She laid out the legal and regulatory basis for that at length and both Alex and Buzz listened meekly. What it boiled down to was that although they had tacitly consented to the LIA agent conducting operations aboard the ship since they had known his documents were false when they’d signed him aboard as a Sub, they had subsequently made it clear to him that his liberty about the ship was conditional upon him observing without interfering. He had been strongly and officially reminded of this on numerous occasions, with a restriction of liberty order imposed after the incident at the lecture. This had put him effectively on parole, with the clear warning given at the time and reminders since that any violation of the terms of that agreement would lead to his spending the rest of the mission as a prisoner under confinement. That morning’s incident, in which Buzz had been obliged to physically restrain him and call for a medic to sedate him, was more than sufficient to deem him a danger to himself and the ship and to confine him on that basis. She would, she said, deal with all the necessary process. When they thanked her, she told them icily that she was only doing her job.
‘And if,’ she said, getting up and giving Buzz a gimlet stare, ‘you see fit to mount covert operations involving passengers in future, kindly be so good as to complete the necessary paperwork!’
She strode out, leaving Alex and Buzz looking at one another, Buzz looking markedly sheepish and Alex sympathetic.
‘We’d best have a quiet word with Mako,’ Alex observed, feeling that Hetty had already said everything that needed to be said on the subject of pretending to be an LIA agent. As he said it, he reached over and tapped out a message, If you have a minute, could you pop down? It was tagged with his daycabin, so Mako would know where to come.
He arrived within a couple of minutes, looking curious as he came in and glancing around as this was not somewhere he’d been, not since the first tour of the new ship where they’d all got to troop through the commodore’s suite.
It was a very pleasant suite. Alex had learned on the Assegai that it was in fact perfectly possible to turn a flag suite into a pleasing environment, which wasn’t something he’d credited or even given much thought to before. Migan had taught him, too, to be a little more open in the way that he expressed his personality through his surroundings. So gone were the heavy, old-fashioned club-style furnishings the Fleet provided for their flag officers. Instead there was light, clean-lined furniture of simple curves and planes. There was a painting on the wall, too – not large, but interesting, at first glance a cityscape but full of subtle detail. Alex had gone to some trouble to acquire it anonymously; the artist was the son of the Assegai’s skipper and Alex had wanted to buy it, not be given it as a gift.
‘Ah – thanks, Mako.’ Alex smiled a welcome and waved him to a chair. ‘Would you like a coffee?’
‘No, thanks – just had one,’ Mako Ireson sat down, glancing around again. ‘This is nice,’ he said, evidently comparing it with the stark depressing blank Alex’s quarters had always been before. ‘But what can I do for you, skipper?’
‘I’m afraid,’ said Alex, ‘that we’re going to need you to put your LPI hat on.’
It amused him to see that Mako actually had to think for a moment before he realised what that meant. He had been a League Prisons Inspector for years before he’d come to work for them. Originally, he’d been with them as a passenger after the Fleet had agreed that the League Prisons Authority could send an inspector along to inspect and evaluate the provision being made in their so-called parole unit. Such was the controversy he’d faced when his report was published, though, that Mako had found himself virtually unemployable. So he and his family had moved to Therik, with Mako taking up a nominal position as the LPA’s ‘liaison’ with the Fourth.
It had been on the mission to Samart that Davie had recruited him for the Diplomatic Corps, spotting his talent for exodiplomacy. He’d been asked to take over the running of the newly created interdeck, too, as events organiser. And he had, since, learned to cook as well, so he was sometimes a chef.
There had been some rather undignified wrangling over who Mako was actually working for, before it was eventually agreed that he would run the interdeck as a civilian administrator, undertake the role of a cultural attaché as required and put his League Prisons Inspectorate hat back on if needed, too, to monitor and advise when the Fourth had any prisoners.
‘Oh.’ He said and as he took that in, ‘Oh! Mister, I suppose?’
Alex nodded.
‘That’s a shame,’ Mako was regretful. ‘Medical confinement?’
‘No,’ Alex said. ‘No – Simon’s done an evaluation and signed him off as fit. Officially, he is being confined because of another violent outburst in which Buzz had to stop him punching a wall and call a medic to sedate him.’
Mako looked shocked. ‘Doesn’t sound fit to me,’ he observed.
‘No, nor me,’ Alex admitted. ‘But there is a line between having a violent temper and being medically certifiable and Simon says he is nowhere near crossing it.’
Mako nodded. That settled that. ‘So, we’re looking at potential self-harm and lashing out? Security C4?’
‘E6,’ said Alex and as Mako’s eyes widened, ‘I said officially,’ he reminded him. ‘Unofficially, we are aware that he has decided that I am a traitor to the League, that I intend to betray military secrets by taking this ship unarmed into Lundane and that it is his duty to prevent that. His preferred method is several explosive bullets to the head, but he’ll settle for poison.’
Mako’s mouth formed a perfect oval.
‘And he is,’ Alex added, ‘a highly trained field agent with unarmed and armed combat skills. There is significant risk of sudden, explosive, lethal violence.’
‘E6,’ Mako confirmed and with a reaction which would have surprised anyone who didn’t know him well, his face brightened. ‘Been ages since we had an E6,’ he observed. ‘Not since that pirate.’
He went off happily to prepare for a maximum security prisoner and Alex grinned conspiratorially at Buzz.
‘We’re lucky to have him,’ he observed and Buzz smiled agreement. Mako was and always would be a civilian, but he was very much one of the team. ‘And you, if it needs saying,’ Alex said, in the same friendly tone, ‘will go nowhere near our Mister Wolf. No, Buzz…’ he could see that Buzz was about to say that he felt he at least owed the man some kind of explanation. ‘It will be totally obvious to him that you betrayed his confidence,’ he said. ‘And you did, Buzz, you lied to him, he trusted you, I know you did it for good reasons but you have to see that he will hate you for that and consider you, if possible, an even bigger traitor than he does me. So you won’t go anywhere near him, all right? Stay away from his cabin and if he’s out, keep out of his sight.’
‘All right,’ Buzz said and recognising that was an order, ‘Skipper.’ And then, seeing the troubled look on Alex’s face and interpreting it correctly, ‘Are you worried about explaining this to Lady Ursele?’
Alex nodded. Shion had asked her aunt not to send anyone to fetch the LIA agent, the only person on the ship she was asked not to summon. Shion had explained that he was in a highly agitated state and too fragile to cope with such an invitation. She had, too, explained the LIA’s role in League affairs and their motives in putting an agent aboard the Venturi, but it was difficult to know how much of that Lady Ursele really understood. ‘And I guess,’ Alex said, ‘that I’d better get it over with.’
Lady Ursele surprised him, though. When Shion explained that the commodore would like to come and see her to discuss the sensitive issue of them having imprisoned the LIA agent, Lady Ursele sent back a singer to bring him to her at once. But this was not, as he’d expected, because she had a lot of questions about what was going on and what it implied for her mission. She was simply concerned about Alex, recognising that he was upset about this. He went in there ready to apologise for having such a person on his ship and for the hostility they might encounter from the LIA at Lundane. I
nstead, he found himself explaining how upsetting it was to have misjudged someone that badly, thinking he was harmless when all the time he’d been anything but.
‘Not the first time I’ve been that naïve, either,’ he admitted. ‘I’m told that it isn’t a bad thing to assume the best in people and generally, I suppose, it isn’t. But it can make you feel such a fool when it turns out you were wrong.’
Lady Ursele smiled kindly. ‘It would be a sad thing,’ she said, in Pirrellothian, ‘if this caused you to lower your expectations of high honour and ethics in those who serve the League.’
She was no longer using her interpreter. Without any comment about it, she was simply speaking in her own language, now, knowing very well that Alex could understand her.
‘That’s what Buzz says, your grace,’ Alex said, recalling several occasions when Buzz had offered that as consolatory advice, over the years.
‘I may not say that he is a wise counsellor,’ Lady Ursele observed, ‘without also complimenting myself.’
That raised a smile, as Alex gave her a grateful look, too.
‘Thank you, your grace.’ He said. ‘But I am sorry that this has happened… and sorrier still that there may be difficulties at Lundane. It must be difficult for you to understand how two branches of the League’s government can be in conflict over something like a peace process.’
‘No, not at all,’ she answered serenely. ‘One must push, one must pull. If they are working together, there is balance… neither rushing headlong, nor holding back in fear, but safe, steady, considered progress.’ She paused. ‘I should like,’ she said, ‘to hear the views of the...’
Alex didn’t recognise the word she used and was obliged to use an optic to pick up translation on the screen being transmitted as a translucency in front of his right eye. It offered nameless and nonentity. When Alex looked through it, the screen vanished.
‘That frightens you?’ Lady Ursele asked, her quiet, musical tone rich with compassion.
‘Significantly.’ Alex admitted. ‘I would be worried for your safety, your grace, and that of your attendants. The man is dangerous.’
Lady Ursele inclined her head. Violence was rare on Pirrell. When it happened it was treated as insanity.
‘I recognise your expertise in such a matter,’ she acknowledged. ‘But if he is willing to speak with me then I am willing to have one of your people in attendance, also, to intervene should his behaviour become… inappropriate.’
In the event, though, it was not an issue. Mister’s reaction to being told that the chamlorn would like to meet him and hear his views was to give forth with such a venomous opinion of her and the threat to League Security she represented that it was clear no meeting would take place.
Other meetings did, though, as the chamlorn continued to send for people who had caught her interest. Ali Jezno was one and to his utter joy was invited to tell her a story. Mako was invited too and asked to tell the chamlorn about the interdeck and the kind of events he organised there. Both told her a good deal more than they realised, as was the case with just about everyone who went to see her.
That could not be said, though, for Bennet. The Samartians had let it be known, via Shion, that while they would of course be more than honoured to meet the chamlorn, they were in a difficult position here as Samartian officers on exchange. There had been some consternation amongst their seniors when it was realised how far the relatively junior officers had gone in the matter of making friends with Silvie. When it had been realised that the quarian ambassador would be on the Assegai with them they had been given permission to meet with her and find out about her people. At most, their seniors had been expecting a report of some passing encounters. Instead, they were told that Jarlner and Bennet had made themselves completely at home on the aquadeck and that they had accepted, in principle, an invitation from Silvie for Samart to send visitors to the quarian resort at Serenity. This went way beyond their pay grade, as it were. There’d been some doubt over whether it was wise to send them on a first contact mission with the Fourth. They had been told pretty firmly that whatever species Trilopharus turned out to be, they were not to undertake any kind of diplomacy on Samart’s behalf, but must explain, if asked, that they were currently serving as Fourth’s personnel and had no separate diplomatic standing.
This, therefore, they did and Lady Ursele had been sensitive to that in not inviting the two of them separately or making it an ambassadorial meeting. And when she did eventually ask to see Bennet, it was as the ship’s gunnery officer, ostensibly to ask her about the work that would need to be done in order to remove the laser cannon.
It was just as well she didn’t really want to know about that, since Bennet found herself absolutely lost for words.
‘I couldn’t speak at all,’ she confided, afterwards, when Alex joined her and Jarlner in their quarters. ‘I just sat there like an idiot!’ She shook her head. ‘Like a civilian!’
Alex grinned. He liked the Samartian quarters and both of the Samartians, too. They had a great deal in common, both genetically and culturally. Alex had had the strangest impression, right from the first time he met their people, that he was looking at himself in a very slightly altering mirror. And these two, while they were rigidly correct and cold on duty, were good friends.
‘I’m sure that her grace didn’t mind,’ he said.
‘No, she was very kind,’ Bennet admitted. ‘She said she was sorry for making me uncomfortable and one of the women came over, was stroking my hair – which was weird, but, you know…’ she gave Alex a speaking look and he chuckled.
‘Yes,’ he said. ‘They make you feel about five.’
‘I don’t think I even made five,’ Bennet said. ‘I’d lost the power of speech, felt like I could barely walk. It’s something, I suppose, that I didn’t wet myself.’
Alex laughed, but sympathetically, then shot a rather more teasing look at Jarlner.
He was sitting there looking quite petrified. There was no furniture in the cabin that they shared, only four small sitting mats fastened to the deck. Sleep capsules, like flimsy sleeping bags, were rolled up neatly and stowed on the wall. They were, of course, entitled to a cabin each, but nobody had been surprised when they’d opted to share, or raised an eyebrow over the unusual fittings. This was what they needed to be comfortable and they generally were very relaxed in here.
Not so Jarlner, though, not right now. He was the senior of the two and as such had no issue with Bennet going first in any situation where dignity was at risk. Besides this being approved Samartian military practice, it was frankly acknowledged that Bennet was the stronger personality of the two of them and the more adventurous. So where she led, Jarlner would follow.
Only this time, Bennet herself had crashed and burned, utterly unable to get out even one coherent word in her meeting with a being who was, to her, a living goddess. And if she couldn’t cope with that experience, what hope did he have?
‘You could try the monkey technique,’ Alex said and laughed as Jarlner physically reeled back in his shock at such an outrageous suggestion.
Jarlner had suffered pangs of self-doubt after meeting Silvie. He was so entranced by her that it was affecting his focus on his work – a situation in which a Samartian back home would do the honourable thing and step out of military service at the next parade. But Jarnler had not been in a position to do that, so Alex had helped him overcome his infatuation by telling him a distinctly squalid story – a true one – about Silvie’s attempts to toilet-train the spider monkeys on Serenity. Whenever Jarlner felt himself drifting into idolising her, he was to remember the monkeys. It had worked, he had never been able to look at her in quite the same way again. But he was appalled even by the suggestion that something that crude might be applied to Lady Ursele.
‘Alex!’ he scolded. ‘That’s a terrible thing to say!’
‘It isn’t, you know, really,’ Alex said. ‘I couldn’t agree more that she is a wonderful, amazing, incre
dible person, meeting her is a profound experience, no question of that. But she is not a goddess, Jarlner. Absolutely not a goddess. Perhaps,’ he shared the advice between him and Bennet, ‘you should have an eye-screen flashing up in front of you every three seconds, Absolutely Not A Goddess.’
‘It’s all right for you,’ Bennet said. ‘You’re not from a world which worshipped her people for thousands of years. And it is astounding, Alex, they were there, they were on our world so long ago. It must have been in the very early days, between the Olaret founding our colony and the Firewall coming down, but they were there, visiting our world, and they were remembered through the aeons, they became our gods. We still have the ruined temples all over the planet and the gods are still with us in stories and things we believe and even daft things that we do even though we know it’s only superstition. Can you even imagine what it would be like if the ancient gods your people had worshipped for most of your history suddenly turned up in real life? I couldn’t talk to her, I couldn’t even look at her. It was too much. All too much. All I could do not to cry.’
For answer, Alex worked on his wristcom for a few seconds, creating an image which he transferred to the cabin’s holowindow, which up till then had been showing the usual starfield view. It was a picture of Chamlorn Lady Ursele, looking glorious, serene, wise and benevolent. Beneath it, in Samartian lettering, were the words Absolutely Not A Goddess.
‘Alex, stop that.’ Jarlner hastily accessed the holowindow and got rid of the poster. ‘It’s disrespectful!’
‘Oh?’ Alex got busy on his wristcom again. ‘Is this?’ His own image appeared on the window-screen, with the same message. ‘Or this?’ Now it was Jarlner’s. ‘This?’ Silvie. ‘Or this?’ Now it was Shion, which arrested both of them in their laughing protests.
Both of them had struggled at first in their relationship with Shion, finding it awkward to meet someone they knew to have the same physiology as those they had worshipped as gods.
Venturi Page 29