Chapter 3: Negotiating

May 28, 1993

The Senate was in disarray. They had been rounded up first thing in the morning and brought to the capitol building by a bunch of soldiers. Faced with armed men and women, they had no choice except to go. The disturbing thing was that these were the same people they had hired to end the civil war.

The Head of the Senate looked at the treaty he had been handed. It didn’t take more than a single glance at it to know that he didn’t like what it said. It went against everything he had worked to achieve.

He said, “I’m not going to put this up for a vote.”

“Why not?”

He shouted, “It says that I have to run against an opponent for my election to be legal. It’s not going to happen. I got this chair! It’s mine, and no one is going to take it away from me!”

The other Senators started muttering upon hearing about having to run against an opponent. None of them liked the sound of that. It could mean they might lose their seat in the Senate.

“Wow!” Pen Sada said. “I can tell you’re concerned about the country.”

“I’m a Senator. I do what I think is best for the country. Some snot-nosed soldier is not going to tell me what to do,” he said glaring at Pen Sada.

“So you aren’t you going to put it up for a vote?”

“No!”

“We are contracted to end the civil war. You are preventing us from fulfilling our contract,” Pen Sada said.

“What has making me run against an opponent got to do with ending the civil war? You should be out killing rebels, not talking nonsense.”

“The terms of the treaty represent the key things the rebels want. It seems to us that it doesn’t change the government any, just allows them to change the people at the top,” Pen Sada said. “That’s reasonable. It’s actually inevitable.”

“No. It’s outrageous. I will not even discuss it.”

He threw the treaty on the floor.

Bang!

Pen Sada asked, “Who’s next in line?”

An elderly gentleman rose from his chair and said, “I am. I am Senator Goil.”

“We have a treaty we wish that you would put up for a vote to ratify,” Pen Sada said.

“Why not just stick your gun to our heads and have us vote ‘yes’ on it?” he asked in a quiet calm voice.

“Life doesn’t work that way. You have to read it, debate it, and then vote. If you vote it down, then we have to go to plan B.”

“What is plan B?”

“We don’t discuss military operations with others,” Pen Sada said.

“Let me see the treaty.”

She bent down and picked it up from the floor. She handed it over to Senator Goil. He looked it over and said, “It will never pass.”

“I think after discussing it, you might feel otherwise,” she said.

“As my predecessor should have asked, why should we accept having to run against an opponent?” he asked.

“Well, you might think that accepting term limits has a lot of disadvantages for you, but there are a lot of advantages as well. I think the advantages outweigh the disadvantages. For one, you get to live. This civil war would normally end with everyone in this room dying. Civil wars don’t end with a government defeating the people, but a mob overwhelming the government. History tells us that.

“If you are convincing in telling the people that you have their best interests at heart, you might even get re-elected. Three terms of five years each term, gives you a run of fifteen years as a politician. However, the term limits on the cabinet member and president means that you stand a better chance of becoming a cabinet member. With a ten year term on cabinet member, you could extend your career to twenty five years. With a five year term on president, you could extend that to thirty years.

“In addition, there’s no need for you guys to have to plot or plan how to get rid of a cabinet member you don’t like, or to create an opening for your own promotion. That’s risky, and more than a few of you have not survived the experience. This just cleans things up tremendously.”

“It’s not a very convincing argument,” he said. “We are giving up a sure thing.”

“Which sure thing are you giving up? Your life or your office?”

“Put that way...”

“I’m not threatening. I’m just saying that if the civil war continues, you will die. The people aren’t going to give you a chance to explain yourself.”

“What about Plan B?”

“We don’t discuss military operations with others.”

“We hired you.”

“That’s a good reason not to discuss our plans,” she said. “Most of our customers want plausible deniability. There’s nothing worse than going down in history as having agreed to ... oh ... say, genocide.”

“You would commit genocide.”

“We live and die by the contract.”

“I’ll accept it for a vote. We’ll have to debate it. To be honest, I don’t see much of a chance of us passing it.”

“All we ask is that you put it through the process,” Pen Sada said with a smile.

Once they got past term limits, the two conditions that were argued most strenuously was granting rights to the Misers and accepting Jade Force as overseers. The Misers issue was actually easy when it was pointed out that the people might be grateful about being granted voting rights, and, as new voters, they might be willing to support those individuals who gave them those rights.

The need for a Jade Force overseer wasn’t so easily dismissed. It was the key sticking point despite it being the one condition that would assure the rebels that the government would follow through on its promises. Promises at gunpoint were easy to make and even easier to break when the gun was removed.

In the end, the treaty passed by a narrow margin. Much to Pen Sada’s surprise, a few people stood firm in their resistance to losing the power they held. It was mostly older people who had a long history of running over the populace who were most adamant about rejecting the treaty. Some of the younger members of the Senate were a lot more flexible in their thinking. She knew that a few felt that the perceived threat of death made voting for the treaty the only sane choice.

To be honest, a lot of those who voted against the treaty were surprised to have survived the vote.

Pen Sada said, “We’ll have a Sword run this up to the President’s office. They are anxiously awaiting the outcome of today’s activities.”

Grumpily, President Klay said, “I haven’t heard any reports of your people killing off those damned Misers.”

He, along with his cabinet, had been sitting in the office with the Jade Warriors for four hours waiting to hear about the outcome of the most recent engagement. He was sure that the streets would have been running with blood by now. Jade Force was supposed to be excellent killers. He kept waiting for news that the killing had begun.

“Your soldiers still haven’t found them. They keep searching the reservations, but the Misers aren’t there. We have found them and they have been dealt with. You won’t hear much of anything until the civil war is ended,” Pen Ocival said.

“You’ve only got three days left,” he said.

“We’re almost finished,” she replied with a smile. Her radio squawked and she added, “That’s the news we are waiting for.”

“What about those protesters out there?” he said pointing towards the window of the room.

He couldn’t even look out the window at them because of the threat that he might get shot by a sniper. There were too many people out there. He knew that if he sent the troops out to kill them, that it would be a disaster. On the other hand, if Jade Force were to do it ... Well, no one would be all that surprised.

“They’ll be gone by evening,” Pen Ocival said. In a more ominous tone of voice, she added, “One way or another.”

“That’s what I like to hear,” President Klay said.

Pen Ocival said, “You really don’t think much of the citizens of Misera, do you?”

“I’m the President. I run this country as I see fit. When I see something I don’t like, I fix it.”

“You live in luxury. You satisfy any whim you have without a hint of guilt. You have women brought to your chambers regardless of their willingness to be there. You are not accountable to anyone. It really sounds to me like you are in this for you and no one else.”

“I’m your employer. Don’t forget that,” he said angrily.

“We know exactly who our employer is,” Pen Ocival replied. “We have a contract.”

“You and that contract,” he said.

He was used to dealing with people who were a little more flexible in their thinking. All he had to do was make his desires known and people jumped to satisfy them. He had tried three times to get Pen Ocival into his bed, but she refused. The last time she had pointed a gun at the center of his forehead and calmly explained that the contract was to end the civil war, not to satisfy his sexual desires. His security detail had stood there with guns pointed to their heads and had done nothing. He wasn’t going to forget that insult.