Fred’s face was white and his hands trembled violently. “Sorry,” he said to Ta Shu. “I thought he might shoot you.” He gestured at Bo and Dhu. “I think I remember seeing those guys. I think they might be the ones that I shook hands with before I met Chang.”
“Are you sure?” Ta Shu said.
“No. Not sure.” Fred’s voice was trembling too. He sat down in a chair, rubbing his forearm. “My memory is fuzzy, but I kind of thought I recognized them, and now I think it must have been from then.”
“Okay then,” Ta Shu said. The four tasered men were perhaps struggling to rise, but they looked thoroughly disabled, at least for now. The one Fred had kicked groaned. “Let’s get out of here.”
But Fred had put his head in his hands and was leaning forward in his chair, folded up and quivering.
“Come on!” Qi cried at him. “What are you waiting for?”
Fred looked up and glared at her with such murderous resentment that she stepped back as if slapped. Then she stopped, went to him, held out her hand. “Come on,” she insisted more calmly. “Time to go.”
She pulled Fred to his feet so hard that they both staggered into Ta Shu, who helped them recover their balance, after which they moved into the hall, hopping too high over Fred’s groaning victim and almost hitting the lintel on their way out. Even without the surge of adrenaline they were too strong for this gravity, and now they could scarcely control themselves.
“Where to?” Qi said.
Ta Shu closed the door on the Chinese agents. “Downstairs to their transport center, quick as we can. Try not to fall. I’m having a hard time moving quickly.”
“We know.”
They scuttled along, holding handrails wherever they could. Fred was the worst at keeping his balance. Despite her big belly Qi was more graceful than either of the men, gazelling ahead in what looked like little dance steps. The two men banged along after her. When they passed people in the halls they all straightened up and tried to look calm. The Americans they passed seemed unconcerned by their presence; their base was part of an international community, and foreigners in their hallways were none of their affair.
Descending stairs proved to be harder than ascending them. They lofted and clutched, leaped and tiptoed. As they made their way down, Ta Shu tried to explain the evolving situation on Earth, focusing on the fact that some powerful forces in the Chinese government appeared to want Qi in their custody very badly. Forces so powerful that they appeared to have rather immense leverage to bring to bear on both the Chinese and American governments.
“That’s got to be Red Spear,” Qi remarked as she waited for the two men to catch up with her. “Or some tiger using Red Spear.”
When they got down to the transport center they quickly found Rover 14, and Qi and Fred climbed up into it.
“You’re not coming along?” Qi asked Ta Shu.
Ta Shu shook his head and waved them on. “The person helping us here wants me to stay and help negotiate a settlement for all this. That’s probably my best way to help you. This car is programmed to drive down to a mine in Procellarum, she said. It might take you a day or two to get there. By the time you’re there I hope I’ll have gotten hold of some people in China to help us. Qi, do you have any way of contacting your father?”
“No.”
“None at all? Maybe someone who would convey a message?”
“No!”
Ta Shu regarded her. Her face was defiant. Possibly she was not telling the truth. Possibly she didn’t realize the extent of the danger.
He said carefully, “Listen, my friend. There are people who will kill you if they can find you. I don’t think your father is one of them. You may want to get in touch with him, if you can.”
“But I can’t.”
Now the frustration on her face was making him think she was telling the truth.
Then there was a noise behind them and he aimed the empty Taser pistol in that direction, struggling to stay upright after his quick spin.
“Don’t shoot!” It was Valerie Tong. “I’m here to help,” she said. She approached warily, holding out a box that looked like a camera. She said to Qi, “A colleague of Ta Shu’s down at Petrov Crater, a Mr. Zhou, sent this to us and said we should give it to you. Is it yours?”
“Yes,” Qi said, surprised. “Someone in China has been using it to contact me.”
“Someone?”
“I don’t know who. They claimed they wanted to help.”
Valerie shrugged. “Do you want it?”
“Yes.”
But Qi glanced at Fred. His face squinched up in thought. Then he met her gaze, nodded slightly. Qi stepped back out of the rover and took the device from the American. “Thanks,” she said. Then to Ta Shu: “Now I can contact someone. I just don’t know who it is.”
He sighed. “We’ll be in contact too, by way of the rover. Now go.”
CHAPTER NINETEEN
daibiao xing weiji
Crisis of Representation
Valerie led Ta Shu from the transport center to an elevator that took them up to the greenhouse. Through its windows the moonscape around Peary Crater looked just like the moonscape around Shackleton Crater. The black sky was the same overhead, the ground the same underfoot, the sun low on the horizon as always. Still Valerie felt a little upside down, a little giddy. She had left the reservation, she was in a new space. Acting on her own recognizance turned out to be a visceral thrill, and combined with the lunar g she felt like she might simply float away. It was, yes, like flying through the air of Satyagraha.
She found who she was looking for standing by a table covered with potting soil. “Ginger! This is Ta Shu. Ta Shu, this is Ginger Ellis. She’s head of the greenhouse here, also a liaison to interested parties back home. She’s one of the people who run things on the moon.”
Ginger frowned slightly at this description, shook Ta Shu’s hand. “Welcome to the north pole,” she said to him. “How can I help?”
“I’m not sure,” Ta Shu said.
He looked flustered, and Valerie took over, giving Ginger a brief explanation of what they had done with Fred and Qi. “So,” she concluded, “Ta Shu is now in enough trouble with some of the Chinese factions here that I think he could use asylum from us.”
“Sounds like you could use some asylum too,” Ginger said to her wryly. “Attacking guests, releasing prisoners—”
“It’s true,” Valerie interrupted, meeting Ginger’s gaze a little defiantly. “Look—Fredericks and Chan Qi were both just handed over to Chinese agents by our own security people. That struck me as seriously wrong, like illegal, or worse. So I did something about it.”
Ginger was shaking her head, but then she said, “Good for you.”
Valerie said, “So now I’m wondering if ordinary asylum will be enough for Ta Shu.”
“And for you.”
“Yes, well, I hope not. But it does seem like someone in Washington might now send word up here ordering us to allow those same Chinese agents to take Ta Shu into custody, like they must have done with Fredericks and Chan Qi.”
“Maybe.” Ginger was frowning now.
“Also,” Valerie said, “the situation on Earth is getting so weird. I wonder if we can use Ta Shu to liaise with the new Chinese leadership as we try to help things down there.”
“Possibly,” Ginger said. “If he has a contact, it might help. Hard to say.”
“Things are falling apart,” Valerie said. “I report to the president, and Ta Shu is working with someone on their standing committee. Seems like we could at least try to help. I mean, if China and the US both go chaotic at once, what happens to the world?”