by Mel Odom
One of the men in the back stood and waved at us. He spoke over a limited short-range comm frequency that I accessed by tapping into the crew ATV’s satellite feed.
“What are you doing out here?”
Hayim jerked a thumb over his shoulder. “ATV went offline a couple klicks back. We couldn’t reach anyone, and it was close enough that it wasn’t an emergency.”
“Come on. We’ll give you guys a lift.”
Hayim waved at them, then started for the vehicle at a trot. “Thanks.” He caught the hand of the man at the crew ATV’s edge and allowed himself to be pulled up.
Before Hayim scrambled aboard, I leaped up and landed in an empty space that had been made in the back of the vehicle. The group of farm workers looked at me in silent speculation.
I let Hayim do the talking because I was a bioroid and most of the workers wouldn’t expect me to speak unless I was directly requested to. He explained that we were contracted inspectors checking water pumps that recycled through the ag-bubbles. The job wasn’t high maintenance, but it was a high priority. Every farm corp, Earth and Mars, kept a crew that rotated through the ag-bubbles. As a cover story, it was easily believable because a technician didn’t have to be highly skilled to perform the job.
Hayim sat on the long bench that stretched across both sides of the crew ATV as the vehicle got underway again. He buckled himself into his seat, then reached for one of the ATV’s oxygen hookups and fitted it to his suit. He wasn’t getting low on his air supply, but attaching to an outside supply any time he had a chance was a good habit.
“Did you hear about the attack on the train today?” one of the females asked.
Hayim shook his head. “I wasn’t on the mediafeed channel all day. You get out there in the bubbles, you get a chance to listen to what you want to instead of being constantly bombarded by advertising.”
“That’s true,” a male worker said. “Life may be a little more difficult here in the colonies, but I haven’t regretted leaving Earth. A man’s got room to breathe out here.”
“Even if there’s no air to breathe,” the woman said.
They all chuckled at that and I gathered that it was an old joke.
“What about the train?” Hayim asked. “You said there was an attack.”
The woman delivered a fairly concise summary of what had happened during the attack on Manta Bill 3047 without embellishing anything. Evidently several of the vid cams aboard the train had remained functional during the engagement.
“Does anyone know who was behind the violence?” Hayim asked when she finished.
“Not yet. Three terrorist groups are trying to take credit for it, but the railroad transit authority isn’t buying into that.”
“The terrorist groups are all small,” another female added. “No one believes they’re organized enough or large enough to pull off a train robbery.”
One of the men who hadn’t spoken cursed. “Life out here is hard enough without the terrorists making it harder.”
“It’s not just the terrorists making life difficult,” the man who’d helped Hayim board the ATV said. “It’s the Earth corps too. Every time a colonist grabs an extra centimeter of success from hard work, the Earth corps find a way to tax or raise prices so they get that extra centimeter for themselves. If they had it their way, the Earth corps would keep us under their thumbs.”
The other ag workers looked at him.
The man held up his hands in defense. “Hey, I’m no terrorist. Don’t get the wrong idea. All I’m saying is what every one of us has thought at one time or another.”
The tension within the group relaxed.
“The Earth corps will put on extra sec teams for a while,” the woman agreed. “And they’ll find a way to pass the cost on to us. Either by raising the cost of basics we need, or by tacking on an export tax, or just raising the cost of shipping freight.”
“Earth corps can’t hold us down forever,” the first man said. “Every day the colonies get a little closer to independence. We’re going to live to see it happen.”
The lights of the sec gate allowing admission to Podkayne colony distracted everyone. Searchlights strobed the ATV and mini-drones with FLIR—forward-looking infrared—and chem-sniffers flitted by us after a brief hesitation. The mini-drones were sensitive enough to pick up gunpowder residue, but I had thoroughly cleaned my hands and clothing with a sonic scrubber aboard the second train that had been sent to transport passengers stranded by the terrorist action.
We disembarked the ATV at the gate, then filed through the sec line, presenting our e-IDs for the scanners. The number of secmen present was doubtlessly increased, and all of them watched us with bright interest.
Hayim’s heart rate was slightly elevated over the baseline I had for him, but the sec point didn’t know what that baseline was. They scanned his legs for a moment, then let him pass on through. I followed without any difficulty. The Norris e-ID still stood.
Once he was through the airlock, Hayim took off his helmet and growled a curse. “Okay, I’ve got to get a drink.”
Chapter Twenty-Three
The bar served an abbreviated menu and was called the Inn of Two Moons, a unit of a small colony-owned chain of bars/diners by XCLJooce Corp. XCLJooce was known primarily for its chain of juice franchises, an empire that rivaled the largest coffee outlets, but it had picked up the Inn of Two Moons chain seven years back.
Although Two Moons had made some in-roads on Earth and the Moon, the inns were primarily located in the colonies. Many off-world and pro-Earth merc units gathered there and Two Moons maintained an extensive merc Net board where privately contracted mercs and sec teams could keep in touch with each other.
The bar/diner was packed with people when Hayim and I arrived. The Two Moons franchises had undergone extensive remodeling when the Earth investments had rolled in. Every one of them tended to look like the next: same layout, same 1950s and 1960s science fiction motif with clunky spacesuits for the males and metallic one-piece swimsuits for females that featured fish bowl helmets for the human and clone servers. Drink dispensers that looked like Robby the Robot from the 20th century film Forbidden Planet trundled across an ever-shifting floor that projected images of space. A television soundtrack from the 20th century show Star Trek was playing.
“It’s not all innocent science fiction posing or vitamin-packed drinks,” Shelly said as she surveyed the place with a critical eye. “A lot of people say these places are clearinghouses established for pro-Earth mercenary work. Earth corps funnel funds onto Mars through membership cred accounts to pay for operations.”
Three years ago, Shelly and I had almost closed an investigation regarding a murder-for-hire that had sprung out of XCLJooce. A whistleblower on a Mars-based operation had turned up executed in New Angeles. No one in homicide had wanted the case because it was politically dangerous and filled with lies. Shelly and I had taken it. She’d nearly gotten killed on two occasions before we were led through a predetermined inquiry that fell into place too quickly.
Just as we’d started making our case, neither of us convinced that we were on the right track, the person of interest in the investigation hung herself. The NAPD commissioner had ordered the case closed despite the misgivings that Shelly and I had made her aware of, citing that our time would be better spent elsewhere. Since we’d found no other leads, we’d had no choice but to walk away. Anytime we devoted too many hours to an investigation, our caseload started to back up. Murder was a fast-paced business in New Angeles. Shelly had kept the file as a cold case and revisited it periodically, but we’d never gotten anywhere on it.
A young female server stepped up to us. She wore an older hairstyle, a shimmering green swimsuit with matching elbow-length gloves, and thigh-high boots. “Welcome to the Inn of Two Moons. May your experience be out of this world. Where would you like to be seated?”
“The bar,” Hayim answered.
That was a primary hotspot for mercs without contr
acts who were looking for work. Exploratory conversation and opening bids were often placed there. Tables and booths were for mercs who already had connections.
The server led us over to the bar, narrowly avoiding one of the 2.2 meter tall Robby Robots as it rolled by on tracked footing. Instead of claw appendages at the end of its arms, it had juice dispensers. Lights flashed in its sloped head, but I knew its logic circuits were not kept and they were only for show.
Hayim sat at the bar. He was getting around much easier since I had replaced the knee ball joint.
The bartender was another young-looking woman but she moved with experience and confidence that suggested she was older than she looked. “What’s your pleasure?”
“Mandarin orange and pineapple,” Hayim replied. “Vodka.”
XCLJooce shipped flavored powder off-planet instead of liquid product.
“New Moscow vodka or domestic?”
Domestic vodka was manufactured at the potato ag-bubbles, a side industry that had taken shape from the moment the first potatoes had been dug up. Off-world vodka was expensive because it had to be carried in a liquid state.
“Domestic. And I’d like the meatloaf platter with all the trimmings.”
“Of course.” She turned her attention to me. “Anything for you?”
“No, thank you.”
Leaving us, already filing the order subvocally through her helmet, she approached a lanky man dressed in simleather and wearing weapons. Carrying firearms wasn’t discouraged in Podkayne colony except in certain areas where rich off-worlders lived while in the megapolis.
The man looked middle-aged and sported a heavy beard shadow. Both eyes were cybered, but only someone looking for that would know. They were a little too clear and the pupils adjusted faster than a normal human’s would.
Hayim and I didn’t speak. Getting connected to a mercenary group was a waiting game and might take days. When the meal arrived—all of it really soy-manufactured to look like different food items—Hayim dug in with gusto.
I waited. No one approached us, which was exactly how Hayim thought it would go.
“He’s right,” Shelly said. “Until you become part of the surroundings instead of sticking out as new additions, no one is going to enter into a conversation with you. Too many local undercover police and terrorist groups have tried to get into the pro-Earth mercenary circles.”
I sat quietly, taking in the local vidcast, learning that more and more civilian unrest was fomenting in the colonies.
“Podkayne police aren’t admitting to speculation about the missing weapons shipment,” a svelte nosie stated on the vidcast, “but we know they have a lot to think about.” She stood in front of a holo of the train wreck. “All of the weapons that we have seen are reputed to be knockoffs of munitions manufacturing giant Skorpios Defense Systems, owned by Argus, Inc.”
She touched the screen and flicked her hand, magnifying a large hand-held blaster.
“This weapon is a blatant reproduction of SDS’s Indra model.” She gestured again and an image of a real Indra appeared next to the knockoff. The only difference was the lack of a serial number and branding information. “This weapon has been linked to a police raid on an illegal arms manufacturing site on the Moon seven months ago.”
Vid of the raid played, showing NAPD officers carrying crates of weapons out of the weapons plant I had found while looking for the people that had killed Gordon Holder, the CEO of SDS. The vid was cut to only a few seconds.
“As you can see,” the nosie went on while the screen behind her changed to the train wreck again, “not all of those weapons were found on the Moon. Some of them have found their way here, and a few people believe that Mars was the intended destination for this illegal arms franchise.”
The vid shifted to a female politician on the steps of the Interplanetary Courthouse in Bradbury colony. A crawler announced her name as Bradbury Senator Coleen Wentworth. She had a short brunette cut that framed her face and the tattoo of a black-bladed broadsword above and below her right eye. The tattoo marked her as pro-Mars without being dismissive of Earth’s interests in the colonies. Few politicians wore such distinct reminders of where their loyalties lie, but Senator Wentworth had no hesitation it seemed.
“Of course those weapons were intended for Mars,” Senator Wentworth said. “The Martian transit authorities have verified that the shipments were going to various pro-Earth facilities in Podkayne colony. I, and several other politicians and police commissioners and military leaders, believe that the weapons were going to be dispersed from Podkayne throughout the colonies for the express purpose of arming employees. Rest assured, this investigation is only getting started. We’re far from finished with this.”
The vidcast opened on the nosie again. “Senator Wentworth is known for her scathing attitude toward Earth corps. For another take on the situation regarding those weapons, we interviewed transit authority liaison, Tars Heinrich.”
As the vid cut away again, I accessed history on Heinrich and discovered that he was a native Martian citizen but was heavily franchised—according to muckraking nosies—to Earth corps. Heinrich was one of the go-to individuals to get pro-Earth legislation regarding shipments. He was slim and sported a greenish tint to his skin as well as body mods that included lower incisors that jutted up over his upper lip.
He stood in front of the Bradbury Transit Authority building on the red land. His presence there without an envirosuit gave away the fact that he’d been holoed in.
“As you know,” Heinrich said, “Mars is my birth planet. Less than a quarter of the people living on Mars can make that claim.”
ONLY BECAUSE OF THE ENFORCED POPULATION GUIDELINES AND THE STEADY INFLUX OF OFF-WORLDERS, a crawler announced as it spun across the screen. EARTH WILL NOT RULE US FOREVER. WE SHALL OVERCOME.
“Hey,” the man in simleather shouted angrily. “Get that drek off the vid.”
“It’s not us,” the bartender called back. “The vidcast at that end got hacked.”
Most of the other patrons at the Inn of Two Moons raised their voices in angry protest as well. The bar was definitely pro-Earth. Hayim watched it all with an air of disinterest, but I knew his sympathies lay with Mars. He was only there to help me locate a mercenary group who might lead me to the Chimeras.
“That shipment of illegal weapons was just that,” Heinrich went on, “illegal weapons. Merchants of death trading on the fears of pro-Earth and pro-Mars sentiments were hoping to make a fortune off those weapons. But we stopped that today. Those weapons have been taken into custody and will never find their way into the hands of people.”
THEY’RE TRYING TO KEEP REAL MARTIANS UNARMED. HEINRICH AND HIS PRO-EARTH TOADIES ONLY WANT THEIR SECMEN TO HAVE WEAPONS.
Finished with his meal, Hayim pushed his plate away. He glanced at me. “Do you know what you’re getting into out here?”
“Yes.” The civil unrest manifested in the people around me. But my thoughts were on Mara. Somewhere out there, she was depending on me to rescue her.
* * *
We were at dinner, Mara and I, when we met Conway Gerrold. I sat at a table in a restaurant bigger and more luxurious than any I had ever before patronized. I was there under protest, but Mara had insisted on taking me out. She had been locked up in her lab for the last week since our return to Earth.
I was not at my best. Although I had trained for the heavier gravity on Mars, training for it and being subjected to it twenty-four/seven was much different. I spent four hours a day in a gym trying to get my edge back. I was not used to being so weak and so easily fatigued.
As a general rule, Martian musculature was genetically coded for heavier gravity than on that planet, but gaining the appropriate muscle mass needed the requisite exposure to the higher gravity. I struggled to build myself up and was exceeding what my physical trainers thought I would attain, but I was still too slow for my personal taste. I was a man used to living on his physical attributes.
; John Rath had tried to prepare me for my transition to Earth. He had wanted me at my best because Mara Parker’s life might depend on that. I had listened, but I had not accepted how weak I would become.
Now that Mara was out of the lab, away from all the coding, she was different. She talked to me about movies and art and places she had traveled to. It was like being with two different women, but I loved the challenge of keeping up with both.
She stopped herself after a bit and smiled ruefully. “I’m sorry.”
“For what?” I asked.
“I didn’t bring you out here to talk your ears off. I’ve read that people who have lived their lives on Mars aren’t used to as much audio output as we have on Earth.”
That was true. Although I had spent time in the colony domes, I had spent much of my adult life in the harsh Martian wilderness in combat-ready envirosuits. There, communications were routed through a helmet and I had control over how much or how little volume I wanted to deal with.
There was no damper for the myriad noises and conversations around us. The tables in the restaurant had come with white noise generators but I had turned ours off so I would be more attuned to our environment. I didn’t expect anyone hoping to harm Mara would announce his or her presence, but I hoped learning all the noises would help me sort out any that might be threatening.
I sipped the wine she had ordered to be sociable, but I nursed it. She was already on her third glass while I was on my first. “I love hearing you talk.”
Her cheeks colored just a little and a smile dimpled her cheeks. “Thank you, but you don’t have to be so polite.”
“I’m telling you the truth.” My attraction to Mara Parker had grown over the months I had spent getting ready for her return to Earth. I wasn’t certain if she knew that I felt that way. I didn’t know what she would do if she found out.
“I don’t normally take employees out to quiet dinners, either.” She put her elbows on the table and picked up her wine glass. She watched me as she sipped from it.
