A Peace Divided

by Tanya Huff

  “All of you?” She thought of Ganes, who’d stepped forward and been struck when Dzar was murdered. No, not all of them.

  “Not yet. Some people are blind to their oppression. But soon.”

  Possibly younger than Dzar.

  This was what came of giving children weapons.

  Before she could ask who or what the Younger Races were continuing to fight, the scanner trilled. She squinted at the screen and cut the power. “That’s it. No further signs of anything that might have once been plastic and no sign at all of what might have been responsible for the state of the sample we found previously.”

  “No weapon?” Trembley scowled at her equipment.

  Arniz snorted. If bad temper could improve performance, she’d have long since finished. Dzar’s murderers would be gone and good riddance to them.

  “You had to have missed something.”

  She sighed. “Follow me. Watch where you put those ridiculous boots.” He was used to following orders; she’d give him that. He stayed between the perimeter pins delineating an animal shelter and the foundation of a tower—neither visible to the uneducated eye. She stopped him well back from the edge of the latrine and pointed.

  “It’s a hole,” he said.

  “Yes, it is. Had I not been catering to the violent enthusiasms of an invading force . . . you lot,” she added when he looked confused, “we’d have performed a CPT, taken samples of varying ASTM dimensions, we’d have done gas tests in the bore holes, and, because I had an ancillary who needed the experience—until you murdered her—we may have used the FFP.”

  “I didn’t murder anyone!”

  “And yet she’s still dead.”

  The acrid undertone of his scent spiked. “How many of us have died?”

  “Oh, for . . .” Arniz ignored the boundary stake, knocked flying by her tail. “That’s a faulty comparison. The two things aren’t at all connected. The point is . . .” She cut off his response, unwilling to put up with his disconnect. “. . . this is a hole. We’re on a first-year mapping expedition on a Class 2 Designate and we have no business digging a hole.”

  “Bullshit. You have a digger.”

  “Yes, we do. That doesn’t mean we intended to use it. Nevertheless, in order to find an imaginary weapon, I not only had the digger excavate the latrine, but six centimeters of undisturbed soil outside of the dimensions of the latrine. I’ve done a full . . . well, not a full given the volume, . . . but a relevant analysis of every bit of soil taken out of the hole at the molecular level. There is no weapon here. Nor are there bodies, plastic or otherwise. Or parts of bodies. Or anything but very potent urea and evidence of fecal matter that supports the possibility of a predominately carnivorous species pre-destruction, some small amount of solid debris consistent with what we know about their civilization—which is less than we would have known by now had you not shown up and interrupted our work and starting killing people—and trace amounts of plastic in a single specific location.”

  He stared into the hole, at her, and said, “Thrown out by a non-plastic-using civilization.” As though that one data point justified everything.

  “Yes, all right, fine. But only three years ago, this planet was a Class 1 Designate. Class 1 allows orbital scans only. Class 2 allows scientific study at selected sites and a complete restriction on anything leaving the planet. I’ve distilled those definitions to the essentials, by the way. There are terabytes of rules the Ministry for the Preservation of Pre-Confederation Civilizations requires us to follow, and not following them to the letter will destroy careers. This is only the third year on-site research has been permitted, and this is the first year there’s been a dig at this particular site. There are things we’ve been able to surmise—that they were a non-plastic-using civilization being one of them. Unless the four sites currently being examined are, by some outlandish coincidence, four extremely large, historic recreations and we entirely missed the actual pre-destruction population centers.”

  “What?”

  “Highly unlikely, of course, because the orbital scans are really very thorough.”

  Trembley shifted his weight from foot to foot, compacting the soil, dark brows drawn in. “Then why did you even mention it?”

  “Every possible hypothesis needs to be considered.” Arniz retrieved the dislodged boundary stake and tried to push it back into place. An insect with long, delicate legs, thorax a shade darker than the soil, scurried away. After a moment, Trembley muttered under his breath and replaced the stake for her. “I don’t see why you need a weapon to destroy the plastic aliens.” She pulled the stake back out and shifted it two centimeters to the right, waiting pointedly until he threw his weight against it again. “By their own admission, they’ve completed their experiment and left the Confederation. Granted, their behavior was unforgivable, you lot would know about that, but they’re gone.”

  “Yeah, you just keep your head in the sand with the rest of the Elder Races. Oh, no . . .” His voice rose as he straightened and picked up a peculiar accent. She had no idea who he thought he was imitating. “. . . we’re too socially evolved to be bothered again.”

  “That’s not . . .”

  He cut her off. “When they come back, we’ll be ready. Times are changing.”

  “Into what?”

  If Humans came with a neck pouch, he’d have inflated it. “Into times where the Younger Races won’t be the cannon fodder anymore.”

  “I understand fodder. What’s a cannon?”

  “It’s a . . .” He glanced around with his strange, brown-on-white eyes, as though the answer was on the plateau with them. “. . . it’s something the sergeant says. It’s a weapon, I guess.”

  “You guess?” Anger pushed beyond background noise, she rounded on him. “You guess? You don’t know why Dzar was murdered?”

  His scent spiked.

  His palm felt like a stone, slamming into her chest.

  “Shut up, lizard!”

  Staring at the sky, catching her breath, that seemed like a good idea.

  “You weigh her death against the millions of us who died in your war and you know what—you owe us.”

  Ideology.

  Or possibly rhetoric.

  When, Arniz wondered, had it become us against them?

  • • •

  “And this was the only place the plastic residue was found?” Yurrisk slapped the edge of the map table, making the image flare.

  If she hadn’t been sitting in a chair one of the ancillaries had dragged from the end of the anchor where the rest of the expedition was once again confined, she’d have lashed her tail. “It’s the only place the soil has been analyzed that completely.”

  His lip rose. “You’re saying no more plastic has been found because no one has looked for it.”

  “I’m not . . .” Arniz thought about it for a moment. “All right, fine, I am saying that. Essentially.”

  “Then I want all your scanners calibrated to search for plastic residue.”

  “I thought you wanted the weapon?” Ganes’ mocking question drew Yurrisk’s attention. Arniz was all in favor of mockery, but Martin had proven himself willing to kill and Yurrisk willing to allow it. Ganes needed to be careful. He was the only one who knew how to keep the tech functional. “Why would you expect to find a weapon with the residue? Do you think your mercenaries dropped their KCs every time they shot a Primacy soldier?”

  All three Polint growled at the spill of words from the translation program in Martin’s slate and Arniz realized Ganes was attempting to divide and . . . well, not conquer, but divide at least. Clever. She may have underestimated him.

  “You were Navy. Have you forgotten your training?” he continued as Yurrisk’s nostril ridges closed and his lips drew back. Arniz thought she saw the Krai’s hands tremble. “I always thought the Navy preferred you to keep ho
ld of your weapons.”

  “His Navy did. Our Navy also.” Qurn, the Druin in red, moved to Yurrisk’s side, her shoulder against his, the contact leaving him no room to move his arms. “But when it comes down to it, Dr. Ganes, no one cares what you think.” Her voice managed to be both precise and melodic. Arniz had no idea how. “We currently have no search parameters for the weapon. If your scanners find more plastic residue, more points of reference, we’ll have identified the layer of history we’ll need to excavate. Or, specifically . . .” Her narrow lips arranged themselves into what Arniz assumed was a smile. “. . . that you will need to excavate. Stop assuming we’re all uneducated and have no idea of what we’re doing. It’s annoying.”

  Maybe not a smile, then.

  Tail up, Salitwisi squeezed between the black and the variegated Polint. “And you want to use all the scanners?”

  “Yes.” Yurrisk had calmed while Qurn spoke. “All the scanners. And all of you out there . . .” He expanded the image of the site and called up a grid pattern. “. . . scanning.”

  Arniz frowned as she considered the changes that would have to be made. “The results will be scientific garbage.”

  “But sufficient for my needs?”

  She wondered what would happen if she said no. Would he know she was lying? Would someone else die to convince her to tell the truth? Had Dzar died so she’d consider that before speaking? “For your needs, yes, it should be sufficient.”

  “Harveer Arniz does not speak for all of us!” Salitwisi’s tail rose higher, the tip tracing small arcs in the air.

  Yurrisk showed teeth. “Be quiet.”

  “But . . .”

  Martin stepped away from the wall where he’d been leaning, arms crossed. “We don’t need you, lizard.”

  Salitwisi’s tail dropped so fast Arniz thought he might have cramped his ass. In response to Martin’s signal, Camaderiz shoved him back into a huddle of scientists with enough force he took Lows to the floor with him. A warning, Arniz assumed, more overt than usual. The other expedition members had been locked in the anchor during the detailing of the latrine and whispered conversations while curled together in the nest at night had included complaints about minor bullying and wasted food, but no overt physical abuse. Yurrisk’s people seemed to have little midground between childish petulance and death.

  “When you find residue . . .”

  Attention drawn back to the common room, Arniz cut him off. “If.”

  “When,” Yurrisk repeated.

  “Science doesn’t work that way.”

  “Commander? Why not go right to the ruins in the jungle?” Pyrus, the pink-haired di’Taykan, leaned over the map table and expanded the view. “Wouldn’t they have stored the weapon in a building?”

  “Very likely,” Arniz answered, not caring she hadn’t been the one asked. “But without knowing where to look, you could be in there for years. We’ve found plastic residue on the plateau, we need more data points, it makes sense to look for it here first.”

  Yurrisk stared at her.

  She stared back. His eyes were a deep green, the same shade as the darker parts of his mottling. She’d expected them to be cold. Calculating. The sort of eyes that could see the death of an innocent and not care. They weren’t. They were haunted. She couldn’t tell how much of the present he actually saw. The disconnect made the scales on her neck itch.

  “No tricks,” he said at last.

  “No tricks.” Arniz pointed at Ganes. “He’ll have to do the calibrating.”

  “Why him?”

  She blinked. “Dr. Ganes is our engineer. It’s his job.”

  Yurrisk stared a moment longer, blinked in turn, focused, then nodded. “Get it done.”

  Having moved to stand behind him, Qurn kept her attention on her slate.

  “That made no sense at all,” Salitwisi hissed after Arniz was sent back to the others and Ganes escorted to the equipment lockup. “What are you playing at?”

  “They’re not leaving without the weapon,” Arniz told him.

  “There is no weapon!”

  “Given what the plastic has done . . .” She thought of Trembley’s millions who’d died. “. . . they won’t believe that. We’re stuck with them, and more of us will join Dzar if they think we’re being deliberately obstructive.”

  He cradled his left wrist against his body. “But you said . . .”

  “I know what I said. The longer we can keep them on the plateau, out in the open, the better the odds that the Ministry satellite will register an unscheduled shuttle, take a closer look, and realize something is wrong.”

  “If any of those useless bureaucrats even looks at the data,” he sniffed.

  “How long did it take them to show up when the Mictok opened that tomb?” When Salitwisi began to smile—nothing cheered him up faster than a rival’s misfortune—Arniz added, “Spread the word. No one turns this into a teaching moment. Let them believe they’ll get results.”

  His tail tip flicked back and forth. “And the Druin thinks she’s educated.”

  • • •

  “Why does the jungle just stop?”

  Arniz approved of curiosity, of a willingness to learn, and this was a teaching moment that had nothing to do with a nonexistent weapon. “It doesn’t just stop.” She indicated Trembley should turn and look at the tree line. “We assume the pre-destruction peoples continuously worked to keep the jungle from encroaching on the western city limits. With nothing to stop it post-destruction, it went over the wall and moved east. Over the centuries, it engulfed three quarters of the city before the drier, shallower soil here on the plateau slowed it, but it hasn’t stopped. Eventually, it’ll reach the edge of the cliff.” The dark line of jungle visible on the other side of the broad crevasse, vines and creepers tumbling down the rock, supported this hypothesis. “Some of my colleagues believe that the ruins on the far west of the city, those first covered, may have been preserved with little deterioration. I, personally, subscribe to the belief that said ruins have been pulled down by the weight of the cumulative years of vegetation. You can’t trust vegetation.”

  He shifted dark glasses taken from one of the larger Katrien down his nose to frown over them at her. “Why not?”

  “It’s too ephemeral.”

  “I don’t know what that means.”

  Smarter than he looked to admit that, she acknowledged. “It changes too quickly. You can count on soil.”

  “If the west side is better, why are you here?”

  “It’s not better. And we’re here because our license from the Ministry extends to the tree line and no further. Had this season gone well, next season the university might have been permitted to breach the canopy.”

  “So this season hasn’t gone well?”

  She stared up at him. He flushed.

  “Trembley!”

  She hadn’t heard Martin approach. From the way his scent spiked, neither had Trembley.

  “Enough talk. Get the furballs back to work.”

  “Yes, sir!” Trembley jogged toward the high-pitched sound of a Katrien argument, boots thumping out a bass line against the packed dirt.

  Arniz had placed her chair in full sun, close enough to where three ancillaries worked to be available if needed, far enough away from the hastily constructed cluster of terminals to avoid another conversation during which Salitwisi declared he could read the results as well as she could. When the sun disappeared behind a Martin-shaped shadow, Arniz tasted the air. The big Human wasn’t happy.

  “What do you think you’re doing?”

  “Sitting. I’m old.”

  “What were you doing with Trembley?”

  “Teaching. You shot my ancillary, I’m making do.”

  “You know nothing he needs to learn.” He knew how to show his teeth, she’d give the verbin kur that.r />
  She watched him rejoin the tall, pale female Human by the edge of the grid and wondered why she couldn’t remember her name. She thought it might have something to do with melons. Had the female Human been an alkali soil, she’d have been able to remember her unfavorable physio-chemical properties, so there was nothing wrong with her memory. Now Zhang, on the other hand, that was a name she remembered. The word felt good in her mouth. Zhang’s first name, however . . .

  “There’s something not right about this.”

  “There’s nothing wrong,” she snapped at Ganes, who’d snuck up on her other side. “They’re a different species with a different naming structure.”

  He blinked, twice, and raised both hands. “What are you talking about?”

  “What are you talking about?” Shells, she sounded like Trembley. And how could Ganes know what she’d been thinking about. “Of course it’s not right,” she muttered. “Dzar’s dead, and we’re being kept from our work by her murderers.”

  “The Humans are holding themselves separate.”

  Arniz took another look around. With the Katrien back at work, Trembley had returned to Martin’s side, his head down as Martin’s mouth moved. The other two were listening passively, hands on their weapons. She couldn’t see Yurrisk and Qurn, but Beyvek and Sareer, the other two Krai, were by the shuttle, the three di’Taykan were watching three ancillaries running scanners over on the northern edge of the grid, and the three Polint were racing in from the edge of the cliff. Tehaven, the smallest, with the variegated pelt, seemed to be winning. “Holding themselves separate from the Primacy?” she asked. “That’s to be expected, isn’t it? They’re all ex-military and they spent centuries slaughtering each other.”

  “No, separate from everyone.”

  “I don’t see it.” No one seemed to like each other very much, but they were working together. Where working could be defined as maintaining a threatening environment.

  “You’re used to academic infighting,” Ganes told her. Unnecessarily. She’d been there. “I spent years working as part of an integrated team—Humans, di’Taykan, and Krai. Trust me. These Humans are not integrated.”