Heart of Granite

by James Barclay

  Solomon mimicked her shrug. ‘Then the Steelback will have to sub-in supported by the Ironclaw. I’ll authorise the sentience upgrade across all squadrons in the MidAf theatre.’

  ‘Forgive my ignorance,’ said Avery, ‘But this whole attack depends on the skills of Inferno-X in enhanced drakes, depleted though the squadron is, to create a gap that ground forces and supporting squadrons from all three behemoths can exploit. You are advocating removing a third of the firepower and the most influential drake squadron from the battle. We cannot bring down the Maputothat way.’

  ‘Then get me Halloran. Quickly. Otherwise your fellow commanders will have to find a way to prove you wrong.’

  ‘I don’t get it,’ said Avery. ‘This is the break you and Corsini have been fighting for. If we take out the Maputo we will see victory in less than a year.’

  ‘Believe me, if someone else picks up Halloran there will be no victory. None of us will see the end of the war.’

  ‘He’s one man,’ said Moeller, aware that Kirby’s silence meant he knew something Avery and Moeller didn’t. ‘Like as not he’ll be dead in a day. Mar— his drake has minimal nutrients, Max is starving and there’s nothing within exhaustion range. As Nic said, if we don’t find him his chances of survival areminimal to vanishing.’

  ‘Even if he dies, no one salvages his body or his drake but us,’ said Solomon. ‘No one examines them but Markov. News of their escape does not leave this behemoth. Otherwise we’ll have a shit storm on the back of a fireball to deal with. Make your staff aware: whatever they think they know, they keep it to themselves.

  ‘He’s a rogue pilot, it’s hardly a PR disaster, is it? The public have seen it before and like all the others, he’ll die in the pouch—’ Moeller stopped when he felt Kirby’s and Solomon’s eyes on him. The pieces started dropping into place. ‘You don’t think he’ll die, do you? You think he’ll survive the Fall.’

  ‘What?’ said Avery.

  Solomon and Kirby glanced at each other, and Solomon gave the slightest shrug and the curtest of nods. Kirby spoke.

  ‘Yes, we do. He’s a perfect, if difficult, test subject. Halloran has a uniquely strong physiology and brain chemistry combination. Why do you think Markov relocated here a few months ago? Why do you think Alex is here and the upgrade was pushed through?’

  ‘Then why did you chuck him in Landfill?’

  ‘Because he was about to expose everything. And if we couldn’t monitor him in-pouch, we could still do critical research in Landfill. Simple, really,’ said Kirby.

  ‘You talk about him as if he’s some kind of experiment!’

  ‘Don’t be so naïve, Gerhard,’ said Solomon. ‘They’re all experiments. We know everythingabout every pilot.’

  Moeller felt a chill across his back. ‘Monitoring and measuring is one thing, experimenting on them to further your ambitions, that’s something else entirely. This mess is a direct result of your misguided interventions.’

  Solomon stared at him and the pity in her eyes made him want to punch her teeth in. Instead, he sat in silence while Kirby swelled with glee.

  ‘And you want to be a behemoth commander? My advice: get your head out of the drake’s arse it’s been stuck in. God’s holy prick, Nicola where do you get your execs from, the idiot tree?’

  Moeller felt his cheeks reddening.

  ‘Fine,’ he said calmly, using every mote of his experience to remain so. ‘I’m not a political animal. But I am also the most effective flight commander in UE. Do you want to win this war, or just carry on playing your power games?’

  ‘The fact that you think they’re incompatible rather makes my point,’ said Solomon.

  ‘I’m not with you,’ said Moeller.

  Solomon rolled her eyes. ‘We can agree on that, at least. Let me lay it out for you: I know the potential of every pilot in the service. Every. Single. One. So does Markov. And on the HoG, so do Avery and Kirby. Pilots with particular skills are gathered together for closer analysis across the fleet.’

  Moeller winced. He’d known I-X were special but he’d never asked himself why.

  ‘Every behemoth needs a gun squadron, the flag carrier more than any other. I didn’t realise they were a mere experiment,’ he said.

  ‘Their skill is certainly a bonus when it comes to skinning enemy drakes but it doesn’t end there.’ Solomon sucked her top lip a moment then began to count off on her fingers. ‘Orin — Iron Mind — her longevity is unparalleled. We’ve been experimenting with her endurance, trying to mimic her brain patterns for eleven months now. Stepanek’s reactions are stunning; his synaptic velocity is off the scale. Something in Redfearn’s mind mimics mind-shielding; we don’t know how yet, but we think her mind might be even stronger than Orin’s. Have you seen how smoothly Monteith flies? Something in his neural pathways and specific muscle chemistry give him extraordinary control over his movements. Want me to go on? Everyone in that squad has a unique strength: we’re working to develop it, clone it, and roll it out as an upgrade for every pilot.’

  ‘And you think Max can survive the Fall?’

  ‘He is the distillation of every other pilot in Inferno-X. If we can capture and sharehis strengths, we’ll win this war.’

  Moeller cursed himself for his naivety. ‘This upgrade’s all part of it, isn’t it? Not just a financial win.’

  ‘Now you’re getting it,’ said Kirby.

  ‘But, unshielded it’s not research and experimentation; it’s gambling.’

  ‘It’s a calculated risk,’ said Kirby.

  Moeller laughed, he couldn’t help himself. ‘But if it fails you’ve tossed all of Inferno-X away.’

  Kirby shrugged and Moeller almost punched him then and there. ‘It’s inevitable that the throughput of pilots will increase but remember we save money on both time and training new jockeys.’

  Moeller sat back in his chair. He felt like he was among strangers, listening to sedition, rather than meeting with people he’d worked with and mostly respected for years. But now he was on the outside, and it had only taken one word to convince him of that.

  ‘Throughput,’ he snarled. ‘You’re not fit to be the ExO. These are human beings you soulsucking, heartless reptile.’

  ‘Yeah, that’s right,’ said Kirby, leaning in so Moeller had the full measure of his contempt. ‘Human beings who watch vids of poster boys like Max and cannot sign on fast enough. They’re ours, and even if the Inferno-X experiment plays out badly we’ll have so many willing to take their re-engineered drakes that the Mafs and the Sambas will wilt under the barrage. But if this works and we have Max out there, a true drake pair, maybe others from Inferno will survive the Fall with him? We’ll be unstoppable. We can’t lose. So long as no one learns our pilots are surviving the Fall and that by default we had to be complicit in their survival. You do get that, don’t you? That’s why we have to get Max back here, alive or dead.’

  Moeller’s p-palm bleeped and he snapped it open rather than spend another second watching Kirby. Yarif had sent him a vid from all the newsnets in UE.

  ‘Too late,’ said Moeller and swiped it up to the big screen.

  It was a little shaky but there was no doubting the insignia in the background. There was an icy silence as they watched high definition sound and video of Martha demolishing her pen door and then taking off with that disconcerting drunken stagger. ‘There goes your poster boy.’

  Solomon turned from the screen and her face was a snarl. ‘Fuck you, Moeller.’

  Chapter 29

  Funny how times change. The sky used to be full of planes and helicopters. There are still a few left, powered by biofuel, but shit do they look weird chugging around up there. Clumsy, no grace, and seriously vulnerable too. The drake . .. that’s the way to fly.

  Max Halloran

  Valera had taken one look at Kullani and knew why Grim had looked so scared. She was going downhill fast. The heaters were doing their work but she needed physical contact with her drake. Valera ho
ped she’d be capable of walking as far as the flight deck when the time came.

  ‘I don’t get it, Skipper,’ said Grim. ‘It came on like someone flicked a switch.’

  Kullani was sitting up in bed, her face grey and with a tic in her left eye. To the casual observer, it probably looked like a bad cold.

  ‘How’s the head, Risa?’

  Kullani’s eyes swam towards her. ‘I can barely hear you, the roaring inside is so loud. It’s full of fluid, sloshing like a tank too full of sludge. I can’t focus. I need my drake.’

  Valera put her hand on Risa’s clammy one.

  ‘You’ve got to hang on. They can’t keep us in lockdown forever . . . the Maputoattack is imminent and we’re the arrow- head.’

  ‘I thought the heaters would stop this,’ said Kullani. ‘Would make me feel normal.’

  ‘Yeah but flying your drake’s the other half of the equation, right? We all get more and more grouchy the longer we’re away from our drakes but it’s worse for you. Reach out, see if you can touch minds. But do it carefully.’

  ‘I’m not sure I can project through the sludge,’ said Kullani, smiling feebly. ‘I’ll give it a shot.’

  ‘None of us is an expert,’ said Valera gently. ‘We all have to find our own way. Remember I-X is with you the whole time, okay?’

  Kullani gripped Valera’s hand and squeezed it, then jerked back at the sound of a huge cheer from the squad rec. Valera heard wild whoops and the slap of high fives and Max’s name was trumpeted loud and long. Footsteps pounded towards Kullani’s door and it was thrust open.

  ‘You have GOT to see this.’ Monteith pointed at Kullani. ‘Want a lift?’

  ‘If you’re asking if I’d I like to arrive in a style befitting a woman of my importance, then yes, a lift would be lovely.’

  Monteith flashed that awesome, melting smile of his. ‘That is, of course, precisely what I am asking. May I?’

  ‘You may.’

  Monteith knelt by the bed, put his arms beneath her knees and shoulders and lifted her in one easy motion. The squad rec had gone quiet and Valera led the way out to find them all staring at her, the anticipation burning them like kids at Christmas.

  There was an image of flight deck alpha on the big screen with a pause symbol across it. Monteith sat Kullani front and centre and the squad grouped around her, Valera and Grim sandwiching her.

  ‘What happened? Did Kirby fall off the gantry or something?’ asked Valera. ‘Because that would be such a shame.’

  ‘Oh, it’s much, much better than that,’ said Stepanek. ‘Tap it, Reds.’

  The pause symbol disappeared and Valera watched with increasing excitement and a very comforting sense of validation as Max’s escape played out on the screen. The sequence ended to more whoops, cheers and high fives. Beside her, Kullani had tears rolling down her cheeks but her eyes were clearer. Grim was sobbing through the broadest smile Valera had seen in days.

  ‘Did you ever doubt he’d do it?’ Monteith’s face was huge in Valera’s vision when he bellowed the question.

  She laughed and pushed him away. ‘It’s so good to see him actually do it, though. Tell me, is this ship-only or has it gone wide?’

  ‘It’s on every news net across UE,’ said Calder. ‘Can’t believe there wasn’t a blackout in place.’

  ‘I’m sure there is,’ said Valera. ‘This is going to cause some serious ripples.’

  She pushed herself from her seat and headed for her usual place.

  ‘Okay, I-X,’ said Stepanek. ‘Looks like the skipper’s got a few things to say.’

  The squad moved quickly to their seats, still buzzing from the video. Stepanek ordered quiet.

  ‘We have to plan fast, before Kirby’s puppets are banging on our door,’ said Valera. ‘Can they break the encryption on our coms?’

  ‘Not a chance,’ said Gurney. ‘We bounced every word around more parts of the central core than Max has notches on his bed post. And we’ve put in that hide and seek sub-routine the Blammers sold me that sends the messages further into the murk if a trace is put out. It’s really bloody clever.’

  ‘So what happens when they break the regs and take our ppalms away for analysis?’

  Gurney shrugged. ‘It’ll get them nothing. Every encrypted message is on auto-delete, every p-palm scrambles each screen tap to defeat keystroke analysis. I’ll check everyone’s kit to make sure but there’s really nothing to worry about.’

  ‘Good.’ Valera felt a little better. ‘And all of you . . . plausible deniability. We were all in lockdown so we couldn’t communicate with anyone, all right? Don’t go getting pissed and mouthing off. Moving on: Calder, we need to set up contact with Max if we can. He’ll have dumped his locators or they’d have caught him by now. How do we tight-beam him?’

  Calder pushed her hands through her hair. ‘I’ve got some coms kit stripped out of an old suit of mine somewhere. Think if we can patch it into the ship’s coms via the old wall buttons we might be able to piggyback the array.’

  ‘Detectability?’

  ‘Miniscule chance. So many coms in and out, it’d be virtually impossible to strip out one.’

  ‘How long will it take?’

  Calder shrugged. ‘I don’t even know it’s possible yet.’

  Valera smiled. ‘Fair enough. Best get to it, we don’t know how much time we’ve got before Kirby comes a-calling or we get put back on flight duty.’

  ‘What’s going to happen to him?’

  Grim’s question bled the euphoria from the squad room like a knife to the throat and every eye turned to Valera, searching for hope. She wanted to give it to them but she wasn’t a bullshitter, never had been.

  ‘Without help, you know he’s got little chance out there,’ she said. ‘But there was no other choice. ‘We don’t know much about Max’s condition barring how fit he is and how strong his spirit is. But he’s going to be living with Martha twenty-four seven. We can all do the maths.’

  ‘That bastard better not beat me into the Fall,’ said Kullani. Laughter fled around the squad room, easing the pain of knowledge. ‘Can’t he leave me to be better at one thing than him?’

  ‘Wouldn’t really be him, would it?’ said Monteith.

  ‘Got no chance, has he?’ said Gurney.

  ‘But this is Max,’ said Valera, wishing greater strength on him than even he possessed. ‘He might even survive it. That’s why I want contact. Then at least we can be with him on whatever journey he takes. It’s the best we can hope for.’

  It was mid-morning on the second day of the hunt for Max Halloran and the bridge was starting to smell. Nothing overpowering or nauseating but for those who worked there day by day, it was a warning that shouldn’t be ignored. It was the smell that signified a behemoth operating beyond its safe working parameters; that the Heart of Granite should be making best speed to the Red Sea for a regeneration cycle. Not running combat sorties.

  Commander Avery paused by the brain and laid a hand gently on the shoulder of one of the bread-heads. Lieutenant Sally Hall started, her hands still making their delicate adjustments, a faraway look in her eyes.

  ‘Just a quick one, I can see you’re wired in right now,’ she said. ‘How’s the texture?’

  ‘Dry,’ she said. ‘Synaptic connection is slow . . . slower. You’ll have to check with bio-systems integration but she feels proper creaky, like she’s been on an all-nighter, you know? How long are we staying here?’

  Avery pursed her lips. ‘Just be gentle with her, all right?’

  ‘Yes, ma’am.’

  Avery strode to the command screens, seeing the buckets positioned on the floor to catch the odd drip of visceral fluid plopping down from the bone-metal interfaces. She took in the active drake cams relaying the hunt for Halloran. Flamehawk-G and Firestorm-E were grid-searching. Avery’s eye was caught by two stationary cameras. She noted the call-signs under the cams and patched herself into the squad com.

  ‘Jas-G, KalG, this is Avery.’<
br />
  ‘Copy ma’am,’ they replied.

  ‘Why are you on the ground?’

  ‘This is the farthest north confirmed landing point,’ said Jas- G. ‘He was here. Footprints of man and drake. Evidence of flame on the ground . . . hold on, sir. Kally, hold that up to my cam?’

  Avery sighed. It was a fused black mass, small and melted, almost unrecognisable from its original form.

  ‘You reading that, Commander?’ asked Jasmine.

  ‘Copy, Jas-G. Now we know it didn’t fail . ..’

  ‘Never very likely,’ said Kally.

  ‘No indeed. He must have found a blade. Complete your sweep and come back. We’ve got some poor weather coming in from the east at dusk.’

  ‘Copy, ma’am.’

  Avery put her headset down on the tac-table and looked across the command consoles to Moeller. Since learning the truth, the man had aged ten years.

  ‘Gerhard?’

  Moeller straightened and told whoever he was talking to out in the field to stand by. ‘Hammerclaws are on approach. I need to get back to Flight Command.’

  Avery nodded. ‘He can’t just have vanished and there’s nowhere to hide. Why haven’t we found him? The cams should have picked up something.’

  ‘We only know his position until he went dark. It was another hour before we got there and in that time he could have gone anywhere. We’ve covered three hundred square klicks and we haven’t scratched the surface.’

  ‘Think he’s hiding?’

  ‘Where? I think he’ll fly east or west as far as he can and then he’ll try to find shelter.’

  ‘Then what?’ asked Avery ‘Unless he finds sanctuary, he’ll die.’

  ‘Commander?’ Avery swung round sharply. ‘Bio-systems and integrated systems update. It’s ugly stuff, want a précis?’

  ‘Yes,’ she said, relaxing. ‘Go ahead, Doctor Rosenbach.’

  ‘Sitting here all night has accelerated the existing problems. Being stationary has played havoc with her digestive system, blood pressure and musculoskeletal linkages. We’ve got tension in ligaments and cramps in major muscle groups. If we sit here another two days, we’ll have to drag her to the Red Sea.’