The Unincorporated War

Tor Books by Dani Kollin and Eytan Kollin

The Unincorporated Man

The Unincorporated War

Dedicated to

Sgt. Eric M. Holke of the California Army National Guard

7/11/76–7/15/07

Wish you were here.

Believing in yourself can get you only so far. It’s others believing in you that truly makes the difference.

Ours:

Imma—For first giving us life and then for teaching us how to embrace it.

Abba—For teaching us to question everything.

Howard Deutsch—For the unenviable job of filtering us and, by extension, ensuring we live to write another day.

David G. Hartwell—For your stewardship, patience, and insight … and patience.

Stacy Hague-Hill—For the skill with which you’ve kept us on track, not to mention the unforgettable adventures in dining.

Patty Garcia—For working so hard on getting us out there.

Amber Hopkins—For helping to keep us there.

Edwin Rivera—For giving us a chance.

Robert Sawyer—For all the advice, insight, and support.

Alec Schram—For ensuring that our science is sound, and saving Ceres from near-certain catastrophe (nano-carbon Bucky scaffolding?—you genius, you!).

Richard Mueller of
3232design.com
—For allowing us to use a majority of his talent for a minority share of our future earnings.

Larry Carlin—For making this book better.

Facebook, LiveJournal, and Twitter readers—For keeping us going through the ups and downs, wild road trips, and never-ending search for the next NBG!

Dani’s:

Deborah—For eighteen years of holding hands, sharing dreams, and being my song of songs.

Eliana, Yonatan, and Gavriel—For always keeping me on my toes.

Carrie Bleiweiss—For ultimate dooberatiousness, apricot leaves, and so many wonderfully lost hours.

Insomniyakkers, Wolverines, and the Magnificent Seven—For helping me to set the bar on words and ideas hopefully equal to your intelligence, wit, and curiosity.

Eytan’s:

Doctor Miles Morgan—An ardent believer in socialism, he taught me what it means to be a true gentleman by giving me the books of Rand, Hayek, and Friedman. “If you’re going to be a capitalist, you may as well be an informed capitalist.” You did not have to give me the tools to defend my beliefs. You chose to, (freely).

Dalia Taft—For the gift of reading, which no other person in the world seemed to be able to teach me, and for having the patience to deal with a younger brother who has all the grace, social skill, and subtlety of a gorilla falling from orbit.

J
ustin Cord drifted on his back, arms clasped loosely behind his head, admiring the delicate mist moving slowly above. It was through these thin wisps of vapor and the eerily warm water flowing quietly beneath him that he would, on that rare occasion, find solace in a lake so big he would have called it a sea. He’d long gotten used to the fact that the horizon line curved upwards instead of down and that instead of a clear blue sky his vista was that of a magnificent mountain range above.

The inverse horizon was just one of the many oddities he’d had to struggle with by virtue of his forced exile to the belt. He couldn’t help it. When he thought “asteroid,” “small” came to mind. After all, Ceres was only a quarter the size of Earth’s Moon. What he failed to realize was just how huge the Moon actually was. Of course Ceres had changed quite a bit as a result of the planetoid’s first meddlesome settlers. Its orbit had been altered to match that of Mars in order to bring it into the elliptic plane along with all the other major bodies in the solar system. On top of that, the Cerians had dug down deep and were still digging. They’d hollowed out a two-mile-wide cylindrical hole through the center and then gave the rock spin for gravity. The early inhabitants had also taken abundant advantage of the fact that their home had miles of frozen water spread evenly beneath its surface. In fact, it had more H
₂
0 than all the freshwater on Earth. This meant that Ceres had lakes, lots of them, with some as big as seas.

And so drifting aimlessly a hundred meters from shore, staring down into the planet, Justin Cord could almost forget that there was a ceiling “behind” him holding in the massive body of water and that the power of centrifugal force ensured that it stayed that way.

For most born in the belt and accustomed to subterranean life, the idea of a sky was unnerving to say the least. Justin had heard stories of some belt-born with agoraphobia so severe that they wouldn’t dare venture outside on Earth unless they were safely confined within the sterile-aired, cumbersome embrace of a space suit. Since he’d never seen such a thing, he chalked it up to talk. Still, after being on Ceres for a little over a year he could certainly relate. In space you weren’t safe until you had a secure roof over your head, and even then you’d always check for leaks. For an off-worlder visiting Earth for the first time, the whole damned planet leaked.

With the new President of the Outer Alliance, the feeling was just the opposite. Try as he might, Justin couldn’t help but feel closed in. He hid it as best he could and took long walks in the great city parks where the “roof” was far enough overhead that he wouldn’t notice the absent sky. Time permitting, he’d sometimes wander into the forest where the trees were so tall and crowns so thick that he could imagine he was in a forest somewhere on Earth. But the thing Justin best loved to do was swim. He could forget where he was, forget all his problems as well as everyone else’s. Arm over arm, head back, Justin would sometimes think that if there were a heaven it had to be an endless ocean he could spend eternity swimming in.

But as usual, heaven would have to wait. Justin could make out the all-too-familiar hum of a hover disk approaching in the distance. It was a sound that elicited an almost Pavlovian response. The President sighed, continued his poor backstroke, and waited patiently to open his eyes until the craft was practically on top of him. It had gotten to the point that he no longer bothered to swim back to shore. He knew something would always happen that would necessitate a disk being sent out to get him. One day, he decided, there would be no emergency at all, no crisis, no feathers to be unruffled, and on that day he would probably drown. But that day was not today. After another hundred yards of backstroking to put off the inevitable, he gave up, stopped, and opened his eyes.

Omad was smiling down on him.

“You know I wouldn’t have come out if—”

“Yeah, yeah, yeah. Let me guess,” said Justin. “They found a monolith floating around Jupiter. Alien contact perhaps, no, maybe Mars revolted and joined the Outer Alliance.”

“No monoliths,” answered Omad, “not for lack of looking, mind you, but none yet. And any aliens smart enough to get into this neck of the galaxy would probably be smart enough to get out. And if Mars decided to join us,” Omad said, looking out into the distance, “it wouldn’t make sense to call us the Outer Alliance then, would it?” He then looked back down to Justin. “We would just be the Alliance, don’t you think? Mars is a core world after all.”

“Not in my day.”

“You’re a really old fart, Justin.
Nothing
is from your day.”

Justin laughed. “OK, Omad,” said the President, noticing his friend’s pained expression. “What is it this time?”

“It’s Eris, friend. Everyone’s waiting back at Cliff House.”

Justin was suddenly tired in a way that had nothing to do with the miles he’d just logged in swimming.

“Crap.”

Omad nodded sympathetically and then extended his hand, first making sure
to get a good grip on the strap in the center of the disk. The machine tilted slightly as Justin got on, but no more than three or four degrees. Omad tossed his friend a towel and without another word sped off toward the shore, where the world Justin had only recently created sat waiting.

“OK, listeners, this is
The Clara Roberts Show
coming to you live from Ceres for the first day of the provisional congress. By mutual agreement, no press or recording devices are allowed into the actual hall, but the delegates are always coming and going. Why, here’s Tyler Sadma of the Eris Colony about to enter the hall. Let me see if I can just ask him to talk to us…. Mr. Sadma … Mr. Sadma! A few words for the … Mr. Sadma …”

“No comment.”

“I am sorry, loyal listeners, but he pushed right past me. Seems his reputation is well deserved. Wait a minute … here comes Karen Cho of the Titan Colony. Miss Cho!”

“Hello, Clara, love your show. We listen to it on Saturn all the time.”

“Thanks for the plug.”

“Well sure, you guys always have a good slant about news from the corporate core. Lots of facts without all the Terran propaganda.”

“We try to keep the truth broadcasting for all to hear. You could help my listeners by telling me what’s going on behind the closed doors of power.”

“Clara, before we could have that power we’d all have to agree.”

“Agree on what?”

“Anything; I’m not sure we can even order lunch as a congress without calling a committee of the whole, and by the time we do agree it would be time for breakfast!”

“And I thought my job was tough! Miss Cho, got time for another question?”

“Sure.”

“Any chance the First Free will show up on opening day?”

“He says he doesn’t want to interfere with the formation of the legislative branch until we’re all settled in and invite him. And surely, Miss Roberts, you know the provisional President does not encourage the use of that nickname.”

“It’s what all my listeners call him. Who am I to argue?”

“Well, just don’t say it to his face. I heard a Plutonian tried that once and got stink eyed out of the reception.”

“Thanks for the advice. So beware, listeners; the President does not
like the distinction of being called the First Free. Apparently he feels it’s not appropriate for a leader of free people. So no one say it in his company! Wait till he’s not around. Thank you for your time, Miss Cho. If it’s true you’re being appointed the governor of the colonies of Saturn, good luck with it.”

“One job at a time, Miss Roberts, and keep up the good work.”

“Will do. This is Clara Roberts outside the newly completed congressional hall. We’ll be back after this message from the Gedretar ship works. Remember, if you can’t get a new booster from the corporate enslavers of the core planets, have yours refurbished—good as new—at Gedretar.”

—From
The Clara Roberts Show
AIR (Asteroid belt Information Radio) Network

Justin stood on a high terrace overlooking Smith Thoroughfare, one of three large, cavernous arteries carved deep into Ceres. Each one of the thoroughfares was a lifeblood of commerce and activity within the planetoid. Traffic, Justin could see, was unusually brisk. The first meeting of the Provisional Congress had brought the usual slew of bureaucrats, press, and hangers-on. Added to that were cadres of tourists who wanted to be a part of history. The streets were packed and the air above them was no different. All manner of hovercraft, drone, and person could be seen zipping to and fro. Justin’s balcony was officially in a no-fly zone, but that never seemed to stop the more tenacious of media outlets.