by Peter F. Hamilton
> the personality said shakily.
<> Dariat said. <> Every part of his body ached from the climb up through the air duct. He had forced himself to keep going, at first hiking up the slope, then as the gravity fell off, pulling himself along a near-vertical shaft with his arms.
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The southern endcap was within twenty kilometres of the mélange. Ahead of it, the surface was churning with activity. Huge peaks were jabbing up as melting bodies climbed on top of each other so they could be the first to touch the shell and feast on the life-energy within.
Dariat reached the end of the duct and commanded the muscle membrane to open. They air-swam out into one of the main corridors leading to the hub chamber.
Tolton had fastened his lightstick to the launcher, as he’d seen Erentz do. He swept the beam round the black corridor in an alert fashion. “Any bad guys around here?”
“No. In any case, they’re all waiting for the impact. Nothing’s moving in the habitat.”
“I’m not surprised. I can taste the horror; it’s physical, like I’ve overloaded on downer activants. Shit.” He smiled brokenly at Dariat. “I’m frightened, man. Really frightened. Is there any way a soul can die here, die completely? I don’t want to join the mélange. Not that.”
“I’m sorry. It can’t be done. You have to live.”
“Fuck! What kind of a universe is this anyway?”
Dariat led Tolton into the darkened hub chamber and held his hand high, letting the energy pulse recklessly. The resulting burst of light revealed the geometry: silent doors leading to the spindle commuter cabs, hoop avenues down to the tube train stations. He aimed himself at a door leading to the engineering section and kicked off.
The corridors on the other side were metal, lined with grab hoops. They slithered along them quickly, using the manual controls to get past airlock hatches. The air was freezing but breathable. Tolton’s teeth started chattering.
“Here we go,” Dariat said. The escape pod’s circular hatch was open. He somersaulted in, vaguely unnerved by the familiar layout. Twelve acceleration couches were laid out around him. He chose the one under the solitary instrument panel and started flicking switches. Same sequence as last time. The hatch hinged shut automatically. Lights came on with reluctance, and the environment pumps started to whine.
Tolton held his hands up in front of the grille, catching the warm air.
“God, it was cold out there.”
“Strap in, we’re about to leave.”
The personality watched the tip of the southern endcap touch the surface of the mélange. <> it told Rubra’s descendants.
Fluid cratered away from the impact, then rushed back to slam against the shell. Hundreds of thousands of berserk souls surfed it inwards and penetrated the polyp to immerse themselves in the magnificent tide of life-energy coursing within, absorbing it directly. The temperature difference between fluid and polyp was too great for the habitat’s weakened shell to withstand. The existing fissures flexed wildly as thermal stresses tightened their grip.
Dariat activated the pod’s jettison sequence. Explosive bolts cut away the berth’s outer shielding, and five of the solid rockets fired. They were flung clear of the spindle, racing out level with the surface of the mélange.
<> the personality said. The accompanying sorrow brought tears to Dariat’s eyes.
Valisk burst apart as if a fusion bomb had detonated inside. Thousands of human souls came fluttering out of the billowing core of hot gas and crumbling polyp slabs, indestructible phantoms naked in the darkness. As with all life in the dark continuum, they sank into the mélange and began their suffering.
The solid rocket burn ended, leaving the escape pod in freefall. Dariat looked out of the small port, seeing very little. He twisted the joystick, firing the cold gas thrusters to roll the pod. Grey smears slashed past outside.
“I can see the mélange, I think,” he reported faithfully. In his mind he was aware of the wailing and torment gushing from the awesome conglomeration of pitiful souls. It chilled his own resolution. There could be only one fate here.
Amid the misery were several steely strands of more purposeful and malignant thought. One of them was growing stronger. Nearer, Dariat realized. “Something’s out there.” He tilted the joystick again, spinning the pod quickly. Pale blooms of light emerged deep inside the nebula, silhouetting a speck that whirled and shook as it arrowed towards them.
“Shit, it’s one of the Orgathé.” He and Tolton stared mutely at each other.
The street poet twitched feebly. “I can’t even say it’s been fun.”
“There are five solid rockets left. We can fire them and fly back into the nebula.”
“Won’t we just wind up here again?”
“Yes. Eventually. But it’ll be another day or two out of the mélange.”
“I’m not sure it makes that much difference to me now.”
“Then again, we could fire them when the Orgathé reaches us, fry the bastard.”
“It’s only doing what we’d do.”
“Last choice, we can fire the rockets to take us into the mélange.”
“Into! What use will that be?”
“None whatsoever. Even if we don’t break apart on impact we’ll melt away into the fluid over a few days.”
“Or fly straight through to the other side.”
“There isn’t one.”
“You never know unless you try. Besides, this way has the most style.”
“Style, huh.”
They both grinned.
Dariat rolled the pod again, getting a rough alignment on the mélange. He fired two of the solid rockets. Any more, and they really would crack open when they reached it.
The cold will probably do it anyway, he thought.
There was three seconds of five-gee acceleration, then they hit. The deceleration jolt was fearsome, flinging Tolton against the couch’s straps. He groaned at the pain, bracing himself for the worst.
But the pod’s thermal coating held, defying the devastating subcryonic temperature of the mélange. The pod juddered sluggishly as its rocket motors continued to fire, thrusting them deeper and deeper below the surface. Both of them could hear the cacophony of souls outside, their shock and dismay as the rocket exhaust vaporized the fluid in which they were suspended. The cries grew fainter the further in they went. After fifteen seconds the rockets burnt out.
Tolton’s laugh had an unstable timbre. “We made it.”
The port had frosted over as soon as they struck the fluid. He reached over and tried to wipe the beads of ice clear. His hand stuck to the glass. “Bugger!” He lost some skin pulling it free. “Now what do we do?”
“Absolutely nothing.”
Chapter 11
The Volkswagen Trooperbus carried Louise and Ivanov Robson back to London. During most of the four-hour trip she’d sat curled up on one of the big leather chairs in the cabin, accessing news reports from the arcology. The landscape held little interest for her now.
There were few rover reporters left in the Westminster dome to provide an impression of what was happening. Those who insisted on toughing it out were releasing their sensevises on a long delay, allowing them to get well clear of the area where they’d been recording. The possessed didn’t take kindly to having their activities exposed to the planet’s accessing public. Rovers who’d been caught on the first day had never accessed the net again.
What was shown by reporters still on the ground—and more comprehensively, by the dome sensors—was a rough kind of order establishing itself among the ancie
nt buildings. The possessed were organized in small bands, walking quite openly along the main roads. It was a defiant gesture up at Govcentral. They could have been targeted easily by SD weapons, had the political will existed to do so. But as there were only ever a couple of hundred exposed at any one time, the remainder would be free to extract an atrocious retribution on the rest of the non-possessed population.
Government forces within the arcology had been effectively eliminated.
Highly specific fires had continued to rage throughout the night, disposing of all the dome’s police stations and eighty per cent of the local council offices. Significantly, although power grids and the communication net had also been targeted, the possessed hadn’t damaged any of the primary civic utility stations. There was still water, and fresh air; and the dome remained capable of warding off an armada storm.
Somebody was controlling the possessed, ordering their activities with a great deal of precision.
The media speculated on who.
Charlie was only interested in why. If anything, the possessed were now enforcing the original curfew with a greater efficiency than the police ever had. The AI’s analysis of their movements indicated there were between seven and ten thousand of them, each with their own area to control. Enough to make sure everyone stayed indoors. Very few new possessed were being created, and there were barely a few hundred in the nine outer domes.
The only significant excursion they’d attempted was to a garage of surface vehicles. Each time they’d driven one of the lumbering machines up onto the ramp, it had been targeted by SD fire. The President himself had ordered the strikes without any urging from the B7 staff among his advisors and cabinet. The possessed had made eight attempts to leave London before giving up.
“Dexter’s preparing for something,” Charlie told Louise just before she left his dome. “There’s no way he’ll be satisfied with just London.
That’s why he’s holding back on possessing the rest of the population.
The way he’s put things together in there, he could do it in less than a week if he wanted. He’s far better organized than New York.”
Louise didn’t understand why Dexter was holding back any more than Charlie did. The devilsome man she’d encountered back on Norfolk didn’t seem capable of any restraint.
The only other information she received on the trip was progress reports on Genevieve. Her sister was being driven to Birmingham in another Volkswagen, along with Divinia and the first batch of Charlie’s family.
From there Charlie had arranged a vac-train to take them to Kenya Station. Gen had been quite disappointed when it turned out that Charlie’s dome couldn’t fly.
It was a much shorter drive to Birmingham. Genevieve was on the African Tower ascending to Skyhigh Kijabe while Louise was still making her way across the Thames valley.
“Coming into view now if you want to see it,” Yves Gaynes called out from the cab.
Louise stirred herself and went forward to sit next to him. When they’d left London, she’d had a poor view of the domes; the direction they were travelling in was all wrong. Now the Trooperbus was pointing straight at them as it lumbered over the last few miles.
She stared at the domes that sliced up out of the rolling horizon. Only the outer nine were visible, gathered protectively around the ancient city at the centre. The sinking sun reflected vivid pillars of copper light off the vast arcades of geodesic crystal; other than that, they were completely black. For the first time, she could appreciate just how artificial they were. How alien.
Yves was looking at her. “Didn’t expect to be coming back this way quite so soon, myself.”
“No.”
“The boss does look after his people, you know.”
“I’m sure he does.” Not that she was convinced she really qualified as a B7 staff member. Then again, it could just be Charlie remote-controlling the driver, trying to reassure her, to make her more compliant. She wasn’t certain of anything anymore.
The Trooperbus drove steadily past the half-buried factory halls surrounding the arcology and dipped down a ramp into one of the huge underground garages. There were few lights on, and no activity at all among the ranks of parked vehicles. They drew up in a bay near the ramp.
As the external door slid down, a navy blue car sped towards them out of the gloom. Ivanov Robson stood up and popped the cabin’s hatch.
“Are you ready?” he asked politely.
“Yes.” Louise made her voice cool. She hadn’t spoken to him since the journey started. It was an issue dominated by anger; although she wasn’t sure who she was directing it against. Him for being what he was, or her for liking him at the start. Maybe he was just too strong a reminder that she’d been so thoroughly manipulated.
She climbed down the short ladder. It was humid in the garage, but colder than she expected. She was dressed for the arcology in a short skirt over black leggings, with a long sleeved emerald T-shirt to cover the medical nanonic bracelet and thin leather waistcoat. Her hair had been battened down into a single ponytail.
Ivanov followed as she hurried over to the car, carrying the slim alligator-skin weapons case Charlie had given him. A policewoman ushered them into the car, her face devoid of curiosity. How many people have B7 sequestrated? Louise wondered. This time the car’s interior was quite ordinary. She settled back in the rear seat with Ivanov beside her, the fateful case resting on his knees.
“I am me most of the time, you know,” he said quietly. “B7 can’t control my every waking second.”
“Oh.” Louise didn’t want to talk about it.
“I regard it as a penance, not a punishment. And I get to see some interesting things. I also know how the world works, a rare privilege for anyone these days. As you now know.”
“What did you do?”
“Something very foolish, and unpleasant. Not that I had a lot of choice at the time. It was them or me. I think that’s why B7 gave me this deal.
I’m not what you’d call a standard career criminal. I even had a family.
Haven’t seen them for a couple of decades, but I’m allowed to know how they’re getting on.”
“But you were still told how to treat me.”
“I was ordered what information to supply to you, and when. Everything else I ever said or did was the real me.”
“Including coming back to London now?”
Ivanov chuckled quietly. “Oh no. Natural altruism doesn’t run to this insanity. I’m here under orders.” He paused. “But now I’m here, I will do my best to protect you if the need arises.”
“You think coming back was stupid?”
“Completely idiotic. B7 should toughen up and nuke London. It’s the only way we’ll ever be rid of these possessed.”
“That kind of weapon won’t work against Quinn Dexter.”
“Is that so?” A long finger stroked the alligator-skin case slowly. “Do you trust this Fletcher guy we’re going to meet?”
“Of course. Fletcher is a decent and kind man. He looked after Gen and I all the way from Norfolk.”
“Should be interesting,” Ivanov mumbled. He turned to watch the concrete wall of the tunnel slip past outside the car.
They arrived at a small vac-train freight station somewhere in one of the arcology’s underground industrial zones. Charlie had selected it because there was a direct road from the garage, and the net was still functioning in that sector.
The platform was a lot narrower than those at Kings Cross, with large units of heavy-duty cargo handling machinery standing by every airlock.
When Louise and Ivanov emerged out of a service lift, eight GISD field agents were waiting for them, each equipped with a static bullet machine gun.
The train arrived five minutes later. Only one airlock door opened.
Detective Brent Roi stepped out first, looking round suspiciously. When his gaze found Louise, his expression told her he was officially the unhappiest person on the planet.
&nb
sp; “Out,” he snapped over his shoulder.
Fletcher Christian emerged from the airlock, dressed in his immaculate naval uniform. Two guards were right behind him, and there was a thick metal collar clamped round his throat. Louise didn’t care, under the stiff gaze of the field agents she ran over and flung her arms round him.
“Oh God, I missed you,” she blurted. “Are you all right?”
“Hardy enough, my dearest Lady Louise. And you? How have you fared since we parted last? More unsuitable adventures, I’ll warrant.”
She was wiping tears off against his lapels, the buttons on his jacket pressing into her skin. “Something like that.” She clutched him tighter, amazed by how glad she was to see him, the one person she really trusted on the whole planet. His hand stroked the back of her head.
“Jesus wept,” Brent Roi exclaimed in disgust.
Louise let go and took a timid step back. Fletcher’s mournful eyes showed he understood.
“You two finished?”
Ivanov stepped forwards. “Try picking on me,” he said to the Halo detective.
“Who the hell are you?”
“Put it this way, we share the same supervisor. And if you had a high enough security rating to be told what Louise has done for us, you’d display some respect there as well.”
Fletcher was looking at the hulking private detective with some interest.
Ivanov thrust his hand out. “Pleased to meet you, Fletcher. I’m the guy who’s been looking out for Louise down here.” He winked at her. “When circumstances allow me to.”
Fletcher bowed. “Then you do us all a service, sir. I would be sorely grieved if any harm befell such a treasured flower.”
Brent Roi sighed in disbelief. “You want to get on with this?”
“Sure,” Ivanov said. “We’ll take over from you. I doubt I have to sign for him, right?”
“Take over? As in my part’s finished? It’s not that goddamn easy. I haven’t got any way of getting back to the Halo. I’m fucking stuck here escorting this jerk.”
Louise was about to tell him B7 could get him back up the orbital tower, then she saw Ivanov’s face go blank momentarily. Charlie must be telling him something.