‘Good grief, can’t it wait?’ Genar-Hofoen said.
‘Yes, probably,’ said the ship reasonably, as though this had just occurred to it. ‘But people usually like to know this sort of thing immediately. Or so I thought.’
‘What sort of thing?’
‘The sentient module Scopell-Afranqui is dead,’ the ship told him. ‘It conducted a limited destruct on the first day of the war. We have only just heard. I’m sorry. Were you close?’
Genar-Hofoen was silent for a moment. ‘No. Well… No. Not that close. But I’m sorry to hear it. Thank you for telling me.’
‘Could it have waited?’ the ship asked conversationally.
‘It could, but I suppose you weren’t to know.’
‘Oh well. Sorry. Good night.’
‘Yes, good night,’ the man said, wondering at his feelings.
Ulver stroked his shoulder. ‘That was the module you lived on, wasn’t it?’
He nodded. ‘We never really got on,’ he told her. ‘Mostly my fault, I suppose.’ He turned his head to look at her. ‘I can be a scum-bag sometimes, frankly.’ He grinned.
‘I’ll take your word for it,’ she said, climbing back on top of him.
10. Heavy Messing
I
Grief, nothing worked! The Fate Amenable To Change’s ordnance directed at the Elench drone ship just disappeared, snatched away to nowhere; it had to react quickly to deal with the collapsing wormholes as they slammed back, now endless, towards its Displacers. How could anything do that? (And had the watching Elench warships noticed?) The little Elench drone flew on, a few seconds away from its home ship.
~ I confess I just tried to destroy your drone, the Fate sent to the Appeal To Reason. ~ I make no apologies. Look what happened. It enclosed a recording of the events. ~ Now will you listen? There seems little point in trying to destroy the machine. Just get away from it. I’ll try to work out another way of dealing with it.
~ You had no business attempting to interfere with my drone, the Appeal To Reason replied. ~ I am glad that you were frustrated. I am happy that the drone appears to be under the protection of the entity. I take it as an encouraging sign that it is so.
~ What? Are you mad?
~ I’ll thank you to stop impugning my mental state with such regularity and allow me to get on with my job. I have not informed the other craft of your disgraceful and illegal attack on my drone; however, any further endeavours of a similar nature will not be treated so leniently.
~ I shall not try to reason with you. Goodbye and fare well.
~ Where are you going?
~ I am not going anywhere.
II
The General Contact Unit Grey Area was about to rendezvous with the General Systems Vehicle Sleeper Service. The GCU had gathered its small band of passengers in a lounge for the occasion; one of the ship’s skeletal slave-drones joined them as they watched the view of hyperspace behind them on a wall screen. The GCU was making the best speed it could, rushing beneath the skein at a little over forty kilolights on a gently, decreasingly curved course that was now almost identical to that of the larger craft approaching from astern.
‘This will require a coordinated full engine shut-off and Displace,’ the small cube of components that was the drone told them. ‘For an instant, none of us will be within my full control.’
Genar-Hofoen was still trying to think of a cutting remark when the drone Churt Lyne said, ‘Won’t slow down for you, eh?’
‘Correct,’ the slave-drone said.
‘Here it comes,’ said Ulver Seich. She sat cross-legged on a couch drinking a delicately scented infusion from a porcelain cup. A dot appeared in the representation of space behind them; it rushed towards them, growing quickly. It swelled to a fat shining ovoid that rushed silently underneath them; the view dipped quickly to follow it, beginning to perform a half-twist to keep the orientation correctly aligned. Genar-Hofoen, standing near where Ulver sat, had to put his hand out to the back of the couch to steady himself. In that instant, there was a sensation of a kind of titanically enveloping slippage, the merest hint of vast energies being gathered, cradled, unleashed, contained, exchanged and manipulated; unimaginable forces called into existence seemingly from nothing to writhe momentarily around them, collapse back into the void and leave reality, from the perspective of the people on the Grey Area, barely altered.
Ulver Seich tssked as some of her infusion spilled into the cup’s saucer.
The view had changed. Now it snapped to a grey-blue expanse of something curved, like a cup of cloud seen from the inside. It pivoted again, and they were looking at a series of vast steps like the entrance to an ancient temple. The broad shelves of the stairs led up to a rectangular entrance lined with tiny lights; a dark space beyond twinkled with still smaller lamps. The view drew back to reveal a series of such entrances arranged side by side, the rest of which were closed. Above and below, set into the faces of the steps, were smaller doors, all similarly shut.
‘Success,’ the slave-drone said.
The view was changing again as the ship was drawn slowly backwards towards the single opened bay.
Genar-Hofoen frowned. ‘We’re going inside?’ he asked the slave-drone.
It swivelled to face him, paused just long enough for the human to form the impression he was being treated like some sort of cretin. ‘… Well, yes…’ it said, slowly, as one might to a particularly dim child.
‘But I was told-‘
‘Welcome aboard the Sleeper Service,’ said a voice behind them. They turned to see a tall, angular, black-dressed creature walking into the lounge. ‘My name is Amorphia.’
III
The drone returned to the Appeal To Reason and was taken back aboard. Seconds passed.
~ Well? the Fate Amenable To Change asked.
There was a brief pause. A microsecond or so. Then: ~ It’s empty, the Appeal To Reason sent.
~ Empty?
~- Yes. It didn’t record anything. It’s like it never went anywhere.
~ Are you sure?
~ Take a look for yourself.
A data dump followed. The Fate Amenable To Change shunted into a memory core it had set up for just such a purpose the mem it had realised what the Excession was, almost a month earlier. It was the equivalent of a locked room, an isolation ward, a cell. More information poured out of the Appeal To Reason; a gushing river of data trying to flood in after the original data dump. The Culture ship ignored it. Part of its Mind was listening to the howling, thumping noises coming out of that locked room.
Information flickered between the Appeal To Reason and the Sober Counsel, an instant before the Fate sent its own warning signal. It cursed itself for its procrastination, even if its warning would almost certainly have gone unheeded anyway.
It signalled the distant, war-readied Elench craft instead, begging them to believe the worst had happened. There was no immediate reply.
The Appeal To Reason was the nearer of the two Elencher ships. It turned and started accelerating towards the Fate. It broadcast, tight-beamed, lasered and field-pulsed vast, impossibly complicated signals at the Culture craft. The Fate squirted back the contents of that locked room, evacuating it. Then it swivelled and powered up its engines. So I am going somewhere, it thought, and moved off, away from the Appeal To Reason, which was still signalling wildly and remained on a heading taking it straight, for the Culture ship.
The Fate raced outwards, powering away from the Elencher vessel and heading out on a great curve that would take it rolling over the invisible sphere that was the closest approach limit it had set. The Sober Counsel was moving off on an opposite course from the Appeal To Reason, which was still following the Culture ship. A direction which would turn into an intercept course if they all held these headings. Oh, shit, the Fate thought.
They were still close enough to each other to just talk, but the Fate thought it ought to be a little more formal, so it signalled.
xGCU Fate Amenable To Change (Culture)
oExplorer Ship Sober Counsel (Whoever)
Whatever you are, if you advance on an intercept course on the far side of the closest approach limit, I’ll open fire. No further warnings.
No reply. Just the blaze of multi-band mania from the Appeal To Reason, following behind it. The Sober Counsel’s course didn’t alter.
The Fate concentrated its attention on the last known locations of the three other Elench craft; the trio which the Break Even had said were all war-configured. The other two couldn’t be ignored, but the new arrivals had to constitute the greatest threat for now. It scanned the data it had on the specifications of the Elench craft, calculating, simulating; war-gaming. Grief, to be doing this with ships that were practically Culture ships! The simulation runs came out equivocal. It could easily deal with the two craft, even staying within range of the Excession (as though that was a wise limitation anyway!), but if the other three joined in the fun, and certainly if they attacked, it could well find itself in trouble.