I had felt superior and in control at the beginning of the conversation. All I felt now was horror. “You told them?” I managed to say.
“We had an agreement with the Alliance of Alliances. I have never made so great a miscalculation in my life.” He clasped his hands under his chin and rocked back and forth on his pillow. “They do not speak with me now. I fear they will take some horrible action. I strongly believe they were behind the Freeze. It’s necessary for us to join forces. Together, we may survive.”
“What have you learned about communications?” I asked, my mind racing far ahead of my questions. We would have to leave soon, get back to Kaibab; I would have to confer with Charles and alert the President.
“We can communicate instantaneously, across great distances,” Crown Niger said. “Petty stuff compared to what your people can do… But we consider it significant, and we’ve had no reports that you’ve made this particular breakthrough.”
“What else have you discovered?” I asked.
“On Earth, they seem to think there’s much more… Because of you and your damned exhibitionism!” Crown Niger shouted. He lowered his eyes and sighed again as if with great impatience. “I have worked hard to create a sanctuary away from these insanities. The insanity of Earth, and now of the Republic. I have put my life and soul into standing apart, giving my people the choice of independence.”
“You sold your services to Earth. I don’t call that independence.”
His lips drew tight; he seemed about to spit. “I do not care what you think about me. It is clear you have no honor. There is nothing truly Martian about you. You would threaten the mother of us all for political gain. To use such weapons… Insane!”
“Martians have died because of Terrie force. Nobody on Earth has died,” I said.
“So naive! To even display such power, such abilities, in itself must lead to violence. And now Cailetet is put in the same basket with you, by our former friends. Martians think they understand the politics of nations, but Mars is just a spread-out village, full of simpletons.”
“You’ve put a new element into the equation,” I said. “They think you’ll soon be as powerful and as capable as we are.”
“Will we?” he asked, face pale. “Are we on this same track?”
Whatever Cailetet might discover in another few months or years was actually irrelevant at the moment. “They wanted to bottle this genie from the very beginning, years ago.”
“What must we do?” he asked.
I stood and said, “The game is out of our control. Do you sense that?”
He shook his head. “Yes, but — ”
“This Alliance of Alliances must know your history. Disturbances in Africa — linking up with Dauble. They can’t possibly trust you. Once you were useful to them. But now…” I shook my head. “I have to leave.”
Aelita Two broke her link with the Cailetet thinker. I walked away, the thinker following on her carriage. In the middle of the dome, Achmed Crown Niger got to his feet, raised his arms, and shouted, “What can we do? Tell me! There must be something!”
Dandy, Meissner and D’Monte joined me in the corridor outside the dome. The mayor of Lai Qila followed, asking questions, trying to understand our sense of urgency. Dandy pushed him back gently, hand on chest. The mayor’s mouth fell open, shocked by this rudeness. We left him and his assistants near the entrance to the dome. Within the dome, Crown Niger ’s shouts and pleas echoed hollow.
“We’re returning to Preamble,” I told Dandy. “I have to speak with the President as soon as possible.”
“What’s wrong?” Dandy asked.
“There isn’t any time,” I said.
No time, no distance, no chance.
Part Seven
The final crisis had come. As clear as Martian night, I knew Earth would feel it had no choice but to extinguish the accumulating threats and bring the, new technology under its total control. All of Earth’s progress and therapy and sophistication would come apart like wet sizzle in fear of our power and unpredictability.
Once in the air, departing from Lai Qila, I sent an emergency message to Ti Sandra and put Preamble on alert. Ti Sandra replied that she would meet with all her staff and advisors at Many Hills to examine our options.
“The box of troubles is wide open and will not be closed,” she said. “Cassie, nothing we can do is as effective as Preamble. Tell Charles I may call upon him soon, and that he must be prepared.”
Her infinitely weary face has stayed with me in sharp clarity all these years: the face of just and caring power placed in a killing squeeze. I am haunted by that face, so little like the Ti Sandra I had first met and had come to love.
The pilot thinker guided the shuttle across the Kaibab Plateau, engines droning monotonously. The two hours spent soaring over Mars seemed endless; I stared but saw nothing through the window, feeling what a mother must feel for an endangered child.
“What do you know about the Alliance of Alliances?” I asked Aelita Two.
“I was most intrigued by that name,” the thinker said. “We have no record of it.”
So Point One and Lieh, with all of their data flies and searches, but not penetrated to the top authority. How much could I rely on Crown Niger ’s words? Had he been deceived, as well? Or was the Alliance of Alliances our multi-minded thinker-enhanced bugbear ruler of Earth, riding high above the plebiscites?
Whoever was ultimately in control of the forces lined up against Mars, there could be no negotiation with two untrustworthy players wielding, or soon to wield, potentially lethal powers. We would come not to war, which has some rules and some sense of limitation, but to simple, panicked savagery.
Dandy Breaker faced me across the aisle and leaned over in his seat harness. “We’re in real trouble, aren’t we?”
“It seems that way.”
“Because of something Cailetet has done?”
“Yes. No. We’re all grabbing for the brass ring. We made our mistakes, too.”
“Moving Phobos,” Dandy said.
I remembered my sense of exaltation at the sudden turnaround; even now my pulse quickened at the thought of so much power, removing my burdens so quickly, allowing me to give back to Sean Dickinson even more than he had shoveled upon me. We are still children. We still dance to our deepest instincts. “They forced us to do it, but Earth can no more trust us now than it can trust a scorpion under its bed,” I said.
Dandy shook his head, bewildered. “I’ve never even seen a live scorpion,” he said.
More coded transmissions came in on the Presidential net. There had been a great many plans made besides Preamble; we had simply put more of our stake in the Olympians. Now the other plans were being explored: individual station defense against locusts, neighboring stations pooling their resources as well as defenses, more sweeps of all automated systems…
Thirty minutes away from Preamble, I spoke with Charles in the laboratory. He listened, face drawn and colorless, as I described what had happened at Lai Qila, and relayed the President’s message.
“We’re being toyed with,” Charles said. “The government treats us like children. On, off. On, off.”
“That’s not our intention,” I said defensively. “Ti Sandra wouldn’t call on you unless — ”
“We’re on for good this time,” he said. “There’s no other choice. They’re going to wipe our slate. I’ll have to stay near the big tweaker. I’ve been training Tamara as backup in case something happens to me… And last night we sent a tweaker to Phobos again. Stephen put Danny Pincher in charge. Everything’s in place for war.”
War. That word summed everything and gave our preparations a horrible, urgent edge.
“What’s the President going to decide, Casseia?” Charles asked.