[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]
added as relevant data?) and of high standing in local sect (unnamed). Parents both of notable rank;
father recently retired from political circles to devote his time to meditation and enlightenment
(hand-written note: rumored he was forced out in power play by agricultural interests). Entered Fleet
service at age twenty-one and declared for commission two years later. (No known other interests.)
Same security clearance. Married permanently. (Interesting. Quite rare.)
I went down the list of other staff members, some of them unusual, others dull as dirt. Strange what
Personnel will think relevant and stick in a man's file. Read several accounts of illicit affairs and resultant
difficulties, none of them bearing even slightly on Fleet business or security reliability, then chucked it
aside. No time for gossip. (Not much, anyway.)
With surprise I felt a touch of hunger. I sounded a chime over my bed and Jamilla came in with lowered
eyes, took my request for fruit and padded quietly out.
I leaned back and thought about my two Executive Officers. Gharma seemed more steady, but less fond
of the spark of a new idea. Majumbdahr might make a better friend, if that was what I was after.
And maybe I was. I had decided on the Sasenbo to save my time on Veden, not become tangled in the
thousand loose ends of a military command. There was only one way to do that: find a core of men you
could trust and let them make a lot of the decisions. Gharma and Majumbdahr were going to be the core.
It had to be more than the usual delegation of authority every officer knows he must release some of his
hold or hell end up ordering his paper clips and I would have to play it by ear.
I needed time. Fleet was finished; not for me the plugging of holes in a crumbling dike.
I had lost everything, been cast out. There was no joy left for me in Sabal, in the warm knit that held me
since I was a boy. I had to find something more. Veden was the spiritual center of the Hindic minority, a
small fragment of the Empire that rejected the Mongol culture as well as it could. Perhaps they had
something for me here. If not, I had accepted the commission under false hopes and might as well be
back in the Slots.
The Hindic and the Quarn. I felt a tension between the two. Veden was at least still human. The Quarn
held all the mystery and hope of the unknown.
Jamilla entered with a bowl of cylindrical fruit and a snifter of red liquid. The fruit was tough at first but
after a moment's chewing released juices with the flavor of warm almonds. The drink was a clashing of
the tang of oranges with a smooth background like apricot nectar that somehow resolved itself and
quenched my thirst.
I caught Jamilla studying me with interest. No more than a fraction of the people here were Mongol in
descent, and certainly she had seen few Polynesians such as me. I supposed my lighter hair and thin
beard (a gene of the Caucasoids, that) were unusual, but&
Normal formalities and liberties, Majumbdahr had said. I raised an eyebrow in speculation. It had been a
long time.
I finished eating, put the tray aside and made a formal sign understood throughout the Empire.
Jamilla smiled and unfastened the brass buckle at her side. Her sansari was a wisp of cloth wound into
expert folds over her slim body. Watching her gracefully remove it was an entertainment. She came into
bed with the good taste not to extinguish the rights as she entered. She was a scent as sweet as the wind.
In the morning Patil aided me in fitting my Fleet Kochu robes. They were designed to cover the wearer
against Lekki's ultraviolet, and were robes only by convention for they retained pants and vest. The only
addition was a cowl that rode on the back of my neck and could be slipped over to shade my face.
My contact filters flushed the morning with an orange tinge even though Lekki's violet dot threw shattered
light up to me from The Lapis. The water traced a pencil line of horizon across two-thirds of the view
from my home and I could see the current ripples as the triple tides of Lekki, the Dwarf and Pincter,
Veden's moon, pulled at the lake. The beach a hundred meters below was a broad white plain worn
smooth by the hissing waves.
All this I saw while blinking the contacts into place and walking down the ramp to my staff car. The
driver saluted, and with a slight piping of steam we went down into the world of men.
Our route skirted the capital. I noted that the thin towers in the distance did not swirl in a dank layer of
brown hydrocarbons, as some, industrial colonies still did principally those with antiquated ideas of
"free choice." It was a hopeful sign.
I wasted an hour in the unavoidable preliminaries in my new offices; nodding at secretaries, exchanging
ritual salutes with second and third rank administrators, accepting a traditional welcoming gift of
burnished rice and layered spices (take one mouthful, then offer it to the troops). Then to the main
conference room, filled with twenty staff workers. Their eyes widened slightly as I sent them all on
detailed, eminently defensible tail-chasing jobs that would take days or weeks to complete. Correlate
fluctuations in rice crop and number of ships passing through the Flinger; compile composite history of all
minority economic alternatives used on Veden which had applicability to Empire economy; detail origin of
more recent sects (this I could actually use); each division prepare reports, sharpen up training schedule,
stipulate defense capability, justify all current supply levels. The orders were a compendium of jargon and
catchphrases, but it accomplished the result: keep them busy, get them out of the room. When only
Majumbdahr and Gharma remained I relaxed.
"Now tell me about Baslin. What are the people thinking?"
"Not very much thinking is being done," said Majumbdahr slowly. "There's a great deal of reacting,
though."
"How do you mean?"
[ Pobierz całość w formacie PDF ]