Horza dried in the airstream with some difficulty. Like everything else in the spaceship it was built on a monumental scale befitting the size of the Idirans, and the hurricane of air it produced nearly blew him out of the shower cabinet.
The Querl Xoralundra, spy-father and warrior priest of the Four Souls tributory sect of Farn-Idir, clasped two hands on the surface of the table. It looked to Horza rather like a pair of continental plates colliding.
“So, Bora Horza,” boomed the old Idiran, “you are recovered.”
“Just about,” nodded Horza, rubbing his wrists. He sat in Xoralundra’s cabin in The Hand of God 137, clothed in a bulky but comfortable space suit apparently brought along just for him. Xoralundra, who was also suited up, had insisted the man wear it because the warship was still at battle stations as it swept a fast and low-powered orbit around the planet of Sorpen. A Culture GCU of the Mountain class had been confirmed in the system by Naval Intelligence; the Hand was in on its own, and they couldn’t find any trace of the Culture ship, so they had to be careful.
Xoralundra leaned towards Horza, casting a shadow over the table. His huge head, saddle-shaped when seen from directly in front, with the two front eyes clear and unblinking near the edges, loomed over the Changer. “You were lucky, Horza. We did not come in to rescue you out of compassion. Failure is its own reward.”
“Thank you, Xora. That’s actually the nicest thing anybody’s said to me all day.” Horza sat back in his seat and put one of his old-looking hands through his thin, yellowing hair. It would take a few days for the aged appearance he had assumed to disappear, though already he could feel it starting to slip away from him. In a Changer’s mind there was a self-image constantly held and reviewed on a semi-subconscious level, keeping the body in the appearance willed. Horza’s need to look like a Gerontocrat was gone now, so the mental picture of the minister he had impersonated for the Idirans was fragmenting and dissolving, and his body was going back to its normal, neutral state.
Xoralundra’s head went slowly from side to side between the edges of the suit collar. It was a gesture Horza had never fully translated, although he had worked for the Idirans and known Xoralundra well since before the war.
“Anyway. You are alive,” Xoralundra said. Horza nodded and drummed his fingers on the table to show he agreed. He wished the Idiran chair he was perched on didn’t make him feel so much like a child; his feet weren’t even touching the deck.
“Just. Thanks, anyway. I’m sorry I dragged you all the way in here to rescue a failure.”
“Orders are orders. I personally am glad we were able to. Now I must tell you why we received those orders.”
Horza smiled and looked away from the old Idiran, who had just given him something of a compliment; a rare thing. He looked back and watched the other being’s wide mouth — big enough, thought Horza, to bite off both your hands at once — as it boomed out the precise, short words of the Idiran language.
“You were once with a caretaker mission on Schar’s World, one of the Dra’Azon Planets of the Dead,” Xoralundra stated. Horza nodded. “We need you to go back there.”
“Now?” Horza said to the broad, dark face of the Idiran. “There are only Changers there. I’ve told you I won’t impersonate another Changer. I certainly won’t kill one.”
“We are not asking you to do that. Listen while I explain.” Xoralundra leant on his back-rest in a way almost any vertebrate — or even anything like a vertebrate — would have called tired. “Four standard days ago,” the Idiran began — then his suit helmet, which was lying on the floor near his feet, let out a piercing whine. He picked up the helmet and set it on the table. “Yes?” he said, and Horza knew enough about the Idiran voice to realise that whoever was bothering the Querl had better have a good reason for doing so.
“We have the Culture female,” a voice said from the helmet.
“Ahh…” Xoralundra said quietly, sitting back. The Idiran equivalent of a smile — mouth pursing, eyes narrowing — passed over his features. “Good, Captain. Is she aboard yet?”
“No, Querl. The shuttle is a couple of minutes out. I’m withdrawing the gun-platforms. We are ready to leave the system as soon as they are all on board.”
Xoralundra bent closer to the helmet. Horza inspected the aged skin on the back of his hands. “What of the Culture ship?” the Idiran asked.
“Still nothing, Querl. It cannot be anywhere in the system. Our computer suggests it is outside, possibly between us and the fleet. Before long it must realise we are in here by ourselves.”
“You will set off to rejoin the fleet the instant the female Culture agent is aboard, without waiting for the platforms. Is that understood, Captain?” Xoralundra looked at Horza as the human glanced at him. “Is that understood, Captain?” the Querl repeated, still looking at the human.
“Yes, Querl,” came the answer. Horza could hear the icy tone, even through the small helmet speaker.
“Good. Use your own initiative to decide the best route back to the fleet. In the meantime you will destroy the cities of De’aychanbie, Vinch, Easna-Yowon, Izilere and Ylbar with fusion bombs, as per the Admiralty’s orders.”
“Yes, Qu—” Xoralundra stabbed a switch in the helmet, and it fell silent.
“You got Balveda?” Horza asked, surprised.
“We have the Culture agent, yes. I regard her capture, or destruction, as of comparatively little consequence. But only by our assuring the Admiralty we would attempt to take her would they contemplate such a hazardous mission ahead of the main fleet to rescue you.”
“Hmm. Bet you didn’t get Balveda’s knife missile.” Horza snorted, looking again at the wrinkles on his hands.
“It destructed while you were being put aboard the shuttle which brought you up to the ship.” Xoralundra waved one hand, sending a draught of Idiran-scented air across the table. “But enough of that. I must explain why we risked a light cruiser to rescue you.”
“By all means,” Horza said, and turned to face the Idiran.
“Four standard days ago,” the Querl said, “a group of our ships intercepted a single Culture craft of conventional outward appearance but rather odd internal construction, judging by its emission signature. The ship was destroyed easily enough, but its Mind escaped. There was a planetary system near by. The Mind appears to have transcended real space to within the planetary surface of the globe it chose, thus indicating a level of hyperspatial field management we had thought — hoped — was still beyond the Culture. Certainly such spaciobatics are beyond us for the moment. We have reason to believe, due to that and other indications, that the Mind involved is one from a new class of General Systems Vehicles the Culture is developing. The Mind’s capture would be an intelligence coup of the first order.”
The Querl paused there. Horza took the opportunity to ask, “Is this thing on Schar’s World?”
“Yes. According to its last message it intended to shelter in the tunnels of the Command System.”
“And you can’t do anything about it?” Horza smiled.
“We came to get you. That is doing something about it, Bora Horza.” The Querl paused. “The shape of your mouth tells me you see something amusing in this situation. What would that be?”
“I was just thinking… lots of things: that that Mind was either pretty smart or very lucky; that you were very lucky you had me close by; also that the Culture isn’t likely to sit back and do nothing.”