I glanced at Kutzko, got cool formality in return. Apparently he still hadn't entirely forgiven me. "I imagine, sir," I said to Lord Kelsey-Ramos, "that you called in some of your high-level favors—no," I interrupted myself, the obvious answer filtering in through my still-sluggish brain. "You're on the commission studying the incoming fleet, aren't you?"
He smiled, a smile that didn't even dent the grimness in his eyes. "I've really missed having you around, Gilead—you so seldom waste my time with the need for long explanations. Yes, I have indeed been honored with one of the seats on the panel."
"I congratulate the Patri on their fine choice, sir."
"Thank you," he nodded. "Though in all fairness I should remind you that I had a good head start on getting my name in front of the proper people—with the Bellwether stuck here and every query I sent coming back with vague and clearly censored answers, I knew that something unexpected was happening." He half turned to look at the sea of thunderheads. "But I never guessed it was anything like this..."
"What's wrong, sir?" I asked.
He turned back to face me. "The commission has finished the first phase of its study, Gilead," he told me, a quiet ache in his voice. "The decision's been made to destroy the Invaders."
I stared at him. "What?" I whispered.
He shook his head wearily. "I'm sorry. I tried to find an alternative—I tried blazing hard. But there just wasn't anything that would work. Not in the time available."
"What 'time available?' " I demanded. "They won't be here for years—surely we can find a way to communicate with—"
"We don't have years. We have four to six months."
My argument froze in its tracks. "Months?"
He nodded. "Admiral Yoshida's experts have gone over the Invaders' engine efficiencies at least five times, from five different directions. They estimate that in four to six months the Invaders will be shutting down their drives, turning their ships around, and reconfiguring for a long deceleration phase."
"But if they'll be slowing down—?"
"Oh, they still won't actually get to Solitaire for seventeen years," he shrugged. "But once they're in deceleration mode... well, there's no need for their drives to be angled at all away from their line of motion."
And suddenly I understood. "In other words," I said slowly, "their exhausts will be aiming forward, where they'll vaporize anything we throw at them. So if we don't destroy them now, we won't have another chance until they get here. Is that it?"
A muscle in his cheek twitched, a deep and genuine pain twisting through his sense. "It's a war fleet, Gilead!—the more Yoshida's experts study it, the more they're convinced of that. If we let them get to Solitaire, the colony is lost—pure and simple."
"We have seventeen years to prepare—"
"It wouldn't matter if we had a hundred years—there's no way we can fight that many ships in face-to-face battle."
I locked eyes with him. "There are less than half a million people on Solitaire. They could surely be relocated somewhere else."
He didn't flinch from my gaze. "Just clear out of the system, then? Is that what you suggesting?"
"Why not?"
"Two reasons." He held up two fingers. "One: it would mean abandoning the ring mines."
A cold knot formed in my stomach. Yes, of course—it had to have been something like that. "So for a few million tons of metal we deliberately murder thousands of—"
"And two," Lord Kelsey-Ramos cut me off firmly, "it would mean abandoning the thunderheads, leaving them to face the Invaders alone. Now tell me where the ethical path lies."
My righteous anger faded, replaced by uncertainty. If you have resident aliens in your country, you will not molest them. You will treat resident aliens as though they were native-born and love them as yourself—for you yourselves were once aliens in Egypt... "I don't know," I had to say. "All I know is that mass murder isn't it."
Lord Kelsey-Ramos sighed. "Deep down, I'd have to agree... but intellectually, I just don't see any alternatives. It would probably take all the time we have until turnover just to figure out the raw mechanics of sending messages to the Invaders, let alone finding a common language to talk to each other in."
"Wait a minute," I said as a sudden thought occurred to me. "What about the thunderheads? Maybe they know how to talk to them."
"Maybe," Lord Kelsey-Ramos agreed. "And if you can get them to give you either a method or a language, I'm sure the commission will be interested. But we've asked them about it ourselves at least a half dozen times, and they've so far completely ignored the request."
I grimaced. "They know something about it—I'm sure they do."
"I agree," Lord Kelsey-Ramos nodded grimly. "But if they won't say anything, there isn't much we can do about it."
"But then how can we assume they're the threatened party?" I argued. "All right—suppose the ships are, in fact, a war party. Who's to say it isn't the thunderheads who brought it on themselves?"
Lord Kelsey-Ramos eyed me. "And if they did, what do you propose we do about it? Take sides with the Invaders against the thunderheads?"
Frustration welled up within me, settled into a bitter pool in the pit of my stomach. Blessed are the peacemakers... "I don't know."
For a long minute we stood there in silence. Then Lord Kelsey-Ramos stirred, looking up at the buttes towering above us. "Interesting place, this," he said, almost conversationally. "Unique, too—we've been over the satellite photos of Spall with a fine mesh and there's nothing even remotely like this city anywhere on the planet."
"The thunderheads have many human-comparable senses," I told him mechanically, my thoughts still on the terrible vision of mass murder hovering before my mind's eye. "They told us they like having this kind of close-packed community when it's possible."
"Uh-huh," he nodded. "And what is it, do you suppose, that makes it possible here?"
The vision of carnage vanished, and I looked at Lord Kelsey-Ramos sharply. There was something new in his sense; something part of, yet distinct from, the overall grimness there. "What is it?" I asked quietly.
"Suspicion," he said. "Nothing more—for the moment, anyway. My question wasn't rhetorical, incidentally."
I looked around the Butte City. "I really don't know, sir," I admitted. "It's somewhat sheltered from violent weather, but that's about all I can think of."
Lord Kelsey-Ramos nodded, turning to eye the slope that Calandra and I had climbed the first night we'd camped here—years ago, it seemed. "The transcript of your pravdrug interrogation mentioned that you'd found a line of heat-treated places going up one of those slopes," he said, pointing. "Show them to me, will you?"
"Certainly. This way..."
I led him and Kutzko over to the base of the proper slope and pointed out the lowest of the spots. "We thought perhaps they marked where thunderheads had once been," I explained. "They apparently needed several stages to get one of their seeds all the way to the top of the butte."
"A watchman," Lord Kelsey-Ramos nodded. "Yes, I remember that speculation from the transcript. Has it occurred to you since then to wonder why a physical watchman should be of any use to beings who can leave their bodies and travel about at will?"
I frowned. It hadn't occurred to me, as a matter of fact. "To watch for the approach of threatening weather?" I suggested hesitantly.