April 2: Down to Earth (15 page)

"See? We're all like that. Nobody is a bloodthirsty monster, who wants to rip into North America. We're just scared that the ability to hurt them, is all that keeps their slimier politicians from attacking us again. We've been watching their news carefully and there is a huge vocal element, that is really unhappy that the surviving officials surrendered. I don't know how long they thought they should let us pound them, before giving up. I thought they were pretty stubborn as it was. But these crazies worry us. We really don't want to be forced into resuming hostilities. We were able to avoid hurting a lot of innocent civilians before, but if they are crazy enough to fight again, we'll end up going down in history as the bad guys, no matter how much they ask for it."

"It's going to take me a bit to adjust to all this. When I left ISSII The thought was there, that I might not be coming back, but I still locked my apartment up and had the idea in my mind there was some small chance I'd be back. Now my bridges are burnt behind me. I need to call a friend there. Can you get me a com connection from this orbit?"

April looked in her spex and checked a couple things. "Sure, we will always be in line of sight from one or another geostationary com satellite. Go ahead and make your call. I'm going back up front," she said, to give him some privacy.

Don punched in Sheila's address back on ISSII. She was probably the only friend there, that he would really miss. He caught her at home, but she was dressed for work in the station infirmary and she was visibly surprised to see his face.

"Hi Don. I didn't expect to see you. There were a couple Homeland Security toughs around yesterday, asking everyone about you and I thought you'd be hanging by your ankles on a wall somewhere, talking to the cockroaches upside-down by now."

"They would have snatched me this morning on New Las Vegas, but one of my old pals from the
Happy Lewis
stuck a pistol in the one's ear from behind, an asked him what the heck they thought they were doing bothering me."

She covered her mouth with her hand to laugh. A gesture he had seen her do so many times. He felt so bad what he had to tell her next. "Sheila, I had to renounce my citizenship and I'm emigrating to Home. Not what I had in mind, but they left me little choice. Anyway I wanted you to know, I'll miss you and don't expect me back. My apartment is all locked up and I left too quick to dispose of anything, so I just wanted you to know you are welcome to take any of the furniture, or anything at all I left, for yourself. After the first of the year my rent isn't paid, they'll reset the lock and I don't know what will happen to the stuff. But for now it should still be the old password, if Security didn't mess with it. I'd say give me a call now and then, but if you do Security will probably give you grief for it. But if you ever visit Home, call me up and I'll take you to dinner," he offered.

"Oh Don. I'll miss you too," she agreed. "I will go by and see what I can salvage. That was sweet of you to think of me. Is there anything there you want sent to you? Did you forget anything with sentimental value?"

"No. You know, everything I really care about fit in my blue duffel bag. I was kind of surprised at that myself. I have music, a few photos and a couple paper books I've had since I was a kid and that's about all. Thanks for all the times you were the only sane person I had to talk to."

"Yeah, I don't know who I can hang with now. When you can read the psych profiles on most of these characters, it's a bit of a turn off. I suppose now I will have to buy a cat or a ferret to have someone to talk to," she joked.

"Let me know if you ever need anything," he said, suddenly very earnest. Sheila knew about his money from Ernie and never allowed him to spend more on her than an occasional dinner, or bottle of wine. The one time he had tried to give her a more expensive gift, she had refused it, saying it implied a seriousness to their relationship that neither were trying to make happen. Now, he regretted she had no keepsake from him.

"Dan you let me know if you need my help too." That surprised him, but made him feel good. They had never gotten to the point of considering marriage, but they had filled a void for a time, in each other's lives.

"Thanks Sheila. Don't be shy to go salvage whatever you can and ask your friends if they want to take stuff. Bye now."

"Bye," she said and looked sad when she closed the connection.

He hoped the call would not make Security hassle her.

Sheila immediately called her Homeland Security control and played the recording of the call into his mailbox. "I think I am done here, if you want to reassign me soonest. There is almost no chance Don Adams will be coming back to ISSII now and nobody who associated with him shows any serious disloyalty, or illegal actions worth monitoring. As I have said before, there was never any indication his aid to the
Happy Lewis
was other than a spur of the moment decision. I have quite a bit of leave saved up, so I'm requesting three weeks as soon as you officially terminate this assignment. Until I hear back from you, I will be prepare a final assessment and contingency document, ready to file. I'm also requesting transportation allowance for Earthside. I'd like to be dropped to Hawaii for my leave and then had a travel allowance to visit my family in Massachusetts, before resuming an active posting. Thanks in advance." She double checked it was being properly encrypted and signed it - Helen.

Chapter 10

"Honey come look at this!" Ruby called to her husband Easy. He came out of the kitchen alcove, wiping his hands on a towel. He was bare-chested and had on loose canvas pants. When she cooked and worked at the cafeteria all day, she didn't care to go back there for dinner, or cook again at home. The construction workers cafeteria at the other end of the station saw some of their business, but it was far enough away twice a week was usually often enough. Easy liked cooking fortunately. She patted the seat beside her, so it must be something important or she wouldn't interrupt him cooking. The screen was paused, but she kept a two day backup running, so when he was seated she glanced at the clock again and said - "Com, back up two hundred seconds and resume from then."

"NASDAQ trading finished the peak period up slightly, after heavier gains during the European business day. Traders are forecasting continued gains, through the long Pacific Rim trading day."

"In Space News - Award winning National Geographic cinematographer, Gerald Williams, caught this striking confrontation, awaiting Lunar transfer at New Las Vegas."

The wide angle view showed the public seating area and the row of com booths behind it. All quiet and normal, then one of the booths lost its privacy and two plain clothes Earthies, with a decidedly military look, zeroed in on it aggressively. The fellow inside pulled one of those little screwdrivers out with the pocket clip, like techies carry to adjust controls and instruments and did something to the door control, locking the men out.

"Do you know something Sugar? I have no idea how he did that," Easy observed. "I can't even picture what the door closure on a public booth looks like. That would be handy to know."

The agent on the right looked back over his shoulder, scanning the area and then, apparently seeing no danger, turning back. Then April landed, right in line with the camera view, on the last row of seats closest to the them. She hunkered down and peered over the seat back at the men and her mouth worked saying something softly. The camera zoomed in on her and the trio at the booth behind, the camera man seeing some potential for action, unlike the dismissive agent. The agent started rapping on the glass with the butt of his weapon and the camera swept across the crowd briefly showing some faces upset and some still indifferent, then panned back to April quickly. The camera was still centered on her, not the agents at the booth behind her. April swiveled over the seat back and launched herself, not in a flat tackle, but rolled over, spreading her legs to grab the near agent around the waist.

"She shouldn't have done that," Easy complained after she was on the man's back, with her pistol jammed under his ear. "She was exposed in the air and couldn't return fire for a moment there, when she rolled over. I have to talk to her about that. It was way too risky."

"Well, what should she have done?" Ruby asked.

"She should have braced herself on the chairs and burned the guy down with the gun in his hand and  then the other one too, if he did anything at all but throw his hands up in surrender."

"Wouldn't that have looked great, to shoot him in the back on video?" Ruby pointed out. "Most people would view that as cold blooded murder."

"This isn't a Hollywood video. The man was a legitimate target once he had a weapon in his hand. I want April home in one piece. She's too valuable to get herself shot, trying to be
fair
to some Security goon."

"I'm sorry," he added in a moment, "you're right, it would have looked terrible to the vast majority of people, who've never been shot at."

On the screen, the agent on the left was pointing the wrong end of his pistol at April menacingly. His partner squatted just a hair at the motion anyway.

"What an ass," Easy judged. "Would have served him right if she just reached across and squeezed the trigger since he was offering. No," he agreed again with Ruby, before she could voice it. "The public wouldn't like her doing that either, but it would be great tutorial, about not whipping a gun out and waving it around to scare people, when you don't know which end of it to grab. Oh crap, here comes the cops," he nodded at the screen again and continued watching. The camera man finally got the audio turned up, so they could hear too.

"Is the older cop really as unconcerned as he acts?" Ruby wondered.

"I'm not sure," Easy admitted. "He's either very, very, good, or very, very, stupid."

They watched it progress, until Don renounce his citizenship and got enough audio to follow it. When he flicked his citizen's card away, Easy whistled.

"That's not going to play well in North America at all," Easy predicted.

They didn't edit out April mugging for the camera and when they passed through the security gate, they were too far away to hear April threatening the station. Then they were gone and the cameraman panned back to the security people, still arguing at the com booth. The audio was even better now, because they were raising their voices.

"They're going to get away!" the senior Earthie protested.

 "They
have
gotten away," the older station cop pointed out reasonably. "I'm just happy they didn't leave your bloody corpses behind, after shooting up a public area and breaching pressure. I'm not about to let you chase after them, so you can still turn it into a disaster."

"We're Homeland Security. You're obligated to assist us. I demand your weapon and you need to immediately call ahead and keep them from undocking."

"And you're obligated to confirm your identity. Let's see your ID and we'll check it out."

"
They took
our ID, along with our weapons, damn it!" he yelled.

"Then I'm afraid you're undocumented intruders, near a primary security area. If you'd only checked in with us, before conducting operations on our station, we'd already know who you are. Now you'll have to come in to Security with us, for a very thorough identity check and have some form of documentation issued before you can wander around the public cubic again." The younger cop was pulling some restraints from his belt kit.

"What the hell do you think you're doing?" the Earthie asked, looking at the restraints absolutely incredulous.

"Protocol for undocumented intruders is to transport them in restraints." he answered. "If you're Homeland Security you should know that. You guys are the ones imposed that rule on us and we don't have any discretion about it. I don't suggest you resist and make a bad situation even worse."

The Earthie grabbed left handed for the older cops Taser. The difference in zero G skills was quickly obvious. The old cop grabbed his wrist and kicked away with both feet, snapping the man's arm first straight and then whipping it back in an arc. He screamed briefly when it dislocated. His partner was clawing at the younger cop's tangle gun, which was pointless, as it needed at least three meters range, for the net to open up when fired. The cop, both hands occupied, head butted him hard and there was a spray of bright blood from his broken nose, that fanned out in the zero G.

By then the old cop had his Taser out and shot the man on his partner in the back, not even hurrying. The one with the dislocated shoulder had also been yanked off his toe hold and used by the older cop as a throw weight to get himself back on deck. He was wind-milling his good arm futilely, to get back within reach of the deck. Being caught drifting, without a hold, was a real newbie error. He had nothing to throw and potentially would have to do what they called a huff and puff - blowing air for the jet action, to push himself back to the deck if there was nobody rescued him.

The old cop turned back and brought the Taser down hard. The snap of the collar bone, breaking on the side opposite the dislocated arm, was audible. That stopped that nonsense, but even Easy winced, when he screamed shrill as a little girl again. The fellow had both arms disabled, but
still
didn't have the sense to keep his mouth shut, screaming a stream of abuse at the cop. The old boy didn't look mad, just resigned and a flash of alarm passed over the Earth agent's face briefly, when the cop lifted the Taser point blank to his face and stunned him senseless.

"Ouch, what a headache that'll be. He's probably going to get a reprimand for stunning him like that," Easy concluded.

"Still had both feet didn't he?" Ruby objected.

"Yeah, but a grounder can't do much with them. I was home on leave once and pecking at the com terminal with my foot and you can't believe how the family harassed me for days about it. If I'd grabbed a pen with my toes and made some notes, they would have sold me to a freak show. But that would be the reasoning he should put forth, if they question it."