Zlepes historia (och död) skapar den ultimata vridningen, att den som informerade kulturens plot för att förstöra navet var inte Zlepe, men var faktiskt ...
...Huyler, inside Quilan's head.
"They showed me all there was to be shown about my society and theirs and, in the end, I preferred theirs. Essentially I became a Culture citizen and at the same time an agent of Special Circumstances, which is the uncharacteristically coy name they employ for their combined intelligence, espionage and counter-espionage organization."
Vi får höra att navet kände till planen före Quilans ankomst.
~ How long have you known? he [Quilan] asked.
~ I have known since a day before you arrived. I can’t speak for Special Circumstances.
Men på nästa sida lär vi oss att Zlepe misslyckades i sitt uppdrag att informera dem (!)
Failed. Failed to get back. Failed to warn. Failed to be the hero. It was not supposed to end this way, dying a lonely, painful death, conscious only of betrayal, fear and hopelessness.
Så vem sa till dem? Hur kollade de sig? Vi hittar det i epilogen;
I [Huyler] went along with everything else to keep Masaq’ and its people safe, not to ensure its destruction. I was SC’s insurance policy, their get-out clause, their parachute (I heard many colorful analogies). If I had been told to do so, I would have prevented Quilan from making his Displacements, not taken over and done them for him had he demurred. In the end it was decided that sufficient other safeguards had been put in place for the Displacements to go ahead, with the aim of back-tracking along the attempted wormhole link to discover and even attack the Involveds behind the attack (this failed and to the best of my knowledge it is still not known who those mysterious allies were, though I’m sure SC has its suspicions).