“Councillor Rael,” she replied. “Good of you to call. You’ve gone over the reports?”
“Yes. Is this call shielded?”
“Certainly,” she said. “Speak freely.”
He sighed. Josen Rael had been a fixture in planetary politics for a decade now. He had first made the newsfeeds as councillor for war, later had climbed to councillor for agriculture, and for four standard years he had been the leader of the council’s majority faction, the technocrats, and therefore the single most powerful man on S’uthlam. The power had made him look old and hard and tired, and this was the worst Tolly Mune had ever seen him. “You’re certain of the data, then?” he said. “ If our crews have made no mistake? This is too crucial for error, I don’t have to tell you that. This is truly an EEC seedship?”
“Damn right,” said Tolly Mune. “Damaged and in disrepair, yes, but the puling thing is still functional, more or less, and the cell library is intact. We’ve verified it.”
Rael ran long, blunt fingers through his thinning white hair. “I should be jubilant, I suppose. When this is over, I will have to pretend to be jubilant for the newsfeeds. But right now, all I can think of are the dangers. We’ve had a council meeting. Closed. We can’t risk too much getting out until the affair is settled. The council was largely in accord—technocrats, expansionists, zeros, the church party, the fringe factions.” He laughed. “I’ve never seen such unanimity in all the years I’ve served. Portmaster Mune, we must have that ship.”
Tolly Mune had known it was coming. She had not been Portmaster this long without understanding the politics of the society downstairs. S’uthlam had been locked into endless crisis all her life. “I’ll try to buy it for you,” she said. “This Haviland Tuf was a freelance trader originally, before he stumbled on the Ark. My crews found his old ship on the landing deck, in terrible shape. Traders are greedy abortions, every one of them. That should work for us.”
“Offer him whatever it takes,” said Josen Rael. “Do you understand, Portmaster? You have unlimited budgetary authority.”
“Understood,” said Tolly Mune. But there was another question to be asked. “And if he won’t sell?”
Josen Rael hesitated. “Difficult,” he muttered. “He must sell. A refusal would be tragic. Not for the man himself, but for us, perhaps.”
“If he won’t sell?” Tolly Mune repeated. “I need to know the alternatives.”
“We must have the ship,” Rael told her. “If this Tuf proves unreasonable, he gives us no choice. The High Council will exercise its right of eminent domain and confiscate. The man will be compensated, of course.”
“Damn. You’re talking about seizing the ship by force.”
“No,” said Josen Rael. “Everything would be proper—I’ve checked. In an emergency, for the good of the greatest number, the rights of private property must be set aside.”
“Oh, hell and damn, that’s puling rationalization, Josen,” said Mune. “You had more common sense when you were up here. What have they done to you downstairs?”
He grimaced, and for an instant, he looked a little like the young man who had worked at her side for a year, when she had been Deputy Portmaster and he third assistant administrator for interstellar trade. Then he shook his head, and the old, tired politician was back. “I don’t feel good about this, Ma,” he said, “but what choice do we have? I’ve seen projections. Mass famine within twenty-seven years unless we have a breakthrough, and there’s no breakthrough in sight. Before it comes to that, the expansionists will regain power and we’ll have another war, perhaps. Either way, millions will die—billions, perhaps. Against that, what are the rights of this one man?”
“I won’t argue that point, Josen, though there are those who would, you know that. But never mind. You want to be practical, I’ll give you some goddamned practical things to think over. Even if we buy this ship from Tuf legally, there’s going to be hell to pay with Vandeen and Skrymir and the rest of the allies, but I doubt that they’d try anything. If we grab it by force, though, that’s a set of coordinates to a whole different place—a hard place, too. They can say piracy, maybe. They can define the Ark as a military craft—which it was, by the way, and a puling world-buster, too—and say we’re in violation of the treaty and come after us again.”
“I’ll speak to their envoys personally,” said Josen Rael wearily. “Assure them that as long as the technocrats are in power, the colonization program will not be resumed.”
“And they’ll take your puling word? Like goddamned horny hell they will. And will you assure them that the technocrats are never going to lose power, that they’ll never have the expansionists to deal with again? How will you do that? Are you planning to use the Ark to establish a benevolent dictatorship?”
The councillor pressed his lips together tightly, and a flush crept up the back of his long, dark neck. “You know me better than that. Agreed, there are dangers. The ship is a formidable military resource, however. Let us not forget that. If the allies mobilize against us, we will hold the trump card.”
“Nonsense,” said Tolly Mune. “It has to be repaired and we have to master it. The technology involved has been lost for a thousand years. We’ll be studying it for months, maybe years, before we can really use the goddamned thing. Only we won’t get the chance. The Vandeeni armada will arrive within weeks to take it away from us, and the others won’t be far behind them.”
“None of this is your concern, Portmaster,” said Josen Rael coldly. “The High Council has discussed the issue thoroughly.”
“Don’t try and pull rank on me, Josen. Remember the time you got drunk on narco-blasters and decided you’d go outside and see how fast urine crystallized in space? I was the one who talked you out of freezing off your hose, esteemed First Councillor. Clean out your puling ears and listen to me. Maybe war isn’t my concern, but trade is. The port is our lifeline. We import thirty percent of our raw calories now—”
“Thirty-four percent,” Rael corrected.
“Thirty-four percent,” Tolly Mune agreed. “And that is going to go nowhere but up, we both know it. We pay for that food with our technological expertise—both manufactured goods and port profits. We service, repair, and build more starships than any other four worlds in the sector, and you know why? Because I’ve busted my puling buns to make sure we’re the best. Tuf himself said it. He came here for repairs because we had a reputation—a reputation for being ethical, honest, and fair, as well as technically competent. What’s going to happen to that reputation if we confiscate his puling ship? How many other traders are going to bring in their ships for repairs if we feel free to help ourselves to any we like? What’s going to happen to my goddamned port?”
“It would certainly have an adverse effect,” Josen Rael admitted.
Tolly Mune made a loud crude noise at him. “Our economy will be destroyed,” she said bluntly.
Rael was sweating heavily now, trickles of moisture running down the broad, domed forehead. He mopped at the moisture with a pocket cloth. “Then you must see that it doesn’t happen, Portmaster Mune. You must see that it doesn’t come to that.”
“How?”
“Buy the Ark,” he said. “I delegate full authority to you, since you seem to understand the situation so well. Make this Tuf person see reason. The responsibility is yours.” He nodded, and the screen went black.
On S’uthlam, Haviland Tuf played the tourist.
It could not be denied that the world was impressive, in its way. During his years as a trader, hopping from star to star in the Cornucopia of Excellent Goods at Low Prices, Haviland Tuf had visited more worlds than he could easily remember, but he would be unlikely to forget S’uthlam any time soon.
He had seen a goodly number of breathtaking sights: the crystal towers of Avalon, the skywebs of Arachne, the churning seas of Old Poseidon and the black basalt mountains of Clegg. The city that was S’uthlam—the old names were only districts and neighborhoods now, the ancient ci
ties having grown into one swollen megalopolis centuries ago—rivaled any of them.
Tuf had a certain fondness for tall buildings, and he gazed out upon the cityscape by both day and night—on observation platforms at one kilometer, two, five, nine. No matter how high he ascended, the lights went on and on, sprawling across the land endlessly in all directions, with nowhere a break to be seen. Square and featureless forty- and fifty-story buildings stood cheek-to-jowl in endless rows, crowding each other, living in the perpetual shadow of mirrored towers that rose around them to drink the sun. Levels were built upon other levels that had been built upon still others. The moving sidewalks crossed and crisscrossed in patterns of labrynthine intricacy. Beneath the surface ran a network of vast subterranean roads where tubetrains and delivery capsules hurtled through the darkness at hundreds of kays per hour, and beneath the roads were basements and sub-basements and tunnels and underways and malls and sub-housing, a whole second city that burrowed as far below the ground as its mirrored sibling ascended above it.
Tuf had seen the lights of the metropolis from the Ark; from orbit, the city swallowed half a continent. From the surface, it seemed large enough to swallow galaxies. There were other continents; they, too, blazed by night with the lights of civilization. The sea of light had no islands of darkness within it; the S’uthlamese had no room to spare for luxuries like parks. Tuf did not disapprove; he had always thought parks to be a perverse institution, designed principally to remind civilized humanity how raw and crude and uncomfortable life had been when they had been forced to live it in nature.
Haviland Tuf had sampled a great variety of cultures in his wanderings, and he judged the culture of the S’uthlamese to be inferior to none. It was a world of variety, of dizzying possibilities, of a richness that partook both of vitality and decadence. It was a cosmopolitan world, plugged into the network that linked the stars, freely plundering the music, drama, and sensoria imported from other worlds, and using those unceasing stimuli to endlessly transform and mutate its own cultural matrix. The city offered more modes of recreation and more entertainment of more varied sorts than Tuf had ever seen in any one place before—sufficient choices to occupy a tourist for several standard years, if one desired to taste it all.
During his years of travel, Haviland Tuf had seen the advanced science and technological wizardry of Avalon and Newholme, Tober-in-the-Veil, Old Poseidon, Baldur, Arachne, and a dozen other worlds out on the sharpened leading edge of human progress. The technology demonstrated on S’uthlam was equal to the most advanced of them. The orbital elevator itself was an impressive feat—Old Earth was supposed to have built such constructs in the ancient days before the Collapse, and Newholme had raised one once, only to have it fall during the war, but nowhere else had Tuf ever observed such a colossal artifact, not even on Avalon itself, where such elevators had been studied and rejected on the grounds of economy. And the slidewalks, the tubetrains, the manufactories, all were advanced, and efficient. Even the government seemed to work.
S’uthlam was a wonder world.
Haviland Tuf observed it, traveled through it, and sampled its marvels for three days before he returned to his small, cramped, premiere-class sleeping quarters on the seventy-ninth floor of a tower hotel, and summoned the host. “I wish to make arrangements for an immediate return to my ship,” he said, seated on the edge of the narrow bed he had summoned from a wall, the chairs being uncomfortably small. He folded large white hands neatly atop his stomach.
The host, a tiny man barely half Tuf’s height, seemed nonplussed. “It was my understanding that you were to stay for another ten days,” he said.
“That is correct,” said Tuf. “Nonetheless, it is the nature of plans to be changed. I wish to return to orbit as soon as is conveniently possible. I would be most grateful if you would see to the arrangements, sir.”
“There’s so much you haven’t seen yet!”
“Indeed. Yet I find that what I have seen, however small a sample of the whole it may be, has been more than sufficient.”
“You don’t like S’uthlam?”
“It suffers from an excess of S’uthlamese,” Haviland Tuf replied. “Several other flaws might also be mentioned.” He held up a single long finger. “The food is abysmal, for the most part chemically reformulated, largely without taste, of a distinctly unpleasant texture, full of unusual and disquieting colors. Moreover, the portions are inadequate. I might also be so bold as to mention the constant intrusive presence of a large number of newsfeed reporters. I have learned to recognize them by the multifocus cameras they wear in the center of their foreheads as a third eye. Perhaps you have observed them lurking about your lobby, sensorium, and restaurant. By my rough estimate, there seem to be about twenty of them.”
“You’re a celebrity,” the host said, “a public figure. All of S’uthlam is interested in learning about you. Surely, if you don’t wish to grant interviews, the peeps haven’t dared intrude on your privacy? The ethics of the profession . . . ”
“Have no doubt been observed to the letter,” Haviland Tuf finished, “as I must concede that they have kept their distance. Nonetheless, each night when I have returned to this insufficiently large room and accessed the newsfeeds, I have been welcomed by scenes of myself looking over the city, eating tasteless rubbery food, visiting various scenic tourist attractions, and entering sanitary facilities. Vanity is one of my great faults, I must confess, but nonetheless, the charm of this notoriety has quickly palled. Moreover, most of their camera angles have been unflattering in the extreme, and the humor of the newsfeed commentators has bordered on being offensive.”
“Easily solved,” the host said. “You might have come to me earlier. We can rent you a privacy shield. It clips on the belt, and if any peep approaches within twenty meters, it will jam his third eye and give him a splitting headache.”
“Less easily solved,” said Tuf impassively, “is the total lack of animal life I have observed.”
“Vermin?” the host said, with a horrified look. “You’re upset because we have no vermin?”
“Not all animals are vermin,” said Haviland Tuf. “On many worlds, birds, canines, and other species are kept and cherished. I myself am fond of cats. A truly civilized world preserves a place for felines, but on S’uthlam it appears the populace would find them indistinguishable from lice and bloodworms. When I made the arrangements for my visit here, Portmaster Tolly Mune assured me that her crew would take care of my cats, and I accepted said assurances, but if indeed no S’uthlamese has ever before encountered an animal of a species other than human, I believe I have just cause to wonder as to the quality of the care they are presently receiving.”
“We have animals,” the host protested. “Out in the agrifactory zones. Plenty of animals—I’ve seen tapes.”
“No doubt you have,” said Tuf. “A tape of a cat and a cat, however, are somewhat different things, and require different treatment. Tapes can be stored on a shelf. Cats cannot.” He pointed at the host. “These are in the nature of quibbles, however. The crux of the matter, as I have previously mentioned, lies more in the number of S’uthlamese than in their manner. There are too many people, sir. I have been jostled repeatedly on every occasion. In eating establishments, the tables are too close to other tables, the chairs are insufficient to my size, and strangers sometimes seat themselves beside me and pummel me with rude elbows. The seats in theaters and sensoriums are cramped and narrow. The sidewalks are crowded, the lobbies are crowded, the tubes are crowded—there are people everywhere who touch me without my leave or consent.”
The host slipped into a polished professional smile. “Ah, humanity!” he said, waxing eloquent. “The glory of S’uthlam! The teeming masses, the sea of faces, the endless pageant, the drama of life! Is there anything quite as invigorating as rubbing shoulders with our fellow man?”
“Perhaps not,” said Haviland Tuf flatly. “Yet I find I am now sufficiently invigorated. Furthermore, permit me to point
out that the average S’uthlamese is too short to rub against my shoulders, and has therefore been forced to content him- or herself with rubbing up against my arms, legs, and stomach.”
The host’s smile faded. “You are taking the wrong attitude, sir. To fully appreciate our world, you must learn to see it through S’uthlamese eyes.”
“I am unwilling to go about on my knees,” said Haviland Tuf.
“You’re not anti-life, are you?”
“Indeed not,” said Haviland Tuf. “Life is infinitely preferable to its alternative. However, in my experience, all good things can be carried to extremes. This would seem to be the case on S’uthlam.” He raised a hand for silence before the host could respond. “More particularly,” Tuf continued, “I have developed something of an antipathy, no doubt overhasty and unjustified, to some of the individual specimens of life I have come upon during chance encounters in my travels. A few have even expressed open hostility to me, directing at me epithets clearly derogatory of my size and mass.”
“Well,” said the host, flushing, “I’m sorry, but you are, uh, ample, and on S’uthlam it is, uh, socially unacceptable to be, uh, overweight.”
“Weight, sir, is entirely a function of gravity, and is therefore most malleable. Moreover, I am unwilling to concede you the authority to judge my weight over, under, or just right, these being subjective criteria. Aesthetics vary from world to world, as do genotypes and hereditary predisposition. I am quite satisfied with my present mass, sir. To return to the matter at hand, I wish to terminate my stay immediately.”
“Very well,” said the host. “I will book passage for you on the first tubetrain tomorrow morning.”
“This is unsatisfactory. I would prefer to leave at once. I have examined the schedules and discovered a listing for a train in three standard hours.”