Del was sick of being interrogated. Supposedly he was a guest of Earth's government. Right. That's why they wouldn't let him leave their military base in this place called Annapolis. He was thoroughly fed up with their questions.
Today it was an Army officer. Barnard? Bubba? No, Baxton. That was it. Major Baxton. He had a green uniform and hair so bristly, it looked like a scrub brush. He sat across the table from Del in an upholstered chair that was obviously more comfortable than Del's metal seat. Holographic lights, or holos, glowed around the major, floating above the table as if he were a demon presiding over a laser-tech hell.
"All right, let's get started," Baxton said in English.
Del gritted his teeth. They all knew he didn't speak English very well. He could ask to use a language he knew better, but damned if he would show vulnerability to these people.
"Tell me your name," Baxton said crisply.
"My name?" Del thought he must have misunderstood.
"Your name," the major repeated. "Is that a problem?"
"You know my name." What was Baxton up to? Del felt off balance, unsure what these people wanted with him.
Baxton folded his arms on the table, and little green spheres floated near his elbows. "For the record."
"This is ridiculous." Del was so uneasy, his accent came out even more than normal. "You know name of mine. Your CO, he know it. Everyone here know it."
"For the record," Baxton repeated.
"Fine. You want my name? Have it all." Del leaned back and crossed his arms. "Prince Del-Kurj Arden Valdoria kya Skolia, Dalvador Bard, Fifth Heir to the Ruby Throne, once removed from the line of Pharaoh, born of the Rhon, Heir to the Web Key, Heir to the Assembly Key, Heir to the Imperator."
Baxton cleared his throat. "Uh, yes. Thank you. Age?"
"Why not look at this mesh file you all keep about me?" Del wondered when they would stop with all this business. "I am sure it say my name, age, home, what I eat, when I use bathroom, and how many wet dreams I have last night."
Baxton cleared his throat. "Your age, please."
Oh, what the hell. "Seventy-one."
"In Earth years."
Del wished he knew how to get out of this conversation. "That is Earth years."
Baxton spoke coolly. "Prince Del-Kurj, you are clearly not seventy-one years of age."
Del glowered at him. "Then maybe you tell me how old I clearly am."
"Seventeen?" Baxton's look suggested he thought Del was some defiant punk.
"Fine," Del said. "Have it your way. I'm seventeen."
Baxton glanced at the holos floating around him. Most were green, but one had turned red. "You're lying, Your Highness."
Del bit back the urge to tell Baxton what he could do with his lie detectors. Being rude wouldn't get him out of here. He wasn't sure of his age, anyway. Twenty-six maybe, but the year on Earth didn't match the world where he lived. Baxton could go look it up if he really wanted to know.
Del just said, "I am older than I look." The holo above the table turned green.
The major regarded him curiously. "Have you had age-delaying treatments?"
"Not really." Del laughed to cover his unease. "They say youth is curable. I guess in my case it isn't."
Baxton gave him a sour look. He tapped the table, and a new holo formed in the air, the image of a serpent curled around a staff, what Del had learned was a symbol of medicine here. When Baxton flicked his finger through the staff, words appeared below it on the table. He read for a moment, then said, "According to this, you have good genes, good health care, and good cell-repair nanomeds that delay your aging." He looked up at Del. "But don't your nanomeds get outdated?"
Del shrugged. "My doctor, every few years, he update them. I am scheduled for update a month ago." Dryly he added, "But I not get the update. It seems here I am, on Earth, instead of home."
"We could do it," Baxton offered, looking helpful, which was about as convincing as a wolf trying to look cuddly.
Right. Del saw their game now. This business about needing his name and age was a ploy in their endless search for excuses to analyze him. During his four weeks here, they had constantly tried to convince him that he should submit to their medical exams. His refusal stymied them, for they walked a fine edge between holding him captive and honoring him as a royal guest. They didn't want to look as if they were forcing him to do anything against his will.
Del didn't want their doctors to touch him. So far, no one had hurt him, but he had no idea what they intended or if they would ever let him go, really go, not just the few brief trips off the base they had so far allowed him with a guard.
He said only, "I update them when I go home."
"Hmmm." Baxton skimmed his hand through a holo hovering above the table.
Across the room, the wall shimmered and vanished, leaving a doorway. It bothered Del to see exits appear and disappear that way and left him feeling even more unbalanced. He had spent his life in a culture where doors swung open.
Mac Tyler walked inside and nodded to them. "Good afternoon, Your Highness. Major Baxton." A bit more than average height, with a lean build, Mac had regular features, hazel eyes, and brown hair. Although he came across as unassuming, it didn't fool Del. Mac's low-key exterior masked the intellect of a sharp negotiator.
Baxton nodded to the older man. "Good to see you, Mac." He didn't look the least surprised, and Del suspected he had signaled Mac when he brushed the table. Del always felt on guard here, and it exhausted him, especially because these people were older, more experienced, and savvier than him in just about every damn thing on their world.
Mac pulled out a chair and settled his lanky frame at the table. "I'm going to pick up some pizza," he told Del. "Would you like to come?"
Del had no absolutely desire to eat the Earth "delicacy" known as pizza. Mac and Baxton were probably doing what people here called "good cop, bad cop." Mac would rescue him, after which a relieved Del would relax with him and let slip useful information about his family. It exasperated him, but anything was better than this scintillating conversation with Major Baxton.
"I like, yes," Del said to Mac. He glanced at the major. "If we are done?"
"We can continue later," Baxton told him.
Del sincerely hoped not.
"It's stupid," Del said. He and Mac were walking down a hallway of the Annapolis Military Complex, which served Allied Space Command.
"They ask the same questions over and over," Del said. Instead of English, he was speaking Skolian Flag, his own tongue, a language his people had developed to bridge their many cultures. His ire welled up. "They want their doctors to examine me to see what they can learn about me and, well, I don't know what."
"They're frustrated," Mac said. "You won't do what they want."
Del slanted a look at him. "You're not doing your job."
Mac smiled. "My job?"
"You're supposed to trick me into a false sense of security and get me talking."
Mac didn't even deny it, "I guess my heart's not in this." Although he spoke as if he were joking, he sounded as if he meant it.
They continued on, Mac lost in his thoughts, leaving Del to his. It was one reason Del liked him despite their awkward situation; they didn't have to converse unless they really felt like it.
Del had met Mac when Earth's military had taken control of Del's home world last year. It still angered Del to think about it. His home was part of the Skolian Imperialate, an interstellar civilization that shared the stars with the Allied Worlds of Earth, supposedly as friends. Hoping to ease the strain, Earth's leaders had sent Mac as a "consultant" to establish good relations with Del's family. The tie-in was music; Del, his father, and one of his brothers were singers. Mac worked in the music business now, but he had been an Air Force major before he retired, which meant he also understood the military.
Although Del didn't usually get along well with military types, he liked Mac. The former major treated him fairly, and he didn't criticize or judge. Del could even forget his Air Force background because Mac didn't look the part. Today Mac had on dark slacks and a dress shirt, more formal than his usual pullover and mesh-jeans.
"Are you going somewhere?" Del asked.
Mac glanced at him. "Later. I have an appointment in D.C."
"More consulting?"
"No, not that." Mac smiled. "You're my only military job."
"What," Del said sourly. "Babysitting a captive prince?"
"You're not a captive."
"Fine. Then I want a berth on the next ship off this planet."
He expected Mac to come up with an excuse, the way the brass here at the base always did when Del pushed them to let him go. Instead, Mac said, "It may be sooner than you think. Your government is stepping up the pressure on us." Wryly he added, "You can always tell it's tensing up around here when people start ordering a lot of pizza."
"You know, I don't mean to offend," Del said, feeling awkward. "But I really don't like pizza." He slowed down as they reached a cross hall. "Would you mind if I went back to my rooms instead?"
"No problem." Mac seemed a little relieved, making Del wonder if he didn't like his babysitting job any more than Del liked being babysat.
"I'm working on a song," Del added.
Mac's interest perked up. "Mind if I listen?"
Even after knowing Mac for weeks, Del still felt that moment of shock, that this former Air Force major enjoyed his music. He knew the military had hired Mac to "like" it, but he would sense it if Mac were feigning his interest. Del was an empath.
It always amazed Del the strange ideas people had about empaths. He wasn't like a sponge that soaked up every emotion from the people around him. In fact, he shielded his mind to keep out their moods. When he did pick up something, he was never certain if he interpreted it right. Knowing someone's mood didn't explain why they felt that way. But as he had become more comfortable with Mac, he had relaxed his mental shields and discovered Mac genuinely enjoyed his singing. Del still didn't trust him, but he didn't resent his company, either. No one else wanted to hear Del sing. Or screech, as one of his brothers so kindly put it.
"Sure," Del said. "You can listen. I call the song 'No Answers.' "
Mac had always liked Del's rooms. No stark quarters here; Del had changed his apartment to evoke his home on the world Lyshriol. His wall panels showed views of the Backbone Mountains against a blue-violet sky. A Lyshrioli carpet covered the floor in swirls of green and gold, and red-glass vases graced the tables. It was a slice of Shangri-la hidden within the bleak walls of the Annapolis Military Complex.
Del leaned over an icer panel in the wall. "Want a beer?"
Mac settled in an armchair. "Sure." He had to remind himself that the "boy" offering him alcohol was legally old enough to drink.
Del might be young, but he sang like no one else. After spending so many years in the music business, Mac knew what the entertainment conglomerates looked for—and Del had it in bucketfuls. The holocam would love his face. Usually he looked like a scowling angel, but when he smiled, it was as if a light went on. Mac had seen women stutter to a halt at the sight. The violet color of his eyes and metallic quality of his eyelashes enthralled people, especially because they didn't occur naturally on Earth; they came from changes his forefathers had made to their genome. So did the wine-red color of his hair, which tousled in curls down his neck and on his forehead, sun-streaked with gold. His leanly muscled build had a lithe grace that would translate well into holographic media.
Of course, Mac could never send Del to an audition. The idea of a Ruby prince loose in the decadent ethos of the holo-rock industry broke him out in a sweat. It would be a security nightmare. Which was a shame, because Del was probably the most gifted rock singer Mac had ever met.
"Here they come." Del grabbed two bottles as they slid into the icer tray. He spun around and tossed one at Mac. "Catch!"
"Hey!" Mac grabbed at the missile, fumbled the catch, and cursed as it slipped through his fingers. The bottle looked like glass, but when it hit the floor, it bounced. He jumped out of his chair and managed to grab it on the fourth bounce.
Del grinned at him. "Sorry."
Sorry, hell. Mac grumpily scraped the bottle's tab as he dropped back into his chair. His infernal drink didn't open, it just hissed as it released gas from the frothed-up contents.
Del sprawled in a chair across from Mac with his legs stretched across the carpet. His beer, which hadn't been cavorting on the floor, opened right away. He took a long swallow, then lowered the bottle and regarded Mac smugly.
"You know," Mac said, "you can be extremely annoying." He tugged on the tab of his bottle, and it finally deigned to snap open. He took a long pull of his drink.
Del laughed. "I keep you awake."
Mac just grunted. "So what's this new song?"
Del's smile faded, replaced by a pensive look. "I'm still working on the lyrics. Tabor did the music for me."
"Tabor? Who is that?"
"Mac! You introduced us. Jud Taborian."
"Oh. Jud." Mac vaguely recalled running into Jud at some over-priced cocktail bar in Washington, D.C. That had been the first time Mac wrangled permission to take Del off base, so he had shown the prince around town. Mac barely knew Jud, though. The young fellow was a composer in the undercity music scene, which hadn't even dented the more lucrative planetary venues or bigger offworld markets. Many of its artists were mediocre or actively rotten, but a few were brilliant, and they all challenged accepted norms. Some tried to evoke the rock of earlier, less civilized eras. Although privately Mac agreed that present day music had become so "civilized," it was suffocating in its own conservatism, he couldn't sell musical anarchists to the conglomerates.
"I've been talking with Jud over the mesh." Del put his beer on the table and rummaged in a blue box he had left there. "He sent me this tech-tick." He pulled out a silver oval the size of his hand and squinted at it. More to himself than Mac, he added, "If I can just figure out how to use it."
"You've never used a ticker?" Mac knew Del had the device because Jud had sent it to Mac. The security people at the base didn't want Del giving out his address, so Mac let the prince use his for correspondence. Security had to clear any packages Del received, anyway. In fact, when Mac took Del off base, he acted as his guard and carried monitors that continually analyzed everything around them.
"I'd never even heard of a ticker," Del said. "Not before Jud gave me this one."
That surprised Mac. "Then how do you compose music?"
"At home, I'd hum the melody I wanted for a drummel player," Del said. "He'd figure out how to accompany me. Or I'd tell him the lyrics and he'd come up with something."
Drummel? Mac thought back to the instruments he had seen in Del's village. "You mean you've only played with those harp-guitar things?" Although Del had grown up in a rural community, he had mesh access to the resources of an interstellar empire. "No other media? No morphers?"
"Why bother?" Del shrugged. "I didn't really listen to offworld music. It's too much to sort through, and I haven't liked what I heard." His smile flashed. "Though if I'd picked up the undercity, that I would have listened to."
"I can imagine." No wonder Del sang so well. With no media enhancement, he's had no choice but to learn real technique.
Del studied the ticker. "Jud says I can edit the music he put on here. But I have no idea how." He tapped a button, and music played, slow and haunting, in a minor key, lyrical but with a raw edge, as if it were strumming under a violet moon.
"I like that," Mac said.
"The melody is right . . ." Del sat listening, his head cocked to one side. "The drums are too heavy, though."
Mac liked the driven quality of the drums, but he was curious to hear what Del would do. "I can show you how to edit the song."
Del let the music fade away. "You know how to do that?"
"It's my job."
Del blinked at him. "I thought you were an agent."
"I'm called a front-liner," Mac said. "I get auditions and contracts for my clients. To sell their music, I need to understand what they do. I can't sing or compose, but I'm pretty good with the technical side."
"Then, yeah." Del grinned. "Show me."
They sat together at the table while Mac taught him how to use the ticker. When Del achieved the result he wanted, the instrumentals for the song had a beautifully eerie quality.
"It's good," Mac said. "Better than the usual undercity work."
Del shot him an annoyed look. "Just because you don't like undercity music, that doesn't make the musicians hacks."
"Oh come on. It's the quality I'm talking about."
"Why?" Del demanded. "Because they don't follow the boring mainstream?"
"No," Mac said. "Because a lot of them can't sing, play, or compose worth shit."
Del waved his hand as if to brush away the comment. But he didn't deny it. He was too accomplished a musician not to realize that for some, going undercity was little more than an attempt to define a lack of talent as progressive. The scene had produced some remarkable music, but they had also put out some of the worst dreck Mac had ever heard.
"You can sing circles around them," Mac said.
Del made a disgusted sound. "I doubt it."
It wasn't the first time Mac had heard Del make derogatory references to his own singing. He didn't understand why the youth felt that way. Del had no sense of his own talent. He was probably Mac's greatest find—and Mac couldn't do a damn thing with that discovery.
Well, almost nothing. He could listen. "So how does the song itself go?"
Del drummed his fingers on the ticker, set the oval on the table, then picked it up again. "I can't sing without something to hold."
Del wasn't the first vocalist Mac had seen who didn't know what to do with his hands while he sang. Mac almost laughed, thinking that some did have ideas, but they couldn't get away with it. The censors would come down on them like the proverbial ton of plutonium.
"Sing into the ticker," Mac said. "It'll record you. Then you can listen to your voice."
"Oh. All right." Del flicked on the ticker, looking self-conscious. "This is only a rough cut of the vocals."
The music began with an exquisite and simple melody played by only a harp, from what sounded like a Latin requiem. When it finished, the guitar riff played that started the music Mac had helped Del edit.
And Del sang.
His lyrics weren't the formulaic doggerel expected in the modern day universe of popular music. He varied the syllables more per line, sometimes drawing out words, other times rushing them. He used repetition to deepen the song rather than following a formula, and he gave the verses a freer form than current mainstream work:
No answers live in here,
No answers in this vault,
This sterling vault of fear,
This vault of steel tears,
Tell me now before I fall
Release from this velvet pall
Tell me now before I fall
Take me now, break through my wall
No answers will rescue time
No answers in this grave
This wavering crypt sublime
This crypt whispering in vines
He stopped, staring at the ticker, his lashes shading his eyes. "It's still rough," he said, as if apologizing.
"I like it." Mac wondered at the dark edge to the lyrics. Del wrote in a range of styles, from danceable tunes to ballads to hard-driving blasts. Sometimes he came out with these eerily fascinating pieces. Although the major labels probably wouldn't consider them commercial, Mac thought they had a lot more to them than the pabulum produced for popular markets.
"I've no idea what it means, though," Mac added.
"I suppose it's about never knowing answers even after you die. Or maybe that's what kills you." Del tapped his fingers on the ticker. "I don't like the third part. The first line is too long. 'Rescue' clunks. And 'Wavering crypt sublime' is idiotic."
"Why?" Mac asked, intrigued. "The sounds fit."
"The sounds, yeah. But the words are dumb. Crypts don't waver." He tilted his head. "Winnowing. Winnowing crypt sublime."
Mac smiled. "Crypts don't winnow, either."
"Sure they do. They winnow you out of life." Del pointed the ticker at Mac. "You can live for decades and never find answers." He lowered his arm. "Until death winnows you out of humanity and makes room for someone more useful."
Mac spoke quietly. "I hope you don't see yourself that way."
Del just shook his head. He had that far-off look that came when he wanted to practice. "I need to work."
"Would you like me to go?"
"I don't mind if you listen," Del said. "But it can get pretty boring when I'm working on a song. I just go over and over the same parts."
"It's not boring for me," Mac said. "I'd like to stay."
"Well sure, then." Del got up and walked around, holding the ticker. And he sang. He kept changing words, pacing like a caged lion. He sang a verse fluidly, then snarled the chorus. Yet somehow it all fit.
Although Mac liked to watch him sing, he knew it made Del self-conscious. So he closed his eyes and leaned his head back, enjoying the music. It was easy to submerge into Del's rich voice. The youth had trained his entire life, using techniques passed through generations in his family. Although Del could sing opera exquisitely, he preferred a far different style. He could croon one line, scream the next, wail and moan, then stroke the notes as if they were velvet, all without harming his voice. No one did anything that commercially risky in the mainstream, but undercity artists threw in all sorts of noise. Mac knew why Del had fascinated them that night in the bar; he easily achieved what they struggled to attain because he had the technique they lacked. To break the rules, they had to master them first.
Del wanted nothing more than to sing. He didn't care about the politics surrounding him. Although no one had physically hurt Del, Mac knew he had suffered emotionally. His people were torn by hostilities that had begun long ago, when humanity splintered into three civilizations: the Allied Worlds of Earth; Del's people of the Skolian Imperialate; and the Trader Empire. The Skolians and Traders had just fought a brutal war that had nearly destroyed them both and ravaged Del's family.
The Allied government had remained neutral, safe in their isolationism, but they agreed to shelter Del's family on Earth. When the war ended with no victor, Earth had feared the Skolians and Traders would send their world-slagging armies back out, again and again, until they wiped out humanity. So they refused to release Del's family. It did no good; the Skolians just sent in a commando team and pulled them out, all except Del, who happened to be apart from the others. So here Del remained, while Earth's government argued over what the blazes to do with him. Some thought having Del gave them a bargaining point with the Skolians. Others wanted to let him go and be done with the whole mess. Personally Mac didn't see the point in keeping him. What would they tell his family, the Ruby Dynasty—that if they started another war, they would never see their youngest son again? The bellicose Skolians were more likely to attack than bargain . . .
"Hey!" Del said. "You awake?"
Mac opened his eyes drowsily. "Just drifting."
"Admit it," Del said, laughing. "I bored you to sleep."
"Never." Mac stood up, stretching his arms. "I do have to go, though. I have a client who is auditioning today."
Del regarded him curiously. "What sort of audition?"
"It's with Prime-Nova Media, for a holo-vid cube."
"Oh. Well." Del squinted at him. "Good."
He smiled at Del's attempt to look as if he knew what the hell Mac had just said. "You've watched holo-vids, haven't you?"
"Not really. I see people playing them, but I don't stop to listen." Awkwardly Del said, "I don't want to intrude."
"You should see one. You'd enjoy it." Mac thought for a moment. "Would you like to watch the audition?" He had wrangled permission to take Del off the base by arguing that it reinforced their claim Del was a guest rather than a prisoner. He wanted to give Del at least those limited excursions; he felt like a cretin treating this youth as a prisoner when Del had never done anything to anyone.
He motioned at Del's ticker. "If we can get some mesh-box space, we could tech up a few holos for your cuts."
Del laughed, his eyes lit with interest. "I have no idea what you just said, but yeah, I'd like to go with you."
Mac grinned. "Come on. Let's go show you what I just said."
They headed out, into the freedom of a late morning turning red and gold with autumn.