Ecolitan Prime (Ecolitan Matter)

by L. E. Modesitt Jr.

  “Do you know why the Legation was bombed?”

  “Someone does not want the trade treaty. When I first arrived, attacked was I. Now comes the bomb.”

  “Isn’t that stretching things?”

  “Aren’t you being overdramatic?”

  Nathaniel shrugged as expressively as he could and pointed to the blast-torn wall. “That. That is not dramatic?”

  The faxers were off Nathaniel.

  The smaller commentator wound the segment up.

  “That’s the story at the Accord Legation. Trade talks, an explosion following an attempted assassination. Frian Su-Ryener for Galactafax at the Accord Legation.”

  The taller woman positioned herself by the worse section of the bulging wall and smiled.

  “For the second time in as many days, violence in New Augusta. Yesterday, the I.I.S. refused to comment on why a fully armed agent was assaulted here in the capital. Last night, this explosion, and an Envoy who wears the diplomatic blacks. The rumored assailant of the I.I.S. agent also was reported to wear black.

  “Now we learn that trade talks with the Empire are involved, and the Envoy involved has already been attacked once before. Why? Whatever it is, it’s sparked the first bombing in New Augusta in three decades. This is Kyra Bar-Twyla for Faxstellar.”

  “Is that right about the I.I.S.?” Hillary asked.

  “Worse than that,” interrupted the other commentator, “if you believe the rumors. Defense had five agents in the area, and three don’t know what happened and two are now walking nuts.”

  “No confirmation,” clipped the taller one, “no story.”

  They both nodded to their faxers, and the four left as quickly and abruptly as they had arrived.

  “What did they mean?” the Ecolitan asked Hillary.

  “There’s some rule by the Ministry of Communications. You have to have at least two witnesses to any rumor you fax, and three or two plus documentation if you present a fact and if it involves official Imperial business.”

  “You know that rule from where?”

  Hillary was spared a response by the arrival of Mydra.

  “Lord Whaler, do you think it was wise to let those…those…rumormongers in?”

  “Wise, I know not. But what would they have said if I had said no?”

  “You may have a point there, but sensationalism could affect the trade talks.”

  Nathaniel nodded politely and waited until the two were looking at him.

  “Later, I think, we should talk. Right now, some communications I must make. Repairs, will they be made?”

  Mydra retreated to her console without acknowledging the question.

  The Ecolitan sat back down behind his own console and began to compose a faxletter for transmission to the Legations of the independent majors, the Federated Hegemony, and the Fuardian Conglomerate.

  When it was completed, he buzzed Mydra.

  “Yes, Lord Whaler?”

  “In my console stored is a communication I need improved for transmission. As soon as possible in the formal way.”

  “I’ll get right to it.”

  “See it I would like before you send it.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  As she was completing the text, he wandered out into the staff office and began to peer over her shoulder at the text screen. Much as he had suspected, the message bore little resemblance to what he had set out originally.

  “Forgot you the part about Haversol.”

  “So I did. Do you think you should mention such an unpleasant incident so bluntly?”

  “Find you a more politic way to express, and pleased I would be.”

  He waited as she revised the language.

  “Need the part about the appearance of delay causing misunderstandings that could be avoided. Say it most politely, as you do.”

  Mydra nodded.

  When it was completed, the faxtext from the acting Legate of Accord was a polite, understated account of the difficulties faced by one Nathaniel Whaler, with even politer implications about how precedents unfavorable to all non-Imperial systems could be set if current patterns continued.

  It has to be good, thought Nathaniel. Mydra doesn’t like it a bit.

  “Show me, please, how it is sent.”

  Mydra touched several studs, and the dispatch plate turned red. She did not touch it.

  Nathaniel bent over and tapped it.

  “Do you not finish by this?” he asked naively.

  “That’s right, Lord Whaler.”

  He watched while she sent off the other twenty-three, knowing she was getting frustrated by the surveillance.

  He retired to his console to authenticate the routine correspondence. The debris had been removed, but the repairs had not been started nor were any workers in evidence.

  After running through the material, he decided to see if anything he had attempted to plant had showed up in the faxtabs. At the three buzzes from the console as it burped forth the faxtab, Mydra looked up sharply at him through the open portal. She seemed to relax as she saw him lean back in the big swivel and began to read.

  The factual side of the news hadn’t changed that much.

  The First Minister of Orknarli protested the “maneuvers” of the Fifth Fleet. Repercussions of the synde bean shortage on Imperial trade balances. Ministry of Defense requests for greater funding. Prince Heuron dedicates H.M.S. Gold Prince, flagship of the newly dedicated Eleventh Fleet.

  Scandalous Sam was at the end of the faxtab, and Nathaniel hesitated a moment before checking the gossip, not sure he wanted to see if any of the bait was there.

  Explosive news…should we tell you which diplomat had his office explode…after seeing a very special assistant…and yet he’s so very hard to see…Which playboy of the court rolled his airchair over his chef? And don’t forget…

  Nathaniel let the flimsies drop. Unless the Imperials were onto every innuendo, Scandalous Sam’s gossip needed a few more kicks to keep the interest in the Imperial treatment of Accord going.

  At 1153, his private line buzzed, and out of the corner of his eye, he saw Mydra go bolt upright.

  “Lord Whaler?”

  “The same.”

  “Alexi Jansen, here, and my valued assistant for External Trade, Janis Du-Plessis. I understand there has been some confusion, some rather strange occurrences.” Jansen was a big blond man with skin the color of leather, and he laughed as he finished the sentence.

  “Of that, some,” admitted Nathaniel.

  “I do hope we can help.”

  “Our proposal submitted to Ms. Du-Plessis, and rapid consideration of those terms would be helpful.” Nathaniel shrugged as dramatically as he could. “What can I say? Come for trade, get explosions. Come to talk, and…”

  “Lord Whaler,” commented Janis Du-Plessis, “we hope we can clear these up as soon as possible.”

  “Janis, here, told me about your visit. It seemed rather unusual, but she checked up on things, and that guard…he was wiped. Strange.”

  “Guard? Wiped? I had difficulties but did not understand the reasons.” Nathaniel shook himself and smiled into the screen. He went on, “Your courtesy I surely appreciate and look forward to hearing from you.” The Ecolitan half bowed. Alexi Jansen bowed in return. “When we have finished an analysis of your proposal, Lord Whaler, we’ll be back to you.”

  The screen images blanked.

  Nathaniel cleared his throat loudly and thoroughly, stood away from the swivel, and strutted over to the open portal where he could peer down at Mydra.

  “Mydra? Where is Sergel?”

  “I don’t know, Lord Whaler.”

  “He is supposed to be an Information Specialist, and never do I see him.”

  “I’ll try to locate him, but I imagine he’s quite busy at the moment.”

  “And busy doing what?” The Ecolitan turned and marched back to his swivel, clearing his throat again for effect.

  He had decided he should be somewhat unreasona
ble; at least some of the time, and occasionally petty until he could see how things were shaking out.

  Dropping himself into the swivel, the black and green swivel, with an audible thump, he twisted the chair to watch the low clouds swirl above the towers. At the angle he chose, he could keep an eye on Mydra without seeming to. The layout of the office had been designed to let her keep tabs on him, and the thought that he could reverse it gave him some small amusement as he saw Mydra keying things out using her console.

  While he couldn’t see the screen itself, she was faxing a number of individuals, from what he could tell.

  At one point, her back stiffened, and he figured she’d been told something she hadn’t expected. After that she made two or three more calls.

  With a snapping movement that flipped out the back of her short black and tan tunic, she stood and entered his office.

  Nathaniel returned his full attention to the storm clouds outside, watching the white-gray tops of the cumulus clouds race toward the patches of blue above.

  “Lord Whaler?”

  He swiveled back from his window view and put both feet on the floor directly behind his console.

  “Yes, Mydra?”

  “I can’t seem to locate Mr. Weintre.”

  “Was he not in someone’s custody the day before last?”

  “You had him released.”

  “Fruit a little rotten can only get more rotten…it is hard to translate sayings into Panglais, but you understand?”

  “A partly spoiled fruit can only rot? Is that what you meant? What does that have to do with Mr. Weintre?”

  “Sergel has gotten rotten. First, a little trouble, now perhaps more trouble. Who guards troublemakers?”

  “Here in the tower, the Diplomatic Police.”

  “Elsewhere?”

  Nathaniel had a solid idea where Sergel was: in the hands of “specialists” at the Ministry of Defense who would be questioning him thoroughly, mind-probing him in depth. But the Ecolitan didn’t want to voice that, just lead her along that track.

  “The Imperial Monitors.”

  Nathaniel shrugged to indicate his ideas were exhausted and went on as if to change the subject. “All the difficulties we have, Mydra, and the Envoy from another system last night told me military people caused his problems. Is that possible?”

  “Everyone likes to blame the Eagles, Lord Whaler, but they stay out of New Augusta for the most part.”

  Nathaniel shrugged again. From the momentary gleam in her eyes, she’d gotten the thought he’d wanted to plant, the military aspect of Sergel’s disappearance and the Legation’s troubles.

  “I understand. Force Command is strong on Accord, and I wondered if the military was also on New Augusta.”

  Mydra gave him a smile that was equally warm and patronizing.

  “The Empire’s not quite like any place else in the galaxy, I suspect, Lord Whaler.”

  “How true. Yet people are people.” He looked out the window and leaned back again. “Not always do I say well what I think. Panglais is a lovely language but too flowery for a simple teacher of trade and economics. I came to New Augusta hoping people would see that agreement is possible always and that all lose when war comes.

  “When the more powerful is stubborn, the small fight. Knowing they will lose, they fight, and before they perish, many would poison the water the victors would drink. Fighting is always so.”

  Nathaniel looked at Mydra, efficient in her brown and tan.

  “A scholar could express that better. The point is the same. Your Empire is…complex…many towers, many Ministries, many people, many battlecruisers, many troops. Accord is simple. Few people, few ships. The only defense we have is the power to destroy the ecologies of the galaxy, strewing death across the suns before we perish.”

  He shrugged.

  “Can I tell the Empire, with thousands of ships, that little Accord can sow such vast death? Who believes? Can I tell our House of Delegates, who know they can sow such death, that the Empire does not believe? To prove our power, must millions die? And so, I sit and talk, sit and hope. Hope they have not forgotten.”

  He looked blankly out the window.

  The room was silent. The clouds swirled outside, and Nathaniel watched. Watched, hoping the snoops had gotten it all, hoping that Mydra had understood it all, and hoping that both thought he wasn’t playing to the unseen audience.

  “Lord Whaler,” Mydra asked softly, “may I go?”

  He nodded.

  The waiting was the worst, whether it was waiting in the darkness of space, in a full-blanked needle-boat, knowing that another needle-boat waited, knowing that whoever moved first was dead, or whether it was lying flat in the jungle outback of Trezenia, listening for the slight change in pitch of the treehoppers’ song to signify someone, something, was out there moving, or whether it was sitting behind a modernistic console waiting, debating whether to take stronger action, when too strong an action might unleash the disaster that needed to be contained.

  He leaned further back in the swivel, half noting that the clouds were clearing, that the westernmost towers were glistening in the jacket of moisture lit by the noon sun.

  The signs were there—the overt absence of military influence coupled with the continuing references to the “Eagles” and the large military bureaucracy; the gentle and total control of the population; the small stories about the use of the Fleets in pressuring out-systems; the dedication of the new flagship of the new Eleventh Fleet; the routine acceptance of the dispatch of the Fifth Fleet to intimidate Orknarli; and, of course, the example of Haversol.

  The Imperials liked to play the diplomatic game as politely as possible, without overt violence, and using the threat of the immense force of the Empire as the major tool. The use of violence in New Augusta didn’t fit, not unless Accord was a real threat to something being planned, not unless the conditioned fear of Accord ran deeper than he thought.

  The intercom buzzed. He ignored it, trying to pin down the elusive angle of the bombings.

  The intercom buzzed twice.

  He wondered if Marcella had anything to do with the explosions. Why her warnings? Or Courtney’s veiled references? And Sylvia…With that thought he wondered if he detected the faintest trace of orange blossoms in the office.

  He shook his head.

  His fingers headed for the console control studs as he swung back to face the bank of plates and lights. Finally, he touched the plates and tapped out the codes.

  “Senator Helmsworth’s office.”

  “Nathaniel Whaler for Sylvia Ferro-Maine.”

  “I’m sorry, Lord Whaler, but she and Ms. Corwin-Smathers are on the floor with the Senator.”

  Floor? Floor of what?

  Charles caught the confusion on Nathaniel’s face and flashed his professionally engaging smile at the Envoy.

  “The floor of the Senate. The debate on the ad valorem tax changes has just begun.” The receptionist paused.

  “Would you like to leave word that you called?”

  “No…not right now. Thank you.”

  Nathaniel absently looked down at the console where the intercom plate still flashed.

  Of course the lady was busy. Weren’t they all? He shook his head again.

  The intercom buzzed twice more, and this time he decided against ignoring it.

  “Lord Whaler, the repair crews are here.”

  “Fine.”

  “They’re likely to make a great deal of noise.”

  “Noise? Ah, yes, noise.”

  “Perhaps now would be a good time for you to eat?”

  Nathaniel scratched his head, then nodded.

  “Lunch, I suppose, I will have now.”

  He stood and looked out at the hills, now beginning to show a golden tinge. He wondered if the color shift were seasonal or merely the result of little rain.

  XXVI

  “HE’S A DANGER for two reasons.”

  “Two? The first is obvious.
If he succeeds in getting that trade agreement, we lose the most favorable chance in generations to remove the Accord influence. But what’s the second?”

  Three officers sat in the small sound-and snoop-blanked room, and the special construction absorbed each word even before the next was uttered.

  “His success fuels the myth of Accord’s invincibility.”

  The third officer, a woman wearing the uniform of a Vice Admiral, frowned, tapped her fingers on the soft top of the table. “Can you honestly say that the average citizen knows, or cares, about whether Accord can hold us off? Who cares? When you get to that level of argument, it’s a leadership discussion. The whole universe knows Accord is not an aggressive force. The more subtle danger is overlooked.”

  “Subtleties yet,” snapped the First Fleet Commander. “How subtle is it that our traders are effectively blocked from the entire Rift? How subtle is it that fifty systems followed Accord into rebellion and still look to the black and green for leadership?”

  The Rear Admiral shook her head. “For you, it’s not subtle. But who in the Imperial Court really follows the trade flow on the Imperial borders? Who understands that Accord’s example will leave us boxed on all borders? Or that stagnation is bound to follow? N’troya understands that. He should, since he’s the Emperor, but he also claims that the use of force begets force, and that force will lead to the Empire’s downfall.”

  “The Grand Admiral hasn’t bought that.”

  “Not yet. That’s the position her daughter is staking out at Commerce, and a successful trade treaty with Accord could bolster both the Emperor and young Ku-Smythe. Not incidentally, it would further strengthen Accord.”

  The Vice Commander spoke up.

  “For generations, they’ve bluffed us, claiming their Institute could poison all the worlds of the Empire. It’s just not possible, but everyone goes along with the blackmail bluff and nods.”

  The Rear Admiral looked at the two younger officers, the Fleet Commander and her Vice Commander.

  “Bluff it might be, but if we get the go-ahead from the Grand Admiral, you’ll have literally only standard hours in which to bake the entire system. Who knows what they have hidden on the outer planets, on asteroids, parked in orbit…”