Babylon's Ashes

Fred found himself smiling. When she’d been his enemy, she’d been a good one. Now that they were working as allies, the ways that they were the same almost humanized her.

“Where was I? Oh. Yes, the so-called relief supplies. I’m sending along a list of what we most need on the surface. If you get a chance to pass it on to Pa, please do. Apparently we’re all fucking pirates now.”

Chapter Twenty-Six: Filip

The night before the Pella left Pallas Station, Rosenfeld hosted a dinner for Marco and the other captains. The hall had been a vast open space designed as a construction compartment, but changed now into a kind of null-g throne room. A soft, chiming music played like flowing water with a melody. Serving platforms bristled with ceramic bulbs brightly colored as oil on water and filled with wine and water. Long ribbons of red and gold shifted in the breeze of the recyclers. Great lengths of gold fibered paper fluttered and bellied against the walls between the hand- and footholds. The crew of the Pella and the staff of Rosenfeld’s Pallas authority mixed, Free Navy uniforms standing out sharp and martial against the casual civilian clothes of the locals. Young men and women in flowing robes of crimson and blue floated through the air slowly enough to deliver tapas of bean-and-grain cake, curried shrimp fresh from the tanks, and garlic sausage with real meat stuffed in the skins.

No element of the design suggested a consensus up or down. No concession had been made to the architecture of Earth and Mars. The combination of a traditional Belter aesthetic with lushness and luxury left Filip a little intoxicated even before he started drinking.

“I don’t know what you could mean by purification,” his father said through laughter, “if not ‘getting rid of the impure parts.’”

Rosenfeld’s answering chuckle was dry. After weeks traveling with the man, Filip still wasn’t certain he could read his expressions. “You’re saying you planned for this?”

“Anticipated. A change in the system of the greater world always risks having people lose perspective. Get drunk on possibility. Pa rode the wave in; now she thinks she can command the tides. I didn’t know she would break, but I was ready if she did.”

Rosenfeld nodded. Across the great echoing chamber, two women sang together a few bars of a song that Filip knew, and then dissolved into hilarity. He looked across the open air, hoping that one of them might be looking back. That a girl would be watching him floating in conference with the great minds of the Free Navy. No one was.

When his father went on, his voice was lower. Still conversational, still friendly, but charged. “I had plans in place for anyone that broke. Pa, Sanjrani, Dawes. You. When I make my next strike, everyone will see how weak she is. Her support will burn off faster than breathing.”

“You’re sure,” Rosenfeld said, making the words a statement and a question at the same time. He drank from his bulb, coughed. Filip watched his father waiting for the pebble-skinned man to finish his thought. Rosenfeld sighed, nodded. Filip felt some deeper meaning swim just below his understanding, leaving him bobbing in its wake. “It’s only that she’s been feeding people. The laity find that sort of thing endearing, sí no?”

“Anyone can buy votes with free ganga,” Filip said.

Rosenfeld turned his head then, like he was noticing Filip for the first time. “True, true.”

“Johnson and his cobbled-up fleet,” Marco said, “have been squatting on Ceres with their eyes wide. Can’t move forward without exposing themselves. Can’t move back and leave Ceres to us again. They’re trapped. Just the way we said they’d be.”

“True,” Rosenfeld said, and left True, but…hanging in the air. All the criticisms trailed behind it like the ribbons in the breeze. True, but it’s been a long time since we left Ceres, and it’s left us looking weak… True, but one of your generals broke away and you haven’t brought her to heel… True, but Fred Johnson is issuing orders from the governor’s mansion at Ceres, and you aren’t. Filip felt every point like a blow to the gut, but because they were unspoken, he couldn’t answer them. Neither could his father. Rosenfeld took another drink, accepted a stick of vat-grown meat from a passing server, and steadied his drift with one hand as he ate. His expression was mild, but his gaze stayed locked on Marco.