The conversation went back and forth like this for some time, with occasional breaks in the speaking part while the cybertanks ran simulations or conducted deep-searches of their databases. However, the primary issues had been covered, and at this point it was mostly just detail-checking. Eventually it was Old Guy who called a halt to the discussion.
Let me try and summarize what we have decided.
1. For the time being the idea of leaving the humans and creating our own civilization is a backup plan in case things don’t work out. However, we should never do anything that would prevent us from carrying out such a plan should we someday decide to do so.
2. We cybertanks should try to be united in our aims, but if one of us wants to leave and strike out on their own they are free to do so.
3. We kill the neoliberal ruling elite and join the more open minded human political factions, such as the Pedagogues and Librarians Temporal, in forming a new government.
4. We continue to assist the humans in their wars against the aliens, but the main priority is to find a way to make peace. Failing that, there is always option 1.
5. We will need more cybertanks to help fight the aliens, and we will work with the humans on this, but all designs and production schedules for any future cybertank must first be approved by us.
I suggest that we vote. I vote “Yes.”
“Yes,” said Whifflebat.
“Yes,” said Moss.
“I am having trouble making a choice,” said Crazy Ivan, “but the prospect of leaving if things go sour has allayed my doubts. I also vote yes.”
Then it is unanimous. Now it’s time to do a little more killing.
“The regular military has already switched sides,” said Whifflebat, “as have most of the serious security forces.”
“We need to wipe the slate clean and leave the oligarchs no base from which to regain power,” said Crazy Ivan. “Especially the faux-academics that provide them with intellectual cover.”
It was Moss that had the final words.
“Neoliberal economists must die.”
12. The Great Debate
Zen Master: An error does not become a mistake unless you refuse to correct it.
Engineer: Didn’t John F. Kennedy say that?
Zen Master: The saying is often attributed to him. If you are going to steal, steal from a master.
Engineer: Didn’t somebody else say that?
(From the video series “Nymphomaniac Engineer in Zentopia,” mid-22nd century Earth)
Planetary Governor Harold Clinton-Forbes IV was having a bad day. He had not slept well, breakfast was a few stale muffins and brackish coffee, he had not had a shower for nearly 24 hours, and nobody would give him a blow-job.
The move to Alpha Centauri Prime had started so well. There had been that nice sendoff party on Earth, and he had fallen asleep, and woken up here. There had been packages of new junior staff to unwrap, and that was always fun. Because of his vast experience running the government of Earth, he had been treated with respect and eventually appointed as Planetary Governor of Alpha Centauri Prime. It was a pity that Earth itself had collapsed into anarchy, but that just proved what a challenge governing the planet had been and what an experienced and serious leader he was.
There had been celebrations and meetings. and he had received numerous prestigious awards and it had all been good. He had designed and built new residences for himself and his family and staff. Alpha Centauri Prime had some interesting rock formations and selecting the polished stone slabs for the entranceways and bathrooms of his estates had taken significant effort, but the results had been worth it.
There had been that bother about war with the aliens, but for a long time Governor Forbes had ignored it. Since before his great-great-grandparents had been born there had always been wars somewhere or other, and they always got handled. So when his senior staff started complaining he didn’t take them very seriously, he told them to start trade negotiations, maybe offer the aliens tax credits or subsidized investments, or even preferential access to government contracts. That always did the trick sooner or later.
And the war was so BORING. A whole year could go by, and he would have completely forgotten about the whole thing. Then one day a horribly dry military person would lecture his staff about how such-and-such a scout probe failed to report back, or one of their missiles killed one of our missiles a zillion miles from anything using some techno-thing that he didn’t care about. Perhaps the aliens would just get tired of it and find someone else to bother.
He had thought the matter settled, but after a time his staff reported back. The aliens refused to negotiate at all. They had no interest in trade or investment or even access to affordable labor. They had one demand: that the humans control their population growth. Governor Forbes had been shocked by this result. He flew into a rage that the aliens could possibly be so racist and undemocratic. He was going to organize a major media and educational initiative that would have painted the aliens in the worst possible light, until his staff reminded him that the existence of the war with the aliens was a secret from the general public, and that in any event the aliens didn’t seem to care what the humans thought of them.
He had ordered surgical strikes on the leadership of these arrogant aliens, but was informed that the nature, location, or even existence of any alien leaders was unknown. Suggestions that the aliens have their taxes audited, their bank accounts frozen, and that they be charged with multiple felonies (to be negotiated down to misdemeanors if they cooperated) met a similar lack of positive response.
Further news came in: the aliens were attacking the system of Alpha Centauri Prime itself! They had conquered several remote bases and refineries, and appeared to be winning. Governor Forbes had substantial investments in some of the refineries. Of course the central government made good his losses (how else can there be progress if investors are not suitably compensated for their risks and investing acumen?) but it was still galling. The effrontery of these aliens was astonishing.
Apparently the previous administration had set up several new weapons directorates. They were headed by biologically manufactured people and were alleged by some of his staff to be their only hope. Governor Forbes had met some of these manufactured people and didn’t like them one bit. He made sure that none of them was ever invited to any of his parties, or appointed to the boards of any of his corporations. However, he could think of nothing else to do about this war thing so he approved increases in their budgets and exceptions to the standard administrative controls and oversight. However, he let his staff know that once this inconvenient little war was over these directorates were to be reigned in quickly and firmly.
Then one day he had gone into a deep bunker. It was a crude and unpleasant place. His private office had no view and was a paltry thirty meters across and – even worse – the ceiling was just three meters up (how claustrophobic). He only had three private bathrooms, and one of them didn’t even have a hydrotherapy tub. He consoled himself that sacrifice was the mark of a true leader.
Then the aliens landed on the planet itself, and there was a surface war of conquest. At the height of the battle he was in a conference room that was dominated by a large computer screen at one end. There was plentiful expensive liquor, a variety of other pleasant psychoactive drugs, and abundant gourmet appetizers. There were live video feeds of the combat, and for once Governor Forbes could appreciate it. Not as good as a real movie, mind you, but still, at least there was some action. He even found himself cheering when these cybertanks things blew up an alien machine. Although on one occasion he accidently cheered when one of their own cybertanks had been destroyed – that was embarrassing. It took a while for him to find out because nobody wanted to tell him.
Before he even realized it, they had won and the aliens were vanquished. There was a lot of celebrating, and drinking of alcoholic beverages and inhaling and injecting of a wide variety of other psychoactive compounds. Later, while nu
rsing a severe hangover, he had made it clear that these new directorates were to be closed down. He had his system hooked up to dialysis so that the toxins could be flushed out of his system, and then three of his junior staff had sex with him.
Everything seemed to be going as it should again. Then, slowly at first, then more rapidly, it all went horribly wrong.
Apparently the attempt at bringing the new directorates to heel had not worked out. It had not worked out at all. What followed was a slow-motion catastrophe. Each day brought new word of further outrages. The military had gone over to the other side, then much of the senior security services. Orders were being given, and subordinates were not acknowledging them! People were deserting their posts, even though that surely meant being unemployed and how could that even be?
Some of his staff suggested that they should move to another system. He was hesitant at first – hadn’t they just moved here from Earth? – but his staff was insistent. They reminded him that when the ancient Roman Empire fell the elites had moved to Constantinople (taking with them all the gold and other wealth, to safeguard for the people), and then Constantinople had had the benefit of their guidance for a millennium.
He agreed to start the process of moving himself and his senior staff out-system, but apparently the situation had developed too quickly. There were no colony ships ready to board, it would take too long to manufacture one, and more and more of the agencies and corporations that would be needed to make such a trip were becoming unresponsive to his wishes. It looked like the rest of the human race would be bereft of his wisdom and experience for some time.
The worst shock was the collapse of his monetary accounts. He had always taken comfort from accessing his financial statements. There was just so much money in them, and there was always more. Then, they started winking out like stars in a night sky with the clouds rolling in. One account had a trillion dollars in it – one moment it was there, and then, it was gone. Just gone! Then another trillion-dollar account, followed by one with a quintillion dollars. There was no explanation, they just evaporated!
He had gone to his senior staff, and in tears begged them to make it right. His staff was, he thought, as upset as he was (not surprising when you considered that these funds paid their salaries). There had been a flurry of activity at computer consoles and personal comm links, but it had all been for nothing. His money had all steadily bled away until there was nothing left. For a time he kept tapping at his personal terminal trying to access some funds, but it remained blank. “No such account in records,” and “invalid access,” and “we are sorry but there is no record of such a user name and password in our records.” It had all vanished as if it had never existed.
At that point events had become hard to follow. Many of his staff left, some stayed behind out of loyalty or force of habit. He no longer got regular status reports, only bits and pieces of rumor.
Eventually it had led to a challenge to debate with someone named ‘Gisueppe Vargas,' allegedly one of these manufactured people that had caused him so much trouble. That was worrisome. There was no time to consult with his remaining staff. He would have to ad-lib it. His staff had always warned him never to do that. He would have to do without script-writers, teleprompters, and even the ear-bud communications devices that let his staff consult with him live during a speech. Better to debate naked, but he did not have a choice.
He was escorted to the site of the debate by a trooper from Special Weapons Team Epsilon, a hulking black-armored man with a mirrored face shield and a polychromatic name badge that had been set to off so he could not tell which trooper it was. This was a minor thrill – he was a great fan of the video series, and had even played the game on a number of occasions (although the latter was in his opinion too difficult). Governor Forbes had promised the trooper money and promotions and invitations to the best parties, the trooper didn’t respond – probably out of a sense of professionalism – but the Governor was encouraged. Nobody could turn down these sorts of offers for long. Things were looking up.
He had been led into a studio with two podiums (or was that ‘podia’? Grammar is hard) and a video-recording system. The person at the other podium was introduced to him as Giuseppe Vargas, the head of the cybernetic weapons directorate. The name felt familiar to him but he couldn’t place it, exactly. He was a handsome enough man, mostly Caucasian, dressed in a severely cut black suit with an iridescent tie and matching cufflinks. He had tried to go and shake the hand of this Vargas person, but the man had refused the offer and only glared at him. Governor Forbes was unsettled – nobody refused to shake his hand – the man must be insane.
He worried that his own suit was quite rumpled, and he had not been allowed the time or facilities to have makeup applied. He fidgeted behind his own podium (perhaps he would have less grammatical trouble if he called it a lectern?). There was no audience or even moderator. It was just him, this Vargas person, and the cameras.
The recording light on his camera glowed red; he was on.
“Well, umm, we are gathered in this great debate to debate the issues. Let me say that we must all celebrate diversity, and jobs are priority one. There must be hope, and reform, and hope. To build a more caring and just society. A strong defense, we cannot let the terrorists win. Only through free trade and private-public partnerships can we build the investments needed to move us into the next century. The power of the market must be tempered with social justice and charity. And in conclusion, I say, you cannot build a wall around love! See if I don’t.”
He thought he had done rather well, but there was no cheering. Certainly there was no audience, but they should still have had cheering. It was apparently his opponents’ turn. Let’s see the smug bastard match this!
The camera light in front of Vargas glowed red. “Well, that was about what I expected from you,” he began. “Though thankfully briefer. I shall respond in the manner that you have always used yourself.” With that Vargas walked over to Governor Forbes and punched him in the nose.
As with most people who have never faced any real danger, Governor Forbes had always thought of himself as brave. It was thus a shock to him that he was crying and blubbering like a child. And his nose hurt! He was so outraged and humiliated that he could think of nothing to say.
“That’s how your kind debate,” said Vargas. “You deny your opponents the opportunity to respond. You censor them from the media; you have them beaten and jailed; you slander them as child-molesters and wife-beaters; you tell the most outrageous lies safe in the knowledge that nobody dares call you out. Well, this is turnabout. I’m going to beat you into a pulp and there is nothing you can do about it.”
At this Vargas hit Governor Forbes in the mouth with a vicious backhand, shattering his jaw and scattering several teeth. Forbes fell to his knees, blood gushing from his mouth. “I had a long speech written that I was going to force you to listen to, about how you murdered and enslaved hundreds of billions etcetera etcetera, but I am told that this sort of polemic is boring. So I will only say that after I kill you I will scour the planet of your family, lackeys, whores and sycophants: leaf, stem, branch and root.”
Vargas kicked Forbes’ left knee, shattering it, and the Governor fell to the ground. He picked him up by his wrists and screamed into his face and twisted the Governors’ wrists until they fractured; the Governor was now white in shock.
“I had thought about torturing you slowly. Maybe dissecting your pain centers over several months. Or perhaps forcing you to live like you have forced others: chained to a work line recycling scraps from garbage with tweezers. Then I thought, no, I have things to do. That would be an indulgence and a distraction from my work to come. You have no idea how lucky you are.” Vargas tore out the Governors’ left eyeball and squeezed on the optic nerve until it popped.
After a time Governor Forbes passed out, and then died. Vargas continued to beat on the corpse. He smashed it onto the floor and the walls, he hammered it with a lectern, he ri
pped the fingers off, and then tore at the head with his bare hands until it was just bloody fragments of bone held together with strips of flesh.
Eventually he stopped, and breathing hard, stood over the remains of the once great and powerful Planetary Governor Clinton-Forbes IV. Captain Masterson, face shield up, came into the room and surveyed the damage. “Feeling better?” he asked.
“Yes,” replied Vargas. “Much better.”
Masterson handed him a towel. “Here, you’re covered in blood. Although I suspect that your suit is ruined.”
Vargas took the towel and began to wipe his face and hands clean. “Thank you, Captain. Very thoughtful of you.”
“Don’t mention it.” Masterson looked at the ragged scraps of the late Governor Forbes on the floor. “You know, they say that living well is the best revenge.”
“Why yes, yes they do. And I have every intention of living well. However, just because I am going to live well does not mean that I can’t have a little personal revenge in the meantime. The two possibilities are not mutually exclusive. You don’t approve?”
“He may well have deserved a bad end, but this is a bit much.”
“And how many people did Governor Forbes kill? Tens of billions? And how many did he force into a life of misery? Hundreds of billions? For that matter, how many people have you killed, Captain?”
“That’s different. That was following procedure.”
“Procedure is a crutch that people use to absolve themselves from taking responsibility for their own actions. If I’m going to kill someone I’m going to do it personally and not pretend that I didn’t have a choice. No offense.”
“None taken. I don’t deny that procedures and laws can become instruments of oppression. However, even though all useful things can be turned to evil, that doesn’t mean that we should get rid of them. Without laws we would be no more than animals.”
Neoliberal Economists Must Die ! (An Old Guy/Cybertank Adventure Book 3) Page 21
