Chapter 28

During the short flight over in the shuttle, Holden told her in more detail what to expect from the interrogation and the ship.

"It is basically a slightly bigger version of the Roci," he explained as the MCRN Ando grew closer as they approached. "All the system will be similar. The crew is bigger though," he grinned.

"They are going to ask you the same questions over and over, and worded differently, trying to catch you in a lie."

"Well, since I'm telling the truth, that won't be a problem."

"And don't lapse into Belter Creole. They might treat you better if you play up the orphaned Martian child angle."

"Rocinante shuttle, you are instructed to proceed to the aft docking port," a dispassionate female voice interrupted.

"Understood. Aft docking port," Holden replied.

"Now," he turned back to her, "if they won't return you to the Roci when you're released, try to get them to take you to Ganymede."

"But all my stuff is on your ship."

"Don't worry about it," Holden waved off her protest. "We'll get it to you if it comes to that. If they won't take you there, just a message to us and we will come to you. Got it?"

"Got it."

"Nervous?"

"Ya."

"Good." He leaned in close to look her in the eyes, "stay alert and stay alive, you hear me? I don't want Amos to tear apart the entire MCRN."

She snorted, "yeah, right."

"Oh, he could and would if he chose. Never underestimate him."

She didn't respond and just sat quietly while Holden went through the docking sequence with the Ando. Once they were secure, he released the controls and nodded to her.

"Remember this if you forget everything else: we aren't going to abandon you. Ever."

"Thanks, Captain," she said, meaning it.

He gave her a smile that once again transformed his face, "I think you can call me Jim."

"Thank you, Jim."

Nik was met at the airlock by a security detail that immediately escorted her to a holding cell to wait. As they made their way through the Ando, she saw that it was indeed just a larger version of the Roci. That would come in handy in an emergency. Not that she expected one. She hoped not anyway.

After an indeterminable period of time, the security detail escorted her to another room; dark with just a single table and two chairs. One of her guards told her to sit and, once she complied, the three men arranged themselves in a line behind her. Again, she waited. Holden, no, Jim, had warned her about this tactic. Intended to put her on edge and stress her out even more. Determined not to let their games get to her, she leaned forward to rest her head on her forearms on the table and shut her eyes. She hadn't slept for a while and was tired, so what better way to pass the time than to take a quick nap?

She was jerked out of her nap when the door slid open with a hiss and a short woman in an immaculate uniform entered the room. She strode around the table and scowled at Nik.

"What kind of game are you playing?"

Confused, Nik replied, "I was just taking a quick nap."

"That's not what I'm talking about," the woman snapped. "Have you made a deal with the UN?"

"The UN? Lady, I have no idea what you are talking about," she said with a sigh. She hadn't expected them to start off this intense.

"That's Captain, Captain Asha Catedral," the woman corrected. "Are you telling me you are so stupid that you don't know James Holden is the UN's lapdog?"

"I didn't make any deal with him or the UN. I just ended up on his ship after what happened at Tycho station."

"You didn't make a deal with him? Are you sure?"

"Absolutely," she was certain.

"Then how do you explain this?" The woman gestured at the screen on the wall with her handheld and Jim's face filled the screen.

"This is James Holden of the Rocinante…," he was saying. He went on to say that she, Nik, had turned herself willingly over to the MCRN in order to clear up a misunderstanding concerning her parents that happened twenty years ago. He went on to explain that the MCRN had been searching for her like she was a fugitive and had threatened them with the use of nuclear missiles.

"Niki Bordini went to them willingly and in good faith to clear up the issue. If something happens to her while she is under their protection, the entire system will know that the MCRN and by extension, Mars, do not operate in good faith and cannot be trusted to keep their word. This is James Holden, I and the rest of the system will be watching you, Captain Catedral."

The captain was furious, but Nik laughed when the feed ended. Jim was just doing what he was best at, poking the enemy in front of all humanity and daring it to strike him back. She sure as hell hoped it didn't backfire on her this time.

"You think this is funny, Ms Bordini?" If the captain scowled any deeper, the sides of her face might slide off.

"Ya, kind of."

The captain looked over her head at the men standing behind her, "take her back to the holding cell." Then she stormed out of the room.

"That went well, don't you think?" she asked the guards as she stood to leave. She could have sworn she saw the mouth of one of them twitch like he was stifling a smile.

She wasn't sure how long she was left in the cell this time, but she had been served three meals while she waited and slept off and on strapped to the hard bench against the wall. She had slept is worst conditions on the Tycho, so it didn't bother her as much as the bright overhead lights that never dimmed.

She would guess she had been on the Ando for over twenty-four hours, because her headache was back. While on the MCRN ship, she had missed her second dose of meds to combat her SSAD. Her symptoms would keep getting worse if she didn't get back to the Roci soon or convince her captors to provide the meds. She doubted they would, but it was worth a try.

This time when she was escorted from the cell to the dark room, she didn't have to wait long before the door slid open for a slender man to enter. Sitting in the chair opposite her, he nodded to the guards to leave the room. Then he pulled out a small case, took out a pill and broke it between his teeth. When he looked at her a second time, his eyes were dilated to the extent that the light brown of his irises were merely a ring around his large black pupils. Holden had told her about his too.

"Tell me, Ms Bordini, or may I call you Niki?" he cocked his head slightly in question.

"I go by Nik."

"Tell me, Niki," he continued as if she hadn't spoken, "how much is the UN paying you?"

"They aren't paying me anything."

"So, you're just giving them the research your traitorous parents stole from my government?"

"No, I'm not giving them anything. I don't have anything to give them."

"Then you're hiding it somewhere? Did you hide it on Vesta during your stay there?"

"No, I don't have anything to hide. I have no idea what you think I have." Despite being warned about this, she was still feeling irritated by it. Maybe it was her headache.

"If you don't have anything to hide, why did you run?"

"I didn't run. I was rescued by the crew of the Rocinante and they took the other Belters they rescued to Vesta. I was just along for the ride."

"But you did run, Niki," he leaned forward as if he had caught her in a lie. "The moment you heard we were on our way to Vesta, you fled."

"No, we dropped off the Belters, then Captain Holden was going to take me to Ganymede to be with my family there."

"Ah, your family," he gave her an oily smile. "The children, Luyne Yeu and Sean Byrne, and the woman, Maggie Johnston. You consider them your family?"

"Yes, I do."

"What about your real family? Did you know you have family on Mars?"

She started at the revelation.

"No? How could you not know this?"

"Maybe because I just recently found out my name was Bordini and I was born on Mars?"

"Do you seriously expect me to believe you spent twenty years on the Tycho and never once tried to find out who you were?"

"I really don't care what you believe," she snapped.

Again, he smiled disturbingly, "If you weren't running, why did the Rocinante go silent after it left Tycho station?"

Caught off-guard by his unexpected change of topic, she struggled for a moment to answer.

"Who knows why Captain Holden does anything?" It was a weak answer, but it was the best she could come up with.

"If you didn't make a deal with the UN, why did Holden send a transmission to the Secretary General of the UN?"

Around and around they went for the next hour. By the time her interrogator called an end to the session Nik's head was pounding and she was having trouble concentrating. The good news is that she managed to stick to the story. The only untruth she told was about why they ran quiet on the way to Vesta. He kept circling back to that point over and over, but she didn't waiver. Still, she was sure she had done nothing to convince him that she had nothing to hide.

Before the door to the holding cell closed between her and the guards, she stopped one of them.

"Can you ask someone about getting me some medication for my SSAS?"

"I can't promise anything, but I will relay your question to the watch commander," he told her.

"Thank you."

Exhausted, she crossed to the bench, lowering herself to it and tried to get some more rest.

Three meals later, she was back in the interrogation room. No medicine had been forthcoming to relieve her symptoms and her headache was still pounding at the inside of her skull. Her nose had started bleeding again and she had an annoying ringing in her right ear.

"You're not looking too good, Niki," her interrogator stared down at her. "I hear you have SSAS. I hear it's a painful condition."

She glared up at him with bleary eyes, "It's a blast. I recommend everyone try it."

"Glad to see you still have a sense of humor," he said as he sat down and pulled out the pill box. "Shall we get started?"

Nik lay listlessly on the bench, her eyes open but not focused on anything in particular. Her last session with the Lieutenant, she had finally figured out his rank, had been a repeat of the first: the same questions again and again. She felt that she was getting nowhere. Maybe this was a giant mistake. She owed Amos an apology. If she ever saw him again. The thought of not seeing him again made her chest tighten inexplicably.

Another meal of tasteless food was delivered, and she ate it automatically. Apparently, the Martians weren't going to let her starve, but they didn't seem to care about her SSAS symptoms.

She was about to drift off to sleep again when the door slid open to admit an older man in a rumpled uniform.

"Hi, young lady, I'm Dr. Tinsley," he introduced himself and he crossed to her and squatted. "Oh," he tutted, "you're not doing well, are you?"

The sleeve of her coveralls was red with the blood she had been wiping from her nose. With no gravity, it didn't drip; instead it pooled inside her sinuses until she couldn't breath and had to blow it out. The only thing she had available was her sleeve. She supposed she could have just blown it out into the room and let the droplets hang in the air, but that seemed a little gross.

"It's SSAS," she told him, unbuckling the strap that held her in place and sitting up to face him with some dignity.

"So, I was told," he nodded. "I'm going to take you to the med bay and run a full diagnostic on you, but this should help you a little."

He pulled out a compact injector and gestured at her arm. Pulling up her sleeve, she allowed him to administer the drug. The hammering pain in her head dulled almost immediately, but the ringing in her ear persisted.

"Better?"

"Ya, taki," she replied, slipping back into creole without thinking.

The doctor frowned slightly but held out his hand to help her get up, "let's get you to the med bay and get you cleaned up. Maybe some fresh clothes?"

Nik accepted his assistance and followed him from the cell. She noticed that her guard detail had been reduced to just one marine. Maybe they no longer thought she was a threat, which meant she might be getting through to them. Maybe.

In the medical bay, brighter and larger than the one on the Roci, the doctor helped her into a chair, and she slipped her arm into the diagnostic cuff. Her single guard didn't enter but posted outside the door to prevent her escape.

"They aren't very pleased with you right now," Dr. Tinsley said conversationally as he ran the machine. "Things would go easier on you if you just told them what they wanted to know."

"I can't tell them what I don't know," she let her head flop back in frustration. "If they gave me a clue what they were even looking for, maybe I might remember something. But all they keep saying is 'research'. All I know is they were on the terraforming project. But so is almost everyone that lives on Mars, so that's no help."

"I can see your point," he hummed a bit as he read the display. "You have some minor aneurysms, but they can be taken care of easily. Your blood sugar is low, though. This should help." He pushed a button and the cuff hissed as it injected something into her arm.

"I eat what they give me," she closed her eyes for a moment.

"Hey, don't fall asleep just yet," he chided her. "I might have some information that could help you."

That got her attention, "what?"

He lowered his voice so that she had to strain to hear it over the hum of the ship and equipment in the room, "picobots."

She scrunched her face up, "what?"

"They were developing picobots for the project. You know, super-tiny robots."

"I know what picobots are," she huffed. "And I know there are no such thing. Nobody has been able to construct one that could reliably take the programming. That's been the hold up for decades."

"I'm telling you they succeeded."

That made no sense at all. "Look, if what you say is true, what do picobots have to do with terraforming on Mars?"

"Everything. You know the project is supposed to take over a hundred years and most of the people working on it will never see it complete? Well, these bots could speed that up to just a few decades. They were programmed to breakdown inert organic material and convert it into CO2, a greenhouse gas. Swarms of the bots could do what millions of people couldn't do: create an atmosphere conductive to the growth of plant life on the surface of the planet."

"Where do my parents come in?"

"They were on the project. Your father, a microbiologist, your mother, one of the foremost programmers in the system, and my sister, a seismologist specializing in the role geology plays in the formation of life on prehistoric earth. They were all on the project. And they were the first to realize the danger."

What he was telling her was overwhelming and more than a little alarming, but something didn't seem right about his story. Something was tickling the back of her brain and she wished she was better rested and had a clearer head. She didn't like the feeling of sluggishness her thoughts had at the moment, like each impulse from the neurons in her brain had to swim through viscous fluid to reach the surface. Something was off, that was certain.

"What did you give me?"

"Nothing bad, I assure you. Just something to help you relax."

Behind him, the lights on a panel seemed to dance. Flickering like multicolored stars, they rose from the panel and circled the room over her head.

"The lights…," she started to say.

"Nik," Dr. Tinsley snapped a finger in front of her face, bringing her focus back to him. Why hadn't she noticed before now that his eyes twinkled with the same lights? She reached out to touch them but found she couldn't move her arm. She looked down at it with a frown and saw that it was strapped to the arm of the chair.

"Why is my arm strapped?" her speech was slow and slurred.

"Huh, maybe I administered a bit too much," he mused and tapped the side of her face. "Can you feel that? No?" He pushed a few buttons and there was another hiss from the cuff. "Let's try this."

The lethargy dissipated, but the fuzzy feeling in her head and the winking lights remained, still she felt more like herself.

"Better," she didn't slur as much.

"Good," the doctor smiled broadly. "Shall we continue?"

Continue what? She wondered. Her confusion must have shown.

"You were telling me who your parents gave the stolen prototypes to."

She was? No, that wasn't possible. She didn't know anything. Or did she?

"Come on, Nik, think. It would have been small enough to easily conceal but robust enough to hold the picobots safely. A containment tube about this big, perhaps?" He indicated the size and shape with his hands.

"No," she said frowning. "I don't remember anything like that."

"Did they meet with anyone?"

She thought about it, but her parents never let anyone into their rooms because she was so sick at the time. The only time she ever left the rooms was to go to medical.

She must have said at least some of her thoughts out loud because the doctor leaned back with a long sigh. Then he spoke into his hand held.

"She really doesn't know anything. This was a waste of our time, Captain."

As he stood, he pushed yet another button and the cuff hissed.

"Why don't you get some sleep," he told her distractedly before he left the room.

Before the door closed behind him, Nik's eyes were already closed as her awareness faded.