EFFECTS OF OPENNESS / CH. 13:CARGO
MARS ORBITAL OBSERVATORY CONTROL ROOM. FRISOL 17TH SEPTEMBER
“Radar scan shows the Mer capsule is spot on the advised track, sir.”
“That's encouraging at least. And it's really slowing at two g?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Any idea on it's fuel, from the emission spectrum?”
“I hate to speculate what the thing is using as a power source, but I'm getting spectral readings consistent with a pulsed beam of ionised helium, but urm, blueshifted quite a lot.”
“Please expand on 'quite a lot'”
“Near-relativistic velocities, sir, lowest speed seems to be about zero point one of lightspeed, but they seem to be still accelerating after they leave the vehicle. If you want me to speculate well past what's reasonable and into science fiction, I'd say we're looking at fusion products being expelled and then pushed off by a forcefield. But we all know that's impossible. So far, anyway.”
“Well said, lad. Keep an open mind, that's what my old professor used to say.”
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MARS ORBIT
“Shuttle five to base, do you hear me?” the pilot called.
“We hear you, shuttle five.”
“I have just overflown the track of the Atlantis capsule, the fireball stage is over and it seems to have sprouted glowing wings. They're currently cycling through the optical spectrum about every five seconds. Oh, they're now pulsing between red and green.”
“Might it be Morse code?”
“Yes sir, slow morse. I think one word was 'Boris', but there was some more before that. Out of sight now.”
“Thank you, shuttle five.”
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MARTIAN WILDERNESS.
“Ruth, prepare to be embarrassed,” Mack said over the radio.
“I'm braced,” Ruth said, “What's my cousin done now?”
“I'm told the pod is signaling 'Happy Birthday Ruth, love Boris.' in Morse code.”
“The good thing about him being my cousin is I'm probably allowed to strangle him. I suppose it could have been worse. Much worse, actually.”
“In between that it's cycling through the colour spectrum a few times.”
“So, he's really showing off, is he?”
“I guess so. I wouldn't know.”
“Some people have far too much creative freedom.”
“Speaking of creative freedom, I hear you've challenged the head of the university philosophy department to a public debate.”
“Well, Claudia said she wanted to sell tickets, so I guess that makes it public, doesn't it?”
“What I am a little concerned about is you talking about being better equipped, and just happening to name a date after your delivery today. I hope you weren't thinking better equipped in a military sense.”
“Well, I'd very much prefer not to have poison in my blow-pipe at a public event. It's really inhibiting knowing that if I had to dart someone in self-defense they'd die.”
“We do have a security force, you know, Ruth.”
“I know. But they're busy people, their reactions are slower than mine, and I don't think I've got so many enemies that I need twenty-four hour guarding or anything. Of course I might have one enemy in the head of the philosophy department.”
“Especially if you go sticking him with one of your darts.”
“I'll only do that if he gets too aggressive. You never can tell with these professional philosophers. Oooh, I see it. It's not just got wings, it's an albatross!”
“Is it? I'm useless at recognising birds,” Hathellah said from her place in the passenger seat of the Marsmobile.
“Yes. I guess it makes sense, the lonely traveller of the interplanetary deeps.”
“That's a really poetic thought,” Hathellah said.
“Boris has a poetic turn sometimes.”
“Aren't albatrosses linked to all sorts of superstitions?” Mack asked.
“Maybe. Not for us though. Oh! End of albatross, parachute time.”
“It's going to be spot on target, isn't it?” Hathellah said.
“Wind's a bit erratic, it might not be,” Ruth said. She was wrong.
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Before they had retreated to a safer distance for the landing, Ruth and Hathellah had used their wrist units to find the exact point Ruth had told Boris to aim for, and marked a cross on the ground, with some rough circles around the outside. The cargo pod had extended four feet and was resting right on top the cross. Hathellah took some pictures, and noticed that someone had put a piece of paper on one of the boxes that were visible through the gently glowing forcefield.
“And if we had any doubts at all about what bird it was,” Ruth said, coming over to read the paper, “Boris provides a poem for you Hathellah, entitled 'Albatross'.”
“For me?”
“Yes, well, maybe for both of us, but that line at the end is certainly for you.”
“I can't read it.”
“No, but you'll need to learn Mer one day I think, and it's not so different to Greek, do you see the last word?”
“Theta, sqiggle, lambda, sea-urchin, different sqiggle.”
“If I tell you that 'sea-urchin' is pronnounced 'ah', and 'different squiggle' is the first person possessive, guess what that word is.”
“My Thellah?”
“Exactly.”
“Why did he shorten my name. Oh, no, he's using the title, isn't he?”
“Yes. Writing 'Soon I come, my Hathellah' would mean a whole lot more decision making had happened than I expect.”
“As in, a decision to marry?”
“Yes.”
“But my calling him my boyfriend is OK?”
“Yes. And as long as you're speaking English, you're OK, different rules apply. Just... well... steer clear of possessives with names in Mer. That's close relatives. Want to hear the poem?”
“Of course I do!”
Ruth read it in Mer, and then translated.
“You listened when I spoke, my kind one,
You did not laugh at my plans or pain,
Though great that distance that separates us,
On outstretched wings I fly,
Across vast and empty spaces,
I've followed my lonely path.
nowhere to turn but to come to you,
I follow now the path of hope,
I come to you my Thellah.”
“It's beautiful. How do I know if he's calling me Thellah as a title, or 'thella as a contraction of my name, or don't you do that?”
“He's more likely to call you Hathie. That's something we picked up from English, by the way. The more traditional contracted form would make you Hath, which unfortunately is a rather vicious type of eel.”
“So Hathie is a diminutive eel? “, Hathie asked.
“The young are quite cute, actually, but with sharp teeth, but no, we wouldn't call them Hathie except as a name in a children's story. You know 'Spidy the spider'. And in case you're wondering, as far as I know, no one has written such a story about an eel, and I really doubt anyone would, especially with it being known that you're using the name Hathie. It would be disrespectful, and no one sane wants to split the Mer. We're too interbred, for one thing.”
“Yes. I was wondering, could it be done?”
“Well there are the toes, they're a clear sign. Creativity like Boris' is another thing that's considered an Outer Mer trait, as is Lara's expertise in combat. So, if you've got someone like Lara as a relative of Boris people would say, OK, she hasn't got the toes but she's got to be Outer Mer. So if you split the Mer, you'd probably get a population skewed towards ingenious inventors, poets and strong vicious fighters, quite likely to let the food burn, just based on people's prejudice, and unless they had webless toes you wouldn't get many reliable stay at home types to whom playing dolphin and looking after a hoard of kids is just about all the excitement they can stand.”
“And society as a whole needs both types,” Hathellah said.
“Exactly. Anyway, here's Robert, shall we try and take this home?”
“It's much bigger than I thought it would be,” Robert said. He'd driven out with a Marsmobile from the university which had a trailer. “we're not going to be able to put all that lot in the two 'mobiles even with the trailer, surely?”
“Oh, didn't I say? We just put the whole thing onto the trailer.”
“Urm...”
“It's all clever forcefields, remember? We just need to put the trailer underneath and tell it to shrink the legs.”
“I'm glad you understand this technology. It looks like magic to me,” Robert said.
“Oh, it is,” Ruth said, grinning, “none of this is possible at all. Let's face it, a mermaid standing on another planet is just impossible to start with. Do you need help with backing the trailer underneath?”
“You want me to reverse it under the pod? I think it'll be easier to disconnect it and put it under by hand,”
“Go on, try, at least,” Ruth urged, “unless you want me to? It's not like you're going to dent the spaceship.”
“What about the trailer?”
“Come here,” Ruth said, “hold your hand out, and prod the field.”
“Oh! It's springy!”
“Try rubbing your hand over it, just a bit.”
“That's weird. It feels like glue.”
“Exactly, So we probably don't need to worry about it falling off the trailer either.”
“I'd be happier to strap it down, still.”
“That's fine. It might tip off, but I don't think it'll slide.”
“No. Urm... Is this going to cause a radiation burst when we turn it off?”
“Probably not. It's glowing.”
“Urm... what does that mean?”
“Glowing forcefields don't trap particles as far as I remember.”
“You vaguely remember stuff I've never heard of, but you consider me the forcefield expert. I don't understand.”
“Who understands electricity better, the kid who knows that picking up a little battery is safe but to stay away from a wall socket, or the guy who shouted eureka when he got a light bulb to light up by spinning a magnet near a coil? Maybe the kid has even seen some pictures of the inside of a power-station, but that doesn't mean she understands what's going on.”
“Oh, right. Thanks.”
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EMBASSY OF ATLANTIS, MARS, FRISOL 17TH SEPTEMBER
Ruth unloaded the last box from the cargo pod, looked around to check it was empty and triggered the shutdown sequence. The colours of the walls faded, and then, sooner than she'd expected, there was a soft pop, and the forcefields shut off entirely. She found herself falling to the ground. It wasn't far though, and she landed well, smiling as a stray thought crossed her mind: finally something that demonstrated Boris could make mistakes. She looked around and found the control unit. Since it was the size of a fairly large suitcase, (complete with handle, she noticed) it wasn't very exactly hard to spot, but either she'd turned or the panel she'd just typed on had retracted inside it. One portable spaceship... She really hoped it didn't have any antimatter in it, but she wasn't going to have a look.
This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it.
She hit the ground, hearing someone decide now was a good time to shoot. An arrow whistled over head. So, no firearms on Mars still, Ruth thought. The arrow hit her airlock wall, pointing as an incriminating finger towards the archer, not that she looked that way. The hiss of escaping air wasn't going to help her hear any decisions, but she had a good idea of where they were hiding — there was a large rock, about three metres diameter, on the other side of the suitcase-spaceship to where she was. The mirror finish knife came in very handy, and she saw him. No, them. One of them, arrow notched, was failing to hide very well on one side of the rock, and his colleague was casting a shadow on the other side.
One of the first things she'd done on opening the cargo pod had been to swap knives and pocket a rock cutter. The next thing had been to look at the collection of darts that Karella had sent her. She now had a nice supply of spare darts and ingredients, plus some pre-prepared relaxant-darts and warning darts, to go with her poisoned ones. As well as a second blow-pipe. Did she want them floppy or screaming in pain? Just in case, she hid her thoughts briefly while she decided that floppy people made better prisoners, then changed her mind. They didn't know she'd swapped darts, so if she hit one with the warning dart, then the other might think he'd been poisoned, and surrender immediately. The pipe with warning darts was also free from any finger holes. She wanted that extra range and accuracy. Land-men often wondered why the Mer blowpipes were blown from the side, flute-like, rather than straight. This was the reason. She didn't need to expose half her face to an arrow-shot. Her knife told her they were both still where they'd been, waiting for a better shot than just a knife blade, and a thin tube. They were quite good, really, she supposed. Patient, silent. She spotted the archer noticing the blow pipe and aiming at it. Silly man, of course she wasn't going to shoot over the top of the case. The pressure sensors in her house finally noticed all was not well and shrieked a pressure-breach alarm.
Knowing he'd almost certainly be distracted by the sudden noise, she brought her blowpipe to her mouth sighed along it and blew in one smooth action.
He'd been looking at the house, just for a moment, and hadn't seen her move. So, they weren't that good. Or maybe they were out of practice. The dart took him in the arm holding the bow, and he yelled. It sounded like Russian. Ruth didn't see, but guessed the bow hit him in the face; certainly the arrow never flew. She drew a long breath on her breather, glad that the atmospheric-pressure down here in the valley was only about as low as on Everest. The bowman's arm must have felt like it was immersed in boiling oil, and she could hear his panicked breathing. He hadn't moved much, but was staring in horror at the dart in his arm, and he slowly collapsed from the pain, in full sight. The other man moved, and she heard him decide not to expose himself.
Ruth reloaded her new pipe, this time with muscle relaxant.
“How long? How long till I die?” the archer yelled at her.
“Make peace with God quickly, that's my advice.” Ruth yelled back. It was good advice, even though it didn't answer his question.
Belatedly, Ruth thought to trigger her panic button.
“Information for antidote,” the archer offered with ragged breath. He was obviously terrified of poison.
The man's 'friend' didn't know she'd spotted him, and decided he'd jump Ruth as she administered it.
“I don't think your friend wants me to walk away with any information you mgit give me:,” Ruth said.
“We just want your pocket space ship,” the friend shouted, “You can walk away from it and live.”
“That's not very nice for your friend there.” Ruth said.
“Casualties happen. Have you got an antidote?”
“Come out with your hands up and nobody dies,” Ruth offered, “I've got plenty more darts if you want to try your luck the other way. Or we can both hide from each other until the police get here, and maybe your friend doesn't make it.”
“Sad thing is, he's not really my friend, and I've got a gun.”
“Let me point out to you that this spaceship is a Mer military vessel, like every Mer military vessel since before you rediscovered steam power it is protected against tampering and has a self-destruct. I'm not sure if that's fusion-based or antimatter-based. Do you really want to trigger a nuclear or antimatter explosion by trying to shoot me through it?”
“Why don't you walk away from it then?”
“What do you think I am? A cowering civilian? I'm sworn to protect civilians from people like you.”
“So, I hide behind this rock, and you hide behind your bomb until the police get here or we see who sticks their head out first.”
“That's one option. Alternatively I cut up at your rock so you've got no hiding place, and if I get the depth control wrong I cut you in half too.”
“Yeah yeah, sorry, that's a bluff. You didn't have time to get one out of it's packet.”
“I'm a mermaid, stupid. We don't bluff, we don't turn into gibbering heaps when cornered, we slice.” She'd half expected him to look round the rock at that, and he didn't disappoint. “Or shoot darts as the case may be,” she added as he collapsed, limp, on the ground.
“The poison's in my chest now. Please!” the archer begged.
“Who sent you?”
“What did you shoot him with?”
“Muscle relaxant, I want one of you to survive, don't I? Want a dose? It's said to to reduce the pain. Naah, that's not good, you can't talk. And you want to talk, surely? To God if no one else? I mean, there is an antidote to what you've been hit with, but it'll take me some time to make.”
“Do you require assistance?” a voice came from her wrist unit.
“That took you long enough,” she replied. “I have one incapacitated assassin/thief outside my complex, who claimed he has a gun, and another one who is not fully incapacitated but in a lot of pain after being hit by another sort of dart, I imagine moving hurts him, but he might feel like crawling away to die, so I'm keeping him covered. He's not doing a very good job at negotiating for an antidote. Oh, he shot an arrow at me earlier and hit the wall of my airlock, so I've got a pressure breach too. So yes, I would have appreciated some assistance from the moment I activated my panic button.”
“Be assured they're on the way, maam.” the operator said.
“Oh, the guy groaning in pain will probably appreciate a shot of something like morphine, even if I do give him some antidote.”
“Please do give him the antidote, maam.”
Ruth walked to the archer. “He's promised me information in exchange for it, and promises are important.”
“I am Vasili Gorbachev, sub-lieutenant of the imperial Russian army.”
“And?”
“I was ordered to help the lieutenant, who cannot move.”
“And?”
“Investigate your pod and its cargo thoroughly.”
“And?” Ruth said yet again.
“Make your death look like an accident, if I could.”
“Dispatcher, did you hear that confession?”
“I did, Maam.”
“The prisoner is capable of movement, and although he is in extreme pain he is probably stronger than I am. He still has in his possession deadly weapons, including a belt-knife, bow and arrows. I will therefore not turn my back on him, or approach him any closer to tie him up. I could incapacitate him with a harmless muscle relaxant, which will reduce his pain slightly and allow me to make the antidote. And of course I'll do that if he presents a greater threat than he does at the moment. Or I could wait until help arrives.”
“How soon must the antidote be administered.”
“I've no idea, really, I don't think anyone's been hit by a full dose of it for centuries. However, the type of dart with which I hit him is not intended to be fatal in humans, and making the antidote will take me some time.”
“Could you describe what you have hit him with?”
“It is a fast acting pain inducer that we carry to warn off large predators, such as sharks or killer whales. It convinces these animals that we make bad prey and makes rapid motion extremely painful, but does not prevent it. The pain starts at the point the dart hits and then spreads through the body without any noticeable reduction in intensity, before fading after a few hours. A certain amount of numbness and joint inflammation may follow. The antidote is intended for when people accidentally prick themselves while preparing the darts, it is said to limit the spread and speed the passing of the pain and reduce the inflammation, but given the dose he got and the delay in administration, for all I know it might not be much more effective than taking a couple of aspirin tablets.”
The man, on hearing this, lunged at Ruth with his dagger. It was made clumsy by the burst of pain it triggered, and she easily stepped aside as she darted him.
“Dispatcher, the prisoner has just tried to attack me, and earned himself a muscle relaxant dart. So, I'll go make the antidote in case it does help.”
“Could you make sure his breather is properly attached?”
“Of course.”
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EMBASSY OF ATLANTIS, MARS
Ruth had typed a quick message to Atlantis, advising Karella what had happened, but Karella had obviously heard by other means, given how quickly she responded. [Ruth, how are you?]
[There are always sharks, your majesty. This time there were two and they had two legs. I've hurt my face knocking my breather mask off to shoot them, but physically I'm OK.]
[Emotionally?]
[I'd come to think of Mars as a fairly safe place. They thought to steal the secrets of the pod and its cargo.]
[So you are now more under threat.]
[Yes.]
[Boris has space for six in his craft. He will not come alone.]
[Thank you, majesty.]
[Call me Karella, Ruth. They were Russian?]
[So one said, who believed he had been hit by a death-dart, rather than a warning dart.]
[Russia have been slow in negotiating peace. I will investigate myself, but there will be repercussions.]
[Do not start a war for my sake, Karella.]
[Not just for your sake, no. But we do not issue empty threats, and our ambassadors bear our honour. I will see how far up the chain of command this went, and decide on what is an appropriate response.]
[My credentials have not been formally presented yet, majesty,] Ruth pointed out.
[This is true, and I will bear it in mind. Now, you do have a personal forcefield.]
[I have not found out which box yet.]
[The one that was under the darts, which I presume you have found, if you have been darting sharks.]
[Yes, majesty.]
[Karella!] Karella corrected [What happened to your boyfriend?]
[I sent him back to work, once we'd moved the biggest boxes. I am curious about what they contain, Karella.]
[Do you have restrictions on what you build on your claim?]
[No...]
[I do not like the thought that your dome could be so easily breached. So I ask that you go to the largest box. It is a small crystal extruder. It will need programming of course, and feeding rock, but there are instructions. The long box with a square cross-section has a number of forcefield doors, I expect your boyfriend will be able to connect them to a control panel that is like people expect there. I want you to have a wall around your claim, so people must ask to enter, and when you have your wall, I ask that you show to Mars a little of our city. Dig down for rock, don't use your regolith.
Your living dome already contains an underground portion, does it not?]
[Yes, Karella]
[I ask that you make a lower level to that, and from that tunnels to the corners of your plot. I ask you plan for yourself an underground pool, for recreation, and underground sleeping chambers to protect you and others in case of a big storm, and underground storage chambers for the secrets of the deep. Do not worry about moving all that rock yourself, you will see a rock lifter in another package. And with the rock you dig, I ask that you make a crystal dome for your home, and also a tower, which will be the offices of our embassy. Not as tall as at home, of course, you do not need a hundred levels, after all.]
[I don't know if my claim is large enough, Karella. Like most people, I have split it, with different parts in different places.]
[I know, and you have a legal duty you have not done yet. Inform the council that you have just been told your shipment contains three and a half kilos of gold jewelery, in with your clothes and equipment.]
[We may not trade gold with landmen!]
[No. But we may trade it government to government for permanent resources. Ask the council to consider whether a state can purchase a claim. Ask if there is any law that would prevent me, or more likely one of my daughters, visiting Mars on a ship like Boris's, to record a claim and purchase more. If I calculate correctly, the gold we have shipped is sufficient to purchase a claim larger than Atlantis. The High Council consider that a supremely good investment, assuming the Mars council are happy.]
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MARS COUNCIL OFFICES. FRISOL, 17TH SEPTEMBER.
“Hello, Ruth. Please accept our heartfelt regret for what happened.” Claudia said as Ruth entered.
“Thank you. I'm informed by my monarch that steps will be taken on Earth, and we do not seek to interfere in any way with the legal processes here.”
“Thank you. But you said you had something else to discuss?”
“I do, yes. My queen has urm... sent me some surprises in the package. One is a small version of the machine we use to build walls on Atlantis, and I'd just like to check that there's no problem with building on my claim with something considerably more permanent than plastic.”
“None at all.”
“Any restrictions on excavating? My queen wants me to have somewhere I can swim and hide from storms at the same time, which is nice of her.”
“Well, if your field dome or a visiting MarsMobile crashes down into the tunnel, then it's your fault. And you pay for the water, of course.”
“Understood, but we might be able to do something clever to get it out of the rocks.”
“Oh yes? Well, none of that's a problem then. Get someone to work out what size of arches and things the bed-rock can support, that's my advice. It sounds like a lot of concrete.”
“Thank you. But I'll probably use my extruder machine for that too. Now... what about building a hundred meter tall fairytale tower, about the same diameter as a house dome? I assume that eventually it'd need booster pumps and stuff to connect up plumbing to the top floors, and have a lift put in.”
“Very funny.”
“Serious. Back home the tallest ones are more like five hundred meters tall, but although it is intended to wow people a bit, we don't want to get silly about things, do we? Even this one is probably going to be three-quarters empty anyway. It'll be for embassy offices, we'd have underground storm shelters of course.”
“You're serious?”
“Before I came, I chucked a few lumps of rock into the wall machine. It moaned about not having enough to process properly and I told it to shut up and do a thin quality control sample. It came up with this.” 'This' was a sheet of crystal a centimeter thick, and the size of a large book.
“It's warm.”
“Insulating, anyway. Feel free to hit it with a hammer you don't mind breaking, or ask the university if they've got anything that'll scratch it other than a cutting laser or explosives. I think this is all called demonstrating the merchandise.”
“You're showing what your people can do on your own claim to help convince us you can deliver?”
“I guess so. But my queen didn't like the sound of one guy with an arrow making a hole in my home, either.”
“OK, right... Legal-wise, you can't make any shadow on anyone else's field dome during noon plus or minus two hours, nor may you cause a shadow for any five hours during the day. That's any field dome that exists or has been contracted for before you formally submit your plans, but since you almost certainly will be casting shadows on land outside your claim, it'd be wise to make sure you talk to the neighbours anyway, to make sure they've not got plans that aren't contracted yet.”
“OK. Now, the other thing, which I've just been told about but not actually witnessed myself, is that hidden amongst my clothes, my queen has put some gold jewelery.”
“So you're declaring an unknown quantity of gold?”
“I'm told it's three and a half kilos. But I don't know if that means roughly, or three thousand five hundred grams.”
“Why?”
“My queen has plans, it seems. I guess she's taking a long view, and thinking that maybe a few hundred years or even a thousand years from now, Earth might become a difficult place for Mer to continue living. She acknowledges that under Martian Law, companies can only have installations, and people can have claims, but asks if there is any law about a state seeking a claim? Or a head of state visiting and making a claim which might be considered to be on behalf of their people. If that was permitted, and I don't really think it could be denied under the law at the moment, certainly not assuming they have descendants, would it also be possible for, say, one of the royal princesses to make the trip in a ship like my cousin is working on in order to make such a claim? She doesn't say, but I guess the question continues: if so, could a duly appointed ambassador already here do so? She points out the fact that for the past few hundred years we've been living in a dome two kilometres across, with fishing and farming outside it, and that even though gold is a strategic resource for our people, we would consider three and a half kilos of gold a very reasonable exchange for enough Martian land to build a place the size of Atlantis.”
“There's a lot to think about there.”
“Yes. I assure you we're not interested in your guesses, but in formal treaties with the council. But she has instructed me that if I needed to buy a few more hectares for the embassy, then I am to use some of that gold.”
“Why send jewelery, rather than flakes, or nuggets or bullion?”
“My guess, and only my guess, is that if I am not to sell it then I am to wear some of it, and the princess of the outer Mer also. I also expect that if there is to be a trade of gold for land, then the actual trade will take place with flakes or nuggets.”
“So this is... a show of wealth and power as well?”
“A demonstration of good intent, that we do not bluff or offer what we cannot deliver.”
“You realise that if we allow Atlantis to buy up bits of Mars, then other states will want to do so too.”
“Yes. We also know that our total stocks of gold are far less than the stocks of India or Russia, for example. This is why we as individuals may not trade it: it is far too important for our lives. My knife, for example, is coated in a gold-containing alloy, our submarines also.”
“I wonder if gold is a good thing to trade then. As you say, it is a scarce resource that other nations have far more of.”
“That is true.”
“Perhaps, then, assuming your cousin's spaceship flies, you would be interested in trading land for Mer on Mars for some spaceships that could take our ambassadors to and from Earth. Because that is surely something that only you can offer us at the moment, and so does not set a dangerous precedent. We have no desire to find ourselves required to sell a Firster's claim of Martian territory to any country that can find half a tonne of gold. Even if their head of state bought that much with them.”
“Thank you, Councillor. I'm sure we can negotiate along those lines, and I apologise on behalf of her Majesty for the embarrassing quantity of gold she sent.”
“I just hope you've got it somewhere safe.”
“So do I,” Ruth agreed.