Vanguard

by Jack Campbell

  Lochan stood up beside her. “One at a time! Take it easy! We are down, we are safe, we are all right!”

  The incipient panic stilled, the passengers began exiting quickly but without losing control. Carmen stood waiting, knowing everyone else needed an example of steadiness, despite her own desire to get off the shuttle. A craft beat-up this badly might explode, after all. Where were the fuel supplies? Hopefully still protected enough from the damage the shuttle had endured.

  Lochan Nakamura remained standing beside her. This close, she could spot him shaking slightly, but to anyone farther away, he would have looked as apparently calm as her.

  The station executive leaned on his seat for support but stood with them as well.

  Only when the others had left did Carmen and Lochan, accompanied by the executive, move to the nearest emergency exit and drop onto the slides to the ground.

  Once out, she looked back at the battered shuttle. It appeared impossible that the pilots could have brought it down the way they did.

  As the pilots and flight crew dropped out of their own emergency exit, moving with wobbly legs and holding on to each other, Carmen began applauding, leading the other passengers to join in.

  Emergency sirens were screaming all around as crash vehicles and security raced toward the wrecked shuttle. The sky was blue, flecked with white clouds. The air felt slightly chilly, tinged with the scents of fluids and fuel. Carmen drew in deep breaths, amazed by how vivid everything seemed.

  “We managed to dump most of the fuel before hitting,” one of the flight crew was reporting to the station executive. “That . . . means an environmental impact report will have to filed, right?”

  The station executive began laughing as if barely able to maintain self-control. “We’ll get right on that!” Others joined in the laughter, the sounds tinged with relief and near hysteria.

  In the gaps between the noise, Carmen could faintly hear parts of an automated message repeating inside the ruin of the shuttle.

  “Welcome to Kosatka! We trust you had a pleasant journey! Welcome to Kosatka! We trust you had a pleasant journey! Welcome to Kosatka! . . .”

  • • •

  First Minister of Kosatka Hofer looked like someone who had aged a decade in the last month. But a few years seemed to fall from him as he greeted Carmen and Lochan Nakamura. “I asked my grandfather for guidance last night, and he told me to wait because help was coming!”

  “Your grandfather immigrated to Kosatka, too?” Carmen asked politely.

  “What? No, no, he died twenty years ago on Io. You should try speaking with your ancestors,” he added earnestly.

  “No one’s ancestors have helped us so far,” a tight-faced woman said. She wore a security uniform and had been introduced as Safety Coordinator Sarkozy.

  The third member of Kosatka’s government who was present was an amiable-appearing man with recent stress lines around his mouth. “Cleon Ottone, Leader of the House of the People’s Representatives,” he introduced himself. “I’ll admit to being surprised that Earth gov did anything.”

  Lochan Nakamura laughed. “You came directly from Old Earth?”

  “Yes. A city called Nantes.” He turned to Carmen. “What about you?”

  Carmen smiled. “Albuquerque.”

  “We heard that you had some experience on Mars?” Safety Coordinator Sarkozy asked warily.

  “Yes,” Carmen said. “Unfortunately, Mars offers a lot of experience with conflicts on every scale.”

  “I’ve wondered what role Reds might be playing in all of our troubles,” House Leader Ottone confessed. “A lot of them have gone down and out, haven’t they?”

  “If you’ve ever been to Mars, you know why they left,” Carmen said. She felt defensive even though she knew the man’s concerns were partly justified. “And Earth itself hasn’t been free of conflict during its history. Not to mention the colonies on the moons of Jupiter.”

  “What is Old Earth exporting to us?” First Minister Hofer grumbled. “I’ve heard that some places are emptying out their prisons by dumping the occupants on crowded ships and sending them to places like Kosatka!”

  “There have been a few cases of that,” Carmen admitted. “Transport of the unwanted to the down and out is an echo of an old practice on Earth. But the criminals involved are more likely to be political dissidents than violent offenders.”

  “Political dissidents are our problem!” Hofer turned to look out a large, real window set into one wall. Below, the new city spread out, wide streets forming a nearly perfect grid joined by traffic circles. “At least, that was our problem before this awful news from Lares. Please, everyone, take a seat.”

  Carmen and Lochan sat together on a short couch while the representatives of Kosatka sat down in individual chairs that emphasized their differing roles. “What’s the latest information on the dissidents?” Carmen asked as if she were requesting an update rather than her first data on the situation.

  “It’s not much different than the older information,” Safety Coordinator Sarkozy grumbled. “You know the very latest. That bomb on the shuttle. It was set among the cargo, but whoever loaded it put it next to the skin of the shuttle so the other cargo around it blocked much internal damage and most of the force vented through the outer hull. That’s what saved you.”

  Lochan Nakamura nodded. “Have the, uh, dissidents clarified their demands?” he asked.

  “Autonomy for Drava,” First Minister Hofer said. “We only have two cities and a smattering of towns outside them, and they say they want autonomy for the second city! How absurd is that? We’re not a totalitarian state. We’re a constitutional representative democracy. The people living in Drava have the same vote as the people here in Kosatka.”

  “I don’t have information on recent developments,” Carmen said, probing carefully for more information. “Or on what led to the escalation from protests to violence.”

  “Your guess is as good as ours,” House Leader Ottone replied. “We had no signs of trouble except the usual political disputes, then, out of nowhere, bombs start going off and manifestos are being issued calling for independence for Drava!”

  “We thought we were getting a handle on it,” Safety Coordinator Sarkozy said. “But then we got a new rash of bombings, and with this event at Lares we have to worry about diverting resources to protect ourselves against a new threat.”

  “I still think the Reds coming in are behind this whole thing,” Safety Coordinator Sarkozy insisted. She gave Carmen a quick, estimating look from the corner of her eye.

  Realizing that, of course, Sarkozy had been told of the tattoo found at the security checkpoint almost threw Carmen’s thoughts off track. But she had known the issue would have to be confronted sooner or later. Carmen looked steadily at the others as if unfazed by the Safety Coordinator’s words. “Your dissident problem exploded, if you’ll pardon the term, out of nowhere. There was minor grumbling before that, right? Then suddenly bombs going off. And, you say, there are quieter periods, then a sudden outbreak of more violence. Just as if there are external factors influencing the bombings.”

  “Reds,” Sarkozy repeated.

  “Some Reds may be involved,” Carmen said, trying to speak calmly. She had been through this kind of conversation many times. Too many times. “Most Reds who get off Mars are grateful for a chance at a new life and not a threat. But I am aware of information that someone was recruiting gang soldiers on Mars for some sort of work in this star system.”

  “Someone?” First Minister Hofer asked.

  “I don’t know who. It would mean that some third party is cultivating the separatists at Drava, using money and supplies and sending in people to create problems for Kosatka.”

  A long moment of silence followed. “Why?” Safety Coordinator Sarkozy finally asked. She sounded less skeptical than genuinely desiring to know mor
e. “Why not just bombard us as they did Lares?”

  “I don’t know,” Carmen said. “It’s not necessarily the same people behind it. And they probably have limited resources, like everyone else out here. Kosatka already has enough means of its own that you could have reacted to an unknown warship approaching your world, right? You could have thrown something together and stopped a bombardment attempt.”

  “I wouldn’t have wanted to be in the position of trying to do that,” House Leader Ottone admitted. “But we could have tried.”

  “So,” Carmen continued, “we can be certain your foe has limited assets, and Kosatka is growing strong enough that it could be a problem for a star system set on taking over other star systems. But not if Kosatka is tied up dealing with its own problems, internally divided and apparently at war with itself.”

  That set them back. “We’re bystanders in this?” First Minister Hofer finally said. “We happen to be in the way, so we get bombs going off?”

  “Worse things have happened,” Carmen said, trying to sound both sympathetic and commanding. “Do you want my recommendations?”

  “Yes!” the leaders of Kosatka chorused, though the Safety Coordinator seemed less enthusiastic than the others.

  “You need to take the legs out from under the separatists,” Carmen suggested. “Get rid of any grounds that might lend support to external attempts to stir up trouble. Legitimate grievances must be addressed. Are there any?”

  “They want more local autonomy,” House Leader Ottone said. “It doesn’t make sense. They elect representatives just like everyone else.”

  “Local?” Lochan Nakamura asked. “What does Drava have? A mayor? A city council?”

  They all shook their heads. “The government is in charge,” First Minister Hofer explained.

  “What?” Lochan said, looking surprised. “There isn’t any mayor? What about this city? No?”

  “We’re not that big,” House Leader Ottone explained. “The planetary government is perfectly capable of running both cities, and running both cities and the towns around them and the orbital facility is pretty much the same as running the entire star system at this point. It’s well within our ability.”

  Lochan Nakamura looked to Carmen, and she gestured to encourage him to continue. “It’s not about capability,” he told the leaders of Kosatka. “It’s about your being the people who run the star system. That puts you on a high level in the perception of your people. Look, I dealt with this kind of thing on Franklin. People want to talk to someone who cares about and deals with them. Not someone who deals with a whole star system. Both of these cities should have mayors and councils who deal with local issues and report to you.”

  “That’s unnecessary redundancy,” the First Minister objected.

  “Yeah! I know! But the cities are going to keep getting bigger, and there are going to be more of them, and how long are the same people going to be running the entire star system and this planet and every city and town?” Lochan gestured dramatically outward. “While you guys worry about interstellar trade agreements and planetary economic trends, who do the people in each city and town go to when they need a new road or the neighbors start smelting lead in their backyard hobby barn?”

  “Handling those issues is still well within our capability,” House Leader Ottone said. “The people just need to enter them in the needs category of the gov net, and it gets routed to the appropriate people to take appropriate action.”

  “How long will that be the case?” Lochan Nakamura asked. “And if the system is working fine, why did you tell us some people are unhappy, especially in Drava? What happens when you found a third city, on another continent? Start distributing political power now, give your citizens a chance to vote for and interact directly, face-to-face, with the people who control their city, and when you reach the point where the central government would be getting overwhelmed or just too huge because it’s trying to do everything, you’ll already be in good shape.”

  “That’s how things worked on Old Earth,” House Leader Ottone admitted. “But we didn’t want all those different governments like on Earth, which Drava seems to want, and we’re so much smaller, we didn’t think . . . yes. We’ve been reacting, not thinking. I think we should consider this,” he told the First Minister. “Cut off the justification the separatists are using.”

  “Even if we do,” Safety Coordinator Sarkozy said, her voice harsh, “we still need to deal with the bombers. And if what you tell us is true,” she said to Carmen, “then those bombers are agents of another star system. We need to hit them hard, clamp down as tightly as necessary, get the bad elements neutralized.”

  “No,” Carmen said. “You cannot go down that path! That’s where Mars went, and that’s what your enemies want: convince the security forces to start acting like occupation troops rather than defenders of the people they protect, and convince the people that the forces of law and order are brutal occupiers. If those narratives are not broken, you reach a point where the security forces are occupiers holding down a hostile populace, and it is only a matter of time before the occupiers either become what they once fought against, or the people kick them out and place themselves at the mercy of those for whom there is no law.”

  “The Martian War For Independence?” Lochan said.

  “Exactly. The well-intentioned were used. The only winners were the ones who wanted war and the freedom to do anything they wanted to do.”

  “You seem very familiar with the history of Mars,” Safety Coordinator Sarkozy commented to Carmen.

  “Yes,” she said, ignoring the implication. “Which is why I want to help you avoid the mistakes made there.”

  “Are you saying there are no Reds involved in the violence we’re experiencing?”

  “No,” Carmen said. “Anyone wanting to cause trouble might well recruit from among gangs on Mars. That does not mean everyone from Mars is a danger.”

  “If they are pushing for changes to the government, we have to assume that they are doing so to cause trouble for us,” Safety Coordinator Sarkozy insisted.

  “You can’t criminalize dissent,” Lochan Nakamura objected. “Not everyone who has a complaint about the way things are done is your enemy. But if you treat them all like enemies, they’ll all start to become enemies. Franklin has strong laws protecting dissent. I hope that Kosatka does as well.”

  “It does,” First Minister Hofer said. His expression as he looked at the Safety Coordinator told Carmen that this was a matter that had already been argued more than once. “Let’s consider the other part of the problem. Lares. We don’t have much to spare, but we will help. What else do you recommend we do?”

  Carmen paused to think, fighting off a feeling of nausea as she thought of the victims of the bombardment. It was odd that she had come through the near disaster on the shuttle without gut-clenching fear but felt sick now when contemplating the destruction at Lares. “Earth has seen this sort of thing many times, in many forms,” she began. “Most recently during the Solar Wars. There are two courses of action that you need to avoid. One is to freeze in hopes the aggressors either don’t notice you or decide you’re not worth similar treatment. That too easily becomes an argument for not preparing defenses that might ‘provoke’ the aggressor. You need defenses.”

  “We are in agreement on that,” Safety Coordinator Sarkozy said.

  “The other action to avoid is panic,” Carmen said. “Taking hasty steps that don’t really address your problem and may make the problem worse. You want your people united behind you, and that will only happen if the steps you take have popular support.”

  House Leader Ottone shook his head. “We’re already under a lot of pressure to ‘take steps’ and ‘protect Kosatka.’ We have to do something, or the people might recall us and put in some demagogue who promises them anything they want at no cost.”

  “We need
alternatives,” First Minister Hofer said, his chin resting on his fist as he gazed at Carmen and Lochan. “Just as with the dissidents. Show them that we are addressing their concerns. What would Earth gov do?”

  Carmen spread her hands. “Ask the member governments for authority to do something, then wait while the member governments debated allowing any action. You, fortunately, do not face that problem. If you want to know what Earth gov would suggest doing, it would involve taking steps to prevent a repetition of the events.”

  “You already said it,” Safety Coordinator Sarkozy said. She seemed unable to decide whether Carmen was giving good suggestions or Red-tainted advice. “Get some weapons up on some ships, so that anyone arriving in this star system with aggressive intent can be countered. I’ve already checked. We can shift some of the assembly processes to get some heavy particle beam cannon put together, mount one on the Pulaski when it gets back, and use the Pulaski as a warship until we can get something better.”

  “We only have two freighters,” House Leader Ottone objected. “Taking one out of trade service would leave us with only the Copernicus. If we’re dependent on foreign shipping for trade, that would cost us a lot more than simply the expense of adding a few weapons to the Pulaski.”

  The First Minister held up a hand to stop the debate, his brow furrowed in thought. “Costs. We need to debate this but decide quickly. The expenses caused by converting the Pulaski and in forgone trade can be calculated. The potential cost of Kosatka’s enduring what happened to Lares would be incalculable.”

  “What about sending the Copernicus to Earth?” Carmen said. “The conversion of the Pulaski can be a temporary step. Earth has surplus decommissioned warships just drifting in space and former crews from Earth Fleet who are looking for work.”

  “Earth is a long ways,” First Minister Hofer said. “How much would Earth charge for one of those ships?”

  “I don’t know the exact prices,” Carmen admitted. “I do know it will be far less than the cost of constructing a new warship. I talked to Earth Fleet sailors who said the only reason Earth gov hadn’t sold the warships for scrap was that it was cheaper to leave them in a fixed orbital point.”