Unreconciled

by W. Michael Gear

  Dan watched as they parted; Ituri headed for the door. Every eye in the place was glancing back and forth between Ituri and Allison, and most of them were covetous. No doubt imagining with salacious detail what Ituri had just enjoyed in Allison’s bed.

  For her part, Allison stopped to deposit something in the cage at the back of the room. First and foremost, Allison was a businesswoman. Dan could count the men she’d sell her sex to on two hands. Whatever Ituri had offered to bed Ali, it must have been worth a small fortune. But then, the man could pay. He was Kalico Aguila’s head engineer down at Corporate Mine.

  Dan inclined his head graciously as Allison turned his way. She paused only long enough at the tables to share a greeting and smile with the patrons. Called, “Vik! Another whiskey for Lee Halston.”

  With an almost predatory smile, she sidled up next to where Dan was keeping an eye on the roulette table as Shin Wong called for bets.

  Dan asked, “Have a nice time?”

  She gave him a conspiratorial wink. “I wouldn’t screw him if I didn’t. No matter how much plunder he offered.”

  “So what did he offer?”

  “Turquoise. Ever hear of it before?”

  “Yeah, I might have. Blue-colored stone, right? What’s the big deal?”

  “The deal is that Lea Shimodi, that Corporate geologist that works for Aguila, was down on the south continent. Found a big copper deposit. I guess it’s a kind of desert down there. Something about it’s got to be dry, and there’s aluminum involved, and anyhow, the conditions are right for this deep-blue turquoise. The first ever found on Donovan.”

  “What’s it worth?”

  “Haven’t a clue. It’s a chunk the size of my fist. The important thing is that it’s the first piece ever found on Donovan. Shimodi wrote it up in her notes. Described it.”

  “How’d Ituri get it?”

  “He made a bet with Shimodi. Some technical thing about the Number One mine down at Corporate. She lost.”

  Dan flipped his toothpick to the other side of his mouth, delighted to watch as C’ian Gatlin lost an entire stack of chips betting odd on the roulette table.

  “Anything else interesting down at the mine?” Dan asked.

  Allison twitched her lips in disappointment. “Ituri made some kind of deal with Aguila to get to come back here. He takes it seriously. He doesn’t let slip about anything critical or salacious. Any kind of talk about the mines or the Supervisor is strictly off limits.”

  “Yeah, too bad. It’s like the good Supervisor has stopped all of her leaks over the last year. Did you ask about Kalen Tompzen?”

  “No. I didn’t want to even hint that we had an interest in him.” Allison stopped long enough to greet the bootmaker, Rude Marsdome, and Bernie Monson from the clay pit as the two strode in the door.

  As they retreated to the pinochle table, Dan said, “Listen, it’s been over a year since we’ve seen or heard from Kalen. We’ve had feelers out to the other marines that serve with him. We know he’s still alive down there. So my best guess is that she finally figured out that he was our agent. That we had our claws into him.”

  Dan made a face, gestured with his toothpick. “I gotta hand it to Aguila, if she finally narrowed it down to Kalen, she’s put the screws to him. Not that Kalen is the toughest of birds to start with, but she’ll have sweated him for everything we had on him.”

  Allison waved to Fenn Bogarten as the chemist entered, headed back to join the others at the pinochle table. To Dan she said, “Just be glad she didn’t order this place off limits after she found out.”

  “If she wanted to make something of it, she’d have sent Tompzen’s corpse, or at least a couple of his body parts our way. That she hasn’t speaks volumes.”

  “At this stage, given time for tempers to cool, perhaps we could make her a deal for Tompzen. Buy him back. Ever since Benteen killed Art Maniken, we’ve needed a good enforcer.” She gave him an amused sidelong glance. “You don’t have the same brute touch that Art had. By nature, you’re much too subtle.”

  “I’ll mention it the next time I see the wily cunt.” Fact was, he did need a good enforcer. Not that he was above slitting a throat now and then, but too many such doings affected his standing in the community. Who the fuck would have ever thought that maintaining a reputation could be such hard-sucking work?

  Allison arched a slim eyebrow. “Why don’t you let me? Aguila and I don’t have the same history that the two of you do. But enough of that. While I was relieving Desch of his built-up stress, what did you learn at the meeting with the triumvirate? That ship really coming in?”

  What’s your game, Ali? Building an alliance with Aguila? Strengthening your position at my expense?

  Dan gestured his dissatisfaction. “Oh, Ashanti’s coming in, all right. But she’s a mess. Turns out they’ve been locked in that bucket of air for ten years. Word is that the transportees got out of hand, so the captain, a guy named Galluzzi, welded them in. Bottled them up in their quarters.”

  “God, that sounds . . .”

  “Yeah, gets worse. Shig said that according to the ship’s records, they gleefully murdered each other to start with, and ended up eating their dead. Having been sealed in without crayons or color markers, they practiced art on each other with knives. And in the process, they’ve elevated some guy called Batuhan into a sort of guru messiah who interprets for three babbling prophets. Batuhan’s calling for some sort of galactic jihad that’s supposed to end in the universe having itself for supper and being reborn in purity like him and all his fawning acolytes.”

  Allison’s lips tightened in distaste. “That for sure?”

  “I guess so. Shig’s clap-trapping weird over it. Remember Shig? The bipedal Buddha? Never-got-his-balls-in-a-knot Shig? That guy? Well, he’s fart-sucking freaked about the transportees.” Dan glanced at the palm of his hand where he’d written it down so he wouldn’t forget. “They call themselves Irredenta. Means something about being culturally unique in someone else’s territory.”

  “They still scheduled to make planet in a couple of months?”

  “Give or take.”

  “So, what’s the plan? Just let a bunch of cut-up cannibals land at the shuttle field?”

  “We’re thinking of Tyson Station. Supposed to be an abandoned base somewhere out west.”

  Allison grunted under her breath. “I lived out there for a while. My parents died there while I was in school here in Port Authority. After Clemenceau was no longer in the picture, they were going to close the station down. Mom and Dad stayed behind to finish up some research. They found Mom’s skeleton. Never did find what happened to Dad. Not a trace.”

  “Apparently some of Ashanti’s scientists and some of the crew are still sane. Since the ship’s Corporate, the cargo manifest has gone to Aguila. She’ll share it with the rest of us as soon as she has a chance to go through it. As to what happens to Ashanti, that’s up in the air. Word is that the crew just want to be dirtside for a while. That for most, ten years in that bucket is enough.”

  “Aguila going to claim them like she did the Turalon deserters?”

  “Maybe. I don’t know. My take was that Aguila’s still figuring this thing out.”

  “We’d better be figuring, too,” Allison mused. “Ship’s crew? They’re going to be hitting dirt, looking for any kind of diversion, and they’re going to be coming here.”

  “Yeah, all looking for a good time, and the randy marks aren’t going to have a cent to their names.” He paused. “There’s opportunity in that.”

  She tapped a slender finger on his chest. “But carefully this time, Dan. We don’t want a replay of the Tosi Damitiri mess.”

  Figures you’d bring that up.

  Was she trying to piss him off? Remind him of how that had almost turned into a disaster?

  Dan nodded, thinking. “You m
ight want to talk to Aguila sooner rather than later regarding Tompzen. Something makes me think we’re gonna need a good enforcer. And the thing about Tompzen is that he’s proven that he’s not squeamish if it comes to a little blood and pain.”

  9

  Ashanti looped around Capella, using the star’s gravity to decelerate. As it did the ship’s energy fields scooped up the dense solar wind, harvesting hydrogen for the reactors. With fuel to burn, and the generation of one-and-a-half gravities of thrust to slow their velocity in relation to Donovan, Ashanti entered the final course corrections on her seemingly eternal voyage.

  The ship might have been structurally rated for a two-g acceleration, but after having been lived in for ten years, many of the constructions, such as ad-hoc shelving, plant stands down in hydroponics, and make-do repairs were not.

  For Miguel Galluzzi and his crew, it was a constant scramble to deal with one minor calamity after another. Pumps failed, pipes began to leak, and so far as Galluzzi was concerned, the activity was a godsend. His people were constantly occupied, and they had to be extra careful. Every move had to be planned. He went to the extent of having them employ safety harnesses to go up and down stairways. Even a simple slip or fall at 1.5g could have dire consequences. No one had time to think about Donovan and what disembarking was going to necessitate.

  Of course, Galluzzi’s crew weren’t the only ones to notice. Every time the captain stepped into the AC, the board was flashing messages from Deck Three.

  He checked a few. In among the usual propaganda about the coming end of the universe as he knew it, were demands for information. Unsurprisingly, each came with a threat, that if it were to be unanswered, dire consequences would ensue.

  Galluzzi considered that as he stared at the holo of Freelander where it was projected over his worktable. He had taken to wondering about the derelict, had spent hours staring at the dead vessel. Had read all of the reports and logs Supervisor Aguila had sent him.

  He’d barely survived ten years. How did he get his head around Jem Orten facing what he thought was an eternity lost in nothingness? On Freelander they had murdered the transportees. Jem and his first officer had welded themselves into the AC and ultimately used a pistol to blow their brains out.

  Just because my actions weren’t as extreme, it doesn’t absolve me of my failures.

  Galluzzi—seated in his captain’s chair—was reading through the latest list when Derek Taglioni minced his way into the captain’s lounge on carefully placed steps.

  “Can’t believe my back hurts so much,” Taglioni noted. “Makes me wish I’d built up to this. That, or we’d practiced for a couple of hours every day.”

  Galluzzi glanced up at the bulbous shape of Freelander where it was projected from the holos. “Won’t be long. Another couple of days. Just about the time you start to adapt, we’ll shut down. Ashanti’s got the final course plot. It’s just a matter of watching the hours count down.”

  He flicked the image of Freelander off and replaced it with a holo of Cap III, Donovan, as he reminded himself to say.

  Moving like an old man, Taglioni seated himself in Turner’s seat at the nav panel. “Hope the Unreconciled are enjoying it. Wonder what they make of all this?”

  Galluzzi tapped the side of his head. “Playing some of their latest demands and threats on my implants now. ‘As the fire is to the wood, so are the Irredenta to you and the rest of humanity. You are about to burn, for only as ashes will you finally reap the true reward of being.’

  “And here’s another: ‘You cannot hide the truth. We know we are nearing Capella III. As we emerge from the womb of transformation, it will be to expand upon a wave of blood. Upon it we shall ride, consuming the ignorant, devouring their being, until reborn in blood they shall be made whole and will know illumination.’”

  Galluzzi winced. “This one is my favorite: ‘The moment of our release is at hand. The universe shall see to this. Upon the instant of our release, you shall know the fulfilling rapture of terror. In it, you shall be reborn and find immortality.’”

  “I’ve heard it all before.” Taglioni stared absently at Donovan where it spun before them. “You don’t think that just maybe we’ve got it all wrong, and he’s talking in metaphors?”

  Galluzzi shot him a chiding look. “Want me to access the photos of the butchered remains they’ve sent down the chute to hydroponics?” He paused. “And don’t forget that we sampled their sewage before it was sent to the tanks. More than enough human myosin II was found in their feces to pretty much discount the notion they were only biting their nails.”

  “So what does Supervisor Aguila say about all this?”

  “She sent a message to the Irredenta that she asked me to forward on for her. It stated that a research station was being made ready for them on Donovan. That upon disembarkation, subject to contract, each individual would be evaluated and suitable employment would be provided.”

  “She’s got to be kidding.”

  “Whatever else she may turn out to be, she is a Corporate Supervisor, and by making the offer, she’s covered all of her contractual obligations. The Irredenta replied in a most colorful way. They informed the Supervisor that they would consume her corpse in a community feast. That the pollution of her existence could only be purified through the concerted action of each and every true believer.”

  “You forwarded that to the Supervisor?” Taglioni asked. “I’d have loved to have seen the expression on her face.”

  “My take on Kalico Aguila is that the woman isn’t your rank-and-file Corporate Supervisor. A fact you might keep in mind when dealing with her. Her reply, which was radioed in almost immediate return, was ‘Please inform them that they’re going to have to age me for a couple of weeks since I’m a lot tougher than they realize. And they’d better have an ample helping of salt and pepper on hand.’”

  Taglioni smiled at that. “Tell me you didn’t send that on to Batuhan and his merry band of man-munching fiends.”

  “I do have some good sense.”

  “I’ve been reading the reports the Donovanians have sent up. What do you make of them?”

  Galluzzi fixed him with a measuring glance. “I had to look up the word ‘libertarian.’ If there’s a total and complete opposite of Corporate, that’s it. Dek, that planet down there is a free for all. Corporate Mine, for what it’s worth, is structured, ordered, and Corporate in nature. A person can know where he or she stands. Where he or she fits.

  “Port Authority on the other hand? It’s chaos. How do they live? Who takes care of them? What’s this market economy they’re so taken with? No one’s in charge. Just stumble along on your own. Who keeps people from making a mistake? And if they do, they have to take full responsibility for it. No equitable redistribution. No management whatsoever. How do they even make it through a day?”

  Taglioni said with smile, “Funny thing. I dreamed of that planet last night. Like it was singing to my bones. Call me crazy, but it’s like I’m coming home to a place I’ve never been before. I can’t wait to set foot down there and see what chaos feels like. Sounds remarkably liberating and terrifying all at once.”

  “You’re kidding, right? Port Authority exists in defiance of everything your family has believed going all the way back to the founding of The Corporation. And they live behind a fence for shit’s sake. Because the wildlife can creep in and eat people. You read that, didn’t you? That the gates are locked at sundown. And if we’re not inside, that they won’t come out looking for us.”

  Taglioni grinned wider. “I went to one of the rewilding reserves on Earth when I was a kid. Stepped outside at night. Knew that there were lions and tigers out there. That I could be eaten. Liked to have scared myself to death.”

  “You’ve seen the holo taken during the Tempest expedition? Of Donovan? The first guy to die down on that rock? That thing, the quetzal, eating him alive? An
d you find that exciting?”

  Taglioni nodded, expression turning thoughtful. “Looking back, Miguel, I have trouble remembering who I was the day I stepped on board Ashanti. I’m not that Derek Taglioni.” He looked down at his hands, spread the fingers, inspected the palms. “I’ve scrubbed caked shit out of the insides of toilets. Fought to keep from puking while I hung over the ferment tanks to repair the agitators down in hydroponics. Hell, I could qualify for a Ship’s Technician Level I rating. I’ve crawled into raceways, come within a whisker of electrocuting myself. Carried the dead bodies of men and women I considered friends down to hydroponics after they committed suicide. I eat at the common table in the crew’s mess. So, compared to that arrogant scum-sucking Corporate prick who strolled aboard back in orbit off Neptune, who the hell have I become?”

  Galluzzi gave him a slight nod. “Once I would have died before I said this, but perhaps you have become a human being?”

  “Makes you wonder, doesn’t it? Looking back, I was a sort of monster once. Now I have become human, and down on Deck Three all those perfectly humdrum humans have become monsters. How—on the scales of universal justice—does that balance out?”

  Galluzzi stared thoughtfully at the projection of Donovan. “Maybe you’ll find an answer on Cap III.”

  “What about you?”

  Galluzzi shook his head. “I don’t have a clue. Once the last of those people are down-planet, I wonder if I won’t just disintegrate into atoms and fade into nothingness.”

  10

  The one-and-a-half gravities had been like an endless torture. Locked as they were in the confines of Deck Three, it wasn’t like the Irredenta had any avenue open to them but monotonous endurance. It didn’t matter that over the years, more and more ration came tumbling out of the conveyor in the mess. These days—eat as much as a person might—he or she just didn’t gain flesh.