Tomorrow’s Heritage (36 page)

The speech went on. All of it. Everything Todd had relayed from Fairchild and Ames and his own digging into the dark, putrid underlayer of Saunder Enterprises and those who had paid them to kill. The power dealings to gain votes. The swaps of property and slaves to make the Saunders secure and fat. The quasi-nation that had become a world-gobbling monopoly in critical fields.

“Mari, please answer me,” Todd pleaded into the com.

“Signal incoming, sir. Masked. I think it’s Goddard,” one of the crew said.

Todd woke out of frightened speculations. “I thought . . .”

“Breaking silence.”

No picture. Either Goddard wouldn’t send one, or the mask was so strong it wouldn’t allow images to penetrate. Mari’s disembodied voice, concerned, reaching out for Todd. “We hear him. Dian relayed us the tapes.”

“Okay! He means it, Mari. He really means it. All of it. Give.” us a chance!”

“The missile strikes . . .”

He ignored the regs, talking over her com. “The Spacers are trying to disarm. You know that. Your agents, Fairchild’s people—give them time. You’ve got to . .

A long pause, static-ifiled. “We read you, Earth ship.” Mari, but sounding cold.

“I’m aboard, Mari. If you shoot us down, you take me out, too.”

One of the crew interrupted. “Sir, tell your sister . . . tell McKelvey that we won’t return fire if they hit us. Our armament won’t be used against them. We’re Spacers. We volunteered.” Todd swiveled his head awkwardly, helmet still togged down, staring at them one by one. The Goddard isolation syndrome. Shuttle pilots and crewmen. They had known the risks when they took Todd aboard. Known his mission. Even if they survived to Goddard, there was still the chance the war would continue and they would be interned for months or years or the rest of their lives, people in limbo, citizens of Earth trapped on an independent Colony planning to go on out to Mars, not stay with Earth.

He did as they asked. Another long silence. This one wasn’t broken. The signal was there, still heavily masked. But Mari didn’t come back on the system to talk to him. There was no way of knowing if she believed Pat, believed him.

Pat’s speech ended. It had been a long one, breaking all Pat Saunder’s rules about leaving an audience before they got bored. Todd doubted anyone had been bored by this speech, despite its length. Pat had an awful lot to say, a whole lifetime of guilt to lay before them.

No adjournment to the V.I.P. lounge and the eyes of admiring colleagues and laudatory ComLink interviewers this time. The trial of Pat Saunder and Saunder Enterprises, accused of collusion in the murder of thousands in Antarctica, among other crimes, was beginning. The lenses stayed with Protectors of Earth assembly. Feedback—hostile, outraged, murderous—pouring in from ComLink’s systems on day and night sides of the planet. The procedure was going to last for hours, it was plain. Night, where Pat was, and it would be day before this session ended, perhaps another night and day from now. Not until he was freed. He was never, really, going to be freed. He had clamped the guilty man’s manacles on his own wrists.

Todd had to sleep. His systems refused to operate any longer. The screens glimmering, propulsion still coming on intermittently, pushing them to the acceleration limits, the soft, conducting-business murmur of the crew. Mari wouldn’t come back on the line. And Pat wouldn’t be able to. The would-be Chairman of P.O.E., his power still intact but his reputation in ruins, was enduring hell, verbally, accepting it, his chosen martyr’s role. Lulled, helpless to do anything, suspended between Goddard and Earth, Todd floated into dreams.

He awoke to monitors’ excited jabbering.

Missiles. Launched. From Earth parking orbit. And Goddard?

“Still holding, sir,” a crewman said. They were tracking the deadly climbers below. “Masked. We just penetrated the screen. Goddard’s picking them up, too. They’re about half an hour or less below us. I make it about seven of them . . .“

Todd was past being scared. The whole arsenal. One last gamble. And he was riding ahead of it.

“We’ll put you at Goddard if we can, Mr. Saunder. Then we’ll join their units and help them fight, if we can.”

“Fight them from here,” Todd said with sudden deciciveness. “Look, you’re maybe closer to them than the Defense Units . . .”

Their smiles were tolerant. “You’re a civilian, sir. And what you can do at Goddard is a hell of a lot more important than you could do getting vaporized in orbit with us. Hang on . . .“

He didn’t think it was possible for them to squeeze any more power out of the systems. They did. Numbers spinning wildly. Yet the ETA was a million kilometers away. He wanted to flog them to still more speed, get himself off the ship, free them to fight—free himself to convince Mari and Kevin.

Dian, safe planetside. Ames had promised.

Pat had promised, too, so much. And Pat hadn’t been able to fulfill those promises, thanks to Jael.

They rose ahead of the hostiles. Being shadowed. Again. Half hours and hours ticking, even at full power. Todd made wistful jokes about an improved ion drive and a Mars trip. The crew winced. They wanted such a system
now
. They pushed their own still more.

They barely made it.

Goddard fighters, Lunar City fighters—a lot of them coming out, patrolling and heading down. Todd braced himself, seeing the blips approaching. It looked very much like a collision course. He waited for the red streaks to lace toward him, convert him and the swift shuttle into molecules and tiny bits of debris.

The explosion didn’t come.

They had heard! They accepted! At least this much! The shuttle was going to be allowed past. At speeds that Todd couldn’t believe, they flashed inside the moving cordon of fighters, and another, larger blip began to form in the monitors. Goddard Colony, dead ahead. The shuttle decelerated, trying to bring all that tremendous velocity back under control, lest they become another form of missile.

Section Four had been hit again, Todd saw when they reached eyeball status. Not taken out completely, but hurt. And Section Three, too, was damaged. One of the orbiting attendant shacks was abandoned, a shattered hulk. Some missile had come in slightly off vector. It hadn’t nailed Goddard, but had gotten one of its workshop suburbs.

Docking grabbed them, Traffic somehow coping with the shuttle’s speed and nearly ramming it into the berth at the Hub. Todd was out of his safety webbing and clawing his way into the tunnel before the craft had fully engaged. Guards met him at the air lock, studying him a long minute, their weapons leveled.

Then Mari was there. Not closing with him. Not touching. Looking at him. “No weapons on me, Mari. The ship could have fired at you, coming in. The crew are with you. Give them a chance to help. They’ll give you the ship if you demand it. But it’s theirs. You know these people. They’ve carried Goddard Power Sats’ products before. Spacers. Fuel them. Let them fight those missiles.”

He was afraid his plea was in vain. Mari could order the guards to drag him and the crew off to Goddard’s version of the brig. Would she? She was talking into her suit com, blocking him from hearing her. He read Kevin’s name on her lips. Conferring? Telling Kevin what he had said? The guards were listening. Another exchange, again masked from Todd.

Then, behind him, he heard the noises of refueling apparatus connecting. Unexpectedly, the com mask was gone. “. . . turn around in six minutes. Give us your guidance key. We will direct. You are hereby deputized into the Goddard Defense Units.”

They were accepting the offer of the crew! They couldn’t afford to waste the ship. But it was a miraculous concession that they would trust this crew, even if they were fellow Spacers.

Mari swung her arm slowly, adapting to the null gravity. “Come on.”

Command center was at the Hub, behind one of those doors Todd had been barred from entering the last time he had been to Goddard. The place was like the hangar, like Pat’s subterranean control center, but even more concerned with survival and military efficiency. Goddard had had all too much experience with defense lately. And were they now going to get experience in offense as well?

Lunar Base’s military capabilities. Correction: Lunar
City’s
. Deserters. Revolutionaries. Kevin looked as if he had been on his feet for days. Leaning over his trackers’ shoulders, coordinating, keeping them. alive. The governor, but also the man at Goddard with the most training in exactly this sort of deadly game, and the people manning the systems looked to him for leadership. He couldn’t afford to sleep, any more than Goddard could afford to let the shuttle sit idle.

“More incoming, Governor. They’re going to try to get us good this time.” Trackers picking out the distant blips amid a horde of defenders. Somewhere another monitor was showing a huge blip, the shuttle, moving out of docking and swinging around for a plunge back down from L5 toward the intruders.

“This is McKelvey,” Kevin was saying to the Defense Units. “Don’t take any chances. We don’t need any pieces any more. Blow them to hell. We know who our enemies are now.”

He glanced up, at Todd. No hatred in his rugged face. Trust.

We trust you. Or you wouldn’t be here.

“Mari . . .” Todd reached out, caught her hand. Gloves between them. But she was there, and she didn’t pull away from him. They floated at the end of their tethers, looking at each other through their faceplates. “Pat did it. You heard it.”

“He’s lied before. Is this a campaign trick?”

“No! Mari, Kevin, believe him.”

“Quadrant five . . . !”

Screens flashed. Impact, out there. A missile? Or one of Goddard’s gallant Defense Units?

“One getting through, Commander—bracel”

The air seemed to boil. Concussion wave, Todd cataloged as he and Mari bobbed about helplessly, clinging to each other. Techs struggling for handholds on their tethers and stanchions, screaming orders and calls for Damage Control into their monitors and suit coms. “Rode him out!” McKelvey exulted. “Now get the next bastard!”

“Secondary, incoming!”

Todd hung onto Mari and the guide rails. Another shock, the command center’s power flickering. Somewhere, transmitted through the incredible immensity of the torus, a groaning, ripping sound.

“Damn!” McKelvey shouted. He managed to drag himself back toward the fire-control screens. “Hit them! Stop them! Everything! No reserve!” His breath rattled hoarsely in the com circuitry coming into Todd’s helmet. No masking devices shutting Todd out. He was part of it, like it or not. He had wanted to be in. He was, and a target along with everyone else at Goddard. Kevin shook his head, the helmet waggling. “Prepare to arm our offensive orbiters . . .”

“No! You can’t!” Todd yelled. He fought his way toward the man. Security blocked him, then moved aside as Kevin jerked a gloved hand. “This is the last wave, Kevin. Your agents have to have told you. You got Riccardi. Protectors of Earth is finally moving . . .” Todd pointed frantically at one monitor. ComLink. P.O.E. assembly. Voting. Pulling the plug on a dozen tyrants and generals and top-level payoff experts who had ruined the promise of Saunder Enterprises Antarctic Enclave. It was daytime in that hemisphere now. Hours had passed. A lot was being done—finally. Months too late. Time gap. Acting against Todd. Com lag into space. Missile launch time to reach target. If McKelvey acted to strike back, the missiles could hit even after the criminals had been caught and punished. And the war would start anew and engulf them all.

“Com!” a tech shouted. “Earth. Incoming through ComLink Geosynch HQ, top priority. For you, Todd Saunder.”

Todd dived toward the monitor the woman was indicating. “Pat? Is that you?”

Static. Scramblers? Overrides? Clearing.

Carissa’s face loomed out of the blizzard. Todd goggled in amazement. She was the last person he expected to use that priority privilege. He hadn’t realized she was even aware of the circuit or of her right to use it. The time lapse figured in again, maddeningly. She took an eternity to respond to his stunned “Carissa? What the hell?”

“Just got off com . . . Jael . . .” Carissa was panting, excited. The baby, Todd thought, then flung the worry aside. A world to worry about.

“Where’s Pat?”

“Heading . . . Saunderhorne . . . P.O.E. arrest escort.” Static as well as Carissa’s excited manner interfered with the words. “Going to . . . custody of Jael. Agreed to . . . public hearing . . .”

Behind Todd, Mari was saying, “She’ll buy her way out, even if Pat won’t. You know she will. She’ll get out of it. She holds credit on too many people. They’ll never make her pay.”

“Oh, Todd, they crucified him . . . terrible . . .” Carissa wailed.

Todd groaned. “I know. They had to. It’s what Pat had to do, ‘Rissa. He’ll be okay.”

“Jael . . .” Through the rotten signal. Todd felt the ominous note in Carissa’s little-girl voice. “Jael called . . . with. . . instructions. Legal. Trust funds for me and the baby . . . mustn’t depend on Pat . . . consult Eli firm regent clause in Pat’s will . . . Jael said I must . . . guarantee . . . could be tangle if . . . happened to Pat.”

The space station rocked from another concussive wave. Techs poised expectantly at their station, awaiting the orders to arm Goddard’s own missiles. There could be a whole deadly ring of them in lower orbit, ready to fire. A chance to get even and continue the madness. They waited. The order didn’t come. McKelvey was listening to Carissa.

Todd hung onto the com console so tightly he thought his fingers would break. “Pat? I’ve got to talk to him. Goddammit. ‘Rissa, clear the line! Dian? Milthail? Somebody! Put me through to Pat as fast as possible.”

A strong, feminine voice, United Ghetto States accent, broke in. “Working. Got it. You’re through, Todd.”

“Love you, Dian.”

Carissa was still with him, butting in. “I told you, Todd. That was the right thing to do, wasn’t it? Todd, you promised you’d give him a chance to—”

Ruthlessly, Todd cut her off. “Pat? Cut out the override, Dian. Tap those military types. Tell them I’ve got to get past that arrest escort’s com and talk to my brother. It’s vital. Pat?
Answer me
. . .”