Barrington Bayley - The Pillars of Eternity

‘No one has been able to get down.’ Obsoc’s mouth twitched. ‘Plenty have tried. The atmosphere is impossible to penetrate.’

Boaz was silent; he left it to his puzzled expression to ask the question.

‘My engineer tells me the planet is surrounded by a “reverse inertial field”,’ Obsoc supplied. ‘Though in my view he is simply covering up ignorance with clever words.’

‘It doesn’t make sense,’ Boaz said slowly.

‘For Meirjain to be inaccessible? Presumably it makes sense to whatever intelligence is manipulating us in this fashion. There is something down there, shipkeeper, and it is playing games with us.’

‘We can’t hang around here forever,’ Boaz said. ‘The cruiser will be on us in a few standard days.’

‘The cruiser may not necessarily have things all its own way. We have a regular orbital town here, Shipkeeper Boaz, and some firepower.’ Obsoc frowned. ‘The real problem is whether anything is going to come of this exercise. You may care to add your voice to an attempt to find a way out of the impasse. We are holding a meeting to see if there might be some way forward.’

‘Who will be at this meeting?’

‘Some of those who have tried to penetrate the barrier. Also some scientific minds who are among us.’ Obsoc paused. ‘Also it has not been possible to exclude some of the more forceful personalities present. I should warn you that they are people of the most dangerous sort. Tempers are frayed; there has already been fighting.’

‘And who is holding it?’

‘It will take place aboard my yacht. The quarters here are particularly commodious. Heave to in three standard hours if you are interested.’

‘All right,’ Boaz decided. ‘I’ll be there.’

The image disappeared from his projective imagination. ‘Instructions?’ the ship queried.

‘Continue orbit.’

Boaz looked again at the planet below. For some reason the events taking place did not arouse his curiosity. He merely found the mystery annoying.

With an aggrieved sigh, he went back to sleep.

The ships were beginning to gather when Boaz approached The Sedulous Seeker . A crowd of them, of all shapes and sizes, stretched about the sleek, elegant form of the yacht. He recognized Romrey’s natty Stardiver nestling close under the belly of the bigger spaceship, its access tube dangling. Romrey, it appeared, had already joined the party.

A voice sounded in his head, not Obsoc’s but a crewman’s or else a machine’s. ‘Citizen Obsoc welcomes you aboard, Shipkeeper Boaz.’

His ship conveyed his thanks for him. He clambered down to the port, from where an access tube was already reaching out to join up with a similar tube from the star yacht. As soon as they were sealed the lid flicked up to allow him to enter.

The distance to the yacht was about fifty yards. The inertial gravity field did not operate outside the skin of the ship and once in the tube he was in free fall, pulling himself along by means of handholds. Then, as he passed the midpoint, he came down to the floor with a bump. He might have guessed, he thought ruefully, that a man as wealthy as Obsoc would have gravity even in an access tube.

The farther lid flicked up as he reached it. A solicitous robot helped him through the port. ‘Citizen Obsoc is in the main lounge, sir,’ it said, in the same voice Boaz had heard earlier. ‘If you will follow me.’

The corridor was panelled with honeywood, an organic fibrous substance with an intriguing texture which had highlights of silver in it. A thick-piled carpet made walking a silent, mossy experience. It was quite unlike the hard though sometimes springy floors he was used to.

The robot ushered him into the lounge. Radalce Obsoc stepped politely forward to greet him.

Boaz gazed about him. Walls and ceiling were patterned in fretted gold. There was little furniture. He got the idea most of it had been removed, perhaps to make more room, perhaps to avoid risk of damage to Obsoc’s valuable antiques. There were about a dozen people present, including Romrey who sat talking with a young man while a fat, bland woman watched them both. He had been invited, presumably, on the strength of the partnership the three of them had recently enjoyed. Obsoc, perhaps uniquely among those who had flocked to Wildhart, had a sense of propriety.

‘You won’t accommodate everybody here,’ he remarked.

‘You refer to the ships outside? They gather like insects around honey. Word has gone around. But I have invited only twenty-six persons in all.’ He lowered his tone. ‘Over there is Larry with two of his girls. You must, of course, take care not to annoy them.’

Surreptitiously he gestured to a huge man, big-boned, with the hard, aggressive face of a mobster, who stood by a table. He was flanked by two junoesque women as large as himself, younger but with a striking family resemblance – the same large-boned jaw, the flashing, challenging eyes. They would be taken for Larry’s sisters or daughters. They were, Boaz knew, his clones, genetically male like himself but somatically female, having been given hormone treatment in the foetus stage. Larry’s entire gang consisted of such girls, of whom he had an unknown number. Now, like most of the other guests, he stood awkwardly, impatiently sipping from a glass.

Boaz’s attention was caught by the opening of another door farther along the lounge. This time it was the Hat Brothers who entered. Obsoc rushed immediately to receive them.

The Hat Brothers might also have been taken for clones, but were in fact naturally identical twins. Their appearance together was striking not so much for their lookalike features as for the black, wide-brimmed hats they both wore. The story of those metal hats was well known. Boaz was aware that the psychopathology of the professional criminal involved a passion for strong family relationships – as witness the Larry gang. The brothers’ hats were welded to their skulls. Bestowed on them by their father, they were transceivers for relaying mental activity, tuned and coded only to one another. Each brother experienced all the thoughts and feelings of the other, and this had been the case since their early years. They were, in effect, one mind with two bodies.

It was an unsettling sensation to be in the presence of the brothers. Boaz watched as, walking in step, they traversed the lounge to reach the drinks table. People moved furtively out of their path. As they passed near Larry and his girls, ignoring them, there was a definite air of tension.

Deftly, like two android robots operated by a single controller, they took a drink apiece from the table top and turned to face the room.

‘All right!’ barked one in an acid voice. ‘Let’s get started!’

‘We’re not all here yet,’ growled Larry, his voice testy.

‘It’s not our liking to be kept waiting,’ the Hat Brother said. Then his twin, as if continuing the same speech (which was likely pointed to the young man who had been talking with Romrey). ‘ You tried to get down, and got farther than most. You’re an engineer too, we hear.’

‘And you ,’ continued his brother, pointing to another man, bearded, in a crimson tunic, ‘you’re a physicist.’ The twins looked around the now silent gathering. ‘We’ve enough here to be starting with. If there are any ideas, let’s have them.’

One of Larry’s girls suddenly strode across the room. She raised her fist at the last brother to speak. ‘If you think you can push us around—’

‘Ladies! Gentlemen! Please!’ Obsoc pressed himself forward supplicatingly. ‘We must not quarrel. We are here to co-operate.’

There was a smile of amusement hovering around Larry’s thin, hard lips. He beckoned to his girl. She rejoined him.