Cassandra Kresnov 04: 23 Years on Fire by Joel Shepherd Page A

and Khan wanted to go and see their friends, other GIs newly arrived from the League, and see how things were progressing. Sandy wanted that, too, but there would be plenty of time for that later. First, she wanted to go surfing.
    The problems began at Balaji Airport. Balaji was the airport Fleet used to avoid crowding up Gordon, the main civilian port. It was nestled in a shallow valley, two hundred kilometers from Tanusha, far enough that the environmentalists didn’t protest at all the trees to be chopped down. For all Fleet’s increasing scale on Callay, now that the Grand Council made Callay the administrative center of the entire Federation, Balaji remained somewhat rural—some big structures mostly underground to guard against orbital strike, a small accompanying town, and only averaging perhaps twenty shuttle flights a day, as Gordon retained all of the station traffic. Balaji only took independent shuttles from interplanetary vessels that did not go through station customs first. Normally, that caused no one any problem.
    “What d’you fucking mean we have to go through customs?” Vanessa snarled at the airport official who’d informed them. They stood in the middle of a vast underground hangar where they’d all expected an aircraft of some description to take them into town. Instead, there was a Fleet officer, accompanied by some government people in suits.
    “I’m sorry,” said the officer, “but we’re informed by the Callayan government that the crew of all foreign vessels must pass through customs first.”
    “Foreign? We’re Federal Security Agency, which is based on Callay . . . how is that foreign?”
    “If it’s not a Callayan national entity, it’s foreign,” one of the suits explained.
    “Um, excuse me?” said Yeoh, who was the unit’s leading Intel officer, pushing to the front. “I actually have a Masters in law from Kannan University, and that’s just not correct . . . clause182b was inserted into the Callayan constitution following the relocation, and it states that all Federal security personnel based on Callay shall be regarded as Callayan citizens for arrivals and departures.”
    Everyone looked hopefully at their antagonists.
    “Our information is that you need to go through customs,” came the reply. Exclamations of dismay.
    Yeoh would have taken it further—the studious young man almost laughing at the stupidity of it all—but Vanessa stopped him.
    “Don’t worry, kid,” she told him, “the president’s just fucking with us. Won’t matter what you say.”
    And so, sixty FSA troopers and nearly a hundred and twenty support staff, newly disembarked from a journey of thirty-three light years and a great military success, found themselves sitting in the sun beside the big elevator leading down to the big empty hangar, waiting for a customs inspection. A few played ball games, a few board or video games, or watched movies or caught up on Tanushan news and events that they’d missed in the past few months. Most simply sat, or lay in the sun, and enjoyed the warmth they’d missed while in space or, briefly, on Pyeongwha.
    “I hate this fucking government,” Vanessa said, sunglasses on, lying at Sandy’s side on a patch of green grass off the taxiway, surrounded by their soldiers. “I want Neiland back.”
    “Fat chance,” said Sandy. “She makes more money a year consulting than we make in twenty, and she lives on a beautiful river with her porch literally over the water. She got out at just the right time, you couldn’t drag her back.”
    Callay’s president now was Vikram Singh, having disposed of Neiland in a political coup nearly two years ago. Establishing the Grand Council on Callay had chewed through Callay’s budget, disrupted long held financial goals, and of course, cost far more than Neiland or anyone had promised. Then loopholes had begun appearing in Callay’s laws, special deals for foreign worlds, for Fleet troops, for new embassies, all