The Godmakers (9 page)

"What do you mean take over the government?" Orne demanded. "The Galactic High Commissioner is the government -- subject to the Constitution and the Assemblymen who elected him."

"That's not what I mean."

"What do you mean?"

"Orne, we may have an internal situation which could explode us into another Rim War. We think Bullone's at the heart of it," Stetson said. "We've found eighty-one touchy planets, all old-line steadies that've been in the Galactic League for centuries. And on every damn one of them we've reason to believe there's a gang of traitors who're sworn to overthrow the League. Even on your home planet -- Chargon."

"On Chargon?" Orne's whole stance signaled disbelief.

"That's what I said."

Orne shook his head. "What is it you want from me? Do you want me to go home for my convalescence? I haven't been there since I was seventeen, Stet. I'm not sure I . . ."

"No, dammit! We want you as the Bullones' houseguest. And speaking of that, do you mind explaining how they were chosen to ride herd on you?"

"That's odd, you know," Orne said, withdrawing reflexively. "All those trite little jokes in the I-A about old Upshook Ipscott . . . then I discover that his wife went to school with my mother -- roommates, for the love of all that's holy!"

"Your mother never mentioned it?"

"It never came up that I can recall."

"Have you met Himself?"

"He brought his wife to the hospital a couple of times. Seems like a nice enough fellow, but somewhat stiff and reserved."

Stetson pursed his lips in thought, glanced to the southwest, back to Orne.

He said: "Every school kid knows how the Nathians and the Marakian League fought it out in the Rim Wars -- how the old civilization fell apart. It all seems kind of distant now that the Marakian League has become the Galactic League and we're knitting it back together."

"Five centuries is a long time," Orne said, "if you'll pardon a statement of the obvious."

"Maybe it's no farther away than yesterday," Stetson said. He cleared his throat, stared penetratingly at Orne.

Orne wondered why Stetson was moving with such caution. What had he meant by that reference to the Nathians and the Marakians? Something deep troubling him. Why speak of trust?

Stetson sighed, looked away.

Orne said: "You spoke of trusting me. Why? Has this suspected conspiracy involved the I-A?"

"We think so," Stetson said.

"Why?"

"About a year ago, an R&R archaeological team was nosing into some ruins on Dabih. The place had been all but vitrified in the Rim Wars, but an entire bank of records from a Nathian outpost escaped." He glanced sidelong at Orne.

"So?" Orne asked when the silence became prolonged.

Stetson nodded as though to himself, said: "The Rah-Rah boys couldn't make sense out of their discovery. No surprise there. They called in an I-A cryptanalyst. He broke a complicated cipher into which the stuff had been transferred. Then, when the stuff he was reading started making sense, he pushed the panic button without letting on to R&R."

"For something the Nathians wrote five hundred years ago?"

Stetson's drooping eyelids lifted, opening his eyes into a cold, probing stare. He said: "Dabih was a routing station for selected elements of the most powerful Nathian families."

"Routing station?" Orne asked, puzzled.

"For trained refugees," Stetson said. "An old dodge. Been used as long as they've been . . ."

"But five hundred years, Stet!"

"I don't care if it was five thousand years," Stetson snapped. "We've intercepted message scraps in the past month that were written in the same code. The bland confidence of that! Wouldn't that gall you?" He shook his head. "And every scrap we've intercepted deals with the coming elections!"

Orne found himself caught up in Stetson's puzzle, excited, interpreting it all through the I-A's prime directive -- prevent another Rim War at all costs.

"The upcoming election's crucial," Stetson said.

"But it's only two days off!" Orne protested.

Stetson touched the time-beat repeater at his temple, paused to get the cronosynch, then: "Forty-two hours and fifty minutes to be exact. Some deadline."

"Were there any names in those Dabih records?" Orne asked.

Stetson nodded. "Names of planets, yes. And family names, but those were translated into a new code system which we haven't broken and may not break.

Too simple."

"What do you mean, too simple?"

"They're obviously cover names relating to some internal Nathian social understanding. We can translate the Dabih records into words, but how those words have been translated into cover names is beyond us. For example, the code name on Chargon was Winner. That ring any bells?"

Orne shook his head from side to side. "No."

"I didn't expect it to," Stetson said.

"What's the code name on Marak?" Orne asked.

"The Head" Stetson said. "Can you make that tie up with Bullone?"

"I see what you mean. Then, how do you . . ."

"They're sure to've changed the names by now anyway," Stetson said.

"Maybe not," Orne said. "They didn't change their cipher system." He shook his head, trying to capture a thought he sensed lurking just beyond his awareness. The thought didn't come to him. He felt drained suddenly by the effort of following Stetson's cautious unveiling of the plot.

"You're right," Stetson murmured. "Well keep at it, then. Something may show up."

"What leads are you working on?" Orne asked. He knew Stetson was holding back something vital.

"Leads? We've gone back to our history books. They say the Nathians were top-drawer political mechanics. The Dabih records give us a few facts, just enough to tease us into frustration."

"Such as?"

"The Nathians chose cover sites for their trained refugees with diabological care. Every one was a planet so torn up by the wars that its inhabitants just wanted to rebuild and forget violence. The instructions to the Nathian families were clear enough, too: dig in, grow up with the adopted culture, develop the political weak spots, build an underground force, train their descendants to take over."

"The Nathians sound long on patience," Orne said.

"By any measurement you use. They set out to bore from within, to make victory out of defeat."

"Refresh me on the history," Orne said.

"The original human stock came from Nathia II. Their mythology calls them Arbs or Ayrbs. Peculiar customs -- space wanderers, but with a strong sense of family and loyalty to their own people. Moody types, very volatile, so it says. Go review your seventh grade history. You'll know almost as much as I do."

"On Chargon," Orne said, "our history texts referred to the Nathians as 'one of the factions involved in the Rim Wars.' The impression I got was that they shared the blame just about equally with the Marakian League."

"There are places where that might sound seditious," Stetson said.

"How does it sound to you?" Orne asked.

"The victors always write the history," Stetson said.

"Except perhaps on Chargon," Orne said. "What has you haring after High Commissioner Upshook? And while we're on that question, why're you parceling out your information like a miser giving money to a spendthrift son-in-law?"

Stetson wet his lips with his tongue, said: "One of Upshook's seven daughters is currently at home. Name of Diana. She's a field leader in the I-A women."

"I seem to've heard of her," Orne said. "I think Mrs. Bullone mentioned the fact she was at home."

"Yes, well . . . one of these Nathian code messages we intercepted had her name as addressee."

"Wheeewww!" Orne exhaled in surprise, then: "Who sent the message? What was the content?"

Stetson coughed. "You know, Lew, we cross-check everything."

"So what else is new?"

"This message was handwritten and signed MOS." When Stetson didn't go on, Orne said: "And you know who MOS is, that it?"

"Our cross-check gave us an MOS on a routine next-of-kin reply. We followed it down to the original. The handwriting checks out. Name of Madrena Orne Standish."

Orne froze. "Maddie?" He turned slowly to face Stetson. "So that's what's eating you."

"We know for certain that you haven't been home since you were seventeen,"

Stetson said. "We can account for all the significant blocks of time in your life. With us, your record is clean. The question is . . ."

"Permit me," Orne said. "The question is: Will I turn in my own sister if it falls that way?"

Stetson remained silent, staring. And Orne noticed now that the man had retreated behind the mask of I-A senior officer, holding one hand concealed in a uniform pocket. What was in that pocket? A transmitter? A weapon?

"I read you," Orne said. "I remember the oath I took and I know my job: see to it that we don't have another blowup like the Rim Wars. But Maddie in this?"

"No doubt of it," Stetson grated.

Orne thought back to his own childhood. Maddie? He remembered a red-headed tomboy, his ready companion for adventure, a fellow conspirator when adults pressed too closely on the secret world of the young.

"Well?" Stetson pressed.

"My family isn't one of these traitor clans you refer to," Orne said. "How can Maddie be mixed up in this?"

"This whole thing is all tangled in politics," Stetson said. "We think it's because of her husband."

"Ahhhh, the Member for Chargon," Orne said. "I've never met him, but I've followed his career with interest . . . and Maddie wrote me and sent a picture when they were married."

"You like this particular sister very much," Stetson said. It was a statement, not a question.

"I have . . . fond memories," Orne said. "She helped me when I ran away."

"Why'd you leave home?" Stetson asked.

Orne sensed the weight behind the question, fought to keep his voice casual.

"It was a family thing. I knew what I wanted to do. The family objected."

"You wanted to join the Marines?"

"No, they were just a way into the R&R. I don't like violence. And I don't like women running my life."

Stetson glanced to the southwest where a flitter could be seen approaching.

Green sunlight glinted from it. He asked: "Are you willing to . . .

infiltrate the Bullone family for . . ."

"Infiltrate!"

"To find out whatever you can about this plot centered on the upcoming election."

"In forty-two hours!"

"Or less."

"Who's my contact?" Orne asked. "I'll be trapped out there at the Residency."

"That mini-transceiver we planted in your neck for the Gienah job," Stetson said. "The medics replaced it at my request while they were putting you back together."

"How nice of them."

"It's functioning," Stetson said. "Anything happens around you, we hear it."

"That'll keep me loyal," Orne said. As he spoke, he experienced the thought that if he just willed the transceiver to leave his flesh, the thing would pop out of his skin like a seed squeezed from ripe fruit. He shook his head.

That was a crazy thought!

"That's not why it's there," Stetson protested.

Frightened by the waywardness of his own thoughts, Orne touched the hidden stud at his neck, spoke subvocally. He knew a surf-hissing voice was being picked up by an I-A monitor somewhere within beam distance.

"Hey, eavesdropper! You pay attention while I'm making my play for this Diana Bullone, you hear? You may learn something about the way an expert works."

Surprisingly, Stetson answered him: "Don't get so interested in your work that you forget why you're out there."

So Stet was wearing one of these damn devices, too. Didn't the I-A trust anyone anymore?

In terms of human systems, feedback involves complicated unconscious processes, both individual and in a collective or social sense. That individuals can be influenced by such unconscious forces has long been recognized. The large-scale processes and their influence, however, are less well known. We tend to see them only latently in a statistical sense -- by population curves, by historial evolution, by changes which stretch across the centuries. We often ascribe such processes to religious forces and have a tendency to avoid examining them analytically.

-- Lectures of the ABBOD (privately circulated)

Mrs. Bullone was a fat little mouse of a woman standing almost in the center of her home's guest room, hands clasped across the paunch of a long dull-silver gown.

Orne thought: I must remember to call her Polly as she requested.

She possessed demure gray eyes, grandmotherly gray hair combed straight back in a jeweled net -- and that shocking baritone husk of a voice issuing from a tiny mouth. Her figure sloped out from several chins to a matronly bosom, then dropped straight as a barrel. The top of her head came just above Orne's dress epaulets.

She said: "We want you to feel perfectly at home with us, Lewis. You're to consider yourself one of the family."

Orne glanced around at the Bullone guest room: low-key furnishings with an old-fashioned selectacol for change of color scheme. A polawindow looked out onto an oval swimming pool. The glass (he was sure it was glass and not a more technologically sophisticated substance) had been, muted to dark blue.

This imparted a moonlit appearance to the view outside. A contour bed stood against the wall at the right; several built-ins there. A door partly open on the left revealed a wedge of bathroom tiles. Everything about the place seemed traditional and comfortable. He did feel at home.

Orne said it: "I already feel at home here. You know, your house is very like our place on Chargon. Just as I remember it. I was really surprised when I saw it from the air as we were coming in. Except for the setting, it's almost identical."

"Your mother and I shared many ideas when we were in school together," Polly said. "We were very close friends. Still are."

"You must be to do all this for me," Orne said, his own voice giving him an oddly alienated feeling. Such banality! Such hypocrisy! But the words flowed right on: "I don't know how I'm ever going to repay you for . . ."