Executive (32 page)

It was an almost surgical measure. The other Latin governments, in debt to us and dependent on us for much of their food and other key supplies, sat tight. In a month the target nation was ours.

Using the enormous leverage of our external farming expertise, we prevailed on other governments to make increasingly binding commitments to us, until all of Jupiter represented a sphere of cooperation.

Officially all the original separate nations remained, but in practice they had become vassal states. But their poor were no longer starving, and their populations were under control. Certainly there was muttering about the Tyrant of Jupiter, but I think there was also an underlying acquiescence because, of course, the Tyrant was Hispanic. Competent and honest administrators replaced the corrupt ones who had governed before, and the lot of the average citizen improved.

Of course, I may not be objective about this. It will be for history to say whether my realm was benign, like that of Asoka. But I did the best I could. So though my madness was developing like hidden cancer within me, the Tyrancy itself, organized by more stable minds, was good.

But even in my hour of success the end was approaching. I am trying to be objective about this, to present it fairly, but this is difficult because it becomes unflattering to me. You see, I lost my reason, and not just when the wind was north-northwest, and great was the mischief thereof.

I suppose it got serious with the iron industry. Iron is critical to interplanetary operation, because it is the avenue to most of the energy civilization uses. Laboratory black holes fashioned and controlled by special gee-shields change the iron to its contra-terrene state, and this is handled magnetically so that it can be combined in controlled fashion with terrene iron to generate the power of total conversion of its mass to energy. Ultimately it is gravity that is the source of our energy, but iron, because it can be handled without direct and destructive contact, is the major instrument. We need the energy where we need it, and iron enables us to have it precisely where we need it. That makes iron important.

Naturally the suppliers of iron are in an advantageous position. Jupiter is actually one of the major processors of iron, for it is among the trace elements thrown up in the bubblene layer, and so is Saturn.

But refining it from atmosphere is tedious. While there are some pure nuggets, most of it is in the form of dust and is combined with other substances, so that it must be refined. As more is harvested the returns diminish, until it becomes too expensive to make it economically feasible. All the major users and refiners have been searching for centuries to develop more efficient methods of refinement, so as to be able to tap the immense potential resources of the major planets, but so far they have not been successful.

The gas giants, however, are not the only objects in the System. Politically the solid inner planets are inconsequential, but they do have ready access to some critical substances. Earth and Mercury have gems, which retain their value because of their rarity, beauty, and hardness. Venus and Mars have iron.

In fact, the proven accessible iron reserves of the Red Planet are greater than those of the rest of the System combined. In addition, it is relatively easy to obtain. It is on the surface of a solid planet, so that it can be picked up in solid state and refined virtually on-site. This makes it relatively cheap to produce.

Mars, in fact, has long enjoyed an interplanetary economic leverage quite out of proportion to its planetary population. Mars has gotten rich by raising the price of its iron as high as the market will bear, with seeming indifference to the hardships worked on poor planets sorely in need of energy. But it has long been suspected that Mars is not the only culprit. The Jupiter iron companies also profited considerably by their handling of Martian iron, because they simply raised their prices to accommodate the higher Mars prices and added a generous margin for profit. But no one was able to catch them at profiteering because their accounting policies were concealed, and not even the Jupiter government had the means to verify the correct figures. More billionaires have been made from iron in the past century than from any other trade.

But the Tyrancy nationalized one of the iron processors, the Planetary Iron Company, or Planico. It took our accountants some time to fathom the records in detail—key files were mysteriously missing—but in due course we verified that this company, in its prior freedom, had defrauded the Jupiter public of monstrous value. Apparently this was standard practice; indeed, there were memos verifying collusion on pricing. We put a good man in charge, and he did approximately what I did with Jupiter Bubble, rendering it into an efficient, innovative, and militantly competitive organization that provided iron at a fraction of the former price. Naturally the other companies had to drop their prices to match, and the cost of living for the average Jupiter citizen declined. Our effort, when it became successful, was widely lauded and became the model for other planets. The power of Big Iron had been broken.

The public was pleased, but the free iron companies were not. No billionaires were being generated by this industry now. Accustomed to having their own way with the various planets, Big Iron set out to reclaim its own. It determined to eliminate the apparent cause of its malaise: the Tyrant of Jupiter.

I hope I have presented this objectively enough. It is no easy task. Had I known the nature and consequence of their drive, I would have nationalized them all at the outset and shipped their executives to space. Even now I shake with anger. But hindsight is pointless.

I should clarify that this was not the Resistance. The Resistance remained passive, merely building a subtle network among concerned citizens, doing nothing to attract the ire of the Tyrancy. No, the Iron Fist was a private, ultimately selfish effort ungoverned by ethical scruples. That kind is dangerous, too, especially when backed by substantial resources. But because it was canted toward action, it was likely to expend itself rapidly. The moment action occurred, the hounds of the Tyrancy were on it, rooting out the source. Thus an action-opposition had to be effective early, or it was soon out of business.

The iron companies approached the Tyrant forthrightly: they believed I misunderstood their position, and they wanted to clarify it. I did not trust this, but it behooved me to listen, so I agreed to a meeting. This was not a physical meeting, of course; I had learned my lesson with the senators. We set it up with holo: an image of each iron exec was to be projected to the White Bubble, while the actual execs remained in New Wash, close enough so that transmission of the images was virtually instantaneous. This was really just about as good for such meetings as physical presence was, and far safer for me.

Thus I was physically present in the Oval Office, along with Shelia and Coral, who confined themselves to the background. There were seats around the table for six iron execs, and another for Gerald Phist, who also projected in for the occasion. He was the one in charge of industry, including the iron industry, and I wanted him to backstop me. I knew the iron magnates would be hurling statistics at me, and I wanted competent refutation at hand.

They appeared on schedule. Abruptly the seats were filled, and certainly if I had not known that the visitors were nonphysical, I would not have guessed. The leaders of Energiron, Spacirco, Rediron, Jupico, Standard Iron, and Abyss Metals. Of course, they sat at similar tables in their own offices, so that when their hands touched the surface, they did not hover above it or penetrate it; they were precisely zeroed in. The days of such inadequacies were long past.

“What, gentlemen, is your concern?” I inquired evenly. I suspected that this whole business was a waste of time, but I had to maintain the forms of reasonableness, and it also showed that I remained in the White Bubble and actively on the job. That was important, since, of course, most of my time was spent elsewhere, while Spirit handled the job. Reba's ploy to maintain my safety had been working excellently, and in fact, I liked my active life as Jose Garcia better than my standby life as Tyrant.

“We feel that you have underestimated the importance of the profit system,” the exec from Standard Iron said. "By forcing us to cut down our margins, you reduce our competitive viability on the System scale.

We can no longer expend the same resources for iron exploration that Mars can, and that is not only bad for us, it is bad for Jupiter."

“What's good for Standard Iron is good for Jupiter,” Phist murmured sardonically. He was old now and getting crusty, but his mind remained sharp.

The exec grimaced. “Laugh if you will, but there is some truth in that. The strength of Jupiter's business is the strength of Jupiter, and we are in great danger of losing it. The greatest advantage Jupiter has had over Saturn is our appeal to the industrious person; to the one who labors most effectively go the greatest rewards. Naturally the elephant consumes more than do the smaller creatures, but the elephant also accomplishes more. If you insist on punishing those who generate the real strength of the planet—”

“You forget that we nationalized Planico,” I cut in, stung by the reference to the elephant. I had elected to save the one in our zoo despite its enormous consumption of food, and I didn't like this not-too-subtle reference. “That we finally got to the bottom of the iron industry finances. You have been defrauding the public for centuries.”

He reddened. “That is purely a matter of interpretation! If you insist on defining a reasonable return on investment as—”

“What you call reason, I'd call piracy,” Phist said.

“Only if you do not take into consideration the risk entailed! Prospecting for iron is an expensive matter, and ninety-eight percent of the sites prove barren. Therefore some allowance must be made for—”

“Only sixty percent of Planico's exploratory sites proved barren,” Phist retorted. “And I believe that you yourself, sir, have castigated that government company as 'Saturnistically inefficient.' ”

“Of course, there is great variance in strikes. The fact that Planico was lucky does not alter the overall—”

He broke off, because something strange was happening. The household garbage disposal unit was trundling in on its wheels, unattended.

These units are mobile, because there are many kinds of refuse, and it is often easier to bring the unit to the garbage than vice versa. But normally ours remained in the kitchen. Though it was self-propelled, it normally did not travel unattended, because the refuse had to be fed to it by hand.

All eyes followed the somewhat lurching progress of the machine. “A late arrival?” Energiron inquired, smiling.

“From the garbage industry!” Jupico responded, and they all laughed. Naturally they found it hilarious that such a foul-up should occur at this moment, as though the Tyrant could not keep his own house in order. I knew that the media would have a field day with this one; naturally they had a camera present.

The disposer rolled slowly around the table, outside the ring of chairs, working its way toward me. I saw Shelia wheeling to intercept it, simultaneously murmuring into her mike. She was summoning the kitchen staff to come and recover their errant equipment, but meanwhile she would deactivate it herself.

Then several things happened in rapid order. A flicker of motion caught my eye; I turned to spy a man backing away from me. But I hadn't seen or heard him come near, which was strange—and he looked exactly like me, which was stranger yet. I glanced down at my own torso as if to verify that I remained me—and was startled to discover that I wasn't me. I was invisible.

And the actual disposer suddenly clanked and lurched at me, its incinerative laser coming into play. “It's remote-controlled!” an exec cried. “Assassination!” another exclaimed.

Coral leapt toward it, her arm moving. “No!” Shelia screamed, jamming her chair right at me. But Coral's grenade was already in the air, bound accurately for the disposer, which had now overlapped my space. I felt no contact, no laser-heat; it was merely a holo image.

And the grenade, which was quite real, was coming at me. Still seated in my chair, I could not get away from it in time.

Shelia's chair crossed before me, crashing into the table. Her right hand reached up and plucked the grenade from the air. She hauled it down to her bosom and hunched over it.

The grenade detonated.

Pieces of Shelia and her chair flew outward. Blood spattered floor, table, chairs, and ceiling—and me. I was half stunned by the concussion, and half blinded by blood, but I was alive. Shelia...

I looked up and saw Coral standing there, totally appalled. Then the madness closed in.

I must clarify, as objectively as I can, what had happened, though the tears of grief and rage well up from my eyes as I write this. It was, of course, an assassination plot—but far more sophisticated than I had deemed at the time. The iron execs had set it up, acting much as had the senators who sought to kill Caesar, but with a fiendishly clever twist.

There had been no runaway garbage disposer, and no remote control. It was only a holo image. The execs had rehearsed their reactions carefully, to contribute to the illusion that the machine was literal. The image was crafted to resemble the White Bubble disposer exactly, and it was possible for that unit to enter the Oval Office; that aided the verisimilitude. So we had had no reason to doubt the obvious: that the machine had gone haywire—or that it had been preempted for a remote-control assassination attempt.

Coral, catching on, had acted in her typical manner, hurling a grenade to destroy the machine before it could reach me. But Shelia had caught on to the truth: that my person had been covered by a holo image of the machine. A holo image of me had been crafted to retreat from my place, while I had been blanked out. A properly manipulated holo can do that, by projecting an image of an empty chair to replace what is actually there. It is tricky and cannot be perfect, but this was only for a moment, while the image of the disposer rolled forward to overlap that same place. Thus, to the observer I was retreating from an assassination-bent machine.

Shelia had penetrated the ruse but too late to stop Coral from throwing the grenade. So Shelia, already moving forward, had goosed her chair and intercepted the grenade, making a spectacular catch. Her legs were paralyzed, but her arms made up for it by being highly coordinated. Knowing that the grenade would go off in a second, she had brought it in toward her body, so that the explosion would be muffled.

Shelia had quite literally given her life to save mine. She had foiled the assassination attempt. It does not surprise me that she did that; she loved me. But it appalled me that she should have had to sacrifice herself like that.

So the iron magnates had plotted to cause my own bodyguard to kill me but had killed my loyal secretary instead.

As I recovered consciousness, being attended by the White Bubble medics, a scene from history was running through my mind. Back in the twentieth century, before Earth had expanded to space, there had been a dictator of Germany, a man named Hitler. There had been a plot to assassinate him, in which a bomb was left in a case beside him, at a meeting. But the case had been inadvertently moved, so that though it exploded, Hitler survived. Even as I had survived.