"Maybe."
"You can't find meaning in this, Vico. There might not be meaning, not that a human mind can understand anyway."
"What's inside the human abdominal cavity?"
"You're not giving up on this, are you?"
"Come on. You went to college. What's inside a man in this region?" He drew a circle in the air above his stomach.
"I don't know. Your large and small intestines mostly."
"What else?"
"Higher up you've got your stomach, liver, duodenum--"
"What's a duodenum?"
"I don't remember exactly. I only remember the name because it sounds funny."
"What else?"
"Gallbladder, diaphragm, kidneys, pancreas. Does it matter? If they were looking for one of those things, they would have pulled it out."
"Good point. The fact that they came out empty-handed suggests they were looking for an organ that wasn't there." He considered a moment. "And really, they can't possibly know our anatomy anyway. Not this quickly. The only anatomy they truly know is their own."
"You're saying they were looking for one of their organs? That doesn't make any sense."
"Sure it does," said Victor. "Maybe they have a critical organ that serves some vital purpose for them, and they want to see if we have it too."
"Such as?"
Victor shrugged. "Could be anything. Maybe it's the organ that lets them communicate mind to mind."
"We don't know for certain that they do that."
"They communicate somehow, Imala. And it's certainly not by talking."
"Has this ever happened before? Has anyone else ever witnessed the Formics do this? Eviscerate people and dig around inside them, I mean."
"Why?"
"How many Formics would you have to cut open to see if they have kidneys like ours?"
He understood her meaning. If the Formics were looking for an organ, they would only have to look inside one person to see if they found it.
Imala pulled her box close to the terminal, and they searched the nets together. They quickly found dozens of gruesome images of eviscerated people all over China.
"These images were posted at different dates," said Victor. "Some at the start of the war, some as early as this morning."
"That throws your theory out the window," said Imala. "If they were looking for an organ, they would have stopped eviscerating people a long time ago because they would have known early on that we didn't have it."
"Unless the different Formics scattered around China aren't talking to each other and they don't know what the other Formics have or have not discovered."
Imala stood. "That's what I'm telling you, Vico. This is a pointless circle of speculation. We can't possibly know what's in their heads."
Victor leaned back in his chair. "But if we could understand them, Imala, if we could get in their heads, maybe we wouldn't have to fight."
"I don't think it matters, Vico. They don't seem like the negotiating type."
Victor didn't have a response to that.
Imala leaned against the wall. "Are you ready for this? The MOPs? The cocoons? The ship?"
Victor took a breath and leaned forward in his chair. "If something happens to me, there's a message here on this terminal I want you to send to my mother in the Belt. It's all programmed in. This one here. Just double tap it, and away it goes."
"You can write her a different letter and send it yourself when this is over."
"I mean it, Imala. Promise me you'll do that. That's all I ask."
"Nothing's going to happen to you, Vico. That's my promise to you. I won't let anything happen to you."
"That's a promise you can't keep, Imala."
She laughed. "You don't know me very well, do you, Vico?"
*
"Is this really a good time to be popping the champagne glasses?" said Ramdakan. "You haven't even started the assault yet."
They were sitting in Lem's office. The music and dancing in the warehouse had stopped, and everyone had returned to work.
Lem had thrown up an image of the city of Imbrium on the four walls, giving the impression that he and Ramdakan were sitting in the middle of a small park in the heart of the city. Ramdakan kept dabbing at his head with a cloth and sipping from the lidded goblet Lem had given him.
"Festivities boost morale, Norja," said Lem. "You should try it sometime. People might actually enjoy working for you."
Norja looked horrified. "Why would I want people to enjoy working for me?" He said the word like it was poison. "That makes them complacent and lazy."
Lem took a sip of his fruit drink. "Why I am not surprised to hear you espouse that philosophy. Then again, you are my father's chief financial adviser. You must be doing something right."
"Which leads me to why I'm here."
"You didn't come for the dancing?" Lem asked.
Ramdakan ignored that. "The Chinese have confiscated and retrofitted Formic transports. This is a serious problem."
"Actually it's an enormous convenience. That's how we're getting the MOPs out of China. But I suspect you already knew that part, too. Tell me, who on my staff is your source of information? I'd so like to know so I can pinch their ears off."
Ramdakan spread his hands and smirked. "Please, Lem. You made the announcement to a room full of Juke employees. You think that intel isn't going to get back to me?"
"I like how you call it 'intel.' Feels military. That's the business I'm in now these days, you know. Military operations. Oh, wait, your little mole already told you that, too, didn't he? Gosh. Snitches spoil all the fun."
"Will you stop being juvenile for a moment?"
Lem leaned back and put his hands behind his head. "No, Norja. I won't. This is who I am. You don't think I have a shot at achieving anything in this company, I'm the scorn of everyone on the Board, why should I bother performing for you? I'm Lem Jukes, remember? The son of Ukko Jukes, forever stuck in the shadow of his father. Isn't that what you said, Norja? Something to that effect?"
"This isn't about you, Lem. This is about the company."
Lem leaned forward. "Let me tell you exactly why you're here, Norja. Cut me off, if I'm wrong here. You're all in a tiff because you've just learned that China has Formic transports in their possession. This appalls you for two reasons. One, you didn't already know this fact, which means your lines of intel out of China have crumbled. And two, your panties are really in a wad because one of our primary competitors, WU-HU, is based out of China and they will almost certainly get their hands on that Formic tech, which they will promptly reverse engineer and use to their great economic advantage."
"Yes, but--"
Lem held up a finger. "I changed my mind. Don't cut me off. I'm just getting started. Where was I? Ah, yes, reverse engineering.
"So now here you are, Norja Ramdakan, Esquire, conscientious member of the Board, come to my office to impress upon me the importance of preserving some of the Formic tech inside the mothership. The secrets to interstellar travel are there, after all. New drive systems, self-sustaining life-support systems, alien alloys, advanced navigation, a ship that can travel at a significant fraction of lightspeed. The laundry list of goodies up for grabs is long indeed. And each little widget is its own fortune waiting to happen.
"With a prize like that in the hands of Juke Limited, nothing and no one could stop us. We would be the most powerful and profitable corporate entity for centuries to come. We would open the stars to humankind, forever preserve our species by spreading throughout the universe. How am I doing so far?"
Ramdakan cleared his throat. "Yes, well, you clearly understand what's at stake. But--"
"But the question on your mind is: How do we preserve something we're about to destroy?"
"It's a valid question," said Ramdakan.
"It most certainly is, and the answer is, you can't. You can preserve some tech, sure, but you can't preserve at all. This is a war, Norja. When the smoke clears, we can pick u
p the pieces and see what we've got. But we're not going to put the bottom line before the fate of Earth. My father and I agree on that much."
"Precautions can be made, Lem. You can take steps now to ensure that the most tech is preserved."
"I am taking such steps. Victor Delgado and I have discussed this. He knows we need to preserve as much tech as possible. He understands the value of that ship."
"He's not a Juke employee."
"Your point?"
"The legal team worries that his lawyers might evoke salvage law and claim that he is entitled to a percentage of anything taken from the ship."
"Ah, the lawyers. Yes. We can't forget them. Those wonderful, endearing lawyers. And I suppose the same could be said for other members of my strike team. Mazer Rackham, the MOPs..."
"They would have to sign release forms that absolve them of any rights of ownership."
Lem laughed and shook his head. "Welcome to the team, boys. Please sign these forms that will make us rich and not you."
Ramdakan looked irritated. "You act like you're not a member of the team here, Lem. I remind you, this is a Juke Limited operation. You may have spearheaded the whole effort, but you've done so as an employee of this company using employee resources." He pointed to the door. "Those coffins out there are the property of this company, not you."
"They're cocoons," said Lem. "Calling them coffins is bad luck. I'm going to have to ask you to throw salt over your right shoulder a few times. Or is it your left shoulder? I can never remember."
Ramdakan grit his teeth. "I'm glad you find this all amusing, Lem, but remember who is calling the shots here."
"Let me guess, it's not me."
"The Board. And frankly we're not thrilled with the idea of Victor Delgado or Imala Bootstamp having any part in this operation whatsoever."
"Is that so?"
"Who's liable if something happens to them, Lem? The company? There's a ride through judicial hell. That's the last thing we need."
Lem was suddenly angry. "Wrong, Norja. The last thing we need are Formics spraying us in the face with their little wands and melting the flesh off our bones. Which is precisely what will happen if we don't destroy that ship, which we are going to do with Victor and Imala. So unless you have another item of business, I'll excuse you to get back to the nice side of Luna."
"You don't want me as an enemy, Lem."
"No, I want you as an absent friend. Are we done here?"
"If you won't budge on Victor, I'm told not to push the matter. But you must at least have a Juke engineer with the strike team. Someone who can assess the tech there before the attack."
"There are only twelve cocoons, Norja. If I give up one, I lose a MOP."
"Then postpone and make more."
"We're not postponing."
"Then make room for an engineer."
"Fine. I'll ask Dr. Benyawe."
Ramdakan laughed. "Benyawe? She's what, in her sixties?"
"You never ask a woman her age, Norja. Don't you know that's bad manners?"
"You can't be serious."
"She's the best engineer on staff, and I trust her more than I trust myself. I don't know why I didn't think of her before. She could be a great help to Victor."
"She's not physically capable."
"We won't be tossing around bundles of hay, Norja. She will observe and record and document and consult. And she stays surprisingly fit. She could run you into the ground, I suspect."
"The Board won't like this."
"That tears me up inside, Norja. Really it does. Hopefully I can make it up to the Board by dropping the most valuable tech the world has ever seen into the company's lap." He stood. "Now if you'll excuse me, I have preparations to make."
He crossed to the door and opened it. Norja reluctantly got to his feet. Lem escorted him out of the building to make sure he was gone. It wasn't until Lem had returned to the warehouse that he saw the vid crew. Two cameramen, with big lights on their shoulders were filming a worker, who was being interviewed by Unna, the Danish reporter with short pink hair who had interviewed Lem in his apartment. She wore a tight blue jumpsuit this time, with just as much skin exposed.
Simona, with her holopad in hand, was standing off to the side by the vid crew. She saw Lem and quickly hurried over. "Now before you go nuclear, hear me out."
"Why is this woman and her cameras in my warehouse?" He maneuvered past Simona. "Hey, you with the cameras, I didn't say you could film in here. Shut that off!"
The cameramen startled, swiveling toward him, blinding him with their lights.
Unna, the reporter, smiled and kept her cool. "Mr. Jukes, just the man we want to talk to."
Lem shielded the light from his eyes. "Unna, tell your boys here to kill the cameras."
"We're here on invitation from Juke Limited, Mr. Jukes."
"Kill the cameras or I will smash them into tiny pieces."
Unna's smile disappeared. She turned to the cameramen and dragged a finger across her throat. The cameramen killed the lights and switched off the cameras.
Lem held out his hand. "Now give me the data cards."
The cameramen hesitated.
Simona said, "Can I talk to you in private, Lem?"
A crowd had gathered.
"Give me the data cards, or I will hit you with a lawsuit so hard your head will spin."
The cameramen looked to Unna, who nodded. They removed the data cards from their cameras and handed them over. Lem dropped them into his pocket and turned around. "Simona, let's chat."
*
They didn't go to his office. Lem worried he might end up shouting so loudly, they would hear him in the warehouse. So they crossed to the far side of the facility to a big utility room where all the HVAC equipment was housed.
"What a lovely meeting place," said Simona.
He folded his arms. "I'm waiting."
She dropped her shoulders and exhaled. "This was PR's idea. A bit of history could be in the making here. They wanted to capture it."
"And do what with it?
She tossed a hand up. "Whatever they do with this kind of thing. Press releases, corporate training vids, company documentary. We have vaults of footage like this, Lem. We do this for every major project we undertake. This is standard practice."
"We're not doing this to promote ourselves, Simona. This is not some product we're offering in a catalog. This is about stopping human suffering. If we turn on the cameras, we look like insincere opportunists."
"I said as much to PR. I told them you wouldn't like it. They told me to come anyway."
"I want them out."
"Fine."
"Fine?"
Simona shrugged. "I'm not going to argue with you. I agree with you."
"That's a first."
"Wonders never cease."
There was something different about her, Lem realized. "You cut your hair," he said. "It used to be much longer."
"Yes well I needed a change."
"I like it. It's nice."
Her cheeks flushed. She tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. "Yes well, there's something else you need to know, Lem. And I don't know how else to say this."
"I'm listening."
"I keep track of your father's schedule, as you know, and various communications he receives. Sometimes I see things I'm not supposed to see."
"Like what?"
She tapped her holopad and gave it to him.
It was an e-mail from Despoina to Father. It was a summary of the conversation Despoina and Lem had had the other evening. She had typed up all the details he had shared with her about the upcoming mission. Most of it was insignificant information, but there were a few juicy bits in there about what Victor intended to do inside the ship.
Lem didn't read the whole thing. There was no need. He handed the holopad back to her. His mouth felt dry. He didn't look at her. "Thank you for showing me that."
"Lem ... I'm sorry."
"Don't be.
&
nbsp; "Do you want to talk about it?"
"Absolutely not."
She nodded. "Well ... I'll go remove the vid crew before they start shooting again." She paused a moment as if she meant to say more, then she thought better of it and left.
He stood there alone, staring at a giant heat inductor. How could he have been so foolish? He had wrangled Des in to get information from Father when all along Father was playing the same game. Only Father had played it better. Father had known Lem would try such a thing. And so he had set the trap and let Lem walk right in.
Of course Lem would go for the shyest and most vulnerable in the office. She would be easy prey. And so Father had hired a ... what? A prostitute? Is that what Des was? A woman of the night? An actress who hadn't achieved the success she had hoped for and thus had settled for acting jobs of a different variety?
It was so obvious now. The way she had played coy that first day in the office, baiting him, making him think he was winning her over with his charm.
How much of her story was true, he wondered. Any of it? Maybe she really was from San Diego. That would be safest. She could speak about it with confidence. Street names and such. Claiming to be from somewhere she didn't know would be risky.
He had slept with her. And he had actually believed that it was special. Not every time, of course; there was a getting-to-know-you phase. But now, to think that all her awkwardness, all her insecurities, every moment, every glance she gave him, every laugh, every smile, it had all been a fabrication. It made him want to throw up. She was a breathing lie. The most vile and false of people. She had played him again and again and again.
Why had he told her anything? Why had he been so asinine? Of course she was fishing for information. Of course she was taking notes. Oh sure, she had thrown him an occasional bone or two, to keep up the facade of giving him information--all of which were obviously lies.
This explained her quick reversal of personalities, he realized. One day she's shy, the next day she's suddenly coming out of her shell. He had assumed that this was the product of the sudden attention he was giving her. He had made her feel special. Of course she would be more confident. But no, she was merely moving from Act One into Act Two.
This is low, Father. Even for you.
He checked the time. He was to meet her for dinner soon. That was obviously out of the question at this point. He could never been seen with her again. It made him sick to think that he had almost appeared in public with her. How stupid. They would almost certainly be photographed. And then the world would be frantic to know who she was. It would only take a quick search on the nets to find her true identity. He didn't want to think what other pictures there might be of her out there.
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