Building Harlequin’s Moon Read online

  The door shut behind the Councilwoman. Rachel’s legs ached from the unfamiliar and shifty gravity, and her back and shoulders felt as though strings of knots were sitting in them, throbbing. She made it to the bed, closed her eyes, and began reviewing the wonders of the garden. It seemed magical that there were so many plants. The huge tree—Yggdrasil—surely trees on Selene wouldn’t get that big?

  It seemed she had been gone from the room for a week, but when she checked it had only been two hours. She had to fight sleep to open her wrist pad and begin recording the experience for Harry.

  CHAPTER 15

  SKATING

  GABRIEL SAT AND stretched on the small spot of lawn, a few feet away from Kyu, who was all purples and yellows today, like a tiny oriental butterfly. The garden surrounded them, hundreds of shades of green and blue and brown dotted with yellow and white and purple flowers. Tenders and floating lamps flitted overhead, and the occasional crew member. A particularly colorful set of wings went by, and Gabriel tapped Kyu’s shoulder and pointed. Kyu looked up and laughed.

  “How is Rachel doing?” he asked. “Has a week on the ship worn her out?”

  “She’s learning fast—seems to like to work. I plan to give her some data rights.”

  “Why?”

  “So far she’s been given exactly what she needs to know on Selene, and nothing more. She’s not developing the ability to really think.”

  “You’ve been talking to Ali.” Gabriel picked up a skate and tucked his foot inside. The top of his foot tingled as the boot conformed around it, fitting snuggly.

  “She’s right, you know.”

  Gabriel put on his other boot. “What access do you want Rachel to have?”

  “What do you think?” Kyu challenged him, standing up, flexing her legs, squatting and standing, preparing to start down the spiral path. They were wearing inline skates of a fairly simple design, with three big wheels on a long axle, smart shock absorbers, brakes on a belt control.

  “What will High Council think?” Gabriel fastened light goggles over his eyes, protection from the air scrubbers.

  “I’m High Council.”

  One of five, three warm.

  She must have known what he was thinking. “I’m not going to ask permission for everything I do to help prepare Rachel. We need functioning leadership down there that isn’t us.” She pushed off with her right foot, glided on her left, a slow graceful movement here by the aft entrance.

  Gabriel followed. Liren was going to hate this. He wasn’t sure he didn’t hate this, although he trusted Kyu. As far as he was concerned, Liren was paranoid to the point of disaffection. But the Children did need information, and maybe that included the skill to dig it out for themselves.

  “Are you going to tell anyone you’re giving Rachel rights?”

  “Only if they ask.”

  The main path spiraled from the garden’s pole down to the river, across a bridge, and back up to the pole at the forward end. Other paths branched off.

  The skates jarred against the pebbled surface. In low gravity, and significant coriolis force, Kyu bounced high, her torso twisting and her arms windmilling to maintain orientation before she touched down. Her hair flew out behind her, light here in the low gravity.

  Gabriel finally caught up enough to talk to her. “So, do you want to give all of the Children more data rights?”

  “Even I’m not that brave. We don’t want to turn them into us! But at least all the teachers need enough information to think with. Unless you want to be the only teacher?”

  “I don’t have time for that.” Wind from their increased speed dragged lightly across Gabriel’s face. “You could come to Selene and help.”

  Kyu ignored his last comment. “Rachel is an experiment. If we don’t like how she reacts, we’ll try something else with someone else.”

  “If they know too much, they’ll realize exactly what we’re doing to them.”

  “That would be the responsible choice.”

  “But . . . but . . .” She was gone, pulling farther ahead as the garden’s spin-induced gravity increased near the equator. She crouched low, reaching for speed, her legs pushing out in long hard strokes.

  He followed, relaxing into the rush of air, bent low, whipping through the savannah’s browns and olive-greens, hitting the edge of the jungle and the deeper greens. Bright orange and yellow flowers lined the path. They sped through, going too fast to talk.

  They came close to full gravity. The spiral path was smoother here. Ahead of him Kyu leaned hard over. She was preparing to veer onto a side path.

  Gabriel prepared for the sharp tight turn, crouched lower, head almost on his knees. Kyu was still ahead of him, and he watched her take the turn perfectly, not even hobbling, using the path’s entire radius. He struggled to execute as well, but had to put his hand down for balance at the apex, just a short touch, but enough to concede her the victory of a more perfect run.

  They let the speed drag from them as they skated by the huge river wall. Honeysuckle vines hugged the wall, rich and sickly sweet smelling. Benches and grass made the river wall a park. The jogging and skating path they were on was designed for high-gee workouts, and they had to dodge three sets of runners.

  Kyu suddenly braked and plopped on a wide expanse of grass.

  Gabriel landed next to her, laughing. “Nice turn.”

  “Thanks. Will you help me teach Rachel to use the Library?”

  “What happens if it goes wrong?” he asked softly.

  “Do you trust me?”

  “Usually.”

  “So lighten up.” She rose, graceful with years of practice, every bead and stitch of clothing falling into place. “Ready to go back?”

  They started the long skate back up, gravity now a drag, speed increasing as spin decreased near the aft pole. Gabriel’s thighs burned. He was the first one to argue for education and some autonomy for the Children. So why did it disturb him when Kyu not only agreed but pushed his own agenda further than he would?

  CHAPTER 16

  MEETS AND BOUNDS

  MA LIREN SAT in the main boardroom. She drummed her fingers, looked at the clock on the wall, tried not to fidget. Captain Hunter sat at the head of the table; Liren was at the foot. A sign glowed above the captain’s head, proclaiming “Council of Humanity” in large black letters. The wall sported two nano-paint pictures that showed scenes from Sol system, switching between the verdant greens of the restored South American jungles, soft azure and deep green seascapes, and the angled blacks and bright lights of Earth orbital housing. Ghosts. All gone. It reminded her how very alone they were, how small, how vulnerable.

  Kyu Ho glided to a seat next to the captain. Liren repressed a grimace at Kyu’s revealing blue and purple outfit. Ever since the tenting came off at Aldrin, Kyu had stayed warm as much as half the time, and Liren was sure she spent half of that time self-decorating. For about the thousandth time, Liren wished for uniforms. They had left Earth uniformed like the crew of a Mars mission, but so much about Sol system tasted so bad to the starfarers that the captain had allowed uniforms to be recycled as soon as they flew past Neptune’s orbit.

  On that day he had proclaimed them free of all Earth influences and able to build their own society. Of course, they were supposed to sleep through a long journey and then become civilians at Ymir. Stage magic: it took more than removing symbols to build a new society. He was a good captain, by and large, but he didn’t understand the relationship of strong symbols to discipline. She did. Uniforms should have been reinstated as soon as they discovered they were marooned.

  Liren watched Kyu laugh at something the captain said, Kyu’s graceful fingers twining like snakes in her purple hair. Everyone liked Kyu.

  Gabriel followed Kyu in and sat opposite her. He was thinner from so much time on Selene, tanned, and coolly collected; even his walk implied physical grace. His attraction to the Children grated. Maybe he needed it. He ran much of the Selene project, under Clare, wh
o let him run free. Clare preferred the social life of John Glenn to the hardships of real terraforming. It was rare to see Gabriel on John Glenn; he spent way too much time on Selene. He went cold on his own from time to time, ensuring he stayed young. Liren was pleased to see him, even if he had brought a Moon Born to her ship.

  It was time. Everyone warm that mattered was in the room.

  Captain Hunter cleared his throat loudly, and the room quieted. “I’m calling the High Council Meeting of Departure Date 60,269 to order. We have a quorum of High Council present, including myself, Ma Liren, Kyu Ho, and Clare Abramson. Rich Smith is off-shift. Gabriel Aaron is an invited guest. I’m turning the meeting over to Ma Liren as Rule of Law for the first few agenda items.”

  Liren cleared her throat, looking around the table, catching the eyes of each person. “I have two things to discuss,” Liren said, “training the Moon Born, and ensuring our safety. So let’s start with the rules for Rachel. I understand you chose to bring her here to learn about terraforming, background for leading crews on Selene.” Liren didn’t like that, but it was better than sending more Council to Selene. “Rachel’s training will be in the garden. I see no reason for her to go anywhere else besides the garden and her room.”

  Kyu objected immediately. “Some of her lessons need the magic rooms.”

  Liren looked around. No one else seemed bothered by the idea. She didn’t see enough support to refuse Kyu. “You may escort her there and back. But there is no reason for her to learn much more about John Glenn. Her focus needs to be on learning what she came to learn, and getting back to the surface and doing work.” Liren turned to Kyu. “How long do you expect Rachel to be here?”

  “At least a Selene year,” Kyu said.

  Liren sat up straighter, looking Kyu in the eyes. “What exactly does she need to learn here?”

  Captain Hunter surprised Liren by speaking up. “It may be she needs to learn about us, as well as horticulture and terraforming engineering. You don’t make a leader by pasting a label on her forehead.”

  Liren frowned. She had expected his support. “She’ll always have a Council boss. Kyu, see that she gets what she needs. I want to meet with her from time to time.”

  Kyu’s eyes were slits, and her lips were tight, but she maintained silence. There might not be uniforms, but there was tradition. In an open High Council meeting, she had to show teamwork for the record. Liren allowed the silence to speak for Kyu, and then continued. “So Rachel can stay in her room, go to the garden, and be escorted to and from magic rooms. Anything else should come back before this Council.”

  Kyu nodded, not bothering to look as if she were happy about it.

  Liren looked around. She hadn’t won much. If it were up to her, the damned Moon Born would stay on Selene. The Selene project wasn’t her direct responsibility—just the John Glenn. But leadership required consent; she had to compromise to keep her power. The girl probably wouldn’t amount to much, anyway.

  “Now,” Liren said, “about Andrew Hain.” She looked directly at Gabriel. “He is clearly a danger. Why not simply bring Andrew up here and ice him? That was the choice with Trill Hain, years ago.”

  Gabriel frowned, steepling his fingers, buying a few moments to frame his thoughts. “We talked about that. It would not punish Andrew. What we’ve done with Andrew will teach. The rest of them will see him living among them, needing to do menial work to eat, cut away from all access to data. He can’t even get basic daily stats. If the others see that, they will know that we can make hard choices. Andrew will be the example. We decided that was less risky than the mystery of a disappearance.”

  Kyu broke in. “We can’t put all of our problems on ice. We must solve some of them.”

  Liren weighed choices. Accepting Gabriel’s answer meant his choice would be seen as right. Could she make it play into her plans? Finally she said, “All right. John Glenn is a bad choice for a prison, and icing criminals is giving out extended life as a reward for vandalism.”

  The captain quietly said, “There is precedent.”

  “No,” said Kyu. “The disaffected are not in prison—they didn’t wake up sane, so we iced them again. We will find a tool to heal them when we get to Ymir.”

  Liren continued. “The situation with Andrew is difficult, and we should have seen it coming. There will be dangerous behavior among these Children. We could handle a few, but we cannot bring every case here and ice them. Besides, it’s the wrong use for limited cryogenic resources. We must include a detention facility in the plan. By the time we have a population of five thousand Moon Born, we need a place we can put unruly ones. I’d like the terraforming team to bring back plans for a detention facility in the next six months. And I want to begin a discussion about a police force.”

  The room fell completely silent. Kyu doodled on her pad, not looking up. Captain Hunter waited, watching the High Council. Gabriel looked like he was biting his tongue. Had she pushed them too far?

  Kyu said, “We must not develop an adversarial relationship with the Moon Born Children.”

  “So what relationship do we want?” Liren snapped. “We must be in control of this project.”

  Kyu’s words sputtered out one at a time through clenched teeth. “Teach them to be like us. Give them our values, positive reasons to respect us. Let them police themselves, perhaps.”

  “That’s dangerous,” Liren snapped.

  “They’ll need a social structure; we aren’t taking them with us,” Kyu said. She stood up, looking around the room for an answer. As short as she was, in spite of the gaudy purple ribbons and makeup she wore, the extra height gave Kyu presence.

  Captain Hunter said, “Sit down, Kyu.” He waited for her to take her place back at the table before continuing. “The core problem hasn’t changed. If we get stuck here, we will die. We chose to accept some hard choices for human beings, for our own children, as a necessary evil that might save all of humanity. Accept that we will be leaving people behind. We already made that choice.”

  Liren continued his train of thought, the cadence of her voice tripping easily on the familiar mantra: “If we become machines, then there will be no more humans.” She nodded at the captain. “We will not resolve this today or tomorrow,” she said. “We may not resolve it for a long time. But we must continue the discussion. Gabriel, thank you for being here. Please be prepared to brief us on the planting tomorrow.”

  Gabriel stood and said, “Thank you,” nodding to Kyu and the captain, ignoring Liren.

  Liren frowned and turned the meeting back to the captain, who ran through some basic status and reporting about the ship, and dismissed them.

  Back in her room, Liren collapsed on her bed, shaking. This was so hard. Why couldn’t they all see how careful they had to be? If they got too attached to Selene or the Children, they would end up staying here. They would die.

  Of course the Children would stay. They would never have been born if John Glenn hadn’t made Selene. They had their very lives to be grateful for. There just wasn’t any other choice. Every time Liren warmed and reentered the social world of the ship, she worried more. All of her worst fears were coming true.

  The knock she was expecting came. She combed her hair, then opened the door and smiled at the captain. “What did you think?” she asked.

  He walked past her, not touching. Like always. He never touched her. Yet he was the only person aboard John Glenn that Liren could really talk to. “You made Kyu angry. She is right, you know.” Captain Hunter handed Liren a bulb of chocolate.

  Liren bridled at this, but—he knew her that well: not tea, but chocolate. She took it. “Of course they’re human. But we have humans here, educated handpicked Colonists and crew, and our first duty is to protect them.”

  “I know.” The captain’s brows were knitted together, and he looked away from her. “We have an obligation to the Moon Born, though. We’ve put them in place, we must use them. We must train them. What would it take to treat them wit
h respect?”

  “I respect them. They have rules and laws to live within, food and a place to sleep, families. Do you expect me to give them eternal life too? We just don’t have the resources. You said the same thing when we got here.”

  “I know. But it’s harder when they’re real people, not just an idea, a plan.”

  Ma looked up at him. “We must keep Rachel contained for another reason. If the Moon Born understand what we have here, they will want it. They will rebel. To put down a rebellion, we will have to kill them and start over.”

  The captain stared at her, brows furrowed. “They see the terraforming team walking among them, and they have limited data rights of their own.”

  “We can’t help that,” Liren said. “But ultimately, we must remain gods to them.”

  “I don’t want to be anyone’s god.” He walked to her little kitchen, set down his chocolate bulb, and then passed her on the way out. She resisted an urge to reach a hand out to him. He had rebuffed her more than once when she touched him, although he bantered easily with Kyu and Clare.

  She watched the door close behind him, and then she sat with her back against the door, sipping chocolate, thinking about discipline.

  She couldn’t afford weakness. Wanting to bed the captain was weakness. Council could engage in relationships, but not High Council. Not with each other.

  In Sol system, even on Earth, most of what humanity ate and drank came from nanotechnology. The rebels, those who would leave humankind’s growing weirdness behind, had turned to natural foods. They’d had to rediscover what grew in the ground. They’d learned how to make green and black tea, cannabis tea, coffee, chocolate, beer, wine. They’d made themselves drink the stuff, and learned to like some of it.

  Her thoughts drifted back to the core discipline problem on John Glenn. She had to work so hard to keep people from becoming fascinated with Selene, with the Moon Born. To focus on the goal. Her father had taught her discipline, taught her to be strong always, unwavering. It had served her well in the near-war that broke them free of Sol system. Here, it was a daily push. A tear ran slowly down her cheek, and another one followed it, and soon they splashed down onto her hands and she heard herself sob. No one would come see her tonight. The captain had already been and gone. She could show weakness when she was alone. She could. It would be okay. Her father’s stern face swam in front of her, demanding that she be disciplined, the image shimmering in her mind, blurred by her tear-laden eyes.