Katalin Zay fell. Giorgi's outstretched hands flashed upwards. The lights of the Big Top spun past her eyes, blinding her to the upturned faces of the crowd. The gasps and screams dazzled her ears as she tumbled.
There was no net. Serzei Kovacs didn't believe in safety nets. Serzei Kovacs was too cheap to replace the nets after age caught up with the last ones. The stray thought flashed resentfully through Katalin's mind as her body responded automatically to the fall, training embedded in her subconscious and her muscle memory.
The ground did not arrive. Harsh light stabbed her from all sides. Sudden silence slammed into her. The world stopped.
Three heavy yet rapid booming sounds thudded into the stillness, crackling around the edges. Then there was a voice. Loud. Relentless. Arrogant. Creepily cheerful, like that awful time Serzei tried to take over as Ringmaster.
"Is this thing on? Yes? No? Come on, come on, they're waiting for me! Yes? Awesome!
"Greetings, creatures of this
Sight and sound abruptly returned. So did the ground. Katalin automatically lessened the impact of her landing with a roll, despite the interruption on the way down. Her head struck too hard and a bolt of pain skewered her behind her eyes. The ring kept cartwheeling as she automatically bounded to her feet and blew kisses to the crowd. The bound was more of a lurch. She took a dizzy step, forgetting where the exit was. Forgetting what her own name was.
Rescue came in a flutter of glitter and silk. Maisie’s dancers floated around Katalin with coloured scarves, making it look like part of the act. Maisie herself, shielded from the crowd, leaned in and whispered. “What’s the damage?”
“Nothing broken… I think. Gave my head a good knock.” Katalin grabbed on to Maisie’s outstretched hand, fighting dizziness. “Ugh.”
Maisie slid under Katalin’s shoulder. She was tiny but built of muscle, and Katalin’s weight was nothing to her. “Don’t you dare barf in the ring. Come on, let’s get you out of here.”
Katalin let herself be walked. She was in no state to get herself out of public view. “Why didn’t they tell us about the new act? Whatever that was. With the weird lights and voice?”
“Who knows? Serzei is an ass. Is that why you fell?” Maisie grinned and winked at her.
Katalin scowled, the expression quickly turning into a wince as the invisible knife through her brain twisted deeper. “If Serzei’s asking, then yes. Yes, it was. Totally his fault. Ugh. I’m going to have to perform again tomorrow. I’m going to hurl over the crowd, I know it.”
Maisie chuckled unsympathetically. “The kids in the front seats are always brats. About time someone upchucked over them. Look, I’ll get you outside for some air, and then I have to be back in the ring right after the horses.”
“You just want to be the first one of the two of us to find out whatever it is Serzei’s got planned.”
Maisie lifted a canvas flap just enough to allow the two of them to slip through. “Too right. Here we go. Don’t die until the audience has left, it’s bad publicity.”
Katalin flipped Maisie the bird, and slumped down on a crate in the shadows at the back of the Big Top as the dancer jogged back inside. Quantafiddly Lord Do-da, my glittery sequined ass. It had felt so much as if she really had stopped, frozen, in mid-air, but that was impossible.
♩♪♫♩♬♪
Quaternary Lord Ten leaned back in his acceleration couch, settling himself more deeply into the plush cushioning. Satisfaction warmed him. Finally, he was on his path to achieving a successful Adoption. "Ready to Initialise."
Tertiary Technician One gave him a nervous glance. "My Lord, Scenario Four really is a very difficult-"
"Of course it is. Nothing but the best for the best!"
"Uh, but, they've only just been linked in. Most planets start at-"
"My Prime is Secondary Lord Three! I will not have been given an inferior planet for my first Adoption! Initialise!"
Tertiary Technician One trembled, but didn’t dare disobey.
♩♪♫♩♬♪
Giant insect-like creatures poured across the field of the Haldoun Highland Games in a glittering tide. The skirling and roaring of the terrified spectators drowned the sound of the monsters’ rattles and clicks. People hurtled in every direction, panicked stampedes clashing and hindering each other as the monstrous, shimmering green ant-beetle-beasties closed. Effie pressed back against the dubious solidity of the commentary box, catching sight of old Neil Munro not far away. He had his claymore in one hand and his long-handled mace in the other, and was roaring at one of the beasties: “Come on, ye shannag!”
It had seemed like a joke at first, the bright light and the strange announcement. Someone sneaking into the commentary box, for a dare or a bet. Everything had been so normal afterwards. Lewis Macadie got disqualified for cheating in the bike race, same as every year. There was the usual heated debate abiut whether baton-twirling majorettes had a place at a traditional Highland Games*. The ice cream van ran out of everything except rocket lollies. Some tourist from Ontario managed to go six paces while dangling a hundred pound rock, on a chain, from each hand, with the crowd roaring at every step. Then Jamie Simpson went sixty paces, and the tourist was forgotten. The commentary-box practical joke was forgotten.
The gleaming insect horrors were no joke. There was no joking when there were real bodies… Effie pressed the back of her hand to her trembling lips, her eyes refusing to stop on the headless figure lying not twenty paces from her, its limbs flung wide. There was nothing funny about the scattered pockets of defiant resistance: Neil Munroe wielding his ceremonial sword against an impossible ant ten times his own size. The towering figure of David Canmore the Heavyweight Champion, turning the twenty-two pound weight of the throwing hammer into a wrecking ball as he spun through the chittering mass of horrors. Jamie Simpson and someone in a Clan Gunn kilt, caber over their shoulders for a ram as they charged towards the beasties.
Effie put one hand down to her sgian-dubh. The hilt looked bonny, poking up above her kilt-hose, but the knife had only a small blade. Neil's claymore clattered against the shell of the beastie in front of him and bounced off. A little knife would do even less. She had her pipes, somehow still clutched to her chest despite the chaos. Pipers used to play in battle, to give the soldiers courage and scare the enemy. She fumbled the blowpipe up to her mouth and filled the bag.
The drone was lost amongst the madness, but at the first notes of “Scotland The Brave” she noticed a change. The insects closest to her started skirling and squealing as they backed off. Something hovered in front of Effie's eyes, but she furiously blinked it away and concentrated on playing, barely noticing the words.
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Skill learned:
Courage of a
Soul Strike: Inflicts a Fear attack on all enemies in range. Attack strength varies with skill level. Effect
Neil staggered a step forwards as the monster in front of him drew back. Its legs and feelers flailed in distress. Looking this way and that for the reason behind the beastie’s retreat, his eyes fell on Effie. The sound of her pipes finally registered on his ears. With a sudden burst of relief and rising hope, he glanced between Effie and the creatures that were beginning to flee, then stood tall and gave his best Drum Major roar. “Haldoun Pipes and Drums… Atten…Shun! Haldoun Pipes and Drums… Ready! Haldoun Pipes and Drums! One, Two-”
There was a single deep, resonant thump from somewhere nearby, a pause, and then the slow rhythm of a bass drum, growing louder. William Sutherland hurried towards them, in disarray but looking unhurt. His Glengarry was missing, leaving his greying hair mussed. One of his sticks was gone as well and his big bass drum was askew. Effie didn’t stop playing and fell into time with his beat. Young Angus crawled out from under the stage they’d been using for the Highland Dancing, his kilt all muddy, drumsticks caught between his teeth and his snare dragging behind him on its strap. His eyes were showing their whites all around, and his hands were shaking. He picked up his snare and took up his sticks. The rattle of the sticks on his drum seemed to settle him.
One and two the pipes joined in from all across the field, and it became the turn of the giant insects to panic. Even Neil’s best roar wasn’t enough to carry over the skirling, but he held his mace high above the confusion and the band began to form up. They were ragged and shaky, with less than half the number they should have had.
Neil took a breath, hoping the band had discipline beyond anything he’d ever asked of them, and signalled them to silence. Confused, one then another player stuttered and stopped. The insects turned once again. A strange churring sound came from the beasties. The creatures skittered together and formed up, a glittering, chittering green-black wall that started to close the distance once again. Neil held still, closed his eyes, gathered himself, and raised his voice and his mace to the sky as he roared. “Haldoun Pipes and Drums… By the centre, Quick March!
Only two drummers gave the tempo rolls, barely enough, but they caught on. They caught on, they formed up, their feet finding the timing. More drums joined in. The pipe drone came in on the fifth beat and Neil mentally cheered them all on as they stepped towards that terrible beastie army, but he didn’t dare cheer aloud. The seventh beat, Fergus Taylor sounding the E as the beasties reached spitting distance. Some steps faltered, but the melody came crashing in on the eighth, cutting across the clattering of the insects and turning it into squeals of pain and dismay.
They found courage in the rattle and the boom of the drums, and more in the defiant song of the bagpipes. Ignoring the strange messages that kept appearing before their eyes, the remnants of the Haldoun Pipes and Drums spread in a perfect line, marching locked in step over the field, driving the monsters before them with High Road to Gairloch, Blue Bonnets Over the Border, and Scotland the Brave.
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♩♪♫♬♪
A warning message flagged up on the screen of Octonary Programmer Seventeen.
"Primary Lord's great scaly tentacles, what now?" it grumbled as it pulled up the data. It was already working double shifts, and was on its second warning. It couldn't afford another reprimand. It blinked and reread the message, but it had seen it correctly the first time. "Eighteen? Eighteen, come look at this."
One of Octonary Programmer Eighteen's eyestalks bent over from the next cubicle and peered at the screen. "Never seen that before. Which planet’s got the problem?"
"One in the new sector, just gone live. Wasn't even graded a ten. Barely passed the minimum Adoption requirements. Allocated to Quaternary Lord Ten and you know what he's like, they don't want him admitted to the Council so they've set him up to fail."
"Looks like they're succeeding, the planet's already broken the programming. Oops, look sharp, One's headed this way. Better get rid of that error message!"
Seventeen wrestled with the code as more errors flagged up. "I can't! It doesn't recognise… whatever it is they're doing!"
"What about the new adaptive code you've been working on? Isn't this exactly the scenario you're writing it for?"
"It's not fully tested yet!"
"So test it some more." Eighteen's eyestalk tapped the screen. "There's your test bed. It's a tiny planet nobody's ever heard of out in the middle of nowhere. Nobody will care if it goes wrong, as long as you don’t upload the error codes so they can't flag up on Central. Look, just dump the whole planet into a sandbox and stick it in Debug Mode until you get your code finished. I’ve done that before, it’ll be fine. Nobody bothers about anything in the sandboxes. And hurry! It’s time to look busy!" The eyestalk pulled back into the next cubicle.
Swearing under its breath, Seventeen uploaded its untried code to an isolated node on the main computation complex, initiated transfer of the World Integration Installation, and tried to look busy instead of guilty.
♩♪♫♩♬♪
* The consensus was, as always, that no, majorettes did not belong, but nobody on the Committee dared suggest that to the Secretary in case she resigned over it, because it had taken them a year to find anyone willing to fill the position and nobody else had the necessary combination of typing skills, reliability, honesty and awe-inspiring intimidation. The number of trophies going missing since she took over had dropped into negative numbers, with two thought lost turning up in the hands of sheepishly repentant former winners. The Committee kept her happy and counted themselves lucky that so far they had managed to stay out of the acrimonious feud between the British Majorettes Association and the Majorettes Association of Great Britain, who seemed to be locked in eternal disagreement about whether or not cartwheels had a place in any baton-twirling routine.