Chapter IX

Night had fallen in the park beyond the huge Foreign Office building and the air was damp and cool. Duke shivered in the shadows that covered his bench. He should head back to his room, but he had no desire to listen again to the meaningless chatter that came through the thin walls. Time didn’t matter to him now, anyhow.

He swore and reached for a cigarette, brushing the crumpled newspaper from his lap. He’d been a fool to think Flannery would bother with him, just as he’d been a fool to turn down Queeth’s offer. He’d wasted his day off from the messenger job.

Footsteps sounded down the walk that led past his bench, and he drew deeper into the shadows. The steps slowed and a man moved to the other end of the bench. Duke drew heavily on his cigarette, tossed it away, and started to get up.

“Drink?” There was a hand holding a flask in front of him. He hesitated, then took it, and let a long slug run down his throat. In the faint light he could make out the face of Director Flannery. The man nodded. “Sorry I was out when you came, O’Neill. One of the guards saw you out here, so I came over.”

“You should have been in,” Duke said, handing the flask back. “I’ve changed my mind since reading about some of your deals in the Journal. Well, thanks for the drink.”

One of Flannery’s prosthetic hands rested on Duke’s shoulder, and the pressure was surprisingly heavy. “When a man takes a drink with me, captain, he waits until I finish mine.” He tipped up the flask and drank slowly before putting it away. “I suppose you mean the Cathay-Kloomiria mess?”

“What else?” Mess was a mild word. The Sugfarth ship had seemed to make victory for Cathay certain the first few days, but the war had entered a new phase now. Cathay couldn’t maintain the big ship, and it was practically useless. It had simply served to reduce Kloomiria to a position where both sides were equal. The war showed signs of settling down to another prolonged, exhausting affair.

“Yeah, I read the editorial.” Flannery sighed. “We did let a couple of fools make Cathay think we’d bail her out. At the time, it seemed wise. The son of old Var was due to assume rule in a little while and he was strongly pro-human. We wanted to hold things off until he took over and scrapped the war plans. When he was killed--well, we pulled out before Var was any stronger.”

“And sent Queeth’s crowd in to do your blood-letting for you?” Duke sneered.

“That was their own idea,” Flannery denied. He lighted a cigarette and sat staring at the end of it, blowing out a slow stream of smoke. “All right, we made a mess of Cathay. We’ll know better next time. Care to walk back with me?”

“Why? So one of your trained psychopropagandists can indoctrinate me? Or to get drunk and cry over your confession?”

“To keep me from sinking to your level and pushing your nose down your throat!” Flannery told him, but there was no real anger in his voice. He stood up, shrugging. “Nobody’s forcing you, O’Neill. Say the word and I’ll drive you home. But if you want that explanation, my working office seems like a good place to talk.”

For a moment, Duke wavered. But he’d reached the end of his own research, and he’d come here to find the answers. Leaving now would only make him more of a fool. “O.K.,” he decided. “I’ll stay for the big unveiling.”

Flannery grimaced. “There’s no great secret, though we don’t broadcast the facts for people and races not ready for them. We figure those who finish growing up here will soak up most of it automatically. Did you get around to the film file on interstellar wars at the library?”

Duke nodded, wondering how much they knew about his activities. He’d spent a lot of time going over the film for clues. It was so old that the color had faded in places. The rest would have been easier to take without color. Most wasn’t good photography, but all was vivid. It was the record of all the wars since Earth’s invention of the high-drive--nearly two hundred of them. Gimsul, Hathor, Ptek, Sugfarth, Clovis, and even Meloa--the part he hadn’t seen, beyond Kordule where the real damage lay; Ronda had been wrong, and cannibalism had been discovered, along with much that was worse. Two hundred wars in which victor and vanquished alike had been ruined--in which the supreme effort needed to win had left most of the victors worse than the defeated systems.

“War!” The word was bitter on Flannery’s lips. “Someone starts building war power--power to insure peace, as they always say. Then other systems must have power to protect themselves. Strength begets force--and fear and hatred. Sooner or later, the strain is too great, and you have a war so horrible that its very horror makes surrender impossible. You saw it on Meloa. I’ve seen it fifty times!”

They reached the Foreign Office building and began crossing its lobby. Flannery glanced up at the big seal on the wall with its motto in twisted Latin--Per Astra ad Aspera--and his eyes turned back to Duke’s, but he made no comment. He led the way to a private elevator that dropped them a dozen levels below the street, to a small room, littered with things from every conceivable planet. One wall was covered with what seemed to be the control panel of a spaceship, apparently now used for a desk. The director dropped into a chair and motioned Duke to another.

He looked tired, and his voice seemed older as he bent to pull a small projector and screen from a drawer and set them up. “The latest chapter of the film,” he said bitterly, throwing the switch.

It was a picture of the breakup of the Outer Federation, and in some ways worse than the other wars. Chumkt rebelled against Kel’s leadership and joined the aliens, while a civil war sprang up on her surface. Two alien planets went over to Kel. The original war was forgotten in a struggle for new combinations, and a thousand smaller wars replaced it. The Federation was dead and the two dozen races were dying.

“When everything else fails, the fools try federation,” Flannery said as the film ended. “We tried it on Earth. Another race discovered the interstellar drive before we did and used it to build an empire. We’ve found the dead and sterile remains of their civilization. It’s always the same. When one group unites its power, those nearby must ally for protection. Then there’s a scramble for more power, while jealousies and fears breed new hatreds, internally and externally. And finally, there’s ruin--because at the technological level of interstellar travel, victory in war is absolutely, totally impossible!”

He sat back, and Duke waited for him to resume, until it was obvious he had finished. At last, the younger man gave up waiting. “All right,” he said. “Earth won’t fight! Am I supposed to turn handsprings? I figured that much out myself. And I learned a long time ago about the blessed meek who were to inherit the Earth--but I can’t remember anything being said about the stars!”

“You think peace won’t work?” Flannery asked mildly.

“I know it won’t!” Duke fumbled for a cigarette, trying to organize his thoughts. “You’ve been lucky so far. You’ve counted on the fact that war powers have to attack other powers nearby before they can safely strike against Earth, and you’ve buffered yourself with a jury-rigged economic trading system. But what happens when some really bright overlord decides to by-pass his local enemies? He’ll drop fifty planet bombs out of your peaceful skies and collect your vassal worlds before they can rearm. You won’t know about that, though. You’ll be wiped out!”

“I wouldn’t call our friends vassals, or say the system was jury-rigged,” Flannery objected. “Ever hear of paradynamics? The papers call it the ability to manipulate relationships, when we let them write a speculative article. It’s what lets us rebuild worlds in less than half a century--and form the first completely peaceful politico-economic culture we’ve ever known. Besides, I never said we had no weapons for our defense.”

Duke considered it, trying to keep a firm footing on the shifting quicksand of the other’s arguments. He knew a little of paradynamics, of course, but only as something supposed to remake the world and all science in some abstract future. It had been originated as a complex mathematical analysis of nuclear relationships, and had been seized on for some reason by the sociologists. It had no bearing he could see on the main argument.

“It won’t wash, Flannery. Without a fleet, it won’t matter if you have the plans of every weapon ever invented. The first time a smart power takes the chance, you’ll run out of time.”