Antagonist - Childe Cycle 11 (94 page)

"Doesn't
it
distract
you?"
Bleys
asked.
"If
you
had
someone
driving,
you'd
have
time
to
get
things
done—"

"Did
you
expect
me
to
pull
up
in
the
back
of
a
chauffered
limousine?"
Dahno
said.

"Of
course
not,"
Bleys
said.
Me
was
disturbed
by
an
aggressively sarcastic
tone
he
heard
in
his
brother's
voice—it
was
not
Dahno's usual
manner.

"You
know
conditions
here
much
better
than
I
do,"
Bleys
continued;
"you've
been
here
for
almost
a
year
now,
after
all.
But
I'd
have been
perfectly
happy
to
hire
a
taxi
and
come
to
you,
you
know that."

"I
never
tell
anyone
where
to
find
me." "All
right.
Where
are
we
going?"

"On
a
tour,
of
sorts,"
Dahno
said,
sounding
more
cheerful.
"It'll give
you
some
idea
of
what
I've
been
up
to.
Then
we'll
grab
a
bite to
eat."

"All
right,
brother,"
Bleys
said.
"Show
me."

Twenty
minutes
later
they
pulled
up
across
the
street
from
an ancient
gray-brick
building
in
a
close-in
suburb.
The
top
two
floors contained
apartments,
while
the
ground
floor
was
given
over
to
a few
modest
commercial
establishments,
the
largest
being
a
cafe that
made
a
small
terrace
out
of
the
sidewalk.
Two
doors
down
from the
cafe,
Dahno
pointed
out,
was
a
freshly
painted
storefront
that appeared
to
be
the
office
of
some
sort
of
political
movement.

"The
signs
in
the
window
give
the
name
of
the
organization
sponsoring
this
office,"
Dahno
said.
"In
several
languages—this
planet seems
to
cling
to
those
old
languages.
It's
one
of
those
generic
names that
become
anonymous
when
you
take
your
eyes
off
it.
But
it's headquarters
for
a
few
idealistic
volunteers
who
make
phone
calls, put
out
press
releases
and
walk
the
streets
handing
out
leaflets
and talking
to
people."

"What
do
they
say?"

"So
far
it's
totally
innocuous,"
Dahno
said.
"With
variations
from place
to
place,
we're
basically
taking
the
side
of
the
underdogs
in actual,
ongoing
local
controversies.
We're
establishing
our
credentials
as
idealists,
against
the
day
we
can
credibly
protest
that
the Younger
Worlds
are
getting
treated
badly
by
Earth."

Bleys
thought
about
asking
his
brother
if
that
was
all
there
was
to the
effort,
but
decided
not
to
push
a
confrontation
just
yet.
Dahno, seeming
to
sense
what
his
brother
was
thinking,
spoke
up
again.

"All
we
want
at
this
point,"
he
said,
sounding
almost
defensive,
"is to
prepare
to
ramp
up
to
a
'hands
off
the
Younger
Worlds'
message."

"When
will
that
happen?"

"Not
before
we
need
it,"
Dahno
said.
"We
need
something
specific,
and
controversial,
to
point
to;
so
we're
waiting
for
the
right moment."

"Can
I
assume
there're
more
than
just
this
one
office?"

"Oh,
absolutely!"
Dahno
almost
crowed.
Bleys
was
beginning
to find
the
rapid
changes
in
his
brother's
mood
disconcerting.
"We've got
seven
offices
like
this
one
scattered
about
Europe,
and
similar— although
apparently
independent—organizations
are
doing
the
same kind
of
public
relations
on
every
continent.
But
this
is
only
the
most obvious
aspect
of
the
work
we're
doing."

He
paused,
turning
to
watch
over
his
shoulder
for
an
opportunity to
pull
out
into
the
traffic
rushing
by.

"This
was
just
about
the
hardest
thing
to
get
used
to,"
he
said offhandedly.
"About
being
on
Earth,
I
mean.
The
traffic
here
is
almost
always
a
constant
stream."

"The
Younger
Worlds,
and
particularly
Association
and
Harmony, have
never
been
able
to
afford
a
lot
of
traffic,"
Bleys
said.
"I
see what
you
mean."

He
tucked
that
idea
into
the
back
of
his
head,
thinking
it
might be
useful
one
day.

"We're
heading
back
to
the
center
of
the
old
city,"
Dahno
said, swinging
smoothly
around
the
next
corner
and
slipping
into
a
slot
in the
flow
of
a
more
major
street.
"I
won't
be
able
to
show
you
much
on a
drive-by,
but
we've
got
two
more
sophisticated
operations
working out
of
modern
offices
there.
These
are
newer
than
the
kind
of
storefront
operation
you
just
saw,
and
so
far
they
haven't
done
much."

"What
will
they
do,
when
they
get
up
to
speed?"

"What
we're
already
starting
to
do,"
Dahno
said,
emphasizing his
point
with
the
tone
of
his
voice,
"is
look
for
weaknesses
in Earth's
leadership
structure—"
Bleys
noted
that
Dahno
now
spoke of
the
planet
simply
as
Earth,
rather
than
as
Old
Earth,
in
the Younger
Worlds
way.
"—anything
we
can
expose
to
the
media
as corruption."

"Again,
giving
your
people
credibility,"
Bleys
said. "Yes.
Of
course,
all
our
organizations
claim
to
be
independent, and
to
be
motivated
only
by
an
interest
in
the
public
good."

"And
of
course
they
really
can't
be
connected
to
any
Old
Earth political
group,"
Bleys
said.
"I
see."

"Well,
that's
true,"
Dahno
said,
a
note
of
caution
in
his
voice. "The
problem
is,
I
can't
have
the
Others
you
gave
me
noticeably involved
with
these
organizations—it
would
be
bad
if
someone
noticed
offworlders
getting
into
Earth
politics.
So
we've
had
to
recruit locals
to
handle
everything
but
the
most
hidden
parts
of
our agenda."

"What're
you
doing
with
our
Others,
then?"

"That
depends
on
their
skills,"
Dahno
said.
"Some
are
handling the
details
of
administering
the
organization,
others
are
out
fund-raising.
The
smoothest
are
mingling
with
powerful
people,
making friends—and
a
few,
the
best
speakers,
have
been
getting
involved in
anything
that'll
give
them
a
chance
to
make
speeches
...
mostly religious
bodies,
although
those
seem
to
be
harder
to
rise
in
than we're
used
to
seeing
on
Association."

"Oh,"
said
Bleys,
returning
to
the
previous
subject,
"I
believe
I see
what
you
were
starting
to
say:
while
your
organizations
can't
be connected
to
any
Old
Earth
political
faction,
some
of
your
'volunteers'
can
be."

"They're
not
with
any
other
faction,
now,
''
Dahno
said.
"But with
only
a
few
exceptions,
the
kind
of
people
willing
to
do
the
jobs my
'public
interest'
groups
take
on
turn
out
to
be
just
the
people who
were
already
involved
in
local
politics,
in
some
form
or
another."

"So
you
have
to
make
sure,
when
you
recruit
them,
not
only
that they're
no
longer
working
for
someone
else—but
that
their
past
history
contains
nothing
that
might
come
back
to
haunt
us."

"Right,"
said
Dahno.
"We
don't
want
to
find
ourselves
tarred with
somebody
else's
brush."

It
took
Bleys
a
moment
to
figure
out
the
meaning
of
the
figure
of speech
his
brother
had
just
used;
but
he
thought,
finally,
he
understood.
His
brother
was
apparently
taking
on
Old
Earth
customs quickly.