“You’ve got all the leverage you need. You’ve got my family down on the surface. What do you want?”
“My friends have access to corporate DNA databases. Wherever you go in the solar system, you leave traces on their scanners. Based on those records, you’ve been everywhere, including places that no ship should’ve been able to reach. Luna, Mercury, Tiangong Erhao …”
“That’s over now.”
“My friend, don’t be modest! You’re one of the best pilots in the solar system. Statistical analysis proves it. Anyone else would be dead by now!”
The truth was everywhere he’d been, he’d been with Jun. It was Jun who was the kick-ass pilot. Jun who’d kept Kiyoshi alive in one dicey situation after another. All he’d done on his own was crash-land a Startractor on Callisto.
He twitched his arm out of Kharbage’s grasp. “Sure,” he said with a half-smile. “Sure I’m good.”
“OK. Then here is your mission, should you choose to accept it! Ha, ha.”
The sun-tube went dark. Night fell in the garden. All in an instant, the birds quieted. The only sound was the burble of water brimming over the swimming pool’s edge into the stream.
The water lit up, reflecting flashes of light overhead. Kiyoshi jerked his head back. “Christ.”
A fleet of Star Force warships burned out of the dark, toppling towards them like metal mountains, engines screaming. You’d never hear anything like that in real life—there was no sound in the vacuum—but the eerie shrieking of fusion drives shook Kiyoshi’s heart in his chest. He involuntarily cringed as the spaceships swept overhead.
Watching them vanish into the distance, he counted two Heavycruisers, a penumbra of smaller ships, and a Flattop belching plasma from its terawatt-class thrusters.
“Do you like my home theater?” Adnan Kharbage shouted. There were cries of approval.
A distant sun rose. The swimming pool and deck, complete with loungers and wet bar, now appeared to be floating in space. Kharbage’s guests clapped.
“It’s all piped into your BCI,” Kharbage confided.
The stars rolled, and the sun illuminated the face of Ceres. This was what they would really see if they looked outside of the orbital. A mother-of-pearl globe, its dayside hardly marred by the tiny diggings of humanity.
“What was that Star Force fleet?” Kiyoshi asked.
“It left Mars orbit yesterday,” Kharbage said.
“And where’s it going?”
“It’s coming here.”
“Ah; they’re coming to squash your little palace coup.”
“No. They are coming to destroy us.”
Kiyoshi felt in his pockets. He found his cigarette, stuck it between his teeth, and inhaled a calming dose of nicotine. He was very, very upset about this. Being forced to experience a sim against your will was one definition of torture. It meant Adnan Kharbage had stolen his log-in credentials—slipped a password-scraper into his BCI the minute it connected to the wifi in the hab. How bad was the damage? It depended how bad this was going to get.
Kharbage pointed to a location a few degrees north of Ceres’s equator. His finger extruded a laser-pointer-style beam, which made Kiyoshi smile a bit. The red dot jiggled over a depression stippled with spaceport facilities. “That is Nawish Crater.”
“And?” Kiyoshi was busy changing his passwords. He still couldn’t exit the sim. This was what you got for tangling with the big players.
“The UN wants us to evacuate the crater. They want to turn it into a refuge for the ‘free’ Martians!”
“Whuh? I heard about them.” And he’d instantly connected it with Jun’s jarring confession in the minutes before the ISA snatched him. “A few Martians have escaped the PLAN’s control …”
“A few? A few thousand. A few million.”
“It said on the news they were building a refuge for them in the Belt.”
“Ceres is in the Belt.”
“I’m sure they said it was going to be on Thisbe or something.”
“That may have been the original plan. Or maybe it was just the original lie. The money isn’t there. The UN is completely broke.”
“So they’re bringing them here?” Kiyoshi shook his head, genuinely wowed by the UN’s chutzpah. However low his opinion of the United Nations, there always turned out to be room for it to sink lower. “I guess they figure you won’t object. Can’t object. Being mere colonists and all.”
“But they’re wrong,” Adnan Kharbage said. “We object. The day that fleet arrives is the day we all die.”
Kiyoshi scratched his ear. He took a drag on his cigarette. “So it’s true about the nanites?”
One of Kharbage’s other guests stood up, a slender, dark man in a joke t-shirt (‘Always Use Protection’ with a picture of a pair of goggles). “I work for Ad Astra,” he said. “It’s worse than anything you may have heard. The nanites are unlike any technology we know. They rewire the limbic system and alter genetic expression markers. They are extremely hardy, and reproduce on a diet of CO2. If they get inside your hab …” He pulled the side of his hand across his throat.
“Well, OK,” Kiyoshi said, “but Ceres isn’t an asteroid. It’s a dwarf planet. From Nawish to Kirnis is a 700-kilometer trek through vacuum … and I mean vacuum. No atmosphere here. No CO2 for these nanobeasties to snack on. That looks like a pretty good buffer zone.”
“We’re keeping our samples in a biohazard containment facility on a research ship in Neptune orbit,” the Ad Astra man said. “That’s a pretty good buffer zone.”
“Seven hundred kilometers …”
“An eight-hour drive.”
“No one’s going to be giving the Martian refugees cars.”
“I would not fucking count on that,” Adnan Kharbage said. “But it doesn’t matter, anyway. Have you forgotten that the Martians are vacuum-adapted? That they don’t need to breathe? That they can tolerate extreme cold? And they can run?”
After a few moments, Kiyoshi drawled, “So drop a nuke on Nawish after they get settled in. Problem solved.”
The Ad Astra scientist shook his head despairingly. “What the UN is proposing is genocide in slow motion.”
“The Martians are resistant to radiation,” Kharbage said. “Suppose we did nuke them. The UN would look the other way while they escaped. While they infected us. We’re being set up as guinea pigs. Victims of a new era in genetic experimentation!”
Kiyoshi saw the legit terror in Adnan Kharbage’s eyes. He remembered how Kharbage had stoked his people’s fear of the nanites. A bit more of that would have all 230 million inhabitants of Ceres screaming bloody murder against the UN.
And of course that was exactly what this gang of pirates wanted.
He also reflected, for a split second, on the unthinkable possibility that everything they said was true—and pushed those thoughts away. Even if it was true to the last detail, he couldn’t do anything about it.
“What are you going to do about it?” he said. His apparent bluntness masked a wild inspiration that he was keeping to himself, for now.
Adnan Kharbage relaxed and beamed. Uh oh.
“That’s my ship, over there,” the Ad Astra scientist said, pointing. A Starcruiser heaved out of the void, sim-style, larger and more glilttery than it would have looked in real life.
The other guests pointed into the dark.
“There’s my ship.”
“And mine.”
“Those are mine.”
The home theater filled up with spacecraft. Kiyoshi recognized pretty much everything he’d logged in Ceres orbit on the way in. Four ITN haulers, a bunch of tugs and privately owned small transports, three corporate Starcruisers, and a handful of Startractors belonging to Kharbage, LLC.
“This is your fleet? Star Force is gonna atomize you,” Wetherall said with a silly laugh.
“Fusion drives make pretty good weapons.”
“Not from halfway around the solar system. They’ll slag you with their long-range
kinetics before you even pick them up on radar.”
“You’re right,” said the former director of Customs & Excise. “That’s why we’re not going to fight them.”
“Good to know,” Molly murmured.
“This is a refugee fleet.”
“A—huh?” Wetherall said. “You’re just going to leave and let the Martians have your planet?”
Adnan Kharbage chuckled. “No. We are going to make the UN think we left.”
“You’ve already started laying the groundwork,” Kiyoshi said, understanding that they must have been planning this for a while. “Getting people scared about the nanites. Ramping up the forum mentions and the email chatter. The ISA’ll pick it up, so they’ll be more likely to buy your bug-out move.”
“Precisely!” Kharbage said, looking disgustingly pleased with himself. It was people’s lives he was jerking around. Kiyoshi’s nieces and nephews he was giving nightmares.
But if this were all true—and Kiyoshi was starting to think it was—the coming reality would be worse than any nightmare.
“So what’s the plan? You make them think the elites have bugged out. Those ships wouldn’t hold everyone. You’ll have to make like you abandoned all the poor suckers in the Belows. It’s plausible, I’ll give you that. But where does that get you?”
“Earth!” hissed the CEO of LGM Industries.
“Earth?”
“Oh, man,” Molly said, pulling her dreads over her face like a child hiding from a scary movie.
The LGM man grinned. He was a freakish-looking individual. An obvious cyborg, he had two extra arms, as small as the arms of a T-Rex, which met in front of his chest for fine work. He had a tail sheathed in feathery black hair, and a bony ridge covered with the same hair atop his head, like a dinosaur’s crest. LGM Industries was the only supermajor corporation headquartered off Earth. By flaunting his augments, this exec was declaring solidarity with the off-the-wall culture of Midway, where LGM was based, and by extension, with the colonies in general.
Kiyoshi personally considered it an offense against God’s creation to mutilate yourself like that. But the LGM exec was still human. Human, as the Martians—surely—were not, whatever Jun had done to them.
“We’re going to hold Earth hostage,” the LGM exec hissed.
Kiyoshi blinked. “Oh.”
“We’ll return to Earth … as if fleeing the threat of nanites. They’ll let us approach. After all, we’re their own kind. The rich and selfish, who would happily allow their inferiors to be genocided.” The exec’s mouth twisted into a sneer. He raised his arms to the sky.
The Ceres fleet vanished, and was replaced by Earth’s familiar cloud-garlanded orb.
A spark flared somewhere in North America.
Another one, in Europe.
A third spark, in Africa, triggered a bloom of smoke and magma.
“Straight down the throat of Nyamuragira,” the LGM exec said with satisfaction. “As you noted,” he added to Wetherall, “fusion drives make excellent weapons.”
Molly said, “You’re not really going to do that.”
“Of course we’re not. It’s the threat that counts.”
“Either the UN diverts their fleet from Ceres, and recognizes us as a sovereign nation,” Kharbage said, “or they lose a carefully selected list of major metropolises!”
It made Kiyoshi furious to see Adnan Kharbage posturing like he had any fucking idea what a ship-sized impactor would do to Shanghai or London or Rome. Practically bursting with self-satisfaction to be included with the really big players.
He said roughly, “I guess you want me to fly the ships?”
“Any one of them,” Kharbage nodded. “The others will be slaved to your hub. Take your pick!” The Ceres fleet reappeared on the screen.
“No, thanks. I’ve already got a ship. It’s called the Unsaved Changes. It’s parked in Occator Crater.”
The LGM man made a face. “Well, why not? It could be refitted with a more powerful drive.”
“I would appreciate that. But I’m not flying your ships to Earth.”
Blank faces. Only Adnan Kharbage, a comparative newbie at high-stakes corporate poker, betrayed emotion. His brows knitted threateningly.
“It’s crazy,” Kiyoshi explained, wondering if he were the crazy one, since they all seemed to take it seriously. The world had changed in the months while he wasn’t paying attention, and he hadn’t completely caught up yet. “It’s just, I mean, Earth! You can’t threaten Earth!”
“Thank you,” Wetherall said. “Thank you very much for saying that. Ooof.” He suddenly doubled over as if he’d been kicked in the stomach.
Kiyoshi gazed desperately around at the big players. “Anyway, I’ve got a better idea.” Now or never.
“A better idea,” the LGM man said. “A better idea. Go on.”
“Pallas.”
“Pallas?”
“Yes. Pallas. You don’t have to go all the way to Earth to point a gun at the UN’s head! Pallas is at least as important to them as London or Rome.”
“It’s the headquarters of the ISA.”
“Yes! Exactly!” Kiyoshi said.
“It is the headquarters of the ISA,” the LGM man repeated, as if he didn’t think Kiyoshi had heard the first time. “Equipped with in-depth defenses that can, and have, stood up to PLAN attacks. We would have no chance of getting anywhere near Pallas … and no media coverage to boost our signal. That’s important. Out there, no one’s watching … except the ISA. They would not hesitate to slag us.”
“Me. It won’t be you flying those ships, remember. It’ll be me. The risk’s on me.”
“Oh, no, it isn’t,” said someone else. “That’s not your multi-billion-spider hardware.”
“Either you want this done, or you don’t. If you want to try threatening Earth, good luck to you. Hire a different pilot, and see how far they get. I’m betting they would get slagged in full view of the media. But if you actually want to succeed … Pallas.”
They exchanged glances. Mouths moved, sub-vocalizing. He saw to his relief that they didn’t suspect his self-interest. They were completely blinded by their own self-interest.
The LGM man spoke. “How do you figure you can threaten Pallas without getting slagged?”
Kiyoshi managed half a smile. He brushed a hand over his hair in a preening gesture, as if checking his appearance in a mirror. “All the best pilots are smugglers.”
xxiii.
“The Unsaved Changes is my ship,” Molly said to Michael. “It’s not his.”
“I guess it’s his now,” Michael mumbled. He was sitting on the floor of Molly’s guest room on the Kharbage orbital. Filmy white curtains blew over the hardwood floor, across rectangles of morning sunlight. The orbital had a ring of rooms all the way around its circumference at one end, each with its own leafy patio. Molly lay face-down across her bed, face buried in the real linen sheets.
“I was going to sell it for seed capital,” she said. “I was going to start a new business. Now everything’s messed up.”
“You still have your skills,” Michael said, trying to find a hopeful angle for her.
“You need money to make money.”
“My dad might give you some money.”
“Your dad is a grade-A shithead. And I don’t care if he’s listening. He’s probably going to sell me into slavery!”
Colin stumbled in from the patio in time to hear this.
“He won’t sell you into slavery,” Molly said. “We’re both superfluous to requirements. But at least I’m hot. No one would want to bang your ugly ass. He’ll probably whack you and sell your organs.”
“Jeez, Moll; the kid.” Colin shot a glance at Michael.
“The kid’s gonna be juuuust like his father in another few years.”
This stung unbearably. Although Michael was aware that everything had gone wrong from Molly’s point of view, her point of view wasn’t the only point of view. “I was just trying to help
!” he protested. “I did help!”
Colin sat down in one of the basket chairs by the window. Half a gee of gravity was starting to tell on his spaceborn frame. His shoulders slumped, and his face looked haggard. He fumbled in the pockets of his duster and brought out a couple of cigarettes, a scarf, half of a bread roll, and a tablet. He pointed up at the ceiling with a quizzical expression.
Michael immediately knew what was being asked. He nodded—yes, there’s a camera—and pointed out to the patio.
Molly followed them out, complaining that her bones hurt.
Colin moved under the lemon tree that grew on the patio. Michael gave him the thumbs-up—the cameras couldn’t see him under there. Colin wrote with his finger on his tablet.
“Can you get this freaking behavioral modification program off my BCI?”
Colin’s handwriting was so bad Michael could hardly read it. He himself had perfect cursive, thanks to school. He wrote, “Sure! That’s easy! I would just need you to give me your admin log-in.”
Colin snatched the tablet back and read what Michael had written. Molly read it over his shoulder. She made a face. “I don’t know if I want to do that.”
“I won’t look at your stuff, I promise,” Michael wrote. He’d been planning to do this for them anyway. It would have been safer to wait until they were down on the surface, but he’d do it right now, if that was what they wanted. Screw what his father would say when he noticed.
Inside Molly’s room, the door opened. “Hey, Molly,” said Kiyoshi’s voice. “Is Michael … huh? Where is she?”
“Out here,” Molly said coldly.
Kiyoshi came out, squinting in the bright morning light. He wore a new pair of jeans, sewn, not printed, and a white t-shirt. He was getting the best of everything, now that the future of Ceres depended on him. It delighted Michael to see that Kiyoshi was taking advantage of the Kharbages’ hospitality while they waited for the Unsaved Changes to be refitted. Kiyoshi had even got himself a new silver pendant on a chain, the same religious symbol as he used to wear. The others could have taken advantage, too, if they wanted. Instead, Colin was just eating his own weight in food, and Molly was sulking.
She gave Kiyoshi the full weight of her sulky stare. “What’ve you been doing?”
The Callisto Gambit Page 26
