XIII

Awakened by an intruder’s impertinent command, Ethnarch Kerian finds a strangely dressed young man seated at the foot of his bed. Kerian tries to trigger voice-coded security, but the intruder reveals the basement center is disabled and the palace is asleep. He lays a small gun on the footboard and begins a parable about a powerful, lawless, post-scarcity culture that prefers saving lives to taking them.

The intruder links this culture’s covert influence to leaders’ extended youth, reminding Kerian of the retro-ageing he’s receiving and the promise he made to stop the Youricam “death trains.” Kerian denies responsibility and reaches for a hidden headboard pistol, only to find it disarmed; the intruder tosses him the removed bullets and states there will be a penalty for breaking the deal.

As Kerian dresses under duress and attempts to bargain with wealth and vice, the intruder refuses, insisting on “job satisfaction.” He clarifies that the Culture usually “disappears” tyrants rather than kills them, placing them where they can no longer harm anyone. Yet he condemns Kerian’s mass resettlement-by-exhaust, equating it to murder.

Declaring the Culture too soft and himself now freelance, the intruder identifies himself: Cheradenine Zakalwe. He shoots Kerian through the mouth, killing him instantly. Zakalwe then removes a sedative patch from the sleeping girl, collects extracted security components, and dons a black mask.

Completing the operation, Zakalwe accesses the concealed escape route behind a wall-sized painting. After a final glance at the bloody headboard, he disappears into the palace’s depths, leaving the regime’s leader dead and its security compromised.