Babylon's Ashes

by James S. A. Corey

  A second rank of chairs held dozens of people whose roles Michio didn’t know. Senators. Businessmen. Bankers. Soldiers. It occurred to her that if she’d had a bomb, she could probably have crippled what was left of humanity’s major governments by taking out this one room.

  “Well,” Avasarala said, her voice clear as a Klaxon, “I’d like to start by thanking all of you again for being here. I’m not fond of this shit, but the optics are good. And we do have some things to discuss. I have a proposal …” She paused to tap a command into her hand terminal, and Michio’s chimed in response, as did everyone else’s in the room. “ … a proposal about the architecture by which we try to unfuck ourselves. It’s preliminary, but we have to start somewhere.”

  Michio opened the document. It was over a thousand pages long, with the first ten a tightly written table of contents with notations and subsections for every chapter. She felt a little wave of vertigo.

  “The overview looks like this,” Avasarala said. “We have a list of problems as long as our arms, but Captain Holden here thinks he’s come up with a way to use some of them to solve the others. Captain?”

  Holden, beside her, stood up, seemed to realize no one else was going to stand up to talk, and then shrugged and bulled forward with it. “The thing is the Free Navy wasn’t wrong. With all the new systems opened up, the economic niche that Belters have filled is going to go away. There are so many reserves on these planets that don’t require we bring our own air or generate our own gravity that the Belt is going to be outcompeted. And, no offense, the plan up to now has been versions of ‘sucks to be you.’

  “There’s a significant population of the Belt that’s not going to be able to move down a gravity well. They’re just going to be forgotten. Left to die off. And since that’s not all that different from how Belters got treated before, it was easy for Inaros to find political backing.”

  “I wouldn’t say that was the only thing that got him there,” Prime Minister Richards drawled. “Having a bunch of my ships helped him out.”

  The room chuckled.

  “But the thing is,” Holden said, “we’ve been going out there wrong. There’s a traffic problem we didn’t know about. Under the wrong conditions, it’s not safe to go through the gates. Which we found out because a bunch of ships went missing. And if the plan is that just anyone who wants to go through the gates does so anytime they want to, more will go missing. There has to be someone regulating that. And, thanks to Naomi Nagata, we now know the load limit of the gate network.”

  He paused and looked around, almost as if he was expecting applause before he went on.

  “So that’s two problems. No niche for the Belt. The need for traffic control through the gates. Now add to that the fact that Earth, Mars—all of us really—have taken enough damage in the last few years that our infrastructure won’t carry us. We have maybe a year or two to really find ways to generate the food and clean water and clean air that we’re all going to need. And we probably can’t do that in our solar system unless just a lot more people die. We need a fast, efficient way to trade with the colony worlds for raw materials. So that’s why I’m proposing an independent union with the sole and specific task of coordinating shipments through the gates. Most people who want to live on planets will just do that. But the Belt has a huge population of people who are specifically suited to life outside a gravity well. Moving supplies and people safely between solar systems is a new niche. And it’s one we need filled quickly and efficiently. In the proposal, I called it the spacing guild, but I’m not married to that name.”

  A gray-haired man sitting two rows behind Emily Richards cleared his throat and spoke. “You’re proposing to turn the entire population of the Belt into a single transport company?”

  “Yes, into a network of ships, support stations, and other services necessary to move people and cargo between the gates,” Holden said. “Keep in mind, they’ve got thirteen hundred and seventy-three solar systems to manage. There’s going to be work. Well, thirteen hundred and seventy-two, really. Because of Laconia.”

  “And what do you propose to do about Laconia?” a woman behind Avasarala asked.

  “I don’t know,” Holden said. “I was just starting with this.”

  Avasarala waved him to sit down, and reluctantly he did. Naomi shifted, murmured something in his ear, and Holden nodded.

  “The proposed structure of the union,” Avasarala said, “is fairly standard. Limited sovereignty in exchange for regulatory input from the major governing bodies, meaning Emily and whoever they elect once I’m out of this.”

  “Limited sovereignty?” Carlos Walker said.

  “Limited,” Avasarala said. “Don’t ask me to put out on the first date, Walker. I’m not that kind of girl. The union will, of course, need to have support from the Belt. The first union president will be taking on a huge job, but I think we can all agree that we have a unique opportunity for that. Someone well-known both among Belters and on the inner planets.”

  Holden nodded. Michio looked over at him. His bright eyes and firm chin.

  “Someone,” Avasarala continued, “above—or at least apart from—factions and politics. Trustworthy, well-tested moral compass, and with a long résumé of doing the right thing even when it’s unpopular.”

  Holden smiled, nodded to himself. He looked so pleased. Michio hadn’t come to a meeting. This was an anointing. She was suddenly profoundly disheartened. It would probably improve her chances for getting amnesty, but—

  “That is why,” Avasarala said, “we need to draft James Holden.”

  Holden yelped like he’d been bitten. “What? Wait. No, that’s all wrong. It’s a terrible idea.”

  Avasarala frowned. “Then—”

  “Look,” Holden said, standing up again. “This is exactly the problem. This is what we keep doing. Forcing rules and leadership on the Belters rather than letting them pick for themselves.”

  A grumble passed through the room, but Holden just kept talking.

  “If I can use this moment to nominate someone else instead. Someone with all the qualities Madam Secretary Avasarala just listed, and more. Someone with honor and integrity and leadership, and with the added bonus of actually belonging to the community they’d be leading.”

  And somehow—Michio wasn’t sure how this had happened—Holden was pointing at her.

  “Then I would nominate Michio Pa.”

  Chapter Fifty-Three: Naomi

  The Blue Frog was closed for renovations, so after the meetings were over, she drove the cart to a pub two levels higher and a little to spinward. The sign beside the door was cheap steel set into the wall with the words COOPERATIVE FOURTEEN hand-welded into it. Naomi didn’t know if the name had a history behind it, or if that was just the new style in naming clubs. On the other side of the door, the decor took on a much less industrial feel. The tables glowed in bright primary colors, and the walls were covered in strands of woven wire, looped and tied to look like old pictures of waterfalls. A low stage with a karaoke setup hummed and danced with itself, waiting for someone to break the ice. There was room for as many as a hundred people in the space, and counting herself and Jim, there were probably fewer than twenty. But it was also off-hours, so that made it hard to judge.

  The crew were already there and, to judge from the empty bottles the waiter was clearing away, had been there for some time. As they walked across to them, Jim relaxed. The four of them gave a little cheer and made space for two new chairs at the table.

  “What happened?” Bobbie said. “You were supposed to be here hours ago.”

  “Avasarala jumped me,” Jim said, and Amos’ empty, amiable smile got a degree wider. Jim laughed and shook his head. “No, I mean she tried to get me named as the head of the spacing guild.”

  “You know that name’s not going to stick, right?” Alex said.

  “Wait, she did what?” Bobbie said.

  Jim held out his hands, a gesture of helplessness. “She
gave out the proposal, and I gave my little speech about it, and then boom. Right at the front, she said I should be the one to help put it together. First union president. It probably took the first two hours just convincing her I wouldn’t do it.”

  “Why didn’t you take the position?” Clarissa asked. She seemed genuinely confused.

  “Because then I’d have to do it,” Jim said, waving to call the waiter back.

  “Makes sense she’d want someone she could control calling the shots, though,” Alex said.

  “Avasarala doesn’t think she can control Holden,” Bobbie said. “But she also doesn’t think anyone else can. She might just want someone from Earth in charge, at least as a figurehead. Makes the union feel like it’s in her circle of influence. Fred Johnson was OPA to the marrow, but he was from Earth. He never totally got away from that.”

  The waiter trotted over and took Jim’s order. Naomi leaned in around him so she could see Bobbie as she spoke.

  “That was our point,” she said. “If it’s going to work, the Belt needs to know it’s their own and not another set of scraps that the inners are tossing out.” The waiter reached out, his fingers stopping just short of touching her shoulder. “Whatever your best stout is,” she said, and he vanished with a nod. She turned back. “Anyway, we threw Michio Pa under the bus.”

  “She’s perfect,” Holden said. “She knows all the players in the Belt. She’s not afraid to work with Earth and Mars. She’s literally the former commander of Medina Station. Granted back before it was a station, but she’s got a real familiarity with the ship. And look what she’s been doing since she broke with Inaros. Coordination and distribution. Exactly the job we’re looking at.”

  “Well,” Alex said, “except with less piracy this time. I mean, assuming.”

  “Did she take the job?” Bobbie asked.

  “She’s coming around,” Naomi said. “It was a long meeting.”

  “What about us?” Clarissa asked. Her voice had dread in it. A hollowness. “What do we do now?”

  “We join the union,” Jim said. “I mean, we’ll need to vote on it here in the family, but it seems weird to push for a new architecture for the colonies and then not be part of it. And there’ll be a lot of work for a good ship. We have a good ship.”

  Clarissa’s gaze flickered up to Naomi, then, with an almost invisible smile, away. Jim hadn’t understood what she’d really been asking. Now that the war’s over, do I still have a place here? And he didn’t know that he’d answered yes. He had a genius for assuming things that let Clarissa trust him. Naomi handed the girl a napkin so she wouldn’t have to dab her eyes with a cuff.

  “Seems to me,” Alex said, “we should look at escorting colony ships. And making sure the ore or whatever the colony has to trade gets where it’s going.”

  “Lot of trade in-system too,” Amos said. “Don’t have to go out past the gates.”

  “Yeah,” Alex agreed. “But there’s more planets out there than I’m going to be able to see in my lifetime. I’d like to get to a few of them.”

  The waiter returned with Jim’s gin and tonic and her own stout. When she tried to pay, the transaction was already zeroed out. The waiter smiled at her, shook his head, and said, “On the house.” Naomi nodded her thanks. Jim was already drinking.

  Bobbie was the only one who seemed quiet, her hand wrapped around a glass. Alex and Amos told Clarissa stories about New Terra and going through to the new worlds. Jim drank and chimed in on occasion, the political meeting starting to fade and his shoulders slipping a little lower as he relaxed. But Bobbie kept her own council until Naomi finished her second drink, took the Martian’s hand, and tugged her away.

  “Are you all right?” Naomi asked.

  “Yes,” Bobbie said in a voice that meant no. “It’s just … this is really the end of the terraforming project, isn’t it? I mean, I knew that, but … I don’t know. Trying to get us all to here helped distract me. But this agreement they’re hammering out. It’s the shape things are going to have from now on.”

  “Yeah,” Naomi said. “And it’s going to be different.”

  “All my life, changing Mars. Making it a viable ecosystem … it’s just always been a thing. Hearing about rules and laws and systems for how that’s never coming back … I don’t know. It’s kind of hitting me that it’s really gone.”

  “Probably, yeah,” Naomi said, but Bobbie went on as if she hadn’t heard her. As if she was saying something out loud for the first time. Discovering her thoughts by hearing them expressed in her own voice.

  “Because Inaros and all the Free Navy people, they weren’t fighting for Belter rights or political recognition. They were fighting to have the past back. To have things be what they’ve always been. Sure, with them on top maybe, but … Earth’s not going to be humanity’s home anymore. Mars isn’t going to be Mars, not like I knew it. Belters aren’t even going to be Belters now. They’re going to be … what? Shipping magnates? I don’t even know.”

  “No one does,” Naomi said, leading Bobbie forward. The big Martian didn’t seem aware that they were walking. “But we’re going to find out.”

  “I don’t know who I am in that world.”

  “I don’t either. None of us does. But I know that I have my ship. And my little family with it.”

  “Yeah. That sounds like a plan.”

  “Good,” Naomi said, and put a microphone in Bobbie’s hand. “Let’s pick a song.”

  The pub filled up more at shift change, but for once no one seemed to take much notice of Jim or any of the rest of them. Even when Naomi got a standing ovation for what in retrospect must have been a deeply flawed version of Devi Anderson’s “Apart Together,” nobody seemed to recognize the crew of the Rocinante as being anything but the people at table six. It felt good knowing that could still happen sometimes. By the end of the night, even Clarissa had a turn on stage. It turned out she had a good singing voice, and after she got down, a local boy with Loca Griega tattoos tried to hit on her until Bobbie gently made it clear nothing was going to happen.

  They took the tube back to the dock, filling up almost half of a car just themselves, still a little tipsy, still talking too loud, laughing at nothing really. Alex’s Mariner Valley drawl got thicker, and Bobbie mimicked it, egging him on until they sounded like parodies of themselves. Jim, least involved with the hilarity and still somehow central to it, sat back against the rattling wall of the car, his hands behind his head and his eyes half-closed. She didn’t really understand what she and Jim and all the others were reacting to until they were at the ship. Seeing the Rocinante locked in the docking clamps was like falling into a familiar pair of arms. They were giddy because Jim was giddy. And Jim was giddy because, for once, he’d just avoided being responsible for the future of the whole human race.

  It seemed like a fair thing to celebrate.

  Back on board, the group moved together to the galley, not ready yet for the day to be over. Clarissa made herself some tea, but there wasn’t any more alcohol. Just the six of them, lounging in a galley designed to serve many more. Alex, sitting with his back against one wall, told a story about when he’d been in training on Olympus Mons and the mother of one of the other recruits had arrived to complain that the drill sergeant was being too rough on her son. That led into Bobbie talking about a time when she and her squad had all gotten food poisoning at the same meal, but bullied each other into training the next day regardless, then spent the day puking into their helmets. They were all laughing together, sharing parts of the lives they’d had before they came here. Before the Rocinante was their home.

  Eventually, without the flow of conversation abating, Alex made enough chicken with peanut sauce for everyone and passed bowls out while Clarissa told a surprisingly funny story about being in a prison writing workshop. Naomi ate the chicken with a fork, leaning against Jim as she did. The sauce wasn’t like Belters made it, but it was good enough.

  She felt Jim getting near the e
nd of his endurance. He didn’t say anything, but she knew from the sound of his breath and the way he unconsciously tapped his leg like a child trying to stay awake. She felt the exhaustion herself. It had been a long day, and the stakes had been high. The pleasant buzz left over from the pub was starting to fade, and deep, muzzy tiredness was slipping into her joints. But she didn’t want the moment to end either, any of the moments with these people in this place, even though eventually they had to. No, not even though. Because.

  Because eventually they had to. Nothing lasted forever. Not peace. Not war. Nothing.

  She stood first, taking her bowl and Jim’s and Bobbie’s, since she was done with it, and feeding them into the recycler. She stretched, yawned, held her hand out to Jim. He took his cue. Alex, who was talking about a music performance he’d seen on Titan back when he’d still been in the service, nodded his good night. Naomi led Jim to the lift, then to their cabin with the occasional sound of laughter filtering through to them, fainter the farther they went, but not absent. Not yet.

  Jim fell onto the crash couch like a marionette with his strings cut, threw one arm across his eyes, and groaned. In the light, he looked young again. The stubble on his neck and along the side of one cheek was thin and patchy, as if it were growing in for the first time. She could remember when the prospect of Jim and his body had been as powerful as a drug to her. Powerful enough that she’d been driven to take the risk of being with him. He hadn’t known then how much of a leap it had been for her. He probably still didn’t know now. Some things were secret even after you told them. He moaned again, shifted his arm, looked up at her. His smile was equal parts exhaustion and delight. Exhaustion from what they’d been through. Delight because it was done. And because they were both there.