“I still didn’t—”
“You did make an exhibit of yourself!” the machine shouted. “That simian in the trees by the river was Marel Pomiheker; news-feeder, guerrilla journalist, media-raptor and all-round data-hound. Look!” The drone swept away from the screen and pointed a strobing grey field at one of the twenty-four rectangular projections protruding from the screen. It showed Ziller squatting on a branch, hiding up a tree in a jungle.
“Shit,” Ziller said, looking aghast. The view cut to a large purple animal coming down a jungle path. “Screen off,” Ziller said. The holos disappeared. Ziller looked at the three others, brows furled. “Well, I certainly can’t go out in public now, can I?” he said sarcastically to Tersono.
“Ziller, of course you can!” Tersono yelped. “Nobody cares you got thrown off some stupid animal!”
Ziller looked at the avatar and the Homomdan and briefly crossed his eyes.
“Tersono would like me to try and argue you into attending the concert,” Kabe told Ziller. “I doubt that anything I might say would change your mind.”
Ziller nodded. “If he goes, I stay here,” he said. He looked at the timepiece standing on top of the antique mosaikey on a platform near the windows. “Still over an hour.” He stretched out more fully and clasped his hands behind his head. He grimaced and brought his arms down again, massaging one shoulder. “Actually I doubt I could conduct anyway. Pulled a muscle, I think.” He lay back again. “So, I imagine our Major Quilan is dressing now, yes?”
“He’s dressed,” the avatar said. “In fact, he’s gone.”
“Gone?” Ziller asked.
“Left for the Bowl,” the avatar said. “He’s in a car right now. Already ordered his interval drinks.”
Ziller looked briefly troubled, then brightened and said, “Ha.”
The car was a large one, half full; crowded by local standards. At the far end, through a few embroidered hangings and a screen of plants, he could hear a group of young, all shouting and laughing. One calm adult voice sounded like its owner was trying to keep them in order.
A child burst through the screen of plants, looking back the way it had come, almost tripping. It glanced round at the adults in this end of the car. It looked to be about to throw itself back through the plants again until it saw Quilan. Its eyes widened and it walked over to sit beside him. Its pale face looked flushed and it was breathing hard. Its dark straight hair was plastered to its forehead with sweat.
“Hello,” it said. “Are you Ziller?”
“No,” Quilan said. “My name is Quilan.”
“Geldri T’Chuese,” the child said, putting out its hand. “How do you do.”
“How do you do.”
“Are you going to the Festival?”
“No, I’m going to a concert.”
“Oh, the one at the Stullien Bowl?”
“Yes. And you? Are you going to the concert?” The child snorted derisively. “No. There’s a whole bunch of us; we’re going round the Orbital by car until we get bored. Quern wants to go round at least three times in a row because Xiddy’s been round twice with his cousin, but I think twice is enough.”
“Why do you want to go round the Orbital?” Geldri T’Chuese looked oddly at Quilan. “Just for a laugh,” it said, as though it ought to be obvious. A gale of laughter burst through the screen of plants from the far end of the car. “Sounds very noisy,” Quilan said.
“We’re wrestling,” the child explained. “Before that we had a farting competition.”
“Well, I’m not sorry I missed that.”
Another peal of high-pitched laughter rang down the car. “I’d better get back,” Geldri T’Chuese said. It patted his shoulder. “Nice to meet you. Hope you enjoy the concert.”
“Thank you. Goodbye.”
The child took a run at the screen of plants and jumped through between two of the clumps. There were more screams and laughs.
~ I know.
~ You know what?
~ I can guess what you’re thinking.
~ Can you?
~ That they will probably still be in the underground car system when the Hub is destroyed.
~ Is that really what I was thinking?
~ It’s what I’d be thinking. It is tough.
~ Well, thank you for that.
~ I’m sorry.
~ We’re all sorry.
The journey took a little longer than it would normally; there were a lot of people and cars stacking up to unload at the Bowl’s sub-surface access points. In the lift, Quilan nodded to a few people who recognised him from the news-service pieces he’d done. He saw one or two frowning at him, and guessed they knew that by coming he was probably going to prevent Ziller from attending. He shifted on his seat and inspected an abstract painting hanging nearby.
The lift arrived on the surface and people walked out into a broad, open concourse beneath a colonnade of tall, straight-trunked trees. Soft lights shone against the dark blue of the evening sky. Smells of food filled the air and people thronged cafes, bars and restaurants at the sides of the concourse. The Bowl filled the sky at the end of the broad way, studded with lights.
“Major Quilan!” a tall, handsome man in a bright coat shouted, rushing up to him. He offered his hand and Quilan shook it. “Chongon Lisser. Lisser News; usual affiliations, forty per cent take-up and rising.”
“How do you do?” Quilan kept on walking; the tall male walked to one side and a little in front, keeping his head turned towards Quilan to maintain eye contact.
“I’m very well, Major, and I hope you are too. Major, is it true that Mahrai Ziller, the composer of tonight’s symphony here at the Stullien Bowl, Guerno Plate, Masaq’, has told you that if you attend the concert tonight then he won’t?”
“No.”
“It’s not true?”
“He hasn’t told me anything directly.”
“But would it be correct to say that you must have heard that he wouldn’t attend if you did?”
“That is correct.”
“And yet you have chosen to attend.”
“Yes.”
“Major Quilan, what is the nature of the dispute between you and Mahrai Ziller?”
“You would have to ask him that. I have no dispute with him.”
“You don’t resent the fact that he’s put you in this invidious position?”
“I don’t think it is an invidious position.”
“Would you say that Mahrai Ziller is being petty or vindictive in any way?”
“No.”
“So would you say he’s behaving perfectly reasonably?”
“I am not an expert on Mahrai Ziller’s behaviour.”
“Do you understand people who say you’re behaving very selfishly by coming here tonight, as that means Mahrai Ziller won’t be here to conduct the first performance of his new work, so reducing the experience for everybody concerned?”
“Yes, I do.”
By now they were near the end of the wide concourse, where what looked like a tall, broad wall of glowing glass extending over the breadth of the pavement was slowly alternately brightening and dimming. The crowds thinned out a little beyond here; the barrier was a field wall, set up to admit only those who’d won out in the ticket lottery.
“So you don’t feel that—”
Quilan had brought his ticket with him, though he’d been told it was really just a souvenir and not required for entry. Chongon Lisser obviously didn’t have a ticket; he bumped softly into the glowing wall and Quilan stepped around him and passed on through with a nod and a smile. “Good evening,” he said.
There were more news service people inside; he continued to answer politely but minimally and just kept on walking, following his terminal’s instructions, to his seat.
Ziller watched the news feeds following Quilan with an open mouth. “That son-of-a-bitch! He’s really going! He’s not bluffing! He’s actually going to take his seat and keep me away! From my own fucking concert!
The stub-cocked son-of-a-prey-bitch!”
Ziller, Kabe and the avatar watched as several remotes followed Quilan to his seat, a specially prepared Chelgrian curl-pad. There was a Homomdan seat next to it, a space for Tersono, and a few other seats and couches. The camera platform showed Quilan sitting, looking around at the slowly filling Bowl, and calling up a function on his terminal which created a flat screen in front of him holding the concert programme notes.
“I think I see my seat,” Kabe said thoughtfully.
“And I mine,” Tersono said. Its aura field looked agitated. It turned to face Ziller, seemed about to say something, then did not. The avatar did not move, but Kabe had the impression that there had been some communication between Hub Mind and the Contact Section drone.
The avatar folded its arms and walked across the room to look out at the city. A cold clear cobalt sky arched over the jagged surround of mountains. The machine could see the bubble that was Aquime’s Dome Square. There was a giant screen there, relaying the scenes at the Stullien Bowl to a swelling crowd.
“I confess I didn’t think he’d go,” the avatar said.
“Well, he fucking has!” Ziller said, spitting. “The puss-eyed bollock-dragger!”
“I was under the impression he was going to spare you this too,” Kabe said, squatting on the floor near Ziller. “Ziller, I’m most terribly sorry if I misled you in any way, even if it was inadvertently. I am still convinced that Quilan strongly implied he would not be going. I can only assume that something has changed his mind.”
Again, Tersono seemed to be on the brink of saying something, its aura field altering and its casing rising a little in the air, and again it appeared to subside again at the last moment. Its field was grey with frustration.
The avatar turned from the window, arms still folded. “Well, if you don’t need me, Ziller, I’ll be getting back to the Bowl. Can’t have too many ushers and general helpers at something like this. Always some cretin who’s forgotten how to operate an automatic drinks dispenser. Kabe, Tersono? Can I offer you a Displace back?”
“Displace?” Tersono said. “Certainly not! I’ll take a car.”
“Hmm,” the avatar said. “You should still make it. I wouldn’t hang around, though.”
“Well,” Tersono said hesitantly, fields flickering. “Unless Cr Ziller wants me to stay, of course.”
They looked at Ziller, who was still watching the wall of screens. “No,” he said faintly, waving one hand. “Go. Go, by all means.”
“No, I think I ought to stay,” the drone said, floating closer to the Chelgrian.
“And I think you ought to go,” Ziller said sharply.
The drone stopped as though it had hit a wall. It flushed creamily rainbow with surprise and embarrassment, then bowed in the air and said, “Just so. Well, see you there. Ah… Yes. Goodbye.” It thrummed through the air to the doors, whisked them open and closed them quickly but silently behind it.
The avatar looked quizzically at the Homomdan. “Kabe?”
“Instantaneous travel appears to agree with me. I will be happy to accept.” He paused and looked at Ziller. “I too would be perfectly happy to stay here, Ziller. We don’t have to watch the concert. We could—”
Ziller leapt to his feet. “Fuck it!” he said through his teeth. “I’m going! That piece of wriggling vomit isn’t going to keep me from my own fucking symphony. I’ll go. I’ll go and I’ll conduct and I’ll even hang around and schmooze and be schmoozed at afterwards, but if that little turd Tersono or anybody else tries to introduce that selfish litter-fucker Quilan to me, I swear I’ll bite the shit-head’s throat out.”
The avatar suppressed most of a grin. Its eyes twinkled as it looked at Kabe. “Well, that sounds eminently reasonable, don’t you think, Kabe?”
“Absolutely.”
“I’ll get dressed,” Ziller said, bounding towards the internal doors. “Won’t take a moment.”
“We’ll have to Displace to give us enough time!” the avatar yelled.
“Fine!” Ziller called out.
“There’s a one in sixty—”
“Yes, yes, I know! Let’s just risk it, eh?”
Kabe looked at the broadly smiling avatar. He nodded. The avatar held out its arms and gave a little bow. Kabe mimed applause.
~ You guessed wrong.
~ What about?
~ About how Ziller would jump. He’s coming after all.
~ Is he?
Even as he thought the question, Quilan became aware of people around him starting to mutter, and heard the word “Ziller’ mentioned a few times as the news spread. The Bowl was mostly full now, a gigantic buzzing container of sound and light and people and machines. The brightly lit centre, the empty stage where the various instruments glittered, looked still and silent and waiting, like the eye of a storm.
Quilan tried not to think anything very much. He spent some time fiddling with the magnifying field built into his seat, adjusting it so that the stage area seemed to swell in front of him. When he was happy that—like everybody else apart from the real no-magnification purists—he had what appeared to be a ringside seat, he sat back.
~ He is definitely on his way?
~ He’s here; they Displaced.
~ Well, I tried.
~ You’re probably worrying needlessly. I doubt anything will go so far wrong here that anybody’s going to be in any real danger.
Quilan looked at the sky above the Bowl. It was probably dark blue or violet but it looked pitch black beyond the vague haze of the Bowl’s rim lights.
~ There are several hundred thousand lumps of rock and ice heading straight this way. Converging on the sky above this place. I wouldn’t be too sure this is safe.
~ Oh, come on. You know what they’re like. They’ll have back-ups on the back-ups, octuple redundancy; safety to the point of paranoia.
~ We’ll see. Another thing occurred to me.
~ What?
~ Supposing our allies, whoever they might be, have made their own plans for what’s really going to happen when they trigger their surprise.
~ Go on.
~ As I understand it, there’s no limit to what you could squeeze through the wormhole’s mouth. Supposing instead of just enough energy to destroy the Hub, they put through enough to annihilate it, suppose they shoot an equivalent mass of antimatter through the hole? How much does the Hub unit weigh?
~ About a million tonnes.
~ A two-million-tonne matter/antimatter explosion would kill everybody on the Orbital, wouldn’t it?
~ I suppose it would. But why would our allies—like you say, whoever they might be—want to kill everybody?
~ I don’t know. The point is that it would be possible. You and I have no idea what our masters have agreed to, and from what we’ve been told, they too might have been deceived. We are at the mercy of these alien allies.
~ You are worrying too much, Quil.
Quilan watched the orchestra begin to take to the stage. The air filled with applause. It was not the full orchestra, and Ziller would not appear yet because the first piece was not one of his, but even so the reception was tumultuous.
~ Maybe. I suppose it doesn’t matter much, anyway. Not any more.
He saw the Homomdan Kabe Ischloear and the drone E. H. Tersono appearing from the nearest access .way as the lights began to dim. Kabe waved. Quilan waved back.
Tersono! We’re going to blow up the Hub!
The words formed in his mind. He would stand up and shout them.
But he did not.
~ I didn’t intervene. You never meant to really do it.
~ Really?
~ Really.
~ Fascinating. Every philosopher should experience this, don’t you think, Huyler?
~ Easy, son, easy.
Kabe and Tersono joined the Chelgrian. Both noticed he was weeping quietly but thought it polite not to say anything.
The music rang round the auditorium, a vast invisible clapp
er in the inverted bell of the Bowl. The stadium’s lights had sunk to darkness; the light show in the skies above flickered, flowed and flashed.
Quilan had missed the nacreous clouds. He saw the aurorae, the lasers, the induced layers and levels of clouds, the flashes of the first few meteorites, the strobing lines that hatched the sky as more and more streaked in. The distant skies all around the Bowl, way out over the plains bordering the lake, coruscated with silent horizontal lightning, darting from cloud to cloud in streaks and bars and sheets of blue-white light.
The music accumulated. Each piece, he realised, was slowly contributing to the whole. Whether it was Hub’s idea or Ziller’s, he didn’t know, but the whole evening, the entire concert programme had been designed around the final symphony. The earlier, shorter pieces were half by Ziller, half by other composers. They alternated, and it became clear that the styles were quite different too, while the musical philosophies behind the two competing strands were dissimilar to the point of antipathy.
The short pauses between each piece, during which the orchestra enlarged and decreased according to the requirements of each work, allowed just sufficient time for the strategic structure of the evening to filter through to people. You could actually hear the coin drop as people worked it out.
The evening was the war.
The two strands of music represented the protagonists, Culture and Idirans. Each pair of antagonistic pieces stood for one of the many small but increasingly bitter and wide-scale skirmishes which had taken place, usually between proxy forces for both sides, during the decades before the war itself had finally broken out. The works increased in length and in the sensation of mutual hostility.
Quilan found himself checking the history of the Idiran War, to confirm that what felt like they ought to be the final pair of preparatory pieces really were so.
The music died away. The applause was barely audible, as though everybody was simply waiting. The complete orchestra filled the central stage. Dancers, most in float harnesses, distributed themselves about the space around the stage in a semi-sphere. Ziller took his place at the very focus of the circular stage, surrounded by a shimmer of projection field. The applause zoomed suddenly then dropped as quickly away. The orchestra and Ziller shared a mutual moment of silence and stillness.
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