CHAPTER TWENTY
ON THE FIRST night after they left Station Ayong Primary, 1491625 took Hemiola aside for a chat. Cheris had gone to sleep, which consisted of leaning her chair back a fraction. It didn’t look comfortable.
The matter of Jedao-Cheris’s identity was, in fact, the first thing that 1491625 made clear to Hemiola. “She usually prefers to be called Cheris,” it said the moment Cheris’s breathing eased into the rhythm of sleep.
“Excuse me?” Hemiola said.
“‘Jedao,’” 1491625 said impatiently. “Her name is Ajewen Cheris these days, although most people will use Kel Cheris instead. And many people confuse her with Jedao.”
“I know a little about Shuos Jedao,” Hemiola said. “It wasn’t until Ayong Primary that I learned anything about Cheris.”
1491625 flickered a deprecating olive green. “You and the rest of the hexarchate. It was her choice, but some of us remember who she was before Kel Command sold her out.”
“Why didn’t she tell me herself?”
“Have you ever heard of the Mwennin?”
Hemiola indicated that it had not.
“Her people. Gone now, most of them. The Vidona rounded them up and exterminated them.”
“Revenge?” Hemiola said, with greater interest. Revenge was a motive it could understand.
“An example. Beyond the matter of names,” and 1491625 pulsed low-intensity lasers directly at Hemiola, so as not to disturb Cheris’s rest, “you are going to be watched every moment, everywhere you go. Because while Cheris is a kindly, trusting person—”
Hemiola expressed its skepticism.
“—for someone hosting the memories of an elite Shuos operative, anyway—”
That part Hemiola believed.
“She may think to win you over,” 1491625 said, “but I know better. You don’t go anywhere unless I accompany you.”
Hemiola flashed its lights nervously in the direction of the nearest viewport. Right now it couldn’t see anything useful. Their mothdrive was engaged, and the gate-space radiations hazed everything. “Where would I go anyway?”
“I don’t know what you’re thinking,” 1491625 said, “and I don’t care. I don’t even care about having to be courteous to you. If you get ideas, remember that my enclave selected me to protect Cheris.”
Hemiola couldn’t think of what to say to that.
“I hope I’ve made myself clear.”
“You’ve made yourself clear,” Hemiola said.
“Good. Go inventory what’s in our hold or something.
Hemiola blinked bemusedly. “Don’t you already have a—” Oh. 1491625 wanted it away from Cheris. “Going.”
“Take your time,” 1491625 flashed after it.
Hemiola floated to the hold. It began the inventory, not just checking the labels against the manifest but scanning the contents for good measure. Kel ration bars in assorted flavors, and a single small crate of preserved Kel pickles. Several replacement suits, even though Cheris obsessively maintained the one she already had. The suits were all the right size for Cheris. Hemiola wasn’t sure what good they did all crated up. Especially since they’d been crammed beneath the ration bars.
At some point Hemiola resumed reading the hexarch’s notes. Taking inventory was routine work and required little processing power, so it could do both at once. Besides, Cheris and her companion might be fascinated by the sheer variety of sealants that were crammed into this next set of crates, but Hemiola didn’t share their interest.
Tired of research on dwarf moths, which didn’t seem to be going anywhere, Hemiola returned to an earlier journal. While the files had comprehensive indexes, it had been compiling one of its own based not on the text but on the doodles. The hexarch didn’t consider them important, but they were more engaging than the text and graphs and tables.
Geometric diagrams drawn in flawless isometric perspective. Beautifully rendered diagrams of the projective plane. The occasional intertwined pornographic figures. Hemiola guessed that some of those had been drawn from reference from multiple partners, judging by the variety of bodies and poses. That, or the hexarch possessed great reserves of imagination.
Had he ever shown these to anyone? Hemiola tried to imagine what their reactions would have been.
More diagrams. Not math, nor any technical discipline that Hemiola recognized. Everything divided up into four segments, each segment sometimes subdivided even further into halves. No, not always four—occasionally three larger segments. But usually four.
Seventeen days away from Ayong Primary, Hemiola deciphered the diagrams. By then it had completed the inventory, dragging out the task as long as it could so it didn’t have to face 1491625’s glower. It was in the middle of taking a break with one of the newer dramas that the Ayong servitors had provided Cheris. 1491625 had grudgingly allowed Cheris to dig out the episodes for Hemiola.
It was the song-and-dance set-piece at the climax of the eighth episode that gave Hemiola the key, although it didn’t realize it at first. Cheris liked the set-piece. Hemiola didn’t.
“Why not?” Cheris had said wistfully. “It’s pretty.”
Hemiola had fluttered distressed red-oranges at her. “None of the colors coordinate! And several of the backup dancers aren’t synchronized, even allowing for human reflexes.”
“Well, yes,” Cheris said, “that’s part of the charm. Didn’t you know? This particular drama was on the censors’ list for depicting heretics in a friendly light. Not just censored. The hearing went all the way up to the Rahal high court, to the Rahal hexarch.”
At least faking interest was easier with a human audience than with a servitor one. 1491625’s lights in the ultraviolet rippled with soft, cynical amusement, but it kept its observations to itself.
“No, that’s not the part you should find thought-provoking,” Cheris said. “The hexarch ruled in the drama’s favor. Because she had watched it too. I don’t know whether she liked it or not. I never knew much about her. But the hexarchs squabbled over it, and eventually the Rahal hexarch gave way to the others. But some of the servitors found out it was going to be wiped and smuggled it out. By the time anyone realized, it was everywhere. The hexarchs had to pretend that had been their intent all along. No one ever figured out the servitors were involved.”
“So that’s where you got the idea,” 1491625 said from the helm.
“What idea?” Hemiola said in spite of itself.
Cheris cracked her knuckles. Her eyes were older than they should have been, and suddenly smudged with exhaustion. “How to pull apart my home and get my people killed.”
“You mean the Mwennin.”
Her voice grew distant. “Yes, the Mwennin. Jedao’s people are long lost. The Hafn conquered his homeworld a couple centuries back.”
Hemiola had no constructive response to that, so it returned its attention to the dreadful song-and-dance number. In fact, it went back and rewatched all the dance routines in the previous seven episodes for good measure. If anything, its opinion of them became more critical.
Then it returned to the one Cheris liked. That was when it realized what the hexarch had diagrammed in the margins of his notes: dances.
It made sense, in a way. Hemiola replayed some of its memories of the hexarch’s visits. Yes: that flawless sense of balance, the way he always placed his feet precisely. He hadn’t just danced casually, to pass the time. He had studied the art seriously. Where had he learned that?