“We also need to create some reliable alliances,” Gore said. “A kind of political resistance network to counter the Starflyer’s influence. I’ll make a start on that.”
“Watch out for Columbia,” Paula said. “Now he’s aware you’re my sponsor, he’ll be gunning for your family as well. And his political influence is growing. Societies make a lot of shortcuts during wartime; as admiral in charge of domestic defense he’ll be able to issue orders that would never be countenanced in peacetime.”
“Don’t you worry yourself about that. Hell would have to freeze over for a long time before some Halgarth stooge outsmarts me.”
***
The little Boeing 44044 VTOL plane landed on the observatory pad amid a swirl of air from its electric jets, which stirred up quite a storm of sandy ocher soil and filthy ice granules. It fell away quickly as the fans slowed, and the flight attendant opened the hatch. Renne felt her ears pop as the pressure dropped abruptly. They were five thousand meters up in the western side of the Andes, just north of Sandia, with the rugged mountains forming a magnificent snowcapped vista all around her. Renne immediately felt short of breath, and sucked down a huge lungful of air. It made no difference at all. She got up out of the seat and scuttled forward, zipping up her coat over her thick sweater. The light outside was bright enough to make her pause at the top of the air stairs and put on her sunglasses. In the treacherously thin air, her breath formed little white streamers in front of her face.
Two officers from the Lima office of navy intelligence were waiting for her on the ground, wearing dark green jackets that looked more like space suits than severe weather gear. Getting down the five aluminum steps left her gasping for oxygen.
One of the men came forward and extended his arm. “Lieutenant Kampasa, welcome to Antina Station. I’m Phil Mandia. I was part of the team boxing McFoster on his way up here.”
“Great,” she wheezed. She could barely make out his face behind a protective amber-tinted goggle mask. Her heart was hammering away hard inside her chest. They had to walk very slowly over to the observatory buildings, a line of squat boxes made from dark plastic, with windows like portholes. Only one had any lights on inside. The three main radio telescope dishes were sitting on the big rocky field behind the buildings, huge white saucers balanced on improbably thin spires of metal. As she watched, one of them turned slightly, tracking along the northern skyline.
“How’s my prisoner behaving?” she asked.
“Cufflin? He claims he knows next to nothing, that he was on some security contract from an anonymous agent. For what it’s worth, I believe him.”
“We’ll know for sure once I take him back to Paris.”
“What are you going to do, read his memories?”
“Yes.”
Even with his face shielded by the mask, Phil Mandia’s grimace of disapproval was quite blatant.
Renne’s feet started crunching on the icy rime that bristled over the soil. There didn’t seem to be any plants anywhere, not even tufts of grass. She had to be careful where she trod; the ground was creased with deep tire ruts that had frozen solid. The aging yellow-painted vehicles that had made them were parked outside around the buildings, looking like a disreputable crossbreed between tractors and snowplows. A pair of new maroon Honda four-by-fours were drawn up beside them, sides splattered with thick brown mud.
“You came in those?” Renne asked.
“Yeah.” Phil Mandia nodded at the single bleak road winding away from the observatory. “It was a brute of a drive up here.”
“How the hell did you manage to avoid being seen by McFoster?”
“With difficulty.”
Renne wasn’t sure if he was joking or not.
They reached the main building and went inside where the world was warm again. It didn’t make any difference to Renne’s heart, which was still racing away. She had to sit heavily in the first office they came to. There was no way she could get up again, so she had to take her coat off while remaining in the seat, a simple act that made her even more out of breath. She couldn’t think how she was going to get back out to the VTOL again; the others might have to carry her.
“Doesn’t this altitude bother you?” she asked Phil Mandia.
“Takes a while to adjust,” he admitted.
Renne was beginning to realize how the local team resented her. Some big shot exec sent up to check on why the operation had crashed, looking to shift the blame onto a field team. It’s not like that, she wanted to say. But that would make her look weaker in his eyes. Office politics she could handle easily enough.
“Okay, let me start with the Director,” she said.
Jennifer Seitz was only five years out of rejuvenation. A small, trim woman with attractive green eyes and very dark skin, she wore a baggy chestnut-brown sweater that was long enough to qualify as a dress. The sleeves were rolled up, but even that didn’t stop them flapping around her thin arms. Renne decided it had to be borrowed from someone else about half a meter taller. The Director seemed irritated by the navy’s invasion of her observatory rather than intimidated or worried. Her forceful, dismissive attitude was outwardly softened by the beguilingly youthful smile that she could produce. Phil Mandia received an exasperated glance as he politely ushered her into the office; even that came over as mere petulance rather than genuine disapproval.
Renne pointed at the room’s circular window and the three big dishes outside. “Which one”—she paused, took another breath—“is pointing at Mars?”
“None of them,” Jennifer Seitz said. “The major dishes are for deep-space radio astronomy. We use one of our ancillary receivers to pick up the signal from Mars. It’s not a huge operation.”
“And are we sure it’s the Martian data which Cufflin supplied to McFoster?” Renne glanced at Phil Mandia for confirmation.
“There’s no trace of any of it left in the observatory network memory,” the navy officer said. “Cufflin loaded a tracerworm program to eliminate any record of the transmissions right after McFoster picked up the copy.”
“There must be other copies,” Renne said. “How long have you been receiving the data?”
The corner of Jennifer Seitz’s mouth produced an involuntary tic. “About twenty years.”
“Twenty! What the hell have you been doing with it?”
“We collect it for a science research association. It’s a very minor contract for us; less than one percent of our overall budget. It doesn’t even require human supervision; our RI can handle the whole process. The signals come in once a month. We receive them and store them for the association. Their project length is expected to be thirty years.” Jennifer Seitz caught the surprise in Renne’s eyes. “What, you think that’s long-term? We’re running some observations here that will take a century to complete, that’s if we’re lucky.”
“Okay, back up a moment here and take me through this slowly,” Renne said. “I didn’t even know the Commonwealth had anything on Mars. Where do these signals come from, exactly?”
“The remote science station on Arabia Terra.”
“And what sort of science goes on there?”
“Just about the full range of planetary science remote sensing: meteorological, geological—I should say areological—solar physics, radiation. It’s a long list; you name the subject and it’ll have its own set of instruments up there busy watching. They’re all over Mars, relaying their readings to Arabia Terra, which in turn sends them to us. Satellites, too. There’s four of them currently in polar orbit, though they all need replacing.”
“I never knew anyone was still interested in Mars.”
“Very few people are,” Jennifer Seitz said sardonically. “We’re talking astronomy, here, after all. Even after Dudley Bose came along, we’re not exactly the most popular profession in the Commonwealth. And there are planets in this universe a lot more interesting than Mars. However, a small collection of sensors operating over a long time can produce just as much data as
a shorter, more intense study. Actually, the data is more relevant when gathered over time, more representative. We have remote stations right across the solar system collecting little chunks of data and sending them back to us and the other observatories in a steady drip. Most Earth universities or foundations tend to have some small department for each solar body. They all struggle along on minimum resources, cataloguing and analyzing their information. But the instruments they use don’t cost much by today’s standards—they’re all solid state, and either solar or geothermal powered; they last for decades. Between them they supply just enough information to keep Earth’s few remaining planetologists in business.”
“I’d like a list of them, please.”
“The association which funds the Martian station is based in London, the Lambeth Interplanetary Association, I think. God knows where they get their grants from. I mean, pure science planetology in this day and age. You’ve got to be a real science philanthropist to support that.”
“What exactly is the project which the Lambeth Interplanetary Association is paying for?”
“I’ve no idea.”
“You don’t know?” Renne said it so loudly she had to take a fast breath to refill her lungs, which made her cough. She could feel a headache growing behind her temple.
“Not my field,” Jennifer Seitz said. “Strictly speaking I’m a radio astronomer; I work with the main dishes. They’re part of the Solwide array. Our baseline is Pluto orbit, which gives us one hell of a reception capability. It’s also why we have a lot of ancillary receivers here, to keep in touch with the Solwide units that are really far out. So you see, I have not the slightest concern in dust on Mars or tidal ice fracture patterns on Europa or the geoshell superconductor currents on Charon. Now if you wanted to know about truly interesting events like big bang emission rebounds or magquasar squeals, then I can entertain you for days on the subject.”
“Is anyone here a planetologist?”
“No. All we’ve got here is two radio astronomers—that’s myself and my partner, Carrie—and four technicians to keep everything running smoothly. Well…as smoothly as something as underfunded as Solwide can be kept running. And just to add to the richness of our lives, since the Prime attack, the UFN Science Agency is actually talking about shutting us down for the duration. I’ve got to produce proposals to mothball the whole observatory. I should have shoved this whole astronomy kick into a secure memory store at my last rejuve, and come up with an interest that makes me filthy rich. I mean, who the hell’s interested in supporting people who’ll quietly dedicate several lives to help expand the general knowledge base of the human race? Not our goddamn government, that’s for sure. Now I’ve got you people jumping all over us.”
“I’m sorry about the observatory,” Renne said sharply. “But there is a war on. The Commonwealth has to prioritize.”
“Yeah, right.”
“So has the Lambeth Interplanetary Association actually seen any of the data you were receiving for them?”
“No. Mars accounts for nearly half of the remote monitoring projects in the solar system. Their timetables are measurable in years. Admittedly, thirty years is quite long for planetary science, but not exceptional.”
“What kind of sensors were transmitting from Mars? Exactly?”
Jennifer Seitz shrugged. “I checked the contract when the shit hit the fan, of course. It doesn’t tell us much. The instruments we were recording just provided a generalized overview of the Martian environment.”
“Could you have been receiving encrypted signals in with the rest of the data?”
“Sure. I don’t know what from, though.”
“Do you at least have a list of the instruments up there?”
“Yeah. But, Lieutenant, you have to understand, we didn’t place any of them on Mars. Some were already there, left over from earlier projects; the rest have been deposited over the years by the UFN Science Agency’s automated ships. We have no control over them, no supervisory role. I cannot give you an absolute guarantee what any of them actually are. Simply because we’ve been told a specific channel in the datastream carries the results of a seismic scanner, doesn’t make it that in reality. It could equally well be information on Earth’s defenses for an alien invasion fleet. There’s just no way of knowing for sure, other than going there and checking the transmission origin in person. All we are is a glorified relay node.”
Renne didn’t like getting distracted, but…“There are automated spaceships working in the solar system?”
“You didn’t know that?”
“No,” she admitted.
“Well, Lieutenant, there have to be. It’s like this. None of us in the heady world of astronomy or solar planetary science can afford to hire a CST wormhole to drop a thermometer into Saturn’s atmosphere. Instead, we swallow our pride and group together; that way we coordinate our budgets to produce instrumentation in batches. When a batch is ready, we load up one of the Science Agency’s three robot freight ships with our precious consignment of satellites and sensors, and send it on its merry eight-year tour around the solar system. Then each and every one of us selfishly prays that the damn antique doesn’t break down before it drops off our own particular package. Tip for you, Lieutenant: when you’re in the company of Earth’s astronomers don’t ever mention the 2320 placement mission. A lot of colleagues left the profession after that minor catastrophe. It takes on average fifteen years of applications, proposals, review procedures, outright begging, and signing away your firstborn to get a sensor project approved. Then all you have to do is find the funds to design and build it. There’s an awful lot of emotional and professional investment riding away in that cargo bay.”
“Yes,” Renne said defensively; her headache was now pounding away inside her skull. She was sure she’d brought a packet of tifi. It was probably in her jacket pocket, hanging up several meters away—too far for her to walk.
“Thank you, I get the picture. Yours is not an overpaid celebrity occupation.”
“Not unless your name is Bose, no.”
“So to conclude, you have no idea what you’ve been receiving from Mars for twenty years?”
Jennifer Seitz gave an apologetic smile. “That’s about it. Although I’d like to go on record as saying I’ve only been Director here for seven years, with two years absent for rejuvenation. I didn’t take the contract, and none of us were involved with it. The whole thing is run by a couple of subroutines in the RI.”
“Who did begin the contract?”
“Director Rowell was in charge when the Lambeth Association began the project. I think he moved to Berkak; he was offered a dean’s post at a new university.”
“Thank you. I’ll have him questioned.” Renne sucked down more thin air; the lack of oxygen was making her feel light-headed. It wasn’t an unpleasant sensation, but her thoughts were sluggish. “Tell me something. In your opinion, what could possibly be on Mars that would interest a bunch of terrorists like the Guardians?”
“That’s the really dumb thing about this: nothing. And I’m not being prejudiced because I’m a radio astronomer. The place is a complete dump, a frozen airless desert. It has no secrets, no value, no relevance to anybody. I’m still half convinced you people made a mistake.”
“Then tell me about Cufflin.”
Jennifer Seitz screwed her pretty face up. “God, I don’t know. He was just a technical assistant; a mundane time-serving tech working in a pisspoor Science Agency job to pay his R and R pension. Up until yesterday I would have sworn I could have told you his entire lives stories better than he could. And incredibly boring they all were, too. We all spend three weeks on duty crammed together up here, for which we get one blessed week off. He was actually assigned here three and a half years ago. So I don’t like to think how much time that means we’ve spent living, sleeping, and eating in this very same building since then. Now it turns out he was part of some terrorist plot to take over the Commonwealth. Jesus! He’s Dan
Cufflin. Seven years short of rejuvenation, and desperate for it to happen. He loves curry, hates Chinese food, accesses way too much softcore TSI soap, had one wife this life which ended sour, visits his one child grandkid every year at Easter, his feet smell, he’s a second-rate programmer, an average mechanic, and drives the rest of us nuts practicing tap dancing—badly. What the hell kind of terrorist enjoys tap dancing?”
“Bad ones,” Renne said dryly.
“I can’t believe he did this.”
“Well, it certainly looks like he’s guilty. We’ll confirm that for ourselves, of course. I expect you’ll all be called as witnesses at the trial.”
“You’re taking him with you?”
“I certainly am.”
Somehow, Renne managed to hobble her way back to the VTOL plane without being too obvious as she leaned up against Phil Mandia. Two navy officers escorted Dan Cufflin onto the plane behind her. He was pushed down into a chair on the other side of the aisle from Renne. Malmetal restraints flowed over his wrists and lower legs, holding him secure. Not that he looked as if he’d make a break for freedom. Jennifer Seitz had been right about that. Cufflin, a tall man who had managed to avoid becoming overweight, was very obviously approaching the time when he needed a rejuvenation. Worry and a defeated air made his cheeks and eyes seem excessively sunken, with flesh that was as pallid as Renne’s. Being dressed in a pair of worn dark blue overalls simply helped to complete the whipped underdog image.
He looked out of the small window as they took off, a bewildered expression in place as the observatory dropped away below.
Renne’s headache had started to fade as soon as the hatch was shut, and the jets began to pressurize the little cabin. She opened the vent above her seat, and smiled contentedly as the filtered air blew over her face. A coffee from the stewardess eased away the last of the discomfort, without any need for a tifi tube.
“The flight should take about fifty minutes,” she said, and turned her head toward Cufflin. “We’re going to Rio; then a loop train to Paris.”