Chapter Forty - Race Me to the Moon

"'We need a publicity stunt. Something big for our people to rally around. Something like we had in the golden age of America.'

'What about going to the moon again?'

'What? No you idiot, are you mental, that's too expensive. I was thinking... let's give everyone a car?'"

--USTWO GOP2 Discussion, 2038

***

"Wait, so let me get this straight," I said as I gestured to the globe. "Some fucks from around the world found out about our Big Gun project and they're not happy about it?

"That sums it up, yes," Grasshopper said. "But for two small details." She raised a hand, two fingers splayed in a peace sign.

"Go on," I said.

"First, I don't think that we can really ascribe negative emotions to either group. We haven't spoken to them directly yet, so it's not fair to assume that they're angry or even unhappy with us. Second, they might not be adversaries to begin with, and the way you're framing things could lead to bigger problems down the line."

I worked my jaw, wanting to disagree on principle, but... Grasshopper was probably onto something.

Two other samurai orgs were working to stop the end of the world. If anything I ought to be happy about it because just a couple of days ago I was pissed that no one was taking action. "I guess we don't hold a monopoly on saving the world," I said.

"We share the same planet," Grasshopper said. "It's only fair that we all do our best to save it too. Especially when saving it only means using great amounts of violence on a deserving target."

I nodded slowly. Something told me that Grasshopper was a card-carrying member of the 'blow up pipelines' school of ecological preservation. "So, can we chat with them, or are we in an unofficial race to see who can blow up Phobos first?"

"I'd much rather we talk first," Grasshopper said. "Which is why I've set up a meeting with a representative of both groups. I was hoping you wouldn't mind representing us? I need to help Major Tinwhistle with some final notes on the Big Gun's construction, and the others are all quite new for samurai."

"So am I," I defended. "What about Gomorrah?"

"She didn't want to."

What if I didn't want to? I grumbled a bit, but... yeah, it was this or try to find something to do so that I wasn't just standing around with my thumb up my ass. "Fine," I said. "Just two samurai, right?"

"Yep! One from the German Nachtwächternetzwerk group, the other from the Keiretsu association of east Asia."

"... The what?"

"Do you want me to write the names down for you? It might make it easier to pronounce them," she said.

I shook my head, but did look at the text she sent me a moment later. There were little spaces telling me which syllables to pronounce in the mismash of letters that was supposed to be a name. "Anything I should know about these two?"

"The Nachtwächternetzwerk group is, as the name suggests, more of a network than a corporate group like the Family. It's founded in Germany, with members in Austria and Switzerland. The group only allows samurai as members, though there are some who have family members and close friends as support staff. It's more an interconnected network of friends who support each other than anything else."

"Weird," I said.

Grasshopper giggled. "Catherine, it's exactly like what we have here."

"Oh," I said. "And the other?" I asked to slip past that awkward fumble.

"The Keiretsu association is far larger in terms of scope, though it technically has fewer samurai members. They call their members Ronin instead of Samurai, which is quite interesting if you're at all aware of the etymological roots of the title samurai. In any case, each samurai member there is the head of a corporation."

"Wait, the... Japanese samurai are all corpos?"

"Oh no. Not in the way you're thinking. Some of those corporations are quite small. Little more than a family business, really. It's just that the Keiretsu association keeps them interlinked. If you had your prosthetics clinic there, you'd find other samurai lending you support for various things for prices far below market rates. Also, it's not just Japan. Both Koreas, Taiwan, Mongolia, a few island nations."

I started to rub at my temples. My education in geography was not enough for this conversation. "Okay, fine. Do we need to worry about any other groups?"

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"No. There's two groups in Africa that are preparing something, but it seems more like a contingency to catch pieces of Phobos before they hit Earth. Another group in India is preparing something as well but it's also preventative. A lot of smaller groups with only a few members like our own are setting up for things, but the Nachtwächternetzwerk network... oh, a tautology... anyway, they've been discouraging people from trying anything and instead encouraging them to focus on the global incursion." Grasshopper clapped her hands. "Enough talk! Time to get you sitting down in front of a camera."

"Wait, we're calling them now?"

"Of course. Do you have any idea what time it is in Germany and Japan right now?"

"I haven't the faintest clue," I said.

"Nor do I, but I imagine that if we wait too much longer, our overseas friends will be quite tired."

Grasshopper tugged me along until I was unceremoniously placed in front of a monitor bank. This was right in the middle of the command area, with engineers wandering in and out behind me and officers working at their own stations.

"There's a privacy screen," she said as she activated a small boxy device. There was a hum from the machine, then the noise in the rest of the room was dropped to a low murmur. "There, that ought to keep you concentrated. That screen is you, and the other two are our friends, and this here is the webcam."

Grasshopper tapped a few keys and a trio of screens lit up. I was on the left, as was half of Grasshopper as she leaned in to type a few last things. The middle and rightmost screens were blank, but they had the name of the organisations we were talking with below.

She patted my shoulders. "Do us proud!"

I really didn't like how quickly I was being shoved into something like a 'face' position. Being the 'tells people to get their heads out of their asses' person? I could live with that. Being the face of this operation? That I wasn't so sure about.

But I didn't get much of a choice as the middlemost screen flickered on and I came face-to-face with... a mad scientist.

The man looked like he was in his mid forties or so. Black hair that was both balding at the front and turning white on the edges. But what he did have was long and unruly. My guy needed a haircut, but judging by the lack of sanity in his eyes, that was a distant concern.

"Ah, you're here," he said in the thickest German accent I'd ever heard. "Good, good. Yes, my name is Doctor Kaleb Weber, samurai designation Radikal. I'm a proud member of the Nachtwächternetzwerk and the Schützenfest Samurai Militia. A pleasure." He smiled, then looked off camera and... grabbed a hot dog? Like, a normal-ass hotdog, with ketchup and mustard. Some of the condiments soon found themselves on his lab coat. "Sorry. I skipped my last meal, we're very busy."

"Uh, hi," I said.

I didn't have time to introduce myself when the other screen came on. There was another man, this one looking like he had just walked out of a period piece. Another middle-aged guy, but he was at least well-trimmed and professional. Actually, his weird outfit kinda had a bit of a corpo look to it. A sort of blend between a... whatever the male version of a kimono was and a business suit.

"Greetings," he said. His words were added at the bottom of his screen as subtitles, even though his English had better enunciation than mine. "I'm Susan, of Amaterasu corp, member of the Keiretsu. Doctor Radikal, a pleasure to meet you again. Miss Stray Cat, hello."

"Hello," I said with a quick wave. "I'm Stray Cat, of... the New Montreal Big Gun Project."

Oh fuck, I was pulling titles out of my ass now, but it only felt appropriate to not just say something like 'Hi, I'm Stray Cat and I was dumped in front of you because we have no idea what we're doing here.'

"Nice to meet you," Doctor... Radikal said. I wouldn't have known how to spell that without the subtitles. "So, it is our understanding that both the Keiretsu and the, ah, New Montreal Big Gun Project are planning to take care of our extraterrestrial visitors? We also have something up our sleeves." He raised a hand and showed the inside of the sleeves of his lab coat, which... had nothing in them.

Yeah, this was not starting off... normally.

***