Ark

38

The successful crew, the final eighty, were led by Gordo and his staff out of the hall into a smaller lecture theater. Gordo climbed up to the stage, where a podium with a blue seal on the front had been set up. A glass-walled compartment at the back held spectators. The candidates-no, the crew, Holle thought-sat in their rows, filling barely a quarter of the theater. There were so terribly few of them. And she estimated that no more than sixty percent wore the uniforms of the official Candidates.

Kelly and Wilson escorted Holle to a seat and sat to either side, making sure she stayed put. Kelly couldn’t conceal her exhilaration. Wilson was grim-faced, massive in his determination.

Holle couldn’t believe Mel wasn’t here, beside her. She felt as if she was on autopilot, unable to make decisions for herself, unable to imagine a future without Mel. She didn’t even know if she’d be allowed to see him again, unless she somehow busted out of this crew assignment.

Everybody around her shuffled to their feet. Glancing at the stage, she saw that President Peery was walking up to the podium.

Pat Peery was a short, stocky man, with a bald pate and a wide face; he wore a dark blue suit and lapel pins, a US flag to the left and his own patent whole-Earth pin to the right. He was followed onstage by a phalanx of dark-suited men and women, some of them surely security people, others maybe aides. Holle had never seen Peery in person before. He looked more like a comedian than a president, she thought, one of the stand-up comics whose improvised black humor about food shortages and eye-dees and epidemics was pumped out on the news channels in the small hours to distract insomniacs.

Peery spread his hands. “Please, sit down. I can imagine how you’re all feeling after the lottery business out there.” He patted his own belly. “Butterflies, right? I don’t want anyone fainting on me.”

His audience sat, and there was a tangible sense of relaxation, Holle thought, even a ripple of laughter.

Peery said, “Now, just nine years after my predecessor spoke to this project, we got our eighty, we got our crew. And before you prepare for your ascension I thought I should address you, and remind you of where you’ve come from, and where you’re going, and why.” He spread his hands. “These are extraordinarily difficult times for all of us. Well, you know that. You wouldn’t be riding an atom bomb to the stars otherwise. And it has been an extraordinarily difficult time to be President of this great country. You may not agree with every decision I’ve made while in office, every measure I’ve ordered. But I can assure you that every step I took was intended to ensure the survival of something of our nation beyond this dreadful historical terminus-survival of its heart and soul. And every step I took, I took in the eyes of God.

“That is as it should be. In a sense the whole trajectory of our nation’s history has been a kind of mission-I use the word in the best and bravest sense. I reversed President Vasquez’s policies regarding the secularization of the state. I may say I never tried to tamper with the Ark crew selection in that regard; things had gone too far. But you will know, if you have listened to my words at all over the last five years, that I have brought God back to the heart of our nation’s destiny.

“And in doing so, I believe, I have preserved your great project. I have argued in these final days that you, your Ark, are a pure and noble expression of the mission brought to this continent by our founders, an expression in an age of an ultimate crisis they could never have foreseen. That is how I have rallied the nation to support you. And I have also ordered the continuation of a second mission, a second Ark, a project to build a sanctuary on the Earth itself. No, I know you never heard of that before- they never heard of you. Such are the times we live in.

“And to ensure these great projects were protected and adequately supported, I have had to take measures that many of you would find unpalatable. Which I find unpalatable. I’ll pick out one example that has affected you directly, right here today in Gunnison.

“We brought you in here to the Zone early, without warning, so as not to allow the eye-dees and saboteurs and other crazies any chance to blow up the Ark or throw their babies over the fence, or otherwise disrupt the mission. We got you locked down before they knew what was happening.

“But here’s the blunt truth. In order to secure the loyalty of my generals, my senior military people, I had to grant their children places on the Ark. This wasn’t done arbitrarily; the kids had to satisfy basic standards of health, genetic diversity, competence and the rest. But now those men, those senior people, will be protecting their own children. They’ll do a job, believe me. But the process to which some of you have devoted your whole lives has been subverted at the very last minute. Maybe you hate me for this. I don’t blame you if you do. But if I had not, I don’t believe I could have guaranteed your security for the seven days left before you launch. I hope you understand, and will forgive me.

“Look, that’s enough from me. You have an enormous amount of work to do, and not very many hours left to do it in. Just remember that I, and all of your parents’ generation, have given you all we can to ensure your remarkable journey is successful. Some of us have blackened our very souls. Remember us, on Earth II.” He glanced at his watch, and at his aides. “I guess that’s it.” He walked away from the podium.

Everybody stood up.

As the President’s party left the stage, Edward Kenzie and Patrick Groundwater walked in from a side door. They hurried to the stage to join Gordo Alonzo, who was earnestly talking to Liu Zheng. Patrick looked around, scanning the audience anxiously, until he saw Holle, and he beckoned her urgently.

Holle ignored Kelly and the rest. She grabbed her bag and hurried down the steps, rushing to the stage. “Dad, oh, Dad-”

“Sweets.” Patrick grabbed her, hugging her close. He was hot, sweating, unshaven, as if he had been working through the night.

“I thought I wasn’t going to get to see you again.”

“Don’t be silly.” Patrick stepped back, smiling tiredly. “I just had to wait for the President. Quite a speech.”

Gordo grunted. “Same old horseshit from Pat Peery. It wasn’t about the project, he’s angling for the statues you’ll build to him on Earth II.” He shook his head. “Well, he’s a brutal operator. Including wrapping the whole thing up in a holy mission. What the times need, I guess.”

Holle didn’t care about Peery. “Dad. You know what happened-you know about Mel?”

“I’m sorry, sweets. You know there’s nothing I could do about that. You load in twenty outsiders at the last minute, you’re going to have to make space by dumping twenty insiders.”

“I won’t fly without Mel.”

Patrick cupped her cheek, as he had when she was very small. “Your whole life has led to this. You have to fly. Do it for me.”

“And besides,” Edward Kenzie murmured spitefully, “here you are. I don’t see you handing your token back to Gordo.”

Patrick turned on him. “You arsehole, Edward-”

Gordo said, “Can this wait until later? Holle, we got a kind of urgent situation on our hands we need your help with.”

Holle glared at him. “You’ll get no help from me.”

Gordo sighed and rubbed his face. “Jesus Christ-kids! Look, can you just pretend you’re still part of the fucking crew for another hour?”

Liu Zheng said, “Of all the Candidates, he will only speak to you.”

“Who?”

“Matt Weiss. He is waiting.”

Bewildered, she let herself be led away, while Kelly and the others stared after her.