John Sandford - Saturn Run

“I’m worried they could decide that you’re bluffing about using the kill switches, and they start shooting people until we turn over the QSUs. You’ve got to think about what you’d do, Naomi. If they say they’re going to shoot one person every so many hours until we give in. If they don’t think you’ll give in, they’ll start with you until, eventually, they work their way down to someone who will. Once that kind of bloodshed starts, it’s hard to stop. Even triggering the kill switches might not put an end to it. A very few of our people still have access to weapons, and they might decide on their own to take the ship back. They might even succeed, if they got lucky. A truckload of people would die in the process, though.”

“I have been thinking about that. But you know what? I don’t think they’ll do it. I don’t think they have as much freedom to act as I do. If they start shooting people, it’ll be because the chairman ordered them to. And that could lead to a war of some sort. Will the chairman go to war?”

“Don’t know.”

The Chinese and Fang-Castro put together duty rosters that let most of the Nixon ’s crew move about the ship; the Chinese had to do that, simply to keep the ship operating. They maintained armed guards at key points, including the entrance to Engineering, and the bridge, where they monitored and controlled the communications, ship security, and safety workstations. Another person had to supervise life support and one more covered the cafeteria/commons. They agreed to let Fang-Castro and Crow consult in private. When they weren’t talking, Fang-Castro was confined to quarters, except for mandatory exercise. She was allowed inbound entertainment vids.

Crow was not confined, but was allowed access to the ship for two shifts a day, sixteen hours. He spent most of his time talking either to Fang-Castro or to the personnel who still had access to weapons: there were seven of them, but only four were out at the same time.

On the second day, the Chinese government offered a compromise: Martinez and two Chinese engineers would fab a rocket-powered capsule that would contain two of the QSUs, and put them in an orbit back to Earth, where the Chinese would pick it up on arrival.

The American government refused to negotiate any settlement as long as the Nixon was forcibly held by the Chinese.

“Something’s gotta happen,” Crow told Sandy, as they sat in the cafeteria. “The Chinese don’t have enough people to keep this up.”

“I know. There are nineteen of them—turns out they had one hidden on the Odyssey , which I didn’t find out until last night. That boy had some guts. Two of them, Dr. Mo and that Dr. Gao, they’re not military and nobody’s gonna make a guard out of them. So there are seventeen of them, including Cui and Sun, and that’s not enough for everything they have to watch.”

“How many do you think we could take down before things evened out?”

“Should we be talking here about this?” Sandy looked about, a bit nervously.

“Safest place,” replied Crow. “They don’t have enough people to monitor in real time, especially in the Commons, with the mikes picking up overlapping conversations. They don’t all speak great English.” He shrugged. “There’s risk, but this whole business is well into risky territory. You think of a better place to talk, fine. You won’t.”

“If you say so. Okay, my best guess?” Sandy gave him the big goofy grin, just a couple of good ol’ boys bullshittin’ here, eating fake bacon and waffles. “If all your guys with guns could get out at the same time, and they probably could, if we worked it right… we could probably get eight of them before they could react. The problem is, they’ve got communications, and we don’t. They’ll know instantly that the shooting’s started, and they’ve got better weapons. After we took out eight of them, they’d start getting some of us… and there aren’t that many of us. And what do we do if they hole up and start taking hostages and killing them?”

Crow chuckled. “Want another cup of coffee?”

“Sure.”

Crow got two more, sat down again, scratched his neck, and said, “Then there’s the question of what happens if we’re about to win. Would Sun do something to blow the ship? She wouldn’t have to do much. A few shots into the cafeteria view window and the decompression would take out most of the crew… and kill her, of course, but maybe she’d do it.”

“There’s something else I’ve been meaning to talk to you about,” Sandy said. “Way back when, I asked you if I could be a major, and you said, ‘No, but you could be a captain.’ Did I ever get that promotion? I mean, really? On paper?”

“To tell you the truth, I forgot all about it,” Crow said.

“But when Becca was killed, and you had to tell the doc about my post-traumatic stress problem so he could rig the grief drugs… you called me ‘captain,’” Sandy said.

“Just giving you a little more status in the eyes of the crew, you know. Letting them know you weren’t just some jerk-off Hollywood videographer…. But if you’re really worried about it, I can talk to the guys on Earth and get the routine started.”

Sandy got his grin going again and slumped in his chair and said, “That’s not where I’m going, Crow. When we went over to the Celestial Odyssey , Sun referred to me as ‘Captain Darlington.’ Showing off, like she did with you.”

Crow rubbed a spot between his eyes and said, “Okay. I missed it, goddamnit. Where’d she get the ‘captain’?”

“Curious minds…”

Crow glanced around the cafeteria. A dozen people, eating and chatting, two sleepy-looking Chinese… with guns. “They’ve not only got a spy on board, he could talk to them. Maybe talk to them directly, ship to ship.”

“Yeah. So if you decide to cook up a little revolution… who do you trust?”

“Ah, Jesus.”

As it happened, trust wasn’t critical.

No one was entirely sure what Lieutenant Albi Summerhill had in mind when he came on shift at the security station, midday on Sunday, April 29, 2068. He hadn’t discussed plans ahead of time with anyone, hadn’t even hinted at any. Maybe he hadn’t had one. Maybe he just thought he saw an opportunity and seized it.

Whatever his reason and forethought, or lack of it, shortly after one o’clock in the ship’s afternoon, when the Chinese soldier who was monitoring Summerhill’s activities was eating his lunch, Summerhill attempted to surreptitiously unlock all the American crew quarters from the security panel.

Lieutenant Lei was not as distracted as Summerhill had thought. He pushed toward the console, his sidearm drawn, and ordered the lieutenant to relock the doors. When Summerhill tried to stall him, Lei attempted to push past and take control of the security station himself. Summerhill grabbed him, they wrestled, and Lei’s firearm went off.

They recoiled from each other, the Chinese as startled as the American, the American bleeding from the back of the head and the neck. The blood dripped with surreal slowness as the American’s body toppled slowly toward the deck.

As Summerhill and Lei began struggling, Lieutenant Peng Cong launched himself at them from the opposite side of the deck, leaving Ferris Langers unsupervised at the ship’s safety and communication station. As Summerhill dropped toward the deck, Peng waved his pistol at Langers: “Call for help! Call for a medic,” he screeched.

Langers hit the open channel tab, his call went out ship-wide.

“Shots fired on the bridge. We have a man down. We need medical personnel here, immediately.”

Seconds later he got nearly simultaneous acknowledgments back from Doctors Manfred and Mo—“On my way,” “Coming.”