Even as things fell apart I was desperate to ask YlSib where they’d been, what had happened, what they’d done since they absconded, years ago. They’d lived so close, maybe in some biorigged dwelling that sweated air at them inside. Did they consult? Had they worked for the Ariekei? Were they independent? Trading in information, go-betweens in informal economies of which I’d never known a thing? There was no way, I thought, such a hinterland could have been sustained without the patronage of some in Embassytown.
“You said they weren’t helping us,” I said. “Those mad Ariekei that came and attacked the others.”
Bren said, “They weren’t.”
YlSib said, “Factions are emerging.” “Some Ariekei can’t even think anymore.” “They’re dying.” “Those are the ones tearing up the outskirts.” “Then there are some trying to keep some kind of order. Live in new ways.” “Manage their addiction.” “They’re trying all kinds of methods. Desperate stuff.” “Repeating phrases they’ve heard EzRa say, to see if they can give each other fixes.” “Trying to take control of neighbourhoods.” “Trying to ration out the broadcasts.” “Organise different listening shifts for different groups, to keep things more...” “... organised.” “And then there are dissidents who want to change everything.”
“We have sects,” Bren said. “So do they, now. Not ones that worship a god, though. Ones that hate it.”
“They know the world’s ending,” said YlSib. “And some of them want to bring in a new one.” “They despise the other Ariekei.” “That’s what you saw.” “Their word for the addicts was...” They said a word together, in Language. “They used to call them that,” Sib or Yl said, “although they can’t anymore.” “It means ‘weak’.” “ ‘Sick’.” “It means ‘languid’.” “Lotus-eaters.” “They’re going to start a new order.”
“How... ?” I remembered the stubbed and ruined fanwings. They can’t call them that anymore, because they can’t hear, or speak, they’ve no Language. “Oh, I...” I said. “Oh, God. They did it to themselves.”
“To escape temptation,” Bren said. “It’s a vicious cure but it’s a cure. Without hearing, their bodies stop needing the drug. And now, the only thing they hate worse than their afflicted brethren is the affliction.”
“Or, to put it another way, us,” said YlSib.
“If they’d seen you...” “... they’d have killed you faster than they did their own.”
“There’s not many of them,” Bren said. “Yet. But without EzRa to speak, without the drug, they’re the only Ariekei with a plan.”
“The only Ariekei,” Sib said. “We’ve got one too, though.” “We have,” said Yl, “a plan.”
15
IN THE OUT, I’d learnt that our Embassy isn’t a huge building. In countries on many planets I’d seen much larger: taller, aided by gravity-cranes; more sprawling. But it was large enough. I was only slightly surprised to discover that there were whole corridors, whole floors that by convoluted design I’d not only never been into but had never suspected were there.
“You know what to do,” YlSib had said to us. “You need a replacement.” “Open the damn infirmary.”
That was the basis of their idea, the plan that Bren relayed to MagDa’s committee, as if it were his own. I wasn’t clear on why he’d introduced me to YlSib, but he was right to trust me. Close to the top of the Embassy, in a set of infolding rooms and halls, was the separated-off zone. I followed those who knew the way.
The Ambassadors and Staff of the committee looked horrified at Bren’s suggestion. He insisted, with references incomprehensible to those of the committee ignorant of the infirmary he mentioned. I pretended to be one of them.
“There could be others in there we can use,” Bren said.
“And how are we supposed to know?” said Da.
“Well, that’s a difficulty,” he’d said. “We’re going to have to have a test subject.”
ONLY STREETS AWAY, the anarchy of desperate Ariekei grew worse, and more of our houses fell. Embassytowners still foolishly near the city would turn corners into those ravenous things, who rushed at them and in Language begged them to speak, to sound like EzRa sounded. When they didn’t, the Ariekei took hold of them and opened them up. Perhaps in rage, perhaps in some hope that the wanted sound would emerge from the holes they made.
I couldn’t believe what we were planning. We’d gone by foot into the city, in a snatch squad. Smoke and birds circled above us. Micropolitics were everything in Embassytown by then, groups of men and women enforcing their wills in territories of two or three streets, armed with wrenches, or pistols or pistol-beasts crudely rigged, that they shouldn’t have had to use, that clenched them too tight, drew blood from the weapon hand.
“Where’s EzRa then, you fuckers?” they shouted when they saw us. “Going to fix everything, are you?” Some of those posses shouted that they would attack the Hosts. If they did they might take down one or two of the weakest, but against those aggressive self-mutilated they’d have no chance.
Into the ring of Embassytown we had lost, where the Ariekei had been followed by pet weeds. They were already shaggy or crustlike over what had recently been our architecture. The air here was tainted by theirs.
We kept our weapons up. Ariekei saw us, and now it was they who shouted, came forward, ran away. EzRa, EzRa, the voice, where is the voice?
“Don’t kill unless you really have to,” said Da. We found a lone Ariekes, turning, pining for words.
Come with us, MagDa said.
EzRa, the Ariekes said.
Come with us, MagDa said, and you will hear EzRa.
We buzzed a corvid. It was antique, metal and silicon and polymers: entirely Terretech. We were chary of using our more sophisticated machines now: they were built with a compromise of our traditions and local biorigging, and as addiction spread, they might be tainted. For all we knew they might gush that need if we flew them, in their exhaust, perhaps in the tone of their drone.
THE ARIEKES who came with us was called 
. It was confused and overcome by need for the god-drug’s voice. It was physically starving, too, though it didn’t seem to know it. We gave it food. It followed us because we made promises about EzRa. We took it with us to that infirmary. I wasn’t the only ex-commoner on the committee, who hadn’t known the wing existed. By a series of counter-intuitive corridor turns and staircases we arrived at a heavy door. There was even a guard. Security, in this time when all officers were needed.
“Got your message, Ambassador,” he said to MagDa. “I’m still not sure I can... I...” He looked at us. He saw the cowed Ariekes with us.
“We’re in martial times, Officer,” MagDa said. “You don’t really think...” “... that the old laws apply.” “Let us in.”
Inside, uniformed staff met us and made us welcome. Their anxiety was palpable but muted compared to everyone else’s. There was a pretend normality in those secret halls: it was the only place I’d been for weeks where rhythms didn’t seem utterly sideswiped by the crisis.
Carers went with drugs and charts in and out of rooms. I got the sense that this crew would continue with these day-to-day activities until word-starved Ariekei broke through their doors and killed them. I suppose there were other institutions in Embassytown where the dynamic of the quotidian sustained—some hospitals, perhaps some schools, perhaps houses where shiftparents most deeply loved the children. Whenever any society dies there must be heroes whose fightback is to not change.