The Canadian writer was still answering questions. She had infinite patience.
It also appeared that she spoke perfect Mandarin.
Abruptly, Xin Pang stood. “My friend, we have much to discuss.”
“She is not yet done.”
“She but indulges their fears now, but soothes the storm in their heads. I have no need of this. I am at peace, my friend.”
“Peace seems our only choice, and thus no choice at all.”
The Leader frowned. “Is the storm in your head at all peaceful, Liu Zhou? No, I thought not. You see? You do have a choice. Now, come to the Control Room. I would we speak again with Captain Shen. There is much to do.”
Belatedly, Liu Zhou realized that he had remained seated when his leader stood, a serious breach in protocol. He quickly straightened and bowed.
“Still you are troubled,” Xin Pang said.
“The new data on our computers, it is accessible to all.”
“Yes. Good. How many new bright young minds will attend to this new data? How many unexpected, wonderful innovations and improvements will we soon see, arising from such unexpected places?”
“All control is lost—”
“Yes, my friend.” Xin Pang smiled. “All control is lost.”
Seven tortured souls. Captain Shen would have imagined that they’d stick together, huddling to one another for the mutual support and, above all, the understanding they each needed. Instead, they mingled freely. They spontaneously hugged the captain’s soldiers, the women, and the scientists, even Shen himself. Such displays made him wary. Such displays made him forget who he was.
They had listened to the speech by Samantha August. Earth, their home, had never seemed so far away as it did now. Shen had led Hong Li and Quang out onto the lunar surface, and with a telescope they had found the array of twenty-two white spaceships now orbiting their home planet. They had then searched for the mobile shipyard approaching from the outer system, but failed in finding it. That was not particularly surprising.
The first man they’d rescued, Tony Newton, was a man who told many stories of his life and experiences in Alaska. His broken marriage. His failed gold prospecting ventures. His encounters with Bigfoot. The multiple abductions that had ruined his health.
Too honest, too forthright, too American for Captain Shen’s sensibilities, at least at first. Now, reluctantly, he was coming to admire those very same qualities.
People did what they needed to do in order to survive. It was the same no matter what country one called home. The conflict came in how one defined this notion of survival. Political, economic, spiritual. Needs clashed, threats loomed, and the impulse to strike before being struck drove all too much of humanity’s history at every scale, from one’s home to nations to between religions across the world.
Tony Newton believed in lizard people. During the worst of the abductions, he had tried to kill himself three times. Now he made his confession and then laughed, as if it had all been a huge joke.
Was he unhinged? If so, he had good reason to be.
Still, thus far he had beaten every opponent at chess. Handily. In the one game Shen had agreed to play, the captain had known he was finished after a mere eleven moves. Startling. Humbling.
When Samantha August made her speech at the UN, the seven survivors had listened carefully, and when it was finally done and the woman began taking questions, each survivor had wandered off, as if driven by a sudden need to be alone. Shen had no idea what that meant.
After a time, Tony Newton returned to where the chess board had been set up, and he began laying out the pieces. And Hong Li soon joined him. They were closely matched, but thus far each time Tony Newton had somehow pulled off a victory. During most of their games, they talked salmon fishing.
But not this time.
Tony said, “Take white, my friend. I’m feeling generous today.”
“You invite me into traps, you mean,” Hong Li replied. “You yield the initiative and choose only to react, and this lulls me into a sense of being in control. When, as I shall discover, I am not.”
“My wife liked checkers. How we ever got married I’ll never know. Still, I loved her, you know? Still do. Oh, and thanks for that feed—hadn’t talked to her in years. She made me cry, just the sound of her voice. And the history between us, I guess. I bawled and bawled.”
“I well recall. Did my presence shame you? If so, I apologize.”
“Nah, not a bit. I remember—vaguely—curling up like a baby in your arms when you first freed me. Way past shame, buddy. Now it’s just love, pure and simple. Check.”
Just like that. Not only did Tony Newton play fast, he could also say things that silenced everyone within range of hearing.
Of course, in this instance, love could be simple gratitude. There was good reason that salvation and worship often dwelt in the same sentence, the same thought. Shen was not a religious man. Well, he hadn’t been. Now he was not so sure. The world of black and white was gone, and no game of chess could change that.
“She’s a bit of a stunner,” Tony Newton now said.
“Excuse me, who?”
“That writer at the UN. The red-head. Sort’ve like Meryl Streep.”
“Samantha August. A Canadian. I have read her books.”
“Really? You allowed books in China?” The wink took the sting from the question.
“I read them when I lived in Vancouver,” Hong Li replied coyly. “Yes, she is attractive.”
“So they chased away the Greys. You know, that was all I needed to hear. About them. All any of us needed to hear.”
“Do you dream of revenge?”
“Nah. If I never see those Greys again I’ll die a happy man. No, let some whup-ass marines paint their numbers. And those other planets, being preyed on, shit, man, we gotta help them. You know? Listen, tell your boss—your leader down there—don’t fuck around with this. Get out there and kick some shit. Tell him that.”
Hong Li leaned back slightly and glanced over at Shen.
The captain smiled. He’d be happy to pass that request along.
“So,” said Hong Li, “you favor this Intervention, then.”
“Favor it? Man, we just got our asses saved, Hong Li. Big gold star on those babies, and for the red-head, an even bigger kiss.”
“Gold star?” Hong Li grinned. “Yes, we could go for that.”
“Oh? Oh! Your flag! Ha ha! Check and mate in four moves.”
A soldier came in to tell Shen that the Leader wished to discuss matters of grave importance. Nodding, Shen rose and headed out.
Tony Newton and six other tortured souls. They walked among his people like angels.
Alison Pinborough remembered their first meeting and it seemed the Prime Minister did as well, for she had invited the same people.
Mary Sparrow had never looked happier. She had just come from a Pow-wow that had taken place outside of Dauphin, Manitoba. There had been one evening celebrating the return of the buffalo, as the first ‘wild’ herd had been tracked by satellite moving into the southwestern corner of the province, along one of the Exclusion Zone tracks that projected northward all the way to the Duck Mountain Provincial Park (and what a traffic-snarling mess that had created!). All of fifty-three animals. But it was a start. Even better news for that province: Lake Winnipeg’s toxic brew of algae blooms—due to over-fertilization of the surrounding farm-land—was now over, and there had been a surge in fish-stocks in that huge, vital lake.
Will Camden, Minister of Natural Resources, had the bearing of a man with little to do. Extraction of minerals, logging, oil, and off-shore ocean harvests all continued, but in a constrained manner. There was little if any surplus and accordingly exports had dwindled, despite the legality of supply contracts and trade agreements. Few of those agreements were being called to count, as each nation found that in turning to its own needs, such needs could be met, and those that couldn’t no longer seemed essential when so many things were
simply appearing out of thin air.
That said, Will noted, manufacturing had slowed to a crawl. The days of producing sixty million new cars every year were gone. They weren’t needed. The only industry surging ahead at the moment was the production of EFFE conversion kits. The air was getting cleaner every day.
Alison had left her team of advisors back in Swift Current, where for the moment not much was happening, barring the unusual response of the visiting Americans, who were all packing up and going home.
America, as with China and Russia and India, had all been given an impressive vote of confidence. Samantha August had made it clear that these nations possessed all the wherewithal to merge almost seamlessly into this new age. More than that, she had pronounced her faith that the citizens of these powerful nations belonged to the very age that was coming, and that no one would be left behind.
Perhaps, Alison reflected, that was more faith than she would have accorded them. Science had been taking a beating in the States in the last few years. Opinions had ceased to require any buttress of demonstrable fact, or even veracity. Intelligence and stupidity existed on the same improbably (and unrealistically) level field of discourse.
Harsh judgments on her part, to be sure. But as with anyone whose pay-check was caught up in the political world, she kept her thoughts to herself.
Propaganda was a powerful tool. It was founded on the conviction by those in power that the majority of the citizens were idiots. Easily manipulated, easily convinced by statements which were patently absurd, even nonsensical. But it all depended upon control of the means of communication. That control no longer existed. Despite that, rubbish still flooded the media, still spewed across the web, still bleated from certain News networks. And it turned out that what people chose to believe was more powerful than the truth itself. They had been in an age of gullibility, and as a scientist, Alison had felt at a loss. No argument could sway those whose opinions had little to do with the subject itself, but everything to do with how they saw the world.
If freedom had an ugly side, this was it.
Then came the Intervention. The web suddenly found focus, and if that focus had begun with fear, it had since changed into something else.
Pundits wrote about it, talked about it, analyzed it from within and from without. Some days, it seemed that the entire web obsessively squinted at its own navel for hours on end. But the one question that could not be answered, the one that remained no matter how many articles and links and commentaries were devoted to it, was a simple one. What do we do now?
The Prime Minister had called them to this meeting chamber to replay the speech by Samantha August. Lisabet had also given them a copy of the address-to-the-nation that the SF writer Robert Sawyer had written for her. It was, in Alison’s judgement, a concise and profound call not just to Canadians but to all humanity.
The country known for its inclusivity was about to offer an embrace for everyone on the planet. That seemed … appropriate.
The video recording came to an end, that strange end that everyone had witnessed, as Samantha August, having exhausted all the questions from the floor—and clearly exhausted herself—slowly raised her hands, in a gesture that might have meant enough or was simply an involuntary act of surrender.
There had been no applause, but from outside the building, in the shadow of the Bird of Prey, a hundred thousand people roared. That sound had been disturbing at first. Outrage? Fury? Hate? Even the reporters on the ground didn’t seem to know.
But car horns had then sounded, rippling outward to engulf the entire city, and before long horns were bleating here in Ottawa, and in Toronto, in Vancouver, and, it was soon clear, in every city across the planet. Her species had surrendered its own voice to a frantic mechanical cry that hurt the ears.
That had shaken Alison to the core. She didn’t know what it meant. People interviewed in their cars didn’t, either. But shot after shot showed faces wet with tears.
“All right,” Lisabet said with a sigh. “Nothing she told us contradicts Sawyer’s speech. In fact, the two seem peculiarly in sync. Thematically unified. That’s good. That’s a relief. Meanwhile, the UN’s Emergency Session has been going on for seven hours straight now.”
Alison glanced at her watch and it confirmed her reason for feeling grainy eyed and worn out. It was four a.m.
“Latest report from Alex?” Will asked.
Alex Turnbill was Canada’s ambassador to the UN, a tall, thin career diplomat who reminded Alison of Peter Cushing, but without the fangs.
“They’re arguing over what to call it.”
Will grunted. “Call it Starfleet and be done with it.”
“A Charter is needed,” Lisabet said. “It needs to be clear but comprehensive. The lawyers have waded in.”
“And how patient is ET?” Mary wondered. “There needs to be progress on this. We can’t fuck this up.”
Lisabet rubbed at her eyes. “Urgency doesn’t fare well in a fug of exhaustion. I’d love to sleep but I’m too wired, and I suspect everyone at the UN is feeling the same.”
“Meanwhile,” said Will, “every human eager to kill something wants on those ships, and wants it now. Those Greys won’t know what’s hit them.”
“Any mission will have to be half military, half diplomatic,” said the Prime Minister. “It will have to have in place a procedure for initiating First Contact. And we, unfortunately, do not possess a Blanket Presence, or forcefields. We will likely arrive at planets consisting of multiple nations that might even be at war with each other.”
Lisabet Carboneau had been having conversations with SF writers. She was getting grounded in the complexities of what awaited them all. That was encouraging.
Will said, “This need-based economy smacks of communism. I guess China is smiling right now.”
“I doubt it,” Mary retorted. “They can’t oppress their own people any more, Will. Can’t shut down dissent. Can’t throw protestors in jail, or work-camps. China may well be the first major country to collapse. And every other repressive regime across the planet will be quick to follow.”
“She has a point,” conceded the Prime Minister. “Will, your ministry. It used to be governed in a complicated give and take system with corporate interests—no, don’t bother objecting. It stopped being about caring for the citizens of this country quite some time ago, and the argument about protecting jobs was just a sop and we both know it. But now, you need to start thinking about it in a different way. The nation’s resources are finite, and those that potentially aren’t finite—like forestry—need to be managed in the best interests of our people. We can no longer continue selling off those resources to private interests.”
“If we don’t,” Will said, his face reddening, “we might as well close up shop and go home, Madam Prime Minister.”
“Not at all. Industry still requires resources. That won’t change, nor should it. I wasn’t being clear enough in what I’m trying to say. I’ll try again: we can no longer continue selling the rights to our resources to private interests, because those interests do not necessarily have our best interests in mind. Nor should they be expected to. That’s our job. Protecting the best interests of our citizens.” She sat back in her chair. “Every government in the world is now facing the same crisis. What does governing mean? What responsibilities are entailed in such a privileged position? When do we lead and when do we step back?” She tapped her copy of the speech she was about to make. “There exists a covenant between those who govern and those who are governed. That covenant needs to be articulated again. In fact, it may need to be redefined. Going right back to the beginning, to those first products of communication between societies and within society.”
“You expect a consensus on how we are to be governed? From the people?” Will shook his head. “It won’t happen. Up until this Intervention, we’d been heading in the opposite direction. More divisive than ever, and it was getting worse and worse.”
“Yes. It
was.”
They were silent then, each mired in their own thoughts, their own fears. Or so Alison assumed, since the strange dread she was feeling looked to be mirrored on the faces of those around her.
Then Mary cleared her throat. “Well, have we come to this, then?”
“Mary?” asked Lisabet.
“The one submission no politician has ever made. When all is said and done, we throw away every other belief. We surrender to having faith in the people.”
“Oh,” muttered Will, “God help us.”
Ronald and Emily had remained with Hamish to witness his wife’s address to the people of Earth. It had been an emotional time for the now-forcibly retired doctor, and at times he would involuntarily stand and begin pacing, or simply move from one part of the living room to another, always watching the screen, always with his gaze fixed on his wife.
After they had watched Samantha leave the building, watched as a column of blinding white light swallowed her up in the midst of tens of thousands of shouting, banner-waving people, watched as the giant Bird of Prey then began rising straight up, silent as a balloon, and continued rising until it was lost from sight, through all of this they had said nothing, as if every possible word had already been expended.
And then on the television the car horns had begun, and before long they were blaring in the city of Victoria as well. What did it signify? Defiance? Surrender? Celebration?
Hamish had gone into the kitchen and returned with three tumblers of single malt. The whiskies seemed to sweep away the strange silence that had taken them all.
“She did well,” Hamish said. “Sam did very well.”
“She threw down a gauntlet is what she did,” Emily replied, sniffing uncertainly at her drink. She wasn’t a fan of scotch, but she sipped nonetheless, making a face afterward that reached right through to Ronald’s heart. “Some people recoil when faced with compassion, especially when it arrives so unconditionally.”
Hamish regarded her. “You are expecting resistance?”
Rejoice, a Knife to the Heart Page 40