Consider Phlebas

a show. 'I'm grateful to you,' Horza said, and raised the flask towards the captain briefly before inhaling again. He studied Kraiklyn's face carefully.

'So, tell me what it's like working for these guys with the three legs,' Kraiklyn said, smiling and resting one arm on a shelf at the side of the couch bed. He raised his eyebrows. 'Hmm?'

Ah-hah, thought Horza. He said, 'I didn't have much time to find out. Fifty days ago I was still a captain in the marines on Sladden. Don't suppose you've heard of it?' Kraiklyn shook his head. Horza had been working on his story for the past two days, and knew that if Kraiklyn did check up he would find there was such a planet, its inhabitants were mostly humanoid and it had recently fallen under Idiran suzerainty. 'Well, the Idirans were going to execute us because we fought on after the surrender, but then I was hauled out and told I'd live if I did a job for them. They said I looked a lot like this old guy they wanted on their side; if they removed him, would I pretend to be him? I thought, what the hell. What have I got to lose? So I ended up on this Sorpen place with this ageing drug, impersonating a government minister. I was doing all right, too, until this Culture woman shows, blows my whole bloody act and nearly gets me killed. They were just about to bump me off when this Idiran cruiser came in to snatch her. They rescued me and captured her and they were making their way back to the fleet when they got jumped by a GCU. I got stuffed into that suit and thrown overboard to wait for the fleet.' Horza hoped his story didn't sound too rehearsed. Kraiklyn stared into the flask he held, frowning.

'I've been wondering about that.' He looked at Horza. 'Why should a cruiser go in by itself when the fleet was just behind it?'

Horza shrugged. 'Don't really know, myself. They hardly had time to debrief me before the GCU showed up. I guess they must have wanted that Culture woman pretty badly, and thought if they waited for the fleet to show, the GCU would have spotted it, picked up the woman and made a run for it.'

Kraiklyn nodded, looking thoughtful.

'Hmm. They must have wanted her awful bad. Did you see her?'

'Oh, I saw her all right. Before she dropped me in it, and afterwards.'

'What was she like?' Kraiklyn furrowed his brows and played with the flask again.

'Tall, thin, sort of good looking, but off-putting as well. Too damn smart for my liking. I don't know… Not much different from any Culture woman I've seen. I mean, they all look different and so on, but she wouldn't have stood out.'

'They say they're pretty special, some of these Culture agents. Supposed to be able to… do tricks, you know? All sorts of special adaptations and fancy body chemistry. She do anything special you heard of?'

Horza shook his head, wondering where all this was leading. 'Not that I know of,' he said. Fancy body chemistry, Kraiklyn had said. Was the Man starting to guess? Did he think Horza was a Culture agent, or even a Changer? Kraiklyn was still looking at his drug flask. He nodded and said:

'About the only sort of woman I'd have anything to do with, one of these Culture ones. They say they really do have all these… alterations, you know?' Kraiklyn looked at Horza and winked as he inhaled the drug. 'Between the legs; the men have these souped-up balls, right? Sort of recirculating… And the women have something similar, too; supposed to be able to come for fucking hours… Well, minutes, anyway…' Kraiklyn's eyes looked slightly glazed as his voice trailed off. Horza tried not to appear as scornful as he felt. Here we go again, he thought. He tried to count the number of times he'd had to listen to people — usually from third- or low fourth- level societies, usually fairly human-basic, and more often than not male talking in hushed, enviously admiring tones about how It's More Fun in the Culture. Perversely coy for once, the Culture played down the extent to which those born into it inherited such altered genitalia.

Naturally, such modesty only increased everybody else's interest, and Horza occasionally became angry with humans who exhibited the sort of fawning respect the Culture's quasi-technological sexuality so often engendered. Coming from Kraiklyn, it didn't surprise him a bit. He wondered if the Man had had some cheap, Culture-imitative surgery himself. It wasn't uncommon. It wasn't safe, either. Too often such alterations were simply plumbing jobs, especially on males, and made no attempt to uprate the heart and the rest of the circulatory system — at least — to cope with the increased strain. (In the Culture, of course, that high performance was genofixed in.) Such mimicking of this symptom of the Culture's decadence had, quite literally, caused a lot of broken hearts. I suppose we'll hear about those wonderful drug glands next, Horza thought.

'… Yeah, and they have those drug glands,' Kraiklyn went on, eyes still unfocused, nodding to himself. 'Supposed to be able to take a hit of almost anything, any time they want. Just by thinking about it. Secrete stuff that makes them high.' Kraiklyn stroked the flask he held. 'You know, they say you can't rape a Culture woman?' He didn't seem to expect an answer. Horza stayed silent. Kraiklyn nodded again. 'Yeah, they've got class, those women. Not like some of the shit on this ship.' He shrugged and took another snort from the flask. 'Still…'

Horza cleared his throat and leant forward in his seat, not looking at Kraiklyn. 'She's dead now, anyway,' Horza said, looking up.

'Hmm?' Kraiklyn said absently, looking at the Changer.

'The Culture woman,' Horza said. 'She's dead.'

'Oh yes.' Kraiklyn nodded, then cleared his throat and said, 'So what do you want to do now? I'm sort of expecting you to come along on this temple caper. I think you owe us that, for the ride.'

'Oh yeah, don't worry,' Horza said.

'Good. After that, we'll see. If you shape up you can stay; otherwise we'll drop you off somewhere you want, within reason, like they say. This operation should be no problem: easy in, easy out.' Kraiklyn made a dipping, flying motion with his flattened hand, as though it was the model of the CAT which hung somewhere over Horza's head. 'Then we go to Vavatch.' He took another gulp from the fumes in the snifflask. 'Don't suppose you play Damage, hmm?' He brought the flask down, and Horza looked into the predatory eyes through the thin mist rising from the flask's neck. He shook his head.

'Not one of my vices. Never really got the chance to learn.'

'Yeah, I guess not. It's the only game.' Kraiklyn nodded. 'Apart from this…' He smiled and glanced about, obviously meaning the ship, the people in it and their occupation. 'Well,' Kraiklyn said, smiling and sitting up, 'I think I've already said welcome aboard, but you are welcome.' He leant forward and tapped Horza on the shoulder. 'So long as you realise who's boss, eh?' He smiled widely.

'It's your ship,' Horza said. He drank what remained of the flask's contents and put it on a shelf beside a portrait holocube which showed Kraiklyn standing in his black suit, holding the same laser rifle which was mounted on the wall above.

'I think we'll get on just fine, Horza. You get to know the others and train up, and we'll knock the shit out of these monks. What do you say?' The Man winked at him again.

'You bet,' Horza said, standing and smiling. Kraiklyn opened the door for him.

And for my next trick, thought Horza as soon as he was out of the cabin and walking down to the mess, my impression of… Captain Kraiklyn!

During the next few days he indeed got to know the rest of the crew. He talked to those who wanted to talk and he observed or carefully overheard things about those who didn't. Yalson was still his only friend, but he got on well enough with his room-mate, Wubslin, though the stocky engineer was quiet and, when not eating or working, usually asleep. The Bratsilakins had apparently decided that Horza probably wasn't against them, but they seemed to be reserving their opinion about whether he was for them until Marjoin and the Temple of Light.

Dorolow was the name of the religious woman who roomed with Yalson. She was plump, fair skinned and fair haired, and her huge ears curved down to join onto her cheeks. She spoke in a very high, squeaky voice which she said was pretty low as far as she was concerned, and her eyes watered a lot. Her movements were fluttery and nervous.

The oldest person in the Company was Aviger, a smallish, weather-beaten man with brown skin and little hair. He could do surprisingly supple things with his legs and arms, like clasp his hands behind his back and bring them over his head without letting go. He shared a cabin with a man named Jandraligeli, a tall, thin, middle-aged Mondlidician who wore the scar-marks from his homeworld on his forehead with unrepentant pride and a look of perpetual disdain. He ignored Horza devoutly, but Yalson said he did this with every new recruit. Jandraligeli spent a lot of time keeping his old but well-maintained suit and laser rifle clean and sparkling.