Expatria: The Box Set (20 page)
Read Expatria: The Box Set Online
Authors: Keith Brooke
Mathias watched them together in the gardens, talking and throwing handfuls of petals over each other. Then they kissed. For long seconds Mathias's heart pounded madly, until they pulled apart and Lucilla strode away with a parting wave, leaving Greta to wander, slowly, out of his sight. He lay down on his bed and stared at the cracked ceiling, wishing life did not have to be so confusing and all the same so painfully simple.
Chapter 21
It was a dream.
Kasimir Sukui knew that it was a dream: the emotions were magnified yet somehow remote; the colours, the perspectives, were unreal, distorted. He wished it would stop.
Siggy Axelmeyer was before him on the balcony of Cane-brake House. He was playing his mouth-organ, his back to Sukui, a microphone cable trailing down over the crook of his right arm.
The two of them were alone, except for the voice ringing in Sukui's head, the Good Lord Salvo booming, 'It's me or him, Kasimir. Me or him!'
The balcony railing came only a few centimetres higher than Axelmeyer's knees and now Siggy was leaning out, playing one-handed and gesturing to the crowd with his other hand.
'
Me or him, Kasimir!
'
Why could the Prime not be quiet? Sukui knew that Salvo wasn't here, on this balcony at Canebrake House, yet the voice was so loud inside his skull.
He took a step toward Axelmeyer.
He knew what would happen next. He had lived this dream before. He took a deep breath, raised his hands in front of him.
And Axelmeyer turned, his eyes swelling, his mouth dropping open, his harmonica tumbling away and lodging itself in the clematis that must be all that held the balcony's railing in position. 'It's me or him, Kasimir,' he said, his voice a strangled imitation of the Prime, Salvo Andric talking to Sukui through the mouth of his cousin.
Sukui took another step and pushed but Axelmeyer was ready for him, his legs braced, his arms raised to fend off Sukui's hands.
They struggled but Sukui found that he possessed a strength he had never suspected and he was edging Axelmeyer slowly, relentlessly, backwards. 'We have to spread the Word,' hissed Sukui, and then he focused all his energy, his strength, and heaved Axelmeyer backwards.
Axelmeyer looked at him, aghast. Off balance, his legs came up against the railing and he tried to brace himself against it, to retaliate.
And then the railing broke.
Axelmeyer cried out, windmilled his arms as he began to tumble backwards, but it was no good, his fall was relentless. Below, the crowd that had been listening to the music gave a collective gasp as the Prime's cousin, along with the harmonica his fall had dislodged from the creepers, fell untidily to the ground.
~
Sukui sat up in his bed.
The night was still dark but his apartment in Hitachi Tower possessed large windows and so starlight illuminated the room. He shook his head, hoping to free his mind from that awful image.
But it was more than a nightmare. As the dream fragments seeped away from his wakening brain they were replaced by memories, transient images from four days before.
He had introduced Decker to the Prime in the morning; Salvo had been scared, he had said little—he had not wanted this extra complication added to his struggle to retain power. It had been a start, though, and it had been enough to distract the Prime from Sukui's recent activities.
And so, later that day, he had gone to Canebrake House. 'I have something to tell you,' he had said.
Axelmeyer had cleared the room of his entourage of supporters and sat with Sukui. 'Then tell me, Kasimir,' he had said. Sukui had told him about the Orbitals and Axelmeyer's response had been succinct. 'They have no jurisdiction. They interfere and we'll blow them out of the skies.' In response to Sukui's open-mouthed expression, he had added, 'We have a world to tame, a nation to propagate: they are irrelevant, these Orbital has-beens, can't you see, Kasimir? Is this all the information you had for me?' And then he had laughed and dismissed the subject.
How could he be so
blind?
Sukui had sat for a few moments more, as Axelmeyer went out to his balcony and played his mouth-organ for the ever-present crowd below the balcony. Sukui felt betrayed. He had gone against his Prime, aligned himself with this misfit scientist Axelmeyer, and now he had been accused of irrelevance. Axelmeyer had laughed at him.
Sukui had tried to work it out but had given up. He had sensed that events were beyond him, somehow all control had slipped beyond his reach.
He had stood and walked out to the balcony.
The railing was low, barely centimetres above Axelmeyer's knees. He had wanted Axelmeyer to turn so that he could argue with him, try to persuade him, but instead Axelmeyer had started to play a distorted version of a tune Sukui knew from Orlyons, a song made familiar to him by Mono and her Monotones.
A rage had overcome him and he had taken another step towards Axelmeyer's broad back.
Now, in the bedroom of his apartment in Hitachi Tower, a violent shudder passed over his body and tears began to flow. The feelings were alien to him: had he really wanted to kill Axelmeyer? To push him over that railing?
He had stepped forward and Axelmeyer had sensed him, half turned, cried out in surprise as his foot caught on the railing that could only have been held in place by the creepers and a layer of rust. The railing gave way and Axelmeyer lost balance, reached out as Sukui had instinctively reached out, their fingers brushing, Axelmeyer's body falling away, arms windmilling, harmonica flying out, matching the rate of his descent to the cobbled street below.
He had wanted to—intended to—kill Axelmeyer. Had he pulled his own hand away as Axelmeyer had reached out for him? If Siggy had not fallen, the railing given way, Sukui would most probably have pushed. He recognised that fact, he was honest with himself, he was rational. Sitting in his room he could see that there was no distinction between intention and fact: Axelmeyer was dead. Sukui had killed a man... he could see no other way to put it.
He hugged his knees to his chest and wished the thoughts would leave him, the memories.
He had nowhere to turn. He was alone. Lucilla had left several days ago to attend Mathias's trial; although that was rumoured to have taken place—and Mathias executed, another terrible black mark on Sukui' s conscience—there was no word yet of her return. In his state of despair he had lost track of everyone else: all his friends from Orlyons, the pageanteers, his colleagues in the Project.
He had been back to Salvo Andric only once since Axelmeyer's death. One phrase lingered in his memory. 'You have proven your loyalty, Kasimir; but how can I ever trust you again after
this?
You killed my cousin.' He had been unable to deny the Prime's accusation and so he had left straight away.
He could see that it had all slipped away from him. The Prime was desperately in need of guidance which Sukui was now unable to provide. The hut at Dixie Hill had been seized and all the trifacsimile machines impounded. How could the Prime be diverted from this suicidal course of action?
He did not know. Thinking hurt his head. He wanted to sleep but he knew what awaited if he were to close his eyes. He rose, dressed, and left his apartment for the first time in three days.
~
The streets of Alabama City were dangerous after dark but Kasimir Sukui no longer cared for his own security. He breathed the cold air deeply.
Leaving his apartment, he had possessed no clear plan. After a few minutes he realised that he had been heading along Grand Rue Street towards Soho. He recognised a small side street and his subconscious intention suddenly became clear to him.
The building's crooked door swung stiffly on its hinges and
Sukui entered, pausing in the dark corridor in an effort to find his bearings. He climbed some uneven steps and paused again.
The pale glow under the door before him, the door of the room Lui Tsang shared with Mags Sender, was a certain giveaway. He knocked and the glow cut out instantly.
'Sukui-san!' cried Mags, as she opened the door. 'We were worried about you. Nobody knew where you were.' Then she peered more closely at him. 'Shit, you look ill. Are you OK?'
He bowed his head and entered the room. Lui Tsang was sitting lotus on the floor below the single, shuttered window.
'Please,' said Sukui, 're-activate the trifacsimile.' He allowed himself a faint smile at the expression on Lui Tsang's face. 'It was the rational thing for you to do.'
Tsang dragged a blanket away from beside him, revealing a back-pack about thirty centimetres in each dimension. He flicked a switch and a trifax of Decker sprang up in the middle of the room. 'It's the only one we could get out,' said Tsang.
''They locked the rest up on Dixie Hill. They're scared.'
'It is possible to construct this apparatus in quantities?' asked Sukui.
'Sure,' said Decker, joining in. 'Once we'd shown Lui what he needed, he knocked up fifteen inside a day. You guys have so much stored that you don't know what to do with, it's crazy: you're almost better equipped than
we
are.'
'He's right,' said Mags. 'We figured they must have used trifax a lot when they first landed, before the revolutions, that is.'
'But all that's locked up now,' said Lui.
Sukui straightened himself, smoothed the creases in his robe. 'Decker, do you have any news from orbit?' His mind was beginning to function again.
'The terran ship is due in months as opposed to years,' said the trifax. 'ArcNet still hasn't given us a definite fix as yet. Listen, we've got to get ready. We have a loose kind of consensus up here now—at least everyone believes that it's happening—but you guys have to get moving. We're waiting for you, but you don't have much time.'
Sukui thought of Prime Salvo; he had obviously dismissed the same argument. He looked at Tsang, at Sender. 'Come along,' he said. 'We have no time to waste.'
'What are we going to do?' said Lui Tsang.
'We are going to visit a friend of mine: we will lend him your trifax.' The expressions on their faces were almost comical. The answer was clear yet they could not see it: 'We are going to see Chet Alpha.'
Chapter 22
Mathias Hanrahan had a day and a night to live. He knew he should prepare himself. He must go with dignity and for that he would need the sort of rigid discipline Kasimir Sukui had tried so hard to instil in him. He wished he could go out to Gorra Point and sit for a time amid the Pinnacles. The sea would calm him, as it always had. He would watch cutters skimming the waves, plunging for fish and then preening their furry bodies as they flew on. He would turn crawlers and watch them resume their initial direction in an ever-tightening arc. He would let the light breeze cool him and remind him of happier times.
But that was not to be. The fantasy calmed him a little but was no substitute for the reality.
There was a light tap on the door and Jeanna slipped into the room. 'I'm on for the rest of the day, sir,' she said. 'Anything I can get for you?'
She sat on a stool she had brought in earlier and began shuffling the set of cards on a cleared bedside table. She looked at him and her expression faltered slightly. 'Or I could just go,' she said. 'If you'd rather be alone.'
Mathias smiled. She was doing what she could. 'You deal,' he said, and swung his legs off the bed so he could be closer to the table. She concentrated intensely on the mixing of the cards; it was a skill she had only recently acquired. Mathias studied the lines of her frown and wondered if she was attracted to him, if that could be her reason for treating him so kindly.
'Cut?' she said.
He cut the pack and she dealt him six cards, straight from the top, then six for herself. He decided she must feel no real attraction towards him, there were no lingering looks, no comments heavy with implication.
He examined his cards. He tapped the table and she dealt him another, a trading Jill, face up. He left it where it was.
Jeanna was small and broadly built, all wisps of mousy hair and narrow lips and nervous flutterings of her hands. She was not unattractive, but Mathias felt nothing physical towards her. In a flash of insight he recognised that he was treating her as a sister, a replacement for the family he had never really had. He tapped and Jeanna dealt him another, a seventh heart. 'End,' he said, and she dealt one to herself.
She was good with the cards. She played intuitively, she had a natural flair for spotting the right moment; her manipulation of her hand was not so good, though—that was something that came with experience—but already, in so short a time, Mathias occasionally lost. Jeanna thought he was being generous and maybe a little patronising—he could see it in her eyes—but Mathias never fooled with cards these days, he always played to win.
Mathias won the first game and then shuffled the pack. As he dealt, Jeanna said, 'I tried to get you the paper you wanted. And a pencil. But it's no good. The Conventists have burnt a lot of books since the Prime came to power. I'm sorry, sir.'
'I wish you'd just call me Mathias, or Matt—that's what my friends call me.' He had wanted the paper so he could write down his memoirs, his own version of what had happened. Then, when Edward's empire crumbled, as Mathias knew it must, there would be a written record of the truth. He had no idea who would read it, if anybody, but the knowledge that it was
there
, on paper, was the one thing that might make his death easier to face. But the opportunity was not there.
Jeanna won the next two rounds. 'You're too kind, sir, you're too kind,' she said, as she swept up the cards from the table. 'I have to get back to my post,' she said. 'Dinner-time inspection, you know.'
'Jeanna, will you be on duty again? Before... tomorrow?'
She nodded.
'I'd like to talk to you.' Mathias grinned and shrugged. 'I'd like to tell you about myself, I'd like to tell you what's happening in the south. There'll be some big changes soon.'
Suddenly he knew what he must do. Jeanna was bright, she was quick and understanding. If Newest Delhi could provide him with no paper then
Jeanna
would be his paper. He would tell her everything. She would hear his own story, but also she would hear about the Orbitals and the ship from Earth. Idi Mondata had been right: such knowledge should not be held only in the south. The first attempt to spread the knowledge—talking to the market-place over Idi's PA system—had failed, but suddenly Mathias knew that a more personal approach might succeed. He had convinced Idi, he had aroused Edward's interest, he could convince Jeanna. Idi and Jeanna could tell their friends and then the process would mushroom. Mathias knew that at least he should try.
Jeanna turned in the doorway and nodded. 'Yes,' she said. 'Of course I'll be here. We'll talk later.'
~
Mathias ate his dinner, because he knew that lack of appetite would be reported as a sign of weakness, a loss of spirit. Edward would love that.
He stared out of his barred window. It was too early to have eaten: the sun was still in the sky, high enough to cast its light over the Manse walls and into the gardens. The door to his room opened and a hard-faced servant took his empty dishes away. The servants didn't wear masks to deal with Mathias. Maybe the practice had been abolished, since the death of Prime March. Maybe they simply felt that they had no need to hide their faces from Mathias: he was even lower than them, he did not count any more.
He stood staring at the closed door, waiting for Jeanna, rehearsing what he would tell her, trying to order the jumbled mass of his memories. There was so much to say, and so little time.
The door opened and Mono entered the room.
Mono
.
She was wearing a servant's jacket and trousers, edged with the tinsel that marked her as an entertainer.
She hugged him so long and so hard that he felt his face and his lungs burning. Finally she relaxed and he breathed in deeply.
He held her at arm's length and studied her tear-streaked face, then he held her close again. 'Matt,' she finally said, the first to speak. 'You dumb shit. Why did you let them take you? You want them to
kill
you? Oh, Matt.'
'How did you get to me?' said Mathias. 'How did you get in?'
'Fuck the right people and you can get anywhere,' she said, her face buried in Mathias's chest. 'And the guard outside, she's OK, she let me through. I had to see you.'
'I got here for the so-called trial,' she continued, pulling Mathias down to sit by her on the bed, holding on to his hand as if she would never let go. 'But I couldn't go. Not my scene.' She smiled, weakly. 'Anyway, Ngota was there. She was in Alabama, she would have recognised me. She hates you, Matt. She was the one after you in Orlyons, right? You can see it in her eyes. She said she'd found religion, back in Alabama: she joined Chet Alpha's Pageant of the Holy Charities—'
'
Chet Alpha?
' said Mathias. 'Religion?'
''S right.' Mono shrugged and moved closer to Mathias. 'I think he's genuine but Ngota, she's different. She hasn't committed herself to Chet's Pageant. She left it to come back here, she just wants to see you swinging, Matt. That's all she wants. One day she's preaching love and peace and the next she's back here, waiting.' Mono was crying again. Mathias had never seen her so distressed, she had always kept her feelings under the surface.
'Lucilla's nothing,' he said. 'Don't let her get at you. It's Edward who's killing me, not Lucilla Ngota.'
'Come on, Matt,' said Mono, suddenly standing and trying to pull him to his feet. 'We've got to get you out of here. It's all worked out.'
'No.' Mathias looked away. He couldn't meet Mono's gaze, it was accusing him, telling him he was cheating her or maybe just that he was the dumb shit she had called him earlier. 'I can't go,' he said. 'It would destroy everything. Edward would blame my escape on Alabama City, he'd stir up the troubles again, probably far worse than they were before. I came here to win some kind of peace, a breathing space for Sukui so he could keep the Project running. There are big things going on, Mono. I can't jeopardise them, not now.'
As he spoke, Mono stared at him. 'Sukui told me all that shit,' she said, her voice sad. 'He said why you'd let them take you, but that's all out in the open now—your Project, the angels. You don't have to stay here now, Matt. It's happening already.' She was pleading now.
'No,' said Mathias, briefly. He reached to his neck for Mono's pendant, removed it, held it out. 'Here,' he said, 'you'd better take this.'
Mono snatched it angrily and turned away. Then she slumped against the door.
Mathias helped her back to the bed where she sat, holding him tightly. 'I'm sorry,' he mumbled, repeating the phrase over and over. 'Will you tell me what's been happening?' he said, after a long interval, trying to change the subject.
'There was a lot of trouble in Alabama City when I got there.' Mono's voice was weak at first, but it strengthened as she spoke. 'The Prime's cousin was trying to start a revolution or something.'
'Siggy Axelmeyer?'
'That's right: Axelmeyer. Well Sukui-san must have thought Axelmeyer would win, and he went to talk to him. Then he was arrested—Sukui, that is—and that was when he told the Prime about the angels.'
'Angels?' Mathias was already working it out in advance.
'That's right. Living in the Arks, up in the sky. That's what they say, anyway. Chet Alpha knew about them too, he'd seen one and it had told him to spread word. They're like people, but Sukui-san says they're just like pictures, they come from projectors—Sukui-san and Lui Tsang have made lots of them. The angels are tall and strong-looking and your eyes can't make them sharp. They're difficult to see, normally, but if you see them in the right light they glow, like they really are angels.'
Mathias grinned. Someone had been fooling with trifacsimiles. 'What are these "angels" doing?' he asked.
'Chet's Pageant has split up and the Holy Charities are travelling around the Andricci lands, spreading the Word. You should see it, Matt, the effect the angels have on the people. They don't know what's hit them. People are just dropping everything and going on their knees, you wouldn't believe it but it's happening.
'The Andricci Prime started off by running things. He wouldn't let the angels out on the street at first, but the Pageant got hold of a projector and word got around. The people wanted to know and the Prime had to let more projectors out so he could stop a civil war. The Prime's lost control now, no one will listen to him—they know about the people living in the sky, they know there's more people coming from Earth.'
'Has the Pageant reached Clermont or the Hanrahan lands?'
'When I left it had hardly got outside of Alabama City,' said Mono. 'The Charities are on foot and they're converting people as they go. They won't even reach the borderlands for another month or two.'
'What did Siggy Axelmeyer do, with all this going on?' Mathias could not imagine Siggy allowing something like this when he had been so close to seizing power.
'Oh, he fell from a balcony,' said Mono. 'He was playing mouth-organ to a crowd, leaning over the edge. Word is that Sukui-san pushed him but I can't see him doing that—he was always so gentle.'
Mathias remembered how Siggy used to irritate Sukui, but he couldn't picture the old scientist as an assassin. Sukui was a peaceable man: that part of the story had to be wrong.
'Can't you see, Matt? It's happening already. You've got nothing to stay here for. Do you
want
to die?'
'I have, Mono, I have.' He shook his head. 'You're right: things are starting to move, but that's even more reason to stay. If Edward started the troubles again, everything would be destroyed. Can't
you
see? The Project is working. I can't go.'
Mono slumped against him in defeat. 'Dumb shit, you dumb shit,' she kept mumbling. When she kissed him her mouth tasted of salt. Her servant outfit came off easily and Mathias's clothes soon joined Mono's on the floor. All the time he was thinking that this shouldn't be happening. He was going to die tomorrow and here he was—here
they
were—sealing their bond in a way they had avoided for so long.
It didn't last long, the flow of emotions was too intense. Even as they were—body pressing against, moving against, shuddering against, body—it was not a physical thing, it was a joining of souls, an acknowledgement of something they had always known.
Afterwards they lay in each other's embrace, Mathias ebbing, slowly, inside his lover. 'You have to leave,' he whispered, when their breathing had returned to normal. 'You have to get away from here.'
Mono shifted. 'You're going to stay, aren't you? You're stubborn, Matt, a stubborn, dumb
shit
.' She struggled away from him and pulled her clothes on quickly, keeping her back to him but failing to hide her tears.
Mathias dressed and held the door closed for a moment. 'Mono,' he said. 'I've never really loved anyone before, but—'
'No,' she said. 'I guess you haven't.' She pulled at the door and Mathias let it open without resisting. He wanted to stop her, to hold her again. More than anything he wanted to go with her, but he fought his feelings.
Sukui would have been proud of his pupil.
As Mono hurried away down the corridor, Jeanna looked at Mathias. 'She looked harmless enough,' she said, her voice nervous, unsure. 'I should have asked.'
Mathias shrugged and shut the door, fearful of the day to come, hoping that he could at least give the
impression
of dignity even if, in his heart, he felt utterly worthless.
Turning back into the room, he noticed something glinting on his table. He picked it up. Mono had left the opal pendant. He couldn't work out if that made him feel better or worse. He put it round his neck and tried to forget.