Page 129 of The Mars House

keep track of it all when we switched

because

I

fucking

trusted

you.

God, they’d have to threaten them somehow, which would be a farce, because Aubrey was hardly military-grade interrogator material. But they’d have to. If River wasn’t scared, they wouldn’t cooperate.

Deep breaths.

A call came through and Aubrey almost jumped onto the ceiling.

River came out of the bathroom, mostly dressed, hair in a damp rope over one shoulder. When they answered, the Consul appeared in a life-sized hologram.

“Aubrey! Bit early to turn in for you, ain’t it?” they said, in their cheery folksy way, looking over River’s clothes, which were just the plain things they wore when no one was around. Dark jumper, never any bright colours, heaven forbid, typical academic. They might as well have worn a sign that said ACTUALLY RIVER, but somehow, the Consul didn’t see it.

“Guang,” River said, sounding genuinely pleased. “What’s this about?”

“You started on a gigantic repair program in the sun fields. You know what that means, don’t you? You know what kind of footage I have of you?”

Aubrey, for all they knew they were invisible, found themselves pressing back against the wall. They’d thought they wouldn’t care, if this happened. It was just a stupid video. People got famous all the time from sex tapes and other kinds of tapes, and it was only terrible if you were ashamed of it, but they were ashamed, far more than they’d imagined; and somehow it was worse now that it was going to be aimed at River, who, if you put them in a room filled with prostitutes, would do nothing except suggest unionisation and appropriate sick pay. River would die of that kind of shame, and it wasn’t even—

Well, they deserved it, but that didn’t stop it being awful anyway.

River smiled. “Bring it on, Song.”

Aubrey almost said, What do you think you’re doing?

“Why are you so happy?” the Consul said speculatively, but they looked more intrigued than angry.

“You’ll have to find out,” River said, with every sign of joy.

Aubrey had never seen River alight like this.

“Hm,” said the Consul. “Well. Watch this space.”

River bowed, and cut the call.

Aubrey stood there feeling like they imagined people did when they could see an unsuspecting pedestrian standing right underneath a giant crate of bricks on a very frayed rope.

Maybe this would be easier than Aubrey thought. Maybe it would be a train wreck, and River would have to say, I’m sorry, I need you to come back and sort this out.

Relief washed through them. No threats, no violence. They could just wait.

What unfolded across the next week was extraordinary to watch from the inside. When every media outlet in Tharsis received leaked footage from the rehab centre where Aubrey had spent a month last year, River didn’t even flinch. Instead, they looked like someone had handed them a big pile of presents. They did a live, televised drug test that proved not only was there nothing strange in them—but that there had never been. The halo could pick up addiction, even an old one. Clean. Of course. River wasn’t even reliant on coffee.

Immediately House Song was facing a huge backlash for releasing what could only be faked footage.

And then, River dropped the price of energy. Drastically.

On a live broadcast, they explained why.

“Kali was overcharging. There was some well-hidden fraud in the House Gale accounts. Half of what taxpayers were paying for energy wasn’t for energy at all, it was profit, and that’s why Songshu is so grand. So House Gale is liquidating everything that that money touched. Every citizen in Tharsis will get their money back, in full.” They didn’t mention House Song. They didn’t say where the money had really come from at all.