“Get some scientists over here to test me if you like,” Daquin said. “I like company.”
“It still doesn’t prove anything,” Hado said, turning to Tarsem. “We’re being asked to believe this unfortunate creature isn’t being coerced into saying these reports are his. We can’t believe that someone in his position can be expected to say anything but what his captors want him to.”
“Captors,” Daquin said, and the derision was hard to miss. “Seriously, who is this guy?”
“Representative Hado has a point,” I said. “You’re a brain in a box, Mr. Daquin. We have no assurance that you aren’t being used.”
“Do you want to tell them, Harry, or should I?” Daquin asked.
“For obvious reasons, you should,” Harry said.
“General Gau, Councilor Sorvalh, you’re aware that your director of intelligence tried to hack into the Chandler’s systems when we arrived, yes?” Daquin asked.
“We, we knew that,” I said.
“Of course you did. You know what Director Oi found, right?”
“Oi said it was a picture of someone showing their posterior.”
“Yup, that’s called ‘mooning,’” Daquin said. “I did that, Councilor. Not the mooning, for obvious reasons. But I put the picture where Director Oi would find it. I did that because I don’t only pilot this ship, I am this ship. It is entirely and completely under my control. The Chandler has crew and they run operations—you can ask Captain Balla if you like, to confirm this—but ultimately they have only as much control over the ship as I allow them. Because this ship is me. And I choose to help. Without my cooperation, the only way the Colonial Union can control this ship is to destroy it. And I’d destroy it myself before that could happen.”
“You still need sustenance, I assume,” Tarsem said. “Your ship still needs energy. You have to rely on the Colonial Union for that.”
“Do I?” Daquin said. “General, if I were to ask you for asylum right now, would you give it to me?”
“Yes,” Tarsem said.
“And I assume you wouldn’t let me starve.”
“No,”
“Then you’ve just invalidated your own assertion.”
“But you still need the Colonial Union to get your body back,” Lowen said.
“To grow a new one, you mean.”
“Yes.”
“Ms. Lowen, there’s a door to your left. When the ship was built, it was the captain’s ready room. Go ahead and open it.”
Lowen found the door and opened it. “Oh my god,” she said. She opened the door fully so the rest of us could see.
Inside was a container with a human body in it.
“That’s me,” Daquin said. “Or will be me, anyway, once it’s done growing and once I decide to put myself into it. Representative Hado, you can have your scientists check its DNA against the DNA in my brain here. It checks out. But the point is that no, the Colonial Union isn’t holding my body hostage. It’s not holding me hostage. It’s not coercing me. Now, you can still believe it or not, but at this point, if you don’t believe me, it’s not because we haven’t made an effort to make it easy for you to believe.”
“Mr. Daquin,” I said.
“Yes, Councilor Sorvalh.”
“You were the one piloting during the rescue of the diplomats.”
“Yes, I was,” Daquin said. “We have two other pilots, but I was the one at the helm for that.”
“I know a pilot who called it an amazing piece of piloting, and wants to buy you several drinks to commemorate it.”
“Tell your pilot friend I accept, in theory,” Daquin said. “The actual drinking part will have to wait.”
* * *
“Are you happy?” I asked Tarsem, when he and I were again alone in his office.
“Happy?” he said. “What an odd question.”
“I mean did everything you plan for the day happen.”
“All I planned for was to have Abumwe give her speech, and that wasn’t even my plan,” Tarsem said. “That was yours. So I suppose I should ask you if you’re happy.”
“Not yet,” I said.
“Why not?” Tarsem said. “Abumwe’s speech entirely disrupted the momentum Unli Hado and his partisans had in pushing a no confidence vote. The fact I assured Hado and Sca that I don’t consider them traitors doesn’t mean their reputations aren’t irretrievably destroyed. Even if they stay on as representatives.”
“I’m not going to pretend I didn’t enjoy seeing Hado get crushed today,” I said. “That vainglorious martinet deserved the thumping. But now we have the somewhat larger problem that both the Elpri and the Eyr have been smeared with the accusation of, if not treason, then treachery of the worst sort. And you know they’re not going to be the only nations who harbor members of this Equilibrium group. Vnac is sifting through the data right now.”