She smiled at him. “Reuben, you have learned to smile this week. Do not rush to escape that.”
“It may all be quite irrelevant,” Reuben said gruffly. “The Fleet isn’t here yet.”
That evening, though, he sat out on Vairya’s veranda, enjoying the dusk. The people of Caelestia had shifted half their lives outside, preferring the new glades to the disconcertingly transformed interiors of their homes. They were still locked into a warmer orbit than before, and the city’s atmosphere had become more humid. Reuben knew there were meetings taking place about water consumption and environmental systems, but he wasn’t invited to those. He just enjoyed the experience of living such a verdant life.
He was alone for once, and that too suddenly struck him as strange for the first time. He hadn’t even questioned it before. In the middle of everything else, he hadn’t thought twice about making himself at home in Vairya’s house. Leaning back in his chair, he looked up at the stars and allowed himself, just for a moment, to dream.
He was roused by the sound of footsteps, and turned to smile at Vairya. “You’re late.”
Vairya grimaced and dropped into the chair beside him. “Committees.”
“I’m happy not to be dealing with that particular brand of idiot,” Reuben said. “My lot are more easily intimidated.”
“I’m sure that says more about you than them,” Vairya said, grin flashing out. “You’ll have to start giving seminars in that too.”
“And give away my secrets?”
“There’s a secret to it? I thought you just growled, loomed, and shredded their self-esteem.”
“No need to sound so happy about it.”
“I think it’s charming,” Vairya said and leaned a little closer. “Feel free to growl and loom as much as you like.”
“It’s supposed to scare them into using their brains.”
“I always use my brain.” He tipped his face up towards Reuben. “Among other things.”
“I’ve noticed,” Reuben said and took the hint. Kissing Vairya was as easy as trading quotations with him, and he sank into it happily. By the time, Vairya rose up and offered him a hand to lead him into the house, he had forgotten all his hesitations.
LATER that night, he was woken by a sudden flash of light, followed by a low rumble in the sky.
“Thunder?” Vairya said, sitting up and rubbing his eyes.
“Is that what it sounds like?” Reuben asked, rolling out of bed to hurry to the window.
Halfway there, another flash lit the room, and the sky shuddered again. Then, as they reached the window, it happened for a third time. They both leaned out, staring up in time to see a jagged slash of light cut the sky wide open as a battleship slid out of hyperspace right over the city. As the city’s shields shook and reverberated under the shock, the ship swam across the sky and took up a place beside its sister ships. They were so low in the sky that Reuben could see their weapons swivel down to face the city.
“They’re here!” Vairya gasped, grabbing his arm, and Reuben braced himself to die.
But no lights kindled in those dark turrets, and no splintering forces came crackling down to destroy them. Instead the ships sat there, looming in the sky.
“What are they waiting for?” Vairya breathed.
“I don’t know,” Reuben said. He was afraid again. For the last few days, caught up in the rush of rebuilding the city, it had been easy to put the Fleet out of mind, to pretend that this idyll would last forever. But the Fleet had come, like all doom must, and they could only have one purpose here.
Then, two rooms away, music began to play softly.
“My com,” Vairya said, pulling away from the window with one last glance upwards. “The mayor, I should think.”
Reuben stayed where he was, willing the ships above to give them a chance, to hear their story, even as he heard Vairya pad away and pick up the com. “Mayor, I take it that… Jibrail?”
Reuben swung round, more at the sheer shock in Vairya’s voice than anything else.
“Yes, I’m fine,” Vairya was saying. “Things got complicated, that’s how I’m alive.”
Reuben lengthened his stride. Whoever this was, Vairya hadn’t been expecting this call.
“No, I don’t usually answer calls from the mayor in the nude,” Vairya snapped, “but as you might have noticed, I just got woken up by someone sailing gunships up to my harbour wall, so unless—”
He stopped, frustration dancing across his face, and after a moment, rolled his eyes at Reuben. “Jibby, you’re a prude. So, unless you want me to step back from the screen and show you components of me you never wanted to see, can we get back to the subject of the gunships?”
He glanced at Reuben and tapped the wall for a blank page, writing with his fingertip, Get dressed, and bring me some clothes. My brother is here.
Reuben did what he asked and then hurried back. Vairya was standing still when he returned, his forehead pressed to the com and his eyelids flickering. As Reuben started forwards in worry, he closed his eyes with a sigh. “Did you get that?”
“Summarise.” The voice was cool and sharp, with none of Vairya’s sly warmth, but there was something familiar about it, a hint of the same intonation.
“No Terran nanites are left, but we have a different nanite situation. Reports of the dead were vastly overestimated, through no one’s fault, but we all owe our survival to nanite-based medicine. We’re rebuilding but in need of aid.”
“Let’s decide if your city survives first,” the stranger said and then paused. “I hear an echo. Do you have me on speakers? Who is eavesdropping?”
“Yes,” Vairya said, taking the clothes from Reuben, “because I need my hands free to get dressed, and the only other one here is Reuben.”
“And who precisely is Reuben? Is this another of your foolish affairs?”
Vairya rolled his eyes. “They were in a rush when they built Jibby,” he said to Reuben. “They completely forgot to include a sense of humour.”
“Vairya.”
Reuben could empathise with that particular note of frustration, at least. Vairya had managed to pull his trousers up at least, although he still looked like a ragamuffin, so Reuben said to the house computer, “Transfer the com screen to the wall, Guillaume.”
It opened up swiftly, and Reuben found himself staring at a slender, stern man seated at a white console. He was as handsome as Vairya, in a lean, austere way, and looked mildly irritated. Where Vairya was the colour of marble and roses, this man was all bronze and copper, from the colour of his skin to the tight curls of his hair. Even his eyes were bright verdigris, too startling to be natural. He wore a plain suit, but on the bulkhead behind him was emblazoned the symbol of the Sirius Protectorate’s High Command, and to one side, Reuben could glimpse a window that revealed the familiar stars above Caelestia.
“Still living in that hovel, I see,” he said, pursing his lips.
“Still too high and lofty to actually set foot on real soil,” Vairya shot back.
Reuben drew in a breath, trying to make sense of what he was seeing. “Vairya, are you being rude to the man pointing planet killing weapons at us? Please don’t.”
Vairya shrugged. “This is my brother Jibrail. He won’t blow me up without very good reason.”
“I wouldn’t rely on it,” Jibrail said, and this time Reuben caught the humour in it, dust-dry as it was. “I have often been sorely tempted.” He looked up and away slightly, at some other part of his screen. “Dr Cooper, I presume.”
“Delighted,” Reuben said.
“I wish it was mutual.” Jibrail frowned a little. “Vairya, I’m running your memory files now, but this is all rather confusing.”
“Head injury,” Vairya said, waving his hand. “Not my fault.”
“Yes, I’m past that point. Dr Cooper, I will have some questions for you in a moment.” His eyes widened suddenly. “Many questions, actually. Revenants, Vairya?”
“They’re not zombies
,” Vairya said sharply. “They live as they did before. Only their bodies have been reassembled.”
Jibrail wasn’t listening. Instead he had put his hand to his head and looked pained. “I have no idea what to do with you. You know nanotechnology is banned and why, more than any mortal. What possessed you to use it so extensively?”
“It was for my city,” Vairya said. “What wouldn’t you do for Sirius, if you were desperate enough?”
“Having seen this, we should pray I never find out.” He looked at Reuben. “Dr Cooper, I will need to talk to you and your teammates further, as well as the city authorities. Vairya, I will try to win you a stay of execution, but do not hope for more than three days.”
Chapter Thirteen
THEN THE screen went off, before either Reuben or Vairya could say anything else.
“Not one for the formalities, your brother,” Reuben said.
“Not so much, no,” Vairya said. “I love him, but he’s a dick. What did he mean, three days?”
“I don’t know,” Reuben said and sighed. “Well, at least he didn’t come in shooting.”
Vairya nodded. “He’s the most rational man I know. I was teasing him, but it would have been the most logical response to our original situation. There must have been something in your captain’s report which stayed his hand.”
“Or he was worried about his little brother. You are younger, I assume?”
“Yes,” Vairya said absently, “but that kind of sentiment would be terribly out of character. Maybe he could just see from space that we were green again. Curiosity is his weakness.”
Reuben hadn’t seen any hints of weakness on that stern face, but he would take Vairya’s word for it. Leaving Vairya to pace and fret, he started contacting the leaders of the city. Chanthavy transported down from the ship, and there were nine of them gathered in Vairya’s house. There weren’t quite enough chairs, and Reuben retreated to a windowsill to watch the proceedings.
When Jibrail called back, he looked pleased to see the gathering. “Ah, that’s almost everyone we need to interview. You have no objection to my using your screen to do so, I assume, Vairya?”
“Do we have our reprieve?” Vairya demanded.
“Yes,” Jibrail said, and everyone in the room relaxed a little. “By then the true extent of the situation should be obvious. We will remain in a stationary orbit in the meantime. My human companions are rather hysterical about the entire situation, so I have informed them that I will be your liaison for the next few days. You may rely on me to convey any information accurately and to inform all involved of any conclusions I draw.”
“You can too,” Vairya said to the room, not looking away from the screen. “Jibby, why are you here? I’d have expected you to be heading for the limits of human space with a cargo hold full of backups.”
“Binah is waiting on my signal to do just that. I thought it appropriate to see exactly what kind of trouble you had managed to get yourself into this time.”
Vairya looked both pleased and surprised. “Thank you.”
“Save your breath. Captain Som, I wish to clarify a few points from your initial report, if you would be so kind.”
Jibrail’s clarifying of points continued day and night. Every time Reuben went through the lounge, on his way to and from the hospital or just on his way between the bedroom and the kitchen, someone else was sitting in front of the screen, tense and nervous under Jibrail’s polite and relentless interrogation. Reuben got his own turn on the second afternoon, and answered every question as clearly and precisely as he could.
“An excellent report,” Jibrail said when he was finally done, “but you have a military background, don’t you, Doctor?”
“Yes,” Reuben said. There was no point in anything else. Jibrail knew who he was.
“My brother is not a violent man,” Jibrail said, his green eyes narrowing. “I would hate for him to become compromised by your extraordinary decision-making.”
“Are the barely veiled threats part of the interrogation, sir, or are you just trying to warn me off?”
“Would that work?”
“Not in the slightest.”
Jibrail glared at him. Reuben scowled back.
“Well,” Jibrail said at last, his sneer undiminished, “your courage, at least, is not at fault.”
“‘None but the brave deserve the fair,’” Reuben said as mildly as he could.
“Dryden?” Jibrail said with a note of disdain. “Dead poets will not charm me, Dr Cooper. I am not like my brother in that respect.”
“I would have guessed as much.” Reuben raised his eyebrow. “‘Did he who made the Lamb make thee?’”
“Amusing,” Jibrail said flatly.
“I have more where that came from. How many must I use before you learn to mind your own business?”
“Now who speaks rashly to power, Doctor?”
“Oh, I know that you are currently the angel with the burning sword at our gate. I only have to look at the sky to be reminded. I also know that you would not unleash that power carelessly, not when your brother’s life is at stake. Apart from anything else, you are too proud to be so petty.”
Jibrail regarded him silently for a moment. Then he gave Reuben a thin wintry smile and remarked, “You have the potential to be just as irritating as my brother, Doctor. It’s possible you may actually deserve each other.”
Then, while Reuben was still blinking with surprise, the screen blinked off.
“That’s as much a blessing as you’ll ever get,” Vairya remarked behind him. “I think he likes you.”
“I think too much sex has broken your brain,” Reuben said and sank back in the chair so Vairya could lean down and kiss him.
“Want to break it some more?”
“I have to get back to the hospital,” Reuben said with regret.
Vairya sighed. “I should get back to the reservoir then. So much to do.”
That night, on the edge of sleep, Reuben chuckled at a sudden thought and said, “Your brother should really wear a monocle. It would improve his sneer.”
Vairya grinned at him. “I’ll give him one for his next birthday. It gets hard to find new gifts after the first hundred years.”
“When’s his birthday?”
“Not for months,” Vairya said quietly. “I suppose it might not matter. Our deadline runs out tomorrow.”
“Have hope.”
“I’m afraid to.” He rose up on one elbow, though, and looked down at Reuben, his face solemn. “It feels like we have lived a lifetime in a week and a half, doesn’t it?”
“It does,” Reuben said. “More than many men see in their lives.”
“Yes,” Vairya said, still serious. “Reuben, have you thought at all about what you will do if we survive?”
“A little,” Reuben admitted. “I’ve been trying to avoid thinking beyond the moment.”
“Have you considered staying? I know it has only been ten days, but it occurred to me that you and I, we both have a gift for annoying people, but we haven’t annoyed each other, not in any way that matters, and that seems… well, I don’t know what it is. Despite everything I know, I don’t know what this is.”
“I have an idea,” Reuben said, his heart warm. He pulled Vairya down against his shoulder, putting his arms around him. “All that poetry in your head, and you don’t recognise it?”
“It’s absurd,” Vairya whispered. “Ridiculous. Preposterous.”
“You have a thesaurus in there too?”
Vairya pinched him in the side, looking affronted. “I’m having a life-altering revelation and you mock me?”
“And you love it,” Reuben pointed out.
“I do, for my sins.”
It could have become another game of quotation and allusion, but Reuben needed to make this clear, especially if they were to die tomorrow. “I am falling in love with you.”
Vairya sighed. “Yes. That’s exactly it, isn’t it? I am halfway in love with you.�
�� His smile went rueful. “Please stay, Reuben, or I shall make a lovesick fool of myself chasing you across the galaxy.”
“I want to stay,” Reuben admitted. Life, and circumstance, had sent him to the stars, but he had always wanted to find a home one day. Until now, he had doubted he would ever be welcome to settle anywhere. “My reputation could cause you some problems.”
Vairya snorted. “Everyone in the city is alive because of you. I’m the one who will have to watch out for your admirers.”
“Nonsense,” Reuben said and kissed him.
When they finally pulled apart, Vairya was smiling. Leaning in so closely their mouths brushed, he recited, laughter in his voice, “‘Come live with me, and be my love…’”
Reuben kissed the words out of him, setting aside all his worries about tomorrow, to take this moment and live it to the utmost.
THE NEXT day was the strangest he had ever lived. No one talked about the impending deadline, but every few moments he would notice someone darting a glance at the sky. The hospital felt very quiet, and there weren’t as many patients as he would have expected. There were staff missing too, and he couldn’t begrudge them the chance to spend the time with their loved ones.
Meili had come to help out, and Eskil and Chanthavy joined them before long. None of them needed to talk about it, but he was glad to have their familiar faces close by. He was gladder still when Vairya appeared at midday, bringing them lunch and then sitting in the garden outside the waiting room, watching him through the window as he consulted with his patients and colleagues.
He needed to visit the wards, so he headed for the doors into the garden to let Vairya know where he was going. He didn’t want to let him out of sight.
“Reuben,” Meili said suddenly, her voice oddly tight. “It’s not working.”
“What’s not?” he asked, turning to face her. She was standing in the doorway of one of the treatment rooms, looking strained.
“The nanites. They’re not responding. I’ve tried and tried, and nothing’s happening. Could you have a look? You’re better with them.”
In Heaven and Earth Page 12
