Chapter 2

They went back to Sonja's place for the afternoon, as Rajata was still somehow reluctant to return to her own home. With them went a completely mundane business card, bearing the name Cynthia Wallace – no rank or affiliation – a mobile number and an anonymous e-mail address. Despite herself, Rajata obsessively played with the thing throughout the journey and, by the time they were sitting in Sonja's kitchen, she'd memorised both contacts and could have described the type face, the ink colour and the nature of the pasteboard in forensic detail. What she couldn't do was work out what on earth to do next.

For a start, she hadn't rejected the approach out of hand, which all her convictions and prejudices told her that she should have done. But, no: It was, she had to admit, just too intriguing, too unexpected ... and so she'd let them talk on, let them expand on their – literally – out of this world offer. And it appeared that they really were proposing to give her pretty much a free hand to structure an entire world, and pretty much from scratch. Actually, they'd been slightly vague about the details of the location, but she did know that the planet in question was a new colony, intended to be a centre for research and development rather than a military base per se, and that while the population was currently small, and the environment somewhat hostile, both these things were expected to change rather rapidly. Rajata couldn't imagine how you'd change the ecology of an entire planet – let alone do so 'rapidly' – but there was something sincere, something appealing about the women she'd talked to that made her want to take what they'd told her almost at face value. Of course, there had to be a catch – one of them was from Naval Intelligence for chrissake – and, equally of course, she'd seen nothing like hard evidence for anything that she'd been told. And yet ... it seemed such an unlikely lie, such a lot of trouble for anyone to go to just to ... well – just to what? – think about it like that and ... well, either it was all, fantastically, true or it was the silliest wind-up in human history. And possibly alien history, too. And whatever the pros and cons of the military mind-set, a sense of humour was not one of its more obvious characteristics.

She knew that all this was getting her nowhere, that she could continue with these circles for years without reaching any sort of conclusion. Yes, she'd liked Cynthia and Dianna – and Rajata was not a person who warmed to officials, to soldiers – but if they'd researched her as well as it seemed they had done – the thought made her shudder – then they'd surely have known not to send a macho martinet to make the proposal, so...

Belatedly, she realised that Sonja was still sitting opposite her with a concerned expression on her face and she made a conscious effort to pull herself together, even tried a smile. For some reason the effort failed ... as soon as she clambered far enough out of her introspection to make eye-contact, even as she was trying to arrange her facial muscles appropriately, she ... crumpled. Suddenly she was sitting there racked with sobs, tears flooding down her cheeks and Sonja ... Sonja was round the table, gathering her up in warm and all encompassing arms, holding her in a close embrace, muttering soothing nothings...

Which was, Rajata thought as something like sanity returned, a situation she could get used to. Which thought – and the realisation that her nose was basically pressed into her friend's right breast – made her giggle and that, disappointingly, caused Sonja to let her go, slightly, leaning back a little and looking down at her.

"You poor little sod," she said, quietly, "I think you need to talk about this stuff, you know ... Much as I love you and your bloody minded self-reliance, this time you really need to talk..."

Rajata was almost shocked by the way her heart leapt at Sonja's use of the word 'love', – perhaps she'd been even more traumatised by events than she'd realised – but simultaneously knew that her friend was absolutely right. So she reluctantly disengaged herself and, accepting a tissue to wipe her eyes and nose, tried to put her thoughts into some sort of order. Eventually, she more or less managed to do so...

Once they had talked, they had a cup of tea. Rajata had to smile at the sheer bloody English-ness of it all, sitting in a largely pine kitchen, sipping Breakfast tea and eating biscuits ... when they'd just been earnestly discussing whether Rajata should accept an offer from a bunch of uniformed nutters to go half way across the galaxy and ... start a revolution. With the active consent of the powers that be, apparently – which, she felt, would certainly be revolutionary...

The thought made her laugh and Sonja patted her hand, tenderly. Sonja wasn't used to seeing Rajata breaking down like that – hell, she wasn't used to seeing Rajata full stop, these days – and she'd been more than slightly thrown by the experience. And by the things they'd learnt, the things they – or Rajata, at least, had been offered ... and offered directly, more or less on a plate, not being picked up in some random trawl at a café or a conference or wherever – the bloody confederacy had come to them.

Or, at least, she reminded herself, to Rajata. Which was a problem, for Sonja, not least because the entire process had only too forcefully brought home to her the reality of the situation: Earth was going to be invaded, and probably overwhelmed, destroyed... consumed ... and in only a few years time. And Sonja did not have the score to escape on her own – or the willingness to debase herself in the meat-markets that characterised the average Extraction. As an academic, a sociologist and a feminist, she knew that the CAP process was gender-biased, knew that the odds had been stacked against her, that that was probably sufficient to explain her own inadequate score of 5.8. Except that she also knew that her inability to lead, to impose herself on others – as well as her complete lack of aggression – had undoubtedly contributed, too. In any case, though, she was on track to be an eye witness when the Swarm arrived on Earth, to watch as things almost certainly fell apart and then ... to die. It was not quite the life she might have chosen for herself, she thought, wryly, but...

But, well, for the moment, there was Rajata to look after – and, while their discussions had been circular, without coming close to a conclusion, things still needed to be done.

"What you need to do," she said, eventually, "is talk to your group about the situation. I mean, the offer was fairly clearly a collective one – they talked about a team, remember? And however unlikely it may be that you've managed to get a bunch of anarchists organised to even that extent, they will undoubtedly have opinions, may or may not be willing to play along."

She paused for a moment, then went on in her practical tone of voice.

"Aside from anything else, if the end result of all this is that you do end up 'going to the stars', it seems a bit unlikely that all of them will have achieved sponsor level scores – or, come to think of it, that the ever so nice and accommodating Confederacy people will let you overlook your status – so you need to think about, well, concubines, for want of a better word..."

The look of horror that passed over Rajata's face was so extreme that in other circumstances Sonja might have found it funny. This was a woman she'd known for fifteen years, a woman she knew was capable of instant – and, when necessary, brutal – decisions, a woman whose grasp of theory never caused her to lose sight of the reality on the ground ... and a woman who clearly hadn't thought about one of the most basic facts of her current situation: If she went, she was going to be taking slaves – however much she might be working to ensure their rights and fair treatment – and if she didn't, she'd be consigning a bunch of people who she could have helped escape to be ... well, swarm fodder. It wasn't nice, but there it was – life, as Rajata herself always used to say, is not particularly fair.

She said as much, as bluntly as she knew how, knowing that Rajata needed to hear it, needed to factor it into whatever conclusions she finally arrived at. For the moment, though, she just looked shell shocked, more deeply uncomfortable than Sonja could ever have imagined her being.

"Gods," she managed, after a while, speaking so quietly that Sonja had to strain to hear her, "but that means ... that means I'd ... I'd have to choose, choose someone – some people and ... and ... there would be sex, too, wouldn't there? I mean, that's kind of the point – that's why their bloody Extractions are always so disgusting, so obscene ... sponsors are there to breed and concubines to provide the ... well, the biological necessities. Oh, no, no, not that, no, I couldn't do that ... I mean, no ... its horrible..."

Decurion Wallace was on an EarthAt command cruiser in orbit, reviewing data on some potential recruits for one of the research institutes her colony was planning, when her mobile rang, the call patched through from earth and delayed slightly in the process. She was not at all surprised to find that the caller was Sonja Richardson, but was taken aback by the steely assertion in the woman's tone. Even as she was pursuing the introductory formalities, she called up her caller's CAP score, noted the submissiveness and lack of aggression that had crippled the overall result, and ... wondered.

The news was also surprising – Ms Mehta, whose own CAP score suggested that she was pretty much indestructible, was struggling severely with her situation, having gone through a virtually catatonic reaction, apparently, when the reality of needing to select concubines and then to breed with them hit home to her. Cynthia raised an eyebrow at that news, reviewing Rajata's scores in turn – as she'd thought, high levels of libido and sexual... flexibility ... but – bloody hell – no experience whatsoever. The woman was a bloody virgin! She cursed the AIs and their scenario orientated, sub-conscious based testing procedures, wondering whether they were aware of just how deeply human beings could sublimate their desires ... in Rajata's case effectively converting herself from what looked like a walking sex bomb into a hardened, focused, political activist.

Well, she thought, giving her full attention to Sonja once more, it was the activist they wanted – so how did they go about getting her?

In fact, Sonja appeared to have the matter in hand – there was nothing lacking in her intelligence or planning sub-scores – and had a viable plan. Yes, Cynthia agreed, probably getting Rajata into a meeting with her 'group', setting the need for her to make a decision in practical, and familiar, personal reality would probably help to resolve the situation. And, yes, she could also see that there was no way for Sonja to organise anything of the sort, given that one of the things that had attracted her colleagues' attention in the first place was the highly effective security measures that Rajata had built into her organisation's very DNA. But ... if Sonja couldn't do it, Naval Intelligence – and a fair amount of alien technology – very probably could. Finishing the call with appropriate thanks and reassurance, she immediately made another.

"Hi, Di ... its Cy ... I think I'd like a little chat, if you've got a moment or two..."

Tiff Armstrong scrolled through her doctoral dissertation one final time, at least for the day, closed down the computer and began to collect her stuff from around the lab. She made a last check on the spectrometers, churning their way through the hundreds of samples she was running over night, and started to make her way out of the building. It was odd being out of the political loop, she thought, but she was sure as hell getting more academic work done. And, she thought, had time to go other places, too – like the art exhibition that that really sweet bloke she'd met the night before had been so keen on...

Johann van der Maar, exiting his own lab in another University altogether, paused briefly to look at his reflection in the plate glass door and wondered again about the sanity of the professorial class. As a post-doc, of course, his entire existence depended on pleasing the prof, but ... an art exhibition? How on earth was that relevant to exotic materials research?

Oh, well – at least he had more time, these days...

Jas Petri, hung over and still a little stoned, shook his bed partner awake. He didn't know his name – last night it hadn't seemed to matter – but he did know that he did want to continue seeing the guy. And he'd seemed really enthusiastic about this art thing, tonight, so he might as well make the effort, get both of them there. And it was a private view, apparently ... should be free wine and everything!