The Holocaust Piano
by Phaedra7veils
Chapter 8: The Sapphire and the Smuggler
Amniotic tanks were used either for gestation or advanced healing. Inside them, it was like being submerged within the ocean, with the sounding thunder of currents like breakers on a distant shore. Sometimes there was the murmur of a voice, amplified and distorted. Floating voices, like mermaids, were they dreams? — Or memories of dreams? Or was it the amniotic tanks themselves? He came to long enough to wonder, and then merged back into the darkness.
Pain.
It surpassed the agony of his birth, the first emergence from the tanks. It surpassed the abuse and beatings his appearance and mannerisms had attracted from the followers of more prestigious students at the Elite Academy. For some reason, he couldn't open his eyes.
There was barely a scrap of skin on his body left without bandages or unsupported by traction, braces, blocks and splints. The stabbing sensations in his side at every breath spoke of fractured ribs. When he lifted his few untouched fingers to his face, it felt swollen twice as large as it should be. Then he knew the reason for his blindness was bandages.
His last memory had been the image of his face reflected in a glass of wine. No, it was the smell of the underground parkade and an insolent voice calling out to him. Or perhaps it was the amniotic tank, bubbling with plasma and serums. Every memory was disjointed. Maybe at some point they joined in a cohesive whole but, for now, he couldn't quite remember.
A gentler, more familiar voice penetrated the thick mats of gauze which covered his ears, pleading, "Please do not strain yourself. I will fetch the physician."
There was a scuffling sound and approaching footsteps, then an unfamiliar voice. "Your body has adapted to this medication already. We are increasing the dosage slightly so that you can continue to sleep. Please try not to move or speak. The effort will drain you of energy that you need to heal."
A gentle hand daubed a moist cloth to his lips and placed a straw at his lips, "You are receiving fluids, nourishment and medication intravenously, but your mouth must be dry. Here is some fresh water."
Who was this person who tended to him? He recognized the voice, but couldn't remember the face to which it belonged.
He sipped and felt the lining of his mouth recover from its drought. Darkness pulled him back.
It was almost as though he had a hover bike strapped to his chest; his very cells felt glued to the bed, his body unable to respond. When he tried to pry his eyes open, they crossed. Had he been turned into a street gladiator, addled by punches? He kept struggling, and soon managed to focus his vision long enough to regret it.
Who chose the colour-scheme for this place anyway? The walls were bright red, the colour of blood, of rage, of murder. It made him jumpier than a virgin in a bar full of horndogs.
His gut was so sore; it felt like he had used it to digest rocks. All his thoughts were woolly and thick. He must've been popping old-fashioned opiates like candy for days. At least he was still alive. At least he looked in better shape than the poor sap lying in that other bed, mummified in bandages, strung up in ropes and pulleys, bolstered and immobilized between great chunks of polymer-matrix. At least he figured he looked better, judging from the lack of bandages on his own body.
Holy shit! If his eyes weren't deceiving him, that was an honest-to-god Sapphire, the long hair draped across his pillow the same brilliant hue as a midsummer zenith. What the hell happened to him? Who was the wise-ass that decided it was a good idea to put them in the same room together?
He didn't like the Tanaguran Elite or their steely towers. Sure enough, this one came with his very own castrated piece of Furniture, complete with hand-wringing service over his pillow. There's a great use of a man's life!
It was too soon for him to think so much. It felt like someone was thumping a hardball around the inside of his skull. He sank his head back onto the pillow.
"Mercure!"
Who was that? Surely that obnoxious voice didn't belong to someone who was actually trying to speak to him, some bozo who didn't know his real name.
"Mercure!"
It's Merc, plain and simple; get it right!
No, scratch that. Leave me the fuck alone.
That groan, did it come from his throat?
"I know you're awake, Mercure. It's time for your physio."
As much as he hated the Tanaguran Elite, Merc had to hand it to them; their biomedical technology was about the best in the Glan system. He was feeling a whole lot better. It still wasn't good enough for some, however.
That evening, while he pretended to sleep, he watched the Sapphire pick up a mirror and examine his face closely. The Elite's capacity for quick healing meant he was already able to sit up. In spite of that, this one was left terribly scarred. It looked as though someone had tried to scalp him with a set of claws. Livid red marks crossed his cheeks and forehead from one side of his face to the other.
Merc knew the signs of depression, having seen many a miner succumb to it during his years as a security agent and smuggler, and this one — what was his name? Hilarion — was on the verge. The sight of his own face disgusted him.
"What are you staring at?"
Just as he suspected, the Sapphire resented him being there.
"Privilege," Merc's voice cracked, his throat was so dry. He could still convey scorn. "Rank, stinking privilege."
"Yet, here you are," the man's intonation was more clipped than usual. "So, either I'm not as privileged as you assume, or you're a hypocrite since you share it."
"Yeah? Well, you asked." Merc was pissed off. He despised the Blue. What right did the man have to feel sorry for himself? He was still alive. He was still part of the Tanaguran Elite, enough to choke anyone else. He still had most of his mental capacities.
Most, but not all. This, Merc could understand since he was in the same boat. Neither of them could remember what happened to them, although the Elite seemed to have recovered many of his memories prior to his attack.
Merc's own extended memory was much more badly damaged, to the point that he had trouble understanding longer speeches and remembering habits, like grooming. It made him even edgier and more anxious than this situation would usually call for, because he sensed there was something very important he had to remember. It was critical, a matter of life and death. So he couldn't keep the bitterness out of his voice when he said, "You make it sound like I asked to get stuck here."
"You weren't?" the other replied with supreme disdain. He then betrayed the presence of a headache by rubbing his brows. "Fancy that. Neither was I."
Merc couldn't resist another jab. "Don't you ever get tired of feeling sorry for yourself?"
"I should ask if you get tired of asking personal questions, the answers of which are none of your business but, frankly, I don't care."
This luminous exchange was interrupted by the man's Furniture, the same one who Merc had noticed when he first regained consciousness. "There is a call for you from Lord Am."
"Thank you, Kosai," the Sapphire flicked on the holostream recorder, "Lord Am, thank you for calling. I'm afraid our conversation won't be private."
"Yes, I realize that," the Blondie's voice sounded dismissive; "I specifically requested that you and the agent, Mercure, share quarters during your recoveries. If you have any objections, I must ask you to set them aside; there are far more critical matters at stake than your differences. We require complete cooperation."
The Sapphire pursed his lips and looked away, shoulders shaking with resistance and insulted pride. Raoul's voice was unusually soft and deep when Merc heard him say, "You are healing so well. I was stricken when it looked like we might not be able to save you."
That shocked Hilarion back to attention. Merc was pretty sure his own face looked freshly slapped. His memories might be full of holes, but he was pretty sure that hearing a Tanaguran Blondie speak to someone — or, in his case, hearing of a Tanaguran Blondie speak to anyone — with anything besides cool, impersonal detachment wasn't ever part of them.
"In both your cases, there was a similar sort of brain damage," Raoul explained. "A similar sort of weapon was used against you. The best technology was used to restore your minds, but it may take some time before they are integrated. I'm sure you've both noticed the gaps. Unfortunately, with Jupiter out of commission, there is nothing we can do at present, except ride it out, hope for the best."
Jupiter out of commission! What was going on? Something familiar flashed through Merc's head for a moment, and then disappeared. He tried to chase it, to connect to whatever image or sound pattern it brought up. He knew it involved those all-important pieces of information that he couldn't remember. He threw his head back and groaned with frustration.
The holostream projection of Raoul reacted to this. "Do you have anything to tell me, Mercure?"
The smuggler shook his head. "I thought I did, but it keeps — pfffftt!"
He flicked his fingers through the air to signal futility. Part of him wondered if he really cared. Not for the Tanaguran Syndicate, that was for sure. He had no energy for them.
"Yes, which brings me to why I've assigned you both to the same room, your respective roles in our investigation: both critical — essential actually. I am horrified that two such accomplished agents should have suffered so much for their participation. It is my hope that you will stimulate each other's memories, help each other to heal, and provide us with any details which we need to — well, to save Amoi. The situation is quite dire."
"Amoi?" Merc pulled himself back up against the pillows. This changed things.
"Yes, Mr. Mercure," Raoul replied. "My senior environmental technicians estimate total collapse of the planet's life-support technology within the week. In any case, things will never return to the way they were."
Raoul looked directly at Hilarion. The Sapphire's face was hard and bitter.
"Are you able to set aside your differences?" The Blondie's voice had the slightest edge, making it clear that this wasn't a request.
"Naturally," Hilarion said, his face and voice composed with that serene implacable quality that the Elite reserved for pretty much everything.
Aw, shit! Merc thought, as he watched the walls shift colour from bright red to purple to a deep, pure shade of blue. I'm in for it now.
"Excellent!" The Blondie shot the Sapphire a last sidelong look. "I am transferring what data I have compiled so far, since time is of the essence. Perhaps it will help to jar your memories."
He couldn't remember how he ended up on the floor with the scary Elite almost sitting on his chest and the man's fingers clenched around his throat. He figured he probably made some smart crack about his face, maybe called him a pretty boy or something insulting. There were a lot of other things which he suddenly remembered with astonishing clarity, thanks to the god-awful bump he got on the back of his head as the Sapphire smashed it against the floor. The lack of oxygen to his brain from being strangled wasn't helping much.
There had been two gun-battles, the most recent when he tried to get back in touch with Katze — yeah, that was the one which almost killed him, and they knew all about it — but the first was in his ship as he tried to skirt Amoi's colonial asteroids upon his return from the Piercks asteroid belt. He came across the black ship which he immediately recognized as a Tenebrian Corsair. After that, all hell broke loose, especially as he tried to shake off the Corsair's escort fighters, which looked Federation in design. He barely made it back to the planet surface in one piece.
"I —remember," he managed to mouth.
The Sapphire stopped clenching his fingers around his windpipe for a moment, "Do you have something to say, Mongrel?"
It took him a couple of minutes to get his breath back. "I can remember what happened now. I know how to get the information that Raoul–"
The Sapphire made threatening motions as though to strangle him again.
"Lord Am, that is — the data he needs."
Hilarion's face was suspicious. He took forever scrutinizing the smuggler's face for signs of deception.
"Look, I'm sorry, okay? Can we just call a truce for the time being? I need to contact Raoul — Lord Am, and tell him what this is all about. If you aren't satisfied, you can finish killing me afterwards. It's not like I'm going anywhere."
Dazed, Hilarion got off of Merc and even helped to lift the smuggler to his feet. He brought the man to the nearest comm-link and overrode the Onyx orderly's protests to connect him through to Eos. Without this Elite intervention, Merc realized that he couldn't even wipe his nose at this facility. Whatever the Blondie hinted that might've changed in Tanagura, this wasn't one of them.
All along the southeastern skyline, the firmament raged.
As he was sped down the last stretch of Orange Road toward the Eos main gate, a vision of Raoul seated at the pianoforte surged through Katze's mind. The sense of something akin to déja-vu was so powerful, it pulsed through his whole body. Was this to be Raoul's final act of leadership? While Midas burned and Amoi dropped into oblivion, was he really going to sit and play the piano? Another image kept superimposing itself over this one, an Emperor, degenerate and mad, demanding worship. Had this happened before? Or was this another thing entirely, something resurfacing from the deeper regions of his psyche?
Something is happening, his premonition overwhelmed his reason. It was as though Raoul's will was carried along with the music he created. In his mind's eye, Katze could almost see it move like a tangible force flowing through the instrument, sweeping along the powerful fibres which rooted it to Eos Tower. Energy flew through those filaments, but where? Something strange is going to—
"Stop the car!"
"Again?" Paviter cried. "What is with you?"
"Stop, now!" What was he doing? Going out of his mind, apparently. Something impelled Katze to stop rationalizing all his actions because, since the piano had arrived, everything had stopped making any sense. He was acting mostly on intuition and impulse now. "You're never going to see another moment like this in your life."
The vehicle shuddered to an abrupt halt, sideways near the rail of the overpass, nearly causing a major pile-up. The engines of the other hover-cars thundered with imploding vacuums and howled with misaligned vortices as their Cars wheeled and wove to avoid collision. Caustic threats and jeers were shouted at them. Katze jumped out and motioned for Paviter to follow, ignoring the insults and commotion.
Dusk had turned the sky purple everywhere else except above the burning sections of Flare. Curious, the other drivers followed Katze's gestures and turned to see what was so important.
"Watch this!" Katze told Paviter.
One moment the skyline above Flare burned a bright orange-red.
The next it was dark, the flames utterly extinguished.
The deathly silence which followed lasted a full minute.
Paviter let out a whoop of jubilation and jumped, punching his fist into the sky. "Jupiter! They finally brought back Jupiter!"
Other voices echoed Paviter's shouts.
"Not Jupiter," Katze said quietly, shaking his head for emphasis. "Something more powerful than Jupiter."
"Yeah, right," Paviter muttered. "Without Jupiter, not even the Blondies are that powerful."
Katze bit off his retort. He almost wondered if Paviter was a child of Ceres, his faith in Jupiter was so absolute, like a citizen of Midas'. He could try to set the Car straight, dredging up the many times he had witnessed Jupiter's force of androids in action. For all their technological wonderments and gadgetry, they never displayed a level of skill, power and speed comparable to this. This was something else entirely, another force at work, alien and inexplicable. But was it worth an argument? — An argument that would most likely be futile? Paviter seemed to have made up his mind; let the Car believe whatever he liked.
Katze's thoughts flew back to Merc's last cryptic words about the piano, his insistence that it was not the enemy, his caution not to destroy it, the strange events which it seemed to put in motion. Although he didn't know why, Katze knew there was a reason why he had that vision at that precise moment.
It was the same reason, now that the firestorm had been averted, another sense, another signal touched his awareness.
He turned his back on Flare. "We've got to get back to Raoul now."
Had the fire been real? He brushed off the ashes which coated his red hair and silken robe with fragile gray feathers.
The old responses were no longer adequate, not in times of Psychetech War. Katze knew he could not trust his senses and perceptions. Thoughts, feelings, reactions, everything was on shaky ground now.
Was any of this real?
In the absence of certain sanity, the heart was the only source of direction left. He ran his fingers along his cheek, suddenly homesick for that ragged trench of scar-tissue, the mark that had both defiled him and defined who he was.
Raoul worked on the piano in the Great Hall, while Katze prepared himself. They were going to the dinner meeting with Hazall together, but that wasn't all.
An undercurrent of tension and energy was coursing between them. Something is happening. Normally, the Blondie wouldn't have been caught dead with Katze at his side. Now, he was making it quite clear he didn't want the faux-Elite to leave.
Without being told, Katze knew what was expected of him, a sense of what was going to happen. This strange awareness had communicated with him right after the fire in Flare was suffocated. He stopped in his room briefly to rinse away the toxic cinders and fumes and to change into formal dinner attire.
He removed the combs which helped fix the hairpiece in place and found, to small surprise, that the false strands had been replaced by natural hair. It fell, glistening, around his shoulders and down his back. If he had the wild urge to draw a moustache on his lip with a fountain-pen, he was sure it would sprout into a real one before the evening was through. Fortunately, that wasn't so much an urge as a random thought about his situation. He still knew the difference.
Had he any faith left in his rational mind, Katze would've put a halt to this. He would've thrown questions at the situation, analyzed it thoroughly, and demanded explanations—reasonable explanations, before proceeding further.
When had his sense of what was natural and normal become so skewed?
He would have liked to place the definitive marker at the moment he had lost his scar, but even that made no sense. His normal condition was mutilated. There was nothing natural about it. His scarred and butchered body had been the perfect emblem for Tanagura, a place whose normal condition, imposed by Jupiter's dictatorship, was deeply unnatural.
According to rumours and their one historical record, the Priestess Cult of Tenebrios routinely unleashed horrors upon unsuspecting populations in order to eliminate or subjugate them, but they had to have some means of restoration after such assaults. In their ignorance and hubris, ancient civilizations may have employed scorched earth techniques to conquer others but, given how rare places were in the galaxy capable of being terraformed to support human life, it was the most impractical, insane and costly form of warfare. Scorched earth ruined everything. This point had been brutally driven into their hard, hard human skulls back during the Radiation Plagues on Earth, when it became clear that humanity couldn't always evolve fast enough to cope with its own nightmares. That was when Psychetech warfare first came into its own. So, in order to overcome the effects of their genocidal atrocities, the Priestesses had to have some means of restoring balance.
Katze slipped a fresh silk robe over his dress-shirt. It gleamed a bright red-violet counterwoven with fantailed goldfish, each scale a perfect reflection of the light streaming off his hair. He belted the robe loosely and walked to the Great Hall.
Could the purpose of the Holocaust Piano be to restore some sort of equilibrium? A prickle ran up his spine. Was that its function?
There was something unusually ferocious in Raoul's eyes that night. Their intensity made the smaller man shiver. Raoul's voice, however, was as calm and deep as ever. "All set?"
Katze nodded.
"I have something to tell you about the Pianoforte," he said. "It's just a hunch, but–"
"Your agent, Merc, called me as Paviter was bringing you back," Raoul cut him off. "It seems that his memories synchronized enough that he managed to recall almost everything he lost. I know what the Pianoforte's purpose is now."
"To heal, harmonize and rebalance a world after an enemy has been eliminated?"
Raoul nodded, then ran his hand down the back of Katze's spine to let it rest against the small of his back. Katze felt the heat which emanated from its palm and found it strong and comforting. They entered the elevator together, where Raoul drew him into an embrace.
"I suspected as much when I learned from your smuggler-friend that the MORS virus was not connected to the instrument," he explained, "that it was introduced by another hostile agent. Needless to say, I was very pleased to learn that the Pianoforte is not the destructive agent, that it is a healing power, and we must not let the Priestesses get their hands on it."
Katze had been losing himself in the hypnotic cadence of Raoul's deep and cultured voice and the incredible sensation of relaxing into the Blondie's arms. For all the panic and mayhem of that day, he felt so safe and protected there. It was such an alien sensation for him. But he was delighted to flow with it.
The next bit of surprising news made him draw back and stare.
"I also picked up some interesting signs that the Piano is sentient, a living organism, and that it communicates through emotional energy and through images and sounds. I tested this by trying to direct some of its power to the conflagration in Flare. It worked to suppress it."
"I knew that was you," Katze's face was filled with wonder. "I had a vision and made Paviter pull over. He didn't want to, but I insisted. We stepped out of the car and the very next moment, the fire went out, just like that, as though it had been completely smothered. It made no sense whatsoever."
"Yes, that was me playing the Pianoforte. I went into some sort of trance. We seem to share some a connection, you and I," Raoul explained. "And, no, there is nothing rational about it. Yet something which my rational mind can't quite grasp tells me that this is a vast improvement. What do you think, Katze?"
Katze smiled. He was about to dart up and plant a kiss on Raoul's lips, when a new thought distracted him.
"What makes me curious," he said, "is whether the Psychetech War actually started ages ago, before we were even born. I wonder if it began the moment Jupiter had taken over Tanagura. Think of it: Tenebrios is dominated by a matriarchy — not even a matriarchy, a society of Priestesses, of celibate women. It isn't balanced any more than Amoi is. So, our world is dominated by a society of sterile men, but when Jupiter started to play god and manipulate the population base, how likely is it that the Cult of Tenebrios, a predominately female-centered population, considered Amoi a threat?"
"Mm," Raoul considered the thought. "Possibly the virus was introduced by the Priestesses; there are indications that they've used it in the past, certainly. This is the purpose of our dinner meeting with Hazall and Florien Von tonight, to discover if it didn't come through someone within the Federation instead, someone with a grudge. I am certain, however, that the Priestesses will move in if they can obtain rulership over our planet."
"Ugh, Hazall," Katze grimaced, and let off a heavy sigh. "I can think of a thousand other ways I would rather spend this evening."
"Oh?" Raoul grinned flirtatiously.
Katze used his lips to communicate in another fashion for a change.
It was midnight. Merc was awakened from a light sleep troubled by vague terrors. They followed him like vicious attack dogs lurking on the edges of his awareness. The source of his wake-up call was the Sapphire who was getting back into bed. Merc noticed he was trying to be quiet about it, which was surprisingly thoughtful of the prick.
"Hey, Sapphire!" He called out on impulse. "Are you okay?"
"The name is Sir Hilarion," the man answered, "or at least, Mr. Fyss, if you can't stomach that. And no, I'm not okay. The comm-links are down."
"What?"
"The signals aren't being relayed properly anymore. There's no power left for our communication devices. It's all going to essential life-support now."
"Shit. That's bad luck. So, what's up?"
"It's just that your message to Lord Am earlier this evening made me remember something important. I just wasn't sure what that was until a little while ago. Now I can't do anything about it anyway, because I can't get through to him."
"Yeah? Well, you know, I'm a pretty resourceful character. Maybe there's something I can do to help."
"Do you think so?" Hilarion's voice was so neutral, Merc wasn't sure if he was being snide or not. The man's eyes shone like silver from the reflected light off the corridor.
"Why don't you tell me? Can't hurt."
The Sapphire sighed and stroked his long fingers through his blue-black hair.
"There are computer components which plug into the Pianoforte. Through the one remaining set of technical specifications I circulated through my off-world contacts, I managed to locate one, but I have to get a Customs agent to fetch it from the colonial asteroid."
"In that case, I'm your man," Merc answered.
"Is that so?"
"Indeed," he made the little word sound clipped and snotty, like a caricature of a cultured man, like a caricature of Fyss. "It just so happens, I've got a spaceship."
The Holocaust Piano – chapter 7 << >> The Holocaust Piano – chapter 9.1