Part 28 (1/2)
”But it's not only future members of the Prime Committee that we have to worry about.
Because while we al molder in the dust and our children's children's children play their political games, the water in those casks continues to struggle towards freedom. It wants to flow to freedom, remember? And so every year, despite your most careful stewards.h.i.+p, precious droplets evaporate into the air and back to the common wel of knowledge. Every year, the enemies of the state work to steal that magic draft away from you. Enterprising programmers work to re-create and reverse engineer that wel of information. Al it takes is a single misstep, a single misplaced al egiance, and those barrels of information wil come cras.h.i.+ng to the floor and spil into the lowest sewer.
”That is what the world wants. And if I have learned one thing in my long and il ustrious career, it is that you cannot stop the wants of the world.
”Let me put the clever metaphors and the verbal puffery aside for a moment and state plainly what should be obvious by now. The government wil eventual y lose control of MultiReal. You cannot keep it secret forever.”
Solemn, unblinking eyes regarded the neural programmer from around the chamber. Not a sound could be heard from the crowd. Jara looked at the rest of the fiefcorpers to find them nodding gravely, snared deep in thought. Robby Robby was studying Vigal's every movement like a dance master critiquing an especial y intricate bal et.
Serr Vigal clasped his hands behind his back and walked a slow, steady track around the floor. ”Now let's look at another alternative,” he said. ”Let us imagine that after long and careful deliberation, the Prime Committee decides that the draft is not to be bottled up.
”No, I'm not suggesting we immediately pipe MultiReal code into the public trough for anyone to gulp down. I suggest something much more practical. I suggest the Committee cal an end to the vendetta that the Defense and Wel ness Council has executed against Natch and his apprentices. Restore this fiefcorp master to his fiefcorp. Let the Surina/Natch MultiReal Fiefcorp-and the Patel Brothers Fiefcorp as wel , natural y-let them continue to refine their distinctive brews of MultiReal and sel them to the public. With a healthy amount of safeguards and government oversight, of course.
”What would happen in that scenario?
”We don't need a crystal bal to see that. Let me tel you what is happening right now, even as this hearing proceeds in Melbourne. At this very moment, tens of thousands of L-PRACG politicians are sitting in meeting hal s, locked in heated debate. Governmentalists and libertarians and every flavor in between are furiously writing bil s. Speaker Frejohr's office informs me that four hundred L-PRACGs have already banned their citizens from using MultiReal. The Islanders have been preparing a Dogmatic Opposition to the technology for weeks now.
”And perfection sustain them al for doing so! What did the great Sheldon Surina say?
Progress is the expansion of choices. If the bottle of knowledge pa.s.ses your way and you choose not to drink, so be it. That is your right and your privilege as a citizen of a modern, rational civilization. n.o.body wishes to force this knowledge on you.
”So, as with any new technology, we have the doubters and the slow adopters. Some wil choose to sit back and sip this new brew cautiously until it finds its way into the mainstream. Undoubtedly some wil engorge themselves until they're sick, causing trouble for themselves and everyone around them.
”And some? I wil not lie to you. A sul en few wil choose to poison the wel for everyone else. They'l use this intoxicating draft to further their selfish schemes, to break the law, to take advantage of others. This has been the way of human nature since the beginning, and we cannot pretend that it wil change overnight.
”So how do we deal with such scofflaws? Why, the same way we've always dealt with them. By punis.h.i.+ng the guilty. By protecting the innocent. By using the laws of the Congress, the Committee, and the L-PRACGs as our s.h.i.+elds, and the officers of the Council as our swords.
”Distinguished members of the Prime Committee, let me conclude by saying this.
”The democratization of MultiReal is not something you should consider because the libertarians believe in it, or the governmentalists don't. Do not believe the chatter that this is a question of politics or a clash of personalities. Len Borda's desires are irrelevant. Natch's desires are irrelevant. You should al ow private businesses to sel MultiReal to the public because that's what the world desires.
”MultiReal wil flow freely, whether you wish it or not. That decision is not yours to make. What you have to decide is whether to swim against the tide or to take the more practical approach and work with it.
”I thank you, and may you al move towards perfection.”
32.
Serr Vigal stayed on the floor of the auditorium to answer the Prime Committee's questions for almost two hours, but Jara found it difficult to concentrate. The neural programmer's speech had jolted the fiefcorp from its stupor of pessimism and given them a faint taste of hope. By the grins on their faces, Khann Frejohr and his libertarian cronies tasted it too. The city that had seemed like a bloodthirsty circus this morning suddenly felt like a place of rational discourse and negotiation; in short, like a center of government.
”Ridglee's gloating,” said a jubilant Horvil to the rest of the fiefcorpers over ConfidentialWhisper. ”Who would have thought that the greatest surge of momentum the libertarian movement has seen in years would come from a soft-spoken code pusher from the memecor ps?”
Robby Robby was taming stray tufts of perm with his fingernails. ”What'd I tel ya, Queen Jara?”
”You're right,” 'Whispered Jara. ”You did tel me. I just didn't believe Vigal had it in him.”
She looked down at the neural programmer with new respect.
He was responding to a diatribe by the Vault representative with reserve and polish.
”Wel , don't start celebrating just yet,” said Benyamin. ”Vertiginous is stil pretty sour about our chances. Serr Vigal pitted the soft sentimentality of freedom' against the hard-edged realities of safety and security. I think the libertarians wil find soon enough that the Blade is more than capable of slicing through those arguments. ”
Merri: ”Anybody catch Natch's reaction?”
There was a glum silence as the fiefcorpers took turns glancing at the entrepreneur, who appeared not to have moved or even blinked in the last hour.
He might have been a marionette propped up in his chair, eyes fixed on nowhere and nothing.
”Wel , we have one thing to be thankful for,” said Horvil a little while later as the company arose as one to stretch. The Prime Committee had just thanked Serr Vigal for his testimony and adjourned the hearing for the day.
”What's that?” said Jara.
”We're not going to get any more grief from those MultiReal exposition lottery winners.
Captain Bolbund's just been arrested. Practicing law without a license.”
After observing the change of the guard at the Defense and Wel ness Council's Melbourne complex, after annotating the transcript of Serr Vigal's remarks to the Prime Committee, after examining and reexamining the black code in his dart-rifle, after scouring through the voluminous doc.u.ment that was the Council's budget for the new year, Magan Kai Lee final y admitted he had nothing to do.
He looked around the office-his home base in Melbourne-where he had chosen to while away the evening hours. It was a cramped s.p.a.ce, an il advised and hastily constructed part.i.tion of an executive office meant for three. Moreover, the prospects for expansion were grim, considering there was no col apsible infrastructure here and you had to actual y find people to move furniture.
Rearranging stone wal s was out of the question.
And yet Magan much preferred this office to his more commodious quarters at Defense and Wel ness Council Root. In Len Borda's fortress, you never knew precisely where you would find yourself when you stepped outside the door; things moved, wal s moved, people moved. But here in Melbourne, geography was firm and unyielding. Stable. You could plan where you were going and expect that plan to stick.
Magan turned his attention back to the budget doc.u.ment stil floating on the window. It was the perfect example of the Bordaesque worldview, a labyrinth of ambiguously worded codicils and provisos, unnavigable to al but the initiated, designed to s.h.i.+ft at a moment's notice.
But the Prime Committee's attentions were focused on the MultiReal situation at the moment. So the budget had sailed through al the requisite subcommittees, and no one at the Congress of L-PRACGs had given it much scrutiny either. Thus the high executive's budget would go into effect without delay, as Borda had predicted, and the escalation of troops and materiel on the border of the Islander territories would continue unnoticed, as Borda had predicted. Even if someone wanted to object at this point, it was too late. Tomorrow was already January 15, the first calendar day of the new year's budget. Credits would start flowing to the designated Council Vault accounts in just over an hour.
Lieutenant Executive Lee waved his hand and blanked out the window display. An empty stone courtyard embossed with a giant yel ow star stared back at him.
January I give you until the fifteenth of January to take possession of MultiReal, Borda had told him, standing in that accursed naval SeeNaRee of his. If you do, we have an agreement. If you don't ...
With al that had happened in the interim-the infoquakes, the protests, the death of Margaret Surina, Natch's change of fortunewould Len Borda insist on holding to this arrangement? Would he take such a narrow-minded interpretation of their agreement even now, when the Council was a mere handful of votes away from legal control of MultiReal?
And if so, what would he do?
Magan fired off a secure ConfidentialWhisper to Ridgel o. Ridgel o, the dependable.
Ridgel o, the ant.i.thesis of mercurial Borda-ism. ”Double the guard at the Tul Jabbor Complex,” said Magan. ”I need you ready for anything tomorrow.”
The commander responded within seconds, despite the late hour. ”It's done. What should I be antic.i.p.ating?”
”Anything.”
Natch, lying on the mattress of some anonymous Melbourne hotel, slick with sweat, fighting a turbulent battle against sleep with half a dozen invigoration programs as confederates. Grappling with slumber and exhaustion.