Moonbase - Moonwar Part 2

His mother raised an imperious brow. "I told you, don't worry about the board."

"Or Ras.h.i.+d?"

"Or Ras.h.i.+d either," Joanna riposted. Turning slightly toward her husband, she added, " Ras.h.i.+d's a man with real delusions of grandeur."

"Okay," said Jinny Anson. "Then I'll run the base and you, Doug, you can run the war."

"Thanks a lot."

"Somebody's got to-"

"Hold it!" Doug snapped. The message icon on his left screen was blinking. Urgent message. And he saw that a cardinal red dot had cleared the swarm of low-orbit satellites around the Earth and was heading outward.

"Message," Doug called out in the tone that the computer recognized. His voice trembled only slightly.

"A crewed s.p.a.cecraft just lifted from the military base on Corsica," a comm tech's voice said. "It's on a direct lunar trajectory."

"Peacekeeper troops," Doug said.

"Must be."

They all turned toward Doug.

"So what do we do now, boss?" Jinny Anson asked.

TOUCHDOWN MINUS 114 HOURS 35 MINUTES.

"Five days," Doug said to the woman's image on his screen. "They'll be here in a little less than five days."

Tamara Bonai frowned slightly, nothing more than a faint pair of lines between her brows. But on her ethereally beautiful face it seemed a gross disfigurement. Her face was a sculptor's dream, high cheekbones and almond eyes; her skin a light clear teak; her long hair a tumbling cascade as l.u.s.trous and black as the infinity of s.p.a.ce.

Like Doug, she was seated behind a desk. Her life-sized image on the wall in front of him made it look as if Doug's office opened onto her office on Tarawa: lunar rock and smart walls suddenly giving way to Micronesian ironwood and bamboo.

"When I visited Moonbase," she said, "the trip took only one day."

"We brought you up on a high-energy burn," said Doug. "The Peacekeepers are coming on a minimum-energy trajectory."

It took almost three seconds for his words to reach Earth and her reply to get back to his office at Moonbase. Usually Doug relaxed during the interval but now he sat tensely in his padded swivel chair.

Bonai smiled slightly. "The Peacekeepers are trying to save money by taking the low-energy route?"

Doug forced a laugh. "I doubt it. I think they want to give us as much time as possible to think things over and then surrender."

Her lips still curved deliciously, Bonai asked, "Is that what you will do: surrender?"

"No," said Doug. "We're just about self-sufficient now. We can get along without Earth for a long while."

If she was surprised by Doug's answer, it did not show on her face. Doug wondered if anyone was eavesdropping on their conversation. It was being carried by a tight laser beam, but still the tightest beam spread a few kilometers across over the four-hundred-thousand-kilometer distance between the Earth and the Moon. The island of Tarawa was tiny, but still big enough for Ras.h.i.+d or someone else to pick up the beamed signal.

"You are prepared to fight Peacekeeper troops?" she asked.

"We're not going to surrender Moonbase to them."

She seemed genuinely worried. "But they will have guns ... other weapons. What weapons do you have?"

"There isn't even a target pistol in all of Moonbase," Doug admitted. "But we've got some pretty good brains here."

Once she heard his words, she shook her head slightly. "You can't stop bullets with words."

"Maybe we can," Doug said. Not waiting for a response from her, he went on, "We're going to declare our independence and apply to the General a.s.sembly for admission to the U.N."

Her delay in responding to him was longer than three seconds. At last Bonai said, "It's my fault, isn't it? You're in this trouble because I bowed to the U.N.'s pressure and signed the nanotech treaty."

"You did what was best for your people," Doug replied. "You did what you had to do."

Masterson Corporation had owned and operated Moonbase from its beginning as a set of half-buried shelters huddled near the mountain ringwall of the giant crater Alphonsus. Nanotechnology made it possible for the base to grow, and begin to prosper.

Virus-sized nanomachines scoured the regolith of Alphonsus' crater floor, extracting oxygen and the scant atoms of hydrogen that blew in on the solar wind. Once ice fields were discovered in the south polar region, nanomachines built and maintained the pipeline that fed water across more than a thousand kilometers of mountains and craters. Nanomachines built solar cells out of the regolith's silicon, to supply the growing base with constantly increasing electrical power. Nanomachines had built the ma.s.s driver that launched payloads of lunar ores to factories in Earth orbit.

And nanomachines took carbon atoms from near-Earth asteroids and built Clippers.h.i.+ps of pure diamond, Moonbase's newest export and already its princ.i.p.al source of cash flow. Diamond Clippers.h.i.+ps were not only the world's best s.p.a.cecraft; they were starting to take over the market for long-range commercial air flight on Earth.

The United Nations' nanotechnology treaty banned all nanotech operations, research and teaching in the nations that signed the treaty. Seven years earlier, when it became clear that the United States would sign the treaty-indeed, American nanoluddites had drafted drafted the treaty-Masterson Corporation had set up a dummy company on the island nation of Kiribati and transferred Moonbase to the straw-man corporation. As long as Kiribati did not sign the treaty, Moonbase could legally continue using nanomachines, which were as vital to Moonbase as air. the treaty-Masterson Corporation had set up a dummy company on the island nation of Kiribati and transferred Moonbase to the straw-man corporation. As long as Kiribati did not sign the treaty, Moonbase could legally continue using nanomachines, which were as vital to Moonbase as air.

But the day after Tamara Bonai, chief of the Kiribati council, reluctantly signed the nanotech treaty, the U.N.'s secretary general-Georges Faure-personally called Joanna Stavenger and told her that Moonbase had two weeks to shut down all nanotech operations, research and teaching.

Exactly two weeks later, to the very minute, all communications links from Earth to Moonbase were cut. And now a s.p.a.cecraft carrying U.N. Peacekeeper troops had lifted from Corsica on a leisurely five-day course for Moonbase.

"You have no idea of how much pressure they put on us," Bonai said, her lovely face downcast. "They even stopped tourist flights from coming to our resorts. It was an economic blockade. They would have strangled us."

"I'm not blaming you for this," Doug said. "I only called to let you know that we're declaring our independence. As an independent nation that hasn't signed the nanotech treaty, we'll be able to keep on as we have been, despite Faure and his Peacekeepers."

She almost smiled. "Does that mean that you will continue to honor your contracts with Kiribati Corporation?"

Moonbase marketed its diamond Clippers.h.i.+ps and other exports to transportation companies on Earth through Kiribati Corporation.

"Yes, certainly," Doug said. Then he added, "As soon as this situation is cleared up."

"I understand," she said. "We will certainly not object to your independence."

Doug smiled back at her. "Thanks, Tamara. I knew I could count on you."

The three seconds ticked. "Good luck, Doug," she said at last.

Thanks again. I think we're going to need all the luck we can get."

TOUCHDOWN MINUS 114 HOURS.

Kind of a shame, the mercenary thought. They're pretty nice people, these guys I work with. The women, too. But I won't be hurting them. It's the leaders I'm after. The Brudnoys and Jinny Anson and the Stavenger kid.

Nodding as if reaffirming his mission, he went back to his work. Got to finish this job, he told himself. Can't leave anything undone. No loose ends; no mistakes.

The word spread through Moonbase's corridors with the speed of sound. In workshops and offices, in living quarters and laboratories, out at the s.p.a.ceport, at the ma.s.s driver, even among the handful of s.p.a.cesuited men and women working on the surface, the word flashed: We're at war. U.N. troops are on their way here.

It's about time, said the mercenary to himself. Years of diplomats in their fancy suits and their evasive language, farting around, trying to talk the problem to death, and now at last they're taking action.

He looked up from the work he was doing; he took pride in his work. No one suspected that he was a deep agent, a trained killer who had been inserted into Moonbase more than a year earlier to work his way into the community and wait for the right moment. He had been without contact from his superiors ever since he first set foot in Moonbase. He would operate now without orders.

Cripple Moonbase. That was his mission. For a year he had studied all of Moonbase's systems and personnel. The underground base was pathetically vulnerable to sabotage. Every breath of air, every molecule of water, depended on complex machinery, all of it run by sophisticated computer programs. Sophisticated meant fragile, the mercenary knew. A computer virus could bring Moonbase to its knees in a matter of hours, maybe less.

There was another part of his mission. Decapitate the leaders.h.i.+p. His superiors used words such as incapacitate incapacitate and and immobilize. immobilize. What they meant was What they meant was kill. kill.

TOUCHDOWN MINUS 113 HOURS 22 MINUTES.

Doug sat alone in his quarters, staring at his blank wall screen. Declare our independence, he thought. Just like that. Tell the flatlanders down there that we no longer belong to Kiribati Corporation or any company or government on Earth. What words do I use to get that across?

His quarters were larger than his office, one of the new'suites' big enough to part.i.tion into a sitting room and a separate bedroom. It even had its own bathroom.

Leaning back in his comfortable chair of yielding plastic foam, Doug asked the computer to call up the American Declaration of Independence from his history program. Jefferson's powerful, eloquent words filled the wall screen. Doug reduced the display to a less imposing size, then spent several minutes studying it. Finally he shook his head. That was fine for 1776, he told himself, but this is nearly three hundred years later. They'd sound pretty stilted now.

Besides, he thought, everybody'd recognize the source. I'd be accused of plagiarism. That's no way to start a new nation.

He thought back to his studies of military history. The American general who had commanded the Allied armies in Europe during World War II-what was his name? Ike something.

A few touches of his laser pointer and he had Dwight Eisenhower's multimedia biography on the screen. He muted the sound and scrolled slowly through it, searching for the terse statement that Eisenhower had written back to Was.h.i.+ngton when the n.a.z.is surrendered. His aides had wanted a long, flowery announcement filled with stirring phrases and fulsome praise for the various generals. Eisenhower had tossed their suggestions aside and written-ah! There it is: 'The mission of this Allied force was fulfilled at 02.41 local time, May 7, 1945."

That's what I want, Doug said to himself. Short, strong, direct.

He cleared his throat and called to the computer, "Dictation.' Then, after a moment's thought, he said slowly and clearly: "Moonbase hereby declares its independence from Earth and asks for admission to the United Nations."

He stared at the words for a long moment, then decided they said what he intended to say. Briefly he thought of running them past his mother and Lev Brudnoy, but he shook his head at the idea. They'd want to tinker with the statement, maybe hedge it or decorate it with reasons and arguments. Ear candy. I'm in command, we've all agreed to that and we've all agreed to declaring our independence. This is the message we send to Faure and the rest of Earth.

Doug called up the communications desk at the command center.

"Beam this message to U.N. headquarters in New York," he said, "and spray it to every antenna on Earth. All the commsats, too. Send it by laser to Kiribati and to Masterson Corporation's headquarters in Savannah."

The chief comm tech on duty was a young man that Doug had played against in Moonbase's annual low-gravity Olympic games. He grinned as he scanned Doug's message.

"Right away, boss," he said.

Doug blanked his screen and leaned back in his foam chair. Okay, it's done. Now to see if it has any effect.

TOUCHDOWN MINUS 112 HOURS 17 MINUTES.

Although Lunar University had no real campus, its heart was the plushly-equipped studio where teaching was done through electronic links to Earth and virtual reality programs.

Wilhelm Zimmerman liked his creature comforts. He demanded them. He had come to Moonbase because the 'verdammt 'verdammt treaty' had closed his university department in Basel. He had given up cigars and strudel and even beer, but he still managed to overeat, under-exercise, and drive Moonbase's supply and maintenance staffs into frenzies with his demands for couches and padded chairs big enough to take his girth comfortably. treaty' had closed his university department in Basel. He had given up cigars and strudel and even beer, but he still managed to overeat, under-exercise, and drive Moonbase's supply and maintenance staffs into frenzies with his demands for couches and padded chairs big enough to take his girth comfortably.

He still dressed in the gray, old-fas.h.i.+oned three-piece suits he had brought to Moonbase with him seven years earlier. He had personally designed a set of nanomachines to keep the suits in perfect repair, renewing fraying cuffs and worn spots-atom by atom. The nanomachines even kept his clothes clean.

Still, as he sat sprawled in his favorite sofa, he looked like a rumpled mess, his jacket unb.u.t.toned and flapping loose, his vest stretched tight across his ample stomach, tie loose from s.h.i.+rt collar, the halo of stringy gray hair surrounding his bald pate as dishevelled as King Lear in the storm scene.

"A direct trajectory here?" he was asking Doug. "It is customary first to go to a s.p.a.ce station, yah?"

"I think they might be worried that most of the people in the s.p.a.ce stations are on our side," Doug said.

Doug was sitting in one of the oversized, overpadded armchairs facing the sofa. Built by nanomachines that Zimmerman himself had programmed, the furniture looked ludicrously out of place in this vast, echoing electronics studio carved out of the lunar rock. No one else was in the studio. The lights had been turned off, except for the lamps on the end tables that flanked the sofa: slender graceful stalks of lunar aluminum; the tables were built of lightweight but st.u.r.dy honeycomb'sandwich' metal, also produced by nanomachines.

Zimmerman nodded as if Doug's answer satisfied him. "And you have notified the U.N. that we are now an independent nation?"

Nodding, Doug replied, "The U.N., and as much of the news media as we could reach."

"Still the troops.h.i.+p has not turned around?" Zimmerman's accent seemed to get thicker each year.

"Not yet."

"And there is no reaction from the U.N. to your declaration of independence?"

"Not yet," Doug repeated.

"So," the professor stretched out his short arms, "now we have nothing to do except wait, yah?"

"And prepare."

Zimmerman's s.h.a.ggy brows shot up. "Prepare for what? Either they accept our independence or the Peacekeepers come in here and close everything."

"I don't intend to allow them to close Moonbase," Doug said evenly.

Zimmerman snorted. "And how do you intend to stop them? With prayer, maybe?"

"That's why I've come here to you, Professor," said Doug. "We need your help."

"To do what? Make a magic wand for you out of nanomachines? A death ray, maybe you want?"

Doug was accustomed to the old man's bl.u.s.tering. "I was thinking more along the lines of medical help," he said. "We may need-"

"I thought I'd find you here, Willi."

Kris Cardenas came striding out of the shadows. Despite her years on the Moon she still kept a deep tan, thanks to ultraviolet lamps. To Doug she looked like a California surfer: broad shoulders, trim build, sparkling blue eyes. She kept her sandy hair clipped short and wore a loose, comfortable jumpsuit of pastel yellow. No jewelry, no decorations of any kind. From the easy-going, no-fuss look of her, you would never suspect she was a n.o.bel laureate nanotech researcher.

"Our young friend here wants me to make everyone bulletproof," Zimmerman said, grudgingly dragging his bulk to one side of the sofa so Cardenas could sit beside him. Even on the Moon, Zimmerman did not move fast.

"No," Doug protested. "All I'm asking-"

"You think perhaps that the nanomachines you carry inside you will protect you against machine guns? They saved your life twice before, but they don't make you a superman."

"Willi," said Cardenas, with a charmer's smile, "why don't you let Doug tell you what he wants?"

"Medical supplies," Doug blurted before Zimmerman could say another word. "If we're cut off from Earth for more than a couple of months we're going to run short of medical supplies. I was wondering if nanomachines could be developed to replace or augment some of the pharmaceuticals we use."