April 4: A Different Perspective (12 page)

"What did you two do to be unwelcome in America?" Dan directed back to Brockman.

Eric looked at Isaac and he shrugged, as if to say, "What are you going to do?"

"We shot the President and uh, most of his immediate detail. They were going to put us against the wall and shoot us, because Hadley was off his nut and running things by decree. He was angry we dragged him out of the Deepwell bunker before it collapsed."

"Well that's gratitude for you," Gunny acknowledged.

"I know you," Brockman said, looking at Gunny hard, trying to place him.

"Master Sergeant Mack Tindal. Call me Gunny. I was third, in the combat handgun nationals, where you placed first."

"What else do you do?" Eric wanted to know.

"I'm an armorer. If it's small arms I pretty much know it and what makes it work. I do training and evaluation. Set up testing regimens and remedial help for shooters having troubles."

"How did you get kicked out?" Isaac asked bluntly.

"I was caught between factions when they tried to do a coup on Wiggen and I had no confidence I wouldn't be unfortunate collateral damage, so when I had a little problem guarding Miss Lewis in Hawaii I joined her in evacuating to Home."

"What sort of a little problem?" Christian Mackay inquired.

"We were having a pleasant barbeque around the pool and aircars started dropping in the woods nearby and a Chinese nuke sub decided to lay a cruise missile on us. Ruined the party."

"You had assets to deal with that great a threat level?" Mackay asked amazed.

"In theory I did and found I was cut off from all of them. Miss Lewis had to handle it all herself. If you get to know her you'll find she doesn't have a subtle bone in her body. She went straight to heavy laser fire and orbital bombardment to solve the problem, but we still found it advisable to evacuate a compromised position. The retreat involved other people and resources I'd rather not discuss," he informed them, making an obvious conclusion.

"Like the rest of you so far, I got caught up in North American politics," Otis Dugan admitted. "I'm another ex-military gun mechanic and just spent two years working for Safety Associates of Atlanta. I recently had to visit Los Angeles for them and was on the same flight as a fellow intent on visiting the city for the purpose of assassinating President Wiggen. He nearly succeeded too," he added.

"I watched the Navy boys arrest him and escort him back to Atlanta. They never let him off the plane. However they did not cover as far as anyone picking him up. When I got off they mistook me for him and I got handed their operation on a platter to bust. I wanted to emigrate off world anyway, now was a perfect time because I doubt they would show proper gratitude for my interference, like Brockman and Friedman here found out, no good deed goes unpunished. I hated to leave my boss so precipitously, because he was treating me well, but I fled on the first shuttle I could book."

"I don't know," Brockman told him. "
Our
principal was off the wall crazy. Are you sure they wouldn't have thanked you? Given you a reward even?"

"The government seems deeply infiltrated with Patriot party and other radical elements. It's hard to know safely with whom I'd be dealing. Their gratitude might last as long as Wiggen stays in office and then I'd get my proper reward in their eyes. I might get a Freedom Medal I wasn't allowed to show anybody, but I doubt their largess would extend to allowing me to keep the fee the assassin was paid," he predicted. That got a round of hooting laughter.

"How about you?" Gunny directed at Lee Chen, "I was told you'd be here and informed Brockman after I told Miss Lewis I needed a few hours off. I was told very little about you except we have mutual friends unnamed. What do you bring to the table?"

"I too am a refugee. I am persona non grata in China. I am however free to travel on a Vietnamese passport. I also have fled to Home but find myself too poor to retire, given the prices we found here. My skills are more agency oriented and I have active contacts in Asia that could be of benefit. I also appear to be the only one with a family. That will color my view of risk taking. I'd hesitate to do mercenary work, unless no other employment presented itself."

"Will that be a hindrance other ways?" Gunny wondered. "Will you be worried they may be taken hostage, or slip and reveal something?"

"I was in Vietnam when it became obvious it would be prudent to leave. I dropped a code word on my wife and she and the children got themselves out of China with no hard exit plan laid out for them. They not only secured transportation, but helped other families of agents leaving. My wife and twelve year old boy killed the chief police agent in charge of preventing them from leaving, when he attempted to arrest them. I don't think they will hold anyone back. Indeed I'd not hesitate to use them as assets, in the proper circumstances."

Ruby chose that moment to approach their table and set a vacuum flask of coffee on the table for them. "Whatever mayhem you rough characters are hammering out, if you need an expert space ship pilot with combat experience and a proven history of destroying both USNA and Chinese spacecraft, come see me. My man Easy is the
best
hot pilot on Home and he'd be cut to the core if something went down and he didn't get a piece of it," she promised them. Then she turned and marched away without waiting for a reply.

"Well, we seem, transparent," Chen said dismayed.

"I wouldn't worry about it," Gunny told him. "I'm assured nothing gets past Ruby," who he named, since she hadn't bothered to introduce herself. "I am also assured by reliable sources she holds information rather tightly," he promised.  Brockman and Friedman shared a significant look, but stayed silent on the matter. "I doubt anybody watching thought we were a book club meeting," he pointed out.

* * *

Back on the Moon, Heather was looking at samples of the sintered iron products the Armstrong people were making. There was a rifle barrel, threaded objects and gears using ingenious forms and cores. However, creating panels big enough for airlock doors was going to be challenging. Jeff was experimenting with spraying and sintering them in layers like a 3D printer instead of pressing and lasing them. The density was slightly better too. That might be to the good, because the microstructure from the first method was perfect for retaining lubrication, but she was worried all but a surface layer was still somewhat gas permeable and would leak if both the surfaces had any cracks or damage at all.

"Do you have your com off?" Johnson asked from the com shack.

"Yes, it's set for you, April and Jeff. Anybody else can wait until I get some work done," she said firmly.

"I think you should take this call," he insisted.

"Connecting," she said begrudgedly. It was President Wiggen waiting, looking right in the camera. Heather actually smiled. "I thought you disliked me too much to ever call," she said surprised. "At most I'd have expected an underling. What can I do for you?" she offered, quite pleasantly.

Wiggen blinked a few times, like she wasn't expecting such a warm welcome. Then she unaccountably smiled too. "I had my doubts a sovereign would accept a call from an underling," she told Heather. Serious or taunting Heather couldn't tell for sure, but she was smiling.

"I'm not that full of myself yet," Heather informed her. "I have not started terrorizing my peasants to build palaces, nor started collecting gold plated weapons, as is traditional."

"But you are allowing your people to pursue a case before the world court, that is embarrassing us all out of proportion to your size and resources," Wiggen accused gently. "This legal case is just another embarrassment that my opposition can use against me. Do you really want to do anything that helps put one of the anti-space crazies sitting in the White House?"

"I actually advised my people to not pursue that case," Heather informed her. "If they wish to do so I will not go to the extreme of forbidding it. I helped them stop being oppressed, but my justice won't reach to make them
whole
, so I can hardly deny them that justice wherever they can get it," she reasoned. "If I make them shut up and accept the treatment they fled here to avoid, then in their eyes I will have joined those oppressing them. How long do you think I'll remain in charge here in that case?"

"But the court is for states," Wiggen pointed out. "they couldn't file with just your permission, it had to be with your cooperation. Besides, I
have
directed the abuses that were listed be corrected and I specifically told Armstrong not to pursue payment for the things taken that were necessities of survival. That seems to me to have gone a long way towards making them whole as you say."

"Your people just give you a briefing summary, don't they?" Heather asked. "I bet you never saw the actual World Court document, you were just told it existed."

"Yes, of course I operate from summaries, I do have a country to run and frankly there are not enough hours in the day already to wallow through legal papers."

"I know the feeling," Heather allowed. "If you had the whole thing in front of you, then you'd see it was not filed for The Central Lunar Kingdom, it was filed on behalf of the Kingdom of Tonga. Your people apparently didn't find that significant. We have a special relationship with Tonga, that has certain reciprocal rights guaranteed for each of our citizens to enjoy in the other's territory," she explained.

"The King is very worried his subjects here will not be safe, nor their property rights respected, until we have normalized relations with Armstrong and by extension the entire USNA. He will not even allow them to come up here until it is resolved. I could not overrule him without a breach and the agreement is important to us," she assured Wiggen.

"So far your people in Armstrong have not
done
what you say you ordered. They will not pass com calls either way. They have tried to lure critical personnel back, because of problems with systems, but refused to reply when any inquiry was made about wages or conditions on the basis of it being a re-hire. Nor to offers made to act as consultants. If they didn't intend to ask for equipment back, or payment, they never communicated that to the people holding it," she added.

"I wouldn't believe you, if you hadn't been right before about my administrator taking it upon himself to chase after his eloping employees. I've given the orders to correct every complaint in the legal brief and I had the acting head of the colony returned under arrest."

"Elopement is far too gentle a term for serfs fleeing for their freedom," Heather told her, but calmly. "From a practical point of view, the administration over at Armstrong is corrupt from the top down. I doubt you will get compliance to anything but their own local desires, until you remove everyone who had
any
administrative authority," Heather predicted.

 "I'll straighten it out if I have to rotate the entire population out," Wiggen promised grimly, grinding her teeth. "I appointed a special investigator and he will crack heads if he has to, in order to see my orders followed down to the least detail."

"Thank you for believing me," Heather said and meant it.

"I'll get back to you," Wiggen said. "Oh and when you speak to your friend April, tell her I said thank you," and gave a big wink before she disconnected.

What was
that
all about? Heather wondered, mouth hanging open.

Chapter 17

April had a plate of pecan pancakes rolled around sliced bananas, surrounded by a ring of sliced strawberries and buried under a mound of cinnamon whipped cream. Wanda dusted the top of the whipped cream with nutmeg. She was getting to be
almost
as good a cook as Ruby.

Dr. Ames, A.K.A. Jelly, came off the serving line and lifted an inquiring eyebrow to test if he could join April. Gunny was running a business errand for her. She gave him a little wave and pushed the chair opposite her out with her foot. They hadn't spoken recently.

"Are you still whipping all the vacuum rats at handball and betting on it?" April asked.

Jelly had the good grace to blush at that. He hadn't known until now she was aware of his little money making side line.

"That well ran dry. It took awhile, but despite a deep reservoir of gigantic egos, the young fellows finally had to concede I'm the All-Home zero G handball champion," he boasted.

"Until you sell your reflex enhancing treatment to a better player," she predicted.

"In which case I shall play for just the love of the sport," he promised her.

"Are you able to support yourself now with the gene business?" she inquired, hopefully.

"Almost. I've been getting some clients from off Home. I'm well along on having some new services and I got your man Gunny to sell me some cheek swabs so I am trying to see what about his genome makes him naturally fast. It's very interesting," he avowed.

"What kind of new stuff are you pushing?" April asked.

"I have a modification that makes your body produce vitamin C," he informed her.

"A whole big bottle of it is pretty cheap," she reminded him. "And I like an orange juice most mornings anyway," she added.

"Yes, but Jeff and his minions are speaking of
very
long voyages. It simplifies nutritional requirements in a closed system. You'd be immune to scurvy and it would breed true."

"Still only attractive if the voyages are
years
," she insisted.

"They might be. Einstein might be right and slow is the only way to go to stars."

"I was supposed to ask you about that and never did. How about freezing us, or at least letting us hibernate, so we don't run out of food and go nuts of cabin fever on a trip?"

"I have not even started to look into hibernation," he admitted. "It is complex and highly variable. It's not the simple thing people draw in a cartoon, of a bear in a cave."

"So you
have
looked into freezing people?" April immediately pressed.

"A little. You might need a gene that flooded your system with a sort of antifreeze on some trigger, like some fish use. But there is no telling what it would do to a mammal. It might have very adverse, even lethal effects. It might make you stupid, or sterile, or susceptible to heatstroke, or for all I know even make you
stink
," he predicted. "Nobody has even tried it on a mouse."