Emprise

by Michael P. Kube-Mcdowell

  “Tai Chen is an astute student of power,” Rashuri said, rocking back in his chair. “I’m sure she arranged it so that she stands to accrue the most power and the least recriminations.”

  “She’s probably been maneuvering for this since the conference.”

  “I have no doubt of that. Nor that we’ll be hearing from her directly before long.”

  Ten days later, with the Sender ship at .08c and still accelerating and Tsiolkovsky Technical Institute’s enrollment at twenty-two and climbing, Rashuri returned to India. Though Rashuri had long ago mastered the art of delegating responsibility and so won himself a more relaxed tenure as Prime Minister, those duties which he could not sign over could not be ignored indefinitely.

  There were other reasons to return. A permanent home for the Consortium’s headquarters had to be found, and there were many advantages if one could be found in or near New Delhi. More importantly, a report detailing what his own nation might have to contribute to the Consortium was to have been completed in his absence and should be awaiting his examination.

  He had no clear idea what to expect. The Indian intellectual life that Nehru had despairingly called “a sluggish stream” in 1947, the year of independence, had begun to move briskly by 1968, when Rashuri was born. At the time of the collapse only the United States and the Soviet Union could claim more scientists and technicians among their populations. Rashuri remembered the pride he had felt when in 1980 his homeland joined the space community with the launch of Rohini from Sriharikota Island.

  But at the same time, he recognized that not since the era of the Gupta emperors, when Indian mathematicians invented the system of numerals later credited to the Arab world, had his nation been in the forefront. The twentieth century revival had been accomplished with borrowed knowledge and technologies, and Hinduism and bureaucracy had combined to stifle creative curiosity. Thousands of the best scientific minds had sought greater freedom and opportunity overseas, and the thousand laboratories and institutes established by Nehru and his successors had had little to contribute even in their prime.

  The report was at least a week from completion, however, and Rashuri decided to see for himself the state of the nation’s space facilities. It was a mistake, for what he found was soundly depressing and tainted forever his boyhood memories of space glory. At ISRO in Bangalore, the buildings still erect stood empty, stripped of their contents a decade ago. The sounding rocket pads of Vikram Sarabhai were gaunt skeletons heavy with red scale.

  Sriharikota Island was far worse. There the launch gantries lay in jumbled heaps, felled by typhoon winds and unchecked rust. The concrete roads and firebrick blast pads were overgrown with weedy grasses, which grew in the earthen coating seemingly imported by nature to cover the stain of an abandoned dream.

  His head and heart both filled with unease, he took a side trip to Waidhan, in the Sonpar Hills of Madhya Pradesh, the birthplace of his wife, Lalmai. Leaving all his entourage behind save a single discreet bodyguard, he sought out the remembered spot along the shore of Govind Balabh Pant Sagar where he had stood and knelt and cried eight years earlier.

  It was a quiet place, far enough from the village to be undisturbed except by wandering wildlife come to drink from the great lake which had formed behind Rihand Dam. Here, he had performed the funeral samskara, the private passage rite, over Lalmai’s ashes. He had performed the ritual more out of respect for her beliefs than out of any personal devotion to the grhya, but the grief was his own. He had allowed the sraddha, the offering to the Brahmin of Waidhan, to be photographed for the nation which joined him in mourning, but this place he had kept for himself.

  Twice before he had come there in times of crisis, to draw strength from its beauty and from the memory of Lalmai. Until a degenerative liver disease took her two days after her fortieth birthday, she had served as the stable center of the family. She was devout enough to satisfy the traditionalists, devoted enough to accept raising their son Charan as her primary task. She had been Devaraja’s refuge from the whirlwind of domestic intrigue and bickering.

  Devaraja spent two hours on the quiet shore. He said a poorly remembered mantra and offered water to the sun, meditated, remembered. When he rose to leave, his unnecessary emotions were again harnessed to the task at hand, and he felt at peace.

  It was in that frame of mind that Rashuri returned to New Delhi to find an emissary from Beijing awaiting him. The man’s many-pocketed jacket and heavy-rimmed glasses gave him a slightly comical appearance, like a nearsighted carpenter. But Rashuri knew better than to judge him on that account. He accepted the double-sealed diplomatic pouch and retired to a private room with Weddell to review its contents.

  There were several documents inside, but the key one was a letter from Tai Chen to Rashuri. Weddell read it aloud:

  “ ‘Great joy comes with the establishment of the Pangaean Consortium. This noble enterprise demands that all the world’s leaders act on behalf of their nations to see that our tiny planet is inoculated against the overt and subtle dangers of our unknowable visitors. It is with solemn obligation that I apply on behalf of the Unified People’s Republic of China for charter membership in the Pangaean Consortium.

  “ ‘We are fully prepared to fulfill the obligations of the membership agreement—’ ” Weddell stopped and looked up. “How did she find out the terms? Do we already have a security problem?”

  “Doubtless, knowing Tai Chen. Go on.”

  Weddell scanned for his place. “Ah—‘to fulfill the obligations of the membership agreement. We view those in fact as minimum requirements which we plan regularly to exceed. I am prepared to commit my nation to yearly financial support of £750 million, or treble the assessment on charter members, whichever is greater.

  “ ‘In anticipation of the Consortium’s needs, I have directed that production of tungsten and molybdenum from our Xinjiang Uygur reserves be accelerated. I have also allocated 10 percent of our mercury and antimony production for use by the Consortium in production or barter. Further, I am assured by the Ministries of Machine Building that the Shuang-ch’eng-tzu rocket test facility’—that would be the old East Wind space center—‘can be readied for use within one year. You may also be interested in knowing that based on preliminary conversations, I believe that Japan, the Philippines, and Indochina would all look favorably upon an invitation to join the Consortium as associate members.’ ”

  “This one would have been a splendid tiger hunter,” Rashuri said. “Is there more?”

  “Some flattery, then this: ‘I offer the resources of China’s one billion to this effort which must not fail. The bearer of this message is Gu Qingfen, a trusted comrade. He represents me in this with full authority and has been instructed to return with the necessary documents for my endorsement.’ ” Weddell passed the letter to Rashuri. “This one is going to take some soul-searching.”

  “No. We will approve the application.”

  “But she’s obviously intending to buy influence with you by making us dependent on China.”

  “And she will probably succeed, since she has to offer the two things which we need the most.”

  “She’s not the only possible source of either.”

  “No. But there is another side to it. If we refuse her as an ally, we will have her as a competitor.” Weddell was shaking his head vigorously. “You can’t be sure you can control her.”

  “No. But I know of no one who has a better chance.” He smiled and reclined in his chair. “As you will discover, Mend Kurt, she and I think much alike. The Consortium needs the help of some powers and the complaisance of others. Those who will not march with us or line the streets for us are luxuries we can’t afford. Those that want to lead the march will have to be distracted or dissuaded.”

  “Or removed.”

  “If necessary. But most can be handled if one understands their basic selfishness. We all defend the interests of the group we consider human. For some, that is a circle of one
. To others, it is a circle enclosing all of mankind. Detecting the difference between them is the key. Now”—he clapped his hands together and stood—“Let us see if you and I can persuade Gu Qingfen that we are less desperate than Tai Chen would wish us to be.”

  Chapter 11

  * * *

  The Labors of Rashuri

  The cab lurched as it crossed the shallow V of the open sewer which occupied the center of the street. A liquid that was only a remote cousin to water splashed the roadway and the tires, giving rise to a notably fetid smell.

  “Feh!” sniffed the only passenger, moving away from the unclosable window.

  The best mood Driscoll was likely to achieve while in Delhi was disgruntled. Since Marti had been taken by cancer between Christmas and New Year’s seventeen years ago, Driscoll had found little joy in the holiday season. The one just concluded had been more draining than usual, with the physical strain of the workload he had taken on added to the familiar emotional emptiness. Then had come Rashuri’s summons, with essentially no notice and even less explanation.

  Driscoll had used the three days it had taken him to reach Safdar Jang Airport to hone a fine edge on his resentment. When his resentment flagged, he reminded himself of the imminent test of a scale Solar Power Satellite rectenna built by Schmidt’s students, which he would have preferred to witness; of the growing pains of the Science Service, on which he would have preferred to focus; and of having to finally face firsthand life in a Third World hive city, which he would have preferred to avoid.

  More than sixty years ago, in an otherwise forgotten class taught by an equally forgettable teacher, a film depicting life in Calcutta and Mexico City had convinced Driscoll he had no interest in traveling the globe.

  Delhi was just as squalid to the eye and claustrophobically crowded as those cities. But reality was worse: the film had not captured the choking onslaught of human and animal scents nor the relentless aggression of tropical insects. As one who had always loved cities and detested rural life, it was distressing to discover a city which reminded him of nothing so much as a chicken coop on a summer day.

  Leaving Delhi proper, the cab carried Driscoll out the Grand Trunk Road toward Ghaziabad, paced much of the way by a smoky coal-fired engine lugging along the Northern Railway. The journey ended at a complex of five white buildings of assorted sizes near the border of Uttar Pradesh. The complex was ringed with fencing and its entrance guarded, but the buildings were plain and gave no suggestion of what might be underway inside them.

  Driscoll had a few moments to study the chess game in progress on a small table in Rashuri’s office before Rashuri joined him.

  “Do you play?” asked Rashuri, entering quietly from an adjoining room and noting Driscoll’s interest.

  “Not for years,” said Driscoll, straightening up.

  “Charan and I are teaching each other. He is by far the better student, I am afraid. But then, he has more time to devote to it.” He noted Driscoll’s uncomprehending look. “Charan is my son.”

  “Ah.”

  “Fifteen years old last week. A fine boy.” He settled behind his desk. “This is Kurt’s January first project update,” he said, tapping a binder. “I realize that it has been only two full months since your division was established. Even so, you seem to be making very little headway. Your proposed organization is dominated by vacancies, and you offer no timetables for reaching any of your goals. What are you lacking?”

  Driscoll snorted. “Half of everything. It’s as if we had ten volumes of a twenty-volume encyclopedia. It’s not too difficult to figure out what’s missing, but it’s damned hard to replace it. You want space flight capability. Fine, that should be easy; we knew how to do that once. But where are the answers to the thousands of technical problems that we solved then?”

  “Is that a rhetorical question or do you know?”

  “I know where they were. In NASA’s Aerospace Database. In the records of Rockwell and Thiokol and Boeing.”

  “None of which, I presume, still exists.”

  “I couldn’t say. I have no contacts in that part of the world. So we’ll do without. What I need instead are some programmers—three crackerjack hackers or a half dozen that are merely excellent.”

  “Why not recruit them?”

  “That’s one skill the U.K. still has use for, and we can’t break any loose. They’re busy trying to turn five loaves and seven fishes into a food surplus—for more perks than we can offer them.”

  Rashuri chewed his lower lip thoughtfully. “Do you have any idea where such as you need could be found?”

  “Sure. The same impossible netherland that has the tech data. There’re probably fifty who could help us working like serfs for the Central Planning Office in Washington.”

  “Do you have names?”

  “After fifteen years? Not likely.”

  “Then what skills should they have?”

  “Facility with machine language or assembly language programming. We could even make do with a few skilled in ADA or PL-l, I suppose.” He slapped his palms on the arms of his chair. “Say, you’re not seriously considering—”

  “I am surveying your needs,” said Rashuri. “Nothing more. Now—what I need. The Chinese have confirmed that they will have a refurbished Long March III ready for a test flight in October, as promised. Will you have a vehicle ready to put on top of it?”

  “If all you want is a can with a man in it, I can have that ready well before April. But if you want him to have the capability to pull off Sun Rise with even the minimum reasonable measure of safety, then I can’t promise you to be ready by any specific date.”

  “Tai Chen would gladly take over that part of Operation Sun Rise as well. I’m counting on you not to make that necessary.”

  “The Long March’s payload capacity to geosynchronous orbit puts us under extremely severe constraints. Unless the carbon-composite hull material passes the strength tests, we seem to have a choice between the recovery system on the one hand and the consumables the mission requires on the other.” Rashuri frowned at the technical jargon. “Are you saying that you couldn’t bring him back?”

  “Correct. At this point, we’d be sending the pilot on a one-way trip.”

  Rashuri pursed his lips. “Please remember that we do not have the luxury of enough time to do it the ‘right way.’ We only have time to do it, crudely if necessary, dangerously if expedient. You need not concern yourself with the human aspects. I will see that a willing pilot is found, whatever the circumstances.” He rubbed the middle of his forehead with the tips of two fingers. “But we can talk of that later. Your trip was no doubt tiring. I will have someone show you to your room where you can bathe and rest.”

  “I’d rather see what you have here in the complex.”

  “Then I will call Kurt and have him take you the long way round.”

  Weddell was there within a minute of Rashuri’s summons, and they went off together to tour the facilities. Rashuri remained behind and called Jawaharlal Moraji to his office.

  “Are you able to operate on the American mainland?” Rashuri asked in Hindi. The shine of Moraji’s smile matched in intensity the sheen of his black hair. “Of course, Devaraja.”

  “This would be a major effort. Six men to be retrieved as well as some technical information of unknown bulk.”

  “If my lord wished the Statue of Liberty, we would find a way. The kidnapping of six is no great matter.”

  “You shouldn’t boast so, Jawaharlal. Should metals be scarce enough, you might be obliged to prove your words.”

  “I would relish such a challenge.”

  “Your craft is exceeded only by your effrontery.”

  “Yes, my lord.” He beamed as though complimented. “What do you wish me to bring you back from my vacation in America?”

  After four days in Delhi, Driscoll escaped back to London and his work. The dreary winter months slipped by, eroded by day-to-day coping and producing no notable acco
mplishment or even any good reason to hope for one.

  Then, on a chill and drizzly March day, Driscoll arrived before dawn at the computer center on the Tsiolkovsky campus. Even at that hour, it was the second time he had been there that day. Five hours earlier, frustrated by a program which was needed to analyze the orbital mechanics of Sun Rise but which refused to perform as required, Driscoll had chased the two analysts working with him and the half-dozen others who were there home with orders to take a day off and come back fresh. Bolstered by what for others would have been little more than a nap, he was returning to resume his work in the undisturbed silence he had ordered.

  But as he neared the building, he saw an unexpected bustle of activity near the entrance. A figure emerged from a lorry parked along the curb, a large box in his hands. Another followed, disappearing into the building. Another emerged from the building empty-handed for another load. Driscoll counted five in all, none of whom he knew. He waited and watched from the shadows as a dozen boxes were carried inside.

  “That’s it,” he heard one say. “Let’s get out of this.”

  It seemed a worthy thought, and Driscoll stepped out from his place of concealment and followed them into the building. He found the group in the office area, beginning to open the boxes they had brought in.

  “Who are you?” he asked commandingly, and all looked up.

  A small man with jet-black hair and an exaggerated smile stepped toward him. “Dr. Driscoll, may I present with the Devaraja’s compliments your new computer specialists.”

  Driscoll looked them over. There were seven, not five, including two women. They ranged in age from perhaps twenty-five to as much as sixty. “Do they all speak English?”

  “Oh, of course, of course. They are from America.”