was the ‘floor’ of rooms and corridors that filled the torus. Attitude thruster jets kept the spin stable and fast enough to produce one-half Earth gee or better in artificial spin-gee. Spin-gee allowed Belters to live their entire lives in the Asteroid Belt, have children, raise them, and then send them out in Hopper ships to locate new sources of water ice, metals and tholin organics for making veggie gardens.
“You were born in Prague, weren’t you?”
Nikola turned inside her helmet to look at him. “Jack! You know that. And you know that my family emigrated to Mars when I was four years old.” Her pale blue eyes looked him over. “You only talk non-sequiturs when something is bothering you. What is it?”
“My youngest sister Cassandra,” he muttered over the comlink as a distant EVA-suited form jetted toward them from the far side of the asteroid’s cavern. “She’s twenty-two. Finished with polysci grad school. Dumped her boyfriend. Wants to be a spy. For me and my Alien crusade.”
“Oh.” Nikola’s brown hair floated away from her sequined headband. She blinked long lashes as she looked away from him to the cavern’s busy interior, then back to him. “Jack, any chance your older sister Elaine can talk her out of this scheme? Elaine’s a trained pilot and a medoc. Plus spending time on Ceres Central is not the choice of most Belters. From what your Mom and Dad have told me.”
He licked dry lips, recalling the family confab that had happened two days ago. Inside his clan’s room compound inside the torus that spun above them. Cassandra, dressed only in a black leotard and soft boots, had looked at Richard their Dad, Julia their Mom, her sister Elaine, and Jack, then declared her intention to be a spy at Ceres Central, saying she had no desire to be a roving rockrat. His parents, recalling the martyr death of Grandpa Ephraim, had chosen lives of moving from one asteroid to another in their family’s ancient Hopper ship, locating mineral outcrops on the smaller asteroids that had no IAU names, plotting them, planting a Claim Beacon, then selling the exploitation rights at Vesta’s Central Hall market. It was a traditional Belter life and career, one that many Belters chose for its personal freedom and ability to escape the formal attention of Earth officials like the Belt’s Governor Aranxis. Jack, Elaine and Cassandra had grown up in that life, relying on the Open Libraries and the Belt’s many Remote Tutors to earn an education. While his mother Julia did hire out as an IT troubleshooter, Belter society had always been dispersed. After the defeat of the Belter Rebellion in 2072, that dispersal had allowed most Belters to avoid ‘indentured’ service to Unity officials and businesses. Others called it what it was—serfdom, just shy of legal slavery. Like everyone, his family paid annual taxes to Ceres Central based on their declared income from Central Hall rights sales. And like every living Belter, his family lied each year about just how much income they made. While Aranxis sometimes sent Tax Agents to monitor rights sales at Vesta Central Hall, tracking down Belters who’d sold those rights was often impossible. So the Unity settled for ‘official’ control of the Belt while the Belters lived lives of hard work, some desperation and deep memory of the lives lost twenty-six years ago.
“No luck. Elaine tried that two days ago when Cassandra first brought it up. Even offered Cassie a place on her own cargo ship.” Jack watched as the suited figure drew closer to him and Nikola, his memory matching the suit’s white and orange stripes with a familiar name. “Max is coming to visit. Maybe he has news on the fusion pulse Main Drive module we bought for the new Uhuru .”
Nikola moved to insert her arm inside his arm. Their love had grown deeper after Nikola left Charon Base and found Jack in the Belt. She’d said, on arrival at Vesta a month ago, that she’d left due to the
“You were born in Prague, weren’t you?”
Nikola turned inside her helmet to look at him. “Jack! You know that. And you know that my family emigrated to Mars when I was four years old.” Her pale blue eyes looked him over. “You only talk non-sequiturs when something is bothering you. What is it?”
“My youngest sister Cassandra,” he muttered over the comlink as a distant EVA-suited form jetted toward them from the far side of the asteroid’s cavern. “She’s twenty-two. Finished with polysci grad school. Dumped her boyfriend. Wants to be a spy. For me and my Alien crusade.”
“Oh.” Nikola’s brown hair floated away from her sequined headband. She blinked long lashes as she looked away from him to the cavern’s busy interior, then back to him. “Jack, any chance your older sister Elaine can talk her out of this scheme? Elaine’s a trained pilot and a medoc. Plus spending time on Ceres Central is not the choice of most Belters. From what your Mom and Dad have told me.”
He licked dry lips, recalling the family confab that had happened two days ago. Inside his clan’s room compound inside the torus that spun above them. Cassandra, dressed only in a black leotard and soft boots, had looked at Richard their Dad, Julia their Mom, her sister Elaine, and Jack, then declared her intention to be a spy at Ceres Central, saying she had no desire to be a roving rockrat. His parents, recalling the martyr death of Grandpa Ephraim, had chosen lives of moving from one asteroid to another in their family’s ancient Hopper ship, locating mineral outcrops on the smaller asteroids that had no IAU names, plotting them, planting a Claim Beacon, then selling the exploitation rights at Vesta’s Central Hall market. It was a traditional Belter life and career, one that many Belters chose for its personal freedom and ability to escape the formal attention of Earth officials like the Belt’s Governor Aranxis. Jack, Elaine and Cassandra had grown up in that life, relying on the Open Libraries and the Belt’s many Remote Tutors to earn an education. While his mother Julia did hire out as an IT troubleshooter, Belter society had always been dispersed. After the defeat of the Belter Rebellion in 2072, that dispersal had allowed most Belters to avoid ‘indentured’ service to Unity officials and businesses. Others called it what it was—serfdom, just shy of legal slavery. Like everyone, his family paid annual taxes to Ceres Central based on their declared income from Central Hall rights sales. And like every living Belter, his family lied each year about just how much income they made. While Aranxis sometimes sent Tax Agents to monitor rights sales at Vesta Central Hall, tracking down Belters who’d sold those rights was often impossible. So the Unity settled for ‘official’ control of the Belt while the Belters lived lives of hard work, some desperation and deep memory of the lives lost twenty-six years ago.
“No luck. Elaine tried that two days ago when Cassandra first brought it up. Even offered Cassie a place on her own cargo ship.” Jack watched as the suited figure drew closer to him and Nikola, his memory matching the suit’s white and orange stripes with a familiar name. “Max is coming to visit. Maybe he has news on the fusion pulse Main Drive module we bought for the new Uhuru .”
Nikola moved to insert her arm inside his arm. Their love had grown deeper after Nikola left Charon Base and found Jack in the Belt. She’d said, on arrival at Vesta a month ago, that she’d left due to the
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