Storms Over Open Fields (Life of Riley Book 2)

by G. Howell

  ------v------

  The single lamp on the table flickered wildly as an evening breeze set the drapes rustling. The polished wood of the round tabletop glowed under that dancing illumination; an erratic little island of soft light surrounded by the twilight that filled the rest of the room. Pale squares of paper were spread around in the light, a dozen of them scattered where Rohinia and Jenes’ahn, sitting to my left and right at the very peripheries of the lamp light, could reach them. A furry hand reached into the illumination and tapped a claw on one entry.

  “That liquid stone, is it dangerous?”

  “That depends on how much you eat.”

  Silence.

  I hissed through my teeth. The evening was proving frustrating for everyone. “It’s a building material. As I said, it’s extremely useful for building everything from houses and roads to bridges and dams. It floats too: you can make ships out of it if you have to. It can also be used to make blockades, forts, walls... any other sort of defensive position. “

  In the gloom on the edge of the light I saw shadows shift as the Mediators considered that. Then Rohinia carefully scratched an entry in his notebook.

  “And how do you think it would impact economically?”

  “I’m not sure. It would affect their imports. There would be less need to import stone from other locations since they could use that. It would also mean that there would be fewer requirement for stonemasons and cutters. Architects and engineers would need to learn new ways to do things. That could be tough for them, but he did say they had a manpower shortage and concrete really helps with that. Production becomes a new industry by itself, one that doesn’t require such skill. I think they could get by without it, but there comes a point where a material like that is necessary: stone will not do anymore as it’s too expensive, labor intensive and slow to work with.”

  There was a lot of stuff like that to go through that night. Every interview we’d had that day, all six of them, had to analyzed and dissected. There’d been the Stonecutters guild to start with. After that there were a couple of prominent merchants followed by an individual from a noble family who’d wanted an expensive and impressive and unique toy to impress his peers. The afternoon had wound up with someone from what had appeared to be a private security company contracted by others to protect warehouses and then there’d been a final meeting with the Guild of Weavers.

  Every item of technology or information that I could impart was scrutinized by the Mediators – by medieval enforcers who’d never even seen or heard of most of the stuff they were trying to evaluate. Half the time I had to explain in the best detail I could what it did, how it did it, the situations it was used in, the effects it had... and of course I had to explain what some of the other things I mentioned were and so forth and so on. It wasn’t that they were stupid – they were very bright. It was just that they were trying to see my world through the tiny peephole my explanations and laptop images could portrait. They couldn’t see how everything meshed on a broader sense.

  So I had to explain concrete to them. And improved metals for chisels and stone saws and how they weren’t suitable for firearms, but they might be made into knives. I had to explain water cutters and how they were better than physical blades for cutting many things and that, no, they didn’t make effective weapons. That was something the representative from the mercenary outfit had wanted: weapons – something to give them the edge over their competitors. Surprisingly the Mediators had let him have his say; he’d had the same opportunity to put his case forward as the others and provided I didn’t give him automatics and weapons of mass destruction, the Mediators were quite happy to provide him with other toys: blades, batons, pepper spray, zip guns, cuffs... lethal or non, that wasn’t the issue. They seemed quite happy to let outfits like that cause mayhem in their own back yards, they just wanted them to keep it there. If they caused waves elsewhere the Guild would come down hard, but otherwise they didn’t care if some light-fingered interlopers were made examples of. They were criminals, why should their rights be considered? It was a rougher society with very different rules.

  We went over everything that’d been discussed that day. A few items they rejected out of hand: the steel alloys that could’ve been used for new gun barrels, nitrocellulose explosive for blasting, steam turbine engines for boats. Some things like the Van de Graf generator they wanted to hold off on while they investigated them further. Other items they passed: The improved optics for telescopes and microscopes, the windmill with water pump, centerboards, trip hammers and paperclips. I guess they’d never seen what MacGyver could do with one of those.

  That conference ran late into the night. Long after the sun had gone down; long after the cold remains of the meal brought to us had been removed by quiet Rris servants, the Mediators tried to come to grips with what had happened that day.

  “Rot you,” Jenes’ahn growled at me from further along the table, past the scattered papers. She was looking as frazzled as I was feeling. “Are you doing this deliberately? ‘Perhaps’, ‘it depends’... can’t we get a straight answer out of you?”

  I rubbed the heels of my hands against my eyes. If the Mediators were exasperated, I was equally so. “I’m trying, but the answer to the questions you are asking me are not simply... yes or no. One device, not matter how basic, may have effects I don’t know about. And just distributing them like this, I think that is going to cause problems.”

  “You do?” Jenes’ahn sighed. “What kind of problems?”

  I shrugged, a quick jerk of my shoulders. I didn’t care if they didn’t understand it; I was too tired to bother with Rris gestures. “That I don’t know. Not all of them and not for sure, but what we were doing before your guild.... intervened was trying to head off one issue before it happened.”

  “Which one?”

  “Just giving away information works in the short run. People can take what they require and build what they require. That’s the problem: they will build what they require, with no thought to what other people are building.”

  “How is that a problem?”

  I tapped my fingers on the beautifully finished tabletop. “You are familiar with the concept of the railroad?”

  “Those trails of metal tracks with the steam engines moving on them. Correct?”

  “Correct. A very good way of moving things from one place to another. It will be very important.. Now, suppose you build a line from one city to another, but each city uses different equipment: the wheels on the engines are different distances apart; the screw threads are at different angles; the attachments different sizes … that causes problems. Each side trying to do the same thing a different way.”

  “It is just a single railroad.”

  That was the problem. They couldn’t see just where things were going. Rris certainly weren’t stupid: They had far fewer problems accepting and dealing with reality than a lot of humans I’d known, but their mindsets were still back in a pre-industrial age. Things moved slowly. Change was something that happened over decades, not at the pace that was starting to emerge, and they certainly weren’t used to thinking globally. Or continentally in their case.

  “A, it is just a single railroad,” I agreed. “And after different countries and cities and Guilds build their own versions, it will be twenty or fifty different single railroads with all their attendant machines only able to use the corresponding lines. It will be two hundred different kinds of ploughs; five hundred different kinds of steam engines and a thousand different kinds of faucets and shovels. Everything will be made the way the local artificers see best or easiest or cheapest.”

  “And that is a problem?”

  “That is a problem when your boat has broken down in some port far from home and none of the locally produced parts will fit your vessel. That is a problem when those parts all require people and resources to make t
hem, so instead of a few places making these parts, you have an immense amount of time and effort being spent making all these little parts that none of the rest of the world can use. And perfectly good versions of this equipment exists elsewhere, but it’s the wrong size or shape for your equipment. Foolish. Wasteful. Expensive.”

  “Huhn,” Jenes’ahn rubbed her own muzzle and looked at her partner. He frowned. “And you think that what you and ah Ties were doing would solve this?”

  “We were trying to set standards: measurements and sizes. An industry to distribute the parts. Once people had them, they could use them however they wished, including making new products based on those parts. It might not have solved all the problems, but it would have reduced them.”

  “And you haven’t mentioned this to us?”

  “Yes. I have. Several times. But recently people seem to have been more interested in deciding whether or not to kill me than listen to anything I have to say.”

  “So, just distributing this information can have detrimental effects?”

  “I’m saying that if you hand it out... here and there to everyone, then you will cause problem for yourself. I had thought that it might be better to fully design and build the required material in one location. The finished design is then provided to the client. They can do what they will with it, provided they use standard parts.”

  “Huhn, and this design and product would come from Land of Water?”

  “Well, Shattered Water does have the foundation for such an industry laid down. Chaeitch probably knows better than anyone what’s required.”

  “So everything is made and distributed from Shattered Water?”

  That question was not unexpected. “No. It can’t do that. There simply isn’t the population to produce everything. Not in any one town or city, or any country, I think. No, it can’t. But I think the first design can be made there and then that is given to the customer, along with all the information. They can then copy it and make it themselves. Perhaps improve it.”

  “Huhn, simple as that?” Jenes’ahn said.

  I looked at her. “No. Just by seeing some of those pictures they’ve got... ideas. I think anyone would. They will try to use them and build their own versions. That will make a mess that will be very difficult to undo. And trying to get countries to agree to use the same system, that’s going to be like herding cats.”

  The Mediators’ muzzles wrinkled and Rohinia flicked an ear. “If that means difficult, then yes it will be. Do you have any suggestions about that?”

  I let my shoulders rise and fall. I was tired and the evening had drained me. Once again I was having to try and explain to Rris that I simply didn’t think like them. Their culture had never even previously considered anything like alien intelligences, so it was quite a step for them. I understood that. I could sympathize, but it was still frustrating. “You’re the Rris. You’re the one’s who’re supposed to know how to manage Rris.”

  A pair of jaws dropped and they both hissed like steam kettles on the boil. I shook my head a the display, “What? I still embarrass myself calling ma’am sir and you want me to tell you how Rris think? I can draw you a picture of a gearbox, but I don’t know how you work.”

  Rohinia was still bristling, literally. “This is apparent,” he conceded in a taut growl and took a deep breath. “So you can tell us what the problems are likely to be but you can’t offer any solutions.”

  “Sorry,” I replied. “For me to try and guess how Rris will think, that in itself would cause problems.”

  “Huhn,” Rohinia growled and the lamplight threw the creases that snarl formed across his muzzle into deep relief. “It seems to be a night for problems, doesn’t it. And I think we’ll be doing the same thing tomorrow.” He snorted and ducked his head to rub at his own muzzle His eyes flared momentarily with reflected lamplight when he looked back at me. “For now, though, it’s getting late. I think curl up on it while there’s still some darkness left. That is acceptable?”

  “That means sleep?” I asked.

  “A.”

  “Sleep sounds good,” I said.

  “Then think about this situation tonight. Perhaps you will amaze us all with a solution to all our problems. Or perhaps present us with an entirely new [conundrum]? Now, get some sleep. Jenes’ahn? If you would?”

  Leather creaked and fur rustled almost inaudibly as she stood. Lamplight gleamed from metal and highlighted her pelt as she tipped her head. I heaved a breath and snapped the lid of the laptop shut, sliding it back into its case and then climbing to my own feet. Albeit a lot less gracefully than she’d done: my damn leg had gone to sleep before I could. Without saying anything she gestured a hand toward the door and fell in behind me as I stamped toward it, shaking my leg to try and restore circulation.

  “First light tomorrow,” Rohinia’s growling reminder sounded after us.

  It wasn’t too far back to my room. Jenes’ahn prowled along at my side as I gingerly made my way through under lit corridors. Some moonlight found its way in when windows were in the right place and there were occasional candles or lamps, but for the most part the halls were dark splendor. We passed a couple of Rris: dark shapes with eyes that glared disconcertingly as they stared at me and then my escort and hurried on their way.

  “You seem to find all this... unremarkable,” Jenes’ahn said quietly.

  “Uh? What?” I asked wittily. “Umm, unremarkable? I think it’s quite remarkable.”

  The silhouette of the Mediator’s head didn’t look about. “I mean that. The business aspect of this. You seem to be quite at ease with it. And you didn’t have any difficulty remembering all that detail.”

  “Ah. Oh, it’s not too far removed to the job I used to do back home,” I said. “Actually, it’s a little easier in some ways. Things here see to be... slower.”

  “Slower?” I caught the sharpness in that query.

  “I’m not trying to be insulting,” I said as we passed a row of paintings, all very narrow, very tall and so dark I couldn’t make what the subjects were as I tried to explain. “Business back home was.. rushed. Things happened quickly. Faster than here. You didn’t have to travel to talk to someone on the other side of the city, or the country or the world. So people didn’t. They could talk to you immediately, and they expected responses just as fast. You had to be able to work with several things at once and do it quickly and correctly. You got used to it. It’s different here; you have to travel to see people or wait for them to come to you. It’s maybe a bit easier in that respect.”

  “Easier?”

  “That is offset by other, ah, complications,” I hedged.

  “Complications,” she said repeated tightly. In the twilight her proud feline profile kept looking straight ahead, but I heard the, “Huhn!”

  There were lamps burning in my rooms: oil burning lamps with milky glass flues. More of them than would be usual for Rris. The gentle glow was homey, actually welcoming after an evening of staring at ill-lit obtuse documents. Jenes’ahn saw me through to the bedroom, watched me dump my laptop.

  “Tomorrow,” she said. “First thing.”

  “I’ll be here.”

  ------v------

  I did dream that night. Dreams about labyrinths and identical hallways and pencil-pushing bureaucrats wearing green eyeshades and cat masks. There were demands made and questions asked and an epiphany that was all so clear in the murk of waking dreams; which promptly dissolved into fragments of memory when curtains were thrown open onto undercooked dawn light and voices told me it was time to get up.

  For most of that day I felt dull, frustrated. I didn’t know if I was missing something or if I just thought I was. So while the petitioners laid their problems on me, I had my own nagging at the back of my mind.

  This lot of petitioners was a similar mix to the on
es I’d met with the previous day. There were Guild leaders and higher-ups, wealthier individual merchants and landowners, lords and ladies from outlying estates. They all had their problems and their hangups and their attitudes: There was the female from the Bakers Guild – the Bakers’ Guild for Christsake – who just refused to speak directly to me and routed all her questions through the Mediators - as though I were just a novelty pet brought along and not worthy of attention; There was the young lord who expected to be given anything he wanted and it was only the presence of the Mediators that put any kind of a damper on his outright, indignant fury at being denied. A pleasant contrast was provided by the elderly, grey-furred gentleman from a shipping outfit who was surprised, but polite and civil. He’d brought along a bottle of amber liquid that he said was from Broken Spine - a country way in the northwest and a long way off by their standards. It wasn’t wine, but something like whiskey: strong, cold, smoky and smooth, although it still had more than a hint of the berries they used in their wines. I’d wondered if it might be considered a bribe. Turns out the locals suspected he was a smuggler, but if he was, he was a good one - there’d never been any concrete proof.

  What was different that day was that I had to be a lot more careful about what I showed the clients. The Mediators didn’t want me showing them material that might show too much and give people ideas they shouldn’t be having. I showed them instead and they vetted the pictures and videos and let me show them to the client. That slowed things down.

  Following the meetings was another debriefing. Again the Mediators and I spent hours reviewing the events of the day. From before the dusk long into the night we went over each case individually and discussed the request and possible options. And it kept coming down to the same problems: the dangers of introducing potentially destabilizing technology; the petitioners being given a quick fix to an issue, in which case they were just as likely to run off and develop their own ad-hoc solution. And you would end up having - for example - something manufactured in Open Fields that was in no way compatible with a similar device made in Shattered Water. There were the questions about if someone like Chaeitch or aesh Smither manufactured the solution, then wouldn’t they quickly gain a monopoly? And who would own the rights to these developments?