He spent a couple of years on the Size Isn't Everything, and on a few of the planets, rocks, habitats and orbitals it stopped at. He was being trained, and learning to use some of the new abilities he had let them give him. When he eventually left the craft, to go on his first tour of duty for the Culture - a series of missions which culminated in him taking the Chosen to the Perfumed Palace on the cliff - it was on a ship just starting its second tour of duty; the General Contact Unit Sweet and Full of Grace.
He never saw Chori again, and heard that she'd been killed on active service some fifteen years later. He was told this news while they were regrowing his body on the GSV Congenital Optimist after he'd been beheaded on - and then rescued from - a planet called Fohls.
Eleven
He crouched behind the parapet, at the far edge of the old observatory from the single approaching plane. Behind him, down a steep slope, were bushes and trees and a collection of roofless, overgrown buildings. He watched the aircraft come closer, checked for more coming from other directions, but couldn't find any. Inside the suit, watching the transmitted view, he frowned as the aircraft came closer, slowing all the time, its obese arrowhead shape silhouetted against the sunset as it approached.
He watched it drop slowly towards the observatory platform; a ramp hinged from the craft's belly; three legs flexed out. He took some effector readings from the machine, then shook his head, ducked and ran back down the slope.
Tsoldrin was sitting in one of the ruined buildings. He looked surprised when the suited figure entered through the creeper-choked doorway.
'Yes, Cheradenine?'
'It's a civilian craft,' he said, pushing the face-plate up. He was grinning. 'I don't think it's looking for us after all. Might still provide an escape route, though.' He shrugged. 'Worth a try.' He gestured back up the slope. 'You coming along?'
Tsoldrin Beychae looked through the dusk at the matt black figure in the doorway. He had been sitting here wondering what he ought to do, and had not yet come up with any answers. Part of him just wanted to get back to the peace and quiet and certainty of the university library, where he could live happily, without fuss, ignore the world, and immerse himself in the old books, trying to understand ancient ideas and histories, hoping to make sense of them, one day, and perhaps explain his own ideas, try to point out the lessons of these elder histories, perhaps make people think again about their own times and ideologies. For a time - for a long time, there - it had seemed entirely and definitely the most worthwhile and productive thing he could do... but he was not sure of that any longer.
Perhaps, he thought, there were more important things to be done which he could have a hand in. Perhaps he ought to go with Zakalwe, as the man - and the Culture - wanted.
Could he just relapse back into his studies, after this?
Zakalwe coming back from the past, as rash and brash as ever; Ubrel - could she really have been? - just acting a part, making him feel very old and foolish, now, but angry as well; and the whole Cluster drifting rudderless towards the rocks, all over again.
Did he have any right not to try and do something, even if the Culture was wrong about his stature in the civilisation? He didn't know. He could see that Zakalwe had tried to appeal to his vanity, but what if even half of what he said was true? Was it right to sit back and just let things happen, however much it might be the easiest, least stressful course? If there was a war, and he knew he'd done nothing, how would he feel afterwards?
Damn you, Zakalwe, he thought. He stood up. 'I'm still thinking,' he said. 'But let's see how far you can get.'
'Good man.' The suited figure's voice betrayed no obvious trace of emotion.
'... Extremely sorry for the delay, gentlepeople; it really wasn't within our control; some sort of traffic control panic, but do let me apologise again on behalf of Heritage Tours. Well; here we are, a bit later than we expected (but isn't that a pretty sunset?); the very famous Srometren Observatory; at least four and a half thousand years of history have been played out beneath your feet here, gentlepeople. I'm going to have to fairly rattle through it to tell it all to you in the time we have here, so listen close...'
The aircraft hovered, AG field buzzing, just above the western edge of the observatory platform. Its legs hung, dangling in mid-air, apparently extended merely as a precaution. About forty people had disembarked from it down the belly-ramp, and now stood around one of the stone instrument plinths while an eager young tour guide talked to them.
He watched through the stone balustrade, scanning the group with the suit's built-in effector and watching the results on the visor-screen head-up. Thirty plus of the people were carrying what were in effect terminals; links to the planet's communications net. The suit's computer covertly interrogated the terminals through the effector. Two of the terminals were switched on; one receiving a sports broadcast, another receiving music. The rest were on stand-by.
'Suit,' he whispered (not that even Tsoldrin, right beside him, could have heard him, let alone the people in the tourist group). 'I want to disable those terminals, quietly; to stop them from transmitting.'
'Two receiving terminals are transmitting location code,' the suit said.
'Can I disable their transmit function without altering their present location code function, or their present reception?'
'Yes.'
'Right; the priority being preventing any further new signals, disable all the terminals.'
'Disabling all thirty-four non-Culture personal commnet terminals within range; confirm.'
'Confirmed, dammit; do it...'
'Order carried out.'
He watched the head-up alter as the internal power-states of the terminals sank back to near zero. The tour guide was leading the people across the stone plateau of the old observatory, towards where he and Beychae were, and away from the hovering aircraft.
He shoved the suit face-plate up, looked round at the other man. 'Okay; let's go. Quietly.'
He went first, through the undergrowth, between the crowding trees; it was quite dark under the half-fallen foliage, and Beychae stumbled a couple of times, but they made relatively little noise as they trod the carpet of dead leaves round two sides of the observatory platform.
When they were under the aircraft, he scanned it with the suit effector.
'You beautiful little machine,' he breathed, watching the results come up. The aircraft was automatic, and very stupid. A bird probably had a more complicated brain. 'Suit; patch into the aircraft; assume control without letting anybody else know.'
'Assuming covert control-jurisdiction of single aircraft within range; confirm.'
'Confirmed. And stop asking me to confirm everything.'
'Control-jurisdiction assumed. Lapsing confirmatory instruction protocols; confirm.'
'Good grief. Confirmed!'
'Confirm protocol lapsed.'
He considered just floating up, holding Beychae, into the craft, but even though the aircraft's own AG would probably mask the signal his suit gave off, it might not. He glanced up the steep slope, then turned to Beychae and whispered. 'Give me your hand; we're going up.' The old man did as he asked.
They went steadily up the slope, the suit kicking foot-holds in the earth. They stopped at the balustrade. The aircraft blocked out the evening sky above them, yellow light spilling from the belly entrance above the ramp, faintly illuminating the nearer stone instruments.
He checked on the tour group while Beychae got his breath back. The tourists were at the far side of the observatory; the guide was shining a flashlight at some ancient piece of stonework. He stood up. 'Let's go,' he told Beychae, who straightened. They stepped over the balustrade, walked to the ramp and up into the aircraft. He followed Beychae; he watched the rear view on the helmet screen, but couldn't tell whether anybody in the tour group had noticed them or not.
'Suit; close the ramp,' he told the suit, as he and Beychae entered the single large space of the craft's interior. It was ornately luxurio
us, its walls slung with hangings and its deeply carpeted floor dotted with large chairs and couches; there was an autobar at one end, while the opposite wall was a single huge screen, presently displaying the last of the sunset.
The ramp chimed and hissed as it came up. 'Suit; retract legs,' he said, hinging the suit face-plate back. Happily, the suit was smart enough to realise he meant the aircraft's legs, not its own. It had occurred to him that somebody might just be able to leap onto one of the craft's legs from the observatory balustrade. 'Suit; adjust aircraft altitude; up ten metres.'
The light buzzing noise around them changed, then settled back to what it had been before. He watched Beychae take off his heavy jacket, then looked round the interior of the craft; the effector said there was nobody else aboard, but he wanted to make sure. 'Let's see where this thing was headed next,' he said, as Beychae sat down on a long couch, sighing and stretching. 'Suit; the aircraft's next destination?'
'Gipline Space Terminal,' the clipped voice told him.
'That sounds perfect. Take us there, suit, and make it look as legal and normal as possible.'
'Under way,' the suit said. 'ETA forty minutes.'
The craft's background noise altered, climbing in pitch; the floor moved just a little. The screen on the far side of the large cabin showed them moving out across the wooded hills, rising into the air.
He took a walk round the craft, confirming there was nobody else aboard, then sat by Beychae, who he thought looked very tired. It had been a long day, he supposed.
'You all right?'
'I'm glad to be sitting down, I'll say that.' Beychae kicked off his boots.
'Let me get you a drink, Tsoldrin,' he said, taking off the helmet and heading for the bar. 'Suit,' he said, suddenly struck by an idea. 'You know one of the Culture's down-link numbers in Solotol.'
'Yes.'
'Connect with one via the aircraft.'
He bent down, looking at the autobar. 'And how does this work?'
'The autobar is voice acti -'
'Zakalwe!' Sma's voice cut across that of the suit, making him start. He straightened. 'Where are...?' the woman's voice said, then paused. 'Oh; you've got yourself an aircraft, have you?'
'Yes,' he said. He looked across to where Beychae was watching him. 'On our way to Gipline Port. So what happened? Where's that module? And Sma, I'm hurt; you haven't called, you haven't written, sent flowers...'
'Is Beychae all right?' Sma said urgently.
'Tsoldrin's fine,' he told her, smiling at the other man. 'Suit; get this autobar to fix us a couple of refreshing but strong drinks.'
'He's okay; good.' The woman sighed. The autobar made a clicking, gurgling noises. 'We haven't called,' Sma said, 'because if we had we'd have let them know where you were; we lost the tight-link when the capsule got blasted. Zakalwe, that was ridiculous; it was pure chaos after the capsule wasted the truck in the Flower Market and you downed that fighter; you're lucky you made it as far as you did. Where is the capsule, anyway?'
'Back at the observatory; Srometren,' he said, looking down as a hatch opened in the autobar. He took the tray with the two drinks on it over to Beychae, sat down at his side. 'Sma; say hello to Tsoldrin Beychae,' he said, handing the other man his drink.
'Mr Beychae?' Sma's voice said from the suit.
'Hello?' Beychae said.
'Pleased to talk to you Mr Beychae. I do hope Mr Zakalwe is treating you all right. Are you well?'
'Tired, but hale.'
'I trust Mr Zakalwe has found time to communicate to you the seriousness of the political situation in the Cluster.'
'He has,' Beychae said. 'I am... I am certainly considering doing what you ask, and for the moment have no urge to return to Solotol.'
'I see,' Sma said, 'I appreciate what you say. I'm sure Mr Zakalwe will do all he can to keep you safe and well while you're deliberating, won't you, Cheradenine?'
'Of course, Diziet. Now; where's that module?'
'Stuck under the cloud tops of Soreraurth, where it was before. Thanks to your nova-profile escapades down there, everything's on maximum alert; we can't move anything without being seen, and if we're seen to be interfering, we might start the war all by ourselves. Describe where that capsule is again; we're going to have to passive-spot it from the microsatellite and then blast it from up here, to remove the evidence. Shit, this is messy, Zakalwe.'
'Well, pardon me,' he said. He drank again. 'The capsule's under a large yellow-leafed deciduous tree between eighty and... one-thirty metres north-east of the observatory. Oh; and the plasma rifle's about... twenty to forty metres due west.'
'You lost it?' Sma sounded incredulous.
'Threw it away in a fit of pique,' he admitted, yawning. 'It got Effectorized.'
'Told you it belonged in a museum,' another voice interrupted.
'Shut-up, Skaffen-Amtiskaw,' he said. 'So, Sma, what now?'
'Gipline Space Terminal, I suppose,' the woman replied. 'We'll see if we can book you on something outgoing; for Impren, or nearby. At worst, you've got a civilian trip ahead of you of weeks at least; if we're lucky they'll stand down the alert and the module can sneak out and rendezvous. Either way though, the war may be a little closer, thanks to what happened in Solotol today. Just think about that, Zakalwe.' The channel closed.
'She sounds unhappy with you, Cheradenine,' Beychae said.
He shrugged. 'No change there,' he sighed.
'I'm really most terribly sorry, gentlepeople; this has never happened before; never. I really am sorry... I just can't understand it... I'll, um... I'll try...' The young man hit buttons on his pocket terminal. 'Hello? Hello! HELLO!' He shook it, banged it with the heel of his hand. 'This is just... just... this has never, never happened before; it really hasn't...' He looked apologetically up at the people in the tour group, clustered round the single light. Most of the people were looking at him; a few were trying their own terminals with no more success than he, and a couple were watching the western sky as though the last red smudge there would give up the aircraft that had so mysteriously decided to leave of its own accord, 'Hello? Hello? Anybody? Please reply.' The young man sounded almost in tears. The very last dreg of light left the sunset sky; moon-glow lit up some thinner patches of cloud. The flashlight flickered. 'Anybody at all; please reply! Oh, please!'
Skaffen-Amtiskaw got back in touch a few minutes later to say that he and Beychae had cabins reserved on a clipper called the Osom Emananish, heading for Breskial System, just three light years from Impren; the hope was that the module would get to them before that. It would probably have to; their trail would almost certainly be picked up. 'It might be an idea for Mr Beychae to alter his appearance,' the drone's smooth voice told them.
He looked up at the wall-drapes. 'I suppose we could try and make some clothes out of stuff here,' he said doubtfully.
'The aircraft baggage hold might prove a more fruitful source of attire,' the drone's voice purred, and told him how to open the floor hatch.
He surfaced with two suitcases, wrenched them open. 'Clothes!' he said. He took some out; they looked sufficiently unisex.
'And you'll have to lose your suit and weaponry, too,' the drone said.
'What?'
'You'll never get on board a ship with that stuff, Zakalwe, even with our help. You've to pack it all in something - one of those cases would be ideal - and leave it in the port; we'll try and pick it up once the heat's off.'
'But!'
Beychae himself suggested they shaved his head, when they were discussing how to disguise him. The last use the wonderfully sophisticated combat suit was put to was as a razor. Then he took it off; they both changed into the rather loud but thankfully loose-fitting clothes.
The craft landed; the Space Terminal was a wilderness of concrete lined off like a game board by the lifts that took craft down to and up from the handling facilities.
Tight beam established again, the earring terminal could whisper to him, guide him and Beychae.
But he felt naked without the suit.
They stepped from the aircraft into a hangar; pleasantly forgettable music tinkled. Nobody met them. They could hear a distant alarm.
The earring terminal indicated which door to take. They moved along a staff-only corridor, through two security doors which swung open for them even before they got to them, then - after a pause - came out into a huge crowded concourse full of people, screens, kiosks and seats. Nobody noticed them, because a moving walkway had just slammed to a stop, toppling dozens of people on top of each other.
A security camera in the left luggage area swung up to look at the ceiling for the minute it took them to deposit the suitcase with the suit in it. The instant they'd gone, the camera resumed its slow sweeping.
More or less the same happened when they picked up their tickets at the appropriate desk. Then, while they were walking along another corridor, they saw a party of armed security guards enter from the other end.
He just kept on walking. He sensed Beychae hesitate at his side. He turned, smiled easily at the other man, and when he turned back, the guards were stopped, the leading guard holding one hand to his ear and looking at the floor; he nodded, turned and pointed to a side corridor; the guards set off down it.
'We're not just being incredibly lucky, I take it?' Beychae muttered.
He shook his head. 'Not unless you count it as incredibly lucky that we've got a near military-standard electro-magnetic effector controlled by a hyper-fast starship Mind working this entire port like an arcade game from a light-year or so off, no.'
They were passed through a VIP channel to the small shuttle that would take them to the orbiting station. The final security check was the only one the ship couldn't rig; a man with practised eyes and hands. He seemed happy they had nothing dangerous on them. The earring jabbed his ear as they passed down another corridor; more X-rays, and a strong magnetic field, both manually controlled, double checking.
The shuttle flight was relatively uneventful; in the station, they passed across one transit lounge - in something of a commotion, due to a man with a direct neural implant seemingly having a fit on the floor - straight into a final security check.
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