Far Thoughts and Pale Gods

by Greg Bear

  Resting lightly on the table in front of her was a chart that showed the basic plan of the asteroid, an egg-shaped chunk of nickel-iron and rock. The positioning motors surrounded a crater at one end. Catapults loaded with huge barrels of reaction mass had just a few hours earlier launched a salvo to rendezvous above the crater’s center. Beckmann drive beams had then surrounded the mass with a halo of energy, releasing its atoms from the bonds of nature’s weak force. The blast had bounced off the crater floor, directed by the geometric patterns of heat-resistant slag. At the opposite end, a smaller guidance engine was in position, but it was no longer functional and didn’t figure in her plans. The two tunnels that reached from the poles to the center of Psyche opened into seven blast chambers, each containing a fusion charge. She hadn’t checked to see if the charges were still armed.

  There were so many things to do.

  She sat with her head bowed, still suited up. Though the bubbles contained enough atmosphere to support her, she had no intention of unsuiting. In one gloved hand she clutched a small ampoule with a nozzle for attachment to air and water systems piping. The Hexamon Nexus’s trumped-up excuse of madness caused by near-weightless conditions was now a shattered, horrible lie. Turco didn’t know why, but the Psyche project had been deliberately sabotaged, and the psychotropic drugs still lingered.

  Her grandfather hadn’t gone mad contemplating the stars. The asteroid crew hadn’t mutinied out of misguided Geshel zeal and space sickness.

  Her anger rose again, and the tears stopped. ‘You deserve whoever governs you,” she said quietly. “Everyone is responsible for the actions of their leaders.”

  The computer display cross-haired the point of impact. It was ironic—the buildings of the Hexamon Nexus were only sixty kilometers from the zero point. She had no control over such niceties, but nature and fate seemed to be as angry as she was.

  “Moving an asteroid is like carving a diamond,” the Geshel advisor said. Kollert nodded his head, not very interested. “The charges for initial orbit change—moving it out of the asteroid belt—have to be placed very carefully or the mass will break up and be useless. When the asteroid is close enough to the Earth-Moon system to meet the major crew vessels, the work has only begun. Positioning motors have to be built—”

  “Madness,” Kollert’s secretary said, not pausing from his monitoring of communications between associate committees.

  “And charge tunnels drilled. All of this was completed on the asteroid ten years ago.”

  “Are the charges still in place?” Kollert asked.

  “So far as I know,” the Geshel said.

  “Can they be set off now?”

  “I don’t know. Whoever oversaw dismantling should have disarmed to protect his crew—but then, the reaction mass should have been jettisoned, too. So who can say? The report hasn’t cleared top secrecy yet.”

  And not likely to, either, Kollert thought. “If they haven’t been disarmed, can they be set off now? What would happen if they were?”

  “Each charge has a complex communications system. They were designed to be set off by coded signals and could probably be set off now, yes, if we had the codes. Of course, those are top secret, too.”

  “What would happen?” Kollert was becoming impatient with the Geshel.

  “I don’t think the charges were ever given a final adjustment. It all depends on how well the initial alignment was performed. If they’re out of true, or the final geological studies weren’t taken into account, they could blow Psyche to pieces. If they are true, they’ll do what they were intended to do—form chambers inside the rock. Each chamber would be about fifteen kilometers long, ten kilometers in diameter—”

  “If the asteroid were blown apart, how would that affect our situation?”

  “Instead of having one mass hit, we’d have a cloud, with debris twenty to thirty kilometers across and smaller.”

  “Would that be any better?” Kollert asked.

  “Sir?”

  “Would it be better to be hit by such a cloud than one chunk?”

  “I don’t think so. The difference is pretty moot—either way, the surface of the Earth would be radically altered, and few life forms would survive.”

  Kollert turned to his secretary. “Tell them to put a transmission through to Giani Turco.”

  The communications were arranged. In the meantime Kollert tried to make some sense out of the Geshel advisor’s figures. To Kollert, the Geshel mathematics was irritatingly dense and obtuse. He was very good at mathematics, but in the past sixty years many physics and chemistry symbols had diverged from those used in biology and psychology.

  He put the paper aside when Turco appeared on the cube in front of him. A few background beeps and noise were eliminated, and her image cleared. “Ser Turco,” he said.

  “Ser Farmer Kollert,” she replied several seconds later. A beep signaled the end of one side’s transmission. She sounded tired.

  “You’re doing a very foolish thing.”

  “I have a list of demands,” she said.

  Kollert laughed. “You sound like the Good Man himself, Ser Turco. The tactic of direct confrontation. Well, it didn’t work all the time, even for him.”

  “I want the public—Geshels and Naderites both—to know why the Psyche project was sabotaged.”

  “It was not sabotaged,” Kollert said calmly. “It was unfortunate proof that humans cannot live in conditions so far removed from the Earth.”

  “Ask those on the Moon!” Turco said bitterly.

  “The Moon has a much stronger gravitational pull than Psyche. But I’m not briefed to discuss all the reasons why the Psyche project failed.”

  “I have found psychotropic drugs—traces of drugs and containers in the air and water the crew breathed and drank. That’s why I’m maintaining my suit integrity.”

  “No such traces were found by our investigating teams. But, Ser Turco, neither of us is here to discuss something long past. Speak your demands—your price—and we’ll begin negotiations.” Kollert knew he was walking a loose rope. Several Hexamon terrorist team officers were listening to everything he said, waiting to splice in a timely splash of static. Conversely, there was no way to stop Turco’s words from reaching open stations on the Earth. He was sweating heavily under his arms. Stations on the Moon—the bastards there would probably be sympathetic to her—could pick up his messages and relay them back to the Earth. A drop of perspiration trickled from armpit to sleeve, and he shivered involuntarily.

  “That’s my only demand,” Turco said. “No money, not even amnesty. I want nothing for myself. I simply want the people to know the truth.”

  “Ser Turco, you have an ideal platform from which to tell them all you want them to hear.”

  “The Hexamons control most major reception centers. Everything else—except for a few ham and radio-astronomy amateurs—is cabled and controlled. To reach the most people, the Hexamon Nexus will have to reveal its part in the matter.”

  Before speaking to her again, Kollert asked the advisors if there was any way she could be fooled into believing her requests were being carried out. The answer was ambiguous—a few hundred people were thinking it over.

  “I’ve conferred with my staff, Ser Turco, and I can assure you, so far as the most privy of us can know, nothing so villainous was ever done to the Psyche project.” At a later time, his script suggested, he might indicate that some tests had been overlooked, and that a junior officer had suggested lunar sabotage on Psyche. That might shift the heat. But for the moment, any admission that drugs existed in the asteroid’s human environments could backfire.

  “I’m not arguing,” she said. “There’s no question that the Hexamon Nexus had somebody sabotage Psyche.”

  Kollert held his tongue between his lips and punched key words into his script processor. The desired statements formed over Turco’s image. He looked at the camera earnestly. “If we had done anything so heinous, surely we would have protected ou
rselves against an eventuality like this—drained the reaction mass in the positioning motors—” One of the terrorist team officers scowled and waved frantically at him. The screen’s words showed red where they were being covered by static. There would be no mention of how Turco had gained control of Psyche. The issue was too sensitive, and blame hadn’t been placed yet. Besides, there was still the option of informing the public that Turco had never gained control of Psyche at all. If everything worked out, the issue would be solved without politically costly admissions.

  “Excuse me,” Turco said seconds later.

  The time lag between communications was wearing on her nerves, if Kollert was any judge. “Something just got lost there.”

  “Ser Turco, your grandfather’s death on Psyche was accidental, and your recent actions undermine the creed of the Geshels. Destroying the Hexamon Nexus”—much better than saying Earth—“would be a meaningless act of inhuman cruelty.” He leaned back in the seat, chewing on his index finger. This gesture had been approved an hour before the talks began, but it was nearly genuine. His usual elegance seemed to be wearing thin in this encounter. He’d already made several embarrassing misjudgments.

  “I’m not doing this for logical reasons,” Turco finally said. “I’m doing it out of hatred for you and all the people who support you. What happened on Psyche was purely evil—useless, motivated by the worst intentions, resulting in the death of a beautiful dream, not to mention people I loved. No talk can change my mind about those things.”

  “Then why talk to me at all? I’m hardly the highest official in the Nexus.”

  “No, but you’re in an ideal position to know those high officials. You’re a respected politician. And I suspect you had a great deal to do with devising the plot. I just want the truth. I’m tired. I’m going to rest for a few hours now.”

  “Just a moment,” Kollert said sharply. “We haven’t discussed the most important issues.”

  “I’m signing off. Until later.”

  The team leader made a cutting motion across his throat that almost made Kollert choke. Kollert shook his head and held his fingertips to his temples. “We didn’t even have time to start,” he said.

  The team leader stood and stretched his arms.

  “You’re doing reasonably well so far, Ser Kollert,” he said. “It’s best to ease into these things.”

  “I’m Advisor Kollert to you, and I don’t see how we have the time to ease into things.”

  “Yes, sir. Absolutely. Apologies.”

  Turco needed the rest, but there was far too much to do. She pushed off from the seat and floated gently for a few moments before drifting down. Psyche’s pull was weak, but just enough to remind her there was no time for rest.

  One of the things she had hoped she could do—checking the charges deep inside the asteroid to see if they were armed—was impossible. The main computer and the systems board indicated the transport system through the bore holes was no longer operative. It would take her days to crawl or float the distance down the shafts, and she wasn’t about to take the small tug through a tunnel barely fifty meters wide. She wasn’t that good a pilot.

  So she had a weak spot. The bombs couldn’t be disarmed from where she was. They could be set off by a ship positioned along the axis of the tunnels, but so far none had shown up. That would take another twelve hours or so, and by then time would be running out. She hoped that all negotiations would be completed.

  Turco drifted for more long minutes, vacillating, and finally groaned and slapped her thigh with a gloved palm. “I’m tired,” she said. “Not thinking straight.” She felt like a ball of tacky glue wrapped in wool. She desperately wanted out of the suit. The catheters and cups were itching. Her eyes were stinging from strain and sweat buildup. One way or another, she had to clean up—and there was no way to do that unless she risked exposure to the residue of drugs.

  She looked at the computer. There was a solution, but she couldn’t see it clearly. “Come on, girl. So simple. But what?”

  The drug would probably have a limited life, in case the Nexus wanted to do something with Psyche later. But how limited? Ten years? She chuckled grimly. She had the ampoule and its cryptic chemical label. Would a Physician’s Desk Reference be programmed into the computers?

  She hooked herself into the console. “Medical, pharmacy, PDR,” she said. The screen blanked, then brightened and said, “Ready.”

  “Iropentaphonate,” she said. “Two-seven diboltene.”

  The screen scrolled down the relevant data. She searched through the technical maze for a full minute before finding what she wanted. “Effective shelf life, four months two days from date of manufacture.”

  She tested the air again—it was stale but breathable—and unhooked her helmet. It was worth any risk. A bare knuckle against her eye felt so good.

  The small lounge in the Baja Station was well-furnished and comfortable, but suited more for Geshels than Naderites—bright rather than natural colors, abstract paintings of a mechanistic tendency, modernist furniture. To Kollert it was faintly oppressive. The man sitting across from him had been silent for the past five minutes, reading through a sheaf of papers.

  “Who authorized this?” the man asked.

  “Hexamon Nexus, Mr. President.”

  “But who proposed it?”

  Kollert hesitated. “The advisory committee.”

  “Who proposed it to the committee?”

  “I did.”

  “Under what authority?”

  “It was strictly legal,” Kollert said defensively. “Such activities have been covered under the emergency code, classified section fourteen.”

  The president nodded. “She came to the right man when she asked for you. I wonder where she got her information. None of this can be broadcast. Why was it done?”

  “There were a number of reasons, among them financial—”

  “The project was mostly financed by lunar agencies. Earth had perhaps a five percent share, so no controlling interest—and there was no connection with radical Geshel groups, therefore no need to invoke section fourteen on revolutionary deterrence. I read the codes, too, Farmer.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “What were you afraid of? Some irrational desire to pin the butterflies? Jesus God, Farmer, our Naderite beliefs don’t allow anything like this. But you and your committee took it upon yourselves to covertly destroy the biggest project in the history of mankind. You think this follows in the tracks of the Good Man?”

  “You’re aware of lunar plans to build particle guidance guns. They’re canceled now because Psyche is dead. They were to be used to push asteroids like Psyche into deep space, so advanced Beckmann drives could be used.”

  “I’m not technically minded, Farmer.”

  “Nor am I. But such particle guns could have been used as weapons—considering lunar sympathies, probably would have been used. They could cook whole cities on Earth. The development of potential weapons is a matter of concern for Naderites, sir. And there are many studies showing that human behavior changes in space. It becomes less Earth-centered, less communal. Man can’t live in space and remain human. We were trying to preserve humanity’s right to a secure future. Even now the Moon is a potent political force, and a future war has been studied by our best strategists. It’s a dire possibility. All this because of the perverse separation of an intellectual class of humans from the parent body—from wise government and safe creed.”

  The president shook his head and looked away. “I am ashamed such a thing could happen in my government. Very well, Kollert, this remains your ball game until she asks to speak to someone else. But my advisors are going to go over everything you say. I doubt you’ll have the chance to botch anything. We’re already acting with the Moon to stop this before it gets any worse. And you can thank God—for your life, not your career, which is already dead—that our Geshels have come up with a way out.”

  Kollert was outwardly submissive, but insi
de he was fuming. Not even the President of the Hexamon had the right to treat him like a child or, worse, a criminal. He was an independent advisor, of a separate desk, elected by Naderites of high standing. The ecumentalist creed was apparently much tighter than the president’s. “I acted in the best interests of my constituency,” he said.

  “You no longer have a constituency, you no longer have a career. Nor do any of the people who planned this operation with you, or those who carried it out. Up and down the line. A purge.”

  Turco woke up before the blinking light and moved her lips in a silent curse. How long had she been asleep? She panicked briefly—a dozen hours would be crucial—but then saw the digital clock. Two hours. The light was demanding her attention to an incoming radio signal.

  There was no video image. Kollert’s voice returned, less certain, almost cowed.

  “I’m here,” she said, switching off her camera as well. The delay was a fraction shorter than when they’d first started talking.

  “Have you made a decision?” Kollert asked.

  “I should be asking that question. My course is fixed. When are you and your people going to admit to sabotage?”

  “We’d—I’d almost be willing to admit, just to—” He stopped. She was about to speak when he continued. “We could do that, you know. Broadcast a worldwide admission of guilt. A cheap price to pay for saving all life on Earth. Do you really understand what you’re up to? What satisfaction, what revenge, could you possibly get out of this? My God, Turco, you—” There was a burst of static. It sounded suspiciously like the burst she had heard some time ago.

  “You’re editing him,” she said. Her voice was level and calm. “I don’t want anyone editing anything between us, whoever you are. Is that understood? One more burst of static like that, and I’ll …” She had already threatened the ultimate. “I’ll be less tractable. Repeat what you were saying, Ser Kollert.”