Planetary Parlay

by Cameron Cooper

  “The Terrans have extended an invitation to talk,” Jai said evenly. “They didn’t have to do that. They could have continued their plundering, but they didn’t do that, either. Your raid upon Hegara opened their eyes. Now they’re very sensibly exploring the unexpected viewpoint we presented them with. They want to understand us, Danny.”

  “They want to enslave us or kill us!” I shot back. “They’re not going to change their ways just because we disapprove of the way they run things. Their entire economy and culture is based upon slavery. They can’t just stop doing it. They need more and more slaves, all the time, just to keep their worlds going. And here we are, without a military force, without any sort of coordinating leadership—”

  “The Carina worlds are doing quite well without either.” Jai’s tone was mild.

  “Because there are still people like me around to yank your coals out of raging fires.” I shook my head. “But that’s not the point.”

  “You don’t trust them. Is that the point you’re trying to make?”

  “Yes! Going to Terra is a bad idea, Jai. Even if they’re not trying to get us way out into their territory where they can cut us off from the Carina section, then do what they want with us, it’s still a terrible idea to just toddle off to speak to them because they crooked their finger!”

  Jai didn’t blink. “That is not a point I’d overlooked,” he said, his voice low and far more controlled than mine. “I was going to speak to you tomorrow, but I may as well do it now. I want you to be part of the mission to Terra, Danny.”

  I stared at him, my jaw slack. “You’re kidding. After what I just said?” My voice rose.

  “Sit down,” Jai said, his tone sharp.

  I didn’t remember getting to my feet, but there I was, standing. Worse, I was leaning upon the table with both arms, a pose I had once used to intimidate seated generals.

  I sat.

  “I want you as part of the team which goes to Terra because you’re the only one who doesn’t want to go. You have a different perspective from everyone else,” Jai said, his tone even more controlled.

  “Contrary to popular opinion, I’m not suicidal, either,” I shot back. “I’ll pass, thank you.”

  “You have just pointed out that you have expertise we can use. You’re refusing to provide that expertise?”

  “No one cares what I once was, Van Veen. I argued myself to a standstill today, pointing out how stupid their plans and ideas are. You know they want to take entire fucking families with them? To show the Terrans how human we are?” I shook my head. “They’re going to offer themselves up for the slave ships—kids included.”

  “Just shut up and listen to me,” Jai shot back, his voice lifting.

  I blinked at him, astonished. In all the time I’d known him, I couldn’t remember him ever shouting, and certainly not at me.

  Jai pushed his hand through his hair and said in a calmer voice, “You’re a strategist, Danny. You think in terms of strengths and weaknesses, defense and offense. I don’t want you to simply give advice when someone bothers to ask you for it, because no one will bother. They don’t think that way, as you’ve just finished pointing out. I want you to be responsible for the security for the mission.”

  I stared. “Responsible?” I repeated.

  “You see threats where no one else does,” Jai added. “Put your naturally suspicious nature to good use. Outthink the Terrans for us.”

  I threw out my arm. “We shouldn’t be going there at all!”

  “What else are we supposed to do?” Jai demanded.

  “Shoot them down whenever they get close! They’re monsters, Van Veen! They are aggressive assholes! They don’t want to explore alternative worldviews! They want to suck out of us all the information they can—our weaknesses, our priorities and our defenses—which we do not have! We need to fight them, Jai! We need to bloody their noses a second time. Or five times. Or a dozen, or how ever many it takes to get the message across that we don’t want them coming near us! They won’t learn the lesson any other way!”

  “Fight them with what?” Jai cried, lurching to his feet. “We are not ready for war. No one is. No one wants to be.”

  I realized I was on my feet yet again. “We build an army. Rebuild the Rangers. Build a navy from scratch. I don’t care how you do it!” I cried. “Call it a peacekeeping force if it makes everyone sleep better but do it. And do it now!”

  “With what?” Jai demanded. “Are you going to pay the salaries of a standing army? There are…no…taxes.”

  I blinked. The Imperial Rangers had been paid for with Imperial money—and the Emperor got his money from the people. Some taxes, but considerably more from selling gate and array hardware with its proprietary and highly secret construction methods. Then he’d taken a percentage of all gate fees…another sort of tax, I suppose.

  “Take tithes, then,” I said, my voice hoarse. Arguing with Jai was making my pulse thready. “Contributions. There has to be a way.”

  “Perhaps we’ll figure that out eventually, but not in time to respond to the Terrans with a show of force. We must go to Terra, if only to delay hostilities.”

  “Then you see that this will end with war, at least,” I said, suddenly tired.

  “Not if I can help it,” Jai said, his voice even more strained than mine.

  I reached for the glass of scotch and drained it. I put the glass down again. “If you want me to be responsible for the security of this insane mission, then I must have free reign to arrange things the way I think will give us the best chance of coming home. No voting. No arguing. No approval process. My way or do it yourself.”

  Jai took in a deep breath. Let it out. “Very well,” he said. “Short of not going at all, we will do what you think is best.”

  I nodded stiffly. “Fine. You get four representatives. The rest of the ship gets filled with people I trust and know can keep their heads screwed around the right way when the shit comes down.”

  “If things go wrong—” Jai began.

  “No, Van Veen,” I said forcefully. “I get to assume they will go wrong, and plan for the worst. You get to play the peacenik. No arguments over this, are we clear?”

  His eyes were filled with genuine anger. He didn’t like being told no. Not flat out like this. He had once been a very senior officer in the Imperial Shield, and a personal favourite of the Emperor’s, which would have added to his gravitas in that organization. The Shield had been a backstabbing, intrigue-ridden organization of scientists, administrators, security experts and secret projects. I imagine Van Veen had rarely received a direct “no”. Most of his opposition would have been the oily, indirect kind.

  I stared back at him, waiting.

  Finally, he stirred. “Very well,” he repeated. “Four representatives. But I’m adding five other people to the ship’s compliment that I consider useful.”

  “Fine,” I replied. I headed for the door. “I need to get back. I have work to do.”

  “Keskemeti is one of that five,” Jai added.

  I came to a halt, halfway between the dining table and the front door. Cold fingers walked up my spine. I’d just agreed to it. He’d set me up.

  I glanced over my shoulder. Jai’s eyes were narrowed as he watched me. Marlow looked upset. He wasn’t enjoying this any more than I was.

  “If I have to have that snake near me, then I’m using the Lythion to take us there. I want a ship with capabilities, not a luxury liner the Terrans can shoot down.”

  Jai nodded. “Good night, Danny.” His tone was cold.

  “Good night, Marlow,” I flung over my shoulder and stalked out. “I’ll be in touch with my list,” I added to Van Veen as I closed the front door.

  I didn’t slam the door but, oh, how I had wanted to!

  —7—

  The line of ground cars rolled down the gentle slope on the other side of the high bridge between the islands, while I thought back over the original argument Jai and I had had about comin
g here.

  I’d lost the argument. We were here on Terra, when I thought we should be a long way from here, back in the Carina worlds, polishing our shrivers. But Van Veen had at least let me have my way on nearly everything else.

  When I had realized he was living up to his side of the bargain, I had tried to soften my demands by explaining my reasoning as much as possible. Jai had just listened and nodded. “As you see best,” he would add, his tone remote.

  I’d done just that. I’d made the very best arrangements I could, given that we were walking into a situation for which I could only guess at even the basic details…which was only one of the problems I’d wrestled with. There had been a lot of sleepless nights.

  And not a few of them had come about because I knew that I had damaged my friendship with Jai, perhaps irreversibly. But I could not take back anything I had said to him across his dining table. I had meant every word and still believed them.

  The downslope on this side of the bridge gave us a spectacular view of the island ahead of us. The island was elongated and ran north for as far as I could see, before details were blurred by the shimmer of heat and distance. It was at least as wide as the island we’d landed upon. The center of this island, though, was filled with an inland sea. Or pond, or harbor. The water was a lighter blue than the ocean around the island and it ran the length of the island, too.

  Marlow, who was sitting in the seat behind Jai, tapped my shoulder. “Look to your right.”

  I turned my head to look through the canopy at the ocean running to the horizon. On that side of the island, right at the corner where the bridge ran onto dry land, sitting in the shallow waters by the beach, was the rusted hulk of a mothership.

  I stared at it, my heart running hard.

  The blunt nose of the mothership tilted at a forlorn angle, the bottom edge of the curved carapace lapped by wavelets. The humidity and the salt water had etched into the tan and cream panels of the ship and some parts of it were rusty lace. Other sections, though, looked scorched. Plus, along the flank of the ship, the side of the fuselage had clearly been blown out by something powerful enough to rip a hole through the metal. Jagged shards stood out around the edges of the old wound.

  It had been sitting here for a while. Long enough to rust out.

  Now we were rolling down to sea level, I had something to measure the size of the ship against. The scaly, feather-topped trees, those we’d rolled past, had been about the height of three men. Carina men, that is. I was still figuring out what was average Terran height.

  The trees lining the edge of the white beach beside the mothership looked tiny in comparison. The ship was enormous. Much larger than the Lythion. Lyssa had told me that, but I had to see it for myself to fully understand just how big the motherships were.

  “It must have been defending this place,” Marlow murmured between our two chairs.

  I stared at the hulk sitting in the water. How deep was the water, just there? Clearly, it was shallow enough to leave the bulk of the ship uncovered, but perhaps not shallow enough to walk out to the ship.

  Not that I wanted to put my foot into water that moved by itself.

  But…

  “The question I would really like answered,” I told Jai and Marlow, “is who they were defending this place against? Because it wasn’t us.”

  “So who was it?” Marlow finished.

  “The enemy of my enemy…” I spoke very softly, because I didn’t know how secure these ground cars were. If I had been the Terrans, I would have all six cars wired and would listen to every word spoken in them.

  “Civil war?” Marlow suggested.

  “That wouldn’t surprise the shit out of me,” I said.

  Jai lifted his chin, gesturing ahead through the canopy. “Look.”

  The car reached the land and rolled along a sealed road with fingers of white sand blowing across it. Clearly, this roadway was not used very often. That didn’t make me any happier.

  The feathery trees were everywhere, smothering the land. And where they were not, there was even more plant life. Trees and bushes packed in together, making dense clumps. Ahead of us, between the beach on the right of the road and the inland harbor, nestled amongst the trees, I glimpsed over the top of the sea of foliage a series of curved roofs, running along different planes and angles and pitches. The steep pitch of each roof plane was possibly designed to shed rain, but the spine of the roof was also a shallow, graceful curve, tilting up at each end.

  As we got closer, I could see that some of the rooflines ran into walls. It was not a single building, but a complex of buildings attached to each other. Or maybe it was one large building.

  The roofing material was the same as the wall material—large tubes of organic something-or-other fastened together in some fashion that was invisible from here.

  The road branched and the operator steered the car onto the left-hand branch. If the curve of this new road remained the same, then we would arrive at the building we had been watching.

  And now we were passing through the trees, I could glimpse between their trunks other, smaller buildings among them, made of the same material as the tall one. Some of the buildings looked faded, the tubes a dull ochre color rather than a shade of green. Clearly, the material they used for their buildings aged. The sun and the elements would do that.

  I shuddered.

  More Terrans moved through the trees. I couldn’t see from here if they were using paths or roads or simply winding through the trees without either. They were all dressed similarly to the Ami we had seen at the landing field and they were all hurrying in the direction of the big building we’d glimpsed.

  “I think this might be one of their…cities?” Jai murmured, his tone flexing upward.

  “We’ll start getting answers pretty soon now,” I said. “I think that’s our destination.” I nodded toward the view ahead of us, as the ground car rounded the last of the curve.

  The trees fell away, the land opening to show more of the pale soil and ground cover we had seen on the landing field. There was no formal arrangement of pretty plants and interesting shrubs the way some of the Carina worlds liked for around their official buildings.

  The road bent sharply to loop around in front of the large building we had glimpsed through the trees. Now we could see the front façade clearly. I gotta admit, the view was impressive, even for something made of oversized twigs.

  The front of the building was as oddly angled as the roof lines. Now the trees had cleared out of the way, I could see that there were at least four levels to the building, and on this side, I could see no exterior walls. There were just roof overhangs to shed rain, and more sticks holding up each roof. I could even see people moving about beneath the eaves of each level.

  Because there were no exterior walls, there were no grand doors to mark the entrance. Instead, a grand set of steps led up to a deck that looked to be only a couple of meters above the ground and level with the first floor. Both steps and deck were made of the same tubular material as the rest of the building. The steps were very wide in both depth and width, making them small decks of their own. The rise from one step to the next was also very shallow.

  The steps fanned out from the front of the building, allowing anyone to approach the building from any angle. Worn paths through the trees were evidence that many people did walk to the building from elsewhere, but none of the paths was sealed or even very straight.

  This close, I could see that the roof was made of half-tubes lying with their sides up in the air. Over the aligned edges of each pair of half-tubes, another half-tube was laid ends-down. It was a simple system that would make a moisture-proof barrier.

  I could also see that each level of the building was a lot taller than I had realized. Perhaps twenty or twenty-five meters between roof and floor. The organic material was rustic in appearance, but this building was anything but homegrown in scale.

  Standing on the second step up from the ground was a smal
l group of richly dressed Terrans. Our welcoming committee.

  Behind them ranged a slightly larger number of Ami, judging from their clothing. Behind the Ami, on the next step up, were a great many Drigu in their simple tunics.

  I recalled the impact of the heat and humidity as it had swept into the shuttle, and suddenly envied the Drigu their single layer of clothing.

  Even more intriguing were the mechanical men standing among the welcoming party. They were metal and made to vaguely resemble humans. They stood on two jointed limbs that were very long compared to the average human leg, with shortened torsos, thick metal shoulders and heads upon necks. The heads were bare domes, with only a suggestion of eyes and mouth and jaw, and no nose.

  The arms on each android reached almost to the ground and had an extra joint—two elbows, compared to the human single elbow. They had no hands, though. Just two extra long fingers. Or stabbing prongs. We’d learn which, later.

  “Robots?” Jai breathed.

  “Remember what I told you,” I warned everyone in the car. “About Lyth and the others.” I had no intention of freely handing over all the details of our worlds and cultures. Now I’d seen these androids, I was even less inclined to reveal the true nature of the Xaviens among us.

  “Let’s see how this plays out,” Marlow murmured, his fingers pressing on my shoulder.

  “Think of facts as leverage,” Jai added, as the ground car swung around the front of the curve closest to the front edge of the steps. “We can hold back until the Terrans meet us half-way.”

  I sighed. I was in favor of not handing over anything at all, but it wasn’t up to me to decide that. Jai and his group of Carina representatives—including Keskemeti, I added to myself, and ground my teeth—had brainstormed various scenarios and diplomatic niceties. I believe Kristiana, the trained diplomat, had led workshops on how to avoid pissing off Terrans. I had not been invited. Their loss.

  The cars came to a silent halt. We had arrived. Now all I could do was let this thing play out.