might try.
What now?
Hatch could run. A singlefighter sheathed with a force-field was hard to detect, hard to follow. It was almost invisible.
Almost – but not quite. Sensitive instruments could detect the sheathing force-field itself. Furthermore, the sophisticated radar systems of the Nexus could detect the patterns of air turbulence left in the wake of an aircraft, and so could hunt down any flying machine, regardless of the sophistication of its camouflaging legerdemain.
'Sequence,' said Hatch, alerting his singlefighter to the fact that he wanted to give it instructions.
'Say sequence,' said the singlefighter, indicating its readiness to receive instructions.
'Maximum self-destruct on ejection plus one.'
So said Hatch. He knew that Lupus would be readying himself for the attack. When Hatch's singlefighter shed its protective force-field, it would be momentarily helpless and exposed to attack. Knowing that, Lupus would probably close the distance and come in close. Come in close for the kill. That was his fashion, his style. He liked to be close, close enough to enjoy to the full the primitive satisfactions of destruction.
That was his weakness.
'Sequence received,' said the singlefighter, acknowledging its receipt of orders. Then it repeated those orders so they could be checked: 'Maximum self-destruct on ejection plus one.'
'Sequence continues,' said Hatch.
'Continue sequence.'
'Ejection is simultaneous with liberty.'
'Continuation received,' said the singlefighter. 'You will be ejected immediately we have liberty.'
As the command 'prison' directed a singlefighter to seal itself inside a protective force-field, so the reverse- word 'liberty' commanded it to unseal itself.
'Very well then,' said Hatch. 'Liberty!'
The singlefighter shed its protective force-field and ejected Asodo Hatch. Blasted free by his ejection sheet, he was slammed up and out. The air smashed him. He heard the taut crack as his back broke. He was slammed to a whirl-shock of buffeting turbulence as the world slammed, as the world burst black and blue, blasted by a double- crash of thunder, of thunder pitched for the shatter. The visible spectrum split into sub-harmonics of pain, and then – Then Hatch was in the clear, free from the turbulence, and given the grace of a lucid moment in which he felt the summer of the blossoming heat from below. He caught a brief glimpse of the crumpling fire expanding below him, of the billowing bloom of destruction.
He could not say or speak, but thinking was still in his power. Though only just.
– Wah!
Thus thought Asodo Hatch.
Then thought no more, for he was falling. Lucidity gone, he fell. He toppled. Down through the gulfs he plummeted. His ejection seat's parachute did not open. Strapped into that seat, he dropped downward, doomed down to destruction, his back broken, his four limbs wrecked and useless.
Falling, he hit turbulence. Hitting turbulence, he was whirled sideways, tossed, corkscrewed, cocktailed in a gigantic blood-shaker, falling wrecked and ruined, a wreck falling toward wreckage, falling toward the wreckage of the world.
And then -
Falling, the seat steadied.
And, seated on the arc of his downward slide, seated on the smooth arc of the longest rollercoaster slide in the history of humanity, Asodo Hatch glimpsed two cinders blistered with flames, two cinders falling, trailing smoke as they arced down toward the blazing sea. One of those two charred meteorites was his abandoned singlefighter. The other was Lupus Lon Oliver's craft, caught in the flamesmash fireball as Hatch's craft blew itself up.
– Marshmallows.
Thus thought Hatch, thought he had no idea why he thought it.
Then there was time for no further thoughts, for he was falling, and the smooth arc of his slide was breaking up as he hit turbulence again, and slammed by the buffeting turbulence he went shockbursting down toward the green. And now at last he found his voice. A scream was wrenched from his mouth a moment before impact, then impact – The shock was lethal.
So he was dead, dead, seated dead in the initiation seat, eyes starting, panic shuddering in his throat, hands clutching at the armrests, flesh shuddering.
'The illusion tank sequence is over,' said Paraban Senk, with those words telling Hatch that his waking dream was done with, that he was back in the world of the living.
Hatch moved his jaw cautiously. Tested his tongue.
Heard himself question with a word, a word which sounded as if spoken by someone else, spoken by a machine:
'Result?'
'Partial point in your favor,' said Paraban Senk, as calm as an accountant.
'Details,' said Hatch.
'You died, but you outsurvived Lon Oliver. You win a partial point. You win 0.0000057 of a point.'
'Good,' said Hatch. 'Good.'
'However,' said Paraban Senk. 'However… wait one moment.
Ah yes. Lon Oliver is contesting this decision.'
'Contesting?' said Hatch. 'What do you mean, contesting?'
'He claims you have no right to your partial point. He claims that partial point is contrary to reason. He says there must be an error in the adjudication software.'
'He thinks I won through computer error?' said Hatch.
'Precisely,' said Paraban Senk. 'So he has demanded that the partial point be wiped.'
'Wah!' said Hatch.
'I have decided to let Lon Oliver argue his case in Forum Three,' said Senk. 'I will then arbitrate on this matter.'
'Will I be able to make my own case?' said Hatch.
'Not if you sit here all day talking to me,' said Senk. 'I think you had better be going.'
So Hatch hastened to Forum Three. He used a side-door which gave him admission to the small stage which faced the steep-banked tiers of seats. On that stage was Lupus Lon Oliver.
Lupus was giving a speech, playing to the gallery for all he was worth. The speech was not just for the benefit of Paraban Senk, for Lupus would ultimately be judged not just by the Teacher of Control, but by his family, his peers, and the Free Corps as a whole. Manfred Gan Oliver sat stonefaced on one of the tiered benches, watching his son and passing judgment.
' – as a warrior,' said Lupus, glancing sideways at Hatch.
'But Hatch threw his life away, thereby winning – '
'My life is as you see it,' said Hatch, interjecting staunchly.
'He threw it away!' said Lupus. 'Threw it away, and so, so won a cheating point from the derelict machineries of judgment.
Had this been a real war with a real death to match it, what would he have won? Only our mutual extinction. In the Season, we count it a victory only when one walks away. Did Hatch's father walk away? No. He killed himself.'
'My father!' said Hatch, flashing white-hot with rage.
'Your father!' said Lupus. 'Do you deny it? The whole city saw it. And – and it is said that any man who kills himself hands a sharp sword to his son. Hatch has accepted the sword. Having accepted the sword, he has killed himself once already before your very eyes. As he killed himself in the illusion tanks, so he will kill himself in the world of the real. And this – this walking corpse – it thinks it has a future? I see for it a vibrant future as a suicide.'
The vehemence of Lupus Lon Oliver's attack was such that it silenced the whole of Forum Three. Hatch was aware that everyone was watching him, seeing how he would react. His anger was so extreme that he durst not move, durst not speak, lest he do or say something extreme.
