Five Planes

by Melissa Scott

  “It was not an ordinary Drop failure,” Quintile Illumination said. “I have studied the mathematics of those, and what happened to us—it was not the same at all.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “This was not—all the other records, I can turn what happened into the proper formulae. I can see what happened, and how the fields were mistuned or interacted with unanticipated flux; I can follow how the ship was destroyed or how it escaped, and I can map the flux around it as it happened. This…” Quintile Illumination hesitated. “Suddenly we crossed some sort of threshhold, and every sensor we had ceased to make sense. Everything was gibberish, chaos that I cannot reduce to order—that none of our systems could interpret. The equations were filled with imaginaries that wouldn’t cancel out. It is as if we were on the wrong side of a locked door, thrown out into a howling storm, and we had no key. And then—then we did this thing, performed this transformation—unlocked the door—and we were back on the right side of everything. But the ship was so badly damaged already that we could not save her.”

  “What do you want me to do?” Val asked, and couldn’t keep the wariness from his tone.

  “I will give you the problem,” Quintile Illumination said. “I have given many people the problem. Tell me where we went and what we did, and I will be forever grateful.”

  Val allowed himself a long sigh. He knew perfectly well that he should say no, refuse to even look at the records, but he also knew he’d never forgive himself if he didn’t at least try. “I’ll look at it. I can’t promise anything.”

  “That is a good sign,” Quintile Illumination said. “Everyone who did promise, failed utterly.”

  I hope that was a joke. Val said, “How angry will the captain be if she catches me at this?”

  “She would prefer the problem did not exist,” Quintile Illumination answered. “Therefore, I have placed the records in a sealed space in your personal dataspace. The keyword is ‘immanence’ and a retina scan is also required.”

  “You’ve got it all figured out,” Val said. “It’s good you’re on my side.”

  “We are on our side,” Quintile Illumination answered. “After all, we are now in this together.”

  Milos settled in his chair, Nalani standing at his shoulder. He looked up at her. “Are you ready?”

  “Always,” she answered.

  That was one of the great things about Nalani, he thought. She hadn’t asked questions—had waved off his attempted explanations, in fact. She trusted him.

  “Quintile Illumination?”

  “Hello, Sen Savoie. Supreme Justice, it’s an honor.”

  Nalani held out a hand. “The honor is mutual. I hope I can assist.”

  Milos opened his personal dataspace. “Is this a good time?”

  “The time is optimal,” the ship said. “I am free of unusual loads for the next three hours.”

  “Okay.” He flexed his fingers. “Please consider the data block we discussed yesterday.” The relevant schematic appeared inscreen. “Copy that block to the register designated QI-Block on my personal system.”

  “Sen Savoie, I cannot release data from those addresses without qualified authorization.”

  Milos gestured to Nalani. She held up her left forearm, clad in the bronze cuff that embodies her codex. “Quintile Illumination, this is Supreme Justice Thurgood IX. I invoke Protocol 86.” That protocol, Nalani assured him, will keep this interaction from inspection by anyone except another Supreme Justice.

  “It is my pleasure to confirm Protocol 86, Supreme Justice.”

  “I hereby authorize any and all data transfer requested by H L Milos Felipevich Savoie Themis, in this or any future session. This authorization specifically includes all data regardless of restriction status.”

  “Acknowledged. Thank you, Supreme Justice.”

  Nalani patted Milos on the shoulder. “Carry on, you two. But remember, we have a date for dinner.” With a wave, she departed.

  Data streamed into Milos’s personal space. “You’d better copy everything linked to that data block,” he said. “There’s no telling what might contain a clue.”

  “Advisory: the total is over six hundred cubic gigabytes.”

  Milos shrugged. “Go ahead. Memory is cheap.”

  1.15 Murder on the Quintile Illumination

  Caridad Sanrosa stepped from the outermost band of the slide-walk to the solid surface of the Lower Promenade and let momentum carry her a few steps further, out of the way of anyone else leaving the slide-walk at this level. It was a vertical habit, one she had deliberately cultivated to blend in with the handful of others traveling in the family cabins, and she was pleased with the results. Everyone seemed to accept that she was Val Millet’s semi-academic cousin, hitching a ride to her next job; in fact, no one seemed to be paying either of them any further attention. Once they emerged from the Drop, she would be safe with the expedition, and that would have to be enough.

  In the meantime… She paused at the edge of the Parkade, where enormous potted trees rose in carefully placed stands, dividing the central space into sections that seemed more spacious than they actually were. Laughter and children’s voices echoed from the Beach—actually a shallow pool well-monitored by ship’s stewards—and as she turned to take the path that led along its upper edge, two small children caromed off a potted palm and nearly collided with her. She caught the smaller out of pure reflex, and instantly released him, glancing around for a responsible adult, and the larger—a girl, surely, perhaps 7 years old?—looked up at her just as warily.

  “We’re sorry, sen. We should have been looking where we were going.”

  “That’s all right.” It was late for children that young to be out, especially unattended, and she was relieved to see a dark-haired man hurrying up the ramp behind them.

  “Zofia! Dav!”

  His tone held the unmistakably parental note, and Caridad allowed herself to relax, certain now that she wouldn’t be required to deal with the children.

  “What have I told you about paying attention? Watching where you were going?” He gave Caridad an apologetic smile. “I’m very sorry, sen. I’m afraid they’re a little overstimulated.”

  The girl pouted at that, but the boy gave a wide smile, as though he were used to the accusation. There had been a magic show at the Beach, Caridad remembered, one of the many entertainments intended to distract the paying passengers from the length of the Drop.

  “No harm done,” she said. “Was it a good show?”

  “They ate fire!” The boy said, eyes sparkling, and his father said hastily, “You know that was a trick, Dav. Not something ordinary people can do.”

  “Then I’ll take it that it was good,” Caridad said, suppressing a laugh. “Good evening, sen.”

  “Good evening,” the man answered, and grabbed for Dav’s hand. “All right, you two, we had a bargain. Back to our rooms—”

  “And ice cream!” The children chorused.

  Good luck with that, Caridad thought, and took the bridge that arched between two of the thickest stands of trees and over the deeper end of the pool. Below, she could see crew clearing away the props and portable stage, while the magician—a white-haired person in a flowing, night-ocean robe still spangled with fading flecks of light—spoke graciously with the dwindling audience. Family of crew were permitted to attend the open shows, as long as they weren’t taking space from paying passengers; perhaps she would try to see this one some day.

  Ahead, the path branched; she turned left, away from the sound of rising dance music, toward a flicker of amber light. The Flux Lounge was one of the smallest on board Quintile Illumination, but it was a favorite with the crew, and she and Val had agreed to meet there.

  For once, he was ahead of her, tucked into a corner booth, and lifted a hand to wave her over. She slid into the seat opposite him, and a menu popped into view in the table’s glossy surface. She flicked through to the night menu—it was the start of Val’s day, but the end
of hers—and ordered a meal box.

  “Have a cocktail if you want,” Val said, and she paused.

  “Are you sure?” The ship’s systems kept track of alcohol consumed at crew members’ tables; he would have to pass a quick breath analysis before going on duty.

  “Positive.” Val shook his head. “I wish you’d believe me. It really doesn’t bother me.”

  “It would bother me,” Caridad admitted—it was one of the reasons she had never really considered a vertical life—but pressed the keys to order one of the bar’s lush fruit drinks.

  “It’s part of the job,” Val said. Overhead, the lights shifted, deepening from amber to the red of embers: it was supposed to reflect the non-space through which they were passing, but Val had admitted that the algorithm was tweaked to make the experience as pleasant as possible for the passengers.

  “Any luck with your project?” It was not the question she wanted to ask, but there was no answer to that one. The Drop would take as long as it took, and she would simply have to wait it out along with everyone else.

  “Not yet.” The light brightened again, enough for her to see clearly the excitement on his face. “But I’m making progress. Well, sort of progress. I’ve eliminated several sets of possibilities, anyway.”

  “That is progress,” Caridad agreed, and settled herself to listen.

  It was shaping up to be a long Drop. Imric took the pilot’s seat in the control room of the Last Fair Deal, nodding as Derrian Hina recited the changeover litany and queued the work files ready for use. They were still inside Quintile Illumination’s Dropspace, the pair of them forming a mathematical simultaneity in the midst of the hyperspatial flux, but the larger ship didn’t seem to have noticed them. Not that there was much it could have done if it had—there was little ships could do during Drop that wouldn’t upset their calculations—but Imric felt better thinking that they were unobserved.

  “Has the capa been up?” He asked, sliding into the takeover chair as its screen lit and mirrored.

  Derrian shook his head. “She’s kept to her cabin, mostly. That’s what she usually does.”

  That was also good news, and Imric risked another question. “Has she said anything about what she’s after?”

  “Not yet.” Derrian hesitated. “Morcant might know, but she’s not saying.”

  “She can’t really mean to attack a transplanar,” Imric said. He scanned the first page of data, seeing nothing but a sea of green, paged through to the next. “Can she?”

  “Probably not?” Derrian sounded less certain than his words. “Or let’s say probably not a direct attack.”

  That wasn’t as reassuring as Imric would have liked. He flicked through the next two screens, frowning. “Has she done something like this before?”

  “Not since I’ve been with her.”

  “And how long is that?”

  Derrian sighed. “Three—no, it’s four years, now. I was in your shoes, got taken off a transplanar that didn’t pay the passage fees, and then the capa picked me for her personal transport”

  “So I can hope she’s not going to get us into a pitched battle?”

  “We can all hope,” Derrian said, grimly. “My transfer’s complete.”

  Imric scanned the last screen. “All green here.”

  “Right.” Derrian pushed himself up out of his chair with a crackling of joints. “The watch is yours.”

  “I have control,” Imric answered, and shifted to the command chair as the hatch slid closed behind him.

  Once again he was alone in the control room. He stared at the main screen, the white dot that was the Quintile Illumination vivid against purple and scarlet swirls of hyperflux. Surely there had to be a way to warn the other ship that they were being stalked, that ap Farr was targeting someone on board, but once again every possibility that occurred to him proved fruitless. Everything that he could think of merely brought ap Farr’s wrath down on him directly, and he wasn’t yet ready to make that sacrifice, particularly since he didn’t know what ap Farr actually wanted. Follow the Quintile Illumination, she had said; that wasn’t enough to act on.

  There was little enough to do while the ship was in Drop. Once the course was fully established, the safest thing was to let the ship run its course, emerging from the Drop once the calculations were complete. He touched keys to make sure that everything was still running, saw nothing but green in the Drop computers. The rest of the ship’s systems were in order, too, engines on standby, environmentals performing at peak, gravity and transit fields all at their optimum settings, and he flicked back to the main screen, wondering rebelliously why in fact anyone needed to be on duty at all. Some ships with small crews let the AI handle everything, keeping the human crew on standby, but when he’d mentioned that in the commons, ap Farr herself had said flatly, “No. We don’t work that way.” He still didn’t know if “we” meant Last Fair Deal or Mac Braith Bain, or just ap Farr herself.

  Something flickered on his screens, a single flash of gold, gone as quickly as it appeared. He frowned, reaching for a keyboard, typed commands to locate and isolate. His own systems came back clean, and he expanded the search, reaching out into the shared Dropspace in case it was a reflection of something on board the Quintile Illumination. This time, nodes flashed yellow and then red, and the ship-to-ship channel suddenly howled with static. Imric slapped the volume back to a bearable level and tried to match whatever frequency Quintile Illumination was using, but the signal wavered up and down the bandwidth, impossible to isolate. It was computer-to-computer, direct data transfer, and he immediately slapped on a data dam, isolating everything received.

  Behind him, the hatch opened, and ap Farr said sharply, “What’s going on?”

  “I don’t know.” Imric put up a second firewall, sealing off the affected volume. “We’re receiving some sort of transmission from the Quintile Illumination—from its AI directly.” There was another burst of static, and he winced, trying to capture the frequency correctly. It slid away from him, and ap Farr leaned over his shoulder.

  “Can you read the message?”

  “Not yet.” Imric checked his screens, symbols cascading across them. “We’re receiving—we’re capturing it, but I don’t want to turn our AI loose on it until I know what we’ve got—” The static rose to a last despairing squeal and cut out. Imric moved automatically to seal the data space, walling it off from the rest of the ship’s memory. “I can run a translation bot—”

  “Without exposing our systems?” Ap Farr asked.

  Imric queried the system even though he knew the answer. “Yes. There’s a pass-through option.”

  “Then go ahead.”

  “I’d like to try to parse its parameters first.”

  “No.”

  There was something in her voice that made him look over his shoulder, to see her standing with her cane held in both hands, the silver band pressed to her lips.

  “If it’s what I think—” She stopped, shaking her head. “We may not have time.”

  “It might be an attack,” Imric said.

  “Oh, definitely,” ap Farr answered, “but not on us.”

  Imric shivered in spite of himself, touched keys to activate the bot and the pass-through, waiting while the gates opened and closed and the bot activated. A secondary screen lit and windowed; he dragged it forward to see more symbols cascading down its surface. At first, they were all placeholder glyphs, nonsense still waiting to be deciphered, but then the shapes changed, first a few here and there, and then in a sudden rush, scarlet emergency symbols spilling across the screen.

  Help danger emergency emergency bomb danger emergency help help attack help danger death death death death

  The screen filled slowly, top to bottom, until it showed nothing but a hundred pulsing characters, all reading death. Imric swore under his breath and scrolled back to the beginning, trying to make sense of the message’s beginning. “An attack?” He said aloud. “A bomb?”

  �
�A software bomb, I’d guess,” ap Farr said. She sounded shaken, and when Imric glanced back at her again, she seemed even paler than before. “Scan for a payload.”

  “Scanning.” Imric refrained from pointing out that he’d wanted to do that from the beginning, or that it was probably too late. “Scan shows clear.”

  “Good.” Ap Farr pressed the handle of her cane against her lips again.

  “I don’t understand.”

  “You’re not paying attention, then,” ap Farr snapped.

  “It’s not possible to destroy an AI in flight.” Imric shook his head. “I mean, it’s not possible to destroy the AI and not take the ship with it.”

  “Of course it is,” ap Farr said. “The ship’s stable in Dropspace—in fact, we’re probably helping to hold it stable. And you don’t need an AI to run the ship’s systems, any ordinary computer handle that. It’s just—”

  “Just that their calculations have been interrupted,” Imric said. His mouth tasted of copper, and he swallowed hard. “They can’t exit the Drop. And we can’t take them with us. They’re trapped—they’ll die in Drop, either when the computers can’t handle the complexity and the ship breaks up, or the crew and passengers will starve to death—” He stopped, aware that both Derrien and Morcant were standing behind ap Farr, staring at the screen as though they could make it show something different. “And we can’t do anything. Can we?”

  Ap Farr shook her head slowly. “I don’t know. I just don’t know.”

  Al-Ghazali said, “Dzamglin. With two moons and four stations. Rent is 1,750 credits.” She held her hand out, palm up.

  His lips a tight line, Bhagwati tapped on his transfer pad. His cash display flickered, the total diminishing while Al-Ghazali’s total rose by the same amount.

  “Milos, it’s your turn.”

  It was late, small hours of the morning, and the game had been going on since after dinner. The board’s pentagonal holographic starscape was crowded with planets, moons, and stations, with blinking tokens indicating each player’s position. Milos, for some reason, had chosen the shoe.