The Galaxy Game (20 page)

‘Sit,’ said a deep voice.

Rafi peered around in the darkness and scant, intermittent light, saw a line of cross-legged figures against the wall with Ntenman at the end and joined them. The voice was not loud or harsh, but it demanded obedience without questions. Then he tilted back his head and watched the reverse side of play, etched in light at a sharp slant above them. It was mesmerising – visual light and screen-light trails combined into a display of cold, ever-changing fire.

There was murmuring in the dark. He pretended not to hear but suspected he was meant to.

‘This boy?’

‘Yes.’ The volume dropped, the words muddled and then a phrase rose out of the mess clearly. ‘. . . Terran trial, and it didn’t work well . . .’

‘Greed-induced incompetence with a supporting wingline of complacency . . .’ came the mumbled response, and harsh, loud laughter burst out all round, making Rafi jump.

‘No sense discussing them. Our aims are different.’ That was the deep voice. It had not joined the laughter and appeared unable to whisper. It sent vibrations down to the marrow of the bone even when speaking quietly. ‘Let him try.’

Ntenman’s hand came down heavy on Rafi’s shoulder and he whispered in his ear, ‘When the demo is over, they open the Wall to anyone who wants to play. You get in there and do what I taught you.’ He paused, and his grip tightened as he pondered. ‘On second thought, don’t do what I taught you. Just have fun.’

‘What?’ Sheer terror closed Rafi’s throat, compressing his voice to a squeak.

Ntenman poked him in the ribs. ‘Relax, Moo. It’s just playing. You won’t gain or lose any credit.’

The crowd howled its approval of another team manoeuvre and, strangely enough, Rafi found the sound comforting. There was no competition. Everything in the long night was for fun and entertainment. He had seen it in the faces they had passed on the way, but more importantly he could feel it, not with any special talent, but with the purely Cygnian sensing of the mood of the crowd.

Rafi took off his tunic, folded it carefully and tied the arms around his waist, and rolled up his trousers snugly to the knee. He took a deep breath and said in a more normal tone, ‘Okay.’

*

Rafi Abowen . . . well, now Rafidelarua. Rafi fall-on-his-feet-accidentally-popular-I-swear-I-don’t-know-what-I’m-doing Delarua. I’ve met his family. We’ve shared food more times than I can count. I’m one of his first-tier keys
and
an essential, and I can’t believe he’s gone so far so fast. Rafidelarua! At least I can still call him
Moo
. It reminds him – and them – that I knew him back when.

He’s catching up to what’s happening around him, and yes, he had to start from square one, which I never did. But he still doesn’t understand what it means to have a nexus in Academe Maenevastraya. He hasn’t tried to find out
who
the nexus is. He can declare he’s an adult till the suns set for ever but he’s acting like a child, a typical Terran child. He thinks if he doesn’t see it, if he doesn’t know about it, it can’t exist and he doesn’t have to worry about it. I’m not going to help him with that. I’ve got my own circles and networks and credit to consider, and I’m not going to waste time on his.

Besides, I was right. He’s got it. Bitter, bitter irony. The greatest booby in the history of the game projects the warmest, strongest binding ever seen in a non-Ntshune Wallrunner. Then there’s me – all the skills, none of the spark. Splice the two of us together and we’d make one outstanding player. You see – even more irony – another name for
booby
is
nexus
. That’s where the term originally came from, from old-style Wallrunning. The nexus links with everyone, keeps them aware of each other, and the team moves as a single body with the nexus as the core. Sometimes the nexus is a good Wallrunner; sometimes they have to be thrown and caught and carried like baggage. It’s a balancing act to decide which is more important: having a skilled nexus to lead the running and call strategy for the team, or having a skilled team with a strong nexus who knows just enough to stay out of the bodycatcher.

Rafi didn’t know what he was doing, as usual. He was nervous at first when he got on the Wall, but when he started to slip and loosen up and laugh you could see everyone on the Wall . . .
buzz
. They all woke up and turned to him and looked at him and at each other as if it was the first time they’d noticed there were other people around. Then they began to move like sentient ribbons of fire – weaving, connecting, dispersing. And this was not the team! There were a handful of players and the rest were Wallrunning amateurs out of the crowd, glad for the chance to play around on a half-decent Wall. Most of the crowd didn’t know what they were seeing but they knew they liked it. They started to cheer for them almost as loudly as they did for the team. Baranngaithe realised immediately. He was standing behind the screen watching, and I was watching him. Slowly he sat down; slowly he lay back. I came closer. He was squinting, as if trying to blur out the individuals and see the motion as coming from one entity. What he saw pleased him because he began to grin and then to chuckle.

‘Oh, Ntenman,’ he said to me. ‘Well done. Very well done!’

And that warmed me. You see, Baranngaithe used to be a nexus, in every sense of the word. He began as a Wallrunner, naturally, but then he got into the managing aspect of the game and used his flair for binding to build and lead one of the most efficient corporations in the third tier of the Galactic League.

This was pure scandal. Some men own individual teams. A smaller number have a few minor strings of teams to their credit. But Baranngaithe was the first man to have a full eight-string corporation in the Galactic League.

Of course, it couldn’t last. In my opinion, the Punarthai matriarchs and Patronae were secretly proud of him, but the Ntshune dynasties tore the bottom out of the bag with ruthless dispatch. I do not exaggerate. Blood was shed. Baranngaithe survived it somehow and ended up in his third life as an academic, studying the history of the game and its associated traditions. His so-called fieldwork soon outpaced his research and writings. He revived the old Brotherhoods and trained teams for form, skill and beauty rather than competition.

He used to mock his life and say that he would spend his final years as a solitary to try to remember who he was away from all the push and pull of other people. But he never left. He was as he had been on my last Punartam almost-Year: wandering the Academe green coaching his teams and overseeing their demonstrations with a delight that was personal as well as professional. If only demonstration teams counted for anything, we could have bragged that he had the equivalent of two and a half corporations, but at least no one would be trying to kill him for these.

‘I am minded,’ he said, ‘to go back to my research. Here is a worthy subject. I could spend some time on this. I think I will postpone my retirement a little longer. This is very much to your credit, Ntenman. I had not thought my teachings would stick with you, and here you have found me something remarkable from a world away!’

I could not stop smiling. Ignition was always slow for Baranngaithe, but when he caught fire he was irresistible.

‘But his Wallrunning technique is atrocious,’ Baranngaithe continued. ‘We shall have to work on that. He must carry himself, at least. We will have no dead weight here.’

I regretfully decided it was time to make sure he knew everything. ‘Revered Baranngaithe, you know his nexus lies with Academe Maenevastraya?’

He tensed immediately but quickly came to terms with the less-than-perfect world. ‘I had heard. Nothing wrong with that. I have some esteemed colleagues in Maenevastraya. They might even be interested in a little collaboration, but I must have him remain here to facilitate training.’

‘You also have competitors in Academe Maenevastraya,’ I noted mildly.

‘I saw him first; they must respect that.’ He sat up and frowned at me. ‘I told you this was to your credit, Ntenman. I do not speak idly. Remember your allegiances from times past and do not play for the highest bidder like a Zhinuvian trader.’

I did not have to pretend to be offended. ‘Rafi is my friend. I only want what’s best for him. He has had a hard time.’

Baranngaithe searched my face and sniffed the edges of my spirit for any hint of insincerity and found, if not truth, at least sufficient self-interest to satisfy him that I would not dabble in that messy combination of Wallrunning and Academe politics.

‘Well,’ he said at last, ‘let it be. Bring him for training before you sleep and after you wake. Make him always take the emergency chutes. Draw on my credit and get him proper kit. Outfit yourself as well. Nothing fabricated. There’s a craftsman who does some good bespoke work. You can find him on the green most long nights, but his workshop is below, closest to Five Trees Escape. Do you need a guide, or can you find your way below-ground?’

‘It has been some time, Revered. I should take a guide,’ I said honestly.

‘I will send a guide to your channel. You should go after the next sunrise. We have no time to waste.’

‘Revered,’ I acknowledged, in full obedience, just as in times past.

So Rafi found us when he came down from Wallrunning at last, worn out and happy. I was standing near the edge of the screen and stepped out to greet him, but Baranngaithe stayed sitting in the shadows and only answered Rafi’s curious look with a nod.

‘When can we come back, Tinman? This Wall is incredible. I might actually learn something on a Wall like this.’ He was excited and I couldn’t blame him. The Lyceum had been his first and only Wall – serviceable, but not at all inspiring.

‘Soon,’ Baranngaithe replied from the shadows like a night-shrouded oracle.

I saw Rafi react to the timbre of his voice, a string struck invisibly by resonance – that buzz, that sudden tension and added wakefulness. For a moment, a brief moment, my jealousy returned and I wondered what could have been if I’d had a fraction of that sensitivity. I consoled myself. I would never be a nexus, but at least I was learning how to move in their inner circles. It was less than a month and my social credit was already going up. I could work with what I had. This would be my Year.

*

The walk back took time, partly because Rafi had pushed himself hard and now could only stumble weakly, bouncing from various shoulders and sides as the growing crowd moved around him with that particularly Punarthai lack of concern about personal space. Ntenman took the slower pace as an opportunity to dawdle and talk to friends and acquaintances, some of whom he introduced to Rafi and some he did not, leaving Rafi to stand awkwardly nearby and pretend to look interested in some other distraction.

He was hoping to see her. He was expecting to see her. He had looked for her among the spectators at the Wall; he had half-convinced himself that if he went behind the screen she would be there, just like the first time. He leaned against the tower and let his gaze linger on every tall person in the crowd – and on Punartam, there were plenty.

When the moment finally came, it did not disappoint. A small box rattled near his ear. He looked at it, watched it tip and automatically placed his hand underneath. Five perrenuts were shaken out onto his palm. He carefully selected three and put the remaining two back in the box, feeling very smug as a low laugh approved his actions.

‘Ixiaralhaneki,’ he said. She was wearing a long tunic and a broad scarf that draped around her head and shoulders. Separate sleeves and leggings wrapped her limbs in scrunched, wrinkled material. Thanks to his daily lessons with the guides, he was noticing things and understanding them better – for example, the bands and badges on her sleeves told the tale of her family line, her credit level and her work. Two things were absolutely clear to him and neither was news: she was a Haneki, and well-off.

He glanced quickly behind him. Ntenman was a good way down the green, fully engaged in conversation and half-hidden in the crowd. As he turned back, he wondered to himself why he was glad of that.

She smiled down at him as she put her snack away into a side pocket. ‘
You
may call me Ixiaral,’ she told him, sliding down the wall from a lean to a half-sit to bring herself closer to his line of sight.

‘And I’m just Rafi.’ He paused, wracked his brain for some courteous nothings to say and found it empty. ‘Are you from Academe Maenevastraya? Are you my nexus?’

‘I’m sorry I came too late to see you run the Wall,’ she replied obliquely, unfazed by his outburst. ‘Did you enjoy yourself?’

‘Very much,’ said Rafi. ‘But how did you know—’

‘I heard,’ was all she said, but immediately Rafi pictured it – a single person speaking into a comm or sending a message, but a few whispered words, repeating from mouth to ear, mouth to ear, sweeping along the green and perhaps even out through the gates to wherever Ixiaral had been previously. ‘We should talk indeed. I’m not formally associated with the Academe but I do some work for them on occasion.’

‘You’re a scout,’ Rafi guessed. ‘A talent recruiter.’

‘Yes. I go around the Academes and see if there are any amateurs with the will and the skill for the commercial leagues. I negotiate with the teams over who they will take and what the credit exchange will be.’

‘And you go beyond the Academes as well. Beyond Punartam.’

Her face creased up with disapproval. ‘That is not one of the things we are going to talk about.’

‘Understood,’ Rafi said, outwardly obliging but inwardly curious.

She looked as if she was trying not to laugh at him, but in a kindly way. ‘Come. Lose your friend for a little while and follow me.’ She took off her scarf and whipped it around him before he could protest, keeping one end in her fist. ‘Come on!’

He did not look back. He crammed a perrenut in his mouth, eager for the rush of energy and bliss, and followed her long strides further across the green. It was impossible to get lost on a circular path, impossible to come to harm with so many witnesses, and he was bored and restless after several Cygnian days without sun. She turned off the path and into a doorway that opened for her without challenge. Before he could take time to wonder at her ease of access to the Academe, she pulled him onto a small elevator, spinning him teasingly until the scarf wound around his eyes and nose. By the time he untangled himself, the elevator was moving at speed – down. Not up, to all the places he had mapped and researched and walked through, but below-ground, which he had not yet seen and knew nothing about.