Friends in the Stars

by Mackey Chandler

  Rents were higher in the old town, and neither of them wanted to deal with the congestion. The agricultural areas their bees might favor were to the west, beyond the hills around the city with newer development. They found a warehouse near the flatlands below the hilltops. They were out of sight of the old city but close enough for business and services. The automated roadways were even extended to their rental in the last year so you could call for a car. That was good because neither of them had ever driven a manual vehicle. They had enough to learn without needing driving lessons too.

  The odd thing was nobody has solicited a single bribe, and the clearinghouse that published public contracts took their registration as Harvac Honey Brokers without a fee. Instead, a small fee would be charged for every contact published. If anybody investigated the Harvac name they’d see all sorts of companies in her father’s name and that she was his daughter before any connection as a minor official in State.

  The cost of the warehouse seemed more reasonable when they discovered that the lack of zoning restrictions meant they could make the office section of their business into an apartment. After sharing a cabin with Kirk without any problems from him, and realizing nobody cared, Pamela decided they could share a residence on their mission as long as she had her own room. That would create a scandal on Earth, at least in North America, but that seemed a silly concern after sharing a tiny cabin on their trip.

  They had a small quantity of sugar and pollen supplement along in case the bees needed support getting established, but found the local cost of sugar in hundred kilogram lots not much higher than the commodity prices to which they’d had access. They’d see if the local food processors could make a pollen substitute for them. That would be one welcome way to approach them and get a relationship.

  Local workmen cut ports to the outside near the ceiling by their direction without much curiosity about why they needed them. They were sure they could handle the ductwork and hive enclosures themselves. That would take several weeks. They didn’t intend to introduce themselves to the local food processors and distributors until they had some early signs the bees were thriving and would produce. Then it would be time to try to ingratiate themselves to those in the industry to both buy and sell.

  After helping Pamela set up the basics Kirk would start searching the local web and find out what Central was doing here. Their agents were certainly easy enough to find. They had their com code listed in public and were building an embassy.

  * * *

  “Incoming message, sending it to your screen,” Lee told Gordon as she had the watch. Her voice, Mike noticed, was carefully neutral.

  “Kurofune, the planetary administrator objects that you did not identify yourselves as claim holders, and your use of military strength radar has panicked some ship masters, disrupting freight and work schedules. Some captains are still refusing to dock to load or unload on our sole say-so, until they have some guarantees from you that we are not going to experience actual hostilities in the system.

  “As it stands now, due to this disruption, we have vacant berths and our schedule is undone. It is unlikely a new docking schedule will be published until either you dock, satisfying the shipmasters that you aren’t going to initiate hostile action or leave the system.

  “If you still wish to dock slip eleven will be held open. Services such as utilities are available upon presenting a letter of credit or showing you are an account holder on a local bank. Docking fees are payable before local traffic control will accept outgoing flight plans.”

  Mike heard an odd scraping sound and thought it was from Gordon. When he looked Gordon had both true hands palm to palm in front of his chin and seemed calm. Then he saw Gordon’s lower arms were holding each side of the command console and the metal was dimpled under each claw, betraying his real emotions. But again Gordon controlled his voice, far better than Mike thought he’d be able to.

  “How long did they take to reply on top of the speed of light lag?” Gordon asked.

  “Just shy of twenty minutes,” Lee said.

  “OK, so he didn’t say something stupid in a rush to respond, he took his sweet time to think on how to be insulting,” Gordon said.

  “I wonder if they gave the Mothers’ survey crew a hard time?” Lee said.

  “Not if they came in by commercial transport. This is because we have our own ship and perhaps because they know we are in conflict with the Commission. I’m going to respond to them now,” he warned Lee.

  “Look, shithead. I know his Glorious Excellency the Straw boss for the Claims Commission thinks this makes him look important, to send messages through underlings and act like we are the sort of people who might skip out on our bill. I don’t believe for a minute he is unaware who discovered the planet he administers. We own fifteen percent of everything that world below you generates in income, after our own private claims worth a few billion dollars Ceres, not the ass wipe North American dollars with which your boss gets paid. We won’t be treated like this by the hired help.

  “You still did not give me the system scan. I’m starting to think you have some reason not to and it can’t be anything good. I have a duty to preserve my command just like those boys too worried to dock on your station. What’s going on you don’t want me to see? I’m altering course to come in on an angle in order to turn my radar array towards you. I don’t want any surprises.

  “Please inform me with your next transmission of any armed ships at your station and our status with them. If the situation has changed during our transit and we are at war or something it would be far better to tell me, because I’m telling my number two to take the weapons board hot and set it to auto-launch on a dead man switch. If we take a beam weapon on close approach, one of my missiles is targeted on your station, and the other one will home on whatever the ship AI thinks shot at us. They’re really good Fargone missiles. If you think you can jam them or intercept them, I wouldn’t bet my life on it,” Gordon warned him.

  “Up our acceleration a half-g to make up for some of the increased distance, please,” Gordon ordered Lee.

  “Board set per your verbal instructions. Sending an altered course to your screen for approval,” Lee said.

  “Still too straight in and I don’t want to increase acceleration any more. Add a couple of hours to our arrival time to widen our approach,” Gordon said after looking at it. “Paint them at full power without power diversion when we roll to alter course. We’ll only be able to throw about sixty percent power at them from that angle even on the altered approach but maintain that after we are on the new course. It should show us what we need even if it doesn’t send a message.”

  “Changing, sending revisions to your screen,” Lee said.

  “Accepted. Have it send the new scan to my screen and make the rest of it happen.”

  Mike felt the ship respond and a new screen painted in front of Gordon, though he sat unmoving for a long time and let Lee work. He did finally let loose of the console and fold his lower arms in his lap. The dimples in the metal remained.

  “What do you make of that target leaving the station?” Gordon asked, when the newest radar image came in.

  “He’s still visible with our radar at 60% power. His profile is consistent with a destroyer and I can’t believe he is a merchant pulling three and a half g. If he’d turn on his radar, I could confirm what he is,” Lee said, frustrated, “probably an older destroyer.”

  “He made the correct command decision,” Gordon said. “They’ll hate his guts for abandoning them. We threaten him not the station, so he’s correct to run. I suspect the Planetary Administrator tried to order him to challenge us and turn us away, but he refused. Everything he knows says that he couldn’t fight a ship that can radiate like the Kurofune and our missiles and targeting systems are newer than his. He can’t be sure we don’t have defensive systems or beam weapons. The very best outcome he could expect would be to destroy us at the cost of his own ship. That’s very bad strategy. Of
course, as crazy as the Earthies are they may censure him for it back home.”

  “A real warship is running away from us?” Mike asked, surprised.

  Lee looked over her shoulder at Mike. “He would never say, but the man is likely running away from Gordon as much as the Kurofune. Gordon has a reputation. Have you studied how the war against North America went for the clan?

  “How would I? I just know that we won. We all went off to the hills and set up to camp indefinitely. The Mothers don’t tell you any more than you need to know. No more about the war than anything else,” Mike said. “They’d think the details of the war and the politics involved are their business, not mine. If we’d lost, I suppose I’d be dead.”

  “You don’t have a pocket phone do you?” Lee asked.

  “I never had a phone for work at the Keep. Nothing I did ever required one. I’ve seen them, but I never held one, and I have no idea how to actually use one. I don’t know what they cost, but I’ve never had any cash money to worry about it,” Mike said. “I’ve seen people talk to them, but other times they press the keyboard. Does it do the same things your spex can do or different stuff?”

  “A pad can have add-ons your spex doesn’t have room for. Most spex can’t check your food to make sure it is safe or do medical imaging. You can write or draw on the screen of a pad with its stylus, but that’s about impossible to do with spex.”

  Lee was still twisted in her seat staring at Mike and feeling foolish.

  “I should have realized you’d never have the use of a phone. Or that if you did the Mothers wouldn’t share the history of the war.”

  “If I stayed until I had my full growth, so I got military training, they probably would have shared things about the war a soldier needed to know to fight the next one,” Mike said, “at least the details that would apply to my specialty.”

  “After all we have been through together, I still find myself not understanding how the Mothers think, and being surprised by things they do,” Lee said, frowning. “When we take the shuttle down to Providence I will buy you a decent pocket pad and make sure there is not only all sorts of general lessons on it, including a good history of the war, but also give you some private files from Gordon and myself that aren’t published anywhere.”

  “I have no way to pay you for it,” Mike said, unhappy.

  “You can owe me a favor,” Lee said.

  “Now that’s a currency with which I’m familiar,” Mike said. “Thank you.”

  * * *

  “I brought the first hive out of cryogenic suspension while you were out this morning and we only had two percent losses. The queen is laying and they are taking feed. I never did this before, so I was kind of worried,” Pamela admitted. “It’s later than I’d like in the season, I wish we’d started a month earlier, but the climate here is very moderate. There are only a few weeks where snow is a possibility and some of the hardy plants will push up through the snow to bloom. I’m going to let this hive go out and explore before I revive another.”

  “How do you get the dead ones out?” Kirk asked. He was curious, but not really comfortable with the bees. Not in any close hands-on way. He looked at the odd stuff Pamela used, special tools to cut wax and protective gear. He picked up a spray can that was labeled Faux Smoke.

  “Why fake smoke instead of real smoke?” Kirk asked.

  “Real smoke is a health hazard and you haven’t been able to expose people to particulate pollution in the workplace for years. A dozen agencies would have a fit if you did. This has all the chemical triggers of smoke to control the bees and mask their alarm pheromones but is environmentally compliant. As far as the dead ones, they clean them up themselves. They just push them out on the floor. I’m just happy I didn’t have to open it up and vacuum the whole colony out. I followed the instructions exactly,” Pamela said.

  “Against all rumor, that works sometimes,” Kirk quipped dryly.

  Pamela smiled because it reminded her of her father’s humor.

  * * *

  “Little by little, they are working up their courage to do something stupid,” Jeff said.

  “Earth?” Heather inquired.

  “North America in particular,” Jeff said.

  “What now?” April asked, looking over the top of her reader, but not lowering it.

  “They are taking action against several companies from smaller countries who have sold things to Home and Central in violation of their embargo, Macedonia for selling us chocolates and Columbia for fruit. They seized some bank accounts and indicted some executives for a show who will never be extradited.”

  Jeff made a sour face as he thought on it.

  “I believe this is simply a shot across the bow at Australia and France. They are threatening them with similar actions. The trouble is, damaging trade with either of them would have serious repercussions. Any action against France could be answered by the whole European Union, and if they had Australian wheat cut off they’d have a hard time replacing it in the current world market.”

  “Texas could make it up,” April said. “The micro-climate changes have brought a lot of wheat and rice acreage into cultivation and they are selling plenty of it to Europe and North Africa. It would be cheaper to sell it to North America with less shipping needed.”

  “Ha! They’d burn it before they’d sell it to their big neighbor,” Jeff said.

  “I wouldn’t sell to them either,” Heather said. “They would probably put ergot in it and claim the Texans were trying to poison them.”

  Jeff looked stunned at the idea, but reluctantly nodded his agreement.

  * * *

  A couple of hours later Providence Control contacted them again. “Kurofune, the Administrator would like to know if you will please cease sweeping us continually with high powered radar if we send you a system scan?” Traffic Control asked.

  “Well, at least it’s please now. That’s progress,” Gordon told Lee with a muted mike. “Providence Control, Gordon here. This is not something over which one normally has to bargain. Star systems give any legitimate traffic their scan as a normal thing. We did not break that protocol, you did, though I suspect you did so on orders. Now if you had given me the scan in your first transmission, none of this would have occurred or become a problem.

  “The problem now is that I have trust issues. We saw what looked suspiciously like a destroyer making an aggressive run to jump. Would he have been on our system scan or would he have been censored out? What ship was that making no emissions and in such a hurry not to be around us? Did he find himself in conflict with his orders or have some other reason to feel we are unfriendly? It’s rather late for me to start trusting you, and we already cut back our radar to almost half power. I’ll cut it further as we approach, but not off entirely.

  “If we decide on closer examination we might not be safe at dock, we’ll leave the system. We have stores and fuel to do so even without mining in this system. I’m not sure what the end of the matter would be if that happens, nothing good I’m sure. One of the reasons we are here is to supply a Red Tree team doing survey work. They have been ceded a huge tract of land and are picking sites for a permanent presence on Providence. It may have implications even I can’t predict to take a message back to the clan Mothers that they are unwelcome as your neighbors and their citizens stranded beyond reach.

  “You might remember there was some unpleasantness between Red Tree and the USNA recently. They may easily be convinced those problems were not fully resolved and the USNA thinks they don’t apply everywhere, or worse are simply breaking their word on the matter. The Mothers don’t have much of a sense of humor for that sort of behavior. You can consult with your superiors who don’t seem to regard me as a peer to address directly. For now, the radar stays on and the weapons board live. Gordon out.”

  There was silence for an extended moment and Mike spoke from the back.

  “Recent unpleasantness? Do you mean the war? I’m taking notes back here.”r />
  “Sometimes understating your case works better than rubbing their noses in the obvious,” Lee said. Gordon didn’t look over at them but nodded.

  * * *

  “So, we can flip it over, and the bearing works just fine inverted,” Musical said, “But the centrifuge pumps down and runs in vacuum. We don’t have a chunk in one piece to actually show that. Obviously, the thing busted a hole through the top of the containment just like the roof. What is it going to do when that happens again? If we have pieces of busted containment bouncing around inside with the impeller spun up the whole thing may come apart again.”

  “I’m going to put a port on that top panel with a thin foil we can change out,” Born said. “I’ll send that to an outside shop to make and pay cash. I didn’t want the engineers to see too much and ask too many questions. The centrifuge only needs to be evacuated to attain top speed. We were nowhere near that when the anomaly occurred. We can shut it down and let it spin down from friction if everything goes well.”

  “OK, but what about the concrete dust and spalling?” Musical asked, still concerned.

  “I have some coated foam sheets like boxes are made from on order. We’ll lay them on the floor with weights around the perimeter.”

  “Ummm, that should work,” Musical admitted reluctantly.

  * * *

  “Kurofune,” Providence Control hailed them again, “Attached on the data sub-carrier is the system scan starting from your system entry plus estimated lag. The administrator supplied that without condition on the advice of the shipmasters in-system.”