"Are we sure that we need to approach this so ... confrontationally?" asked Senator Pimir Wat. He pointed timidly at the sparkling line that represented a transport impost, as if it were a downed power line he'd discovered on his front stoop, buzzing and deadly with high voltage. Senator Oxham had cut back on her dosage of apathy in the last hour, tuning her sensitivity for this meeting. She felt Wat's nerves filling the room like static electricity, coruscating with every sudden movement or sharp word. Oxham knew this particular species of anxiety well; it was the particular paranoia of professional politicians. The legislation before them was, in fact, intended to induce exactly such an emotion, an anxiety that made politicians fragile, malleable.
"Perhaps we could express our concerns in a more symbolic way," Senator Verin suggested. "Reveal all that Senator Oxham has so vigilantly uncovered, and open the subject to debate."
"And give the Risen Father a chance to respond," Senator Wat added.
Oxham turned to face Wat, fixing him with the uncanny blue of her Vasthold eyes. "The Risen Father didn't offer us a symbolic gesture," she said. "We haven't been informed, consulted, or even forewarned. Our Empire has simply been moved toward war, our constituents put in harm's way while His military engages in this adventure."
At these last words, she looked at the third parliamentarian in the room. Senator An Mare, whose stridently Secularist homeworld lay in the midst of the Spinward Reaches and at the high water mark of the Rix Incursion, had helped draft the measure. The most lucrative exports of Mare's world had, of course, been exempted from Oxham's legislation.
"Yes, the people have been put in harm's way," Senator Mare said, in her eyes the distant look of someone listening to secondary audio. "And in a fashion that seems deliberately clandestine on the Emperor's part." Mare cocked her head, and her eyes grew sharp. "So I must disagree with the Honorable Verin when he proposes a symbolic gesture, a mere statement of intent. An unnecessary step, I think. All legislation is symbolic--rhetoric and signifiers, subjunction and intention--until voted upon, at least." Oxham felt the tension go out of the room. This legislation can't really succeed, Wat and Verin were thinking with relief. It was a gauntlet thrown, a bluff, a signal flare for the rest of the Senate. The measure was sculpted precisely to mirror the Emperor's will, to reveal it in reverse, like a plaster cast. Oxham could have given a long speech listing the details that Niles had found, evidence of imperial intentions, but it would have gone unheard and unnoticed. Pending legislation with major party backing, however, was always carefully scrutinized. Oxham had long ago discovered that a truth cleverly hidden was quicker believed than one simply read into the record.
"True," said Wat. "This bill will send a signal."
Verin nodded his head. "A clarion call!"
Although she and Senator Mare had planned their exchange for exactly this effect, Oxham found herself a little annoyed at the other Senators' quick surrender. With a few modifications, she thought, the bill might pass. But Oxham was one of the youngest members of the Senate; and, of course, she was the Mad Senator. Her party's leaders sometimes underestimated her.
"So I have your backing?" she asked.
The three old solons glanced among themselves, possibly conversing on some private channel, or perhaps they merely knew each other very well. In any case, Oxham's heightened empathy registered the exact moment when agreement came, settling around her mind like a cool layer of mist onto the skin.
It was Senator Mare who nodded, reaching for the silver proposal cup and putting it to her lips. She passed it to Wat, her upper lip stained red by the nanos now greedily sequencing her DNA, mapping the shape of her teeth, listening to her voice before sending a verification code to the Senate's sergeant-at-arms AI. The machine was exquisitely paranoid. It was fast, though. Seconds after Verin had finished off the liquid in the cup, Oxham's legislation flickered for a moment and re-formed in the Secularist caucus airscreen.
Now the measure was rendered in the cooler, more dignified colors of pending law. It was a beautiful thing to behold.
Five minutes later, as Nara Oxham walked down one of the wide, senators-only corridors of the Secularist wing, enjoying the wash of politics and power in her ears and the chemicals of victory in her bloodstream, the summons came.
The Risen Emperor, Ruler of the Eighty Worlds, requested the presence of Senator Nara Oxham. With due respect, but without delay.
COMPOUND MIND
Alexander did what it could to forestall the invaders.
Legis XV's arsenal had been locked out from the compound mind, of course. No Imperial installation this close to the Rix would rely on the planetary infostructure to control its weaponry. Physical keys and panic shunts were in place to keep Alexander from using the capital's ground-to-space weapons against the Lynx or its landing craft. But Alexander could still play a role in the battle.
It moved through the palace, seeing through the eyes of security cameras, listening through the motion-detection system, following the progress of the Imperial troops as they stormed the council chamber. Alexander spoke through intercoms to the two Rix commandos left alive after the initial assault, sharing its intelligence, guiding them to harry the rescue effort.
But by now, this last stand was merely a game. The lives of the hostages were no longer important to Alexander. The rescue had come too late; it would be impossible for the Imperials to dislodge the compound mind from Legis XV without destroying the planet's infostructure.
The Rix had won.
Alexander noted the local militia flooding into the palace to reinforce the Imperials. The surviving commandos would soon be outnumbered hundreds to one. But the compound mind saw a narrow escape route. It sent its orders, using one of the commandos in a diversion, and carefully moving to disengage the other.
Alexander was secure, could no more be removed from Legis's infostructure than the oxygen from its biosphere, but the Imperials would not give up easily. Perhaps a lone soldier under its direct command would prove a useful asset later in this contest.
DOCTOR
Dr. Vecher felt hands clearing the goo from his eyes.
He coughed again, another oyster-sized, salty remnant of the stuff sputtering into his mouth. He spat it out, ran his tongue across his teeth. Foul slivers squirmed in the mass of green covering the floor below him.
He looked up, gasping, at whoever held his head.