Текст книги "Invader"

Автор книги: C. J. Cherryh

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Текущая страница: 15 (всего у книги 28 страниц)

Fifteen thousand five a year for twenty-seven people. Twenty-one five for another. Office payments. Faxes, phones, computers —

"I've not that much in personal savings," Bren said with a sinking heart. "I'd thought of one or two assistants. If we can apply to the general office – I don't know, Tano. I don't know that I canget funds out of my government. They may well want to shoot me instead."

"I've concluded nothing as yet, nand' paidhi. But I have all the figures. I can file a requisition through personnel. I'm sure it'll go straight up to the aiji."

"I'm sure it will." He didn't want to have the office funded through the Bu-javid. If he had a shred of propriety left in the office accounts, he shouldn't be accepting any more funding from atevi, who had far different standards for what the aiji's court demanded in dress and style than what the Mospheiran government wanted to fund for what they viewed as a civil servant. But —"Do it, Tano. I've no other recourse but leave the correspondence piling up. There's another stack. The household staff is sorting through it."

"One isn't surprised at more mail, nand' paidhi. But I'll be a while at the requisitions. I've forms to fill out. A lot of them."

"I'm grateful for your doing it, Tano. Everything's fine upstairs. Algini's resting, there aren't any emergencies. Take time for supper. Please. As a favor to me. If it doesn't all get done today, it'll still get done. We're searching out the volatile ones. We'll take care of it."

" Thank you, nadi-ji." Tano said.

He hung up the phone, working the numbers in his head without half thinking and coming up with a budget that wasn't by any stretch of the imagination going to get clearance without a fight. Mospheira wasn't going to understand why the paidhi, when all previous paidhiin had made do with no staff on the mainland and a staff of ten or less on Mospheira, suddenly needed this kind of operation. Long before Wilson, Mospheira in the executive branch hadn't wanted to admit that the paidhiin were anything but a convenient appendage to the State Department's other, internal business – saw them as bearers of messages, generators of dictionaries, or perhaps as mostly engaged in generating tenure in university posts.

And without executive branch support, figure that the legislators were never going to leap to drain money from their constituencies for an office that had never needed it before, for a paidhi that didn't have friends in high places.

God… help him. He didn't have the funds. In the absence of Mospheira suddenly seeing reason, he knew where the funds were going to have to come from: Tabini. Which, on principle, he didn't want, but if the ship answered – if the ship would just, please God, answer Tabini, and call him, and tell him that they were going to agree to Tabini's proposals…

He was in the lady's small office, where he had a phone and some privacy. Supper was in preparation. He hadn't enough time to start any letter or anything else useful. He resolved to try the Mospheiran phone system again, and called through to the operator with his mother's number.

The call went through. Or sounded as if it were going through.

It didn't.

He listened through the phone system Number Temporarily Out of Service message, and couldn't even get the damn central message system to leave her a "Hello, this is Bren."

He called through again, this time to Toby's home, on the North Shore.

"Toby? This is Bren. Toby, Pick up the phone. Pick up the damn phone, Toby."

The daughter came on. A high clear voice called, " Papa? It's Uncle Bren," and in a series of thumps somebody came down the steps to the front hall.

"Bren."

"Toby, good to hear a voice. What's the matter with Mom's number?"

"What's the matter?"

"I'm getting a Temporarily Out of Service."

There was a moment of silence. " Maybe they're doing repair."

"I tried to call this morning. I got a telegram from her. It was censored to hell. Is everything all right?"

Silence. And more silence.

"Toby?"

"Yeah, everything's fine. How are you doing? The shoulder all right?"

"Best I can tell. – Toby, how's Jill?"

"Oh, Jill's fine. We're all fine. Weather's a little soggy. You'll probably catch it tomorrow."

"We could do with some rain. Cool it off a little. Have you talked to Mother in the last few days?"

Silence. Then: " You know Mom. She doesn't like change."

"Toby?"

"I've got to hang up now. We're going out to supper."

"Toby, what in bloody hell's going on?"

"Mom's been getting some calls, all right? It's not a problem."

"Not a problem. What kind of calls?"

" I' ll drop her a message on the system, tell her you called. It's all right, Bren, it's all right, don't worry about it. – I've got to go. Jill's waiting. We were just going out the door."

"Yeah," he said. "Yeah. Thanks, Toby."

Something's wrong, those silences meant. Something was wrong regarding their mother.

He hit his hand on the paneled wall. Which did nothing but summon a concerned servant.

"Nand' paidhi?" She was one of the youngest, very earnest, very anxious.

He carefully removed expression from his face. And tried not to feel the acid upset in his stomach. "It's all right, nadi. It's nothing."

"Yes," the servant said, and bowed and went her way.

The paidhi gathered up the nerves he had left and tried to divert his mind back to office budgets and folded space.

The change of season meaning a more palatable meat course, the cook was inspired, to judge by the meticulous arrangement and green-sauce spirals on the appetizers. And the paidhi, the object of so much attention, should have had a ravenous appetite, counting the chasing about he'd done, and the lunch he hadn't but picked over.

But he couldn't take his mind off Toby's informative silences, picked over the appetizers, too, and decided finally he'd rather try to eat than answer cook's hurt feelings.

He wished he hadn't called at all. He couldn't do anything. He couldn't get there. Toby could, but Toby hadn't, which might mean Toby wasn't that worried.

But "Getting some calls." What in hell did that mean? Some random crazy?

A movement touched the edge of his vision. And stopped, which the serving staff hadn't done. He looked toward the door.

"Nandi," he said, seeing Saidin standing, hands folded, expectant of something. With more staff behind her.

With a serving tray.

Probably the season's inaugural dish. It was a very formal house. And he couldn'toffend the cook. He gave the event his full attention.

The servants brought the tray in and set out a very large flat bread, with an amazing array of foods atop, all appropriate, all seasonal. But on a green vegetable sauce.

"This is a new dish," he remarked.

And evidently set the staff somewhat aback – when cook herself had come into the hall, and waited – clearly – for his reaction.

"It's quite nice," he said, trying to salve feelings.

"What do you call it?" He tried to learn new words and new things as they presented themselves. It was what the paidhi did in the ordinary course of his job.

"Pizza," the youngest servant blurted out. "Is this not in correct season, nand' paidhi?"

"Of course it is," he said, at once. "Of course, pizza, nadi. I'm just – quite surprised." He could have broken into laughter – if he hadn't control of his face, and his voice. "It's wonderful."

"We hadn't the red sauce," cook said. "We're told it will come, but the plane was delayed by weather."

"One did think," madam Saidin said, clearly part of the conspiracy, "that after dealing with that unpleasant woman this noon it was a good day for a traditional food."

"It smells very good," he said. "Would the staff share? It's traditional to pass it around."

The servants looked excited. Saidin looked dubious, but cook said, "There're eight more in the kitchen. One had provided for the staff, nand' paidhi, by your leave."

"Call Algini. And Jago." The notion of an Occasion made him positively cheerful. "Might we have drinks, nand' Saidin?"

Even Saidin was falling into it. Cook declared that she could whip up more in short order, there was serious question about what the felicitous number of pieces should be for the cutting, and servants were scurrying after various members of the household, awake and asleep – nothing would do but that everybody come in, and flowers be found, and the state table be laid out with the second-best silver.

Jago was nowhere about, but Algini came from the security station – and sampled the dish, and went back again, with plain tea to drink – but several of the staff became quite happy, someone put on music, and in the hallway a couple of the servants began a solemn, hands-behind-the-back line step, which in no wise endangered the fragile tables or the porcelain. He left the dining room to watch, and the servants would happily have taught him, but madam Saidin was scandalized, and advised them the paidhi was much too dignified for that.

The paidhi wasn't, as happened, but one didn't defy madam Saidin's judgments in front of her staff, and the paidhi stood in the doorway sipping a drink he knew was safe. They hadtomatos and potatoes, peppers, onions and herbs on Mospheira they didn't allow to cross the strait uncooked, for fear of seeds and starts and the mainland ecology, although atevi who'd tried tomatos found something in tomatos and potatoes and peppers they relished, and there was a seasonal trade; but the ubiquitous green sauce, peppery and sour, went well with the bread and atevi foods piled atop so thickly a single slice was gluttony – and there was plenty of that among the staff.

"What does the dish celebrate?" a servant wanted to know, and the paidhi rapidly searched his mental files and said, shamelessly, "Success in hard work."

That pleased everyone, who congratulated each other, and even Saidin was pleased with herself.

Then Algini came in, in greater haste than Algini's injuries or Algini's habit usually afforded, with:

"Nadi Bren!"

There was a sudden hush, except of the music from the tape system. Security was all but impossible, as Algini said, "A phone call, Bren-paidhi. From Mogari-nai. They say the ship is calling you. They say they'll patch through."

"This is Bren Cameron," he said, still out of breath from reaching the office phone, "Go ahead, Mogari-nai."

"It's going through, nand' paidhi. Stand by."

He was still a couple of drinks to the worse and cursing his bad judgment, because, dammit, he'd known a call from the ship was at least still pending, and he'd assumed – assumed – it wouldn't happen. He took deep slow breaths, trying to pull his scattered wits together.

The next voice was thinner. " Hello?" it said. " This isPhoenix-com. Bren Cameron, please."

"This is Bren Cameron. Go ahead, Phoenix-com." He could hear the rippling murmur of gossip underway among the servants down the short hall, but the party had quietened, Saidin, at least, being as aware as Algini what was at stake in this phone call.

"Mr. Cameron, this is Ramirez."

"Good evening, sir."

" Good evening. Sorry to miss your 1200 request. We've been sifting through a swarm of material, yours, theirs– I just got off the com with the island, and the President is claiming you haven't any authority to negotiate, I should tell you that first."

Damn, was the thought. He said, he trusted calmly, while juggling the phone receiver on his good shoulder and trying at the same time to reach the record button with the good hand – he punched the button —"The President has no authority to negotiate for atevi, sir, by the meaning and intent of the Treaty, the text of which you have. By grant of Tabini-aiji, sir, I dohave the authority, and while I don't imagine —" God, the alcohol was making the room too warm, or the tape was cutting off his wind "– while I don't imagine the President is too pleased with that situation, I'm going to continue to provide translation between you and the atevi authority."

" I think we've come around to that point. What's the aiji's position on dealing with us?"

"Entirely open-minded." This wasn't a diplomat he was talking to. He picked up the bluntness and matched it. "The deal's been integrated economies, equal technological levels. Atevi and humans were building launch facilities before you arrived, to share renovation and operation of the station. That's the deal in progress. The aiji sees no cause to change that."

"Is he receiving this?"

"I can arrange it in a matter of minutes."

"No need, if you'll inform him we certainly want a good relationship with his government and we've selected the representative to go down there, at his request, on two conditions: one, our representative gets official status and official protection; and, two, there'll be an immediate application of resources to getting up here. I want an official confirmation from him that this will be the case."

"You'll get an official confirmation of both points, sir, but I can say there'll be no problem with that."

"We're dropping two representatives, one to you, one to Mospheira."

"No problem with that, either, sir."

" Good. We've got the volunteers. – Jason? Jason Graham. Bren Cameron."

" Mr. Cameron." Anew, younger-sounding voice. " This is Jason Graham. Glad to make your acquaintance. I gather I'm likely to be seeing you soon."

"Looking forward to that. You've got a landing craft, then?"

" Well– we've got one. I'd like to call tomorrow, your choice of times, and get some feeling about what I'm dropping into."

"Delighted." He was. "Local daybreak's easy to figure. We left your clock when we landed. Tomorrow morning?"

"Daybreak. Dawn. Sunrise. All those words. Tomorrow dawn, it is. Good night. Do you say that?"

"Good night," he said, with the least small unease of realization that those were all dictionary words to the man. Conceptually dead. Three hundred and more years away – and daybreak was conceptually a dead word to him.

He signed off with the technicians at Mogari-nai, snatched the tape out of the machine before anything could happen to it, and phoned Tabini's private phone with, "I just had a brief ship contact, aiji-ma. They've apparently agreed to everything we want. I'll get you the full text."

" This is very good, Bren-ji. This isvery good."

"They say they've got a landing capability of some kind and two people are scheduled to come down, one for the mainland, one for Mospheira. I'm going to talk to their representative at the crack of dawn tomorrow and I'll have more detail: the conversation was very brief. They want, they said, good relations with the atevi government. That's about the limit of the conversation, but it was cordial and positive."

" Very good news, Bren-ji. Good to hear. – Bren-ji?"

"Aiji-ma?"

"One hears of celebration over there."

"I'm terribly sorry if I've disturbed you, aiji-ma."

"No, our walls are quite thick. Enjoy the evening, Bren-ji."

"Thank you," he said, bewildered, as Tabini hung up.

Then it slowly came to him that there was something changed, and they might have reason to celebrate – the threat to the world might have taken a turn toward real, productive solution.

He walked out to the dining hall where a hushed assembly of servants stood waiting – hushed until he arrived: then the staff began to ask all at the same time, "Did you speak to the ship, nand' paidhi?" and "Did it go well, nand' paidhi?"

"Hush," Saidin said, scandalized. "Hush! This is by no means our business."

"But it did go well, nand' Saidin," Bren said. "If we can believe what I hear from the ship." He dared not claim to have reached any agreement, although he was sliding giddily toward believing it himself, for reasons that had more to do with where the resources were than any confidence in innate generosity in orbit over their heads. For that, he counted more on Mospheira, and that, very little and in offices not in ultimate authority over anything.

But around him there was growing excitement on faces. Algini was still in the group, and the crowd in the dining room and the hall numbered, he was sure, every servant on staff. Even Saidin and Algini seemed to catch the enthusiasm when he'd said as much as he had said, and someone put a glass in his hand, which accounted for all his ability to hold anything. It smelled at least like the safe variety, a wary touch of the tongue didn't have the queasy rough taste the truly dangerous drink had, and while he was engaged in deciding that, Saidin snatched it from him with an exclamation of dismay and replaced it with another, Saidin berating the glass-giver in the same instant for unwarranted carelessness with the paidhi, who everyone knew had a delicate stomach and a delicate constitution and was, moreover, Saidin's harangue continued, a virtual invalid lately wounded in the service of the Association, beside the hazard to lady Damiri's reputation in their carelessness.

The music had come up again, and cook's cart had arrived, this time with trays of chilled sweetmeats, probably a month's provisions, on which the servants descended and stripped tray after tray. Saidin was nibbling a sweet herself, and Algini had a number of very nice-looking young ladies backing him against the wall and firing questions at him, doubtless on his recent adventures and the reason for the bandages.

Then, ominous, dark and formal in her uniform, Jago arrived in the midst of things, and surveyed the situation without expression.

"Bren-ji," she said, moving up beside him, "one heard, down in Security."

"About the ship? It sounds good so far."

A servant would have given Jago a glass, but she ordered tea; there was still food to be had, and while Jago wouldn't drink, she took down a piece of pizza in short order, and listened to the music, standing by him with a solemn and on-duty stare at the proceedings as dancers, twenty or so of them, this time, wound down the hall.

"It – rather well grew, nadi," Bren said, feeling foolish and completely responsible. "I hate to tell them no, but I fear we're disturbing the peace."

"No," Jago said in her somber way. "Though Cenedi, downstairs, made inquiry for the dowager's sake."

"Oh, damn."

"And Banichi and Tano demand a share saved for them." Jago's tea arrived, with suitable deference, and Jago stood and sipped tea. "They'll be in later. Cook is going to be beset for the recipe. Pieces made their way down to Security, over to Tabini, and down to the dowager. One hopes this contravenes no ceremonial propriety."

"No," he said solemnly. "By no means. God, is nothing safe?"

"The recipe?" Jago said.

"The information. Everything I do —"

"We do watch, Bren-ji. But don't rely on it too far. Banichi says get to bed in good season, don't proposition the servants, and don't break the ancestral porcelains."

"Where ishe?"

Jago cast a glance aside, then said, "He's got your plane arranged."

"Plane."

"To the observatory," Jago said, as if, of course, he should have known.

Which he should. The paidhi wasn't tracking as well as he ought. Probably it was the third glass. He was relatively sure it was the third.

"Day after tomorrow," Jago said, and sipped her tea. And hadn't, he realized a moment later, answered his question about Banichi's whereabouts at all.

Dammit, he thought. He got more information out of Cenedi and Tano than he did out of either of the two security personnel he counted closer to him.

But it wasn't the time or the place to insist. Banichi would turn up, probably as Jago disappeared somewhere, as they'd been doing. Jago'd mentioned a security station, and somehow Jago and Tabini andBanichi knew every move he made and every breath he took, which might indicate the nature of the security station they were occupying and the fact that the porcelains might be listening.

Which might indicate that, with a country at risk, or what passed for one in atevi reckoning, Tabini might not find it within his conscience to take him totally on his word.

Or dared not, with the amount of controversy he'd generated, and apparently a major crisis in the Assassins' Guild, leave him unwatched for a second.

Celebration might be in order. But solutions didn't fall into your hands, strangers didn't agree with you for no reason of advantage to themselves, and aijiin, presidents, and likely ship captains as well, when they had constituents at issue, didn't just do the logical, straightforward, economical – or trusting – thing. Not that he'd ever observed.

CHAPTER 13

" I've got a very little of a few languages," Graham said, on the phone patch-through. " I'm as close as we could come. I'm a history hobbyist. That's how I'm elected to the atevi side of this– I've got a background in history. The other of us, going to the human population– she's got all the technical background you want, but no study in languages at all. Nobody has, much. We don't have different languages. I just got into it because I was interested in history, and I got curious. And I teach, too. It was something I thought I ought to know."

"You're a teacher?" Bren asked, and poured a cup of tea from the pot on the office desk, with growing visions of a gentle, professorial young man, politically naive, dropping into political hell.

"Well, computers most of the time, but somebody's got to write the lessons for the kids. I gave them language study. I thought it was good for them. But not too many were interested."

"Know a noun from a verb?"

" Yes, sir. Conjugations, declensions, participles—"

" That'sgoing to be useful. I've prepped another data-load for you this morning, atevi-Mosphei' grammar notes with at least the basics – you're not going to understand half of it. A handful of phrases in the remote case you have to communicate with somebody other than me. We're not dealing with a human grammatical structure, as you'll find out. Good in math?"

"Up to a point, sir. Why?"

"Because you have to do some calculation constantly. The number of persons in a polite sentence isn't by head count, it's by calculations of rank plus real number, and there are forms you use to avoid jinxing somebody when you haveto use an infelicitous number of persons. You'll love it. I'm soglad to have somebody from the ship who's going to understand that this isn't a straightforward matter of word-for-word translation. I've been trying for years to make my department heads understand that answers one time aren't the answers the next time. If I haven't scared you by now, you may do."

"I'm at least daunted."

"Good judgment. Atevi and humans have deep but solvable conceptual differences, moderately significant psychological differences, and I'll tell you, we were just on the verge of important breakthroughs including space missions when you turned up in the sky scaring hell out of the children. Any background in negotiation? Politics?"

" History. Just– history."

He had an academic on his hands. God help them. Or a dilettante.

"Good vocabulary?"

"A pretty good one. Better than some."

"I've asked your captain to give you real authority to negotiate. And stand behind you. Will he?"

" I've heard what you said. He told me just– call if I had a question and I'm supposed to get a thorough briefing before I go down, on what we're going to need, on the lift vehicle and after. I'll need regular communications with the ship. I can get the technical details in download. "

Either the captain was naive – a possibility – or the captain was sending them somebody who didn't know enough to spill anything under,interrogation.

But Jason Graham wasn't stupid. A man who made a hobby out of history and languages wasn't stupid.

A fool, maybe. That was a different matter.

"You have any concept of politics, Graham? How do you make critical decisions up there? What's your procedure?"

"Guild vote, sir. The captains lay out what's to be done, or sometimes the technicians do, and then we all lay out what our choices are– it's not like a whole country, sir, it's a lot more like we've got information, and we've got what we don't know, and we've got to figure."

"How did you decide to come back, for example?"

A silence for a moment. " Well, we were always going to. And we decided it was a good time."

"Why was it a good time?"

"Well, because we've got another station, and linking up the two of them could give us a lot more options where we could go."

"Fueling, you mean."

"And supplies."

"What are you going to trade for?"

Another small silence. " I don't know, sir. I think that's something that's still pretty far off, the way the station looks right now."

Meaning the station needed population, the station needed workers, and the ship —

The ship, as it always had, wanted refueling. The ship wanted provisions. And the world was supposed to provide that, free of charge, one could guess, after one hell of a lot of man-hours of dangerous effort producing what the starship could drink down at one gulp and leave.

But as Jason Graham said, there were things to do first. They were stuck with the ship as a factor. They had a station decaying more rapidly by the year, the ship was a shortcut to saving it – which was worth something, damn sure.

And the ship – couldn't get anything off the planet. By everything he knew – it couldn't get anything that wasn't brought to it in space. That meant the world had leverage.

"Meaning they'll send down their figures as they develop them."

" Essentially, sir, but– can we talk very frankly?"

"Anything you want to talk about. Go ahead."

"I'm volunteering because I want to do something more with my life than push keys, which is the job I've got, but I don't want to get my throat cut, and I don't want to end up somebody's hostage. Neither does Yolanda. It won't work, for one thing. The captain says he won't deal there to get us back. If anything goes wrong we're on our own. So– how safe are we?"

"You'll have the protection of Tabini-aiji. That's very safe. I can't say about your companion, but Mospheira's quiet to the point of tedium under most circumstances. I'll make every effort to meet you when you arrive. Are you coming down at the same time?"

"That's what we plan. If we can get one of us a way to get to the other place."

"Easily. By the next plane."

" Mospheira says– speaking frankly, sir– that atevi can shoot you for no reason. Legally. That somebody just tried to kill you. Twice. That we're much safer landing on the island. You're telling me otherwise."

"I – equally frankly – advise you that landing on Mospheira would create special problems for you. Yes, there are some very different customs here, and assassination is legal, but it's also strictly regulated. The attempts against me were illicit, they were met by the aiji's security and stopped. In fact, if you land on the island, it would make you much less safe: Tabini-aiji has a great stake in your protection if you land where he asks you to, on his invitation – he's given you his personal assurance of safety, that's one thing. For another, he considerably outranks the Mospheiran President, and accepting the Mospheiran invitation over his would be very bad protocol. Atevi would take it for a calculated insult, or collusion and secret arrangements, which would start you off very badly. Please pass that word into your decision-making process."

" I will, sir. – Second question. Mospheira says the situation where you are is chaotic. They say you might not be acting of your own accord. That a woman who was supposed to be replacing you has disappeared."

Maybe not so politically naive. Or at least not incapable of asking questions.

" Can I believeyou, sir, that's the question. The island says you've violated orders and you're giving unauthorized information to the atevi."

"Yes. I have done that. So has the woman they say has disappeared. You'll discover once you get down here that Mospheira moves incredibly slowly on decisions and translators in the field sometimes have to move very fast. Your ship showed in the sky, atevi feared Mospheira was going to abrogate the Treaty and that it was some kind of plot – -damn right I had to take steps to calm things down, among people who didn't feel they had gotten honest information. That necessarily included my explaining what couldn't wait for some committee on Mospheira to approve. Mospheira is sending very contradictory signals. They want me here. They know I'll act. Now State is mad. Fine. If you want the blunt truth, I'd rather offend the President of Mospheira and not have the whole atevi and human relationship blow up over what I could solve, in a situation the facts of which they'd have to rely on my judgment to find out in the first place."

"What about this missing woman?"

"Deana Hanks? She's not missing. I ordered her to go home and she told me she was waiting for formal recall from Mospheira, which Mospheira hasn't sent."

"Why?"

"Because – you want the truth? – she belongs to an opposition party on Mospheira that's trying to get Tabini to accept her credentials; and he won't. She's fine, I had lunch with her yesterday, we argued as usual, but we've agreed to keep it in bounds."

"That's certainly not what we're getting from Mospheira."

"What are you getting from Mospheira?"

"That the situation there is very dangerous, and you might be lying, bluntly put, sir."

"You know where this transmission is coming from?"

"Yes, sir, a station on the coast."

"You think stations of that size are private? Or that it belongs to the atevi government?"

"To the government, I'd say, sir."

"I assure you that's who I'm speaking for, Mr. Graham. I'm the translator, the paidhi, the only human appointed by the Treaty to mediate between atevi and humans. The atevi legislature asked me to perform the same office between you and them, in which capacity I'm now officially functioning. Yes, I work for the Mospheiran government; by the nature of what I do, I also work for the atevi government. That means that it's my job occasionally to say things Mospheira doesn't want to hear. But if I don't say it, it doesn't get said, the situation festers in silence, and we can all end up with real trouble. Plainly, there are Mospheirans that don't like atevi, and they don't like me, either. But that opinion is never going to get atevi to cooperate. Not till hell freezes over, as the saying goes. So tell your captain he can listen to people on Mospheira who either get their information from me or from their own guesswork, or he can ask me firsthand and get the information directly. There's no other choice, because there's no other human authorized to contact the atevi. You're about to become the second. Welcome to the world of politics."