UNIVERSAL TURBULENT

X - PLANET EARTH

Ambassador Hardin Ishimoto-seven left the hotel, eyed the swiftly moving crowd, and slipped into a gap. The bag was light and hung from his shoulder. It bumped people until he tucked it under his right arm. New Yorkers walked quickly, as if late for some endangerment, and he did likewise.

An ex-legionnaire held out his kepi, said something unintelligible, and was lost in the crowd.

Ishimoto had features that his ancestors would have recognized as Japanese, although he was taller and somewhat heavier. It felt strange to look around, to see many individual faces, and know nothing about them.

Not that there were all that many Ishimotos, only about four hundred if memory served, all of whom looked exactly as he did, or had, or would, since all were cloned from the same man but decanted at different times.

Their particular progenitor had been a diplomat, a man Dr. Faucet Mary Hosakawa admired and recruited for her grand experiment. A culture in which each person was born with the genetic qualifications appropriate to his or her particular function. Administrator, carpenter, or cook. Each was descended from the same person, had the same physical body, and had the same genetic tendencies.

Faucet figured that by controlling how many people were created, and what talent they had, the rest would be easy. No unemployment, no mental defectives no civil unrest, no birth defects, and no waste.

That was why the prototype soldier, a man named Jhon Adam Walter, had been replicated thousands of times, while there were only four hundred copies of the great Ishimoto. Perhaps there would have been less war, less pain, and less suffering had the numbers been reversed.

The thought pleased Ishimoto-seven. He walked even more briskly and gloried in the fact that he was momentarily unique. Think of it! Only one Ishimoto on the entire planet, and free to do so as he pleased. Even if that meant accepting employment for he had no particular talent, or gathering a baby.

Things were more liberal now, especially after the Alpha Clone Marius-Six had mates with General Angela Malta to produce a baby, and not just any baby, but a member of the Triad of One, which was in control of the Hegemony's nearly all powerful executive branch. Not a position the aspirant had reached easily, but one that would have been unthinkable a hundred years before.

Still, most of the Hegemony's citizens clung to the traditional ways, concerned lest the free breeder chaos visible on planets such as Earth being their carefully planned society to its knees.

Ishimoto-Seven looked up as horns blared and cabbies gestured at each other through open windows, street-level traffic had been banned more than a hundred year before, and a good thing too, since there was barely enough room to move. All because of free breeding s*x.

My people are correct, Ishimoto thought to himself. That's why it was so important to maintain the status quo, to put limits on what the free breeders could do, and protect the Hegemony.

He turned left and let the human current carry him east. Grand Central Station loomed ahead. The columns and high-arched windows looked much as they had for hundred of years. Multicolored rivers poured through the building's doors, announcements blared, and a maglev waited to depart.

Ishimoto-Seven stepped over the woman in the ragged utility pants, noticed her boots were polished, and wondered why. The crowd pulled, and he followed.

* * *

The two-story building sat on top of a rise where it could look out over the man-made lake to the Rockies beyond. It was made of rocks and had served as a guest lodge back before Elijah Zuon bought it. Other structures, including barns, sheds, and a corral, were visible beyond.

The security troops still wore the winged-hand-and-dagger emblems they had worked so hard to earn. They swept the area for infiltrators, surveillance devices, and bombs. None were found.

Back on the trees, where they couldn't be seen from orbit, other figures lurked. Large, heavily armed figures that weren't supposed to be there.

The Trooper IIs walked on two legs, had fast-recovery laser cannon and 50-caliber machine guns where arms might have been, and carried shoulder-launched missiles. But that was impossible, or should have been.

The officer in charge, a lieutenant who had been released only two months before, spoke into his boom mike. "Bravo One to Delta One, all clear. Over".

There was a pause, followed by two clicks. The first of four aircars arrived two minutes later, circled the lake, and landed in front of the lodge. The machine wore an NI logo.

The driver waited for his passengers to disembark and took off. Gravel rattled on wooden stairs.

The remaining aircraft arrived at five minutes intervals. The security force stood with their backs to the LZ.

Later, with beers in their fists, the ex-legionnaires would wonder who the visitors had been, and what the brass were up to. Not that it mattered much, so long as the rats continued to arrive, and there was pay at the end of the month.

Quinn checked to ensure that the facility was ready. The meeting was slated for the dining room, which, true to the building's style, featured a high ceiling supported by tree-fashioned wagon wheel hung over the large circular table, a fire cracked in the stone fireplace, and the woodwork gleamed with polish.

A check confirmed that a Midvalian seat frame had been flown in, a top-of-the-line holo tank sat ready for use, and there were plenty of refreshments, including some grublike creatures that wriggled in the bottom of a bowl.

The staff, all of whom were androids, would be brain-wiped the moment the meeting was over, reduced to their component parts, and fed into an electric arc furnace. A rather expensive precaution, but necessary nonetheless.

It took fifteen minutes to complete the necessary introductions and dispense with the small talk.

The guest took their seats, all but the War Vaano that is, who loomed behind Vaano's chair, and stood ready to defend him. It was a relationship that neither one of Midvalians could break, and extended to the Egg Vaano, deep in her distant cave.