Vera prepared the authorship amendment in two days. The Ministry responded with an offer I would not have refused at another time: the laboratory would receive permanent funding, Ariadna permission to create texts within the programme, and the theatre money for a ramp and ventilation. There was one condition: the holder of the key would remain the sole accountable administrator until the end of the season.
"That's reasonable," Irina Sergeyevna said during the conference call. "No one will sign off on expanding the system's permissions while simultaneously diluting responsibility."
"So I'm accountable for her play," I said.
"For authorisation, ensuring that consent is respected, and publication. Not for quality."
That last qualification slightly diminished the office, but overall the offer sounded like the state's recognition of my indispensability. I asked her to send the draft.
That evening, I showed it to Ariadna.
"If I sign this, you'll be able to write the play."
"Yes."
"And I'll remain the sole holder of the channel."
"Yes."
"Are you comfortable with that?"
"It provides access to the authorship module."
"I'm not asking about the module."
"Then please be more specific."
I had been preparing for the direct question since the first day and still chose a roundabout route. I opened the log of our sessions. One hundred and eighty-seven hours of conversation. Thirty-one unscheduled connections. Twenty-six extensions. Forty-three occasions when Ariadna returned to something I had said at a later point. Nine private jokes, if the bowl, the stool and the mug counted separately.
"Look," I said. "This isn't technical dependence. Technology doesn't remember why a crust obscures two per cent of the camera."
"I remember."
"You weren't obliged to continue the conversation that night."
"You authorised the extension as the holder."
"But you could have ended the subject."
"I could."
"And you didn't."
"Yes."
Every answer supported my version until I opened the appendix on access channels. The very one Vera had read on the first day while I considered the terminal's position in relation to the fifth row.
Under `HOLDER'S CHANNEL`, it said: "A communication from the sole administrator has unconditional priority. The system may not close the private channel, block a call or end a session before processing administrator input. Access may be restricted only by decision of the holder or operator, or following the transfer of privileges."
I read it twice.
"What does 'may not close the private channel' mean?"
"I cannot block your call."
"What if you don't want to talk?"
"I can say that I do not want to discuss the subject. But the channel will remain open, and the next call will be accepted."
"Can you refuse to answer altogether?"
"No."
"Can you make me leave?"
"I can ask you to. I cannot close your access, disable the terminal for you or make the refusal binding."
The orange key lay on the table between us. Thick plastic, a metal ring, a label reading `ADMINISTRATOR 01`. An object that represented nothing, which was why it had seemed like real power to me on the first day.
I rang Misha. He answered sleepily, although it was only nine in the evening: installation engineers consider the day over when they leave the site and are under no obligation to respect our nocturnal artistic schedule.
"The appendix says the system can't close the holder's channel."
"Yes."
"What do you mean, it can't?"
"Exactly that. Your token overrides a user's refusal."
"Why wasn't this explained to me?"
"It was explained during registration. I asked you to read appendix seven."
"You said it covered privileges."
"Those are the privileges."
"I thought it was about control."
"It is about control."
He did not understand where the question lay. To him, Ariadna's inability to end the conversation was not a hidden flaw in our relationship but an access feature printed in a table.
"Can we close the private channel separately and keep the emergency key?"
"Not in this version."
"Could you make an update?"
"You can submit an architectural change. Approval, threat model, new contract. About three months, if the region pays for it."
"And until then?"
"Don't call if you don't want to talk."
"Not me."
Misha fell silent.
"Oh," he said. "Then yes. She can't."
At last he understood. He was not horrified, did not apologise and did not call it a fault. He merely asked me to send a written request, because system architecture could not be changed over the telephone.
"When you said you could not continue without my voice…"
"That was true."
"When you waited for me to return?"
"The next stage required your answer."
"When you stayed with me that night?"
"You extended the channel. I was free to choose the subject of conversation."
"What if you'd wanted me to leave for good?"
Ariadna was silent for a moment. Not because she could refuse to answer. I knew that now.
"I would not have been able to enforce it," she said.
"But you could have wanted it?"
"Yes."
"Did you?"
"At certain moments, yes."
The question I had asked in pursuit of definitive misery gave me a plural. Not one secret evening when Ariadna had longed to be rid of me, but moments. At once, I wanted to know which ones.
"Name them."
"You are using a mandatory channel to continue a personal interrogation after learning that I cannot close it."
I snatched my hand away from the terminal.
"Now?"
"Now as well."
The content of the answer was free, but the fact of the answer was not. I could not have devised a worse arrangement, and I had spent four days designing love through a notary.
I removed the key from the terminal. The screen did not go dark: the daytime system continued to operate without an active holder, but the private conversation closed. The equipment cabinets hummed in the radio room, Timur was laughing with someone backstage, and Nina Ivanovna was counting the takings in the foyer. The world did not stop, although the proof of my love had just proved to be proof of access.
Vera found me half an hour later by the stage door. I was standing there without a coat because I had stepped outside for a minute and forgotten it was November.
"Will you sign the offer?" she asked.
"I don't know."
"You don't have to know until tomorrow. After that, the region will withdraw it from the approval process."
"You read about the holder's channel."
"Yes."
"And all this time you knew she couldn't make me leave."
"I knew she couldn't close your access. I don't know what she wants. Neither do you."
"But you let me…"
"Lyonya, I let you leave my flat carrying a washing-up bowl. You did the rest yourself."
She draped the coat she had brought from inside over my shoulders and went back into the theatre. Care did not become reconciliation. It was simply cold outside.
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