“I’m exactly the person,” DeRicci said. “You need someone decisive and nonpolitical. Otherwise, we’d have been in the same situation as Mars, and all those deaths would have been your fault.”
The governor-general closed her eyes. She obviously didn’t want to hear this.
“And,” DeRicci said, moving close enough to get the governor-general to open her eyes in alarm, “if you force me to resign to avoid a scandal, I’ll be happy to tell everyone how indecisive you were, and how awful the council was, and how no one would help me.”
“I don’t like threats,” the governor-general said.
“Neither do I,” said DeRicci. “I also don’t like martyring myself for no good cause. If I step down to avoid your scandal, my life will be ruined. I’d probably have to leave Armstrong. I might even have to leave the Moon. You’re not doing that to me, Celia. You’re working with me, whether you like it or not.”
“But you’re not political,” the governor-general said.
“Then come to the interview with me,” DeRicci said. “Answer most of the questions. Be the political one, and protect me from my worst instincts. Let me talk about my past, and let the people decide.”
“Do you realize what kind of risk that is?” The governor-general’s voice actually shook.
DeRicci stared at her. The governor-general seemed even smaller than she had a moment ago.
“Yeah,” DeRicci said. “I know the risk. It’s a risk to your political career, that’s all. And considering the risks I faced today—the risk of being overwhelmed by panicked Disty, the risk of hundreds, maybe thousands of deaths—I think the risk we would take talking to Ki Bowles is pretty small.”
The governor-general bent her head. Then she shook it.
“You say you’re not political,” the governor-general said softly, almost to herself, “and yet you’ve boxed me in.”
“So,” DeRicci said, “we’re facing this together?”
The governor-general stood. “It seems I have no other choice.”
Sixty-five
Two hours later, the Disty and the Sahara Dome Survivors came to an agreement. Flint was proud of the survivors. Because they knew the Disty needed them, the survivors took control of the situation entirely. They got the Disty to agree to payments, days off, and a duration for the ritual help.
Weiss and Vajra proved able negotiators. They even got the Disty to contact the High Command and lock the agreement in stone. Flint was impressed with the structure they placed on the entire affair—a structure no one else had thought to impose.
When the negotiations were finished, Weiss, Vajra, and the others went with nine of the Disty to the Disty vessel. Only the lead Disty remained. The others had gone through the airlock before the lead Disty asked Flint to take it to Norton.
When they arrived at the brig, they found Norton sitting up. His clumsily bandaged shoulder looked like it hurt him, but his color was still good.
“From one prison to another,” he said when he saw the Disty.
“It is not that simple,” the Disty said.
“I don’t want to go to Mars. I’ve been back too many times. I hate it.”
“You will not have to go to the surface,” the Disty said. “I need one small thing from you.”
Flint looked at it with surprise. He had thought the Disty was going to take Norton to the ship.
“What would that be?” Flint asked.
“Just a bit of blood to clean the site.” The Disty reached into the pocket of its black cloak and removed a small vial. “If you can, tell us where you killed the woman so that we might reclaim that space as well.”
Norton looked from the Disty to Flint. “What did you tell this thing?”
“I told him what you told me,” Flint said. “That’s why you’re not going to the surface. The Disty don’t want to be responsible for a criminal.”
Norton frowned. “I told you that to scare you.”
“Apparently,” Flint said, “it scared them.”
“Time is short,” the Disty said. “Will you release the criminal so that I might take the blood?”
Norton scrunched backwards on the cot, getting as close to the wall as he could. “I’m not volunteering for anything.”
“You do not have to volunteer,” the Disty said.
“I’m ill. Taking blood could hurt me.”
“A consideration you did not have when you murdered your human friend,” the Disty said.
“Or when you threatened us,” Flint said.
“Yet you’re not injured.” Norton rubbed the bandage. “I’m going to complain to every authority I can find about this.”
“Then complain.” The Disty looked at Flint. “Will you let me into your brig?”
Flint unlocked the door. It swung open. He put a hand on his laser pistol but, to his surprise, Norton didn’t try to bolt. Instead, he remained pushed against the wall, watching the Disty.
The Disty opened the vial, setting the cap in its pocket. Then it unsheathed its knife. The blade was as wicked as Flint remembered those ritual knives to be. The black glass absorbed the light—yet something deep within sparkled for just a moment.
Flint held his breath. He knew that the Disty couldn’t commit a vengeance killing for a human-on-human crime, no matter what the outcome. Besides, it would take more than one Disty to do a proper vengeance killing, since most of the knife work happened before the victim died.
Still, Flint’s grip on his laser pistol tightened.
“Thank you for remaining seated,” the Disty said. “This makes my job so much easier.”
Then it reached out with the knife and slashed forward, hitting Norton in the jugular vein. Blood spurted all over the brig, splashing the Disty.
“What the hell?” Flint sprang forward, shoving the Disty aside. It already had filled the vial.
Norton was grabbing his neck, his skin growing paler by the second. His fingers couldn’t contain the blood.
Flint put his hands on the wound as well, but the blood continued to flow out.
“You said just a little blood!” Flint snapped.
The Disty held up the vial. “So it is.”
“You had no right to kill him.”
“Perhaps he will not die.”
But they both knew that Norton wasn’t going to survive this. Even Norton knew it, his eyes panic filled, his voice gone because he couldn’t get enough oxygen into his lungs.
“What the hell am I supposed to do?” Flint asked.
“Try to save him,” the Disty said. “I shall leave before he dies so as not to be contaminated.”
“Wait!” Flint said.
“You can tell your government that he came to me willingly, and participated in the ritual.” The Disty held up the vial. “They agreed to that.”
It nodded, then backed out of the brig, leaving a trail of blood as it hurried down the corridor.
Flint couldn’t follow it. He kept his fingers on Norton’s neck, grasping for the medical kit that had been replaced outside the brig.
He couldn’t reach the kit. So he grabbed the bandage on Norton’s shoulder. The bandage was designed to hold the pieces of the wound in place while nanohealers knitted the skin back together.
But he couldn’t pull the bandage free. In fact, the bandage yelled at him, telling him he would destroy the work if he continued pulling. He ignored the voice, but the bandage didn’t come off. It had incorporated itself into the healing skin.
Norton’s own grip had slipped. His hand was loose beneath Flint’s. Norton’s eyes fluttered, and he made a slight gurgling sound.
The ship bounced. Flint recognized that motion. The automated tunnel had retracted. In a moment, the grapplers would let loose.
He cursed, but kept his hand on Norton’s neck. It was futile. Flint knew it, but couldn’t stop himself, not until the blood stopped flowing completely.
It grew sticky against his fingers.
Flint looked up at Norton, his s
kin a pale grayish-white, and saw that his eyes were half open and glassy. Flint sprinted for the medical kit, placing a bandage on the neck, a bandage like the one stuck to Norton’s arm.
The bandage informed Flint that the subject was dead, and therefore the bandage would be useless.
Flint flung it across the room.
He sank down onto the floor, looking at the dead man in his brig. The ship bounced again and then shook as the grapplers came free.
You can tell your government that he came to me willingly and participated in the ritual. They agreed to that.
Technically, the Disty was right. The government had agreed to that. But the death had occurred in Flint’s ship, in his presence. He was not a government representative. He would be in trouble from the moment he returned to Armstrong.
He sat there for a long time as the blood pooled. Norton’s body slipped down the wall slowly, leaving another blood trail.
Flint knew what he had to do. The Disty had given him the answer. Flint would claim—should anyone ask—that Norton had gone with the Disty. The Disty would back him up with the official language used previously.
Flint would have to change his records so that there were no complete recordings of the Disty taking the six out of the ship, and only a short moment of the lead Disty talking with Norton.
He stood slowly, furious at himself for being tricked. He had known better.
He would not ever do the government—even in the person of DeRicci—any more favors.
This one could have killed him.
But it wouldn’t.
He would make sure of that.
Sixty-six
Ki Bowles almost didn’t believe her luck. Not only would she get an interview with Noelle DeRicci, she would also get to speak to the governor-general. Bowles hadn’t expected anyone to answer her queries for an interview. The fact that DeRicci’s assistant had gotten back to her quickly and had offered the governor-general was a coup.
Thaddeus Ling poked his head in the broadcast booth. He was grinning. “Great job. I expect you to make the most of this.”
“I’m thinking of some puff questions and a light interview at first,” Bowles said, “and then I’ll get to the tougher stuff. That way I’ll have some material for today’s downloads, and more throughout the week.”
“Whatever you need,” he said. “I’m taking you off the overall story and giving you time to prepare. I want this perfect.”
She nodded. The immediate story had pretty much ended. The Disty vessels that had ringed half the Moon were heading back to Mars. That would be a heck of a story—life among the contaminated Disty—but it wasn’t her story.
Her story had to do with discrimination, bigotry, and a justification for keeping the Disty off the Moon.
The fact that the governor-general had allied herself with that was just an added bonus.
Bowles was finally going to get the break of her career.
Sixty-seven
Flint put the Emmeline on autopilot, heading back to the Moon on one of the more unpopular routes. He also had the ship go very slowly.
Then he dragged Norton’s body to the airlock. Flint made sure the environmental controls were on in the airlock before he took the body inside.
There he used one of the small surgical scalpels to remove Norton’s ID chips, as well as any visible network chips. Flint placed those in a pile near the outer door. He leaned Norton against the door as well.
When he finished, he left the airlock and went back inside. He worked steadily, taking his time, making sure he took care of every little detail. Even with the help of his ‘bots, it took Flint hours to clean the ship.
Finally, he went to the cockpit and checked the ship’s location. He still had a long way to go before reaching the Moon. No other ships surrounded him, and nothing registered at all on his scans.
His stomach twisted. He did not believe in treating human beings—even human beings like Norton—in this way. But he had no choice.
Even if he managed to survive the inquiries, DeRicci wouldn’t. No one would approve of a human’s death in service of the Disty. If no one inquired about Norton, then it would simply be assumed that he had disappeared on Mars. A lot of people did that.
Flint turned on one of the internal cameras and looked at the body in his airlock. Norton didn’t seem like a threat at all. He looked pathetic, a man who had had no chance since he was a small child, when his entire family had been murdered in front of him.
Flint had had to take Norton’s word that he had murdered Jørgen, and maybe others. Flint doubted he would investigate that now.
He didn’t want to find out if Norton had lied.
Flint double-checked his instruments again. The Emmeline was alone here. He was alone.
He pressed a part of his console screen and opened the exterior doors.
Norton’s body got sucked outside, along with a flurry of chips. The chips immediately scattered. The body floated away as if it were on some kind of adventure all its own.
Flint closed the exterior doors. Then he hit the engines and sped up, hurrying away from the area.
He sat at the console, head down, for a long moment. Finally, he remembered to contact DeRicci. He did so audio only.
“Flint here,” he said. “I’ve given the survivors to the Disty, but you probably know that. I hope the whole thing works. Now that I’m out here, away from the Moon, I’ve decided to take advantage of the yacht like you’ve always told me to. I’m taking a short vacation. I’ll be back in a month or so, and then we can talk. Good work on this.”
And he signed off. He sent the message, encoded, along a slow channel, so it would arrive after he was too far away to receive an answer.
He didn’t want DeRicci to see how shaken he truly was.
He took the ship off the preprogrammed route to the Moon and headed toward the outer reaches of the solar system. He hadn’t been anywhere except the Moon, Mars, and Earth. Time to see a few other planets, or just be alone for a while on a very long journey, talking to no one, thinking of nothing.
He felt contaminated, and he doubted anything would make that feeling go away.
Sixty-eight
DeRicci got the encoded message from Flint just before she sat down with Bowles and the governor-general for the interview. His voice sounded sturdy and strong—pleased that the transfer had gone well. Happy enough to take some much needed time off. She wished she could.
She was trying not to be nervous. Bowles had come to her office. The assistants had moved the furniture, pushing the desk toward the back so that no one used it, and moving the couch out. Instead, three chairs sat in a triangle with a small table between them.
Bowles had already staked her place in the chair that had a view of the wall screens, which DeRicci had shut off. DeRicci let the governor-general choose her chair. DeRicci didn’t want to sit until the last moment.
She felt calmer now that she had heard from Flint. She had had an odd feeling that something had gone wrong, although she hadn’t heard it from the Disty High Command or anyone at the Alliance. In fact, everyone was thrilled that this crisis had been solved.
So thrilled, in fact, that her contact at the Alliance volunteered to make a statement supporting her to InterDome Media. Apparently, Bowles would talk to various officials about DeRicci’s handling of this matter when this interview was over.
It was good that Flint was going to be away for a while. This story would blow over and no one would hunt him down for an interview. DeRicci wasn’t going to give his name to anyone, and she doubted anyone else knew of his involvement. Even the governor-general had no idea which pilot took the survivors to Mars.
DeRicci would keep it that way.
“Shall we begin?” Ki Bowles’ voice was sickly smooth, fake in its niceness.
DeRicci swallowed the anger she had been feeling toward this woman all day, and sat down with a smile. “I’m ready.”
“Have you started to record?�
�� the governor-general asked.
“Just preliminary stuff,” Bowles said. “The room, the entry, the way that the fledging security office looks.”
“Good,” the governor-general said. “Because I’m going to make a statement.”
DeRicci tensed.
“You will use this statement in its entirety,” the governor-general said, “or you will never be granted an interview with any member of my government again. Do you understand?”
“Governor, that’s—”
“Those are my conditions.” The governor-general spoke softly, yet there was great force in her words.
Bowles looked like she was about to be ill. “All right.”
“Good, because the reporting you did today on Noelle DeRicci amounts to the worst kind of journalism,” the governor-general said. “You made up rationales for events you did not understand. You did not allow Chief DeRicci to defend herself before you aired your hate piece, and you combed through her sterling record to find some sort of case—any case—to support your claims. If you do the same thing with this interview, hack it to bits and make it say what you want it to say, the unedited version of this next hour will make it to your rivals’ desks before your hack job finishes airing.”
DeRicci felt her mouth open. No one had ever defended her like that.
“I don’t appreciate being threatened, Governor,” Bowles said. Her voice was calm, but her eyes flashed with something like hatred.
“I don’t appreciate having an exemplary public servant being trashed for saving lives,” the governor-general said.
DeRicci leaned back in her chair. She listened as the interview became a jousting session between Bowles and the governor-general, learned that manipulating the press had a whole new meaning when it was done by someone with experience and skill.
Bowles got in her questions, but DeRicci never got a chance to answer. The governor-general dominated the entire interview, allowing DeRicci only to describe the reasons she had made such quick decisions.
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