April 6: And What Goes Around

by Mackey Chandler

  "But we have no idea what sort to look for," April said.

  "Hmm, you won't see anything public from any organization where it would be a security concern. Don't expect to see the military admit they have any sort of illness in their ranks. That would be a violation of operational security. If I still had contacts I could speak to face to face I could ask about unit deployments or vessels going on scheduled cruise, but I won't do it on com," Gunny said. "I could get old friends in trouble just asking, even if they didn't tell me anything."

  "Civilian events then?" April asked.

  "Yes, though the same need for secrecy probably applies to police and fire forces too," Gunny said. "They wouldn't want to tell criminals they are going to be short handed. I'd look at concerts. Especially if it's in a big public venue. And church services. I know my mom belonged to a church that didn't want to shut down even for a hurricane. Oh, and company meetings. The sort public companies hold annually to report to their stockholders and vote on changes."

  "How about companies that have big plants? How reluctant are they to shut down?" April asked.

  "Very. There aren't that many big plants like there used to be. With fabricators a lot of it is decentralized. Cars, but there are not all that many people in a plant now it's so automated. Some chicken farms have more people than an automobile factory. I think chickens get flu. They might shut down if they are scared the birds will get infected. A big factory you can check the parking lot and see how many cars are there," Gunny suggested.

  How about colleges? They couldn't keep canceling classes secret." Gabriel suggested.

  "Yes, and some of them you can look at the parking lots just like plants. Come to think of it you might check out police departments the same way. See if their cruisers are parked instead of on patrol."

  "Thank you Gunny, I'll talk to you when you come to supper about what we find," April said. To Gabriel she suggested, "How about if I take colleges and other schools and you take churches? And either of us can look into any commercial or business meetings?"

  He agreed with a nod.

  They dove back into the search, saying very little for long periods. Both went to the public restroom beside the cafeteria, leaving their machine under the other's watch. April continued to drink coffee, her gene modified metabolism allowed her to process ridiculous quantities of carbohydrates and caffeine, but Gabriel being a natural person had lower limits to what he could absorb.

  "I'm seeing some possibilities," Gabriel said after awhile. "There was a conference of Cardinals at a resort type facility canceled in Northern Italy. They called off a big processional celebration for some saint in Sicily. And a religious show in North America that invited a big name TV preacher to appear had him cancel for 'personal reasons'.

  "There was an automobile show in Dearborn, Michigan where they were supposed to have a new Brazilian delivery truck shown to the public. The PR guys and Vice President of the company all were sick in their hotel and sent underlings to carry on. The press said they did a really terrible job on short notice. But people liked the truck anyway.

  "There was a meeting of the board of trustees of a North American university called off suddenly. A French movie studio doing a production in Algeria suddenly shut down and announced it was suspending shooting after three important actors took ill last night and had to be medivaced out by air.

  "You find anything?" he asked April.

  "There was a thing on Italian TV I saw yesterday before Gunny dropped this on me. Some pushy fellow suggesting the Pope was sick and a Church spox denying it. There aren't any schools closed for illness. I found out that hasn't been all that uncommon in North America. There are periodic closures of whole systems for flu and measles, Noro virus and even yucky stuff like head lice. What I do see is a speaker from the Federal government didn't show today for a big teacher's conference he was supposed to address. And you mentioned colleges. Two college football teams played yesterday without their head coach being present. I got the sense that was a very big deal. But what would coaches have in common with these other people we suspect are sick?"

  "Got me, but then I have almost zero interest in sports. Identifying with a team seems like just another odd form of Earth Think to me," Gabriel said.

  "I don't want to keep calling Gunny. Jim who runs the handball courts follows all these Earth sports. I'm pretty sure he bets on most of them. I'll give him a call. Watch if you want," April said.

  "Hello April, need a reservation?" Jim didn't seem surprised to see her although it had been months.

  "I wish, Jim. I'm just too busy. But would you answer a sports question for us?" Gabriel was watching over her shoulder where Jim could see.

  "Sure, if you win big a little tip for the help is always appreciated."

  "Not that sort of a question," April said quickly. "We are looking at data about Earth people and we see football coaches showing up in the same data sets as singers, movie stars, company officials, big wheel politicians and highly placed churchmen. Why in the world would they fall in that sort of group?"

  Jim looked at her incredulously and burst into laughter. He finally got it under control, blotting his tears before they beaded up and go airborne in the zero g.

  "You obviously know little about college football," Jim said. "Exactly how much do you think coaches get paid?"

  "That's why I called you, I know almost nothing about it. But they just teach a sport. Surely that isn't worth as much as professors teaching serious stuff, like sciences or humanities," April said.

  "They don't really teach the sport. All their players know the game long before going to college. It, well it's difficult to explain," Jim said, frowning. "They win, or if they don't win they usually end up fired. I'm aware of one coach who was fired at a southern college last year for winning seven games out of twelve for the season."

  "That's crazy," Gabriel said, leaning over April to look straight in the camera. "Somebody has to lose every game and he won more than half... What do they want? Do half the coaches get fired every year because they didn't win?"

  "Not half, but a lot of them. The schools don't put up with losing very long. And some would define losing as – didn't win a championship. Two or three years. Four years is a long time. They'll give them the boot and try to find somebody who can perform. Having a winning football team means more to a lot of people than the academic programs."

  April and Gabriel just turned their heads and looked at each other. It was insane.

  "The coach I was thinking about had a five year twenty seven Million dollar contract but he waived the last two years for his release," Jim said. "It's not unusual for a head coach to make two or three times as much as the president of the university. Now do you see how they fit in your data set?"

  "Yeah, they make a ton of money. Thank you Jim. I'd have never expected that," April said.

  Jim shrugged. "They share the same personality type as some of the professions you mentioned. Aggressive and obsessively competitive is normal, just like high powered business executives. I keep hearing how sports builds character, but if the coaches are any indication it isn't any character I'd want my kids to acquire. How did you come to group them not knowing they make a lot?"

  "Keep it confidential for a few days, but they seem to be getting sick," April said.

  "Sure," Jim said, indifferent. "That doesn't surprise me. They stress themselves out something terrible. If you watch them during a game it's a wonder they don't stroke out every time they are down a point."

  "No, this is a flu epidemic. But it doesn't look typical. I don't know if it will be bad enough to have real economic consequences or affect us here," April said.

  "There's seasonal flu every year. I lived on the Mud Ball most of my life and it was always a topic in the news whether the flu season was mild or bad. In fact the local TV news when I was a kid often had a short report near the end called: "What's going around". But I think it's pretty much factored into the economy," Jim said. "And
flu tends to kill older people who are retired or near retiring, so that limits the economic impact."

  "That's the usual pattern, yeah," April agreed. "Thanks for helping us, Jim."

  "You're welcome. Come play a game when you have time," he reminded April.

  "I will if I get caught up on stuff," she promised, and disconnected.

  "This is interesting, and since you and your, uh, friends have a bank now I can see why you worry about the economic side of it, but you look terribly upset. Why?" Gabriel asked.

  "So far the only consistent link I see to this disease is high income," April said. "Well just about everybody on Home fits into that classification."

  "Ohhh." Gabriel thought about it a little bit, and smiled suddenly. "Well then, I'm pretty safe!"

  * * *

  Gunny looked stressed, which was unusual for him. He sat opposite April and Gabriel without even getting a cup of coffee. After a big sigh he reached behind his back and clasped hands together and then leaned right and left turning and stretching his neck to the side. April could hear his vertebrae crack from across the table.

  "Well, that has to be cheaper than a masseuse," Gabriel quipped.

  "And I don't have to call for an appointment," Gunny said.

  "Was your meeting productive?" April asked. "Most people I talk to dread organizational meeting and claim they are rarely productive, but they keep having them anyway."

  "My partners are good about meetings. We have very few and they stay on topic until it is solved or shelved. Then they tend to have a social hour at the end that you can join in or leave. We simply couldn't solve the problem we're facing today," Gunny said with a frown.

  "Any chance I can help?" April offered.

  Gunny looked over his shoulders to gauge their privacy. And then looked appraisingly at Gabriel.

  "My, you're being paranoid. Gabriel works for Chen and ultimately for me. Well, me and Jeff and Heather. So he couldn't tell Chen anything he doesn't already know."

  "He works for Ruby too," Gunny said.

  "This is true," Gabriel acknowledged. "But I compartmentalize everything I know and I don't blab Ruby's business to Chen or Chen's business to Ruby. I know you just had business on the moon, but I haven't mentioned that I know that to either. Although I've found it's usually safest to assume Chen already knows everything I do, and Ruby isn't far behind."

  "Oh, and Papa-san. If he works for Chen assume he works for Papa-san," April said.

  "Assume anything you want," Gabriel said, cheerfully.

  Gunny looked dismayed briefly. "But you just revealed my security associates and I have business on the moon to April. That's not very compartmented."

  Gabriel shrugged. "She knew already."

  Gunny looked at April and lifted an inquiring eyebrow.

  April had the grace to look embarrassed. "Yeah, I knew. I figured you'd probably tell me eventually if it affected me. But I don't know how he knew that I knew."

  "Maybe Chen feeds back information to him so he can direct his research better," Gunny guessed.

  Gabriel ignored his suppositions and sat with a poker face.

  "None of us are enemies," April said. "What does it matter?"

  "So many connections. What if it gets to the wrong ear?" Gunny asked. "There are reasons for operational security and need to know."

  "I'm not sure there are," April said. "I'm starting to think most of it is Earth Think. Earth is full of intrigue and double dealing and conflicting interests. In fact anybody who actually is hostile to us is going to have an Earth connection. Would any of the three of us do something harmful to the other two? I don't think so. Ultimately we all live in Home and need to see it secure. So the chances of having a really serious conflict of interests is very small. You know your friends and enemies – or not."

  Neither of them immediately replied, sitting and thinking that over.

  April plunged back in. "So many of the horrible mistakes the Earthies make, starting wars even, result from one hand not knowing what the other hand is doing. Even within their own governments and organizations."

  "You really knew we were doing some sort of deal on the moon?" Gunny asked her.

  "Your fellows Eric and Isaac got a lunch pack for five. It was stuff you wouldn't eat in zero g and high end stuff. They paid extra to impress somebody. They hired a pilot and took a full fuel load in a landing capable shuttle so they weren't going to another habitat where they could buy lunch. You don't hire a landing capable shuttle for three times the price if you are going orbit to orbit, and they returned in the time frame of a lunar landing plus about two hours. When they returned they took a full fuel load as if they might need to do it again soon and not want to wait to fuel up." April gave him a look that was a challenge to deny it. "I'd say they sat and had a meeting in the shuttle with some Loonies. Probably French."

  "Why French?" Gunny asked.

  "Because Heather has infiltrated cameras and electronic surveillance on Armstrong so she doesn't get surprised by them again and she told me the shuttle didn't go there when I asked. And the French are going to declare independence and kick their Earth appointed administrators out soon," April said.

  "Oh crap, that really is seriously secret," Gunny said, looking around again.

  "Do you think you are the only people they need to hire to pull this off?' April said.

  "Apparently not... " Gunny said.

  "They are licensing tech to us and we are helping them acquire things they will need after they declare independence," April revealed.

  "Same here. I hope they don't have multiple parties chasing the same items and if one of us gets it the other has gone to a lot of trouble for nothing. What are you getting them?" Gunny asked.

  "I'll tell you," April agreed, "but only as a trade. What are you shopping for them?"

  "They want a cannon like Heather owns. It impressed a lot of people with how economical and effective it is. Or something similar, but an identical 57mm Bofors would do fine. We are running up against all sorts of obstruction on the Earth side to buying one," Gunny said.

  "They have Jeff buying seeds and cuttings and breeding stock so they can be independent for food. Which I think is an excellent idea so I'm having him buy smaller amounts for Central," April said.

  "Good, I'm glad they aren't jerking us around," Gunny said.

  "I have to call Heather, but would you be interested in buying a cannon from Central?" April asked.

  "They have extra?" Gunny asked, genuinely shocked.

  "Heather's people could reverse engineer what they have. They've are been making some real advances on fabricating steel objects from the iron particles in regolith, alloying the steel right in the laser sintering process. They are moving tons of regolith every day to back-fill the crater with which the Chinese gifted them. It's going to take years. Now that they have a use for the iron they are talking about mining the backfill since they have to handle it anyway.

  "They should get quite the stockpile of metal by the time it is filled. I know they've made gears and gun barrels. and objects as large as a vacuum hatch. It's just a little improvement on conventional fabricating, but it works better in a vacuum. I don't see why there would be any size limitation on the length of the object. I'll ask her directly if they could fab a cannon tube," April promised.

  "That would be marvelous if they can do it," Gunny said. "And probably cheaper to make on site than lift from Earth."

  "Are you ready to go through and get some supper? It will be getting busier soon," April warned.

  "Yes and while we eat you can tell me what you found out about the airports turning away Rome flights," Gunny said.

  "That's what Gabriel and I have been doing the last couple hours."

  "And I have to be elsewhere soon, so you guys have a nice supper," Gabriel said, packing up.

  "Thank you Gabriel. It was fun working with you."

  "We'll do it again I'm sure, April."

  Well, that was an improvement ov
er Miss Lewis.

  "Come on," she told Gunny. "They have stuffed peppers tonight and they run out early."

  * * *

  April didn't have much to say until her plate was near clean. Gunny was recently from Earth so he didn't have any genetic modifications, not even basic life extension therapy yet. In North America gene modification was punished by loss of citizenship and forfeiture of property. If the mob didn't get you first. He could eat less and talk more than April, recounting the frustration they experienced trying to buy a Bofors gun until April was finished. Then she recounted her work with Gabriel.

  "The thing about planes being turned away you showed me this morning turned out to be because of flu. I'd say epidemic, but it's weird, it didn't seem an epidemic. I mean, they don't have a lot of people with it. Not yet at least. But it seems to be making the well-to-do sick before the common people. That of course bothered me because just about everybody on Home fits the demographic," April said.

  "Surely you can narrow it down by more than income," Gunny said.

  "Not so far. It's been movie stars and other entertainers, big company officials, politicians and well known preachers." I won't be surprised if it spreads to the general population, but it hasn't yet. I can't prove it but this doesn't seem to be the usual pattern. I got a book on the last really big influenza epidemic that killed a lot of people, back in 1918. It started at the bottom of the social order then, with soldiers and other young people who were crammed together in camps and ships. I have to finish it but that first half I read this afternoon was terrifying. The quarantines people put up were desperate." April described some of them for Gunny.

  Gunny sat and thought a bit, got up and refilled their coffee mugs while April took her tray to the dirty rack and came back. She had apple pie still for desert but took a break before enjoying it.

  "What if there is another common denominator to rich folks that the Earth news filters because of their prejudices?" Gunny suggested. "It would mask the real reason they were infected from your sight. I don't mean to slight your investigation, but being from down there I've had all my life to learn to see around their ways of hiding things."