Casimirski went on to describe the aliens’ social structure. There is no social mobility; a man is born a private or a noncom and that is what he remains—and all of them are satisfied, for respect permeates their entire order. Their collective noun for a group of sergeants, for example, is a virtue of sergeants. Ambition is confined to attaining excellence in one’s station.
I read the report several times, and it convinced me that they are probably very, very dangerous.
September 22
A long wait, but much has happened. First, Torkonnen’s security has been breached. The word is out. No details—just enough to start the media screaming hysterically, spreading every kind of crazy rumor. All sorts of religious fanatics and demagogues have been whipping up fear and frenzy; there have been major riots in India and South America, in Los Angeles and Cairo and Lord only knows where else. The world’s national governments, who had not been informed, are raising hell and demanding information, and the screeching in the General Assembly is—if we can believe such an improbability—unprecedented.
So the pressure is really going to hit Torkonnen, not only from the member nations, but also from the Secretary General, Dr. Corua-Fanit, who has always been too close to him for comfort. It will not increase the probability of any sane reaction to the intruders.
Next, I’ve received two more reports. Just yesterday Hardesty came through on his way back from Geneva and left me copies. These also are from Casimirski. The first simply amplifies his previous one. The second is much more important. The Conquerors’ fleet, while it has not entered the solar system proper, has come in closer and is hovering on what—if we discount Pluto—can be considered the system’s outer boundary. Casimirski asked them outright if he could visit the fleet, if he could inspect every ship; and the envoy, without hesitation, told him he could. They left immediately, Casimirski taking only a single aide, and it was a strange voyage for there was no conversation. All the envoy and his officers would talk about was business. Though Casimirski and his aide ate with them, at a separate table, in their officers’ mess, they talked around them in their harsh, stacatto native tongue—and even then without inflection, without discernible emotion.
When they reached the closely grouped vessels, Casimirski was taken to each of them and found them all identical, all equally disciplined, all with their small assault craft, all with their crowds of women and children, and all definitely not armed. Even more interestingly, they appear to have no provisions for security, none at all. Seemingly, nothing was hidden from him, including the weaponry of their attack craft, which he says is very similar to our own. He, of course, was careful to ask no intrusive questions; and on one occasion, when he started to board an attack craft, he inquired whether he might not be infringing security. The answer was typical of our visitors: The escorting officer said simply, “We are The Conquerors. The strong are always secure.”
Of course they showed him records of their conquered planets and their now-subject populations, and he was impressed. “I saw an unending panorama of servility, of heads always bent, of faces on which no shadow of resistance—no, not even of simmering resentment—lives. And when I asked how they managed to so humble those they’d conquered, my escort replied coldly, “That we will not tell you. It is better for you not to know. If you knew, it would affect the decisions your Chief Commander soon will have to make.’’
It seems that they do not subject each invaded world to the same process, classifying them as—well, there’s no other way to put it—barbarians without honor, to be subdued utterly, and primitives with barbaric honor, who are given a somewhat higher status, rather after the manner of the Romans when they were feeling magnanimous or needed irregular troops.
Casimirski has also seen their priest-scientists, physically almost indistinguishable from the officers, but he has learned nothing much about them except that they serve a religion of conquest, dedicated to a war god who, I gather, makes poor old Mars seem feeble by comparison. What their scientific accomplishments may be, he couldn’t guess, except that they obviously have FTL—they’d have to. Also, he suspects that they must be excellent geneticists. Again, he was careful not to be too inquisitive, following the rule of never asking questions he himself would be ordered not to answer or that common sense told him might be sensitive.
Their diet, from what he saw of it, resembles ours: meat and fish, frozen undoubtedly, and hydroponic vegetables, a beverage he could only describe as some sort of sparkling tea, and a variety of alcoholic drinks, taken very ceremoniously and with extreme moderation. If there were beasts aboard, he did not see them, neither pets nor livestock. Nor did he learn anything of their private lives. He was introduced to none of their women—tensely beautiful, austere beings very much in the background, simply and richly robed, their hair generally worn long. He saw the children only at a distance and was astonished at their spontaneous discipline and their expressionless faces when they looked in his direction, small copies of their fathers. He found out, too, that at night, after their evening meal, they sang: long, ominous battle chants, chorales of conquest.
One thing that surprised him, especially in view of their high technology, was that all the officers and noncoms wore edged weapons, swords, dirks, or daggers, and wore them without affectation, as though they were part of themselves.
So, incidentally, did the larger boy-children.
So, of course, in Feudal Japan, had the samurai.
It was not in Casimirski’s report, but Hardesty told me they’d turned down Torkonnen’s offer to meet with their C-in-C after they learned that he was “only” Chief of Staff. I wonder if that means Corua-Fanit will get Torkonnen promoted. Apparently a Chief of Staff, to their way of thinking, is nothing more than a glorified errand boy. They practically told him that as he did not command troops in the field (if field can be translated into interstellar terms), he simply wasn’t fit to speak to.
I’d like to have been there when he got the news.
And now I’d best go downstairs, let Louise show me the pups again, and then have a martini or two with her and try to allay the anxieties any intelligent woman would feel in our threatened world. Yesterday she was worrying about whether I might be recalled to active duty. “Me?” I answered. “With our friend Torkonnen in the driver’s seat? Hardly!”
Now, after what I’ve already told her, I think she’s more concerned with the danger to us all. Even as I myself.
September 27
The past days have been anxious ones, with no further word from Hardesty or anybody else. And now, abruptly and without warning, the sword has fallen. I have been proven a poor prophet, a very poor one indeed.
Shortly after five this morning, I received a phone call from the Secretary General’s office. Dr. Corua-Fanit wished to speak to me, and would I take the call? Of course I said I would; and a moment later there his voice was, as smooth and insinuating as ever.
“Good morning, Sir Francis.”
“Good morning, Doctor.”
“I trust you and Madame are both well?”
My God, I thought, what is the slimy little beast getting at? “Very well, thank you,” I replied.
“Good, good! Sir Francis, we are recalling you to active duty.”
“You’re what?”
“We are recalling you to active duty, of course at the rank you now hold but with even greater responsibilities—oh, yes, very much greater responsibilities. You have, I am sure, heard the news of the arrival of aliens from another system?”
“I’ve heard a lot of media hysteria. There’s been damned little hard information.”
“Well, you shall have it—indeed you shall. You will be fully briefed as soon as you arrive. Sir Francis, the world now faces an emergency—the most frightening emergency in all our history. You are needed.”
I decided to be frank. “Doctor, I think you’ll understand that I’m not anxious to serve under Marshal Torkonnen and that the prospect gives me ample reason to s
tay retired.”
He laughed a little shrilly. “My dear Sir Francis! But you will not be serving under him. This I promise you, I myself.” His tone changed for the nastier. “In any case, as you are not disabled, the terms of your commission permit us to order you back, do they not?”
I made no reply, remembering that this was the man who, scarcely three years before, had authorized the killing of nearly forty million human beings.
Finally I said, “Very well, Doctor, but I’ll have one request, a modest one. I want the officer who was my personal aide, Brigadier Olaf Hardesty, reassigned to me, and I’d like to have his orders issued now.”
He thanked me, his voice sounding its insincerity. “Sir Francis, your subspace vehicle will be awaiting you at Ottawa, and your aide will be aboard. I am delighted. I myself will outline your new assignment and your duties.”
“Very well, Doctor.” We said goodbye.
There was no point in going back to bed, and Louise, who had wakened, was sitting up, looking at me silently.
“No, I suppose you can’t turn them down, can you?” she said, almost whispering.
I shook my head. “I wish I could!”
She nodded, leaned toward me, and kissed me. “I’ll go downstairs and get Marie up and started fixing breakfast; then I’ll send Sergeant Wamick up to help you pack.”
Two hours later, Hardesty and I were through the stratosphere.
“Sir Francis,” Hardesty said presently, “did the Secretary General tell you what your new job is going to be?”
“He said he’d explain it when I arrived.”
Hardesty looked at me a little strangely, a little apprehensively. “Sir,” he said, “I—well, I’m sure of this. You’re the new C-in-C.”
Two hover-limos were waiting for us when we landed, and an Italian colonel, a military aide, took us to them, directing Hardesty to the second, opening the door so I could board the first. I was not surprised to find Corua-Fanit sitting there, a thin, inconsiderable man with sparse black hair and an unhealthy skin, his eyes concealed behind the tinted lenses that are a part of the public image he cultivates—a man to whom circumstances have given great power, in my opinion a weak, cruel, ruthless man. The fact that where matters military are concerned, he is completely under Torkonnen’s influence did not help the situation.
As the limo whipped through traffic, I reflected that antigravity and its associated drives had not only reduced the terrific noise level in great cities almost to a whisper, but had been responsible for putting the destiny of the world into Corua-Fanit’s hands, for without them, the Space Force would have remained what it started out to be, a rocket-propelled group of vessels watching out for stray asteroids, giant meteorites and, on the off chance, extraterrestrial visitors.
He smiled at me with his teeth. “I suppose, Sir Francis, that you have been wondering what sort of assignment I have for you?”
“Naturally, sir.”
“I’m sure it will please you. We have created a new post, one that our armed forces have never had before, the post of Supreme Commander—Commander-in-Chief. It is a post for which you are ideally fitted, especially under our present extraordinary circumstances. Let me fill you in briefly. When we arrive at my residence, I shall give you the pertinent reports from those officers who have been in closest touch with the—shall we say?—invaders.”
Then he proceeded to tell me everything I already knew, including The Conquerors’ refusal to negotiate with anyone but a supreme military commander. “They turned down Marshal Torkonnen, not just because he lacked the title, but because they disapproved of his decisive nuclear attack on the rebel powers. They call themselves Conquerors, but they are a strange breed of military, I assure you.”
I began to see the light. My controversy with Torkonnen and my retirement had received much publicity. The Conquerors, thorough as they were, would certainly have heard of it. Hence my recall and my new title. What powers it would carry with it remained to be seen.
Corua-Fanit was astute. “I am sure these people will recognize that you are a man of honor.” He laughed a shrill little braying laugh. “And the fact that you and they see eye to eye about how war should be waged will be most helpful also.”
“Won’t they think it odd that the post has so suddenly been created, and that I myself have so suddenly been called to fill it?”
“I think not,” he replied. “We’ve informed them that you were a de facto C-in-C prior to your retirement but that it simply is not our custom to use the formal title.”
I thought it a pretty thin arrangement but saw no point to saying so. I said, “Doctor, I’m honored. But I can’t possibly accept if the whole thing is only a pretense. I will have to have those real powers the title implies—powers of military decision and command—for responsibility, as you yourself said, will inevitably come with it.”
“Oh, you will, you will!” he exclaimed, putting his arm around my shoulders, apparently not noticing that I stiffened to avoid shrinking from his touch. “Your orders have already been prepared and signed by me, giving you total authority over our armed forces and also empowering you to act as the world’s Ambassador Plenipotentiary. I shall give them to you as soon as we arrive. However—and I trust this will meet with your approval—we do not intend to publish them until your negotiations with the alien commander are completed. We can’t afford to let news get out that would lead our already-frightened public to think we prepare for war, which the publicized appointment of a C-in-C certainly would do. So for the time being, the news must be restricted to the few high-level officers directly concerned.”
I didn’t like it, but still I couldn’t quarrel with it. It did make sense.
“And when do you and my alien counterpart want me to leave for our first rendezvous?”
“As soon as possible. Tomorrow morning, if you can. That should give you ample time to go over the reports, and if it doesn’t, well, it will take three days to ferry you to Saturn Station and you can take them with you.”
“I’ll also require a complete report on the present disposition of our major forces. Can Marshal Torkonnen have that ready for me too?”
He frowned. “Torkonnen can’t. He’s off Earth. He said there was nothing for him to do here in view of your previous—ah, friction. So, with my approval, he left to inspect all our bases and stations.” Again he laughed. “He told me he was not going to stop off at Saturn Station.”
I did not comment.
Then he went on to tell me that according to Casimirski, the aliens were proposing to bring their entire fleet within the solar system. “We’re all agreed,” he said, “that probably it would be unwise to try to stop them at this stage. But on no account must they be allowed close to Earth, certainly no closer than Saturn Station. Otherwise we could have worldwide panic.”
I assured him I’d keep the point in mind.
Finally we arrived at his enormous residence, where I turned down his offer of refreshment and dinner, saying I’d like to set to work immediately and asking for trays to be sent up for Hardesty and me; rather reluctantly, he showed us to our quarters. A few minutes later, the same Italian colonel arrived with a dispatch case containing my orders and the reports. I read the orders in Corua-Fanit’s presence and could find no fault with them. I told him so.
As soon as the door closed behind him, we went to work. There was little in the reports we did not know. However, there was much more detail and the addition of about two dozen photos. Apparently the intruders had made no objection to being photographed. I scanned the lot, promising myself I’d study them at length once I was in space, where they could be discussed more freely. But the most interesting report of all I read three times before I said goodnight to Hardesty and went to bed.
It was Torkonnen’s Estimate of Alien Forces and Capabilities.
September 29
I started the last entry in this journal on the way to Geneva, scribbled a bit more of it after I’d digested Torkonnen�
��s Estimate, then finished it after we’d broken free from Earth’s gravity and were a long way from Corua-Fanit.
The Estimate appalled me, but it is exactly what I’d have expected. I can’t, of course, give it in full here, but I shall quote its highlights.
“In my considered professional opinion,” Torkonnen wrote, “we should not take the claims of these so-called Conquerors too seriously for several reasons:
1. Their weapons and equipment—which they have not tried to hide from us—are in no way impressive. Their major ships are unarmed, transports only, and the attack craft they carry are actually inferior to our own vessels of the same class.
2. The fact that their ships are cluttered with women and children indicates a probably nomadic way of life and, consequently, a shortage of serious military resources.
3. They have antigravity and antigravity propulsion. So do we. They have Faster-Than-Light drives, but this does not necessarily indicate scientific superiority. Their priest-scientists are dedicated to the service of a primitive war god, which argues that scientific thinking cannot have penetrated their culture too thoroughly. As, admittedly, they prey on other civilizations, they may very well have obtained FTL by piracy. Furthermore, FTL is of no use within a solar system, only in open space. It gives them no advantage whatsoever.
4. The evidence they have shown us of conquered planets and peoples, while possibly a record of successful suppression, suggests that the conquered probably had no military power or will to resist. Mankind is neither so feeble nor so passive.
There Will Be War Volume IV Page 11