Please note: this is the sequel to 'The Recruit', also on FanFiction.
- o O o -
"Happy Locust Day, Zy!" Jolinda said, placing a brown bottle on the table in front of Zyan. Zyan wasn't really feeling it – he hadn't been for a while.
No point in being a shard about it, though. He looked up, and painted a polite smile on his face. "Thanks Jo. You too. New batch?"
Jolinda nodded. "It's an IPA."
"Eypey ale?" Zyan asked, frowning. Jolinda, amongst other things, was a home brewing enthusiast and liked to dig into ancient history for inspiration, to the extent that the half of her quarters that wasn't taken up with brewing equipment was taken up by various automated hydroponic experiments intended to recreate long-forgotten ingredients. Many crystal singers had hobbies – Jolinda had a production line.
"I – P – A," Jolinda explained. "India pale ale. Pre-space travel, pre-industrial recipe. Very hoppy."
"Hunh," Zyan said, sniffed the bottle and took a sip. "Wow, yeah. Tastes kinda like Yarran but also smells like intilla flowers. It's really good, thanks Jo."
"You're welcome," Jolinda said. "Why don't you leave it there for a moment and come and dance with me?"
"Wouldn't want to make Dane jealous, Jo," Zyan answered.
Jolinda pointed to where her hawk-faced partner was currently embarrassing himself at the centre of a group of Locusts who were bopping around the improvised dance floor of the Eye of the Storm restaurant with varying degrees of rhythm. "No danger of that, you'll be dancing with him too. For which apologies."
"Maybe later," Zyan shook his head.
"Okay, fine – for now," Jolinda said. "But as soon as you've finished that beer I insist that you join us on the dancefloor without delay. You need to have some fun, Zyan."
Zyan promised faithfully, even though he had little enthusiasm for dancing. Jolinda was worried about him, which was nice of her, and as the sort-of-leader that the Locusts definitely did not have he didn't want to be overly grumpy, especially when Jolinda was several decades his senior in terms of both experience and age, even though she looked young enough to be his sister.
The 'Locusts', as Zyan's oversized partnership were officially known, were only three years old and twenty seven members strong, but they already had a few traditions – one of which was throwing a party every year on the anniversary of their legal-but-not-entirely-authorised-until-a-bit-later formation. Well, they aimed for the anniversary – in practice this had turned out to be the nearest available day when at least most of the members weren't in the ranges, and a mach storm would usually oblige within a two-week window.
Three years ago they had comprised only the thirteen members of class 1999 – now the founder members were in the minority. Their first extra recruit had been the morally ambiguous (but intelligent, skilled and undeniably charming, when she wanted to be) ex-vid actress Schecherzia Alar – Jolinda and Dane had been the next two, and since then a smattering of other singers had either asked to join or had been approached by existing members. Some were established singers, others were recent recruits or even outright newcomers.
One of the outright newcomers approached him as Jolinda returned to the dancefloor. When Zyan had first met her she'd been a Chalician revolutionary, a pale, capable girl called Juliet with black hair and an almost disturbingly single-minded approach to problem-solving which verged on ruthlessness - almost the first thing she'd done was stab him in the arm, as a test of crystal singer healing abilities. These were the things Zyan thought he knew about her – it turned out he had a pretty incomplete picture.
First of all, she had perfect pitch. She'd surprised him with a message from the infirmary last year after experiencing an almost effortless Milekey transition - it was said, only half-jokingly, that the symbiont wouldn't have dared to give her anything but a perfect adaptation for fear of what revenge she would exact upon it if not. She informed him she would be joining the Locusts (she'd hadn't precisely asked, but the decision was an unanimous yes anyway - she had, after all, been instrumental in resolving a serious problem for the Guild and pulled Zyan's behind out of the fire a couple of times into the bargain).
When she signed her contract it'd been apparent her appearance on Chalice had been a disguise. She was tanned and not pale, turned out to have very bright ginger hair, and was called Shara and not Juliet (which to be fair Zyan already knew, thanks to an overly-informative erstwhile associate of hers).
Two things hadn't changed – Shara had a streetfighter's attitude and carriage packed into a misleadingly diminutive figure, and the symbiont had added increased muscle density into the bargain. Aviczue, another Locust, was proficient in three martial arts disciplines and had benefited from the same symbiotic adaptation that made her stronger, but Shara, who had been trained only by necessity, won as many bouts with her as she lost.
The other was that her direct approach to life had apparently been set in quadruple-strength plascrete for all time. She demonstrated it now – Shara placed four glasses of spirits on the table, sat down beside Zyan without being asked and downed one.
"You're lagging behind," she said. "Chalician rum – my festering shardhole of a home system's second best export. Drink."
"Yes ma'am," Zyan said, and dutifully downed a rum, suppressing a gasp – it was strong stuff. "What's the first best export?"
"That would be me, idiot," Shara told him. She had 100% self-confidence, presumably having traded in all her subtlety to get an upgrade. She picked up and drank a second shot, and then pointedly looked at him. Zyan took the hint and followed suit.
"Good – now we can talk, or rather I'm going to talk and you're going to listen," Shara said. "I'm sure all this moping about you're doing is a very important part of some kind of process" - she imbued the word with distaste, wrinkling her nose as she spoke it - "that other people do after a relationship starts to malfunction, but frankly it's starting to annoy me. You're a grownup, she's a grownup. People split up, it happens. You're still friends right now but unless you take immediate action you're going to screw that up too, and, look, well, you know how I split up with my last boyfriend."
"I'm not sure I want to know, to be honest Shar," Zyan replied, with genuine fear.
"That wasn't a question. You know because you were there when I shot him," she said.
"Shards! Romeo was your actual for-reals boyfriend when you did that?" Zyan was surprised, as he had indeed seen her shoot him, albeit with a stunner: after holding a knife to his throat for blowing her cover on Chalice, oh, and threatening to toss him out of an airvan. Zyan had almost forgotten that, which was surprising because he'd been included in that threat too.
"Yes – well, it was more of a casual thing, to be honest. It was hard to meet people in the Front, he was there and he was okay to look at, and even if there wasn't a lot going on upstairs he knew which buttons to push in bed," Shara explained offhandedly.
"Shar! This is information I do not need!" Zyan sputtered.
"Prude," Shara accused him. "My point here is you and Alenda are over, and unless you want it to turn into a bad breakup, it's time for you to stop seeing her and move on."
"I haven't been seeing her," Zyan replied.
"Yeah right you haven't been seeing her," Shara rolled her eyes. "How do you explain last week?"
Zyan thought back. "It was a work conversation, she wanted to run something past Hollin. I told her to just ask him, I'm his partner not his boss."
"And it took an hour and a half to say that? Look, never mind, just draw a line under this, okay? Then either cheer up, or I'm going to help you get over yourself."
"Shara, seriously, I don't need help gett-" Zyan begun, but she cut him off.
"You clearly do, and anyway I wasn't asking, I was telling," she informed him, with a dark look.
"What exact kind of help are we talking about here?" He asked, slightly alarmed.
"Remember when I stabbed you in the arm that one time?" Shara asked.
"Gonna take a whole lot of crystal resonance to make me forget that."
"That will seem like a golden age in comparison," Shara promised.
Zyan was fairly sure she was joking, but it was hard to tell with her, sometimes. He remembered an occasion just after her first trip to the ranges when another singer, frustrated by the sight of a rookie – and a Locust, to boot - bringing in a cut of black decided to give her a piece of his mind, followed up with a shove into a stack of crates. Fortunately for the intemperate singer, Ballybran's inhabitants were able to regrow teeth and heal broken bones, and since he'd struck first she wasn't officially sanctioned.
"You're forgetting I don't feel pain, Shar," Zyan said.
"I'll improvise. I can be very inventive," she said.
"I don't doubt it. Have to say this isn't the most positive pep talk I've ever had."
"Pah!" Shara snorted. "You're my friend and I've got your best interests at heart. You need a little bit of incentive to get over Alenda, who also, by the way, is miserable by having this dragged out – it's not only yourself you're being unfair on. Comradely cheering up isn't my forte, but I can threaten people very effectively."
"How did you know that? About Alenda, I mean," Zyan sked.
"Unlike men, women talk to each other about how they feel. Alenda's a friend, we train together."
"Train? Train how?" Zyan asked.
"Martial arts, shardhead. We train with Vitzy. She usually-"
"You mean Aviczue?"
"Duh. Don't interrupt. She usually kicks both our behinds, even at the same time - whatever you do she's always somehow ready for it. Says she can just hear really, really well. You're changing the subject."
"Am not," Zyan responded.
"Grow up. My main concern is you being dreary and boringly morose. You're also forgetting to be acerbic with the Sorters and I'm getting it in the ear from Zadran and Clodine about it. Marin and Vitzy and Jo and everyone have all tried saying something nice or cheering you up – even Shecherzia has spoken to you with minimal sarcasm but it doesn't seem to be working, so it's time for my approach. So: move on, regain some happiness in your life, let Alenda regain some in hers too, or I will make it a living hell of pain and torment until you do."
"Wow. You should kick crystal singing in the head and go be a counselor down in Medical, Shar. It's a tragic waste that the Guild cannot benefit from your natural therapeutic gifts," Zyan told her, deadpan.
"See, you're making jokes already, it's working," Shara said, then took his beer and downed it disconcerting quickly. "Hey look, you finished your beer: go keep your promise and dance, and if I don't think you're enjoying yourself I will come over there and smash this bottle over your head, so you'd better be sharding convincing, okay?"
"Fine, if it'll make you happy," Zyan said, with a sudden grin, standing up.
"Oh, I'll be thrilled and delighted beyond my wildest dreams." Shara's expression was one of flat nonplussedness.
"You coming?" He asked.
"Me?" Shara favoured him with an expression of mild revulsion. "Don't be ridiculous."
Zyan dutifully spent a few minutes shuffling vaguely to the music with the others and laughing at Dane trying to do the splits, and Shara must have been satisfied as she brought him a replacement beer instead of breaking the empty one on his skull.
- o O o -
It was a perniciously persistent myth that crystal singers couldn't get drunk. They could, but (given that their symbiont was in reasonable shape) they had to work at it quite hard and recovered quickly.
It was a testament to the little organism's irritating efficiency that after burning through the proceeds of an entire crate's worth from his last trip to the ranges (blue, this time, with Marin, Aviczue and Rhanui in a team of four – but a good deep blue) in beer, rum and something orange and green that Q'tonisa mixed up herself, Zyan found himself awake, sober and alert at an ungodly early hour, alone in his quarters. Desperate to return to sleep, he turned to his soporific of choice: paperwork.
The Locusts had decided early on to be a democratic organisation, so there was usually a proposal to look at: a member would suggest a site to prospect, or request volunteers to help cut at co-ordinates they felt needed more than the standard team of three or four singers to get the most out of. There had not, yet, been a dispute to resolve: all earnings went into a common fund from which Locusts drew an equal percentage, and since their new, semi-industrialised approach to cutting worked so well nobody had yet had cause to complain about it. There were bills to pay, though, even if there was only one supplier: the Guild.
There were also complaints, mostly passed on by the Guildmaster, the Crystal Singer or one of the Chiefs. The complaints all originated from other singers, and they were always entirely spurious. A common favourite was that the Locusts were hogging the supply of available exo suits, and thus they were never available for use by any other singers. Zyan knew for a fact that no other singer had ever troubled the Equipment section for one until they needed an excuse to make a complaint. The Locusts' methods were unpopular with a certain set of singers, but since they couldn't take issue with their success, they found other channels to express the dissatisfaction. Zyan had a template with a polite response all ready to go, requiring only a few tweaks, but it was still a thankless pain in the shards of a task.
Zyan looked at his queue of work for perhaps three minutes before his thoughts returned to Alenda.
They'd had two and a bit years together – perforce on and off, as Zyan was often in the ranges or off-planet away from crystal, and Alenda, as a Guildmember of Chief rank, had many demands on her time both on and off world. They'd managed to combine these off world trips twice in order to spend time together, but otherwise they'd been grabbing a day or two when they could, or sometimes even just an hour or two.
They'd both been realistic, too. They loved each other, without a doubt, but neither of them were the type to fall dramatically head-over-heels. Maybe that had been the actual problem: maybe you couldn't diarise romance, plan passion and carefully ration out little packages of ardour.
Their assignations had grown steadily further apart, and neither of them had wanted to mention that at the end of the last one they had not planned another.
Six or so months ago, Alenda had come to his quarters to let him know she was going off-world again: her official job title may have been Chief of Legal but it was common knowledge that she was, in reality, the Guildmaster's 'fixer', so it wasn't unusual for her trips to be at short notice and often without much in the way of explanation.
Zyan was understanding about this most recent trip, as he was about all of them.
"I don't know when I can see you again," she had said.
"Need a bodyguard? I can pack right now," Zyan had offered, with a smile.
Alenda had hesitated before replying, with an answering smile that he now knew she hadn't felt: "It's not one of those trips."
"Okay. Well, don't worry about me," he had answered, with a smile. "Whatever it is Lars has got you doing it's going to be important. It's fine. Good luck."
And that, he decided now, was probably what had hammered in the final nail. He wasn't a telepath like her, but he was pretty sure that she was looking for him to be disappointed, or angry, or to complain that she put the Guild ahead of him or tell her that he was coming whether she wanted him to or not. She wanted someone who didn't think it was fine that they didn't see each other for weeks on end: and she knew what he thought, she always did.
If this realisation had come to him then, or even within the hour or so that it took for her to board the shuttle to Shankill, things might have been different. But he'd only thought of it now, alone in his quarters, half a year down the line in the small hours of the morning.
Zyan sighed. He'd seen her after that, of course – work stuff, like the previous week. They'd even subsequently had the 'talk', very warm and positive and 'let's still be friends' and they were.
The others thought he missed her and he did, but his actual problem was this: Alenda hadn't turned out to be the love of his life, nor he hers, and they were both fine with that, but he wasn't fine with the fact that they could apparently be fine about it. That two people could open up to each other the way he and Alenda had, and then after only a couple of years just think 'well, it was good but it's over now, and that's just how these things go'.
"Only game in town, looks like," Zyan said to himself.
He had an option for making all of this go away, of course. He could perform a few important edits on his personal recordings, get his cutter out of storage with Clarend, jump in the That'll Do and head off into the ranges. A few sessions of intensive cutting without a break, a few instances of letting himself thrall and a precipitous, last-minute escape from a claim thrumming with mach storm resonances would go quite some way to blunting his memories of Alenda: and anyone and anything else, but anything he wanted to reconstruct he could leave in his personal recordings. It would be insanely dangerous, certainly, but effective.
Tempting.
But no.
It wouldn't only be perilous, but also cheating. Slicing out inconvenient emotions and memories struck him as cowardly. If he was going to get past this, the best thing was probably to move on. Have fun. See other people. Book himself some time offworld and have a fling with someone completely unrelated to the Guild or Ballybran. Wash, rinse, repeat and avoid Alenda until he'd done enough of all that to get over himself. Apart from anything else, if Shara was right then his current in-between state of regret and listlessness was bringing Alenda down, and that was just selfish of him.
Right. Okay. Definite course of action decided upon. Zyan already felt better.
His terminal chirruped. Incoming message from Guildmember Falkstrom: I need you, it's urgent. Can you come up to Shankill as soon as possible, please?
Zyan sighed. "Yep. Figures."
- o O o -
Half an hour later, he was showered, changed and onto the shuttle to Shankill. This trip was by now so familiar to Zyan that it was akin to taking a bus rather than leaving a planetary surface and docking with an enormous orbital installation, and like any bus trip, you sometimes had to deal with annoying and obstreperous passengers.
The culprits were, as always, crystal singers. Sorters would tell you that crystal singers were at their worst just in off the ranges, Clarend the Cutter Technician had a long back catalogue of insulting singer behaviour when they brought their cutters in for repair, and Donalla and Presnol would eruditely opine that whilst singers were indeed unpleasant during those times, they could become very objectionable when recovering from an injury in the infirmary.
If you asked Zyan, though, he would answer that they really pulled out all the stops and went to full 100% zero-shards-given maximum spitefulness when they were flush with cash and on their way off-planet to blow it all.
The pair of singers currently exhibiting this behaviour were called… Well, Zyan thought that the woman was Ussa-something and he just didn't know the man's name, but in any case it didn't matter. They were in character as Harpy and her boyfriend Gloat.
Harpy was loudly reading from a flimsy detailing all the wonderful things they could do on the planet upon which they had chosen to inflict themselves this time. Gloat chipped in every now and again with 'that sounds wonderful!' or 'how fascinating, I can't wait to try it!' The purpose behind this, of course, was to impress upon the half dozen or so assorted other guildmembers on board that they would have to satisfy themselves with the quotidian facilities of Shankill or the nearer systems.
Donalla, who headed up medical research for the Guild, had once given Zyan a very thorough explanation of this childish behaviour. The reason most adults didn't carry on like singers was mostly social – humans had evolved to get on with one another because by doing so one improved one's own chance of passing your genes on to the next generation. The Ballybran symbiote – at least in humans – made this irrelevant: Ballybranners were all sterile. Most rational humans would still instinctively co-operate with each other, but when you added in repeated exposure to dangerous levels of crystal resonance, such as those most singers routinely decided not to avoid, your built-in behavioural cues got corrupted. They were rewritten on the individual level, or at most to include one other person: your partner. You ceased to care much about anyone else (with the exception of the Guildmaster and the Crystal Singer, who were respected and/or feared by everyone), and thus didn't bother to suppress the urge to act like a complete fardling when you felt like it because as far as your sociopathic crystal-rewired brain was concerned nobody else really mattered beyond what they could do for you.
"Of course, it's made all the much better because we achieved this ourselves," Harpy remarked.
Here we go, Zyan thought. He'd seen Harpy take note of his presence when she boarded and shoot him a look of pure disdain.
"No help from anyone else, in the traditional way that made the Heptite Guild the force it is today," Gloat agreed.
In the boneheaded way that nearly ran it into the ground, Zyan translated mentally.
He could usually rise above this baiting, but he wasn't in the best of moods and it was still early.
"So you did what, exactly? Built your own Guild cube, built your own sled, fuelled it, grew the food for the rations to stock it with, built your own cutter, sorted your crystal yourselves, fixed yourselves up with sticking plaster and duct tape when you got injured, went round buyers yourselves to sell your crystal, haggled with them, learned enough about contract law to draft the sales agreements on your own, packed your crystal for transit yourselves and handled the export and logistics yourselves, did you? No help from anyone," Zyan retorted. "I'm surprised you're not flying this shuttle right now."
"I don't recall involving you in this conversation," Harpy harped.
"The shard you didn't," Zyan snorted.
"In any case, we pay our tithes the same as any other singer," Gloat sniffed. "We are entitled to the services you describe."
"You're entitled, all right," Zyan told him. "Know what? I just don't get you people."
This made Gloat turn around in his seat to face Zyan with a poisonous expression. "And exactly what do you mean by 'you people'?"
"Idiots," Zyan replied nonchalantly.
Harpy turned around too, with a similar expression to her partner.
"How dare you!" She hissed, pretending outrage although Zyan knew that this was probably exactly what they had been trying to provoke.
"You've sharding won at life," Zyan said. "Don't you understand that? Next best thing to eternal youth? Check. Lose an arm and it grows back? Check. Illness and disease not a problem? Check. Faster, stronger, more agile? Check. Opportunity to earn a shard-ton of cash in a stable enviromment to properly enjoy aforementioned blessings? Check. And what do you do with it? You fry your brains out in the ranges doing something the wrong way, then when you actually do get lucky enough so that it pays off, you sit on your asses on a shuttle being obnoxious shardholes to your fellow passengers, spend as many days as you can manage off-world being obnoxious shardholes to the locals, then drag yourselves back here with the shakes, spend a week in the infirmary being obnoxious shardholes to the medical staff and then start the whole sorry cycle all over again. The only reason you're not both bored shardless with the sheer bloody pointlessness of it all is that you probably don't remember the last fifteen or sixteen times you went through it, although the rest of us poor schmucks who have to share a shuttle with you do, by the way. Seriously: you could do anything. Get ten degrees in a row or become the galaxy's acknowledged foremost expert on something. Learn to play every instrument ever devised by all known species. But no: you do this. So yes, you're idiots."
Harpy blinked.
"I shall be filing a formal change of discourtesy against you the moment this shuttle docks!" Gloat announced.
"Might aswell be hung for a sheep, then," Zyan told him, and gave him that most ancient of insulting gestures: the finger.
"You go too far!" Gloat said.
"No, I'd have gone too far if you actually got up out of your seat and did something about this," Zyan indicated his finger, "besides sit there and bleat about discourtesy. But you won't."
"I would not hasten to make such as assumption, were I you," Gloat threatened.
"Come on and have a pop at me then," Zyan shrugged.
"Guildmembers!" The pilot's voice announced. "Please calm down at once, remain seated and cease this dispute or I will report all three of you to the Guildmaster."
Harpy and Gloat turned back around. Zyan put his hands back in his lap.
That was mature Zyan, Zyan chided himself.
Felt good, though, he added.
- o O o -
He didn't feel so good about it half an hour later, having spent ten minutes waiting outside the Guild offices on Shankill. The reason for the delay became apparent when Harpy and Gloat emerged from one of the offices and strode past him with smug expressions on their faces. Gloat had been as good as his word, it seemed.
"You will die alone in the ranges, unloved, unmourned and unlamented," Zyan said softly.
Sharp crystal singer hearing meant they heard. "What? Was that a threat!" They stopped.
"Just quoting some poetry," Zyan shrugged.
"If we were not now late for our connection, I would report you again!" Harpy screeched.
"Do, it, then," Zyan told her slowly.
"I have a good mind to!" Harpy said.
"You don't have a good mind, that's your entire problem. You've burnt it out," Zyan informed her, standing up and placing his hands very deliberately behind his back as he did so. He leaned forward as he stood, getting into Gloat's personal space. Go on, mate, do it.
"You arrogant, insulting-" Gloat said, and raised a hand to force Zyan away.
Result, Zyan thought, now I can hit you.
This has gone far enough, the thought popped into his brain.
"Whatever. Enjoy your holiday, Guildmembers," Zyan said, and stood aside.
Gloat snorted, and stalked away with Harpy in tow. Zyan waited until they left, and then smirked.
Alenda was looking at him from the doorway of the office, and she was not amused.
"I could have really done without having to deal with that this morning, Zyan. Proud of yourself?" She asked him.
Zyan drew in breath to make a flippant reply, then stopped. "No, not really," he admitted.
Alenda shook her head, and her expression moved from displeasure to something approaching sadness. "CS Ussara and CS Yanholt will be going straight to Departures. You, go to Arrivals. Have some breakfast, have a drink, calm down. I'll come and find you there in a while."
Zyan blinked. "I thought you needed me urgently."
Alenda looked at him, and her expression became colder. "I was mistaken. I have a meeting. I'll talk to you afterwards, or if you prefer you can return to the surface. The Guild will cover the cost of the two shuttle flights, as they were only necessary due to my...error of judgement."
Alenda's voice was level and calm, but Zyan could not remember having been on the receiving end of such a scathing reprimand before. He was, abruptly, no longer angry.
"I'll be in Arrivals," he said.
Alenda's expression softened once again, and she seemed on the verge of saying something else, but then simply nodded and went back into her office. Zyan turned and went out the way he'd come in. He had to step aside to allow one of the station's crew to come past – the woman was leading two men into the Guild offices, both of them in grey shipsuits. One, the younger, was a standard issue FSP apparatchik. The other was older, and did not fit the FSP mould. He had long hair, for a start, iron-grey and in a ponytail, and a short beard. A scar from his forehead to his jawline, bisecting his left eye, completed the grizzled veteran look very nicely, even if it did look quite recent – and the eye beneath it was a cybernetic replacement. They both looked at Zyan, who nodded politely. The younger one nodded back – the older one, whose face was set in a fixed scowl of concentration, as if he was solving a difficult equation without computer or paper – ignored him, and they moved past.
That was all the time Zyan had to gather impressions, and in any case his mind was on other things. He headed to Arrivals, and went immediately to the bar.
- o O o -
Alenda found him a couple of hours later, arrowing across the busy terminal floor with her usual assurance. Her white sensor stick was held loosely at her side – it was there for appearances only, Alenda's senses being different, rather than impaired.
Zyan was in a corner booth, on his second Kachachurian scotch. Alenda sat down, diagonally across the table.
She was beyond beautiful. She was an unique being with unique powers, a mythical goddess reified into perfect form.
Oh, stop that, she thought at him irritably.
Sorry. Not my fault you're the galaxy's only telepath and ridiculously hot into the bargain, is it?
That isn't going to help you get back into my good books, she replied.
I know, I know. That was inappropriate, sorry.
You don't have to apologise for your thoughts, Zyan. Your actions, on the other hand, have just given me an extra bit of stress that added an extra dimension to my morning that really rounded it out nicely, so thank you for that.
Sorry, he winced.
"A little early, isn't it?" She asked him, eyeing his choice of drink while dialling for a coffee.
"Technically it's late, for me," Zyan answered.
"Of course – it's Locust Day," Alenda said.
"Was, yesterday. You were invited," Zyan told her. "You're as much a member as I am."
"Honourary, perhaps. I'm sorry I was unable to attend."
Zyan winced slightly. "I truly am sorry I was such a sharding ass with those two idiots. They really, really rubbed me up the wrong way and I just ran out of patience."
Alenda looked at him. "I don't doubt that they were as wearisomely and predictably horrid as their sort inevitably are, but do you think provoking confrontations will change their attitude?"
"No. Sorry you had to deal with the fallout," Zyan apologised.
"I've had to file the charge, I'm afraid, and your transparent little performance after the fact won't have helped, "Alenda told him.
"Didn't think it would, wasn't trying to fool you, I just really wanted to hit that guy," Zyan confessed.
"I know, Zyan," she said.
Of course you do, Zyan thought. He hadn't been trying to hide anything from her because he couldn't, and knew it.
Please don't, Alenda replied in his thoughts. I didn't ask for this ability and I don't always like having it.
I don't mind you being in here. Didn't when we met, still don't now.
Alenda put her hand on his arm and squeezed it briefly.
Out loud, she said: "It's a first offence, and just a verbal insult. You can appeal it, make a public apology, or pay a 200 credit fine. If you appeal, there'll be a procedure, witness statements and an investigation. If it happens after they've been back in the ranges and they lose the memory, you may even win it – I doubt anyone will choose to speak on their behalf."
"I've wasted enough of your time, so no appeal, but I'll take the hit financially rather than to my pride, thank you," Zyan replied.
"Very well," Alenda said, as her coffee emerged from the slot. She took a sip.
"So, can I ask why you wanted to see me?" Zyan asked.
Alenda shook her head. "I'm not able to talk about it."
But she would have been, Zyan guessed, if he hadn't just flown off the handle at those two singers.
Alenda looked at him, uncomfortable, took her bottom lip between her teeth, and nodded in confirmation.
He'd endured similar needling many times previously with nothing but a roll of his eyes and an indifferent shrug - they'd been the excuse, not the reason. If he was feeling confrontational, it was because of something else.
"I'm sorry," she said. "I was angry earlier, but I have made an error in judgement. It would be a mistake for us to work together on anything sensitive. I'm not an empath, so I don't know for sure what you're feeling, but judging by what just happened it's not anything good, and it's me that brought it out."
"My actions are not your responsibility, Alenda," Zyan said.
"They are," Alenda told him, looking almost scared, for a moment.
"What? No they're not. How is one person responsible for everything a-", Zyan began.
"I mean they are if I recruit you for an assignment," Alenda clarified quickly.
Zyan sighed: she was right. "I was thinking this morning. I can't believe I let you walk out of my life. I didn't think that was what I wanted and-" He paused. "Shards. It isn't what I wanted. It isn't what I want now. I'm sorry, I know we're over and you've moved on and I should bloody respect that but-"
He hadn't meant to say anything. He was just going to apologise for any distress he'd caused with his attitude, reassure her that from now on he was officially back on the market, haha, and they were friends and everything was okay.
"Stop," she said. "I-, look, come back to my office. Please?"
"Of course," Zyan put down his drink, unfinished.
He followed her back to her Shankill office – she neither spoke nor thought, and he said nothing either, although he was wondering what this was about and she would sense that. She opened the door, ushered him in, and closed it behind them.
"How do you know what you wanted, Zyan?" Alenda asked him, crossing her office and standing behind her desk.
"Well, I thought about it this morning and decided it was time to move on, but turns out that deep down I was evidently having other thoughts," Zyan replied.
Alenda nodded. "Thoughts. Let me tell you about something that happened seven months, one week and three days ago. I was negotiating with a senior partner in an interstellar law firm, who was being very firm about exit clauses regarding an agreement we have with one of his clients. I'll be frank: I was bored out of my mind. This is needless, I thought. The Guild has no intention of ever invoking them anyway. Do you know what he then said?"
To his credit, Zyan got it immediately. "He agreed they were needless and would never be invoked anyway. This was almost certainly just a coincidence, Alenda."
Alenda shook her head, and called up a document on her terminal – a series of diary entries. "Three days later, discussion with the other Chiefs, I agreed with the Chief of Marketing that her budget needed to be increased, everyone else suddenly agreed. Seven days later, another contract negotiation suddenly goes my way. Nine days later, again. Thirteen days. Fourteen. Fifteen. I've logged over 300 instances now."
"Alenda, there are plenty of explanations for this," Zyan said.
"Really?" She asked him.
Zyan banged his hand down on the table. "Yes, shard it, there are!" Then he looked at his hand in surprise.
"Didn't really want to do that, did you?" Alenda asked him.
Zyan looked up from his hand to her. "Did you really just…?"
Alenda sighed and nodded. "Yes, disgustingly quick study that I am, I've already analysed what was happening and, and, weaponised it."
"Then you know how to not do it as well as do it," Zyan said.
"It is not a capability I currently have operational confidence in, and anyway it's beside the point. Nobody should have this power, Zyan. I'm only human. Sensing people's thoughts was enough responsibility. I don't trust myself not to control people. I don't trust myself to even know I'm doing it. Not yet."
"Earlier, in the office, when I was trying to provoke-"
"And the thought just occurred to you that things had gone far enough," Alenda finished for him. "Just the most recent in a long line of interventions I had no right to make."
Zyan was quiet for a moment.
"Well, I was being a real shardhole," Zyan admitted.
Alenda gave him a look of frustration. "Anti-social behaviour is not an excuse for mind control, Zyan."
"Alenda, you're a good person," he said. "Maybe nobody should be able to do this, but if someone has to? You're about the most responsible, level, rational person I know. You can handle this."
"What if I can't handle it? What if it becomes an addiction? Power corrupts, Zyan, and absolute power corrupts absolutely. What if this power turned me into a monster?"
"You could never be a monster, Alenda," Zyan said emphatically.
"I really wanted you to say something like that – and then you did," Alenda's shoulders slumped.
"Hey, that was from me. I swear it," Zyan told her, walking round the desk and putting his arms around her. She put her head on his shoulders.
"I don't want you out of my life," she said, "but I don't want your desires to just become an extension of mine. Nobody's ever let me in as much as you, Zyan. It's one thing to maintain mental discipline when I'm doing my job, quite another to keep myself locked away from someone I want to be close to. How do I know my subconscious isn't influencing yours without my even knowing it, and what if I did long-term damage? From the way you blew up at those two singers, I think I might have been."
"This is something we can deal with, Alenda," Zyan told her. "Whatever it takes. I love you. We'll find a way."
Alenda shuddered in his arms. "I needed to hear you say that again. I'm sorry. I love you too, but I have to stop."
Zyan let her go, or rather found himself letting her go. He hadn't had any intention of doing so until then.
Then he went suddenly cold all over. "Again?" He asked her, walking back to the other side of her desk. Why again?
Alenda was crying. "I'm so sorry. I keep doing this. It's not fair on you, but I can't stop."
"Stop? Stop what? We haven't spoken outside of work stuff since we decided we were going to just be friends," Zyan was confused.
Alenda got herself under control, wiped away her tears and sat down. "We have. Five times. You wouldn't remember." She cleared her display, blanking the diary entries.
"I haven't been taking any chances with resonance, though," Zyan told her, also sitting down although he questioned why he was even as he did it. "I'm not suffering from memory loss."
"It's not crystal making you forget, Zyan," Alenda said, looking on the verge of breaking down again.
Zyan put it together. Shara's words from last night rang in his ears: yeah right you haven't been seeing her.
"Oh. I see," he said, shoulders slumping. "It's you."
Alenda nodded. "I'm not safe for you, Zyan. You have to see that. What I'm doing is not normal."
"Shard normal. We can work on this, Alenda. Please!"
"You always say that. You've never once become angry with me," Alenda told him, with a look of sadness.
"I'm honestly more worried about you," Zyan replied. "Let's figure this thing out. There are two of the smartest medical minds in the FSP down on the surface. Got to be worth a shot."
"Putting a friend in the position of knowing about me is not something I want to do – Donalla and Presnol would have to choose between their medical ethics and their duty to protect others from a possibly dangerous individual. I've been weak enough to seek solace in your company and your understanding and your forgiveness, but it's getting harder every time to make you forget, so I'm drawing a line under this before I permanently damage you."
"Then don't do it this time and let's sort this the shard out," Zyan said.
"And risk turning one of the best people I know into my own personal puppet? No." Alenda shook her head. "I'll be away for a while, over Passover and beyond," she went on. "It's for the best, I think. I'll be among strangers – it's easier, with strangers, to keep my mind under control, and there'll only be a few other people at P13205. There is also the possibility that I might-"
She stopped for a moment, and blinked back tears.
"I may be able to learn something – it's a small chance, but now I have something to cling on to. I'm not going to gamble your sanity on a chance, though."
"Stop this, Alenda. You're safe now," Zyan pleaded, fighting to get out of the chair, to go back to her, to make her understand. He shifted his weight, leaned forward – and then sat down again.
"Perhaps one day."
"I'll go with you to this P13205 place, then. I can help!"
"I'm too dangerous for you to be around right now, Zyan," Alenda repeated.
"Let's have this conversation again. If you need me, call me. I'll be there. If it's a risk it's a risk, I gamble with my sanity every time I go out to cut anyway," Zyan said.
"No, you don't, you're careful and you follow Donalla's advice because you know that the ranges are dangerous and you have to respect that. It's time for me to show some respect for the danger I represent. I love you, Zyan, but I have to let you go," Alenda said, and then she was calm and controlled again.
Zyan stared at her for a few moments, then blinked.
"How did we get here?" He asked.
"I thought it was time you stopped drinking in the morning and it's better to have this talk in private," Alenda said hollowly.
"What? Oh, yeah, of course. Are you okay? You look...haunted." Zyan was shocked at her sudden change in demeanour and appearance.
"We both need to move on, Zyan," Alenda told him.
Zyan sighed. "Shara told me as much last night. You're right, of course."
"I want you to be happy. Find someone else. You're a good man, and you deserve someone who can...look after you. Someone who wants what's best for you and puts you first," Alenda told him.
"Couples look after each other, Alenda," Zyan replied. "Help each other with their problems. It's not a one-way street where one decides what's best for the other."
Alenda looked at him as if she'd just seen a ghost.
Zyan shook his head. "Sorry, hardly the time for a debate as to exactly what constitutes a relationship, is it? My bad. I understand. We're friends, you deserve the right somebody too, and we're moving on," he smiled.
Alenda arranged her features into a smile, and stood up. "Great – and do me a favour: no more fights with other singers, so matter how awfully they're behaving."
Zyan stood also. "I'll do my best, and that's all you're getting from me on that score, because for crystal singers, 'awful behaviour' is a pretty high bar."
"Granted," Alenda agreed. "It's goodbye for a while, I'm afraid. I'll be on assignment offworld."
"Sure you can't tell me what it's about?" He asked.
Alenda shook her head. "Not this time, I'm afraid."
"Well," Zyan responded, from the doorway, "if you need me, call me. I'll be there."
Alenda looked, for a microsecond or two, like she'd been punched in the gut – but then her smile returned.
"I know," she said, "but I'm going to handle this one alone."
- o O o -
"Doesn't feel flawed, well, I don't think so anyway," Zyan reported over the comunit he'd duct-taped to his exo-assist suit. "We did bury it pretty deep, though."
That morning, Zyan had woken up from hibernation on Shankill, completing his third yearly cycle of stuffing himself silly and sleeping through the Passover storms. This behaviour was forced upon every inhabitant of Ballybran by the symbiote in their bodies, but after Passover every crystal singer immediately went to check their claims for damage – a habit no less ingrained for all that it was not biologically enforced. It was a fortunate singer who did not find at least one of their claims had suffered damage and had flaw to clear away before they could cut again, or, all too frequently, that the claim was completely destroyed.
The Locusts had thirty seven current claims to check. Despite this lengthy list, they were not overly worried about an expensive butcher's bill, because with a complete and total disrespect for tradition they halted all cutting in advance of the Passover storms and instead expended a great deal of effort protecting their claims. Unless a storm was howling in on them unexpectedly they always piled up some rocks and applied some plasfoam protection after cutting a claim, but before Passover two or more repetitions of this process were indicated, especially for claims with a large working face. This was time-consuming, even with exo-assist suits (all the Locusts were now highly adept in their use), but nowhere near as time-consuming as finding a new claim because your old one had been totalled by a mach storm or five.
They didn't have a 100% success rate – each year they'd suffered at least some losses – but they had, so far, managed to preserve their first (and still most lucrative, by a long shot) claim – Yanakov's black crystal face. It was thoroughly covered up after every visit, and the rule was that it wasn't uncovered unless Meteorology was pretty confident of at least a week's good weather, although a pair of Locusts were always stationed by it to deter claim jumpers. Before Passover, though, it was always buried under several extra metres of rock and foam.
The days when four singers could cut it at once were long gone – the claim had narrowed as they worked their way into the cliff-face, it was now more like a mine than a quarry – but Zyan was certain they were far from exhausting it. He had flown in with Rhanui, Janso and Aviczue to evaluate the claim, unearth it once more and, if the weather report didn't change in the next few hours, fire up the production line (two cut, one carries crates, one rests, then rotate) and get cutting.
First they had to expose it, though – Zyan got to work with solvent and suit, dissolving foam, prying loose boulders and shovelling shale out of the way. Almost an entire day of this exposed the crystal face once more. With intense relief, they found it to have only minor flawing on the surface, which was cut away with minimal effort (even flawed black crystal had value, so they packed the shards). This, just as the sun was setting, rendered the face cuttable.
"Hello beautiful. Sleep well?" Zyan asked it. It chimed and tinkled an answer back to him, almost as if it was as pleased to see him as he was to find it intact.
He'd been unsettled and discontented since the talk with Alenda, after they'd decided to just be friends. It was the right thing for them – that was an unarguable certainty in his mind - but he couldn't shake the feeling that something had been left unsaid between them, something that needed to be dealt with had been left undone – there was no closure there but he couldn't think why not. It felt wrong and it was eating at him, somewhere deep in his core. Strange that it had dragged on so long before they'd finally had a conversation that drew a line under it, or at least tried to. Maybe she had, but he wasn't sure he had.
Crystal, on the other hand, was simple. It always wanted you and never held anything back. A shaft of sunlight angled in to illuminate the face. Zyan closed his eyes and reached out towards the glassy smooth surface.
Aviczue yanked his arm away. "Careful, Zyan! Crystal does not have to be cut to thrall you. Gloves!"
Zyan had to bite back an angry response, but she was right. He looked at his right hand, unsurprised to see that he'd removed his glove without even thinking of it. Zyan thralled very easily – especially with black. He let out a stream of muttered vituperation.
"It is a perniciously dangerous material," Marin agreed. "I recommend you rest, Zyan. You did the lion's share of the excavation. We will cut while there is light."
Zyan nodded and stalked away, but Marin had got it wrong. He thought Zyan had been swearing because he'd nearly thralled, but it wasn't that. He'd been angry because he hadn't.
- o O o -
Zyan hated crystal's 'morning chimes' and always had. Humans should not be so easily controlled by an inanimate substance, it was demeaning – just another example of how the crystal, the spore and the weather really called the shots on Ballybran and always would, no matter how long the Heptite Guild endured for. Zyan curled into a foetal ball and rode it out – trying hard not to think of Alenda's long-limbed grace and ice blue eyes.
He had a perfunctory wash at the sink – the tiny shower cabinet on the That'll Do had never worked and he'd never got round to fixing it – and shrugged on his work gear. Next up was breakfast – a high-protein porridge which he had no strong feelings about but was quick to eat. He was reaching for his cutter when he realised he sensed a distant whine: this quickly resolved into the familiar sound of an airsled's whooshing engines, and then his sled comunit crackled to life.
"Stand down, everyone, it's just me," Q'Tonisa's voice issued from the device.
Zyan keyed the comm. "Hey Toni. What's up? Aren't you supposed to be working that dark green claim with Shara?"
"Yes – I'll fill you in in a moment," Q'Tonisa replied, as she decked her sled.
Q'Tonisa, it turned out, came bearing an official summons from the Guildmaster, for Aviczue and Zyan.
"Your presence has been requested as quickly as possible – he didn't give me any details, before you ask, but they both emphasised that it's very important and that you should go straight to his office upon arrival. Shara's already been called in. I'll stay here with Rhanui to guard the claim, Dane and Jo are securing Blue 5 and then coming here so we can resume cutting ASAP," she explained.
"The Guildmaster would not lightly interfere with our operations," Marin pondered, looking thoughtful.
"Shara's been called in?" Zyan asked. "Why Shara?"
"For that matter, why me?" Aviczue added, then turned to Zyan. "You haven't shot someone again, have you?" Another possibility occurred to her, and she went slightly pale. "Oh Gods, I hope Shara hasn't happened to anyone."
Everyone looked at Q'Tonisa. "Remember the part where he didn't give me any details?" She reminded them.
"Only one way to find out," Aviczue shrugged, "and we can't ignore an official summons anyway. Marin, do you want to stay and cut with Rhanui and Q'Tonisa? Zyan can give me a lift in the That'll Do."
"Will you be okay on your own?" Marin asked.
"We're not cutting, Marin, only flying back to the Guild cube," Aviczue reminded him. Marin nodded his acceptance.
Yesterday's shards had been stowed in Marin and Aviczue's sled. Meagre haul that it was, they transferred the single crate into the That'll Do, and Aviczue took her leave of her partner and buckled herself into the co-pilot's seat – despite the fact that it was a single sled, Zyan had retrofitted one as the Locusts often shuttled each other around. Zyan lifted off and set a course for the cube – there was little point in plotting a sneaky, evasive course: the location of Yanakov's old claim was common knowledge, thanks to it's notoriety and Soros Vander's loose lips.
"Are you ever going to repaint this thing?" Aviczue asked him as they headed off, eyeing the scuffed interior with slight disapprobation. She had Views on the upkeep of sleds, which she saw as a singer's primary home as well as primary mode of transportation. On Aviczue and Marin's sled, there was a place for everything and everything was in it's place.
"It's cramped enough in here as it is – an extra coat of paint'll really cut down on the available living space," Zyan replied.
"Hilarious as ever," Aviczue said, but snorted in laughter despite herself.
"ETA three hours seventeen minutes," Zyan said, as the nav updated.
Aviczue bit her bottom lip for a moment, then expelled her breath through her nose. "Listen, I've kind of avoided mentioning Alenda because you two are clearly going through some kind of process and I didn't want to interfere with it."
Aviczue clearly didn't have the same attitude towards 'processes' that Shara did, because she said it earnestly rather than disparagingly.
"But somewhere in here," she tapped her temple, "there's still a cop and she is currently pointing out that a fairly critical link between you, me and Shara is the aforementioned Chief of Legal whom scuttlebutt says is currently on an off-world assignment that's very hush-hush."
Zyan sighed. "Off the record, but yeah, she is. I don't know anything about it except she decided I shouldn't be involved, this time."
"Because ex?"
"Because I had a blow up with a couple of singers on the shuttle to Shankill who were being, well, singers. But possibly also because ex, yeah. We had The Talk, too. You know The Talk," Zyan admitted.
"In your case it seems to be an ongoing negotiation rather than a talk, but yes, I know what you mean," Aviczue said, but not indelicately.
"Give me some credit, when she said she wanted us to move on, I agreed, " Zyan said, slightly defensively.
"Eventually," Aviczue replied.
"It was a long time not to talk to someone, I know, and I was going to, but it never seemed to be the right time. Always just got the idea in my head that I shouldn't."
Aviczue looked at him oddly. "Have you been cutting alone?"
"What? No. I'm occasionally reckless, Vitzy, I'm not suicidal," Zyan was almost offended.
"Okay, then you're lying to yourself, " Aviczue glared.
"Pretty sure I'm not suicidal. I'd've succeeded by now," Zyan attempted to quip, but it fell flat.
"Not about that, Zyan. You've seen her twice that I can remember since you broke up, " Aviczue informed him heavily.
"I really haven't."
"I'm not saying you've been barging into her quarters unannounced or hanging around outside her office, Zyan, in fact I'm pretty sure she called you both times. You are both, I am sure, mutually unable to make a clean break of it. I'm just saying you need to be honest with yourself that you are letting a dead relationship shamble on, it's not healthy, and, look, just deal with what is actually happening, okay, not the edited version of reality you're apparently trying to paste over the top of it." Aviczue had moved onto being annoyed, now.
Zyan opened his mouth to inform her she could walk back to the cube if she was going to be like that, but then stopped himself. He was a careful cutter, and he'd been following Donalla's three tenets – cut for short amounts of time, don't stay in the ranges for a long time and don't hang around your claim when the wind was getting up – reasonably carefully. This should ensure he suffered minimal memory loss.
"Minimal isn't nothing, though," he said.
"What?" Aviczue asked.
"I'm a bit thrally," Zyan admitted.
"That's putting it mildly," Aviczue agreed.
"Yeah. Especially with black," Zyan went on. "Yanakov's claim's started to get pretty boxed in the more we've cut, at this point whoever's cutting is pretty much surrounded by crystal, and that's the claim I've been working ninety percent of the time. That's a lot of resonance from three sides at once. You think maybe, if there was something in my head I wasn't too happy about, it might get kinda sorta erased even if we weren't cutting intensively? If it was at the edge of my mind, like?" Zyan asked.
"You've got me in a box here, Zyan," Aviczue answered. "On the one hand I'm pretty sure that last part of what you just said is absolute pseudoscientific claptrap, but on the other hand you're actually showing some self-awareness and I'm 100% here for that."
"Quick trip down to medical after we see the guvnor?" Zyan suggested.
"I think that's a really good idea," Aviczue nodded. "Also, I think never call Lars Dahl the 'guvnor'."
"Okay then," Zyan agreed.
- o O o -
They were met, in the hangar, by two staffers from Guild management. This was unusual for many reasons: admin types rarely, if ever, ventured into the noise and bustle of the hangar. The two men – one with the lined look of a guild veteran, the other fresh-faced and probably a recent 'specialist' recruit – also had a strange request.
"The Guildmaster and the Crystal Singer want to see you separately. CS Cahrera first – please come with me to the Guildmaster's elevator," the older one said. "CS Jarvis, please accompany my colleague to the Chief Sorter's office."
"What?" Aviczue asked again. "Why can't we just all get the lift together?"
"This is a direct request from the Guildmaster," the older one said.
"That's not an answer," Aviczue replied.
"I will remind you, singer, that you have been issued an official summons," was the rejoinder. The older staffer, perhaps more accustomed to dealing with singers, looked unfazed. The younger one almost winced.
"Still not an answer," Aviczue said.
"There are stiff penalties for ignoring an official summons, CS Cahrera," Lined-face said.
"We haven't ignored it – we're here, aren't we? All I'm disputing is this rigmarole about keeping us separated," Aviczue glared at the man. "Zyan, is Hollin on the rota to be out on a claim today?"
"Sorry, he is," Zyan nodded. He'd had the exact same thought as soon as this became an 'official' situation, but the Locusts' legal expert was, indeed, out checking sites.
"This is a direct request from the Guildmaster," Lined-face repeated. He was probably happy to stand there and repeat the same lines until the next Passover descended.
Fresh-face had obviously come to the same conclusion and decided to try a little diplomacy. "Crystal singers, if I may, I realise that this is an irregular occurrence but the Guildmaster and his deputy have-"
Aviczue and Zyan blinked. A passing hangar hand winced. Cargo handlers stopped to stare. Only Lined-face evinced no surprise.
"Whoa! Someone's clearly new," Zyan stopped him. "Lemme do you a quick favour here – she is the Crystal Singer. With capitals, with the appropriate tone of reverence. Never a deputy anything, never an assistant anything. You'll thank me for this later, trust me."
Lined-face now seemed to take notice and turned to his counterpart. "You would do well to remember this, Stannon." Zyan twigged – Lined-face was deaf, and had been lip reading. Not at all uncommon in the Guild.
"Oh-kay," Stannon said slowly. "You can all consider that duly taken on board. I was just going to go on to say that the Guildmaster and the Crystal Singer have good reasons for this request. Please trust them."
"Okay, fine," Aviczue acquiesced. "For the record, though, if you'd led with that we'd be upstairs by now."
"Can we swing by Medical instead of getting in Clodine's way, though? I need to see Donalla about something," Zyan asked Stannon.
"Quit name dropping, Zyan," Aviczue murmured to him.
"I never!" Zyan protested.
Lined-face considered it. "That will be acceptable as long as you avoid contact with CS Ferozacorazon."
"I have literally no idea who that is," Zyan answered.
Aviczue sighed. "Shara, you idiot."
"For reals? Wow. No wonder she kept it quiet," Zyan commented.
"If we might proceed?" Lined-face hinted.
"Please," Aviczue acceded, rolling her eyes.
- o O o -
By rights, Zyan should not realistically have been able to saunter into the Infirmary and expect to see the Heptite Guild's Chief of Medical Research on what basically amounted to a whim, but over the course of the past 3 years a solid working relationship had developed between the Locusts and the progressively minded medic, who had adopted a somewhat maternal attitude to the group. Most of them had, from the beginning of their crystal singing careers, adhered strictly to her recommendations on working practices. She had quietly let it be known to the Guild's medical staff that if a Locust had need of medical treatment then they were to be directed to her – Presnol, the Chief of Medicine (and her other half) was happy to go along with this. In return, the Locusts were happy to be her personal research project. Thus, Zyan was waved through the Infirmary to Donalla's office without fuss, Stannon tagging meekly along behind.
"Zyan! How lovely to see you. Is everything alright?" Donalla greeted him, then turned a pleasant smile on the over-awed Stannon (she was, after all, of Chief rank and it was widely known she was a close friend of the Crystal Singer, too). "Hi, I'm Donalla Fiske-Ulass. I don't believe we've met."
"Stannon Bannon, ma'am," Stannon nodded respectfully and introduced himself.
Despite everything currently going on, this gave Zyan cause to pause. He looked at Stannon. "Seriously?"
Stannon looked back levelly. "Yes. You are not, I am sure, going to be the last person to comment on it."
"My condolences," Zyan said. "Anyway, Donalla, could you spare me a couple minutes to, ah-" He shot a meaningful glance at Stannon, hoping he'd take the hint and wait outside.
"My instructions are to remain with you until you see the Guildmaster, CS Jarvis," Stannon demurred.
"You may wait outside, Mr. Bannon, this office has no secret exits that I am aware of," Donalla, bless her, said.
Stannon still looked a bit unsure of this, but nodded and reluctantly retreated back through the door.
"Okay then – what's up, Zyan, and why are you being...shepherded...to see Lars?" Donalla asked.
"Yeah, um, okay. As to question 2, no idea and it's hush-hush anyway. As to what's up, and before I say this I swear I've been following the rules, I've, um, got a bit of memory loss," Zyan confessed.
Donalla frowned, and unshipped a bit of medical diagnostic gear from a belt pouch. "I believe you, or rather, I believe Aviczue and Marin would have unhesitatingly ratted you out if you hadn't been. We're just coming out of Passover, though, and you've been up on Shankill in hibernation. You haven't had time to suffer any aberration."
"It's more of a sort of ongoing background thing," Zyan explained. "I'm reliably informed I've been seeing someone and having conversations with them, but I can't for the life of me remember it."
Donalla walked in a circle around him, holding the sensor up to his head. "Well, I can guess who that is about," she commented.
Zyan sighed. "There really isn't any such thing as a secret on Ballybran, is there?"
"Not when it comes to gossip, no," Donalla said. "Hmm – there's no evidence of neural trauma. What other gaps in your memory have you noticed?"
"Nothing," Zyan shrugged.
Donalla frowned. "Memory loss in singers is rarely so specific. With respect, Zyan, are you sure you're not just trying to forget some uncomfortable interactions with Alenda that you'd rather hadn't happened?"
"No!" Zyan protested, but politely. "It's really not that. As far as I know, I spoke to Alenda up on Shankill just before Passover. We had a talk, called it quits before she went off-planet. Before that, well, we had a word about work stuff a few times but relationship-wise we'd been avoiding each other."
"Hmm. How many of these 'work-related' chats did you have?" Donalla asked.
Zyan tried to dig back through his memory. "I dunno, five, could be six."
"And what did you talk about?"
Zyan's brows furrowed. "Hmm, well, one time I think she asked if she could borrow Hollin for a day or two to go over some contracts – he's an ex-lawyer and quite a scary one, apparently. Once just generally how things were with the Locusts, once asking after Janso when he got hurt on that bloody blue claim that turned out to not be worth the bother, and, shards, I don't know, just general work stuff." He shrugged. "I seriously just don't remember it that well, I mean, they were just random quick conversations, a normal person probably has and forgets hundreds of them every year."
"Not if they're with a very recent ex, Zyan. Even everyday ordinary interactions would be emotionally loaded," Donalla told him, lowering the medical scanner. "You're neurologically fine – my prima facie opinion on the data I have right now is that your subconscious just doesn't want you to remember because you were in the middle of a bad breakup. Never underestimate the power of emotion over the human mind – crystal is nothing compared to what we willingly do to our memories."
Zyan frowned. "Could you regress me? Have a riffle through and see if anything's, y'know, got filed in the wrong place?"
Donalla shook her head. "Remember when you came in about two years ago and we ran some in-depth neurological scans while I asked you questions?"
"Yeah - did I pass that exam? I never did ask."
"It wasn't that kind of an exam, Zyan. What it showed, very unequivocally, was that you are most decidedly not a good candidate for regression. The habit of mentally protecting yourself must run deep in you," Donalla informed him.
"Yeah – blame Prot loyalty checks for that," Zyan answered gloomily. "Okay then, what's the Crystal Singer's deal? Doesn't she remember, like, everything?"
"That is something covered not only under doctor-patient confidentiality but also by Guild statute," Donalla said primly.
"And also by 'the Crystal Singer will be proper miffed' statute?" Zyan guessed.
"You're an astute man, Zyan," Donalla quipped.
Zyan smiled politely. "Is there anything you can try?"
Donalla shook her head. "Not really, I'm afraid. I did, at one stage, attempt regression during thrall, but the results were mixed, to say the least. My first test was a complete failure, and subsequent iterations with different subjects produced unpredictable results. Some subjects claimed that they could access some lost memories after thrall, but if they could, they chose not to share them with me – this was early on in Lars' reforms, I didn't have access to a group of co-operative and willing singers. To be frank, other avenues were far more worthy of research, and far less risky too."
Zyan filed that away for future reference, but made a show of sighing and nodding. "Okay. So probably I'm just looking at standard male emotional shardwittery rather than actual memory loss here?"
Donalla nodded. "There's nothing wrong with you that medicine can deal with, Zyan. My official prescription is fun and dating, repeat dosage until symptoms are gone," she informed him with mock seriousness.
"I'll bear that in mind, doctor," Zyan answered with a wry grin.
- o O o -
Stannon insisted on corralling Zyan in a vacant office on the administration level, and emphasised that he was not to use the comm while he waited.
Challenge accepted, Zyan thought.
The office contained the standard catering slot almost all Guild offices were equipped with, but it was locked down to 'meeting drinks' only - tea and coffee and the like.
Zyan pretended not to understand this, and punched for a beer.
"Well, I fancy a beer. You want one?" He asked Stannon.
"I don't believe that slot will dispense alcoholic beverages, Guildmember," Stannon answered.
"Soon fix that," Zyan said, and dug a diagnostic unit out of his tool belt.
Cube-wide systems with many remote terminals, like the network of catering slots, all piggybacked on the comms network to request orders, report faults and generally check in. For a bodger of Zyan's calibre it was child's play to tie into this and tap out a message in ancient morse code which would set the comunit in Shara's quarters to blinking. This might prove to be useful if a) she was actually in her quarters and b) she knew morse code. The first was pot luck, the second an educated guess on Zyan's part: morse code had enjoyed an extended second life as a surreptitious means of communication for malcontents across the galaxy. Usually that was encrypted with a pre-agreed cypher or one-time pad: Zyan hadn't foreseen the need to communicate secretly with anyone within the Cube, so was going to have to risk plaintext.
"Guildmember, I would really rather you didn't-" Stannon protested.
"Yeah, your objection to day drinks is duly noted, Stannon," Zyan replied with a fake sigh. "Live a little, man."
ZYAN, Zyan tapped out, using a control on the underside of the diagnostic unit so Stannon couldn't see.
He was in luck, and didn't even need to prompt her. Shara had presumably just been through the same rigmarole, knew what he wanted to know, and also knew he would have limited time and would be under surveillance: SERIOUS FEDS STOP QUESTIONS STOP ALENDA STOP NO EXPLANATION STOP USE CAUTION, came the reply. Zyan mentally translated it while making a series of irritated noises, pretending to wrestle with the catering slot's systems.
Interesting. Almost as an afterthought Zyan overrode the catering slot's protocols, snapped shut the diagnostic tool and dialled up a Yarran.
"Boom," he said, took the beer out of the slot and held it up in a toast to Stannon. "You sure you don't want one?"
"No, Guildmember," Stannon sighed.
Zyan trotted out the old 'singer metabolisms require a daily intake of certain nutrients including alcohol' excuse, which the relative newcomer clearly found suspect but decided not to take issue with. The pint was three-quarters sunk when Stannon's comm buzzed and he was informed that the Guildmaster and the Crystal Singer would see him now. Zyan stood up, glass in hand.
"Um, are you going to finish that?" Stannon asked.
"Get your own," Zyan told him facetiously.
"No, I mean, before you go in to see the Guildmaster and the Depu-, the Crystal Singer," Stannon clarified.
"I am not rushing a Yarran," Zyan told him. In truth he would have delayed finishing the beer anyway – it was part of his plausible deniability for screwing about with the catering slot.
Stannon looked like he'd have liked to have rolled his eyes. "As you will, CS Jarvis. This way, if you please."
It took only moments to get to the Guildmaster's office. There was an overly-complicated handoff procedure in the antechamber, where Lined-face was waiting for them. Stannon briefed Lined-face – so silently that even Zyan couldn't hear it, but that wasn't an issue if you could lip-read - as to what they'd been doing. Zyan sipped his beer. Lined-face went inside, then re-emerged a few moments later.
"You are directed to enter," Lined-face said, holding open the door.
"Whoop-de-do," Zyan replied sourly, and entered. In truth he was afire with curiousity and could hardly wait to get inside.
Since the Chalice business, Zyan had met with the Guild's first couple twice, and on both occasions the atmosphere had been collegial, even casual. The subject had been the Locusts' working practices – the Guildmaster wanted to encourage their use by other singers, and had asked for a detailed briefing. They'd sat down together over tea and biscuits and had a chat.
Zyan could tell that this was not a tea and biscuits kind of meeting as soon as he walked in. Lars Dahl and Killashandra Ree were both dressed in dark, business-oriented clothing – with expressions to match. They were, as expected, not alone in their office – there were two other people in there with them. They both wore environmental suits – necessary for any off-worlder wishing to visit the surface and an indication that said off-worlder had a very, very pressing reason to be there.
"CS Jarvis, we thank you for answering our summons so quickly. Please accept our apologies for pulling you off the ranges without notice and keeping you apart from your partners, but once you learn why I think you'll agree with us that it was necessary," Guildmaster Dahl said, by way of greeting. The Crystal Singer simply inclined her head in a regal nod, and raised her eyebrow at the glass of beer. Zyan replied with an infinitesimal shrug and a tilt of his head. The Guildmaster indicated a chair – Zyan steered his butt into it.
"No big deal, Guildmaster," he said, shifting into the same mental mode that had got him through any number of Prot interrogations in his previous life. He was on stage as CS Jarvis, helpful and professional guildmember in good standing of the Heptite Guild.
"These are Agents Moran and Saito of the FSP Sensitive Exigencies Branch," Dahl went on, indicating the two suited figures, a man and a woman. Serious Feds indeed: Zyan had been an FSP citizen only marginally longer than he'd been a crystal singer, but even he had heard of the FSP's Sensitive Exigencies Branch. Usually referred to simply as Exigency, and then in hushed tones, they were the smallest agency within the umbrella of the FSP, but also the most elite. They had no set function, but if Exigency agents were involved you could safely bet a lot of money that whatever was going on was both important and extremely tricky.
Moran's face twigged a neuron, and then Zyan recognised him: he'd seen him as he left Alenda's Shankill office to go to the Arrivals lounge, before Passover, accompanied by the grizzled older man. He was still a standard-issue Fed, clad in a grey shipsuit under the transparent environmental suit – short-cropped brown hair, regular features composed into an expressionless mask.
The woman, Saito, was a different kettle of fish – slim, striking, black-haired and clearly from one of the FSP planets with a strong oriental genotype. She had the patented Fed non-expression down to a fine art too, though.
"Please answer any and all questions they ask you fully and honestly. You are hereby permitted and directed under Paragraph 5 of Chapter 37 of Section 2 of the Heptite Guild Charter to discuss any aspect of the Scorian system, Ballybran, her satellites, and Heptite Guild business with them. Any aspect. Do you understand this, CS Jarvis?" Dahl asked.
"Yes sir," Zyan replied. Someone's got a lot of clout, he thought.
On the heels of that came the thought 'how much do they know about Alenda?' She was registered as an empath, largely to deflect any suspicion about her true abilities. Did these agents suspect Alenda could sense people's thoughts rather than their emotions? Had they been told, even?
Dahl and Ree knew about Alenda. Zyan took careful note of their faces – there was a tightness around the Guildmaster's eyes that belied his directive to be as open as possible, and although Killashandra Ree was as good or better than Shecherzia Alar at not giving anything away via body language or expression, Zyan doubted either of them would drop Alenda in it like that. Alenda was an actual relative of Lars Dahl – at a fair few removes, admittedly, but they acted more like uncle and niece than Guildmaster and Chief a lot of the time. He resolved to be very careful. She's my ex, I know she's a registered empath although she doesn't practice as one, we've only spoken briefly to each other since we split up although we finally called it quits just before she went off-planet, he briefed himself.
What followed was as thorough an interrogation as Zyan had ever experienced. Moran led the questioning in a clear bass voice – Saito would occasionally ask clarifying questions, and when she did, Moran would give her plenty of time to get whatever information she wanted before returning to his own line of questioning. They both made notes on data pads as they went along.
As expected, the questions were all about Alenda. The agents made no effort to disguise the object of their interest, and some of them got pretty personal. They covered how they'd met, where'd they'd gone together, what they'd done, why they'd split up – Saito in particular had a lot to ask about that. Quite a lot of time was spent on the Chalician installation, which worried Zyan somewhat as a fair amount of his activities during that operation had been grey-legal at best – Saito chimed in at that point, too, with a long series of follow-up questions. They were particularly interested in Zyan's final conversation with her, which again worried him, and again this prompted follow-up questions from Saito.
An old cell commander of Zyan's, from back in the early days of the Djielese revolution, had a favourite saying: 'Once is accident. Twice is coincidence. Three times is enemy action.'
One of the things about being a registered empath, Zyan knew from Alenda, was that you weren't allowed to keep it a secret. You weren't required to wear a sign round your neck, but if asked, an empath had to come clean about their gift.
Zyan interrupted the flow of questions: "Are you an empath?" He asked Saito straightforwardly.
"Yes," Saito answered simply, and then went on with her questioning. No blustering, no 'we're asking the questions' - just an acknowledgement and moving on.
It seemed, however, that once the jig was up neither Moran or Saito had much wish to continue, because after a few more questions of a cursory nature they wound things up.
"That will be all, CS Jarvis," Moran said, in closing.
"Yeah, not quite," Zyan replied. "You're not the only one with questions."
Moran looked at him. "The questioning in this room goes in one direction only, Guildmember – you've already discovered the single exception to this rule, so do not press this further."
"My friend went off planet under mysterious circumstances, and now not just the FSP but Exigency turn up asking after her with an Empath, no less – there are what, maybe three or four hundred Empaths, galaxy wide? I'm guessing you guys don't roll out this particular red carpet for anything less than an A-list catastrophe, so...is my friend in danger, Agents?"
"That information is not available, Guildmember," Saito answered, "and you are forbidden, under the FSP Secrecy Act, from discussing this session with anyone except for authorised Sensitive Exigencies Branch operatives and, if there are any follow up questions, the Guild personnel currently involved." Saito indicated the Crystal Singer and the Guildmaster with a wave of his hand.
"The penalties for non-compliance are severe, and apply even on Ballybran," Moran added.
"That'd be a yes, then," Zyan snorted.
"CS Jarvis," Dahl interjected. "these agents aren't at liberty to tell you anything. You know the kind of work that Alenda undertook for this Guild on behalf of the FSP – you've been involved yourself – and those arrangements are secret. She knew this when she accepted the assignment. As you've already noted, the FSP have their very best people on this. You're going to have to content yourself with that, I'm afraid."
Contenting himself with things wasn't exactly Zyan's strong suit, but even he could see that he wasn't going to discover anything further by sitting here giving Exigency a hard time.
"Fine," he said, standing up to leave. He paused in the doorway, did a quick sum, and looked back at the agents. "I make it 64 days since Alenda broke orbit – out of 200 before she has to be back: maybe even less, as she isn't a singer. Clock's ticking. If the 'very best people' turn out to be not quite good enough to meet that deadline, you know where to find me. Don't make me come and find you."
Dahl looked like he was about to say something, but the Crystal Singer laid a hand on his arm.
Saito said nothing, but Moran looked at him levelly. "Your meaning is clear, Guildmember Jarvis."