I gestured to the two defenders still frozen in their mousetrap positions. “You’ve done the same thing with the defenders, and it’s going to lead to the same end result.”
The Chahwyn gave a noiseless sigh. “Your reading of history is accurate,” he admitted. “Yet we have no choice but to try.”
“Sure you do,” I said in my most encouraging voice. “You can close down the project, deploy the defenders you already have for the protection of Viccai, and let me take out the Shonkla-raa.”
“With the aid of he who was once our sworn enemy?”
I frowned at him … and then, abruptly, I realized what this whole confrontation was really all about.
The Chahwyn knew perfectly well that they were playing with fire. They knew that the last time they’d tried this they’d failed spectacularly, to the tune of the devastation of thousands of worlds and the wholesale slaughter of dozens of races. They’d seen firsthand what the Shonkla-raa could do, and were utterly terrified by this new resurgence.
But they were just as terrified at the thought of deliberately making the Modhri into something smarter, more patient, more competent. Terrified enough that they would rather cross their extendable fingers and hope that this time the protector plan would work.
Their minds weren’t made up, the way Bayta had thought. Or rather, the way this Elder had tried to make it appear to her. They were divided and paralyzed with indecision, seeing nothing but death and destruction at the end of all possible paths and afraid to move in any of them. I was here not to batter myself against a monolithic stone wall, but to give them a good reason to choose my proposed path over all the others.
Whether my way was the best, I couldn’t say. But I was pretty sure I could prove all the alternatives were worse.
“Yes, I’m willing to work with the Modhri,” I said. “For two reasons. First, unlike the Shonkla-raa, the Modhri is highly vulnerable to attack. You can walk right up to his coral outposts and destroy them, and if you don’t mind slaughtering a whole bunch of innocents you can walk right up to his walkers and destroy them, too. That vulnerability makes him far less likely to start anything grandiose.”
“Yet for two hundred years he has been trying to conquer the galaxy.”
“Because that’s what you designed him to do,” I countered. “That’s all he could do. But that’s about to change. By combining him with the Melding, you’re opening him up to new possibilities and options, new ways of dealing with the universe around him.”
“Yet you’ve already said that intelligence and initiative leads to competition and the desire to rule,” the Chahwyn said.
“I also said that will be limited by his vulnerability,” I said. “But you’re also assuming that on some level he wants to be our opponent. It’s my considered opinion that he doesn’t.”
“What then does he want?”
I raised my eyebrows. “He wants friends.”
For a long moment the Chahwyn just stared at me. “Friends,” he repeated at last, his voice flat.
“Yes,” I said. “You don’t understand, because you Chahwyn are never really alone. But the Modhri is. He always has been.”
“He has a multitude of mind segments.”
“All of which are essentially him,” I reminded him. “He’s never had any friends, only enemies and potential enemies. He’s never had anyone outside himself to trust, or who trusted him. Until now.”
“We do not trust him.”
“That’s okay,” I said. “I do.”
Another silence settled into the car like fine grains of dust. “Let me offer you a deal,” I said into the gap. “Give me the Melding coral and let me try things my way. If I fail, you can always fall back on your defender plan.”
The cat whiskers twitched. “Even a short delay could prove fatal.”
“Perhaps,” I said. “But if you do head down that path, it will permanently alter the tone and texture of your people, the Quadrail system, and the galaxy. Personally, I like the Quadrail and the Spiders just the way they are. I don’t want to see them ruined.”
“Even at the cost of defeat?”
“There won’t be a defeat,” I said. “My plan will work.”
I gestured around me. “And the time here isn’t quite as critical as you think. Even if the Modhri and I fail, you can always shut down the whole Quadrail system, boxing up the Shonkla-raa on whatever planets they currently happen to be in. That should give you enough time to build up your defender force.”
The Chahwyn’s shoulders did a strange hunchy thing. “That assumes the Shonkla-raa won’t learn the secret of the Thread.”
I grimaced. That was a big, dangerous if, all right. If the Shonkla-raa ever realized that the Thread hidden inside the Coreline was the key to the Quadrail’s faster-than-light travel, and that the Tube and the trains were just window dressing, then shutting down the system wouldn’t even slow them down. All they would have to do would be commandeer a few of the big defense ships that guarded each Quadrail station in the Filiaelian Assembly, wreck the Tube to allow them to get close to the Thread, and they’d be free to travel any place the Thread went. “Hopefully, they won’t,” I said. “Or if they do, that they’ll have their own reasons for sticking to the train system. At least for a while.”
I stood up, being careful not to bump into the metallic legs still half birdcaged around me. “All the more reason why we need to get this show on the road,” I continued. “Let me get this coral to Yandro and start the Modhri on his path to civilization.”
I started to ease past the defenders’ legs. But the legs shifted positions, once again blocking my path. “You cannot return to the others,” the Chahwyn said quietly. “I’ve already said that.”
I clenched my teeth. What part of vital to the cause didn’t he understand? “How about a compromise?” I suggested.
“What kind of compromise?”
I gestured to the two defenders. “You send Sam and Carl here with me,” I said. “If I ever start to tell anyone about your deep, dark secret, they have my permission to tear my head off.”
The whiskers twitched a few times. “That may be acceptable,” the Chahwyn said cautiously. “I shall pass the suggestion on to the others.”
I shook my head. “We don’t have time for a round-table committee discussion. You’re the Elder on the scene. You have the facts. You make the decision.”
The twitching whiskers started twitching a little harder. Then, abruptly, they stopped. As they did so, the two defenders lowered their upraised legs back to the floor. “Very well,” the Chahwyn said. “The defenders will go with you. They will stay with you at all times. If you speak of this matter, they have been given orders to end your life.”
The whiskers twitched one final time. “And they will also end the life of any you have told. Is that acceptable?”
I felt my stomach tighten. Bayta, certainly, would want the details of what had happened out here. So would Morse. Whether the Elder had specifically planned it that way or not, he’d now pretty well guaranteed I wouldn’t say a single word about my visit to either of them. “It is,” I agreed reluctantly.
“You may return to the station,” he said. “The coral will follow.”