“How so?” Holloway said.

Meyer looked over to Irvine, who nodded. “We feel an additional tenth of a percent is appropriate,” he said.

“That sounds fine,” Holloway said.

“Congratulations on your point-three-five percent,” said Aubrey, with the sort of casual condescension that comes from knowing that one’s own share of the pie is immeasurably greater. He motioned at Gruber to continue.

Holloway debated saying anything but then realized that if he didn’t, he’d be forced to take a cut. “Half a percent, actually,” he said.

“I beg your pardon?” Aubrey said, annoyed to be interrupted.

Holloway glanced over to Bourne, who looked appalled to be noticed. “Tell him,” he said.

“Uh,” Bourne said, and then caught himself. “Mr. Holloway recently renegotiated his contract for point-four percent of the gross,” he said. “So this bonus does take him to half a percent.”

“I see,” Aubrey said. “And was there a reason for this sudden renegotiation of a standard ZaraCorp contract?”

“Exigent circumstances,” Holloway said.

Aubrey did not appear to find the joke amusing. “Fine,” he said. “But your bonus doesn’t apply until after we factor in the cleanup cost of your cliff collapse. CEPA is already processing the fine for that. You share in the profits, you share in the cost.”

What a penny-ante little prick, Holloway thought, and glanced again to Bourne. Bourne glared back at him with a stop picking on me expression on his face. Holloway ignored the look. “Chad?” he said.

“What?” Aubrey snapped, shifting his attention to Bourne. “Does his contract get him out of that, too?”

Bourne tried to get the “trapped animal” look out of his eyes. He sighed. “Yes, it does,” he said.

“Who are you?” Aubrey asked.

“Chad Bourne,” Bourne said. “Contractor representative.”

“You must be a very popular rep, Mr. Bourne,” Aubrey said, “considering how lavishly you treat your contractors. Are there any other special favors we need to know about in Mr. Holloway’s contract? Additional hidden points on the backend? Free nights at the brothel? Are you required to hand-wash his skimmer whenever he comes into town?”

“No,” Bourne said. “That’s all there is.”

“You’d better hope so,” Aubrey said. “Who is your director here?”

“I am,” said Vincent D’Abo, Director of Staffing, raising his hand.

“After this meeting, you and I are going to have a talk,” Aubrey said.

“Yes, sir,” D’Abo said, and shot a poisonous look at both Bourne and Holloway.

“Now that we’ve wasted several minutes on contracts, let’s get back to the actual point of this meeting, if that’s not too much trouble,” Aubrey said. Gruber, caught by surprise, cleared his throat and started over.

Holloway glanced back at Bourne, who looked pale. Sorry, Holloway said, mouthing the word silently. Bourne was resolute in ignoring him.

Holloway turned his attention back to the slides on the wall, and to the drone of Gruber’s voice, describing the methodology of the additional surveys as well as the difficulty of doing the additional surveys on the jungle floor, that is, in places where the surveyors, if unwary, might be consumed by large predators. “In short, our survey teams are still sounding the extent of the seam,” Gruber said. “But the data we do have are compelling. The next slide should make this clear.”

The image flicked over to the next slide, which showed topographical maps from the side and from above. The seam was featured in green on both images.

“Holy crap,” Holloway said. The massive seam he’d found in the cliff was in fact just a tendril; it curled out of the cliff and branched like an alluvial flow into what looked like a wide river of rock that extended for kilometers north of the cliff, petering out only a klick south of Mount Isabel. Holloway looked at the width and breadth of the seam and tried to figure out how much it might be worth. His brain wasn’t keeping up with the numbers.

Apparently he wasn’t the only one. “What’s this going to be worth to us?” asked Aubrey.

“It depends on how dense the seam is with sunstones,” Gruber said. “The portion Mr. Holloway here excavated seems unusually dense, but for our models, I think it would be wise to employ standard sunstone density, based on the data from previous excavations.”

“Fine,” Aubrey said curtly. “Give me a number.”

“Somewhere between eight hundred billion and one-point-two trillion credits,” Gruber said.

It took a moment for the magnitude of the number to sink in. Someone at the table let out a low whistle. Holloway was pretty sure it wasn’t him.

“A trillion-credit seam,” Aubrey said, finally.

“Yes,” Gruber said. “That is, provided we can extract the entire seam.”

Aubrey snorted. “Christ, man,” he said. “This thing is worth more than this company’s last sixty years of revenue. Do you really think we’re not going to extract the whole thing?”

“No, sir,” Gruber said. “But there are practical and environmental issues—”

“Which we will solve one way or another,” Aubrey said, interrupting Gruber.

“Yes, sir,” Gruber said, pressing on. “Even so, it will present challenges, particularly in accessing the main seam in the lowland jungle areas. Challenges that will at present take us right to the line of CEPA regulations regarding mining and deforestation.”

“CEPA regulations aren’t written in stone,” Aubrey said.

“No, sir,” Gruber agreed. “But per your father’s orders, they still have to be followed.”

“Yes, of course,” Aubrey said, with the same tone of voice he’d earlier used to opine about the desirability of his father’s continued health. Holloway looked around the table to see if anyone evidenced any concern about this. The faces of the ZaraCorp executives were very carefully blank. Holloway smirked in spite of himself.

Aubrey looked around the table. “Gentlemen, I want to be clear about this,” he said. “This seam of sunstones could be of enormous benefit to the Zarathustra Corporation. I don’t need to remind you that our company’s preeminence in the Exploration and Exploitation segment of the economy has been under attack, both from increased regulatory interference by the Colonial Authority, and by other E and Es, primarily BlueSky, whose revenues exceeded ours last year for the first time in history. This sunstone seam, fully exploited, could put ZaraCorp in an unassailable profit position for decades. Decades. So we will exploit it fully.

“Therefore, gentlemen: The excavation of this seam is now the top priority of your planetary organization,” Aubrey said. “You need to go through your organization and find what resources you can commit on an immediate basis, and which resources you can shift to it thereafter. I have decided to stay on planet to personally supervise the start-up of this effort. If we’re not exploiting this seam in a month—and I mean exploiting it in a serious, focused way—then you all are going to be looking for new jobs. Which I will make it my personal business to ensure you never find. Are we clear?”

No one said anything. Wheaton Aubrey VII held no official executive title at Zarathustra Corporation, but then neither had Wheaton Aubrey VI before he became Chairman and CEO, nor his father before him. No one was under any illusion Aubrey VII was not next in line to the throne. No one was under any illusion Aubrey VII couldn’t bury them and their careers under six miles of shit.

“Good,” Aubrey said. “Then let’s get to it.” He grinned and thumped the table. “Damn! This is good news.” He looked down the table again at Holloway. “Now I really am glad you were disbarred, Holloway.”

“Thanks,” Holloway said, dryly.

Chapter Seven

Holloway woke up to his nose being poked.