The ambassador waved a hand at his other visitors. “I had expected to see you when I awoke, Captain Riordan, and of course your good self as well, Dr. Hwang. But I am not acquainted with these other gentlemen.”
Caine made the necessary introductions, made mention of Karam as Gaspard’s awakener. The ambassador took it in silently. “And with the exception of Mr. Tsaami, they are our legation’s security detachment?”
“They are, along with a few more who, like you, shipped out with us in cryogenic suspension.”
“And, how may I ask, were they selected? Unless I am much mistaken, they are all from nations of the Commonwealth bloc.”
“They are, but that was not what drove their selection. Not directly, at any rate.”
Gaspard shook his head; it looked more like a semi-conscious lolling. “That is a riddle, and I am too befuddled to solve riddles today, Captain.”
For Gaspard, that objection was positively gracious. Maybe we should stick him in a cryocell more often. “Apologies, Ambassador. The security personnel were chosen because they had prior contact with exosapients. By including them on this mission, Mr. Downing not only took them off the intelligence grid, but was assured that they had no latent xenophobic pathologies.”
“I see. However, I suspect that the short, annoying fellow who had such an aversion to my questions — and my needs”—he gestured to a soiled bedpan—“may have an aversion to humans. He did mention that it has been eighty-three days since we departed Sigma Draconis.” Gaspard stared at them unsteadily. “I should have thought you could no longer stand to be in the same room together.”
“We can’t,” Rulaine lied. “But we’re professionals. These are the sacrifices we make.”
For a moment, Gaspard seemed uncertain if he had heard Bannor correctly. Then he smiled. “And you still have a sense of humor. Excellent.”
“Yes, well, Karam doesn’t have a sense of humor,” Wu corrected. “Not anymore.”
Gaspard frowned. “Why not?”
“Because Bannor beat him at the small craft gunnery sim. Every time.”
Gaspard looked baffled. Caine felt a flash of pity, provided the missing context. “I’m sorry, Ambassador. We passed a lot of time reading, in the gym, and acquainting ourselves with xenobiology and other pertinent topics, but we also spent lot of our time in training sims.”
“Such as?”
“Flight, remote vehicle operations, nav plotting, and Bannor’s favorite, small ship gunnery.”
“I didn’t actually like it all that much,” Bannor corrected.
“Maybe not,” Hwang commented, “but it sure liked you.”
Gaspard did not attempt to keep the exasperation out of his voice. “And did you not meet with the Slaasriithi, see their ship, learn their ways?”
Caine shook his head. “No, Ambassador, your premonition about them not providing us with any new information was sadly accurate. We have seen their ambassador, Yiithrii’ah’aash, three times and then only for purely functional matters. The first time was to welcome us on board and acquaint us with the parts of the ship we were allowed to visit.”
“And how much of their ship did you see?”
Hwang’s answer was solemn. “The twenty meters of corridor that separate our hab mod from the cryobank module. They also took us to our cargo module once in an enclosed hovercraft.”
“And that is all?”
Bannor shrugged. “They allowed us to perform two routine maintenance checks on our lander and our corvette. One of the Slaasriithi went with us, observed, said nothing either time.”
“Well, I do not think much of their hospitality,” Gaspard sniffed. “And they gave you no other information?”
Caine shrugged. “They told us which systems we were in, when we were shifting, when we’d arrived, when they began acceleration, when they were going to end or start rotation. The bare minimum.”
“And did you ever ask them why they were not more forthcoming?”
I wasn’t that rude, you ass. “I invited Yiithrii’ah’aash to stay and converse. He was very polite, expressed his regrets, but insisted that words were not the right way to start our relationship. However, three days ago, he announced that we would soon be arriving at a Slaasriithi system. He chose a sparsely inhabited planet because it is the best way to begin what he called ‘the showing that leads to knowing.’”
“Mon Dieu, even their apothegms are uncongenial to finer sensibilities.”
Well, evidently Gaspard has begun his recovery to full-bore asshole…
The ambassador glanced beyond the knot of them in the doorway. “And where are the others whom you have awakened?”
Caine shook his head. “At this point, there are no others awake.”
Gaspard blinked. “You have awakened me first?”
Caine nodded. “We commenced your reanimation thirty-six hours before the others. It seemed best to brief you first, to discuss and strategize before awakening the rest of the staff.”
Gaspard’s frown was one of intense concentration. “This precaution, and personal consideration, was well-conceived, Captain. Thank you.”
“Thank you?” Well, there’s a first time for everything.
“But I will learn the details of our situation with the rest of the group.”
Caine felt the others looking at him. They had discussed the various surprises, all unpleasant, that Gaspard might spring upon them when he was reanimated, but this had not been among the expectations. “Ambassador,” Caine said slowly, “perhaps I was not clear. There are a few official conjectures, based on classified analysis, which cannot be shared with the group. Only I, you, Dr. Hwang, and Major Rulaine have sufficient clearance levels to access them.”
Gaspard seemed entirely unimpressed by this information. “Are these speculations of a biological or political nature?”
Riordan shook his head. “When dealing with first contact, the line between physical differences and social differences from human norm is often murky. Behavior follows biology the way form follows function.”
Gaspard smiled, nodded. “I keep forgetting you were a writer. An excellent point excellently presented. But I deduce that these speculations are essentially strategic in nature, and that their purpose is to inform my objectives when we come to the stage of negotiation, yes?”
“Well, yes.”
“Very well. Then I shall hear these after the unclassified briefing materials have been shared with the rest of the legation. Now, let us rouse the others.”
Chapter Seventeen. IN TRANSIT GJ 1248’S INNER SYSTEM
Two days later, once Riordan and the rest of the legation had gathered for their first collective meal in the overcrowded main room, Gaspard rose to formally announce where they were bound and why: a necessity, since many of the legation’s members had been loaded into their cryocells before leaving Earth. Expecting to be roused for either the counterattack on or policing of Sigma Draconis, they were startled to find those scenarios already outdated. Adapting to the new one took a little getting used to.
After being handed some notes by his administrative assistant Dieter, Gaspard segued into introducing Morgan Lymbery, who had originally been sent along to seek out and investigate technologies that the Arat Kur might not have risked bringing to Earth. His naval designs had made him the war’s least known and most decisive innovator, and Gaspard apparently wanted the gathering to understand that they had a genuine, if unfamiliar, celebrity in their midst.