by Greg Egan
Martin repeated the story he’d told the fruit-seller.
‘We have three hundred prisoners,’ the warder replied. ‘How will I know your son?’
Martin assumed that Zal was sticking to an alias; being known as the visiting prince of Zavolestan might have got him released, but it would also have risked sparking a war. ‘His hair is white, like an old man’s. But he’s young, less than half my age.’
‘I know the one,’ the warder replied. ‘He was caught creeping into the palace stables.’
You don’t know the half of it, Martin thought. ‘He was just looking for a place to sleep,’ he said. ‘We’re strangers here, I and my two sons.’ He gestured at Javeed. ‘The boy misses his brother. Can’t you let us see him for a few minutes?’
The warder sniffed viscously, then hawked and spat on the ground. He opened the gate and let them through.
Three buildings with ominous barred windows faced into a central courtyard. The warder led them across muddy ground; Martin found himself skirting the puddles as if his new virtual self, lacking contact with the dry floor of a ghal’e, couldn’t help taking the threat of discomfort more seriously.
It was dim inside the prison building; it took a few seconds for Martin’s eyes to adjust. Two rows of cage-like cells stretched out ahead of them on either side, each containing half-a-dozen grimy inhabitants. There was no furniture at all, just some straw on the ground and a bucket for each cell that Martin was glad he couldn’t smell. In spite of himself, he couldn’t help searching the prisoners’ faces, wondering about their treatment and when they’d be released.
The warder led them towards a cell near the end of the right-hand row. ‘Hey, stable-boy! Your father’s here for a visit!’ A white-haired youth turned, a shocked expression on his face. His real father, Sam, was off fighting a war in Gorgsaran. Out of the warder’s line of sight, Javeed raised a finger to his lips: we won’t give away your secret, so don’t give away ours.
Zal walked over to the edge of his cage. ‘Welcome, Father. Welcome, Little Brother. I’m ashamed that you’re seeing me this way.’
‘I’m sorry it’s come to this,’ Martin said. ‘It’s my fault for not putting a roof over our heads.’
The warder left them. They drew closer to Zal and he asked in a low voice, ‘Who are you? I’m sure you weren’t in my expedition.’
‘We’re simple Persian travellers,’ Martin explained. ‘We heard about your plight and wondered how we could help.’
‘You must keep silent,’ Zal insisted. ‘If Mehrab learns that Sam’s son was inside his palace, visiting my beloved Rudabeh, no good will come of it for anyone.’
‘Do you want us to take a message to your entourage?’ Martin suggested. They were camped on the outskirts of the city. ‘You must have been missed by now.’
Zal shook his head. ‘If my companions learn my fate, it will be hard to restrain them. And if they enter the city and free me, that will make trouble that will not be easily undone.’
Javeed said, ‘Why did you sneak into the palace?’
Zal sighed. ‘Imagine a woman as slender as a cypress tree, with a face more lovely than the full moon.’
‘But couldn’t you just ask her father to let you marry her?’
‘I will! I must!’ Zal replied fervently. ‘But first I need to write to my own father, to persuade him that this match is auspicious. And then my father must find some way to win over the Persian King Manuchehr, to convince him that this alliance will not lead to tragedy. Mehrab is the grandson of Zahhak, the monster who brought death and sorrow to Persia for a thousand years! I cannot condemn Mehrab for his ancestor’s crimes - or in the same breath I would have to renounce my beloved - but nor should I misjudge the struggle I’ll face to gain my father’s approval and Manuchehr’s blessing.’
That Javeed had supposedly derailed Zahhak’s infamous career in an earlier encounter didn’t seem to faze him; if he’d been able to change the whole history of the Shahnameh there’d be no framework for the stories left standing.
‘Then how can we help you?’ Javeed asked.
Zal stood in silence, pondering the question. Then he squatted down to bring his face close to Javeed’s.
‘Tell me, are you a boy who can come and go from a place unseen?’
‘Yes,’ Javeed replied confidently.
‘Are you a boy who can be trusted with the most prized of my possessions?’
‘Yes.’
Zal hesitated, rocking back on his heels nervously. He wiped his nose on his filthy sleeve; his commoner’s disguise was very authentic, to the point where Martin had trouble picturing Rudabeh letting him into her room at all.
Zal made his decision. ‘In my tent outside the city,’ he whispered to Javeed, ‘there is a small bag made of plain brown cloth, with nothing to distinguish it or draw attention to its value. But if you can bring it to me without anyone knowing what you’ve done, I will throw open my treasury to you. You will have emeralds, diadems, five golden thrones, a hundred Arab horses adorned with the finest brocade, fifty elephants—’
‘Elephants!’ Martin saw Javeed’s happy face, captured in Omar’s shop before their first session, rendered at full strength for the first time in months.
‘Listen carefully,’ Zal said. ‘We are camped on the southern bank of the river, a short march east of here. There will be two sentries standing guard, but we are not at war, so they will not be too serious in their task, and they will not be watching the river. Sneak in through the rushes, then make your way through the camp. My tent lies furthest to the south. The brown bag is beside my sleeping mat. Bring that here, and all my hardship will be lifted. Do you understand?’
‘Yes.’
‘Can you do this for me?’
‘Yes.’
Zal reached through the bars and grasped his hand. ‘Fortune has favoured me with an ally such as this. God protect you, Little Brother.’
Javeed was silent as they walked back towards the courtyard. Zal had been his hero even before Mahnoosh’s death; Martin was beginning to worry that the whole encounter might have been too intense.
‘What are you thinking, pesaram?’ he asked gently.
‘Can we get an island?’ Javeed replied. ‘To keep the elephants?’
‘Ah. We’ll see.’
The warder let them out through the gate; Martin handed him a coin in the hope that it might make him more amenable upon their return. On the street, Martin found his bearings by the sun; he was assuming it was morning, and when they caught sight of the Kabul River it was on their left, so they were definitely heading in the right direction.
‘See the mountains?’ Martin said.
Javeed looked up across the river at the craggy brown peaks. ‘Yes.’
‘When I came here in real life it was winter, so they were covered in snow. It was beautiful, but the weather was freezing.’
‘That’s when you were a reporter?’
‘Yeah. Twenty years ago.’
‘And there was a war here?’
‘Right. There was war here for more than thirty years.’
Javeed absorbed that in silence, but Martin knew he’d keep turning the revelation over in his head. He remembered more of what Martin told him than Martin remembered himself.
The closely packed houses and shops soon gave way to small fields. The river, usually narrow, was swollen with the summer’s melted snow; as it turned towards the dusty track they were following, Martin spotted a cluster of lavishly decorated tents a few hundred metres ahead. Three horses were visible, tethered to stakes, but there was nobody in sight. Maybe the sentries were having a siesta, but however vulnerable the apparently unguarded camp looked, Martin didn’t want to risk marching straight in rather than following Zal’s advice.
‘That’s the expedition,’ he said.
‘Where are the elephants?’ Javeed asked anxiously.
‘Back in Zavolestan, I expect. Don’t worry, I’m sure Zal will keep his word.’
They turned off the track and headed for the riverbank. As they approached, Martin regarded the thick, reedy vegetation with dismay. That the rushes couldn’t actually scratch their skin raw - or even register as tangible to any part of their body save their hands - offered a certain consolation, but it wouldn’t stop the plants impeding their movement almost as effectively as the real thing.
Martin went first, pushing the springy plants aside with his hands, clearing the way for Javeed to follow close behind him. The plants weren’t quite as tall as he was, so he walked with a crouch to keep himself hidden, grateful that at least his knees were spared the effects of doing that in an ordinary ghal’e. After a while he felt he’d settled into a successful rhythm, and he tried to crank up the speed - but Zendegi was having none of it: the same, only faster didn’t compute. At first he could make no sense of this; he couldn’t believe that the reeds were so heavy or stiff that a faster pace would require superhuman effort. Then he peered down at the mud and saw it adhering to his sandals as he lifted his feet. He couldn’t feel the burning in his calves that might have come from pulling himself free of such sticky ground over and over again, but the bottom line was that Zendegi wouldn’t let him operate his body as if these forces were of no consequence to him.
Perhaps they should have come closer to the camp before taking this arduous detour, but Martin had been paranoid about being spotted, and it probably wouldn’t help if they modified their plans now.
After five minutes Javeed lost patience. ‘You’re too big and noisy!’ he complained. ‘Zal didn’t say for you to come. Let me go by myself!’
Martin did not like the sound of that, but when he looked across the dispiriting expanse of marshland that still lay ahead of them, he finally noticed the fine network of gaps that a smaller body could slip through. Every third step he took was accompanied by the sound of reeds springing back into place, but with a little bending and swaying of his own Javeed could simply pass between them, almost in silence. Being lighter, he sank less deeply into the mud. And once he reached the camp his size was sure to offer similar advantages.
‘All right,’ Martin declared reluctantly. ‘Just remember—’
‘If I’m scared, thumbs-down,’ Javeed replied. ‘Don’t worry, Baba, I’ll be okay.’
Martin turned aside and let him dart ahead. Within half a minute he’d vanished from sight.
Standing alone in the mud, Martin struggled to keep his thoughts from turning self-consciously to the Proxy. It was as if the invisible apprentice who’d been peering over his shoulder all this time, silently observing everything he did, now deserved some form of acknowledgement - and a concise lecture on some fine points of parenting to supplement all this long-winded teaching by example. But that wasn’t how it worked. And since all the Proxy could do was mimic Martin’s thoughts - not receive them, like telepathic messages - the very last thing it needed was reflections on its own creation that might risk transforming its mind into a hall of mirrors.
The proper subject for contemplation was Javeed, the proper mood a celebration of the fact that they could still spend time together. But in the life Martin had once imagined for them this journey would have been a mere rehearsal, whetting their appetite for the real thing. It was hard to swallow the claustrophobic vision of his health declining to the point where they could rule out actually travelling anywhere: not Afghanistan, not Australia, not even the ruins of Persepolis with the other tourists. Just Zendegi, over and over again - with his body laid out flat, as if he were already in the morgue.
He cut off that line of thought and tried to focus on his memories of the real Kabul. He pictured the crowded city of twenty years before; thousands of refugees expelled from Pakistan and Iran had found their villages too dangerous to return to, and had ended up living in bombed-out buildings in the capital, trying to survive the winters with broken roofs and the only fuel whatever dead trees could be found in the city’s parks. He’d met one family - Ali and Zahra and their four young children - not too far from the bend in the river where Zal’s imaginary party was camped. When Javeed was a little older he would need to hear their story, to hear who’d survived that winter and who hadn’t.
Insects hovered over the mud. The sun was almost directly above now; Javeed was taking too long to return. Martin’s thoughts snagged on a complication: the Proxy needed to be ready to make the right judgement, not only for the six-year-old Javeed, but also for the ten-, the twelve-, the fifteen-year-old - for however long it continued to be invoked. It would have no power to form long-term memories, or be shaped by its experience of watching him grow up; it had to work out-of-the-box with Javeed at any age. The last thing Martin wanted it to do was to treat his teenage son like an infant.
And he was supposed to prepare for that . . . how? By mentally prefacing every action with a conscious acknowledgement that it might not be appropriate at some time in the future? Well, he’d just done that. Back in the here and now, Javeed was a small child, and he’d either got lost or been caught. That he hadn’t pulled the plug on the whole simulation meant almost nothing - least of all that he didn’t need help.
Martin pushed through the rushes as fast as he could. It was only when he drew close to the camp that he attempted a degree of stealth; he was prepared to risk detection, but so long as they remained in Zendegi he wouldn’t lightly throw away any chance they still had to succeed.
He crawled the last few metres on his knees and elbows; easier than in real life, maybe, but the concentration it took to manipulate his icon through the reeds felt almost as draining as any physical task. Charmingly, the game’s designers hadn’t failed to allow Zal’s party a place where they could feed fertiliser to the river’s algae: a tent had been set up backing onto the reeds, and it was sheer luck that Martin spotted it in time to avoid getting too close to its output plume. He crawled up beside the tent, then rose into a squat, partly sheltered as he peered into the camp.
Just out of sight, a man spoke, his voice at the edge of patience as if he’d been repeating the same question for a while. ‘Are you a spy, or a thief? Which one is it?’
‘No!’ came Javeed’s plaintive reply. ‘I just wanted a job to feed the elephants.’
Another man laughed. ‘Do you see any elephants?’
‘No, but you could take me to Lavosestan.’
‘Where?’
The first man said, ‘He’s a crazy little thief. Do you know what we do to thieves who don’t tell the truth?’
‘I’m not a thief!’ Javeed retorted. ‘I’d never take anything - unless someone told me to.’
‘Really? So what were you planning to take? And who is your master who told you to take it?’
‘No one!’ Javeed insisted. ‘I just wanted to see the elephants.’
Martin forced himself to keep some perspective. Javeed wasn’t having an easy time with his captors, but he didn’t sound desperate yet. His priorities were not hard to guess: an attempted rescue that blew their whole mission would not be acceptable.
Martin crept into the camp, steering clear of the interrogators, hoping he hadn’t become disoriented and really was heading south. He wasn’t sure why there were so few people around; maybe they’d already sent a search party into the city, looking for Zal after he’d failed to return from his latest night of passion. The whole arrest scenario had been cooked up last weekend by the game’s software; the original story of Zal and Rudabeh had been a mixture of politics, family obligations and romantic swooning, loaded with proto-Shakespearean possibilities, but of limited interest to a six-year-old.
Helpfully, Zal’s tent was distinctly more ornate than the others; Martin could have sworn there was real gold thread in the design, or at least . . . whatever. A reddish-brown stallion was tied up right by the entrance; it regarded Martin irritably, and as he tried to squeeze past it, it began to neigh. Martin put a hand on its flank. ‘Sssh. Stay cool, buddy, and you might get to play Rakhsh in the sequel.’ That promise seemed to do the tric
k, or maybe it had caught a trace of its master’s scent on the intruder and deduced that Martin was here with Zal’s blessing.
He ducked into the tent. The silk brocade and khatam knickknacks were almost enough to blind a non-princely eye, but Martin scrabbled around beside the sleeping mat until the plain brown bag materialised from the clutter as a kind of absence of decoration that refused to go away. It was about the size of his hand, sealed with a knotted drawstring; it made no sound when Martin shook it, and when he squeezed it gently he felt nothing but a slight rearrangement of its contents beneath the material. Definitely not a dagger, nor lock-picking tools. Maybe a rolled-up piece of parchment?
Martin lifted his kameez and stuffed the bag down the front of his shalwar. The fabric bulged slightly, but the kameez would hide that. Whatever cultural specifics might plausibly be ascribed to this mutated version of a mediaeval poet’s tale of a much earlier time, Martin was fairly sure that the game’s rating precluded anyone patting down his groin.