“No, you are quite right. Continue.”
“The largest populations, and therefore production potentials, are in the TOCIO and DWC blocs. If their general technological level can be upgraded in the first eight years, they can become integral participants in a truly global effort to establish an interstellar buffer zone. And, after eight years, those nations might be ready to follow the Commonwealth’s leadership in the energetic business of rapid expansion-which is, let’s be honest, a particularly strong trait among the nations of our bloc.”
Nolan’s smile was surprised, a little baffled. Did I just give away some of his deeper game? Well, if I did, he should have stopped me…
Ching was staring at Caine as though he was a rare antiquity that had turned up in his soup bowl. “Fascinating. And astute.” He smiled at the Sun, now accelerating in its plunge toward the horizon. “This is a day of much change.” They had arrived at the buffet tables-olives, wine, a few white-coated attendants-and he turned to Caine. “Perhaps you will advise me on the wines, Mr. Riordan? I seldom partake.”
Caine shrugged, stole a fast sideways look at Nolan, who did not return his glance, but was smiling into the Sun himself. Eyes back upon Ching’s, Caine gestured to the tables. “I’ll try, but I’m not sure I’m any more of a connoisseur than you are, Mr. Ching.”
He reached down, picked up a bottle, tilted it toward a glass-
CIRCE
He reached down, picked up the binoculars, tilted them to snap into the short tripod. He swung them around to aim up at the end of the Sounion headland, leaned over to check the view: the columns of the Temple of Poseidon were slightly off center to the left. He tapped the front right lens rim slightly, looked in: centered.
He looked to his right: the false olive container was open, most of the sharp, acidic fumes carried away from him by the prevailing winds running in from the Aegean.
MENTOR
The breeze from the Aegean tore the cocktail napkin out of Downing’s hand. “High winds,” he commented, then looked back at the milling delegates. “And we’ll soon be heading into others, I wager.”
Nolan kept looking out to sea. “It can’t be ‘we’ any more, Rich: you’ll have to steer the ship on your own from here on. We’ve got to make IRIS your organization now.”
“Rubbish. Nolan, you are not so old that-”
“Richard.”
Downing stopped: Nolan had used his proper name.
“Richard,” Nolan repeated, “it’s not just a matter of age. It’s a matter of policy. Caine isn’t the only one who’s going to be watched, now. For the last twenty years, I’ve operated under the media radar, but here at Parthenon I was running a public show, approved by the leadership of all five blocs. How do you rate my public profile now?”
Downing looked out to sea, felt a sad, cold knot coalesce in his stomach. “You’re through. You’re a newsmaker, so they’re going to watch you.” It was going to be lonely without Nolan…but then there was a deeper reflex: you don’t want to be in charge. You are a good XO-but not a CO. Good God, how will I do this? He took a long drink of his wine to drown the anxiety. “So what now?”
Nolan smiled. “Now, I eat an olive.”
“Hilarious. And then?”
“Then I eat another olive. And I take a vacation: a long one.”
“With Pat?”
“Yeah, and the kids too. Particularly Trev.”
Downing felt Nolan’s pause, looked over, saw a pair of blue eyes that were suddenly old, tired, and very serious. “Richard, there’s something I need to tell you, something I-”
“Admiral Corcoran-”
Ching. Bloody hell.
“Mr. Riordan seems to have good instincts for wine, as well.”
Nolan looked at the returned pair. “I’m not surprised.”
“And, Mr. Downing: which wine did you select?”
Downing turned toward Ching, smiled as a prelude to his response, peripherally saw Nolan take Caine’s upper arm and steer him gently for a walk down toward the oceanside peristyle.
Damn it, Nolan, what were you going to tell me? You’ve got to-
But Ching was waiting and watching. Downing widened his smile and prepared to feign interest in their impending conversation.
CIRCE
He put his hand in his pocket, pulled out a small, featureless black cube, six centimeters per side. He rested the box on the weather wall to the left of the binoculars and stared at it for a moment. Then he brushed his finger over the side that was facing him.
The side of the cube shivered slightly and fell open, as if hinged at the bottom. The man’s nose pinched as a carrion-scented musk diffused into the air around him. Then slowly, deliberately, he inserted his left index and middle fingers into the box.
A moment later he grimaced. Then he breathed out slowly, as if following a yogic discipline, and lowered his eyes back to the lenses. With the temple now centered in his field of vision, he started counting across the columns…
Chapter Twenty-Five
ODYSSEUS
Caine and Nolan exited the ruins of the Temple of Poseidon just to the right of the central column and looked out at the sea. “Ching likes you, you know.”
“Seems to.”
“He does. It’s not an act. When you pointed out the logistical advantages of having the Commonwealth take the last place in Proconsular rotation, you showed him something he hadn’t seen yet. That doesn’t happen to him very often. And you’re an articulate Westerner who is not a loudmouth, and who understands the value of listening instead of talking. You’re a rarity, for him-and he knows that you have a future.”
“I’m glad he knows that.”
“He can smell it. He’s been in this game a long time, and he is its consummate professional.”
“Do I need to watch out for him? Be cautious?”
Nolan chewed down an olive. “For now, you need to be prudent. As time goes on-well, I think you’ll have a friend in him. That’s only a hunch-but sometimes, that’s all you’ve got to go on.”
“Which seems insane.”
“How do you mean?”
“Well, maybe you’ve forgotten how the world of global statecraft looks to all us little people who never become a part of it. We presume it’s all a well-orchestrated dance, but in actuality…”
“In actuality,” Nolan finished for him, “it’s just as haphazard an enterprise as any other. But the chaos can be managed if you understand a few basic rules.”
“Which are?”
“There are only three variables governing the outcome of any given situation. Power-political, economic, military, whatever. Intelligence-the information you have and how cleverly you use it. And chance.”
“And that’s it?”
“That’s it. Leaders get themselves too tangled up when they fail to break a situation-any situation-back down to those basics. Or when they forget the fundamental differences between the three variables.”
“Huh. Any more sage advice?”
Nolan smiled without looking over at Caine. “I hope that I can give you reason to move past the resentment fueling those little digs, Caine. Although it’s true enough that we-IRIS-have had to play pretty rough, sometimes.”
“Like with the megacorporations?”
“And with the desperate groups and states that they use as proxies, yes. One of the harshest lessons of intelligence work is that, to borrow your phrase, sometimes you have to fight fire with fire. It’s an unpleasant but inescapable fact-which, as you also remarked, was appreciated even by our primeval forebears when they bred domesticated wolves to hunt the wild ones. Sometimes adopting the methods of your adversaries is the only effective strategy-and I suspect you’re going to come face to face with just how true that is in the coming years.”
“You mean that we have to keep fighting the megacorporations by using their own tactics against them?”