Текст книги "Ammonite"

Автор книги: Nicola Griffith

Соавторы: Nicola Griffith,Nicola Griffith
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After four hours her head was aching too badly to continue.

She turned everything off and silence swallowed her. The light hurt her eyes. She drank some water and lay down.

“Lights, off.” The dark and quiet made her dizzy. “Lights, low.” She staggered back to her screen, commed Hiam. “My head hurts.”

Hiam glanced off‑screen, nodded to herself. “Your fever’s high, but nothing to worry about.” She gave Marghe a crooked grin. “You look drunk.”

“I feel it.”

“Take a painkiller for the headache.”

Marghe went to the food slot, swallowed the painkiller, and lay down again.

What had happened to Winnie Kimura? Perhaps Eagan knew more than she was saying. Eagan would know a lot that was not in any report. She needed Eagan with her on Jeep, not up here. Six months, alone.

Silence lay like a weight on her chest, pushing her down.

Her dreams were confused. She was back on the Terragin, studying a language map. A word kept appearing, superimposed over her careful roots: CURSED. She tried everything she could think of to wipe the screen clean, but nothing worked. Then the walls and ceilings were whispering in Hiam’s voice: Remember the cursed.

When she woke up, she felt hollow and light, her head full of hot wires trying to push their way out through her eyes. She lay still. The cursed. The cursed… What did the dream remind her of? The Terragin… working… overhearing one of the crew: Supplies for the cursed.

She sat up carefully, pushed herself off the bed, and almost fell onto the chair before her terminal.

“Sara.” Silence. “Sara?”

The screen flickered into color. Sara was flushed. “Yes?”

Marghe blinked. Bad time. “Sorry.” But she could not bring herself to switch off. “There’s something I wanted to talk to you about… A dream. The cursed. Supplies for the cursed.”

“Ah, yes. Our keeper. Our Armageddon.”

Marghe shook her head, confused.

“The Kurst.” Hiam spelled it for her. “Company’s military cruiser hanging out there, watching us, watching Jeep.”

None of this made sense to Marghe. “What?”

“Officially it doesn’t exist, but SEC knows about it. We know about it. Commander Danner down on the ground knows about it. I don’t think she’s thought it all through, but at least she knows it’s there.”

Marghe wished Hiam would go more slowly. “I don’t understand any of this.”

“No? Wait a minute.” Hiam leaned off‑screen, reappeared holding a glass and a small bottle. She poured herself a shot. Drank it down. “Illegal, this. But I’m sure Company won’t mind.” She poured herself another. “The Kurstappeared a while after Estradewas converted. Four years ago, maybe. It’s Company’s insurance.”

Marghe knew she must look confused. Her head hurt.

“Look at it this way, here’s a planet riddled with a virus that kills all men and lots of women, almost as if it was designed as a weapon.”

“Was it?”

Hiam brushed the question aside. “What’s important is that it could be used as one. Don’t you see? Nobody understands it, no one can control it. Except maybe those women down there. If you were a military person, would you take a chance on letting civilian technicians, even Mirrors, wander onto a world if they could come out carrying a weapon our hypothetical soldier doesn’t understand and can’t combat?”

Marghe had not thought of it that way. “But everyone goes through decontamination.”

Hiam poured another drink. “Let me tell you something. We know nothing about that virus. Nothing. We don’t know its vectors, its strength, or longevity… nothing. If you were to go through all those unpleasant procedures I detailed for you before you left the clean area, no one could guarantee you would be free of it. Now, given that that’s the case, would you let someone off here and take them home? Imagine if the virus got loose out there!”

That one was easy. “Death, everywhere. For everyone. Eventually.”

“Not necessarily. The women down there seem to have found a way.” She frowned and drained her glass. “But nobody knows how.”

“So what happens to those people who get taken off here, for the long‑term quarantine?”

“I don’t know. I don’t want to know.”

Marghe was tired. “Well, everything will be all right if the vaccine works.” She wished her head would stop hurting.

“All right for whom?”

“I don’t–”

“A vaccine is a counter‑weapon. It’s control. Imagine: mass vaccination of the women down there. If they need the virus to reproduce, then they’ll die.”

“You don’t know that they do.” Not even Company would deal in genocide, would they? Hiam was paranoid, crazy. “You’re drunk.”

“Yes, I’m drunk. But not stupid. Look me in the face and tell me SEC would stand up to Company on this.”

Marghe imagined her father, and what his opinion would be. Probably he would say nothing–just get up, search his bookshelves, pull down an old volume on the Trail of Tears and other, more systematic attempts at genocide, and hand it to her without comment.

Hiam was nodding. “You see now.. None of us are safe. Estradeis probably wired for destruct. And the gigs. All because no one out there really knows who or what’s safe and what’s contaminated. One whiff of this thing getting out of control and phht, we’re all reduced to our component atoms. That’s why we have no contact with the Kurst: stops the crew from getting to know us, sympathizing. It’s harder to murder people you know.” Hiam stared at nothing. “Every time I wake up, I wonder: Is this going to be my last day?”

Marghe did not know what to do with this information. She did not want to think about it. Her head hurt. She felt as though someone had been beating her with a thick stick.

“Why do I ache so much?” she whispered to herself.

Hiam heard. “First‑stage immune response,” she said cheerfully. She seemed glad to change the subject. “The activation of your T cells is starting a process which ends up with your hypothalamus turning up the thermostat.” She nodded at Marghe’s shaking hands. “The shivering is just one way to generate heat. Don’t worry, the painkiller you took includes an antipyretic. Your fever will ease along with the ache.”

Marghe frowned. This did not fit something Hiam had said before. Something about low‑level response. She tried to ignore the thumping of her head and sort out her information. SEC rules meant that Hiam was not allowed to culture the virus, or bioengineer it, so the vaccine was not made of killed virus. What she had done instead was identify the short string of amino acids, peptides, that folded up to form the actual antigen of the viral protein, map out the amino acid sequence, and then bio‑facture a combination of different peptides, matching different regions of the viral protein, in the hope that one or more of the synthetic peptides would fold up to mimic an antigenic site present on the viral protein. She had linked those to inert carrier proteins to help stimulate the immune system. But Hiam had not been able to fine‑tune the peptides, and the immune response was supposed to be low‑level.

“You said that it would be a low‑level response. That’s why I have to take it so often.”

“The response to the peptides is low‑level–”

Marghe would hate to see an acute response.

“What’s happening now is partly due to the adjuvants I added to the FN‑17.” Marghe looked blank. “The combination of chemicals which enhance the immune response and help maintain a slow and steady release of antigen.”

Marghe struggled against dizziness. Adjuvant. Chemicals. “They’re toxic?”

Hiam nodded. “Cumulatively so. Which is why six months is the absolute limit for the vaccine.”

Toxic, “Why didn’t you tell me this before?”

“I didn’t think there was any need.”

Doctors know best. Marghe felt angry and uncertain; she did not know whether or not to believe Hiam. About the vaccine, about the Kurst. She did not want to talk anymore. “Feel sick. Bye.” She felt for the comm switch, could not find it, pushed the off switch instead. The screen died and the whole room went black.

She squeezed her way through the sticky blackness to her bed. Behind her eyelids gaudy colors swam and burst. She dozed.

In her dreams her head still hurt, but it was Hiam who was going down to Jeep to test the vaccine. That seemed logical; a doctor would be the best person. Then Hiam was in D Section, saying, “But how does it all work? And why aren’t the daughters identical copies of their mothers?” She got angry when Marghe could not tell her. A tree grew from the floor of D Section, a tree heavy with apples, mangoes, cantaloupes. Marghe reached for a grape the size of her fist, realized it was poisoned just as she woke to a voice calling her from the ceiling.

“…up, Marghe. Wake up.”

She tried to say something but her throat was too dry.

“Good,” Hiam said. “I want you to get off the bed. Come on, that’s it. Good. Now get a drink of water. A whole glass. Drink it all. Slowly, Marghe, slowly.” The room swooped. “Fill the glass up again. Take it to the bed. Sit down. Good. Sip it slowly.”

Marghe did. The warm water tasted metallic.

“Your reaction was more severe than I’d anticipated. I was beginning to wonder if I’d have to put a hood on you.”

Marghe looked over at the medical hood. “I’m glad you didn’t.” Speaking made her breathless and hurt her throat.

“I still might have to if you get any more dehydrated.”

Marghe sipped until her glass was empty.

“If you feel up to it, go to the slot and eat what you find there.”

An apple. Marghe stared at it, confused. Had Hiam been inside her dream? She picked it up. It was cool. She felt deathly tired, too tired for subterfuge. “Are you trying to poison me?”

“Oh, Marghe. No, I’m not poisoning you. Try and eat the apple.”

She woke up thirsty but clear‑headed. “How long this time?” she asked the ceiling.

“Almost seventeen hours.”

She sat up cautiously. She still felt a little dizzy, but that could be lack of food. The food slot hissed. It contained a glass of water and one watery pink softgel.

She opened her mouth to protest, then closed it. It was her choice; nobody had forced her to come here. The slot closed automatically when she lifted out the glass and the pill. After a moment, it slid open again. A small portion of fish, still steaming, with a bean sprout salad and another glass of water.

When she finished, she was tired again. She lay down, trying to remember if those conversations with Hiam about genocide had been real or delirium. Marghe fell asleep trying to remember what exactly Hiam had said.

The lights around the door to the outer access lock flared warning red, then dulled. The door hissed open. Janet Eagan was small, naked, and coughing so hard she did not have the breath to greet Marghe.

Marghe brought her a glass of water and pulled a sheet from her bed. While Eagan drank the water, Marghe draped the sheet around her shoulders. They were bony, and pale except for freckles, but her hands and face and legs were weathered. The coughing eased.

“Better?”

Eagan nodded. “For now. Thanks.”

“I’m Marguerite Taishan. Marghe.”

Eagan did not offer to shake hands.

Marghe gave her a cliptogether. While they ate, she found herself watching Eagan’s hands, which were brown and hard, callused across the palms. She had not seen hands like that since watching a carpenter at a demonstration of old‑style skills. Eagan noticed and laid them on the table palm up.

“Rope calluses,” she said. “For a while I crewed a ship working the coast around the southern tip of the continent. I learned a lot.”

“I’d like to hear it.”

“Most of it’s on disk at Port Central. I couldn’t bring it with me.”

“Is there anything I should know before I leave?”

Eagan laughed harshly, “Yes. It’s not like anything you can possibly imagine. If I had it to do again, I’d never set foot outside Port Central, just invite the occasional native in to tell me her story. If you have any sense, that’s what you’ll do. I’m glad to be out of it.”

Marghe said nothing. Eagan shrugged and picked up her fork. They ate in silence.

Marghe got up to get their dessert. She hesitated. “I’ve heard some rumors, I can’t vouch for their validity, but once you’ve heard them, you might want to give up on the decontamination and return to Jeep with me.”

“No.”

“Listen, anyway.” Marghe realized she sounded like Hiam. Was she beginning to believe it? “The rumor is that the people who are taken to Estradeare never heard from again.”

“I’ll take my chances.”

“Take some time to think about it.”

“I don’t need to think about it.”

“Eagan, I need you down there. I need what you know.”

“It’s all on disk.”

“I don’t want just what’s on disk. I want your private thoughts, your theories, the ones that are too crazy to be put on record.”

Eagan looked at her for a long time. Marghe saw the lines around her eyes. Formed by months of squinting at light reflecting on the water? “You’re assuming I have some theories. I don’t. Winnie had theories. She’s missing.”

“Tell me what you know.”

“She decided to go to the plateau of Tehuantepec.”

“Tehuantepec?” Marghe frowned.

“The same. Though the name is about as appropriate as ‘Greenland’ was. It’s cold up there, nothing like the climate of the Gulf of Mexico.”

Marghe went over to her terminal and punched up a large‑scale satellite map of the planet. Jeep was encased in huge spiral banks of water vapor. The whole world glowed like milk and mother‑of‑pearl, like a lustrous shell set in a midnight ocean.

A few keystrokes removed the clouds. Marghe rotated the naked world. “Come and show me.”

Eagan pointed to Port Central, on the second largest continent, then tapped a raised area several hundred miles to the north. “Here. Winnie believed she had found clues in their folklore as to the origins of these people. She was heading for a place on the plateau called Ollfoss.”

“Enlarge.” The screen displayed a more detailed map. Much of the plateau was forested and contour lines showed it at an elevation of almost three thousand feet. “Can you show me’the location?”

“I’m not a geographer. But I ’ll give you some friendly advice. Don’t go. Winnie headed that way, and she never came back.”

Marghe stared at the screen. “How long has she been missing?”

“Fourteen months.”

“She was wearing a wristcom?”

“Of course. But most places out there they’re useless: few relays, and weather interferes with everything.”

“What about the Search, Locate, and Identify Code?”

“A SLIC’s only any good if there are enough satellites out there to scan for it. And if the Mirrors are willing to come and get you.”

Marghe absorbed all that. “Do you have any ideas what might have happened?”

“Anything could have happened.”

“You said that one of the reasons you wanted off was because the natives would just as soon kill you as say hello. Or words to that effect.”

For the first time, Eagan looked uncomfortable. “That’s not strictly true. I exaggerated, to rationalize my need to get off the damn world. They’re just… ordinary people.”

“But–”

“No.” Eagan cut her off abruptly. “Winnie did not have to be murdered to die. The planet itself will do that if you give it a chance. Listen to me. Do you have any idea how many different ways a person could get herself killed? For all I know, Winnie could have fallen off her horse and broken her neck the second day out. Or she could have choked on a piece of meat. Or gotten pneumonia. Or been attacked by something.” Tears, moving slowly in the low gravity, spread a wet line down each cheek. “Or maybe she just forgot to tie her horse up tightly one night and it ran off, leaving her stranded miles from anywhere. Maybe she ran out of food and starved to death. I don’t know, I don’t know.” She brushed jerkily at her cheeks. “All! know is that she went away and didn’t come back.”

“She went on her own?”

“Yes,” Eagan said. “I let her go out on her own. I told her she was crazy to try. So I let her go on her own, and now she’s dead. And if you go, you’ll die too.”

Chapter Two

THE GIG TAXIED to a halt. Marghe stretched to relieve the adrenaline flutter of her muscles and waited for the light over her seat to show green. She stood up and fastened her disk pouch around her waist, patted the thigh pocket of her cliptogether for the vial of FN‑17. Systems whined as they powered down, and from outside she heard the scrape and trundle of a ramp being maneuvered into place. The doors cracked open and leaked in light like pale grapefruit squeezings, making the artificial illumination in the gig seem suddenly thick and dim.

Jeep light.

Wind swept dark tatters across a sky rippling with cloud like a well‑muscled torso, bringing with it the smell of dust and grass and a sweetness she could not identify. The gig stood on an apron of concrete roughened and rubber‑streaked by countless landings. In the distance low buildings huddled against the wind.

She walked down the ramp. The concrete was hard under her soft boots. She eased her weight from one foot to another, testing her balance, feeling her muscles adjust to the difference in gravity. She sniffed, trying to equate the spicy sweet smell on the wind to something she knew: nutmeg, sun on beetle wings, the wild smell of heather.

A woman was approaching. Marghe squinted against the bright concrete light and shaded her eyes. A Mirror. For a moment the spicy breeze of Jeep became the thin air of Beaver; fear and anger flooded her system. She breathed slowly, deliberately. This was Jeep. Jeep.

The Mirror was not wearing the mirror‑visored helmet that had given Company Security members their name, but the rest of her slick, impact‑resistant armor was parade‑ground tidy.

“Marguerite Angelica Taishan?” Marghe nodded and the Mirror made a formal semi‑bow. “I’m Officer Kahn. Acting Commander Danner assigned me to show you your quarters.” She paused and Marghe managed a nod. “It’s a bit of a walk. If the gravity bothers you, I could summon a sled.”

“Walking is fine.” She followed the Mirror, stepping over a thick cable that snaked away from the gig and down an access hole. She had nothing to carry. It made her feel vulnerable and alone.

They walked for almost twenty minutes across concrete and then scrubby yellow grass before they reached the living mods. Many of their regulation doors were carved and painted in different designs. One had been framed with handmade bricks. She had never seen that before in a Company outpost.

Officer Kahn led her along a hard dirt path to the door of an untouched unit. “It needs keying,” she said.

Marghe obediently put her palm on the lock and recited her name and status. The door panel blinked an acknowledge, then invited her to punch in a code for additional personal security.

Inside, the air was clean and filtered. The mod followed standard Company layout: desk and chair, bed, soft floor, bathroom niche, comm port, light panels but no heat or air controls. Filtered air was piped in at a constant seventy degrees. She pulled off her disk pouch and dropped it on the desk by the comm port. She was unpacked.

“Commander Danner thought you might wish to take a few hours to rest and refresh yourself, perhaps look around Port Central.” The Mirror took a wristcom from a pocket on her belt and held it out to Marghe. “The memory already has the commander’s call code, and a few others you might need today. She asks that you contact her when you’re ready to meet.”

Marghe fastened it around her left wrist.

“Is there anything else I can do for you?”

“No. Thank you.”

Officer Kahn half turned to the door, then turned back. She cleared her throat. “Look, it’s always rough coming down alone. I get off duty in five or six hours. Why don’t you come along to recreation then? I’ll introduce you to some people.”

“I’m not interested,” Marghe said harshly.

The muscles around Kahn’s eyes tightened. “As you wish.” She punched the door panel harder than necessary. The door hissed open and she ducked out into the wind.

Marghe sat down on the bed. She had not handled that very well. But the last time she had seen a Mirror he had been standing by with arms folded, smiling, instead of stopping three miners from beating her unconscious.

The comm port was standard Company issue. She called up a schematic of Port Central and scanned the data.

Hannah Danner nodded dismissal to Officer Kahn and waited for her to close the office door behind her before reopening the folder stamped FOR ATTN. OF CMDR, SECURITY PERSONNEL, ONLY: MARGUERITE ANGELICA TAISHAN.

She pulled out the eight‑by‑ten facsimile. The color balance was wrong, giving the complexion an orangy tint. She looked at the strong face, the broad jaw, and wondered what color Taishan’s eyes really were. The picture showed them a muddy yellow. It had been taken at her recontract interview two years ago. People changed a great deal in two years.

She looked over at the picture of herself in full armor that occupied the corner of the desk. It had been taken on the day she had gotten her promotion to lieutenant and learned that she was being posted to Jeep. Her visor was pushed up and she was grinning: a younger, smooth‑faced version of herself. A self who believed there was no problem too hard to solve, nothing not covered by the rule book. Sometimes she found it hard to believe only five years separated the face she saw every morning in the mirror and the face she saw in this picture.

Irritated suddenly by the idealism in that face, she leaned across the desk and thumbed the picture blank.

Marguerite Angelica Taishan was not an idealist. Once, perhaps, but no longer. She read the list of injuries Taishan had sustained in the attack on Beaver, then read the charges she had leveled at Company. Taishan had a point. It had been a careful beating and, reading between the lines, an officer could have prevented it before serious damage was done. According to Taishan’s deposition, the representative had disregarded threats designed to intimidate and had submitted an unfavorable report regarding Company’s operation on BV 4, recommending that the planet not be opened for long‑term settlement by Company miners and their families.

Danner turned a page.

SEC had not backed their representative; they had approved long‑term settlement. Taishan had fought, taking the issue as high as she could before being given an official warning. Danner frowned. That warning seemed to have knocked the stuffing from Taishan; she had stopped complaining and accepted another post. But just two days before departure she had resigned abruptly.

Danner looked at the closed face in the picture again. How did it feel to have one’s trained opinion judged worthless? What did it do to one’s self‑esteem? She hoped she would never find out.

Taishan had become Professor of ET Anthropology at Aberystwyth. The dossier was thorough. It listed her publications: articles on subjects ranging from the evolution of Welsh to the deterioration of kinship allegiance among the population of Gallipoli since reintegration. There were two book‑length works; Danner did not have to read the abstract for one, Uneasy Alliance–SEC As Independent Arbiter?, to guess the subject matter. Also listed were her extracurricular activities (tai chi, chi kung, various biofeedback disciplines), her credit rating (mid‑range), and biographical details of her last lover (no leverage possibilities noted). A note indicated that although her father was a hardline antigovernment activist, Taishan had had little contact with him since the death of her mother several months before recontract. A psychological report made several guesses as to why that might be, but Danner did not put much faith in such things. The important thing about the psych sheet was the fact that they could not come up with enough objections to outweigh Taishan’s qualifications for the job of SEC rep on this kind of world. She had the ability to spend large periods of time alone, an innate belief in herself, a prodigious linguistic talent, and superb physical fitness. She was a flawed SEC tool, yes, but the best they had.

Danner had never heard of an SEC employee getting a second chance. There again, she did not know of many people who would volunteer to risk their lives for something as abstract as knowledge.

She turned to the section at the back of the report, “Miscellaneous.” After reading one paragraph, she closed the dossier. There was no reason she needed to know Taishan’s sexual preferences or her personal hygiene habits.

Her screen chimed and displayed the face of Officer Vincio, her administrative assistant.

“Representative Taishan is here and wishes to see you at your earliest convenience, ma’am.”

“Give me two minutes.” She slid the dossier into a drawer. She had time to push her desk against one wall and pull two chairs into a more informal setting around a low table before Vincio rapped on her door and ushered in a tallish, stocky woman with thick, dark hair.

Danner took her hands in greeting. They were smooth and cool. Her eyes were brown, with a hint of green, but that might have been the light. She chose the chair nearest the door, but seemed relaxed enough.

“You’re well rested?” Danner asked politely.

“ Estradekeeps Port Central time.”

“Of course.”

The representative wore the plainest clothes available in Company issue: soft trousers in a dark green weave and a loose‑fitting brown padded shirt. No adornment. Danner suspected confidence rather than self‑effacement; it took something to go in search of and requisition stores without help within–she looked at her wrist–two hours of landing on a planet.

“Is your time limited?”

Marghe’s tone seemed neutral enough. Danner decided to accept the question at face value. “No,” she said. “Or rather, yes, in a general sense, but this afternoon I’m at your disposal.”

Her words seemed to run off Marghe’s smooth exterior and Danner felt as though she were facing a mirrored glass ball. She did not have time to waste fencing. She stood up, opened her desk drawer, withdrew the dossier. “This is your file. Here.” She held it out. Marghe hesitated, then took it. “It makes interesting reading, but after just two minutes with you, I feel the psychologists have made some fundamental mistakes.” Marghe turned the file over in her hands without opening it. “They think you’ve come here for the same reason that you don’t visit your father: so that you don’t have to face the reality of your mother’s death. The way they see it, while you’re off Earth, you can believe that everything’s the same back there as it was before.”

“As you say, they’ve made a fundamental mistake.” The file remained unopened in her lap.

Vincio tapped on the door. Danner and Marghe were silent as she brought in a tray of refreshments, put it down on the table between them, and left.

Danner poured steaming saffron liquid into a white porcelain cup and handed it to Marghe. Its scent was delicate, aromatic. “Dap. A local tea. It’s a mild stimulant, weaker than caffeine. It’s a common barter commodity, with, I’m told, a standard value, rather like a currency.”

Marghe traced the smooth rim of her cup with a fingertip.

“The pottery was made by one of our cable technicians.” She sipped at her own cup, rolled the aftertaste around her mouth. “It reminds me of dried apricots, though everyone finds something different in it.”

Marghe took a small sip. “It tastes like comfrey.” She moved the still‑unopened dossier from her lap to the table.

“I want you to keep that,” Danner said. “I have no use for it.” She got up and retrieved another folder from her desk drawer. “I’d also like you to have this, though on a temporary basis. It’s another security dossier.” She held it out. “The subject is myself.”

“I don’t understand.”

“I want you to read it, as I’ve read yours, so that we at least have a basis for communication. I want–” She stood abruptly, crossed to her desk, and keyed her screen to a slowly turning representation of Jeep. “Come here. Look. A whole planet. I’m supposed to oversee the safety of every single human being on this planet, and at the same time lay cables, set up communication relays, initiate geographical surveys. Hard enough. What makes it infinitely harder is the fact that I’m operating on one‑third staffing levels–under a hundred Mirrors and less than three hundred technicians to do the work of over a thousand. More than half my equipment is missing or not functioning properly. Add to that the fact that the social structure here is even more out of whack than usual because every single member of my staff is female, then add to thata virus that might mean none of us ever leaves this place again. ”

Banner looked at the representative, fresh off the gig. Do you understand? she wanted to say. Do you have any idea what we’re up against? “What all this adds up to is simple. Uncertainty. That might not sound too bad, but what it means is that the rules don’t work here. It means that nothing has to be the way you expect it to be.”

Marghe poured herself more dap–to buy time, Danner thought. “I can’t just forget everything that’s happened in the past, everything I know.”

“I’m not asking you to forget. I’m asking you to put aside your wariness, just for awhile. I know what happened to you on Beaver, but this is Jeep. I don’t want to hurt you in any way–just the opposite. I need you to be willing to try. I need you on my side.” Danner had no idea if she was getting through. “Please, read the dossier. I don’t know how else to prove my faith.”

Marghe had one hand in her pocket. Danner saw the weave of the representative’s trousers move as she clenched and unclenched her fist.

“Don’t decide anything for now. Just take the dossier with you and think about it this evening.” She opened another drawer in her desk. Disks glittered. ”You’ll need these. Janet Eagan left them for you. Read them, call me in the morning.”

Marghe walked alongside the ceramic‑and‑wire perimeter of Port Central, trying to think. Somewhere behind the clouds that at this time of year almost always covered Jeep’s sky, the sun was setting, turning the gray over the living mods into a swirl of pearl and tangerine. The evening breeze faltered, then changed direction, hissing through the grass around her ankles. The grass stretched to the horizon, broken only by the occasional low bush with black, hard‑looking stems and pale trails of seed fluff. There were no trees. The location had been chosen for its open aspect: easily defended.