Cobra

Jonny chuckled. "I think they're too smart for that. Speaking of smart moves, you and Chrys to the point of setting a date yet?"

"Umm... not really. I think we both want to make sure we're right for each other."

"Well, in my opinion, if you don't grab her while you've got the chance you're crazy. Though I'm not sure I'd give her the same advice."

MacDonald snorted. "Thanks a kilo. Just for that I may make you walk home."

Challinor's house was near the outskirts of Thanksgiving, within sight of the cultivated fields surrounding the village. Two other cars were already parked there; and as they got out and headed for the house, the front door opened, revealing a slender man in full Cobra dress uniform. "Good evening, Moreau; MacDonald," he said coolly. "You're twenty minutes late."

Jonny felt MacDonald stiffen beside him and hurried to get in the first word. "Hello, L'est," he said, gesturing to the other's outfit. "I didn't realize this was a costume party."

Simmon L'est merely smiled thinly, a mannerism whose carefully measured condescension had always irritated Jonny. But the other's eyes showed the barb had hit its target. MacDonald must have seen that, too, and brushed silently by L'est without delivering the more potent blast he'd obviously been readying when Jonny stepped in. Breathing a bit easier, Jonny followed his friend in, L'est closing the door behind them.

The modest-sized living room was comfortably crowded. At the far end, on a straight-back chair, sat Tors Challinor, resplendent in his own Cobra dress uniform; at his right, looking almost drab in their normal work clothes, were Sandy Taber and Barl DesLone, the two Cobras stationed in Greensward. Next to them, also in dress uniforms, were Hael Szintra of Oasis and Franck Patrusky of Thanksgiving.

"Ah—MacDonald and Moreau," Challinor called in greeting. "Come in; your seats are right up here." He indicated the two empty chairs to his left.

"I hope this is really important, Challinor," MacDonald growled as the two men crossed the room and sat down. "I don't know what things are like in Thanksgiving, but we don't have a lot of time in Ariel for playing soldier." He glanced significantly at the uniforms.

"As it happens, your lack of spare time is one of the topics we want to discuss," Challinor said smoothly. "Tell me, does Ariel have all the Cobras it deserves? Or does Greensward, for that matter?" he added, looking at Taber and DesLone.

"What do you mean, 'deserves'?" Taber asked.

"At last count there were about ten thousand people in Caravel District and exactly seventy-two Cobras," Challinor said. "That works out to one Cobra per hundred-forty people. Any way you slice it, a town the size of Greensward ought to have three Cobras assigned to it, not two. And that goes double for Ariel."

"Things seem reasonably calm at the moment in Ariel," MacDonald said. "We don't really need any more firepower than we've got." He looked at Taber. "How are conditions around Greensward?"

"Firepower isn't the issue," Szintra put in before Taber could answer. "The point is that we're required to do a lot more than just guard our villages against spine leopards and falx. We have to hunt down wheat snakes, act as patrollers in domestic squabbles—and if we have any spare time left, we're supposed to help cut down trees and unload supply trucks. And we get nothing in return!"

Jonny looked at Szintra's flushed face, then at the other three uniformed men. A cold knot was beginning to form over his dinner. "Ken, perhaps we should get back to Ariel," he said quietly to MacDonald.

"No—please stay a while longer," Challinor spoke up hastily. "Cee-three Szintra was a bit more forceful than necessary, but stuck all alone out in Oasis he perhaps sees matters more clearly than some of the rest of us."

"Let's assume for the present that he's right, that we don't get the respect we deserve," MacDonald said. "What solution are we discussing here?"

"It's not simply lack of respect, or even the way we always seem to be taken for granted," Challinor said earnestly. "It's also the way the syndic's office takes forever to process the simplest requests for equipment or supplies—though they're prompt enough when it comes to picking up surplus wheat and gluevine extract when we have it. They seem to have forgotten that the whole planet isn't as comfortable as Rankin and Capitalia, that when a frontier town needs something we need it now. Add to that the mania for making lots of little frontier settlements instead of consolidating the territory we've got—which is why we're spread so damn thin—and you get a picture of a government that's not doing its job. To put it bluntly, we feel something has to be done about it."

There was a long moment of silence. "What do you suggest?" DesLone asked at last. "That we send a petition to the Dominion with the next courier ship?"

"Don't be denser than you have to, Barl," Taber growled. "They're talking about replacing Governor-General Zhu themselves."

"Actually, our thinking is that more than the governor-general needs changing," Challinor said calmly. "It's painfully clear that the centralized system that works so well once a world is established is failing miserably on Aventine. We need something more decentralized, something more responsive to the planet's needs—"

"Governed by those who'd do the best job?" Jonny cut in. "Us, for instance?"

"In many ways, our struggle to tame Aventine is analogous to the guerrilla war we waged against the Trofts," Challinor said. "If I do say so myself, we did a hell of a job back then—don't you agree? Who on this planet could do better?"

"So what are you suggesting?" MacDonald asked, his tone far more interested than it had any business being. "We carve Aventine into little kingdoms, each one run by a Cobra?"

"Basically," Challinor nodded. "It's a bit more complicated than that—there'd have to be a loose hierarchy to settle disputes and such—but that's the general idea. What do you say? Are you interested?"

"How many of you are there?" MacDonald asked, ignoring the question.

"Enough," Challinor said. "The four of us here, plus the three from Fallow, two from Weald, and three more from Headwater and the lumber camps upslope of the Kerseage Mines."

"You propose to take over an entire world with twelve Cobras?"

Challinor's brow furrowed slightly. "No, of course not. But I've talked to a lot of other Cobras, both in and out of Caravel District. Most of them are willing to wait and see what happens with our experiment."

"In other words, to see how hard Zhu comes down on you when you declare independence?" MacDonald shook his head. "Your thinking's got loose connections, Challinor. No Cobra's going to be allowed to stay neutral in something like that—they'll be ordered to come here and restore the syndic's rule, and their answer to that order will put them on one side or the other. With the odds at—let's see; twelve Cobras out of six hundred twenty makes it about fifty to one—which way do you think they'll jump?"

"Which way are you jumping, MacDonald?" L'est cut in suddenly from his seat by the door. "You ask a lot of questions for someone who hasn't committed himself yet."

MacDonald kept his eyes on Challinor. "How about it, Challinor? This is going to take more than an ace or two up your sleeve."

"I asked you a question, damn it!" L'est snapped.

Deliberately, MacDonald turned to face the other; just as leisurely he got to his feet. "I stand where I and my family have always stood: with the Dominion of Man. What you're talking is treason, gentlemen; I won't have any part of it."

L'est was on his feet now, too, standing sideways to MacDonald in a Cobra ready stance. "The loyalty of an EarthScot or a fine dog," he sneered. "In case you haven't noticed, EarthScot, this Dominion you're so eager to please is treating you like dangerous garbage. It's thrown you just as far away as it possibly could, with a hundred fifty light-years and two hundred billion Trofts between you and civilization."