The Green And The Gray

by Timothy Zahn

  "Fine," Roger said. "Hold onto your own personal hatred, if you insist. But there's no reason to saddle your children and grandchildren with it, too."

  "The children will go where the adults lead," Halfdan said sourly. "Especially Green children."

  "Maybe," Roger said. "But maybe not. Let me tell you about a couple of idealistic young kids named Jordan Anderson and Melantha Green."

  He related the story of the accidental meeting between the young Green and Gray, the tentative development of their secret friendship, and the eventual expansion of that friendship to their families. Through it all, his audience listened in stony silence.

  "So that's what happened," Torvald murmured when Roger had finished. "I'd wondered how Melantha's family could have persuaded a Gray like Jonah McClung to rescue her that night."

  "He did it because she and Jordan were friends," Roger said. "If your own history doesn't convince you that you can live in peace, maybe that will."

  He looked at Halfdan. "Not just in a state of truce, either, with both sides poised for war but knowing they can't win," he added. "I mean a real, genuine, stable peace."

  "It's easy for you to talk peace," Aleksander growled. "Easy for Melantha and Jordan, too. None of you ever saw the results of Gray treachery."

  "It was Green treachery that started the war," Halfdan countered.

  "There was no treachery!" Roger snarled, suddenly sick of the whole argument. "The fire was started by dry lightning. The Grays fired into the trees trying to create a firebreak. The Greens attacked the cliffs thinking the Grays were shooting at them. The whole thing was a massive, stupid mistake."

  "How dare you talk about us this way?" Aleksander demanded, half-rising from his seat as if preparing to attack Roger bodily. "How dare you pass judgment on things you have no knowledge of?"

  "Besides, if it was a mistake why didn't anyone back then figure it out?" Torvald added.

  Roger took a careful breath, pushing away his frustration and forcing himself back into control.

  They'd reached the crux of the matter, and the last thing he could afford was to let his emotions obscure their chance of understanding. "That is the question, isn't it?" he agreed. "And that brings me to my final point... because the fact of the matter is, they did."

  He looked at the Greens. "Tell me, Aleksander. How did you and your people get here?"

  "In our transport, of course," Aleksander said. "I thought you said Velovsky told you everything."

  "Yes, he did," Roger acknowledged, turning to the Grays. "And you?"

  "Both our peoples had transports," Torvald said. "You should know—you and your friends had a brief tour of ours."

  "They what?" Halfdan asked, frowning at his brother. "When?"

  "Last night," Roger said before Torvald could answer. "We went there to get Melantha."

  Cyril inhaled sharply. "Torvald had her?"

  "And you have her back?" Aleksander demanded.

  "We have her, and she's safe," Roger assured him. "And before you ask, Torvald treated her quite well. Better than certain others of you would have, I might add. The point is that Velovsky was with us on this little expedition, and while we were there he did something that finally put me on the right track."

  He looked over at the old man. "Do you remember pausing at that last T-junction before we found Melantha? We were going to go right, but you told us to go left."

  "Of course I remember," Velovsky said, a little stiffly. "And I was right."

  "You were indeed," Roger said, nodding. "We found her in the aft passenger compartment." He lifted his eyebrows. "The question is, how did you know she was back there?"

  Velovsky frowned. "I don't understand."

  "My assumption at the time was that your close contact with Leader Elymas back on Ellis Island had sensitized you to Green telepathic communications," Roger said. "My wife has developed some of that talent, too, thanks to Cyril's attempt to use his Persuader's Gift on her."

  "But that wasn't it?" Torvald asked, his voice suddenly tight.

  Roger shook his head. "We arrived to find Melantha just waking up," he said. "Aleksander had already told us that Greens don't simply broadcast their presence, like sonar beacons or something.

  But if she was asleep, she wasn't talking, and he couldn't have heard her. And Velovsky had never been aboard the Gray transport, so he couldn't have known where that passenger compartment was."

  He paused. "Or could he?"

  No one spoke. For a moment Roger looked around at them, noting the frowns and puzzlement on their faces. They weren't getting it, or else were refusing to get it. "Cyril, I'll be the first to agree that your people have amazing Gifts," he said, turning to the four Greens sitting stiffly in their little cluster. "But I've yet to see anything mechanical or electronic that you've built. So tell me: who built your transport?"

  "No," Cyril whispered. "You're wrong."

  "And you," Roger continued, turning to Halfdan and Torvald. "Your people could probably have designed and built that transport in your sleep. But how did you throw it five thousand years into the future?"

  "I'll be damned," Fierenzo said, sounding stunned. "The Grays built both transports... and the Greens sent both of them here?"

  "Exactly," Roger said, feeling an odd surge of relief now that it was finally out in the open. "That's how Velovsky knew his way around the Gray transport. It was identical to the Greens', which he'd been aboard any number of times."

  He looked back and forth between the two groups. "Don't you get it? This whole thing was a joint mission, put together to get a remnant of both your peoples away from a war that no one wanted but that no one could stop. The Gray mechanics built both transports, and the Green Farseers and Groundshakers sent both of them on their way. That's why you both ended up here, outside New York City. The whole idea was that you were supposed to live together."

  "If that was true, why didn't anyone tell us?" Sylvia spoke up. "Why didn't anyone aboard the transports even know about it?"

  "Battery Park," Torvald murmured.

  They all looked at him. "What?" Cyril asked.

  "You remember, Halfdan," Torvald said, turning to his brother. "On the first Sunday of every month, Dad always went out alone, early in the morning, to go sit in Battery Park. He never came home until after sunset." He looked with sudden understanding at Roger. "And he always seemed somehow sad."

  Roger shook his head. "I'm sorry. I don't see the connection."

  "I do," Caroline said suddenly. "He was waiting for Leader Elymas, wasn't he? It was a prearranged rendezvous, a time and place for them to make contact once both of you were settled and Elymas judged his people were ready."

  "I think you're right," Torvald said. "Only Elymas never came, because he was already dead."

  "And of course, none of the other Greens knew anything about the plan," Roger said, nodding heavily. "So your father died thinking the Greens had decided they didn't want anything to do with you."

  "It's a nice theory, Roger," Aleksander said. "But that's all it is: a theory. You have no proof of any of this."

  "Actually," Roger said, "I do."

  He gestured toward Velovsky. "That's the real reason I asked Mr. Velovsky to join us here tonight.

  When you first arrived, Elymas gave him an instant telepathic rundown of who and what you were and what you were doing here. I gather it wasn't something a Leader had ever done before, and it affected him so badly that it may be part of what killed him."

  "You aren't suggesting Velovsky can tell us what Leader Elymas was thinking, are you?" Nikolos scoffed.

  "That's exactly what I'm suggesting," Roger said, looking back at Velovsky. "Mr. Velovsky? The floor's yours."

  Velovsky shook his head. "No," he said.

  Roger blinked. He'd been prepared for doubt on Velovsky's part over this part of the scheme, or hesitation or disbelief or even denial. But a flat-out refusal was a response he'd never even considered. "Excuse me?" he asked carefully.

/>   "I said no," Velovsky said firmly. "It's ridiculous and stupid, and it was a long time ago. And I'm not going to do it."

  Roger shot a glance at Caroline, saw his surprise and consternation mirrored in her expression. "Why not?" she asked, leaning forward a little to look the old man more fully in the eye. "All we're asking you to do is try. Won't you at least try?"

  Velovsky folded his arms across his chest. "No," he said.

  "Well, in that case, I'd say the festivities are over," Aleksander said, getting to his feet. "If you'll call off your dogs, Detective, we'll be on our way."

  "Just cool it just a minute," Fierenzo growled. "Look, Velovsky, I don't know what game you're playing, but it ends now. Tell us what Elymas had in mind, or I'll have you up on so many charges it'll make your head unscrew at the neck."

  "Leave him alone," Cyril said sharply, standing up beside Aleksander. "He's said he isn't going to talk. Creating phony charges isn't going to get you anywhere."

  "Phony like hell," Fierenzo retorted, shifting his glare to the Greens. "You're about to start a war.

  Velovsky is preventing us from stopping that war. That's obstruction of justice, failure to cooperate with an official investigation, conspiracy to commit multiple assault and homicide—"

  "All right!" Velovsky snapped, jumping to his feet, his thin hands curling into thin fists at his sides.

  "You want to know what Leader Elymas thought? I'll tell you what he thought. He was full of hopes and dreams: a desire for a new life for his people in this new world, a place where they could live in peace and harmony."

  He turned aching eyes on Roger. "But beneath all of that," he added, his voice trembling, "there was an undercurrent of hostility and hatred at what had been done to them in the Valley."

  He took a deep breath, let it out in a sigh. "Leader Elymas didn't want peace with the Grays, Roger," he said. "He wanted to kill them all."

  For a frozen moment in time the room was filled with a bitter-edged silence. Caroline stared at Velovsky, his words echoing through her mind like a death sentence. Death for the Greens and the Grays, for Melantha, possibly for the entire city.

  "But that's impossible," she heard Roger say.

  Tearing her eyes away from Velovsky, she focused on her husband. He was just standing there, frozen with the rest of the universe, his face looking like that of a lost child. He'd worked so hard on this, with all his hopes and thoughts concentrated into this single moment.

  But that hope had been in vain. Here at the end, it had all come tumbling down around him like a house of cards.

  And then, even as she looked at him, something stirred deep inside her. No—he wasn't wrong. He couldn't be. She might not have been able to create the same train of logic that he had, but she had certainly been able to follow it. Velovsky had to be lying.

  But why? Did he genuinely want war between his old friends and the Grays? Certainly he'd sounded aggressive enough when he'd first told them the story. He'd as much as admitted, in fact, that he was on Aleksander's side of the conflict.

  But that was when it had been a question of Melantha living or dying, and how that would affect the balance of power. Surely now that he'd heard Roger's arguments—now that he'd seen in Melantha and Jordan that peace was possible—surely he wouldn't deliberately let a war begin. Had he been so blindly influenced by Aleksander's opinions that he couldn't think for himself anymore?

  Her eyes drifted away from her husband as she suddenly understood. No, not Aleksander's opinions... "Just a minute," she spoke up as Aleksander threw a final look at Velovsky and started down the steps. "Please. Just one more minute."

  "And what would you presume to add to this discussion?" Aleksander asked contemptuously over his shoulder.

  "It wasn't Leader Elymas who hated the Grays and wanted them dead," she said. "It was someone else."

  Aleksander turned to look at her, taking two more steps before reluctantly coming to a halt.

  "Velovsky just said it was him."

  "He was wrong," Caroline said. "Yes, most of what he got was from Leader Elymas. But not the hatred. That leaked in from the other Persuader."

  "What are you talking about?" Cyril demanded. "There weren't any other Persuaders on the transport."

  "What about you two?" Roger asked.

  "I was only ten," Cyril told him. "Aleksander was seven. Our Gifts hadn't even begun to show, much less been confirmed."

  "Nevertheless, there was another Persuader present," Caroline said. "One who was never identified as such, thanks to a group of Command-Tacticians who were suspicious of Leader Elymas's motives.

  A Persuader who has maintained that same deception ever since."

  Deliberately, she shifted her gaze to Nikolos. "A Persuader," she added quietly, "who was standing right beside Leader Elymas, in perfect position to poison his father's communication."

  Velovsky inhaled sharply. "Nikolos?"

  "Don't be ridiculous," Aleksander said with a snort. But his eyes were on Nikolos, and there were hard wrinkles creasing his cheeks.

  "But that would be..." Cyril stopped abruptly.

  "What he did, he did for the best," Caroline said. "At least, that's what he was told."

  "That's why they sent all the extra Warriors along," Sylvia murmured, as if a long-standing question had just found an answer. "And why they insisted I keep Nikolos's true Gift a secret. They wanted a counterweight to Elymas, someone who hated the Grays as much as they did."

  "These are all fascinating suppositions," Nikolos said, standing up. "But no matter how clever your logic, there's still no way for Velovsky to prove that my father wanted peace with our enemies."

  "Sure he can," Roger said, flashing a quick, desperate look at Caroline. "If he can sort out the memories, he can figure out which ones came from each of you."

  Nikolos shook his head. "You're arguing in circles," he said. "In order to do that, he has to begin by assuming the memories that involve hatred of the Grays came from me, which is precisely what you're trying to prove."

  "Maybe he doesn't have to prove anything," Caroline said slowly. The wildest, most lunatic idea she'd ever had in her life had suddenly occurred to her. A desperate idea; but she could see no other way. "Tell me again why the Greens are split over whose decisions to follow."

  "It's because we have no Leader," Cyril said. "You know that."

  "Yes," Caroline agreed. "But what if you did have one? Would everyone obey his commands?"

  "What are you suggesting?" Nikolos demanded suspiciously. "That we should all just sit and wait for the next Leader to arise?"

  "I'm saying you already have one." Caroline looked at Velovsky. "Namely, the memories and thoughts and dreams of Leader Elymas that reside within Mr. Velovsky."

  Nikolos threw back his head and gave a bark of laughter. "Of course," he said. "Silly me—why didn't I see it sooner? Of course we should let a Human lead us."

  "Why not?" Roger said, jumping in to Caroline's support. "If Elymas was here, he'd be your Leader, right?"

  "A Leader is by definition a Green," Cyril said tartly. "He or she must have both the Gifts of Persuader and Visionary. Velovsky has neither."

  "Of course there are physiological limitations," Roger said. "But he does have Elymas's memories and probably a lot of his personality. He should be able to give you a good idea of what Elymas would have decided in any given situation. Certainly better than you or Nikolos or Aleksander could."

  "Now you've crossed the line to insulting," Cyril said with a sniff. "This meeting is over."

  "Just a minute," Caroline said.

  "You keep asking for minutes," Aleksander said. "I'm sorry, but your minutes are up."

  "I wasn't talking to you," Caroline said calmly. "I was talking to Sylvia."

  That got their attention. "Sylvia?" Aleksander repeated, turning and frowning at her. "What does she have to do with this?"

  "Everything," Caroline said, mentally crossing her fingers. "Because Sylvia is the only one
of you we have to convince."

  "What are you talking about?" Cyril demanded, sounding more bewildered than angry. "She's not a Persuader or a Leader."

  "No," Caroline agreed. "But she's the Command-Tactician, in charge of your Warriors. If she agrees that Leader Elymas didn't want war, there won't be one."

  "She can't decide that on her own," Nikolos insisted, all but sputtering. "The Command-Tactician is under the strict authority of the Leader."

  "Exactly." Caroline looked at Sylvia. "Well, Sylvia? You once told me your job was to do whatever was necessary to give your people their best chance to survive. Was that true? Or is it war that you really want?"

  Slowly, her eyes on Caroline, Sylvia rose to her feet. She walked over to where Velovsky still stood on the steps, and for a moment looked him up and down. "Ti larocel spiroce," she said.

  He seemed taken aback. "What?"

  "If you claim to hold Leader Elymas's memories, you surely understand Kailisti," she pointed out calmly. "Ti larocel spiroce."

  Velovsky licked his lips and threw Roger a furtive look. "Uh..."

  "Ti larocel spiroce," Sylvia repeated.

  "Yes, yes, I know," Velovsky snapped peevishly. "Let me think, will you?"

  "This is ridiculous," Nikolos growled, gesturing toward the door. "Sylvia, we're leaving."

  Sylvia didn't move. "Ti larocel spiroce."

  "Ti larocel spiroce," Velovsky muttered. "Ti larocel spiroce. Ti larocel spiroce..."

  Abruptly, he cocked his head to the side. "Right. Right. Let's see: Doub—doubul—no; dobulocel dinzin ehi blyi," he said, fighting the syllables as if he was wrestling small alligators.

  Sylvia nodded slightly. "Quis el ekt thi semutom," she said.

  "Right," Velovsky said. "Uh... dyi tu el stel eruyn-ehi currti?"

  "Noni epethitoc dobito ampethitoc ruslir sketi," Sylvia said, the words starting to come faster now.

  Velovsky drew himself up to his full height. "Eoth merkidi prupin-ota," he said. "Prucrest onistom slyth."

  Caroline felt a whisper of air beside her, and turned to see Fierenzo come up to her side. "Any idea what they're saying?" he asked quietly.

  "Not a clue," she said. "But they seem to understand. That's what counts."