April 4: A Different Perspective (2 page)

After a quick contract signing at the new customer's studio in LA, he'd be back in Atlanta on a late plane tomorrow. He was dressed in conservative business attire. His suit was far from his best, but a practical combed wool blend that would travel well and he could trust a hotel to clean without damaging it. Neither the suit nor his accessories were flashy enough to attract unwanted attention. That was an important consideration, because even if he wanted to go through the hassles of sending a weapon through in his luggage, the People's Democratic Republic of  Kalifornia, as he called it, didn't offer reciprocity for his Georgia CCW, or anyone else's for that matter. Not even for a security professional. He hated the naked feel of going unarmed, but not enough to call in one of the company's local men to protect him. It just didn't seem to project the image he wanted to his subordinates.

It was a shame they couldn't FedEx the documents around instead of meeting, but there were too many signatories, scattered in too many places. Safety Associates would be fulfilling this contract internationally. The studio shot Nufilm, or video and had agents and subsidiaries, on every continent but Antarctica. He'd have flown back this evening but he'd been advised by his secretary that the President was scheduled in town for some sort of building dedication. Who knew what that would do to the flight schedules? Better to relax in his hotel until tomorrow.

He'd rather wait for them to clear the whole mess up, than to get trapped on a plane in a taxi queue for ten or twelve hours, waiting for the big boys to wrap it up. He was flying conventional for economy too. Safety Associates didn't throw money away on flashy travel. The ballistic flights, orbitals especially, would all be cleared to fly first when they sorted everything out from the mess a VIP visit would make. The peasants in sub-sonic econo-airliners would be released to fly dead last. It might be past midnight before everything was back to normal.

Safety Associates had been his second tier choice. Coming home from the service he'd found folks not much friendlier than the natives where he had served in the Trans-Arabic Protectorate. He was ready for a new start in a new place. The only place really fresh and new was off world, but finding a position there was harder than he'd imagined. They had enough high grade applicants they could be picky and they were.

He'd sent resumes to a couple companies on ISSII and New Las Vegas when he first got out of the service, but nothing had come of it. A discrete inquiry to casino security on a working trip to New Las Vegas for Security Associates had bombed out too. He could have found work as a mercenary easily, but his skills were too lethal and direct for most domestic security or private investigators.

He had the price of a shuttle ticket in his accounts, but after that he didn't have enough to live more than a few months at the cost of living in orbit. So going up without a firm offer of work didn't seem prudent. He wasn't sure what they did with the homeless up there. They probably didn't just shove you out of the air-lock. But somebody would be pissed for sure if they had to pay for a ticket down to be rid of him. Somebody who would likely make sure the cost of it would be taken from his wages for the next twenty years.

Applying to a foreign hab was a problem. If his boss found out he was looking for an off world job he might fire him, but he was sure he could still get other security work. On the other hand, if the
government
got wind of his interest in a foreign habitat, then his loyalty could be suspect and a person could be blacklisted for any work connected with the Feds. That made it far too risky to try, unless it was a last desperate measure.

The seat he was in was too narrow for him in the shoulders, despite being one of the  Explorer class seats. Flying subsonic was one thing, but he wouldn't fit back in the cattle car. He had the window seat and could twist sideways rather than intrude on the other seat, but it was occupied by a boy of about twelve who was with the couple in the row behind. That made it much more comfortable than flying with an adult beside him.

The kid played a computer game plugged into noise canceling headphones and then slept most of the flight, obviously a veteran of air travel, with no nervousness or awe like a newbie. His parents in the row behind were an unremarkable upper middle class couple, dressed for comfort, not business. Otis didn't sleep where he couldn't lock himself in. He wasn't diagnosed as hyper vigilant, but his attitude was common in a veteran.

He'd walked to the lavatory twice, which helped him endure the boredom and restlessness. If you went too often the crew would mark it as suspicious behavior. The three movie choices were insipid and he didn't want to work where someone might read his screen. The news was the same old - same old. Another boatload of English had drowned trying to escape to Ireland. The only variation this time being that they went down in bad weather instead of being shelled by His Majesty's Royal Navy. The Australians were having dust storms blow in from South East Asia so bad they were having brown-outs, because the automated cleaners couldn't keep the solar collectors clean. Sometimes he wondered how much of Indonesia could blow away, before there wasn't anything left. In the end he turned it off. He knew from firsthand experience how bad things were overseas. No reason to think it would change anytime soon either.

The man directly in front of him slept, having grabbed a pillow before they even took off. The fellow beside him in the aisle seat stayed awake like Otis. The one time he had gotten up and walked to the toilet he had gotten Otis's attention, because he examined everyone in the cabin  much like Otis had. Indeed it seemed to amuse the fellow a little when Otis returned his stare  without embarrassment. He was perhaps a couple years older than Otis, in fact he looked a bit like his older brother, with a little grey at the temples and a neatly trimmed moustache.

The engines eased off cruising power and the airplane slowed enough he felt himself shift forward a tiny bit. They were starting the long descent for landing.

An attendant came back from the flight deck and said something to a man in an aisle seat further up front, on the opposite side. Something about the tension in her stance caught his eye. The man got up and came toward the rear of the plane, with the uniformed attendant following. When he was close, but still about two rows away, he produced a badge case and displayed it to the attentive fellow in the next row forward.

"Mr. Polzinsky? You are under arrest sir." His right hand, hidden behind him, came around with an automatic pistol held in close to his side. He had his finger laid over the trigger guard with good discipline, muzzle dipped toward the floor slightly, but Otis had definitely heard the safety being taken off and the hammer was back.

Otis checked the pistol out quickly. The light caught familiar lines of engraving under the muzzle so he knew it for an Ed Brown made weapon, although he couldn't really read it at this distance. That was reassuring. Anybody carrying six thousand bucks of pistol instead of government issue likely knew what he was doing with it. He also favored the 1911 model himself, though he liked the modern 12mm Hornady cartridge over the old .45 ACP. Otis was so close to the fellow's line of fire that he welcomed any small comfort to be found regarding the man's competence.

The man he'd thought sleeping, directly in front of Otis, turned in his seat and produced a set of cuffs holding them in close to his chest.

"Air Marshal, I don't know who you think I am," the man protested, "but you must have me confused with someone else."

"No sir and we're not Federal Marshals. Look closer," he suggested still holding the ID folder out, "we're ONI Protective Services. If you'd turn
slowly
to your left and put first your left and then your right arm behind you my associate will cuff you." He was attentive to the point he refused to blink and Otis felt sure the slightest twitch on the seated man's part would be fatal.

The fellow complied, slowly enough not to alarm them. Otis was relieved when he heard the cuffs ratchet closed. The seated agent felt the man's arms and waist band before ordering him up.

"I'll have people meeting me at the gate, or their driver at least and we can get my identity cleared up with no problem," the fellow was still protesting.

"Yes sir, I'm sure they would vouch for you," The agent agreed. "We're quite aware you have deep local resources. That's why we're not getting off the aircraft in this jurisdiction. We'll remain in the back of the aircraft for the layover and return to Atlanta on its normal turn around." The ONI agents ran a wand over him in the aisle and Otis hoped they would do a full manual pat down in the rear before they got too comfortable.

The boy beside Otis was quite awake now, watching the drama with rapt attention. He leaned out looking back as the agents escorted the fellow out of first class cautiously. The attendant went ahead of them telling the passengers to stay seated and not interfere.

The speakers instructed them to belt up again. Otis had left his latched, just loosening it a bit. The boy turned and looked Otis in the eye for the first time, obviously excited at the arrest, but too well trained to speak to a stranger. Otis knew better than to speak to a strange child in public too. That was a quick way to get a trip to the local lock-up and a court ordered search of his home and computer spaces. Instead Otis turned and looked out the window at the rooftops flashing by and growing closer. They must be under a thousand feet now and the airplane's wheels went down with a clunk.

Chapter 3

April had a lot of issues to settle with Heather and Jeff. She told Gunny she wanted her privacy this morning for breakfast. He just lifted an eyebrow and didn't object. Gunny probably thought it was some sort of lovers spat or something, she thought in a foul mood.

Not least of what she wanted to hash out was that Heather had accepted her real estate customers suggestion and declared herself sovereign. When the administrator of Armstrong had pursued them across the moon to their new homes and tried to arrest them, it had been a brilliant expedient to confer authority on her quickly. However, April still disapproved that she'd not dissolved the arrangement after saving the refugees. In fact, Heather had instead accepted the fealty of the remainder of the Armstrong people when she returned. That wasn't sitting well with April.

She, after all, was owed a lot in Heather's development for her support and transportation services. April had not known she'd be owning a lot in a
kingdom
. One whose existence was likely to be quickly disputed by other powers.

That bothered her enough, but the cherry on top was that Heather named her and Jeff as peers. She was getting a lot of involvement she hadn't asked for, but she certainly hadn't asked to be
Dame Lewis
!

Her partners were already at a table as she expected. Jeff had barely started on his meal, because he was busy waving his hands and talking to Heather. Heather was further ahead, because she was methodically eating while she listened. April got a tray, heavy on calories and protein both, as she was gene modified and needed the extra fuel.

"How long are you here?" April asked right away.

"Maybe three days," Heather allowed. "When are you coming to visit?" she countered.

"When you have a shower," April answered without hesitation.

Jeff thought that far funnier than she intended. He launched into a description of the horrors of moon dust that did absolutely nothing to change her mind about the shower.

"Look, you don't need an entire sanitary plumbing system," April insisted. "How about just a shower stall standing on a base tank. The mechanism vacuum distills whatever is in the base to an overhead insulated tank. Total capacity say thirty or forty liters. It heats it on a timer when you expect to use it. The base tank has a one liter trap for the solids that get distilled out of the waste water. You remove that and dump it outside every few days. The only loss is what gets carried out on your skin and the humidity lost with the air getting in and out."

"Thirty liters isn't much," Jeff objected.

"You set the temperature at one level. No mixing. You have a momentary contact switch that gives you a quick blast to get wet. You blast – shampoo your hair – blast again, soap up your body. Hit the other switch and it runs steady to rinse off. You have a selector to pick fine mist to make it last or a heavier spray, maybe pulsing," she speculated. "And it isn't just for you. It is a product to sell. Broken down to assemble or in a box ready to bolt in.

He liked the manufacturing part of the idea.

"A sealed box," Heather said dreamily, "that could fit in the back of a Russian rover,"

Jeff just looked at her open mouthed.

"You have that much headroom in a rover?" April asked.

"You can just barely stand straight in the rear. You couldn't stand it on top of a holding tank," Jeff insisted. "You'd have to put a thin centrifugal lift pump in the floor drain in one corner," he said, immediately visualizing it, "the motor spinning it just outside the stall, with a waste tank and then a holding tank vertically beside the stall," He drew it in the air with his hands as he spoke. He looked at Heather again and realized he'd just admitted it was not only possible, but he basically had the whole design in his mind already. He bowed to the inevitable. "I'll draw it up tomorrow and let the specs to a prototype shop," he promised, before she even asked.

"So I understand your refugees are willing to pay for the stuff they took from Armstrong when they fled," April reminded her. "Have they ever got back to you and named a price or negotiated at all?"

"No, not only are they not talking, but even though the Lunanet satellites are active again they won't take calls. They tried to sucker a bunch of people back to Armstrong because they need their skills, but they won't send a contract ahead. When you can't call in or out you know it's all a lie. I see why they want their critical techs back. They are asking how to run systems that are failing on them without experienced workers."