Rajiv to finish.
“Wow!” exclaimed Rajiv suddenly, Rajiv, who was not wont to indulge in vulgar or antiquated expressions of astonishment. “According to this, he flourished for five hundred years. Do you suppose they live that long?”
“How should we know?” asked Jo. “We don’t know a damned thing about their physiology. They are clearly built for efficiency, though, or perhaps have engineered themselves to be so. Cara’s studies of the Rhuian population indicate that the humans transported here were engineered as well, to make them disease resistant and to adapt them to the planet. So why shouldn’t they live that long?”
“It might explain,” said Charles slowly, “why their social structure is so static. Longevity might encourage stability, or even stagnation.”
“Like the old folk stories of elves and the fairy kingdom?” asked Maggie. “Isn’t that the analogy Cara used? Their world is static because it can’t change.”
“Yes,” said David, breaking in, “but we don’t know if five hundred years is a short life span or a long one, then, even if it’s true. What if it refers to the amount of time the Mushai dukedom flourished? Not the individual?”
“No,” said Rajiv. “I’m certain it’s the individual. The famous. Our rebel Mushai. Hold on.” He mumbled under his breath, talking to himself as he manipulated a three-dimensional matrix that floated above the surface of his slate.
David stared at the Imperial palace and wondered what it had really looked like in the Tai-en Mushai’s time. Or had it looked the same? Was the empire so old and so unchanging? They did not know. And indeed, why should they, humanity, minor subjects of powerful alien masters, be granted access to such information?
Rajiv sighed. “All right. As far as I can calculate, the transportations from Earth to Rhui of human populations took place over a two hundred year period approximately fourteen thousand four hundred years ago. I’ve got three calendrical dates. Chapalii yaotiwaganishi-chichanpa-oten-li. Before League Concordance 14,185 to approximately 13,985. Let me see, or, archaeologically speaking, you could use the old Common Era dates of approximately 12,135 B.C.E. to 11,935 B.C.E. I’ll get exact figures in a moment.”
“It jibes with Jo’s dating.” Charles nodded. “Remarkable, and that’s from a Chapalii source.”
“If she was telling the truth,” said Maggie.
“If.” Charles walked over to stand next to David, examining the glories of the imperial palace. “But I have no evidence to suggest that she is lying. Rajiv. Bring up the tables again. Everything.”
Rajiv had ordered the sequence in some wildly confusing web, with spheres and cubes and flat tables displaying scrolling data bases. David found the spray of color and shifting symbols nauseating.
“Rajiv, what is your analysis of the material contained here?” asked Charles, seemingly unaffected by this dynamic.
Rajiv considered before he answered the question, because he preferred accuracy to speed. “The easiest analogy would be to imagine we had contained here all economic, political, transportation, and commercial schedules and statistics and timetables and—well, you get the idea—for all the planets contained within the League. Except it’s far more complex than that, and not only because it contains this vast amount of information on the inner workings and structure of the Chapalii Empire. Timetables, calendrical dates within the year although not of the years themselves, economic indices, shipping charts and cargo information, freight schedules, census of house affiliations and house wealth, an atlas of all inhabited and uninhabited regions with reference to population, movement, available resources and potential resource exploitation—” He paused only to take in a breath.
“Complete and extensive.”
“Encyclopedic and precise. Cross-referenced. Triple cross-referenced. Their referencing system is
“Wow!” exclaimed Rajiv suddenly, Rajiv, who was not wont to indulge in vulgar or antiquated expressions of astonishment. “According to this, he flourished for five hundred years. Do you suppose they live that long?”
“How should we know?” asked Jo. “We don’t know a damned thing about their physiology. They are clearly built for efficiency, though, or perhaps have engineered themselves to be so. Cara’s studies of the Rhuian population indicate that the humans transported here were engineered as well, to make them disease resistant and to adapt them to the planet. So why shouldn’t they live that long?”
“It might explain,” said Charles slowly, “why their social structure is so static. Longevity might encourage stability, or even stagnation.”
“Like the old folk stories of elves and the fairy kingdom?” asked Maggie. “Isn’t that the analogy Cara used? Their world is static because it can’t change.”
“Yes,” said David, breaking in, “but we don’t know if five hundred years is a short life span or a long one, then, even if it’s true. What if it refers to the amount of time the Mushai dukedom flourished? Not the individual?”
“No,” said Rajiv. “I’m certain it’s the individual. The famous. Our rebel Mushai. Hold on.” He mumbled under his breath, talking to himself as he manipulated a three-dimensional matrix that floated above the surface of his slate.
David stared at the Imperial palace and wondered what it had really looked like in the Tai-en Mushai’s time. Or had it looked the same? Was the empire so old and so unchanging? They did not know. And indeed, why should they, humanity, minor subjects of powerful alien masters, be granted access to such information?
Rajiv sighed. “All right. As far as I can calculate, the transportations from Earth to Rhui of human populations took place over a two hundred year period approximately fourteen thousand four hundred years ago. I’ve got three calendrical dates. Chapalii yaotiwaganishi-chichanpa-oten-li. Before League Concordance 14,185 to approximately 13,985. Let me see, or, archaeologically speaking, you could use the old Common Era dates of approximately 12,135 B.C.E. to 11,935 B.C.E. I’ll get exact figures in a moment.”
“It jibes with Jo’s dating.” Charles nodded. “Remarkable, and that’s from a Chapalii source.”
“If she was telling the truth,” said Maggie.
“If.” Charles walked over to stand next to David, examining the glories of the imperial palace. “But I have no evidence to suggest that she is lying. Rajiv. Bring up the tables again. Everything.”
Rajiv had ordered the sequence in some wildly confusing web, with spheres and cubes and flat tables displaying scrolling data bases. David found the spray of color and shifting symbols nauseating.
“Rajiv, what is your analysis of the material contained here?” asked Charles, seemingly unaffected by this dynamic.
Rajiv considered before he answered the question, because he preferred accuracy to speed. “The easiest analogy would be to imagine we had contained here all economic, political, transportation, and commercial schedules and statistics and timetables and—well, you get the idea—for all the planets contained within the League. Except it’s far more complex than that, and not only because it contains this vast amount of information on the inner workings and structure of the Chapalii Empire. Timetables, calendrical dates within the year although not of the years themselves, economic indices, shipping charts and cargo information, freight schedules, census of house affiliations and house wealth, an atlas of all inhabited and uninhabited regions with reference to population, movement, available resources and potential resource exploitation—” He paused only to take in a breath.
“Complete and extensive.”
“Encyclopedic and precise. Cross-referenced. Triple cross-referenced. Their referencing system is
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