“You’ll receive basic combat and weapons training at the appropriate lesson cycle. It’s one of the least important aspects of Cultural Theory.”
“Oh.”
Manatu appeared at the door again. “Theorist—”
“They can wait one more moment.” Seg dug in the med-kit for a stim tab. He and Ama hadn’t slept much since their reunion, and napping during the Question wouldn’t go over well.
The cold rush hit his system. He marched out to the common room and passed a mini-film to Lissil.
“House Haffset will host a Victory Commemoration for the raid. It isn’t for several weeks, but you’ll need to make arrangements for the trans, order a dress uniform for me and appropriate rental attire for Ama and yourself. I’ve authorized funds; do you know how to access the Merchant Delivery Network?”
“Of course, Theorist,” Lissil said, with a solemn nod. She reached for the Guild Insignia pinned on his collar. “Let me fix that, it’s crooked.”
As Lissil worked, he noticed a pulsing number in the lower corner of the common room wallscreen. His unread messages had reached two hundred and forty-eight.
“System, reflective.” The wallscreen blackened and then shimmered to a mirror. His physical appearance was slightly worse for wear, but he shrugged it off and straightened his shirt and coat. Lissil had backed away, hands clasped together in front of her. In the mirror, he saw Ama watching.
“This Victory Commemoration, it’s a party?” she asked, her voice unusually hesitant.
“Of a sort,” he said.
“Your People will be there?”
“It is a gathering of the People, yes.” He could not begin to guess at her fascination with the event but there were bound to be many more moments of cultural differences between them.
“And Lissil and I will go with you—”
“Yes, yes. Look, Ama, when—”
“As caj?”
At the word, his hands dropped to his sides.
Ama clenched and unclenched her fists. “I fought beside your people at the temple, my Kenda brothers and I risked our lives for those raiders. I won’t bow down to anyone.”
When he turned, he saw in her face how completely he had failed to assess these new circumstances. She had pretended to be caj once before and, in the brief moment he had considered the party, he assumed she would do so again, that she would understand the need to live within the social parameters of his world. For now, at least.
“No, nor should you. It’s of no concern. Your attendance is not mandatory. You may stay behind. Lissil too, if she wishes. However, I have no choice. It’s an important evening for the Guild, for me, for my career. For us.”
The matter settled, he made as if to leave but Ama was not done with him.
“So my choices are that I can be your caj or I can stay home. And when will I be able to go out with you, among your people and not as your caj?”
He saw that look of hers, the one with the set jaw that said she was ready for a fight. Her eyes, which changed color depending on her mood and surroundings, had turned a blue so dark they were nearly black, her dathe flared. Out of the corner of his eye, he was aware of Lissil and Manatu pretending not to notice the conflict.
“The People do not recognize Outers as anything other than caj. The only distinction is grafted or ungrafted, tamed or wild. The only reason you and the other Kenda remain unregistered, unprocessed, and ungrafted is because of my position in this society. If I were to walk into the Haffset estate and proclaim you my equal? That position would be lost. At best, I would be shuffled off to a dusty corner of the Guild, my salary cut until I had barely enough to support myself. You, Lissil, and all the Kenda would be auctioned off to pay my debts. At worst, I would be blacked, removed from the Guild, and all of you would be killed or, worse, sent to the ponds. You have to understand, I have as little choice in this as you. I warned you about this before you returned.”
“You also said you were going to change your world.”
“I am changing my world, but you do not restructure an entire society in a day. This is the work of lifetimes. How quickly did you and yours change your world? How quickly would you have done it had I not come and done it for you?”
“You did it? You alone? If I hadn’t—”
A loud chime sounded, a signal that the waiting trans was about to leave with or without him. He nodded to Manatu to leave.
“I have to go,” he told Ama, and pushed past her.
She followed him to the door.
“Yes, go play hero. You do that well.”
He whirled to face her. “I bled for your family and your people. You chose to come here after I warned you how it would be. Don’t blame me for your freely made choices.”
He punched the button as he stormed out, sealing Ama’s accusations behind him.
“Theorist Segkel Eraranat, called to Question on the events of Raid Eraranat 001,” the Guild Accountancy announced as Seg stepped into the Question Chamber.
He had seen the space before, on a tour as a cadet. At the time, he had been awed by the history. At the half-moon dais had sat the greatest minds of the Guild. At the small table the dais faced, thousands of Field Theorists had presented, sometimes defended, the details of their raids. Between these gray stone walls, decorated only with a large relief of the Guild insignia, the foundation of Guild protocol had been formed.
Today his boyish awe of the past was replaced by satisfaction. In a moment, he would sit in the same chair that had been occupied by legends—Berrenge, Vonce, Cordray, and of course Lannit. At last, he was where he deserved to be.
In the center of the dais, flanked by six other Senior Theorists, sat the Lead Questioner, Theorist Maryel Aimaz. Gray-haired, silent, and austere, she was the human equivalent of the Chamber.
Theorist Aimaz, he had been informed, had specifically selected herself to oversee his Question. While this was within the spectrum of her duties, as she was in the rotation for Lead Questioner, it was likely also an attempt to attach her name to the process and share in some of the publicity of the raid, even if only within the Guild. A shrewd political maneuver, and not surprising.
The Aimaz family had its roots deep in the Guild, back to the Founding itself. Maryel’s daughter had declined to take up the family profession, but there was a great-nephew who had been one year ahead of Seg in training. As with most of the privileged class of old Guild families, the junior Aimaz had carried an air of entitlement and superiority over first-generation cadets, especially those few who had come from a family of the laboring class, as Seg had.
The junior Aimaz had also yet to head a raid that had brought back profit above vita expenditure, or perform any tasks of note. The thought brought a brief smirk to Seg’s face as he sat down at the small table in front of the forum of Questioners.
“Something amuses you, Theorist?” Maryel asked.
“Simply a pleasure to be home,” he said.
Maryel gave one short, sharp nod. “Indeed. A feeling known to all who sit in this chamber.”
Seg glanced at the digifilm waiting for him on the table. The film contained the full text of his reports as yet completed. He scrolled through the reports and then closed the screen. Further reading was unnecessary. He knew what he had written, what version of events he had delivered.
He looked back up to see Maryel watching him closely, unnervingly so. Their gazes locked and, unlike most, she did not look away. They sat staring at each other until one of the Theorists sitting next to her cleared his throat.
Maryel looked down at the table and lifted her own film. “On this date, 42 and 17 and 76, the Cultural Theorist’s Guild formally begins the Question of Theorist Segkel Eraranat on the conduct and outcomes of Raid Eraranat 001. All parties to this discussion are bound by Law and Orthodoxy to give t
rue witness to all events and particulars to the fullest extent of their knowledge and oaths to the Guild. Theorist Eraranat, do you understand this procedure?”
“I do,” Seg said.
“Then we shall begin with the pre-Question statement of the overseeing Theorist. Theorist Eraranat, what matters will you bring to the attention of the Question?”
Seg shrugged. “I haven’t entirely completed the report yet, but all matters pertinent to the first-day Question are completed, as well as approximately seventy percent of the remaining material. I assume we can move ahead after we dispose of the first-day material in a timely fashion?”
Maryel looked down on him and something in the gaze made the hairs on Seg’s neck stand up. He could not say why, but he felt adrenaline surge into his system. Something was wrong.
“This will be most unlikely, Theorist,” she said.
“Why? The necessary reports are complete.”
“It is perhaps unortho to engage in a discourse on the material of reports before their time of introduction, Theorist, but these reports of yours are hardly complete. Your Raider Interaction Log makes no detailed mention of the conflicts that occurred between you and the recon squad that accompanied you. Your Indigenous Encounter Form likewise notes little more than rough time and date estimates for contacts with the Outers you dealt with during the recon, and during the raid, and the outcome of those contacts. It is generally a given that such matters will be analyzed in depth to determine how vita sources were efficiently located, assuming they were, and what was possibly missed. The Question serves to illustrate the rights and wrongs of a raid, not to touch on the barest details thereof.”
Seg flushed and dug his fingers slightly into the top of the table. “I … understand your point, Questioner.”
Maryel continued. “Then there is the matter of the complaint filed against you by Lieutenant Kerbin of your recon squad. While the complaint was withdrawn, the post-mission reviews of all surviving squad members, other than Trooper Manatu Dibeld, call your judgment and professional conduct into question. Differences of opinion are expected in our field, but these matters must be addressed.”
“Lieutenant Kerbin is small-minded and no judge of Theorist operations. Whatever her competence in fieldcraft, she has no idea how to conduct proper vita surveys,” Seg said.
Maryel lifted her chin, her eyes narrowed. She leaned forward and Seg, once more, was swept with foreboding.
“Lieutenant Kerbin has no idea how to conduct proper vita surveys?” Maryel asked, deliberately enunciating every word in a low voice. “Then you will explain why you detached yourself from the body of the squad and sent her and the other troopers to do precisely that.”
Ama stared at the open box on the floor of the sleeping quarters. She had hurled it at the door when Seg had left so abruptly and its fall had dislodged a piece of paper, clearly a note of some kind judging from the handwriting. This was Seg’s personal business and probably important—paper was rare and valuable on this world—but she did not feel particularly beholden to him at this moment, and so scooped the note off the ground and unfolded it.
The writing was a small piece of art, with high swooping curves and intricately joined letters. In contrast, the sentiment was simple:
You’ve earned this.
~ Jarin
And below that, in quotations:
“The striver accepts not acclaim, but further challenges. This is the reward to those who seek to make true difference.” ~ Kiros Aimaz
She read the quote again then carried it to the bed, sat, and read it once more.
…further challenges.
Her eyes kept returning to those two words.
Seg had tried to stop her, tried to talk her out of following him to his world. She knew, they both knew, what awaited them if they followed this path. Challenges—this was what their life would consist of now. This she had known before putting one foot in the gate but it was not until this morning that she understood, in real terms, what it meant.
He’s difficult … but then so are you. More words. These from her father.
“Difficult.” She sighed.
This victory party was something important to Seg, to his work. Their work.
From her pocket, she pulled out the digifilms Seg had left for her to study; she traced her fingers along the edges. Training wasn’t going to be as exciting as she had imagined, and the year before the next mission would drag slowly. Under his training, however, she would become his assistant and learn about cultural theory. When they did finally explore those other worlds, they would do so side by side, as equals. One day, even his people would have to see that she was not caj, not lesser simply by virtue of where she had been born. But until then?
Cultural infiltration. Seg spoke of it often, stressing the importance of blending seamlessly with the various castes of foreign civilizations. On her world he had posed as both Damiar and Welf, master and servant, with equal ease. In the days since Seg had brought her to his home, she had occasionally flipped through his paper books. Her favorite contained likenesses and stories of people from hundreds of different worlds. No matter how exotic looking, Seg had explained that Theorists had secretly infiltrated almost all of those cultures. That was the job. His job. And soon it would be hers.
She could treat this party as cultural infiltration. For one night she could pretend, try to blend in with other caj, consider it part of her training. And who knew, maybe meeting an ungrafted Outer would bring about some small change to these people. She could show them something new, show them not all Outers were savages to be controlled by force.
If nothing else, it would get her out of this infernal room for one night.
“Go, get this over with.”
Predictably, Lissil was at her post in front of the wallscreen. She was busy trying on fluffery for the Haffset party. At the moment Ama walked in, she stood in front of an image of a dark orange gown covered liberally with yellow, sparkling gems. On the screen, there was a type of mirror that let her see herself in the dress.
“Too plain,” Lissil said. “Next selection.”
Plain? Ama couldn’t contain her smile; it looked as if Lissil had been set on fire.
Lissil said nothing at Ama’s entrance, simply frowned at the next outfit, a pale lavender frock, and instantly demanded another.
“Order something plain for me.” Ama leaned against the wall. “Very plain.”
“You’re attending?” Lissil asked. At Ama’s nod she added, with one raised eyebrow, “You’ve finally accepted that you’re caj?”
Ama pushed off the wall and turned to leave. “Just order something plain.”
“If you think you’re going to learn his job, you’ll have to do better than that.”
At Lissil’s words, Ama stopped.
“There are expectations, especially for the caj of the People’s Hero. The People of the World pride themselves on being conservative. But how do you show off your status at a party if you can’t wear bright colors or flashy jewels?” She didn’t wait for Ama to answer, as she gestured to the image of herself in the latest ensemble. “Caj. You let your caj be your color. The bigger, the brighter, the more exotic your caj, the more impressed your fellow People will be. We’re their color, we’re their status. Haffset is a Major House now; their party will be full of beautifully costumed caj.”
Ama frowned as she took in the gaudy arrangement of iridescent blue and purple, complete with a train of feathers. “Son of a whore,” she muttered. “Fluffery.”
“This is how they do things. If you want to blend—”
“Plain,” Ama said.
“Plain,” Lissil repeated. “You truly still believe you’re not caj?”
“I’m not. One day these people will understand that.”
“What do you see
when you look at me?” Once more, Lissil didn’t wait for Ama’s reply. “You see a Welf. You see someone who grubs around in the dirt or cleans the fish guts off your docks. Even on this new world, you will always see me as your servant. And the People will always see you as theirs.”
“Things will change.”
“Don’t count on it. And if it comes to a choice between you and Eraranat’s People, or his career, you’ll be registered and shipped off to processing before you can whistle. He’s already talked about it. Jarin said he could find another place for you. You would have to be grafted and processed, of course, but the old man said you wouldn’t have to work too hard and your owner wouldn’t be a monster.”
“That’s a lie.”
“There are worse ways to live.” Lissil turned around slowly and the image of the dress with the feathers turned with her. “Perfect. I’ll have to have the matching face paint and hair ornaments as well, but since your dress will be less extravagant we can afford it.” She turned once more and said “Order,” to the screen.
Nothing happened.
“Order,” she commanded, with more volume. When the screen remained as it was, her hands curled into fists. “Order, you stupid machine!”
“It’s not available,” Ama said. At Lissil’s blank face, she continued, “The dress isn’t available. Look at the bottom of the screen, the words say temporarily unavailable. See, those big orange letters?”
Lissil’s mouth hung open for the barest moment, then she tossed her head to one side. “I didn’t really want this one anyway.”
As she demanded the next selection, Ama saw color rise to the girl’s face and understood. Lissil was so well spoken, she had never questioned her education. But she was a Welf, after all. Whatever schooling Lissil had received, Ama guessed it had not come from books.
Their implanted chatterers worked for both spoken and written language, but for those who could not read to begin with, Seg’s language would be indecipherable. Ama had never attended the Lesson House past her first day, but her father and her brothers had seen well to her education and had made sure she could read and write as well as any Damiar.
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