They Said it would be Easy

Seventh Book in the April series

Mackey Chandler

Chapter 1

The board, What’s Happening, had grown to be a community newsletter similar to a small town newspaper. April was reasonably sure ex-President Martha Wiggen was the site’s publisher. The idea of just asking her made April uncomfortable. She noticed that there was still nothing in the header to indicate it was published for Home. It was only when you read past the first few pages you started to see notices for club meetings and ads for businesses that made you realize where it was based. Wiggen still didn’t sign it as owner or editor. If she wanted anonymity, pressing her would be rude. It probably wasn’t worth the aggravation for Wiggen to take credit. There was such a polarization of political thought in North America that some people would automatically hate anything connected to her.

After thinking on it a moment April decided the other side of the coin was true too. There were undoubtedly still many in North America who would listen to anything Wiggen said because of her previous office and associations. Which could be worse for her, because the current military government might see it as an attempt to rejoin public life. That would invite all sorts of trouble.

Wiggen was firmly retired and had no desire to live on Earth again. April had heard her make quite a few private statements on several occasions, that left no doubt in April’s mind of her resolve to make a permanent home here. Others might not be so sure. April wondered how many people found the site and read it on Earth, and if it was blocked in many countries?

The board had a little political commentary by named writers. All fairly mild stuff really, comments about Assembly votes and opinions on the actions of other space habitats. There wasn’t much about Earth politics, USNA or others. That was probably for the best since the oddest things seemed to unexpectedly upset the Earthies.

What’s Happening had a number of regular contributors, although none of them wrote daily yet. April had been surprised at first by some of the community news and club meetings posted. She watch with interest as the list grew to include things like an Elks club, USNA Veterans of Foreign Wars, chess club, Italian club, community help and charity groups, ham radio club, several religious groups, and a bridge club. The gossip in which some other boards specialized was absent. April saw that as a plus.

The currently dated edition listed two births and an Earthside death of a resident’s father, but no weddings. The classified ads were similarly growing week by week in both number and breadth. They featured a lot of courses of instruction, such as a cooking class that met weekly with a limit of six students, vacuum suit safety and procedures, a mixed martial arts class, video cinematography, a piano teacher offering lessons at three skill levels, technical and literary writing, dance, computer languages and programming, drawing, water color instruction, and origami.

There were people seeking roommates or closer relationships, others offering to share sleeping quarters for shifts alternating with theirs. There was a fellow offering marriage in very detailed terms. There was a variety of storage both short and long term as well as household goods such as furniture, cookware, serving items and decorative items ranging from wall art to sculpture and rugs. Items of clothing, shoes and jewelry and small personal electronics were common. Anything, no matter how small, seemed to be worth selling. That wasn’t surprising because anything lifted to orbit or higher carried the price of shipping to lift it. Even cuttings from plants were offered by those who had them.

On the other end of the spectrum were a few ads for residential cubic at prices that went into eight digits in USNA or Aussie dollars. There was one orbit to orbit spacecraft listed, and a few rather expensive things like a complete detached Mitsubishi airlock assembly, a five axis metal and ceramic sintering printer, and a complete millimeter radar unit with matching ballistic computer.

Perhaps the oddest offering was an ultra-lightweight road bicycle with a bucky foam filled aluminum steel frame, carbon disk wheels, and graphene lined high pressure tires. It had electric shifting hubs, a powered active suspension, and two wheel drive. The saddle was covered with genuine leather, and it was painted Blazing Blue Metal Flake. April tried to imagine why anyone would pay to lift a bicycle to Home even if it did weigh slightly less than two kilograms. The tool kit for it weighed more. Had the owner thought he could ride it at high speed through the corridors? Sometimes people amazed April.

The ad for Cindy and Frank’s Tailoring and Design featured a drawing by Lindsey Pennington. Chances were Lindsey would be getting messages asking to buy the original art. She was doing very well as an artist. Her work was in demand and she received commissions. She’d been expanding her subject matter beyond fashion and portraiture.

April was happy to see Lindsey didn’t just drop the tailor shop when she had better paying work. Cindy and Frank gave Lindsey her start. She’d been more interested in fashion design when she started working for the couple. April’s buddy Cheesy had his usual small ad for his burger place outside spin on ISSII. April wondered how hard it had been for him to get supplies with the mess shipping had been from Earth. There wasn’t a source of ground beef off Earth. There probably wouldn’t be for a long time.

There was some financial analysis by Aaron Holtz, a former fund manager who retired to Home. He weighed the relative damage the flu epidemic had done to Earth, and predicted who would recover first in various industries and regions. Aaron estimated that it would take three to four years for shipping traffic to recover to the pre-epidemic levels, but said a large part of the delay would not be recovering lift capacity. Rather it was because off Earth businesses, unable to buy from their usual sources, made provisions to manufacture things on their own. Once the investment was made some of that would become permanent, even after Earth supply was restored.

April thought about that a bit. Her close friend and ally Heather on the moon said they were going to be shipping salad greens to Home within a couple weeks. The lunar greens would be slightly cheaper than produce from Earth, because of lower shipping costs. The vegetables had to go as filler freight but that was fine, because there was enough lunar traffic now to need light filler items. There wouldn’t be lettuce at first. They would be sending beet and dandelion greens first and spinach even before lettuce, but when the people who had been some months with almost no fresh greens or fruit they weren’t going to be picky about getting their favorite kinds.

April remembered a time, not that long ago, when Jeff spent a big chunk of all their cash, to buy a large piece of steel for the plasma engine on their lander. It was a special high strength tool steel and had been very heavy and expensive to ship to orbit. Now he had a Central company on the moon making such parts from local materials. In fact the new parts were lighter than the original ones, that had been machined from a solid billet. The people at Central had gradually improved the density of laser sintering shapes in vacuum from around 99.9% to better than 99.99%. The sintered pieces also had a layered micro-grain structure that was actually more resistant to cracks propagating. The heat treatment was part of the process too, and very even.

The more April thought about it, the more she decided Holtz was if anything underestimating the effect that being cut off from Earth supply would have on Home’s independence. She knew of several products and services in the planning stage that weren’t public knowledge, which would displace Earth made goods.

The site featured an abbreviated market report for those who had a casual interest. More a discussion than report really, lacking extensive charting and tables. Not all the traditional Earth markets were back functioning yet, some were trading but with limits. Hong Kong and Sydney both had limited trading of equities. Some of the stocks were very speculative because one had to wonder which of the companies would recover to have any value in a year or two, although some of the retail companies had significant assets like real estate.

There were also some limited commodity quotes for the Australian/Far East market and some discussion of what real world currency swaps were possible. Such an open discussion would probably be condemned as encouraging black market trading on Earth, since they were not at official rates.

Today the Australian dollar was trading for two dollars and thirty one cents USNA, at par to the Tongan Pa’anga, both officially and in reality. The Aussie dollar was going for four point seventeen EuroMarks in Australia and more elsewhere. It surprised April to see One Gold Solar with the ☼ symbol listed as trading for 25.86K AUS$. Gold wasn’t trading freely anywhere on Earth as far as April was aware. Hong Kong always published a price, but without any data on trading volume. The fact the ‘price’ stayed the same for days at a time suggested the market was mighty thin. April wasn’t sure if there was a real official gold price right now or if the Solar quote was the closest thing. The New York and London fix hadn’t been published since deep in the middle of the flu epidemic. April had no idea at all what the value of Platinum Solars might be. She had to wonder what those quotes actually meant, as far as the buying power of her Solars. April would have to ask Jeff what his people were saying about prices on Earth.

Pure water at Home for immediate delivery was 40.17 AUS$ the liter. Cometary water at Home for six month delivery was 17.50 AUS the liter. That reflected some certainty for both the first snowball that was almost back to Home and the follow on one her friend Barak was helping bring in. She was glad investors were that confident in its safe arrival, after all the problems the expedition had encountered. There hadn’t been any public discussion about that, and she wasn’t about to leak it. But she was sure the people who had a direct interest all knew. The snowball was basically being brought in by remote instructions because they’d lost half the crew and didn’t have a fully qualified command pilot. April was much more concerned with Barak than the price of water. Water you could recycle. Friends were dearer.

Iron granules of meteoric composition screened for sintering stock were 10 AUS$ the kilogram FOB Central on the moon. Heather had privately told her that in another month she’d be selling carbon dioxide and elemental carbon, but hadn’t named any prices. On a longer timeline, Heather also intended to market some licensed yeast based foods and pure alcohol, the flavoring, if any, being your problem.

April hadn’t seen real coffee offered at any price for several weeks and the last time it was listed in the classifieds it was four kilograms offered for two tenths of a Solar. April wasn’t sure she could actually enjoy a cup at that price, and stop thinking about what it cost.

Thanks to Jeff advising her to dump all her EuroMarks and USNA dollars and buy goods back at the start of the flu epidemic on Earth she still had a couple bags of coffee beans. She was rationing her hoard of coffee to stretch it out and couldn’t imagine selling it at any price. It seemed like a crazy dream that they used to have unlimited coffee from concentrate in the cafeteria, although it had only been gone a few months now. They had some freeze dried, but it wasn’t the same.

Everybody missed fresh fruit and vegetables. Enough freeze dried and frozen got through to add a little variety but fresh stuff was really just a taste or garnish. Meat for soup or stew was served at the cafeteria a couple days a week but there had been no premium cuts for grilling for a couple of months. Last week they’d gotten some bacon and it was rationed out two slices to a customer for breakfast and used to season freeze dried green beans and bean soup.

They had some limited amounts of fruit and decent meat the last week. It situation was finally improving. But it would be awhile before there was a big variety again, and it didn’t run out between shuttle runs.

It could have been much worse. If the flu epidemic on Earth had been twice as bad or if there had been war outside of China, the people of Home and other spacers might have actually starved instead of just suffering for variety. There was plenty of oatmeal and pancakes for breakfast and people were eating a lot more bread and soups than would have been their choice, but they had enough bare calories.

April was heavily gene modified and was glad now that she’d cut back her calories severely right at the start of the supply crisis, before things got scarce. She’d been pretty miserable and grouchy for a week, but the low calorie diet reset her gene-mod-boosted metabolism so she could function on about twelve hundred calories a day. She missed eating more and didn’t have as much energy, but it would have looked terrible and selfish to keep eating four or five times what she needed to survive.

Her employee Gunny wasn’t as heavily gene modified as April, and she’d seen him grow thinner eating twice what she did, but he was a huge fellow. Gunny had the additional stress of recovering from the loss of a hand he’s suffered on an Earth mission. The itching and false sensations from forcing it to grow back had driven him crazy. When the protective shell and growth promoting electrodes were removed the hand had the same pasty grey appearance as when someone had a cast removed. He wore a protective glove over the delicate skin for now, increasing the time without it each day. He’d cut back on his usual training and exercise while healing and on short rations, which was bad for a security professional. About all he was doing right now was squeezing an exercise ball he carried everywhere to build up his new hand. He’d have to play catch-up when they had good supply again.

Her friend and business partner Jeff told April a few days ago that they should start seeing a sharp improvement in fresh goods and low priority freight in about six months. They might even start up standby freight again by then. Jeff based his predictions on the orders he was seeing for aerospace components and perishables to support renewed shuttle traffic. April was aiming at making her coffee last a year, because she suspected it was further down the priority list than if she was making the list. She wasn’t about to use it up faster until she actually saw new stock delivered.

Gunny had registered no complaints about only having two small cups of coffee a day. That meant splitting a half pot with her from their machine at home. He also dumped the used grounds in a flask and let it sit all day to extract another two cups later. April tried a cup of it once but it wasn’t anywhere near as good as the fresh stuff made properly. On the other hand Jon, head of security, had bummed a cup of the weak brew one evening and had only praise for it. But he also hadn’t had any real coffee for weeks.

April always took their spent grounds to the cafeteria to be added to the organic waste the kitchen dried and sold to Central for the carbon content. She didn’t get paid anything for it, but it helped keep her cafeteria subscription price down and her mother had always taught her to avoid waste. The station also sold its environmental waste, but it took more processing than the kitchen slops and paid less, so it made sense not to flush the grounds down the drain. If they got an efficient lunar trade going both ways with little loss, that would be great, because it cut their dependence on Earth. Right now everybody keenly saw the need to be independent of Earth supply, since their vulnerability had been so rudely demonstrated to them.

April now realized what an easy childhood she’d enjoyed, maybe not normal, but without want. She grew up with her own tiny room, and a bathroom built as an integral shower stall, like a travel trailer would have on Earth. Her dad was station manager for Mitsubishi with a generous housing allowance and her grandfather had helped build the habitat. Her grandpa, Happy, put all his savings and the considerable salary of a beam dog into cubic. It had been an excellent investment. Then with that pay-off, he’d gotten in on the first asteroid capture mission. That voyage successfully returned a small metallic Earth crosser to be mined. The Rock, as everyone called it, was only a couple hundred thousand tons, but as a result of saving the expense of lifting all those tons from Earth a vast fortune was created in cheap accessible materials. That opened the door for a big expansion in LEO building.

That was the point at which things had gotten much less carefree. The Rock was just too much temptation. A few billion dollars worth of metal, held by a small number of owners, with dubious political clout, was an easy target. Coming at a time of economic turn-down it was an easy political decision to nationalize it without compensation. That was plain theft in the owners eyes.

April and her friends Jeff and Heather were terrified they’d be ripped from the only home they’d known. Their parents and friends were likely to be displaced and impoverished by the process of stealing The Rock. New people would be brought in to replace the angry former owners, and they’d be forced to move back to the Slum Ball below, where they couldn’t easily make trouble. The three conspired to avoid that at all costs.

Like most huge shifts in history Home rebelling from the United States of North America was the sum of many small actions. But April and her friends had anticipated those actions and helping nudge them the right way. They had huge allies in both bumbling government stupidity and the independent nature of the population who sought to live away from Earth on Mitsubishi 3.

The USNA greatly underestimated the value of the small lead in technology the habitat and people on the moon had over Earth. The various Earth powers also used the cover of the conflict with the habitat to destroy each other’s ships and satellites. They did near as much damage to each other in the first few days of the conflict as the spacers inflicted. When the rebellious faction that would form Home bombarded shipbuilding assets on the ground, and started seriously hurting the USNA, they had to sue for peace. It was an uneasy peace the USNA didn’t honestly keep, and eventually Home had to leave Low Earth Orbit to avoid constant sniping and assume a safer halo orbit around L2 beyond the moon.

Even after relocating, Earth powers tried to assert themselves over Home again, using old agencies and agreements over the allotment of satellite orbits. Home had to set a doctrine of no armed Earth ships beyond L1. It required a battle to establish that limit, and Central on the moon also took damage in siding with Home to draw that line. April had hopes after that there would be a little breather in their history with peace and no drama after all that, but then somebody unleashed a gene-engineered flu virus on Earth that threatened anybody with LET – life extension therapy.

There were a lot more people with LET on Earth than in orbit. But proportionally they were a tiny part of Earth’s estimated nine and a half billion. In most of the developed world gene modifications were illegal, with severe penalties. Home on the other hand had a clear majority of gene modified people. The disease, targeting LET patients, could have destroyed Home as a functioning nation in short order.

The devastation the disease wrought on Earth even among the unaltered population disrupted normal commerce, including what was available to lift to the habitats and lunar colonies. Shuttle flights were reduced as crews and support industries faltered. Suppliers shut down and new sources couldn’t be found as businesses lost key people and owners. Home also isolated themselves from the other habitats that didn’t quarantine travelers as aggressively. ISSII had a devastating bout of flu sweep through their station that overwhelmed their medical personnel and facilities. ISSII residents dispersed back to their home countries carrying the virus.

Home wouldn’t grant shuttle flights clearance to leave other habitats during the epidemic without a check of their passengers for signs of disease. Neither were fresh arrivals allowed to run about Home freely until they sat out a four day incubation period to expose any infections. These difficult but necessary policies hurt business and cost money and resentment, but flu hadn’t sweep through Home. The question now seemed to be if it would be a permanent thing? Would the created flu establish itself as a seasonal variety or burn out as other severe strains had done in the past?

The reduced supply from Earth was a hardship only to those who had never experienced real hardship. Not having fresh blueberries for your pancakes or premium cuts of beef for a few months never killed anybody. The absence of small luxuries was a psychological blow, but nobody starved. A few folks were thinner and had their priorities realigned, but that was all probably to the good.

April was amazed all this happened in a bit more than three years. She was seventeen now early in the 2088 new year. Four years ago she would have never predicted she’d be living in a new nation, as an emancipated adult. Nor could she have imagined she’d be in her own apartment with a view of the backside of the moon instead of Earth filling half the view.

The people she dealt with every day had also changed. Most of them she hadn’t met before Home rebelled. Her close companions now, Jeff Singh and Heather Anderson, had been acquaintances, not intimate friends as well as business partners. April couldn’t imagine her bodyguard Gunny Mack Tindal not being a part of her life, and she’d never have thought her brother would be dead so young.

All in all, it really wouldn’t bother April if things were just quiet for a few months.

*

The Fox and Hare was a club in which April had inherited an interest from her brother. The temporary shortage of luxury goods put a major crimp the club’s style and profits. They were selling entertainment more than food and drink right now. April intended the club to be one of the first customers for Heather’s sale of alcohol from Central. She wasn’t sure what they would use to flavor it, but there must be information online, and she had resources. Her friend Ruby was a great cook. Ruby had to know something about flavorings.

Ruby occasionally supplied some of the club’s entertainment. Most of their performers were local talent rather than professionals. Ruby was a previous professor of Medieval Music, who knew her way around a keyboard. In fact she was one of the few local people who played it in harpsichord mode with skill, though she could play well in piano mode too, especially jazz and blues. A few people had requested classical pieces, and as far as April could tell, Ruby was at least competent playing those too.

The demand for a place to socialize had surprised April. She’d worried they might have to shut down the Fox and Hare. But Gunny explained most of the people living on station were Earth born like him. Station born like April were still rare. She could pack friends into a small cubic like a clown car, and enjoy visiting, but Gunny assured her Earth raised folks felt uncomfortable having friends in the typically cramped quarters most could afford. Thus they’d meet at the club.

To accommodate the shift in their business model the Fox and Hare added more musicians, singers, comedy acts and even a few dancers who could deal with the half G environment on the deck where the club was located. The performers took their pay in kind as often as cash. April had been informed the other club, The Quiet Retreat, had poetry readings and added a team book reading featuring Ben Patsitsas’ newest novel, with different people doing the voices of various characters. April had visited The Quiet retreat, but it was a little too quiet for her tastes.

There was still plenty of Earth entertainment. The flu below had removed some performers and producers, but there were always lots of new people striving to break into the business, and for awhile some of the entertainment sources played a lot of recorded shows while fresh talent was developed.

The fact was, there was already a cultural shift happening on Home. People were as unhappy with Earth entertainment as they were with Earth news programming. That meant very unhappy. It particularly grated that Earth entertainment all seemed to have a heavy propaganda thread running through them now. Home people were of different tastes and backgrounds in a lot of ways, but stupidity wasn’t common. They recognized propaganda when they saw it. All too often it targeted spacers.

The club hadn’t imposed a cover charge, but the few food items they could offer were much more expensive. The stock of wine and liquor was quite depleted even with higher prices, and the moon alcohol would be very welcome, but beer was unobtainable. It was just going to have to wait.

*

“The flu epidemic seems to be easing off. The seasonal flu usually peaks in February and eases off sharply in March, in the Northern hemisphere,” Doctor Lee said. “Of course this wasn’t your usual flu, so it might not follow a natural course. It seems to be slowing down sharply for mid-March.”

“Are you still getting candid reports from your retired fellow?” Jon asked.

Lee looked upset. “No, I get no response at his address. I’m afraid he may have been a victim of the disease himself. There is no news report or obituary, but things were so disrupted many deaths went unreported. I have no doubt there are thousands undocumented. I based the idea it is easing on direct observation, not any credible reports. Jeff’s associate, Chen Lee, has anecdotal reports from agents on the ground. And we have satellite observations of fewer burials. In particular there are no new mass graves such as they’d seen earlier. There seems to be more public activity, and some of the closed businesses are recalling workers to reopen and hiring new.”

“When will it be safe to allow entry to Home without a four day quarantine?” As head of security that was Jon’s big concern. The Assembly had shown a great deal of confidence in him and Doctor Lee, voting them the authority to limit entry and quarantine the actual sick arrivals. The restrictions cost some folks a great deal of money not to come and go freely, besides plain inconvenience. Jon wanted to stop the emergency measure before people started pressuring him to do so, or worse moved to have the Assembly revoke it. He might want to present an emergency act again someday, so he wanted a history of moderation and reasonableness.

“I don’t know,” Lee admitted. “This variety may burn out and never appear again. Other very virulent strains have done that. It may shift characteristics if it transfers to animal hosts. It could become less lethal or harder to transmit. This flu was engineered, so we don’t know if it will have the genetic drift of natural varieties. It was spread through the Southern Hemisphere out of season. We won’t know what it is going to do with any certainty until the normal season passes in the South, and then another season passes in the North.”

“I doubt we can convince a majority of Home citizens to stay isolated that long,” Jon said. “I won’t support it if it comes up in the Assembly. I’d be foolish to push a measure I know will be defeated.”

“There is one possibility we might pursue,” Lee said. “I’ve read a paper by a fellow in Canada. This was from before the epidemic. He had an experimental device that could detect a viral infection very early. As early as a few hours after the initial exposure. It seemed a solution in search of a problem at the time, since you don’t need to confirm an infection that early to treat it effectively. But given the time it takes to reach Home from Low Earth Orbit it would give us a significant safety factor. Not so much from the moon, but they are less likely to have an infected person. Nobody just passes quickly through the moon on the way here.”

“Except for special freight runs, almost all our moon traffic comes through Central,” Jon told him. “I can speak with Heather and ask her to control anyone wanting to pass through her domain quickly.”

Lee lifted an eyebrow. “You know her well enough to just ask that kind of thing?”

“I consider us friends,” Jon assured Lee. “If she balks, I’ll ask April or Jeff to talk to her. They’ll understand the importance of this. It wouldn’t surprise me if they already know as much as we do with the way they gather information and share it with each other.

“You worry about finding out how this device works. Surely there was a patent application. Those systems should be secure even with the troubles on earth. If you can’t access it from here I can ask Jeff to have some of his people pursue it on Earth. Eddie Persico might help us too. Time is of the essence, before word gets around the epidemic is easing, and the natives get restless.”

“I’ll start researching it today,” Doctor Lee promised.

Chapter 2

April’s com signaled a priority message. She only had a dozen people on that list.

“Lunch in the cafeteria in twenty minutes? And some show and tell?” Jeff Singh offered.

April looked at the time in the corner of her screen, 11:24. That would get them in just ahead of the mid-day rush. “Yes, don’t be much later, or there will be a line.” She realized she hadn’t had her second cup of coffee and poured it in a thermal mug for Jeff.

Jeff wasn’t late, rather he was a few minutes early when he came in the door, carrying a portfolio, and found April waiting for him. There was a line but it was short and moving right along.

“Is the minestrone soup any good?” Jeff wondered.

“I had it last week. It’s from a mix, but it wasn’t bad. I think Ruby doctored it up from just the straight out of the bag mix. I’m going to get breakfast though,” April said, “the pancakes with dried banana chips and pecans in them are good. We’ve got some real butter right now too.”

“I’m ready for shell eggs and heaps of bacon,” Jeff admitted. That was shocking. Jeff was usually so indifferent to food that April worried about him eating enough. But he didn’t look thinner when she examined him carefully. He looked good, actually. He hadn’t noticed the covered cup in her hand. Or if he had he didn’t mention it. April set it on his tray.

“It’s not shell eggs and bacon, but that may help your cravings,” April promised. Jeff just raised his eyebrows.

April led Jeff away from the knot of folks who still sat in front of the coffee pots, even if they were empty. She knew when Jeff opened the lid how the odor would carry.

Jeff showed restraint, buttering his baguette and tasting his soup before taking a sip from the mug.

“Ahhh…I know you really do love me,” he said.

“I don’t usually carry it outside my place,” April explained. “I don’t want to incite jealousy. But if you come by to visit I’ll make a half pot.”

“We should be getting a lot more coffee in six months, eight months for sure. It’s going to be Indonesian through Australia. I already have it on the short list after silver wire, medical supplies and some special graphene bonding adhesives we need,” Jeff said. “No promises before then.”

“Then I can be a little freer with mine,” April decided, “I mean, if I’m on the distribution list. I’d planned on making mine last a year if I had to.”

“Of course you are going to get some. It gets split six ways,” Jeff revealed.

April didn’t ask who else was getting it. She could guess a couple of them.

“Freight is pretty safe for us to receive, April said, waving at her meal like it was just arrived on the dock, “but what about people? I’m still concerned we’re going to be terribly isolated by this. We were growing and getting good quality people. Who’s going to want to come here if it’s like jail? People want to be able to go off on vacation or visit grandma without sitting out a quarantine.”

“Jon and Doc Lee have been talking to me about that. There was some tech invented before the epidemic that lets you sense an infection just hours after exposure. If they can’t find documentation on it I’m going to have some of Chen’s fellows on Earth hunt it down.” Jeff lost his pleasant countenance. “They’ve done marvelous work for us on Earth even as bad as things got down there. If worse comes to worse, since we know it can be done, we’ll just have to reinvent it if it was lost. We’ll be able to stop the infected at the lock once we have that system.”

There was something about the cold look on Jeff’s face April had seen before and it worried her. “Jeff, are they hunting for who started it? Surely somebody wants to find him or them, and press charges. After all the millions dead and hurt, isn’t somebody looking?”

“Chen’s men knew who conceived it weeks ago. They’ll make sure the people he used to do the technical work can’t do it again,” Jeff promised.

“But they didn’t arrest him?” April asked.

“The Earth governments aren’t even acknowledging this was an engineered disease. The few who suggested that were denounced publicly as nut cases and conspiracy theorists. So they’d hardly be looking to arrest someone as criminally responsible, even if we offered them up. If they did want them our evidence couldn’t be presented in court,” Jeff said. “That’s the fault of Earth laws and courts, not the quality of the evidence. It was beyond a doubt, as they say.”

“You didn’t just kill him, did you?” April asked, concerned.

“You should know better,” Jeff said. He really looked hurt. “Chen’s men held him long enough to question him electronically. They didn’t get rough with him or harm him before they released him. April…Some things are beyond our ability to adequately reward or punish. Not to get all mystical on you, but I honestly doubt he can escape the karma of such a horrible act. Just killing him out of hand would have been far too quick and easy on him.”

“Thank you, I’m happy to hear that,” April said.

Jeff recapped the mug and proceeded with his meal, as did April. She found the pancakes plenty sweet without syrup. When he was done Jeff finished the coffee last, sipping it reverently. When he was completely finished he pushed the tray to the side, wiped his hands rather thoroughly and opened the portfolio. He smiled, looking inordinately proud, and presented her with a blank sheet of paper.

“Thank you,” April said, unsure what she was supposed to do with it. She looked at both sides carefully. It was a bit thin for printer paper and white, but not the brilliant white of coated paper, more crème. But it did have a slick feel. It seemed to be standard letter size, or close to it.

“It’s not from Earth,” Jeff explained.

That was a big deal. They didn’t have trees or enough rags to waste them on paper. Paper meant they could make sani-wipes, filters and hard print documents, packaging for food and medical items. Her favorite artist, Lindsey, would be very interested in paper April realized, beside the practical uses.

“Oh…So what is this? Synthetic fibers? April guessed.

“Soy protein fiber, and a little turnip pulp filler and tiny amounts of soy adhesive and titanium oxide. We can make soy based inks too,” Jeff said.

“Soy huh? That means we’ll have tofu soon?” April asked. “I’m not a huge fan but it’s pretty good deep fried with a sweet peanut sauce.”

“And soy milk, protein powder to add to other stuff, and some pretty good fake cream cheese. It’s even a good base for some useful industrial glues and plastics,” Jeff added. “The fibers that make paper can be made into cloth too.”

“I didn’t know you were trying to raise soybeans,” April said.

“There’s a special variety that grows very low,” Jeff said. “Since it doesn’t need much vertical space you can put the grow racks close together. The variety is working out nicely. I have to wonder why it was developed. I don’t see the advantage for Earth growers, but we’re glad to have it.”

“Good. One more thing we don’t have to lift from Earth,” April said. “Aaron Holtz thinks we’ll make so much of our own goods we may not grow back to the same lift traffic for a few years.”

“The name doesn’t ring a bell,” Jeff admitted.

“Former fund manager from New Zealand,” he writes a couple times a week for What’s Happening, Wiggen’s site,” April said.

“You’re sure it’s hers?” Jeff asked.

“Pretty sure. Unless she’s deliberately fronting it for somebody else,” April assured him.

“When it first came out I thought you might be behind it,” Jeff revealed.

“All my other hobbies and find time to manage a general news site for Home too? I don’t think so!” April objected.

“A lot of the views expressed sounded like yours, and they have avoided gossip from the start. I know how you feel about the gossip boards. But yes, it grew too big and I eventually knew you didn’t have the time to be reviewing and directing that much material,” Jeff said.

“Don’t you think I’d tell you if I had something like that going on?” April asked. Sometimes Jeff didn’t seem very socialized to April. He wasn’t deeply strange like some very smart people could be, but sometimes he just lacked – finesse.

Jeff screwed up his face in concentration. “I guess you would, eventually. But just because we do so much together…You aren’t obligated to tell me everything you’re doing. I’m sure I have no idea about a lot of what Heather is doing at Central. I don’t expect to be told every little thing. If it’s important she’ll get around to telling me.”

That sort of trust was a huge compliment, but April was too much of a snoop at heart. She did want to know what everybody was doing. For the first time she had doubts that was always a good idea. Even worse, April suddenly realized Jeff might not be strange, but simply a better person. It was a disturbing idea. But she still wondered how much of ‘every little thing’ Jeff didn’t tell her encompassed. But now April felt just a pang of guilt for wondering.

“Do you think we need a way to get our own views out,” April asked.

“The majority of folks seem to want the same things we do,” Jeff replied. “I’ve certainly been happy with most of the votes in the Assembly. If we sponsored a public news site or even wrote a regular feature then people will start to see us as having a formal agenda. I don’t think you know how much influence you have, but it’s partly because you aren’t beating a drum constantly. You need to be aware of this. A casual word might have influence you didn’t anticipate or want. Chen has told me he runs into people doing intelligence work who know he has a relationship with us. He said people ask what your views are on matters, assuming he has the inside track on your opinions.”

“They do? On what? And why would they care? I’m no official, and have no power,” April said.

Jeff looked amused. “Yet you can call Jon up and tell him you want to see him, right now, and you are sitting in his office with Gunny telling him he may have to quarantine the station in the time it takes you to walk over. Do you really think everybody gets treated that way?”

“Jon and I have a special relationship. We formally agreed to be allies back when I wasn’t 14 yet. When I told him about that first USNA spy he had the sense to see I knew what I was talking about. When somebody agrees they are on your side and will watch your back I expect them to mean it.”

“I’m very aware,” Jeff said. “And God help anybody who forgets it, or doesn’t mean it. How many young girls do you think would put conditions on helping the head of security and demand he treat you with respect? Much less ask for a formal relationship. Scratch that – Demand a certain relationship. You might be surprised how many people have picked up on that. You have a reputation as being formidable all out of proportion to your age or any official position.

“Chen gets asked how you will vote on things coming to the Assembly, or what you have said about Heather and things at Central. He even gets asked what you say about me. And I don’t just mean the tacky interest some gossip sites have in exactly how we three regard each other. They want to know if you support specific business projects and plans.”

“I’ve never thought to tell Chen what I think!” April said, surprised. “He’s right out on the pointy end of things, or at least his agents are. I try to use what he tells me for our purposes, but I wouldn’t presume to try to tell the fellow doing the hard dirty work, and seeing so much more than me, what it all means. I’m sure he has his own firm opinions.”

“I’m sure he does too. But with Chen and you, people are aware who works for who. Chen said he always tells them that the information flows from him to you, and not the other way. That you hold your cards closely, and he has no idea what you think most of the time. That just adds to the mystique.

“Indeed he often has no idea why you ask certain questions that seem complete non sequiturs to him. Sometimes it is unexpected, and scares the snot out of him when he finds out the answers to those weird questions.

“Like when you called him from the Fox and Hare and asked about the names of Spanish royalty from the ninth century. He kept muttering about that for days – ‘How the hell could she possibly know that meant anything?’ - You connect the dots that are not even close to each other, and as an intelligence officer he admires that. If you haven’t noticed - I take it very seriously when you suggest something. For example, it was you who suggested we needed to have our own bank, remember?” Jeff reminded her.

“Yes, thank you, and Heather agreed,” April said, uncomfortable with praise and deflecting some to Heather. “Barak is another one you don’t want to ignore,” she said redirecting more attention. “He gets sudden insights that amaze me.”

“I agree. Then he irritates me by saying it was obvious,” Jeff said.

“We’ll try to train him out of that,” April decided.

Jeff tried to cover his smile, unsuccessfully. “Thank you for the coffee,” he said quietly, setting the mug back within her reach. That meant he was ready to go, April knew.

“Stop by and visit when you want more,” she suggested.

Jeff looked at her oddly for some reason April didn’t understand, but said, “I will. Sunday?”

“That would be nice. I’ll expect you,” April said.

I wonder how I’m being trained? Jeff thought as he left. Yet the idea didn’t bother him.

*

“Barak, I just can’t keep up with maintenance,” Alice said. She didn’t sound angry, more desperate.

“Have you told Deloris?” Barak asked.

“I hate to. She’s sitting long hours on the bridge. I hate to whine. What can she do? She can’t come help me. Neither can you. I didn’t mean to imply that,” she added quickly.

“We can talk about it. The first few shifts after Dobbs deserted us were really rough. Twelve hours is just too long to stay alert shift after shift. If the investors hadn’t suggested we go to ten hour alternating shifts Deloris and I would both be just as ragged as you are now. I’d have never thought of breaking out of the twenty four hour cycle myself,” Barak admitted.

“She did desert us, didn’t she? I never thought to say it that way. But the ten hour shifts – they made it easier on me too. To be honest - I was scared you guys might cheat like they did, to be together with no shift overlap. It isn’t really fair to Deloris,” Alice said. She said nothing of herself.

“We’re adults,” Barak said. “This goes to the core of what my friend Jeff is facing to pick ship crews in the future. I didn’t appreciate how difficult the problem was when he gave it to me. We have a history of managing people without sufficient tools. I didn’t realize it before. Tests and certifications can tell you if a person could do the job, in an ideal world. They don’t do a thing to tell you if they will. They don’t start to warn you if they are lazy or arrogant or selfish and will avoid duty out of fear of ever exposing themselves to responsibility for their actions. They don’t tell you if they are such flaming jackasses that nobody can work with them, and they destroy the morale of a crew. Excuse the rant…”

“That’s OK. I understand.” Alice actually gave him a consoling pat on the shoulder. “That’s pretty much what I was just saying. As well as I think of both of you, I didn’t know if you’d do your duty until I saw you do it. I’ve had some people I really admired disappoint me when they had to step up and didn’t. Stuff I’d rather not talk about,” Alice added, before he grilled her.

“So has Deloris, I think,” Barak told her. “I made her cry once with a stupid crack about her childhood. I’ve been careful not to go there again. I’m starting to think I had a very sheltered life.”

“You’re a little younger than either of us. We’ve both had experiences elsewhere, like you are having now on the Yuki-onna. And your family sounds like really nice people. Nothing wrong with being sheltered by those you love. I wish somebody had sheltered us from Jaabir and Dobbs. At least you didn’t get close to them and then have them disappoint you,” Alice said.

“I didn’t mean to go off on a tangent and ignore what you said,” Barack apologized. “How about if you come to the bridge with me when we shift change and we can discuss it with Deloris? If she doesn’t have any ideas she can put the question to the shareholders and see if they have any solutions.”

“OK, but don’t make it sound like I was complaining behind her back,” Alice insisted.

“Not at all. I asked you if you were OK because you looked really tired. Just now,” Barak said.

Alice smiled. “Thank you, Barak. Yes. I’m having a really hard time keeping up.”

“Ah, just as I thought. We’ll speak to the captain about it,” Barak told her.

“Of course,” Alice agreed.

*

“We found the fellow who created the sensor for early viral detection,” Chen informed Jeff.

“Wonderful. Did he point you to the paper or patent application?”

“No. He announced it at a professional conference, but he just alluded to it at the end of another presentation he made. The pandemic hit before it was submitted to anybody. The research lab where he was working technically still exists, but the whole school is like a ghost town. It’s deserted and nobody is holding regular classes or getting paid for that matter, unless they are paid direct from Federal funds. There are still some students living in the dorms, but you might as well consider them squatters. They have no way to go home or family to go to, and some of them have paid for their rooms. The maintenance people have been keeping the basics running by selling things off. They don’t have anywhere better to go, and some of them have moved their families into the dorms too. The grass is all grown up and my guys said the deer are grazing in the middle of the campus like a park,” Chen said.

“So, is he asking payment for the tech? That’s not a problem,” Jeff said.

“He wants to come here in exchange for his knowledge. He says he’ll bring all his research notes and some bits and pieces of equipment and show us how to build the thing, if we’ll see him lifted to Home. He’s thirty seven, single, and speaks English very well. I had my guys explain he might not be doing the same line of research up here once this project is done. He said he can do lots of things and he knows we have a labor shortage. If you want to get him, one of my guys in France wants to come up too, and will escort him all the way,” Chen offered. “If it was me I’d take the deal.”

“You want your guy up here too?” Jeff asked.

“I owe him. He went to extraordinary lengths for us on the flu creators and he’d like to be where they can’t find him. His partner already headed off to some remote village where he has family. So yeah. I’d be happy to bring him up,” Chen said. “It may take him a couple weeks to get out of France and to Canada, but he’s very resourceful.”

“Where is the closest functioning spaceport the inventor can get to?” Jeff asked.

“He’s in Canada, and while North America is still under Patriot Party rule, I wouldn’t give him much chance of getting on a shuttle anywhere on the continent,” Chen said. “Very little is lifting, and you can’t just go online now and buy a ticket. The pages and forms are still there, but there’s always some excuse why they can’t sell you a ticket. Most of the time they tell you all seats are sold to ‘essential personnel’ if you try. To watch the news programs you’d think everything is almost normal. But you snoop with a high gain antenna and listen to the local cops and emergency services it’s anything but normal. Just getting a car and driver to safely take you to a shuttle port would be challenging.”

“What do you propose then? Jeff asked. “Could he go meet your fellow somewhere in Europe?”

“No, I doubt he has the skills to travel solo in the chaos down there. My French fellow can get to him in Canada much easier than he’d ever get to Europe and meet up. He’d also have a hard time arranging a meeting with the security my fellow would demand. The inventor is near Vancouver. I was hoping your friends on the Tobiuo would meet them up outside USNA territorial waters, and head out far enough west in the Pacific that your shuttle could pick them up. Picking them up out in international waters should be easy. We avoid all the hassle of dealing with port authorities, treaty or no.”

“The Tobiuo is loitering around Australia. That’s a huge voyage across the Pacific, but still easier than asking the crew to take the passage into the Atlantic again. Are you sure they couldn’t lift from Hawaii, or even go all the way back to the South Pacific, to Tonga?” Jeff asked, scrunching his eyebrows up. “We occasionally drop the Dionysus’ Chariot in that part of the ocean for freight transfer. There’s nowhere on the west coast of the USNA where we do business directly right now. Even for the South Pacific we’d have to put a couple seats in for them temporarily, and that would reduce what they could lift back.”

“Hawaii isn’t any better right now,” Chen objected. “You have to be an official or heavily connected to get a seat. They are lifting maybe six civilian passengers a week to ISSII who usually transfer on to New Las Vegas. If they come through ISSII from Tonga they still could be stopped or turned back. You have to be a media star or a billionaire to buy a seat. There’s a lot more traffic direct to New Las Vegas from Europe, but the USNA is discouraging traffic to Europe a lot more than the other way around right now. It’s too risky. Any given day you don’t know who will get on a plane with no problem, and the next day the same person would be pulled out of line and scrutinized for security issues.”

“Our treaty guarantee of free travel is pretty much a joke, isn’t it?“Jeff said bitterly.

“Unless you are willing to threaten war every time you invoke it, yeah,” Chen agreed. “It’s not just us. It’s impossible to drive from state to state right now in North America without being stopped by every town and county you go through, if you aren’t in a military vehicle, or something with Federal plates. There are still check-points in rural areas at the expressway off ramps from the flu epidemic. The small towns will encourage you to buy fuel if they have it to sell, and move on if they don’t think you have business there. So a lot of it really isn’t directed at us.”

Jeff sighed. “OK, I’ll start setting it up. I’ll make it as profitable to pick them up as possible. Make sure we have everything we need to build his devices. If we don’t, the time to lift it is with him, not scramble to get it later.”

“Good, I’ll tell them,” Chen Lee said.

Chapter 3

“Yeah, I can build that,” Mo agreed, watching the model rotating on the screen. “But it’s wasteful and time consuming and I don’t see the point. We’ve standardized on three meter vertical spaces for almost all mechanical and industrial spaces. Just a few things like rover garages are taller. Even most people cutting residential cubic have gone with that height to allow alternative usage. Everything we make from insulating panels and conduit length to lighting fixtures is based on that dimension. Why does this court need to be so different?”

“If it were an Earth courtroom I’d agree. That’s just another administrative space. It could be like any office space, and furnished well to add a little dignity,” Jeff said. “A royal court is a very different beast. Think of stories you’ve read about King Arthur’s Court. Go look at pictures of Versailles. We are creating a space that speaks to the dignity and power of a nation by how it presents its ruler. She may make judicial rulings there, but also think in terms of receiving ambassadors and declaring law. Even republics house their representatives and law makers in great capitols with columns and domes and lavish interiors to match anything a monarchy erects.”

“OK, so it needs to be impressive, I can see that,” Mo agreed.

“Have you ever been in a cathedral on Earth?” Jeff asked.

“No, we weren’t particularly religious. The family tended to go to the beach on vacation. I’m not an architect, you know. I’m a mining engineer,” Mo reminded him.

“Consult if you need to,” Jeff allowed. “Go take virtual walk-throughs of tourist attractions on Earth. Look at more sites and cultures than just European. There’s some very impressive architecture in Asia. We aren’t going to cut this until we are a little deeper anyway. I don’t intend to heat or cool it. Nor do we want to cover the naked stone with insulation. It will be built at a level where the stone is naturally at a comfortable shirt sleeves temperature. If anything a degree or two to the cool side, so that formal wear is comfortable.”

“Those arches are very strong. Stronger than needed for lunar gravity,” Mo said, just factually, not being critical. “I suspect our aesthetic sense is still biased for forms that full Earth gravity required. Lunar furniture still looks dainty to me. There’ll be a stress point at the top more subject to failure than our standard geometry, but I can do a few unseen tricks behind a false facade to relieve that, and the root can curve under the flooring, It’s not quite as safe from bombardment as the polyangle forms we’ve used. But that many kilometers deep if they can bust the roof in, no shape is going to mitigate it.”

“It doesn’t have to be finished all at once either,” Jeff assured him. “The ribbed shapes can be rough rock and we can smooth them out with a special purpose robot. If it takes years to do that’s fine. The galleries in-between are even less urgent. We have no idea how some of the space will be used. We will eventually have art painted on some of the overhead I hope.”

Mo looked at him funny. “Art has a certain viewing distance. My daughter has made me very aware of that. She has to do her drawings to accommodate the very short viewing distance that the small apartments on Home necessitate.”

“Good point,” Jeff agreed. “I’m sure artists who do murals and paint ceilings are aware of that. Now that you mention it, I should speak to Lindsey about doing some of this art for us. If she is interested, it would be well to let her have some time to think ahead and consult muralists on what she would do once the space is finished, and she can actually work on it.”

“I’ll leave that to you,” Mo said, quickly. “Coming from her father she might think it was an elaborate joke.”

*

“What are you doing that is least important?” Deloris asked. “Where can we cut back?”

“It isn’t mine to decide,” Alice said. “We have a checklist of required maintenance on the Yuki-onna. I’m also doing a few things like water testing Harold used to do. Even the chores that are automated require somebody to monitor the results and make an entry in the maintenance records. You don’t trust the system to tell you when it runs out of spec. You should see it trending that way before it goes to crap. It all takes time that adds up, even if it only takes three or four minutes a day. If I’m to meet my obligations and get a decent review nothing can be skipped. It’s all mandatory.”

“Those maintenance schedules didn’t come down the mountain on Moses’ arm, inscribed by the finger of God,” Deloris said. Barak had no idea what she was talking about but Alice seemed to. She even nodded to acknowledge it, and looked hopeful.

“There are only three of us now instead of six,” Deloris reasoned, “surely the half load on the environmental system alone means that some things aren’t going to get used up as fast. Filters will be fouled slower. Any unbalance in the air will change slower with fewer of us driving it. We might even close off areas like the unused cabins and reduce the ventilation load.”

“Yes,” Alice agreed, “I just don’t feel qualified to make those decisions on complex systems. For sure I’m not authorized to do so.”

“Honey,” Deloris said softly, touching her hand. “Neither I nor Barak are really qualified to fly the stinking thing. The experts are telling us what to do. I’m sort of irritated now that they didn’t see any need to modify your routine too. Some experts!”

“If you could inquire of them,” Alice agreed. “Any break they can give me, consistent with safety, would be welcome.”

“You went on ten hour shifts with us. Is your maintenance and environmental work still on the twenty four hour day?” Barak asked.

“Yes, and that’s a problem too,” Alice admitted. “Tasks tend to bunch up on one shift or fall in the middle of my sleep period.”

“This voyage is turning out to be educational beyond all my expectations,” Barak said. “I’m seeing so many ways people can screw up I would have never dreamed could happen.”

“Then you are exceptional,” Deloris said drolly. “Most people can’t learn from watching others fail. They have to do it personally for it to make any impression.”

“I love it when you sweet talk me like that,” Barak said.

*

April’s news bot didn’t even bother to forward most stories about the flu to her now. She could read all of her waking hours and never read them all. The official agencies got a little higher ranking than other organizations. But almost anybody would have raised an alert in her software with a story that had the flags flu, spacer, pandemic, Home, Spain and Life Extension Therapy all in the same article. The bot ranked the story at 89% relevance with the nearest other story today ranked at 16%.

The interview of the head of Italy’s Health Agency, Daniele Baistrocchi, sounded dry and academic at first. Then the interviewer asked the official: “Is it possible, after all the chaos and lost records and the death of the early witnesses, that we will ever know who was patient zero?”

The impeccably dressed gentleman being interviewed looked young for his office, perhaps on the plus side of forty years old. But then after the ravages of the pandemic a lot of senior officials didn’t look as old as one had grown used to expecting. The older generation suffered much higher morbidity. He frowned and looked down, as if considering what to answer.

“The best accounts we have are that it started among the senior churchmen. There was a…precursor infection. We don’t really understand the mechanism. There was a conference of Cardinals who all came down with an infection. Cardinal Gasco of Spain appears to have been the vector to that group. They later all succumbed in the epidemic and are of course not available for interview or testing. He almost certainly was infected by the Queen of Spain. The King and Queen of Spain were infected by family who had just returned from getting illicit genetic treatment on the orbital habitat of Home.”

“What does this illegal therapy have to do with the epidemic?” the newsman asked. April noticed he had the leading question right on the tip of his tongue. Almost as if it were…scripted.

Daniele frowned deeply and then leaned forward like he was imparting something confidentially. “The gene therapy, is imparted with a viral carrier,” he said as if it was something sinister.

“You lying son of a bitch!” April shouted at the screen. “You know they aren’t connected!”

“Ah, well, if the Cardinals all succumbed then the other Spaniards did too?” the interviewer asked.

“No, the young couple fled back to Home before they could be arrested. And the elder royals left after them. Apparently they were victimized, and did not pass it to the Cardinal deliberately. But they chose to step down once they were in an untenable situation. They could not have retained their position even if it wasn’t a willful act once…polluted. I can’t say that I blame them for choosing exile. It was perhaps the less painful choice for everyone, when they no longer had any good choices,” Daniele said, looking sad.

“Are you saying this tragic disease was a horrible mistake or a deliberate attack?” he asked.

“As to that, we have no idea. We have no way to connect the two with the evidence gone.”

“That doesn’t seem to be hindering your insinuations,” April fumed.

“The Cardinals died early in the epidemic when quick cremation was still the rule for people with infectious diseases. The other early infected are in jurisdictions we cannot reach,” Daniele said, with a wry look and a plucking motion in the air. “The nation of Home has no extradition agreement with any other civilized country.”

“Of course not,” April said aloud to the screen, grinding her teeth. “For your values of civilized.”

“People sometimes felt the prohibitions on genetic treatments too restrictive,” the interviewer said.

“Every country that has thrown the doors open to unlimited gene therapy has had tragedy,” the official said. “People soon forgot the German’s experiment with artificial prodigies ended horribly with mental illness. There were worse horrors in China, though not as public. Italy has avoided the worst of those by reasonable restrictions. I think this just underscores the wisdom of that,” Daniele said.

End of substantive portion, said the program. So the rest was sign-off.

April was irritated and sent the recording to most of her close friends, with a header that demonstrated her displeasure. She had an appointment to run and gladly went to do so in order to run off her anger at the bias and falsehoods implied in the interview.

*

“Are things better now?” Barak asked Alice.

“Of course! They cut all the manual maintenance like filter changes in half, and eased up on the reporting since they saw how diligent I’d been when they looked at the records. That’s what most of the record keeping was about. If they didn’t have to log it and sign it, a lot of people would just never do it.”

“Deloris never really told me exactly what the owners changed in your duties, she didn’t have it on speaker. But I could hear her side of it when she started raising her voice. I think you should know after you’d both discussed it with the owners, and you left, she really lit into them for not examining the wider picture. She said it is her command and accepted responsibility, but pointed out how inexperienced she is, and what poor support it was. They admitted they hadn’t run the changes past somebody with command experience. I’d have never had the nerve to talk to the owners that way,” Barak admitted.

“Our Deloris is not shy,” Alice agreed. “It gives me a lot of incentive to keep her on my side.”

“We’re going to be well known after this in the community. It should be easier to get work, but I’m not going to jump in and take another job for awhile,” Barak said. “Especially not a long voyage. I need a little break and a vacation away from long shifts and tight spaces for awhile.”

“What are you going to do? Maybe a week or two at New Las Vegas?” Alice asked.

“No, I’m thinking a trip to Earth. I really enjoyed the lagoon we visited on a sailboat. I adjusted pretty well to being outside and relaxed after awhile. Maybe someplace else, different. Someplace with trees or mountains if one can be found safe. I’ve never seen snow. But not someplace packed with people. Tonga gave me a taste of seeing lots of people all jammed together. I can’t imagine New York or Tokyo. No thanks,” Barak said.

“You know, I’ll have some pay coming too, and I could use a break. Partner maybe?” Alice asked.

“I wasn’t sure you wouldn’t be ready for a break from me,” Barak admitted. “That sounds like fun. We’ll go somewhere interesting.”

Alice was amused. “Said the boy who just visited Jupiter,” she said, laughing.

*

April woke up slowly, stretched hard, her hands balled in fists and legs straining to poke her toes out. Jeff said he was coming over today, but he hadn’t set a time. That usually meant before supper. He wasn’t one to bang on the door for breakfast.

A glance at the com board showed no priority message light, which was just fine with her.

She thought about getting dressed and going to breakfast, but she didn’t really want to even throw on the minimum shorts and T she put on for Gunny. Even if there wasn’t any romantic spark there, it wasn’t respectful to tease him. And she was just matching what he showed was proper in his mind by his own behavior. He always wore at least shorts and a shirt, and he could have skipped the shirt at home for all that April cared. She’d noticed more guys, beam dogs with tats especially, not bothering with a shirt in public places. It was just tacky she felt.

The amusing thing was Gunny looked much better bare chested than most of the fellows ten years younger. Even with the scars, they lent character. He moved just as nice as the beam-dogs too, now that he’d got some zero G time on the clock. April noticed he tolerated the beam-dogs. A lot of them worked out even beyond their demanding jobs. But one day recently in the cafeteria he’d grimaced like his burger had gone to the bad. April knew Ruby was never going to let that happen, so she asked what was wrong.

“I’m really not fond of the young guys going shirtless,” Gunny confided for the first time, “But that nancy-boy getting coffee can’t pull the look off. He’s enough to put you off your feed.”

April chugged her coffee and turned to go get a refill, even though it was nasty weak instant, just to see what he was talking about. It was an unfamiliar Earth phrase that Gunny used. She’d never heard it before, but she didn’t need it explained.

The kid was obviously an office worker or a student. Maybe eighteen or nineteen, but being bare chested made him look closer to twelve. He was a dead white stick figure, with a wildly inappropriate tattoo on his shoulder of a leopard head. Like putting screen doors on a submarine, as Papa-san was fond of saying when he wanted to label something stupid. He was wearing dress slacks with a darling little narrow belt, and Earthie style hard shoes too. His hair was in a buzz cut and April was totally unconvinced that was because he ever saw the inside of a pressure suit. He also had earrings, which a lot of guys wore. But Dear God, men don’t wear filigree.

April returned with her coffee, and looked at Gunny in horror, speechless.

“If I ever look like that just shoot me,” Gunny begged. “No need to stop and try to explain. If you look like that you’re past any explanations.”

“I hate how restrictive North America is now, that you can’t even wear shorts or short sleeves. But that almost convinces me we need fashion police,” April said.

“Maybe he just came up, and is in joyful celebration of leaving those rules,” Gunny speculated.

“Or maybe he’s an eccentric genius, thinking such deep complex thoughts about mathematics or cosmology that he’s unaware of social things,” April offered.

Gunny made a funny little choking noise and looked down, like it was too painful to watch. “I wish, but he’s just a common jackass,” he said with utter conviction.

“Why so sure?” April asked

“He just put catsup on the first decent little steaks we’ve had shipped up in months.”

It seemed funny now, a couple days later. At the time it was more like a desecration. Home attracts the extremes of human society, the rebels, the people with wander-lust who had no earthly frontier now, the entrepreneurs who were frozen out of markets that wanted nothing new, even a few religious sorts who were too radical for their governments or other believers to tolerate. Jelly had told her Home had more than a few Jews. April was pretty sure they lacked any Amish, but the door was open if the simple folk could rationalize it. Home demographics were certainly shifting away from those of North America with which they’d started. Seeing this young man told her they were definitely going to need to keep a sense of humor about the eccentrics, or the horrors of the Slum Ball would just be copied again on Home.

With that in mind she decided to dig in her stuff and find one of the capes she’d bought a couple years ago. It was a little whimsy, totally unnecessary and impractical, its only purpose to be a little different. Just because she could.

*

“Predictions are for several periods of calm seas and sunny weather for an area not too far to the west-north-west of where we were planning to pick up the scientist and the agent. Do you think you could get them to the pickup a little faster?” Chen asked Jeff. “It would make loading easier.”

“They have the cargo for the Dionysus’ Chariot aboard and are well underway. I can ask them if they have any objection to using power instead of just sail. They have a Singh generator aboard and I know they added an electric motor to the drive behind the diesels. They run freezers and stuff off it all the time, but don’t usually use it for propulsion.”

“I thought North America could detect those running. Aren’t they afraid the Norte Americanos will drop a missile on them when they are out in the middle of the ocean far from any witnesses? They must associate a Singh generator with Home, and I’ve noticed they have no special love for Home or you.”

“They are aware of the risk,” Jeff admitted. “In their opinion North America avoids them because they seem associated with Home. I wouldn’t count on that holding if they went in NA territorial waters. But we track ocean traffic with radar and keep records. On several occasions USNA ships and aircraft have detoured around the Tobiuo. Apparently they think I am insane since I bombed Jiuquan.” He shrugged, “Sometimes it may be advantageous to be thought insane.”

“Only if you are also in possession of insanely huge thermonuclear weapons,” Chen suggested.

Jeff was scowling and visibly conflicted. Chen kept his mouth shut, knowing there was more, but he didn’t want to demand Jeff say what he was thinking.

“If the Tobiuo were the only neutrino beacon shining on Earth it might be tempting to wipe the board clean, as it were. But there are a good dozen sources shining now and a campaign to remove all of them would be difficult, and provocative,” Jeff said. “We have some submersible UMVs. They run part of the time on accumulators, and don’t always return to the same locations to run the generators, so they can’t be sure how many there are.”

“Drone carriers?” Chen asked.

“That, and other things, it’s compartmented,” Jeff said. Too polite to say none of your business. “You have no need to know. We don’t have a neutrino receiver,” Jeff revealed. “It would be nice to have one, and be able to run a com link through the Earth and the Moon. But since we know they have one we always have our generators run through a series of pulses like they are sending encrypted messages. It’s really just random numbers, but if it keeps the USNA wondering what the heck is going on and eats up resources that’s all to the good,” Jeff asserted.

“If they aren’t tied up with something else, I suggest having one of your underwater unmanned vehicles head for the Tobiuo to shadow it. I can imagine having use for such an asset if the North Americans give us trouble. You have one by the west coast I bet.”

Jeff had two, but volunteered nothing. “Yes, I can do that. There are also two unmanned flyers that orbit the polar regions at about forty thousand meters. They stay above international waters and direct radar above them, so nothing can be undetected in a polar orbit. There just wasn’t any commercial service available to buy that coverage, so we built it ourselves. They carry Singh generators for propulsion too. I’d hate to divert one though. We need them there.”

“And nobody objects to those?” Chen asked.

“We actually have subscribers to that data feed,” Jeff said, smiling. “We make a profit on them. They were cobbled together from standard parts and model airplane designs. One of Dave’s men who built them described them as a flying shower curtains stretched over fishing poles. It only costs about a tenth ounce to make the frame for one and they make more than that every month.”

“If one of the Earth powers were doing it they’d need a five year design period and ten billion dollars,” Chen predicted.

“Probably,” Jeff agreed, although it was a slight exaggeration. “I’ll let you know when I get an answer from Li.”

Li was not thrilled to use power to hurry to the North Pacific. “We’ve always preferred to run the generator when in port, or briefly to charge the accumulator, where nobody could use the knowledge of our location to attack us. I’m leery of calling attention to us under way. The USNA has some ocean watching sats back in orbit, and there are more commercial services now. If we go a couple thousand kilometers at twenty knots or better even somebody without a neutrino receiver will know we’re not doing it on diesel. The damned stuff is too dear right now.”

Jeff was disappointed. “Other than being a bit far, I thought it would be easy. What would you need to feel safe?”

“An overwatch,” Li said. “Somebody monitoring to make sure a sub or a plane isn’t taking an unhealthy interest in us. We have a very limited sensor suite. We can see over the horizon a little with radar, but no sonar at all and our radar isn’t configured to track aircraft. If things get actually nasty we want a commitment to actively intervene. You can see subs can’t you?”

“Sometimes,” Jeff admitted. “We can lose track of them if they shut down and sit or sneak around at depth going three or four knots. The Finns and Norwegians and the Israelis are all harder to track than the Americans or Chinese. But if they hurry there is no way they can hide. They roil up the water and it shows. Even if they are quite deep it eventually reaches the surface behind them. It used to be they triggered bioluminescence, but now we can read the difference in water composition, when they stir up deep water to the surface. It’s cooler and has a different composition.”

Jeff didn’t have the resources to keep a watch, and hated to divert people from other important tasks to maintain a twenty four hour watch. He’d have to set up a temporary mission center and rent expensive data feeds. His office was in use. Renting cubic would be expensive – if he could find anything. If intervention was necessary the majority of his weapons were far too big to send a moderate message. They tended more to say – Die sucker! Jon on the other hand had everything in place for the militia to do this sort of thing. Perhaps he could convince Jon it was desirable and needed to run the operation for them both. He’d have to find out how bad Jon wanted these virus sensors.

“I have to call in a few favors and ask questions before I can make that promise. I’ll be back to you quickly,” Jeff promised.

“Sooner I throttle up, the sooner we get there,” Li reminded him.

*

“Maybe…“Jon said. “It depends on what you consider a reasonable trigger for intervention. What do you consider a hostile act and what are your desired response levels?

“If an aircraft or vessel makes a course change to intercept, especially if it must hurry to make an interception. I’d consider that hostile intent. I’d warn them with the smallest weapon you can choose. Maybe just paint the threatening vessel with radar from orbit first. With enough power density it’s obvious you aren’t surveying the whole region, but targeting them specifically. If they ignore the warning – kill them,” Jeff said plainly. “Rods if that will do it, or a small warhead. The size of most of my stuff sends an unnecessary message. I don’t want to provoke a general response. I do have a submersible on route toward their projected course from the east. It was loitering off Baja. But it’s on accumulators. I can use it first to warn a North American sub or surface ship. Once I turn on the power they’ll see it, big time. It isn’t specifically armed, but they don’t know that.”

Jon wondered how it could be armed – unspecifically.

“I want this guy and his equipment pretty badly,” Jon admitted. “I’ll issue instructions to the militia and get volunteers to maintain a seamless special watch.”

“How long before it is active?” Jeff asked.

“About ten minutes, ” Jon estimated. “Nothing much is happening. Some duty stations have one guy covering, and if he’s in the crapper or making coffee, he won’t rush to his board unless he gets an emergency bulletin. I don’t want to do that to them.”

“Thanks,” Jeff said, disconnected and called Li. “We are hot with an umbrella in ten minutes,” he told the Tobiuo’s master. “Crank it up.”

Chapter 4

When April went to the cafeteria for lunch she had on her black cape with the scarlet lining. The closure was a silver chain linking silver chrysanthemums pinned through the fabric on each side below the collar. It was very dramatic and probably too dressy for the rest of her outfit.

When she entered the cafeteria Lindsey the artist was sitting with a sketch book open away from other people. She had one of the big heavy crockery mugs from Zack’s Chandlery sitting a full arm’s length away to safe guard the drawings.

Lindsey’s face lit up seeing April, and she reached down and grabbed a shape like a hamburger bun. She tossed it at April, but it curved away, directed by Lindsey’s spex undoubtedly. It made a barely audible sigh as it turned away from her. It was a tiny drone with interior ducts instead of propellers. April was impressed with how quiet it was. The little jeweled eye of a camera looked out of it at April.

Lindsey often carried a hand camera, or used her spex to take pix for her drawings, but this was something new.

April played along striking some dramatic poses and swirling her cape behind her. The little drone darted high by the ceiling one way and then the other, getting different angles, before it returned to Lindsey. She snatched it out of the air.

“That’s fun, but I’m not sure about doing it with Gunny,” April warned her. “He might have a reflexive urge to shoot it out of the air. Where did you get that thing anyway?”

“There’s a Fuji company that sells toys, Tricky Treasures. It’s meant for ages eight to adult it said. It’s really light, so it was cheap to ship, except the packaging weighed more than the drone. I’ll get you one if you like,” Lindsey offered.

“I already ordered four,” April said, touching her spex.

“You’re fast. I’m not sure you can make a bunch of them fly together though,” Lindsey said, weaving her hands back and forth over each other by way of illustration.

“Not my goal,” April said. “I bought one to play with, one for Jeff to tear apart and see how it stays so quiet, and a second one to take apart because stuff like this you usually bust the first one beyond reassembling it. Toys aren’t made to service or repair, when they stop working you trash it and, they hope, buy a new one.”

“What’s the fourth for?” Lindsey wondered.

“It’s my experience if you buy a few of these mass produced things chances of getting a bad one are really high. Thus a spare, in case one is DOA. Their quality control on cheap stuff is horrible.”

Lindsey nodded understanding. “I have some things to show you if you want to come back after you get your lunch.”

“Sure,” April agreed, “but I’ll eat one table over, clean my hands carefully, and then look. If I don’t I’m the world’s biggest klutz. I don’t want to drip mustard on your drawings.”

Lindsey didn’t argue at all.

Gunny joined them, displaying an unusually cheery disposition.

“You seem pleased about something, win the lotto?” April asked.

“I might as well have,” Gunny allowed. “My house sold. The base where I was assigned before I had special duty expanded in a consolidation. A lot of bases closed, but mine ended up half again as big, and housing in close is at a premium. A lot of empty homes were in bad repair, but other than the yard looking like a jungle and a minor rodent infestation mine was in good shape.

“The houses around it stayed occupied even after the epidemic. That and being right off the main road to the base saved it. Nobody busted in and stole the metal and there weren’t any busted windows. When word came down that Wiggen herself authorized my retirement, the State Department people who were charged with taking care of my house were afraid they might catch some back-blast. They went out and boarded the place up. It pays to have friends in high places.”

“What about your stuff? Did they just dumpster it? Lindsey asked.

“The real estate people asked if I wanted it put in storage. I asked for my books and music and a couple family heirlooms to be shipped up standby. I told him to help himself to anything else, or give it to charity. I had a little city car, a two cylinder Brazilian gas burner, in the garage. I told them to take it too. It hadn’t been started in a couple years. It would be a mess to flush everything and get it running. I don’t dress the same anymore, to want the clothes, and I sure don’t need stuff like a huge leather recliner that must mass a hundred kilos.”

“Good for you,” April said. She was done with her sandwich so she cleaned her hands carefully with a sani-wipe and moved over next to Lindsey. “What are you working on?”

“This is something I told you about,” Lindsey said, closing that portfolio. “It’s an illustrated history of Home. It might not be done for a long time, years even.”

“This is what’s new,” she said opening another folder. “My dad is designing official space for Heather. She wants a meeting hall and court for her kingdom. Well, she wants it, but she’d probably make it look like the security kiosk at the mall. Jeff is really the one who cares how it looks. He insists people take you much more seriously with the right props. What do you think of that?”

April didn’t just give her a glib answer but seriously considered it. “I have to agree. One side of me wants to say that in an ideal world it shouldn’t matter. And yet I spent some serious cash when I was down on Earth having clothing made. I’ve seen how people treat me differently when I’m dressed well. You surely have seen how important clothing is to Cindy and Frank’s customers. It’s the same thing – image. Governments don’t have pants, but they have capitols and courthouses and things, including some things just decorative, like monuments. That’s sort of like jewelry,” April said, running with the idea.

“My dad has been studying impressive architecture on Earth, looking at collections of pix and doing virtual walk-throughs. He got some architectural software, and has been doing floor plans, but the drawings it renders are pretty sad. They give you a sense of it, but the lighting never looks believable and the people might as well be little Lego guys,” Lindsey said, with an eye roll. “They all look like Earthies too. Anyway…look at what I have. It’s a start. Tell me what you think.”

“Wow…It’s big,” April hadn’t expected the high ceilings. Her mind was kind of stuck in the mode of station life. Cubic was expensive and you made things as compact as possible. The first drawing was of a domed room. The deck, floor she corrected herself, wasn’t carpeted. She could tell it was hard and polished, because it showed reflections, the more so as it got further away from you. There were two huge arched doorways showing , neither centered. But the one closest to center you had the angle to see through better. It had repetitions of the arch framing the doorway periodically, but the view cut you off from seeing how far they ran.

“I’ve seen pictures of big churches on Earth that had these things,” April said, making a high arch with her hand since she didn’t know the terminology.

“My dad used a lot of Earth buildings for models. Cathedrals, and capitol buildings, he mentioned the Taj Mahal, and a couple famous mosques, some modern buildings too. A couple art galleries and airport terminals. He even mentioned a train station. So it’ll have a lot of influences.”

Lindsey’s style was to detail the portion she wanted you view in detail, sometimes in photorealism, right where she wanted your eye to go. The perimeter tended to fade off in detail and intensity of the color. Thus the one exit door with the hall beyond in view was very detailed the other exit from the circular room and the dome structure above not so much.

“You have the texture of rough rock just perfect,” April said. “But up above where it is fading out I see some lines and shapes suggesting a pattern. What is that going to be?”

“Dad isn’t sure if he wants to leave the rock bare. He says that has a power all its own, especially if the tool marks are an interesting texture. Or he might make a couple bots to polish it all over a long period of time. It depends on the color of the rock down at the level they want to build it too. He said if it is really ugly he might even paint it. But up above on the domes and vaulted ceilings he wants art. I’m not really a muralist, but I’m trying to see if I can learn enough to do them like he wants. If I can’t he’ll have to find someone,” Lindsey said.

Gunny and April glanced at each other. They didn’t think that would happen.

“The room is magnificent,” April assured her, “but the couple in the foreground…”

“Yes? Are they too close?” Lindsey worried. “They don’t obscure anything important behind them. And the couple against the far wall gives you scale for the room, because the near couple are standing near the center of the pattern inlaid in the floor.”

April hadn’t figured that out. Or rather it was so cunningly effective that her brain made those assumptions like it would in a real room, without having to really think about it consciously.

“That’s fine too, but that gown, where did you see that? I’d like one made for me.”

“Oh…It was just something in my head,” Lindsey said with a little dismissive gesture. “I used to sit in my boring Civics class back on Earth and doodle fifty of those in a period, to keep from going nuts. I’m at the shop tomorrow. Come by and Cindy will help me make a pattern off your scan and we’ll have it fabbed. Unless you want it hand sewn, then we’d have it done in Hong Kong. Freight is back up pretty good. We should be able to get it lifted OK in a couple weeks since it would be so light.”

“Machine sewn is just fine,” April assured her. “I’m not a fashion snob. I doubt anybody looks at my seams that closely anyway.”

“Wouldn’t do them much good anyway,” Lindsey said looking at the drawing like it was somebody else’s work she’d just seen. “Just about all of it is going to be blind seams, except to keep it flat back by the closure.”

Gunny stood up and leaned close to get a better look at it before Lindsey closed it up. He didn’t want to bring food or drink close either. He must have approved, of the dress that is, not the room, because he looked at April and waggled his eyebrows.

“OK, I’ll see you at the shop, tomorrow mid-morning,” April promised.

*

Li had the sails down and the Tobiuo under power. He was holding the power level where the temperature on the electric motor looked safe. They’d never thought to add cooling. The installation had never been intended for long range cruising. He already had the access hatches open to the drive spaces with an air scoop improvised, and made sure the oil cups were full. It was an older rebuilt industrial motor rather than a specially built drive motor. It was cheap, but it ran fine. If he was going to modify the drive train much more he might as well look into a prop with a more aggressive pitch. He’d already installed a much bigger propeller when they added the electric drive. He also needed to know if the shaft could take the added power. It hadn’t been designed as an integrated system.

Still, they were making 23 knots, which was nothing to sneeze at. It wasn’t particularly comfortable though, with a quartering chop. The hull wasn’t shaped for this speed. And undoubtedly they were making a racket with some prop cavitation. They were turning the screw faster than they would with a diesel. None of them had imagined they’d run on full power for three days. It made Li nervous because they were a changed datum in somebody’s system, if anyone noticed, or cared.

*

Jeff looked tired. April decided a few months back to set the door to his palm, but he still used the door chime. It obviously pleased him at the time, and he’d thanked her. But when she reminded him he could just come in, and give a shout, he’d declined. He said it wasn’t like he lived here. April was pretty sure that wasn’t a veiled request to do so. Jeff wasn’t that subtle, he’d just ask. But he said it was good to have another port, should he need it. She’d been tempted to ask what he was expecting with the nautical references? A storm? But she let it go.

April made coffee as she’d promised. Jeff looked like he could use it if he was going to be any company and not just go to sleep on the couch. She didn’t stint on the coffee either, as she’d been doing some days for herself. No need to do that at all soon, she hoped.

“You look whipped. Do you want to get carry out instead of eating out?” April suggested.

“Yeah, whatever the special is. I’ll pay the courier,” Jeff offered.

“I’ll have Lindsey’s little brother do it,” April said. She checked the net for the cafeteria specials today. All of them sounded decent, so she dropped a text on Eric Pennington to buy the first four specials on the list today and deliver them to her cubic. If they didn’t eat everything she knew Gunny would never let it go to waste. There was room in the fridge, since she hardly kept anything there with so little coming up from Earth.

April sat back beside Jeff with two mugs of coffee, and gave him a solicitous pat on the knee. “So, did you get all your fires put out?”

“No. I’m not sure of any of them yet. We have the Tobiuo headed north in the Pacific to pick up a fellow we need badly. He has tech to test people for viral infections very early, within the first few hours of the virus starting to multiply. OK, maybe that fire is dampered a little,” Jeff admitted. “It would have been a major undertaking for me to put an overwatch on the boat, but Jon is really the force behind this fellow coming up. Jon and Doctor Lee want that tech so they can loosen up the travel restrictions, before people get tired enough of them to vote they be lifted.”

Jeff took a long appreciative sip of the coffee and didn’t sit the mug back down.

“Good, because I’m not sure how I’d vote,” April told him. “I’d like to see some evidence there’s still a threat since things seem to be returning to normal on Earth.”

“Jon and Lee aren’t certain,” Jeff admitted. “But if we open entry up too early we can undo all the good the quarantine did.”

“OK, I can see that. I can be patient a while longer. But just remember, I trust you and Jon more than a lot of other folks. I’m glad you’re taking care of Li and the Tobiuo. I’m attached to them and I’m sure Papa-san will support you in caring for them if you need to call on him.”

“Papa-san is a customer of the bank. I hate to look like I need help from him. I’m fond of both just like you are. I’d love to have another vacation on the Tobiuo sometime. Even if it’s never safe again with the flu we can still visit a remote area. The ketch is a significant resource for us too. She isn’t just picking the scientist and his handler up. We’ll have a shipment of goods to drop off also.”

“For North America?” April asked. Her face said that worried her.

“No, no. We never send anything into North America directly now. It’s gotten too dangerous. Li will take her back south, at a much more leisurely pace, and move everything through Australia or New Zealand, even if it is headed to North America. It may seem crazy to haul it across the Pacific twice but it’s safer. The Australians become responsible for it. I understand the Aussies repackage a lot of it to show local origins. It’s pretty much a polite fiction, because everybody knows it wasn’t made there.”

“I’ve always kept the Tobiuo in mind in case my grandparents ever decide to come to Home,” April said. “They live on the beach, and if they can’t go get to a shuttle Li could send the little boat, the inflatable, in and take them right off the beach. But they’ve found one reason after another to not come up for years now. They have a very comfortable home and they’re well off – for Australia.”

“You never say much about them,” Jeff said, cautiously.

“They have my com code,” April said with a shrug. “When they call things have gotten awkward. If I tell them what I have been doing I have to stop and explain most of it in painful detail. They don’t understand how things work here, and when I explain they don’t seem to remember the next time they call. They were freaked out that I moved out into my own cubic before I’m eighteen. I can tell they think the Australian age of majority is a natural law. Once they called and saw Gunny in the pickup behind me and had to be assured I employ him, and he isn’t some scoundrel taking advantage of a naive young girl. When I talk about you or Heather they fret similarly, about what sort of influence you are on me. They never seem to worry how I’m influencing you…My mom says her mom calls up and they have nice long talks, but it always gets strange and breaks off pretty soon when she calls me.”

“Did they get through the flu OK? They’re not gene mod then? Jeff wondered.

“They’ve never had LET. Both of them seem to be in pretty good health. My mom has tried to tell them that LET isn’t rejuvenation. If you wait until you have severe health problems it won’t reverse everything. They can certainly afford Life Extension Therapy. It’s semi-legal in Australia but very much disapproved in their social set.”

“Yeah, have you seen that creepy couple who survived the flu in quarantine? Jeff asked.“They both look middle aged again, but he especially looks wrecked. He walks with a cane and never fully filled out again. Dr. Lee said on Earth they’d probably have sued him for saving their lives, because it didn’t turn out perfect for them.”

“My mom’s parents stopped going out to things like concerts when the flu started up. They got their groceries delivered and pretty much holed up. They’re smart enough to do that and things never got bad enough in Oz that they couldn’t get package delivery. They were content to stay in and watch videos and enjoy the beach below their house. Little chance of meeting people down there I can tell you. Perhaps a rare neighbor sighting. But the neighbors aren’t going to walk on the beach if they come down sick are they? So they avoided this flu. If it isn’t safe to use the Tobiuo now I’ll just forget the idea.”

“No, no…I’m pretty sure it’ll still be safe when this one mission is over. I can take steps to be able to guard them even better in the future, should need arise,” Jeff assured her.

“Then why the worry, or need to guard them?” April wondered.

“Li asked for it before he’d use the generator for such a long trip. They’ve never used it for days before. They might use it to get in and out of a port or when becalmed. They run it occasionally, enough to keep the accumulator charged to run the freezer. He wasn’t explicit about why, but he felt changing his behavior might attract North American attention.”

“OK, I can see that. Somebody might wonder suddenly what they are up to,” April agreed. “And close to their shores would worry them too.”

“The other problem is the USNA is trying to squeeze us out of the banking business.”

April considered that a moment, looking puzzled. “They want to stop trading with us?” she asked. “Last time I checked we make a lot of the stuff they can’t. Things they need pretty badly. If we can’t get paid the trade stops.”

“In your mind yes, the two are immediately connected. Because you’re a reasonable person who looks at the bigger picture. But North America is like a mentally ill person with multiple personalities. One department may know they need things and try to make exceptions to the embargo, another department wants to punish us by cutting off banking ties and what it does to trade isn’t their problem, if it makes them look good.” Jeff said.

“Until the banking regulator finds he has metastatic melanoma. When he needs the cancer drug only we make in zero G, then suddenly it’s terribly personal,” April said.

“Yes, well, even there, the very well to do can fly to Europe or Asia and get treated,” Jeff explained. “They don’t have any shortage of people. Little people that is.”

“That’s one seriously screwed up system,” April said.

“Well yeah, you’re preaching to the choir here,” Jeff reminded her.

“How are they trying to cut us off?” April demanded.

“They’ve informed The Private Bank of Home it will be removed from North American access if it continues to be a conduit for funds from the System Trade Bank. They’d probably like to cut him off too, but a lot of very wealthy Japanese access the Federal system through it. It would cause a stink.”

“So you can’t have Irwin do North American transactions for you,” April said. “That doesn’t seem insurmountable. You still have the Russians don’t you?”

“Yes, they don’t care if I’m wiring funds from heaven to hell. Which I am, sort of. The USNA is in another periodic phase where they don’t want bad relations with Russia so that seems good for now. But getting transactions cleared to and from North America will require several steps. I need a relationship with several other banks. I don’t have the negotiating skills and finesse to know how to approach them. You have to say things very delicately, one wrong word and asking for an automatic transfer account becomes nasty money laundering. I’m not a lifelong professional banker, a member of the club, and it shows. And I need it to operate automatically. It’s lots of little transactions, not worth doing manually. I doubt I can set it up as an unknown, sending texts or calling. This is the delicate sort of thing where you need to meet face to face. They like to know who they are dealing with, and I’m not about to go down to Earth. Eddie’s people could probably set it up, but I don’t want to be associated with them.”

“He wouldn’t ask,” April said. “He has always refused to touch that side of the family. From what I’ve read you are never rid of the mob once you depend on them for something. If I may bring him up again…I’d suggest you ask Papa-san to create a pipeline for you. I saw how easily he extracted Gunny’s money from North America. He called some associates and slick as could be he was handing Gunny an envelope in Tonga.”

“I’m not sure he wouldn’t just be doing it with the Asian equivalent of the Mafia,” Jeff worried. “It might not be any better than going to Eddie’s family.”

“Oh no, much different,” April explained. “With Eddie the most you’d get would be an introduction, and you’d have to deal with one of his ‘uncles’ yourself. If you do it through Papa-san you’ll be walled off from direct involvement. He’s not going to share his contacts with you. Spies do business differently than mobsters, even if their connections overlap. And in my opinion Papa-san would be a very thick wall.”

“Ah…I do appreciate your people skills. You don’t think Papa-san will think less of me for needing the help?” Jeff still worried.

“Not when it’s an ego boost to him. How can he knock you for deciding he’s the go-to guy to fix your problem? Even if he declines, you showed huge confidence in him.”

“OK, I’ll do it,” Jeff agreed. That took some of the weary look off Jeff’s face.

*

“Why so glum Husband? I thought things were going very well for us,” Huian said.

“Ah, I can never hide my moods from you,” Chen Lee said, with a sigh. “Indeed, as I was telling you yesterday things are going very well for us. Our security cooperative has a lot of work, and T has been generous sharing the profits from a number of his enterprises. I feel much more secure financially than when we arrived on Home. No, I feel sad because the gentleman we visited in Myanmar, Chan Aye, was taken by this horrible flu. He had a couple more names, but that was what he always invited foreigners to call him. I’d hoped to disperse some of our new funds to him, and when I called I was informed of his death. I counted him a friend too.”

“Oh…Did he have life extension to be particularly susceptible?” Huian asked.

“No, he was deeply suspicious of the treatment. He’d asked before what the down side was, because he said there was always a down side. As it turned out he was right for many people. But, no,” Chen said, “he just was one of the many older people that died from this flu, as flu has always killed some.”

“Did you still have funds on deposit with him? Is that a problem?” Huian asked.

“No, given the uncertainty when we were fleeing I asked to withdraw all our funds. And it was quite accommodating of him to allow it on such short notice. But then I was quite frank with him about our situation. I was looking to deposit monies again. We have funds in both Home banks, and still have deposits in a few Earth institutions, but we saw the advantage of having assets dispersed when we had to leave abruptly.”

“They are not continuing the family business?” Huian asked, surprised.

“Do not be offended Dear Wife, but they are a very traditional household. The man had no sons and he never trained a daughter to the business. They have his books, literal books as well as electronic records, he always said the memory of computers is too ephemeral. I’d joke with him that others found it entirely too hard to erase. I’ll miss the back and forth with him,” Chen said.

“So, they are just going to pay the funds out and shut down?” Huian asked. “I hate to see a business die almost as much as a person. Their means of living will vanish.”

“Chan Aye left them well provided for. His wives are of a similar age, and he was looking at retirement soon. His daughters will be provided for amply when they marry. I spoke briefly with his eldest wife and she was in no distress like they would be homeless or scrambling for a bowl of rice. A lot of their customers died in the epidemic too. Some of the accounts will never be demanded. She would have appointed another relative to handle dispersing funds, but the only uncle who was a traditional banker and takaful agent died too. She and her co-wives are managing their funds. They are mature women, experienced in life, they won’t do anything stupid with his wealth.”

“Could you not ask them to take you funds and continue as before?” Huian asked.

“I speak with you candidly, and ask your opinion. I value it highly. To do so is new for us, and it is even rarer in their culture. I’ll be honest that I’d feel very uncomfortable to do business with them. It was awkward for just the short conversation we had, because I know women of their household do not normally interact with men who are not closely related. I don’t doubt she wouldn’t have spoken to a man of her own culture, who would disapprove. She dealt with me only because I am a foreigner.”

“And yet the young woman who entertained me while you dealt with the banker had no trouble at all speaking with you after, when you asked her help to outfit me,” Huian remembered.

“Yes, that was Myat, he often bragged on her. But she is of the younger generation. She is more comfortable with outsiders, and I admit I’m more comfortable with her, knowing she thinks differently.”

“Would the sum you intended to entrust to him break us, Husband?”

“Not at all, that was the intent, to disperse our holdings, so no one part would be a catastrophic loss. I’d intended to send the equivalent of two ounces of gold to his accounts at first. Either by electronic transfer or the physical metal transferred by courier as two Solar, if he wished.

“Let me propose something, Husband. Allow me to call Myat. I thought very well of the young woman. Although she was not that young. Like you, I can talk to her easier than the older women I never met. I’d like to offer to put the funds on deposit with the family, since they still have funds, and are managing them. She can do the talking to the older women for us. I remember she said she was the daughter of his second wife. If they are brave enough to accept the challenge then surely there are many other new widows down there who have funds to safeguard. I wonder how many of them lack male relatives they wish to act for them now, and would be very comfortable dealing with another woman. The young daughters like Myat are of an age now to be useful. Surely they have the assets to continue Chan Aye’s work if they chose to.”

Chen didn’t reply for so long she thought he might not, or if he did he’d certainly decline.

“The way we’ll do this, is I’ll start an account with the Private Bank in your name,” Chen said. “That way you are approaching Myat to handle the funds for another woman. That is even easier for them to accept than you, merely acting as my agent. I’ll do this periodically and you may invest the funds with them, or wherever else you think it wise.

“As you get some experience, if you are comfortable with it, I may release some of the funds that are in Earth banks to you. You may want to confer with Tetsuo’s wife, Lin, on occasion as I know he has directed her to manage a separate fund in just this manner.

“I confess, the first time I knew of that arrangement, it made me uncomfortable, but given his success, in everything the man touches, how can I second guess him?” Chen asked.

“Thank you for your confidence, and expanding it,” Huian said.

“There are things you need to know,” Chen said. “You have to speak to them in the terms their traditions allow for financial services. You may think that it’s a silly way to do the same thing as western banking and insurance accomplishes, but the distinctions are real and important to the way they think.

“For example, they do not pay interest in the same direct manner a European or American bank would. Rather you are sharing limited profits in an enterprise, which can mean you may be called on to share in losses, if that’s the way things go. Now, we are not believers, but I always made deposits with the understanding that we’d accept that risk the same as them. It’s no different than other western investment vehicles that have no guarantee. But it has frequently been a source of conflict between Muslim bankers and western bank regulators, who insist on the deposits being completely insured. Now, anybody would know that is an illusion and a lie, because their insurance never has the funds to cover a total loss. But they demand that appearance for the public. Similarly, insurance in their system accomplishes the same thing, but they describe it differently as a form of shared risk. It matters when you speak with them, because they regard the way they accomplish that as moral, and the way westerners do so as a violation of their religious law.”

Huian nodded every once in awhile, and maintained eye contact. Once Chen got in full lecture mode like this he could go on hours. Sometimes she thought he’d have made a better college professor than a spy. He was however an engaging speaker. Not one of those fellows who droned on in a monotone. He was really getting enthused to his subject, and she really did need to know these things, which helped make them interesting.

She might have to force him to stop for a meal in a couple hours, or he’d press on oblivious to the passage of time. But best not to stop him while he was expanding on what he’d granted. The more he built on the idea the less chance anything would undo it. Even though she was just itching to call Myat and get started. She suspected Myat would be forgiving of any gaps in her knowledge and gently correct any cultural gaffes she made. One tended to be patient and forgiving with a person when the money was flowing from them to you. Just like she was right now.

*

April made a simple breakfast, pancakes and scrambled eggs from powder, and more coffee since Jeff convinced her more was in the pipeline. She had no desire to go out this morning. Jeff finally looked less haggard than when he’d showed up. She made extra pancakes knowing Gunny would probably smell the food soon and come stumbling out. Assuming he was in his room. April didn’t have a counter on the door or track his comings and goings. There were nights he didn’t come home. There were entire days again he didn’t come home when his guys had a security job, now that his hand was out of the hard shell.

She still had a four hundred milliliter can of peaches and put them out with the pancakes. Jeff was still a guest even if he was like family, closer in some ways. Fruit that wasn’t freeze-dried was a real treat, and she didn’t expect to see any heavy stuff like that until after the bean coffee started flowing again. Likely closer to a year than six months.

“I ordered a few camera drones,” April remembered to tell Jeff. “Lindsey had one in the cafeteria, using it to take pix to work from for her drawings.”

“In public cubic?” Jeff asked surprised. “I wouldn’t want to be responsible if I messed up and ran it into someone. Seems like a real hazard and liability.”

“I’d agree, but it doesn’t have any external propellers or wings at all. It is a ball with ducts and very, very quiet. I thought we might learn something for your own designs.”

“Sounds expensive then,” Jeff decided. “You can get reimbursed,” he offered.

“They’re cheap. They’re being sold as toys. Kids can run them you wouldn’t dare trust with a real drone. I imagine this drone might knock over some knick-knacks and break them, but you could run one into somebody’s nose full blast and not hurt him. The whole thing can’t weigh much over a hundred grams, and the shell is so thin it’s very flexible.”

“Wow, I haven’t heard of those. I’d bet anything they had to make compromises to mass produce them. If we spend a little more they will probably be quieter and stay up longer,” Jeff predicted.

“What are you smiling at?” April demanded when he suddenly grinned.

“I was remembering visiting my relatives quit a long time ago. They had cats, and the kids were endlessly entertained by watching them chase the dot from a laser pointer. I was just thinking the cats would either be terrified of such a drone, or eager to do battle and drag it down. It would be interesting to see which. Being all enclosed like that it couldn’t accidentally do them any harm.”

“I was hoping you might learn enough from it we could revive trying to make a guard bot. The one we did try to cobble up sounded like a cheap hairdryer. And not just for me,” April made clear. “I think there is a good market for them and some money to be made if they are practical.”

“Yes, but not for an Earth market,” Jeff said quickly. “There would just be too much proprietary tech in them. But I can see Gunny and his buddies doing security work with one hovering over each shoulder. It would be very intimidating.”

“Yeah,” April agreed, picturing it. “But you don’t want them too quiet. If you designate a target for them in your spex you want them to maybe rise toward the overhead and give out an ominous low frequency rumble as a warning.”

“The option to have them do that,” Jeff corrected. “Sometimes people don’t deserve a warning and you want to take them out silently, with extreme prejudice, as they say.”

April was nodding, getting into it. “So, lasers or projectile weapons?”

“How about one of those Air Tasers, like Jon carries?” Jeff suggested.

“Oh, I like that. You have all the bases covered with one of those.”

Chapter 5

Jeff pled business to attend to and rushed off after breakfast, although he lingered to give her a hug and a quick kiss. He thanked her for her help, which meant a great deal. Jeff still intimidated April for sheer intelligence, but even so, he didn’t understand a lot of social nuances and had finally come to realized it was a personal weakness. It was remarkable that Jeff’s father was the same socially, and yet married Dr. Nam-Kah, who was much younger than him, smart, and an absolutely smashing beauty.

April finished the coffee, took another quick shower, and headed to the tailor shop to meet Lindsey. If she was going to be measured and close to Lindsey and Cindy she wanted to be squeaky clean. She put on an all black outfit so she could wear the cape she’d shown Lindsey before. Cindy hadn’t seen it and she hoped it would amuse her.

There was another customer being helped when she got to the tailor shop, not getting fitted but looking at images of garments on a screen, and a few of Lindsey’s drawings in the shop system. April took a stool at the big table and Frank brought her coffee without asking if she wanted it. That was an extravagance. She wondered how they were holding coffee so long after others ran out, and how she rated a cup. She’d have to find a way to make it up to them.

April found it interesting that Lindsey’s drawings were digitalized just like the commercial patterns from Earth, so the customer could be shown different colors and trimmings. A few images were even 3D models so you could view them from all around, change things like the build of the model, and details like buttons and pleats.

The man picked a tunic style of top with a wide belt and pockets in front just under the belt with hidden zippers. He had loose trousers made to match with pockets on each side with horizontal openings, not slash. April thought it all very practical, but ugly, in a heathery grey.

When he turned around his eyes got big, and he said, “Oh, yes…That’s what I want! A cape to match my outfit. He scrunched up his face looking at April’s cape until he had creases between his eyebrows. April’s cape was lined in scarlet so he considered what his should have.

“And line mine with cornflower blue, or something similar, but to the purple a little,” he added.

Behind him Cindy looked dismayed. April wasn’t sure why, but she was on Cindy’s side.

“That might work,” April told the man, “But a yellow would work much nicer with your eyes,” she told the fellow, smiling sweetly. His eyes were a distinct brown even from a couple meters away.

“Do you think so?” the man asked. He smiled and was entirely too taken with the attention from April. To the point she was regretting she got involved. “As she said then,” he told Cindy. “Whatever you have in a nice yellow will be fine. Do you need to remeasure anything to make a cape?”

“Not at all,” Cindy assured him. “We have your shoulder and arm dimensions and length to waist. Everything we need. It requires some hand work on the details. So is next Wednesday OK?”

“Lovely! Drop me a message and I’ll pick it up or send a courier for it,” He promised, and made his exit quickly. From the look on Cindy’s face it wasn’t a minute too soon. Frank just looked amused.

“Bless you child. I don’t have anything pale blue or violet, and it’s impossible to get anything lifted quickly right now. At least anything that isn’t a necessity.”

“I was about to suggest a crème chiffon to compliment his wrinkly white butt,” Frank said, “But on the whole April’s suggestion was probably better.”

“And you see why I deal with the customers instead of him,” Cindy said.

“Then what does Frank do?” April asked.

“I do the books, make the coffee, and care for the cat,” Frank said, defensively.

“You have a cat?” April said, looking around.

“We’re going to get one,” he assured her. “Someday.”

“Lovely idea, it can claw runs in the silk,” Cindy said.

“She doesn’t like cats,” Frank confided.

“I’m perfectly neutral,” Cindy insisted. “Cats don’t like me.”

“I’ve never been around cats,” April said, hoping to break the chain of conversation. “I was around a couple dogs on Earth, but they didn’t impress me much. I preferred the bigger ones though.”

“A hab is a lousy place for pets,” Frank agreed. “No place to walk them and no place to play.”

He looked at her mug. “Do you need a refill?”

“You have it to spare?” April asked. “I was surprised you’re still holding coffee. I have some but I laid in a pretty good supply right before things went bad. I’ve been rationing it out.”

“Frank saw it was coming to a cusp and ordered up a ton of stuff about two weeks before we lost lift. So much we had to rent storage. We bought lots and lots of cloth, but no pale purple,” Cindy said, rolling her eyes. “I think a few of our customers have bought outfits just to come in and get a cup. The stuff in the cafeteria is awful,” she said making a face. “Yet they still run out of it frequently.”

“Well it used to be from liquid concentrate,” April told them, “which wasn’t too bad. Then Ruby saw people were bringing their own in a travel mug and the demand went down for the concentrate. So she bit the bullet and budgeted to buy beans. That lasted about two months before things went all to hell down below, and she had to fall back on freeze dried instant. Gunny assures me the instant is much better than about twenty years ago.”

“You paid for your coffee deflecting Mr. Sweeney,” Cindy told her. “What can we do for you?”

April waved at Lindsey. “She drew a figure in an architectural drawing, and I want a dress like the woman is wearing. Perhaps you’d help and the two of you can develop a pattern?”

Once Cindy had the image transferred to design software all three of them could look at it. There was room for Frank too, but he found other things in the shop to keep him busy.

The dress was basically divided in quarters down the middle and at the waist, with black and white panels.

“Just like you told Sweeney, these colors don’t work for you,” Cindy said.

“Really? Is there a shortage of black and white cloth too?” April asked.

“Not at all,” Cindy insisted, giving Lindsey a dirty look for laughing. “But black and white in big panels is too hard on the eye for contrast. It works better in the drawing than real life. It looks good straight on and horrible from the side. It isn’t good for your figure either. It works for a big blonde built like a Greek god, but sorry, Honey. That’s not you.”

“What would you suggest?” April asked.

“Instead of panels with a central seam, contrasting colors draped across from each side.”

Lindsey made a few lines and shaded them, assigned colors and let the program work. It did look better, April had to admit. “But now below the waist doesn’t work with it,” April complained.

“No, You need something that continues the draping texture, but not mirroring the top or it’s excessively symmetrical. That’s fine for military uniforms, but not ladies evening wear,” Cindy said.

“Continue the drape below the waist, but for one color only,” Lindsey suggested. “Try the light and see how that looks.”

“Interesting but still too plain,” Cindy decided. Try making it arch contrary to the portion above the waist instead of sweeping around the hip.”

“Umm…almost,” Lindsey agreed. “It still needs something.”

“Arch it the opposite way but then straighten it out and plunge straight to the hem,” Cindy said.

They looked at it, and nobody said anything. It was dramatic, but lacked something.

“I think it’s too obvious,” Cindy said. “It’s too much all the same. It looks like something designed for a department store ready-made line.”

“Flare the pleats as it makes the down-turn and have the end open up into a quarter of the hem. From the front center to the left side,” Lindsey suggested.

“That will be difficult to sew,” Cindy said as the software worked to expand to the fan of pleats as Lindsey dragged the edges each way on the screen. “But yeah, that looks like something worth doing.”

“How about making each pleat alternating colors,” April suggested.

“It would be a horror to get it to hang right,” Lindsey said.

“But sew it up separate and put it on top of the material underneath, to lend it structure,” Cindy said.

“That raises it,” Lindsey said, adjusting the form on the screen.

“I like it raised. I’d buy that,” April told them.

“It looks good, but it still isn’t your color,” Cindy insisted. “Try gold and green.”

“Wow,” Lindsey said.

“It doesn’t look like the same dress,” April said.

“Well in honesty it’s not. But I think it would work very well for you,” Cindy said.

“I even have some jewelry I think will work with it,” April said. “Some earrings my grandparents gave my brother, and a necklace he left me. Can you make that?”

“Certainly. It will take some time it’s so complex. Two weeks from today?” Cindy asked.

“Fine, I’d rather have it right than fast,” April assured her.

*

“Our fellow is in Vancouver with a kit of components to build the tester,” Chen reported. “They will board a trawler tonight and be on the tide before dawn.” He copied the message to Jon and Jeff, and a separate copy to Tetsuo Santos.

*

“Don’t worry about us,” Jeff told Irwin, President of the Private Bank of Home. They had a business relationship, and at least a measure of friendship. The man still felt like he was betraying Jeff, and made a voice call to apologize, although no apology was really needed. His hand was being forced in the matter from Earth. He couldn’t deal with Jeff and retain access to the Fed system.

“We’ve made new arrangements, and can still move funds sufficient to our customers’ needs. We are doing more local banking than you anyway. I intend to shift my customers to Solars as much as possible, and Australian dollars when we can’t. Nobody in their right mind holds depreciating EuroMarks an hour longer than necessary. We’ve always dealt with other currencies, but we don’t hold them. We just sell them right off,” Jeff explained, calmly.

“I’m liquidating USNA dollars as quietly as possible, and when we hold none I intend to make an announcement that we will no longer take payment in USNA dollars. If North American customers can’t buy either of those other currencies we’ll take gold in certifiable forms. But physical delivery only. I’d appreciate if you keep that confidential, although if you want to trade dollars in anticipation of it, I understand. That’s why I’m telling you actually.”

Irwin squinted at him, unbelieving. “You are implying…the dollar might dip from such an announcement?” he asked. He obviously had a hard time believing that.

“Could be,” Jeff said, indifferently. “I won’t care, because I won’t be holding any soon.”

“North America is one of the world’s largest economies,” Irwin argued. “Maybe the second again even, with China in turmoil. You can’t trade enough dollars to shift trends, Jeff.”

“Then you will feel perfectly safe in USNA dollars. Perhaps instead of my disposing of them by the convoluted process I intended, you should just buy them from me,” Jeff suggested. “Surely the Private Bank has sufficient Aussie dollars to swap them for our dollars. Or if that’s tight we’d take Yen or even Tongan Pa‘anga. Of course gold is always welcome.”

“I…you…” Irwin shut his mouth and looked alarmed.

“North America might even be the world’s biggest economy again,” Jeff agreed. “Undoubtedly it is one of the four largest. But it’s kind of hard to tell. Nobody really believes the public numbers for any of the Earth nations now. They’ve made so much secret it’s hard to even guess. This year they added the sugar beets and soy beans harvests to corn on the list classified for national security.”

“This is a dangerous game you’re playing,” Irwin accused Jeff. “If I start selling it will be public, and people will start sniffing around. No matter how discreet you are, somebody is going to see what you are doing. I bet you are selling through a chain of banks to hide the source of the money, aren’t you? And that looks bad right there. People could conclude you’re not doing it to avoid regulators, but to get it quietly dumped before some event. And the more hands it goes through the greater the chance some clerk is going to tell his uncle not to be caught holding too many dollars, and he’ll tell a friend, and before you know it, the event the action intimated becomes reality.”

“What you are describing is what they called a panic in a more honest age,” Jeff said. “May I remind you they are kicking me out? I didn’t initiate this. And can they reasonably say they won’t clear dollar trades for me anymore and still expect me to hold dollars?” Jeff reasoned. “Let me ask you something though. Are you admitting confidence is so low, that one word in the wrong ear, one little bank in the tiniest nation, failing to hide that they are selling dollars, could do serious damage?”

“I don’t think we’re far from that, even in the best of times,” Irwin said.

“Maybe not. Within our lifetimes anyway,” Jeff qualified that statement. “You don’t seem concerned North America will retaliate and sell Solars to drive the price down.”

What could Irwin say? Nobody on Earth was selling gold unless they were desperate, and Solars weren’t just redeemable, they had twenty five grams of gold encapsulated. If North America wanted to sell gold they’d have to sell a lot to drop the price in this market. If they really had any. That was as secret as everything else.

“The Private Bank has no way to sell dollars on any scale without reporting it. We have reporting obligations under the regulation we must follow to be in the Fed and Japanese systems. Perhaps it would be better for both of us, for everybody, if we did liquidate our dollars through you,” Irwin suggested.

“That’s a possibility,” Jeff admitted. “However, using a chain of transfers, such as you guessed we will be doing, adds on fees. We were looking at paying about three and a half percent to convert our own holdings. But, as you say, it might damage us if you are seen selling too many dollars also. Let’s say just enough of a fee to make sure I don’t take a loss helping you. Say four percent?”

“That sounds like an equitable arrangement,” Irwin said. After he terminated the call, he wondered how the purpose of his call had changed direction so completely.

*

“The trawler has a Coast Guard cutter shadowing it,” the militia observer, Sam, told Li from orbit. “What do you want to do? I could drop a rod on him in about a half hour and it would come at him right out of the sun. It would arrive transonic and in the glare. He’d never see it with the sort of radar they use. At least he’d never see it in time to swerve and avoid it.”

“They’d know what happened and the stink would attach to us forever,” Li said. “He isn’t following them on his own and nobody knows about it. They are micro-managed from the mainland now almost as bad as the Chinese. I’m not comfortable with the morals of a preemptive strike either. They really haven’t done anything to warrant it.”

“Maybe…It’s up to you,” Sam told him. “I wouldn’t assume he has coms since so many satellites were killed. I don’t think he’s following them as a friendly escort. Just remember if you get into it with him you can’t count on help in four or five minutes. That’s best case. It can take as much as fifteen minutes from when I designate a rod to drop further back in orbit until it actually impacts. A lot can happen in fifteen minutes.”

“I’m changing course to the North West unless you have a better suggestion. I don’t intend to rendezvous with him while the Coastie is dogging him. He’s a USNA flagged vessel and the Coastie has a valid interest. I’ll check with you and see if he breaks off after we don’t meet,” Li decided.

“Why? You aren’t smuggling and you don’t have illicit drugs. You’re not doing anything wrong.”

“We do have an old M2, and some personal weapons. We have a laser on the mast and they can require us to go into port with them on some trumped up charges. I do not want to let armed men on my boat, and they will insist on sending a party over if we get stopped. We do have cargo and they’ll insist on us docking and go over the whole thing. They’ll look in every box of cargo, test anything bottled, Even open random samples of canned goods. They love to rip everything apart searching for secret compartments. No, I don’t want to be forced into a North American port,” Li insisted. “Why now? They never bothered us before.”

“It’s still obvious you have nothing before you on this course but North American and this trawler. He isn’t going to buy that you are on a pleasure cruise of the North Pacific or intended to divert to Russia all along,” Sam said.

“Does the trawler know he’s behind them?” Li asked.

“I told him before you,” Sam said. “He’s low and stealthy and they can’t see him on their radar. They probably have active electronic warfare capacity too.”

“What did he say?”

“He said nothing he has aboard is prohibited, and if they ask he’ll inform them they have two passengers for transfer to Home, and they can’t interfere with them traveling to Home by treaty. He insists he’s going to hold station at the agreed transfer point until you meet him, or he runs low on fuel and supplies.”

“That kind of puts us on the spot,” Li said. “If they stop the Coasties will just board him and demand he turn back with them. So we’ll fail at the pickup still, just a different way. They aren’t going to honor the treaty terms, you know that. How can they prove they are in transit to Home? They hardly have a shuttle ticket, so the Coast Guard isn’t going to buy that for a second. It’s even harder for them to argue because they are USNA flagged so they are his concern. They can board them or take them into port for a safety inspection even if they aren’t accused of a crime.”

“Not my circus, not my monkeys,” Sam said. “I’d sink him for stalking me if I was down there.”

“OK, I’m going to rendezvous with them and get our guys. But I’m not going to let them board me. If you see us both turn to the coast and he’s forcing us toward USNA territorial waters then you may put a rod in him,” Li decided.

“I’ll be listening,” Sam promised. “You don’t have to make a speech of it. Just say ‘rod-now’ and I’ll have one on the way. That will save you a few seconds.”

*

“Jon, we need you in the cafeteria as soon as possible,” Wanda informed him on com.

“Coming,” Jon assured her. “Do I need backup? Do you have an ongoing situation?”

“We have an accidental discharge, one injury, property damage and a resulting argument which may progress into something worse, because they are getting pretty loud arguing,” Wanda said. “I already called EMS for the fellow shot. He doesn’t look to be in any danger.”

“Tell them I’m on the way, that may cool some tempers,” Jon told her. It cost him the advantage of showing up unexpected, but he doubted anybody would set up an ambush if there weren’t more serious crimes than what Wanda described.

“Margaret! Grab a riot gun and follow me. Situation in the cafeteria, and I want you to stand back and cover me,” Jon said, not slowing a bit as he hit the corridor. Jon was walking fast, but didn’t get far before Margaret’s footsteps behind him confirmed she was catching up quickly.

“Beanbag round in the chamber,” Jon ordered when she matched stride beside him. “Use your discretion if that can’t handle it.”

They could hear angry voices from the corridor even before going in. Margaret stopped and took a position just outside the entry, shotgun just out of view behind the door edge, trying not to inflame anyone with an appearance of escalation.

Fred Graham, who worked in a maintenance and housekeeping, was standing in front of the coffee machine, a pool of steaming coffee all around him. He was holding a pistol, but by the barrel, and Jon saw at a glance the man’s own weapon was holstered. He was visibly angry, but all the noise was coming from Phil Donahue, who they called Cowboy. Phil worked for station storage and distribution. He was being held away from Fred by a small crowd. At least four of them literally had hands on him holding him back.

A couple more were attending a young man Jon thought was a shuttle crewman. He had on the sort of coverall some favored as a suit liner, but Jon didn’t know his name. He was seated and had one leg up on another seat, a towel was wrapped around his leg with Ben Patsitsas applying pressure to a wound on his calf. There was blood on the floor, but not enough to make Jon worry he was bleeding out. The fellow looked more pissed off than in pain.

Phil was demanding his pistol back, and Fred was refusing. Jon went over to Fred first and held his hand out. Fred yielded the pistol to him without argument. He looked relieved actually. Jon already understood what this was all about. All the people holding Phil back released him and stood back, one actually walking away. None of them thought he’d try to take his pistol back from Jon, or if he did they’d just watch to see how spectacular his failure would be.

“So, Mr. Donahue, would you like to explain how you lost possession of your weapon?” Jon asked.

Phil looked rattled by Jon’s formal manner of naming him. He hadn’t called him anything but Cowboy for years. He was wearing one of his signature shirts today with the cape shoulders, scalloped pockets and pearl buttons that gave him his nickname. The way Jon addressed him might have been the first clue penetrating his consciousness that he had a serious problem.

“It fell out of my holster when I got up and went off when it hit the floor,” he admitted. “It was an accident,” he added unnecessarily.

“Have you ever heard the expression, ‘Third time’s the charm’?” Jon asked.

Phil said nothing at first, wisely. He’d had two negligent discharges before, both in his apartment. One cleaning his weapon that simply damaged his own belongings, and another that penetrated the bulkhead into the adjoining cubic. Thankfully when that neighbor was absent working. But he didn’t stay smart long, indignation setting his mouth working again pretty quickly.

“I’m sorry, I’ll cover any damages, and I’ll compensate the guy there, I don’t know his name. But that doesn’t give Fred the right to take my property and refuse to hand it back to me.”

“We don’t have a law to cover this,” Jon acknowledged. “I’m pretty happy not having thousands and thousands of endlessly detailed laws. But I’m calling Mr. Muños and asking a vote for authority to handle this from the Assembly this evening. In the mean time, I will return your pistol.”

“Margaret!” Jon called over his shoulder. “Trot down to the Chandlery and get me a roll of tamperproof shipping tape. Wanda, could you get me a meal box for carryout please?” Both of them hurried to comply. A few of those standing there looked satisfied, understanding what he intended.

EMS came in while they waited and took pictures of the scene even though Jon was there, loaded the injured man on a gurney and took him away to the clinic on a powered cart, yellow hazard lights flashing, but no sort of siren in the confines of a public corridor. Ben sat back by his open computer, oblivious to the fact his own shirt was forever ruined from helping the injured man.

Jon unloaded and put Phil’s gun in the carryout box, carefully wrapped two rows of tamperproof tape around the box crossing each other, and handed it to Phil.

“I have not been authorized to do this as Security Head,” Jon told Cowboy, before he could object. “This is personal. If you remove that tape before we have a public hearing on the matter tonight you will personally answer to me, by meeting me in the north hub corridor in the morning, and I will put a bullet between your eyes for your disrespect,” Jon told him, with no particular emotion evident.

Phil just nodded his acknowledgement. Jon had a reputation, and refusing to answer a challenge or resolve it would result in banishment from Home.

“If for some reason you decide you can’t tolerate that, and I see you out in public before then wearing a weapon openly I’m just going to shoot you dead as a public hazard. I won’t wait until the morning. Do I make myself clear?” Jon asked.

“Yes sir,” Phil said, understanding a nod wasn’t sufficient.

“Fine, I’ll go consult with Mr. Muños, and regardless of my wishes and opinion you’ll be at the mercy of the electorate to resolve this in the evening,” Jon said.

Phil didn’t look thrilled by that either.

Chapter 6

When the Tobiuo pulled up near the trawler the Coast Guard cutter had moved up on it, so they were only a kilometer away and closing fast. The trawler was close enough somebody at the rear of the open wheelhouse waved. Across the rear it said, West Shore. There was nothing much to say this late, they just watched the cutter coming, cutting back on power when neither of them fled.

“You there in the ketch, flying the Italian flag. This is the USNA Coast Guard cutter Mobile. Remain at a halt and prepare to be boarded,” they called on the radio.

“We are in international waters and not under your national authority,” Li replied on the radio. “What is your reason for wanting to board us?”

“We suspect you of having prohibited items,” the cutter said.

“We are picking up passengers from the trawler. If you wish, examine them and their baggage they wish to send over. You can see them loaded to us and we’ll leave,” Li offered.

“They are launching an inflatable at the rear,” his helmsman told Li.

“Tara,” Li called to his number two officer, “handle the laser. If they try to point the deck cannon at us disable it. I don’t trust them. They may have been ordered to disappear us. One shot from that will sink us and they have no reasonable need to threaten us with it, sitting dead in the water.”

“Where should I aim?” Tara asked. The turret was one of those faceted designs made to reflect radar up into the sky instead of back towards a ship, probably a Bofors.

“Shoot once right through the middle of the turret. Then again down low near the deck. That should disable it, either from shooting or turning,” Li hoped.

“We are launching a boarding party,” the cutter informed him again on the radio. “Do not resist. Resistance will be met with lethal force. If you have weapons put them down now. Persons with weapons will be assumed to intend using them. Do not engage your engines or you will be fired on.”

“Turret!” Li called, seeing the tube lift and start to traverse toward them. Tara fired while the word was still in his mouth. The beam itself from the laser was invisible at first, but a flare on the turret marked where it burned metal and composite away. The vapor in the beam made it look like the turret was projecting a hot narrow flame up at an angle, towards the top of their mast, then it cut through.

The laser beam could have destroyed either electronics or the motors and mechanism itself to keep the gun from aiming, as Li planned. However the cannon mounted two magazines of two hundred ten shells each. The beam found the left magazine as soon as it penetrated the turret armor. It directly ignited four rounds. The rest followed, aided by being enclosed.

Four hundred twenty 57mm shells with explosive projectiles make a big explosion. The turret over them helped direct the blast down through the deck. It didn’t blow off in a piece, like the turret of a heavy tank might. It burst in pieces, but the ready magazine below failed to detonate, or the Tobiuo might not have survived that from so near. The blast didn’t quite sever the bow, but it was a close thing. It left it bent up barely attached at the keel, and the force of the blast almost drove the foredeck completely under before it rebounded. The stealth cutter was already built low, close to the water. It looked more like a submarine on the surface than a conventional ship with an overhanging hull. The explosion did destroy the bridge, crushing the front of the superstructure, and stripping the radar and radio antennas off.

When the flash blobs started to clear from Li’s vision the rear of the vessel was already tilted forward at about ten degrees, and the bow forward of where the turret had been was pitched up in front making a shallow vee. Li barely got to see the point of the bow sliding under the water. By the time he looked to the rear the screws were coming out of the water, and a couple hands on deck were jumping off the rising stern for the inflatable.

There was damage to the Tobiuo from flying debris. Li could see little pieces littering the deck, and there was a large twisted piece of metal embedded on the inside of the opposite rail.

Li stared open mouthed, shocked. That wasn’t what he expected. Then his brain kicked back in.

“Cease fire Tara,” He wasn’t still shooting, but Li wanted to make sure he didn’t start back up.

Li engaged their loud-hailer and called to the inflatable. “We can pick you up, and any other survivors, but not until you throw your weapons overboard,” Li demanded.

The trawler, on the other side of the cutter, suddenly dipped and had foam at the rear, and started away the direction she was already pointed, to the north. The water was already rising around the front of the superstructure on the cutter it was going down so fast.

The flashes from the inflatable warned Li, and he threw himself to the deck, yelling, “Get down!”

The teak gunwale above him splintered from thirty caliber machinegun fire. Bullets pinged off the rigging, and there were frayed holes through the composite hull.

“They said it would be easy!” Li said, face pressed into the deck.

“Can I shoot?” Tara asked, panic in his voice, but disciplined enough to hold on his last orders.

“Hell yes! Shoot man, shoot!” One of the big main salon ports starred with fresh holes to underscore the urgency. Li couldn’t see what was happening, because he wasn’t going to stick his head up. When Tara finally called an all clear he went on all four to an undamaged section of the rail and levered himself up cautiously.

The cutter’s stern was high in the air now, the back of the superstructure sliding into the water, frothing from escaping air. Of the inflatable nothing could be seen except some small pieces of equipment and some low bumps in the water that Li was afraid were bodies. The trawler had stopped about six hundred meters out and was slowly coming about.

Li kept hoping for somebody else to emerge and jump in the water, but the stern slid out of sight, the only sign of it now the floating debris, a circle of bubbles, and a sheen on the water.

“Tara, check and see if anybody is hurt. Then send somebody to inspect all along the waterline. We need to find and repair any holes there first, and then work upward with patches. Report any other damage you find,” Lin said.

The trawler was returning slowly, there were quite a few people on deck doing something. “Gerald, see if she will respond to the throttle, and point us into the swell dead slow. See if you have someone free to hang fenders…We’d hate to mark her up,” Li said, biting off a manic laugh. She was pretty dinged already…

“The diesel won’t start,” Gerald announced, ” I’ll try to find out why. Using the electric drive to get steerage.”

The cook came on deck looking angry. “We had three holes below the water line. Those are rough plugged and the others will be covered in an hour. The cabin will take longer.” Li was encouraged his crew took the initiative so quickly. His order hadn’t had time to filter down. “We have three big ports in the main salon gone, and one of the lights. They shot the small refrigerator and wiped out a couple pans and a few cans of Spam. There are unsightly holes here and there in the cushions and such. But the bastards shot the big screen in the salon!”

Li nodded acknowledgement. He was more concerned about the diesel.

The fenders were in place now along their rear quarter. The trawler helmsman had obviously done this before. He put his bow about halfway down the length of the Tobiuo and steered away slightly as the flow between the hulls sucked them together. They touched gently enough there was no rebound.

The man with the line did not intend to tie them up. That was fine with Li, he wasn’t keen on that anyway. He had a carabiner tied on a light line which he clipped on the equipment cases before he tossed them across. One of the fellows tossed the soft luggage across, and jumped after it. The hard shell cases were obviously too precious to take any chances of losing them, even in these mild seas and the trawler overhanging their rail slightly. It was only about a meter and a half drop, but the fellow who was already across grabbed the other as he landed, although he didn’t seem to need help. That must be their scientist.

The second hard case came across, safety clipped again, and the fellow who seemed to be in charge sent the line back and waved them off. He handed the case to the fellow who had taken the first one below and worked his way back to Li, ignoring the soft luggage, assuming it would be tended to.

“Are you the master?” he asked of Li.

“Yes, I am. Welcome aboard. Take the first two cabins to starboard.” Since he didn’t offer a name neither did Li. “If there is anything you need ask any crew. If we have it they’ll provide it. I’d appreciate it if you maintain a radio silence. If you need communications we can arrange it securely, and without advertising our location to the world.”

“No sir, we have no wants. I’m Chen’s man, but I have no orders to report to him short of making contact on Home. We’ll eat with crew if you have no objection. I’ll go make sure my charge is settled in and comfortable. Do you have any rules about where he or I can go?”

“You are welcome in the common areas. Storage and other cabins are off limits. I’d rather not have you on deck underway. If you want to come up in the cockpit you are welcome, but clip a safety line on, even in calm seas like today. You may speak with the helmsman if you wish, but if he finds it irritating or distracting he can dismiss you. He isn’t a servant. There’s a small galley off the main salon, if you want a snack between meals or late. But I’m afraid that on top of the other visible damage, the away team the cutter was launching shot up the small refrigerator there. I have no idea what survived or how big a mess it is inside.”

“Cutter?” the agent said. He turned and scanned the horizon as if he’d overlooked it. “I guess I missed that,” he said, perfectly straight faced.

“As you say,” Li agreed. So that’s how we play it, he thought. The ship did go down fast, and the explosion stripped the antennas off…Even if they had a hot satellite link running probably all their command saw was the signal dropping off. If there was even a satellite to link to. North America still hadn’t replaced everything destroyed in the war. A lot of Earth nations had used the war as cover to remove each other’s sats and blame Home. But he was sure somebody, somewhere, would know who to blame. Of course whether one agency would share that with another agency within their own government was another question.

The trawler cut power and slid back. When it slid off the last fender the helmsman skillfully ran the throttle full astern, pulling the bow back before it could swing into contact with their hull or props. It did swing in, sweeping past the edge of the stern, and as they rotated into the Tobiuo’s slight wake he reversed his props and made a long sweeping turn across their stern. They straightened and took a course to the north west. Li had no idea where they were headed, and no desire to know.

Gerald swung to the west, north-west and brought it up to ten knots. Headed for their rendezvous.

The agent looked mildly alarmed as they had gained some distance from the noisy trawler.

“I don’t hear or feel an engine running,” he said. It wasn’t a question, but Li took it for one.

“We’re on electric. We have a diesel with a nice loud exhaust, and we try to run it from dock or in a harbor. The uh, recent damage we sustained included that engine. I have yet to get a report on the exact problem. It’s undoubtedly something expensive. We’ll probably get some sail up in the morning. Everybody is busy patching holes and such, and they’re going to be exhausted.”

“I’m experienced,” the fellow told him, “if you need somebody to lend a hand. If the weather changes you may need some sail up to give you steerage, once your batteries run down.”

“Thank you, but we can run like this all night long,” Li assured him. “Twice as fast as this if we need to really, but she doesn’t like doing it.”

The fellow looked puzzled. No way this boat could carry enough batteries to do that.

“It’s a nuke boat,” Li told him bluntly.

The man got a slow smile and almost laughed, but he read Li’s face, and changed his mind. This was a hard core agent, who’d just been through a great deal, and he wasn’t stupid.

“A nuke boat, and you damn near chopped a cutter in half with one shot,” he said, and looked along the ship from the cockpit. Li observed this inspection without comment.

It looked every bit a normal sailing ketch to the agent. There was nothing to indicate special sensors or weapons ports. He had no idea how they’d dispatched the cutter. He’d seen no missile trail.

“It’s a damn Q boat!” he declared, with sudden certainty. “You suckered the cutter.”

“Cutter?” Li asked, putting his best innocent face on. He was just handing the fellow back a little of his own after all.

“Thank you, sir,” the man said, which was no answer. He looked like he suppressed a salute and went to attend the scientist.

*

Jeff had the toy drone April ordered for him to tear apart and reverse engineer, and an extra because by some miracle all four worked. He’d figured out how to program it to return without managing it with his spex and was sitting playing catch with himself. He’d throw it at least four meters over into the kitchen space and it would fly back and cut power dropping just in front of him to be caught.

“You’ve reinvented the boomerang,” April observed.

“Not nearly,” Jeff objected. “The guy who invented that was brilliant. I’d love to have know him. He had to be much smarter than me.”

April didn’t argue, but she was skeptical and couldn’t hide it.

“No, really. It’s a very complex shape. Somebody thought it out from observation,” Jeff insisted. “I read some fool of an anthropologist theorize that an aborigine found a weathered stick and copied the shape. Anybody who believed that fantasy would believe Henry Ford found a Model T that had auto-assembled from an ore body in the desert and stole the design. What he was really saying is - I can’t believe some grunting savage, without a degree like me, was smarter than I can ever hope to be.”

Then his com demanded his attention with a high priority signal.

Message to ALL on Home com: Special Assembly of the people called for 20:00 Zulu by Mr. Eduardo Muños on behalf of Jon Davis, Head of Security. Discussing a matter of Public Safety.

“What is that about?” April asked Jeff. She got an alert the same time as him. It had to be the same.

“I don’t know,” he said, irritated. “I spend almost a fifth of our income on intelligence gathering and stuff like this still surprises me. Sometimes I wonder why I even try. You’re the one who has a private contact for Jon. Muños is calling the assembly for him. Why don’t you ask him?”

“No, no. That’s a terrible idea,” April said.

“Why? He has to know.” Jeff pointed out.

“Yes, but if Jon has the thought cross his mind, Should I tell April? I’d much rather have him assume there’s no need, because I’ll know already.”

“That’s uh, crazy,” Jeff insisted.

“Not at all. People tell you much more when they assume they don’t have to tell you. They rush to tell you things because they are afraid it will look like they are trying to be sneaky and keep things from you. They’re scared next time they need to ask you something you’ll cut them off because they kept something secret from you.”

“So, you think Jon would tell you, but he isn’t? Why not?” Jeff asked confused.

“He’d tell me if we happened to be doing some other business. He wouldn’t call up to chat about something else and fail to mention what the Assembly is about. We just don’t happen to be in contact at the moment. I could dream up some reason to call, and he’d spill his guts about this and three other things. But if I keep doing that it becomes an obvious pattern where I’m fishing for information.”

“But you didn’t pretend you knew what it was about to me,” Jeff protested.

“Of course not. You already tell me everything you get from Papa-san and Chen Lee, and I tell you everything you need to know. We’re equals, and it’s my money we’re spending to get it too. But I don’t owe Jon everything I know. He has to keep earning it.”

Jeff looked confused and dismayed.

“This is why you hire out spying,” April assured him. “You should. You aren’t devious enough. I find it charming, not a weakness. None of us can do everything. Everybody has a certain suite of talents. I’ve noticed Jon is too honest and can’t lie for anything. He has to delegate that to people who can do it. But since you want to know about this I’ll find out. Just not from Jon.”

April picked up her pad and used it slaved to her spex so Jeff wouldn’t see what she keyed in. She’d learned quite a while back that he could watch the dance of your fingers on the keys and tell you the input. Even for long strings of numbers. She called her friend Ruby, but didn’t mention her name out loud and her screen didn’t display the video either. Her spex did.

“Hi, I need a favor, if you happen to know what’s going on with this sudden call to an Assembly. I have a friend who wants to know,” April said.

“Oh that, sure. Wanda told me when I got to work. Cowboy couldn’t hang on to his gun, which went flying when he stood up in the cafeteria this morning. It went off on impact and shot a shuttle pilot through the leg. Jon has had quite enough of this from him. This is his third ‘oops’. Also, he shot my coffee dispenser. We’re trying to see if it can be welded up and repaired. No way I want to try to get one on the freight schedule right now,” Ruby said. “If they can’t fix it I’ll have one made from scratch. It may not be as pretty, but I don’t care as long as it works.”

“Cowboy? Is that guy who wears shirts with buttons all the time?” April asked.

“Yeah, Phil is his real name. He works in distribution,” Ruby remembered.

“Was that the guy that tried to go nude everywhere after the war, when he realized there was no law against it?” April asked.

“No, no. That was Albert Nielson. He’s a warehouse worker. Phil actually goes out and drops the stuff off at your cubic. But they do seem to be a strange bunch in supply,” Ruby allowed.

“Thank you. I owe you one,” April said.

“Another one,” Ruby said, she was keeping score, and she terminated the call.

“One of our resident idiots dropped a pistol on the deck and wounded a stranger. Did some damage in the cafeteria too. Apparently this isn’t the first time. I never heard about any accidental discharges before, have you?” April asked.

“No, it must not have been out in public,” Jeff guessed.

“But somebody either heard it or he damaged something that had to be repaired,” April decided.

“Yeah, or he was stupid and didn’t realize he shouldn’t reveal it,” Jeff said.

“Yeah, that could be with this fellow,” April agreed. “I just wonder what Jon is going to ask the Assembly to do about it.”

“Banishment seems harsh if it wasn’t willful behavior,” Jeff said. “And yet the next one may shoot somebody through the head. It sounds like a good bet there will be a next time. Three is a habit.” Jeff frowned and thought about it. “A pistol should not go off just from a fall to the deck. I bet he’s been messing with it, modifying it to have a hair trigger.”

“Suggest that to Jon privately. I’m just concerned. If we start disarming people you only have to look at Earth to see where that goes,” April said.

“Yes, I wouldn’t agree to start making general restrictions. But this fellow apparently has demonstrated he can’t be trusted with a gun. Now, if you crashed a shuttle into the dock or other traffic, how many times would they let it pass before pulling your ticket?” Jeff wondered.

“That isn’t the same,” April insisted.

“Only because we don’t make you take lessons and pass an exam to carry a weapon. You are assumed to be competent and granted your ticket automatically. But I’d say you can still demonstrate incompetence,” Jeff said.

April nodded. “If he’s too stupid to handle a gun safely he probably can’t handle other things in life.”

“But those other things won’t kill people,” Jeff said. “I don’t want licensing either. It’s always going to turn political and be used against whomever the licensing authority doesn’t like. But I’d support giving him a choice. Stop carrying a gun or leave.”

“OK, I hate to have to do that, but I agree. If Jon doesn’t suggest something like that, you should. You said it very reasonably.”

“OK, I will. You want to go to the cafeteria and see it live?” Jeff asked.

“Sure, let’s go early, stake out chairs and have a late bite after,” April agreed.

*

Jeff got a call, well before they needed to head to the cafeteria.

“Li had some problems with the pickup,” Chen informed Jeff.

Jeff looked alarmed, and caught April’s eye. “Did they make the pickup or not?”

“Both of them are on board and safe, for now, but a USNA cutter interfered and tried to send an armed party to board them.”

“I’m conferencing April into this,” Jeff said.

“I’m in,” April confirmed.

“To repeat for April, there was a problem. The trawler from Vancouver was shadowed by a USNA Coast Guard cutter and they insisted they were going to do an armed boarding of the Tobiuo. Li might have allowed them to inspect him, I’m not clear on that, but the idiots made a move to point their deck cannon at him,” Chen said. “He said since he wasn’t moving, he saw no need to do that. Very simply, he didn’t trust them not to sink him on political orders. So he took them out instead.”

“They might have just been intimidating Li,” April guessed. “That’s kind of stupid. They couldn’t fire on him once their boarding party was aboard. Or even very close for that matter. It’s dead easy to aim and shoot if they tried to run away. The only purpose to immediately point the gun at them was to communicate that they were too tough to mess with. Oops, they were wrong about that.”

“Well he doesn’t intimidate worth a damn,” Chen said. “It was the Mobile, and she went down with no survivors. They had an away party in an inflatable, but they opened fire on the Tobiuo with a light machine gun. Li had just offered to pick them up if they dropped their weapons overboard.”

“Stuck in an inflatable far from land? Sounds like a generous offer to me. They should have accepted,” April said.

“The main question in my mind is, did they have time to radio a report of what was happening?” Jeff asked. “I assume you are continuing to keep a watch on them? Are there other boats or aircraft making any move to intercept them?”

“The Tobiuo’s first shot produced such a violent secondary explosion they may not have sent any message. The front of the superstructure was severely damaged and it appeared the antennas were all stripped off. I believe naval vessels all have a continuous data link now. I have no idea if that extends to Coast Guard vessels. If they had a sat in position to use it is another question,” Chen said.

“Even if there was, they might have just lost contact. There’s no reason to imagine they were streaming video or anything,” Jeff said. “We have no positive reason to think this was even a centrally ordered surveillance of the trawler. The cutter simply might have noted the trawler was not on a customary heading to go to fishing grounds, or some other anomaly provoked their interest and they followed. North America has been leaving us and ours alone pretty much. They might even have been shaving their orders a bit, and didn’t report trailing the trawler. If they had orders to leave the Tobiuo alone, an overly enthusiastic commander could say he was just following the trawler and rationalize it led him to the Tobiuo without initiating that event himself.”

“If so, he found out the hard way why there was a ‘don’t touch’ order,” April said. “Will they continue to ignore us, or is losing a cutter too painful to let go?”

Chen shrugged. “I don’t know. But it may be too dangerous now for the Tobiuo to approach North American waters. How far do you want me to escalate if they vector another ship or an aircraft toward her?”

Jeff looked at April and lifted an eyebrow, seeking her opinion.

“I’d suggest if you see anything moving toward the Tobiuo drop a rod across their nose. If a blazing reentry vehicle cutting across their path doesn’t send a sufficiently strong message, that there is an interested eye on them from the heavens, don’t bother with a second warning. Drop the next on right on them,” April said. “How long until they transfer the stuff with Dionysus’ Chariot?”

“Early tomorrow morning,” Chen said, and looked at Jeff.

Jeff agreed with April before Chen could ask. He didn’t want Chen to act like he had to confirm it.

“A rod might not suffice for a submarine, and it’s a very poor choice for a maneuverable aircraft. If you need a ten kiloton weapon dropped call me. Better to put the blame on me than the militia. Try to give me at least ten minutes if you can, so I can examine what I have stacked up in orbit and direct it. I don’t have many of the small weapons. But we want the Tobiuo safe. Under no circumstances will we sacrifice her. If I have to use large weapons I will do so,” Jeff warned. “I’m not sure how many square kilometers of ocean a two hundred megaton device will clear of submarines. But I bet the answer is ‘enough’,” Jeff said.

“I’ll try to spare the fishes if I can,” Chen said. He took Jeff’s nod for a dismissal.

“If you want to make things perfectly clear to the North Americans, perhaps you should offer Li the option of having the Tobiuo flagged as a Home vessel,” April told Jeff.

He looked at her, astonished. “But we aren’t a maritime nation,” he protested. “It’s not like we even have any Earth territory, much less on an ocean. It sounds absurd.”

“Look into it. I’d bet anything they let land-locked Earth nations flag ocean going vessels. If they can why shouldn’t we?” April asked. “If that’s prohibited we should refuse the Earth nations the right to flag space ships. After all, they aren’t in space. Fair is fair,” April insisted.

*

As April expected, the artist Lindsey was in the cafeteria. April and Jeff sat out front of the improvised stage. They didn’t sit to the side like they would for a regular Assembly. There was an unofficial hierarchy of seating that had evolved. The prominent people and business owners sat to each side rather than in front. They tended to self sort into groups like ship builders. Today April and Jeff didn’t even sit close to them.

Phil Donahue decided not to attend the Assembly in person. It was a last minute special assembly. April had no idea if she’d want to attend an Assembly if she was the object of a complaint like Phil. She could hope she never had to find out. The thing about it was – Jon could request an Assembly be called – but there was no guarantee it would do what he wanted. Once convened it had the power to do anything it wanted. It could see blame where Jon didn’t, and it might impose solutions or penalties he didn’t anticipate or want.

After Mr. Muños called them to order he sat and turned the lectern over to Jon. Jon told pretty much the story Ruby had related to April, but detailed how Cowboy had placed lives and property in jeopardy before on two occasions. Mr. Muños did interrupt to ask if Mr. Donahue wished to call any witnesses, to contest the facts of those earlier accidental discharges. He didn’t dispute the bare facts at all. Neither did he try to make excuses. That was probably to the good for him.

Jon emphasized how reluctant he was to curtail any person’s right to effective self defense, but insisted Phil was such a hazard having three discharges in two years that it was a matter of public safety. He pointed out that with life extension therapy Phil might live another hundred years on Home. At the present rate he could have a hundred fifty unsafe discharges during that period. The odds one might main or kill somebody seemed too high. He didn’t make a detailed recommendation what to do about it. That surprised April, but it seemed very smart to her. Let the Assembly find their own solution, and Jon couldn’t be put in the position of having his rejected.

A few proposed banishing Phil outright because they were philosophically opposed to disarming him. Before that went to a vote somebody fielded a counter proposal that he be given the choice to stay on home unarmed, or accept voluntary banishment to Earth.

Another voter proposed he be allowed to carry any sort of edged weapon he wished, excepting something like a spear that would be so big it was a danger in the hands of the clumsy. That made another suggest he be allowed a shotgun in the privacy of his own apartment, but only loaded with the Israeli shells that used a sort of grit, and would not penetrate bulkheads.

Mr Muños let them talk, nothing proposed required a vote to clear matters for a subsequent proposal, so he made a list and waited. The last proposal suggested that he be allowed to have the issue reexamined in fifty years, but they then all agreed he was free to petition the Assembly any time he wished, if he stayed.

Muños brought the items to a vote, starting with straight banishment, asking “How do you people say?” in the traditional form. They rejected banishment in short order, less than 5% wanting it.

They ended up with it being his choice to go or stay, edged weapons allowed, a limited firearm in his quarters if he wished. Only the shotgun had a serious number rejecting it, but not a majority.

“I want to stay,” Phil decided without any delay. “Would you tell me what is acceptable to do with my pistol?”

“It’s your property,” Eduardo Muños reminded him. “We are not stealing it. You can keep it or dispose of it as you wish. Just do not wear it out in public at the ready.”

“Anybody want a used pistol, cheap?” Phil asked. That got a laugh, and Zak of the Home Chandlery offered to put it at auction for no fee, as a public service. Phil accepted.

April and Jeff hadn’t needed to say a word. April was very happy with that. The less often you put measures forward the more people were disposed to listen when you did. They grabbed a bite and left to go see what was happening with the Tobiuo.

Chapter 7

The seas were quite calm, that state expected to hold for most of the next two days. Li went to bed, leaving Tara on the night watch after the man had a nap. He could sleep easy with Tara at the wheel. He trusted Tara’s judgment deeply. Li put another crewman at the wheel with him, not because he didn’t trust Tara, but because he was uncomfortable with any crewman all alone at the wheel with Chen’s agent on the boat. The extra man could fetch him coffee and provide a measure of safety, if the fellow wasn’t as committed to Chen as they thought. He also issued Tara a pistol, which wasn’t their custom at all.

Tara seemed alert when Li woke at first light. He hadn’t needed an alarm. Li was actually surprised at how long he’d slept. Li dismissed the helper to his bunk so he could speak with Tara privately. First he examined the plot on the screen in front of the wheel. The following seas were picking up, so Tara had adjusted the speed back to eight knots.

“Do you think the clients will reimburse us to fix all the damage?” Tara asked.

“I certainly hope so! It wasn’t just some random event. It only happened because we were in their service,” Li said. “They’ve never been cheap with us before.”

Tara nodded, satisfied. “I finally got a report on the diesel. A bullet busted the injector manifold. It’s an aluminum casting. I’d suggest getting a new one, because of the pressure at which it operates. I could try patching it, but I wouldn’t trust it. At least it has a safety circuit and won’t keep pumping if the pressure doesn’t rise quickly. It only spilled about a liter of fuel, already cleaned up, and it wouldn’t lose more unless you were stupid and stubborn and manually reset it.”

“Do you think you could have it out before we are done transferring everything from the Dionysus’ Chariot?” Li asked.

“If I get somebody on it, right now,” Tara agreed.

“Do so,” Li ordered. “Things are better in port, but finding a major part, not just common service items, for an older diesel may still be a bit of a challenge. Our friends on Home can copy this one easier than we can find one. And we know we’ll be meeting them again, so they can just bring it along.”

Tara called on the wheelhouse com and had someone on it faster than Li could run down the companionway and see to it himself.

“Do you want to go get some rest?” Li offered.

“I couldn’t sleep. I’d just be laying listening for you to start the transfer and loading. But if you want to take the wheel and ease her up to the Chariot, you are probably safer than me, having rested.”

“All right, I have the conn,” Li acknowledged, and took the wheel. “Did our guests stir last night?”

“Not that I saw. They didn’t come up here. I’m going to use the head and get a coffee,” Tara said. “Want some?”

“Yes, and a couple breakfast sandwiches,” Li requested. “They should be ready by now.”

“Excellent, and a couple for me too,” Tara said, and went below.

*

When his com beeped Jeff was surprised. He had it set to only alert him to calls from a handful of people past 22:00. When he went to bed, which he was near doing, he activated another filter that took it down to seventeen people currently entitled to wake him up.

It was Irwin from the Private Bank of Home on com. From the color of the wall behind him Jeff knew the man was still at work. Of course Jeff was too, except his bed was in the same cubic since he had his engineer Mo occupying his own apartment. Irwin looked frazzled too.

“Did you dump those funds like you were planning to do?” Irwin demanded.

“Starting three days ago,” Jeff assured him. “The Russians are already dispersing it through several European banks. I don’t know the details, but I trust the agents working for me. Don’t worry, they have your funds too. I sent it all at once, although they won’t publically dump the whole amount at once.”

“They’ve been selling USNA dollars three days?” Irwin asked.

“Right, and a few EuroMarks we got stuck with, and some Brazilian notes too,” Jeff said.

“If that’s been ongoing why did things only start going screwy about four hours ago?” Irwin asked.

“Well, I know this will be hard for you to understand, because you live and breathe banking, but I’ve been busy with other things and haven’t followed the markets into the evening. If it wasn’t a big enough problem to make the regular news flow, and trigger my news bots, I wouldn’t know about it. I’d guess off hand perhaps what triggered this, is that late this afternoon I decided I had to put my customers on notice we weren’t dealing in USNA dollars any more. We’ll take Aussie dollars or gold. Anything else is negotiable at that instant. The thing about several of those customers is they may not have the annual cash flow of a small country, but there is no other source for what they make. There are legal barriers as well as physical to making them elsewhere, beside the time it would take to build the capacity. Also, now is not the best time to be forced to lift lots of heavy specialized equipment to orbit. But you still haven’t said how things went screwy.”

“Oh…The Australian dollar went up almost five percent against the USNA dollar. By the time I wake up in the morning it will buy two and a half dollars USNA. And gold has climbed to over eighty two thousand dollars USNA. That’s an eleven percent rise from midday Hong Kong price. But the USNA dollar seems stable against everything else other than the Aussie dollar. It hasn’t taken a dive like we discussed might happen.”

“Don’t be silly, it just took an eleven percent drop,” Jeff said.

“How do you figure?” Irwin asked.

“You didn’t phrase it correctly. How many dollars does it take to buy an ounce of gold? A lot more because they are worth less. Or how many dollars can you buy for an ounce? A lot more, they are on sale,” Jeff said.

“Gold hasn’t been pegged to the dollar for a long time,” Irwin objected.

“Indeed it hasn’t. But it’s not gold having a problem right now,” Jeff explained. “The problem they are having at the moment is that the dollar is not pegged to gold.”

Irwin just looked at him uncomprehending. It was too big a mental leap for him to see valuations in anything but dollars. That was his life long experience and training.

*

Barak took a deep breath, looked at Alice and apologized. “I don’t know why I’m so irritable. It wasn’t worth a cross word at all. I’m sorry.”

“Deloris is in a foul mood too. She was frowning and unhappy when I went by to have a bite with her mid-shift,” Alice revealed. “I’m not really any better, just better at hiding it.”

“Did she cheer up from some company?” Barak asked.

“I can’t help her,” Alice said. “We like each other, but not like that, and I’m wondering if you have a problem with me? You’ve been…stand-offish since we started the new shifts.”

“I don’t want to be, but it doesn’t seem fair to Deloris that she’s the only one excluded. That doesn’t come under the heading of the loneliness of command. Or it shouldn’t. I wish you could sit a bridge watch for a shift,” Barak said.

“I can’t learn enough to do that in the time we have left. Not legitimately anyway. You could overlap a watch with her,” Alice suggested.

“There’s a video record of all bridge time,” Barak reminded her. “Maybe if we didn’t need a clean record because of Captain Jaabir, I’d think about having an equipment failure. But how can we ask the owners to decide stuff about his death and Dobbs flaking out, based on the record, if we play games with it ourselves?”

“I think we need to ask Captain Wrigley to make a command decision and declare a rest day. Not ask but just tell the owners we are cutting the engines back to an idle, setting the boards on automatic, with alarms for vital functions only, and take a recreation day. In my opinion, it will enhance safety, not damage it.”

“Your idea, you should come present it to Deloris,” Barak said.

“Of course. You’re a sweetie, but you’d still get all embarrassed and tongue tied. See?” Alice asked him. “You’re blushing just talking to me. Why in the world do you need to blush with either one of us?”

“That’s such a basic part of me. I’m not sure I can ever unlearn it. I always seem to be intimidated with older women,” he admitted.

“Poor baby, because you’re never going to catch up,” Alice said, amused.

*

The sky was clear and beautiful, the sea peaceful, with long shallow swells. The Tobiuo sailed across the waves with such a slow even pitch that crewmen with their sea legs didn’t even notice the motion. The sun was clear of the horizon behind them and the moon was low to the southwest bleached out to a ghostly crescent by the sun.

Chen’s man and the scientist came up from below. The agent made a little clipping motion with his hand and Li pointed to a locker. He got the right one on the second try and put a safety line on his charge and then himself. Li was impressed he didn’t have to be reminded, and didn’t argue that the day was so nice it wasn’t necessary.

The Canadian quietly questioned his minder however. “Do we really need these when it’s so calm?”

The agent waved at the expanse of the ocean around them. “Think you can swim to shore?” he asked with a faint smile.

“No, but I wasn’t planning on jumping overboard either.”

He was wearing a safari shirt with lots of pockets jammed with stuff, and cape shoulders, loose over a t-shirt like yesterday. It wasn’t cool enough to warrant it, so Li wondered if he was carrying a pistol and wanted to hide it. If so, he had no idea how indifferent they’d be. Wait until he saw Home…

“Very few do,” his handler told the scientist. “Yet every year people fall off cruise ships. Strange things happen. It may sound crazy, but people have been sailing along, enjoying a cold drink and relaxing in the sun, and had a playful whale bigger than their boat jump out of the water and do a belly flop right across their boat. Even on the shore, folks feel safe on solid ground, fishing from the rocks or a jetty, and the odd rogue wave sweeps them off before they can scramble to safety.”

The fellow probably wasn’t fully convinced. But he had the decency to nod his acquiescence.

The agent looked at his charge. Not angry, but thoughtful. “I’ve talked to people who have been there, and read a lot before I decided I wanted to go to Home the same as you are. In a way it’s as beguiling an environment as the sea. You feel safe because nothing is happening, but it can swallow you up as easily as these waters. Just as these folks have life vests and survival suits, the people on habitats and space ships have emergency suits and survival balls. They know how to patch a hole to keep air in as well as a sailor can to keep the water out. I strongly urge you to pay very close attention when they tell you any safety procedure.”

“Of course I will. I’m not stupid,” he said defensively.

“Good, stupid people don’t do well there,” he assured him.

Nobody said anything for awhile. The scientist sat on one of the benches by the gunwale, face into the wind that had swung about, and they were running against. The agent stood behind Li, checking out the plot screen in front of the wheel but not crowding him.

“It was never made clear to me…Do you mind me asking if you also work for Chen Lee?” the agent asked Li.

“I’m the owner of the ketch,” Li told him. “I think you’d probably consider me an independent contractor. Are you aware of a person named Tetsuo?”

“No, where does he fit in?”

“Tetsuo had to leave North America because of the chaos and danger during the coup of the Patriot Party. He was living in Hawaii, and playing host to a young woman from Home named April Lewis.”

“I’m aware of that name from news reports,” the fellow said.

“Tetsuo fled Hawaii in this boat, with some members of his household. He eventually delivered Miss Lewis and her bodyguard to Tonga, where they could safely lift to Home. Later, when he went to Home himself, he liquidated his Earth holdings and gifted those who served his household according to their service and their needs. The Tobiuo was a sort of severance pay to me.”

The man looked down the length of the boat. Even with bullet holes and blown out ports it was impressive as an employment bonus. He seemed to come to a decision from that.

“I’m Peter Martens,” he belatedly volunteered. “I was one of Chen’s men in Europe, but I doubt I shall ever set foot there again. Things are getting normalized again there, after the terrible flu, but one wonders how much will be remembered, or worse, records found of it, from back in the worst of the chaos. I felt it too hot for me. Chen Lee, Tetsuo, and Miss Lewis…How do they relate to each other?”

“You may call me Li,” he said. Since the man finally offered his name. “How all these people relate is pretty complicated. I’ll try to simplify it,” Li said scrunching his eyebrows together. “First, Home is like a small town with one drug store, one hardware. People tend to all do business with each other of necessity. If you can’t get along with someone it’s a problem, because there may not be a lot of other choices. Miss Lewis, April that is, had a role in the revolution that created Home. She is associated with another young woman named Heather Anderson, and a young man named Jeff Singh. They have business interests in common. If you deal with one, assume you are dealing with all three.”

Peter lifted an eyebrow, but Li ignored the unspoken question.

“April came to Tetsuo’s household as a guest of his daughter,” Li said.

“Ah, are they of an age?” Peter asked.

“No, Tetsuo’s daughter Adzusa must be near twice April’s age, but you should understand, the children on Home tend to be precocious, unless they are not very bright. And most of them are of sufficient intelligence simply because in order to get to Home their parents have to be of good stock. It’s harder to find a fool there than a genius. They tend to do things at a much earlier age – such as youngsters did in earlier periods of history out of necessity.”

Peter had that intense look on his face that said this was an adjustment to absorb. So Li paused and let him think on that a moment before he went on.

“Adzusa is a reporter and photographer, associated with a very well regarded Japanese writer. She actually knows April because Adzusa covered her professionally. How she came to invite April to visit her family home is a story she never shared with me. But they showed up one day at the house, and both Tetsuo and his wife Lin were quickly taken with her. One of the reasons April came to Earth was to effect a rescue of a couple USNA naval lieutenants. Tetsuo remained on Earth, on the Tobiuo, and we sailed around the Horn to the Atlantic and picked up her lieutenants on Mount Desert Isle off Maine.”

“That’s…a challenging passage,” Peter said.

“It is, in certain seasons, and with a lesser vessel. The Tobiuo is very hard to break,” Li assured him.

“That’s reassuring.”

“Chen works for Tetsuo and for Jeff Singh both,” Li revealed. “That tells you something right there, since they don’t expect it to put him in conflict between their needs. I know he also does occasional security work with other security professionals on Home. Most just know him as Chen, if you refer to him as Mr. Lee you’ll probably get some blank looks. Tetsuo similarly is only known as ‘T’ to a number of people, and the three young ones sometimes call him Papa-san. He also does some business with the three kids. I know he banks with them, but he has mostly independent interests. So everybody is interconnected.”

“Banks with them?” Peter repeated.

“Yes, the System Trade Bank. Home also doesn’t have an official currency. But the System Trade Bank coins its own money. They call them Solars.”

Peter was nodding. Li wasn’t sure he believed everything.

“Heather is really the quiet one of the three kids. She started a real estate development on the moon. Right smack in the center of the face toward Earth. We had them down for a vacation, along with Heather’s younger brother, Barak. Mostly we anchored in an uninhabited atoll, and they enjoyed the open air and swimming and snorkeling. They were dropped off by the same shuttle we’re going to meet. And we took them to Tonga again to lift. If they come again I suppose they might take the ocean landing shuttle both ways. I’m not sure it’s safe to mingle with Earth crowds yet,” Li said.

“No, if they haven’t been exposed, I’m not sure this last strain of flu is burned out yet. They have good reason to be cautious,” Peter agreed.

“You realize it hits the gene altered much harder than unmodified people?” Li asked.

Peter opened his mouth, shut it, and seemed to swallow something. “Yeah, I heard that. I had it, but was fortunate to survive. It didn’t leave me impaired either.” Peter looked at the plot display and scanned the horizon again. He’d done that several times. Li was starting to worry he might have called someone and was watchfully waiting, expecting them to show up.

“Looking for someone?” Li asked bluntly.

“We did…harm USNA assets,” Peter said. “It would not shock me if somebody is looking for us. Somebody I’d rather not meet. I notice you don’t seem to be running any radar either.” That seemed to worry him, and apparently he really was averse to saying they sank a Coast Guard cutter out loud. Li had no idea who he thought was going to hear it or record it. That made him really stop and think what sort of things the man survived in Europe. He might have cause to be paranoid, and Li should cut him some slack.

“You may take some comfort that we have an overwatch,” Li said, making a sweeping wave at the vast dome of the sky. “The Home militia is monitoring us, and watching for aircraft or submarines to approach. They can do so much better than we can. Both Home Security and Jeff want your scientist very badly. If the militia can’t handle it they can call on Jeff Singh for backup.”

That got a stare and a slow blink. “Not the other way around?” Peter asked.

“I imagine you were busy in Europe, surviving. Were you aware China stole one of Home’s ships and it had all sorts of proprietary goodies in it and wouldn’t give it back?” Li asked.

“No, that sounds bad. One might take that for simple piracy.”

Li nodded agreement. “Where they landed it in China is now a crater, three or four kilometers wide and a kilometer deep. The kid didn’t have to ask the militia to intervene. He dealt with it.”

“I think that’s all I can absorb for now,” Peter told him.

*

Deloris listened with disturbing neutrality to Alice’s proposal. She didn’t display any emotion. To the point Barak expected her to reject the idea, which was really going to bother Alice. Barak felt Alice had real problems with self confidence and her professional image. She didn’t make any sort of proposal easily, and he hoped she’d get over a rejection.

“I believe you are correct,” Deloris said. “The current schedules are an improvement on our initial adjustment to losing half our crew, but we are still stressed. I will inform our control and liaison with the owners I intend to take a recreation day, with appropriate safeguards as you mentioned. It’s a command decision and not subject to negotiation.

“I also intend to have such breaks again at thirty day intervals. While that is far from an optimum schedule it is a vast improvement. It will give us two more breaks before we bring the ice ball to rest and can turn it over to a local team to position and start removing both the Yuki-onna and the embedded engines. Such rest breaks will have a minimal effect on our arrival time and navigation. We make periodic adjustments anyway. If we need to increase thrust two or three percent to compensate that’s easily done.”

Alice looked relieved.

“You may have discussed plans,” Deloris guessed. “I don’t intend to impose anything. On break I’m not captain unless we get an alarm. But if you want to rig the double bunk back up, and make sure we have plenty of beer in the room cooler that would be fine with me. We’ll dip into the special items in our food stores.

“I had to do an inspection and inventory of the captain’s and the XO’s quarters for the owners. If anyone complains later I shall replace it, but our captain had a sealed bottle of peppermint schnapps in his cabin, and I intend to seize that for ship’s stores. I won’t drink from the open one I saw.”

“That sounds like a good start,” Barak agreed. “When do you intend to set this break?”

“I’ll finish this shift, and you will do your full shift. After that we shall all take a double shift liberty. If there are any filters or fluids to deal with can you get ahead on them to have a full shift free?” she asked Alice.

“You can count on it,” Alice promised.

*

“I have a bogey,” the shift militiaman informed Jon and Chen.

“Elaborate,” Jon ordered him.

“Laser reflections indicate there is a submerged craft causing upwelling of deep water on a line here,” he said, drawing a line along the center of an oval shape near the Aleutians. “The line points directly at where the Tobiuo would be in about seven hours, if it wasn’t going to stop before then, but they wouldn’t know that. In fact they are only about a half hour from stopping.”

“How deep is it? Chen asked.

“We don’t know,” the militia man explained. “If we knew how deep it is we could give you an exact position within a few hundred meters, as long as it kept going straight. We’ve just never collected enough data, and if we had, it would depend on what class of vessel is down there. Some drive styles mix water more than others.”

“Give me a guess,” Chen demanded.

“Oh, anywhere from about here…“he drew a line across the screen with a finger, not needing the precision of a stylus, “to about here.” The lines were a good sixty kilometers apart, south of the oval.

“I can however give you a speed, from the rate at which the water anomaly spreads forward. It’s going at about forty two knots, so he will be at the intercept point,” he marked it with a touch, “in about sixteen hours if he is at the front of our guesstimated position.”

“So, he’s not a danger to the Chariot. They’ll have all the transfers done and lift again, likely before he is halfway there,” Jon said. “However he’ll be a hazard to the Tobiuo as she is leaving. She can’t outrun him either. Although they may be within missile range while sitting on the surface. If he gets reports from the USNA command and targeting data he might try to catch both of them together with a ballistic missile, and he wouldn’t have to surface to do that.”

“You are assuming it’s a USNA sub. All we really have is a patch of deep water stirred up to the surface. It isn’t tagged with any flag,” Chen objected.

“The USNA has tracking on the Tobiuo from their power plant. That’s an exclusive as far as we know. The Russians, Chinese and Indians all may have ocean radar back in operation, but why would they be interested in a small civilian vessel?” Jon asked. “Only the USNA makes sense.”

“I can probably answer this very quickly,” Chen offered. He called Jeff and brought him in on the current display, explaining where they estimated a sub was approaching.

“Have you kept the submersible drone carrier shadowing the Tobiuo?” Chen asked Jeff.

“Yes, I have. It’s a couple kilometers away and about five hundred meters down. The Tobiuo is slow enough it has been pacing it on accumulator power. It hasn’t run its fusion generator for about ten days.”

“Excellent. See the point on the plot the submarine seems to be following and the interception point?” Chen asked.

“Yes, it’s really moving isn’t it?” Jeff remarked.

“For the size they build their subs it’s smoking,” Chen agreed. “Here’s what I’d like you to do. First, move your submersible right in close to the Tobiuo so they appear pretty much the same point on any tracking. Then I’d like you to instruct it to head for a point along the sub’s line of approach back from its projected contact with the Tobiuo. Using the detectable power plant, to be seen. Can you do that, with it at five hundred meters?”

“Sure, we can re-program it at that depth.” He didn’t volunteer how.

“Thank you. I’ll leave the feed open for you. If I’m guessing right the sub will stop or change course pretty soon. I don’t think the USNA wants to trade a multi-billion dollar sub for a ketch.”

“I tell you what,” Jeff said. “I’ll have it go ahead to the intercept point, then it will adjust course and turn to meet the sub. That conveys to them that we know the sub’s course. The device will only do twenty knots. We didn’t build it for speed. But they of course have no idea it can’t sprint faster. I’ll tell my guy that handles this and it should be moving ahead to meet the sub in just a few minutes.”

“They are near stopping to wait for the shuttle to land anyway. The sub, or the people manning the sub, may think they are stopping to let the submersible go ahead to deal with the sub,” Jon speculated.

They watched the screen, knowing Jeff’s submersible was in play, but he wasn’t providing tracking. Nothing happened for about twenty minutes. Then the oval of disturbed water stopped spreading south. In another ten minutes the oval grew a knob at the end which distended and started a new line off to the south west.

They all let out a sigh of relief.

Chen had a sudden thought, but he didn’t share it with the others. He’d never asked Jeff explicitly if that drone carrier had any sort of armament. He’d been bluffing. He wasn’t sure Jeff was.

Chapter 8

“It will be coming in from the south,” Li informed his guests.

“Don’t most things orbit with the Earth’s rotation?” the Canadian scientist asked. Peter had never volunteered the man’s name, as he had his own.

“Yes, but the shuttle assumed a polar orbit so it won’t have issues reentering over hostile territory. This way they come down over the ocean, without needing to overfly anyone,” Li explained. “It isn’t as difficult a maneuver from a lunar insertion as radically changing direction from LEO.”

“Who’s hostile to you?” The fellow asked.

“The safest is to assume everybody but Japan and Tonga,” Li assured him. That shut him up.

“I see it,” Peter said. He had good vision. It took Li another fifteen seconds before he found the tiny spark on the horizon. It climbed in the sky from their perspective and dimmed as it bled off speed.

“They’ll pull up and do a vertical drop on the main jets, then roll forward and drop it on its belly using the thrusters when they are near the surface,” Li said.

“I’m surprised they don’t just come in and skip across the surface on their belly,” Peter said.

“In theory they could, dragging the tail and holding the nose up with the front thrusters,” Li said. “They may even try that, someday. When they have a second shuttle in case it doesn’t work.”

The shuttle threw a great deal of spray up landing about a kilometer away. Then as the spray started to settle there was a roar and a smaller plum of water blew out behind her.

“What was that last little burp?” the Canadian asked.

“They blew the main exhaust clear,” Li explained. “In case water gets in between the time it shuts down and the time a mechanism slaps an aluminum disk over the hole to seal it. Flushes the air too for that matter. It has to pump down to a vacuum in the drive to start back up. It needs a few seconds for it to cool down enough that the aluminum doesn’t melt where it touches the hot throat.”

“And it snatches it off when it fires up again?” he asked, demonstrating with a hand.

“No,” Li said, amused. “It just vaporizes it when you fire it back up again.”

The shuttle made a lesser noise and turned its nose toward them a little.

“He gave it a push to meet us part way, but the Tobiuo is much more maneuverable. If you will excuse me I’m going to ease us up against her,” Li said.

Li took them around the shuttle with it off their port side. His guests inspected it with some interest from less than a hundred meters away. Li cut close just to give them a good look at it. Then he eased in from behind while crew hung every fender they owned off the port side.

The portion of the shuttle highest from the water opened, but slid on rails away from them, rather than fold open and present a big area for the wind to catch.

Two lines were thrown across, fastened at the front and rear of the open hatch, before a gangway deployed from the shuttle. The gangway ran the length of the open hatch and swiveled from the rear of that opening to the ship. It was almost long enough to reach the Tobiuo, but when it neared the rail an extension slid forward another couple meters.

Two crew ran forward and dropped gas piston braces from under the front edge of the gangway and gave a signal to the operator in the shuttle. The device stayed planted where it was supported on the Tobiuo and was free to float and pivot on the upper shuttle end.

A fellow in a jumpsuit climbed unseen steps and hesitated, timing his step onto the gangway as it moved. The motion that high up was amplified from the small roll they were experiencing in calm seas.

Once he did step onto it he didn’t run down it, he slid with both feet planted solidly on it, squatting, and came off the end like a gymnast doing a dismount.

“You’re going to break your bloody neck someday doing that,” Tara, growled at him.

“Yes, but until then it’s so much more fun than sliding on your butt!” he agreed. “You are Mr. Martens,” he said right away, looking at Peter. “I’ve seen your file, all of it,” he emphasized right away. “I’m Gabriel. Consider me your control for this operation from this point. I’ll be with you and Dr. Houghton until I hand you off to Chen, face to face.” He looked at Houghton and seemed to know who he was too, or assumed it.

Well, nice to finally have a name. Li thought.

“Is Gabriel your real name, or a operational handle?” Peter asked, scrunching his eyebrows together.

“My birth name,” Gabriel assured him. “And as far as I know, the only Gabriel on Home, so if you ask for me quite a few people will know who you are referencing.” But he offered no surname.

Li wondered what the problem was. Peter didn’t seem pleased. Then he figured it out. Peter was perhaps thirty or a bit older. Gabriel looked to be about eighteen. Well he’d better get over that.

“Pleased to meet you. We’re all set and have all our gear on deck,” Peter said, waving his hand at it.

“We’ll load you as soon as we unload the Dionysus’ Chariot,” Gabriel said. “We’d rather not reconfigure the gangway back and forth. If you want to lend a hand that would be appreciated.”

Gabriel turned back and signaled the fellow standing in the shuttle to start. He was sticking up waist high to the upper end of the gangway and immediately tossed a box down the slick surface. Somebody was feeding them to him from out of sight inside the shuttle, and the crew on the Tobiuo formed a line and started passing them across the deck to the companionway.

While they were watching the shuttle land somebody had rigged a similar slide down the companionway, and the boxes disappeared down into the boat very efficiently. They moved a hundred ten cartons in fourteen minutes, and their passengers did decide to help, but Dr. Houghton looked to be in lousy shape.

When the last box was below they threw a line down and pulled the passengers luggage up the ramp. The crew brought four large hard cases that took all four of them to get up on the gangway and the shuttle crew didn’t pull the cases up hand over hand. They had a winch to drag them up. There was a fellow on each side to ease them down to someone inside the shuttle hold. The hard cases were followed by a couple dozen normal foam boxes and some large burlap sacks.

“I didn’t realize this was a freight run, besides picking the Doc up,” Peter said.

“It’s a short load,” Li assured him. “We got medical things, vaccines and cancer drugs. Now we’ll haul them all the way back to Australia. We gave them frozen beef in the big insulated chests, coffee beans and dry stuff in the bags. But if we’d met them down closer to Australia we’d have sent some fresh stuff too, vegetables and fruit. It was just too long a trip up here to deliver it in good condition.”

“I can’t imagine it will sell for enough to cover lifting it,” Peter said, frowning.

“You’re right. As usual, all the real value was coming down,” Li agreed. “That’s probably somewhere around a hundred sixty to two hundred million Australian dollars of goods we just put below. But that doesn’t mean we want to send her back totally empty.”

Peter was visibly stunned at that figure. “And they told me they’d pick us up even if they had to send the shuttle empty both ways this time.”

“Now you know how valuable your Dr. Houghton is to them,” Li said, smiling.

“You’ll give him a big head,” Peter complained, since he was standing there listening.

“No.” Houghton objected, “You’ll scare the crap out of Herr Doctor. I know now I better damn well perform, after finding out what a shuttle flight to pick me up is worth.”

Li handed Gabriel the diesel injector manifold the crew had hurried to remove. It was an aluminum casting and shattered and bent at one end, unsymmetrical now, but cleaned up nicely.

“Do ask that be passed along to Jeff please, and a functional one made or this one repaired if they’d rather. It doesn’t have to be an exact copy. Just so it works.”

The crew had the surface of the gangway flipped and locked back down. The surface was now a gritty non-slip surface, the very opposite of what was on the other side. Gabriel jumped on it and ran up the incline and into the shuttle. Peter got up with more caution, putting a hand flat on it and stepping up. He offered a hand to Dr. Houghton, but Houghton waved him off. Peter turned his back on him, oblivious to the distress on his face, and walked up the incline without looking back.

Houghton looked back at Li. “Thank you for the ride,” he said, and set his mouth in a hard line. Li was sure that wasn’t what he really wanted to say. Houghton was scared, and wanted to ask for help, but he’d stifled the fear and just said something to cover up his awkward hesitation looking back at Li. The shuttle and the boat were barely rolling, and there was a very mild breeze, but the gangway was only a half meter wide with a ridge on each side barely a hand’s breadth high, and no hand rail at all.

Was the man afraid of heights, or something else? Li hesitated, unsure what to say.

Houghton looked at the gap between the vessels like he was crossing between skyscrapers. The two vessels alternately compressed the fenders between them, and eased apart, as the water rose and dipped in time to the swells. Then Houghton abandoned all pretext of nonchalance and scrambled up the gangway on his hands and knees, head tucked down like he didn’t want to look.

Peter was all the way to the other end and had stepped down inside before he turned and saw Houghton crawling up to him. The man was half way already, so there was little point in going back for him. He just waited and gave him a hand off the other end. Peter made eye contact with Li across the gap. Instead of making fun of the Doctor’s fear he looked embarrassed he hadn’t seen the problem. Li just nodded at him and turned away. Houghton wasn’t his problem now.

Li had to give Houghton credit for proceeding against his fears without demanding help. He wasn’t sure if it was a fear of heights or drowning. He decided the fellow would do OK on Home.

The crew threw off the lines, folded up the supports, and the gangway lifted and pivoted away. Li was away from the wheel, but Tara was standing there and he gave him a wave to move them. He rolled the wheel a bit and eased a little power on to back off. The stern swung away from the shuttle and he increased power and backed away. The crew rushed to remove the fenders starting at the back. The fellow locking the gangway down in the shuttle finished, and gave Tara a wave. He dropped from sight as the hatch started crawling shut, sealing the shuttle up.

To the west of them Jeff’s submersible turned to the southwest like it might follow the sub and then turned its generator off that let it be tracked, accumulators freshly charged. It continued the turn and slowed down, headed back to the Tobiuo to shadow it. No reason to let the North Americans know that however. It might be effective in protecting it again although it wasn’t designed for that purpose.

The drone carrier could discharge its accumulators all at once, on command. He’d included that capacity to destroy it in case it looked like it would get captured, or if it reached the end of its usefulness and was too hard to recover. No need to tell anybody that. What he needed now, Jeff decided, was a dedicated escort submersible. Much sleeker since it wouldn’t need to carry drones, and much, much faster.

If a submarine could do forty two knots he wanted at least sixty, and a bigger warhead of course. He’d read something about releasing air to sheath the hull of a submarine in a layer to reduce drag. His couldn’t possibly carry enough air, but if you had a big enough laser on the nose…wouldn’t steam do the same thing? Jeff had some guys who could advise him, if he just made a few sketches.

*

“I’ve spoken with my mother,” Myat said, “and she has conferred with her co-wives. They agree I may act as their agent with you, to accept a deposit of money to manage just as Chan Aye did. While they agree with your thought that there are many new widows here, who would do business with us, they are concerned there may be opposition to us doing so. It’s a difficult thing to explain.”

“Not at all difficult!” Huian assured her. “My own husband was not taken with the idea at first. We are Chinese and it isn’t common to our people’s customs either, but he does a great deal of business with a Japanese gentleman. That man could reject his own prejudices sufficiently to entrust his wife with a separate funding and freedom to handle them at her discretion. He has had good success doing so, and my husband observed that. Nothing recommends a different course of action like success!”

“How true,” Myat agreed. “And it’s easy to rationalize opposition to something as a moral imperative, if it will just incidentally be a competition to your own livelihood.”

“But no reason to take to the streets with a trumpet to announce your intentions,” Huian counseled. “If you allow word of mouth to gather a following among your female allies, then if someone should raise an objection later you have prepared a body of supporters, who have an interest in seeing you are not obstructed.”

“You echo almost exactly what my father’s third wife said,” Myat agreed. “She pointed out how many people the three of them know socially, or to buy services and goods for the household. Most merchants respect purchasing power above other concerns. A word here…a word there…among a limited group. One may hope it spreads.”

“How do you wish me to move funds to you?” Huian asked. “I can move funds from Russia, Tonga, Japan, Australia or North America, in order of ease. I can have physical gold couriered to you if you wish. That’s how my husband has funded me.”

“Oh no,” Myat said, alarmed. “Gold is not something freely traded here right now. It makes you a target. It isn’t even safe to wear your good jewelry in public. I’d…that is, if I had gold, I’d want to move it off Earth, not send it down. We have need of Australian dollars if that is convenient. We have need of EuroMarks now and then, but since they are a depreciating asset now we acquire them as close to the need as possible.”

“I’ll have a courier deliver cash,” Huian promised. “He’ll have it in a case, and it will open to the code I’m showing you on the screen right now.” Huian scribbled it and displayed it to the camera.

“Oh good. I thought you might send a bank cheque,” Myat said.

“And Myat, if you should get gold you want held safely off world, I can send the same courier and have it lifted here, or to Luna, and held securely for you,” Huian offered, on the spur of the moment.

Myat looked at her carefully and took time to phrase the question.

“If we put gold on deposit through you, to whom is it entrusted?”

“I have two banks that will take it on deposit from me. Both have different clearing rights with Earth systems, but neither are subject to a Earth official walking in and demanding their data or physically closing them down. They both send metal held on account to Central on the moon, where it is held kilometers deep, safe even from nuclear bombardment. Your deposit would be commingled in one of my accounts, and I would be personally responsible for it to you, just like my accounts with you. The gold would be entrusted to me. All my business with you will be kept in a moleskin notebook on my desk. In the event of my death my husband would be entrusted to make good my obligations, or his business partners if he should also pass. Always responsible individuals, never any public company.”

“That’s what I wanted to hear. We trust individuals, not faceless corporate entities. I’ll inform my mother of this conversation. So she is aware the service is available.”

“Thank you, dear. Call anytime you wish, but we are on Greenwich time you know,” Huian said, and disconnected. She sat there looking at the blank screen a bit. She hadn’t planned to offer that to Myat. It just seemed opportune from her reaction about receiving gold. It certainly wasn’t the problem here it was there. Perhaps it went a bit beyond what her husband was expecting, but no need to mention it. After all he was more concerned with her putting money out on gainful deposit.

It occurred to her on further thought, that perhaps she had just founded a bank, but Home had no laws forbidding her from doing so. Maybe not a bank, she decided. She used banks. If anyone found out and pressed her about it, she’d just say she was an investment advisor. That was just as legal and sounded much more defensible, although she could see in her mind’s eye the look Chen would give her if she claimed that. And if they did send her any gold, she better have some ideas ready how to put it to work. It was an interesting problem to think on…

*

Dr. Houghton looked pretty rough. He’d emptied himself out very thoroughly. The shuttle smelled faintly sour still, although Houghton had used the emergency bag in time, and Peter heard the ventilation fans get turned up. The crew brought some sani-wipes and an extra bag. They also quickly offered an anti-nausea drug, but even before that had a chance to work they’d suggested a mild tranquilizer too. They strapped Houghton down nice and tight. The pressure helped some feel better oriented. It reduced the false sense of falling that made some panicky. Houghton gladly accepted, not at all insulted or in denial the way some first time passengers reacted.

“Somebody should have thought to offer him the drugs starting last night,” The second in command, Jacob Reynolds, told him. “Especially for somebody lifting the first time. If somebody is going to have trouble that’s when it will happen. Stress makes it worse, and just being his first time is stressful.”

“It’s my first time too,” Peter told him. “Nobody warned me either.”

“I better tell Li to see to it in the future. I guess he’s used to dealing with experienced crew. He shouldn’t have fed the man a big breakfast either. Maybe just some fluids. Did you eat? Jacob asked.

“Egg and hot sausage on English muffins with cheese and mustard,” Peter admitted, “three of them, because they were really good, but I feel fine.” He was also tethered to the back of his seat by one relaxed arm like he’d been doing it for years. He wasn’t oriented the same as Jacob, which was enough to trigger a mild panic and nausea in some new passengers.

Jacob shrugged. “You’re a natural. We get those too. He seems under control now. I’m going back to my flight station.” He twisted his toes under a take-hold and pushed off toward the front. As he drifted away Peter heard him mutter softly, under his breath – “Mustard?”

*

“You will be happy to know that the Dionysus’ Chariot has successfully made orbit again from an ocean landing,” Jeff informed April on com. “They should dock in about three days. We have the scientist who should equip us to receive passenger traffic again in safety. We also lifted about as much beef as we’ve seen in the last three months, and dearer even to your heart, a limited quantity of very nice Sunda Hejo. I’m willing to split a sixty kilo bag with you.”

“I have half that left,” April admitted. “I’ll stop rationing it if we’re going to be getting it regularly. So, yeah, I’ll take it and be happy, if you can really spare that much without shorting somebody.”

“I can. Use some of it for bribes and to gain favor with people if you want. In a year there won’t be any shortage and people will forget how badly they missed it,” Jeff suggested.

“I do have a few people I owe favors,” April admitted. “I’ll take you out to dinner at the Fox and Hare, since I can’t bribe you with coffee.”

“Your company is what I value. Even if we stay in and gnaw on survival bars,” Jeff told her.

April was amazed. That was downright eloquent for Jeff, almost romantic with better word choices. He might be socializing late after all.

“But I have an elegant new dress I’d like to show off. You’d be polite and nod a lot, but not really care about a dress or fashion at all, except to be nice to me,” April said.

“This is true. But I do enjoy watching other women’s faces when they don’t think you can see. You incite amazing jealousy even I can read. It’s fun,” he allowed. “Then I see them grow cross, and their husbands or dates look puzzled and have no idea why.”

“I think it’s all in your head,” April said. “But whatever motivates you to take me. Pick me up here at 1800, and we’ll be able to catch the first act,” April suggested.

“Do you want a cart?” Jeff asked. “Is your dress long enough to drag?”

“No silly, I wouldn’t buy something like that. I’d just as soon wear high heels.” She rolled her eyes and waved at the camera, disconnecting silently.

*

“Mom and I are going to have the LET done,” Frank informed Lindsey. “We don’t have to go anywhere else, like you used to need to do. But the treatment still ties you up for a few days. Now, if we need to, we’ll both go at the same time, and shut the shop down for a couple weeks while we get the life extension therapy. We understand it leaves you tired for a few days too.”

“I’m glad to hear that. You guys are some of my favorite people. You’ve been so kind to me. I’m glad you should be around for a long time,” Lindsey said.

“We’ve grown fond of you too. But what I wanted to propose is a business arrangement. At least a temporary one. We thought that it would not be too much of a burden to keep the tailor shop open, and take turns at the treatment, if we had a little help,” Frank said.

“Oh, sure. I’d be happy to do that,” Lindsey said.

“We’d pay you of course, but it would be full time for a couple weeks. We know you have other commitments now. So think carefully about that before you repeat the offer you made just now. We never stay busy every moment. So if you wanted to sit and sketch when it’s slow that’s fine. But if we get customers in you’d have to drop that and lend a hand. You’ve seen a lot of what we do, but there’s still things to learn,” Frank assured her.

“I’m sure there are. I have nothing that has a hard deadline. I just don’t do that to myself. So set up your appointments for you and Cindy. Whenever you need me I’ll work,” Lindsey promised.

“Are you going to have it done?” Frank wondered. “The earlier you start, the better, a lot of folks think.”

“Sometime. I’m not emancipated. My mom…My mom is much more reasonable than when we came up here. But sometimes things still freak her out, and I’m not very good at predicting what. All the more so whenever my dad is away. I’ve kind of held off saying anything about it. She doesn’t know how much money I’ve saved from my drawings. I get the idea she still sees it as a hobby. So she might flip out just to know how much I have in my account. She might even try to say it’s too much for me to be responsible to handle. Even if I did earn it. Let’s just wait a little longer for right now,” Lindsey said.

*

“I may have achieved relaxation,” Barak said. He certainly looked relaxed. If he were any more relaxed he might look dead. He wondered if Deloris set it up so she was first back to duty? If so she was smart, because she looked a lot perkier than he felt. Alice did too for that matter. None of them drank to excess, but where did they get the idea that the women were the weaker sex? They both seemed to push through fatigue and the stress of uncertainty better than he could. Barak stopped and made a note of that in his data for Jeff. Some idiot would read that and think – Well then make all female starship crews. He’d have to cut that line of reasoning off right away in his recommendations. However, he needed to head the idea off in a way that wouldn’t offend anybody. Alice and Deloris were more experienced at anticipating idiocy, and he was picking up a lot of their thinking.

Deloris had cut herself off drinking anything after the first of two shifts they took off. That was kind of her again, to give him a little longer to drink before he had to get it out of his system to go on duty. He’d only had a beer this half day, but it was still nice to be able to do so.

Deloris was putting the last of the cold shrimp out, and she’d nap soon before her shift. That started in almost six hours. He looked to his left. Alice was still asleep by the inside bulkhead. The crash net pulled across her legs to keep her from drifting. She was sleeping very deeply, from her slow breathing and stillness. He pushed off and rolled away carefully not to disturb her. He went over to the table and took a seat, hooking his toes under the bar that allowed him to skip a seat belt.

“Let her sleep?” Deloris signed in helmet talk, to avoid speaking out loud.

“Yeah, put a few in the fridge for her later,” he signed back. She nodded, and did so, closing the door while holding the handle pulled so the latch wouldn’t make a loud clack.

They enjoyed the last of the shrimp in companionable silence. Alice had told them that they still had some nice steaks for the next break. They’d even found a small bottle of champagne they were saving for the last break. Deloris put the trash away carefully, pushing a stray glob back with a napkin.

She came over and carefully cleaned his mouth with the folded over napkin like a little kid and kissed him thoroughly, sitting in his lap facing him, ankles tucked under the seat.

He looked a question and glanced at Alice, sleeping.

“She has you all next shift,” Deloris signed.

“No, I mean…We’ll wake her if we go back to the bunk,” Barak signed.

“You’re fine where you are,” Deloris said, amused. As usual, she was right.

Chapter 9

Jeff didn’t say anything when April let him in. He just drew a deep breath and stared. His mouth hanging open.

“That’s the sweetest thing you’ve ever not said about how I look,” April teased.

He nodded, uninterested in arguing, still stunned silent. April told him she was having a dress made from an illustration in one of Lindsey’s drawings. That hadn’t prepared him for this. He’d seen a few of Lindsey’s drawings, but had no idea she was this creative. It was elegant.

“The emerald and diamond earrings are perfect with it,” Jeff said when he regained the power of speech. Did you get those made when you went down to Earth? Jeff asked.

“These were a gift and an inheritance to my brother Bob from our maternal grandmother. He left them to me. Fortunately he wasn’t wearing them when his ship was lost. They aren’t exactly everyday wear,” April admitted.

“Ah, then they’re real stones,” Jeff deduced from all that.

“Yes, and I’ve never had them appraised,” April said, before he could ask.

“You shouldn’t, ever,” he urged her.

“That’s not what I expected from you. Why not?” April asked.

“If some graceless person asks what they are worth, you can just shrug and dismiss it as something with which you have never concerned yourself,” he said, with a haughty dismissive gesture. “That sort of pretentious oaf will always be running verification software on you to pick apart later, and while he might make a show of being indifferent to wealth, it will really rattle him to see you mean it.”

“You have a little mean streak in you. Did you know that?” April asked Jeff.

“For that sort of person? You bet!” Jeff agreed. “I love trolling them.”

Gunny wasn’t home, and they had no reason to wait, so Jeff didn’t even get to sit down. In the corridor April seemed oblivious to it, but several people looked over their shoulder at her long after passing. A few stopped and looked with that still stance people took when they were capturing pix on their spex. Jeff was pretty sure April would be on the social and gossip boards tonight even before they finished supper. He wouldn’t say anything, because those sites just irritated her.

He was glad April had mentioned wearing something special, or he might have been in baggy pants and a hoodie T. That was his everyday uniform. He wasn’t stylish, he didn’t even know what was currently considered stylish right now, but he had on moon boots that went with anything, a nice pair of Earthie style slacks and a silk shirt. It had real buttons which were a nice anachronistic touch. But stylish or not at least he didn’t look like a slob.

When they entered the Fox and Hare the maître d’ Phillip blinked twice. That was the equivalent of an uncovered open mouth, and a shocked look for most folks. He was…reserved.

“Miss Lewis,” he said, happily. “There is still a table by the stage if you’d like.”

“Mr. Detweiler,” April said, with a nod, determined to be just as formal if he insisted on it. “We’d much rather a small table by the bulkhead with fold downs, so we can sit side by side.”

Phillip handed them off to a server April had never met, who took them to the table and left them with single sheet daily menus that had replaced the fancier permanent menus when supplies got short. Jeff looked inexplicably happy with the menu.

“Something unexpected there?” April asked, reading the offerings.

“The menu itself,” Jeff explained. “It’s on our paper from Central.”

When April examined it closer, and felt it, she did see it was silkier than most paper. But she’d have never noticed if Jeff hadn’t pointed it out.

“Are you going to recycle it?” April wondered.

Jeff scrunched up his eyebrows and considered it. “Probably not. There is no infrastructure in place to handle it. I’m not sure how hard it would be to remove the inks. The recycled paper might have a grey tint. And there are still Earth sourced papers and packaging that would get mixed with most of it. People are too lazy to separate things. It does get recycled, but just as a general source of carbon. But I will put out a note that if anybody wants to save up a volume of it we’ll buy it back to use in card stock and plastic filler for packaging. Say a tenth metric ton minimum. The way things look now, freight to the moon is going to be lighter than what is exported. So standby freight to return scrap paper, or other things, will be cheap for awhile.”

“I see things on the menu that have to be from Central too,” April decided. “Spinach salad, fried tofu, pickled beets as a side dish. Potatoes? Is that a Central Export? Potatoes are mostly water and really heavy to lift to orbit.”

“Yeah, they just started raising potatoes, and we’re going to freeze dry them as sliced and diced, but until we have the equipment made to do that, we’re selling whole potatoes as a luxury item. They’re about this big,” Jeff said, making a circle with his thumb and index finger, “and about two dollars Australian each potato, since they’re not nearly as expensive to lift from the moon. They’re good with the soy based, fake sour cream,” he recommended. “I see that on the menu and it must be ours too.”

Their waitress arrived to take their order. April got the roast whole potatoes, with soy sour cream and chives, scrambled eggs from whole powder, with freeze dried mushrooms, and sausage patties. Jeff got two grilled cheese sandwiches with bacon bits, and a spinach salad with vinegar and oil. Just to add some zing it had a sliced radish from the moon too.

“I sure miss having big hunks of beef and whole lobsters,” April admitted.

“We brought some grilling cuts up,” Jeff admitted, “but your dad asked they be sold to the cafeteria. He was willing to pay a reasonable price for them, and said it was an issue of morale. If they were sold off to just private clubs like this, and the price jacked way up, it would cause more troubles than a steak is worth.”

“I hear you, I’ll take your word for it. I have no idea how that discontent would manifest itself,” April said. “Everybody who pays taxes has a vote in the assembly.”

“I believe his concern was that if people feel they are treated unfairly they may introduce measures when the Assembly is called, to correct it. Once you start making such fairness laws there never seems to be any end of it, and when they don’t accomplish what people intended. It just makes it worse. What if someone proposed all imported items not for your personal use had to be put up for public bid? If somebody hasn’t had a steak for a year, and hears you can get one at the Fox and Hare, as long as you are willing to pay five hundred dollars USNA for it, might not such a law seem ‘fair’?” Jeff asked.

“Yeah, but they’d just pre-sell the steaks before they were lifted. You’d be the owner of steak number 138364 before it ever left the ground,” April said.

“Exactly, they’d work around it. You thought of a way to do it in seconds. But then people would be even more upset, because they’d know their intent was made public, and other people thwarted their will on it,” Jeff predicted. “Then they’d probably pass another law that would be circumvented. Every cycle leaves you with more and more people angry that they didn’t get the result they wanted. That’s how you get factions, and class divisions. Pretty soon you have people making a living as a politician by promising to fix the inequities. Better to treat as many as possible, as well as possible, and the resentment doesn’t keep building until it’s just like the Slum Ball here.”

“Put that way, my scrambled eggs will be just fine, and the potatoes a treat. Steak would be nice, but not worth having my fellow citizens hate me,” April agreed.

“Down below, they wouldn’t worry if anybody hates them. They have more people than they need. You can kind of understand why they grab their own wants and ignore the people it may make unhappy, because there’s no chance it will ever be equitable, they can’t imagine making that happen, and everybody having a chance at the nice things,” Jeff said. “Here, everybody is just a temporarily embarrassed billionaire, down on his luck. And by next year he may be buying that steak even if he is only a millionaire. Things are getting better for all of us, and I don’t see any way for that to happen down on Earth.”

“Not the way they run it at least,” April agreed. “You seem to understand these social forces better than I’d expect.”

“The bigger forces and mob movements are easy to understand,” Jeff said, waving his hands in conflicting motions. “It’s knowing what to reply when one person asks a rude question face to face, or assumes something about you that is wrong, and needs to be corrected without alienating them. That’s the social stuff that trips me up.”

“Here comes the first act,” April said, catching the slight dimming of the lights.

The bartender introduced a man by name. The poor bartender didn’t have much else to do because their stock of liquor and wine was almost gone. Beer was unobtainable. He was a terrific bartender however, and they’d pay him as long as they could because they wanted to retain him for when things picked up again.

April wasn’t sure who the musician was or where he worked. Home had grown until she didn’t know everybody, even by sight. The musician didn’t work in vacuum however, you could tell because he had long braided hair. He had an acoustical guitar with no electronics connected to it at all. In the very limited cubic of the club it was entirely adequate. The thing that made him stand out was he played in three different styles and sang to all of them. He played some blues, a folk song that might have been Irish, but April wasn’t sure, and another song where his guitar was just a back ground rhythm and all the complexity was in his voice. He did three songs and then took a break.

As soon as he left the stage they were served. Jeff saw several people looking at their table in such a way he was fairly certain they were taking video with their spex, either to show as a whole or to isolate frames later. He was glad actually. If he wasn’t sure someone else would volunteer he might have arranged for April to be recorded. He cared about April’s public image, even if she didn’t, and the simple meal they both had was worth showing people for all the reasons he’d explained. If he didn’t understand individuals, she similarly didn’t always seem to understand group dynamics. Her dress was marvelous, which was all to her advantage as nobody could rightfully begrudge her looking good. She looked relaxed, and Jeff assumed she wasn’t aware of the scrutiny, so he didn’t mention it.

After a couple more acts, Jeff concluded the audience stayed more reserved and polite when they had very little alcohol to serve. It was too bad but he was going to bring that to an end soon all by himself. He had a locally made thousand liter tank at Central, slowly filling with ethyl alcohol from the waste products of their paper making and other crops. Heather had rights to most of it. He had plans for his portion.

He had a hundred kilograms of hardwood oak and maple cubes he’d bought surplus in New Zealand. They were originally for craft projects, but he’d been adding them in small lots to his cargo as filler, to meet his exact weight allowances. He intended to heat them to charcoal and dump them in the tank. He could hardly afford to lift huge heavy barrels, with the inside charred, to the moon.

Just as people had once sent barrels of whiskey out on ships so the motion sloshed the whiskey over the char and aged it faster, he would circulate the liquor to promote aging. He suspected this would flavor whiskey just as well as the customary way. It would be about a hundred forty proof, but his customers could dial that back with distilled water if they wanted.

With any luck at all it would be marketable in a year. He intended to set a little aside each year in smaller tanks to age longer. It should be a good investment. He had a lunar supplier engaged to make thin lightweight bottles of glass. Most spacers were leery of anything in glass, but these bottles were of the same sort of glass Earthies used in armored ground cars. You could use one of these bottles for a hammer if you wanted. They’d be a novelty.

They had a pianist who played jazz, and for a couple numbers a trumpet and some percussion joined her. Jeff thought Ruby, April’s friend who managed the cafeteria, was a much better pianist.

Their plates were long cleared, and others had come and gone, when there was a comedian. Jeff didn’t think he was funny. Mostly a few people laughed when he said mean things, or truthful things nobody really wanted to hear. But Jeff didn’t say anything to April. April however didn’t object when Jeff indicated he was ready to leave. They still were polite enough to wait until the act was done to exit. When they were near the door, April gave a come here tilt of her head to the maître d’.

“Phillip, I don’t know who invited the comedian we just saw, but I’d rather he be dropped. I don’t think he promotes a happy atmosphere. If someone with a larger interest than me has an objection to that send him to me to discuss it.”

“I have a much smaller share than you, but I agree, and will add my voice on the matter. My feeling is he got put on the play bill by being pushy to be included. I’ll call you privately if there is any problem,” Phillip promised.

“I felt the same way,” Jeff confessed in the corridor, but he’d kept out of it having no ownership.

“Of course you did,” April said. “You practically jerked at a few of the crude remarks and political digs. You’re perfectly willing to politely tell somebody, in a normal voice, that you are prepared to drop thermonuclear hell upon their heads, but you’d never frame it in crude sarcastic language.”

“Thank you, I think…That’s how I would rather be, quite consciously. The people he was addressing had no defense, even if they are slime. He speaks from the safety of distance and obscurity. If any of his targets were actually in the audience tonight they would have been within their rights to call him out. I suspect the people who laughed loudest are not ones I would befriend.”

“That’s another reason I was happy to leave, although it is late anyway. I could see him saying something so outrageous you would stand and offer to meet him in the morning,” April said.

“I haven’t done that yet,” Jeff pointed out. “Although I reserve the privilege. It was hard won, and separates us from those Earthies who value safety and order over everything, including honor and integrity.”

“In that case I have to ask how much range time you’ve had, in say, the last month?”

The silence was prolonged.

“Tomorrow morning. You’ll come with me,” April insisted.

“I’m awfully busy…” Jeff said.

“Oh, I’m so sorry to hear that,” April said, looking sad. “I hoped you might have time to stop by tonight, but I understand.”

“I’m sure if we get up early enough there won’t be any wait at the range,” Jeff allowed.

“Exactly my thought too,” April agreed.

*

Jeff had breakfast alone at his office. A thermal mug of coffee from April, and a chocolate and cherry flavored protein bar from his pencil drawer. Which was more than he bothered to have some mornings. April went to some meeting early. She’d roused him at an ungodly hour to take him to the range. All six lanes were open that early in main shift, and nobody came in until they were almost ready to leave. The range would revert to handball courts mid-shift. He did OK, but wasn’t going to hang his targets out in the corridor to brag on, like some parents did with their children’s art.

In fairness she made them coffee first thing, a full pot at full strength. So he was semi conscious by the time he had to peer over his sights. April pointed out he might have to shoot jolted from a deep sleep in the middle of the night, without the benefit of adequate lighting, never mind stimulants.

He checked for any mail with Tobiuo in the title or body. Their shuttle was slinging around the moon and would be braking for Home soon. Then critical business satisfied he looked on the gossip boards for anything to do with April, The Fox and Hare, and reluctantly added his own name. He might find something in a self search about being with April last night, or something he’d rather not see. That was the danger of searching the gossip boards. They reminded him some people just didn’t like him.

The gossip board, He Said She Said, had a nice short video of April walking to their table that showed her dress nicely. Then there was an editing cut and they were shown seated eating. The angle was slightly down, so whoever shot it was across the floor from them and higher, up in one of the booths with privacy screens between them set to look over the tables on the floor to have a good view of the stage. The angle was more from April’s side, not straight on.

Jeff looked at his own video of the room he’d panned from their table with his spex. The tall striking brunette in the sparkly sapphire dress had to be the one taking video. He isolated her face and set a search up. The man with her was in what was regarded as formal business wear on Home. A long sleeved shirt and long pants, but he had his spex laying on the table so he likely didn’t take the pix. He probably had to wear them all day at work and was happy to take them off when he got off work and went to dinner.

The video was at a slight angle looking down showed their plates. He picked up a grilled cheese and ate it as he watched. The video picked up the piano music, but didn’t invade their privacy. He and April exchanged a few words, but it wasn’t audible even as a low murmur, so the lady hadn’t used a directional mic. She hadn’t planned ahead to record them most likely. She also panned to the pianist and showed his fingers working the keys for a little before fading out to end it nicely. She was just another person who liked to seem knowledgeable about social things to her online friends, and brag on where she’d been. He Said She Said, and similar boards thrived on unsolicited reports from regular readers.

When the video was over he read the blurb. It was short and complimentary, speaking about the club and the food. She seemed to mention April because of her dress, which she liked, and the fact April was as close to a celebrity as she saw there. He got the impression going to the Fox and Hare was a special treat. It was expensive, and April didn’t go often because as a part owner they wouldn’t present her a bill. That made it a treat for him too.

The search found a different video of her promoting her company. She was a placement executive for an employment service. The company was located on the executive level where communications and the cafeteria were located, so it had to be doing well to be able to afford the rent there.

Jeff stopped searching, satisfied April was being treated well. He hadn’t been mentioned at all by the woman. That was fine. April was a much better public face for their enterprises. Now what he wanted was a label for his whiskey bottles. He wasn’t sure what sort of image he wanted yet. Something with the moon on it? Or perhaps something whimsical, with pirates…

*

Tetsuo, or ‘T’ as some called him in his former shadowy professional life, Papa-san to family and a very few close others, was relaxed, reading an interesting book about horse cavalry in the era just prior to what was known as the Great War to its author, and the First World War to the next generation.

The door signal chimed, surprising him. His wife was out shopping and doing some sort of business she hadn’t detailed. His man Chen Lee’s family shared the large cubic Tetsuo and his wife Lin owned. Chen was away, working on a project for both Jeff Singh and the militia. Chen’s wife was off somewhere, her children off at school, and they slept away in full G, so they were hardly ever around. Despite having a packed double household it wasn’t unusual for him to be home alone.

None of his business associates would appear at his door without calling or sending him a text. He didn’t consider himself dressed for company. He had on running pants and an old t-shirt.

Since he was working at the com desk he brought the entry camera up on the screen. There was a uniformed man with a grey cap on. Above the bill it said, Larkin Lines, and had a very old fashioned representation of a Flash Gordon style space ship embroidered. He had a hand tablet, which wasn’t unusual for a delivery service. He probably needed a signature.

What was less usual were the four armored up gentlemen with him. Two with slung weapons and two wheeling hand carts who only carried sidearms. The hand carts had a couple small boxes each, they seemed rather small to warrant such transport. The other two, unencumbered with a cart, stood back against the corridor wall, weapons hung across their chests, but holding the grips.

A really big plus was that they seemed uninterested in the entry, at which he might appear. Instead they were watching the corridor in opposite directions. All of them had on ballistic face shields, but clear, not hiding their faces. They all had a large logo patch high on their chest with the distinctive bear track design of a well known security firm.

There were so many conflicting signals from this unexpected visit that Tetsuo didn’t know what to make of it. His life long career made him cautious, but he knew this firm, and all the signals he was getting said they were concerned with other threats, not him.

The patches were not something any sane person who knew the firm would appropriate, to present a false identity for an operation. Someone doing that would become accident prone, across continents and national borders. Safer to choose the Swiss Guard or the French Foreign Legion to spoof.

Tetsuo thought it safe to answer the door, but caution still was a powerful habit. Answering it with a silly little pistol in his hand would be meaningless with these fellows. He keyed the mic for the door intercom and informed them he was coming. He got in his drawer of odds and ends under the console and got a small pen light. Wrapping the lens end inside his fist he answered the door with his thumb firmly pressed on the end and held in close over his breast bone.

He palmed the door open to greet his guests, “Good afternoon. How may I help you gentlemen?”

The fellow with the Larkin’s Line cap didn’t even glance at his hand. But the agents against the wall both riveted eyes on his fist and the little cylinder. One seemed to suddenly run out of spit and started licking his lips nervously. He had no idea what sort of automated security system releasing that little button unleashed. It could be as complex as armed AI robots with friend or foe recognition, or as simple as a couple claymores set to clear the whole corridor. The man was standing back a little in the entry. Such systems tended to be bought by those people with serious known security issues, and were more effective than they wished to experience.

“I have a delivery for a Huian,” the man said looking uncertain, and pronouncing it slowly. “I’m not sure if that’s his given name or a surname.”

“That is a given name, and a lady. We usually do not refer to her by her family name. If they didn’t give you a surname then I doubt it is any concern of yours. I am Tetsuo, the householder here. Huian and her husband share the cubic with my family, so you do have the right address. If you have something to deliver that’s fine, I’d be happy to receive it for her.”

“Hmm…wish I could,” the deliveryman said. “My ticket says signed delivery or her authorized agent, but there are none listed.”

“Huian is listed on station com. Why don’t you call her and get a face to face authorization to release it to me as her agent?” Tetsuo suggested.

“Good idea,” the man agreed. He had her code looked up and called her in seconds. “Hello,” Huian said, “I’m afraid I don’t know you,” Tetsuo heard her say cautiously from the pad.

“Paul Ligget for Larkin Lines, Ma’am. I have a special flight, special delivery for you, but I need a signature. A verbal authorization isn’t sufficient. Do you want to link and give me a binding digital signature to release your delivery to Mr. Tetsuo?”

“I wasn’t expecting anything,” Huian said from the pad speakers. “I don’t remember ordering anything, but I’m perhaps a five minute walk away. Why don’t you put your delivery in the entry – the emergency lock – and I’ll be there quickly to see what you have, and if it is correct and for me, I’ll give you my mark and use my hanko. It is considered a legally superior endorsement to a freehand signature on Home.”

“Yes Ma’am. I’ve had a number of people use those here. I’m very familiar with them. We’ll do that and be waiting for you.” He hit disconnect and looked at Tetsuo expectantly.

“Just a moment,” Tetsuo said, “I need to turn off my security system.” He retreated to his com console and stowed the pen light away, before he returned and indicated to which side they should set the boxes. The security men looked much happier. Tetsuo stood at the inner entry, where an air curtain would seal it off if there was a pressure emergency. He had no inclination to invite them in further.

Huian appeared very quickly. She must have almost ran. The man presented a hard copy to sign with both a bill of lading and a message to the recipient.

“Security circumstances continue to deteriorate. May personally follow the shipment. Myat.”

The bill listed eight ingots in four cases, net weight ninety nine point two kilograms. Gross weight one hundred thirty four point seven four kilograms. The wooded boxes were screwed shut and had tamper proof tape wound around all three axis. They had to have cost a fortune to ship, and beyond cost, some influence to have them scheduled.

Huian looked perfectly composed as she fixed her chop on the document and thanked the men. They took their carts and left.

Tetsuo raised one eyebrow quite high and silently regarded her.

“I have been doing some independent investment for our family, just as you have had Lin do. I’m sorry my business interrupted your day. The young woman with who I have been dealing on Earth had a sudden need, and sent these items for me to safe guard them. We spoke of that possibility already, but circumstances forced her to act. I’ll get them out of our entry as soon as possible,” Huian promised.

“This is your home too,” Tetsuo told Huian graciously. “They are convenient here, should we need a door stop. So, if you’ll excuse me, I’ll go back to my reading.” He retreated unconcerned to his book, as if they always kept a stack of London Good Delivery gold bars in the foyer. It wasn’t his concern. Nor would he mention it to Chen, he decided with some amusement.

*

“If we’re going to do much business on Home I have a sneaky feeling we should know who that man is,” the second in charge on their team said as they walked away.

“Because he had automated security?” the leader asked. “Dude, anybody stacking gold bars in his entry has reason to have some serious security. We may never see him again. In fact if the lady had been home we’d have never seen him today.”

“We don’t know they were gold bars,” Zeb insisted.

“Yeah, somebody dropped a few hundred thousand dollars to kick priority freight off the pre-paid queue on the next shuttle lifting, and have it couriered by crew for never-leave-your-sight delivery to their door, for tungsten bars. That’s the only other thing that would be as heavy.”

“Well, probably gold bars,” the second admitted. He was the sort who would argue the sky wasn’t blue if he hadn’t seen it today. “I’d still like you to ask. You have helmet pix of him don’t you?”

“OK, Zeb. I’ll ask just to humor you,” His pad had a one touch to contact his superiors.

“Control this is Thad. Coming off armed escort to a delivery on Home for Larkin Lines. We are done and no problems. There was a person of interest to us. He made my partner nervous,” he said, getting a dig in. “Tetsuo was the only name give. They seem to be stingy with full names here, but this is his face off my helmet camera.”

They ran searches on faces all the time. Usually people they suspected of surveilling them. A data base of such people was just prudent. When the same person was caught watching them repeatedly at multiple locations it wasn’t coincidence. But sometimes it was hours before they got a reply. This time they only got as far as the lift at the end of the corridor and Thad get a priority squeal in his ear.

“This is Earl Sasser, Vice President for Operations Asia. The gentleman in your image is regarded as a DO-NOT-TOUCH. That includes anyone associated with him or any location or activity observed. You are not to engage him or interfere with him, nor associate the company with him in any way even if in your opinion it would be a positive. Actions on behalf of a client will not extend to interacting with this man for them. You are instructed to wipe your camera memory of him, forget you saw him and do not engage in idle gossip or speculation about him on or off duty in the future. Do you have any other questions?”

It seemed like a really bad time to have any questions. “No sir. Thank you.”

The contact ended without any more pleasantries.

“Dude, wipe your camera, then wipe your brain. We don’t know the guy, we never saw him or his, and we don’t ever want to have anything to do with him. VP Ops says he is DO-NOT-TOUCH. Got it?”

“Whoa…Got it.”

Chapter 10

“I have present for you,” Jeff told April. He had his hand behind his back and brought it around dramatically. There was a round black ball in it. He let go of it between them. It just hung there.

April leaned over inspecting it all around where it floated. It was the size of a grapefruit.

“I’m impressed. It’s even quieter than the toy. It’s a little rounder and bigger, but not too much.”

“I took your toy along to Dave’s shop when I had business there. He has such an odd collection of designers and machinists with exotic skills. I wanted to see what they’d think of it. I caught them all having lunch break together and they were fascinated by it. He had a fellow who worked on Israeli drones who helped a lot. They had it all disassembled where that’s possible and cut apart in sections where it was bonded together in no time. You notice it has a sort of belt around it now instead of triangular openings?”

“Yes, the air flows out of that?” April asked.

“Indeed it does, and it clings to the surface as it flows and creates a high pressure region under it, not just a jet action. It has active noise cancellation, and two sets of three depth sensing cameras to let it hold location while it is escorting you. When we get a weapon installed the cameras will give it excellent targeting and range sensing. You can control it with your spex, and adjust where you want it to stay in relation to you,” Jeff said, proudly.

“Let me try,” April said. After a few minutes she could move it, then she mastered locking it to hold a location to her. She put it right by the edge of her left shoulder, but trailing enough she had to turn her head to see it.

“It can be made to track where you are looking from your spex,” Jeff said, and walked her through that menu. “Now slave a window to my spex and watch it work.”

It was neat. It floated there right behind her shoulder, but when her eyes moved the triangle of camera lenses on the front rolled to where she was looking. By checking off a box a pale ring floated in her spex marking where it was pointed. Which would be a targeting ring eventually.

“I think you’ll like this. If you blink twice fast while you have the target ring engaged see what it does for you,” Jeff invited.

April followed the instructions and said, “Oh yes! That was creepy. How did it do that?”

“The whole thing pulses out the vents, and gives out a eighteen hertz pulse that drops quickly in power and frequency to about twelve hertz. Then it can’t do it any lower and just fades out.”

“It made me suck my breath in and…I’m not sure how to describe it. Not pleasant at all.”

Jeff nodded. “It produces anxiety, dread even. It’s a tool that might make somebody hesitate or reconsider, but if somebody is afraid or ready to shoot it could push them over the edge.”

“I want two of them. One to float over each shoulder,” April decided.

“Maybe you should write a routine so every once in awhile one lifts and does an orbit above you and comes back. Like it’s somewhat smart or autonomous, and is scouting the surroundings,” Jeff suggested, demonstrating the path with his hand.

“Have you ever considered doing horror movies?” April wondered. “I’d like to keep this a bit and see how people react to it.”

“Knock yourself out,” Jeff invited, “just remember it’s not weaponized yet.”

“Yeah, tell me when you want it back to install that stuff,” April invited.

*

“Did you see there were some Trinity Security guys in the cafeteria?” Chen asked Gunny.

“No! I’m shocked,” Gunny said. He was squeezing his exercise ball like it was a living thing he wanted to throttle. Chen wondered if Gunny realized he made faces while he did that?

“That they got a gig for Home?” Chen asked.

“No, that they’ve had the same name now almost three years. And they are using the bear print logo again,” Gunny said, making a clawed swipe in the air with his good hand. “Usually they screw up and the logo leads some reporter to explore their long sordid history. Then they get a new name and a fresh logo for awhile to get the heat off, but it’s always the same cowboys running it. Rinse and repeat.”

“I’m just sorry we didn’t get the work. I asked the Larkin Line guy if we offended somebody, but he said they got the hot load unexpectedly through ISSII, and had to hire local to bring it out here,” Chen said. “The Larkin Line shuttle is laying over loading, so they’ll take the late passenger shuttle back.”

“That makes sense then,” Gunny allowed. “If we escorted it they’d have had the hot freight sitting waiting for us to get there. Slower and they’d be paying double for somebody to guard it there waiting for us. But how did they avoid quarantine?” Gunny suddenly remembered.

“They came in from Armstrong, and haven’t had contact with any Earth vectors for a week. They went from the moon shuttle straight across the dock to the Larkin Line ship, and that was plenty good for Jon. He’s trying to be reasonable about it. Everybody’s sick of it. Makes you wonder what was so hot, with freight crazy expensive and backed up now,” Chen said.

*

“How long to make one reliable working model?” Jon asked. He was wearing a face mask, and wearing gloves. They were in a Holiday Inn room, and Dr. Houghton would stay there for four days in quarantine. He’d come from an urban area in North America so he was a risk. “It doesn’t have to be pretty. It doesn’t have to be cheap. Then you can worry about making it compact with a nice housing, and able to be printed cheap at your leisure, once we have a working sample.”

“I’m pretty sure we can have a working sample in two weeks, once I start working. Maybe a little faster if we get priority from the fab shops. If they are like the one my university had on Earth, even before the flu they were all backed up and scheduled into the future, and you had to spend a couple days just filling out all the paper work to get approved for your project,” Dr. Houghton said, frowning.

“It’s going to be a culture shock for you,” Jon predicted. “If anybody tries to make red tape here chances are they’ll be found with it applied as a neck tourniquet. I’m going to introduce you to Jeff Singh. Besides me, you might regard him as your primary sponsor here. I don’t have room for you in Home Security. It would be stretching my discretion to add you to my roster as a researcher. We are however covering your Holiday Inn bill. The usual quarantine quarters are lacking in privacy and gravity. We’re expecting you to start work in quarantine. You’ll have access to the local net and can conference with anybody you need to instruct, or send specifications to fab something. What you’ll call your job and what pay you receive you’ll have to talk over with Jeff. I’ve never known him to be cheap.”

“I guess it may look crazy to come up here with all those things unsettled,” Houghton said. “But it was never going to happen easily, like moving inside the USNA. I heard you have a labor shortage, so I figured I’d do OK even if my deal with you guys didn’t crystallize. I understand prices are high here?”

“Any cubic big enough to sleep in, a bed and a locker for your stuff, is going to cost you three thousand USNA dollars a week, five thousand for something that’s a real room, and it’s getting worse fast. Nobody will even commit to a lease. Not even for six months. You can rent a shared hot slot to sleep with no storage and no bath, but that’s no way to live. Mostly those are rented by shuttle crew or couriers who are on layover and don’t want to spend their per diem on a hotel room,” Jon explained.

“If you have Earth accounts in USNA dollars they will make it difficult to transfer them here. If you have a card best just to spend them down for day to day expenses. Jeff will give you a little tour, when you can get out of quarantine, and try to show you what’s needed. It’s very, very different than Earth. Now that we’re independent of North America it just gets further away from their norms almost by the day.” Jon warned. “I don’t have time to acclimate you. Jeff will spend time with you.”

“As soon as I knew I might get a chance to come up I started taking the daily limit out of my account. So I have some cash, but since I could only withdraw a thousand a day I bought gold chains from a jeweler. He gave me a little better deal because I promised to buy at least one a day. Every day about lunch time I went over and bought a chain, and the last day I told him to sell me whatever he could. I wore all fifty six around my neck coming up. It felt weird and I had to wear baggy clothing, but I was scared to put them in my luggage. This was just an unexpected chance for me to leave Earth. I never anticipated it, but I wasn’t going to miss a once in a lifetime opportunity get away either.”

“Wasn’t that uncomfortable?” Jon asked.

“Yes, and I was afraid if I fell overboard I’d go down like a rock,” Houghton confided.

“Apparently you don’t have just book smarts,” Jon said, approvingly. “You’ll do OK.”

*

“So, tell me. Is Home really as strange as everybody tells me?” Dennis asked his buddy and coworker Zeb back at ISSII.

Zeb looked at him funny, like he was testing him. “There’s stuff I can’t talk about. Better not to discuss it at all than maybe mess up and say something I shouldn’t.”

“I don’t want to know about the job,” Dennis clarified. “What’s the hab like? What are the people like? Have they grown devil horns yet, like the news would have you think? Or are they racing up and down the corridors in body paint and feathers on roller skates?”

“Oh, well, I’ve never seen so many people armed in public before. I mean, almost every blessed one of them. No standardization either. Not like the hab issued them weapons. I saw old revolvers and new laser weapons, knives and stuff. I even saw a guy with an old Russian Mosin slung on his back. If you shot that inside a compartment everybody would be deaf for a week. And almost no old people or young people. I think most of them must have life extension work.” Zeb thought about it a little and looked at Dennis. “It’s been a long time since I’ve seen so many people smiling.”

“Do they look like they’ve been on short rations like us?” Dennis wondered.

“The menu board was pretty short in their cafeteria. I didn’t see anybody very fat. But we got supper there, and what they had was good. The lady running the place was real chatty, and when she found out we were taking the late shuttle back she brought us all a sack lunch to eat on the shuttle. She didn’t ask for our cards again to charge us, and she knew what to put in that would be easy to eat in zero G. Everything was about ten or twenty percent higher priced than here.”

“Maybe she was sweet on you guys, seeing some handsome new fellows.”

“Nah, she wasn’t flirting. She was more like mothering us. I think she was older, but you can’t tell there anymore, with everybody looking vaguely middle aged. Oh! And the coffee machine was ugly as hell. Bare stainless and obviously handmade. We asked about that and she changed faces real fast, looked really TO’d, and said, ‘Some flaming jackass shot the old one.’ I didn’t ask any more seeing her reaction.”

“Well, at least they have coffee,” Dennis pointed out.

“Yeah, it was instant, and there was a little sign saying please don’t waste it, and promising that they would improve the quality as soon as possible. But really, it was better than some nasty cheap coffee from grounds I’ve had,” Zeb said.

“So, nobody was hostile to you in company gear and obviously not local?” Dennis wondered.

“Never had anybody so much as frown at us…Oh! Except this one girl. She was eating there, and a couple people stopped and talked to her. Cute but kind of young. She finished up about the same time as us, and when Thad got up to leave she was passing with her tray to dump, and he got in her way, not on purpose, but doing the little-which-way-do-I-duck dance like when you meet somebody head on going through a narrow doorway. She had some king of a bot floating over her shoulder.” He showed with his hands how big. “Quiet as can be. And when she looked at Thad the ball turned and followed her eyes,” he said, making a scanning motion with two fingers. “Now, you tell me what that is,” Zed invited.

“Targeting system,” Dennis said, without hesitation. “Like a gunship pilot.”

“Uh huh. On a teenage girl. Never saw anything like it. Not even in the service. When she blinked like Thad startled her, it scared the crap out of me. I got this weird unreasoning feeling of dread deep in my gut, because I thought she was triggering a fire command.”

“Now that’s a story,” Dennis said.

*

“Dr. Houghton, I’m Jeff Singh. I’m very pleased to meet you. Why don’t we skip shaking since you are in quarantine?” Jeff had on a mask and face shield. He also had on several sets of gloves so he could shed a pair without needing to pull fresh on.

“I registered a com ID for you and brought a pair of spex for you. They’ll let you input the same ID into the room com too,” He laid the new spex on the table.

“This is a cafeteria card. You can check the menu on com, and anything not special order is covered by the card. Although you are in isolation the cafeteria will deliver by courier. They’ll put it inside the emergency airlock. We have it set on manual while you are in quarantine. Normally the inside curtain doesn’t close unless it senses a pressure drop. They’ll spray your container and bag it after you are done and put it back in the entry. It goes to the clinic then for sterilization before the cafeteria.

“My address is already in your spex,” Jeff said. “I’ve put you on my priority list, as long as you don’t abuse it you’ll stay there. Now, we want you to build this device for us, but how we get there isn’t nearly as important to us. I’m sorry we didn’t have opportunity to hammer out all these details beforehand. We’ve fulfilled our side of the bargain so far by getting you up here. But now, do you want to work as an independent contractor directing the development within my organization, or do you want to work for me as an employee? I’ll hire you if you wish.”

“I’m not sure I’d fit the definition of an independent contractor. I know I wouldn’t in North America. They’ve gotten so it’s almost impossible to define a business relationship that way. Have your laws here divulged from that significantly? Houghton asked.

“This is often difficult to explain,” Jeff said. “When we removed ourselves from North America we dropped all USNA law. The Assembly has steadfastly refused to start formulating new law. There are very few decisions about what you can and can’t do on Home, and we are accumulating customs at a much faster pace than laws. So there are no laws about how to define employment, just custom and what agreements we come to. We can define almost anything we wish in a contract.”

“How do you see the difference between my being a contractor or an employee?” Houghton asked.

“If you work for me as a contractor then you are on board for a term until this virus sensor is assembled and deployed. After that you’re cut loose if you wish, you won’t owe me anything and can do as you please, or we might agree to start another project. We don’t have non-compete agreements for after employment ends. At least I haven’t heard of anyone trying to use them. I doubt you could hire anyone demanding that. We don’t have patents. We do have trade secrets, but this wouldn’t be covered by that. We’re more interested in the device for our own use than as a product. I’d expect that once I know how to make the virus sensor I could continue to do so. I can even engage in research to alter and improve them.

“If you become my employee you wouldn’t compete with me while working for me. That’s firm custom. If you pirated our project you’d find people wouldn’t do business with you on Home. Of course Earthies don’t care. Besides the security of continued employment, I do extra things for an employee I wouldn’t do for a contractor,” Jeff added.

“Seems like you are already betting I’ll be an employee. You already got me com and a cafeteria subscription,” Houghton said.

“That’s insignificant,” Jeff said, waving it away. “I did that so you wouldn’t have to waste time attending to these details when I know how to get them out of the way in minutes. That just helps you get up to speed on our project right away.”

“Thank you. That’s generous. What other factors do you think I should consider in my choosing to be short term or an employee?”

“Well, if you are a contractor I’m going to offer you weekly wages in USNA dollars, paid each Friday for the week before. I can get you a bank card for USNA dollars, but it will still have the five percent user fee on transactions just like other Earth issued cards. No help for that. I still have income in dollars and need to use it somewhere.”

“I have news for you, my card I brought up with me charges seven percent. Five percent was before the flu. Everybody has hiked it recently,” Houghton told him.

Jeff nodded. “They may charge that on new accounts then. If you are an employee I will offer you a Solar a quarter at full face value, no premium, paid in advance. I’m also prepared to offer you a place to sleep if you are an employee. It will save you considerable funds until you can establish yourself here. Not a shared hot slot, but an airbed in half G, and access to a bath. I have room at my office for that. It may sound Spartan to an Earthie. There is no privacy or a large area to relax like a living room, but it’s a significant benefit here. That’s how I’m living myself right now.”

“That’s an advantage, the Solars, beside being in advance?” Houghton asked. He seemed dubious.

“I’m working to make sure Solars, issued by the System Trade bank are more stable than any Earth currency. In my opinion, if you save back your wages in USNA dollars they may depreciate more than any return you can get for them. Check the news feeds and see what you think on the matter.”

“Do I have to decide today?” Houghton asked.

“By no means. I’d like a decision by the time you are ready to leave quarantine,” Jeff allowed. “I don’t see how which you choose makes any difference in your getting started on the project.”

That made Houghton feel better, he wasn’t being rushed into anything.

“What is the pay rate as an independent, paid in USNA dollars?” Houghton asked.

“I’m offering ten thousand a week plus your air and water fees. If you want, I’ll open an account for you to start establishing yourself here with the Private Bank of Home. You can speak with Irwin there and see if you can slowly move some of your North American assets here. He can take your cash in deposit if it’s not a huge amount. Both his bank and mine have recently limited our dealings in a number of Earth currencies.”

“Wait…You have a bank?” Houghton asked. “I think you said the Trade Bank? But you are sending me to this Irwin at the Private Bank of Home to handle my business?”

“The System Trade Bank. Which is a bank I hold with some partners. It is also the bank that issues Solar coins. However I see too many possibilities for conflicts of interest, to want to do my employees’ banking for them. Better to separate that, and Irwin has a much better relationship with the Fed system. Irwin Hall has a better chance of dealing with North American funds for you.”

“How can I send cash funds to him?” Houghton asked.

“There are a variety of heavy gauge slide-seal plastic bags in the desk there. If you put your funds inside I’d be happy to take them to Irwin. There is a bottle of disinfectant in the entry and I’d spray the bag inside and out. He’s dealt with matters far more complicated than a little wet money. Or, if you wish, there are bonded couriers listed on com to come convey it.”

“If I can’t trust you I’m in trouble anyway,” Houghton said with a wry expression. “I’d like you to do that for me. Here’s twelve thousand in five hundred dollar bills.” He handed Jeff a small bunch of bills folded over in half.

“It had to be hard, making such a quick decision, and leaving everything behind,” Jeff acknowledged, putting the bills in a bag for him.“If it helps gain your trust, be aware Home is like a very small town. Everybody knows everybody else with who they do business. You can’t do like on Earth and scam and lie, and then move a few states away and start over again. If you treat people badly it catches up with you really fast. The incentive really is to treat people well. If a project goes bad or a client is short of funds most folks will stretch themselves to help them, because even customers are not disposable. If you wonder about anyone ask. If somebody has a bad reputation people won’t hide it.”

“You lack libel laws too?” Houghton asked.

“Yes, but we do have the duel. It’s worth remembering. Even if you can’t recommend someone it’s wise not to frame it in nasty insulting terms. And that is one of the things the Assembly has ruled on. If you refuse to meet a person challenging you then they will banish you off home without any hesitation at all. Or of course satisfy them by other means.”

“You’re kidding…” Houghton looked dismayed.

“No, deadly serious. So far every challenge has been withdrawn or the satisfaction fulfilled. Sooner or later we’ll have one go to the end.”

“Why?”

“You lived in North America. Did you ever feel something was unjust?” Jeff asked.

“I’m here and safe, and I still gag on saying so,” Houghton said quietly.

Jeff nodded. “And what could you do about it?”

“Nothing. Nothing unless you were willing to throw your comfortable life away on a gesture,” Houghton said. “There are paid snoops everywhere and plenty of volunteers anxious to curry favor. You don’t dare say a thing. The more so at a college. Why do you think I wanted out?”

“But there’s a price to all this, isn’t there? Unless you have a camera on something, and a camera watching the camera that watches the camera…the wreckers will find some way to bust it or paint it or build a fire on anything they don’t like. That’s what our people down there are telling us anyway. How long can a cop car sit unattended before it is trashed?” Jeff asked.

“They tend to send two cars on almost any call now. With two cops in each car. I can remember as a kid seeing police out on the expressway patrolling alone. And they weren’t armored with the mirror windows either.”

“We don’t have that here. People have an outlet for their rage, and we try not to provoke them in the first place,” Jeff told him. “We had our first petition before the Assembly to remove a man’s right to carry a gun in public a few days ago. That was the first ever, and the fellow accepted it pretty graciously. He was given the choice to accept it or leave Home.”

“What was he doing? Did he make threats?” Houghton wondered.

“He had three negligent discharges,” Jeff said. “The last one wounded a visiting shuttle pilot. The shuttle pilot got treated and left on his scheduled time, so I have no idea if that will still come back on him. The man is one of those clumsy fellows who shouldn’t be around any dangerous machinery. Maybe not even a kitchen knife, if the stories that filtered down to me are true.”

“That seems reasonable. But the entire habitat has to take time to consider every minor case that a judge would hear on Earth? How long can that go on?” Houghton wondered.

“We’ve only had maybe twelve such cases about individuals in the last four years,” Jeff said. “Most of the time when the Assembly meets it is for considering the budget, or voting matters of state, like whether to go to war. It’s sustainable unless our population triples or quadruples. Oh, and not everybody votes. Just the taxpayers. Some things might surprise you. We didn’t vote on moving the hab from Leo to L2. That was basically an emergency call by both Security and Mitsubishi.”

“Oh, so if I skip paying taxes I don’t get a vote?” Houghton said sarcastically.

“Exactly,” Jeff agreed.

“I was being…facetious.” Houghton said, quickly.

“Oh, I know. I saw your expression. But you’re still correct. If you volunteer to pay taxes you get a vote. Not only on matters of state, and problems put to the Assembly like the clumsy cowboy, but you get to accept or reject the annual budget line by line. You can hardly object to paying for it if you had a direct voice in creating it. And if you decide you can’t pay you can withdraw,” Jeff added.

“And what if I vote and then can’t pay?” Houghton asked. “Do you have an IRS? Will they come garnishee my wages or seize something?”

“You get taken off the voters roll and they won’t let you back on until you pay up,” Jeff said. “If somebody told me to start taking things out of your wages I’d start a new rebellion.”

“That’s crazy,” Houghton said. “Is it a small tight group that runs everything, because the rest don’t volunteer to pay and just let it slide by?”

“Believe it or not, we’re running above ninety percent voters. Mr. Muños runs our voting software. He could tell you the exact percentage. We’ve had such an influx of people it’s hard to keep track. Wouldn’t you like to direct how your tax money is spent if you had the opportunity?”

“Yes, but I think I better wait and see how it actually works,” he decided.

“There is a public record of all the Assemblies. It’s a bit much to wade through, but it’s there. I believe it’s accessible from Earth, as far as we care. Most of the Earthie countries seem to block it pretty effectively. I doubt they want the idea of voluntary taxation promulgated…”

Houghton laughed almost hysterically. “I’m sure they don’t.”

*

“Mr. Hall? I am Chen’s wife Huian. He said he was going to set up a separate account for me to do some independent investment, outside our household accounts. Has he done that yet?”

“Yes Ma’am. I have your cards and numbers for you. I was just waiting for you or your husband to pick them up.” Irwin looked at Eric Pennington standing behind her, pushing a freight cart, and looking terribly amused. The kid was a customer and very bright. He had several little businesses, including a courier service. Anything that tickled him so deeply was worrisome. Was this some sort of elaborate joke being set up for him?

“Good. Then I’d like to take possession of those, and if you’d help me set up my pad to do payments I’d appreciate that. You do accept gold for deposit don’t you?” Huian asked.

When Irwin looked askance at the cart Huian felt obligated to add: “Although it’s uncoined…”

“That is no problem at all,” Irwin assured her quickly. “Why don’t we take it to the vault to unload,” he suggested. “Where we’ll have some privacy.”

After Huian swiped Eric’s pad for the courier fee, and they were both gone, he walked back in the vault and looked at eight London Good Delivery Bars, parked near the ends of his shelves so they didn’t sag. Huian left him the cases too, for future use, standing on end beside his shelves. He was still a little shocked and it took him awhile to recover. When he did, he went back to his desk to make a call.

“Jeff? Irwin here. I was just wondering how large an order for Solars you’d need, to give me a break on the coinage fees? I appreciate you deserve some seigniorage, but if I can offer an economy of scale I should get a deal, shouldn’t I?”

“Yeah, I’m flexible. What are you proposing?” Jeff asked Irwin.

“I’d like a mixed bag, but more of the smaller size than usual. I know they cost more to make.”

“Yeah, but give me a number. How many ounces?” Jeff asked. He seemed distracted by something else to the side, looking at a different screen Irwin would guess.

“Let’s say eight hundred ounces for a starting point,” Irwin suggested. “If that isn’t enough tell me and we can adjust it upward.”

Jeff’s image seemed frozen, like the com might have crashed and locked up, and after a little bit Irwin said, “Hello? Are you still there Jeff?” to his staring image.

Chapter 11

The yard manager stood and stared, unbelieving, at the boarded up ports and hastily patched holes.

“We had a spot of trouble,” Li admitted, walking along after the man as he continued along the deck looking at the damage.

“I’m concerned my yard may be considered complicit in this ‘spot of trouble’ if the authorities come around looking for a boat full of bullet holes. For all I know you have been engaged in piracy,” the manager said. “Unless you filed a police report already, as the victimized party?”

“Actually we were threatened. And they intended to board us. But it happened far off in the North Pacific. Not even in this hemisphere, so there is no report with any authorities you could call. I don’t think anyone is looking for us. If they are, well, it didn’t happen in Australia’s jurisdiction. In fact, it happened in international waters.”

The man looked at him hard. “And what of this other boat? What happened to it? Did you manage to outrun it?” he inquired.

“Best not to ask about that,” Li admitted.

“Tell me why I should get involved in this massive…can of worms?” he asked.

“We can pay up front in gold,” Li said.

The shipyard manager stood frowning, looking down at a cluster of thirty caliber holes awhile.

“That must have been one hell of a hail storm,” he said.

*

“I’d much rather you call me Jeff,” he pleaded. “Mr. Singh makes me want to look over my shoulder for my father.”

“I’ve never called my boss by his given name,” Houghton said, uncomfortable.

“Alright, if it’s formality you crave. I’m named peer of the Sovereign of Central. I’m Lord Singh, and you may address me properly,” Jeff invited.

“You’re kidding me. Nobody has titles like that anymore.”

“Would you say that to the King of England?” Jeff asked. “George the sixth, by the Grace of God, of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland and of His other Realms and Territories King, Head of the Commonwealth, Defender of the Faith?”

“Jeff it is…and you may address me as Walter,” he allowed, “but not Walt. I hate Walt.”

“Fine. Now this ceramic plate, we can have it late tomorrow. I’ll have two made, just in case we screw one up, so it won’t take eighteen hours to make another. They won’t be all that expensive because it’s mostly alumina.”

“Eighteen hours?” Walter asked, big eyed.

“He has a crucible being printed on the medium size machine right now,” Jeff said. “I can’t ask the man to scrap another customers job in the middle and start over later. I mean, I could, but it doesn’t seem reasonable. You do that and pretty soon you have a reputation as a pain in the butt. Even if you’re willing to pay extra and cover the cost of his job being run late.”

“No, you don’t understand. I’d have expected this to take a couple weeks to be done back home. Even with high powered permissions to put the red tape aside. It just doesn’t happen in a day.”

“How do they ever get anything done?” Jeff asked.

“Jeff, sometimes it is a mystery to me too. I suspect we are going to have this made and assembled in a couple weeks,” Walter said.

“Ha! We need it last week. I want to have it assembled in a week, and test it that very day.”

“Where are you getting the viruses to test it?” Walter asked.

Jeff looked stricken. “That’s something I hadn’t considered. I better go talk to Dr. Lee.”

*

“My news bots have gathered a bunch of stories in the past two weeks that have a nasty common theme upon analysis,” April told Jeff. “First, there was that program awhile back, where the head of Italy’s Health Agency, Daniele Baistrocchi, implied the Great Flu came from Life Extension Therapy and maybe carried to Earth by people who got treated on Home. Now, I have a good dozen sermons by different preachers on the religious channels. Normally TV preachers hardly ever trip my net bot parameters. But all of them are making vague references to ‘the sickness of the heavens’ and the ‘arrogance of those who have forsaken the Earth’. There’s a couple more phrases, but you get the idea. When a whole bunch of people who normally wouldn’t politely say good morning to each other start using exactly the same code phrases it’s no coincidence, it’s orchestrated propaganda. I’m just worried. Is this a prelude to something?”

“It doesn’t make sense,” Jeff agreed. “I don’t understand why they would need to increase public fear and rejection of life extension therapy. All their polls, and all our secretly conducted samplings, indicate the vast majority of the public is already convinced LET will drive you nuts, give you cancer, cause your spouse to leave you, and leave you at risk to catch the horrible flu. I don’t know why they would need the extra bonus threat of damnation on top of the horrific immediate effects everybody believes.”

“Maybe support for military action again?” April worried.

Jeff thought about that for awhile. He cracked his neck, and sipped his coffee. “This Indonesian stuff isn’t half bad,” he said.

April just nodded and ignored that. He sometimes muttered non sequiturs while most of his mind was off in some strange place she didn’t understand, processing.

“Again, it doesn’t make sense,” Jeff said. “The demographic targeted is powerless to change policy. If it was somehow aimed at high ranking military, that I’d understand. Every military officer who can tie his own shoelaces is firmly opposed to bothering us again. Every time they’ve tried the number convinced it costs more than the reward goes up. I think we have a pretty strong majority. Even among nations we never touched, they seem to learn from other’s mistakes. If anything they learn easier from others mistakes, because their own pride and a natural desire for retribution is absent.”

“Maybe they’re preaching to the grandmothers expecting them to influence the generals.” April guessed.

“I think you value the wisdom of elders more than the Earthies,” Jeff said. “Also, it doesn’t seem aimed at other groups. I don’t see any push to convince academics or professional classes. Of course it may just be an initial effort and they’ll phase it in to a wider audience. We’ll have to wait and see if that’s the case.”

April perked up. “I like that. I like that more than you might think. Yes. If it’s a general position they are going to push – long term - where do they start? They test it. They start with those already sorted as suggestible, and they start with those who, if they mess up and get push-back, it will do the least damage to them. Once they have feedback and an idea what works then they apply the same message, customized now, to more difficult portions of the population to manage. I expect that’s what we’ll see now. I think I’m understanding better now how a huge propaganda machine works. It wouldn’t work here. But I think you’ve helped me figure it out. Thank you.”

“Always happy to be of service,” Jeff said. “Talking things out with another person always opens up new lines of thought. I’m afraid I didn’t contribute much to this one but being a sounding board.”

“This may actually mean they have accepted they’re going to have to live with us for a long time, and are making accommodations to that reality, preparing to control their populations for the long haul,” April said.

“If that’s the case it might be in our self interest not to try to argue with them about where the plague came from or our status. If we do it could have a significant destabilizing effect, and they might feel a need to abandon accommodation as a policy,” Jeff warned.

“But it rankles, to not fight back against their lies. You said you had agents who identified the source of the flu,” April remembered. “Couldn’t you use them to expose the truth?”

“Yes, if you want to destabilize a whole bunch of Earth governments, and cause chaos and maybe even war down below. We had two agents, one of them came up to Home already, and the other went back to his ancestral home in Russia, far away from Italy where they were in danger. As the civil situation stabilizes, who knows what records may have survived to be consolidated and collated. It might only take one surveillance camera shot or a taxi cab record matched to unravel everything they did. The testimony of the one who came here would be suspect for his coming here, and the other fellow doesn’t want to be found. I don’t want to endanger him by looking. I wish you’d just drop this. It’s the sort of vendetta in which you may win, but you will be dead right.”

“I’ll let it go,” April agreed. “For now. But you spoke of karma once. You know if the day ever comes the mob finds out they’ve been lied to, and are dying years early for it, they’ll tear the politicians apart with their bare hands.”

“That seems a possibility,” Jeff agreed. “Although I can think of a handful of other deadly lies that never roused them to action. But I think we should always keep information about LET on our public servers. Just like the archives of our Assembly meetings and other things the Earthies are already blocking from their nets. That way, come a day of revelation, the onus is on them, not us.”

“Agreed,” April said, but he could tell she still wasn’t happy about it. Well, neither was he. He also really wondered what eventually happened to a certain priest they’d interrogated, who was the deliberate source of the Great Flu. It was far too dangerous to try to find out.

*

“You’re kidding,” Tara said. “Why not Switzerland?” he joked. He had the comm and didn’t look away to respond to Li.

“According to this, that’s just as possible if they wished, and met all the conditions,” Li said, waving the flimsies in his hand. He printed out physical copies of anything this important.

“If we are to be Home flagged I presume they have a flag? I never imagined they had need of a flag. Where would they fly it? Inside with no breeze to lift it? It would look silly hung on a spaceship.”

“They paint an ensign on at least some space ships. That’s an argument right there it is no farce on an ocean vessel. Here, look. It’s not too bad looking.” Li moved forward and showed him a sample image of it, a deep blue flag with three gold ellipses increasing in size right to left along the top edge of a larger angled ellipse. Tara glanced at it, and then back to the sea.

“Hmm, modern, like Brazil’s. I like that it isn’t just colored bars or heraldry. Are you disposed to accept their invitation?” Tara wondered.

“I have to at least sleep on it.”

“Would it affect your own status? Or mine for that matter?” Tara asked.

“No, a Panamanian ship can sail without a single actual Panamanian aboard,” Li said. “Although I’m seeing Home citizenship as a plus, more and more.”

“Maybe you should go up and see the place before you commit to that big a step,” Tara suggested.

“A shuttle ticket is a pretty expensive,” Li reminded him.

“Tell your friend, Jeff, you want a ride up and back on the Chariot,” Tara advised him. “They are making the trips anyway, and they never have every last cubic meter packed to the bulkhead. They always run up against mass limits first.”

“Umm…maybe. That’s an awfully big favor,” Li said. “To forego my weight in steaks.”

“They didn’t have any trouble asking you to push the limits all the way across the Pacific and make a big target of us,” Tara countered. “You have me to command while you are gone – for now. I’m not promising to be here forever. Would you want to leave the Tobiuo in anybody else’s hands if I decide I’m done with Earth and ask for a lift myself?”

“No, not with the crew we have now. They’re good hands, but you’re right, I’d dread leaving the Tobiuo to any of them as master,” Li admitted. He looked at Tara. “Perhaps you should schedule a trip up too, if you are seriously contemplating quitting Earth.”

“True. It seems like too many go there running for their lives, or simply because this is the only chance they will ever have, and they’re unhappy here. It makes sense to make that choice from a less imperative set of circumstances if you have the luxury.”

“Let us think on how to put the question to Jeff then. For both of us. We’ll talk about it again, perhaps start a dialogue about it, when we reply to the question of reflagging her,” Li said.

“That sounds good to me,” Tara said, hands on the wheel.

And if both he and Tara eventually emigrate, what would become of the Tobiuo? Li thought.

*

“It’s still too big for everyday transactions,” Zack complained, tossing the one gram Solar on the counter between them. “And what am I supposed to use for change? People are turning their nose up at USNA dollars and outright refusing EuroMarks. There isn’t enough Tongan money to be found and I think people are hoarding Australian dollars. They are getting so ratty I’m getting them laminated in clear tape now. The tape is probably worth as much as a single, but we see very few of those.”

Jeff had simply stopped to buy some things. Not intending to get in a big discussion. He needed to set up Dr. Walter Houghton as a roommate. The man took his offer of employment. He didn’t wait until the last day either. That was tomorrow. Jeff appreciated not needing to run and make arrangements in the last hours of Walter’s quarantine.

He’d gotten an entirely unexpected earful from Zack when he made his purchases. Apparently he’d been saving this particular rant up for some time. Not that Zack didn’t have a valid point. He had Eric Pennington with him to run the bedding, towels and things back to his office for him on a hand cart. The boy seemed very interested in the discussion.

“Zack, I’m just as aware of the problem as you are,” Jeff assured him. “Don’t you think if I had a solution I’d have gone public with it by now? I can’t make something like a centigram Solar for pocket change. It costs more to make it than the face value.

“Why can’t you make conventional coins?” Zack demanded. “I understand encapsulating the metal and making it traceable for a significant amount of gold. But you could make cheap bare silver or copper coins just like Earth governments did years ago, and counterfeiting wouldn’t be an issue. The metal itself would be the value. You could even make them open source, and let anybody who wanted mint them for that matter. Or offer to mint their metal so cheap it wouldn’t pay anybody to make dies and counterfeit them in the first place. It would be cheap and easy to make testers that check the weight and volume or even the thermal conductivity or something to validate they were the proper metal.”

“We don’t have enough copper or silver,” Jeff explained patiently. “The Rock seems to have only about a hundred ten parts per million of copper, and even less silver. Every bit of it is too valuable and scarce to use for coins. If you struck coins from it they’d just be taken out of circulation and put into electronics and other things. All you’d do is drive up the value of the metals by increasing demand, and distort the local economy. Maybe ten years from now we could do that, if we have a dozen asteroid mines here or out there on site, churning out a whole lot more metal.”

Zack just looked irritated. But he was smart enough to recognize a valid argument.

“OK, how about doing the reverse of Earthies, and having coins, Solars, for the large denominations, and paper or plastic money for the small change?” Zack proposed.

“Earth currencies work very nicely right now, as far as security,” Jeff said. “Look at EuroMarks. They expire in a few months, so they have to be produced really cheaply. Don’t you think I’ve looked into it? But there are a half dozen countries big enough to produce their own. The other countries use the German mint or two other big bank note companies, one in England and one in North America, to produce their own money. It just requires a huge scale to get the needed economy. I am not willing to outsource our money to Earthies. I don’t trust them, and Earth governments could interfere with even the commercial printers, and use our own money as a weapon against us.”

“Yeah, I can see that,” Zack admitted. There was a short silence as both of them were out of ideas.

“I can see a solution,” Eric volunteered.

“Well, enlighten us,” Zack said. Fortunately he didn’t taint it with sarcasm, because Eric was determined he’d tell them to stuff it, if they talked down to him because he was a kid.

“Not for free. You guys need a fix. I have one. I want either a job in your bank as head of monetary creation, or one tenth of a percent of the cash made using my methods,” Eric demanded of Jeff.

“Go for the set fee,” Zack counseled Jeff. “If you let him get a foot in the door the damn kid will have your job in a year.” It was the nicest thing Zack had ever said about Eric.

“I don’t know. I have enough jobs on my plate without fighting this problem. Maybe it would be worth hiring him to have it handled, and free up my time. What kind of a cap or time limit on the tenth of a percent? Assuming it is valid and works,” Jeff added.

“No cap and in perpetuity, Eric said, stumbling over the word he’d recently learned from his banker Irwin Hall. He thought it made him sound much older and more sophisticated.

“Cheap at twice the price,” Eric said when Jeff didn’t respond right away.

Zack just did a face plant and groaned. That wasn’t helpful at all.

“This will take a lot of your time,” Jeff warned. “Are you willing to cut back on your second hand sales and courier business? Can you work with people and suppliers, to make the parts of this scheme you can’t do happen? I’d expect you to work on making Solars too, not just smaller denominations. I have no trouble with a tenth percent fee to make them.”

“I have people to do all that stuff,” Eric assured him. “I only come do courier work for important people, because I want to have a relationship and opportunities to work with them. Like this, now.”

“He has minions…I should have known,” Zack said.

“You’re hired, and the tenth percent fee of small money as your base salary, if you can convince me it will work,” Jeff allowed. “Now tell us.”

“You didn’t talk salary or bennies beyond the set percentage for small stuff,” Zack protested. It wasn’t clear to whom that objection was directed.

“Jeff will treat me right if I do the work,” Eric said with conviction. “He has a reputation with a hundred shops and sources to protect. From shipbuilders to security guys. I think he really is an OK guy, besides being trapped in the local net and under everybody’s scrutiny. Would you sell me something junk and not make it good?” Eric asked Zack.

“You? No way. You’d post it on every blessed public board, and write it on the corridor walls,” Zack said. “I might as well close the Chandlery down and be done with it.”

Eric nodded, satisfied. “My sister sells prints of her drawings. Of course they’re cheaper than the original drawing. I think she hates to let those go at all, so they sell very high if she decides she can part with them at all. You’d be surprised how many sell down to Earth, even though she has never advertised there. Of course, you know Earthies, as soon as she started selling them down below they started copying them. Nothing you can do, if you can’t declare war on them like Jeff here. But now when she sells a print to Earth she sends along a little card with a seal of authenticity for that print. It’s like the seals you get on aerospace parts or tamper proof tape to put on stuff. If you lift it off it’s ruined, and can’t be put back down or on something else.

“But the kind she uses doesn’t say ‘VOID’ or ‘DISTURBED’ underneath when you peel it. It has a hidden number. If you peel it yourself then it is automatically voided. If they want the print authenticated they have to send the card back to her asking to authenticate print number 1207 or whatever. She’ll peel the hologram and check the hidden number against her record. If it’s valid they pay her a few dollars for her trouble and she sends them back a new letter of authenticity with a new hidden number registered to the print. It’s not just out there and dependent on being hard to fake, it stays in her control.

“The tags are mass produced and really cheap. She buys them a thousand at a time. I suggest you sell the same sort of seal on a card. Maybe business card sized, not a bigger one like she uses. They’d be awkward to carry a bunch around. But each one would be a certificate for a hundredth of a gram of gold. People could trade them around, but you would only accept a hundred of them at a time to redeem for a real coin. But only cards with the seal intact and you check the certification to redeem them. For a small fee of course. Or maybe free for enough to get a full Solar.” Eric added.

“What happens if somebody starts buying seals and making their own?” Zack asked.

“It’s like Jeff said about the money, it costs a lot to set up and make these. It isn’t a generic seal like shipping tape, she gets a thousand at a time because that’s the minimum to have her own design. If you order ten thousand they don’t even add a fee for doing your own logo. Nothing is going to be impossible to copy, but you can make it not worth the trouble to try. You’d have to go around to a whole bunch of places and pass them. It would be as stupid as counterfeiting one dollar bills when it costs a buck and a half to make them. If you deal with a company in Switzerland or Japan, someplace that isn’t hostile to us, it should be pretty safe. Safer than the places he’s talking about for printing bank notes.”

“And what happens if I take one of these and it is fake?” Zack asked. “Do I just eat the loss?”

“If you are dumb enough to take a whole stack of them, yeah,” Eric said. “But that’s not the kind of purchase for which they are intended. If I get one from a customer for courier work for example, I’m going to know who gave it to me. If I start getting a bunch I’m going to write numbers on the back to be able to track who gave which to me, and if somebody wants to give me more than two or three I’m going to want to have him initial them or rub each one to get his DNA signature on them, if I don’t know him really well.”

Eric stopped and thought. “Maybe it should have a peel cover or a fold over, and only rip it off and touch the card when you give it to somebody who is going to turn it in to Jeff to redeem it. I can’t see many of these going down to Earth to complicate things. It’s for local use.”

“I will go see your sister and look at these custom security tags,” Jeff said, “You know, it all still depends on everybody trusting me to actually have the gold on hand to redeem them. If I print them like crazy and don’t hold the gold back it would all fall apart,” Jeff said. “That’s usually what happens.”

“Modesty is nice, but I think you underestimate your reputation,” Zack said. “If it depends on your reputation I’ll take them in trade. Besides, your women are officers of the bank aren’t they? No way all three of you are going to turn crooked.”

“They aren’t my women,” Jeff protested. “They might…object if they heard you phrase it that way. They each have their own businesses and reputations and integrity, indeed, Heather is a head of state. And April…” He hesitated to say what April was out loud. It was complicated.

“And everybody knows April,” Zack finished for him. “Indeed that was my point, that I would do business with either of them, independent of you, or of each other. No offense intended in the usage.”

“Do you have the gold to put out enough of these certificates?” Eric asked.

“By the most fortuitous of circumstances, yes. But I want an agreement with other parties to issue them in that form. They were expecting the larger Solar denominations.” Jeff frowned. “I don’t know what we are going to call them but certificates is too big a mouthful, and I don’t want to call them ‘certs’. We need something short and descriptive.”

“They’re small,” Eric said. “Just call them bits.”

Chapter 12

The Sovereign of Central, characterized by some of the Earth press as Queen of the Moon, Heather Anderson, pulled her blue terry robe around her snuggly and stirred some brown sugar into her oatmeal, the sugar was precious, imported, as was her cup of coffee. At the moment it was a privilege of royalty, although she had assurance they would be getting more soon. It was very early in the morning which was the only time free for an impromptu meeting.

Her breakfast companion was her best driver, all around handyman, and loyal subject, Johnson. He was really a good solid fellow, bold and reasonably smart, but Heather had found out over the last couple years he lacked an expansive imagination. That was one reason he’d never been made a Peer.

“I’m concerned. The Obarzanek family placed an ad in What’s Happening on Home and The Word in Armstrong that they intend to offer storage facilities below the two kilometer depth,” Johnson said. “They’ve been more aggressive about tunneling than some of the other residents, going down without bothering to add any cubic along the way. They are suggesting their secure storage for corporate records, personal valuables, and even antiquities for governments and museums, far from political hazards and legal actions, or the threat of things like tornados, earthquakes or hurricanes.”

Johnson had his pad in his hand with the screen lit up. And the way he waved it implied he had the offending ad ready for her to read. Heather made no move to take it. Lidia Obarzanek had told her all that and much more weeks ago.

“Why does that concern you?” Heather asked. “We have no zoning, we have no limits on how deep people tunnel, or how much cubic they excavate, as long as they don’t bother their neighbors, what do we care? Those are the sort of restrictions that cause people to leave Earth to avoid. I know for a fact the Obarzaneks intend to put in the first really deep elevator shaft. They’ve started on that. Beat us to it, since we have other fish to fry right now. You might be surprised to know they intend to make a bunch of apartments and rent them out when they get down another kilometer or so. The whole family is ambitious, I’d guess all that is just a start. I wish everybody was doing as much to create work and suck in outside money.”

“That will impose a burden on our infrastructure,” Johnson warned. “The surface roads can only carry so much traffic. If one ranch has hundreds of occupants what happens when they all hit the road at shift change?”

“Well for one thing the only people coming up to the surface will be those concerned with surface operations. Such as transport to Armstrong or Camelot, and spaceport operations. Even traffic control and space com only intend to keep a very small crew on the surface and most operations will be deep. By the time we have all these thousands of people commuting to their job, it will be done horizontally instead of vertically.”

“How can they commute horizontally?” Johnson asked. The poor fellow looked confused.

“Just as the land owners have full rights vertically, Central has rights under the surface roads. There are several reasons we have generous right of ways on both sides of the roads. One is when there is sufficient need, we will duplicate the surface streets at depth. Right now it looks like we’ll cut a complete set of roads mirroring the surface at the two kilometer depth,” Heather informed him.

Johnson’s mouth was hanging open. “I had no idea that was planned,” he admitted.

“I’m betting we won’t need to start on it for another five years,” Heather said. “We should own a couple more tunneling machines by then too. The vertical rights are a wedge pointed at the center of the moon. The sides taper in. It’s like on Earth, you look at some Earth maps the roads that go north and south taper together towards the pole. Sometimes you see them take an offset or one road stops and the others on each side continue, when the distance they were trying to maintain as a grid got too far off from the meridian lines not being parallel. But we can go really deep before the right of way gets too narrow for a road. We’ll worry about that in a century or two if we don’t just spread out.”

Johnson sat and sipped his coffee, trying to integrate how Heather’s revelation changed all his assumptions. Heather wasn’t cruel enough to drink coffee in front of him and not offer him any. He was starting to see he might not have sufficient data to reach his conclusions. He was uncomfortable.

“There’s also no reason ranch holders can’t agree to easements across their property if they decide to cooperate with adjacent owners,” Heather continued. “I fully expect that to happen eventually. The elevator the Obarzaneks intend to put in will be freight sized. Big enough to take a rover down. So they are putting it on the corner of their property right next to the public roadway. I expect they will allow public access for a toll. I’m just as glad, because they are out at the end of the north road. I already have people asking when we will have a public elevator here at the center. When we do it’s going to charge a fee to lift things too.”

“Thank you, that alleviated my concerns,” Johnson said.

“No problem. You should talk to Wyoming too. She has some numbers on how many vehicles can be on the streets at the same time under automated control. They can run fast enough, and close enough together, that I think you will be surprised how much traffic they can carry. Our systems will be much better than self driving cars on Earth. They have so many limits because of crooked old streets and legacy systems that we don’t. Are you sure you won’t have some oatmeal?” Heather asked.

“No ma’am, thank you for your time,” Johnson said, standing immediately. He took it for a dismissal, although Heather hadn’t meant it that way. But neither did she urge him to stay. It was nice to have a few minutes in the morning without business intruding.

*

“I tend to keep the office a little cool. It helps me stay alert.” Jeff said. “If it bothers you let me know. We can try to come to some accommodation. Put whatever you want in the fridge. I’ll try to keep my stuff to the left and you take the right. If you leave a mess in the bathroom they will never find the body. Other than that I’m not especially fussy. Any questions?”

“Do you want me to kick in for any shared supplies like toilet paper or cleaning stuff?” Walter twitched a bit at his remark about leaving a mess in the bathroom. That was good. He was listening.

“No, it doesn’t take much, Jeff allowed. “You might get in the habit of washing with a sani-wipe besides paper. Some of the station born have never experienced pollution or smoke and have a nose like a blood-hound. Same with showering. Most people take two showers a day. In the morning and before going out in the evening. Water isn’t metered and you don’t have to conserve it. You can buy you own soap and shampoo and so on. Prepare to be shocked at what they cost. I wet and then soap up my hair with liquid soap and try to use that one squirt to soap up the rest of my body if I’m not too grubby, not to save water but to conserve the soap.”

“I’m used to a wider temperature range than you, I’m Canadian. I can adjust,” Walter said. “I’ll put on short sleeves or long sleeves as needed, or even a sweater. If one of us stays out later or wants to go to bed early what should our custom be?”

“I have a light in the bathroom that can be turned down quite low. That gives enough light to find your things coming in late. I keep earplugs and a sleep mask. I suggest you get some if you are a light sleeper. If one of us goes to bed while the other is out or one of us wants to sleep while the other is working we’ll set the inner door on the emergency lock. That way you aren’t opening the door on the bright corridor.” Jeff frowned. “My earplugs are pretty good, but I didn’t ask. Do you snore?”

“I have no idea. Nobody ever told me if I snore,” Walter said. That raised a lot of questions Jeff decided it was safest to keep to himself.

“Well if you do I can always buy noise canceling plugs,” Jeff decided. “That’s your bed in the far corner,” Jeff said, pointing to where it hung on a clip up near the overhead out of the way. “It needs to be out of the way so we can unfold chairs if we have some big action or project going on and people in here. Crap…I didn’t get you a laundry bag. We have laundry service once a week. They vacuum tumble it and return it. You don’t want to do leather, and it ruins wool if you don’t spray it with a conditioning mist every time.”

“Where can I go get one?” Walter asked.

“Zack’s Chandlery by the cafeteria, because it will take too long to have it lifted,” Jeff said.

“I’ll be going by there for breakfast. I’ll get it then,” Walter told him, and looked around “There isn’t anywhere to cook at all is there?”

“No. I eat in the cafeteria or get take-away. If you want a small microwave to heat sandwiches or soup we’ll find someplace to put it.” Jeff looked around. “Probably up on the bulkhead. We had one in here for awhile when we had a twenty four hour watch on China once. Well…twice. I don’t want a plug in fry pan. The grease will come off it as an aerosol and get on everything, documents and screens.”

“Does that happen often?” Walter asked. “A twenty four hour watch while something is going on and people in here, so neither of us could sleep?”

“No…” Jeff looked thoughtful. “I doubt, I hope, it won’t happen again.”

Walter wanted to ask more, but Jeff looked so unhappy he dropped it. They set the door to Walter’s hand and voice and that was it.

“This is new,” Jeff said.

“What?”

“I’ve never had a roomie,” Jeff informed him.

*

Chen wasn’t expecting a call. When Irwin Hall of the Private Bank of Home appeared on the screen he still wasn’t surprised. Irwin greeted him pleasantly, and asked to speak to Huian. That surprised him. He couldn’t imagine the head of the bank making a special call to his wife over the relatively small amount he’d committed to her care, but he summoned her to take the call without prying.

It was by no means a short call, and it seemed she was the one giving permissions and quite happy about the conversation. He’d have thought she was having an affair, except they were not making any effort to hide their communication. Also he kept hearing the occasional word that was definitely about banking. As he should. At the end there was a lot of yes, yes, we’re in agreement, and I think this will work marvelously…What could there possibly be to discuss of this complexity? But he kept his eyes on his own pad, though he hadn’t changed the page in a quarter hour.

After Huian ended the call Chen asked very politely, and as unconcerned as he could make himself appear, if all was well, and their investment was still secure?

“Yes, husband. I did transfer the funds to Myat. So they aren’t in the Private Bank right now. When I was speaking with her I suggested we could send gold, and she was adamant that was a terrible idea as gold is not freely moving there right now. Indeed she indicated it made you a target. I got the sense from other things she said that she was more worried about her government and other bankers applying pressure to shut them down, more than simple thieves. So I offered to act as a conduit for her to send gold up here where it is safer. She sent some the other day and I took it to Irwin to hold for us,” Huian revealed, with a little trepidation. Would Chen approve?

“Ah, you did exactly right,” Chen said relaxing. “Irwin will take good care of it and put it to work somewhere sensible and reliable. If she sends more you might branch out and ask Jeff Singh if the System Trade bank can manage some of it for you and Myat.”

“It already is, sort of,” Huian said. “Mr. Hall was just telling me that smaller denominations of money necessary to business are becoming scarce on Home, and unreliable, because some currencies like the EuroMark have become depreciating. So he and Mr. Singh have decided to issue a business card sized certificate that represents a hundredth of a gram of gold. The merchants can redeem them when they have a hundred, and they have a tamper proof hologram which can be checked on redeeming them to prevent counterfeiting. It seemed like a rather good idea to me, so I agreed to have a portion of the gold entrusted to me by Myat committed to this scheme. I’m going to communicate that to Myat so she knows what we are doing with her gold.”

“That’s sounds good to me,” Chen agreed. “For such small values counterfeiting will never be a big issue, but the integrity of the process will be paramount. I have every confidence in both Irwin and Jeffery not to issue certificates they can’t redeem. That’s the danger with almost any monetary scheme, not the actual function, but the danger of fraud from the managers. I trust those two.”

Huian was happy to see her husband go back to his book. She wasn’t stupid. She hadn’t seen him advance the page all the way through her call. It probably was good he didn’t ask how much gold Myat sent. Better to reveal that later after she had a record of success in administering it.

*

“This is very strange,” Jeff said. Walter just lifted an eyebrow rather than speak aloud.

“It doesn’t have anything to do with our project, not directly anyway, but I have been told by Dave, who does a lot of our ship work that he’s flooded with requests from Earth enterprises to undertake new ship work. Either whole vessels or subassemblies and components.”

“For what sort of vessels?” Walter asked. “I assume you wouldn’t make armed vessels for their military. Orbit to orbit or shuttles? Or perhaps moon landers?”

“I didn’t think to ask,” Jeff said. “But you’re right. It makes a great deal of difference. I’m going to get him back, which I hate to do, he spends most of his time on the shop floor. But I’ll both ask that and see what his opinion is about why. He seemed to assume I’d know.”

Jeff looked even more confused when he got off the com in a few minutes.

“Dave says the sort of things they wanted bid were for private lifters. A few were for the small sporty sort you’d expect billionaires to own, or at least very well to do millionaires. A small four seat shuttle that can be air launched to orbit costs as much as a full size passenger jet with a custom interior. A really sweet one like an Embraer with an Advanced Composites hull even more. But a couple were for more conventional space planes. And he said on one file they sent him somebody messed up and it listed the ultimate customer as the Deutsche Bank. When he turned them down they offered to pay in Australian dollars instead of EuroMarks. It didn’t matter, he’s simply all booked up.”

“Things were pretty bad in North America just now, when I left. You’d think the flu would have been a boost to the economy, if you were a professional economist. That’s what the news was repeating when I left. You are familiar with the Broken Window Theory of economic stimulation?”

“That old crap?” Jeff asked. “You mean the Broken Window Fallacy. Destroying wealth in any form is never a benefit. I can’t believe they keep repeating that.”

“There are bad ideas repeated that were old to the Babylonians,” Walter said. “If you put a guy on the news saying it, wearing a nice suit, with a good haircut, a lot of people will believe it. My experience was things are getting worse instead of better. But you don’t want to say that in public.”

“The numbers are pretty good,” Jeff objected. “If the numbers are true things are recovering. But you were there. Tell me how it’s bad.”

“My school was still basically closed when your man contacted me. It was very important to them to say they were still open. I was still getting paid, but that was from the state and federal government. There were classes being held, but the utilities were shut down to about half the buildings. If they don’t pour antifreeze in the drains and other stuff to winterize them they’ll be ruined by spring. I’m not sure anybody in charge is bright enough to do something so practical. The plumbers might do it themselves if they can find supplies. The maintenance and yard crew are living in the dorms because there’s room and it’s better than their homes in neighborhoods that are falling apart and dangerous. Those buildings will be fine. They’ll see to it.

“There’s no fuel to waste to cut the grass, that’s temporarily illegal anyway, so it’s like a prairie across the central campus. Most of the professors still holding classes get direct gifts of food and cash from their students. A lot of studies are halted because the professors are dead of the flu or just gone – nobody knows where. The Music and History departments are almost totally vacant.

“The big stores were open, but a lot of little shops were closed, and almost all the local restaurants. When I went shopping it was getting harder to get things. You could still get razors,” Walter said, feeling his chin, “but not always the brand you wanted. Some brands of things just disappeared. And then the last couple months we would see days where there were no razors at all, until they got a new shipment.”

“How about prices?” Jeff asked.

“Just my opinion, no proof, but I think the bigger companies have gotten the word from the government to restrict price increases, or they’ll freeze them. There were a couple grocery stores that had sudden price increases and the next thing you know they were closed. Not for ‘profiteering’ but for health and safety reasons, or one of them for storm water run-off violations. Most items have limits on how much you can buy. If you try to buy more they just refuse you at the checkout.”

“That doesn’t sound terrible,” Jeff said. “We were short of stuff here too, but it’s getting better.”

Walter gave him a dour look.

“Not minimizing what you said. I appreciate hearing it,” Jeff said.

“Don’t forget. That’s in a first world urban area of moderate climate, with lots of assets and infrastructure. I expect if you know what is really happening in say Egypt or Iceland things may be a lot rougher there. And harder to find out what’s really happening. Even in North America I know there are people migrating because they no longer have the things they need to deal with their climate.”

“Oh really?” Jeff asked.

“I have a friend who lived in Connecticut. He and his wife have an older home, not right in town. I guess I should say had, I doubt they’ll ever go back, so it is abandoned. The house is so old it used to be heated with fuel oil. But now it has an electric heat pump. He had a back up wood stove, but even though it is the super clean sort that runs really hot, with a catalytic convertor, it is illegal now. You have to have the catalytic convertor replaced every ten years, and he can’t find one. Probably couldn’t afford it if he could. With all the other things not functioning they still have pay for government inspectors to enforce clean air rules. The power isn’t super dependable now to run the heat pump. They’ve had outages in good weather. And the county announced they are only going to plow the main roads now when the accumulated snow falls reach a quarter meter.

“So they closed the house up and moved to the panhandle of Florida. He’s fortunate to have people there, and he had a business permit to buy diesel for their truck to make the move. That was last fall, he’s no dummy, and could see the handwriting on the wall with the flu starting up, and moved while it was still possible. To do that today they couldn’t buy the diesel. Most of the air traffic moving is for officials and soldiers only. You can’t buy a rail ticket and buses aren’t running regularly. Today they’d have to pack a very few valuables and head south walking or on bicycles, if they are healthy enough to do that. I expect to see a lot more of that as the weather cools and people see no recovery of supply.”

“OK, maybe I need to examine things closer,” Jeff decided.

“On the boat, Li said we had an overwatch,” Walter said. “I’d suggest if you can get your data by direct observation, that’s better than trusting official numbers.”

“I still have people working for me down there. But they only send me what I ask for. I need to shift what I am asking for because I was only getting a little anecdotal data about living conditions that they funneled to April.” Jeff stopped and thought a bit before he commented again.

“That still doesn’t say why they would be ship building as a response.”

“Well for one, the really rich want to be able to leave when they wish, not be subject to government controlled shut-downs or commercial service that may end from lack of parts or money. Other than that, all I can think is that the off Earth population is probably the best performing segment of the economy right now. You have growth, and almost zero effective unemployment,” Walter pointed out.

“Yes but we’re small, I doubt there more than ten thousand people off Earth right now,” Jeff said.

“And what is your per capita GNP?” Walter asked. “Sometimes those sort of numbers impress people in business more than totals. How many people stepped off the first few European ships to North America? And look where it is today.”

“That’s an interesting take on it,” Jeff said.

*

“The owners are asking us to make recommendations for the next snowball retrieval,” Deloris said. “They will launch soon, before we return. I know you are working with Jeff to make suggestions on how to select starship crews, but I think you can help the next snowball expedition without a conflict of interest. If you can’t just Alice and I will make a report.”

“They’ve already built the ship,” Barak said. “I wouldn’t be surprised if it is too late to gather new applicants. So all I can suggest is how to pick from the ones they have. They have a set number of crew and it’s limited by life support isn’t it?”

“Yes, but I think they are worried how close this voyage came to disaster,” Deloris said. “So they’re open to a reasonable amount of change.”

“As they should be,” Barak agreed. “I have limited suggestions for this crew they’re about to launch, but it’s too late to make big changes. That will have to wait for the next one.”

“What about this expedition leaving?” Deloris insisted. “They aren’t going to scrap it and wait for you to build an all new system. What would you do to reduce the chances of our sort of problems happening again, this time?”

Barak looked unhappy. He didn’t really want to answer. He wasn’t going to tell Deloris or anybody but Jeff his full thoughts, but he’d say a little to appear cooperative.

“I’d insist on references. Not a person’s previous boss. Not their family or friends alone. This may sound odd, but I’d ask the people who worked under them. I’d ask for references of a previous girlfriend or boyfriend. I’d ask somebody who was a roomie at school, or who rented cubic to them. If a person isn’t decent enough to have the people he had opportunity to treat badly speak well of the him, I wouldn’t send that person off as crew in our circumstances. And I’d run veracity software on all of them while doing this.”

“What if some perfectly qualified lady happened to have the proverbial boyfriend from hell, who is just waiting to give her a bad rating for perceived slights and failures?” Deloris asked, “or the opposite of course, the horrid girlfriend. What if he had a totally worthless subordinate, who hates him for actually expecting him to do his job?”

“I didn’t say it was a perfect or long term solution, but they need six people urgently. I admit they may pass over deserving and qualified people using this method, but if they can’t find six people who have the unreserved endorsement of most of their previous workmates and landlords I wouldn’t want to go with them,” Barak said, and immediately smiled. “Can you imagine the howls of indignation they would have over that down on Earth? They’d sue the company out of existence.”

“Yeah, true. You think this procedure would have been sufficient to expose Captain Jaabir, Dobbs and Harold as unstable?” Deloris asked.

“Harold, I’m not certain,” Barak admitted. “He wasn’t deeply evil, I think even Alice would agree with that. Full of himself and petty, but he wouldn’t force himself on her. We could have put up with him until we got back and then refused to ever be on a crew with him again. But he was impatient. You just can’t be that way in vacuum work. I have no idea how much suit time he had, but…not enough. Maybe it would have showed in pre-hiring, maybe not. But do you have any doubt the captain and XO would have had an interesting history of personal conflict and taking liberties and shortcuts, if enough people had been interviewed?”

“No, I think both of them were messed up enough some kind of a warning flag would have been raised,” Deloris admitted. “They should have never been hired having a relationship. That’s going to be one of my suggestions. Not unless they had been an old married couple, together for years. I recorded, your suggestion and it will be included exactly as you said it.”

“Would you ask, and if Alice doesn’t mind, let me hear her ideas?” Barak asked.

“Sure. She’ll probably tell you more than she’s going to say out loud and publicly to the owners. You are holding back some things too. Aren’t you?” Deloris asked. “I could hear it in the slow careful way you answered.”

“Yes. Aren’t you?” Barak asked pointedly.

Deloris just shrugged, unwilling to even nod a clear yes with the bridge being recorded. She didn’t think they’d review the whole log minute by minute. But why risk it?”

Chapter 13

“Dr. Lee didn’t have a sample of the Great Influenza that swept Earth, but he has dead virus vaccines that will allow us to know some variety of flu is incubating in a person. That’s good enough in my book,” Jeff said. “We don’t really want a person bringing even one of the old strains to Home.”

“Be careful if you try to acquire a sample,” Walter begged him. “It makes the hair stand up on my neck just thinking about having a live sample of that evil crap here inside the habitat.”

“Doc Lee probably feels the same way. He could have retained samples from a couple people we had with the disease in isolation, but rather than take samples he went to extraordinary lengths to make sure everything they touched in the isolation capsule was sterilized a couple different ways.” Jeff said.

“Since this looks for the outer shell, or even fragments of it, that will work just fine,” Walter assured Jeff. “It can look for other viruses if you set it up in memory. I’ve used public data to program it, although the full genome of recent flu doesn’t seem to be available on public sources. If you touch the plate with a sample it should work right now.”

“Power it up then,” Jeff ordered.

Walter touched the corner square displayed on the screen of an open pad cabled to his device. It booted up and showed - ready - in about two seconds. The actual working device was a flat ceramic plate in a frame with a bar forming an arch over the plate, and a cable to the pad.

“Go ahead. Touch the ceramic anywhere,” Walter invited.

Jeff touched a finger tip to the screen.

No pathogens detected – was displayed very quickly, and a square that said, - reset -.

Jeff got a test tube from his pocket with a long handled swab on it. “Doc Lee didn’t waste a whole dose of vaccine on us. He touched the end with far less than a full drop.”

“You’ll want to clean the plate and reset before touching that to it,” Walter said.

“Sure, go ahead,” Jeff waited not opening the container.

Walter touched the reset command and the screen displayed: clearing.

After less than a second it showed - ready – again, and Walter waved an invitation to Jeff.

“What if I stick my hand in while it’s cleaning?” Jeff asked.

“It might burn the hair off the back of your hand. That’s about it,” Walter explained. “I was worried about the reflection off the plate for the operator, not the person being tested. They are only exposed to it once in awhile. The operator gets the flash reflected at him dozens of times a day. But it turns out the plate is extremely absorbent and of low reflectance in the infrared.”

“Maybe you should turn it so the operator isn’t in line of sight of the plate? Jeff asked.

Walter shook his head no. “The security person has to see the incoming person touch the plate. Or you are going to have people hiding that they have something in their hand. Or cover up that one finger has a little boot on it like people use to count money. The next generation machine will check to make sure a real live finger actually touches the screen, besides a few other improvements.”

“OK,” Jeff said, and uncorked the tube. He wiggled it to get the thin handle to stick out and grabbed that. He didn’t swipe a long line with it, just touched the cotton tip to the center of the plate.

Influenza detected – was displayed with no delay.

“Hot damn. We’re in business!” Jeff said. “We have to get Jon down here and show it to him.”

“It’s quite portable,” Walter pointed out. “If he has a moment we could take it to him to do a demonstration. I assume security will take it to the entry lock for each shuttle arrival, and store it somewhere secure between times.”

“You’re right,” Jeff agreed. “That’s even more impressive. I’ll call him right now.”

*

Jeff had dinner with April to give her the good news about the virus sensor early. He expected Jon to make an announcement sometime in the evening. Over supper he related Dave’s story of all the people seeking vessels or components from his shop.

“All these people wanting to build lift capacity make me nervous,” Jeff said. “I was thinking about making another Earth landing shuttle.”

“And you’re thinking about canceling it now, because it will be excess capacity?” April asked.

“No! Just the opposite. I figure if they are worried that commercial lifters may be grounded then I need to do the same as them, and have my own. One shuttle with as small a load as the Chariot can carry isn’t enough to start to supply Home. If supply drops off again you couldn’t blame the Earthies for supplying their own people first. Nobody in orbit owns a ground landing shuttle but us. They’re all orbit to orbit and lunar landers,” Jeff worried.

“You could see if Ernie still has sufficient liquid funds to be a partner,” April suggested.

“If I have to. I really like owning the Chariot outright,” Jeff said.

“You have the plans for Dionysus’ Chariot. Do you want to build a second in series?” April asked. “I know you can make some of the big pieces cheaper now with lunar materials.”

“No, having twice the Chariot’s capacity still wouldn’t get us out of trouble if we lose much commercial lift service. I can’t make a water landing shuttle that will handle the sort of loads we need. I talked about it with Dave, and it might be physically possible, but not at any price we can handle. We need a shuttle that will land on a runway, and take off that way too, lifting six to eight times as much as Dionysus’ Chariot. Right now that’s the only configuration we can build that lifts a lot, cheaply.”

“You need a friendly government to use that,” April reminded him.

‘Yes, we’re pretty sure of Tonga. I’ve spoken with your father and he’s talking to Mitsubishi. The Japanese government didn’t want to have direct landings right after the war with North America, thus supplying us through Tonga, but things may have changed enough that they’ll allow it now. Especially if the case is presented to them by Mitsubishi instead of us directly. I think that if conditions get bad on Earth it may work in their favor to open other landing rights to us. The specialty items we make may be easier to get directly than through a distribution network in chaos.”

“I thought things were getting better,” April said. “But you expect them to deteriorate?”

“Walter has been convincing me from his experiences, that the improvements may be temporary, and in some cases outright lies. I’m shifting some of our peoples’ intelligence gathering. Before they sort of reported what they just incidentally observed to you for your economics education. Now, it’s shifting to be a primary objective. There’s something else I’ve noticed,” Jeff said, in an odd voice.

“What’s that?” April prompted him.

“Nobody has tried to sneak a snoop robot or drone on Home in months. Not against us or anybody I know. I’m pretty sure they haven’t got so good we just haven’t found them. Jon actually has been looking harder, because he was afraid of that possibility. Either they don’t have the assets to spare to continue probing us, they may have lost key people to the flu, or they have so much on their plate down there they don’t want to provoke an incident with us they’d have to deal with,” Jeff guessed.

“We’re still getting bots from Japan?” April asked him.

“Some, but they haven’t brought out a new model since before the flu.”

“I can help,” April offered. “You want to know if the economic numbers are true?”

“Yes, what do you intend?” Jeff asked, interested.

“There’s tons of commercial satellite data, back to before the war. I’ll count trucks on the road and at loading docks, count vessels on the ocean. Maybe even count planes putting in at freight terminals. We should be able to tell something about the level of commerce and recovery from the traffic. And I’ll try to see if crops were harvested or left in the field. One must look different from the other.”

“That’s a huge job,” Jeff warned her.

“Do you still have that company in Pakistan that did data processing for you?” April asked. “I could use them. Or did the flu mess them up so bad they aren’t in business?”

“Actually, they’ve sent a couple messages assuring me they are functioning just fine and could not only handle some work, but are eager for it. But do you want them to have the same information as us, if it reveals deception?” Jeff asked.

“We won’t do any studies in Pakistan,” April said. “Nothing that would embarrass them to reveal to us, or be a touchy thing for them to possess and hide from their own government. They’re an asset. If they get some private benefit from the job I can’t see it being massively disruptive, can you? I mean, I don’t think they’re going to use it to bring down the USNA government, or whatever passes for that in China right now.”

“Probably not. I’ll send the contact information for them,” Jeff agreed.

Their comms both beeped.

Home Net – System transmission to ALL.

Notice from Home Security – Jon Davis

The imposition of a quarantine period for arrivals to Home is ended immediately. We now have the ability to quickly test arrivals for incubating disease and will only disrupt the schedule of those testing positive.

At present this test only identifies carriers of influenza, which has been our primary concern. In the future other pathogens will be added to our detection abilities.

Thank you for your patience and the authorization given our department to act on these matters. We are very pleased to end the disruption to commerce and recreation.

Jon Davis – Head, Home Security

“Well, that will make a lot of people happy,” April said.

“It makes me happy, and it’s going to be an immediate source of income for us,” Jeff added. “Other habitats and some of the shipping companies will buy our early detection machine. I’m sure there is an Earth market, but we’ll have to see how big.”

*

“That’s marvelous. It sounds like the bits will be a real boost to your local business,” Myat said to Huian. “I very much approve of using our gold that way. There are others here, we have spoken with privately, and some of them are attracted to the idea of sending their gold off world. May we send you more if our contacts and customers direct us to do so?”

“Yes, I’m sure the banks here can handle it for me successfully,” Huian assured her. “I realize the last shipment was sent in a bit of a rush, and done quietly to enhance security. But could you possibly send any future shipments in my name directly to Irwin Hall at the Private Bank of Home? They brought the last bunch to my residence, where we have no suitable storage. I had to get a courier and deliver it to the bank right away. They have a vault to hold it awaiting taking it to the moon. It’s much better to direct it there.”

Myat asked a question that confused Huian. “No dear, there aren’t any storage fees. It’s money. At least it is here. You’ll make some interest on it. We’ll pay you, not the reverse. I don’t know how much yet but they aren’t just storing it. A portion is being loaned to production of things, not just speculation. The amount coined to small denominations, and these bits, will generate seigniorage for the banks.

“Now, as far as our funds with you. If we get a share of profits in the fullness of time just add them to our account. I don’t anticipate any sudden need for withdrawals like when we left Earth. Our situation is much more stable now. Indeed I anticipate sending you small amounts from time to time.”

When she finished the call Huian felt it went very well.

*

“Wow, we have the next three shuttles coming into Home sold out,” Jon said.

“Pent up demand,” said Ernesto Muños. “I’d have been surprised at anything else. But tell me. Are the return seats all sold out?”

“Yes, they are,” Jon said. He played with the screen a little more. “I asked old man Larkin if the same people coming in had reservations going out. He told me to mind my own business if it wasn’t a matter of public safety.”

“Tell him you don’t need names. Nothing that invades privacy. You just want the pattern of the reservations. Do they tend to be round-trips? Have a little tact,” Muños counseled.

“There…I even said please.” Jon waited a few minutes and grunted. “Well, you’re right, groveling got information. There are only four round trips bought,” Jon muttered.

“That isn’t groveling Jon. It’s hard to grovel in text at all. You need voice, and I’m not sure you’d know how anyway. What’s with you? Are you angry about something?”

“Yes, no…I don’t know,” Jon admitted.

“Well that covers all the bases,” Muños said.

“I think the job is wearing me down,” Jon suggested.

“When is the last time you had a vacation?”

“Let me look that up,” Jon said, pretending to enter a query in the com. “I heard that term sometime I’m sure. It sounds familiar. It is English isn’t it?”

“Have you even taken a weekend off?” Muños asked.

“Not in living memory,” Jon admitted. “Where would I go? Certainly not down to Earth. We’re not exactly welcome most places, and I’m not sure it’s safe still. I’m not interested in New Las Vegas. I’m not a gambler. I don’t care for most of the things people consider entertainment. Even as a child I detested carnivals.”

“You don’t have to go anywhere. Take a week and relax…Buy a book or two, or a movie if you prefer,” Muños suggested. Got to one of the clubs and listen to some music,” Eduardo said. “We’ll be getting some luxury items back in the clubs within a couple months.”

“I’d go somewhere,” Jon told him, “if I had anywhere interesting to go.”

“Maybe go to the moon, just to see what it is like. You haven’t been there have you?” Muños asked.

“No, I might like that. Can you get to an Apollo site?”

“I understand it is a little bit of a rover ride from Armstrong, and they have an area roped off they don’t want trampled. But there are some Ranger sites you can see from Central,” Muños said.

“I’ll think about that,” Jon agreed.

*

Irwin was used to seeing everybody in the corridors armed to the teeth. He wasn’t used to seeing body armor. There was very little of it worn on Home. When two armored up men took up positions flanking his door it tripped his caution circuits. It was a bank after all. Traditionally banks did get robbed, even if it would be stupid on Home. They also had more than the usual gear. Helmets and boom mics for tactical com and spex with flip down magnifiers and low light viewers. The one man said something. Likely to somebody on com as he wasn’t looking at his partner.

Irwin triggered an alert with his spex. Dan would watch from his office and cover him. Dan kept an antique Browning BAR behind his desk, and to that the body armor might as well be silk crepe. Irwin only had a pistol. He wore it more to fit in and avoid razzing for being unarmed. However he opened his desk drawer and flipped a manual switch. That made the grit Claymore built into the front of his desk live. It would only reach two thirds of the way to the door. But if these two intended trouble they would approach closer.

They stayed at the door, but a strikingly beautiful young woman in the same uniform turned in the door and approached. Tall but thin, and dark haired. She had on a vest but not the helmet or full armored rig of the men, and a simple pistol in a holster under her elbow. On the opposite side she wore something he hadn’t seen in a long time. A kukri. She walked very purposefully and confidently. As she got closer Irwin revised his estimate of her age from late twenties to older but indeterminate, with life extension. That was interesting. Did she survive the flu on Earth with life extension therapy?

“Mr. Hall? I’m Supervisor Thapa for Trinity Security. We have a shipment at the north dock for you and I’d like assurance you will receive it before pulling it off the dock and transporting it. I was told you will receive items for Huian Lee?”

“Yes, Huian is our customer, we’ll be glad to take receipt of anything she wishes to deposit. The north dock is customary for freight, but you’d have been much closer using the south dock.”

Thapa looked around at the mostly open floor plan, the big windows on the corridor and the glass doors. “Do you have a separate depository where you’d rather take delivery?” she wondered.

“No,” Irwin said, amused at her discomfort. “This is very secure. There are hidden systems and everyone here is armed. This is the main business corridor, and if someone attempted to rob a business here it wouldn’t be pretty. Everyone wears spex and is armed. Once the alarm went out on the local net, and an image or description, the cafeteria and communication offices would empty out of irate citizens looking for the miscreants.”

“The civilians really would act, and not just seek shelter?” Thapa asked surprised.

“We once were invaded by USNA Space Marines in full hard shell battle suits. Their first squad didn’t make it to the airlock on the south dock. One of our security ladies dispatched them and blew their shuttle folded over double. The other squad probed in from the north dock, trying to reach the Holiday Inn. Three of them made it that far and when they entered the hotel another of Jon’s security people was waiting and invited them to surrender. When they tried to point a weapon at him he detonated a Claymore in their face, and that was that.”

“Explosives and Claymores are very rough to use inside a habitat,” Thapa said, alarmed.

“Yes, McAlpine did mention later, relating the story, that it blew him the other way – clear into the next room, and knocked him out. It rather destroyed the Holiday Inn lobby too, but it was effective.”

Thapa nodded, probably more in acknowledgement than an endorsement of such insanity.

“Would you like to read the manifest, before I signal my team to move it?” Thapa asked, and held out an actual clipboard with hard copy.

“Sure,” Irwin said to humor her. He read it, and steeled himself to display no emotion, but he realized he had a problem.

“That will fit in our vault,” Irwin said, returning the papers, “but could you possibly divide it into five or six loads, and bring them down slowly, or wait between each load? I’d like to get each lot well under a hundred kilograms. I can hold this end secure if you need your two fellows there to do it,” he said, nodding at the pair at the door.

“Yes, I can do that. It always helps if I know why I’m doing something,” she suggested. “More trips means more exposure. More risk by our normal procedures book.”

“We’re on the outermost part of a spinning wheel,” Irwin reminded her. “We are constantly moving things around the rim, but it’s entirely too much trouble to plan and move a counterweight to keep the wheel in balance when we move large items. The system just barely stays ahead of everyone converging on the cafeteria at lunch time, which will also happen in about two hours.”

“Ahhh,” Thapa said, the light of understanding dawning on her.

“There are automated systems, that use the water we keep in reserve, to maintain balance. But they aren’t terribly fast acting, so bringing the gold down in smaller lots will allow the pumps time to move sufficient mass to adjust,” Irwin explained.

“Very well,” Thapa agreed. “I will pull these two fellows, and go back to the dock. I’ll take your word on your own security, and use mine to cover the shuttle at dock. I’ll be back in about a half hour.”

A little more, Irwin thought. It was a long haul down the main shaft when moving heavy stuff, but he just nodded agreeably. She’d find out, and he wasn’t on any schedule even if they were.

He flipped the switch and disarmed the device on his desk. The interesting thing about this shipment was it wasn’t all Good Delivery Bars. There were containers of all sorts of bullion coins, small bars and some shot he suspected was casting stock for jewelry.

Apparently all sorts of smaller holders decided they couldn’t keep it safe on Earth. There was always a shovel and secrecy, but then you could be questioned under duress to reveal the location. Irwin could see the advantage of being able to say that it is gone…shipped off out of your jurisdiction. With the software that was common now it would be verified. He should suggest to Huian that a code word should be instigated to include in any requests for a return of the metal. Something to indicate to them that the withdrawal request was being made under compulsion.

Supervisor Thapa impressed Irwin. She had a high level of confidence and the bright light of intelligence was obvious in her eyes. Perhaps after the second lot was safely in their vault he’d see if she would care to take a break and have lunch with him. It would be about that time by then, and the corridor traffic seemed a plausible excuse to get her to briefly suspend operations without it sounding like he was asking her for a date. Just a banking executive showing hospitality to another charming lovely security executive.

*

Frank called his friend John and shared the web search results he’s gotten for April Lewis. “It’s a shame. We had a lot of good free publicity from April wearing our creations. But now she has a new source up there, and I have to admit this is a well crafted design. Even if she does wear one of ours again it’s old news now.”

“He’s another Frank. Maybe people will get confused and think it’s you still,” John suggested.

“I didn’t say it was that good,” Frank snipped.

“Well we can hardly invite her back,” John said. “They made it pretty clear she and hers aren’t welcome. Politics is so stupid. I thought she was a lovely young person.”

“It’s not clear if there is still any danger from the flu for gene mod people,” Frank said. “They don’t address the problem clearly and contradict themselves in the news outlets. Hardly the sort of sources on which you’d want to bet your life. I’m just glad we didn’t have that cruise and life extension therapy a couple months earlier, or we might be dead.”

“But we still want it…and there is no telling when it will be safe again. But they are accepting travelers again on Home, so apparently they have the matter under control there,” John said.

“Are you suggesting moving there?” Frank asked. “Could we make a living there in design and fashion?”

“Apparently someone can,” John said, waving at the image of April on the screen. “You could always branch out and license your designs. There are inquiries about that every month. And the economy is so bad…Selling one-off creations for full price has been lean lately. Have you looked at the real estate pages lately? Honolulu is in a real slump.”

“Hmmm. I’ll think about it. I have felt like we’re in a bit of a rut lately,” Frank admitted.

John said nothing. He knew better than to over-sell something.

Chapter 14

“Special delivery for Mr. Singh,” the FedEx guy said at the entry.

Jeff went to take the box there, instead of telling the house to let him in. He and Walter had things on the screen he didn’t want seen, much less recorded with someone’s spex.

The package was suitcase sized and had a folding handle, which meant it was over six kilo. But it didn’t need a hanko, a scribbled signature on the pad was sufficient.

Jeff brought it in and weighed it, then put it on the small table they kept clear for coffee and when they ate lunch in. He rolled it over slowly both ways and made sure it hadn’t been slit, and the tamper proof tape was all intact. His pad sniffer didn’t detect the common boomies. It weighed exactly what the shipping notice said and looked intact. He was expecting it, so he went ahead and opened it. An unexpected package would have been sent to be x-rayed and maybe remotely opened.

“You’re really paranoid,” Walter said. He was amused, and that offended Jeff a little.

Jeff pulled off his t-shirt. Walter had never seen him bare chested. He always undressed and dressed again in the bath to maintain some formality.

“See the scar?” Jeff asked him, pointing it out, high on his shoulder, with his finger.

“Yeah?” Walter looked a little upset in the sudden change in behavior.

“A Chinese assassin shot me in the cafeteria. It’s not paranoia when anybody is really out to harm you,” Jeff assured him. “A hundred years ago it would have probably killed me. Thirty years ago it would have left me with a damaged shoulder, that would never be one hundred percent again.”

“And I’ve sat right next to you there and never realized,” Walter worried.

“Professional assassins have really good aim,” Jeff assured him. “They’re very unlikely to waste shots and hit you by accident.” He shrugged his shirt back on.

“I can’t tell you how reassuring that is.”

“On the other hand, if it’s a bomb you might not make out so well,” Jeff said.

Jeff’s opening of the package suddenly took on a more personal interest.

“But as I expected, it’s my holographic seals,” Jeff said, “this time.”

“Good, are you going to get them in circulation soon? I can take part of my pay in them and start using them if you want,” Walter volunteered.

“I’m waiting on the card stock from the moon to put them on. I wanted to use our local product. It’s another small check on authenticity too, because our card stock is easily differentiated from Earth products. It would be a major pain in the butt to set up making soy and beet paper specifically to try to counterfeit small denomination bits. It doesn’t seem like it would be worthwhile.”

“How many?” Walter asked, frowning at the exposed packets of seals. It looked like a lot.

“Twenty thousand. I’ll have more soon if these seem satisfactory. Want to count them for me?” Jeff asked. Walter didn’t dignify his odd humor with a reply.

“That’s going to be a lot of work, sticking all those seals on the cards,” Walter said.

“I’ll have Eric take care of it. He wanted the job, it’s his problem,” Jeff said, smiling. “And you also seem to know what you need to do for the next few days. I’m going along on the next freight run to Central. I have a little project that needs my attention.”

*

Jeff wasn’t really sure how to make charcoal. All the information he could find online was suitable for Earth, and most of it was full of qualifiers and warnings reminding people doing it would be subject to strict air quality rules in most developed countries. That’s probably why so much charcoal came from Brazil. He couldn’t use the wood gas for heat, because his air was too precious. He was basically faking it from minimal information.

Freight was always averaged up to the next full kilogram, so why give that away free? He brought his wood blocks in five and six at a time. Once he had sixty kilos of hardwood blocks accumulated from fill, to bring his other shipments up to weight, it was time to give it a try.

Jeff had a stainless vessel made with a black oxide film on it. Sitting that in the focal point of a big aluminized Mylar mirror should produce somewhere between eight hundred and a thousand degrees in the vessel if his calculations were anywhere close. He had no firm idea how long it would need to carbonize. The cubes were two centimeters on a side. If they didn’t char all the way to the center that was fine. He decided the simplest way was to bring it up to heat, and hold it there until the out-gassing fell off quite a bit.

Jeff regretted making a thousand liter alcohol tank now. It was too big. But he left it in place to collect for the future, and transferred the two hundred liters he’d saved so far to a two hundred fifty liter tank. Heather owned the next two hundred liters, which would accumulate faster too. When he got twelve kilograms of charcoal he looked at it, trying to visualize the amount of charcoal that would be on the inside of traditional barrels. He’d split a couple chunks of the charcoal chunks open, and the ones from the middle had a wood core left. Twelve kilo still seemed like too much. But it should work all the faster with any extra charcoal.

He still only used half of it, combining the raw alcohol and charcoal in the smaller tank, and setting a pump to work sucking it from the bottom and dumping it back in the top. Now all he could do was wait. The pure alcohol had no color and no flavor. He’d tasted it, and it was awful. Once it had some color and flavor he needed somebody who could tell him if it was any good.

*

Li looked over his shoulder at the blue and gold flag fluttering behind them. There was some traffic in the harbor as they took the Tobiuo out. He kept expecting somebody to call on the radio and ask what the Devil sort of flag he was flying? Maybe not officials but just some other boat, curious because it was an entirely new flag. It had never flown from an Earth vessel before, and it was pretty big.

They had all their correct paperwork ready if anyone wanted to see that they were properly flagged. Home law allowed for civilian weapons. That was one of the few real laws the Assembly had decided to make. They didn’t try to define them as defensive or light, unlike most Earth nations that would allow small arms but not a deck cannon. That allowed Li quite a bit of wiggle room.

The ability was there to be called into service by the Home militia if they had a Home citizen in command. Which was a future possibility. Insurance was not an issue. Li was a little disappointed that after all the preparations nobody appeared to care. He and Tara both still wanted to visit Home. But the advantages of taking their flag right now were too many to pass up.

The Tobiuo was all fixed up. The large glass in the salon ports had been the hardest to repair. The original company making them didn’t seem to be in business now. Their telephone returned a not in service message and their e-mails bounced with no such address. They found a reasonable replacement locally of armored glass of the sort used at street level in areas with a lot of vandalism. It wasn’t too expensive in large rectangular plates. But it was horrible to have cut into rounded shapes. It took a water jet with an abrasive slurry to cut it cleanly.

The bullet holes were very hard to find a trace of from the outside. Inside they hadn’t tried too hard to make them invisible. In the engine room there were obvious patches, but very strong. The diesel still did not run, but they were promised a replacement manifold printed of moon dust, according to Jeff. The internal dimensions and flanges and bolt holes would all be the same but it had thinner walls, so it wouldn’t be much heavier.

Their pilot house was an arch across the wheel with a clamshell on each side that folded up and out like gull-wing doors. One of their minor modifications was to replace the glass and layer composite material on the inside so that it was about as secure as a well armored limousine now when closed.

*

Dick’s dad owned a fab and prototype shop. He was a year younger than Eric and looked up to him. Eric had several businesses, something Dick intended to copy soon. Dick had access to all the junk bins and material racks at his dads shop, was free to use fasteners and tools, as long as he didn’t get too greedy with stock and put things back where they belonged. He’d learned that tough lesson a couple years back. He even had a few basic tools of his own.

Nobody asked Dick what he was making anymore, as long as he stayed out of the way. He took Eric along but made sure he understood the ground rules and wouldn’t mess up a good thing for him.

They retreated to Eric’s cubic to actually assemble their creation. It didn’t look like much. There was a frame made of the perforated angle iron used to construct shelving. A couple grippy rollers left over from taking an obsolete printer apart, with a motor and switch from the same. That fed the strip of holographic seals. A knife edge split the seals from their backing and advanced them across a plate on top of a strip of Teflon faced tape.

A used servo motor about twenty times as powerful as they needed, but free, drove the device. A faceplate on the motor shaft carried a roller to press the seal and card together. There was a card hopper made from a cut-down napkin dispenser. A power supply for the servo motor and a few other things were bolted to the frame. Or in one case held on with several turns of vacuum tape. The contraption was fancy enough you didn’t have to plug and unplug it for power. It had an actual on/off switch.

There was a solenoid which actuated when a little clamp on the edge of the faceplate came around and hit a micro switch. That pushed a new card off the bottom of the stack through a slot. The wheel came around and pressed the end seal against the card and the edge of the wheel split it off the one behind across a sharp edge. Then a spring finger on the faceplate pushed the combined unit out of the way and it fell down a ramp.

That was the theory anyhow. The thing that amazed Eric was that Dick made it without a single sketch. He just rummaged through the junk bins grabbing stuff and remembering what he had at home. Yet he had a clear vision of what he was going to build.

They stacked the cards Jeff had just sent Eric into the hopper. Eric fed his seals in and picked at the end until the first lifted from the backing tape a little and fed it over the separator. He turned the faceplate by hand to work it, but when it got to where it needed to inject a card it wasn’t powered up yet. The little solenoid didn’t work. Dick got a small Phillips screwdriver and pushed on the back of the solenoid, priming it.

“We should have added a counter, and set it up to make a certain number and stop,” Eric said.

“We can add that. Just turn it on and off to do two or three,” Dick urged him. “The servo motor is only set for four rpm. It won’t spit a bunch out before you can stop it.”

Rup, rup, rup, chunka thump! - Rup, rup, rup, chunka thump! - Rup, rup, rup, chunka thump!

It spit out three cards with a seal on top perfectly. Unfortunately the seals all fell off.

“What are you kids doing making a racket?” Eric’s mother yelled from the main room.

“Just tested our machine,” Eric called. “I should have warned you,” he said, hoping that was enough to make peace.

“Well you’re not going to run that loud thing in here,” he was informed. “Take it someplace else.”

“OK Mom. We need to work on it anyway,” Eric agreed.

“We need to put these three on by hand,” Eric told Dick. The pamphlet says they set up and can’t be repositioned after an hour. I guess they have to be pressed on harder.” He grabbed a set and started.

“No problem. We can shim up the spring over the wheel,” Dick said. “I guess maybe a foam board box to cover it for the noise?”

“Lined with something sound absorbing,” Eric said, frowning. “It really thumped loud.”

“Yeah…Some Sorbothane feet under it will help that,” Dick assured him.

“Probably, but you don’t know my Mom. Now that she complained, it’s never going to be quiet enough, if she can hear it at all. So I have to find somewhere else to run it,” Eric said.

“It’s for Singh, right? Ask him if he has someplace,” Dick suggested.

“As a last resort. He made it pretty clear he gave it to me to do so he doesn’t have to deal with it. I’m already paying you ten bits for the machine. I don’t want to rent space if I can avoid it,” Eric insisted.

“Who else wants these made?” Dick asked. “They should be willing to help.”

“It was Zack who complained he needed smaller money in the first place, but he’s skeptical of everything I say,” Eric said, frowning. “He’s cheap too. He’d never do it for free…I know. Jeff keeps saying April is an officer of the bank. And my sister has been to her apartment and says it is huge. If I ask real nice she might just go for it.”

“You know April Lewis?” Dick asked. He was prepared to be even more impressed.

“April does business with my sister, and she and Jeff call me for courier service pretty regularly. She doesn’t talk down to you just because you’re a kid,” Eric said.

Dick just nodded. He understood. “You going to call her?”

“No, it’s too easy to say no on com. I want to go to her place and try to catch her home.”

“What if she’s not there?” Dick worried.

“Then we’ll try another time,” Eric shrugged. “What else you got better to do?”

“You want me to come along?” Dick asked, intimidated but flattered.

“Well sure. We need to get it working right. And…” Eric stopped, but too late.

“And what?” Dick demanded.

“You’re younger than me. I’m getting too big, and I can tell people don’t get that silly look that says they think I’m ‘cute’. If I try to look cute now my Mom says, ‘Oh, bag the kicked puppy dog face.’ I really miss being able to work that.”

“That’s terrible. And they won’t let you start life extension early enough to keep it,” Dick said.

“Oh, I know…” Eric agreed.

*

Chen looked terribly serious, enough to get Jeff’s full attention before he spoke.

“I want you to be aware, there are several places where regional conflicts are heating up. India has problems on the western frontier with Pakistan, and on the east with China. Not really with China per se, but with locals no longer under tight central control of the Chinese government. It’s all driven by scarcity. There aren’t any shipments of fuel, and little of food. Bandits have arisen that steal what little is coming in if it isn’t escorted, and escorts are expensive.

“A lot of the soldiers deserted and started the long walk home taking their small arms when they weren’t supplied. More commonly they joined local factions and militias and went native if you will. China always brought in troops from outside the region, but an empty belly is a powerful recruiting aid. They bring their rifle and join the locals. In a couple years they’ll all take local wives and be totally assimilated,” he predicted.

“Not just there I take it? Where else?” Jeff wondered.

“On a large organized scale like this, at the Chile – Argentine border. Also Sri Lanka is effectively independent again. The new problems with Ireland have spread to Scotland. North Africa has never been what you’d call stable, but the lines on the map now are meaningless. It’s city states and regions dominated by warlords again. In Indonesia and the Philippines a lot of islands or groups of islands are effectively their own state. The few that have armed boats can enforce it quite well. European Russia isn’t in conflict with the east, but Siberia is simply acting independently because they have no supply, no direction and no oversight. There are still even some commercial flights in and out, but the soldiers in the airports have brassards of local police on their arm, effectively identifying them as militia instead of national army. If you can’t feed or pay your troops they will serve those who can take care of them,” Chen explained.

“How is this going to affect us?” Jeff asked. “Are we going to have anywhere to land and buy the things we need? Is there anything we can do to help those who will help us?”

“We will have to avoid the areas in conflict,” Chen said. “There are also bandits and plain old criminals resurgent in a lot of areas that have no military conflict. Nothing as bad as China, but enough to ruin an area for our purposes if products can’t get to and from the spaceport. It may not be the time to be building a shuttle that needs fifteen hundred meter runways to land. That is very limiting. If you can make two smaller shuttles that can land vertically or on much smaller runways it may prove wise. You can land on smaller regional airports and if you lose one it’s not nearly the catastrophe.”

“That’s interesting,” Jeff allowed. “The captain of the ketch Tobiuo, which regularly meets the shuttle Dionysus’ Chariot to transfer freight for us, wishes to come up on the next supply run and see Home for himself. He says his second in command is reliable. Indeed, he wishes to have that man lifted also, next turnaround. They both profess interest in gaining Home citizenship, and Captain Li said he has a proposal he’d like to discuss with me about this very thing, secure landing rights.”

“You’d lose a little freight that lift, although it might be worth it to recruit somebody to become a citizen on the ketch,” Chen said.

“Yes, I approved it already. We won’t lose all that much in freight. We’ll just have more low density things these two flights. The heavier things seem to be priority, but we’ll lift a couple flights with things like surgical supplies and clothing. UPS is always delighted to send some small boxes on standby if we can put the Tobiuo in at Sydney or some other large port.”

“You realize if we had Home citizens in command on the Tobiuo we could call on it to act as a militia vessel?” Chen asked.

“Yes, we’d like to make it immune from being stopped and boarded. It’s difficult to claim it is a warship and carry cargo. Earth law is just not set up to recognize that, but if it is a reserve vessel subject to being called to duty we hope that might be sufficient to make them respect it. At some point we may need to simply say it is our law and we will use force to preserve it.”

“That is only smart to do if you are pretty sure you can make it stick,” Chen said.

“That’s something I intend to discuss with Captain Li. We’ll be having this discussion with Jon Davis in his capacity as head of the militia. Specifically, we’ll want to know if he and his second would accept the responsibility of being militia members, with a full data link and the ability to help run their own overwatch like we did recently for them.

“Merchant ships once sailed with cannon,” Chen pointed out. “There is precedence.”

“I totally agree,” Jeff said. “But it may take seeing they have the ability to enforce their will for the Earth nations to accept that again.”

*

“Mr. Singh, if you have time to receive them, I have your first ten thousand bits assembled,” Eric said on com.

Mr Singh? Jeff smiled, and wondered who was off camera that Eric was trying to impress with his formality. Well two could play that game.

“Mr. Pennington,” Jeff said, with a serious look and a nod of acknowledgement. “I shall be in my offices all day, but if you can come in about a half hour it would be my pleasure to take you to lunch and we can chat a bit about how things are going and our plans.”

“That would be very nice, thank you,” Eric said, and terminated the call.

“Wow, he talked to you like an adult,” Dick said.

“Jeff and April and Heather all treat people right,” Eric said. “I’ve seen them talk to April’s grandfather, and they talk to somebody older the same. They really don’t seem to care about your age if you know what you are doing and can do your job. I’m really trying hard to give them a good opinion of me. Someday my majority is going to go to vote in the Assembly, and I’ll need allies like them.”

“I’m not even thinking about that yet,” Dick admitted.

“Your dad is OK,” Eric pointed out. “My mom is a thousand times better than when we came up from Earth, but I still want out from under her thumb.”

“Yeah, I can understand that,” Dick allowed. “When it comes time for my majority vote I figure my dad will be proposing it.”

“I expect my mom will vote against my majority if I’m forty years old,” Eric said. “But when your vote comes up I’m hoping to be able to vote on it for you.”

“It isn’t a race,” Dick said. “I have much less reason to push for it. So yeah, you likely will.”

*

“Do you realize every room in the Holiday Inn and the Ramada is full and booked for months?” Jeff said. “Some of the shuttle crews have slept in their ship on layover because they couldn’t get even a hot slot. We have people selling room to sleep on their floor and ads in What’s Happening? offering five and six hundred dollars Australian to use a bed when the owner is on his work shift, or in a few cases share it if you can swear you bathe and don’t snore!”

“I should be able to make a fortune,” April said with fake enthusiasm. “Two on the sofas and at least three or four on the floor. One with me and one with Gunny. Double up on shifts. That’s two hundred and forty thousand a month. It may get a bit tight in the bath early in the morning…”

“You can bet it’s tight for four in a tiny two person cubic,” Jeff said. “I hope Mitsubishi built a good safety margin in our life support,” Jeff seemed distressed by it all.

“There’s a problem. I agree,” April said. “Apparently nobody anticipated pent up demand and new interest when it became easier to travel to Home again. I can’t prove it, but I wonder if you didn’t create some of the problem yourself?”

“Me?” Jeff looked startled. “I brought in Dr. Houghton, and I’m going to have Captain Li visit soon, although where I’m going to put him I have no idea. I’m doubled up in my office with Walter and trying to fit a third would be crazy. I haven’t brought anybody else in since I hired Mo Pennington and he brought his family along. I haven’t been a source of a couple hundred people trying to pack in Home, just these two.”

“But I bet almost all those other people are coming in ones and twos and threes too,” April said. None of them feel responsible for the others any more than you do. Is there any group of twenty trying to immigrate or set up a business? Ten even? I suspect your response to North America trying to force you out of their banking net helped precipitate this.”

“What has one got to do with the other?” Jeff asked, looking genuinely quizzical.

“You’re the one who got me studying economics and banking. All the Earth currencies have what backing them?” When Jeff didn’t answer right away April said, “The full faith and credit of the North American Union? Their future ability to tax? When you get right down to it – trust.”

“I can’t argue that,” Jeff agreed.

“Well you stopped taking USNA dollars. What did you expect? Things are a mess down there and there were enough people who don’t trust them that the dollar took a dip. Has it recovered?” April asked.

“No…The USNA dollar is down seven percent against the Australian dollar and down another two percent – thirteen percent total – against gold. That pretty much means Solars, since nobody else is really trading any volume,” Jeff admitted.

“So we live in the least restrictive place in the solar system to do business, and you established the first real hard currency in a century, and you are surprised people want to come here to do business? What you need to be asking is how do we make money from it?” April told him.

“Oh, yeah,” Jeff’s face was interesting. Once the obvious was pointed out to him he was absolutely brilliant at thinking of ten thousand ways to make it work.

“We build a bunch of cheap low-G cans on a cable and position them off just far enough to be clear of local traffic, with a dedicated low delta-V taxi to run back and forth at least every shift change, and maybe in between if the traffic warrants it,” Jeff decided.

“Environmental systems?” April asked.

“Like a ship, a modular system on each can. Centralized water recovery and sell the carbon based waste to Central or other moon colonies. Buy back oxygen and scoop the Earth for our nitrogen.” Jeff stopped and re-thought. “No, not on a cable. You can’t expect these people to suit back up to commute. Although some will work right there. Just a zero G residence, and maybe some office space, and they can adapt to it. If the drugs don’t help somebody to deal with prolonged Zero G they simply can’t live there. Some of them will not adapt and have to leave. Economic necessity.”

“Can we afford to build something?” April asked.

“We have a sudden influx of capital,” Jeff admitted. “I’ll make sure our depositors are comfortable with a long term use of it, that ties it up for a period of years. Although I think without running an analysis that a two or three year break-even point may be achievable. If our new banking customer is uncomfortable with the concept, some of the new people are almost running through the corridors waving money to be invested, but it requires conversion to gold or platinum, often at a premium…”

“What are you smiling at?” April asked.

“I didn’t mention, there was a fellow who came in yesterday from a Singapore Bank, he wanted to form a branch here. He approached Eduardo Muños as the closest thing to an official he could find. His firm tried to find a local lawyer they could retain and question on com. When there were none to be found on our com list they finally sent this fellow up. The man wanted to know to whom one applies to form a bank, and what the procedures were to form a corporation. When he realized there was no restrictions that was great. But when he figured out that meant no special status or privilege, and a banker would be personally liable to his clients and subject to the judgment of the entire voting population if there was a serious problem…”

“Let me guess. He was on the next shuttle seat he could buy down,” April predicted.

“Indeed, and if he heard me speaking of consulting with my depositors like I just did, he’d regard me as barking mad. They want to operate behind a cloak of secrecy and immunity,” Jeff said.

“I’d say the real bottleneck on your idea is construction. We’re maxed out on ship building so we can’t build them as hulls with composites. It will have to be lunar construction and cheap sintered steel and composite ceramics. But Central and Camelot need the work anyhow.”

“Doesn’t it look much brighter now as an opportunity, than an irritating imposition?”

“Yes. Thank you, April.”

Chapter 15

“I got this as change,” Huian said, displaying the bit card to Irwin Hall.

“That was fast, we just started offering them to customers yesterday,” Irwin said. “It’s nice to see they are accepted and circulating.”

“I’d like to withdraw some to send to Myat, with who I am doing business in Myanmar. She has clients who would be interested to see these. I’d like the equivalent of a Solar, please.”

“Yes ma’am, I’ll have my man count them out and he’ll box them for you nicely. Do your people understand they are only redeemable in lots of a hundred?” Irwin asked.

“Yes, but I doubt anyone will accumulate them. It’s more a keepsake and a marketing tool. I am given to understand the atmosphere there is not conducive to trust in the government’s economic policies right now. Myat says people are worried they will even confiscate gold jewelry, which has never happened before.”

“In that case, I have to wonder. Are you sure they won’t confiscate these?” Irwin asked.

“If they do it won’t do them much good. They’ll get twenty five grams at most, and we’ll never send anymore down. We can afford to lose that much to see what they are going to do,” Huian assured him.

“Good, I’m satisfied then,” Irwin said. His assistant sat a foam-board box on the desk. “Is there anything else I can do for you today?”

“Not unless you can tell the Earthies to send up some coffee,” Huian said, laughing.

Irwin reached in his desk and got the one kilo bag of Sunda Hejo Jeff gave him. He was really looking forward to enjoying it, but Huian was far too important a customer to pass up such a good chance to please her.

“A small token of our esteem,” he said, sitting it across the desk, close to her edge.

“You are a miracle worker!” Huian said, not trying to hide her amazement at all.

“Your banker should have some…connections,” Irwin said, pleased with her shock. “We’re working on getting more in time. It’s still difficult unfortunately.” He didn’t want her thinking he had a regular supply. She might think he was holding out on her if he didn’t have more soon.

“My husband will be so impressed,” Huian said. “When I told him I brought Myat’s gold to you and Mr. Singh he said I’d done exactly the right thing. He praised both of you, but there hasn’t been any coffee in our household for a long time, thank you.”

Irwin just smiled and nodded like it wasn’t that big a deal.

*

“What’s that noise?” Jeff asked as soon as he stepped in.

“Your little friend Eric came by and asked if I had a square meter he could use to run his machine for the bank. He said his mom is super touchy, and wouldn’t let him do it at home.”

“I can easily believe that from what little I’ve seen of her. We’ve had some…run-ins already. How much is he paying you?” Jeff asked April.

“It’s for the bank, I never considered charging him.”

“He’s charging me a tenth of a percent for the idea and assembling the bits,” Jeff told her.

“That doesn’t sound like much,” April said.

Jeff regretted saying anything. He didn’t want April to think him cheap.

“That’s just for the bits,” Jeff assured her. “He’ll make more for other work too.”

“He seems to have adapted away from Earth think really fast. He had his buddy with him who built the machine. They’ve been back and modified it a couple times. It runs five hundred cards at a load now and has optical scanners that stop it if something jams up. Then it calls him on com. But it hasn’t yet. So the kid seems to know what he’s doing,” April said.

Jeff walked over to see the machine, and had to bend a bit to get deeper in the low overhead by the ports. It was in where April had finally put a few bagged tomato plants. It looked like junk, but it worked fine. It was half way through the current five hundred cards.

“Doesn’t the noise bother you?” Jeff asked.

“No, I’m not here that often. Just like now, we’re going out to eat. He’s never asked to load it in the evening. I think his family expects him to be home then. Besides, it’s the sound of money being made. It’s hard to dislike that,” April said.

“Good point. It sounds better already,” Jeff joked.

*

“That was brilliant to give Huian coffee,” Jeff said. “April constantly has to advise me on social things. I probably wouldn’t have thought of it. I read in a banking journal that there was a period of time when banks gave gifts for opening an account. It seems they were legally limited what interest they could pay, so they’d throw in a toaster as a prize to get around that.”

“What sort of a toaster?” Irwin asked, not sure he wasn’t joking.

“The sort you plug in the wall socket and put sliced bread in it,” Jeff said. When Irwin looked dubious he explained further. “It was a post war period and there was a lot of pent up demand for simple consumer goods, and the prices for such things was much higher than later when productivity increased a great deal. They put prizes in boxes of laundry detergent and snacks even. So you have sort of reinvented that.”

“I wish I had more, and some bottles of liquor,” Irwin said. “I could create some serious goodwill among my important customers like the Lees, before supply gets back to normal.”

“I’m making whiskey, but by the time it’s ready to taste we’ll have Earth whiskey again,” Jeff said.

“Why didn’t you tell me? How much are you making?” Irwin demanded.

“I have two hundred liters circulating through charcoal to age it,” Jeff said. “It’s a byproduct of lunar food production. I expect I’ll have that much every three or four months for the near future. It should increase as our food production goes up and I have more waste to work with.”

“If you get to where you are making more alcohol than you can sell as whiskey you can sell the straight clear stuff for mix, or add some simple flavoring and call it vodka.

“Heather demanded the first ten liters from setting it up for her personal use, and now she has rights on the second run of two hundred liters. She and April are also partners in the enterprise that is responsible for this, so I could hardly deny her. I have no idea how she flavored it,” Jeff said.

“You can sell it as futures right now you know. Just like the water from the snowballs, that’s all sold ahead before they return,” Irwin urged him. “Ultra-premium Earth whiskey was going for near a thousand dollars a seven hundred fifty milliliter bottle at Home, before the flu.”

“I’m not sure it’s going to be any good, much less premium,” Jeff said. “I’ve never done this and it’s an experiment at this point. It would be a huge embarrassment to sell futures and then it’s crap nobody wants to drink.”

“You’re not a big drinker are you?” Irwin asked.

“Not at all. I may have a few drinks with friends when we go to a club, but I don’t care for a lot of it. It has to taste good. I think I had something at April’s place, the Fox and Hare, five or six months ago. That’s how long it’s been since I had a drink.”

“I can assure you…if it doesn’t make you blind or kill you somebody will buy this stuff.” Irwin said.

“That’s horrible. I don’t want to be associated with an inferior product. People would probably make fun of it, and that reputation will rub off on the other things you do. Remember April’s brother grew mushrooms and the spores got away from him? Some people mocked him as the Mushroom King until his dying day. They still find them on air filters occasionally.

“I’d much rather make good beer or champagne, but that’s difficult. This is what I had the materials to try. If it’s any good I’ll make more money holding it back and letting it age,” Jeff pointed out. “I don’t even consider myself qualified to taste it. When it has a little more color and smells better I’ll have somebody taste it that knows whiskey. I’m not sure if it’s even going to resemble any Earth whiskeys.”

“I will assemble a few friends, who happen to know about such things, and volunteer myself to help you. We have enough group experience to give you an expert panel,” Irwin assured him.

“I’m not going to bring the whole lot until I’m sure it’s ready, but I’ll have a liter sent from the moon when it has some color,” Jeff decided.

“Most of it is bottled in three quarters of a liter units,” Irwin said, “so a full liter will be fine. It’ll make it stand out as different in the market too. Just being from the moon will make it a novelty.”

“Good, because I already have some bottles designed,” Jeff said. “I’d hate to change them. Thank you, Irwin. I appreciate the help.”

“That’s what friends are for,” Irwin assured him, keeping a carefully controlled face.

*

“We can make the pressure vessels, and the locks are no problem if you can get the servo motors made on Home,” Heather agreed, “but we are too short on carbon to make plastic for internal fittings and furniture. If we make the interior from sintered steel it’s going to be heavy. Although we can make wire and do open grid shapes for seats. How were you going to lift this stuff from Central?”

“I have…another project. I’m going to put the motor from one of…from that, in an unmanned sort of a tug. It will lift the cans into lunar orbit and make a return landing on an automated beacon. The can will be pushed to Home by just about any shuttle that has a docking clamp on the nose,” Jeff said. “Then when the project is done I can recover the motor for my other project.”

“Make a third motor,” Heather advised him. “This sounds like a much cheaper way to lift cargo than a manned shuttle. I don’t know why we didn’t do this already.”

“We weren’t lifting that much from Central a year ago,” Jeff pointed out.

“Good point. Now we have food and carbon dioxide to lift. Any reason you can’t clamp a can on this motor base and use it to drop freight to us?” Heather asked.

“No, although you aren’t importing that much yet. Did you have something in mind?”

“Yeah, sounds like a good way to bring in snowball water for now. At least as standby freight while we don’t have much else to keep it busy.”

“That’ll double the price of the water,” Jeff cautioned her.

Heather shrugged. “We’re not getting enough anywhere else. I’m thinking I might have a solution for some of your interior partitions and such for your cans.”

“Oh really? Are you taking up tree farming?” Jeff asked.

“All in good time,” Heather assured him. “For now, I have one of Mo’s guys making a sort of rock foam. Have you ever seen pumice?”

“I think I had some tooth polish with that in it,” Jeff recalled. “It’s gritty.”

“That’s the crushed stuff,” Heather said. “The stuff looks like grey foam before it’s crushed. It’s a little heavier, but I’ll ask what he can do to make it lighter. He’s already adding fiber to make it less prone to fracture, and I know he has already been working on making panels from it, because that’s how we intended to use it for interior walls and partitions. It glues just fine and you can run a self-tapping screw into the stuff too.”

“That’s encouraging. I’m going to ask Mo if he can come up with a lock mechanism that doesn’t require electric motors. Copper and silver are just horribly expensive right now,” Jeff said.

“Do you have any data for motors with aluminum windings?” Heather asked.

“I doubt it. I’ll search, but I think I’d need them designed. It shouldn’t be that difficult. Why?”

“If you can make a workable design in aluminum we had a bit of it from the regolith, but the same or nearly the same design should work for calcium. The Rock owners have a ton of calcium they’d love to sell,” Heather said. “And it should extrude easily. I have no idea if it work hardens however.”

Jeff nodded. “Yeah, I think it’s time to start learning to use it. I doubt we’re ever going to have enough copper. But I’ll put the motor out on the vacuum side, because I doubt we can protect the calcium from air and moisture now. That’s the sort of thing that takes four or five generations of design to get all the bugs out. We might even make them in vacuum.”

“Why not?” Heather asked, amused. “We have plenty of it…I do have a question though.”

“Sure…What’s that?” Jeff asked, catching a sudden change in her tone…

“If you’re going to have a couple hundred immigrants living in these modules, a couple kilometers from Home. Some of them will commute, and some probably just work from their quarters. Are they going to be citizens of Home or outsiders? Will they be eligible to pay taxes and vote? Will they want to? Are they going to pay air and water fees to Mitsubishi? Because it sounds like they won’t see much benefit from that. And will Home citizens accept them? I’m a Home citizen still, even though I spend most of my time at Central. I’ve never had anybody challenge it. Of course if they reject them it may put me out the lock too. Unless they grandfather me in. So I have a real interest. I’d find out some answers to those sort of questions before you start lifting cans for Home,” Heather counseled.

“Oh boy. Nothing is ever simple,” Jeff said.

*

“They launched the next snowball expedition,” Deloris informed Barak at shift change.

“Same basic design ship as the Yuki-onna?” Barak wondered.

“Yes, but they changed the way the motors are mounted on the ice after the amount of time it took you and Hanson to get them positioned. Basically you get them in position now and set off a bunch of charges that drive anchors in the ice,” Deloris said. “No more manually setting anchors.”

“Do you still have to trench and lay the feeds?” he wondered.

“They’ll need to lay them out, but not bury them now. They have staples to pin them to the ice every meter. Then the anchors and pinions get plugged into power temporarily, and it heats the tip. Theory is it melts the ice around the end, and it refreezes in the ice much more securely than with just barbs and friction holding it.”

“If their iceball is pretty dense like ours that should work,” Barak decided. “If they test and find out it is too ‘fluffy’ they better go find another one.”

“That’s what I told them,” Deloris said. “They also did the sort of testing you recommended.”

“Oh really? They mentioned it to you? Or did you ask?” Barak wondered.

“They volunteered it. The coordinator said they had a great deal of resistance to the questions,” Deloris said. “Several people dropped out of the program rather than have family and previous workmates questioned. There was so much resistance that they felt they either had to validate the procedure or drop it in the future.

“So they went to the trouble and expense of determining who would have been on the questionnaire for the people refusing, as many as they could, and tried to interview them. He said the ones who dropped out had references that either clammed up and refused to talk, or were openly hostile. Hostile to the candidate, and even hostile to the questioner for being associated with that person in any way.”

“No kidding?” Barak said. “Who’d have thought it?”

“He said the main candidate for XO elicited such hostile reactions when they mentioned his name that they were afraid they might be assaulted before they could disassociate themselves from him. That was from his own brother and a former commanding officer. Our guys admitted it could have been a disaster if he hadn’t been weeded out.”

“Just think,” Barak told her, “there isn’t an Earth nation now where you could ask those sort of questions without committing a crime.”

Deloris nodded agreement, thinking hard. “That’s going to affect how we pick our crews now, but for me, personally, it’s going to change how I regard the crews of Earthie ships and deal with them. Knowing they can’t screen for defective people I’m going to be a lot more careful and not automatically expect I’ll get a rational response if we have some conflict to resolve.”

“Sounds smart,” Barak agreed. “Sounds like that needs to go in the training manual too.”

“You’re right. It should be official, and the why of it documented in careful detail. I’ll submit that idea too,” Deloris promised.

*

“Captain Li is coming up on the next flight of Dionysus’ Chariot,” Jeff said.

“Oh, good. I want to see him, “April responded. “May I take both of you to the Fox and Hare? I haven’t been there since I went with you. I know we pay to be on his boat, but I’d love to return his hospitality. I feel he and his crew go way beyond what they need to do, just for paying customers.”

“Yes. I’ll leave time for that. Actually…I wondered if you’d extend a different sort of hospitality to him for two nights?”

“Really?” April asked, raising an eyebrow extra high.

“Yes,” Jeff said, looking terribly embarrassed. “I simply can’t find anywhere to bed him down. Not even a hot slot. I’m down to the point of needing to answer one of those ads offering floor space with strangers. I hate to do that to Li. It would hardly give him a good first impression of Home. I can get an air mattress, but not a room.”

“Oh good. You weren’t going to put him in with me,” April said, in mock relief.

“Nor Gunny,” Jeff said trying to cover his embarrassment with humor.

“I’d rather have you as a guest and let you put Li in with Walter,” April suggested. “They’ve met each other, so you wouldn’t be putting him in with a stranger.”

“Is that acceptable then?” Jeff asked, strangely distressed.

“Well of course. Why do you need to ask?” Sometimes April couldn’t figure Jeff out.

“I’ve never invited myself over,” Jeff said. He could see from the look on April’s face she didn’t get it. “It makes all the difference in the world to me,” he tried to explain. “I don’t presume.”

“Do you remember that I set the door to your palm?” she reminded him.

“Yeah. I’m being stupid again, aren’t I?”

“Yes, but very sweetly, in your own way,” April said to soften it.

“Thank you. I very much appreciate it, and he’ll love the club,” Jeff predicted.

*

“Mr Singh, I have your next ten thousand seals,” Eric said.

“That’s great. Can you bring them by my office, please? I have another forty thousand for you.”

“Wow, I had no idea we’d be making so many,” Eric admitted.

“Is that a problem?” Jeff asked, but pleasantly.

“No, no, I want the work,” Eric was quick to say. “I’m just wondering if I’m going to wear my welcome thin at April’s cubic.”

“April? How’s that?” Jeff asked, refusing to admit any knowledge of their arrangement.

“She, uh, did me a favor and let me run the machine in her apartment, but forty thousand is going to take weeks to run, even if I run two or three loads a day.”

“That seems like a reasonable time frame, but that’s between you and April,” Jeff agreed.

“Yeah, I’ll pick up the new cards and seals, I better bring a cargo cart for forty thousand. And I better find a new place pretty quickly,” Eric decided.

“Whatever arrangement you wish to make,” Jeff said, agreeably.

“Thank you, Mr. Singh. I’ll come around within the hour,” he promised. Wow, now what was he going to do? Dick might be able to weasel some space at his dad’s shop, but there was no place secure there. Crime was very low on Home, but not to where he wanted to leave a stack of a thousand gold certificates sitting on the shop floor unattended. They didn’t even lock the doors there, and they had constant traffic in and out. Huh. He’d think of something.

*

“I thought I’d never smell that again,” Chen said when he emerged from his shower.

“We’re having breakfast with the Santos,” Huian informed him. “To share the special treat.”

“Where did they find coffee?” he wondered.

“Mr. Hall at the bank gave it to us. I believe it was in appreciation of our business,” Huian said. “I confess, he asked if there was anything else he could do when we finished our business, and I jokingly said. ‘Not unless you could make the Earthies send up some coffee.’ Never expecting he actually had any. I suspect he enjoyed shocking me with it. And he certainly did!”

“My goodness…The fellow has more connections than I imagined,” Chen said.

“He is quite close with Jeff Singh and his partners. I’d suspect that is the source given his Earth connections, although Mr. Singh has never given you coffee.”

“I’m sure Jeff Singh thinks he pays me enough I can buy my own coffee,” Chen laughed heartily.

Huian just smiled happily along with him. He’d never before revealed to her that Jeff Singh was directly paying him, besides Tetsuo and his occasional work with the other security men. She was enjoying his new openness with her, and the surest way to kill it dead in its tracks would be to voice nagging petulance that he hadn’t said something before.

Chapter 16

Li still had that stunned look of an Earthie plunged into Home culture. Jeff met him at the dock and gave him a tour. Just experiencing zero G for the first time is enough shock to the system in one day for most people. At least Li was smart enough to take his anti-nausea drugs.

Finding that most people, including Jeff, lived in much less room than his crew enjoyed on the Tobiuo was a shock. He knew spacer apartments were small, but he hadn’t actually seen them before. Jeff slept on an air mattress which hung on the bulkhead during the day. Of course it was at a half G which was quite comfortable, but still…Also he had to bunk with Dr. Houghton, whom they had recovered recently. Li was used to having his own cabin on the Tobiuo.

Jeff took him down to the full G level and the main ring with Mitsubishi’s offices, the com room, cafeteria and the high end businesses. The corridor looked more like an Earth mall if you didn’t look up in the distance too carefully. There were screens and art to shield a lot of the disorienting perspective. At a full G he even found a little appetite, and Jeff took him to the cafeteria for a meal.

“You have more fresh greens and variety than we have on the Tobiuo,” Li said, after reading the day’s menu. “I didn’t expect that.”

“But very seldom fish,” Jeff pointed out. “We’re getting salad greens and some other things from the moon now. It’s much cheaper to lift from there than Earth.”

Jeff ordered grilled cheese, a favorite of his, and soup. Li decided breakfast was safest for him and got scrambled eggs and pancakes. He copied what Jeff did with his tray. The coffee wasn’t very good, which was probably why Jeff got soy-milk.

“There are a couple young men in the corner there…they’re bare chested,” Li said, scandalized. “They’d be arrested in North America. Or in Australia and most of Europe too, for that matter.”

“Yeah, that’s a fad,” Jeff said with a grimace. “I hate it, and hope it dies out soon. It’s mostly guys in their early twenties and most of them are either body builders or have tattoos they want to show off.”

“I guess I’m being narrow minded,” Li decided. “We go French boat rules out alone on the ocean, and sometimes just wear trunks even in the harbor.”

“Yeah, but you wouldn’t dock, go into town, and go in a restaurant like that. They’ll be painting themselves next,” Jeff predicted, rolling his eyes.

“No, we wouldn’t, and I have to admit seeing so many armed unnerves me too,” Li admitted.

“Well, nobody has been offended enough to make an issue of it,” Jeff said, with a shrug.

“How could they?”

“Oh, well if it bothered you enough you could demand they cover up or meet you in the north corridor,” Jeff said.

“And what? Fight them?” Li asked.

“Not just brawl,” Jeff said, “duel to settle it. Of course challenging them you’d be giving them the choice of weapons. That’s no small thing.”

Li looked up at Jeff to see if he was having fun with him, but Jeff was intent on dipping his grilled cheese in his soup. He didn’t have the least trace of mischievous smile.

“How often has that happened?” Li demanded.

“We’ve had a number of people called out. I’m amazed really that we haven’t had a duel actually carried out. Several have been declined and the person wouldn’t satisfy the challenger’s complaint, so the Assembly banished the challenged from Home. In a few other cases the person agreed to change their behavior or apologize. One woman from the moon withdrew her challenge, seeing it was going to be a loss no matter what she did.”

“It seems like a rather binary thing to me,” Li said puzzled. “Win or lose.”

“No, she had a beef with a guy living here because of things he’d done on the moon. It didn’t seem reasonable to me, or a lot of other people, but in her mind it was obviously clear cut. She challenged him and had him backed into a corner. He really had no other place to go from Home. He was much larger than her and he picked meter long hefty pipes as weapons. I really doubt she would have prevailed. But then our registrar of voters, Eduardo Muños, informed her that if she survived her first duel, she would be required to meet him the next day.”

“And he was another one who out-matched her?” Li asked.

“Not at all. He is an older gentleman. At the time he hadn’t received any life extension therapy. So he looked rather grandfatherly. She could have picked weapons to suit her lesser strength. The thing is, everybody likes Muños, and she was already aware public opinion was against her call. So if she’d killed Muños too she’d have really been a stink to everybody. You may have a right to call out anybody you wish, for any stupid reason, but that doesn’t mean people have to accept it and like you. We don’t have any public accommodation laws. I doubt anybody on Home would have sold her so much as a pair of footies, or hired her if she left Central. They’d have shunned her and left her stuck at Central for life and entirely at Heather’s mercy. And it would really limit her usefulness to Heather too, not to be welcome here. It would have been a dead-end life.”

“I can see why you don’t say anything,” Li decided, looking at the young fellows, and then deciding that staring at them wasn’t politic either.

“It has had an enormous impact on public civility,” Jeff agreed. “People are much more polite once they realize that rash words and a display of temper can put your life on the line. There was one case, early on after we weren’t under USNA law any more. One of the fellows who had attended nudist camps on Earth decided since we weren’t under their law any more he could go nude. One of the fellows with young daughters disabused him of that notion pretty quick. He decided he would agree to wear some clothing rather than meet the fellow to duel. You see we still have firm customs.”

“I’ll admit, I have mixed feelings about it,” Li said, and went back to his breakfast, thinking hard.

“Are you uncomfortable being away from the Tobiuo?” Jeff wondered.

“Less than you might think. Tara is competent. It’s the long range I’m uncertain about, not being away a few days. I wanted to see if I might find it agreeable to live here. Tara wants a chance to visit for the same reason. That leaves us wondering what would happen to the Tobiuo of course.”

“Which is of interest to me,” Jeff reminded Li.

“Perhaps less down the road than now. I have an idea that might make that true…sooner,” Li said.

“I’d like to hear that,” Jeff encouraged him.

“You realize things are slowing down right now on Earth?” Li asked.

“Economically,” Jeff said, more specifically.

“Yes, well, shipping volumes are way down. When that happens there is always a surplus of ships that are either mothballed or scrapped. One can buy a hull sometimes for literally the scrap value of the metal. And some of the older ships have turbine-electric drives. They’d be easy to convert to use your fusion generators and just leave the turbine in place for backup. They’d be a bear to remove anyway.”

“That’s an interesting idea, but we’ve decided against building more water landing shuttles like the Chariot. There seems to be a consolidation of space shuttles right now too. People are rushing to build small personal craft, not for commerce, but so they have the option of personal travel, even if the commercial services are cut back or go broke. We’re looking for bigger shuttles to land on short runways or even vertically with smaller loads, but still much larger than we can build right now to land at sea. A big ship would take a lot more landings and cargo transfers before it would be worth taking it to a port.”

“If you had shuttles like the Chariot doing it, yeah,” Li agreed. “But a big old container ship or a tanker could let you land right on the deck. You could even have two, maybe three shuttles sitting on the deck at the same time. And you could land in much rougher seas than you can now.”

“Oh…Are you interested in commanding a big ship like that for us?” Jeff asked.

“Me? No, I’m not qualified to handle a ship like that. And even with automation and some of the changes you’d make, it needs a bigger crew. But it doesn’t really need to even put in to a dock on a regular basis. That’s difficult with that big a ship, and you have to hire harbor pilots. It could just hold station one place and other smaller ships would stop and swap cargo with it.”

“Is it possible to stay in one place that long? What about big storms?” Jeff wondered.

“Unless things got so bad down below that you didn’t have decent weather forecasts you can move out of the way of developing storms. Even without them, you could see any significant cyclones from orbit. You wouldn’t have track predictions, but you could view the charts of previous storms and predict their possible paths enough to at least miss the worst of them,” Li said.

“How big are you talking? How long and what sort of volume?” Jeff wondered, getting interested.

“Three to four hundred meters long. Fifty or sixty meters across the beam. You can land on that can’t you? And volume…I’d guess as much usable volume as two of your rings on this station. Maybe a bit more. Why do you ask that?” Li wondered.

“I’m thinking the high G outer level in the ring here is expensive. But just as there are things that can only be done in zero G, there are processes which are easier in gravity. We could process our own fuel right there at the ship to make it cheaper to run the shuttles. I wouldn’t mind a small set up to mine deuterium. And we might grow some food, maybe put out some pens and do some fish farming as well. Then use that as filler freight to top off a load.”

“Jeff, some of those midsized bulk carriers like they are scrapping have five huge holds. You could put an entire factory in one of them, or leave one open and flood it for a fish farm for that matter. Some ballast helps stabilize it anyway. If you reinforce the hold cover, the hatch, it should make a decent landing pad for your shuttle. How close can you set one down in a vertical landing?” Li asked.

“Within a meter if it isn’t terribly gusty and shoving us around right at the end. It can touch down if you have just a couple seconds of no wind, or at least a steady wind. We’d need some sort of automated system to clamp on or chain it down,” Jeff said, working on possible designs in his head already. “If it tips or slides sideways the pilot can hardly jam the throttle on and lift again if he’s going to cook the crew chaining him down.”

“No, the crew wouldn’t appreciate that,” Li said looking alarmed. “An aircar can switch rotor geometry and push itself into the deck to pin it down until it is secured. Some helicopters can, some can’t. If you try too hard with a few, the rotors dip, and can even hit the tail boom. That gets messy. They generally drop a cable and get pulled down against their lift in really rough seas. Can a shuttle do anything to press itself into the deck?”

“It’ll have attitude thrusters. Since we’re purpose building them we can make the thrusters big enough to do that, and have an automated system to use them to keep it from tipping, up to a certain point. But the cable thing sounds promising. If we can yank it down within ten or fifteen seconds. The plasma exhaust tends to melt whatever it doesn’t vaporize,” Jeff said. “Even concrete.”

Li had nothing to say to that. He could see all sorts of problems.

“How much do they want for a ship headed for the scrap heap?” Jeff asked.

“Well, since the price of scrap metal goes down when the economy takes a dive not much. You might buy a stripped out medium sized container ship for thirty or forty million USNA dollars. If you insist on getting it without the electronics and internal systems ripped out figure a couple more million. But you can get a better price by taking a flagged ship stranded at dock or one that can’t be sold at sea. They won’t usually tow one to sea to sell it if they can’t power it up, and some countries have strict laws about breaking up ships that have been under their flag.”

“What difference does that make?” Jeff asked.

“If you can buy it while it is in international waters then it can be driven ashore in a third world breakers yard. They’ll remove the prop and drive it right up the beach. No dry dock needed. It’s broken up where there are no labor safety laws or pesky environmental laws to reduce your profits. So it will sell for more since your expenses are lower and scrap yield will be better.”

“And there’s no shortage of sellers on those terms?” Jeff asked.

“That’s how the majority are still broken up,” Li assured him.

“I just detest how they do business on…down there,” Jeff said.

That pause and switch amused Li. Jeff didn’t have to spare his feelings on the matter.

*

“Oh my goodness!” April stopped and stared at the small notice posted under the daily menu and list of scheduled entertainment posted outside the Fox and Hare.

In order to maintain the atmosphere our guests demand, we now require shirts and shoes on all our guests. If in doubt, anything which might be mistaken for bathing attire is insufficient. We apologize for any inconvenience. If you have made an effort to reach our door and find yourselves unable to proceed, we truly hope you will return at a later date suitably attired. – F&H

Li leaned over April and Jeff from behind reading it. “I take it that’s new?” he asked.

“It certainly is,” April said, horrified. “It’s like down on the Slum Ball. I’ve seen the same sort of sign in Hawaii. Ruby has been talking about doing the same thing at the cafeteria. She’s been working her nerve up to ask my dad, because she wants to be sure he’ll back her up on it once she posts it. But that’s sort of a semi-public area. Who goes shirtless to a nightclub?”

“A clod,” Li agreed.

“You have slandered divots everywhere,” Jeff said.

“I’m surprised you know the word,” Li said amused. “Have you ever played golf?”

“Once, when I was about eleven years old. I did terribly,” Jeff admitted.

Inside the maître d’ Phillip Detweiler looked embarrassed.

“I heard you exclaiming over the notice,” he said.

“They probably heard me on ISSII,” April admitted.

“I’m sorry that was necessary,” Phillip said. “I had to do that because I tried telling a few young gentleman quietly that it wasn’t acceptable, but rather than accept a quiet word to spare them embarrassment they wanted to argue with me. In one case, loudly. I came near suggesting he needed a bullet between his eyes the next morning. But I realized he seemed to have had a few drinks before arriving, since we are out. I wonder where he’s finding it? It might reflect poorly on the establishment to shoot potential customers.”

“I bet the beam dogs made a still,” Jeff guessed. “They have plenty of pipe and tubing.”

“I’m new here,” Li informed him. “Excuse me if this isn’t considered a polite question, but have you ever challenged someone to a duel before? This resurrected custom…fascinates me. And it’s twice the matter has come up my first day here.”

“No, but then I haven’t had a drunken lout shout in my face before,” Phillip explained. “That’s why we have the duel, so matters of honor and acceptable civil behavior cannot be plowed under as secondary to cold law. I’m not a hireling. Like Miss Lewis I have an interest in the club. I won’t put up with it or me being treated that way.”

“Thank you, I don’t blame you,” Li said. Well, wasn’t that a new twist? He thought. April is a part owner of a nightclub.

The place was very plain by the standards Li expected from dozen exotic ports. But things had gotten so bad in some of those ports he didn’t want to go back. Those clubs might be closed, or a shadow of their former glory. The acts were surprisingly good, not small club level entertainment at all.

Before dinner, and between acts, no less than a half dozen people stopped at their table and said hello to either Jeff or April. Li also thought he saw a woman trying to take a pic of their table without being too obvious. One fellow in an odd suit with a buzz-cut started at seeing them, came over and addressed Jeff as ‘My Lord’. Wasn’t that interesting? The fellow said it dead straight, not like it was a joke, and he’d asked permission to send them dessert. Instead April had laughed, and admitted the club was ‘her place’, and she’d send him dessert, since the house wouldn’t bill for anything sent to her table. The fellow wasn’t offended. He went away smiling. There seemed to be a great deal he needed to learn not only about Home, but about Jeff and his friends. He didn’t know them as well as he thought.

Then Li remembered when he and Tara had collected the kids to go back to the hotel from the outdoor market on Tonga. April had just bought some sort of floor mat, and the old rug dealer had called April ‘princess’. Li frowned. He’d have to ask Tara about that.

The fact that there was no beer to be had didn’t surprise him. He’d seen what they were loading on the Dionysus’ Chariot, and they certainly didn’t have room on the manifest for something that heavy and frivolous. It didn’t escape his notice that April really wasn’t presented with a check, just as she’d said, and he also noticed that after Jeff said he’d take Li to his office and get him squared away for the night, April said, “Fine, I’ll see you in a little while.” Li wondered what her place was like? Jeff was the eccentric sort who might not care about such things, but he couldn’t imagine April being crammed in a literal closet, as seemed to be so common on Home.

*

Margaret, one of Jon’s security officers was doing a walk through inspections of the area near the construction worker’s housing. She was in blue uniform, armed with an air Taser, and her spex were streaming her stroll back to the department. Most of the petty trouble in the habitat seemed connected to this area of the station. An interesting coincidence since it was in easy walking distance of a large concentration of young, single, well paid risk takers, who worked as beam dogs.

The management tried to provide every opportunity possible for them to keep their partying within transient housing. There were pointedly no cameras in the recreation room of their own cafeteria. If there was gambling at the tables nobody made that their concern, not even back when they were under USNA law. They could watch whatever they wanted on the big screen in the lounge, including their own videos and recordings.

There were likewise a number of private residences and businesses without signage, which didn’t publically advertise their offerings in close proximity to the beam dogs, and Jon saw no reason for Security to poke its nose in their dealings. As long as they didn’t damage infrastructure, pollute the air, or cause public panic the beam dogs could cut up all they pleased.

Margaret passed the sort of a hostel that offered hot slots, and just down the corridor were some storage lockers that were bigger than the tiny shelf a hot slot offered. Margaret stopped and listened, hearing something. She walked back and slid her hand down the line of lockers. One faintly vibrated under her hand. She put her ear to the door and heard faintly - Rup, rup, rup, chunka thump – over and over again.

She stood there thinking about it. It wasn’t hurting anything. Whatever it was she could barely hear it. Nobody was calling to complain about it. Margaret didn’t know what reason she could give the owner if she called him out to open it up. Home people tended to tell you to mind your own business. It wasn’t emitting noxious vapors. It seemed unlikely to be anything like a bomb. But she was very curious.

Margaret went down the corridor a few steps and reached up high, planting a sticky backed bump that was a tiny camera looking back down the hall, opposite the side the locker door opened. She activated it with her spex to record video and left. She’d check it out and only make a report if it was still suspicious after she saw the renter open up.

*

Jeff leaned back, as relaxed as April had seen him in a long time. His feet were up in felt slippers, a sample to show how the new material being produced on the moon could be used. What really bugged him was how the family producing it had gotten his shoe size. More than just size he suspected. The slippers fit like bespoke – perfectly. All his assets in Chen and Jon’s intelligence network had no idea how they had obtained that information at Camelot on the moon.

He mentioned it to April, and chatted about other things, but she could always tell when he hadn’t dropped a subject. Other people were confused when he suddenly blurted out a non sequitur about something they had been discussing hours ago, or sometimes days ago, that he was still thinking about. He assumed everyone could switch gears and resume that conversation without tedious explanations. April knew he never formally closed a discussion he didn’t consider finished.

He finally came back to it. “Might you ask Ruby or one of your other sources if they know how the Yangs could possibly have my shoe size?”

“No. Would you call up Chen and ask him trivia when you can’t finish a crossword?” April asked.

“It’s been some years since I worked one of those. My father used to make me do them when I was learning Japanese. Theirs are very interesting. Especially the ones that draw a picture when finished. I’m concerned about that big a hole in our privacy however,” Jeff said.

“Oh, it’s our privacy now? Did they send you a pair of turnip felt panties for me you failed to mention out of sheer embarrassment? Do you suspect the Yangs of disloyalty? Did you have the slippers checked? They may be infused with long term neurotoxins,” April suggested.

Jeff blushed, not because he was too prissy to deal with ladies undergarments, but because he had been paranoid enough to have the slippers scanned for those dreaded neurotoxins, infectious agents, and other less subtle poisons and radiological hazards.

“Not at all,” Jeff insisted. “I’m pleased they developed this felt. It’s a mix of synthetic wool and plant fibers. You can’t tear it barehanded it’s so tough, but they have other products that are going to make nice sheets and upholstery, clothing, and toweling that’s much nicer than disposables.

“They sent their eleven year old daughter as a courier to bring these and other swaths and samples to me. I wanted to press her about how they sized them, but I found myself unable to interrogate a sweet young girl, who was thrilled to finally see Home, and babbling about all the shops and meeting me.”

“There’s hope for you, M’ Lord,” April allowed.

“I figure I’ll buy all the bedding and seat covers for ‘The Cans’ from them. Assuming the Assembly allows it to have favored status and go ahead,” Jeff added.

“I take it Annette is doing well at Camelot, or you’d have mentioned it?” April asked.

“Oh yes, she’s stopped asking when she can come home, and she hasn’t shot anybody, so I think she is acclimated now. They have their own tunneling machine running around the clock. And they have a casino, which didn’t thrill Heather, but she was smart enough not to forbid it. It’s not exactly a noble profession, but I don’t know what else they could do to survive. There’s worse they could do.”

“How can they run a casino when it’s almost impossible to get a civilian shuttle ticket to orbit?”

“They only have rooms for six couples. The sort who are gambling there don’t have any trouble getting to low Earth orbit. Some of them lift on their own private shuttles. And since almost all the residents at Camelot are Chinese they’re getting mostly very wealthy Chinese,” Jeff explained. “Only having twelve guests they can smother them in service. I’d hate it.”

“They can get out of China with as much turmoil as it’s in?” April asked.

“Some left China as soon as there was trouble. Others have private aircraft on private airfields, private yachts, these are the sort of wealthy business people or officials who could call up the local military and inform them they need a ride or an escort and they’d divert military traffic to curry favor with them. They might as well be nobility. Annette says they have a waiting list.” Jeff revealed.

“And she has enough cash to pay out when these high rollers win?” April asked.

“Both Irwin and we own a piece of it, and we found five other investors. Most of the winnings from the clients are retained for backing capital, even now. It may be another year before we have sufficient reserves to feel comfortable. The first few sets of visitors placed bets that scared all of us to death, but Annette told me that when a man won a million EuroMarks at the wheel his last day there, the rest of them went nuts and bet more in the last few hours than they had the previous three days.”

“I don’t understand gamblers,” April admitted.

“I know. I must be missing a gland, a gene, or there’s a hole in my brain where the circuitry is supposed to be that makes people double down in a frenzy,” Jeff said.

“So it’s enough to make a difference for Camelot?”

Jeff nodded. “It’s enough to let them hang on until we have other things besides the casino and the felt and paper making to keep them viable.” He looked up at April suddenly, you could practically see his thoughts switching tracks. “Jon sent the girl, Yang Hua, to stay with one of his female agents. She has extra room, don’t ask me how a security agent can afford that much cubic, but she saved me. I had no idea where I was going to put her.”

“I know exactly which lady you are talking about,” April told him.

“Of course you do…But I’m supposed to take her to lunch in a bit. Would you come along? I’m awkward with her. I don’t know what to talk about,” Jeff said.

“You don’t need to play tour guide for Li?” April said surprised.

“He needs to see Home from several viewpoints. Chen will show him some things and he’ll be turned loose to explore some on his own some. Home is pretty safe after all,” Jeff insisted.

“Sure, I’m in with the kid then. I’m curious anyway. When does she go back?” April asked.

“Late tonight. I’m afraid it’s going to disrupt her sleep schedule terribly, but her mother refused when she asked if she could wait four days for the next shuttle,” Jeff said. “She’ll have to layover a day at Central anyway. I said that was good – that she could have another visit there – but she made a face and said she’s been to Central lots of times.”

That amused April. “Sure, I’d like to meet this little ambassador.”

Chapter 17

The fact Jeff ‘didn’t know what to talk about’ didn’t seem to be much of a problem to April. Hua was perfectly able to hold up three sides of a conversation. It was just amazing she managed to wolf down every bit of her lunch between all the words. April was treated to such a detailed accounting of Camelot politics she was sorry she started recording so far in. She’d fill in what she remembered, reduce the whole thing to an outline, and give it to Chen. He’d wonder how the devil she had such a detailed analysis of internal Camelot politics. It was always good to leave him off balance wondering where she got odd items. It was fascinating because it gave April insights into the cultural gap with the Chinese she hadn’t seen before. The girl seemed to be growing up observing and understanding both ways of thinking, and choosing the bits of both she preferred.

The girl didn’t sound eleven years old. She had a blunt assessment of personal failings and quirks that would have shocked the people she was describing. They were both relieved that she approved of Annette. Then April realized it was exactly how she had been at that age. People spoke far too freely, and didn’t hide their prejudices and foibles around a ‘powerless’ child. In the end she thanked Hua for the report and offered to share information if Hua or her family needed any intelligence she possessed, mentioning her com code was on the public net. Hua just said “OK!”, but April was certain she had a firm alliance to trade in kind, despite the seeming casualness of her response.

Jeff took the whole thing in without saying hardly anything. They walked Hua back to Jon’s offices and didn’t go in. They had things to do and didn’t want to interrupt Jon or his people.

“Did you recruit her, or did she just recruit you?” Jeff asked in the corridor.

“Yes,” April agreed, which left him silent again.

*

“Huian, I am having a man contact you from India,” Myat told her. “He is my client, a fine gentleman who is involved in the recycling trade and scrap metals, but it is increasingly difficult for us to do business with any privacy because of both our governments imposing capital controls. He has been doing business with me via a son of a friend who travels between our countries weekly. But it’s no longer safe for him to convey actual payments to me across the border, just verbal orders. He was interested when he heard the head of the System Trade Bank is named Singh. He may have questions or he might ask to invest.”

“Because the name is Indian? He may be disappointed if he thinks they share a culture. The young man would probably seem alien to him,” Huian warned. “I know he’s three generations removed from his homeland. I’m not sure he even speaks a non-English Indian language. But I’ll give you his contact information if the man wants to know him.

“No, more like your situation is similar to our business relationship here. Because we got along just fine despite being from different backgrounds. I believe he was surprised, and thought before that Home was pretty homogeneous, and full of North Americans,” Myat said.

“Oh, well it probably is better than two thirds North Americans,” Huian admitted. “But North America might be less homogeneous than he imagined. Also the characters here were not exactly typical of the USNA. We have a serious surplus of people who wanted to get away from them.”

“That’s interesting. I didn’t really understand that myself. But since you rebelled I guess I should have figured that part out. If I went by the news feeds from America and Europe, I’d have to conclude you all have horns and hooves,” Myat added. “The Indian fellow can do what he wants. I expect he’ll come back and deal with me when he finds out how hard it is to get secure transport to orbit right now. I suspect despite the changes I’m still more accessible than Home, if he makes the effort. He can send things hidden in goods.”

“Yes, I’ve heard three different sources insinuating that we somehow caused the Great Influenza. It’s sort of stupid to imagine we’d unleash something that would have wiped the habitat out if it got loose here. It’s only been a few days since we started letting people enter Home again without being held in quarantine to make sure they weren’t carriers,” Huian said.

“That must have just killed business,” Myat observed. “Are you entirely sure it’s safe yet?”

“No, they aren’t sure the nasty strain has burned out, but they have a machine now to use at the point of entry that detects flu even before the carrier displays symptoms, just a few hours after exposure.”

“Really?” Myat looked intensely interested. “Do you know if they are selling this equipment? I don’t think you realize how paranoid people are down here now. I’d be very interested in buying such an item, or being a dealer in them if some arrangement could be made.”

“It’s the same fellow, Singh. I’ll ask him to contact you if you’d like,” Huian offered.

“Please, by the time he calls I’ll have had time to see who else is interested,” Myat promised.

*

“Yes, Ma’am. We are going to sell them,” Jeff said, “but the one we are using on Home is a our hand built prototype. We’re building a first generation commercial model soon. It will be packaged much nicer and detect other diseases too. We haven’t let out all the contracts for parts yet. I’m not even sure how many will be in the first assembly run. It does work very well, and we’re hoping to have it entirely robot assembled to keep the cost down. It will be another three or four days before I have a price, and a week before I can tell you a delivery date.”

“Thank you, Mr. Singh. We want ten of your first run,” Myat requested.

“Ma’am, I don’t even have a price for you yet,” Jeff objected.

“It doesn’t matter. You have no idea how afraid people have become of the flu. Get me the machines, and I can sell them,” Myat promised. “Price them for me in several currencies and I’ll see what I can do.”

“Yes, Ma’am. The first ten are yours. You have my word,” Jeff agreed. “I’ll price them in gold, Australian dollars, and we’ll see what else. If you have access to the current crop of Arabica coffee, good quality that cups over eighty points, we might do a deal for that.”

Myat looked surprised on the screen. “No need to pledge your word,” Myat told him. “Huian has assured me you are an honorable businessman and a gentleman.”

“Thank you. I’ll let you know price and delivery as soon as possible,” Jeff promised, and Myat dropped the connection.

Now, where did Huian get such strong feelings about me? Jeff wondered.

*

“Eduardo, I don’t want to call an Assembly to deal with this. Just interrupting people’s lives and asking for a vote irritates some enough to make them vote no. I honestly don’t think it is important enough to call a Special Assembly. But I want to give you a heads up, that I intend to ask how the voters wish to treat residents of…call it auxiliary residences. It’s almost four months until the regular Assembly. We aren’t going to be forming hulls and making parts before then anyway,” Jeff said. “A little extra design time is fine.”

“There is already discussion of building another habitat, perhaps two!” Muños said. “This seems much the same question we’ll have about those. Will they be in the same political unit? Can they all be citizens of Home? So far everyone I have discussed this with comes to the same conclusion. If they are all in a group, in the same halo orbit, and close enough to all of us can tie into the same net and vote with Home when the Assembly is called, then they should be accepted. I don’t see how not having a spin on your structure changes that.”

“Nobody has talked to me about that,” Jeff said. “Well, except Heather’s little brother, Barak. He concluded a long time ago we’d have to build associated habitats. And I know there is no reasonable way to add a fourth ring to Home without serious stability problems.”

“Really? That’s very interesting. The young man has exceptional vision then. Is he in your employ?” Muños asked.

“No, he’s off on the second snowball expedition,” Jeff said. “He’s doing a…study for me, but that is incidental to the expedition.”

“Ah, he’s another one of your people,” Muños said, amused.

“You’ve been talking to Jon again,” Jeff accused.

“Of course…All the time. He’s one of my people,” Muños added, and smiled.

*

“The dollar isn’t crashing, but it keeps creeping down,” Irwin warned. “Not so much the Australian dollar. If your Solars are too expensive we won’t be able to sell Home products.”

“Is that happening? Jeff asked.

“Well, no.” Irwin looked stressed, and Jeff waited for him to say something more.

“All the textbook cases say it has to do that, eventually,” Irwin said.

“Fine,” Jeff agreed. “Eventually. But what is happening right now?” He personally didn’t have the faith in economic theory Irwin did, but neither did he want to start a big argument.

Irwin sighed. “We’re selling anything that can’t be made on Earth, every bit of it, and getting requests for things they should be easily making. We’re getting gold flowing to Home at a frightening rate, to where it’s starting to counteract the recovery in shipping, and now the last couple days I’ve gotten platinum and other things.”

“Things?” Jeff asked.

“I got a request for safe deposit services six days ago,” Irwin said. “I explained we don’t have a huge vault, that we send most everything to the moon where it goes in deep storage. That there’s no local demand for the service. Also that we wouldn’t take anonymous bundles, that the risk of something being a bomb or bioweapon was too great on a habitat. The client was from Russia. He asked how secure it was there. I laughed, which might have been stupid, and said Central had already been attacked with a one megaton nuke dead on target and they were still there. My flippant answer apparently decided him.

“He asked a fee to send ten kilograms to the moon and hold it indefinitely, after a visual inspection here. I quoted twenty grams of gold, and ten grams a year thereafter. He didn’t dicker, he said his courier would be here in five days and I could inspect his package, sign for it and send it on. I informed him it usually took three days to recover items from the moon, and asked very explicitly if he wished for the items to only be released to specific persons or anyone bearing the receipt? He opted for the receipt.”

“Did he show? And if so, what did he send?” Jeff asked, surprised how upset Irwin appeared.

“His courier came in and laid a small case on my desk with two ten gram gold bars. I opened it and there was a emerald necklace with huge graduated stones, each with a halo of diamonds, but the center stone was a diamond, about the size of a half walnut. Then to the side there were four containers, each with a diamond almost as impressive as the center piece of the necklace. I pulled them all out and laid them on my desk. The poor fellow looked nervous, wondering what I was doing. He looked over his shoulder, worried about the unlocked door.

“When I pulled all the finger foam out of the case and made sure there wasn’t anything else hidden he seemed surprised. I put all of it back and signed his receipt with my hanko. That didn’t seem to surprise him at all. Earth people usually remark on them, so figure he’s seen them used before. I put a wrap of the bank’s tamper proof tape around the case both ways and thanked him. By that time Dan was standing at my desk because I’d pinged him with my spex, and he carried the case away to the vault. The whole thing was surreal to me, and the Russian went away looking like he felt the same.”

“They trust us. I’m not entirely sure why,” Jeff admitted.

“It isn’t so much they trust us,” Irwin insisted. “They have nobody they trust on Earth, and the situation must seem even less stable to them that it appears to us,” Irwin theorized.

“You didn’t charge enough,” Jeff said.

Irwin thought about it and frowned. “I believe you’re right.”

*

“Mr. Larkin, I’m glad you could come early,” Eduardo Muños, said to the fleet owner.

“My wife already disapproves of my poker night. I might as well have supper with you, as sit and watch her frown deepen until I leave. The odd thing is when I said I was having supper with you she expressed approval. For some reason she has a good opinion of you. I refrained from telling her you’d be joining us at the poker table. No reason to let her know what a scoundrel you really are.”

“I appreciate you keeping my secret. Neither will I tell her she shouldn’t begrudge you your fun, since you win so often.”

“Oh please, that would only make it worse,” Larkin assured him with mock horror. “She once remarked that Home isn’t Texas, and that was one of the things she’d hoped to leave behind.”

“What are you having tonight” Muños asked, picking up his own daily menu.

“Well, I’d love a big hunk of beef. I’m past being picky what cut. But I’m afraid I’ll get the meatballs and spaghetti, and thank my lucky stars it isn’t plain sauce.”

“That sounds good to me too, and we can split a nice bottle of Chianti between us,” Muños offered.

“Indeed, we could if their cellar wasn’t cleaned out,” Larkin laughed.

“I brought a bottle of my own and they can charge me corkage to serve it,” Muños said.

“I’m amazed. I thought everyone was dry by now,” Larkin said. “Thank you, Eduardo.”

“It’s my pleasure.”

“So…Got any good gossip? You always seem to be at the center of things,” Larkin said.

“I’m assured there is a steady stream of valuables leaving Earth. I was told they are lifting important paintings and antiquities. People are afraid. They worry about another engineered disease and disorder. The authorities would have done better to reveal all they know, so the public is not worried the same players may be waiting to unleash another plague,” Muños said.

“Perhaps they don’t know,” Larkin suggested.

“We know, so they must, but they have decided it is policy to imply it was us,” Muños said, sadly.

“Then why didn’t we reveal it? Force their hand to charge them? It was a crime against humanity!”

“The evidence didn’t meet the standards of an Earth court. It was extracted involuntarily.”

“Damn snake-pit,” Larkin growled. “They have no sense of justice. I take that back. They have no sense, period. I’m so glad I’m off the Slum Ball and never have to go back!”

“You’d be hard pressed to find anybody to disagree with you,” Muños said. “That’s why we’re getting this influx. Not just gold and art. But treasures in people too, the smartest and most inventive.”

“And no place to put them,” Larkin complained. “I’m just glad old habits die hard. We don’t have Earth laws, but apparently nobody has figured out it isn’t illegal to lie down and sleep in the public corridor. You can hardly rent a hot slot and it’s near bad enough for people to try that.”

“Well I was told in confidence that next Assembly we’re going to hear some proposals on that, but I have my doubts it can pass the vote. I can see benefits, but problems too.”

“What can they do, Eduardo? They shouldn’t add on a fourth ring, and I’m informed they will house some people on the moon soon, but nothing near as many as want to emigrate. I’d say build a whole new habitat to be a mate to this one, but I don’t have a couple trillion dollars to start the project.”

“With the superior new drugs for zero G, and material from the moon, they could be housed in auxiliary quarters for now. You simply make some pressure vessels, much simpler to make than a ship hull. And position them off a couple kilometers to give local traffic a little room. Some folks would commute to work on Home, and some might stay there for days at a time, and only come over here for recreation or things like the clinic. But the politics of it are much harder to deal with than the physical creation,” he said, sadly.

“Why can’t that pass the vote?” Larkin said, scowling. “It seems brilliant to me. Whose idea?”

“Young Singh,” Muños said, “But it would take funding from other backers. I’m not sure the voters will want to see these people having Home citizenship, and diluting their vote. They may doubt they are as solidly committed to Home, not living here full time. They will probably want to argue about air and water fees. It’s always the petty details like that which torpedo these kind of changes. It’s very easy for people to identify others as outsiders, and find reasons to exclude them at first blush. Perhaps after they think on it, get used to the idea, and housing continues to be tight. Maybe then in two or three Assemblies from now it will look more attractive.”

“Ah, thank you,” Muños said, as the antipasto was delivered. He signaled they could open the wine.

“That would be a big boost for business,” Larkin objected. “All we need to do is talk it around early to the business owners. Almost all of them will see the potential benefits to their bottom line. And quite a few people will go along if their employer persuades them that it’s good for their livelihood.”

“Perhaps,” Muños agreed. “If you wish to mention it to your friends, you might have a consensus form around the idea. I’m not sure I’d be an effective advocate. I’m less a business person and more an administrator. It’s easy for people to say – What does he know? He doesn’t have to make a payroll and crank out product. And there’s some truth in that. But if respected business people, their own peers, stand and endorse the idea it might be possible to save it.”

“Certainly! I think you gave up on it too easily. It can be sold if one does it with a little finesse. People simply don’t like a hard sell, and being pushed into something,” Larkin said, and waited a moment for Muños to approve the wine. It might be his, but the waiter still presented it for his inspection as if the house had provided it.

“Really?” Eduardo asked, when done with that chore. “Thank you. It’s quite interesting hearing someone else’s perception of it.”

*

“Jeff, I think you should see this article,” April said. She hadn’t used the priority com tag.

“Just a second,” Jeff begged. He looked at the material on his screen about their virus detectors, added a note that would be on top when he opened the files again, closed another program without notes or concern and cleared his brain of several other things pretty much running ‘on top’.

“OK, send me the link. Why is it important?” he asked April.

“Well, look at the title. Anytime they use the word ‘war’ it gets my attention.”

“Looking,” he assured her.

Currency Wars, Again? – Byron Winslow – Money Market Matters

Currency wars can’t happen now. Ask any economist. There are too many agreements and treaties in place. Nobody benefits from instability and uncertainty…

Jeff stopped reading then because his eye caught his own picture, half way down the page.

“Where did they get my portrait? I don’t recognize that one,” he said.

“I think that out of focus line on the edge is the old coffee machine,” April said. “I think somebody took your picture in the cafeteria. So it’s not very recent. It’s not bad actually.”

Jeff resumed reading and April waited patiently. It wasn’t that long of an article.

“You’d think they would have interviewed the principal individual named. I notice they quote a ‘Federal Reserve Spoks’ but don’t name him. They could have asked Irwin for comment too, and gotten much the same answers as I’d have given them.”

“You might have confused the issue with facts,” April observed.

“The main fact I’d have mentioned is they excluded us from being able to process payments in USNA dollars. Exactly why would we take dollars, if we can’t freely spend them?” Jeff asked.

“Surely you could spend them in India or Brazil,” April suggested.

“Physical cash yeah,” Jeff agreed. “Still…most of them can clear electronic payments through North America for USNA dollars, but they’d have to hide that the transaction is for us or they’d reject them as tainted. But if they are a depreciating asset, whether like the EuroMarks by design, or just because their value is declining steadily, why should I risk holding them? Even for a few days? Easier just to refuse dollars.”

“Mr. Winslow accuses you of making it decline,” April pointed out.

“I don’t imagine the USNA authorities were pleased with that accusation either,” Jeff said. “They’d much rather not hear that a few thousand people on the far side of the moon are capable of shifting the value of their currency. But if they’d asked me I’d have said they precipitated it. It’s almost like a futures trader accusing a small bakery in Kansas City of crashing the bid on wheat by not ordering flour this week.”

“Did you crash it?” April asked.

“Not on purpose,” Jeff said. He sounded sincere, but not exactly unhappy about it.

April just gave him a questioning look.

“It might have been near the tipping point anyway,” Jeff claimed. “I just was in a bit of a snit from being booted out.” He paused. “Irwin is sure I consciously orchestrated it, and he’s scared of me now.”

“He doesn’t act like it,” April said. “He’s doing more business with you than ever.”

“Yeah, but you’ve been teaching me how to read people too well. It was easier sometimes when I was oblivious. He speaks slower and is careful what he says. As if he’s scared to say the wrong thing, or I might do something crazy. What’s he going to do? He still has limited ability to clear USNA dollars. Come out with his own bullion currency? Then they’d kick him out too. Everybody has accepted Solars and the market quotes them. I think he just decided he had to ride the tiger,” Jeff said.

“He doesn’t see it as a positive?” April asked.

“No, he insists Solars will eventually be valued too high and Earth people won’t be able to buy our products. My take on it is nine billion people are a big enough market we could skim off value for decades before it was enough to worry about. It’s not like we are anywhere near similar sized economies. He admitted they are still buying anything only we can make. The odd thing is he says they are trying to buy things that they should be able to make themselves. That agrees with some other things I’m hearing, but it doesn’t make any sense to me. I don’t understand why.”

“I’d ask what they are trying to buy. Surely he’ll provide that detail. He doesn’t have to say which of his customers are getting the requests. Have Chen ask his Earth contacts why they wouldn’t be producing those things for themselves. You know, it is cheaper to drop things down the gravity well than lift them out,” April reminded him.

“Yeah, but I can probably figure out which customers from the ‘what’, and he knows it. Ideally you’d have full loads of similar value going both ways to have a long term stable situation. But it’s never close to that in the real world, never has been. The high value stuff goes down and the loads to lift always have a good fraction of mass market commodities and food.” Jeff stopped and scowled. “We do need more capacity. I’d love to need to worry about deadheading a shuttle one way or the other.

“And I’ve had requests for the ability to drop small packages in stealthy reentry vehicles. We got stuff to our agents in Europe that way during the flu, but they had the ability to move around freely and find safe remote locations to intercept them. We could practically drop one in the bed of a moving truck on a country road. But how are we going to do that with untrained people?” Jeff asked.

“Bribe a farmer,” April said. “Somebody that has a big field and can plausibly deny he has any idea if weirdos are out in his field when he’s home in bed,” April said. “Surely you can hit a big field, and it shouldn’t have close neighbors. Even untrained people should be able to retrieve something in a big flat field with no trees and marked boundaries.”

“That seems practical,” Jeff admitted.

“What do you need to drop that way?” April demanded. “It has to be a pretty high value item.”

“The virus detecting touch panels,” Jeff said. “They’re already pretty rugged and we can easily make the internal wiring and electronics much more resistant to shock and vibration. Then we foam ‘em in a sturdy box with shock absorbing foam, with a crush layer under it. You could just drop it from a few hundred meters and it would be fine. I’ve been informed that delivering it to Myanmar by the Tobiuo isn’t going to happen. We’d need an order of twenty five or more, not ten, to make it worth the trip anyway, and Li says the route there is pirate infested and dangerous.”

“And once you have the delivery system working there will probably be other uses for it.”

“Yeah,” Jeff agreed, “but when we dropped stuff for Chen’s agents it was a rush, and cost wasn’t the first concern. If we’re dropping stuff to make money we want the cost kept way down. The stuff we dropped to Europe was smaller and took over two kilograms of carbon on the face of a ceramic heat shield. No way we can keep throwing away that much carbon and not get it back.”

“I guess besides water and metal we’re going to have to get carbon in the outer system too,” April said. “Maybe scoop hydrocarbon off some of the moons.”

“Yes, but I can’t see moving methane with a bulk tanker. Not even liquefied. I think we’ll have to process it to elemental carbon out there,” Jeff decided.

“Unless there’s someplace where there are deposits of long chain hydrocarbons,” April said.

“Now that would be funny,” Jeff said. “Vaseline mines!”

Chapter 18

Ben Patsitsas looked at the young man on the com screen with open suspicion. He was entirely too clean cut and earnest. He had on a soft golf shirt, but sat ramrod straight and his manner shouted military as clearly as a row of medals on his chest.

“This is Martha Wiggen’s residence,” Ben confirmed. “However she doesn’t refer to herself as President Wiggen now. You should be aware she doesn’t even qualify to be President anymore. She renounced her USNA citizenship and is a voting citizen of Home. I’m her husband,” Ben said in a tone that clearly indicated he felt the job title included protector.

“A legal quibble,” the fellow said with a dismissive gesture. “I’m aware of who you are, that you’re a writer. I’ve read your political dossier.”

That made Ben smile to think they had a political dossier on him. It was ridiculous.

“I’m here to present a proposal to her from a rather large group of…admirers,” he said, smiling like he thought that was a witty ruse. “I am charged with presenting it to her directly. I intend to be polite, but I can’t go back and tell my people I was simply waved off by her staff and meekly complied. I will persist until President Wiggen grants me an interview. When might I come speak to her?”

“I am not staff,” Ben said, slowly. “I’m family. You look like several kinds of trouble to me, and I’ll be blunt. If you show up at my door and get too pushy, I’ll shoot your silly ass dead and call housekeeping to come clean the corridor. Nobody will give me the least grief over it on Home, unless I breach pressure or shoot innocent bystanders.” He reached across outside the range of the camera and drew an antique Webley revolver, that looked like a prop for a steam punk movie. Ben displayed it to assure the young man he had the means close at hand to do what he’d said.

“Is the security situation so bad you go armed inside your own residence?”

“I put my gun belt on the first time I go out in the morning,” Ben explained. “That’s usually breakfast. I just leave it on to go in and out, and don’t usually think about having it on, until after supper, and I’m in for the evening. The security situation is just peachy, because I and most all my friends carry, and will all respond for each other at need.”

“Oh, I did notice that seemed to be the local custom when I arrived yesterday.”

“So, what you’re really saying is you’re going to make a pest of yourself until Martha speaks with you,” Ben said.

“I wouldn’t put it that way,” the fellow objected.

“No, of course not.” Ben stopped and thought a moment, then turned and called over his shoulder.

“Honey, there is a young fellow who insists on speaking to President Wiggen. He looks military and is disgustingly earnest. I believe he is genuinely young. He doesn’t look like he’s regressed in life extension. He acts young,” Ben said, like that was an indictment. “Do you want to get rid of him, or should I call Security and tell Jon he’s stalking you and we want him gone the safe and gentle way, before I take matters into my own hands?”

Martha came and leaned over Ben’s shoulder. She didn’t look very friendly.

“Lieutenant, I’m not involved in politics now. I don’t want to be involved in politics again. It took months to get the smell off when I abandoned that profession before. Who do you represent, and what sort of trouble are they fomenting?”

“I’m Aaron Janowicz, Ma’am. I did not identify myself as a lieutenant,” he said blushing.

“Well excuse me if you made Captain and I guessed wrong, but Captains don’t usually get thrust out on the sharp and pointy end of things like this,” Martha said.

Aaron opened his mouth like he was going to reply and then changed his mind and began again.

“Madame President, I’d rather not discuss this on com. Can’t you spare a moment and speak with me face to face in a more secure environment?” he pleaded.

“How do I know you’re not just an assassin, here to finish me off?” Martha asked.

“Would an assassin simply call and ask for an appointment?” Aaron asked with an unbelieving look.

“It sounds very efficient,” Ben said, eyes lighting up. “That’s going in my next book. I have this character I’ve been wanting to kill off, he’s such a creep, but I hadn’t figured out how to do it. The look on his face when he realizes he delivered himself up on a platter for the slaughter will be priceless.” Ben had a manic snarl anticipating it already.

“Uh, that’s just in fiction,” he added when he saw Aaron’s horrified expression. “This time.”

“Pay no mind,” Martha said. “You get used to the evil cackling as he types. Look, we’re not going to invite you to our home. We’re going to dinner in a bit at a place called the Quiet Retreat. If I leave word with the maître d’ that you are our guest at the club, will you sit and have a civilized interview in a public place, and leave when I tell you I’ve heard enough and not make a fuss?”

“We won’t have eavesdroppers there?” Aaron asked.

“Not political ones. We may have social media stringers take our pix, but they have never posted audio. They simply aren’t interested in ancient politics,” Wiggen assured him, “and it’s the best deal you are going to get.” When he hesitated Martha added. “And I promise I won’t let my husband test his plot device on you.”

“Thank you, Ma’am. I’ll be there,” he agreed reluctantly.

“You’re nicer than me,” Ben grumbled after she disconnected.

“We established that a long time ago,” Martha said, and leaned over with both hands on his shoulders and pecked his ear.

After she went away to let him work Ben made a call.

“Mackay? Ben Patsitsas. Are you free for a short security gig in a couple hours and free supper on top of your charges? Good. I want you to call Hussein the maître d’ at the Quiet Retreat and tell him you need a table as our guest, on the same level as us but across the room. If you’d like to bring a guest to blend in that might make sense, and make the house happier than a singleton at a prime table. We’ll be having dinner with a young fellow who I don’t trust. If he produces a weapon or it looks like we are under any sort of duress to leave I want him dealt with. If things go badly I’ll clap my hands together. I have no idea what will be behind us on the other side of the bulkhead, so bring a laser, not a projectile weapon. Thank you, that seems a very reasonable rate. Don’t be shy ordering your dinner,” he added.

*

“I have reports for us from several of Chen’s operatives about why Earthies are ordering things from Home companies they should be able to make,” Jeff said on com. He had the oddest look on his face.

“I’ll read them in detail,” April promised. “But if you want to give me a quick summary? You usually describe things more succinctly than Chen.”

“Chen says you get insights from things that don’t impress him at all. So he is reluctant to withhold details. Red tape is the basic answer,” Jeff said. “They’ve had a massive epidemic, with millions dead. Since it was very rough on older people it stripped all sorts of shops and industries of the most experienced workers. There was physical damage where we bombarded specialty shops that made aerospace components. But nobody will soften any of the laws and rules that impede reconstruction. The USNA also embargoed quite a few things we make right after the war, but that was mostly drugs and electronics. Nobody has shown any interest in expanding or dropping the list.”

April frowned. “They haven’t been able to rebuild in this much time?”

“I’ll give you an example. Back in the war we destroyed the Michelin specialty shop making tires for shuttles in North Carolina. There is production in Europe and Asia, but not the right types.

“Chen’s guys talked to half a dozen people either living nearby or who have worked on the site. Half the building was gone because it burned, and half was a shell. They had some foundation left, but they couldn’t use it. The plumbing no longer met code and all the areas with pipes under the floor had to be broken up and start over. They went ahead and tore the whole thing up including the machine bases.

“There was a delay because an environmental study had to establish that there were no heavy metal or organic contamination issues in the soil. A water table survey had to be done even though they didn’t plan on having a well. There aren’t a lot of labs and environmental survey companies running to do these things now. Building declined and a lot of them closed up shop.

“An impact statement on endangered plants and animals couldn’t be done because the state office was abandoned when they didn’t get paid after the coup, and nobody knows where the workers went. There were some big issues with a lot of permit issuing agencies like that, because of disruption between factions of the government from the war and then the coup. Some workers were taken care of, some cut off as likely disloyal, depending on their known politics.

“They also had to do a traffic study and community impact statement, but the guy doing that for the county died and they didn’t rehire because there wasn’t really much building or traffic now. They had a hard time hiring, because anybody taking the job knew they’d just be fired as soon as it was done. The man who finally did take it dragged it out for six months to keep getting paid.

“The town council opposed rebuilding, because their zoning classification changed after the first plant was built, taking it from light industrial to heavy industrial. That also meant they had to put in a rain water run-off retaining pond, and there wasn’t room on the property. They had to buy the plant next door and tear it down to get the retaining pond in and to increase parking and provide mandatory electric car charging stations for employees. Assuming anybody in rural North Carolina still had a functioning electric car by then with periodic power outages. The batteries only lasted so long and then they brick themselves if they are run low and don’t get recharged for a few weeks. But that meant the power had to be not only restored to the site, but upgraded by the local utility.

“By the time they could pour a new foundation there was a concrete shortage. Also they could not prove they were paying prevailing union wages or better because the agency collecting data on that was not functioning and there was no established current year prevailing wage. The agency’s computer system was unusable and they bought a new one and the software from the old one couldn’t run on it. When they had a new suite of software written it simply didn’t work. All that caused delays.

“There were more delays for things like the plumbing. They had pipe, but the site sat with no work done for a week because nobody had sufficient pipe solvent to bond the joints from supply disruptions. And they couldn’t pour concrete until the pipe was down. They had similar problems with the electrical. They were short some items that had to be under the slab. Also, running the conduit, the fire marshal and the electrical inspector got in a war over who passed on the in-slab wiring for the fire alarm system. Both kept visiting the site and slapping NO-PASS and cease and desist orders on top of the other guy’s PASS tickets on the site permit board.

“They shut down one day because an inspector found an older uncertified hard hat being used at the site and they all had to be inventoried and recertified. Some of them had the compliance label rubbed illegible or removed and they needed to bring in more from a city hours away.

“Neither could they affirm the people they wanted to hire were within the diversity ratios allowed on a Federal project. You bombarded the snot out of all the Federal data centers during the war,” Jeff reminded April. “Even the ones buried really deep. Birth records and citizenship documents were lacking, and just because they had old bills and driver’s licenses, that wasn’t sufficient documentation. They can’t, well, won’t take their word what their ancestry is, because people lie to get in the minority classifications. Especially, people from Mexico lacked a lot of records when they were first brought into the USNA. Tons of them had no birth certificate. And it turns out a lot of tire building people are Mexican because most of the production was sent down there even before Mexico was annexed. They mostly went home in the chaos after the coup, and none of them would come back, because as hourly workers they wouldn’t be paid until they had a functional shop with special machines and the exotic materials needed to make shuttle tires up and running.

“Electric power to the work site was disrupted, and they couldn’t get permits from the EPA to run an onsite diesel generator, and the Governor wouldn’t loan a military unit. When they finally got a gas turbine permit the city and county would only let it be run from nine in the morning to five in the afternoon for noise abatement, and no Sunday work. The site had to have ditching and special barriers inside the fence to prevent rain run-off, and there was a dispute what area it had to enclose. Basically the water authority wanted the barrier right where the chain link fence was already installed. They couldn’t just put it against the fence. It had to be staked down a certain way.

“Then there was a dispute and site strike because the Iron Workers and the Cement and Concrete workers couldn’t agree on work rules for anchoring the frame to go up. A bunch of anchors got ripped out and both sides blamed the other. The site guards said everybody who went on site had the proper identification cards, and it wasn’t their business what they did onsite. They just maintained a perimeter.

“I could go on, but you get the idea. And that’s just what we got told easily. Most of it over beer at the local tavern. Certainly not the full horror story.

“The special machines to build the tires and the molds to cap them are all built in Mexico. They’re somewhat more forceful about making a project go forward there. They haven’t absorbed the full bureaucratic culture yet. You can still get things done under their old system, if you have enough cash to grease the ways. It isn’t practical to bring them across country right now so they’ll come by sea. But they’re holding off sending them until the facility has walls and a roof.

“The tires they want to build are defined in exacting specifications. All the materials are called out, and the glassy aluminum steel wire isn’t being made at ISSII anymore. There’s better available actually, but it doesn’t meet the old spec to which they’re locked. They are making as much of the new product as they can, running 24/7 for European shuttle tires, and don’t want to shut down and change dies and purge melt furnaces to make one run of obsolete wire, but nobody will change the spec to European standards, because – not ours. The steel maker at ISSII is in the section under USNA law. If they nationalize them, or force the changeover it won’t be well received.”

“I take it back. If that’s the overview I’m not sure I want to read the blow by blow,” April said.

“It’s amazing and educational,” Jeff allowed, “but you might ration it out little at a time and not try to absorb the whole thing at one sitting. And this is just one specialty shop.

“What I concluded is if you have a very complex system that has slowly grown over a long period of time, it adjusts and accommodates all those changes. But if it gets hit with a major disruption, it is almost impossible to bring the full complex system back up and running all at once. There’s no way to reproduce the step by step way it was created. Especially when a lot of the details of its operation serve no useful purpose. It can carry all those burdens added on one by one. But if you drop that ugly beast to its knees you’ll never get it standing again, much less walking, with the full load on it.”

“What will they do? Just give up on it?” April asked.

“I think it has to get worse before it can get better,” Jeff said. “Bad enough to force them to strip some of the stupid from the process. As a friend has told me a number of times, ‘Not my circus, not my monkeys.’ We can’t force help on them they don’t want. And we can’t produce enough of anything in any reasonable time frame to be of much use to them.”

“We absolutely must never let our system get so complicated it’s that fragile,” April vowed.

“Amen. I totally agree,” Jeff told her.

*

The young man wasn’t standing waiting for them when they got to the Quiet Retreat. Ben took that for a good sign, because he’d expected to find him standing outside impatiently shifting his weight from foot to foot. They were shown to their table and Ben could see Christian Mackay at another table on their level across the room. He had a date with him. Good for him, Ben thought.

“Madam President, Mr. Patsitsas,” the fellow said with an acknowledging nod when he was escorted to their table. “I’m Aaron Janowicz.” He didn’t presume to seat himself which was another good sign. They might have a brief civilized discussion and be rid of him.

Ben pointed, indicating where he should take a seat, on his side, leaving himself between the young man and Martha. It took Janowicz a second to notice because he was intently looking at his wife, not Ben, but he caught on when Martha looked at where Ben was pointing.

“Madam President,” he started again, earnestly.

“Don’t call me that again or I’ll ask you to leave,” Martha said, with angry eyes. “The system of government that gave me Presidential authority no longer exists. If the present regime is deposed I doubt it will be replaced with anything described by the old constitution. The inconvenient portions of it were already ignored when I was in office, and I doubt anybody wishes to put it back in force without some significant modification.”

“Ma…‘am, that is our intent,” he said, leaning forward, “To remove the present military authority and eventually restore a full constitutional civilian authority.”

“Ah…eventually. You realize that’s exactly what the present people have been promising to do?” Martha asked. “Order some dinner Mr. Janowicz, our waiter, Francois, is looking distressed at us ignoring the menus. Dinner is on us, and you have to eat like everyone,” she pointed out, reasonably.

“Thank you,” Janowicz said and looked at the menu. Ben saw his nostrils flare slightly at the prices, but he kept admirable control. Their waiter looked happy to see all of them reading the menu.

“Be aware we’ve had some shortages and the priorities have been for necessities rather than luxuries,” Ben told him. “That’s why the menu is a single sheet. They print it daily depending on what they have the ingredients to offer. You might find better choices of hearty meals in the cafeteria. People come here for the entertainment and to be seen. That’s why the menu runs more to tapas and appetizers. It’s been awhile since you could order a decent steak or a live lobster. The drink menu uses vodka from the moon. A week ago we had no drink menu.”

“It’s been awhile since I could afford a steak or lobster,” Aaron said, “If I even went to the sort of place that serves them. Would you order for me please? I’ve never heard of most of these dishes.”

That put off deciding how much to spend on Ben. It was smart and politic of the fellow, and their server seeing the menus back on the table again hurried over.

After Martha ordered a Papas arrugadas and some tea, Ben said he and their guest would both have the Albóndigas and Papas arrugadas, but his guest would have them media ración. They’d both have a Piparras, and Ben would have a lime vodka on rocks, and his guest water with a twist.

“Would you like your beverages now, sir?”

“Yes, thank you Francois.”

“That’s meatballs with a sauce, seasoned small potatoes roasted, and a skewer of pickles and olives. I ordered a larger serving for you, since a young man usually has a hearty appetite. I assumed you are on duty and won’t drink,” Ben said, after the waiter was out of earshot. “If not tell him when he comes back if anything tickles your fancy.”

“No, you’re quite right,” Aaron agreed.

“So, young man, exactly who do you represent? Does this faction have a name? Committee to Restore the Republic or something?” Martha asked.

“My Colonel informs me that there is a private movement, and he told me early on that he wanted me to be set aside without knowledge of anyone but him, so I could be used on missions like this, without danger of exposing them. He assures me it’s a broad conspiracy, but it has no public face at all yet, for safety. I trust him deeply, he’s a genuine patriot. In fact I am supposed to report if anyone tries to recruit me as they wouldn’t know I am his man, and besides, there are other movements trying to organize as well.”

“Isn’t that lovely?” Martha said. “Others…That means there are at least three cabals fomenting rebellion, maybe more. What will you do if one of them beats you to the punch and rebels first?”

“I believe that problem is way above my pay grade, Ma’am.”

“Yes, although it’s amusing that the people who actually pay you are those you wish to depose,” Martha mused.

“Thus it has always been,” Ben pointed out.

The first of their food and Ben’s drink arrived.

“What are you going to request of me,” Martha asked, pouring her tea. “If you think I’m going to drop from the heavens like an avenging angel with a battalion of Home troops at my back I have to disabuse you of the notion.”

“As the last bastion of legitimate government in exile we simply want your endorsement when we act,” Aaron said. “I have documents with statements for you to issue, all composed by professional writers for maximum impact.”

“If I’m the last vestige of legitimate government, shouldn’t you be telling me, ‘We stand ready to support you, Madam President. What are your orders?’ Not handing me scripts to shill your revolution. No, I’m sorry, but I am not available as a figurehead. I fled for my life and I’m a citizen of Home now. As far as I’m concerned Home won fair and square and I’m happy to not give the military government any reason to send assassins after me. In fact they have paid me my presidential retirement. That surprised me actually.”

“When there is a successful change of administration, it would be good to be regarded in a favorable light, and continue to have your retirement paid,” Aaron suggested.

“Wait…You mean your people don’t intend to bring me back to finish out my interrupted term?” Wiggen contrived to look shocked.

“I wasn’t informed about that issue one way or another,” Aaron dodged. “But speaking for myself, I doubt it will be practical. We hoped you’d feel compelled to act out of patriotism, but speaking plainly, we’re going to remove the present regime with or without you. I have little beyond your pension with which to compel you, but it leaves you a liability rather than an asset to refuse us.”

“Ah, now we come to the threats,” Ben said.

“This isn’t one of your cheap thrillers, Old Man!” Aaron said, suddenly angry, and pointing an accusing finger across the table. Both of them just looked disgusted with him.

Ben lifted his hands above the edge of the table. It looked like a conciliatory gesture. Actually it positioned them for him to clap, but he paused watching the young man warily.

Aaron opened his mouth a little, like he was going to speak, and then changed his mind visibly, and withdrew his extended hand decisively to reach in his pants pocket.

Martha pointed at him emphatically, which neither man saw as they were fixated on each other.

There was a soft thump, and Aaron looked astonished. He opened his mouth briefly, but nothing came out. He froze like that and slumped back in his seat just as Francois arrived with the small plates. He set them down and regarded the young soldier with a woeful expression.

“Damn it, I told Mackay to use a laser,” Ben said to his wife. “I wasn’t sure he was hostile yet. He might have just been reaching for his com or something, not a weapon. I hadn’t clapped yet.”

“I’m afraid it wasn’t Mackay, dear. I had my friend Margaret watching over us and I gave her the high sign. I told her to take him out if I pointed at him. The way he was grabbing for something was reckless, if you move like that you are asking to be shot. By the time you were sure he was hostile you’d have been dead,” his wife told him, sternly. “I’m rather fond of you, and intend to get years and years of good service out of you still.”

Francois was digging in his long serving apron, and came out with a long cork. He took their guest by the arm with his left hand and shoved the cork home in the small caliber hole near his arm pit, using a napkin to keep his hand clean. He gave a perfunctory wipe, covered the cork with the napkin and folded the man’s arm across his waist, covering everything under the arm.

“The first act is starting in a moment,” Francois said, calmly. “If we walk the young gentleman out between us just as the lights go down we’ll only walk across in front of one table between here and the kitchen entry. No need to upset our other guests with any unpleasantness.”

“You have an exit in the kitchen?” Ben asked.

“Yes, further down the corridor from the public entry. Should I make some sort of arrangements?” Francois asked.

“No, thank you, I’ll call Jon Davis and have security waiting there,” Ben promised.

“Very good, sir. I’ll be back shortly.”

“We owe him one hell of a generous tip tonight,” Ben told Martha after Francois went away. Ben sent a text to Jon, not trusting his ability to vocalize softly. “Have inconvenient body. USNA involved. Will need pickup at Quiet Retreat kitchen entry in a few minutes. Details later. Ben Patsitsas.”

“Hussein has mentioned Francois was in French Special Operations,” Martha informed Ben, watching Francois smoothly serve another table on the next tier down. “I imagine it would take a lot more than one dead agent to rattle him.”

“Thank God for that,” Ben said. “Not like some fat old writers, who turns to jelly when faced with ugly reality.” He pulled Aaron’s plate of meatballs over and stabbed one. The young man was quite finished with them after all.

*

“I have a heads up from Jon, and he told me to tell you and Irwin and Chen,” Jeff said. “He said he has it on very good authority that it is a virtual certainty there will be another coup or revolution in North America soon, and to assume that in our plans.”

“Does this have anything to do with the body Jon’s people quietly took to the clinic late in the off shift last night?” April asked.

“He didn’t mention any bodies,” Jeff said.

“Hmmm,” April said, looking thoughtful.

“Hmmm, what?” Jeff demanded. “You know more than you’re saying.”

“I don’t know, that’s the trouble, I suspect, but I don’t believe in coincidences. If two weird things happen so close together they are usually connected somehow,” April told him.

“Probably,” Jeff agreed. “What else happened?”

“Somebody in a pressure suit left the clinic late last shift with a security escort carrying a biohazard container. They didn’t go to a shuttle, they went to a maintenance airlock and the security guy waited while the suited guy worked in the lock for a few minutes. Then when he came out he had his faceplate open and walked back to the clinic with no escort,” April said.

“I don’t…What is your analysis of a possible connection?” Jeff asked.

“The body had something on it that scared them, and they opened it in hard vacuum. Probably got a sample if it was anything bad, because Dr. Lee or Jon either one aren’t stupid,” April pointed out.

“Should I ask Jon?” Jeff asked. “Is it anything we need to know?”

“Don’t bother for me,” April said. “If it targeted us he’d have already let us know. But I’d say somebody on Home was the target of an intelligence operation last night, and it failed.”

Jeff thought about it a little bit. “OK, I can see all that. Does it mean anything to us?”

“It means Jon’s source of information was probably an actual USNA agent of some sort. So I’d assign his warning a very high degree of probability. As if those poor people don’t have enough troubles without somebody making more. Pretty soon it will be as big a mess as China,” April predicted.

“I’m going to warn Chen,” Jeff decided. “He has agents in North America he may want to warn or protect. I’m sure he’ll want to change what his people are following, and watch closely for signs a coup is launched. We also need to decide if there is anything we need from them while things are calm.”

“You just stopped holding USNA dollars. What does a war do to the value of money?” April asked.

“It depends on who wins,” Jeff said. “Internal wars, civil wars, can be a little different. The coup that deposed Wiggen didn’t make a whole lot of difference because there was a change of leadership, but they didn’t really alter the bulk of the government. The same agencies are running things by the same rules. The money didn’t change at all. It’s the same dollars. Congress may be working under duress, but they are still rubber stamping things.

“You can’t blame them for doing it that way. That’s why the big revolution before last in China failed. They threatened the livelihood of millions of lower level officials and bureaucrats. Who in turn withheld their support at the regional and city level, and all their families and friends. Everything came to a screeching halt at the street level. You can replace a few dozen cabinet level people pretty easily, but anger millions of local police, firefighters, garbage collectors, city clerks and public utility workers and you have a big problem. You have to either take care of them or ruthlessly eliminate them.”

“What?” Jeff asked. He knew April and knew that look when a thought hit her.

“Oh, it’s another thing I can’t prove yet,” April admitted, “but when you said ‘Wiggen’ something went ding! in my mind. I have to make a few calls and see who saw Ben and Martha last night. Did you bring in a sample of the whiskey you are processing?” April asked. “I have a professional I’d like to have assess its potential.”

“Yes, I had a liter brought from Central, but you do know it’s nowhere near a finished product?”

“No worries, I won’t present it as such,” April promised.

Chapter 19

“Last recreation break, next shift,” Barak said.

“Don’t sound so wistful,” Alice said. “In twenty years you will be telling this as a horror story.”

“The mission and the stupidity yeah, but not you, never,” Barak assured her.

“You think you can sweet talk me, don’t you?”

Barak just waggled his eyebrows at her and made her laugh.

*

Hussein was preparing for the day’s opening at the Quiet Retreat. The lights were up bright and the young woman who was his assistant and trainee was doing a walk through and inspection of each table. He’d inspected the bar and kitchen before the staff arrived, and she would do likewise after him. He’d found a tray in the cooler uncovered. That was unsanitary by his standards. At a minimum it let things dry out and become less palatable. He hadn’t corrected it yet, interested if she’d note it too.

Phillip Detweiler came in and sat at the bar across from him. He was dressed for work also. In fact it was late enough for him to be at the Fox and Hare soon, getting ready for their work day. Detweiler produced a test tube with a cork. It was about a third full of a light yellow fluid. It was a disagreeable color. The man was patient, not demanding instant attention. Hussein liked that about him.

Technically they were business rivals, but their clubs were very different and the clients from separate demographics. If one business had bought the other only a fool would clone the acquisition as a copy of their own business. One would probably fail if that was done at the present population level.

The Quiet Retreat served older customers. That was difficult to tell now with life extension so common. But the few who were untreated and visibly older were easier to find here. The Fox and Hare had livelier entertainment and a younger audience. It was louder and had more jazz and rock, as well as more non-musical acts. It tended to brighter lighting and less formal food too. The two men had discussed their differences before, and both wondered if the younger clientele would still mature in tastes without the physical signs of aging. It was going to be interesting to find out.

“Would you taste this and give me your opinion to pass on?” Detweiler asked.

Hussein took the tube and swirled the contents to see how it beaded. Lifting it to the light, he lifted a skeptical eyebrow. “Slivovitz?” he guessed from the color.

Detweiler laughed. “I thought you might be cruder than that,” he admitted. “It’s young, but I don’t want to compromise your impression. If it were wine I wouldn’t even confirm it was of grapes before you tasted it. Tell me what you think.”

Hussein poured it in a shallow glass and took a good sniff over it. He looked alarmed and made a funny face. “For the science,” he proclaimed, and took a sip.

“I think…It is going to be whiskey, someday. But it has a considerable journey ahead.”

“Yes!” Detweiler agreed, delighted. “If you can even tell that at this stage we are heartened. I tried it too, but I was burdened with the knowledge of what it was supposed to become, thus prejudiced.”

“It is horrid and rough, without any body or mellowness at all. When can I buy a hundred liters?”

“The young gentleman creating it is careful of his reputation, and wishes to wait until it isn’t something to be ashamed of before releasing it,” Detweiler said.

“I can understand that,” Hussein agreed. “It will sell at a much better price when properly aged too.” He added some sours to the glass and tried it again. “Yes, it helps, but I still wouldn’t use it for mix.”

“The aging should be accelerated compared to Earth methods. I may have some for you in a year.”

“You can enter my order then,” Hussein agreed. “There is considerable pent up demand, and we don’t have to present it as a premium spirit to sell it. Perhaps by then we’ll have more Earth supply, and we can sell this as second tier.”

“I’m afraid my sources indicate Earth supply may get worse instead of better,” Detweiler said. “Not because of transport, but because indicators are North America may soon be as bad off internally as we see in China right now. What supply we do get may shift strongly to Europe and Asia. Even if we have a shuttle, getting it to the shuttle may be difficult.”

“Ah, that’s a shame. Be sure to put me down for a full hundred liters then,” Hussein allowed.

“I will make a note of it to my supplier,” Detweiler promised.

“You don’t have a direct interest?” Hussein asked, surprised. “You play salesman for free?”

“No, I’m a customer, like you. But if you could confirm something the supplier would very much appreciate the information and put it to your account,” Detweiler said.

“If I’m able,” Hussein said with a shrug. “I’m afraid you are by far my best source of information, but what did you wonder?”

“Yesterday evening were the Patsitsas at the Quiet Retreat?” Detweiler asked.

“Yes, no harm in telling you that. There were any number of people who saw them, and it’s a public place,” Hussein said. He seemed to be waiting for another question that didn’t come.

“This is young Singh, inquiring?” Hussein finally asked.

“Jeffery is making the whiskey, but it was his partner Miss Lewis that asked me to inquire. She seemed to know a great deal more she didn’t share with me, but wanted that simple fact confirmed. My experience with her is that she doesn’t trust one source of information until it has supporting evidence.

“Huh! That one! She can tell you the change in your pocket when you haven’t counted it! She should trust you with the whole story if she’d going to use you like this,” Hussein said. “Here’s what happened,” he said, leaning across the bar closer to Detweiler…

*

Jon looked at the little spray pen. It wasn’t very complicated. The cap was difficult to pull off and that was the only real safety. Once the cap was off the release valve was activated by squeezing the neck of the plastic closure. It had flat raised buttons on opposite sides.

“What was in it?” Jon asked Doctor Lee.

“A neurotoxin. One they discovered in an exotic coral a few years back, but this is probably the same thing synthesized. If a diver brings a piece of the living coral up to a boat it’s OK until the coral starts to die. Then, as it decomposes it releases the toxin as a gas. The gas is actually much nastier than the contact with the living coral. They lost several boat crews and tourists to this before some bright person noticed all the boats full of dead people had shells and coral aboard. Then it was just a matter of figuring out which of them was responsible.”

“Wouldn’t it have killed the agent too?” Jon asked.

“Yes. Either he was lied to about how lethal it is, or he was willing to suicide. There was enough to kill at least the neighboring tables if not the whole room,” Dr. Lee said.

“What to do?” Jon said aloud. Lee didn’t answer him because he took it for a rhetorical question. “If we just disappear the young man his group may send another. If we return him to the North Americans it may give them a heads up that they have rogue agents active in their military. There are no ‘good guys’ to warn. We have no idea if it serves us better to uncover their coup by revealing this or not. Or is one of the other factions less a threat to us than the present military government?”

“Surely President Wiggen is a better judge of those factors than us,” Lee said. “Did she express any preference what we should do with the remains?”

“She clearly assumed we’d send him back to ISSII when I talked to her,” Jon said. “If I’m going to do that I intend to send his little assassin’s weapon back with him, taped to his hand. There isn’t enough residue in it to harm anyone is there?”

“It was open to hard vacuum,” Lee assured him. “It would be remarkable if they can find sufficient residue of the gas to identify it. Of course the people who made it will know exactly what was in it.”

“Bag him up and send him to ISSII on the next shuttle then,” Jon said. “Tell the USNA officials there he threatened the ex-President and tried to deploy the bioweapon we sent back with him. I’m not going to tell them anything he said about his mission. If Wiggen decides anyone in North America deserves a further heads up, that’s her concern to contact them. She doesn’t owe me any explanations.”

*

“Li had a proposal he put to me when he was here,” Jeff told April.

“You didn’t even mention he went back,” April said.

“He only stayed three days because the Chariot was doing a quick turnaround. That was a plus as far as he was concerned. Tara is waiting to come up until we have another short layover scheduled.”

“What did he want you to do? Some joint business venture?” April guessed.

“That was my first thought too,” Jeff admitted. “He suggested buying a big ship while a lot of them are being scrapped out. I didn’t realize some are big enough to use as a floating island. We could land and lift shuttles directly from the deck. I assumed he was wanting a job running it, but he said it was outside his skill set and showed no interest in that. If we do use the idea we owe him one, because it was simply a helpful suggestion.”

“How much money are you talking about?” April went to the heart of the matter.

“At least forty million for the hull before we do anything to it for our needs. I…we, don’t have that free right now,” Jeff was quick to say.

“How about all this money coming in to Home?” April asked. “It has to find some productive use doesn’t it? If this is a good idea, why not propose it as a partnership?”

“Then we wouldn’t have control of it.”

“If you land on spaceports on Tonga or Japan you aren’t going to have control of those either.” April pointed out. “Seems like this has even less chance of becoming hostile to you, being purpose built.”

“You’re persuasive. Maybe if we get two shuttles in service, and start using it, some others would build a landing shuttle and generate some landing fees,” Jeff said.

“An unmanned freighter would be a lot cheaper to make,” April pointed out. “Or at least build one more manned shuttle for redundancy, and then a couple cheap robotic ones.”

“I’m prejudiced for the flexibility of manned,” Jeff admitted. “But yeah, as a third or fourth vehicle I can see going for the cost savings.”

“Why don’t you have Irwin or Eddie look at a startup for a floating shuttle base,” April suggested. “Put a token investment in it to show you believe in it, and stop trying to do everything yourself.”

“I could foist it off on you to do in your spare time,” Jeff suggested. “Just kidding!” he quickly amended, hands up in surrender, just from the look he got.

April accepted his surrender.

*

“Jon, sorry to bother you so late. I’m having a judgment crisis here. I’m on a call and not sure what to do at all.”

Jensen was his newest officer, a calm quiet fellow, who impressed Jon when he hired on. He went by the nickname of Ace which was bestowed upon him at ISSII. He had experience in police work in Denmark first and then on ISSII. He had good reports from both places. If he was as perplexed as his voice and face indicated he had reason. Jon just needed to wake up.

“Ace, is the situation stable enough I can used the bathroom and wake up a couple minutes before I help you? Is anyone in immediate danger?” Jon demanded.

“No sir, nothing life-threatening, but it’s a complicated situation. A social problem,” Ace said. “And I have no idea what custom or policy is on it.”

“Where are you Ace?”

“I was called to the cafeteria on a possible medical emergency or a drunk. Turns out it is neither.”

“That’s close. Can you hold ten or fifteen minutes and I’ll come down?” Jon asked.

“Yes sir, that’s a perfectly acceptable time frame,” Ace agreed.

Jon washed his face hastily and used the toilet, dressed in civilian clothes, but with a Taser, grabbed spex and headed to the cafeteria. It had been almost a week since he’d been roused in the middle of the night. In fairness this was the first time for Ace, so Jon was cutting him some slack until he found out what the problem was.

When Jon arrived Ace was sitting across the table from a middle aged Earthie. Just from his posture Ace wasn’t concerned about physical violence. He was talking quietly with the fellow and not keeping a safe distance. The man didn’t appear to be armed, but he had a small bag between his feet and a computer on the table in front of him, closed.

“Good evening. I’m Jon Davis, the head of Home Security,” Jon said. “Has officer Jensen introduced himself?” Jon asked right away.

“Yes, he’s been uncommonly kind to me. I’m sorry to be a problem, but I don’t know what to do and he doesn’t have an easy solution either.”

“Might I have your name,” Jon prodded him.

“Oh, yeah. Sorry I’m kind of slow right now. It’s the middle of my night. I’m Mel Feinberg. I came in on the last shuttle from New Las Vegas. I’m an electronics tech. I program sensor and chip building printers and integrate them in devices. But I can do other stuff. I heard you have a labor shortage and a lot of good things about living here from some guys who worked a couple tours as beam dogs. I had enough winnings I thought I could get established here, but it didn’t matter how much cash I had, I just couldn’t get a room, not even a bed for the night.”

“Ah…You had a big win at New Las Vegas?” Jon asked. “Oddly enough I have a friend who had the same experience.”

“Oh, no. I’m not explaining very well. I won The Big One, the North American Lotto. I just happened to come through New Las Vegas. I couldn’t get a seat from North America, so I flew to France. Took the suborbital, which was a new experience too. I finally bought a lift from the Canary Islands, flew there and lifted to New Las Vegas. I slept there and got a seat on the shuttle to Home. I’d like to move here. I’m sure I can find work. I have enough cash to pay my way. I have a unrevokable business Visa with over twenty million USNA dollars on it, and nobody will rent me a room for the night.”

Between the absurdity of it and the fatigue he broke down laughing.

“Mr. Feinberg was sleeping at the table, resting his head in his arms on his computer,” Ace explained. “The cafeteria crew was concerned he was ill or intoxicated, and reluctant to approach him themselves, so they called our dispatch and I came to check on him. I’m not sure what policy is on this. We don’t have vagrancy laws, right? And he has means, just nowhere to spend it. As safe as Home is I can’t recommend sleeping in public places. I know you said to only interfere with violence and outright theft, But this seemed like a public safety issue to me. The man is putting himself at risk. And it’s alarming to people even if he means no harm. But I checked, and just as he said, there isn’t a single hotel room or hot slot to be had. We don’t have any sort of public shelter do we? What should we do?”

“If you want to throw me in jail that’s fine too,” Feinberg volunteered. “It would be a bed. Just don’t force me to post bond until the morning,” he pleaded.

“I would, but we have no jail,” Jon admitted.

“Somehow, I’m not surprised,” Feinberg admitted.

“I have one possibility,” Jon said, “The construction crew has a barracks. I might be able to get you in there.” He called the Mitsubishi supervisor at the beam dog’s barracks. He left his pad flat on the table with the speakers turned up for their benefit.

“Phil? Jon. I have a traveler sleeping in the cafeteria, because there is not a single bed for hire at any price on Home. Do you have any bunks open?”

“I do, but Mitsubishi’s rules don’t allow me to rent them out,” Phil said.

“Do they forbid you to give the use of one away free, at the request of Home Security?” Jon asked.

“Now that’s an interesting question. It’s been a couple years since I read the operations manual. Let me check.” He was gone some minutes before he returned.

“There’s nothing addressing that,” Phil said. “I think it was just never imagined as an issue when the place was built. As long as he is an English speaker, for safety reasons, I’ll put him up for the next twenty four hours. After that we need to talk about it. I don’t want this talked around or I’ll have people badgering me to do it every night.”

“Agreeable?” Jon asked Feinberg.

“Oh yeah! I’m happy to keep my mouth shut too.” A sudden alert look crossed Mel’s face…“Could I inquire if the construction operation needs an electronics tech? I’m probably way over qualified, but very willing to work repair or even installation. I’m not too proud to be a cable monkey.”

“No, we need three,” Phil said laughing, “and if you are over qualified maybe the supervisor’s position, but talk to me about that tomorrow. Are you sending him over, Jon?”

“Yes, my man Ace will walk him over right now. Thanks Phil.”

“You owe me one,” Phil said. “Even if we do hire him.”

“I shall live in dread of you calling in your marker,” Jon promised, and terminated the call.

“What are you two still doing here?” Jon asked them. “I’m going back to bed.”

“Thank you!” Mel called to his back.

*

“Eduardo, you remember what you told me Larkin said to you about people sleeping in the public corridors? It’s that bad already. Last night my new man on the back shift called me about a fellow sleeping in the cafeteria. He had plenty of funds and just couldn’t find a slot to sleep.”

“Not even in private quarters? I’ve been seeing personal ads in the local net for people to sleep in people’s private cubic. Even folks with single room efficiencies. A few have even offered to share a bed if you are clean and don’t snore,” Muños told him.

“That’s crazy,” Jon said. “How much are they asking?”

“Three to four hundred dollars Australian a night, and a week minimum, or a Solar for six months, seems to be the average rate. Which is still cheaper than an official hot slot with a locker. The market changes rapidly however. For example, within the last week the last ads offering space for North American Dollars finally vanished,” Muños said.

“I didn’t think to check personal ads,” Jon admitted. “I got him a bunk, and maybe a job, with the construction crew. That’s not for public knowledge by the way.”

“What do you want to do about it?” Muños asked. “We already decided we don’t want to call an early Assembly. I don’t want to go down the road to start setting petty regulations about how people can live. If you talked to Bob you might get him to impose occupancy limits from Mitsubishi, but I think everybody would know it was something forced on them locally, not from Japan. It might well back-fire on us and for sure would just drive it underground. That would actually make the practice riskier. If it goes black market the danger is locals could take advantage of immigrants too,” he warned.

“No, no. Better to go the other way, make it more open, Jon said. “I’ll put out a low priority message to everybody that security is concerned about the safety of all these new people going into private homes. I’ll offer to do a free check of Earth police data bases if they want to vet their new roomies. Either way – roomers or landlords. I’ll even moderate it by noting that being on the political list in Earth databases is not necessarily a negative. And it will have the advantage of making any folks unaware about it, know what’s going on. That will prime them to not be surprised when we bring up motions about young Singh’s project.”

“Of course if Singh gets his little hostel functioning it may crimp the ability of some of these folks to pick up a little extra cash,” Muños speculated.

“Everything I am seeing says it’s going to get worse before it gets better. Even with the auxiliary housing I suspect I’m going to have to ask authority to refuse entry to anyone without a return ticket, unless they can show a reservation for a place to sleep.” Jon stopped and frowned thinking about it.

“I’ll talk to Jeff and make sure he understands about the market in sleeping room. I’ll make sure he knows to price his quarters at least a little higher than the going rate in the personal ads, and he should make his intentions public early. They will be bigger and have better privacy, but some of the folks will need to commute from their rooms to Home. We want a balance between looking like he is going to kill the local market by being too cheap, or setting it so high we strongly encourage doubling up here to capacity before people even consider renting Singh’s quarters. Otherwise these new landlords will vote against anything that will rob them of their new found income,” Jon predicted.

“I think you have a handle on it. Are you going to rent out your living room floor now?” Muños asked Jon with a devilish grin. “Mitsubishi was pretty generous with cubic for their personnel. Why not pick up a little help with the high price of things?”

“If you have any attractive young ladies desperate for shelter I could probably find room for three or four,” Jon offered. “I’d need to interview of course, but I’d be willing to set a low group rate. I can turn off my wall screen with the calming environmental scenes, and just let them provide the scenery,” Jon offered. “Better me than some less noble ruffian who might take advantage of the poor waifs.”

“That’s precisely the sort of thing I was worried about,” Muños warned him, unamused.

*

“Vacationing USNA Officer murdered on Home!” the headline shouted. Several other news outlets used harsher terms. “Lieutenant Aaron Janowicz on leave visited the translunar habitat and was shot dead. His remains were returned to ISSII with little explanation and no information about any investigation or criminal charges. The break-away habitat is noted for its Wild West atmosphere, and public displays of personal weapons are common. Apparently they aren’t just for display.

“Lieutenant Janowicz was in civilian dress and unarmed when gunned down. State Department Spox said his remains were sent to the military sector of USNA portion of the satellite, so Home officials were aware of his nationality and military affiliation, but he arrived with no identification or explanation of his death. Preliminary reports say he suffered a single massive gunshot wound to the chest from the side, with a large caliber weapon firing a frangible projectile, typical of those used in spaceships and habitats. Bizarrely the wound was closed with a common cork. USNA officials are forwarding a formal protest of this as a violation of the mutual safe conduct provisions of the treaty between the USNA and Home. The Assembly of home has repeatedly failed to adapt any exiting legal code, or formulate their own, although their governing body has met formally a number of times. They are literally lawless. So unlike all other nation, no matter how backward, there is no way to charge anyone with murder. The only legal redress for such acts being expulsion by a vote of that Assembly. An explanation of the circumstances surrounding the young officer’s death is demanded. State Department Officials said to expect a travel warning to be issued within days, recommending USNA citizens avoid the habitat as a dangerous destination without a functioning legal system.”

*

“I thought we were doing them a favor to handle it quietly,” Jon said. “I’m not sure what to do.”

“Are you sure you should do anything?” Muños asked. “To whom shall they send this letter of protest? Will it be addressed to you, or to the Assembly? If to the Assembly, they can then question you about the incident should they want, and make a reply if they wish, or direct you to do so.”

“I signed the shipping manifest to send the Lieutenant’s body to ISSII. I did note I was Head of Security for Home. So it’s not as if they received him anonymously,” Jon said. “He didn’t have any identification on him to send along. We weren’t even sure he was a lieutenant. But apparently he had some way to reenter ISSII when he returned. That would be interesting to know, if he had somebody who would pass him back into USNA territory, or ID hidden somewhere he didn’t want to carry to his meeting. Wiggen guessed his rank and he never really confirmed it or denied it. She just guessed it was appropriate to the mission. You’d think they’d be asking how a lieutenant could afford an orbital vacation, but no…In fact, he never offered proof he was USNA military. But if they’d got him at ISSII and couldn’t make a match to their records, they’d have sent him on to civilian authorities.”

“I suspect somebody screwed up,” Muños decided. “It may be that someone decided to grab an propaganda opportunity against us before carefully looking into the other consequences of making this public. I bet they checked to make sure he wasn’t in intelligence, wasn’t a spook, and never imagined he might be something else – an agent of an internal opposition faction.”

“Ouch…In that case I predict whoever his handler was is running for his life right now,” Jon said.

“And their conspiracy is either dissolving, or striking earlier than they planned,” Muños predicted.

“I’ll mention that to those who might have an interest right now,” Jon said, working his pad. He stopped and frowned, deep in thought. “I find your counsel excellent. I’m under no obligation to explain why I returned the body as I did. I don’t work for them to care if they find fault with me. Let them address the entire Assembly if they wish to make an issue of it. I suspect they will find the Assembly even less caring of their feelings than me.”

“If they convince a few fearful Earthies not to come to Home that’s a bonus, not a problem,” Muños pointed out. “Home isn’t a place for those who want to be sheltered. It just makes this entire problem of not having anywhere to put them easier if they weed out the timid ones for us.”

Chapter 20

Margaret watched her recording. Two young boys with a small manual freight cart opened the storage locker and serviced some sort of machine. It didn’t look like much, but it was poised on a platform inside the locker. Three black half-spheres supported a plate with another trio of offset black hemispheres isolating a second plate that held the actual machine. The supporting hemispheres had to be Sorbothane or some other vibration isolating polymer. On top of that there was a blanket of noise absorbing mat hung on the locker sides, and fastened across inside the door when it was closed. It was surprising she’d heard it.

The boys switched out a surprisingly large battery; storage lockers didn’t come with power outlets until they were big enough to be walkins. They removed what appeared to be a big stack of business cards. At this distance and angle Margaret couldn’t see what was printed on them. They reloaded what must be blanks in the machine and tested it for function. Satisfied, they closed it back up and went away with their production.

Margaret erased the camera’s memory and didn’t put it back on the corridor wall. She had no instructions to curtail clandestine printing operations. She’d seen much stranger things patrolling Home.

*

“Look at What’s Happening for today,” Muños told Jon. “Martha took the Your Say slot today. I suspect it’s her board anyway, but she’s never used it as her private bully pulpit before. I’m sending a heads up to a whole bunch of people, including Jeff Singh, so it should be widely known by the time you finish watching it.”

Jon navigated to the site. He wasn’t unfamiliar with it. Ex-President Wiggen posted a short video. It was to the point and blunt. She looked irritated but stayed reasonable civil. She didn’t appear to be speaking from notes.

“There have been reports in Earth news agencies that a USNA lieutenant was murdered on Home. The general tone being that this innocent young man was casually slaughtered by the lawless armed crazies on Home.

“Well, I’m the crazy who killed the poor fellow. Not that I pulled the trigger myself, but I gave a signal to my security to do so.

“Don’t expect an apology. You might stop and ask yourself how a lieutenant can afford to vacation on Home when travel here and accommodations add up to about ten years of a lieutenant’s pay. But that would be asking for some thinking ability, something your so called journalists never allow to get in the way of a good story, or a mediocre lie.

“Lt. Janowicz was sent to recruit me to support a coup against the present military government in North America. He never named his group. It doesn’t matter much to us. I had no interest in aiding him. Indeed he indicated there are several such groups, each sure their military government will be better for the country than the present one. I find that remarkable hubris. I’d emphasize…He was not offering to restore me to office. He just wanted an endorsement for whatever legitimacy he imagined that would confer upon his group.

“I’m going to try to make clear to you what this young man would not accept from me. I’m not interested in coming back to Earth on any terms. I’m not interested in getting involved in the cesspool of Earth politics again. I’m a citizen of Home, not any sort of dual citizen. Most of the talking heads on the Earth news channels make it clear they don’t think spacers are very nice people. For your information feelings run the other way too. It is common here to refer to Earth with expressions such as the Slum Ball. Please, just keep your politics to your own world.

“The lieutenant died with his hand on a weapon. A nasty indiscriminate weapon. A spray with a neurotoxin derived from coral. It would have killed most or all of the innocent people in the club where we were having dinner and speaking with him. Once he was sure I couldn’t be enlisted I was an asset to deny to others. The USNA used to regard such suicide missions as simple terrorism.

“I was entirely too polite to him, and he came far too close to killing us for it. I won’t make the mistake again. Be advised, henceforth anyone who appears to drag me back into Earth politics or recruit my endorsement will be shot without any discussion or mercy as soon as they reveal their mission.

“If the lieutenant had succeeded in assassinating me, and in killing perhaps forty citizens of Home, I have no idea what the response would have been. But I doubt you’d celebrate it. I saved you more trouble than you can imagine.

“If that isn’t plain enough I doubt I can make it any clearer. Ignore it at your peril,” she ended.

“Oh my. I believe Martha was ticked off,” Jon said.

“If Martha was irritated, then I’d assume Ben is in a cold rage,” Muños said.

“I’m surprised he didn’t waste the kid himself,” Jon admitted.

“It was done too simply. You should read his books sometime. It would have to be some exotic and improbable cause of death by his hand. He’d get artistic,” Muños avowed.

“What can you do in a nightclub?” Jon pointed out. “One is limited.”

“Perhaps a pickle fork up the nose?” Muños speculated, with a thrusting gesture.

“Don’t tell me anymore,” Jon begged. “I want to sleep tonight.”

“Are you going to do anything supportive of her?” Muños asked.

“Publicly? No. I think your good advice still holds. But I may just leak pictures of his little nerve gas dispenser. It will lend some credence to her story.”

“That may create a chain of events in North America. Somebody is going to recognize the little spray pen, and they’ll start investigating who has access to them and how it was acquired. There may be serious repercussions between various branches of the military and agencies.”

“Not my circus, not my monkeys,” Jon avowed.

*

“I wish she hadn’t admitted killing him,” April worried. “There are all sorts of soft headed Earthies who will never admit there is such a thing as legitimate self defense.”

“Han shot first,” Jeff said.

“Huh?” April had no idea what that meant.

“An obscure literary reference,” Jeff said, waving it away. “It doesn’t matter what they think, because the Assembly would never condemn her. If the North Americans asked for her arrest the Assembly would probably invent some new award with a nice medal to give her, just to irritate them. The USNA issued the travel warning. I suspect they’d have put us off limits entirely, but it would violate the treaty terms.”

“Maybe it will all settle down and be forgotten in a week or two and they’ll lift the travel advisory. You know they always make a big fuss about declaring one, but they never make a big deal about rescinding them,” April said.

“Maybe,” Jeff allowed. He didn’t seem convinced.

*

Jeff followed April’s advice and related Li’s suggestion about buying a ship to Eddie and Irwin, suggesting he’d take a small interest himself, but didn’t have the time or funds to pursue it alone. If they wanted a little piece themselves fine, and they should feel free to mention it to friends.

Irwin had dinner with Larkin, and Tetsuo before the weekly poker. Sadly Muños and his wine were not there this evening. Larkin promoted Jeff’s proposal for housing expansion and found he was preaching to the choir. Irwin tossed out Li’s idea, and Jeff’s limited endorsement of it. Larkin owned nothing that could land on Earth so he wasn’t immediately enthused. Tetsuo didn’t seem that interested either, but with him you couldn’t tell what he was thinking. When they went in the next room to play poker he wouldn’t be giving out free tells there either.

The next morning he described the idea in some detail to Chen over breakfast. Huian said nothing but took it all in. Later she dropped a message to Myat, asking if she knew anyone involved in the ship breaking trade.

*

“I don’t believe it!” April said out loud. That was a bad sign when she was reading on her pad.

Jeff had brought dinner and was unpacking it, putting it on the table. He saw his plans for a quiet dinner evaporating. April rarely got upset enough to shout out. Maybe if he just smiled and ignored it…

“Are these people on drugs? Or do they need some good ones?” she asked. “Listen to this.”

Todd Brenner, correspondent for Capitol Comments made this insightful statement: “This is not the Wiggen I knew when covering the White House. She was always much more gracious than this. I really wonder if she is under duress and sending a message by over acting to a supplied script? We have a treaty that mentions free travel as its core, but we don’t see anyone traveling here from Home. One has to wonder if they are holding up their end of the agreement, or if travel to North America is quietly suppressed.”

“I doubt if Martha will volunteer to take a North American vacation to allay his fears, ” Jeff said.

“I hate this sniping at us,” April said. “How do you deal with it? The creep would never say this stuff to my face up here. I’d invite him to meet me before breakfast and blow his head off.”

“He isn’t addressing you. He isn’t really even addressing Wiggen directly. It’s just propaganda for the herd. And he didn’t really say anything concrete,” Jeff pointed out. “I wonder…One has to wonder…He never reaches any conclusion. There’s no real assertion of fact to attack.”

“It was easier when they threatened us plainly and you could shoot them dead with a clear conscience. I’m not into all this innuendo and subtle propaganda. If I tell him what I think of him it won’t be with a bunch of questions and disclaimers and qualifications,” April promised.

“I have no doubt. If you damn him to hell he’ll be left with his socks on fire. Usually, you are the one to advise me on social things, but I feel compelled to offer my advice here,” Jeff said, trying for a reasonable calming voice. “There is no way to win replying to vague accusations and shadowy rumors. If you make a complex and rational response the public doesn’t have the patience to hear it through and think on it. Most of them have simply had their prejudices reinforced by this garbage anyway. If you lose your temper and condemn him in vile terms they’ll take that for a win, as it makes you look bad too. It’s best just to ignore them,” Jeff counseled. “If Martha decides to make a reply that is her prerogative. She has a great deal of political experience and likely knows how to do this sort of verbal fencing. My guess is she will either say ‘no comment’ or let loose with a one line zinger beyond common skill.”

“I hear you, but they make me feel powerless and angry.”

Jeff looked at April astonished, and then thoughtful. “But you aren’t. You still have the codes in your spex to our private weapons. You could rain a dozen three hundred megaton weapons on them and utterly destroy them. Or simply remove Washington and decapitate the majority of their government. They are like a silly little dog loudly threatening you, when the most they can do is bite your ankle. You should be amused at the absurdity of it.”

“I’m seventeen. It’s not easy to be that responsible. I’m not sure I’ll be ready when I’m fifty,” April said. “But you don’t murder a city to crush a cockroach.”

“Ah, good. You’re still sane.”

“Well yeah, but let me complain now and then. It helps to keep me sane rather than keeping it all bottled up,” April asked.

“Alright. That seems like a reasonable price to keep you from destroying North America,” Jeff allowed. “But dismiss them for a moment and come have some dinner before it needs reheating.”

“That sounds good. What did you get us?”

*

The vehicle braked until its orbital motion went slightly retrograde, and then the solid fuel engine disintegrated from several small charges. It fell almost straight down, already low enough to be experiencing significant drag. The shape behind the capsule was a lattice cone of cheap lunar ceramics. It resembled a shuttlecock more than a traditional reentry vehicle. It produced a layer of ionized air that reflected radar for part of its fall, but at an angle up. The path it followed didn’t fit any of the computer profiles that would alert humans to its fall as any sort of weapon. When it hit denser air the tail burned off progressively from the edges. It exposed a central cluster of sturdier articulated speed brakes that spread when the capsule started rocking, to both stabilize and slow it. It spread wider as it reached denser air and adjusted drag side to side as needed to keep it on course as it fell toward the target field.

In the night, four of Myat’s relatives sat on opposite sides of a farmer’s field. The sorghum was harvested and the field had only a low stubble. The farmer was in his darkened house, presumably sleeping, and paid well to stay there and ignore any noise or odd commotion.

“There it is!” Myat’s cousin with the night vision goggles said. The capsule had ballistically deployed a parachute only a few hundred meters from the ground. That’s what he’d seen. The driver of the small pickup had no goggles and had to take his word for it. “You can start forward slowly. It’s going to hit near the center of the field.” They’d picked tonight just for the fact there was very little wind forecast.

The other truck stayed at the tree line to watch their back, and interfere if anyone tried to disrupt the retrieval. They would turn on lights which the primary wouldn’t do under any circumstances in the field, and they were armed against simple banditry, which was all too common a problem now. Even in the quiet of the night there was no thump as it landed.

“It’s down. Continue forward, slowly,” the cousin said. The driver could see a vague shape in the starlight as the parachute collapsed. “To the right a little. That’s good. Slower…and stop,” he ordered. When he got out there was no interior light. The diode had been removed. He went back and lowered the two piece tailgate that made a ramp. The parachute was used to drag the capsule up the ramp and then it was unlatched, gathered and stuffed in a duffel bag so the wind couldn’t catch it when the truck moved. He raised the ramp and got back in the cab, taking the night vision set off and giving it to the driver. He didn’t need it anymore.

The driver of the other truck had his own goggles and headed for the gate to the road ahead of the loaded truck. When he turned on the road he put his headlights on and drove away at a normal pace. He’d go back into the city. Myanmar had no automated vehicle system except in the capitol. The chances of a vehicle even being tracked and entered into the surveillance system were slight away from government offices or an airport. Both trucks belonged to service companies that might be expected to roam all over at odd hours.

The driver with the load waited and let the other truck get a few kilometers down the road. His phone rang a couple times but he didn’t answer it. That was his signal the other driver hadn’t been stopped or seen any unusual activity. He finally turned on the road also and put his lights on, looking perfectly normal, except there wasn’t much traffic at this time of night. That’s why he only went a couple kilometers and turned in the parking lot for a factory. The guard at the gate was one of their own, and they had a bar code to scan that passed them in. They’d sit there until dawn when there would be much more traffic to blend with going into the city. When the factory shift changed, they’d leave. Their man at the gate would be gone by then, but outflow from the lot was allowed to clear the gate without each vehicle being checked like when they entered.

*

“Myat has your machines,” Huian informed Jeff. “She was very impressed with your aim. They had a really easy recovery.”

“They survived OK? I packed them really well, and put them in on top of a layer of crushable boxes too. The guys who built the vehicle said it could take higher Gs, but it was still all calculated. You never know if reality is going to follow your computer model.”

“They’re all fine,” Huian assured him. “Myat didn’t call until after they powered them all up.”

“That’s great,” Jeff said, relieved. “We couldn’t get away with this so easily in North America now. I wonder how often we can do it this way, before somebody catches on?”

“I hope that’s a rhetorical question,” Huian said frowning, “because it is outside my experience.”

“I do that…” Jeff explained. There was a gap between them of age and experience, probably culture too. He was embarrassed she’d taken him literally.

Huian nodded, relieved actually. Offering advice was full of peril. But she did have something to offer Jeff.

“Myat also informs me that there is an Indian gentleman interested in investing and doing business with your bank. She mentioned him before. They have had difficulty doing business since both their countries have imposed tighter capital controls. You might pick up the slack if you can get around the limitations. I understand from listening to my husband and T talk that you are interested in buying a ship. He happens to be a dealer in scrap from broken up ships.”

Oh really? I’m very interested, and of course there would be a finder fee for you,” Jeff said.

“That’s fine. Myat said part of the deal would be a guaranteed lift for him and his family if they decide to leave Earth. Even Myat said that seemed to be a prudent thing to do – to keep a door open, although she didn’t ask it for her household. That’s surprising to hear her thinking like that, given her families deep roots in Myanmar.”

“Lifting them, if we have a dedicated launch platform, isn’t as big a problem as somewhere to put them once we have them here,” Jeff said. “But I’m working on that too,” he promised.

*

“The coup we’ve been expecting has started in North America,” Jon said.

“The faction that sent the lieutenant to Martha?” Muños asked.

“Who knows? We never identified his handler. It could be one of the other groups he intimated exist. But we see all sorts of movement starting, just like when China had their internal fighting.”

“Have you told young Singh?” Muños asked.

“Chen alerted me, so figure that he knew first,” Jon admitted.

*

“April, your instincts were certainly right on the money about Wiggen,” Jeff admitted. “Jon admits the late night skulking about and the emergency trip to an airlock were all tied up with the mysterious body. You should know in the last couple hours Chen sees a lot of the same remote sensor signs of internal conflict in North America like we saw before in China, government workers told to stay home, roadblocks and troops around agency buildings, bases sealed off and people loading up light armor and prepping helicopters and aircars for either evacuations or conflict. It happened so fast that the morning deliveries for bread and produce were backed up at the gates because they had no notice not to show up as usual.

“Air transport has never recovered all the way from when we fought with them, but they just kicked all the civilian traffic off domestic flights and reduced international flights to a handful. The suborbitals are still flying a daily for most routes, but all the cheap sub-sonic cattle car flights were just put on hold indefinitely. That means the middle class people on vacation somewhere will have to pop for an expensive ballistic ticket, and probably have to extend their stay and wait for seats at the higher price.”

“It’s amazing that as crappy as the economy was doing, so many people still were flying somewhere on vacation. But then wealthy people went on vacation during the Great Depression too. Just not as many. There will be howls of outrage at being trapped. Some of them won’t have the credit to stay over or make it home.” April predicted. “What are they going to do? I imagine most of the other countries won’t accept them staying past a vacation visa period,”

“Yes, No matter how bad the economy is there are always people with disposable income. It isn’t a depression if you still have your job. The government workers always get paid, and they are about a third of the workforce now. They are already showing them lined up at the USNA embassies in England and Spain.” Jeff gave an exaggerated shrug. “If those countries want to deport them they’ll have to buy a ticket to be rid of them. I doubt they are going to organize an evacuation like they would for a local revolution or a natural disaster. The military certainly has other worries at the moment.”

“Are you going to set up a watch in your office like you did for China?” April wondered.

“No. We aren’t engaged with North America like we were with China back then. This is their internal affair. I don’t expect it to reach out and touch us and demand we get involved. I have Walter sharing my space now too. He doesn’t deserve to be disrupted if it isn’t a necessity. If you want to follow it I can ask for Chen and Jon to share feeds, but I wasn’t going to rent a geostationary eye myself. I planned to keep busy with other stuff.”

“Do you want to come by for dinner tonight and keep a bit of a watch? I’ll make popcorn,” April offered.

“Sure. I’ll send the access codes now, look in your spex, and you can record the video. Say six channels of coverage. If something interesting happens we can watch the recording to bring us up to date. Do you want me to bring supper?” Jeff offered.

“I don’t know if Gunny will be around. He said he might have a security escort gig over to ISSII. So order it from my place and have it brought over.”

“OK, but not too late, or they run out of things,” Jeff complained.

*

“This is remarkably generous of you to give us an opportunity to invest in a ship based landing platform,” Irwin said. It wasn’t like Irwin to gush. Jeff wondered if he was betraying some internal doubts about the whole deal. Maybe it looked too good to be true.

“Not really. If I had the cash I’d run the whole thing myself,” Jeff admitted. “I always like having full control of an enterprise. When you have to get consensus and make everybody happy it takes time. I’ve tried to steal time from sleeping, but that only works for about three days. I just have so many irons in the fire I have as little time to invest as money. I found myself regretting I’d invested in the second snowball expedition, even though it’s going to do quite well. It will be generating income soon but it’s still funds tied up. There are just so many opportunities right now it’s hard to pick one over another.”

Irwin nodded. “I hear you. It’s easy to say that you do the one that gives you the fastest return on investment, but sometimes that assumes somebody else is going to offer supportive services. I have people who want to hire employees, but they are waiting on your zero G habitats, because there is no other place to house them right now.”

“And I’m having trouble finding enough people to build them…” Jeff countered.

“You’ll do that at Central on the moon, right?” Irwin asked.

“Yes, but not likely until after one of the families there finishes tunneling and making apartments. So your project is dependent on my project, which is dependent on their project,” Jeff mused.

“It almost seems like we need one central authority to plan out all of it, so it all happens in sequence properly,” Irwin said.

“That always sounds attractive,” Jeff agreed. “But the reality is what you see now in North America. Once a planned source becomes official it can’t be allowed to fail. So if I never made my housing we’d be waiting…and waiting…because it is officially coming, and nothing else can be allowed to replace it once it has official sanction. But unexpected things happen to mess up your timeline. We don’t want to go down that road. If one undertaking fails we want the others to be able to adjust.

“For example on the ship project, circumstances have changed. Huian has just introduced me to a gentleman involved in ship-breaking. He informs me that the price of ships to scrap is tied to demand for metal, and the Chinese market for them has been dead with their internal chaos. I shared with him that we expect North America is also going to be in some distress over the next couple days. He advised me that any further disruption of the North American economy will drive scrap prices even lower. We may have a window of opportunity to get a ship really cheap. There are fixed expenses to owning a ship like insurance, that owners are loath or prohibited from skipping. So he expects a surge in their removal from service. We could see some real bargains soon.”

“I understand,” Irwin said. “That’s why I said almost. I know, intellectually, that central planning never works. But I can see how easy it is to think that way. Control has emotional appeal.”

“The hard part is undoing it once that vision gets entrenched. Because it is usually enforced by law. I don’t think the Assembly will let that get started here,” Jeff predicted. “In fact I know there is a core group that will call out anybody trying to start it and nip it in the bud.”

Irwin raised an eyebrow in surprise. “You mean call them out – as in challenge them to a duel?”

“Yes, and the members are all expert pistoleros. You stand zero effective chance of running through them and surviving. As long as they all like how we are living, and agree to protect it, we aren’t going to turn into a copy of the Slum Ball. If the Assembly goes soft in the head and bans dueling, or the group collectively decides that Home is no longer worth defending, then we are lost. I know I don’t have the skills to contribute,” Jeff admitted. He didn’t add that he’d been bluntly told his other skills were more valuable to Home and refused as a charter member.

“Does this group have a name?” Irwin wondered.

Jeff smiled. “It very deliberately doesn’t have a name. It has no existence except as an agreement among close friends. If something doesn’t have a name or location it is very hard to counter.” Something Jeff, April and Heather had found, and then lost to a certain degree of notoriety.

“I’m in basic agreement with the idea. Do you have any idea how they recruit?” Irwin wondered.

“Oh, if that’s a personal goal I suggest you go to the range a great deal, and display truly scary shooting skills. Past that it’s just a matter of them liking your attitude,” Jeff said.

“I’d like to think my attitude is just fine,” Irwin said defensively.

“But if the skills aren’t there you would just be a very principled suicide,” Jeff pointed out. “I suspect you are doing more for Home as a banker.”

“Yes, but there is little glory in banking,” Irwin complained.

“Are you getting bored with it?” Jeff wondered. He hadn’t sensed dissatisfaction in Irwin.

“Maybe a little. Do you have any suggestions for that?”

Jeff shook his head no. “Nothing other than being patient. I find every time things get nice and boring the universe soon reaches out and returns things to their normal chaotic state for me.”

“I guess I’m borrowing trouble. So, you figure I can just wait and someone will make a trouble deposit?” Irwin asked, amused at the metaphor.

“I think you can bank on it,” Jeff agreed.

Chapter 21

Heather Anderson woke to faint classical music and a room slowly ramping up to bright. “House, hold the lighting there,” she instructed. Unless she stopped it the computer would keep increasing the lighting to an eye searing level. If that and an increase in music volume didn’t rouse her it was instructed to start flashing the lights. Only if that failed was it permitted to use sensors to check for vital signs and summon help if warranted. She liked to plan for every imaginable scenario, like most spacers, but she had no desire for her medical privacy to be regularly invaded by her computer network. Security invariably failed as some devious person contrived to bypass all the previously effective barriers.

It was the first Sunday of the month, which meant court day. Most people worked seven days, but the few who took a day off usually took Sunday. Heather couldn’t remember the last time she’d gotten a day off. But it seemed wisest to disrupt her subject’s lives, and commerce, as little as possible.

Breakfast was simple and eaten alone. She dressed a little better than usual. She took court seriously and wished to project that, and a certain personal maturity, by her dress. Her best silk blouse with a wool jacket and full black pants would serve. She had exactly two dresses and saved them for fun. Court was not fun, nor was it meant to be ritualized by any sort of costume. She wouldn’t let that take hold.

Eventually she’d have a formal court with much more impressive architecture. She’d seen plans and drawings. It mattered to others more than Heather, and they wouldn’t cut that cubic out until they were several kilometers deeper. Deep enough that the rock was at a comfortable shirts-sleeves temperature. If it made others happy and made anyone regard her court with more respect that was fine. She’d have happily held court sitting on the floor and expected both respect and obedience. Anyone who withheld either did so at their peril.

Heather’s apartment was as temporary as the courtroom, but conveniently close. They might be here another six months before they moved deeper. A year was unlikely. She made sure she didn’t have any stray bits of breakfast or other problems showing in the mirror, then walked the sixty meters down the corridor to her private entrance.

There were six people waiting at the other end of the room, three on one bench and three on another. Sometimes that was an indication there were parties in opposition, sometimes not. Today the three on one bench were spaced out as widely as possible to indicate they weren’t together. One of them was sitting scowling at the three clustered on the other bench.

The one surprising sight was a gentleman in full Earth style dress. A business suit with a tie and hard shoes. That was really unusual. They had one family who offered accommodations as a little side business now. The same ones who intended to offer apartments soon. It was more of a bed and breakfast than a real hotel. It was still a very small community. There wasn’t near enough news to share and it spread fast. Heather was surprised she hadn’t heard gossip that they had such an exotic specimen come in on the last shuttle.

Dakota her secretary was waiting inside the door, and they stayed to the back of the hall to confer before approaching the table. “Do you know the story on the Earthie?” Heather wondered.

“I haven’t quizzed him, and he didn’t volunteer anything, just asked if he had the right place, and did he need to sign in or offer any documents? He was second to arrive this morning after Carol Perlman. He looked a bit freaked out and nervous, but he’s calmed down now. Do you want to hear him first?”

“No, first come first served has been working just fine. Besides, Carol looks upset enough. If we don’t hear her first like we’ve been doing she’ll be angry at us too,” Heather predicted.

She already had the furniture in place for the court, which would follow its location as they tunneled deeper. Real wood was expensive and rare. They hadn’t stinted on buying solid hardwood furniture of simple design. Showing the grain and color of real wood meant more here than any fancy carving or decoration. It was Shaker inspired she’d been informed. Too heavy for lunar gravity, but it still appealed to their aesthetic sense. Perhaps in a couple generations it would look far too massive to native born.

Her chair was maple and had arms. It sat behind a matching table set toward the middle of the room that stretched to each side but was short across. She’d used it bare a few times until one of her subjects had gifted her with a brocade altar cloth that draped over the middle third of the table. It was nice, and a lovely silvery white. There were two benches facing each other on the other side of the table. They had no back and the seats were not deep. The idea was to encourage things to move along.

There were no tables for documents or evidence but the one before Heather. There was a small carpet before the table to indicate where someone should stand to make their case or receive judgment, and no chairs or benches for the public. You had to want to observe badly enough to stand, or bring your own stool. Although it wasn’t that hard to stand at lunar gravity.

Heather was set off behind the table as sovereign, but there were no officers of the court, and no attorneys. No bar separated the public from justice. Anyone could bring a case or petition, and it didn’t have to be an adversarial contest. If it didn’t touch on the interests of the sovereign Heather would advise or arbitrate on request, or dictate if the people were brave enough to ask for a set decision.

Dakota looked at Carol. She was poised on the very end of the bench, with a wide gap between her and the Earthie. She wouldn’t have sat too close either. The woman’s face was a scowl that only needed to show some teeth to be a full snarl. “She said she has some issues with her husband. That’s all I know,” Dakota revealed in a low voice to Heather.

“We’ll hear her first,” Heather repeated. “It will let the Earthie see how we operate a little.”

Dakota walked forward around the table and stood on the small carpet. Heather went to her chair and sat, placing her laser pistol on the table on the right side of the cloth, and her belt pad to the left. A few taps on the screen and she announced: “Recording,” for Dakota’s benefit.

Dakota spoke with some volume but unamplified. “Court is in session this third day of October 2088. The Sovereign of Central will hear petitions and complaints. All that is said will be available on the local net to the public immediately after. Complainants are encouraged to study the history of decisions for an understanding of the Sovereign’s mind. Be aware you may request her wisdom to arbitrate a private dispute that does not touch on her justice if both parties agree.

“You may also present a matter for justice. A matter between her subjects may be brought by one party against another. A matter between a subject of the Sovereign and an outsider will only be brought with the acceptance of the outsider. The Sovereign however retains the right to expel from her domain any who decline to be a party to her justice.” Dakota looked hard at the Earthie, who nodded.

“Be aware this is a final court with no appeal. If you ask for a decision it will be rendered and enforced. Matters brought before the court may not be withdrawn once they are presented. The court has the power of life and death, as her weapon on display is meant to show. Subjects are strongly encouraged to settle their minor disputes without the intervention of the sovereign.

“You may come from different backgrounds. Do not assume that the customs of your village are natural law that will be followed here. Our habit has been to hear cases in the order of arrival. Once everyone is heard court will close and anyone arriving after the close will have to wait until the next court. Step forward if you wish speak.” Dakota abandoned the carpet and walked around the table to stand slightly behind Heather to her right side.

Carol practically launched off the bench and stalked to the carpet.

“I have a complaint I can’t resolve,” Carol declared. “My husband has informed me he has married another woman. She has her own cubic and he has been splitting time between us. Well he was…but I kicked him out last time he showed up, so he hasn’t been back since. The man actually had the nerve to suggest we all set up housekeeping together. He said the other woman is agreeable to that.”

She stopped and looked at Heather as if that was sufficient information and she expected a pronouncement.

“And what sort of judgment are you seeking?” Heather asked.

“Why, to order him to honor his first commitment and not engage in bigamy,” Carol said. She seemed astonished she had to explain.

“Do I remember right? Your husband is George, and you took his name?” Heather said.

“Yes, George, and I used to be Carol Dobrinski.”

“Where is George? Is he aware you are here, making a complaint against him?”

“He said he has no complaint, that he’s perfectly happy with both of us,” Carol scoffed. “What man wouldn’t be?”

“I have to ask, how did you marry George? Did you exchange vows publically? Do you have a recording or a written contract? Even a prenup?” Heather inquired.

“Since there isn’t anything like a marriage license here, and neither one of us is strongly enough religious to hire a minister, we just had a party and announced to all our friends that we were married,” Carol said. She looked worried, because this wasn’t going any direction she’d anticipated.

“I see. Well, marriage is a serious contract. I’d suggest if you should get married again you treat it with at least the seriousness you’d give buying cubic or taking employment. We do not yet have a body of law dealing with marriage. Your case is the first one brought in that regard. We have no formal definition of marriage. You have to create a religious or secular contract that defines your marriage.

“However we do have some small experience with contracts. I have accepted the universal idea that a contract requires a meeting of minds. Obviously you are no longer of a mind in this matter. Yet you said something that caught my ear. You said, “What man wouldn’t be?” That suggests to me that you realize there is a tendency in at least some men to favor a polygamous arrangement. I’m sure I don’t have to point out it is accepted in some Earth cultures, and within their legal systems.

“Since you didn’t formalize your contract with George I can’t ascertain his mind at that time, to judge if he is failing to fulfill his contract. Nor is he here to ask. His statement may indicate he isn’t in breach in his mind. Therefore I can’t void this as a contract, which would be like an annulment. I find I have no interest in this matter as head of state, so it is between you two.

“The most I can offer at this point, unless you can persuade him to return with you to discuss it further, is an opportunity to formalize a divorce between you, if it is your wish to divorce him. “Kicking him out,” is not a sufficiently clear public declaration of intent to terminate your marriage. One person seeking the end of the marriage is sufficient to terminate it. Nor as a practical matter would I ever rule a person must stay married and cohabit with another. I have no delusions of such god-like powers.

“All you have to do is say you are no longer married to him in open court, and it will be part of the public record. There are also other public announcement channels open to you to do the same thing. As to any details such as the division of property you consider jointly held – you’d have to come to an agreement with him.

“Even if both of you feel you had differing understandings about jointly acquired property. I am not inclined to administer property claims below the level of real estate. You can be adults and divide the furniture and linens like civilized people, or not, as you wish. A private word of advice however. Everyone who knows you will remember if either of you display graciousness or vindictiveness.”

“I’m not sure I’m ready to do that,” Carol said, looking stricken.

“I understand. I’m sorry for your distress on a personal level,” Heather offered, “but as your Sovereign I believe our business is finished, is it not?”

“Yes, thank you for your time,” Carol said. She looked stunned, and walked out looking down, oblivious to the rest of them.

Dakota stared at the Earthie to give him a clue. He glanced at the others to make sure he wasn’t cutting in line somehow, and walked to the carpet.

“I’m Hannes Lueger. I’m here on behalf of an Austrian based company. I’m accepted to speak before European courts. I hope you’ll permit me to present a case. My specialty is intellectual property law. As I’m a foreigner, may I ask a few questions first?” he requested.

“Certainly. No need to be nervous. I’m not given to taking offense easily,” Heather assured him.

“How should I address the court? Do you prefer Your Honor or Your Majesty?”

“I’m not very majestic, and I’d prefer acts of honor over empty platitudes. You’re not my subject to call me your Lady, so Heather, Miss Anderson, or plain old you is sufficient.”

“Thank you. Miss Anderson, I am trying to ascertain if I can reasonably bring an action before you. Have you adapted any Earth law? Do you recognize any body of case law as applying to your domain?”

“You have no special status here as a lawyer, but I’d accept anyone speaking for another who is uncomfortable presenting their own case. We however have no body of law about things like client-attorney privilege. So you should be very cautious about assuming such things exist here. You may assume I cherish the very basics of any legal code. Don’t lie. Don’t murder. Don’t steal. I don’t intend to deal with thought crimes,” Heather revealed. “I have no idea if you are coveting your neighbor’s goods in your heart. I’m only concerned with if you try to make them portable and take possession of them against his will.

“You should know however that I find a great deal of Earth law overreaching that way. I will allow people to establish customs. To do otherwise is to fight human nature. You have to accept a certain level of customary behavior to fit in a tribe. If you can’t do that you will be encouraged to go elsewhere. Home is in a similar situation to us, and they have found you have to allow custom to exist or it leads to conflict.”

“Oh, does Central have the duel also?” Hans asked.

That was a perceptive question. “I haven’t ruled yet,” Heather said, smiling. “I believe it keeps my supplicants on their toes, since if I get a pair that can’t be satisfied and are completely unreasonable, I can still tell them to find their own solution on the field of honor. I’d rather not encourage them to adapt it for trivial disputes.”

Hannes frowned until he had creases between his eyes. “Then I can present a complaint as a foreigner, if, as your lady said,” he nodded at Dakota, “I accept your decision as binding?”

“Yes. Are you sure you have the authority to do so for your clients?” Heather asked.

“I do. We have no other jurisdiction in which to reasonably pursue this,” Hannes admitted.

“Then I hardly see how you can be worse off than taking my ruling,” Heather pointed out. “Unless you fear I am a crazy lady, and may impose a totally irrational judgment, such as imposing damages on the party wronged, or act against you personally from prejudice.”

“No, you are young, but you seem quite stable,” Hannes allowed bluntly. “One last question. I was not aware of your public records and have not reviewed your previous decisions. You denounced stealing…Have you had opportunity to establish any intellectual property law yet?”

“No. We do not have a patent or copyright system yet. No one has requested them. My feeling is the present system on Earth is broken. I know China essentially ignores patent and copyright. I think some abuses of patent law I’ve read about – such as trying to register patents to cover wide ranges of devices – patent carpet bombing - are reprehensible. I also think the use of Life Extension Therapy is going to make changes necessary. We may have to move to a system that looks at maintaining rights by active use instead of arbitrary years. Especially for things like video compositions and books. That is already happening effectively, since Mickey Mouse has been kept from the public domain by repeated legislation, but it should be available to everyone who doesn’t find buying a legislature a trivial expense. If I do issue patents it will likely be by royal decree. So you can expect they would be few in number and large in scope.”

Hannes took a deep breath, and obviously had to steel himself on the matter. “In that case I wish to present a complaint, and will accept your judgment on it.”

“I appreciate your confidence. State your case in plain English please. No need of legal terms if they are not uniquely descriptive,” Heather said.

“My clients have a software development firm, Greennote Ltd. They’ve created several packages including GreenLeaf, a program for artistic composition and graphic manipulation. They are registered for protection in most jurisdictions. A person we believe to be one of your subjects has set up a distribution system for what is essentially the same program with the title altered to GreenLeaves. Other than the Title bars and some banners the code is the same, and totally plagiarized from our product. He uses paid servers in Earth nations with lax laws about such things, but the money flows here. We seek to stop this from continuing, an injunction if I may use that expression, and to recover damages.”

“You have a name for this person?” Heather asked.

“The payments are made to Bruce Coyle,” Hannes said. “If that is a real person or a name of convenience I can’t say. But there is an account in that name at the Royal Solar Trade Bank at Central. We are also fairly certain he is the person known in the computer community as ‘Black Coyote’.”

Heather lifted an inquiring eyebrow to Dakota.

“He works in food service,” Dakota read off her pad. “He’s from Armstrong, but not from our original group. He came later.” She tapped her pad. “He’s at work now. He takes Mondays off.”

“Call him here, they can prep lunch without him or call somebody in,” Heather ordered.

“Done. Figure ten minutes if he uses the bathroom and changes his shirt,” Dakota said.

“How much of a loss has this plagiarized software been?” Heather asked Hannes.

“It can only be estimated. Our sales were down sharply within a few days of his offering. They were twenty million EuroMarks lower that quarter. Sales of software are down worldwide this quarter too, but some is a bad business climate and some is what he has siphoned off. But there are also sales made at his price that never would have been made at full price,” Hannes admitted. “Mr. Coyle is selling at about one quarter full retail price, so we’d expect he made something like five million EuroMarks. Do you have the ability to demand a forensic audit of his accounts?”

Heather looked at him sharply. “I’m sovereign. I can confiscate his accounts and toss him out the airlock in his underwear if it pleases me. The bank is chartered at Central at my pleasure. But one does such things with some discretion or you have terrified subjects. I have had an interest in the bank since before Central was ever established, but it doesn’t knowingly handle illicit funds. He hasn’t bribed me if that concerns you.”

“I didn’t mean to imply that at all. I’m sorry, I’m used to the few royals left in Europe. They are pretty much powerless now, and entirely subject to their national legislatures. They cut ribbons and mark holidays, but they don’t really rule or decree much of anything,” Hannes said.

“Bloody national mascots,” Heather said, without apology. “Have a seat and yield the carpet for Mr. Coyle.”

Bruce hadn’t bothered to change shirts. Lunch was obviously going to involve something with tomatoes. He looked chipper and not concerned. He stepped to the carpet without being asked and nodded at Heather, silent, but not at all hostile.

“Mr. Coyle, this is Hannes Lueger from Earth. He has entered a complaint before me and chooses as a foreigner to accept my decision. He accuses you of pirating his client’s GreenLeaf software and selling it. Specifically that you have altered the name and some of the interface, but left the code almost in its entirety. Would you care to respond to his accusations?” Heather invited.

“Yeah, I’ve been doing that almost a half year,” Bruce readily admitted. “That’s why I came over from Armstrong. They’re under the USNA and have all these stupid treaties. I knew it wasn’t illegal here so I took a job to get residence, but I run my business on the side. It really doesn’t take that much time once you set it up.” He showed not a trace of embarrassment.

“I’m surprised you bother to retain your cafeteria job when you could live well off your software, uh…‘business’,” Heather said tactfully. “Mr. Lueger indicated it is was substantial sum of money.”

“Well yeah, I guess I could have. But the people in the cafeteria are really nice, and when I got the first transfer from my Earth bank to the System Bank I really intended to just celebrate a bit and then quit when I came back off leave,” Bruce admitted.

“But you didn’t…” Heather surmised, still unsure where he was going.

“I would have, but I had four days off and went to Camelot. They treat you like a king if you walk in and say sell me ten Solars of chips for a starter. They comp you a room and all you want to eat and drink is on the house. It’s the most fun I’ve ever had. I had a whole mob partying with me after a couple days. But I was busted dead broke when I got back. Since I bunk in company cubic and can eat at work it was much easier to just report back to my job. In fact I don’t know what I’d have done without it.”

Hannes gave Heather a terrified, but very questioning look.

“Camelot is the previous Chinese moon base. Their principle business at the moment is a very high end casino,” Heather informed him. He just planted his face in both hands with a little moan.

“So you blew how much?” Heather asked, amazed.

“Well, the first transfer was seven million something. I have to pay for stuff too you know,” Bruce told them. “They charge for server space and taking credit. The miserable EuroMarks are perishable now. They actually tick down in value, so you have to spend them fast or pay again to change them to something else. But somewhere along the line I got a credit card from the casino. I was drinking a bit and don’t exactly remember it all very well. But they were really nice. I remember I was actually up a few million at one point, but by the time I came home I was a couple Solars in the hole on the card.”

“They let a kitchen helper put a couple Solars on a credit card?” Heather asked.

“Hey, I’m a prep cook already. I didn’t stay a scullery hand a week. But when they asked what I do at the casino I just said I’m in software. Since I bought ten Solars of chips cash and some more later, they didn’t seem interested in the details. They offered their own house card easily. When I was back home and sober I had a call from them about making payments on the card, but I told them I’d be back in two weeks and win that back and a chunk more. They said that was fine and not another word about payments. They said they’d reserve me a comped room. Are they a class act or what?” Bruce asked.

Heather was too stunned to say what…

“So, did you win it back?” Hannes asked, hopefully. Heather wasn’t offended he didn’t ask permission to speak. It was her next question too.

“No, but the second trip I came home with only a half Solar on the card,” Bruce said with pride. “I’m getting better at it, but this third trip I’m down just a little. Just another half Solar, but I can see what I’m doing wrong now. I’ll be in the black next time.”

“Allow me to introduce a radical thought,” Heather said gently. “Do you have sufficient funds just to pay them off and be done with them?”

“Yeah, but I want to get some back,” Bruce insisted.

Hannes and Heather looked at each other. Bruce seemed oblivious to the byplay.

“Let me take another tack,” Heather decided. “Are you one of those people who feel that information wants to be free, and everything should be open and shared? What is your motivation?”

“Nah, information isn’t aware,” Bruce said, looking at Heather like she was the odd one. “Maybe what I did isn’t exactly right, but all these rich people, the big corporations and the governments, they’re all the same. They keep a tight grip on anything that can make some money and exclude the little guy. There’s no way left to get ahead. You think they care about patents and copyright? The ones with the best lawyers and enough money to buy the politicians decide whose patents are valid. I’ve been working for them since I got out of school and had nothing to show for it. I just wanted a little back. There isn’t any law against it here, is there?” he demanded.

“No, in fairness there is no law against it here, yet. We’ve been very economical with creating laws.” Heather looked anxious and struggled with her thoughts. “Perhaps a different example…I have not yet formalized a law against murder either. Would you feel that gave you some leeway to kill somebody who you find offensive or inconvenient?”

“I don’t want to kill anybody. I get along with people,” Bruce objected.

“You are evading me,” Heather accused. “You aren’t getting along with Mr. Lueger here, or his clients. In fact you are quite the inconvenience to him. Perhaps he should just kill you if it isn’t illegal here. If all that matters are formal rules and laws, and no right or wrong. What do you think?”

“This is one of those questions like my mom and teachers always asked me,” Bruce complained. “They really just wanted me to agree, and didn’t really want to hear the answer if I didn’t. But the rules always seem to be biased to the other big wheel’s advantage.”

“I am more sympathetic to that than you might imagine,” Heather allowed, which made Hannes look worried.

“In some things, like patents for drugs, and governments keeping secret patents, I believe they can be abused to people’s harm. Certainly if the public has paid with taxes for the research to develop something, then it is a betrayal to funnel the profits to private hands,” Heather explained. “But this wasn’t a life-saving drug kept way over priced, or a revolutionary civilization altering invention kept secret and suppressed. You took a software program that is used for artistic expression. Nobody will die without it and from what I understand it is cheap enough people frequently use it for their amusement rather than employment.

“If Mr. Lueger’s clients were price gouging people, they can simply not buy this program. It’s self-solving by market forces. I’m pretty sure there must be competing programs at other price points. Yet it does support a group of people who produce it and maintain it. That’s not bad. If you wanted to produce something similar to compete with it I’d be open to extending the umbrella of protection by my law to you, to keep your rights to it. None of my subjects have brought such a request yet. I have my doubts you are capable of producing something equal to what you’ve stolen.”

Bruce flinched at the word stolen.

“I’ll tell you a story,” Heather said. “The first day, when Central was established, was a day of battle. We were sitting in our armed rover waiting to kill men chasing after refugees fleeing to us. We were guessing when their rovers would appear on the horizon so we could direct artillery fire on them. In the midst of this two of my subjects bet on when they would appear. Unfortunately their lights showed up within two seconds at most of the chosen time. When they appeared ready to argue over who won, I came very close to banning all gambling within my sovereign territory. The only reason I still don’t prohibit it is that prohibitions are generally counterproductive. Even if something is self-harming, banning it just makes the situation worse. It drives behavior underground and just adds the allure of it being forbidden.

“Perhaps in theory it doesn’t have to be divisive and trouble rousing, but it always seems to work that way. I am inclined to think that the friendly bet is a fantasy. Betting is adversarial. If you don’t pay the people at Camelot they will get ugly with you. And yet you seem to think of them as friends. If you had earned that money through your own talents I’d wager you wouldn’t have thrown it away so easily.”

Heather stopped and glowered at Bruce. For once he was smart enough to keep silent.

“I’ve really heard enough to make a decision. If either of you wish to add something vital you think I have missed you may speak, but be warned it may harm your standing as easily as help it.”

Neither of them spoke. Bruce actually shook his head a quick no.

“I find Mr. Lueger’s clients were wronged and harmed financially. I find Central was wronged and harmed in our reputation. We are not going to be a haven for criminal behavior. I find that Bruce by his own word knew what he was doing was not right. He is directed to terminate his operations quickly.

“I believe the loss to your clients has not been so severe they are in danger of going out of business. Is that correct?” Heather asked Hannes.

“No, most people won’t buy from a pirate source. But enough have to cost the company a great deal of money, and the company stock has had a loss we attribute to this diversion of sales.”

Heather nodded. “I find thus: Mr. Coyle is directed to pay off his gambling debt. Any funds he has left over will be directed back to Greennote Ltd. as a judgment. I shall require a report that all this was done from your bank. You may retain up to the value of a half Solar because nobody should be stripped bare, and you have had the good sense to retain gainful employment as a basis for your future.

“If I strip Mr. Coyle broke and require him to repay you, it will basically enslave him in perpetuity. Especially since in the off Earth community the cost of money is higher than on Earth. He’d never catch up and repay principal if he could borrow it. More likely he’d owe a small amount from each pay for life. I feel enslaving him will cause more harm to our community in the long run than the value of the small payment stream to your clients,” she explained. “I don’t wish to deal in revenge.”

Hannes just nodded his understanding.

“I direct, Mr. Coyle, that if you return to Camelot for the purpose of gambling you are banished from Central and may not return, ever. I could lecture about addictive behaviors and such, but you have an obsession, and it would take more persuasion than I possess to make the smallest chip in that. You are in a state of probation in my mind, and advised if you come before me with any questionable behavior again I am prepared to be very harsh. Do not mistake my mercy as license to be anything but squeaky clean in the future,” Heather said, peering straight at him. He didn’t react.

“If you find that too difficult you would be better off to leave Central on your own,” she suggested. “You are only a resident, not sworn to me. I am refraining from expelling you, but not by much.”

He nodded agreement since she seemed to want a response.

“I’m sorry it is not within my ability to make you whole, Mr. Lueger. If I were to require them to return the monies lost by Mr. Coyle it would be one more injustice on top of others. A casino cannot reasonably be expected to inquire or pass judgment on the sources of a customer’s cash. So there was no criminal intent for them to let him play. However I have stopped the harm.

“Not that it likely matters to you, but I am unhappy to have Central associated with a casino operation. I can make all the arguments for both sides, that it is voluntary, and reasonable people don’t bet more than they can afford to lose. Yet I see it preys on certain addictive personalities and the harm can reach to those who did not volunteer to play. If Mr. Coyle was foolish in dealing with them, fleecing fools is still a sad business model. One is not obligated to instruct the foolish, or shelter them from harm, but it is hardly noble to systematically profit from their defect.

“Camelot is under my law, but is autonomous to a degree. Something about which I am having second thoughts. I intend to make it clear to my peers that if Camelot does not find other ways of supporting itself within a reasonable time frame, I shall cut them loose to go their own way, completely independent of us. Is there anything in this judgment that is unclear?” Heather asked, looking between the two of them.

“No, Ma’am,” Bruce found his voice and spoke up clearly.

“We thank you for your judgment,” Hannes said politely.

“I’m the only We here,” Heather warned him, “but I take your meaning,” She looked away dismissively, done with them.

“You there, on the bench. Whoever has a gripe step up to the carpet and let’s get on with it,” Heather said sharply, not speaking through Dakota.

The one left alone on his bench stood, looking worried. “Ma’am, I’ve decided to not pursue a formal judgment. I’m going to the cafeteria, and if these other folks will join me to discuss our differences that would sure be welcome. I think we could work something out.” He’d lost his scowl.

“That’s an excellent idea,” one of the other group said, standing. “Our Lady has heard enough foolishness today. Let’s not try her patience with this.” They all left together, hurrying, before she took an interest.

“Court is adjourned,” Dakota called after them. She didn’t bother to take the carpet.

Chapter 22

“I feel so bad for the people,” April said, looking at the screen. It was an overhead view from an Indian satellite service. This wasn’t something North America would want broadcast.

Jeff had mixed feeling about that. He realized he wasn’t as nice as April. He held it against the North Americans that they didn’t kick the scoundrels out and take charge of their own lives again. Hadn’t the people of Home done that? But part of him admitted their cost would be higher. Not that Home might not have lost everything. They’d shot nukes at Home, back in the war. Still, he was cautious of her feelings in his reply.

“The refugees?”

“Yes, they look just like the video of others I’ve seen. Well, films for some of the real old ones. I guess they didn’t have video back in WWII.”

“No, and most everything we’ve got is transferred,” Jeff mused. “There was probably lots lost because film got brittle and discolored and stuff. It went bad, and was costly enough to store that short sighted people just threw history in the trash. Some of the early video on tape wasn’t much better.”

“Chen tells me there are mainly three separate committees claiming authority to govern North America,” April said, waving her pad to indicate her source. “Two new ones, and a few smaller regional groups that aren’t going anywhere if they don’t attach to one of the big ones. But none of them have a consolidated territory. The military are mostly hunkered down in their bases, trying to avoid direct conflict. Except in DC. Everybody wants to control the Capitol, even though anybody in their right mind has fled the fighting and nothing is functioning. Most of the civilian population, including all the people that staff the agencies, headed to Maryland if they were on that side, or for points south, even if they had to swing west through Virginia.”

“The smart ones see winter is coming,” Jeff said. “Last winter was tough enough with power outages and short supplies. If you have no job to hold you, time to go where you won’t freeze to death if it’s worse this year. Even if you have to walk.”

There were columns of refugees walking along the shoulders of the expressways. Local police had given up trying to stop them. Now they just wanted then to keep moving on. They were trying to keep them from blocking or looting traffic. Truckers were ignoring the ones that climbed on top of flatbeds and clung to tankers as long as they didn’t cut tarps or mess with the hardware. If you chased them off you had new aboard as soon as you climbed in the cab.

There were impromptu camps near some of the truck stops and exchanges, except where it was inside a town that forced them to move on. Some stopped because they or family were sick or exhausted. Some stayed the night or a few days and moved on. Some just gave up and quit wherever they were. Security to keep them out of the truck stops and fueling centers or nearby towns became a major expense and source of conflict. People carried what they could, draped it on bikes, and not a few piled it in grocery store carts, which proved surprisingly durable.

Some of the smarter migrants could be seen following railroad tracks or power line right-of-ways. Those were more self reliant sorts who didn’t need the supplies to be had along major roads and could protect themselves from those preying on travelers.

From as far away as the Twin Cities and Pittsburgh people anywhere near the Mississippi or its tributaries turned previous pleasure craft into vessels of escape, whether theirs or not. There were canoes, kayaks and less probable things such as homemade rafts on drums or plastic jugs. There was little fuel to be had and most had homemade paddles and oars even if they hadn’t discarded their motors. They covered the water by day, and the sensible ones tied up at night to avoid collisions with big boats.

The authorities of every flavor and faction discouraged this migration. They fed a steady diet of horror stories to those who still had media access even if just a pad or phone. They warned life on the road was hard and dangerous. A charge on their phone was something a lot of refugees valued over food or shelter for the night.

“It’s hard knowing there isn’t much I can do for any of them,” April said.

“You have a rescue complex. It’s sweet. It’s one of the things I like about you,” Jeff was quick to add. “But you got Gunny and the lieutenants up here. You certainly influenced Papa-san to come, and Don Adams off ISSII. I think you’re doing pretty well. And they have all adapted.”

April gave a curt nod of acknowledgement, but she wasn’t really satisfied. Her pad gave a ping.

“I’m changing the feed back to DC,” April said. “Chen says the Sons of Liberty and God’s Warriors merged and are pushing the Patriot Party out of DC. He said to watch it in the infrared. You can see the armor doing a scissors north and south on the beltway and the Patriots aren’t just being pushed out the gap to the west – they are flat out being overrun.”

“Before you go, how many people are migrating?” April asked Chen. Do you have an estimate?”

“Somewhere around three hundred thousand. Most are in the east. We see very little movement in the western states. Almost no people walking, like in the east.”

“That’s all? I thought it would be millions,” April protested. She related the numbers to Jeff.

“This has happened before,” Jeff assured her. “In the 1930s almost that many left the plains states just for California alone, when there was a drought and economic depression. Lots more went to other states, but the California migration of ‘Okies’ was documented in popular books and motion pictures.”

“If it’s that few why isn’t the government helping people?” April asked Jeff indignantly.

“April…Just like in the 30s, government is causing it, more than helping anybody. It’s a symptom of failed policies. Again, your heart is in the right place, but it is their problem to solve. We can’t stick our nose in it and we would be unwelcome to even comment on it.”

April just looked stunned trying to absorb that, and was quiet a long time while they watched.

It wasn’t from any particular animus or disrespect that they had popcorn while they watched it unfold. Dinner was light and April had promised it. The collapse of armed resistance in DC was easy to read in the satellite view. The leading edge of armor showed as a hot line of dots in the infrared, and flowed across the remaining west half of DC in an hour, leaving smoldering hot spots behind.

“Are they going to pursue them to the west and mop up, or will they establish a perimeter and hold it?” April wondered.

As if to answer her three hot sparks flared simultaneously over DC and very briefly overwhelmed the camera. But they faded quickly.

“What’s that?” April demanded. “It was so bright I thought it was a nuke at first, well, nukes, but it didn’t spread out in a big mushroom cloud and block the view like yours did in China.”

“I don’t want to say and sound stupid. If it’s what I think, Chen will know and tell us pretty quickly.”

April looked at Jeff funny. He seemed really upset. He’d barely squeaked that out, like it was hard to say. She just kept quiet rather than upset him more.

It was almost four minutes before her pad dinged and she read Chen’s message.

“The Patriots used enhanced radiation weapons over DC after losing the city core.”

“You weren’t stupid,” April assured him. “Somebody else was stupid.”

“Now I really do feel sorry for the people down there,” Jeff admitted.

“Why would they do that?” April asked.

“I’m not sure if this is what you are asking, but it preserves all the buildings and museums and monuments. It’s a statement from the Patriots that they value all that and identify themselves as a legitimate continuation of government. And a statement they intend to return and reclaim it. The worst it might do to the city is bust a few windows. But it’s a terrible way to die.”

On the screen it washed out in a massive white flash, and the view was blocked this time by the expected mushroom cloud when the glow died away.

“Well, somebody else had the final word,” April said.

April and Jeff stayed up until they were exhausted, worried it could spread and worsen, but the conflict didn’t escalate.

*

In the morning Jeff started looking at the news feeds and satellite views as soon as he stumbled out. April decided she needed coffee at a minimum to face reality. The odor of brewing coffee was filling the apartment before he reported: “The new alliance seems to be in control. But they are blaming the Patriots for destroying Washington, and ‘the nation’s precious heritage’.”

“Oh baloney. They killed all the forces that had just pushed them out,” April insisted. “Any fool could see that. But there wasn’t any reason to do the second nuking on top of the first.”

“But I can guarantee the public down there will never be shown the sat feeds we saw. I can kind of see it. They denied the Patriots a chance to look good to a lot of people,” Jeff said.

“But, they killed their own forces than had just swept across Washington!” April objected.

“Yes, that would look really ugly, if the public ever was convinced. Although by that time it was a mercy killing. They were dead men standing. But anybody who claims it will be ridiculed and labeled a conspiracy theorist. Video is so easy to fake now that revealing the recordings would be pointless.”

When April looked at him with obvious skepticism Jeff added: “And we’d be the last people they would believe. We’re thoroughly discredited with the public.”

It seemed from her scowl April would argue with him, and Jeff was braced for it. He expected her to argue it was their duty to reveal the truth.

But all she said was, “I’m going to have some scrambled eggs, want some?”

“Please,” he said, thankfully. It was nice having the place to just the two of them. Not that he didn’t like Gunny, the man was a solid friend, but he couldn’t relax with April if he had to worry about Gunny showing up. Gunny seemed to relax on vacation just fine, but when they got home it was all back to business, including some North American formality. Maybe that would ease with time.

Both of them had other things to do. Neither paid those things any attention, following the news reports all day long in horror. The force lost at the capitol broke the Patriots, and a wave of undecided military pledged to the new coalition. By late afternoon the outcome was certain.

“They declared a new capitol at Vancouver,” April called from the couch. It was Jeff’s turn in the kitchen and he was heating some stew.

“The one in Canada or the one in Washington?” Jeff asked.

“Isn’t it all one big metro area sprawled across the old border?” April asked.

“No, there another down by Portland, just across the river.”

April tapped on her pad and looked. “Huh! And there’s a Detroit, an Albany and a Dallas to the south too. Didn’t these people have any imagination at all? It’s confusing having so many.”

“What can I say? Heather decided to recycle Camelot for the Chinese base.”

“Yeah, never thought about it that way. New rule,” April decreed. “One city name per planet.”

“You’ll have to take that up with the sovereign,” Jeff said neutrally.

“I need to visit,” April agreed. “I can’t get her to come here and I miss her.”

“I’d be happy to join you. There isn’t anything I can’t handle on com. I miss her too.”

“The head of the new government is making a statement,” April said.

“Don’t bother to turn it up for me,” Jeff said.

“Summary then,” April said, “Blah, blah, historic, blah, blah, heroic, blah, blah…Oh crap. He just declared the actions of the previous regime are void and they never left being in a state of war with us.”

“That is…unfortunate,” Jeff said calmly. “I wonder if he has fully considered all the consequences of that stance?”

April looked at Jeff, paused with a bowl in his hand. Seemingly staring off in space. His demeanor was as icy as his voice.

“Hey, remember what you said to me about chilling, because I know I’m not powerless? You’re not going to do something crazy are you?” Inside his clear spex his eyes didn’t seem to be active. That was a good sign. He wasn’t assigning targets…

“Not at all. Just thinking. Trying to look at it differently, not just the balance of physical forces, but as a social problem as you’ve been teaching me.”

“Glad I can help,” April agreed. “How is the stew coming?”

“You don’t have to distract me. I’m quite calm, and the stew is hot.” He brought a bowl in each hand to the couch and served her at the low stone table.

“I believe they need something external for the population to fixate upon. An external enemy is always a good bet as a distraction to rally the people and make them ignore other things,” Jeff decided. “If we act belligerently I suspect it will just play into their hands. They will say – ‘See? Their behavior confirms our worst fears.’ If we refuse to react, and force them to prosecute their war…What shall they do? They have little ability now to project force even to LEO, much less translunar. We just acknowledge there is nothing we can do to hinder them from making silly declarations, but like a toddler having a tantrum one can simply ignore it.”

“Sounds reasonable to me,” April said. “Now how do we get the rest of Home to agree?”

“You call Jon and Eddie. I’ll call Muños and Chen. Start a com tree branching and take control of it before it gets away from us,” he said, and sat his stew back on the table in front of him and started working his pad.

It was two hours before Jeff sighed, put his pad down and picked up the bowl again. He tried a spoonful of cold stew and made a face.

“Don’t eat that awful stuff. I’ll go warm it up for us,” April insisted.

“Muños is calling an Assembly,” Jeff said. “He announced it for 1400 tomorrow.”

“He’d have to,” April said. “He’d be swamped with demands to call one if he hadn’t.”

“He was swamped,” Jeff said. “A fair number of people wanted an Assembly tonight. But he refused to move it up. That undoubtedly saved us a lot of grief. All the hot heads would have been eager to declare war right back, and do something. With more than half the population on Main Shift tired and ready to go to bed. Or worse, awakened by a priority alarm, they might have been pushed into doing that. By the morning everybody will see that we may have been told we are at war, but there is no immediate attack. After everybody has had a chance to see nothing bad is happening right away, and they have some lunch and their blood sugar is at a reasonable level – we can all talk.”

“If you speak, what are you going to say?” April demanded.

“I’ll let Muños speak first, and Jon if he has anything to say. Muños is like our senior statesman, and Jon also has a lot of respect. I’m still seen as a hothead by some, and I still suffer from looking young. Muños is looking more middle aged now, but I suspect most folks are like me. If I close my eyes I see Muños the way he looked two years ago. Like somebody’s benevolent grandfather. If they can control the mob mentality I’d be just as happy not to say anything.”

Jeff ate a little more stew and thought about it. “But if I get a chance I’ll put forward a proposal for our housing project. Especially if I see Muños wants to close out the discussion about war and move on to something else. It’ll keep somebody from trying to open it back up after a vote if we’ve moved on to something else.”

April’s pad gave a beep and she examined it. It had a site that tripped five key words. That was enough to trigger a notice to her. She routed it to the wall display, and had it back up to the start. Jeff watched with interest. The banner at the bottom identified James Stuckey as a member of the Executive Committee. He was in uniform, but what branch and rank April couldn’t tell. The newsperson was in shirtsleeves, a format that was revived recently to project a sense of urgency. The idea apparently being that he’d rushed to the camera without time to put his jacket on.

“This isn’t the head of the committee who was talking earlier,” April told Jeff. “I’m not sure if the lesser members have special titles.”

“Why pursue conflict with any of the space powers?” The anchor was asking. “Don’t we have enough right here to keep us busy without looking abroad?”

“Because, John, those space powers have never entirely let off from their conflict with us. We were dismayed to find the previous administration covered up such acts in a cowardly fashion. There was an incident in which Home attacked and destroyed several military satellites shortly before they removed themselves to translunar space. These were manned stations. They killed personnel, and even took one of our officers prisoner. Then conducted a mock murder trial of him for their propaganda purposes.”

“Do they still hold him prisoner?” John asked, projecting concern.

“No, they convicted him, and then avoided testing our resolve by foisting off responsibility for sentencing on the relatives of the claimed victims. It reminded me of the barbaric tribal justice I saw permeate their thinking when I served in the Trans-Arabic Protectorate. They elevated the family and friends above the state interest. Yes, they were harmed, but you can’t expect those too emotionally close to render an unbiased opinion. When the law is broken it harms us all, so the state has a superior call on justice.”

For an instant April thought she saw a flash of doubt cross the anchor’s eyes, but then he nodded and agreed with the official line.

“We also suspect one of our Coast Guard cutters lost at sea was actually attacked by agents of Home,” Stuckey continued. “Some unsavory elements who work with the spacers smuggling were in the area. So many of our essential surveillance satellites were destroyed during the war we didn’t have one overhead to see what happened or maintain a data link for security. Our embargo of critical items is vital to keep pressure on these scoundrels. We intend to tighten up our own efforts to deny them Earth goods, and encourage our allies to do so too.”

“What a bunch of crap,” April objected. “He ignores that we moved because their armed sats were taking pot shots at us and they thought we were too stupid to calculate the source. He makes it sound like we are dependent on imports from North America. They need stuff made on Home worse than we need anything from North America. We can get Earth goods from other countries and those nations will tell the Norte Americanos to go pound sand if the USNA tries to force them to join the embargo,” April predicted. “But I’m really sorry they got the connection to the Tobiuo.”

“They don’t actually want to push this, or he’d have admitted they can place them together with much more certainty. They have the ability to track the Tobiuo’s generator when running. They started to vector a sub toward them after, so they knew. They want to use us for a cause, but not actually resume hostilities.”

“It’s a dangerous game they’re playing,” April concluded. “The Assembly could decide to start bombarding them again. You and your mom could refuse to participate and they still have enough weapons to cause some serious damage. That would leave you two unpopular with a lot of people too.”

“Yes, and I have no idea if the people at the top of their Committee have all the pieces to know that. If they do it is absolutely reckless. But they have to know at least some of it is a lie. Even if Mum and I initially refused to attack them we could get sucked in later if the Assembly provokes them. The Assembly might get suckered into ill conceived action by their words, but if it escalates we’d still have no choice but to come in on Home’s side should things go badly wrong,” Jeff promised.

Committeeman Stuckey continued speaking all through Jeff and April’s discussion. They caught the gist of it from the captioning, but the narrative moved away from anything that concerned them directly. He assured the public that the harvest had been successfully gathered, electric service was expected to be better not worse than last winter, and by migrating without any way for the government to know who was going where, people were sabotaging the ability of the authorities to know where to direct help.

This of course ignored that the authorities had admitted electric service would be ‘prioritized’ to critical areas. You didn’t have to be a genius to figure out if you were in an area that wouldn’t be prioritized. Any aid located along interstate highways running south or along the lower Mississippi would be in the path of almost all of the refugees.

April was amazed how reasonable he could make it all sound, and with a perfectly straight face. Even without any satellite imaging it was obvious from ground observations or a simple aircraft over-flight where people were headed, anywhere warm, by any path they could find.

Jeff stood, took their bowls to the kitchen and rinsed them. “I don’t want to watch this Assembly online. I’m going to go to the cafeteria tomorrow. If I get to propose my housing project it has better impact for me to be seen there, interacting with others, than by com where I’m just a face floating in a smaller window. Do you want to come sit with me? Do you want me to come walk you over?”

“Were you uncomfortable here last night?” April asked.

“Not at all. I just thought…I should get back home.”

“Oh, are you concerned Walter is getting lonely?” she teased him.

“I’m sure Walter is delighted not to have to share cramped quarters, but neither do I wish to presume, or wear my welcome here thin,” Jeff said, uncomfortable.

“If you weren’t welcome anytime I wouldn’t have set the door to your hand.”

“You might have other guests,” Jeff objected.

“Is that what’s bothering you? Not likely, but if I do it will probably be Heather,” April said. “But I wouldn’t have anybody here that I’d be embarrassed to have you meet, or vise versa.” She said pointedly.

“I’m being stupid again, aren’t I?” Jeff asked.

“Yes, but it’s sort of sweet and old fashioned,” April admitted. “You’re a little possessive, but don’t want to be put in a situation where you might have to admit it, to me or yourself.”

“Yes, I will admit it. I feel proprietary about you. I’d automatically question if anyone else was good enough for you. But that puts me in conflict. I can’t question your choices and still say I respect your judgment as equal to mine. It nags at me, because I’m afraid…” he looked embarrassed.

“Spit it out,” April encouraged.

“Afraid that it means I’m greedy,” Jeff admitted. “Worse, I wonder if it’s lingering Earth Think.”

“I think jealousy is just human, and can be a force for good if it is controlled and directed properly. You want what is good for me, and I want what is good for you. It doesn’t have to be selfish. You haven’t displayed insane jealousy. Ask Jon sometime about the few stalkers he’s had to deal with as head of security. It’s an irrational obsession that takes over their entire lives. We do have an interest in each other that has grown, more so now than before the war, when we pledged our fortunes and conspired to revolution in your Dad’s apartment. That’s a pretty big base, isn’t it?”

Jeff nodded. “We need to address this with Heather when we go visit.”

“If you want, but I predict she will look at us like we’re nuts and say, Well of course.”

Chapter 23

Eduardo Muños leaned over and spoke with Jon Davis. The video stream was already live. It was displaying a text notice that an Assembly would convene shortly, with the image of them on the usual temporary platform as a silent backdrop. He cracked a joke with Jon, who smiled, but he deliberately laughed. He wanted to give every visual clue that this was not a desperate emergency meeting. He leaned back, relaxed, using body language to show he wasn’t anxious, certainly not afraid.

Now was the time to do this, because the people most concerned would open the feed early and be eager for the show to get going. Jon wasn’t helping much, because he always looked like he was ready to launch from his seat. The man always seemed on. When he leaned back and folded his arms it was worse. His eyes never joined it. At least that was just his normal level of alertness to everyone who knew him.

The live audience in the cafeteria looked calm. Nobody was circulating like they were trying to muster support or lobby voters. Muños could see Jeff Singh and the Lewis girl sitting together. He supposed the other young woman he identified with them would follow the Assembly from the moon. As long as she was logged in with her Home ID she could vote too. He wondered if they would ever have citizens so distant the speed of light lag would be an impedance to that. The artist girl Lindsey was looking at him hard. She was one of the few people who made him feel like a bug under a microscope. She didn’t miss anything.

When the clock approached 1400 hours Eduardo rose unhurried and took his place at the lectern. The cafeteria was packed and the net software showed a good online attendance. He called the Assembly to order with all due formality, but then he leaned an arm on the lectern to address them, something he’d never done before.

“Just in case there is anyone unaware of the reason for calling an early assembly, allow me to briefly summarize.

“Two days ago one of the members of the new military government ruling North America stated that that committee regarded the surrender and treaty with Home of the previous regime as void. They did not make a new declaration of war as some people falsely reported, or at least mis-understood. Since his other committee members have not repudiated this statement we must conclude it is a valid declaration of policy, coming from such a high official. We have not formally requested any confirmation. We must assume they regard themselves as still in a state of war with us.

“I’m going to allow our Head of Security, Jon Davis to discuss how this impacts us. Then I will ask for some comments and if anyone wishes to make any motions or instruct us what actions to take on behalf of Home we will discuss that and vote on it.”

Jon stood and waited to speak until Muños was seated. He looked more irritated than angry.

“Sometimes you see someone do something so colossally stupid that it’s very hard to discuss it in polite terms. It’s an embarrassment to even witness, and you hope they will come to their senses before everyone notices. But if someone shoots themselves in the foot, the report will fade away, but no amount of quiet pretense that nothing happened will close the hole.

“North America had a perfectly good treaty that demanded very little of them and they trashed it for a cheap ploy to paint themselves as victims of the evil spacers. When facing domestic unrest, governments often look for an external enemy to grab their people’s attention. It would have been nice if they picked someone else for that game, but there really weren’t any good candidates.

“On the negative side this means we no longer have the free passage guarantee of the treaty. On the plus side nobody from Home trusted North America enough to use the provision anyway, and it appears the USNA quietly denied free passage to their own citizens. In retrospect we probably shouldn’t have asked for something we didn’t have the manpower to monitor and enforce. So they haven’t deprived us of much there.

“There’s really nothing we need to import that can’t be had someplace else cheaper and easier than North America. So tightening their embargo or adding items is pretty much theater. On the other hand we make a number of items that can’t be made yet down in gravity. They import through third parties, and they would be the ones hurt if we kept our customers from passing those goods on to them.

“They could build facilities on another hab and start up alternative production, but they have had trouble restoring a decent lift capacity. Honestly, the USNA are having trouble even making a full restoration from war damage on Earth. They still don’t have permanent replacement bridges across the Mississippi anywhere but St. Louis.

“Without a restored lift capacity they pose little military threat. Almost none directly, now that we’ve relocated translunar. They could try to blockade other Earth nations from supplying us, but one assumes those nations would have something to say about that, as it would be an act of war. I can’t imagine North America wishes to really provoke a war with other Earth powers. The USNA has quite enough trouble on their plate right now. They can hold this farce of an inactive war up as propaganda, but they don’t have the means to prosecute it.

“In my opinion, we shouldn’t dignify their declaration with a response that credits it as a serious concern. To try to caution them would imply they are a genuine threat. I’d love to be a smart-alec and say – Isn’t that cute? – but international relations should have some decorum. That’s why Mr. Muños here is better for the dignity of Home as Speaker than me. So I’ll give you back to him.” And he sat.

“Mr. Butki,” Muños called when he had the floor again. It would be bad to ignore him because he was standing waving in a high visibility safety suit of a Day-Glo lime color. To refuse to acknowledge him would be a deliberate slight, and an offensive managing of the narrative, even to voters who didn’t like or agree with him. Better to get it out of the way, because he was a bit of a hothead.

“I’m deeply offended by this dishonesty. We had a legal, ratified agreement. I want to hurt them any way we can. What are our options to punish them for breaking their word?”

“That’s a question Jon should address again, being head of the Home Militia also,” Muños said. He looked back over his shoulder, one hand trailing on the lectern, but didn’t yield it.

“You used to be able to take a case to the World Court,” Jon said, looking thoughtful. “They were pretty toothless though. Since we effectively destroyed the United Nations when they instigated a punitive expedition against us, there is no international body left to hear a complaint. It’s back to sovereign nations deciding conflicts by force of arms, as it’s been through most of history. The only public dialog left being the commentary in the public media. We’re at a disadvantage there. We’re pretty much demonized. And much of what we put on the net is blocked to their public.

“We could attack them, but it is expensive and we don’t really have any ability to destroy them. If we put our entire income as a nation towards the task I doubt it would serve to do anything but make them miserable. I don’t know about you, but I have no appetite to endlessly bombard them over words. It would simply harm your average person and never get the leaders except by a really lucky hit. You might catch a few of them with a first strike, and then they will disperse and be in remote bunkers.

“What about those huge bombs like Singh dropped on China?” Butki demanded.

“Oh, I was talking about what the militia can do. If you want Singh to bombard North America for you, you’ll have to present your case to him. Last time we discussed that in the Assembly he was more interested in assuring us he wasn’t a monster, than looking for a reason to use those warheads. He’s sitting right there if you want to ask,” Jon said with a wave of his hand. He was delighted to hand him off to Jeff.

Butki looked where Jon had gestured. Jeff didn’t regard him warmly. In fact he looked downright unfriendly. He decided he wouldn’t like what Jeff would answer and indicated he had no more questions.

Thank You, Muños thought. That look was golden. Muños didn’t expect any further motions to resume hostilities. He was just glad Butki hadn’t immediately made a clear formal motion without discussion, and demanded it be put to a vote.

“Mrs. Yolande?” Muños said, inviting her to speak. She tended to be critical. The woman had sent him some very pointed private messages about how things might be managed better. But in fairness she was right about some of them, and she wasn’t stupid by any means.

“It makes sense to me to sit back and say – OK, the ball is in your court – they made the declaration, now what do they want to do with it? What can they do with it? But what if they do come up with some scheme we haven’t anticipated to attack us?” she worried.

Jeff made a small gesture to him, barely lifting his hand from his lap. The sort of gesture a man might make at an auction to not announce to the whole room who was bidding. Muños suspected he was being given the option to see it or not as he chose.

“Mr. Singh,” Eduardo said, not without some small concern what he would say.

“They’d have to run their mouth a lot more before I would be provoked. They have no credibility with me, but if they announce they actually intend to act…I reserve the right to believe them. If they try anything or make a credible threat, I do have the means and the will to send them back to somewhere around 1400 or so, as far as having a technological civilization. I just have some standards about committing mass murder. But if things get violent then the entire nation does have a responsibility for accepting these people as their leaders. Perhaps it would be more expensive than they care to pay in treasure and blood to remove them. But if they become party to harming us, even by omission, the price can be much higher. Does that address what you wondered, Mrs. Yolande?”

“Yes, it satisfies me entirely. I’d like to make a motion,” she directed to Muños.

Eduardo nodded an acknowledgement, but held his breath.

“I suggest we should not do anything rash over foolish words, but we should formally remind the militia under Mr. Davis that we want them to act aggressively to counter any acts against us from North America. He and Mr. Singh should not doubt our mind on the matter. That we should be resolved to give them the benefit of the doubt, should they act upon a provocation, given the implicit threat in this new announcement. Also, that we petition Mr. Singh to discuss with Mr. Davis under what conditions he will lend support, so that if the need arises, they are of a mind, and don’t need to come to an understanding in the midst of an emergency. With these conditions set as a precautionary measure, I for one have confidence in our militia to respond appropriately. They’ve done so, in a measured manner in the past. But the body politic will have to decide if they agree with me,” Yolande said, sitting.

“She speaks very well, doesn’t she?” April said to Jeff quietly.

“I’d have to sit and write out a script, and refine it, to say it so smoothly,” Jeff admitted.

“Keep her in mind if you need a speechwriter,” April said softly.

Jeff was surprised. He had no idea that’s where April’s remark was headed.

“In the matter of displaying restraint with North America, but specifically ordering the militia to protect us, and to establish terms with Mr. Singh for assistance as Mrs. Yolande proposed, how do you people say?” Muños asked in the usual formal terms.

The vote wasn’t as heavy as Eduardo had hoped. It was 1,213 yea to 832 nay before there was a pause sufficient to close the poll. The number of voters was near 3,000 now so a lot of people hadn’t responded. That usually indicated they weren’t happy with how the question was framed. Perhaps Mrs. Yolande was a little too eloquent and not forceful enough.

The numbers showed on everybody’s screen and the big display behind Muños in the cafeteria, but he still announced them out loud for the record. There were several people standing and some notices that people wished to speak off com before he finished doing so.

“Mr. Donahue,” Muños said. He thought that Phil was an idiot, but at least he was a known idiot. Nobody else standing or signaling was a known quality to him. If he said something stupid perhaps it would get rejected for its source. That could defuse others saying it more effectively.

“I want to have it clarified. I mean, if we let things stand, as folks seem to be saying we should do…We are going to be at war with North America indefinitely. Do we really want to live like that with it hanging over our head every day when we wake up?”

“Then…this is a question…at large?” Muños asked, reasonably.

“Yeah, I’m not sure,” Phil said. “Isn’t there anything can be done?” Phil asked.

A fellow with very close cropped hair like vacuum workers wore stood slowly. He had on a quilted suit liner with an oversized name tag sewn on the shoulder that said DAVE in block letters. He looked stern and didn’t raise a hand, he just looked at Muños.

“Mr. Michelson, do you care to comment?” Eduardo offered. Dave nodded.

“Phil, sometimes there are no good choices. We can’t control what people say. We can only control what we say or do in response. Surely you’ve known somebody that was unhappy with you no matter what you said or did?” Dave asked.

“Yeah, the construction shack had a Russian guy for two tours. Every time I dropped something off he was rude to me. He always acted like I was going to short him on something and made me stand there and wait while he did a count. He complained about stuff like how it was boxed, like I pick the way they bag rivets at the factory. I never did anything to him,” Phil remembered. “Well, I couldn’t say his name right, to please him. But it was a mouthful.”

“Did you try to talk to him about it?” Dave asked.

“Just the first time,” Phil admitted. “It made it worse. I wish I hadn’t said anything. I just started avoiding making a delivery when he was on duty if the stuff didn’t have a rush sticker to show they were waiting on it. If I had to take stuff out I’d just say yes or no, and get out of there fast as I could.”

“That’s how most of us feel about the Norte Americanos,” Dave explained. “Anything we say will probably just make it worse. They’re not reasonable about us. You know they make all spacers look bad on their news programs. We really don’t want to fight them, like Jon said, and it’s probably better not to say anything because it will just get twisted and lied about. So about the safest thing is to just mind our own business and hope they don’t actually do something even stupider than the trash talking.”

Phil nodded and scrunched his eyebrows together thinking. “I was really bummed out when the Russian signed up for a second tour. But he finally finished that up and hasn’t been back. They seem to change who’s running North America so often now…Maybe there’ll be somebody different to deal with soon if we can just wait awhile,” he concluded.

That was a remarkable train of logic for Phil. He wasn’t the sharpest knife in the drawer. If he could be persuaded there was hope nobody else would pipe up and argue for issuing ultimatums or making a show of force with North America, Muños hoped.

“Are you satisfied to wait and see what they do then?” Dave asked Phil. That was excellent. Muños was so grateful that he wasn’t being forced to re-ask that question of everyone in a vote.

“Yeah,” Phil decided. “Better to do nothing than maybe something stupid,” he decided. He nodded agreement thoughtfully and sat down. Muños could have kissed him.

Jeff was standing before Phil was all the way seated.

“Mr. Singh, you have further comment?” Muños said, ignoring several callins on the local net.

“Not on the North American issue. It seemed well covered to me, but I have another matter that it would be very nice to have settled before a regular Assembly comes around, so a group of investors, including myself, know whether the voters will allow us to go forward with it.”

“It’s early,” Muños pointed out. Some Assemblies had run late into the night, with people calling friends back from their beds to vote on critical questions. “If there is no formal objection to hear other matters?”

A glance at the com board didn’t indicate any new log-ons, so Muños gave Jeff the nod quickly, before somebody did object.

“Everybody is aware we have a housing shortage,” Jeff said. “Mitsubishi has indicated that given the economic conditions on Earth, they can’t see their way free to start an associated habitat. We can’t safely build a fourth ring without losing our mobility. Nobody has the funds to start another habitat. I certainly don’t. So I’ve been contemplating creating small free floating housing just far enough from Home to give traffic room for safe maneuvering.

“I’d be using lunar materials, and there would be a dedicated shuttle bus to transport residents back and forth. The residents would use some Home services like the clinic, so Mitsubishi would assess what expense they represented and charge a fee. They’d have their own life support and probably a mini-cafeteria and other size appropriate support, but pay a full tax share. I’d like a vote from the Assembly that such a project be permitted, and that the people in such a bedroom community can still choose to be tax payers and Home citizens.”

There were already two people standing so Jeff decided to cut it short and sat. The more detail he added the more opportunity for someone to hear something they didn’t like.

“Mr. Alfoncino,” Muños acknowledged. Tony Alfoncino was a solid sort, who didn’t speak often.

“I have concerns that such a project might turn into a kind of slum. Also I wonder how large a project we are speaking about? Is there any chance this population will come to outnumber those living in the spun-up habitat?” Tony worried.

Jeff answered without standing. “We calculated we need to house about two hundred to make it worth doing. The most I envisioned was six hundred. It would take several years of adding modules to reach that number. Past that I think we’d be putting too much of a load on things like the clinic, and since some will undoubtedly commute across to work we might have a sort of rush hour, where the dockage would become congested. I certainly wouldn’t object if we placed a limit on un-spun occupancy right at the start.”

“How about setting some sort of standards for the design and upkeep?” Tony asked.

“We’d use the same engineering standards Mitsubishi does for M3. The design standards are mostly independent of the fact it is spun. We’d use the same criteria for lock construction and environmental margins, yearly inspections and dimensions of corridors and so forth. The things like emergency suits, combustibility standards for interior materials and sensor standards for fire, pressure and noxious vapors would all be virtually the same. They’re good standards,” Jeff acknowledged.

“Very well,” Alfoncino agreed. “If this request passes I wish it to be formally amended by the inclusion of the standards Mr. Singh mentioned, and just to make sure that occupancy number is conservative, let us hold it to a limit of five hundred, unless a future full vote of the Assembly decides to amend it. That would satisfy me to where I’ll vote to approve it.”

“Ms. Olaff?” Muños said tentatively. She’d sat down abruptly after Tony Alfoncino had finished. The young lady worked in IT for Mitsubishi, and Muños considered her very sharp.

“The same concerns, basically,” she said, making a waving away gesture. “And I don’t like change, but it is inevitable, so no point in making everyone listen to me chide the universe for not being static.”

That was surprising. She was as genuinely young as she looked, not just from life extension therapy, and Muños thought she’d be the sort to relish change.

“On the matter of allowing auxiliary residences, within the stated standards and limits. How do you people say?” Muños asked.

There was a brief surge of no votes that worried Jeff. Then the yea column pulled ahead. It went on longer than the vote about dealing with North America. The final number was nay 853, yea 1,387.

When Muños read the tally Jeff stood back up.

“Yes, Mr. Singh. Did you have another proposal? The custom is a two proposal limit,” Muños reminded him. He was a bit nervous because he wasn’t aware Jeff might bring another motion.

“No Sir. I just want to tell people that I expected a much stronger acceptance. I’m dismayed so many have reservations, but I respect that. I want to offer to listen to anyone who wants to tell me why they think the project is bad or needs changes. I’m perfectly willing to make changes to improve it or make it more acceptable to the electorate, and I’ll do everything I can to make sure it is a positive for the hab, not a negative. I really do think we need it and it’s not going to harm the real estate market or rentals. The demand is far more than this will fill. Also, most of you have noticed I’m not ashamed to make money.” –That got a round of laughter Jeff had to wait out.- “I plan on charging what the market will bear. So don’t worry that your cubic will suddenly be worth less. Especially as spun cubic will always be at a premium.”

Jon sitting on the platform, was relieved these issues were brought up after the vote instead of before. For everyone reassured by Jeff’s little speech, Jon suspected there were potentially those who hadn’t thought of those objections on their own. Jeff was brilliant, but a bit strange socially, and perhaps suffered from a bit too much honesty. An analysis he was sure Jeff and his partners would reject as residual Earth Think. Sometimes Jon felt Earth Think could be misapplied to plain old human nature.

“A gracious statement,” Muños allowed. “One hopes you’ll get some good ideas and deeper support from such communication.”

“Is there other business?” he invited.

The fellow who always want them to build a park they couldn’t afford stood up, looking hopeful.

“The park proposal sir?” Muños inquired. Unfortunately the screen behind him was already showing votes to indicate the public didn’t wish to discuss this again.

The man nodded yes, but by that time the number on the board had already cut off debate.

“We mean no animosity to you, but the people still don’t want to take time to discuss this,” Muños said waving a hand at the board. There were still negative votes coming in with it already decided.

The man nodded acceptance, visibly disappointed.

April stood up.

“Miss Lewis?” Muños said.

“If the gentleman would contact me. Conditions at Central on the moon may be more appropriate to his project much earlier than Home or any other constructed habitat. I have the ear of the sovereign, and we can at least discuss it,” April offered.

“We wish you every success,” Muños said with real sincerity. If April Lewis deflected him from making the same motion over and over every Assembly they’d nominate her for sainthood.

Muños gave one more look around and called the Assembly closed gratefully.

Chapter 24

“Three more days and we’ll rendezvous with the shuttle carrying our relief crew,” Deloris said when they did the shift switch. “They informed me it was launched early in my shift. I’ll tell Alice when I go off duty. We’ll have to drop boost for a couple hours for the changeover, and we will ride back a bit slower than they came out.”

“It hardly seems worth expending the fuel,” Barak said, after some thought. “If they waited twelve more days they could match velocity with us with a couple hour flight and spend a single day nudging it into exactly what position they want. I appreciate getting home a little faster, but I wouldn’t bother if I were paying for the fuel.”

“They’ve had a change of heart,” Deloris revealed. “When they sent the Yuki-onna out the investors felt we had a safe stable situation with the Earthies. But now that North America has repudiated the treaty our people feel less certain. The shuttle is going to bring a missile battery so the snowball has some teeth while braking into translunar space. That’s why the rush to meet us.”

“I listened to the Assembly about that,” Barak said. “I thought everybody was sure the North Americans don’t have the lift capacity to cause trouble beyond the moon right now. And if they send armed vessels beyond L1 they are inviting general hostilities again.”

“That’s what I heard too, but I noticed our bosses said, ‘Earthies’, a couple times, not just North Americans. There’s a real lack of trust. This is a lot of water,” Deloris reminded him. “If I had all my money tied up recovering it I might be a bit paranoid too. It doesn’t come out of my pay – so they can knock themselves out.”

Deloris got that abstracted look Barak had grown to know.

“And what else?” he demanded. “I can see you’re thinking about something as plain as if you said it out loud.”

“Just that they are sending a four person relief crew. Apparently they feel they need that many for a two week trip. If that’s the case our doing it for months with three was downright heroic.”

“One guy is probably the systems operator for the missiles, but yeah, we lucked out,” Barak admitted. “We got three sane compatible people who could all do their jobs. I’m sincerely starting to think that the chances of that happening were really slim. At least given the old way of picking crew. And if we hadn’t survived and dealt with it nothing would have changed. I’m going to do some research when we get back and I can have better data privacy. I want to know how the crews for early sailing vessels were chosen, and how many ships were known to be lost, not from storm or mechanical failure, but from human factors. Even with the changes in place I’m recommending, I think there is plenty of room for improvement in the process.”

“Just don’t make the process so tight you bump us off of the hiring list,” Deloris warned.

“Jeff may make the whole question moot,” Barak warned. “He may come up with tech to reduce the flight times, so things aren’t so stressed and demanding.”

“I know you’re a fan-boy,” Deloris said. “But there’s no way around the physics of it. It’s simply not going to happen.”

*

The com woke April up first. It was loud and the room lights came up automatically, which meant it was not only a priority message but one of five people who could trigger this urgency level. The lights flashed and the blaring alarm sounded again before she could pull a t-shirt on and get to the com console. Jeff sat up, but his face said he wasn’t functioning yet. He looked dazed. She checked the camera view to make sure he wasn’t in the pickup before she activated it.

Jon was looking at her out of the screen. She’d seen all sorts of expressions on the man’s face but she’d never seen him this angry. His bald head was tilted forward like he was ready to dive into the camera, and his nostrils flared in time to his breathing.

Jeff stirred behind her and muttered something. She reached back and held a palm up to him to stay out of the camera view. But he said, ‘Can’t wait.’ And walked behind her and disappeared into the bathroom. She was embarrassed he hadn’t taken the time to get dressed, but Jon was indifferent.

“The North Americans snatched Gunny out of the public area on ISSII,” he informed her.

“What? But why? Just him? He said he had a security job, an escort, with Christian Mackay and the partners Brockman and Freidman. How could they let him be snatched away?” April demanded.

“They had their charge locked down safe in the hotel and Gunny went out to get food for them. Somebody wearing a cam got a face match hit on him and they called a security team from the USNA sector to do an arrest. That’s what the stationmaster Jan is telling us.”

“He’s not a USNA citizen anymore, he has an honorable discharge and when he took Home citizenship he renounced his North American affiliation,” April protested.

“They’re insisting their computer lists him as AWOL from Hawaii several years ago. With sufficient time now that it was automatically upgraded to desertion,” Jon added.

April felt Jeff’s hand on her shoulder. She looked back and he’d finally put something on, his spex.

Jon repeated the information for Jeff, somewhat abbreviated.

“I just informed Eddie I have priority need of an armed ship, and he is diverting one already in Earth orbit to boost for ISSII at maximum acceleration,” Jeff informed them, touching his spex.

“Don’t get in a rush,” Jon pleaded, “Jan has persuaded the rest of the security team to hold off shooting their way into the North American Module and is talking with them.”

“I’m not going to allow him to be removed from the station,” Jeff vowed. “Once he’s taken off it’s out of our control. If I have to blockade them then they can sit buttoned up until I have him or his body.”

“Threaten them,” April told Jeff. “Threaten them and mean it.” Jon looked alarmed.

“With what?” Jeff asked. “Are you suddenly willing to kill a city now?” Jeff asked.

“No, but there has to be something in-between,” April insisted.

Jeff opened his mouth like he was going to speak, and then closed it. A hard smile slowly formed.

“Jon, inform Jan and the North Americans that if any harm comes to our man I will remove the Colorado River dam system from Hoover dam on downstream. I have some experience at that. If they don’t believe it tell them to examine what we did to the Yangtze River basin. We stripped it out clear to the sea. It will render Southern California pretty much uninhabitable for several tens of millions of people. They can have the joy of many more displaced persons on the west coast to deal with in addition to the mess they have in the east.”

“Are you sure you’re not speaking in anger and will regret it later?” Jon counseled.

“We are not expendable like North American citizens,” Jeff said. “They can count me merciful if that’s all I do for Gunny.”

April was nodding yes. “Jon, I was a party to the call when President Wiggen personally promised to expedited Gunny’s honorable discharge from the service. Tell Jan we can provide an affidavit to that effect. I’m sure Wiggen will be happy to give me one.”

“I still have a call open with Jan, I’ll tell him. The North Americans have a history of ignoring me. I thought maybe they’d listen to Jan,” Jon said, hopefully. “He’s been station head for about four tours now. Every time he tries to go home they find a way to foist it off on him again. I think he’s officially doing it for the Swiss again this time. He already told them to trot Gunny out and they refused. He was not amused they snatched him in the common area, and even less they won’t yield him.”

Jeff nodded. “I will ask Chen what sort of a force he can muster if Jan’s security detail is not equal to the task.”

“I won’t mention that to Jan quite yet,” Jon said. “He’s already upset and might take offense.”

*

“The local commander absolutely refuses to release him,” Jan said blandly.

How could the man look so calm with such a mess? Jon wondered. He had that sleepy eyed look that made you wonder if he was even listening.

“But his Earthside commander assured us he’d arrange his release,” Jon objected. “He has discharge documents if he’s just allowed to produce them.”

“I know,” Jan said, with an exaggerated peeved expression, “but the fellow who took over below since the last coup is sworn to God’s Warriors, and the local man is Son’s of Liberty. At least that’s what he’s saying now. I suspect he was Patriot Party until they got their butts kicked in DC and he had to be something else quickly or dead. Apparently the Sons of Liberty are almost as hard-line on Home as the Patriot Party. They diverge on issues. The God’s Warriors fellows seem more willing to compromise on Home. Don’t ask me why, I’m not about to try sorting out their official positions.”

“What can we do?” Jon offered, remembering Jeff’s preparations.

“You can’t do anything,” The Swiss fellow told him, looking suddenly hard. “In my experience, if we sit and let this fester for too long I can almost assure you they will do something even more stupid. I have sufficient competent men, and we don’t need a mob for this. They’re already putting things in position and on a timeline. My second tier men are basically babysitting the rest of the security team, to make sure they don’t lose patience and attack the North American’s entry.”

“They’re still armed?” Jon asked.

“They are both armed and camped out within sight of the American Module hatch,” Jan told him. “Only one at a time will leave to get drinks or relieve himself, but they have secure coms. If I’d tried to disarm or remove them I’d have had to fight them first. They look to be a rough bunch and disturbingly well equipped. There would be causalities, and perhaps even damage to infrastructure if I tried to remove them. They are willing to wait knowing I intend to act, not dither about. I’d much rather have them on my side as backup than engage them. Frankly they intimidate me far worse than the Norte Americanos.”

Jan didn’t look intimidated at all, but Jon took it for a compliment.

“They’re about to start, and I’d rather not be distracted. The light speed lag makes dividing my attention to you much too difficult,” Jan said, disconnecting abruptly.

*

A ring on ISSII was not a continuous torus like on Home. The various sovereign entities had their own sections with physical gaps between. The rotational radius was greater and allowed several levels with closer perceived acceleration than Home. None of the occupants wanted to be at the mercy of a central environmental system, and each had power backups of varying effectiveness. Even the water and sewer could be sealed off. This made assault or spying more difficult, exactly by design.

Jan’s men intended to start at the furthest ends of the North American module and breach pressure. Exactly how large a hole was critical. Too small a hole would just be patched from the inside. Too large to patch easily but still too slow, might allow the compartment occupants to don emergency suits. Too large a hole might render the people unconscious before they could make it past the area hatch or pressure curtain and seal it. The ideal size hole would alert the occupants the pressure was dropping by sound and their ears popping, convincing them they had one option, to flee the compartment and seal it.

The trick would be to walk these failures in from both ends to drive the entire North American crew into the central corridor and entry spaces. They had to progress at close to the rate at which they could flee the end compartments and seal them. As the growing wave of people needed more time to all clear the next hatch the attackers had to slow down slightly, or risk killing those who didn’t make it to the next compartment, before it in turn was breached.

The odds were low that the USNA had any significant number of people suited up. They only had a two person airlock to the outside, and it had no collar to dock a ship. Trying to match velocity and hang that much mass on the rotating station wasn’t possible. There might be one or two conventional suits nearby, or just the one size doesn’t fit anyone emergency versions. There were safety clips and handholds around the lock to keep anyone exiting from being immediately flung off, but normally suited workers used the larger locks at the hubs. Emergency suits were not comfortable to wear for prolonged periods, and they were easier to damage. They didn’t have the endurance of a conventional suit and refurbishing them after a prolonged use was expensive. They expected few or none to be suited up.

Jan left himself completely free of any need to direct the operation so he could sit and see it in an overview. He would only intervene and direct some action if something went wrong. His team leader had a written script on a large single sheet. Electronic failure could not make it vanish before his eyes. Each trooper was named and a timeline of their expected actions detailed under their name. All choreographed in detail from the zero time of the first charge breaching pressure.

The cameras around the module entry had been destroyed, and two flat plates with a threaded pipe fitting had been silently glued to the bulkheads on either side of the entry. When all the module personnel were driven to the central corridor and entry hall they would detonate a small shaped charge to pierce the bulkhead under the plate, and inject riot gas. Nobody was going to bust their hatch in and force entry. They could exit or stay in with the gas. Two Air Taser shooters stood ready to fry the electronics of anyone exiting in a suit, something they couldn’t do in vacuum. The corridor outside their section had the pressure curtains dropped and ventilation shut off. Nobody wanted even diluted riot gas loose in the system. It was nasty stuff.

Jan didn’t have to speak a command. Everyone had their orders. All were waiting in place and the operation would initiate at 1000. They didn’t want to catch people in their bunks or eating or naked in the shower. They wanted them to move. When the number in the corner of his screen showed 1000 there was a fraction of a second hesitation and then a sharp thump was felt through the floor as if somebody had dropped something heavy in the next compartment.

When the clock reached 1000:45 there was a second sharp pulse through the station deck. Then one at 1001:30. The next took a full minute, and the last an additional fifteen seconds. The breaching of the bulkhead and gas injection was too minor to be felt. The North Americans were stubborn. It was a full minute and thirty eight seconds before their hatch opened and someone staggered out clutching his belly and threw up in the corridor. Another fellow ran out full tilt and knocked himself senseless against the opposite side of the corridor. Two of the first half dozen were armed. They were in no shape to aim or shoot anything, snot and tears streaming down their face. One fellow exited with an empty holster, having lost his weapon before he got out.

When the North Americans opened their hatch the second phase of the drive started. Jan’s men in hard suits forced an entry at the end compartments in pairs, and worked their way in. If anyone was left behind in vacuum they would stuff them in a rescue ball and inflate it with pure oxygen and a medicated aerosol mist. Chances were good for anyone caught like that to survive without significant impairment if they were found and taken to treatment in a three to four minute window.

The module was a wreck when they were done. Every compartment breached and the bulkheads between them all opened by the suited men with what looked like a broad ax and a Halligan tool. It took about forty seconds. Less time than deploying explosive tape to make an opening.

After the last man staggered out they waited thirty seconds and suited men entered the pressurized section. They dragged out three people too sick and disoriented to find or reach the exit, including Gunny with his hands cuffed behind him.

“The evacuated sections are cleared,” his commander announced to Jan. “We had one fellow who had the hatch slammed in his face in the last compartment to be sealed off. He’s in the ambulance being taken to the clinic and starting treatment on route. He’s in his skivvies, so he might have been an off shift worker who got caught in his bunk.”

“Casualties?” Jan inquired of the team leader.

“The hard suited team working counter to rotation had an injury. When they breached the last bulkhead the fellow moved in to pry the section clear before the ax man made his last stroke. He caught a nasty gash by his elbow and the suit deployed a tourniquet. He’s riding to the clinic with the Earthie.”

“Good job. I’ll inform the Home people their man is safe before they do anything rash. They have a ship on the way here, and seem to value this fellow highly,” Jan said, excusing himself.

*

“Your man is recovered,” Jan said as blandly as noting the evening shuttle had docked.

Jon, Chen, Eddie, Jeff and April were all in a conference call awaiting the news.

“Is he OK?” April demanded from her window on the screen.

“Nobody should die,” Jan insisted. “Not even a fellow who was in vacuum for a couple minutes. But your fellow was among the last who didn’t make it out under their own power, so he was in the gas a lot longer. He is on oxygen, bronchodilators, and a sort of anti-inflammatory fog. He had to have his clothes cut off and hosed down, then scrubbed with an alcohol solution. The clinic informs me he seemed to be taking it rougher than the younger men. He’s still in a stupor. He will have some broth late today and may take a couple days to accept any solid food. I’ve unfortunately had the experience myself. I’m pretty sure this will only be an ugly memory in a few months. Just a moment, my team leader is interrogating one of the first fellows out their front hatch and is texting me…”

Jan looked down briefly reading and then reached to respond. He turned back to them, and blinked rapidly. That was a huge display of emotion versus his usual poker face.

“May I ask? There are a couple…anomalies noted in collecting your Mr. Tindal. I know you have more than the usual acceptance of genetic mods on Home. I’d not prejudiced, I have some LET mods myself. It’s one reason I’ve let them persuade me to stay on here. But…do you have some sort of strength increasing mods?”

April and Jeff glanced at each other.

“Ah, well that explains things then, doesn’t it?” Jan concluded. “How strong exactly?”

“I have to warn you. Speaking with Jan is like facing veracity software,” Eddie cautioned them. “You don’t even have to reply to be interrogated. He just observes your reaction, or lack of reaction and plows ahead to the next logical question until you are sucked dry. It makes for a very odd one sided conversation. There’s no way to resist it but to flee, or knock yourself unconscious.”

“Why do you ask?” Jeff said, not denying it.

“The North American fellow being questioned requested several times to be kept away from your Mr. Tindal at the clinic. He seemed terrified to see him unshackled. The man claimed they ambushed Tindal and Tasered him from behind, cuffed him hand and foot, and put him in an officer’s cabin since they don’t have a brig. It seems when he awakened he was somewhat irritated. He broke the hand cuffs by simply snapping them, ripped a bunk free from the decking, and was using it to batter a hole through the bulkhead. They Tasered him again through the opening when he tried to exit. It sounds like something out of a bad monster movie. They then heavily sedated him and placed three sets of cuffs on him. That explains the bruised wrists and why he’s taking so long to come around. He’s fighting the drugs they gave him and the gas.”

“It makes you stronger weight for weight than a chimpanzee,” April admitted. She had every faith in Eddie’s claims about Jan, so she saw no point in denying it. “But Gunny had a hand force grown recently. He’s been complaining it didn’t feel up to full strength yet. If you want the treatment come out to Home when things are settled. We’ll introduce you to the doctor.”

Jan’s sleepy eyed look faltered for a moment. “Really? Your man didn’t seem particularly impaired, ripping his way through the bulkhead. As to the offer, I’ll consider that. I’m unwelcome on much of Earth already. They would regard this as an abomination as vile as gills or webbed toes I’d warrant.

“That explains the other oddity. The USNA people were deeply suspicious and confused because Mr. Tindal had the wrong finger prints on his right hand. Since he was in the Presidential security detail they still take all ten finger prints, besides all the more common biometric data. They get all paranoid and upset if any datum fails to match for their people with special security classifications. I…have another priority message. A moment please.”

Jan frown and pursed his lips, covered them with a hand to send a voice message off to someone before coming back to them.

“This is most interesting. We informed North America of the refusal of their people here to follow their orders to release Master Sergeant Mack Tindal. I know – you indicated he is discharged” – Jan told April, holding a palm out to her when she scowled and leaned forward ready to argue. “I’m simply repeating their usage. I expected a storm of indignation and objections, threats of reprisals even. Instead what I have is a request to hold ‘the prisoners’ ready for transport from the same fellow whose orders they refused. The difference being he signed his orders on behalf of the Joint Committee before, and now he simply signs off as an officer of God’s Warriors.”

“Oh crap,” Eddie and Chen said simultaneously, looking horrified.

“Hmmm, you seem to understand that better than me,” Jan allowed.

“The Son’s of Liberty and God’s Warriors must have had a schism over chain of command,” Chen theorized. “I’ll go see if there is movement visible from orbit as they try to draw apart and claim territory. It’s only been a few hours since the ISSII commander refused orders, but there may be action visible already. I’m messaging some agents and contractors and will know very quickly.”

“This seems stupid given all the other troubles they’re facing, but I believe you are right,” Jan admitted. He seemed to be distracted reading further reports. “At least that’s the side that favors you, assuming they are in the ascendancy. I’ll make some inquiries myself, and in an hour or so I’ll call you and offer to share data,” he told Eddie.

“Why not? That’s the only thing that keeps the whole mess from breaking down…networking,” Eddie said. Jan and Eddie laughed like it was some insider joke the rest of them couldn’t get.

“You realize you may be sending them back to prison or death if they are being delivered up to the other faction?” Jon warned him.

“Not my problem,” Jan insisted. “What am I supposed to do with them? Find housing and support for them indefinitely on my hab? After the trouble they caused?”

“Threaten to bunk them with Gunny,” Jeff said, tongue in cheek. “They’ll beg to leave.”

“You’ll send Gunny home when he can travel?” April demanded of Jan, completely ignoring the byplay and humor.

“Yes, I believe Mr. Mackay will stay and escort him,” Jan said, “and the others will precede them. Don’t anticipate any great delay. He should be along in a couple days.”

“Thank you,” April said. “I owe you…” She wanted to say ‘one’ but it wouldn’t come out. It seemed stingy to say it after getting Gunny back.

“Indeed. Welcome to our network,” Jan told April. She saw Eddie smile bigger at that.

She was more used to doing the recruiting, but she nodded acceptance.

Chapter 25

“It’s a mess all over again. Don’t they ever get tired of this game?” Eddie asked Jeff and April.

“Chen said much the same. I assume Jan spoke to you like he promised?” April asked.

“Yes, but we’re all seeing pretty much the same stuff. Nobody has a big edge and most seem to be avoiding contact unless pushed to sortie. I think DC rattled them. Nobody wants to play tit for tat with nukes until their country is a wreck. More than a few are playing the – ‘My coms are messed up and I can’t hear you.” – game. Some vessels and forward based assets have sought local asylum. By coincidence Australia is quietly accepting some of them. They just disperse, absorb and deny them if called out on it.”

“I keep wanting some sort of stability,” April complained. “Everything they do down there still sends ripples and affects what we do. We’re still tied to their biosphere. We can’t count on them keeping promises. We can go to other countries than North America or China for trade, but even there, I’ve come not to trust any Earth alliance.”

“This is no different than it has always been in history,” Jeff said. “Nations keep treaties until they are inconvenient. Trying to see an entire nation as a person is as pointless as applying that legal fiction to a corporation.” Eddie was nodding his head in emphatic agreement.

“They could be honest and frame treaty terms in conditions,” Eddie said, “but they love to sound noble and high-minded. ‘We’ll agree to do such and such as long as we couldn’t make more money by ignoring it and going to war with you,’ sounds so cynical.”

“Home is even more of an unknown quality for Earth powers,” Jeff said. “It’s an in-your -face democracy like the world hasn’t seen since Greece. We have an even lower barrier to citizenship and a vote than the Athenians. A vote of the Assembly can move you from close ally to a state with which we are at war in a couple minutes. Central is a better choice, because they at least know they are dealing with a sovereign. Their agreements are not going to be swept away by a faddish meme or a shift in demographics.”

Jeff looked thoughtful. “You could forgive them for observing that the world is not full of serious Athenian style democracies. Maybe if we’re here in five hundred years they will concede our way has some merit.”

“Monarchies have been more durable then, haven’t they?” April asked.

“Historically, yes. Athens lasted two hundred years with setbacks. Other Greek city states fared so poorly we don’t have good records of their falls. The United States has lasted three hundred as a representative republic, as has France, but neither resembles their beginnings at all. I’m starting to think any form of self rule has either physical or numerical limits. I’m not sure what those are, but I don’t want Home to find out by exceeding them.”

“Then I’m changing my focus, and where I put my energies,” April decided. “Home is important to me. I was willing to fight to keep it. However, I’m not going to bet everything on it being here, or the same, like you said – in five hundred years. I think we may be here if they keep advancing LET. Barring a really lucky assassin or slipping in the shower. There may be no solution until we can physically leave the Solar System. You’re still thinking on that, aren’t you?” she asked Jeff.

“Yes, but I’d be lying if I said I see a clear path forward. It may be a long time and we have to abide with what we have here until then. It may even wait until we live so long we don’t mind going the slow way.”

April nodded. “Then I intend to pay more attention to Central, and support Heather in whatever way I can. I think I already have more voice as a peer there than my vote gives me here. The new people don’t know me or care what I did in the war. I was welcoming the anonymity, but perhaps that wasn’t wise. I suspect it’s too late to turn about and become loud in Home politics. It isn’t me anyhow.”

“Your strength has never been being loud,” Jeff agreed. “Even in the first couple Assemblies you were less commanding than you were a voice to shame them to do what is right.” He looked amused.

“What? You think it’s funny?” April objected.

“It is, a little, that the girl so offended at the idea of being ‘Lady Lewis’ now wants to support the monarchy so whole heartedly.”

“I guess it is,” April admitted. “We all change and grow up. Well most of us…I plan on being thoroughly adult in about a hundred years.”

Epilogue

Jeff and April went to meet Barak at the north dock. He’d been returned to the moon first by his company shuttle, then transferred to the regular Central – Home shuttle. When he exited he had a duffle and companions. Two young ladies who moved with easy confidence and zero G skills. So did Barak, April noticed. He carried himself differently than when he’d left. She liked the change.

Barak grabbed both April and Jeff with wide spread arms and hugged them as well as you can and stay attached to the deck in zero G. When he stepped back he introduced both Deloris and Alice very formally. Deloris as his captain and Alice as their environmental officer. “They both kept me alive,” he said without a trace of humor. The ladies touched palms lightly with Jeff and April. Both seemed interested in them, a little appraising, and not at all disapproving. Alice let her eyes linger on Jeff, and checked out all of him, to the point Jeff looked away and worried if he was blushing. He wondered what stories Barak had told them.

“Do you have a place to stay?” April asked. “Home is absolutely jammed right now.”

“I called my mom from the moon, and found out she was there too, off at Camelot doing some commission murals. I didn’t pop over to see her though. She’s never any fun to visit in the middle of a big project. She informed me my room is untouched and the door still knows my hand. I’m headed there for now, but I’d like to visit soon.”

“You’re welcome any time,” April assured him.

“Oh! I got the final chit for my voyage. A little smaller for the signing bonus they offered, but I was really happy to have that option before I left. Would you deposit this in your bank?” Barak asked Jeff.

Jeff looked stricken when he glanced at the Armstrong check. “This is in USNA dollars. I’m sorry to tell you my bank doesn’t deal in them anymore. They closed their payments system to me. Irwin at the Private Bank of Home still has access…Look, I’ll just take this to him for you. I don’t know the exact exchange today, but this will cover it easily.” Jeff handed him five one gram Solars and a stack of twenty bits with a rubber band around them.

“These are something new,” Barak said, looking at the top bit.

“You use them like singles or coins for small change,” Jeff told him.

Barak looked at the engraving on the gram Solars. “Dollars are that low now?” he asked, dismayed.

“I’m sorry, yes. I’m afraid they’ve dropped badly, especially the last week since there is renewed chaos in North America. You don’t have the option to demand payment in something else?” Jeff asked.

“No, I didn’t think anything of it when we signed.” His companions looked a little shocked too.

“It would have seemed quite reasonable when you left,” Jeff admitted. “I wouldn’t think ill of your employers. They had no reason to expect such a shift. I expect they must have been stuck holding quite a few dollars too.”

“We were going to go on vacation. I guess that’s out now,” Barak said, looking at the coins.

“Look, there’s all kinds of work to be had. I’ve got plenty of use for you if you want. Come see me in a couple days and we’ll find something,” Jeff promised.

“Thank you, I will. I’ll have to,” he amended, still upset. “Thanks for meeting us.” He marched off, and the women were with him like remoras.

“They’re all effectively broke,” Jeff worried, looking at them walk away.

“Barak will take them in when they find out there isn’t a room to be had. They got along with each other just fine for months in the Yuki-onna. His mom’s place is probably more comfortable. He said they were going on vacation. I took that to mean together. Well, I guess they’re all not going on vacation together now. You watch, they’ll have things sorted out before his mom gets back. Eddie could probably use the pilot right away. Or old man Larkin if Eddie can’t. The short one, who liked you, has to have suit skills. Barak does too, and can do construction or any number of things. They’ll have to turn off the com to get any peace from the recruiters once word is out that they’re looking,” April predicted. “I’m not worried about them.”

Jeff scrutinized her closely. She was unflinching under his gaze. “No, you aren’t, and I like that about you.”

“Come on. Let’s go home. I’ll make some popcorn and we can look at the moon.”

The End

The Last Part

Other Kindle Books & 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, who give them a thin technological edge in rebellion. It’s a good thing, because things get very rough and dicey.

Down to Earth (sequel to April)

http://www.amazon.com/dp/B007RGBIVK

April seems to make a habit of rescues. Now two lieutenants from the recent war appeal to her for help to reach Home. The secret they hold makes their escape doubtful. North America, the United States of North America, has been cheating on their treaty obligations and a public figure like April taking a very visible vacation there would be a good way to remind them of their obligations. Wouldn’t it? Her family and business associates all think it is a great idea. She can serve a public purpose and do her rescue on the sly too. But things get difficult enough just getting back Home alive is going to be a challenge. It’s a good thing she has some help. Why does everything have to be so complicated?

The Middle of Nowhere (third in April series)

http://www.amazon.com/The-Middle-Nowhere-April-ebook/dp/B00B1JJ7RQ

April returns home from her trip down to Earth unhappy with what she accomplished. Papa-san Santos is finishing her rescue of the Lieutenants, Her traitorous brother is dead and so many things are uncertain. The Chinese and North Americans both continue to give her and Home a hard time. But April, Jeff and Heather are gathering allies and power. China, trying to steal Singh technology, gets its hand slapped badly by Jeff and the Patriot Party in America is damaged, but not gone. Their project on the moon is not so easy for North America to shut down, especially with the Russians helping. Heather proves able to defend it forcefully. They really didn’t know she owns a cannon. The three have their own bank now, Home is growing and April is quickly growing up into a formidable young woman, worthy of her partners.

A Different Perspective (fourth in April series)

http://www.amazon.com/Different-Perspective-April-ebook/dp/B00DFL42PU

Despite winning a war against one of the world’s super powers and undertaking a mission to Earth to try to demonstrate their independence, April and her new nation still find their freedom tenuous. There are shortages and hostility and machinations against them behind the scenes. Their small technological lead on the Earthies is about the only advantage they have besides courage and sheer nerve. But they are attracting the right sort of people and if pressed, they still are capable of bold action. Home is growing physically and maturing. So is April.

A Depth of Understanding (Fifth in April series)

http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00IJ02NK8

April’s nation Home has removed itself from orbiting close to Earth, but problems continue. Their enemies try to use the United Nations to act against them, as if that isn’t a transparent subterfuge. The new Lunar nation of Central acts to help them, but at considerable cost. Meanwhile Home is expanding their reach into the solar system and gaining new citizens who appreciate opportunity and freedom. The things Home citizens decide to do, both new and old are interesting. The trouble from Earth is contained, but the whole matter is far from over.

And What Goes Around (Sixth in April Series)

http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00UR2D6SE

The nation of Home and their ally Central seem to have bought some safety by moving Mitsubishi 3 from Low Earth Orbit to a halo orbit around L2 beyond the moon. It has added some expense to stay supplied, but it has unexpected advantages too. A little extra distance works just fine when Earth has its own problems. Like April and her close friends Heather and Jeff, Home is growing, developing its own character, and becoming more independent. They really have no choice.

Paper or Plastic?

http://www.amazon.com/dp/B004RCLW68

Roger was medically discharged after his service in the Pan Arabic Protectorate, cutting off his chosen career path early. He is living in rural Sitra Falls, Oregon trying to deal with hyper-vigilance and ease back into civilian life.

When an unusual looking young woman enters his favorite breakfast place he befriends her. Little does he know he’ll kill for her before lunch and start an adventure that will take him around the world and off planet.

When you have every sort of alphabet agency human and alien hunting for you survival is the hard part. But you might as well get rich too.

Family Law

http://www.amazon.com/dp/B006GQSZVS

People love easily. Look at most of your relatives or coworkers. How lovable are they? Really? Yet most have mates and children. The vast majority are still invited to family gatherings and their relatives will speak to them.

Many have pets to which they are devoted. Some even call them their fur-babies. Is your dog or cat or parakeet property or family? Not in law but in your heart? Can a pet really love you back? Or is it a different affection? Are you not kind to those who feed and shelter you? But what if your dog could talk back? Would your cat speak to you kindly?

What if the furry fellow in question has his own law? And is quite articulate in explaining his choices. Can a Human adopt such an alien? Can such an intelligent alien adopt a human? Should they?

How much more complicated might it be if we meet really intelligent species not human? How would we treat these ‘people’ in feathers or fur? Perhaps a more difficult question is: How would they treat us? Are we that lovable?

When society and the law decide these sort of questions must be answered it is usually because someone disapproves of your choices. Today it may be a cat named in a will or a contest for custody of a dog. People are usually happy living the way they want until conflict is forced upon them.

Of course if the furry alien in question is smart enough to fly spaceships, and happens to be similar in size and disposition to a mature Grizzly bear, wisdom calls for a certain delicacy in telling him no…

The Long Voyage of the Little Fleet (sequel to Family Law)

http://www.amazon.com/dp/B00KYA9WTQ

In the first book of this series “Family Law”, Lee’s parents and their business partner Gordon found a class A habitable planet. They thought their quest as explorers was over and they’d live a life of ease. But before they could return and register their claim Lee’s parents died doing a survey of the surface. That left Lee two-thirds owner of the claim and their partner Gordon obligated by his word with her parents to raise Lee. She had grown up aboard ship with her uncle Gordon and he was the only family she’d ever known. Him adopting her was an obvious arrangement - to them. Other people didn’t see it so clearly over the picky little fact Gordon wasn’t human.

After finding prejudice and hostility on several worlds Lee was of the opinion planets might be nice to visit, but terrible places to live. She wanted back in space exploring. Fortunately Gordon was agreeable and the income from their discovery made outfitting an expedition possible. Lee wanted to go DEEP - out where it was entirely unknown and the potential prizes huge. After all, if they kept exploring tentatively they might run up against the border of some bold star faring race who had gobbled up all the best real estate. It wasn’t hard to find others of a like mind for a really long voyage. This sequel to “Family Law” is the story of their incredible voyage.

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B0167XFXM8

When Lee Anderson and her parents had discovered a new world teeming with life, it had been the dream of every explorer: they were rich beyond their imaginations. But tragedy had struck when a herd of creatures overran their camp and killed her parents.

The only other adult in her life had been their partner Gordon, who adopted her as parent. Which didn’t turn out to be easy, because he wasn’t human. He was a large intelligent alien and to Lee he was Uncle Gordon, but neither his race – the Derf – nor Humans were gracious about accepting their family relationship.

After various misadventures and strife they made others accept it, and also found that while they might not share blood, they both had exploring in the blood. Unhappy in civilization they decided to explore again – going really deep this time, far beyond established frontiers. They’d met other alien civilizations, made claim to new sources of wealth that rivaled their previous claims in value, and then headed home to present their new claims on Earth.

But a lot of things didn’t make sense. Warnings came from their Fargoer allies that not everything on Earth was as it seemed to be. This is the story of their return voyage, and the unexpected mysteries in what they had left behind.

Link to full list of current releases on Amazon:

http://www.amazon.com/-/e/B004RZUOS2

Mac’s Writing Blog:

http://www.mackeychandler.com