There Will be Dragons (2 of 232)

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COPYRIGHT
There Will be Dragons by John Ringo. Copyright 2003 by John Ringo.
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CHAPTER ONE



"This is what Paul would bring to an end?" Ishtar asked, gesturing into the clouded distance.

The woman could barely be described as human. From her hyperelongated height, which was now folded in a lotus position on a floating disk, through her narrow face, to her golden eyes and silver, gem-studded, two-meter hair spread out in a peacock pattern, her appearance reeked of xeno origins. But her DNA was as human as the woman standing next to her.

Sheida Ghorbani was nearly three hundred years old and looked to be anywhere from her upper teens to mid twenties. Her skin had the fineness of youth and her titian hair, while closely cropped, had a natural healthy sheen. Wound around her neck and into her hair was a two-meter-long winged lizard with rainbow skin like a billion shimmering gems.

Unlike her companion who was naked but for a scarce loincloth of gold, Sheida wore a simple jumpsuit of cosilk. It would be easy to mistake her for a student. Until you looked at her eyes.

Sheida sighed, looking out across the tarn and petting the lizard. The water of the upland lake was so blue and still that it seemed God's own paintbrush had been dipped into royal blue to paint it. The tarn was surrounded on three sides by snow-capped mountains that dropped precipitously to the water. On the third side the lake exited the valley via a two-hundred-foot waterfall. There a massive multicolumned building that resembled a Greek temple added to the idyllic nature of the scene. The two women had stopped just at the top of the stairs, looking out over the water.

She leaned up against one of the columns and nodded, gesturing with her chin at her friend.

"Well I don't think he intends to destroy the lake," Sheida said with a chuckle. "But he would end much of it, at least for most people. He wants people to learn how to use their legs again," she continued. "To learn to be 'strong' again. And to learn to be human again."

"Humano-form, you mean," Ishtar corrected. " 'Humanity is mind and the soul, not body and form.' Tzumaiyama's philosophies still are unassailable on that subject. But I guess he's the ultimate conservative," she added dryly.

"Bite your tongue," Sheida replied. "You have to delve into data so old it's practically forgotten to define Paul. What he is, whether he knows it or not, is a fascist. I suspect he would call himself a socialist, but he's not."

"A what?" Ishtar asked. She blinked her eyes for a moment as she accessed data then nodded. "Ah, I see what you mean. That is ancient. But it does fit his personality."

"He wants to use the Council's control of energy distribution to coerce people," Sheida said. "That is why he called this meeting."

"And you're sure of this?" Ishtar said. "He has said nothing to me."

"I think he thinks I agree with him because I'm not a Change," Sheida replied.

"Do you?" Ishtar asked. "I have known you for at least a hundred years and except for occasional changes in eye and hair color I have never seen you Change."

"A good Change requires a genetic component," she said, gesturing at Ishtar's form. "You know what Daneh does for a living."

"But we are past that, surely," Ishtar said. "Such mistakes no longer happen."

"Perhaps and perhaps not," Sheida replied. "I choose, however, to retain my own form. It's good enough for me."

"So he thinks you will vote with him?" Ishtar asked.

"Probably. At least from the hints he has been dropping. And I gave him no reason to doubt it, while not committing. Also, I think he waited until Chansa was elected to the Council."

"Chansa is . . . odd," Ishtar said. "I've heard some very ugly rumors about his personal life."

"Odd but brilliant," Sheida replied. "Like the rest of Paul's faction. So bright and yet so lacking in . . . wisdom. It seems to be the one trait we could not enhance in humanity. Immunity, processing power, beauty." She sighed and shook her head. "But not wisdom. They are so very very smart and yet so very stupid for all that the problems do exist."

"You are opposed, correct?" Ishtar asked with a delicate frown.

"Oh, yes," Sheida said with a nod. "They are right that there is a problem. That does not mean that their solutions are either optimum or even in order. But I wonder what he will do when he finds out?"

"I would say 'to be a bug on the wall,' " Ishtar said with a smile. "But unfortunately I'm going to be at the center of the debate."

"Change is an inevitable outgrowth of our technology," Sheida said with a shrug. "From the nannites and the replicators we get the medical technology. And that same technology permits people to be . . ." she glanced at her companion and smiled, "whatever we can imagine."

Ishtar laughed at the ambiguity of the ending and shrugged her slim shoulders. "Perhaps Paul simply means to end all medical technology? Perhaps that too is 'unnecessary'?"

"If so he can take it up with my sister."

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