Troy Rising 1 - Live Free or Die (10 page)

“I think all will be clear soon,” Tyler said. He'd blown through pretty much all of the
money from the deal with Wathaet but he now had a
shipload
of atacirc. Well, eighty percent of a shipload, damnit. “But that's about right. I don't
want to own
all
the maple sugar in the world. Monopolies just don't work well. But if things become...
difficult and people want to sell because of the difficulties, be ready to start buying
again. Now, to the next step. No, I've got a better way to do that...”

***

Tyler stopped on the sidewalk outside the attorney's office and extended one arm up and
the other down. The one extended up he circled about his head while pointing to the ground
with the other.

“Come on, figure it out,” he said, looking around.

Before long a man in a slightly ill-fitting suit got out of a late-model sedan and walked
over.

“Looking for us?” the man asked.

“Took you long enough,” Tyler said. “In a few days, exactly when isn't quite clear, some
Gratun will be visiting. They'll be planning on occupying the same warehouse in Reading as
the
Spinward Crossing
. I'd appreciate you guys setting up a secure room somewhere nearby. Then we can finally
get to
real
negotiations.”

“And the Horvath?” the man asked.

“These guys the Horvath are
definitely
not going to want to touch,” Tyler said. “Except for the initial exploratory ship
everyone we've been dealing with is bottom rung. Even their governmental people. These
guys aren't going to be Donald Trump but they report to corporations and they're here for
our maple syrup. All large stocks of which I've managed to lock up. They'll then have all
winter to figure out if they want to confront the Horvath over maple syrup. Because,
believe you me, the people that collect the stuff are not
about
to let the Horvath take more than a tithe of it.”

“And if they nuke Boston and Washington?” the agent asked, sarcastically.

“I'll do my best to avoid that,” Tyler said.

“How?”

“I'm from the South. We have our little ways.”

“What about Atlanta?”

“Okay. So sometimes they don't work.”

***

“Gate emergence.”

“What do we have now?” The colonel on duty leaned over and contemplated the screen.

“Looks to be one large ship,” the sergeant said. “Tentative ID is a freighter. No visible
weapons. Four more ships, small freighters maybe? Not a class we've seen.”

“Those are the visitors we were told to expect,” the colonel said. “I hope.”

“Sir?” the tech said. “What visitors?”

“Close held.”

***

“Gentle beings,” Tyler said, breezing into the conference room. “I hope you have been well
treated. We don't have much in the way of Glatun food products but there's Dragon's Tears.”

“Thank you,” one of the Glatun said. “We have managed to refrain.”

“Oh, dear,” Tyler said, waving to the people with him. “Gentle Glatun, Robert Lyle, my
attorney of fact for this negotiation, Ms. Cody Castilla with our Treasury Department and
Mr. Jason Haselbauer who is representing a significant fraction of the remaining holdings
of Dragon's Tears which I have not managed to procure. And you are?”

“Karorird Ongl, Onderil Banking.”

“Canarorird Hetuncha, Gorku Corp.”

“Lathmal Indendu, Hurin Corporation.”

“Rolaut Orth, Limaror Corporation.”

“We need nametags or something. First as to Dragon's Tears. The material is in fact maple
sugar syrup. Please feel free to access relevant information on our network.”

“Geographically and seasonally highly limited,” Hetuncha said. “Excellent.”

“Yes,” Tyler said. “Because limited means valuable.”

“And as of this morning, local time,” the Hurin Corporation representative said, “sixty
percent of the operating distilleries and about thirty percent of the available growing
land just transferred to the LFD Corporation, Tyler Vernon, Chairman of the Board.
Masterful stroke, Mr. Vernon. I see that Mr. Haselbauer, yes, represents many if not all
of the independents.”

“And you and the independents represented by Mr. Haselbauer hold
all
of the stored stocks,” the Limaror Corporation representative said, sourly.

“For which we will be negotiating today,” Tyler said. “Mr. Haselbauer and Mr. Lyle will be
handling those negotiations. Ms. Castilla, who is an expert in banking, will be working on
setting up appropriate banking systems, secure from the Horvath, so that we can engage in
regular trade. But first a word about maple sugar...”

“Mostly collected by small farmers,” Hetuncha said. The Gorku rep wrinkled his nose.
“Geographically scattered, hard to gather. And it
has
to be gathered during a very limited period of time. Even if the weather cooperates, any
resistance to gathering means a severely reduced crop.”

“Which can be good and can be bad,” Tyler said. “Less means higher price in general. But
if it's simply
unavailable
, one can see the market dying. New product and all. You'll want to maintain your source
of supply. I direct your attention to the initials of my corporation, gentle beings.”

“Various meanings,” the Onderil rep said. “But in context our AI says it refers to your
tribal motto.”

“Closer than you realize,” Tyler said. “With everyone who was in it purely for money, or
because they thought the Berkshires are pretty, out of the game the Horvath will find it
rather
hard
to take. Even the Canadians that gather it are pretty stubborn folk.”

“Aren't taking mine, that's for sure and certain,” Mr. Haselbauer said. “Burn the trees
first. And maple's practically religion to my family.”

“I suggest you have your AIs study local tribal reactions to force,” Tyler said. “And
their relationship with the rest of the world. Especially, as they would put it, 'city
folk.' Because what you are buying is
all
the maple syrup that's going to be available until next spring. You have a few months to
process the cultural implications. Negotiation will be for Glatun credits, gentlemen, not
atacirc. After that we can trade with regular traders for atacirc and so on and so forth.
And, of course, the usual taxes go to the...”

“Revenuers,” Mr. Haselbauer said, disgustedly.

***

“The problem is we really don't know if we're getting a significant amount of credit for
this or not.” Cody Castilla was in her fifties and severe. Severe face, severe clothes and
severe body language. “Their economy is still opaque to us. Our analysts are still trying
to process the economic implication of most manufacturing being robotic.”

“Not entirely,” Tyler said. “Economics comes down to food in the end. What one standard
meal costs is another way to say it. I asked Wathaet, innocently, if I visited his station
and if I could eat Glatun food, which I can't, how much a cheap meal would cost. He said
an ormo, whatever that is, was about a quarter credit. He also told me that his full cargo
load of trash atacirc was around a hundred and twenty credits. And, forgetting the earlier
question, made like that was a huge amount of money.”

“We're up to fifty credits a
gallon
,” Lyle said. “We can buy five shiploads of atacirc for a gallon?”

“We got screwed by them boys,” Mr. Haselbauer said.

“Which is why I insisted on more than one corporation being represented,” Tyler said.
“Dollars are not going to translate to credits but
work
will. How much will it cost to send some of our grad students to Glatun to learn their
technologies? How much will it cost to get Glatun to come here to teach? How much will it
cost for us to get starter plants and fabbers to make more? We should be able to buy more
advanced technologies with this. Not much but it's a start.”

“We need to be able to buy advanced weapons, sorry as I am to say that,” Ms. Castilla
said. “So we can get the Horvath out of our sky.”

“A Revenuer wanting to defend the country?” Mr. Haselbauer said, grinning. “Will wonders
never cease?”

“Listen, you...”

“Enough,” Tyler said. “We don't need tribal differences right now. We can't buy enough
weapons, even with the full load, to matter. Probably. It's possible they have weapons we
can set up there that mean no Horvath can survive getting through the gate. But I doubt
it. For right now, we need to be important to the Glatun powers-that-be so that they will
bring
weapons. And Glatun that know how to use them. Which is why we're going to geek to fifty
credits a gallon. Because they're going to make a very nice profit and they will
like
us. We've pushed the negotiations far enough that they won't take us as pushovers.
Hopefully they'll be smart enough to see what we're doing. But if I'm getting their
society, there is one more thing we need and I can
not
think of a way to get that!”

“What?” Castilla asked.

“You don't want to know.”

***

“Mr. Vernon,” the Gorku representative said. “It is a pleasure to meet you.”

“And you, Mr...” Tyler said, grimacing. “Sorry, terrible with names.”

“Hetuncha,” the Glatun said. “It is easier if one has implants. You really don't have to
remember
as you think of it.”

“Nice ability,” Tyler said. “How much does that cost, exactly?”

“Depends on the implants,” Hetuncha said with a slight sneeze. “A basic implant set-up,
were there any designed for humans, would be about fifty credits. Full standard civilian,
with all the trimmings as you would put it, runs about four hundred depending on your
accessories. Can run more but such people are considered... strange.”

“And an AI?” Tyler asked.

“AIs are somewhat limited,” Hetuncha said. “Only a few thousand are produced a year and
they have strict limitations on action. A very basic AI is several thousand credits and in
your current, unfortunate, security situation the Glatun government would never permit an
AI to reside in the system. There is one on the freighter which accompanied us, a Gorku
freighter I might add.”

“Ah,” Tyler said. “And a super-cannon to shoot the Horvath out of the sky?”

“There are ground based defense systems of course,” Hetuncha said. “But they are of
limited use due to orbital mechanics. Point-defense only. You wrote
TradeHard
. You know that.”

“Just hoping,” Tyler said.

“We also have laws against trade in weapons in most cases,” Hetuncha said, working his
snout.

“Heh,” Tyler said. “See how long that lasts when White and Green mountain folk start
having off-planet credit to burn. Like they won't find some free-trader to supply ray
guns? There are things, however, that I'd like to buy that I doubt would bother your
government. Nothing weapon-like at all. But I'm not sure if it's off-the-shelf or
something that needs to be customized. Also, I am in the near future going to be
interested in doing some movement of... stuff to orbit. Again, nothing weapon-like in
nature.”

“What, exactly, do you need?” Hetuncha asked.

“A device that can attach to a satellite that will give a very low delta-v but can
maintain a charge or power system for a very long time. Basically, something that can move
a satellite around the system but it doesn't have to be fast. Slow, cheap and durable is
the key. Also, obviously, with a long-range transmitter.”

“I should, as you say, screw you,” Hetuncha said. “But you're talking about a standard
satpak. They're half a credit. That's if you're buying more than a thousand at a time. And
don't try to negotiate, they are very fixed cost. They weight about a half a pound and
have a duration of seventy-three years. We have very good capacitor technology. But even
if you put a lot of them together you can't get out of your gravity well.”

“Not interested in that,” Tyler said. “Lifting out of the grav well? By one of your ships?”

“Depends on when a ship is here,” Hetuncha said. “And how big your satellite is and mass.
If the ship can just kick it out the door on the way to the gate? Five credits is standard
up to three tons and the size of one of your cars. If they have space available. A few
thousand of them and the ship isn't doing anything else and the same. There's a fuel cost
to getting out of the gravity well, but if they're going that way anyway the extra mass
isn't that much of an issue. The ship we brought has shuttles to pick up cargo. Normally
there would be shuttles on the world but we, unfortunately, had to bring our own. Do you
have satellites to boost now? I don't see you anywhere as involved in the satellite
business.”

“Not yet,” Tyler said. “I'm thinking long term.
Very
long term. I need a thousand satpaks the next time a ship comes through. That's a
registered contract.”

“Well, you certainly have the credit.”

“Last question,” Tyler said.

“At this point I ought to be charging you,” Hetuncha replied, sneezing.

“Feel free,” Tyler said. “Because the answer is going to be long. And time is money.”

“What's the question?” Hetuncha asked, curiously.

“Tell me everything you can about the Horvath,” Tyler said. “Carnivore, omnivore or
herbivore? Reproductive methods? Culture. Monolithic or tribal. How long have they been in
contact? What was their tech level before contact? United before contact? Everything...”

***

“That's two hundred and fifty six thousand gallons off-planet,” Lyle said, smugly. “Which
translates to twelve point eight
million
credits.”

“Given exchange rate as posted to their hypernet that translates as the planetary economy
of earth,” Castilla said, shaking her head.

“Because all we have is maple syrup,” Tyler said, distantly. “Mr. Haselbauer, I've sent a
quiet message through the hypernet to Wathaet that maple sugar independent distributors
now have Glatun credit to burn.”

“Why thank you, Mr. Vernon,” Mr. Haselbauer said.

“Also that some might want to buy atacirc for resale but that you have other interests,”
Tyler said. “I need to go. I have some people down south to see.”