by Patty Jansen
And if this was just a shot across the bow, then we needed to destroy that approaching ship immediately.
And we couldn’t do this without severe and far-reaching consequences for Asto, because of gamra law.
This was the worst possible option. If the ship had belonged to either the Aghyrians or the Tamer Collective, we would have been able to get away with military action that presumed future approval by the assembly because those groups were known as aggressors. This was an unknown group attacking a member entity which had not asked for assistance because, frankly, the current leaders at Nations of Earth were idiots. They’d known about this ship for months. Amarru had freely shared the information collected by the Asto military. And Dekker had simply ignored it.
Chapter Thirty-One
This was not what I’d expected.
I’d thought that we would find evidence of involvement by a fringe group, funded and aided by either the Aghyrians or the Tamer Collective. Most likely the Aghyrians, because the Tamer Collective was too business-minded to attack their own future customers.
We’d dealt with Aghyrian-inspired splinter groups before.
This was different and required a completely fresh approach. An urgent approach.
We needed to get out of here. I wanted to speak with both Veyada and Mereeni, and Amarru, if I could get onto her.
We packed up all our things and made our way back to the hole in the fence. I probably imagined it, but the rain seemed to have eased up a little.
We patched the hole in the fence as much as we could. The driverless vehicle could not take us to the town where we’d meet up with the others, so we had to walk by the side of the road, through the wet grass, mud and ages’ worth of rubbish.
It didn’t look far on the map, but still took us the best part of an hour. In that time, only one vehicle came past, a large delivery truck that did not slow down or stop.
Fortunately, the rain really stopped while we walked.
None of us spoke much. In my mind, I was mulling over what was the best step to take. I knew what I wanted to do, but I didn’t know if my team would support me. Of course I could just tell them what to do, but I wanted Veyada and Mereeni’s opinion on legal matters, and hopefully a suggestion of how we were going to get out of here from the Exchange or whatever support services had been shadowing us.
The town barely deserved that name. It consisted of a gathering of a handful of houses, widely spaced around a bare intersection between two roads.
Neither of the roads looked busy or well-maintained. A road sign had faded so much that it was no longer legible in the light of the single street lamp that stood at the intersection. Weeds sprang up through the paving. Both roads disappeared into nothingness on all sides.
The accommodation Nicha had booked lay across the intersection, across a field of grass and rubble.
It was a sprawling conglomerate of rooms, each with a door that opened onto the courtyard where there was room to park vehicles.
I’d seen these types of accommodation buildings in old movies and had no idea that they still existed. At one point they had existed in New Zealand, but they had disappeared by the time I was old enough to notice.
When we trudged across the intersection and up to the building, the door to one of the rooms opened. The bright light inside backlist a silhouette. That looked like…
“Thayu!”
She came out and ran across the car park.
Her arms were warm, her clothing dry and clean.
“You’re so wet,” she said.
I mumbled something about the weather. Until now, I hadn’t realised how cold and miserable I’d been.
“I hope there is food. I hope Emi is still awake. We have a lot to discuss.”
We went inside. I was happy to find the entire team in the room, spread out over the bed and the floor. The heater blasted hot air in the direction of the table where Nalya and Larrana sat.
Nicha said that the owner of the accommodation had been puzzled at the presence of this large group, but he and his wife had done their best to make everyone comfortable. They had provided us with plenty of food. No meat, no milk for the kids, but plenty of surprisingly fresh bread and fruit. Nicha reported that the Pengali kids had discovered tomatoes and were obsessed with them, especially the little ones which you could put into your mouth whole and bite them until the content squirted into the face of the person next to you.
Pykka seemed to have forgotten about the bubbles, but I made a mental note for myself not to forget.
Sheydu, Evi, Reida, Deyu, Ynggi and I got changed. I sneaked in a hot shower. My skin burned. That was how cold I was.
The rooms themselves were quite basic. This was the biggest room, and the only one with a table. There were only three chairs, so everyone sat on the beds and the floor. Telaris distributed hot tea.
We had some big plans to make.
I told the gathered team of everything we had discovered. Reida backed me up with images.
They were looking on, expressions of shock coming to their faces.
“Wait, so we are dealing with an unknown entity?” Nicha said after I’d finished.
“That’s right, and there is every sign that it’s the same one that we’d already been investigating, and they probably came to our attention because they’ve been stirring. The same entity that years ago misappropriated a space vehicle, had factories all around the country, sent a ship to Barresh, and made thousands of people disappear overnight. That disappearance may be a poorly kept secret in the depths of America Free State, but I don’t think too many other people know about this.”
Nicha said, “And the ship that’s coming in this direction, do we know any more about that?”
“It wouldn’t surprise me if it’s also a drone.” Hence the lack of response.
“Then they should destroy it,” Sheydu said.
I presumed that by “they” she meant Nations of Earth, the entity she now believed no longer wanted to join gamra unless they made serious steps in that direction. She didn’t say we should destroy it, because she would not make suggestions as stupid as I had made.
“Does Nations of Earth have the ability to destroy it?” I asked.
“Isharu may have something to say about that,” Sheydu said.
Yes, and while we had been at the base, she, Anyu and Thayu had met up with our military shadowers.
I bet the Asto military was keen to intervene. They were a fan of short, sharp action that prevented later problems. But after speaking to Veyada, I also understood why it was not going to happen unless Dekker came around. And for the time being, no one at Nations of Earth was speaking to me.
Damn, why did this always happen at such inconvenient times?
“So, what are we going to do?” Thayu asked.
She knew me well enough to know that I would attempt to do something, even if most members of my team saw this as being outside my responsibility. They would probably suggest that we return to Barresh as soon as possible for our safety.
“This is what I really wanted to talk about,” I said.
Yes. They understood. They all looked at me from their positions around the room. On the bed, on the floor, the children at the table. Deyu even opened a blank document on her reader to start a doodle.
I began.
“We can take several paths from here. I can argue that it was Ezhya’s directive to investigate the ship we found in Barresh. We did that. But now, we found a problem and we can report it back to gamra. But we all know that gamra won’t act because in the first place, we’re talking about people from America Free State, a non-member entity that’s related to Nations of Earth, a prospective member entity that has been dragging their feet on membership. One might see it as akin to trying to meddle in the perpetual conflicts at Indrahui. It’s not our business.”
Sheydu nodded. She very much wanted to get
back to Barresh and continue securing gamra against spying from the Tamer Collective or the Aghyrians.
Evi briefly glanced at me and then at her. He and Telaris were victims of those eternal conflicts at Indrahui and would very much like gamra to take greater interest in solving the problems, even if some of it was outside their mandate.
I continued, “I tend to step back and look at the overall picture. When I started working for Nations of Earth, the entity we were watching was gamra. It ruled travel through the Exchange and it determined which were acceptable standards for joining. It controlled too much, people at Nations of Earth said. Then we got the Aghyrians lurking in deep space and threatening our relatively peaceful society. They’re still out there, watching us. We don’t know what they want, but we know they could do a lot of damage to our bubble of safe space. They haven’t shown interest in doing so. But they could. Then we ran into the Tamer Collective. We definitely know that they are not terribly interested in talking to gamra. They’re obsessed with trade. We’re talking to them, and generally, the talks have been fruitful. But they could do a lot of damage to gamra’s authority and credibility if they chose, especially if they collaborated with the Aghyrians. I don’t think they’d want to collaborate, but again, we don’t know. So we already have two entities outside gamra, that could seriously damage the cooperation between entities that allows us to have the Exchange, and to have peace.”
While I’d spoken, Deyu had drawn the circles for gamra, Nations of Earth, the Aghyrians and the Tamer Collective and the arrows between them.
“It now seems that we have another entity. This group, descendants of a disgruntled space army, has been lurking in the shadows. For those who say that we haven’t discovered any people yet—and no, we haven’t—I’d like to remind them of Ezhya’s principle of the technology pyramid. In order to have produced this drone technology, there needs to be a large independent population of people somewhere.”
“They borrowed some of our technology,” Veyada said.
“Even so, they will need to have the people to put these drones together and launch an attack on an entire planet. I suspect that if we start looking, we will find small signs of their presence everywhere. Unlike the entities I mentioned earlier, but especially the Aghyrians and Tamer Collective, they seem to be prepared to use acts of war to make their point. We don’t know who they are: where they are, or how many of them there are. We can guess what they want: recapture their planet. Back when I briefly dealt with them, when I was a young boy, they didn’t have the technology to travel through space. They’ve developed it. They want to use it not to make money, like the Tamer Collective, but to attack.”
“They attacked their homeland,” Isharu said. “They could have sent the most destructive drones to the Exchange, but instead they attacked their homeland.”
“I think they want to build distrust against gamra. They want others on Earth to think that gamra was responsible.”
“That seems like a roundabout way to do it.”
“It’s one way to do it, and it may be a smart way. No one will question Celia Braddock’s speech where she announced that the drone is alien. Technically, she is right. It won’t change anything politically, because most people in this part of the world already believe that Earth shouldn’t join gamra.”
Isharu gave me a see, I’m right look.
“But the biggest player in this world is not Braddock. It’s Dekker. And he has just received confirmation of his already strong opinion that it may not be such a great idea to rush into joining gamra. If there was ever a chance that Dekker would react rationally about the issue of alien attacks, this has well and truly blown it.”
Sheydu snorted. “That’s just another illustration of why we shouldn’t get further involved. Pass the information we have to the gamra assembly, to the ineffective Nations of Earth assembly, if you want. This is not our fight.”
“Isn’t it? So you don’t agree that these people have been trying to do exactly the same thing in Barresh recently? They tried to set up a Pengali war in Barresh that would have seriously destabilised Barresh. Fortunately for us, the Pengali are very big on making a lot of noise about small incidents, but they’re far more likely to hold a betanka fight that will render the entire city deaf for the next ten years than they are to actually go to war. Sorry for saying this, Ynggi and Jaki, but Pengali might murder a few people in the shadows, and have a huge argument about it, but will then negotiate. They also love making beautiful things, including armour and weapons and aircraft, but they would rather sell them than use them. They suck at going to war. This is a good thing. The SCAC tried to destabilise Barresh. They couldn’t get it to work.”
Sheydu looked at me. She opened her mouth to say something and shut it again. She blew out a breath, looking at Deyu’s doodle.
I continued, “We have, at the moment, several entities involved that are barely talking to each other. Atlantia, America Free State, Nations of Earth, which the first two hate, gamra which they all hate, the Pretoria Cartel, whom many consider to be criminals and refuse to talk to, and the Tamer Collective which is doing secretive stuff we barely know about. The Aghyrians who may support an action of war, or they may not. This previously unknown group turns up, seeking to destabilise the ruling order, which maintains peace. We can get involved now and fail, but if we don’t get involved, I think there is a very high chance that for the rest of our lives, we will regret that we never tried.”
A deep silence followed my words.
Sheydu blew out another breath. Her shoulders slumped.
Thayu said, in a low voice, “Doing something would involve—what?”
“Breaking down perceptions. Every single one. Resisting the cause-and-effect avalanche we find ourselves in. Finding the truth.”
Sheydu snorted. “Translate into non-diplomatic speech, please.”
“I’m going to see the governor.”
“Which one?”
“All of them, as many as I can see. Starting with Celia Braddock.”
Chapter Thirty-Two
Seeing the governor, of course, was not simple, especially without invitation. I’d been trying to get an invitation to see Dekker for almost a year, and he was supposed to be friendly to us. I had no illusion that I could just walk up to Celia Braddock’s office and get in. Trickery was needed.
We discussed options and their inherent problems. I didn’t want violence. This restricted the options somewhat, but my team agreed that violence would be unhelpful. I was trying to convince the leaders, not kidnap or threaten them. It would be helpful if Celia Braddock saw my evidence and understood who was responsible for the attacks. She was in a good position to communicate with these people, when they chose to come forward. Maybe they already had, who knew? She was going to be an important link in the future.
Fortunately, while my team would use violence—and explosives—if needed, they specialised in covert operations. They could get me in, Sheydu said, and Isharu agreed. If I authorised them to use military surveillance data. I was surprised that they asked, and I told them I didn’t hear that suggestion.
I left them to plan the operation and walked with Thayu to our room along the front of the building. The glow from the single streetlight at the intersection reflected in the puddles on the pavement. It had started raining again.
“I’ve never seen Sheydu so completely surprised,” Thayu said.
“Yes. Do you know why that was?”
“I think because she had never thought to make the link between what’s happened the last few days and what’s happened in Barresh.”
“That link is obvious,” I said.
“Obvious to you maybe, but not to everyone.”
“That’s what’s wrong with people, and with institutions. They don’t look beyond their own boundaries and their own experiences. They look at what happened in Barresh and they’ll say ‘That’s just Pengali’, beca
use… Pengali. Obviously Pengali are not proper people and whatever happens to Pengali could never happen anywhere else. They tried to stoke a war between the Pengali by giving tools and designs to the poorest, most disenfranchised tribe. And to draw the parallel, they chose a handful of the least listened-to, most ridiculed countries to start the destabilisation of Nations of Earth.”
“I know, I know,” Thayu said, putting her hand on my arm.
I blew out a breath. “I get really fired up about this, don’t I?”
She chuckled.
“Is it annoying or do I get people like Sheydu to feel stupid about themselves?”
“That shouldn’t worry you.”
“But it does. I like Sheydu and she’s very useful. She’s not stupid at all, not in the slightest.”
“She’s also someone who belongs to an older generation. So old that she never went to the spy academy, and she feels sore about that, even though she taught there. There are things younger people get to learn and have to do that are new to her. She doesn’t like being defeated.”
“But I didn’t go either.”
“You’re part of our generation. It’s the generation where conflicts are not solely about sheya loyalty networks and Asto anymore. There is virtually nothing you learn at the academy that you can’t also learn through experience. But she feels that, if only Ezhya had allowed her to go, she wouldn’t have this gap in her knowledge. But it’s just Sheydu being Sheydu. She wouldn’t have seen those things even if she had gone. It’s not the way she thinks. Large-scale political situations bore her. She’s like, if you want that door open, I’ll open the door. Just tell me how much damage you’re happy for me to inflict.”
We both chuckled.
“Sheydu knows a lot of good stuff that I don’t,” I said. “I can tell her that.”
“Don’t,” Thayu said. “It will just make it worse.”
We reached the room.
