WARP world (53 page)

“The CWA has raised tithes consistently as a political ploy,” Maryel said.

“There is some element of truth to that,” Jarin said, “but there is independent corroborating data. Storm intensity has increased by nearly forty percent over the past two centuries.” He looked at his colleagues, “One hundred and fifty years ago, this city was unshielded. Unshielded! When was the last time any of you saw our natural sky?”

There was a heavy silence.

“The fact is that the increase in demand is going to continue,” Shyl said. “By my calculations, within the next ten years our current mode of operation will be unsustainable. Single targets and conservative strikes can no longer be our policy. Young Eraranat is showing us the future here. What the future will have to be, if we wish to sustain our survival.”

Ansin looked at her across the table, “And if the hunger continues to grow? If you’re right—” he took up a stylus and tapped furiously on his digipad. “The increase has been more geometric than linear, which is the current prevailing assumption.”

Let them say it.
Jarin watched as Ansin ran the numbers.

Maryel watched his calculations, then looked up, “The CWA has been underfeeding the warps. They know it and they have been keeping it to themselves.”

Another, more profound, silence descended upon the room. Even Shyl looked disturbed at the notion, so obvious once brought forth.

Ansin sat back in his chair, stared at his hasty calculations, then ran a hand across the smooth patch of skin on the top of his head. “Are they attempting to avoid public panic?”

Jarin shrugged. “Their security is on par with ours, and we have no reasonable level of penetration in the departments that account for quotas and feeding of the Storm. I make no effort to guess at their motivation without further data. What little I’ve been able to gather—some data on the increase in Storm force—cost us dearly in terms of what few assets we do have there.”

“Regardless of motivation, the fact is that even at the current rate of tithe-growth,” Shyl said, “our mode of operation will fail shortly. And if you are correct,” she gestured to Jarin and Ansin, “then the situation is worse than I knew. As such, what Theorist Eraranat is doing will,
must
, at some point become the norm. His model must become orthodox.”

Ansin glanced over at her, then at Jarin. “How long until the Storm consumes us altogether? Can it have a peak hunger? A satiation point?”

“Perhaps the CWA knows. Perhaps not. Perhaps there is no way to know. Perhaps the Storm will grow and consume all reality,” Jarin answered.

“Jarin,” Ansin said, as he straightened in his seat, “you represent our educational facilties, and other resources. Knowing you,” he tipped his head respectfully, “you’re gearing your instruction with this in mind. Shyl, have you likewise been directing the Acquired Technology and Research division toward this end?”

“Yes and no,” Shyl said. “I had been following these numbers, but I see now that we must not rely on the CWA as the sole authority on the nature and hunger of the Storm. I, apparently, reached my conclusion much more recently than Jarin.”

Ansin tapped the pad. “Protocol must be altered. My area. Maryel, you can intervene on Eraranat’s behalf during the Question, and see to shifting of the Field Operations and Review sector.”

“No,” Jarin said. Ansin looked back at him, surprised. He continued, “Segkel must face a truly intensive Question. His methods must be critically examined. He has done more than field a multi-strike, he has taken risks that may well have compromised the mission, or could have compromised the mission in the hands of someone less talented. Radicalism must be tempered. I have advocated on his behalf here and in the Council precisely because it will take a strong-willed, competent individual to be our standard bearer in this process, but we cannot give him a free pass to do whatever he wants. Please,” he looked at Maryel, “by all means, challenge him. He will either prove worthy or not.”

“You think he will,” Maryel said.

Jarin favored her with a slight smile, “I think he will. He will also rage against all of us.”

“The anger of a cub Theorist is something I think I can bear,” Maryel answered. “I agree. We seem to have a consensus here.”

She looked around the room, each head nodded in turn.

Jarin paused in the darkened hallway of the intrans facility. The setting was ridiculously atmospheric, in his opinion—darkened chambers, stone walls and deep shadows—but such places did make for good covert rendezvous. He leaned against the wall and waited. Shortly thereafter, the feminine figure approached. She held out her hands, and he took them in his.

“Shyl surprised you,” Maryel said.

“Yes, somewhat. I thought that I was the only one who had this knowledge and carried it for so long,” he admitted. “I did not know which way she would go. She has been advocating on my behalf enough lately that I quite expected another one of her reversals into a new position.”

“Nevertheless, we have the consensus you wanted when you formed the group.”

“Yes. We’ve achieved the first stage,” he said.

“I have no duties tonight,” Maryel said, a blatant and bold change of subject.

“Unfortunately, I have several. I will be reviewing Segkel’s data. I was just notified that he has turned in his final assessment. Verification will be laborious, though at least I know he will have demonstrated all his calculations and attached exhaustingly copious notes and condescending asides. Also, there is the matter of his women.”

“His
caj
,” she teased. “You soft-hearted old fool.”

He lifted his chin, “Soft-hearted is not an accusation I get often. Ever, actually.”

“Other than from me,” Maryel said. “I’ll not wait, then.”

They squeezed hands once, then went their separate ways.

Seg reviewed the digifilm once more and, with a frustrated growl, threw it across the planning room. The conservatism of the House and their military apparatus galled him. They were going to lose seventeen percent of their potential take with their current structure. He stared at the plan outline and what was left–a wide-range medley of targets, projected takes, force packages. He tapped a button on the table, which brought up the global projection. Glowing amber lights represented targets. Green icons representing various force commitments by type were shown at their projected locations. Special carats indicated his own chosen targets, the ones he had given over to the support of the Kenda uprising. It was merely a quirk of psychological projection, but he felt there was some special question, some insult in that differentiation.

I’m treading more dangerously here than I did there.

It had seemed so right to make the deal with Brin in the heat of the moment but now he considered abandoning the extra strikes altogether. The risk was incredible and if the mission was at all compromised the Question and subsequent punishment would be brutal. They would make an example of him for the next ten generations. Perhaps they would keep him in a cage, hooked to an amp to shock him, and put him out for the students to pelt with rotten food.

I gave Ama my word.

If he backed out now, the Question would come around to his instability and unreliability.

No, he had committed and, long-term, it was a worthy gamble.

His stomach churned as he typed out his final version of the force commitment.

I will be there. I will make this work.

T
he members of the bloc studied Seg’s assessment in silence, each typing notes here and there next to the text on their digipads. At one point, Ansin emitted a low whistle, which caused everyone to look up.

“The young man is even more ambitious than we thought,” he answered, before he scrolled through the pages of the assessment once more.

Shyl was the last to finish; she laid her digipad down but continued to stare at it.

“Well then,” Maryel said.

“Yes,” Ansin said.

“And this is what is going to become the norm?” Shyl said. “This?”

Maryel looked over at her. “This is what you and Jarin argued will have to become the norm. Now is hardly the time to balk. We’re going to have to present this to the Guild Council with a straight face.”

“I like it,” Ansin said, which caused all heads to turn again. “I wish—” he glanced up at the ceiling. “I wish I’d had the courage to call a raid like this on a few targets that I’d surveyed.”

“I believe that before long we will all have that particular regret,” Jarin said.

“I hope so,” said Shyl, “because that means your pupil will have achieved unprecedented success.”

Ansin stood before the 23 assembled Guild Council members, his hands folded together. He could be quite the master of oratory, and Jarin waited with a calm demeanor that masked his nerves.

In the assembly room for the Guild Council, the only decoration of any note came in the form of the artifacts that adorned the walls. Jarin’s eyes fell on a shield–bronze, an image of two moons stamped into the metal. The piece was not as worthy of notice as many of the others in the room but Jarin knew it intimately, down to the singed hole at the top right. His first extrans. He had been proud the day he surrendered his souvenir to grace the Council walls but now, looking at it, he saw the face of the man who had held it and was swept over with shame. When he was young, it was easy to write off the death and enslavement of so many souls as a necessary sacrifice. The man who had held that shield had died so that the People could prosper and thrive.

His other regrets about that first extrans he forced from his mind.

He moved his eyes from the shield to the grey walls, to the grey tables, to the greying Council members whose faces reminded him of corpses.
We do not prosper, we are not thriving.

He needed Segkel to succeed, not only for the good of his People, but also to soothe his conscience, to make him believe the man, the ‘Outer’, with the shield had not fallen for nothing.

His decision to bring Shyl and Ansin into what had previously been his and Maryel’s concern had been a gamble. Ansin was crucial to the next phase, because he more than any other could sway the conservative elements of the Guild (the predominate elements, naturally) toward his course.