'Thank you,' he said to the big man as he stepped into the vehicle. The fellow bowed again, and closed the door. He sat back in plushly luxurious upholstery that couldn't make up its mind whether it was a seat or a bed. The car's windows dimmed in response to the lights of the media people as the vehicle exited from the hotel courtyard. He gave what he hoped was a regal wave, all the same.
The evening city lights streamed past; the car thundered quietly. He inspected a package on the seat/bed beside him; it was paper-wrapped, and tied up with colourful ribbons. "MR STABERINDE" said a hand-written note. He brought the suit helmet over, pulled carefully on a ribbon, opening the package. There were clothes inside. He lifted them out and looked at them.
He found a switch on an arm that let him talk to the grey-haired driver. 'I take it this is my fancy-dress costume. What is it exactly?'
The driver looked down, took something from a jacket pocket, and manipulated it. 'Hello,' said an artificial voice. 'My name is Mollen. I cannot talk, so I use this machine instead.' He glanced up at the road, then down again at whatever machine he was using. 'What do you want to ask me?'
He didn't like the way the big guy took his eyes off the road each time he wanted to say something, so he just said, 'never mind.' He sat back and watched the lights go past, taking the suit helmet off again.
They drew into the courtyard of a large, dark house down near a river in a side-canyon. 'Please follow me, Mr Staberinde,' Mollen said through his machine.
'Certainly.' He lifted the suit helmet and followed the taller man up the steps and into a large foyer. He was carrying the costume he'd found in the car. Animal heads glared from the walls of the tall entrance hall. Mollen closed the doors and led him to an elevator which hummed and rattled its way down for a couple of floors; he heard the noise and could detect the drug-smoke odour of the party even before the doors were opened.
He handed the bundle of clothes to Mollen, keeping only a thin cloak. 'Thanks; I won't be needing the rest.'
They went out into the party, which was noisy and crowded and full of bizarre costumes. The men and women all looked sleek and well-fed; he breathed in the drug smoke that wreathed the motley figures about him; Mollen led the way through the crowd. People fell silent as they passed, and a babble of conversation started up in his wake. He heard the word 'Staberinde' several times.
They went through doors guarded by men even bigger than Mollen, down a flight of softly carpeted stairs, and into a large room walled with glass on one side. Boats bobbed on black water in an underground dock on the far side of the glass, which reflected a smaller but more bizarre party. He peeked under the dark glasses, but the view was no brighter.
As on the floor above, people walked around with either drug bowls or, for the especially daring, drink glasses. Everybody was either badly injured or actually mutilated.
Men and women turned to look at the new arrival as he followed Mollen in. Some men and women had arms broken and twisted, the bones tearing through the skin, showing whitely under the plain light; some had huge gashes cut into their bodies, some had whole areas of their flesh flayed and seared, some had had breasts or arms amputated, or eyes put out, often with the removed article or articles dangling from other parts of their bodies. The woman from the street party came towards him, a hand-wide flap of her belly hanging down over her glistening skirt, her belly muscles rippling inside like dull red glistening chords.
'Mr Staberinde; you've come as a space man,' she said. There was an over-elaborate modulation to her voice he found instantly annoying.
'Well, I've sort of compromised,' he said, swirling the cape and fastening it across his shoulders.
The woman held out her hand. 'Well; welcome, anyway.'
'Thank you,' he said, taking her hand and kissing it. He half expected the suit sensory fields to pick up a whiff of some deadly poison on the woman's delicate hand, and signal danger, but the alarm remained quiet. He grinned as she took her hand away.
'What do you find funny, Mr Staberinde?'
'This!' he laughed, nodding at the people around them.
'Good,' she said, laughing a little (her belly quivered). 'We did hope our party might amuse you. Allow me to introduce our good friend who is making all this possible.'
She took his arm and guided him through the grisly multitude to a man sitting on a stool next to a tall, dull grey machine. He was small and smiling and kept wiping his nose with a large kerchief which he stuffed raggedly into his otherwise immaculate suit.
'Doctor, this is the man we told you of, Mr Staberinde.'
'Sincere greetings and things,' said the little doctor, his face collapsing into a moist and toothy smile. 'Welcome to our Injured Party.' He waved round the room at the wounded people, and waved his hands enthusiastically. 'Would you like an injury? The process is quite painless, and causes no inconvenience; repairs are speedy and there aren't any scars. What can I tempt you with? Lacerations? Compound fracture? Castration? How about a multiple trepanning? You'd be the only one here.'
He folded his arms and laughed. 'You're too kind. Thank you, but no.'
'Oh don't, please,' the little man said, looking wounded. 'Don't spoil the party; everybody else is taking part; do you really want to feel so left out? There is no risk of pain or permanent damage of any sort. I have carried out this sort of operation all over the civilised universe, and have never had any complaints except from people who get too attached to their injuries and resist repair. My machine and I have performed novelty injuries and wounds in every centre of civilisation in the Cluster; you may not have this chance again, you know; we leave tomorrow, and I'm all booked up for the next two years standard. Are you absolutely sure you don't want to participate?'
'More than absolutely.'
'Leave Mr Staberinde alone, Doctor,' the woman said, 'If he does not want to join us then we must respect his wishes. Must we not, Mr Staberinde?' The woman took his arm in hers. He looked at her injury, wondering what sort of transparent shielding kept everything intact. Her breasts were frosted with small, tear-shaped gems, and kept high by tiny field projectors on their undersides.
'Yes, of course.'
'Good. Would you wait a moment, please? Please share this.' She pushed her drink into his hand and stooped forward to talk to the doctor.
He turned to look at the people in the room. Strips of flesh hung from beautiful faces, grafted breasts swung from tanned backs, slender arms hung like bloated necklaces; chips of bone peeped from torn skin, veins and arteries and muscles and glands squirmed and sparkled in the plain light.
He lifted the glass the woman had given him and wafted some of its fumes into the fields around the helmet neck; an alarm sounded and a small screen on the suit's wrist revealed the specific poison in the glass. He smiled, pushed the glass through the suit's neck-field and knocked the contents back, then coughed a little as the half-alcohol concoction went down his throat. He smacked his lips.
'Oh, you've finished it,' the woman came back to him. She was patting her smooth belly, now whole again, and motioned him towards another area of the room. She donned a small, glittering waistcoat as they walked through the mutilated throng.
'Yes.' He handed her the glass.
They went through a door into an old workshop; lathes and punches and drills stood around under layers of dust and flaking paint and metal. Three chairs stood under a hanging light, a small cabinet beside them. The woman shut the door and waved him into one of the low seats. He sat down, placing the suit helmet on the floor at his side.
'Why didn't you come in the costume we sent you?' She altered the lock on the door, then turned to him, suddenly smiling. She adjusted the glittering waistcoat.
'It didn't suit me.'
'You think that does?' she nodded at the black suit as she sat down, crossing her legs. She tapped the cabinet. It opened out with chinking glasses and already smoking drug bowls.
'I find it reassuring.'
She leant over, offering h
im a glass of gleaming liquid, which he accepted. He settled into the chair again.
She sat back too, cradling a bowl in both hands and closing her eyes as she leant over it, breathing in deeply. She flapped a little of the smoke under the lapels of the waistcoat, so that as she spoke the heavy fumes curled back out between the material and her breasts, and twisted slowly into her face.
'We are so glad you could come, whatever your attire. Tell me; how are you finding the Excelsior? Does it meet with your requirements?'
He smiled thinly. 'It'll do.'
The door opened. The man he'd seen with the woman at the street party and when they had chased him in their car was outside. He stood back for Mollen to enter before him. Then he strode to the remaining seat and placed himself in it. Mollen stood near the door.
'What have you been saying?' the man asked, waving away the woman's hand with a glass in it.
'He's about to tell us who he is,' the woman said; they both looked at him. 'Aren't you, Mr... Staberinde?'
'No I'm not. You tell me who you are.'
'I think you know who we are, Mr Staberinde,' the man said. 'We thought we knew who you were, up until a few hours ago. Now we're not so sure.'
'Me, I'm just a tourist.' He sipped at the drink, looking at them over the top of the glass. He inspected his drink. Minute specks of gold floated in its glittering depths.
'For a tourist, you've bought an awful lot of souvenirs that you'll never be able to take home with you,' the woman said. 'Streets, railways, bridges, canals, apartment blocks, stores, tunnels.' She waved her hand in the air to indicate that the list went on. 'And that's just in Solotol.'
'I get carried away.'
'Were you trying to attract attention?'
He smiled. 'Yes, I suppose I was.'
'We heard you suffered an unpleasant experience this morning, Mr Staberinde,' the woman said. She wriggled down deeper into the chair, drawing up her legs. 'Something to do with a storm-drain.'
'That's right. My car was diverted down a spillway, from the top.'
'You weren't hurt?' She sounded sleepy.
'Not seriously; I stayed in the car until...'
'No, please.' The hand waved up from the indistinct mass of the chair, tiredly, 'I have no head for details.'
He said nothing; he pursed his lips.
'I understand your driver was not so lucky,' the man said.
'Well, he's dead.' He leant forward in his seat. 'Actually, I thought you people might have arranged the whole thing.'
'Yes,' said the woman from the mass of the chair, her voice floating up like the smoke, 'Actually we did.'
'I find frankness so appealing, don't you?' The man looked admiringly at the knees, breasts and head of the woman, the only parts of her still showing above the furry arms of the seat. He smiled. 'Of course, Mr Staberinde, my companion jests. We would never do such a terrible thing. But we might be able to lend you some assistance in finding the real culprits.'
'Really?'
The man nodded. 'We think now we might like to help you, you see?'
'Oh, sure.'
The man laughed. 'Who exactly are you, Mr Staberinde?'
'I told you; I'm a tourist.' He sniffed the bowl. 'I wandered into a little money recently, and I always wanted to visit Solotol - in style - and that's what I've been doing.'
'How did you get control of the Vanguard Foundation, Mr Staberinde?'
'I thought direct questions like that were impolite.'
'They are,' the man smiled. 'I beg your pardon. May I guess your profession, Mr Staberinde? I mean before you became a gentleman of leisure, of course.'
He shrugged. 'If you like.'
'Computers,' the man said.
He had started to raise his glass to his lips, just so he could hesitate, as he now did. 'No comment,' he said, not meeting the man's eyes.
'So,' the man said. 'The Vanguard foundation is under new management, is it?'
'Damn right. Better management.'
The man nodded. 'So I heard, just this afternoon.' He sat forward in his chair and rubbed his hands together. 'Mr Staberinde; I don't want to pry into your commercial operations and future plans, but I wonder if you'd give us even a vague idea in what direction you see the Vanguard Foundation going, over the next few years. Purely as a matter of interest, for now.'
'That's easy,' he grinned. 'More profits. Vanguard could have been the biggest corp of the lot if it had been aggressive with its marketing. Instead it's been run like a charity; relied on coming up with some new technological gizmo to restore its position each time it falls behind. But from now on it fights like the other big boys, and it backs winners.' (The man nodded wisely.) The Vanguard Foundation's been too... meek until now.' He shrugged. 'Maybe that's just what happens when you leave something to be run by machines. But that's over. From now on the machines do what I tell them to, and the Vanguard Foundation becomes a competitor; a predator, yeah?' He laughed, not too harshly, he hoped, conscious he might overdo this.
The man smiled slowly but broadly. 'You... believe in keeping machines in their place, yes?'
'Yeah.' He nodded vigorously. 'Yeah, I do.'
'Hmm. Mr Staberinde, have you heard of Tsoldrin Beychae?'
'Sure. Hasn't everybody?'
The man raised his eyebrows liquidly. 'And you think...?'
'Could have been a great politician, I suppose.'
'Most people say he was a great politician,' the woman said from the chair's depths.
He shook his head, looking into his drug bowl. 'He was on the wrong side. It was a shame, but... to be great you have to be on the winning side. Part of greatness is knowing that. He didn't. Same as my old man.'
'Ah...' said the woman.
'Your father, Mr Staberinde?' the man said.
'Yeah,' he admitted. 'He and Beychae... well, it's a long story, but... they knew each other, long ago.'
'We have time for the story,' the man said easily.
'No,' he said. He stood up, putting down the bowl and glass, and taking up the suit helmet. 'Look; thanks for the invitation and all, but I think I'll head back now; I'm a little tired, and I took a bit of a battering in that car, you know?'
'Yes,' the man said, standing too. 'We're really sorry about that.'
'Oh, thanks.'
'Perhaps we can offer something in compensation?'
'Oh yeah? Like what?' He fiddled with the suit helmet. 'I got lots of money.'
'How would you like to talk to Tsoldrin Beychae?'
He looked up, frowning. 'I don't know; should I? Is he here?' He gestured out towards the party. The woman giggled.
'No.' The man laughed. 'Not here. But in the city. Would you like to talk to him? Fascinating fellow, and no longer actively on the wrong side, as it were. Devoted to a life of study, these days. But still fascinating, as I say.'
He shrugged. 'Well... maybe. I'll think about it. It crossed my mind to leave, after the craziness this morning.'
'Oh, I beg you to reconsider that, Mr Staberinde. Please; sleep on it. You might do a great deal of good, for all of us, if you would talk to the chap. Who knows; you might even help make him great.' He held out one hand towards the door. 'But I can tell you want to go. Let me see you to the car.' They walked to the door. Mollen stood back. 'Oh. This is Mollen. Say hello, Mollen.' The grey-haired man touched a small box at his side.
'Hello,' it said.
'Mollen can't speak, you see. Hasn't said a word in all the time we've known him.'
'Yes,' said the woman. She was completely submerged in the chair now. 'We decided he needed to clear his throat; so we took out his tongue.' She either giggled or belched.
'We've met.' He nodded to the big man, whose face contorted strangely under the scars.
The party in the boat-house cellar went on. He almost collided with a woman who had her eyes on the back of her head. Some of the revellers were exchanging limbs now. People sported four arms, or none (begging for drinks to be brought to their mo
uths), or an extra leg, or had arms or legs of the wrong sex. One woman was parading around with a man in tow who wore a sickly stupid grin; the woman kept lifting her skirt and displaying a complete set of male sexual equipment.
He hoped they all forgot who had what at the end of the evening.
They passed through the tame party, where fireworks were showering everybody with cool sparks; they were all laughing at that and - he could think of no other word - cavorting.
He was wished farewell. It was the same car that took him back, though it had a different driver. He watched the lights and the city's calm expanses of snow, and thought about people at parties and people at war; he saw the party they had just left, and he saw the grey-green trenches with mud-caked men waiting nervously; he saw people dressed in shiny black, whipping each other and being tied up... and he saw people shackled to bed frames or chairs, shrieking, while the uniformed men applied their particular skills.
He sometimes had to be reminded, he realised, that he still possessed the capacity to despise.
The car powered its way through the silent streets. He took the dark glasses off. The empty city swept past.
VI
Once - between the time he'd taken the Chosen across the badlands and the time he'd ended up broken like an insect in the flooded caldera, scratching signs in the dirt - he had taken some leave, and for a while had entertained the idea of giving up his work for the Culture, and doing something else instead. It had always seemed to him that the ideal man was either a soldier or a poet, and so, having spent most of his years being one of those - to him - polar opposites, he determined to attempt to turn his life around and become the other.
He lived in a small village, in a small, rural country on a small, undeveloped, unhurried planet. He stayed with an old couple in a cottage in the trees in the dales beneath the high tors. He rose early and went for long walks.
The countryside looked new and green and fresh; it was summer, and the fields and woods, the path sides and river banks were full of unnameable flowers of every colour. The tall trees flexed in the warm summer winds, leaves bright and fluttering like flags, and water ran off the moors and hills and across the bunched stones of sparkling streams like some clarified concentrate of the air itself. He sweated to the crests of the gnarled hills, climbed the outcrop rocks at their summits, and ran whooping and laughing across the broader tops, under the brief shadows of the small high clouds.