Ancillary Mercy

by Ann Leckie

  Seivarden made an irritated noise. Pulled out my old enamel tea flask and its two bowls, one chipped. Began making tea, as Five fussed with the cushions around me, and then, once each one was exactly where she thought it should be, left.

  At length Seivarden brought two bowls of tea, and sat down beside me on the bed. “You know,” she said after her first taste, “that flask really doesn’t brew right.”

  “It’s from outside the Radch,” I pointed out. “It’s made for a different sort of tea.”

  I saw that she was counting her breaths, carefully timing them. She said, after a bit, “Breq, do you ever wish you’d left me where you found me?”

  “Not for a while,” I replied, truthfully enough.

  And then, after a few more breaths, “Is Ekalu a lot like Lieutenant Awn?”

  I wondered, for an instant, where that question had come from. Then I remembered Seivarden, close against me in the bed in Medical as I told Mercy of Kalr that I could see myself liking Ekalu quite extravagantly, if I had still been a ship. “Not really. But would it matter if she was?”

  “I suppose not.”

  We drank a while in silence and then Seivarden said, “I’ve already apologized to Ekalu. I can’t exactly go back to her now and say, I only said what Ship told me I ought to before, but this time I really mean it.” I didn’t answer. Seivarden sighed. “I just wanted her to stop being angry with me.” More silence. She leaned close, shoulder up against mine again. “I still want to take kef. But the thought of taking it makes me sick to my stomach.” Even saying that did, I could see. “Medic told me it would. I didn’t think I’d mind. I thought it wouldn’t matter, because even if I took it, it wouldn’t do me any good. No, that’s not right. I’m feeling sorry for myself again, aren’t I.”

  Briefly I considered saying, I’m used to it. Said nothing instead.

  For several minutes Seivarden sat beside me. Silent, drinking tea in measured sips. Still feeling sorry for herself, but only mildly now, and trying, it seemed, to concentrate on something else. Eventually she said, “Our Tisarwat has suddenly displayed quite a few unexpected abilities.”

  “Has she?” I asked, voice bland.

  “She knows how to make a message look like an official communication, does she? She can access an official gate relay? She’s been talking to Station, and thinks Station is going to give her sensitive information? And you seem entirely unsurprised by any of it.” She took a swallow of tea. “Granted, you’re difficult to surprise. But still.” I said nothing. “Ship won’t answer me, either. I know better than to ask Medic. I’m thinking back to when Tisarwat first arrived, how angry you were that she was on board. Was she a spy, then? Did Medic… do something to ensure she’d be working for us, instead of Anaander?” She meant re-education, but couldn’t bring herself to name it. “What else can our Tisarwat do?”

  “I told you, you recall, that she would surprise you.” In Tisarwat’s quarters, Bo Nine was setting out a flask of tea and a bowl where her lieutenant could reach them. Feeling uneasy. All of Bo had begun to come to the same conclusion Seivarden had.

  In my quarters, on my bed, shoulder still companionably against mine, Seivarden said, “You did say that. And I didn’t believe you. You’d think I’d have learned by now.”

  Tisarwat, on her bed in her quarters, said, “Right, I think that’s done it.” Opened her eyes.

  Saw Bo Nine standing in front of her. “Sir, do you think Citizen Uran is all right? And Horticulturist Basnaaid?”

  “I hope so,” Tisarwat replied. Worried, herself. “I’m trying to find out.”

  “The news hasn’t said anything about that line on the concourse,” Nine pointed out. “If I’d been in line, I’d have gone home and hid as soon as that started.” She meant the constant condemnation of me on the official news channels, that we were getting from the relay.

  “They didn’t all have homes to hide in, did they?” replied Tisarwat. “Or not much of one. That was the point to begin with. And the line wasn’t ever in the official news, was it. But yes, I hope they’re all right. It’s one of the things I’ve asked Station about.” Instantly regretted speaking, because it raised the issue of just exactly how it was she could do what she was doing, and why Station might tell her anything. But she didn’t have time to think much about the implications of what she’d just said, because right about then the official news channels changed.

  Suddenly every single official news feed was displaying the inside of System Governor Giarod’s office. Familiar enough to everyone in Athoek System, no doubt, a common sight on the official channels. But those appearances were always carefully staged and choreographed. Tall, broad-shouldered Governor Giarod always projected an air of calm assurance, of everything’s being under her capable control. But here she stood looking harried and stressed. Beside her, stout and beautiful Station Administrator Celar; the shorter and slender head priest of Amaat, Eminence Ifian; and the new head of Security, whom I did not know, but was quite sure Lieutenant Tisarwat did. All four of them faced Anaander Mianaai. A very young Anaander Mianaai, barely twenty, at a guess.

  Anaander, nearly expressionless, stood in front of those green-and-cream silk hangings, the window onto the concourse darkened. “Why,” she asked, in a dangerously even voice, “is there a line on the concourse?” The sound was not smoothed or filtered, the camera view not composed. This was, very obviously, raw surveillance data.

  “Begging my lord’s very generous indulgence,” said Administrator Celar, after an icy silence during which no one else in the office so much as twitched, “they are protesting the overcrowding on the station in the past few weeks.”

  “Are you, Station Administrator,” Anaander asked, coldly, “incapable of dealing with the issue?”

  “My lord,” replied Station Administrator Celar, her voice shaking only very slightly, “there would be no line if I had been allowed to deal with the issue.”

  Now Eminence Ifian spoke up. “Begging my lord’s most gracious and generous indulgence, but the station administrator wished to… deal with the issue by hastily refitting the Undergarden. Despite, my lord, the repeated insistence of other officials that more careful consideration was needed. It would have made far more sense to send the former Undergarden residents downwell while the question of repairs was more carefully thought through. But I believe the station administrator was being pressured by Fl… by the ancillary.”

  Silence. “Why”—Anaander Mianaai’s voice was still even, but had taken on a sharper edge—“was the ancillary concerning itself with the Undergarden?”

  “My lord,” said Station Administrator Celar, “the Gardens lake collapsed into the Undergarden a week or so ago. The people who had been living there had to be housed somewhere until it could be repaired.”

  Still cross-legged on her bed, watching and listening, Bo Nine still standing in front of her, Tisarwat exhaled sharply. Said, “What else haven’t they told her?”

  Even now they weren’t telling Anaander everything. The repairs to the Undergarden had begun well before the lake had collapsed, and at my very definite insistence. I expected Eminence Ifian to point this out, but she did not.

  Anaander took the news of the lake’s collapse with almost no change of expression. Said nothing. Perhaps emboldened by this, Station Administrator Celar continued, “My lord, shipping residents downwell without consulting them would certainly have resulted in unrest among station residents at a time we can ill afford it. I am, my lord, at a loss to understand why Eminence Ifian—or the system governor, for that matter—felt it proper to oppose repairs which were urgently needed, and which would have dealt with the issue far more conveniently.” Looked as though she wanted to say something further, something bitter, but did not. Swallowed the words, whatever they were.

  Silence. Then Anaander Mianaai said, “As you point out, Station Administrator, we can ill afford unrest. Security. Notify the protesters on the concourse that if they are still in line three minut
es from now, they will be shot. Sword of Gurat.”

  From somewhere out of view an ancillary voice replied, “My lord.”

  “Accompany Security. At the end of three minutes, shoot anyone who remains in line.”

  “My lord!” replied the new head of Security. “With the utmost respect and deference, begging your very generous and proper indulgence, but I submit to my lord that threatening to shoot citizens who are peaceably standing in line is quite certain to produce unrest. The citizens involved have caused no difficulty whatever. My lord.”

  “If they are such law-abiding citizens, they will return to their homes when ordered,” Anaander said, coldly. “And everyone will be safer for their doing so.”

  In my quarters aboard Mercy of Kalr, Seivarden said, shoulder still against mine, bowl of tea cooling in one gloved hand, “Well, it works for annexations.”

  “After a great deal of bloodshed,” I pointed out.

  In the system governor’s office on Athoek Station, Anaander Mianaai said, “Are you refusing my order to clear the concourse, Security?”

  “I… I am.” A breath. “I am, my lord.” As though she hadn’t been certain of it until just that moment.

  “Sword of Gurat,” said Anaander, and held out one black-gloved hand. The Sword of Gurat ancillary came into view, handed Anaander its gun.

  On Mercy of Kalr, Tisarwat leapt off her bed. “No!” But protest was useless. This had all of it already happened.

  “Fuck!” Seivarden, still beside me, on my bed, bowl of tea in her hand. “Security isn’t military!”

  And meanwhile, on Athoek Station, in Governor Giarod’s office, Anaander raised the gun and fired, point-blank, before the new head of Security could more than open her mouth in protest or retraction. Security dropped to the ground, and Anaander fired again. “We are under attack from within,” Anaander said, into the following horrified silence. “I will not allow my enemy to destroy what I’ve built. Sword of Gurat, deliver my orders to the people lined up on the concourse. I don’t suppose they’re troubled by taking orders from an ancillary anyway.”

  “My lord,” replied Sword of Gurat, standing ancillary-straight and ancillary-still behind Anaander, and did not move. Of course. It didn’t need to leave the room to obey Anaander’s order, just send a different segment. And then, before Anaander could speak again, the ancillary said, “My lord, the past few minutes of this conversation are being broadcast on the official news channels.”

  On Mercy of Kalr, Tisarwat, tearful, Bo Nine’s arm awkwardly around her, cried out, “Oh, Station!” And then, “Fleet Captain, sir!”

  “I’m watching,” I said.

  On Athoek Station, Anaander said, sharply, “Station!”

  “I can’t stop it, my lord,” replied Athoek Station, from a console. “I don’t know what to do.”

  “Who came with it?” Anaander asked, sharp and angry. Not even puzzlement, on the faces of Governor Giarod, Station Administrator Celar, and Eminence Ifian. All of them, I was sure, still trying to grasp those sudden shots, moments before, the body of the head of Security motionless on the floor. “Who came with the ancillary?”

  Governor Giarod said, “N… no one in particular, my lord. Her… its lieutenants.” Hesitated. “Only one came onto the station. Lieutenant Tisarwat.”

  “House name,” Anaander demanded.

  “I’m… not certain, my lord,” replied Governor Giarod. Station Administrator Celar certainly knew Tisarwat’s house name, Tisarwat and Celar’s daughter Piat were good friends, but I noted that she didn’t volunteer it. Neither did Station. Not that it would have mattered.

  Anaander considered the silence, and then said, sharply, “Ship, with me.” And left the office.

  “She’ll go to Station’s Central Access,” said Tisarwat. Needlessly. Of course she would. Why, said the voice of Anaander Mianaai, over the official news feeds, is there a line on the concourse? Station’s recording, repeating.

  There was no point getting up off the bed. There was nothing I could do.

  “Oh, fuck,” said Seivarden beside me. “Oh, fuck. What does Station think it’s doing?” This wasn’t in response to any request of ours, of Tisarwat’s. Our messages couldn’t possibly have reached Athoek Station yet.

  “Protecting its residents,” I replied. “As best it can. Letting them know that Anaander is a threat. Remember, this is the same station that turned off its gravity the last time its residents were threatened.” It was probably the best Station could do, under the circumstances. Granted, it wouldn’t necessarily—or even likely—prevent Sword of Gurat from shooting citizens, but it was possible Station believed that even Anaander Mianaai might hesitate to do it if everyone was watching. And everyone would be watching—those official news feeds went not only to every receiver in Athoek System, but to every single gate relay. Hrad System would be getting that recording about now, perhaps a bit later. In the official, approved news channels, which any citizen could access. Was encouraged to access, sometimes could not escape.

  “But,” Seivarden protested, “the Lord of the Radch will just go to Central Access and stop it.” And then, realizing, “So the Lord of the Radch doesn’t have that thing with her, that cuts off communications. Or she’d have used it. What will she do now?”

  What would she do, I wondered, when she discovered she couldn’t get to Station? Or more accurately, what had she already done?

  “Sir,” Tisarwat said, from her quarters. Shakily. “Did you notice, nobody seemed to want to talk about the Undergarden, or the lake. They haven’t told her everything, not even Eminence Ifian. I’m not sure why, though, you’d think Ifian would tell her everything she could. Maybe she doesn’t know about Basnaaid, or Uran.” Eminence Ifian surely knew about Basnaaid and Uran. The she Lieutenant Tisarwat meant was Anaander. “And did you notice how young she was? And that… all of this. All of it. I think she may be the only one of her here, sir, or certainly the oldest one. And I think you did more than punch through some hull plating. She’s really angry. And she’s afraid. I’m not sure why, though. I’m not sure why she would be quite so afraid.”

  “Get some rest, Lieutenant.” It was well after her supper. She was tired, on top of her distress. “Ship will wake you if we hear from Station. Right now we just have to wait.”

  The recording repeated for nearly two hours, until, quite abruptly, it stopped, and three seconds later the regular news announcements resumed. The Justice of Toren show, as Sphene had called it. But now, added to it, the announcement of a curfew. No one was to leave their quarters except citizens in necessary assignments—these were specifically listed: Medical, Security, certain branches of Station Maintenance, refectory workers—or citizens taking food from the common refectories at assigned, scheduled times. What might happen if one left one’s quarters without authorization was left unstated, but everyone had seen the head of Security die, over and over. Everyone had heard Anaander threaten to shoot citizens who did not leave the line on the concourse.

  Tisarwat was upset enough to get out of bed, pull her jacket and boots on, and come to my quarters to speak to me. “Sir!” she cried, coming in the door, as Bo Nine gave her jacket hem a quick tug so it would lie right, “it’s impossible! Some of those dormitories, people are sleeping three or four shifts to a bunk! It’s impossible for everyone to stay in their quarters! What does she think she’s doing?”

  Kalr Five, laying out breakfast dishes, pretended to ignore Tisarwat, but she had been just as disturbed at the news.

  “Lieutenant,” I said, “go back to bed. At least pretend to rest. There’s nothing we can do from this distance.” We were still in the Ghost System, Mercy of Kalr’s hull still warmed by that smaller, slightly orange-ish star, alone but for Sphene, whom we couldn’t see, who only spoke to us through its ancillary, only the Athoek gate communications relay to break the silence. “We’ll likely hear from Station quite soon, if it’s willing or able to speak to us. Then we’ll decide what to do.”

/>   She cast a glance at the table, set for more than just me. “You’re going to eat? How can you eat?”

  “I’ve found that not eating is generally a bad decision,” I replied. Evenly. I could see she was at the edge of her patience, just about to lose any ability to hold herself together. “And I can’t leave the translator all to herself. Or, gods help us all, to Sphene.”

  “Oh, the translator! I’d forgotten all about her.” She frowned.

  “Go back to bed, Lieutenant.”

  Which she did, but instead of sleeping she asked Bo Nine for tea.

  Everyone aboard was on edge, except for Sphene, who appeared not to care much about what was happening, and Translator Zeiat, who had apparently slept through the whole thing. When the translator woke I invited her to breakfast, along with Sphene, Medic, and Seivarden. Ekalu was still on watch. Tisarwat was awake, but I knew she wouldn’t eat, and besides she was supposed to be asleep.

  “Counters is such a fascinating game, Fleet Captain,” Translator Zeiat said, and took a drink of her fish sauce. “I’m terribly grateful to Sphene for introducing me to it.”

  Seivarden was surprised, but didn’t dare express it. Medic was too busy frowning at me across the table to react—she had still not forgiven me for leaving Medical without her approval. And she thought I should be resting more.

  “Your pardon, Translator,” I said, “but I suspect most Radchaai would be extremely surprised to hear that you’re not familiar with counters.”

  “Goodness, no, Fleet Captain,” replied the translator. “I’d heard of it, of course. But Humans do such disturbingly odd things, you know, sometimes it’s better not to think too hard about them.”

  “What sort of games are you used to playing, Translator?” asked Seivarden, and then immediately regretted it, either because it got her the translator’s attention, or because she realized belatedly what kind of answer might be forthcoming.