Moon Flower (38 page)

CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE

It was a little late in life for such things, Callen admitted to himself, but he had decided that he was going soft. It was one of those eat-or-be-eaten situations where coming out on top depended on nerve, ruthlessness, and outthinking the shifting alliances and temporary truces among those who were out to bring you down. Normally it was something he excelled at and thrived on, with adrenaline rushes that his system was deliciously attuned to. As he had anticipated, his sources on Earth were reporting that the story there was being twisted to make it seem that the
Ranger
had been dispatched specifically to effect
his
replacement after a negative assessment of his ability from an unnamed authority aboard the
Tacoma
. To forestall such accusations, Callen was taking them Wade’s head on a plate, tracked down and brought in along with his partner in a matter of days, and their whole subversive operation with the Cyreneans uncovered. And as a bonus he was delivering a renegade Milicorp undercover operative cleared by the people who assigned him to Callen, but whom Callen’s experience had taught him to watch nevertheless. They’d have a hard time nailing him with that record to point at.

But of course it wouldn’t stop there, because that wasn’t really what it was all about. That was merely the pretense they would play out for the sake of external appearances. In reality it was a hatchet job ordered by Joseph Corbel personally after the brat-bitch fed them the story that
Callen
had suckered her by intimating that he was in a position to recommend her as Cyrene’s ambassadress as an enticement for services rendered during the voyage out, when in fact an instruction to that effect had already come in.

Ordinarily it would have been a good fight, with Wade, Shearer, Dolphin, and the others who had been rounded up nothing more than unlucky victims to be written off if that was what the game called for. And over the years Callen had seen plenty of splattered limbs and entrails from collateral damage who had been a lot more unfortunate than these particular victims. Such had always been one of the things to be accepted about life. The world was a harsh place. But now he found it strangely troubling for reasons he couldn’t put his finger on. That was why he told himself that he must be going soft.

His attitude toward academics and intellectuals had always been contemptuous. They waffled and talked, safe within protective borders that others defended. He had watched them projecting themselves into fantasized alpha roles with affected verbal aggressiveness, but never incurring any real physical risk. But there was something about the way the people on Cyrene had quit and vanished that stirred a grudging admiration in him. Instead of fawning, groveling, and falling over themselves to pander to the whims of the institutions that succored them, like all the ones he had known, they had turned their backs on all of it and struck out into the completely unknown. Even on an alien world light-years from home, where the security symbolized by the one link to Earth should have been the overriding consideration, they had opted for independence to follow what they believed in. That took guts and conviction. And Callen thought he had glimpsed why they did it. Once again he was unable to pin down the specifics, but there was something about Cyrene, something vibrant and fresh in the culture emerging there that made Earth feel diseased and degenerate by comparison. And others who had sensed it had gone out to help build what could have been, and to become a part of it.... Yet he was a part of the powers that would destroy all that — just as they were equally prepared to destroy him. Why? Because it was what he had always been.

He thought ahead to the confrontation that awaited when he arrived on Earth. Even if he recruited enough pull on his side, made the right moves, and came out of it with all the tokens to establish himself as having “won,” the thought had little appeal. What would it all be for, really? To impress and gain the favor of worthless people who didn’t interest him? The phoniness and cowardice behind it all repelled him. He felt like a pit pony that had been allowed to see sunshine and know the freshness of open air, being taken back down to the gloom and stifle of the mine. It made no sense. He had hardly been out or seen anything beyond Revo base in the brief time he was there. But already, in some strange way that he didn’t understand, he was beginning to miss Cyrene.

The whine of the cabin door sounded, and a moment later Krieg appeared. He had been up in the communications room behind the bridge, checking on the latest to come in. Krieg was being recalled to Earth too, officially for “reassignment,” since he no longer had a role on Cyrene as Callen’s associate. Callen had little doubt that the real reason was to be pumped for incriminating information that could be used in the forthcoming bloodletting.

“From Cyrene,” Krieg announced. “The last of the natives who were being held at the base have been let go.” Callen nodded. That was to be expected. There were no grounds for holding them. Preferred policy was to induce them into dependence, not start a war. “The Terran property at Linzava has been recovered. No information on the progress of inquiries concerning Uberg and the others.”

“Anything new from Earth?” Callen asked.

“Just routine stuff.”

Callen motioned him down into the fold-out seat between the hinged surface that served as a desk and table below the com screen, and the washbasin. This was definitely not E Section accommodation in the
Tacoma
. “We need to talk about the reception party when we arrive. Something we have to be prepared for is that Borland could bounce the wrong way.” In a situation like this it was a legitimate consideration. The top management at Milicorp wouldn’t hesitate to dump Borland if it meant placating a client like Interworld, which meant that Borland would try to disassociate himself. In fact, Callen had already learned from a sympathetic quarter on Earth that a story was circulating to the effect that Borland had opposed the choice of Callen for the Cyrene mission and been overruled. Who but Borland was likely to have originated it?

“Fishes swim. Bosses do whatever it takes to save their necks,” Krieg agreed.

At times, Callen envied him. He personified the ultimate in reductionist materialism, viewing the world in its simplest mechanical terms, which he accepted pragmatically without moral scruple or value judgment. If he had been affected by Cyrene, he had neither mentioned it nor shown any indication.

“I want you to give me an account of the Amaranth operation,” Callen said. “Names, places, everything that happened. It doesn’t have to identify you as the originator. Just facts I can throw at people, that they’ll be able to verify if they check.”

For once Krieg managed to look surprised. “What does Amaranth have to do with it?” he asked. That had been the operation where they installed a controlled prophet in the king’s court through the device of a manufactured plague, which Krieg had masterminded before being spirited away to Cyrene.

Callen had decided it was time to reveal a few things. “I met Borland in a room in the San Mateo Marriott when he gave me the orders for Amaranth. It was a room that a friend of mine in the state security police recommended. They arrange for foreign visitors that they’re interested in to stay there.” Which was another way of saying that it was bugged. “I’ve got it all, Jerry. Even a vid of Borland and the hooker who showed up after I left. It’ll nail the line down all the way back to the treetop at Interworld. A veep at Milicorp didn’t dream up something like Amaranth on his own.”

Krieg whistled silently. What Callen was saying was more than a landmine under the other side’s position. The Asian and South American interstellar outfits would run with it. The questions it would raise could have repercussions that would last for years. The simple answer was, it
couldn’t
be allowed to get out.

“That’s... interesting,” Krieg said. He gnawed at the edge of a thumbnail and then smoothed it with a finger. His expression was thoughtful and distant. “Very interesting.”

Callen’s price would be a ticket to comfortable obscurity, effectively at whatever figure he chose to name. Even so, he found himself able to summon up little enthusiasm for the prospect. And he didn’t have to be told that life in such circumstances, for people who knew things that made powerful interests decidedly uncomfortable, had a tendency to be inexplicably accident-prone.

There had been an incident once, when Lang was with a Marine unit attached to a force occupying a city in southern Asia. It was in one of the endless actions involving insurgents who were sabotaging oil pipelines that had been laid from somewhere inland to the coast. The unit was on a house-to-house search detail for weapons, explosives, and suspects — kick down the door, go in screaming, knock down anyone who gets in the way. They were trained to disorientate and intimidate any opposition by shock, speed, and violence. The trouble was it could go to your head, and you got carried away — especially if you drugged up before setting out, as a lot of guys did. A terrified boy came out of a doorway onto the street and ran straight at them. Kids had been known to be strapped with bombs — at least, so you were told — and the man working flank to Lang’s right blew him apart with a six-round burst on automatic. The boy wasn’t packing anything.

Later, Lang was standing guard over a teenage girl and her mother who had been brought outside while the squad trashed the house and everything they owned, and beat up the males who hadn’t been hauled off in a truck. The girl had just stood there, staring at him, her eyes unwavering. She didn’t show emotion or attempt to appeal to any sense of humanity in him — implying that there wasn’t anything there to appeal to. In the end she said, “Why are you doing this to us?” Lang had no answer. He’d felt like a reptile.

The incident itself wasn’t particularly exceptional. The reason Lang recalled it now was that the boy reminded him of Mutu, the ferryman’s son. Similar in build and looks, about the same age, impatient to begin the great adventure of learning to become an adult and go out to meet whatever life had to offer. Young people on Cyrene didn’t spend extended childhoods in artificially structured social environments or immersed in electronic make-believe realities that had little relation to the real world and seemed only to generate resentment at being alienated from it. Cyrenean children began learning the skills of the farm and workplace, and assimilating the rules for getting along with others at an early age. Adults were expert at the things they knew they would have to know, and so commanded a respect that came naturally. Lang had never been interested in marrying and starting a family back home. He’d seen too many of the walking wounded that came out of being trapped in years of wage and tax slavery, and then seeing the kids that it was all for taken away and turned into monsters by the state. But maybe, if the day ever came when somehow he could go back to Cyrene...

“Jeff. What are you looking so lost in thought about?”

Lang turned his head to find Wade standing by the bunk. “Hey, Evan. Aw, this and that. At least thinking is something there’s plenty of time for here, for a change.” He swung his legs off the side and sat up. “So what’s up?”

“Some of us in the next room are setting up a poker table. Do you play? Five stud.”

“You guys might not know what you’re taking on here. You’re talking to the man who cleaned out the Marine Corps.”

“I’ll risk it. So are you in?”

“Sure. What are we betting?”

“Anything you’ve got that’s Cyrenean — coins, trinkets, buttons, beads. Lou says it all fetches good prices back home.”

“I’ve still got the pouch I was wearing when they picked us up — full of coins and things. And I think I might have a few pins and a hat badge.”

“Perfect. There’s no rush. We won’t be starting for about half an hour.”

Lang slid down from the bunk without using the steps and moved to the end of the aisle, where the stand with the coffeepot was. “Coffee,” he said over his shoulder as he filled a mug. “Now, that’s something I did miss on Cyrene. Do you think it would grow there?” He saw that Wade had followed him to do likewise, and moved out of the way.

“I don’t see why not,” Wade said. “Life there seems remarkably compatible. You’d need to talk to somebody like Dominic Uberg about that.” He poured himself a mug, stirring in some creamer, and eyed Lang as he took a sip. “What made you ask that, Jeff? Been having thoughts about going back one day?”

Lang grinned faintly and didn’t try to deny it. “Hasn’t everybody?”

“Has Marc talked to you yet?” Wade asked.

“Marc? What about?”

“He’s sounding people out on how they feel about going back to Earth. He seems interested in the ones who don’t have strong ties there and liked what they saw on Cyrene — like you, Jeff.”

“What’s going on?” Lang tried his coffee. It tasted good.

Wade shrugged. “I dunno. He hasn’t said. Maybe he’s thinking of writing a book.”

***

Jerri sat out on the wooden deck at the rear of the house in Ulla, watching the boats on the broad sweep of the Woohosey river. Nim lay by her chair, sprawled alongside Sakari’s
glok
, Roo — named by Nick. The two animals had become inseparable and were sleeping off the exertion of an afternoon romping around the town on expeditions to shops, and visits for Jerri to be introduced to friends. The first evening nip was in the air as Cyrene moved toward the cooler part of its orbit, and Jerri had put a cloak around her shoulders, over her sweater and skirt.

The laboratory and workshops at Linzava, higher in valley behind the town, had looked bare and dilapidated after being cleaned out of their Terran equipment and then subjected to the none-too-gentle attentions of the Milicorp soldiers, but since then the soldiers hadn’t returned. All the same, everyone had agreed it would be a prudent for her and Nick to move down to stay with his Cyrenean girlfriend. Sakari framed pictures and dabbled in printing decorative patterns, pamphlets, and books. Jerri had experience in editing and desktop publishing, and it seemed that each of them would have something to learn from the other. Nick had his eye on some empty rooms in the building adjoining the house, with a view to maybe setting up a physician’s practice.