Fall Revolution 4: The Sky Road

you.’
    ‘How about on the UN side?’
    Sadie waved a chunk of bread dismissively. ‘That’s
all squared.’
    ‘No change there then, huh?’
    ‘Changes, yeah, but we’ve rolled to the top again.
For what it’s worth.’
    ‘Right, I know what you mean. „For what it’s
worth“ seems to come up in conversation a lot these days.
Anyway. Here’s the deal. We sell you exclusive rights to
the package, you back us up against the commie hordes.
Shopping-list to follow, but like you say, later for
details.’
    The waiter arrived with a hot platter and a couple of dishes;
a girl followed with bowls of salad andrice. The main dish was
like a salad of meat, in which most possible cuts from a cow were
represented, along with the tastier internals and a few of the
less tasty.
    ‘Enjoy your meal, ladies.’
    Thank you,’ said Sadie. She stubbed out the roach.
‘Oh, and another sangria, please.’
    Myra was ravenous, her appetite honed even keener by the
joint, and spent about twenty minutes in atavistic carnivorous
ecstasy and exclamation before slacking off enough to take up the
conversation properly again.
    ‘So, Sadie.’ She put down a rib, wiped her fingers
and chin. ‘What do you say?’
    Sadie took a long swig of sangria, the ice chinking
slushily.
    ‘You know, that guy we sent to speak to you? From the
Company?’
    ‘Bit hard to forget him.’
    ‘Uh-huh.’ Sadie sighed. ‘Well, Myra, sorry
about this, but’ She scratched her ear. ‘It’s
still the deal, basically. We can give you some kit, sure, but
nothing like what you’re asking. Definitely no
alliance.’
    Myra rocked back. She heard the feet of her metal chair scrape
the flagstones.
    ‘That’s even with what we’re
offering?’
    ‘Even with.’ Sadie picked up something
intestinal-looking, dragged it through her teeth. ‘Because
we can’t take it. It’s no use to us anyway,
frankly.’
    ‘Oh my God. Oh, shit’ Myra reached for her
cigarettes. ‘Mind if – ’
    ‘Go ahead. Yes please.’
    ‘What’s the problem with our package?’
    ‘Skill sets and legacy systems, basically.’ Sadie
looked at the tip of her cigarette, wrinkled her noseand sucked
grease from her lips. ‘Look above my head. Up. What do you
see?’
    Myra gazed southward and upward.
    ‘Top of the Two Mile Tower?’
    ‘Right. Know what’s in it? Squatters, mostly. Damn
thing damn near built itself, like a stone tree. But the builders
couldn’t find enough businesses to rent work-space in
it.’
    ‘That sort of thing’s common enough,’ Myra
said. ‘Speculative spectacular buildings are usually
finished just before the recession hits, and stay empty until the
next boom.’
    ‘If there is another boom…’ Sadie said
gloomily.
    Myra remembered Shin Se-Ha’s version of the Otoh
equations. ‘There will be,’ she said. One more,
anyway, she didn’t say. ‘What’s your
point?’
    ‘We’re losing people,’ Sadie said.
‘It’s no secret. The coup has succeeded in more ways
than it’s failed. A hell of a lot of our best scientists
and engineers have migrated to the orbital colonies, and they
support the faction that Mutual Protection have been running
supplies for.’
    ‘The Outwarders.’
    ‘Yeah. Think civilisation on Earth is doomed, and
they’re getting out. And, more to the point, so is a lot of
the big money. Most of the corporations have been headquartered
in orbital tax-havens since at least the Fall Revolution. Now
they’ve got the muscle – technical, military –
to back that up. And the on-site personnel. They’ll finance
us, all right, but strictly as user fees, like hiring a defence
agency, and only as long as we don’t step out of line. You
may think of the US as the old imperialist oppressor, but these
days we’re just another banana republic. The whole Earth is
one Third World. Big money and skilled labour are in space, and
what’s left downbelow is mostly surplus population.’
Sadie smiled wryly. ‘And bureaucrats, like you and
me.’
    ‘So you’re saying the US empire still
exists,’ Myra said. ‘But its capital – in both
senses – is now in orbit’
    Teah, exactly!’
    ‘Fair enough,’ said Myra, ‘but how does that
affect our offer?’
    ‘Well.’ Sadie leaned back, took a short draw, like
a sip, on her cigarette. ‘Let me draw you an analogy.
Suppose, just hypothetically, for the sake of argument, that the
US wanted to go back to a strategic