“How much time are you giving us?”
“You’ll have tonight,” Abumwe said. “I’ll be here to answer what questions I can. Okada is here to tell you about Khartoum’s experience with Equilibrium. It’s eleven P.M. now. By eight, I will either need your unanimous agreement or your refusal.”
“And if we refuse?”
“Then you refuse and everything becomes much harder and much more dangerous. For everyone,” Abumwe said. “I’m going to leave you for a few moments. I will be back to answer questions presently.” She walked out the side door I had brought Okada in from. I followed her.
“That was inspiring,” I said.
“Of all the things I need at the moment, Wilson, your sarcasm is not one of them,” she said.
“It’s only partly sarcasm,” I said. “Do you think they’ll commit?”
“I believe Calderon is convinced. I think she might be able to convince others.”
“And do you think the Colonial Union is actually going to agree to the changes you’ve just committed it to?”
“That’s Rigney and Egan’s department,” Abumwe said. “But none of us would be here if we didn’t already see the writing on the wall.”
“True enough,” I said.
“I need you to call in Hart Schmidt,” Abumwe said. “I need him to take your place in the room. I will brief him on everything.”
“All right,” I said. “What are you going to have me do?”
“I have two things I need you to do,” Abumwe said. “First, I need you to talk to Ocampo.”
“What about?”
“The whereabouts of Equilibrium. They fled from their base but that hasn’t stopped them from continuing their operations. We need to know where they are now.”
“He might not know,” I said.
“And he might. You need to ask him.”
“You’re the boss,” I said. “What’s the other thing?”
“I need you to go to Earth.”
“Interesting,” I said. “You know they don’t like us, right? As in, if one of our spaceships shows up above the planet, they’re likely to shoot it out of the sky. Not to mention it’ll take me several days to get there, with no reasonable expectation of getting back, once they shoot my ship out of the sky.”
“I expect you to solve all of these problems before you leave.”
“I admire your confidence in me.”
“Then don’t disappoint me, Wilson.”
* * *
Tyson Ocampo and I stood on a beach, watching the waves roll in and the seagulls circle overhead.
“It’s beautiful here,” Ocampo said, to me.
“I thought you might like it,” I replied.
“Which beach is this?”
“Cottesloe Beach. It’s near Perth, Australia.”
“Ah,” Ocampo said. “I’ve never been.”
“Well, it’s on Earth, so that’s understandable,” I said.
“Have you ever been?”
“Once,” I said. “I went to Perth on business and had a free day. Took the train over to it and spent the day watching the waves and drinking beer.”
Ocampo smiled. “We’re watching the waves, at least,” he said.
“Sorry about the lack of beer.”
“Lieutenant, when you’re not here, the simulation I see is of a small, square cell. It has three books in it, the titles of which rotate after I read them. I don’t get to choose the titles. There’s a single small screen on which is ported just enough entertainment material that I do not go entirely mad. Once a day they make a track appear so that I can give myself the appearance of physical exercise. My only visitor—aside from the occasional Colonial Union interrogator—is a chatbot which is not quite well programmed enough to give the appearance of being a person, and only serves to remind me that I am, well and truly, alone in my brain. Trust me. This beach is enough.”
I had nothing to say to that, so we continued watching the simulated waves of simulated Cottesloe Beach tumble onto the simulated shore, while the simulated birds reeled in the sky.
“I assume this is a reward,” Ocampo said. “For our last session.”
“As it turns out, you were entirely correct that a trap was being laid for the CDF ship at Khartoum,” I said. “My ship got to skip distance in a dangerously short time—we nearly overloaded the engines—and skipped directly into the attack. That was lucky timing.”
“The CDF didn’t send one of the ships it has on standby.”
“With all due respect, Secretary Ocampo, you’re a confirmed traitor, and you have a history of leading ships to their doom. They would not send their own ship, but they didn’t mind if we played Russian roulette with ours.”
“I’m glad you trust me, Lieutenant.”
“I trust that you have nothing left to lose, Secretary.”
“That’s not quite the same thing, is it.”