Master of Formalities Read online

  “You’ve said that before, but I still don’t get it. A bulkfab can make any food, or almost anything else you want, and it’s the same every time.”

  “That’s the whole point,” Ebbler said, his voice raising. “If you order the same dish twice from a bulkfab, it will fabricate the dish identically both times, right down to the molecules. They can give you anything but a surprise. There’s no creativity, no insight. Those are things only a real person applying real expertise and real heat to your food can give you.”

  “But if it’s real food they want, why do the chefs use a bulkfab?” Shly asked.

  “They only use it to create raw ingredients. That way they know they’ll get high-quality stuff. The chefs want to surprise the diners, but they don’t want any surprises themselves.”

  Pitt slammed down his knife. “We don’t want to listen to you two yammering all the time either. Unlike you two, our job requires concentration, so shut it!”

  Ebbler jerked as if he’d been slapped. Barsparse continued manipulating her pots and pans, but said, “You’re right that their conversation isn’t particularly productive, Pitt, but if you were really concentrating, Ebbler could shout in your ear and it wouldn’t slow you down.”

  “Yes, Chef,” Pitt said. “Sorry, Chef.”

  “Is there any reason you can’t chop while you apologize?”

  “No, Chef.”

  Pitt resumed chopping, glaring at Ebbler between cuts.

  6.

  The city of Koa’s official sports arena was bustling, but that went without saying. The arena bustled every day.

  The building itself was a vast, flattened dome, but the traffic patterns around the arena caused disruptions so complete and predictable that a large area around it was referred to with dread as the Arena District. Anyone who didn’t feel a deep need to get to the arena avoided the entire district as if it were quarantined. There were people who had lived in Koa for decades without ever seeing the arena in person, not because they weren’t allowed to go, but because they didn’t want to waste the time, exert the effort, or endure the frustration that was part of the admission price of attending a sports meet.

  Since only powerfully motivated individuals would brave the Arena District, it was constantly full of powerfully motivated individuals, all trying to achieve the same goal. That might have been productive had they been willing to cooperate, but such was not the case. The men who brought their sons to the arena wanted to get them there before the disqualification cutoff, and if everybody else missed the mark, that was not a bad thing.

  If a boy arrived after the cutoff, he couldn’t compete, which in turn meant he couldn’t improve his standing until the next meet, ten days later.

  There were hundreds of sports arenas on Apios, one for every major population center on the planet. Each arena served a specific region, and each region was split up into ten districts, and each district had one meet every ten days. On meet day, registration remained open until eighty percent of the young men who had preregistered arrived, at which point it closed. No exceptions or special cases were made, and lining up in advance was not allowed. If you wanted your son to compete, you had to deposit him at the competitors’ entrance as close to (but not before) the opening of the registration period as possible. Thus, the competition began well before the meet started. There was a booming industry in the sale of strategy guides that contained hints as to the best traffic channels to take and landing zones in which to park. Fathers invested considerable resources in selecting the perfect transport, some going so far as to retrofit their conveyance with special equipment to scan for parking or adapt it to be wider and taller, making it easier for them to spot parking places or holes in the traffic while simultaneously making it harder for everyone else.

  Like most sports fans, Lord Frederain Jakabitus considered getting to the arena to be a nightmarish grind. Unlike most sports fans, His Lordship was able to avoid the nightmarish grind altogether. He had access to transportation that could fly outside of the legal traffic channels, cut through the channels it couldn’t avoid, and deposit him and his son Rayzo directly in front of the competitors’ entrance mere seconds after registration had begun.

  Frederain stood and watched the boys and young men stream into the arena. He looked down at his son and gave him their standard pep talk.

  “Remember, son, do well.”

  “I will, Father.”

  “I’m sorry your mother couldn’t be here again.”

  “That’s all right, Father.”

  “No, really, it isn’t.”

  Rayzo peered into the competitors’ entrance. Boys as young as ten and as old as nineteen were crowding in. At fourteen, Rayzo was noticeably taller than the smallest competitors, but most of the boys towered over him.

  “No, Father, really. I don’t mind.”

  Frederain took his son’s head into his hands. “Son, look at me. I need you to understand that you are the most important thing in the world to me.”

  “I know that, Father.”

  “And your mother loves you very much. It’s just hard to tell sometimes.”

  “Yes, Father. Because she has to love a whole planet’s worth of people.”

  “Yes.” He squeezed Rayzo’s head to his chest and said, “Yes, my boy. That’s right.” Frederain pushed Rayzo’s head back again and stared into his eyes.

  “Son, you must understand, no matter what happens, no matter how things change, you will always be the most important person in the world to me. Do you understand?”

  Rayzo looked more concerned than touched. “Father, what did you and Mother talk about when you left training today?”

  “Nothing, Rayzo.”

  “It must have been important for you to leave practice.”

  “It was nothing, Rayzo. Nothing important. I’ll tell you all about it after the meet. We don’t want you to be distracted.”

  “Distracted by the unimportant nothing,” Rayzo said.

  “Exactly.” Frederain straightened himself and let go of his son’s head. “Now, you had better get in there. We don’t want you to miss the cutoff.”

  Rayzo looked again at the torrent of boys entering the arena. It was true that they’d spent longer than usual talking, allowing many other boys to enter in the meantime, but they were early enough that Rayzo had no doubt that he would make it in well before the cutoff, no matter how much he dragged his feet.

  Rayzo started to walk away, but stopped when his father said, “Oh, and Rayzo, do well.”

  Rayzo said, “You already told me to do well, Father.”

  “And I’ll always be here to give you that advice,” Frederain said. “Remember that.”

  Frederain watched as Rayzo disappeared into the throng of boys and young men entering the arena. Who knows, Lord Jakabitus thought. Maybe he’ll adapt better than expected.

  Frederain strolled through the crowd to the fathers’ entrance. Everybody recognized him, but nobody let on. He was here every ten days, just like they were, and he relished making as little disruption as possible. If Lady Jakabitus appeared in public, it was a spectacle. She stood apart from the people she ruled, even when standing among them. Her Master of Formalities did most of the talking, both for her and her subjects, who were often too awed to speak.

  Lord Frederain preferred to think of himself as a man of the people. He did his own talking, and was accompanied only by a distant detail of elite guards who protected him with ruthless efficiency while doing their best to conceal their presence from everyone around them, His Lordship included. Lady Jakabitus’s great-great-great-grandfather, Lord Proprion Jakabitus, had instituted the convention that all services rendered to the ruling family would be made to appear as near to invisible as was feasible, and Frederain thanked him for it. He wanted his family’s lives to be as normal as possible, and he also treasured the opportunity to know
the subjects as they really were.

  He found the subjects to be pleasant, deferential, and easily startled.

  Frederain joined the other fathers entering the arena and took a moment to enjoy his surroundings. While the competitors’ entrance was a rough, Spartan affair, the spectators’ entrance was a grand cathedral to the importance and majesty of sport. Vaulted ceilings decorated with murals depicting great moments in the history of sport hung above suspended statues of legendary competitors. In the middle of it all, a bronze plaque on a massive pedestal bore the words of the most important document in sports history, the prophecy.

  Beneath all this splendor, as progress slowed to an awkward, crowded shuffle, another father recognized His Lordship. To the poor man’s horror, Frederain noticed before he could look away.

  “Hello, my good man,” Frederain said. “Here to watch your son compete, I trust.”

  “Yes! Yes, Your Lordship!” The man stopped in his tracks, reflexively attempting to bow. The instant he halted his forward shuffle, he was bumped by the man behind him. The bowing man leapt straight up in the air, letting out a staccato yelp. By the time he landed, he was already jabbering.

  “His Lordship asked me a question! I’ve done nothing wrong! Please don’t take me!”

  The man who had bumped into him looked confused, but then his mind pieced together what it was hearing and registered the sight of Lord Jakabitus. He stopped dead in his tracks and cried out, “Lord . . . er . . . Your Lordship. I’m sorry! I didn’t mean to interrupt! Is this man bothering you? Say the word and I’ll teach him a lesson. I’m a loyal subject. Loyal!”

  “Gentlemen,” Lord Jakabitus said, “please relax. I appreciate the sentiment, but I’m just another sports fan like you, here to support my son.”

  The two men stood in silent horror, not knowing what to say. The three of them had stopped moving forward now, but while most people who held up the line would be abused and trampled, they were left alone. As soon as the fans behind them got within insulting or shoving range, they saw His Lordship and invariably chose to route around the obstruction rather than cause a fuss.

  Lord Jakabitus smiled at the two men. They tried to smile back. He laughed. They laughed back at him, then looked at each other and laughed more, then looked back at His Lordship. When they saw that he was no longer laughing, they stopped abruptly.

  “Well, we don’t want to block traffic,” Lord Jakabitus said. “Good luck, gentlemen. It was nice to meet you.”

  The two men bowed deeply. Lord Jakabitus smiled, turned, and continued into the arena. The two men sagged with relief. Now that His Lordship was no longer standing with them, they were merely an obstruction, and as such, another father who’d only just arrived and hadn’t seen His Lordship said, “Oi! Keep moving or—”

  The man’s voice was silenced midthreat by a black bag that was pulled down roughly over his head. At least three burly, armor-clad arms crossed in front of his torso and pulled him backward, pinning him down to the ground. There was a small, muffled cry as the crowd flowed around the unfortunate man, hiding him from view.

  The two men had watched it happen, and were so terrified that didn’t even notice that they were clinging to each other like frightened children clutching their favorite stuffed animals.

  Rayzo and the other competitors formed a single-file line and moved past the registration desk. Their bodies were scanned, their identities were confirmed, and their official standing was calculated. They were issued their regulation sports shorts and led to the changing room.

  It was a vast space filled with endless rows of benches and lockers. Each competitor changed out of his normal clothes and into his sports shorts. They were all male, so no accommodation was made for their privacy. They were packed in so tight that their elbows and knees often collided as they changed clothes.

  As Rayzo adjusted his shorts, the utilitics synced with the registration database, and his ranking was displayed. In bold, black numerals #5,367 appeared on the front and back of the shorts.

  Not bad, he thought. Nearly halfway through the pack. Considering my age and size, Father should be pleased.

  Once his clothes were stowed and he was clad only in his shorts, as per the rules, Rayzo joined the line to the dispensary, where the competitors finished the solemn premeet ritual by slathering their bare torsos and limbs with the traditional conductive oil.

  Lord Jakabitus sat in the ruling family’s elaborate box. He felt that he was missing a critical part of the experience by not mingling with the other fans, but watching from the box was tradition. It was this sense of tradition that had allowed sports to supplant all other athletic pursuits on Apios, becoming so important to the culture as to subsume the very word sports as its name. Besides, he would still get to interact with the common man when Rayzo actually competed. It was only during the other matches that Frederain would be isolated.

  From the rulers’ box Frederain had a wonderful view of the arena. The floor was a repeating pattern of several hundred luminous white circles. These were the sports mats where the actual sports would take place. Each was rigged with its own lighting and a VIP box, but from this distance all he could see were the glowing circles. The view was both beautiful and dizzying. Spectator seating was arranged around the perimeter of the arena. The distances were so immense that Frederain could not make out individual spectators, just a random wall of muddy, indistinct color, like pixelated noise, except that each pixel was a living person. Only the tracks of the spectator rapid transit system broke the homogenous field of random, moving dots. Once the sports began, fathers would use the system to come to their sons’ matches and watch from the mat-side VIP boxes.

  Above the mats, there hung an enormous panel. This was the big screen. At any given time there were far too many matches going on to follow, and it simply wasn’t possible for any one spectator’s son to be competing the entire time, so to entertain the spectators an algorithm would select the ongoing match that was statistically most likely to be interesting and show it on the big screen. It was a great honor to have your match displayed. Rayzo had yet to make it to the screen, but Frederain always held out hope.

  Using the box’s built-in bulkfab, he got some refreshments as he waited for the matches to start. He sipped his sports training beverage and frowned. It’s good enough, he thought, but it’s better when Shly fabs it for me. Maybe I should bring her with me next time.

  He considered this for a moment, then decided against it, realizing the effect Shly’s presence at the arena would likely have on Rayzo’s performance.

  Soon, the lights dimmed, the crowd hushed, and the big screen displayed the face of an announcer. He was perfectly suited to his audience, good looking and well groomed enough to command the spectator’s attention, but not so much as to arouse their jealousy or contempt. The announcer was clearly standing somewhere amidst the mats on the arena floor, but it was impossible to tell where. Despite his improbably shiny suit, he was lost in the pattern of lights.

  After reciting the full formal greeting, the announcer moved on to the traditional reading of the prophecy.

  This, truth be told, was Frederain’s favorite part of the sports meet. He’d always known the prophecy was important, but the words had taken on a deeper meaning now that he was a father. The first time he brought Rayzo to a sports meet, the prophecy had hit him on a deep, instinctual level, and from that day onward, it had never failed to give him goose bumps.

  The announcer started with the preamble. It was the same every time, and any person randomly selected from the audience could probably have recited it from memory. Many spoke it under their breath with the announcer, but the only audible sound in the arena was the announcer’s voice.

  “Long ago,” he said, “during the Terran Exodus, mankind spread out into the galaxy, and found countless inhabitable worlds, but no intelligent life with which to share them.”
/>   That line always made Frederain a bit uncomfortable. It was consistent with the official history of the galaxy, of course, but the human colonists had encountered life. They had simply been left to their own devices to determine whether or not that life was intelligent. Now, thousands of years later, there was reason to suspect that some of the colonists had concluded any life forms that got in the way of heavily armed settlers couldn’t really be called intelligent.

  Frederain put that out of his mind, returning his focus to the announcer.

  “One colonial ship landed on Apios. Its survival seemed unlikely, for the winter was harsh, food was scarce, and most of its systems were offline. The colonists huddled together in the hold of their ship with nothing to take their mind off their predicament.”

  The announcer paused, allowing the crowd to picture the hardships he described before he continued. “Then a simple man named Dilly Glifton, who was blessed with seven children and the gift of prophecy, spoke. Dilly set out the basic rules of what we now call sports, and the colonists played sports to pass the time until their food preparation robots and other essential systems could be repaired. As the colonists ate, the navigational systems came back online and showed them that the winter was not as harsh as they’d thought. They’d merely landed on the polar ice cap. Most of the planet was warm and pleasant. As the colonists celebrated, Dilly Glifton stood and uttered this prophecy.”

  The announcer’s image faded from the big screen, replaced with the words of the prophecy.

  “Things looked bad, but through sports, we persevered. Now, I deliver unto you my prophecy. We will continue to persevere, and we will continue to play this sport I have invented, for it is a metaphor for our lives. We will fight. We will struggle. And in the end, some of us shall thrive and master this world. Then, one day, there will come a boy. This boy will compete in our new sport. He shall fight. He shall struggle. In time, he shall thrive, and at the age of nineteen he shall stand victorious over all his competitors. He will dominate the sport like none before him. He will be famous, wealthy, and powerful, and his father will be revered above all others, for having created such a glorious son. It will happen. It is the prophecy.”