"Perhaps we can talk later," she said.
He turned, still backing off. "Yes; I'd… that would…" He seemed to lose inspiration, and nodded nervously again, walking quickly to the doors at the far end of the arboretum. He left without looking back.
Sma whirled round to the drone, which was now humming innocently and apparently staring into the depths of a gaudily coloured flower, its stubby snout half buried in the bloom. It noticed her and looked up. She stood with legs apart, put one fist on her hip and said, " " Toots"?"
The drone's aura field flashed on; the mixture of purple regret and gunmetal puzzlement looked distinctly unconvincing. "I don't know, Sma… just slipped out. Alliteration."
Sma kicked at a dead branch, fixed the drone with a glare and said, "Well?"
"You're not going to like this," the drone said quietly, retreating a little and going dark with sorrow.
Sma hesitated. She looked away for a moment, shoulders suddenly slumping. She sat down on one of the tree roots. The gown crumpled around her. "It's Zakalwe, isn't it?"
The drone flashed rainbow in surprise; so quickly — she thought — it might even have been genuine. "Good grief," it said. "How…?"
She waved the question away. "I don't know. Tone of voice. Human intuition… Just that time again. Life was getting to be too much fun." She closed her eyes and rested her head against the rough dark trunk of the tree. "So?"
The drone Skaffen-Amtiskaw lowered itself to the same height as the woman's shoulder and floated near her. She looked at it.
"We need him back again," it told her.
"I sort of thought so," Sma sighed, flicking away an insect which had just landed on her shoulder.
"Well, yes. I'm afraid nothing else will work; it has to be him personally."
"Yeah, but does it have to be me personally?"
"That's… the consensus."
"Wonderful," Sma said sourly.
"You want the rest?"
"Does it get any better?"
"Not really."
"Hell," Sma clapped her hands on her lap and rubbed them up and down. "Might as well have it all at once."
"You would have to leave tomorrow."
"Aw drone, come on!" She buried her head in her hands. She looked up. The drone was fiddling with a twig. "You're kidding."
"'Fraid not."
"What about all this?" She waved towards the turbine hall doors. "What about the peace conference? What about all the froth out there with their greased-up palms and their beady eyes? What about three years work? What about an entire fucking planet…?"
"The conference will go ahead."
"Oh sure, but what about this "pivotal role" I was supposed to be playing?"
"Ah," said the drone, bringing the twig right up to the sensing band on the front of its casing, "well…"
"Oh no."
"Look, I know you don't like…"
"No, drone; it's not…" Sma got up suddenly and went to the edge of the crystal wall, looking out into the night.
"Dizzy… , the drone said, drifting closer.
"Don't you «Dizzy» me."
"Sma… it isn't real. It's a stand-in; electronic, mechanical, electro-chemical, chemical; a machine; a Mind-controlled machine, not alive in itself. Not a clone or…"
"I know what it is, drone," she said, clasping her hands behind her.
The drone floated closer to her, putting its fields to her shoulders, squeezing gently. She shook its grip off, looked down.
"We need your permission, Diziet."
"Yeah, I know that, too." She looked up for stars that were twice hidden, by cloud and by the lights of the arboretum.
"You can, of course, stay here if you want to." The drone's voice was heavy, remorseful. "The peace conference is certainly important; it needs… somebody to smooth things through. No doubt about that."
"And what's so goddamn crucial I have to high-tail it tomorrow?"
"Remember Voerenhutz?"
"I remember Voerenhutz," she said, voice flat.
"Well, the peace lasted forty years, but it's breaking down now. Zakalwe worked with a man called…"
"Maitchigh?" she frowned, half turning her head to the drone.
"Beychae. Tsoldrin Beychae. He became president of the cluster following our involvement. While he was in power he held the political system together, but he retired eight years ago, long before he had to, to pursue a life of study and contemplation." The drone made a sighing noise. "Things have slipped back since, and at the moment Beychae lives on a planet whose leaders are subtly hostile to the forces Zakalwe and Beychae represented and we backed, and who are taking a leading part in the factionalising of the group. There are several small conflicts under way and many more brewing; full-scale war involving the entire cluster is, as they say, imminent."
"And Zakalwe?"
"Basically, it's an Out. Down to the planet, convince Beychae he's needed, and at the very least get him to declare an interest. But it may mean a physical spring, and the added complication is Beychae may require a lot of convincing."
Sma thought it through, still regarding the night. "No tricks we can play?"
"The two men know each other too well for anything other than the real Zakalwe to work… likewise Tsoldrin Beychae and the political machine throughout the entire system. Too many memories involved altogether."
"Yeah," Sma said quietly. "Too many memories." She rubbed her bare shoulders, as though she was cold. "What about big guns?"
"We've a nebula fleet assembling; a core of one Limited System Vehicle and three General Contact Units stationed around the cluster itself, plus eighty or so GCUs keeping their tracks within a month's rush-in distance. There ought to be four or five GSVs within a two-to-three-months dash for the next year or so. But that's very, very much a last resort."
"Megadeath figures looking a bit equivocal are they?" Sma sounded bitter.
"If you want to put it that way," Skaffen Amtiskaw said.
"Oh goddamn," Sma said quietly, closing her eyes. "So; how far away is Voerenhutz? I've forgotten."
"Only about forty days, but we have to pick Zakalwe up first; say… ninety for the whole outward journey."
She turned around. "Who's going to control the stand-in if the ship's taking me?" Her gaze flicked skyward.
"The Just Testing will remain here in any event," the drone said. "The very fast picket Xenophobe has been put at your disposal. It can uplift tomorrow, a little after noon, earliest… should you wish."
Sma stood still for a moment, feet together and arms crossed, her lips pursed and face pinched. Skaffen-Amtiskaw introspected for a moment, and decided it felt sorry for her.
The woman was immobile and silent for a few seconds; then, abruptly, she was striding towards the turbine hall doors, heels clattering on the brick pathway.
The drone swooped after her, falling in at her shoulder. "What I wish," Sma said, "is that you had a better sense of timing."
"I'm sorry. Did I interrupt something?"
"Not at all. And what the hell's a "very fast picket" anyway?"
"New name for a (Demilitarised) Rapid Offensive Unit," the drone said.
She glanced at it. It wobbled, shrugging.
"It's supposed to sound better."
"And it's called the Xenophobe. Well that's just fine. Can the stand-in pick up immediately?"
"Noon tomorrow; can you de-brief up to…?"
"Tomorrow morning." Sma said, as the drone flicked round in front of her and sucked the tall doors open; she strode through and leapt up the steps into the turbine hall, skirts gathered in front her her. The hralzs came skidding round the corner from the hall and gathered yelping and bouncing around her. Sma stopped, while they milled around her, sniffing her hems and trying to lick her hands.