Diamond Star (64 page)

The drums joined the driving melody, and Del sang, his lyrics very much like the original. But he did this version hard and fast, one line after another, barely pausing for breath:

You dehumanized us
Your critics, they all died
You answered defiance
With massive genocide
You hunt us as your prey
You assault and enslave
You force us bound to stay
For pleasures that you crave

Listen to me,
he thought to the audience.
Hear me.
He veered away from the original. Instead, he sang the words he had created in the deep of night, born of his worst memories, born out of the pain suffered by the people he loved. He sang hard and furious, filled with rage, sang to the Aristos, the sons of the Carnelian Throne, whose emperor presided over the most monstrous empire in human history:

You broke my brother
You Carnelian Sons
You tortured my mother
In your war of suns
You killed my brothers
You shattered my father
You murdered my sister
Expecting no others

Del heaved in a breath and sang what he knew, no prettied lyrics, just the truth.

Well, I'm no golden hero
In the blazing skies
I'm no fair-haired genius
Hiding in disguise

His voice rose, his anger adding power as he shouted:

I'm only a singer
It's all I can do
But I'm still alive
And I'm coming after you

The morpher thundered, Anne's drums filled the night, Randall's stringer wailed. And Del sang:

I'll never kneel
Beneath your Highton stare
I'm here and I'm real
I'll lay your guilt bare

When the music reached its crescendo, he threw back his head, his legs planted wide as he shouted into the mike.

I'll never kneel
Beneath your Highton stare
I'm here and I'm real
Your living nightmare!

He held the final note, his fist clenched around the mike and raised to the stars as the song finished in one powerful, crashing chord.

Mac was talking to a mech-tech behind the stage when the "Carnelians Finale" began. He stopped in mid-sentence, unable to believe he was hearing that ominous progression of chords.

"Mac?" the tech asked. "Hello?"

"I have to go," Mac said. He spun around and ran for the stage. By the time he reached the top of the stairs that led backstage, he was gasping for breath, his sixty-year-old heart laboring. But he didn't pause as he yanked open the door and ran down the corridor. "Carnelians" kept on, inexorable.

Mac grabbed the audio-comm hanging on a cord around his neck and shoved it into his ear. "Del, can you hear me?
Del!
"

No response. Del rarely answered during a concert, but Mac could always tell the comm was active because he could hear Del breathing and the noise of the crowd. Now he was getting nothing.

He ran through a tangle of light-amps and morph engines, came around a looming pile of equipment, and plowed into a cluster of people standing around the base of the tower: Ricki, Staver, assorted techs, and four very large men from the stage crew.

Mac strode up behind Ricki. "Is he onstage yet?"

She jumped and spun around. "Mac! Don't scare me that way."

"You have to get him off the stage!" Mac said. "
Now.
"

Ricki met his gaze. "No."

"This isn't some special effect!" Mac tried to push past her. The tower lift was gone, but he'd climb the stairs if he had to.

Two stagehands caught Mac's arm, one on each side of him. "I'm sorry," one of the mammoths said. "You can't go up there."

"Let me go!" Mac struggled to pull away. "Ricki, listen. You can't let him do this."

She met his gaze. "I promised I wouldn't let you stop him."

"Where are Tyra and Cameron?" It was all Mac could do to keep from shouting.

"Checking the area," Ricki said. "Like they always do."

Mac raised his arm, but one of the stagehands stopped him before he could activate his wrist comm. They were young, big, strong, and not out of breath, none of which applied to him.

"Don't hurt him," Ricki told them. She spoke more gently to Mac. "I'm sorry. But you can't comm Tyra or Cameron."

"Ricki, you have to listen to me," Mac said. " 'Carnelians' is a fire bomb."

"Maybe," she said. "We'll see."

"Why does it upset you?" Staver asked. "Del's material is cleaner than what you hear from a lot of bands. It's
how
he sings that causes problems, not what he says."

Mac gave an unsteady laugh. "You think I'm worried about sex? God, I wish. He's about to do one of the most politically inflammatory songs ever written." He willed Ricki to listen. "You
hate
politics. Believe me, you
don't
want him up there."

With a comment like that, the Ricki he had worked with all these years would have immediately pulled Del off the stage. This stranger just crossed her arms and said, "He goes on."

Mac clenched his fists, straining against the stagehands. He couldn't fight these hulking youths. He had to depend on Tyra and Cameron. Neither knew the "Carnelians Finale," but surely they would stop Del, especially when they heard the lyrics. If they would just get back here. He wasn't far from the stage, only a few yards back, behind a bank of light-amps. The stage remained dark, but the music was working up the audience. Del was just barely visible in the dark, already at the top of the tower. He raised his hand into the air.

"That's the signal to start the show," a tech said into her comm, probably to someone in the control booth.

The lights came up below Del. As he stalked down the ramp, the music swelled and holos formed around him, first green, then red and orange like flames.

"Don't do it," Mac said to the solitary figure striding down the ramp. "Del, be wise.
Don't do it.
"

When Del reached the stage, he strode to its edge while the music crashed to its final ringing note. Jud immediately started the piece again. It could repeat as many times as the band wanted. In rehearsal, they played it over and over, improvising. Although sometimes Del sang a few verses, usually he left it as an instrumental piece.

Not tonight.

When the music quieted, Del's voice rolled over the audience. Desperate, Mac struggled with the stagehands. When Del shouted, "This is for you, Tarex," Mac swung around to Ricki. "You have to stop him! Don't you understand what he's doing?"

She answered quietly. "Maybe people need to hear him."

Mac stood transfixed as Del's vocals swept over the crowd, carried by orbs, holocams, the night air.
You killed my brother, tortured my mother, shattered my father, murdered my sister.

"Gods," Staver said. "He sings as if that's all true."

Mac spoke numbly. "It is."

Light from the stage washed across Ricki's face as she watched Del. "I've never heard him do anything like this."

I'm no golden hero in the blazing skies. I'm no fair-haired genius hiding in disguise. I'm only a singer, it's all that I can do. But I'm still alive, and I'm coming after you.

"He's singing to the Aristos," Mac said.

Staver stood transfixed. "Why would the Traders devastate the family of an Allied citizen?"

Mac knew billions of people would soon be asking that same question. For every person who thought it was just a song, two more would wonder if Del were singing about himself. He struggled futilely with the stagehands. When Del shouted,
"I'll lay your guilt bare,"
Mac felt as if an avalanche were crashing down on them.

"My God," Ricki breathed. "He's magnificent."

"
Magnificent?
" Mac couldn't believe it. "Do you have any idea how the Traders react to criticism? With one song, he could shatter any hope we ever had of diplomatic relations with them."

"You want 'diplomatic relations' with monsters," Staver said harshly. "Listen to the first verse. It's all there. Your people need to hear it."

"Not like this!" Mac said. "It will destroy everything."

The music thundered to its crescendo and Del's voice soared into the final note. Finally the music dropped into the quiet opening, and Del stopped singing.

Mac sagged in the grip of the stagehands.
Thank God.
It was over.

"That was for all of you," Del told the audience. Then he raised his chin and said, "This one is for my people."

"What the hell?" someone said.

Mac started at the unexpected voice. A group of techs had gathered around them, all watching Del.

"My people?" one asked. "What is he talking about?"

The drums joined the chord progression, and Del sang--

In perfect, unaccented Iotic.

Staver's mouth dropped open. "Gods
almighty.
"

"No," Mac said dully.

Staver swung around to him. "He's a Skolian lord?"

"If you only knew," Mac said. "Ricki,
pull him off.
"

Tyra stalked up next to Mac, her gaze fixed on Del. "What the hell is he doing?" She looked at the stagehands restraining Mac. "What's going on here?"

"Tyra, stop him," Mac said. "Listen to what he's saying."

Tyra paused, her head tilted as she listened. Watching her, Mac feared she would refuse. Then she exhaled and strode toward the stage. The two stagehands who weren't holding Mac blocked her way. Although she countered them, whirling right and left, Mac had the impression she was holding back. Her fighting style looked like a cross between martial arts and street brawling. They kept trying to restrain her--

Tyra suddenly turned into a blur, like a black streak. She threw both hulks so fast, Mac couldn't even see what she did. One of Mac's captors let him go and waded into the fray, but it made no difference. Within seconds, all three mammoths were crumpled on the ground.

Tyra turned to Ricki. "Get him off the stage. Or I'm going out there."

"Look at them!" Ricki jerked her hand at the crowd. "You see how worked up they are? You pull him off, and we could lose control of the audience."

Mac needed no telepathy to read Tyra's thought. She could handle three stagehands, but a million people was another story altogether.

Tyra walked slowly onto the stage. When Mac strained in the grip of his guard, the man said, "I can't let you go, Mister Tyler. I'm sorry."

The stagehands that Tyra had knocked over picked themselves off the ground, brushing dirt off their arms. When they saw Tyra on the edge of the stage, they headed out after her.

"Take it slow," Ricki said. "If you start fighting onstage, it could cause a riot."

The men nodded and kept to the edge of the stage as they moved into the light. Tyra was about ten yards from the front. Del had seen her, but he kept singing, rising into the climax of the song. He held the last note longer this time, but finally, mercifully, he let it go. As the music dropped into the intro, Mac sagged with relief. Whatever damage that furious challenge was going to do, at least it was over.

Del watched Tyra while the music cycled. Then he spun around to the other side of the stage. It looked like a dance move, but Mac knew he had sighted Cameron, who was coming from that side, in front of where Jud sat at his morpher. Jud's gaze flicked defiantly from Cameron to Tyra as he continued the song. Anne and Randall seemed bewildered, but they kept playing, too.

Del took a deep, visible breath--and moved to the very front of the stage, right on the edge. He was standing above a sea of people clapping, dancing, reaching for him, their energy driven by the music. If he took one more step, he would fall into that seething mass of humanity. Mac understood then why Tyra and Cameron weren't going closer. If they spooked Del and he jumped, the devil only knew what would happen. He had provoked the crowd to the edge of rational thought; if he fell now, he could end up in the hospital. Or worse.

Then Del raised his head and shouted into the mike. "This one is for you, Jaibriol Qox." He began again--

In a third language.

The blood drained from Mac's face. He had never had cause to use that language, but he could never mistake the harsh words. Oh, yes, he knew. Del was singing in Highton, the language of the Trader Aristos.

Of their emperor, Jaibriol Qox.

Mac sank down to sit on a light-amp. His guard only eased his hold enough for Mac to move that much. The other stagehands were edging around the stage, closing on Tyra and Cameron.

And Del sang the "Carnelians Finale."

"He's going to start an interstellar war," Mac said dully.

Del
was
the Aristo's living nightmare, the prince everyone had overlooked, the survivor who came to fight them with one of the most powerful weapons in existence.

A song.

As Del finished the Highton version of the "Finale," he lowered his arm with the mike. This time when Tyra came forward, he stayed put. Mac didn't know what Tyra thought, but she was moving with caution, as if Del were a bomb ready to explode. She walked over and stood eye-to-eye with him. Then, slowly, she took the mike. The crowd was clapping like thunder, but quieter pockets of people were just watching. Staring. More and more, they were realizing Tyra wasn't part of the show.

The lights went out and the music cut off.

"Hey!" The protests swelled in a multitude of voices.

Mac laughed raggedly. "A little late, don't you think?" Why it had taken the concert management so long to cut the power, he had no idea. It was only when he looked at his wrist-mesh that he realized almost no time had passed. Del had blasted through the song three times in three languages in three minutes.

* * *

In New York, the giant holoscreen that dominated Times Square showed a man singing with fury, his music filling the humid night air as a Manhattan crowd gathered below to watch.

In Peking, China, holoscreens constructed from the sides of entire skyscrapers showed the giant figure of the man singing, his music filling the city.

The song poured out into space, to Mars, the asteroid belt, the moons of Jupiter and Saturn and beyond. The Kyle relays the Allieds had licensed from the Skolians kicked in and hurtled the music across space.

Deep in the Skolian Imperialate, in the Amphitheater of Memories where the Assembly met, thousands of tiers rose up like a vertical city. The delegates of an empire convened to discuss, debate, and vote on the business of a thousand peoples. Giant screens all over the amphitheater showed the speakers. When a broadcast from Earth suddenly replaced the proceedings, protests rumbled--until people recognized the singer. He had never sat in Assembly or spoken at any government convocation. Almost no one had met him. But his resemblance to the man who sat as the Ruby Consort was unmistakable.