“That’s a pretty simplistic answer, General,” I said.
“Look at our civilizations,” Gau said. “We’re all the same size because we limit each other through war. We’re all at the same level of technology, because we bargain, trade and steal from each other. We all inhabit the same area of space because that is where we began, and we choose to control our colonies rather than let them develop without us. We fight over the same planets and only occasionally explore to find new ones, which we all then squabble over like carrion animals fighting over a carcass. Our civilizations are at an equilibrium, Administrator Perry. An artificial equilibrium that is sliding all of us toward entropy. This was happening before humans arrived in this part of space. Your arrival punctured that equilibrium for a while. But now you’ve settled in the same pattern of stealing and squabbling as the rest of us.”
“I don’t know about that,” I said.
“Indeed,” Gau said. “Let me ask you, Administrator Perry, how many of humanity’s planets were freshly discovered? And how many were simply taken from other races? How many planets have humans lost to other races?”
I thought back to the day we arrived above the other planet, the fake Roanoke, and remembered the questions of journalists, asking who we took the planet from. It was assumed it was taken; it didn’t occur to them to ask if it was newly discovered. “This planet is new,” I said.
“And the reason for that is that your government was trying to hide you,” Gau said. “Even a culture as vital as your own now explores primarily out of desperation. You’re trapped in the same stagnant patterns as the rest of us. Your civilization will slowly run down like the rest of ours would.”
“And you think the Conclave will change this,” I said.
“In any system, there is a factor that limits growth,” Gau said. “Our civilizations operate as a system, and our limiting factor is war. Remove that factor and the system thrives. We can focus on cooperation. We can explore rather than fight. If there had been a Conclave, perhaps we would have met you before you came out and met us. Perhaps we’ll explore now and find new races.”
“And do what with them?” I asked. “There’s an intelligent race on this planet. Besides mine, I mean. We met them in a rather unfortunate way, and some of us ended up dead. It took some doing on my part to convince our colonists not to kill every one of them we could find. What will you do, General, when you meet a new race on a planet you want for the Conclave?”
“I don’t know,” General Gau said.
“Excuse me?” I said.
“Well, I don’t,” Gau said. “It hasn’t happened yet. We’ve been busy consolidating our positions with the races we know about and the worlds that have already been explored. We haven’t had time to explore. It hasn’t come up.”
“I’m sorry,” I said. “That wasn’t an answer I was expecting.”
“We’re at a very sensitive moment, Administrator Perry, concerning the future of your colonists,” Gau said. “I won’t unnecessarily complicate things by lying. Especially not about something as trivial to our current situation as a hypothetical.”
“At the very least, General Gau, I’d like to believe that,” I said.
“That’s a start, then,” Gau said. He looked me up and down. “You said that you were in your Colonial Defense Forces,” he said. “From what I know about humans, that means you’re not originally from the Colonial Union. You’re from Earth. Is that right?”
“That’s right,” I said.
“Humans are really very interesting,” Gau said. “You’re the only race who has chosen to change your home world. Voluntarily, that is. You’re not the only ones to recruit your military from only one world, but you are the only ones to do it from a world that is not your primary world. I’m afraid we’ve never quite understood the relationship between Earth and Phoenix, and with the rest of the colonies. It doesn’t make much sense to the rest of us. Perhaps one day I can get you to explain it to me.”
“Perhaps,” I said, carefully.
Gau took the tone for what he thought it was. “But not today,” he said.
“I’m afraid not,” I said.
“A pity,” Gau said. “This has been an interesting conversation. We’ve done thirty-six removals. This is the last one. And in all but this and the first, the leaders of the colonies have not had much to say.”
“It’s difficult to have a casual conversation with someone who is ready to vaporize you if you don’t give in to his demands,” I said.
“This is true enough,” Gau said. “But leadership is at least a little about character. So many of these colony leaders seemed to lack that. It makes me wonder if these colonies were begun at all seriously, or simply to see if we meant to enforce our ban on colonies. Although there was the one who tried to assassinate me.”