Holly pressed a finger against her wristband until its pop-out display extended several inches along her forearm and revealed her passengers’ latest meal orders.
Yury Gardev, an ageing space pioneer who merited his free place on the station as much as anyone, ordered the same choice for every meal: potatoes, pork, and peas. His cabin-mate Ekaterina Rusev had today opted for the same thing. Holly’s super-rich paying passengers at the other end of the Karrier had chosen an extra large all-day breakfast and a vegetarian lasagne. Given that everything was made of mashed-up algae, the redundancy of the machine’s vegetarian options never failed to make Holly smile.
Holly selected Rusev’s and Yury’s meals first. She set off towards their cabin little over a minute later, making it almost halfway before one of their forks slipped off the tray and fell to the floor. Holly placed the tray down while she picked up the fork and wiped it on her shirt. After standing silently for a few seconds, she sighed, turned around, and walked back to the utility room for a clean fork. Yury deserved as much, and so did Rusev.
In 68 well-lived years, Ekaterina Rusev had done as much for humanity as anyone Holly could think of. Though the Bulgarian matriarch of the Rusentra corporation had inherited her controlling interest in the firm several decades earlier, she had since amassed an even greater fortune on the back of her own innovations and Holly didn’t think the issue of the unearned inheritance in any way detracted from Rusev’s long list of positive contributions.
Top of that list, without question, was the Venus station.
When Rusentra had first published proposals for its research station almost thirty years earlier, one critic decried the plans as “an example of gross scientific self-indulgence and a wasted opportunity to tackle the looming overpopulation crisis.”
Now, with the situation on Earth so precarious that the global population had fallen to a level unseen since the mid-twentieth century, Holly didn’t understand how any reasonable person could be anything but grateful that Rusev had diverted so much funding to the station’s creation all those years earlier.
More than a decade after an unprecedented series of natural disasters and a day-long blitzkrieg of coordinated terror attacks sent the world into a state of chaos which ultimately led to the creation of an all-powerful Global Union of nations, GU policies had done conspicuously little to reverse this population decline.
Thanks to Rusev’s personal vision, the three largest spacecraft ever constructed now orbited Venus as one gargantuan whole. And although the Venus station was originally intended to become both a self-sustaining research base and a jumping off point for an ill-fated asteroid-mining venture, the station had ended up serving as something much more important: a refuge for a lucky few and, in Rusev’s own words, “an off-site backup for humanity itself.”
This point had been made in the worst way on what had come to be known as Devastation Day, when terrorists destroyed all major Earth-based space research hubs along with innumerable military facilities and critical civilian infrastructure across all major nations. All that survived of Rusentra’s space project was the Venus station and the two Karrier crafts docked to it at the time, one of which Holly was standing in right now.
The Global Union which rose from the ashes did not look kindly upon any form of investment in space, deeming it wasteful at a time when so many on Earth were struggling to make ends meet. Rusev’s operating research station had been largely ignored until the rapid rise to absolute power of Roger Morrison, a plutocrat turned GU politician with whom she shared a long history of bitter conflict.
Effective propaganda had since criticised the station as “a bastion of corporate wastefulness.” Despite the GU’s total media control, however, such propaganda fell on deaf ears precisely because Earth’s citizens truly did have far more pressing things to worry about, such as where their next meal would come from and what colour the water would be when they next turned the tap.
But ever since the propaganda began, both of Rusev’s Karriers had been incessantly ferrying cargo and important individuals to the station; as Rusev explained to Holly personally, she feared that Morrison might soon act to block further launches without notice.
Holly had a feeling that Morrison and others within the GU’s hierarchy were quietly glad to be rid of Rusev and her allies, thinking that they probably viewed them as something of an unhappy intelligentsia who could do less harm from a distance than up-close.
Holly often reflected on Rusev’s presence on this final cargo mission. Like any good captain, Ekaterina Rusev had been the last to abandon Earth’s sinking ship and had made sure that all of her associates were on their Venusian lifeboat before she worried about her own escape.
Thoughts sometimes circled in Holly’s mind about the four billion souls who weren’t fortunate enough to reach the lifeboat, but she ultimately consoled herself that four thousand — the number already safely housed on the station — was a lot better than nothing.
When Holly arrived with the meals, Rusev asked her usual question: “How are the other passengers?”
Holly shrugged. “Still pretty quiet.”
No one spoke for a few seconds. Holly understood the reasoning for Rusev’s decision to sell tickets for the last few Karrier trips — it had been the only way to generate the level of last-minute funding needed to buy crucial supplies on the black market — but that didn’t mean she accepted it.
Yury, a gentle giant known affectionately as Spaceman by many who knew him and many more who didn’t, removed his scarf from the cabin’s third dining chair and invited Holly to sit down.
“Thanks,” she said, “but I have to feed the other passengers.”
Yury patted the chair. “They can survive for a few more minutes while we catch up.”
Holly sat down.
In the 74 years since he became the first human to be born in space, Yury Gardev had spent significantly more time off Earth than any other individual.
There was, however, one record which Yury no longer held, and rarely a day went by without Holly — barely half his age at 39 — playfully reminding him that she and the Karrier’s ever-present security officer now shared the record for the greatest cumulative distance travelled by any human. Holly brought this up once again as soon as she sat down, even earning a chuckle from the typically reserved Rusev.
Yury took it all in good spirits; having personally trained Holly during her early days in the public space program some nineteen years earlier, he took nothing but pleasure from seeing her belatedly experiencing what she’d worked so hard for… even if the circumstances weren’t exactly those she would have chosen.
A few short minutes into an easy conversation which Holly would have loved to continue for the rest of the day, her wristband buzzed to remind her that her other passengers were still awaiting their meals.
“I’m sure our friends on the other side of the Karrier are accustomed to a certain level of service,” Yury said, partly jesting but partly betraying his heartfelt resentment that so many qualified and deserving people had been left on Earth while wealthy nobodies had been able to buy their own safe passage to the station. “Better not keep them waiting too long on my behalf.”
Holly sighed, rising to her feet.
“At least there are only three more days until you never have to serve another rich man’s dinner,” Yury added in an effort to lift the mood.
Rusev nodded and offered Holly a slight but warm smile. “Three days,” she echoed softly. “Three days.”
Holly stepped out into the corridor and closed the door behind her. As soon as she did so, she felt a cold hand on her arm. Instinctively, she spun around and pressed its owner against the wall in a single defensive motion.
“It’s just me,” the man said, wide-eyed and whispering.
“Jesus, Dante! What the hell are you doing sneaking up on—”
A firm index finger pressed against Holly’s lips to cut her off mid-sentence. Dante, who had quickly become Ru
sev’s favourite technician and was doubling up as a secondary chaperone for this final one-way trip, scanned the corridor with urgent eyes. He slowly removed his finger from Holly’s lips and brought it towards his own.
“What’s going on?” Holly mouthed silently.
In lieu of an answer, Dante took hold of Holly’s arm again and led her down the corridor. When they arrived at the utility room, where Holly had been going anyway, he double-checked in both directions that no one was watching.
Holly couldn’t miss the heavy expression on Dante’s normally boyish face. Just as she was about to repeat her question about what was going on in more forceful and less patient terms, he opened the door and ushered her inside.
“There’s something you need to see,” he said, no longer whispering and now looking positively grave. “Right now.”
two
“This happened an hour ago,” Dante said, tapping the wall next to the algae machine to activate a touchscreen panel. He wore his standard-issue yellow Rusentra polo shirt, as always, but the expression on his face told Holly that this situation was anything but standard. “Pay attention.”
Holly did as he said. Footage then filled the screen, showing the corridor outside her rich passengers’ cabin. The female passenger emerged from the door with a large towel folded over her arm and a toiletries bag and hairbrush in her hands.
“They’re allowed to use the real showers,” Holly said. “The one in their cabin is hardly big enough to stand in.”
Dante shushed her. “Listen.”
As the woman disappeared from view of the camera feed Dante had chosen, her much older male companion came into view at their cabin’s door. “Viola!” he snapped, clearly furious but trying to keep his volume down. “Get back in here… now!”
When she ignored this order, the man returned to the cabin and slammed the door behind him.
“So the rich guy is a controlling asshole,” Holly concluded. “And that’s your big secret?”
Dante’s face reflected his confusion. “Were you even listening? He called her Viola.”
“And?”
“And that means they’re travelling with fake names! Look at the names on their door: Norman and Jessica Tanner. If her name is Jessica, why the hell is he calling her Viola?”
Holly blew air from her lips in impatience and slight disappointment that this was what Dante had been so worked up about. “My door says Ivy Wood,” she sighed. “But when did you last hear anyone call me Ivy?”
“Yeah, but that’s you. It’s hardly the same.”
“What do you mean? We don’t know anything about these people.”
“Exactly!” Dante stressed. “We don’t know anything about these people. And it’s not like this is the first thing that’s made me wonder. Forget Jessica — AKA Viola — for a minute. What about the guy? Think about how much he must have paid for this journey. How could there be someone that rich who none of us have heard of?”
“His money’s probably dirty,” Holly said with a dismissive half-shrug. “People smuggling, fake vaccines, fuel shipments…”
Dante, still standing beside the screen, was shaking his head vigorously. “You’ve seen what his wife looks like, right? How much younger she is? Money can bridge those gaps up to a point, but there are a lot of rich guys out there. For someone like him to end up with someone like her, it takes more than money. It takes power.”
“You’re jumping to so many conclusions here, Dante… I don’t even know where to start.”
“Look me in the eye and tell me you’ve never wondered about this guy,” Dante challenged. “Tell me he doesn’t look like a guy with something big on his mind. Tell me he doesn’t look like a guy who’s hiding something.”
Holly hadn’t noticed any particular concern on Norman Tanner’s face on any of the countless occasions she’d handed him his meal order at the cabin door — certainly no more than she’d seen on the face of her previous passengers — but she couldn’t pretend that the discrepancy between Norman and his wife hadn’t played on her mind.
It was a discrepancy of effort as much as anything else: Norman either had multiple grey shirts with identical stains or always wore the same one; his rough beard grew by the day; and his fingernails were bitten ragged. Holly would have considered Norman noticeably scruffy even without the stark contrast presented by his perfectly manicured wife, with the hair so straight it looked sharp and the perpetually photoshoot-ready makeup.
“Grav can see what they’re doing all the time,” Dante blurted out, interrupting Holly’s thoughts. “The screen in his security room shows feeds from every other room, not just the corridors. If we could get in there somehow…”
“Sneak into Grav’s room? Are you trying to get killed?”
Dante thought for a few seconds. “Fine. But we could at least ask to see some footage.”
“How about this,” Holly began, reluctant to trouble Grav over what was probably nothing and keen to put Dante’s suspicions to bed. “We both go to their door to say there’s been a problem with their order and that they need to order again. That way we’ll be at the door for more than a few seconds and Norman will have to do more than just nod his head like he normally does. If I think anything seems off — anything — we’ll tell Grav and ask to see some footage. Deal?”
“Deal,” Dante agreed without hesitation. Immediately, he set off.
The Tanners’ cabin lay at the opposite end of the Karrier from Rusev’s and Yury’s, with the utility room right in the middle. Both passenger cabins were in fact refitted emergency landers, a modification which had been necessary to maximise the small Karrier’s cargo capacity by stripping the original and much larger sleeping quarters and using them for storage. Chronic material shortages on Earth meant that neither Rusev nor anyone else had been able to construct any space-worthy vessels since the terrorist blitzkrieg of Devastation Day, leaving Rusev’s two surviving Karriers as her sole means of ferrying people and resources to the Venus station.
Around ten metres from the cabin, Dante suddenly held an arm in front of Holly to halt her progress. “The door’s opening,” he said, spotting the jiggling handle with eagle-eyed focus.
Holly stopped dead on the spot.
Immediately upon opening the door, Norman Tanner — stained shirt and all — caught sight of Holly and Dante. He stood rooted in the doorway like a deer in headlights.
Just as Holly opened her mouth to speak, Norman slinked back inside and quickly but quietly closed the door.
“Suspicious enough?” Dante said.
Holly nodded reluctantly. “Let’s go.”
three
Back in the privacy of the utility room with Holly, Dante pressed a button on his wristband and raised it towards his mouth. “Grav, it’s Dante. Do you read?”
“What do you need?” a gruff and heavily accented voice rang through the wristband’s small but punchy speakers. “I am dealing with something here, so try to keep it short.”
Though functionally perfect, Grav’s English lacked the polish of the group’s two other non-native speakers in Rusev and Yury. His speech often struck first time listeners as incongruently formal thanks to his avoidance of all contractions, while a strong accent betrayed his Serbian origins. There was a slight irony in the fact that the name by which he was universally known was in itself a contraction of his real name — Goran Vuletic — but Holly had never thought of him as a man with much time for humour or irony.
Grav’s voice was as deep and his temper as short as they came. But beyond these few isolated points and the handful of stories Yury had told her, Holly knew very little about him.
Dante briefly considered the best way to breach the delicate subject with Grav, who he knew to be tremendously impatient at the best of times. He soon opted for a straightforward statement of his position: “I don’t know exactly what the problem is, but I need to see the Tanners’ travel cards.”
“Why?”
“Norman is acting
suspiciously and I think ‘Jessica’ is travelling on a fake name.”
“I do not have time for your shit right now, Dante,” Grav snapped in his usual staccato way. “Get back to cleaning the floor or whatever the hell it is you are supposed to be doing.”
Dante held his wristband in front of Holly’s face, clearly urging her to speak up. “I’m here, too,” she eventually said, “and I’m with Dante on this. It would be a real help if we could take a look at those travel cards.”
“Okay, okay, their cards are on the system,” Grav said. His tone was less sharp than when speaking to Dante, but he now seemed even more preoccupied with whatever he was dealing with. “The passcode is 44-22-35. I will be there as soon as these readings stabilise, okay? Give them some privacy until then. Tanner is a good man.”
Dante’s wristband beeped to signal the end of the call before Holly had time to reply.
“So how do we get into the system to see the travel cards?” Dante asked.
Holly responded by expanding her own wristband’s touchscreen and navigating to a menu that Dante wasn’t familiar with. Unable to see much with Holly’s hand in the way, he stepped back and waited for her to relay her findings. It didn’t take long.
“Shit…” Holly said, eyes glued to the screen.
Terradox Quadrilogy Page 2