Cobra - Cobra Strike Part 45

"Oh?" Hemner raised an eyebrow. "The people kill the tarbines' protector bololins so that the mojos can breed more easily; in turn the mojos protect their owners from attack. What's that if not symbiosis? But my real question is what did the mojos do before humans came along?"

All eyes s.h.i.+fted to Telek. "Lizabet?" Stiggur prompted. "Any ideas?"

"Not offhand," she answered slowly, a frown creasing her forehead. "Huh. Never even occurred to me to wonder about that. Have to be a predator, certainly-a big one, to deal with the bololins. I'll have to check the Troft records, see how many likely candidates there are."

"If you'll forgive me," Roi put in, "I don't see that this is a vital part of figuring out how to stop the mojos now that they are riding around on the

Qasamans' shoulders."

"If you'll forgive me," Telek shot back, "one never knows in this business where a key fact will show up."

She launched into a mini-lecture about the interdependence of biological structure and function with ecological position, but Jonny missed most of it.

Skimming the Qasaman biological data, he hit a small sentence that brought his eyes and mind to a screeching halt. He backed up and read the section carefully... and a not-quite-understood s.h.i.+ver went up his spine.

Stiggur was saying something mollifying when Jonny's attention returned to the group. He waited until the governor-general was finished and then spoke up before anyone else could do so. "Lizabet, have you had time to study the fauna records the Menssana brought back? Specifically, the ones from the planet

Chata?"

"I glanced through them." Her expression said you know I did, but the thought remained unsaid. "You driving at anything specific?"

"Yes." Jonny tapped keys to send the two pages he'd been looking at to the others' displays. "On the left is our profile of the flatfoot quadruped of

Chata; on the right, yours of the Qasaman bololin. If you'd all take a moment to scan the two pages, I think you'll see what I mean."

"Interesting," Vartanson nodded a minute later. "A lot of similarity there."

"In particular the use of magnetic field lines for navigation," Telek agreed.

"Highly unusual for large land animals. Probably a cla.s.sic example of the

Trofts' so-called common-stock theory-you know, the same argument as to why we get similar flora and fauna on Aventine, Palatine, and Caelian."

"Uh-huh," Jonny said. He'd found the other two pages he needed and now put them on the displays. "Okay, then, how about the mojo on the right and this bird on the left?"

Fairleigh snorted. "From a binocular photo and computer-generated views? Even I know you need more than that for a similarity study."

Jonny kept his eyes on Telek. "Lizabet?"

"Both predators," she said slowly. "Beaks and wing coverts very similar. Feet... not enough detail, but... interesting. Those short filaments coming off the crown and lore-here and here? The mojo's got some sort of vibrissae there, too; tied somehow into its auditory system, we think. Unless that's a false construct generated by the computer. Where did you spot this-oh, there it is. Tacta. The last planet on your survey, right?"

"Right," Jonny said absently. So the mojos were apparently close cousins to the strange bird whose behavior had spooked them off its world. Which meant... what?

"For the moment, at least," Stiggur said, "Lizabet is right that the mojo data needs more detailed study before we can discuss a counter to them. So I'd like to move on to a strategic discussion of the society itself, particularly the structural aspects that we already know. Uh... let's see... right: page 162 is where it starts."

The discussion lasted nearly an hour, and despite the relatively raw state of the data a picture emerged which Jonny found as depressing from a military standpoint as it possibly could have been. "Let's see if I've got all this straight," he said at the end, trying to go as easy as he could on the heavy sarcasm. "We have a society whose members all regularly carry firearms, whose population is largely spread out in small villages, whose light industry is also solidly decentralized and whose heavy industry is buried deep underground, and whose exact technological level is still unknown. Does that pretty well cover it?"

"Don't forget their willingness to use brain-boosting drugs and to h.e.l.l with the personal consequences," Roi growled. "And all of them h.e.l.lbent paranoids on top of it. You know, Brom, the more we get into this, the less I like the idea of them sitting out there ready to explode across s.p.a.ce as soon as they reinvent the stardrive."

"You sound as if they'll be orbiting us the next morning," Hemner said. He coughed, twice, the spasms shaking his thin shoulders, but when he continued his voice was firm enough. "Qasama is forty-five light-years away, remember-it'll take them years to find us, even if they're specifically looking. Long before that they'll run into the Trofts, and whether they begin trade or warfare they'll be tied up with them for generations. By then they'll have forgotten this little fiasco and we'll be able to start fresh with our brother humans as if this had never happened."

"A nice speech, Jor," Telek said tartly, "but you're missing a few rather vital points. One: What if they hit Chata and the other worlds out there before they find the Trofts?"

"What of it?" Hemner replied. "If we quit the job now our people won't be out there, anyway."

Telek's lip might have twitched, but her voice was even enough as she continued.

"Second is your a.s.sumption the Qasamans will forget us. Wrong. They'll remember, all right, and whether it's a year or a century they'll brace for war the minute they run into us again. You may not believe that," she added, glancing around the table, "but it's true. I was there; I saw and heard the way they talk. You wait until Hersh Nnamdi's final report is in, see if he doesn't agree with me on that. And third: We let them get off Qasama and we're in for a long and very b.l.o.o.d.y war indeed. Our current technological edge is meaningless with brain-boosters in the picture-a few months or years of warfare and they'll be at our level, whatever it is at the time. And if you think they're decentralized now wait'll they're dug in on Kubha and Tacta and G.o.d knows where else."

"Your points are certainly valid," Stiggur said as Telek paused. "But all your tactical arguments miss the one big emotional stumbling block we're going to face here. Namely, are the Cobra Worlds really going to fight as Troft mercenaries against other human beings?"

"That's a rather inflammatory way of putting it," Vartanson accused.

"Of course it is. But it's the way that side of the issue is going to present their case. And in all honesty, I have to admit it's a valid point. We started this whole affair worrying about looking weak in the Trofts' eyes, if you'll recall, and a world's ethics are certainly part of its total strength. Besides, wouldn't we actually be adding to our position to have other human allies on the

Troft border?"

"You're ignoring history, Brom," Jonny put in quietly. "Having two human groups on their borders is precisely what got the Troft demesnes worried enough to jointly prepare for war fourteen years ago."

Fairleigh snorted. "There's a good-sized difference between the Dominion of Man and Qasama as far as border threats go."

"Only in magnitude. And remember that Trofts don't go in for ma.s.s destruction from stars.h.i.+ps. They make war by going in and physically occupying territory... and Qasama would not be a fun place to go in and occupy."

"Agreed," Telek murmured with a slight shudder.

"Or in other words," Hemner said, "the Trofts can't bring themselves to slaughter, so they're hiring us to do it for them."

Several voices tried to answer; Vartanson's was the one that got through.

"Forget the Trofts for a minute-just forget them. We're talking about a threat to us, d.a.m.n it. Lizabet is right-we've got to deal with them, and we've got to deal with them now."

For a long moment the small room was quiet. Jonny glanced at Hemner, but the old man was staring down at his hands, clenched together on the table. Stiggur eventually broke the silence. "I think we've done about as much as we can with the data at hand," he said, looking at each of the others in slow, measured turn. "The final geological, biological, and sociological studies are due in ten days; we'll meet then-prior to a hill Council meeting-and try to come to a decision." Reaching to the side of his display, he shut off the sealed recorder.

"This meeting is adjourned."

Chapter 25.

Stiggur's prediction of the opposition's tactical methods took only a few days to be borne out; and as he had when the Qasaman story first broke weeks earlier,

Corwin abruptly found himself in the middle of the whole public debate.

But with a difference. Before, Qasama had been seen as little more than a mathematical equation: an abstract challenge on one hand, with the very concrete hope of more than doubling the Cobra Worlds' land holdings on the other. Now the comfortable fog was gone. As details of Qasama's people and dangers were released, a growing emotional fire began to simmer within even the most logical and rational arguments, both pro and anti. Most of the antis Corwin talked to were only marginally mollified by the a.s.surance that Jonny was also against a ma.s.sive war with other humans, their att.i.tude usually being that he should be doing more to bring the Council over to that point of view. The pros tended simply to ignore such sticky ethical questions while claiming that the Cobra

Worlds' own safety should be Jonny's first priority. It made for a verbal no-win situation, and within three days Corwin was heartily sick of it.

But it wasn't until he got a call from Joshua that he realized just how much the phone and public information net had again taken over his life.

"Have you had a chance to see Justin lately?" Joshua asked after the amenities were out of the way.