“I think I see Shohobohaum Za in the crowd,” the drone said as they waited at the exit. Ram’s entourage was still cluttering the far end of the ribbon of path held clear by the two lines of policemen.
Gurgeh glanced at the machine, then down the line of arm-linked police. He was still tensed from the game, bloodstream suffused with multifarious chemicals. As happened every now and again, everything he saw around him seemed to be part of the game; the way people stood like pieces, grouped according to who could take or affect whom; the way the pattern on the marquee was like a simple grid-area on the board, and the poles like planted power-sources waiting to replenish some exhausted minor piece and supporting a crux-point in the game; the way the people and police stood like the suddenly closed jaws of some nightmarish pincer-movement… all was the game, everything was seen in its light, translated into the combative imagery of its language, evaluated in the context its structure imposed upon the mind.
“Za?” Gurgeh said. He looked in the direction the drone’s field was pointing, but couldn’t see the man.
The last of Ram’s group cleared the pavement where the official cars waited. Pequil gestured for Gurgeh to proceed. They walked between the lines of uniformed males. Cameras pointed, questions were shouted. Some ragged chanting began and Gurgeh saw a banner waving over the heads of the crowd; “GO HOME ALIEN.”
“Seems I’m not too popular,” he said.
“You aren’t,” Flere-Imsaho told him.
In two steps (Gurgeh realized in a distant, game-sense way even as he was speaking and the drone was replying), he was going to be adjacent to… it took one more step to analyze the problem… something bad, something jarring and discordant… there was something… different; wrong about the three-group he was about to pass on his left; like unplaced ghost-pieces hiding in forest territory.… He had no idea exactly what was wrong with the group, but he knew immediately—as the protagonizing structures of the game-sense claimed precedence in his thoughts—that he wasn’t going to risk putting a piece in there.
… Another half-step…
… to realize that the piece he didn’t want to risk was himself.
He saw the three-group start to move and split up. He turned and ducked automatically; it was the obvious replying move of a threatened piece with too much momentum to stop or bound back from such an attacking force.
There were several loud bangs. The three-group of people burst toward him through the arms of two policemen, like a composite piece suddenly fragmenting. He converted his ducking motion into a dive and roll which he realized with some delight was the almost perfect physical equivalent to a trip-piece tying up a light-attacker. He felt a pair of legs thud into his side, not hard, then there was a weight on top of him and more loud noises. Something else fell on top of his legs.
It was like waking up.
He’d been attacked. There had been flashes, explosions, people launching themselves at him.
He struggled under the warm, animal weight on top of him, the one he’d tripped up. People were shouting; police moved quickly. He saw Pequil lying on the ground. Za was there too, standing looking rather confused. Somebody was screaming. No sign of Flere-Imsaho. Something warm was seeping into the hose he wore on his legs.
He struggled out from under the body lying on top of him, suddenly revolted by the thought that the person—apex or male, he couldn’t tell—might be dead. Shohobohaum Za and a policeman helped him up. There was a lot of shouting still; people were moving or being moved back, clearing a space around whatever had happened; bodies lay on the ground, some covered in bright red-orange blood. Gurgeh got dizzily to his feet.
“All right, game-player?” Za asked, grinning.
“Yes, I think so,” Gurgeh nodded. There was blood on his legs, but it was the wrong color to be his.
Flere-Imsaho descended from the sky. “Jernau Gurgeh! Are you all right?”
“Yes.” Gurgeh looked around. “What happened?” he asked Shohobohaum Za. “Did you see what happened?” The police had drawn their guns and were clustered around the area; the people were moving away, the press-cameras were being forced back by shouting police. Five policemen were pinning somebody down on the grass. Two apices in civilian clothes lay on the path; the one Gurgeh had tripped was covered in blood. A policeman stood over each body; another two were tending to Pequil.
“Those three attacked you,” Za said, eyes flicking around as he nodded at the two bodies and the figure under the pile of police. Gurgeh could hear somebody sobbing loudly, in what was left of the crowd. Reporters were still shouting questions.
Za guided Gurgeh over to where Pequil lay, while Flere-Imsaho fussed and hummed overhead. Pequil lay on his back, eyes open, blinking, while a policeman cut away the blood-soaked sleeve of his uniform jacket. “Old Pequil here got in the way of a bullet,” Za said. “You all right, Pequil?” he shouted jovially.
Pequil smiled weakly and nodded.
“Meanwhile,” Za said, putting his arm round Gurgeh’s shoulders and looking round all the time, gaze darting everywhere, “your brave and resourceful drone here exceeded the speed of sound to get about twenty meters out of the way, upward.”
“I was merely gaining height the better to ascertain wh—”
“You dropped,” Za told Gurgeh, still without looking at him, “and rolled; I thought they’d got you, actually. I managed to knock one of these bods on the head and I think the police burned the other one.” Za’s gaze settled momentarily on the knot of people beyond the cordon of police, where the sobbing was coming from. “Somebody in the crowd got hit too; the bullets meant for you.”
Gurgeh looked down at one of the dead apices; his head lay at right angles to his body, across his shoulder; it would have looked wrong on almost any humanoid. “Yeah, that’s the one I hit,” Za said, glancing briefly at the apex. “Bit too hard, I think.”
“I repeat,” Flere-Imsaho said, moving round in front of Gurgeh and Za, “I was merely gaining height in order to—”
“Yes, we’re glad you’re safe, drone,” Za said, waving the buzzing bulk of the machine away like a large and cumbersome insect and guiding Gurgeh forward to where an apex in police uniform was gesturing toward the cars. Whooping noises sounded in the sky and the surrounding streets.
“Ah, here’s the boys,” Za said, as a wailing noise dopplered its way over the park, and a large orange-red airvan rushed out of the sky to land in a storm of dust on the grass nearby; the marquee fabric flapped and banged and rippled in the blast of air. More heavily armed police jumped out of the van.
There was some confusion about whether they ought to go to the cars or not; finally they were taken back into the marquee and statements were taken from them and some other witnesses; two cameras were confiscated from protesting news-people.
Outside, the two dead bodies and the wounded attacker were loaded onto the airvan. An air-ambulance arrived for Pequil, who was lightly wounded in the arm.
As Gurgeh, Za and the drone finally left the marquee to be taken back to the hotel in a police aircraft, a groundcar-ambulance was pulling in through the park gates to pick up the two males and a female also injured in the attack.
“Nice little module,” Shohobohaum Za said, throwing himself into a formseat. Gurgeh sat down too. The noise of the departing policecraft echoed through the interior. Flere-Imsaho went quiet as soon as they got in and disappeared through to another part of the module.
Gurgeh ordered a drink from the module and asked Za if he would like anything. “Module,” Za said, sprawling out over the seat and looking thoughtful, “I’d like a double standard measure of staol and chilled Shungusteriaung warp-wing liver wine bottoming a mouth of white Eflyre-Spin cruchen-spirit in a slush of medium cascalo, topped with roasted weirdberries and served in a number three strength Tipprawlic osmosis-bowl, or your best approximation thereof.”
“Male or female warp-wing?” the module said.
“In this place?” Za laughed. “Hell;
both.”
“It will take some minutes.”
“That is perfectly all right.” Za rubbed his hands together and then looked at Gurgeh. “So, you survived; well done.”
Gurgeh looked uncertain for an instant, then said, “Yes. Thanks.”
“Think comparatively little of it.” Za flapped one hand. “Quite enjoyed myself, actually. Just sorry I killed the guy.”
“I wish I could take such a magnanimous view,” Gurgeh said. “He was trying to kill me. And with bullets.” Gurgeh found the idea of being hit by a bullet particularly horrible.
“Well,” Za shrugged, “I’m not sure it makes much difference whether you’re killed by a projectile or a CREW; you’re just as dead. Anyway, I still feel sorry for those guys. Poor bastards were probably just doing their jobs.”
“Their jobs?” Gurgeh said, mystified.
Za yawned and nodded, stretching out in the folds of the accommodating formseat. “Yeah; they’ll be imperial secret police or Bureau Nine or something like that.” He yawned again. “Oh, the story’ll be they’re disaffected civilians… though they might try to hang it on the revs… but that’d be a bit unlikely…” Za grinned, shrugged. “Na; they might try it anyway; just for a laugh.”
Gurgeh thought. “No,” he said finally. “I don’t understand. You said these people were police. How—”
“Secret police, Jernau.”
“… But how can you have a secret policeman? I thought one of the points of having a uniform for the police was so that they could be easily identified and act as a deterrent.”
“Good grief,” Za said, covering his face with his hands. He put them down and gazed at Gurgeh. He took a deep breath. “Right… well; the secret police are people who go about listening to what people say when they aren’t being deterred by the sight of a uniform. Then if the person hasn’t actually said anything illegal, but has said something they think is dangerous to the security of the Empire, they kidnap them and interrogate them and—as a rule—kill them. Sometimes they send them to a penal colony but usually they incinerate them or throw them down an old mineshaft; the atmosphere here’s rich with revolutionary fervor, Jernau Gurgeh, and there are some rich seams of loose tongues beneath the city streets. They do other things as well, these secret police. What happened to you today was one of those other things.”
Za sat back and made an expansive, shrugging gesture. “Or, on the other hand, I suppose it isn’t impossible they really were revs, or disaffected citizens. Except that they moved all wrong.… But that’s what secret police do, take it from me. Ah!”
A tray approached bearing a large bowl in a holder; vapor rose dramatically from the frothing, multicolored surface of the liquid. Za took the bowl.
“To the Empire!” he shouted, and drained it in one go. He slammed the bowl back onto the tray. “Haaa!” he exclaimed, sniffing and coughing and wiping his eyes with the sleeves of his tunic. He blinked at Gurgeh.
“Sorry if I’m being slow,” Gurgeh said, “but if these people were imperial police, mustn’t they have been acting on orders? What’s going on? Does the Empire want me dead because I’m winning the game against Ram?”
“Hmm,” Za said, coughing a little. “You’re learning, Jernau Gurgeh. Shit, I thought a game-player would have a bit more… natural deviousness about him… you’re a babe among the carnivores out here… anyway, yes, somebody in a position of power wants you dead.”
“Think they’ll try it again?”
Za shook his head. “Too obvious; they’d have to be pretty desperate to try something like that again… in the short term at least. I think they’ll wait and see what happens in your next ten game, then if they can’t ditch you in that they’ll get your next single opponent to use the physical option on you and hope you’ll scare off. If you get that far.”
“Am I really such a threat to them?”
“Hey, Gurgeh; they realize now they’ve made a mistake. You didn’t see the ’casts before you got here. They were saying you were the best player in the whole Culture and you were some sort of decadent slob, a hedonist who’d never worked a day in your life, that you were arrogant and totally convinced you were going to win the game, that you had all sorts of new glands sewn into your body, that you’d fucked your mother, men… animals for all I know, that you were half computer… then the Bureau saw some of your games you’d been playing on the way here, and announced—”
“What?” Gurgeh said, sitting forward. “What do you mean they’d seen some of the games I’d been playing?”
“They asked me for some recent games you’d played; I got in touch with the Limiting Factor—isn’t that thing a bore?—and had it send me the moves in a couple of your recent games against it. The Bureau said on the strength of those they were more than happy to let you play using your drug-glands and everything else.… I’m sorry; I’d assumed the ship asked your permission first. Didn’t it?”
“No,” Gurgeh said.
“Well, anyway, they said you could play without restrictions. I don’t think they really wanted to—purity of the game, you know?—but the orders must have been handed down. The Empire wanted to prove that even with your unfair advantages you still weren’t capable of staying in the Main Series. Your first couple of days’ play against that priest and his squaddies must have had them rubbing their little hands with glee, but then that out-of-the-hat stunt-win dropped their chins in their soup. Having you drawn against Ram in the single game probably seemed like a really good wheeze too, but now you’re about to kick his latrine boards out from under him and they’ve panicked.” Za hiccuped. “Hence the bungled splat-job today.”
“So the draw against Ram wasn’t really random, either?”
“God’s balls, Gurgeh,” Za laughed. “No, man! Holy shit! Are you really this naïve?” He sat shaking his head and looking at the floor and hiccuping every now and again.
Gurgeh stood up and went to the opened module doors. He looked out at the city, shimmering in the late evening haze. Long tower-shadows lay on it like widely spaced hairs on some near-bald pelt. Aircraft glinted sunset-red above it.
Gurgeh didn’t think he’d ever felt so angry and frustrated in his life. Another uncomfortable feeling to add to those he’d been experiencing lately, feelings he’d put down to the game, and to really playing seriously for the first time.
Everybody seemed to be treating him like a child. They happily decided what he need and need not be told, they kept things back from him that he ought to have been told, and when they did tell him they acted as if he should have known all the time.
He looked back at Za, but the man was sitting rubbing his belly and looking distracted. He belched loudly, then smiled happily and shouted, “Hey, module! Put up channel ten!… yeah, on the screen; yo.” He got up and trotted forward to stand right in front of the screen, and stood there, arms folded, whistling tunelessly and grinning vacantly at the moving pictures. Gurgeh watched from the side.
The news showed film of imperial troopers landing on a distant planet. Towns and cities burned, refugee lines snaked, bodies were shown. There were interviews with the tearful families of slain troopers. The just invaded locals—hairy quadrupeds with prehensile lips—were shown lying down tied up in the mud, or on their knees before a portrait of Nicosar. One was shorn, so the people back home could see what they looked like under all that fur. Their lips had become prized trophies.
The following story was about Nicosar demolishing his opponent in the single game. The Emperor was shown walking from one part of the board to another, signing some documents in an office, then from a distance, standing on the board again while a commentator enthused over the way he’d played.
The attack on Gurgeh was next. He was amazed when he saw the incident on film. It was over in an instant; a sudden leap, him falling, the drone disappearing upward, some flashes, Za springing forward out of the crowd, confusion and movement, then his face in close-up, a shot of Pequil on the ground, and another of
the dead attackers. He was described as being dazed but unharmed, thanks to the prompt action of the police. Pequil was not seriously wounded; he was interviewed in hospital, explaining how he felt. The attackers were described as extremists.
“That means they might decide to call them revs later on,” Za said. He told the screen to turn off, then turned to Gurgeh. “Didn’t you think I was quick there, though?” he said, grinning widely and throwing his arms wide. “Did you see the way I moved? It was beautiful!” He laughed and spun round, then half walked, half danced to the formseat again, and fell into it. “Shit, I was only there to see what sort of loonies they had out protesting against you, but wow am I glad I went! What speed! Fucking animal grace, maestro!”
Gurgeh agreed Za had moved very quickly.
“Let’s see it again, module!” Za shouted. The module-screen obliged, and Shohobohaum Za laughed and giggled as he watched the few seconds of action. He replayed it a few more times, in slow motion, clapping his hands, then called for another drink. The frothing bowl came quicker this time, the module’s synthesizers having wisely kept the previous coding. Gurgeh sat down again, seeing that Za wasn’t thinking of leaving just yet. Gurgeh ordered some snacks; Za snorted in derision when offered food, and crunched the roasted weirdberries that came with his foaming cocktail.
They watched imperial broadcasts while Za slurped slowly at his drink. Outside, one sun went down and the city lights sparkled in the half-light. Flere-Imsaho appeared without its disguise—Za took no notice of it—and announced it was on its way out, making yet another foray into the avian population of the planet.
“Don’t think that thing fucks birds, d’you?” Za said after it had disappeared.
“No,” Gurgeh said, drinking his light wine.
Za snorted. “Hey; you want to come out again some time? That visit to the Hole was a real hoot. I really enjoyed it in a weird sort of way. How about it? Except let’s go totally wild this time; show these constipated bonebrains what Culture guys are like when they really put their minds to it.”