Nate wandered around behind the bar. “I figure the barkeep’s made themselves scarce,” he said. “I’ve worked a bar in my time. What’ll you have?”
“Isn’t that … stealing?” said Meenaz.
“Seems a curious concern,” said Nate. He patted a pocket, pulling out a few Empire coins and dropping them on the bar. “But a good one. Maybe these will be worth something here. You know. One day, when we get this whole mess squared away. Chad said you were…” He tried to find the right word. “Worthwhile.”
“Worthwhile?”
“Sure,” said Nate, eyeing Meenaz up. She looked like a wine drinker, and that was excellent news on account of the power being out to the beer dispensers. He opened a refrigerator, the interior still cool, and fetched a white. He checked the etching on the glass. “Says it’s off-dry.”
“It’s … what?”
“The wine,” said Nate. “Off-dry.”
“Sure,” said Meenaz, her voice faint.
Nate poured her a glass, then thought what the hell and poured himself one too. The first taste made his lips pucker a little. “So, Governor.”
“You keep calling me that,” said Meenaz.
“I do, and for good reason,” said Nate. “Can I be honest with you, Meenaz?”
“I, uh, guess,” she said.
“Thing is,” said Nate. He swirled his wine. “Well, we’re getting our asses kicked. Up, down, sideways, left and right, from Monday to Sunday. The Ezeroc are making it their personal life mission, and I expect this is on account of us destroying their homeworld, to end humanity. We’ve got tricks, but precious few. What we need is good people. We need people who want to fight for being human, Meenaz. Do you understand me?”
“No,” she said. She took a sip of her wine, and from Nate’s judgment, she hadn’t tasted it.
Try a different tack. “How much do you know about espers, Meenaz?”
“Vile overlords, or something, wasn’t it?” She frowned at her wine. “I don’t know. I’ve never met one.”
“You have. You’ve met four,” said Nate. “That I know of, anyway.” He counted on his fingers. “My friend Chad was the first. He probably didn’t call himself that. Came here a spell back to work out if anything was worth saving.”
She placed her wineglass on the bar top between them. “Slim guy? Big mouth?”
“Sounds right,” said Nate. “Would have had a young woman with him.”
“I don’t remember her,” said Meenaz.
“Don’t expect you to,” said Nate. “Saveria can barely remember herself, most times. Anyway. Then you met my wife, Grace.” He pointed. “The empress.”
“The empress,” breathed Meenaz. Nate detected a shade of hero worship there, which aligned with the brief Chad had given him.
“And there’s me,” said Nate.
Meenaz blinked. “You?”
“Me,” said Nate. “I don’t mind admitting, when I had the nanites injected to unlock latent powers or whatever they do, the pain was so bad I almost threw up my feet.”
“Can you read thoughts too?”
“Not well,” said Nate.
“Break ceramicrete with your mind?”
“Not yet,” admitted Nate.
Meenaz took a sip of her wine. “I don’t want this to come out wrong, Emperor—”
“Nate,” he said, voice gentle. “It’s just Nate. All my friends call me Nate.”
She turned on her stool, looking back where their four guardians stood. “The big man.”
“Kohl.”
“He calls you ‘Cap.’”
“That he does,” agreed Nate. “Expect he always will.” He let that sit between them for a while before he leaned forward. “You were saying something.”
“Oh. Right. Sorry.” She turned back to face him, taking a sip of wine to hide her fluster. “It’s just, the empress is so, so…”
“She’s the best thing in the universe,” said Nate. He suspected he was grinning like a lovesick fool and didn’t much care. “Also, she hasn’t done anything today. She stood behind me while people were shooting. Do you remember that part?”
“Smart woman.”
“Definitely.”
“So, she can break rock with her mind. Some say she can fly.”
“Nah,” said Nate. He frowned. “Leastways, not that I’ve seen.”
“What can you do?” Meenaz blurted it out, then put a hand over her mouth, like she wanted to take it back.
“Well, now,” said Nate. “Seems I have a unique skill. I mean, maybe one day I’ll be able to break rocks with my mind, but I don’t know why I’d try. That’s why I’ve got staff. They do all the rock-breaking a man needs. No, Meenaz. The reason I sent the head of the Empire’s Bulwark out here with his new student in tow is because of you.”
“Me?”
“Yes,” said Nate. “You’ll change everything, for everyone.”
“I will?”
“Yes,” said Nate. “My special thing? I can see the future, Meenaz.”
CHAPTER THREE
HOPE SMOOTHED THE front of her Guild robe. She hated wearing it, but inside the Guild Hall it was what people wore. There wasn’t a lot of engineering going on here. There was a lot of politics going on, and Hope wished for about the billionth time that the cap hadn’t sent her here. Be my Guild Liaison, Hope! Things need changing, and I figure you’re the one who could see what’s right and wrong. All she’d seen since shucking her rig in favor of a robe was a bunch of people Kohl would call assholes, all of them trying to climb over each other to get to the top.
The real problem was they didn’t like Hope. Not one bit, because in their eyes she was already at the top. Guild Liaison to the emperor of all humanity. Didn’t get much higher than that, did it? And here she was, about to go before Guild Master Hartwig Chinnery, a man she was sure had left his brain in a jar about thirty years ago and was flying his body on autopilot. If the Ezeroc got into his skull, Hope feared no one would notice for some time.
Hartwig was Guild Master of Earth, and by inference, the Guild Master. The big one. The super one. The Guild Master of all Guild Masters. Hope didn’t think Chinnery liked her very much, but that was just one more person to add to the list. It wasn’t her meeting with Hartwig that had her worried, though. Facing down a legion of insects bent on the demise of humanity reset your expectations of danger. Internal politics were just … wearisome. Hope felt worried because Hartwig wanted to talk to her about Osaka.
His memo to her had said:
FROM: GUILD MASTER CHINNERY
TO: GUILD ENGINEER BAEDEKER
We must discuss Osaka. Come at once.
Hartwig hadn’t even signed off with a little “H” as he often did to other people. Just a come at once, and a notation right there at the top he was the Guild Master, and she was the Guild Engineer. Hope knew expecting the man to put in Guild Liaison to the emperor of all humanity was a bridge too far for Hartwig, but she was a little upset he hadn’t put Guild Engineer First Class. She’d earned that title. Hope had earned it here, on Earth, at the most difficult academy in the known worlds.
All of that was secondary to Osaka. Could Hartwig know? He couldn’t know. Hope was so sure she’d covered her tracks. Left no traces. Stones left mossy side up, or whatever scouts used to do back in the day. Or was it mossy side down? Hope ran a hand through pink hair, a little longer than she was used to wearing it, but what with the constant grav of a planet that wouldn’t wink out at a moment’s notice, she’d decided to live a little. She wished El was here. She knew Elspeth would walk in there and shout. Or October. She missed him, and she missed the way he’d walk in there and kick Hartwig right in the … well. Right there.
Speaking of walking in, she had come at once as directed, and had been waiting outside the Guild Master’s office for about an hour. Hope knew this was what the powerful did, sometimes, if they were uncertain of their power. Make another person feel small, so they can be mighty. The people who carrie
d all the real might were Nate and Grace, and they weren’t here. They were off having an adventure, and they’d said they needed Hope here, not adventuring, which was nice for a change, as it let her work on her project in Osaka. Which made her nervous again, because Hartwig must have found out.
But if he’d found out, she’d have been arrested, or thrown out, or had her rank stripped again. Hope closed her eyes. She felt more tired than usual this morning, forgetting little things. She’d forgotten to stir her coffee, all the sweetness stuck at the bottom. Hope couldn’t even remember most of breakfast, although she felt positive she’d eaten something. Rubbing a hand over her face, Hope had a think about what El had said. Hope, if you can’t remember the last time you slept, it’s been too long. That’s when you sleep. So, Hope counted, and thought she’d slept three nights ago. It might have been four. It probably wasn’t two. In that three-days-but-probably-not-four-and-definitely-not-two, she’d almost finished her project in Osaka. She’d almost finished it a hundred times before, but Hope was confident she’d almost finished it for real now.
The door to Hartwig’s office yawned wide, startling her. Hope looked up, brushing a strand of pink hair aside. Hartwig’s aid, Owain Burnham, stood framed by the light behind him. Owain wasn’t a very nice person, but Hope figured anyone who had to stick to Hartwig at least twenty of the twenty-four hours in a day would be covered in a kind of slime that wouldn’t wash off, even with industrial solvent. “Guild Engineer Baedeker,” said Owain.
“Hi,” said Hope. “I’ve been here a while.”
“We know,” said Owain. “The Guild Master will see you now.”
Hope sighed, smoothed her robe again, and stood up. She walked toward Owain, slipping under one of his arms and into the room beyond. Owain made a small noise, practiced to sound both judgmental and disappointed. Hope ignored him, taking in Hartwig’s office.
It was a lovely office. The ceiling was high above, a good fifty meters. Up there, Hope knew the great spire of the Guild Hall stretched ever up into the hard black. There was a gravity elevator there, all of which was anchored with this room as its heart. It was the Guild showing off: here, look what we can do. To be fair, it was impressive engineering. This room’s roof was held up by thin spires, stretching floor to ceiling. There were twelve of the spires, and each of them was a mere centimeter thick. The entire Guild Hall, and the gravity elevator, anchored to a big empty room with centimeter-thin spires. Neat trick. It got the spacers all wide-eyed, but Hope had learned the math behind it in her first year. The room itself was bright white, no obvious source of illumination. Hope knew the luminescence came from a bioengineered plankton that had been printed into the spires. Someone had made them fluoresce white instead of blue or green or one of the other colors of nature, and then they’d made them fluoresce at many more lumens than nature’s raw wattage would support. It felt cruel, but plankton didn’t have brains, so Hope couldn’t quite put her finger on why she felt it was wrong.
Inside the room was Hartwig Chinnery, at the far end, and on his left side, Holly Edmunds. Ottavia Turford, wearing her white Empire’s Bulwark uniform, was on Hartwig’s right. Seeing Ottavia made Hope scratch under her anti-esper bracelet. Hartwig was looking out windows as tall as the room at the Guild grounds outside. Holly was almost a friend of Hope’s, in that they spoke sometimes over lunch, and Holly hadn’t threatened Hope. Hope wasn’t sure when people would move from the Venn set in her head which was all the people who could hurt you into people who will protect you, but Holly hadn’t moved yet. Hope thought of making a third set, tentatively labelled people who are okay to watch a holo with, except she didn’t have time to watch holos. Not until she finished her project in Osaka.
Hope kept walking, leaving Owain scurrying in her wake. The room was fifty meters tall, but it was about two hundred meters long, so having a conversation with Hartwig without using comms would need a few extra steps applied to the problem. As she drew closer, she saw no desks or tables. Just Hartwig, Holly, Ottavia, and the hurried steps of Owain at her side.
“Engineer,” said Hartwig, not turning to face Hope. His hands were clasped behind his back. Hope said nothing, because Nate had said Hope? Make those motherfuckers respect you, and he’d given her a list of ways to do that. After a few moments, Hartwig turned, scraggly tufts of hair looking like they were trying to escape from the sides of his head. He gave her the once-over, and said, “Well? Are you deaf, girl?”
The emphasis he put on ‘girl’ made Hope’s left eyelid twitch, just a little. Holly was still smiling, but her face looked like it had frozen in that position, all life leaving it. Hope cleared her throat, a quiet noise as if she was being polite, and said, “Excuse me?”
“Or has the cat got your tongue?” said Hartwig, sailing on through bad weather as if it wouldn’t touch him.
“It’s just,” said Hope. “Um. Well, first, my title is Guild Liaison—”
“We do not acknowledge the emperor’s title—”
“And,” said Hope, steaming on ahead, “my Guild Rank is Engineer First Class. So. If you were talking to me, I’d have expected you to say something like, ‘Hello, Engineer First Class Baedeker. How are you today?’ And I’d have thought anyone calling me girl would know better.” She pushed that damn strand of pink hair out of her eyes again. Nate had also told her to not get carried away like October, so Hope said, “Oh, and hello, Guild Master Chinnery. How good to see you.”
Hartwig blinked at her. “Engineer Baedeker—”
“Engineer First Class.” Hope shrugged. “I earned that title, then the Guild took it from me for something I didn’t do. I’ve got it back now, so I figure it’s only fair. Unless you don’t want me to call you Guild Master.”
Hartwig gritted his teeth. “Engineer First Class Baedeker. Hello.”
“Hello!” Hope looked behind her to the big doors she’d entered through, already closed and sealed. “I was waiting for a long time, Guild Master.”
“We had much to discuss,” said Hartwig.
“I understand,” said Hope. “Only, your invitation said, ‘come at once,’ so I did. I stopped doing other things to be here. And I’ve been waiting for an hour.”
“I see,” said Hartwig. His eyes slid sideways to look at Ottavia.
Ottavia did her best to hide a smile. “What the Guild Master means, Engineer First Class Baedeker, is that I have been keeping him waiting.”
“Thank God,” said Hartwig.
“There is a situation in Osaka,” said Holly. Her own Guild robes shushed as she moved an arm, gesturing to the outside. “The Guild outpost is down.”
Hope looked at Holly, then to Ottavia, before looking at Owain. She thought about why she might be here. If they’d discovered her project, there would be different people in this room, with guns. “And you think it is of interest to the Empire.”
“Yes,” said Hartwig. “I think anytime a Guild outpost goes down, it’s of interest to the Empire. We make everything work.”
Hope nodded. “We do. We are good at … stuff.”
Owain coughed. “‘Stuff?’”
“Stuff,” agreed Hope. “Fusion drives. Particle accelerators. Gravity elevators. Blasters. Starships. Endless Drives. Did you know I even made a mechanical kinetic weapon the other—”
“Quite,” said Hartwig. “Our position within the Empire has been afforded by making ‘stuff,’ but only after we’d killed off the other form of sentient life that threatened the human race.”
“You mean, before the bugs,” said Hope.
“Yes,” said Hartwig. “AI almost killed us all. The Osaka Archeology is crucial to ensuring we are prepared.”
“Prepared?” said Hope.
“Yes,” said Ottavia. She turned in a whirl of white fabric. “When you can make genies, some fool always tries for another rub of the lamp.”
“It’s not bugs,” said Hope. “I’m the emperor’s liaison for bug-related stuffs.”
“You are the emperor’
s liaison for what I say you are!” barked Hartwig. His face mottled, red in places, a vein bulging in his temple.
“No,” said Hope, but not without thinking about it first. “I’m the emperor’s liaison for what Nate or Grace say I am. Not you.”
Hartwig built up a good head of steam. “I will crush you like a…” and then, he stopped talking.
Hope blinked. Ottavia held up a bracelet, just like the one Hope wore. She grinned as she tossed it on the floor between them. “Back in a time before, I lived on the streets. The clasp on those is shoddy work, Engineer.” She looked at Owain, who’d gone stiff as a board, face blank, then Hartwig, whose mouth hung open like he was yelling at a storm. “But now, we can talk.”
“About what?” said Hope. She noticed Holly was still moving and talking, not under Ottavia’s thrall, which was interesting by itself. “And why is Owain not doing anything?”
“So,” said Ottavia. “Owain doesn’t want your bracelet because you made it, and I think this morning will be instructive for him in why ego is not befitting an Engineer. To your other point, the Empire has a great deal of interest in Osaka. Chad is a little concerned that things are going down there he’s not able to see.” She jerked her head at Hartwig. “Thing is, this asshole won’t let us in. ‘There’s no minds for your vile type to read,’ I think were his words.”
“They were his exact words,” agreed Holly. “I was there.”
“But what we’ve got here is a perfect storm,” said Ottavia. “In a few minutes, I’ll let go of both Hartwig and Owain. They’ll yell, wave their arms, and be huge dicks. But after that, I’d like you to agree to go. And I’d like you to ask him to get me along, and Holly. And Owain too.”
“Why Owain?” said Hope.
“Because while Hartwig is a pretentious asshole, he’s not stupid, and he will want a balanced team. By ‘balanced,’ I mean a team with at least one person under his thumb.” Ottavia sighed. “You need a little bad with the good. Right, Hope?”
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