Ten
“Who’s that guy?” Stig asked Bill, who liked to pretend he knew everything.
The two men were having a few beers to pass the time late in the afternoon because there wasn’t much else to do. Stig had disembowelled his spare Book again, searching for insights about its structure. Meanwhile, Bill who was a bit of a grub was keeping up a non-stop commentary as he ogled the Skidian women who lived in, or were passing through, the settlement.
“They’re a bit of all right, aren’t they?”
Unsurprisingly, none of the women in the settlement would give Bill the time of day. Most of them were in relationships with long term partners and they weren’t interested in this odd, rude newSkidian. This lack of interest highlighted an imbalance, there simply weren’t enough women around which didn’t seem to concern the indoSkidians but was a worry for the newSkidians who were not looking forward to a future without partners.
Bill gave Bruce a dismissive once over, like a used car salesman sizing up which section of the yard to take a customer to.
“Dunno, looks like a hillbilly.”
The impression was deserved. Bruce was dressed for work on the farm, needed a decent haircut and a shave and had several wild-looking dogs for company. “Wonder how he got here? Seems a bit out of place.”
Stig agreed. Almost immediately, their prejudices were confirmed when Bruce began hurling obscenities at the dogs, one of whom had corralled one of the natives and had leapt up and started to lick his face.
“Those dogs look dangerous. He should be made to keep them on a leash.”
“Well, I’ll let you talk to him about it.” Stig didn’t feel brave enough to confront the man himself.
Everyone had stopped what they were doing when Bruce had sworn at the dogs, and a stunned silence spread over the settlement, as all the indoSkidians looked away to avoid being drawn into the unfolding fracas.
To give the man credit, Stig thought he looked more than a little embarrassed afterwards as he trudged off to the main dwelling with Trev traipsing after him.
“Did I hear him talking to one of the dogs?” Bill asked. “The man’s nuts or on drugs like most hillbillies. You know, there’s a huge opioid drug problem in the States and the life expectancy for people living in hillbilly country is going backwards. How can that be allowed to happen in the world’s biggest economy, the richest nation on the planet?”
“I don’t know. I’m from Denmark. We have free healthcare, but we still have people who are addicted to drugs and who regularly overdose and knock themselves off.”
Bill watched Bruce give Trev’s partner a peck on the cheek, and then went back to his beer. Trev, Bruce, and Sue went inside the house, leaving the dogs to run around outside. Eventually, the animals flopped down and made themselves comfortable on the veranda.
Stig returned his attention to the Book. Its components were unlike anything he had encountered before. He felt if he could crack it and get into the microcode, he might be able to hack into the underlying infrastructure of the planet’s computer network. He suspected the planet-wide computer system was an artificial intelligence of some description. There would be a server farm or farms somewhere, a central control station, and various subsidiary systems to decentralise the infrastructure for it to run on. Resilience management 101, thought Stig.
He was oblivious to how close he was to achieving his goal. The MPU was applying a significant percentage of its computing capability to bolster its defences against his incursions and distract him from his investigation.
“Based on what I see here, none of the natives seems to have a technical bent. They don’t seem to do or know anything,” Bill had said, when Stig articulated his thoughts to Bill.
Stig knew Bill enjoyed being bloody minded and pointlessly defiant, so didn’t bother to correct him. They had asked questions about the Skidian technology, but none of the indoSkidians could shed any light on how it all hung together. Getting a handle on the architecture was all Stig was interested in, but they could find no information online.
The indoSkidian stock answer was ‘Skid is the most powerful and technically advanced planet in the known universe.’ Stig and Bill didn’t disagree: they just needed to find something they could use to their advantage and find a way home.
There was a slight fly in the ointment in relation to this which Stig hadn’t mentioned to Bill: Stig wasn’t sure he was really in a hurry to go home.
“Do you think they are having a threesome in there?”
“Is sex all you can think about?”
“Well there’s not much else for me to do, is there? Everyone else except you and I seem to be getting plenty of nooky.”
This wasn’t exactly true in Stig’s case, which was one of the reasons he was warming to Skid a little more than he might have anticipated. Stig sighed and thought “Here we go again.” Every time Bill got a few beers inside him, he banged on and on about the same two things: how he was going to get laid, and how he was going to get home.
No wonder Bill had never been married. Who’d have him? Stig thought to himself uncharitably. Then he was forced to admit he shouldn’t be too critical, given his own recent track record. His personal and professional history was typical of all MFYers. There was a common thread in the back stories of many MFYers - both male and female - that Stig had talked to.
Broken marriages, a lack of intellectual fulfilment, and an inability to settle down were common traits. The program had been a magnet for waifs and strays who had suffered various setbacks and found modern life and emotional commitment a challenge. Stig pondered his own recent history, and the frustration he often felt about not achieving the things he'd wanted to.
“I don’t know what the answer is,” Stig replied, hoping to shut Bill up for a while. “Have another beer while I see if I can nut this out.” He nodded at Janice and Robert who walked past with Zarif Khan trailing behind them and once they were out of earshot added: “If you think you’ve got problems, look at Zarif, the poor guy.”
Bill was in the process of slurping on his beer and spat half of it out at Stig’s comment. “Ha! You’re right,” he spluttered, once he had wiped the froth off his face and shirt and got himself under control.
Bruce sat down at the kitchen table and found his anxiety levels increasing. He didn’t handle difficult personal conversations well, except those he'd had with Ngaio, which was probably a good sign for their future relationship. Trev and Sue hovered around, equally nervous.
The three of them waited for someone to take the first step in the conversation.
Trev broke the silence. “Do you want me to leave you two alone to have a chat?”.
“No!” Bruce and Sue replied emphatically in unison.
“OK, cup of tea? Coffee, maybe? We have some real coffee beans.” When he didn’t get an answer, he muttered “I’ll put the jug on, then.”
“Thanks,” Bruce mumbled under his breath. “You wanted to talk?” he asked Sue, more brusquely than he had intended.
“Yes.” Sue paused and took a deep breath. “I know some of my recent behaviour left a lot to be desired. It was unacceptable, really,” she added quickly without being specific, “and I put you in a very difficult position at times. But I hope we can put all of this bad blood behind us now and talk about my having access to Little Bruce on a regular basis.”
This wasn’t the approach Bruce had been expecting from Sue, so he was a little suspicious about her real motives. Expecting an all-out verbal attack, this low-key and reasonable approach took him aback.
“I know I betrayed your trust in many ways,” she continued, “and I hope you accept my apology. My deepest apology.”
“Sure,” Bruce replied. “Look, the boy should be in contact with his mother, so I am not going to get in the way of..” He was about to add more conciliatory comments, but they were interrupted by the clump of heavy footsteps outside and then someone came through the door.
“There you are!”
“Do you mind?” Bruce asked mildly, “I’m having a private chat with my ex-wife.”
“Hardly private, Bruce. Trev has big ears and an even bigger mouth. Half the settlement will soon know what you said and agreed to within five minutes of you leaving here.”
Bruce looked at Trev, who was keeping his head down and busying himself with the jug and coffee cups. Bruce knew Mitch had a point. The tips of Trev’s ears had gone bright red.
“Well what the fuck do you want? What’s so important that I need to jump to attention?”
“You’ve got problems here, Bruce. I know you’re behind the recent mass migrations. You can’t fool me.”
“What kind of problems?” Bruce asked cautiously. “As if I don’t have enough on my plate.”
“These newcomers, these newSkidians, as we are supposed to call them, they’re all just parasites.”
“Oh, come on!” Bruce laughed at him. “How can you say that when you’re one yourself?”
“I’m a special case,” Mitch insisted, “I speak for the true Skidians, the indoSkidians who have lived here since time immemorial. Skid is their home, their planet, and their voice needs to be heard.”
“I don’t believe this. You know who you sound like, don’t you?”
“I have the data to prove it. I have proof, and what’s more, I have the will of the people behind me.”
“Come on Mitch, you know this won’t wash with me. Show me the data, the proof and the people putting you up to this nonsense.”
“The true Skidians are unhappy that they are being denied their rights. The economy is under pressure, there is a lack of jobs and there are not enough resources to go around. These are all being hoovered up by the new immigrants. They’re taking the jobs of good Skidians. We have to take back control and make Skid great again, we need to drain the swamp...”
“OK. I get it, Mitch. Look, why don’t you take a seat?” Mitch clearly believed what he was saying. Maybe he had tricked himself into believing this nonsense from his old political playbook to make an obscure point. Maybe he was having a psychotic episode. Nothing Bruce or anyone else might say could change his mind, or what was left of it. But for old time’s sake, Bruce thought he might have one last crack at it.
“You know none of this is true. Who’s been feeding you this load of bollocks? Let’s do the maths. The infrastructure of this planet once supported a population of six hundred million indoSkidians. All those indoSkidians enjoyed a standard of living most people on Earth could only dream of. Now the entire population, even with all the new migrants who have been harvest... I mean, uploaded, is a little over one hundred thousand. There’s more than enough capacity here for hundreds of millions more people,” he added.
“More people will come, now they know. They will be like locusts. There have been many shortages and new immigrants are committing heinous crimes against the indoSkidians,” Mitch continued, gesticulating wildly, and ignoring Bruce’s corrections.
“C’mon Mitch, you know none of this is true. The new and indoSkidians hardly even mix with the newSkidians outside The Farm and the old senate complex in Sietnuoc.”
“How can you believe that? I have witnesses and evidence. Every pure born indoSkidian knows this to be true,” Mitch insisted. He was beginning to rant like the populist politician he had once been. Daring the public to contradict him, simply ignoring them when they did, downplaying their rights to be acknowledged, and quickly moving on with his narrative. He had got away with this behaviour for so long, because the themes he banged on about resonated with so many people, and he played on these fears, irrational as they may have been. Mitch didn’t really care about immigration. Besides, how would he get servants and gardeners if he didn’t have undocumented immigrants to exploit?
Then he remembered none of this mattered any more, and tears welled up in his eyes as he was overcome by emotion.
“Show me the evidence then. Prove it, otherwise stop stirring and forever hold your peace.” Bruce knew those last words would fall on empty ears.
Mitch gasped and let out a sob of despair, ran out of steam and slumped onto a chair.
“Do you want a cup of coffee, mate?” Trev asked sympathetically.
“Did you forget your medication, Mitch?” Bruce asked snidely, earning a kick under the table from Sue.
“Leave him alone. The poor man. You helped destroy him, so the least you can do is not kick him when he is down.”
Bruce’s recollection of Mitch’s downfall was a little different from Sue’s. Initially Mitch had talked himself aboard Myfair’s spaceship, confident he could control the situation, supported by the military might of the United States. He had not taken either the advice of his secret service team or the feedback from his local security detail which had included Wisneski. Mitchell had only himself to blame for his fall from grace, but he always needed someone else to attribute it to.
What nobody had known at the time, not even those closest to him, was he had been experiencing the early onset of dementia which impacted on his decision making and risk assessment capability. This was nothing unusual: his successor, Ronald Chump was also suffering from the same problem. Ronald Reagan had similar issues towards the end of his presidency. Bruce had infused both men with medichines when he had interacted with them, like he had with everyone else he had met. The medichines could stem the development of the debilitating condition, but some irreversible damage had already been done to their neural structure.
Bruce wasn’t going to share this information with either Trev or Sue because, as Mitch had suggested, they were incapable of keeping a secret. Trev often didn’t engage his brain before talking, and in her frequent emotional power-plays, Sue would use any information she had to gain an advantage. They could create a lot of mischief back on Earth if Bruce let any details slip, just when Bruce had Chump and the rest of the key national leaders just where they wanted them.
“I’d better get going,” he said, getting to his feet, even though he had hardly enough time to drink his coffee.
“You always do this. It’s always about you.” Sue started to turn on the waterworks. “You’re just going to take off without arranging for me to see my baby!” she wailed. “When am I going to see my baby?”
“Don’t worry, I’ll bring him next time I come up, and he can stay for the night.”
“Are you sure?” Sue sobbed.
“Yes, why wouldn’t I? Little Bruce might need some coaxing the first couple of times, but I have no intention of stopping him spending time with you. You’re his mother.”
“You’re going to have problems with the immigrants,” Mitch continued, oblivious to his surroundings, as if he was broadcasting a fireside chat to the country, like he had in the old days. It was the same old line. He and his party had committed to reducing the inflow of people into the United States, which was at odds with the nation’s proud history and that of his party.
“I’ll see you in a few days, and I'll bring Little Bruce.” Bruce said to Sue, ignoring Mitch’s ravings.
“What about your coffee?”
“I’ll take a rain check. Unless you have a takeaway cup?”
Eleven
Outside on the porch, Bruce steadied himself with a hand against the wall as he stepped into his boots. When he turned to walk down the steps, he discovered a small delegation waiting to swoop on him.
It was an oddly-assorted group, a mixture of new and indoSkidians. A small crowd, growing all the time, as people drifted in from where they had been sleeping, drinking, or generally mooching around.
He heard Mitch muttering behind him and wondered if the old coot had put some people up to this.
Bruce finished tugging on his boots to ensure they fit properly, which gave him an opportunity to gather his thoughts. He thought about setting the dogs on them, or just yelling and waving his arms to shoo the crowd all awa
y. However, rather than take the nuclear option, he thought he’d better see what they were after. He’d learnt in recent months how, even when you held all the cards and had supreme control over any situation, it was far easier to escalate a confrontation than it was to step back from the brink before events spiralled out of control. Much better to speak softly and wave the big stick only when it was necessary.
“You’re in in charge here? Right?” a woman demanded, shaking a finger at him.
Bruce recognised Janice Chang. He was tempted to conjure up his personal wormhole and beam himself out of there but resisted the temptation. One of his tasks was to get feedback from Skidians, besides if he did that he would never hear the end of it from Mitch, and it would destroy his credibility with these people.
“Not really,” he replied.
“Horseshit,” Mitch called from behind him, “if there is anyone responsible for the influx of migrants to Skid, it’s you.”
“What? That’s just bollocks,” Bruce retorted. The only other person on the planet who knew the full story was Wisneski, and he was nowhere to be seen. Trev, Sue, and Mitch thought they knew the complete plan, but they had been left out of the loop because Bruce didn’t trust Sue, Trev was a bit of an idiot, and Mitch was Mitch.
“Fuck,” Bruce muttered under his breath. He wanted to tell Mitch to shut his mouth, but this would just inflame the situation and agitate this little group even more. He needed to deal directly with the problems these people had, even if there was no easy solution.
“OK. Look, I’m on a pretty tight schedule today, but I can give you a few minutes of my time,” Bruce told the little crowd.
“Typical. Typical bloody politician!” a voice called from the back of the group. “You’ve got plenty of time for us when you need our votes, but when we need your help, you look the other way and pretend not to hear.”
Bruce was now well and truly stumped. Politician? Him? Votes? Who the hell had planted these ideas into their heads? He glanced back over his shoulder at Mitch, but the old bastard wouldn’t meet his gaze. Bruce sat down on the steps and pulled out his smokes. Rolling up a cigarette would give him a few more precious moments to gather his thoughts.
The Colonists Page 37
