(no subject)
Apparently it is Back Up Your Novel Day. Here seems like a good place to do that considering my USB slots are still playing up.
Nessa Trueblood stared out of the window as the shuttle approached Cor Caroli. The movement on the surface of the star was mesmerising. Even through the darkened windows, it was bright enough to fill the cabin with light. Every so often she could see little eruptions burst from the surface, brighter and then darker in tiny concentric circles.
‘You probably shouldn’t stare,’ said Flynn, dropping into the seat opposite her. ‘You’ll go blind.’
‘I think the glass is thick enough,’ Nessa said, ‘and anyway, it’s not as if we really need to read the music for this gig.’ Flynn laughed. Nessa looked out of the window again. As she gazed at Cor Caroli the star, Cor Caroli the space station slid into view in front of it. At first it was just a black shape blocking out the star, but as the light changed Nessa could see the beautifully painted green and gold of the hull, and make out the docking bay and a handful of pinpricks of light that she assumed were windows.
‘Look, there’s the station!’ she said. Wilson looked up from his book.
‘It says here they don’t much like being called a station.’
‘Why?’ said Eliza, leaning over to peer at his book.
‘Because nobody’s stationed here from elsewhere.’ He cleared his throat and read: “The council chambers are decorated with small reproductions of the huge banners that the rebels hung over the hull of Cor Caroli during the Golden Revolution. The people of Cor Caroli are proud of their heritage as the first space station to achieve full independence from Earth rule. They would rather be referred to as a nation than a station.’
‘May I borrow the book when you’re finished with it?’ asked Eliza.
‘Of course. I’ve got two more.’
‘Hadn’t you guessed?’ Flynn shook his hair out of his eyes. ‘Wilson’s got to be prepared in case they stop the ball and force us to take a test on their history, politics and tourist attractions.’
‘Actually, there’s a lot of fascinating stuff about this place,’ said Wilson blithely, passing The Rough Guide to Cor Caroli over to Eliza and pulling out An Independent Nation: Two Hundred Years of Diplomacy on Cor Caroli.
An announcement filtered into the cabin.
Ladies and Gentlemen, we are approaching Cor Caroli. Thank you for travelling with Shooting Star Liners. Please ensure you have all luggage with you before disembarking.
Ice came in and started opening the luggage hatches. Wilson put his book away and helped her. They were both tall enough to reach the hatches comfortably, so they passed luggage and instruments down to Nessa and Eliza, who would both have had to use a stepladder. Rajin and Greg came in and claimed their luggage. David appeared pulling Wilson’s double bass behind him.
‘You didn’t have to,’ Wilson said.
‘I know. I was near the store room.’
‘I was going to come and get it myself.’
‘I know. I’m just trying to help. Don’t be so touchy.’ Ice and Nessa exchanged glances, grabbed their luggage and tried to edge out of the way.
‘I’m not being touchy.’
‘Well you could have fooled me.’
Eliza almost snatched her suitcase out of Wilson’s hand and fled towards the airlock. Nessa and Ice followed her.
‘Do you think they have been cooped up together for too long?’ said Nessa. Ice shrugged and shouldered her bag.
‘Is it any worse than usual? They’ll make up later.’ Nessa nodded, then sniffed. She sniffed her bag, then her cello, then she leaned over and sniffed her friend.
‘What do you smell of? It’s nice.’
‘Incense,’ said Ice. ‘I was meditating.’
‘Ah.’ Nessa felt a pang of guilt. It had been a very long time since she had last meditated properly. And while playing was almost a religious experience, she had to admit it probably didn’t bring her much closer to Nirvana. ‘I should tele home when we’ve docked and got settled in,’ she muttered.
The customs officer looked highly suspicious when the Solar Elite String Orchestra rounded the corner from the loading bay, carrying and rolling an assortment of cases towards his desk.
‘All right,’ he said. ‘Line up please, one at a time. Open your bags please, sir.’ David went first, plopping his briefcase and his suitcase down on the desk and opening them both. The customs officer briefly riffled through the clothes and books, and looked under the sheet music. He opened the velveteen bag and took out David’s silver baton. After ascertaining that it wasn’t a weapon, he put it back. He passed David his org and asked him to turn it on. David did so - the little screen lit up and played a few bars of Tchaikovsky. Nessa saw Wilson’s face flush.
‘Why all the fuss?’ asked Flynn. ‘There wasn’t this much security getting on the shuttle.’ He clutched his violin case protectively.
‘It’s all the diplomats,’ Nessa said. ‘There are politicians here from all over the galaxy! Even the President’s here! I think it’s all very exciting.’
‘I think it’s a pain in the arse,’ said Ice, stepping up to the desk and opening her bag.
‘Fine,’ said the customs officer. ‘Now, your - um - that.’
‘It’s a cello,’ Ice said, rolling her eyes and lifting her cello case onto the desk. ‘Look.’ She pressed her thumb to the sensor panel on the case and it sprung open with a hiss of pneumatics. Nessa stroked her own cello case, somehow feeling the need to reassure it that its old-fashioned clasps and chain lock were good enough for her. The officer peered at Ice’s cello.
‘Can you take it out for me please?’
‘There won’t be any need for that.’ The officer looked up and went pale. There was a man, dressed in an ornate uniform of green and gold, approaching the desk at a jog.
‘Sir!’
‘You can stand down, sergeant. This is the orchestra, for the ball.’ He shook David’s hand. ‘You must be David Collins. I hope you had a good trip?’
‘Governor Cygnus. You really didn’t need to come and greet us yourself.’
‘On the contrary, I’ve heard such wonderful things about you I wanted to come and meet you in person. I’m sorry about all this faff. Let’s get you through it and settled in.’
‘But sir - I should still check their cases,’ said the customs officer. ‘They could have anything hidden in those things - especially that one.’ He nodded at Wilson’s double bass, which was taller than most of the players. Cygnus looked at David.
‘You can check,’ David said. ‘I can promise you you won’t see anything but musical instruments.’
So the orchestra filed past, opening their cases while David and Cygnus chatted, Cygnus occasionally pausing to give the terrified customs officer a hard stare. Wilson showed off his double bass, Nessa opened her cello case - and then spent nearly ten minutes crouched on the floor trying to get it to shut again - Flynn and Greg presented their violins and Eliza and Rajin their violas.
Finally, they were waved on. Cygnus produced a bag full of room keys and handed it to Nessa.
‘Here are your keys,’ he said. ‘You’ve been given guest rooms on Buckingham Row. It’s on the fifth level, if you use the central elevator and turn left you’ll see signs.’ He shook David’s hand again. ‘I’m looking forward to hearing you ever so much,’ he effused. ‘Would it be possible for me to come and hear you rehearse tomorrow morning?’
‘Of course,’ David said. ‘I must say once again how grateful we are to be asked to perform in front of such a prestigious audience.’ Cygnus said his goodbyes and the players crowded around Nessa for their room keys. She opened the bag, and saw that there were three green keys and two gold ones.
‘Looks we’ve been given two double rooms,’ said Nessa. ‘That’s yours,’ she added, handing one of the gold keys to David and Wilson. ‘Who wants the spare?’
‘I do! I do!’ said Eliza. ‘Can I, please?’
Nessa passed the other gold key to Eliza.
‘Ice, you want to share?’ she asked.
‘Sure,’ said Ice, taking a green key.
‘And Rajin and Greg, you still want to share?’
‘Yup,’ said Greg, taking one himself.
‘So Flynn, it looks like you’re in a twin room all of your own,’ said Ice. Flynn sidled up to Eliza and nudged her with his violin case.
‘Hey, Liza. You really want to be in that big bed all by yourself?’ Eliza rolled her eyes contemptuously, but she still flushed. Ice stepped up behind Flynn and caught him a smack around the head.
While Flynn was checking the back of his head for blood, Rajin excused himself.
‘I’ve got a tele to send,’ he said. ‘You know how these things are, if I don’t send it today I’ll arrive back home before it does.’
‘Not going to come and dump your things first?’ asked Greg, waving the key at him.
‘Nah. I can manage. You’ll be there when I’ve finished, right?’
‘Right,’ said Greg. ‘Of course.’
Rajin hurried off.
‘What’s so urgent it can’t wait until we’re settled in?’ wondered Flynn. Greg stared after Rajin.
‘You know, I should probably send a tele too. My parents wanted to know when we’d arrived safely. They’re not really fans of offworld travel.’
‘You’ve got to go to the room first, though - or else Rajin won’t be able to get in when he comes back,’ Nessa pointed out.
‘Yeah, I know. I was just thinking.’
The central elevator was actually about twenty elevators arranged in a circle around a central shaft that ran right through Cor Caroli, from the biodome on top of the solar side right down to the warehouses and generators on the dark side, through the government sector, the service sectors, the housing sectors and the shopping sectors. Cor Caroli had been planned meticulously by the ancient Earthers who had built it, but as any community tends to do, parts of it had evolved. Many of the shops had become apartments during a housing shortage, and then turned back into shops when the economy boomed after the revolution. Parks had sprung up, been removed, been put back. Once there had even been a nuclear reactor stuck on to the bottom of the hull with not much more than glue and hope, during the great solar-panel malfunction of ’64.
Wilson took great pleasure in explaining all of this as the players watched the levels float by through the green glass doors of the elevator. Flynn yawned pointedly, but shut up under the pressure of sharp looks from David, Ice and Eliza.
Greg waved the others off down Buckingham Row and let himself into the room. It was dark, and fairly pokey. He dumped his bags on the bed and flicked the light switch on. A silver shutter along one wall started to go up with a whirr, and light flooded slowly into the room.
He went over to the door and listened intently for a moment. Then he hurried over to the bed. He pulled an org out of his bag and waved it in the air. Nothing happened. He held it above his head and walked from one end of the room to the other. Still, nothing happened. Then he shoved it into his socks and crossed the room again. Finally, he cleared his throat and intoned thus:
‘Bomb. Kill. Terrorist. President. Threat. Codename. Cell. Brother. Corgi.’
He paused. The org stayed resolutely silent. Greg smiled to himself and tapped a few buttons. The org whirred and clicked to itself, thinking very hard about what he’d asked it to do. Greg smothered it with a pillow and listened for footsteps outside the door. Then the org bleeped, and he picked it up again and flicked through the file it had finally decided to show him.
‘Hmm,’ he said after a while. ‘That’s interesting.’
Nessa pressed her nose to the glass, peering out through the clear section of wall into the well of bright light.
‘How does it work?’ she said. ‘Is it real light? From the star?’
‘I think so,’ said Ice, standing her cello by the bed. She came over and looked out of the window. ‘It looks like it’s being reflected all the way down here. See, the walls are all mirrors, or one-way windows.’
‘It’s very clever,’ said Nessa, impressed.
‘Actually, it’s terribly rudimentary,’ said Ice, with a smile. ‘The simplest solutions are so often the best ones.’
‘Well, whatever it is it’s making me kinda dizzy.’ Nessa turned away from the window, rubbing her eyes. Ice stood at the window a bit longer. When Nessa looked back at her she looked almost as bright as the light well itself. Her name wasn’t really Ice, it was Jane, but right now you could see why she’d always gone by her nickname. She was tall and thin and very pale, with a crop of short white-blonde hair that stuck straight up on top of her head. Especially with the light reflecting off her, she looked somewhat like some sort of ice demon. Jane Baldwin was no name for an ice demon.
Nessa pulled her suitcase onto her knee and flicked it open.
‘We’re not rehearsing for the rest of the day, are we? What time is it?’ Ice looked at her watch.
‘I don’t know, my watch isn’t set to local time yet.’ She strode to the other side of the room and picked up the bedside clock. ‘It says about half past 5.’
‘Shall we go and explore the shopping sector or whatever it’s called?’ Nessa suggested. ‘We could ask if the others want to come and get dinner.’
David and Wilson agreed to go to dinner with Nessa and Ice, and Nessa was pleased to see they seemed to have made up. She caught them holding hands when they thought she wasn’t looking. Greg came too, and they bumped into Rajin on the way back to the elevator and he made them wait for him. Eliza said she was tired, and elected to stay behind. Flynn wasn’t in his room when they called on him.
Eliza lay on her double bed, staring at the ceiling. She hadn’t opened the shutter, so the light was very dim. It wasn’t completely dark, though - there was a faint glow coming from somewhere. She couldn’t quite bring herself to get up and find out where it was coming from.
Maybe she should have gone to dinner with the others. It might have made her feel better. At the very least it might have taken her mind off it.
Then again. Somewhere in the crowd, maybe eating in the restaurant or walking through the shopping sector, maybe talking to people or perhaps moving quickly and not making eye contact…
Eliza rolled over and buried her face in the pillow.
She definitely should have gone with the others. Hell, even spending time alone with Flynn would be better than this.
She got up and wandered into the adjoining bathroom. She had to admit it was rather lovely. She suspected that the twin rooms didn’t have bathrooms this nice. She had a lovely big bath made of some kind of green stone, and a selection of interestingly scented bottles. She played with them for a while, reading the labels. One claimed to be ‘martian musk’, but turned out to be made mostly of water, ethanol and fillius nathus, which was a fragrant but ugly brown weed that her parents had spent many years trying to remove from their back yard. Another was called ‘Liquid Starlight’ and was a striking, radiant gold colour. It turned out to be a hair treatment. Eliza applied some according to the instructions, and sure enough her hair seemed a more interesting, richer shade of brown and it sparkled slightly as she moved.
She put the rest carefully back on the shelf. She tried to tell herself that she might wear it for the ball, if she wasn’t afraid of looking too made-up. And she wouldn’t, at all, keep it on the shelf in case of a certain visitor.
Eliza ran a bath, then sat on the edge of the green stone and swore for quite a long time, quietly but enthusiastically.
Nessa wheeled her cello into the rehearsal room, panting.
‘Sorry I’m late!’ she said, ‘I got lost! I’ve spent fifteen minutes running round on the wrong level because someone stopped the elevator and…’ she stopped and looked around the room. David raised his eyebrows at her.
‘Under the circumstances,’ he said, ‘I’ll forgive you.’ Nessa flushed and started unpacking her cello, but not with the frenzied speed she had expected to. Only David, Wilson and Ice were there. All seven chairs were set out and there were empty hovers floating in place, but Eliza, Rajin, Greg and Flynn were still missing. ‘This is really not good enough,’ David muttered. ‘The Governor himself is coming to see us. We haven’t even got one of each instrument! How are we supposed to rehearse anything without the upper strings?’
Nessa managed to stop herself from making a viola joke, but she met Wilson’s eyes and knew he was thinking the same thing. David paced while she tuned up, then threw his hands in the air and announced that they might as well rehearse the tricky cello and double bass bits while they were there.
‘Elgar!’ he snapped, and Ice fished in her music file for the Serenade in E Minor. She held the sheet of paper up against the hover and let go. It fell off. David made a frustrated noise, and Nessa picked up the music and tried again. This time it stuck, and hung in the air in front of them.
‘I’dve thought they’d have better equipment than this,’ Nessa said. ‘These hovers are 20 years old if they’re a day.’
‘They have. I think this might be what they could spare at short notice. They’ve got auto-readers on the stage in the ballroom.’
Ice and Wilson went ‘oooh.’ David rolled his eyes and started conducting, leaving the players scrambling to get their bows on the strings and catch up with him.
They got all the way through the Serenade perfectly on only the second time round.
‘Well done,’ David said, ‘though you’re lucky those eight bars after C are doubled by the violas, you won’t be able to have another go on the night.’
Actually, Nessa thought, they would - the ball was slated to go on all day, and they’d be playing for a few solid hours, plenty of time to get all the way through their entire repertoire at least twice.
They were about to move on to the Saint-Jon quartets when Eliza came rushing in, looking flushed.
‘Sorry!’ she said. David looked about to snap at her, but she looked like she might burst into tears, so he just sighed.
‘Come on, get tuned up and let’s get on with it.’
‘Where are Flynn and Greg? And Rajin?’ Eliza panted, pulling out her viola and running over to her chair.
‘God only knows!’ David said. Eliza winced, and ran to the chair next to Nessa.
‘Did you get lost too?’ Nessa whispered.
‘No, I, um. I sort of overslept,’ Eliza admitted. Nessa winced.
Only another five minutes later, Flynn and Rajin and Greg all walked in together. They tried to look nonchalant and apologetic at the same time, though Flynn was supplying most of the nonchalant and Rajin most of the apologetic. They scurried to their seats and got their music to stick to their hovers and then they all tuned up and finally, half an hour late, the rehearsal began. And just in time - five minutes later they were interrupted again when the door opened and Governor Cygnus slipped in. He motioned to David not to stop. Out of the corner of her eye, Nessa saw a woman come in behind Cygnus. Without losing her place or getting behind David’s beat, she tried to look at the woman. She had dark skin and black hair, and she was wearing a grey suit. But it wasn’t until they finished the piece that any of them noticed who it was. Rajin caught his breath, and Eliza dropped her bow. David turned around and performed a perfect comedy double-take.
‘Mrs Finley!’ he said. ‘I mean, Mrs President, ma’am. What a wonderful surprise…’
‘Please,’ said Finley, ‘Just carry on. Pretend I’m not here.’
‘Yes, ma’am,’ David said. He bowed to her, and turned back to the orchestra and pulled a surprised, terrified face.
‘Ohmygod,’ Nessa murmured to Ice out of the corner of her mouth. ‘President Finley. The most powerful woman on Earth, probably in the galaxy, is sitting right there!’ She turned to Eliza, but instead of nervous excitement, Eliza’s face seemed full of confusion and sadness. She was almost turning green. And she was staring right at the President. ‘Liza!’ Nessa hissed. ‘Are you OK?’
‘No,’ said Eliza. Then she shook her head, and looked at the floor. ‘I mean, yeah. I’m fine. She’s just very… she’s a bit…’
‘I know!’ Nessa agreed. ‘The President of the UN! Sitting right there!’ Eliza looked at her, and again there was a lot less enthusiasm in her face than Nessa would have thought appropriate. But then David stopped shuffling the music on his stand and started beating again. He hadn’t, of course, told them which piece they were doing next, and it was only because he was beating in five-four time that they guessed. There was a general scuffle while they found the right music, and then they began to play again.
Nothing else went wrong for a whole hour. The President of the UN and the Governor of Cor Caroli sat at the back of the room, listening to the music and watching the players, and occasionally speaking in whispers. From the furtive glances Nessa shot them during the Nyman - the cello part had what seemed like fifteen thousand bars of the same two notes, and she had plenty of time to think about the politicians - it seemed like Cygnus was a lot more interested in talking to Finley than she was in talking to him. She seemed far more interested in watching the orchestra. Nessa wondered if she played an instrument herself.
Then, halfway through the second repeat, Rajin’s D string snapped with a loud ptoiing. Rajin swore and got up, picking his way past Ice and Nessa to get a spare out of his bag.
‘Eh, we might as well have a break anyway,’ said David. ‘Fifteen minutes, guys.’
‘Well, we’ll be getting out of your hair,’ said Cygnus, standing up.
‘It was really wonderful to see you,’ said Finley. ‘I look forward to hearing you play tomorrow.’
‘Thank you very much, ma’am,’ said David. The orchestra got to their feet, and Cygnus and Finley left, passing Rajin on his way back to his chair. Rajin’s head turned to watch the President go, and he didn’t look where he was going. He collided with Greg and knocked him to the floor. David stood in front of the chairs, tapping his baton against his leg while they picked themselves up and Rajin finished apologising.
While the others were getting cups of tea and cheese sandwiches - everywhere they went, no matter how far from Earth, they were always provided with tea and bloody cheese sandwiches - Greg slipped into the toilets and turned on his org.
The file was no longer there.
‘Shit,’ he whispered. ‘Shit! Where the shitting shit have you shitting gone?’ He held the org over his head and pressed buttons, but this time rather than whirring and clicking for a few minutes it just beeped decisively.
‘It does!’ Greg muttered. ‘It does exist!’
But the org definitely didn’t believe him.
The door burst open and Eliza fell inside.
‘Oh!’ she said. ‘It, it wasn’t - you weren’t - ohgod.’ And she pushed him aside and threw up. Greg pocketed the org. He knelt beside her and pulled her hair out of her face.
‘There there,’ he said. ‘Not feeling well?’ Eliza didn’t answer him.
He waited for her to stop throwing up, then helped her to her feet and got her to the sink where she washed her face and looked at him for the first time in the mirror.
‘You don’t half look under the weather,’ Greg said. ‘Maybe you should go and lie down.’
‘Should stay,’ Eliza said. ‘David’ll be cross if I just up and leave. I’ll be fine.’ She tried to leave the bathroom with dignity, but ended up stumbling towards the door. Greg caught her and helped her out into the rehearsal room.
‘Oh, Eliza!’ said Nessa, putting down her cheese sandwich. ‘Are you OK?’
‘I’m fine,’ Eliza said, but she kept leaning on Greg.
‘She’s thrown up,’ he said. ‘She ought to go back to bed.’ David came over and held Eliza’s shoulders comfortingly.
‘Eliza. Do you think you’ll be able to play tomorrow?’ Wilson gave him a sharp look, which David ignored. Eliza nodded feebly. ‘Go on then. Go and get some rest. You know all this music anyway,’ he added gently. She nodded again.
‘I’ll take her,’ said Nessa.
‘Me too,’ said Flynn.
‘OK,’ said David. ‘The rest of you, ten more minutes then I want to begin again, all right?’ The others nodded, and Nessa and Flynn took hold of Eliza and led her out of the room. The last thing Nessa heard was Wilson accosting David in a corner.
‘How could you ask her that? Can’t you see she’s unwell?’
‘I need to know!’
‘And if she isn’t well enough to play tomorrow?’
‘Well, I suppose it’ll be OK, but…’
‘So why the extra pressure?’
Nessa was rather glad to get out of the room. She didn’t like it when David and Wilson argued, even if they did make it up again. It was embarrassing somehow.
She did wonder whether Flynn had an ulterior motive in helping her to take Eliza back to her room, but he didn’t try to stay with her. In fact, he excused himself first.
‘Are you OK to be left, Liza? It’s just, I’m a bit nervous about bits of the Holst and I want to be there when David goes over it - do you mind?’ Eliza shook her head, and Flynn made a quick exit.
‘Are you really all right?’ Nessa asked, stroking Eliza’s back.
‘I don’t know what’s come over me,’ said Eliza, giving Nessa a brave little smile. ‘Maybe it’s something I ate.’
‘Look, don’t be afraid to tell David you can’t play tomorrow, OK? Rajin’ll be fine on his own. Maybe we can even find another viola player on the station who can take over.’
‘No!’ Eliza managed to laugh feebly. ‘God no. I’d hate to have come all this way and not even played the gig. It’d all be for nothing. No, I will be all right by then.’
‘If you’re sure. I’d better be getting back too. You know what David’s like.’
‘If you’re lucky he’ll still be bickering with Wilson when you get back,’ Eliza smiled.
‘Oh god. I hope not.’ Nessa gave Eliza a hug and stood up. ‘I’ll come and see you later, OK?’
‘OK,’ Eliza said, lying down on the bed and cuddling up to a pillow. Nessa let herself out quietly.
Flynn half-jogged back towards the rehearsal room. But before he got to the right street he stopped suddenly. He pulled out a piece of card from his jacket pocket and studied it. Then he turned off and carried on jogging towards Jermyn Lane. He abruptly slowed to a casual stroll when he got to the street, which was one of those avenues on Cor Caroli that had once been residential and since had been converted into small shops and cafes. It was snug and fashionable. He headed for a drinking establishment with an old-fashioned sign hanging outside declaring it The Chequered Tavern.
Inside, the bar had obviously once been somebody’s front room. There was the light-well, half open to keep the room fashionably dim, and the viscreen which had obviously been the central focus of the room was now behind the bar, half obscured with bottles and drink-sacs. The air was full of a faint fragrance, possibly some sort of incense.
It wasn’t hard to find the person he was looking for - there were only two people in the bar. One was a middle aged man with grey hair and glasses, who was sitting reading a book. The other was a youngish woman, of probably Asian descent. She was looking right at him.
‘Hi, Suri,’ he said loudly. ‘Great to see you again! I haven’t got long.’ He leant over and kissed her on both cheeks before she could stop him. Then he sat down and lowered his voice. ‘Nice to meet you,’ he said.
‘You are Flynn Darbyshire?’ said Suri, looking him up and down.
‘In the hunky flesh,’ Flynn grinned. ‘You have the money?’
‘In my room - great Shiva’s balls, you haven’t brought it with you have you?’
‘Of course not, do I look like a total idiot?’ Suri looked him up and down and didn’t answer the question.
‘Where is it?’
‘You think I’m going to tell you that with the amount of money I’ve got coming to me? It’s safe.’
‘How do you know?’
‘Believe me. Perfectly safe. When do you want to do this thing then?’
‘Tomorrow evening.’ Flynn coughed.
‘But, uh. You know what I’ll be doing tomorrow evening.’
‘Exactly. Safety in numbers. You get your first break at half past five. You should be allowed to hobnob with the guests. I’ll be the one in the opal dress.’
‘Oh, I think I’ll recognise you,’ said Flynn lecherously.
‘Didn’t you have to be somewhere?’ Suri asked. Flynn swore, and stood up.
‘Gotta rush, but I’ll see you later,’ he announced, and hurried back to the rehearsal.
Nessa had a somewhat trying afternoon. Flynn somehow managed to arrive late back to the rehearsal despite setting off before her. He came in muttering something about a broken elevator but David still snapped at him.
But then, David was snapping at everyone - he and Wilson hadn’t made it up yet and they snapped at each other about nothing for most of the rehearsal, until finally David actually criticised Wilson’s playing, at which point Wilson retorted with a sharp (and not entirely untrue) critique of the way David conducted the Nyman, calling him melodramatic and corny. Ice had to snap at them both to get them to move on with the rehearsal, and she was probably harsher than she meant to be. Now they were not speaking at all, and Ice was playing her cello so with such vicious concentration that Nessa was afraid for the poor thing’s strings. With Eliza taken ill, Rajin was under twice as much pressure to keep up the viola line, and even Greg seemed slightly out of sorts - possibly worried about Eliza, Nessa theorised.
He certainly seemed to be glad the rehearsal was over - as soon as David had finally declared them finished, Greg leapt to his feet and left, seizing his case but not even pausing to pack his violin away, muttering something about sending a tele.
Nessa wasn’t particularly keen to hang around either, and she realised she hadn’t yet teled her parents, so she packed up and went after him. It was actually further to their rooms than to the nearest tele station, so she didn’t bother to take the cello back first. She met Greg at the tele station, just as he was leaving. He jumped when he saw her, and then smiled.
‘Hey,’ he said.
‘Hey,’ she agreed. ‘Good idea,’ she added. ‘Need to tele home myself.’ He nodded and smiled and moved to go past her. ‘Oh, hey, what are your dinner plans?’ she called after him. ‘Me and Ice’ll probably go out again. Are you with us?’
‘Um - no. I think I’ll bow out, if you don’t mind. Big day tomorrow.’
‘Oh, sure. No problem. I’ll see you tomorrow then.’
‘Yeah,’ Greg said, and hurried off. Nessa watched him go, wondering why he was in such a hurry to get back if he wasn’t planning on doing anything that evening. Then she wheeled the cello over to the tele machine. She was about to start typing when she realised that Greg had left his receipt in the slot.
She knew she shouldn’t read it. It was a private tele, and it wasn’t her business. She should feed it straight into the shredder. But she didn’t.
‘Because I’m a bad, bad person,’ she murmured, pulling it out and reading it.
Dear Mom and Dad, it read. All well on Cor Caroli. Big diplomatic ball tomorrow, many celebrities etc. Finley, Ezbatt, Cygnus, Ling, Rekulak, Standfoot, Temple. All as expected. Very exciting! I fORGet the rest. Rajin Pola (viola) sends his greetings. How is Gloria? Saw a beautiful baby bird, very happy in a cage in shop, she would love it. Next stop Earth? Will see what I can do. Love to all, Greg.
‘Aww,’ said Nessa. She felt ashamed of herself, but she was happy that Greg wasn’t writing anything desperately important to his family. She’d been afraid there was an emergency. She dropped the message into the shredder and started to type her own.
Dear Mum and Dad, she wrote. We are settled in on Cor Caroli and everyone is a bit stressed but it is only because it is such a big gig tomorrow. It’ll be fine on the day. Do I mean night? Space stations still confuse me a bit, I prefer the solid earth! Hope all is well on Ganymede. Think we might be going to Earth next, if so I promise to pop by. Also to see Bhikkhuni Petrova - terribly behind on my vipassana. Much love to you all. Ness.
Nessa reread the message on the screen. It was a bit long for a tele, and would cost her more than she’d intended to send all the way to Ganymede. But she decided she did want to say everything she’d said, so she hit the send button and pressed her card to the reader. The machine flashed for a minute, then flashed up ‘TELECOM SENT’ and spat out the automatic receipt. Nessa carefully pulled it out and shredded it.
When Nessa got back to their room and Ice opened the door, Nessa thought her friend still seemed out of sorts.
‘I’m just frustrated,’ she said, though she didn’t mention what she was frustrated about, and Nessa thought it better not to push her. ‘They’ve got a gym here, haven’t they?’
‘Um. I think so.’
‘I think I might go and work out for a bit,’ Ice said. She reached under her bed and grabbed a gym bag. ‘I won’t come to dinner, if you don’t mind. I’ll just grab something to eat while I’m there.’
‘Oh, yeah. That’s OK. I’ll call in on Eliza and see if she’s feeling better.’
‘OK. Good. I’ll see you later.’ Ice headed for the door, then paused and turned back. ‘Nessa?’
‘Yeah?’
‘I am sorry to desert you, it’s just - you know how it is, right? Got to do what you’ve got to do…’
‘Oh, absolutely. Go on, get out.’ Nessa smiled at Ice and made shooing motions with her hands. Ice smiled back, and left. Nessa sat down on the bed. After a few moments’ thought, she picked up the phone and got the operator to connect her to Flynn’s room. He wasn’t there. She called Rajin, but he said he was going to get some extra practice in and eat later. And she couldn’t quite face the idea of dinner with David and Wilson - in any case they needed the space, and with any luck they might have made up by the time the gig began the next afternoon. She hoped so anyway, it wouldn’t be much fun if they spent the whole day snapping at each other over the canapés.
Nessa got up and was about to visit Eliza but she thought she had better call her first, in case she was feeling much better - or worse.
‘Hey,’ Eliza said. Her voice sounded tired and a bit shaky.
‘You don’t sound so good,’ Nessa said. ‘Do you want me to come over and sit with you? I could bring you something to eat - some soup or something.’
‘No! Don’t, um. You don’t need to do that. I’ll be fine. Really - I think I just need to go back to bed and I’ll be fine.’
‘I’ll call on you in the morning, OK? Make sure you’re all right to play tomorrow.’
‘Um. All right. Call me first, though. I’m, I’m going to turn off my alarm, so. If you call I’ll know to get up. OK?’
‘Yes, all right.’ Nessa put down the phone and sat back on the bed. She had to admit, she wondered what had suddenly got into everybody tonight.
Eliza put the phone down and sat back on the bed.
‘That was Nessa,’ she said. ‘My friend, Nessa. Cello player. Of course - you saw her this afternoon. The sort of Chinese looking one, not the tall pale one. Though she’s Ganymedian anyway, Nessa. Her mum was Russian. You really don’t need to know that.’ Eliza passed her hand over her eyes. ‘She thinks I’m ill.’
‘Why does she think you’re ill?’ asked President Finley, concerned. ‘You’re not ill, are you?’
‘I threw up after the rehearsal,’ said Eliza. ‘But no. It was just… too much.’ There was an awkward pause.
‘It’s very dark in here,’ said Finley. She pressed the switch and the light panel began to rise, letting the starlight flood the room. ‘Oh, Eliza. You look terrible!’
‘Don’t,’ Eliza said. ‘You sound like the others. I’m fine.’
Lucinda twisted one of her shirt sleeves between her fingers.
‘Really?’
‘Well, no.’ Eliza sat down on the bed, then stood up again quickly and wandered across the room aimlessly, turning away from Lucinda and sneaking glances back at her. Lucinda watched her. ‘I’ve missed you,’ Eliza said finally. ‘I’m not ill. I just couldn’t bear it. You were just sitting there.’
‘I came to see you. You must have known that.’
‘But what’s the use of seeing me?’ Eliza demanded. ‘What good can it do anyone? Why are you even here?’
‘Because I love you, Lizzie,’ Lucinda said. Eliza winced.
‘I love you,’ she said. ‘But you can’t. Just. You can’t just turn up - after everything we’ve…’ She turned on Lucinda. ‘You got married!’ Lucinda looked surprised, and then ashamed.
‘We’re - we’re separated,’ she said.
‘Good!’ Eliza snapped. Then she melted a bit. ‘Oh… I’m sorry.’ She sat down. ‘I did mean it,’ she said. ‘I’m glad it didn’t work out with whatshisface,’
‘Richard,’ said Lucinda. Then she bit her tongue, expecting Eliza to shout at her. But Eliza didn’t shout. She just crumpled up and rested her head in her hands.
‘But you haven’t divorced him,’ she said. Lucinda knelt in front of her, hands on her knees, and tried to look up into her face. Eliza shivered at Lucinda’s touch, and looked away.
‘No. I haven’t. It would just be political suicide right now. You must understand that.’
‘Must I? I don’t understand you at all, Luce.’
‘How many times can I tell you how sorry I am?’
‘As many as you like. It won’t make any difference, Lucy, you know that.’ Lucinda looked at the floor.
‘Maybe it’s for the best…’ she said, though the words seemed to stick in her throat. ‘I mean, you have a life here - I don’t mean here, I mean with these people. You have a career. I couldn’t ask you to -’
‘Yes you could!’ Eliza said. Lucinda flinched away from her anger, taking her hands off Eliza’s knees. ‘You could ask me to give up my career and come and live with you on Earth and I would. All you’d have to say would be ‘Eliza, I love you and I want you to live with me’ and I’d come running. But you won’t. Because it’s your career that’s important. It always was.’ Eliza reached down and took Lucinda’s hands in her own. ‘And I understand that. It’s fair enough in your position for your career to come first. But you know I’d do anything for you - I’d shake hands with boring politicians and I’d be clean and wholesome and loyal and everything else the wife of the President has to be. And yet you don’t want to let me do any of that.’
To Eliza’s surprise, Lucinda down at their clasped hands, then looked up at her, and then her eyes filled with tears.
‘You have no idea how hard it is to hear you say that,’ she said. ‘I’ve really screwed up, Lizzie. I didn’t come here to fight. I probably shouldn’t have come at all. I don’t have any right to ask you to see me, and I can’t promise you anything. I want you to do all of that so much it hurts to look at you.’ She tried to take her hands away, but Eliza held on tight.
‘Don’t go,’ she said. ‘Don’t you dare get up and go away. You tell me you love me but you say we can’t be together so the very least you can do is stay with me tonight, now you’re here.’
Cor Caroli orbited its star with the same face always towards the light - the solar generators and the huge, transparent- walled farming sector continuously faced the star, making the most of its power. So it was in fact entirely arbitrary what time of day the Carolians thought it was, so they had decided that even after the Golden Revolution, they should remain on Earth’s time and Earth’s calendar, with 12 months in a year, 30- odd days in a month, 24 hours in each day, 60 minutes in an hour, and 60 seconds in a minute.
At seven pm, Greg received a call from Cor Caroli’s central computer to notify him that a tele had arrived for him. He half-ran to the nearest station, elected to print the tele and waited until he was back in his room to open the printout. Luckily, Rajin had gone out to get some extra practice in. Greg absorbed the contents of the message solemnly. Then he turned over the paper and made a list of names. A few he felt he could cross off immediately. Another he decided to draw a ring around. Then he realised how ridiculous it was to put all this down on paper, and burnt the message in the bathroom sink.
At half past ten, David lay awake, staring at the ceiling. Wilson was sleeping peacefully by his side. But David couldn’t sleep.
Wilson would have to know at some point. He’d have to find out what he’d done. And when he did… David didn’t like to think what would happen. It was going to go beyond bickering, beyond any argument they’d ever had. Maybe there would be no coming back from this one. Maybe they’d get divorced. One of them would have to leave SESO - what was he thinking? He’d have to leave, after all he was the one who had done it. Wilson had been completely innocent of any impropriety. He would testify to that in court.
But it wasn’t going to come to that.
But he was going to have to confess to Wilson some time. It didn’t have to be soon, just, some time. Then it would be up to Wilson whether there were repercussions. Apart from the divorce, of course. He probably wouldn’t be able to prove anything anyway. Perhaps they would just go their separate ways and never see each other again.
David stared morosely at Wilson’s back, and tried to go to sleep.
At eleven fifty-nine and fifty nine seconds, Rajin pressed the confirm button on a panel down in the bowels of Cor Caroli. By the time the computer had registered the command it was twelve am and two seconds on what passed for Saturday morning. Rajin wiped a drop of sweat from his forehead with his sleeve. The job done, he set off on the long walk back to his room. Cor Caroli’s central computer system ticked over happily, one more item on its to-do list for Saturday not bothering it unduly as the timer ran down the twenty four hours to Item Five Thousand, Six Hundred and Thirty Nine. When he got in, Greg was asleep. He slipped into his bed and was asleep himself almost immediately.
At about a quarter past midnight, Eliza and Lucinda finally fell asleep, holding each other tightly. Eliza tucked her head into the curve of Lucinda’s neck and dreamed of nothing much. Lucinda wrapped her arm around Eliza’s shoulders and dreamed of papers and rings. They both slept better than they had done in many days.
At one am, Flynn gave up on the idea that he might coincidentally meet Suri again. At one thirty he despaired of his ability to find another girl to spend the night with, and sloped off back to his empty room. When he got back he checked that his violin was still locked away in the room’s safe. It was there, and all the vital parts were still attached. He patted it goodnight, shut up the safe and got into bed.
Nessa wasn’t sure what time it was when she heard Ice come in. Her friend obviously tried to be as quiet as possible, but her bag clunked loudly when she put it down, and even with the bathroom door firmly shut she could hear the shower clearly. She thought about getting up and saying something to Ice when she came back in, but somehow it just didn’t happen. Just as she was dropping back off to sleep, Nessa thought she could smell incense.
The Solar Elite String Orchesta assembled by the elevator the next morning, carrying their instruments and bags full of concert clothes. Nessa thought they all looked a bit bleary- eyed, even though it was eleven am, not exactly first thing in the morning. Eliza was the last to arrive, only just on time, with her viola slung over her shoulders, trying to brush her hair and walk at the same time. Soon afterwards the players were joined by a cheery man in a green suit who introduced himself as one of Cor Caroli’s ‘celebration solutions managers’. He was there, he said, to take them to the diplomatic sector and get them all signed in and comfortable in their dressing room. He took them into an elevator, pulled out a key card and pressed it to a glowing part of the wall which Nessa had assumed was just there for decoration.
‘Do you always have to do that to get to the diplomatic sector?’ she asked.
‘Oh, no,’ said the man, ‘usually the streets are open to the public, but today we’ve got the whole floor sealed off. All the guests can come and go as they please, of course, but the staff have supervised access only today.’
‘Why so much security?’ Wilson asked.
‘Well, because of the guest list,’ said Rajin. ‘Finley, Cygnus, almost every leader of every nation in the known galaxy will be there, not to mention celebrities like Naomi Worn and business leaders like Mr Ezbatt.’ Greg raised an eyebrow at him. ‘At least, I presume that’s why it’s locked up so tight,’ Rajin added, looking at the celebration solutions manager.
‘That’s about the shape of it,’ he said brightly. ‘You’ve done your homework, haven’t you?’
‘I must admit,’ said Rajin, ‘I’m a bit of a closet celebrity- spotter.’
Nessa heard Greg say ‘Hah!’ under his breath. She looked quizzically at him but he didn’t seem to notice.
‘Well you’ll have fun this evening,’ said the man.
‘Yes,’ Rajin said. ‘I hope we’ll all have a good time this evening.’
Nessa hoped so too.
Their dressing room was just about large enough to accommodate them all with their instruments. They had an illuminated mirror each and a hook on which to hang their clothes after they’d changed. In the middle of the room there was a small ornamental fountain, which the man explained was running with perfectly acceptable drinking water.
David had a dressing room of his own next door, almost as large as the one the players were in. They all stuck their heads around the door and decided they preferred their room, even if they did only have upholstered benches while he had a large, squishy- looking sofa. Wilson disappeared into David’s room for a while, and Nessa was pleased to hear - or rather not to hear - that there was no shouting.
‘I’m so glad they’re OK today,’ she said to Ice, as she kicked off her sensible brown shoes and began to pull her concert dress out of her bag. It had got all crumpled again, despite her having ironed it and wrapped it up in anti- wrinkle cloth with almost obsessive care before they disembarked the shuttle. She made a disgusted noise and tried to smoothe out the silk with the flat of her hand.
‘It will make everything easier,’ Ice agreed. She sat down beside Nessa and started to unlace her boots. Around them, the other players also began to change into their concert gear. Flynn stripped down to his underwear almost immediately, much to Greg and Nessa’s amusement and everyone else’s annoyance. He then seemed to spend a long time getting into his grey suit. Even after he technically had all his clothes on, he was wandering around with his shirt undone, looking at himself in the mirror. Nessa had to admit, his chest was actually rather nice to look at. Then she had to look away quickly in case he caught her looking and thought she was particularly interested in being flirted with.
Greg, Wilson and Rajin all remained in the room to change into their suits - respectively an English- style grey one with a waistcoat, a sleek black one with a high buttoned collar (when Wilson stood next to the deep brown of the door he was practically invisible), and an elaborately embroidered traditional Indian one in white silk. Nessa, too, didn’t have any particular qualms about changing in front of her fellow players. She slipped into her dress, tights and slippers and then spent a good fifteen minutes standing in front of the mirror trying to make a particularly annoying crease go away, before she realised that it was on her right side and would therefore be invisible to the audience most of the way through the gig.
Eliza and Ice both retreated into the toilets in order to change. Eliza came out after only a few minutes wearing a flouncy golden brown number and pulling on a tangle in her hair.
Ice was the last person to be ready, which surprised Nessa. She was usually not much keen on dressing up for concerts. She usually wore a simple black suit, and it never took her more than two minutes to get into and out of it, not including the five minutes she spent taking off her combat boots. But she’d been in the toilets for a full half hour, and Nessa was about to go in after her, before she finally emerged.
Nessa couldn’t help but stare.
Ice was wearing a dress. A white dress. A white silk dress. It swished along the floor as she crossed the room. She seemed nervous, and she didn’t move particularly gracefully, but it didn’t seem to matter in that dress.
‘Wow,’ said Flynn. ‘Ice. You’re bloody smoking hot in that do.’ Ice’s face melted into a smile.
‘Thank you,’ she said. She slid her bag away under the bench, pulled out a make- up bag and leant over to the mirror. Nessa looked more closely at the dress. It was embroidered, in white on white, with intricate patterns and symbols.
‘Does it mean something?’ she asked. Ice looked down.
‘Not really. I just…’ she shrugged and went back to the mirror. ‘It’s a sort of ancient Northern design. I just thought it was pretty.’
‘Oh, it is. It’s really lovely.’
‘Thanks.’
There was a knock on the door, and David came in. He did a double- take at Ice’s dress (and by now her shadowed eyes and the tiny glass flowers she was fixing to her hair, which was no more usual than the dress), but he didn’t say anything.
‘Are we all ready?’ he said. The players all nodded.
‘I think so,’ said Wilson.
‘Well, we get to go and look at the room and the stage before the ball begins,’ David said. ‘And we should test out the auto- readers,’ he added, holding up a bag stuffed with sheet music. ‘I know they’re better than hovers, but better safe than sorry. Then we can tune up and get on stage for midday.’
Even the corridors around the back of the ballroom where the dressing rooms were were sumptuously decorated in the diplomacy sector, so the players were expecting to be stunned. But they were. The way the light radiated from the mirrored pillars. The soft golden carpet underfoot in the lounge and the polish on the wooden ballroom floor. The throne-like chairs. The drape of deep green curtains across huge mirrors on the walls, simulating endless windows and reflecting more of the light back into the room. The chandeliers.
The small stage was already set out with the right number of chairs and auto-readers, and a reader up front for David.
‘We’ll be playing for two hours while the guests arrive, then we’ll get a break for lunch - we get to hobnob with the guests, so…’ he looked at them all. ‘I know I don’t have to tell you to behave yourselves. You’re all responsible adults. You won’t do anything to embarrass yourselves.’ Everyone’s eyes strayed over to Flynn.
‘What?’ he said.
‘Anyway, then we’ll be back on stage for some dancing, then off again for an hour, then on again for the evening set, which is the whole four hours.’
Nessa put down the shutter on the light. She patted her cello case fondly as she passed, and got into bed.
Wilson gave him a shark,
Nessa and Flynn volunteered to walk Eliza back to her room.
‘No!’ said Eliza, managing to stand up
in the opposite direction and
It didn’t work out
She was pacing, and running her hands through her sticking-up white hair.
side of the room
Eventually everyone sorted themselves out.
Just
doing anything
‘Hey,
only light in the room was
pretending she wasn’t still feeling horribly, horribly lonely.
of the same name
Nessa got up and headed for the other cabin. Flynn immediately stretched out with his feet on the seat she had been sitting on.
In the other cabin, David and Rajin were having an earnest discussion about Elgar, and Ice and Greg were sitting by the window.
Those random words at the end are me cheating. They are words that I put in, then took out again. If I end up over, I won't count them. But if they are what is between me and 50,000 words, they are so counting...
Nessa Trueblood stared out of the window as the shuttle approached Cor Caroli. The movement on the surface of the star was mesmerising. Even through the darkened windows, it was bright enough to fill the cabin with light. Every so often she could see little eruptions burst from the surface, brighter and then darker in tiny concentric circles.
‘You probably shouldn’t stare,’ said Flynn, dropping into the seat opposite her. ‘You’ll go blind.’
‘I think the glass is thick enough,’ Nessa said, ‘and anyway, it’s not as if we really need to read the music for this gig.’ Flynn laughed. Nessa looked out of the window again. As she gazed at Cor Caroli the star, Cor Caroli the space station slid into view in front of it. At first it was just a black shape blocking out the star, but as the light changed Nessa could see the beautifully painted green and gold of the hull, and make out the docking bay and a handful of pinpricks of light that she assumed were windows.
‘Look, there’s the station!’ she said. Wilson looked up from his book.
‘It says here they don’t much like being called a station.’
‘Why?’ said Eliza, leaning over to peer at his book.
‘Because nobody’s stationed here from elsewhere.’ He cleared his throat and read: “The council chambers are decorated with small reproductions of the huge banners that the rebels hung over the hull of Cor Caroli during the Golden Revolution. The people of Cor Caroli are proud of their heritage as the first space station to achieve full independence from Earth rule. They would rather be referred to as a nation than a station.’
‘May I borrow the book when you’re finished with it?’ asked Eliza.
‘Of course. I’ve got two more.’
‘Hadn’t you guessed?’ Flynn shook his hair out of his eyes. ‘Wilson’s got to be prepared in case they stop the ball and force us to take a test on their history, politics and tourist attractions.’
‘Actually, there’s a lot of fascinating stuff about this place,’ said Wilson blithely, passing The Rough Guide to Cor Caroli over to Eliza and pulling out An Independent Nation: Two Hundred Years of Diplomacy on Cor Caroli.
An announcement filtered into the cabin.
Ladies and Gentlemen, we are approaching Cor Caroli. Thank you for travelling with Shooting Star Liners. Please ensure you have all luggage with you before disembarking.
Ice came in and started opening the luggage hatches. Wilson put his book away and helped her. They were both tall enough to reach the hatches comfortably, so they passed luggage and instruments down to Nessa and Eliza, who would both have had to use a stepladder. Rajin and Greg came in and claimed their luggage. David appeared pulling Wilson’s double bass behind him.
‘You didn’t have to,’ Wilson said.
‘I know. I was near the store room.’
‘I was going to come and get it myself.’
‘I know. I’m just trying to help. Don’t be so touchy.’ Ice and Nessa exchanged glances, grabbed their luggage and tried to edge out of the way.
‘I’m not being touchy.’
‘Well you could have fooled me.’
Eliza almost snatched her suitcase out of Wilson’s hand and fled towards the airlock. Nessa and Ice followed her.
‘Do you think they have been cooped up together for too long?’ said Nessa. Ice shrugged and shouldered her bag.
‘Is it any worse than usual? They’ll make up later.’ Nessa nodded, then sniffed. She sniffed her bag, then her cello, then she leaned over and sniffed her friend.
‘What do you smell of? It’s nice.’
‘Incense,’ said Ice. ‘I was meditating.’
‘Ah.’ Nessa felt a pang of guilt. It had been a very long time since she had last meditated properly. And while playing was almost a religious experience, she had to admit it probably didn’t bring her much closer to Nirvana. ‘I should tele home when we’ve docked and got settled in,’ she muttered.
The customs officer looked highly suspicious when the Solar Elite String Orchestra rounded the corner from the loading bay, carrying and rolling an assortment of cases towards his desk.
‘All right,’ he said. ‘Line up please, one at a time. Open your bags please, sir.’ David went first, plopping his briefcase and his suitcase down on the desk and opening them both. The customs officer briefly riffled through the clothes and books, and looked under the sheet music. He opened the velveteen bag and took out David’s silver baton. After ascertaining that it wasn’t a weapon, he put it back. He passed David his org and asked him to turn it on. David did so - the little screen lit up and played a few bars of Tchaikovsky. Nessa saw Wilson’s face flush.
‘Why all the fuss?’ asked Flynn. ‘There wasn’t this much security getting on the shuttle.’ He clutched his violin case protectively.
‘It’s all the diplomats,’ Nessa said. ‘There are politicians here from all over the galaxy! Even the President’s here! I think it’s all very exciting.’
‘I think it’s a pain in the arse,’ said Ice, stepping up to the desk and opening her bag.
‘Fine,’ said the customs officer. ‘Now, your - um - that.’
‘It’s a cello,’ Ice said, rolling her eyes and lifting her cello case onto the desk. ‘Look.’ She pressed her thumb to the sensor panel on the case and it sprung open with a hiss of pneumatics. Nessa stroked her own cello case, somehow feeling the need to reassure it that its old-fashioned clasps and chain lock were good enough for her. The officer peered at Ice’s cello.
‘Can you take it out for me please?’
‘There won’t be any need for that.’ The officer looked up and went pale. There was a man, dressed in an ornate uniform of green and gold, approaching the desk at a jog.
‘Sir!’
‘You can stand down, sergeant. This is the orchestra, for the ball.’ He shook David’s hand. ‘You must be David Collins. I hope you had a good trip?’
‘Governor Cygnus. You really didn’t need to come and greet us yourself.’
‘On the contrary, I’ve heard such wonderful things about you I wanted to come and meet you in person. I’m sorry about all this faff. Let’s get you through it and settled in.’
‘But sir - I should still check their cases,’ said the customs officer. ‘They could have anything hidden in those things - especially that one.’ He nodded at Wilson’s double bass, which was taller than most of the players. Cygnus looked at David.
‘You can check,’ David said. ‘I can promise you you won’t see anything but musical instruments.’
So the orchestra filed past, opening their cases while David and Cygnus chatted, Cygnus occasionally pausing to give the terrified customs officer a hard stare. Wilson showed off his double bass, Nessa opened her cello case - and then spent nearly ten minutes crouched on the floor trying to get it to shut again - Flynn and Greg presented their violins and Eliza and Rajin their violas.
Finally, they were waved on. Cygnus produced a bag full of room keys and handed it to Nessa.
‘Here are your keys,’ he said. ‘You’ve been given guest rooms on Buckingham Row. It’s on the fifth level, if you use the central elevator and turn left you’ll see signs.’ He shook David’s hand again. ‘I’m looking forward to hearing you ever so much,’ he effused. ‘Would it be possible for me to come and hear you rehearse tomorrow morning?’
‘Of course,’ David said. ‘I must say once again how grateful we are to be asked to perform in front of such a prestigious audience.’ Cygnus said his goodbyes and the players crowded around Nessa for their room keys. She opened the bag, and saw that there were three green keys and two gold ones.
‘Looks we’ve been given two double rooms,’ said Nessa. ‘That’s yours,’ she added, handing one of the gold keys to David and Wilson. ‘Who wants the spare?’
‘I do! I do!’ said Eliza. ‘Can I, please?’
Nessa passed the other gold key to Eliza.
‘Ice, you want to share?’ she asked.
‘Sure,’ said Ice, taking a green key.
‘And Rajin and Greg, you still want to share?’
‘Yup,’ said Greg, taking one himself.
‘So Flynn, it looks like you’re in a twin room all of your own,’ said Ice. Flynn sidled up to Eliza and nudged her with his violin case.
‘Hey, Liza. You really want to be in that big bed all by yourself?’ Eliza rolled her eyes contemptuously, but she still flushed. Ice stepped up behind Flynn and caught him a smack around the head.
While Flynn was checking the back of his head for blood, Rajin excused himself.
‘I’ve got a tele to send,’ he said. ‘You know how these things are, if I don’t send it today I’ll arrive back home before it does.’
‘Not going to come and dump your things first?’ asked Greg, waving the key at him.
‘Nah. I can manage. You’ll be there when I’ve finished, right?’
‘Right,’ said Greg. ‘Of course.’
Rajin hurried off.
‘What’s so urgent it can’t wait until we’re settled in?’ wondered Flynn. Greg stared after Rajin.
‘You know, I should probably send a tele too. My parents wanted to know when we’d arrived safely. They’re not really fans of offworld travel.’
‘You’ve got to go to the room first, though - or else Rajin won’t be able to get in when he comes back,’ Nessa pointed out.
‘Yeah, I know. I was just thinking.’
The central elevator was actually about twenty elevators arranged in a circle around a central shaft that ran right through Cor Caroli, from the biodome on top of the solar side right down to the warehouses and generators on the dark side, through the government sector, the service sectors, the housing sectors and the shopping sectors. Cor Caroli had been planned meticulously by the ancient Earthers who had built it, but as any community tends to do, parts of it had evolved. Many of the shops had become apartments during a housing shortage, and then turned back into shops when the economy boomed after the revolution. Parks had sprung up, been removed, been put back. Once there had even been a nuclear reactor stuck on to the bottom of the hull with not much more than glue and hope, during the great solar-panel malfunction of ’64.
Wilson took great pleasure in explaining all of this as the players watched the levels float by through the green glass doors of the elevator. Flynn yawned pointedly, but shut up under the pressure of sharp looks from David, Ice and Eliza.
Greg waved the others off down Buckingham Row and let himself into the room. It was dark, and fairly pokey. He dumped his bags on the bed and flicked the light switch on. A silver shutter along one wall started to go up with a whirr, and light flooded slowly into the room.
He went over to the door and listened intently for a moment. Then he hurried over to the bed. He pulled an org out of his bag and waved it in the air. Nothing happened. He held it above his head and walked from one end of the room to the other. Still, nothing happened. Then he shoved it into his socks and crossed the room again. Finally, he cleared his throat and intoned thus:
‘Bomb. Kill. Terrorist. President. Threat. Codename. Cell. Brother. Corgi.’
He paused. The org stayed resolutely silent. Greg smiled to himself and tapped a few buttons. The org whirred and clicked to itself, thinking very hard about what he’d asked it to do. Greg smothered it with a pillow and listened for footsteps outside the door. Then the org bleeped, and he picked it up again and flicked through the file it had finally decided to show him.
‘Hmm,’ he said after a while. ‘That’s interesting.’
Nessa pressed her nose to the glass, peering out through the clear section of wall into the well of bright light.
‘How does it work?’ she said. ‘Is it real light? From the star?’
‘I think so,’ said Ice, standing her cello by the bed. She came over and looked out of the window. ‘It looks like it’s being reflected all the way down here. See, the walls are all mirrors, or one-way windows.’
‘It’s very clever,’ said Nessa, impressed.
‘Actually, it’s terribly rudimentary,’ said Ice, with a smile. ‘The simplest solutions are so often the best ones.’
‘Well, whatever it is it’s making me kinda dizzy.’ Nessa turned away from the window, rubbing her eyes. Ice stood at the window a bit longer. When Nessa looked back at her she looked almost as bright as the light well itself. Her name wasn’t really Ice, it was Jane, but right now you could see why she’d always gone by her nickname. She was tall and thin and very pale, with a crop of short white-blonde hair that stuck straight up on top of her head. Especially with the light reflecting off her, she looked somewhat like some sort of ice demon. Jane Baldwin was no name for an ice demon.
Nessa pulled her suitcase onto her knee and flicked it open.
‘We’re not rehearsing for the rest of the day, are we? What time is it?’ Ice looked at her watch.
‘I don’t know, my watch isn’t set to local time yet.’ She strode to the other side of the room and picked up the bedside clock. ‘It says about half past 5.’
‘Shall we go and explore the shopping sector or whatever it’s called?’ Nessa suggested. ‘We could ask if the others want to come and get dinner.’
David and Wilson agreed to go to dinner with Nessa and Ice, and Nessa was pleased to see they seemed to have made up. She caught them holding hands when they thought she wasn’t looking. Greg came too, and they bumped into Rajin on the way back to the elevator and he made them wait for him. Eliza said she was tired, and elected to stay behind. Flynn wasn’t in his room when they called on him.
Eliza lay on her double bed, staring at the ceiling. She hadn’t opened the shutter, so the light was very dim. It wasn’t completely dark, though - there was a faint glow coming from somewhere. She couldn’t quite bring herself to get up and find out where it was coming from.
Maybe she should have gone to dinner with the others. It might have made her feel better. At the very least it might have taken her mind off it.
Then again. Somewhere in the crowd, maybe eating in the restaurant or walking through the shopping sector, maybe talking to people or perhaps moving quickly and not making eye contact…
Eliza rolled over and buried her face in the pillow.
She definitely should have gone with the others. Hell, even spending time alone with Flynn would be better than this.
She got up and wandered into the adjoining bathroom. She had to admit it was rather lovely. She suspected that the twin rooms didn’t have bathrooms this nice. She had a lovely big bath made of some kind of green stone, and a selection of interestingly scented bottles. She played with them for a while, reading the labels. One claimed to be ‘martian musk’, but turned out to be made mostly of water, ethanol and fillius nathus, which was a fragrant but ugly brown weed that her parents had spent many years trying to remove from their back yard. Another was called ‘Liquid Starlight’ and was a striking, radiant gold colour. It turned out to be a hair treatment. Eliza applied some according to the instructions, and sure enough her hair seemed a more interesting, richer shade of brown and it sparkled slightly as she moved.
She put the rest carefully back on the shelf. She tried to tell herself that she might wear it for the ball, if she wasn’t afraid of looking too made-up. And she wouldn’t, at all, keep it on the shelf in case of a certain visitor.
Eliza ran a bath, then sat on the edge of the green stone and swore for quite a long time, quietly but enthusiastically.
Nessa wheeled her cello into the rehearsal room, panting.
‘Sorry I’m late!’ she said, ‘I got lost! I’ve spent fifteen minutes running round on the wrong level because someone stopped the elevator and…’ she stopped and looked around the room. David raised his eyebrows at her.
‘Under the circumstances,’ he said, ‘I’ll forgive you.’ Nessa flushed and started unpacking her cello, but not with the frenzied speed she had expected to. Only David, Wilson and Ice were there. All seven chairs were set out and there were empty hovers floating in place, but Eliza, Rajin, Greg and Flynn were still missing. ‘This is really not good enough,’ David muttered. ‘The Governor himself is coming to see us. We haven’t even got one of each instrument! How are we supposed to rehearse anything without the upper strings?’
Nessa managed to stop herself from making a viola joke, but she met Wilson’s eyes and knew he was thinking the same thing. David paced while she tuned up, then threw his hands in the air and announced that they might as well rehearse the tricky cello and double bass bits while they were there.
‘Elgar!’ he snapped, and Ice fished in her music file for the Serenade in E Minor. She held the sheet of paper up against the hover and let go. It fell off. David made a frustrated noise, and Nessa picked up the music and tried again. This time it stuck, and hung in the air in front of them.
‘I’dve thought they’d have better equipment than this,’ Nessa said. ‘These hovers are 20 years old if they’re a day.’
‘They have. I think this might be what they could spare at short notice. They’ve got auto-readers on the stage in the ballroom.’
Ice and Wilson went ‘oooh.’ David rolled his eyes and started conducting, leaving the players scrambling to get their bows on the strings and catch up with him.
They got all the way through the Serenade perfectly on only the second time round.
‘Well done,’ David said, ‘though you’re lucky those eight bars after C are doubled by the violas, you won’t be able to have another go on the night.’
Actually, Nessa thought, they would - the ball was slated to go on all day, and they’d be playing for a few solid hours, plenty of time to get all the way through their entire repertoire at least twice.
They were about to move on to the Saint-Jon quartets when Eliza came rushing in, looking flushed.
‘Sorry!’ she said. David looked about to snap at her, but she looked like she might burst into tears, so he just sighed.
‘Come on, get tuned up and let’s get on with it.’
‘Where are Flynn and Greg? And Rajin?’ Eliza panted, pulling out her viola and running over to her chair.
‘God only knows!’ David said. Eliza winced, and ran to the chair next to Nessa.
‘Did you get lost too?’ Nessa whispered.
‘No, I, um. I sort of overslept,’ Eliza admitted. Nessa winced.
Only another five minutes later, Flynn and Rajin and Greg all walked in together. They tried to look nonchalant and apologetic at the same time, though Flynn was supplying most of the nonchalant and Rajin most of the apologetic. They scurried to their seats and got their music to stick to their hovers and then they all tuned up and finally, half an hour late, the rehearsal began. And just in time - five minutes later they were interrupted again when the door opened and Governor Cygnus slipped in. He motioned to David not to stop. Out of the corner of her eye, Nessa saw a woman come in behind Cygnus. Without losing her place or getting behind David’s beat, she tried to look at the woman. She had dark skin and black hair, and she was wearing a grey suit. But it wasn’t until they finished the piece that any of them noticed who it was. Rajin caught his breath, and Eliza dropped her bow. David turned around and performed a perfect comedy double-take.
‘Mrs Finley!’ he said. ‘I mean, Mrs President, ma’am. What a wonderful surprise…’
‘Please,’ said Finley, ‘Just carry on. Pretend I’m not here.’
‘Yes, ma’am,’ David said. He bowed to her, and turned back to the orchestra and pulled a surprised, terrified face.
‘Ohmygod,’ Nessa murmured to Ice out of the corner of her mouth. ‘President Finley. The most powerful woman on Earth, probably in the galaxy, is sitting right there!’ She turned to Eliza, but instead of nervous excitement, Eliza’s face seemed full of confusion and sadness. She was almost turning green. And she was staring right at the President. ‘Liza!’ Nessa hissed. ‘Are you OK?’
‘No,’ said Eliza. Then she shook her head, and looked at the floor. ‘I mean, yeah. I’m fine. She’s just very… she’s a bit…’
‘I know!’ Nessa agreed. ‘The President of the UN! Sitting right there!’ Eliza looked at her, and again there was a lot less enthusiasm in her face than Nessa would have thought appropriate. But then David stopped shuffling the music on his stand and started beating again. He hadn’t, of course, told them which piece they were doing next, and it was only because he was beating in five-four time that they guessed. There was a general scuffle while they found the right music, and then they began to play again.
Nothing else went wrong for a whole hour. The President of the UN and the Governor of Cor Caroli sat at the back of the room, listening to the music and watching the players, and occasionally speaking in whispers. From the furtive glances Nessa shot them during the Nyman - the cello part had what seemed like fifteen thousand bars of the same two notes, and she had plenty of time to think about the politicians - it seemed like Cygnus was a lot more interested in talking to Finley than she was in talking to him. She seemed far more interested in watching the orchestra. Nessa wondered if she played an instrument herself.
Then, halfway through the second repeat, Rajin’s D string snapped with a loud ptoiing. Rajin swore and got up, picking his way past Ice and Nessa to get a spare out of his bag.
‘Eh, we might as well have a break anyway,’ said David. ‘Fifteen minutes, guys.’
‘Well, we’ll be getting out of your hair,’ said Cygnus, standing up.
‘It was really wonderful to see you,’ said Finley. ‘I look forward to hearing you play tomorrow.’
‘Thank you very much, ma’am,’ said David. The orchestra got to their feet, and Cygnus and Finley left, passing Rajin on his way back to his chair. Rajin’s head turned to watch the President go, and he didn’t look where he was going. He collided with Greg and knocked him to the floor. David stood in front of the chairs, tapping his baton against his leg while they picked themselves up and Rajin finished apologising.
While the others were getting cups of tea and cheese sandwiches - everywhere they went, no matter how far from Earth, they were always provided with tea and bloody cheese sandwiches - Greg slipped into the toilets and turned on his org.
The file was no longer there.
‘Shit,’ he whispered. ‘Shit! Where the shitting shit have you shitting gone?’ He held the org over his head and pressed buttons, but this time rather than whirring and clicking for a few minutes it just beeped decisively.
‘It does!’ Greg muttered. ‘It does exist!’
But the org definitely didn’t believe him.
The door burst open and Eliza fell inside.
‘Oh!’ she said. ‘It, it wasn’t - you weren’t - ohgod.’ And she pushed him aside and threw up. Greg pocketed the org. He knelt beside her and pulled her hair out of her face.
‘There there,’ he said. ‘Not feeling well?’ Eliza didn’t answer him.
He waited for her to stop throwing up, then helped her to her feet and got her to the sink where she washed her face and looked at him for the first time in the mirror.
‘You don’t half look under the weather,’ Greg said. ‘Maybe you should go and lie down.’
‘Should stay,’ Eliza said. ‘David’ll be cross if I just up and leave. I’ll be fine.’ She tried to leave the bathroom with dignity, but ended up stumbling towards the door. Greg caught her and helped her out into the rehearsal room.
‘Oh, Eliza!’ said Nessa, putting down her cheese sandwich. ‘Are you OK?’
‘I’m fine,’ Eliza said, but she kept leaning on Greg.
‘She’s thrown up,’ he said. ‘She ought to go back to bed.’ David came over and held Eliza’s shoulders comfortingly.
‘Eliza. Do you think you’ll be able to play tomorrow?’ Wilson gave him a sharp look, which David ignored. Eliza nodded feebly. ‘Go on then. Go and get some rest. You know all this music anyway,’ he added gently. She nodded again.
‘I’ll take her,’ said Nessa.
‘Me too,’ said Flynn.
‘OK,’ said David. ‘The rest of you, ten more minutes then I want to begin again, all right?’ The others nodded, and Nessa and Flynn took hold of Eliza and led her out of the room. The last thing Nessa heard was Wilson accosting David in a corner.
‘How could you ask her that? Can’t you see she’s unwell?’
‘I need to know!’
‘And if she isn’t well enough to play tomorrow?’
‘Well, I suppose it’ll be OK, but…’
‘So why the extra pressure?’
Nessa was rather glad to get out of the room. She didn’t like it when David and Wilson argued, even if they did make it up again. It was embarrassing somehow.
She did wonder whether Flynn had an ulterior motive in helping her to take Eliza back to her room, but he didn’t try to stay with her. In fact, he excused himself first.
‘Are you OK to be left, Liza? It’s just, I’m a bit nervous about bits of the Holst and I want to be there when David goes over it - do you mind?’ Eliza shook her head, and Flynn made a quick exit.
‘Are you really all right?’ Nessa asked, stroking Eliza’s back.
‘I don’t know what’s come over me,’ said Eliza, giving Nessa a brave little smile. ‘Maybe it’s something I ate.’
‘Look, don’t be afraid to tell David you can’t play tomorrow, OK? Rajin’ll be fine on his own. Maybe we can even find another viola player on the station who can take over.’
‘No!’ Eliza managed to laugh feebly. ‘God no. I’d hate to have come all this way and not even played the gig. It’d all be for nothing. No, I will be all right by then.’
‘If you’re sure. I’d better be getting back too. You know what David’s like.’
‘If you’re lucky he’ll still be bickering with Wilson when you get back,’ Eliza smiled.
‘Oh god. I hope not.’ Nessa gave Eliza a hug and stood up. ‘I’ll come and see you later, OK?’
‘OK,’ Eliza said, lying down on the bed and cuddling up to a pillow. Nessa let herself out quietly.
Flynn half-jogged back towards the rehearsal room. But before he got to the right street he stopped suddenly. He pulled out a piece of card from his jacket pocket and studied it. Then he turned off and carried on jogging towards Jermyn Lane. He abruptly slowed to a casual stroll when he got to the street, which was one of those avenues on Cor Caroli that had once been residential and since had been converted into small shops and cafes. It was snug and fashionable. He headed for a drinking establishment with an old-fashioned sign hanging outside declaring it The Chequered Tavern.
Inside, the bar had obviously once been somebody’s front room. There was the light-well, half open to keep the room fashionably dim, and the viscreen which had obviously been the central focus of the room was now behind the bar, half obscured with bottles and drink-sacs. The air was full of a faint fragrance, possibly some sort of incense.
It wasn’t hard to find the person he was looking for - there were only two people in the bar. One was a middle aged man with grey hair and glasses, who was sitting reading a book. The other was a youngish woman, of probably Asian descent. She was looking right at him.
‘Hi, Suri,’ he said loudly. ‘Great to see you again! I haven’t got long.’ He leant over and kissed her on both cheeks before she could stop him. Then he sat down and lowered his voice. ‘Nice to meet you,’ he said.
‘You are Flynn Darbyshire?’ said Suri, looking him up and down.
‘In the hunky flesh,’ Flynn grinned. ‘You have the money?’
‘In my room - great Shiva’s balls, you haven’t brought it with you have you?’
‘Of course not, do I look like a total idiot?’ Suri looked him up and down and didn’t answer the question.
‘Where is it?’
‘You think I’m going to tell you that with the amount of money I’ve got coming to me? It’s safe.’
‘How do you know?’
‘Believe me. Perfectly safe. When do you want to do this thing then?’
‘Tomorrow evening.’ Flynn coughed.
‘But, uh. You know what I’ll be doing tomorrow evening.’
‘Exactly. Safety in numbers. You get your first break at half past five. You should be allowed to hobnob with the guests. I’ll be the one in the opal dress.’
‘Oh, I think I’ll recognise you,’ said Flynn lecherously.
‘Didn’t you have to be somewhere?’ Suri asked. Flynn swore, and stood up.
‘Gotta rush, but I’ll see you later,’ he announced, and hurried back to the rehearsal.
Nessa had a somewhat trying afternoon. Flynn somehow managed to arrive late back to the rehearsal despite setting off before her. He came in muttering something about a broken elevator but David still snapped at him.
But then, David was snapping at everyone - he and Wilson hadn’t made it up yet and they snapped at each other about nothing for most of the rehearsal, until finally David actually criticised Wilson’s playing, at which point Wilson retorted with a sharp (and not entirely untrue) critique of the way David conducted the Nyman, calling him melodramatic and corny. Ice had to snap at them both to get them to move on with the rehearsal, and she was probably harsher than she meant to be. Now they were not speaking at all, and Ice was playing her cello so with such vicious concentration that Nessa was afraid for the poor thing’s strings. With Eliza taken ill, Rajin was under twice as much pressure to keep up the viola line, and even Greg seemed slightly out of sorts - possibly worried about Eliza, Nessa theorised.
He certainly seemed to be glad the rehearsal was over - as soon as David had finally declared them finished, Greg leapt to his feet and left, seizing his case but not even pausing to pack his violin away, muttering something about sending a tele.
Nessa wasn’t particularly keen to hang around either, and she realised she hadn’t yet teled her parents, so she packed up and went after him. It was actually further to their rooms than to the nearest tele station, so she didn’t bother to take the cello back first. She met Greg at the tele station, just as he was leaving. He jumped when he saw her, and then smiled.
‘Hey,’ he said.
‘Hey,’ she agreed. ‘Good idea,’ she added. ‘Need to tele home myself.’ He nodded and smiled and moved to go past her. ‘Oh, hey, what are your dinner plans?’ she called after him. ‘Me and Ice’ll probably go out again. Are you with us?’
‘Um - no. I think I’ll bow out, if you don’t mind. Big day tomorrow.’
‘Oh, sure. No problem. I’ll see you tomorrow then.’
‘Yeah,’ Greg said, and hurried off. Nessa watched him go, wondering why he was in such a hurry to get back if he wasn’t planning on doing anything that evening. Then she wheeled the cello over to the tele machine. She was about to start typing when she realised that Greg had left his receipt in the slot.
She knew she shouldn’t read it. It was a private tele, and it wasn’t her business. She should feed it straight into the shredder. But she didn’t.
‘Because I’m a bad, bad person,’ she murmured, pulling it out and reading it.
Dear Mom and Dad, it read. All well on Cor Caroli. Big diplomatic ball tomorrow, many celebrities etc. Finley, Ezbatt, Cygnus, Ling, Rekulak, Standfoot, Temple. All as expected. Very exciting! I fORGet the rest. Rajin Pola (viola) sends his greetings. How is Gloria? Saw a beautiful baby bird, very happy in a cage in shop, she would love it. Next stop Earth? Will see what I can do. Love to all, Greg.
‘Aww,’ said Nessa. She felt ashamed of herself, but she was happy that Greg wasn’t writing anything desperately important to his family. She’d been afraid there was an emergency. She dropped the message into the shredder and started to type her own.
Dear Mum and Dad, she wrote. We are settled in on Cor Caroli and everyone is a bit stressed but it is only because it is such a big gig tomorrow. It’ll be fine on the day. Do I mean night? Space stations still confuse me a bit, I prefer the solid earth! Hope all is well on Ganymede. Think we might be going to Earth next, if so I promise to pop by. Also to see Bhikkhuni Petrova - terribly behind on my vipassana. Much love to you all. Ness.
Nessa reread the message on the screen. It was a bit long for a tele, and would cost her more than she’d intended to send all the way to Ganymede. But she decided she did want to say everything she’d said, so she hit the send button and pressed her card to the reader. The machine flashed for a minute, then flashed up ‘TELECOM SENT’ and spat out the automatic receipt. Nessa carefully pulled it out and shredded it.
When Nessa got back to their room and Ice opened the door, Nessa thought her friend still seemed out of sorts.
‘I’m just frustrated,’ she said, though she didn’t mention what she was frustrated about, and Nessa thought it better not to push her. ‘They’ve got a gym here, haven’t they?’
‘Um. I think so.’
‘I think I might go and work out for a bit,’ Ice said. She reached under her bed and grabbed a gym bag. ‘I won’t come to dinner, if you don’t mind. I’ll just grab something to eat while I’m there.’
‘Oh, yeah. That’s OK. I’ll call in on Eliza and see if she’s feeling better.’
‘OK. Good. I’ll see you later.’ Ice headed for the door, then paused and turned back. ‘Nessa?’
‘Yeah?’
‘I am sorry to desert you, it’s just - you know how it is, right? Got to do what you’ve got to do…’
‘Oh, absolutely. Go on, get out.’ Nessa smiled at Ice and made shooing motions with her hands. Ice smiled back, and left. Nessa sat down on the bed. After a few moments’ thought, she picked up the phone and got the operator to connect her to Flynn’s room. He wasn’t there. She called Rajin, but he said he was going to get some extra practice in and eat later. And she couldn’t quite face the idea of dinner with David and Wilson - in any case they needed the space, and with any luck they might have made up by the time the gig began the next afternoon. She hoped so anyway, it wouldn’t be much fun if they spent the whole day snapping at each other over the canapés.
Nessa got up and was about to visit Eliza but she thought she had better call her first, in case she was feeling much better - or worse.
‘Hey,’ Eliza said. Her voice sounded tired and a bit shaky.
‘You don’t sound so good,’ Nessa said. ‘Do you want me to come over and sit with you? I could bring you something to eat - some soup or something.’
‘No! Don’t, um. You don’t need to do that. I’ll be fine. Really - I think I just need to go back to bed and I’ll be fine.’
‘I’ll call on you in the morning, OK? Make sure you’re all right to play tomorrow.’
‘Um. All right. Call me first, though. I’m, I’m going to turn off my alarm, so. If you call I’ll know to get up. OK?’
‘Yes, all right.’ Nessa put down the phone and sat back on the bed. She had to admit, she wondered what had suddenly got into everybody tonight.
Eliza put the phone down and sat back on the bed.
‘That was Nessa,’ she said. ‘My friend, Nessa. Cello player. Of course - you saw her this afternoon. The sort of Chinese looking one, not the tall pale one. Though she’s Ganymedian anyway, Nessa. Her mum was Russian. You really don’t need to know that.’ Eliza passed her hand over her eyes. ‘She thinks I’m ill.’
‘Why does she think you’re ill?’ asked President Finley, concerned. ‘You’re not ill, are you?’
‘I threw up after the rehearsal,’ said Eliza. ‘But no. It was just… too much.’ There was an awkward pause.
‘It’s very dark in here,’ said Finley. She pressed the switch and the light panel began to rise, letting the starlight flood the room. ‘Oh, Eliza. You look terrible!’
‘Don’t,’ Eliza said. ‘You sound like the others. I’m fine.’
Lucinda twisted one of her shirt sleeves between her fingers.
‘Really?’
‘Well, no.’ Eliza sat down on the bed, then stood up again quickly and wandered across the room aimlessly, turning away from Lucinda and sneaking glances back at her. Lucinda watched her. ‘I’ve missed you,’ Eliza said finally. ‘I’m not ill. I just couldn’t bear it. You were just sitting there.’
‘I came to see you. You must have known that.’
‘But what’s the use of seeing me?’ Eliza demanded. ‘What good can it do anyone? Why are you even here?’
‘Because I love you, Lizzie,’ Lucinda said. Eliza winced.
‘I love you,’ she said. ‘But you can’t. Just. You can’t just turn up - after everything we’ve…’ She turned on Lucinda. ‘You got married!’ Lucinda looked surprised, and then ashamed.
‘We’re - we’re separated,’ she said.
‘Good!’ Eliza snapped. Then she melted a bit. ‘Oh… I’m sorry.’ She sat down. ‘I did mean it,’ she said. ‘I’m glad it didn’t work out with whatshisface,’
‘Richard,’ said Lucinda. Then she bit her tongue, expecting Eliza to shout at her. But Eliza didn’t shout. She just crumpled up and rested her head in her hands.
‘But you haven’t divorced him,’ she said. Lucinda knelt in front of her, hands on her knees, and tried to look up into her face. Eliza shivered at Lucinda’s touch, and looked away.
‘No. I haven’t. It would just be political suicide right now. You must understand that.’
‘Must I? I don’t understand you at all, Luce.’
‘How many times can I tell you how sorry I am?’
‘As many as you like. It won’t make any difference, Lucy, you know that.’ Lucinda looked at the floor.
‘Maybe it’s for the best…’ she said, though the words seemed to stick in her throat. ‘I mean, you have a life here - I don’t mean here, I mean with these people. You have a career. I couldn’t ask you to -’
‘Yes you could!’ Eliza said. Lucinda flinched away from her anger, taking her hands off Eliza’s knees. ‘You could ask me to give up my career and come and live with you on Earth and I would. All you’d have to say would be ‘Eliza, I love you and I want you to live with me’ and I’d come running. But you won’t. Because it’s your career that’s important. It always was.’ Eliza reached down and took Lucinda’s hands in her own. ‘And I understand that. It’s fair enough in your position for your career to come first. But you know I’d do anything for you - I’d shake hands with boring politicians and I’d be clean and wholesome and loyal and everything else the wife of the President has to be. And yet you don’t want to let me do any of that.’
To Eliza’s surprise, Lucinda down at their clasped hands, then looked up at her, and then her eyes filled with tears.
‘You have no idea how hard it is to hear you say that,’ she said. ‘I’ve really screwed up, Lizzie. I didn’t come here to fight. I probably shouldn’t have come at all. I don’t have any right to ask you to see me, and I can’t promise you anything. I want you to do all of that so much it hurts to look at you.’ She tried to take her hands away, but Eliza held on tight.
‘Don’t go,’ she said. ‘Don’t you dare get up and go away. You tell me you love me but you say we can’t be together so the very least you can do is stay with me tonight, now you’re here.’
Cor Caroli orbited its star with the same face always towards the light - the solar generators and the huge, transparent- walled farming sector continuously faced the star, making the most of its power. So it was in fact entirely arbitrary what time of day the Carolians thought it was, so they had decided that even after the Golden Revolution, they should remain on Earth’s time and Earth’s calendar, with 12 months in a year, 30- odd days in a month, 24 hours in each day, 60 minutes in an hour, and 60 seconds in a minute.
At seven pm, Greg received a call from Cor Caroli’s central computer to notify him that a tele had arrived for him. He half-ran to the nearest station, elected to print the tele and waited until he was back in his room to open the printout. Luckily, Rajin had gone out to get some extra practice in. Greg absorbed the contents of the message solemnly. Then he turned over the paper and made a list of names. A few he felt he could cross off immediately. Another he decided to draw a ring around. Then he realised how ridiculous it was to put all this down on paper, and burnt the message in the bathroom sink.
At half past ten, David lay awake, staring at the ceiling. Wilson was sleeping peacefully by his side. But David couldn’t sleep.
Wilson would have to know at some point. He’d have to find out what he’d done. And when he did… David didn’t like to think what would happen. It was going to go beyond bickering, beyond any argument they’d ever had. Maybe there would be no coming back from this one. Maybe they’d get divorced. One of them would have to leave SESO - what was he thinking? He’d have to leave, after all he was the one who had done it. Wilson had been completely innocent of any impropriety. He would testify to that in court.
But it wasn’t going to come to that.
But he was going to have to confess to Wilson some time. It didn’t have to be soon, just, some time. Then it would be up to Wilson whether there were repercussions. Apart from the divorce, of course. He probably wouldn’t be able to prove anything anyway. Perhaps they would just go their separate ways and never see each other again.
David stared morosely at Wilson’s back, and tried to go to sleep.
At eleven fifty-nine and fifty nine seconds, Rajin pressed the confirm button on a panel down in the bowels of Cor Caroli. By the time the computer had registered the command it was twelve am and two seconds on what passed for Saturday morning. Rajin wiped a drop of sweat from his forehead with his sleeve. The job done, he set off on the long walk back to his room. Cor Caroli’s central computer system ticked over happily, one more item on its to-do list for Saturday not bothering it unduly as the timer ran down the twenty four hours to Item Five Thousand, Six Hundred and Thirty Nine. When he got in, Greg was asleep. He slipped into his bed and was asleep himself almost immediately.
At about a quarter past midnight, Eliza and Lucinda finally fell asleep, holding each other tightly. Eliza tucked her head into the curve of Lucinda’s neck and dreamed of nothing much. Lucinda wrapped her arm around Eliza’s shoulders and dreamed of papers and rings. They both slept better than they had done in many days.
At one am, Flynn gave up on the idea that he might coincidentally meet Suri again. At one thirty he despaired of his ability to find another girl to spend the night with, and sloped off back to his empty room. When he got back he checked that his violin was still locked away in the room’s safe. It was there, and all the vital parts were still attached. He patted it goodnight, shut up the safe and got into bed.
Nessa wasn’t sure what time it was when she heard Ice come in. Her friend obviously tried to be as quiet as possible, but her bag clunked loudly when she put it down, and even with the bathroom door firmly shut she could hear the shower clearly. She thought about getting up and saying something to Ice when she came back in, but somehow it just didn’t happen. Just as she was dropping back off to sleep, Nessa thought she could smell incense.
The Solar Elite String Orchesta assembled by the elevator the next morning, carrying their instruments and bags full of concert clothes. Nessa thought they all looked a bit bleary- eyed, even though it was eleven am, not exactly first thing in the morning. Eliza was the last to arrive, only just on time, with her viola slung over her shoulders, trying to brush her hair and walk at the same time. Soon afterwards the players were joined by a cheery man in a green suit who introduced himself as one of Cor Caroli’s ‘celebration solutions managers’. He was there, he said, to take them to the diplomatic sector and get them all signed in and comfortable in their dressing room. He took them into an elevator, pulled out a key card and pressed it to a glowing part of the wall which Nessa had assumed was just there for decoration.
‘Do you always have to do that to get to the diplomatic sector?’ she asked.
‘Oh, no,’ said the man, ‘usually the streets are open to the public, but today we’ve got the whole floor sealed off. All the guests can come and go as they please, of course, but the staff have supervised access only today.’
‘Why so much security?’ Wilson asked.
‘Well, because of the guest list,’ said Rajin. ‘Finley, Cygnus, almost every leader of every nation in the known galaxy will be there, not to mention celebrities like Naomi Worn and business leaders like Mr Ezbatt.’ Greg raised an eyebrow at him. ‘At least, I presume that’s why it’s locked up so tight,’ Rajin added, looking at the celebration solutions manager.
‘That’s about the shape of it,’ he said brightly. ‘You’ve done your homework, haven’t you?’
‘I must admit,’ said Rajin, ‘I’m a bit of a closet celebrity- spotter.’
Nessa heard Greg say ‘Hah!’ under his breath. She looked quizzically at him but he didn’t seem to notice.
‘Well you’ll have fun this evening,’ said the man.
‘Yes,’ Rajin said. ‘I hope we’ll all have a good time this evening.’
Nessa hoped so too.
Their dressing room was just about large enough to accommodate them all with their instruments. They had an illuminated mirror each and a hook on which to hang their clothes after they’d changed. In the middle of the room there was a small ornamental fountain, which the man explained was running with perfectly acceptable drinking water.
David had a dressing room of his own next door, almost as large as the one the players were in. They all stuck their heads around the door and decided they preferred their room, even if they did only have upholstered benches while he had a large, squishy- looking sofa. Wilson disappeared into David’s room for a while, and Nessa was pleased to hear - or rather not to hear - that there was no shouting.
‘I’m so glad they’re OK today,’ she said to Ice, as she kicked off her sensible brown shoes and began to pull her concert dress out of her bag. It had got all crumpled again, despite her having ironed it and wrapped it up in anti- wrinkle cloth with almost obsessive care before they disembarked the shuttle. She made a disgusted noise and tried to smoothe out the silk with the flat of her hand.
‘It will make everything easier,’ Ice agreed. She sat down beside Nessa and started to unlace her boots. Around them, the other players also began to change into their concert gear. Flynn stripped down to his underwear almost immediately, much to Greg and Nessa’s amusement and everyone else’s annoyance. He then seemed to spend a long time getting into his grey suit. Even after he technically had all his clothes on, he was wandering around with his shirt undone, looking at himself in the mirror. Nessa had to admit, his chest was actually rather nice to look at. Then she had to look away quickly in case he caught her looking and thought she was particularly interested in being flirted with.
Greg, Wilson and Rajin all remained in the room to change into their suits - respectively an English- style grey one with a waistcoat, a sleek black one with a high buttoned collar (when Wilson stood next to the deep brown of the door he was practically invisible), and an elaborately embroidered traditional Indian one in white silk. Nessa, too, didn’t have any particular qualms about changing in front of her fellow players. She slipped into her dress, tights and slippers and then spent a good fifteen minutes standing in front of the mirror trying to make a particularly annoying crease go away, before she realised that it was on her right side and would therefore be invisible to the audience most of the way through the gig.
Eliza and Ice both retreated into the toilets in order to change. Eliza came out after only a few minutes wearing a flouncy golden brown number and pulling on a tangle in her hair.
Ice was the last person to be ready, which surprised Nessa. She was usually not much keen on dressing up for concerts. She usually wore a simple black suit, and it never took her more than two minutes to get into and out of it, not including the five minutes she spent taking off her combat boots. But she’d been in the toilets for a full half hour, and Nessa was about to go in after her, before she finally emerged.
Nessa couldn’t help but stare.
Ice was wearing a dress. A white dress. A white silk dress. It swished along the floor as she crossed the room. She seemed nervous, and she didn’t move particularly gracefully, but it didn’t seem to matter in that dress.
‘Wow,’ said Flynn. ‘Ice. You’re bloody smoking hot in that do.’ Ice’s face melted into a smile.
‘Thank you,’ she said. She slid her bag away under the bench, pulled out a make- up bag and leant over to the mirror. Nessa looked more closely at the dress. It was embroidered, in white on white, with intricate patterns and symbols.
‘Does it mean something?’ she asked. Ice looked down.
‘Not really. I just…’ she shrugged and went back to the mirror. ‘It’s a sort of ancient Northern design. I just thought it was pretty.’
‘Oh, it is. It’s really lovely.’
‘Thanks.’
There was a knock on the door, and David came in. He did a double- take at Ice’s dress (and by now her shadowed eyes and the tiny glass flowers she was fixing to her hair, which was no more usual than the dress), but he didn’t say anything.
‘Are we all ready?’ he said. The players all nodded.
‘I think so,’ said Wilson.
‘Well, we get to go and look at the room and the stage before the ball begins,’ David said. ‘And we should test out the auto- readers,’ he added, holding up a bag stuffed with sheet music. ‘I know they’re better than hovers, but better safe than sorry. Then we can tune up and get on stage for midday.’
Even the corridors around the back of the ballroom where the dressing rooms were were sumptuously decorated in the diplomacy sector, so the players were expecting to be stunned. But they were. The way the light radiated from the mirrored pillars. The soft golden carpet underfoot in the lounge and the polish on the wooden ballroom floor. The throne-like chairs. The drape of deep green curtains across huge mirrors on the walls, simulating endless windows and reflecting more of the light back into the room. The chandeliers.
The small stage was already set out with the right number of chairs and auto-readers, and a reader up front for David.
‘We’ll be playing for two hours while the guests arrive, then we’ll get a break for lunch - we get to hobnob with the guests, so…’ he looked at them all. ‘I know I don’t have to tell you to behave yourselves. You’re all responsible adults. You won’t do anything to embarrass yourselves.’ Everyone’s eyes strayed over to Flynn.
‘What?’ he said.
‘Anyway, then we’ll be back on stage for some dancing, then off again for an hour, then on again for the evening set, which is the whole four hours.’
Nessa put down the shutter on the light. She patted her cello case fondly as she passed, and got into bed.
Wilson gave him a shark,
Nessa and Flynn volunteered to walk Eliza back to her room.
‘No!’ said Eliza, managing to stand up
in the opposite direction and
It didn’t work out
She was pacing, and running her hands through her sticking-up white hair.
side of the room
Eventually everyone sorted themselves out.
Just
doing anything
‘Hey,
only light in the room was
pretending she wasn’t still feeling horribly, horribly lonely.
of the same name
Nessa got up and headed for the other cabin. Flynn immediately stretched out with his feet on the seat she had been sitting on.
In the other cabin, David and Rajin were having an earnest discussion about Elgar, and Ice and Greg were sitting by the window.
Those random words at the end are me cheating. They are words that I put in, then took out again. If I end up over, I won't count them. But if they are what is between me and 50,000 words, they are so counting...