Nemesis Games

Holden accepted a steaming mug from Fred with a grateful nod and took a sip. The old man’s coffee didn’t disappoint. “I get that,” Holden said after another drink. “And I think her theory on it is pretty far-fetched, but it’s the kind of thing that will get public traction if we don’t find a better answer first.”

“She has a theory already?”

“She thinks it’s the protomolecule. The robots and tech waking up on Ilus is her one datapoint.”

“You told me that was a onetime thing,” Fred said, frowning over his coffee mug. When he spoke again his words blew steam in front of them, like a whisp of dragon breath. “Is Miller back?”

“No, he’s not back. As far as I know, there isn’t an active protomolecule culture in existence in the universe. But —”

“But I’ve got the inactive stuff you gave me.”

“Right, and Monica knows about it somehow,” Holden said.

Fred’s frown only deepened at that. “I’ve got a leak somewhere.”

“Yeah, you totally do, but that isn’t the part that worries me.”

Fred’s eyebrows went up in a nonverbal question.

“Monica,” Holden continued, “has decided that we should take out the goo and use it like some sort of Ouija board to summon the ghost of Miller.”

“But that’s stupid,” Fred said.

“Right? So I think we should exhaust all other possibilities before we leap right to tinkering with alien viruses.”

“First time for everything, I guess,” Fred said, only lightly coating the words in sarcasm. “You have alternate theories?”

“I do,” Holden said, “but you won’t like it.”

“I also still have bourbon if we need anesthetic for this operation.”

“It may get there,” Holden replied, then drank off the rest of his coffee to give himself time. No matter how much Fred had aged over the last half decade, Holden found himself still intimidated by the man. It was hard to broach topics Fred might take offense to.

“More?” Fred asked, pointing at his empty cup. Holden declined with a shake of his head.

“So there’s that radical extremist faction of the OPA that you were telling me about,” Holden said.

“I don’t think —”

“They’ve had at least two public attacks. One on Martian interests, and one on Earth itself.”

“Both of which failed.”

“Maybe,” Holden said. “But we’re assuming we know what their goals were, and that seems like a bad assumption to make. Maybe blowing up a big chunk of a Martian shipyard and forcing the UN home fleet to fire a bunch of missiles at an ancient freighter are wins to them.”

“Okay,” Fred said with a grudging nod. “Fair enough.”

“But there’s a third leg to this. Sure, the radicals think Earth and Mars will abandon them once the new worlds are colonized, but that means the colonists themselves are part of the problem.”

“Agreed.”

“So, what if this radical OPA wing decides that in addition to blowing up some of the inner planets’ shit, they can send a message by taking out some colony ships?”

“Well,” Fred said, speaking slowly as though he were working out the answer as he said it, “the big problem with that is the location of the attacks.”

“Because they happen on the other side of the gates.”

“Exactly,” Fred continued. “If ships were getting nuked as they passed through the Belt, that would be one thing. But on the other side of the gates? Who has access there? Unless you’re thinking the ships were sabotaged in some way. A bomb with a really long fuse?”

“There’s another alternative,” Holden said.

“No, there isn’t,” Fred replied, anticipating his next argument.

“Fred, look, I know you don’t want to think you’ve got people working against your interests on Medina. Doctoring records, maybe. Shutting off sensors when there’re things they don’t want people to see. And I get why that’s hard to swallow.”

“Medina is central to our long-term plans,” Fred said, his words hard as iron. “I’ve placed all of my very best and most loyal people on that station. If the radicals have a fifth column there, then it means that I can’t trust anyone in my organization. I might as well pack it up and retire.”

“There are thousands of people on Medina, I doubt you can vouch for every one of them personally.”

“No, but the people running the station are my people. The most loyal I have. There’s no way something like this could be going on without their knowledge and cooperation.”

“That’s a scary thought.”

“It means I don’t own Medina Station,” Fred said. “It means that the most violent, hard-line, extremist faction of our group controls the choke point of the entire galaxy.”

“So,” Holden said, “how would one go about finding that out?”

Fred leaned back in his chair with a sigh and gave Holden a sad smile. “You know what I think? I think you’re bored, and lonely, and looking for a distraction. Don’t dismantle the organization I spent a lifetime building to give yourself something to do.”

“But ships are missing. Even if it isn’t Medina taking them, something is. I don’t know that we can just ignore that and hope it goes away.”

“Fix your own ship, Jim. Fix your ship and get your crew back together. This thing with the missing ships isn’t your job.”