Stargods by Ian Douglas (best summer books TXT) 📕

“One does not challenge the Tok Iad.”

“Then you are not equals. And you are not allies.”

“Allies . . . fight on the same side against a common enemy.”

Very good, Gray thought. He’s using the vocabulary we fed him. “Exactly. The Nungiirtok were allies with the Sh’daar Collective, right?”

“We were.” The being had been hunched over in its cell, but now it straightened. Pride? Gray wished he could understand theplay of emotions within the Tok’s mind.

“But did you agree to fight on the side of the Sh’daar? Or was it the Tok Lords who made that agreement?”

“The Tok Iad make all agreements with . . . outsiders.”

“So the Tok are slaves.”

Mavtok threw itself toward the transparency, its hinged lower jaw snapping out and slamming against the acrylic with a thud.Somehow, Gray managed to stay in his chair.

The Marines behind them brought their weapons up, and Truitt jumped to his feet. “My God!”

“I don’t think he can get through, Doctor,” Gray said with a casualness he did not feel. “The transparency has been reinforced.”

“Yes, but did you test it?”

“This is the test, Doctor. He didn’t break through, did he?”

Truitt resumed his seat, a bit reluctantly, Gray thought. “Where are you going with this line of questioning?”

“You’ll see.”

“I don’t think provoking it will help us at all.”

Gray didn’t reply, but studied the Tok through narrowed eyes. “Mavtok Chah. You seem distressed when I suggest that the Tok are slaves. Can you explain how you are not?”

Several untranslatable sounds came through the link. “One does not explain the Tok. We give them life. They give us . . .”

“Yes? What do you get in return for life?”

“Death.”

“Hardly seems fair, does it?”

“If a Tok Iad were here, it would explain in full.”

“Would it talk to me? An alien?”

The Tok hesitated. “No.”

“Then you’ll have to explain for them.”

“I . . . cannot.”

“Can you agree with me that the Tok are slaves of the Tok Iad, and not partners?”

“No!”

At least the creature hadn’t attacked the transparency that time.

“Are you trying to get it to agree with you?” Truitt asked, using a private channel. The prisoner could not hear them.

“Of course.”

“Why?”

“I would like these Nungies to become our allies. Right now, I think the only ones they trust are themselves. And the TokLords, of course.”

Truitt nodded. “The problem is that you’re up against cultural cognition.”

“Explain?”

“Very basic psychology, Admiral. We see it in ourselves all the time. Any time you have an opinion, a belief, it gets filteredthrough all of the emotional baggage we’re carrying, right? In particular, it goes through our cultural baggage, the beliefset that helps us identify with our own group, our tribe. Our chances for survival go up if our group identifies us, by ourbaggage, as part of them. That’s why, once someone makes up his mind about something, all of the logic, all of the rationality,all of the scientific proof in the world won’t make a bit of difference if it goes against his cultural mindset.”

Gray thought about the bewildering kaleidoscope of distinct political, religious, and cultural beliefs back on Earth and thought he saw what Truitt meant. You could argue yourself blue in the face against an Ancient Alienist or an anti-singularist or, hell, a flat-Earther, but the harder you argued, the more the other guy would dig in his heels and refuse to reconsider those beliefs. Those beliefs, even the most bizarre, were shared by groups, and changing your mind meant alienation from the people with whom you identified.

“So what’s the answer, Doctor?” Gray asked.

“You soften your opponent up a bit first. Like this.” Truitt stood up and approached the transparency. “I’m sorry my friendhere upset you, Mavtok,” he transmitted over the open channel. “He doesn’t understand. I can tell you must feel enormous prideat being a part of the Tok and Tok Iad union. You’re a part of a productive and vital civilization, one that’s been aroundfor . . . I don’t know how long, but millions of years, maybe. That is amazing. I hope you can share some of the details ofhow your culture managed that.”

“I did not know any of you understood this,” Mavtok said.

“Oh, some of us do. And we admire you for what you’ve done.”

“Flattery, Doctor?” Gray asked on the private channel.

“Affirmation, Admiral. Some important experiments from a few centuries ago showed that if you get the subject to feel good about himself,you greatly increase the chance of getting him to accept your argument.”

“You’re getting him to feel good about himself?”

“In a manner of speaking, yes. We don’t understand their psychology well enough to be certain this will work, but it’s certainlyworth a try. You weren’t getting anywhere with your tactics.”

“Whatever works, Doctor.”

For almost another half an hour, Truitt chatted with the alien, getting it to talk about itself, about what it had done, about the accomplishments of its civilization. Much of what it talked about was all but unintelligible to the humans. What, for instance, was the cultural significance of ascending to Toktok Moda, or of the mass genocide of a species that refused to fight?

Once, during a break in the conversation, Gray laughed. “You know, I never thought I’d be playing good-cop bad-cop with aNungie.”

“What’s that?”

“A technique in law enforcement from, oh, a few centuries back. Back before we could simply download a suspect’s in-head hardware.A suspect would be interrogated by two officers. One would be the tough guy, yelling, pounding the table, threatening thesuspect. The other would bring coffee, talk nice, be a pal, as they used to say.”

“Ah, yes. This is much the same thing, actually. If the suspect forms an emotional bond with the ‘good cop,’ he might be willingto talk. In this case, we want to see if we can get our prisoner to see our side of things, to see reason.”

Later still, Truitt moved the ongoing conversation back around to the relationship between the Tok and the Tok Lords. “So . . .help me to understand, Mavtok,” he said. “You Tok voluntarily offer your bodies to the lords, yes?”

“There is no coercion, no.”

“And the Masters plant their seed inside your chest cavity, where it takes root and grows.”

“We