Mary Rosenblum (23 page)

Flowering trees and shrubs growing in hand-shaped pots perfumed the air. The equatorial sun streamed through broad windows, the harsh light softened and tinted by subtly tinted panes, so that the chamber was filled with the comforting hues of rose and gold and clear yellow. Servers, young men and women wearing the sky blue and white of the World Council circulated, offering trays of refreshments with a smile and word or two in the member’s own language or dialect. They alone seemed oblivious to the air of tension that permeated the spacious chamber, although rumor said that they were all Class Nine or Ten empaths, sampling the emotional nuance and reporting back to the Chairman and his staff, so that the Chair would know what to expect.

You didn’t need to have a significant empathic rating to feel the tension circulating in the room.

The Session warning chimed through the atrium and the tension spiked, voices rising in pitch as the human schools fragmented and regrouped. Members made their way toward the door that led to their seats in the amphitheater-like Main Council Chamber. One by one, they were greeted by Security and ushered down the narrow, white-walled hall while every cell in their bodies was scanned and checked against their biostatistics. No one, not even during its nascence in the Terror Years, had ever managed to bring violence into the Chamber.

Wen Huang, The Huang, strolled through the bath of scanning beams, alongside Chou Zhen, the Chairman of The China Republic. The air tingled with anticipation and he allowed himself the tiniest of smiles as he and Zhen made their way down the familiar aisles to their adjoining boxes. Each member-country had a private box, a spacious room with a transparent wall overlooking the dais with the President’s desk and the holodesk podium, made of a single sheet of indestructible glassteel. Inside, Taiwan’s box had been decorated with wool rugs and embroidered silk panels imported from Northern China. A suite of antique lacquer furniture faced the small holodesk in the middle of the floor. Huang touched an icon and scanned for recent email. His trace of his renegade daughter had led clearly and directly to a hotel on New York Up. She was still there.

He would give her this chance to atone, in spite of her disobedience. He blanked the screen and took a seat in the custom recliner. A moment later, a page entered, bearing a steaming pot of tea on a tray, along with a dish of tiny dried fish, seaweed, hot peppers, and rice crackers. Bowing silently, the young page, a geneselect Scandinavian type, set the tray on the small table at Huang’s elbow and left.

On the podium platform below the boxes, the Council President, the small brilliant head of the Pan Malaysian Compact, Dr. Suri Kurichatam, sat down at her desk with its data center and surveyed the members in their boxes, her expression coldly serene. This was her second term as Council President, and the fact that she had won the most recent election easily was a testament to her even handed and unbiased administration.

The morning session had dealt with small issues … trade and ocean resource disputes, mostly concerning species taken across naational fishery boundaries. All of them had been dismissed or sent on to the World Court for adjudication. Business as usual.

Crucial issues were brought to the floor in the afternoon sesssion. Huang couldn’t see Chou Zhen in the box adjacent to his but a slow smile crossed his face. Rumors had circulated wildly during the break.

Chou Zhen’s absence from the atrium had been noticed. Rumor was a useful tool. A small push on the correct stone and you could move an entire hillside.

He was looking forward to the afternoon.

“The Council Meeting is now in session.” Kurichatam’s voice sounded as if she sat across from Huang on the lacquered sofa. “Is there any New Business to bring before the Council?” She glanced down at her panel. “I recognize the Chairman of The Republic of China, Chou Zhen.” She nodded toward his box. “Your issue, Chairman Zhen?”

On the dias, the holodesk shimmered, and the image of Chou Zhen, dressed in the historic high collared jacket of the Chairman, appeared. Somewhat small and dark for a Han, a trace of Mongolian blood showed in his round face and the squat muscular body. His son had not taken after him, Huang thought.

Li Zhen looked pure Han. Banishing a pang of grief for his own dead son, Huang clasped his hands and waited with anticipation for Chou Zhen to speak.

“My issue is the current unrest in the orbital platform settleement of New York Up.” Chairman Zhen’s precise, Mandarin filled Huang’s box and the Chairman seemed to be looking Huang in the eye. “We have understood from the very inception of the orbital expansion the dangers inherent in permitting such settlements to become inhabited by long-term residents who would eventually evolve a divergent agenda.

Until now, we have not had to face a threat to world safety from our skies. However, the growing unrest in the New York Up orbital settlement and the unwillingness of the North American Alliance to bring it under control, fills me with grave concern.”

Down on the dais, Kurichatam’s expression was severe as she eyed her desktop. Huang permitted himself the tiniest of smiles. The NAA First Delegate, the President of the United States, as usual, would be shrieking by now. America had always elected their presidents the way they cast actors in their movies, he thought. Lots of good looks and stage presence. Not much substance, and of course the Americans had always believed that they were the center of the universe. Not that the Chinese were much different. Huang’s smile broadened. But history – several thousand years worth – was on the side of the Chinese rather than this upstart country who had come late to the world scene and had never really learned to think of itself as a member of the world community.

The United States was entirely too full of itself, Huang thought with disdain. It considered its interests as representative of the NAA. Canada was easy to bully, as was Mexico with its unfortunat economic reliance on American markets. Now, ostracized by the Estados Latinos, it had no choice but to remain part of the NAA and support America’s swaggering.

The recent disdain with which the NAA’s Ambassador of Trade had dismissed the proposal by the Taiwan Families for an exchange of the Families’ excess eco-credits in return for minor offshore fishing rights had insulted Huang personally. Who did these people think they were, that they could snap their fingers when they wanted something and ignore the needs of others? He sat back, his smile broadening, as the President, with a resigned expressioh granted the North American Alliance member from the Unitec States the floor.

“I beg to question the esteemed First Delegate from the China Republic!” The figure of Harold Warner, President of the Unitec States, replaced that of Chou Zhen, his handsome face quivering with indignation.

“There is no cause for any sort of global concern here.” His words came to Huang’s ears in perfect Mandarin. In real life, he spoke it with a terrible accent. The Huang smirked.

“The media, once again, has been capitalizing on the sensationalism of a minor incident or two. The actions of a handful of disaffected misfits is being blown all out of proportion, and … ” The First Delegate’s holographic eyes seemed to bore into Huang’s. “The entire trivial situation is being twisted to suit political agendas.”

In the privacy of his box, Huang smiled and nodded watching the Council President from the corner of his eye. She was frowning at the screen embedded in the podium in front of her. Obviously the NAA First Delegate’s statement had roused a storm of response.

“Recognizing the First Delegate from the Estados Latinos.”

The Council President’s expression gave nothing away. Even handed, Huang thought. The Latino states opposed the NAA at every turn. He leaned forward as the woman with the bold Mayan features and graying braid wound around her head replaced the NAA delegate on the box holo deck.

“The Council convenes to consider events from a global perspective,” she began in a low, melodious voice. La Presidente of Guatemala, newly elected as First Delegate by Los Estados Latinos, was an unknown quantity, but so far Huang had been impressed, in spite of her gender. He leaned forward now, idly sipping at his tea, still hot in its thermal cup that mimicked fine porcelain.

“When we began to assemble the Platforms and embraced the new frontier of Low Earth Orbit, we embraced equally a share of responsibility and risk. We have pooled our resources and shared our grief for those who died in their building,” she went on in her soft, compelling voice. ”This has been an effort by humanity to collectively push our borders, to expand our horizons beyond the boundaries of gravity and the surface of our birth world.” She smiled into Huang’s eyes. “It has been a shared undertaking. For most of us. But not for all. From the origins of our low orbit expansion, the first International Space Station, the United States was a reluctant participant. And even now, as a member of the North American Alliance, the platform New York is in reality, if not in name, a U.S. possession. I say that it is time for the United States to step into the world community. The threat of hostility originating from orbit has brought the rest of the world together to ban all satellite weaponry other than that maintained by the World Council’s Security Forces, but note that it took serious pressure to force the United States to yield its satellite defenses to CSF control, and that only under the threat of global conflict.”

Huang smiled to himself, imagining the foam flecked rantings of the NAA delegate at this moment. The man had a photogenic charisma, but little self-control. Sometimes, the Council rule of a single speaker at a time made for a dull session.

The Estados Latinos delegate had finished her oration. Huang touched the arm of his recliner and a holofield shimmered to life, morphing into a three-dimensional model of the dais and the surrounding boxes housing the delegates from the countries and alliances. Each box glowed a color that ranged the spectrum from red to violet. Red meant a positive response to the current speaker’s words. Violet meant negative. His own box on the holo shimmered the sunny yellow of neutrality. For now.

The NAA First Delegate had the floor again, his face contorted with a childish outrage that he made no attempt to conceal. Huang watched him with disdain. Such a poor choice of First Delegate. He had had personal dealings with the Canadian Delegate when they negotiated a long term trade policy concerning Taiwan’s carefully bred and controlled giant shrimp. The Canadian delegate was a canny player on the global field and was a much better choice than the spoiled and egocentric U.S. Delegate. Huang watched the shifting spectrum of color on his holo, noting the dramatic deepening from yellow through the greens toward violet.

But personal inclination did not mean votes. At his last count, it would be a close issue when Chou Zhen proposed the vote. Patiently he waited through the speeches of the various other Delegates as they expressed their official opinions either for or again revoking the NAA’s control of its platform. The speeches had more to do with pending trade deals or eco-credit negotiations than it had to do with the issue at hand, but that was an unavoidable aspect of World Council debates.

A soft note chimed through his space–a request for private speech. Huang glanced at the glowing icon that appeared in his holofield. Sri Lanka, one of the small independents, like Taiwan, but allied to no particular coalition at the moment. “Greetings,” Huang said, acknowledging the Delegate’s request. The Sri Lankan Delegate shimmered to life beside the gesticulating image of the NAA First Delegate.

“You will vote with Chou Zhen?” Chai Somkeet, a small, taut man with a round Buddha face dressed in a perfectly tailored cream colored suit addressed Huang briskly. “He believes that this call for intervention will succeed?”

Sri Lanka had been courting NAA trade lately, but last Huang had heard, the negotiation wasn’t going well.

“Chou Zhen is concerned for the safety of citizens of the planet,” Huang said earnestly.

“Don’t play games with me.” Somkeet’s eyes snapped. “This is a move to rub the NAA’s nose in their own arrogance. They will be angry if it succeeds and even more angry at those who supported it, if it fails.”

“You cannot serve two masters,” Huang said smoothly.

“Don’t give me those old platitudes.” Somkeet’s fists clenched in a very un-Buddha like pose. “If I fling pig dung in the NAA’s eye, I do not wish to do so alone! What is to make up for the trade agreement that will not happen if I join you in this vote?”

Huang picked up a small antique jade carving from the low table near his recliner. The amber tint of the white jade marked it as a tomb item, recovered by looters or archeologists as they later called themselves, a thousand years or more after its burial. The tiny clawed dragon … the symbol of his clone-son’s birth year … seemed to smile. “I feel, as does Chairman Chou Zhen, that order must be maintained in such a dangerous location.” He regarded the First Delegate of Sri Lanka. “What is the World Council for, if not to maintain order?”

The First–and only–Delegate of Sri Lanka grunted and vanished.

Barbarian, Huang thought. He had no manners. Council votes were not a chicken in the market place to bargain over. He and the NAA deserved each other. And besides, Somkeet had nothing he wanted.

The last Delegate yielded the floor, and Huang could almost feel the shiver of anticipation that swept the assemblage. Even the Council President seemed to stand straighter, her shoulders tense. Then something on her podium caught her attention and she frowned, her polished and inviolable calm fracturing ever so slightly.

Right on schedule. Huang sat forward.

“The assorted news media are featuring a live-cast direct from the North American Alliance’s orbital platform, New York Up.” Her tone was flat, noncommittal. “As President of the World Counncil, I choose to exercise my authority and set aside our rule about the exclusion of media feeds entirely from the chamber. The incident in progress seems to bear specifically on our ongoing discussion. It is appropriate. “