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Chapter 22: From The Attacking Pilot's viewpoint

rom Donna Bulgarde, the attacking pilot's viewpoint

At the GEO Clarke Belt Habitat Ring embarcation wheel, there were no detention quarters, as there was no reason for people to commit crime there in the Ring. So Donna found herself in a quarantine room intended for use in case of need for bacteriological outbreak isolation wards, but though there was room there for 4,000 people at a time, only she and a few Marines were occupants. She had pleasant quarters, good food, and freedom to go wherever she chose, within the huge isolation facilities. The Marines apologised to her, saying they could not understand her kind and so were attempting to be careful. Donna could not understand them either, what was wrong with them, if someone on earthsurface were to have done what she did, they would have soon been painfully killed in public view. These people were weird. Yet they were competent; the pilot who had outwitted her clearly was an expert and courageous. But somewhere there was a cork in this huge spacehome and she would find it and pull it out, let all the air out, and so would become rid of these hated creatures of the GEO Ring.

Many of the passengers who had their trip from ground to the GEO Habitat Ring delayed for the two hours while the patrol ship vs bombship fracas was going on, looked to the news broadcasts when they got home, to find out more of what had been going on.

There were holoimages of the pilot of the attacking spacecraft, first ever captured: Donna Bulguarde was her name; a very attractive woman but past childbearing age. She was being held in the large quarantine facility at the KESTS embarkation wheel. Was she being held there because they feared she was harboring some disease of the body, or just of the mind? Anyone who would strive to destroy the KESTS, so key to mankind's survival and that of the Earth's ecosystem's restoration, surely had some disease, at least of the mind, so was the consensus. So with fascination they watched this strange creature, a human who looked so much like themselves, but apparently was a mad wild animal inside yet with high intelligence and expert piloting skills. She was prowling the embarkation's quarantine facility, which was built with large numbers of families in mind who were enroute from the ground to their new homes in the GEO Clarke Belt Habitat Ring of space settlements.

Having not found an immediate cork to pull to let the air out of the habitat ring yet, Donna prowled to see what could be found as a weapon to fulfill her mission to destroy the KESTS, maybe even the GEO Habitat Ring too, what a hero she would be to those on the ground! For, she knew she was an undefeatable woman, and she was already in the domain of the hated arrogant ones.

Donna found a room with information access available. Inside were booths to enable new settlers to learn all that was needed to become a fully functioning competant member of the GEO Clarke Belt Habitat Ring. From versions for toddlers to adults, the instructions were geared to the age, experience goals and capabilities of the person. Donna took a seat, and suddenly the holoviewer made her aware of the entire habitat ring, the KESTS in all its fine detail moment by moment, even the view of the defended perimeter around the earthsurface terminal in Ecuador. Setting aside a moment her goal of finding a quick way to destroy all that, she allowed her curiosity to explore some of this dazzling array of colorful happenings. The holofield quickly assessed Donna's ability level and goals in life, to guide her in her quest for knowledge. In the speed of a dream, she learned the history of how the earth surface became depleted of resource after resource, the environment became terminally polluted by civilization's unrecyclable byproducts; the population rose up against the authoritarians that were enforcing the status quo for the benefit of the rich and powerful, and demanded they become responsible for humanity and civilization. The vote was made, the world population chose to move to temporary quarters built in GEO, while the earthsurface was restored to healthful long term balance, much as it was before civilization began to dribble its unrecyclable byproduct wastes all over the planet. There were two ways to lift so many people to space in such a short time: anchored earth tethers and KESTS. Both types went under emergency R&D and into construction, emplaced small at first, then used to build up themselves to working capacities. The anchored earth tether type space elevator was operational first; but when the KESTS became operational it was far more economical and its capacity much larger, and so it did most of the work. She skipped the details of how they built the main Clarke Belt habitat structures out of lunar raw materials, went to the part when the founders of the Earth Sovereign Nations (called "pirates" up here, she noted) halted the project, claiming themselves owners of all the abandoned property on Earth, and preventing the restoration of the ecosystem thereby.

The "pirates" as they called them up here, were made up of a surprisingly large number of the people who had been rich and powerful in the pre-KESTS regimes; corporate, governmental and militarily powerful, those who were unwilling to trade their elite status on the ground for being on a somewhat leveled playing field up in the GEO Habitat Ring cities. They had plotted the takeover and executed it perfectly, now were in possession of a worldfull of resources and military weapons, and everything else on the ground. Their military component drove the weak defense of the KESTS to a balance of about a hundred mile radius of the Ecuadorian KESTS ground terminal. And the "pirates" celebrated their wealth beyond anything they had before. Beyond that, little was known of what transpired after that on the ground, other than the attacks by the bombships periodically from the earth, And new data: the bombships were being piloted by women who were past childbearing age, no longer useful to the masters of the ground... Donna realized with surprise that she was already integrated into the knowledge base. A bit worried, she inquired about herself as now existed in the knowledge base for all to see. She saw herself in the quarantine facility, seated in an information access terminal, she also could see her self inside and out, her subvocal thoughts since arriving here including her determined search for a "cork" to be pulled to let the air out. There was no recrimination, no penalty threatened, the terminal merely described what was. She was a powerful woman, a great bombpilot, an undefeatable saboteur and soldier, and yet here she was, naked beyond any nakedness she had ever imagined possible, for all to observe, even herself.

She disconnected from the information terminal, got up and pondered all this a moment. She realized even now every thought subvocalized was being watched by whomever. And they had not destroyed her on the spot. Why not? Were they toying with her, like a cat with a mouse before dinner?

No mouse was she, no cat's dinner was she, she determined, and quickly went back to the information interface, merged into it again. She looked for the weapons, the jaws of destruction set to chomp down on her at any time. There were the few Marines lounging in their quarters here in the quarantine facility, but that was the whole extent she could see immediately. Were they such fools? Did they not understand what she had attempted to do as a bombpilot, almost succeeded in destroying their precious link to the ground forever? So she thought the question of the infoholoterminal, "why are they not destroying me? What power stays their hand?" The answer was that they did not destroy anybody, because everyone was precious. There was never an intent to harm her. They just did not know what to do with her. But she was a sensation in the news, and billions were fascinated with her this very instant. Some appreciated her physical beauty, others appreciated her single-minded sense of duty and great competence. Most were just curious what the earth pirate people were like, and here was the first one ever to be among them. Welcome! they said to her, billions of people at once, Welcome to the pursuit of life, liberty and happiness with us!

posted by Unknown @ 8:06 PM