by Tammy Salyer
Before responding, the wire-rat sweeps the room with a paranoid glare. “We can discuss that at another time.”
“We don’t have time.”
“No, Vitruzzi. All you do have is time.”
Her jaw clenches, but there’s no intimidating him. Right now, we have nothing to offer him in exchange. Did we really expect him to give us access to his hardware out of the goodness of his heart? La Mer believed he would, but La Mer’s been on the run since the Rebellion, and things have changed for people living outside the Admin’s laws. No one who doesn’t want next week’s newscast to include their obituary would risk what we’re asking for the simple satisfaction of making trouble for the Admin. And Quantum has made his price clear.
“We already have a deal. The use of your transceiver for our information. In that order,” Vitruzzi says, staring at him with acetone intensity.
Quantum faces her with squared shoulders and an unwavering glare, matching her intensity. Then, for the first time, his lips curl up into a grin that’s almost frightening in its ferocity. “As you wish. We have to go to Obal 6.” And in a final surreal act, he reaches out to shake hands, sealing a contract that could—if not for the complete insanity of the idea—potentially bring on the downfall of the Admin.
TWENTY-SEVEN
“We’re going to have to get a bigger ship.” David’s voice tickles my ear as his elbow jabs me in the ribs. The half sleep, half daze I’ve been fading in and out of like a faulty radio transmission for the last six hours comes to an annoying halt. He laughs at my disgusted look and stands up to go to the head.
He’s right; this boat is not built for eight people. In the forty-plus hours since we broke through Obal 10’s atmosphere and slipped into the general din of interplanetary traders and traffic, I’ve become more in touch with my kneecaps than I ever really wanted to be. With a hull that is merely a dual row of jumpseats, a toilet, overhead storage cabinets, and a single sleeping bench at the rear of the passenger cabin, moving around isn’t an option. The only place tall enough for a person to stand at their full height is the narrow space in the aisle between the overhead lockers that crowd the ceiling. David, Vitruzzi, La Mer, and I, along with Quantum and Hirota, fill up the jumpseats while Rob and Thompson, the only other pilot among us, rotate at the helm. Quantum had left his third man behind, and I almost wish Vitruzzi would have asked me to stay back on Obal 10, too—I’ve kept my claustrophobia at bay by trying to stay asleep, but a person can only sleep so long. The hop was never intended to support so many people on any kind of lengthy journey, and it’s starting to feel like we’re attempting to fly to Saturn in an iron maiden.
We have enough water and a solid enough capture-and-recycle system to make it for at least two weeks, provided no one gets attached to the idea of regular showers, but food is tight. We’re small enough not to be noticed by most patrol ships in the Obals—being basically nothing but a personal vehicle for jumping between local planets and moons. Usually these types of hops are owned by wealthy travelers jumping between part-time homes or as transports for business stakeholders to get to and from franchise hubs. But if anyone locks on our flight path and does a quick analysis, they’ll catch on pretty quickly that we’re neither one of those.
Then there’s the ship itself. I don’t know where Rob picked up such a run-down piece of junk, but I’m a little surprised, and more than a little grateful, that we’re still in flight. The interior has been scoured of unnecessary bells and whistles—like seat pads, sound dampeners, or up to code ventilation—making the ride a little like being stuck inside a tin can being flushed through a galactic sewer. The outer hull isn’t much better and looks like the ship’s been used by a flock of birds as a shithouse for the last three hundred years or so. When we loaded up at the Tunis City docks, the engine housing was so encrusted with grit and droppings that I wasn’t sure it would be able to overcome the cross friction gumming up its RPMs enough to break through atmo. Yet, despite its complete derelict façade and torture chamber fuselage, the ship has flown smoothly, and it’s obvious Rob has kept this hunk of metal around for a scenario such as this.
Our time aboard has not been wasted. After getting clear of Obal 10, Quantum made it clear that nothing would be sent using his transceiver that wasn’t first run by him, so he and La Mer immediately went to work on portable consoles looking for any kinks in La Mer’s transmitting worm. After examining it, Quantum came down on him hard for not building redundancy into the signal rerouting piece of the program. Worse, he’d claimed that the transmission’s origination source will be easy to find if the satellite administrators are looking. David and Thompson had barely jumped between the two of them in time before La Mer—interpreting the statement as an accusation that he’d been responsible for the Corps coming to Agate Beach and rounding up the settlers—did something we’d all regret.
Why anyone would be looking is the real question. If the worm works the way La Mer built it, no one should know the satellites are being hacked. Besides, it’s hardly an issue at this point—we don’t plan on staying in one place long enough to give the Admin time to catch up to us. The bigger problem now is managing two-way communication. If we send a message to T’Kai with the expectation that he’ll reply, we have to give him a coordinate to reply to, and triangulating our location will be easy from there.
Or so I assume. We’re only ten hours out from Obal 6’s orbit and Thompson is at the helm, giving Rob time to catch some sleep before the next phase of our mission. Quantum stands up to stretch his legs and Vitruzzi asks, “Why Obal 6? Why not put the transceiver on one of the Spectras?”
“Because Bi Schtum is one of its moons,” he responds matter-of-factly, “and home to enough citizen-owned satellites to mask transmissions sent from Obal 6 for a while. We can stay until we hear back from T’Kai. Then we’ll have to move.”
“What do citizen satellites matter? I thought the whole point of this worm was to use Admin TDRSs,” David says from the rear of the fuselage, yelling to be heard over the engines.
Quantum leans back against the wall next to the cockpit hatch, the expression on his face asking, Why do I have to deal with such morons? He levels a flat, lizardlike gaze on David for a few seconds before replying. “There are people working from inside—Admin personnel—who are helping us. They forward things that are useful, but for reasons I hope I don’t have to illustrate, we cannot let these be sent to us directly. Some of the satellites work as our hubs. They receive and bounce incoming transmissions, but they filter the messages through scramblers that hide their final coordinates. I will contact our allies who have hardware around Bi Schtum and the neighboring planets. Any messages we receive will only be traceable within this quadrant. The Admin may come in and block or destroy the satellites, but unless they are very, very lucky, they will not isolate those that we’ll be using right away.” He lets this information soak in and then looks around for comprehension. My face reflects the same confusion on everyone else’s.
He continues, disdain thick in his voice. “If T’Kai responds, he will use digitally encoded transmissions that cannot be unscrambled by Admin satellite programs. Only Corps and non-Admin satellites will transmit encoded messages, and T’Kai will know—or think he knows—that we don’t have a receiver that can pick up Corps transmissions. It is not legal to own receiver codes for those frequencies, and difficult to build one that isn’t traceable. Of course, my transceiver can pick up Corps transmissions, but that is beside the point.” Quantum smiles, pleased with himself. “If he wants to ensure his message will get through, and stay untraceable by any unwelcome Admin ears, he’ll have to use alternative satellites. Satellites controlled by my allies. With the program Axone has written, he will not be able to figure out where the signal is coming from, but to respond, we will have to point him toward the haystack we are hiding in.”
“It sounds like you’ve been planning something like this for a while,” Vitruzzi says.
“We will only ha
ve a single opportunity of this nature, and we have been waiting for it. Why would we not be prepared?”
“I’d like to know more about who this ‘we’ is.”
Quantum doesn’t respond, but his eyes stray to the opposite side of the fuselage, and after a moment, I realize they’ve settled on Rob.
* * *
Quantum’s transceiver sits on the roof of a warehouse inside a pocket of indistinct buildings near the small down of Rej on Obal 6. Like the majority of planets in this quadrant, this one is mainly water with several landmasses, mostly small habitable continents. With the abundance of water, many of the local populace’s resources—steel, iron, other metals—are shipped in, and what isn’t comes from oceanic drilling. The surplus is stored in these structures and most of the area’s activity consists of roving drones used to keep an eye on the place. There aren’t many people, and the few we saw as we came in were civilians minding their own business, busy at work.
Quantum directs the hop into a warehouse, which he opens using a remote transmission key. I’m so happy to be out of confinement that I want to run laps around the area just to stretch my legs and move my body again. Instead, we convene inside a cramped com room after being warned to stay inside and keep quiet. It’s clear from Quantum’s face that I don’t have a choice in the matter, but I refuse to sit down a minute longer, broadcasting my decision by leaning grumpily against the wall.
Everyone busies themselves with getting blood back into their limbs while Quantum contacts his resources and arranges for cooperation with the satellite transmissions. Before I’m really prepared, he turns to Vitruzzi.
“Ready to begin your show.”
She doesn’t hesitate. “Is it on the right channel?”
“Your transmission will be sent directly to the official frequency belonging to T’Kai’s office in the Ministry. It will be reviewed and, if you are convincing enough, brought directly to his attention.”
She straightens up so that she’s poised on the very edge of her seat. The building is deep and long with no windows, making it dark inside, with only dim green LEDs dotting the ceiling and casting a swampy glow over us. As she looks down at the com unit, lines of deadly seriousness create deep, shadowed grooves across her forehead and beside her mouth.
The sound of the mic activating reminds me of a trigger. “This is Captain Eleanor Vitruzzi of the Sphynx ISPS, registration ID N295831, formerly a legally contracted arms and cargo transporter for the Ministry of S&E. I’m a resident of the non-citizen settlement known as Agate Beach on the southern hemisphere of Spectra 6. Recently, the majority of the population of our settlement was illegally arrested and one member murdered by Corps soldiers. The remainder were transported to the prisoner colony on Keum Libre without cause. All of these events occurred by order of Director Kurosawa T’Kai. I demand these people be set free and our settlement reestablished with a guarantee of no further Admin or Corps interference.
“I am in a unique position to make these kinds of demands. If you doubt me, I urge you to review the flight logs of the MCACS PCA Bellerophon, which was lost en route to the Admin space station known as the Fortress. You’ll find the derelict in Beta Delta, where we left it after using it to infiltrate the station and destroy it. You have five hours to respond using the frequency uplink we send.” The glowing console of the com unit fades out as she releases the transmit button and hands it back to Quantum to input the freq.
“What if he doesn’t respond?” David asks, his question not aimed at anyone in particular.
Unexpectedly, Quantum answers, “Then you give the assets to me and my network. We will take it from there.”
I inquire, “And what about our friends on Keum Libre?”
“There are martyrs in every revolution.”
It’s the flat, uncaring tone in his voice that gets to me. “Fuck that, Quantum. You’ve helped us out some, but you don’t get to decide if our friends live or die.”
“I am not deciding. All of you made that decision for them.”
His statement smacks me into silence—because it’s true. Whatever would have happened, by threatening T’Kai, we’re no longer an anonymous annoyance but identified enemies, and our friends are his collateral.
Rob speaks up. “What would be the point of wavecasting the fact that T’Kai is some kind of villain, anyway? What can it possibly achieve?” He sits forward on his seat in the same alert position as Vitruzzi and focuses on each of us in turn. “At best, you’ll make a lot of people in the system upset, or angry. But that won’t make most of them want to automatically give up their entire way of life. T’Kai’s just one man, he doesn’t speak for the whole government, who, in case you’ve all forgotten, wasn’t completely aware of what he was up to in the first place.”
“But they’re just as complicit, Rob,” I respond. “Don’t you remember all the shit we did in the Corps? The people, mostly innocent people, we were ordered to ‘suppress’? That wasn’t just a Corps decision; those directives came from the Admin. From the government. And now, this chemical they have that will wipe out the Spectras—” Why is he playing devil’s advocate? It’s too late for that.
“Some of those decisions were Admin, but they had their reasons. They mostly take care of people—healthcare, stability, safe planets for people to live on. And you don’t know if this wire-rat is even telling the truth about that soil compound!”
“It’s right for people to know,” David interjects. “We should tell them what T’Kai is doing anyway. Let people decide for themselves.”
“You’re just going to introduce instability, and like Quantum says, they’ll discount the information as fraudulent the minute it gets out. You’ll get nowhere. If T’Kai doesn’t cooperate with you, you’ll gain nothing by implicating him anonymously.”
“Do you think we should just let him get away with it?” I ask.
“That’s not what—”
I don’t let him finish. “I can’t believe I’m saying this, but I agree with Rajcik. T’Kai has to be brought to justice for the things he’s done, the people he’s hurt.”
“But Aly, we’re hardly in a position to—”
“We are in a position.” Quantum glares at Rob, anger blooming in red stripes along his cheekbones. “You are not listening to me.”
“You mean you have enough allies to go to war? With the Admin?” Rob bites the end off his words, his own anger bleeding through. “Then what are you waiting for? If there are that many people who want to overthrow them, there must be a reason. They don’t need this information, or evidence, that a single member of the Directorate is crooked. If all these people you’re talking about want to revolt, they must already believe the Cabinet is corrupt.”
“This is the type of evidence citizens should see in order to help them decide which side to take,” Quantum responds, eyes spitting defiance.
“I’m with these guys,” Thompson chimes in. “Everyone knows the Admin is fucking them over. They just need a reason to do something about it, something to set them off. If knowing the Admin is using its own as bags of test meat doesn’t wake people up, let ’em fuckin’ die. Let ’em drown in their own rotting guts.”
As crude as his words are, no one disagrees, not even Rob. I lean toward him and remind him as gently as I can, “You came with us by choice, Rob. You knew it could come to this.”
He holds my eyes for a few seconds, his eyebrows still raised and causing wrinkles to ladder up his forehead. Then he sighs and leans back in his chair. “Yeah, I did, didn’t I?”
Vitruzzi reaches for the com unit Quantum still holds. “I want to send a message to the Sphynx. Can you give them the same transmission coordinates to respond to?”
* * *
After Vitruzzi sends word to the Sphynx, the rest of us spread out inside the warehouse, killing time as we wait for T’Kai to make his move. We’re all edgy and eager to hear back from our crew. Another advantage of Bi Schtum is its proximity to Keum Libre, approximately four f
light days away. If there’s any such thing as luck, they’ve already been able to suss out the prison rock and are waiting for us somewhere between here and there. Rob’s hop will make it possible to rendezvous with the ship, and we’ll be able to execute the next part of the plan as one team again. If I weren’t completely mentally and physically wrung out from everything that’s happened since the Corps assaulted the Beach, I’d be anxious and uneasy about being back on board the ship with Karl. Only a couple short weeks have passed since things fell apart between us, but they may as well be years, the distance between us galaxies. I don’t even know what I’d say to him at this point.
TWENTY-EIGHT
It’s time I tell Rob that I plan on taking him up on his offer.
The warehouse contains orderly stacks of cargo crates almost the size of Rob’s hop, and I wander around for a while trying to find him. I don’t have any luck, so I nudge David, who’s fallen asleep leaning back against a crate. Payback. Irritably, he grunts that Rob’s gone back to his ship.
Rob is also probably trying to stockpile some shut-eye, but this is important and I don’t know when I’ll get another chance to talk to him. The hatch is pulled closed but not latched and I enter quietly, surprised when I don’t see him lying on the bench in the fuselage’s rear. Except for the light emitting from the cockpit, the interior is dark. The back of his head is just visible over the headrest of the pilot’s seat, and I walk up and lean casually against the wall.
“Hi.”
He jumps and spins the seat around quickly, his eyes wide. “Jesus! You scared me. How long have you been standing there?”
“I just walked in. What are you doing?”