Expatria: The Box Set (44 page)

CHAPTER 20

'Animal, human; emotional, rational; animal-emotional, human-rational.' Kasimir Sukui sat in the Manse gardens pulling the petals from a tea rose, one by one by one. He knew he was not fully recovered, but also he knew that the universe would not wait for him to catch up.

He reached the last petal, split it along its central vein and smiled triumphantly. 'Huminal,' he said, checking his blood pressure on a tiny monitor which RoCora had gummed to his wrist. It gave him his pulse, too, along with blood sugar and numerous substances which were unknown to him.

Apart from the lethargy that was weighing down on his limbs he felt healthy. The monitor concurred. It might be a useful gadget to a person who did not know their own body, he supposed.

'Mathias!' he called, spotting the Prime's half-brother striding purposefully along one of the paths. Here in the centre of the gardens, it was difficult to believe that the Primal Manse surrounded a person on every side. It was so peaceful, it was an excellent retreat from the pressures of government. 'Mathias. I am over here. Under the
Corylus
, besides the
Aster
and the tufted
Achillea
.' Mathias looked up but did not see Sukui. 'Under the tall green bush, by the purple and pink daisies.'

Mathias spotted Sukui and came to crouch before him. 'How are you doing?' he asked.

'I do as I have always done,' said Sukui. 'Perhaps a little more slowly. Please—' he gestured at a rock by his own '—sit with me. You are no longer my pupil. You are upset—perhaps you should have my monitor?' He pulled the device from his wrist but Mathias did not smile. Sukui began to take the monitor apart with a selection of small implements which he produced from a fold in his robe.

'I'm going,' said Mathias. 'I can't take any more.'

'You are all deserting me,' said Sukui, scattering pieces of plastic over the ground. Ants immediately began to remove the smaller sections. Sukui noted this and then bit on a piece of the plastic before spitting it out. 'Sugar-based,' he said. 'Not to my taste. Why are you going?'

'Edward is ... not to my taste. He should never have been Prime, he's too weak, too selfish, too
safe
. A leader has to take some risks to run things well.'

'Security can be pleasing,' said Sukui.

'Not in a time of change. Edward still hasn't come to terms with it all. He thinks that if he can just ride out the storm things'll get back to normal, but they won't. He can't see it.'

'You could do better?'

'I don't know. But I know certain people want to give me the chance.'

'So you run.'

'I'm not running, I'm just getting out. I promised him when I came back that I'd never oppose him—he's always been scared of me, he needed that. I've tried to help him. I've told him we can't just sit back and let GenGen take over, we've got to at least make them meet us halfway. Anybody who stands up to GenGen is finding out what they're really like—did you hear about Strawberry Fields? GenGen have knocked it to the ground. Edward told me, in his matter of fact voice, pretending that it didn't really mean anything. Even the Nano-Hippies are starting to come in for some rough treatment—evangelicals trespassing in their mood shacks, that kind of thing. Suddenly the game's got harder. If Edward had stood up to them from the start they wouldn't be doing this now—either that or they'd have taken over by force. Now they're just slipping in behind the defences.

'I've had enough, Sukui-san. If Edward won't trust me then that's my last connection broken. It's time for me to be selfish like everybody else. I have one of Idi Mondata's catamarans waiting for me. I've fixed its rigging and steering so it doesn't need a crew. Shit, Sukui, I'm getting out before I go crazy. Is that enough explanation for you?'

Sukui bowed his head. 'Your condition is clear, Mathias. Please do not group me with your "opponents". You are going to Orlyons?'

'No.' The answer came quickly, with the speed of a fresh wound. 'Orlyons is through for me. For now, at any rate. I'm going to follow the littoral winds. I'm heading north-west along the coast until I hit the equator. I'm going to make some time for myself, see the world. If I ever come back it'll be when things have had time to settle. It's best for everyone.'

He stood and bowed fully to Sukui. 'Remember me to Lui and the guys at Dixie. Goodbye, Sukui-san.'

Soon Mathias was lost to the greenery. There was a rationality to his decision, but also a large element of impulse. Suddenly Sukui felt a terrible sense of his own insignificance. Whatever he did, the world would continue around him. Perhaps he should hide, too, and return when things had settled? He couldn't. When he was well again, he would be far too curious about what was happening to miss any of it; he was rational enough to see that much. He stood and headed back towards his room. He had things to do.

~

'Why did Edward want me freed, then? Huh?' Chet Alpha tugged at Sukui's sleeve and stumbled over a heap of rubbish in the gutter.

'I was not aware that he did,' said Sukui. It was now three hours since sunrise, four before sunset. Sukui had chewed some
coca
from the primal gardens and now he felt completely well again. It was likely that the herb's properties existed only in his mind but he was content to chew the leaves and believe.

'But...'

Chet Alpha had been locked up in a Corinthian mission house two blocks from the city's primary market-place. He had been drinking, he had become intoxicated. He had lain himself in front of Director Moroni's floater and sung bar-room songs at her and so he had been removed by some evangelicals and locked in the old gaming house that their division now occupied.

Upon hearing this, Sukui had visited the mission house, written three lines in terse Latin on a sheet of the leathery local paper and then emblazoned it with a seal he had borrowed while the Prime was elsewhere. The Corinthians had known no better; they knew the seal, they couldn't read the writing. Sukui had puffed himself up and demanded Alpha's instant release—did they not know that Director Moroni was at this precise moment dining with the Prime? He had been pleased to note that the signals of hierarchy were the same for Terrans as they were on Expatria. They had released Alpha immediately.

'We have been acquainted for some long time,' said Sukui. 'I would hope that you were open to my advice?'

'Sure, sure,' said Alpha. 'You're a man of science, I'm a man of the cloth. We're equals, Sukui-san, course I'll listen.'

'You are most generous. Chet, while you have been visiting with the Corinthians a lot has happened. The signs indicate that more is about to happen. What are your feelings about the Holy Corporation? Will you tell me?'

'Dunno, really. I don't like 'em, that's for sure. But then, beliefs should be able to exist side by side, is what I say. They've mostly ignored the Pageant so far, it's like we're not really here. They're gonna work their way all around and then maybe they'll deal with us when they're ready. Right now I'm going to look out Alya and Larinda an' see what they're thinking. It's time we spoke up, like the Krishnas are doing, time we let blow.'

They emerged on one side of the market-place. Wailing mommas cried from nearby, still trying to sell their statuettes and their blessings and forgivenesses. Farther into the market, set amongst stalls of meat and fish and bric-a-brac, there was a swathe of pink canvas marking a centre for the Pageant of the Holy Charities.

'Chet, I feel that it is too late. The Death Krishnas are learning that at this very moment. I fear that GenGen is about to reveal its true face.

'If you wish to survive then your best chance is to return to Orlyons. It has taken me a long time to realise it, but now I am scared.'

Chet Alpha stopped and squinted at Sukui, clearly unaccustomed to this degree of candour.

'Yes, Chet: scared. I do not know what will happen. I do not know what GenGen will do now that they are established. I do not trust them.'

'You think we should fight?'

'Never,' said Sukui, firmly. 'But we should be aware of the dangers... I do not know. I am tired.' It hit him suddenly, once again.

Chet Alpha helped him over to a stool in the shade of the pink canvas. Here,' he said, grabbing a clay bottle from a passing Charity. 'It's medicine, that's how I see it.'

Sukui took a long drink, felt it slide down his throat, setting the lining afire. He gasped, took another swig, then passed the bottle back to Alpha. 'I am leaving,' he said, eventually. 'I am returning to my people. I feel it is where I should be.'

Alpha crouched before him. 'Sukui-san,' he said. 'Remember Alabama City, when the Pageant was just starting up? You were the first guy there I asked to join up. I didn't think, I jus' asked cos it felt right, you know?'

'I remember,' said Sukui. The world was slowly stabilising around him, the energy returning to his extremities. 'I was flattered.'

'Offer's still there,' said Alpha. 'Will you take the cloth? You don't need to preach or nothin', it's somethin' inside—the Pageant's not about gods or nothin', unless you want it to be. It's about making you whole again, pasting over all the divisions in your head. You asked me what my theology was an' I didn't have it back then, I just
knew
. Now I know that we don't need any—we believe what we want to. Your god is science—well that's OK by the rest of us. We each believe different things; the only thing is we believe them
together
. Will you do it, Mister Sukui?'

The suggestion was preposterous. Sukui had never been a religious man. He was rational, a man of science, a man who sought balance in all things. 'What do I do?' he said.

Alpha did not appear at all surprised. 'I guessed you might be ready,' he said. 'OK. Here's what you do. You take the bottle, you raise your hand, you take a drink, you're a Charity. Congratulations, Mister Sukui, we'll always be by you!'

He felt no different. He wondered why he had done such an impulsive thing. He stood and bowed his head to Chet Alpha. 'I must go,' he said. And so he went.

~

Anderson had warned Sukui against any formal farewell. 'GenGen might oppose your leaving,' he had said. 'They are having trouble approaching Prime Salvo—they might not want someone of your standing going to tell him the mess they're making in Newest Delhi. I will tell Edward later, when he is less unsettled. He will understand.'

So now, Sukui walked alone, resisting the urge to check over his shoulder to see if he was being followed. He passed into Eagles Alley, as instructed by Anderson. The alleyway was narrow and deserted; he paused at its end, but no one appeared to be trailing him.

The next street was wide and dusty, flanked by raised pavements and whitewashed terraces of housing, pocked with the discreet frontages of milliners' and tailors' and the offices of professional advocates. This was Tarabalus Row, this was where Lars Anderson had said he would be met. He stopped in the shade of a small piñon tree, growing from a gap in the pavement. People passed along the street on foot and seated in carriages and wagons, others stood in small groups, talking and laughing and handing over purses of money.

He nodded, satisfied. There were no Terrans here.

A man approached him, shaking his hands by his side in the greeting Sukui had been taught. Sukui mirrored the hand-shake discreetly and bowed his head. 'My name is Sukui-san,' he said.

The man straightened his neck-tie and smiled. 'You can call me Seamus,' he said. 'Come and meet your skipper.'

Sukui followed the man for approximately fifty metres along Tarabalus Row. They came to a pair of stone pillars, each bearing the masonic mark of the pierced bible. Seamus passed through and Sukui followed him into a small courtyard full of knee-high herb bushes and carved stone mushrooms.

The lodge was a tall building of off-white blocks. The columns of a great arch rose from either side of a discreet doorway to a height of seven or eight metres. Lettering covered the surface of this arch from end to end, hieroglyphs and roman letters, running together into what appeared to be one long word. Looking up, Sukui noted that the arch was surmounted by a detailed depiction of the Seal of Solomon, its eyes glinting in the strong afternoon sunlight. 'We'll have to wait,' said the man.

Sounds were coming from the lodge, the tones of a pipe organ, the words of a song. '
Now the evening shadows closing, Drive from toil to peaceful rest
.' Sukui studied the lettering on the surface of the arch closest to him but he could not decipher its content. '
Mystic arts and rites reposing, Sacred in each faithful breast
.'

The song came to a close and almost immediately Masons began to stream out of the building. Some looked strangely at Sukui as they passed him by, but most simply pretended he was not there. There were several faces he recognised, most of whom were open about their affiliations; Sukui assumed that those such as Captain Anderson, who preferred to keep their Masonry a private affair, were more surreptitious about their attendance at the lodge.

'Ah,' said Seamus. 'Egon. Here we are. Over here!'

Sukui looked up sharply. Egon?

A man separated from the crowd and came to stand by Sukui's contact. 'Sukui-san,' said Seamus. 'This is—'

'It's OK,' said the man called Egon, resting a hand on the other man s shoulder. 'I know Sukui-san.' He smiled. 'We have met before.' He bowed his head to Sukui, a smile evident on his face.

'Come on, Sukui-san, we have little time to spare. Our boat is waiting.'