“Abrezio?” she asked. “I heard he has a pretty good reputation.”
“Abrezio’s the reason there’s running water on this station. The problems came in with—you know—”
She tipped her head, looked puzzled. “I don’t know.”
He found himself doing what everybody did on Alpha when the topic of Rights came up in places that might be bugged: ducking his head to make lip-reading harder; lowering his voice, speaking in generalities, while the girl opposite him—probably read the body language and was embarrassed for him, dammit. But if he got himself in trouble, he let Fallan down, let Niall down, let the Family down. “Look, you know what arrived here, with all its problems. Whole damn Pell office got shipped back here, took over the project—started it, really. Word is, they’d had standing orders, once they could get those plans, to high-tail back here. Pell threw them out, but at least some would’ve come anyway. Began organizing and confiscating mats long before the word of the theft could get to Sol and back. Cruz . . . he came in on the next pusher, along with a hold full of dedicated supply for . . . it.” Maybe she wasn’t that well informed by her own higher-ups—and she was probably primed to ask questions and find out things. Likely Lisa Marie had her own agenda. Everybody walked nervous circles around the same truth, and the only people who didn’t know what was going on were young, or feckless, or strangers to the station.
“Cruz is the darling boy of the EC hardnoses,” he said, and darted a glance up, eye to eye. Hers were brown, dark-lashed, prettiest eyes he’d ever seen. Which might figure in the urge to make her really understand Alpha, even beyond what she might well be assigned to find out. “Every scrap Abrezio gets for regular operations he pulls out of Cruz’s hands with Cruz objecting all the way. What we need done—we can’t get here even if we had the finance, because it’s all dedicated to that ship up there. We keep hearing it’ll be better. But it’s been going on long as I’ve been out of the junior-juniors. And I’ll bet you, I’ll bet you anything that Cruz is why Customs did whatever they’ve done. No accident it came down on alterday, while Abrezio was offshift. It’s no secret Cruz wants more than anything to have an up close and personal look at Finity, and now he’s had a serious, public comeuppance. If you see people going a little over the edge laughing about this—that’s the subtext. I wouldn’t say we’re always happy with Abrezio, but Cruz has changed things, that’s what I hear the seniors even of Niall’s generation saying. Cruz is a son-of-a-bitch who thinks when Sol does get in here, that he’ll step ahead of Abrezio and be the darlin’ boy of the whole EC back at Sol. If his ship ever runs. That’s the embarrassing fact. He’s planning for a coup, and you set him down. Hard. With the help of whoever got that picture. That’s prime, that. That gladdens the hearts of everybody who’s ever had to deal with that bastard.” Something struck him, in memory of the image that had flashed up, a face, not one he knew well. He reached for his own pocket com and thumbed through recent transmissions. “If those men even were Customs. God. That first one—I think that’s Hewitt. EC enforcement, Rights project. I’ve only seen him on vid. But if that really is Hewitt, Cruz is really going to be spitting.”
“Abrezio authorized it?”
“No. No way. I don’t think so. But Cruz could. Hewitt might, either one. You reporting to JR?”
Hesitation. A nod. “Yes.” Deep breath. Her hand closed on his, on the table. “Ross. I have to be honest. It’s my job. I’m ship’s security.”
He moved his hand back. “You never said.”
“You never asked.”
“I think I’d deserve to know!”
Her hand advanced again. Fingers over fingers. “I’m telling you now. Do you think they’d let Mum walk around the Strip without security? I had to be there. But I’m telling you now. I’m telling you because it’s fair, and I don’t sleep with people I don’t like. I’ve only ever slept with one guy, on Mariner, and he wasn’t an assignment.”
“So you were assigned to watch me.”
She dipped her chin. “But that’s not why . . . the rest. I didn’t need to sleep with you. That was my choice. Mine. I like you. I like Fallan. I like you both, and Mum likes you, and I don’t think I’d get anything but the truth out of you in any case, which is partly why I’m telling you now. So tell me—did your ship send you to learn about us?”
“To find out what you’re up to, and to keep an eye on Fallan, just because, well, he’s ours. And he’s in love. And capable of being stupid, even if he is the smartest man I know.”
“Good reason. He’s got Mum’s attention.” Fingers moved on his. “Ross, I seriously like you. I can’t say love because I don’t know you, but if you’re ever in any port I’m in I want to find you. You are special. You’ve got special friends. And I don’t think Mum will lie to Fallan. I get the feeling she’s that way with him. She’d steal him if she could. But he won’t. I get that, too. So does she.”
Twists and turns. Jen was like that, truth and words shifting about like smoke, hiding and showing what was a structure of forces. Nav was like that, things you couldn’t see pushing and pulling, and when, on some drunken offshift, you ever described what it was to helm, they put up a hand and said, just give me a point, nav, and don’t make me crazy.
Find us information, Niall had said, and, God help them, sent two navigators into the heart of Finity’s End, to try to make sense of it all. What did he expect from this outsider ship, but smoke and mirrors?
“What in hell are you, the ship, really up to, Jen?” He curled his fingers around hers. “What are you doing here?”
“What I said, Ross. I didn’t lie. Our deck, our rules, for every merchanter out there, and all of us have to stand firm, help each other and keep the stations from fighting each other. We keep Cyteen and Pell apart, and we keep them connected. We keep the Hinder Stars going. All that. We want to make sure every Family ship that needs help gets it and that no monstrosity with hired crew is going to move cargo. You want a problem, Ross—that’s when Cyteen decides it can spare the effort to replace us with cloned-man crews. They’ve got the tech—damn sure their first FTL didn’t abort the run. Fortunately, they gave their first longhauler to the Rileys, not some azi crew. But they’ve got tapes, now, that can create perfect crew, if they so decide. Right now—we work; and so long as they can see we’re a good thing, we go on working. We’re creating an organization, a structure that’s an advantage to everyone involved. We declare independence, financial and legal, from all stations, we deal with everyone and they don’t have to deal with each other. It’s a good plan. A solid one, but we have to get it in place before Sol gets in here and provides a third pushy side to the whole Pell-Cyteen question, with their resources, and their notions of hired crew . . . and their notions of who owns everything out here.”
He listened. She made sense. A very scary kind of sense . . . given that, if Cruz’s security chief had breached Finity and gotten tossed, there was going to be serious push-back. No way not.
“I think,” he said, with a side glance over to Fallan, then back to her. “I think maybe I should get ourselves back to Galway territory. It could get tense on the Strip. And if we have escaped station’s notice in being here, we’ll be lucky. We need to talk to Niall.”
“Understood. Go. We’re covering the bill. Drink up and go.”
He swallowed down his juice—too rare to leave that; and a decent cup of tea—got up and went over to talk to Fallan and Mum. Fallan was reluctant to go. Mum—Mum understood all that was going on, no way that she hadn’t been informed of everything, and probably had Fallan’s own interpretation of the incident as well. Mum understood and she shoved Fallan out the door—with promises.
They took the long way back to Galway’s territory, wending their way past another breakfast spot, pausing to have a cup of tea, then meandering on through a shop display or two.
There was an undercurrent on the Strip, amusemen
t, yes, but a curious expression on certain faces, a mix of a little worry, a little satisfaction. Blue-coats were out in number, and the Strip was quiet.
For now.
Chapter 8 Section v
Rumors.
Abrezio had heard them here and there, caught them in tones and looks and subtle wording, rumors adding up to one thing: the schism between himself and Cruz had ceased to be an internal matter.
The names of the agents were not being released—on his orders—but that did very little good. That picture had gotten out and the fact that one of the four was the project security chief—was a flaming disaster. Talk was that it was Hewitt’s operation, that Hewitt had gone off on his own and done it without Cruz knowing—that wasn’t so, but it provided a useful buffer. Abrezio only hoped his own name stayed out of the talk—and that Cruz’s name stayed out of it as much as possible. Hewitt—was unfortunately indelibly tainted, and that wasn’t going to go away easily.
Rights, not station security. And now the rumor was asking, even in resident hallways—why during alterday?
It was a perfectly logical question, with an obvious answer: to do it when principal authority was in bed asleep—either innocent of the move, or trying to look innocent.
A stationwide schism soon became apparent—some saying any action was appropriate since Finity had scared them all and these four stranger ships lingered without any reason ordinary citizens understood; others saying to hell with that: they didn’t want a Sol-born EC brown-noser running their station and sneaking around in the dead of mainnight. Let them get away with a breach of a visiting ship, and what was to stop them from inviting themselves unannounced into private apartments?
Maddeningly, what happened had also splashed discredit on the Customs Service, and on its manager, for allowing Rights security to go out dressed as Customs. Damnable man. Maclean had no business taking orders from Hewitt or Cruz, not without sending a query up to him, no matter the hour . . . and now he’d apparently done it . . . twice. Abrezio was not a vengeful man. He didn’t see any benefit in carrying grudges. But he did in taking notes. And Maclean’s finances deserved investigation—just to see if there had been under-the-table motivation.
He doubted, though, that the motivation had come from Hewitt, as he doubted that Cruz had resorted to bribes. Likely he’d offered something less tangible—like an exchange of favors, present or future.
Cruz, independently ordering Customs to make the initial move without consulting admin—and Maclean complying without checking? That was bad form. If, on the other hand, EC Enforcement, by whatever means, had had officers pose as customs, and Maclean had gone along with it—that was an outrage.
He couldn’t reprimand Cruz or Hewitt. He didn’t want the action laid at his door, but even more, he didn’t want to advertise a schism in the upper management of the station. Not now. Not when he had Finity and its partners organizing some sort of move that was going to recruit Alpha’s ships—with the likelihood that whoever or whatever was behind Firenze’s ungodly expensive repair was going to make demands, ultimately, and become a power player for somebody.
On the one hand—he had a station to keep viable, a trust handed down to him, Sol’s gateway to the colonies it had set up.
On the other—if Sol found its own way here, as could happen any day, with no warning, Sol would find everything in shambles. An outlandishly expensive ship that couldn’t jump. A station falling into disrepair, no matter it was Sol’s own orders that had pushed it into that state. Maybe neither he nor Cruz would survive the arrival of Sol authority, politically speaking—but right now, he couldn’t abdicate. Wouldn’t give up. Not yet. Right now—damned if he let Cruz pull another such stunt as he had.
The question was—how he could stop the man? If he made an issue of this incident to try to get Cruz under control, the move might not be understood by stationers as a whole. Alpha citizens saw Rights Enforcement personnel as their own sons and daughters, their cousins and their protectors. Seven years ago, Hewitt had shown up and begun recruiting, eliminating station unemployment virtually overnight.
And after two decades, Alpha citizens had become psychologically dependent on Rights, no matter the thing was an expensive doorstop. Alpha citizens had been told Rights was an asset, ultimately, their way out of a downward slide, worth every sacrifice. Rights was going to save them, economically, and Rights was their way out, their escape if the unthinkable happened and the station came under threat.
There was one possible way around Cruz, one possible way to protect himself and to protect Callie’s future. A way that didn’t entail caving in to the visitors. If Cruz was going to blame every problem on him—it also headed that off. If these Pell ships had arrived here suspecting he had a route to Sol, if Pell was bent on finding it out—there was a way he could at least establish a date on which he had taken definitive action on Sol’s side.
Even if Finity had set some receiver out there tapping into the Stream . . . even if they had cracked Sol’s code—it wasn’t going to stop the message. And the date—the date of transmission—
God, he wished he didn’t have a disaster on deck on the day he did it. The timing was bound, eventually, to come out. But today was what he had. The longer he didn’t do something—
He could maintain he hadn’t wanted to do it with the visitors here. But—the pressure they put on was a reason. He had the excuse for silence—in being sure—and the excuse for going ahead: a threat to the project, but not of his creation.
He tapped the call button on the com, and moments later:
“Sir?” Ames said, from the doorway.
“Go out and keep that door shut. I’m not here. I don’t care who shows up asking entry.”
Ames, wide-eyed, stepped back and shut the door.
There was a covered pad in a pullout on his desk. It had a thumbprint lock, and he opened it, sliding his chair back as the entire desk lifted clear of the carpet and powered itself forward.
Ames had no clue. One well-kept retired scientist knew. The people who kept him knew that he knew something, and might suspect, but they had jobs guaranteed so long as that seclusion lasted, which paid them very well. And they knew that.
There were others—in communications—who might guess, before the day was out. Speculation might also run to the fiasco Hewitt was involved in. Let them theorize. It took a computer to breach the code, and those on Alpha that might do it were harming themselves if they tried and talked. Whether Finity could crack it—was a question.
But once that data became part of the Stream, it was unstoppable, and secrecy and timing and motives—all that was for somebody later to figure out.
The drop-safe had a palmprint lock. Abrezio got down on one knee—that was a bit more difficult than in his youth—and opened it.
The chip was in a typical wrapper, fifteenth pocket in a set of chips that had key data and hard resets for various station systems . . . hiding in what was not exactly plain sight: only four people could open the safe and only two of those could move the desk without major damage. Ames was not one of them.
Neither was Cruz. Or Hewitt.
He pocketed the chip, closed the pocket securely, not that he intended to be running—then closed the safe and put the desk back in proper position, snug down against the carpet as if it had no possibility of moving.
Then he exited the office. “I’m in, but not receiving,” he told Ames. “I’m going up to ops. Is Friemann on duty?”
“Yes, sir,” Ames said. “Has been since the early wake-up, sir.”
“Call him, tell him meet me at the end of the hall.” Friemann was his personal security, and came with Turman, Challas and Godfrey, not the youngest and fittest of security teams—Challas in particular was broad of girth and Godfrey was expanding with age; but they were his ordinary accompaniment, had been for a decade and a half, and he felt safer when he reache
d the lift and saw them hurrying up from the side hall, a little out of breath and in other than good order—Challas was still working on his coat. They were a comfort and company, in what was a lift-ride up to a place familiar but ominous in its potential—the nerve center of Alpha Station.
It sprawled on for a fair space. Techs were used to seeing him. Supervisors wished him good morning, and told him their concerns, in a few cases, nominally what they were to do about recovering four hardsuits and a utility pusher from Finity’s End. “I’ll contact the senior captain and request it,” he said. “And I want it clear Customs had no clearance to access outside equipment. I want the request examined, records preserved as evidence, and reprimands issued, all the way up.”
“Yes, sir,” was the response.
Damned sure the suits would come back stripped of recording capsules, including their activity log. Which made proving anything harder. But that became trivial, after today.
The office farthest from the entry was the oldest on the station, dating all the way back to the first century of Alpha’s existence. Everything here was antique, deliberately maintained much as it had been, the bare metal, the tarnish of occupancy. Plastics had been replaced with ceramics that preserved the look. But otherwise—it was historic, this area. And he hadn’t been here in years. Usually the feed to the Stream came through regular station communications.
“Sir,” a tech said, astonished—caught unwarned, with breakfast on the console.
“I have a transmission,” Abrezio said. “It’s interrupt-worthy. Just insert it. I’ll give you a palmprint on the send.”
Alliance Rising Page 28