Leaving Earth Vol. 1 (Leaving Earth Omnibus)

by Kaal Alexander Rosser

  'I get it, mate. No rush. I'm not going anywhere for the minute.'

  'So I see. How're doing?'

  'Oh, splendidly. Never better.'

  'Don't start.'

  'I'm OK. I am H-A-P-P-Y. It only hurts when I laugh.'

  'Now you're reaching. I think I only remember seeing a couple of those waaaay back.'

  'Best I could do in the circumstances.'

  'The families are on their way in. Everyone OK apart from bumps and bruises.'

  So, Mr Grey wasn't lying to me, then. That's good news. 'Thank you. Do you know when?'

  'Well, the nurse let me know, and I said I'd tell you. It's taken me about fifteen minutes to get out of bed and down the hall, so probably any minute now.'

  'Great.' Grum wanted to tell Stew about Mr Grey's visit, and the short time-frame would cut questions down to a minimum. 'You remember the guy I told you about who was Kelvin's personal assistant?'

  'That creepy guy who was in your disciplinary, and came to collect you when you went to see Kelvin that first time? Yes. Er, Mr Grey, wasn't it?'

  'That's the badger. I had a visit from him not long ago, so I knew about Vann and Ju.'

  'Oh, I see. Why was he visiting you?'

  'Because among other things, he is also the personal bodyguard of the CEO of USSMC.'

  'So Kelvin sent him?'

  'No. Kelvin is missing presumed dead.'

  'Then why… Oh. Really?'

  'Apparently so. Although his word hardly constitutes official notice, but it was non-trivial to get the information. I had to logic my way round him.'

  'Very difficult for you to do, I know.'

  'Sod off. Anyway. I just wanted to let you know before the families get here, which…' Grum could hear familiar high-pitched voices coming down the hall. '…they apparently are.'

  'Good timing.'

  'Thanks.'

  There was unbridled joy in the room shortly after. Everyone was safe, as well as could be expected, and confirming the knowledge with their own eyes.

  Chapter 16

  THE next morning Hank called. Vann had told Grum that Hank was was of the few who had been still with it enough to keep the company going after the disaster.

  'Hey, boss,' said Hank in apparent good humour, though to Grum's ear it sounded like it might be a little forced.

  'Oh, you've heard have you?'

  'It's partly my fault, partly Kelvin's. As the current Acting-Acting-Chair for the Board of Directors and Chief Everything Officer, it was my duty to tell the board of the recommendation which Kelvin had left in case he was unable to perform his duties. A recommendation, I heartily agree with and endorsed for the board. I don't think anyone was in the mood to argue over-much.'

  'Gee, thanks, Hank.'

  'Hey, look, man, it was you or me. And I like me.'

  Grum laughed and regretted it. 'Ouch,' he said, responding to both Hank's words and the pain from laughing.

  'Just you get better, and then you can come back and take over from me. I'll hold down the fort until, then.'

  'How bad is it?'

  'We lost a few.' Hank sobered, instantly. 'We lost more visitors. Including children. Quite a few more are badly hurt.'

  'I gave Mr Grey orders regarding my wishes on that front.'

  'And he passed them along. We'll be doing that, at least. Don't you doubt.'

  Grum had one more unexpected visitor. A USAF Major arrived one afternoon, and Grum was quite proud of himself for recognising immediately what the gold oak leaf meant.

  The Major came in, sat down, took off his hat and stuck it under one arm, all before speaking.

  'Good afternoon, Dr Hewson. I would like to talk with you, if you have the time.'

  That threw him for a second… no-one had called him doctor in ages. Since… Well, probably since before MITAMP. He had taken to using Mr Hewson PhD. 'And what does the air-force want with me, Major…?'

  'Brown, Dr Hewson. We would like you to tell us where Kelvin Goldstein is.'

  Well, that's straight to the point. 'As far as I know, Major, Kelvin Goldstein is missing, pres-'

  'Yes, Dr Hewson. We know the official status. But what we would like you to tell us, now, is where he is.'

  'I'm sorry. I don't understand. Do you think that I know where the body is?'

  'No, Dr Hewson,' the Major continued in a patient near-monotone. 'We do not think there is a body to find. We think you know where he has gone.'

  'Look, I'm sorry to disappoint you, but I don't know anything. Until you suggested it, I did not even consider that he might still be alive. To me "missing, presumed dead" in these circumstances, simply means "dead, but we can't find the body under all this rubble".'

  'You know that we have taken a close look at your company, Dr Hewson?'

  I'm pretty sure that you had influence over – and information from – several of the board members, yes, thought Grum. 'How so, and for what purpose?'

  'We… Had concerns over the use to which you would put such munitions as you were developing in Nevada, especially when you started developing possible small-arms sizes.'

  'You what?'

  'Certainly. And capable of producing millions of them per month. That's a lot of weaponry.'

  'It's lot of batteries!'

  'That's what we wanted to find out.'

  'Not too bright, you lot, are you?'

  'We have some exceptional scientists and engineers.'

  Grum snorted, and winced. 'Then they need to do a refresher course in matter-antimatter annihilation physics.' Grum paused for a moment, analysing the words. 'But you did not say that any of your exceptional scientists and engineers had anything to do with your investigation, did you? You just said that you had some. That's not the same thing. In fact, I suspect that whichever idiotic informant you had, told you some cock-and-bull story about bombs, and millions of bullets, and you lapped it up. You may even have gone to your exceptional people, and they probably told you just how idiotic the idea was, but you lot would not listen, would you?'

  'Oh, we listened, Dr Hewson. And then your sub-basement exploded.'

  'And you, because you understand exactly jack about physics or engineering, think it was because we were unsafely storing antimatter weaponry. down there.'

  'Were you?' The Major shot the question at Grum.

  Grum sneered. 'Ask your exceptional people, Major. I'll even authorise that they can view the damned schematics of the shoddy job we had down there. I will also detail just what we tried to put in place to protect against just what happened. And how some of the board — particular directors, who I will name as behaving oddly, as if coerced — voted to cut the maintenance budget, which directly caused that explosion. Is that what you want, Major. 'Coz if so, I will pick up the phone, call Hank, and get him to courier the damn stuff anywhere you want.'

  The Major shook his head, as if sadly. 'Several times, Dr Hewson, you have come close to calling me an idiot.'

  'Very close,' Grum agreed.

  'Would it therefore surprise you to know that I, too, have a doctorate?'

  'What in? Divinity?' Oho! thought Grum. That got his back up! The Major's eyes had narrowed in anger, briefly, but his expression settled once again, into calm solemnity.

  'Particle physics.'

  'Then why are you asking me such stupid questions?' Grum ranted, absolutely enraged.

  'To get you angry. To make you say openly what you think and feel about the situation. So that you would be willing to state your suspicions to me in defence of science and what you see as a great injustice. In short, Dr Hewson, to do my job as an Air Force Intelligence Officer.'

  'Played?'

  'Like a fiddle. Sorry, but we do like to know where our money is going. We were not overly keen on USSMC as it was run by Kelvin Goldstein, but your attitude here today, as well as the actions of reparation that you have initiated through your company, certainly make me feel better about things. And just so you know. I was one of those who informed th
e general staff that nano- or picoscale antimatter masses would make ineffective bullets. Although, I did wonder if that was how a needler might work.'

  Grum felt his eyes widen. Another Anne McCaffrey fan? 'From Sassinak?'

  'Among others, yes.'

  'Hmm, interesting idea, but how would you create the containment cell strong enough to be a containment cell, yet fragile enough to collapse on impact?'

  Major Brown shrugged. 'I don't know that I want to find out.'

  'Fair enough. And the undue influence on USSMC's former board?'

  'Not my job, I'm afraid. To use a quote with which you will probably be familiar: "Secrets… Are not my concern. Keeping them… Is".'

  'Geek.'

  'I prefer nerd.'

  Grum bobbed his head to the side in wry agreement. 'Me too.'

  'Goodbye, Dr Hewson.'

  'Call me Grum.'

  The Major's eyes widened a little at that. 'I'm… Emmett.'

  'You're kidding?!'

  'Nope. I may be a nerd, but my mother? She was a geek. Have a nice day.'

  'You too,' said Grum to the Major's departing back.

  Chapter 17

  THE aftermath of the disaster was terrible in its extent for USSMC, but nothing in comparison to the level of distress felt by the families involved.

  Grum, as the Acting-CEO held little back about the company's failures when addressing the public, going so far as to admit that a quite new, but improperly maintained generator installation in their sub-basement had exploded.

  In the end the casualty list ran to forty one dead, seventy two critically injured, ninety two seriously injured and over three hundred with cuts and bruises.

  No monetary value could be placed upon a human life, and nothing which USSMC could do would match up to the loss it had caused. A loss which Grum felt keenly responsible for, given his hand in creating the generators. He constantly berated himself for not doing more to stop the original installation, or to have taken more notice of the service reports. He felt that he could have stopped this situation if he had read the reports more closely, and noted the drop off in regularity from the personnel assigned as service engineers to the AM generators.

  Grum, through USSMC, nevertheless tried to assuage both his guilt and the suffering of the families by offering to pay for all funeral expenses, pensions, medical and counselling expenses, and anything else which Grum could think off to hurt USSMC's coffers and benefit the families.

  Grum particularly wanted to know about Fey Sikes's condition. The little girl had been so close to death that some extreme intervention had been necessary. From what he could find out, the intervention had been so extreme as to be experimental in a lot of cases. She was alive, though. Just.

  She remained in a coma, and was undergoing what looked to Grum like major surgery almost every day. He had no idea how a body could take that kind of punishment. He wanted to call and ask Frank in Medical — one of the VPs who had survived the disaster, fortunately — about what was being done, and how they were managing to keep her alive through it all, but two things stopped him. One, he probably would not understand the answers. Two, he was scared and a little ashamed that it might be seen as a morbid curiosity. In truth, he was just desperately worried that she would not pull out of it. Even though he had given the initial orders through Mr Grey, Grum would take the opportunity on returning to USSMC's headquarters to personally reinforce those orders. Any of the victims – but Fey in particular – was to be given any kind of help, at whatever expense, to keep them alive and get them well again. USSMC would pick up the tab, or he would bankrupt the company trying.

  Grum lay back in his bed. Lights-out was not really a major feature of private rooms, but he tried to go with the flow, just to keep some order to the day.

  He could not let USSMC try to walk away from this. Now he suspected that the government had been poking their noses in, and that the board had been willing participants — most of them at least — he was going to show them just how dangerous someone with a conscience could be.

  The fact that they had willingly endangered people's lives by disregarding the generator safeguards was unforgivable, and so would not be forgiven. The families would be compensated to the best of his ability, in any way he could and fuck the consequences. He would take the structure of USSMC and wring its bloody neck until it learned that morality had a place in business. That was what he would do. That was what he needed to do. As much to salve his own conscience as to impart righteous wrath on those who deserved it.

  This much I will do, he thought, grimly.

  Chapter 18

  BOARD meetings would now be a regular part of his life, Grum realised. Hank and Tabia Barron were there, but there were more new faces, here, than just himself. Fully half the board had been killed — or presumed dead — in the disaster. Kelvin, of course, but also five of the other nine directors Grum had not known personally. These places were being filled, temporarily, by people who sat on a number of boards and were versed in governance of your average business. Ideally, to Grum's mind, each place would be filled with a permanent version of the same type, but that understood research companies rather than simple wealth-extractors.

  Governance and management played a little too well together. In fact, he was going to abuse that situation, he knew it — as both CEO and Chair — until the board elected a new Chair. He suspected that this board was going to block him, but not for the same reasons as the old one. This one would do it because they were new to the company, and did not yet understand this particular business.

  The first order of business was the motion to confirm Grum as Acting Chair and CEO. This much passed unanimously. Grum suspected that everyone in the room — including those friendly towards him — were as much avoiding a poison chalice as anything else. Grum did not care about that. Nor did he really care how long the appointment lasted. He was going to make sure that this company did the right thing for as long as he could before they ousted him.

  Next up was advising on the composition of the senior management team. Several members of that had also been lost.

  That, Grum decided, was not a useful disposition of two hours.

  Several times Grum had needed to step in when some the pre-existing board member wanted to nominate a specific candidate to the C-suite. He reminded the board that they were not in management positions whilst sitting on the board. The job was governance. At most in circumstances such as these, the board should advise on the likely composition of the C-suite and senior management. Once the C-suite was ready to have their choices ratified, it was the board's job to make sure that the selections were in the best interests of the company and shareholders. That was the limit and extent of their role in this.

  He had received approving nods from the newer board members who were arguably more experienced in governance than the others. Grum also knew that he had just played them for exactly that purpose.

  The board issued some fairly generic recommendations as to how the structure should be, which amounted to little more than "find the best people to fill the same positions you had before, and see how it goes". But that was all Grum had wanted from them on that score.

  They had decided to table a detailed discussion on the disaster victims' compensation package until the meeting the following week, but Grum got a motion passed that critical or emergency care would continue to be paid by USSMC until such time as the board decided otherwise. The board agreed by a majority.

  With four abstentions. Guess which four.

  That was good enough for Grum to get started on getting the senior management in line. He had a week. He wanted to get round to see all the possible candidates and make his own mind up about them rather than relying on second hand information.

  First though, he had to have a chat with Hank. And he did not know if Hank was going to like it or not.

  'Hey, there, boss!' Hank drawled the words as soon as Grum entered the office. 'What brings you to my office?' />
  'They haven't finished rebuilding mine, yet,' said Grum, shutting the door.

  Hank laughed. 'Well, come in and sit down.'

  'Why is it, Hank, that whenever anyone calls me "boss" it's sarcastically?'

  'It's your management style, Grum. You're a leader and persuader. You're not the heavy handed martinet. You probably haven't noticed those times when people do call you "boss" and mean it, because it's usually when you are angry about something.'

  Grum blinked. 'I hadn't, no.' But now that he thought about it, he could distinctly remember a few times when even Stew had called him "boss" without a trace of sarcasm. 'Hmph. I guess so.'

  'Besides. It's affectionate. That's not something a lot of managers can instil in their folks. Aaand most of the time you tell everybody to call you Grum, so they don't get much chance to use it properly.'

  'OK. I give in. I accept the correction. Now. You and I need to have a chat.'

  'I figured as much. I saw you handle the board, y'know. But I also heard what you said about management and governance. I don't disagree, but Kelvin liked his friends close at each level. You would have been put on the board in some capacity at the next AGM, I'm sure.'

  'Perhaps so, but I am aiming for complete separation.'

  'You're going to give up the Chair?'

  'I may not have the choice, Hank. I am going to do a lot of things which piss people off. But right here and now, we're talking about your roles.'

  'OK. You want me to resign from the board, is that it?'

  'Actually, no, Hank. I think you're even more valuable there than you are here. Not to diminish your achievements in this Division, but you have the right mix of experience and ethics I want on the board. Especially if I'm no longer there, if you understand me. However,' Grum held his hand up to forestall the obvious next question, 'I'm giving you the choice. It's up to you which one you give up.'

  'OK. That makes it harder, but thank you.'