Ephialtes (Ephialtes Trilogy Book 1)

by Parker, Gavin E

  Elspeth was thinking to herself, ‘Great, he didn’t notice the extra question’ as she calmly said, “Bobby Karjalainen, thank you so much for your time and good luck with whatever it is you choose to do next.”

  “Thank you,” said Bobby.

  They both sat in silence for a few seconds. Elspeth tapped her comdev. “Great, that’s it, done,” she said. “Thank you so much for doing this.”

  “No problem,” said Bobby. “You do know you said you were going to ask me one more thing, and then asked two things, don’t you?”

  “Did I?” said Elspeth, “I’m sure it’ll be fine, I can edit around it.”

  Bobby nodded.

  “It wasn’t too awkward was it, talking about the war?”

  “It’s fine. I wrote a book about it, people ask all the time. Do you need anything else?”

  “No,” said Elspeth. “I’m sure I got everything. I’ll edit this all together and have it up on my stream in a day or two.”

  “That’s great,” said Bobby, standing. “I’ll look forward to watching it.” He offered Elspeth his hand and she took it and shook firmly. She wasn’t used to shaking hands and hoped she was doing it right.

  “Thanks again, Mr Karjalainen,” she said.

  “Please, just call me Bobby. Take care now,” he said as he turned and left.

  Foveaux got the number from Elspeth. She had seen the stream and thought Bobby would indeed be a useful addition to the MSS. Initially, she would run the MSS much the same as its USAN predecessor but very soon it would be necessary to split it into two separate entities, a military and a police service. While the Martian population was small and politically unified they could get away with having a joint military-police force. As the population grew, and as political opinions diverged, having what amounted to military police under control of the government would not look good or be good for their fledgling democracy.

  Maya’s plan was to start the partition right from the beginning. Although the MSS would be a single organisation it would be split internally into military and police divisions. When the time came for the two parts to be formally split into their own separate organisations it would, she hoped, be relatively painless.

  Coming from a background of security Foveaux saw herself as naturally inclined towards the policing side of the operation. That was where her expertise was. But if Mars was to have an effective military someone with Bobby’s background and experience would be an ideal candidate to oversee it.

  She managed to get through to him shortly after Elspeth’s stream of the interview had been published.

  “Mr Karjalainen, you probably don’t know me, my name is Maya Foveaux and I’m the head of the Martian Security Service.”

  “Hello, Ms Foveaux. No, I don’t know you.”

  “I’m sorry to call unannounced but I’ve just seen your interview with Elspeth Ross.”

  “How was it?”

  “It was very good, Mr Karjalainen, and it got me thinking. As I’m sure you know, the USAN is sending a dropship carrier here. We have some defence systems in place and we have the beginnings of a military force which, unfortunately, it appears will be necessary for us to stand toe to toe with our earthly neighbours when we get to negotiate peace with them. I was wondering if you would like to donate some of your military experience to us over here. It would be greatly appreciated.”

  “What sort of thing?” said Bobby.

  “You’ve been involved before in setting up a new type of unit. That’s exactly what we’re doing now. We have personnel and we’re getting some new equipment, but what we’re really lacking is expertise. The MSS consists, at the moment, of ex-security guards. What we could do with is someone to mould them into an army. It sounds like that’s the sort of thing you would be able to do for us.”

  Bobby thought carefully. “So you want me to design training courses, something like that?”

  “That would be great, but what would be even better would be if you could implement those courses yourself.”

  “Wait a minute, am I being press-ganged here?”

  Foveaux smiled. “Of course not. If you don’t want to be a part of this I understand. But we have a new planet here, and a pressing need we have at this time is for a functioning army. You’re the best hope we have of getting that as fast as we need it. I understand, too, from your interview that you’re at a loose end at the moment.”

  “That’s true enough,” said Bobby.

  “Obviously, we can offer you a full salary and other benefits. And you would have tremendous freedom to organise the new force the best way you see fit. It would be good for us and I think it could be a great opportunity for you, too.”

  Bobby thought. “Let me come over and take a look and I’ll tell you what I think. I can’t commit to anything at the moment. I’ll need to think about this.”

  “Sure, that sounds great,” said Foveaux.

  “Where are you?” said Bobby.

  “We’re based at the garrison.”

  C H A P T E R 2 2

  Buyout

  Venkdt was still using his offices at the Venkdt Mars headquarters building. It seemed no one minded the apparent conflict of interest. Most Martians either worked for Venkdt or owed the company some other huge debt of gratitude. The idea that the interests of Venkdt might conflict with the general Martian population simply didn’t add up. By a large majority, employees of Venkdt were the Martian population.

  Still, it was a matter that Charles Venkdt wanted to address. He knew the Martian economy was starting to grow and in time there would be many corporations and small businesses on Mars. His nascent government would need to be seen to be independent from all biases in order to support that happening. The new Martian economy should be free and open, with the lightest touch of regulation.

  Government finances initially consisted of generous donations from Venkdt himself and from Venkdt Mars, the newly independent Martian corporation. Raising taxes had to be the first priority, and consolidating government infrastructure close on behind.

  With a popular mandate behind him Venkdt had to deliver on the promises he had made to his electorate. One of these was to buy out Venkdt Mars from the parent company. The difficulty facing him was that the parent company did not accept the buyout at any level.

  It was an issue that had to be approached from two angles: legal and technical. Though the purchase would never be strictly legal Venkdt needed it to be as wrapped up in legal terms as it could possibly be. For this he employed the counsel of his daughter, Christina. He imagined the technical aspect, though somewhat more complex, would be easier to implement. Kostovich would be able to funnel money into accounts even where the recipients were unwilling to receive it, that much was certain.

  The original pledge had been to buy the Martian division of Venkdt Corporation at market rates plus ten percent. The events surrounding independence had knocked a significant amount of points off of Venkdt shares. Market plus ten now would be undervaluing the worth of the Martian enterprise but Venkdt was determined to play fair by his erstwhile associates.

  “Market plus ten now would be an insult,” he said.

  “What then? Market plus twenty?” said Christina.

  “No, no, this has to be reasonable and logical. We can’t just pluck numbers out of the air. Can you pull up the share value for the day I made the announcement? Early in the day, before the jitters set in. We’ll take that price plus ten per cent. That makes sense, right?”

  “It sort of does, I guess,” said Christina. “It looks like you’re making it up as you go along, though.”

  “I am making it up as I go along. But we have to give them a fair price and it has to be based on sound reasoning. We’ll go with the price on that date, okay?”

  Christina nodded.

  “And where does the money go?” said Kostovich.

  “It goes to Venkdt Corp,” said Venkdt.

  “Obviously,” said Kostovich, “but which part? Venkdt’s financ
ial organisation is extremely diverse. They have operations across the globe, and beyond. Even without us they have a facility on Luna, Earth’s moon.”

  “Anywhere, I guess. If they have the money, they have the money. It’s up to them how they push it around.”

  “I wouldn’t be so sure,” said Kostovich. “An organisation of that size, with such dispersed management, may be very good at losing money off the books when it needs to. There could be any number of fake subsidiaries, offshore accounts and who knows what else. We have to put this money somewhere where it can’t get kicked under the rug. The point of this exercise is for us to be seen to be doing the right thing. If nobody sees, or worse nobody sees and the money disappears, then there’s no point.”

  Venkdt thought. “Is there any way you can make their accounts public?”

  “Not legally. It would be criminally negligent to do so, anyway. They’d kill us in the press, rightly so.”

  Venkdt paced. “Okay, how about this. We bypass the company entirely.”

  “We can’t pay the company without paying the company,” said Christina.

  “No,” said Venkdt, “we pay the shareholders. Each individual shareholder gets a proportionate pay-off.”

  Kostovich shook his head. “You’re talking about cracking hundreds of thousands of accounts now, rather than just one. That’s a different proposition all together.”

  Venkdt looked at him. “Too hard?”

  “No, not too hard. But a lot harder.”

  Venkdt smiled. “You relish a challenge, Dan. Can you do it?”

  Kostovich took a deep breath. “Yes, I can do it.”

  “How long do you need?”

  Kostovich thought. “I don’t know. A week. Two?”

  “That’s great, two weeks,” said Venkdt. He turned to Christina. “Can you get all this paperwork tied up in two weeks? Take as many people as you need. And when you have all the paperwork done it needs to be published on an open forum. It’s important that anyone can access our documents and see what it is we’re doing, and why we’re doing it.”

  “I think we could do that,” said Christina.

  “Good,” said Venkdt. “That means that in two weeks we can publish the documentation, transfer the money and we will be a truly independent planet.” He stopped to think. “Planet or nation? I can’t decide. We’re sort of a planet made up of one nation.”

  “Plation?” offered Kostovich.

  Venkdt looked at him with a mixture of confusion and pity. “I think we’ll stay with planet.”

  Elspeth’s plan to gain publicity from the interview with Bobby Karjalainen worked. The stream was extremely popular. For a brief period it was the second most popular stream on the news aggregators. Charles Venkdt wanted to announce his proposals for the buyout on a live stream, and having seen Elspeth’s interview with Bobby he selected her to be his interviewer.

  Elspeth felt a little disoriented. She had gone from being a cub reporter to interviewing the president of Mars in a matter of days. Admittedly, the president of Mars was someone she might easily bump into out and about in Marineris, but it still felt like something of a coup. The audience for the interview on Earth would be enormous.

  Venkdt had a number of specific questions he wanted to be asked but he had given Elspeth some leeway to ask questions of her own. The equipment he supplied was top of the range.

  Elspeth set up the equipment and chairs in a similar configuration to the one she had used with Bobby. There was to be a technician who would cut between the three cameras (this time around there was a long two-shot) in real time. The stream was to go out live, but once that had happened it would live forever, being restreamed or otherwise available to anyone with even a passing interest.

  Venkdt had appeared friendly enough when they spoke on the phone. In person too he seemed like an amiable old man. He reassured Elspeth again that as long as she asked the questions he needed she could ask others too. It would be a real interview, albeit one that existed in order to disseminate a specific message to its target audience.

  The live stream was timed such that it would be available at peak time in the most populated areas of the USAN. Elspeth began by asking Venkdt some fairly softball questions about his family history and their connections with Mars. She stepped it up a bit when asking about how he had come to the decision to run a plebiscite. Had he thought about possible unintended outcomes? Had he thought about running for president right from the start, or had that come later? Venkdt gave political answers; conservative, reassuring and easy to swallow. They were very plausible, too, to the degree that Elspeth thought they may have even been honest.

  She asked Venkdt one of his own questions. “You said you will compensate Venkdt Corporation for their Martian division. Can you elaborate on that?”

  “I can elaborate on that, Elspeth. I said in my election speeches that I would buyout Venkdt Mars from the parent company at the market rate plus ten percent. Since then, and we have to assume in response to our new arrangement here, the share price of Venkdt Corporation has dropped somewhat. I want everyone to know that my intentions are completely above board, so what I will be doing is buying the Martian arm of Venkdt Corporation for the market rate plus ten percent as it was on the day I made the announcement about the plebiscite.”

  Elspeth thought this was a good opportunity to chip in with a question of her own. “And what can you tell us about the legality of that arrangement?”

  “Oh,” said Venkdt, “I understand that in very strict legal terms what we are doing is not correct. There can be no doubt about that. But what is happening here is the formation of a new planet, the birth of a new society. I don’t think that can be done within the strict legal framework of the old planet. I know that, strictly speaking, we are breaking the law here, and that Venkdt Corporation are opposed to us doing this. I can’t argue with any of that. But what I want to make very clear is that we are not robbing anyone here. We are taking what we believe to be ours and compensating the original owners. I think that most people would agree that is fair. Not legal, according to the laws of the USAN, but not an injustice either. We don’t seek to aggravate the USAN or steal anything from them. We hope to remain on good terms and I feel, as I’m sure most Martians do, that the people of Earth and the USAN are our cousins. We will be a good solid ally to the USAN and will continue to supply them with essential materials, to their benefit as well as ours.”

  “So you’re quite deliberately flouting the law?”

  “The old law, yes. A law that the people of Mars have overwhelmingly voted to say they do not believe applies to them. Don’t get me wrong here, Elspeth, the rule of law is essential. It’s what has made the USAN so successful, and it’s what will make Mars successful. But in this very unusual case, and at this particular moment in time, it has been necessary for us to change from one legal code to another. That can’t be done neatly. There will always be a point at which things hang in the air, unresolved. What we want to do is move past that point as quickly as possible. Our own Martian constitution and our own Martian laws are now in effect and will be rigorously upheld, just as we upheld the laws of the USAN right to the point of departure. On this one issue - ownership of Venkdt Mars - we’ve unfortunately had to go through this grey area, but as I’ve said, and as I hope everyone can see, while we are not complying fully with the legal requirements of the USAN we are absolutely committed to acting in a fair and just manner. That’s why our terms are so generous, in part as compensation for the difficulties people may have with our actions.”

  Elspeth returned to Venkdt’s own questions. “How will the buyout work, in practical terms?”

  “I’m glad you asked me that. We have our very best people working on this right at this moment and we hope to have a solution within the next few weeks. We are hoping to be able to pay every Venkdt Corporation shareholder a dividend commensurate with the amount of shares they hold. In short, we’re going directly to Venkdt’s owners and paying them
for what we are taking from them.”

  “This will be happening in the next few weeks?”

  “Yes, within two weeks, we hope. Also, we’ll be providing documentation explaining the rationale and other technical aspects of the buyout. All shareowners will receive documentation confirming the amount they will be paid, with full receipts for the monies we will have paid them following in due course. If they run into any financial, legal or other difficulties because of our actions we will support them in sorting any of that out. All this, by the way, is covered in detail in our documentation, which is freely available through the Venkdt site. I can assure any Venkdt Corporation shareholders that they will be fully compensated and supported in every way throughout this process. It is absolutely not our intention to cause any harm, financial or otherwise, to Venkdt Corporation or its shareholders.

  “We have written to all the shareholders asking them to accept our offer. We have done this as a matter of courtesy, but the plain truth is that we will be buying ourselves out whatever happens. I would strongly encourage Venkdt Corporation shareholders to accept our offer. It would greatly strengthen our relationship with our former company as we move forward, and it would send us a message of solidarity and goodwill that would be greatly appreciated.”

  “What happens if they reject your offer?”

  “Well, we go ahead anyway, but with heavier hearts.”

  “Okay, and once again the date for this?”

  “Within two weeks.”

  “So I guess what we have here is an honest thief,” said Cortes as the stream finished. “But an honest thief is still a thief. What do you have for me?” He looked around the table. “Anyone?”

  “We have Ephialtes, of course, and we’re hoping to open diplomatic channels very soon on the back of that,” said Farrell.

  “We’re all well aware of that,” said Cortes. “How do we deal with this? He looks reasonable, almost. How do we counter that?”