A World Between (8 page)

The psychic heart of an Arkology consisted of the lab decks and the computer deck and the communications deck that linked all planetbound Institutes of Transcendental Science and all Arkologies into a unified culture that could truly be said to be galactic, at least in a primitive sense.
Homo galacticus
had at least evolved to the point where he needed no psychological simulacrums of his planetary past any more than planetbound humans needed to live in simulations of the treetop world from which their remote ancestors had descended.

And now we are poised for the next step, Falkenstein thought as he reached 2-deck. And fate has chosen me as the nexus of evolutionary forces, as the instantaneous instrument of the process which has taken our species from the trees to the stars, and which is now battering against the very limits of the naturally evolved universe. Now we must evolve beyond evolution itself or sink inexorably backward into the primordial slime.

The main briefing room was a circular domed chamber; a round white table filled the center of the room, the floor was carpeted in light gray, and the walls were a seamless expanse of pale blue broken only by a large computer display screen and a speaker grid. Computer access was strictly voice-activated here, so that the Ark-mind could take part as just another collegue.

The domed ceiling was a single great screen that could be opaqued to a soothing pearl gray or illumined with an appropriate abstraction from the artbanks, or, as it was now, turned into a “window” onto the space outside the Arkology’s inertia screen.

Now the great globe of Pacifica hung above the table, a cloud-swirled ball of greens, browns, and brilliant blue suspended in the perpetual blackness of star-filled space. White icecaps gleamed at either pole. The great curving horn of the main continent of Columbia half-cradled the vast Island Continent as if it had just flung an armful of green jewels eastward across the azure sea. The Big Blue River and its tributaries were clearly visible .like a network of blue veins draining the green and gold eastern plains. The Sierra Cordillera cleanly divided the western portion of Columbia, furred with green on the western slopes, outlining the sere brown of the desert interior. At this magnification, even the city of Gotham winked at the edge of visibility at the delta-mouth of the Big Blue, like a tiny chip of shiny metal intermittently catching the light of the sun. The immense ball above utterly dominated the room. It was a tangibly living planet, huge, verdant, and, with its perpetual slow swirl and ebb of white cloud patterns, organic and breathing, palpably alive.

Five men and a woman sat around the white table. Carlos Miranda, one of the
Heisenberg’s
Link Officers, had been out of Deep Sleep for a year on his regular tour. The other four men were specialists who had been awakened when the
Heisenberg
entered the Pacifican solar system specifically to background this mission: Lar Dalton, Psychopolitician; Harry Eisen, head of the Survey Update Team; Winston Comelle, Historical Analysis, and Artur Polichev, Legal Advisor.

Together, these five men represented the apexes of five Situation Task Forces of up to twenty men apiece specifically formed to deal with all aspects of the Pacifica mission. The men in this room gave Falkenstein access to more depth information on Pacifica than the Pacificans had on themselves.

And then there was Maria. Falkenstein’s wife was one of the few female graduates of an Institute of Transcendental Science, specialty Projection, which had no immediate relevance to the Pacifica mission. But Psychopolitics had determined that a husband-wife negotiation team was the optimum sync with the Pacifican psychopolitical matrix. One lone ambassador-plenipotentiary would offend their democratic ideology, and a team of experts would tend to arouse their paranoia and point too sharply to their total scientific inferiority. Further, the Pacifican sexual power balance leaned subtly toward the female—though the Pacificans themselves kept this just below the level of full conscious awareness—and a sexually balanced negotiating team was therefore highly desirable.

Besides, Falkenstein knew that he functioned best with Maria at his side—he was a rare and lucky man to have a wife of her intellectual quality—and he would have brought her along no matter what analysis Psychopolitics had come up with.

“Very well/’ Falkenstein said, taking his seat next to Maria with a quick private glance of greeting, “this will be our last chance to run through the scenario before Maria and I go planetside. Arkmind, please monitor. Maria, please summarize.”

A strange look passed briefly across Maria’s even features—annoyance, pride, perhaps both. Annoyance at being treated like a student at an oral exam, pride at being accorded the status of aide-de-camp to the Managing Director, who happened to be her husband. Falkenstein’s motivations were also mixed. He wanted to be sure she had internalized the scenario thoroughly, but he also wanted to assure the others of her competence. Despite the projections of Psychopolitics, there was still a certain reluctance to entrust a woman with this level of responsibility, and the fact that Maria was his wife only added another layer of ambiguity.

“Roger and I will be negotiating with a delegation consisting of the Chairman, Carlotta Madigan; the Minister of Media, Royce Lindblad; and Lauren Golding, a Good Old Mountain Boy Delegate representing the minority faction most favorable to our position,” Maria said crisply. “Lindblad is Madigan’s lover and political ally; therefore, she is in effective control of the delegation.”

“Correction,” said Eisen. “It was Lindblad who proposed the motion their Parliament passed, and Lindblad who has done most of the speaking for the administration position. Madigan has carefully avoided taking a public position. Therefore, he may very well be acting independently.” “Almost certainly a political ploy on her part,” Dalton insisted. “Their personal relationship syncs into the dominant Pacifican female-superior mode, and Lindblad has never opposed her on a significant political issue.”

“But historically, the Pacifican Minister of Media has been a political figure of significant independence, frequently in opposition to the Chairman,” Comelle said.

“But the current situation is an anomaly and therefore historical analysis does not—”

Maria smiled thinly at Eisen. “Is this psychopolitical analysis, Harry, or do you just find the concept of a dominant female political figure in an egalitarian society hard to swallow?”

Eisen flushed. Falkenstein laughed, but no one else laughed with him. “This is irrelevant,” he said. “The operative fact is that the Pacifican Parliament has overwhelmingly instructed the delegation to reject an Institute of Transcendental Science on anything like reasonable terms. Whether this was engineered by Madigan or not, she is bound by the instructions of her Parliament. Maria, will you please continue from there...”

“Therefore, the Arkmind has projected the almost certain failure of the negotiations,” Maria said in flat professional tones. “Even if Lindblad or Madigan should unexpectedly side with Golding and the delegation should accept our proposal, Parliament would have to ratify it, and if an immediate vote were taken, it would certainly be negative, and that would be the end of it.”

“Correction,” said Polichev. “If Madigan supported the Institute and Parliament then turned it down, there would then be a planetwide electronic vote of confidence. If she won, a new Parliament would be elected which would likely overturn the previous vote.”

“A train of events which the Arkmind projects as virtually impossible,” Falkenstein said testily. “Can we please stick to the main lines of the scenario? Maria...” “Therefore, we must avoid an immediate confrontation when our proposal is turned down,” Maria continued. “We ask for time to study their counterproposals. We formally request permission to remain in orbit around Pacifica in the meantime. With the utmost politeness and reasonableness. The Arkmind predicts that the Madigan delegation cannot deny such a request without risking a vote of confidence on the wrong side of the issue of simple galactic protocol.” Maria smiled, knowing she had stated it all well. “That concludes phase one of the scenario.”

“Very good,” Falkenstein said. “But perhaps we had better look ahead and clarify phase two. Artur, will you verify the timing for me again?”

“Once the fact that we’ve been given permission to remain in orbit has been released to the Pacifican media, it will be irreversible except by vote of Parliament,” the Legal Advisor said. “Say overnight, for safety’s sake.”

“At which point I invoke Article 12, Section 3 of the Pacifican Constitution...alkenstein said.

“Section 2, Roger,” Polichev corrected.
“No one
—and the phrasing clearly does not exclude non-Pacificans— may be denied a public net channel or may be prevented from purchasing time on free market channels except by reason of judicially declared criminal intent or in order to advocate the overthrow of the Pacifican government or Constitution by extralegal means.”

“They won’t like it, but they’ll have to swallow it,” Dalton said. “Aside from the legalism, the Pacificans are absolute fanatics on the subject of free media access— it almost has the psychic force of a religious commandment. We’ll have them caught by their own deepest convictions.”

Falkenstein drummed his fingers on the table nervously. “There’s one hole that I can see in phase two,” he said. “They can’t deny us media access once we invoke their own Constitution, but they’re not going to like it. Might they then not simply revoke their permission for us to remain in their solar system? Arkmind, a projection on that, please...”

“Sixty to forty negative under the present scenario,” said the cool, soothing voice of the computer.

Falkenstein frowned. “Not nearly good enough,” he said. “How can we raise the odds to at least 75-25 in our favor?”

“Politicize the issue immediately,” Dalton suggested. “In local psychosexual terms.”

“Elucidate.”

“Transcendental Science’s image is male-dominant—”

“I wonder where they got
that
idea?” Maria muttered. Falkenstein shot her an angry glance.

“—as a result of Femocrat propaganda,” Dalton continued, speaking through her, “Lauren Golding is a so-called ‘Good Old Mountain Boy’ from the Sierra Cordillera, where the local culture is almost entirely male and dominantly homosexual. Any hint that expelling us is a female attempt to surpress free access to the ideas of a male-dominant culture will arouse strong political support for us there, and we seem to have his vote anyway—”

“But if the homosexual male culture supports us openly, won’t that cancel itself out by polarizing Pacifican lesbians against us?” Maria interrupted.

Dalton frowned in annoyance. He glanced at Falkenstein for support. “If I may continue... ?” he said somewhat frostily.

“She
does
have a point, Lar...” Falkenstein said Dalton sighed. “Actually not,” he replied. “You forget that we’re dealing with a subtley female dominant culture on Pacifica, Maria. Which means that since lesbians are thoroughly integrated into the existing power structure, there is no female equivalent of the male homosexual subculture of the Sierra Cordillera. Besides, since this
is
a female dominant society, there are no psychopolitical pressures towards lesbianism, and therefore the demographic equation is
not
evenly balanced.” He smiled wanly at Maria.
“Now
may I return to the main line of the subscenario?”

Maria said nothing, but Falkenstein could sense a resistance in her that seemed only peripherally involved with this minor technical point.

“To continue ”
Dalton said, after an uneasy moment of silence. “Golding’s vote can be considered assured The swing figure thus becomes Royce Lindblad. Befriend him. Appeal to his manhood Treat him as Madigan’s equal or even her inherent superior. Drive enough of a wedge between them so that he won’t support any move by Madigan to expell us immediately. Even if she takes it to Parliament —which I doubt she would with a majority of her own delegation against her—there would then be enough political division to postpone a showdown vote for at least a week, during which time our psywar teams will concentrate on linking the expulsion issue to the freedom of media access issue. It will then be too late to expell us.”

Maria’s features tightened. “I don’t like it,” she said “Don’t you recognize any limits, Lar?”

“It’s well within the Pacifican psychosexual parameters, Maria,” Dalton said mildly.

“I mean limits of human decency,” Maria snapped.

"This is war, Maria,” Falkenstein said testily. “And the stakes are ultimate. You know what the alternative is. Arkmind, a projection on the probable success of this subscenario, please?”

“83 to 17 favorable,” the computer said.

“Well, that settles that!”

“Roger—”

“Enough, Maria!” Falkenstein snapped. “The decision has been made.” Maria nibbled at her lower lip, then stared down at the table. For all her unquestioned intellect, she had as much capacity to make these things difficult as the next woman.

“Now then,” Falkenstein said more calmly, “it occurs to me in the light of what Lar has said that it might be useful to establish a political base in the Sierra Cordillera during our long-term psywar campaign. Might we not persuade the Pacificans to let us land a small party while we’re in orbit—on humanitarian grounds? They know nothing of our culture and the planetbound mentality would surely sympathize with the supposed need of our people to get off the Arkology and smell the flowers, as it were...

“A good idea,” Dalton .said. ‘Try to put it specifically to Golding in a way that will make him believe he thought of it himself. A personal invitation from his constituency, and so forth. Then, during the three-month period before the Femocrat mission arrives—”

‘Tm afraid we have a little problem there,” Miranda said. “The Femocrat ship has delayed deceleration. Projections show they’ll have to pull a steady four gees when they begin, which will bring them here within six weeks. Probably keeping most of their personnel in Deep Sleep and doing it either with automatics or a volunteer skeleton crew.”