Free Exile by Al Sarrantonio

but the same purity of intention that he held about his Venus; to Carter Frolich, any other view was not only heresy, but fiction.
    "Prime Cornelian will tell you whatever you want to hear! But the plain fact is that his plans call for the domination of this world, as well as the Four Worlds."
    "That's nonsense, Targon! The Martian war is a civil war! A squabble among Martians!"
    As often as he had been lectured by Carter Frolich in other matters, Targon found it bizarre that he was the lecturer when it came inevitably to turning their eventually finished work over to mankind. To Carter, that concept had been an abstract one; to Targon Ramir, it had been not only inevitable but more important than the terraforming itself.
    How could one make a beautiful object and then not protect it?
    "The Martian conflict is anything but domestic, Carter," Targon explained. Why couldn't the man see these things? "When Prime Cornelian consolidates his power at home, he will attack the other worlds."
    "But why would he do such a thing?"
    "Resources, Carter! How many times must I tell you? Mars is a resource-poor planet! It has relied on trade for its survival since the day the Terraformers gave up on it two hundred years ago! To a man like Cornelian this is not acceptable. Why should he trade for the things he needs when he can take them? This is what he will do!"
    "Prove it to me, Targon!"
    Targon threw his hands up in frustration. "Just open your eyes! Has he not fomented trouble on Earth already? Have the streets been safe there in Cairo the past couple of weeks?"
    Carter made a dismissive motion with his hand. "More domestic troubles. A band of rebels has been nipping at the empire's heels. It is nothing—"
    "It is everything! The beginning of the end! One way or another, Prime Cornelian will have his way on the Four Worlds. But I won't let him have this planet!"
    Carter's weariness returned; he ran his hand through his thinning gray hair.
    "And you'd rather destroy Venus than let him take it."
    "Not destroy it; just stop our work in its tracks. Cornelian knows that the terraforming equipment on this planet would take decades to replace. More than anything, he wants work to continue here. He wants Venus the way you and I wanted Venus, Carter—green and blue, wet and fertile. He'll never need anything else in the Solar System if he gets what he wants here. And I won't give it to him."
    "For God's sake, Targon! You can't—"
    Suddenly the transmission was cut; Targon watched a deep black screen which returned to depth a moment later, giving him back the puzzled visage of his mentor and friend.
    "Targon, are you there?"
    Targon spoke in the affirmative and was startled at first to see Carter give no response. Then, after a number of seconds, his friend said, "I can see you now, Targon, but we seem to have been cut from phase transmission."
    After the ten-second delay, Targon answered, "Yes."
    After another ten seconds, Carter heard his voice; before he responded, Carter looked to one side, leaned that way, and spoke, "You tell me they're outside the building now?"
    Targon waited; his heart clutched in his chest before his old friend turned once more to him and said, "I must go, Targon. It seems there is some trouble in the streets outside Some sort of disturbance." Wearily he added, "I'll speak with you soon."
    Targon Ramir immediately voiced his concerns for Carter's safety; but by the time the transmission had reached Carter, the old engineer had risen and gone, and Targon heard his words echo in an empty room fifteen million miles away.

Chapter 9
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    D alin Shar did not precisely understand what was going on.
    Despite the counsel of Prime Minister Faulkner and a half dozen other advisers, despite his close monitoring of the news broadcasts, it seemed that his empire was crumbling around him. From the shores of the Black and Red seas to the Bay of Bengal and the South China Sea, civil unrest seemed to have risen up like a