Day Three

"Didn't you get enough the first thousand times, you disgusting sack of whal pus?" said Rubyat amicably, strapping the feedback device to a head that was more tufts of muddy dandelion fluff than hair, "you think you'd get sick of watching her jabber on but whatever rocks your cradle..."

"You would've melted your brains months ago on tsoma if I didn't put up with your flak," Betaine replied. He leaned stiffly against an over-stuffed pillow. It reeked of body odor and honey-tinged smoke. Months of sessions had not removed his revulsion of the Archivists, but it had blossomed into a camaraderie of loathing between him and Rubyat. He slid forward slightly, his feet parallel, the very picture of regularity, had no clue he was as repulsive to the old men as they were to him. Sweat trickled down his narrow back, a small damp patch appearing on the charcoal wool jacket and he cleared his throat, once, sharply, knew the Archivist had been prepared since the call came and was merely delaying to spite him.

"Is there a particular section you're looking for? It's over three hours long and I need to take a piss." Two spotted, hairy-knuckled hands rested on the pressure points below Betaine's ears and the young man shivered, attempted to force himself to relax, failed.

"Begin during the section, 'Owning things creates...'"

Betaine swallowed and as Rubyat began to hum tunelessly the focus sequence that gave him access to his astounding expanse of memory, he closed his eyes, prepared for the shock of contact, the spasm of muscle that created a sensation of white heat in every nerve.

It came abruptly; Rubyat never eased into a playback but slammed him in as hard as he could. It was falling, rising, every cell splitting, reforming, whirling into a void only to return as something new. The scene came into focus as abruptly as a glass window shattering. There was Planet, her gray robe of office gathered at the shoulders, exposing pale arms, piling at her feet. Only she wore the gray, the rest of the room a cacophony of muted colours. Navy blue, sepia, cream, every gown and suit new and almost creaking from the sparseness of line and severity of cut. These were the young ones entering the College, and sat awe-struck as Planet spoke.

"...despite the fact that my wealth exceeds the GNP of several galaxies and I do nothing to hide this information, I'm seen as an otherworldly wanderer, a holy mystic who abstains from the trap of naming things as mine."

"Remember, we are brothers and sisters, if not by blood, then by a common purpose. Our divinity is questionable, our methods even more so. What it is we do is shape a perspective, not persuade or, even worse, get directly involved. Your work may not be visible for several generations or ever. Subtlety and growth. The thread of the sentient subconscious is consistent whatever the background or genetic code of your temporary employer may be. Remember this, and let your story pass through that part of you that accesses the common denominator. Good day."

The seminary hall exploded into wild cheering and whistling after a brief stunned silence, what Betaine had come to recognize as the reaction to almost everything Planet said, their animal brains conquering the confusion and building a kinship with the enigmatic, unassuming woman at the podium. He wondered if they realized that she did to them what they did to their clients, working manipulations so deft and subtle, she might as well be called a magician. Briefly, Betaine mused on the possibility that this was what Bala intended, this quiet, frustrated respect for an art part psychology, part mysticism, part bullshit, part king-making. A strange breed of sociology that was as poorly understood now as it was when Planet first discovered her purpose. How did you find someone as trackless as a dust mote in a sandstorm, as comprehensible as the language of rain?

A sharp sensation bit at his brain, and every muscle spasmed with what felt like a painful sneeze. He opened his eyes, hadn't even realized they were closed, stared through the dirty fog at a violet dome stained black. The frieze depicted was one of Bala's first priests, Kehet, a hairless woman so slender, she barely seemed capable of supporting the yards of billowing fabric that she wore as she reached into the mouth of a spined lizard, scowling with fear and determination. A brilliant gem shone at the back of the throat of the beast, whose fangs were as long as the woman's arm and dripping a virulent poison. It was said she later presented the jewel to the goddess and was rewarded by having it embedded in the center of her forehead, given the power to stir a frenzy in the guts of anyone who gazed at the stone.

Betaine sat up. Rubyat was gone, presumably to pee, and Vermilli had stretched a loop of elastic between his over-sized hands and was making complex figures in the thread. A loop for the sun, lines for waves and clouds, small knots for birds. The Archivist looked up, moved his index fingers in a way that caused the string sea to twist and jerk and rise, swallow the birds from the sky. Betaine tasted bile and suppressed the nausea he felt from being pulled so abruptly from the memory. Normally an Archivist tapped on the foot to alert the watcher that the experience was going to be terminated to give them a chance to prepare for the shock. Rubyat apparently felt Betaine could risk possible temporary loss of muscle control and had simply gotten up and gone to the bathroom. He stood and left the pit, his legs still shaky, without acknowledging Vermilli and his demented cat's cradle.

The door didn't respond to his request to visit Bala and Betaine smoothed his hair in annoyance. Months had gone by since Planet's last appearance and he was no closer to finding her whereabouts, but the gaps...why and how had she circumvented the sensory recorder? It was a complex device, as beautiful as it was functional. Thousands of vibrating crystal scales over-lapped to form curling tendrils that quivered and glowed when activated. Each scale, composed of millions of nano-grade hair-like receptors, recorded the slightest changes in air pressure, temperature, volume, light depth, reflection, intensity....every possible minutiae of data necessary to create a complete three-dimensional memory.

Buffer wires of woven oranium were wrapped around the central quad-lattice diamond core, which contained a greater storage capacity than four hundred thousand humanoid Archivists. The entire scintillating spheroid could fit easily in the palm of the hand and possessed seemingly no weight. It usually hovered twenty feet from the recorded subject and was turned on via a nonsensical thought sequence or physical distress signals by the owner. It had revolutionized much of society in primarily political and corporate fields, where espionage had become an increasingly subtle tool of statecraft and assassination was no longer a viable option except for the exceedingly desperate. Each device was given to persons of note and was unavailable for purchase. The creation and methods by which an Archivist removed and translated data from one of the recorders was a closely-guarded secret and none of those so gifted with what was wryly called "that diamond watchdog" were interested in destroying their relationship with the Archivists.

The primary worth of a device was that it could not be tampered with, its memory was whole and complete. Every time it was activated or shut off was duly noted in the recording and anyone leaving out pertinent information would have a very long inquiry ahead of them as well as the collective pressure of the Archivist Guild to deal with. He remembered the play of light on the silver rings in her hair, wondered why even such a trivial detail had been removed.

Until Bala awoke, there was no way to know if other recordings had been altered. His fingers tapped along his jaw as he scowled at the door, the soft drum sound echoing through the main hall, melding with the trickle of water from the Fountain. He finally ordered the door to access his suite. It would be dawn in a few hours and Betaine realized the shakiness in his knees was as much weariness as the terrible memory session. Fatigue pills would purge the required poisons from his system, but continued use sometimes impaired impressionist abilities.

The bedroom was dark and he left the orb lights off. It was a wide circular room, lined with silvered windows that adjusted the illumination and heat levels during the day to the whims of the occupant and provided almost as impressive a view of the holy city and the landing fields as Bala's conservatory. A wide, sumptuous bed with a duvet covered in quivering white silk roses sat in the center of the room, un-slept in. He collapsed on the mat on the floor and was pondering briefly the ancient significance of the rose when sleep stole upon him, swiftly and gently.