In the end, it all ended up revolving around politics. EIF against SA. Loyalists against Centralists, over and over again. It seemed like the two factions had been in conflict since the birth of the universe, going at each other’s throats since Clark had any memory.
People were either a Loyalist or a Centralist. Loyalists were loyal to the Edge’s independence, and thus supported the EIF and their crusade to stand against Earth, even if it meant sacrificing Jagal. They wanted to do away with the Systems Alliance and go back to the original government of the Edge, the one that gained it its independence in the first place and that had long ago been co-opted by Tal-Kader and the other massive conglomerates.
Centralists envisioned an Edge back under Earth’s wing and thus sharing the planet’s superior technology. They desired humanity to be no longer divided, and claimed that this time, the Edge would surely be recognized as the equal of the Home Systems of the Earther Federation. The Systems Alliance officially backed the Centralist position and persecuted the Loyalists, but life wasn’t as simple. The SA persecuted the Loyalists for the “dismantling the conglomerates” spiel, but, secretly, it hated Earth’s lordship as much as the Loyalists did. They played ball with Commodore Terry for now, (especially with Tal-Kader nobility being held hostage on the Mississippi) but that would change the instant the opportunity presented itself.
Meanwhile, lesser conglomerates financed the EIF, in hopes that the ensuing revolution would bring power to the Backwater Systems, the frontier of the Edge, where oryza was scarce and the rule of the SA was lax.
Clarke hated politics. He thought of the entangled relations between factions as strands in a web where the common men and women got trapped, preyed upon by the politicians and oligarchs, the spiders that drained the Edge of all value and promise while fattening themselves.
But if he were made to choose, to take a stand at gunpoint between the Edge’s people, and the conglomerates that ruled them…well, he knew where his loyalties lay. After all, back when he had joined the Defense Fleet, he had sworn to protect the Edge. It wasn’t an oath he took lightly back then, and he didn’t take it lightly today.
“Back to playing tough guy?” asked the man after Clarke’s silence. “We can make you sign whenever we want you, you know?”
“Yes, but I don’t have to make it easy.”
“Ah, a martyr. How quaint. Looking for redemption for your failure, Craven Clarke? You won’t achieve a thing. The confession is only a formality. To save us time with the bureaucrats. Hell, we already got your girlfriend here, in another room. Julia Fillon signed the papers not two hours ago. Your name was in them.”
A low growl underlined the man’s words. Clarke realized it came from himself. Apparently, someone had exchanged his heart for a burning coal.
The man chuckled, and Clarke’s impulse to kill him was almost overwhelming.
But with the pure, impotent anger also came a kind of clarity. The last piece of the puzzle fell in place, and Clarke suddenly was aware of the reason why something didn’t just make sense about his situation.
Fucking politics.
He laughed, bitterly, because he knew that Julia had betrayed him.
“What’s so funny?” asked the man.
“You think I care about what happens to a bunch of dock kids playing revolutionaries? I was only trying to negotiate a way out of this one, you idiot. By Reiner, you’re as stupid as the Front!”
The punch came at once, without warning. Four knuckles connected with Clarke’s jaw like a brick shot out of a cannon. His vision shorted like a faulty wristband’s screen, and a coppery taste invaded his mouth.
It confirmed all of Clarke’s suspicions.
A second after, two hands smacked hard against the metal desk, and the interrogator’s face appeared a hair-breadth away from Clarke’s, close enough that he could feel the man’s breath brushing his face.
“Listen, you shithead—” the interrogator started.
Clarke tensed his neck and launched his forehead right into the other man’s nose.
The strike had the effect of a car crash. The interrogator’s nose crumpled, with blood splattering everywhere, and his head vaulted backward. The man groaned a nasal and wet sound while collapsing atop the desk and bringing it down with him amid broken poly-plastic. The light beam shot away from Clarke’s face.
The door opened and LED light flooded the room. Clarke tried to jump—chair and all—over the interrogator’s neck, but all he managed was to topple down on top of him, face first into the cold floor.
Many things happened at once after that, one of them involving a sub-dermal knock-out patch.
THIS TIME, Clarke woke up to a brightly lit white room, untied, sitting in his same chair and staring at a new poly-plastic desk. He knew it was the same room because, even though someone had cleaned the remains of his attack, he could still see specks of dry blood marring the soft green carpet.
Instead of being alone with a single interrogator, the room was now occupied by four armed guards wearing black uniforms and carrying sonic batons. They had their eyes focused on Clarke, their necks tense.
Instead of Clarke’s former interrogator, a new man was sitting by the other end of the new desk. This one had clearly been a soldier, judging from his size and complexion, which were signs of access to better stim juice than most civilians could afford. His tanned, clean shaved face was marred by pock marks, and his eyes were framed by wrinkles. Probably in his fifties.
There was no career for a fifty-year-old man as an interrogator brute, so this new guy had rank.
“Sorry about the last guy,” Clarke told him, “but he was wide open.”
The man didn’t laugh. His eyes were laser-focused on Clarke’s, but his face had the stony, unreadable expression of an officer used to dealing with a troublesome command.
“Medics say that, under Earth’s gravity, you may have killed him,” the man said.
“We’re not in Earth,” Clarke said.
“Why did you strike him? Surely, you know it only makes it worse for yourself, Clarke.”
Actually, Clarke was fairly sure he was going to live through this. No sense in delaying the inevitable any longer. He gave the man the confirmation he was probing for:
“I know you’re not Internal Affairs.”
The man nodded. “What gave it away?” he asked.
“A series of details. Your interrogator was an angry brute, all testosterone, but no finesse. IA’s grunts are assholes, but they’re trained assholes. There’s psychology to an interrogation, rapport, trust building. Your guy did none of those things.”
“Go on.”
“He said ‘we’re under siege’ at one point,” Clarke recalled, “That was weird. Official party line is that the Edge and Earth are under negotiations for a possible unification. Internal Affairs would never, ever, refer to our current situation as a siege.”
“I see. Anything else?”
“Last thing he said. That fucked-up scenario you built, with Julia betraying my name?”
“It seemed to have an effect on you.”
“At first, it did. But it also got me thinking. A little contrived, isn’t it? In the real world, IA doesn’t waste their time getting matching confessions, they just throw you in a jail cell and make you disappear.”
The man winced. “A sad reality, indeed,” he said.
“After that, I played it by ear. The guy seemed like the macho type, and he was already into his part as an interrogator…so I insulted him and insulted the EIF in the same sentence…”
“And he forgot you’re six feet two inches tall, which gave the right reach and angle to your headbutt after he leaned in. I’m sure he learned the lesson.”