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“Looks like they’re concerned about contamination,” I told the four Morelli, “We’ve been asked to drop you on your planet’s outer moon. Sergeant Mitrisa has inquired about a flight path, but she can’t get a response for at least another two hours thirty.”
At that moment, Ambassador DeelKonosh entered the room, along with Xenologist Tamana. I’m sorry, he sent telepathically to Tessa and the four aliens, Our experience in contact situations leads us to believe that in situations like this, the odds are that your government regards you as an embarrassment to be disposed of. We can offer you two other choices. We can set you down in a thinly inhabited zone of your main planet, or any other colony of yours, or we can take you to a human exile planet, as we don’t permit non-humans within the main part of the Empire, in which case you will at least still have every chance to live out your lives.
“WHAT? They’d simply kill their own people?” Belatedly, I realized it had come out more a shocked scream than anything else.
I kept telling you you didn’t understand, Tamana explained via datalink, Different species have different responses, but the responses of governments, at least governments not aware of M’Don’s Equations, are far more consistent. If they were willing to receive us, they might ask about cross-species diseases, rare as those are. But we had our Morelli guests checked for likely cross contaminants and they haven’t caught anything from the people they’ve been exposed to, and nobody has caught anything from them. Cross-species contamination is uncommon, and we don’t worry about it because of our healers, but most alien species have more limited experience. But if that was their worry, we’d work out a quarantine protocol, and they’d agree to accept our embassy.
If they simply wanted their people back but weren’t willing to accept the embassy, they’d have us bring them to a base somewhere, or make rendezvous with one of their spacecraft, Ambassador DeelKonosh continued, Instead, they’re having us drop the inconvenient survivors away from any other installation, where they can be disposed of with maximum ease.
“Would the Empire do something like that?” I asked, incredulous.
The Ambassador shrugged, sending a private datalink message. I’m not familiar with that ever having been done, but it the situation required it, yes. We’re not altruists. I can’t think of one, as our Viceroys are not subject to the same political constraints as most of those governments we encounter. Political embarrassment is not a threat to us. But our understanding is that the Morelli are governed by a class oligarchy, similar to many Earth nations
Suddenly, I knew the Ambassador was right. Heartbreakingly correct. Political embarrassment was everything. Earth governments – even the alleged democracies – relied upon inconvenient facts being buried. I suddenly understood that was a near universal truth among governments.
“I have to try,” Motafo declared, “I’m an officer of the Community forces. It is my duty to report what I have seen.”
“Can’t report anything if you’re dead, sir.” That was Grido Cosur. Older than the other survivors, his rank was the rough equivalent to a Chief Petty Officer in an Earthly navy. “On the other hand, we’d be hunted the rest of our lives, and none of us here is exactly a rural medisti to survive in situations like that.”
“So what do we do?” Tammo Sajopil wanted to know, “This is the Community. We take care of each other. The commander’s aunt is a Councilor. Wouldn’t she would want to help us?”
“Commander Hashot was a political appointee,” Cosur replied, “What do you think his aunt’s peers would have to say about Hashot getting the ship destroyed?”
“Why would they even look for us if they think we’re dead?” That was Tammo Bojoka, the final survivor of Dominion. Like the other three, he’d been in the ship’s Engineering Department. But he was a finagler, the sort who was always looking for a way that came out a little bit better for him. “What do you think they’re going to do, order another crew that they don’t want to know what happened to come in and shoot us and report the number of bodies?”
Cosur replied, “No, if the human is right, they’ll order them to bomb the spot. A big bomb, to make certain they destroy whatever threat the politicians invent. Big enough to obliterate the evidence.”
“The rest of you could try to disappear,” Motafo suggested, “If the Community does what they said, you can always step forward later.”
None of them were pleading family, mates, or children. The Morelli were a matriarchal society; males such as these four owed taxes and labor to the Community, not to any specific female. Matings were transient, the young were raised by females alone. Males were the workers and laborers, females were administrators and executives, networking their relatives for advantage. Only in the military and a few other ‘dangerous’ professions was there any path for a male into positions of authority, and even there, oversight from females was pervasive. Hashot had been a ship’s commander – but it had been female Councilors who gave him that rank and command of Dominion, not Warleader Jafinto.
“If you’re certain about that, we’ll do our best to insure your survival.” The Ambassador spoke their dominant language at least as well as I did. None of the Morelli had learned more than a few words of Traditional. To be fair, none of them had the advantages of being operant, either.
“That would be appreciated, sir.”
“I’ll ask the ship’s commander to see to it.” The Ambassador left.
“Any ideas how they’re going to keep him alive, frayn?” Cosur was nothing if not practical. A frayn was a childless female.
“Nothing detailed, no. My planet has only been a part of the Empire for a few years. You’re our first non-human close neighbor – I understand the bright star system you call Mamoshin is known to us as ‘Capella’”
“You think they’re going to try and conquer us?” That was Sajopil.
“Understand I’m just a grad student, hired to learn about you. But according to what the Ambassador told me, his job is to prevent having to conquer you.”
“You think we’re just bugs beneath your feet?” Motafo reacted.
“Your Community is more advanced than my own people were, before the arrival of the Empire. We hadn’t even a colony on our own Moon. But according to what we’re told, the Empire is enormous. I don’t really understand it, but those Earth people who do, find the claim credible. Some have visited Imperial worlds. Others have joined the Imperial military. What disputes have arisen about Imperial truthfulness appear to be matters of opinion. They act as if they’ve plenty of experience contacting new civilizations.”
“Why did they want you, but not us?” Motafo demanded.
“I don’t know. They told us we’re the same species, that we’re a lost colony, result of a ship that got lost. They even claim to have found the remains of the ship.”
“So they want you because you’re the same species, but not us because we aren’t?”
“That’s my understanding.”
“So they’re species supremacists?”
“Could be,” I admitted,”But it doesn’t seem right. According to them, there are large numbers of non-human neighbors they coexist with. But they did have to fight an immense war to conquer First Galaxy.” There was no word for ‘galaxy’ yet in the translator, so it rendered the word in the Empire’s Traditional in which I’d spoken. “Supposedly took thousands of years. That’s what they claim anyway.”
“What’s that word? The one you used after ‘first’”
“Galaxy. A large mass of several sixths of stars. This one is shaped like a spiral with several arms.”
“Galaxy,” Motafo supplied the missing word. Tessa duly added the word and its translation to the database. “Wait one heartbeat. Do you mean to tell us The Empire is in more than one galaxy?”
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