Juno Rising (ISF-Allion)

by Patty Jansen

  THE MEN LEFT, AND FABIO and Thalia remained at the table, silent.

  She was looking at her hands.

  Then she looked up, her eyes meeting his. “So, what is your story?”

  “My story?”

  “Yeah, you didn’t say anything about yourself during that discussion.”

  “What is there to say? I arrived here today. I don’t know much about the base. Never worked here before.”

  “Why did you get involved in this mining water business?”

  “Orders.”

  “You work for these people?”

  “Yes.”

  “You’re not a prisoner?”

  A prisoner? Was he a prisoner? Could be, because he didn’t think it was his own choice to come here. Also because Sanchez had said—

  “If I was a prisoner, then where is the prison?” He spread his hands. “Is this your prison, too?”

  Was that a slight uncomfortable look over her face? “Well, like a prisoner in rehabilitation.” She sounded annoyed.

  “What am I supposed to have done?” Fabio’s heart was thudding. He wanted to know this. Was he being punished or what else was going on? He might have called himself a victim, or a fallen spy in need of protection. Someone who needed to spend some quiet time away from attention. Not a prisoner.

  She frowned. “Where did you come from before you were here?”

  “I was on the interplanetary.”

  “All your life?”

  “For a long time.”

  “Where did it come from?”

  “Earth.” At least, that’s where Sanchez was and he assumed that he had seen Sanchez there.

  Her frown deepened. “The Mars treaty prevents ships going out directly from Earth to the Outer System.”

  “Look, I don’t know where it came from. What do you want from me? I’m new here, and I have no personal involvement in whatever disagreement you have going on between the military and civilians, about water or about other things. I’m just doing my job. I don’t care. I can’t give you any information that you want.”

  “Do you know anything at all about what you’re doing here?”

  Fabio half-rose from the table. “Look, miss, I said I’m not getting involved. If you want to discuss the particulars of this water plan, you should discuss it with Doric.”

  “No need to get defensive.”

  “Yes, there is a need. You have no right to ask anything from me. I’m an ISF officer. You’re a civilian. I am not obliged to give you anything.”

  “Oh yes, you are. Article 275g of the act says that the military forces shall retain no information and undertake no action that conflict with the safety or wellbeing of the civilians.”

  He stared at her.

  “In short: the force is here to protect us, and not to be a law unto itself.”

  Was the force ever a law unto itself? ISF had been his entire life. He didn’t remember a life where it had not dominated his life. Maybe with the exception of this Argentina and the school with the bird in the sky.

  “Do you even know anything?”

  “Of course I do.”

  “Would you want to get out of here?”

  Fabio stared at her. What sort of question was that? Get out of here and then what? Where would he go by himself? “I am not a prisoner.” But then again, what was he?

  “You can help us. The Council Of Four is concerned about the treatment of low-ranked people on the base and those who have been sent here for punishment. After years of negotiation, we finally have in Banparra a base commander at Io who is willing to listen to civilian concerns about the reputation of the military. He may not care about punishment, but he cares a lot about the relationship between the bases and civilians. Banparra is a local, went through Ganymede University before signing up with the force, and although he’s known to be a strict disciplinarian, he’s also aware that the non-military sectors of the system look at Io with suspicion and he is working to improve relationships. But it’s too slow. There are many people like yourself, prisoners—”

  “I’m not a—”

  “—who have been treated with forbidden substances and treatments to wipe their memories so that they become like meek sheep—”

  “Hey, watch who you’re calling—”

  “You will understand that this concerns us, the civilians in this system, and we want to do something about that. All you need to do is to agree to speak to me—”

  “I’m already speaking to you—”

  “On the record. I want to do an interview, so we can put pressure on Banparra to release you and to open up the detention files to see who else they’re holding, because people have gone missing—”

  “What part of ‘I’m not involved with your local politics’ do you not understand?” He now fully rose from the seat. “I helped you open the door. I made sure you got dinner. As far as I’m concerned we are now finished!”

  She stared at him, her expression intense.

  He stared back, feeling the anger seep out of him and the fatigue come in. His head throbbed.

  “Sorry,” he said, sat back down and buried his face in his hands. “I’m not well. Very confused.”

  “They wiped you, didn’t they?”

  “I don’t know what they did or who did what.”

  She let a silence lapse. “I have heard about you from before whatever they did to you to put you in this state. I believe you have your heart in the right place.”

  Fabio said into his hands, “Well, thanks. Not sure I deserve it.”

  “You do. Take it from me, you do.”

  Fabio didn’t intend to become involved, but just these last few days, he had begun to believe that he was a bad person, a selfish traitor with double standards, who had, at some point in the past, done something so vile that all of humankind would hate him. It was good to hear from someone that this was not necessarily the case.

  “I’m so tired. I want people to stop bothering me.” No, he wanted . . . to know where his home was.

  “Then tell me when we can meet you for the interview.” Her dark eyes met his.

  “I have to clear it with my superior.”

  “No. You can’t tell anyone. Tell me when you’re free. Same time tomorrow?”

  What was the time, and when was tomorrow?

  And then he looked into Sanchez’s dark eyes. He said, Keep your head down, Velasquez, and I may just leave it on your shoulders.

  “I don’t know if I can—”

  Doing interviews was not keeping his head down. Sanchez would disapprove. Heck, Banparra would certainly disapprove, because whatever his feeling towards locals, he clearly didn’t like these snooping civilians on his base. Whatever Fabio had done right by this woman, he certainly had a reputation for being a turncoat, even if he had no idea what caused this or what he had done.

  Mars.

  If ever he could dredge up the memories from the woolly depths of his mind, but increasingly he feared that those things were gone, never to be retrieved. And that in itself gave him nightmares. All these people knew something about him that he didn’t, and he couldn’t very well ask without looking like a fool, which he probably already did.

  “Please,” she said. “We have come here just for cases like you, because it’s scandalous how they’re ruining your life.”

  But that set Fabio more on edge. Who, exactly, was ruining his life? And why did they think that ISF were doing so? If nothing else, he was only here because of them. “What are you going to ask me in this interview that you can’t ask me now?”

  “Nothing, except it will be a formal interview with witnesses and a video feed.”

  “No. I’m not doing that.”

  “But you just agreed—”

  “I’m not doing that. You can use what I’ve told you, but I suspect you already know more about me than I do.” And he didn’t know why she glommed onto him. All of a sudden the feeling that she wanted something scared him. There were too many people everywh
ere who liked to take advantage of others when they were down. He was in no state to tell all the local scams from a real situation.

  “Please calm down, it’s just for the record, because when we report to the Council Of Four about a situation, we have to be able to justify our sources. That’s standard practice.”

  “No, no.” He didn’t want anything to do with the Council Of Four. That was moving into the dangerous territory of politics.

  “Excuse me.” There was a sound at the door. A soldier Fabio hadn’t seen before stood there. He wore Space Ops fatigues with the Sarajevo tag and his badge declared him to be Private C. Allen. “Base regulations say that you’re not supposed to be out here outside allocated times.”

  Thalia whirled around.

  “Base regulations also required us to be locked in our room? We had no food and all our calls for help were ignored.”

  Private Allen briefly met Fabio’s eyes, registered Fabio’s higher rank and nodded politely. “Sir?”

  “Um. That’s how I found them. Locked in their room. I don’t understand what happened either, but I think they were entitled dinner at the very least.”

  “I’m sorry about that, sir. We’re very busy.”

  “Why was their door locked?”

  “Probably a mistake, sir. I guess the kitchens had no idea that they were staying here. Normally visitors would stay at the main base and we only cater for research staff who live in a different section of the base.”

  Thalia said, “I’m afraid my colleague will lodge a complaint.”

  “I fully understand, ma’am, and I’m sorry. My superior tells me that no one should roam about the base on their off-shift times, so I have to urge you to return to your rooms.”

  Fabio said, “No one is roaming the base. We came up here from their apartment and will be going straight back.”

  “I’m sorry. Someone must have forgotten to change the security settings on your door. It won’t happen again, I can assure you. It’s about to get very busy in that corridor. Anyway, we’re entering the night shift now. Everyone should be in their cabins, because the heating in this part of the base doesn’t run at night.”

  The private escorted Fabio and Thalia down the stairs, and then to Fabio’s room.

  In the corridors, there were a few more signs of life now, as if a large number of people had been away previously and had now returned to their rooms for the night. Fabio didn’t see any of these people, but he could hear them talk behind the closed doors.

  Fabio went into his cabin where he was alone with the disturbances of his empty mind. Something inside worried him deeply. Keeping his head down meant not getting caught up in politics, but some part in him seemed to like politics and seemed to have a knack for getting people to talk. Not only that, but talking politics had a comforting familiarity that fitted him like a well-worn coat.

  Who was he and what had he done in the past? Something that Thalia thought was good and everyone on the base thought was despicable.

  He opened the door to the empty cupboard and stared at his reflection. The face that looked back at him was almost a stranger. He was pale-skinned, thin. His body was hairless, his beard no more than a stray fuzz on his chin. His hair was a bit messy for a military officer, his face fine-featured. From the front, he couldn’t see the scar where the implant had been removed, but he could feel it, running his hand over the back of his head. One spot, in his upper arm, had been itching consistently today. He held it up to the mirror and when he ran the tips of his fingers over it, he could feel something hard under the skin.

  What was that? He pushed and squeezed the skin.

  It felt like a tube-like thing, about a millimetre across and four or five millimetres long. Big enough to be a tracking device. Or a capsule releasing a steady dose of numbing chemicals.

  For a long time, he stood before the mirror fingering the lump until the skin was red. He didn’t think it had been there before. Was this part of his nanometrics? He couldn’t imagine that all the checks they’d done on the interplanetary would have missed this. Or maybe they had inserted this thing in his arm.

  He kept seeing the incoherent flashes of his memories. He had once known how to break into things, how to open doors. He’d once had a weapon. He’d driven through a snowstorm in a truck. In a pressurised truck, he realised. It didn’t snow anywhere in the solar system apart from on Earth and on Titan. There would have been no need for a pressurised truck on Earth. He didn’t think he’d ever been to Titan. Another mystery. He’d done something on Mars. Something to do with warning people against the wishes of others. Saving people. Pink snow. What the hell.

  You get one more chance, Velazquez.

  Shards of memories chased each other through his mind.

  He was so messed up.

  Thalia

  * * *

  WELL, CRAP, THAT INTERRUPTION came at an inopportune moment, although Thalia doubted that she would have been able to talk Lt. Velasquez into an interview. He seemed a really odd sort. Nervous, flighty, knew nothing. To wipe someone’s mindbase wasn’t usually that successful, she thought. Or maybe that was because there had been almost nothing there.

  Thalia expected to come back to the room and find all three men in different corners, sunk in their own world. Jun moping, Paul being angry about something and muttering under his breath. Sol would be the only one actually doing anything useful, like writing a report, although he’d get Jun to help him, and Jun might actually do it, because he was a good kid, even if far too young.

  But when she entered the room, she found all three men standing at the little desk on the far side of the room.

  They had their back to her, and turned around when she came in.

  “What’s going on?” she asked.

  “Have a look at this,” Jun said. He moved aside so that Thalia could see the screen on the wall.

  It showed a section of the sickly yellow plain with a lot of activity in the form of trucks and containers.

  “Where is that coming from?”

  “It’s one of the base’s outside camera feeds. They only gave us access to the general communication and news hub; but, although it may be hard to get into this base, once you’re in it, the security is pretty lousy.”

  “Meaning: you hacked into it?”

  Sol snorted. “Don’t act like you’re surprised. That’s why he’s with us.”

  Actually, there were other reasons why Jun was with them, mostly to do with his well-to-do family, but admittedly his skills in electronic systems were useful.

  On the screen, a huge crate was loaded onto a very long flatbed truck.

  “What are they doing?”

  “Well, while you were away, another one of these trucks left this field and went in that direction.” Sol pointed at a grey mass of jagged peaks at the horizon.

  “Is this camera facing to the base?”

  “Away from it. They’re taking this stuff to the next valley.”

  “What are they doing with it there?”

  “Your guess is as good as mine.”

  They watched the screen for a bit, but loading a truck with something bulky was slow business, and Sol grew bored and made everyone some tea.

  “Did you learn anything from that guy?” he asked Thalia. Jun had joined them at the tiny table, but Paul was still watching the screen.

  Thalia sighed, blowing steam off her cup. “He doesn’t want to cooperate. He said I could use whatever he told us—”

  “Which isn’t much.”

  “No, I agree. He’s an odd one. But as soon as I mentioned that I wanted to do an official interview he refused to cooperate.”

  “He’s weird,” Jun said. “Creepy. Something’s wrong with him. I don’t know what.”

  “He’s had his mind wiped,” Thalia said.

  Sol’s eyes widened. “That’s highly illegal.”

  “That’s why we’re here. Because ISF still sanctions these practices.”

  “How are you so s
ure?” Paul asked, without turning around from the screen.

  “Because he told me.”

  “How could he tell you they wiped his mind if he doesn’t remember that he has lost memories?”

  “Because he has no memories left. It’s also in how he behaves. He’s numb with fear. He doesn’t want to speak out in case he says something dumb or asks a question about something he should have known. He’s trying to bluff others into thinking that there is nothing wrong with him.”

  “I’m glad you’re the psychoanalyst,” Paul said.

  Thalia put her cup down with a thunk. “Will you just stop it?”

  “Stop what?” He had the temerity to look surprised, which made her even angrier.

  “Stop acting like you don’t want to be here and complaining about everything.”

  “This place is not exactly great, is it?”

  “Then why are you with us, why did you did you volunteer?”

  “I didn’t volunteer, in case you missed that. I never volunteered for any of this stuff. I’m a fucking engineer. I would have been so much happier if I’d been left alone doing my job, but no—look, why the hell do I need to explain this?”

  “How about: because you’ve been an arse ever since we left and being cooped up in this little apartment is not going to improve the situation?”

  “I also don’t want trouble.”

  “Then you could have stayed at home and stuck to being an engineer.”

  In fact, she didn’t even understand why the Human Rights division had picked him to accompany her. Jun might have bought his way in, but at least he was competent in computer systems. Sol was a lawyer. Thalia had worked in media. But Paul? He was an engineer, and a blunt and grumpy one at that.

  Governor Law had called these people the best we can send.

  “You would want to know, huh? You’d like to think that each of these prisoners are interesting cases for you to study or prove that you’re right, that oh, the ISF is such a big baddie because they lock up innocent prisoners. Let’s write a report and get all the credit.”

  “If it isn’t to expose the injustice, then why are you here?”

  “Because we’re not talking about prisoners like they’re numbers. They’re fucking people. That guy we spoke to, Fabio whatever, you can see the pain and anguish on his face. He is a person, and he’s been ruined by the military. And as you may have noticed, he is still a serving officer. We are not talking about prisoners, we’re talking about their own personnel, people who have done something they didn’t like, or even made an objection to something said, and they’re being sent here to cool off or to make sure they shut up and don’t spoil ISF’s reputation with inconvenient facts. Like, that it was actually ISF who sent the asteroid into the dome at Mars, because they needed an excuse to destroy Allion.”