The Evolutionary Void

by Peter F. Hamilton

  Justine hurried out into the central square, and stood on the specific spot she’d been using for the last seven weeks. ‘Take me down,’ she asked the city. The ground beneath her feet changed, and she fell through the city substance to the travel tunnel underneath. And that was the single most satisfying achievement just about ever. She still hadn’t talked to or even sensed the city’s primary mind, buried heaven only knew how many kilometres below the buildings and canals. But she had finally managed to impress her thoughts on the more simple routines that regulated the fundamental aspects of the city structure. Whatever Makkathran actually was, its management network was a homogenized one. Farsight had showed her that electricity powered the lights and some of the pump systems. Gravity was manipulated to make the travel tunnels work. All of which confirmed everyone’s original belief that the city had come from outside the Void. But it still didn’t tell her anything she wanted to know.

  She descended into the dazzling illumination of the travel tunnel and pushed her sunglasses firmly back on her nose before asking the city to take her to Golden Park. Gravity began to shift, and she made sure she was leaning forwards as it altered. She’d made the mistake of falling feet first once, and didn’t want to repeat that. Flying head first, now that was another matter. It was more exhilarating than Inigo’s dreams had ever conveyed. She punched her fists out in front and whooped joyously as she performed her first corkscrew roll.

  Justine rose up into Golden Park beside one of the white pillars along the Outer Circle Canal. The melded domes of the Orchard Palace gleamed with a burnished sheen behind her as she waited. After all the weeks of anticipation, half-convincing herself that she might have decades to wait, she was finally giving in to her body’s hormonal rush of anxiety as she watched the starship appear above the port district. It was flying a lot slower now, though its wingtips were still trailing faint vapour trails across Makkathran’s cloudless sky. Wait . . . Wings?

  The starship circled round over Ysidro district and began a steep descent. It was suffering the same way Silverbird had, Justine decided. The flight wasn’t as stable or as slow as it ought to be, the Void was glitching its drive units. Once or twice she sucked down a sharp breath as it wobbled in the air. Then long landing struts popped out, and it dropped the last ten metres out of the sky to skid a way along the thick tangle of grass before coming to a halt not a hundred metres from the Silverbird.

  A circular airlock opened in the starship’s midsection, and some old-fashioned aluminium stairs slid out. People trotted down, radiating a mixture of joy and disbelief that Justine’s farsight recognized easily. It was identical to her own.

  There were nine of them standing together on the grass as she approached, a surprising number for a ship that size, even if they’d used suspension. Then their farsights perceived her and they turned to greet her as she jogged over.

  Shouts of welcome reached her when she was still twenty metres away. Several were waving jubilantly. A couple of them even started to run towards her. They all seemed to be smiling wildly.

  Not true, she corrected herself, and pushed her sunglasses up.

  The big man standing at the back with a formidable shield around his thoughts, he wasn’t smiling. Nor was the one who looked as if he’d been in a bad streetfight and lost. But the others were all genuinely happy to see her, which was good enough.

  The one who was in the lead flung his arms wide and gave her an effusive hug. Something oddly familiar about his face . . .

  ‘Justine Burnelli,’ he exclaimed. ‘It’s been a while.’

  And that smile was so sinfully teasing she couldn’t help but grin back. ‘Sorry. Who . . . ?’

  ‘We met at the Second Chance departure party,’ he said wickedly. ‘Oscar Monroe, remember.’

  ‘Oh. My. God. Oscar? Is that you? I thought you were still . . . I mean,’ she shrugged awkwardly.

  ‘Yeah, they let me out eighty years back. I didn’t make a fuss about it.’

  ‘Good to see you, Oscar,’ she said sincerely. ‘Gotta admit, I wasn’t expecting you.’

  ‘Nobody does. I think that’s the point of being me these days.’

  She laughed then glanced over his shoulder at the others. ‘Inigo, isn’t it?’

  ‘Yeah.’ Inigo didn’t go for the whole hugging scene. He stuck his hand out formally. That was when Justine realized she might be slightly overdoing the whole Queen of the Wild City act. All she wore was boots, a small black bikini top, some denim shorts with the cattle prod, pistol and a machete hanging off her belt. The sun had tanned her skin a deep honey brown at the same time it’d bleached her hair almost white – and that hadn’t been styled since she arrived; these days she just tied it back with some straps in a loose tail. Quite a change for someone who back at the start of the twenty-first century used to spend over a hundred thousand dollars a year on personal grooming – and that was before her clothes bill. All in all she must’ve been quite a fright-sight.

  Slightly more self-consciously now, she allowed Oscar to introduce everyone else. Araminta-two – two! – was interesting, the Knights Guardians were about what she expected, Troblum she didn’t know what to make of, Corrie-Lyn she took an instant mild dislike to, while Aaron just plain scared her. She wasn’t alone in that, judging by the way everyone else reacted to him.

  ‘All right,’ Corrie-Lyn said to Aaron. ‘We made it. We’re here. Now for the love of the Lady will you tell us why we’re here?’

  Justine was expecting Aaron to smile wisely at least, as any normal human would. Instead he turned his bruised eyes to Inigo. ‘We’re here so that you can bring him forth,’ he said hoarsely.

  ‘What?’ a startled Inigo asked. ‘Oh sweet Lady! You are joking.’

  ‘No. He’s the only one who can help us now. And you’re the one who has his true memory. You are connected with him. Especially here. You can reach into the Void’s memory layer where he was. You don’t even have to reset the Void any more, which was the original intention, we know that now; Justine showed us this with Kazimir.’

  Corrie-Lyn went to Inigo and took both his hands in hers. ‘Do it,’ she whispered fiercely.

  ‘The Waterwalker is gone,’ Inigo said with infinite sorrow. ‘He is a dream now. Nothing more.’

  ‘You can bring him back,’ Aaron said. ‘You have to.’

  *

  —to land on the ground at the foot of the Eyrie tower. His ankles gave way and he stumbled, falling forwards. Strong third hands reached out to steady him. But there was no crowd as there always was, as there should have been. No family. No Kristabel.

  ‘Honious! I am wrong,’ Edeard stammered miserably. In his haste to escape the horror of the hospital in Half Bracelet Lane he had somehow misjudged the twisting passage through the Void’s memory and finished up . . . He looked at the small group of people staring at him; they were dressed so strangely – yet not. His farsight swept out. Finitan was not atop the tower. He scoured the buildings in Haxpen and Fiacre to find them empty. The city was silent, devoid of its eternal telepathic chatter. He couldn’t sense a single mind anywhere save the nine directly in front of him. ‘No!’ he spun round to face the ziggurat, farsight frantically probing every room on the tenth floor. They were empty of people, furniture . . .

  ‘Where are they?’ he bellowed. ‘Where are my family? Krista-bel!’ His third hand drew back, ready to strike instantly.

  One of the peculiar group walked forward, his thoughts calm, welcoming, reassuring. A tall man with a handsome face – a known face, though it was darker than it had been before, and the hair was brown instead of light ginger as it ought to be. Such trivia was irrelevant, for this was a face that could not possibly be here, not in the real world.

  Edeard’s third hand withered away. ‘No,’ he whispered. ‘This cannot be. You are a dream.’

  The man smiled. There were tears in his eyes. ‘As are you.’

  ‘Inigo?’

  ‘Edeard!’

  ‘My brother.’ They
embraced, Edeard hugging the man as if his life depended on it. Inigo was the only thing that made sense in the world right now; he was the anchor. ‘Hold me,’ Edeard begged. ‘Do not let me go, the world is falling apart.’

  ‘It’s not, I promise. I am here to get you through this.’

  Edeard’s thoughts were awhirl, panicked, dazed. ‘The life you lived,’ he choked out.

  ‘Nothing compared to yours,’ Inigo assured him.

  ‘But . . . those worlds you showed me, the wonders that dwell there. It’s all real?’

  ‘Yes. It’s all real. That is the universe outside the Void. The place where the ships that brought Rah and the Lady came from.’

  ‘Oh dear Lady.’

  ‘I know this is a shock. I’m sorry for that. There is no way I could have warned you.’

  Edeard nodded slowly and moved back to gaze incredulously at the one person he’d believed was forever beyond reach. ‘I thought you were someone the Lady had sent to comfort me as I slept. You showed me what kind of life could be built if only we tried. And I have tried so hard . . .’ His voice broke. He was close to weeping.

  ‘You did more than that, Waterwalker, so much more,’ a young woman said. She had dark red hair and a pretty freckled face, and she looked at him so worshipfully he was astounded. ‘You succeeded.’

  Edeard glanced shamefully at Inigo. ‘You know what I have done, what I am fleeing from.’

  ‘We all know your life. That is why we are here.’

  ‘You can help me? Is that why you have come?’

  ‘You don’t need our help,’ Inigo said. ‘Your triumph was magnificent. Whole planets marvel at your achievements here in Makkathran.’

  ‘I don’t understand. I’ve screwed this up just as Owain and Buate and their ilk always claimed I would. I became what they were, Honious take me.’

  ‘No you didn’t,’ the woman said earnestly. ‘Edeard, listen to me. After the unity attempt failed your next effort to bring peace and fulfilment to Querencia worked. You never reset the Void again, you never needed to. You, and Kristabel, and your friends all accepted guidance to the Heart in old age. It was beautiful to behold.’

  ‘You speak as if this has already happened.’ Edeard gave the woman a curious look as some very uncomfortable thoughts began to gather in his mind.

  ‘Edeard.’ Inigo put a steadying hand on his shoulder. ‘We’ve only just arrived in the Void. In here time flows much quicker than it does outside. Which is why only a few hundred years have gone by out there compared to the millennia here. You are our past. I brought you out of the Void’s memory.’

  ‘Are you saying I have already lived my life? All of my life?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘But . . .’ His farsight swept out again, desperate to find anyone else. ‘Where is everybody? If I succeeded the way you claim, what happened to the people I tried to help? Their grandchildren should still be here. Did they desert the city?’

  Inigo appeared embarrassed. ‘You created a society where it was possible for everyone to achieve fulfilment. Eventually, all the humans here accepted guidance. The last one left for the Heart several thousand years ago.’

  ‘Gone?’ he couldn’t believe it. ‘All of them gone? There were millions of us living on Querencia.’

  ‘I know.’

  ‘Why did you bring me back?’ Edeard asked bitterly.

  ‘We need your help.’

  ‘Ha! Then Honious knows you picked the wrong man; Finitan is more worthy than me, or even Dinlay. And even if you had no choice, you should have brought back this future Edeard you spoke of, the one who is triumphant.’

  ‘I chose you very carefully. You are exactly the Edeard I need.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Determination,’ Inigo said simply. ‘This is the you who resolved never to let anything beat him no matter what. You, the you of this day, are the best Waterwalker there ever was. This is the moment your triumph was built upon.’

  ‘I find that hard to believe,’ Edeard said weakly.

  ‘I’m truly sorry this was how we had to meet. But we really do need your help.’

  ‘How? How in the Lady’s name can I possibly help people who have the power to travel between universes?’ He was watching Inigo gathering himself to reply, when the really strange one with the battered face and tormented thoughts stepped forward.

  ‘I am Aaron, and I have come here to ask you to take us to the Heart.’

  Edeard almost laughed at him; but the man was in so much suffering, and so fired up with desperation he was clearly speaking the truth. ‘Why?’

  ‘Because that has to be what controls the Void. I must speak with it, or Inigo must, or even you. Whichever of us it will listen to.’

  ‘What would you say to it?’

  ‘You’re killing us. Switch off.’

  Inigo’s arm went round Edeard’s shoulder again. ‘This is going to take a while to explain,’ he said gently.

  The bright sun was well on its way to the western horizon, coating the edges of Eyrie’s towers in a familiar cerise haze. And yet not familiar, Edeard thought sadly. This Makkathran he found himself in was a sorrowful one indeed. The buildings were exactly as they should be – oh but the rest of the districts and canals. It didn’t suffer decay, the fabulous city would never fall to that, but it had become shabby. Without its citizens it was a poor spectre of itself in its glory days. And there was so little left of the people who lived here, nothing more than blemished trinkets and stubborn dust. That they should have vanished with so little to show for their achievements was infinitely depressing. As was knowing he was forever separate from them all now. Though he supposed he could reset the Void once more, somehow he didn’t have the appetite to plunge back in to what had been. Besides, according to Corrie-Lyn, he had already won his life’s battle. And if he understood what his mind-brother Inigo was saying, he was responsible for unleashing devastation upon the true universe outside.

  ‘More ships are coming?’ he asked.

  ‘Yes,’ Inigo admitted. ‘My fault. I was besotted with your life.’

  They were sitting on the steps outside the Lady’s central church, each of the visitors doing what they could to help him comprehend Inigo’s story of what was happening in the galaxy outside, and what the Void actually was. It had taken hours.

  ‘You showed people my life,’ Edeard said, not quite accusing, but . . .

  ‘I did. You never told anyone of mine.’

  ‘They would have thought me mad, even Kristabel. Flying carriages. People who live forever. Hundreds of inhabited worlds. Machine servants instead of genistars. Cities where Makkathran would be naught but a small district. A civilization where justice was available to all. Aliens. More stars in the sky than it is possible to count. No, such marvels of my fevered imagination were best kept inside my skull. Except it wasn’t my imagination, it was all you.’

  ‘I hope I was of some help, some comfort.’

  ‘You were.’ Edeard finally gathered the courage he’d so far lacked, and asked the question: ‘This future I lived, the one where I finally achieved guidance to the Heart . . . was Burlal part of it?’

  ‘No. I’m sorry, Edeard. He was only ever here that one time.’

  ‘I see. Thank you for your honesty.’

  ‘Waterwalker,’ Aaron said. ‘Can you take us to the Heart, please?’

  The edge in his voice, the way his raging thoughts threatened to burst out of his head, it made Edeard nervous. ‘I understand the need for the Void to be contained. If I could do so, I would.’

  ‘There is a way to speak with it,’ Aaron said through clenched teeth. ‘Once we get there, I know there is.’

  ‘How?’

  Aaron slammed his hands on to his face. Once, twice, three times. Blood trickled out of his nose where he’d hit it. ‘She won’t tell me!’ he yelled furiously. ‘I can’t find it any more.’

  Edeard’s third hand gripped Aaron’s arms, forcing them down.

  ‘
This is my mission! I am the mission. I have an objective. I must be strong. She likes that. She loves me.’

  Tomansio stood next to the stricken agent. ‘Hey, it’s okay.’ He reached out. ‘We have two starships and the Waterwalker. We can take—’

  Aaron’s muscles went slack, and Tomansio caught him as he pitched forwards, unconscious.

  ‘How did you do that?’ Edeard asked.

  ‘Very basic tranquillizer. Lucky our biononics are degraded here. Would have been quite a scrap otherwise.’

  ‘I see.’ Which he didn’t quite. But these warriors from the outside universe were formidable. And they had honour. Somehow he was reminded of Colonel Larose from the Makkathran militia.

  ‘Now what?’ Corrie-Lyn asked with a sigh. ‘Our pet psycho is going to go quantumbusting when he wakes up.’

  ‘I’d hate to try a neural infiltration in this environment,’ Tomansio said. ‘The first glitch and we’d probably rip his brain apart. Besides, I think the way his mind was reconfigured implies it was resistant to that kind of inquisition. The information is hidden in the subconscious.’

  ‘We do have the two ships,’ Oscar said. ‘And we know we have to fly to the Heart. Our problem is always going to be guidance.’ He grinned at Edeard. ‘I guess that’s where you come in.’

  ‘It’s down to fulfilment,’ Inigo said. ‘If the Skylord believes Edeard to be fulfilled, it will guide him.’

  ‘His soul,’ Corrie-Lyn said sharply.

  ‘We don’t know that,’ Inigo said. ‘Humans have never been able to fly around inside the Void before. Maybe it’ll show a living body the way.’

  ‘I’ll ask,’ Araminta-two said.

  His thoughts were gifted in a fashion Edeard was unaccustomed to; the clarity he was given exceeded any he’d known before. It was hard to throw off the sensation that he was actually in Araminta-two’s body, breathing together, feeling together. And there was the shadow perception distracting him, standing in a giant room of metal and glass, watching the nebulas outside. A flock of Skylords guiding the incredible starships. That mind’s perception shimmered underneath the connection Araminta had with the Skylord leading the fleet, and its awareness of the Void.