Lawrence Schoen - Barsk - The Elephants' Graveyard

“We wouldn’t have autonomy if we accepted assistance, Senator. Nor would we have privacy if we permitted visitors. Neither of those things have changed.”

“But everything else has. And while it’s true that our researchers have reverse-engineered many of your products, it has been, as your own people might say, the merest raindrop in a storm. Your officials hide behind their precious Compact and refuse to acknowledge that we live in different times, that the past is indeed past. As a historian, you should appreciate this, Jorl. So I ask you, is this situation fair to the rest of the people living in the Alliance? To the many billions of ordinary souls spread out across four thousand worlds who have come to depend on these exports?”

Jorl sipped his tea. “I suspect the matter is much more complex than you present it, Senator. And as you surely know, I am not part of Barsk’s government. I have no more voice than any other individual on such matters. But that’s not the real issue, is it? Major Krasnoi didn’t take all those people because he wanted to know how to harvest or refine millions of different drugs. He was only interested in one. He wanted to know about koph. Why that one, among so many others?”

“Let me answer your question with another question. Tell me, Jorl, how much do you know about an Eleph called Margda?”

He watched Jorl smile at his query, as he knew he would. The dolt had no idea he was being manipulated, not that his awareness would have changed things one iota.

“Quite a bit. Her life was the focus of my research when I was at the academy. It’s why I ended up studying your grandfather, because he was the first person off Barsk to take a real interest in her life and legacy.”

“He did,” said Bish. “He was particularly fascinated with her fits of clairvoyance, and how she bent those visions to her political will. It was such a novel thing to do, and she proved herself quite effective at it. I assume you’ve read all of her formal papers regarding her visions?”

Jorl nodded. “Those, as well as her journal entries, and what we have of her private correspondence.”

“Good. That’s very good. I have a great respect for thorough research. So it shouldn’t come as a surprise to you that, rare as her precognitive gifts may have been, in the vast population of the Alliance there is no shortage of individuals with similar abilities to your Matriarch. But prior to her, no one — certainly no one in the senate — had ever thought to harness that resource toward our own political prosperity. But such talents are a resource, one that belongs to the greater good of all people. Your Matriarch didn’t simply impress my grandfather, she inspired him. During his tenure in the senate, he began to use the Committee of Information as a means to structure that foresight.”

“Is that how you’ve kept the outer colonies under control? You’ve had teams of psychic operatives scrying for you for three generations?”

“In part. But because Barsk was the only other place to have used precognition in this way, we’ve also always kept an eye turned toward your world. This aspect of the committee is rather clandestine, it’s operation known in detail to only a small subset of senators, and for years now they have begrudged the expense, calling it a waste of time and resources. Barsk has continued on along the same course as always, quiet and calm. Recently though, that began to change. First one, and then another, and then several more of our precognitivists began reporting visions involving Barsk. They saw a change, a fast approaching critical juncture. They told us that it would involve the refinement of koph, a drug unlike any other of your pharmaceuticals. Not restorative, nor preventative, nor recreational. No, koph’s sole purpose is as the means to allow some individuals to become Speakers. In time, every single one of those assets reported that everything would change soon, and all because of koph.”

“What about it? We’ve had koph only slightly longer than we’ve had the Compact. What’s changed?”

Bish stepped closer, arms wide, palms open, and beamed at Jorl with his politician’s smile. “Not what, who. A new player in this vast game. My precognitivists brought me a name, the person they saw who could change everything. Tell me, Jorl, have you ever heard of someone called Arlo?”

A muffled sound from the far side of the room broke the senator’s focus. Even before he could turn toward the source, Druz had shifted enough to point one arm toward the room’s closet and fired a device from up her sleeve. Three steel talons darted across the room to embed themselves in the closet door and yank it open as the Sloth pulled back on their attached cables. A small figure tumbled out and crashed to the floor headfirst. A young Fant, white-fleshed and even more hideous than the larger, gray-skinned versions.

Bish stepped back, mind racing to assess the potential threat, even as Jorl jumped to his feet and gave a name to the creature with a voice of disbelief.

“Pizlo?”

“ I TAKEit you know this child?” said Bish.

He’d tilted a horn in the direction of the Brady but otherwise kept his attention on the pair of Fant. The Sloth rose and started slowly across the room, the trio of cables withdrawing back up her sleeve with every step.

Jorl had left his seat to kneel alongside Pizlo, confusion warring with fear in his mind. How had the child come to be hiding in the closet, let alone here on this station? But questions could wait; he ran hands and trunk over Pizlo, checking the boy for injuries beyond the usual collection of scrapes and bruises that defined his daily life. He paused to puzzle over the circles drawn on his chest long enough to confirm they were only ink and nothing more. His growing relief evaporated when he noticed the arm fitted in a makeshift sling. Real fear took its place as he discovered the ruins of the boy’s hands. Strips of white flesh hung from his palms. Somehow he’d torn through multiple layers of skin leaving behind weeping wounds. Hands and fingers had swollen to immobility, little more than fleshy blocks at the ends of his wrists. Even without the complications of likely infection, Jorl wondered if Pizlo could be saved the use of his hands at all.

“He needs medical attention!”

“Then he’ll have it, of course.” The senator sounded so much like his grandfather, a blend of decisive surety and familial kindness. Jorl doubted the sincerity but would worry about the cost later. All that mattered in this moment was helping Pizlo.

“Jorl, we’re up in the sky! And I saw Telko, and that was after I saw Pemma.” Pizlo’s voice seemed breathy and his eyes didn’t quite track.

“Hush now, it’ll be fine. You’ve hit your head.” Pizlo flailed a useless hand at the circles on his chest. “I have to fill in another of them.” His eyes gave up their attempt to focus and his head lolled to one side.

“Allow me,” said the Sloth, suddenly beside him, her voice deeper than he’d expected. From her sleeve, she drew a small tube which she snapped open, pouring the contents into her hand. “It’s an anesthetic salve that will help with the pain until we can get him to the infirmary.”

Jorl’s trunk whipped left and right in negation. “He doesn’t need it. He can’t feel pain. Use that time to get him treatment sooner, please.”

“No pain?” repeated the Sloth, even as she slid her arms underneath Pizlo and began to rise. “I’ve never heard of such a thing.”

“No, he’s abnor … his physiology is atypical. I don’t know if ordinary healing methods will be effective or do more harm—”