by Steven Brust
The fourth time I sat facing her it was well after noon. We sat in the same pair of chairs that Rudd and I had occupied earlier, at the same oblique angle. I did not offer her brandy, nor did I offer to light a fire. It seemed that I was more tired than she was. She met my eyes; there was no trace of friendship in hers. It would have been stupid to expect any, under the circumstances.
I said, “You know about the missiles, don’t you?”
“What about them?”
“It doesn’t bother you that this whole planet is about to be rendered unfit for human life?”
“Should it?”
“There are four major cities on this planet, and a total population of almost a quarter of a million people. It doesn’t bother you that these friends of yours are going to kill them all?”
“Why should I care? What have they done for me?”
“I can’t believe you mean that.”
“That’s your problem, isn’t it?”
I groped for words like a blind man searching for his stick. I could tell her I still loved her and it would be the truth, and she wouldn’t care. I could tell her that humanity needed her, and it would be the truth, and she wouldn’t care. I looked at her and hurt and tried to keep my feelings off my face. I finally said, “You’re going to die, you know. We aren’t going to let any of you go until we find out what we need to know.”
“What do you mean, need to know?”
“We believe Sugar Bear has a specific home world. We have to find it.”
“Why?”
“So that, in the future, we can—”
“No, I mean, why do you care?”
“Umm. That seems like a pretty weird question, if you ask me.”
“What’s so weird about it? Why should you care what happens to people you’ve never met?”
My mouth opened and closed a few times, then I said, “I don’t really know. I guess I was just brought up that way. Why is your friend the Physician working so hard to destroy humanity?”
“To save us from infection by the rest of you.”
“Who is ‘us’?”
“Those who belong.”
“How does someone get to belong?”
“By being born into it, or else selected.”
“And all of these people have as a goal—”
“Don’t talk about our goals.”
“Whatever you want. But tell me, is the Physician crazy to be working so hard for complete strangers?”
“They aren’t strangers. They’re his people.”
“Well, then, the human race, all of us, are my people.”
“What crap.”
“Sorry you feel that way.”
“All of humanity except for us, right?”
“Right,” I said. “Except for you who are trying to kill the rest of us. You can rot in hell.”
At last she said, in a very small voice that reminded me of Eve’s, “We’re trying to protect ourselves.”
“You could look for a cure, instead.”
“We’re doing that, too, but…” Her voice trailed off. She said, “Do you know what I had to go through when they found out I’d made love to an outsider? The tests, the questions, the—”
“Then why the hell did you?”
“I was in love with you.”
I don’t know what hit me hardest there, the “in love” or the “was.” I said, “Why did you stop?”
“You tried to make me tell you about—never mind. It doesn’t matter.”
“It does, though. That’s the whole point. Do you know how hard it was for me to ask you those things? I hated it. But I had to. I—” There came a loud thump down the hall. It sounded like an explosion. I felt a sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach. Tom and Christian came running past me, and soon I heard the distant echo of shots. Then I heard the sound of automatic weapons.
“Well,” I said. “It sounds like Justin’s come back. With friends.” I took her by the wrist. “Let’s wait in the kitchen.”
“It doesn’t matter,” she said, standing up.
Christian and Tom came back into the room. “Get moving,” said Christian.
“Right,” I said, and led Souci faster. Christian came along with us. As I was about to turn down the hall, I took a look behind, and in that moment he emerged—Justin, holding a machine pistol. He ignored the gun that Tom had pointed at him as he leveled the weapon at me and fired.
It sounded like a continuous explosion then, with slight variation in pitch and volume. Just as it began, someone knocked into me from the side and I fell against the wall. Presently I opened my eyes again. Justin had evidently taken several hits from the .45. All of them in the head. It was very ugly. I looked at the floor next to me, and what I saw there was even uglier, perhaps because she was still alive.
I knelt beside her, too stunned to cry or be sick. “Why did you do that?” I said or screamed. “You stupid idiot bitch, why did you do that?” I reached for her hand and encountered a mass of torn flesh. It was almost more than I could stand, but she was too far gone to notice. I didn’t know how she could still be alive, with what the machine pistol had done to her.
She said, “Rudd,” and coughed up a great deal of blood. There was a wound in her right cheek, and I could see cracked and broken teeth through it.
She said, “Rudd… Physician…”
“Rudd is the Physician,” I said.
She nodded and shuddered. Her left hand reached for me but never made it.
Intermezzo
I know you rider
Gonna miss me when I’m gone.
“I Know You Rider,”
Traditional
Three plain, armless, imitation-oak chairs adorned each side of a plain, armless, imitation-oak table. An identical chair faced the rear of the windowless room. Lighting from an invisible source provided two thousand watts of white light, and distributed it evenly throughout the six hundred square feet of the room. The walls were a pale yellow and twenty feet high; the ceiling was transparent at the moment, and showed the almost starless night sky of Cicero, in the Marko system. The floor was rough with real pebbles, imported from the Coriander Beach on the other side of Cicero, where a small but wild sea chipped away at rock that looked like painted shale, each layer an age, each age a color, to show that, yes, there was some beauty left in the galaxy, after all.
A gentle, warm breeze circulated throughout the room, carrying with it the very faint scent of jasmine. A synthesizer attempted to reconstruct or re-create, or construct or create, as you will, a Bach improvisation in G major. It did a fair job of getting the probable sound of his instrument, but the improvisations were rather lame. The programming realized this eventually and resolved itself into Sonata No. 6.
The door was soundless and efficient, and above it was the only decorative artifact in the room—a symbolic representation of a banana.
The simplicity of the room should not be mistaken for an indication of austerity on the part of the representative cultures, nor on the part of the Grand Banana itself; rather the seven members of the Crisis Committee couldn’t agree on any other decor.
Oh, yes: All of the chairs were occupied.
Richard Immanual Feng, of Beauregard around Sestus, who was seated in the middle left chair, had his feet on the table. He was barefoot, but he had washed his feet very carefully before arriving. He dared anyone to say anything. No one did. Across from him sat Nora Delacroix of Sorbonne around Eveleth, glaring and pouting simultaneously. Feng resisted the temptation to bait Delacroix, and resisted the temptation to try to hurry the meeting. He didn’t have anything specific in mind to do, he just hated waiting.
At last Carla Weismuller of Broderick around Broderick, in the head position, looked up from the V-tab and said, “We have isolated the time when They began serious operations to within a six-month period.”
There was a snort of derision from the far right seat. Feng chose not to look. Byron Santiago of Brine around Neosol said, “Six
months? Splendid. We have one functioning Unit, and we need to guess within a six-month—”
“Could you have done better?” rasped old Delilah Corinth of Bangyoulose around Yeats. She was, Feng reflected, rather less obnoxious than most of the others. He wished she would bathe before attending Session, but he was aware that she failed to do so for the same reason that he was barefoot. She twisted in her chair and sent a small feathered dart to make a little hole among several identical holes in the artificial oak next to the door. “We have enough for a gamble.”
“We have enough—”
“Kiss my ruddy bum,” suggested Corinth. “Feng may be an asshole, but his teams get the job done.” Feng smirked and inclined his head at the compliment, but no one noticed. She continued, “We have a chance now. You haven’t given us diddly-squat.” You must allow a certain freedom in translation here. In any case, Santiago sputtered and went out.
Carla said, “I’d as soon not sit here all day. We need someone to find a team leader to bring a team back through enough nexus points to get the job done without bollixing it up too badly, and do it all without letting Them turn our team into hamburger. Simply stated, the job will be to find out who the enemy is, why he is attacking, and get some idea on how to stop him. It is by definition impossible to stop him in the past, since he exists in the present. On the other hand the past may tell us how to stop him in the future.
“If this sounds like a slim chance, it is. The chance of our fleet defeating their fleet in direct combat is also slim, but we will be attempting that, too, if it comes to it. The chance of one of our human or machine spies learning something useful is also slim, but we will be trying that, too. We will attempt everything that has any reasonable chance, and perhaps one of them will work.
“The backtime will be six hundred and thirty-one years, the starting place will, of course, be Old Earth. Volunteer to find a team leader within twelve hours, or must I pick someone?”
Lois Brockingham of Charity around Biscane, in the near right chair, said, “Why doesn’t Feng do it, if he’s so bloody smart?”
Normally, reflected Feng, this would have gotten her selected on the spot by the others, but everyone was inclined to give her a break, as her home world had been Reduced a week ago. Her eyes showed no signs of tears, which was a credit to her cosmetician. Feng, who was a historian and research specialist, shrugged and said, “If I thought I was as qualified for field operations as Fredericka, I’d—”
“Forget it,” said the representative from Grandview around Zenith. “I’m not—”
“Concerned about the destruction of all human life on thirty planets?” finished Feng nastily.
She paused. “As much as you are.”
Feng bit back a reply as he stared into the old, yellow eyes. A point there, he thought suddenly.
Carla picked up on it at the same time. “Which of you,” she said, “cares more about humanity than his own petty squabbles?”
“Or hers,” said Brockingham.
“Betsy’s tits and mittens,” said Corinth. “You stay here and argue semantics. I’ll find someone.”
“Like hell you will,” said Feng.
“Eh?” said Corinth and Carla at the same time.
“You don’t have a Reduced chance, old lady. I’m going myself.”
She stared at him. “Why?” she said at last.
He shrugged. “To prove that I have as much balls as you, maybe.”
“You’ll need—”
“An overlay. I know.”
Corinth nodded. “Fair enough,” she said.
Carla growled, but said nothing. Feng matched stares with her. She probably planned this all along, the lizard. But then, if she did, it’s probably for the best. Aloud, he said, “I suppose you have the unrefined plans all set to appear before me, eh?”
“And everyone else,” agreed Carla, as V-tab holograms sprang up around the room.
“Splendid,” said Feng with an ironic bite, blinked the machine to life, and kick-wished the plans to unfold. Just to be contrary, he opaqued the back and sides. After a moment he said, “I suspect it’s going to take me at least a week to prepare for the overlay so I don’t—”
“We don’t have a week,” announced Delacroix with a calmness that was effective even if contrived. “Their fleet will be to us in one hundred and twenty to one hundred and thirty hours.”
Corinth growled and threw another dart. There was little else to say. Eveleth was the last remaining bastion against Them. If Eveleth fell, it would be only hours before Broderick fell, then Marko, and then…
Feng licked his lips. “Nothing like a close finish,” he said into the silence. “Very well. I’ll schedule an overlay for the day after tomorrow.”
“It’ll probably improve him,” muttered Brockingham.
Carla continued, “We have been out of touch with Old Earth for several hundred years, but we do retain definitive works of their culture from the period in which you will arrive. We have enough that the team le—that is, that you can be effectively prepared. You will speak like a native and think like a native in all of the small things, such as idioms and elements of popular culture, which are the things most likely to give you away. Put another way, you will be a native in every way, including how you think. Be aware that this will subject you to those underlying psychological factors that lead to those cultural elements.”
“In other words,” said Feng, “I’ll talk like a native, but if I’m not careful, I might act like one, too. Got it. What else?”
“We have,” said Carla, “military preparedness of a sort. We are ready in other ways. What we need is some means of attack. We have no idea what this might be, save that our indicators say there are nine nexus points where such a thing may be found. And, by the way, if you can help us reestablish contact with Old Earth, that would be a pleasant bonus.”
“Got it,” said Feng. “Any idea what I should look for in a team?”
Corinth snorted. “A doctor, for one.”
“For research?” said Carla. “I would think—”
“No,” said Feng. “She means to try to save the rest of the team after They discover we’re there. I suspect she’s right.”
“You’d better find someone who knows the electronics of the era better than you do,” said Carla. “We can’t send much with you beyond the locators, and that is an area in which our knowledge is quite scanty.”
“And,” added Corinth, “find someone who can think well enough to tell the banana from the peel, and find the bastards, since I don’t think you’d recognize a clue if it bit you. And remember that revealing who you are to anyone from the past creates a paradox, negating anything you might accomplish.”
Feng nodded, ignoring the cut, and looked back at his V-tab, where clean red and amber lines blocked out his schedule of training in Earth culture and operation of the machine that would allow him, if he was lucky, to stay one step ahead of those who were determined to wipe out humanity, without creating one of those nasty paradoxes that would render the attempt impossible before it began. No problem. He winced.
“What is it?” said Santiago.
“I don’t like having my personality overlaid. You’ll understand if you ever develop a personality.”
Carla tried to hide a chuckle, Corinth laughed aloud, Santiago looked half puzzled and half irate.
Feng sighed. “I might as well get on it. I’ll be on my way. If I don’t see you gentle souls again, it’s either because I decided to stay back in the Light Ages, or because I blew it and you’re all radioactive dust. Do the Job.”
“Do the Job,” echoed Old Lady Corinth, and one by one the others, except for Carla, who said, “Good luck, Richard.”
Feng managed a smile. “Take care.”
He left the conference chambers and signaled for transport. The pebbles hurt his bare feet, but he didn’t let it show.
Chapter 17
What will you do
When it’s time to die,
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Hey, ho my Johnny?
“Johnny Is a Roving Blade,”
Tommy Makem
The sad thing is, when surrounded by death, each one loses some degree of value. Don’t hate me because I say it; I’m the reporter, not the agent. Well, perhaps I am the agent, too. But I deny responsibility, whatever. Death loses value, life loses value. Each death is a bit easier to take than the last, and in this is sorrow. Death, where is thy fang? Or Feng, if you wish.
But Souci—
This I had not expected, and were I not at least a little numb by this time, I might have broken. As it was, I waited for the tears, but they failed me.
Someone, I think Rose, got me back into the kitchen while Jamie and Christian held off Justin’s friends. Tom and Libby stayed with Rose and me to watch the back door, which was still a large hole. The sounds of gunfire were harder to hear there, but they were present. I looked at Rudd and my mind reeled and spun, and it was all too clear, and too dull, and too much, and too little, and too late.
I took the knife from under my arm and held the point beneath his chin. I said, “Physician, can you heal a cut throat?”
He glared at me. “Go ahead. You’ll never find what you—”
“Shut your goddamned face.” I brought my temper under control, barely, and walked a few steps away from him.
“Souci told you who I was, didn’t she?”
“Yes.”
“Is she dead?”
“Yes.”
“Did you kill her?”
“In a manner of speaking.”
He laughed without humor. “More fool she. I won’t help, since no matter what you do, I will not tell you what you want to know. I have devoted my life to curing the human race of you diseased ones, and I will not fail now. It is just as well she died, and I thank you for that, at least.”
I closed my eyes. Visions of Souci, lying on the floor, smoke and screams fighting for control of the airwaves, came and sat in the control booth of my mind. Would I ever be free of that memory, or would it always dominate and overwhelm the memories of our shared joys, and rob me of the chance to conquer our shared pain? I didn’t know. Perhaps she would have come back to me, and I would never know that, either. But what I did know was that this—this filth—would not mock my pain.
