“Lovely working conditions,” Holloway said.
Aubrey pointed to his ears. “Noise-canceling in-ear headphones,” he said. “Filters out the high end. No headaches.”
“For you, maybe,” Holloway said.
“All the fence workers have them,” Aubrey said.
“Wonderful,” Holloway said. “I don’t.”
“Oh, right,” Aubrey said. “Well, come on, then.” He started walking. Holloway and Landon followed.
“What do you think of the site?” Aubrey asked, as they walked.
“I’m amazed at how quickly you’ve built it up,” Holloway said. “There was nothing here a week ago.”
“I told you this is a priority for us,” Aubrey said. “I commandeered airlifters to bring in the heavy equipment and stole the best crews from other sites. I had people here clearing land the same day you sat in on our meeting. When the site is finished it will be the largest single permanent site we’ll have on Zara Twenty-three. It’ll have to be in order to process that seam you found.”
“I can’t help but notice that you’ve been doing all of this without involving me,” Holloway said.
“Well, it’s—” Aubrey began.
“Exigent circumstances, yes, I know,” Holloway said, and ignored that now both Aubrey and Landon were annoyed with him for his peremptory ways. He had stopped walking; they were far enough from the fence that his ears no longer hurt. “The problem is that exigent circumstances are by their very nature emergent and temporary. What you’re doing here is systematic and permanent. If I’m not involved, then ZaraCorp has a very good case for eventually voiding my claim. I checked both ZaraCorp regulations and Colonial law on the matter. There’s prior case law here: Teppo versus Miller. Teppo lost millions of credits because Miller showed he wasn’t properly involved in the exploitation of his own claim. Now, you may or may not be intending to be pushing me into a Teppo-style situation, but that’s what I see happening.”
Aubrey looked at Holloway for a minute. “God save us from amateur lawyers,” he said, eventually.
“I’m not an amateur,” Holloway said.
“That’s not what the Bar of the State of North Carolina says,” Aubrey said.
“I wasn’t disbarred for not knowing the law,” Holloway said.
“Really,” Aubrey said. “What were you disbarred for, then?”
“It’s not actually important at the moment,” Holloway said.
“You know I can find out,” Aubrey said.
“Then find out,” Holloway said, and nodded toward Aubrey’s assistant. “Have Landon here search it out on the network. It’s a public record; it’s not hard to find. But in the meantime, I want to talk about our situation here, now.”
Aubrey nodded, and started walking again. “Come on, Holloway,” he said. “I want to show you something.”
In a few moments, the three of them were looking at a massive rockfall. It was the part of the cliff Holloway had dropped to the riverbed. Workers and machines were crawling over it. “Look familiar?” Aubrey said to Holloway.
“It’s in a slightly different configuration than I’m used to seeing it in,” Holloway said.
“I’ll bet,” Aubrey said. “It’s going to cost us a couple million credits to clean this up, you know. CEPA regulations require us to return this rockfall area to a pristine state before we can exercise exploit rights. It’s stupid, but that’s Colonial Authority regulation for you.”
“I thought you’d made an ecological exception request,” Holloway said. He noted with a bit of satisfaction that both Aubrey and Landon were surprised he knew this. Good, Holloway thought. Let them wonder what else I know.
“We have,” Landon said, after a second. “But they’re granted rarely, if at all.”
“And in the meantime, we’re on the hook for this expense,” Aubrey said.
Holloway nodded toward the rockpile. “After this fell, I pulled sunstones the size of chicken eggs out of the seam, almost with my bare hands. You’ll probably find enough sunstones in this pile alone to pay for the cost of cleaning this up, and make a profit besides.”
“No doubt we will,” Aubrey said. “But you’re missing the point.”
“Being in the black for cleaning up an ecological mishap is not the point?” Holloway said.
“The point is that you caused this ‘ecological mishap,’ as you call it,” Aubrey said. “Whether we make a profit off it or not, it’s still a black eye for ZaraCorp that you caused to happen.”
“It wasn’t intentional,” Holloway said.
“It doesn’t matter,” Aubrey said. “ZaraCorp has to appear to be attuned to ecological sensitivities, especially since we are requesting an ecological exception for this seam. We have to convince some bureaucrat in a CEPA office a hundred eighty light-years away that we’re going to be careful about the messes we’re going to make, and that we’re going to clean them up after we’re done. What is going to make that argument less than convincing is the fact that the principal surveyor of the seam is someone who rather cavalierly caused an ecological disaster right at the start.”
“The environmental lobbies already know your name, Mr. Holloway,” Landon said. “Their discussion forums are full of outrage that you’ve trained your dog to detonate explosives.”
“There’s no proof of that,” Holloway said.
“Proof is not something that is of great concern to these people, Mr. Holloway,” Landon said.
“Where are the two of you going with this?” Holloway asked. “Because if you don’t mind, I’d rather we just cut to the chase.”
“Fine,” Aubrey said. “Here it is. I think you’ll be a public relations disaster that ZaraCorp doesn’t need. I think it’d be better for all of us, including you, if you just went away. So I want to buy you out.”
“Really,” Holloway said. “And I suppose it would be too much to assume you want to buy me out for what my percentage of this sunstone seam is actually worth.”
“We don’t know what it’s worth,” Aubrey said.
“Your Director of Exploitation estimated eight hundred billion to one-point-two trillion credits,” Holloway said. “I remember those sums quite clearly. I’m sure you do, too.”
“Be that as it may, there are any number of variables,” Landon said. “Sunstone density. Environmental challenges to exploiting the seam. Market forces.”
“ZaraCorp has spent decades building up sunstones as the rarest gem in the universe,” Holloway said. “I think we can assume it’s done its job, marketwise.”
“The sheer size of this find could create a glut,” Aubrey said.
Holloway looked over at Aubrey. “Let’s you and I pretend that we both know what the phrase monopoly on distribution means in this context,” he said. “So. What are you offering?”
Aubrey looked over at Landon. “Three hundred fifty million credits,” Landon said.
“All at once?” Holloway said.
“Over ten years,” Landon said.
“You’ve got to be joking,” Holloway said. “You want me to sell out for less than ten percent of what my claim is worth, and you won’t even give it to me all at once?”
“Thirty-five million a year is not an insignificant amount of money,” Landon observed. “Especially for someone like you, who has grossed twenty-one thousand credits in the last year.”
“I agree,” Holloway said. “But a hundred million a year or so is an even less insignificant amount of money, isn’t it.”
“We’d also offer you warrants on ZaraCorp stock,” Landon said.