External Relations

by Pam Uphoff

  Was it just the fading away of the memories of the Prophets?

  Perhaps it was the sheer number of Oners. Perhaps they couldn't collect any more minds.

  Ajha leaned back and frowned at the ceiling. If we're too big, does that mean it's time to die, or time to split? To reproduce by fission? Had the cabal had the right idea, and executed it the wrong way? We could be like a coral reef. Each similar, each separate. Budding off and forming new structures. But together, spontaneously forming huge reefs. Active, rich in life, beautiful. All together, and each separate.

  "The main problem with being a former Philosopher of the One is that you never seem to stop thinking of strange things that probably ought to get you executed."

  Nothing but silence from Qeez.

  He cued up the personnel lists and asked for all field qualified people in the former joint division. He needed to promote some people to Team Leader. And he needed a broad range of specialties. He started sorting them out.

  He glanced up at a perfunctory knock . Kael, of course.

  "Subdirector."

  She showed teeth. "Subdirector."

  "I'm going through the personnel lists, looking for the best people to reassign to Action specialties."

  She eyed him narrowly.

  He cleared his throat. "When I was an Exploration Senior Admin, I split the . . . more aggressive types up. Ebko reshuffled a lot of them, but there are still a lot of people more suited to Action than Exploration scattered through the remaining teams. So perhaps we should pull them out now and put them together. All the teams are going to get shaken up." He scowled, figured out how to get his computer to talk to this office's net, and switched his comp to the display on the wall.

  "We've got nineteen current experienced team leaders, between us. I've marked yours in red, five of mine who are simply not suitable for Action in green. The yellows could do either. The purple ticks are people I'm prepared to promote to Team Leader. I haven't gotten around to looking at all the experienced field people who could be reassigned from desk or lab jobs."

  "Humph. You're as sensible and logical as a woman." Kael eyed the list and nodded. "I've worked with a couple of your yellows. And I'd promote . . . " She got out her own comp and they started comparing lists.

  In the end they came up with twenty-two teams. Fifteen were Action specialist, and seven Exploration.

  "That works for me. We're short about seventy people to fill out the teams, but we can reassign people with field experience, and train up the people who are field qualified but who've never gotten across." Ajha started approving specific assignments. "I'd like twelve teams so I can cover everything, but I rarely need full eight man teams. Then multiple teams for larger projects. I'll identify some new leaders and boot some desk jockeys out for the science support teams. I don't like outside hires for teams . . . but maybe we can persuade the Directorate School to push more people into Teams."

  She huffed out a breath. "And I thought you were going to be difficult to work with."

  "Oh, I can see the big picture. And frankly, with the Helios problem so very reduced, we had more teams than we needed. This will be about right. Five fewer for you, and one less for me, but I'll split mine up smaller as I pull in more people. And don't think I won't yell for Action Teams when I've got a batch of idiot scientists heading for dangerous worlds."

  Kael grunted. "Indeed. Ordinarily you don't need quite the level of expertise in mayhem that I need. So . . . are we going to fight over Ebsa and Ra'd?"

  "I think Ajki was getting them out of the way. . . Ra'd's on Embassy for Intel right now, and I've lost track of Ebsa." Ajha glanced at the wall, where Ebsa was ticked off in purple. "If Director Izzo will reassign them, yes, we're going to fight over them."

  She showed teeth.

  "Ra'd . . . is never going to fit a normal team. But Ra’d and Ebsa together are an incredible two man team. I think we should admit that, and keep them together as a small team. Then both of us can use them as needed."

  Kael paused . . . nodded. "True. Ra'd's the most competent piece of trouble I've ever seen. But occasionally I'll need that sharpshooter and his very clever pal."

  "I want them for first across, which in most cases are just two or three month assignments. So they'll be cycling back through regularly. And rescues, hopefully rarely needed."

  "Indeed. Let's try it that way, for now." Sharp smile. "We might even let Intel have them, now and then."

  "So . . . Action team numbers are mostly one through twenty-nine. Info are all in the thirties, Exploration the forties. Let's designate Ra'd and Ebsa as team fifty. Ambiguous." Ajha grinned. "Or we could go the other direction and make them Team Zero."

  Snort. "Now that you're a subdirector, you'd better report to medical and get that sense of humor removed. It's not allowed, you know."

  "Oh, come now, I always thought Ajki managed fairly well." He bit his lip. "I have some other people I might just assign to Team Fifty as well. You never know when you'll need a hacker or a medic."

  "Indeed? Perhaps we should call them Team Buffet. Take only what you want." Kael stood. "A pleasure doing business with you, Subdirector. Why don't we let the personnel department deal with splitting the office staff? The support staff is probably going to be tedious."

  "Umm. And then the fight for office space."

  Kael snorted. "I'm moving into Ebko's office in the Southeast corner. Why don't you grab southwest? Move the walls for a proper executive office. We can keep the big conference room between us, and that wasted space of a reception area can easily house a receptionist on either side."

  Ajha nodded. "Then my people up the west side, yours up the east, and we can fight over who gets how much of the north. Pleasure doing business with you, Subdirector." Ajha sighed in relief. Moving day! I can ignore everything for . . . well, a couple of hours.

  Kael nodded and stalked out.

  "Queen? You and Fean want to handle moving all my stuff up from downstairs?"

  "Yes, One. An excellent bit of cooperation, if I may say so."

  "You may. I think . . . I will circulate a bit and talk to people."

  He wandered the halls first. Lots of empty offices. Thank the One mostly retired. Mind, you, Kael and I are both moving into dead men's offices. Heh. I get two of them.

  The staff was relieved that he and Kael were cooperating. He set one of his new underlings to making a list of who preferred Exploration, and who Action, and told him to find out who in personnel was going to be reassigning people, and to give him or her the list.

  Then he headed for the Team offices and barracks, inside the gate security area. Four of the old teams were still out in the field. He talked to all the rest of the team leaders, and some of the people he wanted to promote, and let them know a shake up and reorganization was going to hit them, probably by tomorrow at the latest. He broadcast the tentative assignments. "Might as well make changes now, as later, if there are people who just don't get along."

  Kael joined them, they all wound up lunching together, beating things into shape.

  When they finally split, all the field people were noticeably happier. This is going to work.

  ***

  Ajha's new, ridiculously large office had a view over the gate grounds to the south and Gate City to the West. And absolutely nothing beyond. No mountains at all here on the plains. He turned his back on the view and contemplated the work he needed done. Hob, thank the One, had finished hacking into A&E's database, and all the former employees' files.

  He had three inhabited worlds that needed early studies. One Colony Prospect, two Dinosaur Worlds, and three Pleistocene Megafauna Worlds. A couple of early biota worlds – not a lot of land animals yet, but the plants were flourishing, the seas filled with interesting things. He even had an X World – where a civilization had died.

  For the populated worlds, Arzo, Ylki and Izma all had Contact training, they could just slip in and study the people. Then either drop those worlds or turn them ove
r to Intel, to infiltrate and study from the inside for a year or two, then recommend diplomacy and trade—or not.

  He had a pack of scientists out on one Dinosaur World. The Exploration team there had been thrown together in desperation, and turned into hard working experts. Was it luck, or divine providence that sent Ebsa and Ra'd to that team? They trained the rest of the team in how to survive dinosaurs and keep their scientists both happy and alive. Now the rest of the team has had nearly two years together, and not had a single scientist eaten by a dinosaur. Or Helaos.

  I'll send another team to double up with them for a month, to see how a good setup works, before I send them off to the other Dinosaur World to set up their own base of operations. Enda has always had visions of being a Big Game Hunter. He is about to get his wish.

  He was going to need lots of good shooters for there and the two Pleistocene worlds. That wouldn't be a problem, all teamers had weapons proficiencies. But they needed scientific backup. Geologists, mainly, to find out if there were minerals enough to make the danger worth it.

  Fewer shooters and more scientists for the other worlds. They'd be looking at colonization prospects, as well as minerals. Idre and Egto would be good for those, just good solid guarding and helping the scientists, no human complications. Ajha sorted the lists of those who'd indicated job mobility within the Exterior Directorate. The list was fairly short; people were tending to hunker down and mind their own business after the trials and executions. But Baik was there. Good solid scientist, that girl. Not sure she's had enough experience to be a team leader, though.

  Project Dystopia. And who, besides me, would like to analyze a failed civilization?

  "Damn, this is a big project, over a hundred people across, most of them either directorate or university scientists . . .

  "And there's Iqgu with a double sized Action Team, providing security. One of Kael's leaders and a couple she may promote.

  "So how dangerous is it? And is it going to be my job to protect it or Kael's? Must be dangerous, else they wouldn't need the double team . . . " He hunted through several strangers' files and found no reports since . . . three months ago. Almost four. "That's . . . a little alarming."

  Pity Ebko was so efficient at erasing his tracks. Thank the One some of his people were less efficient at it. Else I'd be floundering even worse.

  He called up the gate log . . . Stabbed at his comm and got the gate trackers . . ."World X 22845. How much traffic do you have through . . . you closed the gate? You got Disco out to close the gate . . ."

  "No, Subdirector. When they opened the gate, they emplaced an experimental device we could use to close the gate ourselves. They put it on that gate because of the . . . dangerous biota."

  Ajha bit his lip. "Well, that is interesting. I take it, it worked? After you evacuated the project personnel . . ."

  "No." Irritation warred with trepidation on the other end of the connection. "We sent the reports to . . . Ebko . . . er . . ."

  Ajha found himself on his feet leaning close to the comm on the desk. "Let's be clear here. Are you telling me that you marooned over a hundred people, most of them civilians, four months ago?"

  He caught movement from the corner of his eye. Kael.

  She mouthed "Dystopia?"

  He nodded. The voice on the other end sounded distracted. A bit away from the pickup, he caught a faint ". . . eaten by giant what?" and then, clearly. "Subdirector? The gate was under military guard. Our records show that the gate was closed to prevent biological contamination after three fatalities. They report that they lost contact with the Project after they detected a large explosion from the camp."

  "Did they check the camp?"

  "There's . . . nothing in their report to indicate that they did so."

  "Did they . . . can they reopen the gate?"

  "No. Umm, I see a notation that we removed our beacon once the permanent gate was in place. They're expensive, you know!"

  Ajha stared at the phone. "This should be huge news. And you reported this to . . . someone who's dead. Who was probably busy plotting a rebellion at the time. Right. Shoot a copy of everything you have to me, to Subdirector Kael, and Director Izzo. Thank you." He clicked off and looked at Kael.

  "I was hoping you had information about them." She scowled. "Do we need Disco?"

  "Yep. Would you like to come meet some of the people there."

  Snort. "I hope you don't think I'll drool over Wolfson."

  He failed to resist. "Well, maybe Q." His mail pinged and he looked over the list of files. Opened personnel. He scrolled down the list . . . "Oh. Shit."

  "What?" Kael leaned to read . . . "The President's daughter? Crap."

  "Yeah." Ajha tapped at his comm. "Izzo? In tracking down our scattered personnel, Kael and I have discovered that a large science party was marooned four months ago. We're going to go talk to Disco about finding it."

  "Is it an emergency?"

  "Yes. I'm surprised the President isn't wondering why he hasn't heard from Paer."

  "Oh . . . meet you downstairs."

  The director's limo was waved through ahead of all the other traffic, not that there was much . . . and waved out of the embassy yard without delay, and by the time the three of them had made it up the stairs of Disco (Kael, with lowered brows, scowling at the atmosphere) Xen was at the doors, waiting for them.

  "Actually we need Q." Ajha glanced right, toward the exploration side of the building. "Or maybe both of you."

  "Oh?" Wolfson didn't even glance that direction, but Q came trotting down the stairs. "What's the problem?"

  "We've marooned over a hundred people." Ajha nodded to Q. "That dead civilization world, where you installed some sort of gate closer. Apparently there was some sort of biological emergency. Four months ago. And . . . Paer is over there."

  The air chilled noticeably.

  Ajha eyed the man . . . no, not him . . . He turned. Ra'd in civilian clothes, Nighthawk on his heels. He turned back to the Comet Fall pair. "So we need a gate, probably through an empty world for quarantine. If you can find that world again."

  Q nodded. "No problem. Let's go." She eeled past them and out the front doors.

  Izzo waved them all after her. "I love the way you guys just dive into things, no arguments, no persuasion needed."

  "No orders . . . "

  Ajha glanced over and spotted Inso, the retired Director of Interior, and now the off-and-on Director of Disco, trotting down the stairs.

  "Don't even bother to tell the Boss . . . " The old man grinned. "I love the pair of them to bits and pieces, even when I want to strangle them. Tell me all about it."

  Izzo snorted. "A large science party marooned. At first guess, Ebko either manufactured a reason to close the gate, or when it happened, realized how handy a timely release of the information might be if he needed a distraction. So no one was ever informed that we'd lost a large project—including the president's daughter."

  "Oh. One. Izzo, not that I have any authority whatsoever, but please, will you keep the politics out of the directorate?"

  "Doing my best."

  They walked down to find Q and Xen getting up off the ground and walking through a gate arch.

  The world on the far side was all barren rock.

  "I think a corridor, in case it's an airborne contagion." Q walked off to the side, and everyone but Xen followed her.

  Izzo looked back, to see an arch of rocks rising from the ground at a wave of the wizard's arm. Marking the gate. Good plan. By the time he'd caught up with the rest, Q had an even larger arch of rocks framing a bronze surface. She stepped into it, shrinking in a few steps to a dot, making his brain hurt while his eyes tried to work out the perspective. A bright light, suddenly expanding, with a full sized Q silhouetted against it.

  "She can throw the far end of a bubble a couple hundred miles without raising a sweat. I'm lucky to get half that." Xen shook his head and stepped through.

  They all trailed along like little
ducklings.

  And watched them sit down and open a gate to a blast furnace.

  They scrambled to either side, gate makers and observers alike.

  "Hundred and forty degrees, easily."

  A snort from Ra'd. "Farenheit."

  Izzo blinked at Xen, then remembered the calculations. "Umm, what we'd call sixty degrees, I think. Centigrade."

  Ajha squinted against the blast of hot air. "There's something moving . . . a crawler."

  Xen and Q sparkled with sudden shields as they grabbed the insubstantial sides of the gate and shoved it into the ground, so the wheels had clearance. Leaped through and . . . probably did the same to the other end. They staggered back through, and stepped out of the way as the crawler lined up and drove through.

  A familiar face in the driver's seat. Ebsa. Maybe I ought to have checked the whole list.

  The metal sides of the big cylindrical vehicle radiated heat. It turned to get out of the approach, and the side door popped open.

  Paer! Ajha sagged in relief.

  "Close the gate! We've got everyone else bagged up."

  Q sat off to the side, and a few moments later the hot wind died, disappeared.

  Paer jumped out without touching the outside of the crawler. Sweaty, sunburned. Grinning. "We figured any gate connection would be here, at the old gate site. We traded off, who got to sweat . . . we were just wondering if it was time to bubble the whole crawler and hope anyone who came would be able to see the bubble, when we spotted the gate opening."

  Ebsa jumped out, two bottles in hand. He handed one to Paer. "We've been rationing water. And . . . we've got whole buildings holding over a hundred people all of which needs decontamination."

  "Oh, yes. I didn't hear any details about this biological emergency." Ajha raised his eyebrows.

  "Insects and arachnids. Size large to Oh-my-One!!!!! And any eggs they might have laid. The reptiles, amphibians, and rodents were all large enough that I doubt any have hitchhiked along with us." Ebsa grinned. "And the elves went home before the heatwave hit."