All in Good Time

by Mackey Chandler

  “I’m twenty-seven, so I’ve been able to buy a legal drink for three years. It is presumed all prisoners are unable to afford private representation. It is out of the reach of approximately ninety-seven percent of those arrested. If you wish to hire private representation you may dismiss me, but the judge will regard a client dismissal without having an attorney of record retained as an attempt to taint the case by claiming lack of representation. This video link is presumed to be private.”

  Irwin just made a rude noise at that last silly remark. “I object to this being a concern of a USNA court at all,” Irwin said. “I have not been on USNA territory in decades and my dealing as a foreign national in my own jurisdiction is no concern of theirs. I’m guaranteed free and safe passage of North America by your treaty with Home even if I’d entered voluntarily, having entered your jurisdiction as a traveler in distress even more so. It’s a diplomatic issue, if it is any issue at all. I’ll point out all the time I was living on Home with a known address no North American agency ever made a complaint I was in any kind of a dispute with them. Suddenly when I am here it is sprung on me.”

  “You are a banker, you are presumed to stay current with the public announcements in regard to your profession. The USNA has a number of sanctions in place against Home goods and support of transactions in those goods. More to the point the USNA has sanctions in place against the creation and use of the private currency known as the solar, meant to be used as public money and displace the dollar in trade. That is in violation of 18 U.S. Code Sec. 486, which prohibits making coins intended for use as current money. There are other associated charges including tax reporting and unlawful trades, but that is the core of it.”

  Irwin’s mouth actually fell open at that. “This is raving lunacy to apply that to a foreign national. You’d be able to charge an Italian fellow for making euromark coins or a Japanese official for creating coins denominated in yen.”

  “I presume they could,” Brooks agreed, “and if the currency in question was sanctioned, as Iranian and Venezuelan have been, I can almost guarantee you they would do so.

  “You are also charged with bringing some of those false instruments into the country as well as items to facilitate their use, that is, your credit cards that will allow transactions to be carried out in solars, and the ‘bits’ that are unregistered securities. There are thirty-seven charges against you in all. You are also a carrier of prohibited life extension technology.”

  “A carrier? You make it sound like I’m going to infect you. What would you do with all those extra years if I did?” Irwin asked sarcastically.

  “Some of those therapies are applied by viral transmission, Brooks said. “There is no official stance on how long after their application they remain infectious.”

  “That’s total dishonest bullshit,” Irwin said. “Nobody arresting me took any precautions at all. If they were worried about it they’d have all been suited up. They knew better.”

  “And yet a large body of clergy and Spanish nobility were infected in Europe,” Brooks said. “Nobody has done a serious study of it.”

  “I refuse your representation,” Irwin said. “I think you are confused about what being an officer of the court means. You sound and act more like a prosecutor than a defense attorney. I refuse to accept or acknowledge your court’s authority over me in this matter. I can’t communicate with them, but my mute appeal will be entirely with the authority and powers of my peers on Home. I am certain they know of my plight by now. This is all political. It’s going to come down to raw power if they decide to rescue me.”

  “That’s a foolish and fanciful position that is going to harm you. You already did something to your computer and accessories to keep the agencies out of them. That right there prejudices your case because you demonstrated you had things to hide. Encrypting a mobile device with no law enforcement access is another charge against you. There were already limits to how much I could have helped you. You could have pled to a few of these in exchange for leniency, but your lack of cooperation makes it worse.”

  “I-am-a-citizen-of-Home,” Irwin said in a very slow deadpan cadence.

  “So? What is that supposed to mean to me?” Brooks asked, increasingly irritated.

  “It’s the same as when Rome ruled the world and one could say ‘I am a Roman’. You touched them at your peril,” Irwin said, making a delicate touching gesture in front of the screen. “If they ran afoul of local law they could appeal to their own law all the way to Caesar. The inferior law did not apply. We built that into our treaty that we would be subject to our own law when transiting your territory, but you people have no honor and don’t keep your word. You’ve forgotten Vandenberg and the loss of California already. Neither have you learned anything from what happened to China for stealing a Home ship. I’m not only a citizen of Home, but I am an associate and business partner with the people who did those things to you and China. You may yet wish the Home Assembly took up your case if my friends decide to handle the matter themselves.”

  “That happened because one of your ships approached our air space in a threatening manner,” Brooks said. “It was in the news and I believe my government’s version of events.”

  “Of course you do, Fool.”

  Brooks scowled and said nothing more before cutting the connection.

  * * *

  “Well it was still worth waiting and giving them a chance to be reasonable,” Jeff said. “These charges are ridiculous. Cuba has suspended connecting flights to North America again, more for their man who was arrested than for Irwin. That’s going to be a pain in the neck for people who use the hypersonics out of Havana. They recalled their consul from Miami too. The other fellow they took off the plane with Irwin is a Cuban political leader in the party the USNA condemns. He has a lot of followers among Cuban expats, all along the Gulf states.”

  “Why was it worth waiting?” April asked Jeff. “What advantage was it at all?”

  “If we have to speak to the Assembly about it, or for that matter how we look in the historical record. I’d like us to look like we didn’t automatically expect the worst of them and provoke them to respond harshly.”

  “I seriously doubt your idea that I’m nicer than you,” April said, “and I intend to write the history books, or at least feed the record to Lindsey to put in her book.”

  “A picture book,” Jeff said, “they will never respect it.”

  “I don’t really care, and I’m going to show her all the straight stuff to prove you were the first to take a ship to another star, whether you care about the glory or not.”

  “She isn’t going to publish very soon, I hope?”

  “No, this is one of those megaprojects that take over a person’s life,” April assured him. “Since you are so worried about the optics of it, and want to be among the angels and wear the white hat in this story, what do you want me to do next?”

  “I think it is time to issue a very sternly worded press release,” Jeff said, straight-faced.

  “Am I allowed to make threats?” April asked. “Take out New York City if they hurt him?”

  “While that has a certain visceral appeal, and striking mental imagery, I honestly think they couldn’t get their minds wrapped around it. You’d end up having to either back down and destroy your credibility, or commit mass murder of about twelve million people.”

  “Plus New Jersey, pretty much,” April said.

  “Indeed,” Jeff agreed, “but everybody would mourn New York the Great City, and nobody would really give a damn about New Jersey unless their Aunt Edna happened to live there. May I suggest a lesser threat, chosen with the idea in mind they will probably make you demonstrate your resolve? You may have to act more than once, so you should leave yourself room to escalate in steps.”

  “I could escalate from New York just fine, but I take your meaning.” April smiled, but it wasn’t a pleasant smile. “I’m considering a target that ties in with their narrative perfectly, lo
w or no casualties if they pay attention, but high value. Probably higher in propaganda value than reality, but that’s how they play the game anyway.”

  “You look too pleased with yourself, what’s the target?” Jeff

  “Fort Knox. Since they make a point of it that gold isn’t money I could relieve them of the ongoing expense of storing that out-dated commodity. We would then see if the loss of a big chunk of their gold reserves influences the value of the dollar.”

  “That’s much more restrained than hitting the Federal Reserve Bank in New York,” Jeff agreed. “They keep more gold there but the collateral damage would be horrid even if you didn’t really sink Manhattan. I wonder if you couldn’t start at a much lesser level though, and escalate if they prove stubborn?”

  “I’ll give some thought to that,” April promised. “Perhaps it would be better to directly target the officials responsible instead of institutions. What do you think? The North Americans love to target third world enemy leaders with drones who don’t have the tech to strike back. I wonder how they’d feel to be on the receiving end for a change? In any case, I don’t need to start right now. Let’s see how they treat Irwin.”

  “Come, fortify yourself with some dinner before you carry on the fight. You don’t want to get obsessed like you’ve warned me many times, and ignore your own needs,” Jeff said.

  “I can hardly ignore my own advice,” April agreed.

  * * *

  “I have some feedback from Chen,” April said.

  “Already? It’s only been about an hour,” Jeff said.

  “It’s daytime in North America. If it was the middle of the night he’s probably be waiting for people to wake up and read their messages. It amazes me he has as many international contacts as he does,” April said. “He mostly worked in Asia for the Chinese. I can’t prove it, and I am scared to demand he tell me, but I suspect he is getting more and more information from Jan on ISSII. His intelligence on North America and Europe, in particular, has gotten much more detailed and useful.”

  “I can believe that for various complex reasons,” Jeff said, but didn’t elaborate. “So what is the scoop? Did he have any suggestions?”

  “Chen never really volunteers advice easily. I have to ask him directly and it’s still like pulling teeth. He said the whole thing started from the Office of Foreign Asset Control, and a bunch of other agencies are having a fit over them jeopardizing the necessary back door payments to The Private Bank of Home. They were happy to let payments be routed through other countries and ignore that Irwin dealt in solars as long as he wasn’t the issuing bank. The Fed was happy showing how tough they are, kicking our Solar Trade Bank out of SWIFT – IPC, but we still have tons of crap they need to buy. They didn’t need that destabilized. If it all has to go full black market the price will get jacked up even more and delivery unreliable.”

  “You better believe it will,” Jeff said. “I’ll make sure of it and see as much of that as is practical ends up in our pockets. Acting like flaming jackasses should have consequences.”

  “The CDC is not thrilled, because the new universal flu vaccine from GSK is ninety percent effective. Since it’s made here they market it in solars, not dollars, or even yen. They haven’t produced the old style multi-strain vaccine in three flu seasons and it would be a nightmare to try to start production back up again from scratch.

  “Also, the CDC has never had to back up their propaganda about Life Extension Therapy in a court with any sort of serious testimony. They don’t want to, and charging Irwin like he has broken quarantine would make them look stupid in discovery.”

  “They would keep any honest expert witnesses from entering the country to testify,” Jeff said. “I’m not sure you could find a USNA scientist willing to trash his career.”

  “I don’t want it to get to trial,” April said.

  “Then what is your opening stratagem?” Jeff asked.

  “To ask Dan Prescott to declare the Private Bank won’t take dollars from any third party, since they’ve imprisoned the owner. Get ahead of them before they can go through a show trial and declare the same thing themselves,” April said. “Dan has a direct commercial interest. They may pay attention to him better than me making any statement just yet.”

  “Irwin would never do that himself,” Jeff said. “Dan is going to know that and it puts him on the spot. How is that going to affect his relationship with Irwin when he returns? It may cost him his job to do that.”

  “It would be terrible to be ungrateful for any effort to free him. What else does Dan have he could do to pressure the North Americans to free him? He can make the explicit point that when Irwin is freed he’ll normalize dollar trades again. I bet that gets some behind the scene support from the countries that have been facilitating those transactions. If it works that may also save them from having an action brought against them for their part in bypassing sanctions. I don’t see how they could avoid doing that if all the details of how it works would be made public in a trial. Anyway, if worse comes to worst we can offer him a job with our bank,” April suggested.

  “Talk to him,” Jeff agreed. “Make sure Irwin didn’t limit his authority to do business while he was gone. Find out if he can do that, and, April… ”

  “Yes?”

  “I think you should tell him that you intend to intervene further yourself as needed, and how, so he can protect his assets and make money from it.”

  “You think Dan refusing dollars would make much difference?” April asked him.

  “Oh yeah, it will make the dollar dip and Dan can make some money on knowing that is going to happen. I don’t know how much, but something. I expect Irwin is going to accuse me later on of coming up with the idea. He still suspects I deliberately crashed the dollar when they kicked us out of their payment system.”

  “Don’t worry, I’ll set him straight it was my idea,” April promised.

  “Did anybody ever say why the hypersonic had to abort?” Jeff asked, suspiciously.

  “It doesn’t appear to be sabotage,” April said. “Once about every fifty flights, a hyper has a flow failure in their transition to ram mode. The laminar flow in the intake is normally right on the edge of stability, and can disrupt and go turbulent. Normally, it cuts the fuel flow, closes the intake opening down, and automatically cycles the opening back while restoring fuel flow. It does it so fast and automatically most passengers don’t notice a little lurch. This time the system glitched and didn’t cut the fuel flow. The turbine was already bypassed and spinning down, so it didn’t self destruct, but the back-fire bent and froze the baffles and left the ram intake unable to adjust. They could fly it with one engine back in turbine mode at reduced power, but it can’t even stay up, just extend its glide and run auxiliary systems.”

  “They’re so complicated it’s amazing they work at all,” Jeff said.

  * * *

  Vic was alarmed at the speed Eileen set. He thought about telling her they didn’t have to get there for lunch. After thinking it all through he decided there wasn’t any way to put it that wouldn’t be poorly taken. If she burned herself out the worst that would happen would be they’d have to stop short, camp off the road, and turn back home tomorrow.

  It did alarm him a little however when after about an hour she picked up the pace. His feet started complaining a bit after about an hour of that, enough to remind him that they really got about the same amount and quality of daily exercise. His only advantage was a longer stride, and he was at a couple of decades disadvantage, something he didn’t usually think about but was starting to concern him today. When Mr. Mast’s barn came in sight they were both relieved. A couple of people were working on the side of the barn opposite the house. They stopped working briefly as Vic and Eileen approached, and then went back to work. They probably had binoculars like Vic, but he didn’t stop to get his out.

  When they were closer it became apparent they were digging, fresh darker dirt piled to the side. When they got c
loser two big dogs came trotting toward them. At a sharp whistle, they turned around and went back, but slower. That said a lot about Mr. Mast. They’d never seen his dogs during the festivals and a lot of folks had enough trouble feeding themselves, much less dogs too. When they were a hundred meters away Mr. Mast shoved his shovel in the pile and walked to meet them. The dogs flanked him and had to be introduced first after which they didn’t seem very interested.

  “It’s kind of ugly there if you’d rather not have to see it, Ma’am. We’re burying some raiders rather than just drag them off. That encourages vermin to hang around. You can go up to the house if you’d rather.”

  “I appreciate your kindness, but I have my big girl pants on today. I’ve seen ugly stuff before and won’t faint away. Did you miss a few who fled off down the road in our direction?” Eileen asked.

  “I did, but I’m not sure how many,” Mast said, “It was still pretty dark and it might have been the three I saw for sure or a couple more.”

  “Five,” Vic said, “but one was hurt and I think he was shot and left behind.”

  “You shoot at them?” Mast asked Vic, eyeballing their slung guns.

  “No, I heard them coming so we hid and let them pass by. I saw them from a distance where the road came back into view. I didn’t see who did the shooting, they weren’t out in plain view of me, but they were divvying up his stuff after the shot sounded.”

  “That was smart when they outnumbered you. Then I got half or better of them,” Mast said, looking satisfied.

  “With some help?” Vic asked, nodding toward the young man still digging.

  “No, that’s my neighbor’s boy Ted from about a half-mile down the road. He came by to see if I needed a hand and help after all the banging and booming. They set two guys to keep me pinned in the house. They didn’t damage much because they couldn’t spare the ammo to keep at it. The one hid behind the Festival outhouse. I had to show him the difference between concealment and cover. I hate to use up .338 Lapua ammo, but one does what one must. The other silly fellow was down behind the barn and the idiot actually looked around the corner and showed me half a face at three hundred meters,” Mast said.