Blue Remembered Earth

‘Hard to say, other than that it had something to do with Mercury. That was where they were assembling the parts for the telescope and launching them into space. We were helping with the shipment of materials and know- how. Not a free lunch, though: Eunice and Lin might have been pals, but this was business. But the Pans weren’t paying us directly. In return for our services, the Akinyas got to piggyback their own start-up venture on Mercury.’

‘What kind of venture?’

‘That’s where it gets murky. I’m in the family and even I can’t get to the bottom of what went wrong.’ Sunday couldn’t help but lower her voice: it was a pointless but unavoidable response. ‘We built a facility there, to tap into the same solar-power grid the Pans were using for their Ocular assembly and launch plant. What we did in that facility . . . well, that’s not easy to say. Cover story was physics research, which makes a sort of sense: we were involved in propulsion system design, and you’d need a lot of energy to do anything worthwhile in that area. But it appears that was just a smokescreen.’

‘Wish my family was half as interesting,’ Jitendra said. He had brought the plastic jewels with him, and was pushing them into cryptic little configurations around the damp circle left by his stein.

‘Trust me,’ Sunday said, ‘you really don’t need a family as interesting as ours.’

‘A smokescreen? For what, exactly?’ Geoffrey asked.

‘For bad machines,’ Sunday said. ‘Artilects. Like the one that got into my head when I fell down that hole. Nothing’s been proved, but it looks as if we were using our means and resources to smuggle contraband artilects to Mercury, under the noses of the authorities, for the purposes of reverse engineering and duplication. Making sure we’d be ahead of the game if and when the Gearheads relaxed the ties on AI research.’

Her brother stroked a finger under his chin. ‘How much of this is guesswork?’

‘Lin Wei had her own suspicions, so she conducted some espionage against us,’ Sunday said. ‘Sent industrial spies into our organisation, found out about the artilect research. That was the start of the bad feeling: not only had we lied about our intentions, but we were developing thinking machines. Needless to say, Lin Wei took that as a grave personal insult. As well she might: it was a betrayal of a lifetime’s friendship and trust. Meanwhile, the Gearheads had been following their own lines of investigation. They closed in on Mercury, aiming to make a forced inspection.’

‘What happened?’

‘By the time they broke into the facility it had been trashed. Deliberate sabotage, to hide any evidence of a crime. Big stink at the time; damaged us and the Pans, but we both bounced back. Ocular was the only real casualty. With the breakdown in relations between the Akinyas and the Pans, the project was left half-finished.’ Sunday nodded in the vague direction of the ceiling, to the Lunar bedrock and the vacuum above their heads. ‘It’s still out there, still gathering data, just not as extensively as they planned.’

‘And the moral of this tale?’ Geoffrey asked.

‘Just that we’re already in bed with the Pans, brother. The marriage might not be something anyone likes to talk about now, but you can’t undo history.’

‘Whatever Eunice got up to, it’s nothing to do with me or my elephants.’

‘No, but it might have something to do with me,’ Sunday said. ‘Maybe they know stuff about Eunice I can’t find out from anyone else.’

Something dawned in Geoffrey’s eyes. ‘So that’s why we have to dine with Chama and Gleb.’

Sunday bottled up her exasperation. She was asking so little of Geoffrey: why, for once in his life, couldn’t he think of the bigger picture? ‘They’re just bit players, brother. They don’t have the keys to every Pan secret. But if we help them, maybe they can get someone else to help us. It’s reciprocity.’

‘That visit to the zoo didn’t just happen on the spur of the moment, did it?’

Sunday noticed Chama and Gleb being shown to the table, stooping beneath the low-hanging handrails and equipment lockers bolted to what was now the ceiling, but which had once been just another usable surface of the ISS. Sunday and Jitendra budged up to make room for the zookeepers.

Chama leaned in and reached for Geoffrey’s hand. ‘Good to see you again!’ he said, grinning broadly.

Geoffrey returned the handshake, but his response was dour. ‘Nice to see you, too.’

Gleb was no longer wearing his laboratory overcoat, and Chama had divested his waistcoat pockets of some of their bulkier contents. Other than that they hadn’t changed much since the meeting in the zoo.

‘So, Jitendra,’ Sunday said brightly, while Chama and Gleb buried their faces in the drinks menu, ‘any news on Eunice?’

‘Sunday . . .’ Geoffrey said.

She fixed on a puzzled expression. ‘What?’

‘I’m not sure that’s something we really ought to be discussing in public.’

‘Chama and Gleb have already confided in us about their own work,’ Sunday said. ‘The least we can do is return the favour, wouldn’t you say?’

‘Right,’ Geoffrey said, shooting her a look that let her know exactly what he thought about that.

Chama looked up. ‘We don’t want to cause any awkwardness.’

‘My brother’s referring to some family business, not a state secret,’ Sunday said. ‘And I don’t think there will be any harm at all in you knowing about it.’

Jitendra smiled awkwardly. ‘Maybe I’ve got something. Possibly. While you were out, I decided to sniff around Pythagoras, see what I could find. Ching resolution isn’t ideal – not enough public eyes on that part of the Moon to give seamless coverage. Which is a bit of a problem if you’re trying to do some amateur sleuthing—’

‘Which we’re not,’ Geoffrey said firmly.