Precursor (30 page)

“You’re talking nonsense, Mr. Cameron.”

He didn’t let his smile vary. “They want us to build a ship.”

“Build a ship,” Kroger echoed, and blinked.

“The aiji’s effectively agreed.” It
was
so, since the aiji had sent him to make agreements, and he had made them. “However… wherever there are increases in personnel, supply is a problem; franchises for station operation, for, say, SunDrink, Inc., would be a fairly valuable commodity. Atevi happen to like it moderately well. Especially given the difficulties of transporting fresh juice.”

“We’re not empowered to agree to human personnel up here. We’re against it.”

“Atevi, however, are interested in this shipbuilding. In mining. You don’t need to do these things. I believe we’ve tried to make that clear. But these halls filled with workers simply drawing uninspired rations from some ship’s store… atevi simply won’t put up with that sort of thing. Think rather of human industry supplying a vital commercial zone,
with
all interested companies selling goods and services tailored to crew and, of course, an increasing dockfront presence…”

“They don’t have currency.”

“Oh, but that, that can be solved. Think of Port Freedom carried into orbit, think of stores, shops… Isn’t that what the stations used to be? Isn’t that our historical image of the station?”

“We’ve got a damned alien menace out there!”

“I don’t think it’s arriving next week, or if it is, we’re absolutely hopeless. We’re not going to fold up shop and refuse to develop because we’re anticipating being blown to hell. I’m quite serious in this. Atevi prefer fruit juice to yeast cultures. There’s a thousand or so people in orbit who have never had a cup of tea. I’m told the food is no inspiration at all.”

“Understatement,” Lund said with a small twitch of the shoulders.

“A modern economy is not monofocused. You can see there’s a market for a widening humans-in-orbit population. Everyone who wants to go up, can go, so long as they have a job to do up here.”

“What side are you
on
, Mr. Cameron?” Ginny Kroger asked.

“The aiji’s. There’s not a single item of the aiji’s business that proposal interferes with. Pizza definitely has a future on the mainland, but atevi generally find the Mospheiran diet quite bland and far too heavy on the sugars. Not to mention their absolute rejection of the meat preservation industry, which they have absolutely no desire to emulate. It would be ethically and morally ruinous to them to try. There’s not going to be any objection whatsoever to Mospheiran companies ex-panding to in-orbit operations, small now, very small, but increasingly important as the population up here increases, and it will. I’m sure it will.”

“What do you get out of it? What does the aiji get?”

“What do the atevi get? A sizable orbital population of their own which
they’ll
maintain, in their own ways. We’re not going to crowd one another, not up here, not in this whole wide solar system. We can engineer our unique facilities, each do what we do best, both benefit.”

“And what about these aliens?”

“They haven’t shown up yet. They may never. They may come tomorrow. In the one instance we have no problem worth worrying about. In the other, our whole discussion may be moot, but in the eventuality we have time to do something, I suggest there’s a great deal we can do. First, take possession of our shared orbital space. We know how to do it. Our economies have been interlocked for two hundred years, increasingly so in the last several decades; it was a decision of several administrations to allow what we called
independent but interlocked
…”

“Not living interlocked.”

“Nor living interlocked here, either, not changing our ways of doing things.
Respecting
our separate ways. You noticed that rather substantial door out there…”

“You’re proposing to set
doors
between our two populations.”

“As we reconstruct this station, yes. Two separate authorities;
we
do the gross construction, and the mining, which atevi do very well. You do the interior refurbishment and start the cycle of light industry up here which can make the shipments to and from the planet profitable. The atevi economy can support more heavy construction below and provide a certain amount of raw materials supply; but the very part of the economy that serves dense, linear human populations, the food preservation and the mass-production approach to manufacturing… all that is completely alien to the atevi economy and hurtful to their psychology. We proved that in the War. We also proved over the last two hundred years that we can interlock our efforts up here, profitably, sensibly, and get that linear multiplication of population linked into a prosperous economy. I’ve had some very substantive agreements with Guild authorities; they’re willing to make gestures of goodwill on their side… I think there’s every opportunity for us both to make sensible agreements with the Guild.”

“We’re here to study that,” Lund said.

“Tom,
agreements
are on the table. I’m here to make firm commitments. And I know my responsibility to the aiji; I know he’ll honor agreements I make with
you
. I’m proposing them.”

“We’re not empowered to negotiate with the Guild, let alone with you.”

“What’s this, ‘Let alone with me’? We’ve
been
negotiating for two hundred years. That’s what I do. That’s what my office is. We collectively, in this room,
are
the planet. What’s more, I know the State Department, I know Tyers on a personal basis;you take notes back to him; you talk to the President, personally; you just
hand
the government a workable agreement and trust they’ll get it through the committees with their recommendation.”

“Mr. Cameron,” Kroger said shortly, “you can omit to tell us our business.”

“Bren,” he said with a fixed smile.

“
Mr
. Cameron, —we have instructions
from
the Secretary. We can manage.”

“I’d be damn surprised if he knew I was coming up here, since I didn’t know it, although who knows? He’s very sharp. He might have guessed.
Did
he give you instructions regarding cooperation with me?”

“Damn you, Mr. Cameron! —No, he didn’t.”

He smiled his smallest, gentlest smile. “Take it from me that I regard him as a friend…
that word
, which I don’t use on the mainland.”

“I’m gratified you still recognize it,” Kroger said, not pleasantly.

“I do. Believe me. You’re from Science. Tom, from Commerce. You’re not Tyers’ personal picks. I think
you
might be someone the President relies on.” This with a look at Tom Lund, who didn’t immediately deny it. “But
you’re
out of Science.” A glance directly at Kroger, who sat thin-lipped and furious. Then he cast a deliberate sop to pride and party. “The
scientific
point of view. I don’t expect decisions until there’s proof.”

“Exactly, Mr. Cameron.”

“I respect that, Ms. Kroger. A fair mind-set, sharp judgment, objective examination of the facts. The Mospheiran point of view… you’re
not
a friend of Shawn Tyers; not of the President, either—and a damned good thing,” he added, as Kroger opened her mouth. It was not what she expected. “I think it’s very well if multiple points of view on the island have their independent fact gathering. But I also know that a distinguished member of the Department of Science and Technology, with your background isn’t going to be gathering anything
but
fact, no matter who appointed you, and anyone who thinks to the contrary isn’t going to find damned much political value in you. You’re no one’s fools, I very much think you’re no one’s fools; certainly
not
Gaylord Hanks’ fools, no matter what the source of the university’s grants and funding.”

Kroger’s face actually colored. But she stared eye to eye and leaned forward,
her
elbows on the table. “Mr. Cameron, you have more gall than any human being I’ve ever encountered. Does that attitude come from the mainland or did you get
that
out of the University on some grant?”

“Ms. Kroger, how
do
you feel about atevi?”

That brought a slight twitch, a flare of the nostrils, a widening and narrowing of the pupils.

“How do
you
feel about them, Mr. Cameron? Damned fond, so I hear.”

If he didn’t react, it was a miracle. But there was no implication she knew more than the rumor mills said.

“Entirely. As I have a naive affection for the human species, one I was born with. I’m not going to destroy my species, and I’m not a fool.”

There was a prolonged staring match—him, and Kroger.

“Ms. Kroger, I
want
to deal with your committee. Give me some cooperation.”

“We
haven’t
the authority. We weren’t
granted
the authority, Mr. Cameron.”

“It wouldn’t be the first time someone’s
taken
it. Call me Bren. And let’s deal sensibly with the hand we’ve been dealt here. Let’s get this settled. Whether there are aliens out there who give a damn about us one way or the other, we’ve got two halves of the human species in renewed contact, we’ve got the

atevi who have their first ticket into space, and at this start of everything all of us have a prospect of control over our own destinies if we don’t hand this over to some damn Mospheiran committee for political wrangling. Paralysis follows. —Ginny Kroger, you
know
that. Represent your view, but for God’s sake, lay it out on the table.“

The steady, angry gaze shattered like a mirror, became an expression of outright fear.

“I’m
nobody’s
fool,
Mr
. Cameron.”

“Bren.”

“Mr. Cameron,
sir
. You have an island-wide reputation for fast and shady dealing.”

“Fast dealing. Never other than honest. I intend to maintain that record.”

“Damn your attitudes, Mr. Cameron!”

“You’re in charge, aren’t you? Mospheiran committees are always committees, but if they’re ever going to work, they tilt. It’s always understood which way they tilt. Tom, here, won’t be listened to, except by the President and the Secretary of State, who’ll hear him. You have legislative backing. I know damned well where, and you won’t be listened to by the other side. But
you
still rate yourself independent-minded.”

“I’m
Dr
. Ginny Kroger, Mr. Cameron, and I damned well
am
independent-minded. As you’ll discover!”

“You’re going to fight. Good. About damned time. So do you take my deal?”

“God!”

“It’s a fair deal,” Lund interjected, “if we could rely on it.”

“I’ll assure you the last thing Tabini-aiji wants is the Sun-Drink concession on this space station. Mospheira and its economy, on the other hand, its whole lifestyle, are set up to use that opportunity and to innovate in its own directions, which is exactly the difference between humans and atevi. You leave our section to us, to the atevi, and you handle trade with the ship, for whatever coin you can get out of them. We’re not going to charge for building the gross structures of the station, or for building the second starship.”

“You can’t do that! We’re not about to—”

“We charge, however, for shuttle space. We charge you not in coin, necessarily, but various things which we hope you’ll supply, and those supplies are the matters I hope to start working out with you at least in gross detail before we even return to the planet. Mospheira understands the way to trade with the aishidi’tat. Mospheira knows we’re a very, very different system. We didn’t go bankrupt building the first shuttle; you won’t lose by paying us for seats and cargo room, especially if you deliver contracts to SunDrink and Harbor Tea. We’ll make sure the Mospheiran economy doesn’t run short of grain or fruit. If we’re waiting for an alien invasion, we might as well be comfortable and progressive about it.”

Lund had leaned forward. Kroger had, too. It was now three heads together. “We’re not talking theory now,” Lund said. “It’s a damn economic miracle you got the shuttle to work at all; I
know
what went on, on the mainland—”

“Damned scary,” Kroger said, tight-lipped.

Bren shook his head. “Not a bit of it aimed at you. That Tabini is in charge of the mainland right now, with the various subassociations all cooperating, is the atevi response to what turned up orbiting over their heads, and a constructive response:
build. Compete. Trade
. There are far worse responses possible. He does not see it possible to associate humans with the aishidi’tat. It’s not good for the two species, damned sure not good for the atevi; and Tabini frankly doesn’t want you under his rule. By no means does he want to rule Mospheira. He does want to cooperate with you, viewing you as having notably good ideas, amid your nerve-wracking disadvantages to his species. And that’s the most constructive model of our cooperation you’re going to get on short notice, but that’s the economists’ jobs, which they’ve been doing for two hundred years.
I know how it can work
.”

“Mr. Cameron,” Kroger said, drawing a large breath.

“Bren.”

“
Bren
, damn you. All right. What’s the gist of it? Lay it out. Let’s see this nonsense.”