Horizons

TWENTY-TWO

THE CSF TROOPS BOARDED AND ARRESTED EVERYONE. Hard eyed and efficient, the squad put all three of them into restraints and towed them onto the armed patrol vehicle they had docked to Dane’s reluctant ship. Nobody asked any questions or spoke to them at all beyond the commands necessary to secure them. During the trip back it occurred to Ahni that Li Zhen might have seen a way to use them to his advantage. She was getting used to betrayal.

She had no idea where the CSF took them. The opaque hull provided no views and her query to the woman wearing the Captain’s insignia didn’t even earn her a glance. Neither Kyros nor Dane said a word, although Kyros grumbled to himself in what she decided was probably Greek. The grumbling sounded surly, but beeneath it, he was afraid.

Not so, Dane. His resigned calm made her angry.

Shewanted to hit someone. Hard.

They finally docked, were towed into microG and separated. She felt Dane’s touch diminish as her captors hauled her into a small, barren room and left her floating. A cell? The spherical chamber had no corners, no features at all to mar the bland white walls, except for the door. She tested the restraints that strapped her arms to her sides, but they had been well designed and she couldn’t get her arms free or even gain any slack. The fabric seemed to tighten whenever she strained against it. Marooned in the center of the space, she contemplated wriggling enough to get over to a wall, where she could launch herself if needed, but to what purpose? Any escape here would come officially or not at all.

After a long time, a pair of CSF privates entered, fitted her with a control collar, released her and handed her a squeeze of tepid waater. When she had drunk he handed her another squeeze full of some thick, faintly fruit flavored liquid that she guessed was a complete ration of some sort. It tasted awful. She handed it back without a word, the silent treatment contagious, she thought wryly.

The solid wall of the cell was comforting, she found. After awhile, she drowsed, waked, and drowsed again, although nightmares haunted her sleep.

The two guards took her to the lavatory after awhile, gave her more water which she drank, and more of the syrupy liquid which she did not drink, then towed her back to the cell again. This happened twice more, although with a different pair of guards. Ahni fiinally dropped into Pause where the nightmares couldn’t reach her. Unlike the NYUp guards, nobody panicked and rushed in to check on her. That, at least, was good.

She was deep in Pause, hibernating, when the door opened. Too soon for another visit to the lavatory and water squeeze, her time sense told her. She had already marked that rhythm. She opened her eyes as two new guards entered, one man and one woman. All senses on alert now, she feigned indifference as they towed her down the corridor and through a dock portal and onto another shuttle.

This time, when they docked, she had weight, and she recognized NYUp. The smell, she thought as they marched her out of the lock and into an empty corridor. Sure enough, she recognized Laif’s office as the door slid open, although the men and women in the space all wore CSF blue.

Nobody paid any attention to her as she crossed the room with her guards at heel. Just business as usual, Ahni thought wryly, and wondered just what was coming now. An inner door slid open and she stepped through. A man with unselected Mediterranean features and a Major’s insignia sat behind a desktop, his arms folded, radiating restrained irritation. The cause for his irritation was immmediately apparent.

Her father sat in the single chair beside the desk, seething. Ahni stopped still, one pace inside the door.

“Ahni Huang, your entry visa to the North American Alliance territory of the New York Up orbital facility has been revoked,” The Major said. “We are releasing you into the custody of Wen Huang. He will accompany you to the shuttle that will transport you to the Elevator.”

“Honored Father.” She bowed at him, speaking Old Taiwanese, aware by the Major’s prick of interest that he was fluent in Old Taiiwanese. Of course. “The two arrested with me saved my worthless self from death.” She switched to Mandarin, used the convoluted Han syntax of supplication. “It would be impossible for one so worthless as I to depart this place without confirmation that these men have received a just reward for their intervention.”

“And what reward would be appropriate for such an action?” Her father spoke through stiff lips.

Ahni kept her eyes downcast. “Their release from this place,” she murmured. “A small thing for one of your stature.”

“Did you need something?” The Major, who had surely spent time in someone’s diplomatic corps, pitched his voice to innocence, chuckling deep inside. “Is there a problem?”

“Their names?” Her father’s snap would have left a bruise had it been a physical blow.

“Kyros.” No reaction from the Major. “Dane Nilsson.” Ahni’s heart sank at the Major’s reaction.

It took her father a full fifteen minutes to negotiate Kyros’s release, which he had to do now, or lose face in front of his daughter. And the Major extracted his pound of flesh in the process, clearly enjoying his power here. Wen Huang’s anger had turned to white-hot coals by the time the last concession was granted and the Major gave him a nod that would have been a deadly insult at a Beijing business dinner.

He did not speak to her as another CSF, a woman this time, removed Ahni’s collar and had her thumbprint a release form.

As they left the office, Ahni turned to her father, bowed once more. “Thank you,” she said, meaning it.

He didn’t answer her, pushed past her into the corridor and halted.

“There. There she is!”

“Hey!”

”Nice catch! Not bad for a downsider!” People, dozens of them, milled in the main corridor watched by four or five nervous CSF. A vendor sold skewers of fruit and filled mugs with juice, as if it was a party.

As Ahni stepped through the door they closed in, leaving her a wide ring of respect but reaching into it to flip fingers at her, grinning, or pump fists.

“Downsiders thought they could play games with us.”

“Thought we were blind up here, huh?”

”You want to move up here, you do it, girl. You’re no downsider, not really.”

Laif appeared at the edge of the crowd, head and shoulders above the grinning men and women. They parted for him, swepping aside into a formal path that led straight to Ahni. Her father actually flinched as the tall, dark man strode up to them, an impossible lapse that revealed his fear of this alien place.

“You’re quite the hero, you know.” Laif swept her into a bear hug that squeezed the breath from her lungs. The small crowd cheered and waved food and mugs of juice. “Your friend Noah hacked Li Zhen’s link downside and dumped it straight into the Con.” Laif was grinning. “Nothing like hacking the hacker.

Talk about setting everybody straight all at once. You, Dane, and that crazy miner are everybody’s heroes right now. You want it, you got it. Everybody heard on the Con that you were getting out. The CSF got a few leaks inside and they can’t shut the Con down for more than a few hours at a time. Hi.”

He turned to her father, nodding down at him. “Pleased to meet you.”

Wen Huang stiffened. “What is this?” He stepped forward, chin out, insult in his posture to cover fear.

“We must hurry to catch the shuttle.”

”There are many shuttles, Father. Laif, this is Wen Huang, my father.”

The people in the corridor called greetings and compliments some of which Ahni hoped her father wasn’t able to translate. Someone pushed a mug of juice at Ahni. She took it, drank and acccepted the skewer of strawberries someone handed her. Dane’s fruit. She swallowed a pang, ate one of the sweet, luscious berries. Her father shook jerked his head in a sharp no as food and juice were offered to him. He took a brisk step forward, clearly expecting the crowd–which was increasing to the unease of the CSF

guards–to move aside. They didn’t.

This was not turning into a good day for Wen Huang, Ahni thought wryly.

“Everybody heard you’d been kicked out.” Laif spoke casually, but he had tensed up. “A lot of folk here feel you got the right to stay if you want to. Just so you know.”

And he didn’t want her to, and if she chose to, it would mean a new confrontation between CSF and upsiders. “I need to go downnside.” Ahni pitched her voice for the crowd, felt Laif’s relief. What did you think I was going to do? she thought crossly. Start a riot? “Dane Nilsson — most of you probably know of him — he’s been falsely accused by the World Council.” The crowd’s reaction told her she was right, and she lifted her hands before the mood darkened any more. “I mean to appear before the World Council on his behalf. He has done nothing wrong, and I’m a witness to that. The situation is critical.” She raised her voice a hair as silence settled over the crowd. “The Council will judge him as a resident of New York Up. They’ll judge him, in part, by your behavior up here.”

“Oh, don’t worry.” A young man with a dark red celtic cross lightfibered into his naked scalp grinned at her, winked one green eye.”We’re gonna be model citizens up here. We know we just won ourselves the jackpot of brownie points. We’re not gonna screw it up.” A chorus of affirmations followed his words.

“Get Nilsson back up here and we’ll sort out our own affairs.”

“Just let us know what you need.”

“Quite the Joan of Arc, aren’t you?” Laif put one arm around her waist, one around her father’s. “Bless you,” he whispered.

“Don’t push him away,” she said sharply to her father in Old Taiwanese.

He did not. Which said a lot about his fear of this place.

“I hope not Joan of Arc.” She looked up and sideways at Laif as he strolled them toward the Arrival Hall. “I’ve read my history.”

“I didn’t mean that part of the story.” Beneath his smile he was grim. “By the way, it’s still dicey downside. Some folk still want us shut down and they’re using Dane as a reason. I really hope you can help him. I hope that wasn’t just for the crowd.”

“They sent him downside already?”

Laif nodded. “Koi and his family are on Dragon Home. With Zhen’s kid. Dane’ll want to know. I don’t know what’s going to happen, but something. Some of the smaller Council members are all of a sudden calling for debate on orbital independence. There’s a media feeding frenzy over that live link Li Zhen opened. Every seccond of your time on the tug is bouncing all over the place, upside and downside, and nobody has been able to shut it down for long. Everybody downside got the shit scared out of them and I kind of get the feeling a bunch of folk would be shooting at us… if the pilot of that tug hadn’t been a downsider. Thank all the gods for that.”

“We must leave.” The Huang stepped firmly from beneath Laif’s arm, finally recovering his downside presence as Head of the Taiwan Families as they reached the bustle of the Arrival Hall. “You may go.”

He spoke English, his tone putting Laif neatly in his place as something equal to a dog’s accident.

It was the most insulting tone she had ever heard her father use. “Yeah, I know. In a minute.” The insult went right past Laif. “I’m almost done.”

Ahni winced at her father’s reaction and stifled a smile. Nobody had ever talked to him like that.

Laif’s gaze shifted to a spot behind her, down the corridor. “I think you’re about to get an escort to the shuttle,” he murmured “Guess they think you might want to stay. Skedaddle, will you? Beefore the crowd gets protective.”

“We are going,” her father snapped in Old Taiwanese. “Now.”

“Of course, Honored Father.” She let him propel her forward. “So what’s going to happen if the Council makes you independent?” she called back over her shoulder. “What then?”

“I’ll get myself elected to run things.” Laif didn’t follow them.

“I’ll grant you the first immigration visa when it happens. Get Dane back up here, will you? I need him.”

I’ll try, she thought. But as her father propelled her through the corridor and into the Arrival Hall, his anger buzzing though his grip on her arm like electricity, her confidence ebbed.

It was an old pattern in global politics. If you had to cede a batttle, find a scapegoat. Memories of the ugly human engineering years still lingered like nightmares in the global subconscious. Dane had scapegoat written all over him.

THE ELEVATOR TRIP seemed to take a month. Her father believed that Tania had been the would-be assassin, that she had brainwashed and destroyed Xai. He could understand a woman betraying her lover. It made sense to him, and he also believed that Ahni had attempted his rescue.

Her mother’s doing, Ahni realized, although her father’s approval of his daughter’s actions was tempered with anger that she had brought this family disgrace to world attention. Her mother’s spin on events and her father’s willing belief disturbed her enormously, but Ahni remained silent in the face of his misinformation. Let her mother believe that she had given in to the temptation of heir. When the enemy holds the knife and you are weaponless, it is not time to fight.

And Dane came first.

She spent her time checking the news media. Xai’s face was everywhere, and so was Tania’s kiss and the glimpse from the link’s view, of the edges of her hands as she cupped Tania’s face to betray that moment of trust. Ahni had her link excise those images automatically, but she found them everywhere she looked, their absence like a missing tooth, inviting the tongue over and over again.

The planet was in turmoil, a host of fanatics demanding the destruction of the orbitals as a place of demons, another host of fanatics claiming them as wise keepers of Earth, probably with divine powers.

Those fanatics pointed to Ahni’s deadly touch as proof of the divine. Her first encounter with that interpretation of events left her full of nausea.

Dane’s image was absent and so was any mention of the girl the CSF had killed.

That frightened her more than anything else.

She had only one doorway to Dane and that was through the gates of the Council island. She could only negotiate that doorway as daughter of The Huang. She had sent Li Zhen a message as they left the platform. I want to be there. He had so far sent no response. That worried her. She wasn’t at all sure they were on the same side anymore.

On the surface, nothing had changed since she had left the commpound a handful of weeks before.

Servants came running to carry luggage, when they arrived, to bow to her father, usher her to her apartment with its pool. Ahni stood in the doorway, for a silent moment. “I will sleep in another apartment,” she told Fan.

Her servant-relative murmured acquiescence, bowed, and hurrried ahead of her across the courtyard to the tiled entry of a spotless, principal guest room. Barely able to contain her curiosity, Fan hurried through a list of apologies for the bed that was not aired, the room that was surely dusty (although it had the look of a dusting within the past hour) and the lack of comfort.

“I am not a guest,” Ahni finally snapped at her. “I apologize,” she amended, instantly guilty. “I am tired.”

Fan assured her many times that there was no problem, and scurried about to straighten and polish for what seemed hours and Almi couldn’t tell her not to, because she had been wrong and they both knew it.

Fan finally left, her eyes downcast in a silent rebuke of Ahni’s behavior.

Ahni stripped off her filthy singlesuit and tossed it into a corner. She hadn’t washed since her arrest. Her skin and hair smelled of old sweat, the tug, of Xai and the platform. Of Tania. She crossed the room naked, stepped into the tiled bath. This one had a deep, square tub with a shower. The shower turned on as she stepped beneath it, just warmer than blood. It fell with the gentle rhythm of a spring shower and she scrubbed with soap scented with sandalwood, let the water sluice away the smell and memory of Tania’s kiss, let it wash away the tears as they came. “Cold,” she said finally. “Cold, cold, cold,” until the rain pelted her like liquid ice and her teeth chattered.

She stepped from the shower and the water shut off instantly. Dripping she stood on the cool, glossy tiles, her skin thick and ridged with goose flesh.

Her mother stood in the doorway.

She wore a sleeveless dress woven from raw silk and dyed the color of milky jade. She stood straight and still, her arms relaxed at her side, her face tranquil.

“Why are you here?” Ahni asked softly.

“To greet you.” Her mother smiled silkily. “Surely you did not think my husband and those who know me would credit any ranting of desperate criminals. My son was misled by that evil woman. I grieve for him.”

She smiled and her smile was genuine. “It is not against the law to belong to Her, daughter. Your father is angry… but at Xai, who disgraced him. You are his heir. I do not matter.” Her eyes flashed.

“But I know the truth. About you and others in your cult.” Ahni spat the word, “You stood behind Tania, didn’t you? Those were your clever plans, not hers.”

”Your anger is to be excused after your brush with death. I feared for you.” Her mother’s smile softened.

“Not one shred of evidence ties me to this cult as you call it. One uses the sharp tool at hand. Our paths have converged, child. We walk together, now. You will see the rightness of it in time. We will rule this planet, you and I. You are my heir, not his.”

Ahni stood still, nearly dry now, still naked on the wet tiles as her mother vanished through the doorway.

Her mother’s certainty frightened her. The first scents of evening stole in through the open window and transported her back to that homecoming after her first trip upside. I walked into the spider’s web, she thought, and then, no. I was already there. Shivering, she pulled a silk robe from a convenient hook beside the shower. The air from the garden caressed her, thick and humid, as she sat crosslegged on the low bed and accessed her link.

She accessed Jira, the family synthesist and one of the best, a woman with an impeccable reputation for predicting trends and compiling pertinent information. Ahni expected her formal interrface. But to her surprise, Jira’s torso materialized in front of her in realtime, her sari a soft gold that made her skin glow.

“Ah, I wondered if I would hear from you.” She twinkled at Ahni, the dimple beside her mouth making her look childlike and innocent. “I wish to congratulate you on your father’s announcement of your status as his formal heir. How may I help you?”

“I need a solid forecast of the Council vote on platform indeependence, Jira. Who is going to vote how, and their leverage points, if any suit my profile. And I want a forecast on the Judiciary decision on Dane Nilsson. Double fee if you can do it in less than six hours.”

Jira’s glazed look grew more pronounced and a sitar played softly in the background as she left a virtual placeholder to run a quick assessment of what it1formation she had on hand “Doable.” Her gaze refocused. “Can’t cut it finer than six hours. This topic is up in the air right now and I suspect half the delegates don’t know for sure which way they will vote yet. The deals are humming.” She chuckled.

“Gonna take a lot of AI hours. I’ll need advance payment. Even from you, honey.” Her speech had shifted from formal English with a trace of Bengal to something more like North American city-street.

Ahni had never entirely decided what Jira’s personal history might be. Not Bengali upper middle class, the pose she wore for clients. Possibly not even female. Whatever the nature of her… or his… flesh reality, she delivered a high quality information synthesis. For a price. “I’ll send it to you directly from my private account. I want something else, too.”

Jira, about to exit, paused, one perfect eyebrow rising.

“I want solid proof of Gaiist influence on national coalitions. Past two years only. Look at local-focus media for a start.”

“Your shift in interests intrigues me.” Jira smiled politely, back to Bengali formality.

A new data point for Jira to add to her syntheses. Ahni wondered how much money it would earn for her. “Time bonus,” Ahni said shortly. “ASAP.”

“It is, as always, your money.” Jira’s smile turned creamy and feline.

Anhi blanked the connection, opened a new one, to Noah’s private email. “I need one last thing,” she said. “Go through what you found on the Gaiists and find me proof of Michelle Raud Huang’s involvement with the Gaiists. It will be difficult to find. I need this, Noah.” She ended the link and flung herself on the bed, her eyes on the ceiling. That, she dared not trust to Jira. One more task. She levered herself from the bed, opened her link again, highest security, diplomatic. “Li Zhen, Chairman of Dragon Home.” She smiled, imagining him looking up, mental alarms going off at the expensive security level of the message. Just so, Chairman. “I wish to thank you for your assistance in the recent matter of orbital security.” She used formal, diplomatic Mandarin. “I hope our goals are still aligned.” She paused to let his tension rise a bit. “I wish to discuss the plight of Dane Nilsson with you.” Another pause. He would be waiting now to find out just what she thought she could use in leverage against him.

“I was quite impressed with your son. He is charming, and reppresents a powerful future for the Zhen name in the universe. I am sure that his grandfather will share this opinion and it occurs to me that I should congratulate him on this continuation of his DNA into the future.” Ahni broke off, let the silence hum for several heartbeats. “I will speak with you before the Committee meets to judge Nilsson, Chairman of Dragon Home. I look forward to our mutual support. End message,” she instructed and stared at the delicately carved and painted screen that decorated the room. This was her only hope to save Dane. Translation: Make sure that Dane doesn’t become a scapegoat or I will take DNA evidence of your son to your father. Perfection was expected of a Zhen heir. Imperfections did not come into existence. The price Li Zhen ultimately exacted from her for this blackmail would be… significant.

DNA. Something nagged at her. It came to her suddenly, a suddden memory of Dane, returning with the proof she needed that Xai was alive. Check them, he had told her and he had not realized that the DNA belonged to her half brother. That should have been obvious to him. Frowning, Ahni searched for it in her email, found it, unopened, archived and waiting.

It was standard report, a direct readout from the sequencer, stamped and legal, titled ‘Huang, Ahni’, the second titled only ‘subject’. Ahni accessed the family archive, called up the birth registry for both herself and her brother, security stamped and encrypted. Curious, Ahni ran a comparison between Dane’s sequence and the sequence from her birth registry and from Xai’s.

Stared at the results, thinking furiously.

No wonder Dane had been puzzled. Ahni called up the very secure directory that contained the DNA sequence of all Elite members, alive and dead. It confirmed her guess.

Still numb, she tried Jira’s access again, this time got her widesmiling, “I have a message for you.” face.

Opened it. The media has forgotten Dane Nilsson, Jira’s image said. That is not by accident. I would suggest that his is a lost cause. I seriously doubt that sufficient media momentum could be built in time to motivate the Judiciary members. The crime he is accused of carries illogical, emotion-based baggage for a majority of the voting members.

Ahni accessed Security. “I need a skimmer to take me to the Council island. Private pickup, top priority.” There were advantages to being The Huang’s heir, she thought bleakly.

Security had the skimmer at the private dock within half an hour. Ahni sat silently as it whisked her across the ocean, her mind circling back on itself again and again as she watched the sky lighten.

In spite of the early hour, a private Courier met her on the Council Island, with a greeting from Li Zhen.

He was watching her. Ahni smiled bitterly. She still carried his beacon, hadn’t bothered to search it out and destroy it yet. The sun was just peeping above the horizon as he delivered her to the small but luxurious hotel suite occupied by Li Zhen.

He greeted her formally, his icy anger carefully restrained. Without speaking he poured tea.

Ahni shook her head. “I did not come as your guest. I meant to blackmail you with your son, as you surmised.” She faced him in the cluttered little European-furnished room. “I apologize.” And she bowed.

Felt surprise and disbelief dilute his anger.

“You would not throw away such a lever, Huang Ahni,” he said at last. “You are very concerned about this man, Nilsson.”

“I am tired of levers.” Ahni drew a slow breath. “Dane Nilsson does not deserve to die, and I cannot save him.” Bitterness twisted her lips. “I have a gift for you.” She handed him a data sphere. “You will find my DNA scan on it. You will discover that I am your sister.”

“What?” Li Zhen said softly.

“I am as much a created tool as was my brother. I was meant to be a lever. My mother found a better lever in the Gaiists. The exisstence of your son is between you and your father.” She bowed again.

Deeply. “I will not turn your son into a lever.” And she turned and left.