Still stunned by Zude's deliberate vulnerability, Rhoda adjusted her subvention belt, trying to ease its pressure on her waist. "Magister, do you feel comfortable with Longleaf as our witness and facilitator?"
"Fine."
All three women shifted and settled, though a measure of tension remained. Longleaf began, "There are three preliminary agreements and three behaviors required for true-talk. The agreements include equal commitment to struggle and self-examination in dialogue, suspension of rank without fear of retribution, and good will that avoids the exploitation or abuse of any being or thing, whether natural or artificial."
"All granted." Rhoda and Zude spoke almost simultaneously. Then Zude added, "That last agreement will be difficult, since it's precisely the agenda of the people you seem to represent here. In my view they wish to exploit or do violence to a whole group of people."
"You mean they want to exploit violent . . . people?" Rhoda asked.
"Exactly," answered Zude.
Longleaf spoke decisively. "We suspend the agreement about good will for the present, since it is substantial, a part of the discussion." She continued, "The first of the three behaviors states, 'I will say all of the truth as I know it that pertains to the matter at hand. I believe my partners in true-talk will do the same.'"
"Granted." Rhoda and Zude again spoke in unison.
"Second behavior: I will acknowledge the shortcomings of my position and the virtues of the counter position."
"Granted."
"Last behavior: I will articulate and attempt to understand and appreciate the point of view that opposes my own; I will give this viewpoint respect-in-disagreement."
"Granted."
Zude addressed Rhoda. "So you will present a case and receive my response."
Rhoda smiled in spite of herself. "Yes, and -- dare I use the word? -- I will persuade you if I can . . . ."
Remarkably, Zude smiled back. "And I you, Major. If I can." She lit another cigarillo, adjusting the exhaust chute. "Take us back to the cusp, Jing-Cha."
"Before we return to that point, Magister," said Rhoda, "would you ask Captain Edge to bring us the package I turned over to her staff?"
Zude moved to her desk and tapped a message into one of the consoles there. She resumed her seat. "Jing-Cha?"Longleaf recited. "Amah Densmore had just said, 'They want a final ridding of violence, Magister, and to them the solution is the use of neurological inhibitors on any man corrected to person convicted of a violent act.'"
"Thank you. I wish to respond."
Rhoda nodded.
Zude pressed the edge of the table, activating a large screen in the cushioned wall by Longleaf. From what looked like a dense graphic, she isolated and magnified a statistical report. "There it is, Kanshoumates. We now have on Little Blue 780 bailiwicks, colonies which confine within their boundaries habitantes found guilty of violent acts." She filled the screen with the three tri-satrapies in sequenced carto-sections, highlighted to demonstrate the bailiwicks' locations. "That figure includes central cities, like this one, where the colonies are characteristically surrounded by free citizens."
She shifted the screen to the tables again and scrolled to comparative calculations. "Each bailiwick holds an average of 1,282 habitantes, some as few as 500 and some as many as 4,000. As you indicated, the habitantes are in large majority men, even when we count the people, in large majority women, who choose to live there with convicted habitantes.
"All told, we're looking at about a million habitantes and approximately 120,000 people who choose to live near them in bailiwicks, from Thule to the Falklands, from Ouagadougou to Fiji." She paqued the screen and leaned back in her chair. "Let's assume the highly unlikely possibility that a violence center is discovered in the human brain." She extinguished her cigarillo. "One million people. If I understand you, you're suggesting that all of them, at least those convicted, should, against their will, be subjected to the surgical procedures that are supposed to render them docile and law-abiding."
Rhoda hesitated, wondering, in spite of the true-talk, what trap might lie ahead. "Yes. Perhaps with the promise of freedom or a reduced sentence if they have the surgery. It would not be against their will, Magister. They would have a choice."
Zude looked toward the entrance wall. Captain Edge appeared, deposited a small package in front of Zude and disappeared.
"A choice, you say," Zude repeated. "A choice of what? Surgery or death?"
Rhoda did not answer.
"And how many do you imagine would choose to be so altered?" Zude persisted.
"Magister, when the benefits to society are understood, I suspect most of those convicted would choose to be relieved of their drive to destroy or injure."
Zude grunted. "If they were choosing it over death, maybe. But maybe not. Maybe even the freedom to die unaltered, un-invaded, to die as one's own self, is more precious than living as a citizen, harmless and docile." Zude rose to her feet, pacing again. "And consider the consequences of such research for future generations, in the issue of Infancy Protocols. Suppose through the widest stretch of the imagination that we could to determine which infants might 'carry' the violence center and which not. Then we impose on newbornsa neurological requirement that vastly alters their lives--"
Rhoda interposed, "Like the transfusion of healthy blood for diseased blood, Magister? Like endocrine transplants? Like in-uteroorgan rehabilitation, gene substitution, lymph regeneration, all the techniques--"
"Major!" Zude snapped. "What the pluperfect hell do you think the biotech riots were about? About control of epidemics, yes, but far more than that! What kind of history are they filling you with at the Hong Kong Academy these days that you don't know about the cyborg disasters and the genetic engineering fiascos? You--"
Longleaf stood. She moved to Zude's side and placed her hand on the Magister's arm. "Personal attack and associational slur."
Zude looked at her. "Right," she grunted. "Right. Delete. I wish it unsaid." Both she and Longleaf sat again.
Rhoda nodded. "Magister, on this matter my feet point with yours," she encouraged. "I understand the reasoning behind banning such research and behind the moratorium on cloning. I am in sympathy with the public's loss of confidence in biotechnology."
Zude raised an eyebrow.
"But we are speaking here of benefits to all humankind. If research were to be authorized and a violence center discovered, then we could make ethical use of our knowledge and take a giant step toward an advanced, nonviolentcivilization, toward a reverence for life from the moment of our birth." She looked toward the cat figure by Zude's desk unit. "And if we rid ourselves of violence, Little Blue might even be populated again with animal beings."
Shaking her head, Zude contended, "Amah, you can't talk about the Protocols and reverence for life in the same breath. Reverence for life interferes as little as possible with another's freedom." She paused for several heartbeats, looking far down the familiar discursive path that now rolled out before them. Then she changed direction entirely. "You say you come with Magister Lin-ci Win's knowlege, even though she has not sent you. I'm fully aware of her support of Habitante Testing. Does she plan some strategy for convincing the Central Web?"
"I don't know the answer to that."
Longleaf touched Rhoda's sleeve. "First Behavior."
The Matrix Major blushed as she turned back to Zude. "Magister Win would of course wants your support with the Central Web, though she realizes that's unlikely. Still, she hopes a new development might influence you." Rhoda picked up the cotton pouch that Captain Edge had brought in, and emptied onto the table two three-inch wooden shafts, each terminating in a delicate and sharply pointed crystal. "Have you ever seen these?"
Zude shook her head. She examined the crystals. "Are they tuned?"
"Precisely. But not charged. Captain Edge will tell you that they are monoclinic staurolytes with a wildcard vector that can operate as far away as twenty feet. They burn out hairs, vocal bands . .
. and testicles."
Zude looked at her.
Rhoda picked up one of the shafts. "They're called 'ballbakers.' In a rash of recent incidents in Singapore, they have been used to castrate men. The woman in possession of these told us that if the Amahrery continues to stall on the matter of neurological violence inhibitors, renegade women would do it themselves and in their own way. By castration."
Zude's fist hit the table. "Revenge!" she breathed. "Insane, mindless revenge!" She pushed her fingers through her hair, then stood abruptly. "Forgive me, Kanshoumates," she said, pulling in a deep breath, "but I have trouble understanding anyone who thinks that burning off a man's balls will make him docile."
Rhoda shot a glance at Longleaf, then turned back to Zude. "I would agree, Magister, but you will admit that the symbolism of the act carries with it a powerful message."
"I'll admit no such thing!" Zude shot back. She leaned on the table. "Such women don't want a nonviolent world, Major. They simply want to punish men. And to participate in the escalation of the violence . . . thus, I might add, damaging their own argument that men are the violent sex!"
"Whatever the case," Rhoda replied, "Magister Win believes the spreading use of these devices triggered the uprisings, at least in Kandy and Singapore."
Zude leaned toward Rhoda. "Lin-ci Win sent these crystals?"
Rhoda looked at Longleaf. "Insofar as she sent us at all, she sent them with us as evidence of the new extremes that citizens are moving toward. She is being pressured, Magister, to use her influence in hastening the Central Web to a ratification of the Testing and the Protocols . . . pressured by women from all over China and India. And by women from your own tri-satrapy."
Something with sharp corners stirred in Zude's stomach. "What women?" she asked steadily.
"Jezebel Stronglaces has brought together most of the sentiment here in your jurisdiction. She allies herself with many in the Africa-Europe-Mideast Tri-Satrapy as well."
Zude stiffened. "I knew Jezebel Stronglaces. At the Academy."
Both Amahs visibly refrained from making full eye contact with each other. They waited in silence.
"Amahs," Zude continued, "if Jezebel Stronglaces is still the woman she was then, she would abhor such violence as this."
"Clarification, Magister," said Longleaf promptly. "Jezebel Stronglaces has not been identified with the women distributing the ballbakers. The majority of women who pressure Magister Win are not associated with the crystals either. Most are opposed to violence in any form."
Zude suppressed a sardonic rejoinder. "I understand," she muttered, sifting and sorting the new information. When she refocused at last on her two guests, it was with deliberate purpose. "Kanshoumates," she said, "I have to end this encounter. You've fanned the fires of change tonight, and I formally thank you." She straightened, and smiled briefly. "Do we need any closure?"
Matrix Major Densmore studied the Magister. "Only to thank you," she said, "for the surprise -- and the gift -- of the true-talk."
Zude nodded.
"And for the such-and-such," added the Jing-Cha. "I thank you too, Magister."
Together the three women stood.
Zude moved toward the exit wall. "Then goodnight," she said. "Captain Edge will see you to your quarters here in the Shrievalty. Consider yourselves my guests for as long as you need to stay." She touched the depaque control that revealed the hallway.
When the wall re-established itself behind the Australian women, Zude walked to the desk unit that held the taxidermed cat. She rested her hand on its taut curved neck and closed her eyes.
Long minutes later she swung into action, calling up desktop, wall, and ceiling screens for the files she was seeking with her fingers. "Flora!"
"Ma'am, Magister?" Vigilante Flora Arguelles's voice filled the room.
"Get me Magister Lutu on flatscreen. Tell her I must hear from her within three hours or I'll be in Crete by low rocket before sunset tomorrow." Zude's voice lost its sharp edges. "I also need Kayita and Ria. At home. They're waiting up for me. Set it up on holofone if you can."
When Flora beeped off, Zude threw one last toggle.
"Here, Magister," said the voice of Captain Edge.
Zude worked smoothly with her adjutant, conducting conferences with her three Vice-Magisters and then reaching two old friends in simul-call at Kanshou field posts in Shenyang and Paris, each of whom had been a legal advisor to her in the past. She set them to the task of polling every member of the Central Web as to whether or not Habitante Testing or the Anti-Violence Protocols might reach active agenda status. "Explore any morally defensible technicality," she told them, "that could stop the Web from initiating this legislation."
She left off her study of the Central Web's roster of members to take Flora's relay of the message from Magister Flossie Yotoma Lutu. Magister Lutu would be free to talk early the next morning, L.A. time, by unmonitored priority holochannel. She would call Magister Adverb then. Under no condition was Zude to come to Crete since tonight Yotoma herself was being gerted to Rome.
Zude was in conversattion with Aztlán's best crystal expert when Flora announced, "I've got your folks on comline three." Zude cut short the lecture on orgone accumulators. She pressed a strip under her desk and filled her office with the holoscreen image of an old woman's face -- a highly agitated old woman. Behind the face -- and trying to calm it -- was a younger woman who struggled at the same time to control a small black-haired girl eager to get into the holopicture.
"Again, again," the old woman moaned loudly, "again you are not coming!"
"Zudie!" the child cried, wiggling with joy. When the young woman whispered in her ear, the little girl settled, still intent upon Zude's holo-image. The old woman continued moaning.
Zude waved a sound-dampinto effect and widened the hololensto encompass her chaotic desk. She addressed the old woman. "Kayita," she soothed, trying to be heard over the sounds of distress, "Kayita--"
"Zella, you are wholly without honor, worth nothing to woman or child. Worth nothing to a man. Worth nothing. Why do you not come?"
Zude overrode the tirade. "Kayita, look at my desk, look at my office. Look at all the work!" She pointed to the disarray of cups, chairs, magnopads, papers, full screens, blinking lights. "Hey," she said, snagging the image of Bosca out of the air, "there's a woman I'd like for you to meet, from Old Mexico—"
The old woman's eyes lit up. "Oaxaca? She is from Oaxaca?"
"Near there, at least. I'm sure she could tell us about Oaxaca. Why don't I bring her for a visit tomorrow?"
"Tomorrow? 'Tomorrow' you said yesterday. You said, 'Tomorrow I will sleep at your house.' It is tomorrow. And you sleep in your office. Again."
The younger woman pushed in beside Kayita, holding her, stroking her hair, talking both to her and Zude. "Zude, it's fine," she said.
"Fine?" burst in Kayita. "What is fine? Fine that she is not coming? We are her family. Like a mother I am to her!" she railed. "Zella, you come home tonight. Your bed is ready."
Zude interrupted. "I know, Kayita, I know." She addressed Ria. "I see generations one and three, and half of number four. Where's the other half of four?"
"Enrique? He's sleeping tight."
"And number two? Eva?"
"She's at a class. And we'll all be here tomorrow. Bring your friend." Ria grabbed Regina to stop her plunge into a hololens.
"Zudie!" bellowed the child.
"Reggie," Zude beamed, "I promise, we'll go flying when I come--"
Regina's face glowed brighter. "Tomorrow! We'll fly! You and me and your friend!"
Zude swallowed abruptly. "Well, not that friend, preshi. But I'll fly with you soon."
Regina was soothed.
Kayita had lapsed into a grim silence. She peered at Zude. "You work too much," she rasped.
Both Zude and Ria laughed.
Kayita grumbled, moving out of holorange. "Big cocoroca. She says she is not coming tonight. She is not coming tonight. When
God says no, the saints are helpless." She disappeared.
Zude shook her head. "I can't make it okay with her."
"She'll be fine," Ria promised, "bright as the sun tomorrow, knowing you're coming."
"And by then I'll be brighter too, Ria."
Ria, her arms full, kissed the air in Zude's direction. Regina sputtered her affection with a loud lip flutter. Magister Adverb blew a gallant goodbye kiss toward them both.
Zude's longest and most wide-ranging strategizing session was conducted by intra-tri-satrapy conference with three trusted friends/Vigilantes: Captain Edge; Brigadier Vigilante Robin Echevarría, in charge of the tri-satrapy's bailiwick management and stationed in Buenos Aires; and Sky Commander Susana Femmesole whose staff in Old Albuquerque handled one of the tri-satrapy's three information centers. After Edge had played the flatcube of the just-completed meeting with Amahs Densmore and Longleaf for the advisors, Zude drew responses from each of them, especially in regard to the possible threat of the ballbakers.
Within an hour the group had evolved a plan of action for data-gathering throughout the tri-satrapy. It called for the activation of tempsquads, polling groups which operated in highly tuned personal contact circumstances; these groups would spot-interview carefuly selected cross-sections of the population to determine the "temperature" of the citizenry on the question of Habitante Testing and the Anti-Violence Protocols. When Echavarría and Femmesole signed off, Zude called up from her personal files the names of free citizens and officers in the other two tri-satrapies who could shake loose the results of similar polls outside Nueva Tierra. She copied their preliminary assessments of the inquiry and handed the magnopad over to Edge.
When Edge's departing footsteps had died, Zude took up her vigil again by the depaqued wall overlooking Los Angeles. Her thoughts were no longer of violent skirmishes within the tri-satrapy or of crystal ballbakers, not even of Kayita or her chosen children. Instead, Magister Adverb summoned the memory of an earlier world and a younger heart. She traced in her mind the curious turns of Fate that had crossed her path with that of Jezebel Stronglaces. Many years ago they had come together and then separated -- painfully and irrevocably.
The Kanshou (Earthkeep) Page 5
