I note these details primarily because I do not have clearance to access the datagel’s storage matrix. It therefore houses the most secure dataset on Jefferson, excepting my own classified systems, of course. After sixty-eight point three seconds, the president digs his stylus emphatically into the datagel, consigns his notes to permanent storage, and wipes the datagel’s surface clean. He lowers the privacy shield, then addresses me in a brisk, decisive manner.
“The Joint Assembly will be voting on some important legislation in a few days. There’s been a lot of dissension from some regions, with a lot of wild talk and even threats from certain population segments. I’m not talking about the routine ‘I won’t vote for you again if you vote for that’ kind of threat. That’s only to be expected. You can’t propose any major change to a legal code without ruffling somebody’s feathers.”
I file a reminder to research this pending legislation and the reasons it has been proposed as well as protested, since it troubles the president so greatly. After he reveals the reason for his concern, I make this my highest priority.
“What’s worrisome — to me, at least — are the threats of retaliation against hard-working members of the Joint Assembly. If they vote to pass this legislation, if they support measures critical to the defense of this world, these dissidents are talking about personal and violent retaliation against Assembly members and their families.”
If accurate, this is a serious charge to levy against one’s opposition. Intimidation tactics are invariably the hallmark of those whose agenda is abuse of power. Such practices are worthy of contempt. If the threat they pose is serious enough, honor demands that such threats be met with all the proper legal — or physical — action necessary to remove the threat to individuals or to a society as a whole.
If there are sufficient numbers of dissidents advocating intimidation, coercion, and violent retaliation against lawfully elected officials, Jefferson may face a serious threat. An internal enemy can be as deadly to long-term stability as outside invasion. It is all the more insidious because it is subtle, making it more difficult for people to recognize a threat to their safety, freedom, and well-being.
Bolos are programmed for strong ethics in this regard, for good reason. Were a Bolo to use its firepower to usurp command of a local system of governance, few governments could muster anything to stop it. Tyranny is tyranny, whether perpetrated by humans upon one another or by war machines against their own creators.
Usurpation is one of the Seven Deadly Sins a sick Bolo can commit, sins which trigger the Resartus Protocol, preventing a Bolo from acting on its destabilized impulses. There is very little a human fears more than the spectre of a mad Bolo. Intentions — good or otherwise — are immaterial when human survival is at stake.
Gifre Zeloc’s voice jolts me out of my distracted reverie. “The vote is due to take place six days from now. I want a full report on dissident activities and plans before then. I’ll give you further guidance after you’ve debriefed me on the state of affairs you uncover.”
The president breaks the connection. I ascertain, through my surveillance of data lines leading from the Presidential Residence’s computers, that he places an immediate call to Vittori Santorini. I ponder whether or not I should monitor that conversation, along with everything else I am attempting to do. Before I can decide whether or not to break contact, the call goes through and Gifre Zeloc says, “Vittori, I’ve got some wonderful news. No, not over the phone. The usual meeting place? Is four-thirty suitable? Excellent. I can hardly wait to discuss things.”
The president breaks the connection, leaving me to ponder what Gifre Zeloc has to tell the founder and leading power behind the POPPA coalition. Speculation in the dark is useless. I turn my attention to the daunting task of learning what has transpired during the bulk of the past ten years and what the dissidents President Zeloc spoke of may be saying and doing. I am unsure that once I know, I will be any materially better positioned to know what to do. It is an unhappy state of affairs to look forward to additional guidance from a man Simon Khrustinov refused to trust.
I have no other choice.
Unlike Gifre Zeloc, I am not pleased.
II
Simon drifted in and out of awareness, caught somewhere between confusion, pain unlike anything he had ever known, and a drifting disconnection from himself, from the world, from reality itself. It was like drifting through thick fog where every touch of smothering vapor cut like razor wire. He didn’t know where he was or why everything was so desperately wrong. He could remember nothing except a lurch of terror that blotted out everything beyond the knife-edged pain.
When the pain ceased, as suddenly as though it had never existed, Simon fell headlong down a bottomless black hole in which nothing, not even himself, existed. When he roused again, his mind was strangely clear, but he couldn’t feel anything. That was sufficiently alarming to nudge him further toward wakefulness. He struggled to open his eyes and found nothing that looked even remotely familiar. The space in which he lay was small and cramped, which he found odd, since he was positive that he’d been injured badly enough to need a hospital’s care.
Had he been captured? Kidnaped by Vittori Santorini in some weird vendetta?
He tried to reach for his wrist-comm, to contact Sonny, and discovered that not only could he not feel anything, he couldn’t move, either. Straining produced no response at all, not even a twitch. Fear began to seep into his confusion, cold and poisonous. He stared at the portions of the room he could see and frowned, or would have, if he’d been able to control his body. The walls and ceiling looked like the interior of a space-capable ship.
He’d been on enough interstellar transports of one kind and another to know the telltale signs and this room had them. He was trying to puzzle out why he might be on a space ship when he heard a sound from somewhere behind him, exactly like the opening of a cabin door.
“You’re awake, Colonel,” a quiet, soothing voice said. A moment later, a man he didn’t know stepped into his field of view. He was dressed in medical whites. “I’m Dr. Zarek, Colonel. No, don’t try to move. We’ve got nano-blocks in place in your nervous system, to keep you from shifting, even involuntarily. Do you remember what happened?”
Simon couldn’t shake his head and his vocal chords didn’t seem to belong to him any longer, either. The doctor frowned, tapped at something behind him, and muttered, “Too high. Let’s dial that down a bit.”
A whisper of pain ate into his awareness. His first voluntary sound was a hiss that he had almost no control over, as his body reacted to some ghastly level of abuse he didn’t want to think about too closely. Then he realized he could move his face, just a little. “What happened?” he whispered, barely able to control the muscles in mouth and tongue enough to get the question out.
“Your aircar crashed. If you were someone else, I would say you’re a very fortunate fellow. Instead, I’ll say it’s a good thing you’re a cautious Brigade officer and listened to the intuition that prompted you to armor your aircar. It saved your life.”
“Shot down?” he managed to ask.
Dr. Zarek’s eyes were shadowed. “We don’t think so. Your Bolo didn’t think so, either. I was in the room when your wife contacted the Bolo, so I heard what it — he — said.” The doctor’s expression altered, shifting into something Simon couldn’t quite fathom. “He apologized. The Bolo asked your wife to tell you it was his fault. He was watching for missiles and didn’t think about sabotage.”