Carnifex

death.

'Belisario Carrera,' said the judge, 'you have been found guilty of the premeditated murder of Robert Nyere. We have no death penalty, as we have grown above such barbarisms. If we did, I would certainly have no choice but to sentence you to hang by the neck until you are dead. I would enjoy passing such sentence, Mr. Carrera, as the man you murdered, a flawless and faultless gem of mankind, was my nephew. As is, I sentence you to transportation for life to the colony of Balboa, on the Planet Terra Nova. May the planet kill you in a way I am forbidden from doing.'

'Bailiff, take him away.'

Long Island, New York, 15 April, 2099

It wasn't bad enough that Detective Juan Alvarez, as a city employee, had to pay tax to the city of New York, along with the State of New York, and the United States. No, no; that wasn't nearly bad enough. Now he had to pay as well, after filling out a half inch thick stack of virtually incomprehensible forms, to Earth's United Nations.

Actually, it was worse than that. The UN didn't collect a single tax. This would have been too simple and employed far too few bureaucrats. Instead, Alvarez had to pay to the General Assembly Fund, the Peacekeeping Fund, the Food and Agricultural Organization Fund, the Arts and Humanities Fund, the Reparations to the OAU for the Loss of Human Capital Fund . . .

'For Christ's sake,' Alvarez blurted out, putting his head down and running thick fingers through thinning hair, 'my family were goddamned serfs to the Spanish. Most of my wife's were serfs to the English. Why the hell are we paying the descendants of people who made money selling slaves for having sold those slaves?'

There was no answer, of course, or none that would satisfy. The real, and unsatisfactory, answer was that money was collected to go to the Organization of African Unity, in order to employ bureaucrats who knew nothing and did nothing, and pad the accounts of the chiefs of state of the countries that made up the OAU and those of their families.

With a sigh, Alvarez wrote out a check and attached it to the Human Capital Fund return, then added those to the pile. The next form was the tax return for the Repatriation Fund for non-Islamic citizens of the Zionist Entity. This, however, was an optional tax, mostly paid by Islamics across the world. Alvarez crinkled up the form and tossed it into the wastebasket.

UN direct taxation was not something federally mandated, nor even approved. Instead, over the last fifteen years, a growing number of states of the United States had adopted UN taxation within their state tax codes. They received a percentage back, much as private corporations and companies did with the sales tax, for what they collected on behalf of the UN. There was talk of an amendment to the Constitution. Certainly the Supreme Court had been no help since it had unilaterally decided it was subject to the laws and rulings of various international tribunals.

'I could move down south,' Alvarez said aloud. 'They don't collect for the UN, yet. But . . . ' He shook his head, no. The language of the American Deep South was now mostly Spanish, and Alvarez didn't speak Spanish. Not much work for a police detective in North Carolina who couldn't speak Spanish, less still in Texas.

'Besides, they're a mess down there; Mexico in confederate gray. I couldn't afford the bribes to get on a police force even if I did speak Spanish. No wonder great-great-grandpappy wet his ankles in the Rio Grande. No wonder . . . '

Alvarez felt one of those rare epiphanous moments that happen, sometimes, when two or three different little reminders hit all at once. The Jews are leaving Israel en masse for Terra Nova, and the more that leave, the more want to. When the going got tough in Mexico, not that it was ever likely to have been too easy, Great-Grandpappy lit out for greener pastures. And there's not too much fucking bureaucracy on the New World.

'Honey?' he called out to his wife. 'I just had an idea . . . '

Chapter Seven

Set a thief to catch a thief.

—Gallic Proverb

Set a lawless non-governmental organization to destroy a lawless non-governmental organization.

—Patricio Carrera

UEPF Spirit of Peace, 27/5/467

'Computer, center on target and enhance scale.'

At Robinson's command the image on his Kurosawa screen shifted, then changed, going from the western half of the continent of Uhuru and the eastern half of the Sea of Sind to a narrow view of Xamar Coast and, finally, to the little flotilla comprising the Dos Lindas task force. It was in real time; he could actually see the aircraft taking off and landing.

'From here we could toss a rock down and destroy their flagship, but . . . '

'But,' Wallenstein interjected, 'the FSC has made clear that any direct military action on the part of the UEPF on any target down below will be an instant casus belli. No matter the party in power, none have ever wavered from it. They'd be hounded from office if they did.'

Robinson sneered, not at Wallenstein but at the memory of his predecessor, the High Admiral who had scorched two of the Federated States' cities.

'I wonder if he knew the trouble he would cause us.'

Wallenstein shook her blonde head. 'I doubt it. It's easy to forget how quickly an uncivilized and uncontrolled people can advance if they have good reason to.'

'Which reason my predecessor certainly gave them. And all for nothing since they won that war anyway. The only difference was that there were twenty or thirty million fewer Yamatans to see the end. Oh, well, spilled milk and all. Besides, he paid with his life, after a fashion.'

Robinson turned his attention back to the Kurosawa. 'I can't attack them directly. I can; however, make sure they not able to attack anyone else.'

Wallenstein made a quizzical sound.

'It's simple, Marguerite. That contemptible little fleet can only affect the sea it occupies and about three or four hundred kilometers around it. Even that three or four hundred, though, is constrained by the speed of their aircraft and the chance of being in the right place at the right time. We get to choose whether those times and places will be right.'

Robinson's voice changed to the neutral, uninflected tone used for talking to machines. 'Computer, connect me with Abdulahi.'

To the High Admiral's mild surprise, the answer came almost immediately. A melodious voice said, 'Yes, High Admiral; Abdulahi here.'

There's a shock; one of those down below actually listening to instructions.

Whatever his thoughts, Robinson confined his words to business. 'Friend, that new threat I told you of has taken up station off your coastline.'

'I see that, High Admiral,' the Xamari answered. Robinson had transferred to him, as he had to Mustafa, the means of tapping directly into UEPF surveillance and sensing systems. 'We can easily avoid them.'

'Excellent, Abdulahi.'

4/6/467 AC, BdL Dos Lindas, Xamar Coast

'This is superb, Commodore,' Fosa complimented Kurita on the sushi the Yamatan had prepared from fish he'd caught himself the night before.

Kurita smiled, slightly, and nodded, acknowledging the compliment.

Fosa looked around at the Yamatan's quarters. In warship terms they were the height of luxury, measuring all of about three hundred and twenty square feet. Even Fosa's own were not quite so large. They were furnished well, as warships measured such things. Kurita had hung on one wall a portrait of the emperor he had served ably and bravely in the Great Global War. That emperor had long since joined his divine ancestors. His memory retained Kurita's loyalty, even so.

It wasn't the size or the luxury, nor even the portrait of the emperor and what it said of Kurita, the samurai, that impressed Fosa. It was the unbelievable cleanliness of the quarters.

He'd asked of his senior naval centurion how the place had gotten so completely sanitized. The centurion had shrugged, 'Got no clue, Cap'n. He never asked us for anything but a mop and bucket, sponges and some rags. Oh, and liquid cleaner.'

Fosa was left with the only possible solution; that Kurita, at nearly a century old, had gotten down on his ancient hands and knees and made quarters fit for his emperor's portrait. That was rather