Originator (25 page)

“And apparently, since each was plotting to have the other removed, we both were correct in that assessment.”

“No.” Sandy shook her head. “Incorrect. I think all uplinks accentuate the process of CNS, the selective interpretation of data. SuperPsych have been picking up on that. Institutionalisation makes it worse. You were plotting because we were plotting. We were plotting because you were plotting. Chicken and egg, at some point, we have to stop. I think this is a good place to stop. What do you think?”

Shin thought about it. Tapped more ash into the tray. “Your presumption is that our differences are not grounded in functioning realities. I can't say I agree. FSA and FedInt stand for different things. Naive fools in the media cry that all squabbling political factions should just get along and put those differences aside. Until they realise that one of those differences is important to them, whereupon they become partisan players like the rest of us. Only the ignorant and the uninvolved crave bipartisanship. We're neither.”

“We can talk about it,” Sandy insisted. Her gaze inviting agreement.
“And we can talk about it
later
. If every fundamental disagreement spirals into out-of-control narrative ideology and institutional confrontation, then we'll end up like the League, tearing itself to bits.”

Shin nodded slowly. “Yes. I have confidence that this intelligence takes priority for both of us. If Takewashi is not delusional.”

“We can't presume that.” She took a deep breath. “Shit.”

Shin nodded again. “Shit indeed.” Took a long drag and stubbed out his cigarette. “Let's begin.”

Everyone was waiting for her in HQ's briefing room, the most secure room in the building. She hadn't even sent an emergency signal, just a low, meaningless pulse, with a few random beats thrown in. It meant nothing. Which in turn meant everything.

“Talee,” Sandy told the gathered faces around the long table. It was past midnight, and the absence of so many top FSA figures from their usual routines, in the absence of an announced emergency, might be noticed. “Takewashi says the Talee are trying to kill him. The League too, but mostly he's scared of Talee. Says they're coming for him. He wants to be taken somewhere with no net access. That's why I couldn't say anything on the way back. Considering Cai.”

Ashen-faced silence around the room. Barely a breath was heard. Ari was there, cold pads on his skull under a cap, head still throbbing after the sonic pulse that FedInt had hit the shuttle with. It had been inside the cabin, new tech that no one had known to look for, probably on the walls. Designed especially for use against GIs in enclosed spaces, it had concussed even Poole, Tuli, and Rhian. They were no worse for wear than Ari, save for their good humour. It had been cunningly done, all were aware. FedInt were players, and being spies rather than soldiers, perhaps somewhat better at playing the cunning angle.

“We need to go red,” Reichardt said quietly. “The whole system.”

“But they're only after Takewashi, right?” Hando asked.

“Yes,” Sandy answered Reichardt, ignoring Hando. “Quietly.” And glanced at Ibrahim. Ibrahim looked as grim as Sandy had seen him. Partly that was unhappiness with her, she knew. He'd given her orders on FedInt, she'd ignored them. Now, FedInt had Takewashi and were calling the shots. She'd explained her reasons, and he wasn't buying it. Sandy wasn't sure she'd
be any different in his position. FedInt had a gun pointed at their heads. Unconditional trust, in that circumstance, was not feasible. Even if she was right, from Ibrahim's point of view she still might end up being wrong.

He nodded. “Give the signal. The system goes red. We must alert President Raza and Mr Ranaprasana.”

“Sir,” said Hando, “the more people who know, the more inevitable that Cai will find out. We simply can't keep him out of our systems.”

“Then we'll have to keep the systems quiet,” said Ibrahim. “Verbal communication only on this matter. And we'll have to implore those we tell to do the same.”

“Safer not to tell them anything,” someone volunteered.

“Given the Federation is still nominally a democracy, we don't have that luxury. Cassandra, Cai. Suggestions?”

“I could kill him,” she said. And took a deep breath. “Or I could try. I'm not sure even autistic can stop him . . . and if he gets into my head, there's the killswitch . . . which can't be activated by any technology known to humans, but . . . well.” A grim silence. “I think I'm a better soldier than him, to judge from Vanessa and Rhian's assessments from Pantala, but we've never seen him at full stretch, so that's uncertain also. All up, I'd give that a less-than-equal chance of success.”

Ibrahim pursed his lips. “Yes. And Takewashi may be delusional. Best to let him explain himself fully first.”

“He's being taken to a more secure location,” Sandy continued. “Obviously they'll need to limit access, the location will be blind to most of us.”

“Better and better,” Hando muttered.

“Shin is frightened.” Sandy looked firmly around at them all to make sure the gravity of that sank in. “I saw it, elevated pulse, trembling hands, nothing out of the ordinary, but real nonetheless. And he's sure as hell not scared of me, he's too smart for that. He agrees we have to work together, FedInt and FSA. On this, we can trust him.”

“No, we can't,” said Ari. Sandy stared at him. He was sitting farther up on the table, feet on a chair, face drawn in a permanent grimace. “This is an initial shock, but we've seen Talee get interventionist before. If they're just after Takewashi, then he'll readjust and we'll be back in the firing line . . .”

“What if they're not?” Sandy interrupted. “Just after Takewashi?”

“Then we'll need a secure foundation we can depend upon, and Federal Intelligence isn't it! Shin is pathologically incapable of accepting FSA leadership on this issue, and the higher the stakes get, the more he's going to grab at the steering wheel . . .”

“Ari!” Sandy snapped. “No more! This is Compulsive Narrative Syndrome, and it nearly got us all blown to hell out at the spaceport! We have to work with FedInt, because if there's anything to Takewashi's fears, we're going to need them!”

“Sir, this is a mistake,” Ari said to Ibrahim. “They'll knife us first chance they get.”

Ibrahim's craggy face looked deadly grim in the low light. “I agree with both of you,” he said finally. “They will knife us, and we can't trust them. But for now we have no choice. We'll walk the tightrope because we have to.” With a dangerous stare at Sandy. He wasn't happy about it. That being the case, Sandy knew that eight years of friendship wouldn't count for much, if Ibrahim felt she was becoming more liability than asset. If she pushed too hard, Ibrahim would sit her out.

She nodded. “Good enough.”

“Cassandra,” said Amirah, more composed and calm than most. “Any thoughts on Talee motivations?”

“To kill Takewashi? Hell, any number of reasons.
I've
wanted to kill Takewashi, and we know the Talee aren't pacifists.” She ran a hand through her hair, thinking. That mannerism was new. She'd never made random, subconscious mannerisms in the past. “But targeting an individual, if they are, is a new step. We know they can do it, that's possibly what Cai and others like him were intended for in the first place. As to why . . .” she shrugged. “It's dangerous to guess too much. Let's wait to see what he says.”

“Why not just give Takewashi to them?” Hando asked. “I mean, he's not that important to us that we're going to stand between him and the Talee?”

“No, you don't get it,” said Reichardt. “Fleet have code for degrees of Talee contact. Talee have been minimally interventionist before. Pantala was a huge escalation, them destroying a League warship, but that was defensive, not aggressive. Takewashi's one of the best-defended people in the League. Was. And didn't think League could protect him, and now suggests we can't either. That means he expects Talee to come through us, to come through anyone, to get him. That's the nightmare scenario. We know Talee can be unstable and incredibly destructive. If that starts coming here . . .”

Deathly silence. Sandy had never seen outright fear in an FSA briefing before. But it was a time for firsts.

“Danya?” Danya started awake and remembered immediately that he had to keep still and quiet, or the drug pushers on the floor of the warehouse below would hear and send someone up with a gun to investigate the loft. But the air on his cheek was warm, not chill, and . . . no, that was the wrong memory, and the wrong reflex. He was on Callay, in Tanusha. In Sandy's house, in his own room, in a comfortable bed, with a surfboard against the wall and AR glasses on the bedside bench so as to check on Svetlana and Kiril any time he wanted . . . “Danya!”

He blinked and lifted his head to peer at the doorway. Kiril was there, in his Moondog pyjamas—his favourite cartoon character. Scruffy-haired and lightly freckled, and now a little confused . . . but that was Kiril, much of the time. “What's wrong, Kiri?”

“I just got a message from Cai.”

“From Cai?” He blinked wider awake. “On your uplinks?” He picked up his glasses and peered at the timestamp . . . it was quarter past one in the morning. Cai had been helping periodically with Kiril's uplinks, giving advice to Sandy on how to help them grow in non-dangerous ways. But why would he be sending a message after one in the morning? “What did he say?”

“He said he just wanted to see how I was.” Kiril wandered into the room to stand at Danya's bedside. “I was already awake, I was trying out some things.”

“On your uplinks?” He wasn't wearing his headband, the one with the repressors that would talk to his uplinks and tell them to stay quiet, for a time at least. To help him sleep, as these days they were waking him. “Kiri, you have to leave the headband on. Sandy says you're giving them enough exercise during the day, you shouldn't do it at night as well.”

“But I wanted to try something.” With no real fear about the trouble it might cause. Kiril was brave. Danya tried to remember what it was like to be that brave.

“So what did Cai say?”

“He just said hello and that he couldn't sleep either. I think he's nice.” Danya sighed. Kiril thought everyone he talked to was nice.

“I think he's nice too. But he's a very unusual GI, so we have to be careful with him. We're not sure if he's actually nice, or if he just seems nice. Understand?”

Kiril nodded. Danya didn't believe it. He'd had this conversation with Kiril a thousand times on Droze, be careful of this person, don't trust that person, but as soon as he turned his back, there would be Kiril, chatting away with some new friend.

“Now go and put your headband on, do you know where it is?”

Kiril nodded. “It's just by my bed.” Danya ruffled his hair and kissed him.

Svetlana came in. “What's going on?”

Danya rolled his eyes. “Kiril's just going back to bed, with his headband on this time. Aren't you, Kiril?”

“I was just talking to Cai on my uplinks!” Kiril sat up on Danya's bed, all eager to start this new conversation, as though the previous one had never occurred. Danya groaned. “We were both awake, I think he could see me on the net. Sandy says that can happen when I'm awake, or with Cai it can happen anyway.”

“Sandy's not here,” said Svetlana, bouncing on the end of Danya's bed. “She hasn't been back all night.”

“Sandy sent me a message an hour ago saying she had to work tonight,” Danya explained. “She doesn't know when she'll be back.”

Svetlana pouted. “That's not fair, why does she only message you?”

“Because I asked her to, and she doesn't want to wake you up.” Danya was a light sleeper at the best of times, and Sandy had quickly learned that he would sleep less, and worry more, if he woke to find her gone with no explanation, than if she woke him herself with a quick message.

“I bet I could talk to her on my uplinks,” Kiril suggested.

“No, Kiri,” Danya said sternly. “She'll be very angry if you do, you know she doesn't like you using them at night at all.” And far less than that, in fact. “Why don't you both go back to sleep?”

“I don't like how she's never here,” Svetlana complained, lying on the bed by Danya's feet. “Doesn't she get tired?”

“She doesn't need as much sleep as we do,” said Danya pointedly. “And we see her a lot more than some kids see their parents. I was talking to Raul Esparza, he was saying he only sees his dad for an hour each day, just before he goes to bed. We see Sandy much more than that.”

“She's never here at night lately.”

“But you're asleep, it's not like you're missing her at night.”

“I just feel safer,” said Svetlana. She stretched out tiredly, head on the covers.

“Svet,” said Danya, “go back to bed.”

“U-hmm,” Svetlana agreed, dozing.

“I had a dream I was back in Droze,” said Kiril. Svetlana's eyes opened to look at him. “That's why I couldn't sleep. I dreamed I was running away from a big lizard, and I was trying to find you, and you were looking for me, but you couldn't see me and you just kept walking past. And I tried to talk to you, but you couldn't hear me, and . . . and then a storm came up, and . . . and the lizard . . . I can't remember the next bit.” He bit his lip, looking downcast and upset. “And Cali Wiley was there, and she kept trying to steal my apple.” He frowned. “I can't remember how I got the apple. But she kept trying to steal it.”

Svetlana's eyes flicked to Danya. Concern. “Cali Wiley died, Kiril,” said Danya. “You remember that, don't you?”

“Yes, but she was trying to steal my apple. In my dream.” His eyes were far away, concentrating. Evidently it had not been a nice dream. “I should have given her the apple. Cali Wiley was nice.”