Hellhole (12 page)

And she preferred it that way.

Tanja sat at a single canopy-covered table on the roof garden of her admin building, which floated in the placid harbor of Saporo. Candela’s capitol building was eight stories tall, indistinct from other interconnected structures that floated on the harbor. The buoyant buildings in Saporo were engineered not to topple over during wind and wave action. Across the waterway, she could see a large new construction being towed into place by tugboats and aerocopters.

Over the past couple of decades, when the new frontier worlds were opened to settlement, original investors had believed that planet Candela, and the harbor city in particular, would become a booming tourist mecca with its picturesque setting of mist-capped hills ringing the clear, blue water. A semi-prosperous town had been built here by independent settlers long before the new Constellation stringline connected the Deep Zone planets with the Crown Jewels. Candela had been re-annexed into the government fold without incident twelve years earlier, and a second wave of pioneers had moved there.

As rapidly built houses began to dot the steep hills around the harbor, Elwyn Morae, the Constellation’s ambitious first administrator, had even built a funicular system to carry tourists up the steep hills to reach spectacular viewpoints. The locals, including Tanja Hu, who served as his assistant and liaison with the old settlers, warned Morae he was overextending the settlement.

The first rainy season’s incessant, torrential rainstorms put an end to the man’s ambitious plans, causing mudslides, structural losses and loss of life. Once word about Candela’s terrible weather spread around the Crown Jewels, tourists and settlers went elsewhere. The funicular was abandoned, and its two counterweighted cars left to rust in place. In the resultant uproar the disgraced and nearly bankrupt Morae quietly gathered the shreds of his fortune and returned to Sonjeera, where he recommended Tanja as his replacement (although in his state of ruin, Morae’s blessing counted for little).

Tanja had the pedigree for this: she and her family were descendants of the passengers aboard the original slow ship that had set off into the Deep Zone. Because Candela was a bountiful planet, despite the worrisome rains, they lived a relatively good life, but a woman with Tanja’s ambitions did not fit in with the old ways.

When she’d first accepted her position in the aftermath of Morae’s debacle, she had been filled with idealism and excitement, a sense of adventure. With Constellation assistance, the possibilities for her world seemed limitless. Then reality had set in as Sonjeera’s priorities became apparent. Tanja attended meetings and ceremonies on Sonjeera, but she quickly realized that she didn’t want Candela to become just like the Constellation. There was a reason her ancestors had come out to the Deep Zone.

Though her own dreams did not die as dramatically as the rusted cars of the abandoned funicular, Tanja realized how much had not been explained to her. She learned the truth about Constellation politics swiftly enough. The old-guard nobles did not consider her an equal, and certainly not a force to be reckoned with. They were wrong.

Though she had to work within the framework of rules and restrictions imposed on her, Tanja made her own grand plans for her planet. And soon enough, General Adolphus would make that future possible . . .

As Tanja sat under the canopy on her rooftop, she inhaled the rich moisture from a recent pattering of warm rain. Now that the clouds had blown away, the distant mountains wore a fresh mantle of white snow. During the brief but glorious season of good weather, Tanja preferred to work out in the open instead of at her desk inside the offices below. She called this her “garden office,” and her staff knew to interrupt her only for the most important decisions.

She activated a flatscreen embedded in the tabletop, chose the observation systems, and kept an eye on the workers bustling about on the office floors below. Her administrative assistant, Bebe Nax, looked agitated as she spoke to someone over her implanted earadio. Tanja didn’t bother to listen in. The small, feisty woman could take care of whatever it was. Tanja had few enough reliable people, whether among her employees or her extended family. Bebe was one of them, and Tanja’s paternal uncle Quinn Hu was another.

She smiled at the thought of her uncle. With his wild hair and colorful clothes, Quinn looked more like an eccentric artist than a construction business manager, but he had a great head for organization and accounting. She always pictured him sitting at the controls of one of the gigantic earth-moving machines used for strip-mining the rugged hills.

Tanja glanced down at two document screens open in front of her: off-network folios containing highly confidential information. Technically, as planetary administrator of Candela, she worked for the Constellation, but Tanja felt increasingly alienated from the distant central government. Their frivolous civilized concerns had never really mattered to her, and their unrealistic expectations of Candela’s contribution to the treasury were an increasingly heavy anchor dragging her people down.

One of the files on the screen had been delivered to her by courier: a revised taxation schedule specifying Candela’s new tribute payments. She had been fuming about it for more than an hour.

Citing the extraordinary costs of installing and maintaining the stringline network from Sonjeera out to all of the Deep Zone planets, the Diadem demanded increased revenues, exploiting whatever goods or resources each “Deezee” world could produce. Comfortable back on the Crown Jewel planets, the powerful noble families were getting richer while the colonists struggled to keep up with the outside demands.

The fifty-four frontier colonies operated under a compact with Sonjeera that calculated tributes based upon percentages of standardized production revenues. DZ wealth came primarily from raw materials and exotic native products that were shipped via stringline to the Sonjeera hub. These new tribute levels were arbitrarily set to squeeze more money from the Deep Zone. The old Diadem simply didn’t understand the hardships she was imposing. Maybe she didn’t care.

In her annoyance, Tanja paced around the roof garden, wrapped up in thoughts of problems and potential solutions. In order to meet the Constellation’s unrelenting demands, Tanja had been forced to set up large strip-mining operations; it was rush work, messy and short-sighted, but the only way to produce sufficient material to make the inspectors happy.

During the interminable monsoon season, the miners and machinery worked in perpetual mud, processing the slop in order to extract metals. Now, thanks to this increase, they would have to work harder still, cutting corners before the rains came again . . .

On the flatscreen, she noticed that Bebe Nax was still on the earadio, looking flustered. Presently the assistant turned a pleading face up at the videocam unit on the wall, sure her boss was watching. Tanja closed out the computer files on her desktop, then hurried down a circular stairway into the office levels.

Meeting her at the doorway, Bebe said, “Sorry, Administrator. That pest Captain Walfor insists he has an appointment with you. Why do you even deal with him? He’s a black marketeer!”

Tanja smiled. “So they say. Where is he?”

“In the dock-level lobby.”

Bebe’s disapproval was plain, but Tanja knew exactly what sort of things Ian Walfor offered. He was good-humored, rakish, and sometimes intolerable, but he had value to her. So far from Sonjeera she liked to have alternative sources for the items she needed. “Tell him I’ll be right down.”

Full of bluster and good cheer, Walfor was the sort of fellow who told bawdy stories to burly men in taverns, yet still had the charm and good looks to attract the ladies. He could also be irritating and demanding. Once he arrived on Candela – after an interminable journey using old-model FTL engines that bypassed the fast Constellation-controlled stringline network – he acted as if his schedule was more important than anyone else’s.

No matter. Tanja liked him personally, and she could understand why he wanted to stretch his legs after such a long, slow transit from Buktu. Any man who found ways to sidestep the Diadem’s transportation monopoly earned points in her book, even if the alternative delivery system was contorted, slow, and inconvenient. Walfor was also, despite the obvious illegalities of his activities, impeccably honest, at least in his dealings with the Deep Zone planets. Authorities on Sonjeera would have a much different view if they knew what Walfor was doing, but the man and his cumbersome old-style FTL freighters had thus far escaped their attention.

Walfor had a weathered face and a shock of wavy black hair. His olive eyes were flirtatious, and whenever he smiled at Tanja she knew he was imagining her in bed with him. He was doing that now, but she ignored it.

“Been a long haul from Buktu to deliver these goods. My ship and crew are in orbit, but I wanted to see you first. I could use some RandR.” He smiled. “We could anchor my jetboat out in the harbor, watch the sunset, have a candlelight dinner.”

“How . . . antique sounding, and clichéd. Can’t you think of anything more original?”

“
I
am an original myself, one of a kind.” His eyes twinkled, then grew serious as he lowered his voice. “But, knowing you, we’ll end up getting down to business instead. Such a beautiful woman shouldn’t be so serious.”

It took an effort, but she showed no hint of a smile. “I’m a serious woman. The beauty is only a secondary characteristic.”

“It’s the first thing I notice.” He ran a hand through his hair, gestured for her to walk ahead of him along the floating walkway towards the waiting government aerocopter she had signed out. “Someday you’ll relax.”

“I’ll relax when we’ve got the cargo loaded and you’re on your way to Hellhole. Do you have room for the same size shipment as before?”

“Once we offload my cargo, there’ll be plenty of shielded space for the haul. Let’s go take a look at what you’ve got.” He extended his arm to escort her, and she indulged him by taking it.

Walfor insisted on flying the aerocopter himself. As he worked the controls with great confidence, Tanja thought he looked particularly handsome. Maybe one day she would give him a try in the romance department . . . when she had more time. The craft rose over the calm harbor, then headed north up the coast.

“Not to detract from my lovely companion,” he winked at her, “but Candela’s scenery is quite beautiful.”

“Compared to Buktu, anything’s a paradise.” He didn’t disagree. Walfor’s frozen outpost was too far from its sun ever to become a nice place to live, but his rugged frontiersmen had made it secretly profitable.

The aerocopter cruised over several mountain villages, then arrived at Puhau, a settlement mostly occupied by Tanja’s own extended family. He gave her a teasing look. “Shall we buzz your Uncle Quinn’s house? Wake him up?”

“He’s awake, and he works harder than you ever will.”

“Then how about some of your cousins?” He grinned impishly.

“Not today, even though they might deserve it.” They probably had hangovers, she thought, although despite their frequent parties and binges, they did put in their expected work time. Unlike Tanja, when her numerous relatives left the worksite at the end of the day, they actually forgot about the job.

Upon her appointment as planetary administrator, Tanja’s large family had been very proud to have someone of such importance to the whole Constellation. They asked her if she would meet the Diadem in person; whenever she returned from Sonjeera, they crowded around to see what souvenirs she had brought back for them.

After Elwyn Morae departed Candela, Tanja had reclaimed his property for her own relatives, setting them up with land, houses, and employment. She saw to it that that her clan received jobs in the lucrative mining industries, along with a number of perks.

In retrospect, she realized it had been the worst possible thing to do. Apart from Uncle Quinn and a handful of others, Tanja’s uncles and cousins lived embarrassingly wild lives, certain that good times had come to their whole family. Some of them, she was sure, did things intentionally to irritate her, leaving Tanja to clean up their messes.

After one reckless episode in which a pair of unruly cousins unhooked three buoyant buildings and floated them around Saporo harbor, causing great mayhem and damage, Tanja had been forced to pay off angry businessmen and government visitors. When she had confronted the perpetrators, furious, they had laughed at her, wondering why she didn’t find the whole escapade as funny as they did.

Afterward, Tanja sent her rowdiest relatives to faraway towns in the hills, where they could work in the farms and strip mines. Though she loved her cousins, and they were eventually contrite, Tanja knew their behavior wouldn’t change. She had no intention of letting their antics hamstring her efforts to keep Candela running; best to give them elbow room in the hills, where they could operate without many constraints. In that region, Uncle Quinn had been able to keep them in line, so far. It was the best solution for everyone.

Now the aerocopter approached a broad, raw scar on the hillsides that marked the Puhau strip-mine Quinn managed, flanked by the crowded shanties of the worker village and his little job-shack office. Atop the hillside, huge earth movers scraped the dirt and filled immense dump trucks with soils that would yield valuable metals.