Battlefield Earth Part 110

So diplomacy was like a battle, Jonnie was thinking. Watching these lords arrive one could see that they practically oozed authority and power. The visitors attacking Earth were almost local small fry, controlling at the most a few dozen planets. Some of those arriving, he knew from earlier readings, were from other universes and controlled hundreds of planets in just one governmental sphere. And they were very arrogant, very sure of themselves. Whatever their physical form, there was no doubt that they were ministers plenipotentiary to powerful heads of state. What wealth and striking power they represented! Behind them were collective populations numbering trillions in just one state alone. They were the veterans and victors of hundreds of such conferences. Yes, a conference was a battle and an even more important one than a war.

And what chance did he and Sir Robert have against these experienced diplomats? They were both warriors, not glib, smooth, cunning courtiers with a thousand parliamentary tricks up their sleeves. With no guns or battalions, but with only his wits and the tips Mr. Tsung had given him, he felt quite outnumbered. And so far he had no strategy at all.

The girl had a small mirror she was holding up so he could see. She had cut his hair to collar height in back and combed and rolled it at the bottom. It looked kind of like a helmet he had seen with a back neck guard. And the hair was s.h.i.+ny. His beard and mustache looked very precise, much shorter. He hardly knew himself- had she seen some old paintings of men with beards and mustaches cut like this? Indeed she had- there was an ancient man-book, English, open on the bed to a picture of somebody named "Sir Francis Drake" that had defeated somebody called "the Spaniards" long, long ago.

His attention was attracted by something and he took the mirror from her. His neck! The scars had been quite faint for they were really callouses. And they were gone.

He had to look very hard to see the remains of the Brigante grenade scar on his cheek. That would probably vanish too.

Somehow he felt freed with the collar scars gone. He understood the irony of it and would have smiled but his attention was pulled to the ops room screen. The sound relay had been off and he gave the girl back the mirror and hit the b.u.t.ton.

"...can't think what they're up to!" Stormalong was saying as he angrily finished pulling another picture out of the drone resolver. "I've lost count!"

"Fifteen," said somebody else.

"Look at this! A spray of fire bombs going down into this deserted..." he looked at a map. "Detroit! Why set Detroit on fire? There's been n.o.body in Detroit for over a thousand years! Are they trying to pull defenses over to that continent? They're insane." He threw the picture down. "I'm not providing any air cover for a bunch of ruins! What's the latest from Edinburgh?"

"Antiaircraft still replying," said someone at the ops board. "Smoke interfering with visual firing. Dunneldeen just shot down his sixteenth Hawvin strafing plane."

Jonnie touched the b.u.t.ton to "sound off." He felt an impatience taking hold of him. These diplomats coming in one by one...it was too slow!

The Coordinator had come in with Mr. Tsung, who was holding a lot of things in his arms. It was obvious that Jonnie was under strain. Mr. Tsung said something in his singsong voice.

The Coordinator said, "Mr. Tsung reminds you that even a lost battle can be redeemed at a conference table, to be patient and use skill."

Mr. Tsung had other things now. He took the haircut cloth off Jonnie and showed him a tunic.

It was a very plain garment at first glance. It was cut from s.h.i.+mmering black silk; it had a stand-up collar. It was supposed to be a tight form fit. But it was the silver-colored b.u.t.tons that attracted Jonnie's attention.

He knew what they were. He had once remarked to Ker that it was surprising to see such pretty metal on a Psychlo emergency switch. It looked like silver at first glance but the least amount of light striking it made it glow in rainbow colors. Ker had said, no, it wasn't used for emergency switches because it was pretty. It was used because it was hard. It was a one-molecule-thick metal spray of an iridium alloy, and no matter how many claw points. .h.i.t it, it wouldn't wear off. And when you were in a dark mine with little light, the emergency b.u.t.ton was visible because it looked like it flashed in colors. He knew what the son-in-law had been doing- plating b.u.t.tons. Enough to blind you!

Mr. Tsung had him put it and the black silk pants on and b.u.t.toned the tunic all up-iridium b.u.t.tons every couple of inches down the front.

Then Mr. Tsung made him put on a pair of boots. They were c.h.i.n.ko boots but they had plated them with iridium alloy.

A belt was fastened around him, a wide one, and it was also plated. All except the buckle. And that was his old gold-colored "U.S. Air Force" buckle, s.h.i.+ned until it gleamed. He remembered thinking once in the cage he might be the last surviving member of a long-gone force. A strange thing to think. But right now it sort of cheered him up.

He had thought he was getting dressed and was a bit dismayed to find that Mr. Tsung did not like a pucker on the shoulder and a certain gather in the tunic back and took it all off him and sent them back.

Mr. Tsung had something else now. It was his twisted k.n.o.bkerrie with the carved figures. But they had plated it with iridium. It flashed like a length of flame. He knew he couldn't use it that way but he was glad not to be going into that conference totally without a weapon.

Then the son-in-law came in. He was carrying a helmet. Basically it was just a Russian helmet they had smoothed down. But what had they done to it? The chin strap was plated with iridium alloy. So was the whole helmet. But what was this? The son-in-law turned it, a bit proudly, so Jonnie could see what was on the front.

How had they done this? Then he saw that the son-in-law was holding the paper patterns he had laid down on the helmet front and sides, one after the other, and sprayed through the open holes with different metal sprays.

It was a dragon. And what a dragon!

Gold wings on the side of the helmet, clawed paws that seemed to grip the lower helmet edge, scales and spikes from the spine edged in blue, a ferocious face with what appeared to be real rubies for flaming eyes, white fangs in a scarlet mouth. Ferocious. And a round, whitish ball in its scarlet, otherwise gaping, mouth.

It looked three-dimensional. It was similar to the dragon at the console and the clay dragons lying on the building pile except for this big white ball in its mouth.

At first Jonnie felt it was far too fancy. And just then another emissary arrived on the platform wearing a towering gold crown. This was far less fancy than that. But still.

Jonnie looked at it. It was a bit different from the other dragons. "Very beautiful," said Jonnie so the Coordinator could tell the son-in-law.

They were fixing his clothes. It wasn't time yet by a long way. Jonnie looked at the helmet. Via the Coordinator he said to Mr. Tsung, "Tell me about this dragon."

Mr. Tsung tossed it off and via the Coordinator told Jonnie that the throne of China had been called the "Dragon Throne." "Lung p'ao" or "Chi-fu" patterns or robes were court dress. It was an Imperial...

Jonnie knew all that. "Tell him to tell me about this dragon. It 's different."

Mr. Tsung sighed. There were a lot of other things, far more important, that he should be telling Lord Jonnie, and he didn't think it was very applicable just now to embark on myths and fairy tales. But, well, yes. This dragon was different. The whole story? Oh, my. Well, it went this way. Once upon a time...

Jonnie lay back on the bed with the helmet on his stomach and listened. Unfortunately he did have time. So he listened as Mr. Tsung went on telling him the long and involved fairy tale.

Suddenly about halfway through it, Jonnie abruptly sat up and said to the Coordinator, "I thought so! Please send for Sir Robert."

It startled Mr. Tsung and Jonnie said, "Thank you. Very good story. Thank you more than you know!"

As Lord Jonnie seemed pleased and things were a bit rushed, Mr. Tsung happily went out to make sure the silk suit was altered correctly.

Jonnie looked around to see whether there were any b.u.t.ton cameras in the place. He couldn't really tell. He didn't think so, but he would be very brief and cryptic to play it on the safe side.

A couple minutes later Sir Robert came in. He too had been grooming himself. He was wearing a cloak with the Royal Stewart colors, a matching kilt, and Scottish white spats. The wool was made of s.h.i.+ning hairs. He was the complete Scottish soldier and lord, excepting only weapons. Jonnie had never seen him dressed in full regimentals before. Quite impressive. But the old man looked a bit hollow-eyed and worried.

"This is going to be a tough one," said Jonnie.

"Aye, lad. Did ye ken thet Tolnep? I be no diplomat, laddie, and there's nae chonce of bringing Fearghus oot. The danger lies in antagonizing them lords and states thet isna involved as yet. A false step and we'll be adding them tae the enemy!"

He was upset. Even talking in dialect.

Jonnie never thought he'd have to soothe Sir Robert. "We have a chance. A good one. Now here's what I propose we do: you go in there by yourself and do all you can." Sir Robert didn't much care for that but he listened. "And then when you have finished or think you have gone as far as possible, you call me in, introduce me however you please but not too specifically."

"The communicator they've been using as host will do a' the introductions," said Sir Robert.

"well, tell him what I said. All right?"

"Verra good, laddie. I'll do whativer I can. An if I havna a cease-fire, I'll ca you.

The old War Chief turned to leave. "Good luck!" said Jonnie.

"Aye, lad, that's exactly what I'll be a needin'! We're nae a doin' weel at a' in the field!"

Jonnie looked at his watch. It wouldn't be long now.

Chief Chong-won popped in, grinning. "The hole in the dam has stopped all but a trickle! My men are replacing the armor cable, patching and replacing it. The lake will be armored again before nightfall." He threw his arms up simulating the earlier explosion Jonnie had made. "Boom!" he said and vanished.

Jonnie thought, boom indeed. We'll all go boom if this conference fails.

Chapter 7.

Sir Robert had not been in the conference room three minutes before he realized that he was fighting the most difficult duel of his life.

And he was in no shape for it. He had hardly slept at all since their return and he recognized now that this was a huge error. For all his nickname, "the Fox," he felt sluggish mentally. That nickname had been earned in physical combat and not in a conference room. Had this been a matter of troop dispositions and tactics, he could have coped with it. He would have laid an ambush for this Tolnep and transfixed him with arrows and hacked him to pieces with lochaber axes.

But there stood the Tolnep, elegant, poised, and deadly, already pressing Sir Robert back toward defeat.

Sir Robert's morale was very bad. Half the antiaircraft cover of Edinburgh had been wiped out by a desperate charge of Tolnep marines. Russia was not answering at all. And his own wife was unreported after a cave-in of pa.s.sages to the bunkers. It was desperate that he get a cease-fire!

Yet this Tolnep was dithering around, posing, fiddling with his scepter, flattering the emissaries, and acting like he had all the time in the world!

His name was Lord Schleim. He had a t.i.ttering laugh that alternated with insidious, acid hisses. He was a master of debate much like a swordsman became a master of his blade.

"And so, my worthy colleagues," the Tolnep was saying now, "I really have not the faintest idea why this a.s.semblage was convened at all. Your own time, your physical comfort, even the dignity of your august persons, representing as you do the most powerful lords of the universes, should not have been a.s.saulted and insulted by an upstart lot of barbarians involved in a petty, local dispute. This is a purely local affair, a minor spat. It involves no treaties and so your presence was well known to be unneeded by this weak band of outlaws and rebels who seek to call themselves a government. I propose that we simply dismiss this gathering and leave it up to the military commanders."

The august body stirred, bored. And they were an august body. Jewels glittered on the breathing masks of some. Brilliant cloth rippled as they moved. Some even wore crowns as tokens of the sovereign power they represented. Twenty-nine arbiters of the fates of sixteen universes, they were quite conscious of their power. They felt that if they so chose, they could flick this small and unimportant planet into eternity with no more than a careless gesture of a claw or finger tip. They were not really paying too much attention to Lord Schleim, but t.i.ttering and whispering to one another, possibly about trivial scandals that had occurred since last they saw one another. They were evidence, physically, of what happens when different genetic lines, moving up from different roots, became sentient.

Off to the side sat the small gray man. Another man, quite similar to himself but with a better-quality gray suit, had arrived. They were quietly watching Sir Robert. It was very plain they were not going to intervene or help further.

Sir Robert loathed courtiers. Weak and corrupt and dangerous- that had always been his opinion of this breed. His contempt, he counseled himself, must not show. "Shall we get on with this meeting?" he said.

The emissaries stirred. They muttered responses. Yes, let's complete the formalities. Must have come for something or other. Let's get it over and done with-I've a birthday party waiting for my pet lizard (a remark followed by laughter).

They had all shown their credentials earlier and these had been acknowledged by the group, all but Sir Robert's.

Lord Schleim had seated himself off to the side, in front where he could appear to be addressing them all as their leader. "We have not actually examined the credentials of this...this...soldier? who called this meeting," he offered. "I move that he be removed as the princ.i.p.al speaker, that I be appointed in his stead."

Sir Robert offered them the disc. It was played. It was in Gaelic, a tongue they didn't know. And he might have been called ineligible to conduct the meeting had he not looked beseechingly at the small gray man and if one of the disinterested members had not asked the small gray man whether he had accepted these credentials. The small gray man nodded. Bored, the rest of them accepted the credentials.

That one had been touch-and-go for Sir Robert, for just prior to his entrance he had gotten word that the Chief of Clanfearghus had been wounded in repelling an attack on the guns and he did not know whether he could get a confirmation from Edinburgh.

"I fear," said Lord Schleim, "that I must raise another critical point. How can we be sure that this upstart planet can afford even the small costs of convening such a meeting as this? Your lords.h.i.+ps surely would not want to remain unpaid and have to bear such expenses yourselves. They guaranteed the diplomatic costs but we have no way of knowing that they will ever pay them. A sc.r.a.p of paper saying that one is owed does not fit well in the pocket."

The emissaries laughed at the joke, poor as it was.

"We can pay," glowered Sir Robert. "With sc.r.a.ps off dirty plates?" said Lord Schleim.

The emissaries laughed some more.

"With Galactic credits!" snapped Sir Robert.

"Taken, no doubt," said Lord Schleim, "from the pockets of our crewmen. Well, never mind. Your august lords have a perfect right to declare that the meeting should proceed. But I, myself, feel it is demeaning for the representatives of such mighty and powerful sovereigns to meet just to determine the conditions of surrender and capitulation of some felons-"

"Stop!" bellowed Sir Robert. He had had enough. "We are not here to discuss our surrender! Also there are other planets than your own involved and we have not heard from them!"

"Ah," said Lord Schleim with a leisurely, airy rotation of his scepter, "but my planet has the most s.h.i.+ps here- two for every one the other planets have. And the senior officer of this 'combined police force' happens to be a Tolnep. Quarter-Admiral Snowleter-'

"Is dead!" roared Sir Robert. "His flags.h.i.+p, the Capture, is lying right out there in the lake. Your admiral and that entire crew are carrion."

"Oh, so?" said Lord Schleim. "It had slipped my mind. These accidents happen. s.p.a.ce travel is a perilous venture at best. Probably ran out of fuel. But it doesn't alter what I have just said at all. Captain RoG.o.deter Snowl is the senior officer, then. He has just been promoted. So it remains that the senior commander and the greatest number of s.h.i.+ps are Tolnep, which leaves me in the position of princ.i.p.al negotiator for the surrender of your people and planet after their unprovoked attack on us."

"We are not losing!" stormed Sir Robert.

Lord Schleim shrugged. He cast a negligent glance over the a.s.semblage as though pleading with them to have patience with this barbarian and drawled, "Would the a.s.semblage give me leave to confirm certain points?"

Yes, of course, they muttered. Reasonable request.

Lord Schleim's head bent over the round ball atop his scepter, and with a shock Sir Robert realized it was a disguised radio and that he had been in communication with his forces all along.

"Ah," said Lord Schleim as he raised his head, showed his fangs in a smile, and fixed his gla.s.s-hooded eyes on Sir Robert. "Eighteen of your major cities are in flames!"

So that was why they were burning deserted cities. To make an appearance of winning. Just to terrorize and have a bargaining position in any surrender talks.

Sir Robert was about to tell him those were just deserted ruins that hadn't been lived in for a millennium, but Lord Schleim was pressing on. "This august a.s.sembly needs proof. Please have this trace run off!" He pulled a tiny thread from the base of the radio, a trace copy of the type they received from drones.

"I will not do it!" said Sir Robert.

The a.s.semblage looked a little shocked. It began to dawn on them that maybe this planet's forces were were losing. losing.

"Suppression of evidence," laughed Lord Schleim, "is a crime punishable by this body by fines. I suggest you mend your att.i.tude. Of course, if you have no modern equipment..."

Sir Robert sent the trace out to a resolver. They waited and presently a stack of pictures came back.

They were spectacular air views, in full color, of twenty-five burning cities. The flames were roaring thousands of feet into the air, and if you pa.s.sed a finger down the right border the sound turned on, the sound of rus.h.i.+ng flames and cras.h.i.+ng buildings cut through with the howl of furnace winds. Each picture had been taken at a height best showing the conflagration and the resulting effect was devastating.

Lord Schleim pa.s.sed them around. Paws and jeweled hands and inquisitive feelers made them roar.

"We offer," said Lord Schleim, "very liberal terms. I am quite sure I will be rebuked by a motion of our House of Plunder for being so liberal. But my feelings of pity prompt me and my word here is, of course, binding upon my government. The terms are that all your population be sold into slavery to meet the indemnities it incurred when Earth brought on this unprovoked war. I can even guarantee that they will be well treated- over fifty percent survive such transportation on the average. Other belligerents- the Hawvins, Jamb.i.t.c.hows, Bolbods, Drawkins, and Kayrnes-to divide up the rest of the planet to meet the expenses incurred in defending themselves against this unprovoked attack upon their peaceful s.h.i.+ps. Your king can go into exile on Tolnep and even be provided with a s.p.a.cious dungeon. Good fair terms. Too liberal, but my feelings of compa.s.sion prompt them."

The other emissaries shrugged. It was obvious, it seemed to them, that they had been called here just to witness some surrender terms in a petty war.

Sir Robert was thinking fast, trying to see a way out of this trap. At the start of the meeting he thought he had heard the hum of the transs.h.i.+pment rig two or three times. He could not be sure. He could not count on anything right now. He was tired. His king was wounded. His wife might be dead. All he could really think of was leaping on this horrible creature and taking his chances with those poisoned fangs. But he knew such an action before these emissaries would be fatal to their last glimmering chances.

Seeing his indecision, Lord Schleim said with a harsh, acid hiss, "You Earthlings realize that these mighty lords can make an agreement to force your capitulation! I believe the other combatants of the combined police force agree to my terms?"

The representatives of the Hawvins, Jamb.i.t.c.hows, Bolbods, Drawkins, and Kayrnes all nodded and said, one after the other, that they certainly agreed to these liberal terms. The rest of the a.s.sembly was just watching. A local dispute. But they could swing over and support the Tolneps if it meant ending this useless consumption of their time.

"I came," said Sir Robert, "to discuss your surrender. But before we go any further with this, I shall have to call in my fully authorized colleague."

He made a signal in the direction of where he knew the b.u.t.ton camera was and sat down. He was tired.