“It probably is. I don’t forget conversations like that.” A quick grin that promptly faded. “I don’t know for sure, but I think you were trying to tell me that you’ve also had to deal with the expectations of those around you. Your family, friends, the Corps . . . everyone believing that you should be like your parents, your grandfather and grandmother, even our great-grandfather.” She paused. “It’s always been something of a burden to you, hasn’t it?”
Jorge stared at her, astonished to hear this. “Are you sure you don’t know how to read minds?”
Inez didn’t laugh. “It’s not hard to tell. Even before we became . . . um, close . . . you were my commanding officer. I could see how you were having trouble, trying to live up to the family name and all that.” A slight frown. “Just between you and me . . . did you ever really want to belong to the Corps?”
Now it was Jorge’s turn to look away. “Not really, no. You’re right . . . it’s something that seemed forced on me, from the very beginning. I don’t think I ever had a choice.”
“You always have a choice. But . . . what else would you have done with your life, if not become an explorer?”
Jorge shrugged. “I don’t know. Maybe become a writer, like my grandmother ...”
“Your grandmother wrote her memoirs because she was an explorer, not the other way around.” Inez impatiently shook her head. “Don’t you see? Maybe this isn’t what you wanted to do . . . but all the same, perhaps it’s what you were meant to do. Just as I was meant to be here, by my father’s side.”
“Are you trying to tell me that I . . . ?”
“I’m not trying to tell you anything that you don’t already know yourself.” Inez smiled at him again. “I’ve watched you over the last few days, and what I saw was someone who was much stronger than he himself realized. Anyone less strong would’ve given up trying to get here, to this place, long before you did. But you didn’t, and that’s why you need to go home.” Again, she paused. “But it’s still your life and your choice of what to do with it.”
Jorge didn’t quite know how to respond, yet he knew that what she’d said was true . . . all of it. He could be her friend, but their relationship would never be more than that. And his place wasn’t on Earth, but on Coyote.
“Maybe you’re right,” he murmured.
“Think about it awhile. You’ll know I am.” Letting go of his hand, Inez stood up. “That’s enough for now. I think Papa is waiting for us to have dinner together . . . and I’ve been told that Hugh will be there, too.”
Jorge realized that he hadn’t thought about McAlister in many hours. “He’s okay? They’ve let him out of the hospital?”
Inez nodded, and grinned. “Still upset about finding Sergio at the controls, but . . . well, he’ll have his ship back soon enough.” The grin faded. “Sooner than he thinks. Jorge, you’ve done everything you can do here. It’s almost time for you to go home.”
Without asking why, Jorge slowly nodded. She was right about that, too, whether he liked to admit it or not. There was no place for him on Earth, and the time was coming for him to return to Coyote.
Standing up from the bench, he let her slip her arm inside the crook of his elbow. Then they walked down the center aisle of the greenhouse, two friends going in search of others with whom to have dinner.
Part 8
SHALL WE GATHER BY THE RIVER?
On the bright winter morning of Anael, Gabriel 30, Wendy Gunther
passed away.
As usual, she woke up shortly after sunrise, getting out of bed with the assistance of her aide, Tomas Conseco. Her dog Campy watched from his place on the bedroom rug as Tomas helped her put on a robe, and once she was seated in her wheelchair, he pushed her across the house to a small dining nook adjacent to the kitchen, where he’d already prepared a breakfast of oatmeal and strawberries. Tomas put Campy outside, then he and Wendy sat down at the nook table and had breakfast together while listening to the morning newscast from Liberty.
Wendy wasn’t very hungry that morning, but she ate a little bit of her oatmeal while she and Tomas chatted about politics; even after retirement, Wendy hadn’t lost interest in affairs of state. Tomas then wheeled her into the living room, where he left her at the desk comp with a cup of hot tea. As she went about reading and answering the day’s mail, he returned to the kitchen to clean up.
Campy returned shortly after that, scratching at the kitchen door to be let back in. By then, Tomas had already put out a bowl of kibble for him, yet he noticed that the dog didn’t go straight to it but instead hurried to the living room. Tomas didn’t think much of this; he finished washing the dishes, then began an inventory of the pantry, preparing a grocery list that he planned to take with him when he went shopping in Bridgeton later in the day. He’d just finished writing the list when he heard Campy barking from the other side of the house. A second later, there was a faint crash, and Tomas dashed from the kitchen to the living room.
He found Wendy collapsed in her wheelchair, her face ashen as she struggled to breathe. The crash he’d heard was her knocking the tea-cup off the desk; Campy was standing beside the wheelchair, barking frantically at his mistress. Tomas quickly picked her up from the wheelchair and gently laid her on the carpeted floor. Discovering her pulse to be weak and erratic, he proceeded to administer mouth-to-mouth resuscitation. Her pulse didn’t get any stronger, though, so he placed his hands together upon her breastbone and compressed her chest, repeating this a dozen times in quick succession before planting his mouth against hers again to force air into her lungs.
Despite his best efforts, Wendy didn’t regain consciousness. Tomas took a moment to stab at the Vox button on the desk comp and make a call for help, but by the time a gyro from the university hospital landed on the ridgetop near Traveler’s Rest, she had slipped into a coma. As Campy frantically ran back and forth, barking the entire time, Tomas helped the paramedics load Wendy onto a stretcher and carry her to the waiting aircraft. Leaving the dog behind to fend for himself, he rode with her to the hospital. Tomas held Wendy’s hands in his own as he quietly spoke to her, begging her to please not leave.
It was no use. A few minutes before the gyro touched down on the hospital’s landing pad, the electrocardiograph flatlined, and stayed that way. Wendy Gunther died within sight of the very hospital she herself had helped found. Doctors would later pronounce the cause of death to be a severe coronary seizure.
Within the hour, local news media issued the first reports of the death of the second president of the Coyote Federation. To the end, Tomas acted as Wendy’s aide; borrowing a suit from a hospital administrator, he dried his tears and composed himself, then walked into a reception area crowded with reporters and, calmly and deliberately, issued a public statement. His voice cracked at one point, and it seemed for an instant that he’d break down, yet he managed to perform this one last official duty to the woman he’d served for so many years.
Wendy’s family was quickly informed of what had happened. Her daughter Susan and son-in-law Jonathan were in Liberty; Susan would later blame herself for not being with her mother at the time, having instead decided to return to the city for a few days. She and Jon arrived at the hospital just as Tomas was preparing to meet the press. They didn’t join him, though, going instead to the room where Wendy’s body lay. The doctors closed the door behind them, allowing them a few minutes of privacy.
Marie Montero was told about her sister-in-law’s death a short time later, yet it barely registered upon her. From deep within the abyss of her senescence, Marie’s only visible response was a flickering frown, the slightest batting of an eyelid. Her caretakers at the hospice where she lived said that it was probably just as well that she wasn’t fully aware of what had happened. Nonetheless, it was lost on no one that Marie was now the last surviving member of the
Alabama
party; it had only been a couple of days earlier that Chris Levin had been murdered in Defiance.
As significant as Wendy Gunther’s death was, the importance of the life she’d spent was not overlooked. Long aware that she was dying, the editors of the
Liberty Post
had already researched and written a long obituary for her, which they issued as part of a special report. Her place in Coyote history couldn’t be understated. One of the small handful of children who’d traveled to 47 Ursae Majoris aboard the URSS
Alabama
, the daughter of a Liberty Party loyalist who’d attempted to kill Captain Lee shortly after arrival. Wife of legendary Carlos Montero, and mother of the first child born on Coyote. Member of the first major expedition to leave New Florida and explore the Great Equatorial River. Participant in the resistance movement that revolted against the Western Hemisphere Union and eventually succeeded in expelling its occupation forces from Coyote. Doctor, diplomat, former Federation president, author of the memoirs that became the first and, in many ways, most reliable account of the colonies’ early years . . . there seemed to be no aspect of life on this world that she hadn’t touched.
By noon, President Edgar issued a statement of his own from Government House, expressing regret on behalf of the Federation and ordering all flags to be flown at half-mast. He also stated that President Gunther would be honored by an official state funeral, details of which would soon be made public. It was noticed by some in the press that her family didn’t respond in kind, instead maintaining a neutral silence. No one said anything about it, yet a few political observers had already taken notice of the fact that there had never been any great affection between the current president and the former one, and that Wendy’s family reportedly didn’t like President Edgar very much either.
In the midst of all this, almost no one paid attention to the return of a Federation Navy shuttle, the CFS
Mercator
, through Starbridge Coyote.
A cold wind from the north was whipping across the concrete field
of Liberty’s municipal aerodrome as Sawyer Lee watched the government gyro from New Brighton come in for a landing. Its rotors were still in motion when the side passenger hatch opened and Jorge Montero climbed out. Sawyer raised his hand as Jorge ducked beneath the spinning blades to trot toward him, his duffel bag slung over his shoulder.
“Welcome home, Lieutenant.” Ignoring the perfunctory salute from the younger man, Sawyer extended a gloved hand instead. “I’m just sorry that the circumstances couldn’t be better.”
“Same here, General . . . but thanks anyway.” As Jorge shook his hand, Sawyer noticed that he wasn’t wearing his Corps uniform. Which was just as well; neither was Sawyer, although most likely for different reasons. Jorge glanced around the airfield, looked back at Sawyer again. “Not that I’m unhappy to see you, sir, but . . . where’s my father?”
“Still at the hospital, last time I checked.” Sawyer grimaced. “I’m afraid your mother isn’t taking this very well. She had to . . . well, rest awhile.” He wanted to avoid telling Jorge that Susan had broken down at Wendy’s bedside; Sawyer was reluctant to let Jorge know about this, or at least so soon after he’d returned. Things were hard enough already. “I think your family plans to eventually get together at your grandmother’s house, but right now . . .”
“Yes, sir. I imagine everything is pretty much a mess.” Jorge glanced past Sawyer at the coupe parked nearby. “Is that for us?”
“Uh-huh. I’ll take you to the hospital . . . or wherever you want to go.” Sawyer turned to lead Jorge to the waiting coupe; he hoped that Jorge wouldn’t immediately notice that it wasn’t a government vehicle but a private cab instead. “Hospital? Or maybe you’d like to get a drink first?”
Jorge gave him a sidelong look. “Pardon me for saying so, General, but the last time you offered me a drink, it was just before you dropped a bombshell on me.” A grim smile. “And I thought that I’d already received the bad news.”
Damn,
Sawyer thought.
The kid doesn’t miss a trick.
“A couple of things happened while you were gone,” he said, opening the cab’s rear door for Jorge and climbing in after him. “For starters, you can knock off the ‘general’ and ‘sir’ bit. Looks like I’m about to become a civilian again.”
Jorge stared at him for a moment, as if not quite believing what he’d just heard. “I may need that drink after all,” he said at last, then turned to the driver. “The Laughing Boid, please.”
The driver smiled and nodded, then pulled away from the gyro and headed toward the aerodrome gates. For the first time, Jorge seemed to notice that he wasn’t in an official vehicle. Before he had a chance to ask why, though, Sawyer reached forward to close the window between the front seat and the rear.
“There . . . we can talk now.” Sawyer settled back in his seat, crossed his legs. “It’s a long story, but to make it short, things haven’t gone well for me lately.”
“You were planning to find David Laird . . .”
“And I did, but . . .” Sawyer sighed, shook his head. “It didn’t work out quite the way I expected. He’s dead, and so is . . . well, an old friend of your mother’s who went along to help me. I also twisted a few rules, and because of all that, the president isn’t very happy with me just now.” He paused. “Anyway, word came down from Government House that I could quit or be fired, so I’ve decided that I’d rather leave headfirst than feetfirst. Just this morning, before the news about your grandmother broke, I submitted my resignation letter. I haven’t heard from Edgar yet . . . he’s likely been too busy to read it . . . but no doubt he’ll accept it.” A short, humorless laugh. “In fact, it’ll probably make his day.”
Jorge didn’t say anything for a moment. He appeared to be taking it all in. “Sir, I . . .”
“Like I said, there’s no point in calling me ‘sir’ anymore.” Sawyer gazed out at the houses passing by. “I appreciate the courtesy, but save it for your father. He probably doesn’t know it yet, but he’s up for a major promotion.” He glanced at Jorge again. “And I imagine you’ll be, too.”