Marghe had one hand in her pocket. Danner saw the weave of the representative’s trousers move as she clenched and unclenched her fist.
“Don’t decide anything for now. Just take the dossier with you and think about it this evening.” She opened another drawer in her desk. Disks glittered. ”You’ll need these. Janet Eagan left them for you. Read them, call me in the morning.”
Marghe walked alongside the ceramic‑and‑wire perimeter of Port Central, trying to think. Somewhere behind the clouds that at this time of year almost always covered Jeep’s sky, the sun was setting, turning the gray over the living mods into a swirl of pearl and tangerine. The evening breeze faltered, then changed direction, hissing through the grass around her ankles. The grass stretched to the horizon, broken only by the occasional low bush with black, hard‑looking stems and pale trails of seed fluff. There were no trees. The location had been chosen for its open aspect: easily defended.
That was typical of the way a Mirror’s mind worked. Attack, Defend. Advantage. Disadvantage. Always looking for the edge, looking for a lever.
Three years ago she had walked like this for hours over the hills in Wales, seeking to forget the way her mother had tried to smile as she coughed and coughed and finally stopped breathing. Some new kind of viral pneumonia, they said. She had been sick only three days.
Walking like this when she was unused to the gravity was not helping at all. It had not helped much then, either. She walked slowly back to her mod.
It was easy to override the door controls. She sat with her legs sticking out onto the grass and her back warmed by the air streaming from inside. A woman stepped from a mod further down the row and raised a hand in casual greeting. Her hair was still wet from a shower and she wore what looked like a homemade skirt. Marghe waved back, glad they were too far away to speak. The woman walked past the mod with the handmade brick doorway and followed the path around a curve and out of Marghe’s sight.
She reached down and pulled up a blade of grass. It was a flattened, hollow tube. Cautiously, she put the broken end in her mouth. It did not taste like grass, but she chewed on it anyway.
Banner’s dossier had not been at all what she had expected. This was no by‑the‑book career officer. Most startling had been the revelation that it had been the young Danner, on Jeep on her first tour of duty as a lieutenant, who was the mysterious Mirror of rumor–the one who had helped Courtivron circumvent SEC and Company corruption and bring the Jink and Oriyest v. Companycase to court.
Who are you, Danner? Can I trust you?
She wondered how much Danner knew about the Kurst, and what advice Sara Hiam might give in this situation.
She sat outside until it was dark. The heaving cloud blurred two moons to a soft silver glow; the third moon was too small to be visible through the overcast. The night was cool and silent–no insects. Two searchlights speared the grass outside the perimeter, and the unlit grass looked black. She wondered what the indigenous population thought of Port Central, and when she would get to see her first native.
Her muscles ached, from the walking, from the gravity. She went inside where it was warm and went to bed.
She dreamed that a native spoke to her, but she could not understand, and she stood by helplessly while the native rotted and died of some disease. She buried the pathetic thing, then found a Mirror kneeling by the grave. She knew it was Danner, but when the Mirror flipped up her visor, underneath there was no face.
Danner agreed to see her before lunch the next day. Marghe dressed slowly and checked her pockets twice for the FN‑17 before she left the mod.
The cloud cover was heavy and multilayered, shades of slate blue and silver, pearl and charcoal, like a sketch washed with watercolor. The air was cool and spicy. She wondered how long it would take her to adjust to the smell, learn to filter it out of her awareness, just as the filters scrubbed it from the air in her mod. A long time, she hoped.
Again, Danner served dap in handmade china. Marghe sipped at the hot tea. “On Earth I was promised full support from Company personnel in the field. However, I now understand that you’re seriously understaffed and underequipped. What can you offer me?”
Danner leaned back in her chair. “Why don’t you tell me your plans.”
“If there are clues to be found about the origins of these people, their common background, I need to find them. It might help with tracing the origins of this virus. It might also lead to some clues about how these women reproduce. Everything in Eagan’s notes points northward. To Ollfoss.”
Danner looked down into the cup she held cradled in both hands, resting on her stomach. “One of your team already tried that. She’s believed to be dead.”
“All the more reason to go up there and find out what happened.”
Danner sighed. “At this time of year, the weather alone up there will be enough to kill you.”
“I can’t wait for an improvement in the weather. I only have six months.”
“You’ll be dealing with more than the weather. The north is isolated. The people you’ll meet there won’t give you any special treatment. They won’t know who you are.”
“I’m aware of that.”
Danner put her cup down on the table between them. “I’m not happy about you risking yourself like this. You’re being paid to see how well the vaccine performs, not to solve mysteries. If you get yourself killed, we’re no nearer to finding out ifthe vaccine works. No nearer to being home.”
Marghe remained silent. This was Commander Danner now, not the young lieutenant of five years ago.
Danner sipped from her cup. “I just don’t understand why you want to do this. I need you here. You could teach us so much about living with these people, what to do and what not to do. You could really help us, but instead you want to hare off north and get yourself killed.”
“I don’t intend to die.”
“But in all likelihood that’s what will happen.” Danner leaned forward. “I just want you to understand: I don’t want you to die while you’re my responsibility. I have enough on my conscience. I’ll do everything in my power to help you, but that won’t be much. If you go onto Tehuantepec, I can’t protect you. Do you understand that?”
“I understand.”
“And I can’t dissuade you?”
“No,” Marghe did not dare say anything further. Danner was going to jump, one way or the other.
They were both silent for a moment. Danner straightened. “Very well. When do you intend to leave?”
“As soon as possible.”
Danner went around to her desk and consulted her screen. “If you can wait two days, I have a team–one officer, two civilian technicians–traveling north to a settlement called Holme Valley to install a new communications relay. It will mean an escort for part of your journey. And the community there has had contact with us before. They might be able to help you with more suitable equipment for further travel north than you could find here.” She smiled tightly. “We have only six operational sleds. You can ride one to Holme Valley, but I’m not letting you risk it in the freezing snow of Tehuantepec.”
On her walk back to her quarters, Marghe tried to figure it all out. Danner was going to let her go. Why? Did she believe the vaccine would not work? Or did she know too much about the Kurstand its intentions? Marghe reflected on this, and on the other things she had learned in the twenty hours since she had landed in Port Central.