The View from the Imperium (11 page)

“By you! You are several weeks ahead of us!” Pinckney protested, jabbing a finger at the tabletop.

“You were late!” Tross said. “We began our deliberations on the appointed day.”

“We could not be here! You know how difficult it is to time space-travel. The black hole has been emitting unusual quantities of quasars. We had to detour for safety. We have been monitoring your negotiations. Yolk does not necessarily stipulate that we consider any of them settled!”

“You are welcome, of course, to open matters to the floor for debate,” Marden said. “But as I see it, most of the items are old arguments brought around again. Only two matters stand out in importance.”

“Two?” demanded Thanndur, his mandibles clacking. “I have sixteen vital themes bookmarked!” Around his three-digited claw-hand, several small icons danced.

“Two need to be pushed up the list, or the others are largely moot,” Marden said. “With your permission, First Councillor?”

“Of course,” DeKarn said, and turned to the Carstairs contingent. “Twenty-Nine?”

Zembke made an impatient gesture. “Very well, go ahead!”

Marden nodded. “The two matters are interconnected. The first is the pending arrival of the Imperium’s envoy. How will we greet her? We need to discuss our response. Are we a part of the Imperium or not? It has gone undecided for two centuries, and that is long enough!” Muttering began, not all of it low-pitched. “I apologize for being too direct, but what are we? A loose collection of systems, with no central government? A mini-confederation of our own? We are, after all, self-sustaining, producing most of what we consume, yet . . .”

“The details are a secondary matter,” DeKarn interrupted him.

Marden’s spine elongated slightly, elevating his saturnine face. “Very well! I will leave that to the debates! But it is urgent to decide now that we are independent!”

Desne Eland raised a hand. “But we are not independent. We have always been a part of the Imperium.”

“Are we?” Zembke asked, rounding on the Cocomon representative with the light of battle gleaming in his eye. The human and his insectoid counterparts recoiled, chittering to one another fretfully.

“I am not going to let you make us live through ancient history again,” said Ten with a sigh. “We are who we are. This sector was founded by the Imperium . . .”

“On the backs of our Cocomon brothers and sisters!” said Seventeen.

Thanndur chittered. “We were glad to become part of a larger whole. The swarm survives. It prospers!” His companions, Eland included, trilled agreement. “Do not use us as your excuse for an argument.” Seventeen looked put out.

“I say that we tell the Imperium that we will go our own way from now on,” Marden bellowed, amplifying his voice with the help of the hidden console.

“There is no call to be this hasty over such an important matter!” said Councillor Tross.

Marden rounded on him. “There is every reason to be hasty! The woman is on her way here. Her ship is making its final hop into Portent’s Star’s space. She will be here in days. Are we a government, or are we a social club that meets every few years to eat expensive food and complain about our separate constituencies?”

“We can be both,” Councillor Six said, mischief on his face.

“But what is your point?” asked DeKarn patiently, although she had already deduced it as, undoubtedly, had everyone else at the table, but the rules required him to state his case.

Marden rose and settled his robes around his shoulders. He raised an upturned hand in an orator’s pose. “We are now pressed to make a decision that we have refused to make. Do we humbly submit to the Imperium and resume our place as a unit of an enormous and faceless entity—”

“Hardly faceless,” said Twelve, gently. “Shojan is the scion of the house that gave us birth, that urged us forward into civilization, who fostered the hope that we would conquer the reaches of space and go ever onward . . .”

“Oh, stow your longwindedness!” snarled Fourteen, slamming her hand down and flattening the spent nic-tubes in front of her. “Very well, I’ll be the one to halt this cascade of unnecessary verbiage. I propose a preliminary vote, First Councillor. Are we of the Castaway Cluster part of the Imperium, or are we an independent entity?”

“Councillors?” asked DeKarn. “Will anyone second?”

“I will second,” said Five.

“The matter is proposed and seconded,” DeKarn said, dreading what she was about to say, but protocol was protocol. She took a deep breath. “Everyone will be limited to forty minutes of opening statements, followed by question and answer from the full council. Following that will be the preliminary vote. Debate is open.”

Not waiting to be called on, everyone broke into their own tirade. All of them shouted to be heard over all the others.

“No, no!”

Marden stood up and began to wave his arms. Behind him, colors of distress filled his screens and sirens wailed. When the others stopped talking and put their hands over their ears, he bellowed at them. “We don’t have time for this! Vote now! Then we’ll debate the outcome.”

“No! That’s not the way things are done!” said Bruke, severely.

“I agree with Councillor Marden,” DeKarn said, breaking protocol herself. “We do have very little time. We can’t hold off the ambassador, so we will have to decide before she gets here.”

“Why can’t we?” asked Sixteen. “It is not uncommon in legal matters to prevent a witness from hearing the testimony of others.”

“Because she is a diplomat. All of our deliberations ought to have been accomplished before this. I quite agree with Councillor Fifteen.” Marden gave her a grudging nod. “If the question is asked, we owe an answer.”

“We can easily send her away without an answer,” said Fourteen, angrily. “
We’ve
been without answers long enough. Let them see what it tastes like, for a change.”

“And what will that accomplish?” Eland asked. “They deserve our candor. It is not unreasonable that in two centuries we would have made up our mind what we are. Our ancestors were beings of decisive action. They reached out from a small, isolated planet and founded great empires! If they had become bogged down like this, there would never have been science enough to lift them out of atmosphere, let alone the will to make it happen. But I would go back to the discussion we were having before the arrival of our friends from Yolk. In advance of the arrival of the representative from the Core Worlds, let us choose someone who will speak with the force of all of us behind that one being.”

Thank goodness! DeKarn almost smiled. Someone else had said it without having to be prompted.

“No,” Marden said firmly. “We need to decide what it is we will say before we choose a spokesbeing. The debate was opened on the subject. We have two choices before us. Let us choose one. Will we decide once and for all that we are a part of the Imperium, or are we independent?”

“A-ha!” said Pinckney, light blossoming around him as the screens erupted with starbursts. “Then there is a third choice that needs to be added to that item of the emergency agenda. That is our friend Sgarthad. He represents the Trade Union. It has sent him to ask the Castaway Cluster to join their vast and prosperous confederation. The Board of Directors have offered us open trade routes, decrease or surcease of tariffs for export of our goods, and protective services, including a patrol fleet between us and potential enemies. It’s a fantastic deal, one that we ought to take advantage of.”

“Bah!” Seventeen said, brushing off the desk with a sweep of his hand. He lowered his thin brows over his bony nose. “To trade historical ties for those greedy hucksters? Not while I breathe.”

“How could you fall for such a sales pitch?” asked Tross. “When have they ever offered something for nothing?”

“We have plenty to offer them,” Quelph said, her brown eyes meeting the Thirteenth Councillor’s bulging blue ones with sincere conviction. “Our crafts are more than worth their interest.”

“Handiworks! They have plenty of factories. All they need is one example of each item, and, in about a week, you’re shut out of the market. So, what will we offer them next month?”

The Wichu representative wrinkled her nose. “Not just exports. They want to know more about our culture. He says knowledge of others helps improve their own lifestyle. Gotta like that.”

“Very tactful,” Five said, with a glance toward DeKarn. The First Councillor kept a noncommittal expression on her face.

“Very well, I believe that the contingent from Yolk has a valid amendment to the subject that is already upon the table,” she said. “Those in favor of discussing the three possibilities of adhering to the Trade Union or the Imperium or remaining independent, signify now.”

In fairness, she had to illuminate her own voting light. The Yolkovians immediately joined her. Other lights went on more slowly, but in greater numbers than she thought would arise. She had to put the increase down to the solemn regard of the eyes looking at them from the screens at the narrow end of the oval table.

Impulsively, she thought she might vote against allowing the measure just because
he
seemed to be asking for it, and she permitted no one to coerce her, not even with charm. Still, when she weighed the matter in her own scales of right and wrong, whether or not that handsome face was present she knew she would choose the same option.

“Opposed?” Naturally, Zembke, Tross, Marden and Ten voted no. She passed her hand over the recording light.

“The matter is carried.

“In the matter of independence versus the Imperium versus the Trade Union, the vote will commence. I will abstain from this first vote. You may also abstain, but only this time. We must know where we stand.” DeKarn thought it was unlikely that any of them would.

“Independence?” Zembke’s hand flew to his controls, and his voting light went on, nearly obscured by the image of the Cluster that exploded on his screen. Others followed, including, to DeKarn’s surprise, two of the Cocomons. “Thirteen.

“For the Imperium.” The entire party from Dree voted as a bloc. The rest of the Cocomons added their numbers. “Also thirteen.

“For the Trade Union.” Before she had finished speaking, Yolk’s lights bloomed, as did the remaining members. No absentions. “Also thirteen. No clear majority. Very well. Who will speak first on this matter? Remember, you have only forty minutes apiece.”

“More than enough time,” Zembke said, rising. “My dear friends, you are forgetting matters of the last two hundred years!” Many of those at the table groaned. They certainly hadn’t forgotten the multitude of speeches he had made over the last thirty years on the topic. “We stand alone as we have stood for centuries! Let us make that decision so it is in place before the arrival of the Imperium’s envoy . . .”

A faint chime sounded. Dob Rengin looked up from his screen, and passed his hand swiftly to the right. The icon “landed” in DeKarn’s viewscreen and skidded to the halt in the center.

“I am afraid there won’t be time to make the decision final, unless we vote finally right now,” she said. “The ambassador is here.”

She passed a fingertip over the newly arrived file.

Hiranna Ben had the pleasantly harried look of a campus counselor. The eyes, a pale hazel with thin but sharp lines at the corners and underneath, looked both compassionate and shrewd. Generous lips had acquired confining brackets from which they dared not escape. Her warm complexion was set off by very short silver hair gelled to a peak. This was a woman, DeKarn thought sympathetically, who was too nice for her job and had had to learn to behave otherwise lest she, to make use of an ancient phrase, give away the store.

“Gentlebeings,” came the warm, rich, lilting voice. “I give you greetings from his majesty, the Emperor Shojan XII, to his most honored subjects . . .”

“Bah!” Zembke erupted.

“Hush!” Councillor Twelve said. “Let her speak.”

“. . . pleased to say I will be among you soon. My pilot informs me that we will be over Pthohannix within twenty-five hours. I am aware that the full council is in session. I request a meeting with all of you as soon as can be arranged. I have brought many delicacies from the Core Worlds, and I invite each of you and your significant others to a feast at the,” Ambassador Ben glanced down, as if consulting notes, “the Boske Ruritania, to get to know you.” She raised her eyes to meet the video pickup. “I await your convenience, and remain your humble servant . . .”

“Bah!”

“Hush!”

“. . . Hiranna Ben.”

The light dimmed and the face disappeared. DeKarn sat back and saw the dismay in her own soul reflected in the faces of the rest of the council.

“Well, my colleagues, the moment is upon us. Shall I call for another vote?”

Chapter 5

Being a man of abnormal optimism, I did not allow myself to remain in the doldrums because of unappetizing rations. After all, I had survived many an Imperial banquet, where, I recall, I might have been far happier with a survival bar than the exotic viands that chefs had made to tempt the taste buds of the noble guests. I remembered the wedding feast of my cousin Olthiorus Kinago and his lovely bride, Demarca, who though human hailed from a formerly Gecko system on the edge of the Autocracy. As the main course, we had been served large, black-shelled insects, boiled and adorned with a sprig of herb as if the creature was clutching its own last meal when it died. The flavor of this sad arthropod was no better than its appearance. None of the subsequent celebratory meals was any more appetizing. I had made it through that week of festivities. At least for this ordeal I did not have to wear formal attire, smile constantly or dance with any of my aunts. I merely had to erase, report and try not to chuckle out loud.

As my fair guide had said, I found numerous repetitions of the stories that had so tickled my funny bone on my first shift, and many more in the same vein. I found myself rehearsing under my breath how I would tell such stories when I returned to an audience who was unfamiliar with them. I pride myself that I can tell a joke well. It’s an innate behavior, not really a learned one, and I had enlivened many a party by my store of humorous material.