then it isn’t money anymore,” Lee figured out immediately.

“It stopped being money for you, too, as soon as you got faster star drives,” Jeff said. “I know you found tremendous sources of metals around the brown dwarfs. Their scarcity is only limited now by the transport to bring them back. All I can suggest is that it is in your self-interest to not flood the economy with so much metal it loses value. It’s a huge advantage not to destroy its value as money for everyone else. You still have purchasing power for Fargone, New Japan, the Badgers, and even Earth, if you can deal with the non-crazies.”

“Well, I was about to ask you to lend me a freighter, or whatever you use for a mining ship, to go get some of that metal so I don’t have to take yours,” Lee revealed. “We saw one of your mining sites along the route of the Little Fleet so I know you have the equipment. But the question now is if you trust me not to mess everything up.”

“If it makes you feel better, that can be arranged. Our bank can offer you coining services too if you want them,” Jeff offered. “There’s no point in trying to inhibit you now. It would only work for a few years anyway. The benefit of salvaging Providence has a narrow time window. It’s better to accomplish that right now and benefit many people rather than worrying about a little inflation.”

“I’m horrified to realize the collapse of the Commission probably left a bunch of other worlds and stations in a similar mess,” April said.

“I know and you have a rescue complex,” Jeff said, “but it’s plenty for all of us to bite off just to keep Providence from having a complete collapse of civilization.”

April silently nodded to acknowledge that, but it bothered her.

“I believe I can regulate myself to not fund every whim that occurs,” Lee said. “I’d welcome your help and examples of how you are regulating yourselves.”

“All right. We’ll ask Heather to make you the loan of a mining ship and crew. I imagine you’ll switch Providence to a solar standard faster than you thought. We should be making payroll in coin inside a month,” Jeff predicted.

“Real coins?” Lee asked.

“If people want it. They will usually be happy with an account balance on the local net and a card, if they just see others occasionally ask for the coin and they know it’s redeemable. People do ask for them as wedding and birthday gifts.

“What are you going to replace it with when it stops working?” Lee worried.

“I don’t know,” Jeff admitted. “I’ll thank you not to charge me with being responsible for replacing it. I’m open to good suggestions from anyone. There is a positive side to it if it frees us to build things with what works best instead of what is cheap enough to use. Gold may not be expensive, but it will still be beautiful and malleable. It’s corrosion-resistant and reflective in the infrared. Why would you use anything else for electrical contacts?”

“And it removes the incentive for the criminally inclined to steal it,” April added. “Can you imagine trying to string silver wire for power distribution? You’d replace it weekly.”

“You probably get all the platinum group metals, don’t you?” Lee asked.

“Yes, and things like the rare earth metals and thorium and uranium in quantities past any use for them at present,” Jeff said. “It will be a major adjustment for design engineers.”

“I appreciate your support and helping me save Providence,” Lee said, “not just for me. Look at what a mess the Commission made of it for the people living here. They were descending into chaos.”

“Like you told Werner, whatever he cobbles together has to be better than Glasser sitting on his butt while everything fell apart. They should be back tending crops before they lose this year’s harvest, and you can have new com gear and stuff here in a month I bet.

“But all that about your Voices overseeing the government is on you to make work. I hope it works out. You are brave to try it, but after my own bad experience governing Camelot, it sounds like you are stretching beyond being a sovereign and trying for goddess. People are ornery and selfish. They will resist you in ways that will amaze you. You can’t believe the stupid things people bring to Heather’s court over and over.”

“I understand,” Lee said. “No offense taken. We’ll see if I can make it work.”

“Everybody needs a hobby,” April cracked wise in a snippy voice.

In the back, Otis started giggling. It was contagious. Even Strangelove joined in, and everyone in the Twool roared with laughter as they rose to catch the Kurofune in orbit.

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The End

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The Last Part: Books and Links by Mackey Chandler

April (first in series)

http://www.amazon.com/dp/B0077EOE2C

April is an exceptional young lady and something of a snoop. She finds herself involved with intrigues that stretch her abilities after a chance run-in with a spy. There is a terrible danger she and her friends and family will lose the only home she has ever known in orbit and be forced to live on the slum ball below. It's more than a teen should have to deal with. Fortunately, she has a lot of smart friends and allies. It's a good thing because things get very rough and dicey.

Family Law (first in series)

http://www.amazon.com/dp/B006GQSZVS

Who is family? Who should decide? Should it be a matter of law? Could an alien adopt a Human?

Of course, if the alien in question can fly starships and is the size and temperament of a mature Grizzly bear one needs a certain delicacy in trying to tell him no…

Link to a full list of current releases on Amazon:

http://www.amazon.com/-/e/B004RZUOS2

Mac's Writing Blog:

http://www.mackeychandler.com

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