Explorer (10 page)

Several doors back, in their relatively compact living arrangement, this linear, human-designed interlock accommodated what should be roughly circular routes, by atevi habit. Atevi ingenuity did manage: the dowager’s household accessed the bone-numbing cold of a service tunnel running behind the cabins’ back walls for brief, discreet trips past the dowager’s front door, where a guest entered.

He rapped softly—a shared custom—rather than use the signal button. The door opened. Cenedi had a small, highly electronic secretary desk in the curtained-off foyer. Cenedi was often at work there, and Cenedi was on the spot at the door, right behind the dowager’s major domo. Expecting them—no miracle, given their ubiquitous communications links.

“Welcome,” Cenedi said. “Welcome, nandi.”

“Indeed, thank you, Cenedi-ji.—I shall keep the coat, nadi.” This for a servant who silently offered to take it. The dowager’s favored temperatures were too cold for comfort—this, the woman who preferred a drafty mountain fortress with minimal plumbing to the luxury of temperate—and political—Shejidan.

He retained his coat, left Banichi and Jago to their ordinary social interface with the dowager’s security, and followed the servant’s polite lead to the service access, a bone-chilling walk three doors down, a duck of the head to get into the comparative heat of the dowager’s underheated study.

They could have gone back into the main corridor. The dowager did otherwise. The staff did otherwise. So her guests, once admitted to her premises, did otherwise.

The dowager occupied a chair in what was, given the carefully restrained objects on the shelves, an office-study-cum-library—in short, all those functions that in the dowager’s establishment were sanity-saving and civilized.

The dowager, knitted shawl about her, read. And looked up from her book.

Scowling. Darkly scowling.

“You coddle the boy.”

Where
was
her communications link? He had never spotted it.

“He’s bigger than I am,” Bren said, and it struck the dowager’s humor. She laughed, and laughed, and moved her cane to tap the other chair.

He sat. He didn’t begin a report. He waited about two breaths.

“So,” she said. “And how is Sabin-aiji?”

“Well,” he said.

“Have you broken your fast?”

“No, aiji-ma, but—”

“But. But. But. Will you have breakfast? Or tea?”

“I fear my stomach could by no means deal with a breakfast, aiji-ma, and I have had tea upstairs.”

“And your estimate?”

That was the formal invitation. “Aiji-ma, you know the ship-aijiin lied to the crew.”

Impatient wave of the hand. “Estimate of Sabin-aiji.”

“A difficult book to read, aiji-ma, a palimpsest of several regimes on this ship, and to this hour I cannot know precisely which layer has the truth. But she acts as if she expected Jase-aiji to find that tape. She is aware that it was falsified. And in my own opinion, that deception may have served us all. The crew would have been very difficult for the aijiin to manage over the last decade if they had known from the start that there were survivors back at the original station. They would most surely have diverted all energy toward refueling the ship precisely for this voyage, and subverted all construction toward that end. Neither Mospheirans nor atevi would have agreed with that as a priority, one is sure, and one is convinced Ramirez foresaw that. If there were no particular haste to return, the crew would take any order. Pratap Tamun’s attempt to take power—this is my own guess, aiji-ma—might indicate a certain suspicion within the certain levels of the crew. He may have used his suspicion to blackmail the other ship-aijiin into conceding to his demands—but he lacked proof. His kidnapping of Ramirez instead of killing him suggests he wanted something Ramirez could give. I used to wonder what. Now I strongly suspect it was an admission of information on this tape—or beyond it, from some meeting of
Ramirez’s men with station authorities.”

“And this tape shows?”

“Corridors lacking power or air . . . in which the search team walks—walks, with the appearance of gravity, which, aiji-ma, cannot be created without stable rotation, and stable rotation of a damaged station is no accident. That is the sensitivity of this record, on a pinpoint. At a certain point they disappear into a working airlock and the tape ends. Which is also against regulations, Jase-aiji informs us. That record should not have terminated, but it does. They preserve the secrets of their negotiations with their Guild.”

“Shall we be surprised at this?”

“No, aiji-ma. In retrospect, one thinks not. But that raises another question:
did Ramirez act on his own?
Jase suspects the timing in which he and Yolanda were created, decades before their usefulness in Shejidan. Jase suspects Ramirez had ambitions to create yet another colony, secret from the Guild. But Sabin suggests Ramirez meant to contact foreigners—spacefaring foreigners, and that his intrusion into sensitive foreign territory prompted the attack on Reunion.”

“Bypassing atevi? How were these persons preferable?”

Trust the dowager to see to the heart of a matter. “One believes, aiji-ma, that it was not so much fear of atevi as fear of detection, if he diverted the ship to a known and forbidden destination—the old colony; and fear that contacting humans once hostile to the Guild would be very difficult to manage. He had no idea of the technical advances atevi might have made. He wanted potent, spacefaring allies. And found potent, spacefaring enemies, as seems, from some place he visited.”

“And where is this place?”

“Out among the stars. Sabin-aiji strongly suggests Ramirez disturbed and alarmed a foreign world.”

“As Mospheirans dropped down on us, abusing our hospitality. Is once not enough?”

“One hardly thinks Ramirez’s intentions were to land. In this case, aiji-ma, the owners of the planet were out in space and armed. And resented his intrusion.”

“Bad habits will get one in trouble.”

“One concurs, aiji-ma. In this—very likely they did.”

“Why run such a risk, counting its previous failure?”

He had no clear answer, even for himself, on a human level. “Desire to throw off an oppressive authority, one might surmise. The Pilots’ Guild is that. Desire for alternatives. Atevi, to his knowledge, had only mastered the steam engine. He thought, mistakenly, that contact would be easy—it had been easy, with atevi, before the ship left. It lent him false confidence. In seeking allies, he found an enemy—or made one, by error. He never had a chance to engage Jase in the contact—Jase was, at the time, quite junior. He was unprepared, and fled. This may have been a grave mistake.”

“So. This fills in the shadows of the image, but only slightly. Ramirez was ambitious. Are we utterly surprised at his ambition?”

“We are not, aiji-ma. Not wholly. But he was desperate, perhaps, as desperate as ambitious—wholly dependent on the station for fuel. Everything he did found limits on fuel needs. I surmise they continually planned his missions and kept the ship on a tight rein precisely because they lacked confidence in the captains’ man’chi. A powerful ally would have utterly upset the balance and given the ship alternatives, resources, everything at a stroke. And patience is not a ship virtue. He looked elsewhere than Alpha, continually niggling away at something he could do undetected. A second contact, with those he might deal with in secret, changing the ship’s man’chi, establishing himself as aiji, making his power firm before challenging his Guild.”

“History has sharp teeth, Bren-paidhi. Both our species have found that true.” Ilisidi took a placid sip of tea. “So. So. One always wondered what lay within Ramirez’s energetic and open-handed approach to us.”

“Not only to you, as now seems, aiji-ma. But you were by then used to humans.”

“A truly reckless man. So we read him in his dealings. If the paidhi-aiji had not intervened—who knows what his contact with us would have been when he returned? A disaster. Clearly a disaster.”

“He had prepared Jase to deal with outsiders. This time, Jase and Yolanda having had intense preparation, he did engage their services—having more foresight than his ancestors, on a year-long voyage toward that meeting. I respect him for that act of foresight, aiji-ma, but, yes, he was reckless. Utterly. And naive in his
approach to outsiders. He should have consulted them when his contact with outsiders went wrong—although possibly the incident proceeded too rapidly to brief newcomers to the situation. One has no idea.”

“He was reckless. He offended strangers. He brought ruin on his Guild. And what shall we do with this knowledge, Bren-paidhi?”

“Little else we can do, now, aiji-ma, but go to the station and hope to find what Ramirez left in no worse condition than it was.”

“And if there are worse conditions?”

“Jase-aiji tells me we have resources to pull off to a nearby refuge, one where Gin-aiji and her robots can work, though it would be chancy and slow. One suspects Sabin-aiji has had that contingency very much in mind. I confess I have increasing misgivings about the planning for this venture.”

“Which we have left in human hands.”

“I have requested more information on Ramirez’s past actions, aiji-ma. Jase is attempting to learn, and he takes our view. But Sabin forecasts a ship-move tomorrow. The
last
ship-move, so they think, before our destination. We are forced toward this event, precipitately so.”

“Inconvenience,” Ilisidi said with a grimace. “Uncomfortable, these transitions. One wearies of them. And far too much to hope that these remote station-folk at our destination dine better than we.”

“One greatly doubts it, aiji-ma.” His misgivings on Sabin’s misdirection of his request were heard. Not discussed. Not discussable, since there was nothing, in the dowager’s opinion, to be done, except to note the fact against Sabin. Therefore she changed the subject. “One doubts we will find much comfort there.”

“We equally doubt that Reunion has entertaining sights to see. We have extensively
seen
a station.”

Be brave, she was telling him. Steady on course. Be calm.

“I fear we could never promise the aiji-dowager grand entertainments there.”

“Ah, well.” The dowager adjusted her laprobe. “We have seen very curious things on our voyage, all the same. Whatever the outcome, we have learned the names of two hundred stars and seen one eat another—Grigiji will be envious.”

“That he will, aiji-ma.” The Astronomer Emeritus would have given his aged life to be on this voyage—but health and duties and the pleas of his students had, the dowager had said, dissuaded him.

“Do you suppose Sabin-aiji plots revenge on this household?”

Back to the Sabin matter. Back to questions of reliability of human authority in charge of this ship—a logical question, since she’d served Sabin poison at her dinner-party, letting Sabin choose it, to be sure: baji-naji. And in that chaotic revolution, she’d made sure that Sabin would
not
dictate to atevi where they spent the voyage, and
not
restrict atevi movements or communications on a ship on which her grandson might have designs of ownership—if atevi had one species-wide bad habit, it was that tendency to take for themselves anything they could lay hands on, if there was no preventative civilized agreement . . . and ship-humans had never quite established their willingness to defend their own ship.

Now the dowager asked, having been informed about Sabin’s ignoring his request for information—has Sabin a lingering intention of revenge?

And he had to say, with far too little information—“One doubts it would be related to that, aiji-ma. She seems to take the matter of the dinner as a known hazard in dealing with foreigners.”

“And her opinion of the situation?”

“By her history, she might decide to favor the Pilots’ Guild for certain reasons, in some attempt against Ogun’s authority, on our return to our world. But as regards the incident of the dinner—with this one particular woman, I believe a decision to act against atevi would be a policy decision, no personal vendetta.
Humans
find this woman difficult to predict. It is a trap to find some of her actions atevi-like and reasonable.”

It was wry humor. Ilisidi was wryly amused. But took the information behind those lively eyes and stored it.

“A grudge is not efficient,” Bren added. “And very few of Sabin’s acts carry inefficient ornament.”

“One finds it very tempting to think one understands this woman.”

“A trap, very certainly a trap. I remind myself daily not to view her as, say, a miniature Tatiseigi.”

That did amuse Ilisidi. The aiji’s wife’s uncle, Cajeiri’s former guardian, possibly Ilisidi’s lover, was a
notorious stickler for tradition, often offended in this era of fast food and faster transport—and a notorious participant in various schemes.

“Ah,” Ilisidi said, “but Tatiseigi would have invited us all to dinner.”

True. And made them sweat every minute of it, likely doing nothing at all.

He was amused in turn.

“And do you think she may yet invite us?” Ilisidi asked.

“Her customs are by no means atevi, aiji-ma. But this is how I read her. Ramirez deceived the crew in his pursuing alien contact. He kept that secret from his Guild. And from the moment he saw the station in ruins, he knew he had to persuade his crew to leave the ruined station behind, or embroil himself in the rebuilding and defense of the station, which would, I believe, have been a mistake—binding the ship to a hazardous location, and not using the assets he had—notably Jase and Yolanda. He lied quickly and efficiently. One suspects he grieved not at all for the Guild—but he had to refuel, and he lied to Guild authority, telling them that he was going to our world to find out if there were useful resources there. Perhaps he even offered them the chance to board, and they refused. One suspects so. And failing the Guild’s delivering themselves to his authority, he maintained his deception of his own crew and left, with or without his Guild’s permission. And of course once he reached our world, it became necessary to deal with atevi instead, and to take nearly ten years making Alpha Station viable. Then . . .” On this point he was far from certain. “Then he did something curious, given all the rest. He refueled this ship, as his health failed, and in dying, told Jase the truth about survivors at Reunion. He also managed to talk where someone could overhear: whether that was intentional or not, it certainly put the heat under the pot, as the proverb runs.” All of this latter history Ilisidi knew as well as he, but he was aiming the arrow of logic at a particular point and the dowager listened with remarkable patience. “So the crew, once they heard, demanded to go back, and of course, the ship being fueled, the surviving captains found it expedient to concede to this voyage—Sabin protested being the captain in charge, but Ogun-aiji ordered her to go—logical, since he communicates far more easily with the planet, and Sabin-aiji is far more skilled with the ship. Sabin-aiji undertakes this mission under protest . . . she finds herself poisoned before the ship leaves dock, and accedes to
the arrangement that atevi will go where they like—as human crew can’t, on this ship. Understand, aiji-ma, that very, very many who work aboard have never set foot in the control center—persons whose jobs run ordinary operations, maintenance, cooking, cleaning—lately, opening and provisioning the three decks of the ship that can take the population of the space station and feed and house it, as if we shall indeed find survivors—which Sabin now avows she very much doubts. Yet all this work proceeds.”