Invader

by C. J. Cherryh

  Matched up to expectations? Hell, he wasn’t the first human in the world to marry a job, break off a human relationship. He talked to a human being he marginally responded to and all of a sudden his brain was scrambled and he was facing that parachute drop along with Jase Graham as if he had his own life riding on that chute opening.

  All those forbidden things he’d disciplined himself to write off, except Barb, who’d turned out as temporary as he’d planned at the start of their association, and he couldn’t fault that in Barb. He was the one who’d gotten too close, broken the rules, come to the end of what he shouldn’t have relied on lasting in the first place.

  And he was damned close to another dangerous precipice, an expectation of some outcome for what he did. Write that off double-fast: it didn’t happen, any more than for the paidhiin before him, that he’d ever look back at the accomplishments of a lifetime and say, We won; let alone, It’s all solved. It wasn’t that kind of a job: it didn’t just happen in one paidhi’s lifetime. Atevi in space, humans returned to the station, the whole bispecies world enabled to break down the cultural and psychological barriers and live and work together in some Utopian paradise of understanding—

  That was the God complex they warned you about when you embarked on the program and reminded you of it anytime you grew extravagant in your proposals to the committee. They showed you the pictures of the dead and the wounded in the war and they told you that was where too much progress too fast led you, right down the fabled primrose path to the kind of damage atevi and humans could do each other now that atevi and humans had much more advanced weapons—not only because certain ideas could be dangerous, but because change had to reverberate slowly through atevi society, and that it wasn’t wise to add another set of vibrations before the first set had dissipated down to harmlessness, or one risked an untoward combination of effects that humans just weren’t able to foresee.

  Damned sure it wasn’t the moment to lose his head and start expecting things were going to work. It was his job constantly to anticipate the worst, and to expect the parachute wasn’t going to open. Most of all, baji-naji, the demon in the design: never expect common sense on both sides of the strait at the same time.

  He walked out of the office and toward the breakfast room, as servants, some doubtless nursing hangovers, paid rapid bows and hurried off to that communications network they had that assured him if he sat down at the table his breakfast would turn up very soon.

  He opened the glass doors onto the balcony and enjoyed the cool, damp wind. He had to brief Tabini, he ought to brief Hanks, he ought to brief Mospheira if he could get a call through to the Foreign Office.

  God knew—he really ought to call the presidential staff and explain to George. Take a couple of antacids and see if he could work up the stomach to talk directly to the head of staff on the phone—assuming that Mospheira let the phones work this morning, and that the FO could get him patched through.

  But he had a Policy Committee meeting before noon. He had a meeting with Tabini to set up. He had an interview upcoming with network news—a request had been waiting for him with the morning tea, and he’d confirmed it: the news service had found out, one assumed, that the paidhiin were holding conferences, that there were answers, that there was, in fact, another Landing imminent. He had a flight out to the Bergid and back staring him in the face.

  He ate breakfast while he ran a voice-to-written copy of the tape, one of the mind-saving as well as finger-saving pieces of software he’d cajoled the censors into allowing across the strait. The program wasn’t worth using for dictation; he was far more fluent without thinking about it and the damn thing mistook phonemes with no consistency or logic whatsoever, that he could discover: it took more headwork to figure out what word in Mosphei’ the thing had distorted than it did to do it in the first place, but on a transcript of a considerable amount of recorded speech it was a help.

  Especially if it let the paidhi have breakfast while it ran. And a little fuss with spell-check and a visual onceover let him fix the truly inane conversions that had gotten past the software and send it through the second phase translation, that at least gave him a framework to render into atevi script.

  Half an hour’s work and he had two sets of copies: of the tape itself, for the Foreign Office, for his records, and for Hanks—With my compliments, he sent to Deana, expecting a retaliatory note. And, while he had a line to Mospheira, with his mother’s number: Drop me a line on the system. I’m worried about you.

  Of the translation—a copy first to Tabini, with: Aiji-ma, I find the tone and purpose encouraging. I have undertaken to meet their descent and to find a suitable landing site such as serves for the petal sails. I wonder is the plain below Taiben suitable and reasonable, being public land? To the hasdrawad: Nadiin, I present you the transcript of my first conversation with the chosen paidhi from the ship. I find him a personable and reasonable man. And to Ilisidi, with: One has reason to hope, nand’ dowager.

  To his own security, then, via the house security office: I am encouraged by the tone and content of my initial conversation I have had with this individual. I hope that he and his companion make a safe descent. I look forward to dealing with this gentleman.

  “This seems a judgment of feeling,” Tabini observed, when they had a chance, over lunch, to talk in Tabini’s apartment. “Not of fact. There is no actual undertaking on their part to perform in any significant regard—and they’re dealing with Mospheira. One would think they mean to bargain down to the last moment.”

  Right to the soft spot. Count on Tabini.

  “I’ve tried very analytically to abstract emotion from my judgment,” Bren said. “I agree that there’s a hazard in my interpretation: I’m apprehensive of my own instinctive reactions to the man I talked to, aiji-ma, and I’m trying to be extraordinarily cautious at each step. I do judge that these are brave people, which makes them valuable to their captain, there’s that about them: among humans, their willingness to take risk means either the risk is small, they’re sensation-seeking fools—neither of which I think is the case—or they’re people with an extraordinary sense of duty above self-interest.”

  “This man’chi-like ‘duty.’ To whom?”

  “That’s always the question, aiji-ma. They’re very plain-spoken, very forthcoming with their worries about the descent, their worries about being stranded down here. They asked straightforward questions … well, you’ll see when you read the transcript. We discussed landing sites. I did warn them very plainly they should land here rather than Mospheira, and that it was a matter of protocol. I hope I was convincing.”

  “This choice of Taiben,” Tabini said. It was a private lunch, only Eidi to serve them, while Tano waited outside with Tabini’s other security. The violence of the morning storms had passed and the daylight was, however gray, far stronger beyond the white gauze of the curtains. “Taiben—is an interesting idea. Among other sites with other advantages. Let’s see what the ship people think important. Speed of transport—Taiben certainly has. And with public lands, there’s no clearance to obtain.”

  “The south range is flat,” Bren said. “And unwooded. It’s a very dangerous thing they’re attempting. I’ve serious doubts they understand this technology very well. There’s a knack to stone axes, so I’m told, that makes it no sure thing for moderns to do.”

  “Why, do you think, they’ve no better choice?” Tabini asked. “Are these not the lords of technology? The explorers of the bounds of the universe?”

  “I find it—though it’s only a guess, aiji-ma—very logical that they have no means to go down into an atmosphere. Our ancestors left their home planet to build a station in space, not to land on a world. They certainly had no craft adequate when our ancestors wanted to come down here. The station folk refused to build one then: if they had, all of history would be different. And if the Pilots’ Guild had been willing to fly the craft, those who did land might have built better. The landing capsules, the p
etal sails, were the only alternative my ancestors had, then—and it’s ironic that they’re all that exist now.”

  “All this vast knowledge,” Tabini said, “and they fling themselves into the world like wi’itkitiin off the cliffs.”

  “Without even the ability to glide.” A thought came to him. “I halfway suspect they don’t know how to fly in air. It surely takes different skills. They wouldn’t be trained for it. Flaps and rudder. They don’t work in space.”

  “Meaning these lords of the universe can’t land? They only exist in space, where you say is no air, no breath at all? They’ve forgotten how to fly?”

  “In storms like this? There aren’t any in space, aiji-ma. Other things, other dangers, I’m sure—but weather and air currents have to be very different for them.”

  “Which means all the pilots that can navigate the air—are Mospheiran humans and atevi.”

  “Meaning that, yes, I would suspect so.”

  One saw the estimation of advantage dawning in Tabini’s eyes. Thought, and plan.

  “There is, then,” Tabini said, “—if one builds this go-and-return craft you talk about—a point at which it is actually an airplane, dependent on air and winds.”

  “Yes, aiji-ma.”

  “I like this notion, nand’ paidhi.”

  Nobody put anything over on Tabini. And one had to count on Tabini understanding exactly where his advantage was.

  They talked also about the office expenses. Tano had sent a proposed budget, and Tabini passed it off with, “Household expense. Doesn’t the Treaty say we would bear such expenses?”

  Household expenses. A member of the tashrid had that kind of staff. A lord of a province. The paidhi was embarrassed—literally—and said, “Thank you, aiji-ma,” very quietly, mentioning no more of it.

  Tano, meeting him at the door, simply said, “One thought so. The elderly retired gentleman will be very pleased. He’s of my clan.”

  “Ah,” Bren said. On Mospheira one called it nepotism. On the mainland, one was simply relieved one understood where man’chi lay, definitively and absolutely. No elderly retired gentleman would disgrace even a junior member of the Guild. “What is he retired from, actually, Tano-ji?”

  “He was Senior Director of External Communications for the Commission on Public Lands, and very skilled at politics,” Tano said. “The commission has very many serious disputes and inquiries.”

  “That seems appropriate,” he said. “I’m very grateful, Tano. I’ll meet with the people as soon as they’ve set up the office. Please tell them so. Does one send flowers?”

  “It’s not strictly required, but a felicitous arrangement and good wishes from the paidhi, also ribbons, if there were time—”

  “Can we do it now? Before the press conference?”

  “One could. I could find the ribbons. I could work the seal, nadi Bren.”

  One-handed sealing was a problem. But atevi set great store by cards, ribboned with the colors of office or rank, and stamped with official seals, as keepsakes, mementos of service or meeting.

  “We should have them for all the staff, too,” he decided. “Those that have served as well as those that will.”

  “That’s a good thought,” Tano said.

  “I wouldn’t offend the security staff if I gave them ribbons?”

  Tano looked actually shy, at the moment. “One would treasure such a gift, nand’ paidhi.”

  “You saved my life, Tano-ji. If ribbons would please you—by all means. Or anything else I can do.”

  “Nand’ paidhi,” Tano said, and caught-step and bowed as they walked the hall. “If you give a ribbon, my father will believe I’ve achieved distinction. Give me one for me to give to him, paidhi-ji, and I’ll hear no more of being an engineer.”

  Such gestures counted. He’d never thought of doing it for the staff, and wished he had. He had a list, by now, of people he should send cards to. Everyone on staff at Malguri. Certainly every man and woman who’d risked his life for the paidhi’s.

  That had grown, he realized with some dismay, to a very long list.

  14

  The reporters had notepads full of questions: having found a chance to have the paidhi-aiji alone to themselves in a room, they’d naturally come armed with very specific and sometimes unanswerable questions, such as, Where does the ship come from, nand’ paidhi? And: What does the ship want, nand’ paidhi?

  The first of which he couldn’t answer, and didn’t dare try to surmise: he didn’t want to touch the topic of stars and suns; he segued desperately to the second question, which he could answer honestly enough on a level anyone not on the ship could possibly know: “Nadiin, by all it’s said so far, the ship folk want the station restored to operation. They expected to find things the way they left them. And of course nothing’s the same, not even the station they expected to be waiting for them. They’re puzzled, and they’re trying to find out what’s happened to the world since they left.”

  He didn’t mention the ship’s desire to get a fair number of workers from the planet up to orbit, and left that to the reporters to ask if they thought of it. But one reporter asked how he viewed the Association’s economic outlook, and what the impact was on relations with Mospheira.

  To which he answered, “Nadiin, the Treaty was never more important to us or to Mospheira than it is now. Experience shows us how we can moderate the effects of change: history tells us that atevi will, in the long run, profit from this event, and the ones willing to research their investments thoroughly—I stress ‘thoroughly’—should fare very well in industry. Space science is not a new proposition in Shejidan. Many companies already have important positions in space-age manufacturing, communications, and commerce.

  “I also have a message for all the thousands of children who’ve written to the paidhi, asking if the machines will come down again or if the station will come down and shoot at people. And the answer is, No, the machines won’t come down. No one will shoot at anyone. Tabini-aiji and the ship captain and the President of Mospheira are all talking by radio about how to fix the space station so that people can live there again—as I hope some of you may live there when you’re grown. I’ve talked to a man on the ship who’ll come down very soon to live in the Bu-javid, and be paidhi for the ship and the atevi. He’s a young man, he’s quite pleasant and polite, and he wishes to help atevi and humans to build a ship that will fly back and forth between the station, something like an ordinary airplane. You may see this ship-paidhi soon on television. He’s been a teacher, just like your teachers in school, and he’s coming to learn about atevi so he can tell his people about you.

  “Ask your parents and your teachers about living in space, and what you’d do if you lived there and looked at the world every day from much higher up than an airplane flies. I may not be able to answer each and every letter you send to me, but I do thank you for writing and asking, nadiin-sai, thank you very much for your good questions.”

  He drew a deep breath. And thought—God help us. Where do you start with the kids? What are they seeing but invasions and battles on television?

  He said to the reporters, “Nadiin, please urge your station managers to think carefully what the children see on television, at least until the news is better. The paidhi asks this, on his own advice, no other.”

  “Bren-paidhi, what is this news about another paidhi?”

  “Two, actually, a man who’ll come to Shejidan and a woman who’ll go to Mospheira, each invited, each anxious and willing to assure a good relationship with the planet. Our talk was, as I’ve said to the children, pleasant, informative, and dwelt on the good of both humans and atevi. They’ve no other way at the moment to descend to the planet but to use the petal-sails our ancestors used. Only two such craft remain, and they’ll use one for the two of them to come down—as early as five days from now. It’s very dangerous, to my thinking, but perhaps ship folk believe they can moderate the dangers.”

  “Paidhi-ji, where will the
y come down?”

  “That’s under discussion. But they will land by official invitation, and I stress that only two people are landing, in a very fragile and navigationally helpless craft, and they’ll be here at the aiji’s request, observing all appropriate courtesy and respect of property and authority. That’s all I can tell you at the moment. Thank you for your questions, and please request another conference if you see that anything varies from what I’ve told you. I will hold a formal news conference as soon as I’ve met with these people, which I hope to do soon. Thank you.”

  “Paidhi-ma,” one said, and several bowed as he concluded the conference, as they would for a person of rank and substance, which the paidhi didn’t quite expect—so he thought he’d at least made the necessary point, and maybe satisfied the questions, and maybe calmed some fears. He didn’t know. But he returned the courtesies, and felt he’d escaped at least for a little while.

  He’d dodged around the one first question, the one that was a disaster waiting to happen—thank God no one had asked, specifically, How far did they come?

  But someone eventually would ask, besides lord Geigi. And since even atevi children worked sums in their heads very, very rapidly, once they had asked, as the average person didn’t ask, yet—not having much grasp of a larger universe—there was no stopping them.

  Not once the average atevi knew that the numbers of that wider universe were impacting their lives. Wait till the number-counters got their hands on those figures.

  He was still signing cards, late, still stamping and sealing, after a supper attended only by the servants, until he’d reached those for staff, the staff solemnly coming by fives to receive his formal thanks.

  Which seemed appropriate for the evening of a day—after which, he said to himself, he’d be so engaged in meetings and preparations he wouldn’t have time to draw breath. He wanted to acknowledge the staff.