“How’s it going?” Al asked the trainer.
Malone shrugged, his heavy face showing complete misery. “Today’s people, they gone soft, Al. They don’t want to hit each
other, they think it’s immoral or something. We ain’t gonna find no Ali or Cooper on this world. But I got a few contenders,
kids who’ve had it hard. They’re working out okay.” A fat finger indicated the two young men in the ring. “Joey and Gulo,
here, they could have what it takes.”
Al cast an eye over the two boxers dancing around in the ring. Both of them were big, fit-looking kids, wearing colourful
protective gear. He knew enough about the basics to see they were holding themselves right, though they were concentrating
too much on defence.
“I’ll just watch awhile,” Al told Malone.
“Sure thing, Al. Help yourself. Hey! Gulo, close the left, the left, asswipe.”
Joey saw his opening and landed a good right on Gulo’s face. Gulo went for a body lock, and both of them bounced on the ropes.
“Break, break,” the ref cried.
Al pulled up a stool and gazed contentedly at the two combatants. “All right, what’s the order of play for today? Speak to
me, Avvy.” The ex-mayor’s body twitches were getting worse, Al noticed. And some of the weals still hadn’t healed over despite
a couple of attempts by Al’s possessed lieutenants to heal them. Al didn’t like having so much resentment and hostility festering
close by. But the guy sure knew how to administrate; replacing him now would be a bitch.
“We now have fifteen delegations from outsystem who have arrived,” Avram Harwood said. “They all want to see you.”
“Outsystem, huh?” Al’s flagging interest started to perk up. “What do they want?”
“Your assistance, basically,” Avram said. He didn’t hide his displeasure.
Al ignored it. “For what?”
“All of them are from asteroid settlements,” Patricia Mangano said. “The first bunch that came here are from Toma, that’s
in the Kolomna system. Their problem is that the asteroid only has a population of ninety thousand. That gives them enough
energistic power to shift it out of this universe easily enough. But then they realized that spending the rest of eternity
inside a couple of modestly sized biosphere caverns which are totally dependent on technology wasn’t exactly going to be a
whole load of fun. Especially when nearly a third of the possessed come from pre-industrial eras.”
“Goddamn, this is what I’ve been telling people all along,” Al said expansively. “There ain’t no point in vanishing whole
planets away, not until we got the Confederation licked.”
Several of the trainee boxers had drifted over to stand close by. As if aware of the growing interest, Joey and Gulo were
increasing their efforts to knock each other senseless. Malone’s rapid-fire monotone picked up momentum.
“So what has this got to do with me?” Al asked.
“The Toma people want to move everyone to Kolomna.”
“Je-zus!”
“They want our fleet to help them. If we chose Kolomna as our next invasion target we will receive their total cooperation
for as long as you want it. Every industrial station in the system will be given over to supporting the fleet, every starship
captured will be converted to carry weapons or troops, they’ll bring the planetary population into order along Organization
lines. They say they want to sign up as your lieutenants.”
Al was flattered, it turned his whole day around.
Out in the ring, both boxers were perspiring heavily. Blood was trickling out of Gulo’s mouth. Joey’s left eye was bruised.
Cheers and whistles were swelling from the spectators.
“Risky,” Luigi said. “Kolomna is First Admiral Aleksan-drovich’s homeworld. He probably wouldn’t take too kindly to it. I
wouldn’t I was him. Besides, we’re still getting things in order for Toi-Hoi.”
Al rocked back on the stool and materialized one of his Havanas, its end was already alight. “I’m not too worried about that
Admiral getting pissed with me, not with what I’ve got in store for him. Any chance we can split the fleet, send some ships
to Kolomna?”
“Sorry, boss, that’s some of the bad news I’ve got for you,” Luigi said. “The Confederation is really hassling us bad at Arnstadt.
They’ve got voidhawks flying above both poles dropping invisible bombs on the SD platforms in orbit. Stealth, the bastards
call it. We’re losing a shitload of hardware every day. And the non-possessed population are putting up some resistance—quite
a lot, actually. The new lieutenants we’ve appointed are having to use a whole load of force to establish our authority. It
gives them a sense of independence, so we have to use the SD platforms to make them see reason, too. Except the Confederation
is knocking the platforms out one at a time, so instead we gotta use starships to substitute, and they’re just as vulnerable.”
“Well, fuck it, Luigi,” Al stormed. “Are you telling me, we’re gonna lose?”
“No way!” an indignant Luigi protested. “We’re launching our own patrols up above the poles. We’re hassling them right back,
Al. But it takes five or six of our ships to block one of their goddamn voidhawks.”
“They’re bogging us down out there,” Silvano Richmann said. “It’s quite deliberate. We’re also losing ships out among Arnstadt’s
settled asteroids. The voidhawks make lightning raids, fling off a dozen combat wasps and duck away before we can do anything
about it. It’s a shitty way of fighting, Al, nothing is head on anymore.”
“Modern navies are built around the concept of rapid tactical assault,” Leroy said. “Their purpose is to inflict damage over
a wide front so that you have to overstretch your defences. They’ve adopted a guerilla policy to try and wear down our fleet.”
“Fucking cowards’ way of fighting,” Silvano grumbled.
“It’ll get worse,” Leroy warned. “Now they’ve seen how effective it is against Arnstadt, they’ll start doing it here. New
California’s SD network is just as vulnerable to stealth mines. Our advantage is that the Organization is now up and running
on the planet. We don’t need to enforce it the way we do on Arnstadt. I think we only used a ground strike ten times last
week.”
“Twelve,” Emmet corrected. “But we do have a lot of industrial capacity in orbit. I’d hate to lose much of it to a stealth
strike campaign. Our outer system asteroid settlements really aren’t supplying us with anything like the material they should
be, production simply doesn’t match capacity at all.”
“That’s because we essentially have the same problem as the outsystem delegations,” Leroy said.
“Go on,” Al said glumly; he was rolling the cigar absently between his fingers, its darkened tip pointing down. But he still
hadn’t taken his eyes off the fight. Joey was sagging now, swaying dazedly, while the blood from Gulo’s face was flowing freely
down his chest to splatter the floor of the ring. No bell was going to be rung; it wouldn’t finish now until one of them fell.
“Every possessed wants to live on a planet,” Leroy said. “Asteroids don’t have an adequate population base to sustain a civilization
for eternity. We’ve started to see a lot of inter-orbit craft heading towards New California from the settlements. And for
every possessed on their way, there are another ten waiting for the next ship.”
“Goddamnit,” Al shouted. “When those skid-row assholes get here, you send them right back where they came from. We need those
asteroid factories working at full steam ahead. You got that?”
“I’ll notify SD Command,” Leroy said.
“Make sure they know I ain’t fucking joking.”
“Will do.”
Al relit his cigar by glaring at it. “Okay, so, Luigi, when can we start to take out the Toi-Hoi system?”
Luigi shrugged. “I’ll be honest with you, Al, our original timetable ain’t looking too good here.”
“Why not?”
“We thought we’d almost double the fleet size with Arn-stadt’s ships. Which we have done. But then we need a lot of them to
keep order in that system, and reliable crews are getting hard to find. Then there’s Kursk. We made a mistake with that one,
Al, the place ain’t worth a bucket of warm spit. It’s those hillbilly redneck farmers. They just won’t roll over.”
“That’s where Mickey is right now,” Silvano said. “He’s trying to run an offensive which will bring them to heel. It’s not
easy. The tricky bastards have taken to the countryside. They’re hiding in trees and caves, a whole load of places the satellite
sensors can’t find them. And the Confederation is hitting us big-time with those stealth weapons, like Arnstadt was just a
warm-up. We’re losing three or four ships a day.”
“I think Luigi is right when he said we made a mistake invading Kursk,” Emmet said. “It’s costing us a bundle, and returning
zippo. I say pull the fleet out; let the possessed on the ground take care of the planet in their own time.”
“That’ll mean the Organization won’t have any clout there,” Patricia said. “Once everyone’s possessed, they’ll snatch it clean
out of the universe.”
“The only thing it ever gave to us was propaganda,” Leroy said. “We can’t work that angle anymore. Emmet’s right. I don’t
think we should be aiming at any planet lower than stage four, one that can replace our losses, as a minimum requirement.”
“That sounds solid to me,” Al agreed. “I don’t like losing Kursk, but spelt out like that I don’t see that we’ve got one whole
hell of a choice. Luigi, get Mickey back here, tell him to bring all the ships and as many of our soldiers as he can. I want
to go for Toi-Hoi as soon as you can load up with supplies. People will think we’ve stalled otherwise; and it’s important
to keep the momentum going.”
“You got it, boss. I’d like to send Cameron Leung as the messenger, if you ain’t using him. It’ll be the quickest way, cut
down on any more of our losses.”
“Sure, no problem. Send him pronto.” Al blew a smoke ring at the distant ceiling. “Anything else?”
Leroy and Emmet gave each other a resigned look.
“There’s a lot of currency cheating going on,” Emmet said. “I suppose you could call it forgery.”
“Je-zus, I thought you rocket scientists had that all figured out.”
“Foolproof, you said,” Silvano said with a demon’s grin.
“It should have been,” Emmet insisted. “Part of it is due to the way it’s being implemented. Our soldiers aren’t being entirely
honest about the amount of time the possessed are devoting to redeeming their energistic debts. People are starting to complain.
There’s a lot of restlessness building up down there, Al. You’re going to have to make it clear to the lieutenants how important
it is to stick with the rules. The economy we’ve rigged up is shaky enough already without suffering this confidence crisis.
If it fails, then we lose control and the planet goes wild, just like Kursk. You can’t use the SD platforms to waste everyone
who disagrees with us; we need to be subtle about how we keep the majority in line.”
“All right, all right.” Al waved a hand, nettled at the schoolmaster tone Emmet was using.
“Based on what we’ve seen so far, I’m not sure a wild possessed population could even feed themselves. Certainly the cities
would have to be abandoned as soon as the supply infrastructure collapses. You do need a large area of land under cultivation
to support a city like San Angeles.”
“Will you cut this
crap
. I fucking understand, okay? What I want to know is, what are you going to do about it?”
“It’s about time you met with the groundside lieutenants again, Al,” Leroy said. “We can build on the fleet’s return, show
how together we are up here, how they’d be nothing without us. Make them toe the line.”
“Oh, Jesus H. Christ, not another fucking tour. I just got back!”
“You’re in charge of two star systems, Al,” Leroy said matter-of-factly. “There are some things which have to be done.”
Al winced. The fatboy manager was right, as goddamn always. This wasn’t a game to be picked up when he felt like it, this
was different from before. In Chicago he’d climbed on the back of the power structure to advance himself; now he was the structure.
That was when he finally realized the responsibility, and enormity, of what he’d created.
If the Organization crashed, millions—living and resurrected—would fall beside him, their hopes smashed on the rocks of his
selfish intransigence. Alcatraz was the result of his last brush with hubris. Alcatraz would be bliss compared to the suffering
focused on him should he fail again.
The fight which was limping to its conclusion was no longer the centre of attention; most of the possessed in the gym were
staring at him strangely. They could see the muddle and horror in his mind. Leroy and Avram were waiting, puzzled by the sudden,
uneasy silence.
“Sure thing, Leroy,” Al said meekly. “I know what I’m in charge of. And I ain’t never been scared of doing what has to be
done. Remember that. So set up that tour. You got that?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Makes a fucking change. Right, you guys all know what you gotta do. Do it.”
Gulo landed one final blow in Joey’s stomach which sent him staggering backwards to collapse in a corner. Malone hopped over
the ropes to examine the fallen man. Gulo stood over them, uncertain what to do next. Blood was dripping swiftly from his
chin.
“Okay, kid,” Malone said. “That’s it for the day.”
Al flicked his cigar away and stood by the ropes. He beckoned Gulo over. “You did pretty damn good out there, boy. How long
you been training?”
Gulo slipped a blood-soaked gumshield from his mouth. “Nine days, Mr Capone, sir,” he mumbled. Little flecks of blood splattered
Al’s suit jacket as he wheezed painfully.
Al took hold of the kid’s head with one hand and turned it from side to side, examining the bruises and cuts inside the sparring
helmet. He concentrated hard, feeling a cold tingle sweeping along his arm to infect the kid’s face through his fingertips.
The bleeding stopped, and the grazed bruising deflated slightly. “You’ll do okay,” Al decided.
• • •
Jezzibella was lounging on the circular bed. A wall-mounted holoscreen showed her an image of the gym relayed by a sensor
high in the ceiling. Emmet, Luigi, and Leroy clustered together, discussing something in sober tones, their amplified murmurs
filling the bedroom.