Fall of the White Ship Avatar

by Brian Daley

  "Hello, ge'mun," she purred, a loud purr. "Ah thought somebody ovah theah might be up foah a game o' Grafenberg hockey. Why, ge'mun! Whut's wrong?"

  They did look a little foolish; slack-jawed and frog-eyed. She was standing across the way, in a white gown that shone blue in the dusk and threw out tiny speckles of starlight. It was tight as sausage skin on a truly awesome shape.

  She was that same startling female persona they'd seen in dozens of holoflix and tapes, with the honeyed, stand-clear voice. Her windblown coif was no one color; it was all colors, a spectrum or rainbow that shifted around her face and neck and shoulders.

  And, where they just about had to chin themselves on the wall, she was leaning down on it, a tumbler looking small as a fruit-juice glass in one long hand. Floyt and Alacrity looked down at the planter on which they were standing, and at each other again, and back to their neighbor.

  "Look heah, hons: the least y'all could do is say good evenin' and invite me ovah theah! Oh, well … "

  She put the glass down behind one sawtooth and vaulted up very neatly for someone in a designer sheath gown, to stand with one foot on either side of the makeshift assault bridge. The fabulous floor-length dress had a walking slit that reached all the way to her treated, jewel-threaded pubic locks.

  The two friends squeaked like a pair of gerbils and bumped into each other, hands outflung to ward her off, not sure what to do but anticipating catastrophe.

  "No! Circe, you can't—"

  "Don't! Miss Minx, please! I beg you, stay back!"

  She put fists on her hips and thrust out her lower lip at them. If the scale is the same at her end, Floyt processed, she's about three and a half meters tall.

  "Now, ge'mun, ah come fum Damfino, which is a planet wheah folks innerduce themselves to one an-othah! So, heah ah come!"

  She put one big, pink, bare foot out onto the flagpole; Floyt sprang to brace it but Alacrity dragged him back, afraid he'd only jostle Circe Minx.

  Circe Minx—after Hecate achieved her tremendous fame, the whole pantheon had been pillaged by people in search of catchy stage names, pseudonyms, and aliases—walked the balance-beam of the flagpole with a definite air of authority, the long, wide feet grasping, toes reaching and feeling for purchase, gripping. Air traffic passed by in the distance, beyond the Sceptered Isle's restricted zone, and low-level fliers and ground vehicles streamed below in rivers of light. She was out beyond the climate controls, where the winds carried Avalon sounds from far away and the fall would be long, long …

  "Alacrity, shouldn't we call somebody?" Floyt whispered harshly.

  "No! No, don't leave me in the middle of this! And anyway, who would you call? Just get ready to grab the pole if it bows too far, but don't let it drag you over the side if we can't save 'er."

  Circe Minx's weight—no fan publication or publicity outlet ever revealed it—caused a pronounced dip in the composite flagpole, but then again she was halfway to her destination. She held one cross-tie, stiletto-heeled dancing sandal in either hand, arms out for balance like a circus pro. Except she was giggling.

  Alacrity and Floyt waffled between shielding their eyes and watching fascinatedly. Alacrity couldn't help thinking what a splat the reigning sex symbol of the Third Breath would make if she misstepped.

  One moment she was doing fine, hair tossed by the breezes; the next, she was in trouble, arms windmilling slowly, brows knotted as if she couldn't recall something. "Uh-oh … "

  Alacrity breathed "Vaina!" to himself and got ready to grab for the pole or go after her or something. But Floyt jumped up to brace his elbows on the parapet, to yell through cupped hands.

  "There's a commo call for you here, Miss Minx! Something about you not having script approval on your next feature!"

  She dropped both big sandals. "What?" The shriek hurt their ears. She finished the walk one foot in front of the other, arms outspread, so quickly that the two friends fell to either side so as not to be trampled.

  Circe Minx hit the turf with a solid thud and a swirl of sense-satin. "Where the hell's that commo terminal? No script approval? Would you two ge'mun be gallant enough to 'scuze a gal while she goes and toe-asses a little butt?"

  "Yes, well now, how shall I put this?" Moisture beaded on Floyt's forehead and in his mustache. "I'm afraid I made that up. Heh-heh!"

  "To get you in off that flagpole. I mean, really," Alacrity hastened. "You had us kinda scared." They both gulped, staring up at her. Alacrity estimated that she came in at three hundred kilos and a good deal more, but distributed on that amazing frame it all looked healthy and dynamic, fetchingly proportioned if voluptuous, but under the circumstances, frightening.

  Uh, where is that gun?

  Floyt was more contemplative, recalling things he'd read. Height was a matter of some introspection to him, what with most non-Terrans running to extra-tall according to his standards, by way of nutrition, eugenics, bio-engineering, and what-all. Circe and people her size were about as far as human physiology could be stretched and not run into prohibitive troubles like osteological breakdown, critical loss of coordination, and square-cube revenge. As it was, cardiovascular glitches almost always cropped up, necessitating transplants, implants, and synergies.

  Despite that, Circe Minx struck him as a big, healthy woman in her early thirties who'd adapted about as well as anybody could be expected to. She'd started out in erotic entertainments that were still prized and praised as high paradigms. Her lackluster dramatic vehicles only pointed up the fact that she was bright, funny, well read, and woefully underserved by the material given her. Much better things came with time.

  As a performer and actress, her main problem was that there were few enough costars of any height with talent to match hers, much less leads who could play a scene opposite Circe without recourse to a forklift. Of people her size with her comedic timing, singing, and dancing ability, there were just about none. That notwithstanding, she'd almost singlehandedly made the "larger-than-life" school of holo and multimedia enormously popular and profitable, and become the fantasy figure of billions of people.

  Still, all that mass was more than a little intimidating up close, especially to someone who'd just conned her, Floyt decided. Where is that Webley?

  Circe scowled down at them for a beat, then broke into a smile warm as a fireplace. "You did it foah feah of mah safety?" The big hands bloomed, somehow graceful as Japanese fans. She affected to be a little breathless. "Such noble ge'mun. Are y'all sure yoah not fum Damfino?" The magnificent bosom rose and fell.

  Oh, Freud in the Void! If she faints, she'll crush us! Alacrity thought, a little unkindly, wanting to yell timber! himself but refraining, because he figured she'd probably become sick of height jokes long since.

  "Just admirers of yours," Floyt said honestly.

  She threw her head back and laughed. When she spoke again, a lot of the Damfino accent was gone. "Well then, you're forgiven for userpin' my favorite half of the Imperial Domain. You mean you didn't know? Who'd you think that economy-size furniture was for, gents? Trained polar bears?"

  "Won't you come and sit down in some of it?" Alacrity invited, the only thing he could think of to say.

  "Hold up, now." She was looking at them closely. Circe Minx pointed at them with an elegant forefinger the length of a tentpeg.

  "You two fine darlin's are Alacrity and Hobart, now aren't you? You look just like your pictures, but not a thing like those book covers! My, my! Aren't you just the most dappah things ever?" She clapped the big hands, a small explosion.

  They squared away uniform and tux as best they could, trying to live up to the billing, Floyt mumbling, "You're too kind, I'm sure."

  "Things weren't any fun over at your place?" Alacrity asked.

  "Aw, everybody says they want to comfort me about the diz-bonding, but mostly they wanted to freeload and try and take a canoe trip up the Delta!"

  "We were sorry to hear about your divorce—your diz-bonding," Floyt lied a bit.

/>   She nodded tiredly. "Blix 'n Frix 'n Strix are good ol' boys, but I ask you: do I look like a gal who's gonna settle down and help run just one l'il ole planet?"

  They shook their heads energetically.

  "Aren't you sweet! Anyways, so here I am, high and dry again, with all the debts those stinkin' triplets ran up, and lawyers pouncin' down at me outta the trees, an' a yacht Ah cain't be spacin' in 'cause it holds so many sad mem'ries."

  Alacrity and Floyt sighed for the tragedy of it. Circe thumbed at her suite. "So I sent 'em all packin'! Then I decided to see whut was goin' on over here at your place, because if I'd sat there alone I'd've ended up blubbering for the first time in almost twenty years now."

  She seemed about to cry anyway. "That's a funny thing," Floyt told her, "for, you see, we were just about to yank out our flagpole and drop it over your wall."

  "Well, darlin'! Th' evening's young! Now, which of you is gonna offer me some refreshments?"

  An expedition was organized to ransack for food and drink, the food being optional. Floyt, trailing along on rearguard, gave the western suite flagpole a little tug, then a considerable heave.

  Nothing.

  They ordered up two pitchers of dogfights—one for Alacrity and Floyt, one for Circe Minx—and returned to the garden, the men taking chairs and the woman settling into a wrought-composite couch with such limber nonchalance that it looked small rather than she, large.

  They talked some more, during which time Floyt denied, "Just because we've got a lot of problems, don't mistake us for heroes," and Alacrity and Circe laughed. A little later, what with Floyt being an Earther, Circe made them harmonize with her on "Irene, Goodnight."

  "Well, that's what I get for bonding with somebody again," Circe said at a certain point. "Should've learned better by now. Hwa-fioo!" she added, spitting over the wall practicedly, as a sort of editorial.

  "My feelings exactly," Alacrity said a little wearily, wondering what in the world he was saying and how it might bear on his bursting love for the Nonpareil.

  "Love," Floyt explained to Circe Minx.

  "Oh, yes! You and that Heart, right, Alacrity? That Nonpareil? I saw about that on one of those gossip shows. Woof, she's such a looker! Wish I wuz a chill beauty like that!"

  "Stop looking suicidal, Alacrity," Floyt said, and they all touched glasses.

  "Listen: why don't one of you sell me some White Ship stock?" Circe proposed.

  When she saw how guarded that made them, she added, "Now quit bristlin'! Forget ah said it! It's just that ah've played most of the other games there are, and one of these days the looks'll go and the bod'll give out—probably right at the same time, given my luck.

  "Bein' an Interested Party'd be just the pastime for me when ah git to be this blousey old coot with a few compromised helmet gaskets." Circe Minx twirled her finger next to her temple. "Ah'd like to poke my nose into that mess.

  "Ah got interested in it a while back, but it's been a year and a half now and ah still haven't found a single share for sale. Except for one old foop who wanted, well, you might say, more than it was worth. Ge'mun, ah came close to hurtin' him!"

  "More than it's worth is what they all cost," Alacrity intoned, crunching an ice cube.

  "That's life for you, all right, sugar." Circe nodded. "Listen: I have something I want you boys to see … "

  She rose unsteadily and headed for the improvised drawbridge. Alacrity and Floyt swapped frantic, resigned looks and dove for her ankles, rattling around like castanets but eventually bringing her down, mostly because she didn't resist. To their vast relief, she was laughing.

  "All right, nevah mind!" They led her back across the lawn and somehow got her onto the couch while she was still helpless with laughter. She put a giant hand on each man's shoulder.

  "Look, we'll just leave it at this: I'm tired of performing. If there's some stock around, you jes' let me know."

  Alacrity had his chin on his chest, abruptly more pensive and reluctant to banter than Floyt was used to seeing him. "I'll try my best."

  Circe kissed him hard enough to tilt the two front legs of his chair off the turf, even though she did it with an artful restraint. She smelled wonderful and was a sufficiently marvelous kisser that Alacrity started fantasizing with no thought to possible sprains and torn cartilage. Or whatever it might take.

  Circe beamed. "Now I'll do somethin' for you luvs. A party! That's it! Gawd! We'll invite all the—"

  But Alacrity had stopped her. "No good; outsiders." Circe slouched but nodded.

  "I'll tell you, though," Alacrity went on. "Ho's proteus got trampled by … that is, it just got stomped to smithereens a while back. And had a tree pushed over on it, quit looking at me like that, Circe! So we're putting a new one on the tab and quit yelling, because you can't buy it, but I thought you could suggest something, maybe help us pick one out."

  He showed her Floyt's watch chain, a venerable herringbone pattern, which looked so striking against Floyt's white vest but had only a fob on it—the heavy keepsake coin celebrating Terra's first five hundred years in space, with Yuri Gargarin's features on it—and no watch or proteus.

  "So I thought, some big pocket model," Alacrity said. "If you could tell us the best place to—"

  But Circe Minx was making her way to a commo terminal. She drawled a few quick orders with winsome noblesse oblige. Within minutes, attractive, beautifully dressed, amazingly eager-to-please people were pouring into the place with gorgeous wooden, leather, and precious-metal display cases of pocket-watch-configuration proteuses, at prices that made even Circe lift her long brows.

  Floyt felt like shielding his eyes against the blaze of gems, gold, silver, and the rest. Circe was in her element, friendly and familiar with the clerks but demanding, too. Alacrity suspected that was because, for a change, she was helping pick out something for somebody else and her money had nothing to do with it. She was being protective of Floyt.

  All the argument, testing, and comparison went on for three quarters of an hour. At one point, Circe and Floyt were happily yelling at one another about the relative merits of beauty and function, which discussion they both took personally, while Alacrity refereed.

  A decision came to pass; Floyt held up the winner as the other two gathered round to admire. The case was an exact duplicate of a gold seventeenth-century John Willats watch, but machined from a solid block of super-alloy and strong enough to carry out-suit on Jupiter. The case showed gamboling figures in deep repoussé, so that some of the limbs were actually free-standing. The instrument had a face, chapters, working hands, multiple dials, and crown just like the original, but under the back cover were displays and instrumentation and controls that would let Floyt do pretty near anything he cared to, short of raising the dead. When he tried it on his chain, tucking it into the watch pocket of his white waistcoat, Alacrity said, "You look like Old Money."

  The price of the proteus more than quintupled their hotel bill; Floyt followed Alacrity's example, registering the purchase with a world-weariness. When the supervisor asked if Floyt would like an inscription on the outside of the case-back cover, Floyt thought for a moment then turned to Circe Minx.

  "I hope this won't sound too forward, but, since you picked it out—would you mind?"

  She blushed, and wrote out the inscription in a beautiful, fluid, and draftsmanlike longhand, gnawing at the end of the tintstik as she decided what to set down; the engraver beam-etched it into the metal in reduced scale: "TO HOBART, MORE THAN JUST ANOTHER HERO. WITH ESTEEM, CIRCE."

  In light of the very tidy profit she'd just turned, the supervising clerk threw in, free of charge, a likeness of Circe Minx carved into a wafer of glittering ice-lense, a popular item whenever she was in residence, mounting it in the inside of the case front cover.

  The clerks withdrew, high-spirited as if they'd just won a buzzball championship. Floyt, Alacrity, and Circe Minx adjourned to the garden to celebrate. Alacrity dug out an adapter and let his own proteus do a
complete sweep of Floyt's new one, to make sure it was free of logic bombs, saboteur AI's, sleepers, and other booby traps.

  "Oh, ge'mun, that was fun!" Circe's eyes were moist and she ran the back of her hand under her nose, but she was more sober than when she'd shown up. "Ah don't get to do things for people, y'know? Ah mean, ah don' even get to meet many people."

  "Good flagpoles make for good neighbors," Floyt observed grandly. Circe sprayed out part of her glass of dogfight and Alacrity broke up.

  "But really," Circe forged on. I'm not singing one of these 'poor little me' type numbers to you; after all, I'm lucky I'm not freakshowing somewhere or busting heads in an arena, or going catatonic in some flesh emporium. That's the kind of stuff people like me are slated for, in case you didn't know.

  "What I run into's usually some avant-gardeoisie who sneers at what I do for a living until I hint around that I might hire him to write for me. Then all I have to do is yell 'frog!' Hwa-thoo!"

  Circe massaged her neck. "You know when the last time was that somebody asked me an intelligent question? I sure don't."

  "Well then, where'd the Precursors go?" Floyt popped out owlishly.

  She considered. "Well, it's funny most sentient races we've found are more or less on the same footing, now isn't it? Almost impossible, if you look at the odds. Maybe the Precursors cleared the decks, retired, if you catch what I'm saying. Maybe, in order to love Creation—I mean, to love it in spite of itself, in spite of the unpleasant parts, they had to withdraw from it and contemplate it from afar. From Outside. Hey, this is great! Ask me another!"

  Floyt hiccupped. "That was one of the most inneresting hypothesis I've ever heard. And it makes more sense than most."

  Circe let go a long breath. "Nobody ever wants my opinion on stuff like that. I can visit twenty starsystems and never see a blessed thing, ta-taaal"

  She struck a pose. "But oh, you two guys! You really live!"

  "Nothing to it," Alacrity said. "First thing you do is, you throw away all your money."

  "And if you happen to get more, make sure someone steals it from you," Floyt chimed in. "Preferably while they shoot at you."