The Naked God

by Peter F. Hamilton

  That the radiant green columns were some form of wormholes was easy enough to establish. The exact status of the people walking out of them was more problematical.

  “The serjeants do not contain Edenist personalities,” Acacia exclaimed.

  “General affinity is a babble of voices, they declaim without adherence to simple convention. Clarity has become impossible.”

  “Then who are they?”

  “I believe they are ex-possessors.”

  By then several serjeants with their original Edenist personalities had come through the gateways, helping to clarify the situation, telling every Edenist in or orbiting Ombey that they were the refugees from Ketton island. Even so, Ralph activated the incursion strategy, drawn up in the weeks preceding the liberation in case a wild foray by the possessed penetrated Fort Forward’s perimeter. All ground and air traffic across the camp was shut down, all personnel confined to barracks. Duty marines were rushed to the gateways. The one thing he had to confirm was that the possessors now in serjeant bodies hadn’t retained their energistic power. Once that was proven, he allowed the full-alert status to drop a level. Both he and Admiral Farquar agreed that the SD platforms would continue targeting the gateways. They might be benign now, but who was to say that would last.

  For all its strangeness, the situation was a problem of logistics again.

  The humans who came staggering out of the gateways were in the same kind of physical condition as every other ex-possessed, badly in need of medical treatment and decent food. It couldn’t be coincidence that each gateway had opened just outside a hospital; but their numbers and rate of arrival were putting a severe strain on the immediate medical resources.

  As to the serjeants, the one contingency Ralph and his staff had never planned for was acquiring over twelve thousand ex-possessors in non-threatening guise. Ralph initially classified them as prisoners of war, and the AI reassigned three empty blocks of barracks as their accommodation. Marines and mercenaries on leave at the camp were formed into guard squads, confining them to the buildings.

  It was a stall manoeuvre; Ralph didn’t know what else to do with them.

  They had to be guilty of more than just being in the enemy army. Other charges would have to be brought, surely? Kidnap and grievous bodily harm, at least. And yet, they were the victims of circumstance—as any lawyer would be bound to argue.

  But just for once, the problem of what to do with them afterwards wouldn’t be his. He didn’t envy Princess Kirsten that decision.

  Dean and Will reported to the Ops Room to act as Ralph’s escort when he was finally ready for his inspection. The closest gateway was less than a kilometre from the headquarters building itself. Even with the marine squads orchestrated by the AI, the area around it was predictably chaotic. Huge crowds of spectators from all over the camp, including every rover reporter, milled round the gateways to snatch a byte of the action. Dean and Will had to elbow people aside to let Ralph through. At least some degree of order had been established by the time they reached the gateway. The marine captain in charge had established a hundred-metre perimeter. Inside that, marines were deployed to form two distinct passages to shepherd the returnees away. One led back to the nearby hospital entrance, the other finished up at the parking lot, where trucks waited to drive serjeants away to their detention centres. As soon as a figure walked out of the shimmering green light, an assessment team decided which passage they were destined for, a decision backed up by nervejam sticks. All protests were simply ignored.

  “Even our remaining original serjeants are going to the detention barracks,” Acacia told Ralph as they shoved their way through the perimeter. “It makes things easier. We can sort them out from the ex-possessors later on.”

  “Tell them, thanks. I appreciate it. We need to keep things flowing here.”

  The marine captain squelched over to Ralph’s little group and saluted.

  Rainwater dripped steadily off his skull helmet.

  “How’s it going, Captain?” Ralph asked.

  “Good, sir. We’ve got a valid supervision routine up and running here now.”

  “Well done. You get back, do your job. We’ll try not to get in the way.”

  “Thank you, sir.”

  Ralph spent a couple of minutes watching quietly as the people and serjeants came flooding out of the green light. Despite the humidity and warm rain, he felt cold trickling through his chest.

  Strange, I can accept a wormhole or ZTT jump across light-years as perfectly normal, but a portal leading out of this universe is like a phobia. Is this too divine for me, physical proof of a realm where celestials exist? Or the opposite, proof that even the human soul and omnipotent creatures have a rational basis? I’m looking at the end of religions, the fact that we were never visited by any messenger from any creator god. A fact presented in a fashion I can never ignore. The loss of our race’s spiritual innocence.

  He could see that the ex-possessed humans that came through were surprised, a dim-witted confusion present on every face as the dreary rain started to soak their clothes. The serjeants lumbered out, their bewilderment less obtrusive, but none of them seemed in full control of their moments during the initial few moments.

  Several members of the science investigatory team were wandering round the gateway, waving sensor blocks at it. Most of the army’s scientific staff were down on the peninsula, trying to make sense of the energistic ability. Diana Tiernan was one of the few people content with the sieges, explaining how it gave the physicists a chance to study the power outside the laboratory. Ralph had left her back in the headquarters building, desperately trying to arrange for instruments and personnel to be flown back to Fort Forward.

  “That’s Sinon,” Acacia exclaimed. “He’s an original.”

  Ralph saw a serjeant who lacked the unsteadiness of the others. The assessment team of marines and medics pointed him at the passage of armoured marine troopers. “You sure?” Ralph queried.

  “Yes.”

  Ralph hurried up to the assessment team. “Okay, we’ll take this one.”

  The marine captain’s exasperation was throttled back at the interference.

  “Yes sir.”

  A thoroughly chastised Ralph led Sinon away. They wound up standing between the gateway and the perimeter ring of marines. His own staff gathered round. “This crystal entity you encountered back there, did it tell you how we could solve the overall problem?” Ralph asked.

  “I’m sorry, General. It took the same attitude as the Kiint. We must generate our own solution.”

  “Damnit! But it was willing to help de-possess bodies.”

  “Yes. It said it judged us by our own ethics, and that such a theft was wrong.”

  “Okay, what kind of conditions were you facing in that realm? Did you see any of the other planets?”

  “The conditions were what we made of them; the reality dysfunction ability was paramount. Unfortunately, even wishes have limits. We were cast out alone on that island, without any fresh air or food. Nothing could change that. The entity implied that our planets would be considerably more fortunate, not that we saw any. That realm is too vast for any chance encounter. The entity even hinted it may be more extensive than our own universe, though not necessarily in its physical dimensions. It is an explorer, it went there because it believed it would expand its own knowledge.”

  “So it’s not paradise?”

  “Definitely not. The possessed are wrong about that. It’s a refuge, that’s all. There’s nothing there which you don’t bring to it yourself.”

  “So it is entirely natural?”

  “I believe so, yes.”

  After the burst of confusion at the start of the exodus, the marines exerted complete control over everyone who came through the gateways.

  They were on top of the situation, and stayed there right up until the last four serjeants came through. The marines immediately ushered them towards the trucks waiting in the parking lot as they’d
done with all the others.

  “No way,” Moyo said. “We’re waiting for her.”

  “Who?” the marine captain asked.

  “Stephanie. She must have gone back somehow.”

  “Sorry, no exceptions.”

  “Yo, dude,” Cochrane said. “She’s like our righteous leader; and she’s doing her last good deed. So where do you cats come off acting like colonel asswipe?”

  The captain wanted to protest, but somehow the sight of a serjeant wearing slim purple sunglasses and a paisley-patterned backpack stopped the words from coming out.

  “I mean, she’s like out there all alone battling the last and greatest of the hobgoblin queens, to save your soul. The least you can do is act thankful.”

  “It’s closing,” McPhee shouted.

  The gateway was contracting, shrinking back to a small sliver of emerald shimmering a metre above the surface of the road. The physicists shouted excitedly, datavising fresh instructions to the considerable sensor array they’d assembled round the transplanetary rift.

  “Stephanie!” Moyo yelled.

  “Wait,” Cochrane said. “It’s not shutting down completely. See?”

  A small remnant of green light continued to burn steadily.

  “She’s still there,” Moyo said desperately. “She can still make it. Please!” he appealed to the marine captain. “You have to let us wait for her.”

  “I can’t.”

  “Hang on in there,” Cochrane said. “I maybe know someone who can help here.” Ever since he’d arrived back on Ombey there had been a thousand alien voices whispering away to each other at the back of his mind. <> he yelled at them. <>

  Acacia took the problem directly to Ralph. He might have been firm about it, but the Edenist mentioned Annette Ekelund.

  “Let them wait,” Ralph datavised to the marine captain. “We’ll set up a watching brief.”

  An hour and twenty minutes later the gateway expanded briefly to let three humanoid figures stagger out. Stephanie and Annette, in their serjeant bodies, supported a trembling Angeline Gallagher between them.

  They handed her over to the small medical team, who rushed her into the hospital.

  Moyo raced over and flung his arms around Stephanie, his mind leaking a torrent of distress into the general affinity band.

  “I thought I’d lost you,” he cried. “After all that, I couldn’t stand it.”

  “I’m sorry,” she said. A physical embrace was almost impossible, their hard skulls clacked together loudly as they attempted to kiss.

  The rover reporters who’d hung on to the bitter end dodged round the marine guard to close on the strange party.

  “Hi there you dudes, I’m Cochrane, one of the like superheroes who got the kids out across the firebreak. That’s Cochrane. C-O-C-H …”

  It was quiet in the detention barracks. Not that the serjeants slept, they didn’t need to. They were lying on their bunks or walking round the hall downstairs, being interviewed by the rovers, catching up on AV news shows (mainly featuring themselves). Most of all, they were getting used to the fact they were back in genuine bodies, and owned them one hundred per cent. Apprehension and marvel at their latest turn in fortune had left them stupefied.

  Ralph walked through one of the barracks, escorted by a watchful Dean and Will. The marine guard was allowing the serjeants to move around freely, all except one. There were five armed troopers standing outside the door to the office the bitek construct was secured in. Two stood to attention as Ralph approached, the others kept focused on their job.

  “Open the door,” Ralph ordered.

  Dean and Will came in with him, expressions informing any serjeant they’d love it to try taking them on. It was read by the room’s sole occupant, who was sitting passively behind a table. Ralph sat down opposite.

  “Hello, Annette.”

  “Ralph Hiltch. General, sir. You are becoming a depressing recurrent feature in my life.”

  “Yes. And it is a life now, isn’t it? How does that feel, coming back from the dead as a real person?”

  “This is what I always wanted. So I can’t complain. Though I expect I’ll eventually become ungrateful about the lack of this body’s sexuality.”

  “You’ll be even more unhappy if I fail, and the possessed come marching over the horizon to capture your fine new body for a lost soul to host.”

  “Don’t be so modest. You won’t fail here on Ombey, Ralph. You’re too good at your job. You love it. How many sieges are left now?”

  “Five hundred and thirty-two.”

  “And falling, I believe. That was a good strategy, Ralph. A good response to Ketton. But I still would have loved to see your face when we took that chunk of landscape out from under your nose.”

  “Where did that stunt get you? What did you achieve?”

  “I got a body, didn’t I. I’m alive again.”

  “Only by chance. And you didn’t help a lot from what I hear.”

  “Yes yes, Saint bloody Stephanie the hero of the flying isle. Is the Pope going to give her an audience? I’d like to see that, a bitek abomination with a soul that’s escaped from purgatory having tea at the Vatican.”

  “No. The Pope’s not seeing anybody anymore. Earth is falling to possession.”

  “Shit! Are you serious?”

  “Yes. Last I heard, there were four arcologies infested. It might even have fallen by now. So you see, I won, but you were right after all. This will never be decided here.”

  The serjeant sat up straighter, its recessed eyes never moving from Ralph. “You look tired, General. This Liberation is really wearing you down, isn’t it?”

  “You and I both know there is no paradise now, no immortality. The possessed can never have what they wanted. What will they do, Annette?

  What will happen to Earth when it arrives in that sanctuary realm and none of their food synthesis machinery works? What then?”

  “They’ll die. Permanently. Their suffering will end.”

  “Is that what you’d call a final settlement? Problem over.”

  “No. I had that opportunity. I didn’t take it.”

  “The beyond is preferable to death?”

  “I’m back, aren’t I? Would you prefer me to be on my knees?”

  “I’m not here to gloat, Annette.”

  “Then what are you here for?”

  “I am the supreme commander of the Liberation forces. For the moment that gives me an extraordinary degree of power, and not just in military terms. You tell me if there’s any point to my being here. Can this be settled on Mortonridge, or has everything we’ve both endured all been for nothing?”

  “You’re in charge of a weary army facing a dying enemy, Ralph; that’s not a platform for revolution. You’re still trying to validate your glorious war by searching for a noble conclusion. There is none. We are a sideshow. An incredibly expensive, fabulously dramatic entertainment for the accessing masses. We distracted their attention while the real men and women of power decided what our fate was going to be. Political policies determine how the human race confronts this crisis. War doesn’t have that ability. War has only one outcome. War is stupid, Ralph. It is the desecration of the human spirit, martyring yourself for someone else’s dream. It is for people who do not believe in themselves. It is for you, Ralph.”

  The security level one sensenviron conference room never changed.

  Princess Kirsten was already seated at one end of the oval table as the image of white nothingness walls formed around Ralph, seating him at the other end. Nobody else was present.

  “Well, what a day,” Kirsten said. “Not only do we get all our people back safely, we wind up with fewer lost souls to plague the living.”

  “I want to stop it,” Ralph said. “We’ve won. What we’re doing now has become utterly pointless.
”

  “There are still over quarter of a million possessed on my planet. My subjects are their victims. I don’t think it’s over.”

  “We have them confined. As a threat they’ve been neutralized. Of course we’ll maintain their isolation, but I’m asking that we stop the actual conflict.”

  “Ralph, this was your idea. The sieges have stopped all the shooting.”

  “And replaced them with Urswick. Is that what you want, your subjects eating each other?”

  The image of the Princess showed no emotional response. “The longer they remain possessed, the bigger their cancers grow. Those bodies will die unless we actively intervene and rescue them.”

  “Ma’am, I am going to issue an order that food and basic medical supplies are handed over to the possessed currently under siege. I will not rescind it. If you do not want it issued, then you will have to relieve me of my duty.”

  “Ralph, what the hell is this? We’re winning. Forty-three sieges collapsed today. Another ten days, a fortnight at the most, and it’ll all be over.”

  “It is over here, ma’am. Persecuting the possessed that remain is … disgusting. You listened to me before—God, that’s how this whole thing began. Please give the same consideration to what I’m saying now.”

  “You’re saying nothing, Ralph. This is a media war, a propaganda exercise, that’s what it always was. With your cooperation, I might add. We must have total victory.”

  “We already have it. This is more. We found out today that it’s possible to open a gateway to the realm where the possessed flee to. Nobody understands it, the physics behind it; but we know it’s possible now. We will be able to replicate the effect ourselves some day. The possessed can’t hide away from us any more. That’s our victory. We can make them face up to what they are, what their limits are. That way we can go on to find a solution.”

  “Expand that for me.”