The Player of Games

'are you going deaf?'

'Please forgive the over-ride,' a rather officious and unapologetic voice Gurgeh did not recognise said from the screen. 'Am I talking to Chiark-Gevantsa Jernau Morat Gurgeh dam Hassease?'

Gurgeh stared dubiously at the screen eye. He hadn't heard his full name pronounced for years. 'Yes.'

'My name is Loash Armasco-Iap Wu-Handrahen Xato Koum.'

Gurgeh raised one eyebrow. 'Well, that should be easy enough to remember.'

'Might I interrupt you, sir?'

'You already have. What do you want?'

'To talk with you. Despite my over-ride, this does not constitute an emergency, but I can only talk to you directly this evening. I am here representing the Contact Section, at the request of Dastaveb Chamlis Amalk-ney Ep-Handra Thedreiskre Ostlehoorp. May I approach you?'

'Providing you can stay off the full names, yes,' Gurgeh said.

'I shall be there directly.'

Gurgeh snapped the screen shut. He tapped the pen-like terminal on the edge of the wooden table and looked out over the dark fjord, watching the dim lights of the few houses on the far shore.

He heard a roaring noise in the sky, and looked up to see a farside-lit vapour-trail overhead, steeply angled and pointing to the slope uphill from Ikroh. There was a muffled bang over the forest above the house, and a noise like a sudden gust of wind, then, zooming round the side of the house, came a small drone, its fields bright blue and striped yellow. It drifted over towards Gurgeh. The machine was about the same size as Mawhrin-Skel; it could, Gurgeh thought, have sat comfortably in the rectangular sandwich plate on the table. Its gunmetal casing looked a little more complicated and knobbly than Mawhrin-Skel's. 'Good evening,' Gurgeh said as the small machine cleared the terrace wall.

It settled down on the table, by the sandwich plate. 'Good evening, Morat Gurgeh.'

'Contact, eh?' Gurgeh said, putting his terminal into a pocket in his robe. 'That was quick. I was only talking to Chamlis the night before last.'

'I happened to be in the volume,' the machine explained in its clipped voice, 'in transit — between the GCU Flexible Demeanour and the GSV Unfortunate Conflict Of Evidence, aboard the (D)ROU Zealot. As the nearest Contact operative, I was the obvious choice to visit you. However, as I say, I can only stay for a short time.'

'Oh, what a pity,' Gurgeh said.

'Yes; you have such a charming Orbital here. Perhaps some other time.'

'Well, I hope it hasn't been a wasted journey for you, Loash…. I wasn't really expecting an audience with a Contact operative. My friend Chamlis just thought Contact might… I don't know; have something interesting which wasn't in general circulation. I expected nothing at all, or just information. Might I ask just what you're doing here?' He leant forward, putting both elbows on the table, leaning over the small machine. There was one sandwich left on the plate just in front of the drone. Gurgeh took it and ate, munching and looking at the machine.

'Certainly. I am here to ascertain just how open to suggestions you are. Contact might be able to find you something which would interest you.'

'A game?'

'I have been given to understand it is connected with a game.'

'That does not mean you have to play one with me,' Gurgeh said, brushing his hands free of crumbs over the plate. A few crumbs flew towards the drone, as he'd hoped they might, but it fielded each one, flicking them neatly to the centre of the plate in front of it.

'All I know, sir, is that Contact might have found something to interest you. I believe it to be connected with a game. I am instructed to discover how willing you might be to travel. I therefore assume the game — if such it is — is to be played in a location besides Chiark.'

'Travel?' Gurgeh said. He sat back. 'Where? How far? How long?'

'I don't know, exactly.'

'Well, try approximately.'

'I would not like to guess. How long would you be prepared to spend away from home?'

Gurgeh's eyes narrowed. The longest he'd spent away from Chiark had been when he'd gone on a cruise once, thirty years earlier. He hadn't enjoyed it especially. He'd gone more because it was the done thing to travel at that age than because he'd wanted to. The different stellar systems had been spectacular, but you could see just as good a view on a holoscreen, and he still didn't really understand what people saw in actually having been in any particular system. He'd planned to spend a few years on that cruise, but gave up after one.

Gurgeh rubbed his beard. 'Perhaps half a year or so; it's hard to say without knowing the details. Say that, though; say half a year… not that I can see it's necessary. Local colour rarely adds that much to a game.'

'Normally, true.' The machine paused. 'I understand this might be rather a complicated game; it might take a while to learn. It is likely you would have to devote yourself to it for some time.'

'I'm sure I'll manage,' Gurgeh said. The longest it had taken him to learn any game had been three days; he hadn't forgotten any rule of any game in all his life, nor ever had to learn one twice.

'Very well,' the small drone said suddenly, 'on that basis, I shall report back. Farewell, Morat Gurgeh.' It started to accelerate into the sky.

Gurgeh looked up at it, mouth open. He resisted the urge to jump up. 'Is that it?' he said.

The small machine stopped a couple of metres up. 'That's all I'm allowed to talk about. I've asked you what I was supposed to ask you. Now I report back. Why, is there anything else you would like to know I might be able to help you with?'

'Yes,' Gurgeh said, annoyed now. 'Do I get to hear anything else about whatever and wherever it is you're talking about?'

The machine seemed to waver in the air. Its fields hadn't changed since its arrival. Eventually, it said, 'Jernau Gurgeh?'

There was a long moment when they were both silent. Gurgeh stared at the machine, then stood up, put both hands on his hips and his head to one side and shouted, 'Yes?'

'…. Probably not,' the drone snapped, and instantly rose straight up, fields flicking off. He heard the roaring noise and saw the vapour-trail form; it was a single tiny cloud at first because he was right underneath it, then it lengthened slowly for a few seconds, before suddenly ceasing to grow. He shook his head.

He took out the pocket terminal. 'House,' he said. 'Raise that drone.' He continued to stare into the sky.

'Which drone, Jernau?' the house said. 'Chamlis?'

He stared at the terminal. 'No! That little scumbag from Contact; Loash Armasco-Iap Wu-Handrahen Xato Koum, that's who! The one that was just here!'

'Just here?' the house said, in its Puzzled voice.

Gurgeh sagged. He sat down. 'You didn't see or hear anything just now?'

'Nothing but silence for the last eleven minutes, Gurgeh, since you told me to hold all calls. There have been two of those since, but—'

'Never mind,' Gurgeh sighed. 'Get me Hub.'

'Hub here; Makil Stra-bey Mind subsection. Jernau Gurgeh; what can we do for you?'

Gurgeh was still looking at the sky overhead, partly because that was where the Contact drone had gone (the thin vapour-trail was starting to expand and drift), and partly because people tended to look in the direction of the Hub when they were talking to it.

He noticed the extra star just before it started to move. The light-point was near the trailing end of the little drone's farside-lit contrail. He frowned. Almost immediately, it moved; only moderately fast at first, then too quickly for the eye to anticipate.

It disappeared. He was silent for a moment, then said, 'Hub, has a Contact ship just left here?'

'Doing so even as we speak, Gurgeh. The (Demilitarised) Rapid Offensive Unit—'

-Zealot,' Gurgeh said.

'Ho-ho! It was you, was it? We thought it was going to take months to work that one out. You've just seen a Private visit, game-player Gurgeh; Contact business; not for us to know. Wow, were we inquisitive though. Very glamorous, Jernau, if we may say so. That ship crash-stopped from at least forty