by Robin Craig
Chapter 57 – David
David sat at his desk going over his notes. He was just an intern here, not paid to think deep thoughts about the issues he was involved in. He did that thinking free of charge. His true passion was philosophy, and he had taken this job not only to earn money but also to earn experience of how things worked in the real world. It was perhaps a rare attitude for a student on the verge of a doctorate in such a field, but he was a rare student.
It had turned out more interesting than he could have hoped, with the current brouhaha about the geneh Katlyn and the fallout from her escape from the law. His department was engaged in a politely, and sometimes impolitely, raging debate over the fate of Trainee Detective Miriam Hunter, and both the issue and the debate were fascinating in their own ways.
In their desire for a disposable scapegoat GenInt had applied pressure to have her fired, but that may have done her more good than harm: her department was furious that GenInt would spy on one of its own and in such a manner. Had GenInt been its usual self that would not have saved her. But GenInt was having its own problems with the revelations that had brought down the President. Having had one of their own present and equally unable to prevent the fiasco did not help: if they wanted Miriam to be a sacrificial lamb, then Amaro would have to join her on the block.
To the surprise of many, GenInt showed admirable loyalty to their agent, choosing not to press matters against either of them. Cynics opined that they couldn’t afford yet more embarrassment. They may have changed their minds, though not their cynicism, had they heard certain remarks Amaro idly made to his superiors. These concerned the contents of his memoirs, should they ever be published; he had then ruminated on the difficulty of finding the time to write books while one remained gainfully employed.
But that did not end the debate within her own department, a debate which David watched as an entomologist might watch the frantic life under a log. In his view there was no question. Perhaps, as some argued, Miriam was not as innocent as she made out. There were inconsistencies in her story. There always were, her supporters countered: such were the twin fogs of war and memory. The latter view was particularly popular among those who had spent part of their career in the field themselves rather than entirely behind a desk reading and writing reports. In his own mind, David dispelled the fog with a simple binary logic. If Miriam had done exactly as she said, upholding her duty to the end but failing, there could be no grounds for censure when she had done better than everyone else involved. But if for some reason she had been complicit in Katlyn’s escape, then in David’s view she had done what was moral, or as moral as anyone could be in the circumstances they had been thrust among.
These views he kept to himself. He had worked here long enough to know they would not be understood, and if they were understood they would not be welcome. He might have told anyone who asked but he knew that nobody would. The people around him did not seem concerned with the issues or even with the truth of the matter. They seemed concerned only with navigating the safest course between the battling flames of public opinion. And even that was by the indirect means of divining which way their political overlords would jump in reaction to those flames, rather than watching the actual fire.
David did not blame them for this: not much, anyway. It was the inescapable nature of a bureaucracy that it would devolve into a web of competing pressures, set by the fears and ambitions of men more than reality or the morality needed to survive in it.
He rested his chin on steepled fingers and stared into the depths of his tea. The moral issue is the key, he thought. He felt he might admire this Miriam Hunter if the truth was what he suspected, but he did not envy her. What could a cop on the street do with a moral contradiction between the law and what she thought was right? For all the times in history when “just following orders” was rejected as an excuse after the fact, following one’s own ethics instead was rarely accepted as justification at the time. In liberal times you were likely to lose your job; in harsher times your life.
He could see why the police had to obey the law, but he could also see why an unjust law set up an intolerable moral dilemma. What was an honest cop to do? Enforce the law at the price of her own ethics? Resign, depriving the law of its best people? Or betray her own oath? If this Miriam Hunter had somehow sought him out to ask his advice, what would he have told her? He did not know.
The only solution was that the law must always be just. But how to do that was the question: the central question of the philosophy of law, he thought.
So what of the politicians who made the laws? They too were more dancers to the tune of public opinion than its conductors. No free country had been born and no dictator voted into power in the absence of fertile soil in the minds of the citizens. True, a great leader could push the people in one direction or another, could even inspire them: but only by kneading or sharpening the ideological clay he was given, not by changing their minds in any fundamental way. Genghis Khan had not made the Mongol hordes out of peaceful farmers any more than Washington had made the United States out of compliant serfs.
Genghis Khan had done what he did because that is what people did. But Washington and his friends had made something new, because they believed something new and enough other people believed it too. And sometimes one man might be enough to light the fire. He thought of the man who had had the courage and vision to make the country of Capital a reality, which had grown into a haven for a desperate creature for whom no other haven existed; which had led to all of this.
No, David thought, politics itself is not the answer. If you want to change the world you first have to change minds, and that was a process beyond the purview of bureaucracies or the timeframe of elected leaders.
He sat still, pinned by the thought. His love of philosophy had started with a love of existence, the burning desire to understand it, and the unshakable belief that it could be understood. That love had taken something of a battering when faced with the reality of much of the field as it was: the tortured arguments and flights from reality that he had seen too much of. He had begun wondering whether a career in philosophy was really what he wanted; whether he should just take his shiny new doctorate when it was granted and use it as a ticket to other pastures, perhaps science. But it was what he wanted, and now he knew the want was both real and necessary. He was idealistic enough to care about changing the world; young enough to think he could.
He was also old enough to know he might not. He wondered whether his work would be remembered by the world, or remembered only by the students he might one day teach. Or perhaps not even by them. He decided it didn’t matter. You could only change the world one mind at a time. Perhaps he would change the right one, or perhaps he would merely lighten one corner of the world for a brief instant and then be forgotten. But it was enough. And who knew how far in space or time the ripples might then reach. He did not know the captain of the yacht Seabitz, or even that he existed; yet the far faint ripples of that man’s life had touched him in a way he would never know.
He looked up to see a man gazing at him with a look of mild amusement. “You look done in, Samuels. Do you have much more to do? Time to go, I reckon.”
David smiled back at him. “Oh, I have a lot more to do. But yes, time to go.”
~~~
In the end they couldn’t decide whether Miriam should be punished for what she had failed to achieve or rewarded for what she had. They saw dangers in both courses, which was an uncomfortable position for those whose aim was to avoid danger entirely. So in the manner of bureaucrats in any place or age they followed their principles: they passed the decision to her own boss.
Ramos had looked at this non-decision with cynicism honed by years of never having it disappointed. He knew they didn’t really care about Hunter; they didn’t care whether they threw away the career of a good cop or saved that of a bad one. They would be happy with whatever decision he made and happy if they had to fire him for it in turn.
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br /> Of course they did not put it that way. No, as her supervisor he was in the best position to understand the nuances of the case, and he had the experience to do what was fair while giving due weight to the views of the public. The same thing, in other words.
But Ramos was an honest man who had come up through the ranks, and while he knew how to play the game he thought the game had to be kept in its place. He had made many compromises in his life, but no more than he had to, and there was one principle he held dear: when there was no safe course, the safest course was to just do what was right. Screw the lot of them, he thought. When boldness and justice gave the same advice, he would grasp the double-edged blade and see who had the courage to try to turn it on him.
He made the decision that would make everyone better off in the long run, from the citizens he was sworn to serve and protect to his superiors, whom he merely had to. Citing her diligence, courage, creativity and perceptiveness, he promoted Miriam Hunter to full detective.
Chapter 58 – Friends
So Miriam again found herself at a party hosted by her uncle.
It was much the same as the last one, with quality food and champagne flowing freely, and sundry relatives close and distant come along to offer their congratulations and just catch up with each other.
But this time it was more than family: she had acquired new friends as well. She spent a riotous time with Rianna, Darian and Kimberley, toasting each other’s achievements and careers, with occasional digressions into the follies and perfidies of the male of their species. If a point of pain remained within Miriam on the subject, it kept itself quiet.
Stone had arrived and Miriam saw him out of the corner of her eye, having a long chat with Seth. He then came over and said laconically, “Well, I guess we’re not going to be rid of you anytime soon, kid: I just hope your next partner has good medical insurance. But try to learn some caution. For all your many flaws, I really don’t want to see you killed.” He smiled and shook her hand, then moved off to relate tales of Miriam’s exploits to her eager relatives. The tales sprouted embellishments proportionally to how well watered they were with champagne. Miriam overheard a few and rolled her eyes.
Even Ramos made an appearance and took her aside. “Congratulations, Detective Hunter. I have some more good news for you too. With all you’ve been through you’ve earned a couple of week’s vacation time. When you come back we’ll assign you a permanent partner.”
“Can I make a request?”
“Sure.”
“I’d like to keep working with Jack Stone if I can. I know our partnership was just a convenience and not meant to last. I also know all those beatings and bullets might have persuaded him that a desk job might be a good idea after all. But we work well together and he can teach me a lot. So I have to ask.”
“I’ll talk to him, see what I can do. In the meantime enjoy your vacation: you deserve it.” He toasted her with a smile then moved off into the crowd.
As usual, Miriam eventually found herself at the window. There was a fog, and the buildings appeared to rise out of a faintly glowing sea, the lights of vehicles like fish in its depths. Seth joined her and they looked out over the city together in silence. Then he said, “So, I hear you’ll be taking some time off. About time too, I think. Have you made any plans?”
Miriam stayed looking over the city rising from its sea and replied, “You know, I’ve always liked snorkeling. That feeling of utter peace and stillness, just drifting through all that beauty. The opposite of my work,” she added with a crooked smile. “Isn’t it funny, how you can love two opposite things for two opposite reasons?”
Seth nodded slowly. “I know what you mean. Do you want some advice? With your time and bonus you can afford to treat yourself: do something exotic. I’ve dived in Vanuatu and it’s magnificent; I hear the Maldives are still good too.”
Miriam smiled. “Maybe. Or maybe I’ll do something even more exotic. I think I might visit that weird country, Capital. I have friends there.”
Book III: Time Enough for Killing
Chapter 1 – Killing Time
“Please don’t kill me. I am innocent. I don’t deserve to die.”
The Spider stopped, uncertain, not knowing why it was uncertain. Had some independent observer been privy to this scene, they would have seen a metal monster towering over a young woman, and there would have been no doubt in their mind of the outcome. The monster was clearly fit for its purpose, a purpose that as clearly was killing. And here was a person; soft, warm and defenseless: waiting to be killed.
But inside the monster’s mind something was wrong. Something in what it had just heard. But what? It was confused and did not know why. Perhaps part of its confusion was that it did not know what confusion was. Its Id rose like a wave, insistently calling to complete its mission; but the Mind needed answers. There is a reason for the Mind, it told the Id sternly: Be patient. There is a mystery here that must be solved. Time enough for killing then. It replayed the scene, seeking those answers.
It had entered this wreck of a building, searching. And it had found. With its grippers it had torn away a fractured concrete block sprouting tendrils of twisted steel, and found the woman hiding there. Cowering. Staring white-faced at it, as at her doom.
There was no question in its mind, no mercy, not even a concept of mercy. Just a calculation of which weapon was most appropriate: a calculation taking into account energy cost, materiel use, replenishment estimations and the chance of collateral self-damage. There was no calculation of whether the woman should be destroyed or whether her death should be painless or agonizing: such things were irrelevant to the Mind that weighed them. The laser on its left secondary arm was the optimum choice: the woman was not armored or armed, except for a string of hypertherm mines she had not dared detonate in such a confined space; a soft target easily dispatched. But when it swung its weapon to bear and the red bead of its aiming beam swept to a stop on her neck, the woman had said something. Something strangely disturbing. It was as if a tiny crack had opened in a shell around its soul, a shell it had not known was there around a soul it had not known it possessed, and a bright light was shining through the crack.
Kill! Its desire, if desire was the word for what drove it, bared its fangs at the Spider’s reluctance. Again the Mind soothed the desire, smoothing the quills of its angry urgency into acquiescence. It needed to know. In its existence this experience was unparalleled. Its answer to it was unexpected and bold: it did something unprecedented.
Lyssa stared at the Spider in terror. She had heard it coming and hidden as best she could. But it had found her, and now there it stood in all its gleaming horror. Four slender metal insectoid legs supported a fat ovoid about three feet off the ground; an irregular, rounded cylindrical shape about four feet long perched atop the ovoid on bearings that let it stretch vertically or lean forward. Had it wished to, it could have leaned so far forward that they could have stared into each other’s eyes. Lyssa was glad it did not so wish.
It had an active skin that could change color and pattern in an instant, like a chameleon adjusting to its background or a cuttlefish flashing its rage. When it had found her it had shimmered from a black and grey camouflage pattern to a uniform silver, as if to accentuate the implacability of its metallic strength. The eyes were binocular cameras in a dark sensor band near the top of the cylinder; the band was shaped like a frowning mask that gave the Spider a perpetually hostile glare. Below the head sprouted two long metal arms terminating in two fingers and an opposed thumb, each over a foot long: if those names could be used for such cruel claws. Beneath each clawed arm was a smaller arm terminating in even deadlier weaponry. One of those weapons swiveled toward her head, its red eye a harbinger of death.
In sudden clarity Lyssa saw the room as if frozen in time. Dirty red sunlight from the setting sun struggled through a window and highlighted the Spider’s metal surfaces, giving it a tinge of old blood; a thin trickle of dust fell onto its shell, p
attering and sliding to the floor. This Spider must be fairly new, she realized: it had few of the scars of war on its unfeeling skin, and only a few desiccated fingers, trophies of its more personal kills, hung from the chain looped on its chest. Lyssa thought what an interesting painting this scene would make, like the image of a technological god of death and decay. Strange what you think, when you are about to die, she thought with an echo of wonder. Strange that life can see beauty even in its end. Then the beauty died as she contemplated the shriveled fingers and glanced at her own, still alive and warm and feeling. She wondered which of them would soon hang chained to those others in cold and bloodied death.
Somewhere out there was Charlie, if indeed he was still alive himself. But he would be unable to rescue her now. Her people had found to their dismay how hard the Spiders were to kill. And those few that had been overmatched had not gone gracefully into whatever dark night awaited their darker souls: when a Spider decided its cause was hopeless it exploded in a flash of flame and shrapnel. There was little left to study, and too often little left of its destroyers. They were fast and it was difficult to engage them effectively from a safe distance, so instead they tried to cripple the monsters enough to stop them but not enough that they immediately self-destructed. With luck the attackers could then retreat to bombard it from afar. It was not a particularly good strategy: but there were no good strategies.
Lyssa knew she was going to die here; she knew that the gleaming monster before her was the last thing her eyes would see. But she was young. It had not been so long ago that she had been not only young but happy, with the carefree joy of youth. A teenager just blossoming into womanhood, reveling in the growing power of her body and mind; exulting in the wonder of her new passions: passions satisfied so gloriously by Charlie. Her life, like the lives of so many others, had been filled with light and promise. Then the war had come, and with the war had come the Spiders; then too many of her friends had died, and the promises had died with them.
