Late in the afternoon when the place was finally getting straightened out she’d started spreading the sealant sheets over the lounge’s floorboards. That was when her u-shadow told her there was a call from Laril. “Are you sure?” she asked it.
“Yes.”
She debated with herself if she should call Cressida, maybe the Revenue Service would pay a reward. “Where’s he calling from?”
“The routing identity originates on Oaktier.” A summary slid into her peripheral vision.
“A Central Commonwealth world,” she read. “What’s he doing there?”
“I do not know.”
“Right,” she sat on the cube that was her portable bed and took her gloves off. Wiped her forehead. Took a breath. “Okay, accept the call.” His image appeared in her exovision’s primary perspective, making it seem as if he was standing right in front of her. If he was providing a real representation he hadn’t changed much. Thin brown hair cut short, round face with a chubby jaw and a wide neck, as always thick dark stubble longer than she liked. It was scratchy, she remembered. He never gelled it down smooth no matter how many times she asked.
“Thanks for taking the call,” he said. “I wasn’t sure you would.”
“Neither was I.”
“I hear you’re doing okay; you got the money.”
“I was awarded the money by the court. Laril, what are you doing? Why are you on Oaktier?”
“Isn’t it obvious?”
That took a few seconds to register, and even longer to accept. It must be some stunt, some scam. “You’re migrating inwards?” she asked, incredulous.
He smiled the same carefree smile he’d used when they first met. It was very appealing, warm and confident. She hadn’t seen it much after they married.
“Happens to all of us in the end,” he said.
“No! I don’t believe it. You are going Higher? You?”
“My first batch of biononics have been in a week. They’re starting to integrate some basic fields. It’s quite an experience.”
“But…” she spluttered. “For Ozzie’s sake. Higher culture would never take you. What did you do, erase half your memories?”
“That’s a pretty common myth. Higher culture isn’t the old Catholic Church, you know; you don’t have to confess and recant your past sins. It’s current attitude which counts.”
“I know they don’t take criminals. There was that case centuries ago—Jollian thought that he could escape what he’d done with a memory wipe and a migration to the Inner Worlds. Paula Myo caught up with him and had his biononics removed so he could face trial on the External Worlds as the type of human he was when he committed his crime. I think he got a couple of hundred years’ suspension.”
“That’s what you think of me, that I qualify for the Jollian precedent? Well thanks a whole lot, Araminta. A couple of things you might want to consider. One, Paula Myo isn’t after me. And she isn’t after me because I haven’t committed any crime.”
“Have you told the Viotia Revenue Service that?”
“My business economics were a mess, sure. I’m not hiding from that. I even told my Higher initiator about my finances. You know what she said?”
“Go on.”
“Higher culture is about rejecting the evil of money.”
“How very convenient for you.”
“Look, I just wanted to call and apologize. I’m not asking for anything. And I wanted to make sure you’re all right.”
“A bit late for that, isn’t it?” she bridled. “I’m not part of some therapy session you have to complete before they’ll take you.”
“You’re misunderstanding this, perhaps with anger leading you away from what I’m actually saying.”
“Ozzie! This is your therapy session.”
“We don’t need therapy to become Higher, it is inevitable. Even you will migrate eventually.”
“Never.”
His image produced a fond lopsided smile. “I remember thinking that once. Probably when I was in my twenties. I know it probably doesn’t make a lot of sense to someone your age when every day is fresh, but after a few centuries living on the External Worlds you begin to get bored and frustrated. Every day becomes this constant battle; politicians are corrupt and crap, projects never get finished on time or in budget, bureaucrats delight in thwarting you, and then there’s the eternal fight for money.”
“Which you lost.”
“I fed myself and my families for over three centuries thank you very much. Even you came out ahead with the residue of that work. But face it, I didn’t achieve much now did I? A few tens of thousands of dollars to show for three and a half centuries. That’s not exactly leaving your mark on the universe, is it? And it’s not just me, there are billions of humans that are the same. The External Worlds are fun and exciting with their market economy and clashing ideologies and outward urge. Youth thrives on that kind of environment. Then there comes a day when you have to look back and take stock. You did that for me.”
“Oh come on! You’re blaming me for the dog’s dinner you made of your affairs?”
“No. I’m not blaming you. Don’t you get it? I’m thanking you. I was old, it took you to reveal that to me. The contrast between us was so great even I couldn’t close my eyes to it for ever. There really is no fool like an old fool, and part of that foolishness came from deluding myself. I was tired of that life and didn’t want to admit it. Turning Punk Skunk and taking a young wife was just another way of trying to ignore what I’d become. Even that didn’t work, did it? I was making both of us miserable.”
“That’s putting it mildly,” she muttered. In a way though, it was gratifying hearing him admit it was all his fault. “I left my whole family behind because of you.”
He showed her a sly smile. “And that was a bad thing?”
“Yeah, all right,” she grinned puckishly. “You did me a favour there. I’m not really cut out for two centuries of selling agricultural cybernetics.”
“I knew that the minute I set eyes on you. So how’s the world of property development coming on?”
“Harder than I thought,” she admitted. “There are so many stupid little things that bug me.”
“I know. Well imagine today’s frustration multiplied by three hundred years, that’s how I wound up feeling.”
“And now you don’t?”
“No.”
“I don’t believe Higher culture is free of bureaucracy, or corruption, or idiots, or useless politicians. They might not be so blatant, but they’re there.”
“No, they’re not. Well… okay, but nothing like as bad as they are in the External Worlds. You see, there’s no need for any of that. So many of the social problems the External Worlds suffer from is born out of markets, capital and materialism; that’s what old-style economics produces, in fact trouble just is about all it produces. The cybernated manufacturing and resource allocation procedure which Higher culture is based on takes all those difficulties out of the equation. That and taking a mature sensible perspective. We don’t struggle for the little things any more, we can afford to take the longer, intellectual view.”
“You talk like you’re one of them already.”
“Them. That’s perspective for you. Higher culture is mainly a state of mind, but backed up by physical affluence.”
“You are what the External Worlds strive to be: everyone’s a millionaire.”
“No. Everyone has equal access to resources, that’s what you lack. Though I’d point out that External Worlds always convert to Higher culture in the end. We are the apex of human social and technological achievement. In other words, this is what the human race has been aiming for since proto-humans picked up a club to give us an advantage against all the other predators competing for food out on the African plains. We improve ourselves at every opportunity.”
“So why didn’t you go straight to ANA and download? That’s how Highers improve themselves, isn’t it?”
“Ultim
ately, I will, I suppose. But Higher is the next stage for me. I want a time in my body which isn’t such an effort. A couple of centuries where I can just relax and learn. There are so many things I want to do and see which I never could before. The opportunities here are just astounding.”
Araminta laughed silently, that at least sounded like the old Laril. “Then I suppose I wish you good luck.”
“Thank you. I really didn’t want to leave things the way they were between us. If there’s anything you ever need, please call, even if it’s just a shoulder to cry on.”
“Sure. I’ll do that,” she lied, knowing she never would. She felt indecently content when he ended the call. Closure obviously worked both ways.
***
The people had no faces. At least none that he was aware of. There were dozens of them, men, women, even children. They were in front of him. Running. Fleeing like cattle panicked by a carnivore. Their screams threatened to split his eardrums. Words rose struggling out of the soundwall. Mostly they were pleas for help, for pity, for sanctuary, for their lives. However hard they ran he kept up with them.
The bizarre mêlée was taking place in some kind of elaborate hall with crystal grooves running across its domed ceiling. Rows of curving chairs hindered the frantic crowd as they raced for the exit doors. He wouldn’t or couldn’t turn round. He didn’t know what they were trying to escape from. Energy weapons screeched, and the people flung themselves down. For himself, he remained standing, looking down at their prone bodies. Somehow he was remote from the horror. He didn’t know how that could be. He was there with them, he was a part of whatever terror was happening here. Then some kind of shadow slid across the floor like demon wings unfolding.
Aaron sat up in bed with a shocked gasp. His skin was cold, damp with sweat. Heart pounding. It took a moment for him to recognize where he was. The lights in the sleeping cabin were brightening, showing him the curving bulkhead walls. He blinked at them as the dream faded.
Somehow he knew the strange images were more than a dream. They must be some memory of his previous life, an event strong enough to cling on inside his neurones while the rest of his identity was wiped. He was curious and daunted at the same time.
What the hell did I get myself mixed up in?
Thinking about it, whatever the affray was, it didn’t look any worse than anything this mission had generated so far. His heart had calmed without any help from his biononics. He took a deep breath and climbed off the cot.
“Where are we?” he asked the Artful Dodger’s smartcore.
“Six hours out from Anagaska.”
“Good.” He stretched and rolled his shoulders. “Give me a shower,” he told the smartcore. “Start with water; shift to spores when I tell you.”
The cabin began to change, cot flowing back into the bulkhead, the floor hardening to a black and white marble finish. Gold nozzles extruded from each corner, and warm water gushed out.
Even given the ship’s obvious Higher origin, it had come as a wondrous surprise to discover it was equipped with an ultradrive. Aaron had thought such a thing to be nothing more than rumour. That was when he realized he had to be working for some ANA Faction. It was an idea he found more intriguing than the drive. It also meant the Pilgrimage was being taken a lot more seriously than people generally realized.
After the spores cleaned and dried his skin he dressed in a simple dark purple one-piece suit and went out into the main lounge. His small cabin withdrew into the bulkhead, providing a larger floorspace. Corrie-Lyn’s cabin was still engaged, a simple blister shape protruding into the hemispherical lounge. His suggestion yesterday that they share a bunk had been met by a cold stare and an instant: “Good night.”
She probably wouldn’t come out again until they touched down.
The culinary unit provided an excellent breakfast of fried benjiit eggs and Wiltshire drycure bacon, with toast and thick-sliced English marmalade. Aaron was nothing if not a traditionalist. So it would seem, he mused.
Corrie-Lyn emerged from her cabin while he was munching away on his third slice of toast. She’d dressed in a demure (for her) turquoise and emerald knee-length cashmere sweater dress which the ship’s synthesizer had produced. Her cabin sank back into the bulkhead, and she collected a large cup of tea from the culinary unit before sitting down opposite Aaron.
Recognizing a person’s emotional state was an important part of Aaron’s assessment routine. But this morning Corrie-Lyn was as unreadable as a muted solido.
She stared at him for a while as she sipped her tea, apparently unperturbed by the awkwardness of the situation.
“Something on your mind?” he asked mildly, breaking the silence. That he was the one who broke it was a telling point. There weren’t many people who could make him socially uncomfortable.
“Not my mind,” she said, a little too earnestly.
“Meaning? Oh come on, you’re an attractive woman. I was bound to ask. You’d probably be more insulted if I didn’t.”
“Not what I’m talking about.” She waved her hand dismissively. “That was some dream you had.”
“I… Dream?”
“Did you forget? I didn’t become a Living Dream Councillor just because I’ve got a great arse. I immerse myself in people’s dreams, I explore their emotional state and try to help them come to terms with what they are. Dreams are very revealing.”
“Oh shit! I leaked that into the gaiafield.”
“You certainly did. I’d like to tell you that you are one very disturbed individual. But that would hardly be a revelation, now would it?”
“I’ve seen my fair share of combat. Hardly surprising my subconscious throws up crap like that.”
She gave a small victory smile. “But you don’t remember any combat, do you. Not previous to this particular incarnation. That means whatever event you participated in was truly epochal for it to have survived in your subconscious. Wipe techniques are generally pretty good these days, and I suspect you had access to the very best.”
“Come off it. That was too weird to be a memory.”
“Most dreams are engendered by memory, except Inigo’s of course. They have their roots in reality, in experience. What you see is the event as your real personality recognizes it. Dreams are very truthful things, Aaron, they’re not something you can ignore, or take an aerosol to ward off. Unless you face that which you dream you will never truly be at peace with yourself.”
“Do I cross your palm with silver now?”
“Sarcasm is a very pitiful social defence mechanism, especially in these circumstances. Both of us know how disturbed you were. You cannot shield yourself and your emotions from someone as experienced as myself. The gaiafield will show you for what you are.”
Aaron made very sure the gaiamotes were completely closed up, allowing nothing to escape from inside his skull. “Okay then,” he grumbled. “What was I dreaming?”
“Something in your past.”
“Hey wow. Surely I am in the presence of a truly galactic master of the art.”
Unperturbed Corrie-Lyn took another drink of tea. “More relevantly: a darkness from your past. In order to have survived erasure and to manifest so strongly, I would evaluate it as a crux in your psychological development. Those people were very frightened; terrified even. For so many to be running so fearfully the threat must have been lethal. That is rare in the Commonwealth today, even among the outermost External Worlds.”
“So I was running an evacuation mission out of some disaster. Rare but not unfeasible. There’s a lot goes on among the External Worlds that the more developed planets turn a blind eye to.”
Corrie-Lyn gave him a sad smile. “You were above them, Aaron. Remember? Not running with them. You were what they feared. You and what you represented.”
“That’s bullshit.”
“Men. Women. Children. All fleeing you. All hysterical and horror-struck. What were you going to do to them, I wonder. We established back at the fane that y
ou have no conscience.”
“Very clever,” he sneered. “I pissed you off, and now you come gunning for a little psychological payback. Lady I have to tell you, it takes a great deal more than anything you’ve got to spook me out, and that’s Ozzie’s honest truth.”
“I’m not trying to spook you anywhere, Aaron,” she said with quiet earnest. “That’s not what Living Dream, the true Living Dream, is about. We exist to guide human life to its fulfilment. The promise of the Void is a huge part of that, yes; but it is not the only component to understanding what you are, your basic nature. I want to liberate the potential inside you. There is more than senseless violence lurking inside your mind, I can sense that. You can be so much more than what you are today, if you’d just let me help. We can explore your dreams together.”
“Call me old fashioned, but my dreams are my own.”
“The darkness you witnessed at the end interests me.”
“That shadow?” Despite himself, Aaron was curious she’d picked up on it.
“A winged shadow—which has a strong resonance for most humans no matter which cultural stream they come from. But it was more than a simple shadow. It held significant meaning to you. A representation of your subconscious, I think. After all, it didn’t surprise you. If anything you felt almost comfortable with it.”
“Whatever. We have more important things to concentrate on right now. Touchdown is in five and a half hours.” Something in his mind was telling him to close this conversation down now. She was trying to distract him, to throw him off guard. He couldn’t allow that, he had to remain completely focused on his mission to locate Inigo.
Corrie-Lyn raised an eyebrow. “Are you seriously saying you’re not interested? This is the real you we’re talking about.”