The Aleph Extraction

by Dan Moren

  A succession of emotions paraded across her face, starting with eager anticipation and flickering through brief trepidation on the way to cold, dispassionate analysis. Her eyes came up to meet his. “You authenticated it?”

  He’d spent the last few months of his life transforming himself into the man who was the foremost expert on this particular field – it had become more than a pretense, as with all his jobs, and he’d absorbed this knowledge down to the bones. Was there truly any difference in studying all this information to masquerade as an expert and actually being that expert? It was semantic, as far as he was concerned.

  “Of course. I ran the scans against the details from your father’s records. The mass spectrometer and half-life decay confirm it is the genuine article.” A note of wonder crept into his voice, despite his best efforts to suppress it. “I’m not sure I believed in it myself.”

  “Belief is a funny thing, Mr Sadiq,” said the woman, slowly closing the lid. “My father has been searching for this item for much of his life. And now, when it’s finally within his grasp, he’s in no position to enjoy it.” She let out a sigh. “Life will have its little ironies.”

  He made a noncommittal grunt in response, too preoccupied with the sudden sense that they were no longer alone. Two of them, he thought. Both behind him, facing his host, who was showing no sense of alarm.

  “Now,” said the woman, smiling. “To the matter of the second half of your payment.”

  He tipped his head, resisting the urge to go for the blades in his sleeves. They’d know about them anyway. “Of course. Might I say what a pleasure it is to work for a professional. A lesser person in your position might be tempted to, let us say, ‘tie up loose ends.’” He smiled mirthlessly. “But someone of your caliber is smart enough to know that I would have taken precautions.”

  Her eyebrows went up. “Oh? What kind of precautions?”

  “The usual. A secure dispatch on a deadman switch that would transmit all the details of my latest job to, let’s say, a certain Commonwealth major that I’ve recently encountered.”

  For a moment, her smile went stiff, but she recovered gracefully. That training and poise again. “Of course,” she said. Her eyes flicked behind him and then to one side, and he could tell the two people had withdrawn. He let himself relax, but only fractionally. “I don’t usually work with freelancers, you see. But I had a suspicion that with my own people in place nobody would see you coming. I trust you have no reason to think your cover was compromised?”

  “My false dossier was inserted in the Queen Amina’s local databases. Once they’re off the ship, even a cursory look will show them that there is no Dr Seku al-Kitab at Rizkin University. But beyond that, they won’t be able to locate me, much less trace me back to you.” That was the guarantee he offered to his clients.

  The hazel eyes glittered. “That had best be the case. I would hate for us to have to terminate what could prove to be such a productive working arrangement.” But, he was sure, she would have no hesitation about it. She stood. “Thank you for your services.”

  He got to his feet as well. “Of course. If our business is concluded, I trust the remainder of my fee will be transferred to my account by the end of the day.”

  “You may count on it. Let me see you out.”

  They walked back to the front of the house, and though there was no sign of anybody else on the premises he was at least able this time to spot the concealed doors that kept armed personnel at her beck and call. He expected no less of someone of her station.

  The driver was standing at attention outside and, as they stepped out the door, he moved to the rear of the vehicle, ready to open it for his passenger.

  The woman turned to him. “A pleasure doing business with you, Mr Sadiq. I hope we’ll have the opportunity to work together in the future. Perhaps I could interest you in a more permanent position in my organization?”

  He smiled. The pitch often went as such. “That is very kind, and I will certainly keep it in mind for the future. But at the moment, I am already engaged upon my next job. So I’m afraid I must move on. Still, the offer is much appreciated.”

  “A pity. Very well then. Take care, Mr Sadiq.”

  “Your highness,” he said, sketching a slight bow. Hopefully that wasn’t over the top.

  The woman smiled, though there was a tightness to it, as if she didn’t like being reminded of how everybody else saw her. Then again, he saw it more as a signal that she had much more to lose than he did, should any information about this operation become public.

  With that, he got back in the car, which pulled out the gate and headed back to the spaceport. As it turned onto the street, his sleeve chimed, letting him know that the rest of the money had been deposited in his account, and prompting him to authorize a twenty-four hour delay on the message that was in the queue. He tapped the “delay” button, and swiped the display off, then stared out the window, enjoying the feeling of the sun on his face.

  Now that his business was concluded, he was starting to feel a bit hungry. Perhaps he should stop before the spaceport for a bite to eat. Everybody said that of all the places in the galaxy to have a real, honest-to-goodness taco, Mexico City was the one to beat. And why not celebrate? After all, it wasn’t every day that one survived a meeting with the Director of the Imperial Intelligence Service.

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  There’s no “i” in “novel”, any more than there is in “team”, and a team is what it took to shepherd this book from start to finish. As always, I want to extend a heartfelt thanks to the many people who helped whip this novel into fighting shape.

  My indefatigable and sartorially splendid agent, Joshua Bilmes, helped me develop this idea from a synopsis into a real story, deftly knowing when to push and prod, but always having my back. Thanks to him and the rest of the team at JABberwocky for being the very best at what they do.

  Angry Robot’s dynamic duo of Eleanor Teasdale and Gemma Creffield deserve boundless appreciation: they were always on hand to answer questions and make things happen. Simon Spanton’s editorial guidance helped turn my rough musings into something that made a lick of sense, Paul Simpson smoothed out my gaffes, and Georgina Hewitt put together a stunning cover that I only hope the content inside measures up to. Thanks too to former Angry Robot staff Marc Gascoigne, Mike Underwood, Nick Tyler, and Penny Reeve for their enthusiasm for this book’s predecessor.

  As always, I entrusted early versions of this manuscript to some crack beta readers, including Jason Snell, Antony Johnson, Gene Gordon, and Anne-Marie Gordon. If even the slightest error remains in the text – whether factual, scientific, or grammatical – the blame is mine and mine alone.

  Let us not forget the value of moral support in these trying times. Fellow authors and bahn-migos Adam Rakunas and Eric Scott Fischl definitely spent way more time hearing me bang my head against a wall than anybody should have to endure, and thanks as well to the rest of the Literarily the Worst crew, and all my friends at The Incomparable and Relay FM. Special thanks to Brian Lyngaas, Jason Tocci, Tony Sindelar, Jordan Atlas, Evan Ritt, Keith Bourgoin, and Phil Chu for always being there.

  Harold Moren and Sally Beecher are, as ever, my most ardent supporters, and I could not have done this without their love and encouragement, even if they probably wonder whether or not I’ll ever get a real job. To the rest of the Beecher/Kane/Moren clan, you’re still the best family anybody could ask for.

  Finally, to my best friend, partner, and now wife Kat, who, when I told her that I would be writing a book at the same time we were planning a wedding, still agreed to go through with it all, even though I had to turn in this manuscript about a week after the big day. You are my very favorite person: thank you for putting up with all my agonizing over a single word or comma, talking endless plot threads, and generally being a pain. Love you.

  CHAPTER 1

  “The top story tonight – military sports continue to dominate ratings for the twentieth strai
ght week, with the Army’s World’s Best Ranger Competition capturing over 100 million viewers in the coveted prime time slot. Even bigger is this year’s Boarding Action, which pits space-based crews in a simulated boarding of a hostile vessel in zero-gravity. The highest rated civilian sport is still the American NFL, but it doesn’t even come close, with less than fifty percent of military sports’ audience share in that coveted 18-39 demographic. It truly looks like the new age of military training competitions as a civilian spectator sport is here to stay.”

  JENNIFER SALVATORE, MEDIA MIX

  “Now this,” Captain Jane Oliver said, gesturing through the hatch of the Defiant Class response boat, “is a really bad place to put your shotgun.”

  The students in the boat maintenance class crowded closer, squinting through the fluorescent overhead lights at the weapons clasps. Then they stood back, looking at her with blank expressions, nobody wanting to question the wisdom of such a high-ranking officer. The instructor was used to Oliver pausing in her daily rounds to take over the class, and had patiently stood aside, but he spoke now. “Ma’am, that’s the proper place for long guns. That’s why the clasps are there.”

  “That’s real nice,” Oliver replied, “but you try getting it out of those rubber bands in four-foot swells when you need it in a hurry. In the clasps for inspection. In the seat-sleeve for ops. Trust me on this.”

  She smiled and the students smiled with her. To them, a captain was akin to a god, and she knew the reminder that their leaders rode the same rough seas they’d be tackling went a long way. She also knew there were precious few officers at her level that still did.

  “That’s gear adrift, captain,” one of the students ventured. The rest glanced from his face to Oliver’s in shock, and then with admiration once they realized that she wasn’t annoyed by being challenged.

  “New rule,” she said, “unless there’s water on the deck, gear isn’t adrift. You can quote me on that. Now, are you insulting your coxs’un? Saying he can’t keep water off the deck?”

  She gestured to the two students with coxswain qualification badges, and the class laughed. “No, ma’am.”

  “Thought so!” She grinned. In the years since they’d assigned her here, she only ever smiled when she succumbed to the temptation to take over the classes and give them the real scoop on what life was like in the boat forces. And as the commanding officer of the training center, she could only do that once in a blue moon. The rest of the time was a video on repeat in her head – her shouting to Kariawasm to pour on the throttle, Tom’s boat coming apart under a hail of autocannon fire.

  The instructor exchanged a look with Commander Ho. Her XO only smiled. If Oliver was frustrated with being pulled off operational duty, then Ho was thrilled. The sterile halls and quiet contemplation of the schoolhouse suited him just fine. She felt a pang of jealousy at his obvious contentment and squashed it an instant later. She had promised herself that she wouldn’t let Tom’s death make her bitter. She would be happy for the happiness of others, and if she couldn’t feel it, then she would damn well fake it.

  She turned back the class and paused. Captain Sean Elias was walking through the maintenance bay doors. Behind him, the York River twinkled in the Virginia sun. He was wearing his “tropical” blue uniform, the hard shoulder boards and pressed shirt that he only wore for important business. That he’d come to find her in the boat maintenance facility instead of waiting in her office was troubling.

  “OK, Chief,” she said to the instructor, “I think I’ve stolen enough of the class’s time, you have the conn. Thanks for indulging an old lady.”

  “It’s our pleasure ma’am,” the instructor said, but she saw his shoulders relax as he returned to the lesson.

  Ho was at her side as she shook Elias’ hand. “Hey Sean, you clean up nice.”

  Elias glanced down at his crisp uniform as if he were surprised to be wearing it. “Sorry to interrupt, you looked like you were on a tear there.”

  “Nah,” Oliver said, “I was just wrapping up.”

  “That’s a lie,” Ho smiled.

  Elias laughed. “Yeah, I don’t believe that for a minute. Jane, do you mind if we do this in your office?”

  Oliver cocked an eyebrow. “Depends on what we’re doing. You look like you’re about to summon me to a court martial.”

  “No, nothing like that. Just something best done in private.”

  Oliver’s office was just plush enough to convey her authority to subordinates, but not so well appointed that Oliver might start thinking she was an admiral. A long, glass-surfaced cherry-wood desk dominated the blue and gold rug, emblazoned with the crossed anchors of the Coast Guard. Behind the desk, a broad oil painting depicted the Coast Guard’s sole Medal of Honor winner evacuating marines off Guadalcanal in a hail of machine gun fire. The same family picture she’d had on the Aries occupied the credenza beside her challenge coin display, Tom smiling out at the camera as if he would be waiting for her when she got off duty.

  Ho’s office was adjacent, but she motioned for him to stay, and he leaned against the credenza as Elias took his seat in the chair she reserved for students who were in her office for an ass chewing. She’d deliberately chosen chairs with short legs in order to make her charges smaller than her. She hadn’t intended the effect for Elias, but she was glad of it anyway. If she didn’t know what he was here to do, let him be intimidated while he did it.

  “OK,” she said, “what’s this all about?”

  “You want the good news or the great news?” Elias spread his hands.

  “How about the cut-the-bullshit-news?”

  Elias bit back his smile, “Well, there’s a star for you, if you want it.”

  She saw Ho stir out of the corner of her eye. He was normally as still as a crocodile until he had to move. This was as much of a tell as a man like him gave. Oliver didn’t move, but it was a long moment before she answered. Whatever she’d expected Elias to say, it wasn’t this.

  “I’m pushing thirty years in,” Oliver said. “I can’t take a star.”

  “Yeah, well. They’re willing to make an exception in this case. We can get you a waiver, and in this command, you’ll… uh… well, you’ll age more slowly.”

  “What the hell are you talking about?”

  “The 16th Watch, Rear Admiral Select,” Elias leaned forward, grinning, “the Moon.”

  Oliver felt her stomach turn over. The image of Tom’s small boat ripped in two swamped her. She was there again, wrenching the frozen handle as she watched the wreckage of her husband’s ship settle into the snow-like surface.

  “I’m a blue water coastie.” Oliver had to speak slowly to keep the tremor out of her voice. “I’ve been on the Moon exactly once. This has to be some kind of mistake.”

  Elias shook his head. “No mistake, Jane. They want you on SAR-1.”

  “You can’t want an O6 kissing retirement to run search-and-rescue in a domain she isn’t familiar with.”

  “SAR-1 is now part of the Tactical Law Enforcement Detachment on Mons Pico.”

  “SPACETACLET,” Oliver said. “The lunar head shed. What’s SAR-1 doing attached there?”

  “SPACETACLET is the command element now. The Commandant wants a unified presence for all lunar ops. Law enforcement and SAR are one body. Putting SAR-1 front and center sends the right message.”

  “And what does the old man want me to do with SAR-1?”

  Elias gestured at the silver eagles stitched to her collar. “You’re a leader. He wants you to lead it.”

  Oliver stared at him so long that Elias began to talk to fill the silence. “Look, Jane. SPACETACLET was the main responding element at Lacus Doloris after you were knocked out of the fight. They lost people.”

  Before she knew what she was doing, Oliver had leaned forward, covering her face with her hands. She remembered the Quick Reaction Force prying the hatch open, dragging her out. She remembered them cracking the hardshells of Flecha and Kariawasm’s suits, la
ying them out on silver blankets on the regolith despite the lack of atmosphere. It didn’t matter, they didn’t need air anymore. Somewhere less than a hundred yards away, she knew the Navy corpsmen were going through the same ritual with her husband’s body.

  When she looked up again, Elias’ face was inscrutable. “Morale is low on Pico, Jane.”

  She stumbled over the next words, desperately searching for something to say. “Chief Elgin and Petty Officer McGrath… are they still attached?”

  Elias nodded. “Both of them were due to rotate out last year. They requested extensions. Chief pulled in every card he had to stay put.”

  Elias looked uncomfortably at Ho. “Jane, maybe it would be best if…”

  “Commander Ho has been with me for my entire career. Anything you can’t say in front of him can’t be said.”

  Elias shrugged. “Look, Jane. We both know you’ve been… adrift since Tom died. Are you sure you’re ready to retire?”

  “That’s condescending as fuck. I’ve made it through worse.”

  Elias’ position in the sunken chair didn’t intimidate him at all. “We’re all worried about you.”

  “Who is?”

  “I am, everyone in the C-suite is. The boss is.”

  Oliver swallowed the anger that rose in the back of her throat. Tom’s death was hers. Her loss. Her fault. It wasn’t for Sean or any of the top brass or even the goddamn Commandant himself to be deciding what that meant to her. She paused, steadying her breathing before she answered. “The Commandant doesn’t know who I am.”

  Elias sighed. “You’re the legendary ‘Widow Jane.’ Of course he knows who you are.”

  Oliver remembered an interrogation she’d done of the head of a metal theft ring, stealing copper wire out of offshore buoys. The man had an odd tic – whenever he was hiding something, he would lick his lower lip, darting just the tip of his tongue out to barely sweep it before reeling it back in. Elias did that now. Oliver’s eyes narrowed. “Look, I appreciate the routine to make it seem like it’s in my own best interests, but you’re not here because you’re worried I’ll wilt in retirement. You want something. The Commandant wants something. I don’t know a damn thing about space, Elias. I’ve been a blue-water coastie my whole career. The one tour I had out there was cut short after… what happened.”