Vale of Stars

by Sean O'Brien

  He had enough of his faculties to remember where Kuarta Verdafner lived, however.

  Chapter 11

  Dunbarston had gathered his entire twelve-person force and had equipped them with full riot ordinance. Tann could not help but nod in satisfaction when he met the New Chicago police captain at the transfer tube precisely at noon. It had been a scant twelve hours since the raid on the Halfner apartment and only five since Onizaka’s treachery.

  “Sir. We’re all ready. We’ve got both our transports prepared,” Dunbarston explained, his eyes darting to the few wirebus passengers who looked at the assemblage with curiosity. The wirebus had stopped to pick up and drop off passengers and light freight at the New Chicago/Valhalla transfer tube. At least a dozen people were seated in the bus with their windows open, all looking intently at Dunbarston and his riot force. He shifted in his armor, adjusting his screamer carbine slung over his shoulder. The man’s discomfort was obvious—he was anxious to get Tann and his force inside the transports.

  “You have verified the mutant is in the Verdafner’s apartment?” Tann said casually, making no attempt to keep his comment from the civilian passengers. He had deliberately designated the transfer tube as the staging area for Dunbarston’s officers, aware of the civilian traffic they would encounter.

  Dunbarston stammered, “Yes, sir. Two of our constables confirm that the two parents and the child entered the apartment building about four hours ago. We’re ready to get into the transports,” he repeated lamely. Again, he glanced at the wirebus and saw that at least some of the passengers had heard the comment. There was a general commotion inside the bus. Dunbarston swore silently, then added, “Sir, we should get going. If you are worried about a riot, the more time we delay, the more—”

  “Oh, I’m not particularly worried about a riot. If one was going to happen, it would have happened by now, right, Captain?”

  “I’m not sure, sir. If—”

  “No matter. Let’s go,” he said, and, almost cheerfully, entered the nearest of the two transports. Dunbarston directed his force to their trucks and the fourteen men and women headed to New Chicago’s residential sector.

  This time, the officers did not cast their eyes downwards in shame for what they were about to do. This time, they looked at each other with bold camaraderie. They checked each other’s gear and made minor adjustments to armor straps and helmet fittings. They checked and rechecked communications gear with a businesslike air. Tann watched with detached interest. An officer sitting opposite him on one of the seats caught his eye.

  “Didn’t think we’d be back here so soon, Mr. Tann,” she said, grinning behind her faceplate.

  “Nor did I.”

  She grunted and cast her eyes over Tann’s bruised forehead. She gestured with her chin and said, “How’d you pick that up?”

  “A disagreement with a colleague.”

  She stuck out her lower lip and nodded crookedly. “Must have been some disagreement. Have anything to do with this mutant?”

  Tann was spared the necessity of fabricating another lie by Dunbarston’s angry voice. “Kolski! Quiet down and stay focused.”

  Kolski glanced at Dunbarston. “Yes, sir,” she said, but Tann’s practiced ears heard the disrespect behind her words. He watched her as she settled back into her seat. She had said the word “mutant.” Obviously, Dunbarston would not have briefed his police using loaded language such as that—this Kolski must have picked up the term elsewhere. Tann smiled. He had made a few calculatedly injudicious remarks to prominent people in New Chicago before leaving Valhalla, and the rumors were already flying. The rest of his plan could not be far from fruition.

  Only a few minutes later, Tann heard the driver grunt something in the forward compartment.

  “What?” Dunbarston said.

  “A disturbance ahead, sir. Looks like rioters.” The driver slowed the vehicle as the five officers in the back of the truck tensed.

  Dunbarston twisted in his seat and studied the vehicle’s tactical display. “Dammit! All right, let us out. I don’t want to take the truck into them.” Dunbarston grabbed the radio and ordered the second police vehicle to stop as well. Tann grabbed hold of a strap above him to steady himself as the truck braked to a stop.

  The rear door opened and the five officers scrambled out and formed a double-file line with their counterparts from the other van. By the time Tann had climbed out of the truck, all twelve of them were assembled and awaited Dunbarston’s orders. Tann could hear the distant din of angry humanity from ahead. The two drivers had placed their vehicles behind one of the other apartment towers in the residential sector, out of sight.

  Dunbarston shouted his instructions to the force. “Squad A will disperse the riot using screamers when possible, paralyzers when they must. Squad B will break into three pairs and detain or arrest anyone who openly defy police or deface public property. Any threats to Dome integrity take precedence—if you see anyone with a weapon that could conceivably damage the Dome, you are to take action immediately to prevent such destruction. That goes for squad A, too. If we get into a fight with the rioters, form up into a phalanx and assume full defensive posture. We’ll use numbjel if it gets too wild.” He looked the group over. “Any questions?”

  There were none, or if there were, no officer voiced them. Dunbarston nodded to the two women (one of whom was Kolski, Tann noted) at the head of the lines. They started off towards the rioters, the group designated as squad A forming a horizontal line and advancing behind their clear plastic shields. The second group paired up and followed them.

  Dunbarston motioned to Tann. “Come inside with me. We can monitor from there,” he said, climbing back inside the truck. He switched on a bank of monitors positioned in the upper corners of the truck and adjusted some other controls. The view on the monitors was evidently from the helmets of the police officers. The shots were clear and steady, and as Tann watched, he could see the lead officer of squad A round a corner and come face to face with the riot.

  Dunbarston switched a toggle and the truck was filled with angry shouts.

  “Kolski, go ahead and break it up,” Dunbarston said. Tann looked at the screen, leaning forward in his seat to do so. Something was wrong here—almost all the rioters he could see were facing the building but had not gone inside. Kolski’s viewpoint was blocked past one or two layers of people; Tann could not see closer.

  Dunbarston said, “Kolski, float your camera. I need a top-down.” As he spoke, he grabbed a joystick controller on the panel before him. The picture shook a bit, then everything in the shot descended, as the camera flew upwards. The ground tilted crazily, and then the remote camera was floating above the riot, under Dunbarston’s control. Now Tann could see why the rioters had not entered the building. There were perhaps fifty people outside trying to get in, but Tann could see a line of people, argies and shippies, blocking entrance to the apartment building, their arms linked together at the elbows.

  Kolski and her officers started to shove their way past the outermost layer of the crowd to the building itself. Tann followed their progress on the bird’s-eye view he was afforded by the floatercam.

  “Kolski, get up to the door and disperse this mob. Everyone—including those people guarding the door—is to vacate the area.”

  “Yes, sir.” Kolski grunted, working her way through the crowd. No one jostled her—in fact, most of the rioters, once they realized who was pushing them from behind, moved aside with minimal resistance. Kolski and a brace of officers made it to the front and shouted for the crowd to go home.

  “There’s a mutant in there!” several people shouted back.

  “She’s already killed a child!”

  “What are you going to do about her?”

  The other officers had by now arrived with Kolski at the front and were slowly but steadily pushing everyone back, using their shields and occasionally jabbing at particularly recalcitrant rioters with their stun rods. Kolski muttered into her mi
ke as she pushed, “Captain, I think we need some help here. They’re not violent, but we can only push them back so far before our wedge breaks down.” She moved her mike away from her face and shouted at her officers to stop where they were. Tann saw the distance between them was already dangerously great—as the officers pushed the rioters back in a semicircle, the bubble of safety between the police and the building grew, but so did the perimeter. There were perhaps ten meters of space where nobody stood, only the twenty defenders, arms still linked. Now that the riot had moved off a bit, Tann could hear the defenders singing quietly.

  A young voice came over the radio. “Captain, this is Galmeade. There’s a wirebus on its way here, packed full. About forty more people on it.”

  Dunbarston worked his controls and pivoted the floating camera towards the wirebus track. He zoomed in on a moving speck in the distance and saw two of his officers accessing a small box mounted on a pole near the wirebus stop.

  “What are they doing?” Tann asked.

  “They’re stopping the bus.” As Dunbarston spoke, the wirebus slowed gradually to a stop. It was perhaps two hundred meters away from the apartment building and one hundred away from the stop.

  The two officers moved towards the bus. Galmeade’s voice came through again. “They’re getting out. Captain, I don’t think we’ll be able to stop them. You’ve got a few minutes before they arrive.”

  “Opechui here, Captain. Rioters coming in on foot from the rest of the residential sector. I make it about two hundred.”

  “Captain? Baghdassarian reporting in. I think there are more people coming, sir. Looks like from the University complex. Students, mainly, I’d guess. About fifty of them. Me and Franco can’t hold them back.”

  As Dunbarston listened to the reports, his head sank lower and lower. Tann watched him—there could be no doubt: the man was simply not suited for this work. He could police a quiet community very well, Tann supposed, but as soon as he was called upon to act decisively and perhaps violently, he became paralyzed. All the better.

  Tann leaned towards him and said, “Perhaps I had better speak to the crowd. Can you get me in there?”

  Dunbarston’s head snapped up and there was a moment of relief in his eyes that faded almost as quickly as it came. “No, no. Too dangerous. I can’t risk getting you hurt.”

  “I take the risk, Captain. Besides, as a member of the government, I might be able to quiet them down. After all, we are here to deal with the mutant, as they are asking. They will welcome the news.”

  Dunbarston did not move for perhaps ten seconds. Then he nodded and lowered his head again. Tann waited. Dunbarston snapped his head back up, as if that would give him the courage he needed to face the mob and his force, and escorted Tann out of the truck.

  It was perhaps a minute’s walk to the edge of the mob, which could now be seen from around the residential building behind which the transport trucks were parked. Tann spent that minute in fierce thought.

  The mob had indeed gathered as he had planned, but who were these people staked out in front of the building, preventing entrance? Could Halfner have mobilized a counterforce so quickly? Tann dismissed the thought. She had been busy with the Commissar-General, and besides, how could she know Tann had planted information to encourage a riot?

  “All right, make way there. Move aside,” Dunbarston started pushing the outermost levels of the crowd out of his way. Tann followed in his wake.

  When they reached the perimeter and were permitted to pass, Tann headed for the line of people in front of the building. One of the officers stood nearby, watching the group but taking no action. Dunbarston stepped over to her and conferred quietly. Tann approached one of the argie defenders.

  “What are you people doing here?”

  The person to whom Tann spoke was a young argie adult, perhaps thirteen years old. She answered, “We’re exercising our right to assembly.” That brought a murmur of support from her twenty or so comrades nearby.

  Tann glanced up and down the line. For the first time, he noticed that the members in the line alternated shippie and argie almost to the very end, where three shippie defenders clung to one another to complete the chain. The mob on the other side of the police barricade had been all argie, of course. Tann looked back at the argie woman in front of him.

  “You must disperse. The police need to enter this building.”

  “To take the child away? No. You’ll have to go through us.”

  “Don’t make this harder than it has to be. We’re taking the child for her own safety. You can see—”

  The woman snorted. “Don’t lie to us, Tann. We know perfectly well why you’re here. Yallia has done nothing wrong. You can’t have her.”

  “Nothing wrong?” Tann shouted, quite aware that his words would be heard by the crowd. He needed this stalemate broken, and quickly, before more supporters to the mutant’s cause arrived. If that meant utilizing the raw power of the mob, he would do so. He half-turned so the crowd could better hear his words. “The mutant inside this building killed a little boy! How many more children must die before you allow your government to act for the safety of its citizens?”

  Dunbarston strode quickly to Tan and hissed, “What’re you doing? You want to start a riot?”

  “Yes, Captain, he does,” the argie woman said. “I’d call for medical services while it’s still quiet. You might not get the chance if Tann has his way.”

  Tann shook off Dunbarston’s hand on his shoulder. “Go back to your officers, Captain. I’ll handle this.”

  “Not like this, you won’t. I’m getting reports that more and more people are on their way here. I’ve got to stop this now before it’s more than we can handle.”

  Tann could feel his control of the situation slipping away. He turned back to the argie woman. “What do you think you’re accomplishing here? Do you think you can stay here forever? The child will have to be examined and quarantined. We don’t know what we’re dealing with yet.”

  The woman did not answer, but just looked at Tann with maddening satisfaction.

  Tann growled and turned away to look back at the mob. There was only one thing left he could do.

  “I can see more people coming from the University,” Dolen said, his face pressed up against the glass of the living room window. The University complex was perhaps three hundred meters away from their building, near the outskirts of the populated section of the Dome. Beyond the University were the botanical sections. As Dolen watched, another floater cam zoomed up to his level, joining the two that already hovered outside the window. Dolen had long since adjusted the glass to one-way transparency, and although the technology existed to penetrate the opacity of the window, extreme reluctance to violate personal privacy kept the newscams outside. The newsweb would wait for its story.

  “Come over here, dear. The newsweb has shots from all around the Dome,” Kuarta said. She and her mother were watching the newsweb screen as it displayed pictures of people giving their reactions to the disturbance. Most were unfavorable and seemed to blame the Verdafners themselves for the civil unrest.

  “Mommy, are all those people mad at me?” Yallia said, snuggling up to Kuarta on the sofa.

  “No, dear. No one’s mad at you.”

  “I heard them say my name and they looked mad.”

  Kuarta looked at her daughter with what she hoped was a reassuring smile. “No one’s mad at you.”

  “Then what are they mad at?”

  “Nothing, dear,” Kuarta hugged her daughter closer.

  “Mommy?”

  “Yes?”

  “I’m sorry I killed that boy.” Yallia said it with a sincerity few adults ever reached. Kuarta looked at her daughter again, wondering why she had to grow up so fast.

  “Kuarta,” Dolen said softly. He was gesturing at the screen. Kuarta turned her head to see the outside of their own building on the newsweb. As the shot returned to the front of the building, Kuarta saw Tann talking animatedly w
ith an argie woman she vaguely recognized. She was one of the chain of defenders at the building’s entrance.

  “Tann’s here.” Dolen said.

  Kuarta was not looking at him—she was trying to place the woman. She knew her from somewhere.

  “Shhh,” Jene said, and Dolen fell silent. The three adults listened to Tann’s exchange with the young woman and saw Tann try to incite the crowd with his rhetoric.

  “My God,” Dolen said, “he’s actually trying to start something. He’s going to kill someone if he keeps this up.”

  Kuarta turned to her mother to ask her if Newfield knew about this, but the expression on Jene’s face took her words away. Her mother was sitting transfixed—her face was looking at the screen, but her eyes were elsewhere. Kuarta could see that her mother was lost in memory.

  “Ma?”

  Jene did not answer immediately. Kuarta said, more loudly, “Ma?”

  Jene shook her head a bit and turned to Kuarta. “What? Oh, sorry. What was it?”

  “You were thinking about Ship, weren’t you, Ma?” Kuarta asked quietly.

  Jene was silent for a moment. When she did speak, her voice was husky. “It’s happening again. I can’t let it happen again.”

  “It’s not your fight this time, Ma.”

  “It wasn’t mine then, either. I had no right—”

  “You had every right to do what you did.”

  Jene shook her head slowly. “No, no. It wasn’t necessary. All we had to do was land and it would have been fine. No one needed to die. Not Rik. Not Bobby. Not your father.”

  “You didn’t know that. You couldn’t have known that.” Kuarta spoke soothingly, even as the throng outside threatened to rip their family and their world apart. The two women were together in the past, trying to heal a wound that had festered for twenty years.