Seeds of Earth (21 page)

The others listened with worried faces, exchanging glances when he finished, all eyes eventually turning to Sundstrom. The president was silent for several moments, his frowning gaze fixed on the tabletop before him where he slid and turned a pencil through his fingers over and over.

Have I gone too far}
Robert thought.
Perhaps I painted too bleak a picture .. .

'This is all... illuminating, Ambassador,' Sundstrom said at last. 'What is your position on this? What advice might you have for me?'

'My government fully supports Hegemony policy on acts of terrorism,' he said. 'Most of the measures I've described have in the past been enacted by Earthsphere authorities in response to attacks carried out in our domains. My advice to you, which my government has approved, is to pre-empt the High Monitor's request for heightened security arrangements - offer a detachment of your best troops as permanent guards for the Hegemony embassy and as an escort should he or any of his staff need to move outside its confines. Consider the measures I mentioned - I'll have a list sent over later - and go as far as you can to put them into practice.'

'You'll never get the Northern Towns to agree to the likes of censorship and weapons confiscation,' said Storlusson. 'They'll fight it all the way.'

Robert shrugged. 'Then at least propose curfews and restrictions on public assembly. Also, you might like to think about temporary legislation to help enforce antisedition options - that would persuade the Sendrukans that you're serious.'

Voices were raised but Sundstrom cut them off with a sharp sweep of the hand.

'Ambassador Horst,' he said. 'I would like to formally request the prompt deployment of Earthsphere marines to aid the security needs of my government.'

'I'm sorry, Mr President,' he said. 'I have been instructed that no Earthsphere troops are to be dispatched to the colony at the present time. You see, the Brolturans would interpret such a move as staking a claim and the Hegemony would tend to support that view.'

'So what material assistance can you offer us?' said Pyatkov.

'Some intelligence, some training for police units, but weapons or support equipment - that would be seen as technology transfer, which is strictly forbidden under multilateral treaty. Look, Mr President, I know this seems very unhelpful but you have to be patient and try to help the Sendrukans to feel that you're on their side. To that end, I strongly advise against appealing to the representatives of other nations or blocs for aid - that the Hegemony and the Brolturans would regard as an unfriendly act.'

He stood, glancing at the large oval clock on the wall. 'Now I must take my leave - I am shortly to meet with High Monitor Kuros's senior assisters and after that the
Heracles's
first officer.'

The rest got to their feet, apart from the wheelchairbound president.

'Thank you for explaining your government's position so candidly, Ambassador,' Sundstrom said. 'We shall give serious thought to your observations and recommendations. I should also like to consult further with you later this afternoon if that is convenient.'

'I'll tell my office to expect your call, Mr President.'

A courteously slight bow to either side of the table, then he was outside the conference room, following his personal attendant round to the main elevator with Harry striding along beside him.

'We//
you can't say you didn't leave them wanting more,'
the AI said, smiling drolly.

Robert waited until he was alone in the descending lift before replying.

'It's a grave situation, Harry, with the potential for turning nasty if the Brolturans get the wrong idea ...'

He sighed. The Brolturan Compact, like Earthsphere, was a close ally of the Hegemony; however, their origins as an offshoot of Sendrukan society and their willingness to act as the Hegemony's military proxy gave them a kind of favoured-ally status which amplified both their arrogance and their endemic paranoia. Robert had on several occasions encountered Brolturan priests and military (which often amounted to the same thing) and knew that they would have to be treated with kid gloves.

'Jr
wouldn't have hurt to let them know that you asked for permission to deploy the marines down here.'

Robert shook his head. 'It would have softened the blow. I want to shock them into the reality of their situation and our role here - they can't afford to harbour any illusions.'

'Yes, Robert,'
said Harry without a hint of irony. 'We
can't have illusions getting in the way of stark reality, absolutely not!'

21

THEO

Depressed and angry at Horst's response, Theo was crossing the Darien Assembly's wide foyer, making for the entrance. The three sets of ogival arched double doors lay at the foot of a huge mural of the First Families done in a variety of woods, their colours carefully arranged. He was a few paces from leaving when one of the azure-uniformed government couriers caught up with him.

'Begging your pardon, Major Karlsson, but the president asks if you would care to join him in the diplomatic suite.'

'Did he say what it's about?'

'No sir, only that you would be glad you came.'

Theo's frown turned into a smile.
More presidential hugger-mugger, eh? Well, could be instructive, maybe even entertaining.

'I'm game, lad,' he said. 'Lead the way.'

The diplomatic suite was a comparatively recent extension of the assembly complex. Three levels constructed on pillars at the rear with plush room and conference chambers whose big curved windows looked out over the Kalevala Gardens. The young courier led him to the third floor and past several OG guards to a room adjacent to the big, half-domed auditorium at the end of the corridor. As the courier smiled and turned away, one of the guards opened the door and ushered Theo inside.

It was a long, narrow room with small tables along one side. The windows were opaque and the wallmounted uplights gave off a soft yellow radiance. More OG guards stood behind Sundstrom, who sat at a table, flanked by Pyatkov and Soutar, both of whom looked sombre. When Theo entered, Sundstrom smiled at him then nodded to a guard officer, who hurried off to the other end of the room and left by a second doorway, where another guard was on duty.

'Come and join us, Theo,' the president said. 'This is quite a sight.'

On the table before him was a portable display. From a low vantage point it showed a wide section of the diplomatic suite's roof, which was marked out with a landing grid. Moments later he heard the sound of an approaching craft, its engines a blend of deep bass drone and high-pitched whine, then a strange, webbed cluster of angular modules came into view, the blast of its drives sending dust and leaves flying as it banked, straightened up and drifted to the centre of the grid. The craft, Theo noted, was a uniform dark, matt, coal-like grey, and he wondered if that was evidence of stealth technology. Then landing legs unfolded and it descended, its entire structure flexing as it settled onto the roof.

'Our guests are disembarking from the other side,' Sundstrom said. 'So they'll be with us shortly.'

'And who are these guests, Mr President?' Theo said.

'If we're lucky, valuable allies. Otherwise, we may at least be able to rely on considerable sympathy.' He turned his wheelchair a little. 'My friends, I have a small admission to make. For more than two years my administration, i.e. myself and a few trusted colleagues, has been in touch with officials from the Imisil Mergence, one of the nine star nations that make up the loose alliance of the Erenate. I have had many exchanges with one of their senior diplomats, Javay shtu-Gauhux, a Makhori of long and distinguished lineage. Soon after we got the first messages from the
Heracles
he predicted that something like this situation would arise and that the Earthsphere response would be weak and subservient to Hegemony interests.' He smiled bleakly and spread his hands. 'This meeting is to formalise relations between Darien and the Imisil Mergence, but we will also be introduced to a representative from the Cyclarchy of Milybi, an immense confederation whose territory borders the far edge of the deepzone. This emissary is from a race known as the Chatha who are, I'm told, insect-like in appearance ...'

Theo knew that the Makhori were an octopoidal species, but he wasn't expecting the strange, small object that glided through the doors at the far end, flanked by diminutive Gomedran escorts. It was an antigravity platform with a transparent carapace beneath which the Makhori ambassador sat, its long pseudopods nestled under an inner rim.

'My good friend Holger! It is most refreshing to meet you face to face at last!'

The Makhori's voice was a synthesis of Human speech but the cadences and emphases seemed slightly awry: what made it remarkable was the musical accompaniment, soft, fluty notes that gave an undertone to every syllable. As the words were spoken, Theo could see one of the Makhori's pseudopods working a little panel with a cluster of stubby palps. Theo held back from smiling - it was like having your own personal orchestra.

'Ambassador Gauhux, I am most pleased to welcome you to Darien,' said Sundstrom. 'I regret that this could not take place under more relaxed conditions.'

'Indeed. It appears that the warmth of your welcome is not shared by the Earthsphere forces which are in control of your orbital environs. I do not mean that they mistreated us, merely that they extended the minimum of courtesy and consideration.'

'I can only apologise, Ambassador.'

'There is no need - such is only to be expected within the ambit of Hegemony influence.' The Makhori's floating pod turned slightly so that its large oval eyes could take in Theo and the others. 'You have companions with you, I see.'

'Yes, Ambassador - may I introduce Mr Pyatkov, director of our intelligence service; General Soutar, commander of the Darien Volunteer Corps; and Major Karlsson, my personal adviser.'

Personal adviser?

Theo had to focus hard on keeping any surprise from showing at this promotion. And from the stiff glance Pyatkov gave over his shoulder, he wasn't the only one caught unawares.

'Fellow sentients,' the Makhori said, 'I am very pleased to meet you and thereby expand the boundaries of my knowledge. Sadly, this must be a brief encounter my travelling companion is a cautious and highly circumspect being and wishes to return to our ship as soon as possible - ah, he approaches.'

As Ambassador Gauhux drifted to one side, a pair of odd, birdlike creatures, tall and feathery in rich shades of blue and ochre, strode in through the doors at the far end. They had no wings or arms and in the place of a beak they possessed a long, prehensile snout ending in four bony fingers. Each one held a glassy, polyhedral device whose facets glowed and glittered. The strange sophonts calmly pointed these things at everyone in the room before facing each other, bowing, and pressing a stud on each device. For a moment all were still, then a newcomer entered.

Theo's first thought was that this was an emissary from a machine race, going by the four slender metal legs, but in the next instant he realised that, like the Makhori's antigrav platform, this was a mobile carriage. The Chatha was larger and bulkier than the Makhori, and although it bore a vague similarity to an Earth-type spider, there were some clear differences. Rather than hairs on a hard exoskeleton, the Chatha had a leathery, greenish-purple hide with a pebbly texture, and instead of a low-slung body there was an oval hump which rose to a wedge-shaped head with an occipital ridge running from the smooth, rounded back of the skull forward to a tapered, beak-like proboscis. There was a pair of eyes on either side of the head, giving it about 270 degrees of vision, Theo guessed, while a curved opening underneath, at the neck, was probably its mouth. The Chatha's real legs, he realised, must be quite short and had to be interfaced with the powered, mechanical ones which extended from the open pod in which it sat. The Milybi emissary looked grotesque to Theo and he felt uneasy in spite of himself.

The trunk-armed attendants presented their devices, which the Chatha took with its short limbs, examining each in turn. Then it stowed them away inside its pod, approached the table where the others were waiting, and began to speak.

The words were a stream of liquid vowels pronounced with a wide range of pitch, then the speech changed into a sequence of hard but expressive sounds, interspersed with an occasional deep hum. Then suddenly it was speaking Anglic.

'I am Estimator Jeg-sul-Mur. I greet you in the fair language of the Great Cyclarchy of Milybi, in the formal tongue of the Chatha, and in your own language. I am deeply gratified to see that none amongst you is contaminated with the machine virus which afflicts the unwise Sendruka. Similarly, your race seems to lack any significant mind-force faculty, which for weaker races can be a burden rather than a benefit.' The twin eye-pairs considered them all one by one, ending with the octopoidal Imisil ambassador. 'Colleague Gauhux, if you would designate.'

'With pleasure, Colleague Sul-Mur. This is the foremost leader of the Darien Humans, President Sundstrom, and his diligent attendants.'

Once again a smile laid siege to Theo's lips. While 'diligent attendant' felt more natural to him, he knew that the General thought otherwise, at least going by the dark look on her face.

'President Sundstrom,' the Milybi emissary continued, 'I am able to tell you that interlocution between your collective and ours is acceptable but not possible under these circumstances. And unfortunately, prognosis indicates that the Hegemony or their Brolturan proxies will soon seize control of your world and use it as a staging post for further strategic expansion throughout the deepzone.'

Theo was taken aback by the emissary's frankness even Sundstrom was visibly shaken.

'I knew that we faced a perilous situation, Estimator,' the president said. 'But you seem to think that our cause is lost even before the struggle has begun.'