Conference Call

Take me to the moon.
Brian Harquart.
Seven. Three. Bravo. Three. Bravo. Sierra. Null. Two.
Oh Bill, you shithead, I am not listening to Motzart all the way out to—
Hi, this is Brian. Who’s already on the call?
Whoa, Bill—Bill—
I don’t know what to tell you, Bill, it’s on your email. The time is listed on your email; the call is supposed to happen at two. I heard nothing from Jerry. I have had no calls from Jerry. Yes, I’m sure. It could have been you or him that sent it, I have got zero new emails on the call. Look, I’ve got my comp up, I’ve got Outlook open, I’ve got the email from you up—hold on, I’m pulling it up—this is the Thursday email. Thursday? Its the one you sent out, the—the meeting email. Yeah, with Delarge on it. I’ve got the email from you setting the call for two eastern, and it’s two eastern now. Right?
Because my comp is still set to New York, the display time. Bill, there is no local time, I’m in outer space. The moon, Bill, Suzanne sent me out to talk to the Shoshiba-Domingo people at Tycho. Because they’re delicate negotiations, Bill; God knows Jerry’s got a hell of a track record for pissing off these S-D jackasses—yes, that thing with the staple remover. Unless you were there you can’t appreciate it. He’s screaming like a banshee, sending these little drops of blood all over the place, I mean with their gravity. You know how they got that pure-white decor thing going up there? Yeah, exactly. And he wasn’t even hurt, really, the thing barely even dug into his thumb. I don’t think they have any respect for him at all.  Had, even before the incident.
And they certainly don’t now. Jesus, they probably think he blew the damn thing up himself.
Well then talk to Suzanne. I’ve got my marching orders. I’m with her. I don’t think it’s worth doing this at all if we’re going to be doing it on some bullshit three-satellite relay light-second delay bullshit. Well yeah, that, and S-D’s convinced that even US DOJ and is watching all the comms traffic at this point. I think so too, but I just . . . Christ Bill, we’re . . . I mean, I’m in a five point restraint up here because of all these goddamn rocks, on a simple trip to Tycho—
Bill, I’m sorry if Jerry’s angry, but I don’t know what to tell you. It must be a network problem. You don’t see how it could be some kind of network problem?  You don’t see how the message could have somehow gotten delayed while I was going into orbit and then entering the debris field.
Alright, fine. Fine.
What.
Oh yeah, that’s alright. Fine.
No. What—
No. No way that’s going to—
Jesus, Bill, wake up! I don’t give a shit about the civil filings! I don’t care if the arbitration provisions hold, I don’t care if we can get it in front of the ICC, I don’t care if we can get Delaware Chancery, I don’t care if we can get this case in front of twelve certified stone-cold sociopaths. We have screwed equatorial Earth orbit, Bill!
If the Board is asking about meteorite strikes, that just shows you they don’t know what they're talking about. You need to talk to someone we have working up here in order to get the—oh, yes, that's right, they’re all dead! You ought to talk to S-D, but they won’t talk on the phone and their installation is the one place they know doesn’t have an extradition treaty or easy access to some black bag unit.
Stop thinking about money. Stop. You want to know what kind of losses we’re talking about? You take a look at this and imagine. The hack serivces have jacked their fares by like a factor of twenty, they’ve pulled everyone but their aces off the run and we're still getting banged up. And the next guys who think there’s big money in a LaGrange colony are going to be paying ten times as much as we did just to get rid of what’s left of the last one. I’m talking about just to pitch all this shit out of the elliptic, let alone doing it under ESA regs.
No one is going to give a shit about standing, Bill. You ever work med-mal? When they wheel that drooling five year old basket case into the room, everyone stops worrying about Who Is Legally Responsible For The Child’s Injuries. Now think that, except instead of screwing up some kid, we screwed up a couple of hundred thousand really valuable cubic kilometers of freefall real estate, without any sort of official or governmental sanction. They’re going to find a way. We have no options—
Well obviously that’s our job, but it’s also our job to inform the Board, of, you know, reality, and I’ve been riding through this shit, Bill, and I’m telling you right now they’re going to be lucky if any of them stay out of prison. Yes, jail! That kind of prison, Bill! The one with bars, where they put you! You could evade an Imperial Star Destroyer in this mess, Bill!
The Empire Strikes Back.
No—Yes. Han Solo.
I don’t think that trivializes—you—I’m just trying to illustrate what—hello. Hello.
Up yours, Bill.
Jesus.
Thanks, driver. Sorry about the mess.