Use of Weapons (44 page)

'Yes,
Cheradenine?'

'It's
a civilian craft,' he said, pushing the face-plate up. He was grinning. 'I
don't think it's looking for us after all. Might still provide an escape route,
though.' He shrugged. 'Worth a try.' He gestured back up the slope. 'You coming
along?'

Tsoldrin
Beychae looked through the dusk at the matt black figure in the doorway. He had
been sitting here wondering what he ought to do, and had not yet come up with
any answers. Part of him just wanted to get back to the peace and quiet and
certainty of the university library, where he could live happily, without fuss,
ignore the world, and immerse himself in the old books, trying to understand
ancient ideas and histories, hoping to make sense of them, one day, and perhaps
explain his own ideas, try to point out the lessons of these elder histories,
perhaps make people think again about their own times and ideologies. For a
time - for a long time, there - it had seemed entirely and definitely the most
worthwhile and productive thing he could do... but he was not sure of that any
longer.

Perhaps,
he thought, there were more important things to be done which he could have a
hand in. Perhaps he ought to go with Zakalwe, as the man - and the Culture -
wanted.

Could
he just relapse back into his studies, after this?

Zakalwe
coming back from the past, as rash and brash as ever; Ubrel - could she really
have been? - just acting a part, making him feel very old and foolish, now, but
angry as well; and the whole Cluster drifting rudderless towards the rocks, all
over again.

Did
he have any right not to try and do something, even if the Culture was wrong
about his stature in the civilisation? He didn't know. He could see that
Zakalwe had tried to appeal to his vanity, but what if even half of what he
said was true? Was it right to sit back and just let things happen, however
much it might be the easiest, least stressful course? If there was a war, and
he knew he'd done nothing, how would he feel afterwards?

Damn
you, Zakalwe, he thought. He stood up. 'I'm still thinking,' he said. 'But
let's see how far you can get.'

'Good
man.' The suited figure's voice betrayed no obvious trace of emotion.

'...
Extremely
sorry for the delay,
gentlepeople; it really wasn't within our control; some sort of traffic control
panic, but do let me apologise again on behalf of Heritage Tours. Well; here we
are, a bit later than we expected (but isn't that a pretty sunset?); the
very famous
Srometren Observatory; at
least four and a half thousand years of history have been played out beneath
your feet here, gentlepeople. I'm going to have to fairly rattle through it to
tell it all to you in the time we have here, so listen close...'

The
aircraft hovered, AG field buzzing, just above the western edge of the
observatory platform. Its legs hung, dangling in mid-air, apparently extended
merely as a precaution. About forty people had disembarked from it down the
belly-ramp, and now stood around one of the stone instrument plinths while an
eager young tour guide talked to them.

He
watched through the stone balustrade, scanning the group with the suit's
built-in effector and watching the results on the visor-screen head-up. Thirty
plus of the people were carrying what were in effect terminals; links to the
planet's communications net. The suit's computer covertly interrogated the
terminals through the effector. Two of the terminals were switched on; one
receiving a sports broadcast, another receiving music. The rest were on
stand-by.

'Suit,'
he whispered (not that even Tsoldrin, right beside him, could have heard him,
let alone the people in the tourist group). 'I want to disable those terminals,
quietly; to stop them from transmitting.'

'Two
receiving terminals are transmitting location code,' the suit said.

'Can
I disable their transmit function without altering their present location code
function, or their present reception?'

'Yes.'

'Right;
the priority being preventing any further new signals, disable all the
terminals.'

'Disabling
all thirty-four non-Culture personal commnet terminals within range; confirm.'

'Confirmed,
dammit; do it...'

'Order
carried out.'

He
watched the head-up alter as the internal power-states of the terminals sank
back to near zero. The tour guide was leading the people across the stone
plateau of the old observatory, towards where he and Beychae were, and away
from the hovering aircraft.

He
shoved the suit face-plate up, looked round at the other man. 'Okay; let's go.
Quietly.'

He
went first, through the undergrowth, between the crowding trees; it was quite
dark under the half-fallen foliage, and Beychae stumbled a couple of times, but
they made relatively little noise as they trod the carpet of dead leaves round
two sides of the observatory platform.

When
they were under the aircraft, he scanned it with the suit effector.

'You
beautiful little machine,' he breathed, watching the results come up. The
aircraft was automatic, and very stupid. A bird probably had a more complicated
brain. 'Suit; patch into the aircraft; assume control without letting anybody
else know.'

'Assuming
covert control-jurisdiction of single aircraft within range; confirm.'

'Confirmed.
And stop asking me to confirm everything.'

'Control-jurisdiction
assumed. Lapsing confirmatory instruction protocols; confirm.'

'Good
grief. Confirmed!'

'Confirm
protocol lapsed.'

He
considered just floating up, holding Beychae, into the craft, but even though
the aircraft's own AG would probably mask the signal his suit gave off, it
might not. He glanced up the steep slope, then turned to Beychae and whispered.
'Give me your hand; we're going up.' The old man did as he asked.

They
went steadily up the slope, the suit kicking foot-holds in the earth. They stopped
at the balustrade. The aircraft blocked out the evening sky above them, yellow
light spilling from the belly entrance above the ramp, faintly illuminating the
nearer stone instruments.

He
checked on the tour group while Beychae got his breath back. The tourists were
at the far side of the observatory; the guide was shining a flashlight at some
ancient piece of stonework. He stood up. 'Let's go,' he told Beychae, who
straightened. They stepped over the balustrade, walked to the ramp and up into
the aircraft. He followed Beychae; he watched the rear view on the helmet
screen, but couldn't tell whether anybody in the tour group had noticed them or
not.

'Suit;
close the ramp,' he told the suit, as he and Beychae entered the single large
space of the craft's interior. It was ornately luxurious, its walls slung with
hangings and its deeply carpeted floor dotted with large chairs and couches;
there was an autobar at one end, while the opposite wall was a single huge
screen, presently displaying the last of the sunset.

The
ramp chimed and hissed as it came up. 'Suit; retract legs,' he said, hinging
the suit face-plate back. Happily, the suit was smart enough to realise he
meant the aircraft's legs, not its own. It had occurred to him that somebody
might just be able to leap onto one of the craft's legs from the observatory
balustrade. 'Suit; adjust aircraft altitude; up ten metres.'

The
light buzzing noise around them changed, then settled back to what it had been
before. He watched Beychae take off his heavy jacket, then looked round the
interior of the craft; the effector said there was nobody else aboard, but he
wanted to make sure. 'Let's see where this thing was headed next,' he said, as
Beychae sat down on a long couch, sighing and stretching. 'Suit; the aircraft's
next destination?'

'Gipline
Space Terminal,' the clipped voice told him.

'That
sounds perfect. Take us there, suit, and make it look as legal and normal as
possible.'

'Under
way,' the suit said. 'ETA forty minutes.'

The
craft's background noise altered, climbing in pitch; the floor moved just a
little. The screen on the far side of the large cabin showed them moving out
across the wooded hills, rising into the air.

He
took a walk round the craft, confirming there was nobody else aboard, then sat
by Beychae, who he thought looked very tired. It had been a long day, he
supposed.

'You
all right?'

'I'm
glad to be sitting down, I'll say that.' Beychae kicked off his boots.

'Let
me get you a drink, Tsoldrin,' he said, taking off the helmet and heading for
the bar. 'Suit,' he said, suddenly struck by an idea. 'You know one of the
Culture's down-link numbers in Solotol.'

'Yes.'

'Connect
with one via the aircraft.'

He
bent down, looking at the autobar. 'And how does this work?'

'The
autobar is voice acti -'

'Zakalwe!'
Sma's voice cut across that of the suit, making him start. He straightened.
'Where are...?' the woman's voice said, then paused. 'Oh; you've got yourself
an aircraft, have you?'

'Yes,'
he said. He looked across to where Beychae was watching him. 'On our way to
Gipline Port. So what happened? Where's that module? And Sma, I'm hurt; you
haven't called, you haven't written, sent flowers...'

'Is
Beychae all right?' Sma said urgently.

'Tsoldrin's
fine,' he told her, smiling at the other man. 'Suit; get this autobar to fix us
a couple of refreshing but strong drinks.'

'He's
okay; good.' The woman sighed. The autobar made a clicking, gurgling noises.
'We haven't called,' Sma said, 'because if we had we'd have let them know where
you were; we lost the tight-link when the capsule got blasted. Zakalwe, that
was ridiculous; it was pure chaos after the capsule wasted the truck in the
Flower Market and you downed that fighter; you're lucky you made it as far as
you did. Where is the capsule, anyway?'

'Back
at the observatory; Srometren,' he said, looking down as a hatch opened in the
autobar. He took the tray with the two drinks on it over to Beychae, sat down
at his side. 'Sma; say hello to Tsoldrin Beychae,' he said, handing the other
man his drink.

'Mr
Beychae?' Sma's voice said from the suit.

'Hello?'
Beychae said.

'Pleased
to talk to you Mr Beychae. I do hope Mr Zakalwe is treating you all right. Are
you well?'

'Tired,
but hale.'

'I
trust Mr Zakalwe has found time to communicate to you the seriousness of the
political situation in the Cluster.'

'He
has,' Beychae said. 'I am... I am certainly considering doing what you ask, and
for the moment have no urge to return to Solotol.'

'I
see,' Sma said, 'I appreciate what you say. I'm sure Mr Zakalwe will do all he
can to keep you safe and well while you're deliberating, won't you,
Cheradenine?'

'Of
course, Diziet. Now; where's that module?'

'Stuck
under the cloud tops of Soreraurth, where it was before. Thanks to your
nova-profile escapades down there, everything's on maximum alert; we can't move
anything without being seen, and if we're seen to be interfering, we might
start the war all by ourselves. Describe where that capsule is again; we're
going to have to passive-spot it from the microsatellite and then blast it from
up here, to remove the evidence. Shit, this is messy, Zakalwe.'

'Well,
pardon me,' he said. He drank again. 'The capsule's under a large yellow-leafed
deciduous tree between eighty and... one-thirty metres north-east of the
observatory. Oh; and the plasma rifle's about... twenty to forty metres due
west.'

'You
lost it?' Sma sounded incredulous.

'Threw
it away in a fit of pique,' he admitted, yawning. 'It got Effectorized.'

'Told
you it belonged in a museum,' another voice interrupted.

'Shut-up,
Skaffen-Amtiskaw,' he said. 'So, Sma, what now?'

'Gipline
Space Terminal, I suppose,' the woman replied. 'We'll see if we can book you on
something outgoing; for Impren, or nearby. At worst, you've got a civilian trip
ahead of you of weeks at least; if we're lucky they'll stand down the alert and
the module can sneak out and rendezvous. Either way though, the war may be a
little closer, thanks to what happened in Solotol today. Just think about that,
Zakalwe.' The channel closed.

'She
sounds unhappy with you, Cheradenine,' Beychae said.

He
shrugged. 'No change there,' he sighed.

'I'm
really most terribly sorry, gentlepeople; this has never happened before;
never. I really am sorry... I just can't understand it... I'll, um... I'll
try...' The young man hit buttons on his pocket terminal. 'Hello? Hello!
HELLO!' He shook it, banged it with the heel of his hand. 'This is just...
just... this has never, never happened before; it really hasn't...' He looked
apologetically up at the people in the tour group, clustered round the single
light. Most of the people were looking at him; a few were trying their own
terminals with no more success than he, and a couple were watching the western
sky as though the last red smudge there would give up the aircraft that had so mysteriously
decided to leave of its own accord, 'Hello? Hello? Anybody? Please reply.' The
young man sounded almost in tears. The very last dreg of light left the sunset
sky; moon-glow lit up some thinner patches of cloud. The flashlight flickered.
'Anybody at all; please reply! Oh, please!'