Review Night on Union Station (EarthCent Ambassador Book 11)

by E. M. Foner

  “Once I got over the initial shock, I began to get the feeling they were all dancing around some larger issue,” Kelly said.

  “You mean they aren’t really complaining about the way we flare our nostrils or how we slurp our soup?” Ambassador Fu asked.

  “It’s just that they were all so, I don’t know, shifty about it. I can’t help wondering if they know something we don’t.”

  “They know lots of things we don’t,” the president observed. “Speaking of things we don’t know, I was hoping you could get Mr. Oxford to participate in this meeting.”

  “He and his wife are waiting in the reception area outside my office,” Kelly said. “They wanted to give us a chance to discuss the recent intelligence misses amongst ourselves before they join the holo-conference.”

  “You’re referring to the piracy hearing?”

  “Actually, they feel worse about the questions they suggested we use to prepare for our review meetings with the alien ambassadors.”

  “And well they should,” Svetlana said. “I went into the meeting with the Horten ambassador on my station primed to talk about gaming and was told that we’re litterbugs. And my Vergallian counterpart suggested that I find something to do with my hands while talking, rather than waving them around like I’m being attacked by flying insects.”

  “Arm-waving aside, I think it’s well established by this point that the aliens don’t see us as a threat to their economic well-being,” the president continued. “Since there’s nothing we can do about having tin ears and noisy digestive tracts, I suggest we concentrate on the areas where we can improve.”

  “Like no more singing ‘Happy Birthday’ with aliens in the room?” Belinda asked.

  “That would be one possibility, but I was thinking more in terms of adding, rather than taking away. Who can tell me what all of the aliens doing business on Earth have in common?”

  “They’re oxygen-breathers,” Ambassador Oshi replied immediately.

  “Yes, there’s that, but I meant something more fundamental.”

  “They’re humanoids, and as such, the Stryx probably fiddled with their genes,” Ambassador Fu said bluntly.

  “I just learned that all of the oxygen-breathing tunnel network species independently developed their own version of the ‘Alley Cat’ dance,” Kelly added. “The local Farling doctor implied that it’s part of our genetic programming.”

  “Perhaps I should have been more specific,” the president said patiently, sounding rather like a Stryx librarian himself. “The aliens doing business on Earth are all contributing to our economy.”

  “They’re on Earth to make money,” Svetlana pointed out.

  “And it works both ways.” President Beyer looked around the virtual table, pausing for a moment on each ambassador. “What have we contributed to alien economies, other than low-cost labor?”

  “InstaSitter,” Kelly replied. “The Vergallian ambassador told me so herself.”

  “They only offer babysitting on the Stryx stations,” Ambassador White reminded her.

  “I’d say the Galactic Free Press, but I guess the only aliens who read it are spies,” Kelly followed up on her first answer.

  “Closer,” the president said. “Can anybody tell me why?”

  “I suppose that alien spies get paid for reading it,” Ambassador Tamil suggested.

  “Reporters are similar to tourists, Raj,” the president explained. “They travel to alien worlds where they rent rooms, buy expensive synthesized meals, and hire local guides.”

  “But there are so few of them,” Kelly objected. “How can one or two reporters visiting an alien world contribute to the economy?”

  “They can’t,” the president agreed. “And there aren’t enough human tourists or businessmen visiting alien worlds to have any noticeable impact either. There aren’t enough of us and we don’t have much money. I was just pointing out that tourism is one way humans could contribute to the economies of the tunnel network member worlds that allow visitors.”

  “Is this your idea or did you get it from consultants?” Ambassador Oshi asked suspiciously.

  “Let me answer your question with another question. When you attend a party on Middle Station, what sorts of aliens do you meet?”

  “All kinds, I suppose,” Carlos said. “Well, diplomats mainly. If you take into account that the aliens are bothered by the way that we eat, smell, talk, drink and move, it’s not surprising that most of our social contacts with other species are work related.”

  “As are my own contacts with aliens. But while your duties primarily bring you into contact with diplomats, my main job for the last several years has been making extraterrestrial entrepreneurs feel welcome on Earth,” the president said. “I’ve learned that businessmen have a different way of seeing the galaxy than diplomats, which is why I’ve come to the conclusion that the EarthCent Intelligence ‘miss’ referred to earlier is the fault of this committee for steering them in the wrong direction. Could you invite Mr. and Mrs. Oxford to join us now, Kelly?”

  During the brief delay while Clive and Blythe took their seats and were added to the hologram, the other ambassadors batted the president’s thesis back and forth, trying to come up with any contributions that humans had made to alien economies. Raj brought up the sovereign human communities movement, which was adding to the trade of open worlds run by several friendly species. Svetlana reminded him that these were universally populated by ex-contract workers who had been screened by the aliens when they were hired and had chosen to stay after their terms were complete.

  “They’re still contributing,” Ambassador White argued.

  “True,” the president allowed. “But you are talking about open worlds, which by definition are recently developed planets with low populations. I’d like to see us making visible contributions on established alien worlds, perhaps their homeworlds, if that’s possible. Ah, Director Oxford. Thank you for joining us.”

  “I apologize for the prep questions we sent the ambassadors,” Clive said immediately. “It was a poorly conceived idea on my part. I allowed my own preconceptions about the importance the aliens place on economics shape the instructions I gave to our analysts. If I had given them free rein, I’m sure the results would have been more useful.”

  “I don’t believe anything could have prepared us for the feedback we received from our colleagues, and frankly, it wouldn’t have made a difference even if we had known what they were going to say,” Ambassador Oshi replied. “My Drazen friend criticized me for breathing through my mouth rather than my nose. How do you change something like that at my age?”

  “No apology is required,” the president told the Oxfords. “When the two of you took over our intelligence service, I had my doubts about the focus you put on business information, but I understood that you wanted the agency to be self-funding, so I didn’t object. Now I see that your approach was correct all along, and that it would have made no sense for us to have spies running around trying to steal military secrets and causing diplomatic crises. Looking forward, my question is whether we have the potential to contribute directly to the economies of any of the alien homeworlds.”

  Clive deferred to his wife, who answered without hesitation. “Potential? Certainly. Capability? That’s another matter. I’m assuming you wouldn’t want to pursue the low hanging fruit.”

  “Such as?”

  “I could stake any number of human merchants I know to open import/export businesses on alien worlds, but do we really want them competing with the native businesses or the manufacturers and exporters you’ve attracted to Earth? Besides, I thought you had to grant all of the alien businesses you brought in monopolies, even the Vergallian dance academy.”

  “Thank you for reminding me. Just because I talk with businessmen all the time now doesn’t mean I’ve become one, and I’d completely forgotten about the guaranteed terms.” The president made a little circling motion with his forefinger on his desk, like he was wind
ing an old fashioned reel-to-reel tape recorder that held his memory before continuing. “Hildy tells me that our best use of resources would be to do something unique, since the visibility of the contribution is more important to our goal than the financial impact. It’s too bad that ‘Let’s Make Friends’ is actually a Grenouthian production.”

  “Could InstaSitter be extended to alien worlds?” Kelly asked.

  “I wish,” Blythe replied. “The reason InstaSitter only operates on the tunnel network stations is that we are totally dependent on the Stryx librarians for all of our back office support.”

  “You couldn’t convince Libby to help out remotely, like she does with the teacher bots?”

  “The aliens wouldn’t tolerate it,” Blythe said. “They depend on the Stryxnet for real time communications, the Stryx registers for certain financial transactions, and of course, they use the tunnels and ship controllers. But none of them would welcome a business that relied on direct Stryx involvement, and I’m sure Libby would decline for competitive reasons if I asked.”

  “You couldn’t replicate your business model on alien worlds using the native technology for your infrastructure?”

  “Not without being at a huge disadvantage on cost,” the co-founder of InstaSitter explained. “Part of the reason we were able to succeed on the tunnel network is that we offer babysitting for all of the aliens using part-time employees from all of the species. On a Drazen world we’d be providing babysitting for Drazens using Drazen girls. Even if the business worked initially, the first well-funded local who came along and wanted to push us out could do so. On the stations, no species has an inherent advantage, and we discourage competition by operating on such thin margins that nobody wants to bother.”

  “But the idea was brilliant,” the president insisted. “With all of the business data your agency is gathering, couldn’t you come up with something similar for aliens? Some business that they’ve overlooked or abandoned so long ago that they’ve forgotten about it?”

  “Like Dorothy,” Kelly suggested. “SBJ Fashions started with her trolling through the lost-and-found for discarded styles.”

  “Then we should have drafted Daniel for this meeting, though now that I think of it, he’s off visiting one of the members of his sovereign human communities,” Blythe said. “I know that many of the humans on open worlds are providing sub-contracting services to the alien proprietors after completing their labor contracts. A product that works for a Dolly on a Dollnick open world might translate to one of their more established planets.”

  “I knew I was missing something obvious,” the president said. “One of the most successful businesses on Earth is the floater factory operated by humans from Chianga under license from Prince Drume. It never occurred to me to ask the, uh, Chiangans, whether they had any ideas for opening businesses on Dollnick worlds rather than Earth.”

  “I realize we missed the first part of this meeting, Mr. President, but perhaps you can explain the connection between our intelligence failures and opening businesses on alien planets,” Clive requested. “I can’t imagine we would be making any significant economic contributions, and thanks to the Grenouthian documentaries and Aisha’s show, I suspect most of the tunnel network aliens could already pick a human out of a police line-up.”

  “It’s easy,” Raj interjected. “We’re the ugly Vergallians.”

  “Actually, I was saving that part of the explanation for when you joined this holo-conference, and then I forgot to give it,” the president admitted. “Allow me to take a brief poll. After meeting with the ambassadors on your stations about the issues they have with humanity, how many of you asked what you could do to correct the situation?”

  “But they weren’t things we can correct!” Svetlana objected. “We already agreed on that.”

  “I promised the Verlock Ambassador I would look at the math book he gave me, but I gave up after five minutes,” Kelly admitted.

  “I talked to a meditation teacher about breathing through my nose,” Ambassador Oshi volunteered. “She told me to try taping over my mouth.”

  “Earlier this evening, I attended a Grenouthian party in the city to celebrate their restoration of archival movie footage documenting cavalry charges in World War One,” the president said. “They were positive it would be a blockbuster, but I digress. Most of the important alien businessmen on the North American continent were in attendance, so I took the bull by the horns and asked each of them how they cope with all of our unpleasant characteristics. Do you know what they said?”

  “Nose filters and contact lenses,” Kelly guessed, but the president ignored her.

  “Every last one of them told me, and I quote, ‘Oh, you get used to it.’ And that made me question whether we are the only species on the tunnel network with disturbing odors and aggravating conversational styles.”

  “Did you bring that up with them?” Clive inquired.

  “I did, and I got an earful, but it was all past tense. The Drazens used to be driven insane by the high-pitched whistling produced by the Dollnicks, and the Frunge wandered around in shock that everybody else used woody plants for construction materials. I don’t have to tell you that the Verlocks drove everybody nuts with their slow speech. The Dollnicks still whistle, wood furniture is more popular than ever, and the Verlocks probably speak slower than they did a million years ago. The only thing that’s changed is familiarity.”

  “But most of the aliens still live on their own worlds,” Ambassador White pointed out. “It’s not like they’ve all been mixed up for hundreds of thousands of years and developed some kind of genetic resistance.”

  “Not genetic, psychological,” the president asserted. “When a Drazen meets a Dollnick in person for the first time, he knows that the Dolly isn’t whistling on purpose to give him a headache. But when a human invites a member of another species to a party and sings ‘Happy Birthday,’ that alien wonders if we’re being obnoxious on purpose.”

  “And you think that opening high profile businesses on their homeworlds will accelerate the process of habituating the other species to humanity?” Clive asked.

  “I want to do something proactive and it’s all I could come up with,” the president replied. “It’s going to be a long process no matter what we do, but it seems like a reasonable investment.”

  “We’ll take a look at the data and see what we can come up with, but in my experience, creating businesses with an ulterior motive usually results in losing a lot of money,” Blythe said.

  “I’m just looking for a starting point, so that regular mom-and-pop aliens who never travel off-world will see, smell, and hear humans contributing something to their planetary economies. I want those aliens to learn that humans aren’t just entertainment content.”

  “Perhaps a business like the Thark soap bars,” Ambassador Fu suggested.

  “I’m not sure that providing the Tharks with a semi-addictive intoxicating stimulant is our proudest hour,” the president replied.

  “I don’t mean the soap itself, that’s no different from exporting wine to the Frunge. But an enterprising woman here on Void Station who manufactures her own line of organic soaps opened a café for Tharks to come in and lick them. Anne has been successful enough to pick up two new competitors in the last cycle, but she still gets mad at me when I call them soap bars rather than cafés.”

  “The Tharks would never allow a human business on one of their worlds,” Clive said. “Despite their deep integration in the tunnel network as financial middlemen, they keep their off-station lives strictly private.”

  “We don’t currently have a Thark ambassador on Union Station, they don’t seem to feel it’s worth the bother,” Kelly said. “Did anybody get feedback from one during the review?”

  “Ironically, they complained about our hygiene,” Ambassador Fu replied.

  “Soap-based intoxicants aside, the concept is intriguing,” President Beyer continued. “The Drazens will eat anything. Perhaps they wo
uld welcome a restaurant chain featuring human cuisine? It has the built-in advantage that the human employees would be part of the dining experience.”

  “I’ll ask Herl for his opinion,” Clive said. “He’s on the station advising the Drazen ambassador on the piracy reset. I’ll repeat your proposition word for word, and I’m sure the first thing he’ll ask is whether you were proposing to put people on the menu.”

  Eighteen

  “You know, you’re different than you were when we were kids.”

  “I better be,” Kevin replied to the ambassador’s daughter. He dipped the roller in the deep end of the tray and then drew it up the ribbed slope to shed the excess paint. “We were seven years old then. Are you going to help, or are you going to play with Alexander all night.”

  “That’s exactly what I mean,” Dorothy said, showing no indication that she intended to abandon the puppy for a paintbrush. “You would never have said anything like that when you were seven. I think you were afraid I’d get mad and leave or something.”

  “Don’t forget that I didn’t go to school or get to meet many other kids, other than my older brothers and sisters. I probably thought that if I did something wrong you’d just go back to your Union Station friends.” The roller left a horizontal swath of white paint on the blood-red bulkhead, and the young man began working it up and down to take out the drips. Then he squatted to reload the roller and looked over at Dorothy, who was sitting with her back against the opposite bulkhead and absently scratching behind the puppy’s ears. “And I didn’t develop a lot of new social skills living alone in a two-man ship. It’s mainly exercise, reading, and watching immersives.”

  “But traders have great social skills,” the girl protested. “How else could you barter with all those people and aliens?”

  “Work is different,” Kevin replied, applying another stripe of paint to the metal partition. “You do it because you have to, and after a while it becomes easy. I can swap dirty jokes with a Drazen that I’d be too embarrassed to ever tell a human.”