Glass Sky (8 page)

“Green Army goes too far. You blow up coal plants. You sabotage equipment.”

“And UNBio doesn’t go far enough,” snapped Ruth. She glared at Tania. “It’s only by pushing the boundaries that we make room in the middle. Green Army may be on the wrong side of the law sometimes. But that’s only because the laws are written by the people we are fighting against. We’re never on the wrong side of morality. And we never hurt anybody. Never. Can you say that about the people you spent the weekend with?”

Tania bit back a gasp.
Does Ruth know about Jim Wong? No. How could she?
But the words hit hard.
This isn’t Earthsayer anymore. This isn’t a tidy consulting contract, greening urban areas that have committed to reinventing themselves. Khan Tengri’s brought me into a war. And a lot of it will be fought online, with words. I need to choose my allies wisely.

“I’m sorry, Ruth. I can’t afford the risk.”

Ruth looked at Tania, as if understanding much more than Tania would have liked. She shrugged, reached into her pocket, and produced a business card. “If you change your mind,” she said, dropping the card on the table by the door. “Call me some time. I enjoyed hanging out with you.”

The door thudded shut. Tania picked up the crisp plastic card. “Ruth.” No last name. No email. Just a phone number.

Unpacking wasn’t nearly as much fun alone.

***

Tania pedaled up the final switchback to the front gates of the UNBio campus, a collection of sand-colored buildings perched on a flat hilltop overlooking the city. The sun had risen over the prairies, bathing the rocky fingers of the Flatirons in pink, and turning Boulder’s solar-paneled roofs to polished gold. She locked her bike, savored a breath of mountain air, then stepped through glass doors marked “UNBio International Headquarters.” Halfway across the lobby a hawknosed woman rose to intercept her, high heels clacking on the tiles.

“Doctor Black?” The woman looked at Tania’s biking clothes with obvious disapproval. “My goodness. I almost mistook you for a courier.”

Tania took a breath. “You must be Katherine. Glad to see you in meatspace. I’m sorry to arrive in such tragic circumstances.”

“Yes. Poor Jim. What a tragedy.” Katherine smiled, lips pulling back to reveal her teeth. “But at least you’re here to continue his work.”

The two women measured each other for a moment. As the Permanent Secretary for UNBio Katherine was the most senior civil servant and handled day-to-day operations, leaving Tania free to concentrate on high-level policy and science issues. So while Tania was technically Katherine’s boss, Katherine wielded significant power.

Katherine’s smile seemed to vanish, though her expression didn’t change. “I’ll take you up.”

Two flights of stairs led to a spacious corner office looking west onto the mountains. The carpets had been vacuumed, but the walls still had pins where pictures had been removed. Tania dropped her backpack on the fauxwood desk, next to two large displays.

“Your omni should have network access,” said Katherine. “The documents you requested are in your inbox. Don’t hesitate to call if you need anything.”

Tania changed out of her biking clothes in the corner, where she wouldn’t be visible through the hallway window. She hadn’t ridden hard enough to worry about finding the shower facilities today. She opened the cardboard box she’d had Percy ship from Seattle, and dug through its meager contents. Mainly pictures, old-fashioned ones, printed on paper and framed behind glass. She propped her parents between the two displays and pulled out a photo she’d taken last fall, just after she’d met Percy, when they’d hiked part of the John Muir trail. He’d framed it for her as a gift, saving it from the digital black hole where most of her photos went to die.

She let it thunk back into the box, blinking.
Keep busy. Best cure for a parting of ways.

She tapped her omni to the displays and waited for the systems to connect. A garble of random horizontal streaks moved across the screens. She wasted several minutes downloading updated video drivers, then opened the first of the documents Katherine had prepared. She scrolled through the pages, her fingers flicking faster and faster.
No. This won’t do.

“Call Katherine,” she told her omni. Katherine’s face appeared on the display. “Katherine, sorry to bother you so soon. I’m confused. The documents you prepared for me are summaries. I asked for full reports on our preserves. How much money are they getting and where is the money going?”

Katherine held Tania’s gaze. “The summary data tells you everything you need to know,” she said. “Your biospherics work is too important for you to get bogged down by accounting minutia. I’ll take care of the day-to-day details.”

Tania scrolled to a random line in the report. “Beng Per, Cambodia,” she read out. “$180K on waterway stabilization? No contractors are listed. How do we know this even happened?”

An almost imperceptible shake of Katherine’s head. “If the reports are too detailed, we lose flexibility.”

“I see,” said Tania. She rolled her shoulders to stop them from tightening. “Katherine. Please get me better numbers. I have to understand how flexible we are.”

Katherine emitted a low growl not meant for the microphone. “Please. Don’t just charge in, and start down-voting the work we’ve been doing,” Doctor Black. “It’ll be bad for morale.”

“I’m not down-voting anything,” said Tania. “I just want auditable data. Get. Me. The. Damn. Data.”

“Jesus.” Katherine sat back, mouth wide, her shock as false as her smile. “No need to get so uptight. I’ll get you everything. Give me a few weeks. In the meantime you can learn our processes.”

“A few weeks…? Never mind. Fine.” Tania hung up.
The UN’s given me two weeks to evaluate Plan B. I don’t have time for this.

***

Tania’s office door opened a few inches and a muscled man in jeans and a T-shirt appeared in the crack. “You wanted to see me?”

Tania studied Gordon Hill as he took a seat across from her. Between his ponytail and his ear stones, the head of simulations didn’t look near the 55 years his file indicated – a file that listed two reprimands from James Wong for “making statements harmful to the reputation of the department.”

“Sorry I couldn’t be more helpful when you called me from New York,” said Gordon. “Did you stop that freight train?”

“I slowed it,” said Tania. She gave an edited version of the back room meeting she’d had with the UN Climate Council. “Molari’s team is looking at a plan B. It’s potentially faster than the disk array, so we might avoid the need to sulfur. And hopefully it’ll be cheaper so that we don’t have to sacrifice our preserves to pay for it. But it’s got a terrible risk curve. I will need hard numbers comparing plan B to the original design. Integrate risk over time, and give me species loss and human mortality distributions. Treat sulfuring and funding as independent variables. Add sunlight control to the models as best you can.”

Gordon’s jaw tightened. “James Wong didn’t allow those types of simulations. Said it was…
speculative
.” He spat the last word like a curse.

“I prefer informed speculation to uninformed guesswork,” said Tania. She rapped her knuckles on the desk. “Can you do it?”

Gordon groaned. “I understand what you want,” he said. “But there’s so much uncertainty. We don’t even know what plan B looks like yet. Not that I have much information on the disk array either. And Wong cancelled independent preserve audits. He said they smacked of colonialism. It’s all self-reported now. So the data is sketchy.”

“Why am I not surprised?” sighed Tania. “I hadn’t gotten to the preserve audits yet. How bad
is
the data?”

“I couldn’t tell you for sure,” said Gordon. “But wildlife density in some preserves
doubled
the first time they self-audited. I think it’s safe to assume that for many areas we’ve got no meaningful statistics.”

Tania pushed her displays aside so that she had an uninterrupted view over the desk. “I’ve got two PhDs. I understand error bars and standard deviations. So do the best you can.”

Gordon grinned. “A UNBio Director who understands the science! What will they come up with next? How soon do you want my informed speculation?”

“The Climate Council is keen to get the disk array proposal approved by the General Assembly,” said Tania. “They want to start handing out aerospace contracts. I could only delay them two weeks. Molari’s team needs half of that to get us some details on their plan B. Assuming it’s even feasible.”

“So really I’ll only have a week?” said Gordon. “For two full planetary simulation runs. You don’t ask for much do you? Would you like the second coming of Christ with that?”

“No, the simulations will be fine,” laughed Tania. “The second coming would just be a distraction.”

JIE’S THEORY ABOUT lunar manufacturing had proven correct. Not an hour after leaving the launch facilities, Jie had received a video message informing him that Nanoglass was now the leading candidate for plan B. The night that followed had been largely sleepless.

‹Search: L1 Point.› Jie shoveled in a mouthful of rice. A group of blue-clad workers got up. Metal trays clanged as the cafeteria staff consolidated the remains of the buffet.

Wikipedia Summary:
Lagrange points are the positions in an orbital configuration where an object affected only by gravity can be stationary relative to two larger objects. In the Earth-sun system, the L1 point is 1.5 million kilometers from Earth (about three times the distance of the moon). Instruments at L1 orbit in such a way that they remain directly between the earth and sun.

‹Search: Lagrangian equations.›

Mathematical Summary:
Lagrangian points are the stationary solutions of the circular restricted three-body problem.

The lightening sky unveiled layers of detail in the desolate mountains on the other side of the frosty glass wall. Dark shadows became rocky faces, grey ridges became sculpted knives of snow.

‹Search: lunar manufacturing.› Jie tipped back his tea, hoping to squeeze out a few more drops. Wafts of coffee drifted, as if carried by the babble of a hundred conversations. Just minutes to the meeting.

Wikipedia Summary:
Practical work on lunar manufacturing dates to the lunar station from 2026 to 2034. The goal was to extract raw materials from the lunar surface to support a manned mission to Mars. As lunar gravity is only 17% of Earth’s and the moon lacks and atmosphere, items produced on the moon enjoy much easier access to space. Current techniques are most applicable in situations where large amounts of easily manufactured material are required outside Earth’s gravity well. Mining and refining technologies reached a moderate degree of sophistication. Manufacturing of more complicated products was limited to a few small-scale experiments.

Jie pushed away his scroll.
This is lunacy. What am I getting myself into?

He looked up at the sound of approaching footsteps. A frizzle-haired woman in a shapeless black dress strode towards him. She leaned across the table, a finger aimed at his chest. “I suppose you’re Tian Jie?” Her voice dripped acid.

Jie looked around, astonished, as if there might be another Tian Jie that he’d been mistaken for. “Ummm. Pleased to meet you.”

“I’ve been the materials engineer on this project for six years,” the woman hissed. “Six fucking years. Do you know – do you have any idea – how many materials I tried before I perfected Spidex?” She stared at him in contempt. “I have a Nobel Prize. What do you have?”

This didn’t seem like the time to bring up the four Engineering Brilliance Awards on his office wall. She looked familiar.
Nobel Prize? Patricia Ivanov?
The
Patricia Ivanov?
Jie hoped he didn’t look too startled.

“You can fool them, but you can’t fool me.” Ivanov’s head moved in abrupt increments, like a bird’s.

“I…,” stammered Jie.

“I. I. I,” mocked the woman, the sounds sharp, like the cry of a gull. “I will tear you apart before I see my work discarded.” She spun, stomping away from him. If she’d intended a dramatic exit, she failed. She tangled with a food trolley for awkward seconds before storming out of the cafeteria.

Jie envisioned Cheng trying to sneak the cup away from her.

***

His heart still pounding from his encounter with Ivanov, Jie followed a hallway lined with photos of satellites and rocket launches, to a glass doorway marked ‹Team Room.› He opened the door cautiously, as if Ivanov might be lying in ambush. A dozen people sat around a circular table: a typical engineering demographic, mostly women, not a suit in the bunch, and more electronic devices on the table than people around it. Jie relaxed.
Scientists. These are the people I have to convince. No. Not convince. I’ve already gotten enough money to stay afloat another year. My job is to give facts. Help them make a wise decision.

Nishad Singh paced the room’s perimeter, tapping his omni to each display to clear off the old notes. “Good morning, Jie.” Singh must have arrived during the night – very late, judging from the dark circles under his eyes.

All conversations stopped. A dozen sets of eyes sought their first glimpse of the celebrated newcomer. A woman with short salt and pepper hair rose to greet him, tall and square in her tunic and pants.

“I’m Sharon,” she said. “Sharon Steel.”

Jie gulped air like a goldfish as he made his way to an empty chair. Sharon Steel. Hero of Malapert. The only survivor of the final mission to the lunar station. Jie had been in university then; he’d watched her splashdown live on the web. Seen her tears when she climbed out of the capsule. The agencies had lost their appetite for risk after the accident, especially coming so soon after the Ganymede fiasco. A two-year safety inquiry had become a five-year delay. Then the ice sheets had crumbled and the world’s focus had turned inward. Mankind’s quest for the stars ended, swept away by the rising seas.

Until now.

Singh turned to face the group. “Molari proposed sunlight control technologies ten years ago, around the same time the UN created the Climate Council and started sulfuring,” he began. “Serious engineering started six years ago, which is when most of us joined.” Singh nodded at a hirsute Australian. “Jie – Paul Brumby. Paul has 180 patents in zero gravity robotics. Xiao Xing specializes in celestial mechanics. And Feng Hu works in artificial intelligence.” Jie scribbled notes on his omni so that he could remember the names and roles. He hadn’t heard of any of them before, but then, they wouldn’t have heard of him either. Science was too specialized, the frontiers of knowledge too distant. Even top researchers had no visibility outside their own narrow fields.

Singh made a few more introductions. “Our final team member will be here soon,” finished Singh. “Patricia Ivanov invented Spidex.” Singh smiled so broadly that he bared his teeth. “We’ve got very little time, so we’re going to run this meeting using an accelerated trial workflow. Patricia volunteered to be lead prosecutor against the lunar construction plan.” He nodded at Sharon. “Sharon will be defending the idea. She’s been flogging lunar manufacturing ever since we brought her onto the team. Now we finally have to listen to her. With great humility, I defer to you, Sharon.”

Sharon bowed, to a burst of good-natured laughter. “Jie,” she said. “Thank you for not using carbon or rare-earth elements in Nanoglass. A moon-compatible ingredient list makes this so much more feasible.”

“A happy accident,” said Jie.

“I am curious,” said Brumby. “Our ability to aim photons is critical. How does Nanoglass actually aim light?”

“We use quantum effect to channel light so it always come out of Nanoglass perpendicular to surface. If Nanoglass at two degrees to light source, light come out at two degrees,” said Jie. “We make simple molecular machines to change Nanoglass angle. Silicon is like carbon. It has four free bonds, so is perfect building block for protein-like machines. Each Nanoglass tile has molecular hinge on one end, and molecular lever on other. Electrons ratchet lever up or down.” Everyone was nodding.
Good, they’re actually following this!

Brumby was captivated. “How much testing have you done?”

Sharon broke in before Jie could answer. “Our engineering support group is working with Jie’s Beijing staff to verify Nanoglass’s optical characteristics; to save time, we should assume it works unless they tell us otherwise. Let’s concentrate on lunar-specific issues.”

At that moment an angular shadow jerked behind the frosted glass of the doors. Jie sensed a collective intake of breath. The door swept open and Ivanov strode into the room.

“Patricia,” said Singh. “Thanks for coming.”

“If you’d bothered to ask my opinion earlier,” she sneered, “I could have saved us all some trouble. However, I’m confident I can still provide a much-needed perspective to this clown show.”

The rest of the team watched the exchange with reactions ranging from bemused horror to embarrassment, but Singh shrugged it off. “Patricia, I’d like you to meet Tian Jie.”

She twitched her head in Jie’s direction. “Mmmm…”

“We met this morning,” said Jie. He offered his hand with what he hoped was a conciliatory smile. “I look forward…”

Ivanov brushed past him and dropped into a chair. “I don’t respond well to fawning admiration.” She gave Singh a withering look. “I can’t believe we’re taking Nanoglass seriously. It’s completely unproven. And we’ll be reliant on Mr. Tian here to make it work. Look at him. He’s a hack.”

Jie imagined putting a sword through her, though Sharon looked like she’d get there first.

Patricia slapped her omni onto the table, then snapped her scroll open to a medium tablet size. She reviewed her notes, then turned on Sharon. “So you want to replace our entire design and start from scratch? On the moon? How do I even critique something so absurd?”

“We’re not starting from scratch,” said Sharon. “Our government’s spent a trillion dollars on the lunar base. And the robotics this team created for the disk array are reusable. I’m offering to get 30 million kilograms of material to L1 for the cost of a getting a mass driver to the moon.”

“The moon base has been deserted for fifteen years,” said Ivanov. “What makes you think the facility is still usable?”

“We’ve got remote monitoring on most of it,” said Sharon.

“
Most
?” asked Patricia. “Very reassuring. I’m sure a few small failures won’t be a problem. Just nip over to the hardware store, right?”

“Or the 3D printer,” said Sharon.

But Patricia had done her homework: the moon-base was old, nobody designed manned spacecraft anymore, the mass driver technology was unproven. Sharon answered well, but enough doubts arose to induce a feeling of tension that saw everyone sitting forward in their chairs, searching for the solid ground of confidence. Within two hours, Jie was convinced that the moon base was a disaster waiting to happen.
Who would be crazy enough to man such a place?

Then it was Jie’s turn to be interrogated. Ivanov circled the table like a shark around a rubber dinghy.
Don’t let her intimidate me. Just tell the truth.

“You have no idea how to mass produce the Nanoglass tiles, do you?” she started.

“I haven’t tried yet,” said Jie. “But nanolabs and nanofactories are established technology, as you know.”

“How will you stop the iron particles from causing quantum fasciculation?”

Quantum what? Is she making this up? No, surely she wouldn’t stoop to such tactics.

“Never mind.” Ivanov humphed and looked at Singh. “Are you really going to make me do this?”

Singh sighed. “Please, Patricia. Constructive, not destructive.  You’ve made your point. It’s not easy. But let’s at least assume Nanoglass can be made on Earth, and concentrate on the lunar specific issues.”

“You can get anywhere you want if you start with a false assumption,” Ivanov said petulantly. “But fine. Jie. Nanolabs filter out completed particles using a gravity trap. How are you going to adjust for the lower lunar gravity?”

“I don’t know yet,” said Jie. “We will figure it out.”

“Excuse me, I’m lost. Can you explain what the nanolab does?” asked Sharon.

“It’s the step before mass production,” said Ivanov. “The nanolab is the machine in which people like Jie experiment with different manufacturing techniques. When they find one that works, they replicate it at a large scale in a nanofactory.”

Jie nodded. “And what Patricia is getting at is that at a nanoscale, a process that works on Earth may not work on moon. Things get really weird when dealing with individual atoms.”

Ivanov shot him a dark look, as if he had just stolen her thunder. “Which brings me to my next concern,” she said. “What about the particle polarizers? How will you compensate for the moon’s lack of magnetic field?”

“I don’t know that it will be an issue… External magnets perhaps? We have to figure that out, too.”

She stopped directly behind him, so that he had to twist his neck to see her. “Who’s we?” she asked. “Are
you
going to the moon?”

“What? Me? Of course not. Are you crazy?”

“So you’ll just simulate lunar conditions here on Earth?” She made a dismissive noise. “That’ll work well. We’ll just turn down the gravity.”

“I’ll use the software simulator,” said Jie.

“The software simulator doesn’t have configurable gravity,” said Ivanov. “I just talked to the designers. That’s why I’m late.” She looked down at her scroll. “I quote: ‘We don’t use a physics engine. Gravity is too complex on a quantum scale, and solving M-Theory equations is not practical in realtime. We interpolate loop quantum gravity using data that we’ve generated from experimental observation.’”

Coffee cups and electronics littered the smooth glass table. A dozen world-class scientists watched Jie squirm.