The Luna Deception Read Online Free PDF Page A

never caused any trouble, MeReMSG had chugged along placidly for years, not troubling themselves to codify or document their procedures. Why bother, when the old-timers had it all in their heads? This stemmed from both laziness and fear. Mendoza recognized the mindset from his days in the Astrodata Analysis Group: the less paperwork you generated, the less you were at risk of being held accountable for it.
    But as their early-morning visitor, Derek Lorna, had mentioned, you were supposed to get public approval for resource extraction operations, especially when these were funded by the UN taxpayer. Thus, Mendoza’s job would be to craft polls that tricked the UN taxpayer into approving of the ramp-up of a mining operation that would extract 10 35 kilograms of iron ore and other silicates from Mercury’s crust, on a tight schedule, utilizing hardware that either didn’t exist or hadn’t been procured yet.
    Drawing on his long-ago training, Mendoza designed graphics, animations, and questions that were weighted to produce the desired result. It was fun to let his visual-arts side come out and play. But he regularly found himself with hours to kill while his proposals were stuck in Dillinger’s basket of kittens. He drifted back to the Mars forums.
    There’s neither sin nor crime in looking …
    A new poster had shown up on All-We-Know-About-Mars/secret.cloud. ‘Fragger1’ was grabbing all the kudos that had formerly been Mendoza’s, even though he had no fresh data to share. He just posted rants about how urgent it was to FIGHT BACK against the PLAN before it EXTERMINATED humanity. Mendoza skimmed long reply threads consisting basically of “Yes, but.” He could not resist posting a reply of his own, in support of Fragger1’s position: “Yes, agree 100%. If not now, when?”
    Fragger1 responded: “YEEAHH! And if not us, WHO!?!”
    But HOW, Fragger1? Mendoza thought. That would seem to be the problem, wouldn’t it?
    He sighed. He’d broken his promise to Father Lynch, and for what? For who? Fragger1 was just another internet warrior—probably a mild-mannered office worker in real life.
    He looked up from his screens and saw his new colleagues trickling out of the office. Lunchtime. He ordered chicken shawarma from one of the restaurants off Hope Circus.
    On Earth, takeout was normally delivered by drones that flew up to your front door, or your office window. This was Shackleton City, so his food was delivered by a teenage boy who expected a tip.
    As he ate, he started to return to All-We-Know-About-Mars, to see if Fragger1 had posted anything else, but then he stopped. Was he really going to keep on doing this?
    No, he told himself. No, and again no.
    With an effort of will, he canceled his security redirects and called up a news feed. He checked for news about the UNVRP election. Just what they’d expect him to be interested in. They’d never know he was mostly searching for glimpses of Elfrida.
    ★
    An email popped into his HUD.
    From: Derek Lorna [ID string attached]
    “Hey, fellow! It was great meeting you the other day. I was wondering if you could help me out with that issue we were discussing? Put together a sample poll on the Phase 5 ramp, without mentioning it as such, natch. I just want to know what such a poll would look like. Doesn’t have to be done immediately. Whenever you’ve got a minute. Thanks!”
    Mendoza blinked all the clutter out of his retinal display. Unobscured by virtual overlays, the office looked strange. People stood or sat at their desks, staring at their screens, occasionally making odd gestures, or mumbling under their breath. The fake sunlight of Wellsland shone in through the windows.
    Put together a sample poll on the Phase 5 ramp.
    The request struck him as odd. This was the same thing he was doing for MeReMSG. So why hadn’t Lorna gone through Preeti Dillinger, if he wanted a sample? Why had he contacted Mendoza directly?
    Without mentioning it as such, natch.
    There