Random Chance and the Paradise that is Earth (2 page)

The captain turned around. He was a
medium-sized middle-aged man with a severe crewcut and grizzled
countenance. His mouth looked as though it hadn't smiled since he
was a boy, if ever. He regarded him as one would a rotten piece of
meat, blue eyes squinting.

Random, for his part, couldn't hide his
surprise.

"Uncle Bartlett," he said, blinking. "Well,
rock me like a hurricane …"

Chapter
Two
Trust Me, Uncle
~~*~~

GUARDS LED him off the bridge. Captain
(Uncle) Bartlett walked ahead, but not before ordering the men to
cuff him.

The cuffs—not electronic, but the ancient
steel variety—bit into Random’s wrists. He looked over his shoulder
at the one cuffing him. "You're good at this. But I bet your
girlfriend's side squeeze is better—gentler."

The soldier next to that one brought the
butt of his rifle up into Random’s chin.

He fell to his knees. Blood filled his
mouth.

"That one gets what's comin' to him,"
murmured Hewey.

They picked him up by the hair and shoulders
and pushed him behind Bartlett, who didn’t bother turning around to
watch. "I think that's enough to convince you to behave, isn't
it?"

"Not ever," replied Random, fighting to stay
conscious. He spat, aiming for the wall to his right.

The soldiers did not respond. He expected
them to.

Down a short corridor, then into a small
room with a table and two chairs.

"I'll be just a few minutes," said Captain
Bartlett.

The men saluted and the door whispered
closed.

"Sit down," ordered the captain, who
sat.

Random remained standing.

"Would you like me to call the guards in
here and force you to sit? I'll do it, and when they're done you'll
be lucky if you can sit at all!"

"Asshole," grumbled Hewey.

Random sat.

It was obvious that Uncle Bartlett was used
to cowing men simply by staring at them. Random stared back,
uncowed.

The captain grunted contemptuously and
motioned at him. "Look at you. Back in the days when your father
had some sense, he'd've whipped you for dressing like this."

Random said nothing.

"You got contraband in that RV?"

"They're tearing this place apart looking
for some," said Hewey. "They've got a tracer running through the
interface, too."

"I'm talking to you, boy!" yelled the
captain, slamming his fist on the table.

Once, long ago, his dad had demanded respect
this way, too. Once …

Generals gathered in their masses,
just like witches at black masses.
Evil minds that plot destruction,
sorcerer of death's construction.

He shook his head.

"No? No contraband?"

He swallowed bloody spit. "Do you know what
he said to me before he was arrested?"

"Who?"

"Dad. Jameson."

"I'm not interested in what he said," said
Bartlett with a scowl.

"Yes you are."

Uncle Bartlett's hand lashed out and slapped
his face. "You are being investigated for aiding and abetting the
enemy! I could have you charged! You'll be incinerated inside of a
day, do you hear me?"

"You've got nothing to say worth hearing,"
said Random. He spat blood on the table.

Uncle Bartlett ignored the bloody saliva and
stood. He walked to the wall and barked, "Bay 5."

The wall disappeared. In its
place was
The Pompatus of Love
floating within the bay's confines. The bay was so
large that it could probably hold ten more of her and still have
room to spare. Men walked in an out of her landing ramp, which
extended from her belly to a walkway.

"I'll do it, you know," he said. "I'll push
that stupid turtle into space and blow it to bits. And I'll make
you watch."

"No you won't."

"Yeah? Why won't I?"

"Because you pig Garkies need to present a
peaceful front, and blowing up a civilian vessel would really throw
a monkey wrench into the works. The posse storming out of Mars
right now wants a piece of me, too. Their cameras are rolling, bet
on it. You’re in civilian space. The military isn’t welcome—"

Bartlett was on him in an instant, his face
red as a plum. He pulled Random up by the collar with two fists and
shook him, his teeth bared. He went to say something, but stopped.
He threw him back into the chair.

"You think you're so damn clever."

Random spat blood on the table. Hewey said,
"They made a mess, Rand, but they're leaving. I hacked the report.
They're going to say you're clean. They didn't find the library,
thank your dear ol' Dad.... Several wanted to frame you, set you up
with some microsoft ... but the lead pig told them you weren't
worth it. I think it was his stash and he didn't want to part with
any. They should be there pretty quick."

Random looked up at his uncle. "No more so
than Dad."

"I knew that asshole wasn't
right in the head when he named you, his only son,
Random
. What a stupid,
nonsensical thing to do."

"Well, Uncle, he told me before he was
executed that he always thought you were a ball-less, pathetic
excuse of a man." Random grinned, his teeth stained red.
"Conscience? Principles? A moral center? He got those before he
died. You, on the other hand, Bartles ..." He shrugged
indifferently.

"That's rich. You, a trust-fund baby,
lecturing me on morality, on having a conscience ..."

The door buzzed.

"Come!" the captain roared.

The door opened and a Garky regular entered.
He handed Bartlett a thin tablet which the captain looked over.

A moment passed in silence.

"Says you're clean," he said. The
disappointment in his voice was evident.

Random smirked. "Not like that skank bot you
sank your soggy toothpick in back on Europa, eh? You really got
into her, huh?"

Hewey laughed. "Hoo boy, Random! He's gonna
knock your teeth out!"

But Uncle Bartlett did not strike him. He
gave the tablet back to the sailor (soldier?). "Five minutes," he
said to the man.

The regular saluted and left.

Captain Bartlett stared.

"How do you know about Europa?"

Random didn’t answer. He spat more blood on
the table. He waited for fists to come raining down on him, but his
uncle did not move.

"I was born in the wrong time," said Captain
Bartlett with murderous calm. "Back in the nineteenth century there
wasn't all this technology. It was a clean time: no radio waves, no
video feeds, no constant connection over the SolarWeb, no
interfacing technology, no Cortex, none of it. Captains sailing the
oceans of Earth were given great discretion as to what to do with
pirates and other scum they encountered. Usually they just shot
them in the head and dumped them overboard."

He withdrew the pistol in his belt and
leveled it between Random’s eyes.

"Whoa,"
said Hewey.

Random jerked in surprise, but did not move
from his seat. His face remained impassive.

"I'll just tell the Reds that
you got feisty and tried to escape. I
had
to shoot you."

Random looked up from the barrel into his
uncle's wide, angry eyes and shook his head.

"If Jameson could look at you now ..."

"Jameson—is—dead!"
bellowed Bartlett. "And I'm glad of it! He was a
traitor and a sellout! I'm just sorry I didn't get to push the
incinerator button myself!" He thumbed the pistol's safety
off.

"Nail 'im, Random," said Hewey. "If you're
gonna die, amigo, then get 'im before he pulls that trigger."

"You're one sad son of a bitch," said
Random, forcing his fear into a dark smirk. "And you're going to
regret everything you said here. I promise you that. If you pull
that trigger, you'll regret everything twice as fast and twice as
hard. Trust me, Uncle, you don't want that."

"That should do it," said Hewey.

Uncle Bartlett clicked the pistol's safety
back on, and then brought the handle of the gun into Random's
temple. Random fought for consciousness, but a second strike
brought only blackness.

Chapter
Three
Cubey
~~*~~

HE WOKE on a cold white floor under
similarly colored lights. His forehead throbbed and had a bloody
gash on it. He struggled to sit up while holding it. The right side
of his mouth felt swollen, and there was a nasty bruise under his
chin.

He looked around.
"There's somethin' happenin' here ... what it is
ain't exactly clear ..."

Cold, smooth floor. Cold corporate lighting.
Even the air, sterile and lifeless, had a bit of a chill to it.

"Hewey?" he half-spoke, half-groaned, not
caring if the walls were bugged, which they almost certainly
were.

Hewey didn't respond.

He pushed himself back to a wall and leaned
against it, pulling his knees up and wrapping his arms around
them.

The room was a cube three meters on a side
and windowless. The pit of his stomach told him the gravity was
reduced, maybe half or less Earth standard.

Mars, then. Or he was on Phobos above it. It
was one or the other, no doubt about it. That jackass Bartlett
probably drugged him and handed him over when the Reds arrived.

He tried again. "Hewey?"

Nothing.

"Who is Hewey?" said a disembodied male
voice which seemed to come from everywhere.

Random fingered his lower lip, which was
swollen. The underside of his chin felt broken.

"I said, who is Hewey?”

"He's the name of the dude doin' your mama,"
murmured Random. "Probably right now."

"You are in no position to give us
attitude," said the voice. "You are in serious trouble, Mr. Chance.
I would advise that you cooperate."

He fingered the gash on his head and
whispered:

"The ocean is on fire
The sky turned dark again
As the boats came in
And the beaches
Stretched out with soldiers
With their arms and guns
It has just begun ..."

Silence.

"What has just begun, Mr. Chance?"

He tongued the inside of his lip. He could
still taste blood.

Ah-ha
.

"Phobos?" he said.

"Yes," answered the voice. "Please tell me,
Mr. Chance: What has just begun?"

"You can't tell by that bit of verse?"

"Are you talking about war?"

Random nodded. He knew that was all he
needed to do.

"Are you referring to the police action
against the insurrectionist Nyett Zhong, and is that your verse?
Did you compose it?"

" 'Police action,' " he said, shaking his
head sadly. "Call it what it is. It's war."

There was a long moment of silence.

"War."

"That's right. War."

"A conflict carried on by force of arms, as
between nations or between parties within a nation; warfare, as by
land, sea, air, or space."

"Yep."

"A state or period of armed hostility or
active military operations."

Random nodded.

"A contest carried on by force of arms, as
in a series of battles or campaigns."

"True enough."

"Armed fighting, as a science, profession,
activity, or art; methods of waging armed conflict."

"Now you're getting it."

Another long moment of silence.

"Active hostility or contention; a conflict
or a contest."

"Give that man an 'A.' "

The silence stretched on for whole minutes
this time.

"I am not a man, Mr. Chance."

"I know that," said Random. "And call me
Random. My name is Random Chance."

"The flip of a coin," said the omnipresent
voice.

Random smiled.

"The roll of the die."

"Of course."

"The existence of man ..."

"Call it humankind."

A much shorter period of silence.

"Humankind."

"Not random," said Random.

That
shut the voice up for what was probably an entire hour.
Random, in that time, and as best as he could, lay back down. He
needed sleep. He felt woozy and lightheaded and worried that he had
a concussion—or two.

He didn’t sleep, but it felt good to close
his eyes and doze, if fitfully. He had to keep huddled in himself
against the almost-cold.

"Are you from the Oligarchy?" asked the
voice, pulling him back to consciousness.

Random sat up, rubbed his eyes. "Why would
you ask that?" he said after yawning an unsatisfying yawn.

"I am having trouble registering brain-wave
activity from you, Random Chance."

"That makes me Oligarchy? Your
malfunctioning sensors?"

"No. It was your comment that humankind did
not come about by random chance."

"But that's exactly what the Oligarchy
believes," said Random, puzzled. "So if I disagree with that
assertion, why would you ask if I was one of them?"

The voice went quiet again. Random thought
it might be another hour, and he was thinking of trying to sleep
again, when it cut in.

"Age: twenty-nine Earth-standard years.
Heart rate: sixty-three. Blood pressure: one twenty-one over
seventy-six. Height: one-point-eight-two meters, Earth-standard.
Weight: eighty-six kilograms, Earth-standard. Brain activity ...
unreadable. Why is that, Random Chance? Why can't I read your brain
activity?"

"I suppose you've also catalogued my
DNA?"

"Of course. Why can't I take a brainscan
reading, Random Chance?"

"What did your DNA reading tell you?"

"You are in the SolarWeb's records. You were
born on Earth, year 3438, in February of that year while your
parents were vacationing there. Your parents were Jameson and
Cecilia Chance, both deceased."