A change of tactics, p.32
A Change of Tactics, page 32
Den doubted that the Regional Controller’s Diplomatic Office had anyone who could deal with Clear Springs’ problems as well as he had. In fact, the training given to inter-territorial troubleshooting specialists might well be more hindrance than help. There was a world of difference between politicians, who were accustomed to dealing with facts, and groups of fanatics who already knew all the “facts” they cared to learn. The only way to combat an out-Territory style political movement was with an even more effective counter-movement.
The more Den thought about it, the more convinced he became that the only real solution was for him to stay in Clear Springs and see the matter through. He would miss the conviviality of in-Territory life—the Sudworks Brewery was no substitute for a certain shiltpron parlor not far from the Valzor Sime Center complex—but the lack of civilization in Clear Springs was easier to bear than knowing that his hard work might be destroyed. Mentally, the Donor began to compose a letter to Monruss, requesting an extension of his temporary assignment to Clear Springs.
Considering how hard it is to find people willing and able to work out-Territory, Den thought ironically, this is one permanent assignment that I might actually get!
In fact, things were going so well in Clear Springs that neither Den nor Rital thought to consider how the fall’s events would look to those unfamiliar with the out-Territory city’s recent political history. It was thus an unpleasant surprise when Gati handed Rital an official communication from Monruss, just as they were preparing to set out for the Center for Technology to recharge the batteries.
“If they’re redoing the transfer assignments again, tell them I quit,” Den said, not quite facetiously, as he opened up the channel’s retainers.
Rital skimmed the message, then gave Dan an appalled look, all eight handling tentacles extended in shock. “We’re summoned to Valzor for an official investigation into ‘certain recent events,’” he said numbly. “Now that there’s a treaty with Cordona, the Regional Controller’s Diplomatic Office has finally found time to deal with problems on this continent. They reviewed the reports that Controller Monruss sent with his application for a diplomatic specialist for Clear Springs and they didn’t like what they saw. They’re blaming us for everything Sinth’s done since the Sime Center opened!”
Den snatched the page from the channel’s fingers and scanned it rapidly. “‘…ordered to return to the District offices in Valzor by one week from today…answer to certain charges…why you have been unable to win the trust of out-Territory Gens in your area…before a panel of impartial investigators from the Regional Controller’s Diplomatic Office…possible disciplinary action…’”
He looked up at his cousin, equally horrified.
“Oh, shen!” they swore in unison.
* * * *
Two days before the channel and Donor were scheduled to return to Valzor to face the judgement of the professional diplomats, two unexpected visitors were shown into Den’s office: Rob Lifton and his mother, Carla.
“We want to travel to Valzor,” Carla announced as she seated herself on one of the visitor’s chairs.
“Why?” Den asked. Although Carla hadn’t demonstrated against the Sime Center for almost nine months, she openly sympathized with Reverend Sinth and his goals. She had studiously avoided having anything to do with the Sime Center and its staff, not an easy task when her daughter was an enthusiastic member of OLD SOKS.
“Our friends and neighbors are in jail,” Carla said, a little indignantly. “Is it so strange that we should want to visit them?”
“Actually, yes.” Den rearranged some of the papers on his desk. “It’s been over a week since they were arrested and you’re the first people to inquire about a visit.”
“I know,” Carla said, “but Rob wants to see Bethany, and I…” She swallowed. “I got a letter from Florence Grieves yesterday. She sounded very depressed. She wrote that hardly any of the other inmates speak English and those who do aren’t friendly, not even the Gens. Florence saved my sanity after my husband died. How can I desert her now?”
Den sighed. “Well, if you really want to go, you’ll have to make an official request. I’ll ask our receptionist, Seena ambrov Carre, to help you fill out the forms. Then you’ll have to wait for an Escort.”
“A what?” Rob asked.
“An Escort is a channel or Donor who can keep you from provoking nearby Simes and translate for you. All out-Territory Gens traveling in Tecton-governed territories are required to be Escorted. It prevents accidents.”
“How long would it take to get one of these Escorts?” Carla asked.
“Rital and I will be travelling to Valzor in two days. If you get the paperwork done by then, you can come with us. Otherwise, it could take a while.”
“We’ll go in two days, then.” She nodded in satisfaction, reaching for her purse. “My boss won’t be happy about such short notice, but Florence is more important than the spring inventory.”
“Fine. Sometime before you go, you should both come in and donate selyn.”
Carla, who had started to stand, blanched and dropped back into her chair. “Is that really necessary?” she asked.
“I’m afraid it is,” Den said apologetically. “It’s not precisely illegal for non-donors to travel in-Territory, but few hotels, restaurants, or taxi drivers will accept their business and the exceptions are usually limited to organized tour groups. Besides, do you really want to wander around a city full of renSimes when you’re high field?”
Carla slumped in defeat. “All right, then. If I have to, I will.”
Rob gave her hand a reassuring squeeze. “It’s not that bad, Mother. Really.”
“If you say so.” She shuddered. “But please…”
Her voice trailed off and Den lifted a politely inquisitive eyebrow.
“Could it be Hajene Madz?” she asked in a small voice. “I don’t know if I could let a strange Sime do…that…to me, but Hajene Madz is different.”
“Unable to win the trust of out-Territory Gens,, indeed! Den thought gleefully. Wait until the Regional Controller’s office hears about this.
“I think that can be arranged,” he assured Carla.
* * * *
Of the four travelers headed for Valzor on the night train, only Rob was excited about the trip. He kept asking Rital questions about life in-Territory, which the channel answered in monosyllables, too worried about the upcoming inquisition to carry on a conversation. Den was completely occupied with minimizing the inevitable damage that eight hours on a moving train while in Need and wearing retainers was doing to his cousin. Carla, too, was subdued. She had managed to donate to Rital the day before, but neither had enjoyed it.
They arrived in Valzor early in the morning and found a restaurant near the train station, where the Gens ordered breakfast. Afterward, they took a taxi to the hotel where the two out-Territory Gens would be staying. There was a message for Den waiting at the desk, informing him that Terressa Bowlers, the Third Order channel who was supposed to take over as the Liftons’ assigned Escort, had been caught up in an emergency and asking the Donor to fill in until she could get free. So, while Carla and Rob installed their luggage in their room, Rital headed for the Valzor Sime Center complex to get more information about the progress of the Regional Diplomatic Office’s investigation. When the two out-Territory Gens were ready, Den Escorted them to the jail where the twenty-seven demonstrators were imprisoned.
The district prison was in the oldest section of the city: a squat, heavily fortified stone building that had once housed captured out-Territory Gens waiting to be auctioned off. Den arranged with the prison warden for Rob and Carla to see Bethany and Florence Grieves. When they were settled in the bare, depressing interview room, Den headed for the infirmary, hoping to find a mug of trin tea and more congenial company than the guards would provide.
Hajene Rassam, the Second Order channel in charge of the prison’s small infirmary, was a middle-aged woman with hair grey as iron and a temperament just as yielding. She was obviously unhappy with her less-than-prestigious assignment and inclined to take it out on anyone nearby.
“Those lorshes!” she exclaimed, when Den confessed what had brought him to the jail. “Why anyone would want to visit them is beyond my comprehension. They’ve been nothing but trouble from the moment they arrived.” She busied herself getting the Donor some tea. “I’m supposed to zlin incoming prisoners for contagious diseases. You would have thought I was a Freeband Raider going for a Kill, from the fuss those idiots put up.”
Den shrugged, accepting his tea and sipping cautiously at the hot liquid. “Well, where they come from, berserkers are a lot more common than channels and their religion prohibits them from having contact with Simes.”
“They’re lorshes,” she insisted. “Won’t donate, haven’t the faintest idea how to behave themselves…” She snorted in open contempt. “We had to put six of them into isolation cells. The other Gen prisoners were getting a little tired of being preached at and threatened to shut the idiots up permanently. I can’t blame them. I had the leader, Reverend What’s-his-name, in here for a few days—melic withdrawal—and my Donor was about ready to strangle him. The things he was saying…and that’s when he wasn’t hallucinating.”
“Have there been any injuries?” Den asked worriedly. The out-Territory press might have been willing to accept the arrests without too much comment, but physical abuse of helpless prisoners in a foreign jail was a terrific story to boost newspaper sales.
Rassam shook her head. “Some of them got shoved around a bit, that’s all. They refused to let me look at them, so they can’t have been hurt too badly.”
Remembering how Sinth had refused treatment for a life-threatening transfer burn, Den wasn’t convinced of this, but he didn’t think it was worth arguing.
When he returned to the interview room, he found Rob and Carla looking content, if not happy.
“Did you have a good visit?” the Donor asked.
Carla nodded. “We prayed together and talked about what the Scriptures truly mean. They don’t specifically forbid donating selyn, you know.”
“I’m not surprised,” Den said. “They were written shortly after the downfall of Ancient civilization, weren’t they? That was centuries before there were any functioning channels that a Gen could donate selyn to.”
“God knew about channels,” Carla insisted. “And His written words will tell us His wishes, if we have the wisdom to understand them properly.”
Den had a hard time understanding how a book could be considered authoritative on subjects that didn’t exist when it was written, but there didn’t seem much point to arguing religion with a True Believer. When Carla stopped off at the bathroom, he asked Rob how his talk with Bethany had gone.
“She’s mad at me for telling you folks about the demonstration,” he confessed, “but when I told her what you and Hajene Madz did for me and Annie last summer, she said she understood.”
“Then she forgave you for spying?”
“Well, mostly,” Rob said hopefully. “She’s not as convinced all Simes are demons as she used to be. In fact, she wouldn’t have been at the demonstration at all, if her uncle hadn’t made her. This past week, she’s been talking to some of the Gens who live here in Sime Territory. It hadn’t really dawned on her that there are people whose friends’ and relatives’ lives depend on the selyn those Gens in Clear Springs donate. She thought it all went for trains, cars, and cheap lights.”
“But she understands now?” Den asked tiredly, wishing Bethany’s change of mind had happened before she was arrested.
Rob shrugged. “She hasn’t quite decided what to do about it. Her uncle still insists that all contact with Simes is sinful, or at least he did before they locked him in an isolation cell.”
Somehow, Den wasn’t surprised that Sinth was one of the six out-Territory prisoners who had been put in isolation.
On their way back to the hotel, Rob and Carla began to argue over the interpretation of key passages of either their Scriptures or some theologian’s commentary on them, the Donor wasn’t sure which and didn’t really care. He had read excerpts from the Church of the Purity’s Scriptures in his class on out-Territory culture during Donor training and found them full of hatred and violence, even downright obscene.
Den listened as the two out-Territory Gens came up with two very different meanings for one sentence, neither of which made the least sense. As far as he could tell, there were only two rules to the game: the phrases had to be contained within the Conservative Congregation’s version of Scriptures and despite obvious discrepancies, nothing in the scriptures could be called a mistake. Even if two sections flatly contradicted each other, they both had to be considered correct.
The current discussion hinged on a reference to “slimy” tentacles and the religious obligation for the pious to avoid them. Both Gens, of course, knew from personal experience that Sime tentacles were not slimy.
While Den appreciated the lessons spiritual philosophers could teach as much as anyone, the modern world knew a great deal more about Simes than the Gen religious leaders who had compiled their Scriptures shortly after Ancient civilization collapsed. Looking at the clear meaning of the passage, Den concluded that the church elder who wrote it had made it up as he went along.
Instead, Carla was insisting that Sime tentacles must have “spiritual” slime, whatever that was supposed to mean, while Rob claimed that the passage in question referred only to new Simes, whose tentacles were covered with the blood and other fluids of breakout, and not to adult channels. Deciding that the two Gens could solve this weighty issue without his help, Den introduced them to the substitute Escort who was waiting for them back at the hotel. Then, he went to the Valzor Sime Center in search of his cousin, eager to share the most amusing aspects of the discussion.
Rital pounced as soon as he entered the main administrative building. “Monruss wants to talk to us,” he said.
“When?” the Donor asked.
“Now,” the channel said, turning to lead the way.
All thoughts of out-Territory theology fled.
CHAPTER 20
A Change of Tactics
“What the bloody shen have you two been doing out there in Clear Springs?” Monruss scolded, looking like an indignant pigeon ruffling its feathers. “Den, I told you to find a way to stop the demonstrations against the Sime Center and six months later, you have a blockade instead. Not a great improvement.”
Den squirmed uncomfortably, but before he could open his mouth to explain, Monruss had rounded on Rital.
“And you, Rital. Even if your cousin there didn’t understand the consequences, you’ve worked with out-Territory Gens long enough to know better. Don’t you two ever speak to each other?”
Rital also tried and failed to get in a word of explanation.
“Now I have the jail warden complaining about being stuck with twenty-seven Gens who won’t donate and who spend their time trying to convert the other inmates to their lunatic religion,” the Controller’s rant continued. “The newspapers are printing lurid tales of a reporter being held at gunpoint to prevent her from getting help for a child in changeover and the Regional Controller’s office is on my neck, wanting to know why I haven’t pulled you out of Clear Springs for incompetence and offering to do it for me.” He glared at them, daring them to speak.
Both prudently remained silent.
“I’ve done what I can for you,” the District Controller continued somewhat more calmly after a moment of silence. “The investigating team is reading your reports today, so they probably won’t want to talk to you until tomorrow. That will let you have transfer first, at least. Now get out of here and let me get some work done.”
* * * *
When they reached the privacy of the deferment suite, Rital turned lost eyes on Den. “If they pull us out of Clear Springs, neither of us is likely to get out-Territory again!” he said, stunned by the enormity of the penalty. “Den, what have we done?”
“We did what we had to,” the Donor insisted as he guided his cousin over to the transfer lounge and mentally berated whichever lorsh from the Regional Controller’s office was responsible for dragging them back to Valzor for this inquisition just before their transfer. “And it worked! We’re finally rid of the demonstrations and the Sime Center is now shipping pallets of filled selyn batteries back to Valzor. Whatever the diplomats decide, they can’t take that away from us.”
“It’s all right for you,” Rital said, just a little scornfully. “You’d rather work at an in-Territory Sime Center anyway and no Controller is going to mind one blemish on the otherwise excellent record of a First Order Donor.”
Den shook his head thoughtfully. “Six months ago, I would have agreed with you. But I’ve discovered that I have a talent for out-Territory politics, just like you have a talent for dealing with individual out-Territory Gens. I want to keep using that skill and I don’t want to see my work in Clear Springs messed up by someone who doesn’t understand the situation.”
“And you think you do understand it?” Rital asked skeptically.
“Not as well as I’d like, but I do know one thing.” Den let himself feel his cousin’s Need and felt that Need begin to grow in response. “Reverend Sinth and his followers aren’t out there screaming every day because they’re afraid you might hurt someone. They hate you because they know you won’t. Your existence makes them question the fundamental assumptions that their religion makes about the universe and their place in it. That’s more threatening than any number of berserkers.”
