‘Fuck off.’
This outburst drew a blink from Grave, but he looked more puzzled than offended. ‘I’m sorry – did we get off on the wrong foot again? I was praising your work, not criticising it.’
‘You know exactly what you were doing.’
Grave’s smile was all innocence. ‘Do I?’
‘Rubbing my nose in the truth, at least as you see it. You’re so happy about that, aren’t you? Look at you. You can barely contain your joy that the Tantors won’t be coming back. They were an affront to your view of things because they dared to displace humanity from the centre of the universe. Well, fuck that as well. They were something marvellous and beautiful, a new possibility – but you can’t handle that.’
‘I see we’re going to get on tremendously.’ At last the smile faded, replaced by an expression of quiet sadness and resignation. ‘I know you disagree with Maslin’s position and I don’t blame you for that. But most of us are just trying to see both sides.’ He combed his fingers through his hair, pushing it back from his glistening forehead. ‘How well do you know everyone else?’
‘What sort of question is that?’
‘Not an unreasonable one.’ His eyes were pink with sweat. ‘It’s only human nature to divide everyone into groups and cohorts, but it’s not always like that. The Second Chance delegation was thrown together at the last minute, with a lot of disagreement and compromise. You see twelve of us and think we’re all exactly alike, but I feel I know you almost as well as I do some of my colleagues.
‘On the other hand, we sometimes feel beleaguered and believe the rest of you are thinking in lockstep. I’d wager that isn’t true, either. We’re just people, all of us. Thank goodness for your uncle, I say. Mposi is a very good man – we all like him.’
‘I’m thrilled for you.’
‘So much for that, then. I’m trying to offer an olive branch – I thought you’d respond well to a little intellectual discourse. Shall I let you in on a secret? There’s no chance of Vasin changing her mind and Maslin knows it. He’s stated his case, and now he’ll go along with whatever she decides.’
‘All right,’ Goma said, slowly, as if she had to consider each word. ‘You and I are never going to be friends. Your people screwed up my mother’s life and you’ve gone to a lot of trouble to screw up mine. Collectively, I mean, with your stupid, repressive, backward-looking, antiscientific ideology. But I do have to share this ship with you.’
‘If we both took the time, Goma, I’m sure we’d find a lot more in common than divides us. But I’ll say one thing for that Watchkeeper. It unifies us in one very important sense.’
‘Which is?’
‘We’re all equally terrified.’
They could see it with their own eyes now. It was forty-five hours since Goma learned the news; five more hours until the projections said the Watchkeepers would be on them.
They crowded the windows, lights turned low. It was approaching on a nearly parallel course although not moving in the manner they might have expected – with its blunt or sharp end aligned with the direction of travel – but rather sideways, showing the utmost alien disdain for sensible human notions of physics and propulsion. And indeed, as the distance narrowed to tens of thousands of kilometres – the mere span of a world – so the Watchkeeper compassed around with a terrible grindstone slowness. Blue light spilled from the gaps in its pine-cone coating and from the ‘signalling’ aperture at its thick end. The light abated just as the beam was about to sweep over Travertine and then resumed on the other side of the ship.
By then no one was sleeping and all but the most essential housekeeping duties were being postponed. It was hard to eat, hard to talk about anything other than the unignorable presence outside.
Goma was on her way to Mposi’s cabin when she heard raised voices coming from behind the door. They were the voices of two older men and she recognised both. Not quite a blazing argument, but as close to one as she had yet heard aboard Travertine. She considered turning around, but a fierce compulsion made her continue, knocking hard on the door until Mposi answered.
‘Ah. Goma. Maslin and I were just . . .’ But her uncle trailed off, surely knowing she would not be assuaged by any explanation he could offer.
‘What were you discussing?’ Goma asked, still standing on the threshold.
‘It’s not too late,’ Karayan said, dressed in his usual formal attire. ‘We have a few more hours. A gesture from us, a small change of course, that would be sufficient.’
‘As far as I can tell,’ Goma said, ‘Captain Vasin has made up her mind.’
‘Of which you doubtless approve.’
‘I approve of doing what we came here to do, which is carry on into space. Were you hoping to bend Mposi to your view, Maslin?’
‘That would be for your uncle to decide.’
‘I think my uncle knows what’s best. Why do you even talk to these people, Mposi? They’ve got their concession – they’re on the ship. There’s no need to give them any more ground.’
‘I am sorry for troubling you,’ Karayan said, directing his statement at Mposi. ‘Sorry also that your niece would prefer disharmony and factionalism to cooperation and mutual advancement. But she is young. It would be wrong to expect too much from someone with so little experience of life.’ Something moved under his beard: a smile, perhaps. ‘You’ll convey my sentiments to Gandhari, Mposi?’
‘Of course.’
‘That’s very good of you.’
When the Second Chancer had gone, Mposi held an uncomfortable silence before speaking. ‘He was within his rights to speak to me, Goma. You didn’t have to take such an automatically hostile tone. He has strong feelings. Why shouldn’t he?’
‘You were arguing.’
‘We were being frank with one another. At our age, I think we’ve earned it.’ A sudden weariness appeared to overcome him. ‘Oh dear. The last thing I want is to exchange harsh words with you, of all people.’ He gestured for her to enter his cabin. ‘Shall I make us some chai?’ I fear it may have come to that.’
‘I was angry, and I’m sorry. I just . . . don’t like them.’
Mposi closed the door on the rest of the ship. ‘None of them?’
‘I make no exceptions. They’ve chosen their ideology; I’m free to choose mine in response.’
‘They can’t be our enemies for the entire trip, Goma. Sooner or later we’ll have to do the unthinkable and start liking each other. They’re as nervous of us as we are of them! And Maslin doesn’t have the automatic authority you imagine. His selection was controversial, even within Second Chance circles. He barely knows some of his own people, several of whom were actively critical of his appointment. All that rhetoric of his? He has to do that to bolster his strength within the delegation. But in person he’s perfectly reasonable and open to persuasion.’
Goma sat down on the chair Mposi kept for visitors. ‘It didn’t sound that way.’
‘I would not have admitted him into my cabin if I did not trust the man, Goma. Anyway, there’s a lot we needed to talk about. Might I ask you something?’ Despite her lack of encouragement, Mposi was fussing in his kitchen, boiling water for chai.
‘It depends.’
‘It’s about Peter Grave. You know him?’
‘Yes, we’ve spoken once or twice.’ She was looking around the room, comparing Mposi’s efforts at personalisation with her own. The room was slightly smaller, but Mposi had it all to himself. She spotted the two elephants, the other pair Ndege had insisted travel on the ship. Goma had the matriarch and a calf; Mposi the bull and another juvenile.
‘What do you make of him?’
‘He’s a Second Chancer. What more do you need to know?’
‘They’re not all cut from the same cloth, Goma. There are pragmatists and hotheads and zealots, just as in any other calling. How well do yo
u know Maslin?’
‘How well am I meant to know him?’
‘He was ill, once, and I did him a small favour. He’s never forgotten that. Deep down, beneath all the bluster, he is a decent man. And his doubts and fears are ours. The odd thing is: Maslin was asking me what I know of Peter Grave. Now why would Maslin quiz me about one of his own people?’
‘As you said, they don’t all know each other particularly well.’
The chai was ready. He set a cup before Goma and took his own seat.
‘I have a slightly unusual position on this ship. The captain isn’t a politician, and because she’s an outsider she doesn’t have strong ties to the Crucible political structure. Whereas I do, which makes me the natural point of contact, I suppose you would call it, for those friends and colleagues concerned with our mutual welfare.’ Mposi spooned honey into their cups, drawing from his precious personal ration. ‘When intelligence comes to light . . . intelligence relating to us, to our expedition, I am the trusted party. And there has been intelligence, Goma. This Watchkeeper isn’t my immediate concern. Or, to put it another way, I am obliged to look beyond it. There is a deeper threat to our success.’
‘What kind of threat?’
‘Call it a sabotage plan, although it’s likely a lot more complicated than that.’
Goma was momentarily lost for words. She had spent enough time around her uncle to know when he was making idle play with her and when he was serious. There was nothing frivolous in his manner now.
‘You’re serious?’ she asked. ‘Actual sabotage – a physical threat to the ship?’
‘My sources on Crucible believe we are carrying something we should not be. A weapon, perhaps – smuggled aboard with the rest of the cargo. Thousands of tonnes of equipment and supplies, much of it for inscrutable purposes – it wouldn’t have been that difficult to slip something through. And by implication, there must be someone – maybe several someones – with the wherewithal to use that weapon. Or maybe the weapon is us, and we just don’t know it. This crisis places us under a lot of stress. But that’s the perfect time to observe our individual reactions. I may have said too much. Have I said too much?’
‘I’ve no idea.’ Goma was still unsettled. ‘Why would anyone put a weapon aboard? What’s the point?’
‘The expedition has never sat well with everyone.’
‘You mean Maslin and his nutcases?’
‘Perhaps.’ But Mposi’s answer was not the automatic affirmation she might have hoped for.
‘What do you know?’
‘Enough to keep me awake at night. As you can imagine, I need to tread very, very carefully. The wrong word, a note of misdirected suspicion – it could sour everything.’
‘Have you spoken to Gandhari about this?’
‘Not yet. To the best of my knowledge, she isn’t aware of the issue, and our captain has enough to worry about for now. When I have definite answers, I’ll go to her.’
‘So who does know?’
‘You, for a start. You’re my extra pair of eyes and ears, Goma, but I don’t want you to do anything out of the ordinary or change your routine in any way. Just carry on as normal.’
‘With that thing out there?’
‘You know what I mean. But be alert, watch other people – and not just the obvious candidates. If you see or hear anything that you think might be of interest to me . . . well, my chai may not be the best, but my door is always open.’
‘And Ru?’ Goma asked. ‘Can I tell her?’
‘It might be expecting too much of an Akinya, asking one to keep a secret,’ Mposi said. ‘Certainly your mother found it beyond her. But you would be doing me a great favour if we could keep this between ourselves, just for now.’
At last the alien machine had turned to face the same direction of travel as the ship, matching their course and acceleration precisely. Goma wanted to do something, and she knew she was not alone in that compulsion. The instinct was to talk, to negotiate, to offer explanation. To beg for clemency, or pray for salvation. But what was the point of even attempting communication after all the years of failure and silence? Negotiating with the Watchkeepers was like negotiating with geology, or some vast, indifferent weather system.
She had been at a window, watching for long, silent minutes, thinking herself alone, when Peter Grave announced his presence at her side.
‘Does it frighten you?’
As irritated as she was at being jolted from her contemplation, she had vowed to be civil with the Second Chancer.
‘It would be strange if it didn’t. They’re an alien machine civilisation, they’ve probably been in space longer than we’ve had tools and language. They could dismantle our entire culture in an afternoon if we did something they didn’t like. We barely know what they want, or what they really think of us. And they’re back, hanging around as if this is judgement hour. Which part shouldn’t I be frightened by?’
‘I agree, totally. And maybe, as you say, this is the hour, the moment. No one has operated a ship like this in this system for decades, and certainly not a ship as fast as Travertine. Perhaps this is the point where we cross a line with them? Some algorithm trips inside them, a decision path, and that’s it? Extinction for the monkeys?’
‘Would you like that to happen?’
‘Do you think I would?’
‘At least you could say you were right all along.’
‘I don’t think that would be much of a consolation. How about you? With your family connection, your grandmother and the Watchkeepers – do you feel you’ve earned some kind of special treatment from them? Your mother must have, when she went poking into Mandala’s secrets.’
‘First,’ Goma said, trying to keep her voice as level as possible, ‘she wasn’t “poking”. She was conducting a structured scientific investigation based on a profound theoretical breakthrough in the understanding of the Mandala grammar. Second, I didn’t ask for a deep, meaningful conversation about my ancestors.’
‘Ah, and there was me thinking we’d turned a page.’
‘Don’t hold your breath.’
‘Regardless of what you think of me, I honestly admire what your grandmother did for us. All of us do – every human being on Crucible. Chiku’s martyrdom —’
‘Don’t put martyrdom on her – she deserves better than that.’
‘You speak as if she might still be alive.’
‘No one’s proved that she isn’t.’
‘Someone sent this message to us. No one would blame you for presuming a family connection. But it has been a very long time, Goma.’
‘Meaning what?’
‘I know many of us were alive at the time of the first landing, but your grandmother was already old by then.’ For a few seconds, Grave studied the alien machine, some of its holy blue radiance anointing his face. If it had not been so dark in the room she would never have tolerated him being so close to her. ‘I hope you find answers, anyway. I meant everything I said to you, when we first met. I do have great respect for your work.’
‘So you say.’
‘Believe me, Goma – nothing’s as black and white as you think. Our feelings towards the elephants are much more complex than you imagine. We regret what they were, we regret the mistake of them, but we also mourn for what became of them.’
‘Hate the sin but not the sinner?’
‘If you wish to put it in those terms. It was a terrible day, in any case – a stain on our collective history. Yet Mandala’s retribution could have been much more severe.’
‘You think this was about retribution? That Mandala was somehow acting against the Tantors?’
‘The facts are all we have,’ Grave replied. ‘Mandala was provoked, Mandala acted, and the uplifted elephants ceased to exist. I make no inferences. It is up to each and every one of us to draw such conclusions as we s
ee fit.’
‘I’ve changed my mind,’ Goma said, after a silence. ‘I was starting to think I might be able to stand being in the same room as you, let alone the same ship. I was wrong.’
‘And I am very sorry that we cannot find common ground.’
‘There isn’t any. There never will be.’
She was speaking when the blue radiance increased its intensity by many factors. There was barely time to react, barely time for anyone in the room to do more than draw breath. Goma had an impression, no more than that, of the gaps in the Watchkeeper’s layered, armour-like plating opening up, the way a pine cone changed with the weather, permitting more of its internal blue glow to gush out into space. And then it was gone – not just the blue glow, but the entire alien machine.
It had simply disappeared.
CHAPTER TWELVE
Kanu was unsettled. While Nissa slept, her ship operating itself, he made his way from window to window, pausing at each to survey his reflection – the cabin lights were dim but not totally off – and attempt to convince himself that he had not begun to slip into madness. What he saw in the reflection was the face of a profoundly troubled man with a desperate, searching stare in his eyes – as if the face in the glass expected answers of him, the man least capable of giving them.
He thought about what happened to him on Mars and everything he had been through since – the deaths of his colleagues, his own recuperation, the end of his political career. It would have been odd if he did not look troubled, like a man cast adrift from every certainty. But there was more to it than that, and as much as he tried to rationalise, he could not find a way to explain what he had dreamed. He had not known the name of her ship until she told him. So how was it possible that it had been prefigured during his dreams on Mars, when he never had the slightest intention of recontacting Nissa Mbaye?
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