The Paratwa

by Christopher Hinz

Genres: Post-Apocalyptic sci-fi; Hard Science Fiction; Space Opera

Synopsis

This is the third novel from award-winning novelist Christopher Hinz. Beginning where the critically acclaimed Liege-Killer and Ash Ock ended, The Paratwa chronicles the lives of the Irryan colonists as they prepare for the imminent attack of the fierce and vicious Paratwa assassins. Facing the threat of their dark enemies, Gillian must also cope with his inner turmoil, as the madness of his nature threatens to consume his life. He discovers that he is a genetically modified creature whose purpose is to serve the needs of others, and the course of his destiny is not in his own hands.

Release date: October 26, 2021

Publisher: Angry Robot

Print pages: 404

Sample

– from THE RIGORS, by Meridian

It was the time of our emergence. It was the time of the first coming, when the Earth was still vital and the Ash Ock fresh as today’s memory. In retrospect, a fragile era, but one where life seemed aglow with all manner of possibility, where we Paratwa felt destined to rule the Earth, to rule the stars. It was a time when each of us sizzled under the spell of our illustrious simultaneity, relishing the genetic fate that had cast our souls into two bodies rather than a mere one. It was a time when our binary spirits seemed molded by the essence of some primordial ubiquity, our bodies glazed to perfection, our minds burnished by the hands of an immortal poet.

It was a time of the Ash Ock, the Royal Caste, those five unique creations whose sphere of influence exploded outward from a secret complex deep in the Brazilian rainforest to envelop the world. The Ash Ock united our disparate Paratwa breeds into a swarm of binary elegance that, for those brief fragile years, seemed unstoppable.

It was a time of innocence. It was a time that could not last.

Some of us began to perceive the underlying dynamics of Ash Ock power, comprehend their subtle manipulations, hear the distinctive growls of five exquisite motors beneath five exquisite hoods. The mirror that the Ash Ock had held before each of us, reflecting only our own virtues, splintered under the roar of those engines; our worship of their godlike prowess yielded to mere admiration, appreciative yet tempered by the knowledge that those of the Royal Caste remained mortal despite their long lifespans and the majesty of their accomplishments. The poet departed, never to return.

It was also a time of betrayal.

As the Star-Edge fleet under the clandestine guidance of Sappho and Theophrastus prepared to escape an Earth drowning under the fury of the Apocalypse, some of us learned the truth behind the Ash Ock. And that juncture marked the beginning of a cynicism that spread through our ranks with the swiftness of a biological plague. By the time the Star-Edge fleet had cleared the boundaries of the solar system, Sappho and Theophrastus were almost faced with open revolt, for many of the Paratwa had trouble adjusting to the indignity of these ultimate truths.

But the patience of the Royal Caste helped us persevere. The crisis passed. An even greater vista of conceptualization was now open to us, and we were invited to perceive the universe from new and dizzying heights. Most of us lost our cynicism. Those few who did not kept their doubts to themselves.

Theophrastus proclaimed: “Never forget that you represent the vanguard of the Second Coming.”

“And never forget that you serve the true Paratwa,” Sappho added. “Your lives now intertwine with the destiny of the chosen.”

History texts were subtly altered; the roles of the other three Ash Ock – Codrus, Aristotle, and Empedocles – were lessened to those of supporting players.

Codrus was the first of the Royal Caste to fall from grace. His tways, like the tways of Empedocles, were of mixed sexes – male and female. Even in those early days, when we were still emerging from the landscape of humans, when Theophrastus had not yet infiltrated the Star-Edge project and bent it to his own designs, Sappho had begun to subtly suggest that dual-gendered Paratwa were inherently flawed. For a while, even I fell for her elegant craftiness, though eventually I came to see such illogic as a refraction of my own male-male prejudice.

Still, I understood some of Sappho’s negativity toward the others of her breed. Codrus often displayed blatant weaknesses, misconstruing Ash Ock formulations for precise truths, falling into that intellectual trap of regarding the mind as absolute ruler of the body while ignoring the equally potent impact of subliminal emotional currents. Facets of reality that Codrus failed to grasp were reduced to simplistic data points. Eventually, his inability to fathom the depths led Sappho to regard him like the child of the royal family, his tways forever loyal and anxious to please, yet his monarchial consciousness incapable of reaching its destined maturity. He was ultimately precluded from most Ash Ock intricacies, and it was arranged that he be left behind when the Star-Edge fleet departed. Until his death at the hands of the Costeaus two hundred and eight years after the Apocalypse, he remained blissfully ignorant, an intellectual pauper.

Aristotle, for a time, also remained unaware of the greater concerns, although Aristotle’s ignorance was not of his own making, for in many ways, he was the equal of Sappho, shrewd and cunning, with a natural aptitude for the intricate methodology of politics. Aristotle’s male-male interlace seemed to know instinctively how to utilize others to amplify his own desires. He played the human race like a grandmaster played chess.

In the earliest years of Ash Ock ascendancy, I was the servant of Aristotle, and I grew to admire and respect the sophistication of his agile mind. I came to like him, especially after he introduced me to Empedocles, youngest of the five, whose opposite-sex tways’ infectious lust for all manner of experience rivaled even my own. In truth, I loved those years we spent training Empedocles, helping to mold our young warrior into an elegant bastion of Ash Ock authority, preparing him to assume his place in the sphere of the Royal Caste, to become the champion of Earth’s Paratwa army.

And for a time in those early years I even doubted Sappho’s wisdom in keeping Aristotle – and thus Empedocles – ignorant of the greater reality. In Codrus’ case, I understood. But I felt that Aristotle and Empedocles should be given full access to Sappho’s knowledge – the secret knowledge – which at that time she shared only with Theophrastus and trusted lieutenants such as myself, Gol-Gosonia and a handful of others.

Eventually I came to see Sappho’s wisdom in keeping Aristotle in the dark, for that monarch’s plans within plans began rivaling the complexity of even her own intrigues. The simple fact was, he was too much like her. There could be but one ruler, and Sappho – by virtue of birthright alone – would be sole proprietress of our destiny.

Nevertheless, the day I betrayed Aristotle – and doomed Empedocles in the bargain – remains the most regretted day of my life.

 

ONE

Gillian felt eager for another fight. The darkness of Sirak-Brath seemed an ideal place for it.

He followed Buff and the black marketer through the alley separating a pair of low-tech industries, a nuke breeder and a manufacturer of organic soak-dye. The dank passage cut between the towering buildings like a thin wafer sliced from a monstrous loaf. From the alley’s floor, the walls veneered in brickface soared fifty meters into the night sky, interconnected by shadowy beams and saggy conduits.

Grayish light leaked down the artificial canyon from the distant slab of cosmishield glass. A sliver of stars in the blackness beyond should have been revealed, but the sixty-kilometer-long cylinder had acquired one of pre-Apocalyptic Earth’s nastier habits: air pollution. During peak manufacturing periods, the smog became so dense that Sirak-Brath’s atmospheric circulators couldn’t remove it faster than it was generated.

“How much farther?” Buff asked Impleton, the black marketer.

“It’s real close,” he said.

Weeks of hiding out with Gillian in a Costeau exercise cone had enabled Buff to shed some kilograms. She remained short and stocky but with little fat. The dark skin of her upper arms and thighs bulged with newly toned muscle. Gillian had also taught her some advanced fight moves, increasing her agility to complement the physical improvement. He suspected the moves might come in handy this evening.

Impleton pointed ahead and whispered something to Buff. Ghostly pale in the alley’s dim light, he wore a fancy pink corset coat that made his hips seem even wider. Buff gave Gillian a subtle nod, reassuring him that Impleton’s words weren’t cause for alarm.

Tonight’s smog seemed worse than what Gillian remembered from his last visit to Sirak-Brath fifty-six years ago. In personal time, that had occurred only a few months in the past, but, due to his stasis sleep, it was now the year 2363 rather than 2307. During his earlier visit, the periodic onslaughts of dirty air hadn’t been so conspicuous. He would have expected that during his long artificial slumber, technological improvements might have improved air quality.

But despite the imminent threat of the returning Paratwa starships, many sci-tech advancements were still under E-Tech’s lock and key. The powerful institution’s mandate to limit the degree of change was intended to prevent the extreme social turbulence that had caused Earth’s abandonment during the Apocalypse of 2099. E-Tech deliberately made it difficult for a colony to alter its status quo. The cause was noble but Sirak-Brath’s smog illustrated one of the downsides.

Sirak-Brath had other problems. It was considered the black sheep of the Colonies, the cylinder which the denizens of the other two hundred and sixteen orbiting space islands could point to with disdain. No matter how bad your home colony might be, Sirak-Brath was probably worse. The industrial cylinder boasted the highest crime rates, the dirtiest streets, the most corruptible politicians. Many non-mainstreamed Costeaus, black marketers and high-tech smugglers called it home.

The alley curved to the left. A breeze hit Gillian’s face, carrying with it an oppressive odor of untreated garbage. He glanced over his shoulder, saw the remaining pale light from the street gate two blocks back disappear. The alley was technically a private service corridor. Impleton somehow had procured a key to the gate.

He closed his eyes momentarily and listened to the night: the omnipresent hum of heavy machinery, distant sirens of patrollers en route to crime scenes, their boots slapping the wet pavement. The occasional human voice sounded from far away, amplified by the canyon’s odd acoustics.

The alley’s curvature terminated in a wide cul de sac, where the paralleling industries merged into a common bulkhead. Power distribution machinery, greasy piping, and an overworked pollution grid bristled from the shadowy walls.

A pair of lamp posts provided slightly better lighting near ground level, enough to bring Buff’s shaved scalp to life. The blue and red photoluminescent lines zigzagging from front to back were a cosmetic choice she carefully painted on each morning. She usually wore a cap in the daytime, but when a colony’s mirrors rotated into darkness, she exposed her handiwork. Buff’s clan was the Eisen-Cerniglias, but her markings were universal Costeau symbols. Blue was for mourning, red for vengeance. With Costeaus, the two colors often went together.

She’d vowed to continue displaying the ritual colors until she found and killed the trinary, the Paratwa assassin terrorizing the Colonies. Its brutal massacres were linked to the imminent return of the Paratwa starships, but Buff’s reasons for wanting it dead were personal. One of the creature’s three tways had almost killed Martha. Her soulmate remained hospitalized but was recovering well and expected back on her feet soon.

Gillian trailed Buff and Impleton into the cul de sac, his senses hyperalert, muscles prepped for instantaneous response. His tongue slithered along the tiny rubber pads attached to his bicuspids and molars, the activation circuitry for his crescent web. A snap of the jaw would ignite the defensive field. Beneath the loose sleeve of his right arm was a slip-wrist holster with his cohe wand. The deadly energy whip, forever associated with the Paratwa assassins, required years of training to become proficient. But once mastered, it was a hand weapon without equal.

Impleton again muttered something to Buff. She turned to Gillian.

“He says Faquod’s not here yet.”

“You said he’d be waiting for us,” Gillian challenged.

Impleton shrugged. “I cannot predict the future.”

The two men who were in the cul de sac were either the smuggler’s advance bodyguards or common thugs. Gillian hoped it was the latter. He wanted the deal with Faquod to succeed. But he equally looked forward to a nasty fight.

The man leaning against the wall to Gillian’s right had a sawed-off beard and appeared well-groomed. One hand was tucked under his overcoat. Across from him, seated on a meter-high ledge, was a blond-haired muscle boy. Stripped to the waist and grinning like a scuddie, his bulging pecs bore tattoos of ancient motorcycles. Imprinted above his navel was a cryptic phrase, I’m a Harley in Heat.

“Faquod, he often does as he pleases,” Impleton added.

The muscle boy laughed. Gillian approached the youth while casually scanning the walls and their clusters of machinery. He had a good hunch of what would be concealed up there.

He located the threat easily. The sniper was ten meters above, concealed amid a batch of giant conduits and pressurized pipes. It was a decent hiding spot, though not good enough to escape Gillian’s detection. Although they’d only met Impleton yesterday, his profile suggested the potential for bold treachery. An armed backup with a thruster rifle made sense.

Impleton licked his lips. “These high-tech playthings you desire… Faquod, he says they’re not easy to come by. Faquod says they will not be cheap.”

Gillian halted two paces away from the grinning muscle boy and leaned over the ledge he was perched on. A vertical drop of five meters revealed below a plodding channel of waste runoff. The odor, more potent than it had been in the alley, assailed his nostrils. The open sewer had to be illegal. Even Sirak-Brath had basic sanitation rules.

“Very expensive,” Impleton continued, his cheeks squirming as if his mouth was stuffed with food. “Faquod, he will want at least half the money in advance, I am sure.”

“You told us that already,” Buff said.

“So you have the money?”

“Not with us, of course.” She sighed. “You don’t really think we’re that dumb, do you?”

Impleton’s face revealed that he indeed thought as much. Gillian leaned against the ledge and relaxed, muscles poised for action. Not only wasn’t Faquod coming, it was possible Impleton didn’t even know the smuggler. The rationale for the ruse was obvious. Rob us, kill us if we resist. He smiled to himself and considered ways to extend the duration of the upcoming fight. It was important to relish every moment.

The man with the sawed-off beard slowly withdrew a thruster from under his coat. He made no threatening gestures, kept the pistol aimed at the ground.

Impleton smiled. “My men, they are very excitable. I told them they would be paid tonight. I hope they will not be disappointed.”

Buff glanced over at Gillian with a look that said, Crap, not again. Unlike him, she was growing tired of these constant fights.

“I think maybe you have some of the money with you,” Impleton said. “Faquod would want a down payment, sign of good faith. If you give it to us, we’ll take our cut and make sure Faquod gets the rest.”

Gillian felt his chest tingling, a pleasant onslaught of an excitement that now preceded his fights. Buff referred to his eagerness for violent confrontation as a full-body hard-on, an analogy not far off the mark. Over this past month, since parting ways from Nick, his combat lust indeed had developed strange sexual overtones. Fighting had morphed into a form of self-expression where violence and lust intertwined.

But he knew that at its core, his fights remained a way to keep his turbulent inner forces at bay, offering temporary relief from the mental-emotional pressures that relentlessly strove to devolve his consciousness into something that was no longer Gillian. Bottom line, fighting helped maintain his sanity.

He turned to Buff, eager to push things along. “These scuddies have been lying. I doubt they’re even smart enough to know Faquod.”

Impleton sneered. “Not smart? Smarter than you, maybe. Smart enough not to wander into an alley with strangers.”

Gillian released a harsh laugh, heard it echo up the canyon walls. Excitement escalated. He inhaled deeply, was freshly assaulted by the malodorous sewage from the runoff channel. The odor should have repulsed but it actually smelled good. The whole night smelled good.

He turned to Impleton, deliberately putting his back to Muscle Boy. “You’re right. You should never allow yourself to be alone with strangers. It’s not safe.”

Saw-beard raised his thruster, aimed it at Buff. She held up her hands, feigning surrender.

“We don’t want any trouble,” she said.

“Then you pay,” Impleton concluded, believing he had the upper hand.

“Not a chance,” Gillian said.

He caught Impleton’s subtle nod, heard Muscle Boy hop off the ledge and come at him from behind.

Gillian whirled, lashed out with his right foot. It caught Muscle Boy in the belly and he doubled over in pain.

Saw-beard pivoted the thruster from Buff to Gillian, the more immediate threat. By the time he depressed the trigger, Gillian had ignited his crescent web. Braced against the ledge, his front crescent easily absorbed the discrete energy blast. He felt it only as a gentle nudge.

He flexed his wrist, launched the cohe from the holster into his palm, and squeezed the egg. The twisting black beam erupted from its needle and whipped up the wall, its leading forty to fifty centimeters the deadliest portion of the hot particle stream. The sniper let out a howl as Gillian’s beam sliced through the tangle of conduits and pipes, showering him in arcs of electricity and pressurized liquids and gases. The electrochemical assault jolted him from his hiding place. He flew into the air spreadeagled. Without a crescent web to cushion his fall, he landed hard, likely breaking bones.

The sniper was still in midair when Gillian twisted his wrist and turned the cohe’s twisting energy on Saw-beard. The black beam sliced Saw-beard’s thruster in half, severing his trigger finger and thumb as well. He dropped the weapon and squealed in pain.

“Cohe wand,” Impleton whispered, the words echoing his fright. Buff grabbed him by the coat collar and shoved him to his knees. She didn’t even bother to draw any of her own weapons. It wasn’t necessary. Impleton’s face told the story. He was finished.

Muscle Boy wasn’t. Still clutching his aching guts, he reached into a pants pocket for a weapon. Gillian holstered his cohe and deactivated his web. Hand-to-hand combat would be more fun.

The thug whipped out a mini thruster. Gillian kicked it from his hand, sending it over the wall and into the sewer channel below. Muscle Boy reached behind his back, drew a long knife from a belt holster.

Gillian felt a wave of pleasurable heat coursing through his torso. Full-body flush. Full-body hard-on.

He let Muscle Boy attack first, parrying his first three knife thrusts, but in a way that suggested to his opponent that the wild slashes had nearly found their mark. That boosted Muscle Boy’s confidence. His smile returned and he crouched low, waiting to spring again. Gillian intended to enjoy the fight for at least a few more minutes. But then the words of his former fight teacher slithered into consciousness.

Toying with an inferior opponent is unworthy of your skills, Meridian had instructed. Such behavior leads inexorably to the mind-crippling excesses of sadistic exultation.

Muscle Boy lunged. Gillian grabbed the leading knife arm, snapped it at the elbow. The knife fell. Pain distorted Muscle Boy’s features but he didn’t cry out.

Gillian grabbed hold of him by an ankle and his good elbow, lifted him into the air and threw him over the wall. Seconds later came a loud splash as body met sewage.

He walked over to Buff, still towering over the kneeling Impleton. To the right, Saw-beard was sitting meekly on the ground, wrapping the stumps of his severed fingers in strips of rag torn from his shirt. He eyed them warily but his defeated expression indicated he posed no threat. The sniper was sprawled face down on the ground, unconscious.

“What should we do with this one?” Buff asked.

“I have money,” Impleton whimpered. “I can pay you.”

Gillian felt cheated. Meridian’s preaching notwithstanding, the fight had ended too soon. And now the leader of this rather pathetic takedown crew was finished as well.

Gillian grabbed him by the neck and hauled him upright.

“Won’t tell what I saw,” Impleton pleaded, his eyes blinking like short-circuiting status lights. “Won’t say anything about… your cohe.”

“Let’s talk about Faquod,” Buff suggested.

“Please,” he begged.

“Calm down,” Gillian ordered.

“Yeah,” Buff added. “And maybe you’ll survive this night.”

“Faquod was never coming, right?”

Impleton’s lower lip quivered. It almost looked like he was having a seizure.

“Speak!”

“No, never coming. Please!” His eyes flashed back and forth between them. “I didn’t know you were tways! I didn’t know you were Paratwa!”

Buff sighed. “And you’re a shitpile with maggots for neurons. Now talk! We want to find Faquod!”

Saw-beard started to get up. Gillian glared at him. It was enough of a warning. He sat back down.

“Don’t want to die,” Impleton moaned.

“Faquod!” Buff shouted in exasperation. “Where is he?”

“Fin Whirl in centersky! Tomorrow night. He’ll be there. He never misses it.”

A deep frown settled on Buff’s face. “Where else?” she demanded. “Where else can we find him?”

“Don’t know. It’s the truth! Fin Whirl, that’s all I know!”

Gillian leaned forward, pressed his mouth to Impleton’s ear. “If you’re lying, I’ll find you. I’ll slice off your head for my trophy case!”

“Fin Whirl,” he cried, fighting back tears. “It’s the truth!”

“Fin Whirl’s a big place,” Buff pressed. “Where exactly?”

“He has a private booth – BS-four.”

Gillian believed him. He nodded to Buff. She pressed her hand against Impleton’s forehead. The black marketer jerked once. His eyes glazed over and he fell into her waiting arms, unconscious. She let him slide off her body onto the damp paving. She opened her palm, revealing the tiny neuropad. The anesthetic would keep him unconscious for a couple hours.

She crooked her finger and summoned Saw-beard. He came quickly, almost eagerly. A few hours of deep sleep via synaptic scrambling was preferable to any further encounters with Gillian’s wand.

“You may as well get comfortable,” Buff said, gesturing to Impleton lying on his back. Saw-beard positioned himself next to the black marketer. Buff touched his forehead and knocked him out.

Splashing sounded from the sewage channel.

“Should we be magnanimous and help him out of there?” she asked.

Gillian shook his head. “Maybe he’ll find a motorcycle down there and ride out.”

She answered with a grunt as they headed back into the alley, and toward the street two blocks away.

“So tell me about Fin Whirl,” Gillian said, picking up the pace. His body was still amped up and he thought about running to drain some of the excess energy. But he settled for a fast walk.

“I don’t think you should go there.” Buff’s distaste was easily discernible.

“Assume that we have to.”

She was a Costeau and would do what was necessary. They’d been partnered since the Venus Cluster debacle in Irrya where Martha had been injured. Their matching goal – finding and killing the trinary – provided a commonality of cause and kept them together.

“Fin Whirl is a place where games are played,” she said finally. “Dangerous games. I don’t think you should go there.”

“Why?”

“You’re too goddamn excitable.”

They reached the barred gate at the end of the alley. Gillian found the control panel on the wall and pressed the button. Silently, the gate slid open and they emerged onto the narrow street, deserted except for an old man seated on a stoop across the way. His head was encased in a metallic shroud, a ree-fee. The programmable holo provided multi-sensory experiences as rich as a wearer’s fantasies. The man was muttering to himself.

“Now, silky – onto the floor! On your knees. Give us what we’ve been asking for. Ground it, silky. Ground it good. Make it earth, silky. Make it wet as the world.”

The gate closed automatically behind them. They walked swiftly along the street toward the main boulevard garage where they’d left their rental car.

“So Fin Whirl is some kind of entertainment complex,” Gillian concluded.

“Sort of. But the games… they’re very real.”

“But a place of enjoyments, nonetheless?”

Buff grimaced. “I don’t think you should go there.”

 

TWO

The message decoded itself onscreen, the iconic spheres, triangles and bubbling spirals transposing into words and sentences.

PERPS WERE WHITE MALE AND BLACK FEMALE. DESCRIPTIONS MATCH GILLIAN AND BUFF. WEAPON USED IN FIGHT BELIEVED TO BE COHE WAND. PERPS WERE SEEKING CONTACT WITH EL ESTE FAQUOD, A SMUGGLER BELIEVED TO SPECIALIZE IN HIGH-TECH WEAPONRY. VICTIMS CLAIM IN SEPARATE INTERVIEWS THEY WERE ATTACKED WITH INTENT TO ROB, BUT LENGTHY CRIMINAL HISTORIES SUGGEST THEIR STORIES WERE CONCOCTED. HOWEVER, VICTIMS’ CLAIM THAT MALE PERP DISPLAYED EAGERNESS FOR CONFLICT BELIEVED VALID.

Jerem Marth, the Lion of Alexander, scanned the intelligence summation a second time, then turned off the monitor. The report would be relegated to the Alexanders’ secret files. Not that secrecy at this juncture was all that important. The victims had already related their version of the fight to freelancers. Considering that no one in the Colonies had seen a cohe wand in action for more than half a century, it was no surprise the story was trending.

Jerem recalled the gist of Gillian’s parting words, weeks ago.

If something should happen to me and I’m no longer recognizable as the man you once knew, send your Costeaus out to find me.

“To bring you back?” he had asked.

No. Not to bring me back.

The grim instruction was clear even if Gillian’s exact reason for it remained vague. In the event Gillian’s real self succumbed to his Ash Ock monarch, Empedocles, the order was to be given for his execution.

The Lion would do what was necessary. He was fully capable of giving such an order… even if Jerem Marth was not.

He sighed and rose from the terminal. A spot on his lumbar vertebrae ached and he kneaded the old injury, acquired in youth and stirred to prominence by the ravages of late adulthood. He wished his wife Renata was here, an expert masseuse. She remained in the Alexanders’ home cylinder – the colony known publicly as Denn – with some of their children and grandchildren. Denn was one of the three so-called new colonies, Costeau places that had been admitted to the Irryan federation over the past twenty years under the auspices of the mainstreaming movement.

I am Jerem Marth, the Lion of Alexander. I am sixty-eight years old, and today I am feeling my age. He would have liked nothing better than to hop on a shuttle and make the short journey home. But duty demanded his presence here.

He left the communications room and the large A-frame home via the back door, which brought him to a small secluded garden at the rear of the house. Wildly sprouting rosebushes in more than twenty shades of blue encircled a clump of stunted trees. Surrounding the garden was a forest dominated by soaring pines whose crowns seemed to dissolve into Irrya’s low-hanging clouds. It was the gloomiest day the Lion could recall in months: damp and cool, and with occasional sharp gusts sweeping down from centersky with enough force to shower the ground with pine needles. Perhaps his backache was caused by the abysmal atmospheric conditions.

Irrya’s weather programmers had announced the gloomy day as part of their regular schedule, which was formulated months in advance. Sociopsychological theory suggested that the well-being of the populace was enhanced by occasionally unpleasant skies. But this time, the addition of a bad-weather day had sparked all sorts of political opposition.

Local freelancers had been covering the spirited debate. Fine-weather advocates remained in the majority, most of them virulently opposed to sun blotting. Even though the Irryan governor herself had reminded the populace that today’s shrouded skies were a rarity, the fine-weather contingent hadn’t been assuaged, and demanded that henceforth, the Irryan norm – seventy-two degrees, low humidity, minimal clouds – be adhered to.

The faction of bad-weather proponents argued that changes in day-to-day routines were good for the soul, and that overcast skies served to remind people that their planet-bound ancestors had lived without potent forms of weather control throughout most of Earth’s history. Some of the bad-weatherers were even lobbying to increase the most extreme forms of weather, such as snowstorms and thunderstorms.

The thought brought up a childhood memory, the T-storm in his home colony of Lamalan, where he and his mother had huddled on their front porch while the Paratwa assassin Reemul crept across their neighbor’s yard. That had been Jerem’s introduction to the vicious creatures who’d forever altered his life.

Still, the entire meteorology affair was silly, although he understood the subtext. The Ash Ock servant Meridian would arrive soon, harbinger of the as-yet-undetected fleet of returning Paratwa starships. The Colonies might well be invaded and conquered by humanity’s ancient enemy. Fighting about less consequential things like the weather was how many people were trying to deal with a more upsetting reality. Storm clouds served as a temporary catharsis, enabling avoidance of deeper and more terrifying emotions.

Other forms of escapism were also on the rise. Clubs and taverns everywhere were jammed. Touring dramusicals were opening to record runs. For the astute businessperson, at least those capable of mentally sidestepping the possibility of imminent destruction, it was a time of great profit potential. New fortunes were being made every day.

The Lion knelt beside a rose bush and checked the underside of the flowers for tiny pinch bugs, one of Irrya’s unique and difficult-to-eliminate garden pests. He hoped that when the day came for the Paratwa ships to arrive, the majority of the populace would be able to refocus on pertinent issues. He also hoped that such a day would take place under sunny skies.

He smiled at the thought and muttered, “I’m as much of a contradiction as everyone else.”

A rustling noise sounded behind him. He turned to the Costeau guard emerging from the house, her thruster rifle slung combat-ready in front of her. Her name was Parkta and she was nineteen years old, the youngest member of the elite unit tasked with his safety. She glanced around suspiciously, scanning the forest for evidence of who the Lion of Alexander, chief of the United Clans and esteemed councilor of Irrya, might be talking to. She cleared her throat when she realized he was alone.

“Sir, sorry to interrupt. Doyle Blumhaven would like to speak with you.”

The Lion enjoyed tending to his gardens. But whatever moments of joy the activity induced were quashed by the prospect of a conversation with E-Tech’s exasperating director.

“Thank you, Parkta. Bring a comm outside. I’ll speak to our esteemed councilor from here.”

She shook her head. “No sir, he’s not onscreen. He’s here, at the retreat.”

Blumhaven in the flesh? The director rarely left his offices in the main governmental district. And as far as the Lion knew, he’d never been to the clan of Alexander’s private preserve. Although they were both Irryan councilors, he couldn’t imagine what had motivated the man to make a personal appearance in the unofficial heartland of the Costeaus.

He followed Parkta along the stone path encircling the house. Doyle Blumhaven sat at one of the lawn tables out front, garbed in a conservative black suit cut to de-emphasize his heavy frame. A servant had brought a tray of refreshments. The councilor was munching contentedly on pita bread stuffed with mashed flounder.

A tight smile crept onto his face at the Lion’s approach. He didn’t bother getting up to shake hands.

“Terrible weather, isn’t it?” he said. “Such days are most upsetting.”

The Lion nodded. Blumhaven licked crumbs from his upper lip and took a sip of diluted grape juice.

“This retreat is a marvelous place. You and your Costeaus should be most proud.”

“We are.” He perceived the words as Blumhaven intended, to remind him that Costeaus remained different from other colonists. Despite the great inroads in mainstreaming the Costeau population, walls of prejudice still existed. To the Lion’s way of thinking, Doyle Blumhaven often exemplified bigotry, some of it unconscious, some not.

At least most of them don’t call us pirates anymore.

When he was growing up it had been a common moniker for Costeaus, a nickname that the mainstreaming movement had worked hard to eliminate from intercolonial vocabularies. Of course, in private, many Costeaus still thought of themselves as pirates. It was an identity that even the most mainstreamed clung to long after giving up clan odorant bags for the more appealing scents of proper culture.

Blumhaven finished the pita bread and poured a tall glass from a pitcher of cognac tea.