‘A better fucking future? And what exactly was your bright new future going to be, you motherfucker? Covert ops in other people’s countries. Corrupt corporate practice? A genetic concentration camp in Wyoming?’
Carl pulled him back. ‘Get a grip, Tom. This isn’t what we’re here for.’
But the force had already gone out of Ortiz’s face, like a candle flame blown out by Norton’s rage. Suddenly, the wheelchair held only an ill, old man, shaking his head in weary admission.
‘I… was… young. Foolish. I have no defence. But I believed what we were doing was right, at the time. You have to understand what it was like. In the West we were losing the edge, terrified of the gene research that needed to be done, held back by moral panic and ignorance. China was doing work that our universities and technology institutes should have been pursuing. They still are.’ Ortiz shifted his gaze to Carl, grew animated once more. ‘There is a future on Mars, Mr Marsalis, but it’s not a human future the way Jacobsen and UNGLA understood it. You’ve been there, you know what it’s like. We will need the variants, we will have to become a variant of some sort if we plan to stay. The Chinese understand this, that’s why they haven’t stopped their programmes. I only sought to equalise the pressure, so when the explosion, the realisation finally came, it would not rupture our society apart from the differential.’
Carl nodded. ‘Yeah. Let’s get back to Onbekend.’
‘You don’t believe me?’
‘What does it matter what I believe? It won’t change what you’ve done. How did Onbekend find out he was Manco Bambaren’s half-brother?’
Ortiz sighed. ‘I really don’t remember details of that sort. It was a long time ago. Yes, possibly, he used Scorpion Response time and resources to track his sourcemat mother down, discovered who she was and saw the angle. The work we were doing in Wyoming may have sparked his interest. It is through Scorpion channels that he discovered he had a twin, that I do know, so quite possibly he found Isabela Gayoso the same way. And I know that when he wasn’t seconded to us, Project Lawman deployed him in a covert capacity in Bolivia on at least one occasion, so he would perhaps have had opportunity then as well. All I can tell you is that when the time came to dissolve the Scorpion operation, he already had his place in the sun prepared. He knew that his twin had accepted Mars resettlement, and that Scorpion Response would be wiped from the flow by n-djinn. And Bambaren had made a place for him in his organisation. It was a perfect disappearing act.’
Yeah, until Stéphane Névant shows up trying to sell Bambaren a pistaco threat he already has blood-related access to and drawing down attention they can really all do without. Poor old Stéphane, right on target. Better intuition than you ever knew. No wonder Bambaren turned you over so fucking fast. All you were going to do was lead an UNGLA squad right to his half-brother’s door.
And no wonder Bambaren freaked when we showed up, set it all in motion, all over again. I thought I’d offended him when I talked about exemplary executions in some village square somewhere. Must have nailed something Onbekend did for him, too close to the truth for comfort.
He thought I was playing with him. Thought I’d come for his brother.
He thought of Sevgi Ertekin, propped against the side of the COLIN jeep, hands in pockets, jacket hooked back. Casual reveal of the shoulder-holstered Marstech gun, the telegraphed warning to Bambaren not to fuck up.
Sevgi, you should have been here to hear all of this. We were so fucking close after all.
But you would have told me not to gloat, it’s not attractive.
He focused hard on the man in the wheelchair. ‘Is Isabela Gayoso still alive?’
‘No, she died some years ago. Onbekend mentioned it to me in passing when we met in New York. She grew up in crushing poverty, it seems, and of course these things tend to take their toll later in life. From what I hear, Bambaren himself was lucky to survive his childhood. Neither of his siblings did.’
‘Does Bambaren know he has a second half-brother?’
‘No. We did not involve him. Onbekend has enough familia presence these days to make the contacts we needed at Bradbury and Wells, and to be convincing when he did. It took some time, but he convinced the Martian chapters that there is a wedge opening between the Lima clans and the altiplano.’ Ortiz’s shrunken shoulders lifted under the grey silk of the pyjamas. ‘From what I understand, it’s not far from the truth.’
‘And Merrin never knew who was hiring him either?’
‘Merrin was never aware that he had a twin in the first place. As I said, it was only through Scorpion Response intelligence that Onbekend discovered what had been done. Merrin never would have had access to the data. And you’ve seen Onbekend, he changed his face when he went underground back in ’94. No resemblance any longer.’
Carl thought about the echo in the features he’d seen the night Sevgi was shot. ‘No, there is a resemblance. If you look for it.’
‘Well, as I understand it the actual hiring was filtered through the Martian familia machine anyway. I doubt Merrin and Onbekend ever actually saw each other across the screen. The familias knew only that this was a personal matter, that the people at this end had chosen this particular man, Merrin, and that if they could not recruit him, there would be no deal.’
‘And Merrin?’ Norton wanted to know. ‘What was he told?’
Another fragile shrug. ‘That he had friends here on Earth who wanted him back, who would provide him with a new identity and the resources to disappear in comfort. We made it a very attractive package.’
The COLIN exec shook his head numbly. ‘So Onbekend just sold out his brother? His twin?’
‘Sacrified him, yes. What of it?’ Ortiz gestured. ‘They had never known each other, never met. What bond could there be?’
‘That’s not the point!’ But now Norton was looking at Carl. ‘He was his brother, for Christ’s sake!’
‘That is the point, Tom,’ Carl told him quietly. ‘Thirteens don’t do abstract allegiance. It’s not part of our make-up.’
‘But… Bambaren.’ Norton held out his hands. ‘That’s an abstract blood tie.’
Ortiz made an arid chuckling sound. ‘Yes, one that Onbekend has exploited to great benefit.’
‘Bambaren got used,’ said Carl, looking down at Ortiz. ‘Just like everybody else. Just like Scorpion Response, just like Human Cost. Just like Onbekend and Merrin. You got everybody dancing.’
‘Mr Marsalis, please understand—’
Enough.
Carl grabbed Ortiz under the arms and hauled him out of the chair in a single violent motion. The other man seemed to weigh almost nothing, but that might have been the mesh kicking in, or the rage. Ortiz kicked and struggled, but feebly. Carl held him in what felt for a moment like an embrace, stepped back clear of the panic-wired wheelchair and laid the COLIN director carefully down on the polished wood floor.
‘Wait, you can’t—’
But Ortiz’s voice was as weak as his struggles. Carl knelt and pressed a hand to the COLIN director’s chest to hold him still. He leaned over him, face impassive.
‘I know you, Ortiz,’ he said. ‘I’ve seen your kind making your speeches from every pulpit and podium on two planets, and you never fucking change. You lie to the cudlips and you lie to yourself so they’ll believe you better, and when the dying starts, you claim regret and you offer justification. But in the end, you do it all because you think it’s your right, and you do not care. If you really suspected Jeff Norton, if you knew what kind of man he was, you could have squeezed him for the names, dealt with whoever it was—’