The Hundred Gram Mission (6 page)

"Saturn is
far away
. You can't just hop over there."

"You see? This is why I need you onboard."

They got off at the exit. Henrikson watched as they passed the park he had launched his early balloons from. Dying trees poked out of the water. People wanted to pump the park dry, but there wasn't any funding.

"Look kid, I've done everything, I've seen everything, I've met everyone. I even fucked the President - hey don't judge me, power totally makes up for looks. But nothing, none of it at all, matters. I don't even care if I never do any of that, ever again. There's only one thing I want - and every day, I want it more and more. You know what that is? It's sending a spaceship to another star. Henrikson, you listening?"

Henrikson kept staring out at the rain. "Of course I'm listening."

"Of course you are. Because you want this, too. Your whole life you wanted this. You've worked deep space projects like the Kuiper Navigator. You go to conferences on space colonization. You designed an engine for a starship. You and me, we're alike Henrikson. We're peas in a pod."

"I'm not so sure about that."

"No hurry, it'll sink in. You're not used to talking about what you want - most people aren't. Me? I talk about what I want, all the time. I'm very comfortable with it. Talk about it, Doctor. Talk about interstellar travel. Otherwise, no one else is going to talk about it."

"No one is interested in interstellar travel."

"Of course not. Even before the world went to hell, no one was funding it. Interstellar travel is for another time, another people, maybe."

They pulled into a cozy neighborhood. The rain softened slightly. LED lamp posts made bright cones.

"Fuck that shit, that's what I say."

They drew up beside a small house. The door slid open. The perhaps-assistant stepped out and opened a large umbrella.

"I need some time to think about this. I have to go over it with my husband."

"I need your answer no later than 11:15am tomorrow."

"What's then?" he stepped out.

"Here," Spektorov leaned out and handed him an envelope. Henrikson looked inside.

"Air tickets?"

"Just one air ticket, direct to Manaus, Brazil. The other ticket is for the space elevator.
[x]
Have a good evening Doctor Henrikson. Pack light."

The door slid shut. The trunk opened, carefully lowered, and deposited Henrikson's car in the driveway. Then the behemoth slid noiselessly into the darkness, and was soon gone. Henrikson stood there in the rain, staring after it.

The front door opened. Pieter stood in the light, rubbing his hands on a wash cloth.

"What was that, darling?"

Henrikson kissed his husband and stepped inside.

"A very rude and powerful man."

"Is he rich?" Pieter helped him out of his coat.

"Very."

"That explains it. What did he want?"

"Everything."

Pieter rolled his eyes. "Typical. I hope you said no."

Lakshmi Rao, I

2002, Tamil Nadu, India

"Lakshmi," Ms. Rajasingham’s fingers were white with chalk.  "Why have you not done your homework?"

The school was a single room, with only three walls.  Three walls were good, thought Lakshmi. In Batticaloa, some were so poor they couldn’t afford any. Rows of wooden tables and benches faced the front. There was room enough for thirty.

"Lakshmi," she frowned and put her hands on her hips. "Don’t look around the class at your friends. They don’t have the answer. Tell me why you haven’t done your homework."

There were just three other students in class that day. Two were the Balakrishnan girls. They always wrote with pens and their mother had a cell phone. Shankari had a boyfriend, but Lakshmi wouldn’t tell or she’d get into trouble. Their father was mean, he would probably hit her. The Balakrishnans would never talk to Lakshmi; she was too low caste. The third was Gautam the Retard. He sat in a corner, drawing on pieces of cardboard. He didn’t seem to mind the UN logos on them. Gautam didn’t bother anyone. He just sat there and drew. Sometimes he did something nice, like the sun with people playing cricket. Mostly, he just did shit. His pictures hung proudly from the classroom walls. That was just to keep his mother happy.  She was a crazy bitch, thought Lakshmi. Always creating drama to put herself at the center of attention. Gautam was her prop, he brought her pity dividends. Maybe she had made him retarded by smoking when she was pregnant. Wasn’t that how that happened?

"Lakshmi? I’m waiting."

"There’s no point, Miss."

Ms. Rajasingham seemed taken aback. "No point? No point in doing your homework?"

"No, Miss."

The teacher sat on the table, her bright blue sari trailed to the ground. The Balakrishnans smiled evilly at each other: Calculus had definitely been derailed.

"Why do you say that?"

"My mother works in a shop. She works twelve hours a day, I see her after the sun has gone down, and before it comes up again. Do you know what we have to show for that? I had two dosais for breakfast today, with a little bit of coconut.  I had that same breakfast yesterday, and every other day. Once a month, we’ll have potato curry as a treat. Next door, Harini eats that every day, and fish curry, too. She has new clothes from town, and lipstick. She also lost her father in the war. But, do you know what her mother does for money?"

The Balakrishnan girls tittered. Gautam looked up.

"She’s a whore, Miss. She spreads her legs, and she feeds her family."

"Lakshmi, desperate people do what they must to survive. You shouldn’t judge them."

"I’m not judging her Miss, I think she’s right!"

"What? Lakshmi!"

"You said it; she is doing what she must to survive. Pahal’s mother makes drugs. Udita smuggles guns for the Tigers in her sari.  They are all doing better than my mother, in the store. I don’t want to grow up to be like my mother."

Ms. Rajasingham’s face softened.

"That’s all true, Lakshmi. They do all these things, and they make money. They can take better care of their families than your mother can," she paused a moment, "or than I can. But do you think they like doing what they have to do? Do you think you would like doing it?"

"No, Miss."

"Drugs, prostitution, gun running, these are all aspects of one thing."

"The war in Sri Lanka."

"The war in Sri Lanka. But not just that one, but any other war as well. They are the symptoms of the male, military, model. Women always suffer under that model.  Women are weak all over the world, Lakshmi – but we are very weak in Asia."

"No we’re not," said one the Balakrishnan girls.

"See?" Ms. Rajasingham pointed. "Why do men need to control us, when we will control ourselves, for them? The war in Sri Lanka is a male agenda – no woman wanted that. We have to refuse it. A prostitute feeds her children, Lakshmi. But is she protecting them? What world will they grow up into?"

"It is easy to be noble, when you are not hungry, Miss."

"You can eat from my lunch packet."

"No."

"You are proud, I understand that. It is right to have your pride. But you must learn to accept help as well, when you have to, and when it is given without strings."

"No."

"Women must work together and support each other. How else will we succeed in a world stacked against us? You can eat from my lunch and do your homework, Lakshmi. Or, you can become a whore. What do you think would be worse?"

Lakshmi said nothing. The Balakrishnan girls looked down, quietly.

"The lives of women are always hard. You are old enough now that this can’t be hidden from you. It will not get any easier. But it may as well be hard in your favor, Lakshmi. Not the person who wants to keep you weak."

2051, UNHCR Field Office, Chennai, India

"Some of the staff are asking if they can work from home, tomorrow. They are worried about the storm."

Lakshmi Rao, UN High Commissioner for Refugees, swung open the French windows. The hot, humid, city streamed in. Besant Nagar had been one of the city’s richer neighborhoods. That, like everything else in the city, had changed.

Salvagers in just shorts and good luck charms smiled from across the street. Their boat was moored to the top of a billboard. The murky water censored whatever the smiling actress had promoted.  A swimmer burst forth, they pulled the gasping man aboard. A waterproof flashlight was tied to his arm. In his hands was a net filled with silt and dirty china. An elderly man began sorting them between stacks of abandoned homeware.

Out of glass-stripped windows, urchins sat by fishing lines and played games on their phones. Pirated, Kollywood soundtracks boomed from rival speakers. A woman cursed as a passing police boat splashed her fruit stall. The solar-powered craft whispered down 17
th
Street, it’s Khaki-garbed crew, unconcerned. 

The sky was dark with torrential promises. Today was no different from any other, that month.

"It will just be heavy rains," said Lakshmi, turning back. "I didn’t think Chennaites would be bothered by that. You’ve survived much worse."

"Traffic is the problem, not the rains," said a tall, slim, Tamil girl in a black business suit. "They are mostly commuters. The roads are already getting congested with people leaving the city. By tomorrow, they will be impassable. The ferries stop running tomorrow afternoon. No one will be able to leave work, except by water taxi. They will charge storm prices."

Lakshmi nodded. "Thank you for your insight. Things are of course quite different in Geneva. Anyone with families can work from home tomorrow. Tell the rest to bring overnight kits, we have some couches. I’ll be right here with them. Geneva and New York don’t want to hear that we stopped resettling climate refugees because of a storm that won’t make their news. They’re unhappy enough that I’ve relocated here. I have fallen behind these past two days with the move; I’ll need your help to get caught up."

"Of course, Commissioner."

"Please call me Lakshmi, I run a very informal office." She stepped back from the balcony and walked to her table. "Now I understand you’ve been covering this blow out over Orbital E4? Something about the allocations? I haven’t had a chance to go over it yet."

The girl shook her head, "It developed very quickly. Everyone is grumbling."

"Everyone? Anjana, it can take the whole population of the Bogra camp. That’s what it’s for."

"The camp is very mixed, Bengalis, Hindus, Biharis. They don’t get along when stressed, nor have they ever in the past."

"So they don’t want to share E4 with each other?"

"It’s more than just the camp’s leaders. Last night Dhaka and Delhi got involved."

"Perfect. What are they saying?"

"Well, Dhaka wants only Bengali Moslems on E4. Their rationale is that the Bengali population has the most Internally Displaced Persons, so should get preference. They profess to have no part in the dispute, and that they are simply speaking in support of the upset Bengalis at Bogra camp."

"Oh I’m sure. But E4 can support a thousand people. There aren’t enough elligible Bengalis at Bogra to fill E4."

"Yes. Dhaka suggests emptying the Jamalpur camp as well."

"That’s ridiculous! I’ve been to Jamalpur, it’s not even Highest Risk."

"Delhi agrees. However, they are urging only Hindus instead. To fill the rest of the orbital, Delhi wants to send some of our own climate refugees. A mixed group of all religions and castes."

"A mixed community is just a charade at multiculturalism to embarrass Bangladesh. I think what’s really happening, is that someone in Delhi wants to set up E4 as an ally."

Anjana shrugged. "All the nations are doing it. Orbital refugee stations are space assets, subsidized by Big Five
[xi]
money. And E4 is being built by India."

"Delhi is forgetting they’re building Orbitals to stabilize our crumbling neighbors. I’m sure this is just some idiot trying to please a minister. We don’t have to care what Delhi says on the matter. I will talk to the Prime Minister and clear this up, this weekend."

"There’s more though. The situation has become tense," she waved a file towards Lakshmi. It glowed towards her, reality augmented. Lakshmi tapped it and stats scrolled in the air.

"This report is just in today, from the camp management. It’s an analysis of recent violence in the camp. They’re not having the usual patterns of theft and murder. They’ve had disappearances killings, rapes. Women in particular have been targeted. These are ethnic cleansing patterns. I talked to RAW
[xii]
about it this morning; they are concerned that militant groups have taken root."  

"RAW thinks militant groups have taken root, everywhere," Lakshmi frowned. "Off the record, what are they telling us?"

"Off the record, the militias are Bengalis, backed by the ruling party. Prime Minister Begum is a Bengali nationalist. If he can give them privilege over the minorities, he will. Getting the UN to sanction partial treatment, will be a coup."