geometry,’ Antoinette said. ‘No, that’s what I thought, but the additional light is different. It’s coherent, peaked sharply in the optical in Skade’s rest frame.’ ‘Laser light?’ Lasher asked. Clavain looked at the pig, Scorpio’s most trusted ally. ‘So it would seem. High-power optical lasers, probably a battery of them, shining back along her line of flight. We’re probably not seeing all the flux, either, just a fraction of it.’ ‘What good will that do her?’ Lasher said. He had a black scar on his face, slashed like a pencil line from brow to cheek. ‘She’s much too far ahead of us for that to make any sense as a weapon.’ ‘I know,’ Clavain said. ‘And that’s what worries me. Because Skade won’t do anything unless there’s a good reason for it.’ ‘This is an attempt to kill us?’ the pig asked. ‘We just have to figure out how she hopes to succeed,’ Clavain replied. ‘And then hope to hell that we can do something about it.’ Nobody said anything. They stared at the slowly wheeling square of light, with the malign little star of Nightshade burning at its heart. The government spokesman was a small, neat man with fastidiously well-maintained fingernails. He despised dirt or contamination of any sort, and when the prepared statement was handed to him — a folded piece of synthetic grey government vellum — he took it between his thumb and forefinger only, achieving the minimum possible contact between skin and paper. Only when he was seated at his desk in Broadcasting House, one of the squat buildings adjoining Inquisition House, did he contemplate opening the statement, and then only when he had satisfied himself that there were no crumbs or grease spots on the table itself. He placed the paper on the desk, geometrically aligned with the table’s edges, and then levered it open along its fold, slowly and evenly, in the manner of someone opening a box that might possibly contain a bomb. He employed his sleeve to encourage the paper to lie flat on the surface, stroking it across the text diagonally. Only when this process was complete did he lower his eyes and begin scanning the text for meaning, and then only so that he would be certain of making no mistakes when delivering it. On the other side of the desk, the operator aimed the camera at him. The camera was a cantilevered boom with an old float-cam attached to the end of it. The float-cam’s optical system still worked perfectly, but its levitation motors were long expired. Like many things in Cuvier, it was a taunting reminder of how much better things had been in the past. But the spokesman put such thoughts from his mind. It was not his duty to reflect on the present standard of living, and — if truth be told — he lived a comfortable enough existence by comparison with the majority. He had a surplus of food rations and he and his wife lived in a larger than average domicile in one of the better quarters of Cuvier. ‘Ready, sir?’ asked the camera operator. He did not answer immediately, but scanned once more through the prepared text, his lips moving softly as he familiarised himself with the wording. He had no idea where the piece had originated, who had drafted and refined it or puzzled over the precise language. It was not his business to worry about such matters. He knew only that the machinery of government had functioned, as it always did, and that great, solid, well-oiled apparatus had delivered the text into his hands, for him to deliver to the people. He read the piece once more, and then looked up at the operator. ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘I believe we are ready now.’ ‘We can run through it again if you’re not happy with the first reading. This isn’t going out live.’ ‘I believe one take should suffice.’ ‘Right you are, then…’ The spokesman cleared his throat, feeling a spasm of inner revulsion at the thought of the phlegm being dislodged and resettled by that particular bodily action. He began to read. ‘The Democratic Government of Cuvier wishes to make the following statement. One week ago the fugitive known as Thorn was successfully apprehended following a combined operation involving Inquisition House and the Bureau of Counter-Terrorism. Thorn is now in custody and no longer poses a threat to the law-abiding citizens of Cuvier or its satellite communities. Once again, the Democratic Government of Cuvier refutes in the strongest possible terms those irresponsible rumours that have been circulated by misguided sympathisers of the fugitive Thorn. There is no evidence that the colony itself is in imminent danger of destruction. There is no evidence for the existence of a pair of intact shuttles with surface-to- orbit capability. There is no evidence that covert evacuation camps have already been established, nor is there evidence that there have already been mass migrations from any of the major population centres towards these fictitious camps. There is, furthermore, absolutely no evidence that the Triumvir’s starship has been located, and no evidence that it is capable of evacuating the entire populace of Resurgam.’ The spokesman paused, re-establishing eye contact with the camera. ‘Only twenty-six hours ago, Thorn himself publicly criticised his own complicity in the spreading of these rumours. He has denounced those who have assisted in the spreading of these malicious untruths, and has sought the government’s forgiveness for any inconvenience that may have been caused by his participation in these acts.’ The spokesman’s face betrayed not a hint of inner dissonance as he read these words. It was true that on his first scan through the text he had racked his own memory at that part and failed to come up with any recollection of Thorn making any kind of public statement, let alone a public criticism of his own activities. But such things were not unknown, and it was entirely possible that he had missed the appearance in question. He soldiered on, changing his tone. ‘On a related matter… recent studies released by the Mantell Scientific Institute have led to a reassessment of the likely nature of the object visible in the evening sky. It is now thought less likely that the object in question is cometary in nature. A more probable explanation is that the object is related to the system’s largest gas giant. The Democratic Government of Cuvier, however, strongly refutes any suggestion that the planet itself has been, or is in the process of being, destroyed. Any rumours to this effect are malicious in origin and are to be condemned in the strongest possible terms.’ He paused again and allowed the tiniest trace of a smile to ghost his lips. ‘And that concludes this statement from the Democratic Government of Cuvier.’ Aboard Nostalgia for Infinity , with no great enjoyment, Ilia Volyova smoked to a stub one of the cigarettes the ship had furnished her with. She was thinking, and thinking furiously, her mind humming like an overworked turbine room. Her booted feet squelched through secreted ship slime that had the precise consistency of mucus. She had a mild headache, which was not in any way alleviated by the constant drone of the bilge pumps. And yet she was in one sense elated, for she could finally see a clear course of action before her. ‘It’s so good that you’ve decided to talk to me, Captain,’ she said. ‘You can’t believe what it means after all this time.’ His voice emerged from all around her, simultaneously near and distant, immense and ageless as a God’s. ‘I’m sorry it took so long.’ She felt the entire fabric of the ship tremble with each syllable. ‘Do you mind if I ask why it took quite as long as it did, Captain?’ His answers, when they came, were seldom immediate. Volyova had the impression that the marshalling of his thoughts took time; that with immense size had come immense slowness, so that his dealings with her did not really represent the true rate of his thought processes.
