On My Way to Paradise (28 page)

Mavro pulled out my jack and plugged himself in.
Abriara had given up her jack to Zavala. In the halls below
mercenaries cheered and celebrated, thousands of voices united. The
walls muted and smothered the noise.

Perfecto slapped me on the back. He opened my last
bottle of whiskey. "Let us celebrate!" he cried, and he forced the
bottle to my lips.

I swallowed a drink and asked, "What happened?"

Perfecto grinned, "The socialists are being routed
from all the countries they stole. They’ve lost more in a single
night than they gained in the past seven years!"

"But how?" I asked. I knew how. Tamara must have
regained consciousness. When I thought about this, it was as if
something inside me snapped. I felt an overwhelming sense of
relief. I hadn’t realized how concerned I’d been about her. She’d
supplied the names of the artificial intelligences who’d aided the
socialists, and Garzón had relayed the information to his compadres
on Earth. With the local AI’s destroyed, banks, roads, and
communications would be down in most of the EUSS.

"It was so simple," Perfecto said. "Someone blew up
the AI’s and the whole country blew up with it. Millions of
refugiados in Independent Brazil and Panamá have armed themselves
and are pouring over the borders into every socialist state. In
almost every city in the EUSS, the military is so busy trying to
fight looters that they can’t defend themselves from outside
forces, while at the same time many soldiers are sabotaging their
own defense systems and switching sides. And it has become evident
that three of the AI’s were dedicating their entire memories in
efforts to aid the socialists—for nearly three quarters of the
socialists defenses went down when the three AI’s were bombed,
including all of the cybernet tanks and neutron cannons. Since the
AI’s have violated every agreement they ever made by supporting a
military struggle, many nations are supporting our actions. India
is even going so far as to send military aid to the
refugiados—fifty thousand cybernet tanks, and an orbital neutron
cannon. Ah, I wish I were back in Chile!"

I was stunned. No one had ever offered us military
aid, except for a little bit from Australia, and they made you beg
so much it almost wasn’t worth the trouble. "Do you think it’s
true! Do you think the EUSS could fall in one day?"

Abriara shook her head. "No. They’re already
recovering. They’re drawing up new battle lines, retreating to
Bolivia, Paraguay, Uruguay and Chile. People in some of those
countries haven’t even stirred. They may be so far behind the lines
that they don’t even know what’s going on. It will still take years
to win everything back."

"I would not be so sure," Perfecto said. "The
socialists are being cut off from most of their heavy weaponry. If
our forces gain control of some of those weapons, this war could be
over in three months."

Zavala and Mavro jacked out. Zavala began screaming,
and jumped up and down, and ran out of the room with Abriara and
Perfecto, heading downstairs to celebrate with friends. I told them
I’d join them in a while. Mavro sat on his bed and smiled, and I
just sat down on the floor.

When the others were gone, Mavro said. "So, Angelo,
the information from that socialist whore you brought with you was
good, no?"

"Sí, it was excellent information."

"And to think, it all happened because I saved you at
Sol Station!"

"You are a good friend," I said. I wasn’t sure I
meant it. I remembered how he’d spoken evilly of me behind my back,
criticizing my battle skills. But he’d been drunk, so I tried not
to hold his words against him.

Mavro grinned and leaned his head back and stared at
the ceiling. "In a couple of months Garzón will choose his
captains. When he does, he will remember what we’ve done. I would
not be surprised if you and I both were made captains."

I remembered the green rolling hills of Panamá, the
way the sun set over the lake behind my little house in Gatún while
the big ships sailed across the lake to port in Colón and Panamá
City. I thought of the way the flocks of blue and green canaries
played in the bushes in my back yard. I’d left all that behind, and
suddenly it hit me that I’d left it behind for nothing. I could
have taken Tamara to the rebel soldiers in the forests south of
Colón, and she could have given them her information. The results
would have been the same. The socialists on our borders would have
been repelled, and I could have lived in Panamá forever, a free
man, with no threats hanging over me—if I’d only let Arish live. I
should have let Arish live, taken Tamara to safety, and just gone
home.

Yet the idea of doing this had never struck me
before. Once again, the fact that I’d acted so irrationally hinted
that I was insane. Or could I just be stupid, I wondered. When I
was a young man, every two or three weeks I’d notice how stupid I’d
been at that same time a year before. But now that I’d reached 59,
I no longer looked back with amazement to realize how stupid I’d
been at age 58.

Perhaps it was time to begin doing that again.

More than anything, I yearned to be in Panamá. But
even if I managed to return after battling the Yabajin on Baker,
I’d have spent 45 years Earth-time in travel. The Panamá I left
wouldn’t be the same. Even though I felt a sweet sense of victory
because of what was happening, the victory was irrelevant to me.
I’d never benefit from it. It could just as well have been
happening on some tiny planet I’d never heard of.

Mavro said, "That socialist woman, she must have had
some strong information. She must have been in the highest echelons
of their government. Remember when Garzón was questioning you and
he got excited about her and asked what she did in Intelligence? He
said he knew the socialists had ‘someone with her talent’?"

"I remember," I said.

"What did he mean—‘Someone with her talent’? I could
tell by the look in his eye that he had discovered her job in
Intelligence, but I do not know what he meant."

I pondered. "I have no idea. I don’t think it is
something Garzón is willing to discuss." Somewhere, I knew, Tamara
was now awake. I wondered how well she was recovering, how complete
her memories were. I wondered if she’d remember me, and if she’d
know what I’d sacrificed for her. For a moment I felt content, free
of the desire to seek her out, and I wished her well.

But when I tried to consciously break my tie with
her, I suddenly felt as if a great dark bird unfurled its wings
above my head, filling me with overwhelming dread as it readied to
strike.

That morning we passed Pluto’s orbit and exited the
solar system. The Japanese kept us on standby while the ship made
course adjustments, ejecting the huge pulse rocket that accounted
for most of the ship’s mass, and then extending the fins for the
ship’s ram scoops. The way the Japanese had dramatized the event,
I’d have thought it would be some big thing, but I only felt
slightly queasy for a second, as if I were in an elevator and it
had stopped at the top floor, then a lurch as the ship’s gravity
increased from 1.35 to its full 1.45 G’s.

Our bodies hadn’t yet adjusted to the force of the
new acceleration speed. It was not the crushing weight one would
feel at four or five gravities, where air is tugged from your lungs
while blood pools at your feet and your bones groan as if they’ll
splinter if you make a false move. It was a steady pull, a feeling
of sinking slowly into the floor, a heaviness that seemed
unbearable because it steadily increased. My muscles had tightened
and my excess fat was falling away. Yet I felt tired. Worn and
frail. We tried to convince the samurai to give us a day off so we
could celebrate. But the samurai were not concerned with the small
victories our friends gained in South America.

While we put on armor, I kept expecting Abriara to
give us some encouragement, but all she said was, "I hope you’re
all prepared for another joy ride through hell."

Mavro suited-up with his usual grim smile, and
Zavala’s eyes glittered like those of a nervous madman. An air of
depression hung over our little group. We put on armor, took our
places on the model hovercraft, then Kaigo jacked us in:

Scenario 66: Deep Patrol

The message on my monitor gave me hope, something I
had not felt for days. If we had graduated from the Mid-patrol
scenarios, it meant we’d see new territory. It might also mean we
were getting better and had graduated to a higher level in spite of
the fact that we’d lost every battle.

The scenario opened on the cruelest desert we’d seen
on Baker, a flat plain of cracked soil as hard as concrete that
stretched as far as the eye could see. No plants. Not even a rock.
Only the shimmering heat of the desert gave any reprieve—in the
distance the cracked soil turned into imaginary lakes. We shot
along the plain at top speed and the hovercraft didn’t rattle. We
may as well have floated over a paved road.

We spotted the Yabajin to the east at ten kilometers,
the sun gleaming on their metal hovercraft. It was to be a duel on
the open plain—a test of our basic battle skills—an unpromising
scenario. Abriara held course straight south and the Yabajin moved
to intercept us. It was a wasted gesture—the best they could hope
for was to close up a kilometer or two, and that was all they did.
We spent over an hour running, cheating them of a quick victory,
and everyone’s moods lightened a little, enough so that Mavro began
to tell a few jokes. But then we came to a marvelous canyon.

It was as if the world fell away. Painted mountains
in shades of red, yellow and white stone hovered in the hazy
distance seven kilometers below us, and wind-sculpted chimneys of
rock rose up nearby. It was as if the fiery crust of Baker had
cracked apart, leaving nothing but blasted stone behind. I’d seen
the Grand Canyon back on Earth, but it was just a furrow in the
dust compared to this. We couldn’t discern the far rim—only pale
violet sky and billowy clouds in the distance.

At first the immense canyon appeared impassable, but
directly below us one could see that the earth didn’t just drop
away: There were many slopes and fault lines in the rock, and these
were worn smooth with age. If we took the right route, the lucky
route, we could make our way to the canyon floor.

Abriara said, "I vote that we go down." The Yabajin
were closing in behind us, and I wondered quickly if it would be a
wise move, but Abriara continued, "And since I’m driving, mine is
the only vote that counts," and she drove off the cliff.

We spent the next five minutes in a barely controlled
fall, sliding down a 40-degree slope, constantly gaining momentum,
with a cliff to one side and a rock wall on the other. I threw my
gun down, hooked my feet under my chair, and clutched the
hovercraft’s handrail.

Perfecto chuckled nervously. "Did I ever tell you I
was afraid of heights?"

Mavro said, "This is not so bad. You won’t even feel
it when you hit bottom."

Abriara was torn between the desire to run from the
Yabajin and the desire to get down the cliff safely. She traveled
fast, too fast. We came to a switchback and almost flew over the
cliff. Perfecto moaned and grasped the handles on his turret so
hard he accidently fired a round into the rock above us, sending
shards of gravel to fall on our heads. Because the hovercraft
travels on a cushion of air, it is difficult to make tight corners.
We made the corner and saw that before us our road ended in a sheer
ledge. Abriara hit the forward thrusters and slammed us into full
reverse, but at so steep an angle of descent the engines just
groaned and the hovercraft kept sliding down. I bailed out over the
side along with Zavala. Perfecto was at the forward turret and
didn’t have time to jump, and Abriara wasn’t able to get out of the
driver’s seat. Mavro didn’t seem to care.

They roared over the cliff and dropped away. Perfecto
screamed, "Agh! Agh! Agh!" through his head mike as if he were
choking.

But Mavro just said, "Ah, this isn’t so bad."

I shouted, "Goodbye, my friends." Then they crunched
as they hit a cliff below us. I ran to look down where they’d
fallen.

The hovercraft rolled several times down a hill and
came to a rest in a narrow defile. If it had rolled twice more it
could have dropped over the next cliff. Even the first drop was a
long way down.

Zavala started laughing, and I thought about Mavro’s
last words and laughed with him. Zavala laid down on the rock and
kept it up for several minutes, holding his stomach and rolling
around.

When he was able to sit up he said, "Angelo, where is
your gun?"

"I left it in the hovercraft."

He held up his rifle. The barrel was bent, which
meant its internal mirrors would not be aligned. It couldn’t be
used as a weapon. "I fell on mine," he said. "How long do you think
we’d last if we attacked the Yabajin bare-handed?"

"We might be able to prolong the battle out to three
seconds," I said.

Zavala laughed. "Sí. I think so too. How do you want
to die—fry or fall?" he asked, then he ran two paces and swan-dived
over the cliff. He made a tiny cracking sound when he landed.

"Let me think about it," I said to no one in
particular.

I still had a good ten minutes until the Yabajin
descended the trail—plenty of time to come up with a plan.
Actually, the more I considered it, the less likely it seemed that
I needed a plan. If the Yabajin matched our velocity they’d just go
flying over the same cliff. Maybe I’d even be lucky and none of
them would jump out in time. All I really needed to do was to hide
in a crevice somewhere up the trail till they passed.

I climbed back up the trail, looking for a good place
to hide. But the rock wall was pretty smooth and left few
convenient overhangs. None large enough to hide under. After five
minutes I found a spot that could do in a pinch. It was just at the
top of the switchback, where the Yabajin would be clinging to their
handrails for their dear lives. It was a small vertical crevice,
and I found that if I removed my chest plate I could squeeze in the
crack. I wriggled in and scrunched down tight.