Time proved that the noble Eiipul knew whereof he spoke. Visitors and members of the extended family came and went without coming anywhere near Flinx's isolated chamber. Safe and secure, he was able at last to rest and relax.
The only interruptions to his daily routine arrived in the form of the still wary Eiipul offspring. When not occupied with daily studies, tasks, or family business, they joined Kiijeem in frequenting the softskin's hideaway, peppering him with questions about everything from daily life in the reviled Commonwealth to the nature of the colorful scaled flying creature that was the human's constant companion. Flinx answered them all readily. Ignorance breeds hatred, while conversely, education slays ignorance. Knowledge, he knew from a lifetime of personal experience, is a more effective weapon than a gun. As Truzenzuzex had once pointed out, it's hard to convince an enemy of the rightness of your cause while you're blowing his head off.
He would have been happy to stay in the storeroom awaiting the return of the reconfigured Teacher. Such a simplistic solution to his situation was not to be, however. Converted to a greater reality by what Flinx had shared with him, Lord Eiipul was convinced the attempt had to be made to sway the entire Imperial Gathering. If it could be done, a reluctant Flinx knew, it would be a milestone not only in the history of the Empire but in AAnn-human relations as well.
And all he had wanted to do was spend a few days on Blasusarr to prove to himself that that could be done. Was he fated, he wondered, to never be allowed to do anything small and simple?
When the day arrived to escort Flinx into the very heart of Krrassin there was no need to hide him. Sealed securely in his simsuit he was such the figure of an ordinary AAnn that the twins found themselves once more taken aback by the perfection of the illusion. Once his guest had again donned the eye-averting ijkk, Lord Eiipul accompanied him out into the characteristically harsh Blasusarrian light of early morning. The integrated polarizing lenses that camouflaged Flinx's eyes immediately darkened to protect his more sensitive human retinas. He felt his eyes watering anyway. He had not stepped outside since entering the Eiipul compound.
He remembered to fold his tail as Eiipul preceded him into the private family vehicle. The interior was far more luxurious than that of the various public transports he had ridden in the course of his stay on Blasusarr. Rare woods and lustrous concaves of tactile glass lined the walls. Powerfully rhythmic AAnn music, all drums and bells and atonal electronics, emanated discreetly from an unseen source.
As the automated craft rose, rotated, and smoothly accelerated through a waiting gap in the residence's security barrier, Flinx stared out the tinted canopy at the surrounding synthetic desert. After a while, the expensive pseudo-canyons and faux buttes gave way to more utilitarian structures of poured and molded walls and domes. These prosaic edifices jumped through no aesthetic hoops in expensive attempts to disguise their function.
Though traveling at maximum altitude on a level reserved for VIPs, the AAnn aircar still had to negotiate a bevy of traffic. This was Krrassin, after all. The capital, the economic and military hub, the heart of the AAnn interstellar Empire. The homeworld of the Commonwealth's most dynamic and cunning adversaries.
Flinx felt no anxiety, experienced no discomfort at this knowledge. Having never felt quite at home anywhere, not even on Moth, he was therefore equally at ease everywhere in the galaxy. Vagabond and chameleon that he was, home was wherever he happened to be at the moment.
That realization did not entirely squelch the rising trepidation he felt as the nearly silent vehicle drew within sight of the central administrative compound. Here decisions were made that affected not only Krrassin, but Blasusarr and all the worlds of the Empire. The lives, the futures of billions of intelligent beings ebbed and flowed according to judgments rendered within the complex by a hundred or so of the most noble AAnn. Actual choices and preferences were discussed, debated, fought over, and finally voted upon within a single structure known as The Eye of the Nye.
That impressive mass now loomed directly ahead. Analogous constructions on Earth consisted of clusters of needle-like towers or immense domes. On Hivehom, several substantial artificial caverns had been deftly hollowed out of the ground to serve the needs of the greater hive.
In contrast to both, The Eye of the Nye took the form of a single immense rock several square kilometers in extent. Rust red in hue, it had been skillfully shot through with ornamental streaks of azure and silver. In keeping with the traditions of those it had been built to accommodate, it was only five stories high. As always and especially in this sacrosanct place, the AAnn had built outward and not upward. If tradition held true throughout, Flinx knew, the hall would have an internal configuration like an iceberg, with the preponderance of its extensive chambers and corridors situated belowground.
Matte-flat in the morning sun, the red roof was perfectly level and utterly unadorned; devoid of antennae, signs, drifting decorations, spires, or any kind of architectural fillip. In contrast, the building's streaks of silver and slashes of bright blue exploded against his retinas.
He was going in there. Essentially alone, to try to influence an entire alien polity. One that would regard him, as Lord Eiipul originally had, with ingrained suspicion or worse. The Teacher was right: surely he was mentally unbalanced. Pip stirred uneasily against his side in the suit's internal pouch. He struggled to prepare himself mentally. Maybe it was better if he was a little crazy.
Madness is always the best armor against reality.
It was also a cheap out. He knew he wasn't mad. Retreating into psychosis would have been easy, especially in light of all that he knew and had experienced. Holding on to sanity was always the more difficult course for any sentient being.
The true immensity of the structure did not really hit home until the aircar cleared Security and proceeded deeper into the complex. The Great Hall was a city unto itself, frantic with activity and invested with purpose. Other vehicles darted in all directions, usually at a greater velocity than their own. When his host ordered the transport to turn down a narrower corridor, they found themselves traveling among a swarm of workers riding personalized vehicles.
After what seemed like half an hour they arrived at a parking area. As they disembarked, Eiipul told Flinx it was safe to remove the ijkk and leave it behind.
“No one will be looking for a common criminal in here,” he explained confidently. “The kind of antissocial figure repressented by your falsse AAnn identity would never make it passt the firsst ssecurity checkpoint.”
Taking extra care with his servo-assisted AAnn gait, Flinx loped alongside Lord Eiipul as they made their way through crowds of busy, intent AAnn. Focused on their individual tasks, hardly any of the workers glanced in the direction of the two nye. Flinx was unusually tall for an AAnn, but not to the point of drawing impolite (and potentially challenge-triggering) stares. The only interruptions came from the occasional passerby who would pause long enough to salute the status of the important noble who was Flinx's host and guide.
The final corridor they entered was different from any that had preceded it. Longer than most and devoid of doorways or branching passages, it had been machined from a single tube of some pale golden-brown metal. It reminded Flinx of translucent bronze. The hordes of workers had thinned here as well. Only a few AAnn strode the impressive span. Though their voices were kept to a respectful hiss, they still echoed off the flawless, seamless curved walls and ceiling.
“We are very closse now.” Flinx noted that in this place even Lord Eiipul had lowered his voice. “Make no eye contact with anyone we meet, resspond to no queriess. As my guesst, you are protected from challenge within The Eye. But I am not omnipotent. Even my influence hass itss limitss.”
Flinx gestured third-degree understanding. It was enough. Ahead, the light was growing brighter. The tunnel corridor was opening out into a larger space. How much larger he could not imagine until he and his host entered the chamber at the end of the bronze-colored corri
dor. He did not gasp for breath: in his short life he had seen far too much to be overawed by a mere room. But while he was not overawed, he was certainly impressed.
He had stood in chambers with higher ceilings. The core of a faraway structure that housed a certain ancient weapon/musical instrument, for example, rose to a greater peak. He had wandered through more extensive artificial voids, such as the interior of an ancient construct that appeared from the outside to be a methane dwarf but was in reality an unimaginably massive alien starship. But he had never before entered into one that was at once so expansive, so alien, and so beautiful.
The AAnn artisans who comprised the Tier of Ssaiinn would have approved, he decided as he admired his surroundings. For all he knew, some of them might have contributed to the decoration.
The inner sanctum known as The Eye of the Nye ran almost the entire width of the building. A full five stories high, it was crowned by an immense shallow dome of synthetic quartz that had been treated to change color at predetermined intervals. One moment it was a deep, rich amethyst purple, the next a golden citrine yellow, then transparent as crystal, followed by a tinting of sapphire blue, after which it appeared shot through with simulated rutile—the material of which the dome was composed progressively traversing every color of the visible spectrum.
Mammoth metallic bas-reliefs moving slowly across the walls depicted the history of the AAnn, from the race's humble beginnings as small nomadic bands struggling to survive the harsh landscape of Blasusarr, to the great internecine wars of unification finally won by Keisscha the Firsst, to the rapid rise of technology and the eventual expansion of the Empire to other worlds. Gaps in this hovering history were filled with dazzling knife-edge mosaics fashioned of gemstones and rare metals. Formed from a single continuous viscous pour of bonding chemicals infused with tons of finely ground synthetic corundum, the artfully sculpted floor glistened as if paved with a trillion trillion minuscule jewels.
In addition to the traditional spiral glowlamps, natural light pouring in through the immense dome provided not only plenty of illumination but additional heat. Without the simsuit's integral climate control, heatstroke would have felled Flinx an hour ago.
Hovering in sharp contrast to the long-established and time-honored conventional ornamentation, contemporary no-nonsense AAnn infolos drifted everywhere. Their presence constituted an exorbitant waste of energy whose purpose was not only to supply information but to celebrate the importance of The Eye and those who were allowed to work therein. As he and his host made their way forward through the cavernous chamber, Flinx saw numerous nye gathered around one or more of the highly responsive migratory knowledge-base projections. Many of the most important decisions involving the course of the Empire were hotly debated in front of those infolos, Eiipul informed him, with the results to be voted on later.
Though the discussions were frequently loud and seemingly hostile, Flinx knew that such voluble acrimony was characteristic of the AAnn. Surprisingly, physical confrontations seemed to be lacking. When queried about this, Lord Eiipul responded with a gesture of second-degree amusement. The highly knowledgeable human was apparently ignorant of something that was a well-known fact to every AAnn.
“Challengess are forbidden in The Eye of the Nye. With sso much high sstatuss at sstake, if confrontationss were allowed here they would take up too much of the time essential to actually making crucial decissionss.” Extending one arm in a broad, sweeping gesture, he indicated the vast, crowded, noisy space in which they stood. “For the ssake of the Empire, argumentss made in here can only be contessted with verbal violence.”
Flinx started to nod, caught himself just in time, and responded instead with the appropriate gesture. “What happens when disagreements unresolved inside find their way outside?”
“On ssuch occassionss,” his guide informed him matter-of-factly, “it iss not uncommon for vacanciess to appear in the body politic. Thiss iss not a problem. For every noble or technocrat who perisshess in a challenge, ten eagerly await to take their place.”
Flinx was hardly surprised by the noble's explanation. “I'd always heard that AAnn affairs of state were a bloody business.”
Eiipul took no umbrage at his guest's remark. “Toughness iss forged in conflict. I mysself have taken and ssurvived many physsical as well as verbal blowss, and have prevailed in as many combatss as debatess.” Holding up his left arm and turning sideways, he showed Flinx a depression that ran lengthwise from elbow to shoulder. “You mark where musscle and connective tissue iss missing and was not resstored? The result of a ssomewhat heated disspute involving continental economicss.” He lowered the permanently scarred arm.
Flinx was at once appalled and impressed. Personally, he could not recall having read or heard of an instance where a human economist had resolved a disagreement with a fellow academician by ripping out the other's tendons and ligaments. Clearly, Lord Eiipul regarded the disfigurement as a mark of honor. AAnn medical science was more than advanced enough for him to have had the muscle repaired or restored, had he so desired.
The great expanse of The Eye had a practical as well as ceremonial purpose. Its extent and the specific design of the highly embellished walls served to mute the volume of ongoing AAnn political deliberations. Apparently there was no such thing as a quiet debate among the AAnn. Flinx felt that the sometimes petty bickering he overheard as he loped onward alongside Eiipul was unworthy of the grand surroundings. Nevertheless, in the course of all the ancillary hissing and screaming it seemed that necessary decisions were eventually arrived at, consensus was periodically reached, and the resultant resolutions were set down to form new policy throughout the Empire. Though each noble was first and foremost out to advance the cause of him or herself and their extended families, it was clear that the raucous alien process still managed the work of successfully governing the Empire.
Reflecting on how closely the system reminded him of certain less savory aspects of human political discourse, Flinx found himself wondering not for the first time how the soft-spoken, conciliatory thranx had ever succeeded in establishing a functional political union with his own far more fractious species.
At the touch of a clawed hand on the forearm of his suit, he leaned to his left, the better to hear his guide's whispered hiss.
“Ssay nothing. Leave everything to me. You do not know the proper protocolss. We musst work our way through the cusstomary Sspiral that Sswirlss. Within it you encounter a politeness that exisstss nowhere elsse in Krrassin, or for that matter anywhere the length and breadth of the Empire. As I have told you, we will not face challenge in the traditional ssensse. Here all battless are fought with wordss and phrassess, with gessturess and eye contact. It iss a ssign of resspect.”
“Respect?” Flinx murmured in response. “Respect for what?”
“For the eminence of the Emperor, of coursse.” Raising a hand, Eiipul gestured toward the center of the crowd immediately in front of them. It was composed of stylish AAnn strolling in an ever-tightening spiral. “He iss there, at the nexuss. The loci of Empire. We musst reach him. It will not be a ssimple matter.”
Flinx had already surmised as much. Making personal contact with a head of government was never easy. Ignoring the sporadic interrogatories that were lobbed in his direction, Flinx kept his jaws shut and stayed close to Eiipul, marveling as his host demonstrated exquisite skill with both language and gesticulation. With proficiency born of long experience the AAnn noble replied to, deflected, or disregarded each and every query that came his way, including those that were intended for his tall companion. In this manner they worked their way deeper and deeper into the eddying throng of nobles, bureaucrats, and advisers.
It was amazing to see so many commanding, combative AAnn functioning in such close quarters with nary a knife or claw being unleashed. Occasionally Flinx was nudged sharply by a passing nye or accidentally found himself bumping up against a crowding individual he could not avoid. Out on the street any of these c
ontacts would have been sufficient reason for the offended to initiate personal combat. Here in The Eye of the Nye, at the hub of Empire, an atypical civility governed everything that was said, gestured, or done.
“There!” Raising one hand, Eiipul pointed with two of his four fingers. A modest open space loomed not far ahead of them, a circle of deference. Leaning against a resting post at its center, an elderly nye crouched low. Unpretentious, functional, and formal, his garb suggested nothing about his identity or his station. His attire contrasted powerfully with the far more costly, elegant apparel of those who swirled around him. At the moment he was conversing with a high-level government functionary from offworld. The latter's gestures were filled with fawning, while his tone dripped supplication. Both nye were flanked by two discreetly armed guards nearly as tall as Flinx.
“Jirasst, human! Before uss sstandss the Beloved, the Wisse, the Clear-thinking and Ssharp-of-wit, Highesst Prince-of-the-Circle Navvur W, Emperor of all the AAnn.” Breathy reverence was absent from Lord Eiipul's voice. In its place there was a wealth of genuine respect. “In hiss persson iss embodied all the hisstory of my kind and all itss hopess for a bountiful and prossperouss future. We sstand here at the heart of the Empire.” Once more he glanced over at Flinx, his voice low. “No human hass ever sstood sso near to the Imperial Pressence. Whatever happenss from now on, whatever your fate, know that you are the recipient of a ssingular honor.”
“I don't feel honored,” Flinx replied in his usual self-possessed tone. “I feel hot and itchy. No matter how hard it tries to keep me comfortable and how much I work with the interior lining, some part of this simsuit always grates.”
Lord Eiipul gestured second-degree exasperation. “Truly, you are an unclassifiable example of your ssad, ill-fated sspeciess. Desspite having sshared the dreadful experience you promissed and having thereby become convinced of the truth of your outrageouss assertionss, a part of me sstill findss you to be afflicted with a deep and dissturbing madness.”