“From a … bomb?” the ambassador said, unable to say the word.

“Yes. Around fifteen kilotons,” the head of state said lightly, as if the misery was unremarkable for him.

The atmosphere of the cross-time meeting grew weighty.

“When did the war start?”

“This one? Two years ago.”

“This one?”

“There’ve been a few since you left.”

Then he changed the subject. He seemed less like a younger man from the future than an elder of the ambassador’s own time, someone to show up at work sites or farms and gather up every hardship in his embrace, letting none slip by. “We will accept all immigrants, and will ensure they live in peace.”

“Is that even possible, given the present circumstances?” The question was put by someone accompanying the ambassador, who herself remained silent.

“The current administration and the entire public will do all they can to accomplish it. That’s our duty,” he said. “Of course, the immigrants must do their best to adapt. That might be hard, given the substantial changes over one hundred and twenty years.”

“What kind of changes?” the ambassador asked. “There’s still war, there’s still slaughter …”

“You’re only seeing the surface,” a general in fatigues said. “Take war for example. Here’s how two countries fight these days. First, they declare the type and quantity of all of their tactical and strategic weapons. Then a computer can determine the outcome of the war according to their mutual rates of destruction. Weapons are purely for deterrence and are never used. Warfare is a computer execution of a mathematical model, the results of which decide the victor and loser.”

“And the mutual destruction rates are obtained how?”

“From the World Weapons Test Organization. Like in your time there was a … World Trade Organization.”

“War is as regular and ordered as economics?”

“War is economics.”

The ambassador looked through the car window at the black world. “But the world doesn’t look like war is only a calculation.”

The head of state looked at the ambassador with heavy eyes. “We did the calculations but didn’t believe the results.”

“So we started one of your wars. With bloodshed. A ‘real’ war,” the general said.

The head changed the subject again. “We’re going to the capital now to study the issues involved with immigrant unfreezing.”

“Take us back,” the ambassador said.

“What?”

“Go back. You can’t take on any additional burdens, and this isn’t a suitable age for immigrants. We’ll go on a little further.”

The hovercar returned to Freezer No. 1. Before leaving, the head handed the ambassador a hardbound book. “A chronicle of the past hundred and twenty years,” he said.