The scale of her losses, had she admitted them, would have justified her immediate execution. But Sondra was cunning, and had an instinct for self-preservation, and so she kept the cover-up in place during a period of expansionary fiscal policies and outward investment. It was during this period that the Atlantis project was underway. The Atlantean conspirators built their exit pipelines even as they built their Potemkin village of a stellar civilization: and somehow Sondra became involved.
I do not know all the details. We could barely acknowledge what we found: that within a decade of her involvement with the criminals, her personal debts had magically disappeared and her employer’s liabilities had been adjusted back to zero, and then to a satisfactory profit margin. Clearly the money had to come from somewhere, and the only obvious source that could account for it was Atlantis. Running the records forward another few decades, we watched as Sondra’s account bloated with a commission on the slow dollars flowing through her managed funds. And then, finally, the blow-out came: Atlantis went dark, and the huge sums saved in hidden deposits throughout Hector SystemBank and elsewhere . . . well, they disappeared, for the most part, shuffled carefully into the startup funds of interstellar colony angel investors.
Sondra somehow came out of it covered in money, wealthy beyond belief. She ran, then, to New California—to a polity in flight, a floating kingdom between the stars, beyond the easy reach of anyone not already wealthy. A prepared bolt-hole, in other words, where we were subsequently raised in her own image. Not everything went according to her plans. Slow money, as I have explained, must be transferred by three-phase commit across vast distances: and the change of ownership must be notarized by recognized banks at each end. Some of Sondra’s funds were, shall we say, long term deposits, for recipients who thought them safer in the custody of known and trusted bankers (ahem: ones who could be blackmailed) than in their direct possession during the inevitable post-Atlantis witch hunts. Some transfers were delayed: Sondra sent them, but received no acknowledgment of receipt from the payee. And some were aborted: she received a deposit, acknowledged it, but got no final sign-off from the sender.
This wasn’t entirely surprising. The Atlantis scam was so vast and overarching that it involved hundreds of bankers and thousands of conspirators. Some of them were bound to die irreversibly or meet with other mishaps during the years, decades, and even centuries following the bust-out. Arrangements had, of course, been made to deal with the failures.
A stable, sober, reliable banker had been chosen in each star system: one who would maintain custody of the deposits down the centuries until, after a suitably long period had elapsed, the surviving creditors could come together and wind up the residual funds that had been held in trust. The banker would make arrangements to build a capability to revoke and unwind half-completed exchanges of slow money, carefully collecting the loose ends retrieved by her minions. Once the key meeting had been held, the clerks entrusted with these instruments would unwind the remaining transactions and hand everything over to their employer (and owner and parent) to deal with. And that, the fraudsters had assumed, would be that.
“Hello, Ana.”
Andrea looked older, this time: Or perhaps she was tired, under stress. She wore the same elaborate (even baroque) outfit: Clearly fashion in New California a few years ago had been iterating through ostentatious status displays even faster than usual. She lounged by the side of the ornamental pond she’d used in her message to me, but there was a tension in her shoulders. And I could see walls behind her: She’d brought up a maintenance screen, deliberately enclosing this volume and flagging it as off-limits, under repair.
“We’re in deep trouble.”
She said it without relish, reluctantly, somewhat hesitantly, as befitted the bearer of bad news.
“Sondra knows that one or more of us has uncovered her history. There’s been a leak; someone sent an assassin to steal one of the uncommitted transactions and replace it with a forgery. The target they picked was the uncompleted carnet payable to Ivar Trask on Shin-Tethys. I believe you may know something about this. Sondra has a suspicious mind, and naturally her suspicions turn to those of her children who are trained in the art of forensic reconciliation and who have a connection to Dojima System—meaning you and Krina. I’ve already sent a warning after Krina, telling her to cut short her pilgrimage and go straight to Shin-Kyoto, but I doubt it’ll catch up with her before she heads out to meet you; right now New California is closer to Dojima System than to Ganesh. Meanwhile, Mother has been raging through the vaults like a mad thing and has latterly checked one of her soul chips into the departure hall for immediate transmission to parts unknown. She’s splitting herself. That’s never happened before, and I think it’s a very bad sign indeed.”
Andrea took a deep breath, flushing her lungs. “When I said she’s sending another instance of herself to parts unknown, I meant it. The beacon crew are in lockdown, not talking to anyone for money or love. There are armed guards on the departure hall door to stop people getting out, or getting in. I managed to convince a—friend—to sneak a pleasure boat out around the hull, and they say one of the high-power lasers is pointing near to, but not at, Dojima System. The High Council is in session and there have been rumors about an Enabling Act, emergency legislation, all sorts of draconian nightmares. Other rumors are circulating about New California going dark for a few decades while this plays itself out.”
Another deep breath. “There is a witch hunt in progress, and we three shall not meet again. Once I’ve sent this message, I’m going to run away very far, very fast: I’m activating my personal bug-out plan. Ana, you need to hide as deep and as anonymously as possible. If you can do so safely, leave Dojima System—if Sondra turns up there, it will be very bad news indeed—but if not, change your identity, change your body plan, find a crypt and estivate for a century, whatever it takes. For your own safety you should assume that Sondra has captured me and extracted the rendezvous plans and knows all our plans: They’re all compromised. If you get a chance to warn Krina off, do so: I sent her another memo but can’t be sure she’ll receive it in time. If you get word via trustworthy channels that Sondra is dead or has been overthrown in a palace coup, then it might be possible to return home—but be wary of entrapment and lies.
“I’m sorry it’s come to this, sis. But we’re all on our own now.”
“That’s Ivar’s soul chip.”
“Yes.”
“Ivar Trask-1. SystemBank Dojima’s long-missing executive.”
“Yes.”
“He was the countersignatory? The designated recipient for the big transfer from Atlantis that Sondra was involved with? You’re sure?”
Ana’s pupils were fully dilated, luminous and black in the gloom of her office. “Yes.”
“You know I’ve— I’m carrying—”
“Yes, Krina.”
(And so, it all came down to this.)
“I’m astonished. I mean, you did it. That’s not supposed to be possible, it’s—”
“Krina?”
“Um, yes?”
“Shut up and confirm it for me? Please?”
I raised the soul chip reluctantly, then held it behind my neck. Popped the cover from my second socket, currently holding my private journal and memory palace. Removed that chip, slid the new one into place. A shuddery moment of wrongness: Then my vision cleared. “Ivar Trask-1. That’s a huge blob.” I compared it to my copy of the carnet, checksumming. Waited for the hash function to complete—a noticeable delay. “Yes, it matches.” I met her gaze. “I’m completing the signature now.”