Reclamation (Book One of the Art of War Trilogy), page 29
The squabble with the provar over the Perseus ore belt, a rich mineral field eighty-five billion kilometres long, sandwiched between the Alliance and the Ascendancy’s Fourth Crusade Fleet, had evidently hardened their attitudes. Yano knew that golgron civilians had died on the second moon of Ghessis as a result of provar intimidation, which perhaps made the Alliance’s support less surprising in retrospect, but the golgron still had no conventional military to speak of, save about twelve voidseekers. As a consequence, for all their altruistic or self-serving intentions, their declaration of support wasn’t worth the hardcopy it was written on.
Yano sighed angrily, landing another ball of paper into the centre of the mug. It was easy to dismiss the support and pains of other species as worthless, without pausing to appreciate the risks they were taking. In siding with the UN so overtly, most of the Tier-Three players were putting themselves in genuine danger. The quorl and the golgron were extremely vulnerable, and impressive rhetoric meant nothing when entire cities were being drenched in radiation beams and civilians by the thousand were cooked inside their houses. Perhaps they were hoping the UN would protect them, emboldened by the UN Fleet’s provocative actions and the President’s bluster. Yano almost wanted to stop and tell them just how selfish humanity had become. The UN meddled when it suited it and sold entire species out when it didn’t. They only had to look at the kaygryn death toll following Hadan’s Reach. At the end of the day, though, none of the declared support mattered. Until the Ascendancy withdrew from Uvolon, the day would be considered nothing but a failure.
‘You can’t blame yourself,’ Codey said, not taking his eyes off the cold curried meat in front of him. ‘You can only follow your mandate.’
Yano absolutely did not blame himself; he blamed the air-headed idiots on Vargonroth for the whole situation. But since Codey was trying to comfort him, he smiled tolerantly. ‘Thanks, Bal,’ he said, deciding that that was the time to stop flicking bits of paper everywhere. It was surprising how little they were actually obliged to do in between each session in the Grand Chamber, though there was plenty they should have been doing, cosying up to other diplomats and making deals and alliances through the back door. Since the majority of Tier Three had declared unilateral support for the UN, however, there didn’t seem much need. Constance and Graydon were out there anyway, which made him feel less guilty about moping.
It didn’t fully clear his conscience, however.
‘We should be doing something,’ he mumbled after a while. He gestured vaguely to the door. ‘Out there.’
Codey gave a noncommittal grunt. ‘We can do that at dinner,’ he said, his eyes tired. ‘If we can do it at all,’
‘Why don’t we go home, then,’ Yano said. Part of him – and it was a large part – actually wanted to. He was not used to such comprehensive failure with the provar. He was a rising star for God’s sake; they said as much in the news.
Codey didn’t answer, presumably because he thought Yano was joking.
‘The President is sending more ships to Uvolon,’ Yano said after a while, trying to find company for his misery. ‘It’s so… I can’t get my head around it, Bal.’
‘Yano,’ Codey said levelly, fixing him with a stare. ‘The President has been locked in a room in UNSOC with his Chiefs of Staff for two days now. All this…’ He gestured about the room. ‘… this summit, this diplomacy, it’s all bullshit. It was McKone’s idea, not Aurelius’s. As far as he is concerned, this has been a military operation from the start, with a bit of left-wing summit garbage to satisfy the Veigis middle classes.’
Yano’s eyes widened slightly in genuine surprise. ‘Christ, Bal, I didn’t have you figured as the cynical type.’
Codey rolled his eyes. ‘Come on, Zav.’
‘All right, perhaps not as brutally cynical.’
‘Hold on,’ Codey said, sitting forward. ‘Vargonroth.’ Yano sat in silence while Codey read the message, his eyes scrolling back and forth across an invisible screen.
‘Well?’ he asked, trying to keep the irritation from his voice.
‘Apparently,’ Codey said slowly, ‘there are some UN agents here who want to speak to the kaygryn legation.’
Yano sat up. ‘What kind of agents?’ he asked, his face wrinkled in confused disgust.
Codey shrugged with an affected nonchalance. ‘UNIS probably. Maybe even EFFECT. I don’t know. To be honest, I’m not sure I want to know.’
‘We should be the only ones speaking to the kaygryn legation,’ Yano said. ‘This is a diplomatic mission.’
‘Mm,’ Codey replied, distracted. ‘Kaivan,’ he called over his shoulder. The junior envoy looked up from his conversation.
‘Sir?’
‘Would you go to the kaygryn legation’s official chambers, and then any caucus rooms they have, and see what’s going on? I want to know where they are, specifically. Come and find me when you’re done.’
‘Yes, sir,’ Kaivan replied and disappeared.
‘You’re not going to indulge this are you?’ Yano pressed, his voice dripping with contempt. ‘Aren’t you tired of having our authority undermined by SOC?’
Codey shrugged impassively, an infuriating return to form. ‘We’re all on the same team.’
Yano snorted. ‘If you believe that, you are a fool.’
A flash of anger passed over Codey’s face, and he was about to retort when Yano interjected, realising his mistake. ‘Why would UNIS want to talk to the kaygryn, anyway?’ he asked, pretending not to have noticed his second’s transient rage.
‘To try and find out why they attacked the crusade fleet, I should imagine. Since diplomacy isn’t getting them the results they want,’ the man replied, affably enough.
‘It’s only been one day.’
‘I’ve known the UN to abandon summits in less than an hour,’ Codey said, staring at the wall. ‘We are not a patient organisation.’
Yano reclined back into his appallingly comfortable chair, deflated. Codey’s words had hit home. ‘Shit,’ he said, once again feeling the weight of failure on his shoulders.
‘I’m going to find Andrea,’ Codey said after a while. ‘See if I can make myself useful.’
Yano watched as he stood up and left, settling back into his morose reverie. After a short while, however, it became apparent that no one was paying him any attention. He sighed, stood and walked slowly over to the group in the corner.
‘How is everyone?’ he asked, not caring in the slightest but unable to conjure a better opener at that moment.
‘Good thanks,’ Bennett replied, flashing that obsequious smile of his. Of all the five of them, he cared the least about Bennett.
‘A little shaken, to be honest, Special Envoy,’ Siun replied. ‘It is difficult to retain one’s composure in the face of ten baying Folhourtians.’
‘I can well imagine,’ Yano replied, offering a pat on the shoulder. Velsze and Abena Ghani both said something as well, which he disregarded out of hand. His attentions instead fell on Tanja, who thus far had avoided his gaze.
‘I’d never witnessed an exchange between the Ascendancy and Xhevega,’ she said after a short pause that was milliseconds from becoming uncomfortable. She spoke more to Siun than Yano. ‘Their hatred is quite profound.’
‘It is,’ Yano replied, feeling himself already losing control of a conversation he had started. His professional confidence had taken a knock, but his courtship abilities remained first rate. Or were the two more entwined than he’d thought?
‘They hate everyone,’ he continued. ‘Sometimes I wonder why they agreed to join Tier Three at all.’
‘They are not all fanatics,’ Siun said. It was all Yano could do not to stare.
‘What do you mean? Of course they are.’
‘As I was explaining to your colleagues,’ the provar continued, indicating Tanja and Bennett, ‘the Ascendancy is a population governed by fanatics. Many follow because they have to, not because they are willing. It is no different from a hundred human dictatorships you’d care to name.’
Yano sat down slowly next to him. He felt like this was something, as a diplomat, he really should have been aware of. But then despite the size of the Ascendancy, they had developed an unparalleled aura of secrecy around their daily dealings. It made sense; they had had millennia in which to do it.
‘I didn’t know that,’ Yano admitted, embarrassed.
‘Few within the UN do, even those as senior as yourself,’ Siun said, gently massaging Yano’s ego back to form. ‘The Ascendancy media outlets are tightly controlled by the Zecad. They allow only flattering coverage of the state. Dissenting citizens are publicly and savagely executed. Space travel is restricted.’ Siun did the equivalent of a shrug. ‘And besides, many do believe the cause. Ascendancy infants are indoctrinated from birth. Raised to believe in the war, to glorify the crusade fleets. Their sole purpose in life is to travel across open space and die in battle against an enemy they know nothing about, for a cause they do not even realise they have been forced to believe in. They do it willingly. You cannot blame them for believing they are superior to every other race in the galaxy. Aside from the fact that, technologically speaking, they are, they have been told as much since the minute they were born.’
‘But why do the Enclaves remain silent?’ Yano asked. ‘Why do you not make this kind of knowledge public?’
Siun exhaled loudly. ‘And what would be the point? We are a principled people, but we are not stupid. If we spread word about the Ascendancy, the true Ascendancy, they would destroy us in a blink. The UN and the Ascendancy are trade partners within the Trade Pact. The UN does not want to know about our plight unless it suits them.’
‘The UN has intervened in the past–’
‘To stop massacres! Massacres that we should not have to endure in the first place!’
Yano flinched slightly at the provar’s sudden, anguished temper. Empathy, despite all his UNDC training, was not his strongest suit. Especially empathising with aliens. Yano was a superb negotiator, but he didn’t care how they felt. Perhaps not until now, anyway.
‘I’m… sorry,’ he said. Moisture was swelling up behind the alien’s nictitating membranes. Yano hoped to dear sweet Christ Siun wasn’t crying. He looked at the others for help, but Tanja looked as useless as he imagined he did. It was Bennett, to his great surprise, who reached out and placed a hand on the alien’s.
‘We will never understand what your people have gone through,’ he said, ‘but we will try.’
Siun gripped his forearm, nodding once. ‘Thank you, youngster. That day may come sooner than you think.’
Yano frowned. He was about to ask Siun what he had meant when the door opened violently. Kaivan stood there, his face marked with a seam of perspiration, flushed from running. He looked around the room until his eyes settled on Yano in such a way as to make very obvious that Yano was his second choice.
‘Mr Yano, the door is under armed guard,’ he said, breathlessly. ‘No one can get in or out.’
Yano frowned. ‘Guarded by whom? Kaygryn?’
‘And ZENs. Two kaygryn, four ZENs. I can’t find Mr Codey.’
‘Shit,’ Yano said, standing. His eyes went blank for a moment as he relayed the information to McKone. It took a full two minutes for the message to be encrypted, packaged and fired into a wormhole by one of Gonvarion’s satellite relays.
‘What does that mean?’ Tanja asked.
‘I don’t know,’ Yano murmured, walking back over to his corner. It took fifteen tense minutes for the reply to come.
Negotiate with the zhahassi to gain access. You are authorised to use force if necessary. I do not condone force. Be careful. The President has run out of patience. Harsh actions lead to harsh consequences.
McKone.
‘What force are we supposed to use?’ Yano said to himself, incredulous to the point of laughter. He forwarded the message to Kaivan and Abena. ‘Barge our way through six armed guards with fists flying?’
Codey burst back in a moment later, his own face flushed. ‘Where are these bloody UNIS agents who are supposed to be interrogating them?’ he said without preamble. The unapprised in the room were looking uncomfortably at one another. ‘How are we supposed to negotiate an entrance if we don’t even know who we’re negotiating it for?’
‘They’re in one of the caucus chambers,’ Kaivan said quietly, unsure of whether he was speaking out of turn.
Codey took a step forward. Kaivan nearly took a step back. ‘Bring them here,’ Codey ordered. ‘Now.’
‘Yes, Mr Codey,’ Kaivan replied, quickly exiting the room.
‘Ambassador Velsze,’ Codey said, looking over to the zhahassi in the corner.
‘Yes, Special Envoy?’ Velsze said, head bobbing with anxiety.
‘I want to speak to Fhalco and Zvell, please. Will you fetch them for me?’
Velsze looked positively uncomfortable at the request. ‘Yes, Ambassador,’ he said dutifully, though not before a moment’s deliberation. He followed Kaivan out of the chamber.
‘What are you doing?’ Yano asked. ‘Are we seriously going to break into the kaygryn legation room with armed UNIS agents? Have you any idea how illegal that is?’
‘Jesus, Yano, what do you want me to do? At least this way we can control some of the collateral.’
‘They have IMMUNITY! I can’t believe we’re even talking about this! Hell, I want to know what those fucking morons are up to as much as the next man, but there are rules! If we go charging in there, we’re no better than the goddamned provar!’
Codey’s glance shifted irritably to the wall. ‘Orders are orders, Yano.’
‘That’s it? “Orders are orders!” Fuck you, Bal, you sound like a goddamned Nazi.’
‘You want to leave?’ Codey exploded. ‘There’s the door! What are you, a fucking idealist now?’
‘Stop it!’ Tanja shouted from the corner of the room, leaping to her feet. ‘Stop it now! Please!’
Silence seized the chamber. Yano’s hands were trembling. He thought of a hundred things to say, things that he would regret personally and professionally for the rest of his life. Instead, he held his tongue for ten seconds, promising himself that if, after ten seconds, he still wanted to say them, he would.
He didn’t. ‘I’m sorry,’ he said quietly. Somewhere in the back of his mind, he wondered when the last time he had said sorry was.
Codey waved him quiet. ‘Shut up,’ he said, though the anger had melted from his voice.
The ambassadors arrived five minutes later, still clad in their white and crimson diplomatic robes.
‘Special Envoys,’ Zvell said, his neck wobbling in pleasure.
‘Ambassadors,’ Codey replied. Diplomatic protocol suggested he at least attempt Zhahassi before speaking in Terran, though evidently the time for diplomatic niceties was over. ‘We have a problem regarding the kaygryn legation.’
‘Ah, yes,’ Fhalco replied, quite unperturbed by the breach in etiquette. ‘The spectre at large. Strange, isn’t it? They are the lynchpin of this entire summit, and yet they are absent. It’s almost as if they intended it this way.’ A small smile played across the zhahassi’s lips. It was well done, since smiling wasn’t a natural expression for the aliens.
‘Quite,’ Yano remarked drily.
‘I have been informed that they are now under guard. Armed guard.’
‘I am aware of it. A squad of ZENs, no less. Barbaric, if you ask me,’ Zvell said.
‘Do you know why they are there?’
The alien frowned. ‘I can’t say I do. Though they are native to the Memorial Tower, of course. Given that the kaygryn fear the provar, the Custodians probably thought it prudent to take the precaution. The situation in the Grand Chamber was somewhat volatile, after all.’
‘I’ll get to the point, Ambassador,’ Codey said, with an undercurrent of irritation. ‘We need to get inside that room and speak with the kaygryn legation. The orders have come from the President of the United Nations himself.’
Yano had to stop himself from looking witheringly at Codey. It was the lousiest thing he had ever heard his second come up with. No one gave a shit about the President of the United Nations himself, especially when that President was a hot-headed cretin.
Zvell smiled again, that same knowing smile as Fhalco. They had evidently practised it.
‘Of course, Special Envoy,’ Zvell said, inclining his head. ‘I will see what I can do.’
Codey bowed in return, smiling a broad, slightly false smile. ‘We are much obliged.’
The two zhahassi ambassadors loped out of the room with a characteristic lack of grace. Kaivan almost body-checked Fhalco on his energetic return.
‘Mr Jean-Luc Courte is here to see you, as requested,’ he said to Codey. Behind him, a plain, grim-looking man, slightly shabby and well into his forties, appeared in the door. His navy-blue UNDC fatigues concealed a bullish frame of muscle which suggested to Yano that he was some kind of operations man.
‘Mr Courte,’ Codey said, ‘I’m Special Envoy Balthazar Codey. This is Special Envoy Zavian Yano.’
‘I know who you both are,’ Courte said in accented Terran, acting every bit as dour as he looked. ‘I’m sure you’ve guessed who I am and what I do.
‘Actually–’
‘I have been tasked by our mutual employer with obtaining certain information from our kaygryn friends. I have a number of pressing engagements. This gives me a very small window of opportunity to sort this mess out. You are diplomats. This is a diplomatic summit. Do your jobs, get me inside, or so help me I will have my men do it – and if they do it, there will be no pleases and thank yous involved. Understood? Good.’
