A Slave is a Slave

by H. Beam Piper

of lesser but still imposing chairs for their staffs.

  * * * * *

  They took their seats. He slipped the earplug of his memophone into hisleft ear and pressed the stud in the middle of his Grand Star of theOrder of Odin. The memophone began giving him the names of the Presidiumand of the Chiefs of Managements. He wondered how many upper-slaves hadbeen gunbutted to produce them.

  "Lords and Gentlemen," he said, after he had greeted them and introducedhimself and the others, "I speak to you in the name of his ImperialMajesty, Rodrik III. His Majesty will now greet you in his own voice, byrecording."

  He pressed a button on the arm of his chair. The screen lighted,flickered, and steadied, and the trumpets blared again. When the fanfareended, a voice thundered:

  "_The Emperor speaks!_"

  Rodrik III compromised on the beard question with a small mustache. Hewore the stern but kindly expression the best theatrical directors inAsgard had taught him; Public Face Number Three. He inclined his headslightly and stiffly, as a man wearing a seven-pound crown must.

  "We greet our subjects of Aditya to the fellowship of the Empire. Wehave long had good reports of you, and we are happy now to speak to you.Deserve well of us, and prosper under the Sun and Cogwheel."

  Another fanfare, as the image vanished. Before any of the Lords-Mastercould find voice, he was speaking to them:

  "Well, Lords and Gentlemen, you have been welcomed into the Empire byhis Majesty. I know, there hasn't been a ship in or out of this systemfor five centuries, and I suppose you have a great many questions to askabout the Galactic Empire. Members of the Presidium and Chiefs ofManagements may address me directly; others will please address thechairman."

  Olvir Nikkolon, the owner of Tchall Hozhet, was on his feet at once. Hehad a loose-lipped mouth and a not entirely straight nose and pale eyesthat were never entirely still.

  "What I want to know is; why did you people have to come here to takeour planet away from us? Isn't the rest of the Galaxy big enough foryou?"

  "No, Lord Nikkolon. The Galaxy is not big enough for any competition ofsovereignty. There must be one and only one completely sovereign power.The Terran Federation was once such a power. It failed, and vanished;you know what followed. Darkness and anarchy. We are clawing our way upout of that darkness. We will not fail. We will create a peaceful andunified Galaxy."

  He talked to them, about the collapse of the old Federation, about theinterstellar wars, about the Neobarbarians, about the long night. Hetold them how the Empire had risen on a few planets five thousandlight-years away, and how it had spread.

  "We will not repeat the mistakes of the Terran Federation. We will notattempt to force every planetary government into a common pattern, ordictate the ways in which they govern themselves. We will foster inevery way peaceful trade and communication. But we will not again permitthe plague of competing sovereignties, the condition under which war isinevitable. The first attempt to set up such a sovereignty incompetition with the Empire will be crushed mercilessly, and no planetinhabited by any sapient race will be permitted to remain outside theEmpire.

  "Lords and Gentlemen, permit me to show you a little of what we havealready accomplished, in the past three hundred years."

  He pressed another button. The screen flickered, and the show started.It lasted for almost two hours; he used a handphone to interjectcomments and explanations. He showed them planet after planet--Marduk,where the Empire had begun, Baldur, Vishnu, Belphegor, Morglay, whencetheir ancestors had come, Amaterasu, Irminsul, Fafnir, finally Odin, theImperial Planet. He showed towering cities swarming with aircars;spaceports where the huge globes of interstellar ships landed and liftedout; farms and industries; vast crowds at public celebrations;troop-reviews and naval bases and fleet-maneuvers; historical views ofthe battles that had created Imperial power.

  "That, Lords and Gentlemen, is what you have an opportunity to bringyour planet into. If you accept, you will continue to rule Aditya underthe Empire. If you refuse, you will only put us to the inconvenience ofreplacing you with a new planetary government, which will be annoyingfor us and, probably, fatal for you."

  Nobody said anything for a few minutes. Then Rovard Javasan, the Chiefof Administration and the owner of the mountainous Khreggor Chmidd,rose.

  "Lords and Gentlemen, we cannot resist anything like this," he said. "Wecannot even resist the force they have here; that was tried yesterday,and you all saw what happened. Now, Prince Trevannion; just to whatextent will the Mastership retain its sovereignty under the Empire?"

  "To practically the same extent as at present. You will, of course,acknowledge the Emperor as your supreme ruler, and will govern subjectto the Imperial Constitution. Have you any colonies on any of the otherplanets of this system?"

  "We had a shipyard and docks on the inner moon, and we had mines on thefourth planet of this system, but it is almost airless and the colonywas limited to a couple of dome-cities. Both were abandoned years ago."

  "Both will be reopened before long, I daresay. We'd better make thelimits of your sovereignty the orbit of the outer planet of this system.You may have your own normal-space ships, but the Empire will controlall hyperdrive craft, and all nuclear weapons. I take it you are thesole government on this planet? Then no other will be permitted tocompete with you."

  "Well, what are they taking away from us, then?" somebody in the rearasked.

  "I assume that you are agreed to accept the sovereignty of his ImperialMajesty? Good. As a matter of form, Lord Nikkolon, will you take a vote?His Imperial Majesty would be most gratified if it were unanimous."

  Somebody insisted that the question would have to be debated, whichmeant that everybody would have to make a speech, all two thousand ofthem. He informed them that there was nothing to debate; they wereconfronted with an accomplished fact which they must accept. So Nikkolonmade a speech, telling them at what a great moment in Adityan historythey stood, and concluded by saying:

  "I take it that it is the unanimous will of this Convocation that thesovereignty of the Galactic Emperor be acknowledged, and that we, the'Mastership of Aditya' do here proclaim our loyal allegiance to hisImperial Majesty, Rodrik the Third. Any dissent? Then it is ordered sorecorded."

  Then he had to make another speech, to inform the representatives of hisnew sovereign of the fact. Prince Trevannion, in the name of theEmperor, delivered the well-worn words of welcome, and Lanze Degbrendgot the coronet out of the black velvet bag under his arm and theImperial Proconsul, Obray, Count Erskyll, was crowned. Erskyll'scharge-d'affaires, Sharll Ernanday, produced the scroll of the ImperialConstitution, and Erskyll began to read.

  Section One: The universality of the Empire. The absolute powers of theEmperor. The rules of succession. The Emperor also to be Planetary Kingof Odin.

  Section Two: Every planetary government to be sovereign in its owninternal affairs.... Only one sovereign government upon any planet, orwithin normal-space travel distance.... All hyperspace ships, and allnuclear weapons.... No planetary government shall make war ... enterinto any alliance ... tax, regulate or restrain interstellar trade orcommunication.... Every sapient being shall be equally protected....

  Then he came to Article Six. He cleared his throat, raised his voice,and read:

  "_There shall be no chattel-slavery or serfdom anywhere in the Empire;no sapient being, of any race whatsoever, shall be the property of anybeing but himself._"

  The Convocation Chamber was silent, like a bomb with a defective fuse,for all of thirty seconds. Then it blew up with a roar. Out of thecorner of his eye, he saw the doors slide apart and an airjeep,bristling with machine guns, float in and rise to the ceiling. The firstinarticulate roar was followed by a babel of voices, like a tropicalcloudburst on a prefab hut. Olvir Nikkolon's mouth was working as heshouted unheard.

  He pressed another of the row of buttons on the arm of his chair. Out ofthe screen-speaker a voice, as loud, by actual sound-meter test, as ananti-vehicle gun, thundered:
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  "SILENCE!"

  Into the shocked stillness which it produced, he spoke, like aschoolmaster who has returned to find his room in an uproar:

  "Lord Nikkolon; what is this nonsense? You are Chairman of thePresidium; is this how you keep order here? What is this, a planetaryparliament or a spaceport saloon?"

  "You tricked us!" Nikkolon accused. "You didn't tell us about thatarticle when we voted. Why, our whole society is based on slavery!"

  Other voices joined in:

  "That's all right for you people, you have robots...."

  "Maybe you don't know it, but there are twenty million slaves on thisplanet...."

  "Look, you can't free slaves! That's ridiculous. A slave's a _slave_!"

  "Who'll do the work? And who would they belong to? They'd have to