Denys Nye was going to continue the one Project, the cloning of Ariane Emory herself, but he was going to keep it, and her juvenile self, under his thumb for at least a decade…the Centrists hadn’t minded.
Meanwhile Denys focused entirely on post‑War economics, on the complexities of Earth‑Alliance‑Union trade, and on those agreements, which pleased the Centrists no end. They might not have gotten their terraforming bill passed, but they hadgotten an administrator of Reseune who was pushing most of their agenda and precious little of Ariane Emory’s–just the Project, which guaranteed, so long as Denys Nye had physical guardianship of the Project, that it wasn’t going to threaten him…in its lifetime.
Yanni’d done the day‑to‑day administrative part through all of both Nyes’ terms, running Personnel, which, in Reseune, was a key post. Denys had been the genius behind the programs; Giraud had kept the lid on dissent and quietly smoothed the bumps in the very short, very defined road Reseune had traveled in the post‑War years.
But Giraud and Denys had each been seduced–Giraud by devotion to Denys, and Denys by the one thing that Denys coveted for himself–immortality. Denys and death hadn’t liked each other. If the Child succeeded, it proved the psychogenesis process was possible. Denys wantedthe Project to succeed, at least until he knew the result.
And meanwhile Denys was busy storing all his own data, and Giraud’s, out in that archive. It was very likely that Denys had double dealt Ariane Emory’s plans by killing her; had double dealt the Centrists by continuing the Project; Denys had double dealt absolutely everybody, all to keep Denys Nye alive for another lifespan…solipsistic bastard. He’d attempted to kill her only when she’d succeeded and he had his result–unfortunately for him, she’d succeeded too well, too fast, and consequently he’d been the one to die, else he’d just have blamed her assassination on another Warrick and started all over again. That would have gained him another twenty years, during which he could bring up his own successor, another Giraud, who would be duty‑bound to bring up him, the all‑important center of his universe.
And Yanni? Yanni had kept his hold on power through both administrations, letting the Nyes run things, mopping up, keeping the Nyes from doing too much damage, while the Project ran, and she grew…
So which side was he on?
Florian came back into the room with the requested glass of orange and put it in her hand. She drank it, absorbing the sugar hit, still staring elsewhere.
“Yanni’s not necessarily pernicious,” she said. “He is bent on his own agenda, and he’s been very clear about that. Getting the Eversnow project going…that’s major. He had Thieu in safekeeping at Planys. But Thieu’s gotten too old; he’s on his way to the grave. So now Yanni needs Patil. He’s saved the Eversnow project. He’s gotten it passed. He’s saved the Warricks, kept Justin sane. I’m not so sure he wanted Jordan out, but he’s got him. He probably wants Justin for his ally. He can’t have Justin. Justin is mine.”
Blink. The thoughts were trying to shred and go away in different directions. She held onto the central problem: Eversnow. “Yanni kept all the first Ari’s projects alive, and he preserved the Warricks, especially Justin. Yanni’s still on her program. Not Denys’. Hers. And that’s not necessarily mine. He’s courting the Centrists. He’s trying to move them onto his agenda, and they’re buying it, seeing him as Denys’ backup, in the years before Itake over. If I did take over sooner, it would disturb them a lot. The Paxers would have a fit. They’ll go back to the underground, blowing things up again. But they’ll do that, whenever I take over.”
Florian and Catlin waited, both seated, neither saying a thing to interrupt her.
Blink. More shreds. Tatters. But the structure stayed. “I still like Yanni. I don’t want him to die. I just don’t want him to do what he’s doing. Eversnow is something I wouldn’t have done and the more I think about it, the more uneasy I get. Yanni sees the job crisis and a new trade route as important–more so than I do. It takes us further from Alliance, and I’m not sure that’s a good thing for humanity at this point.” She thought: Ari set me to watch her projects. Her projects, and this was one. But keeping Union together–keeping humankind from fragmenting: there were already more variables than she could handle–or she wouldn’t have created me. It was already afield‑too‑large problem, just with what we’ve already created, Novgorod, and Gehenna, and the military azi, and Alliance, and Earth. Then pile Eversnow on top of that, as odd as people could get, learning to survive on a snowball. It’s a planet, not just one more star station. Gravity wells breed difference. They don’t communicate with the outside.
There might have been a reason besides elder Ari’s health that she let Eversnow drop.
It was hard not to plunge back into deepstate, following that thread. But Florian and Catlin didn’t go away. They waited for something more concrete than her worries. “I’m not sure yet,” she said. “Who, do you think, does Hicks belong to?”
“Possibly to Yanni,” Florian said. “He was Yanni’s appointee in the current office. Giraud Nye’s second‑in‑command when Giraud was alive.”
“Both, then. But he didn’t protect Denys. He just protected Yanni. And he didn’t resist me ousting Denys. Possibly Yanni protected me from Hicks.”
“Likely,” Catlin said. “Hicks and Yanni together would have been a difficult opposition. We met none, once Abban died.”
She nodded slowly. “I have to take over,” she said, half‑numb, and with that wide focus that blanked out the whole room, except them. “I have to take charge. I don’t want to, but Hicks’s gift isn’t enough. I can’t let Yanni go on in the direction he’s going. I like him, understand. I don’t want him hurt. But Eversnow is much too dangerous. Yanni doesn’t see things the way I do. He belongs to the first Ari. And he wouldn’t like it if I started steering from over his shoulder. He’d rather go back to his labs. He should, now.”
“Wait,” Florian said, “wait, sera, until we have Hicks’ people passed through Justin Warrick’s opinion, and installed, and tested. We’re not enough to secure your safety, as is.”
Sobering thought. Honest thought. People like Yanni had beenhonest, at least honest enough not to make an attempt on her life. On her freedom, however–she’d been advised into seclusion. By Yanni. By the agreement of her own security. Now Hicks offered her either spies–or real power, in the presence of some unnamed threat–or in the progress of something Yanni was up to.
Did Hicks himself have an opinion? A loyalty? Unlike with azi, they couldn’t find it in a manual.
“We can wait,” she said, “so long as we don’t alert anyone to our intentions. I don’t want anyone to be killed if we can help it. I want Justin safe. Can we do that?”
“Are you going to tell Sam and Amy?” Catlin asked. “And Maddy?”
The other members of the junior cabal. Her friends, her allies, the kids who’d grown up to take jobs in the real world. She was the only one who hadn’t. Who’d had real power, and laid it down for a time. She was still studying, still growing up. There was so, so much yet to grasp, so much to understand.
“I don’t know yet,” she said. “I may not tell anyone my opinion. Or I may tell them.” She looked at them, finding the blood moving away from her brain. She felt a little lightheaded, but collected, all the same. “I have a headache, still. I’ll be in my room. Go see about these things. Lay plans. Come back to me with a report before you implement anything. Let me know where we are and what we need to do.”
“Yes, sera,” Florian said. He and Catlin got up and opened the door. They left, and she got up, and walked out of her office and down the short hall to her bedroom, in her section, her own safe section of the safe apartment in the sacrosanctity of Wing One, where–theoretically–she controlled her own security. But ReseuneSec guarded the doors of Wing One. ReseuneSec was in the halls. The old lab was dead. Dead as the first Ari. Equipment mostly removed. The place had become a little shabby–she’d laid other plans, a grandiose plan, a notion of gathering what was hers where it was indisputably safe. That was what that construction was, between Wing One and the cliffs. She intended to live there. With people she loved. Yanni had been part of it.