White Queen

by Gwyneth Jones

  She recalled him to the present.” So what was worth the plane fares, Dougie?”

  He was recovering. He’d been on the verge of fugue all the way from Krung Thep

  “Rajath is not their leader. He’s a…a hat, as the Japs used to say. There is a leader in there, you can forget Kershaw’s egalitarian fantasies. He may not be on Earth.”

  “Or she.”

  “They don’t have ‘shes.’ But we can do business with Rajath. We can say, okay, call it off, what do you want? It’s as simple as that. Give him a blank check, claw it all back in the negotiation process.”

  Carlotta sighed at him, and he knew why she seemed so calm. She’d given up.

  “When there was time,” she said. “You stupid bastards didn’t tell us you were in trouble. Now there is no time. Read this.”

  She gave him some paper and went to the kitchenette. “Are you hungry? Coffee? I could make you a sandwich?”

  “Mortadella!” shouted Pirate, and jumped from the keypad with a great rattling of chainmail grey wings. Douglas read the fax, and felt the blood drain from his face.

  “Where’d you get this from?”

  “Beijing. Isolated line. They’ve recognized us, you know.”

  She returned, leaned over his shoulder. “When Mr. Rajath gave the orders about his real estate, he seemed to think we’d all be listening. He doesn’t know everything, does he? But there’s somebody up there at Uji a little more public-spirited than you or Martha.”

  “Kaoru”

  “Of course. Beijing couldn’t keep something like this from their clients. Pakistan—a nuclear state, you’ll recall—, doesn’t care much for this suggestion just here. Or that word the alien used in his big speech: ‘sterilized.’”

  Douglas whispered. “The nest must be burned out. Oh my God.”

  She laughed at his expression. “That’s not me speaking, Tonto. That’s the wrath of Islam. The Chinese seem to think it’s worth a try. I don’t, but I’m only the President of the USSA. Who am I to tell people what to do?”

  She handed him coffee. “I can’t help you. I’m sorry. Your mercy mission has failed.”

  She was so calm. “No,” said Douglas. “That’s not why I’m here. I want you to do something, and I felt I had to ask you face to face. The Aleutians, you see: they know us. We have a chance to make a deal. We’re the only hope. We have to have the right to deal with them.”

  The President was silent for a few seconds. She blinked, twice: then smiled for all her public. “Ah, I understand.” She laughed. “What the hell. Oh Dougie, those damned aliens. This is not the way I planned to go down in history.”

  Ellen tried to work. The summer rains had begun, the damp air smelled of jasmine, and rot, and methane/alcohol.

  These beings are bipedal, they are marginally lighter (at 1g) than humans of similar size, have less body fat; marginally cooler body temperature. Possible air sacs against the spine, a bowl of belly between the hips that might contain a longer gut than ours. Stereoscopic vision, omnivorous dentation: what looks like our tooth enamel, a rooted tongue. They find our “hard” food distasteful, but at some very recent time (in evolutionary terms) they ate much the same way as we do. But they are not naked chimpanzees. The hair isn’t hair. It handles like—chitin? Like brittlestar tentacles, or the legs of a dead spider. (They were wary of human touch, but someone had managed to collect that vivid impression: it was faithfully simulated for Ellen’s fingertips.)

  Something marine, a tang of the cold seashore in that weed-bundle hair, pumice skin, those lumpy, rocklike joints. They could be spiritual cousins of the original Aleuts, the Amerindian tribe that gave its name to those cold islands.

  What about sex? Douglas’s fantasy about the Aleutians as obligate pedophiles was nonsense. But the Multiphon chamber had mostly been populated by single sex female delegations, alongside about thirty percent middle-aged men. Not many youngsters Look at the demographic, if you could call it that, of the chosen. It was so simple. Aleutian pairing crosses a generation. The Aleutians had picked out the few normal-looking couples they could see. This explanation had leapt out at them when they’d got together on Dougie’s breakthrough. In emergency session, before the ultimatum, when it had seemed that the Uji project could be saved.

  Ellen moved through the stacks of SETI’s library, no longer taking books from the shelves: haunted always by the Aleutians themselves. They would find this grab-bag of information so ludicrous. Their complete disregard for the rituals of first contact wore people down. What did it mean? You cannot know us, you infants, insects.

  She had fought for their innocence. She had insisted that their execution of Sarah was not what it seemed. To a people who believe sincerely in reincarnation, death is not such an terrible punishment. Their horror at the idea of flesh or blood being taken from them had to be taken into account. Then Rajath spoke in the Multiphon. That speech had had a terrible effect on Ellen. She saw the same old political monster, mouthing the same old threats. Interest dressed up as emotion, wounded principle a cloak for villainy, the same old story. She was not afraid. A vision, a foolish dream, had been destroyed. That was all.

  She exited from SETI, pushed back the headset. The good people were gone, no better than the rest. Because of a stupid accident the alien invaders had studied the minds of a woolly-hatted bunch of conciliationists, under the impression that they were getting the measure of the whole hive. They’d made a big mistake and planet Earth was going to pay for it because Pakistan would make her air strike. No one could stop that.

  She and Robin were invested as plenipotentiaries of the Westminster government (wonderful words!). If need be, they were empowered to speak for the whole EC. The WOCWOM had become more popular in the past year, but it was doubtful if the Aleutians would recognize video-delegates; and it was going to be difficult to rush more bodies from Europe to Thailand in present circumstances. It was unfortunate that the two lonely champions of the gold and blue banner were pariahs: the Brits who tried to steal tissue. They couldn’t hope to prove their innocence. But it didn’t matter. The Government of the World had failed to achieve closure. Poonsuk had been forced to inform the Aleutians, via Kaoru, of course, that their demands were rejected. And to warn them, as politely as possible, that if they didn’t vacate the Uji valley before the term of their own ultimatum, Uji would be burned out.

  There was nothing else she could do. The Islamic states were not going to crack, not with China behind them. The ultimatum was running out. No more flights in or out of Thailand, no big boats. At the moment no one would trust their life to any kind of computer, whatever its processor was made from. Little fleets of manual rigged prahu were doing a great trade ferrying refugees down from Karen. Poor Poonsuk. What a terrible and meaningless end, to the conference meant to better the lot of those mouse-armies of helpless women.

  Klong Ruam Rudi, still low on the pillars of the hotel’s garden at this season, was full of eerily quiet traffic: the splash of poles and oars. She could hear hymns being sung. The church of St Savior blazed with light on its concrete island. In the room next door the Thai girl who’d been looking after them since Sarah died was praying, on her knees before a tv flanked by pictures of the Queen and of the Virgin Mary.

  “You don’t remember ’04, Robin. People think they’re so important. So many daft fools, convinced our little messes had altered the working of the earth’s crust. It was terrible, the way people leapt at the idea of Gaia’s Punishment. This time it’s true. If we all get blasted to bits, some of us bloody well deserve it.”

  Robin said nothing. He did not want Ellen to know that he was one of the daft idiots. She was iron all through, the unshakable old idealist. He was jelly at the heart. The fans clattered to a halt. He started back from his desk with a gasp. His nerves were playing tricks.

  Ellen shook her head. “Just KT grid, trying to scare us.”

  Robin laughed, nodded shamefacedly.

  “Kaoru’s doing wonders with t
his evacuation. He’s obviously been planning for years to turf the Karens out.”

  Ellen had taken to wearing makeup, for the first time in about forty years, he guessed. The Multiphon fuzzed everybody into blooming infancy. It was the way Thai tv did things, but they’d been having to face other cams in the last few days. It was a shock to see yourself au naturel, on a diet of insomnia and adrenalin. Old fashioned powder had collected in Ellen’s bulldog jowls. He had thought of offering her something better. But she probably didn’t know he used cosmetics, and she would be shocked.

  The power returned. Ellen and Robin made no pretense of getting back to work.

  “I can’t believe it,” muttered Robin. “I can’t believe it. Why don’t they just leave?”

  But the aliens stayed. Maybe they didn’t think the insects would carry out their threat. Maybe it took time to set up the FTL. In two days, the superbeings would die. Not even the Pakistan government believed they would go unavenged.

  When the riposte to their ultimatum was delivered, no one knew what to do. Rajath’s plan did not allow for such a drastic raising of stakes. Eventually Clavel and Rajath went to the cottage again, in a very different mood. It did not occur to them, no more than the first time, to contact him mechanically and make sure he was there. Without realizing it they treated him as one of themselves. They were right, there was no need. He was waiting.

  Kaoru did not explain that the real governments of the world had intervened, it would have been distasteful and pointless. He did not tell them that he himself had leaked their demands to those real powers. There was no need. The Aleutians believed in their hearts that whatever one earthling knew, all knew: Kaoru understood that, and had acted upon their belief.

  “I assume, excuse me, that you are in some form of communication with your ‘planet’?”

  He stressed the word minimally. He would never spell out the truth he strongly suspected. “And that people there command large-scale weaponry? Please do not mistake me, only a ‘show’ is called for.”

  Rajath was horribly at a loss.

  Clavel told Kaoru.

  He made a speech.” I’m afraid not. We…Aleutia has no standing army.”

  “Ah, I see.”

  Kaoru became very silent. The harsh bright room gathered around him, a shrine and a tomb. The figures and letters on the old-fashioned screens stood frozen in the moment of their death.” And your preemptive encouragement?”

  Long ago in Africa, Maitri had used his legendary power over big dumb mobiles to tame one of the local vehicles, in an emergency. Cars, even the meanest brutes, always loved Maitri. Lugha, in Alaska, had found it easy to get a computing colony-creature to do what he wanted. In those days, they were all still living at home. It’s bad form to tamper with someone else’s commensals: but tempting, in a competitive situation, if you can seduce some dumb creature that knows no better. That was why the quarantine had seemed so natural. They knew now that these feats had been exceptional. Some of the local machinery could be subverted at a distance, most of it could not. Much of it was utterly mysterious.

  He still didn’t understand. They had used the idea that the locals don’t have any wanderers. But a deep conviction lingered, even now. Things couldn’t be as different as they seemed.

  He found that only formal speech would do, though it was hard work in this situation.

  “It’s like this. We have nothing from which to build actual weapons. Don’t you remember? That’s how this all began. A series of Lugha’s smallest wanderers altered the workings of some colony-animals of yours, I mean, belonging to the locals. Some people got hurt and died. We didn’t really intend what happened. We assumed. Commensals don’t attack their own kin; not where we come from…. We thought we’d do that again. We thought we’d cause a little mild mayhem.”

  murmured Rajath, the irrepressible.

  Kaoru was impassive. “Will the effect continue to spread?”

  “Lugha’s not an artisan. His wanderers will not thrive, they will die. The colonies will go back to the way they were before. Unless we go out and dose some more.”

  “I don’t think that would be wise,” murmured Kaoru. “You are without resources?”

 

  Rajath crouched, on reversed limbs. He looked at Kaoru’s withered hand, lying on the desktop. It wouldn’t be impossible to start building weapons, if they had the vital ingredient. He was sure that those who would count the cost would do so willingly. But the request that Clavel could not think of making wouldn’t come from him. Once the weapons are out, no one wins. Tears of frustration brimmed his eyes and glistened in the dark of his nasal. The steps that had led to this situation still looked so innocent.

  “If all of you here died?”

  Clavel bowed his head.

  The old man listened to the speaking silence.

  “The Americans have a saying,” he remarked. “In the country of the blind, the one eyed man is king. Please accept my apologies, I had forgotten how very far that is from the truth. Please excuse me further: you must surrender most abjectly, or else leave at once. Any attempt to set terms will only make these people more obdurate. I blame myself,” he added. “I should have made sure I understood your position before we tried to bluff them.”

  Kaoru’s disappointment was a bitter reproach. He had been carried away by Rajath, people always were. said Clavel. He crept up to Rajath and rubbed the trickster’s hunched shoulders.

 

  Rajath was afraid to talk to the dead. They all were. At home, priests and monks dealt with all of that. Your occasions were recorded. If you had done wrong or done something marvelous you would make confession, and it would be processed into your permanent record. But no one talked to the images! How could you talk to someone, without sharing their breath?

  Clavel reflected that there was nothing to fear. These people were as far away dead or alive. A vision of a whole world uninfested flickered through him, but found nowhere to rest.

 

  The great dictator sniffled. Rajath was always like this. He truly never knew his schemes were going to collapse, and he truly never meant any harm. It was moral idiocy, but somehow lovable. Clavel relented.

  Kaoru bowed very deeply as they left, acknowledging the Imperial presence, that he’d felt bound to ignore on other occasions. He took out a can of glass cleaner and a duster, and began to polish his relics.

  The open space between the National Assembly and Dusit was full of people. Many were defending tripods: friends and relatives hovering over or looking out of box screens; like tiny invalids carried above the jostling crowd. The streaming dusk was full of lights, water puddled ominously underfoot. The drastic and splendid measure the Thais had taken, of deliberately flooding their capital, had eased their problems for a while. But the water traffic fumes had began to build up, and in heavy rains the dikes that protected the National Treasure Area were awash.

  Douglas had trouble getting through, though the crowd was completely docile. They all knew who he was, his black face was sufficiently unusual among all the gold. Not many tourists these days. People kept pressing things into his hands. By the time he reached the doors he was laden with jasmine buds and little gilt buddha
s.

  He was back because the Multiphon was still trying, fighting to achieve closure: though the Pakistan Air Force might well be on its way already. It was the twenty sixth of June, 2039 The year 2583 by the Buddhist calendar. Not yet a whole year since the aliens had announced themselves in Alaska. He found his desk, and Martha. They embraced, hugging hard. He gave her a jasmine garland. “Carlotta’s planning a war,” he said: as if the Aleutians were right, and communication isn’t real unless you can feel each other’s breath. “She’s living in the past.”

  “Can you blame her? It was fun in the past. These fucking super-beings, they’ve ruined our parade.”

  “Any word from Kaoru?”

  “He’s staying up there.”

  Doug nodded. It was what he’d expected.

  “He sent a special message for you and me. He says he doesn’t hold us responsible.”

  “Huh?”

  “For the Manhattan Project, I guess. Or Economic Imperialism Who knows.”

  So this was what it felt like to be dying. It made you raw, in a way he couldn’t describe even to himself. Yet you went on talking, reacting, living, right to the end. He entered the Multiphon and checked around, briefly greeting friends: the team. There were the Brits. No reproaches: this was too big for recrimination. Poor bastards, it could have happened to anyone. We’ve all been under pressure to get some goods.

  (Hi Robin, Hi Ellen)

  Everything went dead quiet, for no discernible reason. There were plenty of astrals, he noticed. By this point no one was worried about offending the Aleutians. The Multiphon became for him its screen-self: a great assembly, a hall full of people, all equally present. All of us in here, and all the billions outside. They were one entity. He was dying, he could do what he liked. He took Martha’s hand and willed himself part of that being. Every one that wants to live, push on this balance, push, with all your hearts.