The real work, the work that would let Elsa grow up in a universe that was safe for her, and for her children’s children’s children, was the work that came after the conquest of the rest of humanity. Work that required stability.
“Ensign,” Singh said at his monitor, which was currently flattened out on his desk. He’d appointed a temporary replacement for Lieutenant Kasik, and he hadn’t quite memorized her name yet.
“Governor?” she replied a moment later.
“Please send my compliments to President Fisk, and let her know we’re sending a cart to pick her up. I need an immediate meeting to discuss some urgent matters. Do not take no.”
“Yes, sir,” the ensign replied. “I also—”
“Right away, Ensign,” Singh said, then took a look around at his office. The flowers someone had placed in a vase on his corner table were dying, and the shelf that held his coffeemaker was a mess. “Also, send in someone to make fresh coffee and replace these flowers before the meeting.”
“Yes, sir. I wanted to also let you know that you have an incoming message from Laconia. The Storm just sent it over.”
“Send it through. And please let me know five minutes before President Fisk arrives.”
“Of course, sir,” the ensign said and then killed the connection.
Singh tapped on the glowing message button on his monitor and it projected a still picture of his wife holding Monster.
“Play message,” he said.
The still image sprang to life. The recording must have started midway through her expression, because Nat’s face went from an enigmatic Mona Lisa smile to her normal wide grin. Monster didn’t seem all that interested in the camera lens, and instead was focused on something over her mother’s shoulder. They were both beautiful, and Singh felt an emptiness in the pit of his stomach that was always there, but that he managed to ignore until he saw their faces.
“Hi, Sonny,” Nat said to the camera. She held up Monster’s hand and waved at the screen with it. “Say hi to Daddy.”
“Hi, sweetie,” Singh said to the recording like an idiot. He couldn’t help himself.
“I know you’re so busy right now, but we have some good news to pass along,” Nat said. She put Monster down, and the girl ran off out of frame. Singh felt irrationally disappointed to see her go. “My work with sheep modification has been approved for the next round of live testing. We could go wide with it in the next thirty months. Which means a posting to Medina would actually help me move the project forward. No pressure, or anything.”
She smiled as she said it, but he felt the loneliness echoed in her eyes. She continued. “Monster is doing well. She’s a little bored, and so ready to move into the big kids’ room at school. She spends most afternoons with your dad, and they’re becoming the best of friends. She calls him Poompaw now, and he’s started insisting everyone else call him that too. Most days he doesn’t want me to take her when I get off work. We eat dinner at his place a lot of evenings.”
Singh felt a swell of love and gratitude for his father that he’d never felt before he had a child of his own. He paused the video playback and took a moment so he wouldn’t get maudlin and weepy. It wouldn’t do to bring Carrie Fisk in and begin delivering his orders while his eyes were goopy and red. When he’d gathered himself, he started it again.
“So, that’s it, I guess. Reply when you get a minute. The home monitor has figured out Monster’s version of the word play, so she loves replaying your messages over and over again. Love you, Sonny. Be safe out there.”
And that was it. Nat saying she loved him shattered whatever resolve he thought he had, and he spent the next several minutes blubbering shamefully to himself.
Someone tapped at his door, and he called out, “Give me a moment!” Then rushed off to his private bathroom. While he was washing his face, he heard the sounds of someone cleaning up his office, and by the time he’d put himself back in shape to see people, there was a fresh pot of coffee percolating on the shelf. A noncom was just finishing up by placing new flowers in his vase. The chief threw him a snappy salute, then faded out of the room like a cat.
Singh sat at his desk, composed himself, then started a recording to Nat. “Hello, my dear. Thank you for the lovely message. I’m so happy to hear things are going well there, and Monster looks very well fed, so my father is almost certainly spoiling her rotten with sweet rolls. Things are still ahead of schedule here. Living here will take some getting used to, but there’s plenty of usable land for your sheep and lab, and we’re working to get all the services up to snuff for my little girl. Talk soon. I love you, Nat. I love you—” He almost said Monster, but something felt wrong about using her pet name. “I love you, Elsa.”
He killed the connection, and sent the file for processing to pass it down to Laconia with the next comm dump. He took a lot of pride in the fact that saying “I love you” to Nat hadn’t sent him into another weeping fit. There were people who thought that sort of thing was unmanly. Singh didn’t care about that. But it was undignified.
“Five minutes,” Ensign Somebody said from his monitor.
“I’m ready,” he replied.
Carrie Fisk sat in a chair in his office, drinking his coffee and looking twitchy and uncomfortable. She’d been picked up at her office by fully armored Marines and driven to the governor’s offices in a convoy of three carts filled with other Marines. For her protection, certainly, but it could also be a little intimidating for someone who wasn’t used to it. If that gave Singh a bit of a home-field advantage when dealing with the minor functionaries on Medina, he’d happily take it. He waited until she’d stopped fidgeting and started paying attention to him, then pulled up a list of the hundreds of ring systems that had habitable colonies and threw the list up onto his wall.
“Madam President,” he said. “We’ve reached an exciting moment for us all, but especially for you as the first president of the Laconian Congress of Worlds.”
“Are we married to that name change?” she asked. “Or …”
“The name of the legislative body is established in the documentation I gave you after our first meeting. Did you not read those documents?”
“I did,” she said. “I just wasn’t sure if that was a working title, or not. We haven’t voted on adopting the new—”
“You do not vote on directives delivered from the executive authority of the high consul’s office.”
“I see,” Fisk said. She stared at her lap and blew steam off her coffee.
“As I was saying,” Singh continued. “This is an exciting time for us all. High Admiral Trejo has decided that our situation is now secure enough to allow limited trade to resume through the gates.”
Fisk looked up at him with genuine surprise. “What?”
“Yes. Limited trade can be scheduled starting now. Put together a list of the worlds in the greatest need, as well as a schedule of deliveries that can meet those needs. Not from Sol system. Not yet. At first, we’ll allow a single ship transit per week, and of course each transit must be approved by me personally at least thirty days before it’s scheduled to occur.”
“That’s actually—” Fisk started, then stopped for a moment. “That’s actually really good to hear. There are a lot of colonies barely hanging on by a thread. This will save lives.”
“And that is, of course, always the first priority of our respective positions.”
“Ah,” Fisk said, then leaned forward to put her coffee cup on the edge of his desk. As Singh frowned at it and the disrespectful informality it denoted, she said, “On that topic I passed along your threat to every colonized world. I also extended your invitation to the planets that have not already joined the association—forgive me, the Laconian Congress of Worlds—to elect a representative to join our group once trade has resumed. I assume some of those planets will be asking to send their new reps along with the trade ships.”
“That’s good,” Singh said. The Laconian Congress of Worlds was something
High Consul Duarte insisted on to make the member worlds feel like they had a voice in government. As annoying as the idea of dealing with thirteen hundred Carrie Fisks would be, the high consul’s opinion on this topic had the force of law, so he’d do his best to see that the new legislative body succeeded.
Fisk was still staring at him, waiting for some sort of answer.
“And?” he asked.
“And, if some of these transiting ships are carrying newly elected representatives, they’ll need permission to dock or send shuttles to Medina. Does the lifting of the transit ban also include permission to dock with the station?”
Which was an excellent question, and Singh was annoyed that Carrie Fisk had thought of it before he did.
“Permission will be granted by this office on a case-by-case basis. Requests to be filed at minimum thirty days prior to the transit,” he said, feeling like it came across as established policy and not something he’d just made up on the spot. He’d need to document that once Fisk left.
“Thank you, Governor,” Fisk said.
“It’s important that this feel familiar, stable, and safe as quickly as possible,” Singh told her. “To the degree possible, you will use Transport Union ships and pilots. The union will also handle the pickup and delivery of goods using their existing policies. Other than the approval process for transits, everything should work the way it did before.”
“I’ll send out a notice to the union reps here on the station, and to the local leadership on each world.”
“Excellent,” Singh said, standing up and reaching out to shake her hand. “At the risk of sounding repetitive, these are very exciting times for us all.”
Fisk didn’t stand. She sat in his chair squeezing her hands and not looking at him. When the silence had become uncomfortable, he said, “Was there something else, Madam President?”
“There is,” she replied, looking him in the eye for the first time. She showed no sign of standing up to leave, so he sat back down again.
“Then out with it,” he said, immediately regretting the snappish tone. “Please.”
“We’re—I’m doing everything you asked. I’ve passed along your messages to the worlds. I’ve asked for reps to be sent from every planet that wasn’t already part of the association. I’ve passed along President Duarte’s—”
“High Consul Duarte,” Singh interrupted her.
“Of course,” she said. “I’ve passed along the high consul’s very detailed documentation on convening the new Congress of Worlds.”
“Laconian Congress of Worlds,” Singh said.
“Of course. But so far, that’s the only thing my office has done. Act as press secretary for your office. And, with all due respect, that is not what I was voted into my office to do.”
She looked nervous saying it, and Singh gave her a minute to stew in her worry. If the mouse wanted to grow some claws, that was probably a good thing in the long run. The Laconian government had no use for those who wouldn’t fight for what they believed. The high consul made it very clear that every conflicting viewpoint should have a vigorous proponent, so that everyone felt that the final decisions were made only after everything was considered fully. A planetary congress run by mice wasn’t useful to anyone.
“And what,” Singh said after he’d let her squirm enough, “would be a better use of your time, Madam President?”
“If we’re to be the legislative body of this new government, when do we actually start legislating? You’ve brought me in here to deliver these directives for me to disseminate, but not once have we voted on them. I feel that very quickly we’ll be viewed as a congress in name only, in place to rubber-stamp your orders.”
“As the governor,” Singh replied, “I am here as the direct representative of the executive branch, and the office of the high consul. You don’t vote on orders from the high consul.”
He couldn’t help but laugh a bit at the very ridiculousness of that idea. As if the high consul might change his policies because of a vote.
“Then,” Fisk replied, “what do we vote on?”
“When the high consul’s office has decided on this year’s legislative agenda, you will be the first to be notified, Madam President. Until then, please continue working with the member worlds to ease their transition into the new government. And I assure you, that will be an excellent use of your time.”
“Okay,” Carrie Fisk said, and stood. “I’ll just go make sure my rubber stamp is all warmed up.”
Singh didn’t stand to shake her hand. “You are dismissed.”
Singh was still mulling over the deeply unsatisfying meeting he’d had with Carrie Fisk when his monitor buzzed and Overstreet’s voice came over the speaker.
“Sir, I have a … gentleman who says he has important information for you.”
“Can’t he give it to you?”
“He’s reluctant to, sir. Says it’s for the top man only. I think it might be worth the interview.”
That was interesting. Even if the alleged information turned out to be nothing, he was curious to see what sort of thing Overstreet thought important enough to engage him.
“Do we know this person?”
“No, sir,” Overstreet replied.
“I assume he’s already been searched for weapons.”
“Yes, sir.”
“Give me two minutes, then,” and Singh closed the connection. His office was still neat and tidy from Fisk’s visit. He sat up straighter in his chair, and pulled his uniform jacket tight. He turned on his monitor’s front-facing camera and examined himself. Secured and shipshape. The very picture of a military commander.
There was a discreet knock, then two Marines walked in with Overstreet and a tall, thin man of the generic Belter variety. The only feature this one had that seemed different at all was his comically large nose. It was misshapen from repeated breaks, and had a large scar on one nostril. Clearly a man who’d been in a few fights, and who did a poor job of keeping his hands up while boxing.
“You asked to see me?” Singh said. He did not offer the man a chair.
“My sister in one of them cages you got out there,” the man said, clearly working to keep his accent as Belter free as possible, and only sort of succeeding.
Singh glanced at Overstreet.
“Not one of the people involved in the bombing, Governor,” Overstreet said. “Petty theft from a merchant.”
“A military tribunal has been formed, and the cases will be adjudicated promptly and in the order they were filed,” Singh replied. “Is that all?” It couldn’t be, or Overstreet wouldn’t have brought the man to his attention, but he was willing to let the Belter do some of the work here.
“All that shit you said, about we help you, you help us? That just the merde or what?”
“It’s the truth,” Singh said, feeling a glimmer of interest. Overstreet had what could have been the ghost of a smile on his lips. “Are you here to help me?”
“Let my sister go. She’s just stupid, caught stealing, no threat to you. Let her go, I know something you want to know.” The man rubbed his big, lumpy nose nervously as he spoke. “Something coming, and I know the coyo behind, yeah? Deep in with Voltaire Collective, me.”
“You’re in contact with the forces behind the bombing?”
“Maybe,” the broken-nosed man said. His bravado was barely thick enough to stretch across his fear. “If there’s enough in it. You tell it to me.”
Singh paused for a moment, letting the silence stretch. A network of locals loyal to him. Dependent on his generosity. It was all coming together so well.
“I think you and I are about to become friends,” Singh said.
Chapter Thirty-One: Drummer
Sleep and Drummer had developed an uncomfortable relationship. Its worst aspect was the time it left her to read the public comment boards and newsfeeds.
THIS SENSE OF PURPOSE IS EXACTLY WHAT MARS LOST WHEN THE GATES OPENED. THIS ISN’T AN INVASION AT ALL. IT’S TH
E RETURN OF THE REAL MARTIAN SPIRIT TO ITS PROPER PLACE, AND I AM HAPPY—FUCK, DELIGHTED—THAT I HAVE LIVED LONG ENOUGH TO SEE IT.
The way it played out was predictable. During her days, she felt like People’s Home was turning too fast on its axis. Only it wasn’t just her body that was getting spun. Her mind was too heavy to lift. She was controlling herself with a bad lag, like driving a mech with choppy software or running a waldo at the edge of its range. Meetings with the union board, with the EMC admiralty, with her own staff. Interviews and speeches in which she declared the independence of the union. She got through all of them with a physical sensation like her brain was evaporating. All she wanted to do from the start of her shift to the last moment before bed was close her eyes.
And then, as soon as she did, they opened again, as if by themselves.
THESE ASSHOLES SHOULD HAVE BEEN CUT OFF BEFORE THEY COULD GET THROUGH THE GATE. THIS IS EXACTLY THE PROBLEM I’VE BEEN TALKING ABOUT FOR YEARS. A TRADE UNION DOESN’T MATTER FOR SHIT WHEN AN ARMY COMES KNOCKING. IF YOU EVER NEEDED ANY PROOF THAT THE TRANSPORT UNION ADMINISTRATION WAS INCOMPETENT, THERE YOU GO. IT’S RIGHT HERE FOR YOU, AND IN SPADES.
She’d try to rest. Try to lure sleep back. Her eyes felt gritty. Her mouth felt dry. She wanted to eat, even though she wasn’t hungry. Wanted water, even though she wasn’t thirsty. It was like her body knew it needed something, and all it could do was run through the list of possibilities over and over, hoping that something would give her solace that hadn’t the last time. She found herself craving a pipeful of marijuana, even though she hadn’t smoked in decades.
She waited an hour, maybe two, then got up and spooled through the feeds and networked discussions with a dummy account she’d made for the purpose. She told herself it was research, that she was gauging the morale of the populace. It was easy to pretend that she was somehow learning something that would help. It felt like tearing off a scab and pressing salt into the opened sore, but it was better than paging through the names of the dead. Emily Santos-Baca …