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Two aspects of the scalar representative council government that carried
over from the advisory-administrative model were the main leaders of all the
councils combined. If your community were to join the federation, these two
would be at the tippy top. The Moderator and Facilitator weren’t
policy-makers per se, but they did make sure that everyone was on the same
page about the policies. Having democracy didn’t mean that everyone was on
the same level. It was prudent to have people who managed and directed the
conversations. They were never meant to be unilateral nor tyrannical,
though, hence the titles.
Facilitator Abascal walked into Dreychan and Yunil’s shared office after
they unlocked the door from Dreychan’s desk. Yunil was sitting on his lap.
They weren’t doing anything untoward, but they should probably be more
professional. They were just tired, and ready to be done working. That was
the point anyway. She climbed off of him and stood at his side. He stayed
seated. “Amazine, how the hell are ya?” he asked.
Amazine reportedly lived on Castlebourne for years before anyone
pointed out that the name she chose for herself simply sounded like the word
amazing. She felt so embarrassed, but she didn’t want to change it,
because it felt right to her. Like so many others, she had spent most of her
life as nothing but a number. In the end, it was a decent name. It sounded
nice on its own, and it made her unique, which was an unheard of
characteristic in the Goldilocks Corridor. “We need to talk about Vip.” Vip
was Amazine’s direct superior. Now, Vip...Vip chose his name quite
deliberately. It was a mononym, and it stood for
very important person. He would deny this if you were to ask him
about it, but he came here with a complex, just like Maaseiah, though maybe
to a lesser degree. Then again, Maaseiah was still in prison, and Vip was
the Moderator of the Castlebourne government, so who had the highest
aspirations here? He wasn’t evil, as far as they knew, but Azad called him a
populist candidate, which Dreychan still didn’t understand, but he was told
it wasn’t a compliment.
“Are you suggesting that I remove Vip from his position, and replace him
with someone else?” Dreychan asked, absolutely knowing that this was not at
all what she would suggest to him.
“Wull...no, of course not. We’re not there yet, but—” Amazine began.
“I’m gonna stop you right there,” Dreychan said, holding his hand up. “My
job as Superintendent is not to settle your internal disagreements.
My job ought to be done.”
“Our job,” Yunil corrected.
“Right,” Dreychan agreed. “Our job was to start the
government. It’s supposed to be able to run itself. My position is a
failsafe against tyranny, but if all goes according to plan, I should be
able to sit on a beach in Polar Tropica, and not worry about anything
anymore. That’s how our Earthan ancestors designed the system, and it is a
characteristic that we have chosen to maintain.”
“I understand that, I just...”
“You mostly wanna vent,” Yunil guessed.
“Yes,” Amazine admitted. “You may not technically be above me in the org
chart, but you’re certainly not below me. Everyone else is. I don’t
have anyone to talk to about his bullshit, or I’ll appear weak and unfit for
office. I just thought..maybe you would have some ideas. I know it’s not
your obligation, but maybe you could save beach day for tomorrow?” A look of
horror spread across her face. “Oh my God, that was so rude. I am
terribly sorry, I was out of line.”
“It’s all right,” Dreychan said to her calmly. “I’m not offended. And you’re
right, there’s no need for us to be lazy. Maybe we should be
available to people who need our guidance. The problem is...”
“That’s not really where his strength lies,” Yunil explained. “I, on the
other hand, give great advice.” She glided around the desk, reaching out
towards Amazine. Once they made contact, she wrapped her arm around her
shoulders, and started leading her back towards the door. “Let’s go off
somewhere to talk. Have you ever heard of Christmas?”
“No,” Amazine replied.
“Oh, it’s this delightful little Earthan tradition. We can have a cup of hot
cocoa in Holidome. Have you ever heard of hot cocoa?” Yunil asked her.
“No,” Amazine repeated.
“You are going to love it.”
Dreychan stayed in his office, glad that Yunil stepped up for this one. His
sense of relief didn’t last long before Moderator Vip showed up.
Vip was just as annoyed at Amazine as she was at him. “She is undermining me
at every turn. She’s talking to Dominus Petit behind my back, ya know. I was
this close to convincing him that I need to be in charge of the
military, but she screwed it up, saying all this nonsense about peace, and
the..middle way. I don’t know what the hell she’s talking about.”
“Why would you be in charge of the military?” Dreychan questioned.
Vip flinched like it was obvious. “I’ve been studying Earth history. The
most powerful country was called The United States, and their leader
was the Commander in Chief. He ran the civilian government and the military
at the same time. It just makes sense.”
“That was a democratic republic,” Dreychan argued. “That’s a completely
different model. You’re here to moderate, that’s why you’re called that. And
besides, the military isn’t an ex-Exin contingency. It’s managed by the
Executive Administrative Authority. They’re not going to give you anything.
I’ve known Azad for almost a year now. He and his superior officer aren’t
going to give it up, to you, or anyone.”
Vip shook his head. “The Governor. That guy’s even softer than Petit. I’ll
tell you what, you should superintendent his ass out of here.”
“That’s not my purview,” Dreychan said. It wasn’t the first time he had to
explain what his job was to this guy. Dreychan would not have picked him for
this role, but there were two sides to Vip. He was charismatic and
well-spoken to the public. In private, he was temperamental, contrary, and
sometimes downright dumb. Dreychan and Yunil could have designed the
government so that they could move members around with impunity, but that
wouldn’t have been very democratic. They bowed to what the people wanted,
and the people wanted Vip. That was why it was so important that they
maintain the council federation structure, so he wouldn’t have any actual
power. In that way, they were a lot alike.
“Whatever,” Vip mumbled.
Dreychan sighed. “Vip, why do you want control over the military? What would
you do with that?”
“I would protect our home from the Exin threat.”
“Defensively or offensively?” Dreychan pushed.
“The first one, obviously. Wait, which is the one where we go out and murder
as many of our enemies as possible?” He feigned an evil grin. He did have
some sense of humor, albeit a rather dark one, so at least that was one
redeeming quality. “I don’t know what I did to make you all think that I’m
some power-hungry moron bent on destruction. But you have largely stayed out
of the military’s dealings. I’ve been paying attention, and I see the
issues. Drey, they’re not doing anything. They’re barely training, they’re
relying far too much on their robots. Have you seen them? Each soldier has
this whole compliment of bots that follow them around. They have this
animal-like one at their side that carries all of their gear. I think Azad
said it looked like a dorg, or a duck, or something, I dunno. Then they have
their hawk, which flies above to look out for future obstacles. And then
there’s this flutterby thing that—I don’t know what it does, but it’s
small enough to fit in my hand, so it can’t possibly help.”
“What the hell is your point?” Dreychan asked.
Vip sighed. “They need someone to lead them...inspire them. Governor
Whinawray is not up to the task. The way I hear it, he just sort of fell
into the role because he happened to be on the planet when the Charter
Contingency was born. I strongly believe that we need to grow our numbers,
and what, are they gonna promote him to Ligament or higher? I don’t
think he can handle it. I don’t think he wants it.”
Dreychan slammed the side of both fists on the table.
“Oh, no, I’ve said something else that you don’t like,” Vip quipped.
Dreychan tapped on his desktop device, and pulled up what he needed. He spun
his monitor around to show Vip the resignation form.
“I don’t wanna quit.”
“Well, you don’t wanna be here, doing this. A Moderator needs to be
non-violent by nature. He shouldn’t be looking to grow an army, or train its
officers. He shouldn’t be disparaging his colleagues’ names, or complaining
that soldiers are safer and better equipped than they have ever been because
of their bot pack. And the flutterby, by the way, is for stealth recon. It’s
that lack of attention to detail that tells me that you really
shouldn’t be responsible for our military, and you probably shouldn’t
be the Moderator either. So go ahead, go on, resign. I’ll find someone who
wants to do it. The planet will be fine without you. And hey, if you’re
really serious about aidsmanship, there’s nothing stopping you from signing
up. But you won’t be starting at the top, like you think. Whinawray didn’t
start where he is today, and neither did Petit. They’ve been at this for
literal centuries. So you’ll train first. Maybe spend a year in Mêléedome.
Or two. Or a few decades. I don’t care where you go, or if you quit at all.
Just for now, get the hell out of my office. I need to focus on garnering
support for the next vote on the stellar engine.”
Vip was trying to hold it together. “Ya know, I voted against that.”
“I know.”
“I didn’t campaign for the opposition—I was a good soldier—but I voted with
my heart. I think we should stay here and fight.”
“And if it were just us here, I might agree with you,” Dreychan admitted,
“but the visitors outnumber us almost 230:1 at last count. A million new
visitors are arriving every week. Unfortunately for them, they are not
capable of voting, so it is up to us to ensure their safety. We do
that by running and hiding, not by subjecting innocent people to
our problems.”
“Why didn’t you say all of this before?” Vip questioned.
“Because we underestimated the opposition. We won’t make that mistake
again.”
Vip’s face changed, but it was impossible to tell what he was thinking. He
seemed to be absorbing the information, and processing it in some way. “Let
me help.”
“You voted against it.”
“You’ve changed my mind.”
“Just like that?”
“You’re very persuasive,” Vip explains. “You should have been more involved
in the discussions. You underestimate yourself, but people listen to you.
They want to hear your opinion.” He looked around at the office. “Don’t just
hide out here. You decide what your job entails. Tell me how I can help.”
Dreychan sighed and glanced over at his inbox. Still no messages. Well, he
had a ton of messages, but not the one he was looking for. “The
primary voice of dissent. I messaged him yesterday, and he still hasn’t
responded. He seems to like you, so maybe you can talk to him.”
“Well, where is he?”
“I don’t know.”
“Check the tracking system.”
Dreychan didn’t budge.
“We all know you have access to that. The prison is allowed visitors. People
talk, especially members of the Old Council of Old Worlds. Just look him up,
and point me to him. I make no guarantees, but I will give it my best.”
Dreychan sighed again and checked the tracker. Once he saw where the guy
was, he leaned back in his chair and tapped on his lips.
“What is it?” Vip asked. “If you feel uncomfortable with telling me, that’s
fine, or if you feel guilty about using this tool in the first place, that’s
okay too. I’ll just send him my own message, and see if he responds to me
instead.”
“It’s not that, it’s...he’s in XDome.” XDome is probably the most
controversial one of all. Azad hinted that Hrockas agonized over whether to
include it way back in the day. In the end, he approved the idea when the AI
he placed in charge of coming up with most of the dome concepts produced its
master list. The truth was that sex was a part of life, and a necessary one,
though technically no longer a required activity in a galaxy of gene
splicing and artificial gestation. Still, it was a primary human motivation,
hard-coded into most organic people’s DNA. Even the most enhanced of
transhumans typically kept that trait, because life without pleasure was
just survival. Ignoring it as a fundamental component of happiness wasn’t
going to make it go away. People were going to have sex, and those who
couldn’t find anyone to do it with them—or who couldn’t find their ideal
partner—were going to do it with synthetics. At least, by creating a central
hub for all sexual fantasies, it kept it fairly isolated and contained. It
was easier to keep it out of reach of children and asexual individuals when
there was one best place to get it above all, and access to that place was
easily controlled.
“Yeah, I’m not surprised. You’ll notice he hasn’t joined the military
either. He doesn’t want to fight, he just wants someone else to do it for
him. Do you know where he’s from?”
“Slain?” Dreychan asked rhetorically. “I don’t actually.”
“You didn’t know him?”
“Huh?”
“On Ex-777?”
Oh. Dreychan’s face went numb. “Oh. That explains it.”
“That explains it,” Vip echoed
Dreychan didn’t keep up with the refugee manifests. It would be too many
people to keep track of anyway, but as far as he knew, he was still the only
former 777er. So if Slain was also from there, he must have come to
Castlebourne really, really recently. Why were people listening to him? Why
were people following his lead when only a year ago, Dreychan was quite
nearly murdered for being from the same Old World?
“I bet I know what you’re thinking,” Vip began. “My hypothesis is that it’s
your fault. People hated you because you were from a luxury world, but you
proved them wrong. You proved your worth. I think they’re overcompensating
in their heads, and deciding that maybe ex-Ex-777ers are the best amongst
us. That is why you need to make your voice heard, and not just play in the
background. People need to know that it’s not because of where you’re from,
but despite it. They need to hear a voice of reason.”
Dreychan leaned back again, and tried to rethink the strategy. Maybe they
were going about this all wrong. The reason the so-called opposition won out
was because, as Vip was just saying, the voice of reason wasn’t strong
enough. He had thought it made sense to try to convince Slain to change his
mind, and do the right thing, but Ex-777ers were not known for their
open-mindedness. And honestly, Dreychan didn’t want the rest of the refugees
to start seeing 777 as some kind of hot bed for the intellectually
enlightened. It was full of entitled assholes who didn’t understand the
danger of war and struggle because they had never faced it before. They were
living in a post-scarcity civilization before anyone on Earth had even
dreamed it up. “Scratch that. I don’t need to talk to him. We need to talk
against him. You’re smarter than I give you credit for.”
“I am?” Vip asked. “I mean, I am.”
Dreychan laughed. “The first rule of warfare: the bigger the gun, the more
compelling your argument is.”
“Okay...” Vip didn’t know what he meant by that.
Dreychan stood up. “So let’s go recruit some bigger guns.”
