to foment, are you? If you are, maybe...'
Smith scoffed at the very motion. 'The ignorant greenies on this planet are completely incapable of doing what she told them to do. That was actually the most amusing part of her little speech. Greenies organizing a recall vote? Ridiculous.'
'So you see?' Hayes said, smiling a little. 'Things are well under control. You attack her from the political level and we'll attack her from the legal angle. She'll be impeached within a week and then we'll indict her and send her to prison for a year or so. That'll serve to get rid of the problem and make any of the other greenie politicians that might consider such a thing in the future do the same.'
Perhaps the only politician who was absolutely delighted by what Laura Whiting had done was the one who had the most to gain by it. Scott Benton had been sworn in as Lieutenant Governor of Mars about thirty minutes after Laura Whiting had left the stage. Though he had had a great speech planned — a rambling twelve-page jerk- off about how he was going to work through the differences that he and the Governor had to strive for a better tomorrow — he had been unable to give it due to the unusual circumstances of the Whiting inauguration. After that the reporters had all left to go compose their stories, taking their cameras with them, and the legislature had voted an early recess to the gathering to give themselves time to return to their offices and think about the spectacle that they had witnessed. Benton's swearing in had been in front of less than twenty witnesses and hundreds of empty chairs, without a doubt the most unceremonious inauguration of a Lieutenant Governor on record.
Benton didn't care and in fact had never been happier about anything. He muttered his oath before the associate judge, making himself official, and then he immediately headed upstairs to his new office to begin his work. Whiting had actually thrown the Governor's office away. She had actually insulted and abused her own sponsors on live Internet before millions of people. Amazing, simply amazing. And now that she had done this he had no doubt that he would be sworn in by the senile old judge as Governor within days. There was no way that that bitch Whiting would be allowed to survive this.
A third generation Martian haling from New Pittsburgh, Benton had the cleverness of his people but the ambition of the Earthlings. The son of a MarsTrans chief lobbyist, he had chosen politics as his profession while he had still been in the private high school where he received his secondary education. He had always had a keen ear and a warm way with people and he had developed the instincts that went with the job well before graduating from the University of Mars at NP with his degree in political theory. By the end of law school he had already been marked by the powers-that-be (namely MarsTrans and Tagert Steel) as an up and coming star to be reckoned with. He had done two terms as an NP city councilman and one as mayor before moving into the legislature — the true springboard to high politics on Mars. He had made many friends among the people who counted as he worked his way through three terms on the legislature but had been derailed in his path towards the Governor's office by Laura Whiting, whose power and influence had always been just a few steps higher than his own. Whiting had a way of getting things done — she had pushed through the Martian Planetary Guard all of those years ago, had led the fight against the feds to have anti-bombardment emplacements installed in all of the cities, had pushed through a dozen or more anti-crime bills — and she was much loved by the Martian people because of this. He and his sponsors had known that running against such a popular candidate would be an exercise in futility and a huge waste of money so instead he had been encouraged to run for the number two spot which, by Martian constitutional rules was completely separate from the Governor's race. That he had won easily enough and he had been prepared to settle in for an unpleasant four to eight years under Whiting's thumb before he had another shot at the big spot. But now, Whiting had just handed him the Governorship after less than one hour in office. Amazing. He would have to remember to thank her as she was led away in handcuffs by the feds.
His staff members had set his office up the day before and he was not in there for more than two minutes before the first of the calls came in. It was from Robert Flanders himself, the CEO of operations for MarsTrans, which owned and operated eighty percent of the rail services, both passenger and freight, on the planet.
'I think you know what to do now, don't you, Scott?' he was asked after the preliminaries were taken care of.
'Yes sir,' he said. 'Beginning tomorrow I'll address the legislature and urge an investigation into Whiting for misrepresentation. I'll have her impeached in a matter of days.'
'Very good,' Flanders said, offering a fatherly smile. 'I can see we did well to invest in you. It's strange how fate works sometimes, isn't it?'
'Yes sir,' he replied truthfully. 'Indeed it is. I'll have my speechwriters and my staffers working all night. You'll have a governor in office in no time.'
Laura herself was, understandably under the circumstances, getting her fair share of Internet calls as well. Though she had a secretary to screen most of them, her high-powered former sponsors — and there were a lot of those — all had access to her private Internet address and they damn sure made use of it now. Though her fate had already been discussed and decided while she had still been on the stage saying her words, they all wanted to talk to her, to demand an explanation of her.
'Why, Laura?' Smith of Agricorp, her biggest sponsor, demanded once he got her online. 'What were you thinking? What were you doing? Why did you throw your career away like this?'
'I threw nothing away,' Laura told him curtly, her voice even and almost teasing. 'As of the moment I said, 'I do' I was governor of this planet. And as for why I did what I did, I believe I explained myself quite well during my speech. Surely you caught the speech, didn't you?'
General Jackson, commander of the MPG, was standing just off to the side, out of camera range. He chuckled a little at her words.
'You betrayed us, Laura,' he told her. 'After all we've done for you, after all we've spent getting you elected, this is how you repay us?'
'You mean that after all of the bribes you gave me I am now refusing to do as I'm told like a little RC toy. Sorry if I hurt your feelings, Smith. Do you think they'll fire you for this? I'm sort of anxious to find out how the head office in Denver responds.' She looked at her watch. 'The transmission should have gotten there about twenty minutes ago now. How long until they send a message back? Do you think it's on its way now? Or do you think they'll need more time to figure out how to shitcan you?'
'The head office is not your concern,' he told her angrily. 'What you should be worried about is your resignation. If it's in by tomorrow morning we'll call off the FLEB agents that are after you. We'll tell the public that you had a mental breakdown and they'll forget about all of this in a few months. I'm sure you have enough of our money stashed away to live comfortably for a while.'
'I have none of your money stashed away,' she told him. 'Every dollar went into my election account. Most of it is still there. Within a year your money won't be any good on this planet. And as for my resignation, you can forget it. Do your best. I'm here under the constitution and you have no means to get rid of me. You're not playing with an amateur here.'
'You think those ignorant greenies that you're so fond of are going to save you?' he asked her. 'Is that what you think? You think they're going to call off our legislature members with the little e-mail campaign you suggested? Tell me that you're not really that naïve, Laura.'
'I think you'll be surprised by what us greenies are capable of,' she told him. 'You've been degrading us and underestimating us for so long now that you have no idea of the resentment that most of us hold for all things corporate and Earthling. They'll compose those letters. Take my word for it. Actually, you don't have to take my word. Why don't you call up some of your pet politicians and ask them how many have come in so far?'
'I have no need to waste my time that way,' he said dismissively.
Laura shrugged. 'You'll just have to hear it in the morning then, won't you? Our independence is coming, Smith. I think you might want to consider the best way to negotiate it with us so that Agricorp comes out on top. My offer was sincere. You hand your assets over to us and we'll continue to produce food and give it to you. If you cooperate, we'd be inclined to hand all of the food to
Smith shook his head a little, the way one does when one is dealing with a lunatic. 'I'm going to enjoy seeing you led away,' he told her. 'This is your last warning. Resign now before it's too late.'
'It's already too late,' she said. 'Goodbye, Smith. Don't send any more of your people here. I won't accept them.' With that she signed off, making his face disappear. Before ten seconds had gone by the next call came in and then the next and then the next after that. Most were sponsors but a few were reporters. She denied all calls from the big three reporters but gave a brief statement to the MarsGroup reporter, mostly just assuring her that she
