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  COMING HOME

  A Capricornica Publication / 2015

  UUID# 5B9DDEFF-6476-4BB2-9973-80BD451DAB64

  ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

  Copyright © 2015 by Patty Jansen

  Cover Art copyright © 2015 by Tom Edwards

  No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the author.

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  PUBLISHED IN AUSTRALIA

  CONTENTS

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  About the Author

  Chapter 1

  * * *

  THE MIDDLE OF the afternoon—that lazy, comfortable time after lunch when people more fortunate than I could afford to have naps—was not the ideal time to be catching up with administration. It was the time that I would normally go for a walk, find someone to visit or something to buy. But the neglect of my administration account for the past three weeks had exploded the list of exceedingly boring tasks that also happened to be important, such as to make sure my staff was paid.

  And I was a little ashamed that I found it impossible to concentrate, my thoughts drifting off to more pressing issues such as Captain Luczon of the Aghyrian ship, who lodged in the apartment below mine and who had proven to be a little . . . difficult to deal with.

  Who had to be dealt with—after I’d done the damned administration.

  Someone knocked on the door.

  I looked up from my reader. “Come in.”

  The door opened, briefly letting in a snatch of sound: a woman yelling at the top of her voice, somewhere in the hall, I judged, by the way the sound echoed.

  My trusted member of staff Devlin slipped into the room.

  The noise cut off when he shut the door behind him. He sat on the armrest of the chair opposite the desk, glancing over the various readers spread out before me, each with a different accountancy page displayed. He knew what I was doing. Respected it. It needed to be done.

  “Is she still at it?” I asked him.

  “Yup.” He gave a lopsided smile, because, seriously, smiling was the only thing one could do besides hoping that this ordeal would soon be over, and Xinanu would go home and terrorise everyone there.

  “What’s she on about now?”

  “Apparently, Eirani brought her yellow-coded breakfast and she spent most of the morning throwing up.”

  “Isn’t that what most pregnant women do?”

  Devlin shrugged. “You tell me, Muri. I wouldn’t know.”

  “So what about this breakfast? Did she accidentally get Evi or Telaris’ trays? Did they get their breakfast?”

  “They did. They ate at the table.” He grinned. “You have no sympathy for the poor woman, Muri.”

  “Not if she behaves like that.”

  He chuckled, and then his face turned serious. We all knew this episode would cause trouble somewhere down the line. We could laugh at Xinanu now, but we wouldn’t laugh so much when she went home and her clan leaders heard her side of the story. I’d already suffered more run-ins with Delegate Ayanu than I cared to remember.

  And then Devlin said, “I have a problem, Muri.”

  “A problem? I would love the luxury of having just a problem.” Ever since we had returned from the Aghyrian ship with its captain, the problems that we hadn’t solved before we left appeared to have bred in dark corners. They were swarming us like a herd of cockroaches: when you squished one, two new ones appeared.

  “I think this may be the mother of all problems.” His face was perfectly serious, but I didn’t miss the playful look in his eyes.

  I had often accused the local keihu people of being lazy, humourless bureaucrats, but like so many of my ill-informed snap judgements, I was quickly coming to re-evaluate that opinion. Even if keihu weren’t blessed with the most attractive physique and their ways were unassuming, they were incredibly stubborn and could be funny if you took the time to pay attention to their dark, self-deprecating comments.

  “Let’s have this mother-of-all-problems, then.”

  “I’ve discovered why so many people have been angry at you.”

  “You mean any reason other than that I cleared out without notice, stayed away for three weeks and came back with someone who will change the course of history?”

  “Other than that.”

  “It had better be something we can fix then.”

  “We can, but it’s going to need some investment. The reason why you haven’t responded to a lot of urgent correspondence is that you never got it. The hub storage is full.”

  I stared at him. “Is that all? Empty it.”

  “That’s all very well, Muri, but what do I do with all the messages, materials and documents that people have sent you?”

  “Isn’t there some sort of backup running?” I didn’t see why this was my problem. Information systems and communication was Devlin’s job. Surely he could shift all that stuff elsewhere and allow the current space to be usable again? I didn’t know anything about data systems. That’s why I had him.

  “There is a backup, and it works. And we use it all the time. It’s just that I cannot back up things that haven’t been dealt with.”

  Oh. Hell. “You mean . . . the storage has filled up in the space of those three weeks?”

  He nodded. “And more is coming in every day. More than we can deal with. I’d apply for bigger storage, but I’m sure Delegate Namion would get upset because it will then be bigger than his storage.”

  And Delegate Namion could certainly not be allowed to get upset. I was tempted to roll my eyes, but Delegate Namion and whoever elected the doofus as Chief Delegate was another subject altogether. “Well, in that case . . . maybe we should try to direct some of the correspondence to Delegate Namion.”

  “We’re already doing that, but we cannot stop people using your main address.”

  No, we couldn’t. “What is it all about, anyway?”

  “Your trip, the Aghyrians, any of your projects in the past. A long list of subjects.”

  “Who is it from?”

  “All kinds of people. A lot of civilians. Individuals, smaller organisations, businesses. All kinds. From everywhere. Gamra worlds, non-gamra worlds, Indrahui, even.”

  “And why are they all writing to me? They should be writing to their own representatives.”

  “Yes. And some have. But the representatives cannot answer the questions, so they’ve sent them on to you.”

  “But why not Delegate Namion?”

  “I’ve looked at it. A lot of messages ask
quite detailed questions and I know I’m not supposed to comment on it, but I don’t think Delegate Namion would have a clue how to reply to them.”

  Oh. Yes. I couldn’t disagree with that. And ouch. And I still didn’t understand why the assembly had chosen him to succeed Delegate Akhtari.

  The little voice in my head said, Then you should have been here, shouldn’t you? That was the story of my life in these last few days.

  But I’d had no idea that using the Asto military’s single-node exchange sling would lose us three weeks. Three weeks! The biggest chunk of time the regular Exchange system lost was about half a day on a transfer to Hedron.

  I spread my hands. “All right. I will make a quick selection of the correspondence. I will probably authorise you to dump a huge lot of it in Delegate Namion’s account. Then we’ll clear it all out. And get more storage, anyway. We can’t stop people sending us correspondence. If Delegate Namion complains, send him to me.”

  He nodded, looking happy. One of the rumours about me I’d heard in the corridors was that my staff liked to work for me because I would often do exactly as they’d hoped I would. Whatever that was supposed to mean.

  Devlin opened the door, letting in another wave of yelling.

  “Devlin, while you go past Nicha’s room, do tell that woman to shut up.”

  “Uh-uh. Not doing that. I’d rather keep my head where it belongs, Muri.”

  I could understand that.

  He shut the door. I ignored the sound of muffled yelling through the door and pulled my reader in front of me.

  I hadn’t accessed the correspondence directories since coming back, because I’d been too busy, and because I had relied on my staff to keep them under control and pass the important items to me, but I was horrified to see that Devlin had been right. Everything was full to capacity. Almost every directory had a time period of a few days this week when no messages had come in at all—probably bounced because there was no space, until the ones from yesterday and today, when the auto-backup had made some space because I had dealt with some correspondence.

  The most recent ones that I had received were all high-priority correspondence, from the Aghyrian delegation whom I had abandoned without notice or from the Barresh council and various other people who had been upset with me not reacting to their correspondence because it wasn’t getting to me. This included messages that should have been replied to with automated responses. For example, every three days a slew of authorities like the Barresh Council, the Pilot’s Guild and a whole bunch of additional professional organisations would send me a message requesting updates on the negotiation process. My account would automatically send out this material from the relevant administration accounts where my staff kept recordings of meetings and tabulated the status of various negotiation processes.

  When I left with Ezhya to go to the massive Aghyrian ship that the Asto military had cornered in a distant part of the galaxy, it was bad enough that I’d left the negotiations about the Aghyrian claim in limbo. My account had failed to send out updates to all the people who wanted them.

  Bloody hell.

  What a disaster. As if having the zeyshi Aghyrians walk out furious about a week after I disappeared wasn’t enough. Fortunately, I had received their latest statement yesterday, because I don’t think my system would have survived having it re-sent without scorch marks.

  Three. Fucking. Weeks.

  Thousands and thousands and thousands of messages.

  With one tap of a button, I sorted everything according to the mandatory gamra priority levels. This system was only used within gamra, so any correspondence from outside automatically fell to the bottom of the priority scale, where, ironically enough, it was easiest to find.

  As I scrolled to the top of the list, there were a couple of priority one messages, all of them from Ezhya Palayi’s account.

  That was weird.

  Ezhya didn’t use the gamra account. If he wanted to contact me, he would use the direct link through the Exchange which reached me through the hub, not via the gamra system. I opened the oldest message. It said,

  Daddy tells me not to be upset that you left suddenly, but I cannot be ‘not upset’ when I am upset. You promised me that we would go to the beach if I did all my work. I finished all of it, and I even helped Eirani with her things. I know how to make bread and how to fold the laundry. I did everything she said, but I did not even get to see you before Daddy’s guards came to take me home. It’s so boring here. There is no one to talk to. I don’t like my sister. She screams too much and my parents give her too much attention. They tell me I have to have more lessons, but my tutors are all boring old men. I understand that you’re busy and that what happened is important for now. I would like to make a time that I can come back soon and you’ll be able to teach me how to surf.

  She used the Isla word for surf, with Isla characters.

  I chuckled. At only eight years of age, that little rascal Raanu was fast starting to outsmart her father, learning how to use his top priority message privilege.

  There were a couple more messages from her, each sent a day apart. None of them were identical.

  Another said,

  I got into an argument with my tutor today. He says that the zeyshi Aghyrians are nothing but opportunistic sleazebags taking advantage of a loophole in gamra law. I asked him has he seen how these people live, in holes in the ground, guarding the old treasures? I think they deserve better than what we have given them so far. I don’t know. I could be made to agree that the Aghyrians in Barresh are sleazebags, although their sense of fashion is impeccable.

  I laughed out loud at that one.

  Another message said,

  After you left, I was so bored I actually went to sit in the public gallery at the assembly meeting. I saw how they elected Delegate Namion. He got the votes basically because a lot of people hated Delegate Ayanu so much. I felt sorry for the poor guy who put his name in after the first round of voting. He seemed a decent sort, but by that time, the race was between Delegate Ayanu and Delegate Namion and he came in too late.

  I laughed at that analysis, too. That “poor guy” had been Delegate Samarin of Miran, a very serious gentleman who would have had to be extremely stressed out by the situation to put his name forward. Its turbulent history notwithstanding, Miran was usually a quiet bystander in most conflicts, a major agricultural export powerhouse that saw no sense in upsetting too many of its customers.

  Raanu had sent the last two messages this morning. The first one said,

  I am very sorry to have bothered you. I should not have wasted your valuable time with my childish complaints.

  Raanu Palayi

  Hmm, that was oddly formal.

  Coldi rarely signed their clan name, preferring to go by first name only—their first names were unique. A register was kept to let expectant parents see which names were available. A Coldi person would only sign with a clan name for very serious occasions.

  The second message said,

  Daddy made me write the previous message. He discovered that I’d been using this account, and he wanted me to apologise, although I’m not aware that I did anything wrong.

  I laughed. The rascal.

  Privately I was sure Ezhya was laughing as well. Raanu was every bit her father’s daughter.

  My good mood lasted until I saw that underneath the last message from Raanu, arrived barely an hour ago, was another priority one message from an unfamiliar account in the gamra security group.

  What the hell? Why would security send me anything urgently?

  I opened it up, feeling sick. It was bad enough that we’d had Tamerians running around the supposedly secure island, a fact which I didn’t expect security to openly acknowledge. Was this about some other problem?

  The message was very short. It said,

  I heard you found it. Please confirm at your earliest opportunity and arrange a visit.

  There was no name, but the location tracking sho
wed that the message had been sent from a unit on the ground floor of my building. I knew who was in that particular apartment. I guess I’d better inform gamra security that Captain Kando Luczon had been here less than a week and had already cracked their system.

  Add that to the growing pile of disasters. No, actually, it was something I needed to address right now.

  Chapter 2

  * * *

  I WOULD NORMALLY have left the room in search of Thayu, but I was hesitant to brave the situation outside, so I sent her a message instead. She came into the room not much later, again letting in a wave of yelling.

  “Seriously, does that woman ever get tired of it?”

  Thayu shrugged while she sat down. “She’s very stressed.”

  “Really? I hadn’t noticed.”

  She gave me her famous cold dead fish look.

  “What? She’s been behaving terribly ever since we came back. I can’t find any good excuse for it, especially not when most of the abuse is directed at Eirani and the staff who have been going out of their way—”

  “It’s not unusual for Coldi mothers to become extremely stressed just before the birth. Their bodies are telling them that they should seek safe places and make everything perfect before they go into labour.”

  Oh. Variation number six thousand and fifty-nine of putting my foot in it. Thayu had given birth. Thayu wanted another child. Despite having no love for Xinanu, Thayu understood what she was going through, about to bring a child into the world in an essentially hostile household.

  I sighed. Boy, I was an arse. “Well then let’s hope it all happens speedily and safely.”

  She looked out the window.

  I sighed and put my hand over hers on her knee. She didn’t respond at first, but then turned her hand palm up and squeezed.

  “I’m sorry,” I said. “I guess we’re all stressed. We just seem to be going from monumental fuck-up to monumental fuck-up.”

  “What happened now?”

  I showed her Kando Luczon’s message.

  Her eyes widened. “He broke into security?”