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“Oh, yes,” Molotov said. “I have to be sure I am right.” That sentence would eventually stir the armed forces the way a babushka stirred shchi, to make sure all the cabbage and sausage in the soup cooked evenly. Molotov went on, “Who is likelier to have done it, the Reich or the United States?”
Behind gold-rimmed spectacles, Beria’s eyes glinted. “The Reich is always more likely,” he replied. “The Americans are capitalist reactionaries, but they are, by their standards, sane. The Hitlerites?” He shook his head. “They are children, children with atomic bombs. Because they want a thing, they reach out and grab it, never worrying or caring what might happen because of that.”
“And Himmler is more sensible than Hitler was,” Molotov said.
“Indeed,” Beria said. Molotov suspected he was jealous of the German Fuhrer. Himmler was a master of secret policemen and spies, too, and he had reached the top in the Reich.
Molotov exhaled deeply, a sign of strong emotion in him. “Even for the Germans, this is madness. They struck one blow, but it would take a great many to destroy the colonization fleet. And the Lizards will not permit many blows to be struck against them. They can still strike harder than we, and they will.”
“Indeed,” Beria said again. His eyes glinted once more, this time in anticipation. “Shall I begin an investigation of the Ministry of Defense and the armed forces?”
“Not yet,” Molotov told him. “Soon, but not yet. The soldiers scream when the NKVD encroaches on them. I will tell you when I require your services. Until I tell such a thing, you are to keep your hands in your pockets. Do you understand me, Lavrenti Pavlovich? I mean this most particularly.”
“Very well,” Beria said in sulky tones. No, he did not like following orders. He would sooner have been giving them, as he did in the building on Dzerzhinsky Square.
“Another thing,” Molotov said, to make him attend: “Cut back on arms shipments to the People’s Liberation Army in China. We must soothe the Lizards wherever we can.”
“Yes, this is sensible,” Beria agreed, as if to say the other hadn’t been. He held up a forefinger. “But will it not make the Lizards think we have a guilty conscience?”
“Now that is an interesting question,” Molotov said. “Yes, a very interesting question.” He considered it. “I think we had better cut back, Lavrenti Pavlovich. We have always denied supplying the Chinese for their insurrection against the Lizards. How can we possibly cut back on what we have denied doing at all?”
Beria laughed. “A nice point. We shall do that, then. Shall we do it gradually, so that even the Chinese do not realize at once what is happening to them?”
“Yes, that would be very good.” Molotov nodded. “Very good indeed. Mao has complained from time to time that we are not Marxist-Leninist enough to suit him. Let us see how going without aid suits him, and how much he criticizes us after that.” Had he been another man, he might have chortled. Being the man he was, he allowed himself another nod, this one of anticipation.
Reffet’s furious face stared out of the screen at Atvar. “Destroy them!” the fleetlord of the colonization fleet shouted. “Destroy all the nasty Tosevites, that we may take this world for ourselves and do something worthwhile with it.”
“Could I have destroyed the Tosevites, or at least their capacity for making war, do you not think I would have done so?” Atvar returned. “In this case, the destruction would be mutual.”
“Incompetence,” Reffet hissed, careless of his opposite number’s feelings.
“Incompetence,” Atvar agreed, which startled Reffet into momentary silence. Atvar went on, “Incompetence reaching back more than sixteen hundred years. We misjudged what the probe told us, and we failed to send another one to see if the situation had changed in the interim before dispatching the conquest fleet. As a result, very little has gone as it should on Tosev 3.”
“As a result, twelve of my ships are blown to radioactive dust, and all the males and females in them,” Reffet replied. “And you have not yet punished the creatures responsible for this outrage.”
“We do not yet know which of the creatures are responsible for the outrage,” Atvar pointed out. “If we knew that, punishment would be swift and certain.”
“You told the Big Uglies that, if you could not find out which of their ridiculous groupings committed this crime, you would punish them all,” Reffet reminded him. “I have yet to see you do this, however eagerly I await it.”
“The Tosevites’ groupings would be more ridiculous were they not armed with nuclear weapons and poison gas,” Atvar said.
“Your warning will be more ridiculous if you issue it and then fail to carry it out,” Reffet retorted.
That was true; Atvar knew as much, and the knowledge pained him. “Much of the blame for this disaster is mine,” he said. “We have been at peace-or at an approximation of peace-with the leading Tosevite not-empires for too long. We examine what they do less minutely than we did in the days just after the fighting ended-and they are better able to conceal what they do, too. So many of their satellites were shifting orbit lately, we still cannot determine which not-empire activated one of its machines. For that matter, the machine might have been disguised as something other than what it was, and lain quietly in wait for a moment of opportunity-a moment of treachery.”
“That is why you said you would punish them all,” Reffet said.
“It is also why they all said they would consider punishment for deeds I could not prove they committed an act of war,” Atvar answered unhappily. “Big Uglies enjoy fighting to a degree we have trouble understanding. They are always fighting among themselves. I believe they would fight us.”
“I believe they are bluffing,” Reffet said. With his lack of experience with Tosevites, that was not helpful. His next comment was: “And one group of them is bound to be lying.”
“But which?” Atvar asked. “Mass punishment is something they would be more likely to use than we. We care more for justice.”
“Where is the justice for my colonists?” Reffet asked. “Where is the justice in making a threat and then forgetting it?”
“I was hasty,” Atvar said. “In my haste, I may have behaved like a Big Ugly-the Tosevites are hasty by nature.”
“This world has corrupted you,” Reffet said in the tones of a judge passing sentence. “Instead of the Tosevites’ becoming more like proper subjects of the Emperor, you act like a Big Ugly.”
“This world will change the colonists, too,” Atvar said, admitting most of Reffet’s charge without acknowledging the word corrupted. “If you think it will not, you live in a ginger-taster’s dream.”
Perhaps he should not have mentioned ginger. With a fine mocking waggle of the eye turrets, Reffet said, “One more delight Tosev 3 has produced. I tell you this, Atvar”-alone among males and females of the Race on Tosev 3, he addressed Atvar as an equal-“if you do not keep your promise to punish the Big Uglies, I shall report you to the Emperor.”
Fury and scorn ripped through Atvar. “Go ahead, Reffet,” he hissed, using the other fleetlord’s name with savage relish. “By the time your grumbling reaches him, and by the time he composes a reply and it gets back to us, as many years will have gone by as passed between your departure from Home and your arrival here. Have you forgotten where you are? For better or worse, we are the males on the spot. Whatever answers the Race finds for Tosev 3, we are the ones who will have to find them.”
Reffet looked as if he hated Atvar, hated Tosev 3, hated everything except the idea of tucking down his tailstump and fleeing back Home. He had probably been ready to refer any hard problems he found to bureaucrats back on Home, confident conditions would not have changed much while light sped from Tosev to Home and back again. Slow change, incremental change, was the hallmark of life in the Empire.
Atvar’s mouth fell open in a bitter laugh. Incessant, maddening change was the hallmark of life on Tosev 3. If Reffet couldn’t figure that out, couldn’t adapt to it as
Atvar had had to adapt… too bad, Atvar thought. “Out,” he said aloud, and broke his connection with the other fleetlord.
Ttomalss looked on his summons from the fleetlord of the colonization fleet as an honor he could have done without. Not only did it take him away from his work, it also involved him in high-level controversies that might end up causing him trouble later. But Reffet had not asked his opinion: Reffet was a male new-come from Home, not a snoutcounting Big Ugly. Reffet had simply summoned him. What choice had he but to obey?
None, he thought as he folded himself into the posture of respect and said, “How may I serve you, Exalted Fleetlord?”
“Computer searches and a conversation with Senior Researcher Felless identify you as the leading expert from the conquest fleet on the natives of this chilly ball of mud,” Reffet said. “I presume this is accurate?”
