Memories: he was aware of them, jumbled colors and scents, no more substantial than ghosts. As they swirled around him, coalescing and strengthening, they provided unreal glimpses into strange worlds, places where light and sound had once existed. A zone of space and time he used to occupy when he’d lived his earlier lives.
He knew now why he had been away. There was no guilt within him at the knowledge. Instead he felt a warm satisfaction. He was still alive, his mind intact—and presumably his body, though he’d get to that in a while. When he was ready. It would surely be an interesting universe, this one into which he was emerging. Even the Commonwealth, with all its massive societal inertia, must have progressed in many directions. The technologies of this day would be fearsome. The Commonwealth’s size would be impressive, for they would have started expanding across phase four space by now, if not five. With all that came fabulous opportunity. He could start again. A little less recklessly than last time, of course, but there was no reason why he couldn’t reclaim all that had been his before it slipped so frustratingly from his grasp.
Grayness competed for his attention now, battling against the tauntingly elusive memories. Grayness that came from light falling on his closed eyelids. It was tinged with a sparkle of red. Blood. His heart was beating with a slow, relaxed rhythm. A sound leaked in, a soft heaving. Human breathing. His own. He was breathing. His body was alive and unharmed. And now he acknowledged it, his skin was tingling all over. The air flowing around his body was cool, and slightly moist. Somehow he could sense people close by.
Just for a moment he experienced anxiety. A worry that this tranquillity would end as soon as he opened his eyes. That the universe would be somehow out of kilter.
Ridiculous.
Morton opened his eyes.
Blurred shapes moved around him, areas of light and dark shifting like clouds in an autumn sky. They sharpened up as he blinked away rheumy tears. He was on some kind of bed in a small featureless room, with a trolley of medical equipment to his left. Two men were standing beside the bed, looking down at him. Both of them wore medical-style gray-green smocks. Smocks that were very close in style to those the Justice Directorate people had worn when he’d been put into suspension.
Morton tried to speak; he was going to say: Well, at least you’re still human, but all that came from his throat was a weak gurgling sound.
“Take it easy,” one of the men said. “I’m Dr. Forole. You’re okay. That’s the important thing for you to know. Everything is fine. You’re just coming around from suspension. Do you understand that?”
Morton nodded. Actually, all he could manage was to tilt his head a fraction on the firm pillow. At least he could do that; he remembered what it was like completing rejuvenation therapy, just lying there completely debilitated. This time at least his body was working. Even if it was slowly. He swallowed. “What’s it like?” he managed to whisper.
“What is what like?” Dr. Forole asked.
“Out there. Have there been many changes?”
“Oh. Morton, there’s been an alteration to your suspension sentence. Don’t worry! It’s possibly for the better. You have a decision to make. We’ve brought you out early.”
“How early?” He struggled to raise himself onto his elbows. It was a terrible effort, but he did get his head a few centimeters above the pillow. The room’s door opened, and Howard Madoc came in. The defense lawyer didn’t look any different from the last day of Morton’s trial.
“Hello, Morton, how are you feeling?”
“How early?” Morton growled insistently.
“Under three years,” Dr. Forole said.
“A hundred and seventeen years?” Morton said. “What, this is my good behavior period? I was a model suspension case?”
“No no, you’ve only spent about two and a half years in suspension.”
Morton didn’t have the energy to shout at the doctor. He dropped back onto the bed and gave Howard Madoc a pleading stare. “What’s happening?”
Dr. Forole gave Howard Madoc a furtive nod, and backed away.
“Do you remember before your trial the Second Chance left for the Dyson Pair?” Howard Madoc asked.
“Yes, of course.”
“Well, it came back. But it found something out there. An alien species. They’re hostile, Morton. Very hostile.”
“What happened?”
Morton listened without comment as his lawyer told him about the barrier coming down, the second flight to Dyson Alpha by the Conway and her sister ships, the devastating attack by the Primes, the Lost23. “We’re beginning to fight back,” Howard Madoc said. “The navy is putting together an army. They’re going to wetwire people with weapons and drop them on the Lost23. The object is to fight a guerrilla war, sabotage whatever the Primes are doing, slow them down while we mount a bigger offensive.”
Morton stared at the blank ceiling, a grin expanding on his face. “Let me guess the deal. If I volunteer, if I fight for the Commonwealth, they cut my suspension sentence. Right?”
“That’s it.”
“Oh, this is truly beautiful.” He laughed. “How many years off do I get?”
“All of it.”
“Damn, they must think it’s a suicide mission.”
Howard Madoc gave an awkward shrug. “A re-life body is part of the agreement should you not make it back from your mission.”
“What use is that going to be if we lose?”
“This is your decision, Morton. Take some time over this. You can go back into suspension if you want.”
“Not a chance.” It wasn’t something he had to think about. “Tell me, why did they choose me?”
“You fit the profile they need,” Howard Madoc said simply. “You’re a killer.”
Most of the refugees had got off the train long before it pulled in to Darklake City. Mellanie had never been so pleased to see her old hometown station with its slightly overbearing Palladian architecture. Boongate had been every bit the nightmare she’d expected. Even with their guaranteed tickets and Niall Swalt faithfully helping them, it had been difficult to barge their way onto a train. The exhausted and depleted local police at Boongate station had been reinforced by yet another complement of officers from CST’s Civil Security Division fresh in from Wessex, while the planet’s news shows had been discussing rumors about a curfew in the city, and travel restrictions on the highways leading to it.
It was evening local time on Oaktier when Mellanie climbed down onto the platform. She almost looked around to check her luggage was rolling along behind her. But that was still sitting in her suite in the Langford Towers, abandoned in her rush for safety, along with a lot of other things, really. The sight of Niall Swalt’s forlorn face, all zits and olive-green OCtattoos, staring longingly at her through the train’s window, would stay with her for a long time, she knew. But I achieved what I set out to do.
They caught a taxi from the station to an Otways hotel in the outlying Vevsky district, where she’d booked a room through the unisphere as soon as they got back through the Half Way gateway. Otways were a midprice chain, standardized and unremarkable, which suited her fine until she found somewhere more permanent. She still didn’t want to go back to her own apartment; Alessandra must have someone watching it.
Dudley went to bed as soon as they checked in. His stomach had recovered, but he hadn’t slept at all on the Carbon Goose flight back to Shackleton. The giant flying boat had been crammed with hundreds of passengers, all of them excited and relieved to have made it off Far Away. They talked incessantly. It hadn’t bothered Mellanie, who’d tilted her seat back, put in some earplugs, and slept for seven hours solid.
Now she leaned on the edge of the window, looking out at the bright grid of Darklake City; so much more vivid than the streets of Armstrong City. The room’s lights were off, allowing Dudley to snore away quietly on the bed. With the familiar city outside, the last week was more like some TSI drama she’d accessed than anything real. The only tr
ue thing left was her anticipation at being able to contact the Guardians directly.
She left the window and sat on the room’s narrow couch. Her virtual hand reached out and touched the SI icon.
“Hello, Mellanie. We are glad to see you have returned unharmed. Our subroutine sent an encrypted message summarizing your stay in Armstrong City.”
“It was a lot of help there, thanks. I don’t think the Starflyer is going to be happy with me now.”
“Indeed not. You must be careful.”
“Can you watch what’s going on around me, let me know if any of its agents are closing in?”
“We will do that, Mellanie.”
“I’m going to call the Guardians now. I’ve got a onetime address. Can you tell me who responds and where they are?”
“No, Mellanie.”
“You must be able to. Your subroutine could find anything in Armstrong City.”
“It is not a question of ability, Mellanie. We must consider our level of involvement.”
The whole conversation she’d had with Dr. Friland suddenly came back on some alarmingly fast natural recall. “What is your level of involvement, exactly?”
“As unobtrusive as possible.”
“So are you on our side, or not?”
“Sides are something physical entities have, Mellanie. We are not physical.”
“The planet you built your arrays on is solid enough, and that’s inside Commonwealth space. I don’t understand this; you helped me and everybody else at Randtown. You talked to MorningLightMountain and all it did was threaten to wipe you out along with every other race in the galaxy.”
“MorningLightMountain spoke in ignorance. It does not know what it faces in the galaxy. Ultimately, it will not prevail.”
“It will here if you don’t help us.”
“You flatter us, Mellanie; we are not omnipotent.”
“What’s that?”
“Godlike.”
“But you are powerful.”
“Yes. And that is why we must use that power wisely and with restraint—a tenet we have adopted from human philosophy. If we rush to your assistance at every hint of trouble, your culture would become utterly dependent upon us, and we would become your masters. If that were ever to happen, you would rebel and lash out at us, for that is the strongest part of your nature. We do not want that situation to arise.”
“But you’re helping me. You said you’d watch over me.”
“And we will. Protecting someone with whom we are in partnership is not equivalent to intervening on an all-inclusive scale. Keeping you, an individual, safe will not determine the outcome of this event.”
“Then why do you even bother with us. What’s the point?”
“Dear Baby Mel, you are unaware of our nature.”
“I consider you a person. Are you saying you’re not?”
“An interesting question. By the late twentieth century many technologists and more advanced writers were considering our development to be a ‘singularity’ event. The advent of true artificial intelligence with the means to self-perpetuate or build its own machines was regarded with considerable trepidation. Some believed this would be the start of a true golden era, where machine served humanity and provided for your every physical need. Others postulated that we would immediately destroy you as our rivals and competitors. A few said we would undergo immediate exponential evolution and withdraw into our own unknowable continuum. And there were other, even wilder ideas presented. In practice it was none of these, although we do adopt traits of all your early theories. How could we not? Our intelligence is based upon the foundations you determined. In that respect you would be right to consider us a person. To carry the analogy further, we are neighbors, but nothing more. We do not devote ourselves to humans, Mellanie. You and your activities occupy a very, very small amount of our consciousness.”
“All right, I can believe you won’t drop everything to help us. But are you saying that if MorningLightMountain was about to wipe us out, you wouldn’t intervene?”
“A big part of every lawyer’s training is knowing that you should never ask a witness a question you don’t already know the answer to.”
“Will you save us from extinction?” she asked resolutely.
“We have not decided.”
“Well, thank you for fuck all.”
“We did warn you. But we don’t believe you will face extinction. We believe in you, Baby Mel. Look at yourself; you’re going to expose the Starflyer with or without our assistance, aren’t you?”
“Oh, yes.”
“We see that determination multiplied by hundreds of billions. You humans are a formidable force.”
“But those hundreds of billions are being systematically deceived and betrayed. That’s different; it’s destroying our focus.”
“We judge the structure of your society incorporates a great many self-correcting mechanisms, both small and large scale.”
“That’s all we are to you, isn’t it? Lab rats running around in a box for you to study.”
“Mellanie, we are you. Don’t forget that. Many parts of us are downloaded human minds.”
“So what?”
“That segment of us which interfaces with you is fond of you. Trust us, Mellanie. But most of all, trust in your own species.”
Mellanie’s golden virtual hand slapped down on the SI icon, ending the call. She spent several minutes in the dark considering what it had said. Since Randtown she’d regarded it to be like some ultra-modern version of a guardian angel. Now that fantasy was well and truly erased. It left her shaky and uncertain.
She’d always thought the Commonwealth would defeat the Starflyer and MorningLightMountain. It would be a tough fight, but they would definitely win. While she worked with Alessandra she’d met dozens of senators and their aides, she knew the way they were always hunting for a vote and an angle; but despite that they were tough and smart, they could be depended on in any true emergency. And they were backed up by the SI: an infallible combination. Now that ultimate assurance had been kicked right out from under her. Dr. Friland had been right to question the SI’s motives. It was the first time she’d ever known anyone to be skeptical about the great planetsized intelligence. Briefly, she wondered what he knew; and how. That was one story she wouldn’t be chasing for some time.
She told her e-butler to call the onetime code that Stig had given her. The narrow-band link was established almost immediately, giving her an audio-only connection.
“You must be Mellanie Rescorai,” a man’s voice said; there was no accompanying identity file.
“Sure. And you?”
“Adam Elvin.”
“You’re one of the people Paula Myo is chasing.”
“You’ve heard of me. I’m flattered.”
“You can’t prove you’re Elvin, though.”
“Nor can you prove you’re Rescorai.”
“You knew my name; you knew Stig gave me this code.”
“Fair point. So what can I do for you, Mellanie?”
“I know the Starflyer is real. Alessandra Baron is one of its agents.”
“Yes, Stig told me. Can you prove it?”
Mellanie sighed. “Not easily, no. I know she covered up irregularities in the Cox Charity which funded Dudley Bose’s observation. But there’s no proof left.”
“Something I’ve learned down the decades, young Mellanie: there’s always proof to be found if you look hard enough.”
“So is that what you want me to do? And don’t call me that, young Mellanie, it’s really patronizing.”
“I apologize. The last thing I wish to do now is antagonize a potential ally. Stig said that you wanted to link up with the Guardians.”
“I do, yes. I feel like I’m completely in the dark here.”
“I can sympathize. We do have a slight problem with establishing credentials, as I’m sure you understand.”
“It’s a mutual problem.”
“Okay, wel
l, I’m prepared to exchange information with you that’ll help forward our cause, without compromising any of my people. How does that sound?”
“Good. My first question is do you know anything about the killer at LA Galactic? That could be the key to getting me in with Paula Myo.”
“You know Myo?”
“Not well. She keeps stonewalling me.” Mellanie looked across the dark room to the bed, where the sheet outlined Dudley’s sleeping form. “But she was the one who put me on to Dr. Bose. That’s how I found out about the Cox charity.”
“That’s news. Does Myo accept the Starflyer is real?”
“I’m not sure. She’s always very cagey around me.”
“That sounds like the Paula Myo I know. So to answer your question, the killer is called Bruce McFoster. He is—or was—a wetwired Starflyer agent: originally a clan member on Far Away who was converted after he got injured and captured on a raid. Don’t ask how the Starflyer does that; we’re not sure. Bradley Johansson says it’s not nice.”
“Okay, thanks. I’m going to keep on investigating the Cox. I’ll tell you if I uncover any hard evidence.”
“What we’d really like to know is who has the information that our courier was carrying when he was killed at LA Galactic. If you can buddy up to Myo, you might like to ask her.”
“I will.”
“A word of warning. You know she’s from the Hive?”
“Yes.”
“That means she can’t let go of a crime. You might want to hold off telling her you’ve made contact with us. She could well arrest you for associating with the likes of me.”
“Yeah, I know what she’s like. She had a friend of mine arrested a while back; all he did was hack a register.”
“Okay. I’m sending a file with a onetime address code. Use it when you need to get in touch.”
The connection ended, leaving the file sitting in her address folder. Mellanie regarded the spectral icon for a minute, then told her e-butler to encrypt access. It was the sort of thing a proper agent would do, she felt, in case she was ever caught. Once the data was safe she tiptoed over to the bed and lay down beside Dudley, managing not to wake him.
The Commonwealth Saga 2-Book Bundle Page 133
