The One-Eyed Man

by Modesitt,, L. E. Jr.

  13

  Dark summer gardens of my sky, thought two,

  land grubbers twisted sky soul from the true.

  “Come to me, whether sky is clear, or free, or you are near,” chanted Ilsabet, walking swiftly up the gentle slope.

  “Don’t talk nonsense,” said the one Ilsabet called Matron, “or I’ll have to insist that you come back inside, where it’s always safe.”

  “I never talk nonsense through,” replied Ilsabet. “It’s only no sense to you who cannot do, and cannot call those who’ll bring again the Fall.”

  “Nonsense is as nonsense speaks,” said the Matron, her voice condescendingly soft, her hand close to the stunner at her waist.

  “As you wish and say,” said Ilsabet. “I’ll be good today.” After a pause, she added, “It’s always safe outside for me. You’d see, if you’d let me be.” She danced across the thick carpet of brown-purple-gray-green grass at the top of the low ridge, not looking back, her eyes to the west and south.

  The Matron did not answer, only glancing nervously to the south, then back to the door in the small and low section of the building aboveground.

  A light breeze rippled the white cloth of Ilsabet’s blouse, a wind neither hot nor cold.

  “From the south please come, and let this charade be done…” Those words were chanted barely in a murmur before the bright blank expression returned to her face.

  14

  Fiveday morning, I sipped tea—or what passed for it—up in the study. I saw no one outside, even after it got lighter—not that there would ever be a true sunrise—no one at all. As I thought about it, I hadn’t seen anyone outside any time that I’d actually looked, but I hadn’t looked that much. Then I dressed and made my way past the concealed pressure doors at the top of the ramp, and walked down to the main level, then out into the tunnel way, and to the Survey Service and my “official” office, where I went back to my detailed and increasingly boring study of the local Systems Survey records and reports.

  It was a very long day, with a quick break for a meal prepared by the synthesizer in my quarters. I did arrange with Dermotte for him to make template copies of some monitoring equipment and a new analyzer design, for distribution to the Stittaran Survey Service. In late afternoon, as I was massaging my forehead and about to stop pushing my way through more and more documents, there was a rap on the open door to my spaces. I turned my head and saw Aloris standing there.

  “Good afternoon,” I offered.

  “The same to you. I haven’t wanted to bother you. You’ve been working rather hard, and I thought you might like to join several of us for dinner tonight at Ojolian’s.” Her smile was more than professional and less than flirtatious, and that was fine with me.

  “I’d be delighted.” And I was. Eating alone in a strange city, if that was what Passova was, on a strange world gets old quite quickly. Besides, who knew what I might discover … even by what no one talked about. “What time, if I might ask?”

  “Around seven.”

  “I’ll be there. Thank you.”

  “We’ll look forward to seeing you.” With that, she slipped away.

  She’d left me largely to my own devices for four days, except for politely occasionally asking if I needed anything and insisting I get checked out on how to operate the Survey van … and now I was getting a dinner invitation?

  It couldn’t hurt.

  That left me a good hour before I had to get cleaned up for the evening. So I took a deep breath and went back to reading another series of responses to Survey Service proposals, most of which dated back hundreds of years and had never even gotten to the study stage, about possible investigations of the skytubes. What still amazed me, after all the years as an ecologist, was how much administrivia led to absolutely nothing. Almost as amazing was how often good data and studies were ignored once they’d been completed.

  I didn’t have a chance to read in detail the last three studies, ones that looked to be among the most promising, but I did skim them and make quick notes so that I could go over them in more detail.

  At seven I walked into Ojolian’s, what I would have called a bistro back on Bachman, and I’d had to take one of the tunneltrams or trains, since it was on the far northeastern side of Passova. Even with a link, I’d had to ask the system for directions once, but that was probably because I was used to orienting myself with an open sky around me, something that the tunnels and even Ojolian’s made not the faintest attempt to reproduce in any sort of fashion.

  Ojolian’s looked to be a cross between an ancient Anglo pub, with dark pseudo-oak walls and partitions and an equally antique Frankish bistro with spindly-looking chairs and glass-topped iron-rimmed tables. The light came from wall sconces from a period or culture I didn’t recognize … and could have been Ansaran or Farhkan, for all I knew. The floor was of square tiles, alternating black and white.

  When I approached the table where Aloris and the others sat, she gestured to a young man, accompanied by another young-looking person.

  “This is my son. Haraan, this is Paulo Verano, the noted ecologist I told you about.”

  “I’m pleased to meet you,” said the young man. “And this is my partner, Amarios.”

  “I’m also pleased to meet you,” said Amarios.

  With that low husky voice and silky hair of midlength, androgynous looks and figure, Amarios could have been female or male, or either attempting to be the other. I wasn’t about to guess. “It’s good to meet you both.”

  Both Haraan and Amarios looked young—and so far as I knew Stittara had no rejuve technology or biologic systems beyond those available in the rest of the Arm. Yet … if Aloris could have children, why had she also, even earlier, permitted or agreed to degendered cloning? Was the birthrate that low? Haraan barely showed any resemblance to Aloris—or to Raasn Defaux—except in the eyes and in general build, yet my eyes flicked from one to the other, because there was … something.

  “You know Raasn,” added Aloris, gesturing, “and that is Darlian across from him. No, she’s not in the Survey. She’s a private advocate.”

  I turned and inclined my head to her. “Domestic, commercial … or both?”

  “Both,” replied the woman with short-cut blond hair. “Stittara’s too small for that kind of specialization.” Her voice was firm, just short of being hard. In the comparative dimness of the bistro, I had no idea what color her eyes were.

  “Commercial infringement one day, and domestic unity and property disputes the next?” I returned lightly.

  “More likely water rights one day, and domestic disturbance hearings the next.”

  I nodded and settled into the sole empty chair, between Aloris and Darlian, and directly across from Amarios.

  “To keep things clear in my mind,” I said, looking at Amarios, “what do you do, if I might ask?”

  “I’m a singer.”

  “This is one of her few nights off,” interjected Haraan.

  “Just because there was a power surge that fried half the systems in Invireo … about three stans ago.” Amarios shook her head. “Aelston kept saying he’d have it fixed. It didn’t happen. It never does.”

  “Does it happen often?”

  “Two or three times a year.”

  “That seems like a lot.” But then, I reflected, Stittara’s year was four hundred and twenty days. On the other hand, all the power sources and lines were underground.

  “You’re thinking that’s too many, aren’t you?” asked Raasn, an amused expression on his face.

  “I was…” I stopped because a server, an elflike young woman—I thought—had appeared, with a tray of crystal-like beakers and goblets, placing one of whichever before everyone but me.

  “What would you like to drink, ser?”

  “Pale lager or whatever comes closest?”

  “We have Spendrift and Yelos. We’re out of Zantos.”

  “Whichever is less bitter.”

  “Spendrift.”


  “That will be fine.” I turned to Raasn. “There’s obviously something I don’t know. What is it?”

  “There’s always a fairly strong magnetic field with the storms. They can put stress on the power grids and components, and if the stress doesn’t immediately cause failures…”

  “It does later … and unpredictably,” I suggested. But a power surge and not just a failure? When there haven’t been any storms? Maybe I just didn’t know enough about Stittara and especially its infrastructure. That was understandable after not quite a week planetside.

  Raasn nodded.

  “So what systems failed at Invireo?” I asked Amarios. “Or was it just the combination of too many black boxes?”

  She smiled. “Doesn’t every club anywhere have a system that’s been added to and modified so many times no one’s quite sure what goes where … until everything goes wrong?”

  “I’ve known some clubs like that,” I admitted, even if I’d only known them because they were the kinds of places Chelesina and Leysa liked.

  “Are you in the Survey?” I asked Haraan.

  “I fear not. My talents don’t lie in that direction. I’m the entertainment coordinator and director for Passova Comm. I’ll be especially busy for the next few months, scanning, rating, and the like…”

  “Oh … the downloads from the Persephonya?”

  “That’s right. They always need editing and localization, the ones that aren’t period pieces of some sort.”

  “Haraan is one of the best at that,” added Amarios.

  “Then there’s the problem of pricing and distribution, and no matter what I do, some staffer for some member of the Council is always complaining.”

  “The Council pays for the acquisition and shipping?”

  “They wanted to make certain that no local media linkster had monopoly access. It’s by bid, but no media combine can obtain more than thirty percent.”

  “Why thirty percent?”

  Haraan chuckled. “Given the amount of material that comes in at one time, that seems to be the right number to assure that no one can buy enough of the more obviously popular content.”

  “There are always shows, dramas, concerts that weren’t that popular on Bachman, but do better here than they did there,” added Amarios.

  “Do you send back local entertainment?”

  “Some,” replied Haraan, “but we only net about a quarter of what it costs us. And the Unity government actually subsidizes us. We get what we get at a fifty percent discount. The rationale is maintenance of cultural homogeneity.”

  Those, frankly, were factors I’d never even considered. So I just nodded.

  “Enough of what I do,” said Haraan with a self-deprecating laugh. “My mother says that you’re one of the top ecologists in the Unity. How did you ever decide to be an ecologist?”

  “It happened. I couldn’t explain everything that went into it, but what kept me interested is that ecology is the organic equivalent of fractals, if you will.”

  Amarios offered a husky soft laugh. “That sounds like entertainment.”

  “Music is most ordered and not fractal,” said Aloris, not quite primly.

  “Mother is also an oboist in the Passova Symphony.”

  They still had community or civic symphonies on Stittara? The only symphony orchestras on Bachman were those maintained by a few entertainment multis. They generally catered to older and wealthier eccentrics. “Oh … how long have you been playing with them?” I asked Aloris.

  She laughed. “Long enough to know better.”

  “She’s really quite good,” insisted Haraan.

  “She is,” added Amarios.

  “But why do you equate ecology with fractals?” asked Haraan.

  “Because the same uniqueness persists no matter how far down you go in size and how far up … well … until you get to the point where intelligent species start destroying the interrelations.” At that point I caught a quick glance between Aloris and Raasn.

  “Surely you don’t mean us?” asked Raasn ironically.

  “Perhaps I should have said pseudo-intelligent species.”

  Everyone laughed.

  At that point, the server returned with my lager and asked, “Are you ready to order?”

  I had to grab for the menufilm and scan it while Aloris began. Thankfully, or perhaps she gestured, the server went around the table the other way, and by the time the others had ordered, I’d decided. “I’ll have the torna salad, and the beefalo crepe with pommefrit and vegetables.” The beefalo was likely either synth or tank, but that didn’t matter to me.

  “That’s actually pretty good,” said Haraan after the server left. “I’d recommend against the calamari in the future. Perforated sonic foam is tastier and more tender.”

  I winced at that.

  Amarios gave a brief but amused smile.

  “What do you sing?” I asked.

  “It depends on which set. The early set, that’s mostly old and slow, ballads and an upbeat art song or two…”

  She had to have searched long and hard for any upbeat art songs, I suspected, but maybe they weren’t art songs at all.

  “… and the second set is usually old pop, twenty years back, maybe more … the third set is the edgy stuff … and the late set is pretty much whatever people request. There are some songs I won’t do … just claim I can’t do it. Aelston backs me up on that.”

  “Once he turned the system into a deafening squeal every time one asshole tried to demand ‘Bareback,’” added Haraan with a grin.

  “How many nights a week do you do that?”

  “Five … twoday through sixday. The club’s closed on sevenday. On oneday, the music’s all playback from earlier shows.” She shrugged in a way that was feminine, and not at all androgynous … but I still wasn’t certain.

  “You never said what your initial specialty in ecology was,” said Haraan.

  “Water. Fresh water, sources and interactions, chemistry and biologics … regulations … pollution of all sorts, including sonic and nanetic…” It was my turn to shrug. “That led to everything else, because you really can’t separate out the components of a planetary ecosystem, not without horrible mistakes and even worse political, technical, and developmental decisions and regulations…” I talked for a good ten minutes nonstop, until Haraan’s and Amarios’s eyes began to glaze over—but not Raasn’s, I noticed.

  After that, the conversation got lighter—how could it have not?—and I had a good meal and conversation that wasn’t too taxing … even if I still wondered about Haraan, his partner, and his mother. I also noted that no one said a word about my assignment or the Survey Service.

  Hell! I worried about them all, even the advocate who’d said almost nothing.

  15

  Early on sixday morning, after I’d exercised and eaten in my quarters, I did see someone outside, for the first time. She was close to a half kay away, her back to me, and she was looking south, toward the distant skytubes. She wore a white blouse and stood in the middle of an expanse of the grass, grass that was somehow brown and green infused with purple. One hand gathered part of a purple gray skirt, the kind that no one donned except for formal balls, if then, and certainly not for everyday wear, and the other held a flower, a single stalk with white petals. I couldn’t identify it, not surprisingly, because on Bachman, few flowers had survived the Terran mutebees designed for food crops and little else, since the founders hadn’t been exactly all that interested in what they termed frills, a shortcoming the Arm was still paying for.

  Then she skipped lightly up the treeless slope, and white petals dropped off the flower stalk. At the top of the slope, she stopped again. After a time, another woman, one with a weapon at the wide belt around her waist, approached and said a few words to the woman in the anachronistic long skirt.

  The woman in the white blouse turned and walked down the slope, almost like a dejected child, although she was clearly older than that.

 
; The image of her, looking toward the giant but distant skytubes in the southwest, remained in my thoughts even after I went down to the Survey System spaces and my temporary office there. As was typical for a government organization, sixday wasn’t a workday, but I saw a few people in passing as I made my way to my space and console.

  For the first stan or so of my continuing perusal of the Systems Survey records, I went over the three studies that had looked intriguing … and came away somewhat disappointed, in part because of the fact that all the evidence and factual presentations were observational, rather than experimental. What was intriguing was the notation that no attempt at penetrating a skytube had ever been successful, and would likely not be unless attempted with a hardened military type penetrator—which the study authors recommended against “for obvious reasons.” Those reasons were never presented, but there was a short section that had been deleted—two hundred years earlier. What was odd was that the deletion was noted. I doubt I would have noticed otherwise, even with the awkward transition to the next section, the one that noted that Stittara had no high-flying birds, that all avian species were small, and used burrow nests.

  I was still puzzling over that when I began reviewing the documentation submitted by the various research multis—both those that had come and gone and those that remained. For some reason, my thoughts drifted back to the woman in the antique garb, but I finally pushed the image aside and concentrated on the voluminous files.

  After several stans more of heavy reading, I decided to walk through the tunnel ways over to one of the “local” eating establishments. I’d no more than stepped into the tunnel than Aloris appeared, with a shorter brunette.

  “Paulo … are you going to lunch? Would you like to join us?”

  “I would.”

  “This is my friend Zerlyna, Zerlyna Eblion. We were catching up on some data systems changes while no one was around. We’re headed to Carlo’s. It’s not bad, and it’s quick.”

  Zerlyna offered a warm smile, almost too warm, I thought, before I replied, “That’s fine with me.”