Stellarnet Rebel (16 page)

Duin hoped that the hours it spent gaining med clearance from Dr. Geber had been painful.

“The Freedom Council is an illegitimate organization,” said the Tikati, waving a fabric-sheathed hand in Duin’s direction. Or what appeared to be like a hand, but their appendages were not the same as human or Glin. “This so-called ‘envoy’ should not be here and has no authority to represent Glin.”

“I don’t represent Glin,” Duin said. “I represent the cause of liberty.”

Blaze addressed the Tikati. “Earth withholds judgment as to who has authority and who doesn’t, Liaison Kitik. That’s one of the things we humans hope to ascertain during your visit here.”

The colonel was sitting to Duin’s right, halfway down the table. His rank insignia glowed light blue on his body armor because he was now the head of the UN peace-keeping troops, several of whom lined the room. The flags of the nations of Earth glowed on the walls. The conference room was in the military zone and its cameras were not accessible to civilians. But for this meeting, a live feed had been approved for the Stellarnet.

Duin glanced at J’ni. She sat across from Blaze, to Duin’s left. The colonel had introduced her as Genevieve O’Riordan, the Interstellar News Corporation blogger who would witness this meeting on behalf of Earth. If the Tikati understood what a blogger was, or had any knowledge of J’ni’s relationship to Duin, it gave no indication.

J’ni studied her bracers and typed on the tabletop. Duin’s device was on her other arm, because he didn’t want to reveal to the Tikati the extent of his knowledge about human technology.

“This Glin, and his fellow Freedom Council members, are terrorists and criminals,” said Kitik.

“You steal our water, destroy our food supply and resources, imprison and enslave us, but
we
are the criminals? If I’ve done anything criminal, it’s because these Tikati bastards leave me no alternative. If my only choice is to be a criminal or to be silent, I will not be silent.”

“Envoy Duin, can you refrain from using the term
bastard?
” asked the colonel.

“Can the Tikati refrain from being one? No, it’s too late for that.” Duin might be an envoy, but he wasn’t going to be diplomatic. Not to any Tikati.

“Do not rebuke the Glin, Colonel Villanueva,” said the Tikati. “I am used to their uncivilized ways, and their unceasing desire to live in complete anarchy.”

“What I
desire
,” said Duin, his voice rising as he rose from his chair, “is peace and quiet. I want it so much I’d die for it. But I won’t purchase it at the price of chains and slavery.”

The Tikati would not look at him, but addressed J’ni. “See how the Glin yells for quiet? See how he threatens for peace?”

She did not raise her head to acknowledge the Tikati, nor make any reply. Duin could see she was adding links to relevant net files and their past blog posts about the devastation and abuses perpetuated upon Glin. Duin sat down.

The Tikati liaison turned to Blaze. “I appreciate your willingness to meet with me, Colonel Villanueva, and I respect Earth’s insistence on maintaining neutrality at the current time. It demonstrates your race’s wisdom and civility. I relish the opportunity to explain what is happening on Glin. I imagine you’ve heard that we keep Glin in chains like pets, and eat their children, and lay waste to their planet, burning all in our path. But, I ask you, Colonel Villanueva, how would Tikat profit from that?”

“You wouldn’t ask that if you had any familiarity with human history,” the colonel replied.

“You are correct that we know very little about humans. Only what your scientists shared with us, quite some time ago. And a few recent developments, brought to our attention by concerned Earth businessmen.”

“Businessmen?” The colonel looked surprised. “What sort of businessmen?”

“I do not have that information,” said the Tikati.

While the Tikati’s mask-like visage remained as smooth as its voice, Duin noticed there were several muscles twitching in Blaze’s face.

“Businessmen do not represent Earth’s interests, Liaison Kitik,” said the colonel sternly. “They represent their own. I suggest that in the future, if you want to deal with Earth, you deal with the United Nations.”

The agreeable nod of the Tikati’s head was a big fat lie.

And that’s when J’ni spoke, her voice soft but acrid, like a
razit
fruit. “If the ‘unceasing desire’ of the Glin is to live in complete anarchy, why does Tikat persist in an equally unceasing desire to prevent them from doing so?”

How Duin loved her. She peered at the Tikati with a look that might be described as impartial, but Duin knew her too well. She was fighting the flood of emotions she could not reveal as he could. Well, he could reveal most, but not all—not the one that made him want to reach out and touch her at that moment. For her own safety, that emotion must remain hidden here, like the
nagyx
that was tucked beneath her clothing. He did not want to risk the Tikati identifying it as a Glin object and trying to hurt J’ni.

“When we arrived on Glin,” said the Tikati liaison, “there were no cities, no agriculture, no leaders. Their few industries were under-developed, their technologies primitive. Now they have dry land where there were once only swamps.”

“
Wah!
We don’t want dry land, we’re Glin!”

“We brought them leadership, industry, responsibilities, currency.”

“I had a job,” said Duin. “My job was to do what I pleased. My only duty was to be accountable for my actions. My wealth was in the number of things I could afford to ignore.”

The Tikati went on as if Duin had not interrupted. “There were millions of Glin living in poverty. We have brought them a system of education…”

“Indoctrination,” Duin declared.

“… a more efficient food management system, and better housing. They no longer travel the waterways like nomads, living out in the open. We have given them several technological advantages, and they have the freedom to pursue a more civilized life.”

“Freedom?” Duin jumped up again and smacked his hand on the table. “Freedom is not in Tikat-managed farms, it is not in Tikat-built housing structures, or Tikat-run schools. That’s not freedom; it’s dependency. Those are rations of slavery. I don’t want this so-called
civilization
.”

“Yes, that’s obvious,” the Tikati said. It still would not look at him.

“And I’m proud of it. My barbarity shields me from this so-called
civilization
where all of our rights are wrongs, where Glin must beg for the water that belongs to us all, where we cannot gather
hidal
and hunt
wallump
, where everything we love and need is taken away or destroyed. I will be barbarous and wild, in act and in deed, against any civilization imposed by despots, rather than tamely accept it.”

The Tikati turned to the colonel. “Perhaps you could send your witness to Glin.” Here it gestured to J’ni. “So that she might attest to the improvements we’ve made there?”

“Improvements?” Duin spat the word. He drew a breath, but before he could speak, J’ni addressed the Tikati.

“Liaison Kitik, you implied earlier that your goal was profit—that was the word you used—not charity,” she said.

“The two are not mutually exclusive, Witness O’Riordan. We went to Glin seeking resources to help our world. For generations, we’ve suffered starvation, ecologic collapse, disease…”

“Your misery is not currency with which you can purchase the right to oppress my people,” said Duin.

The Tikati still would not address Duin. It spoke to Blaze. “We hope to enlighten the Glin. They are quick to violence, slow to understand. They have no sense of duty or loyalty to anything or anyone but themselves. They prefer laziness to industry, and will choose duplicity over honesty whenever it suits them.”

“It doesn’t matter if I’m
Gurrpawub
the water demon. Does your suffering give you the right to cause others to suffer? Does your need give you the right to render us needy?”

“Have you ever gone hungry, Colonel Villanueva?” Kitik spoke with long-suffering sadness. “Or held the very last seed of a fruit tree in your hand and known that you could never plant it, because it wouldn’t grow in dead soil? Have you watched great monuments crumble, or great innovations fall into disuse, because you lacked the resources to maintain them?”

“Have you ever relocated a village of Glin?” Duin asked. “Have you ever stolen their water, burned their huts to the ground, or torn families apart? Have you ever rounded them up and imprisoned them, without a trial, without recourse to justice, because their only crime was being in your way, or—even worse—daring to resist you?”

Kitik turned its flickering yellow eyes on Duin. “How many Tikati have you killed, murderer?”

“Not enough.”

“Envoy Duin.” Blaze gave him a warning look.

Duin ignored the colonel and glared at Kitik. “The last Tikati that looked in my eyes is still digesting in the bellies of the
karak’tukt
who feasted on the shit of the
drizni
that ate its corpse.”

“Envoy Duin, you cannot be a party to this discussion if you are going to make death threats,” said the colonel.

“That
thing
is a death threat to my entire race, and yours. You think you will win its friendship? To befriend a fiend is to become a fiend.” Duin reached as far as he could across the table, his hand sparking with bioelectricity. Guards rushed forward to restrain him.

“This meeting is over for you, Envoy Duin,” Blaze declared.

“The meeting is over, but nothing is finished!” Duin let himself be dragged from the room. “Where’s my village? What happened to my wife and my children?
Tell me that, Tikati!
”

J’ni twisted in her sleep, knocking several pillows to the floor. She dreamed that glowing eyes were watching her, making her skin burn. There was no water, no way to stop the burning. No one to help her.

“Duin?” She reached for him as she woke up. But he wasn’t there.

The dim glow of the Asternet wall lit their compartment. Someone sat in a chair beside the table. The thin, immobile silhouette had to be Belloc’s.

“Bad dreams?” he asked.

A bolt of lightning flashed, illuminating his pale face and large, dark eyes. She heard rain.

“What are you watching?” She sat up and rubbed her hands over her face.

“Storms. I thought it might calm you. Would you prefer a river?” He touched the tabletop and replaced the rain with rushing water.

“That just makes me have to pee.”

Belloc touched the table again and the river was replaced by a lugubrious Euro-clank fusion remix of Beethoven’s
Für Elise
. It didn’t sound much different than the storm vid, which is why he liked it.

“Where’s Duin?” she asked.

“With Elder Blaze.”

“Still? He hasn’t slept in three days.”

“He said he fell asleep in the colonel’s office, yesterday.”

J’ni got up, tied on a dress and pulled on her boots. She wouldn’t wear the
bava
again until the Tikati liaison was gone. Just in case. Everything was “just in case.” Every path in her life was strewn with eggshells that couldn’t be swept into a compost chute as easily as the dozens Belloc put there every week. Raw eggs were one of his favorite Earth foods.

He handed her a cup of tea. The cup was glass recyclable. None of her Nana’s cups survived the bombing. The loop of one porcelain handle, recovered after the investigation, hung from a cord around her neck, below the
nagyx
.

“Thank you.” The tea, whatever it was, was very good. Lightly sweet, citrus and cinnamon, maybe, and a flavor she couldn’t quite place. “What is it?”

“Tikati repellent,” Belloc said.

She smiled. His humor was precious not only because of his usual seriousness, but because there was so little humor in anything at all any more.

He opened another window on the wall. “Your blog is number three.”

“Yep.” Her blog was in the INC 5 and one of the highest-trafficked sites on the Stellarnet. There were several news bloggers in Asteria Colony now, from conglomerates like Liberty News Corp, GE-Disney, MS-WSJ, and TW-AOL-Sony, as well as smaller companies, non-profits and special interest groups. And there were countless indie bloggers, some of whom were on Asteria before she arrived and were enjoying a small degree of fame by association. But none of them were living with a Glin. Duin’s co-authorship, and the titillating fact that they were “married”—though they had both tried to explain, many times, the real meaning of the
nagyx
—gave her blog a huge advantage.

“What will happen when it reaches number one?” Belloc never blogged, but even he got fan mail and the occasional smutty fan vid. His initial appearance in the colony, and subsequent silence, had intrigued thousands of her followers.

“It won’t,” she said. “Sex, celebs and sports always outrank everything else.” If she wanted to go all the way to the top, she would have to take Hax’s advice and run a live feed of their bed. Not that she and Duin had been doing anything worth watching the past few days. There were much more pressing matters.

When she was ready to leave, Belloc reached for his hood. He had taken to wearing a Zentai suit, which covered him from head to foot, including his face and hands. Human Zentai wore the suits to keep from being ID-ed by netcams, and as a general socio-political statement. To that end, they also went without bracers or any technology. So, to complete the disguise, Belloc wouldn’t be able to wear his gloves from Hax. But he would carry them in his new, human-made, recycled-fiber messenger bag. Kitik might have heard that there was a second Glin on Asteria, but no point in making Belloc an easy target. Just in case.

She left the compartment first, while Belloc went out through the garden, sneaking past a glitchy netcam, and then trailing her through the hallways and thoroughfares. When she reached the military zone, he sat down to wait.

Lucky for Belloc, he honed his awesome sitting-and-waiting-for-me skills in
Meglin, she thought. In all seriousness though, his presence was appreciated. He was the eye of the storm that churned around her.

J’ni reached Blaze’s office and went in without knocking. Under the current circumstances, she had a free pass to come and go any time.

“I
am
trying to help you,” Blaze said to Duin as she entered. The colonel put his booted feet up on his desk. “But you can’t keep ranting at him.”

“Why not?” Duin was pacing.

“You ever heard of
public relations?
”

Duin ignored Blaze’s question. “Where is the Tikati?” He scanned the wall, which displayed several netcams throughout the colony.

“Still walking around,” said Blaze. “What are you worried about? He’s been searched a hundred times.”

“Its treachery is well hidden.”

“He’s being watched, everything in the military zone is off-limits, and he has an escort.”

“You never gave
me
an escort,” Duin said.

“Consider it a compliment. ’Lo, Genny. Want some grapes?” The colonel pointed to a large bowl on his desk.

“’Lo, Blaze. Thanks.” She took a handful.

Duin turned, surprised to see her. “I thought you were going to sleep.”

“I did, Duin. I slept for six hours.”

“Great Rain, have I been here that long?”

“Yes!” Blaze bellowed at him.

“Anything new?” she asked.

“We had to increase the size of Kitik’s escort,” said the colonel.

“Because the colonists keep trying to riot, wherever it goes,” Duin said with glee.

“They’re protesting, not rioting,” said Blaze. “So far.”

“They threw refuse,” Duin told J’ni. “It was glorious.”

The thought of the Tikati roaming the station unsettled J’ni. “Has he—it—” she glanced at Duin, “—figured out how to use the Asternet?”

Duin refused to use gender-specific pronouns when referring to the Tikati. She considered asking him if it was a psychological tactic, or whether Tikati lacked male/female gender, but wasn’t sure she wanted to find out his real reasons.

“I’ve never seen him use our technology,” said Blaze. “He doesn’t ever touch anything, he walks. Up and down. Through the thoroughfares.”

“It’s plotting,” Duin said.

“Plotting what?” asked the colonel.

“Whatever you can imagine,” said Duin.

“I can imagine a lot,” said Blaze. “Can you be a cat’s ass-hair more specific?”

“Perhaps,” said Duin, but did not elaborate.

J’ni offered Duin some fruit, which he waved away without taking his eyes off the wall. “You should get some sleep,” she told him.

“I’m not tired. Are you tired, Blaze?”

“I’m so full of coffee and experimental stimulants, my eyes are about to pop out of my head. But I don’t know what you’re high on.”

“Righteous fury.”

“I could go to Glin,” J’ni suggested. “Kitik invited me. Maybe we can learn something new.”

That turned Duin’s attention from the wall. “J’ni, I’d sooner drop you into a lake full of starving
driznit
.”

“I know,
nagloim
, but I want the story, and I want to get him—it—away from Asteria. INC would pay for the transport, and an escort—either military or private contractor. I might be able to convince Kitik to leave Asteria sooner rather than later.”

“Their liaison’s not going anywhere until he finishes meeting with the reps from the UN Security Council, ESCC, United States, China, India, European Union…”

“You know, J’ni, all those people who refused to talk to
me
,” said Duin.

“They’d talk to you, now,” said Blaze, “if you would stop scaring the crap out of them.”

“I want to scare them. They
should
be scared out of their torpid complacency. I’m not telling them anything I haven’t already blogged.”

Blaze rolled his eyes and dragged a hand over his face. “Genny, can you please school your pugnacious patriot—?”

“Look, right there.” Duin tapped the wall.

“What?” Blaze got up and stood beside Duin, both of them examining the spot Duin indicated.

“The Tikati… It stopped and…”

“What?” asked Blaze.

“It
looked
at that open panel, where the repair crew is working.”

“Oh, fuck me with a feather duster.” Blaze grabbed Duin by the arm. “Genny, get him out of here and make him eat something, and then make him go to sleep.”

“But it’s—”

“Shut your hole!” Blaze pushed Duin to the door. “I’ll bet Dr. Geber has
something
we can inject into you. Don’t make me ask him.”

“Colonel,” Duin protested, trying to hang back. “Blaze!”

Blaze shoved him into the hallway, sent J’ni out after him and clanged the door shut.

Duin strode down the hall. “I’ll have to watch the Tikati from our compartment. No, better yet, from Belloc’s hut.” Duin spread his arms. “He has more wall space.”

***

The
tippa
that Duin and Belloc built in the garden bore a vague resemblance to the woven huts of
Meglin
. But instead of branches and vines, it was made with wires, fiber optic threads, plastic tubing and recycled cloth. It was less like a hut, J’ni thought, and more of a large, glowing, cyber lean-to, propped up in one corner. And the block walls in that corner were alive with Asternet access, thanks to Hax.

“Is there something we can feed him to make him fall asleep?”
she asked Belloc, only half-joking. She spoke to him in Glinnish, so that she could stay in practice. They sat together beside the fish pond while Duin paced Belloc’s floor and muttered to himself.
“Or maybe you could knock him unconscious?”

“I would have to hurt him badly.”

“Mm. Probably not a good idea.”

Belloc shrugged.
“He would heal. If we were on Glin, I could put
rizwij
in his food
.”

“Would that make him sleep?”

“It would render him immobile and give him hallucinations. Which is like sleeping. But you wouldn’t like him when it wore off.”

“Anah!”
Duin cried out from inside the
tippa
. He pushed aside the strips of plastic which curtained the doorway, the way vines had hung at the threshold of Sala’s hut.

“What? What’s wrong?” J’ni got to her feet.

“Nothing’s
wrong!
” Duin laughed, a bit too maniacal even for him. “Good news. Very good news.”

He rushed to her and kissed her. It had been too long since he’d kissed her. She understood how busy he was, how precarious the situation, and how difficult his decisions. But understanding didn’t make her miss him any less. Clutching him, she returned the kiss with such force that when they stopped, they were both breathless.

“I… I have to go, right now, but I will be back very soon,” he said. “Don’t—
please
don’t leave the compartment until I send Belloc. And stay with him, no matter what happens. I don’t trust the Tikati to be anything but the sinister, ruthless monster that it is. Yes?”

“I’ll be careful. Wary. Vigilant.”

“You are ten times as clever as any Tikati, but I worry.”

Considering how they took his family, his village and his world, she didn’t blame him. “I understand.”

“I worry less when Belloc is with you.”

Yes, Belloc is as good as having a small army of Glin
, she thought, recalling how many were needed to restrain him for Ga’Duhn. But was there anything that would help
her
worry any less about Duin?

“Where are you going?” she asked.

“To see Owen.” Duin kissed her again. For days, even when they were in the same room together, he’d felt a million miles away. She relished the closeness, the hard strength of his arms and chest beneath his
wallump
suit, his webbed hands cupping her face. She didn’t want to let go.

“Soon,” he promised, in a half-whisper, half-kiss. “Very soon you will have my full attention.”

Belloc followed him out the back door of the garden, leaving through the adjacent block instead of their own private hallway.

She went into their compartment so she could watch him on the colony netcams. Belloc was in his Zentai suit, several yards behind Duin.

Close to Aileen’s, she lost sight of Belloc. J’ni opened windows of the pub’s live feeds but couldn’t scope Duin, Belloc or Owen. “Damn it. Stale fucking netcams.” They were everywhere, except when you really wanted to see something.

Leaving all of the windows open, she continued watching the wall. About twenty minutes later, she spotted Belloc coming down the thoroughfare near their block.

As soon as he entered the compartment and removed his hood, she asked, “What’s Duin up to?”

“He found a source for weapons. He must meet them in the sky ocean, not here, so he’s leaving Asteria.”

For the next day, J’ni found it impossible to concentrate on answering email or keeping up with her discussion boards. The Tikat liaison was in private meetings to which she was not invited, but she interviewed the delegations sent from Earth. She blogged what she could and tried to cover for Duin’s absence by making several posts comparing the current ecological devastation on Glin with the problems on Earth at the turn of the century. She also posted some of Duin’s recent vids of his planet—those which contrasted with the Tikati’s allegations of widespread improvement.

But the interviews, the emails, the blog, even the corners of her compartment, all pressed the lack of Duin upon her to the point of suffocation. His absences had never bothered her this much before. She gave up trying to work or to sleep, and went out into the garden to find Belloc.

Peering through the strips of plastic in his doorway, she saw him fighting a ghost hunter guild that included a high-level mad scientist, a fairy queen and a retro-cyborg. Belloc still slept on the bare ground, his few possessions hung inside the woven walls of his
tippa,
and he used the open floorspace to play Mysteria whenever he had a chance.