:- Honestly, I think that if true ambition were so common, I would have had a very different experience in Velgarth. ...I suppose it is not impossible that the gods selectively bred it out of our population, since anyone slightly less paranoid than myself would be set on fire for their efforts and would not come back. And - perhaps what is rare enough to be almost nonexistent in a population of thirty million, is very different with thirty billion: 

He closes his eyes. 

:Think what you will of me. My main point is that - I hope, maybe - that if I tell your father he is being an idiot and he should listen to my wisdom, he might listen, when he would not listen to anyone else: 

He might, if he thinks you understand his grand vision. I'm not sure he has anything to offer you, though. He doesn't have this lab anymore. We do.

:He has context on this star system. Potential contacts with the UN and Mars. - He seems very confident that his people would not allow a war to start for real. I - am dubious that he is not being careful enough, that is something I did, eventually, learn. But people know him. They do not know me. Also he has monetary and personnel resources, and I am...very poorly equipped on both of those fronts: 

Anderson Dawes has context and knows people. He doesn't have as much money, because no one has as much money, but I don't even know what you need money for right now.

:I have no specific plans, but - well, for example I could pay for medical care for both of us. Knowing what you know about me now, do you think Anderson Dawes is someone who would be...willing to work with me?: 

A brief pause. 

:- honestly we might have some things in common. Your world does not have alien gods, but it does have Earth and Mars, and it does seem - not in those powers' interests, to improve the state of affairs in the Belt. That is what Anderson Dawes is fighting. I - imagine he would be willing to be very ruthless, to achieve what he wants: 

Yes. I think he'd work with you.

:- Do you think there is literally any possible way I could convince him to work collaboratively with the UN or Mars? I do not need him to like their leaders, or forgive them for any of what they have done. Simply to realize that - the protomolecule is bigger than any of the factions in this star system. And I do not have good feelings about a happy ending, if all the factions are mostly thinking about obtaining it for themselves first, to use as a weapon against their enemies: 

Depends on what you mean by 'work collaboratively', probably. And on how stupid the UN and Mars are being.

:...What is your assessment of how likely Mars and Earth are to be stupid? Do you have any guesses of which leaders in both powers are - the kind of people I could work with?: 

Mars and Earth are awful to the Belt but they don't want a war, probably they'll be possible to reason with. I don't know that many politicians. People say that the Secretary General's all right?

:Noted: 

Leareth sighs again, heavily. 

:I - am concerned that given the starting conditions here, it will be very difficult to convince anyone other than your father's team to work with the protomolecule rather than against it. Nevertheless, I do appreciate that your father is...not a good ally in many ways. I need to think on the matter: 

Well. Good luck.

:Is there anything else you can tell me about - your impression of him. What he was like to you, as a father; how you saw him interact with other people?: 

Whichever option he chooses, he HAS to understand Jules Pierre Mao. And he has a feeling that he doesn't, yet; that his mind is filling in a picture from a few scattered puzzle-pieces, and he has no idea how much of that is the right extrapolation, for this man's real underlying motives... And Nayoki could get that from deepscanning him, but that's impossible to pull off without Mao noticing - 

He's a shitty manipulative father. He can't handle people disagreeing with him and he's incapable of seeing them as equals. He doesn't give a shit about Belters and he hangs out with people who don't mind.

Leareth nods, slowly. That...doesn't not fit with what he and Nayoki observed during their meeting. Jules Pierre Mao wasn't trying - not at all, really - to bring them on board as equals. He was tempted to write them off entirely. Because he thought Leareth would be dead in a week, of course - which is understandable of him, really. 

:Thank you. I - I need to think, and I ought let you rest: 

He closes his eyes. 

Julie grimaces.

Then she grabs her hand terminal and texts someone.

[Hey, are you awake?]

[Yeah. Lungs okay?]

[Seems to be. You had a transmission ready to go, explaining everything?]

[Yeah. For if that's how we decide to go.]

[Do it.]

[Send it, tell people what's happening.]

[Otherwise they're just going to get away with it.]

[Okay]

[Do you need an extraction]

[They can give the proto orders]

[If they're that mad about it I'm dead]

[but I think they care about being the good guys]

[thanks for the offer though]

[does anyone on your team even know how to use a gun]

[Amos does]

[I haven't asked where he learned]

[Sent]

[Good luck]

The autodoc is fretting about Julie's blood pressure. She puts the news back on.

Leareth isn't actively reading her mind. It's - unfriendly, adversarial as an act, and besides he's way too tired. And if he'd wanted to minimize the chances that she would...react badly and do something about it...he would have had a very different conversation with her. 

He nonetheless has his Thoughtsensing just open enough to sense that she's agitated about something. 

:Emril? Message to Nayoki, ask her - if anything happens - do not wake me unless it is an emergency, though: 

And within a minute he's asleep.