Revolution World (23 page)

"Local government offices have always found ways to hide money they need from the nationals, but now we are ramping up big time," Clio continued. "The national government wouldn't give us enough for police and fire stations so there's a whole group of accountants juggling the books so that we look broke, but we have what we need."

Seth shook his head. "How is it possible for your group to accomplish all that? You'd need top hackers working night and day."

"Well, we've been at this almost six years now," she said with a shrug. "It started as small acts of rebellion. Myrna at the county office spills a drink all over the server that stores all the mineral rights data and then makes sure that the new data doesn't contain any information about oil deposits or water reserves."

"I see. It sounds like you are trying to keep the government from arresting people with the kind of money or resources that might attract their attention," he replied. "That's kind of a roundabout way to do it."

"We have more direct methods. We operate an underground railroad for people trying to escape military detention or flee the country. That's our 'terrorist kidnappings.' They've been taking up quite a bit of our time and money the last two years. The government is totally out of control with these arrests," her voice rose.

Seth stared out a window as he turned it over in his mind. It really was astounding how quickly you adapted after you found yourself down a rabbit hole with mad hatters and tea parties.

He was impressed at how much they had done and terrified at how swift the US government's vengeance would be if they ever found out. He doubted being a foreign citizen would slow their hand even in the slightest. "You really need my help."

"Oh God, yes," Clio replied. "We need so much help."

"I don't think it's a good idea to involve Omerta," he said at last. "But I think Max might like to join. If your family is involved, he'll want to play rebel too."

"Not all of them are," she cautioned. "We don't involve Terpsi because she's got the kids and the town needs its doctor. And my Mom has refused to even hear anything to do with it."

"Really? This sounds like the sort of thing you mother would be running. It's so organized," Seth replied, typing in some calculations into his handheld. He was already planning out some possible applications.

Clio took his comment as a compliment. "Well, we try to be organized. After we lost a few people to the prisons, we were pretty motivated to save as many as we could."

"You really need to think about defense. By which I mean weapons," he said, pointing out the glaring hole in their plan.

"Oh we do," she replied. "Jason is on that committee. He thinks it's hilarious that they keep sending money and weapons down to help us control the 'Terrorist Threat.' All the guns and ammo go right out of the government warehouses into our hidden safe houses. It's a lot easier to be a terrorist when you get all your bombs from the military for free."

Seth snorted. He would have laughed, but he still wasn't ready to like Jason.

"That group started before the resistance group did, really." Clio bustled around, cleaning up the evidence of their earlier tequila-tinged antics. Seth watched her sadly. Someday, he would get to just spend a quiet evening at home with her. But not tonight, apparently.

Clio explained, "They got worried that with all the wars the US was fighting abroad and all the ill will our foreign policies were creating, the US was making itself a huge target for foreign attack. And they didn't have to look around too hard before realizing that the US wouldn't be able to protect Texas if that happened. So they started doing it themselves."

"How? Local militias would be one way I guess, but that would be pretty obvious," Seth said.

"Not if the local militias are just rednecks playing a stupid computer game," she grinned. "And they have other irons in the fire. I don't know what all, but they have plans." She answered the next question she could see forming on his lips.

He blew out a slow breath. "This has been an overwhelming evening."

Clio sat next to him and held his hand. "I know. I'm sorry. I wish things were easier."

He pulled her into his arms. "I'll take what I can get."

Clio made a happy noise. "So you still want to date?"

"Are you kidding? Hell yes, I want to date. I'm now a member of a vast conspiracy to undermine the government. Without love, I'll turn into an alcoholic for sure."

She gave him a steamy look. "Well, we can't have that."

CHAPTER NINETEEN

T
he senator was already waiting when the governor arrived at the Elephant Room. He waved him over to a different table than their usual.

"Does that not look like the shiftiest little weasel you ever saw?" the senator growled as soon as the governor had turned on his scrambler. He pointed to a man slumped in their usual booth. He was a singularly unimpressive specimen.

"He's probably just depressed about this current attempt by our totalitarian regime to destroy all that is good about America. I know I am," replied the governor, dismissing the unfamiliar man with a wave of his hand.

"What's got you in a snit?" asked the senator, pushing a beer into his hand.

"Oh, not much. Just the federal government trying to requisition the Texas oil reserves," the governor said after a healthy gulp.

"They've been doing that forever," the senator said.

"No, not stealing from private citizens. They want our public oil reserves. The ones we use to fund the university system," the governor said. He just barely stopped himself from bellowing. Only the look of horror on the senator's face kept him leaping up and pacing about. "Did you turn off your handheld or something? It went out two hours ago."

The senator dove into his coat pockets and pulled out his handheld. "Are you sure?"

"Of course I'm sure. They are probably trying to keep Senate and Congress from finding out until it's too late to do anything about it," the governor replied darkly. "They can't think they will get away with this."

"How will we fund the universities?" asked the senator, bewildered. "This can't be right. They wouldn't do that. The right to our public lands and mineral rights is the basis of our membership in the United States at all. It was in our annexation agreement back in 1845. Texas retains all rights to public lands. That includes mineral rights. They can't try to take that away."

"This isn't the time for a history lesson, Joe. We need solutions and we need them now," cried the governor.

"Screw the beer, I need something stronger." The senator suddenly looked like the old man that he was. "How did it come to this? How can we protect ourselves?"

"I have some ideas," replied the governor. As they mapped out their plans on bar napkins, Shiva and Medea entered the bar. They made straight for the unimpressive man sitting at the governor's normal table.

"Why don't you have the information for us yet?" Shiva hissed at him.

The man looked startled and began to shift away from her as though she were a poisonous insect.

"What are you doing here? I can't be seen with you," he replied as Shiva slid into the booth with a shark smile. He looked around quickly, and then asked in a low voice. "Are you people crazy? When I said to create a distraction so we could break into the lab again, I did not mean blow up a building. An embassy, no less."

"We will do whatever is necessary to finish the project. Right now you are not helping us, even though we gave you quite a lot of money to do so. Please don't make us try to think of ways to get our money's worth out of you," Medea hissed.

"Maybe we should just take you back to our labs and start yanking out your fingernails until you are properly motivated," said Shiva with an evil glint in his eyes.

"Shiva here made some truly horrific mistakes using the notes you took," Medea chimed in. "Maybe we'll stick you in a cage with one of them at feeding time."

"Now, wait," replied Eric in a panicky tone. "You can threaten all you want, but there's nothing I can do. Really. What could I do?"

"Think of something," hissed Medea. "Impress us."

"And do it soon," said Shiva. The man bolted for the door. After a moment, Shiva and Medea slithered over to a table close to the stage. There was a short man with a fiddle and a tall woman with an accordion setting up on the stage.

The governor looked up, realized their usual booth was now empty and turned to tell the senator they should move. The senator was busy glowering at a loud group in the corner. The governor noticed the musicians and realized they were in for another night of experimental jazz. He made a mental note to order a round of scotch. He found that was the best anesthetic for experimental jazz.

"Those fools are obviously lost. They belong in one of the shot bars on Sixth Street," said the senator as someone from the loud group threw back a shot and the others cheered. "Not here where people are treating the business of drinking with the proper level of..."

"Sobriety?" finished the governor. The senator gave him a wry grin and flourished his empty glass by way of reply before he lurched off to the bathroom.

The governor turned his gaze to a table close to the loud group. He thought that the two people at the table were those Malsanto folks he'd overheard a few weeks ago, but he couldn't say for sure. His eyesight was going again and he hadn't had time to go get it fixed. They were obviously arguing about something. He wondered if they had given up bothering those Floracopia women.

After overhearing them, the governor had been interested enough to look up their company, Malsanto. If he had to guess, he'd say these two were under a military contract for something that they weren't able to provide. He almost felt sorry for them.

The military was not forgiving to those who didn't give them what they wanted. Not forgiving at all. Most of the military research facilities were staffed with scientists who were little better than indentured servants. That's what happened when you failed to fulfill a military contract.

After observing these two bickering away for the last hour, the governor thought the world would probably be a better place if the military threw them in a hole somewhere. That would keep them from bothering normal people who were just trying to get through the day.

"There must be a way to get access to their notes," Shiva said to Medea, though his eyes never rose above his feet. "Maybe we just need to go to Gordon and tell him everything? Maybe he'll have a way out of this mess?" Shiva proposed.

Medea rolled her eyes. "Go to the CEO and tell him we utterly screwed up? What a great idea. I'll be sure to bring a sword so we can commit ritual suicide in his office right afterwards. He'll find that amusing."

"He's got to suspect something is up with all the trips we have been logging down here," Shiva pointed out.

"Are you kidding me?" Medea croaked, choking on her drink. "I had to seriously shuffle the numbers to hide all the fuel expenditures. He thinks we are locked away in some lab too deep to get globenet signals for the weekend."

"We have to tell him something. What else can we do?" said Shiva. "If only we could actually call up our powerful military buddies and send them in to bust heads."

"I know, believe me," she replied, tapping her foot unconsciously. "But to do that, we'd have to admit that we don't have anything for them. And it's off to the salt mines for the both of us, best case scenario."

At this point, someone from the loud group was standing behind Medea and telling a story that involved wild hand gestures. He stumbled backwards right into her chair, spilling beer all over her. Medea leapt to her feet with a shriek. The group was all apologies. Medea fumed at them for five minutes before they soothed her with free drinks.

"What brings y'all to Austin?" one of them men asked after Shiva and Medea said they were from out of state. He was a soldier. Something about the way he carried himself would never let him hide that.

"We're trying to do some business in Ambrosia Springs," Medea said.

"And failing miserably," Shiva added.

"At least we aren't the only ones," replied the soldier man. The rest of his group groaned and ordered another round.

"What do you mean?" asked Medea.

Some of the group shouted that they didn't want to talk business on their day off, but the soldier answered her. "We were dispatched from our unit to help DARPA test surveillance equipment out in Ambrosia Springs. I never heard of the place before."

Medea raised an eyebrow. Encouraged, he went on. "Well, come to find out, there's this group there that makes security stuff for the private sector. Omerta? Something like that. Apparently, they ate DARPA for breakfast a few months ago. DARPA's hot for payback and wants us to catch these guys with their pants down."

Shiva leaned forward to make sure he missed nothing. The soldier continued, "And after working down there, I can understand why DARPA's so pissed at these guys. Everything we come up with, they catch on immediately and they are such jerks about it. There's this snotty little nerd with his freaky girlfriend," the soldier said. He demonstrated his frustration by taking a violent swig of beer.

"I sure would like to get some dirt on those guys," the soldier man said. "It would be a real pleasure to haul those jerks off to a dark prison. But we can't just raid the building or haul them off for questioning on account of them being some sort of diplomats with powerful friends in the UN."

"Why don't you raid the girlfriend's office?" Medea suggested, as though the thought just popped into her head. "Involved with a guy like that, she's bound to be up to something."

"Lady, you're alright," the soldier said, slapping her leg in what might have been a flirtatious gesture if Medea looked and acted less like something that might kill and eat you after you mate with it. "That's the kind of thinking that's going to win this war. If I only had some kind of evidence I could take to DARPA's colonel. He'd love it. He's not too fond of those Floracopia women either. Of course, he's not too fond of anybody."