“So nothing has really changed.”
“Sometimes, when your adversary is trying to precipitate dramatic change, stability is the best victory. Besides, their stalemate is your gain. Your decision to desist from attacking the Arat Kur Homenest shall garner the humans of Earth the high opinion of the Dornaani and, I suspect, the Slaasriithi. Although provoked and holding apocalypse in your hand, you refused to unleash it. You are a promising species, after all. But history shows that you can also be mercurial at times, and wayward when it comes to following any single course for very long. Perhaps, this time, you will contemplate other species whose natural inclination is to quietly flourish in times of peace, rather than spectacularly soar in times of crisis. We shall see.”
“Well, you must have suspected, or at least hoped, we’d be capable of restraining ourselves,” observed Caine. “Otherwise, you wouldn’t have invested so much effort and faith in Nolan. You watched him, helped his heart resist the damage he had received. Which means you knew how he received the damage. Which means you knew about the Doomsday Rock. Which means you knew the Ktor were behind it. Which means you knew the Ktor had a particular interest in and fear of Earth. Which means the identity of the Ktor really wasn’t so uncertain, that they were likely to be huma—”
“Be still, Caine Riordan.” Alnduul looked about furtively and in that second, appeared to be anything but a super-being. “The moment of revelations about the Ktor is past. Leave it so, and learn not to speak of it. One is never so alone as one thinks. And, yes, we knew of the damage to Nolan’s heart, and what had caused it. And so we surmised what he must have seen, to become so fixed and certain in his purpose to lead your people to the stars. But those of us Custodians who had further suspicions had no proof—and still have none we can share—as to the intents and actual identity of the Ktor.”
Caine gaped. “But today, just minutes ago, you saw—”
Alnduul’s eyes closed. “Understand, Caine Riordan, amongst my people, particularly amongst my elders, I am considered what you would call a hothead: impetuous, prone to unwarranted conclusions, willing to act as much upon instinct as evidence. What was revealed here today cannot even become official information within the ranks of the Custodians, let alone the Dornaani Collective.”
“But—why not?”
“Because this knowledge, and indeed, the entire outcome of your war, is the fruit of a much-poisoned tree. Consider the procedural violations we committed in handling this conflict. We did not announce ourselves to the Arat Kur as soon as we landed upon your world. We provided your people—long before the war commenced—with the device in your arm, foreseeing this probable course of events. We enabled you to carry out a sneak counterattack upon the Arat Kur by using deep-space shifts. And we were willing to stand aside—or so it seemed—as you hovered above the Arat Kur Homenest, with the fate of their entire race in your hand.” Alnduul closed his eyes wearily. “At best, what was revealed here today about the Ktor will be whispered in the ears of those few volunteers who are willing to be more ‘proactive’ in their Custodianship. But it cannot be entered into the records, nor openly acknowledged.”
Caine felt nauseated. “Meaning that the Ktor are right in one regard. The Accord is founded, and runs, on lies.”
Alnduul closed his eyes. “If that is true, then you may say the same of being a parent. It is founded on the telling of lies.”
Again the paternalistic wisdom crap. “That’s just not—”
“Attend, Caine Riordan. Think of yourself as having an infant child—”
“I wish I could.” A vision of dying, pregnant Opal flitted through his mind, scissored at his heart.
Alnduul seemed to shrink inside himself. “Apologies. Profound apologies. Let me rephrase. Think of small children you have seen about you in Indonesia, and elsewhere. Children who are scared, are hungry, possibly even mortally wounded. And they ask their parent: ‘Progenitor, will I be safe? Will I be fed? Will I live?’ And the parent, knowing the truth to be in the negative—what do they say?”
Caine looked down. “They lie.”
“Just so. And they must. It is a kindness to the child, no less so than a palm placed upon a fevered brow, or lips upon a face streaked with tears. And so, Caine Riordan, do not answer now, but think upon this. Is no lie a justified means to a good end? Is existence so black and white as that? It would be comforting and simple if such were the case—but is it?”
Alnduul stepped back and his mouth puckered slightly: a melancholy smile? “Enlightenment unto you.”
Caine lifted his arms in response. “And unto you, Alnduul. I hope we shall meet again.”
Alnduul, who had started to turn after the farewell, half turned back toward him: “We shall. Indeed, we must.”
Chapter Fifty-Eight
Caine looked from Sukhinin to Downing as they rose. “Are you at least going to monitor the meeting?”
Downing shook his head. “The Slaasriithi specifically asked that their first contact with us be unrecorded.”
“And that it be with you alone,” Sukhinin said through his playfully malicious smile.
Caine found he was impatient for them to leave. It’s harder to act like I’m not nervous than it is being alone. He made sure his answering smile was lopsided, his tone ironic. “Yeah, that’s me: Speaker to Exos.”
Sukhinin picked up his briefing materials. “Better you than me, cheloveck.” There was a very slight tremor under their feet. Half out of the room, the Russian cast one eye back at the light over the airlock. The red light flickered, became yellow. “Well, they have arrived. Good luck. Don’t get eaten by aliens.”
“Hah, hah, Vassily. Go away.”
“I hear and obey, Gospodin Riordan.” A cough of laughter and he was gone.
Downing sounded more serious and more sympathetic. “Their representative should just about be ready. They breathe an almost identical mix of gases, so neither of you will need suits. When they signal that their representative has debarked and they have undocked from this module, our shuttle will leave as well. You’ve removed your transponder anklet?”
“And my collarcom. I don’t like that requirement, Richard. Did they give any explanation?”
“As to why there are to be no transmissions of any kind while the two of you are out here? No, but they were firmly, if gently, insistent.”
“Firmly but gently insistent.” That’s a pretty good descriptor for every one of our few, brief exchanges with the Slaasriithi.
Downing continued. “I suspect they just want to create an environment that is—for their species, at least—optimally private, even intimate.”
“Yes. Like two scorpions in one high-tech bottle.”
“Nonsense. They are simply very careful. They have suggested some general discussion before direct contact. The idea is that you acclimatize to their discourse first, then to them. Or so goes the theory.” Downing looked up sharply, beyond Caine’s shoulder.
Caine turned. The green light over the airlock had come on.
Downing straightened up. “Your show, now.” He smiled, put out a hand. “Try not to muck it up.”
Before he could rethink the reaction—before he could recall Downing’s lies, manipulation, withheld secrets—Caine had offered his own hand in response to the unpremeditated amity that he felt in Richard’s gesture.