The Unincorporated Future (50 page)

“Have whom?” asked Cyrus.

J.D.’s mouth parted slightly into savage grin. “Our enemy, Mr. Secretary. We can bring them to battle at a time and place of our choosing, and once there, eviscerate what’s left of their fleet.”

“And you’re absolutely certain you can win?” asked Ayon.

“If you have any doubts,” replied J.D. without any hint of reproval, “I strongly suggest you air them now.”

Ayon nodded respectfully. “You’re outnumbered nearly two to one, and while it’s true this is the last fleet the enemy has, it’s equally true it’s the last one we have.”

“I understand your concern, Madam Secretary. While indeed we are outnumbered, we happen to have the enemy at a distinct disadvantage. Yes, they have twice as many ships, but most of those ships are in wretched shape. The Avatar Plague appears to have destroyed a significant number of important systems within each ship, causing the enemy fleet to cannibalize itself in order to stay afloat. It has been maneuvering with obvious difficulty, and they’re scrambling to make repairs in a manner that is haphazard and rushed.”

“You mean like us,” said the Rabbi with just enough of a grin to take the sting out of the comparison.

“Yes, Rabbi, but we’re better at it.”

“How do we know it’s not a trap?” asked Padamir. “After all, you’ve pulled similar stunts many times, especially to lure in unsuspecting glory seekers.”

J.D. grinned at the memory of all those wishing to bring her head back to the UHF on a pike. “Yes, I have. But I’m no glory seeker, Mr. Secretary, just an opportunist. Regarding whether it’s a trap or not, the answer is that we can’t be sure. We have to assume that Trang got hit by the plague, but the fact that he’s got most of his ships up and moving, even if tepidly, means he probably avoided the worst of it. But he can no longer fake the telltale signatures of what’s working and what isn’t. Our sensors can pick up the blood of a wounded ship millions of kilometers away, and they’re telling us he’s bleeding. On top of that, half his crews are still green, which means no matter how good Trang is, he and Jackson can’t possibly think for
everyone
. And with green crews, mistakes will happen and we’ll be there to exploit them. Now, I’m not saying he isn’t going to put up a fight or that it’ll be an easy one for us to win, but if ever there’s a time to go after him, it’s now. Plus,” she said, lips turned up into an impish smile, “we have it on good authority that it’s not a ruse.”

“Whose?” demanded Eleanor.

“Mine,” said Dante. “Pardon my interrupting.”

“I do like new Cabinet members,” chortled Cyrus. “They’re so polite—in the beginning.”

“Good point,” chimed in Padamir. “Then before you know it, they’re as obnoxious as the rest of us. Best to enjoy it while we can.”

Both Cyrus and Padamir then looked over to Dante with wide toothy smiles: round one.

Marilynn wasn’t sure, but she could’ve sworn Dante blushed slightly. He’d always said what he loved best about humans was their unpredictability, and she was sure he hadn’t expected the good-natured ribbing. In fact, he’d been boning up on protocol—even having Marilynn test him—so as not to “blow it” for avatarity by saying something offensive in his first-ever official appearance as a Cabinet secretary. Well, the two elder statesmen had just thrown down. To Marilynn’s inestimable pride, so too did Dante.

“In that case,” offered the Secretary for Avatar Affairs, “I will endeavor to lose my innocent veneer of civility as soon as the mitigating circumstances permit.” He ended with an ostentatious flourish of his hand and an overly formal bow. The avatar had said it in such a perfect homage to Cyrus’s verbose speech and mannerisms that the new Secretary of Treasury at first seemed flabbergasted and then actually applauded.

“As I was saying,” continued Dante, clearly cheered on by the positive response, “the authority was mine. As you all know, we’ve been fighting the Core avatars for years and are well aware of how they manifest themselves in systems they wish to destroy. With that knowledge and with the collusion of the Defense Secretary and the grand admiral, we used our now greater access to the Neuro”—Dante was making a clear reference to the fact that the OA avatars no longer had to hide in buried nodes—“to create an exact virtual copy of Admiral Trang’s fleet. After running numerous tests, which involved the removing and replacing of various systems on each ship as well as applying the various forms of sabotage commonly used by the Core avatars and then matching them with what we’ve observed in the physical world, we’ve come to the conclusion that the UHF’s fleet is pretty well screwed. Complete results are with your fleet.”

“How screwed is the question,” said Sandra.

“They’re trying to run heavy cruisers with linked DijAssists,” said J.D.

“Yeah,” said Sandra with a short laugh. “I guess that’s pretty screwed.”

“Correct me if I’m wrong,” said Padamir.

Again Cyrus grinned expectantly. “With pleasure.”

“Then it should be twice as pleasing, since the question is directed toward you.”

Cyrus bowed.

“Given what we discussed previously vis-à-vis our resources and the fact that we’ve emerged from the Avatar Plague intact, won’t we be an industrial power again shortly?”

“Correct,” answered Cyrus. “By my estimation, in just under a year or about how long it’ll take the UHF just to find enough food to feed its survivors.”

“So,” added Rabbi, “for the first time in a long time, isn’t time on our side?”

J.D. took a deep breath. “Your suppositions are correct; it’s your conclusions that I believe are faulty. At this very instant, Trang is devising new methods and training his crews to operate their ships as best they can with the data systems they have. The UHF fleet that Trang has, while green, is still good—damn good, Madam President. In six months’ time, I predict that they’ll be able to use their ships with very little combat liability. They may even pull it off in four. Once that happens, Trang will come hunting. He knows that if he doesn’t destroy the Alliance within a year, it’s over.” J.D. now focused her attention solely on the President. “Madam President, the odds are with me now. Therefore, we should strike now.”

Sandra nodded and, thought Marilynn, did a masterly job of pretending to weigh the options—considering the President had already heard the arguments that morning and had already informed both Marilynn and J.D. of her decision.

“Do you have a name for this operation?” asked Sandra.

“Actually, yes, Madam President: Operation Endgame.”

“Most appropriate,” agreed Sandra. “Do it.”

My sisters and brothers, I saw the faith of our people this day. I was trying to decide what my sermon should be, and as if guided by the very hand of Jesus himself, found myself walking toward the temple. You know the one of which I speak. The lines around the temple of the holy vessel have been so long, they stretch to the beginning of the thoroughfare. As it stands, priority has been given to members of our divinely led fleet now about to leave for what many sense is the final battle of this long and terrible struggle. Each spacer has been given only twenty seconds to touch the battle suit that the Chosen One, Justin Cord, transcended into heaven with; for there are hundreds of thousands of spacers in the fleet and only so much time before that fleet leaves this holy city. And it is thus fair that those spacers be given priority, for the presence of the Holy Justin brings peace to our warriors and may it bring peace to us all. The divine has touched us and shown us and tested us. Let us be worthy of the guidance. Let us be worthy of victory. Let us be worthy of peace and let us say us say, amen.

—Sermon heard before the temple on the day
the war turned seven years old

Grand admiral’s quarters
Ceres

“Why do I have to stay?”

The little girl’s voice held such heartbreak and pain that for a moment J.D. wavered—but only for a moment.

“Because, little one,” she answered, crouching low, “this is the last battle of the war, and you are so very precious to me, more precious than anything.”

“I know,” sniffed Katy, bottom lip pushed forward.

“And it’s important that I fight my best, right?”

Katy managed a single brave nod through her tears.

“But I may not be able to fight my best if I didn’t know you were safe here on Ceres.”

J.D. was not prepared for what happened next. Katy cannonballed into her and then grabbed her with such fierce determination that it seemed to J.D. as if the child were holding on to her for dear life—which Katy was. “But you’ll die if you go without me!”

“Why do you say such a thing, little one?”

J.D. could feel the warm tears mixed with mucus on the lapel of her jacket and the nape of her neck. “Because it’s the last battle, Mama Bo.”

“Yes. But that’s a good thing.”

“No!” shrieked Katy into the scruff of J.D.’s neck. She then pulled back and stared forlornly at the woman who’d swept in and saved her, who’d taken her in from the cold and desperate halls of a dying asteroid and whisked her away to the sheltered confines and clockwork predictability of a warship, filled with food and uncles and aunts and angels and floating rolled-up balls of socks. “No,” Katy said with downcast mouth and water-filled eyes. “The hero
always
dies in the last battle.” And the tears began to flow anew.

“I’m no hero, little one,” she said, hugging the child tightly. “I’m just one woman trying to do the best she can.”

“That’s what heroes
always
say!” wailed Katy. “You have to promise me you’re coming back. You have to promise me, please!”

J.D. hugged Katy once more, stood up, and walked away without saying another word. Katy was in too much shock to notice the tears rolling freely down the face of her mama Bo, the grand admiral of the Outer Alliance and the Alliance’s best chance to achieve victory.

The Triangle Office

Sandra was sitting across from Tyler Sadma. On the coffee table floating between them were the possible election dates. It was decided that when a sufficient number of refugees from Jupiter and the asteroid belt were integrated into the fabric of the outer planets, new elections would have to be held. So much had happened that new representation was desperately needed in order to let the will of the governed be expressed. Hektor’s ruling by fiat with an Assembly that was literally on ice was not an example they wanted to emulate. But of course, the devil was in the details. The biggest one being when exactly to hold the election, followed by how to adjudicate votes of those still suspended, followed by whether or not to elect a new Vice President or have the Assembly choose one. And of course, the perennial question: Was it time to hold a constitutional convention or, at a minimum, set a date?

While they were in the midst of figuring out the nuts and bolts of Alliance politics, Sandra’s DijAssist informed her of a low-priority message. Sergeant Holke knew better than to interrupt her when she was with any dignitary, much less Tyler Sadma—unless it was an emergency. But if it was not an emergency, why interrupt her—and with a low-priority signal, to boot. Because of the nearly successful coup, little oddities like the one that was occurring now tended to make her jumpy. She asked Tyler if he wouldn’t mind waiting for a moment, and he readily acquiesced. She then took advantage of her newly integrated internal VR matrix and touched both her index and pointer fingers to her temples and scanned for any anomalies. She could find none in the immediate vicinity, so she decided to scan the outer one. She almost laughed when she realized what had the good sergeant flummoxed. She lingered a moment at the sight of the sergeant—one of the most fearless individuals she knew—looking so decidedly nervous and uncertain. She quickly returned to her physical body.

“Yes, Sergeant Holke,” she said pleasantly.

Before Holke could say a word, the voice of an insistent child could be heard over the DijAssist. “Tell her it’s important! Tell her it’s me! Go on,
tell
her.”

“Uh, Madam President, I, uh, have a, uh … situation here.”

Sandra actually saw Tyler Sadma trying to hold back a laugh as the sergeant attempted to explain why his normally very strict security protocol about not interrupting the President unless in case of dire emergency had been so easily breached. And not at the gunpoint of a battalion of UHF assault marines or by the threat of imminent decapitation by the razor-sharp claws of one of Al’s nightmares, but rather by the unbending tenacity of a six-year-old girl.

“Send her in, Sergeant,” Sandra said, giggling.

“We can continue this conversation after lunch, Madam President,” Tyler said. “They have fish sticks at the Congressional cafeteria, and if I don’t get there on time, the damn Neptunian delegation eats them all.” Sandra smiled at the excuse but accepted it. Katy flew into the room, ignoring the Speaker of the Congress altogether—even as he gave her a very cordial half bow—and into the outstretched arms of the President of the Outer Alliance.