Dirge - Alan Dean Foster [94]
“Me, I think we should put every weapon we can find on every ship that can be mustered and blow them out of existence all the way back to their beloved bastard Dominion, and then seed both their precious Twin Worlds with radioactive dust that has a nice, long half-life. How about it? Why don’t you put the question to a couple of their local representatives? Gauge their reaction. They’ll lie, of course. Fluently. They’re doubtless convinced they obliterated any evidence of their treachery. Which they did—except for me.” The bluster and bravado abruptly leaked out of him like the air from a balloon subject to deep-sea pressures. His voice became small and frightened, as if two distinct personalities were fighting for space in the same body.
“They don’t know about me, do they? They don’t know I’m here…?”
“Easy,” Tse told him, leaning closer and stroking his arm with her fingers. “Be calm, Alwyn. Nobody knows you’re here.” She looked anxiously over at Chimbu. “Do they?”
The chief physician shook his head. His words spelled confidence. “Only the upper echelon of the hospital staff knows about Mr. Mallory’s origins. Beyond the people presently assembled in this room, there are a handful of government officials who had to be informed.”
Colonel Nadurovina added soothingly, “You would be surprised who knows and who does not, who was deliberately informed and who was kept in the dark. You are safe here, Mr. Mallory. If you look in the hallway you will not see much, if you look out your window you will see less, but it would take vaster weaponry than we believe the Pitar or any other species possesses to reach you.” She smiled, and it did not seem forced or artificial. “At this moment you may very well be, Mr. Mallory, the best-protected individual in this portion of the Orion Arm. The members of the world council are not as well looked after.”
“Then you do believe me.” She might not be in charge, but Nadurovina acted as if she was, so he directed half his attention to her. Whether she was aware of it or not, the rest had been settled on Irene Tse.
“We believe you saw something. We believe that a powerful and inimical sentience is responsible for the eradication of human life on Treetrunk. Whether those two things are one and the same we cannot accept on the word of one man found drifting in space starving, near death, and out of his mind.” This time her smile was wry. “Surely you can appreciate the sensitivity of my position and that of my colleagues who are charged with rendering a decision in this matter.”
“Question the Pitar,” Mallory shot back. “Corner them and press them. Ask them what they might want with human organs and judge their reaction.”
A plump man in civilian clothes who had hitherto been silent now pushed his way forward. “I am Jenju Burriyip. I represent the world council.” His lips curved upward. “Those members who have been informed, anyway. Please tell me, Mr. Mallory, how I am supposed to confront the representatives of what to this point has been a likeable, good-natured species and inquire politely if they might perchance have in an off moment slaughtered six hundred thousand of my fellow beings?”
“How should I know?” the patient snapped curtly. “I’m no diplomat.”
Burriyip nodded solemnly. “That is exactly my point, Mr. Mallory. If, and please bear with me when I say ‘if,’ what you have told us has somehow become confused by your condition, or distorted because you have suffered physically, or has otherwise been altered in your mind, and