Kinder des Schicksals 4 (Xeelee 9): Resplendent

doomed to life - we are their servants.’
    ’Perhaps. But this >essence of humanity< is motivated by
lies. Already we understand their jabber well enough to know that.
These absurd legends of theirs - ’
    Arles raised a hand, silencing him quickly. ’Belief systems drift,
just as languages do. The flame of the Doctrines still burns here, if
not as brightly as we would wish. And, Doctrinal or not, this Post is
useful. Always remember that, Hama: utility is a factor. This is a
war, after all.’
    Now two of the drones came before Hama, hand in hand, male and
female, nude like the rest. This pair leaned close to each other,
showing an easy physical familiarity.
    They had made love, he saw immediately. Not once, but many times.
Perhaps even recently. He felt an unwelcome pang of jealousy. But on
a thong around her neck the female wore what looked hideously like a
dried human ear. The fish in his chest squirmed.
    He snapped: ’What are your names?’
    They didn’t understand his words, but comprehended the sense. They
pointed to their chests. ’La-ba.’ ’Ca-si.’
    Arles smiled, amused, contemptuous. ’We have the perspective of
gods. They have only their moment of light, and the warmth of each
other’s body… What is it, Hama? Feeling a little attraction,
despite your disgust? A little envy?’
    With an angry gesture, Hama sentenced both the drones to the Cull.
The drones, obviously shocked, clung to each other.
    Arles laughed. ’Don’t worry, Hama. You are yet young. You will
grow - distant.’ Arles passed him the Memory.
    Hama weighed the Memory; it was surprisingly heavy. It contained
the story of the war since the Commission’s last visit to this
backwater Observation Post, a glorious story rendered in simple,
heroic images. The contents of the Memory would be downloaded into
the Post’s fabric and transcribed on its walls, in images timeless
enough to withstand further linguistic drift. Nothing else could be
written or drawn on the surfaces of the Post - certainly nothing made
by the inhabitants of this place. What had they to write or draw?
What did they need to read, save the glorious progress of
mankind?
    ’Carry on alone. Perhaps it will be a useful discipline for you.
One in three for the Cull. And remember - as you condemn them, love
them.’ Arles walked away.
    The drone couple had moved on. More ugly shaven heads moved past
him, all alike, meaningless.
    Later that night, when the Post’s sourceless light dimmed, Hama
watched the drones dance their wild untutored tangoes, sensual and
beautiful. He clung to the thought of how he had doomed the lovers:
their shocked expressions, the way they had grabbed each other’s
arms, their distress.
     
    After another sleep, La-ba and Ca-si were thrust out of the
Observation Post. Only one of them, La-ba or Ca-si, would come back -
one, or neither, depending on the outcome of their combat. This was
the Cull. A way of sifting out the strongest, while keeping down the
population.
    To La-ba, stiff in her hardsuit, it was a strange and unwelcome
experience to pass through the shell of the Post, to feel gravity
shift and change, to feel up become down. And then she had to make
sense of a floor that curved away beneath her, to understand that the
horizon now hid what lay beyond rather than revealed it.
    The Post was adrift in a cloud, a crimson fog that glowed around
La-ba. The endless air, above and below, was racked by huge storms.
Far below she saw the smooth glint of this world’s core, a hard plain
of metallic hydrogen, unimaginably strange. Lightning crackled
between immense black clouds. Rain slammed down around her, a hail of
pebbles that glowed red-hot. They clattered against the smooth skin
of the Post, and her hardsuit.
    The clouds were a vapour of silicates. The rain was molten rock
laced with pure iron.
    The Post was a featureless ball that floated in this ferocious
sky, a world drifting within a world. A great cable ran up from the
floor before her, up into the crowded sky above her, up - it was said
- to the cool emptiness of space beyond. La-ba had never seen space,
though she believed it existed.
    La-ba, used to enclosure, wanted to cringe, to fall against the
floor, as, it was said, some infants hugged the smooth warm walls of
the Birthing Vat. But she stood tall.
    A fist slammed into the back of her head.
    She fell forward, her hardsuited limbs clattering against the
floor.
    There was a weight on her back and legs, pressing her down.