Eric Flint - Time spike

"Geoffrey, our power over you today-if we exercised it, which I have no intention of doing-would come entirely and simply from this. And the rifles, of course. And the fact is, this is a very finite resource. That's a lot of the reason I want to make this alliance and go after de Soto. Now. While we still have enough ammunition. By this time next year…" He shrugged, and slid the pistol back into the holster. "This gun and all the others will just be so much scrap metal. Fancy-looking, but still scrap. We have no way of making new ones. We don't even think we can make new ammunition that they could use. Maybe a little, but certainly not enough to rule anyone unilaterally. That's one of the reasons I lie awake at night worrying about the prisoners. I hate spending any ammunition on de Soto, with two and half thousand convicts to keep under control. But I figure I don't have any choice. De Soto's on the loose, and at least the convicts are locked up behind bars." Watkins shook his head. "You are being too shortsighted, Andy. It may be true-I'm not questioning your statement-that you can't make new guns like that. But your people will still start outpacing my own, when it comes to such things, as time goes by." He waved his hand at the town. In some indefinable manner, the gesture including everything, not just the buildings. The meat being smoked, the nutmeal being made, the little patch of corn, even the children Andy could see in the distance, eagerly picking their way through some short horsetails looking for grasshoppers. "We are very good at this," Watkins said softly. "Much better than you are. But you have things we don't, and they go much farther than guns." Andy made a face. "I suppose. But-" "What is this thing you call a 'machine shop'?" Watkins asked abruptly. Andy began to explain. And, as he did, finally began to understand what the Cherokee chief was getting at.

"You see?" Watkins said when he finished. "Even in one of yourprisons -a place you put the worst people you have-you have the means to work with metal and make complicated machines. And I can tell you more, because I have spoken to many of you and listened very carefully when you told me things that you yourselves did not even think about. For here is what else you have." He started counting off on his fingers.

"Even in one of yourprisons, you have a library. Even in one of yourprisons, you have what Jenny Radford calls an infirmary. Even in one of yourprisons, you have vehicles that make the fanciest carriages in the Washington D.C. of my time look like a child's toy." He grinned, then. "Speaking of which-I know you have at least one, so don't pretend you don't-I will insist as part of any bargain that we get all the ones called a 'Cherokee.' Call it a penalty for being presumptuous." Andy laughed. "Okay, fine. I think we've got three of them, if I remember right. That belong to the prison, anyway. Some of the guards might have one as a personal vehicle out in the lot. You'd have to dicker with them about that. But I'm warning you, Geoffrey.

They won't run for very long. We're very low on gasoline." "Then you will make gasoline." He held up his hand in a peremptory gesture.

"Don't tell me you won't. If not gasoline, something else. Rod Hulbert told me the vehicles can also run-some of them, at least-on what he calls 'biofuel.' As I understand it, that's a sort of whiskey." He lowered the hand. "Now, do you see the problem? What you propose is to provide us with protection, and we will provide you with food. From which you will make-or we will make for you-this whiskey you will use to ride across the land as warrior kings. While we remain working your fields and bringing you meat. That we gather with hoes and bows and arrows. "No, Captain Blacklock. That is not a bargain I can accept. I can accept it this year and next year. I cannot accept it for ten years. A century from now-less, even-we would be walking another Trail of Tears. A people's attitudes are important. But I am not an idiot like those warriors of Tecumseh's, who thought his magic would protect them from bullets. I would much rather have unpleasant attitudes, if need be, and an equality of power, than have splendid attitudes-today-if they come with a complete disparity of power. When a wolf offers to lie down with a sheep, the sheep can only agree if the wolf offers to share his teeth. Or, sooner or later, he's just mutton." He looked away, sighing. "You were not there, Andy. I was. To you, it is ancient history; to me, it happened weeks and months ago. I have listened to you and your people, as you apologize to us for the Trail of Tears. And swear it cannot happen again, because you are not the wicked people your ancestors were. And it is all a lie, not because you lie, but because you do not understand your own ancestors.

You do not understand, not really, that your ancestors were not wicked at all." He shrugged. "Not most of them, anyway. The Georgians were horrible, true, and some others. No different from the worst convicts in your prison or de Soto. But the rest…" He nodded his head toward the town. "No different from James Kershner, whom one of my nieces is already plotting and scheming to get for a husband. No different from his soldier John Pitzel, who is the object of the plots and schemes of Susan Fisher's niece. If Van Buren is a fucking asshole, Winfield Scott is not. The very general the Americans placed in charge of the Trail of Tears tried to stop it. And Winfield Scott is not alone. Others are still better. Attitudes? You could not ask for a better attitude than Sam Houston's. Who has lived among us, was married to one of our women for time, speaks our language fluently, and has always been a friend of our nation. "And what did it matter, in the end? We still walked the Trail of Tears. "Even Andrew Jackson, whom some of you seem to think is the arch-devil in the business, bean't a monster. I know him myself, Andy. I fought with him at the Horseshoe Bend, and I visited him years later-twice-with some other Cherokee chiefs at his home at the Hermitage. Many Indians visited Sharp Knife at his home, over the years. The man's wife was distant and aloof, but he was friendly and cordial. The truth is, I enjoyed the visits. He did not force the southern tribes off their land because he was filled with hatred for Indians. He adopted a Creek orphan for one of his sons-a boy he'd made an orphan himself, in his war against the Red Sticks. He's simply doing what he thinks best for his own people." He lifted his leg and straddled the log, now looking at Andy squarely. Then he grinned. "Jackson's still a fucking asshole, you understand. But that's my point. You can expect people to be fucking assholes, from time to time, if they think their interests are deeply involved in something. So the trick is to make sure that, when they act like assholes, they really can't do very much harm. But that brings us back to the problem of power, which is where I started."

Andy scratched his head. He understood what Watkins was saying, and the simple fact that he kept referring to the history involved in the present tense drove it home more sharply than anything. "I can give you some of our guns right now, easily enough," he said, although he really didn't like the idea. Not because he was worried about what the Cherokees would do with them, but simply because that would mean fewer guns to deal with the convicts in the prison. Watkins shook his head.

"I'd want a few of a rifles, and some ammunition, but that's just to deal with the immediate threat of the big lizards. In the long run, the rifles are almost nothing more than a symbol. It's the rifles and everything else." Andy kept scratching his head. Watkins raised his hand again. "Never mind, Andy. I bean't raising this to get an answer right now. Truth is, I don't think there are any simple answers. I'll agree to the alliance. But I just want to point out that we're going to need to keep dickering. For years." "Oh." Andy finally stopped scratching his head. "That's no problem." Watkins grinned. Belatedly, it occurred to Andy that Cherokees had a reputation for being good at dickering, if he remember his history correctly. And prison guards didn't.