The Great Destroyer (8 page)

Mission control stood in stunned silence for a few seconds.  The first contact had turned into a tragic bloodbath.  And yet, deep within the technicians of the 27th century, a tribal pride stirred. 

Humanity was not helpless in the face of this new danger.  It had a champion to defend it.

Murphy’s screams of pain returned the room to reality.  The head of mission control radioed to the stricken astronaut, “Hold on, Drew, we’ll get you home.”

Takagawa called over the radio, “Charlie, apply a tourniquet to Drew’s right arm.”

Charlie II, having been designed to protect humans, knew rudimentary first aid.  He sheathed Ascalon and, consistent with his programming, retrieved a tourniquet from a first-aid kit in a wall compartment.  He applied the tourniquet to Murphy’s shoulder, and the Deputy Equality Minister mercifully passed out from the pain.

Luke Tanner called out, “We have another launch from the Ushah mothership.  Looks like another shuttle.  The mothership’s on a different orbital trajectory; it’s drifted away considerably over the last hour.  ETA at Earth orbit thirty minutes.”

“Shit,” Takagawa observed.  “We need to get the
Empathy
back down.”

“What do we do with the last Ushah?” Jackson asked.  “He’s bound to know all sorts of interesting things.  Might be useful to have a hostage.”

Takagawa nodded and triggered her radio.  “Charlie, strap the last enemy to Equality Minister Eldridge’s chair.”

“Yes, Dr. Takagawa.”  Charlie II moved to comply with the order, grabbing onto the Ushah linguist’s arm and leading him to the seat.  The Ushah did not resist, thankfully.  Takagawa guessed that Charlie II’s most likely reaction to resistance from the Ushah would have involved Ascalon and the swift death of the Ushah linguist.

Charlie II had been given basic programming, repurposed from factory robots, on how to tie an object down, which required rope or an available substitute.  He used the Equality Minister’s shirt, taking it off of her headless body to the disgust of viewers around the world.  Charlie II had not been programmed to think about public relations.

Takagawa thought fast.  War, or a very tense peace, was coming.  The Ushah clearly possessed advanced technology, but Charlie II had shown that they were not invincible.  What humanity needed now were better weapons. “Charlie, get the EVA jet pack, go to the Ushah shuttle and retrieve whatever electronic items you can.”

“Yes, Dr. Takagawa.”

The mission control director’s face showed shock, which quickly turned to anger.  “The Ushah reinforcements are coming and we’ve got a wounded astronaut up there.  We need to initiate reentry and get her back as quickly as possible.”

Takagawa continued looking at the room’s main screen, which displayed Charlie II’s visual feed.  Jackson answered for her.  “Ushah technology could be worth more than one life.”

The director, taught the Terran Alliance Creed since infancy, said reflexively, “People matter more than things.”

Jackson shook his head.  “Not right now they don’t.”

As it turned out, Charlie took four minutes to travel to the Ushah craft, rip out several electronic instrument panels, and return to the
Empathy
.  After securing the Ushah spoils and jettisoning Equality Minister Eldridge’s body, Charlie II made sure everyone was securely in their seats, including himself.  Space Administration technicians then initiated reentry of the
Empathy
.  The Ushah reinforcements were five minutes too late, and the
Empathy
returned to Earth, its mission over.

Calls began flooding into the First Representative’s office as soon as the first contact went sour.  Every representative and governor wanted to know what Flower would do now that the Ushah had proven hostile. 

The overwhelming preference of the politicians was to begin urgent negotiations with the Ushah, to cede them some portion of the Earth if they would only spare humanity.

The constituents mostly had other views, however.  Flower flipped from one news channel to another, watching the reactions of the people of Earth to the events that had transpired an hour earlier.

Flower watched one interview with a human resources specialist from Caracas.  “Charlie II’s a bad ass!”

A pool manager from Rome gushed, “As long as we’ve got Charlie II, I don’t see why we should surrender.  He makes me feel a lot safer.”

A dog sitter in Arkansas asked, “Why should we give up when Dr. Takagawa has a way to fight back?  She isn’t screwing around.  This is our damn planet.”

Flower closed the television application on her computer.  The reactions unsettled her, and not just because everyone seemed to have unconsciously reverted to using “he” and “she” instead of “ou,” doubly ironic when they were referring to a robot without gender. 

She buzzed her secretary.  “Get the Cabinet on a teleconference call with the Space Administration in five minutes.  It shouldn’t be too hard to get a hold of any of them, they all called in during the first contact anyway.”  She thought for a moment.  “Add in Dr. Takagawa as well.”

The roboticist had become one of the most important people in the world, Flower reflected.  Whatever course of action the Terran Alliance chose to take on humanity’s behalf would depend in great part on what Charlie II and his companions could do, which depended in turn on Dr. Takagawa and her team.

For a minute, Flower had nothing to do.  Her own aides would brief her when they briefed the Advisory Council.  She thought about the situation.  She was now a wartime leader, the first in centuries.  The crowning achievement of her tenure as First Representative was supposed to have been her dog parks initiative.  She closed her eyes, and a moment of panic overtook her.

I don’t know what I’m doing.  If it’s to be war with the Ushahs, we will lose.  We have no army, no air force, nothing but a few dozen robots that were built to fix telescopes on the Moon.  If anyone’s alive to remember me after I die, they’ll remember a fool, unequal to the moment.

She flicked on her intercom and ordered a glass of red wine, feeling the need to calm down.  Just as she was taking the first sip, the intercom buzzed. “First Representative, the Cabinet is on your teleconference line.”

Flower’s hand shook as she clicked on her teleconference application.  “We all saw what happened,” she began without ceremony. “The first person I want to hear from is Administrator Korzov.  What is the current status of the
Empathy
and its passengers?”

“The
Empathy
landed in Florida sixteen minutes ago.  Drew Murphy lost a lot of blood, but ou’s in stable condition.”

“And the Ushah linguist?” Flower asked. 

“We have the linguist in custody as well.  We don’t know how to disarm its suit’s weapons, so we have Charlie II and a public safety team watching it constantly in case it tries anything.”

“Has it said anything since you took it into captivity?”

“Not a word,” Korzov said. 

“How do we know it isn’t communicating with the mothership?” Safety Minister Redfeather wanted to know.

Takagawa took the question, “We’re monitoring the suit for electromagnetic transmissions, and we’re holding the linguist inside a Faraday cage.”

Flower asked, “A what?”

“A metal mesh enclosure.  Electromagnetic signals like radio waves can’t penetrate it in either direction.”  Seeing blank stares among the other participants in the video call, she added, “It means the Ushah linguist can’t communicate with the rest of the Ushah, even if his suit has some built in transmission capability.”

Flower nodded.  “OK.  Now the tougher problem.  What do we do about the Ushah?”

Silence reigned on the line for a moment.  Then Takagawa said, “There’s not much we can do about the Ushah right now.  We don’t have any other launch vehicles ready to take more Charlies into space, and no weapons we could use against their mothership.” 

“We can try to contact them again by radio, I suppose, and ask for peace,” Redfeather suggested hopefully.

A new voice came on the line.  “That would be a terrible mistake, Safety Minister.”

Flower frowned.  “Identify yourself, please.”

“This is Thomas Jackson, Professor of Conflict Resolution at Yale University.  I have been working on Project Charlie with Dr. Takagawa.”

Safety Minister Redfeather asked angrily, “And why would talking to the Ushah be a mistake?”

Jackson replied, “At this moment, the Ushah believe that we are strong.  Charlie II just wiped out their boarding party and took their linguist captive.  If we start making desperate calls for peace immediately, the Ushah will correctly surmise that we have no real defense other than a few Charlies.”

“And what will they think if we say nothing?” Flower asked.

“There are a couple possibilities,” Jackson said. “They may think we are about to mount a devastating attack on their mothership.  That could lead them to contact us and ask for substantive negotiations.”

Redfeather countered, “Or it could lead them to launch a massive preemptive assault on Earth and wipe us out.”

Nodding, Jackson said, “That is the risk.  But let’s not forget the strategic situation.  The Ushah want our planet.  They won’t want to render it uninhabitable.  That means a massive nuclear or chemical attack is highly unlikely.  If they want to fight us, it’ll have to be a sustained attack, mopping up every last bit of resistance on the planet.”

Takagawa completed the thought.  “And that’s where the Charlies come in.  If it comes to war, the Charlies will drive the cost of conquering the planet up so high that the Ushah will conclude that they have no option other than a sustained peace.” 

Flower rubbed her eyes.  She was a long way from plotting out the dog parks initiative with Entertainment Minister Fabrizio.  She wanted another drink, but knew that the other conference participants could see her.  “Does anyone have another idea?”

“Call the Ushah,” the Safety Minister advised.  “We don’t even know what they want.  Maybe we can reach an accommodation.”
“And the Charlie program?” Flower asked.

“Shut it down.  Our robot could take on a few Ushah in a confined space, but we don’t have anywhere near enough robots of anywhere near high enough quality to win a ground conflict.  If the Ushah discover the Charlie program, it could start a war.”

Jackson couldn’t hold back his mockery.  “They already know about the damn program, remember?  Charlie II just spilled the beans pretty dramatically.”

Flower didn’t laugh.  She took another gulp of her wine and considered the decision that lay before her.

“This is Thomas Jackson.  I have been assigned to speak for the Terran Alliance in these discussions.”  Jackson spoke the words clearly into the microphone sitting in the middle of the table in a conference room in Toronto.  The setting sun outside cast an orange glare through the window, which looked out over the Terran Alliance capital city.

Another man might have dreaded negotiating on behalf of humanity, but Jackson was thrilled.  His conscience reminded him of the terrible stakes, the lives that depended on his thoughtfulness and the very words he chose, but the deeper recesses of his mind knew that he reveled in the excitement and importance of what he was doing.

A speaker hissed back.  “This is Ashsef.  I speak for the Ushah.”

It had taken an hour to arrange the mechanism of conversation. The Ushah had acted first, ending First Representative Flower’s deliberations by sending radio signals emulating those they had intercepted from the
Empathy
an hour after the deadly first contact between the species.  Their linguists had apparently deciphered much more of Terran Standard in the intervening hour by intercepting more radio calls, as Ashsef’s speech was noticeably more human-like, less reedy.

Ashsef continued, “The incident that occurred on your ship was an accident.  The linguist Oslahef mistranslated the words of our emissary.  She intended to ask if we might land some of the Ushah on Earth so that we can establish a stable home for the Ushah.  Our people have been weakened by a great calamity, and we cannot survive forever on our mothership.  We ask for roughly one percent of the land of Earth.”

Takagawa, sitting across from Jackson, did the math in her head almost instantly and wrote a note to him:

1.6 million km
2
, about the size of a decently large country

Jackson took a minute to consider.  Loss of that much land was nothing to sniff at, but it would leave humans in control of the vast majority of the planet.  He wanted more time to consider the problem, so he changed the subject slightly.  “You must have come from another planet similar to ours.  What was the calamity that caused you to leave that planet?”

A brief pause followed that presumably allowed an Ushah team of linguists to translate Jackson’s words for whoever was making decisions.

The linguist answered in a neutral tone, slowing when he didn’t know the right word. “Our home planet was... harmed so that we could no longer live there. Our ship carries the last of the Ushah.  We were put into a long sleep so that we could be alive once again when we reached a new home.  We were... sleeping until a few weeks ago.  Our guidance computer aimed us at Earth... long ago, while we slept.”
Jackson took in the story and stared at the speaker.  He wanted to know more about what had “harmed” the Ushah’s home planet, but there was also business to attend to, and he tried to plan his next words carefully.  “You propose that we grant you a great deal of land. What would you offer us in exchange?”
There followed a long pause, allowing for deliberation. “We will refrain from violence,” Ashsef finally replied.
“What makes you think we won’t destroy you if you attempt to hurt us?” Jackson asked immediately, and not without a calculated trace of anger.
If the linguist detected the anger, he gave no indication. “We do not see any spaceships in this solar system other than... satellites orbiting your home planet and some telescopes on the moon. You are not a technologically advanced society, and you cannot stop us from taking what we need. We do not wish for wasteful violence, but we will not be denied a home after so long in travel.”
Now it was Jackson’s turn to think. He felt like the Incan ambassador speaking to Spanish conquistadors for the first time.  Unless he wanted humanity to be subjugated or destroyed, he needed to be firm without provoking a war.
“You insult us with your demands, Ashsef,” Jackson said, letting the Ushah know that humans could be prodded to hostility. “Our defenses are more powerful than you know, as you saw on our ship. We have not colonized space because we have not needed to. However, on account of the suffering of your race, we might be willing to grant you some land—but only as part of a fair exchange. We will give you some land if you teach our technicians how to build fusion drive engines like the ones on your ship.”
The fusion drives would be a fantastically complicated system. Learning how to build them would require learning every advanced technology the Ushah had, from metallurgy to reactor design. There was very little chance the Ushah would give all that away, essentially ceding every technological advantage to their likely rival for control of Earth. Jackson knew the proposal would be rejected, but his real negotiating objective was not the fusion drive.
Ten minutes passed.  Some of that time would be necessary to simply understanding what Jackson was talking about.  The Ushah linguists could apparently process language very quickly, but even they would stumble a bit on technical terminology like “fusion” and “drive.”

The Ushah negotiator finally hissed, “We will not pay you like a... merchant for our survival.  However, if you grant us the land, we might teach you some of the basic knowledge required to operate a civilization.”
Jackson smiled to himself.  The Ushah were not so different from humans when it came to negotiations.  Jackson had successfully grounded expectations for the bargain to come.  Any haggling would take place within the basic land-for-technology framework.

The conversation went on for an hour, as Jackson and Ashsef crept closer and closer to an agreement.  Finally, Jackson felt ready to ask for what Takagawa and Project Charlie—and consequently, humanity as a whole—really needed most from the Ushah.

Meeting eyes with Emma, Jackson asked the radio nonchalantly, “What if we gave you 67 percent of the land you request, and in exchange, you teach us the operating principles and programming languages used in your spacesuits?  As you’ve seen, we need further technological development on our spacesuits, and the technology could not be used to threaten you.”

That was a lie.  Dr. Takagawa and her team of programmers didn’t give a damn about the spacesuits—Charlie II and his successors would not need a spacesuit at all, of course.  However, once the engineers of Project Charlie could decipher Ushah programming and electronics, they could unlock the secrets of all the equipment Charlie II had taken from the Ushah shuttle.  Faster computers, better weapons, more advanced materials—who knew what else Takagawa could develop from the building blocks of Ushah technology.

Jackson held his breath, hoping Ashsef wouldn’t quite appreciate that teaching humans how to program and build better spacesuits could give them the keys to the Ushah technological treasure chest.

The pause that followed was relatively short.  “If you give us 75 percent of the land we requested, that arrangement would be acceptable.”

Takagawa pumped her fist in delight.  Exhaling, Jackson did his best to sound reluctant.  “You are a difficult negotiator, but I reluctantly agree to that arrangement.  I will convey the agreement to First Representative Flower.  She will have to approve it before we can discuss the details of how the land and spacesuit technology transfer will be carried out.  I propose that we speak again in two hours—one-twelfth the period of rotation of the Earth—on this same frequency.”