Embassytown - China Mieville [25]
On Arieka, for lifetimes, the last two megahours, our representatives hadn’t been twins but doppels, cloned. It was the only viable way. They were bred in twos in the Ambassador-farm, tweaked to accentuate certain psychological qualities. Blood twins had long been outlawed.
A limited empathy might be taught and drugged and tech-linked in between two people, but that wouldn’t have been enough. The Ambassadors were created and brought up to be one, with unified minds. They had the same genes but much more: it was the minds those carefully nurtured genes made that the Hosts could hear. If you raised them right, taught them to think of themselves right, wired them with links, then they could speak Language, with close enough to one sentience that the Ariekei could understand it.
The Stadt test was still taken in the out, by students of the psyche and of languages. It had no practical use, now, though—we grew our own Ambassadors in Embassytown, and didn’t have to find each precious potential one among very young twins. As a way to source speakers of Language, the test was obsolete, I had thought.
Latterday, 2
“Please join me”—I couldn’t see who it was who spoke loudly, announcing the arrivals to Diplomacy Hall—“in welcoming Ambassador EzRa.”
They were immediately surrounded. In that moment I saw no close friends, had no one with whom to share my tension or conspiratorial look. I waited for EzRa to do the rounds. When they did, how they did so was another indicator of their strangeness. They must have known how it would seem to us. As JoaQuin and Wyatt introduced them to people, Ez and Ra separated, moved somewhat apart. They glanced at each other from time to time, like a couple, but there were soon metres between them: nothing like doppels, nothing like an Ambassador. Their links must work differently, I thought. I glanced at their little mechanisms. They each wore a distinct design. I shouldn’t have been surprised. Disguising their unease with functionaries’ aplomb, JoaQuin led Ez and Wyatt Ra.
Each half of the new Ambassador was at the centre of a curious crowd. This was the first chance most of us had had to meet them. But there were Staff and Ambassadors whose fascination for the newcomers had clearly outlasted their own initial meetings. LeNa, RanDolph and HenRy were laughing with Ez, the shorter man, while Ra looked bashful as AnDrew asked him questions, and MagDa, I realised, stayed close enough to touch his hands.
The party bustled about me. I caught sight of Ehrsul’s rendered eyes at last and winked as Ra approached me. Wyatt made an aaah noise, held out his hands, kissed my cheeks.
“Avice! Ra, this is Avice Benner Cho, one of Embassytown’s … Well, Avice is any number of things.” He bowed as if granting me something. “She’s one of our immersers. She’s spent a good deal of time in the out, and now she offers cosmopolitan expertise and an invaluable traveller’s eye.” I liked Wyatt and his little power plays. You might say we tended to twinkle at each other.
“Ra,” I said. A hesitation too short for him to notice, I think, and I held out my hand. I shouldn’t call him “Mr.” or “Squire”: legally he was not a man, but half of something. Had he been with Ez I’d have addressed them as “Ambassador.” I nodded at AnDrew, at Mag, at Da, who watched.
“Helmser Cho,” Ra said quietly. He after his own hesitation took my hand.
I laughed. “You’ve promoted me. And it’s Avice. Avice is fine.”
“Avice.”
We stood silent for a moment. He was tall and slim, pale, his hair dark and plaited. He seemed slightly anxious but he pulled himself together somewhat as we spoke.
“I admire you being able to immerse,” he said.