Alice is standing next to Nikki on Dock Twenty-One, the first place she ever set foot upon CdC when she disembarked here on Wheel Two after her journey from Heinlein less than a week ago. Dock Twenty-One is where VIPs normally land, close to Central Plaza and the only such facility dedicated exclusively to passenger use. As usual, it is looking pristine, befitting the first impression the Quadriga wishes to grant visitors to its fabled realm. Less usual is the fact that it is in lockdown, closed off to anyone without clearance, and guarded by high-level security.
The dock is replete with as many VIPs as have ever assembled here at one time, but it’s not because any of them are arriving or departing. They are here to greet the FNG’s task force taking temporary charge of the Seguridad, Ochoba’s team of new captains who will each oversee a different regional sector. However, this high-profile arrival is not the real reason for the lockdown and elevated security presence. All of that is for an extremely low-profile departure, which will happen once the great and the good have been and gone. Not even they have clearance for that.
There are several senior Seguridad officers present in dress uniform, looking all kinds of uncomfortable in their unaccustomed garb, but more uncomfortable at the prospect of meeting the people whose arrival here will constitute an effective demotion.
Nikki is not one of them, but she is looking unusually presentable, like she’s dressed for a cocktail reception at the Ver Eterna rather than a night of drinking and who knows what else on Mullane.
“You scrub up well,” Alice remarks, by way of deliberate understatement. Nikki looks stunning, and she suspects Nikki knows she looks stunning, so she wants to undermine her just a little.
“I’m a changed woman, remember. Got new duties and responsibilities.”
“Glad to see you’re taking them seriously. I’ll want a full report.”
“Oh, you’ll get a report. You maybe won’t want all the details.”
Nikki smirks. Alice shakes her head, fails to suppress a smile. She knows Nikki won’t let her down.
Alice tracks the shuttle’s approach and watches it pass beneath out of sight. It brings back a vivid memory of her recent extravehicular ingress, sending a thrill through her. It’s been a hell of a week.
“I’m hearing Ochoba didn’t make the trip,” Alice remarks.
“So?”
Alice doesn’t respond, but Nikki works it out anyway.
“Oh, I get it. You were wanting a pat on the head and an attaboy.”
Busted.
“She’s my boss. I’ve had a tricky start to a new job, and I’m an affirmation junkie.”
“Girl, the fact Ochoba didn’t make the trip is your attaboy. She knew she didn’t need to come here because she knows you got this.”
Alice appreciates the sentiment, but suspects that Ochoba has bigger fish to fry. There are trades and negotiations going on at the highest levels regarding what is to happen to Gonçalves and to Beatrice, and the only thing looking certain is that they will never see a courtroom back on Earth. The whole affair remains ultra-classified, with the official version still blaming a turf war between bootleggers. Partly this is because nobody wants a panic breaking out regarding mesh technology, given that almost everybody on Seedee has one; but just as crucial is the fact that Gonçalves and the Neurosophy Foundation are simply too valuable to the Quadriga.
She has no idea what is likely to happen to Beatrice, and remains content that this is not her problem to solve. However, she is less sanguine about the possibility that Gonçalves will end up essentially serving out a sentence of sorts here on CdC, a permanent house arrest that allows her to continue her work under supervision. Alice’s brief time here has taught her that the culture of petty corruption she was supposed to eradicate is positively noble compared to the squalid compromises that get hammered out between the Quadriga and the FNG.
With the shuttle’s ascent imminent, the untidy gathering divides and begins to order itself. That is when Alice sees Helen Petitjean, and Helen Petitjean sees her. More significantly, she sees Nikki too, though it takes Helen a moment to recognise her in her glad rags. Once she does, her face is a picture, and not because Nikki is looking so damn hot. Nikki gives her a sarcastically cheerful wave then takes leave of Alice to assume her assigned role in the reception committee.
The subject of her disapproval having absented herself, Helen predictably seizes the opportunity to buttonhole Alice.
“It is an auspicious day,” she states, adding gravitas to her words with that sing-song Southern accent.
Alice can tell that this is as much an unsubtle reminder of Helen’s on-going agenda as an acknowledgement that change is afoot.
“I suppose so,” Alice replies neutrally. “Hence everybody who is anybody being in attendance.”
This prompts Helen to glance across to where Nikki is now standing.
“That’s one way of putting it. I have to say, I am relieved to be assured that Nicola Freeman was not guilty of the things she was accused, but I must express my great surprise to see her present at an occasion such as this. Unless you consider it symbolic to include someone who embodies everything about CdC that needs to change.”
“I would argue that Nikki represents that change. Trust me on this much: you will never know how grateful you and everyone else up here ought to be to her.”
“And why will I never know?”
“You don’t have the clearance.”
Helen sighs.
“Well, I guess after all is said and done, CdC is a place for redemption. For second chances and sometimes third and fourth ones. But I do assume she will not be allowed to persist in her role as a sergeant in the Seguridad.”
“You assume correctly,” Alice replies. “I have seen to it personally that this will no longer be the case.”
Helen nods with understated satisfaction.
“So, if you don’t mind me asking, what is she doing here?”
“She is part of the reception committee. I have assigned her a very specific role, and I trust her to carry it out conscientiously.”
The shuttle is rising into view. Helen strains to look over the heads of the people in front, trying to get a view of the door.
“I guess I don’t need to ask what you’re doing here,” Alice remarks. “Come to welcome your little brother.”
“Younger brother, yes. He’s not so little.”
“I know. I’ve seen his profile. He should be a model officer. Could be a model, period. He’s a good-looking fellow.”
“He is good in every particular, Dr. Blake. And with the likes of Dominic forming your new broom, there is absolutely no reason for you not to sweep CdC clean now.”
The door opens and the first of the flight crew emerges, greeted by ground staff to complete safety checks and admin formalities.
“Oh, I’m going to sweep the place,” Alice assures her. “Though maybe not quite as clean as you’d like.”
Helen tears her gaze away from the shuttle to fix Alice with a disapproving glare.
“And just what might you mean by that?” she enquires, her tone challenging to the point of impertinent. Alice could remind her of their respective credentials, but she has other ways of making her point.
“I mean that my experiences here have taught me how we all need to misbehave sometimes in order to feel alive. We each of us have our private temptations, our secret transgressions. They’re part of what makes us human.”
“Many undesirable things are part of what makes us human,” Helen replies with a pronounced haughtiness. “But it should not be the policy of the authorities to turn a blind eye to them.”
“Really? Because I was talking to someone who works in the Wheel Two rotary hub, and I’ve got him on record saying you bribed him to force an all-stop at the moment of your choosing.”
Helen’s eyes bulge, all colour draining from her face.
“My policy was to continue turning a blind eye to that,” Alice continues, “but I’m happy to alter it if that’s your preference.”
Helen swallows, sweat breaking out on her otherwise immaculately made-up face. She bounces back quickly though, her composure returning in a matter of seconds.
“Well, Dr. Blake, I suppose we all have to compromise ourselves sometimes in the pursuit of what we believe to be right. I guess I’m just disappointed it took so little time on CdC for you to turn native.”
“To turn native?” Alice replies. “Ms. Petitjean, I was born here. I am a native.”
Almost an hour has passed since the last of the official delegations departed Dock Twenty-One, but the same shuttle remains in position in the bay. This would ordinarily be an unacceptable turnaround time, but nothing about this mission is ordinary. The flight crew who brought the task force from Heinlein is comprised entirely of high-clearance FNG personnel, but this was not due to the status of their inbound passengers. It is their outbound manifest that is the real reason for the lockdown.
Nobody must know about this. Any of it.
Having been given the signal to proceed, today’s truly important people begin to emerge on to the floor of the shuttle bay. They have travelled here the way Alice was involuntarily conveyed from beneath Sin Garden and the way Nikki travelled out to the McAuliffe district when she was on the run. For today’s journeys, however, the crates have been modified to enhance safety and comfort, their progress monitored every metre of the way, and each of the young passengers is accompanied by an adult. The trip will only have taken a few minutes from the Neurosophy HQ, where they have remained CdC’s most closely guarded secret.
The first to appear, her baby son in her arms, is the woman Alice previously knew only as Amber. Her real name is Rachel Coutts. She looks transformed: calm, younger, complete.
Then come the rest of the children, each one led by the hand. They are looking around the dock in wide-eyed fascination.
Alice doesn’t know what will happen to them, but she knows they will grow up on Earth, breathing fresh air, making their own choices. Certain decisions are out of their hands, however: the procedure that was done to her has been done to them too. Inside their heads, the nanobots are steadily carrying out their tasks, and to interrupt it would be fraught with risk.
Their mothers will be contacted. The question is whether they will want them, given that they will not remember. Perhaps like Rachel Coutts, some part of them will instinctively know the truth. If not, then ironically their lives will be much the same as Gonçalves planned out for Alice. They will be placed with trusted, responsible, well-connected families, given the best of upbringings, given every opportunity to realise their vast potential. But what they won’t have is someone overseeing which memories they are permitted to keep, or inserting artificial ones because their real-life experiences have been deemed inappropriate or insufficient.
Alice watches them board the ion shuttle, waiting until they are all out of sight before she approaches a member of the flight crew. The conversation is brief. She has only one instruction.
“Once you’re in open space, take off their seatbelts. Let them fly around.”
“That is against regulations, Dr. Blake.”
“I know. But they’re kids, and it’s fun.”
Alice watches the crew make their final checks, then the shuttle descends smoothly out of sight upon the platform. She remains in place, observing through the canopy until she sees it reappear, flying free, accelerating towards Heinlein.
Now that first memory she had upon waking up in the elevator is true. There are no children on CdC.