by Ty Beltramo
She handed me a small orange marble.
“It’s probably not complete. I was able to piece together a small number of the transmissions received by the Thoth for the last month, or so,” she said. The marble was a memory stone, used by Engineers to store large amounts of information in various forms. But for some reason, I’ve never had any luck using them.
“Uh, can I get this on DVD?”
“What on earth for?” she asked.
“Never mind.”
She looked suspicious, but chose not to go there. She was learning. “It’s not complete, but there are placeholders for most of the missing pieces.”
“It’ll have to do. Can you work on it with me? I’m on a tight schedule, in case you hadn’t noticed,” I said.
“Yes.”
“Good. And one more thing: don’t tell anyone you’ve seen me since the last time we met. Aeson thinks I’m still in his little prison. There’s no sense in having him believe otherwise for now.”
“I understand,” she said.
She opened the marble. The information appeared as translucent text and images in the air before us. We began the laborious process of sifting through millions of bits of information, looking for who knows what.
Even at our rapid rate of assimilation, it could take days. Diomedes’ organization collected all kinds of junk. There were statistics about economics, crime rates, stories from the human media on many events, scientific discoveries, reports from operatives placed in key locations, and reports on the activities of operatives from many Disciplines. I took note of names and places as they passed. You never know when that kind of thing might come in handy.
After going over a myriad of reports, it hit me.
“Aello. These are analyst reports. Diomedes was collecting intelligence. He’s not a Thought nerd. He’s a spy.” I was really impressed. Aello said nothing. Then it occurred to me that this was not good news. I covered my face with my hands.
“What’s wrong, Elson. Disappointed in him?”
“Disappointed? Not hardly. I knew there was a reason I liked the guy. But this changes things a bit.”
“How so?”
“Well, first of all, it means that you’re a spy, too. You lied to me. Not very lawful, Little Miss Hypocrite. But more importantly, it means that the destruction of that boat was Diomedes’ idea.”
“Elson, that’s absurd. Why would Diomedes destroy that which he worked so hard to create?”
“Aello, you said that you were guarding the Thoth the day I sank it. Right?”
“Yes. I said that.”
“Why?”
“Because it was immensely valuable and irreplaceable, that’s why.”
“No, I mean why were you guarding it? You said Diomedes was your mentor. Guarding boats doesn’t sound like normal mentoring to me,” I said.
“That’s true. I hadn’t done anything like that before. But I am well trained in combat. So when he asked me to do it for the day, I didn’t think about it much. Although, I was surprised and a little curious whether I had angered him somehow to warrant such a duty.”
“You mean that day was the only time you’ve ever guarded the Thoth?”
“Yes. Just minutes before you arrived, actually,” she said.
“Huh. So why does a spy destroy intelligence? I’ll tell you why: to keep it out of the wrong hands, that’s why. Let me ask you. If he had come to you and said,”--I did my best Diomedes impersonation--“’Hey, Aello, my little harpy, I’ve discovered something very important. But I don’t want it in the wrong hands, so would you mind vaporizing it for me? There’s a good girl.’ What would you have done?”
“I would have done whatever I could to keep it out of the wrong hands if it was really that dangerous.”
“And what if there were no right hands?”
“I doubt that’s possible.”
“Really? What about the atom bomb? Are there any right hands for that knowledge?”
“Okay. I see your point. But we’re not human, Elson. We don’t have their frailties in that regard.”
“What? Who are you talking about? Are you totally deranged? What makes Chaos different from Law? We all come from the same mold, sister. What’s to stop those in Law from becoming like those in Chaos? What’s to stop any Engineer from making a big mistake with the best intentions?” I said.
Aello looked at me with great suspicion. She still viewed the world through her Law vs. Chaos, black vs. white, glasses. I needed to help her see the color.
“Let me tell you how this went down. I’m sitting around enjoying some wonderful espresso, contemplating how to have some fun at Aeson’s expense. A powerful friend shows up and asks me to whack a boat. Now mind you, this guy is very powerful. Not like Melanthios powerful, like Designer powerful. But he is clearly in a big hurry. This guy was suddenly pressed for time. That’s not like him. He’s an eternal guy with a plan. He plans ahead for everything. Out of nowhere he needs me to act for him and to act fast. He’s so desperate, in fact, that he agrees to kill for me without a second thought.”
“It does sound somewhat contrived when you describe it like that,” she said.
“Yeah. Now if this guy wanted that boat gone, he could have done it in his sleep. It’s what he does. But he didn’t just need it wasted. He needed me to waste it. Now why would someone need me to be the heavy? What’s unique about me?”
Aello frowned. “You have no loyalty, none at all. So you could be trusted to do the deed.”
I pointed my finder at her nose. “Not true. Sure, I don’t mind messing with either side. But if I’d known the boat was Diomedes’ I’d have hesitated at least.”
She shook her head. “You think Diomedes discovered something so terrible that he couldn’t allow either Law or Chaos to have it?”
“Yes. But that’s not all. It doesn’t add up,” I said
“What’s left?”
“First, why the sudden urgency? Second, why does he allow himself to be captured? Third, why does he openly and gratuitously oppose Aeson? There’s more to it. But I think we’re on the right track,” I said.
“Okay,” she said. “Let’s assume you’re right. Whatever it was he discovered, it couldn’t have been something Aeson already knew or there wouldn’t have been any urgency to destroy it. If Chaos already had it, Diomedes would have made sure Law got it too, if for no other reason than to keep the balance of power. It must have been something that Chaos was after. He got it first and it got into the intelligence pipeline before he could stop it, or it got in there unexpectedly.”
“Yep. And that tells us one other thing. Not only was Chaos after it, but both sides knew the other was after it, and Chaos knew that Diomedes found it. Now they want it, and don’t believe it’s gone.”
Aello sighed. “If only he hadn’t been captured. Then he could have handled this. He’s far more qualified to deal with this than we are.”
Yeah, I thought. And if only Death hadn’t eliminated Aeson’s operatives right when I was wiping out Diomedes’ boat.
Something about all this didn’t add up. There was a chicken-before-the-egg problem with our reconstruction.
By putting the events together chronologically, I could draw only one conclusion.
“Diomedes handpicked us for this assignment. Diomedes sent you to the Thoth to witness its destruction, and to witness me doing the destroying. He was making certain that both you and I would be involved, together.”
Death sent me to destroy the boat. Diomedes sent Aello to guard the boat. That meant Death and Diomedes were working together.
“He had the information but didn’t want it. He didn’t want anyone to have it. Sending me to destroy it makes sense, but sending you to guard it doesn’t. Unless . . .”
“What?”
“Unless he wanted us to have it, and only us: not Aeson, not Law, and not himself. And Aeson thinks he’s holding Diomedes to get the information.”
“What do you mean? Why else would
they be holding him prisoner?”
“Because he wants to be held. They just don’t know it,” I said.
“But why would he want that?”
“That’s a good question.” I remembered how Diomedes always talked about misdirection and layers of strategy in chess. But why would he put himself essentially out of the game? “Let’s assume that he’s the only one who knows about the information we’re guessing exists, and let’s assume that he feels it’s too dangerous for anyone to have, including himself.”
Aello nodded. “That’s possible. Diomedes is very humble. He has no grand ideas about himself. He would be well motivated to keep the information from Chaos, but maybe not so motivated to keep it from Law,” Aello said.
“I agree. That leaves only one question before we continue,” I said.
“And that is?”
“Can Diomedes trust you?”
“What?”
“Are you the person he can trust the most? Because if I’m right, you’ll have to help me do what he didn’t trust himself to do.”
“I think the point is moot, Elson. You’ve already destroyed the information. It went down with the Thoth, and if you’re even half right, he made sure that the destruction was complete. There won’t be any copies.”
“The information I destroyed was only the discovery, Aello. Whatever scared Diomedes into such extreme actions is still out there. We don’t know what or where it is. But it’s still out there. Chaos wants it. Law will want it, too. So, can Diomedes trust you?”
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
I’m no humanitarian, or shall I say, I’m no Engineer-itarian. Very few Engineers make a habit of being concerned for my welfare. While Aello was tolerating me because she had no choice, I felt I owed it to Diomedes to look out for her. She was obviously something special to him. And despite her high intelligence, she was wrong about one thing: I was no traitor. I never betrayed Law because I never swore allegiance to that philosophy or to any of its leaders. As far as I could tell, they were nothing but self-glorifying pinheads. I’ve pretty much always thought that way. But I value friendship as someone who cherishes the hard-won fruit of adversity. And, for my part, she was now a friend. So I’d have to look out for her. Besides, she’d warm up to me--eventually. I couldn’t shake the feeling that she had an important part to play in helping me figure out what Aeson was up to and what to do about it.
Aello was still sorting through the data from the Thoth.
“Forget it, Aello. What we need isn’t going to be in there. We need to think about this differently.”
The marble went dormant as she lowered it to her side. She looked worn, more so than usual. The stress was getting to her.
“So what do we do?” She asked.
“We’re assuming that Diomedes planned this, and if that’s the case, what you said earlier is probably right. There won’t be any trace in those records. We have to think about this from his perspective,” I said.
“Okay. How would he have prevented everyone but us from understanding?” she asked.
“Yeah. That’s the right question. If he had any real time to plan, he would have done something to ensure we’d be able to pick up where he left off.”
I reviewed the few meetings he and I had had over the last year or so. Not much there. No hints that I could recall.
“Elson, it wouldn’t be something we had, because that could be found by the right kind of search. It had to be something we knew. That’s the only way it’d truly be safe. Something unique to us.”
That reminded me. “Aello, have you studied very ancient languages?”
“Like Phoenician, or Aramaic?” she said.
“No, I mean real ancient. Maybe pre-human.”
“That’s odd of you to say.” Her eyes began to gleam. “Diomedes had me do an in-depth study of the early Engineer dialects only a few months ago. I thought it odd because it’s not my specialty and he has many other operatives that are well versed in ancient Engineering dialects. What do you have in mind?”
“Aello, before I tell you any more, I need to know I can trust you,” I lied.
“Elson, we’ve been through this. I assure you that my loyalty is to Diomedes, as is yours. I thought my showing you the intelligence was proof of my trust in you as well.”
“This goes beyond that, Aello. Oh, and don’t forget that the memory rock was not all that helpful. Just saying . . .”
“So, what do you want from me? I don’t have anything else to give but my word.”
“Not true.” I reached over to her, and raised my hand and placed it on the center of her chest. “Allow me?”
“What are you doing?” she asked. But she didn’t move to stop me.
“Ensuring I can trust you.” I really didn’t doubt that I could. But this had to be done, for her sake. I reached down into my soul and began to weave a very fine thread. I copied the double-helix pattern that I had seen in Melanthios’s glamour and infused it with a trace amount of energy. When I was confident that the structure was correct and had attached to the proper lattice structures of my own soul, I reached down into Aello’s and wove it into her most inner being. She gasped, and stood up. But it was done.
“You didn’t!” She exclaimed. “I thought that only princes could place a glamour on another Engineer. How did you do that? And why?”
“It’s a secret. So, now I guess that makes you Mrs. Elson. You being bound to my will, and all.” I smiled the most evil grin I could muster, which could have cracked a mirror.
“That was not necessary, Elson. You didn’t need to do that.” She was hurt.
“Yes, I did. It was for your own good, Aello. But don’t worry. Hopefully, we’ll never need it.”
She rubbed her stomach as if she were pregnant. “You are a strange and surprising Engineer, Elson. I guess this is just the beginning, isn’t it?”
“Sister, you ain’t kidding,” I said.
“So, what now?”
“Now, we go on our honeymoon.” She rolled her eyes. “I’m sorry dear, but the best I have to offer is an all-paid adventure vacation into a big cave.”
“What?”
“Actually, it’s kind of small. Come on, it’s not far,” I said. I led her into the ethereal plane. It was very hard to follow someone in the ether without being detected, and I was about to take her to my most secret place. A place that I was guessing held a clue as to what Diomedes had planned.
We traveled with extreme caution, being careful not to be observed, to a small island in the Detroit River. There was an abandoned zoo there. It was small even in its heyday. But that day had past. Now it was an empty shell made of cages and fish tanks.
The prisoners had left long ago, destined for another zoo, I guess. All they left behind was the smell of a hundred kinds of crap.
Hidden deep below the zoo was a cave. That cave kept me coming back to Detroit.
After traveling nearly a mile down, the blackness turned to bright white light. We entered an enclosed chamber and stood there, back in the prime material plane.
I never could locate the source of the light.
We gazed at the walls. They were covered with symbols and glyphs like no other language I’d ever seen—until recently. In fact, the only other places I’d ever seen them was the white pyramid in the Builder’s Plane and on Aeson’s birdbath. I knew the glyphs by heart, but I didn’t have a clue what they meant.
“What is this place, Elson?”
“It’s sort of home, for me.”
“Home?”
“This is where I awoke, where I was born.”
She looked at me, then at the walls, then back again.
“I remained here for a long time. I studied these writings, trying to glean some clue to help me understand the words given to me at my birth. But I never could. Recently I had asked Diomedes to look at them. He was the only other person to come here, I suppose. He told me at Aeson’s Gathering that they were interesting, but he didn’t say why. Can you
read them?”
She stepped up to the nearest wall and began to study the markings. They wandered every which way. It was hard to tell the flow of them, if there was any.
“Some. It’s a story. Or a history. Could be either. Or maybe a biography.”
“What does it say?” I asked.
She pointed to a small section that seemed to make a unit. “This refers to the hosts of heaven. Probably early Engineers. They are fighting someone. The Angel of Death, I think.”
“Really? Huh.” That was interesting.
“Yes. It tells a story of a war in heaven.”
“Probably an allusion to the Schism.”
“Maybe. It says that the world was beautiful and full. There is a description of rivers in the east. A great forest. Then the Patron of Man came and there was war in heaven. The Patron of Man sent the Angel of Death and another--someone called Laughter, or maybe Jester. Odd. Seems like a yin and yang duality. Death and Laughter. Polar opposites.”
“Don’t think so.”
“What? Why not?”
“Because Death and Humor are not polar opposites. Trust me.”
“Ohhkaay. Whatever you say.” She thought about that. “You’re a sick person, Elson.”
“What else?”
“There are pictures of the Patron of Man looking upon the battlefield. There is a whirlpool to one side of where he stands.”
I took a step close and looked. The whirlpool reminded me of Aeson’s birdbath.
“Uh, yeah.” I wondered how Aeson had managed to get his sticky hands on that piece of hardware. You’d think someone as powerful as the Patron would be able to keep it safely hidden away.
Aello walked around the chamber and inspected more of the pictures and glyphs. “Most of this looks pre-historic, or pre-human anyway. Myths, mostly. This is probably an ancient shrine of some sort.”
“Why do you think they’re myths?” I asked.
“Well, first of all it’s pretty fantastic. Second, it recounts events so old that it’s unlikely that they would have been transmitted down through the ages without corruption. Finally, I don’t see any mention of the Designers, which is inexplicable, given their involvement in these early times.”
