Charles Gannon - Raising Caine

Riordan took up the thread. “The Dornaani have told us, point-blank, that the Slaasriithi are significantly more advanced than the Arat Kur, whose technology we’ve now inspected in detail. The Arat Kur fusion plants are smaller and more efficient than ours, as are their antimatter production and retention systems. The Slaasriithi are an order of magnitude more advanced.”

“Gentlemen,” Gaspard sighed, “your enthusiasm for machinery is understandable. But are there no other objectives? No cultural initiatives? That, after all, is my area of expertise.”

Caine leaned forward. “Frankly, I think the cultural benefits of a meeting with the Slaasriithi could be the most significant, in the long view.”

Gaspard, finding some ground on which he was comfortable, leaned into Caine’s comment. “Go on, Mr. Riordan.”

“The Slaasriithi are a conduit into the deeper history of this part of space and of the exosapient races we’ve discovered within it. They might be able to answer key strategic questions, such as: why are so many intelligent races contained in a one-hundred-light-year-diameter sphere? Why is there no Convocation record of making contact with other intelligences beyond that range? Why are so many green worlds readily inhabitable by the majority of the races of the Accord?”

Gaspard’s eyebrows had risen high on his forehead. “I understand that these are crucial questions, but they speak more to cosmology than strategy, non ?”

“Not entirely,” Riordan responded. “Getting those answers helps us understand the larger political and astrographic environment in which we’re operating.”

“Have we not had analysts studying these ramifications?”

“Mr. Gaspard, as I understand it, every single analyst we have has been working overtime for the past year and then at triple-speed when we were invaded. This is really the first opportunity we’ve had to lean back and look at the bigger picture. There have been too many impending catastrophes to spend time pondering the deepest implications of the marble and granite bones of the twenty-thousand-year-old human ruin — and conundrum — we found on Delta Pavonis Three.”

Gaspard nodded. “Yes, I have thought this too. Even now, too many strategists and statespersons are flushed with the euphoria of victory and the relief of deliverance. They are not speculating upon the mysteries behind us, only upon the possibilities before us.”

Caine nodded. Well, Gaspard had frequently been an asshole, but he was proving to be a fairly insightful asshole. “Mr. Gaspard, I couldn’t have said that better myself.”

Gaspard frowned, considered. “No, you probably could not have.”

So he’s not just an asshole: he’s a total asshole. Aloud: “I just hope the Slaasriithi are going to be as productive as we’d like them to be in answering these questions.”

Downing leaned forward. “Why do you think they wouldn’t be?”

Caine shrugged. “I don’t mean they’d be uncooperative, but so far, their self-representation suggests that they might not record or even think of history the way we do.”

Gaspard shook his head. “History is history. How can it be different?”

Ben Hwang folded his hands as he took up the explanation. “The Slaasriithi are polytaxic. The integration and interaction between their different subspecies — or, more properly, taxae — may necessitate a tendency toward what we would think of as self-effacing consensualism. There are hints, in the primer they relayed to us, that in their society, pride of self and cult of personality are not merely morally egregious but might be considered dangerous psychopathologies.”

“What you are suggesting,” Gaspard summarized over steepled fingers, “is that they might not keep a history, but merely a chronicle of the past events.”

Downing nodded. “I think that’s possible.”

Gaspard gaze slid away from Downing, settled upon Caine. “And you concur with that conclusion?”

“Frankly, I don’t know enough to concur or demur, Mr. Gaspard.”

“Yet it was you who brought up the possible limits of their historical perspective. Do you doubt your own assertion?”

“Mr. Gaspard, I presented a possibility, not an assertion. As for doubts — well, we’ve spoken to a grand total of one Slaasriithi, and we have their primer.” Caine shrugged. “I know it’s human nature to want to draw conclusions, but I distrust straight-line projections when we only have two data points.”

Gaspard nodded sharply. “I quite agree. All these hypotheses follow logically from the data we do have, but we do not have very much. Well, when the time comes for me to be awakened, I will ask you to apprise me of any new information you have acquired from our Slaasriithi hosts.”

Caine frowned. “You intend to travel in cold sleep?”

“Of course I do.”

“Mr. Consul,” Downing began cautiously — Caine could not tell if he was being cautious about arousing Gaspard’s temper or his own—“it was presumed that you would logically wish to spend all available time preparing for your meeting with the Slaasriithi.”

Gaspard stared at Downing. “I am pained to point out that there is nothing logical about that presumption at all, Monsieur Downing. Here, instead, is what is logical: that this mission, too, may be cancelled. And if it is, I much prefer not having burdened my mind with yet another encyclopedia of facts that I shall never use, and having lost a further four months of my waking life needlessly committing them to memory. After all, if the Slaasriithi decide to strictly enforce their statement to Mr. Riordan, that we must ‘meet them to understand them,’ they may not even allow us access to their vessel or provide us with additional preparatory materials during our journey to their homeworld. In which case, I would have remained awake for the singularly productive pleasure of staring at the dull walls of one of our habitation modules. Of course, I insist on being awakened should we face a crisis or emergency.”

Caine smiled. Well, you clearly don’t know much about the real practicalities of cold sleep. Not if you think being roused for an unfolding crisis is a good idea. Awakening cold sleepers into a crisis is like dragging a boozehound out of bed to rescue his family when he’s still sleeping off a binge. Accelerated reanims are more trouble than they’re worth.

Sukhinin’s voice interrupted with a toneless imperative: “Ambassador Gaspard, for that is your primary title for the duration of this assignment, let us be clear on one further matter. Although you are our senior envoy and a consul of the Republic, do not presume that you may issue orders to Captain Riordan in all matters.”

Caine’s surprised sputter did not allow him to get out the question before Gaspard did: “ Captain Riordan?”

Sukhinin stared at Gaspard, then glanced at the other faces ringing the table. “Was I unclear?”

Downing leaned forward. “Ambassador, it is necessary that we send along a person of appropriate rank, both to advise you on the military ramifications of any agreements you might make with the Slaasriithi, and as your legation’s security and intelligence overseer. Riordan’s former rank of commander was deemed insufficient for this role. He is thereby being promoted to captain, although that is as much in recognition of his actions in the recent war as it is an administrative necessity.”

Caine looked from Downing to Sukhinin. “Thanks. I think.”

Sukhinin fixed him with a look that said, You poor young fellow , and held up a hand to stop Gaspard’s imminent protestations. “This is not open to debate or discussion,” Vassily declared. “Firstly, although you are a consul, and so carry plenipotentiary powers for entering into treaties with the Slaasriithi, you have been a politician, not an ambassador, up until this point in time. Nyet ?”