The Mote in God's Eye (73 page)

“Who else could it be? Me, Cargill, Sandy Sinclair—
MacArthur
’s old crew will land. Maybe they’ll really surrender. Somebody’s got to give them that chance.”

“Rod, I—”

“Can we have the wedding soon? There’s no heir to either of our families.”

“No use,” said Charlie. “Taste the irony. For millions of years we have been in a bottle, its shape has shaped our species to our detriment. Now we have found the opening, and now the
Navy
pours through to burn our worlds.”

Jock sneered, “How vivid and poetic are your images!”

“How fortunate we are to enjoy your constructive advice! You—” Charlie stopped suddenly. Jock’s walk had turned strange. She paced with her hands twisted uncomfortably behind her, head bent forward, feet close together to render her stance as precarious as a human’s.

Charlie recognized
Kutuzov
. She made a peremptory shushing motion to stop Ivan from commenting.

“I need a human word,” said Jock. “We never heard it, but they must have it.
Summon a servant,
” she snapped in Kutuzov’s voice, and Charlie leaped to obey.

Senator Fowler sat at a small desk in the office next to the Commission conference room. A large bottle of New Aberdeen Highland Cream stood on the otherwise bare oak desk. The door opened and Dr. Horvath came in. He stood expectantly.

“Drink?” Fowler asked.

“No, thank you.”

“Want to get down to it, eh. Right. Your application for membership on this Commission is denied.”

Horvath stood rigid. “I see.”

“I doubt it. Sit down.” Fowler took a glass from the desk drawer and poured. “Here, hold this anyway. Pretend you’re drinking with me. Tony, I’m doing you a favor.”

“I do not see it that way.”

“Don’t, eh? Look. The Commission’s going to exterminate the Moties. Just what’s that going to do for you? You
want
to be part of that decision?”

“Exterminate? But I thought the orders were to bring them into the Empire.”

“Sure. Can’t do anything else. Political pressure’s too big to just go in and wipe ‘em out. So I got to let the Moties draw some blood. Including the father of the only heir I’ll ever have.” Fowler’s lips were tightly drawn. “They’ll fight, Doc. I just hope they don’t make a phony surrender offer first, so Rod’ll have a chance. You really want to be part of that?”

“I see... I guess I really do see. Thank you.”

“You’re welcome.” Fowler reached into his tunic and took out a small box. He opened it for a second to look inside, closed it, and scaled it across the desk to Horvath. “There. That’s yours.”

Dr. Horvath opened it and saw a ring with a large blank green stone.

“You can carve a baron’s crest on that next Birthday,” Fowler said. “Do not bind the mouths and all that. Satisfied?”

“Yes. Very. Thank you, Senator.”

“No thanks needed. You’re a good man, Tony. OK, let’s get in there and see what the Moties want.”

The conference room was nearly filled. The Commissioners, staff, Horvath’s scientists, Hardy, Renner—and Admiral Kutuzov.

Senator Fowler took his seat. “Lords Commissioners representing His Imperial Majesty are now convened. Write your names and organizations.” He paused briefly as they scrawled on their computers. “The Moties have requested this meeting. They didn’t say why. Anybody got anything to bring up before they get here? No? OK, Kelley, bring ‘em in.”

The Moties were silent as they took their places at the end of the table. They looked very alien; the human mimicry was gone. The permanent smiles were still painted on, and the fur was combed sleek and shiny.

“Your ball,” the Senator said. “I may as well tell you we’re unlikely to believe anything you say.”

“There will be no more lies,” Charlie said.
Even
voice was different; the Mediator sounded alien, not like a blend of all the voices the Moties had ever heard, but with a distinct— Rod couldn’t trace it. Not an accent. It was almost perfection, the ideal of Anglic.

“The time for lies is finished. My Master thought so from the beginning, but Jock’s Master was given jurisdiction over negotiations with humans, as you were given such jurisdiction for your Emperor.”

“Faction fight, eh?” Fowler said. “Pity we didn’t meet your boss. A bit late now, isn’t it?”

“Perhaps. But I will now represent him. You may call him King Peter if you like; the midshipmen did.”

“What?” Rod stood at his seat, and the chair fell backward to crash to the floor. “When?”

“Just before they were killed by Warriors,” Charlie said. “Attacking me will gain you no information, my lord; and it was not my Master’s Warriors who killed them. Those who did were ordered to take them alive, but the midshipmen would not surrender.”

Rod carefully retrieved his chair and sat. “No. Horst wouldn’t,” he muttered.

“Nor would Whitbread. Nor Potter. You may be as proud of them as you wish, Lord Blaine. Their last moments were in the finest traditions of the Imperial Service.” There was no trace of irony in the alien voice.

“And just why did you murder those boys?” Sally demanded. “Rod, I’m sorry. I—I’m sorry, that’s all.”

“It wasn’t your fault. The lady asked you a question, Charlie.”

“They had discovered the truth about us. Their landing boats took them to a museum. Not one of the places of amusement that we allowed you to visit. This one has a more serious purpose.” Charlie spoke on, in a low voice. She described the museum and the battle there; the flight across Mote Prime, the beginning of the war between Motie factions, and the landing in the street outside the Castle. She told of the final battle.

“My own Warriors lost,” she finished. “Had they won, King Peter would have sent the midshipmen back to you. But once they were dead—it seemed better to attempt to deceive you.”

“Lord God,” Rod whispered. “So that’s your secret. And we had all the clues, but—”

Someone was murmuring across the room. Chaplain Hardy. “
Requiem aeternam donum est, Domine, et lux perpetuae...
”

“Just how the hell do you think telling us this will help you?” Senator Fowler asked.

Charlie shrugged. “If you’re going to exterminate us, you may as well know why. I’m trying to explain that the Masters will not surrender. King Peter might, but he doesn’t control Mote Prime, much less the asteroid civilization. Someone will fight.”

“As I predicted, my lords,” Kutuzov said heavily. “And men and ships sent to accept surrender will be doomed. Perhaps Fleet as well. If we enter Mote System, it must be in full attack.”

“Oh, boy,” Senator Fowler muttered. “Yeah. I see your plan. You think we can’t order an unprovoked attack, and maybe we
won’t
send in a suicide mission first. Well, you read us wrong, Charlie. It’ll mean my head, maybe, but all you’ve convinced me of is to give the Admiral his way. Sorry, Father, but that’s the way I see it.”

The Senator’s voice crackled across the room. “Admiral Kutuzov. You will hold your fleet in readiness, and it will accept no communications from any source without my prior approval. And I mean
any
source. Understood?”

“Aye aye, Senator.” Kutuzov raised a communicator to his lips. “Mikhailov. Da.” He spoke fluid syllables. “It is done, Senator.”

“I have not finished,” Charlie said. “You have another alternative.”

“And what’s that?” Fowler demanded.

“Blockade.”

They stood for a long time on the balcony outside Rod’s suite. Faint sounds of a city after dark floated up to them. The Hooded Man rose high in the sky, his baleful red eye watching them with indifference: two human lovers, who would send squadrons of ships into the Eye itself and keep them there, until they too passed away...

“It doesn’t look very big,” Sally murmured. She moved her head against his shoulder and felt his arms tighten around her. “Just a fleck of yellow in Murcheson’s Eye. Rod, will it work?”

“The blockade? Sure. We worked out the plan at Fleet Battle Ops. Jack Cargill set it up: a squadron inside the Eye itself to take advantage of the Jump shock. The Moties don’t know about that, and their ships won’t be under command for minutes at best. If they try to send them through on automatic it just makes it worse.”

She shivered against him. “That wasn’t really what I meant. The whole plan—will it work?”

“What choices have we?”

“None. And I’m glad you agree. I couldn’t live with you if— I couldn’t, that’s all.”

“Yeah.” And that makes me grateful to the Moties for thinking up this scheme, because we can’t let the Moties get out. A galactic plague—and there are only two remedies for that kind of plague. Quarantine and extermination. At least we’ve got a choice.

“They’re—” She stopped and looked up at him. “I’m afraid to talk to you about it. Rod, I couldn’t live with
myself
if we had to—if the blockade won’t work.”

He didn’t say anything. There was a shouted laugh from somewhere beyond the Palace grounds. It sounded like children.

“They’ll get past that squadron in the star,” Sally said. Her voice was tightly controlled.

“Sure. And past the mines Sandy Sinclair’s designing too. But where can they go, Sally? There’s only one exit from the Eye system, they don’t know where it is, and there’ll be a battle group waiting for them when they find it. Meanwhile they’ve been inside a star. No place to dissipate energy. Probably damaged. There’s nothing you can think of that we haven’t considered. That blockade’s
tight
. I wouldn’t approve it otherwise.”

She relaxed again and leaned against his chest. His arms encircled her. They watched the Hooded Man and his imperfect eye.

“They won’t come out,” Rod said.

“And they’re still trapped. After a million years—what will we be like in a million years?” she wondered. “Like them? There’s something basic we don’t understand about Moties. A fatalistic streak I can’t even comprehend. After a few failures they may even just—give up.”

He shrugged. “We’ll keep the blockade anyway. Then, in about fifty years, we’ll go in and see what things are like. If they’ve collapsed as thoroughly as Charlie predicts, we can take them into the Empire.”

“And then what?”

“I don’t know. We’ll have to think of something.”

“Yes.” She drew away from him and turned excitedly. “I know! Rod, we have to really look at the problem. For the Moties. We can help them.”

He looked at her wonderingly. “I think the best brains in the Empire are likely to be working on it.”

“Yes, but for the Empire. Not for the Moties. We need—an Institute. Something controlled by people who
know
the Moties. Something outside of politics. And we can do it. We’re rich enough...”

“Eh?”

“We can’t spend half of what we have between us.” She dashed past him and into his suite, then through it and across the corridor to her own. Rod followed to see her burrowing among the stacks of wedding gifts that littered the large rose-teak table in her entry hail. She grunted in satisfaction when she found her pocket computer.

Now should I be irritated? Rod thought. I think I’d better learn to be happy when she’s like this. I’ll have a long time to do it. “The Moties have been working on their problem awhile,” he reminded her.

She looked up with faint irritation. “Pooh. They don’t see things the way we do. Fatalism, remember? And they’ve had nobody to force them into adopting any solutions they do think up.” She went back to scribbling notes. “We’ll need Horowitz, of course. And he says there’s a good man on Sparta, we’ll have to send for him. Dr. Hardy. We’ll want him.”

He regarded her with awe and wonder. “When you get going, you move.” And I better move with you if I’m going to have you around all my life. Wonder what it’s like to live with a whirlwind? “You’ll have Father Hardy if you want him. The Cardinal’s assigned him to the Mote problem—and I think His Eminence has something bigger in store. Hardy could have been a bishop long ago but he doesn’t have the normal share of miterosis. Now I don’t think he’s got much choice: First apostolic delegate to an alien race, or something.”

“Then the Board will be you and me, Dr. Horvath, Father Hardy—and Ivan.”

“Ivan?” But why not? And as long as we’re doing this, we may as well do it right. We’ll need a good executive director, Sally’s no use as an administrator, and I won’t have time. Horvath, maybe. “Sally, do you know just how much we’re up against? The biology problem: how to turn a female to male without pregnancy or permanent sterility. But even if you find something, how do we get the Moties to
use
it?”

She wasn’t really listening. “We’ll find a way. We’re pretty good at governing—”

“We can hardly govern a
human
empire!”

“But we do, don’t we? Somehow.” She pushed a stack of gaily wrapped packages aside to make more room. A large box almost fell and Rod had to catch it as Sally continued to scrawl notes into her computer’s memory bank. “Now just what’s the code for
Imperial Men and Women of Science
?” she asked. “There’s a man on Meiji who’s done some really good work in genetic engineering, and I can’t remember his name...”

Rod sighed heavily. “I’ll look him up for you. But there’s one condition.”

“What’s that?” She looked up in curiosity,

“You finish this up by next week, because, Sally, if you take that pocket computer on our honeymoon, I’ll throw the goddamn thing into the mass converter!”

She laughed, but Rod didn’t feel reassured at all. Oh well. The computers weren’t expensive. He could buy her a new one when they got back. In fact, maybe he ought to make a deal with Bury; he might need the things in shipload lots if they were ever going to have a family...

Horace Bury followed the Marine guards through the Palace, pointedly ignoring the other Marines who’d fallen in behind him. His face was calm, and only a close study of his eyes could show the despair that bored through him.

As Allah wills, he sighed, and wondered that he no longer resented the thought. Perhaps there would be comfort in submission . . . there was little else to console him. The Marines had brought his servant and all his baggage down on the landing ship, and then separated him from Nabil at the Palace roof. Before they did, Nabil had whispered his message: Jonas Stone’s confession was even now reaching the Palace.