Ambassador 1_Seeing Red

by Patty Jansen

  Inaru.

  Had she been serious? Had she thought I was more than a game? Had she thought because I wouldn’t pay, I didn’t love her?

  What did it matter? It was too late. She had gone to honour her contract. By now, she would have her money and the man would have his children, and I had no doubt that, being from the Palayi clan like Nicha, she would occupy a plum position somewhere on Asto.

  And in six months’ time, I would marry Eva.

  Thayu said, “I came about something else. You asked me to find out about the person who owns the apartment?”

  I shook my thoughts free of times I would do better to forget. “You found something?”

  “Come and have a look.”

  I followed Thayu inside. It was a lot cooler inside the building, and cool air stroked my sweaty skin.

  But when I sat down, I made the mistake of putting my left palm on the seat. Something snapped under the bandage and white hot pain seared across my hand.

  I cried out; black spots danced in my vision. I sat there, breathing deeply.

  A hand came into my field of vision. “Let me have a look.”

  Trembling, I extended my hands.

  Somewhere on the instrument panel, she flicked on a small light that showed a wet patch of yellow ooze seeping into the bandage.

  Thayu gave me a sharp look. “Why haven’t you seen a medico yet?”

  All of a sudden, fatigue and pain overwhelmed me. I leaned back in the bench. My head spun, and when Thayu reached past me to a control, the heat radiating from her body made me shiver.

  “I’ll arrange it right now.” Thayu slid an earpiece over her ear.

  I sat there, fighting dizziness.

  A little while later, she said, “That’s arranged. Are you all right to continue?”

  I desperately wanted to say no. I wanted a hot mug of manazhu, to crawl into bed and ignore the world around me. But I nodded. “Show me what you found.”

  Her hands moved over the panel and dragged a projection forward. “I came across this.”

  I squinted at a piece of text. I could just make out that it was in the local keihu language, which I couldn’t read. The translator had made a copy in Coldi next to the original document, and had done its usual job at mangling up the sentences. Something about a meeting. Thayu had highlighted one sentence. It is said that representatives of Amoro Renkati came to the meeting.

  And a memory came to me.

  Like this, with the two names together, I remembered where I had seen that name before: in the credits of the movie on Seymour Kershaw. The same person who owned this apartment?

  “This . . . Amoro Renkati . . . is he a local?”

  “I don’t know. I checked the population register, but nothing comes up under that name.”

  But this person could be an unregistered local, not a gamra citizen.

  A local, who was spying on me, who funded movies that told lies about my predecessor.

  Renkati sounded awfully like Akhtari; I was sure it was an Aghyrian name. The Aghyrian section of Barresh were rich; they were high up in politics, or in business.

  Was it really as simple as that? A businessman in Barresh discovers the glamour and money of the movie industry on Earth, supports a movie about a subject that is close to his heart—and vilifies the much-maligned Coldi in the process. Sirkonen tries to stop the release of the movie, and in return the businessman—not understanding the nature of free speech and democracy—thinks his investment is at risk and orders the attack on the president?

  A possible motive, but I didn’t think the potential loss of income was serious enough for murder, not by any gamra entity’s understanding. But it was a start.

  And I had an idea. A stupid and risky idea maybe, but one that might answer some questions.

  “Right,” I said, “let’s see if we can find someone to give me paid work.”

  If Thayu was surprised at the sudden change of topic, she didn’t show. “What do you want me to do?”

  “If you could take down what I tell you.” I cringed, holding up my useless hands. I hated being dependent, but could only get the auto-type feature in Coldi to work through my feeder, and since I didn’t have one . . .

  “That’s what I’m for, to help you.” While she clipped on her thought-sensor, her eyes met mine in an intense, almost accusing stare, but she said nothing and calmly took down the text. The lines of curly Coldi script grew in the projection.

  Finally, she read it out. “My name is Cory Wilson, delegate of gamra. Unforeseen circumstances in my home entity have necessitated that I seek temporary alternative funding. I have completed training in gamra law and am familiar with Trader law. Besides Coldi, I am fluent in Standard, the language of my home entity, and proficient in Damarcian, Kedrasi and Indrahui. I am willing to take projects as translator or negotiator. It is my hope that your organisation can help me.”

  “What do you think?” I asked.

  “It’s very . . . unusual.”

  “Anything wrong with it?”

  “It’s very direct—for something coming from gamra.”

  Yes, I knew the pronouns were too direct. But gamra was the only place where such archaic forms of Coldi were used. “This won’t be sent through gamra. Not officially anyway.”

  “You want to send this—to whom?”

  “Anyone I can think of. Marin Federza and the Trader Guild and the Ledger, but also the Damarcian master builders, and local businesses in Barresh.” If Amoro Renkati was such a rich man and wanted to keep close watch on me, he might bite; I was sure that if I were in his position, I would bite. “Do you think anyone will be upset?”

  “I don’t know.”

  I spread my hands, frustration welling up in me. “What do you do when you’re stuck for a job?”

  Her look was blank.

  Of course. That didn’t happen in Asto. When Coldi children were thirteen, they went into schooling and moved up through the ranks by completing tasks and exams until they reached a level they couldn’t attain. At that stage, authorities matched their abilities with a position, where they remained for life. It was easy to plan for a government which operated on strict population control.

  “Well, I’m going to send it, whether it’s polite or not.”

  13

  “DELEGATE, THE MEDICO has arrived.” Eirani stood at the door, a washing basket on her hip.

  I stopped my transcript mid-sentence, thoughts of flowing sentences fleeing my brain. For a while, I had almost forgotten the throbbing pain in my hands, since it had become less after the popping feeling, but now, with treatment in sight, it returned in full force. I did not like doctors and hospitals.

  Thayu gave me a small nod. “Go. I’ll keep working on this.”

  I rose, reluctantly.

  A woman waited in the hall. She towered almost a head over me, yet held her back straight. Wide but bony shoulders made me think of an athlete thirty years after Olympic glory. An orange robe hung from her thin and knobbly shoulders, leaving bare thin arms with skin wrinkled as an elephant’s hide.

  Dark eyes met mine from a face with a sharp nose and high cheekbones. She wore her greying hair in a tight bun.

  She nodded a greeting. “Delegate.”

  Eirani returned a tiny bow. “There are benches and a clean table in the bathroom.”

  The woman gave a short reply in a language I didn’t recognise but presumed was keihu, after which Eirani bowed again and shepherded us to the bathroom.

  The medico woman followed me into the cavernous room. Without looking at me, she gestured at one of the couches that lined the wall. “Sit there.” Right. Someone who didn’t adhere to the gamra formality.

  She plonked a metal case on the table next to the couch, and dragged the table until it stood between me and her. She flipped open the lid. From within the depths of the case, two telescope arms extended, and lights flicked on at their ends. Then the front and back of the case clicked open and panels unfolded into a wo
rking table, while a fine mist sprayed from nozzles hidden in the remaining side walls of the case.

  I stared. I had never seen anything like this.

  “Put your hands here.” She pointed at the pool of light on the treatment table.

  I did so. In the brightness, the bandage looked positively disgusting.

  “This is not good. Why not come earlier?” She met my eyes with deep black ones.

  I shrugged, feeling both hot and cold at the same time; I had left this far too long and I knew it, but I didn’t need this abrupt woman to tell me that.

  From the sides of the medicine case, she unfolded another panel which held a neat row of metal instruments, many with pincer-sharp points that would put a dentist’s pick to shame.

  Squinting, she selected a tweezer-like gadget with knife-sharp points.

  I focused on the languid steam rising off the water in the bath past the woman’s back. I didn’t want to know what she was doing but, at the same time, I felt a morbid fascination. Just what had made that popping sound under the bandage?

  She used the implement to alternately pull and cut the bandage away from my palm.

  Like Nicha’s, her skin carried not even the faintest fuzz of hair. Yet she wasn’t Coldi.

  Aghyrian.

  She had all the aristocratic features. The height, the wide shoulders, the straight nose, the high cheekbones, the long fingers.

  It was the first time I had heard an Aghyrian speak with an accent, staccato, snappy, as if she really hated Coldi.

  By now, she had removed most of the bandage. The skin of my left palm, red and shiny, strained against strips of tape which the doctors in Rotterdam had applied to keep both sides of the cuts together. One had come loose, leaving a raw and gaping wound, red rimmed and oozing pus. The faintest breeze of air stung like acid.

  A drop of sweat rolled down my stomach.

  “Hold still.” She put one hand across both my wrists and with the other picked up an instrument, with what looked like a small light bulb at the end. Something, a spark or a light, flew from the glass bulb. It hit my palms with a sharp stab of pain. It crackled along my fingers . . . and then . . . nothing.

  The pain was gone.

  “What . . .” I stared.

  She gave me a withering look, while putting the instrument away, nothing more than a metal rod with a little piece of glass at the end, a simple thing, a . . . conductor.

  On second thoughts, I had heard of this. It had something to do with the ability to store energy in the body, like static electricity. All three races native to Barresh had this to some extent. It had a name—which I had forgotten. I had read a report written by someone, a Coldi author I seemed to remember, who was quite scared of the ability, calling it a regrettable abomination.

  I wriggled my fingers. “Could you show me how you do that?”

  “Is not for fun.”

  Talk about grumpy. “You are Aghyrian, aren’t you?”

  She gave me a piercing look, but didn’t disagree. “Aghyrians are locals, aren’t they?”

  “Not by choice, we’re not.”

  Heh, my probing had struck a raw nerve. All those years ago, a meteorite strike had made Asto, the Aghyrian home word, uninhabitable for them. Through the ages, the once-brilliant Aghyrian race had clung onto survival, but only in the last hundred years or so had their numbers increased substantially. There were rumours of a hard core within that group, who believed it was time for the Coldi race, their temporary place holders, a people created by them, to relinquish control of gamra, and of their home planet.

  Never mind that these days Asto was too hot for any species except the Coldi.

  “Do Aghyrians all live in Barresh or are there concentrations somewhere else?”

  Another sharp look. “You have a lot of questions, young man.”

  “It interests me.” I could hardly say that I was hoping to pave the way for a question about Amoro Renkati.

  But I was not to be so lucky.

  She picked up the tweezers and proceeded to peel off the strips of tape, releasing a foul scent. My palms started bleeding again, but I still felt nothing.

  After another spray from the nozzles, she took an implement like flat-tipped tweezers with incurved gripping edges, and pushed together the sides of the cuts, while with the other hand, she took a pen-like device made of metal, which she ran over the jagged cuts. I could have sworn the metal glowed with a faint greenish aura. Steam rose where it touched my skin, but I felt no pain.

  Slowly, with a sure hand, she worked over all the cuts. The metal pen appeared to seal my skin and left it shiny but less red.

  She treated both my hands this way, then put down the implements. “Move your hands.”

  I did. The cuts had indeed sealed together, almost as if new skin had formed.

  “Hurt?”

  “No, not at all.” I clenched my fist and let it relax again, staring at my palm. It was sensitive, not entirely healed but much better. “Is there anything I should do? Keep my hands dry? Can I bathe?”

  She met my eyes squarely. “Hands gone bad like this because you never take bath. Must keep clean.”

  Was there a more blunt way of saying I stank? “I will do that. Thank you.”

  I stared after her back, realising that during the entire conversation I had not thought about pronouns.

  In the afternoon, I received a terse statement from Danziger’s secretary about the military blockade of the Exchange, mentioning that I was one of the individuals sanctioned to enter, from which I deduced that Danziger wanted me to come back.

  To my question clarifying if this was indeed so, I received no reply, so I wrote that if Danziger did want me to come back, I would need some funds first.

  To which there was also no reply.

  Communication failure? I didn’t believe it. Not for this long. I knew Nations of Earth couldn’t communicate with me without gamra listening in, and this probably meant, or rather I feared, that Nations of Earth were being deliberately obtuse because they had found something significant.

  The news services only reported that Danziger would make a general statement immediately following Sirkonen’s funeral.

  I concluded that was going to be it.

  Unfortunately, the timing of the statement fell just after my speech.

  What if Danziger had found evidence of Asto’s involvement?

  There was no reason for them to be involved. If Asto interests had killed Sirkonen, Asto would lose much more than control over two hundred thousand of its citizens. They would lose their standing as a non-aggressive entity within gamra. A lot of entities would no longer be happy to vote with them.

  Meanwhile, the bullying Asto delegation held a deadline over my head, almost like one of their damn writs. Respond satisfactorily or else. And no one was cooperating.

  I submitted an application to gamra administration to meet Delegate Akhtari and to my surprise, was granted a short audience. Maybe the reason I’d given for wanting the meeting, to avoid a humanitarian catastrophe, had something to do with it. Maybe not. Gamra entities could learn a thing or two from Earth about humanitarian aid in major crises.

  And so I put on my new uniform, submitted my cheeks to another round of torture, never mind what had happened to that elusive shaver. By now I was starting to fear I’d forgotten to pack it, and I wondered how that poor abused razor was going to hold out for six months.

  Delegate Akhtari met me in her office, seated behind a gleaming, kidney-shaped desk, and listened to my plea. When I had finished, she clasped her hands before her, and said, “Delegate, the situation is stable. Without gamra and the Exchange, Nations of Earth forces are not going to harm any other entities, are they?”

  Isolationist policies, at which gamra excelled. Got a problem? Isolate it and ignore it. I bit down on my frustration. “Delegate, the situation is sliding into war. There is a large population of Coldi trapped on Earth. Asto is readying military to free them.”

 
; “They won’t be used. The Asto delegation assures that.”

  “That was not the impression they gave me.” Pronouns, Delegate, pronouns! Not such a good idea to use the offended-me in this case. “Delegate, I think the establishment needs to move with some urgency to allay suspicion that gamra had a hand in the attack on the president, and is willing to help solve this crime. When that statement is forthcoming, I can negotiate the withdrawal of Nations of Earth military forces so that normal Exchange traffic can resume.”

  “The establishment has been assured by the highest Asto authority that there will be no action until after zhamata. The Asto delegation have given the assurance that the Delegate understands that also.”

  “That deadline is too early. The president is to make an important statement after zhamata sitting.”

  “The president cannot give the statement earlier?”

  Damn. “There are communication problems.”

  Her eyebrows rose.

  My argument was weak and I knew it. Hell, communication problems would well alert her to where the real difficulty was: that Danziger wasn’t talking to me. That I was failing in my job, that my network had broken down.

  “I’m asking that my appearance in zhamata be postponed to the following day until the president has made his statement.” The Asto delegation wouldn’t be happy with that, but they had said your authorities’ response at zhamata, which referred to my upcoming speech, but nothing about when that speech would be held.

  “The Delegate can plead for this at the sitting. It is not for me alone to decide. I am not the aggrieved party.” That was an offended-I as well.

  And that was the end of my hope. Shut up, Delegate, and talk your puny arse out of this. Ask before all the delegates in the very public zhamata meeting if Asto—the aggrieved party—would wait. I already knew their stance on the matter. Worse, Thayu sat next to me, listening to every word of my squirming. She had ties with Asto, she would probably report back to their delegation. Asto would draw the only right conclusion about my relationship with Danziger. Where the spider veins of imayu reached, they protected against conflict, but where there was a barrier . . .