Cibola Burn (Expanse 4)

Naomi went quiet. Her fingertips pressed against the cage and she hummed quietly to herself. It wasn’t a melody Havelock knew. He checked his incoming queue again. Another half dozen requests for comment. A note from one of the security team that the Belters on the Israel had started sitting together in the commissary and exercising together in the gym. It seemed suspicious to the man making the report. It sounded like circling the wagons to Havelock. He’d have to think about what to do about that. If anything. The radio signal to the planet still didn’t go through. The analysis of the IR sensors that could see through the cloud cover was that First Landing was being destroyed by the storm. He turned his attention to the sensor array data as it streamed back to Earth. Maybe someone there could make something of it. The first-report newsfeeds were already speculating that it had been a fusion core overloading. Having just heard about how Jim Holden was a shapeshifting alien left him a little skeptical about everything.

When, six hours later, his hand terminal lit up with an incoming request from Murtry, Havelock felt a huge weight lifting from his shoulders. He accepted the connection, and a low-res Murtry fuzzed to life on the screen. The feed jumped and hopped, but the audio quality was all right apart from a little static.

“Good to see you, Havelock. How’re things holding together up there?”

“No complaints, sir. Mostly we were waiting to hear from you. That looks like a hell of a rainstorm you’ve got going down there.”

“Loss of life was minimal,” Murtry said. “A few of the squatters didn’t bother getting to shelter in time, and the floodwaters pulled some local bugs out from the ground that’ll kill you if you touch them. They lost another one to that. Our people are fine. The camp’s a loss.”

“Ours or theirs?”

“Ours and theirs. Everyone down here’s going to be starting over from scratch.”

“I’m sorry to hear that.”

“Why?”

Havelock blinked. His smile felt nervous. “Because we just lost everything.”

“We didn’t lose as much as they did,” Murtry said. “That makes this a win. We’re going to need to pack the shuttle with relief supplies and get it down here. Food. Clean water. Medical supplies. Warm clothes. No shelters, though. Or if they are, make ’em those cheap laminate ones that won’t hold up for more than a week.”

“Are you sure? I can get some emergency prefabs worked up —”

“No. Nothing like permanent shelter comes down here until our people are the only ones using it. And we’ll be hauling up some of the squatters. Can you start setting something up for an extra hundred or so people? It doesn’t need to be comfortable, but it has to be something we can control.”

“We’re bringing the squatters on the Israel, sir?”

“We’re getting them off the planet and putting them under our thumbs,” Murtry said with a smile. “His Holiness, Pope Holden, thinks he bullied me into it. That man is about as smart as a dead cat.”

Havelock was suddenly acutely aware that Naomi’s privacy shield was down and every word of his conversation was carrying to her. He tried to think of a way to trigger it that wouldn’t let Murtry know that he’d forgotten protocol up to now.

“There a problem, Havelock?”

“Just thinking where we can put them, sir,” Havelock said. “We’ll come up with something.”

“Good man. This thing was a lucky break. Play this right, and we’ll get all the squatters off the planet. Even if we can’t, they’re going to have hell’s own time claiming they’ve got a viable settlement.” Murtry’s smile was thin. “This last sixty hours, we’ve probably made more progress toward straightening this mess out than all the time since we came out here.”

Naomi rapped against the cage with her knuckles, the grate clacking softly enough that the hand terminal’s mike didn’t pick it up. Her eyebrows were raised in query, but she didn’t speak. Havelock made the smallest possible nod.

“What about the mediation team?” he asked. “Holden and his people?”

“Holden and Burton are fine. Burton almost got his ass caught out in the worst of it, but it didn’t quite happen,” Murtry said with a shrug and a smile. “Can’t have everything.”

Havelock winced, thinking how callous Murtry’s words would sound to someone who didn’t know him. “Well, let them know we’ll put together relief supplies and get them down there as soon as we can get through the cloud cover.”

“No permanent structures.”

“No, sir. I understand.”

“I’m going to want to get some of our science team up when the shuttle goes back too. The ones that’re going a little too native. I’ll work up an evac list.”

“Do you want me to get the… ah… other shuttle ready to return to normal duty?” Havelock said, hoping that Murtry wouldn’t tell him to keep the weapon live. There was silence on the connection. “Sir?”

“We’ll have to, won’t we?” Murtry said. “Yeah, all right. But be ready to put it back in play as soon as the evacuation’s done. I don’t like giving up our advantages for nothing.”

“No, sir,” Havelock said. “I’ll see to it.”

“Good man.”

The connection died. Havelock started pulling up the duty roster and inventory lists. It was almost a minute before he risked glancing over at Naomi. She looked like she’d eaten something unpleasant.

“That’s who you work for?”

“He’s the chief of security,” Havelock said.

“That man is a snake.”

“He just came off badly,” Havelock said. “He didn’t know you could hear him.”

“If he had, he might have hissed a little different,” she said. Then a moment later, “Do you have any selective apoptosis catalysts on board?”

“Oncocidals? Sure, anti-cancer meds are standard.”

“Would you send some down in the shuttle?”

“I think antibiotics and clean water are more likely to —”

“Holden needs them. He caught a lot of rems on Eros. It’s not a big thing when we have a med bay, but he pops a new tumor every month or two. Unless Alex decides to take the Roci down into that soup, they may be down there for a while.”

He should probably have said no. She was his prisoner, and doing her favors wasn’t really part of the job. But she hadn’t made it clear to Murtry that she was listening. She could have embarrassed him and hadn’t.