Stars Rise

XII. Stephen and Candra

Something, something, something, "Stephen," said Franco.

Something about the executives. From the edge of the roof in the corner, the view to Nova Dasilva was clear. I watched as she talked to the man in the fox mask, instead of listening to Candra and Franco's argument. Candra had come over to talk politics, and my hilarious best friend was giving her a hard time.

I don't know what she was expecting. I heard my name spoken in her voice, too, as each of them tried to drag me onto a side, but I didn't follow the conversation.

Under the black cat mask, Nova's face was impossible to read, but her body language said expressively that she was politely confused, then politely insistent, then unimpressed, and starting to become cross. I considered going over there, but something more than an inability to get free from the conversation I was sort of having with my friends held me back.

Candra noticed she was losing me, and she leaned in, twisting around to bring her head next to mine to see what I was looking at. "What's so interesting? Franco just called Sunyin Aura a crackpot pseudoscientist and either you didn't hear him or you haven't realized yet that you're bigger than him. You could just hit him over the head and he'd shut right up. He doesn't have your reach."

She twisted back toward Franco and gave him a grin.

He looked deep into her eyes and said, "You're a moron. Stephen would resort to words, not violence. He has a bigger brain than me; he can fight me with ideas."

I was taller than him, but his shaggy mop of hair was blocking my view. He forced eye contact and I couldn't see and I should have had the strength to force the moment to its crisis, to rush to Nova's rescue and begin the last romance of my life, when the meaning of their words finally filtered through my supposedly 'big' brain and I realized what they had been talking about. "Wait, did you say Sunyin Aura might take over the board?"

I analyzed the interestingly complicated smile Candra gave me. In it I saw that the idea was abhorrent to her, but she was happy for me while manically and possibly drunkenly concerned that the world was doomed.

"That's what I heard," she said, hesitant but sweet, because though Aura was against everything she believed in, I believed in Aura, and Candra's tepid enthusiasm on my behalf said that our friendship meant something or other. "It could be close. Sunyin Aura has more definite votes than any year before. And a few more executives are considering her, supposedly. Catastrophically foolish, impatient, reckless executives, of course, but it could come down to one or two votes. Imagine if you had a vote on the board. She'd have a chance."

"Aura? Actually? Am I that out of touch?"

"Yes," said Candra, and laughter spilled out of her smile. Friendly laughter. "You're out of touch. You also fail to realize the point of these parties. It's not to give the average constituent the chance to talk to the boss. You should be campaigning for Sunyin Aura. Idiot."

"Me? No, I don't . . . I'm not campaigning. I advise, I help where I can, I'd vote for her if I were on the board, but . . . I don't . . . What would I say?" Now I was the one laughing. "That's more your thing, Candra, how much do you charge? Hourly rate?"

"Not for any amount of money, Aurelian." Her eyes narrowed and she looked serious. Right, Sunyin Aura was the enemy in Candra's political spectrum.

"How is it again that we're friends?" I was grateful to her for the heads up on Aura's chances, and it was nice that she thought I could get Sunyin Aura elected as president of Constellation, so I should have listened to her answer, but I could see Nova again, she had fallen back to the left of Franco's shoulder.

I half-listened as Candra said, "Because unlike most people," and across the party, Nova reached visible peak anxiety, and Candra went on, "you and I realize that our differences come down to immovable core values. We can argue all night—" and at the moment I should have come to Nova's rescue, swept across the party to get rid of the man in the fox mask for her, someone else was at her side, a man in a white mask — "yet still we appreciate the logic of one another's reasoning, and continue to respect one another's intelligence. I vote what I believe is right. And we are friends—" she built to a conclusion as the man in the white mask came between Nova and the man in the fox mask, "because you do the same."

"Right," I said, slowly.

"Or you would," said Candra, "if you could vote on the board." There was a sparkle in her eyes. I was too late, wasn't I? The man in the white mask would take care of it.

"Right," I said again, to Candra.

"For my, you know, survey purposes, I wanted to double-check. If you were on the board tomorrow, nothing would stop you from voting Aura, correct?"

"Absolutely."

"Not even if Alma Valerian were closer defeating President Solin, giving you a director closer in line with your views. You wouldn't vote for Alma?"

"No," I said.

"And certainly not Solin."

"Certainly not."

"And not Justin Marius, of course," she said.

I realized that was who was behind the white mask, Justin Marius. "You're kidding."

She smiled big. "I had to ask. So that's a firm Aura."

"How is that even a question? I'm not sure why you're asking me, though."

"You're the future. Presumably," said Candra. "Presumably you will replace your father on the board, one of these centuries."

My attention shifted back to Nova, as a possibly better candidate to the board than me.

But then it shifted back to Candra. To what she had said. Which made no sense. "Wait, hold on a second. How can Sunyin Aura be close to beating President Solin within a margin of one or two votes if you think Alma Valerian might have, you said, a better shot? And now you're jokingly asking me to vote for Justin Marius. President Gaia Solin has held a majority for going on three decades, and now the night before the board election you're telling me any one of Sunyin Aura, Alma Valerian or Justin Marius could unseat him."

"Did I say that?" said Candra.

"Don't think I don't know that survey in your head has all fifty board members carefully tallied."

"I didn't say Sunyin Aura has those potentials in the bag. As I said, she's a bit more radical than Alma Valerian; either one of them could win, especially with strategic voting. A few dozen voters could get together and agree to one or the other. Either of them could unseat President Solin."

"Or split the vote to the point that Justin Marius, your candidate, wins."

"That would be fantastic," said Candra. "I wonder if you could convince your father to vote for Sunyin Aura."

"Fuck, if only," I said.

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