Frozen Sky- Battlefront Page 4

  "I want to get moving," she said.

  Harmeet clucked at her. "Sweetheart, it's a miracle you're alive. Stay in bed."

  Reclining on her bunk, she helped integrate the ESA's subsurface arrays with NASA's rapidly expanding grid as their mecha placed beacons and posts. She also viewed their sims of the sunfish skulking outside Zone Two.

  Appearing in fours and eights, the sunfish played hide and seek with the mecha, scratching and crying. Most of them were savage males. They shrieked for blood. They claimed the darkness, roaming the catacombs, feasting on the dead.

  She identified two scouts from Ghost Clan Thirty. Unfortunately, Peter had ordered a communications blackout except for their datastreams to the Jyväskylä and to Earth. Their subsurface arrays listened passively but she could not transmit. Nor would he allow her to send a doppelgänger as her envoy.

  She thought that was shortsighted. Berlin's decision to postpone reaching out to the sunfish was unjust, even demeaning. Too many sections of the catacombs had flooded or collapsed, destroying the clan's air locks, their hatcheries and their food supplies. They deserved help. Without it, they might leave for other regions of the frozen sky, although she accepted that her crew had larger problems.

  Encased in the solidified mass created by the floods, at least three PSSC mecha remained operational. They clawed feebly, working to dig themselves loose. They swept the ice with radar. Their surveillance of Zones One and Two must have been spotty, but they were a constant presence. Vonnie worried that the sunfish would attack.

  Their cease-fire with the PSSC was predicated on minimal activity. Both sides had sworn to announce every move they made. Of course they violated these terms. The PSSC neglected to mention their quest toward the Great Ocean, and the allies wouldn't advise the PSSC of their plans until they were prepared. They wanted to have the Jyväskylä positioned above Europa's southern pole before they breathed a word about probes or a submarine.

  The morning after Vonnie had her surgery, the Jyväskylä was on final approach.

  Far away, the FNEE ship hovered in neutral space, holding a path for two EUSD vessels and a USAF cruiser en route from Mars and Earth -- but the Jyväskylä intended to jostle the Dongfangzhixing, intermingling what remained of its defensive screens with the PSSC spy sats and HKs.

  Both ships were on a hair trigger.

  Now the Jyväskylä launched one lander. The lander deployed no CEW and it deactivated its targeting systems. Equally important, its commander -- Lieutenant Wade -- maintained contact with the PSSC throughout his flight.

  Wade touched down at a predesignated spot. Wearing pressure suits, ESA and FNEE crew unloaded supplies onto jeeps as PSSC spy sats scanned for weapons.

  When the lander was empty, Wade returned to space. Vonnie didn't ask if he'd smuggled missiles or nukes among their supplies. Her contribution was tabulating food, an asinine job that the AIs could have accomplished in a microsecond. Peter was giving her make-work.

  Then she took another stupid nap.

  Ash woke her from a nightmare, standing by her bunk, not sitting or crouching. Earlier, Ash hadn't even called, avoiding the women's barracks and sleeping in Lander 04. Ash might not have visited at all except Vonnie had fibbed about wanting her to consult on their grid.

  "What do you need?" Ash said.

  Vonnie rubbed her good eye and sat up. "Hi. How are you?" she asked.

  "Busy. What do you need?"

  Five of the American women were in the room. One was watching a drama on a hand-held display. The others were dozing. Vonnie lowered her voice. "I know Peter's upset, but he shouldn't be, and I know you're hurting, and you should be. Don't bite my head off. Whatever I'm going through with him doesn't affect you and me."

  Ash shrugged just like Peter.

  Jesus, she's stubborn, Vonnie thought. More stubborn than I am, which is really saying something. She might have shared the joke if Ash had any sense of humor about herself. That was Ash's problem. Peter and Ash were too stiff.

  Vonnie gestured for her to bend down. "Did you save copies of Choh Lam?" she whispered.

  “No.”

  "You're positive? Maybe you should check. What about duplicates in Berlin?"

  "We never sent his mem files to them. In fact, I was reprimanded for keeping his files in first place. He was too hot. He was hotter than the sun."

  "So you can make jokes."

  "I wasn't joking," Ash said as she wrinkled her brow, puzzled by Vonnie's remark.

  Vonnie sighed. Lam is dead, she thought. He's died his last death. Even if we can patch together what's left of him, a few random impulses won't be more than a ghost of a ghost. What would those fragments remember? Europa? Earth? She said, "When you hear something from Tony, will you please tell me?"

  "We'll have a briefing if Peter says so. Anything that's classified has to stay classified, especially because we're in a foreign camp. I won't break the rules for you."

  Vonnie almost said, Henri would. She meant it as a compliment. Henri had been flexible. Ash was not. I could have guessed she'd act like Peter's offended daughter, she thought, but what she said was, "I'm glad you came."

  "Me too," Ash said, although her voice was devoid of warmth. She walked out.

  Like a prisoner, Vonnie watched the door after Ash was gone. She wanted to go after her. She was lonely, but the American woman with the display was absorbed by her drama and the others were asleep, so Vonnie settled down in her bunk and shut her eye, trying to clear her head.

  Damn it, Ash. You should trust me more than Peter. You should take my side, not his. Why are women so much tougher on each other than we are on men?

  Maybe she could find new friends among the Americans. She had spoken with several of them. Their crew was remarkably diverse and they loved their hyphens. In addition to the typical assortment of German- or British- or Scottish-Americans, two were African-Americans, one was Mexican-American, one was Native American, two were Jewish -- a Polish-American and an Israeli citizen -- and one was a Japanese citizen.

  Four of the women had Disney names like Christmas Bauman. They were Jewel, Purity, Mississippi and Sky. Vonnie supposed Vonnie was equally absurd, but it was a nickname, not what her parents had christened her.

  One person stood out. First in command was Jana Palmquist, a Swedish-American elf from Texas. If Vonnie had been keeping a scorecard, Palmquist would have won. The married man, Gould, was a strong runner-up as a Jewish Polish American born in Seattle. Sky's official bio claimed Native American blood from the Cheyenne and the Pawnee even though she'd grown up in Boston, but it was Palmquist's combination of a Swedish heritage with a Texas upbringing that took the prize as far as Vonnie was concerned since Sweden was made of snowy forests at the Arctic circle and Texas was a desert.

  Jana Palmquist did not sleep in the women's barracks. NASA's second in command, DeBrun, did not sleep in the men's barracks. Both of them had private rooms in another module. More than a luxury, her separation from her crew added to her authority.

  She came to see Vonnie not long after Ash. She was in her thirties with gray eyes and a self-assured smile and short loose sandy curls. She had freckles and an old, pitted scar on her cheek as if to show she wasn't unapproachable.

  The scar was the size of a small coin. Except for that wrinkled pockmark, she was much prettier than Vonnie. She was delicately proportioned whereas Vonnie was tall for a woman, not to mention Vonnie's shoulders were too wide.

  Jana Palmquist looked like a Viking, like when she smiled she might bite. Her eyes were quick -- and despite her Texas drawl, her words were quicker. "I want you on your feet and outside with us," she said in a tone that wasn't a request. It was a mandate.

  "Thank you, Commander," Vonnie said.

  "Call me Jan. I don't have time for all that."

  "All what, ma'am?"

  "Jan. One word. Gavin doesn't feel like people take him seriously without his title, so call him Commander DeBrun. My name is Jan. Got it?"

 
; "Yes, ma'am."

  Jan laughed and clapped Vonnie on the biceps before yanking her hand back in alarm. "Sorry. Did I hurt you?"

  "That's my good side."

  "All you have are good sides," Jan said. "We've watched you on the net. Most of my crew is mesmerized. You're a bigshot. Get healed up and get outside with us. It'd be a huge boost for morale. We need you."

  Vonnie was drawn to her. For such a skinny woman, Jan had a heavyweight aura of confidence and charm.

  She was a very different sort of leader than Peter, which was evident in how her people worshipped her. Even more than hyphens or Disney names, the Americans loved their popularity contests. Like a cult, many of the women had styled their hair with the same short curls as Jan including Andrea, Meiko, Jewel and Sky.

  Byron Troutman was a distinctive name, too. When she was loopy from the drugs, Vonnie free-associated about fish and sunfish and oceans and ice. Troutman visited her regularly for imaging or meds. Unlike Ash or Ben, he was always there. Since transferring to the women's barracks, she'd actually spoken to Troutman more than anyone else even though he was always in a rush.

  When he arrived ten minutes after Jan, he removed Vonnie's bandages. She winced. The light stung her new eye, which clenched shut uncontrollably as she grimaced, leaking tears down the left side of her face. Transplants weren't simple procedures. She was relieved that her immune system hadn't rejected NASA's clone stock.

  Troutman tested her muscles, her lacrimal glands, her pupil response, her vision. He let her look into a mirror. The new eye was indistinguishable from her memory of the one she'd lost, although her lashes had been clipped. She would have an odd, wide-eyed appearance on that side until they grew back.

  He said the discomfort would pass. He also told her to stay in bed. More bed, she thought, but she would endure it because she was alive when Henri and so many others died.

  Araújo's speech about The Hero Of The ESA had resonated with her. He'd embellished her so-called counteroffensive, overstating what she'd done, but she couldn't overstate the dead.

  She wanted to honor them.

  She wanted to do something.

  She called Peter on her display. He answered, which was a surprise. Her real motive for calling was to let him see her face without bandages. "Peter, hi. Can I help with some of the engineering jobs?"

  "No." He looked like he wanted to say more. His expression was thoughtful and guarded. He switched off before she could suggest tasks as basic as calibrating their auxiliary heating and airco units, which the Americans had installed like they thought a hundred people were landing tomorrow.

  The Americans believed in convenience. They'd connected five of their six modules with plastic tubes, which allowed them to walk from module to module without suiting up.

  Module D, their kitchen and mess hall, was the camp's hub, where everyone went for the food and stayed for the social aspects -- and Vonnie missed out.

  Harmeet had been good about carrying a display with her and introducing Vonnie to everyone. Vonnie listened to them talk and eat. She watched them getting to know each other. She felt like a voyeur, but peeking through Harmeet's display was better than silence.

  After dinner, Jan walked back into the women's barracks. The module was empty except for the two of them. Jan sat on Vonnie's bunk and Vonnie was embarrassed by how strongly she responded. "Thank you for coming," she said. "I, uh, I'm going out of my mind sitting here."

  "You did fine work with our grid."

  "I can do anything you want."

  "Well, there's a bush we gotta beat."

  "Excuse me?"

  Jan flashed her smile, brash as Texas, confident as a Valkyrie. "A bush we gotta beat," she said. "That was an ice breaker. Washington told me to play nice. The thing is... I need to hear more about Choh Lam."

  Vonnie opened her mouth, then shut it. Had the Americans put a microphone in her bunk?

  One of their utmost secrets was Lam's transformation from a man into a doppelgänger. Few people in Berlin had been told, and none of their allies. Vonnie didn't know if Peter had been authorized to share this information or if Jan had acquired it through more roundabout methods, so she was cautious. "Where did you hear that name?" she asked, not even saying Choh Lam herself.

  "Berlin told us as part of our consolidation. They told the Brazilians, too. Colonel Ribeiro and I met with Administrator Koebsch this afternoon."

  "Then you've seen our reports."

  "Yeah. Have you?" Jan pulled a display from her pocket. Before turning it on, she glanced around the barracks. Many of the women should arrive soon. Someone always went to bed early or four of them gathered for a game of dominos called 42. Tonight, however, they'd lingered in the mess hall.

  She told them to wait, Vonnie thought.

  Jan pointed at the display and said, more explicitly, "Have you seen your own reports?"

  Vonnie shook her head. Her interviews with the AIs had been a one-way street. She gave, they took, and Peter hadn't shared Berlin's conclusions with her. He let them manipulate her and himself.

  I need to be careful. I can't afford to burn more bridges with him, she thought, but her anger made her receptive. Jan must have counted on it. In fact, Jan's first visit had probably been to groom her -- to befriend her -- to set her up for a fall. All of them were maneuvering on chessboards as large as the solar system or as small as one-on-one relationships.

  This feels like an overture. She's offering something I don't have. I want to hear what Berlin decided.

  What does she want in return?

  4.

  Jan said, "Lam was infected with PSSC sabotage and control programs when you met him in the ice before their assault. When he came to the surface, he was almost totally under their control. I have your engineer's diagnostics. Most of Lam's internals were fried by the explosion that tore him apart, but there were enough pieces left for a convincing autopsy." She set the display on her lap.

  Vonnie kept herself from looking at it. She didn't want to seem too eager. She said, "Tony isn't who I would have picked for diagnostic work."

  "Maybe so, maybe not. We've done background on all of you, and Tony Gravino is dependable. He's the man your people put on the job. His numbers look reliable. It was Lam who was off his rocker."

  "You mean he was insane."

  "Bingo."

  Lam had spoken in riddles, signing to Vonnie with his body. We've felt their weight. Larger enemies. They're in the water. Hungry and loud.

  Jan said, "I wouldn't bet a dollar on a single thing he said. The PSSC put their hooks into him. Then they used him against you. Even if half of what he said was accurate, they twisted the rest. Lam was a diversion. We have a lot of people who agree on that, but I also watched your interviews. You swear we can trust him. Is that blind loyalty or do you know something we don't?"

  "I don't believe in blind loyalty except to my friends. Lam, the man... I trusted him. As an AI, he was dangerous. That was my fault. But as a doppelgänger, he wasn't insane. He'd corrected his core and pared down his memory of who he'd been. He thought like a sunfish. When he said he heard new creatures in the ocean, he wasn't reporting false data invented by the PSSC. Why would they bother? If they wanted to trick us, they could have made him say there were more mecha than they really had. They would have presented us with a close-range threat to distract us. To me, the real proof of his sanity was his decision to come to the surface at the end. He didn't need to climb out of the ice."

  "Our people think he was forced up by the PSSC. He spouted a bunch of garbage about your favorite subject -- the sunfish. Then he was going to attack you."

  "That's a hundred percent backwards. He saved me. I think he intentionally came to the surface even though he knew he would be exposed to more SCPs. I think he did it because scouts protect matriarchs."

  "The two of you were close."

  "Oh, Jesus, how times do I need to answer that question? When he was alive, Lam and I were interested in each other. So
oner or later, I'm sure we would have had a ton of sex, all right? At the time, there wasn't anyone on Europa except him and me and Christmas Bauman. Who else was I going to date? But they died. End of story. I'm not defending him because we were in love."

  "That's not how your psych profile lays it out," Jan said, shifting the display on her lap.

  She was baiting Vonnie with it. Reading her updated profile would be like looking into a mirror. Months ago, Vonnie might have been curious. Now she felt so in tune with herself, no mirrors were required.

  She said, "If Earth thinks I can't let go of the guilt I feel about Lam, they're wrong. People lie and cheat, so they assume everyone is lying. They don't even believe their own eyes and ears, but I've learned to think like a sunfish, too. Sunfish are open with each other. Lam was open with me."

  She thought Jan would continue dueling with her. Instead, Jan was as blunt as any matriarch. With her cocky smile, Jan said, "I like you, Von. I really do. We followed your mission from day one and you're a go-getter, although I might've done a few things differently. Here's the deal. Washington thinks we're up to our eyebrows in shit. Folks are trying to figure out if they give us a shovel or a paddle."

  "The paddle must be sending probes or a submarine into the ocean. What's the shovel?"

  "The shovel is we go home."

  "Peter said we're staying."

  "The minority party in my government is ready to pull everybody from Europa if our payoff is China lets us bring in new mecha and new tankers. We appease China, we start mining again. You've heard that proposal."

  "Yes."

  "It's not an idea that's going to go away. It's the easy out. Some folks in our majority party are walking across the aisle. They call it bipartisan leadership. I call it idiocy of the highest order."

  Vonnie blinked at her. Jan had sounded like she was presenting arguments to discredit Vonnie and Lam. Suddenly she’d swerved in the opposite direction.

  "You want to stay," Vonnie said.

  "I'm an astronaut. I'd sell my mom if it meant getting to the ocean first and showing up those commie assholes for what they did to us. My crew is with me. We need Washington to accept Lam's testimony because everything he told you could tip their decision in our favor."