"I only want you to watch and wait," Sten said. "I have something I need to accomplish. To show you we have the will and means. In return..."
"Yes." Real abrupt. Sr. Ecu was going for it.
"In return... I want the opportunity to speak with you again. Or Mahoney, if that's how it ends up working best. Probably I'll be busy. So Ian it will be. If you agree. Will you at least do that?"
How could Sr. Ecu reject him? He did not. Instead he asked to see his gift again. He wanted to visit the air circus—where anyone could fly.
It worked out exactly as Sten had predicted. No sooner had Sr. Ecu returned home than he found a request for him to meet with a member of the privy council. Actually, it was no request at all. It was a summons.
The council members had discussed at length how to handle the Manabi. They as yet had no suspicion of them. But their purge, and especially the long, drawn-out invasion of Honjo sovereign territory, had produced howls all over the Empire. They badly needed to keep things glued together, at least for a while. To do that they needed the support of the Manabi. Badly.
There was some discussion of whom to send. Malperin was mostly favored, because she had the best diplomatic skills, at least as far as a businessbeing could go. But even she saw drawbacks in that. If Sr. Ecu sensed the slightest opening, they were lost, she said. They had to act from strength. What they needed was a master of the bottom line.
They sent Lovett.
That meant there was no foreplay.
Lovett deliberately chose a small, shabby park for the meeting. There was little room for the graceful Manabi to maneuver, and he had barely cleared the fence when dirt and dust particles began clogging his delicate sensing whiskers. Lovett waited just long enough for Sr. Ecu to get really uncomfortable. The healthy black sheen of the Manabi's body turned to gray. The lovely red tinge shaded to a sickly orange. Then he let him have it.
"We want a statement from you," he said. "I've got a copy of what we have in mind with me. Okay it now. You can read it later. At your leisure."
"How very thoughtful of you," Sr. Ecu said. "But first, perhaps I should know what exactly we're to agree to say. The topic... would be especially enlightening."
"It's about the assassination business," Lovett snapped. "You know... you say you deplore it-etcetera, etcetera."
"We certainly do deplore it," Sr. Ecu agreed. "It's the etcetera I'm worried about."
"Oh...no big thing. It lists those responsible. Calls for their punishment. That sort of thing. Oh... and yeah. The Honjo. We figure any right-thinking being will back us on liberating all that AM2. Can't let wild types like that have all that fuel. Do what they please. When they please.
"I mean... it's legal as drakh. Our actions, that is. We license the AM2. Therefore we have the right to see that it's used properly."
"I see," the Manabi said. And he certainly meant it.
"So that spells it out. Got a problem with any of it?" Lovett spoke as belligerently as possible. He wanted there to be no mistake about what would happen if Sr. Ecu did object. So he continued just a touch longer. "See, if you do, we've all got problems. My friends on the council have to be sure whose side everyone is on. Times are tough. Tough actions are required. You're either with us-or the Honjo. Okay?"
Sr. Ecu did not think it was okay. However, there was no way he was fool enough to say so. Instead, he explained that he had rushed to the meeting so quickly that he had failed to get any kind of blanket approval from his own government. This was a terrible oversight on his part, he apologized. But it was a necessary formality. Otherwise, he could not legally speak for all the Manabi. And was this not what Lovett wanted?
"No. I want it settled. I want no loopholes some sneaky legal types can slip through later. Okay. Get whatever approval you need. Make it good. Make it soon. Do I make myself clear?"
Sr. Ecu said that Lovett spoke with impeccable clarity.
The privy council's ultimatum put Mahoney in what Kilgour called the catbird's seat. Ian only vaguely understood what a catbird might be, but he hadn't the foggiest what kind of a seat the being might prefer. Something lofty, he assumed. Mahoney knew he had assumed correctly when he was spared the long dance Sten had suffered through in the initial negotiations with the Manabi.
Sr. Ecu got directly to the point. Without preamble, he described the spot between the rock and the hard surface in which Lovett had placed him. Both options were intolerable.
Ian didn't say "We told you so." Nor did he waste Sr. Ecu's time by making appropriate soothing noises. Instead, he was as direct as the Manabi. He sketched out Sten's main plan.
What the young admiral had in mind, he said, was a murder trial. The trial would be conducted by an independent tribunal, composed of the most prestigious beings in the Empire. The previous loyalty of each representative had to be beyond question. To ensure that the proceedings were impeccable, Sten proposed that Sr. Ecu act as a neutral referee. He alone would be granted the authority to see that all evidence and testimony were handled with complete fairness.
During the tribunal's proceedings, Sten and Mahoney would do their absolute best to guarantee the security and safety of each member.
"How possible can that be?" Sr. Ecu asked.
"It isn't—totally. That's why I said we'd do our best. No more."
"Quite understandable," Sr. Ecu said. "And fair."
Mahoney was not surprised at the answer. It was a far better pledge than any offered by the privy council. He went on to say that he and Sten would make sure that every moment of the trial would be broadcast as widely as possible. It was Sten's intent that every being—no matter how distant or lowly—would have the opportunity to learn the impartial details of the proceedings. He did not have to point out that the privy council would also do everything possible to prevent such publicity.
"Will you invite them to defend themselves?" Sr. Ecu asked.
"Of course."
"They will refuse."
"So?"
Sr. Ecu mused a moment. "So, indeed."
It was not necessary to explain that if the tribunal came in with a guilty verdict, it did not mean that the members of the privy council would meekly turn themselves in to their jailers. It was moral weight Sten was after, enough to tip the balance. Handled correctly, the decision would punch so many holes in the privy council's power bucket that all their allies would leak away. What else did they have to offer, besides AM2? And that they had found impossible to deliver.
"Who will choose the members?" Sr. Ecu asked next.
Mahoney said that only a Manabi could be trusted enough to do such a thing. The same went for the mechanics of meeting with potential appointees. Sr. Ecu would have to launch a supersecret effort, shuttling from one system to another, all the while making sure that no tracks of any kind were left behind. He was to have complete freedom in this, not only for reasons of trust and secrecy, but for practical ones, as well. Without the Eternal Emperor, who else had those kinds of skills?
Sr. Ecu had some thoughts of his own about the Emperor, but he did not share them with Mahoney. He would have been surprised that Ian's thoughts ran along similar lines. And Mahoney would have been equally surprised that the being's thinking added a great deal of weight to his decision.
As the Manabi was drifting toward agreement, Mahoney flash thought about the second part of Sten's plan. He had revealed not one detail of the reasons for Sten's absence. It was not lack of trust that kept him silent, but the old inviolate Mercury Corps rule of "Need to Know." Besides, if he had told about the mission, he was not sure which way Sr. Ecu would decide. If Sten failed this time, all bets were off. The independent tribunal would be an empty exercise.