The Lotus Eaters

Rome, Province of Italy, Old Earth

Wallenstein had had months to think on the voyage from new Earth to Old. She'd put those months to good use.

"Why are you so convinced that this Carrera person and the petty little fiefdom he occupies have to go, Marguerite?" The SecGen drummed his fingers on the marble inlay of his ornate desk, a thousand year old relic dug out the Vatican's cellars. The finger drumming made her nervous.

Best not to mention the nukes, she thought, since I had a small part in them. Fortunately, I don't have to mention them.

"He upsets things," she answered. "He's an unpredictable factor that is controlled by no one, listens to no one, and can be deterred or bribed by nothing."

"Are you sure he can be bribed by nothing?" the SecGen asked. "Near immortality is no small thing. Would he cooperate with us for that?"

She shook her head in doubt. "From what I can gather he already has the only kinds of immortality that might matter to him, children and a belief in the Christian god. Those, and that he's already going into the history books, if that matters to him. Plus . . . well . . ."

"Go on," the SecGen urged.

"I think he makes us the most useful kind of enemy," Wallenstein answered.

"Please explain."

"As a practical matter, our kind of people never could have taken and held power here on Earth if Terra Nova hadn't been there as both a draw, initially, and a dumping ground, later, for those who would have resisted us. The discovery of the rift and then of the other planet are what changed the political and philosophical make up here on Earth.

"That can't happen there. There is no other rift with a useful planet at the other end—at least none that's ever been found—and so there is no place to send away the kind of people we sent to Terra Nova. Without that kind of demographic change—or engineering, there towards the end—we lose. At least our kind of people lose."

I say 'our kind of people,' Wallenstein thought, but they're really not my kind of people.

"So, in any case, our experience here on Earth is nonanalagous and we need another way."

"Which is?"

"Our natural allies on Terra Nova need to establish their credentials by a series of decisive acts. They're not, mostly, very competent to do those. They can't even do a half decent job of humanitarian intervention, let alone run a war."

"And that's where you come in?" the SecGen asked.

"That's where I come in," she agreed, with a deep nod. "Not that I'm in the same military class as this Carrera; honestly I'm not. But with the Fleet restored, and sufficient other forms of aid to our allies on Terra Nova, I can still stymie him, report his every move, keep him from pulling the kind of clever, sneaky things he's been specializing in for ten years.

"And I'll need to build him up, in the public eye, as a kind of monster. That way, when our people on TN triumph, slay the monster, they will have credibility and to spare."

"Do you so hate this Carrera?" the SecGen asked.

Wallenstein suppressed a slight shiver. "Oh, Your Excellency," she said, "I don't hate him at all."

The SecGen noticed the shiver and raised a single, quizzical eyebrow.