Cherryh, C J - Alliance-Union 08 (103 page)

But the Family council would stand with Denys and Giraud, even yet, he thought; and that might be dangerous, psychologically, to Ari's ability to wield authority in future, if she lost the first round.

An appeal to the Bureau opened up the whole Warrick case history. That was what Ari was saying. Opened the case up while people were bombing subways and using Jordan's name, while the Defense election was in doubt, and Ari was too young to handle some of the things that could fall out of that land of struggle—involving her predecessor's murderer.

They might win if it got to Bureau levels—but they might not. The risk was very large, while the gain was—minimal.

"No," he said. "It's not a matter of pills. It's one of the damn slow-dissolving gels, and they'd have the devil's own time getting the stuff cleared out."

"Damn! I should have come there. I
should
have called Council and stopped it—"

"Done is done, that's all. They say what they're giving us is something new; no color fade, no brittle bones. That kind of thing. I
would
like to get the literature on it before I say a final yes or no about a protest over what they've done. If it's everything Dr. Wojkowski claims—it's not worth the trouble even that would cause. If it costs what they say it does—it's not a detriment; because
I
couldn't afford it. I only suspect it has other motives—because I
can't
afford it, and that means they can always withhold it."

Her face showed no shock. None. "They're not going to do that."

"I hope not."

"I got the tape," she said.

And sent his pulse jolting so hard he thought he was going to throw up. It was the pain, he thought. Coffee mingled with the taste of blood in his mouth, where they had taken their sample from the inside of his cheek. He was not doing well at all. He wanted to be home, in bed, with all his small sore spots; the arm was hurting so much now he was not sure he could hold the cup with that hand.

"She—" Ari said, "she went through phases—before she died—that she had a lot of problems. I know a lot of things now, a lot of things nobody wanted to tell me. I don't want that ever to happen. I've done the move—you and Grant into my wing. Yanni says thank God. He says he's going to kill you for the bill at
Changes."

He found it in him to laugh a little, even if it hurt.

"I told uncle Denys you were going on my budget and he was damn well going to increase it. And I had him about what he did to you, so he didn't argue; and I put your monthly up to ten
with
a full medical,
and
your apartment paid, for you and Grant both."

"My God, Ari."

"It's enough you can pay a staffer to do the little stuff, so you don't have to and Grant doesn't have to. It's a waste of your time. It's a lot better for Reseune to have you on research—and teaching
me.
Denys didn't say a thing. He just signed it. As far as I'm concerned, my whole wing is research. Grant doesn't have to do clinical stuff unless he wants to."

"He'll be—delighted with that."

Ari held up a forefinger. "I'm not through. I asked uncle Denys why you weren't
doctor
when you'd gotten where Yanni couldn't teach you anymore, and he said because they didn't want you listed with the Bureau, because of politics. I said that was lousy. Uncle Denys—when he pushes you about as far as he thinks he can get away with, and you push back, you can get stuff out of him as long as you don't startle him. Anyway, he said if we got through the election in Defense, then they'd file the papers."

He stared at her, numb, just numb with the flux. "Is that all right, what I did?" she asked, suddenly looking concerned. Like a little kid asking may-I.

"It's—quite fine. —Thank you, Ari."

"You don't look like you feel good."

"I'm fine." He took a deep breath and set the cup down. "Just a lot of changes, Ari. And they took some pieces out of me."

She got up from behind the desk and came and carefully, gently hugged his shoulders—the sore one sent a jolt through to the bone. She kissed him very gently, very tenderly on the forehead. "Go home," she said. Her perfume was all around him.

But through the pain, he thought it quite remarkable her touch made not a twitch—no flashback, nothing for the moment, though he knew he was not past them. Maybe he escaped it for the moment because it hurt so much, maybe because for a moment he was emotionally incapable of reacting to anything.

She left, and he heard her tell Florian he should walk with them and make sure they got home all right, and get them both to bed and take care of them till they felt better.

Which sounded, at the moment, like a good idea.

B/1: Ari, this is Ari senior.

You've asked about Reseune administration.

My father set it up: James Carnath. He had, I'm told, a talent for organization. Certainly my mother Olga Emory had no interest in the day to day management of details.

Even the day to day management of her daughter, but that's a different file.

I mention that because I fit somewhere in between: I've always believed in a laissez-faire management, meaning that as long as I was running Reseune, I believed in knowing what was going on in the kitchens, occasionally, in the birthlabs, occasionally, in finance, always.

An administrator of a facility like Reseune has special moral obligations which come at the top of the list: a moral obligation to humankind, the azi, the public both local and general, the specific clients, and the staff, in approximately that order.

Policies regarding genetic or biological materials; or psychological techniques and therapies are the responsibility of the chief administrator, and decisions in those areas must never be delegated.

Emphatically, the administrator should seek advice from wing supervisors and department heads. All other decisions and day to day operations can be trusted to competent staff.

I devised a routine within the House system coded MANAGEINDEX which may or may not be in use. Go to Executive 1 and ask for it, and it will tell you the expenses, output, number of reprimands logged, number of fines, number of requests for transfer, number of absences, medical leaves, work-related accidents, anti-management complaints, and security incidents for any individual, group of individuals, office, department, or wing in Reseune, and use that data to evaluate the quality of management and employees on any level. It can do comparisons of various wings and departments or select the most efficient managers and employees in the system.

It will also run a confidential security check on any individual, including a covert comparison of lifestyle data with income and output.

It operates without leaving a flag in the system.

Remember that it is a tool to be used in further inquiry and interview, and it is not absolutely reliable. Personal interviews are always indicated.

I was a working scientist as well as chief Administrator, which I found to be generally a fifteen-hour-a-day combination. A pocket com and an excellent staff kept me apprised of situations which absolutely required my intervention, and this extended to my research as well as my administrative duties. Typically I was in the office as early as 0700, arranged the day's schedule, reviewed the emergencies and ongoing situations via Base One, and put the office in motion as the staff arrived, left on my own work by 0900, and generally made the office again briefly after lunch, whereupon I left again after solving whatever had to be done.

I had a few rules which served me quite well:

I did my own office work while no one was there, which let me work efficiently; I had Florian and Catlin sworn to retrieve me from idle conversations—or from being accosted and handed business. Florian, I would say, handle this. Which usually meant it went to the appropriate department head; but sometimes Florian
would
check it out, and advise me personally. As he still does. Now that I'm Councillor for Science, it's much the same kind of thing. I absolutely refuse to be bogged down by lobbyists. That's what my staff is for. And they're to hand me investigative reports with facts and figures; which I then have cross-checked by Reseune security, and finally,
finally,
if there seems to be substance that interests me, I'll have my full staff meet with the interest group; and I will, if the reports are reasonable—but not in other than a businesslike setting and with a firm time limit for them. It's quite amazing how much time you can waste.

Delegate paperwork. Insist the preparers of reports include a brief summary of content, conclusion and/or recommended action; and that they follow strict models of style: this will appear petty, but I refuse to search a report for information which should have been prominently noted.

Give directions and reprimands early and clearly: an administrator who fails to make his expectations and his rules clear is inefficient; an administrator who expects a subordinate to pick up unspoken displeasure is wasting his time.

Learn a little bit about every operation. On one notorious occasion I showed up in the hospital and spent two hours walking rounds with the nurses. It not only identified problems up and down the line, but the whole MANAGEINDEX of Reseune shifted four points upward in the next two weeks.

Most of all, know your limits and identify those areas in which you are less adept. Do not abdicate authority in those areas: learn them, and be extremely careful of the quality of your department heads.

This program finds you have the rank of: wing supervisor.

You are seventeen years old; you have held your majority for: 1 year, 4 months.

You have a staff of: 6.

You have one department head: Justin Warrick, over Research.

He has a staff of: 2.

This program is running MANAGEINDEX.

There have been 0 complaints and 0 reprimands.

There have been 0 absences on personal leave.

There have been 2 medicals in Research.

Your Research department staff has a total of 187 Security incidents, 185 of which have been resolved. Do you wish breakdown?

AE2: No. I've read the file. None of these occurred in my administration.

B/1: Projects behind schedule: 0.

Projects over budget: 0.

Project demand: 12.

Project output: 18.

Projects ongoing: 3.

Wing expenses, 3 mo. period: C 688,575.31.

Wing earnings, 3 mo. period: C 6,658,889.89.

This wing has the following problems:

1. security flag on: 2 staff in: Research: Justin Warrick, Grant ALX.

2. security watch on: 1 staff in Administration, Ariane Emory.

3. security alert: flag/watch contacts.

Status: Reseune Administration has signed waiver.

Your wing has an overall MANAGEINDEX rating of 4368 out of 5000. MANAGEINDEX congratulates you and your staff and calls your high achievement to the attention of Reseune Administration.

Your staff will receive notification of excellent performance and will receive commendations in permanent file.

The vote totals ticked by on the top of the screen and Giraud took another drink. "We're going to make it," he said to Abban.

After-dinner drinks in his Novgorod apartment. Private election-watch, with his companion Abban, who very rarely indulged. But Abban's glass had diminished by half since the Pan-paris figures had started coming in. Pan-paris had gone for Khalid in the last election. This time it went for Jacques by a two percent margin.

"It's not over," Abban said, dour as usual. "There's still Wyatt's."

The stars farther off the paths of possible expansion were very chancy electorates for any seat. The garrisons tended to be local, resisting amalgamation into other units, and voted consistently Centrist.

But Pan-paris augured very well. . . coming out of the blind storage on Cyteen Station: the computers spat up the stored results of other stations as Cyteen polls closed simultaneously, on-world and up at Station, and the tallies began to flood in.

"I told you," Giraud finally felt safe to say. "Not even with Gorodin's health at issue. Khalid's far from forming a third party. He certainly can't do it with support eroding inside his own electorate. Then we only have Jacques to worry about."

"Only Jacques," Abban echoed. "Do you think he'll keep a bargain? I don't."

"He'll appoint Gorodin. He knows damn well what reneging on that deal would do for him. All we have to hope is that Gorodin stays alive." He took a drink of his own. "And that he hurries and makes an appearance.
Hope
he's not going to wait overlong on proprieties."

The moderate do-nothing Simon Jacques for Councillor; Jacques to appoint Gorodin as Secretary of Defense, then Jacques to resign and appoint Gorodin proxy Councillor, back to his old seat—after which there was bound to be another round with Khalid.

But by then they had to have a viable Expansionist candidate ready to contend with Khalid. The two-year rule applied: meaning Khalid, having lost the election, could not turn around and re-file against the winner until two years had passed; which meant Jacques could hold the seat for two years without much chance of challenge—but if Jacques resigned directly after election, it would be a race to file: whoever filed first, Gorodin or Khalid, could preclude the other from filing because they were each a month short of the end of the prohibition from the election that had put
Khalid
in: which was sure to mean a Supreme Court ruling on the situation—the rule technically only applying to losers, but creating a window for an appeal on the grounds of legal equity.

That meant it was wiser to leave Jacques in office for as long as the two-year rule made him unassailable—while Gorodin—the health rumors were
not
fabricated this time—used what time he had to groom a successor of his own . . . because the one thing no one believed was that Gorodin would last the full two years.