David Brin - The Heart of the Comet

“This is in no way to detract from your accomplishments,” Matsudo said quickly, trying to soothe Said. “You have, in fact, achieved wonders, wonders! I find your methods unnerving, as well you know, but I cannot argue with success. If any of us survive, it will be in no small measure thanks to you.”

Saul shook his head. “There’s more to be done! We have to see if the procedures.”

“And I insist that you underrate your success!” the tall Japanese hissed.

Akio must have been severely agitated. This was the first time in Saul’s experience that he had ever interrupted anybody. The man looked quickly aside. “Excuse me, please. But I have done simulations, and Earth Control concurs. The larger Halleyform organisms—the purples especially—can be kept in check using ultraviolet and your new microwave beamers. The fungoids are now under control using more precise versions of both techniques.”

“And the diseases?”

“The diseases fall off dramatically in nearly everyone who has received your new cyanutes. Tests show there are few actual cures, but the advantage has been given back to the human body’s immune system.”

“So.”

“So your techniques will hold the line! People will fall ill, true. Some will even die—but at a far, far slower rate.”

Then Akio did something quite rare. He looked Saul directly in the eyes.

“I am in awe of your power, Saul Lintz,” he confessed softly. “Another reason you must be slotted is that we simply cannot afford to lose you. There are three decades ahead until the hard work of aphelion. A greater period afterwards. There will be more crises. New, adapted bacteroids and viroids. Please think of yourself as our secret weapon, our reserve against all contingencies.”

His eyes were pleading, asking Saul to accept, and not to inflict any more of his Occidental directness against something that was already decided.

He’s holding something back , Saul realized. Politics? Orders from Earth?

Virginia had spliced press clips for him, over the two months since the mutiny. He had been too busy to more than glance at the news blurbs, but apparently some elements in the media were making celebrities of two particular members of the Halley Expedition.

Carl Osborn and me. We’re the latest sensations, back there.

Could it be that the powers back home can’t afford to have this popular image last too long? Both an augmented person and a former collaborator of Simon Percell in the headlines?

Oh, what a laugh! I sought obscurity and safety out in space—and find neither!

Matsudo looked away again. Saul knew, then, that this was a matter decided far above, and there would be no use inflicting protests on his uncomfortable friend.

He had seen simulations better than Matsudo’s—prepared in stochastic logic by JonVon to his own models. Matsudo was right. Things were indeed getting better…or at lest they would slip downhill more slowly for the foreseeable future. Saul had hoped that it would mean more time to study—to really study—what was going on here.

There was more to all of this than a life-or-death struggle between colonists and native organisms. Much, much more, and he wanted to find out about it.

But how does one fight city hall?

Maybe I could persuade Virginia to desert with me, into the tunnels. We’ll graze on green stuff; like Ingersoll. Raid the animal lockers and thaw some sheep to raise. Maybe plant sorghum down on the south forty and tell the universe to go to hell.

The ridiculous image made him smile, in spite of himself.

“I must have three months.” He began the inevitable bargaining. “There are experiments to finish, and I’ve got to brief Svatuto. Also, Keoki and Marguerite need more training before I hand the lab over to them.”

Matsudo shook his head. “Two weeks. It is all I am willing to… all I can risk you further.”

Saul smiled. “I’ll have to write a training manual for future shifts—on handling the cyanutes and using the microwave disruptor… Eight weeks, minimum.”

After a long silence, Matsudo sighed in acquiescence. “I fear for you, Saul. But I am also selfish. I admit that it will be good to have you here for that much longer.”

The black-haired immunologist looked out over the slopes of Mount Asahi. Sunset faded into a purpling night. Lowering clouds flickered with hints of thunder.

“Flesh is weak,” Akio Matsudo said softly, removing his glasses to polish them one more time. “And it is lonely without friends, where only the snow falls.”

As she approached the sleep-slot prep room one of her own poems— if indeed they deserve such a highfalutin’ name! —came rushing into her head.

Okay, you’re brave enough to say it to JonVon. Now do it.

She slipped into the prep room. Saul already lay in the carrier beneath cool pale light, surrounded by cylinders and spheres of gleaming steel. Carl Osborn was helping Keoki Anuenue, the med-tech, work over him. The red nutrient webbing resembled a net of blood vessels projected through the skin, like a demonstration in school. Saul was still awake, though drowsy. His eyes followed her as she walked to his side. Fog curled in chilly fingers around her.

Carl glanced up. “Where the hell have you been! I’ve been listening to the comm. Just as I started, all the mechs went dead.”

“I know.”

“Oh, is it already fixed?”

“It will be, if I give the order,” she said precisely.

Carl blinked. “What’s that mean?”

“I shut them all down. And I won’t bring them back on line unless you and Ould-Harrad honor my request.”

Anuenue kept attaching leads to Saul, oblivious, but Carl stopped and carefully put down his needle-nose pliers. He stepped away, where the tech couldn’t hear. “You’re… threatening us?”

“Let’s call it a promise.”

“Promise! What the—?”

“Either let me slot now, or you won’t get any useful work out of me or the mechs.”

“That’s disobedience! Blackmail!”

“Call it anything you like. Just do it.” Virginia compressed her lips into a thin, pale line.

“We need you.”

“There are other programmers available—unslot one. And JonVon can take over a lot of functions. I’ve upgraded his capabilities.”

“No computer is as good as you.”

Good. Get him to argue rationally . “JonVon’s general organizing structures are better than mine. He also does higher-order selfprogramming. That makes him very adaptable.”

“But your experience.”

“Listen, I’m not negotiating here. I’m demanding.”

Carl sighed and she saw that he was worn down. Not physically—his solid jaw and strong cheeks were ruddy with health, a welcome sight in these days—but mentally. Ould-Harrad is a frustrating commander. Carl was the natural choice for exec officer, but it’s a relentless task being number two to a man like that. And I’m not making it any easier on him.