The ethos effect, p.26
The Ethos Effect, page 26
“A pleasure to meet you, Commander.” The silver-haired woman spoke with great warmth.
“And you.” Van bowed slightly. “I’ve heard only good of you.”
“He’s as charming as you are, Trystin.”
“I fear not, Director,” Van replied. “I’ve much to learn from the commander.”
“He’s wise, too.” She nodded, then turned to Desoll. “You wanted...?”
“I’d like to transfer...” Desoll seemed to make a mental calculation, “four hundred twenty thousand Ks from the IIS operations account to a personal account for Commander Albert. He’ll also need it tied to his draw card.” Desoll handed over an ordinary-looking datacard. “The same normal limits as mine.”
“Your standard limit? Ten thousand per draw?” asked Mubarca.
“That’s right, and also a transfer link from his personal account in Cambrian Holdings.” Desoll nodded. “And a beneficiary arrangement. He’ll give you those details.” Desoll smiled, then stepped back. “I’ll be outside.”
Mubarca smiled, her eyes on the commander as he stepped away. “He is one in millions. You will see.” Her gray eyes fixed on Van as though he were the only one in the Galaxy, and Van understood immediately Desoll’s attraction to the woman. “Your beneficiary?”
“Can I name joint beneficiaries? I’d like to name my brother and sister.”
“We can certainly do that...”
As she linked the data into the Trust’s systems, Van had a feeling similar to the one that had come over him when he’d first received the orders for the Fergus to relieve the Collyns off Scandya. He was jumping blind into a future that was more uncertain than anything he’d ever faced.
Chapter 43
After they finished at Nabatan Trust, Desoll guided Van to a nearby restaurant, where Van ate dishes that he’d never tasted, much less seen, but which would have delighted Dad Almaviva.
Near the end of the meal, the older man looked at Van. “I’ve got a few items to follow up on. You might as well look around, and I’ll meet you at the shuttle terminal at sixteen hundred.”
Once Desoll was on his way, Van used a pubcomm to call the Republic embassy and ask for directions. It took two different guideways to get to the embassy, a truncated pyramid of a pale greenish white stone that still seemed blinding in the early afternoon sun.
He stepped through the shaded outer archway, then through a nanite-based climate barrier into the cooler air of the public area. There, he found a vacant console, where he put through a call to the third secretary.
An image appeared against the wall behind the console, and Van couldn’t tell if it were Emily or a simmie. “Ah ... this is Van Albert...”
“Commander?” The surprised expression clearly indicated that the respondent was Emily, and not a simmie. “Where are you?”
“Down in the public area of the embassy. I just got here, and I was hoping you might have a few minutes.”
“I’ll make them. I’ll be right down.” The image vanished.
Van walked away from the console and toward the archway his implant indicated security devices, then stopped to wait.
He’d been standing there for several minutes when a Taran Republic Marine appeared. “That area’s off-limits, fellow.” The tone was polite, but clearly unwelcoming.
Van turned and forced a smile. “I know.” He produced the card with his commodore’s ED. “And it’s commodore to you, Corporal. I’m waiting for the third secretary.”
“Ser, I don’t care...”
“Corporal!”
Van was actually pleased to see Emily’s look of disapproval, and he was certainly not the only one to recognize its force, because the Marine stepped back.
“Commodore Van is one of the most decorated officers in the RSF,” Emily went on. “He was also the military attaché at the Scandyan embassy who saved the prime minister there.”
Emily was wearing a slightly mussed tan singlesuit that tended to wash her out, along with a darker brown jacket, but to Van she looked marvelous, even with her stem expression.
The corporal took another step back. “Yes, ser.” He nodded to Van. “I’m most sorry, ser.”
“You were doing your duty,” Van said politely, although he could tell that the Marine didn’t seem all that sorry. “Carry on.” He turned his back on the corporal and faced Emily. “I won’t be in Kurti long, but I’d hoped I could catch you.”
Emily brushed back a strand of disarrayed hair, then smiled. “We’re in the middle of various projects, but... I can ... I mean, I’m so glad you could...”
“So am I. I won’t take much of your time, because I have to catch a shuttle a bit after sixteen hundred.”
“My office would be best.” She gestured toward the archway.
Van followed her, noting, as he passed through the security scanning, how simple the protocols seemed with his new implant. As in Valborg, the senior staff offices were on the second level, up a long ramp that doubled back on itself once.
Emily closed the door to her small office—again a single room—and sat down in one of the two chairs opposite the console. “I can’t believe you’re here, Commander, I mean, Commodore.”
Van took the other chair. “Just Van. The rank doesn’t mean much when you’re retired.”
“For a moment downstairs, I almost didn’t recognize you without the uniform.”
Van grinned. “I do fit in around here a bit more.”
Emily flushed. “I didn’t mean that.”
Van could sense she hadn’t, and wondered why he was so sensitive. Had it been the Marine? Then, he had been sensitive all his life. He just hadn’t dared to make any comments. “I’m sorry. I know you didn’t.”
“How did you ever get to Kush, Commodore? Or should I ask?”
“Van,” he reminded her again. “And you can ask. I’ll even answer. I’m now in training to be a command pilot for an Eco-Tech outfit...” As briefly as he could, and omitting the actions on Sulyn to murder him, he summarized his hiring by IIS.
“You must be going to do more than pilot a ship from point to point. I can’t imagine you being happy doing that, and you don’t look miserable.”
Van offered an exaggerated expression of misery. “Is that better?”
“You look like you’re in pain, not misery.”
Van laughed, and then they both did. “I’m supposed to be handling a bunch of other duties as well, but the training for that will be in Perdya, I understand.” He paused, not sure of what else to say, before asking, “How are things going here?”
“As well as at any embassy, and better than at some. The ambassador’s good, and so is the first secretary. The second secretary’s more like a male version of Cordelia, but not quite as sharp...”
“There aren’t many that sharp,” Van said, before adding quickly, “She’s so sharp that I came out of meetings looking for wounds.”
Emily smiled, but Van could sense the tiredness behind her smile.
“You’ve had a hard week, I take it?” he asked.
“Enough to wish I didn’t have six years for minimum immediate retirement. Yes. There’s a dissident group here ... refugees from Sulyn...” Emily looked down. “I mean...”
“You don’t have to soften it. Sulyn’s always been independent-minded.”
“They’re claiming that the Republic has been forcing certain black Taran businesses to sell to larger multis, using regulatory policies ... as inducements...”
“I wouldn’t be surprised,” Van said. “On and off, that’s been a problem for years on Sulyn. I’d thought that it had gotten better—until I was retired, and one of the mediacasters I grew up with suggested that things had recently taken a turn back.” After a moment, he asked, “You’re being asked to deny it? Come up with statistics and reports, and it’s getting hard to do?”
Emily nodded. “There are all sorts of statements, but Alaster—he’s the second secretary—can’t find any real numbers that support them, and we’re getting hit with charges that claim we can’t. The numbers we’re getting from New Oisin don’t track with the older series, and that’s giving us both headaches.”
Van nodded. “That makes it tough.”
“And I’m supposed to have the text of another release ready by four o’clock for the ambassador to review this evening.”
“Maybe I’d better go... I wouldn’t want to have you thinking of me as the reason something didn’t get done.” Van didn’t want to leave, not since it had been so long since he’d seen her, but he also didn’t want to leave her blaming him for any trouble she might get into for missing a deadline. He just looked at her for a long minute, slightly disheveled. He was glad he’d come. He could always sightsee before he met Desoll.
“I can take a few more minutes. It’s mostly done.” She grinned. “Besides, you’re from Sulyn, and I can always say that I was getting a historical perspective.” The grin vanished. “How did it happen? Sulyn becoming part of the Republic, that is?”
“All the alternatives were worse, and the Republic made a lot of concessions in the early days. I think the politicians on Tara have regretted it ever since, and it’s been a cause of friction for generations.”
“What sort of concessions?”
“There’s an outright prohibition on media censorship. Local multi tax levels are capped, and the rates are lower, which means that there are smaller revenues per capita from Sulyn. Same-gender unions have equal legal preference and status, and that kind of discrimination is subject to stiff penalties. Independent justiciary ... Those sorts of things.”
Emily was frowning. “With that background, it’s hard to make a case for martial law.”
“Martial law?”
“The RSF sent in a domestic peacekeeping unit, but there aren’t any reports of trouble. Not yet”
“I’m glad to hear that.” Van frowned. “I don’t see why the RSF would be involved. Historically, all the protests in Sulyn have been of the peaceful, civil-disobedience type, not armed riots or that sort of thing...”
“I don’t know why the RSF is there.” A rueful smile appeared. “I do know that you just made my job harder.”
“That seems to be something I’ve been good at.” Van decided not to press for more information, since it was clear Emily had told him close to all she knew.
“Oh ... you sound like Sean.”
“Sean had something...”
From there, the conversation drifted into summaries of what had happened to the senior staffers from Scandya. Abruptly, Emily looked up.
“I can tell I’d better leave,” Van said, “or you’ll be facing the ambassador’s wrath, or that of the first secretary.”
“Can’t you ... couldn’t we have dinner?”
“I wish we could,” Van said, “but by dinnertime, we’ll be headed out-system. Like you, I’m not the one in charge.” He stood.
So did Emily, almost reluctantly, it seemed to Van.
“I’m so glad you did come.”
“So am I.” He grinned. “But you’d better get back to that release, or you won’t be.”
Emily made a gesture as if to brush off his words, even as she nodded.
When Van left the embassy, he was well aware that the same Marine was watching him closely, although the corporal made no move toward him.
Van barely made it to the shuttle terminal by sixteen hundred, but he was there five minutes before Desoll. That just gave him more time to worry about what was happening on Sulyn, but he could find nothing on the pubcomm channels, not beyond what Emily had told him.
By eighteen hundred local, they were back in the Elsin, preparing to delock from Meroe orbit station. Desoll seemed so rushed that Van didn’t bring up the matter of seeing Emily, not under the circumstances. He wished he’d had more time to talk with her.
“Normally, we’d spend more time here,” Desoll explained, “but we do have an urgent deliverable on Keshmara, and the urgent ones are what keep IIS going financially.”
“Do we know what?” probed Van from the cockpit’s second couch.
“No. I’ll tell you more once we’re clear.” You have the conn. I have the conn, ser.
Meroe orbit control, Coalition ship Elsin, ready for delocking and departure.
Wait one, Elsin. Maintenance tug at your two-twenty. Clear to break power links, but hold at lock.
Holding at lock, control. Have tug on screens. Van pulsed Eri on the shipnet. Eri, we’re going to null gee.
Thank you, ser, came back over the shipnet.
After cutting the power link to the station and dropping the ship grav to nil. Van checked the screens, and the fusactor run-up again, still half-amazed at both the ship and the control provided by his enhanced implant. No wonder no one wanted to fight the Coalition Service pilots.
Coalition ship Elsin, cleared for delocking. Incoming traffic, red zone, approximately one emkay.
Elsin clearing lock charlie two this time. Have traffic on screens. Will stay green until clear. Van used just a touch on the side steering thrusters, then another touch on the main thrusters.
Elsin, cleared for low-power departure. Stet, control. Departing this time.
As he eased the Elsin away from the orbit control station, Van checked the systemwide EDI, noting the various drive emissions. A Revenant courier was decelerating toward Meroe orbit control, while three Kushite light cruisers were patrolling beyond the comet belt, each patrol sector looking to be roughly a third of the system. There were two Coalition fast couriers, one locked on the other side of orbit control from where the Elsin had been, and the other seemingly taking station on the larger moon Omdhurman.
“Does Kush have some sort of agreement with the Coalition?” Van asked.
“Several, as I recall.”
“Including military assistance?”
“There is one like that.” The older pilot’s eyes twinkled. “Why do you ask?”
“The two Coalition couriers on station, and the fact that there only seem to be a handful of ships in the Kush defense force.”
“Warships are expensive, and Kush is not that well off. They’re still paying down the planoforming debt to the Argentis.”
“But their alliance is with the Eco-Techs?”
“They share borders with the Coalition, Keshmara, and the Revenants, as much as you can call borders those regions claimed by those systems. Each, including Kush, has claimed a number of uninhabitable systems without planets that could be planoformed.”
“I’ll bet Kush doesn’t patrol those it has claimed.”
“The Kushite SDF does not.”
Van nodded, as he spread the photon nets to twenty percent, and the Elsin began to angle up out of the plane of the ecliptic toward the low-dust regions where jumpshifts were possible.
Chapter 44
A tall man in shifting robes and a matching white turban ushered the two commanders into the fifth-floor waiting area. Van walked to the expanse of armaglass that overlooked the River Plaza through which they had entered the governmental complex. On the far side of the River Khorl was a matching plaza or park, with tall spreading trees and miniature buildings that resembled ancient temples. The river itself was a wide expanse of shimmering blue-gray in the afternoon sunlight, somehow appropriate for the city of Keshmar, planetary capital of Keshmara.
From the door to the left, there was a cough.
Van turned.
A slender man, also in white robes, but with short dark hair, and without any headgear, stood in the doorway. “The minister will see you.”
Van let Desoll take the lead as they entered the office, which held a circle of padded and backed, but armless, stools set around a low table.
Standing before the chairs and table was a small man, with the lines in his face that signified the great age that not even advanced medical treatments could erase. His smile was somehow both professional and personal. “Director Desoll... a pleasure to see you again.”
“And you, too, Minister Sahid.” Desoll bowed.
So did Van.
“I took the liberty of bringing Senior Director Van Albert with me. I thought you should meet, because at times in the future he may be the one carrying out IIS responsibilities.”
“Ah ... You are not departing?”
“Not for many, many years. Not until the white stars turn red...” Desoll smiled. “But the Arm has more people and more systems, and as it expands, so must we, or we will not be able to continue to provide the services you deserve.”
“And for which we pay.”
“You do indeed.” Desoll grinned. “But far less than if you were required to provide them yourselves.”
“Please be seated.” The minister took a stool, seemingly at random but as soon as he sat, a young man appeared with a tray.
Van could smell the café, strong, black ... and sweet.
Following the minister’s example, Van drank, throwing the tiny cup’s contents back in a single swallow.
Sahid turned to Van. “You are also a pilot and commander?”
“Yes, Minister Sahid.”
“He is a commodore,” Desoll added. “Not a mere commander as was I.”
“You were never a ‘mere commander,’ my friend.” Sahid looked straight at the older commander. “I would that we did not need your services.”
“I understand.”
“Alas, we do. We have begun to implement an integrated infrastructure control system on Behai. Most of the components have been fabricated there. The controllers themselves, they cannot be. They are not terribly delicate. In fact, they are most sturdy. But it does not matter how tough they are if they do not arrive.”
“I see.”
“I am most certain you do. The Coalition monitors the Keshmara system but not a more ... isolated system such as Behai.”
“We will undertake delivery,” Desoll affirmed. “Assuming the specifications and mass figures are as your dispatch indicated.”
