Bobbie shifted her chair, turning it out so her legs were free. It might have been a casual gesture, except that it wasn’t. Holden ran his hands over the top of the table. Whatever it was made from wasn’t wood, but it had the same hardness and subtle texture. Houston and his cabinet were quiet. He had their attention now.
Holden needed to decide what to do with it. Follow instructions or fudge it a little.
“There are two ways this can go,” he said, fudging a little. “The first one is the union cuts off gate access to Freehold for three years.”
“We aren’t self-sustaining yet,” one of the other cabinet members said. “You’re talking about a death sentence for three hundred people.”
“That’s a decision you folks made when you sent your unauthorized ship through the gates,” Holden said. “Or maybe you can find some way to up the timetable. Get a way to feed people sooner. That’s up to you. But for three years, any ship going in or out of the Freehold gate gets killed without warning. No exceptions. Communications in and out of the gate are jammed. You’re on your own. Or, option two is Governor Houston comes with us for trial and probably just a whole lot of jail time.”
Houston snorted. His expression looked like he’d taken a bite of something rotten. The other people on the bench were less demonstrative. Freehold was a colony of pretty good poker faces.
“You forget the third option,” Houston said. “Being the ambassador of tyranny is a job with risks, Captain Holden. Very. Real. Risks.”
“Okay, so let’s do the math on that,” Holden said. “We’re here, and there are a dozen of you up there and four guards at the doors—”
“Six,” Bobbie said.
“Six guards at the doors,” Holden said, not missing a beat. “If you just look at the hundred or so meters around this building, we’re totally outnumbered and outgunned.
“So force,” Houston said, shaking his head. “Taxation always comes at the end of a gun.”
“I thought of it more as an argument against shooting ambassadors,” Holden said. “We’re leaving now and going back to our ship. Twelve hours after we get there, we’re taking off. If we have Governor Houston here on board, you can start scheduling ships with the union again. If not, we’ll send someone back in three years to check in.”
Holden stood up, Bobbie following his lead so closely that she was on her feet before him. Houston leaned forward, his left hand on the table and his right at his side like it was resting on the butt of a gun. Before the governor could say anything, Holden started for the door. The guards watched him step forward, their eyes cutting from him to Bobbie, then up to Houston. In Holden’s peripheral vision, Bobbie settled a little deeper into her legs, her center of gravity solidifying. She was humming softly, but he couldn’t quite pick out the melody.
As they reached the door, the guards stood aside, and Holden started breathing again. A short corridor to the anteroom, then out to the dirty street. He eased his hand terminal out of his pocket as they walked. Alex picked up the connection as soon as he put in the request.
“How’s it going out there?” Alex asked.
“We’re on our way back now,” Holden said. “Make sure the airlock’s open when we get there.”
“You coming in hot?” Alex asked.
“Maybe,” Holden said.
“Copy that. I’ll have the welcome mat out and the PDCs warmed up.”
“Thank you for that,” Holden said and dropped the connection.
“You really think they’ll be dumb enough to make a play?” Bobbie asked.
“I don’t want to bet my life on other people being smart,” Holden said.
“Voice of experience?”
“I’ve been hurt before.”
Freehold was the name of the town and the planet and the solar system. Holden couldn’t say which had come first. The town nestled in a valley between two ridge mountains. A soft breeze smelled faintly of acetate and mint, by-products of whatever chemistry the local biosphere had figured out for its life cycles.
