“They’re doing fine. Ed said he’d hide out in space, just to see what it was like, since he had to hide, anyways. So it was arranged.” Dian gestured toward a lean, uniformed black man edging through the circle surrounding Todd. Ames. The second in command who had never grabbed publicity, except to pose as a hard liner. Another man, like Todd and Ed Lutz, who specialized in blending in with his background, increasing his value when he decided to commit treason and help Pat Saunder’s political rival and the Earth First’s candidate’s own brother. His face had lost some of that inscrutable mask, though not all of it.
“General,” Todd said, nodding. “Thanks. You made it possible, right down to rescuing me out from under those goons at the terminal.”
“I still wish you hadn’t done it, Mr. Saunder.” Ames gave a pained sigh. “But it’s done.” He paused, his eyes narrowing. “I gather it paid off.”
“Yes, it did. And
I
wish it hadn’t—”
Ames didn’t let him go on. “That happens. The thing is, to use what we find to stop something worse from happening. Like now. I know McKelvey. I served with him some years ago. But he won’t trust me now, or any other Earth-based officer. I can’t say I blame him. It means I’m going to have to ask a civilian to do something he shouldn’t meddle with—again. And this time it is me doing the asking, not you. You’re our connection to Goddard, Mr. Saunder. I just hope to hell you can keep them from counterattacking. You’ve got to.”
Startled, Todd gawked at him, and Dian broke in. “It just started, Todd. Goddard’s gone on war status. They were hit with a new wave of missiles while you were en route from the pole. And this time they struck back.” Her dark eyes filled with tears. “They were ready. They disarmed one of the incoming birds and got a tight ident. They found out who . . .”
Ames finished for her, his manner dripping contempt. “Riccardi. Not only has he been providing guidance with his com sats, but Goddard’s agents tapped into his line—an unscrambled line—when he was making plans with President Galbraith.”
The revelations stunned Todd—Goddard’s proof against its enemies, while he had been in Antarctica gathering a different sort of proof.
“Riccardi’s apparently been using his satellite network to handle the missile launches,” Ames explained. “He helped the anti-Spacers mask orbital build-points with holo-modes. In retaliation, Goddard hit him hard with their missiles, and they’ve got some heavy stuff, thanks to the Lunar Base. They’ve had the capability for some time. We knew it, and we’ve been hoping to God nobody would push them into using it.”
Mikhail Feodor broke in, his voice shaking. “They hit Riccardi’s northwest Geosynch, boss. Killed everybody on station.”
Riccardi. Todd’s business rival, one who had often played very rough. Had he united with Goddard’s enemies because he hated Todd and anything Todd was supporting, like the Colony? Or had there been more to his murderous opposition?
“He . . . Riccardi was on his inspection rotation this week, wasn’t he?” Todd asked, knowing the answer, remembering his rival’s schedules very well. “He was on that Geosynch with his staffers. Dead.” The faces around him registered horror. Enemy or not, Riccardi depended, as they did, on the orbiting HQs. They, too, had been riders in such satellite villages and knew the terrible vulnerability of those structures. They envisioned themselves trapped in Riccardi’s situation, sudden death ripping open the hulls and pouring them and their air out into high vacuum. Todd shook his head in bewilderment that Riccardi had invited that retaliation from Goddard. Had blatantly asked for it. And had let his enemy find out about it when he was stupid enough to use an open circuit to talk to his conspirator. No wonder Ames was so contemptuous of the dead anti-Spacer. “What about Galbraith?” Todd inquired.
Ames made a rude noise. “The CNAU President’s in over his ears. So’s Ybarra. And Monte. And Weng.”
Weng. Boss of that vicious little secret police chief on Mari’s tape. The pieces all falling into place. The hyperendors weren’t wearing off; Todd’s thinking was sharper than it had ever been. The petty tyrants, and factions within their countries, turning more and more to Goddard’s cheaper power. It wasn’t only anti-alien paranoia. It was economics. And the greed, the brutal tyranny, were far more dangerous than Earth’s fear of the unknown. The fear was random. The greed moved with calculation. Kill Goddard. Kill its enemies in the Enclave.
And kill Todd Saunder, who might find out the truth.
Todd took a deep breath and held it. Ames and the others were watching him. “Pat can stop Galbraith, probably pull the strings to stop the others, too. I’m sure there are some you haven’t named, General. If you can give me the data, I’ll pile it on my brother and make him listen— even if I have to put a gun to his head.”
“That’s already there, Mr. Saunder. Goddard’s gun. Her missiles. I’m expecting their declaration of war any hour now. Killing Riccardi wasn’t the end of it. His heirs are frantic for revenge, and the other conspirators are cornered. They fight and win, or lose everything.”
“But we’re the ones who really lose,” Todd said with cold anger. He glanced at Dian. There was something in her eyes, something deep and terrible. “I found it,” he said simply. “Exactly what I didn’t want to find.”
She was nodding. “So did we. The buried accounts. The erased idents. The other end of the conspiracy. And something else.” The eyes were brightening with a light that illuminated the immense hangar. Todd’s pulse quickened in response as Dian spoke. “The key. The critical piece. The alien’s still meeting us more than halfway. And I feel sure that means it sprang from a civilization not too impossibly different from our own. It all broke, just as Beth and I felt it would. That’s why they firebombed us, Todd. They listened in, knew how close we were. Now
real
communication begins. We were this close when they. . .” She held her thumb and forefinger a centimeter apart. Then she frowned. “You were limping when you got out of the car.”
“Staged the burn, the plan we discussed. Necessary. It’s not important.”
“Are you all right now?”
“No. But it has nothing to do with my leg.” Todd’s anger was returning, redoubled. “General Ames, where’s my brother right now?”
Ames indicated a nearby monitor. Spy monitor. Even Patrick Saunder wasn’t immune. Protectors of Earth guarded him, guarded their star member and probable future Chairman. But P.O.E. watched him, too. “Scheduled to arrive at SE Mainland HQ in about an hour. Chairman Li Chu is calling an emergency session of Protectors of Earth for this evening. Your brother undoubtedly intends to make a speech . . .”
A speech arousing Earth, whipping her billions into more xenophobic frenzy as a result of Goddard’s strike against Riccardi’s satellites.
“He’ll make the speech,” Todd promised. “But not the one he expects to. I’m going to replace his speech writers. If I have to, I’ll override him with ComLink’s translator-splitters around the world, and Pat knows I can. I’ve never done that, but I will—edit his words, use his voice to say what I want to say, to reach the world.” Mikhail and the rest of Todd’s people were shocked at the threat, but nodded, ready to go against all their ethics if they had to.
“You’ll have help,” the military man said tersely. Todd tried to read his face. He couldn’t. Ghetto face. McKelvey’s face when McKelvey refused to let down the walls. Coup d’etat in the making? Galbraith about to lose his Presidency in an overthrow? And Weng and his secret police, about to disappear as they had made so many others disappear? Todd was afraid to ask for details.
“Hold off, General. Let me try it my way first. Can you get me to my brother? Is Earth on war status, too?”
“We’ll get you there, Mr. Saunder. But first, let’s swap data. Cover all the possibilities. Then, if . . .”
If I’m killed, the facts I learned in the Enclave won’t be buried with me. And if I can get through to Pat, I’ll need what the general and all the agents and Spacers and the rest of this hidden network have uncovered, to clinch the arguments.
“Todd,” Dian said shakily, “sabotaging your plane, someone from Saunder Enterprises . . .”
He held her very close, taking and giving comfort. “I know. It’s a risk. But I have to try. For all of us. And you’ll have to back me up, with ComLink. You and Mikhail . . . everyone.” His people were agreeing, very sober and determined. “General, can you protect my people?”
“We’ll certainly try, Mr. Saunder. And your satellites. We need those.” Ames and his fellow military conspirators were caught in a difficult situation. “We’re sympathetic to Goddard, want to stop the madness. But we’ll have to commandeer your equipment to fight a possible counter-strike from Goddard. The one on Riccardi came too fast. The next ones . . .”
“There won’t be a next one,” Todd returned flatly. “Dian, if I don’t—” She tried to stop him. He went on, drowning her out. “If I don’t make it, finish Project Search. Meet the aliens for me, if any of us are still here.”
“We’ll meet them together,” Dian said, her chin going up.
Todd fed his data to the staffers in the hangar. Computers relayed to other computers, a global and orbiting network. Goddard wouldn’t open the circuits. Todd was dismayed. Ames shrugged, not surprised. The state of things. Worsening steadily. Ames
was
surprised and appalled by the extent of murders in the Enclave. And Todd absorbed as much as he could of the corroborating data. Family matters. Family disgrace. Saunder Enterprises. He was cutting his heart open, spilling his heart’s blood. But these people had a right to know.
ComLink, Fairchild’s Third Millennium Movement, the civilian and military underground that General Ames represented—working together to stop an impact with disaster.
Dr. Tedesco had sent counter remedies, via Dian. Todd took the first dosage in the treatment that would return him to being Todd Saunder physically. It should be having a noticeable effect by the time he reached Pat, enough so he would be recognized. There was a flier waiting, and a bit of an argument when Todd insisted he was going to fly her. The co-pilot’s motives and his chase pilot’s were strong. But not as strong as his. He intended to outfly them all.
Time was telescoping. The future, terrible or wonderful, thundering toward them. By the time he was geared for flight, his irises were already faded to blue, his skin lightening, some of the kink relaxing from his now-undyed hair. Todd moved by reflex, boarding the flier, familiarizing himself with the systems. Outside, on the hangar floor, Dian was watching, waving, seeing him off. A million years ago—Dian, waving, seeing him off for Goddard, Gib Owens riding co-pilot at his side.
The flier lifted, sidling, almost but not quite out of control. The big man who had led the rescue team at the terminal was his co-pilot. The trooper inhaled sharply, clutching the safety bar, and Todd grinned, getting even for the rough treatment earlier. “Hang on,” he warned. A lot of ship was under his hands and voice. Enough, he hoped, to get him to New York-Philly in time to prevent a species’ extinction.
He pushed propulsion, zooming through the opening hangar door, barely clearing obstructions. People dived out of his way. Todd flew straight into the holo-mode of the trees. “Good imagery,” he complimented the Protectors of Earth enforcement officer. “But not as good as my father’s inventions are capable of. I saw just what they can do, when their use is perverted, in Antarctica.” Wide-eyed, the other man braced himself. Behind them, the screens showed Todd’s chase escort, scrambling to catch up with him, flying out of the hangar in his wake.
Invisible fury exploded rearward in a full-power launch. Todd’s flier leaped into the sky, gees slamming him and the P.O.E. trooper back in their seats. Data tore across the screens faster than most human eyes could take it. Todd noted what he needed, flying on instinct, mock-attacking Saunderhome once more. The other man was priming the military gear, on the com with the chase fliers trailing them. They were scrambler-masked from CNAU Flight Control—which might still be loyal to Galbraith and the anti-Spacer conspirators. The screens read heavy weaponry on board Todd’s ship and the others. They would fight their way through to Pat, if they had to.
Todd reached for sub-orbital altitude, high above the slow-moving civilian traffic. Earth lay far below, her ugliness and old scars lost from this height. Earth. Humanity’s birthplace. Earth, at the bottom of a gravity well. And Goddard, priming a counterlaunch. The Earth First Party had clamored for a war, in its own way, and was likely to get it. Species’ suicide was a voice command away.
He pushed his flier to Mach 3, aiming eastwaEd, still accelerating, flying over old battlefields. History. Man’s conifict with himself. Brother against brother . . . and against sister. The ship became a two-passenger defensive missile, its target an underground castle, and a man with a golden voice,
CHAPTER NINETEEN
ooooooooo
HE walked into the V.I.P. train-and-car parking area. The storm troopers protecting Saunder Enterprises Mainland HQ weren’t expecting that. Nobody arrived here on foot. The guards specialized in screening vehicles and their occupants. Todd almost made it to the elevator bank before they noticed him and swung around, training their weapons on him.
Todd raised his hands and walked on toward them slowly, his voice cold and firm. “I’m Todd Saunder, in case you don’t recognize me. Patrick Saunder’s brother. If you shoot me, you’re going to have one hell of a mess to explain to the family.” The guns and electrostingers wavered as he kept coming at them. “I’m going down to the apartments to see my brother. I know he’s here, so don’t give me any nonsense about his being on a campaign tour. Are you going to get out of my way, or do I let ComLink go live to the world with my execution?” Carefully, not wanting to move their nervous trigger fingers, Todd pulled aside his flight coat and let them see the chest relay miniaturized lens he wore. Nuñez Falco, Chabot, and the other media hotshots had taught Earth how much cold be captured and sent out to the world via such a tiny device. One of Ward Saunder’s spinoffs. One of hundreds. The guards edged back, reluctantly. One of them whispered into a security monitor.
“Tip him off. That’s okay. A lot of surprises come with my package. You can’t ruin them by warning him I’m on the way.”
But if the surprise never got there?
Riding down in the elevator, Todd didn’t dare breathe. Guards, checking these elevators for bombs and booby traps, ostensibly to protect their employer. If they knew how to spot one, chances were they also knew how to plant such a device—and remove an unwanted intruder.
But nothing happened.
The aides and inner-fortress bodyguards didn’t try to stop Todd when he stepped out into the subterranean foyer. They watched him with animosity and muttered among themselves, earning his sneer. He went on into the apartments and used the complex’s own spy monitor systems to narrow his search. Pat and Carissa were in their bedroom suite.
Carissa might be a problem. What Todd had to say, could cause severe shock, possibly bring on a miscarriage. Despite what was at stake, he didn’t want that. There had been too many deaths already.
And this death would be that of a little Saunder.
They looked up as he walked in. They had been told about his approach. Carissa was tremulous and puzzled, smiling uneasily. Pat was hard-faced, ready to strike. But he was confused, too, reacting out of that emotion and what his guards had told him about Todd’s words and actions.
“Kid! What the hell . . . ?”
“Todd! Where on Earth have you been? I’ve been calling your space station for a week!” Jael, on the com at Carissa’s bedside. Todd glanced at the screen. Jael was sitting in her office at Saunderhome, palm trees visible out the window panel beyond her head. The dowager queen in her castle, as Pat was in his.
“Hello, Carissa,” Todd said gently, ignoring the screen and Pat. He kissed his sister-in-law’s cheek, squeezed her hands. Then he straightened and looked at Pat and at Jael’s image. “Can we adjourn? Elsewhere. I don’t care where in this cave. But we’d better be private and masked—fair warning. You’re going to answer some questions, and you may not want the whole world to hear us when you do. Not yet.”
“Todd, how
dare
you burst in on our conversation like this!”
Pat had gazed steadily at Todd ever since he had come into the room. Unlike the last time they had seen each other, Pat was now cold sober and very much in possession of his faculties. And of his intuition. “We’ll do as he says, Mother.”
“Pat, don’t leave me!” Carissa wailed, clutching Pat’s arm. He kissed her and summoned the doctor and nurses, leaving her in the women’s care. “Pat! Pat! Please don’t cut me out like this . . .” The medics were giving Carissa something to calm her down when Pat led Todd out of the room.
Todd followed him through the labyrinthine apartments. He didn’t recognize most of these rooms any more. Pat and Jael had changed everything radically. They had changed themselves, too, perhaps. Too much. Pat stopped at what was obviously his staff’s security command center. Five mufti-clad “aides” gaped as Pat pointed at the door. “Get out. And if I find any of you sons of bitches have tapped into my private lines again, you’ll end up stationed at a Saunder Enterprises seal farm in northern Greenland. Out!”
They went, fearing him and hating him, not hiding their reactions. A massive series of doors closed, sealing the brothers in. Their sole contacts with the outside world were the shimmering monitor screens. Pat spoke to the systems. “All right. Transfer Jael Saunder’s call to this station. Terminal one. Full scrambler lock on the connection. I don’t want anyone else with us. Emphatic. Execute.”
Jael appeared on screen one. She was seething, predictably, furious with both her sons. “I hope you have a good reason to—”
“How about murder?” Todd asked, wasting no valuable time.
“What?” Pat blinked and shook his head, then flared at him. “What murder? Goddard again? You blaming me for that? And what’s all this talk about my guards shooting you?”
“Goddard. Yes. You are to blame.” Todd hesitated, regarding Pat intently. “You don’t know? You honestly don’t know?” He wanted to believe that, more than anything in his life. “I
did
expect a challenge, or to be shot on sight. The plane I was going to take here was booby-trapped, by Saunder Enterprises techs, Pat. It would have blown me out of the sky. The only reason I’m here is because some Spacer supporters spotted the attempt on my life and provided alternate transport, military style, with weapons and masking scramblers. Just like your private ships carry. You and Mother are getting pretty damned good at assassination prevention measures. Does it go both ways? Prevent it? Or cause it? Is that what we’ve come to, Pat? Murder? My murder? Three hundred and twenty innocent people on the Nairobi shuttle? People Galbraith’s trying to kill with anti-Spacer missiles? Or thousands of people in SE Antarctic Enclave, people supposedly saved for the future? But they’ve been eliminated, down to the very cubicles they should be resting in. I suppose it doesn’t matter, really. I mean, what’s the difference if it’s one or a few thousand? It’s all a body count, right?”
Pat forced a derisive laugh. “You’re mad. That’s the only explanation possible.” Fighting. Still fighting it. Pat Saunder wasn’t a quitter, and he wouldn’t give up easily, not with his honor and his future at stake.
“Second system,” Todd commanded the adjacent screen. “Put me through to ComLink Central. And don’t stall me. I know they’re ready. Connect.” He looked at Pat and at Jael’s iniage. “You want this scrambled, too? I’ll give you time to get your alibis together. The only fair thing to do, for the family.” No reply. Todd shrugged and added on a scrambler lock. The systems refused it. They would respond only to Pat or to one of his clearance-rated “aides.” His face an impending hurricane, Pat gave the order.
Dian appeared on the second screen. Like Jael’s, her image wavered slightly under the influence of the masking circuitry. “Got it, Todd,” she said. She split the screen.
A staticky, machine-created set of shapes and figures formed in the lower frame. A voice, high-pitched yet growling. Imitating its master’s.
“Earth . . . Earth . . . Vahnaj . . . Vahnaj . . . Earth . . . Vahriaj . . .”
A name! Todd grinned, delighting in the present Dian had given him amid so much grief. A name for the alien. Its world’s name? And what they called themselves, most likely, as the intelligent species which had originated on Earth were the Earthmen.
Todd couldn’t hold back the tears. He wiped his face with the backs of his hands, not ashamed of his joy. But this wasn’t the time. He hadn’t wanted this to happen here, under these conditions. Dian had no choice, he knew. Yet the wonderful discovery was tainted, thanks to what his family had done.
Pictures. Machine-made, a little jerky because of the communications difficulties and the astronomical distances involved. A human figure! Spelled out in a rapid-fire series of static blips, compressed, rippling dots and open spaces. No,
two
human figures! Male and female. Copied from the Voyager plaque, as some idealistic Science Council members wanted to believe? Todd doubted it. Dian and Project Search had sent a similar mode weeks ago. That was probably the image the Vahnaj messenger had picked up and copied. Replaying humanity to itself, but with more clarity than any of the previous signals. Now Todd understood Dian’s excitement. Words, a name, figures . . .
Another picture. Two more figures. Male and female. Not human. Humanoid. Distinct and subtle differences in the images, reproduced side by side. Human and Vahnaj. The average height, calculated against the spectrum wavelength Dian had supplied originally, was a bit taller than that for
Homo sapiens
. The head was broader, flatter on top, perched upon a very long neck and steeply sloping shoulders. A long torso, abnormally so by human standards. Slender appendages. Three fingers and an opposing thumb, shown in quick extreme close-ups formed of the on-and-off static. The images shifted, ultra-sophisticated, close-ups and side-by-side comparisons of the two species, the machine supplying the contact point for
Homo sapiens
and Vahnaj to view each other for the first time.
Todd wondered if the messenger had sent the images back home. They wouldn’t have reached there yet. Might not for years. The
real
Vahnaj. Not their images. Again he wanted to weep at the awesome concept.
The four figures, drawn with signals from a vehicle hurtling toward Saturn’s orbit, moved, squatted in a powwow circle. The preferred Vahnaj conference ritual? They extended hands, representing the living beings behind the images. Touched fingers, five-fingered hands to four-fingered. The mechanical voice spoke as the figures’ mouths appeared to open and close. “Kusta. Vahnaj.”
Dian’s voice cut over the machine’s, explaining. “Kusta equals Talk. Vahnaj equals Earth.
Their
Earth.”
Machine-voice: “Yes. Earth. Yes. Kusta. Talk. Signal equals Talk. Bel equals Kusta. Sha.” The figures were making gestures, moving again. Demonstrating. Dian had sent signals such as these, too, weeks ago. Apparently the alien machine had had to think it over. And perhaps decide if it wanted to communicate with such a species? In a way, humanity was on probation. As Dian had said, most of the work would be done by the Vahnaj machine. But Project Search had supplied its own share of the key. Pidgin English. Baby talk.
But it was talk—with another species, from another world!
On the screen, the alien figures held something—a fruit or vegetable shape, to human eyes. The human figure also held something. The figures reached out to one another, trading what they held. Again. Lines traced on the crude figures’ faces, both species’. Smiles.
“My God,” Todd whispered, shaken by the discovery. Facial muscles, only so many ways to stretch on a humanoid face. But there were human cultures which didn’t express friendliness and pleasure with that expression. Not many, but a few. Another evolution, light-years away, had matched them, for all the peculiarities of the Vahnaj physique.
Smile. Friend. We come in peace.
No guarantees. But it was one hell of a more convincing proof of peaceful intentions than anything Todd had been able to show anyone previously!
Dian froze the image on the scene of the four figures clasping hands with one another, those smiles on their simplified faces. “There’s more. Kilotons of it. Pouring in now, faster than we can absorb it. To us. To Goddard. To the science institutions’ orbiting telescopes, to ground stations. A flood. The machine’s boosting its gain now, Todd. It’s finally understanding just how backward we are. That is humiliating, but it’s also wonderful. We have so much to learn . . .“
“It’ll revolutionize our communications systems, for a start,” Todd said out of his own field of expertise, touching the tiniest fragment of the significance of the new data.
“She’s lying. It’s a hoax.” Jael. She didn’t really believe what she was saying. Todd detected the cornered-tigress defeat in her tone.
“Keep saying that until the aliens get here, Mother. Eight months, by our current vector calculations. Dian, give me the rest of it. And you two, I can handle the alien. What I can’t handle is politics. In this case, murder.”
The magnificent, enriching aspect of this four-way conversation was over. Now Todd had to deal with the dark side, the maliciousness, the cruelty. Dian gave her signal over fully, the screen filling with a blizzard of data.
Facsimiles. Readouts. ComLink, calling in debts. Breaking through the locks. Mikhail and Putnam, other loyal ComLink staffers, going around when they couldn’t get through the scramblers. They had been digging everywhere. Just scraping the surface, but there was, as Dian had described the alien signals, a flood, even so. Not all the holes had been plugged. Not all the conspirators had been paid enough to ensure their silence.
Stock transfers. Halmahera—Djailolo’s conqueror— selling stock cheap to Saunder Enterprises. Too cheap to be honest. !Ngai—_Elizabeth Gola’s oppressor—stock sold to Saunder Enterprises. Bloek—Van Eyck’s enemy—stock to Saunder Enterprises. Energy. Transport. Syntha food. Fishing franchises.
Documents, with Patrick Saunder’s recognizable, written signature. More stock changing hands. And property. A lot of valuable property. Property in lands where slavery had been reinstituted to serve tyrants. Property in countries ruled by oppressive governments and murderous warlords, countries which Protectors of Earth was trying to reform. Saunder Enterprises, secretly profiting off the blood of these millions.
“That’s enough,” Jael said tonelessly.
“There’s more, Mrs. Saunder,” Dian countered, rigidly correct. “A very great deal more. Todd and I worked together on this—him going to the Enclave, me putting ComLink’s people on these hidden stats. And this is just the surface.”
Pat yelled, “Wait! Just wait! I didn’t sign those!” He pointed at the documents on the screen. “What the hell? Are you trying to frame me, Todd? Do you know what this’ll do to . . .”
“To the election? To the campaign? Face it, Pat, in a few hours, if Galbraith and the others get what they deserve, Goddard and the Moon are going to start lobbing missiles back at Earth. You won’t have a world to govern. No, I’m not trying to frame you. These things are real. All we did was turn over the rocks and find out where they were hidden.
Some
of them.”
Todd moved toward his brother and took him by the shoulders, holding Pat tightly, searching those eyes. “Tell me. Straight. Please. You didn’t know?”
There was an endless moment of stillness. Then, together, like automatons, they turned toward Jael’s image. A telltale dot was flashing on Dian’s monitor. She was recording what was happening in the sealed room. Jael made no move to override her, contemptuous.
“Yes,” Jael said. “He doesn’t know. Why should he? There was no need.” The voice was velvet, despite the years of bitterness in the words. “Patrick always let me handle the dirty details. He says I have a gift for it. And I do.”