Mission to Minerva (g-5) by James P. Hogan

Author:James P. Hogan [Hogan, James]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: sf

***

By the next day, after repeated metaphorical walks around the subject in his head to explore all possibilities and angles, he had satisfied himself that, quaint though it was, Mildred's simple suggestion didn't contain any hidden key that he should have recognized. Embarking on some kind of moral lecture tour through the world's corridors of power was unlikely to achieve anything of note except feed it into the gossip mill that the strain had gotten to Caldwell finally, and possibly-done with all due civility, of course, and the requisite honors for him to cosset in his doting years-cost him his job.

And even if he did get some serious and sympathetic attention here and there, the conflicts of interests were so tangled and the true motivations behind them so guarded that any initiative he might manage to spark would be diluted away by countermands and bureaucratic obstruction long before it cold grow into anything coordinated and effective on an global scale. He should know, having played a significant part in coordinating one of the biggest international ventures of modern times. But the Space Arm had come into being and been able to function as it had precisely because all the financial and political forces aligned behind it had stood to gain. They were unlikely to show the same capacity for concerted action when they saw themselves as being asked to renounce the very opportunities for expanding and diversifying and generally outperforming their rivals that had spurred them before.

Caldwell wasn't going to change human nature or the way it shaped the world; at least, not anytime soon. The only other factor in the equation was the Thurien disposition that viewed humans as violently disposed aliens-to be accommodated generously if their inclinations could be curbed and redirected; but if not… who knew what? On the face of it, Caldwell didn't see that he could do much to change that either. It would need something that lessened the distance between them emotionally and psychologically, so that the "alienness" was reduced; that made humans "family," the way he accepted Mildred within his Division of UNSA.

After Minerva's destruction, the Thuriens had shown their capability and potential willingness to form such close ties in the way they had taken the Lambian element of the Lunarians back and tried to integrate them into their civilization-later to become the Jevlenese. But that attempt had been marred by the intrusion of the Ents from the surreal world of computing symbology that came into being inside JEVEX. The Cerians, at their own request, had remained in their own Solar System after being transported to Earth and become the ancestral Terrans. The separation since then had produced the sense of alienism underlying the superficially cordial relations that existed now.

What was needed was some unifying event or experience that would overwhelm all other considerations, something momentous enough in the minds of Thuriens-and humans too-to weld their two races into one with a common future with the kind of affinity the Thuriens had been able to show for the Jevlenese.

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