A Charter for the Commonwealth

by Richard F. Weyand

  “I see. So access to fast mails, then. And the conference should be someplace really nice, some resort? Doma is the obvious choice,” Sigurdsen said.

  “That was my thought as well, Admiral.”

  Sigurdsen stood up, followed by Ansen and Kusunoki.

  “Well, Professor, I must say, I really do enjoy our discussions. Thank you for calling this one.”

  “No problem at all, Admiral. We enjoy them as well. Until next time then?”

  A Dangerous Game

  They were in Westlake’s office in the Planetary Governor’s Mansion in the government center north of Jezgra. They were seated in the same side arrangement where Ansen and Kusunoki sat with Westlake the month before. Georgy Orlov had just laid out Ansen and Sigurdsen’s hypothetical discussion of a few days before.

  “Well, there’s his plan for a constitutional convention,” Westlake said.

  “Agreed. What do we think about it? That’s the question, Jim,” Orlov said.

  “I think we have to do something like it, Georgy. The question of legitimacy always comes up. If all the planets aren’t involved, if it’s just Jablonka’s plan, then there’s no chance it holds.”

  “Thirty-three planets. Not all of them.”

  “Most of the rest are only fifty years old or so,” Westlake said. “Some maybe seventy-five. The thirty-three he chose were all in the first wave of colonization, between a hundred twenty-five and a hundred fifty years ago now. That’s a big difference. I hate to leave them all out – there’s over a hundred of them now – but they just aren’t ready.”

  “Compromises, compromises.”

  “As always.”

  “Fair enough. What about using our names, though?” Orlov asked.

  “I know why he’s doing it. If it has our names on it, the other planetary governors won’t interfere. Won’t inquire too deeply. And it signals to his delegates that they’re protected, at least somewhat.”

  “Are they, though? Can we protect them?”

  “I think so,” Westlake said. “There’re no guarantees, though, for any of us. We’re playing a dangerous game, Georgy. Ansen knows that. He’s not a child, and he’s not stupid.”

  “Well, you’ve met him. I haven’t.”

  “No, he’s not stupid, and his wife is his secret weapon. She’s very quiet, but she’s got him covered where he’s intellectually weakest, on the people side of things. They’re a powerful pair.”

  “So they’re the two Jablonka delegates?” Orlov asked.

  “Yes, and I’m good with that. They’re who I would have picked. Did pick, in fact. And I’ve spot checked some of the rest of these people. Solid, one and all. Not a statist in the bunch.”

  “Good. It would be silly to do all this work and take all these risks to replace one totalitarian government with another. At least with only one, there are no wars. With two, they would be fighting it out all the time. At least if it was only the peasants getting killed.”

  Westlake nodded.

  “What about the costs on this, Georgy? Sixty-six academics, their spouses and families, round-trip to Doma, resort accommodations for the best part of a year, and a generous stipend into the mix.”

  “Not a problem, Jim. I have a thousand times that many people back and forth to the asteroid belt every other week in a dozen different systems. Those expenses are a nit in my cash flow. We do a certain amount of community work anyway. This will come out of that fund.”

  “All right. I just wanted to be sure.”

  Westlake looked down at the list of academics again. Georgy sat quietly, smoking a cigar. Their friendship went way back, and Westlake had always been the deeper thinker of the two. Now they were finally coming to the culmination of their plans.

  “Yeah, let’s do it,” Westlake finally said.

  “OK. I’m on it.”

  It was a bit over a week after their last conversation with Admiral Sigurdsen that Ansen and Kusunoki were notified of their selection as awardees of the Westlake Prize.

  “Wow. These guys don’t fool around,” Ansen said.

  “Why is it I keep thinking we’re a part of someone else’s larger plan?” Kusunoki asked.

  “Well, for the time being at least, their plan is our plan.”

  Ansen scanned down the list of awardees.

  “It’s the whole list. Everyone I sent them. I can’t believe they just took my list verbatim.”

  “I’m sure they at least spot-checked them to make sure we were all on the same page.”

  “Probably so, probably so,” Ansen said. “Well, I guess it’s time I got started on my ‘Dear Colleague’ letter.”

  “Now that should be an interesting read.”

  Dear Colleague:

  Congratulations on your selection for the Westlake Prize.

  As you know from the materials you were sent by the selection committee, the Westlake Prize includes an invitation to the Westlake Conference, to be held in three years’ time, at The Dachas, Doma’s premiere vacation resort. Round-trip transport, resort fees, and meals for you and your family will all be paid by our sponsor, the Orlov Group, including private schooling for your children, for this sabbatical year. In addition, a generous stipend will be paid for your attendance.

  The Westlake Conference will consider in detail a single academic question. First, however, some background is necessary.

  As you know, there have been numerous instances of decolonization in Earth’s history. These decolonizations have had mixed results. When structures were in place for the post-colonial period, the transitions have usually been smooth and orderly. When decolonization resulted in a power vacuum, transitions have often been violent, and the resulting situations unstable.

  It is the goal of the Westlake Conference to determine an appropriate post-colonial structure to ensure that, were a decolonization event to occur, the transition to a post-colonial environment would be smooth and orderly, avoiding the chaos of a power vacuum.

  We will work together for these next three years toward this end, preparing for the Westlake Conference, where all outstanding issues will be resolved. We hope to issue a conference paper detailing our recommended post-colonial structure at that time.

  I look forward to working with you all on this important project.

  And, once again, congratulations on your selection for the Westlake Prize.

  Most sincerely yours,

  Gerald Ansen

  Professor Emeritus of History

  University of Jablonka

  Jezgra, Jablonka

  Three weeks later, on Calumet, Matheus Oliveira was reading his latest mail. He got the letter from the Orlov Group and the letter from Gerald Ansen in the same batch. They were marked as having come in on the latest courier ship from Jablonka.

  “What the hell?” Oliveira muttered as he read first one, then the other.

  His wife, Sania Mehta, walked into his home office.

  “I just got a mail saying I won something called the Westlake Prize,” she said.

  “Me, too. Never heard of it.”

  “Isn’t Westlake the planetary governor of Jablonka?”

  “Yeah. Oh, great. There go all our friends,” Oliveira said.

  “Not necessarily. Did you read the letter from Gerald Ansen?”

  “Yeah. I couldn’t make heads or tails of it. Who’s Gerald Ansen?”

  “Gerald Ansen,” Mehta said. “The author of ‘Human Rights: A History of Freedom’ and ‘A History of Statism: Legacy of Failure.’”

  “That Gerald Ansen? What’s he doing clowning around with the likes of Westlake?”

  “Read his letter again. Read between the lines.”

  Oliveira turned back to his display and read Ansen’s letter again carefully.

  “Oh, my God.”

  “That’s what I said. Now look at the list of our fellow awardees. Mineko Kusunoki is Ansen’s wife and a respected libertarian sociologist.”

  Oliveira scanned down the list of names, now ke
yed to the context. He turned back to Mehta with wonder in his eyes.

  “That’s a short list of all the most radical libertarian academics on the thirty-three most well-established colony planets.”

  “It sure is,” Mehta said. “Some husband-and-wife teams there, like us and the Ansens. Most aren’t. But what is true of all of them is that they are ideologically aligned with Enlightenment principles. That is not an accident.”

  “What does he mean by ‘post-colonial structure?’ The only colonies of any kind now are Earth’s colony planets. He wants to design an ‘appropriate post-colonial structure’ in the event of a ‘decolonization event?’ That’s setting the stage for colony independence.”

  “Yes, it is. What he’s doing is planning a revolution. Right out in front of God and everybody.”

  “They’ll string him up. And I mean that literally,” Oliveira said.

  “I don’t think so. That’s why it’s called the Westlake Prize, why it’s sponsored by the Orlov Group. Big establishment names. The biggest. Ansen has powerful sponsors, and he’s letting everybody know that.”

  “So should we go?”

  “Absolutely. I wouldn’t miss this for the world,” Mehta said.

  “A year on Doma sounds nice, I admit. But what do you do at a year-long conference?”

  “You still don’t get it, do you? That’s not a conference. It’s a constitutional convention.”

  Oliveira merely stared at her, his jaw slack. Mehta was smiling hugely, and her eyes danced.

  All across Earth’s largest colonies, academics who had worked toward human freedom in obscurity for years read and reread their mail, and wondered they had lived to see such times.

  Warships

  It was the weekly crew chief meeting. All of the Red Team crew chiefs were there, meeting with the crew boss, Lloyd Behm.

  “OK, so some of the new beam cutters are here, and the big boss sent me some plans for what he wants us to do with ’em.”

  Behm rolled the plans out on the table so everybody could see.

  “What we got here is one o’ the new freighters came in last month. It has four cylinders o’ ten decks each, which is a lotta deck space for a freighter, but the thought is to sell passage as well, so there’s lotsa passenger cabins and all the extra crap that goes with that. It’s been plumbed up for triple water stocks in the front containers, so it can go anywhere to anywhere and back without needin’ to rebunker reaction mass at the other end. Same for food.

  “What we want to do is mount those big beam cutters here on the first ring of freight racks. Eight o’ them big bastards here around the front. We’ll use some of the control runs that are already there for container release, and run them to a couple extra consoles we can use for beam focus and aiming and shit. We’re still gonna have the other rings of container racks, and we’re gonna work up some stuff there, too. They’re makin’ some special containers on Jablonka that will be able to push out nuclear demos. And of course we have our own rock-throwing mines.

  “Finally, the new freighters have racks between the radiator fins behind the cylinders. We want four more o’ the big beam cutters here on these extra freight racks, pointed aft. What that does is provide a field of fire aft for beam weapons located behind the cylinders.”

  “Sweet baby Jesus,” Eben Waters said.

  “Damn,” Mark Walker said.

  “Uh, boss?” Theresa Lucas asked. “That’s not a freighter anymore. That looks like a warship, and a really nasty one at that.”

  Behm put his hands on the table and leaned across to be face to face with Lucas.

  “Looks like a freighter to me, Lucas. And that’s what we’re callin’ it. OK?”

  Behm held her eye, and she nodded.

  “Sorry, boss. My mistake.”

  “Look like a warship to anybody else?” Behm asked as he scanned faces left and right.

  “Nope,” Bob Dean said. “Straight up freighter to me.”

  Waters and Walker both nodded.

  “Me, too, boss.”

  “Yeah. Me, too.”

  “Good. Don’t forget it.”

  “How many of these are we gonna work up?” Dean asked.

  “A dozen,” Behm said.

  “Holy shit,” Waters said softly.

  “We got a couple years, so figure gettin’ one done every two months or so. If it takes us three, four months to get the first one right, that’s OK. What we don’t wanna do is screw it up somehow, right? So let’s get the first one right so we know what we’re doin’, then we can ramp up.”

  Mark Walker watched as his crew mounted one of the big beam cutters on the first freighter to be converted, the OGS Stardust. The big units were two containers wide and high, and full depth – twenty four feet high by twenty four feet wide, and eighty feet long – with the big circular beam emitter exposed on one end. About the size of a big two-story house in the suburbs. It still looked small compared to the fifteen-hundred-foot-long freighter.

  He looked along the length of the freighter. It was bigger than the ones he was used to, but all the same elements were there. The shuttle racks were on the bow, really just a set of protruding frameworks with latches to hook the shuttles on. Stardust had two big cargo shuttle racks and two small passenger shuttle racks, and all the shuttles were currently aboard.

  Behind that, down the length of the ship perhaps three-quarters of the way, were the cargo racks. There was no cargo hold on a space freighter. The cargo was all in containers latched onto the ship. The cargo racks on the frame of the ship held the first layer of containers, the next layer of containers latched to the previous layer, and so on, until you had five or six layers of containers girdling the ship. Right now there were no containers on Stardust other than the ones they were wrestling into place, and all the innards of the ship’s engines and plumbing were exposed. Unlike an aircraft or an ocean-going ship, there was no reason to skin over a starship for aerodynamic or hydrodynamic reasons.

  At the rear of the ship were the cylinders for the crew and passengers. These and their connecting corridors were the only part of the ship sealed against vacuum. Stardust had four cylinders. They were currently unfolded, sticking out from the ship at right angles. When stationary, the ship could be set spinning, which provided apparent gravity in the cylinders. For spacing, the cylinders, which were mounted in huge yokes, were folded back along the length of the ship. The acceleration of the ship provided apparent gravity.

  Between the cylinders, the four massive black radiators stuck out from the ship. Huge rectangles of black, two hundred feet on a side, stuck straight out from the ship at ninety-degree angles like fins. Whenever humans used energy, there was waste heat, and Stardust used a lot of energy. The radiators radiated the waste heat into space.

  Walker brought his attention back to the here and now. They had settled on four twelve-hour shifts out of every two week rotation working on the ‘freighters,’ one first shift and one second shift per week. All the hundreds of people working on them in orbit about Misty knew what they were working on, but the word had gone out. Freighters they were, and that’s what everyone called them.

  A beam cutter designed to carve up asteroids was big, but size wasn’t the problem in space. Mass was. If that big bastard got moving, it would crush one of his spacers with no problem at all, so the key was to take it slow. They had some of their heavy scaffolding rigs lashed to the freighter with cables, and dozens of cables restrained the big unit as they slowly moved it into place with motorized come-alongs.

  Walker and all his people were on lines clipped to the scaffolding. Breaking loose and going adrift was a special terror of the job. You would think it would be easy to go and retrieve someone, but it wasn’t. They had given up trying. Simplest thing to do if you went adrift is pop your face mask. At least it was quick.

  “McBride! Take it easy, dammit. We don’t want that big bastard to swing,” Walker said over the crew radio channel.

  “All right, boss,
” Jack McBride’s voice came back.

  There was always one guy on a crew who was in a goddamn hurry all the time, and for Walker it was Jack McBride.

  The good part was those issues usually resolved themselves. He would be a man short until the next rotation, but everybody would start being more careful again.

  Theresa Lucas’ crew was connecting control runs into a couple of extra consoles on the bridge. There were always a lot of extra consoles, each with their own display and configurable interface. Ships lasted a long time, and might go through several different phases of their careers. Engineers and shipping companies kept coming up with new capabilities. You couldn’t predict what future uses would be needed, so there were always extra consoles on the bridge, extra control runs in the chaseways. Every console had its own computer capability as well, for the same reason.

  They were connecting control runs from the ship’s radar processors’ extra outputs into the gunnery consoles, for targeting, and connecting control runs from the chaseways coming in from the front container racks, for weapons control. The nice thing about this work is it was inside the ship, so her crew wasn’t EVA this shift. It was still in zero-gravity, though. You couldn’t exactly spin the ship while they were mounting the beam cutters.

  “We’ve got connectivity to beams 1, 2, and 3, boss,” Kevin Walsh said as he checked one of the gunnery panels. “We can talk to ’em.”

  “OK, good. What about radars? We seeing them?” Lucas asked.

  “Yeah. We’re not getting any feed because the radar’s not hot, what with people EVA and all, but the processors are talking to us.”

  “OK. What about you, Little? You up?”

  Paul Little was sitting at the second gunnery panel.

  “Radar’s talking, and I can see beams 1 and 2. I’m showing no connection to beam 3,” Little said.