“Give them ten days to think it over. Meanwhile I’ll talk to Sigrid and Nyo about making the platform’s functions tamper‑proof, accessible only from our uplink station. We’ll need those facilities, especially the satellites, as long as we can get them. I don’t want a bunch of disaffecteds screwing with the programs. If we can lock those systems in, then let’s let them go.”
After she dismissed Teng, Danner read the geologists’ reports on Dentro de un Rato. Her thoughts kept wandering. Why did Vincio want to leave? Why did she think she had anything to gain by going up to an orbital station where she had a good chance of dying, either immediately, courtesy of the Kurst, or later, due to failed life support? And if–a big if–Company did take them all off, where did Vincio expect to spend the rest of her hopelessly contaminated life?
Danner contemplated calling Vincio into her office and asking her why straight out, but in the end decided not to; she was not sure she could face the answer.
Danner walked slowly across the grass from Rec, her face still red from Kahn’s fencing workout. She wiped sweat from her forehead with the back of her hand. It came away sticky with pollen. Damn this planet. It just kept getting hotter–thirty‑eight degrees Celsius according to her wristcom.
Her mod was blessedly cool. She had a fast shower, resisting the temptation to stand under the revitalizing water for longer, and pulled on summer‑weight fatigues. Her stomach growled, and she glanced at her wristcom. She would have to eat while she talked to Gautier, the ceramicist, about her report. There were not enough hours in the day.
She had just stepped back out into the muggy heat when her wristcom bleeped.
“Danner,” she answered, walking toward the cafeteria.
“Vincio, ma’am. Another message from SEC rep Taishan. Do you wish to follow code‑five procedure?”
Banner was already changing direction, angling toward her office. “Yes. I’ll pick it up personally.”
Day and T’orre Na were sitting on the bench along the far wall of the outer office when Danner got there. She nodded to them both. The viajera was running a knotted cord through her fingers; bright threads flickered through her tanned hands. “It came on a herd bird,” she said.
“My office.”
They sat. Danner felt a vast irritation. She did not have time for this. “What does it say this time?”
“ From Marghe Amun to Commander Danner, greetings. Hannah, you must,”–Thenike looked at Danner–“there’s great emphasis on that word, you must accede to Cassil’s trata demands. Even if you only send half‑a‑dozen officers. You must be seen to do something. Please review my report. I’m on my way to talk to you personally.”
“But she’s pregnant!”
T’orre Na looked at Danner blankly, and Day grinned.
“I mean… Oh, curse the woman! This is the last thing I need! A pregnant SEC rep who’s gone native, swanning in here stomach‑first and telling me what I must and must not do! Well, I can’t stop her, she can come and she can say what she likes. But I’m just too damn busy.” Danner felt foolish at her outburst, then angry at feeling foolish. Damn it, the day was just too hot for this. “I have an appointment.” Then she remembered she needed to talk to the viajera. “If you two could meet with me for dinner? Good.”
She got out of the office and took four strides across the grass toward her appointment with Gautier and her lunch before her wristcom beeped again.
What the hell was it now? “Danner!”
“Dogias here. We’ve got trouble. The northern relay has just gone from the grid.”
“Gone? What do you mean, gone?”
“Gone. Phht. Kaput.”
Danner felt like strangling the woman. “Explain,” she said through gritted teeth.
“The northern relay is no longer accessible. Diagnostics show it does not exist.”
“Theories?”
“None. What I need is a satellite scan, or to go up there personally and take a look.”
It took Nyo two hours to send signals through the Port Central uplink to Estradeordering a satellite to scan the right area and send down a data squirt. Sigrid took another half an hour to collate the information. The delay did nothing to soothe Danner’s irritation.
The room was crowded: Dogias, Danner, T’orre Na, Sara Hiam, Lu Wai, Day, Nyo; Sigrid at the screen.
“It’s a bit fuzzy, but the best I could do with the cloud cover. This is the Holme Valley. Here and here”–she circled areas to the north–“are native dwellings. Here”–further to the north–“is the area where the relay is.” She magnified. And again. “Or was.”
“Sweet god.” Danner stared at the tangled structure that had once been the northern relay.
“Someone trashed it,” Dogias said. “They must have fired it first. Only way to bend those plastics. Can you enlarge it once more?” Nyo did. Dogias studied it intently. “Looks like they’ve even smashed the dish. See? Those shards there. I can’t put that back together. Build another, maybe, but that one’s history.”
“How the hell did this happen?” Danner turned to T’orre Na. “Is this how Cassil responds when I refuse to help?”
There was a sudden thick silence; Danner had ample time to wish she had not said anything.
“No,” T’orre Na said, mildly enough, but Danner knew the viajera was angry.
She did not have the patience to apologize now. “The weather, maybe?”
Dogias shook her head. “A big enough storm with lightning hitting it square on might damage it, but, no, this kind of destruction is deliberate.”
They all looked silently at the screen.
“There’s something else you might want to see,” Sigrid said. The picture changed.
“What the hell is this?”
“Watch.” The dark patch that filled a quarter of the screen shifted. “This one was taken one minute later. Let me enlarge.”
Horses. It was a hundred or more riders. “It’s those damn tribes,” Danner said wonderingly.
“It looks that way,” Day agreed.
“Assuming they’ve kept a straight line, extrapolate their origin.
It took less than a minute. The screen showed a purple line running directly from the wrecked relay to the riders.
No one, no one could be allowed to get away with that. “Lu Wai, assemble four sleds. Sixty officers, with full field armor and rations for…” she calculated in her head, “thirty days. Field hospital and shelters. And make sure we include the crossbow squad.” It would be interesting to see how they performed in a real situation. “I’ll command. Other personneclass="underline" Dogias and Neuyen and whoever else we need to build another relay. When can you have your gear together, Dogias?”
“Three hours.”
“Then we’ll leave in four. That gives us two hours’ daylight.” She turned to Nyo. “I want that satellite moved north. I need communications.”
“I can do that. And keep you updated on the weather. There’s an unusual weather system building up there. Severe storms.”
“Very well. Dr. Hiam, we might need a physician.”
“I’d be happy to come along.”
“And T’orre Na, and Day. I’ll need you to liaise at Holme Valley.” She remembered they were guests. “If you’re willing.”
Danner strode out of her offices, the adrenaline of rage singing light and hot through her veins. Rage that soon became a kind of exhilaration.
She was going to get to do her job. At last.
The breeze blowing cool through the Yelland hills eased off as Marghe and Thenike made their way down the foothills and onto the plain toward Holme Valley. The heat made Marghe feel tired and tense. The air was humid, so thick with moisture that she felt it like spiderwebs across her face, and kept wanting to brush it away, wipe it from her skin.